Gujarat to bring law against 'love jihad'

India

pti-Deepika S

Ahmedabad, Feb 15: Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Sunday said his government will soon bring a strict law against 'love jihad' in the state. He made the announcement while addressing a poll rally in Vadodara ahead of the municipal corporation elections.

"We are going to bring a law against love jihad in the Assembly. Such activities being done in the name of love jihad will not be tolerated...The BJP government will bring strict laws against love jihad in the coming days," he said.

In the recent past, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, both ruled by the BJP, have brought religious freedom laws to stop conversion through marriage or by any other fraudulent means.

Rupani said his government has also framed strict laws against 'gunda' (anti-social) elements and land grabbers with provisions of up to 10 and 14 years of imprisonment to protect the interests of the common man.

"In the past Assembly sessions, our government had come up with stringent laws. We have made an Act against gundas. To ensure that such elements do not cause trouble to the common man and get strict punishment of 10 years, we brought the Act.

Kerala Assembly elections 2021: BJP promises law against love jihad

"We also came up with the Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act so that people do not enter others' land and take over others' property using bogus documents. We brought this law with a provision of 14 years of punishment," he said.

The chief minister added that the BJP government at the Centre has fulfilled the promises made to the people regarding construction of Ram temple, scrapping of Article 370, and took revenge for Pulwama by launching an air strike.

According to Rupani, Gujarat will witness a "golden age of development" when the BJP rules "from panchayat to the Parliament". "This is the golden time for Gujarat because the Modi government at the Centre gives us whatever we ask for. The previous Congress-led Union government did not allow us to open the gates of the Narmada dam. But Modi gave permission within 17 days, which opened up the gates of development," he said.

"The BJP government in Delhi, Gujarat, in the cities and villages...when the BJP rules from panchayat to Parliament, then there will be a golden age for the development of the state," he said. He also promised metro trains in Vadodara and other cities of the state.
Judge David McHugh said what the woman did was an appalling breach of trust for a mother.

A NEGLECTFUL mother who left her baby alone, wet and filthy in a hotel room with a bottle of milk propped up on a towel has been put on probation for a year.

The woman (21) abandoned her four-month old son in dirty clothes while she left the building to smoke outside with a drunken man.

Gardai found the child alone in a buggy in a room that smelled strongly of cigarettes, with open alcohol bottles nearby.

Placing her on a probation bond, Judge David McHugh said what the woman did was an appalling breach of trust for a mother.

The accused pleaded guilty to wilfully neglecting, ill treating or abandoning her infant at the Clayton Hotel, Liffey Valley, under the Children Act.

Sergeant Maria Callaghan told Blanchardstown District Court, Garda Claire Higgins went to the hotel following a call that a baby had been abandoned in a room at 10.55pm on April 6, 2018.

Gda Higgins was taken by security to the room, where the child was asleep in a buggy with no adult there.

He had been found with a bottle in his mouth, propped up with a towel.

The garda saw the bottle at the childs side, while the blanket covering him was wet and dirty.

He was not strapped into the buggy and when lifted, it was found his baby-gro was also wet and filthy.

There was no sign of a crib, travel cot or any sleeping device and there were no clean clothes or sterile bottles in the room, Sgt Callaghan said.

The mother was seen on CCTV leaving the hotel at 10.35pm and returning at 11.14pm.

While en route to the hotel earlier, Gda Higgins had seen the woman a short distance from the hotel but was not aware it was her baby at the time.

When the mother returned, she was detained downstairs and not allowed to return to her child.

The garda had to travel to Crumlin Childrens Hospital to get infant milk and the baby was kept overnight for observation. He was later put into voluntary care, was now in a foster home and the accused saw him regularly.

The woman, who already had an older child from a very early teenage pregnancy, had no previous convictions.

The womans solicitor Fiona Brennan said while the accused pleaded guilty, she disputed the evidence that there was no provision for clothing or bottles, insisting the bag was in the hotel room.

On the night, the mother had been in the company of an extremely intoxicated man, whose father had died. The man was in no fit state to conduct himself in any area, Ms Brennan said.

The woman decided to stay with him to assist him and had not thought matters through.

They went outside to smoke and she deeply regretted leaving her son.

Ms Brennan said the accused accepted it was incredibly immature of her.

She said the total time the baby was alone was under 40 minutes, but Sgt Callaghan said the charge related also to the state Gda Higgins found the baby in.
Handset maker Motorola is set to launch Moto E7 Power in India on February 19 which comes after the global launch of Moto E7 Plus in September last year. The specifications revealed by the Lenovo-owned company suggest that Moto E7 Power is expected to be a budget smartphone. It will compete with Redmi Note 9 Pro.

Motorola hasn't revealed the pricing details of the upcoming Moto E7 Power, while the smartphone is confirmed to be available via Flipkart starting February 19 at 12 pm. It will come in a single 4GB + 64GB storage configuration. Some rumours suggest that the phone will be priced under Rs 15,000 in India. This means the phone could compete with phones like Poco M3, Redmi Note 9 Pro, among others.

In terms of specifications, Moto E7 Power will sport a 6.5-inch HD+ (720x1,600 pixels) display and it will feature up to 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage, along with a 5,000mAh battery. It will also feature a rear-mounted fingerprint scanner for security.

For cameras, Moto E7 Power may sport a dual rear camera setup that comprises a 13 MP primary snapper and a 2MP secondary sensor. For selfies and video chats, the smartphone may come with a 5MP sensor at the front.
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

The World Health Organization said Monday that only around one percent of the wider Middle East region's population had received a first coronavirus vaccine shot.

The UN body released its data for what it calls the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMRO) of nearly 600 million people, stretching from Morocco to Pakistanbut excluding Israel.

"So far, more than 6.3 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been given to people in 12 countries," Ahmed al-Mandhari, the Cairo-based WHO's regional chief, told reporters.

WHO's Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMRO) comprises 21 member states and is home to some 583 million people.

But while it includes the Palestinian Territories, it does not include Israel, the country in the region with the biggest mass vaccination campaign.

Israel reports that 3.8 million people have received a first dose, while 2.4 million have received a second shot.

Mandhari did not name the 12 countries where people have been already vaccinated.

But he said that vaccines distributed through the Covax programme are due to reach Tunisia and the Palestinian Territories in coming weeks.

Tunisia is expected to receive around 37,000 doses, while 94,000 doses will go to the West Bank and Gaza Strip, he said, without specifying the brands.

The remaining countries in WHO's region are due to receive "an estimated 46 million to 56 million doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine... during the first half of this year," Mandhari said.

Since the start of the pandemic, there have been more than six million confirmed cases of the virus across the EMRO region, including 140,000 deaths, Mandhari said.

Thirteen countries are affected by variants of the coronavirus, he added.

Mandhari also warned of the "unequal distribution of the vaccine roll-out" globally, and said it was "difficult to predict" how many vaccines were available.

"A number of countries in the region have entered into bilateral agreements with manufacturers," he said, but predicting that "the pace of these agreements will accelerate".

Lebanon was the latest country to launch its vaccination drive on Sunday.

Bed occupancy in COVID-19 intensive care units in Lebanon, which saw a spike in cases after the December holidays, stood at more than 89 percent on Friday.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 AFP
New Delhi: The Indian Bank, which has merged with the Allahabad Bank, carried out a software migration over the weekend. In addition, changes made in IFSC code, mobile banking app, cheque book and passbook of Allahabad Bank account holders have come into effect from Monday (February 15).

The bank has successfully completed the process of technical migration of CBS/ITMS software of erstwhile Allahabad Bank with CBS/ITMS software of Indian Bank, it said in a regulatory filing. Indian Bank carried out the migration process on 13-14 February, and had informed that customers may face some disruption in services.

After this bank merger, there are now only 4 banks left in the country, and a transformation has begun for the customers of the bank whose bank was merged with the other bank.

Allahabad Bank was merged with the Indian Bank after which the new rules have come into force from today. Now customers will have to use the new IFSC code for money transfer.

Allahabad Bank account holders will now have to download the indOASIS app for online banking. Allahabad Bank had already appealed to all account holders to adopt new changes. In fact, allahabad bank has been merged with Indian Bank since April 1, 2020.

After which customers can contact their home branch or get a new IFSC code by logging on to www.indianbank.in/amalgamation to know their new IFSC code starting with IDIB for RTGS, NEFT, IMPS(IMPS). In addition, customers can also sms their registered mobile number to 92688 01962 to get a new IFSC code.

Even though online banking operations have changed since today, it does not mean that your cheque book has been deactivated with immediate effect.

Allahabad Bank's checkbook will continue to work for the next 6 months or till the cheque is over. In addition to the cheque book, ATMs will also be active for 6 months as before.

Allahabad Bank customers can call customer care number 1800-425-0000 for more information.

The bank has taken full care to avoid any inconvenience to the customers. Customers will be able to use http://indianbank.net.in for internet banking.

The website will provide full knowledge of the new rules to the account holders and also know how and where they can update the old bank related papers.

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Karam Gill, who directed a three part documentary of Tekashi 6ix9ine called the hip hop artist 'truly a horrible human being.'

The director called Tekashi someone with no talent or morals, 'hyper calculated' and a 'social media mastermind' who can spark a reaction, according to his interview with Page Six.

Gill initially said he was reluctant to even do the project and didn't want to explore 24-year-old's story because he's 'such a toxic individual in our culture,' but he 'realized its an extremely important story that shines a light on where we are as a culture.'

The latest: Karam Gill, who directed a three part documentary of Tekashia 6ix9ine called the hip hop artist 'truly a horrible human being.' The director called Tekashi someone with no talent or morals, 'hyper calculated' and is a 'social media mastermind' who can spark a reaction, according to Page Six; seen September 1, 2018 in Philadelphia

Explaining: 'We're living in the era of manufactured celebrity, where people can create inauthentic online personas and rise to fame without any talent or morals.'

'Tekashi's story is exactly that - he's someone who realized the power of having your own platform.

The Supervillain: The Making of Tekashi 6ix9ine is a three part documentary that will air weekly beginning February 21 on Showtime's on-demand platforms.

Gill added to the outlet that the hip hop star is 'someone who never did anything online on accident. Every click, word and action online was designed with care to spark a reaction.'

Thoughts: Gill initially said he was reluctant to even do the project and didn't want to explore Tekashi's story, but he 'realized its an extremely important story that shines a light on where we are as a culture;' seen June 26, 2018 in Oslo, Norway

While making the documentary, Gill revealed that he realized 'how much of a social media mastermind' he was.

Adding that the rapper's 'understanding of how human beings operate on these platforms is incredible.'

He noted that from an overall perspective of Tekashi, born Daniel Hernandez, he 'loves to instigate' and also 'aggravate,' things that both 'spark a reaction.'

Gill never met him in person or spoken to him, according to the Rolling Stone feature he did, via Page Six.

The docu series features unreleased post-prison tapes that the production team acquired.

Gills says this doc series gave him the chance to capture a time in history were 'we have seen pop culture figures, and even presidents, shape their own realities and manipulate us all though digital media.'

Soon after his statements, Tekashi's lawyer Lance Lazzaro told Page Six: 'It's the furthest thing from the truth. Danny's talent speaks for itself, and Danny is a good human being. Daniel Hernandez was never interviewed for [the docuseries], and never participated. It is interesting and almost unbelievable without ever having met the person... how [the director] characterized him.'

He added to the outlet: 'It's hard to fathom. No one can comment about this talent... and how he characterized him when he never met the person.'

Lazzaro noted that they should look at the artist's charity work and 'the things Danny did for people when they were on their last days of life.'

On Sunday, Tekashi and Meek Mill had a run-in outside of an Atlanta nightclub early Sunday, with security squads for both rappers getting in between them amid an exchange of fiery words.

Coming soon: Soon after his statements, Tekashi's lawyer Lance Lazzaro told Page Six: 'It's the furthest thing from the truth. Danny's talent speaks for itself, and Danny is a good human being. Daniel Hernandez was never interviewed for [the docuseries], and never participated. It is interesting and almost unbelievable without ever having met the person... how [the director] characterized him;' seen August 22, 2018 in Miami

Meek Mill, 33, was departing the venue in the parking lot when the Fefe artist began shouting him down, claiming he's was incorporating police officers into his private security detail.

Both took to social media in the wake of the incident, with Tekashi writing in a since-deleted Instagram post, 'STOP LETTING THESE RAPPERS LIE TO YOU! THEY TO TOUGH FOR SECURITY @meekmill RUNNING AROUND WITH POLICE.'

Meek Mill, a Philadelphia native, gave his side of the story in a series of tweets, writing, '69 waited out side the club for me they tryna get usssssss wtf.'

He continued: 'We did not run into each other I was getting in my car he just popped out ....we almost was smoking on that 69 pack for the love of a viral moment ..... he tryna get something locked up no cap lol.'

According to TMZ, he also tweeted, 'The feds sent him to take me out wtf. [I] had to spit on him so he retreated lol he really waited outside the club for me. I thought I was dreaming wtf we almost smoked him lol he posed a lil threat popping up in the parking lot waiting for me.'

6ix9ine in 2019 was convicted in connection with racketeering, drug trafficking and weapons charges, and got a lesser sentence.

He had faced as many as 47 years in custody for his testimony against one-time associates.

He was sentenced to two years in prison, and released from prison into home arrest last April after citing concerns about coronavirus, with his home arrest drawing to a close July 31.
The week before Oregon schools let out for winter break, approximately 53,000 students sat in a classroom with a teacher for some form of in-person instruction. By early February, that number had more than doubled.

An Oregonian/OregonLive analysis of state data shows that nearly 117,000 students experienced in-person schooling for at least two hours in the first week of February, approximately 97,000 of them public school students.

Still, fewer than 17% of the 561,000 students enrolled in the states public schools got to learn face-to-face.

Gov. Kate Brown told Oregon education leaders in late December she was relaxing the states role in school reopening decisions in hopes that more students, particularly elementary schoolers, would get some form of in-person instruction by Feb. 15.

By that vague and singular metric, the governors move proved successful.

Within one week after most Oregon schools went back into session following the winter break, the number of public school students who saw at least two hours of in-person instruction jumped from about 55,000 to 79,000. The state added an average of 9,250 students to that total weekly through the first week of February.

And the vast majority of those students spent significantly more than two hours a week back in school. Many districts, for instance, offered students multiple half days of instruction.

In a statement, Brown lauded the efforts of districts that brought students into classrooms over the last six weeks. While the governor has said she believes in-person instruction is especially important for younger children, she urged districts to move quickly to offer the same for middle- and high-school students.

It has been almost a year since most Oregon students have set foot in a classroom, and they are suffering, Brown said. The social, emotional, mental, physical and academic impacts of distance learning on our students have been well-documented. And, much has changed since last march.

Brown said shes consulted with teachers and superintendents over the last few weeks to better understand how to help educators feel safe returning to classrooms. In early February, she told reporters there were legal tools available to her in order to pursue a broader reopening of Oregon schools but did not specify what tools she might use.

Of her conversations with education officials, Brown said, I am using my powers of persuasion.

In the Portland area, however, very few public schools are allowing more than a handful of students with particularly acute learning needs into school buildings.

And it doesnt appear those numbers will move much before districts let out for spring break on March 19. Most of the metro regions largest districts do not plan on allowing a significant number of elementary schoolers back on campus until early April.

Only two, Lake Oswego and West Linn-Wilsonville, have set firm dates for elementary students to begin hybrid learning, a mix of in-person and virtual instruction. Officials in both districts say theyll launch hybrid options the last full week of February.

Meanwhile, officials in the Tigard-Tualatin district say theyll begin hybrid instruction for kindergartners and first-graders on March 29, the Monday after spring break.

Beaverton officials set a date of April 5 to transition their youngest learners away from fully virtual instruction. Portland Public Schools has indicated it will follow three days later.

In-person instruction in Oregon

Students in Portland and Beaverton whose parents opt for them to participate in those hybrid offerings will join either a morning or afternoon cohort for the rest of the year and attend class in-person for 2 1/2 hours on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays in most cases.

Portland Public Schools officials say they plan to provide similar offerings for middle schoolers. But they say that some state guidelines still make it nearly impossible to roll out hybrid options for high school students.

State rules require students come into contact with no more than 100 other people during the week, which school district officials across the region say is a barrier keeping them from offering in-person instruction to high schoolers on a wide scale.

In the metro area, only Hillsboro, Lake Oswego and West Linn-Wilsonville have announced preliminary dates or estimates for when high schoolers might return to classrooms.

The Oregon Department of Education released a new set of reopening guidelines in the weeks since Browns late-December announcement. Those relaxed standards, along with a steep decline in coronavirus infection rates in the metro, area paved the way for districts to offer some form of in-person instruction for younger students.

But that doesnt mean everyone is ready to return to the classroom.

Teachers unions have stiffly opposed reopening plans in Lake Oswego and Portland Public Schools. A survey of Reynolds district families showed about 16% of families would refuse to allow their child into a classroom this school year.

The Register-Guard reports that more than half of the parents and educators who emailed Springfield district officials in the weeks leading up to their hybrid reopening opposed the move.

Reopening plans for Portland-area districts.

In Lake Oswego, district officials announced they were postponing their reopening by a matter of weeks after educators pushed back.

Brown, along with researchers and schools officials at the state and local level, has said its essential younger students, in particular, return to classrooms as soon as possible. The youngest children at the elementary level are still adjusting to new day-to-day routines and learning how to learn, so to speak.

We recognize that remote instruction for such young children is not developmentally ideal, said Lillian Duran, the associate dean for academic affairs at the University of Oregons College of Education.

Research has long shown that children younger than 10 are significantly less likely to spread coronavirus than adults, teenagers or preteens. Over the last three weeks, officials in Bend and Vale have canceled high school classes after a student tested positive for coronavirus.

--Eder Campuzano | 503-221-4344 | @edercampuzano | Eder on Facebook

Eder is The Oregonians education reporter. Do you have a tip about Portland Public Schools? Email ecampuzano@oregonian.com.
Second Impeachment Trial Of Donald Trump Begins In Senate

Rep. Joe Neguse, a Democrat from Colorado, walks through Statuary Hall at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 10, 2021. Credit - Ting ShenBloomberg/Getty Images

Its an icy Sunday morning in Washington, less than 24 hours after the Senate voted to acquit Donald Trump in the unprecedented impeachment trial of a former president, and Representative Joe Neguse is trying to figure out what it all means.

As one of nine House impeachment managers, Neguse prosecuted the case against Trump. Today, sitting in his Capitol Hill office in jeans after four grueling weeks of little sleep, hes still processing the outcome. Am I disappointed that we werent able to secure the sufficient number of votes to convict? Of course, Neguse tells TIME in his first in-person interview since the verdict. At the same time, he knew the outcome was all but pre-ordained. Many of the senators made very clear their view, long before the trial even commenced, that they had no plans to convict, he says. So for me, the surprise of the trial was the senators who chose to cross party lines and ultimately voted to convict.

The vast majority of Americans believe Trump was at least partially responsible for inciting an insurrection on Jan. 6, when a group of his most fervent supportersspurred by his lies about election fraudstormed the Capitol on the day Congress was certifying Joe Bidens victory. Neguses job was to try to hold Trump accountable while creating a public record of the assault.

In the end, Trump was acquitted for a second time. But the way the trial unfolded left Neguse hopeful. While most Senate Republicans argued it was unconstitutional to try Trump after he left office, seven voted to convict him10 shy of the number Neguse and his team needed, but still the most senators ever to vote to convict a president of their own party. It is clear to me that history will not look kindly on his conduct, or those who enabled it, Neguse says. We did our part.

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The ignominious end of the Trump presidency was also a breakout moment for Neguse, 36. Until the trial, the sophomore Democrat from Colorados 2nd District had been little-known nationally. Neguse, the son of Eritrean refugees and the youngest impeachment manager ever, impressed colleagues and viewers at home alike with his eloquent speeches and poised delivery at the trial, earning praise from both sides of the aisle. His performance even evoked some comparisons to the 2004 Democratic National Convention speech that propelled future President Barack Obama onto the national stage. (Its a comparison Neguse would surely appreciate: he has more than one photo of himself with Obama displayed in his office.)

Toggling between deft legal analysis and soaring rhetoric, Neguse argued an emotional, high-stakes case without ever seeming antagonistic or disheartened. Joes family is recent enough to America that he could talk about our country as a miracle to behold for people coming here from oppressive circumstances around the world, says Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin, the lead impeachment manager. During his closing statement for the prosecution, Neguse made an earnestif futile appeal to the patriotic ideals of the Senate, refuting Trumps lawyers assertion that the impeachment was motivated by political hatred.

This trial is not born from hatred, Neguse said, invoking a favorite quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. Far from it. Its born from love of country. Our country. Our desire to maintain it. Our desire to see America at its best.

The assignment was personal for Neguse. He was on the House floor Jan. 6 when armed rioters stormed the building. He says he felt an acute danger of being a Black lawmaker as a mob that included white supremacists breached the Capitol brandishing Confederate flags. Alarmed, he sent a text to his wife as he was being evacuated, telling her and their two-year-old daughter he loved them.

Less than a week later, Neguse got a call from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi asking him to be an impeachment manager. In some ways, he was a natural choice for the role. Neguse was a lawyer before he was elected to Congress in 2018, leading Colorados consumer protection agency and then working in administrative law in private practice. He served on the House Judiciary Committee that in 2019 wrote the articles of Trumps first impeachment, charging him with abusing his power in pressuring Ukraine to investigate Biden.

Neguse and the eight other Democratic managers knew what they were up against. No president has ever been convicted in an impeachment trial. Convicting Trump would have required 17 Republicans to join all 50 Democratic votes in the Senate. In Trumps first trial, just one Republican voted to convict.

To woo the jury, the Democratic managers refrained from attacking Senate Republicans for going along with Trumps spurious rigged election claims. They built their case by showing graphic footage of the Capitol attack and connecting it to Trumps lies about election fraud, his violent language and his refusal to quickly condemn the rioters as they marauded through the building. There was no ego, Neguse says of the strategy sessions with the managers.

As the Democrats prepared, Neguse holed up in the managers office near the Senate chamber and worked late nights in his Washington apartment. Every evening, he would FaceTime his wife and daughter in Colorado, order dinner around 11 p.m., and keep drafting until the early hours of the morning, revising his scripts in consultation with the teams constitutional lawyers. His diligence did not go unnoticed. I think he has read more than anybody on our team in terms of the history of impeachment trials, says Raskin. He was ready for everything. For example, Raskin recalls, Neguse predicted that Trumps lawyers would try to deflect from the insurrection by focusing on unrest stemming from Black Lives Matter protests last summer.



Neguse says he always believed the case was winnable, but felt his first real glimmer of hope during a vote on the first day of the trial, when Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana unexpectedly voted with all Democrats and five other Republicans for the House managers position that holding an impeachment trial for a former president is constitutional. Cassidys vote was a momentum shift, and all of a sudden signaled to the countryto usthat there were senators who are listening, Neguse says.

Still, throughout the five-day trial, there were only a handful of Republican senators who appeared seriously undecided. Neguse trained his sights on one long shot in particular: Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, who had told members of his party that the vote would be a matter of conscience. Neguse targeted McConnell in his closing argument, invoking the names of two of McConnells home-state political heroesHenry Clay and John Sherman Cooperand referencing a principled vote McConnell cast early in his career against South Africas apartheid despite the wishes of then-President Ronald Reagan.

In the end, McConnell voted to acquit, arguing the trial was unconstitutional. But he blasted Trump in a speech afterwards, calling the former president practically and morally responsible for the deadly riot. Once again, Neguse was caught between disappointment and satisfaction, wrestling with whether he could have done anything more. I think his speech makes clear, Neguse says, that we proved our case.

With the trial over, Neguse will return to representing his constituents in a very different way. Colorados 2nd District is 50% public land, and at the end of a nearly hour-long conversation, he became animated in discussing the preservation of Rocky Mountain National Park and other beautiful places he represents. A lot of the work that I do is protecting our open spaces back home, he says. Its in our DNA as Coloradans. This week, hes launching a new bipartisan caucus with Republican Representative John Curtis of Utah to address the threat of wildfires and introducing legislation to help communities in his district recover from them.

On Valentines Day, Neguse would board a plane home for the first time in nearly three weeksthe longest stretch hed ever gone without seeing his wife and daughter. But while he says hes really excited to get back to his normal life, prosecuting the most high-profile case in the country has now made him somewhat of a household name. His tone shifts abruptly from talking about the beauty of the Rocky Mountains and becomes more somber. Im hopeful that folks will remember what happened yesterday, and that we dont forget, he says. Because our country went through a lot. And the most dangerous thing we can do is forget.

-With reporting by Lissandra Villa/Washington
Hollywood heavyweight Robert De Niros celebrity-loved Nobu London restaurant has used taxpayer' money to furlough staff during the pandemic - despite his 360million fortune.

Goodfellas star De Niro, 77, co-founded the high-end Nobu chain with celebrity chef Nobu Matsuhisa and film producer Meir Teper in 1994.

The trio now co-own scores of Nobu restaurants and hotels across five continents.

London's branches have played host to hundreds of celebrities over the years including Cheryl Cole, Brad Pitt, Kate Moss, Tom Cruise, Elton John and Naomi Campbell.

TaxPayers Alliance CEO John OConnell said: Justifiably, the Government cast a wide net to catch everyone who could be affected by this coronavirus crisis.

But recipients should keep in mind that this money ultimately comes from taxpayers, and support should only be sought if its really needed.

Robert De Niro attends the Nobu Hotel London Shoreditch Official Launch back in 2018

Robert De Niro, Alice Eve and chef Nobu Matsuhisa attend the Nobu Berkeley in 2015

Nobu London Ltd has claimed furlough money to cover 80 per cent of temporarily laid off workers wages, according to a Government list published on January 26.

The company's latest accounts are made up to December 2019 and were published in September.

Its annual accounts state: The restaurant has been closed since March 21, 2020, as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic in the UK, and reopened on May 6 2020 to operate in providing a limited restaurant service that can be operated by the company under the recommended health and safety guidelines imposed during the Covid-19 pandemic such as food take away service.

Also on July 8, 2020 the company reopened its in-house dining service to guests that can be operated under social distancing rules during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The directors therefore expect to report a significant decrease in profitability due to materially reduced revenues in 2020.

De Niro is just the latest wealthy celeb to be slammed for taking furlough cash taxpayers will eventually have to pay back.

Meir Teper, Robert De Niro, Nobuyuki Matsuhisa and Trevor Horwell attend the Nobu Hotel

Model lara Stone and Robert De Niro The launch of the Nobu Hotel London in Shoreditch

Guy Ritchie and former Rugby ace Mike Tindall - who is married to the Queens granddaughter Zara Tindall - both enraged the public after their firms claimed furlough cash.

Other stars like Ed Sheeran - who owns Bertie Blossoms restaurant in posh Notting Hill, north-west London - have won praise for not taking state handouts.

Despite his enormous reported wealth, De Niro has complained of cash flow problems recently.

Divorce proceedings in July heard how the actor slashed his ex-wife Grace Hightowers monthly American Express limit from $100,000 to $50,000.

De Niro reportedly said the Covid-19 pandemic has forced him to dramatically cut spending.

One of his lawyers Caroline Krauss reportedly said that the plight of the Nobu chain had put De Niro under financial pressure.

De Niro and Nobu London Ltd have been approached for comment.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi announced on Feb. 15 the arrests in Basra of a group allegedly involved in the murders of Iraqi protesters and activists.

The death squad that terrorized our people in Basra and killed innocents are now in the hands of our heroic forces [and] on their way to a fair trial, Kadhimi tweeted. We got the killers of Jinan and Abdulsamad, and we will get the killers of Reham, Hosham and all others. Justice will not sleep.

Forty-nine-year-old Jinan Madhi Al-Shahmani, known as the compassionate mother of the revolutionaries for her work as a paramedic to all of the protesters, was killed in Basra by gunmen on Jan. 21, 2020.

Ahmad Abdessamad, a 37-year-old journalist working for Dijla TV, was killed on Jan. 10, 2020, alongside his cameraman, 26-year-old Safaa Ghali, in their hometown of Basra.

A source from the Iraqi security forces told Al-Monitor the four suspects have already admitted to assassinating the two journalists.

There are clues that they have been involved in killing some other activists as well, most notably famous Iraqi protester Reham Yaqoub and the former Basra governor, Muhammad Msabbah al-Waili. They have provided the investigation team with critical information about people involved in the killing of the famous Iraqi researcher Hisham al-Hashimi, the source said.

Iraqi security forces are searching for seven other suspects, according to the source.

This is the first time those suspected of killing Iraqi protesters during the 2019-2020 demonstrations have been arrested. About 700 protesters were killed while dozens of others were kidnapped or assassinated outside of the protest areas.

Kadhimi formed a special committee to investigate these incidents and prosecute the perpetrators. These initial arrests are a direct result of Kadhimi's committee.

Identifying groups and people behind the violence and prosecuting the accused are top priorities of Iraqi protesters and the Shiite religious authority in Najaf.

Government efforts in this regard come within a broader plan to control militia activities in Iraq in order to bring them under full control of the state and halt illegal activities and crimes they have been involved with, as they exploited their influence within the state.

Iraqi security forces also arrested Hosam Azerjawi last December. He was known as the engineer of rocket attacks on foreign embassies in Iraq, which stopped after his arrest.

Kadhimi also removed several security officials associated with militias, including head of the Falcon Intelligence Cell Abu Ali al-Basri. This has given the Iraqi government more control over the security sector, reducing the militias' influence in the state.
This is like a virus, like COVID, a media pathogen, said Kang Liu, a professor at Duke University who studies cultural politics and media in China, comparing the spread of disinformation about the virus to the spread of the virus itself. We have a double pandemic  the real pathological virus and the pandemic of fear. The fear is what is really at stake. Spreading rumours On January 26, a man from Inner Mongolia posted a video claiming that the new virus ravaging central China was a biological weapon engineered by the US. It was viewed 14,000 times on the Chinese app Kuaishou before being taken down. The man was arrested, detained for 10 days and fined for spreading rumours. Peoples Daily, the Chinese Communist Partys mouthpiece, broadcast news of his detention in early February, showing the man, face pixelated, wrists shackled, and legs caged in a chair. It was a stern reminder to the citizens of China that fake news can lead to arrest and part of a broader effort by Chinese state media to debunk COVID-19 conspiracies. But just six weeks later the same conspiracy would be broadcast by Chinas foreign ministry, picked up by at least 30 Chinese diplomats and missions and amplified through Chinas vast, global network of state media outlets.

During those six weeks, Chinas leadership came under intense internal criticism. On February 7, Li Wenliang, a Chinese doctor punished for circulating an early warning about the outbreak, died of COVID-19. The outpouring of grief and rage sparked by Lis death was an unusual  and for the ruling Communist Party, unsettling  display in Chinas tightly monitored civic space. Loading Meanwhile, powerful voices in the US  from former President Trump to congressional Republicans  were working to rebrand COVID-19 as the China virus, amplifying fringe theories that it had been engineered by Chinese scientists. Social media accounts that appeared to be pro-Trump or QAnon followers pushed the disinformation, repeatedly retweeting identical content that claimed China created the virus as a bioweapon, researchers at the Australia Institutes Centre for Responsible Technology found. As US rhetoric intensified, China went on the offensive. On February 22, Peoples Daily ran a report highlighting speculation that the US military brought the virus to China, pushing the story globally through inserts in newspapers such as the Helsinki Times in Finland and the New Zealand Herald.

The New Zealand Herald said it has an ad hoc commercial relationship with Peoples Daily, labels their content as sponsored and reviews it before publication. Upon further review of the story that you have referred to, we have removed this particular item from our website, a spokesman said in an email. The Helsinki Times said it has a barter-exchange content agreement with Peoples Daily, whose content it labels but does not vet. We believe that the Western media coverage is at times extremely one-sided and biased, said Alexis Kouros, the editor of the Helsinki Times. Even though Peoples Daily is state-owned, like the BBC, we believe it is beneficial for the global audience to have both sides of stories. As China embraced overt disinformation, it leaned on Russian disinformation strategy and infrastructure, turning to a long-established network of Kremlin proxies in the West to seed and spread messaging. One was amplifying the otherHow much it was command controlled, how much it was opportunistic, it was hard to tell, said Janis Sarts, director of the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, based in Riga, Latvia. Long-term, he added, China is the more formidable competitor and adversary because of the technological capabilities they bring to the table. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video

The truth as I see it Loading In January, long before China began overtly spreading disinformation, Russian state media swept in to legitimise the theory that the US engineered the virus as a weapon. On January 20, the Russian Armys media outlet, Zvezda, announced that the outbreak in China was linked to a bioweapons test, citing a four-time failed political candidate named Igor Nikulin. Nikulin claims to have worked with the United Nations on disarmament in Iraq from 1998 to 2003, including as an adviser to former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

But the UN has no record of his service. Richard Butler, the lead UN weapons inspector at the time, told AP hes never heard of him. Neither has Hans Corell, who served as Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and Legal Counsel of the United Nations from 1994-2004, where he worked closely with Annan. Nikulin said records of his UN work may have been destroyed and stuck by his theory that COVID is a US bioweapon  a claim that has been repeatedly debunked. What other proof is needed?! he said in an email to AP. Over the next two months, more than 70 articles appeared in pro-Kremlin media making similar bioweapons claims in Russian, Spanish, Armenian, Arabic, English and German, according to APs analysis of a database compiled by EUvsDisinfo, which tracks disinformation for the European Union. Loading Online journals identified by the US State Department and others as pro-Russian proxies picked up the bioweapons narrative, enhancing its reach and resonance.

Russian politicians joined the chorus. Parliamentarian Natalia Poklonskaya argued that the novel coronavirus could be a biological weapon created by those who want to rule the planet to undermine China. Shortly after, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the nationalistic leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, suggested that the US and its greedy pharmaceutical companies were to blame. Meanwhile, Nikulin kept flogging his theory, which morphed as the pandemic spread from an attack on China to an attack on Trump. Despite his inconsistency and questionable bona fides, by April, Nikulin had appeared at least 18 times on Russian television. US officials also said Russian intelligence had been covertly spreading COVID-19 disinformation, including claims that the virus was a US bioweapon. On January 23, Beijing began to roll out the largest medical quarantine in modern history, sealing tens of millions of people at the epicentre of the outbreak in central China. The images were harrowing, as people desperate to slip out thronged train stations. Shortly after 11am the next morning, Francis Boyle, a Harvard-trained law professor at the University of Illinois, emailed a worldwide alert to 300 contacts warning, without evidence, that China had been developing the coronavirus as a bioweapon at a biosafety lab in Wuhan. Over the next few weeks, Boyle refined his theory, now asserting that Chinese scientists had not developed the virus themselves, but taken it from a North Carolina laboratory.

This is clearly an offensive biological warfare agent, Boyle told conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on a February 19 Infowars broadcast. The theory spread via outlets like One America News Network, a pro-Trump channel, Irans Press TV, Global Research and its erstwhile partner, the Strategic Culture Foundation, an online journal that masquerades as independent but is actually directed by Russias foreign intelligence service, according to the US State Department. Boyle told the AP his conclusions are based on research and that he cant stop conspiracy theorists or foreign governments from using his claims for their own ends. My job is to tell the truth as I see it, he said. Information laundering

On March 9, a public WeChat account called Happy Reading List reposted an essay claiming the US military created SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, at a lab at Fort Detrick, in Maryland, and loosed it in China during the Military World Games, an international competition for military athletes, held in Wuhan in October 2019. The account, which has been suspended, was registered in May 2019 by a woman from Henan province in central China, who did not reply to messages. Its not clear who first wrote the article, which can still be found on other WeChat accounts. Loading The next day an anonymous petition appeared on the White Houses now-defunct We the People portal. It urged US authorities to clarify whether the virus had been developed at Fort Detrick and leaked from the lab. The petition was lavishly covered by Chinas state media, despite getting only 1426 signatures, far shy of the 100,000 needed to merit a response from the White House. On March 11, Larry Romanoff, who claims to be a former management consultant based in Shanghai, posted an article on Global Research Canada that cribbed heavily from the Happy Reading List posting, citing it as a source.

There have been a number of stories where the origin of a story is in Russian-controlled space but its picked up by Global Research and then put forward as their own story. Then you get Russian media saying western analysts in Canada say that. We call that information laundering, said Sarts, the NATO StratCom director. They have been helpful for a long time to Russian information operations and recently to the Chinese as well. Neither Romanoff nor Global Research responded to requests for comment. The day of Romanoffs article, the World Health Organisation officially designated the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic. Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for Chinas foreign ministry, spent part of the next afternoon retweeting cute dog videos. Then, late that night, he sent out a series of tweets over 13 minutes that launched what may be Chinas first truly global digital experiment with overt disinformation. When did patient zero begin in US? Zhao wrote. How many people are infected? What are the names of the hospitals? It might be US army who brought the epidemic to Wuhan. Be transparent! Make public your data! US owe (sic) us an explanation!

The next morning, Zhao urged his hundreds of thousands of Twitter followers to read and retweet Romanoffs piece. An hour and a half-hour later he gave Global Research another boost, referring his followers to an earlier Romanoff article that cited Chinese state media reporting to cast doubt on the origins of the virus. Twitter later added a fact-check warning to Zhaos tweet about the US Army  but only in English. An identical post in Mandarin carried no such alert. Twitter also put a fact-checking label on only one of Zhaos two reposts of Global Research content. A Twitter spokesperson said that the platform has expanded its policies to deal with misleading COVID-19 information but did not address specific posts flagged by AP. Zhaos tweets were now global news, and they hijacked mainstream discussion of the coronavirus. On Twitter alone, Zhaos aggressive spray of 11 tweets on March 12 and 13 was cited over 99,000 times over the next six weeks, in at least 54 languages, according to analysis conducted by DFRLab. The accounts that referenced him had nearly 275 million followers on Twitter  a number that almost certainly includes duplicate followers and does not distinguish fake accounts. Influential conservatives on Twitter, including Donald Trump Jr., hammered Zhao, propelling his tweets to their largest audiences.

Chinas Global Times and at least 30 Chinese diplomatic accounts, from France to Panama, rushed in to support Zhao. Venezuelas foreign minister and RTs correspondent in Caracas, as well as Saudi accounts close to the kingdoms royal family also significantly extended Zhaos reach, helping launch his ideas into Spanish and Arabic. His accusations got uncritical treatment in Russian and Iranian state media and shot back through QAnon discussion boards. But his biggest audience, by far, lay within China itself  despite the fact that Twitter is banned there. Popular hashtags about his tweetstorm were viewed 314 million times on the Chinese social media platform Weibo, which does not distinguish unique views. Late on the night of March 13, Zhao posted a message of gratitude on his personal Weibo: Thank you for your support to me, let us work hard for the motherland ! Contagion The same day Zhao tweeted that the virus might have come from the US Army, Irans Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei also announced that COVID-19 could be the result of a biological attack.

State media outlets reinforced Khameneis message, drawing on foreign sources for validation. Tasnim News, for example, quoted Nikulin, the self-proclaimed Russian bioweapons expert, to suggest the US engineered the virus to target China. Javan Online quoted Zhaos tweets to claim Chinese officials had evidence the US was behind the pandemic. Military and religious leaders in Iran repeatedly referred to the virus as a US-made bioweapon. Their remarks were, in turn, amplified by Russian media and picked up in China, where they fuelled further speculation. The International Union of Virtual Media (IUVM), an Iranian network that has been purged repeatedly by Facebook, Google and Twitter, activated a network of websites and covert social media accounts to accuse the US of engineering the virus and praise the leadership and benevolence of China. Khamenei again cited the conspiracy theory that the virus was made in America during his annual Persian New Year speech on March 22  this time as justification for refusing US assistance. I do not know how real this accusation is but when it exists, who in their right mind would trust you to bring them medication? Khamenei told the nation. Possibly your medicine is a way to spread the virus more.

That same day, the first of two cargo planes loaded with doctors and supplies for a 50-bed field hospital from Doctors Without Borders landed in Iran. On March 23, Irans Ministry of Foreign Affairs tweeted a Global Research reprint of an article from Chinese state broadcaster CGTN that questioned the origin of the coronavirus, again suggesting it had been made in a US government lab at Fort Detrick. The next day, Irans Ministry of Health withdrew permission for Doctors Without Borders to deliver COVID-19 aid. A media pathogen Ten days after Zhaos first conspiratorial tweets, Chinas global state media apparatus kicked in to push the theory that Zhao, and now Khamenei, were broadcasting.

Did the US government intentionally conceal the reality of COVID-19 with the flu? asked a suggestive op-ed in Mandarin published by China Radio International on March 22. Why was the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick in Maryland, the largest biochemical testing base, shut down in July 2019? Within days, versions of the piece appeared more than 350 times in Chinese state outlets, mostly in Mandarin, but also around the world in English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and Arabic, AP found. The story flew across China, through social media accounts run by police, prosecutors, propaganda departments, anti-cult associations and Communist Youth Leagues. Seven prisons in Sichuan province, five provincial and municipal traffic radio stations, and a dozen accounts run by state media giant CCTV also pushed it out. Chinas Embassy in France promoted the story on Twitter and Facebook. It appeared on YouTube, Weibo, WeChat and a host of Chinese video platforms, including Haokan, Xigua, Baijiahao, Bilibili, iQIYI, Kuaishou and Youku. A seven-second version set to driving music appeared on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok. Clearly pushing these kinds of conspiracy theories, disinformation, does not usually result in any negative consequences for them, said Mareike Ohlberg, a senior fellow in the Asia Program of the German Marshall Fund.

AP found the story was viewed over 7 million times online, with more than 1.8 million comments, shares or reactions. Those numbers are an undercount because many platforms did not publish metrics, and they dont account for television viewership or circulation in closed groups. Accounts promoting the content had a combined total of over 817 million followers, though many are likely to be duplicates or fakes. Conspiracies brewing in the United States reinforced Chinas messaging. In late March, George Webb, a for-profit conspiracy theorist in Washington DC, doxed a US Army reservist as Patient Zero, claiming on YouTube that she brought the virus from Fort Detrick to Wuhan during the October military games. Webbs video circulated widely in China and was picked up by state-run Global Times. The falsely accused woman got death threats and Webbs video was pulled from YouTube, but its still live in China on Weibo, where it has accrued millions of views. In search of an ending In April, Russia and Iran largely dropped the bioweapon conspiracy in their overt messaging. They had a more pressing concern: Surging numbers of dead.

China carried on. Beijing was besieged by demands for accountability. In the US, there were calls for a pandemic tariff and cancelling US debt with China. Republicans in Congress began introducing legislation to strip China of its sovereign immunity so Americans could sue. Australian officials called for an inquiry into the origins and spread of coronavirus. Chinas ambassador to Australia, Cheng Jingye, issued a veiled threat. Maybe the ordinary people will say, Why should we drink Australian wine? Eat Australian beef? he said. Within a month, China banned beef from four big Australian producers and slapped an 80 per cent tariff on Australian barley  moves widely seen as retribution, though China has denied that charge. Chinese officials and state media continued to promote made-in-America COVID-19 conspiracies.

State broadcaster CGTN jumped in on May 16, releasing a slick documentary about Fort Detrick set to spooky music that has been viewed on its YouTube channel more than 82,000 times. YouTube has not flagged the video as state-sponsored content, despite a 2018 policy to label government-funded videos. A YouTube spokesperson said that because the video is about COVID-19, it was labelled with an information panel about the virus instead of the publisher. The video has been played on Chinas Bilibili platform 378,000 times and broadcast in English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Indonesian, Filipino  as well as by NTV, a Houston TV station that failed to note the content was Chinese government propaganda. NTV said it has removed the video flagged by AP. I have warned our newsroom department for the future, said Navroz Prasla, the CEO of NTV, which says it is the largest South Asian TV network in North America. In July and August, Zhao, the foreign ministry spokesman, rekindled the Fort Detrick conspiracy in Tweets that have not been flagged for fact-checking: Much remains unclear about US #FortDetrick and over 200 bio labs in the world, he wrote on August 11. On January 14, 2021, a team from the World Health Organisation landed in China to investigate the origins of the outbreak. The next day, in one of the final acts of the Trump administration, the US State Department put out a Fact Sheet stating that the pandemic could be the result of a leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which it claimed has collaborated on secret projects with Chinas military.

Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned those allegations as the last-day madness of Mr. Liar. Loading Id like to stress that if the United States truly respects facts, it should open the biological lab at Fort Detrick, give more transparency to issues like its 200-plus overseas bio-labs, invite WHO experts to conduct origin-tracing in the United States, spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at a January 18 press conference. Her remarks went viral in China. COVID-19 disinformation has been good for Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Within China, Zhao and his colleagues have a growing fan base and their followers on Twitter have soared. Zhao now has over 879,000 Twitter followers.
ROME, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Maire Tecnimont S.p.A., through its subsidiary NextChem and Essential Energy USA Corp. today have executed a Front-End Engineering Design contract as well as a Memorandum of Understanding for the construction of a new biorefinery in South America for the production of Renewable Diesel. Essential Energy USA Corp is one of the leading biofuels producers in South America.

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Subject to the client's Final Investment Decision, the biorefinery will produce 200,000 tpy (tons per year) of High-Quality Renewable Diesel from advanced bio-feedstocks non in competition with food. NextChem will be the exclusive EPC contractor. The project is expected to be operational in 2023.

The biorefinery will transform natural oil, waste vegetables oils and tallow into HVO (Hydrogenated Vegetable Oils) also known in the market as Renewable Diesel. The Renewable Diesel is a fuel which is chemically identical to petroleum-based diesel with the advantage of improved performance. It is used worldwide as a drop-in biofuel in diesel vehicles with no engine modifications. Furthermore, the Renewable Diesel allows a Carbon Intensity reduction, for greenhouse gas emissions, above 80 percent compared with petroleum-based diesel.

Maire Tecnimont Group has exhaustive experience in EPC contracting in Energy Services including in South America. Additionally, NextChem has been active in energy transition projects with a focus on deploying solutions in carbon footprint reduction, through the development of new technologies for the production of biofuels and biochemicals from biobased feedstock and circular chemicals from waste.

Pierroberto Folgiero, Maire Tecnimont Group and NextChem Chief Executive Officer, commented: "Our business in the biofuels sector and in particular on the Renewable Diesel segment is gradually growing and South America is a very interesting area for us. Low carbon mandates in North America and Europe will drive strong demand and premium pricing: this, together with the availability of proven technologies and solid EPC capabilities opens a path of market success for such investments. We are proud to be the partner of a sector- leader company such as Essential Energy USA Corp. in this world scale industrial initiative which enhances the EPC capabilities of Maire Tecnimont Group in green chemistry and the biofuels market."

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Logo -- https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1390855/NextChem_Logo.jpg [https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1390855/NextChem_Logo.jpg] Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1322292/Maire_Tecnimont_Log... [https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1322292/Maire_Tecnimont_Log...]

CONTACT: Margherita Ficola, Ilaria Catastini, Maire Tecnimont Group -NextChem, mediarelations@mairetecnimont.it, mediarelations@nextchem.it, +39327 0663447 +39 3281297533
A wastewater testing program aimed at early coronavirus hot spot detection recently completed a trial program in Scranton.

Bettermeant Health of Berkeley, California, briefly worked with Scranton on a trial period to search sewage for the genetic material of the virus shed by infected people.

Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti said that the trial ended near the beginning of the year. She said that it could be a useful tool to look for outbreaks, but the city does not have the funds to continue the program beyond the trial period.

The mayor said a longer-term project would cost tens of thousands of dollars, but it did follow along with the rate the infection spread through the region.

It really does track the cases and it could be a way to supplement (COVID-19) mitigation, Cognetti said.

In October, Scranton announced it had agreed to take part in a wastewater testing program with Bettermeant Health.

Pennsylvania American Water, the citys sewage plant owner, began collecting wastewater samples in December for testing at a laboratory, utility spokeswoman Susan Turcmanovich said.

The practice, called wastewater epidemiology, was used to once pinpoint polio outbreaks and high opioid-use areas.

Other communities in Pennsylvania, like Harrisburg, have tested wastewater for months to track the virus.

Efforts to reach a representative from Bettermeant Health were unsuccessful.MONDAY UPDATE brings Times-Tribune readers up to date on past or pending stories of interest. To offer a suggestion for a Monday Update, please email metrodesk@timesshamrock.com with Monday Update in the subject line.

Innovaccer, a Silicon Valley-based software startup focused on the healthcare industry, is in talks to raise about $100-150 million from Tiger Global at a valuation of over a billion dollars, sources close to the development said. This will make it Indias newest unicorn, at a time when enterprise software firms are raising large rounds at a rapid pace.

Founded by Abhinav Shashank, Kanav Hasija and Sandeep Gupta in 2015, Innovaccer was valued at $400 million last February, when it raised $70 million from Tiger Global, Steadview Capital, Dragoneer Investments, Microsoft venture fund M12, and early backer Lightspeed Venture Partners India.

They have grown 100 percent year-on-year, and the SaaS market is very hot right now. Anyone with a good solution and who is well funded will command a premium on valuation, said a person close to the company, requesting anonymity. Moneycontrol could not confirm Innovaccers revenue immediately. Innovaccer and Tiger did not respond to mails seeking comment.

Innovaccers main objective is to take the millions of data points available in the healthcare industry  patient profiles, risk factors, types of disease, etc  and channel that data effectively to digitise solutions for hospitals, clinics and patients.

Its main product, InCare, includes patient assignment, automated outreach, collaborative worklists and being able to measure team and individual productivity in various ways. As Innovaccer has grown, its solutions have aimed to cover all aspects of the healthcare industry, including remote patient monitoring, bundled payments and all overall healthcare data platforms.

The Covid-19 pandemic, which has accelerated digital adoption across industries, has also helped Innovaccer. Digital solutions, including patient records, internal messengers and analytics, also help avoid physical contact to some extent.

Innovaccer has also developed tools aimed at dealing with the pandemic, including medication inventory tracking, staff planning for Covid-19 demand, real-time updates on critical metrics, and a telehealth platform for patients.

Tiger Global, which is in talks to double down on its investment, has also been particularly aggressive on Indian software-as-a-service firms for the last two years or so, particularly in 2019. Its enterprise bets during the period include salon software firm Zenoti (now a unicorn), mobile marketing platform CleverTap, and logistics software firm Locus, which were spearheaded by Tigers new chief Scott Shleifer.

Shleifers predecessor Lee Fixel had also led Tiger Globals early investment in Freshworks, which at $3.5 billion is currently Indias largest SaaS startup by value.

SaaS has also been one of the hottest themes for investors in the US and India over the past year, led by a spate of successful IPOs and the fact that many of these firms continue to grow rapidly even after becoming billion-dollar companies.

Compared to the consumer internet, theres the obvious advantage that SaaS firms have stable revenues from day one. In addition, niche software and leading technology is seeing acceptance from businesses, which is very encouraging for investors, said an investor tracking the space, on condition of anonymity.

This has also led to SaaS valuations zooming from ten times of annual revenue earlier to 25-30 times more recently. The successful IPOs of Zoom, Slack, Cloudflare and Snowflake, among others  on listing day some of these stocks doubled and tripled  have made venture capitalists and private equity funds more bullish about the space.

The last few years have also seen the number of SaaS unicorns in India rising. Salon and spa software firm Zenoti was valued a billion dollars in December 2020, against $300 million in May 2019. Similarly, API startup Postman was valued at $2 billion, a six-fold jump in valuation in just a year.
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Global Security-as-a-Service (SaaS) marketrevenues totaled US$ XX in 2019, and are anticipated to grow at a staggering CAGR of XX through 2027. Key factors propelling the adoption of SaaS services include proliferation of Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud computing. The key end use sectors for SaaS include telecom and IT, BFSI, and healthcare remain the largest end-users of SaaS, with telecom and IT particularly witnessing robust adoption. By 2026, the revenue share of telecom & IT is expected to reach XX, whereas BFSI sector will account for XX of total revenues.

Concerns about potential security threats to confidential and important information is influencing telecom & IT companies to invest in SaaS. Consequently, providing end-to-end security solutions remains a lucrative mode of operation of SaaS companies. Prominent SaaS companies, including Intel Security, Cisco Systems, Inc., and Oracle Corporation are focusing on offering customised solutions to their clients. While IT & telecom will continue to remain the most lucrative end-user, gains will be steady in the healthcare and BFSI sector.

Get Access to sample pages: https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/sample/3017

Global SaaS market revenues remain equally concentrated between large players and local vendors. It is projected that by 2026, large companies and multinational corporations will account for over XX share, with the rest remaining fragmented among small and medium enterprises.A key trend in the global SaaS market is that service providers are focusing on becoming integrators of holistic solution providers rather than just offering one particular type of service.

Reluctance to adopt cloud based solutions is steadily waning, and as more companies come on board, the SaaS market is anticipated to gain further traction.It is projected that the SaaS delivery market will grow at a higher rate as compared to traditional software. File sharing continues to be the leading end-use for SaaS globally, with virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) being the otherleading segment.For global players, growth of the security services of IoT and cost advantages remain key opportunities to leverage during the forecast period.

Although the outlook on SaaS remains positive, longstanding challenges, such as difficulty in storing unstructured data and risk of organized attacks remain key challenges. Further, easy accessibility to data makes confidential information vulnerable to cyber-attack and hacks.Some of the leading market players profiled in this report include Intel Security, Oracle Corporation, Cisco Systems, Inc., Gemalto NV, Qualys Inc., Alert Logic Inc., Trend Micro Inc., Proofpoint Inc., Zscaler, Inc., and Okta, Inc.

Place a Direct Purchase Order @ https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/checkout/3017/Single

North America and Western Europe remain the two largest markets for SaaS, with the former accounting for over XX revenue share of the market in 2019. The North America SaaS market was valued at US$ XX billion in 2019, and is anticipated to grow at a staggering XX CAGR through 2027. Western Europe, the second largest market globally, will also be the fastest growing market after North America.

It is worthwhile to mention that SaaS market in North America will be completely dominated by the U.S., with Canada accounting for only XX share of the market. This is expected to further decline to nearly XX by the end of the forecast period.

To Get Discount: https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/discount/3017

Amber Heard and her girlfriend Bianca Butti decided to celebrate Valentine's Day by getting out of Los Angeles.

The 34-year-old actress and her 38-year-old cinematographer girlfriend were spotted at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday afternoon.

While their destination was unknown, the happy couple masked up as they headed into LAX with their luggage.

Getaway: Amber Heard and her girlfriend Bianca Butti decided to celebrate Valentine's Day by getting out of Los Angeles

Heard was spotted wearing a long-sleeved black shirt with an elaborate necklace that fell across her chest.

She also stayed safe amid the COVID-10 pandemic with a multi-colored face mask covering her mouth and nose.

She had her blonde hair up in a bun, and completed her look with a pair of black sunglasses, a black leather purse, another black bag, black pants and black boots, while carrying a black coat.

Amber's look: Heard was spotted wearing a long-sleeved black shirt with an elaborate necklace that fell across her chest

Butti stepped out with a brown sweater with a light brown cowboy hat and a black face mask keeping her safe from COVID-19.

She was pulling two large roller bags into the terminal while wearing black pants with another bag slung over her shoulder.

The happy couple were first spotted kissing during a trip to Palm Springs back in January 2020, just before the pandemic lockdown.

Couple: The happy couple were first spotted kissing during a trip to Palm Springs back in January 2020, just before the pandemic lockdown

While it's unclear how they met and started dating, Butti works as a director of photography, having worked on the TV series Love & Hip-Hop: Atlanta and movies such as Eyes On the Moon, An American in Texas and most recently Bedroom Story.

She shot a film entitled The Uncanny, which is currently in post-production, along with Measure of Revenge starring Bella Thorne and Melissa Leo.

Heard has been keeping busy as well, playing Nadine Cross in the CBS All Access streaming service series The Stand, which just wrapped its first season.

Busy: Heard has been keeping busy as well, playing Nadine Cross in the CBS All Access streaming service series The Stand, which just wrapped its first season

She'll next be seen returning as Mera in Zack Snyder's Justice League, a four-hour version of the 2017 theatrical film which debuts on HBO Max March 16.

She is also attached to return as Mera in Aquaman 2 alongside Jason Momoa as the title character, though it's unclear when filming starts.

Heard is also set to star in Run Away With Me, following an American in Paris falls for a model and the two become intertwined in the criminal underworld of the European modeling industry.
Artist's rendering of a comet headed towards Earth. Credit: public domain .

It forever changed history when it crashed into Earth about 66 million years ago.

The Chicxulub impactor, as it's known, left behind a crater off the coast of Mexico that spans 93 miles and runs 12 miles deep. Its devastating impact brought the reign of the dinosaurs to an abrupt and calamitous end by triggering their sudden mass extinction, along with the end of almost three-quarters of the plant and animal species living on Earth.

The enduring puzzle: Where did the asteroid or comet originate, and how did it come to strike Earth? Now, a pair of researchers at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian believe they have the answer.

In a study published today in Nature's Scientific Reports, Harvard University astrophysics undergraduate student Amir Siraj and astronomer Avi Loeb put forth a new theory that could explain the origin and journey of this catastrophic object.

Using statistical analysis and gravitational simulations, Siraj and Loeb calculate that a significant fraction of long-period comets originating from the Oort cloud, an icy sphere of debris at the edge of the solar system, can be bumped off-course by Jupiter's gravitational field during orbit.

"The solar system acts as a kind of pinball machine," explains Siraj, who is pursuing bachelor's and master's degrees in astrophysics, in addition to a master's degree in piano performance at the New England Conservatory of Music. "Jupiter, the most massive planet, kicks incoming long-period comets into orbits that bring them very close to the sun."

During close passage to the sun, the cometsnicknamed "sungrazers"can experience powerful tidal forces that break apart pieces of the rock and ultimately, produce cometary shrapnel.

"In a sungrazing event, the portion of the comet closer to the sun feels a stronger gravitational pull than the part that is further, resulting in a tidal force across the object," Siraj says. "You can get what's called a tidal disruption event, in which a large comet breaks up into many smaller pieces. And crucially, on the journey back to the Oort cloud, there's an enhanced probability that one of these fragments hit the Earth."

The new calculations from Siraj and Loeb's theory increase the chances of long-period comets impacting Earth by a factor of about 10, and show that about 20 percent of long-period comets become sungrazers.

The pair say that their new rate of impact is consistent with the age of Chicxulub, providing a satisfactory explanation for its origin and other impactors like it.

"Our paper provides a basis for explaining the occurrence of this event," Loeb says. "We are suggesting that, in fact, if you break up an object as it comes close to the sun, it could give rise to the appropriate event rate and also the kind of impact that killed the dinosaurs."

Evidence found at the Chicxulub crater suggests the rock was composed of carbonaceous chondrite. Siraj and Loeb's hypothesis might also explain this unusual composition.

A popular theory on the origin of Chicxulub claims that the impactor originated from the main belt, which is an asteroid population between the orbit of Jupiter and Mars. However, carbonaceous chondrites are rare amongst main-belt asteroids, but possibly widespread amongst long-period comets, providing additional support to the cometary impact hypothesis.

Other similar craters display the same composition. This includes an object that hit about 2 billion years ago and left the Vredefort crater in South Africa, which is the largest confirmed crater in Earth's history, and the impactor that left the Zhamanshin crater in Kazakhstan, which is the largest confirmed crater within the last million years. The researchers say that the timing of these impacts support their calculations on the expected rate of Chicxulub-sized tidally disrupted comets.

Siraj and Loeb say their hypothesis can be tested by further studying these craters, others like them, and even ones on the surface of the moon to determine the composition of the impactors. Space missions sampling comets can also help.

Aside from composition of comets, the new Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile may be able to observe tidal disruption of long-period comets after it becomes operational next year.

"We should see smaller fragments coming to Earth more frequently from the Oort cloud," Loeb says. "I hope that we can test the theory by having more data on long-period comets, get better statistics, and perhaps see evidence for some fragments."

Loeb says understanding this is not just crucial to solving a mystery of Earth's history but could prove pivotal if such an event were to threaten the planet.

"It must have been an amazing sight, but we don't want to see that again," he said.

Explore further The sun may have started its life with a binary companion
[February 15, 2021] TD Bank Group Joins the Open Invention Network Community

DURHAM, N.C., Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Open Invention Network (OIN), the organization formed to safeguard open source software (OSS) and now the largest patent non-aggression community in history, announced today that TD Bank Group (TD) has joined as a community member. Offering a full range of financial products and services to more than 26 million customers worldwide, TD is focused on constantly improving its operating platforms, and frequently uses OSS to do so. By joining OIN, TD is demonstrating its commitment to patent non-aggression in OSS.

The financial services and fintech industries are increasingly relying on open source technologies for building and integrating feature-rich platforms, said Keith Bergelt, CEO of Open Invention Network. As the first major North American bank to join our community, we are pleased that an established leader like TD is committed to patent non-aggression in core Linux and adjacent open source technologies. We remain focused on leveraging the best technologies for our platforms and are excited to join the Open Invntion Network (OIN), that supports protection from patent infringement claims for the greater good of the wider innovation community, said Josh Death, Intellectual Property and Patentable Innovations Lead at TD.



OINs community practices patent non-aggression in core Linux and adjacent OSS technologies by cross-licensing Linux System patents to one another on a royalty-free basis. Patents owned by OIN are similarly licensed royalty-free to any organization that agrees not to assert its patents against the Linux System. About Open Invention Network

Open Invention Network (OIN) is the largest patent non-aggression community in history and supports freedom of action in Linux as a key element of open source software (OSS). Patent non-aggression in core technologies is a cultural norm within OSS, so that the litmus test for authentic behavior in the OSS community includes OIN membership. Funded by Google, IBM, NEC, Philips, Sony, SUSE and Toyota, OIN has more than 3,300 community members. The OIN patent license and member cross-licenses are available royalty-free to any party that joins the OIN community.

For more information, visit http://www.openinventionnetwork.com . Media-Only Contact: Ed Schauweker

AVID Public Relations for Open Invention Network

+1 (703) 963-5238

ed@avidpr.com



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SANTA FE  A proposal to repeal a 1969 anti-abortion law moved closer to final passage Monday as it cleared the House Judiciary Committee.

The legislation, Senate Bill 10, could be taken up by the full House later this week, the last step necessary to send the measure to Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who has made its passage a priority.

The proposal would repeal a state law that makes it a crime to end a womans pregnancy, except in certain circumstances. Its largely unenforceable now because of the Supreme Courts decision in Roe v. Wade.

Rep. Micaela Lara Cadena, a Mesilla Democrat who presented the bill Monday, said the legislation would ensure women can make their own health care decisions, even if the U.S. Supreme Court revisits abortion rights.

The measure really is saying that we trust New Mexicans to make these decisions for themselves, Lara Cadena said.

Republican lawmakers objected to the bill, arguing that New Mexico should establish a ban on late-term abortions.

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Unfortunately, the potential of the provincial councils has never been utilized properly by anyone in the North or the East. It is more unfortunate that the current Report of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has completely ignored the principles of devolution and the provincial council system in Sri Lanka.

by Dr Laksiri Fernando

What is terribly missing is the necessity of reconciliation. Further, there is no other constructive analysis or recommendationin the Report of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Almost all others are negative, destructive, or punitive. There are 11 recommendations prescribed to the Government of Sri Lanka, but nothing on the question of devolution, the Provincial Council (PC) system, or holding of elections to the PCs as soon as possible. Why?

Is she misleading the world?

This is surprising in a context where the present government or the last government have failed to hold elections to the nine Provincial Councils. They are at present defunct as peoples representative councils particularly affecting the regions and remote provinces where people are largely minorities, poor, and without basic amenities. The terms of office of the nine provinces ended in the following order.

Sabaragamuwa and Eastern  September 2017

North Central  October 2017

Central, North Western, and Northern  September 2018

Southern and Western April 2019

Uva  September 2019

The Provincial Council system was introduced to the Constitution of Sri Lanka in 1987 through the 13th Amendment (13A) with an understanding and agreement between the Sri Lankan and the Indiangovernments as a way of reconciliation to the minority-majority problems, devolution and taking care of the people affected by too much centralization of the administration and financial resources. In a recent visit to Colombo, Indias External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar has raised the issue again with his counterpart, Dinesh Gunawardena, in a friendly and a constructive manner.

Under the PC system, the Tamil community could administer at least one council (the Northern), if not two (Northern and Eastern), and influence several others (Central, Western and Uva). The Muslim community could administer or influence another council (the East) in partnership with the Sinhalese or the Tamils. All depend however on how the people use their franchise and the representatives behave after that.

The failure to hold elections to the provincial councils is a fundamental human rights question or a violation at present that the Office of the High Commissioner has completely failed to understand. Sri Lankans have the right to exercise franchise at three levels: local, provincial, and national. Any breach in this respect at any level is a fundamental violation of rights. It is possible that the High Commissioner or her advisors have gone along with the extremist sections of the Tamil community who expresses the view that provincial councils are useless for their purposes.

When C. V. Vigneswaran (a judge turned politician!) was the Chief Minister of the Northern Provincial Council (2013-2018) he used it for his extremist political objectives without utilizing the opportunities to serve the people or to pursue reconciliation. He formed a new party and passed a genocide resolution 2015. The Office of the High Commissioner perhaps is going in that direction. All these are extremist politics. These are some reasons why the people particularly in the South have some misgivings on the provincial council system on their part. Of course, the Sinhala extremists are also against provincial councilsadvocating an extremely centralized unitary state.

Otherwise, the PCs are the best institutions to address the grievances of the minorities, the rural people, and the marginalized sections of the Sri Lankan society without harming the rights of the majority. Of course, there are certain limitations and technical difficulties in the laws and administration. These should be and could be sorted out through negotiations, reforms, and cooperation. In my opinion, the vision that could be followed is cooperative devolution. This means the cooperation between the center and the provinces through formal meetings, discussions, and dialogue.

A cooperative devolution model also does not exclude the possibility of strengthening the center or national security to prevent extremism and possible terrorism. When the matters like education, health and regional development are devolved, the national government has more opportunities to focus on security, national economic development, international relations and shipping and tradein the present context.

The Finance Commission is an important element in the devolution architecture. As Article 154R (3) of the Constitution says, The Government shall, on the recommendation of, and in consultation with, the Commission, allocate from the Annual Budget, such funds as are adequate for the purpose of meeting the needs of the Provinces. The principles on which these allocations should be implemented are explained very clearly as follows (para 5).

The Commission shall formulate such principles with the objective of achieving balanced regional development in the country, and shall accordingly take into account  (a) the population of each Province; (b) the per capita income of each Province; (c) the need, progressively, to reduce social and economic disparities; and (d) the need, progressively, to reduce the difference between the per capita income of each Province and the highest per capita income among the Provinces.

Unfortunately, the potential of the provincial councils has never been utilized properly by anyone in the North or the East. It is more unfortunate that the current Report of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has completely ignored the principles of devolution and the provincial council system in Sri Lanka. If there were any positive recommendation to the government in the Report, a priority should have been given on the provincial council system and holding elections with mutual understanding between all communities as soon as possible.

Be positive and be constructive,without being politically biasare the simple advices that the people could offer to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
The decaying, heritage-listed Lamb House has been boarded up ahead of an increasingly likely council auction to recover unpaid rates.

The 119-year-old mansion, which overlooks Brisbanes CBD from atop the Kangaroo Point cliffs, will be acquired and sold by Brisbane City Council if $321,000 in outstanding rates are not paid.

A mound of newspapers and magazines litters the garden of Lamb House, which has been boarded up while its fate is determined. Credit:Tony Moore

At the front of the residence  officially and simply named Home  is a metre-high mound of newspapers and magazines fused together in a papier-mache mass forged by months or years of rain.

Rails and ironwork have fallen from the second-storey verandahs since last June, as more and more of the exposed timber perishes.
The Assam Regiment and Arunachal Scouts of the Indian Army signed an affiliation with 106 Air Force Squadron at Tezpur in Assam on Monday for capability building. Image Source: IANS News

The Assam Regiment and Arunachal Scouts of the Indian Army signed an affiliation with 106 Air Force Squadron at Tezpur in Assam on Monday for capability building. Image Source: IANS News

New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Assam Regiment and Arunachal Scouts of the Indian Army signed an affiliation with 106 Air Force Squadron at Tezpur in Assam on Monday for capability building.

The 106 Air Force Squadron is the SU-30 Squadron of the Eastern Air Command of the Indian Air Force.

The affiliation will assist them in development of mutual understanding of joint ethos, capability, limitations and core competencies of other services through common understanding of tactical military doctrines and concepts in the contemporary conflict environment.

"The Guard of Honour was inspected by Major General P.S. Behl, Colonel of the Assam Regiment and Arunachal Scouts. Thereafter the 'Charter of Affiliation' was signed by Maj Gen Behl and Gp Capt Varun Slaria, Commanding Officer, 106 Squadron," the Ministry of Defence said.

The Assam Regiment was raised on June 15, 1941 and stood its ground to turn defeat into victory, winning six battle honours in the Second World War. The contribution of the regiment in the Burma Campaign and in the 1971 Indo-Pakistan war in changing the course of the battle is well documented in history.

The 106 Squadron, IAF, was raised on December 11, 1959 and currently operates the air dominance fighter Sukhoi 30 MKI. It is the most decorated squadron of the Indian Air Force with three Mahavir Chakras and seven Vir Chakras. The squadron has been awarded the prestigious President's Standard.

The contribution of the IAF squadron and the Assam Regiment in the 1971 war and the combined war waging efforts of the regiment and Eastern Air Command in the Burma Campaign speaks volumes of their martial ardour, resoluteness and dauntless courage.

Maj Gen Behl talked about the importance of affiliation and its far reaching impact in the present day. He highlighted that the idea behind the affiliation was aimed at greater understanding of each other's operational ethos, building camaraderie and 'espirit-de-corps'.

This enhanced synergy and understanding of each other's strengths will act as a force multiplier within our armed forces, he said.

Later, Maj Gen Behl flew a familiarisation sortie on a Sukhoi 30 MKI to acquaint himself with its capabilities. The ceremony was also marked by an aerobatics display by the formidable warplane.
SOFIA -- Bulgarian prosecutors want to question a prominent Sofia businessman who fled the country after helping to reveal a fraud scheme allegedly involving prosecutors in the capital, Sofia.

The move against Iliya Zlatanov appears to be part of a related criminal investigation, and is the latest chapter in the scandal that erupted last year with the release of a documentary called The Eight Dwarves. The scandal has highlighted Bulgaria's continuing problem with corruption and organized crime.

The film alleged that the Sofia Prosecutor-Generals Office and other official entities were involved in a scheme to defraud Zlatanov and take control of the countrys biggest elevator manufacturer, which Zlatanov was the majority shareholder of.



The elevator manufacturer was seen as a prime target by shady business interests because of government efforts to rebuild and repair much of the countrys aging housing stock, which dates back to the communist era.



The European Union is helping to fund that effort, part of which would include upgrading elevators in thousands of multistory apartment blocks.

In the film, Zlatanov accused the former head of the Sofia prosecutors investigative unit, Petyo Petrov, his wife, and special prosecutor Dimitar Petrov (no relation to Petyo) of a number of crimes related to the takeover of Zlatanovs company, called Izamet.

Among other things, they allegedly threatened that if Zlatanov refused to turn over his shares in the company, his son, who suffers from a kidney ailment, could be deprived of medical hemodialysis treatment.

The film caused an uproar in Bulgarian politics; the reporter and anti-corruption activist who spearheaded the film, Nikolay Staykov, has received dozens of death threats and has gone into hiding.



Last week, however, Sofia investigators visited Zlatanovs daughters house, as part of an investigation into alleged forgery involving a former employee of the elevator manufacturer.

Speaking in an interview with RFE/RLs Bulgarian Service on February 15, Zlatanov said prosecutors want to question him as a witness as part of a criminal investigation against a company accountant who, they allege, falsified his signature on a company document.

However, Zlatanov, who spoke to RFE/RL from an undisclosed location, said he personally signed the document in question. He said it appeared the move was an attempt to pressure him. He said he feared for his personal safety if he were to return to Bulgaria and submit to questioning.

"Instead of gathering evidence, the prosecutor issued a decree on February 4 ordering [Sofia police] to determine Zlatanov's address. In the course of this procedure, my client found himself in the search system, Zlatanovs lawyer Greta Ganeva told RFE/RL.



The Sofia City Prosecutors Office did not respond to queries from RFE/RL seeking comment.



The name of the film, The Eight Dwarves, refers to a well-known Sofia restaurant where prosecutors and lawyers, and crime bosses, were known to meet regularly.
We have to ruefully acknowledge that the ones who successfully argued for saving the economy and giving back hope to the people have got it wrong  not once, but twice.

After three unusual but not altogether unpleasant months, last spring and early summer, Ireland eased up its Covid-19 lockdown and we revelled into a summer of joy  not wisely but too enthusiastically.

That reopening proceeded without controls on foreign travel. There is evidence to suggest that when the second wave hit us, from last August onwards, that a new strain of the virus from Spain was an aggravating factor.

We soldiered on through the onslaught of winter and a second lockdown, and then contemplated Christmas with a second relaxation of controls. There followed a virulent spike in cases which threatened to overwhelm health services, this time it was aggravated by a new British strain.

Given that, it must be acknowledged that the Government is managing lockdown No.3s latter stages with a strong view that it must not be followed by a fourth Covid-19 national shutdown. It is impossible to argue with that one.

But as we face into another week, at least a full week ahead of another promised Covid-19 plan, the people are equal parts weary and resigned. Surely, part of the Governments role is to urgently address the all-pervasive gloom with something more than the negative signals leaked to reporters or indirectly relayed via parliamentary party meetings.

It would be more than helpful at this point if the Government brought forward its new anti-Covid plans originally slated for publication this day week, or a few days thereafter. Otherwise the risk is that peoples resignation will turn to anger.

The time has come for clear, direct and prompt communications with the people who no longer need any sugar-coating of the message. As with other times over the last 11 months of pandemic, such frank and timely public information is now seriously lacking, and that lack is damaging.

There is a sense in all of this, that not just our politicians, but our scientific experts, and the behind-the-scenes senior government officials are all afraid of being seen to get things wrong. That anxiety must be banished.

The publics resignation at this stage, 11 months and three lockdowns into this crisis, is heavily imbued with a realisation that it has to get everything right in the response to Covid-19. We now well know the virus to be amoral, stealthy, adaptable and swift in its own unseen battle to survive and spread.

That reality tells us that the authorities response must be agile, speedy and capable of changing tack. Any new plan to emerge this month must be styled as an overall framework which can, probably must, be modified as things change.

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The evidence now all around us is that there will very likely be new variants regularly emerging, not all of them amenable to the vaccines which are being rolled out. This brings us to some of the difficulties which emerged with the current Covid-19 plan published in mid-September last.

This five-step plan was in hindsight too rigid. Reality is that the Government never kept with it, not even from the outset. We were always talking about Level 5-minus or Level 3-plus, suggesting the gradated steps were too rigid from day one. That criticism may appear to smack of pedantry  but in fact it points clearly to an erosion of public confidence.

It is clear by now that it will be after Easter before we see real movement on easing Covid-19 restrictions  if even then. Easter Sunday this year is April 4, this newspaper was told the earliest date for change was in the following week starting April 11. But do not be surprised if that slides into May.

The only change here is that the schools may be gradually reopened. This coming week will tell us much about this with difficult talks between teacher unions and the Government very finely poised. Hopefully, we will see a good outcome and the suffering of any potential lasting damage to young people finally being addressed.

Then there is the potential opening of the building industry. Housing Minister Darragh OBrien has told us that for each week the sites are closed, Ireland loses 900 new houses. Covid-19 has merely distracted us from our housing crisis which is caused by a serious shortage of new houses.

But this one is complicated. While it is clear that safe virus conduct on the sites themselves is highly feasible, we cannot be so sure about the virus spreading via building workers clubbing together to travel to work. That issue is harder to resolve  but some resolution can surely be worked out.

Everything turns on a successful roll-out of the Covid-19 vaccines. We know that this will neither be as speedy or as simple as we had first hoped. But given steady EU vaccine supplies, and a competent distribution plan in Ireland, it should proceed apace.

We can reasonably expect everyone over 70 and all health workers to be catered for by June. And by September the critical mass of people, or around eight out of 10, should be vaccinated. From then on hopes of a semblance of normality returning can be realistically entertained by all of us.

But there are three underlying assumptions which must become reality if that hope is to become real. First is that quarantine for travellers must be rigorously applied to stave off the threat of new variants. Second is that tracking and tracing is further improved to peg down any emerging cases.

The third assumption is the drearily predictable one: we still have to follow the public health guidelines on precautions to the best possible degree. If all of those variables come together, we may finally learn to live with Covid.

But we will have only won a phase of the war  not the entire war.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15) There have been no COVID-19 superspreader events brought by the reopening of cinemas in areas under modified general community quarantine, Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles said Monday as he explained the Inter-Agency Task Forces earlier decision to allow the gradual return of the industry in the stricter GCQ.

Nograles, also the IATF co-chair, told CNN Philippines that officials had basis to permit the reopening of these leisure activities  the implementation of which has been postponed in Metro Manila pending mayors meeting.

So far, weve not seen any superspreader events happening in cinemas in MGCQ areas, Nograles said in an interview with The Source. So ibig sabihin, meron na po tayong basis (so it means we have basis). And that was the reason why the IATF decided.

In an earlier interview with CNN Philippines, Metro Manila Council Chairman and Paranaque Mayor Edwin Olivarez said the local chief executives in the capital region are worried to reopen cinemas because these are airconditioned and enclosed, possibly triggering further spread of the coronavirus.

Nograles backs the suspension of the implementation, since guidelines have not yet been finalized, but expressed hope the mayors would be more open to the decision once the specific health and safety protocols are laid out.

He added environments can avoid the risk of being a superspreader if they are managed correctly.

If the management sticks to the protocols and manages it very cleanly, clearly, and tightly, then in the same manner, the patrons also are aware of the need for these protocols," Nograles pointed out. "I think hand in hand, that ensures na hindi magkakaroon ng superspreader events sa mga places like that (there wont be any superspreader events in these kinds of places)."

Opening up the economy based on science

Nograles also believes that the decision to open up the economy, including these select industries, is based on science of health, economics, and experience.

The science of experience as well because sa MGCQ areas like Ive said its already 50% in cinemas capacity, he explained.

The task force official added the country cannot afford to stay in the same place as far as economic activities and jobs are concerned.

Ang bottom line naman dito is hanapbuhay (The bottomline here is the livelihood). I saw somewhere that were really talking here about 300,000 jobs, he added.

Meanwhile, Health Spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire said in a media forum the same day that government authorities have been tasked to come up with ventilation guidelines in cinemas.

From Entergy Texas:

Entergy Texas has started periodic power outages for its customers across southeast Texas. The company is taking this action as directed by our reliability coordinator, the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, as a last resort and in order to prevent a more extensive, prolonged power outage that could severely affect the reliability of the power grid.

Crews have taken proactive steps to prepare and protect our assets from the extreme cold as well as placed additional power generation into service. Due to bitterly cold temperatures and the winter storm, the demand for electricity has reached an all-time high.

We apologize for the inconvenience these outages may cause, but we have an unusual situation right now driven by extreme weather conditions. We are working to respond and restore power as soon as it is safely possible, said Stuart Barrett, vice president of customer service. While our crews worked to prepare for this storm, a loss of generation combined with the peak load has caused a strain on the system. As a result, we are short of the power needed to meet our customers demands across southeast Texas.

Depending on conditions, individual customers may experience multiple outages during the day.

MISO is taking action or directing actions to be taken to restore the system to normal operations as quickly as possible and will direct Entergy Texas to stop the periodic outages as soon as the power shortfall no longer threatens the integrity of the rest of the electrical power system.

If customers decide to use a portable generator, use it safely and DO NOT run it in an enclosed space.

If connecting to the whole house, do so only if the connection has been installed by a licensed electrician to prevent back feed on to the distribution system.

We continuously keep our communities informed throughout a storm. Customers are encouraged to download our free app for their smartphone at entergy.com/app and sign up for text alerts. Customers can also stay up to date by visiting the Entergy Storm Center website and our View Outages page. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook or check for updates with your local news media like radio, television and newspapers.



MISO comprises a pool of electricity generators and users that stretches from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, and as reliability coordinator is responsible for monitoring the portion of the electric grid it oversees and providing instructions to its members regarding actions needed to maintain reliability in that portion of the grid. In extreme and unusual circumstances, such actions may include periodic outages of the type occurring today.
SCG Packaging is one of the leading packaging businesses in Thailand (Photo: Komchadluek)

Bangkok  Thailands SCG Packaging (SCGP) is joining hands with its Vietnamese partners under an investment worth 10 billion THB (334 million USD) to expand its packaging solution business in Vietnam, where demand for packaging products is growing.

The latest move is the signing of a share purchase agreement on February 9 to acquire a 70 percent stake in the Duy Tan Plastics Manufacturing Corporation, Vietnam's top producer of rigid plastic packaging products, according to its letter sent to the Stock Exchange of Thailand.

The purchase will be made through the SCGP's wholly-owned subsidiary and further transaction details will be provided in the middle of this year.

SCGP chief executive Wichan Jitpukdee said SCGP has constantly increased investment in Vietnam, which has yielded a revenue growth of more than 10 percent annually.

"SCGP is prepared to work with all partners to share experience and knowledge in the development of integrated packaging solutions and support the growing demand for diverse types of packaging among customers in ASEAN," Wichan was quoted by the Bangkok Post as saying.

Duy Tan operates business-to-business sales to multinational companies and local brand owners of consumer and fast-moving consumer goods. The company also manufactures household plastic containers under the brand name "Duy Tan," with a capacity of 116,000 tonnes per year, the paper said.

The 10 billion baht is part of 20-billion-baht investment budget the SCGP announced last month for business expansion and merger and acquisition plans.

Earlier in 2009, the SCGP established Vina Kraft Paper in the Vietnamese southern province of Binh Duong to produce packaging paper, with total production capacity of 500,000 tonnes per year.

In 2015 the company invested in the Tin Thanh Packing Joint Stock Company (BATICO), one of the five largest flexible packaging producers in Vietnam.

The company also acquired 94.11 percent stake in the Bien Hoa Packaging Joint Stock Company (SOVI), a producer of corrugated paper and offset laminated packaging in Vietnam, with an annual total capacity of 100,000 tonnes.

According to Wichan, all three projects expand SCGP's production base for downstream products in Vietnam and are expected to contribute sales of an additional 8.5 billion baht per year.

The SCGP is also seeking opportunities for business expansion in paper production capacity in northern Vietnam to serve demand within the country.
Research News

Murphy offers 10 reasons to take the COVID-19 vaccine

By CHRISTOPHER SCHOBERT, DANIELLE ABRAMO-BALLING and MEGAN WILSON-CROWLEY

The vaccines are what is going to help us get rid of the virus in our community. 

For a variety of reasons, many Americans are uncertain about receiving the COVID-19 vaccines. One element is not knowing where to turn for trustworthy information.

Thats why UBNow asked Timothy F. Murphy, SUNY Distinguished Professor of Medicine, director of UBs Clinical and Translational Science Institute and an infectious diseases physician scientist, to share some important details about the vaccines and why they are so vital in the fight against the virus.

You have to assess the risks and the benefits, Murphy says. What are the risks here compared to the potential benefit? Hundreds of millions of vaccines are safely administered each year in this country. And as of Feb. 1, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) tracker shows that more than 400,000 people have died from COVID infection in the past 11 months in this country alone. The vaccines are what is going to help us get rid of the virus in our community.

If a COVID-19 vaccine is available to you or members of your family, Murphy says, do not delay. Here are 10 reasons why.

The science for the vaccines was not rushed.

People worry that the vaccines were developed too quickly. However, the science was not rushed, Murphy explains. The research that led to these vaccines has been going on for 15 years or more; it started during the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemic in 2003 and 2004. This is the case for the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, and it is going to be the same with the other vaccines to come.

The vaccine testing process was efficient, but no steps were skipped.

There are two main reasons the Moderna and Pfizer trials were completed so quickly: collaboration among lots of partners and the fact that the trials were conducted at multiple sites, he says. Since there are so many COVID infections occurring during the trials, we were able to test them quicker and get a faster result. There was no compromising at all in terms of the number of people that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) required to be studied in order to determine the vaccines are safe and effective.

All of the data produced from the vaccine trials was carefully reviewed.

Before any trial can begin it must first be reviewed and approved by the Data and Safety Monitoring Board. If there is a bad effect, they stop the study right away, Murphy says. Once the trial is complete, the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee reviews the data and advises the FDA on whether the vaccine should move forward. The next reviewer is the FDA itself  career scientists who review all the results. The CDC has a fourth review panel that looks at all of the data and the recommendations, and makes a final decision. So, these vaccines have gone through four careful reviews by neutral experts to determine that the vaccines are safe and effective.

Both the Moderna and Pfizer studies included a diverse group of participants.

The Moderna trial included a significant number of racial and ethnic minorities (Black or African American, Asian, American Indian or Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, multiracial and Hispanic or Latino), as did the Pfizer trial, Murphy says. Both studies were done in such a way that we can say, in contrast to many clinical trials, this vaccine works in our population nationally. It was tested in a broad range of people.

The vaccine is safe and effective for people who are older and/or have multiple chronic conditions.

In elderly people, there were no serious side effects in either the Moderna or the Pfizer trials, Murphy says. The reactions  fever, muscle aches and fatigue  are less common in the elderly and people over 65 than they are in people under 65. The vaccines were more than 95% effective in preventing severe infection, which means they save lives. They work just as well for people over 65 as under 65. This is very important because 80% of deaths from COVID are in people over the age of 65.

People with allergies can take the vaccine.

If you have allergies  food allergies, contact dermatitis, egg allergy, pollen allergies, allergies to other medicines  you are no more likely to have an allergic reaction to these vaccines than someone who does not have any allergies, Murphy says. The only people who should not take the vaccine are people who are known to be allergic to an ingredient in the vaccine itself.

We need 75-80% of the population to be vaccinated in order for COVID-19 to go away.

Epidemiologists talk about whats called the R-value. If someone has COVID and passes it to one person, that is an R-value of 1. When we can keep the R-value below 1, we wipe out the virus, Murphy explains. The estimate is that the R-value of the coronavirus is 2.6. So, without masking or social distancing, each person who has COVID will give it to 2.6 people. That number is what allowed scientists to calculate that about 75-80% of people in the population need to be vaccinated in order for the virus to go away.

When we reach herd immunity, even those who have not yet received the vaccine will be protected.

The importance of having a large part of the population immunized is that it causes COVID cases to decrease, Murphy says. And when we do that, not only are the people who are vaccinated protected, the people who are not yet vaccinated are also protected because there is less of the virus in the community going from person to person. The whole idea of herd immunity is that when more people are protected from the virus by the vaccine, fewer people have the virus so the risk of spread noticeably drops and the virus will go away. And then none of us will be at risk anymore.

Mutations in the virus do not mean the current vaccines will become outdated.

As we are learning, there are some mutated versions of the coronavirus. It is going to continue to be watched, and if the virus does change, then it may become like the flu vaccine where you have to get it every year, Murphy says. However, that is not going to make the current COVID vaccines outdated. It is worth noting that coronavirus mutates much more slowly than the flu virus.

There is plenty of COVID and vaccine information available from trustworthy sources.

The CDC website is easy to find and has COVID information and frequently asked questions right at the top of the page, Murphy says. You can find helpful local information, including where to get a test, from the Erie County Department of Health. The county site, as well as UB's COVID-19 vaccine guidance website, also offer vaccine information. You can get local and state information from the New York State Department of Health, and the state website can help you determine if you are eligible yet for the vaccines or make an appointment. It also features a nice what you need to know section. The New York Times vaccine tracker is a great resource, as is the Johns Hopkins University of Medicine Coronavirus Resource Center. Those are the best, and it is also worth noting that social media in general is a bad place to get accurate information. I encourage everyone to make the effort to get reliable information.
There is no evidence having schools open drives the spread of coronavirus in the wider community in the UK, SAGE advisers have found.

In a study of pupil and teacher absences caused by positive Covid tests, researchers said confirmed infections in schools did not lead to bigger outbreaks.

Instead, they said there were small signs that the opposite was true, and that schools tended to get worse hit when the cases around them had rocketed.

Schools are gearing up to bring their pupils back into classrooms within weeks, with Boris Johnson optimistic about beginning to the long route back to normality from March 8.

Many pupils have been home-schooling for almost all of the past year, except for a brief period between September and December before the second wave spiralled out of control.

But education bosses fear rushing back to normal classes could lead to an explosion in cases, leading to more closures and greater disruption. Neither pupils nor staff will have been routinely vaccinated against the virus.

Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, described Number 10's plan as 'impossible' and suggested it was too optimistic to be promising normality in March.

Dr Mike Tildesley and Dr Ed Hill, members of SAGE sub-group SPI-M and Warwick University experts who did the study published today, said the reopening should be cautious and that it was important to 'mitigate' the inevitable risks of doing it.

The team admitted their paper was 'an absence of evidence rather than evidence of absence' of risk. And they conceded it probably underestimated how many Covid cases there actually are in schools because many people don't get tested.

Schools in the UK have had to try and maintain social distancing between children but this is particularly difficult among the very young. On the other hand, missing school is particularly damaging for this age group as they are in key development stages (Pictured: Year 1 and 2 pupils eat lunch at a school in Greater Manchester last year)

The Warwick study found Covid cases among teachers fell during the November lockdown, even though schools remained open.

And in December, cases in schools appeared to rise in tandem with outbreaks in the community, with bigger outbreaks in London and the South East, where the new variant was surging, and fewer cases in more rural regions.

Evidence showed that the numbers of people taking time off appeared to track alongside general outbreaks in the area around the school.

But there was no sign cases in schools would predict an outbreak in the community. Instead, there was 'weak' evidence that the opposite was true, suggesting pupils and teachers were more likely to get infected elsewhere.

Secondary schools appeared to see more confirmed cases in pupils and teachers, the study found, compared to primaries.

Academy boss says No10 must vaccinate teachers to avoid having to shut schools again An academy chief today cast doubt on 'optimistic' plans to get all pupils back into school at the start of March as he warned dates were 'being pulled out of thin air.' As the PM faces mounting pressure to send children in England back to school, Downing Street has suggested that all primary and secondary children can return to classrooms three weeks today. But Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, described Number 10's plan as 'impossible'. He suggested ministers take a 'regional approach' by vaccinating all staff before sending pupils back. He also warned schools needed to create more space including having marquees in playgrounds, to avoid children being 'like sardines in a can'. Mr Chalke is the founder of the Oasis Trust, which runs 53 schools around the country. He warned against the chaotic scenes last September, when all children were sent back after the summer break, 'like sardines into a can.' He told BBC Radio 4 Today's programme: 'We're optimistic because the vaccine seems to be working, we all want to get children back...because we know all children will learn better with their peers in a classroom than at home online or whatever.' Advertisement

A difficulty with the study was that it relied on officially reported infections. Children, particularly young ones, are known to only rarely get symptoms of Covid, meaning the virus may have been spreading among them unnoticed.

Dr Tildesley said in a briefing today: 'We need to approach the data with an element of caution  this will be an underestimate of the true number of cases within schools.

'There will be some children with very mild symptoms or no symptoms at all.'

Because the data could not prove that Covid doesn't spread in schools  it only found there is no strong proof it does  the scientists said it shouldn't change the way schools reopen.

Dr Tildesley added the country should be 'stepping slowly out of this and monitoring it and allowing vaccination to keep pace'.

He said: 'Given there's an uncertainty as to what will happen if we open all schools, and whether [the R rate] will go above one, there is certainly an argument for staggering this.

'So, potentially, thinking about early years or primary schools and then easing back in might be something for the Government to consider.'

The study looked at absence rates among children and teachers and compared them with the communities around them to work out whether outbreaks appeared to come earlier, and independent of, larger surges in cases.

There were 1,320,113 report of absences to the Department of Education between September 1 and December 17, they found.

But they could not be disentangled from community outbreaks.

The researchers wrote: 'When we examined the relationship between community and school cases in more depth, we observed a correlation between cases in the community and cases in schools in most regions, with the strongest correlation between current cases in schools and community cases reported several days previously.

'From this analysis we conclude that there is not sufficient evidence to suggest that outbreaks in schools are driving an increase in community cases, with the calculated correlations providing weak evidence suggesting the opposite may be true, that an increase in incidence in the community leads to more cases in schools.

'As schools re-open, careful monitoring may be required in order to determine the risk associated with open schools upon community incidence.'

Number 10's strategy for reopening schools has become a hot topic of speculation in recent weeks as teachers wait to hear how it will happen.

Boris Johnson is expected to outline possibilities next Monday. Officials promised to give teachers and parents two weeks' notice before schools reopened.

The data showed that the numbers of pupils who were testing positive for coronavirus declined in November's lockdown (light grey shaded period) in November even though schools were open at the time, suggesting the outbreaks inside schools mirror the community and not vice versa

The same was true of secondary school pupils, who had higher rates of Covid-related absence

Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, has described Number 10's plan to get classes back up and running on March 8 as 'impossible'.

He suggested ministers take a 'regional approach' by vaccinating all staff before sending pupils back.

He also warned schools needed to create more space including having marquees in playgrounds, to avoid children being 'like sardines in a can'.

Mr Chalke is the founder of the Oasis Trust, which runs 53 schools around the country.

He warned against the chaotic scenes last September, when all children were sent back after the summer break, 'like sardines into a can.'

He told BBC Radio 4 Today's programme: 'We're optimistic because the vaccine seems to be working, we all want to get children back...because we know all children will learn better with their peers in a classroom than at home online or whatever.

'But optimism can be born of two things  dreams and hopes or planning and preparation.

'What we don't need is a false start. It's one thing to open schools - it's another thing to keep them open.

'Dates are pulled out of thin air  March 8, after half-term, January 4, it could be Easter, it could be May.'

In a blog last week, the Department for Education appeared to be trying to dampen expectations, saying: 'We hope to be able to start welcoming back more pupils from 8 March at the earliest.

'It is important to reiterate that we do not see this as a 'return to school' but more of an expansion of the numbers of pupils already in school.'

How WILL lockdown be lifted? Schools will open first on March 8, followed by outdoor sports including golf and tennis and picnics with friends in the park - and grandparents could see grandchildren BEFORE Easter (with UK minibreaks 'back on by April')

Britons could be out and about playing golf and tennis and enjoying time in the park with friends and family within weeks under plans being drawn up to ease the lockdown.

Boris Johnson this morning pledged a 'cautious but irreversible' approach to easing restrictions that have been in place since the new year.

The Prime Minister is due to unveil a 'roadmap' out of lockdown on February 22 that is expected to confirm at least some children will return to school on March 8.

But he and ministers are refusing to reveal and other firm dates - and have warned that any they do announce will be the 'earliest' measures could be lifted - reserving the right to push the lifting back if there are any new spikes in Covid cases.

However reports suggest that some of the more gruelling social aspects of the lockdown - like preventing grandparents from seeing grandchildren and barring people from enjoying outdoor spaces unless exercising - could be among the first to be lifted.

Non-essential shops could also lift their shutters March.

There are even suggestions that domestic holidays could return in time for Easter - but limited to family bubbles staying in self-catering accommodation.

Pubs and restaurants are also expected to open in April - initially to serve people outdoors.

Plans to ease lockdown were boosted yesterday by figures showing the dramatic impact vaccines are already having as Mr Johnson last night confirmed the country had hit its target of 15 million vaccinations ahead of schedule.

The Prime Minister said the number of new cases has already dropped 'very considerably' preparing the way for lockdown measures to be relaxed.

Here is how the lockdown lifting could pan out:

Boris Johnson this morning pledged a 'cautious but irreversible' approach to easing restrictions that have been in place since the new year.

February 22: Boris Johnson unveils his roadmap

Mr Johnson will unveil his lockdown-easing roadmap to MPs and the nation on Monday.

But after a year of anti-coronavirus measures that have been marked by often misplaced optimism and criticism over doing too little, too late, the Prime Minister today stressed the need to be 'very prudent', while lockdown-sceptical Tory MPs pressure for a swift reopening.

'No decisions have been taken on that sort of detail (dates) yet, though clearly schools on March 8 has for a long time been a priority of the Government and of families up and down the country,' Mr Johnson told reporters during a visit to Orpington Health and Wellbeing Centre in south-east London.

He added that 'we will do everything we can to make that happen', but cautioned that infection rates are still 'comparatively high' and Covid-19 patients in the NHS remain higher than the April peak.

'So we've got to be very prudent and what we wanted to see is progress that is cautious but irreversible and I think that's what the public and people up and down the country will want to see,' Mr Johnson added.

March 8: Children return to school

The only firm date so far in the PM's lockdown diary is March 8, when children will return to school for face-to-face lessons for the first time since January.

Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, described Number 10's plan as 'impossible'

What are the UK priority groups for vaccinations? 1. Residents in a care home for older adults and staff working in care homes for older adults 2. All those 80 years of age and over and frontline health and social care workers 3. All those 75 years of age and over 4. All those 70 years of age and over and clinically extremely vulnerable individuals (not including pregnant women and those under 16 years of age) 5. All those 65 years of age and over 6. Adults aged 16 to 65 years in an at-risk group 7. All those 60 years of age and over 8. All those 55 years of age and over 9. All those 50 years of age and over 10. Rest of the population Advertisement

The only firm date so far in the PM's lockdown diary is March 8, when children will return to school for face-to-face lessons for the first time since January.

The remaining question is over how many children will go back straight away. Reports have suggested that a staggered approach may be taken, with secondary schools going back a week later than primaries.

Mr Johnson said today that no decisions have been made on whether year groups across schools in England will return together or whether primaries and secondaries could be staggered.

An academy chief today cast doubt on the 'optimistic' plans as he warned dates were 'being pulled out of thin air.'

Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, described Number 10's plan as 'impossible'.

He suggested ministers take a 'regional approach' by vaccinating all staff before sending pupils back.

He also warned schools needed to create more space including having marquees in playgrounds, to avoid children being 'like sardines in a can'.

Professor Neil Ferguson, who advises the Government as part of the New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group (Nervtag), said modelling suggests 'there probably is leeway to reopen all schools' from March 8 but acknowledged there will be 'slightly more of a risk' in a rise in cases than if just primary schools were reopened.

Professor Gabriel Scally, president of the epidemiology and public health section at the Royal Society of Medicine and a member of Independent Sage, said schools must be made safe before reopening.

He told Good Morning Britain: 'By taking on extra space, by improving ventilation, by extending mask-wearing in schools - all of these things will help.'

Early March: Outdoor rules loosened, return of golf and tennis

After the schools are reopened, some of the social measures in place in the lockdown are likely to be among the first to be lifted.

Exercise is the only regular reason people in England have been allowed to leave home, but this rule is likely to be among the first to be relaxed to bring respite to people cooped up at home, especially without a garden.

People are expected to be allowed to meet friends and family outdoors on a one-to-one basis - with social distancing - and in a boost for families this two-person total may not include children.

A Government source also told The Telegraph: 'If grandparents had had the vaccine, that would be likely to be okay.

'Given that people will have immunity, that would be a fair assumption, but nothing has been decided.'

Mr Johnson also wants to bring back the rule of six for outdoor gatherings, which would allow families to meet in groups for walks or picnics.

The rules could also allow for the resumption of outdoor individual sports and those where competitors do not come into close contact with each other. Golf and Tennis have both been banned during the lockdown but could be among the first to resume.

Late March: non-essential shops

Plans to ease lockdown were boosted yesterday by figures showing the dramatic impact vaccines are already having (packed high street pictured during December last year before the latest lockdown was imposed)

High Street shops will be allowed to reopen within weeks if Covid infection rates keep dropping.

High Street shops will be allowed to reopen within weeks if Covid infection rates keep dropping.

Government sources expect this will happen towards the end of March, or the beginning of April at the latest.

Rishi Sunak's furlough scheme and other job-prevention measures were extended late last year to cover the period up to the end of April. But firms will be able to access emergency loans only until the end of March.

Any reopening before would act as a welcome economic stimulus and ease - if only a little - the massive level of public spending during the pandemic.

Easter: Pubs could reopen, self-catering holidays allowed

Ministers are said to be considering plans to allow hospitality firms to serve customers outside by Easter, which falls on the weekend of April 2.

But a full reopening which service and seating inside pubs as well is not expected until May at the earliest.

Wetherspoon boss Tim Martin today warned that the industry is 'on its knees' and must reopen to save jobs.

Aditionally, Mitchells & Butlers, which owns All Bar One, Toby Carvery and Harvester said it will raise 350million from its largest investors to shore up its finances.

M&B, which is Britain's largest listed pub company, operates around 1,700 restaurants and pubs across the UK but cut about 1,300 jobs last year.

The developments follow a bust-up between pub groups and the Government which has seen companies pull out of regular business roundtables in frustration.

The head of industry body UK Hospitality warned today said there will need to be more support for businesses if restrictions continue.

Kate Nicholls said that flexible furlough and grants would need to be extended past March 31 cut-off without some way of opening to make money.

It is thought that due to the vaccine rollout success ministers are currently looking at plans that would allow families that live in the same household to go away for self-catered staycations as soon as the Easter holidays (Cornwall pictured)

She told Good Morning Britain: 'If we are to stay closed or severely restricted for much longer then we are going to need to have additional government support over and above that (which has been provided to date). Flexible furlough and grants going on beyond March 31 so that our businesses can survive.'

Ms Nicholls called for a 'very clear phased exit strategy from the lockdown and then from the restrictions that the hospitality sector is facing'.

She said: 'Even if we open up under lockdown, we're opening up under very strict restrictions that meant we didn't break even last year when we were trading from July, so we can be confident that we can be safe when we reopen and when the time is right.

'We need to see not just that initial date but the phasing out of those restrictions linked to the rollout of the vaccine.'

In a recent letter to Mr Johnson, chief executive of pub giant Young's, Patrick Dardis, said: "There is no reason why pubs cannot open in April, giving people back their liberty and their much-loved pub."

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's World At One on Monday, Mr Dardis described reports of allowing pubs to serve customers outside only as "a nonsense" and "just a lockdown in another name".

But Dr Bharat Pankhania, senior clinical lecturer at the University of Exeter medical school, said talking about pubs reopening in April is "premature" and pub bosses need to realise there is a danger of going "back to square one".

Mr Johnson today promised Britons will not need to carry a 'vaccine passport' to go to the pub. He shot down growing reports the controversial scheme is being looked at as a tactic to keep the economy open when restrictions are finally lifted.

But Mr Johnson conceded that some form of proof of vaccination will likely be needed to get international travel back up and running in the future.

'I think inevitably there will be great interest in ideas like can you show that you had a vaccination against Covid in the way that you sometimes have to show you have had a vaccination against Yellow Fever or other diseases in order to travel somewhere,' he said.

'I think that is going to be very much in the mix down the road, I think that is going to happen. What I don't think we will have in this country is - as it were - vaccination passports to allow you to go to, say, the pub or something like that.'

It is thought that due to the vaccine rollout success ministers are currently looking at plans that would allow families that live in the same household to go away for self-catered staycations as soon as the Easter holidays.

This has raised fears that letting people travel long distances to their destinations could lead to 'big movements' across the UK - potentially leading to a spike in coronavirus cases once again.

The Save Future Travel Coalition, made up of 12 leading travel trade organisations, has said it is vital that the Government works with the industry to develop a road map to reopen travel.

The coalition warns that the industry cannot afford to wait until everyone in the UK is vaccinated before people start to travel again, otherwise insolvencies and redundancies will be inevitable.

The industry argues that a risk-based approach to travel, including a co-ordinated approach to vaccine certificates and use of passenger testing will be critical in opening up the overseas travel market.

Last week Downing Street said the Government is doing 'everything we can to make sure people can have a holiday this summer' but Mr Johnson and other ministers have repeatedly cautioned that it is too early to be certain about what people will be able to do regarding holidays.

May: Weddings?

A group of senior Tory MPs has demanded Boris Johnson allow Covid-safe weddings to resume from March 8 and unrestricted ceremonies from May 1.

Some 13 Conservative backbenchers, including 1922 Committee chairman Sir Graham Brady, have backed the What About Weddings campaign.

The group is pushing for the Prime Minister to include the moves in his lockdown exit plan which he is due to unveil next week.

Philip Davies and Esther McVey, who got married last September, are among 13 Tory MPs who have backed the What About Weddings campaign

The MPs want Mr Johnson to deliver some hope to the hundreds of thousands of people who are waiting to get married and who have seen their plans ruined by lockdown.

The group is being led by Tory MPs Esther McVey and Philip Davies who got married last September.

Current lockdown rules state that people should 'only consider booking a wedding or civil partnership (or continuing with one that is already booked) in exceptional circumstances', for example in cases of terminal illness or life changing surgery.

The What About Weddings campaign represents 400,000 people who work in the 14.7billion UK wedding industry and the estimated half a million couples waiting for restrictions to be lifted so they can get married.
LONDON (Reuters) - The number of people heading out to shops across Britain increased by 1.5% last week from the previous week, a fourth straight week of rises, indicating that Britons are increasingly tiring of lockdown, industry data showed on Monday.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson ordered England into a new national lockdown on Jan. 4 to contain a surge in COVID-19 cases that threatened to overwhelm parts of the health system.

Under the rules in England, schools are closed to most pupils, people should work from home if possible, and all hospitality and non-essential shops are closed. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have imposed similar measures.

Essential shops allowed to stay open include food outlets and home improvement retailers.

Market researcher Springboard said that while footfall in high streets declined by 1.7% in the week to Feb. 13 versus the previous week, there were rises of 3.9% in shopping centres and 6.1% in retail parks.

Despite Beast from the East 2 hitting virtually all of the UK at some point last week, footfall across retail destinations continued to rise from the week before," said Springboard director Diane Wehrle, referring to bitterly cold and snowy weather.

"Last week was the fourth consecutive week in which footfall has increased from the week before, delivering ever more evidence that shoppers are experiencing lockdown fatigue and are increasingly willing to travel to retail destinations, whatever the weather," she said.

Despite the week-on-week rise, Springboard said footfall was still 61.4% lower than in the same week last year.

(Reporting by James Davey; Editing by Kate Holton and Nick Macfie)


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Bamako, Mali (PANA) - Leaders of the G5 Sahel have gathered in the Chadian capital, N'Djamena, for their their Summit that will discuss security issues in the area
The Winter Weather Advisory has been upgraded to a Winter Storm Warning as confidence grows on heavy snow.

The criteria for a Winter Storm Warning is generally more than 6 inches of snow in a 12-hour time period. It appears that much of southeast Lower will get at least 6 inches of snow from this evening through noon Tuesday, when the snow winds down.

Winter Storm Warning in pink for the heaviest snow, and Winter Weather Advisory in purple.

The pink area is the newly-issued Winter Storm Warning area, and includes Ann Arbor, Detroit, Oakland County, Flint, all of the Thumb except Tuscola County, and the southern border counties.

The Winter Storm Warning effective time gives you a really good feel for the period of heaviest snow. The warning is in effect from 6 p.m. tonight to noon Tuesday. The northern warning area of Genesee County and the western parts of Huron and Lapeer Counties can plan on 5 to 8 inches of snow. Southeast Lower, including Ann Arbor and Detroit can plan on 6 to 9 inches of snow.

So get set for a good old-fashioned heavy February snow. Its not an extreme snowfall, but it will make dangerous driving tonight and Tuesday morning.
By Tom Balmforth

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia and the United States are in talks on a possible prisoner swap that could secure the release of Paul Whelan, a former U.S. marine jailed for spying, within two to three months, his lawyer told Reuters on Monday.

Russia convicted Whelan, who holds U.S., British, Canadian and Irish passports, of spying last June and sentenced him to 16 years in jail. He denied spying and said he was set up in a sting operation. Washington demanded his release.

Moscow said that Whelan had been caught red-handed with classified information in a Moscow hotel room where agents from the Federal Security Service detained him on Dec. 28, 2018.

Whelan's Russian lawyer, Vladimir Zherebenkov, said that talks on an exchange were now taking place between Russian and U.S. security services.

"I speak with the siloviks (Russia's security services). They say that negotiations are under way. The question with an exchange will be resolved," he said.

"As far as I understand some kind of initiative has appeared, I think the American side has begun initiating talks...specifically under Biden," he said.

Zherebenkov has said in the past that he believed Moscow wanted an exchange deal that could include Whelan. It has not been previously reported that talks with U.S. President Joe Biden's administration were happening.

"According to my information, negotiations are underway and the question of a handover will be resolved in the coming two to three months," he added.

The U.S. Embassy did not reply to a request for comment.

Zherebenkov said he was not in a position to say if the talks were broaching the case of Trevor Reed, another former U.S. marine who was jailed by Russia for nine years in July for endangering the lives of two Moscow policemen.

Washington has protested both Whelan and Reed's cases, describing the latter's trial as "theater of the absurd" and lacking serious evidence.

Story continues

Russia's Foreign Ministry said on Jan. 27 that Reed and Whelan were wrongly presented in the West as innocent victims and had been convicted of crimes in Russia. It said talk of their exchange was being used to exert pressure on Moscow.

Zherebenkov said there were various views in Moscow as to which Russians held in custody by the United States could be exchanged for Whelan.

He named arms dealer Viktor Bout and Konstantin Yaroshenko, who was convicted of conspiracy to smuggle cocaine. Russia has long sought their release. He also suggested unnamed Russian entrepreneurs and people he described as computer programmers.

(Reporting by Tom Balmforth; editing by Angus MacSwan)
On Feb. 14, the most romantic day of the year, Brian Austin Green celebrated love with his new girlfriend.

On Instagram, Green and Sharna Burgess shared a couple of details about their new romance, gushing about their unique connection.

The 47-year-old "Beverly Hills: 90210" star didn't fail to mention that he had a very "weird year," but he is thankful that he's having a memorable Valentine's Day.

He also described Sharna in the video as "amazing, considerate, loving, and kind."

"I kind of feel like when you put yourself in a space where you on some level decide that you're gonna surround yourself with people that help you move forward on a path instead of pulling you back, that they do that," Green said, per Us Weekly.

After his high-profile split with Hollywood actress Megan Fox, he credited the "Dancing With the Stars" professional for leading him in a new direction.

"Sharna's been amazing in my life, not only for that reason, but that's been a big thing for me," Green added. He also said of their relationship, "This could be the start of something amazing."

Brian Austin Green's Girlfriend

Sharna Burgess also had great things to say about her new beau. In the clip, she revealed how their relationship completely took her by surprise because he was a unique man.

The 35-year-old Aussie native praised the actor for not only being a good human but also for being an amazing father.

She witnessed what kind of father Brian Austin Green was when they went on a trip to Big Bear, California, along with the three kids he shares with Megan--who is currently dating Machine Gun Kelly.

The pair talked about their fun trip details, even sharing entertaining stories that also serve as warning tales.

During their trip, Green revealed he made liquor-store ground beef and steaks "that were about paper at the point they were done."

They were supposed to enjoy their meals at a restaurant, but the place wasn't taking reservations, so they decided to take matters into their own hands and start grilling.

In the end, the kids were reportedly content with their little adventure.

"They had mac and cheese and fish sticks. We had some fried rice with chicken from the night before and liquor store steaks," Green added.

Instagram Official

On Jan. 11, Brian Austin Green and Sharna Burgess confirmed their relationship by posting a PDA picture.

She captioned the photo, "HIM" alongside a lips emoji.

They were first spotted jetting off to Hawaii on Christmas Day for a vacation.

See Now: Famous Actors Who Turned Down Iconic Movie Roles
He's also one of the five engineers who left Ferrari in the so-called "Ferrari night of the Long Knives," the event that eventually led to the creation of Bizzarrini S.p.A and the beautiful, intriguing, and innovative P538.It took Giotto Bizzarrini around five years to unleash the P538. That's because he originally created Automobili Turismo e Sport with ex-Ferrari engineers, where he created the famous 250 "Breadvan." He then joined Iso Rivolta before establishing Bizzarrini S.p.A in 1964.Bizzarrini designed a couple of road-legal cars before the P538, but it was the latter that combined all of Giotto's innovative ideas. Featuring disc brakes at all four corners, a fully independent suspension, and a fiberglass body mounted over a tubular steel chassis, the P538 was one of the most modern race cars by the time it broke cover in 1965. But it was also incredibly beautiful for a low-slung barchetta.The American underpinnings made it even hotter and appealing to both racing enthusiasts and car collectors of the era. No longer having access to Ferrari engines, Giotto turned to American power for the P538, something it had already done while working with Iso Rivolta. The engine of choice? A small-block, 5.4-liter V8 from Chevrolet. Bizzarrini went with the most iconic small-block V8 of the era, the 5.4-liter that GM offered in the Corvette, with up to 375 horsepower.Giotto also built a couple of cars fitted with Lamborghini V12 power. One was shipped to the U.S. with a 4.0-liter engine and was raced at Can-Am, while the second one was prepared for the 24 Hours of Le Mans with a 3.5-liter unit. That's the same V12 that powered the 350GT and the Miura back in the day and became the basis for every Lambo V12 until the 2000s (up to the Murcielago).Bizzarrini built only a handful of P538s, with most records reporting five examples. At least one was disassembled by 1970 and rebuilt for an American client in 1974. Was the P538 a successful race car, as Giotto had dreamed? No. Financial problems prevented Giotto from developing the P538 to its full potential, while new FIA rules ousted the car from European endurance racing.But the P538 was proof that Italy still had a fighting chance against the Ford GT40 after Ferrari failed to recapture its glory at Le Mans in 1966. The P538 has also soldiered on as a fine example of Italian beauty powered by American muscle.And yes, the P538 is a rare collectible nowadays. RM Sotheby's is offering one for 475,000 (about $576,560). It's a late model that Bizzarrini rebuilt in the 1970s, and it packs the massive Chevy V8. It's not the most valuable version out there, but it's arguably the rarest car you can buy for a half-million bucks.That's barely enough to buy a pair of Ferrari 250 GTO wheels, but unlike the latter, the P538 is a truly unique piece of automotive art of unparalleled scarcity. And you can argue all you want, but nothing beats a big V8 in a race car. Not even a Ferrari V12. Hear for yourself!
Is liberal democracy liberal enough? By J.K. Baltzersen

In his essay Liberalism and Its Discontents, Francis Fukuyama argues that the greatest threat against "democracy" is against the liberal component of liberal democracy. In a response, Ian Bassin says the real complaints are with the democracy component. When Fukuyama admits to, on behalf of general public discourse, the shorthand of "democracy" really meaning liberal democracy, he addresses a problem. We should be talking about democracy (pure majority rule) and liberal democracy as two different things. Unfortunately, way too many people assume an implicit modifier liberal when referring to democracy. How are we going to know what we are talking about when we are so sloppy with terms? On the one hand, we speak of democracy almost as if it is sacred. On the other hand, we are surprised that people with reference to head count want to ease the limits on democracy  or the liberal component of liberal democracy, if you will. It should come as no surprise at all. Double-speak has its perils. In his description of why liberalism (in a sense more related to classical liberalism than the modern American meaning of the word, although not entirely the same as classical liberalism) is under threat from the left, Fukuyama spins the story of excessive liberalism since the presidency of Ronald Reagan and the premiership of Margaret Thatcher. While there may be some truth to that story, it is far from the whole truth. Government has been expanding immensely in size and reach, in spending and regulation. Reagan and Thatcher did not stop that process. As Joseph E. Capizzi notes: "The modern state is so much more vast and comprehensive than the state of the late 18th and early 19th centuries[.]" And Shadi Hamid touches on the problem as well: "[L]iberalism, with the passing of time, tends to have trouble staying minimalist and classical. It is fascinating that Fukuyama apparently cannot tell the Chicago school of economics and the Austrian school of economics apart. It is particularly remarkable when discussing the financial crisis now about a dozen years ago, where monetary economics is involved, monetary economics being a field where the two schools in particular tend to be in disagreement. Fukuyama puts the blame on said financial crisis on deregulation. It may have some of the blame, but it is far from the whole story. The Austrian school tends to draw attention to too much government and central bank intervention. To say that the financial crisis was caused by classical liberalism is at best a half-truth. Professor Fukuyama came to my hometown just before the pandemic. Yours truly asked him from the floor after a talk of his about F.A. von Hayek on democracy and limits. In his response, Fukuyama said there are no democracies without limits. That is true. One could say that every democracy to some degree is a liberal democracy. The question is to what extent the limits are. Liberal democracy can be said to be a compromise between liberalism and democracy. Its relative success lies in part in the liberal traditions and elements that more or less arrived before mass democracy; in part, the success lies in taking conflicts into a process of relatively peaceful resolution. Through the riots of 2020 and early 2021 we have gotten a taste of what violent conflict resolution looks like, and it does not look good. I have myself experienced an attempted coup in the city in which I happened to live at the time. In the comprise between liberalism/liberty and democracy, however, also lies the danger that liberty may be compromised. The fear or sighting that liberalism/liberty is not sufficient in that compromise is at the basis of all opposition to or skepticism of democracy from the liberty-minded, from the likes of Hans-Hermann Hoppe to those who merely want more limits on what the majority can do. But there's also the other end of the picture. There's the expansion of rights. Not only are there more traditional positive rights, as opposed to negative rights. It goes further. If you are a political crusader, define your crusade as a crusade for a right. If this is accepted, anyone opposed to it risks being seen as opposed to liberal democracy itself. While this form of challenge to (liberal) democracy (the view that democracy is a threat to liberty) may not be the most dominating, it exists. It may be tempting to blame the tragic event on Capitol Hill on January 6 generally on those who represent this view of democracy. To make January 6, 2021 a form of "Reichstag fire" against the critics of democracy, so to speak. However, peaceful criticism of society is legitimate. This also goes for criticism of democracy. Sweeping the problems democracy pose for liberty under the rug, as there has been tendencies to do for decades on end, will hardly do any good. Talking about them in a civilized manner may arguably even be part of the unification President Biden has been talking about. J.K. Baltzersen writes from the capital of the Oil Kingdom of Norway. He is the editor of the book Grunnlov og frihet: turtelduer eller erkefiender? (in Norwegian and Swedish; translated title: Constitution and Liberty: Lovebirds or Archenemies?), with Cato Institutes Johan Norberg amongst the contributors. He has spoken at FreedomFest in Las Vegas on the problems of democracy. Home
Johannesburg: The head of a South African judicial inquiry into state corruption said he would apply for former president Jacob Zuma to be held in contempt of court for ignoring a summons to testify, and for him to be jailed if hes found guilty.

Ignoring a summons is very serious because if it is allowed to prevail, there will be lawlessness and chaos in the courts, Deputy Chief Judge Raymond Zondo said after Zuma failed to appear at a hearing of the so-called state capture commission in Johannesburg on Monday, local time.

Former South African president Jacob Zuma, at an earlier hearing. Credit:AP

The commission will approach the Constitutional Court and ask it to impose a term of imprisonment if it finds he is guilty of contempt.

Zumas refusal to attend the hearing is his latest attempt to subvert the authority of his successor, Cyril Ramaphosa, whose efforts to stem graft have been undermined by a faction within the ruling African National Congress headed by officials aligned with the ex-president.
They are known for fighting like most siblings do on their reality show Keeping Up with the Kardashians.

On Monday, Kim Kardashian was making no excuses as she posted yet another bikini snap of her and sister Kourtney with a cheeky caption that read: 'There's a thin line between love and hate.'

Kim, 40, and Kourtney, 42, looked effortlessly stunning as they posed for the casual snap while baring their bikini bodies.

Why the hate? Kim Kardashian posted this bikini shot of herself and sister Kourtney on Monday telling followers, 'there's a thin line between love and hate.'

The girls also reminisced on warmer days as she shared throwback snaps from the Turks and Caicos getaway last week.

Kim flashed her hourglass figure in a barbed wire print bikini top as she played around in the water with older sister Kourtney.

Her killer curves were on display in the triangle top which featured ribbons of fabric wrapped around her neck and waist.

Biting caption: Kim appeared to be having a bit of fun when writing out her Instagram caption on Monday

Dynamic duo: Kim uploaded a second image to her post that showed off their bikini bodies

She kept somewhat covered up with a pair of swim shorts, but later opted for a briefs version of bottoms.

The Keeping Up with the Kardashians star questionably captioned the snap: 'somehow in this crazy life we found each other,' despite being sisters.

Her long, dark brown hair was parted down the middle and she wore a massive pair of mirrored sunglasses.

Kourtney looked equally as svelte in a fiery red bikini paired with retro frames for their boating adventure in the Bahamas.

Kim reflected on warmer days after coming to the defense of her daughter North, seven, when critics questioned a few paintings shared by the KKW Beauty founder.

All aboard: Kim Kardashian reminisced on warmer days as she shared throwback snaps from the Turks and Caicos getaway on Tuesday afternoon

Funky: The 40-year-old influencer flashed her hourglass figure in a barbed wire print bikini top as she played around in the water with older sister Kourtney

Kim's killer curves were on display in the triangle top which featured ribbons of fabric wrapped around her neck and waist.

Gretings from Turks and Caicos: Kourtney looked equally as svelte in a fiery red bikini paired with retro frames for their boating adventure in the Bahamas.

So many options: She kept somewhat covered up with a pair of swim shorts, but later opted for a briefs version of bottoms

A look: Her long, dark brown hair was parted down the middle and she wore a massive pair of mirrored sunglasses

Oh: Kim reflected on warmer days after coming to the defense of her daughter North, seven, when critics questioned a few paintings shared by the KKW Beauty founder

The mother-of-four insisted her eldest child had, in fact, painted an incredible mountainscape complete with a lake and trees.

Almost immediately, Twitter lit up with disbelief that the impressive painting was created by Kim and Kanye West's little girl.

'You're telling me North West is out here drawing like she is Bob Ross.. and I'm over here still drawing stick figures at 25?!?' one skeptical Twitter user posted.

Another person chimed in: 'Kim Kardashian's child did not paint this. You can even see the photo shop signature. And even if you didnt, it's Kim K so you have to take everything she says with a heavy spoonful of salt.'
Conservative MP Steve Baker speaks to members of the media as he arrives to attend a meeting in central London, on September 12, 2018. (Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images)

UK MP Wants New Laws Restricting Government Imposed Lockdowns

A British MP on Sunday said the UK needs an updated Public Health Act so the government cant make decisions such as imposing lockdowns without parliamentary scrutiny.

Writing in The Telegraph, Conservative MP Steve Baker said that lockdowns and restrictions have caused immense damage as the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus itself did, citing food insecurity, physical and mental health implications, interruption of education, unemployment, and the huge cost of the measures.

Baker also cited a new report (pdf) by the Treasury Committee, which called on the government to be more transparent about economic analyses it undertakes during crises and to include economists in its decision-making process alongside epidemiologists and health experts.

Thats why we need a new Public Health Act: an improved set of democratic checks and balances which would provide greater confidence in decisions and prevent a Government from overreaching, the article reads. A new Act requiring proper impact assessments would force ministers to engage in a rigorous, cross-departmental exercise, weighing up the benefits and harms of each proposed restriction in light of its impact on health, on education, on the economy, and on personal liberty.

Baker said that unless in exceptional circumstances, measures proposed by the government shouldnt take effect before Parliament approves them, and they should have a sunset provision of 30 days.

Baker is the deputy chair of COVID Recovery Group (CRG), a group of MPs who argued the governments lockdown measures to curb the spread of the CCP virus may not be proportionate to the problem.

Sixty-three Conservative MPs on Saturday signed the groups letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson, demanding that he lift all CCP virus restrictions by the end of April.

Since its launch on Nov. 10, 2020, CRG has been demanding the government publish full cost benefit analyses of restrictions.

According to the government, its emergency power to make public health regulations came from Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984 and and Coronavirus Act 2020, which was rushed through Parliament in March.

After MPs raised concerns about government overreach, Health Secretary Matt Hancock on Sept. 30 promised to consult Parliament and try to hold votes before regulations com into force.

Johnson on Monday refused to set firm dates for easing lockdown measures, arguing instead that a cautious but irreversible plan would be preferable.

Alexander Zhang contributed to this report.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 05:53:49|Editor: huaxia

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CAIRO, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Egyptian army said on Monday that its forces destroyed four smuggling tunnels in North Sinai, foiled illegal immigration attempts, and seized large numbers of weapons and ammunitions nationwide in January.

In a statement, the Egyptian army said border guards seized three sniper rifles, three machine guns, 11 automatic rifles, 12 shotguns, 90 air rifles, 2,500 bullets, and 15 satellite phones during January's operations.

Furthermore, 140 vehicles used for smuggling, large quantities of smuggled goods, 535,000 narcotic drugs, and 7 kg of gold were also seized.

Meanwhile, border guards arrested 170 smugglers and suspects, the statement said, adding that the forces foiled the infiltration of 3,740 foreign migrants into the country.

Egypt has been fighting against a wave of terrorism that has killed hundreds of policemen, soldiers, and civilians since the ouster of former President Mohamed Morsi in July 2013 and the massive crackdown on the currently outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group. Enditem
The Italian president swore in the former chief of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, as prime minister on Saturday at the head of a unity government called on to confront the coronavirus crisis and economic slump.

All but one of Italy's major parties have rallied to his side and his cabinet includes lawmakers from across the political spectrum, as well as technocrats in key posts, including the finance ministry and a new green transition portfolio.

Much now rests on Draghi's shoulders. He is tasked with plotting Italy's recovery from the pandemic and must immediately set to work on plans for how to spend more than 200 billion euros ($240 billion) in European Union funds aimed at rebuilding the recession-bound economy.

If he prevails, Draghi will likely bolster the entire eurozone, which has long fretted over Italy's perennial problems. Success would also prove to Italy's skeptical northern allies that by offering funds to the poorer south, they will fortify the entire bloc.

But he faces enormous challenges. Italy is mired in its worst downturn since World War Two, hundreds of people are still dying of COVID-19 each day, the vaccination campaign is going slowly and he only has limited time to sort things out.

Italy is due to return to the polls in two years time, but it is far from certain that Draghi will be able to survive that long at the head of a coalition that includes parties with radically opposing views on issues such as immigration, justice, infrastructure development and welfare.

Highlighting Italy's political instability, Draghi's government is the 67th to take office since 1946 and the seventh in the last decade alone.
Iyiola Omisore, former deputy governor of Osun state, has defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC). Omisore picked up the mem...

Iyiola Omisore, former deputy governor of Osun state, has defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Omisore picked up the membership card of the ruling party at his polling unit in Ile-Ife on Monday.

He had contested the 2018 governorship poll on the platform of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) but came a distant third in the inconclusive election.

Initially, he had refused to throw his weight behind either the APC or the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).





He later went into coalition with the APC before the September 28 rerun election.

The rerun held in seven polling units across four local government areas  Orolu, Ife north, Ife south and Osogbo.

Ile-Ife is the stronghold of Omisore, with the former senator enjoying enduringly loyal support in the ancient city.

Omisore served as deputy governor from 1999 to 2003 under Adebisi Akande and later as a member of the Nigerian senate for Osun-east from 2003 to 2009.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) called early on Monday for rotating outages across the state as extreme winter weather forced wind power generating units offline, while electricity demand set a new winter peak record.

ERCOT set a new winter peak demand record on Sunday evening, reaching 69,150 MW between 6 p.m. and 7 p.m. This is more than 3,200 MW higher than the previous winter peak set back in January 2018, ERCOT said.

At the same time, the extreme winter weather and ice storms cut offline almost half of the wind power capacity in Texas.

We are dealing with higher-than-normal generation outages due to frozen wind turbines and limited natural gas supplies available to generating units, ERCOT said.

Wind power generation is the second-largest source of electricity in Texas, behind natural gas.

On Monday morning, rotating outages began across Texas, as ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness said Every grid operator and every electric company is fighting to restore power right now.

Related Video: Texas Freeze Takes 1.2 Million Bpd Of Oil Offline

Rotating outages are underway to reduce demand on the electric system, ERCOT said early on Monday, urging Texans to put safety first and warning that traffic lights and other infrastructure may be temporarily without power.

The National Weather Service has issued winter storm warnings for southern and southeast Texas, with major to extreme impacts possible from southeast Texas to northern portions of Ohio, as a massive winter storm lifts from the Gulf Coast to the Ohio Valley.

Houston has prepared for below-freezing temperatures, and snow fell on Monday morning. Austin Energy, the City of Austins community-owned electric utility, said that the rotating power outages last longer than expected.

The situation continues to worsen across TX and here in Austin. Austin Energy implemented required outages early Monday morning, doing our part to help stabilize the ERCOT grid. The required outages are more extensive than anyone expected and do not allow us to bring affected customers back online at this time, Austin Energy said on Monday morning.

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Iran Warns Of Fourth COVID Surge Due To Mutant Virus

02/15/21

Source: RFE/RL

The Iranian health minister has warned about a fourth COVID-19 surge in Iran due to the spread of a mutated virus in his country. Meanwhile, Iranian President Hassan Rohani has told state television that "alarm bells were ringing for a fourth coronavirus wave" as at least nine cities and towns in southwestern Iran were declared high-risk "red" zones after a rise in cases on February 12.

In a February 13 meeting with the heads of Iranian medical colleges broadcast live on state television, Health Minister Saeed Namaki said: "Hard days are beginning for us and you must prepare to fight the most uncontrollable mutated virus which is unfortunately infecting the country."

Namaki said Iran's first three deaths this week from the virus variant that was first found in Britain -- including the death of a 71-year-old woman with no history of travel -- suggested that the mutant strain of the virus was spreading and soon "may be found in any city, village or family."

He urged Iranians to avoid gatherings in order "not to turn weddings into funerals" during what is traditionally one of the most popular wedding months in the country.

Iran started a vaccination drive on February 9, two weeks after declaring there were no "red" cities left in the country.

Based on reporting by Reuters and IRNA



Iran COVID-19 update as of February 15: 7,760 cases, 83 deaths in 24 hours

TEHRAN, Feb. 15 (Mehr News Agency) - The Iranian Health Ministry has confirmed 7,760 COVID-19 infections and 83 deaths due to the disease in the past 24 hours.

Iran's Health Ministry Spokesperson Sima Lari made the announcement on Monday, saying that the number of total coronavirus cases in the country has so far reached 1,526,023 with the death toll standing at 59,028.

According to Lari, 3,704 patients are in critical condition while close to 1.3 million patients have recovered.

So far, over 10 million tests have been taken across the country to detect infected cases, she added.

According to the latest figures, more than 109 million people have so far been infected with the novel coronavirus globally, with the deaths passing 2.4 million and recoveries amounting to more than 81 million.


Disha, Nikita, Shantanu attended zoom meet with pro-Khalistani Mo Dhaliwal before R-Day

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: The Delhi Police said that Disha Ravi had sent the toolkit document to Greta Thunberg through the Telegram application.

Addressing a press conference, the police said that Disha was arrested in the presence of her mother in Bengaluru and due procedure was followed.

Further the police said that Disha Ravi along with another activist, Nikita Jacob and Shantanu created the toolkit and sent it to others. Nikita was one of the editors of toolkit, the police also said.

Toolkit: War of words break out between BJP, Opposition after Disha Ravis arrest

The police said that there was a zoom meeting before Republic Day which was attended by Mo Dhaliwal of the Poetic for Justice Foundation, a pro-Khalistan group. The meeting was also attended by Nikita, Disha and Shantanu. It may be recalled that violence broke out on Republic Day, when the farmers had arranged a tractor protest.

The meeting was aimed at creating a storm on Twitter, the police also said.

Further the police also found that Disha had deleted the WhatsApp group she had created to spread the toolkit.

The 21-year-old activist was arrested from Bengaluru on Saturday and sent to five days'' police remand by a Delhi court on Sunday.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The two suspects against whom the non-bailable warrants have been issued are Nikita Jacob and Shantanu, the police said, adding that the duo was allegedly involved in preparing the document and was in direct touch with pro-Khalistani elements.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 16:48 [IST]
For the record, having grown up sharing bunks in a bedroom, Elliott and Zaac now each have their own bedroom at the house they share in Sydneys inner west  they are super-happy, marvels Sam  but as musicians The Rubens have found individual paths that allow them to productively work together. Sam and Elliott, for example, are the instigating songwriters, much to the latters surprise. I didnt know how to write a song and I never thought that was something I would do. I just figured I would play keys and basically show up, Elliott says. Eventually I realised all of us could contribute and have an influence. Adds Sam: Elliott will just sit down and write and if he has a problem with a song hell just work through it. Hes quite studious, whereas if somethings not right for me writing a song I just want to break my laptop and walk out of the room. 0202 is testament to one of The Rubens defining strengths: a willingness to adapt and change their sound. The vintage British 60s R&B rock grooves and modern production of 2012s The Rubens has given way to electronic textures and rhythms predicated on their love of hip-hop music. While recording their debut album the band members had to stage an intervention with leading producer David Kahne, who they felt was adding too many synthesiser parts to their songs, but now theyre the ones channelling pops glinting pieces.

We would have gotten bored by this if wed stayed in that mindset of what were allowed to use when we record and what were not, Sam says. Its in our personalities to constantly want to try new things. We also had success with certain songs that freed us up. Hoops was a departure, it was scary for us, and the fact that it was our most successful song at the time was liberating. Says Elliott: Were not technical musicians at all. When were writing a song the parts we put down are often quite simple. Were not trying to blow anyones minds with our chops. What we get down is what were capable of: we keep the instruments simple and slot in a melody that works. Were not hindered by our lack of virtuosity, it helps us. 0202 began without the band realising it. On a lengthy regional Australian tour to promote their third album, 2018s Lo Ra Ru, The Rubens got into a routine of tinkering with demos during the week, playing a long weekend of gigs, and then during the drive back on Monday voting on which new composition to record. One van session produced a 5-0 verdict in favour of a song called Live in Life, which became a surprise hit when they released it as an interim single in 2019. The bittersweet self-recrimination and buoyant melody are now emblematic. My favourite type of song is the one where theres something sad about it but at the same time youre kind of happy but you dont know why, Elliott says. I dont know if its major chords or a nice melody, but when the thing youre singing about feels dark the listener is lulled into a weird dreamy state  thats the kind of music I like to listen to. Thats our personalities, and thats where were comfortable, notes Sam of the quintets melancholy streak. Regardless of how good you feel you have it in life or your career, people have inner turmoil. That never goes away. A big element of my life is really nice  I am very happy and more settled than ever  but I still have a lot to think about.

The Rubens still have their eye on America, where their career was sidelined in 2014 because the song about romantic dissolution they were hoping would be their breakthrough had the title and repeated chorus of My Gun, which radio balked at in the wake of multiple school shootings. But for now theyre excited for 0202, and determined to stay relevant for a young audience. At gigs Sam is delighted when he meets teenagers whove talked their way in, making The Rubens their first adult gig. I meet them at the merch desk and theyre always so excited, he says. Someone whos 18 now and listening to these new songs was eight when we released our first album. Thats wild. Its great that people are still on board, but I dont just want to write songs for people our age. That wouldnt be fun for us. Baby Rubens - the band in 2012 (from left) Scott Baldwin and Zaac, Sam and Elliott Margin. SCHOOL OF ROCK One of Sam Margins favourite memories of being 18 was travelling in Germany and spontaneously deciding to sneak into a gig despite not having a ticket. He made it inside the venue, discovered it was a heavy metal fest, and happily ended up in a vortex-like mosh-pit. These are the things that you do when youre young, and The Rubens frontman is acutely aware these are things teenagers couldnt do in 2020.

[February 15, 2021] GiftLogic Integrates Paystri's Technology Into Their Point of Sale Software

ENGLEWOOD, Fla., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- GiftLogic, a company that has developed a powerful and intuitive point of sale software headquartered in Englewood, Florida, announced today its newest partnership with Paystri, a payments technology company delivering solutions to independent software vendors (ISVs) and businesses of all sizes. Paystri is an industry leader that develops smart and strategic payment solutions to propel businesses forward. The partnership helps GiftLogic add to its list of payment processors which helps provide all of their customers and prospects the best options for each merchant. "Partnering with GiftLogic is an important expansion of Paystri's presence in the retail market," says Jonathan Arst, Paystri's Founder and CEO. "Our payments technology is designed to deliver innovative payment experiences to retailers and their customers, while streamlining business operations and reducing costs." Chris Wheeler, President at Paystri, adds, "We are excited to partner with GiftLogic, as there is excelent alignment between our two organizations. We share a mutual desire to delight customers and help merchants navigate the post-COVID era. When talking with each person on the GiftLogic team, you can tell how passionate they are about helping every merchant they can."



GiftLogic President, Ben Mitchell is a point of sale software veteran. Starting with personally obtaining the first GiftLogic customer to now having built a team of like-minded individuals that continue to grow the company to what it is today. "We are always looking forward to build a better future for our merchants. In the retail industry, it's easy for merchants to get lost with the vast amount of software and payment processors in the market. It's very logical to have teamed up with Paystri. When two great teams work together, greatness happens, and that's what we have with our newest partner." Mitchell adds, "We are integrating Paystri's many features into the GiftLogic software and the open communication we've established will shrink the time needed to get it into the hand of merchants."

ABOUT GIFTLOGIC

GiftLogic is a leader in retail point of sale software, located in Englewood, FL that is consistently recognized for the vast amounts of functionality, robust capabilities, and great flexibility. Since its inception, GiftLogic has innovated retail software solutions to help merchants streamline their business operations and create more time for them to focus on customer engagement while easily adapting to today's retail trends. GiftLogic is "The Only Logical Choice" for retailers around the world. For more information, please visit https://www.giftlogic.com, email sales@giftlogic.com or call 941-475-1201. Contact:

Ben Mitchell

9414751201

291407@email4pr.com View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/giftlogic-integrates-paystris-technology-into-their-point-of-sale-software-301227919.html SOURCE GiftLogic

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Travellers Receive A Small Ship Cruise Alternative in Canada



(TRAVPR.COM) CANADA - February 15th, 2021 - Kingston, ON: On February 4th, Transport Canada announced measures that will prohibit cruise ships with over 100 passengers from operating in Canadian waters until 2022. However, travellers will still have a small ship cruising alternative.



St. Lawrence Cruise Lines has confirmed operations for 2021 and will provide overnight cruises on the St. Lawrence and Ottawa rivers from May to October. Key features of their cruises are the small ship profile of the 32-stateroom CANADIAN EMPRESS, an all-Canadian crew, and a robust Health and Safety program.



St. Lawrence Cruise Lines President Jason Clark comments, We are excited to offer travellers a small ship option for the 2021 season. Our overnight cruises stay close to shore in Canadian waters and our Covid-19 Health and Safety program has been recognized for its high standards.



This past December, St. Lawrence Cruise Lines was awarded the Safe Travels Stamp by the Tourism Industry Association of Ontario (TIAO) for adherence to global standards of health and hygiene. Their Covid-19 Health and Safety program includes reduced passenger loads, masking, physical distancing, and a hospital-grade electrostatic disinfectant regime for both private staterooms and shared spaces.



The line will offer a variety of cruises from 4 to 7 nights in length, with departures from Kingston, Ottawa, and Quebec City. The vessel will travel exclusively in domestic waters and stop at select ports in Ontario and Quebec. All staterooms have access to fresh air, climate controls, and an intimate view of the river.



The 2021 cruising season will run from May 20 to October 24. Their free travel brochure is available at www.StLawrenceCruiseLines.com or by calling 1-800-267-7868.

###

St. Lawrence Cruise Lines is a Kingston-owned business operating on the St. Lawrence River since 1981.



For more information, please contact:

Jason Clark, President

613-549-8091

###

Several virtual Rutgers University Black History Month programs have been attacked by Zoom bombings in which intruders hijacked the event with racist, threatening messages and images, the school and a fraternity said.

One of the video-teleconferencing attacks took place Thursday night and targeted the Delta Iota Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha as it conducted a program with the Paul Robeson Cultural Center on dynamic Black leaders, the fraternity said in a detailed Instagram post.

Shortly before the program began, a group of racist white supremacists attacked and sabotaged the program with a plethora of racially charged remarks, Alpha Phi Alpha wrote.

The post went on to describe how the attackers repeatedly used a racial slur directed at Black people and changed their Zoom user names to mocking phrases.

The saboteurs then began sharing their screen and playing the KKKs famous theme song, which includes words such as kill all blacks and we will find you repeatedly, Alpha Phi Alpha said.

Most disturbingly.. not only did they play this song repeatedly, but they put together a slideshow/video compilation which displayed extremely vulgar images of black people being murdered... all while laughing and spewing racial terror in the chat. This is concerning not only because of the act, but because these were real graphic videos that were obtained or recorded somewhere.

Rutgers-New Brunswick chancellor Christopher Molly denounced the zoom bombings in a weekend statement.

I am deeply disturbed and saddened to learn of racist and bigoted Zoom-bombings that have been occurring in the past several days during non-academic student events.... I do want us all to acknowledge the harm done to Black and LGBTQ members of our community, and affirm their pain. Marginalized communities are too often forced to bear such hatred and navigate in spite of it, and moments like this cut and wound deeply. I strongly condemn these horrific acts. Please know that as Chancellor, I stand in solidarity with you, as do all of us at Rutgers-New Brunswick.

Molloy said the attacks likely didnt originate locally and are likely part of a larger coordinated international activity.

An investigation is ongoing, though Molloy said it might take awhile because it involves multiple law enforcement agencies and technology companies.

We will not resolve this overnight, and it is likely that incidents like these may reoccur before the perpetrators are identified, Molloy wrote. Therefore, we must remain vigilant to protect our community.

A Rutgers spokesman said Monday morning the university has no additional updates or comment.

Rutgers list of tips to avoid meetings being Zoom-bombed can be found here.

Jeff Goldman may be reached at jeff_goldman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JGoldmanNJ.

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Playtime Is Over: Brace Yourself like a Woman/Man: an enthralling account that invites the readers to allow the Holy Spirit to navigate their lives so they may be able to see where they are going amidst these darkest days. Playtime Is Over: Brace Yourself like a Woman/Man is the creation of published author Derek E. Anderson, a writer whose love for writing became his way to deal with living in the projects and his familys brief brush with homelessness. He joined the U.S. Army at the Los Angeles MEP station to escape the tragic events of his life in the inner city.

Anderson writes, Playtime Is Over: The book that is long overdue yet very much needed is finally here. Too often many people live a life that becomes one big lie after another. I have learned by living that its one thing to lie to other people, but its a terrible thing to lie to yourself. For many years some people have allowed their life to continue in this state of deep sleep, which is destructive not only to themselves but to others as well. This book is not to a race or creed of people, but to a type of people: To people that know that there is more to life than the things that they are seeing and doing. To people who know that there are issues and topics that need to be talked about (yet), not many people seem to want to talk about them. To people that are so fed up with the sexual sins and perversions of these times that they just want for someone to address the topic from a real honest perspective.

Well, that is what I am here to do, talk about the sexual sins and perversions that are overrunning the world we live in. Healthy sexual relationships were designed to be a good thing, performed within the union of marriage between two (consenting) married adults. What we are allowing today in a lot more ways than one is for contamination to settle in. Men and women are leaning to their own understanding and doing (by choice) whatever they are big and bad enough to do. Some people (not all) live their lives in silence about a lot of these topics, because they dont have anyone to talk to about them. Nowhere to turn for real, honest conversations about this issue. For the most part, we spend time on the surface of these issues. Well, within the pages of this book we will go past the surface and bring some clarity in a lot more areas than not, so consider your realities and know that help is here. So, brace yourself like a woman/man because playtime is over!

Published by Christian Faith Publishing, Derek E. Andersons new book is a contemporary tome that exposes the current issues of the world that need to be talked about. It aims to open the readers minds and encourages them to open their eyes so they can see the realities of why these issues have to be addressed from a truthful and sincere point of view.

View a synopsis of Playtime Is Over: Brace Yourself like a Woman/Man on YouTube.

Consumers can purchase Playtime Is Over: Brace Yourself like a Woman/Man at traditional brick & mortar bookstores, or online at Amazon.com, Apple iTunes store, or Barnes and Noble.

For additional information or inquiries about Playtime Is Over: Brace Yourself like a Woman/Man, contact the Christian Faith Publishing media department at 866-554-0919.
PRESS RELEASE  National Museum of the U.S. Air Force visitors will have the opportunity to see fast flying micro machines as 20 pilots maneuver their drones over, under, around and through the C-124 and F-82 aircraft during the museums second annual micro drone race on Feb. 20.

Registered drone pilots will begin practicing at 9 a.m. and then race in a series of 2-minute heats with four drones in each heat from approximately 11 a.m.  5 p.m. Spectators will be able to watch the race along the course in the museums second building, as well as from a large screen that will show the drones perspective as they are racing.

From 9 a.m.  4 p.m., visitors will also be able to experience flying a drone with computer-based simulators from the Air Force Research Lab (AFRL), Sinclair College Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) program, the museums Education Division, and the Drone Racing League (DRL)  a global, professional drone racing circuit for elite pilots with custom built racing drones traveling from 0  90 mph in under a second. Visitors can then fly an actual drone in two designated areas courtesy of AFRL and the museums Education Division.

In addition, Sinclair Colleges UAS program will have a vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) and fixed wing UAS on display inside the museum, and their Mobile Ground Control Station will be parked outside of the museums main entrance for photo opportunities throughout the day.

Those who cannot attend the race in person at the museum may follow along with the live broadcast on the Cincinnati Quad Racers YouTube channel https://youtube.com/c/CincinnatiQuadRacers. (Federal endorsement is not implied.)

For additional information, including a map of the event area, visit www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Upcoming/Micro-Drone-Race/.
Rotunda Rumblings

Map crunch: The Census Bureau says it could be as late as Sept. 30 before it provides states with the 2020 data necessary to draw new congressional and Statehouse district lines, the result of coronavirus-related delays. The detailed local population counts normally are available by the end of March, Rich Exner reports. That means some Ohio deadlines for drawing new maps will be broken. The maps, for elections from 2022 through 2030, will be the first under voter-approved reform. Secretary of State Frank LaRose tweeted Saturday that the delay was unacceptable and said hes working with Attorney General Dave Yost to explore options.

Warning shot: During a hastily called news conference Friday evening, Gov. Mike DeWine said he wont allow employee vaccinations to start at schools that dont resume in-person classes March 1. As Jeremy Pelzer reports, DeWine said Cleveland schools CEO Eric Gordon pledged to do everything in his power to resume by then, rather than early April as Gordon previously said. DeWines briefing followed the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions long-awaited guidance, which says vaccinations are important, but not a prerequisite for returning to school.

To impeach or not to impeach: Ohio Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown voted Saturday to convict former President Donald Trump on an insurrection charge for his role in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol where five people died, while Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman voted against it. Sabrina Eaton has their statements on the vote.

Doing the honors: Portman will read George Washingtons 7,641-word farewell address on the Senate floor on Presidents Day as part of a yearly tradition that dates back to the Civil War. After reading Washingtons statement, the chosen legislator inscribes his or her name along with some brief remarks in a black, leather-bound book maintained by the Secretary of the Senate. The books first entry bears the signature of Ohio Republican Joseph Foraker and is dated Feb. 22, 1900.

Panel discussion: State legislative committees are slated to take their first look this week at a number of new bills, including measures to allow townships to hold referendum votes to block wind farm projects (Senate Bill 52), exempt commuting time and other minor tasks from overtime pay requirements (Senate Bill 47), and require flashing lights for Amish buggies (House Bill 30).

Shakeup: The Ohio Department of Health announced a reorganization in response to the coronavirus death data error. An epidemiology investigator who had been put on leave resigned Friday, the supervisor involved got assigned to a new position in a different area of the department and an employee from the Ohio Bureau of Workers Compensation now oversees the health departments Bureau of Infectious Diseases, Laura Hancock reports.

COVID-19 data cleanup: As the Ohio Department of Health worked to cross-check coronavirus death numbers after finding 4,100 that werent publicly reported, the weekend saw some large increases. On Friday, Hancock reports there were an additional 2,559 deaths, bringing the total to 15,136. Saturdays death total was 1,204, with 2,799 new cases. On Sunday, the department appeared to have finished the correction, with only six deaths and 1,809 cases reported. That brought the death total to 16,346. Just last week, fewer than 12,000 deaths had been reported.

Q&A: State lawmakers last week grilled Ohio Department of Job and Family Services Director Kimberly Henderson about ongoing delays with Ohioans getting unemployment benefits, as well as a large number of fraudulent claims. Pelzer has more on what Henderson said.

Keeping watch: Even though the overnight coronavirus curfew has been lifted, the agents who patrol bars and restaurants for potential violations will still be on the job, Marc Bona reports. The Ohio Investigative Unit agents check for underage drinking, overserved patrons, drugs, gambling and human trafficking -- in addition to health violations regarding overcrowding, social-distancing and mask wearing.

Help yourself: Ohio is now allowing self-service food stations in restaurants, bars, banquet and catering facilities with certain conditions. As Bona reports, the new order from Ohio Department of Health Director Stephanie McCloud includes responsibilities for both businesses as well as customers as a way to stem the spread of the coronavirus. On a light note, journalist Dan Rather got a bit of social media buzz when he commented Hard Pass while retweeting the Columbus Dispatchs tweet about salad bars reopening.

Weeding out: A State Medical Board of Ohio committee has narrowed down 30 petitions for new medical marijuana qualifying conditions, Hancock reports. The board is now taking public comments on autism, Huntingtons disease, panic disorder with agoraphobia, restless leg syndrome, spasticity and spasms and terminal illness.

RIP: Former Ohio Supreme Court Justice James Celebrezze has died, the court announced. In addition to serving on the Supreme Court from 1983 to 1985, Celebrezze, a native Clevelander, was a judge in Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Court and the Eighth District Ohio Court of Appeals, as well as a military judge in the Navy as part of the Judge Advocate General Corps.

Tax time: Tax filing season opened Friday for both federal and state taxes. This year there is more incentive than ever for people who are due refunds to file electronically, Exner reports. The IRS says this is the case not only because of ongoing mail delays, but social distance measures at facilities where the paper forms are processed are likely to cause other delays. But for those who want to wait, the deadline as usual is April 15.

Take me to your leader: Ohio Republicans are slated to pick their next leader following former Party Chairman Jane Timkens resignation. According to a notice that went to central and executive committee members, ORP will meet 10 a.m. Feb. 26 for the election.

New kids on the block: While Republican former Treasurer Josh Mandel is currently the only declared candidate in the U.S. Senate race, Ohioans may end up choosing between two first-timers come November 2022. As the Cincinnati Enquirers Jessie Balmert writes, both Timken and former Ohio Department of Health Director Amy Acton  while having never been elected to office  arent exactly novices in politics. Balmerts piece also explored the upsides and downsides to running against more entrenched candidates.

Shocking development: General Motors announcement that it would phase out gas-powered vehicles from its facilities by 2035 was well received by both the business and environmentalist communities as a necessary step to move into the future. But the Associated Press Tom Krisher and John Seewer explored what that transition might mean for the 50,000 GM workers at plants like those in Toledo who might find themselves on the outside looking in when it comes to the electric car revolution.

Tough pill: Dublin, Ohio-based Cardinal Health plans to recoup $974 million in cash refunds by declaring the losses from its part in a $26 billion deal to settle opioid litigation, the Washington Posts Douglas MacMillan and Kevin Schaul report. That comes after the company was able to cash in on the Cares Act and surpassed Wall Street expectations by posting a $15 billion market capitalization with $4 billion cash on hand in its latest earnings report. Activists were predictably infuriated at Cardinal exploiting loopholes to lessen its burden in the settlement, and the IRS may consider challenging the filing.

Full Disclosure

Five things we learned from the Feb. 13, 2020 financial disclosure form of state Rep. Laura Lanese, a Grove City Republican.

1. Aside from her legislative salary of $68,250.91, Lanese reported earning up to $999 in interest from a bank account and from writing and royalties from Arcadia Skyhorse Publishing.

2. Lanese reported investments of a tuition trust with College Advantage, a money market account with Navy Federal Credit Union, equity units and convertible notes with SmartCrowdz and Onseen Marketing, a whole life policy with Navy Mutual Aid, a retirement fund through the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System, a mutual fund through Ohio Deferred Compensation, and shares in several ETFs through Morgan Stanley.

3. Lanese reported receiving travel expenses of $545 from Ohio State University and $141.50 from the Ohio Chamber of Commerce.

4. Lanese reported receiving gifts worth more than $75 from state Rep. Jamie Callender and former Franklin County Republican Party Chairman Doug Preisse.

5. Lanese received meals, food and beverages worth more than $100 from the Ohio House Republican Organizational Committee and Ohio State University.

On the Move

Kelsey Woolard, the Ohio House Democrats finance director and deputy policy director, has been named manager of governmental affairs for Governmental Policy Group, Inc., a Columbus-based lobbying firm.

Andrew Huffman, Governmental Policy Groups director of legislative affairs, has been promoted to senior director of legislative affairs.

The Center for Christian Virtue hired Nilani Jawahar as its legislative liaison. Jawahar previously worked for the Ohio House of Representatives through the Legislative Service Commission Fellowship Program and as a legislative aide.

Gov. Mike DeWine has appointed longtime magistrate Amy H. Lewis of Xenia to the Greene County Common Pleas Court, Juvenile Division.

Birthdays

Lobbyist/ex-state Rep. Dan Dodd

Straight from the Source

With his stupefying unoriginality, Mandel sounds exactly like innumerable congressional Republicans who clawed their way to Washington by espousing an anti-Washington-cocktail-circuit stance as conservatism. Mandel has perfect pitch for populisms rhetorical banalities.

-Conservative columnist George Will in a Washington Post opinion piece that referred to Republican former Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel, who is running for U.S. Senate, as an aspiring member of the Lout Caucus. Mandel tweeted Sunday that he was proud to be bashed by out-of-touch elites at Washington Post, Plain Dealer & others.

Capitol Letter is a daily briefing providing succinct, timely information for those who care deeply about the decisions made by state government. If you do not already subscribe, you can sign up here to get Capitol Letter in your email box each weekday for free.
SAINT CLAIR  A handful of demolition requests were approved by members at Tuesday nights borough council meeting.

Structures to be razed include those at 500, 501, 502 and 503 E. Hancock St. for $23,500; 311 Broad St. for $20,000; 102 Cherry St. for $13,500; 104 Cherry St. for $13,500; and 211 N. Second St. for $19,000.

Borough Secretary Roland Price Jr. was authorized to submit the funding requests to the county demolition department, which uses state Community Development Block Grant funding and money from deed fees charged under Act 152 to fund such projects. The county funds 75% of the work and the borough is responsible for the rest, along with any asbestos abatement costs, Price said.

The county will seek bids for the work. The funding amounts are needed for the resolution, but they are only estimates, he said.

In other business, solicitor Edward Brennan has submitted the notice for intent of adoption of a revised flood plain ordinance. The council members unanimously agreed that residents who will be affected by the ordinance will be notified before the plan officially goes into effect. Brennans notice is scheduled for publication on Feb. 16 with an adoption deadline of May 18.

Schuylkill River Greenways discussed the possibility of having its Schuylkill River Trail run through the borough. It would begin at Tunnel Road and travel to the Coal Creek Commerce Center. The trail would be implemented at no cost to the borough.

Members of West End Fire Company expressed interest in having a No Parking sign placed toward the front of their building. Its implementation would aid in keeping a clear path where the original fire truck would exit.

The sign would help when we have our monthly meetings and any other social events that we might have throughout the year, said Renee Arner.

The council accepted and plans to fulfill the request.
 Ruling 6-2, SCOTUS holds in Manuel that Fourth Amendment claim can be brought contesting pretrial confinement | Main | Interesting letters from and to US Senate about work of federal prosecutors in Trump era 

March 21, 2017

Senate confirms two (holdover) nominees to US Sentencing Commission!!

Federal sentencing fans should be excited to hear that the full US Senate has now confirmed Judges Charles Breyer and Danny Reeves to be members of the United States Sentencing Commission. (And, proving that somethings can still get done in a bipartisan manner inside the Beltway, this Senate reporting webpage indicates that the confirmation vote was unanimous.) As previously noted, the original nominations of Judges Breyer and Reeves back in 2016 got stalled last Congress, but then outgoing Prez Obama thereafter renominated them for the US Sentencing Commission in January after the new Congress got to work. I had been pessimistic about the prospects of these holdover nominees getting a hearing and a vote, but my pessimism was obviously misguided.

Of particular importance, with Judges Breyer and Reeves now having been confirmed as full voting members of the US Sentencing Commission, they join Acting Chair Judge Bill Pryor and Commissioner Rachel Barkow to form a quorum on the USSC. The Commission needs seven voting members to be fully staffed, but four members are sufficient to get stuff done if they all vote together on amendments and other action items. Though it is not ideal for the USSC to have only four Commissioners rather than the full seven, it is literally "good enough for government work" and thus presents the possibility that the USSC can and will be more than just an effective research agency this year.

As previously flagged here and now highlighted here at the USSC website, the Commission promulgated some notable proposed amendments in late 2016 when it still had a nearly full compliment of Commissioners. Those proposed amendments have generated a whole lots of public comment, and I think they could prove to be quite consequential if formally passed in the coming months. (A USSC hearing on the amendments is now scheduled for April 18.) So, if the two new Commissioners agree to move forward with some form of the amendments promulgated late last year (which seems likely, especially because Judge Breyer was on the USSC during their development), it is now quite possible that the first big tangible federal sentencing development of the "Trump era" could involve significant federal sentencing guideline amendments.

March 21, 2017 at 05:16 PM | Permalink

Comments

@Doug

Do you have any thoughts on this case from Religion Clause?

https://religionclause.blogspot.com/2017/03/7th-circuit-upholds-enhanced-sentence.html

The court upheld an enhanced sentence in part because the criminal's behavior inflicted a "spiritual injury" on the victims. I've never heard of a court finding that a "spiritual injury" is a legally cognizable harm.



Posted by: Daniel | Mar 21, 2017 5:44:42 PM

I gather that's Justice Breyer's brother. Will that matter? Will he recuse in some major case?

Posted by: Joe | Mar 21, 2017 6:06:38 PM

Judge Charles Breyer is indeed Justice Breyer's younger brother. Judge Breyer has been on the Commission for some years already. To my knowledge, Justice Breyer has never recused himself because his brother is a Commissioner. (I do know that Justice Breyer has recused himself before when Judge Breyer was the district court judge in a particular case.)

Posted by: Anon | Mar 21, 2017 6:25:37 PM

Justice Breyer was once a Commissioner and I don't believe he recused himself from anything involving the Commission.

Posted by: Anon2 | Mar 21, 2017 6:53:51 PM

Joe and anons: Justice Breyer was an original Commissioner and consulted an ethics expert/prof before the Booker case and decided, obviously, that he did not need to recuse. And because his brother is now just one of multiple votes on USSC, I suspect Justice Breyer does not see a significant conflict in cases that involve guideline issues (which are actually pretty rare).

Daniel: the 7th Circuit case referenced (Minhas) did not exactly find "spiritual injury" is a legally cognizable harm. Rather, it upheld a trial court decision to apply a guideline enhancement focused on the harm of a fraud which involved scamming folks out of travel monies devoted to making a religious pilgrimage. I see a reasonable basis for a court to conclude that a travel fraud can be considered worse/aggravated by a sentencing judge if it prevents the faithful from going to Jerusalem rather than just preventing fun-lovers from going to the Jersey Shore.

Posted by: Doug B. | Mar 22, 2017 10:24:07 AM

Thanks.



Posted by: Joe | Mar 22, 2017 12:37:53 PM

Hello, very interesting blog. I stumbled across it while I was doing some research for Legal Writing class - Argumentative Thesis on why a different set of Guidelines are needed for "certain" Women Sex-offenders. So, last night I dissected the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, page by page and I'm sorry women do not have a.)the GENETELIA 2.)the uncontrollable sexual psychopathic tendencies to commit some of these acts. period.

So, before the Senate rules on a new proposed Bill 695 on April 18th I need to try and get something passed for separate sentences, unless the crime fit.

I am going to be 50 yrs old but took a plea (which now I know I should have fought my case) for having sex with a neighbor kid when he came on to me at a time when my husband and I were separated. The boy was 14 and I was 24- that was 25 yrs ago and it's been debilitating and I get s angry I am put into the same "pool" as those who really are unforgiving, mentally disturbed and a true predator when it comes to "Children."

I am will become a certified Paralegal this year as I hope to make a difference and need this to be behind me already.

Anyway, this is a great website, liked your article, keep up the good work and wish me luck.

Respectfully,

Lisa in Los Angeles

Posted by: LISA V. | Mar 24, 2017 10:31:24 PM

Post a comment
Conversation Lab has been appointed by London-based global marine insurance club UK P&I, increasing its penetration into the UK market.

Kevin Power

It fascinates me that the team in Durban and Cape Town can look out of the office and count up to 30 ships waiting to enter the harbour and know that most of them are insured by our client!

The independent creative agency will be responsible for UK P&I's search engine optimisation strategy and execution. Critical to the engagement is ongoing conversion optimisation of its website, data analytics and reporting. The account will be run out of Conversation Labs UK office and supported by the agencys performance and development hub in SA.The UK P&I Club is one of the oldest P&I clubs in the world protecting shipping globally since 1869. They are also one of the largest mutual marine protection and indemnity organisations in the world, insuring over 240m tonnes of owned and chartered ships from more than fifty countries across the globe.UK P&I, global marketing director, Jenny Lane, said of the appointment: We were introduced to Conversation Lab through our London partners Pancentric Digital to support in driving the effective visibility of our digital ecosystem. We were impressed with how they unpacked the challenges for us and the clear and direct strategy to increase our reach in a globally competitive market. Initial results have beaten all our expectations and we are very excited about the step change we are seeing already."Kevin Power, group MD of Conversation Lab, said: This win means a lot to us. We get to work with a truly remarkable business such as UK P&I, with a size and scale that dwarfs anything else we do.""Insurance is a highly competitive sector which makes our job that much more challenging but equally rewarding when delivering results. This win also underlines our B2B capabilities both in SA and globally!"The win is part of a new partnership with London digital agency Pancentric to deliver full through-the-line digital marketing services to the UK market.Work has already begun with teams both in UK and SA working between both agencies, multiple locations and client.
By Arthur I. Cyr





"Bullets wrote our past. Education, our future."



On Jan. 28, the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP) in Colombia indicted eight FARC leaders for war crimes and crimes against humanity. All allegedly participated in widespread criminal hostage-taking in exchange for ransoms.



The quotation above is the inscription on pens used on Sept. 26, 2016, to sign the peace agreement between the government of Colombia and the FARC. Craft workers fashioned the pens from recycled bullet casings, apt symbolism for progress in ending killing.



The term FARC is an acronym for the Spanish name of the powerful rebel army, known in English as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. The movement eventually found inspiration and effective recruitment through Communist ideology. At the same time, the FARC was rightly notorious for enormous illegal drug dealing.



Negotiators established the JEP to implement peace. Given Colombia's long history of political bloodshed, numerous critics were skeptical.



During the half century before the peace agreement, brutal warfare killed approximately a quarter of a million people. Fighting ended only after complex negotiations.



Officials from the United Nations were present for the 2016 signing, along with representatives of Cuba, El Salvador, Mexico, Uruguay and the United States. Cuba has played a significant role long-term in brokering these negotiations. That is important not only in symbolic terms, but also as a reflection of the substantial real strategic changes over the past three decades.



Soon after the remarkable success in early 1959 of revolutionary forces led by Fidel Castro, Cuba became a Soviet ally and force fomenting and supporting communist subversion throughout the Western Hemisphere. That commitment survived the collapse of the Soviet Union, increasingly vital as a prop for Cuba's economy, and has only faded in recent years.



President Barack Obama visited Cuba, the first U.S. chief executive since President Calvin Coolidge to do so. Limited investment and travel opportunities resulted. However, politically Cuba remains a brutal and repressive dictatorship.



Early in this century, the FARC seemed to be gaining momentum. The evolving conflict resembled the first years of the United States' long and costly military involvement in Vietnam. More and more civilian and uniformed advisers were being sent, along with a steadily growing array of helicopters, arms and ammunition, and other materiel.



The administration of President George W. Bush significantly expanded aid which began in the Clinton administration, but also tried to minimize media attention. This effort was eerily reminiscent of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, which endeavored before 1965 to deflect Vietnam from the news even as U.S. involvement increased. Then, violence in Colombia began to decline, in great contrast to the evolution of the war in Southeast Asia.



The long war in Colombia made the nation an inviting place for international criminals. In November 2011, Viktor Bout, the "Merchant of Death," was convicted and imprisoned. A Soviet Army veteran, he became enormously rich dealing weapons and drugs on a global scale. Colombia was a major profit center, but Drug Enforcement Administration agents posing as Colombian rebels arrested him.



Also in 2011, the U.S. Congress ratified free trade agreements with Colombia along with Panama and South Korea. The Colombia agreement indirectly is strong confirmation of established regional cooperation. The Summit of the Americas, begun in 1994, is held every three to four years. The Organization of American States, formed in 1948, is one of the world's oldest regional organizations.



Americans should be encouraged.





Arthur I. Cyr is Clausen Distinguished Professor at Carthage College and author of "After the Cold War" (NYU Press and Macmillan/Palgrave). Contact acyr@carthage.edu






Renowned legal luminary and former judge of the Bombay High Court and Supreme Court, Justice P.B. Sawant passed away here following a cardiac arrest, a family member said.

A former Chairman of Press Council of India, he was 90 and breathed his last at the family home here around 9.30 a.m.

Justice Sawant is survived by his wife Jayashree, a lawyer son Vishwajeet and two daughters Sujata and Rajashri, his grandson Aditya told IANS.

"Justice Sawant was a very ideal, public-minded and dignified person. He excelled in every field as a judge, as an activist, as a social worker... The manner in which he conducted himself in public life serves as an example to all of us," said retired Justice B.G. Kolse-Patil, a crusader and a personal friend of Justice Sawant.

Well-known activist lawyer Asim Sarode said Justice Sawant was a reformer in the socio-legal fields who regularly used to guide and mentor young lawyers, exhorting them to work for social justice through the legal profession.
The CCPs Agenda in Kashmir

News Analysis

NEW DELHIPropelled by its geostrategic ambitions, China is silently expediting a policy of unrestricted warfare in Kashmir, a region that has witnessed decades of territorial disputes between India and Pakistan, according to an expert on Kashmir.

I will say the Chinese have a much more sinister, deeper, and larger agenda in Kashmir, rooted in its larger regional and global geostrategic ambitions, Abhinav Pandya, CEO of India-based think tank Usanas Foundation, told The Epoch Times on Feb. 8.

While India and China decided to end a 10-month-long military stand-off in the northern Indian region of Ladakh last week, Indian army chief Gen. Manoj Naravane said on Feb. 12 that Chinas rising footprint in Indias neighborhood and its bid to unilaterally alter the status quo along Indias disputed borders have fostered an environment of confrontation and mutual distrust.

Kashmir and Ladakh are the northernmost border territories of India and were part of a common state that shared borders with both Pakistan and China before the political reorganization of Jammu and Kashmir in 2019.

Since the 1980s, China has adopted a policy of neutrality on the Kashmir issue, a region that was the triggering point of multiple wars between India and Pakistan. However, for some years, the regime in Beijing has issued loose-leaf stapled visas to people from Jammu and Kashmira gesture indicating that China doesnt accept Indias sovereignty over the region.

Pandya believes that China doesnt want a resolution to the Kashmir issue. Its their long-term strategic game. They wouldnt want the settlement of Kashmir in that sense, he said. They would want it to be a disturbed area to keep India engrossed and to keep India under pressure.

A map of the Kashmir region. (Wikipedia)

Draining Indias Resources in Kashmir

China works in tandem with its ally Pakistan to keep India totally engaged and bogged down in Kashmir, with an insurgency and local terrorism, said Pandya, whos also the author of the book Radicalization in India: An Exploration.

China wants to keep a major part of the Indian army occupied with Kashmir insurgency and the problems on the Pakistan frontier so China can establish their firm control over the oceans, where they are vulnerable, as 60 percent of their oil supplies pass through Malacca straits, he said.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies notes that 80 percent of the global trade by volume and 60 percent by value goes by sea, and 60 percent of that passes through the Strait of Malacca. India has greater control over trade in the area because the trade route from the strait leads to Indias maritime boundary. Pandya said that since India has the ability to choke that point, the Chinese are creating an alternate route by way of the Belt and Road Initiative.

While the conflict in Kashmir appears to be a dispute between only India and Pakistan, he explained, it is largely the result of unrestricted warfare waged by China against India. For [the Chinese regime], war is not just confined to your military confrontation that lasts for a specific period of time. The idea is to dominate others, put others under some kind of an inferior economic and military position. Hence, the war is always continuing, he said.

They would not want to have India as a powerful and adversarial neighbor in their backyard, as all their claims to global superiority will fall flat if India is seen or perceived as some kind of a challenger to China.

So they would also want India to be economically backward under pressure. And Kashmir is a big, big theater to keep India economically drained.

Pandya said Pakistan acts in a tactical convergence with China in Kashmir.

Chinese would start aggression in the eastern theater [Ladakh], and they would ask Pakistan to execute some kind of terror attack or organize a civil protest in Kashmir or massive ceasefire violations or even an attack on the western front [de facto border with Pakistan], he said.

Indian paramilitary personnel take up positions outside a school after an attack against Indian paramilitary personnel in Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir, on March 13, 2013. (TAUSEEF MUSTAFA/AFP/Getty Images)

About Chinese Arms in Kashmir

When Pakistan directs a terrorist into Kashmir, the fighters are provided with two kinds of AK-47 assault rifles: One manufactured in Darra Khel, Pakistan, which costs roughly $370 to $415, and the other a Chinese-made version that costs $690 to $830, Pandya said, citing his research for his upcoming book Terror Financing in Kashmir, a project of Vivekananda International Foundation.

Pakistan spends less than 1.5 to 2 lakhs ($2,300 to $3,000) on each foreign terrorist sent to Kashmir, he said. Since there seems to be no shortage of local recruits, foreign fighters and the costs incurred are even less, he added.

Meanwhile, the Indian army spends a minimum of $9,643-$11,021 (7-8 lakhs) on each cordon and search operation (CASO) to neutralize terrorists in Kashmir, he said.

And in one day, you will have around 50 to 60 CASOs in Kashmir, and out of those 50 to 60 CASOs, maybe two or three turn out to be successful ones. So imagine the amount of money that India is spending, he said, adding that on average, 16 percent of Indias development funds go to 1 percent of Indias population in Jammu and Kashmir.

Then surrounding this builds a whole huge conflict narrative, he said about the situation before India re-organized Jammu and Kashmir into two federally governed territories called the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir and the Union Territory of Ladakh.

In the name of conflict, its very difficult to prove the expenditure, its difficult to hold people accountable, and it paves the way for massive corruption, huge corruption in the state.

The daughter (C) of Indian civilian Sarpanch Karamat Hussain who was killed in Pakistani shelling, wails at Balakot sector in Poonch, Jammu and Kashmir, India, on Aug.16, 2015. Indian and Pakistani troops traded heavy gunfire and mortar rounds for a seventh day Sunday along the highly militarized line of control dividing the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir between the two archrivals, officials said. (AP Photo/Channi Anand)

Chinas Fears About CPEC

The ChinaPakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which is a nodal project of Chinas Belt and Road Initiative, is displacing locals in the areas of Balochistan and Gilgit-Baltistan, which is legally Indias territory but currently under Pakistans control. The resulting dynamics have created a silent flashpoint between India and China in Kashmir.

The [Pakistani army is] killing civilians. It has already generated hatred and resentment, giving rise to the armed Baluch resistance movement against CPEC activities and Pakistans illegal occupation, he said. Because of such a precarious situation, China fears that Indians might help the local rebels in sabotaging CPECs projects in Balochistan.

So thats why they want to keep India under some kind of pressure. And, to do that, they prefer to keep Kashmir boiling.

Researcher Zeus Hans Mendez at the Centre for Security Studies wrote in a paper published last fall that, at the time of the formation of India and Pakistan in 1947, Pakistan forcibly took over the region of Balochistan, while the ethnic Baloch people wanted independence. Mendez explained that fighting between the Pakistan army and Baloch rebels has led to the loss of thousands of soldiers and fighters since the 1970s.

With so many Chinese set to enter Balochistan, the Baloch fear irreversible demographic changes and increased marginalization, Mendez wrote in the Journal of Indo-Pacific Affairs, adding that the Balochs have started a series of unsuccessful attacks against the CPEC. A top Baloch leader reached out to both the United States and India to support an independent Balochistan, describing the CPEC as threatening to the interests of both India and the U.S.

A Pakistani army officer (3L) briefs Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan Yao Jing (4L) and Pakistani army Major General Asif Ghafoor (2L) and foreign diplomats during their visit at a cross border shelling affected area in Jura, a village of Neelum valley in Pakistan-administered Kashmir on Oct. 22, 2019. (FAROOQ NAEEM/AFP via Getty Images)

US Policy

Pandya said the United States must realize that amid a changing geopolitical context, India will be the most trustworthy and credible partner against China, should the Biden administration seek to be sincere with India.

In the past, [the United States has] suffered from misplaced priorities and made wrong investments in Afghanistan. They provided billions of dollars in aid to Pakistan, and Pakistan kept bleeding them through Taliban and Haqqani network, he said.

Now, President Biden must be perceptive and understand Indias concerns and security issues vis-a-vis cross border terrorism supported by Pakistan. If the U.S. had supported and stood firmly with India against Pakistan on the Pak-occupied Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan issue, China would not have pulled off its CPEC in Gilgit-Baltistan.

He said that at a time when the United States is withdrawing from Afghanistan, China is ready to act as a decisive player with its ally Pakistan.

The U.S. must stand firmly with India if it wants India to be its trusted partner against China, he said.

This is the first in the series on Global Agendas in Kashmir based on an exclusive interview with Abhinav Pandya, a field researcher in Kashmir who also advised the former governor of Jammu and Kashmir, Satya Pal Malik, on radicalization and security issues during the critical phase of the abrogation of the Article 370 that led to the constitutional reorganization of the state.
It was supposed to be the most romantic day of the year, but disgruntled shoppers have claimed their Valentine's Day was something of a flop after their orders turned up with wilted flowers or missing cards.

Among the companies criticised on social media were Moonpig, eFlorist and Funky Pigeon, with people left frustrated after their flowers arrived wilted, or with the heads falling off.

Others received cards addressed to the wrong people after a mix up and others joked about an impending divorce after cards didn't arrive in time.

Moonpig responded to a lot of the photos, apologising and asking the complainant to DM them with their name and address.

Yodel, who were tagged in a few of the tweets regarding Moonpig's flowers, told social media users they are looking into the complaints.

A Moonpig spokesperson told Femail: 'We take pride in delighting our customers and go to great lengths to provide an exceptional service to them.

'While the issues only affect a small number of the overall volume of orders, we take every single complaint seriously and work as quickly as possible to put things right. We are engaging directly with these customers, we know that these orders and the loved ones they are destined for are extremely important.'

Sudesh Loi received wilted white roses among a bottle of prosecco and a box of Thorntons chocolates from Moonpigm and tweeted that he was 'really annoyed at the condition of the flowers'

Another user shared a photo of their red roses from Moonpig, with one of the heads snapped off in her hand as they said they were 'poor sad crusty dry dying roses'

Another user shared a photo of their red roses from Moonpig, with one of the heads snapped off in her hand as they said they were 'poor sad crusty dry dying roses'

Claudio compared the photo on eFlorist's website of what he ordered, and said that he would not get away with claiming that 'it's the thought that counts'

Another compared the photo on eFlorist's website of what he ordered compared to the wilted roses which arrived and said 'thought that counts isn't it' as he compared the two

Another said the delivery was 'appalling' and that their 26.99 roses from Moonpig were delivered looking 'broken, wilted, tired', writing: 'Thank you for ruining Valentine's Day!'

Andy said that it was 'absolutely disgraceful' and they were 'expecting nice flowers' for 35 from eFlorist

John said that his card from Moonpig didn't show up and theat his roses were broken in the box

Paige shared photos of six wilted red roses from eFlorist worth 25 which were delivered looking 'half dead and nothing like the photo' according to one Twitter user, who asked 'how these look anything like the photo advertised?'

Another received a dozen red roses for Valentine's from her husband for the 'first time' and that one of the roses came without a head, and that the flower 'wasn't even in the box' so it wasn't lost during delivery

Another user received red roses from eFlorist 'worth 55' and was disappointed when they arrived with the flowers 'broken at the head and bent' before saying they 'want their money back'

One Twitter user said that someone else's Valentine's Day card, destined for Kent, ended up in Suffolk after it got delivered with her mum's flowers

Another posted a photo of her roses with a broken stem, which was bent over, while others had completely dried out and were brown. They said they were 'very excited' for their delivery until they opened it and saw the flowers
Social activists and environmentalists called for immediate release of climate activist Disha Ravi who was arrested in the 'toolkit' document case, asking the government to stop targeting India's youth.

Ravi (22) was arrested on Saturday from Bengaluru for allegedly sharing with the toolkit related to the farmer's protest against the Centre's three new agriculture laws, police said.

The Delhi Police claimed that Ravi was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.

Activists and environmentalists have condemned the arrest.

Kavita Krishnan, the secretary of All India Progressive Women's Association, said people like Ravi are India's best hope because they are concerned about not just themselves, but the future generations.

"We are not behaving like a democracy right now. If we are going to equate protest with conspiracy and organising protests as conspiracy, then you are not a democracy anymore," she said.

"They should immediately drop this case based upon absolutely flimsy, ridiculous and evil pretext. A toolkit is not sedition, it is not conspiracy, toolkit is for protest," she added.

Rights activist Shabnam Hashmi also questioned the basis of Ravi's arrest, saying anybody even doing a local campaign prepares a toolkit.

"We should look at the prime minister's campaign toolkit. We are crossing the limits of absurdity. We will become a laughing stock internationally," she said.

Sunita Narain, head of the Delhi-based for Science and Environment, also extended her support to the arrested activist.

"We know #climatechange is an existential threat. World desperately needs the passion and commitment of the youth and their loud and strong voice to shake it to more action #FreeDishaRavi," she tweeted.

Nine-year-old climate activist Licypriya Kangujam called it an attempt to silence the voices of young girls and women in the country.

"This is an attempt to silence the voices of young girls and women in this country. But this will not stop us from fighting for our planet and future," Kangujam tweeted.

In a joint statement, more than 50 academics, artists and activists voiced support for Ravi and called her arrest disturbing, illegal in nature" and an "over-reaction of the State.

The statement issued under the banner of 'Coalition for Environmental Justice in India' also called it an attempt to distract the public.

"It is also becoming increasingly clear that the current actions of the central government are diversionary tactics to distract people from real issues like the ever-rising cost of fuel and essential items, widespread unemployment and distress caused due to the lockdown without a plan, and the alarming state of the environment," it said.

An online petition has also been started by the group demanding the immediate release of the climate activist.

Environmentalist Vikrant Tongad said the incident will be demotivational for climate activists.

"We cannot go on the merit of the case as the probe is ongoing, but the incident will be demotivational for climate activists...," he said.

Thunberg, a teen climate activist, had shared the "toolkit" to lend her support to the farmers agitation against the three farm reform laws. In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were listed which were needed to be taken to support the

A graduate in Bachelor of Business Administration, Ravi is also one of the founding members of a group named 'Fridays For Future India', police added.

(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.)
Max Lucado apologizes for past sermon on homosexuality after critics slam National Cathedral invitation

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Christian author and pastor Max Lucado, who holds biblical Christian views on marriage, issued an apology for disrespecting and hurting the LGBT community in his past sermons after the Washington National Cathedral was criticized for inviting him as a guest speaker.

In 2004 I preached a sermon on the topic of same-sex marriage. I now see that, in that sermon, I was disrespectful. I was hurtful, wrote Lucado, pastor of Oak Hills Church, a nondenominational Christian church in San Antonio, Texas, in a letter last week to the Episcopal Churchs Cathedral Church of Saint Peter and Paul in the City and the Diocese of Washington, also known as the Washington National Cathedral.

I wounded people in ways that were devastating, Lucado, who spoke at the National Cathedral on Feb. 7, continued. I should have done better. It grieves me that my words have hurt or been used to hurt the LGBTQ community. I apologize to you and I ask forgiveness of Christ.

Some members of the Episcopal Church, a denomination known for holding liberal views on marriage and sexuality issues, launched a petition asking the cathedrals dean, Randy Hollerith, to rescind Lucados invitation to preach.

Lucados teachings and preaching inflicts active harm on LGBTQ people, the petition read. To cite one example, in 2004 he wrote of his fears that homosexuality would lead to legalized incest and likened same-sex marriage to incest and bestiality. Fear-mongering and dehumanizing messages from powerful speakers like Lucado have been used to justify rollbacks of LGBTQ rights and to exclude LGBTQ people from civil protections and sacred rites. To our knowledge, Lucado has not publicly renounced these views.

Mentioning that the remains of Matthew Shepard, a gay college student who was murdered in 1998, were entrusted to the cathedral, the petition maintained that inviting a man who preaches the kind of dangerous theology that promotes oppression of and violence toward the LGBTQ community does not honor that trust nor serve his memory.

Lucado wrote that faithful people may disagree about what the Bible says about homosexuality, but we agree that Gods holy Word must never be used as a weapon to wound others.

To be clear, I believe in the traditional biblical understanding of marriage, but I also believe in a God of unbounded grace and love," he said in his letter. "LGBTQ individuals and LGBTQ families must be respected and treated with love. They are beloved children of God because they are made in the image and likeness of God.

Over centuries, the church has harmed LGBTQ people and their families, just as the church has harmed people on issues of race, gender, divorce, addiction, and so many other things. We must do better to serve and love one another.

The cathedrals dean also responded to the petition, which had been signed by over 1,600 people, falling short of its goal of 2,500 signatures.

Hollerith wrote, When we only engage with those whom we agree on every issue, we find ourselves in a dangerous (and lonely) place. My hope is that all churches and faith communities will find ways to open their doors to perspectives different from their own.

In his letter to the cathedral, Lucado clarified that he was invited to preach on the topic of the Holy Spirit. My desire was to highlight the power of the Spirit to bring comfort in these chaotic times. However, instead of that sermon, many only heard my words from many years ago.
By Mohammad Gharebagh, KYODO NEWS - Feb 15, 2021 - 22:25 | World, All

Iran's foreign minister has said he hopes Japan and the European Union will persuade newly inaugurated U.S. President Joe Biden to lift crippling economic sanctions imposed on Tehran by his predecessor Donald Trump.

Mohammad Javad Zarif's remarks in an interview with Kyodo News on Sunday appear aimed at speeding up the decision of the Biden administration, which intends to return to the 2015 nuclear deal and to resume dialogue with Iran.

Calling Japan an old friend of Iran and noting its good relations with the United States, he said, "We expect Japan to act as a friend, particularly when it comes to international law" -- suggesting that sanctions reimposed after Washington left the landmark nuclear deal in 2018 are illegal.

"Since the United States is violating international law, the best role that Japan can play is to show Americans that Japan will not implement their illegal decisions," he said.

Zarif specifically called on Japan to unfreeze Iranian assets frozen in Japanese banks due to U.S. sanctions, as a gesture to Iran by the new government of Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, who came to power last September.

According to Zarif, frozen assets in Japan and South Korea total close to $10 billion. Japan's share -- mainly revenue from crude oil exports to Japan -- is estimated to be just under $3 billion.

He said the unfrozen funds could be used to procure medicines and food, including vaccines for the novel coronavirus.

On the role of the European Union, Zarif stressed EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell's responsibility to sequence a restoration of compliance with the nuclear accord by Washington and Tehran.

But the foreign minister ruled out direct negotiations with the Biden administration to that end.

"Mr. Borrell can specify the time frame in consultation with Iran and the United States. It is clear the United States has to take steps first," Zarif said.

"When Washington takes its steps, and we see the outcome, we can immediately take (steps) ourselves, and it is up to Borrell to choreograph these steps," he said.

With the inauguration of the Biden administration on Jan. 20, expectations have been raised for an improvement of U.S.-Iran relations, which had deteriorated almost to the point of war under Trump.

But so far, both sides insist the other act first.

The U.S. side wants Iran, which has been strengthening uranium enrichment in contravention of its commitments under the 2015 deal, to resume full compliance with it.

It also seeks to lengthen and to strengthen the provisions of that deal, using it in turn as a platform to negotiate follow-on agreements to address such concerns as Iran's ballistic missile program.

Zarif, however, said the deal cannot be renegotiated.

He warned the window of opportunity to resolve the impasse will soon close as Iran's parliament has set Feb. 21 as the day to end nuclear watchdog inspections beyond the country's obligations under its safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency.

"A law has been passed by parliament. That law has to be implemented," he said while pressing Biden's team to decide soon whether to return to the nuclear deal with Iran or continue Trump's legacy by not quickly lifting sanctions.

After that window closes, Zarif said, Iran will produce more enriched uranium and further promote its nuclear development.

Related coverage:

Biden sworn in as U.S. president, vows to re-engage with world

Coronavirus pandemic picked in Japan as top international story of 2020

Iran vows revenge for assassination of nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh

Under the deal struck with six major powers -- Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States -- Iran agreed to curb its nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.

Since 2018, when Trump withdrew the United States from the accord struck under his predecessor Barack Obama, Iran has downgraded its commitments, resulting in an increase in its nuclear fissile purity up to 20 percent and installation of new generation and speedy subterfuges in its underground facilities.

Zarif called that a natural outcome of Trump's failed "maximum pressure" policy on Iran and added, "If President Biden wants to continue the same legacy, he will not be able to produce miracles."

Biden told CBS News last week that he would not lift sanctions first in order to get Iran back to the negotiating table and that Iran needs to stop uranium enrichment beyond levels agreed to in the nuclear deal.

But Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei emphasized later that sanctions must be lifted first and said this is Tehran's "final and irreversible" policy.

The focus will be on whether Japan and Europe can act as intermediaries and find clues to get out of the current predicament.

Zarif expressed his willingness to meet with senior Japanese government officials, saying, "They can raise whatever they want to raise with me, and I will respond to them based on Iranian policy and based on long-standing friendship between Iran and Japan."

The previous administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe tried to mediate between the United States and Iran such as by proposing the barter of Iranian crude oil and U.S. grain, which never materialized.
Two of Australia's most prominent billionaire businessmen want to build quarantine facilities outside of Brisbane and Melbourne to house 2,000 returned travellers - and avoid another dreaded lockdown.

Linfox trucking tycoon Lindsay Fox, who owns Avalon Airport, is in talks with the Federal and Victorian Governments to allow 1000 international arrivals at a time to quarantine in Geelong.

If the plan gets the green light from the Federal Government, it could greatly reduce the risk of Covid spreading from quarantine hotels into the community.

Victoria is currently in the middle of a five-day snap lockdown after 17 cases were linked to the Holiday Inn Airport Hotel cluster.

Linfox offered his 1700ha airport to the Andrews Government to use for the proposed camp.

Linfox trucking tycoon Lindsay Fox, who owns Avalon Airport, is in talks with the Federal and Victorian Governments to allow 1000 international arrivals to quarantine in Geelong. Pictured with wife Paula

In Queensland, John Wagner is campaigning for a quarantine facility to be set up next to Wellcamp Airport in remote Toowomba - a 1.5 hour drive west of Brisbane

Fox said either the state funds the cost of the construction, or the airport foots the bill and taxpayers are charged for arrivals.

Avalon Airport chief executive Justin Giddings said the camp would reduce the amount of contact needed between guests and staff.

The facility would have no corridors, and guests would cook and clean for themselves.

'The risk would be remarkably lower. There would be no need for anyone (outside the guest) to go into these room,' Mr Giddings told The Australian.

Premier Daniel Andrews said the government and health officials are in talks about the possibility of creating remote quarantine accommodation.

'At some sites with very large amounts of space and an international airport located just next door, that's obviously got some real strength,' he said.

'That could work well for, say, charter flights, where the Australian government can direct those flights to land wherever they choose.'

Linfox offered his 1700ha airport to the Andrews Government to use for the proposed camp

Premier Daniel Andrews said the government and health officials are in talks about the possibility of creating remote quarantine accommodation

And in Queensland, business mogul John Wagner is campaigning for a quarantine facility to be set up next to Wellcamp Airport in remote Toowomba - a 1.5 hour drive west of Brisbane.

The camp would be operated by the Queensland Government and charge its 1000 guests a capped fee for their 14-day quarantine.

The Wagner Corporation would build 500 rooms in six weeks, with the entire premises to be completed in 14 weeks.

The company would even foot the bill for construction of the camp.

To further reduce the risk of Covid spreading from the complex, staff would live onsite for weeks at a time and be tested frequently.

Wagner said the facility would likely house returned travellers arriving on chartered flights, but didn't rule out commercial aircraft also landing there too.

'They can actually land commercial flights at Wellcamp, they don't need to go to Brisbane or the Gold Coast. I'd certainly like it to happen,' he said.

The push for remote quarantine facilities comes after Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack said he is open to debating a cut to international arrivals.

Mr McCormack said there was room for a discussion on reduced arrival caps but argued Federal Labor was at odds with Mr Andrews.

'We'd obviously like to get every Australian back as soon as possible but there are quarantine restrictions, of course. There are limits on those numbers coming back in,' he told the ABC on Monday.

If the plan gets the green light from the Federal Government, it could greatly reduce the risk of Covid spreading from quarantine hotels into the community

'There's only a certain number of places and Australia has helped that by facilitating paid-for flights to get back into the country.'

Opposition home affairs spokeswoman Kristina Keneally continues to attack the government over the growing list of stranded Australians registered to return home.

The Labor frontbencher believes the Victorian premier's suggestion to cut arrival caps is motivated by the Morrison government's refusal to take over quarantine from states.

'The problems that exist in hotel quarantine today are because we have not had national leadership to take responsibility here,' Senator Keneally told Sky News.

Brisbane and Perth have endured mini-lockdowns after hotel quarantine workers became infected.
News reports say a bomb detonated under a car carrying a militia official with Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, wounding him.

Russian news agencies identified the man as Sergei Popov, leader of a police unit in a separatist-controlled part of the Donetsk region.

News organizations linked to the unrecognized regional administration said the explosive device detonated under Popovs car in the town of Horlivka on February 15, showering him with shrapnel.

Those reports identified him under the code name Dolgy and said he was a commander of a battalion of the "people's militia of the Donetsk People's Republic."

His condition was not immediately clear.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, nor confirmation from Ukrainian government officials.

The Donetsk Peoples Republic is one of two administrative entities that oversee government functions in parts of eastern Ukraine that have been controlled for years by Russia-backed separatists. Their authority is not recognized by the government in Kyiv.

The incident was the latest in which prominent militia leaders in eastern Ukraine have been targeted by suspicious bombings.

In 2018, the leader of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic, Aleksandr Zakharchenko was killed in a bomb attack in Donetsk.

In February 2017, Mikhail Tolstykh, a separatist commander known as Givi, died in an explosion at his office in Donetsk.

Arseny Pavlov, another prominent militia commander known as Motorola, was killed when a bomb exploded in an elevator in his Donetsk apartment building in October 2016.

No one has claimed responsibility for any of the bombings, though suspicion has often fallen on the Ukrainian intelligence services.

Since war broke out in eastern Ukraine in April 2014, more than 13,200 people have been killed in the fighting that pits Russia-backed separatists against Ukrainian government forces.

Moscow has denied funding or supplying separatist forces, despite overwhelming evidence pointing to its involvement.


Australia's confectionery brand Allen's has delighted lolly fans with a new twist to the classic red frogs.

The brand is set to launch Sourz Frogs Alive - complete with a 'burst of sour, tangy flavour at first bite', followed by a 'deliciously dazzling' raspberry flavour.

With no artificial colours, the product, which costs $2.95 per bag, will hit supermarket shelves around the country from Wednesday, February 17.

Australia's confectionery brand Allen's has delighted lolly fans with a new twist to the classic red frogs. The brand is set to launch Sourz Frogs Alive - complete with a 'burst of sour, tangy flavour at first bite', followed by a 'deliciously dazzling' raspberry flavour

'We know how much Aussies love Allen's Frogs Alive and that sour lollies are a trending flavour profile among lolly lovers,' Nestle head of marketing confectionery Joyce Tan said.

'We thought we'd combine the two and create something we know our customers will love.

'Allen's Sourz Frogs Alive also follows the success of Sourz Tangy Randoms and Sourz Snakes Alive so we're excited to see the reaction on our customer's faces once they taste how sour they really are.'

With no artificial colours, the product, which costs $2.95 per bag, will hit supermarket shelves around the country from Wednesday, February 17

Shoppers can let their taste buds come to life with the new lollies with a 'supercharged' flavour that will sure be a crowd pleaser.

Allen's Sourz Frogs Alive will be available in Woolworths from February 17, Coles and independent stores from March 1 and convenience stores from April.
Lawyers for a potential class of e-book consumers have asked a federal judge to consolidate four cases alleging an e-book price-fixing conspiracy among Amazon and the Big Five publishers. The move was not unexpected. Seattle-based firm Hagens Berman was the first to file a federal price-fixing suit against Amazon last month but the filing of such copycat cases is a common practice in consumer class action.

In a letter and proposed order filed with the court late last week, attorneys for the proposed consolidated consumer class asked judge Gregory H. Woods to join the cases and to set a new schedule.

Consolidation is appropriate here, where all four actions assert the same price-fixing and monopoly claims, based on the same allegations that Amazon and its co-conspirators anti-competitive agreements causes consumers to be overcharged for e-books purchased through retailers that compete with Amazon, reads a joint letter to the court filed by the plaintiff attorneys.

Under the proposed order, the plaintiff attorneys would file their consolidated amended complaint within 45 days after entry of an order consolidating the Actions and would appoint of an interim counsel for the potential class. Amazon would then have 45 days from the filing of a new consolidated complaint to respond. If that response is a motion to dismiss, as is expected, the plaintiffs would then have 45 days to reply to the motion, and the defendants reply would be due 30 days after that.

Last week, Hagens Berman filed an amended complaint adding the Big Five publishers (Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin Random House, and Simon & Schuster) as defendants. The three follow-on actions name only Amazon as a defendant, although it is likely the amended consolidated complaint would also add the publishers.

The four cases are: Fremgen v. Amazon.com, Inc.; Sacks v. Amazon.com, Inc.; Weinberger v. Amazon.com, Inc.; and Bonilla v. Amazon.com, Inc.

In 2011, Hagens Berman was the first to file an e-book price fixing case against Apple and a group of five major publishers, which was swiftly followed by about a dozen follow-on cases. Those cases were consolidated into a single action, with Hagens Berman, as the first to file, appointed lead counsel.
New Delhi: Yashraj Mukhate, the music composer who has made a name for himself in making iconic tracks out of some dialogues or meme-worthy content is back in action and how! #PawriHoriHai - this hashtag has taken social media by storm and Yashraj Mukhate`s new composition is going viral and netizens continue to groove to this party anthem. However, it is important to note where the word "pawry" came from.

Earlier this week, Pakistani influencer and content creator Dananeer Mobeen went viral on social media in which she is seen to be vacationing in a hilly location. In her 15-second video, she can be heard saying, "Ye humari car hai aur yeh hum hai aur ye humari pawry ho rahi hai (this is our car, this is us, and this is our party)."Mobeen saying party as "pawry" took the social media by storm and looks like Mukhate has also stepped on the bandwagon to use "pawry" to make a party anthem that everyone can groove to. Mukhate made a new composition out of this viral content and he captioned the post as: "Aajse me party nahi karunga sirf pawri karunga. Kyuki party karneme wo mazaa nahi jo pawri karneme hai."

As soon as the new composition was posted on Mukhate`s Instagram account, users started to comment and there were the likes of Bollywood celebrities including Sidhant Chaturvedi, Archana Puran Singh, and Fatima Sana Shaikh who gave their approval to this "pawry anthem".

Netflix India`s account also jumped on the bandwagon and the official Twitter handle tweeted pictures from Golmaal directed by Rohit Shetty and captioned the post as: "Yeh humari car hai, Yeh hum hai, hope we are not too to the party."PIB Fact Check`s official account tweeted that one may not be able to "pawwry" at the moment, but people who missed out can join their party to bust fake news.Several other users took to Twitter to approve of Mukhate`s new "pawwry anthem" and memes still continue to flock in.

Dananeer creates content on a range of topics including the latest make-up and fashion trends. She also speaks on mental health issues plaguing the youth of Pakistan. While the footage has been recreated hundreds of times with #pawrihoraihai on Twitter, the video has over a million views on Dananeer`s official Instagram handle alone, said The Express Tribune. Mukhate has earlier composed several iconic tracks like `Rasode mein kaun tha,` `Biggini shoot` and `Tuadda Kutta Tommy.`
Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Credit Suisse Group AG is grappling with how to keep top bankers from fleeing to competitors and drastically reducing risk as new Chairman Antonio Horta-Osorio seeks to recover from a series of scandals.The lender is cutting ties with SoftBank Group Corp., a backer to Lex Greensills collapsed supply-chain finance empire, and its temporarily barring clients from withdrawing all of their cash from a fund that invests with Renaissance Technologies after the strategy tanked and investors rushed for the exit.Its also considering retention bonuses for top performers to stabilize the business as defections mount in the wake of the Greensill debacle and the implosion of Bill Hwangs Archegos Capital Management, which contributed to a first-quarter pretax loss of 900 million francs ($1 billion).Theyre looking a bit like a basket case right now, Octavio Marenzi, chief executive officer of capital markets consulting firm Opimas, said Friday in a phone interview. The Archegos thing is really bad, and what happens after an event like that is people start to pick on them. Theyre seen as the weakest kid in the class.Some of the firms senior talent is streaming for the exits. Its top financial services banker, Alejandro Przygoda, is leaving for Jefferies Financial Group Inc., along with at least three colleagues, people familiar with the matter have said. That followed the recent departures of at least four other members of the financial institutions group to competitors including Barclays Plc., Bank of America Corp. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc.Shares of Zurich-based Credit Suisse have tumbled about 14% this year, the only decline among 35 companies in the Bloomberg Europe 500 Banks & Financial Services Index, which has surged 26%.Credit Suisse will no longer do any new business with SoftBank, people with knowledge of situation said, a decision that may ripple across the firms investment bank. SoftBank has been a prolific dealmaker, and last year Credit Suisse and other banks held about $8 billion of SoftBank shares in collateral, pledged by founder Masayoshi Son.A SoftBank Group spokesperson wasnt immediately available to comment, while Credit Suisse declined to comment.Horta-Osorio, 57, who succeeded Urs Rohner as chairman last month, pledged a wide-ranging review after the bank was forced to suspend billions of dollars of funds it managed with Greensill and took a $5.5 billion hit on Archegos, raising questions about the oversight of key clients.Credit Suisse conducted an internal review into the Greensill funds after allegations of possible conflicts of interest involving SoftBank last year. A number of SoftBank portfolio companies received loans via supply-chain funds at Credit Suisse, while SoftBank was also an investor in the Credit Suisse funds.In the aftermath, SoftBank pulled $700 million from the funds and the bank changed its investment guidelines for Credit Suisses funds to reduce the maximum exposure to a single borrower.The overlapping financial relationships raised questions about whether SoftBank was using the Credit Suisse funds to prop up investments in the Vision Fund, including Greensill Capital, in which it had a substantial stake.SoftBank wrote down its $1.5 billion Greensill holding to almost zero after Credit Suisse was forced to unwind its four Greensill-linked funds in March, people familiar with the matter have said. SoftBank is now seeking $1.15 billion in claims as part of Greensills insolvency proceedings.Credit Suisse marketed the popular supply-chain finance funds as among its safest investments because the funds were insured and the loans they held backed by invoices typically paid within weeks. But as the funds grew into a $10 billion strategy, they strayed from that pitch and much of the money was loaned through Greensill against expected future invoices, for sales that were merely predicted.Greensills collapse forced Credit Suisse to liquidate the funds.Guptas BusinessThe Greensill debacle is also at play in claims that Credit Suisse executives ignored warnings from colleagues about troubled steel tycoon Sanjeev Gupta as they channeled $1.2 billion of client funds to his businesses. Bankers in Credit Suisses commodity trade-finance unit blacklisted Guptas Liberty Commodities Ltd. in 2016 because they suspected some of its deals werent legitimate, according to people familiar with the matter.When they learned roughly two years later that the bank was lending to his companies through a suite of investment funds, which eventually grew to $10 billion, they flagged their concerns to leaders in compliance and the division that housed the loans, one of the people said.The disclosure that Credit Suisse may have put clients at risk despite internal concerns over Guptas businesses adds a new twist to the debacle stemming from the March implosion of Greensill, the finance firm at the center of the three-way relationship. The U.K. Serious Fraud Office is now investigating Guptas group of companies for suspected fraud, including in its financing deals with Greensill, according to a May 14 statement.We are currently focusing our efforts on recovering our investors money, Will Bowen, a spokesman for Credit Suisse in London, said in an emailed statement, adding that the banks internal probe will focus on all of the issues linked to the funds. We are committed to learning the lessons and will share the relevant lessons learned at the appropriate time.Andrew Mitchell, a spokesman for the Gupta Family Group Alliance, or GFG Alliance, a collective of businesses linked to Gupta including Liberty Commodities, denied any wrongdoing.RenTech FundSeparately, Credit Suisse is temporarily barring clients from withdrawing all their cash from a fund that invests with RenTec.The bank has invoked a so-called hold-back clause, after assets in the CS Renaissance Alternative Access Fund slumped to about $250 million this month from approximately $700 million at the start of last year, according to people with knowledge of the matter. While investors will receive 95% of their redemption requests after two months, the remaining 5% is expected to be paid out in January, after the funds year-end audit, the people said.The fund lost about 32% last year, in line with the decline in the Renaissance Institutional Diversified Alpha Fund International fund that it invests into, the people said. Renaissance, regarded as one of the most successful quant investing firms in the world, was rocked by billion of dollars in redemptions earlier this year after unprecedented losses in 2020. Three of its funds open to external investors fell by double digits last year.Credit Suisse and Renaissance declined to comment.More stories like this are available on bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.2021 Bloomberg L.P.
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The police in Lagos said they have arrested four members of the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC) for beating and stabbing a man to death in Lagos.

In a statement released by Olumuyiwa Adejobi, the police spokesperson, the incident happened on Saturday at Bariga, Lagos.

The victim, Tochukwu Chidi, a 35-year-old man of Arobadede Street, Bariga, was attacked by the OPC members after an argument occurred, the police said.

The Police operatives attached to Bariga Division of the Lagos State Police Command on Saturday, 13th February, 2021, arrested four (4) members of Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC) for beating and stabbing one Tochukwu Chidi, m, 35, of No 76 Arobadede Street, Bariga, to death after an argument with them at Temple Street, Bariga, Lagos.

The suspects attacked the deceased and inflicted injuries on him. He was rushed to the General Hospital, Bariga, for treatment before he was confirmed dead, Mr Adejobi said in the statement.

He identified the arrested suspects as Sunday Onilede, Azan Razak, Abdullahi Ibrahim, and Fatai Taiwo.

The Commissioner of Police in the state, Hakeem Odumosu, condemned the act and directed that the matter be transferred to the State Criminal Investigation Department, Panti, Yaba for proper investigation and prosecution.

In another development, the police said a suspected armed robber had been arrested with an English pistol at a brothel in Lagos.

Mr Adejobi said the suspect, Peter Arinola, was arrested by police operatives attached to Surulere Division while he was negotiating and harassing a lady prostitute for sex.

The suspect intended to use the pistol to intimidate the lady to agree to his terms and the amount he wanted to pay, but the lady insisted on certain amount of money. Peter brought out the pistol and wanted to force the lady to sex. The lady raised alarm and Peter was overpowered and arrested by the people around the brothel.

The police swung into action and further investigation revealed that the suspect used to assist an armed robber (name withheld) to keep the pistol for operations. The police later recovered 5 rounds of ammunition in the room of the lady during the course of their investigation, Mr Adejobi said in the statement.

The police spokesperson said the suspected armed robber was at large, but will be apprehended by all means and brought to book.
James McClean has highlighted a threat sent to him on social media just days after he posted calling for an end to 'anti Irish abuse'.

On Sunday, the Republic of Ireland international shared on his Instagram story a direct message sent to his account which read: 'Don't make me set your house on fire and burn everyone inside it.'

It was the fourth in a string of messages sent from the same account, part of which read 'f**k the IRA and f**k Ireland' and also called McClean a 'stupid ginger pr**k'.

While McClean said the earlier messages in the chain were 'like water off a duck's back', he said the final message was 'crossing the line'.

It followed just two days after McClean had taken to social media to call for an increase in condemnation of 'anti Irish abuse' as, having flagged the issue on previous occasions, he said the 'silence is deafening'.

"Banging my head against a brick wall here but I have been doing that for a long time so one more wont make a difference," he wrote.

"So much coverage this past couple weeks about discrimination and the condemnation of it across media outlets, players, ex players etc which is great to see because it's wrong and idiots should be held responsible for their actions and words as nobody should be subjected to that.

"Make no mistake about it or to take anything away from that but just to pose the question... does being abused for being Irish and anti Irish abuse acceptable? Is it not popular enough to be seen to be... spoke out about too?"

Last summer, McClean said he had considered retirement in light of the abuse he has received.

Read More

Since moving to England from Derry City in 2011, the 31-year-old has received death threats, bullets in the post and suffered abuse both online and during matches.

Catholic Campaign for Human Development funded pro-abortion, pro-LGBT groups: report

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The Catholic Campaign for Human Development is facing criticism for giving money to groups that promote abortion and LGBT activism, which violate the teachings of the Catholic Church.

According to a report from the Lepanto Institute published last week, the groups Stand Up Nashville, Memphis Interfaith Coalition for Action and Hope and Nashville Organized for Action hope received grants of $45,000, $50,000 and $60,000, respectively, from the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, the domestic anti-poverty program of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Grant guidelines stress that awardees of funds from the Catholic Campaign for Human Development must affirm compliance with Catholic social teachings. The guidelines also make clear that any organization involved in partisan political activities is ineligible for CCHD funding.

A checklist outlining eligibility requirements for organizations seeking CCHD grants specifically states that your organization, and its affiliates, partners and coalition members must not endorse or advocate policies and issues that are contrary to Catholic Social Teaching  such as favoring abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, same-sex marriage, racism, sexism and other prejudices.

The Lepanto Institute found that the three aforementioned organizations did not meet those requirements. The group Partnership for Working Families is listed as a member of Stand Up Nashville.

In a document called For All of Us by All of Us: Challenging State Interference to Advance Gender and Racial Justice, the group described a bill requiring Tennessees Medicaid provider to report annually on the number of abortions paid for by the medical assistance program as an example of legislation that is harmful for women and people of color.

Additionally, the document repeatedly uses pro-abortion phrases such as womens reproductive rights, indicating that the group has not hesitated to endorse or advocate policies and issues that are contrary to Catholic Social Teaching.

A 2015 social media post from the Partnership for Working Families features a link to a New York Times article announcing that Gay Marriage is Upheld by Supreme Court. The post was accompanied by the hashtag #LoveWins and a cheer for #EqualityForAll in and out of the workplace!

In October 2019, the Partnership for Working Families shared a post affirming that Lesbian rights are workers rights, Gay rights are workers rights, Bisexual rights are workers rights, Trans rights are workers rights, (and) Queer rights are workers rights. A tweet from earlier that year celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots included the hashtag #Pride.

Today is the 50th Anniversary of the #StonewallRiots. Weve come a long way. But we wont stop until we all get free. #Pride#Stonewall50https://t.co/70xI1T2j7F  For Working Families (@P4WF) June 28, 2019

In September 2018, as decades-old sexual assault allegations threatened to derail the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, the Partnership for Working Families shared a post from the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance. The post trashed Kavanaugh as a virulent opponent of reproductive justice, LGBTQ, and Disability Rights, adding, These biases alone should discount him from consideration for the highest court of the federal government.

Another member of Stand Up Nashville, the Central Labor Council of Nashville, has also engaged in LGBT activism. A June 2020 Facebook post by the CLC described the Bostock v. Clayton County Supreme Court decision finding that sexual orientation was a protected class under federal civil rights law as a good way to celebrate PRIDE month!

The other two groups singled out by the Lepanto Institute for failing to meet the eligibility requirements for CCHD grants, the Memphis Interfaith Coalition for Action and Hope and Nashville Organized for Action and Hope, are listed as coalition organizations of Power Together, a local chapter of the Womens March on Washington. The guiding vision and principles of Power Together include support for open access to safe, legal, and affordable, abortion and birth control for all people, regardless of income, location, or education.

This is not the first time that the Catholic Campaign for Human Development has come under fire for giving money to groups engaged in left-wing activism. A previous report from the Lepanto Institute, published in October, found that the group Faith in Action received $1.5 million from CCHD in 2019-2020.

The Twitter account from Faith in Actions Live Free project features several retweets of posts supportive of Democratic Party politicians and left-wing political causes as well as posts critical of Republican Party politicians and right-wing political causes.

For instance, the group retweeted a call from Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., seeking to raise $150,000 for fellow Democratic Sen. Gary Peters as well as a statement made during the first 2020 presidential debate asserting that You cant debate a piece of s***, referring to then-President Donald Trump.

In a previous interview with The Christian Post, the Lepanto Institutes Michael Hichborn explained that the CCHD was set up as an organization to fund Saul Alinskys community organizing groups, and theyve always been groups that support hard-left socialist Marxist ideologies.

At the time, the Catholic Campaign for Human Development maintained that Catholics can be confident that the CCHD does not fund organizations that violate the moral teaching of the church and that any departure from this irrevocable commitment would lead to immediate termination of funding support.

The Christian Post reached out to the CCHD for a comment about the Lepanto Institutes latest report. A response was not received by press time.

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Paducah Snow Sculpture Contest Entries Due Sunday

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - With the abundant supply of snow this week, the City of Paducah Parks & Recreation Department is holding a Snow Sculpture contest.

Now through Sunday, Feb. 21, submit a photo of your snow creation to the Snow Sculpture Facebook event page at https://www.facebook.com/events/1530032447201030 and use the hashtag #operationsnowball.



Entries have the chance of receiving a gift card.
The Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has made it compulsory for all vehicle owners to use FASTags, which facilitate electronic payment of fees at toll plazas, beginning from February 15 midnight. As per the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, all lanes on the fee plazas on national highways shall be classified as 'FASTag lane of the fee plaza' from today midnight.

Union Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari has urged people to adapt to FASTags quickly as the deadline to implement FASTag would not be extended further. With more than 2.54 crore users, FASTag contributes 80 per cent of the total toll collection. Daily toll collection using FASTag has surpassed the Rs 89 crore-mark.

What is FASTag and how do you get it?

FASTag is a sticker attached on your windshield from the inside. It has an imprinted radio-frequency identification (RFID) barcode linked to all the registration details of your vehicle. FASTag is valid for five years from the date on which it was issued. You can get FASTags from toll plazas, banks like SBI, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank and apps such as Paytm and Airtel Payments Bank.

Can I buy FASTag at toll booth?

Yes. One can buy FASTag from a toll plaza.

Is FASTag mandatory from tonight?

Yes. The Central Road Transport and Highways Ministry, helmed by Nitin Gadkari, has made FASTags mandatory on all national highways from February 15 midnight.

How and where to apply for FASTag?

Vehicle owners can go to any of the Point of the Sale (POS) locations at toll plazas/ issuer agencies to create their FASTag accounts. In order to know more about the same, a vehicle owner can dial the customer care number of the issuer agency.

Documents needed for FASTag

For this, you need documents like registration certificate (RC) of the vehicle, passport size photo of the owner, KYC documents according to the category of the vehicle owner (individual/corporate), identification document (PAN Card, Passport, Voter ID Card) and Aadhar Card with the address.

Can I get FASTag immediately?

In a bid to get FASTag quickly, you can also visit Amazon.in or approach banks like ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Airtel Payments Bank, State Bank of India, Kotak Bank, Axis Bank, and Paytm Payments Bank. Recently, ICICI also announced a collaboration with Google to enable vehicle owners to pay for a FASTag via Google Pay.

To purchase FASTag via a bank, the vehicle owner will have to visit their website. In the case of Airtel Payments Bank, one can purchase these directly from the payments app on your phone.

Can I have two FASTags for one car?

A vehicle owner can purchase only one FASTag for a single vehicle. In case someone has multiple cars, they will need to take separate FASTags for each vehicle.

How to recharge FASTag?

To recharge your FASTag account, you can pay via cheque or online through Credit Card/ Debit Card/NEFT/RTGS/Net Banking. FASTag account can be recharged till Rs 1 lakh. Vehicle owners can also recharge their FASTag accounts via online payment apps like Google Pay, Paytm, Airtel Payments Bank and PhonePe.

Can I Go Without FASTag?

No. If you don't have FASTag installed on your windscreen, you will have to pay a heavy fine -- double the toll amount.

Also read: No minimum balance in FASTag now

Also read: FASTags to be mandatory from February 15; all you need to know

Also read: Nitin Gadkari urges vehicle owners to adopt FASTag immediately


Universal masking, proper social distancing and a de-densification of classrooms are among the public health measures needed for schools to reopen amid the coronavirus pandemic, the head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in an interview with CNN over the weekend, noting theres work to do.

CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the former chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital, made the comments during an interview with CNNs Jake Tapper on Sunday. She brought up a recent morbidity and mortality weekly report from the federal agency that showed around 60% of students are reported to be reliably masking.

The public health official appeared to be referencing a Feb. 12 MMWR in which roughly 65% of middle and high school students aged 13 to 21 sampled by the CDC reported their fellow students wore a mask all the time in the classroom and in hallways or stairwells.

That has to be universal, so we have work to do, especially when the country remains in the red zone of high community transmission, Walensky told CNN. As that transmission comes down, well be able to relax some of these measures, but the real point is to make the science is consistent with our guidance, which is consistent to say: Until we can ensure that we have all those measures happening, schools wouldnt be safe.

Her comments echo recent guidance from the CDC that says schools can reopen for in-person instruction given strategies to stave off transmission of the viral respiratory infection, like mask-wearing, are being followed consistently and fully.

In its guidance, the CDC put emphasis on the need for universal mask-wearing, physical distancing of at least 6 feet, hand-washing, cleaning, maintenance and contact tracing done in combination with isolation and quarantine.

Even if the COVID-19 transmission risk is high in a city or town, putting the community in the red, the CDC recommended elementary schools continue to use a hybrid instruction of remote and in-person learning with key mitigation strategies in place.

For middle and high schools in high-risk communities, virtual instruction is recommended, though some schools may consider reopening if public health measures are consistently being implemented, the CDC noted.

Theres 90% of communities with this high rate of transmission going on right now, and we really dont want to bring community disease into the classroom. We also know that mask-breaching is among the reasons that we have transmission within schools when it happens, Walensky said, and so we really need to do the hard work to make sure that theres universal masking, theres strict 6 feet of distancing, that theres cohorting or podding so that theres restriction of disease if it were to be transmitted and all of the contract tracing and whatnot that needs to be done, and all of that is really hard to put together.

Walensky pointed out there are numerous research studies that have demonstrated if mitigation strategies are being properly followed, its possible to return to the classroom safely.

Really, what we have said in our guidance is that the amount of classroom activity really depends on the amount of spread in the community, the CDC director told CNN. If theres more disease in the community, there will be more in school, and most disease in school does not come from in-school transmission but comes from in the community. So what we would advocate for is to have more kids in school as our community spread comes down.

Related Content:
Ex-Peruvian health minister Oscar Ugarte took up his old role again Saturday, after his predecessor resigned over claims that a former president was vaccinated against Covid-19 long before the jab was available to the public.

Ugarte, a physician who had served as health minister under President Alan Garcia from 2008 to 2011, was sworn in again on Saturday, and thus became Peru's fifth health minister since the coronavirus pandemic emerged in the South American country 11 months ago.

He succeeds Pilar Mazzetti, who had served as health minister since July. She presented her letter of resignation on Friday to President Francisco Sagasti, state television reported.

Ugarte is taking office at a time Peru is being hammered by a second wave of Covid-19. Hospitals have been overrun, with more than 14,100 coronavirus patients, and have reported a lack of oxygen to treat those with breathing problems.

Peru only began its immunization program on Tuesday, two days after receiving 300,000 vaccine doses from state-owned Chinese company Sinopharm.

But the Peru 21 newspaper reported Thursday that former president Martin Vizcarra had been vaccinated in secret in October, just weeks before he was impeached and removed from office on charges that he was "morally incompetent."

Vizcarra has insisted he had merely volunteered to take part in a vaccine trial for the Sinopharm jab.

"I made the brave decision to join the 12,000 volunteers," the former president, who is currently campaigning to win a seat in congress in April's general election, has said.

Vizcarra, 57, said he kept the fact a secret -- his wife also took part in the trial -- because "volunteers have to maintain confidentiality."

However, rival legislator Ali Mamani said his party would make a formal complaint against Vizcarra.

Mazzetti, who was appointed by Vizcarra, has said she knew nothing about her former boss's secret jab and that those in decision-making positions shouldn't take part in the trials "so as not to skew the results."

Peru, which has recorded around 1.2 million coronavirus cases and more than 43,000 deaths among its 33 million people, began immunizing health care workers this week.

Authorities have yet to announce when immunization of the wider population will begin.

burs-bbk/st
Varuthini Ekadashi 2021: Facts, fasting rules and what you need to avoid on this day

Basant Panchami 2021: Speech, Essay and Quotes For Vasant Panchami

India

oi-Deepika S

New Delhi, Feb 15: The festival of Basant Panchami 2021, marking the arrival of spring will be celebrated on February 16 across different parts of the country.

Basant Panchami is celebrated on the fifth day (Panchami Tithi) of the Hindu month of Magha, Shukla Paksha. The festival is also known as Sri Panchami in the South.

The festival also marks the birthday of Goddess Saraswati who is often depicted as a beautiful woman dressed in pure white, often seated on a white lotus, which symbolizes light, knowledge and truth. People worship Goddess Saraswati on this day as it is considered very auspicious, especially to begin a child's education.

Basant Panchami 2021 Mahurat

Muhurat: 06:58 am to 12:34 pm

Basant Panchami Madhyahna Moment - 12:34 PM

Panchami Tithi Begins - 03:36 AM on February 16, 2021 and ends - 05:46 AM on February 17, 2021

Basant Panchami 2021 Essay

Good morning everyone, we all are gathered here to celebrate the Basant Panchami. Basant Panchami is a Hindu festival which is celebrated with great pomp and show across India on the fifth day (Panchami Tithi) of the Hindu month of Magha, Shukla Paksha. On this day people across the country worship Goddess Saraswati, the goddess of knowledge, music, and art is worshiped.

She is the one who gives us intellect and talent. We as Dance Academy/ Singing School/ School/ College bow down to her and request her to bless us so that we learn and perform better to spread the joy of art and knowledge.

Basant Panchami 2021: Speech ideas

Significance of Saraswati Puja

Arrival of spring season

Basant Panchami and its deep connection with women

Basant Panchami 2021: Messages

As winter ends and mustard flowers bloom, may your life also bloom. Happy Basant Panchami 2021!

May the occasion of Basant Panchami bring the wealth of knowledge to you, may you be blessed by Goddess Saraswati and all your wishes come true.

With the blessings of Maa Saraswati, may you succeed in eliminating ignorance and darkness from your life. I am extending my warm greetings and best wishes ahead of Vasant Panchami.

May Maa Saraswati shower you with her choicest blessings and may you lead a healthy life.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Wishing you and your family, a very healthy happy and prosperous life. May you be blessed by Maa Saraswati, the Goddess of knowledge and learning.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 11:11 [IST]
Union Minister on Monday said while India was making PPE kits for the world, some people were busy "making tool kit against Indians".

His remarks came after Delhi Police arrested activist Disha Ravi from Bengaluru and alleged that she was involved in creating and sharing with climate activist the protest "toolkit" backing the farmers' agitation with the aim of tarnishing the image of India and collaborated with pro-Khalistan elements.

"While India was making PPE KIT for the World, These ppl were making TOOL KIT against Indians. Shame!" Shekhawat tweeted.

In another tweet, the Union Jal Shakti Minister took a swipe at those who cited Ravi's age to question the police action against her.

"If age is the criteria then Param Veer Chakra Second Lt Arun Khetarpal, martyred at 21 is who I am proud of. Not some #toolkit propagandists!" Shekhawat said.

Non-bailable warrants have also been issued against lawyer Nikita Jacob and engineer Shantanu, who are absconding.

On January 11, 15 days ahead of the Republic Day violence in the capital, the two attended a Zoom meeting organised by pro-Khalistani group Poetic Justice Foundation, said Joint Commissioner of Police (Cyber) Prem Nath at a press conference earlier in the day.

The meeting decided the modalities to create the toolkit titled "Global Farmer Strike" and "Global Day of Action, 26 January", Nath said.

(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.)
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.

Originally Posted by LSG501 Originally Posted by

Well nvidia are still saying from 299.00 for the 3060 series (so I'll assume that's the 3060 12gb and there isn't a secret 6gb or something)...



Bigger issue isn't so much the price (I hope), it's if there is enough stock to supply anyone who wants one and if companies don't go and price gouge 'desperate' consumers trying to buy 'important' bits of their pc.
Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.
The human cost of the draft budget set out by Stormont's communities department would be "colossal", it has been warned.

The Department for Communities (DfC) is responsible for benefits, social housing, regeneration, sport and other issues.

Its draft budget for the 2020/21 financial year includes cuts to welfare reform mitigations and homeless support.

In the department's own Equality Impact Assessment (EQIA) of the draft budget, which is out for consultation, officials stated that the proposed spending allocations "will impact on the department's ability to deliver public services, support Covid-19 recovery and deliver on the wider Executive priorities as outlined in the New Decade New Approach (NDNA) agreement."

The NDNA deal made commitments for the Executive to develop and implement an anti-poverty strategy, as well as extending current welfare mitigation measures, such as a subsidy to the bedroom tax, which are due to expire at the end of next month.

Dr Ciara Fitzpatrick, a lecturer at Ulster University's School of Law, said there is simply no money in the budget for DfC to meet such commitments.

She said "thousands of families will suffer", particularly due to measures such as the two-child limit, which restricts the amount that larger families can receive in benefits and sees families losing an average of 2,700 each year.

Other issues Dr Fitzpatrick identified include lack of funding for staff to process additional Universal Credit claims and no budget for youth unemployment schemes.

"We're still in the middle of a global pandemic that is having untold economic impacts for the whole world, but particularly in the UK and especially here in Northern Ireland, where shocks tend to hit much harder because of our past and our turbulent political background," she told the Belfast Telegraph.

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Whatsapp Warning: Dr Ciara Fitzpatrick says draft budget strips money from those in need

"So it's really a time that we need to see huge investment from the Executive in anti-poverty and employment support measures to ensure that people are able to get back on their feet again when the economy starts to open, and the draft budget does quite the opposite. It strips money away from the people who need it most."

One major area of concern, Dr Fitzpatrick said, is the pause of the planned Jobstart scheme, which is designed to help 18 to 24-year-olds get on the employment ladder and was due to be launched in December. The launch was postponed, however, and now it has emerged that the scheme is "not deliverable within the proposed 2021-22 budget allocation", according to the budget EQIA.

She added: "Youth unemployment here before the pandemic was around 2.5% - it is now sitting at around 11.7% and growing. Without employment schemes like this it will just go up and up.

Dr Fitzpatrick also warned that this could lead to a 'brain-drain' here, with people moving elsewhere for better opportunities.

"Back in October, DfC said it would be recruiting 900 extra staff to deal with an expected surge in Universal Credit claims caused by the pandemic, particularly at the end of April when the Government's job retention scheme ends. Around 60,000 extra claimants are expected. However, no additional funding is available in the draft budget to put the extra staff in place.

"Therefore, instead of waiting five weeks for their first claim - which is already long enough - they could be waiting up to seven weeks for their first payment to come through. It's horrendous," Dr Fitzpatrick said. "Most people can't wait seven weeks. Imagine someone in the private rented sector, waiting seven weeks in arrears because they have no money coming in? People could end up on the street, especially if they may have been on the job retention scheme or going into their savings - this could tip them over the edge."

She also accused the Executive of "completely rolling back" on its commitments to mitigate the impact of welfare reform.

She added: "The draft budget as it stands will further compound economic hardship here. I would call on the Executive to prioritise the economic well-being of the people of Northern Ireland and look at the funding allocation - especially when there's still a 300m Stormont underspend," she added.

"The Executive has known that these economic problems existed before the pandemic. People are really, really going to suffer. It's going to bring a rising tide of poverty here and it will be extremely difficult to reverse. The human cost of this draft budget will be colossal."

In response, a DfC spokesperson said: "It is clear that the draft budget presents very significant challenges for the Executive and across departments with a constrained Spending Review outcome.

"The Draft 2021-2022 Executive Budget is currently out for consultation and all responses will be taken into account in finalising the Budget. No decisions on the final outcome have yet been made.

"The minister is committed to working hard to ensure the necessary resources are targeted towards all of those who are most in need."

Another Shia rebel cruise missile (UAV on automatic and armed with explosives) was intercepted by Saudi air defenses at it crossed the border heading for a city or military base. This is the sixth such attack in the last five days. Shia rebel ground attacks continued as did extortion of foreign aid to finance the Shia rebels. The rebels continue trying to disrupt Red Sea shipping by using naval mines and remotely controlled speedboats loaded with explosives.

Three days ago, the U.S. cancelled its designation of the Iran-backed Shia rebels as international terrorists, cancelled some smart bomb shipments to Saudi Arabia and paused the sale of F-35 stealth fighters to the UAE. This was meant to encourage the Saudis to negotiate an end to the Yemen civil war. Iran and the Shia rebels interpreted this as a victory because the Americans were making it easier for Iran to continue making attacks on Saudi Arabia via the Shia rebels who control portions of the Saudi-Yemen border. The Shia rebels want autonomy, or independence, for their traditional territories in northern Yemen. The Shia tribes up there have been seeking that for half a century and the majority of Yemenis would not agree to another partition of Yemen. A decade ago, Iran quietly increased financial, political and logistical support to the Shia tribes of northwest Yemen as part of the Iranian effort to replace Saudi Arabia as the protector of the most sacred Moslem shrines at Mecca, and displace the Saudis as the nominal leader of the Islamic world. The 2011 Arab String uprisings crippled and weakened the corrupt Yemeni government. This enabled the Shias to form an armed force strong enough to occupy and seize control of the capital Saana and declare themselves the new government of Yemen. The rebels were unable to control the southern half of Yemen and in 2015 an Arab coalition (mainly the Saudis and UAE) came to the aid of the post 2011 elected Yemeni government. Iran responded by increasing shipments of guided missiles and military advisors to the Shia rebels. This made it possible for the rebels to launch missiles at Saudi targets.

The Arab coalition responded with airstrikes against rebel forces and weapons (especially missile) stockpiles. The rebels moved their forces and storage sites to residential neighborhoods to use the civilians as human shields. The Arab coalition carried out their airstrikes anyway. Iran knew how to play the Western media and portrayed the Arab coalition as deliberately targeting civilians. Iran is accused of doing this in Syria even when the targets are not acting as human shields. In the West many politicians support negotiating with Iran and its proxies (governments and rebel groups that survive only with Iranian aid). Iran says it is willing to negotiate but inside Iran insists that this will not halt to their efforts to become the dominant power in the Middle East. A growing number of Western politicians are abandoning efforts to negotiate with Iran, which has a growing track record of agreements made and promptly violated. The neighbors of Iran have long accepted the fact that the Iranian religious dictatorship maintains power via a state of perpetual war against Israel (which must be destroyed) and Arab states (which must acknowledge Iranian domination). This led to informal cooperation between Israel and the Arab states which officially agreed that Israel should be destroyed. Gradually over the last three decades the Arabs came to realize that Iran was the real threat and the Israelis were actually potential allies. That led to covert cooperation arrangements turning into formal diplomatic and military agreements. The Americans called out the Iranian violation of the 2015 nuclear weapons deal that lifted economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for Iran halting its nuclear weapons program. In 2018 the U.S. revived economic sanctions and that had an immediate and very visible impact on Iranian military operations in Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq and Yemen. Iran now senses a way out of these problems using another series of clever deceptions. There is more skepticism of Iranian intentions in the West and the countries under attack by Iran keep providing evidence of this deception and violence, so much so that even the UN investigators have been convinced.

The Yemeni Shia rebels, also known as the Houthis or Ansar Allah, are sponsored by Iran and regularly attack Saudi Arabia and ships from all nations in the Red Sea. The rebels are so dependent on Iran that the new Iranian ambassador to the rebel government was an IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) general named Hassan Irloo, who had to be smuggled into Yemen in 2020 and had sanctions imposed on him in December 2020. Many Western politicians, especially in Europe, oppose the designation of the rebels as terrorists and favor trying to negotiate with Iran and the rebels to achieve a peace deal. Many Americans and most Arabs point out that the main reason Iran backs the Shia rebels is because it gives them a base from which to attack Saudi Arabia, a nation Iran is at war with. Iran is also at war with Israel and the United States. Iran has a record of not complying with agreed-to treaties and the Yemeni rebels do the same. The rebel designation and impact with took effect January 19th. Four weeks later the terrorist designation was reversed. Inside northern Yemen the rebels celebrated as did the Iranian government and their supporters.

The seven years of fighting in Yemen have further damaged an already crippled (by corruption and mismanagement) economy and caused a lot more deaths due to hunger, poor medical care and outbreaks of diseases like cholera. The rebels blame it all on Arab coalition air strikes but even UN investigators now agree that Shia rebel theft of foreign aid and denying hostile populations access to such aid have caused a large portion of the civilian deaths. Nearly all these deaths occur in the rebel controlled north because in the south foreign aid is delivered through several ports and distributed to whoever needs it. Unlike rebel held territory, aid officials and journalists are not restricted in their movements down south. In rebel controlled areas UN investigators have a very difficult time collecting evidence and in some cases the collected evidence is taken from the UN personnel by force before the UN investigators can leave rebel territory.

February 14, 2021 : In central Yemen (Marib province) a renewed Shia rebel offensive has failed to push government forces out of the province completely. The current rebel push has been underway since early February. These renewed offensive operations were encouraged by UAE forces leaving Marib in early 2020 because of disagreements with Saudi Arabia over strategy and to deploy all their military forces in the UAE. This is meant to discourage any Iranian aggression. For that reason, the UAE took their missile defense systems with them when they left Marib and that made government military bases more vulnerable to rebel ballistic and cruise missiles provided by Iran. The withdrawal of Arab coalition forces from Marib enabled the rebels to successfully regain control of much territory in the province. But the rebels have suffered hundreds of casualties in recent failed efforts to capture the provincial capital, which is 120 kilometers east of the rebel held national capital Sanaa.

In the north (the Saudi border) two rebel cruise missiles were shot down as they headed towards the Abha airport in southwestern Saudi Arabia.

February 12, 2021: The new government in the United States announced a change in strategy towards the Yemeni civil war by easing pressure on Iran and the Shia rebels while trying to force the Arab coalition to negotiate a settlement.

February 11, 2021: Saudi air defenses intercepted two rebel UAVs and one ballistic missile.

February 10, 2021: In the north (the Saudi border) a rebel cruise missile got past the Saudi air defense system and reached the Abha airport in southwestern Saudi Arabia. The missile hit an airliner, punctured the hull and caused a fire that was quickly extinguished. The airliner was put out of service until the damage could be repaired, which might take weeks.

February 9, 2021: In the southwest (port city of Aden) the investigation of the December 30 attack on the Aden airport by three Iranian cruise missiles continues. More evidence of rebel complicity has arrived from rebel territory, where local civilians took cell phone videos of the missile launches that apparently hit the Aden airport. The Shia rebels are now regarded as an oppressive occupying force in most areas they control. The Shia rebels no longer seek to hide the Iranian support and increasingly exercise control over civilians with threats of violent retribution for those who cooperate. This has been a major intel victory for government and Arab coalition forces because there is a steady stream of accurate information on rebel activities coming out of rebel territory.

The December 30 attack hit the airport shortly after members of the new Yemeni government arrived from Saudi Arabia. The officials were not harmed but the missiles killed 25 and wounded 110. The airport remained closed until January 3rd. These Iranian missiles are used by the Shia rebels more frequently indicating that the Iranian smuggling network is growing again. The rebels denied that they were responsible for the airport attack and blamed it on Saudi Arabia. Fragments of the three missiles were collected so that precise identification of the cruise missiles could be made. UN investigators are involved in the identification process and have confirmed the Iranian origins of the rockets and missiles (cruise and ballistic) used by the rebels. Also employed are Iranian UAVs equipped with explosives but these are being replaced by Iranian cruise missiles. One such UAV was shot down on December 30th as it headed for the Presidential Palace in Aden. Saudi Arabia responded with several air strikes against rebel facilities, including at least one involved in assembling cruise missiles using Iranian components.

February 8, 2021: In Syria there is more evidence of Iranian cutbacks on support for foreign wars. At the beginning of 2021 the Syrian Assad government ordered the military to reduce costs by having most military units return to lower peacetime (pre-2011) levels of readiness. Syria is not at peace but the Assads cannot afford to keep most of the military combat ready. The cutbacks are dictated by the sharp reduction in financial support from Iran. The American economic sanctions have, in the last three years, greatly reduced the amount of money Iran could spend on its foreign wars. Iran-backed groups in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza and Yemen are all feeling the impact. Iran is hoping the new American government will relax the sanctions. While the Americans are now saying nice things about Iran, the sanctions are still in place and enforced. In Syria that means the troops have less ammo and fuel for patrols and combat. As was the case in peacetime, more soldiers and officers were given leave, to spend a few weeks visiting families or even taking a vacation. Yemen was always much less expensive for Iran than Syria, Lebanon or Iraq and that enabled Iran to maintain the level of support it provided its Yemen proxies.

January 30, 2021: In the north (the Saudi border) a rebel cruise missile was shot down as it crossed into Saudi air space. Intended target was unknown, except that it was somewhere in Saudi Arabia.

January 27, 2021: Yemen has long been recognized as one of the most corrupt places on the planet. The extent of this corruption can be seen in the international surveys of nations to determine who is clean and who is corrupt. For 2020 Yemen ranked 176th out of 180 nations in international rankings compared with 177th in 2019.

These ratings and ranking are updated each year for the annual Transparency International Corruption Perception Index. Corruption is measured on a 1 (most corrupt) to 100 (not corrupt) scale. The most corrupt nations (currently Venezuela and Yemen at 15, Syria at 14, South Sudan and Somalia at 12) have a rating of under 16 while of the least corrupt (New Zealand and Denmark) are both 88.

For 2020 the least corrupt nation in region was UAE (United Arab Emirates), which ranked 21st out of 180 nations. The current UAE score is 71 (same as 2019) compared to 61 (61) for Israel, 67 (69) for the United States, 33 (35) for Egypt, 25 (26) for Nigeria, 44 (44) for South Africa, 21 (20) for Iraq, 40 (39) for Turkey, 53 (53) for Saudi Arabia, 33 (30) for Ukraine, 47 (45) for Belarus, 56 (58) for Poland, 80 (80) Germany, 65 (65) for Taiwan, 40 (39) for Turkey, 40 (41) for India, 30 (28) for Russia, 61 (57) for South Korea, 42 (41) for China, 18 (14) for North Korea, 36 (37) for Vietnam, 85 (85) for Singapore, 74 (73) for Japan, 37 (40) for Indonesia, 38 (38) for Sri Lanka, 34 (34) for the Philippines, 31 (32) for Pakistan, 26 (26) for Bangladesh, 25 (26) for Iran, 19 (16) for Afghanistan, 28 (29) for Burma, and 25 (28) for Lebanon.

Yemens corruption score has changed for the worse since the 2011 Arab Spring revolution when it was 23.

January 23, 2021: In Saudi Arabia air defense systems guarding the capital Riyadh intercepted and destroyed something in daytime. The intruder was an Iranian UAV armed with explosives and acting as a cruise missile. No ground targets were hit by one of these UAVs. This is not the first time such weapons have been launched from Yemen towards Riyadh, which is in central Saudi Arabia, a thousand kilometers away from the Yemeni border. In one mid-2020 attack the rebels claimed that five UAVs and several ballistic missiles were used and some of them hit the Saudi capital. The Saudis say they intercepted the missiles with their Patriot ABMs (anti-ballistic missiles) and the UAVs were shot down by Saudi jet fighters. There are a large number of foreigners in Riyadh so you cannot conceal missiles or explosives-equipped UAVs hitting targets. All that was reported overnight were explosions in the night sky, indicating a Pac-3 missile intercepting a ballistic missile. Not a common sight over the capital but not unknown either since Iran started supplying the Yemeni rebels with longer range ballistic missiles.
The big picture: Farfarout was first discovered in January 2018 using the Subaru Telescope, an 8-meter scope located on top of a dormant volcano in Hawaii. Over the next few years, co-discoverer Scott Sheppard and colleagues tracked the object using a variety of telescopes around the world to get a read on its orbit. They have since confirmed it is the most distant object yet found in our solar system.

The team has since learned that Farfarout resides 132 astronomical units (AUs) from the Sun. A single AU is defined as the distance from the center of the Earth to the center of the Sun, or about 91.757 million miles. For comparison, dwarf planet Pluto is just 34 AU from the Sun.

Farfarout is not to be confused with Farout, another object discovered by Sheppard and crew that was also found in 2018. Its not as distant as Farfarout, hence the nomenclature.

Farfarout has a long orbital period, moving very slowly across the sky. As such, it takes a full 1,000 years to complete one orbit around the Sun. This is why it took so many years of observations to correctly map its trajectory.

Scientists believe Farfarout may at one point have been much closer to Neptune or perhaps have originated from a more central location within our solar system.

Observations will continue on Farfarout and as scientists gain more knowledge about the object, theyll work to give it a proper name (although personally, I dont see whats wrong with Farfarout).

Masthead credit Aphelleon
Amid the turmoil different countries are facing, humanity still has hope. It is evident when the Colombian government grants protection to Venezuelan migrants, making Pope Francis hail and salute the nation for doing the initiative. The movement the Colombian government has initiated is in line with the Pope's encouragement to people in expressing their gratitude towards the migrants who fled due to economic hardships and with hopes to start a new life.

AP News shares that Colombian President Ivan Duque notes that Venezuelan migrants illegally in their land will be eligible for a 10-year resident permit. Meanwhile, they add that migrants who are on a temporary residence may extend their stay.

Read also: Colombia Ready to Rollout COVID-19 Vaccine Once Doses Arrive in the Country

Pope Francis on Colombia

On behalf of the migrants, ABC News notes that Pope Francis expresses his gratitude for the country's bravery, noting that Colombia is also experiencing their troubles when it comes to development, poverty, and peace.

Pope Francis shares with Republic World that he always looks with gratitude at the efforts of those who work hand in hand on behalf of the migrants., which according to AP News, was announced publicly in St. Peter's Square. Republic World furthers that the Pope is eager to join the bishops in Colombia in expressing recognition for the country's decision. He furthers that it would allow Venezuelans to be welcomed, protected, and integrated.

Colombia's Helping Hand

According to ABC News, the ten-year protection statute will be enjoyed by 1.8 million Venezuelan migrants that will allow them to stay and apply for permanent residency. They also add that Venezuelan migrants hope the policy will make it easier for them to obtain work and access social services.

President Duque shares with The Guardian that migration crises are defined as humanitarian crises. He adds that they have close to a million migrants in their country whose government has no idea with their names. The Guardian also notes that Colombia is one of the most popular destinations of the more than four million Venezuelans who have fled their country.

Duque points out in AP News that they are hoping that other countries will make them an example as Colombia tries to take this historic and unprecedented step for Latin America. He also adds that registering undocumented Venezuelan migrants will also benefit their country's security agencies and make social services, including coronavirus vaccines, more efficient.

The Guardian shares that apart from the Pope, humanitarian organizations and foreign governments also celebrated Colombia's movement, like the United States expressing their support to Colombia, as they also expand their humanitarian programs worldwide. This was done through a Twitter post from Secretary Anthony Blinken.

With the Pope's recognition in the movements like what the Colombian government made for Venezuelan migrants, we hope that more countries will follow what they did. It is evident that mercy and compassion still reign in the heart of people.

Related article: Venezuelan Refugees in Colombia Face Eviction Amid the COVID-19 Quarantine

WATCH: Why Colombia has taken in 1 million Venezuelans from Vox




Minister of Cooperative Governance and Corporate Affairs Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has published amendments to the lockdown regulations which take effect immediately.

These changes include new travel regulations related to the opening up of certain land borders following prolonged restrictions on all land border crossings.

The new rules also prohibit additional categories of gatherings, namely community political meetings and political events.

These changes are summarised below.

Opening up of land borders

Following a prolonged closure of all land borders to neighbouring countries, the government has now reopened 20 of its land border crossings.

The regulations state that the 20 land borders which were partially operational will be fully operational and the 33 land borders which were closed will remain closed.

Travelling to and from South Africa over these borders is now allowed, subject to certain restrictions.

Daily commuters from neighbouring countries are required to adhere to COVID-19 protocols, including:

COVID-19 screening and quarantine where necessary.

The wearing of a face mask.

Sanitisation and social distancing measures.

International air travel remains restricted to OR Tambo, King Shaka, and Cape Town International Airports.

Political events and traditional meetings

In a separate government gazette, Minister Dlamini-Zuma amended the lockdown regulations to include a ban on certain gatherings related to politics.

This regulation adds traditional community meetings and political events to the list of banned gathering types.

Gatherings at political events and traditional community meetings (izimbizo) are prohibited.

These types of gatherings are now included under the specific exclusions table in the regulations, along with all social gatherings, after-funeral gatherings, and night clubs.

Days after SONA 2021

The publication of these new regulations and the ban on political events follow days after the State of the Nation Address by President Cyril Ramaphosa on 11 February 2021.

This address was attended in person by a few ministers, with the majority attending the address via teleconferencing software.

During his address, Ramaphosa outlined the countrys recovery plan and lauded the progress being made in various initiatives deemed crucial to the countrys economic performance.

These included a renewed focus on local manufacturing as well as a plan to construct new smart cities across the country, beginning with a project centred around the Lanseria airport.

Provided the State of the Nation Address would be classified as a political meeting, it would not have been able to accommodate the physical attendance of ministers if the new regulations were published just a few days earlier.

The new adjusted level 3 lockdown regulations are embedded below.

Level 3 lockdown changes

Now read: Thousands of students yet to be placed in schools
Los Angeles Police Department has launched an investigation after an officer reported that a 'Valentine' image of George Floyd was being shared among police with the caption 'You take my breath away'.

Floyd, who was black, died on May 25 when a white Minneapolis police officer, Derek Chauvin, knelt on his neck for nine minutes while arresting him. Footage showed Floyd told cops 'I can't breathe' more than 20 times before he died.

Michel Moore, chief of LAPD, said on Saturday that he had not seen the offensive image, and that he would interview the officer who reported it on Monday.

'Our investigation is to determine the accuracy of the allegations while also reinforcing our zero tolerance for anything with racist views,' the chief said.

Moore said that, if the department confirms officers were circulating the image, 'people will find my wrath.'

Floyd died in Minneapolis on May 25 after Derek Chauvin, a police officer, knelt on his neck

Moore, chief of Los Angeles Police Department, has opened an investigation into the report

Moore also confirmed the department is investigating two Instagram accounts that people have reported as possibly being linked to department personnel  including one called the 'Blue Line Mafia.'

Floyd was arrested for using a counterfeit $20 bill in a grocery store in Minneapolis

LAPD said in a statement: 'The Department has become aware of allegations that an image was being passed around the department and this image was in the workplace. There are also allegations that the post with the image was authored by a department employee.

'A personnel complaint has been initiated and we are pursuing each allegation including interviewing the department member who brought it to our attention.

'At this point the Department has not identified any actual postings in the workplace or identified that it was in fact our department employee who created the image. We have raised the apparent existence of the image and directed commands to survey the worksites for it.

'If found any employee or supervisor is directed to take possession and identify those present. The Department will have zero tolerance for this type of behavior.'

Chauvin and the three other officers who took part in Floyd's arrest - Thomas Lane, J. Kueng, and Tou Thao - were fired the day after his death.

They are all facing trial for Floyd's killing, with the trial expected to begin in March.

Chauvin is charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter. Lane, Kueng, and Thao are charged with aiding and abetting those crimes.
ALTON  Minor flooding is expected this spring along the Mississippi, Missouri, and Illinois rivers, according to the National Weather Service.

Most local streams are expected to have a near normal flood risk this spring, according to the NWS. Its forecast included theMississippi River from above Canton, Missouri, to above Cape Girardeau, Missouri; the Missouri River above Jefferson City, Missouri to its confluence with the Mississippi River; the Illinois River downstream from its confluence with the LaMoine River to its confluence with the Mississippi River; and for tributary rivers in eastern Missouri and west central and southwest Illinois.

The NWS reported no current flooding anywhere within the St. Louis Service Area, so probabilities within this outlook are not skewed by any ongoing flooding.

The Mississippi and Missouri rivers are experiencing near normal streamflow for this time of year, the NWS reported. Flows along the Illinois River have experienced well below normal streamflow through most of the winter. This is providing a low to average starting point for these rivers to accept future runoff.

Soils have dried out considerably across the Midwest, the NWS said, leaving local areas with near to below normal soil moisture. Drier soils are the rule from Minnesota and the Dakotas through western Kansas, which will provide the upper Mississippi River and middle Missouri River basins with additional storage to deter flooding.

The NWS also reported snowpack and snow water equivalent in this snowpack are well below average from northern Wisconsin, most of Minnesota, and the Dakotas. However, the snow water equivalent is well above average from southern Nebraska through much of Iowa, northern Illinois, and southern Wisconsin. That could lead to the likelihood of minor flooding for the Illinois, Missouri, and Mississippi rivers.

Given the below normal snowpack in other portions of these basins, the likelihood of significant (moderate or greater) flooding is not as great, the NWS reported. For local basins, the chances for minor flooding at most locations throughout the St. Louis service area are near or above average.

Most local forecastpoints have flood probabilities close to normal, the NWS reported.

Looking ahead to March through May, temperatures are expected to warm back into the above normal realm throughout the St. Louis service area, but precipitation is expected to have a slightly better than average chance to be above average throughout the St. Louis service area.
Its first all-electric Land Rover model is slated for 2024 and it aims to have six electric variants of its vehicles over five years.

Jaguar Land Rover is aiming to take on as it lines up its entry to the electric vehicle market, with a new fleet of SUVs and premium models planned in the coming years.

The formerly British car brand, now owned by Indian conglomerate Tata, aims to roll-off six electric variants of Land Rover vehicles over the next five years.

At the same time, it said it will reimagine Jaguar as an all-electric luxury brand from 2025.

Land Rovers first all-electric Land Rover model is slated for 2024.

Furthermore, the company plans for all Jaguar and Land Rover nameplates to be available in pure electric form by end of the decade.

READ: Tesla recalls thousands of older cars

With the companys market position  high-value luxury cars and as the leading brand for 4x4s and SUV  it is in direct competition with Tesla which this year usurped the entire gasoline fuelled car industry to become the worlds most valuable vehicle firm.

It comes as Tesla is working to bring the Cybertruck, its first SUV, to market. Earlier this month, Elon Musk said that a few Cybertruck deliveries could start by end of 2021 if the company if the company can get lucky.

Musk, meanwhile, said that volume production would start next year.

The Cybertruck garnered a high profile upon its launch announcement for both its unique aesthetic and a demonstration gaffe which saw its unbreakable and bulletproof glass shatter during a live test.

In the months following its November 2019 unveiling the Cybertruck had reportedly received over 500,000 orders and Tesla was said to be rapidly adding further orders, at nearly 6,000 order per day prior to the coronavirus pandemic.

Whilst Tesla has billionaire rocketman Elon Musk, Jaguar Land Rover has Indias largest conglomerate Tata Group which is backed by the Tata family (which is also related the Petit Baronetcy, which started Indias textiles trade in the nineteenth century).

Jaguar Land Rover said that collaborations and knowledge-sharing with industry leader, particularly those within the Tata Group, will allow it to explore synergies on clean energy, connected services, data and software.

Jaguar Land Rover is unique in the global automotive industry. Designers of peerless models, an unrivalled understanding of the future luxury needs of its customers, emotionally rich brand equity, a spirit of Britishness and unrivalled access to leading global players in technology and sustainability within the wider Tata Group, said Thierry Bollore, Jaguar Land Rover chief executive.

We are harnessing those ingredients today to reimagine the business, the two brands and the customer experience of tomorrow.
Angie Kent has learned firsthand about the perils of making an unfortunate typo on Instagram.

The Bachelorette star was left red-faced on Sunday after infamous 'snark' account Celeb Spellcheck re-posted an Instagram post in which she'd accidentally spelled 'meditation' as 'mediation'.

'Empowering / mediation groups on the Gold Coast!!!' the 31-year-old wrote next to an Instagram Video of herself asking fans for advice about local meditation communities.

Oh dear! The Bachelorette's Angie Kent, 31, (pictured) was left red-faced on Sunday after infamous 'snark' account Celeb Spellcheck re-posted an Instagram post in which she'd accidentally spelled 'meditation' as 'mediation'

Celeb Spellcheck promptly roasted Angie for her typo by uploading a screen-grab of the video, alongside the tongue-in-cheek caption: 'Hit up @angiekent_ with your alternative dispute resolution suggestions.

The post attracted an avalanche of comments by amused fans, one of whom mused: 'I imagine attending mediation would have the opposite effect of meditation.'

'Hahahaha maybe she could give me a hand in my less than amicable separation', another quipped.

Help needed? 'Empowering / mediation groups on the Gold Coast!!!' Angie wrote next to an Instagram Video of herself asking fans for advice about local meditation communities

Whoops! Celeb Spellcheck promptly roasted Angie for her typo by uploading a screen-grab of the video, alongside the tongue-in-cheek caption: 'Hit up @angiekent_ with your alternative dispute resolution suggestions

Another follower jokingly questioned whether Angie was planning to build a fence on her property - an issue that often is resolved between neighbours through mediation.

Never one to shy away from responding to criticism on social media, Angie quickly penned a comment defending her spelling error.

'[Laughing/crying emoji] I'm loving this read. It's like none of you have made a slippery mistake before!' she declared.

Poking fun: The post attracted an avalanche of comments by amused fans, one of whom mused: 'I imagine attending mediation would have the opposite effect of meditation'

Hitting back: Never one to shy away from responding to criticism on social media, Angie quickly penned a comment defending her spelling error

'It's like none of you have made a slippery mistake before!' Angie boldly accused her critics of being hypocritical

'There's plenty of slippery slip ups where this came from,' she continued, adding a clapping emoji, praise emoji and water splash emoji.

Celeb Spellcheck began a few years ago as an account making fun of poor spelling on sponsored Instagram posts, but has since become a platform for holding influencers to account for their lies and irresponsible behaviour.

The profile is also a hub for user-submitted gossip, with one notable example being the claim a high-profile couple from Victoria is on the verge of divorcing.

Hitting back: The account has attracted criticism, with the likes of Skye Wheatley and Tayla Damir (pictured) accusing the admin of 'bullying' them by correcting their spelling

Celeb Spellcheck has attracted criticism in recent months, with the likes of Skye Wheatley and Tayla Damir accusing the page of 'bullying' them by correcting their spelling.

The admin has denied bullying the influencers she features on the account, saying: 'This page is meant to be lighthearted and fun. I have definitely posted things in the past that I'm not proud of, but I do try to never cross the line.'

The account previously made headlines when it shared a screenshot of model Elyse Knowles misspelling 'voila' as 'wallah'. The gaffe went viral in December when it was picked up by U.S. social media sensation Joshua Ostrovsky, a.k.a. The Fat Jewish.
Ex-Khabarovsk heads sentencing in Rosneft embezzlement case rescheduled for February 17

 RAPSI, Eugeny Varlamov

18:31 15/02/2021

MOSCOW, February 15 (RAPSI)  Moscows Zamoskvoretsky District Court on Monday will announce sentence against ex-governor of Russias Khabarovsk Region Victor Ishayev accused of embezzling over 7.5 million rubles (over $100,000) from Rosneft oil company on February 17, but not February 16 as was scheduled earlier, the courts press service told RAPSI.

Prosecutors earlier demanded 7 years in prison for the defendant.

Ishayev was arrested in Moscow on March 28, 2019. On March 29, Moscows Basmanny District Court denied a 15-million-ruble ($200,000) bail to Ishayev and placed him under house arrest.

From 2013 to 2018, Ishayev was a vice-president of Rosneft. According to investigators, between 2014 and 2017, he fraudulently ensured signing of premises lease agreements for the company offices use in the Khabarovsk Region at an overvalued price. The contracts were concluded with Ishayevs firm.





She stars with John David Washington in the Netflix movie Malcolm & Marie.

And on Sunday, Zendaya shared some behind-the-scenes photos from the shoot as she joked about how the intense drama might not be the best choice for couples celebrating Valentine's Day.

'Happy Valentines Day from Marie (If youre watching our movie tonight with your significant other...were sorry lol),' she posted on her Instagram.

Candid: Zendaya joked about how her Netflix movie Malcom & Marie might not be the best choice for couples on Valentine's Day as she shared some behind-the-scenes photos Sunday

Malcolm & Marie is the work of the actress' Euphoria director Sam Levinson.

Zendaya plays the girlfriend of a filmmaker, played by Washington, and the intimate drama follows the couple as they examine their relationship over the course of one night.

The actress, 24, served as a producer on the project and has been diligent in promoting it as much as she can on her social media.

'This is my first time being a leading lady, but also my first time being this creatively involved in something, producing something, co-financing something, owning something and sharing it all with my crew,' she explained in a recent interview on GMA.

On screen couple: The drama stars Zendaya, 14, and John David Washington, 36, and was filmed over 14 days last summer amid strict COIVID-19 protocols

Low-key: the film was shot in black and white and was directed by Zendaya's Euphoria director Sam Levinson

Behind the scenes: The actress also served as a producer on the project and has been diligent about promoting it in her social media

The movie was shot over 14 days last summer with a crew of just 22.

It was also made in black and white, something which Zendaya says gives it a certain 'timelessness'.

'There was a thought also about reclaiming the narrative of black and white Hollywood and Black actors really having their moment at that time,' she said on the ABC morning show.

'A lot of filmmakers have already done this before, a lot of Black filmmakers, so it's not necessarily a new idea, but we did want to pay tribute to that era and reclaim that beauty and that elegance with these two Black actors,' she added.

Intense: In Malcolm & Marie, Zendaya plays the girlfriend of a filmmaker, played by Washington, and the intimate drama follows the couple as they examine their relationship
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'Buffalo' represents hard work, persistence and stability in the Vietnamese people's conception, and these characteristics are considered to apply to people born in the Year of the Buffalo [according to eastern zodiac].

According to many experts in 'feng shui', 'buffalo people' are more suited to traditional business than other lines.

Three entrepreneurs born in the Year of the Buffalo talk about how they lead their businesses.

Tran Dinh Long, chairman of the Hoa Phat Group: I dont say much, but when I do, I make it happen.

Though not the first to produce construction steel in Viet Nam, Long, born in 1961, made the Hoa Phat Group the leader in the industry in 2018.

He noted the demand for construction in Viet Nam and began leveraging his two businesses in machinery and furniture trading to produce construction steel in the late 1990s.

Industry insiders said at the time: He knows nothing about steel, so how can he succeed? They would never have guessed that, 18 years later, in 2018, Longs group would become number one in the market and the person who knows nothing would be a billionaire.

Last year, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Longs group recorded a surge in both revenue and profit, earning more than VND91 trillion (US$3.9 billion) in revenue and posting VND13.5 trillion in after-tax profit, up 41 per cent and 80 per cent, respectively, against 2019.

While crude steel output doubled 2019s figure, reaching 5.8 million tonnes, the group also produced about 3.4 million tonnes of finished construction steel, up 22.5 per cent. It currently holds a steel market share of 32.5 per cent in Viet Nam.

Its shares (HPG) also doubled last year, taking Long and his wifes fortune to an estimated $1.9 billion.

He told Viet Nam News of three factors behind his success: First is the right investment on a long-term path. Second is good management. And the last is the huge market demand for construction steel in Viet Nam, as a new industrialised country.

Hoa Phat benefited greatly from the Governments policy of increasing public investment during the pandemic.

With construction to begin next January to meet increasing demand for hot-rolled coil (HRC), its second Dung Quat steel complex will help boost annual revenue and profit by as much as 80 per cent, Long said.

The consumption of HRC last year totalled 12 million tonnes in Viet Nam, for growth of 8-10 per cent. As the countrys two steel mills -- Hoa Phat and Formosa -- supply only 8 million tonnes, there is huge potential for a new complex, Long believes.

With the character of a 'buffalo', which is earnest and serious, he always takes care of things in a gradual process. He told Viet Nam News about his success: Its no secret. The way we do things at Hoa Phat is to consistently follow the path chosen, carefully calculating the needs of the market and investing accordingly.

Long is famous for telling the groups shareholders some years ago: I dont say much, but when I do, I make it happen.

Dr Mai Huy Tan: I started again at the age of 72.

Mai Huy Tan, born in 1949, earned his PhD in Mathematics at Germanys Martin Luther University. After a time teaching in the country, he returned to Viet Nam and worked for the Ministry of Industry and Trade before starting his own business at the age of 52.

His first company, sausage-maker uc Viet, was a great success, winning the hearts and taste buds of consumers countrywide.

He sold the business in 2016 to South Koreas Deasang Group for US$32 million.

I have nothing to regret about the deal. I sold the company to the best partner and the South Korean owner appreciates my work, keeping the same trademark and growing the business around the world, Tan said.

With the persistence of a 'buffalo', Tan started yet another business, using the circular economic model, in the Mekong Deltas Hau Giang Province, with the aim of making the Delta 'the Netherlands' of Asia.

I started again at the age of 72, he told Viet Nam News. My project will turn Viet Nam into an agriculture hub of the world. Viet Nam cant copy the way Singapore became wealthy but it can do so itself by developing smart agriculture in a circular economic model.

He calculated the Mekong Delta has a similar area and population as the Netherlands, which is the worlds second-largest agriculture exporter.

His circular economy project would develop a closed chain of smart and organic rice cultivation, cattle husbandry, and an aquaculture area, while producing four types of green energy -- bioenergy, wind power, rooftop solar, and waste energy -- initially in Hau Giang and then in 12 other provinces in the Delta. The energy generated would be used for the project and sold to the national grid, he said.

The project consists of the AGINE complex for beef cattle, rice and rice husk processing, and renewable energy, in Chau Thanh A Districts Nhon Nghia A Commune, and the GREENDEVI complex, with milch beef cattle farming, feed processing, and renewable energy facilities, in Phung Hiep Districts Tan Phuoc Hung Commune.

Costing about $210 million, the AGINE complex spans 30ha, while GREENDEVI will cost $420 million and covers 63.5ha.

When the project is expanded to the entire Hau Giang by 2030, as planned, Tan said it would post a turnover of VND200 trillion ($8 billion) for the province.

He believes that his persistence in whatever he does is indeed because he was born in the Year of the Buffalo.

At the age of 72, he is still a regular jogger and sometimes swims and does gym excercises. Staying abreast of new knowledge every day, he said he could lead the project at least until he is 80.

He has also staffed the company with people from the 8x and 9x generations. They will help turn my project into reality to benefit Viet Nam, he told Viet Nam News.

Le Hoang Diep Thao: People often expect to face more difficulties during the year of the animal they were born in, but I choose to think and plan ahead for myself and my business to overcome any difficulties. When I plan carefully, the difficulties, if any, are included in the planning.

Born in 1973, Le Hoang Diep Thao, CEO of King Coffee, was recently recognised as the Most Admired CEO in Food & Beverages by Global Brands magazine.

Viewing King Coffee, which began in 2016. as her second start-up, following Trung Nguyen Coffee, Thao chose the US and its large overseas Vietnamese community as her first market.

A few months later, King Coffee entered the Chinese market and was among top 4 best-selling brands on T-Mall Super Market (one of Alibabas three key e-commerce sites) by the end of March 2017. King Coffee was being exported to 60 countries and territories at the time, which had grown to 120 by last year.

Calculating the global coffee industry to be worth more than US$200 billion, Thao was not happy with the fact that Viet Nam, as the second-largest coffee exporter in the world and the worlds leader in Robusta exports, only earned around $3 billion a year from the crop.

My ambition is to make the coffee industry one of the key sectors in the local economy. Globally, we are aiming to develop King Coffee into one of the top 10 coffee brands in Asia and one of the key players in Viet Nams agricultural industry over the next five years, Thao, also vice chairwoman of the Viet Nam Coffee-Cocoa Association (Vicofa), told Viet Nam News:

She believes that Viet Nam needs to further elevate its coffee industry, entering higher segments of the global value chain rather than simply exporting raw materials. One kilo of green coffee beans now sells for VND5,000 (22 US cents), while a cup of actual coffee costs $5. Local farmers struggle to nurture their coffee trees, and are yet to see worthwhile results because the coffee price is too low and unstable.

She told Viet Nam News that, amid the pandemic, the global coffee industry still grew 2 to 4 per cent annually. In the next 5 to 10 years, the global coffee market is expected to be short of supply, so Viet Nam needs to take practical action to quickly seize new opportunities, by replanting trees, improving coffee standards, and creating a better reputation in the world market.

Born in the Year of the Buffalo, she said persistence in reaching goals is the key to success, adding: People often expect to face more difficulties during the year of the animal they were born in, but I choose to think and plan ahead for myself and my business to overcome any difficulties. When I plan carefully, the difficulties, if any, are included in the planning.  VNS
Presenter and ex-model Yvonne Connolly has become the latest celeb to move into DIY hairdressing.

With the recent announcement from the Government that hairdressers will not be reopening any time soon, many of us have been turning to homemade beauty solutions.

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Tanaiste Leo Varadkar has said that services like hairdressers and beauticians wont return until much later than March 5th.



Most of us havent had a hair or beauty appointment since before Christmas so it comes as no surprise that more people are turning to the dreaded box dye with each passing day.



Television presenter and cook Yvonne Connolly has become the next person to try her hand at dying her own hair.



She revealed her new do earlier today on Instagram, stating that she used Clairols Nicen Easy semi-permanent hair dye in the shade Light Ash Brown 75.



The ex-wife of Boyzone star Ronan Keating shared: First time I put a colour on my own hair! Didnt turn out too bad. I have a filter on of course.

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She also jokingly apologised to her hairdresser for her DIY hairdo: My hairdresser is going to kill me. Sorry @zaraharte  couldnt wait any longer.



Yvonne gave followers a glimpse into her Valentines Day plans with partner and cinematographer John Conroy in another Instagram post.



Champagne, rugby and treats with my Valentine, wrote the broadcaster.



The pair have been together since 2012 and are taking it easy in their Kildare home after Yvonne revealed in November that she had been recovering from a devastating horse-riding accident for several months.



Im hoping to get back to work in a couple of months and usually Im the kind of person who wants to get back on top of everything very quickly, but this time around I promised Id be good to myself.
Madam Akua Donkor, 2020 Presidential candidate for the Ghana Freedom Party (GFP) has commended President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for efforts being made to fight coronavirus.



Ghana has currently recorded 656 new cases taking the active cases to 7,850.



Nine (9) more deaths have been recorded bringing the tally to 542 from a previous 533.



Meanwhile, the total number of cases recorded in the country is 76,492



Speaking in a one-on-one interview on Hello FM Akua Donkor thinks COVID-19 cases being recorded in the country is the fault of former President John Mahama.



Listen to her 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.

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MANCHESTER  A man is facing charges of first-degree assault and carrying a dangerous weapon, among others, in connection with a Saturday incident, according to police.

Hartford resident Kelvin McCullough, 33, also faces charges of second-degree threatening, as well as disorderly conduct, an update to a police news release read.

On Saturday, police responded to Hilliard Street in Manchester, where they saw two men  one of whom had a large knife pointed toward the other male  outside, the updated release said.

After being told to drop the knife, the suspect, later identified as 33-year-old Kelvin McCullough out of Hartford, threw the knife to the ground and was detained by officers, according to the updated release. The other male immediately indicated to officers that someone needed help tow[a]rd the entrance to the building.

Police say a man from Bridgeport  who had multiple stab wounds including a large laceration to the abdomen  was by the entrance. The man got medical assistance and was sent to Hartford Hospital, according to the release.

The Bridgeport man is currently in stable condition, according to a news release update sent Sunday.

McCullough is in custody, with bond set at $150,000, according to police.

In a release, police requested those who have information about the situation reach out to Detective James Graham at (860) 645-5519, the Investigative Services Unit at (860) 645-5510, or the Manchester Police Department directly at (860) 645-5500.
With a federal election possible as early as spring this year, the political pressure points are becoming clearer. None more so than on the industrial relations front. It should hardly be surprising  for decades it has proven a rich source of scare campaigns on both sides of the political aisle. Apart from the politics, its an area of community concern and importance.

With the Coalitions latest proposed changes before parliament, drafted after a six-month consultation process that brought together employer and employee representatives, and Labor releasing its own policy a week ago, the Coalition and Labor are wrestling over industrial relations.

The Morrison government is shaping up for a fight with Anthony Albanese's Labor opposition over industrial reforms. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The politics are never subtle. Labor, with the backing of the unions, is bent on playing up the Coalitions proposal as an attack on workers wages and conditions, while the Coalition has claimed Labors policy would cripple businesses. It should be unsurprising that the truth is never so neat.

The Coalitions bill certainly has some red flags, most notably its proposal to give companies two years to negotiate agreements that can pay below industry minimums if employees vote in favour of it and the industrial commission approves, taking into account the coronavirus and public interest.
Rebecca Judd and her AFL player husband Chris were thrilled when their children returned to school after Melbourne eased it's months long lockdown in October.

But the kids are now being home schooled again after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews announced a statewide five-day hard stage four lockdown on Friday, amid fears the hyper-infectious UK strain of coronavirus is spreading 'at light speed' around the state after leaking from a quarantine hotel at Melbourne Airport.

The famous couple are back to homeschooling their four children - son Oscar, eight, five-year-old daughter Billie, and three-year-old twin boys, Tom and Darcy.

Ready for round two! Rebecca Judds children are back to home-schooling as Melbourne is plunged into lockdown again

Posting to her Instagram Stories, the 38-year-old footy WAG shared a boomerang video of Billie seated on a table in the family's lounge room, hitting the books and accessing online learning with an iPad.

In the footage, the little girl is seen giving her mum a thumbs up motion.

'We got this Vic,' Bec captioned the inspirational post.

Back to homeschooling! Posting to her Instagram Stories, the 38-year-old footy WAG shared a boomerang video of Billie seated on a table in the family's lounge room, hitting the books and accessing online learning with an iPad

When the children returned to school after the first lockdown in October, Bec claimed her youngsters were initially scared to leave the comfort of home-schooling for the real thing.

On a episode of radio show 3pm Pick-Up, Rebecca - who was a host at the time - revealed that her eldest son, Oscar, was particularly concerned about socialising with people outside his family.

She told her co-host Katie 'Monty' Dimond that her children were a little apprehensive about being around other kids again.

Family moments: Bec poses here with her son Oscar, eight, five-year-old daughter Billie, and three-year-old twin boys, Tom and Darcy

'My Oscar said, "I feel excited, but a bit nervous to talk to people,"' she explained.

Rebecca added: 'They hadn't socialised with anyone but our family unit for so long.'

Rebecca and her husband, retired Carlton captain Chris Judd, breathed a sigh of relief in September when their children, son Oscar, nine, daughter Billie, six, and twin boys Tom and Darcy, four, finally went back to school.

Celebrating the occasion on Instagram, she uploaded a black-and-white photo of her kids beaming together in their school uniforms.

'It feels like the first day of school,' she wrote in the caption.

'It feels like the first day of school': Rebecca and her husband, retired AFL star Chris Judd, breathed a sigh of relief when their children, son Oscar, nine, daughter Billie, six, and twin boys Tom and Darcy, four, finally went back to school

So proud: When her children returned to school in September last year after a strict stage-four lockdown, Bec took to Instagram to celebrate the momentous occasion. 'So proud of all the Melbourne teachers, parents/carers but most of all students. The resilience they've shown for the endless months of learning from home has been unbelievable,' Bec said

'So proud of all the Melbourne teachers, parents/carers but most of all students. The resilience they've shown for the endless months of learning from home has been unbelievable,' she continued.

The multi-tasking mother made no secret of her struggles during lockdown, posting to Instagram in July: 'Home school finishes at three and I will have a glass of rose in my hand at 3:01pm!'

'Home school finishes at three and I will have a glass of rose in my hand at 3:01pm!' The multi-tasking mother has made no secret of her struggles during lockdown

Throughout the original lockdown, Bec shared several photos to Instagram of her eldest children, Oscar and Billie, being home-schooled via Zoom.

One image showed Oscar at his makeshift desk in his bedroom, and Rebecca joked that the boy's teachers should 'use their mute button frequently'.

'Term three coming at ya,' she wrote. 'What a year. 2020 can f**k right off.'

'What a year. 2020 can f**k right off': Rebecca shared several photos to Instagram of Oscar and Billie being home-schooled via Zoom back in July

On Friday, Dan Andrews plunged all of Victorian into lockdown again amid fears the hyper-infectious UK strain of coronavirus is spreading 'at light speed' around the state after leaking from a quarantine hotel at Melbourne Airport.

Stage Four restrictions endured by Victorians during winter have been re-imposed with residents confined to their homes except for two hours of exercise, essential shopping, care-giving and work.
All 77 BJP MLAs in Bengal to have central security cover

BJP Kisan Morcha to organise 'Krishak Soho Bhoj' in West Bengal

India

oi-Briti Roy Barman

Kolkata, Feb 15: An outreach programme called 'Krishak Soho Bhoj' will be organised by BJP Kisan Morcha in West Bengal on February 18.

"Our aim is to avail the farmers of all benefits planned by Centre. State farmers are deprived of Centre's welfare programmes," Bengal BJP Kisan Morcha President Mahadev Sarkar told ANI. The programme will be held in Kisan Morcha's 1,263 mandals.

This comes ahead of West Bengal Assembly polls slated for later this year.

Among 48,751 villages, almost 40,000 villages have roped under the umbrella of Krishok Surakkha Abhiyan till date.

Mahadev Sarkar, President of BJP's state Kisan Morch said, "Our aim is to avail the farmers of all benefits being planned by Centre. There are more than 70 lakh farmers in West Bengal. It is sad to know that the state government has not come up with any proper plan for the benefits of the farmers. The farmers of the state are being deprived of welfare programme developed by the Centre."

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

"More importantly, there is not even 'fasal bima' (crop insurance) for the farmers. The Minimum Support Price has scaled up to 50 per cent in last six years," said Sarkar.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 15:02 [IST]
The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
2021 is going to be our most exciting year yet! Expect some big announcements about how we are bringing a bigger audience from around the world to learn more about our winning entries.

Las Vegas Global Wine & Spirit Awards return in 2021 after a record-breaking year of entries in the truly chaotic year of 2020.

The competition is proud to be one of the very few events who was able to honor their industries and the competitions are now back for its 5th year to celebrate the Wine & Spirits industry.

In 2020, they did what they do best, their expert judges blind-tasted submissions from around the world with the only criteria being: the quality of the juice in the bottle. Medal winners were recognized from globally known brands, emerging brands from lesser-known regions and every level and location in between.

Proudly, their honors have increased the sales and visibility of several winners and they look forward to sharing even more exciting results with the world this year.

2021 is going to be our most exciting year yet! Expect some big announcements about how we are bringing a bigger audience from around the world to learn more about our winning entries.

Founder and Executive Director Eddie Rivkin continues: With all signs pointing to convention business returning to Las Vegas by summertime, June is the perfect time for the Las Vegas Global Wine and Spirit Awards to be held. I am looking forward to having our biggest and best competition yet. And most importantly, having our international judges be able to travel and join us again this year. With wine and spirits being submitted from all over the globe, having palates with expertise in all different facets assures all of our entries the fairest ratings and scores.

Las Vegas Global Wine and Spirit Awards sets itself apart from many others based on its global reach, its setting in the #1 Wine & Spirits market in the world - Las Vegas, and the undisputable credibility of its judges. Over two dozen recognized experts in their industry who have been acclaimed for their palates and skills by the most respected media and trade organizations in the world.

As always, wine and spirit brands of all production sizes and from all regions around the world have the valuable opportunity to be tasted and assessed by our panel of judges.

The 2021 Las Vegas Global Wine Awards will take place in June 2021 in Las Vegas, NV.

The 2021 Las Vegas Global Spirit Awards will take place in August 2021 in Las Vegas, NV.

Early Bird entries have just been announced. If you enter now, their early pricing is the best its going to be all year  saving you up to $45 per entry on wine and up to $125 on spirits!

Early Bird pricing wont last long, so act now to lock in your chance to be honored at this incredible price.

You can enter your wines today on their website at https://www.vegaswineawards.com/entry

Spirits can be entered today on our website at https://www.vegasspiritawards.com/entry/
[February 15, 2021] SnapCell Chosen as Preferred Visual Solutions Provider for GM Canada

TAMPA, Fla., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Lead generation and video tool, SnapCell, has been selected by GM Canada to be a certified partner for visual solutions as part of the Dealer Digital Solution Program. GM Canada is made up of over 400 individual stores that can have full access and support from SnapCell. Those dealerships will be offered a handover introduction and onboarding session by their GM Digital Consultant. Full training, follow-up sessions, and regular contact are available to support the dealer's success with SnapCell. Supporting car dealerships throughout Canada and the United States, SnapCell offers a range of video-based dealership solutions, from live streaming to 360-degree spin displays. SnapCell has been designed to benefit a range of specialists within the dealership. The sales and BDC teams can conduct personable walkaround videos and virtual test drives, whilst the technicians are able to create engaging service videos. 360-degree spin displays help dealer websites to convert more visitors into sales. As General Motors continues to exceed its social responsibility in the fight of Coronavirus, its commitment to the cause is evident. GM Canada has manufactured millions of PPE masks and over 30,000 ventilators, to date. It also continues to explore new and innovative ways to allow its dealers to trade using new methods, whilst reducing the spread. CEO and Founder, Brent Williams, commented: "We're thrilled to be working with such a forward-thinking and globally responsible brand. Due to a number of factors, more and more consumers are looking to buy their next car from the comfort of their own home. The teamis excited to support GM Motors in becoming a part of that journey and we look forward to sharing SnapCell and its benefits with the individual dealers."



Created with GM Canada in mind, SnapCell has recently introduced a new chat tool. This allows dealers to chat with customers whilst on the go and in a relaxed and informal manner, catering to the 87% of consumers that revealed in a recent study that they dislike the dealership experience. SnapCell is also available in French, with the support of a French-speaking trainer, for dealerships and customers in French-Canadian regions. Product usage, reporting, dashboards, autoresponders and integration support are all included as part of the service. All customer contact is sent using a CASL-complaint (Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation) SMS number that is registered to the dealership. All communication is automatically logged within the dealer's CRM, for full compliance and autonomy.

The partnership launches in February and dealers will be given full access to the SnapCell support team, through its GM Digital Consultant. About SnapCell (www.snapcell.us.com) SnapCell is the industry's leading video tool for car dealer's. Designed to create vehicle walkaround videos, technician videos and 360-degree spin displays, SnapCell is proven to increase lead conversions, service up-sells and overall dealership revenue. For more information visit snapcell.us.com or follow them on LinkedIn by visiting: https://www.linkedin.com/company/10795223/ About General Motors Canada GM (General Motors) Canada is an automotive manufacturer, designer and distributor of vehicles and parts, with over 400 stores operating throughout Canada. General Motors supplies a number of car brands, including Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac. Media Contact

Brent Williams

954.762.7567

+447841 579859

291438@email4pr.com

https://snapcell.us.com/ View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/snapcell-chosen-as-preferred-visual-solutions-provider-for-gm-canada-301227917.html SOURCE Snapcell Inc

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Laois has had its lowest daily number of new Covid-19 cases since the start of the third wave, according to the latest figures from the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET).

NPHET's daily report shows that there seven new cases were confirmed in Laois on St Valentine's Day. The figure reduces the five day average for new cases to 16.2 a day. The 14-day incidence per 100,000 population in Laois is now 273.9 per 100k due to 232 new cases in the past two weeks.

More than 2,900 people have been officially recorded as having contracted Covid-19 in Laois during the pandemic.

The county has dropped out of the top ten counties with the highest incidence. Neighbouring Carlow and Offaly are now in that group. COUNTY BY COUNTY TABLE AT END OF STORY.

Meanwhile, NPHET said there have been no new deaths reported to the Health Protection Surveillance Centre today. However, HSE figures from hospitals up to 8pm on February 14 show that there were three deaths in ICU units.

It said a total of 3,948 COVID-19 related deaths in Ireland.

As of midnight, Sunday, February 14, the HPSC has been notified of 821 confirmed cases of COVID-19. There is now a total of 210,402* confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Ireland.

Of the cases notified today:

430 are male/ 389 are Female

70% are under 45 years of age

The median age is 31 years old.

NPHET highlighted 333 in Dublin, 91 in Galway, 53 in Limerick, 41 in Kildare, 38 in Meath and the remaining 265 cases are spread across all other counties.

As of 8 am today, 916 COVID-19 patients are hospitalised, of which 157 are in ICU. 40 additional hospitalisations in the past 24 hours.




During an official visit to the United Arab Emirates, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky met with business representatives who have joint projects with the UAE in the fields of energy, education, and advanced technologies.

The meeting took place in Abu Dhabi's Masdar City on February 14, Ukrinform reports with reference to the press service of the head of state.

"Zelensky stressed that Ukraine as a state has taken responsibility for these businesses and their development in the UAE," the report reads.

The president noted that he had a very warm and productive meeting with Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. Both countries are exploring opportunities to expand and strengthen contacts.

"Now is the time of great hopes and a great reboot of relations between our countries," he said.

Zelensky stressed that we are building a strong Ukraine, which means not only a state that can protect itself, but also an economically strong state. In this direction, the state and business must cooperate and support each other.

"We will protect Ukrainian business, it is very important for us. But Ukrainian business also needs to support and protect its state. Only together can we do something modern, like this city of advanced technologies," the head of state added.

As Ukrinform reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife Olena Zelenska are on an official visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15.

Photo credit: the Presidents Office

ish
Warning: Dont read until you have watched Your Honor finale Episode 10.

If youve seen that Shakespearean ending to Your Honor, you probably have a few questions. including is there a second season?

A lot seemed to happen, but as writer Peter Moffat tells Variety, Originally the ending was going to be that Jimmy Baxter takes possession of Adam  that he owns him  and thats the kind-of killing of Adam. While his father looks on, he loses Adam to his nemesis.

Instead, in the months Moffat had to sit with later scripts after production was paused due to the COVID-19 pandemic, he realised he wanted to bring Eugene (Benjamin Flores Jr.), the young man who lost his family because Jimmy Baxter (Michael Stuhlbarg) was led to believe it was one of them who killed his son, more centrally into the finale.

He just really matters to me, that kid. I think Benjamin is a seriously good actor, especially the way he does very little but tells us so much  thats very unusual in somebody that age, particularly, Moffat says of Flores.

Deadline also asked Moffat if had any plans for a second season?

Moffat: No thought at all for laying track for another season of this show. If there are loose endsIm never unhappy about loose ends, provided, as you say, that the main stuff is satisfied and the main architecture has been built, constructed, and loved. I dont mind loose ends, but theres no planning which says lets leave that open, or lets leave that open. That was never an intention in the writing of this.

Deadline: The Israeli show had a second season. Is there a desire for you to keep exploring these characters and this storyline in subsequent episodes? Your judge remains in the pocket of the devil. Does that intrigue you?

Moffat: The honest answer to that is, what kind of writer would you be if you wrote and spent two and a half years working on something, written 10 hours of television, and hadnt given another thought to what would happen if there were an episode 11 and beyond? Youd be a strange human being if you could just drop everybody at the end of 10 hours. So, of course Ive thought about it, and of course, I have several hundred good ideas, but thats a description of where Im at in my head.

Deadline: So nothing solid about continuing?

Moffat: No.

Theres more from Moffat you can read here.

Related
Health Minister Greg Hunt speaks as Prime Minister Scott Morrison looks on at the news conference at the CSL facility on February 12, 2021 in Melbourne, Australia. (Diego Fedele/Getty Images)

First 142,000 Vaccine Doses Have Landed in Australia

Australias COVID-19 vaccine rollout will begin next week after the first doses of the Pfizer jab landed in Sydney.

The eagle has landed, Health Minister Greg Hunt told reporters in Canberra on Monday.

More than 142,000 doses are being taken to a secure location and batches will be assessed for damage and quality in the coming days.

Today is an important day, Hunt said. It is the next step in a careful plan based on safety, and this is about protecting Australians.

Hunt said 60 percent of the shipment50,000 doseswould be given to the states to begin the process of vaccinating hotel quarantine staff, frontline health workers, and aged care workers, and residents.

Hotel quarantine workers are considered the highest priority because they pose the greatest risk of spreading the virus to the community.

The federal government will have about 30,000 doses available for aged care facilities.

The government expects about 60,000 doses to have been administered by the end of February.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison will receive the Pfizer vaccine early in the rollout in a bid to boost public confidence in the jab.

Two doses of the vaccine are needed, with a 21-day gap in between.

Hunt said the first vials of locally-made doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were also being manufactured.

The vaccine is awaiting final regulatory approval from the Therapeutic Goods Administration.

Local manufacturing of the University of Oxford-developed vaccine has been underway since late last year at biotechnology company CSLs manufacturing facility in Victoria.

Hunt said he would receive an AstraZeneca jab once available, imploring the public to have trust in the medical regulators assessment that the medicine is safe and effective.

Its a free country and anybody can take a different view, he said. But that support for confidence will lead to uptake, will lead to protection and will lead to greater freedoms.

By Rebecca Gredley
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A day after former TMC leader turned BJP leader Babu Master was attacked, two people have now been arrested by West Bengal police in connection with the assault. They have been arrested from the Minakha area of North 24 Parganas.

READ | After Tapas Roy, TMC Min Bats For Left-Cong Rule In Bengal; Appeals Voters To 'desert BJP

READ | West Bengal: BJP MP Jagannath Sarkar's Car Attacked; Leader Suspects TMC Conspiracy

Babu Master Attacked

BJP leader Firoze Kamal Gazi alias Babu Master received splinter injuries when miscreants attacked his car in West Bengal's North 24 Parganas district, police said. Gazi was on his way to Kolkata when miscreants attacked his car with crude bombs on Basanti Highway on Saturday, they said. Gazi and his driver received splinter injuries in the attack. Both have been admitted to a private hospital in Kolkata. Doctors said Gazi is out of danger but will be under observation. The police said they are investigating the matter. Gazi had recently joined the BJP. He was earlier with the Trinamool Congress. Senior BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari visited Babu Master at hospital on Saturday evening. He alleged that criminal elements of Trinamool Congress attacked Babu Master.



"Earlier this evening, visited my friend Babu Master in the Hospital. He was mercilessly attacked by criminal elements from the AITC official ...," Adhikari tweeted. Senior Trinamool Congress leader and West Bengal Food and Supplies minister Jyotipriya Mallick denied Adhikari's allegations on the attack.

READ | TMC Calls Dinesh Trivedi Ungrateful; Says 'would Win Elections Because Of Mamata's Image'

READ | Dinesh Trivedi Claims 'TMC Outsourced To Prashant Kishor', Rejects Opportunism Charge
AS the white pirogue drifted in the waters just off Belle Garden in Tobago early yesterday morning, fishermen working nearby knew something was wrong.

What they saw in the small vessel stunned them.

Fourteen bodies, all of them male, along with a skull and other skeletal remains, were piled inside the vessel as it floated four miles off Belle Garden, police confirmed.

The bodies were all clad in tracksuits and green rain jackets and were severely decomposed, police investigators said.
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The total number of confirmed cases has reached 1,273,475.

Ukraine said 2,332 new active COVID-19 cases had been confirmed across the country in the past 24 hours as of February 15, 2021.

The total number of confirmed cases grew to 1,273,475 as of February 15, 2021, according to the interactive map compiled by the National Security and Defense Council.

Read alsoEU can help Ukraine with coronavirus vaccines: DetailsAs many as 1,116,779 patients, including 2,478 in the past day, have recovered.

The death toll has hit 24,392 with 62 fatalities recorded in the past 24 hours.

The government reported 132,304 active cases as of February 15. In total, there have been 1,389,644 reports on suspected COVID-19 since the beginning of 2020.

"In the past day 2,332 people tested positive for the coronavirus, including 160 children and 47 healthcare workers. Some 1,145 new patients were hospitalized," Ukrainian Health Minister Maksym Stepanov wrote on Facebook on Monday.

In total, 13,740 tests were conducted in the country in the past day. In particular, there were 11,073 PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests run, as well as 2,667 ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay) tests.

The highest number of new confirmed cases in the past 24 hours was registered in Ivano-Frankivsk region (457), Chernivtsi region (225), the city of Kyiv (211), Kyiv region (171), and Zhytomyr region (150).

Data from Russia-occupied areas  the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, the city of Sevastopol, parts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions  is not available.

Other related news reports

Reporting by UNIAN
on Monday added 455



new cases and six more fatalities, pushing the overall tally in the state to 8,45,575 and toll to 12,425.

State Health Secretary J Radhakrishnan, who took the second COVID shot, urged people not to let their guard down vis-a-vis the virus and stressed on continued wearing of face mask in public.

According to a government bulletin, 477 people were cured of the virus on Monday, with the total recoveries touching 8,28,918.

The number of active cases as of today was 4,232.

Chennai continued to top the virus chart with 143 new cases, followed by Coimbatore (46) and Chengalpattu (39).

Perambalur had no new cases while many other districts reported single digit new infections, according to the bulletin.

All six deceased suffered from comorbidities.

Meanwhile, Radhakrishnan said of the 2,47,372 people inoculated with covid vaccine as of Saturday, a little over 2.10 lakh were health workers, while 20,000-odd were frontline personnel.

Over 14,000 police personnel also have been vaccinated, he told reporters.

Plans were afoot to include personnel, who would be deployed for election duty in the poll-bound state,to be covered under the covid vaccination programme, he said, adding, this will start in a week.

He also cautioned against any hesitation or delay by those who have already been vaccinated to take the second dose.

The second shot must be taken within the mandated 28 days after the first one, he added.

(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.)
Delhi police said that Disha didn't only "edit" the toolkit but also shared it with Greta. Delhi police also pointed Disha as one of the "key conspirators" in the formulation and propagation of the controversial document shared by Greta.

Disha Ravi, a 22-year-old environment activist arrested on Saturday has been sent to 5-day police custody by the court. While producing Disha before a magistrate, Delhi police said that Ravis arrest was the first arrest in the case and there were many other people who were involved. Sources suggest that the police is looking for two more suspects in the case, Nikita and Shantanu and is carrying out raids in Mumbai and other cities.

Dishas arrest happens to be in connection with a toolkit that was shared by Swedish activist Greta Thunberg. This toolkit had ignited controversy earlier, it had stock messages and hashtags to be used on social media and suggestions on organizing rallies in order to initiate a pro-farmer movement.

Ravi happens to be one of the editors of the toolkit, however, during a hearing, the Delhi police said that Disha didnt only edit the toolkit but also shared it with Greta. Delhi police also pointed Disha as one of the key conspirators in the formulation and propagation of the document shared by Greta.

Also read: China hits back at US allegations of lack of transparency in early findings of Covid-19

Also read: Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla to visit Russia this week; Maritime corridor, expanding strategic ties on agenda

The first document shared by Greta Thunberg was taken down and an updated version of the same was later posted. While sharing the updated document, Greta wrote that the previous document was outdated. However, people had already collected screenshots from the initial toolkit shared by Greta. Some allege that the Greta had exposed herself by revealing the document.

Also read: 2 years of Pulwama attack: PM Modi, Amit Shah and others pay tribute to CRPF jawans
Nearly 170 million people are under winter weather advisories Monday, with icy roads, power outages, and dangerously low temperatures threatening to snarl traffic and paralyze cities from coast to coast.

In the nation's heartland, at least 11 people have died in weather-related vehicle accidents since cold temperatures took hold of the country. Nine died in three separate incidents in Texas Friday, one person was killed in Kentucky, and another died in a wreck in Oklahoma Sunday.

More than 2 million customers were without power in the US as of early Monday morning, with the majority of outages reported in Texas, where rolling outages started overnight amid high demand.

The severe winter weather has sparked emergency declarations in at least seven states, including Alabama, Oregon, Oklahoma, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi and Texas -- which has borne the brunt of the cold weather.

Officials in Harris County, Texas, warned residents during a press conference Sunday night to stay indoors.

'The window to prepare for this historic storm has closed as the time to hunker down is here,' Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said, adding that the dual threat of ice on the ground and extreme cold weather is going to pose 'serious challenges.'

Historic lows in Texas

Houston police responded to more than 130 traffic accidents Sunday night, Police Chief Art Acevedo said in a tweet.

A ten-car pileup on Interstate 45, south of downtown, was just one of many incidents on icy roads.

'Please avoid traveling until this severe weather event subsides,' Acevedo said.

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, who declared a state of emergency earlier in the day, echoed the chief's orders

'Please stay off the roads tonight and through tomorrow. This is serious! The roads are dangerous!'

Icy roads in Texas have already proved deadly. A pile-up in Fort Worth on Thursday, involving more than 130 cars, killed nine people and injured dozens more, with at least 65 people seeking treatment at local hospitals following the crash.

On top of the danger icy roads pose, the mayor also cautioned residents that the weather could cause rolling blackouts.

Early Monday morning, more than 2 million customers were without power in the state, according to PowerOutage.US. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) started rolling outages early Monday, a tweet from ERCOT said.

'This is typically done through rotating outages, which are controlled, temporary interruptions of electric service. This type of demand reduction is only used as a last resort to preserve the reliability of the electric system as a whole,' the ERCOT said.

They had previously asked consumers and businesses to reduce their electricity use as much as possible through Tuesday.

'We are experiencing record-breaking electric demand due to the extreme cold temperatures that have gripped Texas,' said ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness.

'At the same time, we are dealing with higher-than-normal generation outages due to frozen wind turbines and limited natural gas supplies available to generating units. We are asking Texans to take some simple, safe steps to lower their energy use during this time.'

Houston and surrounding areas are under their first ever wind chill warning. Every county in Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas is currently under a winter storm warning.

Cold snap from coast to coast

Below freezing temperatures are forecast to affect more than 245 million people in the lower 48 states over the next seven days, with more than 50 million Americans expected to experience temperatures below zero.

The cold air is so widespread that you could travel nearly 2,000 miles from the Rio Grande on the Mexican border to the St. Lawrence River on the Canadian border entirely in winter storm warnings or watches.

There is the potential for more than 240 cold temperature records to be broken by Tuesday evening, and some records have already been shattered.

Oklahoma City has gone a record five days without climbing over 20 degrees Fahrenheit -- they are not expected to top that temperature until Thursday, for a stretch of nine days.

'This cold snap is forecast to result in record low temperatures that are comparable to the historical cold snaps of Feb 1899 & 1905,' according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Along with the unusual, widespread cold comes snow events that could also break records.

Seattle has already reported more than 11 inches of snow over the weekend, the most since January 1972, almost 50 years ago.

Cities in the south, including Dallas and Oklahoma City, have the potential for their biggest snowfall in a decade, and between two snowstorms this week, have their snowiest weeks on record.

Correction: An earlier version of this story had the wrong day for the pile-up in Fort Worth and the incorrect number of deaths. The Thursday pile-up left nine people dead.
New York Democrats on Monday slammed an unapologetic Andrew Cuomo over COVID-19 deaths in the state's nursing homes.

Cuomo remained defiant on Monday as he claimed that a 'toxic political environment' is to blame for the backlash he has received over the scandal.

He slammed 'conspiracy theories' and said that his March order on nursing homes was the subject of 'distortion' and not responsible for bringing coronavirus  and more deaths  into long-term care facilities.

But the governor's comments did not satisfy a number of Democratic lawmakers, including state Assemblyman Ron Kim. His uncle died of a presumed case of COVID-19 in a New York nursing home in April.

He said: 'All of it is BS. They could have given us the information back in May and June of last year. They chose not to.'

New York State Sen. Jessica Ramos tweeted: 'Trash. No one believes you.' NY Sen. Alessandra Biaggi said the press conference was 'riddled with lies'.

The order, which Cuomo said followed expert guidelines at the time, stated that COVID-19 patients could be sent back from hospitals to nursing homes, as it was believed then that they were not infectious anymore.

Families claimed it added to the number of deaths, yet Cuomo claimed on Monday that 98 percent of the care homes already had COVID-19 in the building before the sick patients were sent back there - and that he was not responsible.

More than 15,000 people have died in New York state's nursing homes and long term care facilities from COVID-19, but as recently as last month, the state reported only 8,500 deaths.

The numbers, while accounted for in the full state death totals to the state, were not ascribed to nursing homes for residents who died in hospitals rather than within the facilities.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo remained defiant and unapologetic on Monday as he claimed during a press briefing that the 'toxic political environment' is to blame for the backlash he has received over COVID-19 deaths in the state's nursing homes

The governor's comments did not satisfy a number of Democratic lawmakers including NY Sen. Alessandra Biaggi

New York State Sen. Jessica Ramos tweeted: 'Trash. No one believes you'

The Communications Director for New York State Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie tweeted

Democratic New York State Senator Gustavo Rivera also tweeted Monday

State lawmakers have been calling for investigations, stripping Cuomo of his emergency powers and even his resignation after new details emerged this week about why certain nursing home data wasn't disclosed for months.

Requests from state lawmakers and the U.S. Department of Justice were made in August for full accounting, along with numerous requests from the media, Cuomo said.

He added: 'We gave precedence to the DOJ. We told the assembly that, we told the Senate that and that's what we did.'

But New York State Sen. Jessica Ramos tweeted: 'Trash. No one believes you.'

'At no point did the Administration notify the legislature about a DOJ investigation. People died and Cuomo lied then he had the gall to write a book.'

New York State Sen. Alessandra Biaggi added: 'To NY'ers watching Cuomo's press conference -- it is riddled with lies, theatre, & deflection.'

She added: 'No, @NYGovCuomo, you did not tell the *entire* Senate or Assembly that there was a DOJ investigation, as the reason why you didn't share the nursing home numbers.

'I found out about a DOJ investigation with the rest of NY'ers in the @nypost story Thursday night.'

Tweeting throughout Monday's press conference Fox host Janice Dean - who lost her mother-in-law and father-in-law to the virus - called the nursing home deaths 'a massacre'

A report late last month from Democratic state Attorney General Letitia James examined the administration's failure to tally nursing home residents' deaths at hospitals.

The state then acknowledged the total number of long-term care residents' deaths is nearly 15,000, up from the 8,500 previously disclosed.

Next, a Freedom of Information request showed that more than 9,000 recovering coronavirus patients in New York were released from hospitals into nursing homes in the pandemic's early months .

This was more than 40 percent higher than the state had said previously because it wasn't counting residents who returned from hospitals to homes where they already had lived.

It then emerged that Cuomo aide Melissa DeRosa had told Democratic lawmakers that the tally of nursing home residents' deaths at hospitals was delayed because officials worried that the information was 'going to be used against us' by the DOJ.

Tweeting throughout Monday's press conference Fox host Janice Dean - who lost her mother-in-law and father-in-law to the virus - called the nursing home deaths 'a massacre'.

She said Cuomo was 'lying', adding: 'He is just a disgrace. We are not confused governor. There are no conspiracy theories. You are a criminal.'

Cuomo insisted Monday the state didn't cover up deaths but acknowledged that officials should have moved faster to release some information sought by lawmakers, the public and the press.

'All the deaths in the nursing homes and hospitals were always fully, publicly and accurately reported,' he claimed.

He explained the matter Monday as a difference of 'categorization,' with the state counting where deaths occurred and others seeking total deaths of nursing home residents, regardless of the location.

'We should have done a better job of providing as much information as we could as quickly as we could,' he said. 'No excuses: I accept responsibility for that.'

'We should not have created the void [of information]. We should have done a better job of providing information and knocking down conspiracy theories.

'We did not take enough action and the pain is it created confusion, cynicism and pain for the families of a loved one.'

Yet he refused to take any responsibility for any of the deaths in the state's nursing homes as he continued to blame a 'toxic political environment,' and 'disinformation' for much of the criticism surrounding his administration's handling of the issue.

Cuomo slammed 'conspiracy theories' around the scandal as he stated in a press conference that his March order on nursing homes was the subject of 'distortion'. Pictured, a patient is wheeled out of the Cobble Hill Health Center by emergency medical workers in April 2020

Cuomo's defiance and placing of the blame on a 'lack of information' on Monday came despite the revelation last week that his administration had hidden the number of deaths from COVID-19 in the facilities. Pictured, medical workers attend to a patient outside Harlem Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation in New York City inn May 2020

Cuomo said the state was slow to respond to the lawmakers because officials prioritized dealing with requests from the Justice Department and were busy dealing with the work of the pandemic.

'Its not like people were in the South of France,' he said.

'When we didnt provide information, it allowed press, people, cynics, politicians, to fill the void,' he said, and 'it created confusion and cynicism and pain for the families.'

'The truth is: Everybody did everything they could.'

Cuomo, who has seen his image as a pandemic-taming leader dented by the series of disclosures involving nursing homes in recent weeks, said he would propose reforms involving nursing homes and hospitals in the upcoming state budget, without giving details.

Cuomo claimed that it was a question of 'political spin' over 'facts' as he hit back at those who claimed he hid the true number of deaths from the public and blamed 'misinformation'

The governor said the scandal had only erupted due to a 'void in information' he created

Cuomo attempted to lay out what had happened with the nursing home death figures

It came after Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa (pictured left) reportedly said that Cuomo's administration had feared that the COVID-19 deaths in nursing home could 'be used against us' as the Justice Department investigates New York and three other states

Secretary to the Governor DeRosa reportedly said that Cuomo's administration had feared that the COVID-19 deaths in nursing home could 'be used against us' as the Justice Department investigates New York and three other states.

Rosa's remarkable comments were made during a conference call with state Democrats and obtained by the New York Post.

In her confession, DeRosa admitted that officials 'froze' when former President Donald Trump's Department of Justice asked for the data, before rebuffing the request.

DeRosa has since walked back the confession and said the state was 'comprehensive and transparent' with the DOJ.

She claimed on Friday that she meant they 'needed to temporarily set aside the Legislature's request [on nursing homes] to deal with the federal request first'.

Earlier on Monday families of victims of COVID-19 who died in the state's nursing homes had accused Cuomo of issuing a death sentence to their loved ones as they joined the calls for probe.

'He needs to answer for what he's done, so we need an independent investigation,' Tracey Alvino told 'Mornings with Maria' on Fox News on Monday. Her father died of COVID-19 in a New York care facility last year.

Tracey Alvino argues that Cuomo's nursing home order has led to a 'lifetime of heartache, anguish, and pain' for coronavirus victims' families. Her father died of COVID in a home

Alvino said that Cuomo's original order 'makes absolutely no sense' to her, adding 'I don't know what they were thinking'. She is pictured above with her late father

She was joined by the three children of 93-year-old Agnes Minisalle who have demanded 'justice' for their mother and claimed that the investigation into the alleged cover-up should not be a partisan issue.

The families claim the Cuomo administration has continued to show them 'disrespect' as they try to brush off the scandal.

Cuomo has previously asked 'who cares where they died' when he was pushed on the nursing home death numbers.

'Who cares how they died? We care how they died,' Alvino told Fox of her father and the other victims.

'The only thing that's been worse than losing my father has been the continual disrespect that the Cuomo administration has shown us families.'

She said that Cuomo's original order 'makes absolutely no sense' to her, adding 'I don't know what they were thinking'.

'We knew from the beginning that this [coronavirus] was most deadly to the elderly. So why would you put a disease that's most deadly to the elderly in with them? It makes absolutely no sense at all.'

'With the stroke of Gov. Cuomo's pen, he sentenced thousands of people like my father to death, and he sentenced us, the families, to a lifetime of heartache, anguish, and pain.'

The three children of 93-year-old Agnes Minisalle have demanded 'justice' for their mother and claimed that the investigation into the alleged cover-up should not be a partisan issue

Minisalle also died in a nursing home after contracting COVID-19

Alvino told Fox that her father was otherwise healthy before his death but had contracted coronavirus after going to a rehabilitation facility following a neck surgery.

She claims that her father asked her to get him out of the facility after he heard a lot of ambulances, 'chaos and commotion', and 'coughing' and began to grow concerned.

'And he literally told us, 'If you don't get me out of here, I am going to die,'' she said.

Her angered was echoed by Agnes Minisalle's children who criticized Cuomo for 'lying about the lives that are being lost' on Fox & Friends on Monday.

'You pat yourself on the back and tell everyone how good you're doing  'It's just terrible, absolutely terrible,' Ted Minisalle claimed.

Cuomo's pandemic: A timeline of the governor's response to the COVID-19 crisis MARCH 1: Female nurse, 39, returning from Iran becomes the first in New York to test positive for COVID-19. MARCH 2: Cuomo gives the first of 111 consecutive daily televised briefings for New Yorkers MARCH 13: Donald Trump declares national emergency. MARCH 14: An 82-year-old woman with emphysema is announced as the first patient to die from the virus. MARCH 17: New York City mayor Bill de Blasio says city should follow San Francisco with a shelter-in-place order; Cuomo says it will be statewide: 'As a matter of fact, I'm going so far that I don't even think you can do a statewide policy.' MARCH 19: California Governor Gavin Newsom issues first statewide lockdown order MARCH 22: Cuomo signs statewide stay-at-home order. MARCH 25: Cuomo orders that nursing homes accept convalescent COVID patients back into their facilities. MAY 10: The nursing home ruling is reversed, to insist on a negative COVID test before return to a nursing home. By now, more than 9,000 people have returned to nursing homes. AUGUST: Questions begin to be asked about the nursing home policy. AUGUST 26: Department of Justice opens an investigation into New York's nursing homes and COVID policy. OCTOBER 13: Cuomo publishes American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic. OCTOBER 21: Cuomo announced a policy of isolating identified 'micro clusters' of COVID cases. NOVEMBER 20: Cuomo wins an Emmy 'in recognition of his leadership during the Covid-19 pandemic and his masterful use of television to inform and calm people around the world'. JANUARY 28: Attorney General Letitia James released a report finding that New York under-reported the number of deaths among nursing home patients by around 50 per cent, with 15,000 actually dying - not the 8,500 reported. FEBRUARY 11: Melissa DeRosa, Cuomo's secretary, admits that in August they 'froze' when asked for nursing home data, and dragged their heels on releasing it. The AP reports that more than 9,000 people were returned to nursing homes to recover from COVID in the period March 25-May 10, a figure 40 per cent higher than the official tally. Advertisement

He also revealed that he lost his father-in-law who was a resident in the very same nursing home as his mother two weeks after her death.

The family pointed to the scathing report published by James as an indicator that a DOJ investigation into the NY governor would receive bipartisan support.

New York Congresswoman Elise Stefanik claimed that the 'dam is breaking' as she blasted Cuomo as 'the worst governor in America' in his handling of the pandemic.

She believes that a federal investigation in the Democratic governor must begin immediately.

'You're seeing overwhelming bipartisan outcry. Democrats ... need to grow a spine and stand up for what's right,' Stefanik told The Faulkner Focus on Fox on Monday.

'This is not about politics but people's lives. What was so shameful about the transcript that was released was the secretary to the governor didn't apologize for the number of deaths, didn't apologize for the policy, but apologized for the political fallout for Democrats.

'It's a disgrace,' she added.

Stefanik also accused Cuomo of being 'a bully' after attempts were blocked last month for Senate Republicans to rein in his emergency powers.

'They bully people within their own party. This is more important. We are talking about lives that were lost here, so these Democratic state senators and the Democratic congressional delegation need to grow a spine and grow some political courage and stand up for what's right, for the people of this state who deserve justice.'

Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Mayor Bill de Blasio, have also since turned on Cuomo over the recent revelations.

George Pataki, the former Governor of New York, also said on Saturday that the state should look at creating laws to recall Cuomo following the scandal.

Currently, New York does not have a procedure to allow for the recall of an elected official and creating one would require a constitutional amendment bill passed in successive years.

At least one politician has also called for impeaching Cuomo.

New York Assemblyman Michael Montesano, a Republican, said on Friday that he plans to ask the state legislature to consider impeaching the governor, Fox News reported.

'We've been calling for subpoenas and a hearing for quite a while,' Montesano told the outlet.

'This news of the last several days is extremely troubling to me and I'm going to be asking today for his resignation and I'm also going to be asking the legislature to look into, to explore filing articles of impeachment against the governor if he doesn't resign.'

In her confession to lawmakers released last week, DeRosa told lawmakers: 'We were in a position where we weren't sure if what we were going to give to the Department of Justice, or what we give to you guys, what we start saying, was going to be used against us while we weren't sure if there was going to be an investigation.'

Around the same time the data was requested by the Justice Department, the Empire Center for Public Policy filed a Freedom of Information Law request for the true number of nursing home deaths.

An Albany judge ruled earlier this month that the Cuomo administration's Health Department broke New York State law by failing to provide totals of all nursing home deaths caused by COVID-19 to a watchdog group that had requested the records.

The office of Attorney General Letitia James in January found that the Cuomo administration had misled the public about the total number of nursing home residents killed by the pandemic.

Cuomo's administration has been rocked by the confession on Thursday of his top aide, Melissa DeRosa, that they deliberately hid data on nursing home COVID deaths, in the midst of a Justice Department investigation into their handling of the pandemic

Her office announced that the state had undercounted the number of nursing home deaths by as much as 50 percent forcing officials to admit the true death toll was 12,743, rather than the 8,711 previously claimed.

The state's total death toll was unchanged following the revelation as the deaths had been counted in overall figures.

The change in number was down to nursing home residents who had been transported to hospital where they then died not being counted in the nursing home death tally.

Amid the backlash, on Friday, 14 Democratic New York State Senators joined Republicans in calling for Cuomo's pandemic emergency powers to be rescinded.

'Without exception, the New York State Constitution calls for the Legislature to govern as a co-equal branch of government,' they wrote.

'While COVID-19 has tested the limits of our people and the state - and early during the pandemic, required the government to restructure decision making to render rapid, necessary public health judgement - it is clear that the expanded emergency powers granted to the Governor are no longer appropriate.

Cuomo was granted emergency powers by the state legislature in March 2020 giving him the authority to suspend laws or create new laws with immediate effect during the pandemic.

As of last week, Cuomo has issued at least 94 executive orders throughout this time, according to WGRZ.

Cuomo had before Monday remained uncharacteristically quiet on the matter but was seen attending a meeting with Joe Biden and other leaders at the White House to discuss a coronavirus relief package over the weekend.

The governor, who won an Emmy for his coronavirus press briefings, has fallen from grace as new details continue to emerge about his handling of COVID-19 in the state's nursing homes.
The company is expanding its nutraceutical and functional food business.

Kerry Group PLC (LON:KYGA) told investors it is to acquire Biosearch Life, a Spanish company that sells premium probiotic products made from human breast milk.

Biosearchs breast milk products are under the Hereditum brand, meanwhile, it also has the Exxentia and Eupoly-3 brands which are botanical extracts and natural omega-3 respectively.

The London-listed company noted that it seeks to acquire all of Biosearchs shares through a public tender offer.

Grupo Lactalis Iberia, Biosearchs largest shareholder, has committed irrevocable undertakings to accept the offer for its 29.5% stake.
Joe Simone Prime warehouse space with parking is at a premium in Lower Westchester County and we are excited to welcome these two quality tenants to 55 Lafayette Avenue, said Joe Simone.

Joseph Simone, President of Simone Development Companies has announced the completion of two new leases totaling more than 17,000 square feet at the firms 55 Lafayette Avenue property in White Plains, NY. Westchester County Government has leased nearly 10,000 square feet and Sila Services, LLC, an HVAC and plumbing service company, leased 7,250 square feet at the property.

The tenants were attracted to the propertys prime location and convenient access to the Bronx River Parkway, State Route 22, the White Plains CBD and the North White Plains Metro North station, said Joseph Simone. Prime warehouse space with parking is at a premium in Lower Westchester County and we are excited to welcome these two quality tenants to 55 Lafayette Avenue.

Joe Simone said the property at 55 Lafayette Avenue is a prime mixed-use industrial/office featuring 17,000 square feet of warehouse space and 4,500 square feet of office space. The warehouse space feature 12- to 16-foot ceiling heights and three overhead doors with direct loading to each floor. The property offers on-site parking flanked by two large parking areas. There is no available space left and the property is fully occupied.

About Simone Development Companies

Simone Development Companies is a full-service real estate investment company specializing in the acquisition and development of healthcare, office, retail, industrial and residential properties in the New York tri-state area. Headquartered in the Bronx, the privately held company owns and manages more than 6 million square feet of property in the Bronx, Westchester County, Queens, Long Island, New Jersey and Connecticut. The companys portfolio includes more than 100 properties and ranges from multi-building office parks to retail and industrial space.
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Kingwest is gathering momentum with its intention to establish a gold mining province within its portfolio enhanced by results from the Goongarrie project.

The realisation of s ( ) vision to establish a gold mining province within the company's portfolio is gaining momentum enhanced by the latest results from the Goongarrie project.

Mineral exploration has always been about taking the risk to drill projects. There is a humorous saying in our industry that one should never drill a perfectly good project. However, jokes aside, finding a province or a good concept is an acquired skill coupled with a (big) stroke of luck.

Kingwest Resources has a province to work from and the Goongarrie project has always been the blue sky.

Ed Turner and I talked about this in our very first Coffee with Samso back in October 2019, Coffee with Samso - Episode 025 - The Menzies Goldfields, however, at that time, this was all nothing more than a theoretical concept.

In February 2021, the reality is now apparent as more work has been done on both projects.

In this episode, Ed Turner shares with us the significance of the recent drilling announcement about the Goongarrie project.

We discussed the meaning of the results and the underlying prospectivity of the salt lakes.

These salt lakes may play a big role in coming up with potential future ounces of gold that is synonymous with companies working in the Kalgoorlie-Menzies gold belt.

PODCAST:

About Ed Turner

Ed is a geologist with 30 years of experience throughout Europe, South America, Africa and Australia in a range of roles encompassing base, precious and speciality metals for leading mining companies. Technical strengths include exploration, underground mining, resource estimation, feasibility studies and development level work.

Ed was previously engaged as the CEO and general manager of Exploration of Geology for ( ) where he delineated the high-grade Abra lead-silver deposit that is shaping up to be a highly profitable mine development.

About Kingwest Resources

Kingwest Resources Ltd ( ) is a mining and exploration company focused primarily on gold exploration in the Eastern Goldfields Region of Western Australia. It will aggressively explore for and extract gold in a mix of advanced, intermediate, and greenfield projects within this highly prospective district.

Focus on Menzies Gold Project

With a new team on board and new projects, Kingwest is redirecting its focus on developing the highly prospective Menzies Gold Project (MGP).

The MGP contains some of the highest-grade historic production in the Eastern Goldfields with the five underground mines producing between 16 g/t and 32 g/t gold over their respective life of mine for a total of 650,000 ounces at 22.5 g/t.

The last underground mining ceased in 1943 and there has been limited drilling beneath the historic workings since then. Open pit mining during the 1990s before the collapse of the gold price in 1999 also produced 145,000 ounces at a high-grade average of 2.6 g/t.

A relatively shallow resource comprising 2.42 million tonnes at 2.2 g/t for 171,300 ounces (using 1g/t cut-off) has been estimated in recent years. However, the best future economic potential is in targeting the high-grade mineralisation that remains open at depth beneath every deposit.

READ: High gold grades continue in Menzies drilling

Please let us know your thoughts and send us any comment to info@Samso.com.au. Remember to Subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Samso Media and our mail list to stay informed and make comments where appropriate. Other than that, you can also give us a Review on Google.

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Samso simplifies your story to customers or investors. Samso creates organic content for you to engage your audience and BRAND yourself to them.

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Working with allows exposing our Insights to over 1.2 million monthly unique views internationally.

Samso has nearly 30 years of experience in developing business ideas and concepts in the Australasian region.

Samso has worked primarily in the mineral resources industry, capital markets and corporate finance. Noel Ong is the founder of SAMSO.

Disclaimer

Samso and affiliated companies accept no responsibility for any claim, loss or damage as a result of information provided or its accuracy. The information provided is general in nature, not financial product advice, see a financial expert before making any investment decision. Your personal objectives, financial situation or needs have not been taken into consideration. There may be a conflict of interest present with commercial arrangements with companies and/or stock held. Samso or an associate may receive a commission for funds raised.

LVF leader Billy Wright boasted of going to the home of IRA bomber Aidan Grew to warn of his intention to kill him.

The claim is contained on recordings the loyalist made before his 1997 murder in the Maze Prison by the INLA, sections of which are only now coming to light.

At the time of the intimidation in the 1990s, the Mid-Ulster UVF was at war with the East Tyrone IRA, with both gangs responsible for dozens of killings.

Wright, known as King Rat, was at the time a UVF leader in Portadown, while Grew, now a millionaire cigarette smuggler, was a senior Provo.

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Whatsapp He had a running feud with IRA man Aidan Grew

The pair hated each other and one regularly plotted to murder the other. Wright detailed this in his tapes, even claiming to have visited Grew's home to intimidate him.

He said: "Aidan Grew would be slightly older than me. He has been there a long, long time. He was one of their (the IRA's) top men.

"He never stayed at home - he moved continuously. He sent a few threats to me.

"I went and had a nosey at him, sat outside his door and waved at him - childish stuff like that. I don't have any fear of him."

Wright also identified prominent republicans from the East Tyrone gang who his Portadown UVF intended to take out.

They included Christopher and Martin Mallon, who served prison sentences for IRA activity in the 1980s and whose elderly aunt Roseanne Mallon (76) was murdered by the gang.

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Wright added: "Members of the security forces have said that we done (sic) what the army and the police couldn't do. We put the East Tyrone Brigade of the IRA on the run.

"They were the boys doing the business. The East Tyrone Brigade was carrying the war in the whole of the north.

"They (the IRA) were decimated, absolutely decimated. The UVF wiped them out and that's not an idle boast. What they didn't do, the SAS done (sic)."

The Wright recordings, some of which have been aired previously, have resurfaced among former pals of the LVF boss who now intend making them widely available.

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They claim that the loyalist, who was involved in more than a dozen sectarian murders, predicted 25 years ago that the Union would be sacrificed.

They also point to extracts from the tapes in which Wright warns that Ulster "will fight" as warnings that should be heeded.

One said: "Billy Wright's words are as prophetic now as they were then. The Government should understand that.

"The tapes are being passed around young loyalists who feel betrayed by the sea border cutting Northern Ireland off from the rest of the UK. They are learning that Billy predicted this would happen 25 years ago and are realising they have been sold out."

In the recordings, which were made shortly after Wright broke away from the UVF in 1996 to set up the LVF, he also anticipated his own murder.

Warning of future conflict, the loyalist added: "What was the point in all the deaths, all the young people dying and all the boys in jail if, at the end of the day, it (the Union) is given away?

"We've nowhere to go. We're not going to go away. We're going to stay here and fight it out and we will fight it out whether people in Belfast like it or not.

"It will be fought out on these streets because we are not giving it (the Union) away."

cbarnes@sundaylife.co.uk
Three drug companies have filed separate lawsuits to preserve their ability to restrict offerings of 340B-discounted drugs to contract pharmacies. The lawsuits, filed in early January in different federal courts, all share the same goal: getting rid of an advisory opinion filed by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) general counsel that says drug companies must offer 340B drugs to contract pharmacies.

The companies argue that the advisory opinion alters the statute for the 340B program, which requires manufacturers to offer discounted products to safety net hospitals and other providers in exchange for participation in Medicare and Medicaid.

In its lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, Eli Lilly argues that Nothing in the statute allows, let alone mandates, the use of contract pharmacies or that manufacturers respect an unlimited number of covered entitycontract pharmacy relationships. In fact, the opposite is true.

In its complaint filed in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware, AstraZeneca went so far as to say the agreements between 340B hospitals and contract pharmacies have transformed the 340B program from one intended to assist vulnerable patients into a multibillion dollar arbitrage scheme that benefits national for-profit pharmacy chains and other for-profit intermediaries.

The companies are also concerned that the alternative dispute resolution board created by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) in early December 2020 will rely on the advisory opinion. In its filing, filed in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, Sanofi is concerned that because the board consists of HHS representatives, it will treat the advisory opinion as binding in any ADR proceeding, almost certainly find that Sanofis integrity initiative violates Section 340B as interpreted by HHS, and potentially impose crippling sanctions.

These lawsuits come on the heels of drug companies reducing the number of pharmacies permitted access to drug discounts. The companies say their actions are focused, at least in part, on preventing discounts being given for the same drug twice. Its possible other major drug companies will file their own lawsuits against HHS, similar to the ones already filed by Sanofi, AstraZeneca, and Eli Lilly.

This follows action taken by the American Hospital Association (AHA) and others, who sued HHS to force the agency to suppress the drug manufacturers moves. AHA, along with five other groups and three individual systems, also sent letters to drug companies in early January 2021, asking them to reinstate sending the discounted products to their pharmacies and reimburse facilities for damages.

Today

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 42F. Winds light and variable.

Tonight

Some clouds this evening will give way to mainly clear skies overnight. Low 42F. Winds light and variable.

Tomorrow

Sunshine and some clouds. High 78F. Winds light and variable.
NASA's Mars rover Perseverance is all set to land on the surface of the Red Planet later this week after completing more than seven months of grueling journey in deep space. The rover will touch down the surface of Mars after entering the Red Planet's atmosphere, but before that it will send a radio transmission to a NASA team back on Earth, monitoring the journey of the space capsule. The transmission from Mars takes at least 11 minutes to reach mission managers on Earth, but the full descend of Perseverance from the top of the atmosphere to the Martian surface will take only 7 minutes, which scientists refer to as "seven minutes of terror".

Read: Mars Has Mysterious Dark Streaks And Scientists Believe It Sustained Life-like Situations

The Perseverance rover will already have landed on the surface of Mars, before the radio transmission could get back to mission managers on Earth, some 204 million kilometres away. So, scientists will get to know about the mission's success only after four minutes of its completion. Perseverance, which has an onboard laboratory to conduct various tests, will land on the surface of Mars on February 18.

Read: Excitement In China As Tianwen-1 Reaches Mars Orbit

Perseverance rover will be released from the capsule some few hundred kilometres above the Martian surface following which it will start making descend with the help of the Lander Vision System (LVS). LVS is equipped with navigation and other features to make the landing for Perseverance as smooth as possible because of the tricky terrain on Mars.

Read: Chinese Spacecraft Enters Orbit Around Mars

What will Perseverance do?

NASA's Mars probe was launched in July 2020 during last year's window for launch to the Red Planet. Perseverance, a six-wheeled robotic geologist, will search Jezero Crater after landing on the Martian surface for signs of ancient life and collect samples that will eventually be returned to Earth. NASA says Jezero Crater is the perfect place to search for signs of ancient microbial life because billions of years ago, the now-bone-dry 45-kilometre-wide basin was home to an actively-forming river delta and lake filled with water.

Read: Arab Spacecraft Enters Orbit Around Mars In Historic Flight
The 11th edition of exchange4medias India Public Relations and Corporate Communications Conference (IPRCCC) 2021 took place on 12th February 2021. The IPRCCC 2021 witnessed thought leaders sharing insightful talks and having a fresh perspective on the know-how of the communication industry.

The 7th session of the IPRCCC conference was a panel discussion on the topic Communication for social change and transformation. The session was chaired by Sherya Krishnan, Sr. VP & Head Marketing & Comms, Anviti. Anurag Chauhan, Founder, Humans for Humanity; Nanditta Chibber, Media & Communications Consultant; Vansh Nathani, Director, Educis and Renuka Dudeja, Brand and Marcomm Specialist were the panellist.

Starting the discussion, Chauhan sharing the potency of communication for his NGO said, Communication and its tools have helped us during this lockdown. I run this organization as an NGO called Humans for Humanity and we were struggling to reach out to people in the remote areas. All of us are privileged to be talking on a laptop or a mobile. But in rural areas, people do not have the tools of communication it is difficult to reach out to them. With our team, we were able to connect to them digitally and managed to organize workshops and had sessions to train women about menstrual hygiene.

Dudeja sharing her perspective on CSR stated, For every corporate, being socially responsible is a big agenda to drive not only customers but to genuinely bring a change in the world around us. One of the most important life skills that humans must have is communication. The ability to say what you want to say to the world out there and understand them. For me, social change is a healing process and it is constant healing. It evokes the feeling of people wanting to make a change. Communication bounds people into a flock. For any social change, you need a flock, you need to enhance and make a bigger impact.

Sharing what the role of communications plays in a mass spectrum as an educationist, Nathani said, From an educational perspective we have adapted very swiftly and we had to do the most adapting in this lockdown. Education was so physical and was very detached from technology be it, teachers, students, or parents. To be able to engage with our audience which is an 8-12 age group and to be able to come up with something that sells them this dream. What we did was come up with the Mindlers Scholarship Fund in which we told the students that while you are sitting in the comfort of your home, build profiles and apply for free scholarships.

Talking about social change Chibber remarked, Only once in a lifetime do we have these watershed moments like a pandemic that can trigger social change so quickly. We are struggling with how to cope with it. In a lockdown, it was the communicators through communication tools and platforms we were able to get important messages out. The pandemic has also led to technology changes and has also triggered policy changes. Right now the health care budget is 137% up. This pandemic has shown the gaps in health and hygiene. This pandemic is a silver lining crisis and a huge opportunity for media and communicators to go full throttle. Communicators need to go forward with their efficacy and awareness in a plethora of subjects.

Chauhan speaking about the challenges that organizations have in terms of communication and what has changed in the pandemic year remarked, People have the power of social media today. There is a difficulty to communicate in front of others. But today having platforms like Facebook or Instagram people have the power to communicate and reach out to each other. In the lockdown, we worked with the biggest street artist community called the Kathputli Community in Delhi. This community didnt have any scope of earning money in the lockdown. We transformed this issue into a Kathputli project and partnered with schools. In schools, online classes can get mundane for students. So we took stories from the Hindi course material and gave it to the street artist. Through the modes of communication, we were able to reach out to schools where Katputli artists were taking classes showing students the stories with the help of their Katputlis. This project beautifully used media reaching out to students benefited communities, and had a positive impact.

Chauhan stressed the importance of awareness grassroots level has to reach through NGOs, organizations, corporates. These organizations need to make sure that the information is correct and it is reaching the grassroots level where it should reach. The communication should reach the bottom level of society, commented Chauhan.

Dudeja talking about how all communicators can be conscious of social change said, A good story needs insights from people first. It is not one-way communication. We need to see what the TG wants to hear. While we do our storytelling piece that is very focused from a corporate point of view to sell our value proposition to our customers. As corporates, there is also a huge responsibility to educate and have a thought leader stance.

Nathani sharing how he has connected social, impact and change with communication said, The first thing is to create the right offering for the time. One of the co-work that we do at Educis is teaching students how to communicate better. The root that they typically prefer for that is debating training or model united nations training. We were able to take that online which was a barrier because they only thought you can only learn through in-person activities. We also had the flexibility of time through these digital channels. We could create a cohort of 10 students as well as of 100 because of the channel communication and it was accessible. Also, there is a lack of career guidance in our country. We have created a digital platform and as opposed to certifying typically 100 counsellors a month, during this pandemic we have already about 14 and a half thousand. On-ground there has been a change in impact from rural places as well where we couldnt have access before. It all depends on the medium you choose and clarity.

On a parting note, Chibber speaking about how one can measure and track social impact said, If we want social change and transformation in terms of media we have to explore vernacular regional media. If we are sitting in metros we are in our little bubbles we start focusing on mainstream media. We are not factoring in a lot of regional media. But to take that message to the last mile is extremely essential. During the lockdown, the message of hygiene had to be sent across to the most vulnerable and the last mile, it is through voice, video and adaptable formats that helped to take the message to rural India. In terms of measurement, we have to start using technology. There are a lot of apps that nonprofits and organizations are using to monitor what is the impact of the messaging and its response.

Read more news about (internet advertising India, internet advertising, advertising India, digital advertising India, media advertising India)
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has asked lawmakers for a further extension of emergency powers to help curb the spread of the coronavirus in the country.

Orban wants his cabinet's special mandate extended for 90 days, in contrast with an open-ended mandate he sought and was given in March, sparking international criticism.

Under the exceptional rules, the government is authorized to rule by decree but parliament, dominated by Orban's right-wing nationalist Fidesz party, remains in session and can take back those powers.

RFE/RL's Coronavirus Crisis Archive Features and analysis, videos, and infographics explore how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting the countries in our region.

In a speech on February 15, Orban defended the move, which is expected to easily pass.

"We want more than just turn the 'closed' sign on our door. We want to reopen the economy and the entire civic life," Orban said.

He reiterated criticism of the European Union for its slow rollout of vaccines in the bloc. Orban has been repeatedly criticized by EU leaders in Brussels for his authoritarian governance in the country.

And he defended his governments decision to unilaterally seek vaccines, without EU approval, from Russia and China. Hungarian health authorities last month approved vaccines from China's state-owned company Sinopharm as well as Russias Sputnik V, making Hungary the first EU country to do so.

"The most important task facing our country is to try to get as many vaccines as possible. Not later, as they are promising from Brussels, but quickly," he said. "For us, every vaccine is good which is safe and with which several million people around the world have already been vaccinated.

Health officials began administering the Russian vaccine in Budapest hospitals on February 12.

As of February 15, Hungary had nearly 389,000 cumulative cases of COVID-19 and nearly 14,000 deaths. More than 310,000 people have received at least one dose of a vaccine to date.

With reporting by Reuters
Polizzi became an instant star with the premiere of the MTV reality series Jersey Shore, where she and about a half-dozen other sexy twentysomethings partied it up at different locales. She currently appears on Jersey Shore: Family Vacation.
As the pandemic drags on for months or possibly even years into the future, it is inevitable that the countries will respond with curfews, lockdowns and other curbs on movement. In this context, health professionals are concerned about the deteriorating mental state of young people, who they say have been among the most badly affected by the current crisis. Across the world, countries are prioritising the elderly and frontline workers and rightly so, as they are most vulnerable to the disease, but that could also mean it's a long wait for the young. With schools, colleges and institutions shut and an uncertain future staring at them, the resilience of youth may be tested and it has already been overestimated according to mental health experts. Read here



Let's look at the global statistics Global infections: 108,818,669 Global deaths: 2,399,985 Nations with most cases: US (27,640,282), India (10,916,589), Brazil (9,834,513), United Kingdom (4,049,920), Russia (4,026,506). Source: John Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center

China refuses to hand over raw data critical to WHO probe

China has refused to hand over raw data that might be critical to uncover the origins of the pandemic that emerged in Wuhan, independent investigators of the World Health Organization (WHO) said. Several members of the team said that there have been arguments with the Chinese scientists about the quality of data that has been given. The Chinese side, according to the investigators, has urged them to accept the Beijing version that the virus may have originated outside the country, a theory that has found little support among the scientific community abroad. Read here

ASEAN's 2021 GDP forecasts

Southeast Asian economies are looking to come out of the long shadow of pandemic this year, and are aiming to regain the growth momentum they had before the Covid-19 pandemic triggered historic declines in 2020. This report gives us a peep into the early forecasts around the region. Singapore maintained its forecast of gross domestic product growth of 4-6 per cent for 2021, unchanged from its estimate in November. The city-state is coming off a record 5.4 per cent annual contraction in 2020. Indonesia expects GDP to grow between 4.5 per cent and 5.5 per cent this year, after a 2.1 per cent contraction in 2020. Meanwhile, the Philippines projects a growth range of 6.5 per cent to 7.5 per cent for this year, versus a 9.5 per cent drop in 2020, as the economy reopens further and vaccinations begin. Thailand lowered its sights, revising its 2021 forecast down to 2.5 to 3.5 per cent growth. Read here



Australia gets first batch of Pfizer vaccines

Australia on Monday received the first batch of around 142,000 Pfizer vaccines and the country will begin its rollout from next week. The eagle has landed, declared the health minister, ending weeks of doubt as to whether supply delays could blow out the governments timeline to begin vaccinations in late February. Of the first Pfizer shipment, 62,000 doses will be set aside as second doses in case of supply interruptions. Of the first 80,000 doses available, 30,000 will be administered by the federal government in aged care, with the remaining 50,000 to be administered by state and territory governments to hotel quarantine and other frontline workers. Read here
Russia's top diplomat blamed the European Union on Monday for a freeze in ties but argued that Moscow remains ready to mend relations if it hears positive signals from the bloc.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said after talks in St. Petersburg with his Finnish counterpart, Pekka Haavisto, that if the EU decides that it's necessary to restore relations, we will be ready for it."

Lavrov's statement followed his warning last week that Moscow was ready for a split with the 27-nation bloc if Brussels moves to introduce new crippling sanctions that would hurt the Russian economy.

Russian-EU ties, which sank to post-Cold War lows after Moscow's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimea and support for separatist insurgents in eastern Ukraine, took a new blow recently over the arrest of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

The most prominent political foe of President Vladimir Putin was arrested January 17 upon his return from Germany, where he spent five months recuperating from nerve agent poisoning he blamed on the Kremlin. Russian authorities have denied the allegations.

Russia has rejected U.S. and EU criticism of Navalny's arrest and imprisonment, and a sweeping crackdown on protests urging his release, as meddling in its internal affairs.

Just as EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell was visiting Russia earlier this month, Moscow announced the expulsion of diplomats from Germany, Poland and Sweden for attending protests in support of Navalny. The three EU nations expelled a Russian diplomat each in a quid pro quo response.

Haavisto emphasized the EU's strong criticism of the Russian action, noting that the EU diplomats were fulfilling their duty while observing the protests. He reaffirmed the EU's demand for Navalny's release and the bloc's criticism of the crackdown on demonstrations.

Lavrov said that economic relations with the EU have been hurt by sanctions and political contacts have been limited to sporadic exchanges of views on international crises.

He added that while Russian-EU relations have stalled, Moscow has maintained strong bilateral contacts with individual EU members and will develop them further despite the damage inflicted by the sanctions.

Haavisto meanwhile said: "Talking about relations between the European Union and Russian Federation, we should keep in mind that Finland is a European Union member state."

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)

Rupani, 64, was given first aid on the stage after he collapsed. He was then flown in a helicopter from Vadodara to Ahmedabad and admitted at UN Mehta Hospital

Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani has tested positive for coronavirus , said a hospital where he is admitted after he fainted in a rally on Sunday.

Rupani's sample was collected on Sunday night and sent for RT-PCR test which has come out positive for coronavirus , said a health bulletin issued by the hospital on Monday.

He has mild symptoms, it added.

Rupani, 64, was given first aid on the stage after he collapsed. He was later seen descending the stairs of the stage on his own. He was then flown in a helicopter from Vadodara to Ahmedabad and admitted at UN Mehta Hospital.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi enquired about Rupani's health over phone, said a statement issued by the Chief Minister's Office. Modi told Rupani to get himself thoroughly checked and to take proper rest, it said.

This was Rupani's third political rally during the day in Vadodara. "Rupani fainted on stage and I gave him a primary medical treatment. He was fine and walked back to his car from the stage," said Vadodara city BJP president Dr Vijay Shah, who was present on the dais at the time of the incident.

BJP leader Bharat Danger told reporters that the chief minister collapsed while addressing the public meeting in Nizampura area. "Rupani's security guards caught hold of him when he fell. He was given first aid and was taken to the airport (from where he flew to Ahmedabad)," he said.

"Rupani was unwell for the last two days, but instead of cancelling his public meetings held in Jamnagar on Saturday and in Vadodara on Sunday, he preferred to continue," Danger said.

Elections to six municipal corporations including Vadodara will be held on 21 February while those for municipalities, districts and taluka panchayats will be held on 28 February.
ROTTERDAM, Netherlands and SAN DIEGO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, SkylineDx announced a research collaboration with an academic hospital and a Dutch cancer registry to investigate patients with early-stage melanoma (skin cancer) at high risk of disease-related fatality. Approximately 90% of all melanoma patients are diagnosed with an early-stage melanoma (American Joint Classification on Cancer [AJCC] stage I/II), without any lymph node metastasis or distant metastasis at time of diagnosis. However, 41% of melanoma-related deaths, are these early-stage patients that are anticipated to have a good prognosis at their diagnosis. As current predictors are not sufficient to identify the specific patient group that should be considered high risk for recurrence, the consortium will dedicate their research to find new or additional variables and attempt to develop an accurate biomarker for this specific purpose. With the aim for a non-invasive tool and identification of this high-risk patient at diagnosis, the consortium collaborates to find these variables in the primary tumor (including genes and proteins). The patient will always have their primary tumor removed; therefore, no additional medical intervention is necessary for this research.

"Identifying these early-stage patients at high risk of melanoma-related fatality at diagnosis is needed to positively change their clinical pathway," comments Jvalini Dwarkasing, scientific- and clinical lead at SkylineDx. "Currently, early-stage patients with thin melanomas, are not eligible for any follow-up visits according to the Dutch melanoma guideline."

"Our Falcon melanoma R&D Program is set-up to address medical unmet needs with innovative biomarkers on the whole skin cancer array," concludes Dharminder Chahal, CEO SkylineDx. "After the Merlin Study Initiative that focuses on the selection of patients that can safely forgo lymph node surgery due to their low risk for metastasis and the Peregrine Study Initiative that focuses on recurrence prediction in general, we could potentially add a third clinical utility: predicting the risk that an early-stage patient will develop distant metastasis."

About SkylineDx

SkylineDx is a biotechnology company, focused on research & development of molecular diagnostics in oncology and inflammatory diseases. The company is headquartered in Rotterdam (the Netherlands) and complemented with a field medical and scientific affairs team in the US and a CAP/CLIA certified laboratory in San Diego (California). SkylineDx uses its expertise to bridge the gap between academically discovered gene expression signatures and commercially available diagnostic products with high clinical utility, assisting healthcare professionals in accurately determining the type or status of disease or predict a patient's response to treatment. Based on test results, healthcare professionals can tailor the treatment approach to the individual patient. To learn more, please visit www.skylinedx.com.

Footnotes

1. Link to this press release on website SkylineDx (click here)

SOURCE SkylineDx
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(Natural News) Dementia Joe is standing by as the Department of Justice (DoJ) launches a discrimination investigation into Elon Musks SpaceX company for allegedly hiring American citizens over non-citizens.

The Xiden regime is apparently concerned that people who are not from the United States are being overlooked for hiring at SpaceX, which seeing as how it is an American company is dedicated to hiring actual American citizens.

A man reportedly filed a complaint with the DoJs Immigrant and Employee Rights Section alleging he was discriminated against based on his citizenship status. The DoJ says Musk is stonewalling a subpoena for information about the claims, this according to court documents revealed on Feb. 4.

The charge alleges that on or about March 10, 2020, during the Charging Partys interview for the position of Technology Strategy Associate, SpaceX made inquiries about his citizenship status and ultimately failed to hire him for the position because he is not a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident, DoJ attorney Lisa Sandoval wrote in a court document.

This document contains a petition to a judge to order SpaceX to comply with an administrative subpoena for documents related to how the company hires.

According to Musk, he would like to hire more non-citizens because they will typically work for far less pay, aka slave wages, compared to American workers. The only problem is that government regulations prevent him from doing so because rocket technology is a form of advanced weapons technology.

Biden regime targets Musk after he spoke out against Big Tech censorship and in favor of GameStop short squeeze

The timing of the DoJs probe into Musks business is highly suspect as just last month Musk spoke out against Big Tech censorship.

The worlds richest man, Musk tweeted on Jan. 11 that a lot of people are going to be unhappy with West Coast high tech as the de facto arbiter of free speech.

Probably less than a few dozen primary decision makers, Musk added in a separate tweet about how speech control online is currently in the hands of just a few people. Technically, only three, he added.

Musk has been a strong proponent of an encrypted text messaging app called Signal that operates as a safer alternative to WhatsApp. Musk has simultaneously been steering his fan base away from major tech platforms like Facebook and Twitter, even though he continues to use these.

Another thing Musk did to upset China Joe and his regime was stand up for the retail investors who are trying to launch a short squeeze on GameStop (GME) stock. While the mainstream media and corrupt trading platforms like Robinhood screwed over the little guy, Musk sided with the underdog.

While there is plenty to be said about the horrible things that Musk has done over the years, not the least of which includes naming his baby X  A-12 and declaring it to be gender-neutral, Musk has made some suggestions that he is anti-establishment.

This would explain the sudden interest in his business practices by the federal government, which under Beijing Biden does not want Americans to benefit. All jobs are to be handed over to foreigners and illegal aliens because this is progress, according to the regime.

Interesting waste of time, wrote one Information Liberation commenter about the DoJ probe into SpaceX. Amnesty for all treason is bound to get a Constitutional amendment any day now.

Hiring non-citizens is against the law, wrote another, citing 8 U.S. Code  1324a which deals with the unlawful employment of aliens in the U.S.

More related news about Big Tech censorship can be found at Censorship.news.

Sources for this article include:

InformationLiberation.com

InformationLiberation.com

NaturalNews.com

NaturalNews.com
Andy Lee will give away large cash prizes to contestants able to complete random skill games on his new Channel 10 game show, The Cube.

And on Monday, he put himself to the test with a bizarre challenge.

The comedian, 39, filmed himself attempting to throw two slices of bread into a toaster that was a few metres away.

Scroll down for video

Un-BREAD-ievable! Andy Lee perfected a VERY difficult trick shot during Melbourne's lockdown on Tuesday by throwing two slices of bread perfectly into a toaster

Andy, who is based in Victoria, entered another Melbourne lockdown on Friday night and chose to use his time indoors for a fun activity.

'During lockdown, you have a lot more time on your hands to prepare breakfast and you can also touch up on your skills for if you ever get the chance to take on The Cube,' he captioned the hilarious video.

Andy filmed himself throwing the already-toasted bread towards the toaster, determined to land both simultaneously in the holes.

Success! After more than 12 attempts, Andy filmed himself throwing the already-toasted bread simultaneously in to the toaster's holes perfectly

He looked determined and focused as he took multiple turns practicing the trick shot on camera.

After more than 12 attempts, Andy finally achieved the perfect landing, writing: 'put me in the cube.'

Fans went wild in the comments for the incredible shot, and were disappointed Andy didn't react with more enthusiasm when he landed the difficult feat.

He explained: 'Stay cool. Makes it look like you do it every time!'

'Stay cool': Fans went wild in the comments for the incredible shot, and were disappointed Andy didn't react with more enthusiasm when he landed the difficult feat

Pressure tests: The Cube will see contestants put in a small perspex cube where they must take on a series of tasks in the hopes of winning $250,000

Based on the UK series of the same name, The Cube will see contestants put in a small perspex cube where they must take on a series of tasks in the hopes of winning $250,000.

The tasks can involve anything from throwing and catching challenges to memorising games.

'Things get tense with me and my mates when we play skill games to determine who's going to get the next round of beers at the pub, imagine doing it for a quarter of million dollars. I cant wait,' Andy said in a statement.

Andy's new hosting role will see him placed in direct competition with his colleague, Hamish, who hosts the hugely popular Channel Nine series Lego Masters.

The Cube will premiere on Channel 10 on February 24

In air travel news, Delta will challenge Southwest between Oakland and LAX; Allegiant will fly from OAK to Yellowstone National Park this summer; United delays its SFO-New York JFK and SFO-Bangalore service; Cathay Pacific suspends San Francisco flights; new southern California service from Delta, United, Frontier and JetBlue; Delta extends its empty-middle-seat policy once again; Southwest debuts COVID testing at Mineta San Jose Airport and puts 737 MAX aircraft back into its schedule; Delta develops new digital COVID tools for customers; airlines are dismayed by the prospect of federally mandated COVID testing for domestic travel; United hopes to deploy 200 electric-powered air taxis within a few years; and hundreds of airport Starbucks locations will be getting an upgrade.

Southwest will soon be getting some competition on its Oakland-Los Angeles International route as Delta plans to jump into that market on April 12. Like Southwest, Delta will operate three flights a day, but using Embraer 175s (Southwest uses 737s) with first class, Comfort+ (extra legroom) plus regular economy and basic economy seating. Spirit Airlines also flies the OAK-LAX route, but with less-than-daily frequencies. Delta already flies to LAX from San Francisco International and Mineta San Jose airports. Oakland will also get new service from ultra-low-cost Allegiant Airlines starting May 28, when the carrier starts flying twice a week from OAK to Bozeman, Montana  a gateway to Yellowstone National Park.

Meanwhile, United has once again delayed its plans to revive service from the West Coast to New York JFK, which it pulled out of several years ago when it consolidated flights into its Newark hub. The airline had announced it would begin San Francisco-JFK and Los Angeles-JFK service on Feb. 1, then pushed that back to Feb. 28, and now is targeting a March 28 launch. It is also scaling back its service plans from twice-daily flights in both markets to just five flights a week from both SFO and LAX.

On the international side, COVID is once again taking a toll on airline service. Cathay Pacific is due to suspend its San Francisco-Hong Kong service as of Feb. 20, part of wide-ranging route cutbacks at the airline in response to new quarantine requirements for flight crews. And United has pushed back the planned debut of its new ultra-long-haul non-stop India service between San Francisco and Bangalore (Bengaluru) from May 6 to May 27. (Air India started flying the same route last month.) At its Newark hub, meanwhile, United is also delaying the launch of new non-stops to Johannesburg from March 27 to June 3 as South Africa copes with the rapid spread of a new coronavirus variant. Delta is also delaying its introduction of Atlanta-Johannesburg-Cape Town flights from March 27 to June 1.

Southwest Airlines travelers heading to Hawaii from Mineta San Jose now have a pre-departure COVID testing option at the airport. The airline has teamed up with CityHealth Urgent Care to offer pre-flight tests at 2470 Airport Blvd. (the former taxi staging area), where Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines already offer testing through Carbon Health and Worksite Labs respectively. SJC said the CityHealth lab promises appointment-only test results within 72 hours, with priority given to Southwest passengers but customers of other carriers accepted as well. The testing center is open from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tests have a $20 administration fee for Hawaii-bound travelers while the full cost of the test may be covered either through insurance or the CARES Act, the airport said. Southwest and CityHealth already offer airport-area testing for travelers out of San Francisco International, Oakland and Sacramento airports.

Elsewhere in California, Delta will start twice-daily flights from LAX to Houston Bush Intercontinental on April 12, using its new Airbus A220s, but it has dropped plans to resume suspended service in April between LAX-Columbus, Ohio and Burbank-Atlanta. United said last week it will begin the only non-stop service between Orange County and Honolulu on May 6, when it introduces daily 737-700 flights from John Wayne Airport in Santa Ana. Frontier Airlines last week started flying from Ontario International Airport to Las Vegas four times a week and to Phoenix Sky Harbor twice a week (increasing to four a week March 8). And JetBlue last week kicked off its recently announced transcontinental route between Los Angeles International and Miami, using an Airbus A321 equipped with its premium cabin Mint service.

Delta has kept its empty-middle-seat promise in effect after all its rivals discontinued that policy in an effort to boost load factors, and now Delta is extending it again  this time through April 30. The airline says it is following the wishes of its customers, who like the idea of seeing a little in-flight social distancing, even if its only a couple of feet. Passengers continue to tell us that more space provides more peace of mind, said Bill Lentsch, the airlines Chief Customer Experience Officer, adding that the company will continue to reassess seat blocking in the months ahead.

Southwest, the largest U.S. operator of Boeing 737 MAX aircraft, now plans to put the troubled plane back into service on March 11 after an almost two-year grounding mandated by the FAA. That makes Southwest the last of U.S. MAX operators to schedule the aircrafts return to service, after American, United and Alaska Airlines had already done so. Southwest will start using the plane for 32 flights a day on a variety of routes, none of them from Bay Area airports. The FAA said the plane can resume operations once operators have made the required software fixes and retrained their pilots. Southwest had 34 MAX aircraft in its fleet when the grounding started but has taken delivery of 11 more in the interim and expects to have a total of 69 by years end. Meanwhile, aviation authorities in Canada and the European Union recently followed the lead of the FAA in approving the planes return to commercial service.

As travelers struggle to navigate the new requirements of the COVID era, Delta said it is developing a travel concierge that will help them do so seamlessly through the airlines website and mobile app. Instead of checking one website to find testing locations and using another app to upload a test result, were building the capability to manage all of it through the airlines existing digital channels, said Bill Lentsch, the airlines Chief Customer Experience Officer. When customers make bookings, the concierge will alert them to the travel requirements of their destination, inform them of COVID test scheduling options, and automatically validate their test results. And on Feb. 18, Delta said, it will start a pilot program on a daily Los Angeles-Honolulu flight testing the new CLEAR Health Pass. Developed by CLEAR, the biometric ID verification company in place at dozens of airports, the free Health Pass securely connects a person's verified identity to multiple layers of COVID-19 related insights, including vaccination results, to reduce public health risk, the company said.

Now that Pete Buttigieg has been installed as the Biden administrations new Secretary of Transportation, he is continuing to hold out the possibility that the government might impose a mandatory COVID testing requirement for all domestic air travelers  as it already does for inbound international flyers  and its driving the airline industry nuts. Buttigieg said in an interview last week that a final decision on a new testing rule will be guided by data, by science, by medicine and by the input of the people who are actually going to have to carry this out. And Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky said at a press briefing that the CDC still believes a domestic testing mandate for air travel could be an effective mitigation measure to rein in the disease, especially with new variants spreading in the U.S.

Delta CEO Ed Bastian said in a TV interview last week that mandatory COVID tests for all domestic passengers would be a logistical nightmare and would seriously set back the recovery of the airline and hotel industries. Southwest CEO Gary Kelly and the airlines unions sent a letter to President Biden last week warning that a domestic testing rule would be counterproductive, costly, and have serious unintended consequences. And the Allied Pilots Union, representing 15,000 American Airlines pilots, said such a requirement would be unwarranted, logistically impractical, and wasteful, and it would seriously threaten the stability of our industry. Airline executives were scheduled to meet with White House officials at weeks end to discuss a variety of issues, and a new testing rule was likely to be near the top of the list.

Would you fly in a battery-powered plane? In a sign of big technological changes coming to the aviation industry, United Airlines said it has entered into an agreement with Archer, an aircraft tech company, to spend as much as $1 billion on a fleet of up to 200 vertical takeoff-and-landing (VTOL) planes that use electric motors. United and its Mesa Airlines regional affiliate will use the propeller-driven planes to offer a new kind of air taxi service, giving customers a quick, economical and low-carbon way to get to United's hub airports and commute in dense urban environments within the next five years. Archers current models can achieve a range of 60 miles and speeds of 150 mph, although future versions would be able to fly further and faster, United said. Archer expects to begin producing the aircraft in 2023 and putting passengers into them in 2024. Los Angeles is expected to be one of the launch markets for the planes.



In airport news, travelers can expect to see some enhancements coming to Starbucks outlets in the months ahead. HMSHost, which operates 400 Starbucks airport locations, last week signed a new multi-year partnership with the coffee giant that will mean a technology upgrade for those airport stores  specifically, they will be able to accommodate Starbucks customer loyalty program as well as mobile ordering and payment. HMSHost will also introduce Starbucks contemporary fresh food program across the nation, the company said.

Jim Glab is a freelance travel writer.
A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
Too little covid vaccine and too great a demand: That's what KHN readers from around the country detail in their often exasperating quest to snag a shot, although they are often clearly eligible under their local guidelines and priority system. Public health officials say the supply is growing and will meet demand in several months, but, for now, readers' experiences show how access is limited. Some savvy readers report no problem getting in line for the vaccine, but others say that balky application processes and lack of information have stymied their efforts. Their unedited reports are a good snapshot of the mixed situation around the country.

TALE OF THE DAY

 Feb. 12 

Im 65 and eligible for the vaccine. But I belong to an independent medical group, and many of the big vaccinators here are big medical groups. When I call my doctor, he tells me that they are waiting for a clinic, that he has no vaccine. The touted mass vaccination site at Cal Expo is barely used. When I hear theres vaccine available at various hospitals, pharmacies and clinics, when I log on there are no appointments available. Its vaccine for the privileged and members of the big medical groups. Everyone else loses out.

 65-Year-Old

Sacramento, California

 Feb. 12 

I am trying to get my 86-year-old mother vaccinated in Manhattan, NYC. Aside from the shortage, I am very angry at the hospitals and other vaccination sites for their horrible, inconsiderate websites, which are making the anxiety worse. Very simple things could be done to make them kinder. At present, you end up going in circles. For example: NorthwellHealths facilities are near her apartment. After going to the NYC covid page, I select one of their hospitals and click to their site. When they do not have any vaccine, they have no information on their covid page about 1st vaccine appointments. None. There is a button for making appointments, which leads you to making regular appointments with doctors. There should be a big button on the page you land on from the NYS listing that says MAKE A VACCINATION APPOINTMENT, even if there are no appointments. Some of the other sites make you fill out the forms before telling you that there are no vaccines. And you cant just do it once. You have to do it over and over again.

My sister and I are trying to do this for her. The fact that you MUST go thru the internet is pushing the elderly, those who need the vaccine the most, to periphery. But, at least, they could make the websites friendly and helpful. Were a country where we spend more money and time making sure people know how to drink coke than they do helping people understand healthcare. This is a systematic problem that should be improved. There are marketing people out there who know how to interact with the public, but the healthcare system chooses not to use them.

 New York

Yesterday I experienced the good and the bad of the vaccine rollout. My 95-year-old mother endured a one hour, twenty minute ordeal mostly standing outside 380 W MacArthur Kaiser in Oakland, thankfully a wheelchair was offered and very much appreciated.

We were there 15 minutes early for the 10:15 appt. and finished at 11:20. The whole operation seemed clunky and bureaucratic, think of standing in a long line at a rental car company.

Now to my almost dreamlike experience gliding through the Moscone Center in SF, arriving about 25 minutes early for my 5:45 appt. I was immediately checked in and escorted to the vaccination booth, the nurse checked me out on her screen asked me the routine questions jabbed my arm gave me my 5:45 sticker and sent me to observation area. After my morning in Oakland Id love to take my mom to Moscone for her second shot but as far as I can tell Kaiser doesnt seem to allow that.

 Oakland, California

I'm a stage 4 cancer survivor and may have long-term heart and lung effects from the treatments I went through. I'm 44 and live in Denver. It's unclear which vaccine group I fall into. Some states, such as New York, prioritize any cancer survivor, but Colorado only considers people who have been in treatment for the past month. Also, they want you to have two high-risk conditions  how are those defined? Do I qualify? Do my doctors have any input on that?

My oncologist and my primary care doctor have no word on when I might get vaccinated. My health systems website says if you have an online account, youre already in their system and they will inform you when youre eligible. I do not know if that takes into account my medical history.

Ive been to four pharmacies so far in my area; only one has had vaccines, and they did have a list on paper to call if they wound up with extras. I also signed up online with a couple of health care systems (Centura, National Jewish) for notifications; only one asked about medical conditions upon sign-up.

So, at this rate, Im guessing: spring? Summer? Will I be treated as a healthy adult and be the last vaccinated?

 44-Year-Old

Denver

Checked the Sacramento County website on Feb. 3. Found a link to a vaccination clinic at our neighborhood Safeway. Made an appointment for Feb. 6, at which time I received my first dose. Within minutes of being vaccinated, I received an email confirming an appointment for the second dose in 28 days.

 Sacramento, California

We heard the local center would allow people to sign up at 3 p.m. on a Sunday. My husband and I were refreshing our respective computers every five seconds waiting for the portal to open. We snagged appointments via EventBrite on the same day, same hour. When my husband and I went for our first shot, we stood in line for roughly 1 hours outside, in the sun and heat, before we got inside the county health office, which administered the shot. Most of the other people in line were older and/or frail, with walkers and in wheelchairs. The county staff did their best to make them comfortable, which wasnt much due to the logistics of the operation. The second shot was a breeze  in and out in about 25 minutes, including the mandatory 15-minute wait after the inoculation. I have a friend who is 80 years old, a three-time cancer survivor, and still cant get an appointment and has tried numerous times.

 Lakewood Ranch, Florida

I signed up with the Kalamazoo County Health Department in Michigan. It was just a couple of weeks, I think, before they sent the application to sign up for the appointment. I had a choice of two days and three time spans with first, second and third choice and was asked if I needed any assistance. I then was emailed an appointment. When I got there, a policeman was directing traffic and giving instructions to stay in the car until five minutes before my appointment. It seemed less. I went through several stops very fast. The parking lot had so many cars and I had to wait 30 minutes after my injection. And, still, in 45 minutes I was driving down the street and also had my second appointment made.

They reminded me days before my appointment, the day before my appointment and the morning of my appointment. So fast, so efficient and so many people there that there was no time to do anything but get done what had to be done. AMAZING planning and amazing workers and volunteers.

 77-Year-Old

Kalamazoo, Michigan

Maryland covid distribution is a true mess. There is no central registration site. The state has a site that lists many providers, most of which do not have the vaccine. One of the large statewide vaccine sites, Six Flags America, does not allow you to sign up for the vaccine. Almost all the sites listed on the states website indicated they do not have the vaccine.

 68-Year-Old

Ellicott City, Maryland

It's terrible here in the county for Tier 2. That includes all the educators and everyone over 70. The appointment software company they chose to use did nothing to change their program to account for thousands daily and hourly trying to get an appointment.

I eventually was able to get my first shot. I still was not able to use the information that the Carson City Health and Human Services was putting in the news. I noodled around on the internet and discovered a notice that a drugstore (Walgreens) and a drugstore within a supermarket (Smith's Food and Drug) were being sent the Moderna vaccine and were taking appointments starting the next day. I tried Walgreens but I don't shop there and could not enter its system. I tried Smith's, and it was so simple anyone could get on it. I made an appointment so easily for the next morning. Four days ago, I received an email from Kroger, the parent company of Smith's, telling me the day and time for my second dose.

Each city, county and state seem to have surprisingly different ways of putting out information, where and how the vaccine is delivered and administered. I do think it is still a logistics issue that was not anticipated by our former government officials.

 78-Year-Old

Carson City, Nevada

I signed up for a vaccine several weeks ago with the county health department. Im 78, living in Albuquerque. My registration was acknowledged but nothing further. The county program appears to be in chaos.

 78-Year-Old

Albuquerque, New Mexico
The elections will be held for 12 municipal corporations and 75 municipalities/nagar panchayats

The Andhra Pradesh State Election Commission announced on Monday that urban local body polls in the state will be held on 10 March, and the results will be announced on 14 March.

Re-polling, if required, will be held on 13 March

The elections will be held for 12 municipal corporations and 75 municipalities/nagar panchayats. The municipal corporations which will go to polls are Vizianagaram, Vishakhapatnam, West Godavari, Krishna, Guntur, Prakasam, Chittoor, YSR, Kurnool and Ananthapuramu. Municipalities/nagar panchayats in the districts of Srikakulam, Vizianagaram, Vishakhapatnam, East Godavari, West Godavari, Krishna, Guntur, Prakasam, SPSR Nellore, Ananthapuramu, Kurnool, YSR and Chittoor.

The Andhra Pradesh urban local body polls were going to be held in March 2020, but were postponed due to the coronavirus lockdown.

In a press note, the state election commission has said, "The Commission reviewed the situation and decided that the situation is conducive for conduct of elections to local bodies."

At present, the panchayat elections are also underway in the state. The polls began from 9 February and will go on till 21 February in four phases.

As many as 7,507 candidates are contesting for sarpanch posts and 44.876 are in the fray for ward members. The panchayat elections are being held to elect a total of 20,817 ward members, an official press release said.

With inputs from PTI
ITASCA, Ill., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- A National Safety Council (NSC) survey released today shows 90% of employers are concerned about mental health and chronic stress impacting fitness for duty  in addition to persistent concerns around legal and illicit substance misuse. In response, NSC is becoming the first national organization to call on employers to consider far more than substance misuse when addressing "workplace impairment." NSC urges that employer policies and procedures outline "workplace impairment" as anything that could impede one's ability to function normally or safely as a result of a number of factors  from chemical substances, such as alcohol, opioids or cannabis, to physical factors like fatigue, as well as experiencing mental distress and social factors like stress.

The survey data underscore how the pandemic has impacted workplace safety. In expanding what it means to be impaired in the workplace, NSC aims to reshape the national narrative and help employers adjust internal policies and programs accordingly.

The Council began a holistic assessment of "workplace impairment" in 2020 as the pandemic raged, and NSC found 93% of employers agreed with a broader description one that extends beyond substances to include health and wellbeing.

"The National Safety Council has been the nation's safety watchdog for more than 100 years, identifying emerging issues and developing resources to help keep workers safe from the workplace to anyplace," said Lorraine Martin, NSC president and CEO. "We believe the issue of impairment is multifaceted and therefore requires an approach that recognizes all aspects of it. We urge employers to join us in looking at impairment through the new lens that our current moment demands."

Impairment has been a workplace safety issue for decades. The pandemic, however, has forced a new era of workplace safety, one in which employers are grappling with increased substance use and misuse, as well as increased mental health distress including depression and anxiety  medical conditions that frequently are interrelated. In particular, the pandemic has worsened the country's opioid crisis, which has been challenging employers for several years. In the 12-month period ending in May 2020, there were 81,000 fatal drug overdoses  the highest number ever recorded.

More than half of employers surveyed by NSC  52%  said they know impairment is decreasing the safety of their workforce, while 77% of respondents view impairment as an important consideration when determining an employee's fitness for duty. While 70% of employers said they discuss substance impairment during employee onboarding, only 47% discuss other forms of impairment, such as fatigue, mental health and stress. In previous research, NSC found that tired, fatigued employees have negatively impacted 90% of employers.i

No matter what's keeping employees from working or driving safely, NSC stands ready to help employers deal with the impacts of impairment in the workplace with a robust offering of free resources and tools to help businesses manage these emerging issues. Offerings include cost calculators to understand the business case around substance misuse and fatigue in the workplace and toolkits to implement strategies to proactively address opioids and fatigue.

Additionally, NSC is tackling mental health in the workplace and providing guidance for employers to effectively address. Employers can visit nsc.org/safer for playbooks, guides and other resources to help address mental health and wellbeing as part of the Council's SAFER effort.

About the National Safety Council

The National Safety Council is America's leading nonprofit safety advocate  and has been for over 100 years. As a mission-based organization, we work to eliminate the leading causes of preventable death and injury, focusing our efforts on the workplace, roadway and impairment. We create a culture of safety to not only keep people safer at work, but also beyond the workplace so they can live their fullest lives.

Connect with NSC:

Facebook

Twitter

LinkedIn

YouTube

Instagram

i According to NSC research: https://www.nsc.org/work-safety/safety-topics/fatigue/survey-report

SOURCE National Safety Council

Related Links

https://www.nsc.org


Guinea has officially declared a new epidemic of Ebola as at least four people died and four others were infected. The four who have not died are being treated in an isolation center. It marks the first outbreak of Ebola in the region since 2014-2016, when more than 11,300 people died and 28,000 were infected in what became the deadliest outbreak on record. That outbreak also started in Guinea and spread to Liberia and Sierra Leone, two countries that are now on high alert for any potential resurgence of the virus in their countries.

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West African health officials are now scrambling to try and trace and isolate any suspected cases. But Guinea, one of the worlds poorest countries, is suffering from a severe lack of resources to combat the outbreak as it is already trying to contain not only the coronavirus pandemic but also outbreaks of yellow fever and measles. We are facing four epidemics at the same time, said Sakoba Keita, head of the National Health Security Agency.

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The outbreak took place in the countrys south where people became sick with diarrhea, vomiting, and bleeding after taking part in the burial of a nurse on Feb. 1. Regional health officials emphasized that they have to act quickly. Time is of the essence. The resurgence of the virus in Guinea comes at the worst possible time when the country is already facing the COVID-19 pandemic, Mohammed Mukhier, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies Regional Director for Africa said, adding there is hope with scientific advances. Unless the response is swift, the health, economic and social impacts are likely to be immense for millions of people.

Doctors Without Borders, the international medical organization, also said it is sending teams to the region to try to control the outbreak before it spreads further. We know from past experience that the speed of the response is important, both in order to contain transmission and to provide treatment for people who have caught the disease, said Frederik van der Schrieck, the head of the organizations mission in Guinea.

Guinea, which has around 12 million people, has so far recorded some 15,000 COVID-19 cases and 84 deaths.
In a big boost to sub-regional connectivity and cooperation, India facilitated the transit of fertilizer export from Bangladesh to Nepal via the Rohanpur-Singhabad rail route.

According to All India Radio's news division, at present, 27,000 MT of fertilizer will be exported to Nepal through the Rohanpur-Singhabad rail transit route. Another lot of 25,000 metric tonnes of fertilizer is likely to be exported subsequently, it said.

India and Bangladesh had signed an agreement in 1976 to allow for the export of commodities from Bangladesh to Nepal and import from other countries to Nepal via Indian territory as traffic in transit.

A report carried earlier by The Kathmandu Post noted that fertilizer shortage is a perennial problem in Nepal. It added that "despite tall promises, the Oli administration has miserably failed in ensuring the timely supply of fertilizers." Adequate supply of fertilizer would be critical for Nepal's agriculture sector. The agriculture sector, much like in India, plays a critical role in the overall economic growth story of the Himalayan country.

A source said that India will look at all feasible options to boost regional trade and connectivity. The complex mechanisms in place for the movement of goods at the integrated check posts (ICPs) could also be looked at.

"We are looking to boost ties with Nepal. Deepening of ties will benefit both countries, we have a lot in common with Nepal especially when it comes to culture and business," Gopal Krishna Agarwal, BJP's national spokesperson said.

Kathmandu's long-pending demand has been to set up a freight corridor through India that connects Nepal and Bangladesh and also gives the land-locked Himalayan country access to a seaport.

Sources said that the Narendra Modi government is also looking to push the Bangladesh-Bhutan-India-Nepal (BBIN) initiative, to boost connectivity in the region, which in turn will expand trade among the countries. The BBIN initiative has the support of all the member countries, one of the sources said.

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Indias Exports rise 5.37 pc in Jan; trade deficit narrows to USD 14.75 billion
Authorities on Monday identified 57-year-old Mustapha Faddi as the Marlborough man who was struck and killed by a tractor-trailer on the Massachusetts Turnpike in Framingham over the weekend after exiting his car.

Massachusetts State Police troopers responded shortly before 6 a.m. Saturday to reports of a pedestrian hit by a vehicle in the eastbound lanes of Interstate 90 at mile marker 116.2, according to a statement from state police.

Faddi was driving his 2007 Nissan Murano east on the Mass. Pike when his car became disabled in the right lane due to what state police described as unknown mechanical problems.

The Marlborough man exited the Nissan and was standing on the highway when a 2016 Volvo tractor-trailer struck both him and his car. He was killed in the collision, according to state police.

The tractor-trailer, which was being driven by a 67-year-old Linden, New Jersey man, was traveling east in the right lane of the highway when it hit Faddi, state police said.

The right and middle travel lanes on the Mass. Pike were closed for 2 hours while authorities investigated. No charges have been filed at this time, according to state police.

Related Content: Marlborough man struck and killed by tractor-trailer after exiting car on Massachusetts Turnpike
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The location of the Covid-19 vaccination centre for Offaly has been confirmed.

The centre will be located at Faithful Fields, the Offaly GAA facility outside Kilcormac.

While the facility has ample parking and is somewhat central geographically, the vast majority of the population of the county is to the north and west meaning the majority of people will be travelling long distances to the centre.

There will also be a vaccination centre in Nenagh, one of two in Tipperary, which is closer for people who will be getting vaccinated in the south of the county.

Westmeath will have two centres, one each in Mullingar and Athlone while the centre in Laois will be in Portlaoise and the one for Longford will be in Longford town.

Almost all the other centres are being set up in the largest towns in each county.

The Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly TD, has today confirmed locations for 37 vaccination centres across Ireland for the COVID-19 Vaccination Programme.

The 37 centres have been confirmed by the HSE, with at least one in every county. These centres will support the vaccination of the general population in a safe and efficient manner. While currently vaccines are being administered in healthcare settings and by GPs, many people will be offered their vaccination in these centres, having self-registered online.

All of the centres vary in size and operating hours and have been selected based on population density, ease of access, transport and parking. The design and layout of the centres also incorporates learnings from the COVID-19 swabbing centres. It is important to note that the centres will be of different sizes and operating hours will be based on vaccine supply and catchment area need.

Minister Donnelly said: I would like to thank the HSE for their ongoing work in developing these vaccination centres across the country. These centres will be ready well in advance of vaccine supply when they will be used as part of our programme. People can expect to see these vaccination centres ready and waiting in their county.

We have always said the vaccination programme would only be limited by the availability and reliability of supply in these early stages of the programme. In the coming months supply will increase substantially and we will see these centres operating to full capacity and administering vaccines to the general population, following the Government priority list.

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A 59-year-old Pennsylvania man got so cold in his unheated house Sunday that he piled up some wood, doused it with lighter fluid and set it on fire in his basement, police claim.

Bad idea.

He ended up with the fire department for company.

State police at Hazleton said the unnamed man started the fire just after 7 p.m. It quickly spread up the wall and reached the attic of the house on North Cedar Street, investigator Zachary Martini said. City firefighters were able to prevent the blaze from spreading to adjoining homes.

Martini said it is believed the man started the fire to keep warm and fell asleep while sitting beside the flames and drinking alcohol. The occupant of the home was intoxicated and unable to competently answer questions, Martini wrote.

He said the fire heavily damaged the homes roof. Charges will be filed, Martini said.
Chip and Joanna Gaines are returning to television with Fixer Upper: Welcome Home. The home renovation show is back and bigger than ever to change peoples lives. On one of the episodes released on the Discovery+ app, the couple made history showcasing something they had never shown during their renovations. To make this moment happen, the Gaineses had to break a rule they implemented in their own homes.

Chip and Joanna Gaines | Nathan Congleton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty Images

Chip and Joanna Gaines are doing Fixer Upper again

Fixer Upper is back with Chip and Joanna Gaines renovating homes once again. The couple is ready to launch their own channel slated to debut on TV in January 2022. However, Discovery+ subscribers have been able to get a sneak peek of their new show called Fixer Upper: Welcome Home as part of the Magnolia Network preview.

After ending their run on HGTV and producing 79 episodes for the network, the couple thought they were done. However, with the launch of their own network, they wanted to share those stories that touched peoples hearts once again and the reboot was born.

The day we wrapped our final episode of Fixer Upper, we really believed it was a chapter closed. We knew we needed a break and a moment to catch our breath. But we also knew we werent done dreaming about ways to make old things new again, Chip and Joanna said in a statement. These past few years, weve continued tackling renovations and projects, doing the work were passionate about, but I dont think either of us anticipated how the show would become such a permanent fixture in our hearts. Weve missed sharing the stories of these families and their homes with you, and were excited to do that again very soon!

Chip and Joanna Gaines | Daniel Zuchnik/WireImage

RELATED: Today: How Joanna Gaines Talked to Her Kids About the Coronavirus Pandemic

Chip and Joanna Gaines dont own a TV

One thing that fans have noticed about Fixer Upper is that a TV is never featured in their renovating projects. This is possibly due to a personal rule they have in their own family. Chip and Joanna dont own a TV and have strict rules about using an iPad.

Our rule for the iPad is that the kids can use it a certain amount of time every other day, Gaines told Southern Living magazine in their March 2019 issue. Its contingent on them doing their chores and homework. I try hard to make it not the thing they look forward to every day. I dont want them focusing on that.

Joanna says that without screen time, their kids create and invent [things] on their own to keep entertained.

Chip and Joanna Gaines | Nathan Congleton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty Images

RELATED: Martha Stewart Blasts Chip Gaines for Made up Story and the Fixer Upper Star Fires Back

Chip and Joanna Gaines break the rules

On the second episode of Fixer Upper: Welcome Home, Chip and Joanna have the task of helping out John transition from New York City to Waco, Texas. John works for the couple and one of his requests was to be able to see a TV right from his office inside his home.

When youre in this space, do you want to be able to see the window of your dreams and the kitchen of your dreams or do you want little closed-off sections? Joanna asked John while in the living room.

When Im in this room, I would like to see the TV of my dreams, John replied.

To accomplish this task, Joanna broke down the wall separating the living room from his new office and put a window that served as a wall. The TV was then placed on top of the chimney. During the revelation of the home, Chip and Joanna pointed out that it was the first time they included a television in the home decor.

RELATED: All the Episodes of Magnolia Table With Joanna Gaines Are Now Available To Watch on Discovery Plus

First time in Fixer history weve done., Joanna started to say before being interrupted by Chip adding, Dont tell him, see if he can guess it.

Oh, I already know what it is. First time weve ever featured a television in a Fixer Upper house., John said.

And I did it for you, Joanna added.

Despite Chip and Joanna not owning their own TV, they honored their clients wishes in integrating a television in his new home.

More episodes of Fixer Upper: Welcome Home will be available on Discovery+ and a new Magnolia Network app starting in July.


COLUMBIA  First-time visitors to Keenan High Schools C-wing, take note: You may be greeted by diapered, splay-legged Nigerian dwarf goats searching for a head scratch or neck rub over the next few weeks.

The long corridor inside the northeast Columbia school is home to one of South Carolinas more unique educational experiences  a blossoming livestock program that gives students a glimpse into an industry they likely know little about.

Run by Maria Ausburn, the South Carolina Association of Career and Technical Educations 2018 teacher of the year, the Keenan program has grown from just 20 students when it started in 2017 to 100 now. It's the only agriculture-related program in the urban Richland One School District.

I would love for every single one of my students to leave my program and go into the agriculture field, however that's not the reality, but if they can leave my program and be more literate when it comes to agriculture and be a more productive citizen, then I did my job, Ausburn said.

Her classroom is standard in some ways, with models showing various anatomies of animals and posters of food-production chains.

But a large odor-dampening air purifier gives away the classroom's biggest draw  a menagerie of live-in animals.

In addition to the baby Nigerian dwarf goats, named Levi and Wrangler, the class has pigs, chickens, rabbits, turtles and guinea pigs spread across four classrooms and into a fenced-in outdoor area that gives Ausburn space to put her curriculum into action.

In all, about 25 animals reside at the school, located about 12 miles from downtown Columbia.

Jenna Wilson, a Keenan senior, has spent her entire high school career involved with Ausburns program, and helped feed and groom the animals earlier this year when her teacher was sidelined by COVID-19.

At first, I really didn't know anything about pigs or ducks or goats or anything like that, said Wilson, who wants to pursue an animal-care career. I think that's one of the best things that I've learned here so far is what each animal does to help, and what you can do to help them.

Levi and Wrangler were acquired in late January, and could become the foundation of a Future Farmers of America program where students could compete at animal shows at the South Carolina State Fair and other venues.

Across South Carolina, more than 12,600 K-12 students were enrolled in some type of agricultural program in the 2017-18 school year, according to the most recent state Department of Education figures available. About one-quarter of acreage statewide is driven by agribusiness, which accounts for nearly 250,000 jobs, according to S.C. Department of Agriculture data.

Just like in the wild, Ausburn and her students need to prepared for almost anything. Two years ago, Ausburn wore a dress to school for senior awards night but that afternoon, the chickens escaped.

It takes a lot of hard work and so not only does it teach them about the culture of agriculture, but I think it also gives them a little bit of respect for it, she said. Its not a 9-to-5 kind of job.

Ausburn focuses her classes beyond animal welfare to nutrition, genetics and anatomy.

Even the smallest of creatures can offer lessons in her class.

A hermit crab, named Shelley, was not moving Feb. 9. Ausburn said its too early to say whether the creature is deceased or in the initial stages of a four-to-eight week molting period when it idles, building up enough internal water pressure to split from its old shell.

But either way, it presents another experience for Ausburns students in that they can learn from the deaths of animals. Recently when a goldfish was found dead in its tank, a dissection was held to determine what happened and students figured out a puncture to its swim bladder caused the fish to drown.

Sometimes we have really tough conversations in here, Ausburn said. I think one of the big things I try to express to my students is that animals don't have a voice, so we kind of have to be that voice for them, and so teaching them that humanity and that care for animals is a big part of it.
DUBAI: Iran said on Monday it will block snap inspections by the U.N. nuclear watchdog from next week if other parties to the 2015 nuclear deal do not fulfil their obligations, a challenge to U.S. President Joe Bidens hope of reviving the accord.

If others do not fulfil their obligations by Feb. 21, the government is obliged to suspend the voluntary implementation of the Additional Protocol," Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said.

It does not mean ending all inspections by the U.N. nuclear watchdogAll these steps are reversible if the other party changes its path and honours its obligations," he said, alluding to the United States.

The Biden administration aims to return the United States to the nuclear deal, which his predecessor Donald Trump abandoned in 2018. Under the deal, Iran agreed to curbs on its uranium enrichment programme in return for the lifting of sanctions.

After Trump quit and reimposed sanctions, Iran began violating some limits in the deal. Washington and Tehran now disagree over how best to restore the accord, with both sides demanding the other side act first to return to compliance.

Despite Irans public hard line that Washington must take the first step, several Iranian officials told Reuters last week that the mounting economic pain of U.S. sanctions may push Tehran to be flexible on terms for restoring the nuclear deal.

Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani said last week Doha was in consultations to help salvage the deal, and Iranian state media said he would meet Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif in Tehran on Monday.

We welcome efforts by friendly countries like Qatar  There have been consultations between Tehran and Doha at various levels," Khatibzadeh said.

The nuclear deal granted wide-ranging access to the International Atomic Energy Agency to gather information on Irans nuclear activities. But under a law enacted last year, Irans government is obliged to revoke that access on Feb. 21 if other parties are not complying with the nuclear deal.

Iran has long denied striving to develop nuclear weapons through uranium enrichment, though its intelligence minister said last week persistent Western pressure could push Tehran to fight back like a cornered cat and seek nuclear weapons.

But Khatibzadeh rejected this, citing a religious decree issued in the early 2000s by the Islamic Republics top authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, banning the pursuit of nuclear arms.

(Writing by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
She recently split with her businessman beau, Seyed Payam Mirtorabi, following a whirlwind romance.

But Shanina Shaik, 30, has revealed she has already found love again, and on Valentine's Day she debuted her new flame on Instagram.

Sharing a black-and-white picture of the couple, Shanina wrote: My Valentine... Happy Valentines Day.'

Feeling the love! Aussie model Shanina Shaik has revealed the identity of her new boyfriend Matthew Adesuyan. Taking to her Instagram on Valentine's Day she shared a loved-up couple selfie alongside the Los Angeles-based record label owner.

In the photo, the beauty looks off into the distance while Matthew stands from behind her with his arms clutching onto her waist.

She confirmed the identity of her beau was Los Angeles-based record label owner , Matthew Adesuyan.

When he isn't on tour with his artists, Matthew is also the creator of fashion brand Made By US.

Earlier this month, Shanina told fans she was in a new relationship during an Instagram Q&A.

'You'll meet him soon,' she wrote in response to a fan's question about her relationship status.

Quick moves! Shanina Shaik has not confirmed when the two became an item, but her relationship with Matthew comes shortly after her break-up from her business man beau, Seyed Payam Mirtorab

Revelation: Earlier this month the 30-year-old former Victoria's Secret model revealed she was in a new relationship during an Instagram Q&A. 'You'll meet him soon,' she wrote on Instagram

At the time, she posted a picture of his arm around her, but hid his face in the photograph.

Her relationship with Matthew comes shortly after her break-up from Seyed. In August last year she shared a cryptic Instagram post, hinting at a split between the two.

'What I have learned this week nothing ever goes away until it teaches us what we need to know,' she wrote at the time.

Over: Shanina hinted that she had split with her ex Seyed (pictured) in August last year in a cryptic Instagram post

The couple were last spotted in the South of France only two weeks before, sharing a kiss while at the exclusive, Hotel du Cap Eden.

She had debuted the romance in December 2019.

That relationship had come after she had announced her split from husband DJ Ruckus in June 2019, after just one year of marriage.

First marriage: Shanina announced her split from husband DJ Ruckus in June 2019, after just one year of marriage

She recently admitted that despite her first marriage ending in divorce, she is open to tying the knot again.

'What do you think about marriage?' a fan asked Shanina.

'I think marriage can be a beautiful union!' she replied, sharing a picture of herself from her wedding day.

'I'm not against it... and I would love to get married again one day.'

Open to it: She recently admitted that despite her first marriage ending in divorce, she is open to tying the knot again

Shanina, who walked the runway for Victoria's Secret five times between 2011 and 2018, announced her split from DJ Ruckus in June last year, after a year of marriage.

In October 2019, Shanina told The Herald Sun she'd leaned on her family and friends for support in the aftermath of the separation.

'Of course no one decides when they get married to get divorced,' she said.

'It was a difficult time but I've had amazing friends and family supporting me throughout the process and I have a great relationship with my ex-partner and that's important as well.

'We're all on great terms and we want one another to be happy.'
Mr Ivan Domasaa, a Senior Broadcaster in the Upper West Region, has bemoaned the falling standard of radio programming in the Region, blaming it on the "laziness" on the part of some presenters to research before producing.



"Radio workers we are lazy. We are making the traditional formats of radio to die. It's because we want things in a cheap way. But if you are to do a good radio production for people to listen unless you work hard," he said.



Mr Domasaa, who was the Acting Station Coordinator for Radio Progress, said this in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Wa on the occasion of World Radio Day commemoration.



February 13 every year is set aside by the United Nations (UN) to promote radio as a medium of communication, increase accessibility and to encourage more people to use it.



This year's commemoration was hinged on the theme: "New World New Radio".



The Senior Broadcaster, with about 24 years of experience in radio work, noted that radio was a powerful tool for communicating to people, particularly in rural areas, in the language they understood.



He underscored the need for radio broadcasters to imbibe the skills of documentary and drama production.



"Drama production is one way you can use to entertain people and still inform them, but drama is almost missing in our radio programming.



"Documentaries and features are also some of them. If we take our time to research and gather information to produce, people will listen and enjoy it," Mr Domasaa explained.



On the impact of radio on society, he stated that it had helped to promote the culture of the people, especially preserving the language of the people in the Region through programming in their own languages.



Mr Seidu Bomanjor, a Development Communicator and broadcaster with the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, said unprofessionalism and deliberate negligence of media ethics had negatively affected the radio industry.



He said the 1992 Constitution had created room for any individual to be a media practitioner, which had resulted to the proliferation of the radio industry with non-professionals who churned out false and half-truth to the public.



The 1992 Constitution says that there should be no censorship, and that we should hold government accountable, so all these are opportunities given to us. But whether we are living up to expectation or not is another matter.



There are people who are in radio without qualification, some too are qualified but are doing it deliberately. Mischief is part of radio today, he observed.



According to Mr Bomanjor, the public trusted radio and consumed every bit of information from it hence the need for the actors in the industry not to misinform the public.

Source: GNA









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The Antonine Plague was such an experiment. Even without understanding the microbiology of the disease, the Romans knew that the Antonine Plague had come from without, that it was something new that had appeared with terrific fury. They believed that the pestilence had been unloosed by their own soldiers on campaign beyond Roman borders, inside what is now Iraq. More likely, the germ simply spread along the bustling trade routes that connected virtually the entire Old World. The Romans carried on a vigorous commerce with East Africa, the Near East and India and China beyond. As it happens, the first documented direct contact between Rome and China fell in the very year the Antonine Plague broke out under Marcus Aurelius. Though nothing compared with our flat world, the Romans lived through one of the most important phases in the long history of globalization. Then as now, exposure to disease was one of its unintended consequences.

The Antonine Plague might have been one of historys first pandemics, if by that term we mean an explosive disease outbreak on an intercontinental scale. Living through a pandemic not only causes us to see different layers of the past, but can also inspire us to listen to our ancient sources more empathetically. For instance, Covid-19 has made the psychological import of daily death tolls in our ancient texts  such as the 2,000 per day that died in Rome under Commodus  far more real and vivid than ever before. Descriptions of corpses hastily cast into burial pits, the dead deprived of the sacred rituals that were so carefully observed in ordinary times, once read like hyperbole. Long after Covid-19 is over, it is such intimate trauma  of loved ones passing in anguished solitude, of respectful rites denied or deferred  that are likely to linger.

The final death toll of the Antonine Plague is unknown and unknowable, and respectable guesses have ranged from 2 percent to 25 percent of the population. I have ventured a tally somewhere in the realm of seven million to 10 million, in an empire of 70 million souls. One of the hardest paradoxes to reckon with, though, is that the Antonine Plague was as much a symptom of the empires success as its sins or stresses. Rome was struck at its apex of power and prosperity  precisely because that power and prosperity had made it ecologically more likely that such a microbiological challenge would emerge and disseminate.

In consequence of the pestilence, the arc of Romes growth was abruptly ended. Romes margin of military dominance was lost and never completely regained. Yet the Romans were resilient, and we would be fortunate if our country endures for as long as Rome did after this deadly disruption.

Retracing the role that nature played in Romes history reminds us that we, too, are ecologically fragile, the fate of our society only partly under our control. A sense of our fragility should not make us fatalistic. Rather, it should inspire us to be less complacent. Even with all the tools of modern biological science, we could not have predicted exactly when and where a new pandemic would emerge. But we were warned, and those warnings went unheeded, in part because we told stories about ourselves implying that we had been freed from nature, that we were immune from the patterns of the past.

Historys role is humanistic. Its purpose is to help us see those patterns and take them to heart because they are human. History is powerful because we can identify with the hopes, follies and sorrows of those who have come before us. In recognizing the limits of their power in the face of nature, we can also acknowledge our own. It is a lesson we would do well to heed. The Antonine Plague wasnt the last lethal pandemic the Romans faced. And Covid-19 wont be ours.

Kyle Harper, a professor of classics and letters at the University of Oklahoma, is the author of The Fate of Rome: Climate, Disease, and the End of an Empire and the forthcoming Plagues Upon the Earth: Disease and the Course of Human History.

CHICAGO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Numerator, a data and tech company serving the market research space, has launched a Health Trends Tracker to monitor sales trends and consumer sentiment among select health categories associated with start of year health intentions, including Fresh and Frozen Produce, Vitamins & Supplements, Meat Alternatives, and Activity Trackers & Smartwatches.

The Health Trends Tracker reports an index of year over year category sales for the past 13 months with additional data from a survey of 3,000+ verified health category buyers.

Health Trends Index shows:

All categories were up versus prior year in 2020 in line with increased eating at home, stockpiling behaviors and health concerns throughout the pandemic.

All categories are up January 2021 versus 2020, noting January 2020 behaviors predated widespread concern about the pandemic.

versus 2020, noting behaviors predated widespread concern about the pandemic. Vitamins & Supplements show the highest growth at +23%, followed by Meat Alternatives and Fresh Vegetables at +21% and +13% respectively.

Sales Growth Index for Tracked Health Categories







FRESH FROZEN



Activity

Trackers &

Smartwatches Vitamins &

Supplements Vegetables Fruit Vegetables Fruit Meat

Alternatives Annual Sales 2020 vs. 2019 105 124 117 113 118 125 161 YTD Sales 2021 vs. 2020 105 123 113 111 110 111 121

Key consumer sentiment findings among verified buyers of health categories include:

Consumer health-related behaviors have improved during COVID: 42% of those surveyed indicated their health-related behaviors have improved since the onset of COVID, with 42% indicating they had not changed since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and 15% reporting their health-related behaviors had declined.

42% of those surveyed indicated their health-related behaviors have improved since the onset of COVID, with 42% indicating they had not changed since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and 15% reporting their health-related behaviors had declined. Consumers plan to improve: 74% of consumers indicated they were targeting a healthier lifestyle in 2021. More than half (54%) intend to purchase more healthy foods, and 45% intend to purchase fewer unhealthy foods in 2021.

74% of consumers indicated they were targeting a healthier lifestyle in 2021. More than half (54%) intend to purchase more healthy foods, and 45% intend to purchase fewer unhealthy foods in 2021. COVID is helping drive healthier change: 14% of respondents said their year-to-date 2021 health purchases were a result of a COVID-related behavioral change, while another 14% said the purchases were influenced by start-of-year intentions related to their health. This number jumps to 27% of consumers indicating their year-to-date Vitamins & Supplements purchases were related to a COVID health focus.

The Health Trends Tracker is updated bi-weekly with YTD omnichannel sales data.

About Numerator

Numerator is a data and tech company bringing speed and scale to market research. Headquartered in Chicago, IL, Numerator has more than 2,000 employees worldwide. The company blends proprietary data with advanced technology to create unique insights for the market research industry that has been slow to change. The majority of Fortune 100 companies are Numerator clients.

SOURCE Numerator

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COLONIE  U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer, in his first visit to upstate New York as the Senate majority leader, lauded a restaurant relief fund policy he's folding into the broader COVID-19 stimulus package that in the works in Congress.

In a press briefing at the TORO Cantina on Wolf Road in Colonie on Monday afternoon, Schumer was joined by owner of the restaurant Jaime Ortiz, who said he'd planned the Mexican eatery for two years before doors opened last spring  just in time for them to almost immediately close again due to the pandemic. Because it was a new business, it was ineligible for Paycheck Protection Program funds, Ortiz said.

Under the proposed program, Schumer said $25 billion would be set aside for restaurants  restricted to small businesses  to help them out through the end of the year.

Schumer touted his new swagger in the Senate, saying that as majority leader he has the power to decide what amendments get votes on different bills. That allows him to ensure that measures like the restaurant fund, which he said has bipartisan support, end up in the final version of bills that land on the president's desk.

"I am going to use that clout to help New York and help the Capital Region," Schumer said.

The press conference was held in the midst of a political maelstrom over the policies of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in dealing with COVID-19 in New York's nursing homes.

Republicans had long alleged a coverup of the full number of deaths in the facilities, allegations that were given weight by a state attorney general's report last month. Then last week, Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa acknowledged in a closed-door meeting with Democratic state legislators that "we froze" and the administration had withheld information from their chambers  and from the public  out of fear it would be politicized or used against them in an unrelated U.S. Justice Department inquiry.

Typically, when Schumer or his junior colleague Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand hold press conferences to tout specific policies, they ask for questions on those policies first, then open the floor to broader questions. More than a dozen journalists attended Schumer's Monday afternoon event, and many had planned to ask the senator about the controversy involving Cuomo.

But Schumer abruptly ended the news conference and cut through the kitchen to exit through a back door to a waiting car, dodging questions about Cuomo and nursing homes.
Celebs Go Dating stars Sophie Hermann and Tom Zanetti seemingly broke lockdown rules to spend a romantic evening together on Valentine's Day.

The British rapper, 31, and his German love interest, 34, accidentally revealed their date night at home through videos posted to Instagram, reports The Sun.

Their flirty and romantic behaviour has been building throughout the hit E4 dating series, culminating in a date on Sunday's episode.

Tom lives 220 miles away from Sophie's West London base, in Leeds, with the pair's romantic evening suggesting they flouted government guidelines which forbid non-essential travel and household mixing.

Love is in the air? It is believed that Celebs Go Dating stars Sophie Hermann and Tom Zanetti have broken lockdown rules to spend a romantic evening together on Valentine's Day

And their budding relationship appears to be going from strength to strength as Tom said to his Instagram Story on Sunday while topless in bed: 'I've got the creme de la creme, the cream of the crop.'

A woman's hand, which featured a scarlet manicure, then entered the frame to playfully cover his mouth and prevent him from divulging more information.

Eagle-eyed Instagram followers were quick to notice that Sophie was rocking red nail polish on Valentine's Day, as she revealed her dainty fingers during a promotional social media clip.

Tom proceeded to share the side profile of a blonde beauty, who is believed to be Sophie, sat opposite him during a candle lit dinner as she sipped a glass of wine.

The scene of the crime: The rapper, 31, and his German love interest, 34, accidentally revealed their date night at home through videos posted to Instagram, it was reported in The Sun

Getting closer: Their flirty and romantic behaviour has been building throughout the hit E4 dating series, culminating in a date on Sunday's episode

Romantic music played in the background as the DJ captured their mouth-watering meal.

Later on, Tom sported stylish silk pyjamas and revealed his breakfast the next day, suggesting that the couple spent the night together.

Current Covid-19 rules prevent citizens from leaving home to meet others socially, unless they are in their support bubble.

According to government guidelines, all non-essential travel has been banned and overnight stays are not allowed unless a person has a reasonable excuse

Changing into his pyjamas: Their relationship appears to be going from strength to strength as Tom said to his Instagram Story on Sunday while topless: 'I've got the creme de la creme'

The duo have since removed all videos and have yet to comment on the speculation.

MailOnline have reached out to Tom and Sophie's reps for comment.

Sophie and Tom have been flirting back and forth in recent episodes of Celebs Go Dating, and on Sunday night's show, Tom finally mustered the courage to ask Sophie out on a date.

What was intended as a 'mate date' soon turned into the real deal for the unlikely pair, with Tom visibly nervous around 'The Duchess'.

Dinner for two: Tom shared the side profile of a blonde beauty, who is believed to be Sophie, sat opposite him during a candle lit dinner as she sipped a glass of wine

Earlier in the episode, Tom was seen approaching the Made In Chelsea star, telling her he was 'scared' of her.

'I'm not intimidated by many people but The Duchess I do find scary... I can't read her,' he was seen telling the camera before suggesting he and Sophie have some time to themselves.

Self-declared 'girl's girl' Sophie laid down the stipulation that Tom would need to be honest with any of the other girls in the house hoping to romance him.

Later in the episode, they enjoyed caviar and champagne, with Tom trying the decadent fishy treat for the first time.

Rule breaker? The performer lives in Leeds while Sophie resides in West London, and current Covid-19 rules prevent citizens from leaving home to meet others socially, unless they are in their support bubble

'That tastes like a fish's a**hole!' was his analysis.

Yet things got a tad more serious when he opened up to Sophie about becoming a father at just 17-years-old.

'I was really really happy, I fell in love with him the day he was born,' he told her. 'I worked as a scaffolder, a brick-layer, a roofer, I did everything I could to make sure he had a prom and a car...'

Sophie asked if having a child so young left Tom feeling he had missed out in life, to which he replied: 'The only thing I wish I had was that I always wanted to get married...'

He also spoke of having little money when he grew up and how he started providing for the rest of his family as young as 14.

'I was still playing with Barbies at 16!' Sophie admitted, comparing their very different backgrounds.

Tom also recited a poem he'd written about Sophie - featuring a line in her mother-tongue, German.

Liebe liegt in der luft? On Celebs Go Dating on Sunday night, Tom finally mustered the courage to ask Sophie out on a date

Besotted: What was intended as a 'mate date' soon turned into the real deal for the unlikely duo, with Tom visibly nervous around 'The Duchess'

'That is the sweetest thing...' she said, clearly moved by the gesture.

Later in the episode, she was seen telling Kimberly Hart Simpson and Chloe Ferry about the date.

'This is what you've wanted - to be happy!' Chloe exclaimed.

Sophie also admitted it was the best date she had been on during her time on the show thus far.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
There is increasing doubt over the running of the Junior Cycle written exams in June, as difficult talks continue on finalising options for Leaving Cert students.

While no decision has been taken, the challenge would be bringing 60,000 Junior Cycle candidates into schools to sit exams at the same time as 63,000 Leaving Cert students.

The Leaving Cert is a priority, and when the current phase of talks were announced, Education Minister Norma Foley said there would also be discussion on Junior Cycle exams, but they havent featured to date.

Sources said the last time the Junior Cycle exams were raised with the education partners and the public health implications outlined, no one objected to a return of the school-based assessments that happened in 2020.

Leaving Cert candidates will have choices around a modified version of the calculated grades based on teacher assessments, used in 2020, and traditional exams.

Students have demanded options to provide certainty in the event that the traditional exams are disrupted by Covid and time lost in school.

Precise details of how the hybrid system will work are still being teased out, with further discussions between the Department of Education and teacher unions taking place today.

Intensive talks continued over the weekend, with the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI), returning to the table after pulling out of the process on Thursday.

It remains to be seen how much will be achieved ahead of tomorrows Cabinet meeting, where Taoiseach Micheal Martin had hoped to sign off on Leaving Cert 2021. Mr Martin and the two other Coalition leaders, Tanaiste Leo Varadkar and Transport Minister Eamon Ryan, will be briefed ahead of the Cabinet meeting, but it seems likely it will be an update rather than a final deal.

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Leaving Cert written exams are set to start on June 9, but the options being explored include whether students would sit all their subjects or a smaller number, alongside the non-exam assessments.

Before the written exams, the major challenge will be accommodating components such as orals, practicals and projects. About half of subjects have a second component, with deadlines for projects fast approaching and orals and practicals due around Easter.

The weekend talks explored various proposals for the orals and practicals, as well as school-based assessments for a calculated grades-style system. The longer schools are closed the more difficult it will be to fit second components into the timetable, and some work may have to be done in the first week of the Easter holidays.

The Teachers Union of Ireland (TUI) is prepared to cooperate with the return of Leaving Cert students next week, but there is no similar commitment from the ASTI.

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly confirmed yesterday there was no fixed date for the reopening of schools.

With mid-term break this week, and agreement so far only on special schools and special classes, it seems unlikely that any more students will be back before March 1. Even then any return will be phased.

Detailed discussions on reopening primary schools resume today, but much will depend on the evolving public health landscape.
Millions of Americans traveled for President's Day weekend despite warnings from health experts to avoid taking to the skies.

New data from the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) shows that 4.03 million people passed threw airport security checkpoints between Thursday and Sunday.

On Friday alone, a total of 1.15 million people took flights.

These are the highest figure seen in more than a month when 4.4 million were screened by the TSA between New Year's Day and January 4.

It comes as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) warned that travel could trigger more surges in COVID-19 infections and amid airlines' fury that the White House might start requiring negative tests for domestic travelers

New TSA data shows 4.03 million Americans passed threw airport security checkpoints between Thursday (February 11 - purple) and Sunday (February 14 - purple)for President's Day weekend

This the highest figure seen in more than a month when 4.4 million people flew between New Year's Day and January 4. Pictured; People wait for a flight at an international terminal at JFK Airport in New York City, January 25

The CDC and other health experts have advised against traveling, warning it could trigger more surges in COVID-19 infections. Pictured: People wait for a flight at an international terminal at JFK Airport in New York City, January 25

The CDC has been very vocal in warning Americans to not travel, especially as new variants from the UK, South Africa and Brazil continue to spread.

'If someone must travel, they should get tested with a viral test 1-3 days before the trip,' the agency said.

'After travel, getting tested with a viral test three to five days post-travel and staying home and self-quarantining for 7 days, even if test results are negative, is a recommended public health measure to reduce risk.'

Airlines, however, have been concerned about a new rule that would mandate all passengers be tested for coronavirus before traveling, which would drive down passenger loads even further.

The U.S. already requires all international travelers coming into the country show proof of a negative COVID-19 test in.

Passengers are required to get tested no more than three days before their flight and show a negative result to the airline before boarding.

In one of his last weeks in office, former President Donald Trump announced he was lifting coronavirus-related travel restrictions for Europe, the UK, Ireland and Brazil, effective on January 26.

This was quickly reverse by President Joe Biden after he was sworn in.

On Sunday, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told Axios on HBO that the Department of Transportation and the CDC were considering requiring all passengers to get a negative COVID-19 test before boarding any domestic flight.

Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian called the proposal a 'horrible idea' and said that air travel poses a minimal due to air filter on planes that filter in fresh air every few minutes.

'In fact [there are] very, very few documented cases globally, not just domestically,' Bastian told CNN's Poppy Harlow of COVID-19 cases related to air-travel.

'It would set us back another year in the recovery.'

Meanwhile, Southwest Airlines CEO Gary Kelly sent a letter to the White House on Tuesday asking that the Biden administration not impose the rule.

'We believe such a mandate would be counterproductive, costly, and have serious unintended consequences, including for millions of people who have travel needs but may not have access to testing resources and for the millions of people whose livelihoods depend on a stable air travel industry,' Kelly wrote in the letter.

However the CDC told CNN it will not be recommending a testing requirement before domestic air travel,

'At this time, CDC is not recommending required point of departure testing for domestic travel,' the statement read.

'As part of our close monitoring of the pandemic, in particular the continued spread of variants, we will continue to review public health options for containing and mitigating spread of COVID-19 in the travel space.'
The Pentagon has finally admitted to testing wreckage of UFO crashes, according to Anthony Bragalia who wrote to the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) requesting details of all UFO material. In a blog post, Bragalia claimed that the DIA released 154-page test results of a mysterious memory metal called Nitinol which remembers its original shape when folded. While speaking to The Sun, Bragalia even said that it was a stunning admission from the US government and added that some of the retrieved debris possess extraordinary capabilities.

"Now officially referred to as UAP (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena) rather than UFOs, some of this material was placed with a defence contractor for analysis and storage in "specialized facilities," Bragalia informed in his blog post.

READ: 'UFO Spotted' Off Florida Coast Triggers Epic Theories, Experts Say It Was...

Bragalia said that the Pentagon has been able to learn some things about the materials of construction which hold tremendous promise as futuristic materials which will change lives forever. He said that the Freedom of Information request, first sent in 2017, was very specific seeking the test results of UFO debris, not with material already known to science. Further, in his letter to DIA, Bragalia claimed that the testing was carried out by Bigelow Aerospace, one of the DIAs private contractors based in Las Vegas, Nevada in the US.

UFO material could be from Roswell incident

Bragalia believes that some of the material that is being tested could have come from the Roswell incident of 1947, in which a UFO was crashed in New Mexico. He said that although much of the reports details are redacted, what can be gleaned is that these technologies represent a literal quantum leap beyond the properties of all existing material known to man. He noted that throughout the official documents, mention is made of the potential use of some of the materials in advanced aerospace platforms.

READ: Pakistan Pilot & Others Spot 'Massive UFO' In Karachi Sky; 'Aliens Came To Collect Debt?'

Reference is made to desired material characteristics such as being extremely lightweight and tough, like the characteristics of the debris found at the Roswell crash," Bragalia wrote.

It is worth noting that former US President Donald Trump had given authorities 180 days to reveal all they know about the UFOs. The DIA and the Secretary of Defence were given at least six months to provide information on unidentified aerial phenomena to the congress and committees of armed services. The CIA later even allowed all UFO information to be downloaded ahead of the deadline last month. Americas spy agency had allowed documents to accessed by downloading from the Black Vault website and the data involved every instance of UAP which has been mapped by the US government.

READ: CIA Releases Data On UFO Sightings Months Before Agencies Have To Appear Before Congress

READ: Black Vault Makes 'entire' CIA-related UFO Documents Available For Download




Shudder

In what will come as a shock to no one, a good deal of what you see online isnt real. Thats especially true when it comes to social media influencers, who create idealizedand desirablepersonas on Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook, and then use their clout to hawk products for their own personal benefit. Theyre the 21st century equivalent of paid infomercial actors and hosts, and their blather is about as trustworthy as anything else you hear from a corporation thats trying to sell you the latest, greatest whatever thatll help you win friends and influence peoplenot to mention increase your follower count.

Writer/director Jennifer Harrington wades into these digital waters with Shook, a thriller thats heavy on censure and woefully light on scares. A Shudder exclusive premiering on the horror streaming platform on Feb. 18, its tale concerns Mia (Daisye Tutor), a young, pretty blonde influencer whose claim to fame are makeup videos for a cosmetics brand. The phoniness of Mias vocation is underscored by the films introductory scene, in which she and two other womenincluding beauty influencer of the year Genelle (Genelle Seldon)pose for the paparazzi, only for Harrington to cut to a master shot of this newsworthy event, which is really just a staged red carpet thats been constructed in an abandoned parking lot. This entire worlds phoniness is thus laid bare succinctly, and sharply.

Claudia Conway Goes Hollywood, Surprises American Idol Judges With Adele and Emotional Confession

Thats not the only pointed thing about Shooks opening; when her dog pees all over her swanky dress, Genelle rushes off to a nearby bathroom, where she winds up getting stabbed through the chin with her designer high heel shoe. Subsequent headlines indicate that this slaying is related to a spate of recent Southern California attacks by a killer that primarily preys on dogs, and in the aftermath of her colleagues demise, Mia takes to social media to proclaim, Im shook. Seriously. Given that everything about these individuals is performative bullshit, shook she most certainly is not. In fact, she barely gives it another thought, instead turning her attention to her own dilemma: having to watch her sister Nicoles (Emily Goss) dog Chico and, in the process, miss out on a big livestream with her boyfriend Santi (Octavius J. Johnson) and friends Lani (Nicola Posener) and Jade (Stephanie Simbari).

Story continues

Mias predicament is hardly tragic, even if she treats it like her own personal Sophies Choice. Still, her circumstances do soon take a turn for the upsetting. When Chico goes missing, Mia begins searching her siblings home, which clues us into the fact that Nicole had been caring for their mother, who suffered from a made-up incurable brain disorder called Livingstons Disease, and who appears to have passed it on to Nicole. Mia, however, never visited her ailing mom because, per her navel-gazing profession, she only cares about herself. Some of this is spelled out by Mias conversations with Nicolewho can see Mia via a security camera installed in their mothers bedroomand the rest comes via Mias chats with Kellan (Grant Rosenmeyer), a neighbor who gets in touch with Mia first as a friend, and then as a sinister tormentor.

Shook slowly develops into a wannabe-nightmare in which Mia is harassed by unbelievable threats from Kellan, who snatches Chico and then promises to kill her friends (and the pooch) if she doesnt answer his questions and play his games. Its When a Stranger Calls (or Scream) reimagined for the age of texting, voicemails and social media apps, except that the films characters are so one-dimensional and thoroughly obnoxious that its impossible to care about their safety. Harrington visualizes Mias digital interactions by projecting her laptop screen on walls, and by depicting her text-thread friends whispering in her ear. Unfortunately, such devices are handled as clunkily as the rest of the storytelling, which moves the plot forward through leaden exposition, and which primarily envisions Mias friends as braying faces in extreme selfie close-ups.

Things are not what they seem, but if youre expecting the inevitable twists to be clever, have I got some miracle foundation and concealer to sell you. Given that the proceedings are populated by only a handful of characters, its not difficult to see the out-of-left-field turns on the horizon, although a lack of surprise is far from the films sole shortcoming. Shook takes place in the sort of sparsely furnished home that feels like a low-budget set, and Harringtons decision to shroud her action in darknesseven when Mia asks an Alexa-like smart speaker to turn on the lights, they barely illuminate anythingonly further contributes to the overarching chintzy atmosphere. At least the social media posts presented on screen look reasonably authentic, and consequently go some way toward conveying the way in which influencers (and everyday people) use phones and computers not only as their chief means of communication, but as the filter through which they process their every waking experience.

Shooks revelations further underscore the disingenuousness of influencerswhat they say, what they do, who they claim to beand, by extension, everything seen and heard on Instagram et al. Yet in a 2021 grappling with a tidal wave of democracy-undermining disinformation, such notions come off as dully obvious. The casts performances are uniformly bland, and Harringtons inability to bestow Mia or her cohorts with distinctive personalities turns them into mere vehicles for her materials familiar message. Worse, however, is that the cat-and-mouse game which eventually kicks into gear is clumsily staged, its helter-skelter rhythm doing much to neuter any menace or peril. Its also borderline illogical, hinging on incidents that make no sense regardless of the explanations provided by characters dialogue.

Why Shooka movie about pulling the curtain back on social media influencers narcissism and insincerityrevolves around dog murders is anyones guess, but such randomness is in keeping with the endeavors general sloppiness. Devoid of suspense and, at times, basic narrative cohesion, it simply tells audiences what they already knowan approach that doesnt leave one shook so much as bored.

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Syracuse, N.Y.  Sally White has been spending her time checking Covid-19 vaccination websites several times a day.

White is 74, lives in Syracuse, and has learned to navigate the various state, county and drug store websites offering the vaccination appointments.

Shes also learned not to get her hopes up.

On one recent try, Onondaga County had 114 appointments available, she said. By the time she filled out the forms on her computer, the slots disappeared.

And thats how its gone, she said last week. And I check several times a day. Thats where I am.

White is one of thousands of frustrated seniors who, so far, have been left behind when it comes to getting vaccine appointments. The search for most appointments in Central New York requires nimble internet skills, persistence and a heavy dose of good luck.

State and local officials say they understand the frustration, which in large part is due to the paltry amount of vaccine available so far.

Ten million New Yorkers are chasing 300,000 vaccines each week, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said last week. This will be an ongoing tension until the supply is increased.

But the digital race to nab open appointments on different websites adds to that imbalance, according to many seniors who are searching for the appointments in the Syracuse area. Some have had help from their children and neighbors. Others are constantly refreshing their browsers.

I was working this link every few minutes, Sherry Chayat said of her attempt at what she calls The Grand Quest to get the vaccine.

Chayat, 77, finally had luck snapping two appointments for herself and her husband, who is 75, at the New York State Fairgrounds. The date? April 4.

So she kept trying  and finally was able to get two slots at the countys clinic for Jan. 21. That success only came after others alerted her that the county had open appointments at that moment.

Most people getting appointments now in Central New York are doing it three ways: through NYs Am I Eligible website, through Onondaga Countys website, or through Kinney Drugs. CVS also recently started offering appointments in the Syracuse area.

Some say they are having luck calling the states vaccine hotline: 1-833-697-4829. Some say the calls go unanswered.

In Onondaga County, a vaccine routine has developed over the past few weeks.

State health officials tell County Executive Ryan McMahon on Sundays how many doses are coming, he said. For the past couple of weeks, thats been 1,200 shots per week. Some of those are reserved for certain groups, such as public housing residents or people with developmental disabilities.

The vaccine arrives on Tuesdays, McMahon says. Usually, he opens up the appointments on Wednesday mornings. Thats what happened last week  and hundreds of appointments were gone within 20 minutes.

Anthony Dinicola was able to book three of those. Since late January, Dinicola of Camillus has helped about two dozen people make appointments. Six of those were family members. The rest were strangers he offered to help through Facebook and word-of-mouth.

Dinicola figured out that even if the states Am I Eligible? site says no appointments are available, its worth clicking the get started button and searching anyway. The state is reopening some appointment slots as cancellations happen, Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi said. There are not many available, but some do pop up.

Dinicolas advice? Refresh, refresh, refresh that state website. And sign up seniors for alerts from Kinney Drugs. Those let people know when the vaccine arrives in their area. Again, once the alert comes in, you have to act fast on the website.

Anthony Marrone, a Syracuse lawyer specializing in elder law, is doing the same. At first, he and his staff of about 10 started helping their clients get appointments. Now they are doing it for anyone who asks for help. And theyre doing it for free.

Weve done about 60 so far, Marrone said on Friday.

Hes had the most luck with the states website. Heres his advice: Once you enter your qualifying information and get to the Locate Providers page, stay there. Update often. And click on the different sites even if it says there are no appointments available.

This image is from New York's "Am I Eligible" website. You get to this page after entering eligibility information. From here, keep updating and clicking on the various vaccine sites. Appointments do pop up occasionally.Source: New York state

McMahon says with more vaccine Onondaga County could vaccinate thousands more.

He estimates the county could do 18,000 shots a week  9,000 first doses and 9,000 second ones  at the Oncenter. He thinks the county could manage about 10,000 to 12,000 a week at ShoppingTown Mall, the empty shopping center the county now owns.

The county executive says he wishes the state had kept the vaccine concentrated at large-scale distribution centers  and focused on vaccinating seniors  before allowing more of the public in line. McMahon has held off, for now, on allowing restaurant workers and cab drivers into the eligibility pool.

At the same time, hes said hes glad that people with underlying health conditions were allowed to begin start making appointments on Sunday.

Yet even as eligibility increases, its unclear exactly how many more appointment slots are opening up. The state opened up thousands of vaccine appointments at its 13 sites in late January with no notice or fanfare. Now the majority of those appointments are booked through mid-April.

Cuomo has said hes reallocating unneeded vaccine at hospitals to the state sites. And the federal government has boosted the states weekly allotment by another 5% for the next three weeks.

That should open up more slots  but exactly when and how many isnt known. A request on Wednesday to Cuomos office for more details went unanswered.

Joan Hunter, 69, tried all three main ways and finally booked a couple of appointment for herself and her 85-year-old neighbor in April.

Then she heard through a friend people were having luck at the Main Street Pharmacy of Marcellus. She made two appointments on Feb. 1 for shots the next day. (She canceled the April appointments.)

It was very frustrating process of checking the websites constantly, Hunter said. Theyre dangling them out there and snatching them away.

Finally, last Wednesday, White was one of the lucky ones. She got an alert in the afternoon from Kinney Drugs that appointments were available in the Syracuse area.

She got her first shot Friday.

Got a story idea or news tip youd like to share with a Syracuse-area reporter? Please contact me through email, Twitter, Facebook or at 315-470-2274.
SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE  For more than 20 Airmen at Scott Air Force Base, Friday will be remembered as the day when they embarked on a new path in their military careers.

The Scott AFB Event Center hosted a mass swearing-in ceremony for the nations newest branch of service, as the Airmen officially became Guardians in the U.S. Space Force.

When the ceremony ended, the members took off their Air Force uniforms for the last time, donning their new U.S. Space Force insignia.

This is incredibly important and historic because we have not done something like this since the United States Air Force was born out of the Army Air Corp in 1947, said Col. Zachary Warakomski, 375th Communications Group Commander at Scott. We will probably not do this again in my lifetime, and to bring in all of these Airmen, now Guardians, is making them a part of history and bringing them into this new mission set.

In the Space Force, Warakomski will be the Peterson-Schriever Garrison Commander at Petersen Air Force Base in Colorado.

Warakomski is transferring to the Space Force after 22 years in the Air Force, but he expects the transition to be smooth.

Air Force Space Command has been around since 1983 and Ive actually served already in a space role at Peterson Air Force Base as well as Schriever Air Force Base, Warakomski said. This is kind of a match made in heaven from my standpoint.

Two bases are coming together as a single garrison and to be able to take command of that is a great opportunity.

The U.S. Space Force, which was officially founded as an independent service on Dec. 20, 2019, is the space service branch of the U.S. Armed Forces and one of the eight U.S. uniformed services. It is the worlds first and currently only independent space force.

For the Airmen who officially became Guardians on Friday, the chance to join the Space Force is the opportunity of a lifetime.

I found out through the chain of command when there was an announcement on the website that we use in the Air Force, said Sgt. Tory Martinez, who is from the San Francisco Bay area and has been stationed at Scott for four years. Im in communications and they were opening up applications in that area.

I talked to my commander about it and I talked to my wife and submitted the application form and it went up to the Air Force Personnel Center. At that point, in December of last year, I was notified that I was selected.

For Martinez, joining the Space Force just over a year after it was founded adds to the appeal of his new position.

Its a personal decision and you have to weigh the pros and cons, but something like the Space Force hasnt been done since the creation of the Air Force, Martinez said. Were going into the vastness of the unknown and how that parallels to space, and its exciting.

The domain of space has become a very contested environment in terms of Russia and China, and weve got to be prepared for that. Thats the future and knowing that Im going to be part of it really excited me.

Spc4 Jaime Alvarado, likewise, jumped at the chance to join the Space Force in its infancy.

We heard last year about a chance to go into the Space Force and it sounded exciting, said Alvarado, who is originally from Los Angeles and has been in the Air Force for four years, including the last three and a half years at Scott.

I always had an interest in space, but I never thought I would have a chance to be a part of it. Im in IT and Im a systems technician and with space, there is bigger technology working with satellites, so I applied and Im really happy I got chosen.

While Alvarado has known for weeks that he would be accepted into the Space Force, the enormity of the honor didnt fully hit him until Fridays ceremony.

This is a huge moment for me, and my wife is here sharing the moment with me, Alvarado said. Its going to take a while to get used to wearing the Space Force insignia. Its the first new patch since (the Air Force) in the 1940s and its pretty exciting.

People walk up to me and see the new uniform. I think theyre excited too.

For Sgt. Christiana Epperson, who has been in the Air Force for nearly four years and has been at Scott since August of last year, joining the Space Force is an opportunity to become a trailblazer.

For me, one of the main reasons I was so excited to join is that with not having a new branch (in the U.S. military) since the Air Force, this a chance for us to be a uniquely inclusive branch, said Epperson, who is originally from North Carolina but grew up in an active-duty military family and lived all over the U.S. If you look at what women could in the Air Force when it was initiated, it was very insignificant compared to now.

With Space Force, people like me get to be part of it. I think its going to be really exciting.

At first, though, Epperson wasnt sure if the Space Force was the right fit for her.

They put out all the information about the application and initially I wasnt going to do it, but my flight chief told me I can decline it later if I decide I dont want to join, said Epperson, who is an intel analyst in the Air Force and will probably have a similar job in the Space Force. I ended up totally changing my mind about it and instead of being reluctant, I ended up being really excited to get selected for it.

The Space Force is the smallest U.S. armed service, but it slowly continues to grow.

Right now, we have about 3,000 active duty personnel but we also have about 10,000 civilians, and there is going to be an increase in the next year of a little over 3,000 more active-duty personnel, said Warakomski, who is originally from the Atlanta area. Airmen like these are switching over to become guardians and begin the transition.

For the time being, the Space Force is only accepting personnel in a limited number of fields.

Those that were already part of Air Force Space Command under the Air Force flag are now part of the Space Force and they are being moved over immediately, said Warakomski, who has been at Scott for nearly three years and has been in his current role for a year and a half. The focus now is on engineers, acquisitions, cyber operations and intelligence.

After that, I think the Army and the Navy will be the first to bring in a few dozen personnel over the course of the next few months. We work very closely with our sister services in some of the payloads that we operate, whether it be military satellite communications or other areas.

Martinez, like many of his fellow Airmen in Fridays ceremony, doesnt profess to be an expert on space.

But he expects to become one, thanks to the Space Force.

In the communications field, I do cable and antenna maintenance, which is a very hands-on job, Martinez said. But my experience with space is through watching Star Wars and Star Trek. Theres nothing in particular that is job-related, but whats most important is the interest and the drive.

The individuals who joined the Space Force on Friday will likely stay at Scott for a while before being transferred to a Space Force installation.

The excitement of the Airmen during the ceremony today was palpable, but the next step is bringing them over into the Space Force, Warakomski said. It will be six months, or maybe 18 to 24 months, where they will have to finish up their time in the Air Force where they are currently stationed here at Scott. Then well get them out to one of those other garrisons.
Washington Township Public Schools 27th annual Helping Hands hoagie sale has raised $17,000 to help local families in need, $10,000 of which was realized thanks to a helping hand from Liscios Family Bakery owners and operators Chad Vilotti and James Liscio and the staff at their three stores.

Since COVID-19 protocols prevented student volunteers from assembling and selling hundreds of hoagies, as in years past, Liscios agreed to sponsor a promotion that donated 25% from the sale of hoagies and hoagie trays purchased using a special code in their stores from Feb. 1-8 to the Helping Hands hoagie sale fund.

An additional $7,000 came from the sale of T-shirts, donations to the Washington Township Education Foundation, which sponsored the event, and a $1,000 gift from the Turnersville Auto Mall. All money raised will be donated to local families facing medical setbacks and related financial hardships.

We are thrilled that this partnership with Liscios paid such big dividends in such a short period of time for Washington Township families, said school superintendent Joe Bollendorf, who brokered the community service arrangement. We will be forever grateful to Chad Vilotti, James Liscio and the Liscios Bakery family for stepping up to help us reimagine our districts signature fundraising event to the benefit of so many in need. Our community is so giving and charitable and never disappoints when we enlist help.

This years hoagie sale, being completely restructured, was as gratifying as any other sale previously held, WTEF president Charlie Doud said. Thanks to an unbelievable partnership with Liscios Bakery, we once again proved that Washington Township is an extraordinarily generous town. We, again, will be able to support some families in dire need of both financial and, more importantly, emotional support.

Send community news to south@njadvancemedia.com.
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Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], February 15, (ANI/BusinessWire India): (https://www.csscorp.com), a new-age IT services and technology support company, today announced that it has been presented with the Gold Stevie Award in the 'Best Use of Technology in Customer Service - Computer Industries' category at the 15th Annual Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service, for their customer experience transformation platform.

CSS Corp's customer experience transformation platform transforms contact center ecosystems holistically across the business application layer, the CRM platform and the CTI system. Clients can pick and choose across a basket of flexible modules with pre-built integrations. Based on the customers' imperatives, telephony migration to the cloud or CRM re-alignment can also be done to structure an optimized and agile ecosystem.

The platform streamlines end-to-end customer service delivery, across customer acquisition, support, and retention, with an outcome-based approach. It unites the three essential pillars of customer service, namely, customer experience, operational efficiency, and agent productivity, seamlessly with shared intelligence and insights. It leverages cutting-edge technology, including AI, cognitive RPA, analytics, and augmented reality, to deliver customized solutions for clients, and ensure tangible business benefits for them.

Speaking on the occasion, Manish Tandon, Chief Executive Officer, CSS Corp said, "When contact centers faced unprecedented disruptions due to rising customer expectations and the shift to virtual operations during the pandemic, CSS Corp stood strong using its proprietary technology platforms. Our customer experience transformation platform is designed by strategically infusing technology interventions at all stages of the customer journey to drive unprecedented service level consistencies. Winning the Gold Stevie Award is another indicator of our capabilities and positioning to drive unique value creation for our clients as we take a pragmatic approach towards the digital transformation journey."

"In the toughest working environment in memory for most organizations, 2021 Stevie Award winners still found ways to innovate, grow sales, please their customers, and secure new business," said Stevie Awards president Maggie Gallagher. "The judges have recognized and rewarded this, and we join them in applauding this year's winners for their continued success. We look forward to recognizing them on April 14."

More than 2,300 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry, in 51 nations, were considered in this year's competition. Winners were determined by the average scores of more than 160 professionals worldwide on nine specialized judging committees.

This story is provided by BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)

DISCLAIMER

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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Turkish Cypriot President Ersin Tatar (L) meets British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab (R) on Feb 4 - Anadolu Agency

Dominic Raab has been accused of violating red lines on Cyprus after meeting the leader of the breakaway north.

In a letter seen by The Telegraph, Fabian Hamilton, Shadow Minister for Peace and Disarmament, and Catherine West, Shadow Minister for Europe and the Americas, have written to the Foreign Secretary expressing concern that he is considering breaking from the longstanding position of successive UK governments.

It comes after Mr Raab called for all sides to be flexible earlier this month, ahead of United Nations talks to heal the longstanding divisions within Cyprus.

It is understood that the UKs position has not changed on Cyprus.

In the letter, Mr Hamilton and Ms West write that since the Turkish invasion in 1974, both Labour and Conservative-led UK Governments have committed to the reunification of the island on the basis of a bi-zonal, bi-communal federal political settlement.

However they accuse Mr Raab of not having made this publicly clear on his recent visit to the country.

As penholder for Cyprus at the UN, the UK has a historic responsibility to the people of Cyprus and to reaching a settlement that sees the island reunited," they say, as they called on the UK to "uphold its non-recognition of the occupied north of Cyprus in order to avoid bending our historic red lines".

They add that it is particularly worrying that during the visit Mr Raab met with Ersin Tatar, the President of Northern Cyprus; the self-declared Turkish Republic which is recognised only by Ankara.

However it is understood that it is not unusual for the UK to meet with members of the Northern Cypriot government.

Mr Raab recently said that the UK continues to support a comprehensive, just and lasting settlement of the Cyprus issue, based on the existing parameters as set out in relevant Security Council Resolutions.

While visiting Cyprus on February 4, he spoke at a press conference alongside Cypriot Foreign Minister Nikos Christodoulides, where he said: The UK feels we are also a long standing friend of the Cypriot people across the island. So we want to see a permanent, enduring and lasting end to the dispute.

Story continues

The letter adds that in order to quell the considerable anxiety now felt among the Republic of Cyprus and the British Cypriot community in the UK, Mr Raab must commit to a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation for the Island of Cyprus and oppose all drilling by Turkey in the Republic of Cyprus Exclusive Economic Zone.

They also call for the withdrawal of all Turkish military personnel and to stop the resettling of the resort of Varosha.

Last November, Turkeys president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, stoked tensions by declaring he would have a picnic amid the ruins of Varosha, a ghostly suburb of the coastal city of Famagusta.

Varosha used to belong to Greek Cypriots but tens of thousands of them had to flee when the Turkish army invaded the island, in response to a coup intended to annex Cyprus to Greece.

Next month Mr Raab will join the foreign ministers of Greece and Turkey, at a UN summit at the U.N to discuss the future of Cypriot reunification talks.

At the end of the letter they wrote its vital that the UK upholds its historic commitment to the people of Cyprus and to the protection of the sovereignty of the Republic of Cyprus.
Togbui Korbadzi III, the 'Dufia' of Gefia within the Avenor Traditional Area of the Volta Region has called on all leaders, especially traditional authorities to allow the spirit of love for one another to reign in their activities of leadership.



"Love suppresses all issues of negativity towards the growth of our communities," he said.



Togbe Korbadzi made the disclosure in an interaction with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) during a meeting of Chiefs from the Avenor Traditional Area ahead of Valentine day, which is celebrated across the world.



Togbui Korbadzi, also a representative from the Avenor Traditional Council serving as a youth Chief of the Akatsi South Youth Parliament, emphasised the need for leaders to embrace forgiveness during every aspect of endeavour.



He said a leader with an unforgiving heart faces challenges and "this retards development".



Togbe Korbadzi, a private businessman, pledged his continuous support to youth development in Avenor.



He therefore, appealed to all to eschew acts of indiscipline and immoral lifestyles.

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.

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LOS ANGELES (AP)  The California Republican Party is giving $125,000 to the campaign aimed at recalling Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom.

The infusion of cash comes at a critical time for organizers, who are required to collect 1.5 million valid petition signatures by mid-March to qualify the proposal for the ballot.

The funds will go toward hiring workers to gather signatures. So far, that work has fallen largely on volunteers.

The funds were donated to Rescue California, one of several political committees working to oust Newsom from office.

Newsom's political advisers call the proposal a misguided effort by supporters of former President Donald Trump and other Republicans.
At least one million Australians could soon be better off under government plans to streamline Centrelink payments for the jobless into one.

The government has been examining ways to permanently increase the dole when the additional $150 a month JobSeeker payment comes to and end on March 31.

One of the proposals being considering is axing a number of different welfare supplements or subsidies, in return for one, increased payment offsetting the loss of the extra top-ups, The Australian reported.

Some JobSeeker recipients are currently eligible for supplements that include pharmaceutical allowance, telephone allowance, literacy supplement and utilities allowances.

The federal government is looking at permanently increasing the JobSeeker rate after the $150 a fortnight coronavirus supplement ends on March 31. Pictured, people are seen lining up in Melbourne last year

Every recipient receives a fortnightly energy supplement. The top-up payments are worth as little as $4 a fortnight.

Those additional payments would all be scrapped as part of the measures to permanently boost the base rate of JobSeeker.

But rent assistance and family tax benefits are likely to remain under the reforms, which are still being thrashed out.

The government is adamant the coronavirus supplement with end as scheduled but has confirmed it has been considering it is looking to increase the rate of JobSeeker rather than allowing it to return to $40 a day.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison last week flagged the government was looking at the welfare reform measure amid warnings reducing the dole payment will result in a national crisis.

A decision on what might replace the $150 per fortnight pandemic payment will be made by the end of March.

'In terms of the rate and its future, we will consider that in the normal expenditure review committee process, and that's what we're doing right now,' Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said.

Social advocacy body Anglicare Australia says its polling of service agencies across the country showed 100 per cent of respondents said any cut will see more people needing help.

The federal government is reportedly examining axing multiple supplement payments in favour of providing one streamlined payment. Pictured, people are seen in long queues outside the Centrelink office in Southport, Gold Coast last year

New figures released Monday show 785,000 jobs were created in the past seven months, while the unemployment rate dropped from 7.5 per cent in July to 6.6 per cent

'The old rate of JobSeeker was frozen for decades, leaving hundreds of thousands of people trapped in poverty,' Anglicare Australia executive director Kasy Chambers said.

'When the government raised the rate last year, it righted that wrong.'

Last April, the introduction of the coronavirus supplement effectively doubled the rate of JobSeeker to $557.85 per week.

The supplement was cut in September to leaving JobSeeker recipients with $407.85 per week and then that was reduced again in December to $357.85 per week.

Under the current JobSeeker rates, a single person with no children can earn up to a maximum of $715.70 a fortnight, which includes a base rate of $565.70 and the coronavirus supplement.

JobSeeker was introduced alongside JobKeeper, with the latter provided as a lifeline to businesses impacted by coronavirus restrictions to help retain staff.

Recent figures from the Australian Taxation Office showed more than 2.13 million Australians were no longer receiving JobKeeper payments at the end of December.

There were 1.54 million employees eligible for the wage subsidy between October and December last year, down from 3.6 million between April and September.

The biggest decrease came in Western Australia, the Northern Territory and South Australia while Victoria reported the smallest decrease.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg (pictured) while welcoming figures showing a decrease in JobKeeper recipients said some sectors will need support once the pandemic-inspired scheme cuts out

'What these numbers show is a broad based recovery in the Australian labour market much better than we expected, even through the pandemic last year,' Mr Frydenberg told ABC radio on Monday.

JOBKEEPER FIGURES JobKeeper registrations between the first phase (April to September) and second phase (October to December) were down in: - Retail trade (68 per cent) - Accommodation and food services (52 per cent) - Education and training (50 per cent) - Wholesale trade (71 per cent) - Construction (48 per cent) Advertisement

JobKeeper is set to end on March 28 - six months later than first planned - but Mr Frydenberg has conceded sectors like tourism, aviation and international education are still struggling and will need support once the pandemic-inspired scheme cuts out.

Mr Frydenberg said 785,000 jobs had been created in the past seven months, while the unemployment rate has dropped from 7.5 per cent in July to 6.6 per cent in December.

But ACTU secretary Sally McManus said the education, tourism and manufacturing sectors continue to be 'smashed' by the coronavirus pandemic.

'What we say is JobKeeper should be extended for those businesses that are still affected by the coronavirus, through no fault of their own,' she told the ABC.

Ms McManus said the support should continue 'for as long as the pandemic is with us'.

Shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers says the government not only has to focus on supporting businesses through the pandemic but deal with the broader issues of stagnant wages, underemployment and job insecurity.

'It's not a recovery if it's built on the back of less secure work or weaker wages growth.'
COVID-19: Night curfew in 4 Gujarat cities extended till Feb 28

India

oi-Madhuri Adnal

Ahmedabad, Feb 15: The night curfew, currently in force in four major Gujarat cities, including Ahmedabad, to stem the COVID-19 spread, was on Monday extended till February 28, officials said.

However, in a concession to people, the curfew from now on in Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara and Rajkot will be in force between midnight and 6 am instead of the earlier 11pm to 6am, they added.

COVID-19: Night curfew in Amravati district of Maharashtra as new cases on rise

This is the fourth extension of the night curfew which was first enforced in the end of November last year after a spurt in COVID-19 cases in these cities post-Diwali.

As against average 1,500 cases per day in November and December, the current daily addition to the infection caseload is around 250 in the state, the officials said.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 23:29 [IST]
The lead prosecutor in Donald Trumps second impeachment trial has hit out at the former presidents legal team, describing their defence as explosive and deranged.

They couldnt get a summer internship with My Cousin Vinny, Jamie Raskin, Democratic congressman from Maryland who led the prosecution in the senate, told the Washington Post in an interview after the trial, referencing the Joe Pesci movie about a hapless lawyer.

Rep. Raskin also harshly criticised Republican senators who voted to acquit the former president, likening them to members of a religious cult.

Speaking after the senate failed to achieve the two-thirds majority needed to convict Mr Trump, he said that he believed his strategy was a resounding success, but added that theres no reasoning with people who basically are acting like members of a religious cult.

"It was a dramatic success in historical terms, it was the largest impeachment conviction vote in US history, and it was by far the most bipartisan majority in the Senate to convict," he said in a separate interview on NBCs Meet the Press.

"Remember these Republicans who voted to acquit in the face of this mountain of evidence were going to find some reason to do it. We could have had a thousand witnesses but that could not have overcome the kinds of silly arguments that people like [Mitch] McConnell were hanging their hats on, he said.

Only seven Republicans voted with Democrats to convict Mr Trump, who faced a charge of incitement to insurrection for his speeches to the crowd who went on to storm the US Capitol in Washington DC on 6 January.

In a speech in front of the White House, Mr Trump had encouraged a crowd of thousands to fight like hell and stop the steal as electoral college votes were being tallied in the senate.

Mitch McConnell, Republican minority leader, voted to acquit Mr Trump but delivered a scathing rebuke of the former presidents actions in a speech following the verdict.

"Theres no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day," he said after the senate vote.

"The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president, and having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories and reckless hyperbole which the defeated president kept shouting into the largest megaphone on planet Earth."

Mr Trump has shown no contrition for his role in the attack. In a statement released after the verdict, he called the trial yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our country.
Protected by metal cages and a new roof, some 1,200 pieces of African art sit inside a Sunnyside warehouse under the watchful eye of security cameras  and criminal investigators.

Houston real estate agent Sam Njunuri has collected the works since the 1970s, with a lifelong goal of creating a museum and cultural center. To become a reality, his vision needs partners, financial support and a physical space.

For more than three years, however, Harris County taxpayers have been unwitting and perhaps unlawful benefactors for the project. Since January 2018, Harris County Precinct 1 Commissioner Rodney Ellis has stored Njunuris artwork, free of charge, at the county warehouse.

Though Ellis was given permission from Commissioners Court to receive 14 pieces for display in county buildings, his precinct later accepted more than 1,400, few of which have ever been shown publicly.

The original agreement lapsed in January 2020, leaving Njunuris collection of masks, furniture and sculptures in limbo. The works cannot be returned because the County Attorneys Office has been unable to confirm Njunuri actually owns them. And that office, which handles civil matters, said its investigation is on hold pending the outcome of a criminal probe by the district attorney. The District Attorneys Office declined comment.

The legal and ethical questions about the arrangement center on a key concern: What have county taxpayers received in exchange for providing a valuable benefit to a private art collector?

Precinct 1s claim that it planned to find enough county buildings for all 1,400 works doesnt pass the smell test, said Lloyd Gite, owner of the Gite Gallery of African art in Third Ward. He said Njunuris pieces are impressive and urged the county to be transparent about its involvement with the collection.

I think the bottom line  and I think Rodney would agree with this  is that the public needs to experience this art. Its wonderful art, he said. If the county wants to pay for it, thats something they need to vote on.

Ellis declined to be interviewed by the Chronicle and did not respond to emailed questions about taxpayer expenses related to the art, the commissioners knowledge of Njnuris plans and why his office took possession of a collection 100 times the size specified in the contract.

Spokesman Bill Miller said Ellis hopes all investigations conclude swiftly so the art can be returned to Njunuri and displayed publicly in the near future.

Commissioner Ellis knows Mr. Njunuri but has not spoken with him in a while. He takes him at his word that he owns the art in question, Miller said. The commissioner hired very capable counsel to look at every detail of this entire matter. He has been told by them he has no culpability.

Njunuri, a Houston real estate agent originally from Kenya, declined to sit for an interview but corresponded with the Chronicle via a series of text messages beginning in November.

He described an ambitious goal to create a museum displaying 5,000 pieces of art from all 54 African nations as a global attraction for Houston.

(Ive) been at this project since 1972/3 and ready to go at it till I die, he said. (Ive) spent over 50 years putting it together and thousands of hour(s) talking to dealers in Africa.

Njunuri said he does not know the value of his collection nor did he disclose its full size. He told investigators last year that he had additional artwork stored out of state. The collector said he saw a partnership with Precinct 1 as a way for the public to see his pieces while he worked on the museum project.

Houston lawyer Ken Okorie said he is helping Njunuri create a nonprofit to operate the museum and said the collector has no interest in profiting from the venture.

Hes as decent a human being as you can find.  I have never met anybody who spends all of his efforts and time caring about art, Okorie said. Thats Sam. Thats his passion.

Okorie said Njunuri can rattle off details of each piece in his collection but said he is unaware of any written records documenting the works.

Commercial pieces?

African art has been exported to the West since colonial times, said Christopher B. Steiner, author of African Art in Transit and a professor at Connecticut College. Broadly speaking, he said, this art falls into two categories.

The first are pieces that artists crafted for Indigenous use, such as masks and statues, that Western curators consider authentic works suitable for museums. Many are hundreds of years old, Steiner said.

The second are works produced specifically for Western consumption, sold in bazaars from Abidjan to Dar es Salaam or exported to the United States and Europe. Often, these are copies of authentic works and can range in quality of craftsmanship. Unlike museum pieces, however, there is little demand for documentation during the sale of tourist art.

What Njunuris collection includes remains unknown. Three African art scholars who reviewed photographs of the pieces, including Roslyn Walker, former director of the National Museum of African Art, said they all appear to be of the tourist variety.

If the works are solely commercial pieces, Steiner said, they still could be showcased for the public and be useful educational tools.

Our argument is that these tourist pieces are important artistic productions, and that theyre a moment in time that documents this contact between Africa and the West, Steiner said. On the other hand, you wouldnt want to misrepresent this art as masterpieces without contextualizing it as pieces made for the market.

Legal quandary

Ellis himself is an African art enthusiast. A Houston television station in 2009 featured a story on his personal collection, the product of more than three-dozen trips to the continent.

The commissioners public art program includes neighborhood murals, a planned lynching memorial and other works that reflect the diverse communities in Precinct 1. Ellis also has used more than $11,000 in campaign funds since 2017 to purchase art for the precinct.

Ellis said he met Njunuri in 2017 and was drawn to their mutual interest in African art. Njunuri in August of that year signed an agreement to allow his company, African Art Global, to lend 14 pieces for display in county buildings.

Angele Johnson, the commissioners sister-in-law, is listed as a director at the firm. She did not respond to requests for comment; a Precinct 1 spokeswoman said last year that Johnson had no financial stake in the company.

Soon after Commissioners Court approved the agreement with African Art Global in January 2018, Precinct 1 accepted a total of 1,407 pieces. Ellis never sought to amend the contract. An invoice from May of that year shows the precinct spent $16,000 moving African art.

Reginald Adams, then Precinct 1s art director, interviewed Njunuri and learned the work was being stored in poor conditions, at risk of being destroyed by floods or the Gulf Coasts brutal humidity.

One of the assignments that was given to me was to assemble all that artwork in one place so it could be better stored, better cared for, to ultimately be placed in public spaces, Adams said.

Only 140 works have been shown publicly, a precinct spokeswoman said. The remaining 1,267 have never left the Reed Road warehouse, where they occupy about 5,000 square feet. Two Houston art storage facilities provided quotes of between $12,000 and $16,000 per month for similar accommodations.

Precinct 1 also spent $220,000 on upgrades to the warehouse between May 2018 and January 2020, according to Harris County purchase orders. These included a new roof, front door, thermal protection and a new access gate. One-quarter of the building is used as a studio.

Controversial too long

John Guess, CEO of the Houston Museum of African American Culture, said Ellis invited art professionals to tour the collection in hopes of finding suitable locations to display it. So far, that effort has been unsuccessful, which he attributes to a lack of existing spaces and a historical reluctance by foundations to support initiatives by artists of color.

I know that Sams idea is a bigger vision, and sometimes thats cut back  and he understands that  based on the funding that you could get, Guess said. Its a Black asset run by Black people. Its going to be a very tough argument to make, given the biases that go with the fact that there are few Black assets.

The county attorney has ordered the art to remain in the warehouse, however, until investigations have been resolved.

The district attorneys probe likely centers on whether Ellis committed a state offense called abuse of official capacity, said Adam Gershowitz, a professor at William & Mary Law School. Misuse of government resources by a public servant is illegal but only if it is done with an intent to personally gain or commit fraud, he said.

Just because something is outrageous doesnt mean its criminal, Gershowitz said. Unless prosecutors can prove Ellis desired to get some sort of benefit from this, theyre going to be hard-pressed to come up with that.

Still, Ellis legal bills suggest he is taking the issue seriously. Since the beginning of 2020, Ellis has used his campaign account to pay two attorneys: $149,000 to ethics expert Cris Feldman and $64,000 to prominent defense lawyer Rusty Hardin. Both are providing counsel on the art issue, Feldman said.

Gite, the gallery owner, said he hopes Ellis can soon resolve the situation so the works can finally be put on display.

Its been too controversial for too long, and I think the goodness of this project has been overlooked, he said.

zach.despart@chron.com

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The former Nigerian Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has spoken about her plan for the World Trade Organization, after she on Monday emerged the first female Director-General of the global trade body.

Mrs Okonjo-Iweala was confirmed DG of the trade body during a meeting of the WTO.

The United States government had last week announced its endorsement of Mrs Okonjo-Iweala for the top job.

It became clear earlier on Friday that Mrs Okonjo-Iweala, a former l World Bank executive, would likely clinch the coveted post after her final challenger to the position, South Korean Trade Minister and candidate, Yoo Myung-hee, announced her withdrawal.

When she takes office on March 1, Mrs Okonjo-Iweala will become the first woman and the first African to be chosen as Director-General. Her term, renewable, will expire on August 31, 2025.

This is a very significant moment for the WTO. On behalf of the General Council, I extend our warmest congratulations to Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on her appointment as the WTOs next Director-General and formally welcome her to this General Council meeting, said General Council Chair David Walker of New Zealand who, together with co-facilitators Dacio Castillo (Honduras) and Harald Aspelund (Iceland) led the nine-month DG selection process.

Dr Ngozi, on behalf of all members I wish to sincerely thank you for your graciousness in these exceptional months, and for your patience. We look forward to collaborating closely with you, Dr Ngozi, and I am certain that all members will work with you constructively during your tenure as Director-General to shape the future of this organization, he added, according to a recording of the meeting release by the WTO.

Mrs Okonjo-Iweala said a key priority for her would be to work with members to quickly address the economic and health consequences brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.

I am honoured to have been selected by WTO members as WTO Director-General, said Mrs Okonjo-Iweala.

A strong WTO is vital if we are to recover fully and rapidly from the devastation wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic. I look forward to working with members to shape and implement the policy responses we need to get the global economy going again. Our organization faces a great many challenges but working together we can collectively make the WTO stronger, more agile and better adapted to the realities of today.
Woodbine Mohawk Park would like to inform all horsepeople of an adjustment to Tuesdays (Feb. 16) training times.

Due to a snowfall warning, Woodbine Mohawk Park has pushed back the start of training from 7 a.m. (EST) to 9 a.m. (EST). The new training times for Tuesday are listed below:

Session One: 9 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

Session Two: 11:45 a.m. to 2:15 p.m.

All horsepeople are reminded to complete Woodbines daily COVID-19 screening questionnaire prior to arriving at the racetrack.

(Woodbine Mohawk Park)
NEW DELHI: Israels Rafael Advanced Defence Systems SPICE bomb became a household name after the 2019 Balakot strike when the Indian Air Force used it to target a terrorist hideout in Pakistan.

At the Aero India show earlier this month, Rafael unveiled a new variant of its air to surface weapon system--SPICE250 ER--with a mini turbo jet engine that gives it standoff capability. Rafael also signed a pact with the Hyderabad-based Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) for the joint induction of an anti torpedo defence system.

Also Read | Why Mumbais mojo lies beyond its locals

According to Eli Hefets, corporate regional director, India, of Rafael Advance Defence Systems, the pact with BDL entails advanced technology transfer and the use of indigenous content sourced from India.

Edited excerpts from an interview:

What were the new systems that you unveiled exclusively at this Aero India show?

At Aero India, we unveiled SPICE 250 ER (Extended Range), a variant of the SPICE Family, which includes the SPICE 250, SPICE 1000 and the SPICE 2000 guidance kits. SPICE is a stand-off, autonomous, air-to-surface weapon systems that strike targets with pinpoint accuracy and at high attack volumes, independently of GPS navigation, based on its autonomous electro-optic Scene-Matching Artificial Intelligence (AI) Algorithms.

SPICE 250 ER will incorporate a miniature turbo-jet engine with an internal JP-8/10 fuel system, providing the weapon a range of at least 150 km, while retaining the same mission-planning system, aircraft interfaces and aircrew operation.

India has launched Atmanirbhar Bharat" for self reliance including in defence manufacturing. Does this diminish the importance of India as a market for you?

On the contrary, we remain fully committed to India and deeply involved in its defence and technology endeavours. The joint induction of SHADE (anti-torpedo defence system), which was announced at the show, is part of Rafael's commitment to the Atmanirbhar Bharat (self-reliance) initiative of the Government of India.

We will also work together to identify joint opportunities for export, subject to export control guidelines of the two governments.

Rafael has consistently supported indigenous manufacture through its offset ventures where it has sourced high quality and specialist components and subsystems for its products manufactured in Israel.

A major Electro-Optic contract for the IAF was serviced through one of Rafaels technology partners based in India. It has been among the first few FOEMs (foreign original equipment manufacturers) who have set up joint ventures in India to support local manufacture of existing contracts as well as to establish itself as an Indian manufacturer for future contracts. The joint ventures established are in the field of land systems, Communication and EW systems.

Overtime, Rafael has also signed joint venture contracts with leading Indian defence companies like Kalyani Group (KRAS) and Astra Microwave (Astra Rafael Communication System). These strategic technology partnerships and joint ventures have led towards substantial and effective transfer of technology to India, enhancement of local production and skills, building and working on projects with superior caliber, and have laid the necessary infrastructure to facilitate export activity. This kind of activity has widened supply chains, and is playing an important role in supporting India's economic stance, especially post-Corona, creating employment, and bolstering its efforts to become a significant exporter of technology. We have identified nearly 100 MSMEs fully qualified to manufacture defence sub-systems.

What about the MoU you signed with BDL for the SHADE system? So far you have tie ups with Bharat Forge and BDL. Any others happening?

Rafael and BDL signed an MoU for joint induction of an Anti-Torpedo Defence System called SHADE for the Indian Navy. SHADE will be the first system in the world to employ a combination of soft kill and hard kill decoys, thereby providing a robust and effective defence against modern torpedoes.

This MoU will be a precursor for cooperation on futuristic systems for the Indian Armed Forces in India, entailing advanced ToT, and a very high indigenous content, leading to self-sufficiency in the field of cutting-edge technology in defence. This MoU represents an ideal opportunity for industrial cooperation between Israel and India, leading to closer collaboration and co-development of advanced systems in India.

India is facing a serious security situation along two of its borders. What kind of a role are you playing in helping India counter the security situation?

Rafael has demonstrated its ability to respond quickly and effectively to emerging needs, without making any quality compromises, as a result of its flexibility, its ability to make swift adjustments, and due to its vast experience in customer requirement analysis and tailor-made solutions. We will continue to provide our Indian partners the knowhow and the technology they require to deal with their complex challenges.

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Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.
Arizona News

Phoenix, Arizona - The Arizona Attorney Generals Office (AGO) is teaming up with the Arizona Food Marketing Alliance (AFMA) to launch a consumer fraud awareness program inside hundreds of neighborhood stores to combat gift card scams. Every year, consumers lose millions of dollars in scams involving gift cards and/or reloadable cards.

Approximately 990 local grocery and convenience stores within AFMA now have warning signs at gift card displays to prompt customers to stop and think about why theyre buying the gift card and remind them gift cards can never be used to pay a government agency. Participating stores include Albertsons, Safeway, AJs Fine Foods, Bashas, Food City, Circle K, and Los Altos Ranch Markets.

I am proud to work alongside AFMA and hundreds of stores to protect Arizonans from scammers, said Attorney General Mark Brnovich. This program is a great example of the government partnering with the private sector to prevent consumer fraud.

The Attorney Generals Office should be thanked for all they do to keep everyone safe in Arizona, said AFMA President Mark Miller. Their job gets more difficult every year as more criminals use technology to steal and deceive the citizens of Arizona. We are hopeful the signs make Arizonans stop and think before they purchase a gift card at the request of a scammer.

There are many different variations of gift card scams, but one of the most common involves government imposters. Oftentimes, fraudsters call and claim to be from a government agency and ask you to pay off your debt/balance with gift cards. If the debt is not paid immediately, the scammer threatens to arrest you or drop your government benefits or services. A government agency will not request payment in the form of gift cards. Since January 2019, the Arizona Attorney Generals Office has received more than 230 consumer complaints related to gift card scams.



In November, the AGO partnered with CVS Pharmacy to display the stop signs within their Arizona stores, as well. These awareness programs were handled by Civil Litigation Division Chief Counsel Joseph Sciarrotta, Consumer Protection Unit Chief Counsel Matthew du Mee and Senior Litigation Counsel Mitchell Allee.



If you paid a scammer with a gift card, file a consumer complaint with the Attorney Generals Office. The matter also may be referred to criminal law enforcement for handling. You may also contact the AGO at (602) 542-5763, in Tucson at (520) 628-6648, or outside the metro areas at (800) 352-8431. Bilingual consumer protection staff is available to assist.

The nationwide controversy over the winner of the 2020 contest in Georgias 14th Congressional District in the House of Representatives, Marjorie Taylor Greene, doesnt need to be elaborated on further except to confirm that she won almost 75 percent of the vote as an arch conservative Republican candidate.

Said district starts in Marietta and generally follows Interstate 75 northward covering 12 counties to the Tennessee state line in Catoosa County.

In 2016 ex-president Donald Trump carried the district with the eighth best showing in the nation and statistics further show that the 14th District is the 10th most Republican district in America.

Retired Congressman Tom Graves served from 2012-2020 as the Republican standard bearer.

The district has for many years been a conservative district, but it was occupied by Congressman Larry Patton McDonald, a Democrat, in what was formerly the 7th Congressional district from 1975-1983.

McDonald was a distant relative of General George S.

Patton and was born in Atlanta, Georgia on April 1, 1935.

He attended several private and parochial schools as well as a non-denominational high school and also attended Davidson College in North Carolina for two years and then entered the Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta at the age of 17. He graduated in 1957 with a medical degree.

McDonald would serve two years as a flight surgeon in the United States Navy stationed in Iceland and married an Icelandic national and had three children.

It was in Iceland that he became concerned about the spread of communism which would follow him the rest of his life.

Following his military tour of duty, he returned to Atlanta and resumed his career as a urologist at the McDonald Urology Clinic.

His interests in politics would lead to retirement as a practicing physician. He became an avid member of the John Birch Society which further fired his anti-communism belief which became a major theme of his life.

McDonald was an elegant orator and lost to incumbent Congressman John Davis in his first campaign for Congress in 1972 but was elected in 1974 and would serve until his death on September 1, 1983.

He defeated Davis on a platform of being opposed to mandatory federal school integration and school busing and an attack on the out-of-state groups who gave his opponent substantial political contributions to support mandatory federal programs that used busing to achieve school integration.

Although beating Davis in the Democratic primary, a Vietnam War prisoner of war almost beat McDonald as a Republican indicating a future shift towards the GOP in spite of the fact that the post-Nixon scandal had resulted in the election of 75 new Democrats to Congress.

Barely surviving a defeat in the General Election, McDonald would never again be involved in a close election race.

He was an admirer of Senator Joe Tailgunner McCarthy the most vocal anti-communist in the infamous House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC). Senator McCarthy and Rep. McDonald both admired the work of the House Committee on Un-American Activities and Larry hoped to be appointed to it when he was elected to Congress but its heyday in the 1950-1960s had passed and the committee was in the process of being dissolved.

McDonald was supported by the National Right to Life Committee, Gun Owners of America and was described by one publication as the leading anti-Communist in America.

He employed the strategy of not often speaking before the microphones/cameras in the House of Representatives while introducing over 150 bills during his tenure in Washington but used the tactic of inserting material into the Congressional Record.

He would alternatively move to impeach United Nations Ambassador Andrew Young while introducing legislation to place statues of Booker T. Washington and George Washington Carver in the Capitol.

He gained support in the 1980s from Jerry Falwell and the Moral Majority, Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina, and multi-millionaire conservative financer Nelson Bunker Hunt.

In Congress his closest confidante and voting partner was another physician, Dr. Ron Paul of Kentucky, father of the current senator, Rand Paul.

A series of bizarre incidents kept his name before the public and his high rating in his home Congressional district. Many of the ultra-conservative principles he espoused as a Democrat have been adopted by Republican candidates.

Although his brother allegedly told the Atlanta Constitution in 1983 that he wore a bulletproof vest the record is reportedly silent as to whether he was ever photographed holding an assault rifle.

Perhaps his most outrageous reported advocacy was the suggestion to release the convicted war criminal Rudolph Hess from his decades long imprisonment and an alleged suggestion during a political debate that Hess be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, according to a report in a local newspaper.

On September 1, 1983 he was a passenger on the Korean Air Lines (KAL) flight to Seoul, South Korea which was shot down by Russian fighter jets near Sakhalin in the Soviet Union when it allegedly wandered into Soviet air space.

All 262 passengers and crew were killed in the incident which caused an international crisis and also led to all types of conspiracy theories, including one that McDonald was on a spy mission.

Because of bad weather Larrys flight from Atlanta to JFK was diverted to Baltimore and the connecting flight to New York was late and McDonald missed his connection to South Korea by a few minutes.

In a move not typical today, McDonald refused a Pan Ann Boeing 747 flight because of the cost to the taxpayers and chose to wait for the next KAL flight two days later which resulted in his death.

In 1998 the Georgia legislature in recognition of McDonalds service to his district named the part of I-75 that runs from the Chattahoochee River northward to the Tennessee State line, the Larry McDonald Memorial Highway.

Numerous research sources on the world wide web provide lengthy historical facts about the controversial life of the late Congressman from Georgia.

Marjorie Taylor Greene appears to be continuing in a political career reminiscent of Larry McDonald.

Whether she will have a section of interstate highway named after her remains in the future?

* * *

Jerry Summers



(If you have additional information about one of Mr. Summers' articles or have suggestions or ideas about a future Chattanooga area historical piece, please contact Mr. Summers at jsummers@summersfirm.com)







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Aerial mapping provider Nearmap is getting ready to pump more money into its US operations, with company CEO Rob Newman labelling the recent attack by Beijing-based short seller J Capital Research baseless.

J Capitals report, released on Thursday last week, alleged that Nearmap has been using accounting tricks to hide its poor performance in the US market and questioned the technology used by the company.

However, Mr Newman on Monday said that J Capitals assertions were inaccurate and misleading, in a response coinciding with the release of its results for the December half year, which Mr Newman says completely debunked the short sellers thesis.

Nearmap had zero warning of the short attack by Beijing-based J Capital, said chief executive Rob Newman. Credit:Trevor Collens

We had zero warning in the short attack and nobody from J Capital has ever approached our company . so it was definitely a surprise, he told the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
Jalgaon : , Mumbai, Feb 15 (IANS) At least 15 labourers were killed, and two others injured in Maharashtra when a truck laden with papayas overturned near Kingaon village of Jalgaon district early on Monday, police said.

Investigating Officer of Yaval Police Station Inspector Sudhir Patil said that the incident happened around 1 a.m. when the truck apparently lost control and overturned near a temple.

"The deceased were labourers hailing from Raver and surrounding areas. Two injured have been admitted to a rural hospital here for treatment," Patil told IANS from the accident site.

The deceased comprised seven males, 6 women and two minors, and the process of identification is currently underway, he added.

Eyewitnesses said the impact of the accident was such that the bodies were mangled and some of the victims were crushed under the huge vehicle.

Around dawn, the police deployed a crane to lift up the overturned truck and remove bodies trapped underneath.

Though the cause of the accident is not clear, locals said that the roads in and around Yaval on the Dhule-Jalgaon section are riddled with potholes which makes driving a nightmare especially in the dark.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi condoled the deaths. "Heart-wrenching truck accident in Jalgaon. Condolences to the bereaved families. May the injured recover at the earliest," Modi said in a tweet.
The Whedon Studies Association, a society of academics devoted to studying the works of Joss Whedon, is debating whether to change its name. Fans who grew up with his signature show, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and were planning to introduce it to their children are grappling with what to do.

Some said they are regretting tattoos inspired by Buffy and other shows Mr. Whedon created.

For years, fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which aired on the WB and UPN from 1997 to 2003, have had to reconcile their adoration for a show about a teenage girl who slays monsters with the criticism that often swirled around her creator.

Mr. Whedons early reputation as a feminist storyteller was tarnished after his ex-wife, the producer Kai Cole, accused him of cheating on her and lying about it. The actress Charisma Carpenter, a star of the Buffy spinoff Angel, hinted at a fan convention in 2009 that Mr. Whedon was not happy when she became pregnant.

In July, Ray Fisher, an actor who starred in Mr. Whedons 2017 film Justice League, accused him of gross and abusive treatment of the cast and crew. Mr. Whedon has disputed some of Mr. Fishers accusations, and said his ex-wifes 2017 account included inaccuracies and misrepresentations.

Dana Shulman considers Dunkin her happy place, so there was no better place to get married to the other love of her life.

Dunkin is the most comforting thing I can think of, it is my happy place, Shulman said.

Shulman and Giancarlo Osaben have been together eight years, and officially tied the knot after going through Dunkins drive-thru over the weekend at location in New York.

The event was part of an Instagram contest the fast food restaurant held earlier this year.

Each couple will receive special wedding presents from Dunkin, including a gift basket of Dunkin wedding gear and accessories, professional photos from the big day, and a $500 cash prize, the company said.

The company also launched wedding merch for the rest of Dunkin fans unable to get married in the drive-thru.

The couple both currently live in New York, however, Shulman grew up in Massachusetts, the company said.

Originally from Massachusetts, Dana grew up with a special love for Dunkin, the company said in a statement.

Now a teacher, Shulman told Dunkin that even her students know her love for the company, calling her Dunkin Dana. So, a wedding there seemed almost natural.

When I saw the contest on Instagram, I 100% knew we were going to get married at Dunkin, she told the company. Its fun and spontaneous, quirky and entirely non-traditional, low stress, and memorable.

In 2019, two other Dunkin fans got married in a Worcester Dunkin.

Has anybody been married in Dunkin Donuts before? Maybe well start a trend, Valerie Sneade told the Associated Press.

Related Content:
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  A House committee approved on Monday a proposal which seeks to exempt COVID-19 vaccines that will be purchased by LGUs from importation duties and other taxes.

The House Ways and Means Committee approved during its meeting the tax provision of House Bill 8648, or the Emergency Vaccine Procurement Act of 2021, filed by Speaker Lord Allan Velasco, Majority Leader Martin Romualdez and Minority Leader Joseph Stephen Paduano last week. The bill was approved in principle last week except for the tax provision amendments that were pending.

The measure aims to allow LGUs to purchase vaccines directly from manufacturers, citing the need for "speedy procurement and effective administration of vaccines against the deadly disease." After its panel approval, the bill still has to undergo plenary deliberations before it can be approved in the lower chamber.

Section 6 of the measure states that procurement, "importation, storage, transport, distribution and administration of COVID-19 vaccines by LGUs shall be exempt from customs duties, value-added tax, excise tax and other fees." It adds that these vaccines shall only be used for their residents and not for commercial distribution.

The bill also allows provinces, cities and municipalities to make advanced payments to foreign pharmaceutical companies for the purchase of the vaccines by up to 50% of the contract amount, unless otherwise directed by the President.

The foreign manufacturer is required to supply the vaccine to the LGU within six months from the time the contract is perfected.

The Commission on Audit, on the other hand, must conduct an audit on all these vaccine-related transactions and submit the post-transaction report to Congress before the end of the quarter after the advance payment is made.

Officials from the Health Department and Customs Bureau expressed support for the measure.

In a statement, Velasco said the bill would ensure that COVID-19 vaccines are procured and administered in an expeditious, effective, efficient and equitable manner.

The next crucible in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic is the speedy procurement and effective administration of vaccines against the deadly disease, he said.

Separately, committee chairman and Albay Rep. Joey Salceda said he might propose other amendments to the bill at "the proper time" so the vaccine purchases of individual LGUs could be clustered and they could benefit from the economies of scale.

That will be especially useful in storage, since we can have shared storage facilities for LGUs. Thats what I am working on next: shared LGU facilities for storage, Salceda explained.

CNN Philippines' Xianne Arcangel contributed to this report.
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Guineas authorities have officially declared an Ebola outbreak in the southeast of the country, Guinee114, a news portal, said on Sunday.

An Ebola epidemic outbreak was reported from the Nzerekore region and in the city of Gueke. The government held an emergency meeting on February 14 to agree on a number of measures to combat the epidemic. Thus, all those who could have contacts with those sick are to be traced and isolated.

According to the news portal, the government meeting was held after blood samples taken from the three people who had died of Ebola-like symptoms had confirmed the diagnosis. The results of one more test are expected soon.

According to the Guinean government, the first Ebola case was reported from the city of Gueke. It was a nurse who died on January 28. As of today, seven people who attended the nurses funeral might have caught Ebola. One of them lives in the capital city Conakry.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said earlier it would use its resources to help Guinea come with the Ebola outbreak.

Guinea was one of the epicenters of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa in 2014-2016. More than 28,000 cases were reported back then, with the death toll of 11,300. The most serious situation back then was reported from Guineas neighbors, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

This is the second Ebola outbreak in Africa in February. Four Ebola cases were confirmed in the city of Butembo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Two of the patients have died.
The Chinese city of Wuhan had more than a dozen Covid variants by December 2019, new findings by a team of World Health Organisation (WHO) scientists probing the origins of the pandemic suggest.

Peter Ben Embarek, who led a team of WHO investigators in Wuhan, said 13 different genetic sequences of the SARS-COV-2 virus were found in the Hubei province city, adding thousands more blood samples have been requested for analysis.

It suggests that the infection had been circulating in China earlier than previously thought, although Mr Embarek refused to be drawn on the matter.

Wuhan is widely considered to be "ground zero" of the outbreak, although its exact origins and timeframe continue to be debated, with some reports suggesting the disease was present in Europe as early as October.

In an interview with CNN published on Monday, Mr Embarek told the network "the virus was circulating widely in Wuhan in December, which is a new finding.

Mr Embarek said Chinese officials had presented his team with 174 cases of coronavirus in and near the Wuhan area in December 2019, around 100 of which had been laboratory test-confirmed, with the remaining cases identified through the clinical diagnosis of the patients' symptoms.

He said this suggested there could have been as many as 1,000 cases of the disease in Wuhan by December. "We haven't done any modelling of that since," he said. "But we know... in big ballpark figures... out of the infected population, about 15 per cent end up severe cases, and the vast majority are mild cases."

Mr Embarek said that the 13 variants examined alongside other patient data across China in 2019 could provide vital clues to the origins of the outbreak.

He added: "Some of [the variants] are from the markets... some of them are not linked to the markets. This is something we found as part of our mission... part of the interaction we had all together."

Mr Embarek's comments came after a UK scientist on the Wuhan mission refused to rule out a lab leak as the possible source of the outbreak, contradicting an earlier finding.

Professor John Watson, a former deputy chief medical officer, said while China remained a very, very possible source, reports that the virus was circulating in other parts of the world, notably northern Italy, as early as September and October, warranted further investigation.

I think that there are all sorts of reasons to do with the way it did start and the outbreak in Wuhan and the various bits of information about the way in which these viruses live in different animal reservoirs that suggest that China is a very, very possible source, he told BBC One's The Andrew Marr Show.

But China was by no means necessarily the place where the leap from animals to humans took place and I think we need to ensure that we are looking beyond the borders of China, as well as within China, he added.

A study released by the National Cancer Institute (INT) in Milan in November showed the new coronavirus was circulating in Italy in September 2019.
As many as 1,132 wild animals were successfully rescued in Vietnam last year, according to the Education for Nature Vietnam (ENV).

One of seven bears which were rescued from two bear bile farms in the southern province of Binh Duong. Photo phapluatplus.vn

These animals include 436 birds, 362 turtles, 120 monkeys and others.

In particular, in October last year, seven bears held captive in the southern province of Binh Duong were transferred to a sanctuary in Ninh Binh Province, bringing the total number of rescued bears in 2020 to 32.

ENV recorded 2,907 violation cases last year, nearly doubling that of the previous year. Of these, 1,956 cases involved advertising wildlife illegally and 863 of illegal captivity.

It showed that the wildlife trade and consumption continue in Viet Nam, despite the development of the COVID-19 pandemic most likely originating from wildlife along with drastic measures from the government, ENV said.

It also said that 57.1 per cent of 2,216 violation cases reported by residents had been handled.

Each day the ENVs Wildlife Protection Department received an average of nine reports, compared with 4-5 cases recorded in 2019.

The number of violations reported to ENV per day in 2020 nearly doubled 2019s figure, proving that the community was increasingly concerned with wildlife protection issues, said Nguyen Phuong Dung, Deputy Director of ENV.

ENV has succeeded in encouraging the community support authorities in monitoring wildlife violations, she said.

Dung urged relevant agencies to exert more efforts in raising the success rate of handling violations in 2021.

Since 2005, ENV has operated a hotline to receive reports of unlawful activities relating to wildlife violations through 1800-1522 which is free of charge and email hotline@fpt.vn. After receiving information, ENV staff will transfer it to the relevant authorities to handle the violation and closely follow the process of handling violations until the final results are available.  VNS

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :Minister for IT and Telecommunication Syed Amin Ul Haque has been appointed as President of Global Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) Committee of the World Business Angels Investment Forum (WBAF), a sub-organization of G20 countries.

The WBAF has selected Pakistan from 127 countries for the office of Committee's President while India was also in a queue to hold this important position.

However, the position was secured by the Pakistan, a news release said here on Monday.

The appointment of Syed Amin Ul Haque as President of the STI Committee was based on his prominent role in the IT and Telecom sector in Pakistan.

The organization encourages and supports startups and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) around the world, besides ensuring practical steps to promote science, technology and innovation.

Queen Maxima of the Netherlands, Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey and several other world leaders are members of the organization.

Syed Amin Ul Haque said "it is an honor for Pakistan, and I hope that it will pave the way for Pakistan to become a technology hub in South Asia." He said as per the commitment of Prime Minister Imran Khan, now Pakistani artisans would have access to international level le start-ups, while small business entrepreneurs and companies would have access to global investors.

The minister said that Pakistan's IT, science, technology and telecommunication sectors would be opened to the world, which would result in business development, foreign investment and employment opportunities in the country.

Amin said the position of the President of STI Committee would greatly help in Pakistan's access to foreign investors, multi-million Dollar funds from all over the world, fulfilling digital vision of Pakistan and country's economic stability.

Small businesses, technology companies, creative professionals and start-ups will have easier access to investors, while Pakistan has a great forum for branding around the world, he added.

A high level team of the Ministry of IT has been working for several months to showcase Pakistani artisans, start-ups and SMEs, all over the world and to encourage foreign investors to come to Pakistan.

The WBAF is an international organization aiming to ease access to finance for businesses from start up to scale up, with the ultimate goal of generating more jobs and more social justice worldwide.

It is committed to collaborating globally to empower world economic development by creating innovative financial instruments for innovators, start-ups, and SMEs.

As an affiliated partner of the G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion (GPFI), the WBAF Angel Investment Fund is designed to capitalize on the worldwide growth in entrepreneurial activity and venture financing for start-ups and scale-ups and to benefit from WBAF's extensive network of global investors, including angel investors, private equity funds, co-investment platforms, and wealth management institutions, family offices, VCs and acceleration centers.

The Global Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) Committee is committed to connecting innovators with smart finance, creating a better environment for innovation, helping inventors commercialize their inventions, fostering the kind of creative thinking that leads to innovation by open learning and skill development, and accelerating technology transfer around the world.
Artists from the Berkshires and beyond are contributing 10x10-inch original works of art available for $25 each during the virtual 10x10 RAParty (Real Art Party) on Thursday, Feb. 18.

Its always a fun community event that brings out the best of our local artists as well as some friendly competition from the crowd, said Berkshire Art Association Board President Mary Beth Eldridge.

The show will include drawings, prints, textiles, photography, collages and ceramic art.

We receive art donated by emerging, mid-career and well-established artists, many who exhibit widely and sell their work in the marketplace. All the works are a bargain at $25, Eldridge said.

The event will benefit Berkshire County students through, for example, Berkshire Art Association Fellowship scholarships, field trips to Berkshire educational art departments, free admission for students to the Berkshire Museum and art supplies for students and teachers.

Tickets will be selected in random order, and the bearer will be able to choose any work of art that is still in the virtual gallery. Admission to the event is free; to be a viewer of the 10x10 RAParty register at bit.ly/10x10RAP.

The live, online event will take place in a virtual gallery that simulates the experience of being at the party. Guests will be able to walk around the gallery virtually, tour the show and view the artwork.

People look forward to Pittsfields 10x10 Festival, and they love this event, Eldridge said. Well be lighting up the peoples living rooms, making art accessible and raising funds for young artists.  How could we not do it? despite the COVID-19 restrictions.

A $25 ARTtix guarantees the buyer a work of art. ARTtix may be purchased on the Berkshire Museum website link http://bit.ly/10x10RAPAuction through the night of the 10x10 RAParty.

Each ticket guarantees a work of art to be chosen.

Work is abstract, realistic and everything in between. We have assemblage, ceramics, sculpture, many mixed, photography and a few categories I havent even thought of, Eldridge said.

Live hosts will call out the raffle and host the festivities which begin at 6 p.m. At 6:30 there will be orientation to the virtual 10x10 RAParty and guest speakers; at 7 the raffle begins.

Among the guest speakers will be recent recipients of BAA College Fellowship Awards and board members.

The 10x10 RAParty is a collaboration of the Berkshire Art Association and Storefront Artist Project. It is being presented as part of Pittsfields 10x10 Upstreet Arts Festival coordinated by the City of Pittsfields Department of Cultural Development.

For more information, visit berkshireartassociation.org.
The vaccine rollout in Illinois has been, well, as Tutor says, a fiasco. As of late last week, Illinois ranked 37th among states and D.C. in terms of rate of shots injected and that was actually an improvement. Of the vaccines it has received from the federal government, Illinois has injected 66.2% of those doses, which puts the state under the national average of 68%. As of late, distribution has been improving in Illinois, but the question remains: Why has Pritzkers vaccine distribution management been so subpar, compared to other states? And why does he keep pretending it hasnt been?
The heroism of a passerby failed to save a driver who crashed into a bridge abutment early Monday, Columbia police said.

Police said Jason Brock, 37, of Columbia, collided with the abutment at Route 441 and Rotary Avenue at 4:24 a.m. His vehicle caught fire.

A passerby pulled Brock out of the blazing wreck before police arrived, but Brock was pronounced dead at the scene, police said.

Police are seeking witnesses to the crash. Anyone with information can call Officer Brent M. Keyser at 717-684-7735.
by Nirmala Carvalho

The Dalit Christian Liberation Movement held public rallies and made appeals to the nuncio. Dalits complain of discrimination because only non-Dalits have been named archbishops, although Dalits represent about 75 per cent of Catholics in the archdiocese.

Mumbai (AsiaNews)  Dalit Catholics in the Archdiocese of Pondicherry-Cuddalore, southern India, and Catholics in the dioceses of Tamil Nadu are calling for the appointment of a Dalit bishop.

This comes after Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Archbishop Antony Anandarayar on 27 January and appointed Bishop Peter Abir Antonysamy of Sultanpet as Apostolic Administrator of the archdiocese.

Dalit Catholics raised the issue of caste discrimination in a protest on 29 December 2020. Last Saturday they organised another protest in Villupuram (pictured), Tamil Nadu, calling for the appointment of a Dalit archbishop to the Archdiocese of Pondicherry-Cuddalore.

After the rally, the Dalit Christian Liberation Movement (DCLM) presented a memorandum to the Apostolic Nuncio to India.

The document states that it is being presented on behalf of Dalit Christians at the end of their public protest, which they were forced to hold in order to obtain justice within the Catholic Church. The Catholic hierarchy in Tamil Nadu, Pondicherry and in India is responsible for this situation.

In the past three decades, we have repeatedly complained to the Apostolic Nuncio to India about caste discrimination against Dalits within the Catholic Church, and we have appealed for action to eliminate it.

We wrote several times to the Nuncio: on 10 March 2018, 12 November 2018, 7 June 2019, 6 September 2019, 14 November 2019, 20 May 2020, June 1 2020, 12 November 2020, and most recently, to Mgr Robert D. Murphy, on 13 January 2021.

In them and others we explain that Dalit Christians are seriously affected by prolonged caste discrimination and marginalisation within our Catholic Church. We have explained enough and justified enough with historical backgrounds, with facts and figures about our legitimate claim for equality and rights within in the catholic Church.

What we are saying and asking for are all very well justified and accepted by the CBCI[*] policy itself for Dalits Empowerment in the Catholic Church of 2016 and the Dalit policy of the TNBC[] several years before. But these have not been implemented so far. When it comes to really doing justice and giving equal rights to Dalit Christians, the Catholic hierarchy in India takes only a hostile stand.

When we raise our voice against it, they misinterpret, misinform and misguide the Apostolic Nuncio and the Holy See about our claim and legitimate struggle. They sanctimoniously suppress our voice as victims. It is a silent atrocity which is not visible to the outsiders. How long should we be patiently and silently enduring this? It is unfortunate that we have to come to the streets to fight against it, but it has become necessary and inevitable.

Our demand is to combat the caste inequality suffered by us within the Church. It is in fact against the caste division and domination. The CBCI policy of Dalit Empowerment in Catholic Church itself affirms that the term Dalit does not indicate a caste identity.. It is not only a matter of social and cultural category but a theological category as well.

In the past 388 years of history of the Archdiocese, Dalits Catholics have suffered caste discrimination and untouchability in all forms and at all levels. Especially now, Dalit Catholics of the Archdiocese of Pondicherry-Cuddalore and our DCLM have taken up public struggles during the past few months with the demand to appoint a Dalit archbishop to fill the present vacancy in the archdiocese. This needs to be done as a historical justice to the Dalit Catholic community. In particular, only non-Dalit archbishops have been appointed so far, even though Dalits have ben the majority since the early days and now comprise about 75 per cent of the Catholics in the archdiocese.

On 29 December 2021, Dalit Catholics held a mass rally in Pondicherry, the headquarter of the archbishop, and at the end of the rally, a delegation of DCLM leaders met outgoing Archbishop Antony Anandarayar and reiterated the demand to have a Dalit archbishop appointed after him. He categorically assured the people gathered and the DCLM delegation in the very presence of the archdiocesan administrators that only a Dalit archbishop will be appointed to fill the vacancy and said that he had already written to the apostolic Nuncio in India and the Vatican strongly recommending the same.

Similarly, Archbishop Antony Pappusamy of Madurai who is the President of the Tamil Nadu Bishops Council (TNBC) also assured the same to Dalit Christian leaders in the national level virtual meeting with them on 6th October 2020 and promised to write to the Apostolic Nuncio in India recommending it. But in spite of their assurance and our appeal for historic justice to our Dalit Christians, Bishop Peter Abir Antonysamy of the Diocese of Sultanpet in Kerala was appointed as Apostolic Administrator to the archdiocese on 27 January 2021.

This has gravely disappointed and frustrated Dalit Catholics not only in the archdiocese but also in other dioceses in Tamil Nadu and they have serious apprehension about it.

Bishop Peter Abir has been a junior bishop for only seven years and belongs to the Kerala Bishops Council. Tamil Nadus very senior Dalit bishop, who has 18 behind him, was overlooked. Our apprehension is all the greater since Bishop Peter Abir belongs to the same caste as that of the Archbishop Antony Anandarayar and Archbishop Antony Pappusamy, the TNBC president, who will make the main recommendations for the new archbishop to Pondicherry-Cuddalore. Their caste affinity is well known to us.

Todays demonstration by Dalit Christians is to express our apprehension about the appointment of Bishop Peter Abir as the Apostolic Administrator and who is behind it , whether there is the usual attempt to prevent the appointment of a Dalit archbishop. It has been our experience all along that the Indian Catholic hierarchy and prelates accept the truth and reality of caste discrimination against our Dalit Christians and the justice of our demands. But when it comes to doing justice and giving rights to Dalits, they go back on the assurance and only try to prevent it .

For this reason, a delegation of the DCLM met with the Apostolic Administrator Peter Abir on 7 February to know what steps he has taken for the appointment of a Dalit archbishop as indicated by the outgoing archbishop as well as by the TNBC president. We pleaded with him to take responsibility now to fulfill the pledge given by them and follow up the recommendation of Archbishop Anthony Anandarayar to the Apostolic Nuncio to appoint a Dalit archbishop, as he told us. We also appealed to him and other non-Dalit bishops not to accept the position of archbishop here if it is offered, but instead recommend a Dalit archbishop and show their solidarity to Dalit quest for justice and equality within the Church.

The Apostolic Administrator Peter Abir Antonysamy was evasive on the question of a Dalit archbishop and seemed unwilling to positively recommend one to the Apostolic Nuncio in India and the Vatican while explaining the reality of caste discrimination. This is very disappointing and we are very apprehensive about a caste conspiracy to prevent the appointment of a Dalit archbishop.

We Dalit Catholics are frustrated and distressed by the long-lasting injustice and by our exclusion until now. We feel let down and disowned by the caste-dominated Catholic hierarchy. We have completely lost hope in the bishops as we find them not to be trustworthy. So, if a Dalit archbishop is again not appointed in the Archdiocese of Pondicherry-Cuddalore this time, the people are determined to take other measures such as the following:

- To take up the issue of untouchability and caste discrimination and deprivation of Dalits within the Catholic Church with the Government of India for its intervention.

- To raise these issues appropriately in the High Courts and Supreme Court of India, since they are very much against the Constitution of India.

- To challenge the relevance and propriety of the Apostolic Nunciature in India since it is protecting and promoting caste domination within the Catholic Church and practising discrimination against Dalits in the appointments of bishops, archbishops and cardinals in India.

- To organise hunger strikes at the State and national levels to draw the attention of the Pope and publicly appeal to him to intervene to end caste discrimination against Dalits within the Indian Catholic Church.

The Indian Catholic hierarchy is squarely responsible for this situation and the victim Dalit Catholics are not to be blamed.

Still we wish to believe that the Apostolic Nuncio will seriously take notice of the situation and see that justice is done at least at this juncture. We fervently and humbly appeal to your Excellency and, through your good office, to the Congregation for the Evangelisation of People in the Vatican and to the Holy See to appoint a Dalit archbishop in the Archdiocese of Pondicherry-Cuddalore.

It is only appropriate and urgently necessary for us to explain these to your Excellency in person. So we fraternally request you to give an appointment to our delegation to meet you in Delhi or elsewhere as soon as possible.

[*] Catholic Bishops Conference of India.

[] Tamil Nadu Bishops Council.
The Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine plans to present a plan of measures for media literacy in the near future, Deputy Minister of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine Taras Shevchenko said.

"Over the past six months, the Ministry has repeatedly emphasized the importance of this topic [media literacy]. We are now working on and in the near future we will present our action plan for media literacy," Shevchenko said during a public discussion on the topic "Media literacy: What Ukrainians Lack to Feel Safe in the Info World" on Monday in Kyiv.

At the same time, he said that the implementation of this project should be carried out in cooperation between the state and public organizations, and "the budget that the Ministry has for the media literacy project [is] roughly UAH 7 million for the current year."

At the same time, he said that this project is designed not for one year, and therefore the relevant ministry considers "different options for scaling, depending on what resources will be available."

My quest to harvest a bull elk only took 68.8 years.

I used a borrowed rifle.

I should have completed the quest with a bow around 65.7 years but came so unglued that I not only missed that particular bull once, but twice. That was just two days after managing to knock the cable off of the bow on the first big bull ever drawn on.

The knocking the string off of the cam still to this very day violently vibrates one raw nerve. In a time where transparency is a little rare, Ive decided to just step forward and spill my guts about the whole affair.

My Montana hunting partner assures me that he has in fact shared this story, without my express permission, around every campfire in elk camp since that monumental day. He says that the kicker comes when he tells everyone about how I got on the radio and asked if anyone in camp had a bow press. That line, he assures me, generates some epic laughs around every campfire.

When the first bull to ever respond to my most questionable call repertoire sounded off we started the slow dance of cutting the distance in half. The closer the distance the more severe each conversation got. Id cut him off after every bugle making him extremely vocal and seemingly more enraged.

After about a quarter of a mile of this I was completely out of spit when the tree he was raking looked like it was in a Cat 5 hurricane. The boulders and lay-downs pinned me and I found myself unable to move any farther. He was still invisible when I picked up a Louisville slugger sized lodgepole and started flailing a nearby tree like my very life depended on it.

All of Idaho fell suddenly deadly quiet. That was about the time my nervous system failed to overload mode. The diaphragm call was stuck in the roof of my mouth as dry as an Arizona horny toad. Logic seemed to indicate that I had blown it badly until, magically, there was the biggest bull I had ever seen looking me dead in the eye. He was steaming, drooling for a fight. The 12 pound limb was still firmly gripped by my right hand.

Now what?

I dropped the limb. The release went on the cable like it had 1,000 times before. Dropping the limb made a crashing sound like a giant Sequoia had just fallen between us. The huge old bull grunted, snorted steam and angrily eased away. In my mind there was still a shot. I drew the arrow, put the sight pin on his vitals and suddenly realized that something just didnt feel quite right. A frantic check indicated the arrow was dangling from the end of my arrow rest.

The bull turned and grinned at me when I gasped.

Slowly releasing the bow I spastically tried to grab the knock of the arrow and seat it back on the cable. That was about the time that the cable decided that I had done something that cables and cams on compound bows dont like. I frantically watched the bull slowly chuckle through the boulders. It was his best chuckle witnessed through a view finder of junk that was just seconds ago a perfectly functional compound bow.

Bull number 1 was just the beginning.

The mud covered bull I managed to miss twice a couple of days later roared up at a full gallop, steam, spit and drool streaming from every orifice. He slammed to a halt behind an Idaho lodgepole at what I figured was about 40 yards. Turned out later that it was more like 27 yards. When the dust settled I was forced to let down and wait for just one more step. That wait was where the second ungluing event of an inaugural elk hunt really began to move at mach speed.

The bull finally took the step, presenting the shot. That was the very instant the sight pins on the bow began to glow like extremely bright neon traffic lights. I never saw the arrow. The bull wheeled and vanished.

I gave him the old come on back and fight like a man bugle and by golly, he did just that. Same tree, same step, same everything. This time my sight pins were spinning like some kind of glowing, hypnotic pin wheel. I never saw that arrow either and that was the end of my sorry attempt at harvesting a bull with a bow at age 65.7 I have since been told by old hands at this sort of thing that two shots with a bow at the same public land elk is a milestone in itself.

As far as a good excuse goes for missing, or messing up these opportunities, about the only thing I can come up with is bow hunting has just too many moving parts. At age 68.8, plan B was to try a rifle.

Prior to this hunt deep in the Madison range of southwestern Montanas Lee Metcalf Wilderness the majority of my hunting lifetime experience has been exclusively up close and personal. Where I grew up hunting and still hunt in East Tennessee, all hunting has been at close range due the topography of hills and hollows that the Tennessee River flows thru.

Learning to stalk squirrels carrying a Remington 22 with a 1918 patten date stamped on the barrel was my personnel rite of passage in this part to the planet. Squirrels, rabbits, frogs, doves and wood ducks always seemed to be in your face encounters.

As the decades passed and deer and turkey became more prevalent, they too were normally encountered within 60 or so yards due to the terrain. A lifetime of hunts made these formative years a look em in the eye kind of thing.

I was sucked into elk hunting by my son who had been taken in as a rookie by some die-hard bow hunters while he was living in Washington State. He convinced me that chasing elk was as close to turkey hunting with bow as I could get. My logic, at the time I decided this seemed like a worthy endeavor went something like this; How on earth could anybody with a good bow miss an animal that was the size of a Volkswagen bus? Then there was also this flawed logic: You can maybe still get in some kind of reasonable shape at this age.

I wont attempt to brag about how far away my first bull elk was when I shot the borrowed 300 Win Mag. I humbly submit that there is probably no way anybody would actually buy it. For me, it was a ridiculously long shot. Just trust me here, it was a long, long, poke. Lets just say it was somewhat better than 860 yards.

After we spotted the bull across an incredibly wide canyon I immediately called the shot near impossible. After much counsel from the gun owner, the same guy who told every elk hunter he knows about my knocking the cable off of the bow in Idaho, I settled down to a series of dry fire practice runs and scope adjustments.

This was not just any old scope. This beauty cost more than my first three pickup trucks. This technological marvel had data input capability, a range finder, wind speed calculator and moving red dots. From a prone position in the snow, I quietly fretted once again that maybe there were just too many moving parts.

To make all of this a little more believable, the first shot indicated that the wind speed feature on the scope was not quite up to the task by about a half a body length. With the help of a good spotter and a whole lot of just plain luck, the second shot found vitals, and the third shot put the bull belly up.

I watched through the scope in utter amazement as the bull tumbled a hundred yards down an avalanche chute. Standing slowly in a hail of congratulations as a rage of emotions washed over me. The best description I can come up with is that at that vey moment there was an aura iridescent with disbelief. I saw it with one eye through a scope. I instinctively knew it had happened. Somehow this shot had been dramatically different. In some inexplicable way the whole event seemed almost dramatically unbelievable.

As we made the long trek to the sprawled 5x5, I struggled to put my finger on what was eating at me about what exactly had just transpired. The answer for my confusion didnt come to me until a couple of weeks later as I was suspended in a deer stand in a tight hollow back home.

Somehow the whole event had been simply too distant. Impersonal is not the right word; but it was not by any stretch of the imagination in your face hunting. There was no rush of a covey rise, no watching whitetails nose to the wind, or the rustle of leaves under foot. No big eyed squirrel hugging the hickory in his best attempt to be invisible. There was no spit, drool or steam.

After almost 69 years I feel like I may have mastered the ability to stalk eye-to-eye with an animal that is more than worthy of all the skill I can muster after years of trial and error. To me the significance of the stalk probably comes from a long gone era where hunting was all about getting as close as you possibly could to whatever you wanted to eat. Getting close enough to use the technology you happened to have in your hand at the time. Think flint tipped spears and woolly mammoths here.

I missed that on this Montana adventure. I missed seeing elk drool, and spit, and steam, hearing limbs crack and feeling the hair on the back of my neck doing that strange dance. I guess that after 68.8 years and a lifetime of hunts that were up close and personal has warped me to some strange end.

Maybe this all makes me feel that we may have lost something in the art of the hunt with the addition of technology that enables long range shooting. I am not so sure that it is as bad a loss as so many other things that we have sacrificed with the addition of technology. Dont get me wrong here, I do not regret a lucky shot or the fact that I could even consider such a shot at age 68.8. There are no regrets, but in some strange way this particular elk has managed to push me back to the bow.

If I can find sight pins that dont glow like traffic lights I may even invest in some technology so that 27 yards doesnt look like 40. Then all I have to do is figure out how to keep the cable on the bow, keep from coming apart at the seams and make sure someone in elk camp carries a bow press.

Like my friend in Bozeman, who loaned me his hi-tech rifle says,  A man cant have too many campfires in his life.

* * *



Email the White Oak Mountain Ranger at news@chattanoogan.com
SpaceX will perform a major flight test of its latest Starship prototype this week after the previous two ended in fiery explosions.

The Starship SN10 will launch from SpaceXs facility in Boca Chica, Texas, after improvements were made to its landing abilities.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said these upgrades would give Starship a 60 per cent chance of landing successfully.

High-altitude tests of the SN8 and SN9 Starship prototypes were largely successful, despite their catastrophic conclusion.

They each demonstrated SpaceXs ability to launch the craft to over 10km, before reorienting it to perform a controlled aerodynamic descent. Both initiated the complex landing-flip manoeuvre but neither could complete it.

Recommended SpaceX Starship crashes in huge fireball explosion

These test flights are all about improving our understanding and development of a fully reusable transportation system designed to carry both crew and cargo on long-duration, interplanetary flights and help humanity return to the moon, and travel to Mars and beyond, SpaceX said following the Starship SN9 test.

The Starship SN9 and SN10 prototypes at SpaceXs Boca Chica facility in Texas ahead of Tuesdays test flight (YouTube)

The latest test comes just two weeks after the Starship SN9 test, and less than 10 weeks after the SN8 test.

The rapid test rate comes after Mr Musk told SpaceX employees to prioritise development of the Mars-bound craft ahead of other missions like Starlink.

The technology billionaire hopes to send the first humans to Mars aboard Starship as early as 2024, with hopes of mass producing the craft to facilitate a reliable route between the two planets.

If the tests prove to be successful, and funding is no issue, then SpaceX could manufacture 100 Starships per year over the next decade to create a 1,000-strong fleet of the next-generation rockets.

Mr Musk has frequently spoken of his ambition to travel to Mars himself in his lifetime, as well as establish a colony on the red planet in order to ensure humanitys future survival.

SpaceXs Starship SN9 exploded on landing in Boca Chica, Texas, on 2 February, 2021 (SpaceX)

SpaceX is yet to announce the exact time and date of the Starship SN10 flight test but previous launches have been beset by weather and FAA delays.

Road closures in Cameron County are yet to be put in place, as SpaceX first needs to complete a static fire test of the Raptor rocket engines.

Starship SN11 is already in development, as well as future prototypes up to at least SN18, according to Nasa Space Flight.
Power Cut Across Texas as Snow, Ice Blanket Southern Plains

DALLASA winter storm dropping snow and ice also sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the United States.

Rotating power outages were initiated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, early Monday morning, meaning thousands went without electricity for short periods as temperatures fell into the teens near Dallas and 20s (about minus 5 degrees Celsius) around Houston.

Two people play in the snow in San Antonio, Texas, on Feb. 14, 2021. (Eric Gay/AP Photo)

We urge Texans to put safety first, ERCOT tweeted as it urged residents to reduce electricity use. The council manages the flow of electric power in the state.

Traffic lights and other infrastructure may be temporarily without power, the council said.

The council described the rotating outages as a last resort to preserve the reliability of the electric system as a whole, adding that utility transmission companies are tasked with determining how to reduce demand on the system.

Snow along Main Street near the Tarrant County Courthouse in Fort Worth, Texas, on Feb. 14, 2021. (Yffy Yassifor/Star-Telegram via AP)

Every grid operator and every electric company is fighting to restore power right now, ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness said in a statement.

The rotating outages were expected to last throughout Monday morning.

More than 2.3 million customers in Texas were in the dark as of 7 a.m. local time, according to poweroutage.us, a utility tracking site.

Around 5,000 Oklahoma Gas & Electric customers were without power overnight, and Entergy Arkansas logged about 3,000 outages. Both states have much smaller populations compared with Texas.

Officials in Houston had warned people to prepare for outages and hazardous roadsconditions similar to what residents might see in the wake of a Category 5 hurricane.

A pump jack array seen in Midland, Texas, on Feb. 13, 2021. (Eli Hartman/Odessa American via AP)

There [have] been numerous reports of accidents from icing recently, National Weather Service lead forecaster Bob Oravec said Monday. I think theres going to be a big threat today as the system pushes northeastward.

Accumulating ice between a tenth and a quarter of an inch (0.25 and 0.6 centimeters) was possible across eastern Louisiana, Mississippi, central Tennessee, Kentucky, and over into the West Virginia and Ohio border region, Oravec said.

Up to 12 inches (30 centimeters) of snow was expected across parts of the southern Plains into Monday, said Marc Chenard, a meteorologist with the National Weather Services Weather Prediction Center.

The region had been gearing up for the winter weather for the better part of the weekend. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for all of the states 254 counties. Abbott, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson each activated National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks including rescuing stranded drivers.

President Joe Biden also declared an emergency in Texas in a statement Sunday night. The declaration is intended to add federal aid to state and local response efforts.

The Ratliff Stadium is seen covered in snow and ice in Midland, Texas, on Feb. 13, 2021. (Eli Hartman/Odessa American via AP)

More than 760 flights were canceled at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, and at Dallas Love Field most of the nearly 200 flights for Southwest Airlines, the airports main carrier, were canceled on Sunday.

American Airlines said about 345 of their flights were canceled at DFW Airport, its hub, by early Sunday afternoon. The airline said the storm was also affecting their flights across the region, with operations reduced and canceled at airports across Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.

The National Weather Service said Sunday that the forecast through early Tuesday calls for 8 to 12 inches (20 to 30 centimeters) of snow in central Oklahoma, and 4 to 8 inches (10 to 20 centimeters) in an area extending from eastern Texas to the Ohio Valley in the Northeast.

In Memphis, Tennessee, snow started falling Sunday afternoon, and while main roads were still passable, lines formed during the day at grocery stores as people rushed to stock up.

In Mississippi, sleet in Jackson and other central parts of the state left roads and bridges slick. Bill Parker, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Jackson, said up to three-quarters of an inch (2 centimeters) of ice could accumulate in central Mississippi, bringing the possibility of power outages or falling tree limbs.

Parts of Kentucky and West Virginia still recovering from an ice storm last week are expected to get up to a quarter-inch (0.6 centimeters) of ice or up to 8 inches (20 centimeters) of snow by Tuesday.

Meanwhile, in the Pacific Northwest, tens of thousands of people were without power after a winter storm blanketed the region with ice and snow and made travel treacherous.

Through the wintry conditions Sunday, florists stayed busy for Valentines Day.

In Fort Worth, Texas, Gordon Boswell Flowers general manager said delivery drivers worked to wrap up deliveries before the weather worsened.

It is icy and snowing and theyre calling for more snow, Cheri Kirkman said.

Despite the weather, she said they still had some people coming in to pick up gifts. Weve got plenty all made up, ready to go, Kirkman said.

By Jamie Stengle
Not Cong's convention to announce CM face in advance; will decide after Assam polls: Ripun Bora

India

pti-Madhuri Adnal

Sivasagar (Assam), Feb 15: It is not in the Congress' convention to announce a chief ministerial face in advance, and a decision on it will be taken after the Assam polls, the party's state unit chief Ripun Bora said on Monday and exuded confidence that the alliance forged to take on the ruling BJP will win over 101 of the 126 seats.

Slamming the BJP for its criticism of his party's alliance with the AIUDF for the upcoming state polls, Bora said the AIUDF chief, Badruddin Ajmal, is not anti-Hindu and the BJP, which accuses him of being communal, had in fact joined hands with his party to run three district councils in the state.

The Badruddin Ajmal-led outfit is not communal and cannot be regarded as "untouchable", he said. Bora also said that "winds of change" were blowing in Assam and expressed confidence that the Congress, along with its allies All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), CPI, CPI(M), CPI(ML) and Anchalik Gana Morcha, will win over 101 out of the 126 Assembly seats in the polls likely in March-April.

In an interview with PTI, Bora said it was not the Congress' convention to announce a chief ministerial face in advance and the party will decide on who would be the chief minister only after the elections.

"It is a party of internal democracy. So the party will decide who will be chief minister only after elections, that is the democratic way. It is not only the case with Assam but in other states also the party has followed this," he asserted.

Badruddin Ajmal is not anti-Hindu, BJP is more communal: Assam Cong chief

The Assam Pradesh Congress Committee chief lashed out at the BJP for attacking the Congress over its alliance with the AIUDF, saying while the BJP had in the past aligned with the "anti-national" PDP in Jammu and Kashmir, it was questioning the Congress' tie-up with the AIUDF. "Ajmal is not anti-Hindu, but talks only about the welfare of Muslims.

Talking about the welfare of Muslims or the people of his own religion is not a crime unless he hates the people of other religions. Ajmal has never been anti-Hindu," he said. AIUDF is considered to have a large base among Assam's about 35-per cent Muslim population. Bora, a frontrunner for the chief minister's post if the Congress-led alliance is voted to power, said the BJP has been saying the Congress has joined hands with AIUDF, but the fact is that the saffron party had entered into a pact with Ajmal's party to capture power in district councils of Darrang, Karimganj and Nagaon.

"The BJP has no moral right to lecture us on politics," he said. Bora claimed that the BJP is "more communal" than any other party as it had formed a government in Jammu and Kashmir along with "anti-India forces" like the PDP, which "does not accept the Indian constitution and Indian flag".

The BJP is focused on communalisation, but for Assam's people, the main issue is to save the state because of the way the BJP and the RSS have attacked the identity, culture and heritage of Assam by the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), Bora said. The CAA is going to destroy Assam's social fabric, it will divide people and create communal disturbance as well as conflict between different castes, communities and religions, he alleged, adding that the CAA will serve no purpose for the people.

"The CAA will bring threat to the language and to the existence of the culture of the people of Assam. Therefore, even though the BJP has declared that after elections they are going to implement the CAA, but we in the Congress have said that after election if our party comes to power, we will not allow implementation of the CAA in Assam," Bora said.

On Sunday at a rally here, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had said his party will protect every principle of the Assam Accord and will not let the CAA be implemented if voted to power in the polls. Bora also hit out at the BJP over the issue of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) for Assam, saying it has been a long standing demand of Assam but the BJP has stopped the NRC after final publication. The Congress' stand is clear that the NRC, the final list which has come out with 3.11 crore people of Assam, should be accepted, Bora said. "Secondly, side by side we have said that 19 lakh names which are not there, all of them are not foreigners, most of them are Indians, we have demanded that those people as per the rule of NRC should be given an opportunity of appealing before court so that they can prove themselves as Indian citizens," he said. Asked about the number of assembly seats the Congress will contest, Bora said of the 126, the party would field candidates in around 90 and the remaining 36 would be given to allies. He, however, said seat-sharing talks are yet to be concluded as there are "surprising demands" from partners.

Bora also said the alliance will "very soon" come out with an appeal to the people elaborating the issues for which the six parties have come on a common platform and added that the CPI(M) has some reservations about calling it a 'common minimum programme'.

On Congress' chances in the polls, he said "winds of change are blowing" in the state and there is a "tremendous undercurrent" in favour of the party and its allies.

"People are scared of coming out openly (against the BJP) as they are being threatened and blackmailed that if you go with the Congress you will not get benefits," he alleged. Bora said the people are feeling a "sense of betrayal", realising that the ruling party has only been making "false promises". "In Assam, the BJP made so many tall claims.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The BJP said there are 25 lakh unemployed youth and they will all be absorbed within six months of it forming government, they said not a single Bangladeshi foreigner in Assam will be left, they said 1 lakh crore will be allotted for expressway on both sides of Brahmaputra, 1 'tola' of gold will be given to girls, but nothing has happened," he said.
Why I Want to Pursue a PhD as a Woman Pastor

Becky Castle Miller

Ten-years-ago me didnt even want to get a masters degree. Undergrad was enough. I was still trying to forget the sleep deprivation and homework load. Five-years-ago me started to realize she needed a masters. A seminary degree would be necessary to pursue a calling to become a pastor and to gain the biblical studies skills to write books for the church. Two-years-ago me was nearing the end of that mastersputting up with plenty of all-nighters for paper writingand was starting to get an inkling that a PhD was an inevitability for both scholarship and ministry goals.

So here I am, still catching up on sleep lost to my thesis, studying Greek and German and GRE-prep books and looking at doctoral programs.

I dont want to be a professor or write academic monographs. I want to pastor people and serve the most vulnerable in the church. So why am I looking to sign up for six more years of school?

Gaining research skills

Before I started my masters at Northern Seminary, I was trying to write a book about Jesuss emotions. I devoured the Gospels, examining all of Jesuss emotional expressions and trying to figure out how the church today had taken such an anti-emotional turn. I realized I did not know how to study the Bible at an academic level. I didnt know how to evalutate sources or understand how one author fit into the broader swaths of interpretation history. I couldnt understand the contexts the various books of the Bible were written into, much less understand how to apply them to my context today.

Studying at Northern taught me some of those skills. I learned which sources to use and how to use them. I wrote my thesis on Jesuss emotions contrasted with teaching on emotion in the American church over the past 70 years. Now Im finally able to write the book I set out to research five years ago.

Gaining further knowledge

Most importantly, my time at Northern taught me how much I dont know. In some ways, I feel like I know less now than I did before seminary. Exposure to the sheer volume of knowledge out there has shown me how little knowledge I have attained. A masters was just a sniff of the complexity of aromas in the Scotch glass of biblical scholarship. Rather than slaking my thirst for understanding, my degree left me craving more. I want to know more and deeper and learn in ways that I cant accomplish by reading books on my own. I want an advisor to guide me.

Gaining language skills

The MANT at Northern isnt specifically a PhD prep degree, so it doesnt have a strong biblical languages component. I took a few small group seminars with Scot to learn Greek basics. I progressed to the point of receiving this evaluation: Well, Beckyat least you no longer read Greek like a Barbarian. I have wanted to read the Bible in its original languages since I was a kid, so I am studying Greek now (and will do Hebrew next) so I am qualified to apply to programs. I want the academic rigor of doing original language study that a PhD offers, so that I can remove the middle-man of translation currently standing between me and the text.

Gaining credibility

Two woman scholars I respect, Dr. Cherith Fee Nordling and Dr. Alice Mathews, told me plainly that, as a woman, to be respected as a scholar, I need a doctorate. This applies to male academics as well, of course, but it applies to women in a different way. Ive seen over and over that in the Christian world, more qualified women get passed over in favor of less qualified men. Women have to be excellent beyond question to get opportunities and respect. I dont want the lack of a degree to keep me from doing what God has gifted me to do.

Bringing original research to the academy

The niche Ive delved into for myself is the intersection of neuroscience/psychology/sociology with biblical studies and theology to produce better pastoral care in the church. I touched on some cross-disciplinary work in my masters thesis by applying a neuroscientific theory about emotions (Lisa Feldman Barretts constructed emotion theory) to Gospel studies, and I love the discipleship understand that came out of this crossover. I want to contribute fresh insights and new research to our body of knowledge.

Bringing wider knowledge into the church

The church does not have a good understanding of emotional and mental health. I want to earn the further credentials to speak into that gap with validity. We cant know everything necessary about the human condition from theology and biblical studies alone. Other disciplines that study humanity have valuable insight for church practice, and I want to help build those bridges of understanding.

Bring seminary to church

In the Netherlands, I co-taught a class for university students in various fields who wanted to study the Bible at a deeper level. Those were some of my most treasured teaching experiences. People like my DRx students who study biochemistry or public health or international law will probably not ever go to seminary, but they want to study the Bible at a seminary level of depth. I want to develop programs that bring deeper biblical studies to the church.

Bringing church to seminary

Ive seen that in seminary, there can be a lack of pastoral care for the pastor-students. Some learn new ways of viewing the Bible that throw doubt on their previous beliefs, and they need people to process with. Others are going through traumatic experiences in their home churchesespecially womenand they need people outside their church contexts to care for them. Others are hurt in the classroom by professors or fellow students who havent learned to speak pastorally about issues like racial justice and sexual abuse. I want to help seminaries care for the mental and emotional well being of their students. Producing healthier church leaders out of seminaries will produce healthier church bodies in the future.

The financial question is a big one. If you want to see more women and people of color broaden the knowledge of the academy and you have the means to do so, consider funding schools endowments and scholarship funds.

Though I dont see myself becoming a full-time professor (which seems to be the assumed career path for most people with PhDs in theology or New Testament), I would love to do some part time lecturing and direct programs to better care for current leaders and better train future church leaders for pastoral care.

How can I make money doing what I love?

Full time tenure track jobs in academia are rare and getting rarer. Pastors make small salaries in most regions of the US (and women make less than their male counterparts, if they can even get a job at a church in their denomination). Writers often have to have day jobs because books dont usually pay the bills. So for the pastor-scholar, what is the point of getting an expensive degree that probably wont pay for itself?

I dont know the full answer to that question. Especially for women with children, higher education can seem financially unattainable. I paid more for childcare during my masters than I did for tuition, and Ive spoken to other women, and some men, who face the same challenge.

I am looking primarily at funded programs. I cant take on more student loan debt while I am still paying off my last degree. I have a financially privileged position because my husband has a good job, so our family can afford for me to not work for a few years.

I am working on developing multiple avenues to earn money with my education: freelance writing and editing for business clients and publishers, working in churches, speaking and consulting at churches and ministries, and writing books.

The financial question is a big one. If you want to see more women and people of color broaden the knowledge of the academy and you have the means to do so, consider funding schools endowments and scholarship funds.

I am pursuing a PhD because it is an important part of my calling. I want a deep knowledge of the Bible and better grasp of theology so that I can be taken seriously as a scholar and have the creditials to improve the health of the church. Ultimately, Im realizing I simply want to do it. I feel like I cant NOT do it. Ive been told that I will need that sense of drive to sustain me through the next set of sleepless nights.

Becky Castle Miller is a writer and speaker on emotional, mental, and spiritual health in the church. She recently graduated from Northern Seminary with a master's in New Testament, studying with Scot McKnight. Her discipleship workbook with Dr. McKnight is called Following King Jesus. She is working on a new book about Jesus's emotions. She and her husband and their five kids and two cats just returned to the U.S. after living in the Netherlands for the past eight years, where she worked at an international church. Find her on Instagram and Twitter @bcastlemiller.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.









[ the footage ] 02.14.21 What You Cant See in the Picture

I ts my job to bring ghosts back to life, to make them resurface and reform out of amorphous images and subconscious memories. To do this, I stare all day at closed circuit TV monitors, grainy footage from grimy cameras hung in corners that capture our worst moments. Or the deceptively mundanea final purchase, a walk down a dark street, a bicycle flying past. You see, I passed the many tests given by the police department so they can ferret out the super recognizers in our city. Last summer, in a room heavy with hot, stale air and the occasional smokers cough, I was able to match up, on my computer screen, the array of faces to each other, to pick them out of lineups and mug shots and to match them to their CCTV scans. Out of the 500 black-and-white faces I was presented with to match, I got just one wrong. So now, when I go to work, all I need are my eyes. My eyes and a bag lunch. I stare at screen grabs of perpetrators. Ive learned to know the tricks of light and what ageing can do to a face, but not to its bone structure. Video stretches skin, compresses heads, but cant erase moles, large curvy ears, cleft chins, battle scars, tattoos, haunted eyes. They call me Superwoman in the squad. Im the only female super recognizer to date. When we cover mass protests, crowds, and festivals, spreading out and looking for perps, theres always a male colleague lurking nearby. At first I was offended, but after this one time when I was able to call out a perp, even with a scarf covering his mouth, and the perp came after me with a knife, the male officer on the other side of the street managed to catch him from behind, his thick arm around the wrapped neck saving me from being scarred. Or worse. I decided, after the rush of fear was over, to relax into my Superwoman role and let them keep an eye on me. This past Halloween, I wore a Superwoman T-shirt to work as a joke. There are selfies with me and the squad on my Instagram page. Me in the middle with a big smile on my face, and the men around me pointing to the big S shield. No one but us knows what we do. No one.

Its hard to date people when you have this SR ability. Im talking about online dating. About looking at faces all day for work, then going home to an empty apartment and scrolling through the dating menu at night. More faces, only these are clearer and most are smiling, inviting you in rather than trying to hide. Still, I recognize the men who have changed their profile but still have the same picture, or vice versa. Ive passed these imposters in the street, only to realize they are so much smaller or less tidy and together when not posing. I can tell when someone has doctored his image, like adding a cleft chin. Or photoshopped his bad skin. Once, I found one of our convenience store robbers on a dating site, calling himself Gary. I alerted the Chief. At his orders, I pretended to set up a date with Gary at Starbucks. I had some surprisingly interesting chats with him online before we met, about the loss of the visible four seasons up north and his desire to get into acting. I admit I was hoping to see if we could continue the comfortable chatter in the cafe, but the moment he walked up to the table and pulled back his chair, the boys swooped in and gathered up my shocked perp. It was his ears that had given him away. Even in the vague gray landscape of the CCTV screen capture, the tops of his ears spread like thin-veined bat wings and his lobes hung heavy like ripe fruit. Sorry, I muttered, not looking up when they cuffed him. I felt bad they took him before he could drink his coffee. It sat there, abandoned, vapors rising. I picked it up and gave it to a homeless man I see every day, who was folded into the seam between the sidewalk and the cement foundation outside the cafe. Here, John, I said. I always try to speak his name. My robbers lobes haunted me for days. I stayed away from my personal computer till the ears faded into the constant, rushing stream of other parts and expressions and bone structures, along with the mans dream to become something, or someone, other than himself.

It was tough being in the office after that arrest. My squad loves to tease me. Sorry we took your boyfriend. Does coffee now remind you of Gary the Perp? Wanna go through the database today to find a date? Its all in good humor. I dont mind. Were all bonded together by our peculiarity. Were all skilled chess players and have tournaments when things are slow. We see the patterns others cant see. Its when Im moving one of my bishops across the chess board that the Amber Alert comes in. Missing girl, four feet eight, age 10, last seen biking to the convenience store on Hathaway Street. Might be caught on CCTV. Janet Little has face blindness and has a fear of strangers. Both parents are cooperating. I swing my office chair back to my monitor to see the uploaded school picture offered by her parents. Janets upper frame is made of thin bones. Her face has no high cheekbones. She has freckles (one on the left cheek is in the shape of a butterfly), wide-set blue eyes, thick, unplucked eyebrows that thin out to a point. The left eyebrow is higher than the right. A small white scar graces her temple near the hairline, which has no peaks. Long red hair drapes her in unkempt curls. I get lost in her blue eyes. She is the opposite of meI cant forget a face, she cant remember one. During our training, we learned about face blindness, or prosopagnosia. I wonder if she has it so bad that she cant recognize her own beautiful face.

I offer to stay at headquarters late, waiting for the CCTV hard disks, praying they are not cheap disks that have been corrupted. The officers have fanned out, casing the area she biked in, looking for the cameras, talking to their owners, hoping for cooperation so we dont have to obtain warrants, the best-case scenario. Then we can isolate her moment on camera. I keep studying her face, till I notice her jawline is crooked. I think of her being born, being pushed out so hard her jaw was curved wrong. This is the first young girl who has gone missing since I joined the squad. Im warned that these are the hardest cases. What you dont know, or cant ever find, is sometimes worse than what you do. Still, I feel like she is mine to find. She could be me, I could be her, but for some abnormality in the fusiform area of the brain. I feel guilty that my life must be so much easier than hers. And I try not to think of what could be happening to her at that moment. I choose instead to envision her lost, wandering around the city or in the woods that edge it, not being able to recognize her way home to parents whose faces she cannot recall. I have to find her. Or her abductor, if there is one. Fast.

The best, and last, image we find of her is on the convenience store footage. Luckily theyd upgraded to a surveillance-grade disk after two hold ups in six months that were lost on a plain old cheap disk the owner had been using. So for Janet, the timing is right. There she is, as clear as can be in black and white. The store has two cameras, one facing the street and one over the register. She silently pulls up on her bike, captured by one camera, ignores her kickstand and leaves the bike on the sidewalk, laying it down carefully. Up the three concrete stairs till her head disappears. Then inside, the second camera has her moving about the aisles, taking her time. I make notes as to what she is wearing. A T-shirt with a Hello Kitty image on the front, light-colored shorts. One knee looks bruised. Flip flops. She scans the makeup aisle, touching the Maybelline eye shadows, picking up nail polish bottles, putting them back. I suspect shes not allowed to wear these yet, so shes scouting out the future. Then she walks to the front by the register where all the candy and gum is displayed and picks out what looks like a chocolate candy bar. She pays with a dollar from her left pocket, accepts the small change, never looking up, and walks out. Then the first camera finds her again, on her bike, leaving the footage in a burst of pedaling. I note she does not head back in the direction of home. I watch the footage over and over. Back it up to see if I note anything unusual or different. Ive learned the eye can overlook things in forward motion, because we can anticipate whats coming next. When you reverse, you play a trick on your mind. It stumbles on itself, gives you time sometimes to see whats right there under your nose. Its in reverse that I see him. A mans grainy form is on a bench across the street, facing the store, tucked into the right corner, leaning on the arm. Its a park bench, just on the edge of the far sidewalk. Ball cap pushed down over his eyes, arms crossed. Hes there when she arrives. When she picks up her bike to leave, he stands up and gets on his own bike, which is parked behind the bench. He heads in the same direction as she does, on the opposite side of the street. There are moments in this business where your body tells you more than your eyes. Those little hairs on my forearms rise up with the shiver that runs through me. I call the Chief over. Everyones working some angle of the case. We all know these first twenty-four hours are crucial. Hes been working with the street squad and police dogs, who lost the scent by a marshy swamp area but found the abandoned bike. The parents verified it was hers. Chief, did the parents say if this was a routine or not? Going to the store? Yeah, she went every Saturday after she got paid on Friday nights for babysitting. I need more footage. I want to go back and look at the Saturdays before this one. At least a months worth from the store. Done. Lets hope they saved them.

Im staring now at the previous weeks CCTV recording, and there he is again. And also in the weeks footage before this one. Each time, he rises and leaves when she does, and heads in the same direction. We get more footage from a park CCTV. Its clearer. I get a screen grab of the man and pass it around. As I mentioned before, light can play tricks on the eyes. The sun shining through the fully leafed tree branches creates white patches and shadows that move across his cap and clothes and profile. But when he stands and walks to his bike, hops on it, something triggers in my mind. I enlarge his hands. Ive seen them before. And I enlarge his nose. Ive seen it before, too. Now I have to go deep into my minds files. I leave the squad room and go to the bunkroom and shut off the lights and lie down. I pull up the ghost images from the past. Breathe in and out. In and out. Hands. Hands holding guns, hands hitting dogs, hands throwing rocks and beer cans, handsgrabbing girls. Last year, an abduction aborted when a good Samaritan grabbed the girl back from the large, hairy hands of a man wearing a ball cap. Ive never seen so much hair, all the way up the knuckles to the nails. And I recall the bent nose, probably once broken. I get up and turn the light switch back on. Im blinded temporarily.

By 7 a.m., he is identified by a weary neighbor answering the knock on her door, clutching her tattered bathrobe closed at her chest. By 9 a.m., we have his clothes, and the dogs are on the scent. By 1 p.m., he is found, fleeing the tent in the woods. Janet is brought back to her parents, carefully, still alive.

Animals recognize each other mainly through smell. Birds, mostly through song. Humans have been given the gift of sight, some more so than others. On the way to the hospital for the photo op with Janet and her parents, as requested by the mayor, I scan the streets as a habit. Watch the people move together as a mass, like a river, parting ways, tumbling over and around each other, looking down at phones and up at lights. All these faces with stories, good and bad. And I recognize, always, some of them. Even years after Ive seen them in the store or in a bar or on the street. But they dont know me. Its an odd feeling, like being a voyeur. Janet makes it all worthwhile. She is lying in her hospital bed with a gown on, her hair washed and dried and curled in a mass around her little face. When I walk in, she turns her head my way. Usually those with face blindness look down, to avoid making eye contact and having to admit they dont recognize you. She doesnt know me, but I can see she wants to. Its like she is drinking me in with her blue, bruised eyes, her freckled, crooked face now holding the wisdom of an adult woman. I place the gift Id wrapped in pink Hello Kitty paper on her lap. Its the Superwoman T-shirt. Its big enough to be a dress on her, but her mother puts it over her gown for the pictures. If you get this Sundays paper, you will see us there on the front page. Im to the right, pointing toward Janet and the big S, my arm around her. The caption bills me as her rescuer. But the whole squad, down to the dogs, played a part. What you cant see in the picture is us saying our goodbyes, my tears in her hair, her tears dampening my shoulder. Two diametrically opposed sisters clinging to each other to extend the moment. Me knowing she will become one of the ghosts. Janet knowing that as soon as she lets go, she will never recognize me, her hero, again. I will see her once more, years from now. I will be glad to recognize her face as a mother, as she navigates the crowded city sidewalk with a child holding both of her hands. I will keep walking.

China, India say disengagement of troops started at Pangong Tso

After a bloody fight that left 20 Indian soldiers dead and a border standoff that lasted several months, Chinese and Indian troops have finally started simultaneously pulling back from the Pangong Tso Lake in Ladakh, as part of an agreement reached during the last round of military talks.

The Chinese defence ministry said on Wednesday that troops on both sides have begun simultaneous pullback, which was also confirmed by Indias defence minister Rajnath Singh in Parliament on Thursday.

The Chinese and Indian frontline troops at the southern and northern bank of the Pangong Tso Lake started synchronised and organised disengagement from 10 February," Chinas defence ministry spokesman senior colonel Wu Qian said.

This move is in accordance with the consensus reached by both sides at the 9th round of China-India corps commander level meeting," Wu said in a written statement put up on the ministry website.

In New Delhi, defence minister Rajnath Singh said on Thursday that there was progress on the disengagement issue after nine months. He gave full credit to Indian troops for making China agree to disengage their forces.

Tensions have been running high between India and China for nine months since India first detected Chinese intrusions into its territory in May. India quickly mobilized troops to match the Chinese deployment that Singh said had started in April last year.

Last month, foreign minister S. Jaishankar warned ties were truly at a crossroads" and that choices that are made will have profound repercussions, not just for the two nations but for the entire world".

Over the weekend, Jaishankar acknowledged some progress in dialogue but added that this had not eased the situation.

However, reports citing sources said India was moving out some armoured components, while also thinning out of troops" from the rear on the Indian side.

We continue to hold strategic heights. Frontline troops are not disengaging at the moment. It is still early days," the report cited one source as saying.

He declined to confirm if the development could be described as disengagement. Its a multi-step process, and there will be verification at each stage," the person said.

According to strategic analysts, Indias cautious response is understandable, given the tense situation on the ground.

We will not judge the Chinese by their words, we will judge them by their actions," said former Indian ambassador to China Gautam Bambawale.

Even if there is disengagement of troops, the trust deficit between both sides will not be bridged, considering that the Chinese have gone back on almost all the agreements they have signed in decades to stabilise the border," said the second person cited above.
ALMATY (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th February, 2021) Kazakhstan has registered the Sputnik V vaccine against COVID-19 that is produced at the Karaganda Pharmaceutical Complex, the enterprise announced on Monday.

"The Karaganda Pharmaceutical Complex has completed the procedure to register the Gam-COVID-Vac (Sputnik V) vaccine against the coronavirus infection on the territory of the Republic of Kazakhstan," the pharmaceutical company said in a press release.

On February 13, an expert organization of the Kazakh Ministry of Healthcare issued a report confirming vaccine safety and efficiency. After that, an application to obtain a registration certificate was submitted to the health ministry's committee for pharmaceutical control.

On February 1, Kazakhstan started vaccinating citizens against the coronavirus with the Russian-made Sputnik V vaccine.

Meanwhile, domestic production with the use of Russian components was launched at the Karaganda Pharmaceutical Complex. Around 90,000 doses of the vaccine produced there are set to be distributed across all Kazakhstan's regions by the end of the month.

Apart from that, Kazakhstan's QazCovid-in vaccine, which is currently going through phase three clinical trials, is expected to join the vaccination campaign in the second quarter of the year. While high-risk groups are currently prioritized, free vaccination is expected to be available for all the citizens in April-May, according to the health ministry's estimates.
The Serpent has become BBC iPlayer's most watched show since Normal People, it was revealed by the BBC on Monday.

31 million viewers have tuned into the intense crime drama, which stars Tahar Rahim and Jenna Coleman, since it first began airing on New Year's Day.

The eight-part drama concluded its BBC One run on Sunday night, but has been available to stream in full on iPlayer since the beginning of the year.

It's a hit! The Serpent has become BBC iPlayer's most watched show since Normal People as 31 million viewers tuned into the intense crime drama, it was revealed on Monday

The Serpent's first episode is the streaming service's most watched episode across all genres, with over 5.5 million checking it out online, as of writing.

Including linear viewing, the first episode received a consolidated 9 million viewers across all screens in its first 30 days, and 7.4 million tuned into the second episode.

In December it was revealed that Normal People had received a staggering 62.7 million views since it launched in April, with 6.75 million tuning into the first episode just two months after it aired.

Normal People follows Marianne (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and Connell (Paul Mecal) as they navigate the difficulties of social and class dynamics during their time at high school and college.

Wow: In December it was revealed Normal People got a staggering 62.7 million views since it launched in April, with 6.75 million tuning into the first episode two months after it aired

Impressive: The Serpent's first episode is the streaming services most watched episode across all genres, with over 5.5 million checking it out online and 9 million tuning in over 30-days

Of The Serpent's success, Damien Timmer and Preethi Mavahalli, executive producers for Mammoth Screen said: 'Its been a privilege to tell the real life story of Herman and Angela Knippenbergs dogged pursuit of justice, and to have a chance to reclaim the stories of the young travellers whose lives were so cruelly cut short.

'Were absolutely thrilled to see the British public come to the series in such vast numbers'

Piers Wenger, Director of BBC Drama added: 'These exceptional figures for The Serpent are a testament to the power of telling the lesser-known, human side of a real-life story, and an exceptional creative team.

'Its great to see The Serpent become such a hit, driven in no small part by phenomenal word-of-mouth from the British public watching the boxset on BBC iPlayer.'

The Serpent follows the pursuit of real-life conman and killer Charles Sobhraj (Rahim), who preyed on and murdered Western tourists throughout Southeast Asia during the 1970s, and his girlfriend Marie-Andree Leclerc (Coleman).

Sobhraj was branded the Bikini Killer after two of his victims were found wearing just a bikini, while he was also known as The Serpent for his ability to slither away from facing justice for his crimes for years.

French Canadian Leclerc began her relationship with Sobhraj aged 30 after he poisoned her male friend to 'get him out of the way', however Leclerc was 'thrilled' to meet charismatic Sobjraj.

Leclerc soon learned how immoral and corrupt her new partner was, however she still stuck by him and even turned up the music as he and an accomplice bludgeoned two victims to near-death.

Drama: The Serpent follows the pursuit of real-life killer Charles Sobhraj (Tahar Rahim), and his girlfriend Marie-Andree Leclerc (Jenna Coleman)

Plot: Marie-Andree began her relationship with Sobhraj aged 30 after he poisoned her male friend to 'get him out of the way', however she was 'thrilled' to meet charismatic Sobjraj

Notorious con-artist Sobhraj attracted tourists and tricked them into handing over their money for his scams, and if they refused to help he poisoned them.

Sobhraj was first caught in 1976 when he tried to drug an entire group of French students in New Dehli and one of them caught on to his plan and handed him over to the authorities.

He spent a total of 21 years in jail in India where he was jailed for culpable homicide for poisoning a French tourist and killing an Israeli man. He was released in 1997.

During his time in prison, authorities in Thailand attempted to extradite Sobhraj and he threw a huge party for inmates and guards alike. He drugged them all with sleeping pills and managed to walk out of the prison.

Criminal: Sobhraj was branded the Bikini Killer after two of his victims were found in swim suits, while he was known as The Serpent for his ability to slither away from justice for years (pictured left in 2011)

Pictured: Charles Sobhraj 'The Serpent' and Marie-Andree Leclerc pictured together in 1986

He was later caught and jailed for another 10 years for the event until 1997.

The law caught up with him again in Nepal in 2004 when he was jailed for the killing of US tourist Connie Joe Bronzich in 1975.

In 2014, he was handed a second life sentence for the killing of Canadian backpacker Laurent Carriere, whose passport he had used to escape Nepal after killing the pair.

Sobhraj has now been linked to 20 murders during his killing spree.
Medicom now producing almost 5 million N95-type respirator masks per month at new Montreal plant
Peter Gay is the Executive Director of North Attleborough Community Television Inc.  North TV. The views expressed in his column are not necessarily those of North TV. Reach him at pgay@northtv.net.
Valentines Day marked one year since a Hoover wife and mother was gunned down outside her apartment and police again are asking for information that could lead to justice in the case.

Shemethia Coteat Stanton, 41, was shot in an ambush on Feb. 14, 2020 outside her Hoover apartment. Police and fire medics responded shortly before 7 p.m. that Friday to The Park at Wellington and Wakefield apartments off Tyler Road.

Once on the scene, they found Coteat Stanton outside her car. She was pronounced dead on the scene at 7:05 p.m.

Police said it appears Coteat Stanton was retrieving items from the backseat of her vehicle when she was attacked. She was shot four times from behind. Detectives are still working to determine a motive, but investigators believe Coteat Stanton was specifically targeted. The suspect was waiting in the parking lot for Coteat Stanton to return home.

Investigators said they have identified a suspect in the case but still need more information to arrest that person. Her death is one of more than 70 2020 homicides throughout Jefferson County that remain unsolved.

One of the victims children, Kassidy Stanton, found her mother shot multiple times. I heard the last three shots because I think there were five,' Kassidy told AL.com in a 2020. I was sitting there waiting on it to stop. I heard the tires go off and thats it. Im thinking, OK, somebody just got shot and Im nosy so Im going to go look.

Kassidy glanced out the blinds and saw her mothers car, but her mother was nowhere in sight. My first instinct was to go look again, double check, because maybe shes in the breezeway and maybe shes running from the gunshots,' she said. I saw her car door open, but I didnt see her still. At this point Im worried because why didnt she come in the house?

Kassidy, then 17, ran outside. Thats when she saw her mom unresponsive on the ground. I checked her pulse because Im trained for CPR,' Kassidy said. There was no pulse. By that time, the neighbors came out and I was screaming but it was so unreal to me that my mama was laying there.

There was no reason for somebody to do something like this to somebody so loving, and so God-fearing,' she said. It just hurt me so bad. I cant explain it.

Sheneka Coteat said her sister had just left Piggly Wiggly in Bluff Park, not far from her home. She was seen at 6:53 p.m. visiting with the store security guard and another employee, and then went home. She was pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m.  thats how quick it happened,' Coteat said in 2020.

Coteat Stanton left behind four children, including Kassidy and 9-year-old son Joshua. Her death has been a hard-hit for all of them. They still live in the same apartment with their dad.

My mama was the type of person who everybody loved. She was just the energy of everything,' Kassidy said. If there was a party and my mom walked in, the party started. She was the type of person who would help anybody, just anybody.

She was just a problem solver and a peacemaker and everything you could ask for in a person,' she said.

Coteat Stanton grew up in Birmingham, attending West End High School and then Lawson State Community College. At the time of her death, she was the business operations manager at Old Navy at the Riverchase Galleria.

It has broken us down. Were definitely trying to bring strong but it so hard,' her sister said. And to know this person is still walking around. Somebody that would do something like that to somebody, they dont deserve to be walking around because that means they would do this to anybody at any given moment.

Justice is important to all of them at this point. I know it wont bring her back, but it may give us a little peace to know the person who took her away from us, and that they will pay for what they did because its not acceptable,' her sister said.

Crime Stoppers is offering a $5,000 reward for information that leads to an arrest in the case. Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777. Tipsters to Crime Stoppers can remain anonymous.
Kanhaiya Kumar meets Nitish aide, sets tongues wagging in NDA

India

pti-Madhuri Adnal

Patna, Feb 15: Many eyebrows were raised in Bihar on Monday as news broke of a meeting between CPI's rising star Kanhaiya Kumar and Ashok Choudhary, a minister and key aide of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.

A fiery former JNU student leader, who has of late is being seen as veering towards Nitish Kumar despite their parties rarely getting on the same page on most issues, Kanhaiya met Choudhary on Sunday.

Choudhary had headed the state unit of the JD(U) during the assembly elections and played an instrumental role recently in enlisting the support of the sole BSP MLA Zama Khan and independent legislator Sumit Singh, both of whom were inducted into the cabinet last week.

He had also caused jitters in the LJP, an ally turned adversary, by inviting its sole MLA Raj Kumar Singh to his residence for a book launch function a few weeks back. Choudhary's meeting with Kanhaiya, a staunch communist, came at a time when the charismatic young politician is said to have been left mortified by a censure motion that the CPI recently passed against him.

Kerala Assembly Elections 2021: NDA ally in Kerala splits, alleges BJP's conspirancy

The party action had followed alleged manhandling of a key CPI official attached to the state headquarters here. Earlier, there had been tensions between the aspiring leader and his party during the Lok Sabha elections when the CPI reportedly insisted that he share a part of money he had raised through crowd-funding.

Kanhaiya had fought from his home constituency Begusarai, where he lost to Union minister and BJP leader Giriraj Singh by a massive margin. Nonetheless, the contest had created a lot of buzz and brought many celebrities from far-off places to the dusty town in support of the young leader who has been slapped with a sedition case for allegedly raising anti-national slogans at JNU.

Sources close to Kanhaiya as well as Choudhary insisted that it was a "non-political" meeting and that both have known each other for long. It has, nonetheless, evoked reactions from those holding strong views on nationalism and against the so-called "tukde tukde gang". Subhash Singh, a state minister from the BJP quota, called the former JNUSU president a "lunatic" (paagal) and said his meeting with a senior leader of an alliance partner was "not appropriate" (theek nahin hai).

Ajay Alok, a JD(U) spokesman, reacted "Kahaiya shall be welcome into our party if he chooses to give up his perverse (vikrit) ideology. Kanhaiya is also understood to have been disappointed with his party's decision to side with the RJD, which had queered the pitch for him in the Lok Sabha polls by fielding its candidate, and acknowledge Tejashwi Yadav as undisputed leader of the five-party Grand Alliance. Yadav, who has for all practical purposes inherited the legacy of his father and RJD supremo Lalu Prasad, is said to be wary of the former student leader who is of the same age but exhibits superior oratorical skills and grasp of issues.

Some in the ruling alliance said on condition of anonymity that the meeting could have been yet another attempt by the JD(U) to raise its stock after its unsatisfactory performance in the assembly elections. A few hours after Kanhaiya's meeting with Choudhary, Chandan Kumar Singh, an LJP MP, called on Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.

JD(U) spokesman Rajiv Ranjan Prasad latched on the development to berate the LJP, saying "Chirag Paswan has been alleging that his constituency of Jamui has been neglected and there has been no progress in Bihar at all. The meeting between his party MP and the chief minister is a rebuff to his brand of politics".

The LJP sought to downplay the significance of the meeting. "Our respected MP must have met the chief minister with regard to development works in his constituency. We wonder what is there to be so excited about," LJP spokesman Ashraf Ansari said in a video statement.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Paswan had pulled out of the NDA ahead of the assembly polls, vowing to decimate the JD(U) and help the BJP seize power. He fielded candidates against all JD(U) nominees, many of them rebels from the saffron party, a strategy that cost Nitish Kumar's party dear and reduced it to the status of a junior partner to the BJP in the state for the first time.
A giant comet that 'pinballed' off Jupiter then slammed into the Earth 66 million years ago killed off the dinosaurs - not an asteroid, a team of astronomers claim.

Researchers from Harvard University looked at the mechanics of the solar system, including comets in the Oort cloud and their movements over millions of years.

They found that a significant proportion of objects from this icy region of the solar system can be 'bumped off course' by Jupiter's gravitational field and hit the Earth.

This is what they believed happened 66 million years ago when the 'Chicxulub impactor' created a 94-mile wide and 12-mile deep crater off the coast of Mexico, killing the dinosaurs and about three quarters of all life on Earth at the time.

Previously scientists assumed this was an asteroid, but the the Harvard team found an Oort cloud comet orbit would have coincided with the Chicxulub impact.

A giant comet that 'pinballed' off Jupiter then slammed into the Earth 66 million years ago killed off the dinosaurs - not an asteroid, a team of astronomers claim

THE OORT CLOUD: ICY DEBRIS FROM THE EARLY SOLAR SYSTEM The Oort cloud is a vast and mysterious region that is thought to surround our solar system. It contains trillions of comets left over from the birth of the system, along with dwarf planets. It begins at about 0.08 light-years from the sun - 170 times the orbit of Neptune - and extends 0.8 light-years. Occasionally, comets from the region make their way into the solar system, known as long-period comets. One of the most famous this year was comet Siding Spring, which brushed past Mars on October 19, 2014. It has never been directly observed, and it is not exactly known how large it is - although it is thought to define the gravitational influence of the sun. Advertisement

Astronomers examined 'long-period comets' from the Oort cloud - an icy sphere of debris at the edge of the solar system - to determine whether they had the potential to hit the Earth during their lengthy orbit of the Sun.

Undergraduate student Amir Siraj, involved in this new study, said the solar system acts as a kind of 'pinball machine' with Jupiter as the largest planet kicking comets into orbits bringing them closer to the Sun than would otherwise be the case.

As they pass close to the Sun, the comets, known as sungrazers, can experience tidal forces that break apart pieces and produce cometary shrapnel.

'In a sungrazing event, the portion of the comet closer to the sun feels a stronger gravitational pull than the part that is further, resulting in a tidal force across the object,' explained Siraj.

'You can get what's called a tidal disruption event, in which a large comet breaks up into many smaller pieces.

'And crucially, on the journey back to the Oort cloud, there's an enhanced probability that one of these fragments hit the Earth.'

The new calculations increase the chances of long-period comets impacting upon Earth by a factor of about 10, and show that about 20 per cent become sungrazers.

Researchers say their new rate of impact is consistent with the age of Chicxulub, providing a satisfactory explanation for its origin and other impactors like it.

Using statistical analysis and gravitational simulations, Harvard researchers found that 20 per cent of Oort cloud comets are bumped off course by Jupiter's gravity

Astronomer Avi Loeb, study lead author, said: 'Our paper provides a basis for explaining the occurrence of this event.

'We are suggesting that, in fact, if you break up an object as it comes close to the sun, it could give rise to the appropriate event rate and also the kind of impact that killed the dinosaurs,' he explained.

Evidence found at Chicxulub suggests the rock was composed of carbonaceous chondrite and the new theory might explain this unusual composition.

'Our hypothesis predicts that other Chicxulub-size craters on Earth are more likely to correspond to an impactor with a primitive composition than expected from the conventional main-belt asteroids,' the researchers wrote in the paper.

This is important because a popular theory on the origin of Chicxulub claims the impactor is a fragment of a much larger asteroid that came from the main belt, which is an asteroid population between the orbit of Jupiter and Mars.

Only about a tenth of main-belt asteroids have a composition of carbonaceous chondrite, while it's assumed most long-period comets have it.

Evidence found at the Chicxulub crater and other similar craters that suggests they had carbonaceous chondrite within their make-up - including one object that hit the Earth 2 billion years ago, leaving the Vredefort crater in South Africa.

Researchers from Harvard University looked at the mechanics of the solar system, including comets in the Oort cloud and their movements over millions of years

SOLAR SYSTEM PINBALL MACHINE CREATES 'COMET RISK' Using statistical analysis and gravitational simulations, Harvard researchers found that 20 per cent of Oort cloud comets are bumped off course by Jupiter's gravity. This happens as these objects continue their long orbit around the Sun. Jupiter 'pings' the objects close to the sun, whose tidal force breaks apart pieces of the rock. That increases the rate of comets because these fragments cross the Earth's orbit and hit the planet once every 250 to 730 million years or so. 'Basically, Jupiter acts as a kind of pinball machine,' said researcher Amir Siraj 'Jupiter kicks these incoming long-period comets into orbits that bring them very close to the sun.' It's because of this that long-period comets, which take more than 200 years to orbit the sun, are called sun grazers, he said. Advertisement

The researchers say that composition evidence supports their model and that the years the objects hit support both their calculations on impact rates of Chicxulub-sized tidally disrupted comets.

If produced the same way, they say those would strike Earth once every 250,000 to 730,000 years.

Carbonaceous chondrites are rare amongst main-belt asteroids, but possibly widespread amongst long-period comets, potentially providing additional support to the cometary impact hypothesis, the team explained.

Studying other craters and those on the surface of the Moon to determine the composition of the impactors could further prove this new theory, the team said.

Space missions sampling comets, such as the current NASA Stardust mission from 2006 that passed by comet Wild 2, collecting dust samples from the coma.

There are also a number of new comet sample return missions under development at NASA as part of the New Frontiers mission.

Aside from composition of comets, the new Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile may be able to see the tidal disruption of long-period comets after it becomes operational next year.

'We should see smaller fragments coming to Earth more frequently from the Oort cloud,' Loeb said. 'I hope that we can test the theory by having more data on long-period comets, get better statistics, and perhaps see evidence for some fragments.'

Loeb said understanding this is not just crucial to solving a mystery of Earth's history but could prove pivotal if such an event were to threaten the planet again.

'It must have been an amazing sight, but we don't want to see that side,' he said.

The findings have been published in the journal Scientific Reports.
The Vodafone Ghana Music Awards (VGMA) board has lifted the ban imposed on Ghanaian artistes, Shatta Wale and Stonebwoy.



It may be recalled that the ban was after a brawl occurred between the two during the 20th Anniversary edition of the VGMA in 2019.



In a statement issued on February 12, 2021, the Board (VGMA) agreed to admit them back to the scheme, hoping that such altercations that bring the scheme into disrepute, do not occur in future events. This makes them eligible to participate in this and subsequent editions of the VGMA, If they so desire. By extension, their collaborative works with other artistes are eligible for participation in the VGMA



Meanwhile, deadline for nominations for the 22nd edition of the VGMA closes on Monday, February 15, 2021.



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Will Waldron

While many politicians seem to scorn compromise as if it were an invasive perennial, "Solar panels sought, stymied, Feb. 5, reminds us that achieving compromise, so essential to the survival of democracy, is still possible. In both communities mentioned in the story, Glenville and Clifton Park, there are solar energy projects that are underway and, in both communities, residents are having a voice.

Residents can be in favor of solar energy but still need to have some say in how solar energy is developed in their community. Should large solar developments be placed in green space set aside for parks or conservation? Or on protected wetlands?
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.

Though Taliban tactics vary from region to region, the outcomes are usually the same: increased taxation on highways, plummeting morale among the Afghan security forces with dwindling U.S. support and growing fear among those living in once-secure areas.

The Talibans aim is to force the Afghan government into complying with their terms of peace. In Qatar, Taliban leaders have demanded the release of around 7,000 more prisoners and the establishment of an interim government, two requests that Ashraf Ghani, Afghanistans president, has so far refused.

The Taliban seem to believe that applying this pressure, staging their fighters to potentially strike Kandahar and other urban centers, will pressure the U.S. to withdraw, or else, Mr. Watkins said. The strategic logic might have the opposite effect.

To prepare for a possible multipronged attack should the United States stay beyond the May 1 deadline, the Pentagon has requested additional military options  including an increase of U.S. troops or a commitment of more air support from U.S. Central Command, which oversees operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan, according to two U.S. officials. Whether these requests will be granted depends on the Biden administrations next move, which is expected to be announced in coming weeks upon completing a review of the current agreement in place with the Taliban.

The unrest has already delayed the handover of Kandahar Airfield, a sprawling American base east of the capital, to Afghan forces in recent months. For now, a small detachment of U.S. and NATO troops remain to support the struggling Afghan forces, according to a U.S. military official.

With the police force mostly in ruin, the Afghan army and commandos have moved into Kandahar, beginning operations in November to retake territory that was then retaken by the Taliban. Commando officers said their forces had been exhausted by frequent orders to fill in for their police counterparts.

In nearby Arghandab District, the site of the Talibans northern offensive on Kandahar city, army leaders and police officers say theyre severely understaffed and their pleas for support have gone unheeded by officials in Kabul.
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Copyright  2021 Albuquerque Journal

It started with a trip to Albuquerque.

In 2015, producers Lloyd and Beatriz Levin traveled to New Mexico to meet with lawyers Nancy Hollander and Theresa Duncan.

At the time, the two women were representing Mohamedou Ould Slahi  who was incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay.

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This moment was the impetus behind the film The Mauritanian. The film hit select theaters Friday. A premium video on-demand release date is expected in early March.

The film is based on Slahis bestselling memoir, Guantanamo Diary, published in 2015. It follows the imprisonment and the fight for freedom of Slahi, who was captured by the U.S. government in the West African country of Mauritania in 2001.

According to published reports, U.S. intelligence officials believed Slahi was involved with al-Qaidas European and North American operations, including the 9/11 attacks. He was imprisoned for 14 years without trial at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp beginning in 2002. The site is a U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, a U.S. outpost on the southeast coast of Cuba.

Slahi was released on Oct. 17, 2016. The movie is his account of survival against all odds as he fights for freedom and finds allies in his defense attorneys Hollander and Duncan.

The U.S. government, once they get a hold of you, they never quit. He didnt get a passport for three years, Hollander said. He won his habeas in 2010 and was ordered to be released, though he didnt get released until years later.

Oscar winner Jodie Foster portrays Hollander, Shailene Woodley plays Duncan, and Tamar Rahim portrays Slahi.

I dont know whats more exciting, Hollander said from her New York City apartment. That Jodie Foster plays me or the attention the film has been getting.

Last week, Foster picked up a Golden Globe nomination for best performance by an actress in a supporting role for her portrayal. Rahim picked up the nomination for best performance by an actor in a motion picture drama.

The film is also getting attention from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, where it is on the long list for 11 categories.

Hollander  who is a partner at Freedman Boyd Hollander Goldberg Urias & Ward in Albuquerque  hopes that the film will bring more attention to Guantanamo Bay.

Guantanamo is a huge stain on the system, Hollander said. The military commissions  they arent real courts. The Constitution doesnt apply, and they can use hearsay. There are 40 people there, and about 30 have never been charged. They should all be out, and thats not what we do in this country. You dont hold people for 15 years without charge. Thats exactly what were doing.

Hollander was involved in the screenplay from the start.

I provided the filmmakers with the transcripts of hearings, I explained the law to them and the case, and I said that I know you cant include everything, but I want you to know what really happened and then you can decide how youre going to put this into a movie,  Hollander said.

Slahi was the first detainee to publish a memoir while imprisoned.

When casting, the production reached for the stars and landed Foster, Woodley, Rahim and Benedict Cumberbatch.

Producer Adam Ackland thought getting Foster was too good to be true.

We thought about Jodie really early on, but it was a bit of a pipe dream, Ackland said. You dont actually think that someone like that is going to engage with you, but she was very open to it, and her and Kevin connected really well. She was amazing.

Leah Clarke, producer, said there was quite a lot of work to do on Hollanders character.

She is unrelenting, she is not sentimental, and she is a career fighter, Clarke said. We also felt that it was really important  for the real Nancy Hollander  to represent her accurately as this rock that essentially, over 15 years, helps Mohamedou, and still does today. It was a really tricky character to get right.

Hollander was able to visit the set a few times.  once in South Africa. When she sees the actor Rahim, there are bits of Slahi she notices.

She has also already seen the film in different iterations. And she says that while its exciting to have the world hear the story, there are some scenes she cant watch.

I cant watch the torture scenes anymore, Hollander said. I love watching the film, and I cant get enough of it. The rape scenes are awful. Theres a hallucination scene where he sees his mother. I cant watch that.

Hollander is grateful that Duncan was part of the journey as well.

Teri was right there from the beginning, Hollander said. We never saw Mohamedou together. We wanted to see him every couple months, so we staggered our trips. A lot of what we worked with was classified, and it took time to see our client.

Duncan has been practicing law since 2000, when she graduated cum laude from the University of New Mexico School of Law.

In 2003, Duncan joined the defense team for Terry Lynn Nichols, who faced the death penalty for his role in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

When she returned to New Mexico in 2004, Duncan joined the law firm of Freedman Boyd Hollander et al., eventually becoming a partner. She left the firm in 2012 to start her own practice, Duncan Earnest LLC.

Hollander hopes for change and believes the film can be a vehicle for it.

Its still happening, and I have another client there, she says. I signed the contract for the film in 2015 before Mohamedou got out. Were hoping the film will help get the other 40 out and close Guantanamo.

This is at least the second time a New Mexico lawyer has been fictionalized on the big screen.

In 1992, the Tom Cruise movie A Few Good Men was said to be based on David C. Iglesias, a Navy lawyer at the time. He later became the United States attorney in New Mexico. In 2006, President George W. Bush made headlines when he took the unprecedented step of firing eight U.S. attorneys, including Iglesias.
Liberal MP Andrew Laming has hit out at the federal governments new efforts to reverse entrenched Indigenous disadvantage, warning the gap will never be closed unless community leaders are empowered to lead the way.

The Coalition backbencher used the 13th anniversary of former prime minister Kevin Rudds apology to the stolen generations to tell Federal Parliament Indigenous communities were being corroded from beneath by government welfare payments that had been imposed as a Western model.

Liberal MP Andrew Laming has hit out at new targets designed to help close the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

He said the new national agreement on Closing the Gap was doomed unless the nation was prepared to ask itself the hard questions on how it could turn around troubling education, unemployment and incarceration levels.

After more than a decade of failure and backwards steps, federal and state governments agreed in 2019 to the first Indigenous-led reform of the Closing the Gap socio-economic targets, increasing them from seven to 16.
Irish exports were valued at 160bn last year, the highest level ever recorded, according to figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO).

Total exports were up 5pc when compared to 2019, despite a slowdown in economic conditions across the world due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The performance was driven by the medical and pharmaceutical sectors, with these goods accounting for almost 40pc of all Irish exports.

Exports from the medical and pharmaceutical sectors increased 25pc or by 12.5bn in 2020 to 62bn.

Organic chemicals were the next biggest area, with 31bn of exports last year.

Food and live animal exports, when combined, totalled 11.5bn in 2020, a reduction of 266m on 2019.

Imports in 2020 decreased compared to 2019, falling by 5.5bn (6pc) to 85.3bn, according to the CSO.

Imports of other transport equipment, including aircraft were valued at 12.7bn last year, or 15pc of total imports. This was a decrease of 8.7bn (41pc) on the 2019 level of imports.

Imports of petroleum decreased by 1.7bn (down 40pc) in 2020 to 2.6bn.

Last year exports to Britain fell by 9pc to 12.4bn. Overall, exports to Britain accounted for 8pc of Irelands total exports in 2020.

Meanwhile, imports from Britain were down 5pc year-on-year, falling to 17.8bn.

Goods from Britain accounted for 21pc of total imports in 2020.

The European Union accounted for 40pc of Irelands total exports in 2020, an increase of 13pc on 2019.

Of the EU 27, Belgium and Germany were the most popular destinations for Irish exports last year.

There were 30.3bn of imports from the EU in 2020, representing 36pc of total imports, according to the CSO. This was a decrease of 9pc on 2019.

Looking beyond the EU and UK, exports to other countries were valued at 82bn last year, up 3pc on the 2019 level of exports. From this, United States was the largest export destination in 2020, accounting for 49.8bn, or 31pc of total exports.

Taking just the month of December, the value of seasonally adjusted goods exports decreased by 2bn to 12.5bn compared to November 2020.

There were 4.8bn exports to the EU in December, of which 1.6bn went to Germany and 1.1bn went to Belgium. Overall, exports to EU countries in December increased by 680m, or 16pc, compared the corresponding period in 2019.

The United States was the main non-EU destination accounting for 3.6bn, or 31pc, of total exports in December.
On any given night more than 40,000 American military veterans are forced to live on the streets. Veterans lived their lives in the service of others, and it is only just that we provide them with the most assistance possible. We are here to make things possible for veterans and help them live a more fulfilling life.

On any given night more than 40,000 American military veterans are forced to live on the streets. Homelessness among veterans is at a crisis level with more than 1.4 million service men and women exposed to chronic homelessness. The situation has become a stain on the nation and an insult to those who defended The United States through generations of conflict. The homeless veteran problem is huge, said Nick Saifan,a 24-year-Navy/Army veteran and Chairman of Vendaval Corporation. We cant build affordable housing centers fast enough to handle the need.

The homeless crisis did not happen overnight. It grew as the numbers of vets suffering from PTSD, alcoholism, isolation, divorce and desperation exploded over the past several years. The current economic crisis, a global pandemic, and a lack of affordable homes has given veterans few options and little hope.

Demographics of Homeless Veterans



11% of the homeless adult population are veterans

20% of the male homeless population are veterans

68% reside in principal cities

32% reside in suburban/rural areas

51% of individual homeless veterans have disabilities(1)

The Veterans Administration does what it can, but the problem is too large for government alone. Public officials and homeless advocates agree that an extreme shortage of affordable housing, livable income and access to health care contribute to the growing crisis. Caring communities, non-profit organizations and volunteers are needed to stand up for those who fought for our freedoms.

A report from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs(2) supports the need for change, especially in the area of affordable housing.

Saifan, a fierce advocate for homeless veterans, senior citizens, and working families, has a vision to end the crisis. He plans to build a multi-use development in Moreno Valley, CA. It will be a sanctuary for peoplemainly veteransin need of housing assistance. The development will help veterans and independent-living seniors find jobs, homes, facilities, training, access to programs, mentoring and a sense of place all in one location. It will also be a huge job creator for the residents of Moreno Valley and Riverside County.

The Moreno Valley project will put many veteran-friendly programs under one roof, including:

Veteran Programs, including counseling and mentoring;

Job-Placement Assistance;

Transportation to Medical Appointments;

On the job training.

Saifan asks the community to support the Moreno Valley plan as it is long past time for communities across the nation to stand up for these underserved populations. Other pro-active moves include:

Determine the need in your community. Visit with homeless veteran service providers.

Involve others. If you are not already part of an organization, align yourself with a few other people who are interested in attacking this issue.

Donate to your local homeless veteran service provider.

Contact your elected officials. Discuss what is being done in your community for homeless veterans.

The growing tragedy of homeless veterans will not vanish overnight. It will take a coordinated effort from advocates, government leaders, non-profit organizations and every-day citizens. Its a battle that can be won, and its a fight veterans deserve.

Veterans lived their lives in the service of others, and it is only just that we provide them with the most assistance possible, Saifan said. We are here to make things possible for veterans and help them live a more fulfilling life.

About Vendaval Corporation

Nick Saifan served in the U.S. military for 24 years, including time stationed in Riverside County, CA. He experienced firsthand the difficulties of transitioning from military life to civilian life and, as a co-founder of a community-based nonprofit, he watched the difficulty in getting donations increasing year by year. Today, hes putting his business savvy where his heart is. He sees a community that, like many, has struggled to evolve with a changing employment picture in the region. Today Vendaval Corporation visualizes a sustainable business structure creating the opportunity for helping those in need with successful community-based programs. The differentiator in the communities he visualizes is self-sufficient affordable housing in a mixed-use development that offers on-site programs for veterans, youth, education, childcare, on-the-job training, and job placement. These programs begin even before ground is broken. Rounding out the community are retail outlets such as bakeries/coffee shops, dry cleaning shops, a paid-membership fitness center, and financial institution. For more information visit http://www.vendavalcorp.com/

1. National Coalition for Homeless Veterans; nchv.org/index.php/news/media/background_and_statistics/#demo

2 U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs; va.gov/homeless/docs/FS-10Ways062916.pdf
A BREAKTHROUGH has been made by the Consular Agency of France and the Civic Trust in their bid to locate Patrick Sarsifelds remains.

The Sarsfield Homecoming Project was launched last October by the organisers of the Limerick Bastille Day Wild Geese festival with the aim of locating and repatriating the remains of one of the citys most famous figures.

To this end, Dr Loic Guyon, the honorary consul of France in Limerick wrote to the Mayor of Huy, the city in Belgium where its believed Sarsfield is buried, to seek his assistance in trying to locate the ancient burial ground where the iconic figure is believed to be laid to rest.

Sarsfield was wounded in the service of France at the Battle of Neerwinden, now in Belgium, and historians believe he is interred at St Martins Church in Huy. Nothing but a wall is left of that church nowadays, and the exact location of his grave was unknown up to now.

However, Huy City Council has replied to Dr Guyon with 28 documents, including an 18th century map of the area, and references to the exact location of the graves of two French officers who, according to some records, were buried in the church around the same time as Patrick Sarsfield.

Some big news in our quest to find the remains of Patrick Sarsfield! Check out @LimerickWild for more!



Could my wonderful followers please give a boost to the festivals account by following it too and by retweeting the below announcement? We need the world to know! https://t.co/9J0Ix2l04o February 15, 2021

Dr Guyon said: Given the date when these two French officers were buried, one of them could well be Patrick Sarsfield himself. And even if it is not the case, it is almost certain Sarsfield would have been burned next to them. Thanks to the documents sent by the Huy City Council, and after some further research, we will therefore not only be able to determine the precise location of the burial grounds of St Martins Church, but we will also be able to pinpoint the exact area within the church where Patrick Sarsfield was most certainly buried.

David OBrien, chief executive of Limerick Civic Trust added: This is a European endeavour involving Ireland, France and Belgium, and who knows if the trail will stop there or where it might lead us? Its such an honour to be part of such a quest.

Next, the Civic Trust and the Consul will scope out the location, and gather funding in order to appoint a team of archeologists before bidding to access the site.
WINFIELD, Kan., Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Kansas Distribution Alliance is proud to announce that regional distributor Clock Medical Supply, Inc. has joined as one of its "Founding Five" members. As an industry leader, Clock Medical Supply will play a vital role in the Alliance's mission of strengthening the distribution industry labor base to provide good jobs for Kansans and contribute to a thriving Kansas economy.

Headquartered in Winfield, Kansas, family-owned Clock Medical Supply serves the post-acute care market in six states. As a Medicare and Medicaid Participating Provider of thousands of medical supply products, they understand the value of skilled, knowledgeable and well-trained associates to solve problems and deliver solutions for their customers. Customers rely on them for their expertise and for fast, on-time delivery of needed supplies. Staff must also continually adapt to new regulations and changes in the medical industry.

"Clock Medical Supply joined the Kansas Distribution Alliance to promote the growth of our family-owned, Kansas-based distribution company through the acquisition of talent that comes to our company prepared to meet the upcoming challenges," said Dennis Clock, Owner of Clock Medical Supply.

As a founding member of the Kansas Distribution Alliance, Clock Medical Supply is essential to the support of the Keep Kansas Running Campaign, an initiative to increase the number of qualified candidates in distribution careers. Keep Kansas Running encourages traditional and non-traditional students to pursue distribution careers through the Pratt Community College Modern Distribution Sales and Management (MDSM) programthe first distribution degree of its kind in Kansas.

As a supporting business, Clock Medical Supply helps MDSM students gain the hands-on experience and transferable skills they need by providing internship opportunities, field trips and guest speakers.

"We believe the MDSM program will be part of our plans and we look forward to working with interns and graduates of the program to keep talented people employed here in our home state and wherever else we decide to grow," said Clock.

"Keep Kansas Running helps students become highly sought-after candidates in an industry filled with opportunity and well-paying careers," said Jenny Egging, Program Coordinator of MDSM at Pratt Community College. "Clock Medical Supply's support is integral to the success of our students and we could not be more thankful for their involvement."

About The Kansas Distribution Alliance

The Kansas Distribution Alliance is made up of leaders who are invested in the success of the distribution industry and strengthening their employee base. Their Keep Kansas Running Campaign is an effort to increase the number of qualified hires who enter the workforce through the Pratt Community College Modern Distribution and Sales Management (MDSM) program. This one-of-a-kind program equips students with the skills, education and hands-on experience to prepare them for success in the distribution industry.

Businesses and students interested in learning more about the Distribution Alliance and MDSM program should visit https://keepkansasrunning.com/

About Clock Medical Supply, Inc.

Solving Problems. Delivering Solutions.

Headquartered in Winfield, Kansas, family-owned Clock Medical Supply is a strong regional distributor serving the post-acute care market in Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa and Nebraska. With over 2,800 products in stock and thousands more available, they provide expert knowledge, reliable solutions and fast, timely delivery.

Clock Medical Supply was established in 1981 and has grown and adapted over the years to meet the changing needs of the post-acute market. They are a Medicare and Medicaid Participating Provider offering a multi-insurance billing system, a top-tier interactive web-based ordering system, a Resident Care program and more.

Learn more at https://www.clockmedical.com/

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Robert Nichols is the state senator for Senate District 3. First elected in 2006, Nichols represents 19 counties, including much of East Texas and part of Montgomery County. He can be reached at 699-4988 or toll-free at (800) 959-8633. His email address is robert.nichols@senate.state.tx.us.
tech2 News Staff

Samsung is hosting a launch event in India today to announce a new F-series smartphone  Galaxy F62. The launch event will be live streamed on Flipkart at 12 pm today. Flipkart has a microsite dedicated to the launch event, and has a 'Notify Me' button which users can click to be notified in advance for the launch event. This also makes it clear that the Galaxy F62 will be on sale exclusively on Flipkart, however, as of now we don't know when the smartphone will go on sale.

Galaxy F62 is Samsungs second F-series smartphone, after the Galaxy F41 that was launched in 2020.

Samsung Galaxy F62: What we know so far

Ahead of the launch, we already know that the Samsung galaxy F62 will be fuelled by a massive 7,000 mAh battery. The smartphone has also been confirmed to run on a 7 nm Exynos 9825 chipset, along with Mali G76 GPU. The microsite for the smartphone on Flipkart also reveals that the Galaxy F62 will feature an sAMOLED+ display with a punch-hole selfie camera.

The Samsung Galaxy F62 is expected to be priced between Rs 20,000 to Rs 25,000.

Samsung has also confirmed that the Galaxy F62 will sport a 64 MP quad-camera setup.

Some reports also suggest that the smartphone will sport a 32 MP selfie camera. The phone will run on Android 11-based One UI 3.1 out of the box, backed with 6 GB of RAM with 128 GB storage. The phone is likely to come with 25 W charging support.
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Coronavirus infection rates have tripled or more in 0.6 per cent of council wards across England, with a six-fold surge in one village in East Yorkshire mystifying its residents.

South Cave, a village 13 miles (21km) west of Hull and home to 5,000 people, saw its infection rate surge from 123 cases per 100,000 people in the week to February 2 to 750 by February 9. During the latest week 55 people there tested positive for the virus in just seven days. Residents told local news website Hull Live they were 'gobsmacked' that cases had shot up.

Nationally, the same weekly data shows 21.3 per cent of almost 6,500 council wards saw their positive test rates rise between February 2 and 9, despite England's lockdown still being in full force. Forty-two of these saw Covid infections triple.

The small areas  which are home to around 8,000 people each, on average  with the highest infection rates were in Rutland, Dorset, Staffordshire, Knowsley, Bedford, Walsall, Fenland, Doncaster and Liverpool, as well as South Cave.

But looking at larger borough areas, of which there are 315 across all of England, analysis shows that cases have come down in 95 per cent of authorities.

And hospital data is promising, too, with the number of inpatients with Covid-19 now at half of its January peak in England  with 17,694 down from 34,336  and patient numbers down 41 per cent UK-wide.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said today that there is still 'some way to go' in ending the second wave of Covid in the UK but said there was hope jabs would stop the virus spreading. Boris Johnson will lay out his roadmap out of lockdown next Monday.

Boris Johnson says he wants to make 'cautious but irreversible' changes with roadmap to freedom due next Monday Boris Johnson today insisted he wants the UK to make 'cautious but irreversible' progress when lockdown starts to be lifted as he prepares to unveil his exit strategy on Monday next week. The Prime Minister, who will hold a Downing Street press conference at 5pm, said the roadmap out of lockdown will include specific target dates for reopening different sectors of the economy and society. But he stressed dates will be when the Government aims 'to do something at the earliest' and if there is a spike in infection rates ministers 'won't hesitate' to delay the reopening. His comments came as scientific experts said they 'confidently expect' the current national shutdown to be the last one - as long as a new vaccine-busting variant is not discovered. Earlier, Matt Hancock hailed a 'little step towards freedom for us all' after the Government hit its 15million vaccinations target as he slapped down Tory demands to lift all lockdown rules by the end of April. The Health Secretary said 'there is a long way to go' before life can return to normal and while coronavirus cases are falling 'sharply' the number of people in hospital with the disease is still 'too high'. He also said it is 'too early to say' whether the falling number of deaths is 'directly due' to the vaccine roll-out. Mr Hancock's comments represent a firm rebuke to the Covid Recovery Group of Conservative MPs which has demanded Mr Johnson remove all legal restrictions in England by the start of May. Ministers are said to be discussing plans to allow shops to re-open, families to be re-united and self-catering staycations to be given the go ahead if Covid-19 infection rates continue to plummet. Plans to ease lockdown were boosted yesterday by figures showing the dramatic impact vaccines are already having as Mr Johnson last night confirmed the country had hit its target of vaccinating the 15million most vulnerable people two days ahead of schedule. Mr Hancock described hitting the target as an 'emotional moment because it is the moment that protects us and also it is just a little step towards freedom for us all'. The PM said the number of new cases has already dropped 'very considerably' preparing the way for lockdown measures to be relaxed. It is thought that this could mean the re-opening of High Street shops within weeks as well as the easing of restrictions on outdoor exercise and socialising. Ministers are also said to be considering plans to allow for families of a single household to travel across the UK for an Easter holiday in self-catered accommodation. It has led to growing hope that families will be able to meet outside by Easter as early as next month to allow grandchildren to reunite with their grandparents. Advertisement

In other coronavirus developments today:

Boris Johnson insisted he wants the UK to make 'cautious but irreversible' progress when lockdown starts to be lifted as he prepares to unveil his exit strategy on Monday next week;

Air passengers arriving in London criticised Number 10's 'ridiculous' hotel quarantine rules as they started ten days of isolation despite mixing with dozens of travellers not from nations on the 'red list';

The PM promised Brits will not need to carry a 'vaccine passport' to go to the pub when the country eventually escapes lockdown  but conceded that some form of proof of vaccination will likely be needed to get international travel back up and running in the future;

The scientist who led the WHO's Covid fact-finding mission to Wuhan revealed the first evidence that the virus was circulating widely in China before Beijing alerted the world to its existence;

Britain's coronavirus vaccine postcode lottery was laid bare today after a number of celebrities revealed they have already been given their first dose, including US singer Courtney Love who today thanked the NHS after getting jabbed.

Granular local data show positive test rates increased in 1,453 out of 6,791 wards known as middle super output areas, each of which generally has a population of between 5,000 and 20,000 people.

In 42 of these areas in England, the week-on-week increase in cases between February 2 and February 9 was 200 per cent or more  meaning that the number of people testing positive tripled.

In Northallerton South and Leeming Bar, in North Yorkshire, the rate rose seven-fold, with 21 new cases  this was the only area to see a bigger increase than South Cave, Newbald and Little Weighton.

The South Cave area now has the fifth highest MSOA infection rate in the country, according to data published by the Department of Health.

During the latest week 55 people  more than one per cent of the population there  tested positive for the virus in just seven days.

Locals told the Hull Daily Mail that they had no idea what caused the spike in cases, saying it doesn't have a 'large industry' that an outbreak could be traced back to.

However, HMP Humber is located nearby. But the Department of Health's interactive map appears to show the prison falls in the next MSOA and isn't in the South Cave reporting area.

The rural authority had by far the biggest spike in infections in all of the East Riding of Yorkshire in that week with cases up 511 per cent, more than double the second biggest rise of 225 per cent. 15 out of 42 wards in the area saw cases rise.

Only one of the tiny council wards in England had an infection rate higher than one per cent in the week ending February 9, which was Market Overton, Cottesmore and Empingham in Rutland, East Midlands, with a rate of 1,201.

Rutland's outbreak  which has made it the UK's Covid hotspot  was driven by a cluster of cases in the local prison.

Others rounding out the top 10 all had infection rates higher than 650 positive tests per 100,000 people  0.6 per cent of the population within a week.

They were Underhill and the Grove in Dorset (861); Featherstone West, Coven and Shareshill in Staffordshire (844); Kirkby South East in Knowsley (761); Harpur in Bedford (742); Leamore in Walsall (714); Wisbech North in Fenland (686); Hatfield East in Doncaster (680) and Fazakerley South in Liverpool (656).

The areas are evenly distributed across the country, with two each in the North West, North East, Midlands and East of England, and one in the South West, but none in the South East or London.

A bigger-picture analysis of infection rates found that, across England, cases came down in 95 per cent of the 315 local authority areas  these are larger than middle super output areas and envelop them.

Just 12 areas saw their positive test rates increase, while the numbers fell in 301 places. Two did not rise or fall in the week to February 10.

Academy chief casts doubt on 'optimistic' plans to get all pupils back into school at the start of March An academy chief today cast doubt on 'optimistic' plans to get all pupils back into school at the start of March as he warned dates were 'being pulled out of thin air.' As the PM faces mounting pressure to send children in England back to school, Downing Street has suggested that all primary and secondary children can return to classrooms three weeks today. But Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, described Number 10's plan as 'impossible'. He suggested ministers take a 'regional approach' by vaccinating all staff before sending pupils back. He also warned schools needed to create more space including having marquees in playgrounds, to avoid children being 'like sardines in a can'. Mr Chalke is the founder of the Oasis Trust, which runs 53 schools around the country. He warned against the chaotic scenes last September, when all children were sent back after the summer break, 'like sardines into a can.' He told BBC Radio 4 Today's programme: 'We're optimistic because the vaccine seems to be working, we all want to get children back...because we know all children will learn better with their peers in a classroom than at home online or whatever. 'But optimism can be born of two things  dreams and hopes or planning and preparation. 'What we don't need is a false start. It's one thing to open schools - it's another thing to keep them open.' Advertisement

The highest case rate was in Rutland, with 280 new cases recorded in the seven days to February 10  which equated to a rate of 405.7 cases per 100,000 people. This was up 50 per cent on the previous week. It was followed by neighbouring Corby.

The highest week-on-week increase for these bigger areas was in Copeland, Cumbria, where the rate rose from 178 cases per 100,000 to 238, with 162 new positive tests.

Calderdale in West Yorkshire had the second highest rise, up from 164 to 207, with 438 new cases.

Newark and Sherwood in Nottinghamshire had the third highest, up from 213 to 248, with 304 new cases.

Nationally, the number of people testing positive for coronavirus has plummeted in recent weeks.

NHS Test & Trace figures show that 92,399 people were diagnosed with the virus across the UK last week, down from 128,504 the week before. This was a decline of 28 per cent in a week.

And it was significantly lower than the 400,640 people who tested positive in the first week of January while the second wave was at its peak.

It comes after the PM today insisted he wants the UK to make 'cautious but irreversible' progress when lockdown starts to be lifted as he prepares to unveil his exit strategy on Monday next week.

The Prime Minister, who will hold a Downing Street press conference at 5pm, said the roadmap out of lockdown will include specific target dates for reopening different sectors of the economy and society.

But he stressed dates will be when the Government aims 'to do something at the earliest' and if there is a spike in infection rates ministers 'won't hesitate' to delay the reopening.

His comments came as scientific experts said they 'confidently expect' the current national shutdown to be the last one - as long as a new vaccine-busting variant is not discovered.

Earlier, Matt Hancock hailed a 'little step towards freedom for us all' after the Government hit its 15million vaccinations target as he slapped down Tory demands to lift all lockdown rules by the end of April.

The Health Secretary said 'there is a long way to go' before life can return to normal and while coronavirus cases are falling 'sharply' the number of people in hospital with the disease is still 'too high'.

He also said it is 'too early to say' whether the falling number of deaths is 'directly due' to the vaccine roll-out.

Mr Hancock's comments represent a firm rebuke to the Covid Recovery Group of Conservative MPs which has demanded Mr Johnson remove all legal restrictions in England by the start of May.

Ministers are said to be discussing plans to allow shops to re-open, families to be re-united and self-catering staycations to be given the go ahead if Covid-19 infection rates continue to plummet.

Plans to ease lockdown were boosted yesterday by figures showing the dramatic impact vaccines are already having as Mr Johnson last night confirmed the country had hit its target of vaccinating the 15million most vulnerable people two days ahead of schedule.

Mr Hancock described hitting the target as an 'emotional moment because it is the moment that protects us and also it is just a little step towards freedom for us all'.

The PM said the number of new cases has already dropped 'very considerably' preparing the way for lockdown measures to be relaxed.

It is thought that this could mean the re-opening of High Street shops within weeks as well as the easing of restrictions on outdoor exercise and socialising.

Ministers are also said to be considering plans to allow for families of a single household to travel across the UK for an Easter holiday in self-catered accommodation.

It has led to growing hope that families will be able to meet outside by Easter as early as next month to allow grandchildren to reunite with their grandparents.

How WILL lockdown be lifted? Schools will open first on March 8, followed by outdoor sports including golf and tennis and picnics with friends in the park - and grandparents could see grandchildren BEFORE Easter (with UK minibreaks 'back on by April')

Britons could be out and about playing golf and tennis and enjoying time in the park with friends and family within weeks under plans being drawn up to ease the lockdown.

Boris Johnson this morning pledged a 'cautious but irreversible' approach to easing restrictions that have been in place since the new year.

The Prime Minister is due to unveil a 'roadmap' out of lockdown on February 22 that is expected to confirm at least some children will return to school on March 8.

But he and ministers are refusing to reveal and other firm dates - and have warned that any they do announce will be the 'earliest' measures could be lifted - reserving the right to push the lifting back if there are any new spikes in Covid cases.

However reports suggest that some of the more gruelling social aspects of the lockdown - like preventing grandparents from seeing grandchildren and barring people from enjoying outdoor spaces unless exercising - could be among the first to be lifted.

Non-essential shops could also lift their shutters March.

There are even suggestions that domestic holidays could return in time for Easter - but limited to family bubbles staying in self-catering accommodation.

Pubs and restaurants are also expected to open in April - initially to serve people outdoors.

Plans to ease lockdown were boosted yesterday by figures showing the dramatic impact vaccines are already having as Mr Johnson last night confirmed the country had hit its target of 15 million vaccinations ahead of schedule.

The Prime Minister said the number of new cases has already dropped 'very considerably' preparing the way for lockdown measures to be relaxed.

Here is how the lockdown lifting could pan out:

Boris Johnson this morning pledged a 'cautious but irreversible' approach to easing restrictions that have been in place since the new year.

February 22: Boris Johnson unveils his roadmap

Mr Johnson will unveil his lockdown-easing roadmap to MPs and the nation on Monday.

But after a year of anti-coronavirus measures that have been marked by often misplaced optimism and criticism over doing too little, too late, the Prime Minister today stressed the need to be 'very prudent', while lockdown-sceptical Tory MPs pressure for a swift reopening.

'No decisions have been taken on that sort of detail (dates) yet, though clearly schools on March 8 has for a long time been a priority of the Government and of families up and down the country,' Mr Johnson told reporters during a visit to Orpington Health and Wellbeing Centre in south-east London.

He added that 'we will do everything we can to make that happen', but cautioned that infection rates are still 'comparatively high' and Covid-19 patients in the NHS remain higher than the April peak.

'So we've got to be very prudent and what we wanted to see is progress that is cautious but irreversible and I think that's what the public and people up and down the country will want to see,' Mr Johnson added.

March 8: Children return to school

The only firm date so far in the PM's lockdown diary is March 8, when children will return to school for face-to-face lessons for the first time since January.

Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, described Number 10's plan as 'impossible'

What are the UK priority groups for vaccinations? 1. Residents in a care home for older adults and staff working in care homes for older adults 2. All those 80 years of age and over and frontline health and social care workers 3. All those 75 years of age and over 4. All those 70 years of age and over and clinically extremely vulnerable individuals (not including pregnant women and those under 16 years of age) 5. All those 65 years of age and over 6. Adults aged 16 to 65 years in an at-risk group 7. All those 60 years of age and over 8. All those 55 years of age and over 9. All those 50 years of age and over 10. Rest of the population Advertisement

The only firm date so far in the PM's lockdown diary is March 8, when children will return to school for face-to-face lessons for the first time since January.

The remaining question is over how many children will go back straight away. Reports have suggested that a staggered approach may be taken, with secondary schools going back a week later than primaries.

Mr Johnson said today that no decisions have been made on whether year groups across schools in England will return together or whether primaries and secondaries could be staggered.

An academy chief today cast doubt on the 'optimistic' plans as he warned dates were 'being pulled out of thin air.'

Steve Chalke, the head of the Oasis Academies Trust, described Number 10's plan as 'impossible'.

He suggested ministers take a 'regional approach' by vaccinating all staff before sending pupils back.

He also warned schools needed to create more space including having marquees in playgrounds, to avoid children being 'like sardines in a can'.

Professor Neil Ferguson, who advises the Government as part of the New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group (Nervtag), said modelling suggests 'there probably is leeway to reopen all schools' from March 8 but acknowledged there will be 'slightly more of a risk' in a rise in cases than if just primary schools were reopened.

Professor Gabriel Scally, president of the epidemiology and public health section at the Royal Society of Medicine and a member of Independent Sage, said schools must be made safe before reopening.

He told Good Morning Britain: 'By taking on extra space, by improving ventilation, by extending mask-wearing in schools - all of these things will help.'

Early March: Outdoor rules loosened, return of golf and tennis

After the schools are reopened, some of the social measures in place in the lockdown are likely to be among the first to be lifted.

Exercise is the only regular reason people in England have been allowed to leave home, but this rule is likely to be among the first to be relaxed to bring respite to people cooped up at home, especially without a garden.

People are expected to be allowed to meet friends and family outdoors on a one-to-one basis - with social distancing - and in a boost for families this two-person total may not include children.

A Government source also told The Telegraph: 'If grandparents had had the vaccine, that would be likely to be okay.

'Given that people will have immunity, that would be a fair assumption, but nothing has been decided.'

Mr Johnson also wants to bring back the rule of six for outdoor gatherings, which would allow families to meet in groups for walks or picnics.

The rules could also allow for the resumption of outdoor individual sports and those where competitors do not come into close contact with each other. Golf and Tennis have both been banned during the lockdown but could be among the first to resume.

Late March: non-essential shops

Plans to ease lockdown were boosted yesterday by figures showing the dramatic impact vaccines are already having (packed high street pictured during December last year before the latest lockdown was imposed)

High Street shops will be allowed to reopen within weeks if Covid infection rates keep dropping.

High Street shops will be allowed to reopen within weeks if Covid infection rates keep dropping.

Government sources expect this will happen towards the end of March, or the beginning of April at the latest.

Rishi Sunak's furlough scheme and other job-prevention measures were extended late last year to cover the period up to the end of April. But firms will be able to access emergency loans only until the end of March.

Any reopening before would act as a welcome economic stimulus and ease - if only a little - the massive level of public spending during the pandemic.

Easter: Pubs could reopen, self-catering holidays allowed

Ministers are said to be considering plans to allow hospitality firms to serve customers outside by Easter, which falls on the weekend of April 2.

But a full reopening which service and seating inside pubs as well is not expected until May at the earliest.

Wetherspoon boss Tim Martin today warned that the industry is 'on its knees' and must reopen to save jobs.

Aditionally, Mitchells & Butlers, which owns All Bar One, Toby Carvery and Harvester said it will raise 350million from its largest investors to shore up its finances.

M&B, which is Britain's largest listed pub company, operates around 1,700 restaurants and pubs across the UK but cut about 1,300 jobs last year.

The developments follow a bust-up between pub groups and the Government which has seen companies pull out of regular business roundtables in frustration.

The head of industry body UK Hospitality warned today said there will need to be more support for businesses if restrictions continue.

Kate Nicholls said that flexible furlough and grants would need to be extended past March 31 cut-off without some way of opening to make money.

It is thought that due to the vaccine rollout success ministers are currently looking at plans that would allow families that live in the same household to go away for self-catered staycations as soon as the Easter holidays (Cornwall pictured)

She told Good Morning Britain: 'If we are to stay closed or severely restricted for much longer then we are going to need to have additional government support over and above that (which has been provided to date). Flexible furlough and grants going on beyond March 31 so that our businesses can survive.'

Ms Nicholls called for a 'very clear phased exit strategy from the lockdown and then from the restrictions that the hospitality sector is facing'.

She said: 'Even if we open up under lockdown, we're opening up under very strict restrictions that meant we didn't break even last year when we were trading from July, so we can be confident that we can be safe when we reopen and when the time is right.

'We need to see not just that initial date but the phasing out of those restrictions linked to the rollout of the vaccine.'

In a recent letter to Mr Johnson, chief executive of pub giant Young's, Patrick Dardis, said: "There is no reason why pubs cannot open in April, giving people back their liberty and their much-loved pub."

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's World At One on Monday, Mr Dardis described reports of allowing pubs to serve customers outside only as "a nonsense" and "just a lockdown in another name".

But Dr Bharat Pankhania, senior clinical lecturer at the University of Exeter medical school, said talking about pubs reopening in April is "premature" and pub bosses need to realise there is a danger of going "back to square one".

Mr Johnson today promised Britons will not need to carry a 'vaccine passport' to go to the pub. He shot down growing reports the controversial scheme is being looked at as a tactic to keep the economy open when restrictions are finally lifted.

But Mr Johnson conceded that some form of proof of vaccination will likely be needed to get international travel back up and running in the future.

'I think inevitably there will be great interest in ideas like can you show that you had a vaccination against Covid in the way that you sometimes have to show you have had a vaccination against Yellow Fever or other diseases in order to travel somewhere,' he said.

'I think that is going to be very much in the mix down the road, I think that is going to happen. What I don't think we will have in this country is - as it were - vaccination passports to allow you to go to, say, the pub or something like that.'

It is thought that due to the vaccine rollout success ministers are currently looking at plans that would allow families that live in the same household to go away for self-catered staycations as soon as the Easter holidays.

This has raised fears that letting people travel long distances to their destinations could lead to 'big movements' across the UK - potentially leading to a spike in coronavirus cases once again.

The Save Future Travel Coalition, made up of 12 leading travel trade organisations, has said it is vital that the Government works with the industry to develop a road map to reopen travel.

The coalition warns that the industry cannot afford to wait until everyone in the UK is vaccinated before people start to travel again, otherwise insolvencies and redundancies will be inevitable.

The industry argues that a risk-based approach to travel, including a co-ordinated approach to vaccine certificates and use of passenger testing will be critical in opening up the overseas travel market.

Last week Downing Street said the Government is doing 'everything we can to make sure people can have a holiday this summer' but Mr Johnson and other ministers have repeatedly cautioned that it is too early to be certain about what people will be able to do regarding holidays.

May: Weddings?

A group of senior Tory MPs has demanded Boris Johnson allow Covid-safe weddings to resume from March 8 and unrestricted ceremonies from May 1.

Some 13 Conservative backbenchers, including 1922 Committee chairman Sir Graham Brady, have backed the What About Weddings campaign.

The group is pushing for the Prime Minister to include the moves in his lockdown exit plan which he is due to unveil next week.

Philip Davies and Esther McVey, who got married last September, are among 13 Tory MPs who have backed the What About Weddings campaign

The MPs want Mr Johnson to deliver some hope to the hundreds of thousands of people who are waiting to get married and who have seen their plans ruined by lockdown.

The group is being led by Tory MPs Esther McVey and Philip Davies who got married last September.

Current lockdown rules state that people should 'only consider booking a wedding or civil partnership (or continuing with one that is already booked) in exceptional circumstances', for example in cases of terminal illness or life changing surgery.

The What About Weddings campaign represents 400,000 people who work in the 14.7billion UK wedding industry and the estimated half a million couples waiting for restrictions to be lifted so they can get married.
Information about the characteristics of variants of the COVID-19 disease is rapidly emerging. Scientists are working to learn more about how easily they spread, whether they could cause more severe illness and whether authorised vaccines will protect people against them.



Viruses constantly change through mutation, and new variants emerge with time. Sometimes the new variants emerge and disappear.



At other times, they emerge and persist. Multiple variants of the virus that causes COVID-19 have been documented in the United States and other developed countries.



Changes



The virus that causes COVID-19 is a type of coronavirus, a large family of viruses. Coronaviruses are named for the crown-like spikes on their surfaces.



Scientists monitor changes in the virus, including changes to the spikes on the surface of the virus.



These studies, including genetic analyses of the virus, are helping scientists understand how changes might affect the spread and what happens to people when infected.



The United Kingdom (UK) identified a variant called B.1.1.7 with a large number of mutations in the fall of 2020.



This variant spreads more easily and quickly than other variants. In January 2021, experts in the UK reported that this variant might be associated with an increased risk of death compared to other variant viruses, but more studies were needed to confirm that finding.



It has since been detected in many countries around the world. This variant was first detected in the US at the end of December 2020.



In South Africa, another variant called B.1.351 emerged. Originally detected in early October 2020, B.1.351 shares some mutations with B.1.1.7.



Cases caused by this variant were reported in the US at the end of January 2021. On February 12, 2021, the CDC reported that that particular variant was 70 times more easily transmissible and more vicious than the previous one.



Its mechanism of attack and points of entry into the body were beyond human understanding. Does it enter only through the nose, mouth and eyes?



Or is there another possible route of transmission through the skin? Scientists all around the world are still debating and learning since this virus is quite new.



Danger



The danger, however, is that the more easily they spread among the population, the more easily they undergo mutation, giving rise to more virulent strains.



This South African variant is alleged to outsmart our immune system, rendering it useless to defend the human body.



It survives under all weather conditions. All new vaccines produced by Moderna, Pfizer, Russian Sputnik, China and Astra Zeneca seem not to work against it.



Johnson and Johnson vaccine is still being monitored to see if it has any efficacy against this variant.



In Brazil, a variant called P.1 emerged that was first identified in travellers from Brazil who were tested during routine screening at an airport in Japan in early January. This variant contains a set of additional mutations that may affect its ability to be recognised by antibodies. This variant was first detected in the US at the end of January 2021.



These variants seem to spread more easily and quickly than other variants, which may lead to more cases of COVID-19. An increase in the number of cases will put more strain on healthcare resources, lead to more hospitalisations and potentially more deaths.



So far, studies suggest that antibodies generated through vaccination with currently authorised vaccines recognise these variants. This is being closely investigated and more studies are underway.



Rigorous and increased compliance with public health mitigation strategies such as vaccination, physical distancing, use of masks, hand hygiene, isolation and quarantine is essential to limit the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19 and protect public health.



What we do not know



More studies are needed to understand:



How widely these new variants have spread; and how these variants may affect existing therapies, vaccines and tests.



The Centre for Disease Control (CDC), in collaboration with other public health agencies, is monitoring the situation closely.



CDC is working to monitor the spread of identified variants, characterise emerging viral variants and expand its ability to find new SARS-CoV-2 variants.



The CDC is collaborating with Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on whether disinfectants on the EPAs list can inactivate these variants.



The writer is a pharmacognosist, Chief Medical Officer and CEO of the Medi Moses Group of Companies









Source: graphiconline.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
SBI Chairman Rajnish Kumar (Image: Reuters)

The top bosses of PSU banks and top central bankers are taking up private assignments after retirement is not new. The latest such case is former SBI Chairman Rajnish Kumar joining the Kotak Mahindra Group. Kumar retired from the country's largest lender on October 6, 2020.

Four months later after his exit, Kumar joined Kotak Investment Advisors, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Kotak Mahindra Bank, as an exclusive adviser for its $1-billion special situation fund. There is a one-year cool-off period for retired PSU bank officials before taking up a private assignment.

But, it is learned that Kumar has got a NoC (no-objection certificate) from the Government of India to get an exemption from the one-year cooling off rule. So, there are no technical issues with this appointment.

Kumars predecessor in office Arundhati Bhattacharya, who retired in October 2017 as the SBI chairman, took up her first major executive role when she joined SWIFT India a year later. Bhattacharya later moved on to a different job as the India CEO of US Cloud-based service provider, Salesforce.com Inc in March 2020. After her retirement, Bhattacharya also served as an adviser or Board member at different companies. Bhattacharya completed her one-year cooling-off period before accepting these assignments.

Similarly, Bhattacharyas immediate predecessor, Pratip Chaudhuri is also a director on the Boards of multiple companies but never took up an advisory role. There are other former top bosses of SBI such as O P Bhatt, P C D Nambiar and A K Purwar who, too, have joined different companies as Board members.

Top bankers who retired from other PSU banks, too, have taken up private assignments. One such example is R K Bansal, who retired as executive director at IDBI Bank, joined as managing director of Edelweiss ARC in June, 2018.

Now, what about regulators? Former RBI deputy governor, R Gandhi - who retired from the central bank in 2017 - accepted a job at Paytm in June 2018 as an adviser and a board member in Yes Bank in May, 2019.

Similarly, S S Mundra - the former RBI deputy governor and former chairman and managing director of Bank of Baroda, joined as non-executive chairman of Indiabulls Housing Finance in August 2020.

Mundra had retired in July, 2017 from RBI as one of the DGs. Mundra is also associated with an ARC (asset reconstruction company) as an advisor. Another former deputy governor, Anand Sinha - who retired in January 2014 - took up a job in global private equity firm, KKR as an advisor in April 2015 while Shyamala Gopinath had stints as advisor to consultancy firm, Ernst and Young and as the chairman of HDFC Bank in January 2015 till end of last year. These are some of the examples.

What prompts the former PSU Bankers and regulators to take up private jobs? One of the key factors is attractive pay. Private firms pay very well to experienced former high-profile bankers. In the banking circles, there is a joke that the private employers pay the retired PSU bankers and regulators many times more than what they earned during their entire career in just the four or five years at the job. One of the former SBI chairpersons received Rs 5-6 crore annual compensation through private assignments. There are others too who have drawn hefty pay packages.

There is nothing wrong with a professional doing what he or she wants to do.

But there is a genuine question on the likely possibility of conflict of interest in some of these cases. There has been criticism on such appointments from certain quarters. For instance, bank employee unions have been questioning the logic of top PSU bankers moving to the private sector after endorsing the public sector throughout their career.

Also, one can argue that these bankers and regulators were once part of the many business proposals involving their future employers directly or indirectly; so are former regulators. Such appointments are always sensitive and hence the requirement to seek prior approvals before the cooling off period.

Question is can the prospects of possible post-retirement slots influence crucial business decisions of regulators and senior bankers who are serving their final years in the job? Is there a mechanism that effectively addresses the possible conflict of interest in such private assignments taken up by former regulators and top PSU bankers? This is a larger question that needs to be debated.

(Banking Central is a weekly column that keeps a close watch and connects the dots about the sector's most important events for readers.)
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The countrys COVID-19 case count breached 550,000 on Monday after the Department of Health confirmed 1,685 new infections.

The official tally now stands at 550,860, of which 27,588 or 5% are active cases. This does not yet include the latest data from six testing laboratories which failed to submit their report on time.

Two more fatalities, both previously announced as recoveries, also raised the death toll to 11,517. This is the lowest single-day rise in deaths since July last year. Meanwhile, another 14 patients got well, pushing the number of survivors to 511,755.

After final validation, one duplicate entry was removed from the overall count.

Of the nationwide case tally, the DOH said 44 are confirmed cases of the new and more transmissible variant first detected in the United Kingdom. This was after the department reported 19 more on Feb. 12. Health Spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire, however, said there is still not enough evidence to prove there is community transmission of the new variant.

RELATED: One UK variant case linked to COVID-19 cluster in MRT-3 - DOH

Among Filipinos abroad, the Department of Foreign Affairs said confirmed cases rose to 14,671 after 13 more tested positive. It also listed 11 new recoveries, bringing the total to 9,231, while the death toll stayed at 979.

Worldwide, over 108.8 million have been infected with COVID-19, of whom 2.4 million died and 61.1 million have recovered, based on the Johns Hopkins University tracker.
In an extraordinarily treacherous move that involved all the groups on the executive board of the APEOESP teachers unionthe Workers Party (PT), the Communist Party of Brazil (PCdoB) and the various tendencies of the pseudo-left Socialism and Freedom Party (PSOL)the teachers strike in Sao Paulo was sabotaged in virtual assemblies held last Friday, February 12.

Sao Paulo state public school teachers initiated a health strike on February 8, when the partial reopening of schools in the state began. Last Wednesday, teachers in the municipal public schools of Sao Paulo, the states capital, also went on strike against the school reopenings.

Despite not going into the schools, the state school teachers participating in the health strike continued to work remotely. They were demanding the total shutdown of the schools, as the pandemic spirals out of control in Sao Paulo. One day after the strike began, the state government announced that it would stop paying teachers if they did not go back into the schools.

Added: A teacher works with students, all of them wearing masks, on the first day back to in-person classes amid the COVID-19 pandemic at the Raul Antonio Fragoso public school in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Monday, Feb. 8, 2021. (AP Photo/Andre Penner)

According to the APEOESP, 15 percent of the 180,000 teachers in the state did not go to school on the first day of the strike. An additional 25 percent of the teachers were already doing exclusively remote work as they are part of COVID-19 risk groups. Showing the broad rejection by Brazilian families of the reopening of schools, the APEOESP also reported that only 5 percent of students participated in in-person learning last Monday. The expectation of the state government had been that 35 percent of the students would go to school.

In the four regional virtual assemblies held last Friday, the APEOESP executive board presented a proposal calling for the continuation of the strike for life, but asked teachers to return to the schools and register attendance. This, in practice, meant the end of the strike. The entire presentation of the proposal took place amid a deliberate attempt by members of the executive board to sow doubt and confusion among participating teachers.

In the virtual assembly for the Greater Sao Paulo regionwhere most of the unions local branches are controlled by the PSOL opposition to APEOESP president and PT state deputy Maria Izabel Noronha, known as Bebelthe proposal of the executive board was presented by Joao Zafalao, a union leader affiliated with the PSOLs Morenoite tendency, Resistencia. In the previous weeks assembly that voted for the strike, he had tried to postpone it until February 19, even though this could lead to an increase in infections and deaths throughout the schools.

Zafalao began with a long introduction on the severity of the pandemic, saying demagogically, reopening schools prematurely is a crime.  Yesterday there were 1,400 deaths [in Brazil], and this is going to increase more and more. However, he continued, there is a contradiction between the need to close schools and the low participation in the [strike] movement.

According to him, the proposal presented by the executive board, in a unified way, was: strike for life, all teachers back to school from February 15 to 19 to dialogue with the school community. In an explicit recognition of the APEOESPs inability to mobilize teachers, he concluded, We think this is the way to keep the struggle alive and not have to depend only on COVID to close schools.

APEOESP president Maria Izabel Noronha and Joao Zafalao of the PSOL's Morenoite tendency Resistencia (Facebook)

If he genuinely recognized the announced tragedy spelled by the reopening of schools, then he and the unions executive board would not have proposed in a unified way the return of teachers to the classrooms! All the concern he expressed about the worsening of the pandemic with the reopening of schools were empty words. In practice, he and the APEOESP are on the same side as the right-wing Sao Paulo governor, Joao Doria (PSDB), in the drive to reopen schools.

The teachers attending the virtual assembly responded with a combination of doubt and indignation. They bombarded the assemblys online chat: I couldnt understand the executive boards proposal. Is the proposal to end the strike?; The proposal would be to return [to school] ... registering attendance?; The proposal of the executive board is to go back to school and call [it] a strike; Going back to school is to increase infections; Going back to school is government policy!; To go on strike you need to have teachers alive.

After the heated online debate, Stenio Matheus, a member of the APEOESPs executive board and of the PSOL, made it clear: You have people asking, is it for going back to school? Yes ... which means registering attendance.

This discussion also forced Joao Zafalao to present another proposal for a vote by the virtual assembly in the Greater Sao Paulo region. First, 60 percent of the teachers voted to continue the strike. However, in the second vote, concerning the format of the strike, the executive board insisted on keeping the strike for life proposal, even if it meant the end of the strike. The majority rejected this proposal, voting to keep the strike in its current format, with teachers on a health strike, not going into the schools and continuing their work remotely.

After the end of the Greater Sao Paulo virtual assembly, teachers had to wait more than three hours to find out the joint results of the three other virtual assemblies. In an expression of the APEOESPs contempt for internal democracy and transparency, the union gave no information as to the percentages for and against in each assembly, reporting only that its proposal had passed.

In a statement, APEOESP called for the creation of inspection and vigilance committees ... to denounce the health security conditions in the schools. The union still insists that the return to in-person classes will only be possible with the vaccination of education professionals in the first stage and with all the conditions of health security in the schools. In other words, the claim that the APEOESP is in favor of a strike to close schoolsas it has advocated throughout last yearto avoid the explosion of COVID-19 cases and deaths is a lie. In schools with precarious infrastructures and with millions of students not expected to be vaccinated, there is no safety protocol to prevent the spread of the pandemic.

The illegal maneuver by the PT, PCdoB and PSOL union bureaucrats to effectively break the strike of Sao Paulo state school teachers took place just two days after teachers of the Sao Paulo municipal public school system went on strike against the reopening of schools in the state capital. In a virtual referendum with the participation of more than 5,000 teachers, the strike was approved by a 92 percent majority.

Teachers at APEOESPs Greater Sao Paulo virtual assembly denounced the move to avoid a united struggle among teachers in Brazils two largest school districts: [Suspending the strike] now that the municipal teachers are going [on strike]? Now that we can get stronger? This is absurd, one wrote. What is the logic of going on strike in the municipal schools and not in the state schools, since the demands are the same? Right to life! wrote another.

However, the logic behind the APEOESPs move is clear: to prevent a unified struggle between state and municipal teachers against school reopenings for fear that it would get out of the unions control. The arguments of the union bureaucracy against this unified struggle couldnt be more ridiculous. PSOL and APEOESP executive board member Stenio Matheus explained: Someone might say: but the municipal schools [went on strike], but it is another reality.  Anyone who has talked to teachers that work in both municipal and state schools has heard the following: I will strike in municipal schools, I will not strike in state schools. We can make an assessment of that later.

Another reality?! As much as there are differences in salary and working conditions, the objective situation of teachers in state and municipal public schools, as well as that of teachers in most private schools, is the same. The COVID-19 pandemic has not only added to the common interests of these teachersthe struggle for lifebut has also united them with all the teachers in the world fighting against the deadly reopening of schools.

The APEOESP has never done, and will never do, an assessment of its long history of betrayals, either by ending strikes against the will of teachers or by blocking a unified struggle with the municipal teachers of Sao Paulo and all of Brazil. In fact, the main reason for the APEOESP not formally ending the strikeand trying to cover it up by calling it a strike for life with a return to schoolswas its fear of losing even more of its almost zero credibility among teachers.

Sao Paulo teachers have long since ceased to see the APEOESP as an instrument to defend their interests, and for this reason many teachers refuse to enter the struggle, knowing that they will be betrayed, as last weeks events have confirmed. In the Greater Sao Paulo region virtual assembly, they expressed this feeling, saying: One week of strike is not enough to build anything.  And how will we make a new strike call in face of this retreat? Who will believe in this union that is already so discredited? and, People will join [the strike] seeing schools closed by COVID or seeing other teachers strengthened in the strike. Going back this week is demoralization.

One teacher also said: ending [the strike] now is total demoralization. I dare to say its the end of the APEOESP.

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the criminal character of the Brazilian and world ruling elites. In Brazil, a second wave is spiraling out of control; last Thursday registered 1,452 COVID-19 deaths, the third highest number since the pandemic began. In Sao Paulo, last week ended with an 8 percent increase in deaths over the last week of January, with an average of 233 deaths per day. The APEOESP itself reported on Friday, after a week of partial in-person classes, 319 COVID-19 cases in 179 state public schools.

However, the pandemic has also exposed the middle-class pseudo-left organizations that try to give a left cover to the ruling elites genocidal policy toward the pandemic. This includes Morenoite and Pabloite organizations within pseudo-left parties like the PSOL, as well as unions like the APEOESP that have advocated going back into the schools.

The dynamic of the class struggle is increasingly pitting, on one side, the ruling elite and their pseudo-left apologists, who advocate reopening schools to save profits; against, on the other, the working class which advocates closing schools to save lives. The events of the past week have shown this, not only in Sao Paulo but also in Chicago, where the teachers union approved an agreement with the Democratic mayor to reopen the schools. The APEOESP and all of the political tendencies represented on its executive board have stood against the interests of working people.

The recent developments mark not merely one more rotten betrayal on the part of the APEOESPs bureaucratic leadership. They are the clearest expression of a long historical process that has transformed the unions from working class organizations into organizations that defend the interests of the national capitalist elites.

All teachers going through this bitter experience in their struggle to defend their lives against the reopening of schools must draw the necessary political lessons. What is required is a conscious and complete break with the unions and the formation of new organizations of struggle, rank-and-file committees independent of the unions, armed with a socialist and internationalist program.
Mumbai (Maharashtra): After the Delhi Police issued a non-bailable warrant against lawyer Nikita Jacob, in connection with alleged spreading a 'toolkit' related to the farmers' protest, she has moved to the Bombay High Court for interim protection against the police action on Monday.



Jacob has filed a transit bail plea against the non-bailable warrant with Delhi Police in the 'toolkit' matter.

The case was mentioned before Justice PD Naik's bench and it is to be heard tomorrow.

In the transit bail petition, she has claimed that the Delhi Police's Cyber Cell has recorded her statement.

As per the petition, a team of Delhi Police on February 11 went to Jacob's residence in Mumbai with a search warrant and seized some of her personal documents and her electronic gadgets.

"The Delhi Police team also took the passwords of her social media accounts from her. A 'panchnama' regarding all this was also made by the police," the petition read.

It further reads, "There is an apprehension that despite cooperating with the investigation, the applicant can be arrested due to a political vendetta and media trial."

This comes a day after Disha Ravi, "a climate activist", was arrested and sent to five days of police custody.

Disha Ravi, a 21-year-old climate activist was arrested from Bengaluru in connection with the formulation and dissemination of the 'Toolkit' document, in the ongoing farmers' protest. She was one of the editors of the 'Toolkit' document.

Earlier, the Delhi Police sent a communication to Google seeking registration details and activity log of the account through which a "toolkit" related to the farmers' protest was created and uploaded on the social media platform.

Two e-mail IDs, one Instagram account, and one Uniform Resource Locator (URL) were mentioned in the toolkit and police have asked for details from the respective platforms.

The police had registered an FIR against unidentified persons in connection with the creators of the 'toolkit'.


First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has said Scotland will have to look at alternatives if an agreement cannot be reached on international quarantine rules with the rest of the UK

People flying directly into Scotland on international flights have to self-isolate for 10 days in a quarantine hotel, under new regulations which took effect on Monday.

Unless exempt, a passenger has to pay 1,750 to quarantine in a room at one of six designated hotels in a bid to avoid importation of the virus.

However, Transport Secretary Michael Matheson said on Sunday that a loophole allowing overseas travellers to avoid hotel quarantine still exists which could potentially undermine the public health approach here in Scotland.

In England, the UK Government will only require hotel quarantine for visitors from a red list of 33 countries designated as high risk, meaning travellers arriving from elsewhere could avoid it by entering Scotland via England.

Visitors would still have to self-isolate for the 10-day period, but would not have to do so at one of the designated hotels due to a lack of agreement between the Scottish and Westminster Governments.

The first international flight subject to the new rules arrived in Scotland from Istanbul, Turkey, on Monday morning.

It had been due to carry around 65 passengers but fewer than five made it on board, due to issues at departures.

Speaking at the coronavirus briefing in Edinburgh, the First Minister said: It would be better if we had that four nations approach, or at least a three nations approach where the border of the island that Scotland, England and Wales share, had the same provisions in place.

My responsibility is to try and protect Scotland as much as possible so if it just proves impossible to do that then we have to look at alternatives, but it would be far better to try to come to a reasonable agreement on a four nations, or at least a three nations, basis.

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Monday that he is happy to discuss the matter with the Scottish Government.

Six hotels have been block-booked in Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow, with up to 1,300 rooms available.

Screens are in place at Edinburgh Airport to separate passengers (Andrew Milligan/PA)

Scottish Government guidance stipulates that those subject to quarantine require a negative Covid-19 test no more than three days before travelling and to have booked at a room at a quarantine hotel in advance.

They will also have to submit a passenger locator form to the Home Office, declaring which countries they have been to in the 10 days before arrival in the UK.

Airlines have been asked to check for these and they will also be checked on arrival by Border Force officers, who can issue fines of 480 for non-compliance.

Security officers will then escort passengers to baggage reclaim and to pre-arranged transport to their quarantine hotel.

On arrival at the hotel, they will be given two home testing kits to be used on days two and eight of isolation.

These are covered by the cost, as are three meals per day, fruit and soft drinks.

If they test positive at any point they will be required to stay in the hotel for 10 days after the test, at an additional charge starting from 152 daily for the first adult.
Ghanas Dela Wosinu Gadri, was crowned Mrs. Top Of The World 2020 on Saturday 13th February 2021. She becomes the first African woman to win this coveted title. Along the ultimate prize, Dela also won Mrs. Style Top Of The World 2020.



The 39-year-old is a proud wife and mother of three. Hailing from Dabala in the Volta Region of Ghana, she lives in Rotterdam, Netherlands where she is the managing proprietor of a high-end Hair & Beauty Salon  Delaganza, a destination of choice for most top class celebrities in the Netherlands.



Mrs. Top Of The World is an international beauty pageant for ladies from 18 to 45 years old. The pageant provides equal opportunities to look the best you can possibly be and focus on doing the best you can do.



In appreciation of the support from all and sundry and cognisant of her roots, Dela used her Instagram page to express her excitement and gratitude with I will definitely make good use of this crown to help and empower women and the less privileged in Ghana.



The pageant had its fair share of COVID-19 interruptions which resulted in the original scheduled date of November 2020 being changed to February 2021. Dela is appreciative to the judges for their accurate weighting of her impressive photo shoots, creative hair artistry and innovative presentation about Ghana.



Dela takes the baton from Fashion Model Aishwarya Gupta, Mrs. Top Of The World 2019 from India, fully aware of the enormity of the associated responsibilities. She wishes to congratulate the runners up for Mrs. Top Of The World 2020, Golshan Barazesh from Italy and Viryin Colina from Venezuela.



Dela signed for the pageant primarily to carve a platform to become a voice, inspiration and motivation to the less privileged. She pledges to use this crown to pursue her dream of helping peasant pregnant women and single mothers who hawk on the streets of Ghana.

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.

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PsychologyDegreeGuide.org, a leading higher education research and resource provider in the psychology space, has announced their 2021 rankings for the top US Master's in Counseling Psychology programs. The company researched 260 programs from around the nation to highlight the best of the best in this important field. Among the top schools listed are The University of Pennsylvania, Northwestern University, Lehigh University, and Columbia International University.

"Finding the top schools offering the highest quality counseling psychology programs for graduate students required looking beyond just the cost of a degree," Jason Samarin, founder and CEO of Psychology Degree Guide said. "Our team of data experts spent several months identifying and researching the hundreds of counseling psychology degree programs at the master's level to find which schools truly excel when it comes to academics, curriculum, affordability and student support."

The ranking methodology weighed metrics designed to determine appeal to prospective students, including student-to-faculty ratios, research expenditures, and enrollment rates for accepted students, as well as factoring in acceptance rates, graduation rates, tuition costs, mid-career salary information and other data points. The 2021 rankings use the most recent data compiled by the National Center for Education Statistics as provided through their IPEDS and College Navigator platforms, as well as information provided on the universities' websites, among other sources.

To be eligible for placement in PsychologyDegreeGuide.org rankings schools must be an accredited public or private not-for-profit institution and submit an annual report to the National Center for Education Statistics. For complete information on data and methodology, as well as a full rankings for each psychology program visit:

https://psychologydegreeguide.org/rankings/masters-in-counseling-psychology/

Schools listed among the top Master's in Counseling Psychology programs for 2021 include:

Bethel University

Boston College

California State University-Bakersfield

Central Methodist University

Cincinnati Christian University

Clarks Summit University

Columbia International University

Hope International University

Johns Hopkins University

LeTourneau University

Lehigh University

Lincoln Christian University

Multnomah University

New York University

Northeastern University

Northwestern Oklahoma State University

Northwestern University

Santa Clara University

Simpson University

Southeastern University

Southern University and A & M College

Tarleton State University

Texas A & M International University

Texas State University

Texas Tech University

University of Illinois at Springfield

University of Mary

University of Pennsylvania

University of Wisconsin-Madison

Webster University

About PsychologyDegreeGuide.org

Launched in 2010, PsychologyDegreeGuide.org is headquartered just outside of Boston in Watertown, MA. The company's mission is to create reliable and authoritative online information resources for students pursuing higher education in the field of psychology. The team at PsychologyDegreeGuide.org are passionate believers in helping prospective students make informed decisions about higher education through objective information about educational options and career prospects. For more information, visit https://psychologydegreeguide.org/.
'Superstar' Rajinikanth's cop film, Darbar, directed by A. R. Murugadoss under the Lyca Productions banner and featuring chart-buster music by Anirudh Ravichander kicked off 2020 in grand style. The mass action entertainer also had actress Nayanthara pairing opposite the iconic superstar, with Nivetha Thomas playing his daughter. Darbar, which had big names in its cast and crew, also went on to be talked about after shooting spot stills and the film's trailer included actress Shamata Anchan, who played an important role and also alongside Rajinikanth.

Shamata Anchan appeared as a lady cop in Darbar, whose character assists Rajinikanth and had a screen time of nearly forty minutes in the film. Having said that, Shamata entered wedlock with her beau Gaurav Verma on February 8 in a private ceremony, which saw family members and close friends taking part in the joyous occasion. The popular actress, who also starred in acclaimed Bollywood director Ashutosh Gowariker's telenova titled Everest, opened up about her wedding on social media on the eve of Valentine's Day. The wedding was planned to be a private ceremony as the couple wanted it to be kept low profile. Pictures from the Shamata-Gaurav wedding were shared on social media by the actress, who looks stunning in her traditional red saree, while her partner appears dashing in an embroidered sherwani.

According to reports, Shamata Anchan and Gaurav Verma have been in a relationship for nearly a year. The couple had decided to tie the knot after being together for a year, with the wedding ceremony including both North and South Indian customs. It has been revealed that the couple are planning to spend their honeymoon in Maldives and will be flying off soon. Taking to her Instagram page, Shamata posted pictures of the wedding with captions like, "A promise of forever", "From Darbar to Gharbaar" and "My forever Valentine. Here is to our first and many more". Below are the pictures from the Shamata Anchan and Gaurav Verma wedding:
Tens of millions of Americans should expect $1,400 COVID-19 stimulus checks in their bank accounts by the end of March or early April, according to lawmakers and economic experts.

The House Ways and Means Committee chaired by Rep. Richard Neal of Massachusetts concluded markups of President Joe Bidens $1.9 trillion relief package this past week without major changes, meaning the proposal will now work its way through other House committees before a potential vote next week.

Democrats on Capitol Hill  pushing the bill through the annual budget reconciliation process, which wont require Republican support  are hustling to complete a package by March 14 because thats when a $300 weekly bonus to unemployment insurance and other benefits from previous coronavirus aid plans expire.

CBS News reported over the weekend that Hunter Hammond, an analyst at Height Capital Markets, said in a Feb. 12 research note that the Senate will likely vote on the package by the beginning of March, where it will then land on Bidens desk in the White House.

Once signed by Biden, the Treasury Department within a week or two will likely start cutting checks to Americans who already have their direct deposit information on file with the Internal Revenue Service. The last time the federal government approved stimulus checks, of $600 in December, people started receiving them in their bank accounts within a week. Paper checks or debit cards will follow over the next several weeks for those who dont have their banking information on file.

The Ways and Means Committee has considered aggressive, science-based solutions that will deliver the urgent relief our country so desperately needs, Neal said in a statement last Thursday evening. From unemployment benefits to health care affordability, the work weve done is substantial, and it is exactly what the American people have been calling on us to do to meet this moment.

If the pandemic hurt your income in 2020 or if you had a child last year, it may be worth it to file your tax return as soon as possible, so that the IRS sends your stimulus check based on your updated income and family status. For more on filing your taxes before or after stimulus payments, read here.

Under a proposal from Neals office, American adults earning up to $75,000 and couples making $150,000 will likely be eligible for the full $1,400 COVID-19 stimulus checks that are part of the overall relief package. If approved by Congress and signed by Biden, the stimulus payments will phase out incrementally based on income, with individuals earning more than $100,000 and couples earning $200,000 receiving nothing.

The proposal followed calls from conservative Democrat Sen. Joe Manchin III of West Virginia and Republicans to limit full payments to those making less than $50,000 or $40,000. The caps proposed by Neal marked a win for progressives who argued the lower thresholds were out of touch with reality and at odds with disparate costs of living across the country.

The most recent fine-tuning of the bill comes after weeks of debate over how much to spend on pandemic aid and where to target the most assistance.

Congress and the Trump administration previously spent about $4 trillion addressing the coronavirus and the economy, prompting Republicans to express concerns about the national debt. But Democrats  who control of both chambers of Congress and the White House  have agreed to go big, arguing the economic devastation including record job loss, hunger and child poverty demand a robust, costly response.

In addition to the stimulus checks, the $1.9 trillion aid bill includes hundreds of billions of dollars for vaccine distribution and to help reopen schools, $35 billion to help local governments boost small businesses and a $25 billion restaurant grant program. The package also extends federal additional unemployment benefits through Aug. 29 and increases the weekly supplemental jobless aid to $400.

Another proposal from Neals office working its way through House committees as part of the relief effort would see families receive up to $3,600 per child under 6 and $3,000 for every child between 6 and 17 over the next year, starting in July. The payments would decrease for single parents earning more than $75,000 or couples earning more than $150,000 combined.

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(CNN)  Kudos to everyone who has been doubling down on mask wearing and social distancing. Health experts say your efforts are paying off.

But with only 4% of the US population fully vaccinated, experts say Americans must continue safety precautions at full force to prevent highly contagious variants from undoing all the progress.

Researchers reported Sunday that they identified seven troubling new coronavirus variants circulating in the US, according to Dr. Wilbur Chen, an infectious diseases specialist at the University of Maryland Medical School.

"We certainly want to preserve the full efficacy of these vaccines by preventing more variant viruses, but again, these vaccines are effective and they continue to be useful," Chen, who is a member of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, said.

The US shattered its records for daily new infections, hospitalizations and deaths in early January after widespread holiday gatherings and travel.

Since then, Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations have plummeted. Doctors say there are several reasons why:

"One, we came off of really high numbers from the holidays," said Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health.

"Second, there is pretty good evidence that people are doing a better job of social distancing and mask wearing," he said.

"Third, I think in a lot of communities, we've had so much infection that you have some level of population immunity. Not herd immunity, but enough population immunity that it is causing the virus to slow down."

The US is still months away from having most Americans vaccinated. About 14 million Americans have been fully vaccinated with both doses of their Covid-19 vaccines. That's only about 4% of the US population. And it takes weeks for vaccines to fully kick in.

But more than 11% of Americans have received at least one dose of a vaccine. And that might contribute slightly to the decreasing Covid-19 hospitalizations, said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

"The doses that are out there ... are mostly first doses, and that will provide incomplete immunity, short-lived immunity," Offit said. "You need that second dose."

Where the US stands now

The seven-day average of daily new cases is now 90,416 -- down from a peak of about 250,000 in early January, according to Johns Hopkins University.

As of Sunday, 67,023 people were hospitalized with Covid-19 -- about half the record-high of 132,447 set on January 6, according to the COVID Tracking Project.

But Covid-19 deaths are still painfully high. More than 42,500 Americans have died from Covid-19 in just the past two weeks. That's an average of more than 3,000 lives lost every day.

And disturbing variants keep spreading, threatening another surge.

"We've had three surges. Whether or not we have a fourth surge is up to us," said former CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden.

"And the stakes couldn't be higher -- not only in the number of people who could die in the fourth surge, but also in the risk that even more dangerous variants will emerge if there's more uncontrolled spread."

That's why health experts say state leaders shouldn't ease restrictions such as mask mandates now.

"It's encouraging to see these trends coming down, but they're coming down from an extraordinarily high place," CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky told NBC on Sunday.

"If we want to get our children back to school, and I believe we all do, it all depends on how much community spread is out there," she said.

"We need to all take responsibility to decrease that community spread, including mask wearing, so that we can get our kids and our society back."

Variants in the US include homegrown strains

More than 1,100 cases of the highly contagious B.1.1.7 variant, first spotted in the UK, have been reported in 39 US states, according to the CDC. About a third of the cases were reported in Florida.

The troubling B.1.351 strain, first detected in South Africa, has been found in 17 US cases. That strain is concerning because some vaccines may be somewhat less effective against it.

Now, researchers have identified a batch of worrisome mutations in US samples that also appear to make the virus more transmissible.

Those mutations all affect the same stretch of the spike protein -- the knob-like extension of the virus that's used to dock onto the cells it infects, researchers wrote in a pre-print report that has not yet been peer reviewed.

But so far, these mutations appear to be "relatively rare," one of the researchers said.

There's also an important lesson from the recent global drop in new Covid-19 cases.

In the past five weeks, "weekly reported cases (have) fallen by almost half," said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization.

"This shows that simple public health measures work -- even in the presence of variants," he said.

"What matters now is how we respond to this trend. The fire is not out, but we have reduced its size."

States still struggle with vaccine supply

Public health experts say the US is now in a race to vaccinate as many Americans as possible before coronavirus strains keep spreading and mutating further.

But supply shortages continue.

In Washington state, officials said appointments for the first dose will be "extremely limited" this week as the state will focus on administering second doses.

"We are monitoring the distribution of doses closely and making adjustments as needed," Secretary of Health Umair A. Shah said.

"While the limited availability of first doses will be challenging this coming week, focusing on second doses will help pave the way for an improved and more sustainable allocation of vaccines in future weeks."

In San Francisco, officials said high-volume vaccination site will pause for a week and will reopen "once supply is sufficient to resume operations."

A second high-volume site expects to resume vaccinations Friday -- but only for second doses. A third high-volume vaccine site is set to launch this week, but "with available appointments far below full capacity," officials said in a news release Sunday.

"The City has the capacity to administer more than 10,000 vaccines per day but lack the vaccine supply," they added.

Several of Los Angeles' Covid-19 vaccination sites were forced to temporarily close because of a lack of vaccine doses.

Washington state and California are far from alone in their struggles. Officials have said supply will likely remain a challenge for a while, and experts say vaccines will likely not be widely available to the American public until late spring or summer.

"By the end of the summer, we will have enough vaccine in order to vaccinate the entire US population that is eligible," Walensky, the CDC director, told Fox News on Sunday.

Debates over teacher vaccinations and school reopenings

About 89% of children in the US live in a county considered a red zone with high levels of Covid-19 transmission under new school opening guidelines shared by the CDC on Friday, according to a CNN analysis of federal data.

Red, or "high transmission," communities are defined by the CDC as counties where there were at least 100 new Covid-19 cases per 100,000 people or a test positivity rate of at least 10% during the past seven days.

Emergency physician Dr. Leana Wen said teacher vaccinations are crucial for reopening schools -- a stance that differs from the CDC's school reopening guidance released last week.

The agency's guidelines did not list vaccination as a "key" strategy for opening schools, focusing instead on measures like masks and physical distancing, among others. Vaccinations for staff and teachers are "an additional layer of protection," Walensky has said.

If schools in "high transmission" communities cannot "strictly implement all mitigation strategies," the CDC says all extracurricular activities should be virtual. Plus middle and high schools should stick with virtual learning in these red zones, and elementary schools should maximize physical distance through hybrid learning or reduced attendance.

On Sunday, Walensky told CNN that while vaccination for teachers is not a prerequisite for reopening schools, current CDC guidance does say those who are at higher risk should have virtual options.

"I'm a strong advocate of teachers receiving their vaccinations," Walensky said. "But we don't believe it's a prerequisite for schools to reopen."

Wen, however, called teacher vaccinations "essential."

"If we want students to be in school for in-person learning, the least that we can do is to protect the health and well-being of our teachers," Wen said.

She said teacher vaccinations are especially important because "in so many parts of the country, teachers are already being made to go back to school in poorly-ventilated, cramped areas, with many students who may not always be masking and practicing physical distancing."

A day after reported



over 4,000 COVID-19 cases, highest single-day tally in more than a month, the daily count on Monday fell but remained above the 3,000-mark for the sixth straight day as the state government warned of "harsh decisions" after the recent spike.

On Monday, the number of daily cases dipped to 3,365 in Maharashtra, where 4,092 infections, the highest single-day rise since the first week of January, were reported on Sunday.

Also, 23 more patients succumbed to the infection, while over 3,100 people recovered from the infection.

The state has registered 20,67,643 positive cases till now, an official statement said.

reported 2,216 new cases on February 8 and 2,515 a day later.

On February 10, the number of daily cases surged to 3,451 and the single-day rise has been above the 3,000-mark since then.

Apart from Mumbai, Nagpur and Amravati cities in the Vidarbha region reported over 400 new COVID-19 patients in a day on Monday.

Describing as "alarming" the recent rise in fresh COVID-19 cases in some districts of Maharashtra, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Monday warned of taking some "harsh decisions" and asked people to be prepared.

Speaking to reporters in Aurangabad, Pawar expressed displeasure over people not following the pandemic-appropriate behaviour and violating guidelines.

"Harsh decisions can be taken and people should remain prepared. If certain decisions are not taken in time then we will have to pay a heavy cost later," he added.

Notably, a central team which visited parts of earlier this month, had in a meeting with Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on February 8 noted that rural areas of Vidarbha -- particularly in Amravati, Akola, Yavatmal and Bhandara districts -- reported higher positivity rate.

On the other hand, the number of patients discharged from hospitals across the state on Monday stood at 3,105, that is, more than double of those who headed for homes post recovery a day earlier.

A total of 1,355 patients were discharged on Sunday.

The number of recovered persons in the state stood at 19,78,708, the government said.

The number of active cases in the state increased slightly to 36,201 on Monday from 35,965 a day earlier.

According to the Maharashtra government, Palghar, located adjoining Mumbai, was the only district in the state which did not report a single COVID-19 case on Monday.

With 23 new deaths reported on Monday, the state's fatality count rose to 51,552, the government said.

The health department said of the 23 deaths, 7 were reported during the past 48 hours, while 3 were from the last week. The remaining 13 deaths were from the period before last week.

Mumbai city continued to report the highest single- daycasesin the state with a spike of 493 on Monday, while Nagpur city saw a jump of 415cases.

Amravati city in Vidarbha saw a rise of 405 cases on Monday.

Pune city in Western Maharashtra and Buldhana district in the Vidarbha region also reported three-digit rise in daily cases of 202 and 173, respectively.

Raigad district in the Konkan region reported deaths of 11 persons, highest in the state on Monday, due to the disease.

In Mumbai and Marathwadas Aurangabad city, three and two individuals died due to COVID-19, respectively.

Out of the total 3,365 newcases, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), accounted for 880.

With this, the total number of cases reported in the MMR -- which includes Mumbai and its satellite towns -- till now has increased to 7,05,441. The region has reported 19,701 deaths till now.

The countrys financial capital alone has witnessed 3,14,569 casesand 11,422 deaths till now.

The Akola division -- which covers Amravati, Yavatmal, Buldhana and Washim districts, besides Akola -- in Vidarbha reported a rise of 837 new cases.

The states recovery rate is 95.7 per cent, while the fatality rate is 2.49 per cent, the department said.

Currently, 1,74,704 people are in home quarantine and 1,714 in institutional quarantine in the state, it said.

With 37,418 new tests on Monday, the number of samples tested so far in the state increased to 1,53,59,026, the government said.

Maharashtra's COVID-19 tally is as follows: Positivecases: 20,67,643; newcases3,365; deaths: 51,522; discharged 19,78,708; activecases: 36,201; people tested so far: 1,53,59,026.

(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 cross section of Ghanaians have taken to social media to pass a verdict on the Presidents Nominee for Energy, Dr. Mathew Opoku Prempeh popularly called NAPO.



The population has eulogized the delivery of Hon. Boakye Agyarko some four years ago when he was before the appointments committee.



Mr. Agyarko in his signature bow tie , dazzled Ghanaians to a show of his brilliance, the former Snr Vice President of the Bank of New York demonstrated massive prowess in the area of energy markets , upstream and downstream of the petroleum sector, power purchase agreements and its financial related issues.



The current nominee demonstrated little knowledge in his appointed schedule which comes as worrying to most Ghanaians as he did not impressed as expected.



A number of Ghanaians have expressed their dissatisfaction at the current nominee Minister for Energy for apologizing for the allegations made against the former President, John Mahama. This makes Dr. Opoku-Prempeh appear weaker under a little pressure.



It is believe that the President, H. E Nana Addo-Dankwa is likely to appoint Hon. Dr. Mohammed Amin Adams and Hon. Lawyer Agyapa Mercer who both have energy backgrounds to support the minister and ensure he delivers.



The vetting continues on Monday , 15th February, 2021 , with the finance minister as one of the much awaited vetting sessions the public is looking forward to.



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How sex and the subprime mortgage crisis of 2008 led to scapegoating a little guy By Rachel Alexander

In the aftermath of the subprime mortgage crisis of 2008, the Obama administration decided someone must be punished. But instead of taking on the powerful financial institutions at the core of the scandal  which were given bailouts instead  they went after the easy targets like small real estate brokers. Tony Viola was one. Prosecutors sent him to prison for supposedly tricking banks into offering mortgages with no money down. But in reality, the banks were knowingly offering those loans. The prosecution withheld this evidence from him. The wrongdoing was so blatant that from prison, and without an attorney, Viola was able to establish his innocence during a second trial. Now its come out that there was even more wrongdoing by prosecutors. Viola, who served eight and a half years in prison and was released in May 2020 as a result of the new evidence, recently discovered that the married prosecutor in his case was having an affair with one of the governments witnesses, who was also married. Ohio Assistant County Prosecutor Dan Kasaris presented Kathryn Clover as a fact witness, when in reality she was a paralegal for the prosecutors and in a romantic relationship with him. They cozily shared the same attorney, Jaye Schlachet, who Kasaris hired for his separation from his wife and Clovers divorce. Clover lied about Viola during the initial trial. But she felt so bad about it afterwards that she asked Schlachet to be put back on the stand. The prosecutors refused to let her apparently because they needed her false testimony in order to convict Viola. She was not able to recant her testimony until the second trial in state court. Then she took the Fifth Amendment, obviously afraid of being prosecuted for perjury. However, Viola believes prosecutors continued using her in other grand jury proceedings and criminal cases  even though they knew she committed perjury  because she'd say whatever they needed. Viola obtained thousands of emails exchanged between Kasaris and Clover from Kasariss Yahoo email account, where Kasaris affixed his official signature as a prosecutor. Several witnesses submitted affidavits regarding their knowledge of the affair between the couple. Kelly Patrick, a former sister-in-law of Kasaris, says she has over 100 pages of Facebook Messenger messages with his wife Susan about this sexual relationship that went on for many years." Patrick believes Kasaris had bad motives for prosecuting Viola. She thinks he was jealous of him. Kasaris and his wife also bought and sold houses with no money down and cash back, and Patrick believes Kasaris saw Viola as a competitor. Kasaris is a Democrat. Patrick observed, Around me he was an atheist; he disliked minorities, Republicans, and Catholicism. Viola is Catholic and Republican. Kasaris at first denied the existence of the Yahoo emails, but later admitted he used the account for emails regarding criminal prosecution. He claimed he fixed the problem by deleting the emails. Apparently because Hillary Clinton got away with using a private email account to conduct confidential government business and then delete the emails, Kasaris thinks its fine for him as well. Other wrongdoing by the prosecution in Violas case has still gone unpunished. For a decade, the FBI claimed it was unaware of almost 10,000 pages of records in its own records system on Violas case that would have exonerated him. FBI Agent David M. Hardy twice made materially false statements asserting that the prosecution had turned over all the documents and evidence to Viola. The FBI finally admitted lying about those records. The DOJ withdrew Hardys statements and in a letter to the judge, Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Colville said he regrets those inaccuracies and the resulting inconvenience. He asked the judge to vacate her previous rulings in their favor. Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Bennett falsely stated there was no FBI 302 interview summary with a banker whod said the bank offered the very no money down mortgage loans that Viola supposedly duped them into making. Kasaris also made false statements under oath about the existence of the same voice recordings and the FBI 302. Bennett later admitted in writing that Clover had lied, but didnt bother retracting the testimony. He also lied about the existence of voice recordings made by the prosecutors office manager Dawn Pasela, who recorded her conversations with Viola so prosecutors could obtain confidential defense trial strategy information. Pasela felt so horrible later on that she disclosed evidence the prosecution had been hiding and gave it to Viola. Viola filed a complaint requesting that prosecutors follow the regulations and report misconduct, but so far it has fallen on deaf ears. Despite knowingly using Clover's perjured testimony to win a conviction, Bennett received an award in 2015 for prosecuting Viola and others. Nothing has happened to Kasaris, in fact he appears to be raising money to run for office. Viola filed a request to search Kasariss Yahoo email account, but strangely, Republican Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost has fought those efforts. This is odd considering Yost wrote in the introduction to the 2020 Edition of the Ohio Sunshine Manual (which lays out how public records laws are to be enforced), I fully support government transparency and your right to know what goes on behind the scenes. Emails by government employees are considered public records, and while certain confidential information regarding cases may be redacted, the emails must still be released. Even many of Hillary Clintons emails were eventually released by the State Department. There are numerous blatant ethical violations in this case. If Donald Trumps election attorneys had been caught engaging in this type of behavior, they would have been disbarred. But because the deep state is involved and the legal system is dominated by the left, no one wants to turn on the corrupt people involved who used Viola as a scapegoat to further their political agenda.



Rachel Alexander and her brother Andrew are co-Editors of Intellectual Conservative. She has been published in the American Spectator, Townhall.com, Fox News, NewsMax, Accuracy in Media, The Americano, ParcBench, Enter Stage Right and other publications.mericano, ParcBench, Enter Stage Right and other publications. Home
There is a strange reason why work has ground to a halt on hundreds of construction sites, fields and greenhouses all across Israel. On Friday Feb. 5, tens of thousands of Palestinian laborers returned to their homes in the West Bank for the weekend. They have since been prevented from returning to work because of the closure order. This has a devastating impact on the work and salaries of countless Palestinians and their families; the money that they earn in Israel is an essential part of the Palestinian economy, particularly during the coronavirus pandemic.

A total of some 45,000 Palestinian laborers  out of a total 80,000 with regular work permits  have been living within the Green Line since the current closure was first imposed in January, as a result of a spike in coronavirus cases. According to the Health Ministry, although there has been a high rate of vaccination in Israel, there has nevertheless been a spike in infections, due to new mutations of the virus from Britain and South Africa.

Ahead of the lockdown, an agreement reached between the ministries of Defense, Housing and Health allowed workers to enter Israel from the West Bank on condition that they remained in the country, and did not return to their homes. Contractors and farmers, who employed these laborers, were then required to provide them with accommodation and food.

Then on Feb. 5, after a heated Cabinet meeting the night before, these contractors and farmers were informed that as a result of a discussion in the Defense Ministry, workers who had not seen their families in weeks would be allowed to return to their homes, on condition that they would return to work on the morning of Feb. 7. A senior government official told the press that this information was relayed by the Office of the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), after a discussion led by Defense Minister Benny Gantz.

Thousands of Palestinians then returned to the West Bank, intending to return to work on Feb. 7. But then, just a few hours later, COGAT sent a different message to the Housing Ministry overturning the previous announcement. The closure was still in place, meaning that workers who had left would not be allowed to return to work within the Green Line. Since the ministry only received the second message late on Friday afternoon, it was Saturday night before it was relayed to the contractors and farmers, and from them to their workers, who were already at home.

The Contractors Union told Al-Monitor, On Friday [Feb. 5] we were informed by representatives of the government that Defense Minister Benny Gantz decided to open the border crossings into West Bank territories on a daily basis for workers of all types. As a result of this, most Palestinian workers returned to their homes in the West Bank after spending three weeks working and sleeping in facilities within the Green Line. That evening, Gantz changed his mind deciding that the defense establishment would not be opening the border crossings for these workers. The result now is that we are missing almost 65,000 Palestinian workers in construction out of 80,000 with permits [65,000 had special permits before the closure] and other essential infrastructures. A large part of this branch of the economy will grind to a halt if Gantz doesnt change his mind.

The Defense Ministry spokespersons office and the office of Gantz told Al-Monitor unequivocally that there has been no change to the current instructions, since the closure went into effect four weeks ago. In other words, Palestinian workers were not allowed to enter Israel during the lockdown. What they failed to provide was an explanation for the contradictory statements given to the Housing Ministry. Furthermore, they refused to confirm or deny that they conveyed such information.

As a result of the confusion, several thousand Palestinian laborers tried to reenter Israel Feb. 7, only to be informed at the border crossings that the closure remains in place and that they cannot reenter.

The contractors appealed to Housing Minister Yaakov Litzman, who immediately sent a letter to Gantz, saying, Preventing the daily crossing of Palestinian workers will bring all construction activity to a halt. Litzman estimates that the monthly output of the construction industry is 7 billion Israeli shekels ($2.15 billion). Return to full work capacity would take about two months, meaning that the economy would lose 14 billion shekels in that time. The daily extent of construction work amounts to the enormous amount of 308 million shekels ($95 million) per day, of which 203 million shekels ($62 million) covers work that Palestinian laborers are involved in.

Eldad Nitzan, head of the Federation of Foreign Construction Workers Unions, warned the housing minister that the lack of foreign workers could delay the transfer of new housing units by as much as six months and lead to a delay in the start of new construction projects.

Mustapha Abdullah Natshe from the Hebron region in the West Bank, who heads a group of workers at a construction site in Rishon LeTzion, was one of the laborers who returned home for the weekend after being told he could by his contractor. They told us we could leave and then come back on Sunday. I missed my kids. I missed my mother. I needed to see my family. After all, we work so hard to support them. The contractor called me on Saturday night to tell me that the authorities changed their minds, and that we would not be allowed to return. I told him that I would try anyway. That morning I went to the Tarqumiyah crossing and they wouldnt let me in. What do I do now? Who will pay our salaries, when we are at home? Its not right.

But many other workers, possibly thousands, did find a way back into Israel. They took advantage of breaches in the border fence, particularly in the area west of Bethlehem and Hebron.

One of them was also a worker from the Hebron region. He used such a breach to get back to his job in Beit Shemesh, a city in the midst of a frenzied construction boom. He explained that he had no choice. His familys business, a furniture store in the town where he lives, has not made any money in close to a year because of the coronavirus pandemic, and he is the familys only source of income. If I dont bring them money for food, who will? They told us that Gantz made a mistake. Will he buy food for my children? Its a good thing that the contractors gave me an advance. They even helped me transfer the money back to my family at home, said the worker, who spoke with Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity.

It is now expected that the laborers will be allowed to return to work over the course of next week.

Once again, this story highlights the dependency of the Palestinian economy on tens of thousands of laborers employed in Israel. According to data provided by the Israeli civil administration, they brought in 750 million shekels ($231 million) per month before the coronavirus outbreak, which were the wages of all Palestinian workers in Israel and in West Bank settlements. In 2020, after the pandemic struck, this dropped to around 600 million ($185 million), largely because of layoffs in multiple sectors. At the same time, it is now expected that with rapid vaccinations in Israel and the anticipated reopening of different branches of the economy, Palestinian laborers will also be returning to work.
Theories on possible 'Life on Venus' were debunked after several studies claimed their findings were wrong, which only further proves that God's Word, about life as being exclusive on earth, always wins.

Months ago, reports regarding potential life on Venus was making the headlines around the world, claiming that signs of life had been found on Venus, a hot, gaseous planet near the sun.

Since then, articles regarding the search for extraterrestrial life have listed hints of life in the planet Venus as another exciting possibility in the continuous and expensive search for E.T.s.

Although just a month later, two separate studies have been conducted that argued the headlines' conclusions saying, the "signature of life" (phosphine) they were claiming to have found, was actually fake news and was not found in Venus.

Dr. Danny Faulkner, Answers in Genesis' astronomer, explained in an article that Phosphine can have a biogenic origin, meaning it was produced by a living organism, however, it can also have an abiogenic origin too. He also added that a decade ago, phosphine was detected in the atmospheres of Jupiter and Saturn, but no one claimed it was biogenic.

"Apparently, the people involved in this discovery think they have eliminated all abiogenic pathways that could produce phosphine on Venus. I suspect that they haven't considered all possibilities," Dr. Faulkner claimed.

The headlines did not accurately convey what the studies have discovered, instead, the media manipulated the headlines to disprove God's words and existence. Ken Ham, a Biblical apologist and the founder of Answers in Genesis, wrote:

"Secularists are desperately searching for life elsewhere in the universe, as they think this will prove that the God of the Bible doesn't exist and that His Word is not true. So when a scientist suggests that possibly, maybe, perhaps, they don't know for sure, there's a slight possibility, but it may not be evidence for life on another planet, the headline is constructed by the news media to deliberately mislead and imply something that is not true-really it's just "clickbait.""

Another study suggests that the phosphine that was allegedly found on Venus was actually more likely to be sulfur dioxide.

"Instead of phosphine in the clouds of Venus, the data are consistent with an alternative hypothesis: They were detecting sulfur dioxide," said co-author of the study Victoria Meadows, a professor of astronomy at the University of Washington.

"Sulfur dioxide is the third-most-common chemical compound in Venus' atmosphere, and it is not considered a sign of life," Meadows continued.

These studies that debunk the "Life on Venus" theory, however, did not make the headlines which would probably mean that many people still believe the false headlines last year that suggests there were detected signs of life on Venus, Answers in Genesis reported.

"Life on other planets is not something we expect when we start our thinking based on the Word of God and what it teaches about the uniqueness of earth," Ham wrote in a recent blog.

Ham also wrote that sometimes, Christians feel anxious whenever a new headline, such as these, that contradicts God's words are being published. Instead of feeling anxious, he said Christians should wait for and search for the right answers.

This is also a reminder to parents to equip their kids in learning and understanding God's words, and not fallible "science" using man's wisdom, Ham, who is a Doctor of Science, added.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 14:39:06|Editor: huaxia

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VIENTIANE, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Laos plans to open a new international border crossing with Vietnam on March to ease the movement of goods and people between the two countries.

According to local daily Vientiane Times on Monday, southern Laos' Sekong province will open its first international border crossing with Vietnam on March 24.

The province's governor Leklai Sivilay said the Lao and Vietnamese governments had agreed to upgrade the existing Dakta-ok-Nam Giang border crossing between Sekong province, some 530 km southeast of Lao capital Vientiane and Quang Nam provinces to international status.

"We have agreed with Vietnam on the date to officially upgrade the status of this border crossing, which is slated for March 24," the governor said.

The upgrade was originally scheduled for the end of 2020 but was postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

All provinces in Laos, with the exception of Sekong, that share borders with Vietnam, have international crossing points to the neighboring country.

Leklai said the upgrade of the border crossing in Sekong would shorten the distance between Thailand and Vietnam through southern Laos by more than 100 km.

Although the pandemic is widespread in the region, trade between Laos and Vietnam is continuing through the Dakta-ok-Nam Giang border crossing.

Laos mainly exports agricultural produce to Vietnam while importing construction equipment needed for hydropower development and other mega projects.

The upgrade of the border crossing will create more accessible links with Vietnam and Thailand and enable more Vietnamese investors and visitors to enter Laos when the pandemic is subsided.

The expected surge in trade and the movement of goods should encourage local people to grow more crops for export so they can improve their living standards.

One of the main challenges for Laos now is how to improve tourist sites and provide transit services to benefit more from regional connectivity, according to the report. Enditem
Dancing On Ice viewers had a shock on Sunday evening when the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge took to the rink. Or so it seemed.

In reality, Faye Brookes and Hamish Gaman dressed as the couple to perform a Valentine's Day routine in replicas of their wedding outfits.

The former Coronation Street star wore a knee-length wedding dress while her partner donned a ceremonial red jacket and blue sash.

Royalty on ice! Dancing On Ice viewers had a shock on Sunday evening when the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge took to the rink. Or so it seemed

When Kate Middleton married Prince William in April 2011, she wore a Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen design made of satin, with an overlaid lace bodice and appliqued skirt.

The ivory gown featured floral detailing and a nine ft train - something Faye's ensemble was missing for obvious reasons.

Prince William wore an Irish Guards mounted officer's uniform in Guard of Honour Order with a forage cap, having been appointed colonel of the Irish Guards two months before his wedding day.

As a Knight of the Order of the Garter, he wore the order's star and blue riband, to which were affixed his RAF wings and Golden Jubilee Medal.

Copycats: In reality, Faye Brookes and Hamish Gaman [R] dressed as the couple to perform a Valentine's Day routine in replicas of their wedding outfits. Prince William and Kate Middleton wed at Westminster Abbey in April 2011 [R]

Mimics: The former Coronation Street star wore a knee-length wedding dress while her partner donned a ceremonial red jacket and blue sash

The happy couple: When Kate Middleton married Prince William in April 2011, she wore a Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen design made of satin, with an overlaid lace bodice and appliqued skirt

Faye was seen becoming emotional on Sunday's show, having to spend Valentine's Day away from her boyfriend.

He sent her gifts, however, and she was seen tearfully FaceTiming him in her VT before her dance with Hamish.

The duo received a lukewarm score because, according to judges, they were 'capable of so much more' - a comment that left Faye in tears yet again.

Hamish was suffering an injury, revealing he'd hurt his finger while putting a sock on during the week.

One major detail: Kate's ivory gown featured floral detailing and a nine ft train - something Faye's ensemble was missing for obvious reasons

Less than perfect: They got a lukewarm score because, according to judges, they were 'capable of so much more' - a comment that left Faye in tears yet again

And presenter Holly Willoughby looked romantic in pink in her floor-length chiffon dress.

But the show has been dealt another blow as Jason Donovan was forced to pull out of last night's competition with back pain.

The actor was due to skate to Elvis Presley's Burning Love. He did not suffer the injury in training.

Prince charming: Faye was seen becoming emotional on Sunday's show, having to spend Valentine's Day away from her boyfriend

Emotional: He sent her gifts, however, and she was seen tearfully FaceTiming him in her VT before her dance with Hamish

A decade on: The future king and queen will celebrate 10 years of wedded bliss this year

Good effort: Hamish was suffering an injury, revealing he'd hurt his finger while putting a sock on during the week

ITV confirmed the 52-year-old had been advised to rest by the show's medical team. 'I'll be watching from home and cheering everyone on and I look forward to returning next week,' Donovan said.

The ex-Neighbours star is the latest contestant to drop out through injury or illness. But his absence is only temporary as the show permits each contestant a bye week.

Injuries forced Denise Van Outen and The Only Way Is Essex's Billie Shepherd to pull out of the show, while Emmerdale's Joe-Warren Plant and comedian Rufus Hound withdrew after testing positive for Covid.
Watertown, NY (13601)

Today

Chance of a shower or two during the evening, followed by partly cloudy skies overnight. Low 44F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Chance of a shower or two during the evening, followed by partly cloudy skies overnight. Low 44F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 30%.
China's Crackdown On Illegal Gambling

Published February 15, 2021 by Sol FH

Illegal gambling operators have until April 30 to confess and avoid serious punishment.

China has issued a warning to illegal gambling operations with the Ministry of Public Safety announcing an amnesty which will protect those individuals who come forward and admit their involvement, by April 30.

This cease and desist order on cross-border illegal gambling was a joint issue by the Ministry, the Supreme Peoples Procuratorate, the Supreme Peoples Court, and, is the arm that will fight China's continued illegal gambling battle.

The offer of amnesty focuses on those that would be prosecuted for organizing or operating illegal gambling, as published in Article 303 of China's criminal laws. Customers would also be targeted, which makes this issue far more complex.

There will be a punishment, albeit far lesser than what will happen if no admittance is made. All that China wants is a confession, most likely so operators and customers' details can be used in future investigations.

Wrongdoers will be able to admit to their wrongdoings in person, or, via third-party communication such as email, letter, or phone call.

Some of the confessions will undoubtedly need to include a name drop or two about others' activity and if that evidence assists in catching more illegal operations, will lighten the punishment.

There has been word that any illegal operations or play found after April 30 will come with severe punishment.

There will be police protection to encourage people to come forward and report others' crimes. One of the biggest influencers in this area and reasons not to come forward is out of fear of threats and any retaliation from illegal operators.

This notice by the Ministry is part of China's ongoing commitment to end cross-border gambling activities. Liao Jinrong, director-general of the Ministry of Public Security is a way for those that need to confess to do so and step away from the life of crime and punishment.

This will also inhibit future gambling operations. Many Chinese players travel overseas to bet on huge sums of money in an attempt to win big jackpots. China started a pilot program in three provinces, which sets out to limit travel for people who do this. To date, over 35,000 people have been ID'd and punished for their crimes.
In todays highly charged political environment, the changes are controversial. While we cannot support the rule changes as proposed, and well explain why, we can help separate fact from fiction after reading, studying, interviewing and listening to key stakeholders in the rule-making process. Those stakeholders came to the table with a genuine desire to make classrooms more inclusive. But the well-intended proposal goes too far in requiring, via government overreach, teaching approaches that should be encouraged but not mandated, and that should be local decisions, not centralized.
The government hopes to completely resolve the military stand-off between India and China within the next two or three months in order to create a conducive atmosphere for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to host Chinese President Xi Jinping for the BRICS summit later this year.

Though it may take years to narrow trust deficit created by Chinas aggressive moves along its Line of Actual Control (LAC) with India over the past 10 months, New Delhi is keen to restore some degree of cordiality in bilateral relations ahead of the BRICS summit, which the prime minister is set to host and the Chinese President is expected to attend.

Read: China tries to lay blame on India using VK Singh's remark over Indian Army crossing 'boundary' more than PLA

The BRICS  a bloc comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa  on November 17 last had its last annual summit virtually in view of the Covid-19 pandemic, with Russian President Vladimir Putin chairing it from Moscow. Though the stand-off along the disputed boundary between India and China was on, both prime minister and the Chinese President participated in the virtual summit.

It is now the PM's turn to host the 2021 BRICS summit and it may be held with all other BRICS leaders physically attending it, of course, if the Covid-19 situation does not worsen in India.

It will be a bit awkward if the prime minister has to host Chinese President for the BRICS summit even when the soldiers of India and China are engaged in an eyeball-to-eyeball stand-off along the LAC, a source told the DH in New Delhi.

He pointed out that unlike the 2020 virtual conclave, a BRICS summit with all leaders attending it physically would have to have a bilateral meeting between the prime minister, who would be the host and the Chinese President.

Read: India cautious about US proposal for meeting of Quad leaders

A conducive atmosphere for such meetings could be created only if the stand-off could be resolved before the summit.

The Indian Army and the Chinese Peoples Liberation Amy (PLA) of late agreed on a mutual disengagement process from the face-off points on the northern and southern banks of Pangong Tso in eastern Ladakh. The two sides started withdrawing forward deployments from both banks of the lake in a phased, coordinated and verified manner last Wednesday.
Opinion Article

15 February 2021

In today's physically separated world of hospitality, engagement and interaction between hoteliers and guests are taking new forms but are still as critical as ever. In a series of studies using data from a well-known hotel chain and a customer feedback software company, Professor Christopher Anderson and co-author, Assistant Professor Saram Han Ph.D. '19, illustrate the long-term impacts of guest engagement upon guest satisfaction, loyalty, and booking channel selection.

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In two studies published by the Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, and one soon-to-be-published study, Anderson and Han put forth a compelling argument for hotels to facilitate review collection through a guest satisfaction survey (GSS). A GSS has several features that can give hotels a more accurate picture of overall guest satisfaction. Namely, it provides a representative set of reviews, avoids non-response bias, and enables private post-stay communication between hotel management and guests, a feature that can be used to send personalized apologies to dissatisfied customers, which, according to Anderson's and Han's analysis, leads to increased satisfaction in future stays. Likewise, a simple automated thank-you, executed quickly (following feedback), results in increased likelihood that a satisfied guest will share their satisfaction with others by posting an online review after their next stay.

In the second part of the study, the authors took a deeper look at GSS data, using a longitudinal, three-year sample, composed of customer satisfaction surveys from 515 randomly-selected hotels within a robust portfolio of hotels. The data contain hotel visit information and satisfaction ratings submitted by customers to a hotel's GSS provider and comprise over 500,000 unique customers and 300,000 survey responses.

The major results or implications of the research:

Analysis of the data focused on how a customer's willingness to share feedback, along with hotel management's response, impacted these four critical elements:

Future guest satisfaction. The results show that acknowledgement of service failures with personalized and detailed apologies helps improve guest satisfaction of future stays.

The results show that acknowledgement of service failures with personalized and detailed apologies helps improve guest satisfaction of future stays. Propensity to share reviews online. A quick and automated thank-you from the hotel increases the likelihood that the guest will share a review online after their next stay, whereas an overly detailed thank-you may deter the guest from sharing future reviews.

A quick and automated thank-you from the hotel increases the likelihood that the guest will share a review online after their next stay, whereas an overly detailed thank-you may deter the guest from sharing future reviews. Loyalty . Positive or negative feedback provided by guests signals a willingness to engage with the brand and increases the probability of them becoming loyal by almost 50%. If management responds to guests' feedback, there is a further increase in the probability of them becoming loyal.

. Positive or negative feedback provided by guests signals a willingness to engage with the brand and increases the probability of them becoming loyal by almost 50%. If management responds to guests' feedback, there is a further increase in the probability of them becoming loyal. Booking channel choice. OTA commission savings from direct bookers are further increased by approximately 5% through engagement with guests through a GSS.

These studies indicate, perhaps more so in today's environment, that guest engagement is a critical element of the hotel stay. Hotels need to let consumers know that they want their opinions (i.e. solicit feedback and encourage sharing online), and they are listening (i.e. respond to consumer feedback). This engagement not only leads to improved satisfaction through customers sharing their satisfaction with others (by posting reviews) but also financial gains as customers grow more loyal and book direct.

Read the full research brief published by the Center for Hospitality Research and watch the author and industry panelists discuss the studies in depth during a recent eCornell keynote.

The Center for Hospitality Research was created in 1992 for the purpose of expanding both the quality and volume of research supporting the hospitality industry and its related service industries.

Disciplines represented:

Customer satisfaction and engagement, loyalty, consumer behavior

Co-authors:

Christopher Anderson, professor, School of Hotel Administration, Cornell University

Saram Han, Ph.D. '19, assistant professor, College of Business and Technology, Seoul National University of Science and Technology

Publication information:

"The Effect of Customer-Manager Social Engagement upon Online Booking Behavior" was published in Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, in November 2020.

"Customer Motivation and Response Bias in Online Reviews" was published in Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, Volume 61, Issue 2, in May 2020.

The third study is forthcoming.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law on Monday condemned the arrest of a 21-year-old climate activist from Bengaluru, Disha Ravi, over the "toolkit" controversy related to farmers' protest on social media and said that 'how can we call ourselves, the largest .. if arrests occur on a girl'.

"I do condemn the arrest of Disha Ravi, a 21-year-old Indian girl, a climate activist, who stood with the protesting Indian farmers and voiced her opinion for their needs and demands",wrote Vadra on his Facebook account.

"How can we call ourselves, the largest .. if arrests occur on a girl, who has her opinion? Citizens of our country will not be gagged. Daughter to remain silent? Daughter to say nothing?" he added.

Disha has been sent to five days police custody for allegedly editing and disseminating the "toolkit" on social media.

A Delhi court on Sunday remanded Disha to five days of police custody following her arrest in connection with allegedly spreading a "toolkit" related to the farmers' protest. Duty Metropolitan Magistrate Dev Saroha of Patiala House Courts Complex allowed Delhi Police to quiz Ravi for five days. She was arrested on Saturday.

The Congress leaders have termed her arrest as "unwarranted harassment, unfortunate and shocking".

According to the Delhi Police officials, Disha is a key conspirator in the "toolkit" case as she had admitted during the initial interrogation to editing, adding some things in the "toolkit" and spreading it further.

Last week, the Delhi Police sent a communication to Google seeking registration details and activity log of the account through which a "toolkit" related to the farmers' protest which was created and uploaded on the social media platform.

Two e-mail IDs, one Instagram account, and one Uniform Resource Locator (URL) were mentioned in the toolkit and police have asked for details from the respective platforms.

The police had registered an FIR against unidentified persons in connection with the creators of the "toolkit'.

(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.)
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"We have to restore the consultation services at the primary care level, at outpatient care centers and health posts, and to do so we need more health personnel and molecular tests so as to obtain a precise diagnosis, to know who is sick and who is not. We need to make this diagnosis to guarantee the epidemiological control," he said in remarks to RPP radio and TV station.

The high-ranking official noted that those who are diagnosed with the infection will not be sent home to self-quarantine, given the high risk of infecting their family members.

In search of oxygen

In addition, the Minsa head affirmed that the supply of medical oxygen will be increased at all medical centers, where required, and the in-patient bed capacity will be further increased to treat severe COVID-19 patients.

"It is clear that we need more oxygen plants. The private market has been described as insufficient to meet the demand for public and private centers," Ugarte explained.





"The private sector said we can no longer (). The public sector has intervened, and a decree is in force since the end of May last year which declared oxygen a public good and we need to strengthen it," he added.
On Christmas Eve 2020 the Pakistani government issued a legal notice to U.S. citizens Amjad Mahmood Khan and Harris Zafar in their capacity as the spokesmen for the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA. Pakistan demanded that the U.S. based Ahmadiyya website, TrueIslam.com, be shut down. The Pakistani legal notice claimed that failure to comply would subject Kahn and Zafar to fines of up to three million dollars or even criminal prosecution and ten-year prison sentences. Pakistan has been making similar demands for websites and social media to remove Ahmadiyya, of Ahmadi content or face prosecution. These international demands and threats have no legal basis outside Pakistan, where the government blocks Ahmadi content from being seen in Pakistan. That only makes it more difficult, not impossible, for the forbidden content to get through. Such legal notices against foreign firms or citizens are more about showing the Moslem world that Pakistan is a more diligent defender of Islam than other Moslem-majority nations. Pakistan also prosecutes individual Ahmadis in Pakistani courts for blasphemy and heresy. Sentences are often suspended because sending Ahmadis to prison turns them into martyrs for religious freedom and puts them at risk of being murdered by the many Islamic terrorists in prisons.

Pakistan is not the only Moslem state to target Ahmadis. For example, in 2017 an Algerian court found Islamic cleric Mohamed Fali guilty of offending Islam for being the leader of Algerian Ahmadi Moslems. He was released from jail and given a six-month suspended sentence.

The Pakistani government plays down its support for some forms of Islamic radicalism and the fact that it also tolerates some forms of religious persecution. This is especially true of one minority Islamic sect; the Ahmadi (Ahmadiyya). This sect appeared in India during the 1880s and has been popular enough to get one or two percent of all Moslems to join. This happened despite constant persecution in most Moslem nations. There are Ahmadis in just about every nation, even Saudi Arabia where it is illegal for Ahmadis to enter the country. Moslem foreign workers are told to keep quiet about their Ahmadi connections when entering the country, and recognize that the Saudis forbids any other religion from public worship while ignoring such worship if done by invitation in homes. This makes it possible to recruit the many essential technical experts who are not Moslem.

To avoid persecution or worse, many Ahmadi try to conceal their religious beliefs while in Moslem majority nations. To most Islamic conservatives and radicals the Ahmadi are heretics and are often attacked and even killed because of their beliefs. The Ahmadi believe in centralized authority for Islam and a separation of church and state. They also have different views on the caliphate and the future of Islam. In the late 20th century Ahmadis became more ambitious in their efforts to gain more adherents. As a result, Ahmadis began showing up in many Moslem nations where they had never been seen before.

For example, Ahmadis first appeared in Algeria during 2007 and soon got the attention of Moslem conservatives. In Algeria Moslem sects must register with the government but the Ahmadi refused to do so because their leaders felt that would expose them to rejection by the government and more violence from Islamic conservatives. Between 2017 and to 2017 nearly 300 Algerian Ahmadis were arrested because a local Ahmadi group sought a mandatory government permit to build a new mosque. Many of those arrested were prosecuted and fined or sentenced to prison. Because of all the persecution in Moslem nations the Ahmadi world headquarters is in Britain, where the Ahmadi are free to practice their belief that the West is in need of more religion and Ahmadi clerics seek new members from among Moslems and non-Moslems. The Ahmadi dont believe in Islamic terrorism and that makes them tolerable in non-Moslem nations. But for most Moslem majority nations, leaving the Ahmadi alone is unpopular with a lot of Moslems who dont want Islamic terrorism, or Moslems who are as nonconformist as the Ahmadi.

Some nations go further and make it illegal to be an Ahmadi. In 1974 Pakistan declared that Ahmadi Islam was illegal. This came during the 1970s when Islamic radicalism in Pakistan was given massive government support, and with that came more violence against Ahmadi Pakistanis. The Pakistani government did little to stop it. Similar patterns were seen in Indonesia although the Indonesian government has not gone as far as Algeria or Pakistan.

American lawyers for TrueIslam.com replied to Pakistan on January 11th, pointing out that the Pakistani demands were absurd as well as legally deficient. Pakistan can try to get American courts to give them a hearing but that exposes Pakistan to ridicule and more bad publicity because such moves in the past have ended badly for the foreign plaintiffs and exposes them to countersuits in American courts, which have been known to decide in favor of the countersuits and impose large fines on the foreign governments involved. That leads to more legal action in U.S. courts to seize assets of the foreign government refusing to pay the fine. No matter, Pakistan has proved that it is taking the lead in defending Islam from infidel attack. The Ahmadi are considered a dangerous internal threat because the sect is attracting a lot more new members who are already Moslem but no longer want to be the kind of Moslem Pakistan supports.
One Republican woman had the courage to take on a corrosive bully in her own party, a fellow senator who had Washington firmly in his thrall, deftly using lies and intimidation to keep his opponents off balance and his fellow Republicans in check.

Her name, at least in 1950, was Margaret Chase Smith, the junior senator from Maine. On her way to the Senate floor to say what no one else had been willing to say, she was approached by the bully, whose name, at least in 1950, was Sen. Joseph McCarthy.

Margaret, you look very serious, he told her, according to a recounting by historian Jon Meacham. Are you going to make a speech?

Yes, she said. and you will not like it.

McCarthy growled to Smith, a potential vice-presidential pick, that any path to the White House went through him: Remember, Margaret, I control Wisconsins 27 convention votes.

For what? Smith asked.

Then she delivered her Declaration of Conscience, speech. Backed by six other GOP senators, it condemned attitudes of know nothing, suspect everything and McCarthys scorched-earth tactics that leveled wild accusations of communism and trampled democratic principles for political advantage.

In that moment, Smith guaranteed her place on the bad side of McCarthy  and on the right side of history.

Seventy years later, most Republican senators sided with the bully, whose name today is Donald Trump, absolving the former president from his role in the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters, which left five people dead, dozens injured and threatened democracy itself.

As for this editorial board, we side with the heroes, who, just like in 1950 were led by a courageous Republican woman, whose name today is U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming. The third-ranking House Republican stared down censure, calls to resign and promises of a primary challenge when she backed Trumps impeachment and called his siccing of a violent mob on Congress exactly what it was: an unprecedented betrayal of his office and of the Constitution.

We also applaud her GOP colleague, U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington state, who bravely came forward in the eleventh hour of Trumps Senate impeachment trial with a damning recounting of a conversation she said House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a Trump loyalist, told her he had with Trump in which the president sided with the mob over those trying to stop it.

We salute the seven Republican senators, some of whom are facing harsh backlash for choosing the right thing over the easy thing. They joined the majority of U.S. senators and voted to convict Trump of inciting insurrection. Together with steadfast Democrats, who presented a compelling case, they made it the most bipartisan vote ever in favor of convicting a president in a Senate impeachment trial. In their own words:

I cannot allow the significance of my vote to be devalued by whether or not I feel that this is helpful for my political ambitions, said Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

The President promoted unfounded conspiracy theories to cast doubt on the integrity of a free and fair election because he did not like the results, said Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina.

President Trump attempted to corrupt the election by pressuring the secretary of state of Georgia to falsify the election results in his state, said Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah.

He publicly and falsely declared that Vice President Pence could break his constitutional oath and simply declare a different outcome, said Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska.

When these efforts failed, President Trump summoned thousands to Washington, D.C. and inflamed their passions, said Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Instead of preventing a dangerous situation, President Trump created one, said Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. And rather than defend the constitutional transfer of power, he incited an insurrection with the purpose of preventing that transfer of power from occurring.

I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty, said Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana.

Because conviction required two-thirds of the chamber to agree, these brave senators were on the losing side  but then, so was the truth.

Their colleagues who voted to acquit either averted their eyes from the glaring evidence or cowered behind strained legal arguments. History will judge them, but the American people need not wait. We bore witness to the assault on our nations Capitol and the evidence presented in trial.

We will not forget Trumps crimes or the failure of most in his party to hold him accountable. Senators failed to show the same kind of courage that Republican state officials did as they resisted the former presidents pressure to overturn an election.

They failed to put their duty to safeguard democracy above partisan allegiance. They took no strength from former Vice President Mike Pence, who rebuffed calls to interfere in the Electoral College certification process, or from former Attorney General Bill Barr, who investigated allegations of voter fraud and, finding no evidence, chose to resign rather than perpetuate Trumps false claims.

They failed to honor the bravery of the officers who risked their lives to prevent further carnage, including Capitol officer Brian D. Sicknick who was killed and the almost 140 officers who were bruised, bloodied and bashed by a mob wielding bats and flag poles.

Perhaps the starkest profile in cowardice belongs to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell for voting to acquit and then delivering a damning speech proving he knew better. McConnell declared Trump practically and morally responsible for the Capitol riot but relied on a questionable legal interpretation to claim the Senate lacked the power to hold a former president accountable. Then he tried to pass blame on the House for delays when he himself

blocked the Senate from starting the trial while Trump was still in office.

Such excuses, including Texas

Sen. John Cornyns claim that Democrats were being unnecessarily vindictive in pursuing impeachment, arent fooling anybody whos been paying attention.

Their real motivation for acquittal is fear. Fear of losing political power, of facing a primary challenger backed by the partisan faithful, who at this moment overwhelmingly supports Donald Trump. A recent poll found that 7 in 10 Republicans do not consider a vote to impeach principled, but disloyal.

That could be because they still believe Trumps lies. And that could be because their Republican representatives in Washington have been afraid to set them straight.

What an awakening Senate Republicans could have engendered for their constituents still under Trumps spell if they had at last vouched for the truth and voted to convict.

Instead, they vouched once again the lies of a reality TV star who proved a master of delusion.

It took almost four years from when Margaret Chase Smith spoke up against McCarthy for popular opinion to turn against him, but turn it did. What is right bears out. What is wrong is found out.

Republican Senators who cast conscience aside may try to forget the violence, the destruction, the distrust Trump incited, but history will remember  and so will the American people.

As Smith said in her Declaration of Conscience, I do not believe the American people will uphold any political party that puts political exploitation above national interest. Surely we Republicans are not that desperate for victory.

Surely.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan has resumed classes for its schools as per the guidelines issued by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and state governments across the country.

According to data compiled from all the Kendriya Vidyalayas till February 11, an average of 42 per cent of class nine students, 65 per cent of class 10 students, 48 per cent of class 11 students and 67 per cent of class 12 students have physically attended all classes.

The Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan started opening schools in a phased manner from October 2020.

The Union Ministry of Education said these figures are dynamic and trends indicate steady growth every day. The classes for first to eight grades have also been started in some Kendriya Vidyalayas, where state governments have given permission to open schools for junior classes.

Kendriya Vidyalaya schools are establishing regular contact with students and parents. Students are being allowed to attend school after prior consent of their parents.

Giving information about students coming back to schools on Monday, the Sangathan said, "In view of the coronavirus pandemic, the Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) issued by the state and Central governments are being completely followed in schools. All Kendriya Vidyalayas have been explicitly instructed to ensure adequate safety measures, including maintenance of proper social distancing in classrooms for the students." However, for students who are not coming to schools, provision of online classes is there. Students are also in contact with their teachers through various digital platforms.

Feb. 15MANCHESTER  The Planning and Zoning Commission will hold a public hearing Wednesday to discuss allowing tattoo businesses in the downtown business district, which are now prohibited.

At Wednesday's hearing, the PZC will consider a series of amendments to zoning regulations recently proposed by the Economic Development Commission. That includes revising removing tattoo parlors and body-piercing studios from the list of prohibited uses in the town's Central Business District zone. The Central Business District zone includes the majority of downtown Manchester.

Other proposed changes to the regulations would reduce the maximum setback of a business from Main Street to allow greater flexibility for how businesses use that setback space. Further, there are several proposed revisions that would allow sidewalk cafes and seasonal vestibules such as outdoor eating areas to be in extended areas not allowed and to have things like outdoor heaters, trash receptacles, and food preparation areas with certain approvals.

Tattoo parlors and piercing shops have been prohibited from downtown unless they receive proper zoning variances. According to a summary of proposed changes by town staff, the intent of the change is to permit this use in the downtown area under the broader category of personal services, as it is in other zones.

"Prohibition of this use is an outdated regulation  modern businesses of this nature are professionally operated and are not anticipated to detract from the character of the district," Senior Planner Megan Pilla wrote in her staff review of the proposed changes.

The town has other tattoo parlors less than a half-mile from the downtown district.

The amendments were presented to the Downtown Special Services District Board of Commissioners in January, and the board unanimously voted to recommend approval of these changes to the PZC.

The meeting will be streamed live on Silk City TV. Written comments can be emailed to pzccomments@manchesterct.gov or mailed to the Planning Department, 494 Main Street, P.O. Box 191, Manchester, CT 06045-0191. All written and submitted comments will be read into the minutes during the hearing.

Story continues

More information about the hearing and Wednesday's agenda can be found online at

http://planning.townofmanchester.org

For updates on Manchester and Bolton, follow Skyler Frazer on Twitter: @SkyFraCT, Facebook: SkyFraCT, and Instagram: SkylerFrazerJI to stay updated on his latest articles.
Blast site: Smoke rises from fuel tankers at the Islam Qala border with Iran, in Herat Province, west of Kabul, Afghanistan, on Saturday. Photo: AP

A catastrophic explosion and fire at an Afghan customs depot has destroyed hundreds of fuel tankers and caused traders tens of millions of dollars of losses.

A series of blasts hurled lorries hundreds of yards into the air and deposited the crumpled remains of fuel tanks as far as half a mile from the blast site.

Nasa satellites could reportedly see the blast from space and the fire was so intense that Afghan officials appealed to neighbouring Iran for help.

The blast on the Iranian border in Western Afghanistan on Saturday destroyed as much as $50m worth of vehicles and goods, the local chamber of commerce said.

Bodies

Its a huge catastrophe for the private sector, said Younis Qazizada, a spokesman for the chamber.

Health officials in the nearby city of Herat said only 17 people had been injured, but with the customs depot entirely incinerated, there were fears bodies would only be found later. The cause of the blast was unknown, officials said.

The devastation is much higher than we imagined, said Mr Qazizada. Theres no infrastructure remaining at all.

Some estimates put the number of destroyed fuel tankers as high as 500.

The blast site was still smouldering yesterday. Electricity pylons had been knocked down by the force of the blast and the highway next to the depot was blocked by incinerated vehicles.

Crowds looted many of the remaining lorries, and yesterday there were repeated bursts of gunfire as soldiers tried to keep order.

Local traders blamed delays by customs officials for building a dangerous backlog of tankers at the border.

Iranian state media said the country had sent several helicopters, 11 fire engines and 21 ambulances to the scene after requests for help from the local governor.

Units of the Iranian Armys Ground Force were also sent to the border area and the Iranian police were drafted into rescue operations.

One blast erupted around 1.10pm Afghan time on Saturday, the next around 30 minutes later.

The fire continued to burn after nightfall and forced Afghanistan to shut down its electrical supply from Iran, leaving Herat in the dark.

The road between the city of Herat and Islam Qala is a dangerous stretch of highway that Afghans rarely travel at night for fear of attacks by criminal gangs.

Taliban insurgents also travel freely in the area.

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The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
An officer is being investigated over claims a man who died hours after being arrested said he had a fit but the information was not passed to custody staff, the police watchdog has said.

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said it was investigating whether the officer failed to relay Mohamud Hassan's complaints of having a fit and being in pain to custody staff after arriving at Cardiff Bay police station.

Mr Hassan, 24, was arrested at his home in Newport Road, Cardiff, on the evening of January 8 on suspicion of a breach of the peace, but was released the following morning without charge.

The father-to-be was found dead at his property later on January 9, with his family's claims that he was assaulted while in custody sparking demonstrations outside the police station where he was held.

The matter was referred by South Wales Police to the IOPC for an independent investigation.

Campaigners' calls for CCTV and police bodycam footage to be made public have been refused in case they are needed for potential criminal, misconduct, or inquest proceedings.

Mohamud Hassan was arrested in January after a disturbance at his home in Cardiff. He was taken into custody but was later released without charge before he was found dead at home

On Monday, the IOPC said in a statement an officer who attended Mr Hassan's home and accompanied him to custody in a police van had been served a misconduct notice.

The spokesperson said: 'The officer attended the Newport Road, Cardiff, address on January 8 and accompanied Mr Hassan to Cardiff Bay custody unit in the rear of a police van.

'During this time period, Mr Hassan was heard on body worn camera to complain of having a fit, suffering a migraine, and displayed signs of experiencing pain.

'The misconduct notice relates to this information potentially not being passed to custody staff in charge of Mr Hassan's welfare.'

The spokesperson said the misconduct notice 'does not necessarily mean an officer has committed any wrongdoing' but that an officer's conduct was being investigated.

The most serious sanction that can be imposed if an officer is found to have breached professional standards at misconduct level is a written warning.

Multiple protests and demonstrations took place outside Cardiff Bay police station in the days after Mohamud Hassan's death following his arrest by police officers in January this year

Pictured: A woman holds a sign during a candlelight vigil for Mohamud Mohammed Hassan outside Cardiff Bay police station on February 9 as public calls for footage to be released

IOPC director for Wales, Catrin Evans, said: 'We are continuing to analyse the footage and piece together other evidence, and we are looking at all the interaction police had with Mr Hassan over the weekend of his death.

'In the course of an investigation, where an indication arises that an officer may have breached professional standards that may warrant a disciplinary sanction, we serve a disciplinary notice to advise them they are subject to investigation.

'We have advised Mr Hassan's family and South Wales Police that we have done so for one officer over possibly not passing information about Mr Hassan's welfare to the custody sergeant on duty.

'We keep misconduct notices under review during the course of an investigation. At the conclusion of an investigation the IOPC decides whether any officer under notice has a disciplinary case to answer.'

Lawyer Hilary Brown, who is representing Mr Hassan's family, said the family were 'hugely distressed' to hear that he had been in pain or was injured during his time in custody.

Ms Brown said: 'We don't know the source of those injuries.

Pictured: Protestors make their way from Cardiff city centre to the police station in January

'But conveying that to a police officer, who should have then highlighted this to a custody sergeant, one thinks that if that had been done then maybe medical attention would have been sought for him.

'I can't see how they say this could lead to misconduct. This is gross misconduct that is so serious it could have contributed to the loss of somebody's life.'

She said the family had called for the immediate suspension of the officer involved, and that a potential written warning 'in no way reflects the seriousness of the negligence'.

Ms Brown added that Mr Hassan had no prior history of suffering from fits.

A statement from South Wales Police said: 'The force continues to fully co-operate with the IOPC investigation and is providing them with information and material, including CCTV footage and body-worn video.

'We acknowledge the impact Mr Hassan's death has had on his family, friends and the wider community. Our thoughts and condolences continue to be with them.'
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The Lagos State government has attributed the smooth traffic at the Lekki tollgate to people working from their homes due to COVID-19.

Gbenga Omotosho, the commissioner for information in Lagos State, spoke on Monday at a press conference organised by the Lekki Concession Company and the state government to clear the air on issues around the reopening of the tollgate.

There has been an argument over the tollgate that it was causing traffic jam while it was there, but now there is no traffic, said Mr Omotosho.

The truth of the matter is that you dont see traffic along that corridor today, it is not because tolling has been removed, the truth is that people are complying with COVID-19 protocols, many people are working from home, the commissioner said.

Mr Omotosho added that when there was tolling, people go out every morning, schools operate in full capacity and other businesses but these have been reduced due to COVID-19 impact.

Pupils are doing online learning, even public schools dont go to school every day. Anybody saying traffic has been reduced because there is no tolling, I dont think that is correct, he said.

Mr Omotosho said the state government had done a lot of work along the corridor such as the removal of roundabouts to reduce traffic congestions.

The scientific and practical attention that the Lagos state government has given to that corridor has caused the free flow of traffic not the (absence of) tolling, he said.

Mr Omotosho said that people adhering to protocols is the major reason there is free-flow of traffic on the axis.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are set to sit down for a 'wide-ranging' and 'intimate' TV interview with Oprah that will send tremors through Buckingham Palace and cover everything from their latest pregnancy and marriage to their exit from the royal family.

Royals will be braced for a host of potentially embarrassing revelations from the 90-minute primetime chat, which the couple have agreed to in spite of their insistence that the media respects their privacy.

The tell-all special, entitled 'Oprah with Meghan and Harry', will air on US network CBS on March 7, and will focus primarily on the Duchess of Sussex who will discuss 'everything from stepping into life as a Royal, marriage, motherhood, philanthropic work to how she is handling life under intense public pressure'.

Prince Harry will then join his wife in front of the camera, and the two will open up about their decision to move to the US following Megxit, and their 'hopes and dreams for their expanding family', a CBS spokesperson revealed.

The news will raise fears at the Palace that bombshell details of Harry's reported rift with members of the Royal Family including his brother Prince William could be aired for the world.

It would also be Harry's first opportunity to publicly discuss the Megxit summit with the Queen that he called as his bitter split from royal life unfolded.

The meeting could become one among a series of TV chats that have rocked Buckingham Palace to its core, along with Prince Andrew's 2019 interview with Newsnight and Princess Diana's bombshell 1995 interview with Panorama.

It was not immediately clear who will air the interview in the UK.

Opening up: Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will sit down for a primetime TV interview with Oprah, it has been announced, one day after they revealed they are expecting a second child

Connections: It will likely come as no surprise that the couple have chosen to speak with Oprah, 67, who is a close friend of the couple and was a guest at their 2018 wedding

ROYAL AUTHOR: INTERVIEW IS A 'BETRAYAL OF TRUST' Royal author Robert Jobson said he thought the interview was a 'betrayal of trust' and Meghan and Harry 'seem hell bent on causing the Queen more discomfort and possible embarrassment'. 'Buckingham Palace were quick to say the Queen, Prince Philip and Prince Charles and the rest of the family wished the couple well on the news. They were apparently told about the baby bump before Harry and Meghan went public,' he said. 'But now, just after smoothing over the cracks caused by ''Megxit' - just over a year ago - the Sussexes seem hell bent on causing the Queen more discomfort and possible embarrassment. 'Given the way the media focus on such royal interviews, one word out of place will be jumped on to confirm on-going feuds in the Royal Family. 'If Harry or Meghan talk openly about the fall-out with William and Kate it will cause uproar. If they don't even mention them, it will be seen as a snub to his brother or just another silky PR exercise - something their friend and interrogator Oprah Winfrey won't like. 'Sources in the royal household say ''Megxit'' is not talked about by senior royals. ''It is a subject the family want to move on from,'' one senior figure told me. 'But how can anyone move on when Meghan and Harry continue to drone on about the difficulties of royal life and being part of the Royal Family. 'This interview is a betrayal of trust whatever way you look at it. Harry, who claimed he wanted to escape the publicity of being a front-line royal, has swapped duty for a cash bonanza deal with Netflix. We are not told if money has been paid for this interview. 'The army veteran, who serviced with distinction in Afghanistan, often talks about respecting the Queen. 'But to be blunt his decision to join his wife's tell all on US television interview after they exited the royal family so noisily and dramatically, is another act of disrespect. 'The Queen has always lived by the mantra of ''never complain and never explain''. With her husband's 100th birthday celebrations approaching the Harry and Meghan loose cannon continues to fire.' Advertisement

The interview is the latest in a line of carefully planned publicity moves from the couple and the announcement comes less than 24 hours after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex announced that they are expecting their second child.

If Meghan and Harry's decision to record an interview will be seen as surprising, their choice of Oprah is not given their close friendship with the TV host, who was a guest at their 2018 wedding in London, and now lives just a short distance from the couple's $14.5 million Montecito mansion.

In December, the TV mogul made clear her close relationship with the couple when she promoted Meghan's new range of vegan coffee in an Instagram post that is estimated to have been worth $1 million in free publicity.

However, their decision to take part in such an 'intimate' interview is certainly at odds with the couple's ongoing insistence that they wish to maintain complete privacy.

The Palace said they would not be formally commenting.

But a source said that the Duke and Duchess were no longer working members of the Royal Family and therefore any decisions they take with regard to media commitments were matters for them and they had no obligation to inform the Royal Household of such plans.

Phil Dampier, who has been writing about the royals for 35 years and is author of Royally Suited: Harry and Meghan In Their Own Words, told MailOnline news of the interview would the the 'last thing the Queen and the rest of the royal family will want to hear at the moment'.

He added: 'The Queen, Prince Charles and Prince William will be bracing themselves for a series of accusations and revelations, as will Buckingham Palace courtiers.

'And the sad truth at present is that Harry and Meghan, buoyed up by recent legal victories against the press, feel they have the upper hand.

'There is little anyone can do stop them but history tells us that royal interviews - be they Diana's Panorama, Charles's admission of adultery to Jonathan Dimbleby or Prince Andrew's Newsnight clash with Emily Maitlis, normally end in tears.

'Whether justified or not, the fear will be that the couple claim Meghan was not welcomed into the royal family, experienced a degree of racism, and was hounded by the British tabloids.'

Royal author Robert Jobson said he thought the interview was a 'betrayal of trust' and Meghan and Harry 'seem hell bent on causing the Queen more discomfort and possible embarrassment'.

'Buckingham Palace were quick to say the Queen, Prince Philip and Prince Charles and the rest of the family wished the couple well on the news. They were apparently told about the baby bump before Harry and Meghan went public,' he said.

ROYAL INTERVIEWS THAT SHOOK THE PALACE In late 2019 Prince Andrew gave a 'no holds barred' interview with the BBC 's Emily Maitlis about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, along with claims the royal had sex with one of the billionaire paedophile's young 'slaves'. 'Prince Andrew & the Epstein Scandal' was filmed at Buckingham Palace - a sign it had Her Majesty's approval - and was the first time the duke was grilled on his friendship with the American sexual abuser, who was found dead in his New York prison cell while awaiting trial for sex-trafficking. Andrew - the Queen's second son - stepped down from public life on November 20 2019, following the fallout from his disastrous Newsnight interview about his friendship with convicted sex offender Epstein. The duke was criticised for showing a lack of empathy towards the paedophile's victims and a lack of remorse over his friendship with the pervert. In the interview with the BBC's Emily Maitlis, the duke denied claims that he slept with Virginia Giuffre, who says she was trafficked by Epstein, on three separate occasions, including when she was 17, still a minor under US law. Decades earlier, in a sensational 1995 Panorama interview, Princess Diana said there were 'three people in my marriage', a reference to her estranged husband's relationship with Camilla Parker Bowles, now Duchess of Cornwall. No one and nothing was off limits; Diana didn't even spare her own reputation. In one gripping exchange with Mr Bashir, she admitted she had been unfaithful with Army officer James Hewitt. 'Yes, I adored him,' she said. 'Yes, I was in love with him.' For Prince Charles the examination was excoriating as his estranged, but not yet divorced, wife questioned his credentials to be king, while publicly placing Camilla Parker Bowles front and centre as the reason their marriage broke down. Advertisement

'But now, just after smoothing over the cracks caused by ''Megxit' - just over a year ago - the Sussexes seem hell bent on causing the Queen more discomfort and possible embarrassment.'

He added: 'This interview is a betrayal of trust whatever way you look at it. Harry, who claimed he wanted to escape the publicity of being a front-line royal, has swapped duty for a cash bonanza deal with Netflix. We are not told if money has been paid for this interview.

'The army veteran, who served with distinction in Afghanistan, often talks about respecting the Queen.

'But to be blunt his decision to join his wife's tell all US television interview after they exited the royal family so noisily and dramatically, is another act of disrespect.

'The Queen has always lived by the mantra of ''never complain and never explain''. With her husband's 100th birthday celebrations approaching the Harry and Meghan loose cannon continues to fire.'

What is clear is that this interview will likely be the couple's most candid yet, with a statement from CBS promising that Meghan and Harry will open up about a variety of hot-button topics - perhaps most significantly their exit from the royal family in January 2020, and the Duchess's views on what it was like to 'step into royal life'.

'Winfrey will speak with Meghan, The Duchess of Sussex, in a wide-ranging interview, covering everything from stepping into life as a Royal, marriage, motherhood, philanthropic work to how she is handling life under intense public pressure,' a CBS press release revealed.

'Later, the two are joined by Prince Harry as they speak about their move to the United States and their future hopes and dreams for their expanding family.'

The interview will be the first time that either Meghan or Harry have addressed Megxit directly in a public forum; thus far the couple have remained silent about their reasons for leaving the royal family - despite both waxing lyrical about their new life in Los Angeles during several public appearances.

Meghan's decision to discuss her experiences of royal life may also be cause for concern from the Queen and her aides, particularly given that the Duchess has already stated in court documents that she felt 'unprotected by the [royal] institution' during her pregnancy - and claimed that she was 'prohibited from defending herself' against stories published in the media.

Opening up: According to CBS the couple will open up about a number of sensitive topics, including Meghan's entry into the royal family, and their decision to quit royal life for the US

The choice to broadcast the interview on CBS is surprising, given that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex inked a very lucrative deal with Netflix just last year in a move that is believed to have earned the couple up to $150 million.

HOW DOES MEGHAN KNOW OPRAH? Oprah was friends with Harry, 36, and Meghan, 39 (as well as Meghan's mother Doria Ragland) before their move to the US, and attended their royal wedding in May 2018. However they appear to have grown considerably closer over the past 12 months, with Oprah proving herself a generous friend, gifting story books to their son Archie and organising for her friend Tyler Perry to let them stay in his Beverly Hills mansion while they found their feet across the pond. Oprah had met Meghan just once before her royal wedding to Prince Harry, but has reportedly since played the role of a mentor to the duchess. Discussion of a possible interview had taken place before Harry and Meghan gave up their positions as working royals, according to The Times. It has been reported that Oprah got in touch with Meghan in 2018 through CBS, and after a phone conversation the American chat show host was invited to meet Meghan at Kensington Palace before the royal wedding. In 2020 it had become an 'open secret' among palace circles that Meghan had agreed to the idea of an interview, reports say. And last year it was claimed that Oprah had helped advise Meghan and Harry on leaving their posts as senior members of the Royal Family - but she denied this. In April 2019, the Duke of Sussex announced a partnership with media mogul Oprah as co-creators and executive producers of a new mental health documentary series for Apple. The pair had reportedly worked on it for 'several months' during a number of 'secret meetings in London' - however it emerged this week that Covid-19 restrictions, Harry's exit from the Royal Family and move to the US with Meghan Markle has 'stalled' production. Meghan has gifted Oprah a bundle of coffee from a company she invested in to plug to her 19.2 million followers on Instagram. Oprah captioned the post: 'On the first day of Christmas my neighbor 'M' sent to me... A basket of deliciousness! (Yes that M).' It later emerged that the Duchess has decided to invest in Clevr Blends as she begins to build a portfolio of startup investments - her first such venture since officially stepping back from royal duties. PR guru Mark Borkowski told MailOnline that Oprah's endorsement was worth at least $1million and is probably the most valuable piece of free publicity in history. Advertisement

Their partnership with Netflix sparked furious controversy - and further questions about the legitimacy of their pleas for privacy - particularly given that the streaming site is responsible for The Crown, which delved into the very private life of Harry's mother Princess Diana in its most recent season.

Although the fourth season of the show did not premiere until several weeks after Harry and Meghan's Netflix deal was revealed to the public, it had already been widely publicized that it would cover Diana's heartbreaking battle with bulimia in great detail, as well as her turbulent relationship with Prince Charles.

It is understood that such a public and dramatized depiction of such a private matter caused great 'discomfort' for Prince William, and many other senior members of the royal family, with one source revealing in September last year that Harry's partnership with Netflix had created yet further tension between him and his brother.

'William and other senior royals are incredibly uncomfortable about this drama and livid Harry is now in partnership with the company that's airing it,' the insider told The Sun.

Details of the couple's Netflix partnership were kept closely guarded, with the streaming site only revealing that the deal included a wide range of content, from documentaries and children's programming to feature films.

Oprah also boasts her own multi-year streaming partnership with Apple TV+, on which she recently streamed an interview with former President Barack Obama.

Harry and Meghan have mirrored many of the Obamas' post-White House deals, following in their footsteps by inking multi-million-dollar deals first with Netflix and then with Spotify, just as the former President and First Lady had already done.

It is unclear whether the interview has already been filmed, or it location; a CBS spokesperson refused to comment, telling DailyMail.com: 'We have no further information at this time.'

The network has also not revealed whether Harry and Meghan's son Archie will make an appearance during the 90-minute interview.

Harry and Meghan's sit down chat with the famous broadcaster will be aired on March 7, just a few weeks from the one-year anniversary of the couple ending their roles as senior royals.

Winfrey is a personal friend of Meghan and attended her royal wedding in May 2018, and there was speculation at the time the couple were likely to be interviewed by the celebrity.

The global chat show star has welcomed everyone from Tom Cruise and Madonna to former president Barack Obama to sit down and discuss their lives.

The last royal television interview aimed at setting the record straight failed spectacularly when the Duke of York appeared on a special edition of the BBC's Newsnight.

Andrew's attempt to explain his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein led to him withdrawing from public life after he was accused of lacking empathy for Epstein's victims.

His ex-wife Sarah, Duchess of York was interviewed by Winfrey in 2010 after she was left humiliated by a newspaper sting that caught her offering to sell access to Andrew for 500,000.

She repeatedly talked about herself in the third person and also broke down in tears during the confessional interview.

It is not known if Harry and Meghan informed the royal household in the UK about their plans to be interviewed, but as non-working members of the monarchy they do not have to give notice of their media commitments.

Guest role? It is not yet known whether the couple's son, Archie, will make an appearance during the interview, and CBS refused to comment on any other details about the sit-down

PIERS MORGAN: Meghan and Harry's intimate baby bump photo proves they don't want privacy, they just want to control the media and use it to promote themselves when it suits them First, let me offer my sincere congratulations to Meghan and Harry on the news that they're going to have another baby. Any pregnancy is a wonderful blessing, though as Jerry Seinfeld once cautioned: 'Make no mistake about why babies are here - they are here to replace us.' It's an especially joyful moment for a couple who suffered the pain of a miscarriage last summer, and as a father-of-four myself, I wish them nothing but happiness with their new addition when he or she arrives. Meghan and Harry (pictured with son Archie) announced that they are expecting their second child on Valentine's Day But I can't have been the only one who was somewhat surprised by the manner in which we learned of this delightful development. The statement from their spokesman, saying the couple are 'overjoyed to be expecting their second child', was perfectly standard. However, accompanying it was a photograph of Meghan lying in Harry's lap under a tree in the Californian sunshine, with her Hobbit-like bare-footed husband grinning broadly as he cradled her bump. Like everything they do, this picture had been very carefully choreographed. News of their second pregnancy came on the 37th anniversary of when Harry's mother, Princess Diana, announced that she was pregnant with him They hired an old friend to capture the 'spontaneous' intimate moment - Misan Harriman, a Nigerian-born British photographer who a few months ago became British Vogue's first black male cover photographer in the magazine's 104-year history. He took the black-and-white picture remotely with an iPad from his home in London and told Vogue: 'With the tree of life behind them and the garden representing fertility, life and moving forward, they didn't need any direction, because they are, and always have been, waltzing through life together as absolute soulmates. When you see people who have the connection that they have, it's like reading the pages of a book.' So true if your library's stacked with Barbara Cartland swoon-busters! The date of the photo's release was very deliberate too: Princess Diana and Prince Charles had also chosen Valentine's Day to reveal they were having Harry, 37 years ago in 1984. But it was the fact this photo was given to everyone in the media, via the Press Association, that raised my eyebrows in disbelief. Ten months ago, Meghan and Harry declared they would now have a 'zero engagement' policy with four British newspapers in one of their many furious tirades against the press whenever they are criticised for doing stuff like preaching about the environment as they use Elton John's private jet like a taxi service. They loftily announced they would no longer have anything to do with The Sun, the Daily Mirror, the Daily Mail or the Daily Express, and all their Sunday and online versions, because of their supposed 'salacious gossip' about them which they apparently know to be 'distorted, false, or invasive beyond reason.' They insisted 'this policy is not about avoiding criticism, shutting down public conversation or censoring accurate reporting', in a letter to those publications (that the couple leaked to the Guardian) - although that was exactly what it was about. The letter ended by saying the motivation for this unprecedented and heavily criticised royal attack on press freedom was that the couple no longer wished to 'offer themselves up as currency for an economy of click bait'. Today, the front pages of most British newspapers carried the baby announcement news along with the couple's tree photo. The Sun headline was 'HARRY & MEG BABY No2', the Daily Mirror's was 'Meghan & Harry: We are having baby No2', the Daily Mail's read 'MEGnificent! Baby No2 for Harry and Meghan' and the Daily Express screamed: 'MEGHAN AND HARRY: We're overjoyed, Archie is going to be a big brother.' All very positive publicity, from the same papers that Meghan and Harry supposedly detest, and a perfect illustration of the couple choosing to 'offer themselves up as currency for an economy of click bait' when it suits them. Why were these papers allowed to publish such an intimate photo given the ban? The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have announced that they are expecting their second child - who will become eighth in line to the throne (order of succession pictured) It seems especially baffling when you consider that last Thursday, Meghan won a legal action against the Mail on Sunday over a letter given to them by her father Thomas  and used the victory to launch a fresh attack on the paper, its sister outlets and its parent company, for what she said were its 'dehumanising practices', 'moral exploitation' and a 'business model to profit from people's pain'. In a furious rant, she raged: 'For these outlets, it's a game. For me and so many others, it's real life, real relationships and very real sadness. The damage they have done and continue to do runs deep.' (Full disclosure: I write a weekly column for the Mail on Sunday along with the columns I write like this for the Mail Online) I personally think the case should have gone to a trial where Thomas Markle, the father Meghan has disowned, could have had his say on the matter, and we could have also got to the bottom of exactly who may have helped Meghan write the letter, or who she may have revealed its contents to. But the judge didn't agree, so Meghan got to have yet another whack at the press. Which makes it even more baffling as to why, just a few days later, she would then want an incredibly revealing private photo of her and Harry and their unborn child to appear on the front page of the Mail and the front pages of all the other papers she claims to hate. Or rather, it's not baffling at all. For this is yet another example of Meghan and Harry's brazen hypocrisy, and further evidence that they don't have any real desire for privacy. They just want the right to use the media to promote themselves when it suits them, and trash and ban them when it doesn't. In fact, it's quite clear that the pair of them crave attention and publicity like ravenous jackals gorging on the carcass of a freshly slain gazelle. Since they quit Britain and royal duty 13 months ago, barely a week has gone by without a new grainy self-promoting Zoom chat, statement or interview being released from their Santa Barbara mansion, or announcements about their latest lucrative multi-million-dollar commercial deals with the likes of Netflix or Spotify, or leaked details of power-broker meetings with top politicians like California's governor Gavin Newsom. They know all this publicity is key to their success and bank balance, and they depend on the media they profess to loathe to deliver it. In this regard, they're no different to reality TV celebrities like the Kardashians who don't actually do anything for a living other than sell their 'brand' to the highest bidder. In Meghan's New York Times article about her miscarriage, pictured, she urges people to ask others if they are ok, adding: 'In being invited to share our pain, together we take the first steps toward healing' It's a self-promotional hustle and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have proven to as effective at it as Kim and her sisters. I just find it contemptible that they continue to exploit their royal titles in such a ruthless greedy way without doing any of the hard graft that other royals back home in the UK have to do to earn their keep. As I've said many times, they want to have their royal cake and eat it, and they shouldn't be allowed to trade off their royal connections like this. As for privacy, do they even know what it means? One of the numerous reasons they attracted criticism in the UK before quitting was their weird refusal to share details of their son Archie's birth with the British public who'd just paid millions for the refurbishment of their new home. They briefed that this was to safeguard his privacy. Yet they didn't give a damn about Archie's privacy when it came to recently launching their new podcast  releasing tapes to the world of him giggling and gurgling to his parents in an effort to stimulate media interest in their otherwise rather boring woke meanderings. In fact, they were cynically invading their young son's privacy purely for click-bait and personal financial gain. Just as they were happy to sign a $100 million contract with Netflix who, with latest series of The Crown, have invaded and gnawed over more royal privacy, including that of Harry's parents, than any tabloid ever did. And now they're marketing their own privacy. I'm thrilled for Meghan and Harry that they're having another baby. But not as thrilled as they will be feeling about their very private photo adorning the front page of every paper that they banned for intruding into their privacy. As I write this, I know their diehard fans  including many of the most horribly abusive people on social media - will already be screaming 'LEAVE THEM ALONE!' at me. But the one thing Meghan and Harry want least is to be left alone, which is why it's just been announced they're giving a 'wide-ranging' interview about their private lives to Oprah Winfrey for a 90-minute prime-time special on March 7. That's just the kind of thing people do when they want to be private! As for the baby bump photo, they could have refused to let the papers they despise have it. That would be consistent with their ban. But they wanted it splashed all over their sworn enemy's front pages because it will boost the Sussex brand and earn them even more money. This decision made them look like the perfect expectant parents. It also made them look like a right royal pair of shameless hypocrites. Advertisement
It will take years, not months, to gain the upper hand in the coronavirus pandemic  and it will require thinking well beyond our borders, says Dr. Larry Brilliant.

The 76-year-old Bay Area epidemiologist, who has worked to eradicate smallpox, polio and co-founded the Seva Foundation in Berkeley to combat blindness, has a unique perspective on the subject.

For years, Brilliant warned of a pandemic on the scale of the one we are living through. He even served as the senior technical adviser on the 2011 motion picture Contagion, filmed partly at the San Francisco 49ers old stadium, Candlestick Park  during which time he presciently predicted that epidemiologists would become rock stars and stadiums would become mass vaccination sites.

As the CEO of Pandefense Advisory, Brilliant has assisted in the global response to the coronavirus crisis over the past year. He has a broader view of the pandemic than most public health leaders and scientists, having invested his lifes work in anticipation of this very moment.

He is encouraged by dropping case counts, the rapid development and rollout of innovative new vaccines, the new science-driven leadership in the White House. But Brilliant is not here to reassure anyone that this will all be over soon.

I think theres a lot of good happening, he said, speaking to The Chronicle by phone from his home in Mill Valley in a rare interview Friday. I would prefer to think that things will get better, but the scientist in me worries were too perilously close to things going the other way.

Frederic Larson / The Chronicle 2003

Brilliant, who moved to San Francisco in 1967 from his native Detroit, clearly remembers how he felt the moment he realized, in January 2020, that his predictions were about to come true. He was in a meeting with top epidemiologists and public health policy experts from around the world at the Flood Building in San Francisco when an alarming call came in. The Thai Health Ministry had identified a case of the novel coronavirus at one of its airports.

Those of us who had been through MERS and SARS, we looked at each other and said, This is going to really bad, Brilliant said. We knew then that this was going to happen.

As the first leader of Googles philanthropy division, Brilliant is connected with tech leaders and public health officials worldwide. But in the former administration, he found his efforts stymied, and he was forced to watch from the sidelines as every opportunity to get the pandemic under control was ignored, dismissed and disparaged.

He feels renewed optimism with President Biden in charge, especially with a new federal COVID-19 response team that includes Andy Slavitt, the former acting chief of Medicare and Medicaid under the Obama administration; Vivek Murthy, the former U.S. surgeon general; and David Kessler, the former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration.

I think its going to be a very different attitude, Brilliant said, praising Bidens swift action in securing enough vaccine to deliver doses to every American by the end of the summer.

Weve got enough vaccine on order to vaccinate every man, woman and child in the United States, he said. We also have enough vaccine to help the rest of the world, which is important.

He cautioned, however, that it will take a global effort to truly make an impact, especially to head off increasingly aggressive variants of the virus that could elude testing and vaccines.

Even if the United States gets most people vaccinated, it wont be enough, he said: Until everybody in the world is safe, no one is safe.

The virus does not recognize borders, and variants such as those discovered in the U.K., Brazil and South Africa will continue to emerge until everyone is vaccinated, he predicted.

Brilliant, a longtime Grateful Dead doctor, laments that half the country still believes in an America First policy, and that kind of nationalism will create an uphill battle in the quest to wipe out the pandemic.

While he is confident that the vaccines in production now will be suitable to combat the variants in circulation, that picture could rapidly change.

Todays vaccines are good enough to stop todays variants, Brilliant said. The problem is tomorrows variants. Were just on the cusp.

He thinks that the global picture of the pandemic is much more dire than the numbers show. There have been more than 100 million cases of COVID-19 reported since the start of the pandemic, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University. Brilliant predicts the actual number of cases will top a billion, without question.

As government leaders rush to reopen the economy and schools while the pandemic continues to rage Brilliant urges caution.

People are beginning to think, Well, I can go hug my granddaughter, he said, noting he rarely ventures out of the home he shares with his wife, Girija Brilliant. The psychological letdowns people will have are going to be tremendous.

He said the three surges we experienced last year may not have been surges at all but a portent of what is to come globally.

Theres a nonzero probability that well look back and all those three bumps will all together just be the first wave, and whats coming next could be worse, he said. I think the future is really complicated.

Brilliant, who said Thursday that he was set to receive his second vaccine dose with his wife on Valentines Day, said people should continue to follow public health protocols for now, including masking, physical distancing and staying home except for essential outings. He said not enough is known about the vaccines to be sure that even after people receive their shots, they will be unable to spread the virus.

As a country, were still not vigilant enough, he said. When you meet the people who have long COVID, and a year after, they still wake up some night unable to breathe, they still have swollen toes, they still have difficulty focusing.  If I can use a technical medical definition, this is really a sty disease.

Aidin Vaziri is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: avaziri@sfchronicle.com
The seven-day average for COVID-19 cases has dropped by 64 percent since its January peak and hospitalizations have halved, data shows.

A total of 71,844 people tested positive Sunday, the COVID Tracking Project said, while the seven day average is 90,201.

In January daily cases were reaching 225,000; the national peak was 314,093 cases reported on January 8.

The tracking project tweeted: 'The case declines that we've seen have been massive since mid January, falling far more than the number of tests reported.'

But they added: 'South Carolina, for example, has been declining more slowly than other states and now has the most cases per capita over the last week.'

A total of 67,023 people are currently hospitalized with virus symptoms; more than 130,000 were hospitalized with the virus last month. The seven day average is 74,034.

Despite that, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Tom Frieden told CNN Sunday: 'I dont think the vaccine is having much of an impact at all on case rates.

'Its what were doing right: staying apart, wearing masks, not traveling, not mixing with others indoors.'

The seven-day average for COVID-19 cases has dropped by 64 percent since its January peak and hospitalizations have halved, data shows

A total of 71,844 people tested positive Sunday, the COVID Tracking Project said. That is a nearly 19,000 drop from Saturday. The seven day average is 90,201. In January daily cases were reaching 225,000; the national peak was 314,093 cases reported on January 8

He noted 'were nowhere near out of the woods' with numbers still higher than the previous two waves.

CDC director, Rochelle Walensky, said: 'Its encouraging to see these trends coming down, but theyre coming down from an extraordinarily high place.

Researchers at the University of Washingtons Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation said Friday the vaccination effort and 'declining seasonality' have helped push the numbers down.

Eleanor Murray, a professor of epidemiology at Boston University School of Public Health, said: 'I worry that its at least partly an artifact of resources being moved from testing to vaccination.'

It comes as restaurants in New York were once again able to offer indoor dining at 25 per cent capacity, and Montgomery County in Maryland became the last jurisdiction in that state to lift a similar ban.

Couple kiss while dining indoors at The Leopard at des Artistes restaurant during Valentine's Day in Manhattan, New York City

New York restaurants are once again able to offer indoor dining at 25 per cent capacity

Happy Galentine's! Diners at The Mark enjoy martinis. The famous hotel is where Meghan Markle had her baby shower in February 2019. The restaurant offered a $138 pp Valentine's menu and the hotel offered a $4,400 'fool proof' Valentine's Day package which included a $2,000 wedding ceremony in a hotel room

The seven-day average of new cases has declined in 40 states; for hospitalizations it has decreased in 45 states, data shows.

More then 52 million Americans have received the vaccine as of Sunday evening.

A total of 1,363 deaths were reported Sunday. The seven day average is 2,574.

COVID Tracking Project data shows there has been a 63.7 per cent drop in the seven day rolling average of cases; tests have dropped off by 17.5 per cent.

Average daily new coronavirus cases in the United States dipped below 100,000 in recent days for the first time in months, but experts cautioned Sunday that infections remain high and precautions to slow the pandemic must remain in place.

The seven-day rolling average of new infections was well above 200,000 for much of December and went to roughly 250,000 in January, according to data kept by Johns Hopkins University.

'We are still at about 100,000 cases a day. We are still at around 1,500 to 3,500 deaths per day. The cases are more than two-and-a-half-fold times what we saw over the summer,' Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said on NBC's 'Meet the Press.'

'It's encouraging to see these trends coming down, but they're coming down from an extraordinarily high place.'

The tracking project tweeted: 'The case declines that we've seen have been massive since mid January, falling far more than the number of tests reported.' But they added: 'South Carolina, for example, has been declining more slowly than other states and now has the most cases per capita over the last week'

On Saturday, the seven-day rolling average for deaths was around 2,500. That number peaked at more than 3,300 earlier in the winter, according to Johns Hopkins.

The U.S. saw a spike of more than 5,400 deaths reported Friday  nearly half from Ohio, where authorities said earlier in the week that they planned to add deaths to the state's tally over the course of a few days after discovering as many as 4,000 unreported COVID-19 fatalities.

Walensky added that new variants, including one first detected in the United Kingdom that appears to be more transmissible and has already been recorded in more than 30 states, will likely lead to more cases and more deaths.

Diners eat at The Leopard at des Artistes restaurant during Valentine's Day in Manhattan

Alexander McCormik and Brianna Hines have dinner on Valentine's Day on February 14 in the Little Italy neighborhood in New York City

'All of it is really wraps up into we can't let our guard down,' she said. 'We have to continue wearing masks. We have to continue with our current mitigation measures. And we have to continue getting vaccinated as soon as that vaccine is available to us.'

The U.S. has recorded more than 27.5 million virus cases and more than 484,000 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins data.

With parents and political leaders eager to have children around the country back in school for in-person learning, it is important that people continue to observe precautions, Walensky said.

'We need to all take responsibility to decrease that community spread, including mask wearing so that we can get our kids and our society back,' she said.

But she added that schools can reopen safely 'without all of the teachers being vaccinated'.

New York City, pictured, resumed indoor dining over the weekend at 25 percent capacity, with restaurant hours being extended from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m

Customer wearing a protective mask has her temperature checked at the front doorof a restaurant in Manhattan after indoor dining reopened

Walensky told Fox News Sunday: 'From a scientific standpoint, we know that it is possible to reopen schools safely without all of the teachers being vaccinated.'

The CDC released guidance on Friday outlining mitigation strategies necessary to reopen schools or to keep them open.

The agency's guidance is just that - it cannot force schools to reopen, and CDC officials were careful to say they are not calling for a mandate that all US schools be reopened.

Officials said there is strong evidence now that schools can reopen, especially at lower grade levels.

Some teachers have expressed concern about returning to the classroom without having been vaccinated, but the guidelines do not say that's necessary.

Dr. Anthony Fauci said on ABC's 'This Week' that it would be 'optimal' if teachers were vaccinated but that other measures laid out in the 24-page document can lessen their risk.

'Practically speaking, when you balance the benefit of getting the children back to school with the fact that the risks are being mitigated, if you follow the recommendations and these new guidelines from the CDC, hopefully, I think that will alleviate the concerns on both sides,' he said.
A convicted felon from Florida is wanted for theft after he allegedly stole a diamond engagement ring from his fiancee to propose to a second woman, after meeting both of them on the same dating website OKCupid using two fake identities.

Joseph Davis, 48, is wanted on a felony charge for reportedly stealing around $6,270 worth of jewelry from his girlfriend in Orange City including the ring he gave to her when he proposed and a ring that belonged to her grandmother.

He is accused of using the engagement ring to propose to a second woman in Orlando, 30 miles away.

Now the women, who both ended their relationships with the man they knew as 'Joe Brown' and 'Marcus Brown' have teamed up with police to bring him for questioning.

Joseph Davis, 48, (pictured) is wanted on a felony charge for reportedly stealing around $6,270 worth of jewelry from his girlfriend in Orange City including the ring he gave to her when he proposed and a ring that belonged to her grandmother

It began when one unnamed partner in Orange City came forward to detectives after spotting the man she knew as 'Joe Brown' on Facebook with a woman she suspected was wearing her engagement ring, as reported by Yahoo.

When she went to her jewelry box she found that several items, including the engagement ring and her wedding band from a previous marriage.

In a statement posted on Facebook Volusia County detectives wrote: 'Several other pieces of jewelry [were missing], including a diamond ring that belonged to her grandmother. The total value of property stolen was about $6,270.'

When the victim confronted 'Brown' about the thefts she also sent messages to the second fiancee and recovered some of her belongings.

With both relationships over due to the alleged infidelity, the victims began cooperating with each other and with detectives.

Volusia police added: 'The Orlando fiancee described to police how 'Brown' had fooled her, too  even taking her to the Orange City girlfriends house while she was at work, claiming the house was his, and asking her to move in with him.'

They added: 'She told detectives she packed up her apartment, disassembled her furniture and was ready to move until one day, he told her the deal fell through.'

The Orlando fiancee also reported a laptop and jewelry were missing from her apartment after 'Brown' moved out and disappeared.

Both women reported they met Davis on the same dating app, OKCupid, in 2015 and 2016.

When detectives searched databases and shared photos of Davis with other law enforcement agencies in hopes of identifying him, they came up empty.

However, one of the fiancees remembered the name and address of a niece that he had in North Carolina.

With that information, detectives were able to track down a woman who turned out to be the sister of a Joseph Louis Davis, whose photos matched the photos provided by both victims.

Volusia police added that Davis 'had a record as a convicted felon out of Oregon and North Carolina, and has an active arrest warrant out of Oregon for a hit and run crash with injuries.'

He is accused of using the engagement ring to propose to a second woman in Orlando, 30 miles away

They added: 'His prior arrests include possession of fictitious ID, filing a false police report, domestic assault and possession of cocaine with intent to sell. In one of his out-of-state booking records from 2014, the jail listed a tattoo described as a cross with "Only God can judge me" on his left arm  identical to the tattoo both victims described their boyfriend/fiancee as having.'

Anyone with information about Davis whereabouts is asked to contact the Volusia Sheriffs Office at 386-668-3830 and ask for Detective Wheeler. If you want to remain anonymous and qualify for a potential cash reward, you can contact Crime Stoppers of Northeast Florida at 888-277-TIPS, or via the P3 Tips app.
Megan Fox's relationship with Machine Gun Kelly has certainly blossomed over the past year.

And the famous lovebirds are spreading the love on social media, as they celebrate the romantic weekend.

Kelly revealed Sunday that he wears his girlfriend's blood on a necklace, as he took to Instagram with some sweet memories and a passionate Valentine's Day tribute to the Jennifer's Body star.

Bloody valentine: Machine Gun Kelly revealed Sunday that he wears his girlfriend Megan Fox's blood on a necklace, as he took to Instagram with some sweet memories and a passionate Valentine's Day tribute

Romantic jewelry: The 30-year-old shared a photo of the unique transparent jewelry, featuring a red smudge, captioned: 'i wear your blood around my neck. my bloody valentine'

The 30-year-old shared a photo of the unique transparent jewelry, featuring a red smudge, captioned: 'i wear your blood around my neck. my bloody valentine.'

It appeared to be a nod to his single Bloody Valentine, from his fifth album Tickets to My Downfall, after he and Fox first sparked rumors of their romance when they appeared together in the music video last May.

Fox, 34, also gushed over her boyfriend on Instagram, writing: 'there goes my heart. manifest outside of my body. draped in the towering silhouette of a most unusually handsome boy.

'magical and haunted. kinetic and tortured. ethereal and dangerous. cosmic. lawless. eternal. creative genius. the journey will likely be perilous. but there is no destination without him. happy valentines day rehab barbie.'

In love: Fox, 34, also gushed over her boyfriend on Instagram, writing: 'there goes my heart. manifest outside of my body. draped in the towering silhouette of a most unusually handsome boy'

Onscreen romance: She and the Hotel Diablo artist met last March, on the set of their upcoming crime thriller Midnight in the Switchgrass

Wedding bells: The couple recently sparked engagement rumors when she was seen sporting a rock on her left hand, but they're reportedly not ready for matrimony just yet. A source told People earlier this month: 'They are very serious and plan on spending the future together. There will be an engagement at some point, but they are not engaged now'

She and the Hotel Diablo artist met last March, on the set of their upcoming crime thriller Midnight in the Switchgrass.

The couple recently sparked engagement rumors when she was seen sporting a rock on her left hand, but they're reportedly not ready for matrimony just yet.

A source told People earlier this month: 'They are very serious and plan on spending the future together. There will be an engagement at some point, but they are not engaged now.'

It comes after Fox filed for divorce from husband of 10 years Brian Austin Green, 47, in November: 'Megan needs her divorce to be finalized before she can fully move on. She is very happy though.'

The couple tied the knot in June of 2010, sharing sons Noah Shannon, eight, Bodhi Ranson, seven, and Journey River, four, and they announced their latest split last May.

Calling it quits: It comes after Fox filed for divorce from husband of 10 years Brian Austin Green, 47, in November: 'Megan needs her divorce to be finalized before she can fully move on. She is very happy though'

Moving on: Green has also moved on to a new relationship, as he was first romantically linked to Sharna Burgess, 35, back in November, making it Instagram official last month

Blossoming love: They took to Instagram for Valentine's Day, as he professed his love for the Australian dancer: 'This has been kind of a weird year for me so what an amazing Valentine's Day this has been'

Green has also moved on to a new relationship, as he was first romantically linked to Sharna Burgess, 35, back in November, making it Instagram official last month.

They took to Instagram for Valentine's Day, as he professed his love for the Australian dancer: 'This has been kind of a weird year for me so what an amazing Valentine's Day this has been.

'Sharna is a really amazing, considerate, loving, kind person. I kind of feel like when you put yourself in a space where you on some level decide that you're gonna surround yourself with people that help you move forward on a path instead of pulling you back, that they do that.'

Burgess also gushed over the Beverly Hills, 90210 star: 'This one took me completely by surprise. I've never known a man like him.'
Comedienne and Media personality Afia Schwarzenegger celebrated her 39th birthday on Sunday, February 14, 2021.



Born in 1982, Afia Schwar turned 39 years old and it was a double celebration as her birthday coincides with the celebration of Valentine's Day.



She started her birthday by releasing some stunning photos on social media earning praise from her fans. In the afternoon, Schwar paid a courtesy call on the National Chief Imam Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharabutu at his residence.



She recieves several surprises inclusing a customised necklace from Rev. Obofour's wife, a new phone, boxes of pizza, a he-goat, paintings of her, among other things.



Schwar had a private birthday party organised for her at the residence of Musican, Nhyiraba Kojo.



Watch exclusive video below:



Source: Eugene Osafo-Nkansah/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
Irish penalties for illegal fishing compatible with EU, court rules

by Sean McCarthaigh

February 15,2021 | Source: Irish Times

Irish legislation which penalises boat owners engaged in illegal fishing by getting them to forfeit illegal catches and fishing equipment is not incompatible with EU legislation, according to the EUs top court. The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has ruled that Ireland is entitled to have legislation which imposes such sanctions on vessels convicted of illegal fishing offences. The ruling following a referral to the Luxembourg-based court by the Court of Appeal in Dublin after a Dutch skipper challenged a fine of 500 as well as the forfeiture of a catch worth 344,000 and equipment valued at 55,000 imposed by Cork Circuit Criminal Court in June 2015.



The skippers UK-registered vessel was intercepted by the Irish Naval Service vessel LE Samuel Beckett on February 11th, 2015 during a sea fisheries protection patrol and escorted to Cork Harbour. It was found to have been engaging in the banned activity of high grading which involves selecting the best catch and discarding smaller, less profitable and already dead fish back into the sea.



Disproportionate



Lawyers for the Dutch skipper claimed the penalties imposed by the Irish courts were disproportionate on the basis it was his first conviction. They also argued that the Sea Fisheries and Maritime Jurisdiction Act 2006 is incompatible with EU legislation and the regulation of fishing exploitation is an exclusive role of the EU rather than national governments. However, the CJEU said the persistently high number of serious infringements of the rules of the EU Common Fisheries Policy within EU waters was largely due to the non-deterrent level of sanctions and the wide variation in penalties among many EU member states.



The court said EU regulations left the choice of sanctions to the discretion of member states so long as they were commensurate with the seriousness of the breaches. It claimed the forfeiture of illegal catches had the effect of depriving offenders of an undue economic benefit from their infringements which a fine alone could not ensure. The court noted the maximum fine that the Irish courts could impose was between 10,000 and 35,000 depending on the size of the vessel. It observed that such fines on their own would be neither effective nor dissuasive.

Theme(s): Freshwater ecosystems and threats, Landing Centres, Fisheries Resources, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods, Communities and Organisations, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Others, Post Harvest Technology and Trade.
Brattleboro, VT (05301)

Today

Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch..

Tonight

Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch.
ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :A delegation of the PAF Air War College, Karachi on Monday was apprised that per capita water availability in Pakistan had come down from 5650 cubic meter in 1951 to an alarming level of 908 cubic meter per annum, pushing us to the stage of water-scarce country.

Briefing the visiting delegation at WAPDA House, General Manager (Hydrology and Water Management) Shahid Hameed said that Pakistan can store only 10 percent of its annual river flows against the world average of 40 percent.

Ironically, instead of increasing water storage capacity, Pakistan has lost about one-fourth storage of the dams, said a press release.

He said the live water storage capacity that used to be 16.26 million acre feet (MAF) in 1976 has reduced to 13.68 MAF, which equals to only 30 days carry over capacity.

India has carry over capacity of 170 days, Egypt 700 days and America 900 days.

The carry over water storage capacity has to be increased from 30 days to 120 days. Likewise, the ratio of low-cost hydel electricity also requires to be drastically improved.

The delegation was briefed that WAPDA has been expeditiously working on a number of projects to improve water situation in the country and add a sizeable quantum of hydel electricity to the National Grid. Mohmand Dam, Diamer Basha Dam and Dasu Hydropower Project are to name a few.

A comprehensive strategy has been devised through which various projects will be completed in a phased manner.

On completion from 2025 to 2029, Mohmand Dam, Diamer Basha Dam and Dasu Hydropower Project (Stage-I) will add gross water storage capacity of 9.3 MAF and about 7500 MW low-cost and environment friendly hydel electricity to the National Grid.

Later, PAF War College delegation head Group Captain Hashim Khan and WAPDA Secretary Fakharuz Zaman Ali Cheema exchanged souvenirs as memento to the visit.

PSO to WAPDA Chairman Brig (R) Mateen Ahmad Mirza, Central Design Office GM Shahid Mahmood and Monitoring & Surveillance GM Salman Farooqi were also present during the briefing.
Pelcha's age discrimination lawsuit is based in part on comments made from the bank's president and CEO, who played a role in her dismissal. According to the lawsuit, the president once stated he wanted to hire younger tellers. Also, when discussing another employee who was in her 80s, he said she had a limited shelf life and had reached her expiration date."

'Sole cause legal standard at heart of dispute

In January, when a panel of judges from the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a district court ruling in favor of the bank, they noted that Pelcha could not prove that her age was the sole cause for her firing. Pelcha is now appealing to the full 6th Circuit Court to overturn that panel ruling. Both of the amicus briefs from AARP and the EEOC argue that a sole cause standard should not apply in this case, based on previous legal precedents, including from the U.S. Supreme Court. If sole cause were to become the new standard in age discrimination cases, it would be extremely difficult for older Americans to successfully fight age bias through the courts.

"Too many older workers have been victims of age discrimination and are denied a fair shake in our justice system. Placing the burden on older workers to show age discrimination as the sole cause of an adverse employment decision would often make it extremely hard to prove illegal bias based on age, said William Alvarado Rivera, AARP Foundation senior vice president for litigation. Age should not play a role in employment decisions. If this legal error is not corrected, we fear it may be replicated in other courts across the country  erasing decades of progress made against age discrimination in the workplace."

The EEOC's brief asserts that the court should use a but-for standard to determine whether Pelcha was fired due to illegal age discrimination. The but-for standard means that age would only have to be a determinative factor in Pelcha's firing, not the only such factor.

"The conclusion that the ADEA requires a showing of but-for causation, not sole causation, is amply supported by numerous other decisions of the Supreme Court, this court and other courts of appeals, the EEOC brief states.

Kenneth Terrell covers employment, age discrimination, work and jobs, careers and Congress for AARP. He previously worked for the Education Writers Association and U.S. News & World Report, where he reported on government and politics, business, education, science and technology, and lifestyle news.

Mekong river at 'worrying' low level amid calls for more Chinese dam data

February 15,2021 | Source: Hindustan Times

Water levels in the Mekong River have fallen to a "worrying level" in part due to outflow restrictions from Chinese hydropower dams upstream, the Mekong River Commission (MRC) said on Friday, calling on Beijing to share all of its water data. The vital waterway has turned blue along the Thai-Laos border, from its usual murky brown colour - signaling shallow water and low levels of nutrition-rich sediment - partially from outflow restrictions from the Jinghong dam in China's Yunnan province, the inter-governmental MRC said. Friday's statement said low rainfall and dams on the Lower Mekong and tributaries also contributed to the drop in levels.



"There have been sudden rises and falls in water levels immediately downstream of Jinghong and further down to Vientiane," said Winai Wongpimool, director of the MRC Secretariat's Technical Support Division. Such fluctuations affect fish migration, agriculture and transportation that nearly 70 million people rely on for their livelihoods and food security. "To help the Lower Mekong countries manage risks more effectively, we call on China and the Lower Mekong countries themselves to share their water release plans with us, Winai said. The MRC said normal conditions may be restored if large volumes of water are released from Chinese dams' reservoirs.



China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs disputed the MRC's findings, adding that there are many causes of downstream drought. China last year pledged to share data from it dams with MRC member countries Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. In January, Beijing notified neighbours that its dams were filling reservoirs until Jan. 25. Outflow levels at Jinghong Dam were 785 cubic metres per second in early-January before rising to 1,400 cubic metres per second in mid-January, the MRC said. However, levels dropped again in February and were 800 cubic metres per second as of Thursday, the MRC said. The statement did not mention any recent notification from Beijing. China said the dam's outflow has been consistently more than 1,000 cubic meters per second since the end of January, a level it says is nearly twice the natural flow of the river. It called on the MRC "to avoid causing public misunderstanding".

Theme(s): Others, Post Harvest Technology and Trade, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Fisheries Resources, Landing Centres, Freshwater ecosystems and threats, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats, Communities and Organisations, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods.
Men from around the world have revealed why they 'refuse' to date 'skinny girls' in startling online confessions.

Taking to anonymous secret sharing app Whisper, the men explained they favour women with 'curves, boobs and a butt' over ones with more slender physiques.

One man said he thinks skinny girls 'suck at cuddling' while another said they 'don't have enough boobs or butt'. Several said they simply don't find slimmer women attractive.

The gallery also includes posts from men who felt others don't understand their preferences, with one writing: 'I can't date skinny girls anymore. I just want plump women, but my friends don't understand.'

Straight to the point: A man from Aurora, Colorado, said there's nothing better than curves

Confidence is key! This man seems to think there's a correlation between confidence and waist size - and says he simply 'refuses' to date skinny girls because of it

Snuggling up: This man from Holbrook, New York, thinks skinny girls 'suck at cuddling'

He IS shallow! It's all about the looks for this man from Oregon who loves big girls

Keep those curves! This poster from Randolph, Massachusetts, wants 'boobs and a bum'

Cruel: A Maryland-based man said he finds skinny girls 'gross' and doesn't want to date them

Growing up: This man, thought to be from the US, said 'thick girls' are for him

Full of praise: This man, thought to be from the US, couldn't say enough about 'chubby girls'

Someone's picky! This man from Huntington Park, California, has exacting standards

All on his own: This man from Sappington, Missouri, said his friends didn't understand
The reason we are tracking the variants is to help locate any areas where COVID-19 might be spreading faster, so the city can intervene to slow the spread, said Dr. Mary Hayden, chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Rush and a co-principal investigator of the new lab. This is a time when we have to be really careful. We cant let up our guard and stop being really aggressive about controlling this.
Australian shares climbed again on Tuesday after BHP declared a record-high interim dividend, oil prices leapt and the Reserve Bank insisted interest rates would not rise for several years.

Earnings season continued to surprise on the upside, with consumer-facing companies such as Collins Food and Adairs announcing they would repay JobKeeper supplements thanks to surprisingly good results.

The ASX 200 finished 0.7 per cent higher at 6917.3, its best since February 25 last year. Credit:Louie Douvis

But exporters like Tassal continued to struggle after COVID-19 linked travel restrictions reduced salmon transportation options.

The S&P/ASX 200 ended a strong session up 0.7 per cent at 6917.3 points, its best since February 25 last year.

Futures were pointing to strong gains overnight in the US, where southern states reported cold snaps that saw spot prices for electricity and natural gas rise sharply. West Texas Intermediate crude broke through $US60 per barrel for the first time in 13 months.

The local energy sector out-performed the market, up 2.1 per cent, followed by industrials and healthcare. Consumer discretionary dragged as sector heavyweights Wesfarmers and Dominos dropped 1.1 per cent and 1.8 per cent respectively.

OANDAs senior market analyst in Asia Pacific, Jeffrey Halley, said the RBAs minutes from its February meeting confirmed interest rates were likely to stay at emergency lows, despite rising bond yields.

Low rates have been fuelling global stock market gains because the returns were higher than other assets. Japans stock market has been trading at 30-year highs this week.

The panic of a return to 70s style inflation is overdone, inflation has been missing in action for the last 20 years and will remain so in a globalised economy, Mr Halley wrote in a note to clients.

Nevertheless, if the US 10-year (bond) grinds towards 2 per cent in the next few months, it will give the Dollar sell-off and the equity rally food for thought.

Although not showing quite the same momentum as yesterday, a combination of dovish central banks, and the ever-present US stimulus and vaccine hopes have kept equity markets in business as usual mode. With the data calendar ultra-light, only a headline surprise could threaten the buy everything narrative in the near-term.

On the ASX, BHP added 2.7 per cent and Rio Tinto 3 per cent, while Transurban gained 4.4 per cent.

A shock announcement from Fortescue Metals Group in the afternoon saw its shares suddenly drop before closing 3 per cent lower at $23.70. Three executives resigned on Tuesday afternoon as the company reviewed the $US2.6 billion Iron Bridge magnetite project in the Pilbara.

Commonwealth Bank went ex-dividend, but the other three banks closed higher.

The buy now, pay later sub-sector saw Zip Co gain 10 per cent to $13.92. And signs of global economic recovery in Sims Metal Groups half-year results saw its shares gain 7.4 per cent to $13.75.

But bad news in results pushed Domain Group down 3 per cent after it flagged rising costs, and GWA Group finished down 8.1 per cent.
As freezing rain bore down on the Portland metro area, extending an unusually icy February storm, officials said warming shelters across the metro area would remain open Sunday night.

In addition to the hundreds who sleep outside on a typical night in Portland, the shelters may be slammed by people seeking respite from the cold, as thousands are still without power from the storms first waves.

Across Oregon and southwest Washington, residents can call 211 for shelter assistance and referrals. More emergency shelter information is available at 211info.org.

In Multnomah County, three emergency warming sites will be open for their fourth night, in addition to the winter shelters that had been open all season. The county also is seeking volunteers to staff the shelters overnight.

Those shelters are located at the Oregon Convention Center at 965 N.E. 1st Ave., the Metro parking garage at 578 N.E. Irving St. and the Arbor Lodge Severe Weather Shelter at 1952 N. Lombard St. The Arbor Lodge location is the former Rite Aid that Multnomah County purchased for $2.6 million in December with intent to turn it into a year-round, full-service shelter. It will be used as a severe weather site until those renovations are made.

In Gresham, the Sunrise Center at 18901 E Burnside St. will be open for warming up, but not to sleep overnight.

Clackamas County warming shelters were open at Hope City Church, 5197 SE King Road in Milwaukie, and Molalla Warming Center, 920 Shirley St. in Molalla. The shelter at The Fathers Heart Street Ministry in Oregon City was full, while shelters in Estacada and Sandy were open by referral only.

Washington County also had expanded its shelter capacity in preparation for the storm, but shelters were requiring preregistration and not accepting walk-ins because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The number to register is 503-640-3263, while online registration was available at co.washington.or.us/homeless.

In Clark County, Living Hope Church, 2711 N.E. Andresen in Vancouver, will be open for walk-ins through the night. The countys Council for the Homeless hotline will be available until 8:30 p.m. at 360-695-9677

-- The Oregonian/OregonLive

This is the first part of a new series. If you have an inspirational story to share, please reach out to the author at asalmieri@siadvance.com.

STATEN ISLAND N.Y.  More than my Crohns.

Inspirational Islanders is a series dedicated to highlighting Staten Island residents who are overcoming challenges that come their way.

Sabrina Todaro, 22, of New Dorp had endured many life-changing experiences in the past year.

In February 2020 she began suffering from severe stomach pain.

Soon after she was diagnosed with Crohns, a disease that causes inflammation of your digestive tract.

For her, the diagnosis was the beginning of a journey and a new lifestyle.

In November, Todaro underwent surgery leaving her with an ileostomy bag.

Having the bag definitely affected my life a lot different than I expected, said Todaro.

She explained that having the bag was a positive experience and made her stronger in the long run.

Sabrina Todaro, 22, of New Dorp shares her journey battling Crohns Disease. Feb. 1, 2020 (Staten Island Advance/ Alexandra Salmieri)

Todaro decided to share her story via social media, hoping to bring awareness to the disease while showing others that you can live a normal life with an ileostomy bag.

" I know a lot of people in my age group go through this and its hard to adjust.

Now, Todaro is recovering from the ileostomy reversal surgery where they removed the bag and reconstructed her intestines.

She is looking forward to completing her degree at The Fashion Institute of New York (FIT) and is focusing on living a healthy life.

Watch the video above to learn more about her journey battling Crohns Disease.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 11:44:25|Editor: huaxia

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Photo provided by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation shows that Bill Gates (R) and Melinda Gates pose for a photo after annotating the 2019 annual letter in Kirkland, Washington, the United States, on Jan. 8, 2019. (Xinhua)

"Without the contributions of China, many of the key ingredients (in fighting climate change) like the batteries and solar power wouldn't be so affordable," Gates said.

NEW YORK, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has applauded China's determination to prioritize the climate and its contributions to carbon reduction, saying the world benefits from the country's efforts to make green energy more affordable.

"It's great that President Xi is making climate a priority and wants to work with other countries on this," said Gates, also co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, in a recent exclusive interview with Xinhua.

China aims to have CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, said Chinese President Xi Jinping in September 2020 at the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly via video.

Aerial photo taken on Sept. 4, 2020 shows the scenery of a lake in Jianfengling nature reserve at Hainan Tropical Rainforest National Park in south China's Hainan Province. (Xinhua/Pu Xiaoxu)

"Without the contributions of China, many of the key ingredients (in fighting climate change) like the batteries and solar power wouldn't be so affordable," Gates said.

China and some other countries have reduced the cost of solar power and electric cars, driving prices down to facilitate worldwide adoption, he said, adding that electric buses are becoming the norm in many Chinese cities.

Aerial photo taken on July 30, 2018 shows an electric bus running on the Yanggongdi Causeway in the West Lake scenic area in Hangzhou, capital of east China's Zhejiang Province. (Xinhua/Huang Zongzhi)

China is also doing a lot to build up its electricity grid to use more renewable energy, said the U.S. billionaire philanthropist. "I hope that innovators in China can bring down the cost of green energy enough, so that China can even increase its commitment to use renewable energy in the Belt and Road Initiative."

Citing many sources of emissions like steel and cement factories and the way people grow rice, make fertilizer and raise livestock, Gates said that the world cannot skip over any of these to reach zero emissions.

Aerial photo taken on Dec. 15, 2020 shows a solar thermal electricity project in Gonghe County, Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Hainan in northwest China's Qinghai Province. (Xinhua/Zhang Hongxiang)

"To solve these problems, innovation is a key," Gates said, noting that Chinese companies are increasing their R&D budgets.

Describing basic R&D as a huge area for cooperation, Gates called upon China and the United States, the world's two largest economies, to work together to promote R&D and help reduce the green premium for the entire world.

Climate change and innovation are areas that China and the United States could achieve big win-win results, he said.

"Both countries have amazing smart people in the younger generation that would be proud to be part of this," Gates said. 
New Delhi:

New security cameras are installed on Sunday by Israel at the entrance to a sensitive Jerusalem holy site, as officials began indicating it was considering"alternatives" to the metal detectors at the contested shrine that set off a weekend of violence and raised tensions in the region.

Israel set up the new security measures last week after Arab gunmen opened fire from the shrine, killing two Israeli policemen. It said they were a necessary measure to prevent more attacks and were deployed routinely at holy sites around the world.

But Muslims alleged Israel was trying to expand itscontrol at the Muslim-administered site and have launched mass prayer protests. Three Palestinians were killed in street clashes Friday in some of the worst street violence in years, and later a Palestinian stabbed to death three members of an Israeli family.

Major General Yoav Mordechai, who heads the Israeli defence body for Palestinian civilian affairs, said Israel wasopen to alternatives to lower the tensions. "The only thing we want is to ensure no one can enter with weapons again and carry out another attack," he said."We're willing to examine alternatives to the metal detectors as long as the solution of alternative ensures the prevention of the next attack." However, the Mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein,told the Voice of Palestine he demands a complete return to procedures that were in place before the initial attack at the shrine, known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews asthe Temple Mount.

In a statement today, the Islamic institutions in Jerusalem, of which he is a part, said they "affirm the categorical rejection of the electronic gates and all the measures of occupation." Disputes over the shrine, revered by Muslims and Jews, have set off major rounds of Israeli-Palestinian confrontations in the past. On Friday, several thousand Palestinians clashed with Israeli security forces in the West Bank and in Jerusalem after noon prayers, the centrepiece of the Muslim religious week.

Three Palestinians were killed and several dozen wounded. Late on Friday evening, a 20-year-old Palestinian identified as Omar al-Abed jumped over the fence of the Halamish settlement and entered a home, surprising a family that was celebrating the birth of a new grandchild during their traditional Sabbath dinner.

He stabbed to death Yosef Salomon, 70, and his adultchildren, 46-year-old Chaya and 35-year-old Elad. A neighbour,an off-duty soldier, heard the screams, rushed to the home and opened fire, wounding the attacker. TV footage showed the floor tiles drenched in blood, and officials called it a"slaughter."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denounced the attack as"an act of terror, carried out by a beast who was incited withunfathomable hatred." Al-Abed said in a pre-attack Facebook post that heexpected to be killed in the attack and his father said he was motivated by the violence at the Jerusalem shrine.

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A British national pleaded guilty Monday to breaking a quarantine order in Singapore. Skea Nigel left his room at The Ritz-Carlton, Millenia Singapore hotel on three occasions last September, according charge sheets. He was not wearing a mask at the time.

The 52-year-old l then climbed an emergency stairwell to a room that his Singaporean fiancee had booked. The two spent nine hours together. Nigel said he was "guilty" of the two charges against him at Singapore's State Courts.

They face a maximum sentence of six years in jail and a fine of 10,000 Singapore dollars ($7,558.58) for each charge. Nigel's lawyer Dhillon Surinder Singh said his clients hoped for the best, but would not comment further because the case is not over.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
The pandemic cure roll out continues to stall. Here's more evidence of an ongoing public health FAIL . . . Read more:

Demand for vaccination shots, early arrivals lead to long lines in the cold in Johnson County OVERLAND PARK, KS (KCTV) -- Many Johnson County residents braved the cold to get vaccines shots Saturday afternoon at the University of Kansas Health System's Indian Creek Campus in Overland Park. Concerns about the long lines were expressed to KCTV5 News throughout the day.
Mumbai Police has launched the 'Zero Beggars' drive in an attempt to make the city begging free. Under this drive, all police stations in Mumbai have been asked to track beggars and keep them at a special home in Chembur after testing them for COVID-19 infection.

The drive to rid Mumbai of beggars will be carried out throughout the month of February according to the directions of Joint Commissioner of Police Vishwas Nagre Patil under the Bombay Prevention of Begging Act, 1959.

DCP (PRO) S Chaitanya told India Today, "Begging is a social crime. All police stations have been instructed to detain these beggars, take permission from the court, conduct their COVID-19 tests and then lodge them at the beggars home."

Another police official said that the motive behind this drive to end the abominable practice of people forcing children to beg on streets, adding that begging gives a bad image to India's financial capital.

While the intentions behind the anti-begging drive seem to be noble, experts and activists have raised questions on adequate space to accommodate beggars in the Chembur home and further rehabilitation.

Senior advocate and activist Abha Singh said, "Will this drive end begging in Mumbai? For how long will the beggars' home keep them? Is there a plan to rehabilitate them? The police can implement the law but what next. There should be a plan to eradicate begging and it should not be a token drive."

The Mumbai Police identified 14 beggars and sent them to a beggars' home in Chembur as of Friday. The Brihanmunbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) identified approximately 29,000 people including women and children engaged in begging in the city in November 2020.

Also read: Delhi govt to soon start registration of e-autos, says transport minister

Also read: Pulwama attack anniversary: Netizens pay tribute to CRPF soldiers


Representational image. The PM CARES Fund Trust will finance two COVID-19 makeshift hospitals in Bihar with 500-bed each, in a way to improve the coronavirus care in the state. The Prime Ministers Office (PMO) announced the decision on social media on August 24. (Image: Twitter @PMOIndia)

Note to readers: This story is part of a two-part series on the decision taken by insurance regulator IRDAI asking insurers to not delay or reject COVID-19 claims. This part looks at how the customers will benefit.

Mahesh Panigrahi*, a 42-year-old software professional from Delhi, was diagnosed with COVID-19 in the first week of February 2021.

While he has a health insurance policy, his biggest worry was whether his insurer would pay the entire hospitalisation bill or not. Thanks to a timely move by the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI), Panigrahi got the full bill of Rs 3.9 lakh paid by his insurer for the one-week hospitalisation.

Inadequate payment of hospitalisation bill by insurers is one of the biggest worries customers face during the pandemic. IRDAI has now told general insurers through their industry body, the General Insurance (GI) Council, that COVID-19 claims should not be delayed, even if hospitals are not following standard rates.

This means that customers need not worry about whether their reimbursements or medical claims will be borne by the insurers or not. Insurers, on the other hand, will have to renegotiate rates and package deals with hospitals.

Standard rates are fixed rates set for COVID-19 treatment across India. However, as reported by Moneycontrol earlier, many hospitals have not been following this rate, leading to friction between the insurers and medical institutions.

The IRDAI decision is beneficial to customers, though insurers would still have to struggle with high claim ratios. High claim ratios mean that an insurers losses would exceed 100 percent. In simple terms, this means that for every Rs 100 collected as premium, the insurer will pay Rs 101 or more as claims. This would lead to a price increase in health policies during renewal.

COVID-19-related health insurance claims worth close to Rs 6,650 crore have been settled by insurers till the first week of February. So far, hospitalisation claims worth about Rs 13,100 crore have been filed. The absolute number of claims, as of February 6, is 870,000.

What has the regulator told insurers

The regulator has said that non-life insurers can use the reference rates of the GI Council as the standard metric for claims settlement. In case of high claims, it has been said that the policyholder should not suffer and that it should be the responsibility of the insurer to settle the claims quickly. This move assumes significance because policyholders have been hit with high medical expenses for COVID-19 treatment, especially with infection-control costs being added to the bill.

Customers stand to benefit, but it is unfair on us because hospitals are at fault. We will pay the claims as advised but shouldnt hospitals be penalised for not following rules, asked the head of underwriting at a private insurer. This official also added that many hospitals are exceeding the package rate and the final payment burden is on the insurers.

For instance, the GI Council rate card says that the cost at National Accreditation Board for Hospitals & Healthcare Providers-accredited (NABH) hospitals will be Rs 10,000 per day, including PPE cost (Personal Protection Equipment) of Rs 1,200.

In the case of non-NABH hospitals, this will be Rs 8,000 per day. For severely sick patients, who need intensive care unit (ICU) with ventilator care, hospital rates per day will be Rs 18,000 (Rs 15,000 at non-NABH hospitals), including PPE cost of Rs 2,000.

The standard rates are hardly being followed. The government should pull up the hospitals and force them to follow these rates. We will pay bills as instructed but customers may be hit with 10-15 percent higher premiums when the policy is renewed, said the senior vice-president at a state-owned insurer.

There are some caveats to the payments. One is that the room-rent limit (for example, Rs 1,500-2,000 per day) will be strictly followed for claims payment if the insured has opted for it. Secondly, home-based care will not be covered under traditional hospitalisation medical insurance.

So, if a customer has contracted COVID-19 and is only advised recovery at home, any expenses related to PPE kits or medicines at home will not be payable under a standard health insurance plan, if it only covers hospitalisation (minimum 24 hours).

Why is this crucial for customers?

Traditionally, there has been a trend of hospitals charging customers a higher amount, especially if they have health cover. During the pandemic, too, this scenario played out all across India, when several thousand people started getting admitted to hospitals from April 2020 onwards.

Hospitals faced the challenge of how to manage costs at a time when elective surgeries were being postponed due to the virus outbreak.

While insurance claims were being paid only partly, hospitals continued to add newer charges such as temperature check fee, PPE kit fee and cleaning fee.

In fact, the GI Council had also planned to file an appeal in the Supreme Court against overcharging by hospitals but this matter wasnt taken up.

Insurance works on a pool concept. So whatever money is collected as a premium is paid out as claim. If in a year the claim paid out exceeds the premium collected, the excess amount is passed on to customers in the next year in the form of a premium hike.

Customers also pointed out that some hospitals resorted to selective charging. Malini Saraogi*, a 34-year-old artist from Kolkata, told Moneycontrol that while she was charged for masks and PPE kits, two other people sharing her room were not.

I found out that they did not have any health policy while I did. My insurer did not pay the excess charges amounting to Rs 18,000. It would have been good if insurers were asked to pay all such claims in the initial stage itself, suggested Saraogi, who underwent COVID-19 treatment in October 2020.

However, her neighbour Nisha Rebello* has been lucky. The 57-year-old teacher was hospitalised due to COVID-19 about two weeks ago and has been assured of full payment under the reimbursement policy.

*Names changed to protect identity
A powerful winter storm unlike anything seen in 31 years, when temperatures fell to 6 degrees in San Antonio, left a thick carpet of snow on top of a layer of ice across San Antonio and the Hill Country on Monday.

As bad as the storm was, even greater dangers loomed after dusk and into today, when the radiant heat of the sun no longer melts ice from roofs and roads and when temperatures nose-dive, turning slush into deadly ice.

The National Weather Service said temperatures were expected to plunge by this morning to as low as 7 degrees in North Bexar County and 9 in the south toward Pleasanton. The wind chill factor would make it feel worse, as if its 5 to 10 degrees below zero.

Sunlight and traffic melted the snow on many roads Monday afternoon, but it will refreeze as hard, slippery ice. Roadways will be treacherous Tuesday morning, Mayor Ron Nirenberg said.

Dont travel until temperatures rise above freezing if you can avoid it. Please exercise extreme caution if you must leave home, he added. In addition to icy conditions, the extreme cold is dangerous. Stay indoors if possible.

San Antonians awakened Monday to see 3 to 6 inches of powdery snow and to feel bitter cold that shattered record low temperatures not seen in the Alamo City since Dec. 22, 1989.

As the day began, temperatures dropped to 9 degrees at San Antonio International Airport, with wind chill readings that were well below zero. Anywhere from 3 to 6 inches of snow fell across San Antonio and a wide swath of South-Central Texas from near east of Eagle Pass to Austin. But in some parts of the Hill Country, it was even higher  6 to 7 inches of snow piled up.

On ExpressNews.com: As winter chill deepens accidents mount, police swarm to close roads

The high Monday barely reached freezing and then started a downhill slide into the 20s, making certain that the snow and ice already on the ground would remain not only into today but also Wednesday.

Arctic air will deliver single-digit temperatures by this morning throughout South-Central Texas, with the mercury expected to hit 2 degrees in San Marcos, 4 degrees in Kerrville, 8 degrees in Uvalde, and 15 degrees in Eagle Pass and Del Rio.

Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff called the cold blast dangerous days for sure and discouraged people from driving unless they absolutely have to go somewhere.

The deep freeze will be compounded later today by icy rain starting at night and continuing into Wednesday, when highs will reach the upper 40s before overnight temperatures tumble back into the 20s, bringing yet another hard freeze.

William Luther /Staff photographer

Weather conditions will look similar Thursday, with a high of 40 and a low of 23.

On ExpressNews.com: Snow in San Antonio

Compounding the cold were rolling power outages caused in part by the states overtaxed electricity grid system. To conserve power, CPS Energy began controlled outages at 1:30 a.m. Monday. But the utility said that if an outage lasted longer than 15 minutes, it likely was part of a separate outage, not related to a rolling blackout. As of 4:45 p.m. Monday, the utility had 327 outages affecting 202,155 customer accounts, about 23 percent of its total accounts, according to its website.

In some cases, electricity would snap on briefly and be lost again. At one home in the Great Northwest Silver Creek subdivision, a resident said she hadnt had power for more than eight minutes an hour throughout the afternoon.

Still, parts of the Lone Star State fared even worse.

Roy Ferguson, a state district court judge for an area that includes Brewster, Culberson, Hudspeth, Jeff Davis and Presidio counties, said in a tweet after noon Monday that far West Texas  including all of the Big Bend area  would be without power for more than 24 hours, including throughout Monday night.

Plus, no cell service or water, he added.

There were fewer problems on San Antonio roads than some might have expected, perhaps because many overpasses and bridges were closed. Police Lt. Jesse Salame said the number of accidents Monday appeared to be significantly lower than average.

Altogether, 1,178 crash calls for service had been logged from 9 p.m. Saturday through 3:30 p.m. Monday, but some likely were duplicate calls.

Thirteen San Antonio police vehicles were damaged. One patrolman badly injured in a weather-related accident, Officer Travis Gossett, was listed in stable condition at University Hospital, but Salame said his injuries were significant.

A two-year veteran, he was on foot and attempting to direct traffic in the main lanes of U.S. 281 North at Brook Hollow when he was struck by a vehicle about 2:20 a.m. Sunday.

Hes got a long road to recovery, but hes a real healthy and strong guy, Salame said.

The number of calls went down significantly Sunday night and into Monday. Police fielded about 100 for weather-related accidents from 3 p.m. to midnight Sunday and had taken an additional 30 calls since, Salame said.

The icy weather contributed to two fatal traffic accidents Sunday. One was at 6:30 a.m. in the 3800 block of northbound Interstate 35, and the other was at 1:22 p.m. on an overpass on OConner Road at Weidner.

Sheriff Javier Salazar said a 78-year-old man was found dead in the front yard of a home on the Northwest Side. Authorities believe that the man, who was leaving home for an appointment, fell. He was later found dead by EMTs.

No foul play was suspected, Salazar said. While it has not been confirmed that the mans death was related to the weather, it is safe to say weather contributed, Salazar said.

San Antonio firefighters responded to two accidents and two structure fires, but spokesman Joe Arrington said the biggest call volume had been for falls, with more than 30 reported late Sunday once ice formed on paved areas. He warned people to be careful when out in the snow because of the icy surface below.

VIA Metropolitan Transit announced just after noon Monday that it had temporarily suspended all bus, VIAtrans and VIA Link service until further notice while roads and highways remain closed or unsafe for travel.

Many schools, universities and businesses were closed Monday, some for the Presidents Day holiday but also for the inclement weather. Dozens of flights to and from San Antonio International Airport were delayed or canceled Monday, and all are canceled today as well.

Wolff, who estimated that 5 inches of snow fell on the Northwest Side area where he lives, called the winter storm a historic event, comparable to the great snow decades ago when the white stuff lasted three, four or even five days.

Its absolutely beautiful out there, he said. Of course, its a really, really exciting period of time for young kids. My two youngest grandkids, they took them outside and they were laying in the snow doing the angel thing with their legs.

Its a winter wonderland that they will hardly see, maybe once or twice in a lifetime down here.

ezavala@express-news.net | Twitter: @elizabeth2863
Syracuse, N.Y. -- A Syracuse man has been arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated after the car he was driving hit a Syracuse police car, according to police department spokesman Sgt. Matthew Malinowski.

Neither of the officers in the car were injured, Malinowski said.

Donta Albert, 28, was arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated, according to Malinowski.

The crash happened Wednesday at 8:05 p.m. in the 2000 block of South Salina Street, according to Malinowski.

Albert was driving a white Chevrolet Impala when the car crossed the center line and hit the marked police car, Malinowski said. He was taken to Upstate University Hospital with facial injuries, according to Malinowski.

Got a tip, comment or story idea? Contact Chris Libonati via the Signal app for encrypted messaging at 585-290-0718, by phone at the same number, by email or on Twitter.
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A man who worked in multiple jobs that put him in contact with children in the Portland area was arrested last week on charges of buying and possessing child pornography, federal officials said.

Alexander Wiese of Portland was taken into custody Wednesday after federal agents from the Homeland Security Investigations unit served a search warrant at his home, officials said.

Investigators said they believe Wiese bought and downloaded explicit images of children between September and October, Robert Hammer, special agent in charge who oversees Homeland Security Investigations operations in the Pacific Northwest, said in a statement.

There is no safe place on the dark web for criminals to hide from Homeland Security Investigations, Hammer said. HSI brings significant digital forensics expertise, broad legal authorities, and a worldwide network of investigators and professional staff to bear in combatting the global production and distribution of child pornography.

Wiese worked at several camps, schools and other places where he would have come into contact with children, according to federal officials and Portland Public Schools.

Between September 2012 and May 2015, Wiese was a regular volunteer in a band classroom at daVinci Arts Middle School in Northeast Portland, which serves students in 6th, 7th and 8th grade.

In 2019, he worked as a day camp counselor and at the front desk of the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry. He also visited Chapman Elementary school on Oct. 28, 2019, and the Creative Science School in Southeast Portland on Dec. 4, 2019, both times as a volunteer with a science program.

Within the past few weeks, Wiese observed two virtual session of an outdoor school facilitated by teachers from Hosford Middle School.

Officials with Portland Public Schools said Wiese, like all volunteers, was subject to a criminal background check, which he passed.

Although we know that Mr. Wiese was involved at a small number of PPS schools, no one has reported to the district that he acted inappropriately with, or harmed any PPS student, the district said in a statement. Prior to being permitted to volunteer in PPS schools, all volunteers are required to clear a criminal history check that includes the national sex offender registry. Mr. Wiese cleared this check.

Officials said the district was in full cooperation with investigators and encouraged anyone with information about Wiese to contact Clint Lindsly, Department of Homeland Security special agent, at 503-910-7375.

-- Kale Williams; kwilliams@oregonian.com; 503-294-4048; @sfkale
Syracuse, N.Y.  As more teachers and school staff get vaccinated and Covid-19 cases decline, Onondaga County and New York state now have loosened quarantine rules for schools once again.

This is a big game changer for us,' said Jordan-Elbridge Superintendent James Froio. We wont have to keep losing teachers to quarantine, and we wont have to send 40 kids home to quarantine anymore.

The new rules are twofold: one applies to vaccinated staff and the others apply to everyone - vaccinated or not.

New York state accepted the CDCs quarantine recommendation, which says that anyone vaccinated and two weeks past their last shot (when immunity is said to kick in) doesnt have to quarantine if exposed to someone with Covid-19. For now, that lasts for 90 days, as studies continue to determine how long immunity lasts.

But Froio points out that 90 days pretty much takes schools to the end of the academic year.

At J-E, 90 percent of the school staff is vaccinated.

The new state and county quarantine rules mean schools wont have as many students and staff out. And when teachers were absent, staffing became a huge issue forcing schools to switch to remote learning, Froio said.

This will make the last third of the school year much more normal,' he said. Dealing with Covid has been challenging, but dealing with quarantines has been just as challenging.

What stands out in Onondaga Countys new rules is that quarantines for K-12 students are different depending on whether someone is exposed to to a symptomatic or asymptomatic person with the virus. That never entered into the picture before.

Also new are that the rules differ if students have assigned seats or not.

Among the new county rules:

If a student is exposed to someone who is asymptomatic, no quarantine is required no matter whether there are assigned seats or not. Masks and six feet of social distancing is required.

With symptomatic exposures of students in assigned seats, only those adjacent to the symptomatic one with the virus would have to quarantine.

If no seat assignments, teachers, staff and students would have to quarantine after two hours in a classroom with a symptomatic infected person. Prior to this, most instances called for quarantine after one hour in a classroom whether someone was symptomatic or asymptomatic. This is a substantial change.

Lunch: Only those adjacent to the infected person would have to quarantine.

Gym: No mandatory quarantine as people typically have masks on and are 12 feet apart. If closer, quarantines will be determined case by case.

Buses: Students will need to quarantine if they are sitting in front, behind or directly across from a person with the virus if together more than 15 minutes. Otherwise no quarantine.

Staff to staff: Quarantines required if a staff person is exposed to a person with the virus for 10 minutes within 6 feet or 15 cumulative minutes in 24 hours.

Elizabeth Doran covers education, suburban government and development, breaking news and more. Got a tip, comment or story idea? Contact her anytime at 315-470-3012 or email edoran@syracuse.com
( ) (OTCMKTS:ALKEF) continues to add new chapters to its gold story focused on Central West New South Wales with production at the Tomingley Gold Operations (TGO), ongoing underground development and development plans for nearby satellite deposits and exploration success at the project as well as at the nearby Boda prospect.

The company has had strong success over a number of years at Tomingley and is confident of opening up further mining opportunities at the Roswell and San Antonio deposits south of the existing operations.

TGO performs strongly

The Tomingley Gold Operations (TGO) continue to perform well in the transition from open pit to underground mining and the company is progressing the processing of underground stope material with recovery as expected.

During the December 2020 quarter, a total of 15,919 ounces of gold was poured, with about 16,613 ounces of gold sold at an average sales price of A$2,302 per ounce, generating revenue of A$38.2 million.

Guidance for FY21 has subsequently been increased to 47,000-52,000 ounces at an AISC of $1,450 to $1,600 per ounce.

Development intentions

Exploration success has been achieved in the past 12 months at Roswell and San Antonio adding to existing resources.

Recent drilling comprised 167 holes for a total of 37,000 metres at San Antonio and final assay results have been received with notable intercepts including:

17.4 metres at 1.75 g/t gold from 194.6 metres, including 5.2 metres at 4.28 g/t from 201.8 metres; and

10.0 metres at 6.68 g/t from 74 metres, including 3.0 metres at 17.1 g/t from 75 metres.

This comes as Alkane examines open-cut and underground mines for these deposits with the intention of development as soon as possible.

The company has started the approvals process for this development and consultation with regulators, landholders and other stakeholders while on-ground assessments needed for the Environmental Impact Statement continue.

Feasibility plans that include both options at Roswell and San Antonio are expected to be finalised in the coming quarter, once the San Antonio indicated resource is completed.

Alkane managing director Nic Earner said the final intersections from San Antonio completed the drilling program needed to confirm the resources for the next phase of growth at the producing Tomingley Gold Project.

Drilling at San Antonio is continuing for the purpose of mine development studies including geotechnical, metallurgical, sterilisation and groundwater test-work and reconnaissance exploration drilling has resumed around near-mine targets.

Regional exploration

Extensive exploration focused on the immediate area to the south of the TGO mine has continued as part of the plan to source additional ore feed, either at surface or underground.

During the quarter the program, which focused on both increasing the drilling density within the Roswell and San Antonio prospects as well as testing strike and depth extensions, was completed.

As well as San Antonio and Roswell, the exploration expenditure focus has been on the Boda copper-gold prospect, part of the Northern Molong Porphyry Project within the Northern Molong Volcanic Belt to the northeast of TGO.

After the initial Boda broad copper-gold discovery hole which attracted strong interest to the area, the company has continued to be encouraged by ongoing results.

Other investments

In accordance with its strategy of investing part of its cash balance in junior gold mining companies and projects that meet its investment criteria, namely potential investments that have high exploration potential or require near-term development funding, Alkane continues to hold its investment in gold exploration and development companies ( ) and Minerals Ltd ( ).

Gold forward sale contracts

During the quarter, Alkane entered into new gold forward sales contracts for 8,000 ounces for delivery in the June, September and December 2021 quarters.

The average delivery price is $2,534 per ounce.

Alkane purchased put options with monthly expiry dates from January to September 2021.

This is for 2,000 ounces per month at an exercise price of $2,400 per ounce.

A zero-cost collar was also put in place for 2,000 ounces covering the September and December 2021 quarters, with a put price of $2,300 per ounce and call price of $2,910 per ounce.

The company also holds 18,000 ounces of put options priced at A$1,800 per ounce and these options have expiry dates from March 2021 to September 2021.

Posted Sunday, February 14, 2021 6:23 pm

Washington lawmakers are discussing a bill that would end the automatic disqualification of people with certain criminal convictions from working with vulnerable populations in health care or home care.

Bill sponsors say it would address the shortage of qualified caretakers and empower people with convictions to take charge of their lives.

House Bill 1411 would allow people with certain crimes on their record to be eligible to apply for jobs with the Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) at long-term care facilities or as in-home caretakers.

DSHS is in charge of investigating the backgrounds of people who may have unsupervised access to children, vulnerable adults or people with disabilities. Employers now cannot hire someone with certain disqualifying convictions for a position that works with these populations.

In Washington, 2.14 million people have a criminal record of some kind.

Bill sponsor Rep. Tarra Simmons, D-Bremerton, testified that people can change. She points to herself, a former nurse who also spent time incarcerated on a drug conviction. She also spent nine years in recovery for substance abuse.

Though a nurse, she said she was unable to be a paid caregiver for her dying father because of the rigidity of the DSHS background checks, all the while being able to keep her registered nurse license.

"This barrier made it to where my father spent his last days in a nursing home because I couldn't afford to stop working and care for him," she said. "It's a tragedy that our laws are making these hard decisions for families all across Washington."

Simmons pointed out how hard it can be for families to find in-home caregivers. She also said that many formerly incarcerated people already do the work of caregiving but are not being paid for it.

The bill will help meet a few goals at once, she said. It will increase the supply of eligible workers for those in need of care; it will allow people with convictions to take care of loved ones for compensation; and it will advance racial equity because communities of color are disproportionately impacted by the criminal-justice system, Simmons said.

Disability rights advocates raised concerns on behalf of the disabled community, but supported the intent of the bill. The bill does not specify whether clients would be notified of a worker's criminal record, and some argued that people have a right to know who is working with them.

Darya Farivar, public-policy director with Disability Rights Washington, a nonprofit that advocates for the rights of people with disabilities, said DRW "believes in the importance of employment opportunities for people who have been involved in the criminal legal system ..."

"However, folks with disabilities who experience abuse are more likely to experience it at the hands of their caregivers, family members, and the people closest to them. Making changes to laws which govern caregiving need to center on both the caregivers and those who rely on them," Farivar said in an email.

Sandra Latham, the mother of a disabled adult, urged the sponsors to add more safeguards to protect the most vulnerable from abuse and neglect. She wants the bill to clarify that disabled clients will have access to the details of a worker's criminal history and be able to refuse any candidate that applies to work with them.

" ... The care and dignity of the disabled individuals must come first," Latham said.

In some cases, a person with a disqualifying crime on their record can be granted a certificate of restoration if a specific amount of time has passed since the end of their sentence, according to the bill.

The waiting period lasts one year for a misdemeanor when sentenced to probation; 18 months for a misdemeanor when sentenced to confinement; two years for a class B or C felony; and five years for a violent offense.

Eligibility is never restored for people convicted of offenses such as a class A felony, a sex offense, a crime that includes sexual motivation or vehicular assault.

A public entity cannot discriminate against a person holding a certificate solely based on criminal history, with many exceptions made for criminal-justice agencies, the Washington State Bar Association and other organizations.

Still, those with felonies are unable to hold paid positions that give them unsupervised access tending to vulnerable populations.

Under HB 1411, the waiting period for selling drug paraphernalia or selling marijuana to a minor would be three years. It would be at least five years for those convicted of theft, second-degree robbery, second-degree extortion, or second or third-degree assault.

The exemption wouldn't apply to crimes involving the abuse, neglect, personal or financial exploitation or abandonment of a minor or vulnerable adult.

A similar bill, House Bill 1399, is designed to reduce barriers for those with felonies to get professional licenses that are required for jobs as architects, cosmetologists, security guards, funeral directors and other careers.

Susan Mason, a formerly incarcerated person who heads an organization to help people reintegrate into society, said people with criminal records who no longer have contact with the criminal-justice system continue to be marginalized for life. She said that in 2007 she wanted to enter a surgical-technician program, but her conviction from four years before that stood in her way.

"The milk in my refrigerator has a cutoff date," Mason said, "but my sentence doesn't."
A man who appeared before court for taking three bottles of vodka said he drank all of the alcohol in a day.

Before Naas District Court on February 10 was Tomas Kuoliszu, 43, whose address was given as Peter McVerry homeless shelter, Kerdiffstown, Naas, was prosecuted for taking the vodka on January 1 last and a box of Aerial pods on January 22, both at the Dunnes stores outlet in Naas.

Read more County Kildare news

The defendant, who has no previous convictions, told the court he has an alcohol issue and is on a waiting list for treatment.

The court heard that he admitted the offences straight away..

Solicitor Tim Kennelly said the man, a Polish national, has a daughter and lives in a homeless shelter.

Judge Desmond Zaidan said he would apply the Probation Act, provided that the defendant attends the treatment programme.
Domestic leather and footwear firms have no choice but to convert their production activities as difficulties are expected to linger through this year due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, experts have said.





According to Phan Thi Thanh Xuan, an expert from the project on promoting reform and enhancing connectivity of small and medium-sized enterprises funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the industry had been negatively affected since the outbreak of the pandemic last year.

At that time, most enterprises merely had enough materials for production until the first week of March. From March onwards, the pandemic spread shut down the European and US markets where almost all stores were closed and sales fell freely.

Another problem is that prolonged pandemic has changed the trends, as well as the habits of consumers. More than 60 percent of consumers have cut down expenses on fashion products. About 65 percent of consumers have switched from fancy fashion to basic and durable fashion products, and 67 percent care about the quality of the working environment of manufacturing enterprises.

Enterprises have encountered difficulties as they have failed to find the market for their products and not revamped production in a timely manner to adapt to the new market changes.

Given this, Xuan suggested domestic enterprises increase their investment in automation, raise productivity to reduce costs, build closed production chains, and self-supply materials.

However, according to Nguyen Thi Xuan Thuy, head of the Department of Integration Strategy and Policy under the Institute of Industrial and Trade Policy and Strategy, out of 3,000 footwear producers, only 17 have designing activities, 400 process intermediate stages or produce auxiliary materials and accessories, and 20 percent of them use automation equipment.

Economic experts said it is time for Vietnam to look directly at the shortcomings of the domestic footwear industry. First of all, most enterprises produce under the cut, make, and trim (CMT) manufacturing. Because they export through foreign intermediaries, they have not yet built brands. Enterprises have also failed to grasp information about the trends of markets and customers, so they remain passive in production. Most enterprises only produce upon the orders given by partners.

As for the value chain, domestic enterprises are losing the balance between stages. Particularly, they focus more on the processing of footwear and bag products but less on designing, producing raw materials and auxiliary materials, and branding. The source of input materials is heavily dependent on imports, so it does not meet the requirements of rules of origin of new-generation free trade agreements. Just a few Vietnamese enterprises with big brands play a leading role in establishing the domestic supply chain.

Moreover, the fashion industry has yet to receive adequate attention and lacked linkage to form a chain. Regarding sustainability, the appraisal of manufacturing enterprises according to sustainability criteria has not been fully implemented. Activities related to traceability and transparency have not been methodically built and fully carried out. Authorities have not had specific criteria to monitor, evaluate, and use them as a foundation to develop policies to support the green and sustainable development of enterprises.

Quickly overcoming the above disadvantages will create conditions for enterprises to accelerate development.

Nguyen Duc Thuan, Chairman of the Vietnam Leather, Footwear, and Handbag Association (Lefaso), said that on average, the world produces 20 billion pairs of shoes annually, of which China accounts for 60 percent. Vietnam accounts for a modest percentage of about 5 percent.

However, in the context that orders from China are pouring heavily into Vietnam, the opportunity to expand the market share of the Vietnamese leather and footwear industry is great. From the end of last year up to now, long-term orders have returned steadily. Enterprises have actively made production plans until the end of this year.

Cao Quoc Hung, Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade, affirmed that the ministry had been promoting the implementation of groups of solutions for sustainable development of the footwear industry. Particularly, it will focus on developing raw materials and auxiliary materials for the textile and footwear industries in order to gradually meet the rules of origin of free trade agreements.

It will step by step support the establishment of the domestic textile, garment, and footwear value chains, focus on developing human resources to meet the needs of enterprises in the fields of management, designing, technology, market development, and research and development.

Besides, the Vietnamese textile and garment industry must go green, ensure international standards on environment, safety, labour, and sustainable development. This is also a necessary foundation for footwear enterprises to remove technical barriers and penetrate more deeply and broadly into the global market in the coming time.

Last year, the whole industry exported 19.5 billion USD, down 11.5 percent compared to 2019.

VNA
A satellite called Satish Dhawan Satellite, or SD SAT, will be launched to space at the end of the month by the polar satellite launch vehicle (PSLV) and it has some interesting things it's carrying.

Reportedly, the satellite will carry a copy of Bhagavad Gita, a picture of PM Narendra Modi, and the names of 25,000 individuals.

Looks like the government is ready to bring BJP to space as well now, so amazing.

 Twitter

The nanosatellite, named after one of the founding fathers of Indias space programme and was developed by SpaceKidz India, an organisation dedicated to promoting space science among students.



Along with the few confusing items, the satellite will also carry three scientific payloads  one to study space radiation, one to study the magnetosphere, and another that will demonstrate a low-power wide-area communication network.

Dr Srimathy Kesan, founder and CEO of SpaceKidz India, said, "There is a lot of excitement in the group right now. This will be our first satellite to be deployed in space. When we finalised the mission, we asked people to send in their names that will be sent to space. And, within a week we received 25,000 entries. Of these, 1,000 names were sent in by people from outside India. There is a school in Chennai that sent in the names of everyone. We decided to do this because it will spark the interest of the people in the mission and space science."

 Reuters

The reasoning behind the inclusion of Bhagavad Gita is that similar space missions have carried holy books like The Bible.



Moreover, explaining the picture of PM Modi, Dr Kesan said, "We have also added the name and photograph of the Prime Minister on the top panel with the words Atmanirbhar mission. This satellite has been completely developed and fabricated in India, including the electronics and circuitry."



Lastly, Dr Kesan added, "We are conducting last-minute checks before sending over the satellite. We had to re-do the solar panel on the satellites after testing at ISRO because there was a problem with the resin and there was bulge on a few cells. But it was thought that the entire thing might ooze out in space in two to three days."



People are understandably confused about PM Modi's picture being sent to space in a satellite.



This is something which grabbed my attention

I am still wondering that how inclusion of religion or Modi's photo is going to help satellite..

It's bizzare to see their scientific knowledge..

https://t.co/AHN5vxcse2  Shubhra (@shubhshaurya1) February 15, 2021

There are some suggestions.



Why only the photo, why not the man himself. He is very much available.



New satellite to carry Bhagavad Gita, PM Modis photo | Hindustan Times https://t.co/hRZJenNliJ  AndolanJeevi Sangram (@sangram_enm) February 15, 2021

Sure.

By doing this we are super powerhttps://t.co/4XqTYxA0CE  Andrew (@AndrewUSA1888) February 15, 2021

Okay then.

SD Satellite will carry PM Modi's picture into space.

Alien's be like: pic.twitter.com/elP7Vsxtcv  Veer Sorry Worker (@VeeryaSorry) February 15, 2021

Seems like it.

Space mein BJP ki govt banaaney ka programme shuru ho gaya hai 



"New satellite to carry Bhagavad Gita, PM Modis photo" https://t.co/Q47QKlaV78  Gaurav Gupta (@GauravGupta1110) February 15, 2021

Not cool.

God asked for autographed photo of Modi. https://t.co/I8DlZtSgJO  Aakar Patel (@Aakar__Patel) February 15, 2021

The necessities.

Gita and Modi, perfect payload for a space missionhttps://t.co/s5ADk9Edt7  Soumya Sarkar (@scurve) February 15, 2021

Yep.

ModiG will soon become a household name in space... Dearest followers must be thrilled with this news.. https://t.co/O62EDIBnZM  Deepak (@kaphybreak) February 15, 2021

A lot of people are suggesting this.

New satellite to carry Bhagavad Gita, PM Modis photohttps://t.co/bwC9RZowrQ



Why just a photo? Put him in it no.  words are weapons  (@vimoh) February 15, 2021

Ouch.

This is height of narcissistic stupidity



New satellite to carry Bhagavad Gita, PM Modis photo | Hindustan Times https://t.co/ILF9q1lw79  rajennair (@rajennair) February 15, 2021

Hmm.
Co-founder of opposition Girchi party Zurab Japaridze fined for operating a night bar

By Veronika Malinboym

One of the founders of the libertarian-mined opposition Girchi party, Zurab Japaridze, was fined for operating a night bar despite the existing COVID-19 induced regulations. During a live stream on his Facebook page on Friday, Japaridze announced that he would open a bar to deliberately violate the existing government-imposed restrictions on the commercial activity in the country. He added that by managing to operate despite restrictions, the bar would encourage other businesses to do so as well. The Facebook page invites guests to a bar called Japarastan reads to everyone who is sick of living like a hamster in a cage.The Health Ministry of Georgias Labour Department fined Japaridze GEL2,000 for running a bar, however, the opposition politician announced that he has no intention of paying this fine. He said that he is currently under the protection of the immunity of the MP mandate, and is planning to not only reopen the bar but to even celebrate the birthday of one of his fellow party members there.One more facility and two individuals were fined yesterday for similar violations. As of Monday, February 15, food facilities and restaurants will be able to operate their outdoor terraces amidst the decrease in the numbers of persons infected with the coronavirus.Zurab Japaridze, co-founder of the Girchi party has recently left it to start a Girchi party of his own, called More Freedom  Girchi. His decision to leave came shortly after the controversies rising around his fellow party members. Japaridze explained that he envisions for Girchi to be a more open platform, able to support young politicians. Japaridze also explained that he would not cooperate with the other co-founders of the Girchi party for many reasons.During the Parliamentary Elections of 2020, Girchi managed to overcome the 1% threshold, however, the MPs refused to claim the four seats in the Parliament. Girchi believes that October 2020 was fabricated and demands repeat elections to be held.
The COVID-19 stimulus payments likely headed to Americans bank accounts by late March or early April may provide families significantly more cash than previous rounds of pandemic relief, with child and adult dependents also eligible for $1,400 payments according to the most recent proposals.

The Biden administration and Democrats have pushed to expand payments to help cover more dependents, with lawmakers arguing that the pandemic has hit a range of families hard, including those with college-aged dependents and disabled and retired seniors living at home. Whereas previous aid packages in March and December provided $500 and $600, respectively, for child dependents under the age of 17, the latest proposal approved by the House Ways and Means Committee chaired by Rep. Richard Neal of Massachusetts includes $1,400 payments to families with both children and adult dependents.

The credit is $1,400 for a single taxpayer ($2,800 for joint filers), in addition to $1,400 per dependent, according to a House Ways and Means document detailing portions of President Joe Bidens $1.9 trillion stimulus package. For purposes of this credit, a dependent includes both children and non-child dependents. A taxpayer is eligible for a credit with respect to any individual in the household for whom a Social Security number is associated with such individual on the tax return.

Lawmakers in the House of Representatives expect to vote on the overall stimulus bill next week. Ways and Means concluded markups of the legislation this past week without major changes, so the proposal includes $1,400 payments to adults earning up to $75,000 and couples earning a combined $150,000; the payments phase out incrementally and cap entirely for Americans earning $100,000 or couples making $200,000.

If approved as is, a family of four earning less than $150,000 may be looking at a $5,600 check after Biden signs the stimulus bill, which lawmakers and economic experts say will likely happen by mid-March.

Economic experts say checks could hit bank accounts of Americans whose direct deposit information is already on file with the Internal Revenue Service within a week or two of Bidens signature; paper checks and debit cards to others will follow weeks later.

The expanded dependent payments are coming on top of another proposal that worked its way through Neals committee that could see families receive up to $3,600 per child under 6 and $3,000 for every child between 6 and 17 spread out over the next year starting in July. The payments would decrease for single parents earning more than $75,000 or couples earning more than $150,000 combined.

Democrats on Capitol Hill  pushing the bill through the annual budget reconciliation process, which wont require support from Republicans concerned about rising deficit spending  are hustling to complete a package by March 14 because thats when a $300 weekly bonus to unemployment insurance and other benefits from previous coronavirus aid plans expire.

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(Newser)  Canada's top court is being asked to decide whether mocking a disabled child should be considered legally protected freedom of expression. French-Canadian comedian Mike Ward is appealing a 2016 order from the Quebec Human Rights Tribunal to pay $28,000 to Jeremy Gabriel, who has the rare genetic condition Treacher Collins syndrome, which causes hearing problems and facial deformities, the Montreal Gazette reports. As a child, he sang for Pope Benedict XVI and Celine Dion. In 2010, when Gabriel was 13, Ward mocked the boy's singing ability and said he thought he was fatally ill and was disappointed to find out he was only "ugly." Ward joked that he tried to drown Gabriel after finding out he wasn't going to die.

story continues below

The Gabriel jokes were part of Ward's act until 2013. Gabriel said he became suicidal after the jokes led to persistent bullying at school. The human rights tribunal ruled that the comments were discriminatory. After an appeals court upheld the moral and punitive damages in 2019, Ward vowed to take the case to Canada's Supreme Court, saying that as a public figure, Gabriel was a fair target, and it "shouldn't be up to a judge to decide what constitutes a joke on stage," the BBC reports. "Mocking doesn't deprive someone of a service or a right," Ward attorney Julius Gray told the court Monday, per CTV. (Read more comedian stories.)
Delhi Police said Disha Ravi was the 'editor' of a toolkit, which was a guide sheet to stoke 'economic, cultural, social and regional tensions' in India

Bengaluru climate activist Disha Ravis arrest by the Delhi Police on Saturday for her alleged involvement in the "toolkit" case invited widespread criticism.

According to the police, Ravi was the editor of a toolkit, which she also shared with Swedish climate change activist Greta Thunberg, was a guide sheet to stoke "economic, cultural, social and regional tensions" in India. Thunberg tweeted the toolkit, which voicing support for the ongoing farmers protest. "Later, she asked Greta to remove the main Doc after its incriminating details accidentally got into public domain," the Delhi Police tweeted.

The stated aim of the toolkit was to enable anyone unfamiliar with the ongoing farmers protests in India to better understand the situation and make decisions on how to support the farmers". However, the government referred to "incriminating" content in the now-deleted toolkit to file a case of sedition against unknown persons on 4 February, with Ravis arrest being the first in the case. The police also said that the organisation collaborated with pro Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State.

A former business administration student of Bengalurus Mount Carmel College, the 22-year-old started Fridays for Future India (FFF) in 2019, which was linked to Thunbergs Fridays for Future movement. She organised strikes to create awareness about climate change in various parts of Bengaluru every Friday. The FFF India website states, "Climate strikes or marches are peaceful, non-violent ways to let our national and state governments know of our demand to address the ongoing climate crisis and ecological breakdown.

Ravi had told Auto Report Africa that was inspired to launch the climate change movement when she saw her grandparents, who are farmers, getting severely affected by the changing weather pattern. In September, she was featured by The Guardian for her frequent protests in Bengaluru against the alleged lack of regulations to curb environmental degradation. "We are not just fighting for our future, we are fighting for our present. We, the people from the most affected are going to change the conversation in climate negotiations and lead a just recovery plan that benefits people and not the pockets of our government," she had said.

The environmentalist was also featured in the British edition of Vogue magazine in September among four activists who emphasised the need to counter environmental racism. The fact that you would choose to listen to a white person on the same issue rather than a person of colour, to me, is environmental racism, she told the magazine.

A familiar face at lake clean-up and tree plantation drives in Bengaluru, Ravi is inspired by primatologist Jane Goodall and hopes to pursue a career in ecological conservation and restoration, her friends and colleagues told The NewsMinute.

Her social media profile shows she supported campaigns of Green Peace in her early college days and friends in her list of friends describe themselves as eco-feminists, campaigners against abuse of women and social activists. She works as a culinary experience manager with GoodMylk, a company involved with making plant-based food accessible and affordable to people.

FFF Indias email campaigns include a demand for ethical implementation of the National Action Plan for Climate Change (NAPCC), a campaign for protection of the Mollem forest area in Goa by cancelling clearances for projects passing through the Bhagwan Mahaveer Wildlife Sanctuary and National Park, Goa and to save an elephant conservation zone in Uttrakhand by cancelling the proposal for extension of the Jolly Grant runway. Social media campaigns are also run for the protection of the Aarey forest in Mumbai, the Raika forest in Jammu and the Dumna nature park in Madhya Pradesh.

Personally for my country, I am not very optimistic. The amount of violations and environmentally destructive projects the government has promoted  especially during the lockdown there have been huge deforestation issues. It is very scary. There are no existing political parties that can lead an environment or climate change crisis, she said, according to The Indian Express.

Ravi and FFF India had earlier come under the police radar in July last year when the website was blocked and Delhi Police sent a notice claiming depiction of "contents and unlawful activities or terrorist act, which are dangerous for the peace, tranquility and sovereignty". The Delhi Police had invoked the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, but later decided to withdraw the notice.

Another notice was sent to the organisation under the Information Technology Act for allegedly attempting to spam Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar's inbox over the draft Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) notification. It was later withdrawn.
Mumbai, Feb 15 : Fans of Rana Daggubati are looking forward to his trilingual release Haathi Mere Saathi on March 26, but the film's director Prabhu Solomon insists the busiest star on the set was Unni the elephant! "In India, only four or five elephants (are certified with) AWBI (Animal Welfare Board Of India) license (to work in films). So you can't shoot with all the elephants in Kerala. Among these four elephants, Unni was the busiest one! It is taken to festivals, and it is busy with ad and film shoots. So we had to take Unni's dates first and accordingly schedule the artists' dates!" said Solomon.

"On the sets too, there were more protocols in place for Unni than the actors. According to AWBI, we had to shoot with Unni in soft light of the mornings. We couldn't use top lights for it. So we gave it rest in the afternoon. And evenings, when the sunlight is no more harsh, we used to take it out. So all the stars would be waiting for Unni to arrive on the set," he added.

The film is based on one man's struggle to save the forest and its animals, and Unni was the star elephant of the film. Prabhu reveals how Unni was cast in the film. "A few years ago, I needed a lead elephant and we auditioned more than 30 to 40 elephants across the length and breadth of Kerala. There I found Unni. He is very friendly, emotional, obedient and intelligent. I worked with Unni in (the 2012 Tamil film) 'Kumki', and because it was so good, I cast him in 'Kumki 2' as well. Once again, I've chosen him for 'Haathi Mere Saathi' for its exceptional skills and friendly behaviour," shares Prabhu.

He adds: "Unni followed instructions perfectly. Often, he would come and stand where the markings were made for him to stand, he was that intelligent. If we wanted him to move a few inches behind, he'd do exactly that. Unni is very special to me. It is the only animal who has an acting certificate. It understands the director's instructions like 'action', 'cut' and follows everything to the tee, performing like a thespian." Haathi Mere Saathi featuring Rana Daggubati, Pulkit Samrat, Vishnu Vishal, Zoya Hussein and Kalki Koechlin releases as Kaadan in Tamil and Aranya in Telugu.
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New Feb 15 : Congress leader Rahul Gandhi is on a campaigning spree in poll-bound states. After Assam, Gandhi is scheduled to kickstart the poll campaign in Puducherry on February 17.

Gandhi is raising local issues in the states during the campaigning. In Assam, he made a strong anti-CAA pitch, saying that the Congress will work for the welfare of the people and attacked the BJP over its divisive agenda.

Gandhi said in the public meeting: "CAA will not be implemented and I have worn this stole in which CAA is written but it has been crossed." He said that the Congress will honour the Assam accord and no power in the world can break Assam. "Whoever will try to touch the Assam Accord or spread hatred within the society the Congress party and the people of Assam will together teach them a lesson." Gandhi has already visited Tamil Nadu and Kerala where the polls are scheduled in next two months. In Tamil Nadu, he attacked the BJP over NEP and the language issue.

But there is no clarity on his visit to poll-bound West Bengal where the party is contesting elections in alliance with the left parties. Sources say that the Left parties had invited Rahul Gandhi in a rally on February 28, but his participation is not yet confirmed.
2020 was a year marked by hardships and challenges, but the Prince William community has proven resilient. The Prince William Times is honored to serve as your community companion. To say thank you for your continued support, wed like to offer all our subscribers -- new or returning --

4 WEEKS FREE DIGITAL AND PRINT ACCESS.

We understand the importance of working to keep our community strong and connected. As we move forward together into 2021, it will take commitment, communication, creativity, and a strong connection with those who are most affected by the stories we cover.

We are dedicated to providing the reliable, local journalism you have come to expect. We are committed to serving you with renewed energy and growing resources. Let the Prince William Times be your community companion throughout 2021, and for many years to come.
The Taliban have been encroaching on key cities around Afghanistan for months, threatening to drive the country to its breaking point and push the Biden administration into a no-win situation just as the United States longest war is supposed to be coming to an end.

Around the northern city of Kunduz, despite the winters fierce cold, the Taliban have taken outposts and military bases, using small armed drones to terrorize Afghan troops. In neighbouring Pul-i-Khumri, they have seized important highways in a stranglehold of the city, threatening main lifelines to Kabul, the countrys capital.

And here in the city of Kandahar, a bedrock of historic and political importance and an economic hub for the countrys south, Taliban fighters have pummeled the surrounding districts and moved closer to taking the provincial capital than they have in more than a decade.

The Talibans brazen offensive has put the Biden administration into a dangerous political bind. Under the deal struck by President Donald Trump with the Taliban last year, all foreign troops  including the remaining 2,500 US service members who support Afghanistans beleaguered army and security forces  are scheduled to withdraw by May 1, leaving the country in an especially precarious state.

If the Biden administration honours the withdrawal date, officials and analysts fear the Taliban could overwhelm whats left of the Afghan security forces and take control of major cities like Kandahar in a push for a complete military victory or a broad surrender by the Afghan government in the ongoing peace negotiations.

But if the United States delays its withdrawal deadline, as a congressionally appointed panel recommended on February 3, the Taliban would likely consider the 2020 deal with the United States void, likely leading to renewed attacks on US and NATO troops, and potentially drawing the United States deeper into the war to defend Afghan forces, whom the Taliban could still retaliate vigorously against.

The threat of Taliban military victories, especially in an area as symbolic and strategic as Kandahar, makes it difficult for the Biden administration to swallow the risks of finalizing a troop withdrawal, said Andrew Watkins, a senior analyst on Afghanistan for the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based conflict resolution organization. Pulling out might be politically impossible if Kandahar was on the nightly news.

In Panjwai, a district that neighbours Kandahar city, the low thud of artillery punctuated a recent warm winter afternoon, signalling the Talibans proximity to its populated centre.

Read | Taliban warn Nato to push ahead with troop withdrawal in Afghanistan

At the edge of the district, a lone police outpost sandbagged into the rock overlooked what was now Taliban territory. One officers head was bandaged from a roadside bomb blast, another wore a gauze sling under his uniform, propping up a shoulder wounded from a snipers bullet.

They are still working here; we cant replace them, because we dont have enough forces, said Safiullah Khan, the police officer in charge. Our commanders steal from our fuel, food and our supply.

During an offensive in the fall, the Taliban took swathes of territory and then mostly held their ground despite attempts by the Afghan security forces and US airstrikes to dislodge them.

Taliban commanders told tribal officials in the district that the insurgent group deliberately stopped short of taking Panjwai, said Haji Mahmood Noor, the districts mayor, because they were told to wait and see how the next phase of peace negotiations played out.

When the trees turn green the situation will get worse, Noor said, referring to the spring, when the Taliban can move more at ease under the cover of blooming foliage.

Panjwais near collapse and the growing threat to Kandahar city are partially the consequence of the death in 2018 of Gen. Abdul Raziq, who had been the provinces police chief since 2011. Known for settling disputes with threats and bloody retribution, and accused of many human-rights abuses, Raziq also used his close relationship with the US military, to keep Kandahar province mostly secure for years.

After Raziqs death at the hands of a Taliban infiltrator, his brother, Gen. Tadeen Khan, was made a general overnight and took over as police chief, but his lack of military experience meant he was largely disconnected and absent from his duties. As his officers taxed and abused their residents with little oversight, the Taliban forged alliances with local tribal leadership and paid low-level police officers to abandon their posts before their fall offensive, local and provincial officials said.

When the Taliban pushed into the districts around Kandahar, the police put up very little fight. Many outposts were already barely staffed, Noor and other local officials said. Some Afghan government officials disputed that accusation, saying they retreated in fear. Others said they didnt know why they retreated at all.

Also Read | As US revisits Doha Accord, regional peace hinges on what Pakistan does

Tadeen rejected any accusations of corruption and abuse and denied that his police forces were withering around Kandahar.

The Taliban do not have more power, he said, from his well-guarded compound in Kandahar city. The Afghan forces can defend themselves.

The deteriorating situation in Kandahar is a broader reflection of security around the country. The Taliban have spent the past months capturing military bases and police outposts and installing highway checkpoints near capital cities in provinces such as Helmand and Uruzgan in the south, and Kunduz and Baghlan in the north.

Though Taliban tactics vary from region to region, the outcomes are usually the same: increased taxation on highways, plummeting morale among the Afghan security forces with dwindling US support and growing fear among those living in once-secure areas.

The Talibans aim is to force the Afghan government into complying with their terms of peace. In Qatar, Taliban leaders have demanded the release of around 7,000 more prisoners and the establishment of an interim government, two requests that Ashraf Ghani, Afghanistans president, has so far refused.

The Taliban seem to believe that applying this pressure, staging their fighters to potentially strike Kandahar and other urban centres, will pressure the US to withdraw, or else, Watkins said. The strategic logic might have the opposite effect.

To prepare for a possible multipronged attack should the United States stay beyond the May 1 deadline, the Pentagon has requested additional military options  including an increase of US troops or a commitment of more air support from US Central Command, which oversees operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan, according to two US officials. Whether these requests will be granted depends on the Biden administrations next move, which it is expected to be announced in coming weeks upon completing a review of the current agreement in place with the Taliban.

The unrest has already delayed the handover of Kandahar Airfield, a sprawling US base east of the capital, to Afghan forces in recent months. For now, a small detachment of US and NATO troops remain to support the struggling Afghan forces, according to a US military official.

Also Read | Taliban negotiator discusses Afghan peace talks with Moscow

With the police force mostly in ruin, the Afghan army and commandos have moved into Kandahar, beginning operations in November to retake territory that was then retaken by the Taliban. Commando officers said their forces had been exhausted by frequent orders to fill in for their police counterparts.

In nearby Arghandab District, the site of the Talibans northern offensive on Kandahar city, army leaders and police officers say theyre severely understaffed and their pleas for support have gone unheeded by officials in Kabul.

One outpost was using two armoured vehicles likely left over from the 1980s Soviet invasion to defend against Taliban positions on the river banks below.

In December, nearly 200 checkpoints in Kandahar were abandoned by the Afghan army, according to a US government watchdog report released Feb. 1. The collapse of some military bases in the fall afforded the Taliban troves of military equipment and ammunition, including several pieces of heavy artillery.

Afghan security forces are also contending with portions of a populace that have more faith in the Taliban than in the government. In capturing new territory, the Taliban installed their own administrative services, explained Lal Mohammad, 23, a wheat and grape farmer who now lives behind the Talibans front line in Panjwai.

Insurgent fighters have smashed smartphones and banned music, imposed a curfew, dug defensive tunnels between peoples homes and used empty rooms in them as fighting positions. Roadside bombs are everywhere, he said. But land disputes and petty crime are well managed, compared to the Afghan governments corrupt bureaucracy, said Mohammad said.

People like it, Mohammad said, adding that he just wants someone to take over Kandahar so people can get back to their lives.

These sentiments are common in more rural areas of Afghanistan. But the Afghan governments incompetence and widespread corruption have brought that attitude to the doorstep of one of the countrys most populated cities.

The government, Mohammad said, has failed.


EDMONTON - Before Canadian Khalid Hashi and his team began their work in Somalia, the country of about 15 million people who mostly speak Somali and Arabic only had information about COVID-19 in one language.

Canadian Khalid Hashi, right, shows videos about COVID-19 in his app OGOW EMR in Garowe, Puntland, Somalia, to front-line nurses and health-care workers in an undated handout photo. Before Hashi created the app, which contains information in Somali and Arabic about the novel coronavirus, Somalia only had public health messages about COVID-19 in English. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO-Khalid Hashi, *MANDATORY CREDIT*

EDMONTON - Before Canadian Khalid Hashi and his team began their work in Somalia, the country of about 15 million people who mostly speak Somali and Arabic only had information about COVID-19 in one language.

"It was all in English," says the Somali-Canadian, who was born in Ontario and raised in Edmonton.

The 29-year-old says he travelled to the Horn of Africa last spring to help kick-start a digital information campaign that would address concerns, misinformation and rumours about the novel coronavirus in a way communities and villages could understand.

"Initially, people were very hesitant to listen," says Hashi, who has since returned to his home in Edmonton.

"There's misinformation across every community. It was challenging and it still is challenging. But now there's more information every day on the virus, and people are starting to understand the seriousness of the virus."

Hashi says with the approval of Somalia's health ministry, he expanded an app he had created three years earlier to include videos and information about COVID-19 in the local languages. Front-line workers in Somalia went door-knocking to 45 villages and continue to show the videos on tablets.

"This content, (that is) really helping with prevention and risk mitigation, has scaled across four regions, has reached 60,000 (nomads) and there's about 100,000 impressions on social media," he says.

His team has since incorporated features on the app that send communities emergency health alerts about the pandemic.

Somalia has just over 5,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and more than 1,000 that are active. About 144 people have died of the infection, said Abdihamid Warsame, a research fellow at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Right now he's based in Somalia working on a research project on COVID-19.

"There's quite a lot of misinformation about the disease, that it doesn't really exist in Somalia, and it's a disease of foreigners. People don't really take the precautions that they should. And I think Khalid's work is doing a lot to try and overcome this challenge," Warsame said.

"There have been fewer and fewer cases as time has gone by. Khalid's expertise and his material and his distribution channels are definitely helping to contribute toward the COVID-19 response in Somalia."

Hashi says Somalia's health ministry reviews the app's content and makes sure it resonates with communities.

"We're not talking about a village. We're talking national distribution of this content."

Public health videos educate locals on symptoms they should be looking for and on where people can get tested.

"It really helps guide people for next steps on how to stay safe.

"We did our first video for a hospital that we were working with to help support our doctors. Doctors would show the video to their patients ... people saw value (in that) and now that content is going to rural communities."

Hashi says some of the videos he and his team have created in Arabic are being used in Yemen.

The idea for Hashi's original app came to him in 2017 when he was visiting his grandmother. He was taking her to a doctor appointment when he learned Somalia didn't have a good way to track medical records.

He ended up designing OGOW Electronic Medical Records to store patients' health details.

"OGOW means 'to know' in the Somali language," Hashi says. "I named it that because it's me getting to know my grandmother. It's a constant reminder of why I got into this work."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb 14, 2021

This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship

Note to readers: This is a corrected story; a previous version said Hashi is 30.
Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been wasting millions of dollars each month on unused detention space in contracts often made without following proper procedures, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

The lapses in procedure have cost taxpayers millions and potentially put detainees at risk because they may be put in facilities unsuited to their needs or with poor safety track-records.

The report, released publicly on Friday, details how the immigration agency often used guaranteed minimum contracts, which pay detention operators regardless of how much capacity is needed at a given moment, and resulted in millions spent for empty space.

ICE spent $20.5 million in May 2020 for over 12,000 unused beds a day, on average, the GAO reported in a summary of its findings.

Between fiscal year 2017 and May 2020, the agency entered into 40 contracts and agreements for new detention space, many with state and local officials who contract detention facilities out to private companies.

According to the GAO, 28 of these deals broke ICEs own requirements and did not have documentation from ICE field offices showing a need for the space, outreach to local officials, or the basis for ICEs decisions to enter into them.

ICE did not respond to a request for comment from The Independent. It told the GAO it uses guaranteed minimums and subcontracts with state, local, and private detention providers to meet its often dynamic needs for detention space.

The ICE review, based on data analysis and interviews with officials, also reported that ICEs leadership ignored safety concerns from its field offices about new detention agreements.

In one example, field staff warned a new detention facility was in a remote area which would make serious medical care more difficult for detainees to access, but were ignored for a deal the GAO found had minimal justification.

In another, field officials said they strongly disagreed with adding a new facility which had a previous record of chronic understaffing in correctional and health services, which a previous Department of Justice watchdog report had concluded lead to a 2012 prison riot that killed a corrections officer and injured 20.

The field officials we interviewed said they were directed by headquarters to retroactively write a white paper to support using the facility after the agreement terms (including a nearly $4 million a month guaranteed payment for 1,100 detention beds) had already been negotiated, the GAO report said.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers detain a man during an operation in Escondido, California in 2019 (AP)

Civil rights advocates reacted to the report with outrage.

At the end of the day, immigration detention is an inhumane, brutal, and unnecessary system that allows continued death, misery, and abuse, said Eunice Cho, staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Unions National Prison Project in a tweet. Private prison corporations and local law enforcement agencies profit by the billions. Shut it down.

The problems didnt end once deals for housing immigrants were agreed to, according to the reviews finding. The GAO found that ICE could do more to scrutinize its own data on contracts, where, in one case, the agency had recommended penalizing the same three facilities 12 different times for things like detainee deaths, escapes, and excessive force.

The report also broke down the economics of immigrant detention, which can often be a boon to local authorities. Federal authorities pay state and local ones to house inmates, and these authorities in turn often contract private companies to hold them. The companies, meanwhile, also pay the local authorities fees for helping administer the detentions.

For example, the report noted, since 2016, the city of Adelanto, California, gets about $1m per year from GEO Group, an investment trust which invests in prisons and mental health centers, as well as $1 per bed per day. Other ICE contracts pay between $.50 to $3.50 per bed per day.

Private immigration facilities have been criticized for mishandling Covid-19, including using solitary confinement as a means of quarantining, and excessive use of force.

ICE detention is nominally administrative, where individuals are held while the government decides whether to deport them, but often resembles a traditional prison.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15) Despite a little delay in delivery, the Inter-Agency Task Force on Monday expressed hope that the much-awaited doses of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines would still arrive in the Philippines this month.

Speaking to CNN Philippines, IATF co-chair and Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles said the country is finalizing details of the indemnity agreement with the World Health Organization-led COVAX facility, which will be supplying the initial 117,000 doses.

WHO Country Representative Rabindra Abeyasinghe earlier explained that manufacturers require indemnification funds "for their own safety" since not all vaccines have been approved for the market.

RELATED: Indemnification vital to ensure more vaccine supply, generate demand  Galvez

Basically theres just that detail of an indemnity agreement that was supposed to be finalized and which is in the process of being finalized, so thats a little delay there as far as the Pfizer shipment is concerned from WHO, Nograles told The Source. But well still get it  hopefully within the month.

Government officials, citing conversations with COVAX, earlier announced that the indicative date of the Pfizer vaccines arrival would fall in the middle of February. Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque had said the government was ready to start the inoculation drive once the products arrive.

Meanwhile, Nograles also raised the possibility that the delivery of the vaccines from COVAX may coincide with, or come later than, the arrival of Chinas Sinovac vaccine shipment which is slated around Feb. 23.

Baka maunahan pa sila ng Sinovac. Lets see. Were still following up on them, the official said. So if it will be delayed by one week, then halos baka kasabay na niya yung Sinovac pagdating.

[Translation: Maybe the Sinovac vaccine will come first. Lets see. Were still following up on them. So if it will be delayed by one week, then maybe it will arrive at the same time as Sinovac.]

China is set to provide some 600,000 doses of Sinovac vaccines to the Philippines, officials said. However, the product has yet to receive an emergency use authorization from the country's Food and Drug Administration.
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The Samsung Galaxy S21 series was launched back on January 14th at the Unpacked event. Not only did the phones come with a refreshed design, but they also packed a bunch of cool new features as a part of One UI 3.1. One of which is the upgraded Single Shot, i.e. Single Shot v2.0.

The Single Shot feature first debuted on the Galaxy S20 series. It quickly became a favorite feature of Samsung Galaxy S20 users. So, Samsung upgraded this feature with improved AI technology and added the latest version on the Galaxy S21 lineup.

The new version of Single Shot is much improved and gives better results as compared to the previous version. Now, in an official blog, Samsung has explained how this new-improved Single Shot feature works on its newest phones.

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Talking about updates, the duration of the Single Shot video is bumped to 15 seconds (from 5 seconds on Galaxy S20) on the Galaxy S21 lineup. During this time, it also takes up to 10 photos per second.

Later, the AI analyzes the video and photos taken with the Single Shot feature and picks out the best moments. Moreover, the AI also adds the Fast Forward (3x) effect or the new Dynamic Slow motion effect, depending on whether the footage captured is in fast or slow motion.

Galaxy S21 Single Shot also creates Boomerang, Reverse, and more

On top of fast forward and slow motion, footage captured using the Galaxy S21 Single Shot also creates Boomerang, Reverse, Highlight video, and Scene Relighting videos.

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This gives the user a wide array of AI edited videos to quickly share across their social media platforms. Normally, editing this many videos with different effects would require a lot of time.

If you take a photo of people or pets, then it applies the bokeh effect or blurs the background using AI. The Aesthetic Engine checks the facial expressions and rejects a photo where someone blinked or is looking down. This engine is trained with a database of 300,000 photos that were selected by professionals.

Poorly framed photos are rejected by another AI feature called Smart Crop. It was trained on a much larger database of 100 million shots. The AI properly edits the Landscape shots and keeps only the interesting parts.

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Another neat trick which Samsung has up under its sleeves for the upgraded Single Shot for Galaxy S21 is Scene Relighting. The 24-hour time-lapse out of a single photo is created using this effect, which makes use of the Generative Adversarial Network (GAN).

As per the official blog, it picks out elements from the image such as sky, clouds, trees, water, buildings. Later it animates the scene from morning to sunset and even nighttime.
10 May 2021 --- Chocolate remains the top snack of the COVID-19 pandemic, with nearly 90 percent of US consumers purchasing some form of chocolate candy within the last three... Read More
Some of the worlds largest technology companies are complaining to US antitrust regulators about Corps acquisition of Arm because the deal will harm competition in an area of the industry that is vital to their businesses.

Alphabet Incs Google, Corp. and Inc. are among companies worried about the $40 billion deal and are urging antitrust officials to intervene, said people familiar with the process who asked not to be identified because they werent authorised to speak publicly. At least one of the companies wants the deal killed. shares fell as much as 3.1 per cent in New York trading on Friday. The acquisition would give control over a critical supplier that licenses essential chip technology to the likes of Apple, Intel, Samsung Electronics, Amazon.com and Chinas Huawei.





ALSO READ: Google and Facebook nearing deals to pay for news, says Australia

UK-based Arm is known as the Switzerland of the industry because it licenses chip designs and related software code to all comers, rather than competing against semiconductor companies. The concern is that if Nvidia owns Arm, it could limit rivals access to the technology or raise the cost of access.

Nvidia has argued that the purchase price alone means it has no incentive to mess with that neutrality but some rivals and Arm customers are unconvinced. As we proceed through the review process, were confident that both regulators and customers will see the benefits of our plan to continue Arms open licensing model and ensure a transparent, collaborative relationship with Arms licensees, an Nvidia spokesperson said in a statement.
21m Commercial Village will provide gateway to town centre and lead hospitality fightback against Covid-19

This article is old - Published: Monday, Feb 15th, 2021

A multi million pound Commercial Village driven by retail, hospitality and education will provide a gateway to Wrexham town centre and boost the economy.

The stunning 21m extension to Coleg Cambria Yale is yet to open due to the Covid-19 pandemic, but work has been going on behind the scenes in preparation for when it is safe to unveil the Grove Park Road building.

Cutting-edge facilities include a restaurant and training academy, florist, coffee bar and hair and beauty salon which will all come under the new Ial (Yale) brand.

Students, staff, and the public will have access to these services and sectors, which complement existing provision and support the local economy at a challenging time for high streets across the country.





Maria Stevens, Cambrias Director of Commercial Operations, said the college will be pivotal in helping the hospitality and retail arenas make a positive recovery from the pandemic.

Our ethos  particularly at the restaurant  will be centred on supporting local producers and independent businesses and giving learners a real-life, real-time experience to prepare them for the world of work, she said.

All of our produce will be sourced locally where possible, and meat and vegetables will be grown and supplied by our land-based sites in Llysfasi and Northop.

Ial will showcase the very best of this region, right down to the interior of the restaurant itself, using glass, slate and other natural elements to give customers a true sense of Wales.

Maria added: The florist, restaurant, coffee bar and salon will all be operated by industry professionals working alongside students to give them a taste of whats to come in their future careers.

And importantly, the new building will play a pivotal role in helping Wrexham to build back from the challenges of the last year, particularly the retail and hospitality industries that were hit so hard.

We plan on being a beacon of best practice, a leader in what needs to be a sustainable, responsible answer to the pandemic; when the time is right and it is safe to do so, Ial will be at the forefront of that recovery.

Cllr Terry Evans, Wrexhams Lead Member for Economic Development and Regeneration, said the new facility will be an asset to the town centre for generations to come.

Ial is a fantastic addition to the site and young people can be assured of a quality experience and an excellent footing for their future careers, said Cllr Evans.

It also complements plans for the regeneration of the town centre, and I wish everyone the very best of luck with this venture as we look to a more promising future.

You can also find out more on Ial via these websites: www.ialrestaurant.co.uk, www.ialsalon.co.uk and www.ialflowers.co.uk.
[February 15, 2021] Texas Book Company Unveils Enhanced Online Bookstore and Course Materials Platform

GREENVILLE, Texas, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Texas Book Company today launched its reimagined virtual platform, OnCourse, which combines all forms of course material content with the Company's revered management and support services. The OnCourse platform is a trailblazing expandable program that delivers virtual solutions for all stakeholders; students, faculty and college administration. OnCourse advanced virtual platform provides seamless access to digital and print course materials, analytics, monitoring, financial reporting, and regulatory compliance for institutional needs. The OnCourse platform provides a sleek and contemporary school-branded landing page, and integrates into LMS and SIS platforms to deliver a cohesive experience for faculty and students. The OnCourse streamlined site provides straightforward directive verbiage on the landing screen, one-click access to course materials, and a full assortment of school-branded merchandise. OnCourse delivers all functionality and service of a brick-n-mortar store in a virtual environment. For Students

Buy/Sell/Rent course materials

Print, digital and publisher subscriptions

Search features by course, ISBN, Title, Author

Full line of logo merchandise and supplies

24-hour order fulfillment

Secure checkout

Financial aid accepted For Faculty Faculty online research tools and adoptions

OER, print and digital options For Administration

Integration with LMS and SIS

Registrar integration

Customized sales and usage reporting

"Opt-out" compliance for digital and one-price programs



Darren Croom , president of Texas Book Company. "OnCourse is much more than a shopping site for course materials. OnCourse offers all the products and services of the campus store, with the added ease of online ordering, digital downloads and connection to interactive digital materials. OnCourse administrative tools ease faculty adoptions and provide financial aid integration. It's a "one-stop" campus store virtual solution; the next generation in virtual campus store management." OnCourse is built to be flexible. For schools that need more than a virtual store, we offer OnCourse+, which allows schools that want to remain independent to partner with OnCourse for professional course material management. OnCourse+ provides off-site, on-campus, virtual, or a combination depending on institutional needs. Schools ready to turn over the course materials department to the experts can trust us to deliver top-tier technology, affordability and service. The school maintains store control and eliminates the risk and responsibility of the course materials department.

For more information about OnCourse visit http://www.texasbook.com/oncourse or inquire with Bill Boney at bboney@texasbook.com, or 800-527-1016 ext. 334. About Texas Book Company Established in 1975, Texas Book Company is one of the largest academic retail companies in the U.S. serving the higher education industry. Texas Book Company's Retail, Military and OnCourse divisions provide customized bookstore and course material management on-campus and online. The Company's OnCourse platform provides 100% uptime and fail-safe procedures that guarantee the security of valuable sales, ordering, inventory, and analytic data. Press Contact: Stacy Dyer

469-236-6978

http://www.texasbook.com/ View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/texas-book-company-unveils-enhanced-online-bookstore-and-course-materials-platform-301228106.html SOURCE Texas Book Company

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WASHINGTON: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says Congress will establish an independent, Sept. 11-style commission to look into the deadly insurrection that took place at the U.S. Capitol.

Pelosi says the commission will investigate and report on the facts and causes relating to the January 6, 2021, domestic terrorist attack upon the United States Capitol Complex and relating to the interference with the peaceful transfer of power."

The speaker says in a letter to Democratic colleagues that the House will also put forth supplemental spending to boost security at the Capitol.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. APs earlier story follows below.

WASHINGTON: After former President Donald Trumps acquittal at his second Senate impeachment trial, bipartisan support appears to be growing for an independent Sept. 11-style commission into the deadly insurrection that took place at the U.S. Capitol.

Investigations into the riot were already planned, with Senate hearings scheduled later this month in the Senate Rules Committee. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has asked retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honor to lead an immediate review of the Capitols security process.

Lawmakers from both parties, speaking on Sundays news shows, signaled that even more inquiries were likely. The Senate verdict Saturday, with its 57-43 majority falling 10 votes short of the two-thirds needed to convict Trump, hardly put to rest the debate about the Republican former presidents culpability for the Jan. 6 assault.

There should be a complete investigation about what happened, said Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump. What was known, who knew it and when they knew, all that, because that builds the basis so this never happens again.

Cassidy said he was attempting to hold President Trump accountable, and added that as Americans hear all the facts, more folks will move to where I was. He was censured by his states party after the vote.

An independent commission along the lines of the one that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks would probably require legislation to create. That would elevate the investigation a step higher, offering a definitive government-backed accounting of events. Pelosi has expressed support for such a commission while stressing that the members who sit on it would be key. Still, such a panel would pose risks of sharpening partisan divisions or overshadowing President Joe Bidens legislative agenda.

Theres still more evidence that the American people need and deserve to hear and a 9/11 commission is a way to make sure that we secure the Capitol going forward, said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a Biden ally. And that we lay bare the record of just how responsible and how abjectly violating of his constitutional oath President Trump really was.

House prosecutors who argued for Trumps conviction of inciting the riot said Sunday they had proved their case. They also railed against the Senates Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, and others who they said were trying to have it both ways in finding the former president not guilty but criticizing him at the same time.

A close Trump ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., voted for acquittal but acknowledged that Trump had some culpability for the siege at the Capitol that killed five people, including a police officer, and disrupted lawmakers certification of Bidens White House victory. Graham said he looked forward to campaigning with Trump in the 2022 election, when Republicans hope to regain the congressional majority.

His behavior after the election was over the top, Graham said. We need a 9/11 commission to find out what happened and make sure it never happens again.

The Senate acquitted Trump of a charge of incitement of insurrection after House prosecutors laid out a case that he was an inciter in chief who unleashed a mob by stoking a monthslong campaign of spreading debunked conspiracy theories and false violent rhetoric that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Trumps lawyers countered that Trumps words were not intended to incite the violence and that impeachment was nothing but a witch hunt designed to prevent him from serving in office again.

The conviction tally was the most bipartisan in American history but left Trump to declare victory and signal a political revival while a bitterly divided GOP bickered over its direction and his place in the party.

The Republicans who joined Cassidy in voting to convict were Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Its frustrating, but the founders knew what they were doing and so we live with the system that we have, Democratic Del. Stacey Plaskett, a House prosecutor who represents the Virgin Islands, said of the verdict, describing it as heartbreaking. She added: But, listen, we didnt need more witnesses. We needed more senators with spines.

McConnell told Republican senators shortly before the vote that he would vote to acquit Trump. In a blistering speech after the vote, the Kentucky Republican said the president was practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day" but that the Senates hands were tied to do anything about it because Trump was out of office. The Senate, in an earlier vote, had deemed the trial constitutional.

It was powerful to hear the 57 guilties and then it was puzzling to hear and see Mitch McConnell stand and say not guilty and then, minutes later, stand again and say he was guilty of everything, said Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pa. History will remember that statement of speaking out of two sides of his mouth, she said.

Dean also backed the idea of an impartial investigative commission not guided by politics but filled with people who would stand up to the courage of their conviction.

The lead House impeachment manager, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., called the trial a dramatic success in historical terms by winning unprecedented support from GOP senators. He said the verdict didnt match the reality of the strength of evidence.

We successfully prosecuted him and convicted him in the court of public opinion and the court of history, he said. Pointing to McConnell and other Republican senators critical of Trump but voting to acquit, Raskin said, Theyre trying to have it both ways.

Raskin and Plaskett defended the House teams last-minute reversal not to call a witness, Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash. They acknowledged they were aware they might lose some GOP votes for conviction if they extended the trial much longer.

Beutlers statement late Friday that Trump rebuffed a plea from House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy to call off the rioters was ultimately entered into the trial record.

I think what we did was, we got what we wanted, which was her statement, which was what she said, and had it put into the record, Plaskett said.

Cassidy and Dean spoke on ABCs This Week, Graham appeared on Fox News Sunday, Raskin was on NBCs Meet the Press, and Plaskett appeared on CNNs State of the Union.

___

Associated Press writers Alexandra Jaffe, Lisa Mascaro, Eric Tucker, Mary Clare Jalonick and Alan Fram contributed to this report.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor

RailTel Corporation of India's initial public offering is be the second public issue from the government and the seventh IPO of the year 2021.

Indian Railway Finance Corporation, Indigo Paints, Home First Finance Company and Stove Kraft have already listed on the bourses. Brookfield India REIT will make its market debut on February 17 and Nureca opened its public issue on February 15.

ICICI Securities, IDBI Capital Markets & Securities and SBI Capital Markets are the lead managers to the issue.

Here are 10 things to know before subscribing to RailTel Corporation of India IPO:

1) The IPO

The public issue comprises up to 8,71,53,369 equity shares of the face value of Rs 10 each and is a complete offer for sale by the Government of India.

Investors can bid for a minimum of 155 equity shares and in multiples of 155 thereafter.

2) Opening and closing dates

The public issue will open for subscription on February 16 and will close on February 18. The issue will also open for a day on February 15 for anchor investors.

The share allocation will take place around February 23 followed by unblocking of funds from ASBA account on February 24. Eligible investors will get shares on February 24 or 25 and the stock will get listed on February 26.

3) The price band

The company and the government, in consultation with merchant bankers, have fixed the price band at Rs 93-94 a share. In the higher price band, the minimum application size for retail investors comes to Rs 14,570.

4) Fund raising

The government is going to raise Rs 819.24 crore by selling a stake in RailTel.

5) Objects of Issue

The company will not receive any proceeds from the offer and the funds would be received by the selling shareholder, which is the government.

The main object of the offer is to carry out the disinvestment of 8,71,53,369 equity shares held by the Government of India.

Nureca IPO: Top 10 things to know before subscribing the issue

6) Company profile

RailTel Corporation is an information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure provider and one of the largest neutral telecom infrastructure providers in the country, owning a pan-India optic fibre network on exclusive right of way (ROW) along railway tracks. It is a Mini Ratna (Category-I) Central Public Sector Enterprise, wholly-owned (100 percent) by the Government of India and under the administrative control of the Ministry of Railways.

The company was incorporated in September 2000 to modernise the telecom system for train control, operation and safety and to generate additional revenues by creating nationwide broadband and multimedia network by using the right of way along railway tracks.

As of January 2021, its optical fibre network covered 59,098 route kilometers and 5,929 railway stations. It operates data centres in Gurugram, Haryana and Secunderabad, Telangana to host and collocate critical applications for customers including the Indian Railways.

In addition to strategic and critical network infrastructure services, RailTel also undertakes various ICT projects for the Indian Railways, the Centre and state governments, including various train control system projects for Indian Railways.

The company offers a diverse range of services across industries and its portfolio can be broadly classified as telecom network services, telecom infrastructure services, managed data center and hosting services and projects (system integration services).

The company is in the process of carrying out a project in Haryana for a state agency, where it is required to supply, install and commission IP-MPLS and MPLS routers at various sites under the state WAN and also supply, install and commission switches, servers and firewalls and undertake facility management services for management of the common IT infrastructure.

The company is working on a number of projects. These include the Kerala Fibre Optic Network project where the company is a part of the consortium that involves provisions of scalable and resilient optic fibre across Kerala.

7) Competitive strengths

RailTel believes that the company has the following competitive strengths:

a) It is among the largest neutral telecom infrastructure providers in India with pan-India optic fiber network.

b) It offers a diversified portfolio of ICT services and solutions ,including MPLS-VPN, leased lines services, TPaaS, eOffice services and data center services, large network hardware system integration, software and digital services.

c) It is a key partner to the Indian Railways in digital transformation.

d) It has experience in executing projects of national importance, with a robust pipeline of projects.

e) The company has a consistent record of financial performance and growth.

f) RailTel is professionally managed, with strong corporate governance and senior management team with significant industry experience.

8) Strategies

a) The company intends to continue to expand telecom services and deploy latest technologies.

b) It intends to further diversify services and solutions with a focus on Indian Railways.

c) It intends to expand services outside India.

9) Financials

RailTel has been profitable since fiscal 2007 and has paid dividends since fiscal 2008. Its operations have been funded entirely by internal accruals since fiscal 2013 and is a debt-free company.

Its revenue from operations has grown at a CAGR of 7.47 percent during FY18-FY20 and were at Rs 537.4 crore in the six months ended September 2020. In FY20, it reported the highest net profit margin among key telecom companies and key IT/ICT companies in India, with a net profit margin of 12.50 percent while net profit margin was 8.48 percent in the six months ended September 2020.

It ranked first in terms of operating profit margin among the key IT/ICT Companies in India in FY20.

10) How does it stack up against peers

Here is an assessment of the key telecom service companies in India, which include Bharti Airtel, BSNL, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam (MTNL), RailTel, Reliance Jio Infocomm, Tata Communications and Vodafone Idea:

An assessment of the key IT and ICT companies in India, which include HCL Infosystems, RailTel, Sify Technologies, Tata Communications and Telecommunications Consultants India (TCIL) follows;

Puneet Chawla is the Chairman and Managing Director of the company since December 2018. He is an IRSSE officer (batch of 1985). Prior to joining RailTel, he held positions such as Executive Director (Safety) in the Railway Board of Ministry of Railways, Government of India, Divisional Railway Manager, Ajmer, Chief Project Manager, Indian Railway Project Management Unit, General Manager, Rail Vikas Nigam Limited.

Sanjai Kumar is the Director (Network, Planning and Marketing) and whole-time director. Anand Kumar Singh is the Director (Finance) as well as a whole-time director and Chief Financial Officer. He has over 33 years of experience in finance and accountancy. Prior to joining the company, he was the executive director (finance) at IRCON International and also worked in Bokaro Power Supply Company and Damodar Valley Corporation.

Umesh Balonda and Vinay Srivastava are the parttime government director and nominee director, while Rashmi Jain and Chinnasamy Ganesan are the parttime (nonofficial) director as well as independent directors.

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The Bankers Committee led by the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, on Sunday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Federal Government for the handover of the National Arts Theater, Iganmu, Lagos.

In July 2020, the federal government handed over the National Theatre to the Central Bank of Nigeria and the Bankers committee for restoration and development of the 134 hectares of fallow land within the premises.

Mr. Emefiele said revamping the National Arts Theatre will unlock the creative talents of hundreds of thousands of Nigerian youth in the fields of music, movie, fashion, and information technology.

Bankers Committee to provide funding for a prototype cluster labeled the Signature Cluster which consists of a building each for Music, Film, Fashion, and Information Technology verticals, he tweeted Sunday.

In addition to these, a Welcome/Visitors Centre, Police and Fire Stations, and structured parking for up to 500 vehicles will be built.

Main contractor is Cappa & DAlberto Limited, the Electrical Sub Contractor is Nairda Limited, while the Mechanical Sub Contractor is VACC Limited.

The governor commended President Muhammadu Buhari for his magnanimous approval for the handover of the National Arts Theatre as well as the pivotal role he continues to play in providing the Nigerian youths with limitless opportunities to reach the summit of their capacities.

The Federal Executive Council (FEC) on February 10 approved an agreement that will lead to the renovation of the National Theatre in Lagos for N21 billion.

According to the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, who disclosed the development after the FEC meeting, the CBN will invest the money in the project in a PPP arrangement.

The CBN through the Bankers Committee is willing to invest N21, 894, 000, 000 to renovate the National Theatre, refurbish it, and run it profitably.
Peers to Press UK Government to Replace Person With Woman in Proposed Maternity Bill

Peers are preparing to press the UK government to replace the word person with the word woman in a proposed Maternity Bill, The Telegraph reported on Monday.

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath is in talks with fellow House of Lords peers and will be urging the government to revise the Ministerial and other Maternity Allowances Bill (pdf) amid worries that the wording used could be taken as a precedent for future legislation, according to The Telegraph.

The problem is were seeing the introduction of an ideological language of public bodies trying to avoid the use of the word woman, Lord Hunt told the publication.

You need a mark in the sand. I dont want to see women marginalised or discriminated against because we are now afraid to use the word.

The bill, drafted to allow ministers to take paid maternity leave while remaining in government posts, will be put before the House of Lords for its second reading on Feb. 22.

Huntss concerns follow Scottish National Party MP Joanna Cherry last week highlighting fears over the erasure of women in the proposed law, which she said does not adequately tackle discrimination around maternity.

Why does this bill make no mention of women? she asked when addressing Parliament on Feb. 11.

Its possible to support both #transrights & #womensrights. Neither should be sacrificed for the other. But womens biology & lived experience must not be erased from the statute book. #LesbianVisibility is also important. My speech on #MOMABill pic.twitter.com/hQyitHfBi9  Joanna Cherry QC (@joannaccherry) February 11, 2021

It is women who give birth and women who benefit from maternity leave, she said.

Why must we deny that there are two sexes and why must we deny that biological sex exists?

Cherry suggested the wording of the draft legislation mimics the ideological language which is now seen across schools, universities, and the NHS.

She also said it fails to comply with the Equality Act 2010, which refers to pregnancy and maternity using the day to day language of centurieswoman, she and her.

If this is an innocent mistake then lets put it right quickly and easily by replacing the word person with woman she said.

Cherry said identity politics is causing conflict between politicians, with those who try to warn against the erasure of biological reality and the reality of womanhood within legislation often being pilloried.

Many politicians are now so enthralled to those who wish to erase women for the purposes of advancing gender identity theory, she said, that they call those of us who advocate for womens sex-based rights transphobic.

She added that it is not transphobic to advocate for womens sex-based rights.

We must find a way to be inclusive without erasing womens biology, she said.

Cherrys remarks came just a day after the Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust announced, in an effort to promote gender inclusiveness, that midwives can replace the words breastfeeding with chestfeeding, mother with birthing parent, and pregnant women with pregnant women and people.

The trust noted, however, that the language was only being introduced for trans and non-binary midwifery service users.

The trust recognises the vast majority of midwifery service users are women and already has language in place women are comfortable with. This is not changing. For example, we will continue to call them pregnant women and talk about breastfeeding, the trust said in a statement.
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Pennsylvania movie theaters ditch mask mandate

Three chain movie theaters have announced that masks are no longer mandatory for moviegoers who have been vaccinated against coronavirus.
Bridge adds real strength and depth to our learning and talent offering for the mid-enterprise market, which has attractive structural dynamics. The acquisition extends LTGs current market coverage, enabling us to meet the needs of customers of all sizes and complexities.

Learning Technologies Group plc, the provider of services and technologies for digital learning and talent management, has agreed to acquire Bridge from Instructure Inc.

Bridge is a learning, performance and skills development platform for mid-enterprise organisations. Specialising in employee-centric experiences, the offering includes a learning management system in addition to performance, engagement and skills development products  delivered to clients in a single, easy-to-use, SaaS-based platform.

The acquisition significantly extends LTGs learning and talent offering in the important mid-enterprise market. Bridge is highly complementary to PeopleFluent, which serves the large enterprise market, and Breezy HR, which serves the small and medium-sized business market. This latest addition enables LTG to provide a holistic learning and talent development offering to meet the needs of small, mid-size and large enterprises, three distinct groups with varying needs.

The combination and integration of Bridge with LTGs other portfolio offerings will create opportunities for cross-sell and upsell-led growth. Bridge contributes a further 800 customers to the Group.

Jonathan Satchell, Chief Executive of LTG, said: I am delighted to welcome Bridge to LTG. Bridge adds real strength and depth to our learning and talent offering for the mid-enterprise market, which has attractive structural dynamics. The acquisition extends LTGs current market coverage, enabling us to meet the needs of customers of all sizes and complexities.

The acquisition, which is expected to complete on 26th February 2021, is to be funded from LTGs existing cash resources.

/Ends.

About Learning Technologies Group

Learning Technologies Group is a leader in the high-growth workplace learning and talent industry. The Group offers end-to-end learning and talent management solutions ranging from strategic consultancy, through a range of content and platform solutions to analytical insights that enable corporate and government clients to close the gap between current and future workforce capability.

LTG is listed on the London Stock Exchange Alternative Investment Market (LTG.L) and headquartered in London. The Group has offices in Europe, North America, South America and Asia-Pacific.

LTGs businesses, including LEO Learning, Gomo, PRELOADED, Rustici Software, PeopleFluent, Affirmity, Watershed, VectorVMS, Instilled, and Open LMS, are at the forefront of innovation and best-practice in the learning technology and talent management sectors, and have received numerous awards for their exceptional performance. Our portfolio of brands represents the best of breed and they are acknowledged throughout the industry as market leaders.
A hacking campaign that U.S. intelligence services have said Russia likely was behind is "probably the largest and most sophisticated attack the world has ever seen," Microsoft President Brad Smith said.

Smith, speaking in an interview that aired on February 14 on CBS, discussed the scope of the massive intrusion discovered in December that breached government and private company networks in the United States and many other countries.

"When we analyzed everything that we saw at Microsoft, we asked ourselves how many engineers have probably worked on these attacks. And the answer we came to was, well, certainly more than 1,000," Smith said, speaking with the program 60 Minutes.

Cybersecurity experts have said it could take months to identify all the compromised systems and expel the hackers. Russia has denied any involvement in the cyberattack.

Microsoft announced in late December that it was among the thousands of companies that found its systems compromised. It said that hackers gained access to its source code but said the activity did not put the security of its services or any customer data at risk.

The software giant had previously acknowledged that like U.S. government agencies and other firms, it had downloaded updates of network management software made by the company SolarWinds that the hackers had targeted. The compromised software provided hackers a backdoor into government and company networks.

Microsoft said at the time that the hacking operation was carried out by a very sophisticated nation-state actor and said companies and businesses affected were in several other countries, including Canada, Mexico, Belgium, Spain, the United Kingdom, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates.

Then-U.S. President-elect Joe Biden called the cyberattack a great concern and promised to impose substantial costs on the perpetrators in coordination with U.S. allies and partners.

Based on reporting by CBS and Reuters
The treasurers of Delaware, Illinois, Wisconsin and Colorado are lobbying Amazon to stop reported anti-union activities at its Bessemer fulfillment center.

The officials sent a letter Feb. 9 to the chair of Amazons Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee, echoing a similar letter sent by an investor group.

Last week, a group of about 70 Amazon investors told the company in a letter to stop interfering in unionization efforts in Bessemer. The investors, led by the Swedish groups Folksam and Ohman Fonder, control more than $20 billion in company shares and include the comptrollers for both New York State and New York City, Legal and General Investment Management, BMO Global Asset Management and the Church of England Pensions Board.

As with the investor group, the state treasurers noted that the company website states that Amazon respects employee rights to join or not join unions without fear or reprisal, intimidation, or harassment.

In the letter, the treasurers applaud Amazon for its policies, but are concerned that the company has yet to demonstrate how it meets this commitment and by recent allegations that Amazon has engaged in activity at its Bessemer facility that contravenes Amazons Global Principles on Human Rights.

Four state treasurers (Del., Ill., Wis., Col.) just sent a letter to Amazon saying its anti-union efforts in Alabama violate Amazon's own "Global Human Rights Principles." Letter here: pic.twitter.com/67KFVenWke  Dave Jamieson (@jamieson) February 9, 2021

Balloting began last week for more than 5,000 workers at the center in a mail-in vote on whether to be represented by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU), which has a membership of up to 18,000 members in Alabama. Workers must return the ballots by March 29. Workers and union organizers have said publicly that the company has employed various union-busting tactics over the past few weeks, including mandatory meetings, text messages and a website. Employees say they are told at training sessions that unions are broke and bad for business, with union leaders spending union dues on lavish lifestyles.

Amazon has said it does not believe the RWDSU represents the majority of its employees views.

Colorado State Treasurer David Young, one of those who signed the letter, told Al Dia that the reported anti-union activity is unfortunate.

I think thats contrary to what I believe is the prospects ultimately for a sustainable corporation. Investors and Amazon want to know that their leadership is taking all the necessary steps to make sure their company really works well. And listening to employees is really an important part of that, Young said. Amazon wants investors to come in and invest in the company, but if it appears that theyre not working with their employees, that puts their service delivery at risk and makes people think twice.
MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th February, 2021) The Syrian air defense systems downed most of the Israeli missiles while repelling an attack over the western suburbs of Damascus, the Syrian state news agency, SANA, said in the early hours of Monday.

Earlier, SANA reported that strong explosions were being heard in the Damascus suburb as air defenses were repelling the Israeli attack.

"Today, at 01:18 [23:18 GMT on Sunday] the Israeli enemy launched a missile strike from the occupied Syrian Golan Heights and Galilee [in northern Israel] on a number of targets on the outskirts of Damascus, and air defense systems repelled the aggression and shot down most of the enemy missiles," a military source told SANA.
The Supreme Court on Monday issued a notice to WhatsApp, and its parent company Facebook, in connection with a plea challenging its new privacy policy. The apex court has sought a response from the tech giants in four weeks.

"You may be a $2-3 trillion company but people's privacy is more valuable for them and it is our duty to protect their privacy," a bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde told Facebook and WhatsApp.

The petition seeks that WhatsApp be restrained from implementing its new privacy policy in India and be directed to apply the privacy policy which is made applicable to users in the European Union region.

"In January, they (WhatsApp) have come up with a new privacy policy. One set of privacy standards apply to Europe and a different set of standards apply to Indians. This happens when the Personal Data Protection Bill is pending," senior lawyer Shyam Divan, appearing for the petitioner, told the top court, adding, "there is a huge differentiation between Europeans and Indians."

Senior counsel Kapil Sibal, representing Whatsapp, vehemently denied that the the data of users would be compromised by the new policy. "This 2021 policy is applicable everywhere apart from Europe as it has a law. If India has a law we will follow the same," Sibal said. "Then put that on oath," the Bench responded.

In January, WhatsApp had renewed its terms of service and privacy policy, which were to come into effect on February 8. The date, however, has been exteneded to May 15 following concerns triggered by the new rules.

This new privacy policy asks users to agree to its new data sharing norms, a key point of which is sharing data from business conversations with Facebook, the owner of the messaging service. Since it was not optional, users were left confused and concerned about the privacy.

The new data-sharing policy, however, does not apply on users in Europe, the messaging app had clarified, because of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a robust law protecting privacy and data of people in EU. This differentiation has become a sore point of contention.

Shyam Divan asked the court that WhatsApp should not be allowed to lower privacy standards for Indian users when compared to Europeans, and it should not be allowed to share data with Facebook or any other third-party till the Personal Data Protection law comes into force in India. The Bill was introduced in the Parliament in 2019, but still remains pending.
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YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. President of Armenia Armen Sarkissian has sent a congratulatory letter to President of Serbia Aleksandar Vucic on the national day  the Statehood Day, the Presidential Office told Armenpress.

President Sarkissian highlighted the consistent development and deepening of the friendly ties between Armenia and Serbia, which, according to him, have a firm historical and civilizational base.

I highly value the personal relations between us. I am sure that we will be able to raise the inter-state cooperation to a qualitatively new level with joint efforts and consistent fulfillment of bilateral agreements, the letter reads.

The Armenian President wished his Serbian counterpart good health and success, and to the good people of Serbia  peace and welfare.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
New Delhi, Feb 15(UNI) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday condoled the loss of 15 lives in a road accident in Maharashtra's Jalgaon district.

"Heart-wrenching truck accident in Jalgaon, Maharashtra. Condolences to the bereaved families. May the injured recover at the earliest," the Office of Prime Minister said in a tweet.

At least 15 labourers were killed on Sunday night, when a truck carrying them overturned near Kingaon village in the district.

Seven men, six women, and two children lost their lives in the accident.

All the deceased were labourers from Abhoda, Kerhala, and Raver in the district, police said, adding they died after their papaya-laden truck overturned shortly after midnight near a temple at Kingaon village.

Five labourers have sustained serious injuries and are being treated at a rural hospital.



UNI SB ASN 1211

Partially treated wastewater is being discharged into the Willamette River due to a prolonged power outage caused by the storm.

The Tri-City Water Resource Recovery Facility  located north of Oregon City where the Clackamas River meets the Willamette  is currently on standby generator power, which means the plant is treating 77% of the wastewater it typically processes, but the rest is being discharged with only partial treatment, Clackamas County spokesperson Kimberly Dinwiddie said.

The county said it is working with Portland General Electric to restore power as soon as possible. County staff is also working with PGE to get more fuel for the standby generators at the water facility.

The water being discharged is likely out of compliance with the Clean Water Act, the county said, and the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality has been notified.

The county advised the public to avoid contact with the water in the Willamette River downstream of the Tri-City water facility for the next few days as a precautionary measure.

-- Jaimie Ding

jding@oregonian.com; 503-221-4395; @j_dingdingding
Army Technical Officers search a green area close to the Racecourse Road at Ballyarnett County Park outside Derry. Picture Martin McKeown. 15.02.21

A security alert in Londonderry has ended following searches after police found "nothing untoward".

The Racecourse Road was closed between Fir Park and the Springfield Road for several hours to facilitate a search after claims a device was left in the area on Sunday.

Superintendent Catherine Magee said:  I would like to thank anyone affected by this incident for their patience and understanding while officers worked to ensure their safety.

"As we continue with our enquiries, I would ask the local community and people travelling through the area that if they notice anything suspicious they should contact police immediately on 999.

Anyone with information about this incident is asked to contact police on the non-emergency number 101, quoting reference number 576 14/02/21.

"A report can also be submitted online using the non-emergency reporting form via http://www.psni.police.uk/makeareport/. You can also contact Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 or online at http://crimestoppers-uk.org/.
Police say a suicide bomber died and seven civilians were wounded when a vehicle exploded near a checkpoint outside the presidential palace in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu.

At least three people including a suicide bomber were killed and eight others wounded after a car bomb detonated near a security checkpoint outside the presidential palace in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu Saturday, security official and witnesses said.

Police spokesman Sadiq Ali Adan told AP the driver defied orders to stop on Saturday morning, and police opened fire as passersby ran for their lives. He says more than a dozen vehicles were destroyed in the blast.

"The police were chasing the hostile vehicle after spotting it a few kilometres away from where it exploded. Three civilians died according to the information we have received so far and eight others are wounded," security official Abdirahman Mohamed told AFP.

"The police opened fire on the vehicle and chased it and this has allowed many people to flee away from road. This has really limited the number of casualties the blast could have caused," he added.

This latest bombing occurred as Somali politicians argue over how to hold a national election. The vote had been scheduled for February 8, and some argue that President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed has overstayed his mandate. He seeks a second four-year term. More talks on the election crisis are set for Monday.

The al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group based in Somalia often targets high-profile areas of Mogadishu. It has threatened to attack the polls.

Witnesses said they heard gunfire and saw vehicles and three-wheel tuk-tuks scatter before the heavy blast occurred.

"I was at a gym close to where the blast occurred, but thanks to God we have heard the gunshots before the blast. And this alerted many people including myself and we fled from the area to take cover before the vehicle reached the area of the explosion," Dahir Osman, a witness said.

"The blast was huge, I was inside a shop and I saw police chasing a vehicle on the wrong side of the road. It crashed into several vehicles and tuk-tuks before it exploded close to the checkpoint as police continued opening fire on the vehicle," said another witness, Aisha Ahmed.

Mogadishu is regularly targeted with attacks by the Al-Qaeda-linked Al-Shabaab group who have been waging a long and violent insurgency seeking to unseat the internationally-backed government in Mogadishu.

They were driven out of Mogadishu in 2011, but still, control swathes of territory from where they plan and launch frequent, deadly strikes against the government and civilian targets.
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Press Release

February 15, 2021 More aggressive roll-out of additional interest-free loans for backyard hog-raisers: Pangilinan AS the price cap on pork products goes on its second week, Senator Francis "Kiko" Pangilinan urges the Department of Agriculture to focus its initiatives to overcome the effects of the African swine flu (ASF) on backyard hog-raisers. "We welcome DA's P500 million worth of interest-free loans payable in three to five years, initially set aside by its Agricultural Credit and Policy Council (ACPC) for backyard hog-raisers," said the former Presidential Assistant on Food Security and Agricultural Modernization. "But we also call for three things. Una, maging mas aggressive at proactive sa pag-rollout ng availment ng pautang na ito. Madalas kasi hindi alam ng maliit na magbababoy na merong mga ganitong magaan na pautang," he said. Secondly, Pangilinan asked that the lending process be made easier so that more small-scale hog-raisers can avail themselves of the credit facility. "Kadalasan pumupunta na lang sa mga nag-fa-five-six ang mga kababayan natin kasi mas madaling umutang sa kanila. Dahil gipit, sa usurero kumakapit," he said. Thirdly, with P27 billion allocated for commercial hog-raisers, Pangilinan suggested a much bigger credit allocation for backyard hog-raisers. "Kung ikukumpara sa nakalaang pautang para sa mga commercial hog-raisers, wala pang 2 percent ang bahagi ng para sa mga maliliit na magbababoy," he said. Citing the Bureau of Animal Industry's swine inventory as of January 2018, Pangilinan said this credit allocation is disproportionate to the almost two heads produced by backyard hog-raisers for every head produced by commercial hog-raisers. "Mas marami ang kanilang kontribusyon sa suplay ng baboy at mas kailangan ng maliliit nating kababayan ang ganitong pautang," he said. "Karamihan din sa ating mga magsasaka ang nag-aalaga ng baboy, manok at iba pang hayop para ma-supplement ang kinikita sa pagsasaka. Sila ang pangunahing makikinabang sa ganitong mga pautang ng gobyerno," he said. Pangilinan also noted that the P500-million credit facility for backyard hog-raisers is 60 percent less than the P800 million allocated for transportation assistance for both hog growers and traders who will deliver and sell their pork products to markets in Metro Manila. In the launch of its twin programs of national hog repopulation and "Bantay sa ASF sa Barangay" over the weekend, DA announced that Land Bank of the Philippines and Development Bank of the Philippines are also allocating P15 billion and P12 billion, respectively, for lending to commercial hog-raisers. DA also said its Philippine Crop Insurance Corporation (PCIC) is providing hog-raisers insurance coverage for ASF-culled hogs at P10,000 each. The Philippine swine industry, which is worth about P200 billion a year, has been hit by the African swine flu (ASF) since 2019. Aside from hog-raisers suffering from huge income losses as millions of their pigs are culled, consumers also have to deal with high pork prices. Lack of supply has also affected traders and market vendors. Pangilinan, who believes that agriculture can be an engine of growth, said farmers usually augment their income with hog-raising and poultry and have been affected by the ASF. "Pag maganda ang kita ng ating mga magsasaka, mas gaganahan silang magtanim at mag-alaga ng hayop, mas dadami ang suplay sa palengke, mas mumura para ating mga mamimili, at mas lulusog tayo," he said.
The US Senate voted Saturday to acquit President Donald Trump for incitement of insurrection in connection with the attempted coup of January 6, 2021.

The verdict marks a milestone in the breakdown of American democracy. A president sought to overthrow the separation of powers and install himself as dictator, and Congress refused to take the most basic action to hold him accountable.

By voting to acquit, 43 Republican senators gave aid and comfort to a fascist coup attempt. Their votes showed what they would have done had Trump succeeded: they would have endorsed and supported the overthrow of the Constitution.

In this Jan. 6, 2021, file photo rioters try to break through a police barrier at the Capitol in Washington. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

Trumps legal defense was a combination of incompetent sophistry and raving hysterics, making the fascist argument that his insurrection was the outcome ofor even the appropriate response toleft-wing demonstrations against police violence. Trump lawyer Michael Van der Veen declared that the Capitol riot was pre-planned by fringe left groups.

Emerging from the impeachment trial emboldened, Trump stands secure in his position as the head of the Republican Party. Donald Trump is the most vibrant member of the Republican Party, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a close Trump ally, gloated on Fox News Sunday. The Trump movement is alive and well.

This outcome was aided by the Democrats, who sabotaged Trumps prosecution. The Democrats purposely protected Trumps co-conspirators. This includes the 147 Republican House and Senate members who voted against the certification of Joe Bidens election victory, along with those who provided the political framework for the January 6 insurrection with charges of a rigged election. It also includes those forces within the state who secretly worked with Trump to orchestrate a stand-down of federal forces on January 6.

Throughout the trial, the Democrats begged and pleaded with the same Republicans who encouraged and took part in Trumps drive to overturn the election.

The Democratic impeachment managers never once addressed themselves to the American people or sought to explain the political strategy behind the insurrection. They did not once mention what was happening inside the Capitol while Trump was inciting the mob--the objection by one congressman and senator after another to the electoral vote totals certified by the states in an election Trump lost by over seven million votes.

The only reference to the Republicans objections during the entire trial was a video played by the Democratic impeachment managers of the rioters ransacking the desks of members of the Senate, in which one of the insurrectionists declared that Republican Senator Ted Cruz was with us because he backed Trumps efforts to overturn the election.

The Democrats also deliberately excluded any discussion of why the rioters were allowed to overrun the Capitol without any opposition from the tens of thousands of National Guard and federal military forces stationed in and just outside Washington. The day after the riot, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan said that his request to deploy the Maryland National Guard to Washington to support the Capitol police was held up for 90 minutes by the acting secretary of defense, who had been installed by Trump after the November 3 election. It was only the secretary of the Army who gave the authorization to release the Guard.

Yet there was no investigation of which elements in the military chain of command facilitated the stand-down and whether this was done at the orders of Trump.

Even as they limited their case to Trumps actions alone, the impeachment managers kneecapped the prosecution on even the extremely limited, legalistic grounds for impeachment they had set out.

On Friday night, Washington Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler, a Republican, released a statement making clear that Trump actively supported the insurrectionists in a phone conversation with Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. According to Herrera Beutler, when McCarthy pleaded with Trump to stop the attack, Trump openly sided with the insurrectionists, saying, Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.

With the Democrats in control of the Senate, not only Herrera Beutler, but dozens of other people with first-hand knowledge of Trumps attempt to overturn the election and the stand-down of federal forces could have been subpoenaed and forced to testify under oath.

But despite winning a vote to bring Herrera Beutler and possibly other witnesses to testify, the Democrats abruptly backtracked, hastily bringing the trial to an end less than 24 hours after Herrera Beutlers statement.

The record of Trumps first impeachmentcentered around the Democrats differences with Trump over foreign policyspanned thousands of pages. The impeachment process unfolded over a period of three months, including many witnesses called before the House committees considering the charges.

But after the greatest assault on constitutional government in the countrys history, the Democrats devoted less than a week to the Senate trial, on the grounds that the impeachment was a distraction from other legislative priorities. This claim was proven to be a complete fraud when the Senate adjourned for a week immediately following the impeachment vote, and senators left town for the recess.

It is worth comparing the way in which the second impeachment of Trump was conducted with the investigation of the Watergate scandal under the Nixon administration. The Senate hearings that began in February 1973, chaired by Democratic Senator Sam Ervin, led not only to Nixons forced resignation in the face of virtually certain impeachment, but also to the exposure of FBI and CIA involvement and the criminal conviction of nearly two dozen people. And all that was triggered by a single burglary carried out by five people, in which no one was injured, let alone killed.

The Iran-Contra hearings in 1987 also had significant consequences. The investigation revealed that the Reagan administration flagrantly violated the Boland Amendment, passed by Congress to prohibit US government assistance to the Nicaraguan Contras. It also exposed the existence of the Rex 84 plan for the mass detention of subversive elements.

The Democrats deliberate sabotage of their own case in the second Trump impeachment was widely noted by legal observers. If the House was going to impeach, it should have framed the case to make it as difficult as possible for the Senate to acquit, wrote Michael W. McConnell, a constitutional professor at Harvard Law School.

It is abundantly clear, he noted, that Trump sought to intimidate members of Congress and other officials to block Mr. Bidens election, and that he failed in his duty to do what he could to end the violence once it started. Those would be ample grounds for conviction.

But any investigation of the Republicans efforts to overturn the election and the stand-down of federal forces would have implicated precisely the forces the Democrats were most concerned with protecting.

Following the impeachment vote, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made clear the Democrats motivation for protecting Trumps Republican co-conspirators. We need a strong Republican Party, Pelosi said, echoing an earlier declaration by Biden.

The Democrats protected Trumps Republican co-conspirators because they need this wretched band of fascists as a constituency for the right-wing, pro-business policies supported by both parties, in the face of mounting working class opposition.

In choosing between the interests of the ruling elite and democratic forms of government, the Democrats will side with the needs of Americas plutocracy every time. The Democrats have proven once again that they have no interest in defending constitutional forms of government in the United States. The defense of democratic rights must and will be carried out through the independent mobilization of the working class on the basis of an anti-capitalist, socialist program.
The hospitality sector has urged the Executive to plan for the end of lockdown.

Northern Ireland's hospitality sector has urged the Executive to form a plan for when the industry can reopen its doors.

Hospitality Ulster Chief Executive Colin Neil said many business owners were now at financial breaking point after a year of changing restrictions.

He called for politicians to work alongside public health advisers and the Covid taskforce to publish detailed guidelines well ahead of any reopening date.

The Executive is set to meet on Thursday to discuss Covid regulations, though it is unlikely restrictions on hospitality will ease in the immediate future.

Mr Neil said that this week's review of restrictions must include hope for the sector.

Hospitality premises have been closed since the latest lockdown begun in December, with pubs that don't serve food only being open for a number of weeks since the pandemic began.

Bars and restaurants that serve food have been allowed to reopen at various points as restrictions ease, with a number of mitigations in place including social distancing, limiting the number of people at a table and an 11pm curfew.

Mr Neil laid bare the full impact of lockdown on the industry.

The hospitality sector has been the worst hit and suffered almost an entire year of being closed or heavily restricted. We are now in a frightening situation. Bounce back loans have been burnt up and cash reserves have been depleted and desperation is really beginning to set in," he said.

Both the industry and government now need to learn lessons from past restrictions, what worked, and what didnt."

Expand Close Colin Neill, chief executive of Hospitality Ulster (Brian Lawless/PA) PA / Facebook

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The hospitality chief called for a "new approach" to reopening which would include reversing the previous strategy.

He suggested that rules be clearly set out, with businesses able to fully comply allowed to reopen.

Businesses that cannot operate sustainably under the new rules should remain closed and receive financial support, he said.

"Simply choosing a business type as criteria to open and removing financial support rather than a risk assessed approach can actually be counterproductive, pushing a business to open even though it cant be compliant," Mr Neil said.

Lets be proactive, lets get a plan in place well in advance and fight back and accelerate the recovery. We have already been through the wringer prior to previous lockdowns and have developed a significant level of experience in relation to safety measures and understanding restrictions and how to implement them.

Mr Neil businesses must know well in advance what standards would be required for reopening.

If we need to do more, we need to know now. If its greater ventilation for example, give us the specification and the financial support so that business owners can go off and source well before the reopening phase, just dont land this on us last minute  we are in too fragile a state to survive last minute rule decisions and rule changes," he said.

The statement was echoed by Retail NI's Chief Executive Glyn Roberts who called for a high street reopening roadmap.

He acknowledged a firm date for the reopening of non-essential businesses was unlikely to be given this week, but said planning must begin.

"We need to hear a lot more hope in the messages coming from the Executive to give businesses and the broader community confidence that the vaccine rollout will lead to recovery and some degree of normality," Mr Roberts said.

More light and less tunnel is needed from the Executive in its communication.

DUBLIN (dpa-AFX) - Ireland's trade surplus decreased in December, amid a fall in both exports and imports, figures from the Central Statistics Office showed on Monday. The trade surplus decreased to EUR 5.463 billion in December from EUR 5.875 billion in October. In the same month last year, the trade surplus was EUR 4.621 billion. Exports declined by a seasonally adjusted 14.0 percent monthly in December and imports decreased 19.0 percent. On an unadjusted basis, exports grew 1.0 percent annually in December, while imports declined 3.0 percent. Data showed that exports to Britain declined 9.0 percent yearly in December and imports decreased 5.0 percent. In 2020, the trade surplus was EUR 75.447 billion from EUR 61.672 billion in 2019. Exports grew 5.4 percent and imports declined 6.0 percent. 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.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu criticized Western countries over their "double standards" and "selective approach" to terrorism, a day after 13 Turkish citizens held hostage by the PKK were brutally executed in northern Iraq.

The minister said Turkey has always opposed terrorism and stood in solidarity with African countries in their fight against terrorism.

"We have never been hypocritical like many Western countries," Cavusoglu said, adding that Turkey will continue to target terrorists at home and near its borders.

"Countries claiming to be fighting terrorism are either silent on PKK massacre or trying to slur over it with ifs and buts," Daily Sabah cited him as saying.

The U.S. State Department issued a statement offering its condolences over the killing of Turkish citizens five hours after Cavusoglus message.

State Department spokesperson Ned Price said in a statement that if reports that the PKK was responsible were confirmed, they "condemn this action in the strongest possible terms."
US electric vehicle maker Tesla on Friday launched its compact sport utility vehicle (SUV), the Model Y, in South Korea as it tries to boost sales in the country.

Tesla Korea said the Model Y is available in three trim levels here, with the starting price for the standard range model set at 59.99 million won ($54,191). This sum roughly translates to Rs 39.50 lakh.

The prices for the long-range model and the performance trim are to start from 69.99 million won and 79.99 million won, respectively.

Starting this year, South Korea will give the full amount of government subsidies to electric cars that are priced below 60 million won, meaning only those who buy the Model Y standard trim can get the subsidies in full.

People who purchase the long-range trim and the performance model of the Model Y will get half of the government subsidies.

The Model Y is Tesla's newest vehicle launched in South Korea after the Model 3 in August 2019.

It is also the first time in nearly three years that Tesla is bringing an SUV model to South Korea following the Model X in 2018.

Tesla Korea said the Model Y offers five-seat and seven-seat options, but the latter will be introduced in the country later.

The US EV brand also launched the 2021 version of the Model 3 sedan. It will be available in three trims as well, with the price starting from 54.79 million won.

With the launch of new models, Tesla Korea said it will establish supercharger stations in 27 spots in the country and add a maximum of eight maintenance centres nationwide by the end of this year.

According to data from the Korea Automobile Importers and Distributors Association and automakers, Tesla accounted for one-fourth of the total EV sales in South Korea last year.

The data also showed that imported EV sales reached 15,183 units in 2020, and Tesla represented 77.9 per cent of them.
Marc Llistosella replaces Guenter Butschek as CEO & MD of Tata Motors

Tata Motors on Saturday announced the appointment of former COO of Airbus and a Daimler AG, Marc Llistosella as the companys new managing director and CEO.

Llistosella, who took charge at Tata Motors in January 2016, succeeds Guenter Butschek who is relocating to Germany after his term ends,

Llistosella was the president and CEO of Mitsubishi Fuso Truck & Bus Corporation and Head of Daimler Trucks Asia till 2018 before he moved on to join Einrides board of directors.

Sweden-based Einride calls itself 'The intelligent movement company' targeting complete transformation of the transportation industry.

"I am delighted to welcome Marc to Tata Motors. Marc is an experienced automotive business leader with deep knowledge and expertise in commercial vehicles over his illustrious career and has extensive operational experience in India. Marc will bring this experience to take the Tata Motors Indian business to even greater heights," N Chandrasekaran, chairman, Tata Motors, said.

"I am delighted to become a part of the unique Tata family. Having been bonded to India for so many years, a new exciting chapter is now opened. We would jointly awaken the potential of Tata Motors," Marc Llistosella said.

Guenter Butschek has informed his desire to relocate to Germany at the end of the contract for personal reasons. He has accepted the request of the board of Tata Motors to continue as the MD and CEO till 30 June 2021, Chandrasekaran said.

"I would like to thank Guenter for leading Tata Motors successfully over the last 5 years," he added.

Llistosella joins Tata Motors at a time when the company is seeing a revival of business with surging demand for its new passenger vehicle models and an improved performance for its commercial vehicles.

Tata Motors reported a 67 per cent growth in profit in Q3 FY2021 at Rs2,906 crore compared with a profit of Rs1,738 crore in Q3 FY2020.

The company also posted strong results for third quarter of FY2021.

Consolidated revenues from operations in Q3 FY2021 grew over 5 per cent year-on-year to Rs75,653.8 crore as sales picked up in key markets across the world.
People queue to receive the CCP virus vaccine outside a closed down Debenhams store that is being used as a vaccination centre in Folkestone, Kent, UK, on Jan. 28, 2021. (Andrew Couldridge/Reuters)

Updates on CCP Virus: World Wont Be Adequately Vaccinated Until 2027, Specialists Predict

World Wont Be Adequately Vaccinated Until 2027, Specialists Predict

An Australian infectious disease physician said it would take six years for the world to be adequately vaccinated against the CCP virus, so vaccines must be shared with developing countries to avoid more sinister strains emerging.

Infectious diseases specialist and Australian National University lecturer Sanjaya Senanayake said about 70 countries have signed up for vaccination programmes. Presently, he estimates that the goal wont be met in just a year or two.

At the current rate of vaccination it is estimated we wont reach global coverage of 75 percent with vaccines for about six years, Dr Senanayake told Australias National Press Club on Feb. 10.

15 Million Vaccinated in UK

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said his country reached a significant milestone on Sunday as 15 million people across the UK had received the first dose of a CCP virus vaccine.

Wuhan Residents Commemorate Virus Victims

On the first few days of the Lunar New Year, which began on Feb. 12, fresh flowers were sold out in Wuhan, the Chinese city where the virus first broke out. Many florists told state-run media on Feb. 14 that they hadnt rested for the past 50 hours, in order to continue preparing bouquet orders.

Wuhan residents told The Epoch Times that the city has a local custom that in the first three days of the Lunar New Year, people buy marigold or chrysanthemum bouquets to memorialize family members who have died in the past year.

All flowers were sold out, reflecting that the virus death toll is huge and much higher than the official announced numbers, said Wuhan resident Zhang Hai in an interview. There are families I know that lost their loved ones exactly on Lunar New Year day last year.

Read full story

Czech Government Re-Declares State of Emergency

The Czech government has re-declared its state of emergency for next two weeks to be able to effectively tackle the pandemic in one of the hardest hit European countries.

The decision has been approved in defiance of the lower house of Parliament, which has refused the governments request to extend the tool that gives the Cabinet extra powers necessary to impose and keep in place strict nationwide restrictive measures and limit peoples rights.

French Hospitals to Move Into Crisis Mode

Frances Health Ministry has asked regional health agencies and hospitals to enter crisis organization from Thursday to prepare for a possible surge in CCP virus cases as a result of highly contagious variants, Le Journal Du Dimanche reported.

The move, which would echo measures taken in March and November when France went into lockdown, involves increasing the number of hospital beds available, delaying non-urgent surgery and mobilizing all medical staff resources.

New Zealand City Going Into 3-Day Lockdown

New Zealands largest city of Auckland has begun a three-day lockdown following the discovery of three unexplained virus cases in the community.

Health officials say the cases are of the more contagious variant first found in Britain and that genome testing hadnt linked them to any previous known cases.

Japan Approves Its First Virus Vaccine

Japans Health Ministry said on Sunday it has officially approved Pfizers CCP virus vaccine, the first such approval in the country as it steps up efforts to tame a third wave of infections in the run-up to the Summer Olympic Games.

UK Shares US Concerns Over WHO Mission to China

British foreign minister Dominic Raab said on Feb. 14 that he shared concerns about the level of access given to a World Health Organization COVID-19 fact-finding mission to China, echoing criticism from the United States.

The White House on Feb. 13 called on China to make available data from the earliest days of the outbreak, saying it had deep concerns about the way the findings of the WHOs COVID-19 report were communicated.

Chinese Citizens Needing Urgent Medical Care Are Neglected

On Jan. 8, several cities in northern Chinas Hebei Province were placed under lockdown amid a resurgence of COVID-19 cases. Then, in mid-January, local authorities in Xingtai city of Hebei Province tightened controls when confirmed cases continued to rise.

The Epoch Times obtained a series of classified documents from Xingtai municipal government revealing that many residents who were not affected by COVID-19 had struggled desperately to get treatment for heart disease, kidney failure, and tumors due to the harsh and inhumane lockdown measures that were imposed.

Read full story

Jessie Zhang, Alexander Zhang, Olivia Li, Nicole Hao, The Associated Press, and Reuters contributed to this report
Representative Image: PTI)

The rumors began almost as soon as the disease itself. Claims that a foreign adversary had unleashed a bioweapon emerged at the fringes of Chinese social media the same day China first reported the outbreak of a mysterious virus.

Watch out for Americans! a Weibo user wrote on December 31, 2019. Today, a year after the World Health Organization warned of an epidemic of COVID-19 misinformation, that conspiracy theory lives on, pushed by Chinese officials eager to cast doubt on the origins of a pandemic that has claimed more than 2 million lives globally.

From Beijing and Washington to Moscow and Tehran, political leaders and allied media effectively functioned as superspreaders, using their stature to amplify politically expedient conspiracies already in circulation. But it was China -- not Russia  that took the lead in spreading foreign disinformation about COVID-19s origins, as it came under attack for its early handling of the outbreak.

A nine-month Associated Press investigation of state-sponsored disinformation conducted in collaboration with the Atlantic Councils Digital Forensic Research Lab, shows how a rumor that the US created the virus that causes COVID-19 was weaponized by the Chinese government, spreading from the dark corners of the Internet to millions across the globe.

The analysis was based on a review of millions of social media postings and articles on Twitter, Facebook, VK, Weibo, WeChat, YouTube, Telegram and other platforms.

Chinese officials were reacting to a powerful narrative, nursed by QAnon groups, Fox News, former President Donald Trump and leading Republicans, that the virus was instead manufactured by China.

Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs says Beijing has used its expanding megaphone on Western social media to promote friendship and serve facts, while defending itself against hostile forces that seek to politicize the pandemic.

All parties should firmly say no to the dissemination of disinformation, the ministry said in a statement to AP, but added, In the face of trumped-up charges, it is justified and proper to bust lies and clarify rumors by setting out the facts.

The battle to control the narrative about where the virus came from has had global consequences in the fight against COVID-19.

By March, just three months after COVID-19 appeared in central China, belief that the virus had been created in a lab and possibly weaponized was widespread, multiple surveys showed.

The Pew Research Center found, for example, that one in three Americans believed the new coronavirus had been created in a lab; one in four thought it had been engineered intentionally.

In Iran, top leaders cited the bioweapon conspiracy to justify their refusal of foreign medical aid.

Anti-lockdown and anti-mask groups around the world called COVID-19 a hoax and a weapon, complicating public health efforts to slow the spread.

This is like a virus, like COVID, a media pathogen, said Kang Liu, a professor at Duke University who studies cultural politics and media in China, comparing the spread of disinformation about the virus to the spread of the virus itself.

We have a double pandemic -- the real pathological virus and the pandemic of fear. The fear is what is really at stake.

SPREADING RUMORS

On January 26, a man from Inner Mongolia posted a video claiming that the new virus ravaging central China was a biological weapon engineered by the US. It was viewed 14,000 times on the Chinese app Kuaishou before being taken down. The man was arrested, detained for 10 days and fined for spreading rumors.

Peoples Daily, the Chinese Communist Partys mouthpiece, broadcast news of his detention in early February, showing the man, face pixelated, wrists shackled, and legs caged in a chair. It was a stern reminder to the citizens of China that fake news can lead to arrest and part of a broader effort by Chinese state media to debunk COVID-19 conspiracies.

But just six weeks later the same conspiracy would be broadcast by Chinas foreign ministry, picked up by at least 30 Chinese diplomats and missions and amplified through Chinas vast, global network of state media outlets.

During those six weeks, Chinas leadership came under intense internal criticism. On February 7, Li Wenliang, a Chinese doctor punished for circulating an early warning about the outbreak, died of COVID-19.

The outpouring of grief and rage sparked by Lis death was an unusual  and for the ruling Communist Party, unsettling -- display in Chinas tightly monitored civic space.

Meanwhile, powerful voices in the US -- from former President Trump to congressional Republicans -- were working to rebrand COVID-19 as the China virus, amplifying fringe theories that it had been engineered by Chinese scientists.

Social media accounts that appeared to be pro-Trump or QAnon followers pushed the disinformation, repeatedly retweeting identical content that claimed China created the virus as a bioweapon, researchers at the Australia Institutes Centre for Responsible Technology found.

As US rhetoric intensified, China went on the offensive. On February 22, Peoples Daily ran a report highlighting speculation that the US military brought the virus to China, pushing the story globally through inserts in newspapers such as the Helsinki Times in Finland and the New Zealand Herald.

The New Zealand Herald said it has an ad hoc commercial relationship with Peoples Daily, labels their content as sponsored and reviews it before publication.

Upon further review of the story that you have referred to, we have removed this particular item from our website, a spokesman said in an email.

The Helsinki Times said it has a barter-exchange content agreement with Peoples Daily, whose content it labels but does not vet.

We believe that the western media coverage is at times extremely one-sided and biased, said Alexis Kouros, the editor of the Helsinki Times.

Even though Peoples Daily is state-owned, like the BBC, we believe it is beneficial for the global audience to have both sides of stories.

As China embraced overt disinformation, it leaned on Russian disinformation strategy and infrastructure, turning to a long-established network of Kremlin proxies in the West to seed and spread messaging.

One was amplifying the otherHow much it was command controlled, how much it was opportunistic, it was hard to tell, said Janis Sarts, director of the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, based in Riga, Latvia.

Long-term, he added, China is the more formidable competitor and adversary because of the technological capabilities they bring to the table.
Margaret Kyne Delaney sits in an observation area after receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine at an HSE centre in the Phoenix Park, Dublin. Photo: Clodagh Kilcoyne/Reuters

The next phase of the Covid-19 vaccination roll-out will give the jab to more than 70,000 people aged over 85 over the next three weeks.

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said there would be about 20,000 vaccines distributed to 84 GP practices across about 20 counties this week.

He said that next week the programme would be ramped up further, getting to another 384 practices. The balance of the practices will get their deliveries of the vaccine in the first week of March.

He said GPs had started contacting the people on their books to organise for them to come in to receive the vaccine.

This would mark an important week in the fightback against the virus, with the further roll-out of the vaccination programme to the general population, he said. The first phase had focused on long-term residential care and frontline healthcare workers.

Meanwhile, Mr Donnelly said it was too early to be able to give accurate predictions as to when the country could exit Level 5 restrictions.

It comes as figures released yesterday by the Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) showed there were 17 additional deaths reported related to Covid-19.

Read More

A total of 15 of these deaths occurred in February, while one had occurred in December. The date of the other death is still under investigation.

In addition, the HPSC was notified of 788 new confirmed cases of Covid-19.

Of the new cases, 315 were in Dublin; 61 in Galway; 59 in Meath; 42 in Louth; 33 in Kildare and the remaining cases were spread across all other counties. A total of 899 Covid-19 patients were hospitalised, of which 160 were in ICU.

The figures come as the most recent vaccination figures released last Thursday showed 261,073 doses of Covid-19 vaccine had been administered in Ireland, with 171,239 people receiving their first dose and 89,834 people their second dose.

Meanwhile, Mr Donnelly said yesterday, specifically what month different parts of the economy will be able to open up at this point is certainly difficult to say.

Speaking on RTEs This Week Radio 1 programme, the minister said: Thanks to everyone sticking with Level 5, we have got the biggest fall in Europe at the moment in our 14-day rate.

However, he said he had a briefing with Dr Ronan Glynn, the deputy chief medical officer, last Thursday and various points were raised.

Close contacts are going up again, not a lot, but they are going back up again.

The positivity rates remain high, particularly with close contacts, and the percentage of new cases coming from Dublin is rising.

We think there is more opportunity in terms of workplaces to help people just add those extra protections as well, particularly with this new variant.

So its far too early unfortunately, given all of that to be able to give accurate predictions as to when we can exit Level 5, he said.

I think what we are dealing with here is the challenge of an awful lot of uncertainty.

About seven in every 10 of the new cases, were the UK variant of the virus, which was proving to be much more aggressive, he said.
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

Osama Al Jabri, a student from Shaikh Abdullah bin Isa Industrial Secondary School for Boys, has employed robots in innovative projects that serve the community, thanks to the capabilities, skills and advanced technologies he acquired in this system.

Al Jabri said that he never regretted taking up technical and vocational education as it is a wide field in which a student can explore new and wide horizons of innovation, creativity and practical field application close to the needs of the labour market.

He indicated that his latest project was a robot designed to provide guidance and preventive services during the pandemic.

He added that the school has a great role in providing students with safety and security guidelines during the practical application and its continuous encouragement for them to innovate everything new and keep pace with the technology era.
ANN ARBOR, Mich. (Purdue Sports)  No. 11 Purdue volleyball (4-4) completed the series sweep of No. 24 Michigan (0-2) Sunday night with a four set victory (26-22, 22-25, 25-13, 25-18).

The match saw 26 tied scores throughout the course of the night, with a battle ensuing from the first set, which saw 14 knotted scores in the extra-point showdown.

As a team, not only did Purdue out-block No. 24 Michigan 15-6, but out-hit its host .349 to .197 in hitting efficiency. The Boilermakers held a

Highlighting the night was Hayley Bush, who joined elite company after notching her 3,000th career assist during the first set. Currently, the redshirt junior totals 3,034 assists and is on-track to enter the Purdue annals during the 2021 season (No. 10 in program history: 3,066 by Paula Harmon, 1991-93).

Additionally, Grace Cleveland produced a season-best 19 kills with just two errors on 30 swings for a .587 attack %, the most efficient the junior has been with at least 19 kills on the day. The Bloomington, Illinois, product also added four block assists in the victory and a stellar performance in the third set with eight kills and no errors (.889 attack %), which was key in the Boilermaker's momentum swing.

The match completed a rigorous opening four weeks of play, which the Boilermakers took on three top-25 ranked opponents over the four-week span.

Set 1 (26-24)

A battle through the entire set, Purdue and Michigan recorded 14 ties in the first set, with 10 coming within the first 20 points. In the set, the largest lead was four points by the Boilermakers (19-15 and 20-16). The Wolverines cut the Purdue lead after a 5-1 run for Michigan to knot the match 21-21. The fight ensued with ties at 22-22, 23-23 and 24-24, but Chinn blasted a kill to kick start the Purdue set win., which was sealed on a block assist by Caitlyn Newton and Taylor Trammell.

The team tallied seven of their 15 total blocks in the first set.

Set 2 (22-25)

No. 11 Purdue and No. 24 Michigan were back and forth through the first 12 combined points with five ties, however Michigan went on a 10-1 run to pull away. The Boilermakers cut the score 21-22 with a seven-point unanswered run, however the Wolverines put it away with a 3-1 run to close out the set.

Set 3 (25-13)

Cleveland put on a show to open the third set, recording five of Purdue's first seven points to take a quick 7-1 lead. The junior recorded eight kills with no errors on nine hits in the set (.889 attack %) to seal the Boilermaker set win. Bush chipped in three kills on three attempts while Chinn and Trammell went errorless in the set as well (1-0-1 and 1-0-2, respectively).

Set 4 (25-18)

Another tight-knit battle ensued between the teams, until a solo block by Bush turned the tide for Purdue (16-13, Purdue). In the set, Bush produced four kills on six attempts (.667%). Newton and Cleveland combined for five of the team's kills on their way to closing out the set, 25-18.

In total, three Boilermakers: Bush (4-0-6), Cleveland (6-0-8) and Trammell (1-0-2) went errorless in the set.

Up Next

Purdue returns home for a pair of matches against Northwestern on Friday, Feb. 19 at 6 p.m. ET on Big Ten Network Plus, and Saturday Feb. 20 at 7:30 p.m. ET on BTN.
A young woman with cerebral palsy came into camp, feet white with frostbite and hands nearly frozen. Six weeks pregnant, she had lost her wheelchair while fleeing her abuser.

A young woman with cerebral palsy came into camp, feet white with frostbite and hands nearly frozen. Six weeks pregnant, she had lost her wheelchair while fleeing her abuser.

Volunteers set to work, bringing her into the south teepee, rubbing her hands and feet to jump-start her circulation. They gave her ski pants, a blanket, a hat and scarf and fed her. Then, they arranged for a womens shelter to take her in.

"You cant help but feel good that youre saving lives, ultimately," said Eva Wilson-Fontaine, retelling the womans story. Wilson-Fontaine is a volunteer at the Community Care Camp set up outside Thunderbird House on Main Street as a bastion of warmth for the citys homeless during a dangerously cold stretch.

Since Indigenous-led organization Ashiniative erected the camp on Feb. 9, Wilson-Fontaine has volunteered every day. The warmest temperature in that time was -22 C. Sunday morning, the windchill dropped to -47. Its the coldest stretch since 1996.

Inside the camp, two teepees wrapped in white canvas towered over a bustle of people. The smell of burning wood drifted from the teepees entrances. A man whose eyebrows glistened with frost chopped wood for the fires, stacking them in piles more than a metre tall. And people lined up outside a tent, called the prospector tent, where volunteers were handing out supplies.

JOHN WOODS / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Eva Wilson-Fontaine, left, is a volunteer at the Community Care Camp set up outside Thunderbird House on Main Street as a bastion of warmth for the citys homeless during a dangerously cold stretch.

Donations of winter gear have poured in, and Wilson-Fontaine said shes also received $7,700 in monetary donations.

"Its been absolutely amazing," she said. "Its been an outpour of community love."

A crew behind her in the prospector tent scrambled to organize piles of coats, sweaters, socks, mitts, tuques, medical face masks, hygiene products and whatever else the community has dropped off or donated money to buy. One volunteer, George McLeod, was sure to mention they still need thermal underwear.

One woman, Lauren Spence, spent Saturday night in one of the teepees. She sang Mother Earth and River Song, huddled in the warmth, she said.

"I learned this before  how to beat the drum and sing songs while beating the drum," she said. "And I learned other different songs, and it feels like culture."

Another man who didnt want to give his name said the camp gave him and others a place to feel safe. Many feel uneasy in the shelters, he said. Having a place like Community Care Camp can provide a sense of security.

JOHN WOODS / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS A volunteer splits wood at the Anishinative camp at Thunderbird House

The camp received good news Saturday. The Treaty One Nation Government and The North West Company committed a combined $10,000 to the Community Care Camp.

Chief Dennis Meeches, spokesperson for Treaty One Nation, praised the volunteers working around the clock at the camp.

"Its absolutely wonderful," he said. "Were very, very appreciative of it. Were grateful that we have community-minded citizens that recognized the challenge, and theyre stepping up."

But Meeches said more needs to be done to address homelessness at its roots.

"Homelessness is a big issue for the Indigenous community," he said. "We will reach out to the city sometime very, very soon and hope we can get into a dialogue and how we may be able to help."

Wilson-Fontaine also has plans to contact Mayor Brian Bowman. Shed like to establish a storefront that could continue to distribute supplies and offer food and coffee, she said, even after Community Care Camp comes down.

When that will be, she doesnt know, but she said the camp will likely remain another two weeks, at least. And shell keep showing up, she said. Its important, said Wilson-Fontaine, to stand together as a community  to show struggling people theyre not alone. "Theyre our most vulnerable community," she said. "And they need to feel that they are cared for."

The community has risen to the challenge, she said, and the government needs to do the same.

fpcity@freepress.mb.ca

Victims of the Operation Midland scandal last night criticised the Government for appointing former Scotland Yard chief Lord Hogan-Howe to carry out an external review of a major police database blunder.

The ex-Metropolitan Police Commissioner  in charge when officers raided homes of leading Establishment figures as part of the force's disastrous VIP paedophile ring probe  was this month chosen by the Home Secretary to chair a review into a data-deletion incident.

In January, it emerged that the entire criminal records of more than 15,000 people were accidentally deleted from the Police National Computer.

Victims of the Operation Midland scandal last night criticised the Government for appointing former Scotland Yard chief Lord Hogan-Howe to carry out an external review of a major police database blunder

More than 200,000 offence details were lost, including fingerprints and DNA records, putting entire investigations at risk and creating 'huge dangers' for public safety, according to Labour politicians.

Home Secretary Priti Patel and Policing Minister Kit Malthouse have appointed Lord Hogan-Howe to conduct an external review to ensure 'lessons are learned to avoid similar incidents in the future'.

The ex-Metropolitan Police Commissioner  in charge when officers raided homes of leading Establishment figures as part of the force's disastrous VIP paedophile ring probe  was this month chosen by the Home Secretary to chair a review into a data-deletion incident. Pictured: Carl Beech who accused Establishment figures of paedophilia

A spokesman yesterday described him as 'ideally placed'. He is due to report back next month. However, the decision has astonished those caught up in the Operation Midland scandal.

Retired High Court judge Sir Richard Henriques last week called for a criminal inquiry into Scotland Yard and the police watchdog after all officers involved in the disaster were cleared of any wrongdoing.

Sir Richard was commissioned by Lord Hogan-Howe to conduct a review into Operation Midland in 2016 which identified 43 separate failings. But the Met boss announced he was standing down before the findings were made public.

He has since been elevated to the House of Lords as a cross-bench peer, and last year was appointed by Michael Gove to a non-executive directorship at the Cabinet Office.

Midland was launched following wild claims of a sadistic Westminster paedophile gang made by fantasist Carl Beech  known as 'Nick'. He was jailed for 18 years for perverting the course of justice and child sex offences in 2019. Last night former MP Harvey Proctor, who lost his job and home as a result of Operation Midland, said: 'Lord Blunder' should never have received a reward for failure by being ennobled still less should he have been appointed to work at the Home Office to attempt to undo the police blunders of losing data in its criminal records. This man is unfit to hold any public office whatsoever.'

And Lincoln Seligman, godson of former PM Edward Heath who was falsely accused by Beech, said: 'The police officers involved, whatever their degree of involvement, have walked away to higher things. Not only have they not criticised their employees for screwing up, they seem to have suffered no consequences at all and have no shame about the stupidity of the whole thing.'

Barrister Daniel Janner QC, whose late father Lord Janner was falsely accused by Beech, said: 'Given the cloud over his reputation in regards to the Met's Operation Midland investigation, now is not the time for him to be looking into blunders involving the police.'

Home Secretary Priti Patel and Policing Minister Kit Malthouse have appointed Lord Hogan-Howe to conduct an external review to ensure 'lessons are learned to avoid similar incidents in the future'

Last week, the Home Secretary refused to publicly back current Metropolitan Police Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick following criticism of her force after revelations about Operation Midland in the Daily Mail.

She was asked three times during an LBC radio interview whether she had confidence in the Scotland Yard boss, but would only say that Dame Cressida 'has done a lot of great work'. It prompted a spokesman for Miss Patel to hurriedly release a statement on her behalf insisting she had 'full confidence in her to do the job'.

The Prime Minister also backed the under-fire police chief, whose term as commissioner is due to end next year.

But Scotland Yard sources have insisted that Dame Cressida is merely 'carrying the can' for mistakes made under her predecessor, Lord Hogan-Howe.

Last week, Lady Brittan, widow of former home secretary Leon, whose homes were raided during the probe, condemned a 'culture of cover-up' at the Met.

Last night a Home Office spokesman said of Lord Hogan-Howe: 'His wealth of experience, including as Commissioner of the London Metropolitan Police, HM Inspector of Constabulary and Chief Constable of Merseyside Police, means he is ideally placed to conduct this review.'

Bendable concrete created at the University of Michigan allows for thinner structures with less need for steel reinforcement. Credit: Joseph Xu/University of Michigan College of Engineering

One of the big contributors to climate change is right beneath your feet, and transforming it could be a powerful solution for keeping greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere.

The production of cement, the binding element in concrete, accounted for 7% of total global carbon dioxide emissions in 2018. Concrete is one of the most-used resources on Earth, with an estimated 26 billion tons produced annually worldwide. That production isn't expected to slow down for at least two more decades.

Given the scale of the industry and its greenhouse gas emissions, technologies that can reinvent concrete could have profound impacts on climate change.

As engineers working on issues involving infrastructure and construction, we have been designing the next generation of concrete technology that can reduce infrastructure's carbon footprint and increase durability. That includes CO 2 -infused concrete that locks up the greenhouse gas and can be stronger and even bendable.

The industry is ripe for dramatic change, particularly with the Biden administration promising to invest big in infrastructure projects and cut U.S. emissions at the same time. However, to put CO 2 to work in concrete on a wide scale in a way that drastically cuts emissions, all of its related emissions must be taken into account.

Rethinking concrete

Concrete is made up of aggregate materialsprimarily rocks and sandalong with cement and water.

Because about 80% of concrete's carbon footprint comes from cement, researchers have been working to find substitute materials.

Carbon dioxide can make up a significant percentage of concrete mass. Credit: Lucca Henrion/University of Michigan, CC BY-ND

Industrial byproducts such as iron slag and coal fly ash are now frequently used to reduce the amount of cement needed. The resulting concrete can have significantly lower emissions because of that change. Alternative binders, such as limestone calcined clay, can also reduce cement use. One study found that using limestone and calcinated clay could reduce emissions by at least 20% while also cutting production costs.

Apart from developing blended cements, researchers and companies are focusing on ways to use captured CO 2 as an ingredient in the concrete itself, locking it away and preventing it from entering the atmosphere. CO 2 can be added in the form of aggregatesor injected during mixing. Carbonation curing, also known as CO 2 curing, can also be used after concrete has been cast.

These processes turn CO 2 from a gas to a mineral, creating solid carbonates that may also improve the strength of concrete. That means structures may need less cement, reducing the amount of related emissions. Companies such as CarbonCure and Solidia have developed technologies to use these processes for concrete poured at construction sites and in precast concrete, such as cinder blocks and other construction materials.

At the University of Michigan, we are working on composites that produce a bendable concrete material that allows thinner, less brittle structures that require less steel reinforcement, further reducing related carbon emissions. The material can be engineered to maximize the amount of CO 2 it can store by using smaller particles that readily react with CO 2 , turning it to mineral.

The CO 2 -based bendable concrete can be used for general buildings, water and energy infrastructure, as well as transportation infrastructure. Bendable concrete was used in the 61-story Kitahama tower in Osaka, Japan, and roadway bridge slabs in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

The challenge of lifecycle emissions

These cutting-edge technologies can start addressing concrete infrastructure's carbon footprint, but barriers still exist.

In a study published Feb. 8, three of us looked at the lifecycle emissions from infusing CO 2 into concrete and found that estimates did not always account for emissions from CO 2 capture, transportation and use. With colleagues, we came up with strategies for ensuring that carbon curing has a strong emissions benefit.

A lot of North American infrastructure is in a state of disrepair. Credit: Achim Herring/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

Overall, we recommend developing a standard CO 2 curing protocol. Lab experiments show that CO 2 curing can improve concrete's strength and durability, but results vary with specific curing procedures and concrete mixes. Research can improve the conditions and the timing of steps in the curing process to increase concrete's performance. Electricity usethe largest emissions source during curingcan also be reduced by streamlining the process and possibly by using waste heat.

Advanced concrete mixes, bendable concrete in particular, already begin to address these issues by increasing durability.

Merging infrastructure and climate policy

In 2020, a wide range of companies announced steps to reduce their emissions. However, government investment and procurement policies are still needed to transform the construction industry.

Local governments are taking the first steps. "Low embodied carbon concrete" rules and projects to reduce the amount of cement in concrete have cropped up around the country, including in Marin County, California; Hastings-on-Hudson, New York; and a sidewalk pilot in Portland, Oregon.

In New York and New Jersey, lawmakers have proposed state-level policies that would provide price discounts in the bidding process to proposals with the lowest emissions from concrete. These policies could serve as a blueprint for reducing carbon emissions from concrete production and other building materials.

Nationally, the crumbling of federally managed infrastructure has been a steadily growing crisis. The Biden administration could start to address those problems, as well as climate change, and create jobs through a strategic infrastructure program.

Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg recently declared that there were "enormous opportunities for job creation, equity and climate achievement when it comes to advancing America's infrastructure." Policies that elevate low-carbon concrete to a nationwide climate solution could follow.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Screenshot/Twitter

Hey, have yall heard? Its very cold in Texas right now. And in many areas its only going to get colder.

On Saturday Governor Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for all 254 counties in the state. And the freezing temps are seemingly all everyone on Twitter can talk aboutand maybe rightfully so.
The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Guatemala City, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :Guatemala police have arrested a suspected drug-trafficker wanted by the United States, the public prosecutor's office said on Monday.

Maynor Salazar, 44, is the seventh such suspected drug-trafficker captured in the Central American country this year.

He was detained during an operation in the eastern Chiquimula department, close to the border with Honduras, public ministry spokesman Juan Luis Pantaleon said.

A state court in Texas has submitted an extradition request for Salazar, known as "El 7", accusing him of being the head of a group bringing heroin into the US.

"An investigation ... identified a drug-trafficking organization operating throughout South, Central and North America," Pantaleon said.

"The organization uses a sophisticated infrastructure to manufacture, acquire, store, transport and distribute several hundred kilograms of heroin destined for the United States." Anti-narcotics forces also detained three more Guatemalans suspected of trafficking cocaine, between Friday and Saturday.

They now have seven people in detention wanted by the US.

According to Guatemalan authorities, large international drug cartels use Central America and local drug dealers there to help transport illegal narcotics and launder money, something which results in an increase in violent crime in the region.
US Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell leaves the Capitol in Washington after the third day of senate impeachment hearings against former US President Donald Trump. Photo: Reuters

The words spoken on the Senate floor over the past few days were almost innumerable. But the ones that stayed with me through the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump were among the very first ones uttered. Democracy needs a ground to stand upon  and that ground is the truth, House impeachment lead manager Jamie Raskin said in his opening statement, quoting his father, the political activist Marcus Raskin.

This Senate trial would not be a contest among lawyers, or between political parties, said the Maryland Democrat, who led the prosecuting team trying to make the case that Trump had incited the January 6 attack on the Capitol. No, the trial would be, and should be, a moment of truth for America.

As it turned out, truth was perfectly well served in the trial, at least on one side. Raskin and the other House managers made an irrefutable case. It was so irrefutable that even the former presidents greatest enabler, Mitch McConnell, admitted what the facts were: that Trump was practically and morally responsible for the insurrection. But the truth wasnt enough.

It should be no surprise. After all, one of the hallmarks of the Trump administration was the lying. From Day Ones alternative facts about the size of the 2017 inaugural crowd, Trumpian falsehoods became nothing short of routine. They were generously ladled out by a president, his spokespeople and his administration  and then repeated and amplified by his many helpers in the Maga mediasphere, led by those at Fox News.

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This culminated in the big lie that undergirded the insurrection: That the election was rigged  stolen, in fact. And that something had to be done about it. It was this pervasive culture of lying that made it politically untenable for so many Republican senators, in the end, to vote their underdeveloped consciences.

For if they voted to convict, their constituents  far from giving them credit for doing their duty  would turn on them. Perhaps viciously. Perhaps violently. And with the incitement, no doubt, of the twice-impeached president.

Days before the verdict, Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley said Trump would be acquitted on a technicality, what he called an easy gate out: the misbegotten notion that its unconstitutional to hold an impeachment trial after a president has left office.

Why did so many of my colleagues need this easy escape hatch? he asked. They needed it because their base has been listening to what President Trump called Trump media ... 

Merkley aptly described a media bubble of far-right radio talk shows, cable TV and social media feeds.

So disconnected from reality that when reality manages to intrude  in the form of undeniable facts, timelines, videos and presidential tweets  theres nothing to do but deny it as outrageous and either look for an escape hatch or go on the attack.

That happened in the trial itself, as Trumps defence lawyers channelled him with repeated false claims, including that President Joe Biden never condemned the violence that accompanied some of the racial protests last summer.

And then there was this whopper offered by defense lawyer Michael van der Veen, who said the insurrection was premeditated by fringe left and right groups.

Where does this all leave us? Im hopeful enough to think that the sheer amount of truth that was hammered home over the days of the trial will matter.

Im optimistic enough to wonder whether McConnells post-trial statements, self-serving and hypocritical as they were, might sink in with some Americans.

And Im still idealistic enough to think that the courage of the seven Republican senators who did overcome partisanship to vote their consciences could make a difference.

Maybe, even though the truth didnt prevail, some of it managed to see the light of day. Enough, perhaps, to give Americas democracy some ground to stand on.
Rupani was addressing his third political rally on Sunday ahead of the elections to six Gujarat municipal corporations scheduled to be held on 21 February

Vadodara: Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani fainted on stage on Sunday while addressing a rally for upcoming civic polls in Nizampura area of Vadodara, following which he was flown to Ahmedabad and admitted in a hospital, BJP leaders said.

Rupani, 64, was given first aid on the stage after he collapsed. He was later seen descending the stairs of the stage on his own. He was then flown in a helicopter from Vadodara to Ahmedabad and admitted in UN Mehta Hospital. No medical bulletin was issued by the hospital till late night.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi enquired about Rupani's health over phone, said a statement issued by the Chief Minister's Office. Modi told Rupani to get himself thoroughly checked and to take proper rest, it said.

This was Rupani's third political rally during the day in Vadodara. "Rupani fainted on stage and I gave him a primary medical treatment. He was fine and walked back to his car from the stage," said Vadodara city BJP president Dr Vijay Shah, who was present on the dais at the time of the incident.

BJP leader Bharat Danger told reporters that the CM collapsed while addressing the public meeting in Nizampura area. "Rupani's security guards caught hold of him when he fell. He was given first aid and was taken to the airport (from where he flew to Ahmedabad)," he said.

"Rupani was unwell for the last two days, but instead of cancelling his public meetings held in Jamnagar on Saturday and in Vadodara on Sunday, he preferred to continue," Danger said.

Elections to six municipal corporations including Vadodara will be held on 21 February while those for municipalities, districts and taluka panchayats will be held on 28 February.
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. - President Biden announced the members of the Biden-Harris COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force and there's a Minnesotan on the committee.

Mary Turner is the president of the Minnesota Nurses Association and also serves on the National Nurses United committee. She works in the ICU COVID-19 unit at North Memorial Hospital saving patients and getting a first hand experience of what this virus is doing. Turner is the only registered nurse to advise the White House on how to make sure every single person has access to proper COVID-19 resources.

Turner received a letter saying she had been personally nominated by President Joe Biden. She's hopeful she can bring a different perspective to the White House's response to COVID-19. "I wanna do the best job that I can and that means using all the resources that I can," explained Turner. "So that when I do start partaking in this task force that I've got questions and solutions and opinions. So I'm really looking forward to it."

Turner explained she's asking other nurses some questions, checking in with hospitals and meeting with the Minnesota Department of Health to start preparing. She wants to go to the White House and be a voice for nurses across the nation and make sure their patients are taken care of. "I see first hand these disparities that they're talking about. I see the overwhelming amounts of patients that are people of color," she said. "I see that our resources need to be dulled out equitably."

Turner isn't sure when her duties will officially start at the White House, but she said the first thing she's going to focus on is getting as many people vaccinated as soon as possible.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The global ophthalmic drugs market size is expected to reach USD 60.3 billion by 2028, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc. The market is expected to expand at a CAGR of 6.4% from 2021 to 2028. An increase in the prevalence of eye-related disorders, such as presbyopia, macular degeneration, and diabetic retinopathy, is one of the major drivers of the market. According to the American Academy of Ophthalmology, over 2.71 million people in the U.S. were affected by Primary Open-angle Glaucoma (POAG) in 2011, and the number is estimated to reach 7.3 million by 2050.

Key suggestions from the report:

In 2020, anti-VEGF agents dominated the market owing to high preference by ophthalmologists, enhanced tissue penetration, and rapid responsive rates

Retinal disorders was the fastest-growing disease segment in 2020 owing to an increase in the prevalence of age-related macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy, technological advancements, and rising strategic collaborations

The topical route of administration dominated the market in 2020 due to the high patient compliance, non-invasiveness, and self-administrability

The eye drops segment is estimated to witness the fastest growth over the forecast period due to impending launches of several ophthalmic solutions and suspensions in the near future and its direct drug delivery mechanism

North America dominated the market and accounted for the largest revenue share in 2020 owing to the rising consumer awareness, high disease burden, technological advancements, and proactive government measures

Read 307 page research report with ToC on "Ophthalmic Drugs Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report By Disease (Dry Eye, Eye Allergy, Glaucoma, Eye Infection), By Drug Class, By Dosage Form, By Route Of Administration, By Product Type, By Region, And Segment Forecasts, 2021 - 2028" at: https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/ophthalmic-therapeutics-drug-market

Moreover, due to COVID-19, it has become increasingly unsafe for individuals to touch their face several times a day, which is a known cause of transmission. Therefore, companies are developing long-acting, hands-free therapies to combat such challenges. For instance, in April 2020, Ocular Therapeutix, Inc. completed Phase III clinical trial to evaluate the safety and efficacy of DEXTENZA for allergic conjunctivitis. It is a hands-free therapy administered in the office setting as an intracanalicular insert. It is bioresorbable and designed to release the corticosteroid dexamethasone to the ocular surface, lasting 30 days. It is a one-time and long-acting therapy that can be useful during the COVID-19 crisis.

Investors are increasingly funding companies to support the clinical development of novel treatments for eye diseases thereby fueling the market growth. For instance, in February 2019, Oyster Point Pharma, Inc. received USD 93 million series B financing from Invus Opportunities, Flying L Partners, New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Versant Ventures, and Vida Ventures. The company's product candidates include OC-01 and OC-02 in a Phase 2b clinical trial.

In addition, increasing development and approval of new laboratory methods is expected to boost the market growth. For instance, in July 2020, Quest Diagnostics received emergency Use Authorization (EUA) from the U.S. FDA for a laboratory technique that was developed for extracting viral RNA. This new technique was designed to expand the testing capacity of COVID-19 molecular tests.

Furthermore, key players in the market undertake various strategies to strengthen their product portfolios and offer diverse, technologically advanced, and innovative products. For instance, in September 2019, Alcon introduced iLUX Patient Care Kits to support practices in treating people with dry eyes in the U.S.

Grand View Research has segmented the global ophthalmic drugs market on the basis of drug class, disease, dosage form, route of administration, product type, and region:

Ophthalmic Drugs Class Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Antiallergy



Anti-VEGF Agents



Anti-inflammatory



Nonsteroidal Drugs





Steroidal Drugs



Antiglaucoma



Others

Ophthalmic Drugs Disease Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Dry Eye



Eye Allergy



Glaucoma



Eye Infection



Retinal Disorders



Macular Degeneration





Diabetic Retinopathy



Others



Uveitis



Others

Ophthalmic Drugs Dosage Form Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Gels



Eye Solutions



Capsules & Tablets



Eye Drops



Ointments

Ophthalmic Drugs Route of Administration Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Topical



Local Ocular



Subconjunctival





Intravitreal





Retrobulbar





Intracameral



Systemic

Ophthalmic Drugs Product Type Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Prescription Drugs



OTC Drugs

Ophthalmic Drugs Regional Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

North America



U.S.





Canada



Europe



U.K.





Germany





France





Italy





Spain





Russia



Asia Pacific



Japan





China





India





Australia





South Korea





Singapore



Latin America



Brazil





Mexico





Argentina



Middle East & Africa



South Africa





UAE





Saudi Arabia

List of Key Players of Ophthalmic Drugs Market

Alcon

Johnson & Johnson Services, Inc.

Bausch Health

Allergan

Pfizer, Inc.

Bayer AG

Santen Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd.

Genentech, Inc.

Novartis AG

Regeneron

Merck & Co.

Coherus Biosciences, Inc.

Find more research reports on Pharmaceuticals Industry, by Grand View Research:

Retinal Disorder Treatment Market  The global retinal disorder treatment market size was valued at USD 8.8 billion in 2018 and is expected to register a CAGR of 7.6% over the forecast period.

The global retinal disorder treatment market size was valued at in 2018 and is expected to register a CAGR of 7.6% over the forecast period. High Potency Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients Market  The global high potency active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) market was valued at USD 14.4 billion in 2016 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 10.3% over the forecast period.

The global high potency active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) market was valued at in 2016 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 10.3% over the forecast period. Eye Health Supplements Market  The global eye health supplements market size was valued at USD 1.5 billion in 2019 and is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.1% from 2020 to 2027.

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About Grand View Research

Grand View Research, U.S.-based market research and consulting company, provides syndicated as well as customized research reports and consulting services. Registered in California and headquartered in San Francisco, the company comprises over 425 analysts and consultants, adding more than 1200 market research reports to its vast database each year. These reports offer in-depth analysis on 46 industries across 25 major countries worldwide. With the help of an interactive market intelligence platform, Grand View Research helps Fortune 500 companies and renowned academic institutes understand the global and regional business environment and gauge the opportunities that lie ahead.

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IDLIB, Syria  The United Nations' special envoy to Syria, Geir Pedersen, called the fifth round of talks by the Syrian Constitutional Committee in Geneva a disappointment Jan. 29.

I told the 45 members of the drafting body that we cant continue like this, that the week has been a disappointment. I set out a few things I thought we should be able to achieve before we started this meeting, and I am afraid we did not manage to achieve these things. I believe the reason for that is that there has not been a proper understanding on how we are going to make progress in the committee, Pederson said.

I will, of course, also have that discussion with the SNC [the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces], and as I already had this week, I will also be meeting, of course, with the Russians, with the Turks, with Iranians, with Arab friends and of course also Europeans, and hopefully also with the new US administration, he added, expressing hope it will be possible for him to go to Damascus in the not too distant future.

Pederson briefed the UN Security Council on the deliberations on Feb. 9, saying that the regime delegation had rejected his recommendations. He also informed the Security Council that he will attend the upcoming Astana talks in Sochi on Feb. 16.

The Syrian Constitutional Committee, formed in 2019, is made up of 150 members, including 50 figures from the Syrian regime and 50 from the the Syrian oppositions negotiating body, Syrian Negotiations Commission (NSC), in addition to representatives of civil society. From this committee, the UN selected a smaller committee of 45 to draft the document.

After the meeting in Geneva, Nasr al-Hariri, the head of the NSC, said in a virtual press conference in Geneva Feb. 3 that to the regime, the political process is merely a way to play for time until it retakes control through bloody military operations against civilians.

Yasser al-Farhan, a member of the NSC's political body, told Al-Monitor, Three reasons have been behind the faltering negotiation rounds, adding that they affect all negotiations involving Syria.

First, the regime follows a single strategy based on obstruction and stalling. It does not believe in a political solution and relies solely on military action by committing further crimes against humanity to remain in power in Syria, he said.

Second, Russia is fully backing the regime militarily on the ground, participating in its aggression against the Syrian people, and politically in the UN Security Council by using its right to veto. On the negotiating table, Russia is not playing the role of a neutral mediator despite its efforts to appear so in international meetings, Farhan continued.

Third, friendly countries do not appear serious in pressuring the regime to stick to the political process and Russia to end its bias toward [President] Bashar al-Assad and respect international resolutions, Farhan argued.

He added that the opposition has dealt seriously with the UN and the international parties, trying to make progress in the political process. The opposition is now calling upon the international mediator, Mr. Pederson, to name the party that is responsible for the failure of the talks before the Security Council and the secretary-general. It also calls upon the Security Council and the member states to take practical measures to ensure the political transition as per the Geneva Communique and Security Council Resolutions 2254, 2118 and 2254, as well as General Assembly Resolution 67/262.

Farhan called on the UN to pay more attention to the humanitarian issues to release the detainees, and hold those involved accountable. He also called for another round of negotiations with a clear agenda of forming a transitional government body with full executive powers, including those of the presidency and the government, to oversee the missions of the security forces.

Mohammed al-Sarmini, a Turkey-based researcher at the Jusoor Center for Studies and Development, told Al-Monitor, There is no international will to find a definitive solution for the Syrian issue.

He went on, Two factors are at play here. First, there is a conflict of interest at the regional and international levels, without any real compromises between the stakeholders that are involved in the Syrian quagmire. Another reason for the lack of international will to find solutions is the fact that it is in the interest of [stakeholder] countries to undermine the local players and play for time to dismantle the regimes security and military structure, while also weakening other factions and organizations.

Sarmini continued, At the same time, there should have remained a political process for the Syrian opposition to try to force the regime to deal with it, if only superficially. But nothing can be achieved through this political process if there is no international agreement to find definitive solutions.

He concluded, From the Geneva talks in the spring of 2017 until now, the Syrian opposition has fully abided by all the UN conditions, as it believes that any reluctance on its part could prompt the UN to make major changes to the oppositions structure and replacing certain figures or groups. The opposition is trying to convey a message that it is participating in the talks, despite being well aware that the result is a foregone conclusion, because of the regime's constant obstructionism. The opposition also seeks to keep the Syrian issue under the international spotlight.

Sarmini believes that the international community must draw a map of Syria in line with the political and economic interests of all the regional and international stakeholders.

True negotiations should take place between the stakeholders concerned and involved in the Syrian issues and include the most basic constitutional items such as the form of governance and the distribution of power, he said.
In his latest policy change since assuming office, Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams has withdrawn a dozen of his predecessor's bids to maintain life without parole sentences on people convicted long ago as juveniles.

Former DA Leon Cannizzaro sought to keep juvenile lifers behind bars at one of the states highest rates after a 2016 U.S. Supreme Court decision put their sentences in doubt.

But in 12 cases since Williams took office Jan. 11, prosecutors told judges they no longer wish to reimpose life without parole sentences. Instead, those defendants should be allowed to eventually make their case to the Louisiana Parole Board.

In one case Williams went even further. Clifford Braud, who was 15 years old when an accomplice shot and killed a 9th Ward convenience store clerk in 1982, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and left prison this week under an agreement with the office. A jailer had described Braud as a model ward.

The new attitude from the DAs office risks angering some victims families, and at least one judge has pushed back. A top official said Williams handling of the cases is in line with state law and his pledge to treat juveniles as juveniles.

Many juvenile lifers from New Orleans area get shot at parole  but not without a fight Kevin Jordan was just a few months over 17 when he leaned out a car window with a revolver and killed a 12-year-old boy who was tinkering with

In addition to all of the factors set out in court decisions and the legislation, as a guiding principle we believe that each of these, are our children, each is our communitys children, Ben Cohen, the offices appeals chief, said in a statement. And to the extent they have committed serious, aggravated, horrible crimes, we also assess the places where we as a community have failed to serve these children; we look at how they have grown, their prison record, what (the state Department of Public Safety & Corrections) says about each person.

Life without parole sentences for children were once common in Louisiana. State courts doled out at least 300 by the time of a pair of related U.S. Supreme Court decisions in 2012 and 2016.

Drawing on developments in brain science, the high court said that because children still had the capacity to change, courts had to determine whether juveniles were truly the worst of the worst before prohibiting parole eligibility.

The 2012 decision addressed cases going forward. The 2016 decision, Montgomery v. Louisiana, centered on sentences that had long since been imposed. The latter decision set up a dilemma for Louisiana, which now had to develop a scheme to decide which of the roughly 300 juvenile lifers in prison would get a shot at freedom.

Jason Williams says office won't oppose parole bids as new DA launches reform agenda Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams began to unfurl his reform agenda this week in a directive related to parole decisions that ma

The Louisiana Legislature decided to leave it up to district attorneys and judges. Prosecutors were granted the power to again seek life without parole sentences from district courts. If they didnt file a notice to do so, however, juvenile lifers would be granted parole eligibility after serving 25 years and meeting education requirements. Eligibility was only that. The Parole Board can still deny release.

Cannizzaro said he would have preferred that the decision be left solely to the Parole Board, but he filed notices to seek life without parole sentences at one of the states high rates. His prosecutors filed those notices against 47% of Orleans Parishs 64 juvenile lifers in 2017.

Critics accused him of ignoring the Supreme Courts admonition that life without parole sentences should be reserved for all but the rarest of juvenile offenders, those whose crimes reflect permanent incorrigibility.

However, Cannizzaro said he was listening to victims families. He also worried opposition to release at the Parole Board stage would be diluted if he didnt challenge parole eligibility upfront, he said.

+5 Ronald Gasser can't be retried on murder charge in Joe McKnight killing, judge rules A Jefferson Parish judge ruled Wednesday that the state cannot prosecute Ronald Gasser again for second-degree murder when he is retried in th

Many of the juvenile lifers cases have since been bogged down in political and legal quicksand. Amid a debate over how to pay for their legal defense teams, only a handful of cases from Orleans Parish received full hearings in Criminal District Court.

Attorneys at the Louisiana Center for Childrens Rights were assigned to represent many of the juvenile lifers under a state contract. This fall, they began filing motions asking judges to declare their clients parole eligible, without conducting a full-fledged hearing.

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

Williams took office on Jan. 11 and quickly began pulling some of Cannizzaros motions to re-impose life sentences. Throughout the campaign, Williams promised to take a more restorative approach to juvenile justice and not to seek life sentences for juveniles.

Williams office has pulled the motions from Cannizzaros era in 12 of 26 cases, it says. In a written response to questions, Cohen seemed to leave room for the office to keep some in place.

In deciding whether to withdraw notice in cases, we are reviewing each case individually, with care and attention to the factors set out in Montgomery v. Louisiana, Cohen said. Consistent with the campaign commitment, the office will not initiate or pursue life without parole in any case whether it is an old re-trial or prospectively.

One beneficiary of the course change is Kevin Jordan, now 42. He was convicted of first-degree murder for a drive-by shooting that left a 12-year-old boy dead on a Mid-City street in 1996. The bullet was meant for someone else, according to trial testimony.

Jordan was 17 at the time, and his pro bono lawyer, Kirk Gasperecz, said that a psychologist who examined him found that he suffered from an anxiety-related disorder due to living through a traumatic event before the shooting.

Jordan is pleased but mindful that he has to face the Parole Board, Gasperecz said. He wants the ability to show that he can change, Gasperecz said.

Clifford Braud skipped past the Parole Board. Now 53, Braud has spent the vast majority of his life in Angola as a result of his second-degree murder conviction for the robbery of a St. Claude Avenue grocery that led to the death of its owner, Berardo Valdivia.

Braud didnt fire the fatal shot. Another teen did that. But under Louisiana law, it didnt matter. He received the mandatory life without parole sentence. On Tuesday, Braud appeared via video link, wearing a white shirt and glasses, for the hearing that set him free.

Under Cannizzaro, Brauds attorneys had girded for a full-blown fight with prosecutors. They filed a motion quoting Brauds warden, who described him as a model prisoner who was just the guy they were talking about in the Supreme Court decisions giving a second chance to juvenile lifers. The lawyers said it made no sense to call him the worst of the worst when he hadnt fired the fatal shot.

Braud is intellectually disabled, according to his lawyers, which might have made it more difficult for him to complete the education requirements to go before the Parole Board.

Under Brauds agreement with prosecutors, he pleaded guilty to manslaughter, aggravated battery and false imprisonment. He received a sentence of 40 years and left prison later in the week. Valdivias relatives didnt raise objections, according to Emily Maw, the chief of the DAs civil rights division.

+2 After 55 years in prison, Baton Rouge man key to Supreme Court ruling again denied freedom Henry Montgomery's victory at the U.S. Supreme Court in 2016 created a way for hundreds of prisoners like him  those convicted of horrific cr

While Williams is removing many of Cannizzaros bids to resentence juvenile lifers to life without parole, a Criminal District Court judge pumped the brakes in one case.

Chief Judge Karen Herman allowed Williams office to remove notices for Jordan and another defendant, but on Jan. 28 she denied the states request to withdraw its motion to seek a life without parole sentence for Scott Lingle, who was convicted in the 1982 killing of a live-in housekeeper in Gentilly.

The nature of the crime  Janet McLeod was stabbed more than 50 times  prompted the original prosecutors on the case to reach out to Cannizzaro to oppose parole eligibility. Lingles attorney told Herman she will appeal to the state 4th Circuit Court.

Cohen, in his statement, acknowledged that some victims families wont be pleased with the new DA's position. He said Williams is following the law on juvenile lifers, however.

That legislation and caselaw makes clear that life without parole is only permissible for the worst of the very worst offenders, who have committed the worst offenses, Cohen said. The Parole Board will listen and take into account the views of family members of victims. We will seek to identify services and support for communities who suffer violence.

Story updated on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021.

A car fell from the Glenn L. Jackson Memorial Bridge and into the Columbia River Sunday night, prompting a search effort by the Multnomah County Sheriffs Office Marine Patrol Unit.

Portland police received a report about 5:48 p.m. that a vehicle traveling south on Interstate 205 may have gone over the guardrail of the bridge, which connects Oregon and Washington over the Columbia River.

Multnomah County Sheriffs Office spokesperson Sgt. Brandon Pedro said the marine unit was dispatched to the bridges midspan.

Portland police said it appears the vehicle lost control and went over the guardrail between the Oregon-Washington border and Government Island, based on physical evidence and witness statements.

The frigid weather and snowfall that blanketed the Portland area led Oregon Department of Transportation officials to urge motorists to stay home Sunday. Agency officials advised motorists to monitor TripCheck before chancing icy roads.

The National Weather Service forecasts freezing rain across the Portland area overnight.

--Eder Campuzano | 503-221-4344 | @edercampuzano | Eder on Facebook

A look at some of the major movers in London on Monday

( ) soared 55% to 21.25p, prompting the company to put out a statement about the share price movement.

The developer of novel immunotherapies for the treatment of cancer and infectious disease noted the recent press coverage and the share price increase and referred shareholders to its interim results statement of January 29, where it gave a full update on the COVIDITY program and the goal of starting a Phase 1 clinical trial, to determine the safety and immune responses to the vaccine, as soon as possible during 2021.

READ Scancell Hlds  Interim Results

Subject to the result of the Phase 1 clinical trial future studies would be undertaken to establish efficacy, Scancell told shareholders.

UK company Scancell developing vaccine to fight COVID-19 variants https://t.co/lSivwbagwg pic.twitter.com/RMXVfSgxf9  New York Post (@nypost) February 14, 2021

2.30pm: Bluejay Mining flying high after provisional funding offer for the Dundas Ilmenite Project

Bluejay Mining PLC ( ) jumped 23% to 11.3p after its subsidiary, Dundas Titanium, received an offer of debt financing.

Dundas Titanium A/S has received a letter of interest from the Export-Import Bank of the United States for a provisional sum of around US$208mln in debt funding for the capital requirements of the Dundas Ilmenite Project.

Any potential debt financing would be eligible for a maximum repayment term of 8 years 6 months, Bluejay said.

1.35pm: Primorus slumps after quarterly update

PLC ( ) shares lost a tenth of their value at 4.05p after its quarterly investor update.

The decline meant the investment companys market capitalisation was 6.3mln, compared to the value of its cash and listed investments, which has been put at 4.8mln.

The new management said it would be abandoning regular quarterly updates as it does not feel its investments are particularly liquid and therefore subject to much volatility.

12.40pm: IDE lower after non-exec quits

Holdings PLC ( ) fell 5.3% to 1.8p after non-executive director, Sebastian White, quit with immediate effect.

The board intends to recruit a replacement non-executive director in due course.

11.45am: Mining, Minerals & Metals taking its time over its first acquisition

( ) slumped 22% to 9.5p after chairman Matthew Bonner quit the cash shell.

Another non-executive director, Andrew Monk, has also moved on but the company has added Johnny Smith, the chief executive of Sumner Group Mining, to its board.

The company has noted speculation about whether a reverse takeover transaction is being progressed and revealed there is not currently any specific acquisition in progress.

10.50am: Ebiquity on the comeback trail

( ) climbed 9.1% to 20.9p after it said it returned to profitability in the second half of last year.

The marketing and media consultancy said it still expects to make a full-year operating loss, albeit a modest one.

The group's net debt of 7.7mln at the end of 2020 was in line with expectations.

9.55am: MGC Pharmaceuticals expands its brain cancer research programme

MGC Pharmaceuticals Limited ( ) was 15% higher at 4.45p after it announced an expansion of its Glioblastoma research programme.

Its ongoing pre-clinical research programme into the use of cannabinoids in the treatment of aggressive glioblastoma brain cancer has been expanded to explore the use of nanotechnology concerning the most effective treatment delivery systems.

The delivery system is similar to the nanoparticle delivery system being used successfully in MGC Pharmas ArtemiC clinical trial into the treatment of COVID-19.

9.00am: soars as it enlists services of entrepreneur Michael Edelson

PLC ( ), which floated at the end of 2020, soared 69% to 1.65p after it appointed Michael Edelson as a senior business adviser.

The company, which is seeking to transform the way things are done within the petroleum industry with the implementation of block-chain technology, said Edelson has helped to float more than 20 companies during his career, one of which was ASOS.

The company will be drawing upon Edelson's extensive experience and connections to help it source investment opportunities and develop business partnerships.

Oilex Limited ( ) jumped 29% to 0.1225p after it said it is close to resolving its dispute with the Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC).

Oilex and GSPC are in advanced discussions where it is proposed that Oilex will acquire GSPC's 55% participating interest in the Cambay production sharing contract.

Oilex added it is in advanced discussions with third parties to provide finance, including working capital, to Oilex should a sale be agreed.

Proactive news headlines

( ) said dosing has commenced with its inhaled interferon beta product as part of a US Government-funded phase II/III coronavirus clinical trial.

Learning Technologies Group PLC ( ) announced it has agreed to acquire learning and talent development software provider Bridge for US$50mln (36mln) using existing cash resources.

Sativa Wellness Group Inc ( ) said it has submitted its novel food application for validation to the UKs Food Standards Agency (FSA) ahead of the March 31 deadline as part of what it said is a commitment to continually deliver the highest level of regulatory compliance and product quality.

( ) told investors that it is confident its careful approach to distribution would ultimately lead to better sell-through rates as it provided an update on the progress of its rollout of CBD products on both sides of the Atlantic.

( ) said it will launch its novel payments and loyalty solution powered by Open Banking in the second quarter of 2021, which it said will provide merchants with an alternative to rising card interchange fees" and boost loyalty amongst consumers.

( ) has signed non-binding heads of terms with mass spectrometer maker Microsaic Systems to enter a multi-year framework services agreement through which DeepVerge which be appointed as a non-exclusive agent to promote the latters technologies.

Limited ( ) said its tidal turbine and generation equipment has been successfully installed in the Goto Island chain in Japan.

Group PLC ( ) has acquired the remaining 16.7% of Pax World Management LLC that it did not already own.

( ) has agreed a new offtake agreement for tin concentrate from the Uis mine in Namibia with its existing trading partner, Thailand Smelting and Refining Corporation (Thaisarco), as well as signing an inaugural offtake agreement with AfriMet Resources AG for its future tantalum production.

s ( )(USOTC: SMCDY) 100%-owned subsidiary Cornwall Resources Limited has been notified that the 'Deep Digital Cornwall' project led by the University of Exeter's Camborne School of Mines, in which Cornwall Resources and are delivery partners, has been awarded funding by the European Regional Development Fund. Strategic Minerals Redmoor exploration licence area will be used as a field laboratory for collection of geochemical and geophysical data, which will also provide information relevant to a number of new prospects.

( ) has completed an initial soil sampling programme on its Jundee East gold project in the Eastern Goldfields region of Western Australia and has now commenced ground-based gravity surveying over key target areas.

( ) told investors that the ASH-3 production well at the Abu Sennan project, in Egypt, will begin initial testing in the coming days.

Holdings PLC ( ) achieved a sixfold increase in revenue in the six months to the end of November as it continued to establish partnerships with leading pharmaceutical and biotech companies in the key areas of oncology, autoimmune diseases and infectious diseases.

APQ Global Limited ( ) noted that, as at the close of business on January 31, 2021, its unaudited book value was 36.69 US cents (26.72p) per share.

( ) announced that it has received notification to exercise warrants over a total of 10,000,000 new ordinary shares at a price of 0.15 pence per share. The exercise of the warrants will add A$27,000 of funds to Mosman's existing cash reserves.

CentralNic Group PLC ( ) notified that its preliminary unaudited results for the 2020 calendar year will be on March 1, with the audited annual report and accounts published towards the end of April.

( ) has posted a circular to shareholders in respect of its firm placing, directors' subscription and open offer to raise up to 13mln.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 14:39:36|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- China's top procuratorate has pledged intensified crackdowns on crimes related to COVID-19 vaccines, following the emergence of cases including sales of counterfeit vaccines.

As of Wednesday, procuratorial organs across the country have approved the arrests of 70 suspects involved in 21 vaccine-related criminal cases, according to the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP).

In one case revealed by the SPP, several suspects manufactured nearly 58,000 counterfeit vaccine doses by using normal saline, pocketing close to 18 million yuan (around 2.8 million U.S. dollars) from illegal sales.

The SPP has requested that procurators nationwide take resolute actions to combat vaccine-related crimes, providing legal guarantees to COVID-19 control and prevention work. Enditem
Agartala, Feb 15 : Opposition Left parties and Congress on Monday criticised the BJP leadership after Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb's reported comments to extend the base of the saffron party in Nepal and Sri Lanka.

The opposition parties said that the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party's plan and target to expand its base in Nepal and Sri Lanka are against India's foreign policies and these cannot be done as the two countries are sovereign nations.

Deb while addressing a party meeting here on Saturday reportedly quoted Union Home Minister Amit Shah, and said: "When Home Minister was the BJP's National President he during a meeting with us in Agartala had said that we have extended our base across India. Now we have to go to Sri Lanka and Nepal." The Chief Minister said that the BJP would form government in West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the party would remain in power in Tripura for 30 years as the CPI-M would be finished in the next assembly elections in 2023.

"The BJP is the largest party in India now. It has maximum numbers of MPs, MLAs and other elected members," Deb said. The BJP, however, also supported the Chief Minister's views. Party spokesman Nabendu Bhattacharjee said that not only Sri Lanka and Nepal, the BJP's philosophy is being extended in many Asian and African countries.

"Our targets and plans are not to form governments in those states. Our "Pracharaks" (functionaries) are broadening BJP's philosophy and belief in those states. If the people of those countries accept our principles and viewpoints then the future course of action would be shaped," Bhattacharjee told the media on Monday.

Sharply criticising the Chief Minister's announcement, Communist Party of India-Marxist central committee member Jitendra Chowdhury said that Deb's speech is a combination of arrogance and ignorance.

Chowdhury, a former Tripura Minister, said that Deb's speech in a public forum portrayed the approach and method of governance that was prevailing in Tripura after the BJP-IPFT (Indigenous People's Front of Tripura) alliance came to power three years ago.

"The BJP-led governments both at the Center and the states have forcefully muted all kinds of civil liberties, freedom of speech and all pillars of democracy while a total lawlessness has been prevailing in Tripura.

"It has been revealed further from Deb's speech that the top brass in BJP is engaged in the internal affairs of our neighbouring countries, which is contrary to our long cherished foreign policy since independence," the veteran tribal leader and former Lok Sabha member said.

He alleged that it is extremely unfortunate that this same BJP and their governments have brought sedition charges against the innocent citizens to silence the dissent voices, and octogenarian Varavara Rao, Gautam Navlakha and teen ager Disha Ravi like people are not spared.

Tripura Congress Vice-President Tapas Dey said that Deb's comments with reference to Sri Lanka and Nepal are against the foreign policies of India. "It was a long established policy of India not to interfere into any internal issues and affairs of any sovereign nations," Dey told the media on Monday.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
The Nagol is Back! VTOs guide to this years Nagol, plus where to stay and play in south, central and north Pentecost.
A little more than a week ago, Moscone Center opened in San Francisco as a high-volume COVID-19 vaccination site.

But now, already facing vaccine shortages from the federal government, the center is temporarily shutting down. The closure, announced Sunday by Mayor London Breed, was the latest local setback in a troubled national vaccination program that has left California and Bay Area cities unable to meet demand.

Cities across California have recently opened mass-vaccination sites, only to find they cant get enough vaccines to operate them fully. Cities and health care providers have also struggled with inconsistent and unpredictable vaccine deliveries from California, which is moving to contract out its delivery network.

Beginning Monday, the city will pause inoculating residents at the Moscone convention facility for at least a week, as well as at City College of San Francisco, until the next shipment of resupply arrives.

Im frustrated because weve shown that SF can administer shots as soon as they come in, Breed said in a tweet. CCSF has been running well for weeks. The reports from Moscone are overwhelmingly positive. The only thing holding us back is a lack of supply.

Officials say City College will probably reopen Friday for second doses. A third high-volume site in San Francisco will also open this week as planned, but with fewer available appointments. No existing appointments, which are made on the states MyTurn scheduling system, have been canceled.

When Moscone Center opened this month as a high-volume vaccination site, officials spoke hopefully of getting all city residents vaccinated by the end of June  if enough supply arrived. But despite having the capabilities to administer more than 10,000 vaccines daily, supply has remained inconsistent.

Cities across the state have faced similar struggles, as more vaccines are being administered than those arriving. As of Friday, more than 5.5 million vaccines had been administered in California, Gov. Gavin Newsom said after touring Moscone Center.

What this site proves is that the only limitation in our capacity to do more is supply, Newsom said Friday. Supply is the constraint. Supply is the issue here in the state of California and all across the country.

Last month, Newsom said the state will contract with Blue Shield of California to run its vaccine delivery network, which was criticized early in the inoculation program as one of the slowest in the country.

In Los Angeles, five vaccination sites  including Dodger Stadium  closed late last week because of supply shortages. Officials said vaccine delivery had dropped that week from 90,000 to 16,000 doses. In San Jose, the deputy health director said about 6,000 vaccines were being administered daily. The site has capacity for up to 15,000 per day, officials have said.

The Oakland Coliseum was scheduled to open as a vaccination center Tuesday with capacity to administer 6,000 doses a day and run by the federal government with involvement from California.

As of Saturday, San Francisco has received 262,000 doses and administered more than 190,000  the remaining doses are reserved for scheduled first and second appointments.

Theres no doubt about it, we need more vaccine doses, said San Francisco Supervisor Matt Haney. To get this done, we need the doses. But we also need more transparency from the SF Department of Public Health. Theyre still not releasing total number of doses weve received, how many we expect, and who has them. Thats information that the public should have access to.

Last week, San Francisco administered an average of 7,400 doses per day. About half of residents older than 65 have been vaccinated. But this still leaves a huge gap  the city must vaccinate all 760,000 residents older than 16, meaning more than 1.5 million doses are needed.

At Moscone, frontline health care workers and individuals 65 and older can receive vaccines. The City College site could deliver up to 3,000 shots a day to individuals 65 and older, by invitation only.

Lizzie Johnson is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: ljohnson@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LizzieJohnsonnn
Yves here. An important fracture in Black Lives Matter confirms and greatly adds some doubts Lambert and I harbored about the organization as a result of a very sudden and non-organic shift to a more professional veneer, not the sort of thing that normally happens with a grass-roots movements. As you can see from the open letter below, the former Black Lives Matter Inland Empire has broken away from Black Lives Matter Global and calls out practices it regards as deceptive and contrary to the founding principles of Black Lives Matter.

While centralization and diversion of funds away from locals like Inland Empire to favored operations like Los Angeles is demotivating to active members, the most explosive charge is that Black Lives Matter is a Democratic Party operation and is even forming a political action committee. The former Inland Empire group describes in detail why it regards fealty to Team Dem as contrary to advancing black justice.

Lambert and I followed Black Lives Matter from its early days. We were struck by how it took off in cities across the US, like a spark on dry tinder, and how its innovative tactics, developed and tested at the local level, were getting favorable press attention. Prominent on that list were its die-ins, which typically drew as many whites as people of color to these demonstrations.

Almost as soon as the die-ins became started getting attention in local and national press, they bizarrely stopped. That was when the movement suddenly sprouted spokespeople who looked far too professional and media-genic, a stark contrast with the plainspoken power of Erica Garner.

Around that time, Lambert and I noticed other abrupt, non-organic looking changes, like designated leaders, a shiny website, fundraising, and donations from organizations not known for backing grass-roots activists.

It is also striking that Black Lives Matter Global is opaque. The About page of the site does not list a board of directors, and even though the site proclaims that donations go to the Black Lives Matter Support Fund, the site links potential and actual sponsors to Tides Foundation, which among other things also supports Wikipedia. The disclosure page at the link is anything but; it instructs the curious where to write to obtain Tides Foundation filings in various states. It is unlikely that there is remotely enough detail to construct a freestanding Black Lives Matter Global P&L.

Originally published in LeftOut Magazine. Cross posted from Black Agenda Report

Black Lives Matter Inland Empire, in an open letter, last week announced its departure from the cash-heavy Black Lives Global Network.

To our community,

Recently, a group of BLM chapters known as the BLM 10 has come forward to voice their concerns and opposition to the Global Network. Those concerns, along with the egregious conduct the Global network demonstrated on Dr. Martin Luther Kings birthday, have brought us to the conclusion that continuing to remain silent would be an act of betrayal. While the issues and problems that have been raised have been well known within our circle for years, it prompted many questions & concerns for us locally. Wed like to let the community know everything outlined in the statement put out by the BLM 10 is valid. Weve also reached out to the BLM 10 and offered to sign on in support. Hopefully, we can provide insight and clarification into our chapters history, our relationship with the global network, and our commitments going forward.

When BLM IE first started, we were originally known as the Black and Brown Underground (BBU). In 2015 we were approached by an individual named Patrisse Cullors, who offered us an opportunity to join the Global Network and organize as a Black Lives Matter chapter. After hearing her proposal, we believed that our work, direction, and principles aligned and agreed to join the network; renaming ourselves Black Lives Matter Inland Empire in the process. We were told that the organization we were joining was decentralized and leaderless, but we quickly discovered that was not the case. The Global Network is a top-down dogmatic organization that promotes certain chapters that choose to align with their direction and sequester the ones that dont. For us locally, that chapter has been Los Angeles.

For years, the leadership of the Los Angeles chapter has aligned with the Global network and One United Bank to impose on various chapters, particularly ours. We believe that while doing this they received substantial donations and funding, despite them continually soliciting the community for donations. Together, the Los Angeles Chapter along with the Global Network have consistently tried to strong-arm other groups and have worked to undermine a grassroots movement by capitalizing on unpaid labor, suppressing any internal attempt at democracy, commodifying Black death, and profiting from the same pain and suffering inflicted on Black communities that were fighting to end. In spite of being ostracised, receiving no financial support, and the maltreatment from both the Global Network and Los Angeles Chapter weve maintained our composure while working to the benefit of our community and victims of state sanctioned violence.

Clearly, we do not have the same beliefs or sense of ethics. We no longer feel, as we initially did, that our politics align. As a result, we are announcing that we are no longer associated or connected to the BLM Global Network. As an attempt to distance ourselves, we have decided to rename part of our organization The Black Power Collective while we restructure.

The use of the BLM name, which we believed was intended to unify our struggle, has been commodified and debased. It is now being used to sell products, acquire book deals, T.V. deals, and speaking engagements. We have no interest in these pursuits, and we are opposed to the movement to substitute Black capitalism for white capitalism. It has become clear that the Global network and certain figures have platformed our struggles with the sole purpose of exploiting our labor.

Furthermore, the issue of greatest concern for us is the relationship between the Global Network and the Democratic Party. This is hypocritical at best, as the Democratic Party has historically rejected and ignored BLMs demands and has made it clear that they are pro-police, pro-prison, and committed to capitalism. From Obamas support of police and his double-cross of Erica Garner, to Top Cop Kamala Harris denial of justice for Matrice Richardson, even going back to the 1994 Crime Bill authored by Joe Biden along with the Prisoner Litigation Reform Act that stripped basic human rights from countless Black peoplethe Democratic Party has literally created the conditions that led to the formation of this movement. Even now, the Demoractic party continues to support imperialism, killing African heads of state, bombing Somalia, abusing immigrants (including those of the Black diaspora), and spreading the U.S. military throughout Black and Brown countries around the world. This is a party that is a threat both here and internationally. To ally with them is to ally against ourselves.

The BLM10 statement calls out the lack of financial transparency and power moves by Patrisse Cullors and others. The actions demonstrated by the Global network have provided proof that the Global Network is essentially a steering committee acting in the best interest of various fractions within the Democratic Party. Additionally, the creation of the Black Lives Matter Political Action Committee is a violation of our collective agreement. This agreement was composed of two rules: 1. We do not work with police, 2. We do not endorse politicians. We had hoped that those rules would protect our struggle from being corrupted by the nonprofit sector or absorbed into the Democratic party. However, it now appears that the same fate that many activist groups before us fell victim to is the same fate that the BLM Global Network are destined to face. They have not only aligned with a political party, theyve used the finances they acquired from a massive uprising during a global pandemic to create the aforementioned BLM PAC.

We believe that all finances should be clear and transparent to the Black community. We also believe they should be controlled by chapters that adhere to a democratic structure along with community checks and balances. Leaders that appoint themselves can no longer serve or be seen as leaders. We can not accept charismatic figures imposing themselves as dictators, nor can we support personality cults. In the spirit of Audre Lordre and Ella Baker we believe that, the masters tools will never dismantle the masters house and that strong people dont need strong leaders. To that end, it is imperative that we engage in the struggle with our own tools and work to build a stronger people.

We would also like to address the violent rumor-mongering directed towards a member of our group who was maliciously accused of being a member of law enforcement. These slanderous accusations came from a leader of BLM LA and a figurehead of the Global Network. These accusations were nothing but an attempt to duck accountability for the way members of national leadership have treated victims of police brutality and a violation of their own policies. The bullying and attempts to silence smaller chapters and individuals who speak up must end.

Let us be clear, we are not the authors of the discord within our movement. Malcolm X encouraged us to handle our differences behind closed doors, but all attempts at that have failed. This corruption has thrived in part due to our silence and for that we must apologize.

Hide nothing from the masses of our people. Tell no lies. Expose lies whenever they are told. Mask no difficulties, mistakes, failures. Claim no easy victories-Amilcar Cabral

Ruth Dayan, the founder of Maskit, a fashion house that expressed her social justice ideals by employing the artisanal traditions of Jewish immigrants and Arabs, died on Feb. 5 at her home in Tel Aviv. The ex-wife of the Israeli soldier-statesman Moshe Dayan, she was 103.

The cause was cardiac arrest, her granddaughter Racheli Sion-Sarid said.

In 1948, Ms. Dayan was part of an organization of Israeli women teaching farm skills to new Jewish immigrants. She met a group of Bulgarians, miserable in their harsh new home, struggling to grow tomatoes with no water and no background in farming while fending off an infestation of rats. (Many of the men had been dentists.)

In their ramshackle huts, she noticed the delicate lacework they had brought with them, a traditional craft young Bulgarian women used to make their wedding trousseaus. It gave her the idea that their handiwork might be a better source of revenue than farming.

Textiles, like so many things in those days, were rationed, so on her next visit, Ms. Dayan brought scraps of sacking, out of which the Bulgarian women made bags she sold on their behalf. Within weeks, as she recalled in her autobiography, And Perhaps  The Story of Ruth Dayan, written with Helga Dudman, she had visited 20 other settlements, meeting Yugoslavian knitters, Syrian weavers, Arab silversmiths and other skilled artisans.
Kourtney Kardashian showed her sexy side on Instagram on Monday when she posed in red silk lingerie by La Perla.

Both she and her good friend Stephanie Shepherd, who works with her on her Poosh business and was sister Kim's former assistant modelled the brand's Maison Set.

The two-piece consisted of a silk triangle Bra with black frastaglio & matching medium briefs with frastaglio in their latest Instagram stories on Valentines Day.

Hot stuff: Kourtney Kardashian looked incredible as she posed up a storm in very sexy red silk lingerie by Perla on Instagram on Monday

No doubt 41-year-old Kourtney's new love, Travis Barker, 45, best known as the drummer for the rock band Blink-182, was thrilled with her latest sexy look.

Kourtney shares three children - Mason, 11, Penelope, eight, and Reign, six - with her sizzling on-off ex Scott Disick whom she last broke up with in 2015.

About a week ago an Us Weekly source claimed: 'Scott is aware of them being together and is OK with it since she and Scott havent been dating for a while.'

Both fans: Her good friend Stephanie Shepherd, who works with her on her Poosh business and was sister Kim's former assistant also modelled the brand's Maison Set

The 37-year-old heartthrob allegedly 'isnt jealous over their romance because he believes he still has the upper hand being the kids father.'

Kourtney and Scott had a tempestuous relationship since the they were first introduced in 2006 at the Mexican home of Girls Gone Wild founder Joe Francis.

In the aftermath of their breakup Kourtney spent a while romancing Algerian model Younes Bendjima, who is 14 years younger than she is.

She was briefly linked to model Sabbat, who is friends with Kendall - but he told The Cut in February 2019: 'We're definitely not dating.'

Heating up: Kourtney is now dating Blink 182 drummer Travis Barker, pictured in 2020

Meanwhile Scott is dating Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin's daughter Amelia, a 19-year-old professional model signed with Women 360 Management.

Meanwhile, Stephanie, who is now an influencer, was famously let go by Kim as her assistant in 2017 but she was keen to stress that there was no bad blood between them.

She said in 2018: 'You guys, we've never had a feud. [Steph] wanted to go in a different direction. I respect that.

'I love giving that encouragement to whoever I'm working with. People just took it just because people stop working together doesn't mean that they're feuding and stop being friends.'
Daily at the cock's crow, when everyone is still snuggled up in their cozy beds, a man is busy using well-worn wooden moulds and clay to make traditional Kitchen God statues.

Dia Linh village (Huong Vinh commune, Huong Tra town, Thua Thien - Hue province) has long been known as the traditional land for sculpting Land Genie and Kitchen God (Stove God) statues for Vietnamese Kitchen guardian day on the 23rd of December (lunar calendar).

Along the paths across Bao Vinh old town approaching Lunar New Year, there are many raw statues basking in the sun getting ready to be baked. The sound of knockings on the moulds rings out evenly, covering the whole village in a festive atmosphere. This sight is incredible to behold at the very entrance. Land genie and Stove God statues, after going through firing process, will then be colored by skillful hands, smoothly and rhythmically.

Sitting in a corner of the house is a 64-year-old man diligently putting the clay in wooden moulds of Land Genie and Kitchen God shape. To avoid concavity, the moulds need filling with a generous amount of clay. Any excess afterwards is wiped off the edge. Stickiness is avoided during the shaping process by sprinkling some ash on the templates rather than just placing the damp clay in. The man next settles the raw products on red bricks so that water can easily be drawn out before sun drying. At day's end, the average number of statues he can produce is around 300.

His name is Vo Van Nhat, now already 70 years old. Time has flown since the day he started his father's profession at the age of 25. Half a lifetime went by in just a blink of an eye. A young man until this day, hes carried on the tradition as part of his means of living.

The village elders say the village in the past was renowned for its abundance of clay. During Nguyen Dynasty, the place specialized in manufacturing products to supply for the construction of mausoleums for kings in Hue. The profession of statue craft was then created.

The chief material of the process is clay which is obtained from the fertile fields behind the village or bought elsewhere. From March of the lunar calendar, craftsmen start to prepare clay by kneading it until smooth and flexible. A batch of statues becoming finished requires about two days in the kiln, and another two more days for cooling.

The most significant and strenuous phase to make certain a successful outcome is clay processing and moulding. Clay with the least impurities is a must, the same with kneading it to a desired pliability and sufficient pressure whilst moulding to keep the statues neatly in shape later on. Mould lining should beforehand be done with white ash, Mr. Nhat shared.

Land Genie and Stove God statue making gets the most hectic during later months when Lunar New Year is on its way. There are countless products Mr Nhat has made on his own during around 40 years in this profession.

Keeping tradition alive

Opposite to Mr. Nhat's house is Mr. Vo Van Nam's family, the members of which also have over 30 years of statue crafts.

The process of placing statues in the kiln requires meticulousness. More than a thousand statues are arranged in rows with proper gaps maintained for the fire to burn evenly, to avoid cracks when heated, said Mr. Nam.

Previously, statues were barely decorated. However, to match consumers tastes nowadays, they after cooling are brilliantly colored or sprinkled with eye-catching glitter powder.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Thuy Linh (28 years old, Mr Nhats daughter-in-law) said that people do not earn much from this job since the products are sold at very low price ranging 500-2000 VND, which for craftsmen is just enough to make ends meet.

"VND100,000 is the average we make for a whole day. In comparison with other works, it is low-paid, but with burning passion, many families in the village still want to keep the tradition alive, Ms. Linh said.

The elders in Dia Linh village shared that Land Genie and Stove God statue making was first present in Thua Thien - Hue including Dia Linh village and Sinh village (Phu Vang district). Sinh village later shifted to making only votive offerings.

More and more households in the village are leaving the statue making tradition and seeking new ways to make their living because it demands a long day work alongside low income. There are now only four households engaging in the occupation giving rise to a fading culture of statue craft.

The profession generally reflects traditional values of the past and cultural beauty thats worth breathing life into.

Clay excess being eliminated.

Raw statues being sun-dried. Mr Vo Van Nhat.











Land Genie and Stove God statues after molding. Mr. Nhats wife places raw products around the kiln.







Final phase to get the statues finished. Finished products.

Quang Thanh

Hanois handicraft village promotes beauty of Vietnamese Ao Dai Trach Xa Village in Ung Hoa suburban district of Hanoi is famous for the craft of tailor-made Ao Dai (Vietnamese traditional long dresses), an epitome of Vietnamese culture.
The OHalloran family in happier times with Isabella, Tara, Ben, Scarlett, Richard and Amber all together.

The leader of the Seanad has vowed to do absolutely everything to bring home Irishman Richard OHalloran, who has been held in China for almost two years.

Mr OHalloran, a senior aviation executive, has been involved in a complex legal case in China and has been barred from leaving the country.

His wife, Tara OHalloran, has campaigned for his release for months, desperately pleading for the Governments support in bringing him home to his four children.

Mr OHalloran, who has underlying lung issues and has spent most of his time in his hotel for fear of contracting the coronavirus, has now been told that he must pay $36m to the Chinese authorities before he can leave the country.

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Leader of the Seanad, Regina Doherty, today vowed that his case will be debated in the Seanad in the coming weeks with a view to doing absolutely everything we can to get him back to Ireland.

I will absolutely have no issue in debating or scheduling a debate in the next number of weeks, she told Senator Michael McDowell, who raised the issue.

I think you have unanimous support in this house, in any house in Ireland for the absolute safe return of Richard OHalloran to his wife and his children.

I cant begin to imagine the difficulty that they have gone through in the last number of years.

We need to do absolutely everything we can to make sure that we get him home, she added.

Senator McDowell said that he was intending to put forward a motion to debate Mr OHallorans case. However, he was contacted by Foreign Affairs Minister, Simon Coveney, and asked to not debate the issue as it is at a delicate stage of negotiation.

He said that he is giving the benefit of the doubt to the Department and not debating the issue today.

Mr McDowell said that no Chinese citizen would be treated in Ireland like Mr OHalloran has been treated in China.

The comparative size of our two countries does not justify wolf diplomacy being deployed against Ireland to try to blackmail this man into doing something unlawful, he said.
Donald Trump's acquittal at his second trial may not be the final word on whether he's to blame for the deadly Capitol riot. The next step for the former president could be the courts.

Now a private citizen, Trump is stripped of his protection from legal liability that the presidency gave him. That change in status is something that even Republicans who voted on Saturday to acquit of inciting the January 6 attack are stressing as they urge Americans to move on from

President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office, as an ordinary citizen, unless the statute of limitations has run, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said after that vote.

He insisted that the courts were a more appropriate venue to hold Trump accountable than a Senate trial.

He didn't get away with anything yet, McConnell said. Yet.

The insurrection at the Capitol, in which five people died, is just one of the legal cases shadowing Trump in the months after he was voted out of office. He also faces legal exposure in Georgia over an alleged pressure campaign on state election officials, and in Manhattan over hush-money payments and business deals.

But Trump's culpability under the law for inciting the riot is by no means clear-cut. The standard is high under court decisions reaching back 50 years. Trump could also be sued by victims, though he has some constitutional protections, including if he acted while carrying out the duties of president. Those cases would come down to his intent.

Legal scholars say a proper criminal investigation takes time, and there are at least five years on the statute of limitations to bring a federal case. New evidence is emerging every day.

They're way too early in their investigation to know, said Laurie Levenson, a law professor at Loyola Law School and former federal prosecutor.

The have arrested 200 people, they're pursuing hundreds more, all of those people could be potential witnesses because some have said Trump made me do it'."



What's not known, she said, is what Trump was doing during the time of the riot, and that could be the key. didn't produce many answers. But federal investigators in a criminal inquiry have much more power to compel evidence through grand jury subpoenas.

It's not an easy case, but that's only because what we know now, and that can change, Levenson said.

The legal issue is whether Trump or any of the speakers at the rally near the White House that preceded the assault on the Capitol incited violence and whether they knew their words would have that effect. That's the standard the Supreme Court laid out in its 1969 decision in Brandenburg v. Ohio, which overturned the conviction of a Ku Klux Klan leader.

Trump urged the crowd on January 6 to march on the Capitol, where Congress was meeting to affirm Joe Biden's presidential election, Trump even promised to go with his supporters, though he didn't in the end. You'll never take our country back with weakness, Trump said.

He also had spent weeks spinning up supporters over his increasingly combative language and false election claims urging them to stop the steal.

Trump's impeachment lawyers said he didn't do anything illegal. Trump, in a statement after the acquittal, did not admit to any wrongdoing.

Federal prosecutors have said they are looking at all angles of the assault on the Capitol and whether the violence had been incited. The attorney general for the District of Columbia, Karl Racine, has said that district prosecutors are considering whether to charge Trump under local law that criminalizes statements that motivate people to violence.

Let it be known that the office of attorney general has a potential charge that it may utilize, Racine told MSNBC last month. The charge would be a misdemeanour with a maximum sentence of six months in jail.

Trump's top White House lawyer repeatedly warned Trump on January 6 that he could be held liable.

That message was delivered in part to prompt Trump to condemn the violence that was carried out in his name and acknowledge that he would leave office January 20, when Biden was inaugurated. He did depart the White House that day.

Since then, many of those charged in the riots say they were acting directly on Trump's orders. Some offered to testify. A phone call between Trump and House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy emerged during the impeachment trial in which McCarthy, as rioters stormed the Capitol, begged Trump to call off the mob.

Trump replied: Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.

The McCarthy call is significant because it could point to Trump's intent, state of mind and knowledge of the rioters' actions.

Court cases that try to prove incitement often bump up against the First Amendment. In recent years, federal judges have taken a hard line against the anti-riot law. The federal appeals court in Virginia narrowed the Anti-Riot Act, with a maximum prison term of five years, because it swept up constitutionally protected speech. The court found invalid parts of the law that encompassed speech tending to encourage or promote a riot, as well as speech urging others to riot or involving mere advocacy of violence.

The same court upheld the convictions of two members of a white supremacist group who admitted they punched and kicked counter-demonstrators during the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

(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.)
During a visit of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to the United Arab Emirates, a memorandum of understanding was signed between the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine and the Ministry of Interior of the UAE.

The memorandum, in particular, provides for the mutual recognition and exchange of national driver's licenses, Ukrinform reports with reference to the press service of the head of state.

On behalf of Ukraine, the memorandum was signed by Interior Minister Arsen Avakov.

"From now on, the holder of a driver's license issued by the competent authority of one of the countries will have the right to drive a vehicle of the category specified in the driver's license in the territory of another country for a period determined by its national legislation," the report reads.

In addition, the conclusion of this memorandum will have a positive impact on the development of the tourism industry, economic and business activity, as well as promote the development of people-to-people contacts and increase bilateral passenger traffic.

As Ukrinform reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife Olena Zelenska are on an official visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15. A number of bilateral documents were signed during the visit.

ish
PWD Minister Ashok Chavan on Monday said his government was planning to obtain loans to the tune of Rs 15,000 crore from the at a nominal rate to build roads and clear the work backlog in the state.

Speaking to reporters here, Chavan said the backlog in road work had gone up and the funds required would be more than what the state budget has allocated.

"The MVA government is planning to take a loan of Rs 15,000 crore from the at a nominal rate of interest ranging between 1 per cent and 1.5 per cent," he said.

"The process of getting cabinet sanction for this loan application is underway. We are also planning to raise funds through asset monetization. Last year, fund allocation for road works was 30-40 per cent due to the coronavirus outbreak. This year, we will need more funds," Chavan added.

He added that restrictions placed on the Shiv Jayanti celebrations, scheduled for February 19, were due to the coronavirus outbreak.

(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.)
Its Monday, Feb. 15. Happy Presidents Day. It seems Florida has become ground zero.

When it comes to the B.1.1.7 variant of the COVID virus, also known as the U.K. variant which is the more infectious version of the virus, Florida is now the nations hotspot.

When it comes to the reemergence of Donald Trump, after his historic defeat, second impeachment trial, and Pyrrhic acquittal victory, Florida is also closest to detonation.

WHAT WERE TALKING ABOUT

Just begun: Reinvigorated by the vote to acquit him again, the former president is expected to emerge from a self-imposed hibernation at Mar-a-Lago this week as he seeks ways to reassert his power. When he does, how will the Republican Party define itself? Does it prioritize policies or allegiance to Trump? How will it now describe law and order? Personal responsibility? Adherence to truth?

In the months ahead I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all of our people, Trump said in a statement after the Senate vote, which included votes to acquit from Florida senators Rick Scott and Marco Rubio. The movement, Trump said, has only just begun.

B.1.1.7 Florida: There were 379 confirmed cases of the COVID variant in Florida on Sunday, including a student at the University of Central Florida in Orlando. But the true number is likely much greater as researchers have examined only a small fraction of the cases because the process, known as genomic sequencing, is expensive and time-consuming.

Recent studies predict B.1.1.7 will be the predominant strain of the COVID virus in Florida by March. Because it is between 40-60% more contagious than other strains, scientists worry it could accelerate severe disease and deaths before enough people get vaccinated.

Travel restrictions? As the Miami Herald first reported, that concern is enough to spark talk within the Biden administration about whether to consider imposing domestic travel restrictions, based on the spread of the virus surge in each state.

Story continues

Unconstitutional and unjust: Gov. Ron DeSantis, who opposes local government mask mandates and social distancing limits responded: I think it would be unconstitutional, it would be unwise and it would be unjust.

This response is the opposite of the way he reacted on March 14, 2020, when he wanted then-President Trump to consider imposing flight restrictions on travelers coming to Florida from other states. I think the administration needs to look at domestic flights from certain areas that have outbreaks, he said then.

Is Florida just testing more? In an appearance on Fox News Sunday Morning Futures with host Maria Bartiromo, the governor suggested the reason the B.1.1.7 variant is more prevalent in Florida is because the state is doing more sequencing to find the mutation than other states.

So first off, we obviously look at all the data that comes in, he said. But this strain is in Blue States and they dont talk about doing anything with Blue States. We do a lot of analysis and genetic analysis on strains, so we find more than probably some other states do.

In fact, the Biden suggestion made no reference to red or blue states but instead to case prevalence. Although DeSantis administration has refused to release its data about the variant, the governor suggested that Florida cases are dropping, so the variant isnt a concern. Since the beginning of January, visits to the emergency departments for COVID-like illnesses in Florida are down almost 60 percent. Cases are down, he said. Hospital census are down 30 to 40 percent.

Numbers still high: Those numbers are accurate, said Mary Jo Trepka, an epidemiologist at Florida International University. But while cases and hospitalizations are falling, they are still high and the state may be seeing a lag in new infections from the variant, she and other experts said. Public health officials worry that the drop in infection rates will lead people to let down their guard just as the variant is getting a foothold in Florida. The flu season typically extends longer in Florida, they warn, and as the weather heats up, people gather more often inside, increasing the risk of exposure.

WHAT WERE WATCHING

Demonstrators march in Port-au-Prince on February 14, 2021, to protest against the government of President Jovenel Moise. - Several thousand people demonstrated on February 14, 2021 to denounce a new dictatorship in Haiti and the international communitys support for President Jovenel Moise. The protesters were accusing Moise of illegally extending his term. He says it lasts until February 2022 -- but the opposition argues it should have ended last weekend, in a standoff over disputed elections. (Photo by Valerie Baeriswyl / AFP) (Photo by VALERIE BAERISWYL/AFP via Getty Images)

Haiti becomes Biden test: Haitis political turmoil threatens to become one of the Biden administrations first foreign policy tests. A peaceful march to demand the ouster of President Jovenel Moise ended in violence Sunday with at least one dead, several journalists injured and police firing tear gas and rubber bullets onto crowds in the countrys capital. Moise has been ruling by decree for over a year after dismissing most of the legislature and has issued a number of executive orders strengthening his powers as president. Opponents say his term expired on Feb. 7. He disagrees.

Tech relocations: COVID has also produced another side effect: Tech entrepreneurs and finance gurus are relocating to Miami. And for economic development professionals, what happens in the next few months could set the tone for years to come.

Suarezs positioning: Miamis Republican Mayor Francis Suarez sees opportunity in the COVID crisis. He not only has been talking with the likes of Elon Musk, he last week attended a meeting with several U.S. governors and mayors to discuss President Joe Bidens proposed $1.9 trillion COVID stimulus package. While there, he said the city can handle a dramatic increase in the supply of vaccines if the federal government can provide the shots.

Vaccine confusion round 5: Walmart mistakenly allowed Florida residents under 65 with health conditions to book a COVID-19 vaccine appointments last week, in violation of the governors order which only gives hospitals the option to single out exceptions to the 65-plus rule. The company said, however, it would honor the appointments.

Miami-Dade Countys vendor last week also mistakenly offered 430 vaccine appointments to ineligible people, forcing the county to retract the offers for the coveted doses. The mistake occurred when the vaccination website run by Utah-based Nomi Health sent out invitations for people under 65 to schedule vaccine appointments.

Too few Miami-Dade seniors: Despite being the epicenter of severe COVID cases and deaths in Florida, Miami-Dade has vaccinated a smaller percentage of its seniors than the state average, according to data from the Florida Department of Health. The state has been making progress as a whole, with about one-third of Florida seniors having now received at least one dose of the two federally authorized COVID-19 vaccines. But in Miami-Dade, which has suffered the most hospitalizations and deaths from the disease in the state, the percentage of seniors 65 and older who have received at least one dose is closer to 1 in 4.

Unfair allocation: The federal government currently allocates COVID-19 vaccines based on a states adult population, not based on the number of people over age 65. Florida Democratic Rep. Stephanie Murphy says thats unfair to states like Florida with a high percentage of older adults, so shes asking the Biden administration to change the formula.

Goodbye Shane: Shane Strum, the governors chief of staff who for two years helped guide his boss  a newcomer to both state government and executive leadership  has resigned. Strum was named chief executive officer for Broward Health and will move back to his hometown at the start of March. Its part of the mid-term changing of the guard in the governors administration, and we expect more transitions to come.

Hello Richard: Richard Gentry, a veteran lobbyist who last year represented a utility-backed nonprofit, was appointed last week by legislators to be the chief lawyer representing consumers in utility rate cases before state regulators. Gentry has spent four decades as a lobbyist representing developers, sugar producers and the parimutuel industry. He replaces J.R. Kelly, the lawyer who for the last 14 years represented the public in rate cases and has been an aggressive opponent to rate requests and legal maneuverings of the states largest utility, Florida Power & Light.

Missing kids = missing $: Florida House Speaker Chris Sprowls warned school districts that hundreds of millions of dollars they were allowed to keep this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic could be gone next year if the 87,000 students who didnt return to school last fall dont show up again next year.

Not a witch hunt: After a preliminary report into executive compensation at nonprofit social services organizations, the DeSantis administration has found itself on the defensive. Last week, the governors chief inspector general told a House committee that the probe into social welfare organizations was not any kind of witch hunt but instead was an attempt at bringing transparency to the process of state and federal funds used by privately run entities.

Redistricting watch: The U.S. Census Bureau said Friday it wont be delivering data used for redrawing congressional and state legislative districts until the end of September. This is a bigger headache for lawmakers in other states who have deadlines this year. Florida legislators werent expected to start the process until fall anyway, and complete work early next year.

Vacation rental pre-emption: The effort to block local governments from regulating vacation rentals is on the move again, as Florida House and Senate leaders revive a proposal to prevent cities and counties from inspecting and licensing properties offered on platforms such as Airbnb. One change: for the first time the online platforms would have to collect and remit taxes on vacation rental properties, ensure that only properly licensed rentals are advertised, and provide the state with specific information about the rentals. Last year, DeSantis signaled his opposition to a similar bill, effectively killing it.

Shielding from liability: A measure that would provide broad immunity to nursing homes, hospitals and physicians from coronavirus-related lawsuits is being fast-tracked through the state Legislature. Democrats and consumer advocates warn the measure will keep people with legitimate claims from access to the courts.

Same ask on same sex: Florida Democrats will try again this year to repeal an outdated law banning same-sex marriage. The section of Florida code has been irrelevant since 2015, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that same-sex couples across the country have a Constitutional right to marry. And yet, efforts to repeal it have been stymied.

Lets talk! Tune in Thursday, Feb. 18 at 6 p.m. for a virtual conversation with political scientist Dr. Susan McManus and me, Miami Herald Capitol Bureau Chief Mary Ellen Klas. Well take your questions as we talk about the 2020 election cycle, its impact on voting and access, and the forces impacting 2022. The event is hosted by the Florida Historic Capitol Museum and The Village Square in celebration of the virtual opening of the Smithsonian Institution exhibition Voices and Votes: Democracy in America. Please join us! Register here.

Stay well and wed love to hear from you. Miami Herald Capitol Bureau Chief Mary Ellen Klas curated this newsletter. If you have any ideas or suggestions, please drop me a note at meklas@miamiherald.com.

Special $1 deal: The Miami Herald needs your support if we are to continue to supply the meaningful local journalism you count on during these unprecedented times. Weve lowered our introductory offer for unlimited digital access. Check it out!

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Irish VAT Rate Cut To Be Reversed In March

by Jason Gorringe, Tax-News.com, London

15 February 2021

The Irish headline rate of VAT will return to 23 percent from March, having been temporarily reduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe told parliament's Budgetary Oversight Committee that it is his intention that the rate "will go back up to its original rate at the end of the planned period."

As part of the Government's July Stimulus Package, the standard rate of VAT was reduced from 23 percent to 21 percent on September 1, 2020. The rate reduction was due to remain in force until February 28, 2021.

However, Donohoe also said that the temporary reduced VAT rate of nine percent for the hospitality sector will continue until the end of 2021.
The got its third submarine, which will be commissioned as INS Karanj, of Project P-75 on Monday in Mumbai.

The acceptance document was signed by Vice Admiral (Retd) Narayan Prasad, Chairman and Managing Director of Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited, and Rear Admiral B Sivakumar, Chief of Staff Officer (Tech) of Western Naval Command.

With the delivery of Karanj, India further cemented its position as a building nation. MDL, one of the India's leading shipyards with the capacity and the capability to meet the requirements and aspirations of the Indian Navy, has delivered three submarines named Khanderi, Kalvari and now Karanj.

The fourth submarine, Vela, launched on May 6 2019, has commenced sea trials, the fifth Vagir, was launched on November 12, 2020 and has commenced harbour sea trials whilst the sixth is presently in an advanced stage of outfitting.

All the six submarines are being constructed under Project 75. The number 75 in Project 75 refers to a unique identifier which was assigned to a programme for series production of submarines.

Two SSK submarines built by MDL in 1992 and 1994 are still in service today, after more than 25 years.

MDL also achieved expertise in submarine refits by successfully executing the medium refit-cum-upgradation of all the four SSK class submarines of the

It is presently carrying out the Medium Refit and Life Certification of INS Shishumar, the first SSK submarine.

With the construction of the Leander and Godavari class frigates, Khukri class Corvettes, Missile Boats, Delhi and Kolkata class Destroyers, Shivalik class Stealth Frigates, the SSK submarines and the submarines under its belt, MDL has almost mapped the history of indigenous warship building in India.

--IANS

sk/bg

(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 terminally ill newlywed who tied the knot with his partner on Valentine's Day will fly to Switzerland to end his life at Dignitas.

Alain du Chemin, 50, will take a 25,000 private jet to Switzerland from where they are staying in Jersey to make sure he does not endure a prolonged death at home.

Optometrist Mr du Chemin was diagnosed with terminal glioblastoma in September 2019 and says he has no other options.

He has already had two operations to try and treat the condition as well as chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

Mr du Chemin wed his partner of 10 years Paul Gazzard, 48, in Covid-secure ceremony and are enjoying some private time together before the trip to the clinic near Zurich. It is not yet known when the trip will take place.

He said: 'I'm not going to be around forever but I really want to leave Paul with some good memories.

Alain du Chemin, 50, who has terminal brain cancer with his newlywed husband Paul Gazzard

'I won't go into details about what the symptoms are as this tumour gets late  but they are not pleasant.

'And they are quite undignified to be honest. And that word  dignity  and losing all your dignity is not something I want to go through.

'I really don't want to have to take my own life in an unpleasant way.

Obviously if that happens over here there will be an inquest and whatever comes after that.

The building of the assisted suicide clinic, Dignitas in Pfaeffikon near Zurich, Switzerland

A waiting room in the clinic Dignitas assisted suicide clinic, Pfaffikon, Zurich, Switzerland

Assisted dying: the law Under the Suicide Act 1961, anyone helping or encouraging someone to take their own life in England or Wales can be prosecuted and jailed for up to 14 years if found guilty of an offence. Section two of the act states that a person commits an offence if they carry out an act capable of encouraging or assisting the suicide or attempted suicide of another person, and the act was intended to encourage or assist suicide or an attempt at suicide. In 2015 MPs including former prime minister David Cameron rejected a Bill to legalise assisted dying. Opposition to changing the law has come from faith groups, campaigners who say disabled people may feel pressured to end their lives and campaigners who fear assisted dying would become a business. Earlier this month, terminally ill Noel Conway won the first stage of a court bid to challenge a ruling he says denies him a 'peaceful and dignified' death. The 68-year-old previously said he feels 'entombed' by motor neurone disease and wants medics to be able to help him die when he has just six months left to live. The retired lecturer from Shrewsbury lost a High Court fight in October 2017 to allow him to bring about his death in the way he wishes. In December 2018 he said he felt 'cheated' and claimed that a 'medieval mindset' had stopped him from having control of when he ends his own life. This came after he was refused permission by the Supreme Court to challenge the law on assisted dying. He has been supported by the campaign group Dignity in Dying, and his legal team have spent the past two years challenging the ban on assisted dying. Their argument is that the Suicide Act, which makes it an offence to help someone to die, contravenes the European Convention on Human Rights. That legal challenge came to an abrupt end at the end of November, when the Supreme Court refused permission to hear an appeal, after Mr Conway's case had already been rejected by two lower courts. Advertisement

'I don't want to put other people through this as well.

'At the moment the only option to me is to fly to another country and go to sleep there,' he added to the Mirror.

His IT manager husband said they had decided to get married after deciding to avoid waiting until after the pandemic.

He said: 'I think we both thought let's just do this. Let's just have a special day.'

The couple are making their situation public to highlight issues facing those wanting to have an assisted death under Covid-19 restrictions.

They say that in normal times a terminally ill Brit would travel to the clinic every eight days to end their life.

At the moment UK travellers cannot enter Switzerland under draconian restrictions.

But Mr du Chemin has been able to return to his birthplace Jersey, whose residents are allowed to enter the country albeit by private jet.

The situation means he has to leave earlier to go to Dignitas than he would have liked, because passengers have to be fit to travel.

It will also mean he has to be cremated in Switzerland instead of being buried in Jersey.

But he said: 'I am not depressed  I have been very lucky in many respects and I have the most lovely boyfriend and family.

'I just simply don't want to go through potentially really unpleasant side effects and my husband and my family having to watch that.

'I have had all the treatment. I have been trying to get on a research trial because the one thing I really would like, if I have to pass away is I would like, is for that to be part of a research trial that might help find a cure for somebody else in the future.'

Before he leaves he wants to give evidence to a Citizen's Jury in Jersey, which is considering relaxing the ban on assisted dying in the Channel Island.

Sarah Wootton, CEO of Dignity in Dying, said the UK should reconsider the law on assisted dying.

She added: 'Alain simply wants to avoid a painful, protracted death from brain cancer.

'His only option to guarantee a peaceful end is to travel to a foreign country and die earlier than he would want.

'The UK must review our outdated legislation as a matter of urgency and hold an inquiry into the options for a new British law on assisted dying.'
BCT will become a system integrator partner of Lightbend in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, where BCT has deep expertise with large enterprise customers across Oil and Gas, Telecom, Power, Banking, Retail and Logistics. BCT will lead digital transformation initiatives based on Akka Platform in key use cases across Predictive Analytics, Digital Experience and Digital Supply Chain Management.

As the MENA region focuses on modernizing applications for the cloud, Akka Platform will give BCT customers major advantages building cloud-native microservices designed to be responsive, scalable and distributed. Akka Platform is powered by an open source core and brings developers important capabilities across Reactive programming, data streaming and microservices. Lightbend's customers include major brands like Credit Karma, Hootsuite, iHeartRadio, LinkedIn, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Starbucks, UniCredit Group, Verizon, Walmart, Weight Watchers, William Hill and many more.

"Our partnership with Lightbend comes at a time when many digital transformation initiatives across the region have been driven to high levels of maturity," said Mr. S. Vishwanathan, Executive Vice President at BCT. "Akka Platform is a great addition and complements our range of specialized IP and services offerings. More importantly, BCT is now better positioned to speed up digital transformation projects and facilitate faster go-lives with our outcome-based business models."

"The MENA region represents a $160 billion information technology market[1], and Lightbend is excited to partner with its leading reseller servicing the Oil and Gas, Telecom, Power, Banking, and Retail and Logistics industries," said Jeff Vance, EVP Global Field Operations at Lightbend. "Lightbend and BCT give MENA enterprises the most powerful technology platform and expertise for transformation toward real-time, cloud native application architecture."

About BCT

Established in 1999, Bahwan CyberTek (BCT) is a global provider of IP-based digital transformation solutions in Digital Experience, Predictive Analytics and Digital Journey Management. Driving innovation through outcome-based business models and powerful IP solutions, BCT is a trusted partner of Fortune 500 companies with over 1,000 customers worldwide. BCT has over 3,000 associates with technical and domain expertise focusing on the Oil and Gas, Telecom, Power, Government, Banking, Retail and Logistics industries. Learn more about BCT at www.bahwancybertek.com.

About Lightbend

Lightbend (@Lightbend) is leading the enterprise transformation toward real-time, cloud native applications and setting the standard for cloud native architectures. Lightbend provides scalable, high-performance microservices frameworks and streaming engines for building data-centric systems that are optimized to run on cloud-native infrastructure like Red Hat OpenShift. The most admired brands around the globe are transforming their businesses with Lightbend, engaging billions of users every day through software that is changing the world. For more information, visit www.lightbend.com.

1. Gartner Says IT Spending in Middle East and North Africa Will Grow 2.4% in 2020

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1438202/Bahwan_CyberTek_and_Lightbend.jpg

SOURCE Bahwan CyberTek

Related Links

https://bahwancybertek.com


The states must act in such a way as to allow any deprivation of liberty to be examined by independent courts, Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu said at the launch of the Declaration Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations, a video conference event organized by Canada, the Foreign Ministry informs.

"The observance of human rights must be at the heart of all our actions, both nationally and internationally. Initiatives such as the Declaration Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations are an additional opportunity to confirm the essential importance of the international order based on rules and on our joint commitments. Romania is honored to endorse this Declaration and to contribute to the creation of the political and diplomatic context necessary for this approach to become a landmark," said Minister Aurescu.

The Declaration Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations is a political document initiated by Canada and backed by more than 50 states, including EU member states, the US, the UK and Norway.

According to the Foreign Ministry, Minister Aurescu's intervention reconfirmed "Romania's attachment to a rules-based world order and to the development of international relations in a constructive and predictable manner."

"The Romanian chief diplomat pointed out that the elimination of arbitrary detention is essential, and states must act in such way as to allow any deprivation of liberty to be examined by independent courts, including in terms of the authorities' responsibility for such acts," specified the Foreign Affairs Ministry.

The Declaration's guiding principles are:

- reaffirming the fact that arbitrary arrests and detentions are contrary to international human rights law and instruments;

- expressing grave concern about the use of arbitrary arrest or detention by states to exercise leverage over foreign governments, contrary to international law;

- calling on all states to refrain from arbitrary arrest, detention, or sentencing to exercise leverage over foreign governments in the context of state-to-state relations;

- reaffirming the fundamental importance of the rule of law, independence of the judiciary, respect for human rights, and respect for the obligation to provide consular access in accordance with international law.
Italian start-up Italvolt wants to build a 4 billion EV battery manufacturing facility in Italy. The site for the project is currently being identified, and the factory's initial capacity should reach 45 GWh.Italian start-up Italvolt Spa is planning to build a 70 GWh manufacturing facility for EV batteries at an as-yet-unspecified location in Italy. The company said that it wants to invest around 4 billion in the new factory, which will have an initial capacity of 45 GWh. Italvolt is currently seeking to identify a location for the factory, with due diligence and evaluation exercises already ...

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.
[February 14, 2021] Dye & Durham Reports Second Quarter 2021 Financial Results and Provides Corporate Update

FORECASTED JUNE 30, 2022 , ADJUSTED EBITDA AND REVENUE OF OVER $200 MILLION AND $340 MILLION , RESPECTIVELY1 TORONTO, Feb. 14, 2021 /CNW/ - Dye & Durham Limited ("Dye & Durham" or the "Company") (TSX: DND), a leading provider of cloud-based software and technology solutions designed to improve efficiency and increase productivity for legal and business professionals, today announced its financial results for the three and six months ended December 31, 2020, and provides a financial outlook for fiscal year 2022 ending on June 30, 2022 and for the third quarter of the current fiscal year. For the three months ended December 31, 2020, the Company generated revenue of $33.7 million and Adjusted EBITDA2 of $17.1 million, representing growth of 96% for both revenue and Adjusted EBITDA compared to the same period in the previous fiscal year. "The Company's strong second quarter results reflect the successful execution of our business strategy over the period, highlighting our ability to achieve our stated goals," said Matt Proud, CEO of Dye & Durham. "As we have an established platform and financial scale now in our key markets of Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, the opportunities in our pipeline are becoming more sizeable as we look to acquire strategic vertical assets." Second Quarter Fiscal 2021 Highlights Deployed approximately $630.0 million on strategic acquisitions, the Company anticipates it will achieve post-synergy returns on these acquisitions that are consistent with its targeted return model.

on strategic acquisitions, the Company anticipates it will achieve post-synergy returns on these acquisitions that are consistent with its targeted return model. Completed equity financings of approximately $426.3 million , and secured debt facilities of $570.0 million .

, and secured debt facilities of . Revenue of $33.7 million , an increase of 96% from comparative period in the prior year.

, an increase of 96% from comparative period in the prior year. Net income of ($21.5) million , a decrease of ($20.0) million from the comparative period in the prior year, primarily driven by non-cash stock-based compensation expense of $20.3 million .

, a decrease of from the comparative period in the prior year, primarily driven by non-cash stock-based compensation expense of . Adjusted EBITDA 1 of $17.1 million , an increase of $8.4 million or 96% from comparative period in the prior year.

of , an increase of or 96% from comparative period in the prior year. Market capitalization increased by $1.8 billion , resulting in a share price accretion of 127%; this resulted in the Company recognizing a $20.3 million non-cash, stock-based compensation expense.

, resulting in a share price accretion of 127%; this resulted in the Company recognizing a non-cash, stock-based compensation expense. On February 5, 2021 , entered into a definitive agreement to acquire GlobalX Information Pty Ltd. for approximately $166.0 million , which is expected to close in the quarter ended June 30, 2021 .















































1 Forecasted June 30, 2022 financial information are considered forward-looking information. Please see "Forward-Looking Information" below.

Financial Outlook The Company is providing the following financial guidance: Forecasted June 30, 2022 , Adjusted EBITDA and Revenue of over $200 million and $340 million , respectively.

, Adjusted EBITDA and Revenue of over and , respectively. Integration from recent acquisitions is ahead of plan, resulting in the realization of certain synergies in the current quarter. This is expected to result in Adjusted EBITDA of more than $30 million for the third quarter of the current fiscal year, which represents an increase of over 75% compared to the prior quarter. This forecast is provided to enhance visibility into the Company's expectations for financial targets for the third quarter. Please refer to the section regarding forward-looking statements, which forms an integral part of this press release. Quarterly Dividend On February 12, 2021, the Board of Directors declared a quarterly dividend of $0.01875 per share to shareholders of record on March 12, 2021. Conference Call Notification The Company will hold a conference call to discuss its business on Tuesday, February 16, 2021, at 8:30 a.m. ET hosted by senior management. A question-and-answer session will follow the corporate update. CONFERENCE CALL DETAILS DATE: Tuesday, February 16, 2021 TIME: 8:30 a.m. ET DIAL-IN NUMBER: (416) 764-8659 or (888) 664-6392 TAPED REPLAY: (416) 764-8677 or (888) 390-0541 REFERENCE NUMBER: 10924983 (Live call); 924983# (Taped replay) This call is being webcast and can be accessed by going to:

https://produceredition.webcasts.com/starthere.jsp?ei=1427587&tp_key=2edf10723e 2 Represents a non-IFRS measure. For the relevant definitions, see "Non-IFRS Financial Measures" section of this press release. Management believes non-IFRS measures, including EBITDA, Adjusted EBITDA, and Adjusted EBITDA margin provide supplementary information to IFRS measures used in assessing the performance of the business. Please see the Company's most recent Management's Discussion and Analysis for a reconciliation of these measures to their nearest IFRS measure. About Dye & Durham Dye & Durham Limited is a leading provider of cloud-based software and technology solutions designed to improve efficiency and increase productivity for legal and business professionals. Dye & Durham provides critical information services and workflows, which clients use to manage their process, information and regulatory requirements. The Company has operations in Canada and the United Kingdom, and has a strong blue-chip customer base that includes law firms, financial service institutions, and government organizations. Additional information can be found at www.dyedurham.com. Non-IFRS Measures This press release makes reference to certain non-IFRS measures. These measures are not recognized measures under IFRS, do not have a standardized meaning prescribed by IFRS and are therefore unlikely to be comparable to similar measures presented by other companies. Rather, these measures are provided as additional information to complement those IFRS measures by providing further understanding of the Company's results of operations from management's perspective and to discuss Dye & Durham's financial outlook. Accordingly, these measures should not be considered in isolation nor as a substitute for analysis of Dye & Durham's financial information reported under IFRS. The Company uses non-IFRS measures including: "EBITDA", "Adjusted EBITDA" and "Adjusted EBITDA margin". EBITDA EBITDA means net income (loss) before amortization and depreciation expenses, finance and interest costs, and provision for income taxes. Adjusted EBITDA Adjusted EBITDA adjusts EBITDA for stock-based compensation expense, asset impairment charges, loss on settlement of loans and borrowings, gains or losses from changes in fair value of derivative financial instruments and contingent consideration liabilities measured at fair value through profit or loss, specific transaction related expenses related to acquisitions, IPO and capital structure reorganization, operational restructuring costs, restructuring costs includes impact to the full year of cost synergies related to the reduction of employees in relation to acquisitions. Adjusted EBITDA margin Adjusted EBITDA margin means Adjusted EBITDA divided by revenue. Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forwardlooking information and forward-looking statements (collectively, "forward-looking information") within the meaning of applicable securities legislation, which reflect the Company's current expectations regarding future events. Particularly, information regarding the Company's expectations of future results, performance, prospects or the markets in which we operate is forward-looking information. In some cases, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "forecast", "target", "goal", "may", "might", "will", "expect", "anticipate", "estimate", "intend", "plan", "indicate", "seek", "believe", "predict", or "likely", or the negative of these terms, or other similar expressions intended to identify forward-looking statements. In addition, any statements that refer to expectations, intentions, 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 or circumstances. Such forward-looking information is necessarily based on a number of opinions, estimates and assumptions, including but not limited to those assumptions described under the heading "Caution Regarding Forward-Looking Information" in the Company's Management's Discussion & Analysis for the quarter ended December 31, 2020 (the "MD&A"). Forward-looking information is subject to and entirely qualified by known and unknown risks, uncertainties, assumptions and other factors that may cause the actual results or performance to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information, including but not limited to factors discussed under the heading "Risk Factors" in the Company's final long-form prospectus dated July 13, 2020 and under the heading "Risks and Uncertainties" in the MD&A, which are available on the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. If any of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or if the opinions, estimates or assumptions underlying the forward-looking information prove incorrect, actual results or future events might vary materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking information. Accordingly, investors should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information, which speaks only as of the date made. The forward-looking information contained in this news release represents the Company's expectations as of the date of this news release, and are subject to change after such date and the Company disclaims any intention or obligation or undertaking to update or revise any forward-looking information whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required under applicable securities laws. In addition, Dye & Durham's guidance on revenue and Adjusted EBITDA is considered forward-looking information. The foregoing demonstrates Dye & Durham's objectives, which are not forecasts or estimates of its financial position, but are based on the implementation of its strategic goals, growth prospects and growth initiatives. Management's assessments of, and outlook for, revenue and Adjusted EBITDA set out herein are generally based on the following assumptions: (a) Dye & Durham's results of operations will continue as expected, (b) the Company will continue effectively execute against its key strategic growth priorities, (c) the Company will continue to retain and grow its existing customer base and market share, (d) the Company will be able to take advantage of future prospects and opportunities, and realize on related synergies, including in respect of acquisitions, (e) there will be no changes in legislative or regulatory matters that negatively impact Dye & Durham's business, (f) current tax laws will remain in effect and will not be materially changed, (g) economic conditions will remain relatively stable throughout the period, and (h) the industries Dye & Durham operates in will continue to grow consistent with past experience. The Company considers these assumptions to be reasonable in the circumstances, given the time period for such projections and targets. The achievement of target revenue set out above is subject to significant risks including: (a) that the Company will be unable to effectively execute against its key strategic growth priorities and (b) the Company will be unable to continue to retain and grow its existing customer base and market share. These estimates have been prepared by and are the responsibility of management. The Company's independent registered public accounting firm has not conducted a review of, and does not express an opinion or any other form of assurance with respect to, these estimates. SOURCE Dye & Durham

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The United Kingdom is one of the biggest trade partners of Dubai and the UAE emirate's external trade with the UK stood at AED21.5 billion ($5.85 billion) in 2020, it was revealed during an official meeting.

The implementation of Brexit and the following consequences on trade, travel and security were the main highlights of the meeting between Ahmed Mahboob Musabih, Director-General of Dubai Customs, and Bill Williamson, Director of British Customs, said a Wam news agency report.

During the online meeting, Musabih assured Williamson that Dubai Customs will provide all that is necessary to British businesses and investors to help them overcome any challenges that might result from them leaving the trading bloc.

Britain has officially left the European trading block and started applying new procedures from the first day of the new year.

On his part, Williamson highly commended the outstanding achievements and performance of Dubai Customs in the past few years. He attributed that to the hard work of its teams and the sophisticated and advanced technologies used in its operations.

This has helped in expediting trade, close monitoring of traffic of goods between the two sides, and helping British authorities thwart cross border illegitimate shipments, he explained.

"We would like to enhance international efforts in what is related to legitimate trade and to have more cooperation and exchange of information and experience with Dubai Customs," Williamson asserted. "Dubai Customs has long and outstanding experience that will help us facilitate trade and build advanced customs systems. Dubai Customs and Her Majesty Revenue & Customs (HMRC) share important relations. The work undertaken by the Fiscal Crime Liaison Officers based in Dubai is important as we seek ways in which to deepen our mutual co-operation further."

Musabih said Dubai's external trade with the UK stood at AED21.5 billion in 2020 (AED16.3 billion for imports, AED1.6 billion for exports, and AED3.6 billion for re-exports).

He stressed the strong relations between the UAE and Britain, which resulted in fruitful mutual trade and expanded security and investment horizons. "The cooperation between Dubai Customs and the UK authorities has helped in fighting illegitimate trade, especially in counterfeit tobacco products. The UK and Dubai have seized 198m cigarettes and 122 tons of illegitimate tobacco products that were to be transported to the UK," he added.

Musabih invited his British counterpart to attend the 5th WCO Global AEO Conference, hosted by Dubai in coordination with the World Customs Organisation and the Federal Customs Authority. The international event will include rich discussion panels and roundtable meetings to discuss all customs related issues and means to develop the sector. It will see the participation of around 1,500 experts in the field.

The meeting has also covered procedures taken by the two sides to mitigate the impact of the pandemic.
When seven GOP members voted for conviction with the DEMS, they are now facing a backlash. The majority of the GOP believe Trump is the new face of the Republicans.

The vote to convict mattered that the GOP would be unified, but the seven who sided with the DEMS will be affected in the coming 2022 midterms, keeping their position that fellow party mates will challenge. Many who side with Trump strongly believe what he stands for.

Seven senators face political adversity

From the start, the entire GOP was positioned to repel the DEMS' attempts to convict ex-president Donald Trump courtesy of Pelosi and House DEMS. These seven senators who choose to vote against Trump on the insurrection are now facing backlash. Many of the GOP are trying to give a new direction via Trump as a focal point, reported NTD.

Republican senators who voted with Democrats

One of the senators included is Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who was censured by the Louisiana GOP's Executive Committee with a unanimous vote against him. They released a statement that indicated how the senator was supposed to represent them with a no vote. Instead, he voted with the other Republicans to declare the sham trial constitutional.

From the North Carolina Republican Party, Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) decided to convict, but the NC GOP strongly condemned him. According to the statement, the NC Republicans believed that he would not consent to the sham trial. But his vote to the rightness of unconstitutional impeachment was utterly disappointing to North Carolina GOP Chairman Michael Whatley. He was one of seven GOP members voted for conviction.

Also read: Trump's Acquittal Creates Aftershocks to the Republicans, Democrats in American Politics

One more Republican head, this time in Pennsylvania, Chairman Lawrence Tabas, cited how Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) choose a convict vote that was not acceptable. He added that the disappointment of leaders and volunteers were apparent, Tabas said. Stressing the impeachment was always unconstitutional, and voting for acquitting should be the right choice.

Aside from them, four other Republicans went against the consensus. They are Sens. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), and Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who also voted to convict.

This reporting the Republican parties in Maine, Utah, Nebraska, Alaska had not reacted to their members' vote. Maine GOP has not issued any remarks, while the others have not to issued anything.

But, Sasse has been making anti-Trump statements and votes against him, drawing flak from many critics. He is staking his political future as a Trump critic.

Meanwhile, Chuck Schumer praised these Republicans for choosing to side with DEMS on an unconstitutional impeachment sham. Many oppose the DEMS and consider it illegal, as he called the Patriots.

2022 may not go well for the seven senators

Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), will be affected in midterm elections, if re-elected, uncertain. She added it is her choice, and her constituents decided not her. When interviewed by the press when asked about her vote, she said that there are consequences to any vote, and that is acceptable.

For Toomey and Burr, they are not running for re-election in 2022; they are retiring. Cassidy said that Trump was guilty in a video statement. Cassidy said in a short video statement that he voted to convict Trump "because he is guilty." These seven GOP members are voted for conviction because they believe Trump is.

Related article: Failed Attempt to Impeach Trump Angers Pelosi, Says Censuring Is Not Enough

@ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 03:48:04|Editor: huaxia

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RIYADH, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz and the Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed in a phone call on Monday the coordination to help stabilize oil market.

The two emphasized the continuation of the bilateral cooperation to back up the stability of the petroleum market and the growth of the world economy, the Saudi Press Agency reported.

Saudi Arabia and Russia have been promoting global efforts to reduce oil production.

They also reviewed the ties between the two countries, as well as the regional and world latest developments, said the report. Enditem
WICHITA, Kan., Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Kansas Distribution Alliance is proud to announce that industrial supply and manufacturing company GT Midwest has joined as one of its "Founding Five" members. As an industry leader, GT Midwest will play a vital role in the Alliance's mission of growing a thriving distribution industry that provides good jobs and career growth opportunities for Kansans.

Headquartered in Wichita, Kansas with locations in Missouri and Nebraska, family-owned GT Midwest serves a national customer base with world-class industrial supplies and products, fabricated parts, and customer services. With customer relationships that span decades, they understand the value of skilled, knowledgeable and well-trained associates.

As a founding member of the Kansas Distribution Alliance, GT Midwest is essential to the support of the Keep Kansas Running Campaign, an initiative to increase the number of qualified candidates in distribution careers. Keep Kansas Running encourages traditional and non-traditional students to pursue distribution careers through the Pratt Community College Modern Distribution Sales and Management (MDSM) programthe first distribution degree of its kind in Kansas.

As a supporting business, GT Midwest helps MDSM students gain the hands-on experience and transferable skills they need by providing internship opportunities, field trips and guest speakers.

"The distribution industry offers tremendous opportunities," said Matt Onofrio, President at GT Midwest. "Our biggest challenge is finding people who understand the industry and want to be a part of it. GT Midwest is excited about the MDSM program at Pratt Community College because it helps bridge that gap by introducing people to the industry and preparing them to work in it."

"Keep Kansas Running helps students become highly sought-after candidates in an industry filled with opportunity and well-paying careers," said Jenny Egging, Program Coordinator of MDSM at Pratt Community College. "GT Midwest's support is integral to the success of our students and we could not be more thankful for their involvement."

About The Kansas Distribution Alliance

The Kansas Distribution Alliance is made up of leaders who are invested in the success of the distribution industry and strengthening their employee base. Their Keep Kansas Running Campaign is an effort to increase the number of qualified hires who enter the workforce through the Pratt Community College Modern Distribution and Sales Management (MDSM) program. This one-of-a-kind program equips students with the skills, education and hands-on experience to prepare them for success in the distribution industry.

Businesses and students interested in learning more about the Distribution Alliance and MDSM program should visit https://keepkansasrunning.com/

About GT Midwest

GT Midwest is a family-owned manufacturer and distributor of a wide range of products and materials for industry and commerce. Their mission is to provide world-class industrial supplies and products, fabricated parts and customer services at or below competitive price levels, thereby becoming an acknowledged leader in industrial distribution measured in terms of total quality, managed growth and customer satisfaction.

Founded in 1946, the company has grown from a handful of people in one location to over 150 associates across three states through both acquisition and organic growth. GT Midwest serves a national customer base from their headquarters in Wichita, Kansas, with additional locations in Missouri and Nebraska.

Learn more at https://www.gtmidwest.com/

###
WASHINGTON  A central issue in last weeks impeachment trial was whether former President Donald Trump deserves a political future. But his acquittal sparked speculation Sunday about the electoral prospects of another Trump: his daughter-in-law, Lara.

Sen. Richard M. Burrs decision to vote for the conviction of Donald Trump incensed many Republicans in his home state of North Carolina, and in doing so reignited talk that Lara Trump, a native of Wilmington, North Carolina, would seek the Senate seat Burr will vacate in 2022.

My friend Richard Burr just made Lara Trump almost the certain nominee for the Senate seat in North Carolina to replace him if she runs, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said in an interview on Fox News on Sunday.

Lara Trump did not respond to a request for comment. One senior Republican official with knowledge of her plans said that the Jan. 6 riot soured her desire to seek office, but that she would decide over the next few months whether to run as part of a coordinated Trump family comeback.

If negotiating a post-Donald-Trump world has been a disorienting experience for Republicans around the country, it is especially acute in North Carolina, a state that has become a polarized, and nearly deadlocked, partisan battleground.

Burrs vote, and the torrent of criticism among North Carolina Republicans that came with it, appeared likely to sharpen the differences in the primary to succeed him between staunch Trump loyalists and Republicans who see a need to appeal to educated suburban voters in a state with steadily changing demographics.

The GOP base is getting smaller, said Paul Shumaker, a veteran party strategist in Raleigh.

It was not just Burrs vote that inflamed the partys rank and file. While the states junior senator, Thom Tillis, who was reelected last year, voted to acquit the former president, Tillis used his statement after the vote to all but invite prosecutors to indict Trump, saying the former presidents ultimate accountability is through our criminal justice system.

Donald Trumps allies predict that such talk would prompt a revolt from the right that would result in the election of more pro-Trump candidates. And, the thinking goes, who could be more pro-Trump than an actual Trump?

Lara Trump, 38, a former personal trainer and television producer who graduated from Emsley A. Laney High School in Wilmington and from North Carolina State University in Raleigh, has floated herself as a possible Burr successor for months.

Another Republican, former Rep. Mark Walker, a Trump ally, has already announced his candidacy, and Pat McCrory, a Republican former governor, is considering one. Mark Meadows, the former North Carolina representative and former Trump chief of staff, is also said to be in the mix.

We are going to take a very long look at all the candidates versus, you know, some kind of coronation, said Mark Brody, a member of the Republican National Committee from Union County, outside Charlotte.

Doug Heye, a former Republican National Committee spokesman who used to work for Burr, questioned whether Trump was willing to endure the tussle and tedium of running or serving. Many people love the speculation and the attention, but being senator is a lot of hard work, he said.

First, however, there is the question of her residence. Lara Trump lives with her husband, Eric, and their children in the northern suburbs of New York City and would have to move back.

Then there is the less straightforward question of branding. The Trump family name is a wild card  it will be a plus with loyalists and fundraising nationally, but it could be a liability in a battleground that the former president won by a mere 1.3 percentage points in 2020. There is also a possibility Trumps candidacy could help increase Democratic turnout, especially among the states large Black population.

Or it might be a wash.

There is a myth that Trump voters will come out for Trump candidates or family members, said John Anzalone, a Democratic pollster and a veteran of campaigns in the South. Cult members only come out in full force for the cult leader.

That Trumps may-or-may-not-happen candidacy is generating buzz is, in itself, a reflection of the partys anxiety over its future.

Trumps boosters, led by Graham, view her presence as a way to weaponize the backlash against Burrs vote, seen as a betrayal sufficient to warrant a rebuke by the North Carolina GOP over his shocking and disappointing decision.

Others simply see Trump as a potentially well-funded candidate with the built-in advantage of sky-high name recognition.

Rep. Patrick McHenry, a Republican who represents the Greensboro area, downplayed the importance of Burrs vote but said Trump would be the odds-on favorite if she runs.

No one comes close, he said.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Missing suspected con artist Melissa Caddick has allegedly swindled at least 20 more victims out of their hard-earned savings, Australia's corporate regulator has said.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has reportedly been contacted by more burnt investors over the past six weeks, taking the number of those said to have been allegedly fleeced from 61 to 80, the Daily Telegraph reported.

The number of alleged victims is continuing to rise according to court documents lodged by ASIC in December.

Melissa Caddick went missing on November 11 from her Dover Heights home

'There is stark evidence of further victims of the suspected contraventions,' ASIC says in the papers tendered to the Federal Court.

'A large number of additional and, unsurprisingly, distressed consumers who claim to have invested with the defendants have contacted ASIC and provided further information and documents to ASIC regarding their investments which show that they have invested approximately $13.1million with the defendants.'

The financial advisor from Sydney's classy eastern suburbs went missing on November 11 when her $6.1million Dover Heights home was raided by ASIC over allegations she had used another person's financial services licence to run her business.

Caddick (pictured here with husband Anthony Koletti), who allegedly pocketed more than $20million from investors, lived a lavish lifestyle

Caddick, 49, has been accused of running an elaborate ponzi scheme to steal more than $20million from clients - including friends and family.

ASIC documents show she owned luxury cars, travelled widely and splurged hundreds of thousands of dollars on high end fashion labels including Chanel, Dior, Louis Vuitton and Oscar de la Renta.

She spent $229,277 on Dior alone in less than three years.

Caddick has been accused of siphoning millions of dollars from investors into 29 personal and company bank accounts.

NSW Police chief Mick Fuller revealed on Monday that missing persons detectives are investigating several different scenarios in the whereabouts of the missing Svengali.

Mr Fuller confirmed Caddick may have drastically changed her appearance to disguise herself in the local community - or that she somehow fled the country.

He told Radio 2GB detectives don't have specific leads as to who, if anyone, was assisting her.

But the veteran cop added if the suspected runaway conwoman has in fact fled overseas, she likely had help.

'You have to safely assume if her journey was to leave Australia and go overseas - particularly with the challenge of getting out of the country without specific Border Force approval - one would think she would have to have the help of someone,' Mr Fuller told breakfast host Ben Fordham.

Barbara and Edward Grimley, Melissa Caddick's elderly parents who may lose their home

Melissa Caddick's $6.1million Dover Heights home has come into focus after being raided

Caddick vanished more than three months ago, placing her in the rare 'two per center' club of people considered long-term missing persons by police.

Left in Caddick's wake are potentially dozens of victims of her allegedly fake financial advisory business - as well as her teenage son and elderly parents.

Daily Mail Australia revealed on Monday each of them could lose their homes due to federal court action against Caddick and her company by the corporate regulator.

Mr Fuller today confirmed that the Financial Crimes Squad is now working with the corporate regulator in its investigation into her alleged multi-million dollar fraud, amid recent suggestions a warrant could soon be issued for her arrest.

Off to the races: The once happy couple. Melissa Caddick and husband Anthony Koletti attending an event together

'At some stage, she will realise she's gonna have to turn herself in and face these allegations,' Mr Fuller said. 'I think the sooner she does that, if she's alive, the better.

'She's not the first person alleged to have engaged in fraudulent activity.

'I think for her, and her family, it's time to come home'.

Mr Fuller's remarks came as receivers are poised to report back to the Federal Court about Caddick and her company Maliver Pty Ltd's remaining assets.

The receivers' report will contain information about Caddick's assets and and will outline the amount of investors' funds she personally received from Maliver.

Liquidators will also report back on the likely returns due to creditors and will identify the investors who gave funds to Maliver, and to what extent.

Investors recently urged receivers to immediately sell Caddick's two mortgaged properties: the $6.2million property where she, husband Anthony Koletti and her son lived; and the $2.55million Edgecliff parents her elderly parents and older brother call home.
By Radhika Tiwari

New Delhi, Feb 15 (UNI) India should make special provision for Nepal in its foreign policy, especially to settle the border dispute, and treat the country as an equal in order to strengthen the relationship between the two sides, says Nepal Janata Dal (NJD) president Hari Charan Shah.



"India-Nepal are linked culturally since ancient times and we do not have many differences, except for the border disputes at Kalapani and a few other places, which I firmly believe can be resolved through diplomatic dialogues," Mr Shah told UNI.



"Other than that people of Nepal want their prime minister to be treated the same way the head of any other democratic country is treated in India. Mr Oli too is a democratically chosen leader like Mr Modi after all," Shah said, suggesting that his country feels sidelined by its age-old friend India.



Indo-Nepal ties hit a low in May 2020 when Nepal approved a new map including Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura under its territory - an action it said was in retaliation against the construction of a key road connecting the Lipulekh pass with Dharchula in Uttarakhand.



This claim was categorically refuted by India, which said that the road section in Pithoragarh district in Uttarakhand lies completely within its territory.



Since then, political leaders from both the sides are batting for a diplomatic dialogue to address the border issue once and for all.



"Once these issues are resolved, "we would like India-Nepal relations to start afresh," Mr Shah said in a conversation with this correspondent.



Last month the two neighbours took part in the Joint Commission Meeting, the first high-level conference post the dispute wherein External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and his Nepal counterpart Pradeep Kumar Gyawali discussed cooperation in a range of areas including economy and trade, border management, power, oil and gas, water resources, capacity building and tourism among others.



The Ministry of External Affairs ruled out any substantive dialogue with Nepal on the Kalapani border issue saying there was a separate mechanism to address the matter, although prime minister K P Sharma Oli had asserted in the National Assembly that discussions during Mr Gyawali's visit to India will be centred around Nepal's new political map.



Speaking about the current political turmoil in Kathmandu, where the lower house of Parliament has been dissolved, the NJD Chairman said, "The fact that it is the result of an internal conflict for power in the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) is not hidden from anyone. These communist parties have become opportunists. They (former prime minister Prachanda and present-day leader KP Sharma Oli) are no longer fighting on the moral ground. It has rather become a fight for more power, money and benefits."



"Nepal cannot progress on the lines of Marx and Lenin ideology of the West because our problems and the times we are in are different from that of theirs," said Mr Shah, adding that the current government and its allies are peddling the same old narratives that create a rift among its inhabitants, especially against the Madheshi community for minting votes.

"There is no innovation in their development policies and schemes and hardly any implementation," he alleged.



He also blamed China for the current upheaval in his homeland, "Prachanda and Oli are being tutored by the Chinese communists on the behest of Xi-Jinping. If it were development, I don't think we would have minded but we are scared that this may not be the case."



Soon after the dissolution of the Nepal Parliament, India distanced itself from the issue, calling it an "internal matter" of the country, whereas China jumped right into it for damage control by sending Guo Yezhou, a Vice-Minister of the International Department of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to Kathmandu. However, much could not be done to reach a consensus.



CCP and NCP have grown closer over time which has been made clearer by the fact that China has managed to surpass India by accounting for more than 60 per cent of the total FDI in Nepal. In the past three years, China has tripled its investment in the hospitality, tourism, cement manufacturing and construction sectors.



Mr Shah sought India's cooperation in "reviving democracy" in his country. "India has always helped Nepal in dire needs, the only way out that I can see in today's situation is India's cooperation for reviving democracy in here. We just need a clarion call, the people of Nepal will fight for themselves. All we need is a little help," he said.



He said that the India-Nepal relationship will flourish only if both countries have a like-minded government that strives for the development of its people.



The engineer-turned-politician also highlighted the problem of migration as the country's main headache. "As a result of poverty, unemployment, slow economic growth, and political instability at home more and more Nepalis are seeking work abroad, devoiding our country of its human resource. Forty lakh of our people are in India, about 10 lakh in the west. This problem needs to be taken seriously," he averred.



"One all these issues are settled, we would like to invite Indian industrialists and businesses to set up their plants in Nepal that will not only help us address the migration issue but will also push us to become a developed nation," he said, adding, "Padosi shakushal honge tabhi aap bhi chain ki neend so payenge (One will only be able to sleep soundly if their neighbours are at peace)."



Shah, who is in India for the past one month, has met quite a bunch of political leaders like BJP leaders Devendra Fadnavis, BL Santosh, Vijay Chauthaiwale, Sanjay Vinayak Joshi, Lok Jan Shakti Party's Chirag Paswan, Communist Party of India's D Raja, Janta Dal's Keshi Tyagi, Shiv Sena's Shashi Yadav and MP Rajan Vichare to discuss the Indo-Nepal relations.



Mr Shah also thanked India for the grant of one million doses of 'Make In India' Covid-19 vaccine to Nepal at a critical time when India was rolling out vaccination for its own people.



UNI RHK SRJ 1222
There have been 821 new cases of Covid-19 and no further deaths confirmed by the Department of Health this evening.

3,948 people have died with the virus in Ireland while the total case count has now risen to 210,402.

The national 14-day incidence per 100,000 people now stands at 272.

Of the cases notified today; 430 are male and 389 are Female; 70pc are under 45 years of age and the median age is 31 years old.

There have been 404 deaths so far in the month of February, Professor Philip Nolan of Nphet said at the bi-weekly Covid-19 press briefing.

There have been 333 new cases in Dublin, 91 in Galway, 53 in Limerick, 41 in Kildare, 38 in Meath and the remaining 265 cases are spread across all other counties.

As of 8am today, there were 916 Covid-19 patients hospitalised, of which 157 are in ICU. 40 people have been hospitalised with the virus in the past 24 hours.

Read More

As of last Friday, 265,237 doses of Covid-19 vaccine were administered: 175,238 first doses and 89,999 people have received their second dose.

Dr Ronan Glynn, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health, said: With the commencement of vaccination of people aged over 85 in the community, today marks a significant milestone as we seek to protect the most vulnerable from this pandemic. It is an extraordinary testament to science that less than one year since our first case in Ireland, we are now in the process of rolling out three effective vaccines. The challenge now is to continue to suppress this disease so that as many people as possible can benefit from these vaccines over the coming months.

Prof Nolan said we are making continued progress in the suppression of the virus but said the rate of the progress may be slowing down. He said Ireland still had a long way to go to get case numbers down to a safer level.

The testing of asymptomatic cases may be leading to a drop off in progress with regard to reduction in daily case numbers, Prof Nolan said.

The admission of Covid-19 patients to ICU has declined sharply, along with the number of deaths due to the suppression of the virus, with prevalence of the virus among older age groups steadily declining.

Dr Lorraine Doherty, National Clinical Director for Health Protection, said there have been reported outbreaks among students including 120 cases among students in Limerick recently.

Dr Doherty said the incidence among some groups of students was concerning.

There are 29 open outbreaks in meat plants currently, Dr Glynn said, adding there was one outbreak linked to a meat plant that had 125 new cases.

Dr Glynn said Ireland was very far off scenarios that are being entertained in the UK where restaurants may be permitted to open but without alcohol. He said case numbers were far too high for such suggestions to even be considered.

The Deputy CMO acknowledged the boredom people are experiencing but said there are brighter days ahead and urged people to stick with this.

Dr. Sumi Dunne said the level of vaccine confidence and enthusiasm for vaccination in the over 85 group has been widely reported, along with a sense of relief as hope for a normal life returns.

The death rate from the UK variant - which is now responsible for 75pc of cases in Ireland - may be 65pc higher than strains of the coronavirus seen in Ireland in the first wave, a newly released report from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) indicated today.

The risk assessment report states that preliminary analyses conducted in the UK show the risk ratio of death was 1.65 in the UK variant, compared to other less virulent strains. This means that the variant which is now dominant in Ireland, could be 65pc more lethal than previous dominant strains here.

While the ECDC report points out there were limitations to the dataset used in the analyses conducted on the variant of concern, it supported NERVTAGs assessment that it is likely that infection with this variant is associated with an increased risk of hospitalisation and death.

Dr Glynn said the data mentioned in the ECDC report was preliminary data from early UK studies and as of yet, Ireland has not yet witnessed evidence of increased mortality from the B.1.1.7 UK variant. He said this will be kept under constant review.

There is no evidence that the efficacy of vaccines will be affected by the dominant UK variant, Dr Ronan Glynn said.

He said the South African, unfortunately, does appear to hinder the efficacy of certain vaccines and reminded people variants that may come down the line may also do this.

There are still just 11 cases with the South African variant confirmed in Ireland so far, with no new cases found during recent genetic sequencing.

There has been a very positive trend in the nursing home sector, as there were just five new outbreaks in nursing homes across the country last week, compared to 23 two weeks beforehand and 46 four weeks ago, Dr Glynn pointed out.

While the ECDC report points out there were limitations to the dataset used in the analyses conducted on the variant of concern, it supported NERVTAGs assessment that it is likely that infection with this variant is associated with an increased risk of hospitalisation and death.

The UK variant has also been shown to be 56pc more transmissible than previous variants circulating, according to studies quoted in the ECDC report.

Earlier today, Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly unveiled the location for all 37 mass vaccination centres across the country, with at least one centre in every county. Cork has five centres, Dublin has four and four counties have two, while all others have one centre.

Northern Ireland today crossed the milestone of 2,000 fatalities from Covid-19 as it recorded four further deaths and 234 new cases today.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 01:28:01|Editor: huaxia

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PRETORIA, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese embassy in South Africa on Sunday held a virtual Chinese New Year celebrations to welcome the year of the ox.

More than 130,000 people watched the event online, entertained by the Chinese community singing and dancing.

South African Minister of Tourism Mmamoloko Kubayi-Ngubane said the country enjoys cordial relations with China in the fields of politics, trade, people to people, tourism, science and technology.

She said South Africa expects to cooperate with China this year to revive the tourism sector and the economy.

"As we fight the pandemic with tourism being the hardest hit sector, we look to China as the key source market to help us recover as a sector and in terms of the economy," she said.

"We look forward to the upcoming year, for rejuvenation of bilateral cooperation of our two countries in the spirit of renewal, revitalization and new beginning," added the minister.

The Chinese ambassador to South Africa Chen Xiaodong said South Africa has been working together with his country to fight COVID-19. He said the ox symbolizes hard work and fortitude.

"In the coming Chinese New Year, let us carry forward the spirit of the ox to continue to fight the pandemic, work hard and advance cooperation. Let us wish together progress and fruitful outcomes in China-South Africa and China-Africa cooperation," Chen said. Enditem
Lucknow: Girdhari, the main shooter involved in the murder case of history-sheeter Ajit Singh, shot dead by Police in an encounter on Monday (February 15) morning. The shooter was trying to escape from the Police custody in Vibhuti Khand of Gomati Nagar following which the encounter took place.

Ajit Singh, the henchman of gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari, was shot dead near the Kathauta crossing in Lucknow on January 6, 2021.

Lucknow: Girdhari, the main shooter involved in the murder case of history sheeter Ajit Singh, shot dead by Police in an encounter earlier this morning. He was trying to escape from Police custody in Vibhuti Khand following which the encounter took place. pic.twitter.com/NlqdoOCGGD  ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) February 15, 2021

Meanwhile, other details are awaited.
Flash floods in Uttarakhand's Chamoli have increased turbidity of raw water fetched by Delhi from Upper Ganga Canal to "unprecedented levels" which is likely to hit water supply in many parts of the national capital, DJB vice chairman Raghav Chadha said on Sunday.

In a series of tweets, Chadha said the Sonia Vihar and Bhagirathi water treatment plants were functioning at reduced capacity. He said the supply is likely to be affected in south, east and northeast Delhi and urged people to use water judiciously.

"In the aftermath of #UttarakhandDisaster, turbidity in raw water fetched by Delhi from Upper Ganga Canal has increased to unprecedented levels (8000 NTU). As a result, @DelhiJalBoard's Sonia Vihar & Bhagirathi Water Treatment Plants currently operating at reduced capacity," tweeted Chadha, who is also an Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA.

The DJB is deploying water tankers in adequate numbers and all possible efforts are being made to reduce turbidity in water, he said.

"Turbidity is the measure of relative clarity of a liquid. Turbidity is measured in Nephelometric Turbidity Units (NTU). High turbidity can be caused by debris, silt, mud, algae, plant pieces, melting glaciers, sawdust, wood ashes or chemicals in the water," he tweeted.

Following a break in a glacier in Chamoli district of Uttarakhand, flash floods in Dhauliganga and Alaknanda rivers caused massive destruction of lives and property, last week.

Chamoli District Magistrate Swati Bhadauria had said 38 bodies were recovered from the flood-hit areas of Chamoli district while 166 are still missing.

The rescue operations are still underway to save those who are trapped in the destroyed hydel projects in the area.

Also Read: Uttarakhand flood: Tapovan tunnel rescue ops underway; 32 bodies recovered, 206 still missing
President Joe Biden will hold his first event with other leaders from the Group of Seven nations in a virtual meeting on Friday to discuss the coronavirus pandemic, the world economy and dealing with China, the White House said on Sunday.

The meeting is the first by top leaders from the G7 group of rich democracies since April, it said.

"This virtual engagement with leaders of the world's leading democratic market economies will provide an opportunity for President Biden to discuss plans to defeat the COVID-19 pandemic, and rebuild the global economy," the White House said in a statement.

The White House said Biden would focus his remarks on a global response to COVID-19 vaccine production and distribution as well as "continued efforts to mobilize and cooperate against the threat of emerging infectious diseases by building country capacity and establishing health security financing."

Biden, a Democrat who took over from Republican former President Donald Trump on Jan. 20, has sought to project a message of re-engagement with the world and with global institutions after four years of his predecessor's "America First" mantra.

Trump withdrew the United States from the World Health Organization and the Paris climate accord and largely scoffed at multilateral organizations and groups.

Biden brought the United States back into the WHO and rejoined the Paris accord and has signaled a desire to work with allies in confronting China on a host of thorny issues.

"President Biden will also discuss the need to make investments to strengthen our collective competitiveness and the importance of updating global rules to tackle economic challenges such as those posed by China," the White House said.

Trump challenged China over its trade policies by imposing punishing tariffs, an instrument he also used on traditional allies, drawing criticism for not taking a more unified approach with US friends to stand up to Beijing on issues such as intellectual property theft and other economic practices.

Domestically, Biden is pressing Congress to pass a $1.9 trillion stimulus package to boost the US economy and provide relief for those suffering from the pandemic.

The White House said he would discuss his economic agenda with G7 counterparts and encourage them and all industrialized countries to maintain "economic support for the recovery" and other collective measures.

Climate change would also be on the agenda.

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen spoke to her G7 counterparts last week and called for continued fiscal support to secure the economic recovery.

Also read: COVID-19: UK says it shares US concerns over WHO mission to China

Also read: Boris Johnson set to host virtual meeting of G7 leaders on February 19
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I was a ten-year-old, but the memories of the '62 debacle are eidetically etched in my mind; that feeling of helplessness of the elders, their sense of shame, the silent imprecations, the muted curses in private but dignified poise in public, were a temporal marker in the growth of my consciousness as an Indian.

The short war, while it lasted, was an unending season of solemnity and sadness. My father tried to explain to me the enormity of the loss, the depth of our humiliation. I dont know how much of it sank in me cognitively, but the emotional equivalent seeped through me, as if by a process of osmosis. That moment forever lodged itself like an iron in the soul. My young mind, perhaps in a compensatory behaviour, supported a belief that someday, we will be able to pay back the debt of history.

As I grew up and became wiser in the ways of the world - especially when I became aware of the contretemps of political power play and the metrics of military confrontations - I modified my unstated wish into a more moderate plea: Oh, God, please dont let us face the same humiliation, at least not in my lifetime.

The recent traumatic events of our soldiers fighting, unarmed, under some weird protocol, against a devious and barbaric enemy, soldiers being clubbed, being pushed off cliffs and dying of hypothermia, though not in same category of misfortunes, are rooted in reasons quite similar. I was reminded of Brigadier Dalwi's lament in The Himalayan Blunder, "This is a record of the destruction of a Brigade without a formal declaration of war". This time round, at least twenty Indian soldiers died, and many more were injured, in an absurd engagement, without so much as a chance for our men to fire a shot - something straight out of an Italo Calvino or Kurt Kusenburg story.

In 1962, we had a Prime Minister who felt more at home strutting on the international stage, peddling his peculiar nostrums of non-alignment and Panchsheel to enhance his personal standing in the world. Getting China - which was perceived to be an enemy by everyone else except him - its due place under the sun was his seminal concern. Despite repeatedly being warned of the bellicosity of the Chinese by those who knew, he refused to square up to the reality, because how could he - a man of peace - countenance the thought of war? It seems he was prepared to lose territory rather than lose his face. His paranoia about the military eyeing his ouster led him to deliberately starve it of resources and stunt its growth. Finally, when the moment of reckoning came, he entrusted the conduct of war to those who had no other credential than that they enjoyed his trust: Krishna Menon & General Kaul. But talent for intrigue and currying favour does not come in handy in fighting a war. The rest, as they say, is history.

We have now a high-profile PM who is also a global player, bonding on equal personal terms with POTUS. At the same time, in a seemingly deft act of diplomacy, he sleeps with Americas and our own arch enemy - China. Reportedly, he has established a personal equation with President Xi Jinping. But other than diplomacy, he has also let himself be known as a decisive man of war, and has tried to live by this image. All the spectacular military feats against Pakistan, our idee fixe - are supposed to flow from his iron will.

General Kauls seem to be an undying tribe in the army, and even now, reportedly, an unhealthy proximity between the military and political leadership has grown. And it has consequences. History bears witness that China strikes at an opportune moment (in '62 the world attention was riveted on the Cuban missile crisis, today the world is snowed under the Wuhan Virus avalanche originating from China) and in such a manner that the friend feels obliged to cover up for the enemy and go into denial for fear of losing face. 2020 is not 1962, and such matters are independently verifiable. Hence his government has been in denial, and has felt obliged to prevaricate, obfuscate, and tell downright lies to domestic audience. Now that the truth is out the government finds itself hard-pressed to admit and explain the killing of soldiers. From denial, the government has come down to the familiar mournful tune of 'stabbing in the back.' When a war seems to be the only course of action, policy planners seem to have discovered that the national interest is best served by diplomacy, peaceful negotiations and avoidance of war. And China loves, as always, has plotted the mortification of its ambitious neighbour just as it did in '62 ; it is China's way to tell the world who is the hegemon. The situation is still live, and one cant look into the seeds of the time, but there does not seem to be much cause for joy.

But what about the simulated war being fought with greater seriousness within the borders of the country? Going by the social media posts, one would think that a large number of Indians take the reality of the disputed "Modi jee's 56 inches" quite seriously. The mobilization on both sides is impressive; a sizeable population is attacking their bete noire with all they have: invective, satire, mockery and moralism, and an equal number defending their bete noire with all they have - lies, chicanery, and recourse to the history of Congress. Of course, Mr. Modis jugular is quite a prized trophy for his detractors, but it is way too insignificant compared to the Chinese jugular. Of course, political scores need to be settled but not when we are in the process of a debt that the nation owes to history. Admittedly it is a lying, self-obsessed government, but unfortunately this is the only government that we have at the present time, and the conduct of war is in the hands of this government. Persistent questioning is all right, the right to be told the truth is spot on, but this rubbing brings in defenders, the battalion of Bhakts, and the discourse becomes divisive when the call of the hour is to put everything in abeyance. Similarly, the Bhakts who try to hang their "56-inch" on any peg that is available, are sure to bring, in retaliation, the demolition squads in droves.

On Twitter, there was a bare as bone tweet  "twenty soldiers killed in Ladakh." Pat came a retweet form a journalist of repute, a leading light of the left liberal brigade, with the following comment: "Knock, knock, Modi jee, are you there?"

Social media is overflowing with callous and crass remarks and this is just an emblematic example. But little do they realise that they are trivialising the tragic death of our soldiers fighting under impossible constraints. To offset it, there is another example of a paid, commissioned anchor of a Hindi TV channel trying to salvage the image of the government by shifting the blame on to the Army. Whose war are those brave men fighting anyway?

I remember the emotional climate of 62, and I can definitely say that a feeling pulse in our national heart has atrophied, gone dry. The difference in the public mood between '62 and now is dramatic. In '62, Indian women - for whom gold means a part of their lives - came forward to freely donate it to the national defence fund without demur. (When boycott of Chinese goods is mentioned today, figures and fine economic calculations roll out. This gestures of solidarity against the enemy is not economically feasible, we are told!) The unlettered, untutored masses knew that it was matter of life and death and the nation spoke in a chorus of approval for the nation, for the army. I exclude the communists, because they are a class apart, a different species.

If ever there was a case of not learning the lessons of history, this is the one. Or is it that in a globalised world profit is placed above patriotism? May be some favourable economic deal with the Chinese will act as a healing balm and we will again be dining with the Dragon till such times it makes a decent dinner of us.

Tonight, I will tell my God that He should consider my unstated prayer as withdrawn.

India Today magazine once referred to Manoje Nath, a 1973-batch IPS officer, as being fiercely independent, honest, and upright. Besides his numerous official reports on various issues exposing corruption in the bureaucracy in Bihar, Nath is also a writer extraordinaire expressing his thoughts on subjects ranging from science fiction to the effects of globalization. His sense of humor was evident through his extremely popular series named "Gulliver in Pataliputra" and "Modest Proposals" that were published in the local newspapers.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 09:48:07|Editor: huaxia

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NEW YORK, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has applauded China's determination to prioritize the climate and its contributions to carbon reduction, saying the world benefits from the country's efforts to make green energy more affordable.

"It's great that President Xi is making climate a priority and wants to work with other countries on this," said Gates, also co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, in an exclusive interview with Xinhua.

China aims to have CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, said Chinese President Xi Jinping in September 2020 at the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly via video.

"Without the contributions of China, many of the key ingredients (in fighting climate change) like the batteries and solar power wouldn't be so affordable," Gates said.

China and some other countries have reduced the cost of solar power and electric cars, driving prices down to facilitate worldwide adoption, he said, adding that electric buses are becoming the norm in many Chinese cities.

China is also doing a lot to build up its electricity grid to use more renewable energy, said the U.S. billionaire philanthropist. "I hope that innovators in China can bring down the cost of green energy enough, so that China can even increase its commitment to use renewable energy in the Belt and Road Initiative."

Citing many sources of emissions like steel and cement factories and the way people grow rice, make fertilizer and raise livestock, Gates said that the world cannot skip over any of these to reach zero emissions.

"To solve these problems, innovation is a key," Gates said, noting that Chinese companies are increasing their R&D budgets.

Describing basic R&D as a huge area for cooperation, Gates called upon China and the United States, the world's two largest economies, to work together to promote R&D and help reduce the green premium for the entire world.

Climate change and innovation are areas that China and the United States could achieve big win-win results, he said.

"Both countries have amazing smart people in the younger generation that would be proud to be part of this," Gates said. Enditem
(Newser)  "They'll have to break in to arrest and imprison me," Spanish rapper Pablo Hasel tweeted Monday after barricading himself inside a university building with around 50 supporters. Hasel, who holds radical leftist and anti-establishment views, was supposed to surrender to authorities by last Friday to begin serving a nine-month prison sentence for tweets and lyrics attacking the police and monarchy and praising banned guerrilla groups, the BBC reports. Hasel and his supporters locked himself inside a building at Catalonia's Lleida University and said they would wait for police to arrive. "We are trying to raise awareness of what is happening," he tells Reuters. "This is a very serious attack on our freedoms, not just on me."

story continues below

In his tweets and lyrics, Hasel accused police of torturing and killing migrants. He also likened former king Juan Carlos to a Mafia boss. He was convicted under a 2015 law known as the "gag law," which bans insulting the monarchy and glorifying terrorism. The case has sparked a national debate over free speech and more than 200 artists, including director Pedro Almodovar, have signed a petition against imprisoning Hasel. His sentence "leaves the sword hanging over the heads of all public figures who dare to openly criticize the actions of state institutions all the more evident," the petition states, per the AP. The government responded to the uproar by saying it will reduce the penalty for crimes involving freedom of expression, though it didn't mention Hasel's sentence. (Read more Spain stories.)
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PHOENIX  Prosecutors are moving to dismiss charges against 16 people accused of crimes that included assisting or participating in a criminal street gang after being arrested at a protest against police brutality.

Maricopa County Attorney Allister Adel said in a brief statement released Friday night that her office filed motions to dismiss the charges stemming from the Oct. 17 protest in downtown Phoenix while it reevaluates evidence that has been and continues to be submitted for review.

The motions said the dismissals were requested in the interest of justice.

Adels statement did not elaborate, but she said her office remains committed to holding those who committed criminal events in this event responsible.

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The motions requested dismissal without prejudice, which would allow charges to be refiled.

The motions followed investigative reports by Phoenix television station KNXV on the gang charges and circumstances related to handling of other protests.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona and others had called the gang charges against the protesters an abusive political prosecution intended to silence dissent and scare protesters.

These political prosecutions should have never happened in the first place .We demand accountability for all prosecutors and police officers involved, the ACLU of Arizona said Friday night on Twitter.

The Arizona gang law allegedly violated by the protesters includes indicators such as wearing of uniforms and proclaiming gang membership, and police contended the protesters met those criteria by wearing black clothes, carrying umbrellas and chanting a slogan critical of police, KNXV reported.

A police sergeant and a prosecutor called the protesters dangerous and compared them to such notorious gangs such as the Crips, Bloods and Hells Angels, KNXV reported.

Defense lawyers and others welcomed the dismissal motions but said the charges should be be dismissed with prejudice, meaning they couldnt be refiled, KNXV reported.

Along with the felony gang allegation, the motions would dismiss felony charges of rioting and obstructing a public thoroughfare and a misdemeanor charge of unlawful assembly.

Before Adel announced the motions, Phoenix City Councilwoman Debra Stark earlier Friday had called the gang charges troubling and said she hoped theyd be dropped.
Moscow, Feb 15 : Internet access in Myanmar is returning to normal after a full-blown connection snap amid ongoing protests in the country against the military takeover, traffic tracker NetBlocks reported on Monday.

"Internet connectivity is being restored in #Myanmar from 9 am local time; network data show national connectivity rising to ordinary levels after information blackout; social media still restricted for most users; incident duration ~8 hours," Sputnik news reported citing NetBlocks.

On Sunday, the watchdog confirmed that a "near-total Internet shutdown" was in effect in the country starting 1 a.m. local time (18.30 GMT on Saturday) following "state-ordered information blackout," with national connectivity down to 14 per cent of normal levels.

On February 1, the Myanmar military seized power hours before the new parliament was due to hold its inaugural session.

Myanmar's de facto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, was arrested alongside other senior officials, after the military accused her party of rigging the November elections.

Protests have since broken out nationwide to demanding restoration of the civilian government.
NEW DELHI : Future Retail Ltd (FRL) today said Amazon has approached the Supreme Court against a Delhi High Court order that vacated the status quo on Future Group's proposed 24,713 crore-deal with Reliance Industries.

Future Retail Ltd in a regulatory filing to stock exchanges said that it "shall defend the matter/proceedings through its legal counsels".

Amazon and Future are locked in a bitter legal tussle after the US e-commerce giant dragged Future Group to arbitration at SIAC, arguing that the latter had violated their contract by entering into the deal with Reliance.

"... Company's advocates are in receipt of communication dated 13th February, 2021 from advocates of Amazon.com NV Investment Holdings LLC ("Amazon") informing that Amazon has filed a Special Leave Petition before the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India against the captioned Order dated 8th February 2021 passed by the Division Bench of the Hon'ble High Court of Delhi in FAO (OS) (COMM.) No. 21 of 2021 and C.M. No. 4124/2021 in FAO (OS) (COMM) No. 21 of 2021. FRL said in the filing.

Amazon had moved the Supreme Court in a bid to block Future Group's deal with Reliance after the Delhi High Court stayed a previous order of status quo on the deal. The court had also said that statutory authorities cannot be restrained from acting in accordance with law. The scheme of arrangement related to the Future-Reliance deal has already received approval from the Competition Commission of India (CCI) and no objection from market regulator Sebi as well as bourses. The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), Mumbai was approached for approval of the deal on January 26, 2021.

Last month, Amazon had approached the Delhi High Court seeking enforcement of the interim order of the Emergency Arbitrator (EA) at the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) that had restrained FRL from going ahead with the deal with Reliance.

The court had directed FRL and other parties to maintain status quo on the deal and the same was stayed later. Delhi High Court has passed this interim order while reserving the final order, which is yet to be pronounced.

Amazon had invested in Future Coupons in August 2019, with an option of buying into the flagship FRL after a period of 3 to 10 years.





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GARDAI are appealing for information following a number of recent burglaries in rural areas of the Limerick garda division.

In one incident a tractor battery and a chainsaw were taken by an intruder who entered a shed in the Ardnacrusha area.

"The home owner left his house at 7.30 in the morning, when he returned at 12 midday he could see that his shed had been

broken into and a chainsaw and a tractor battery taken," said divisional crime prevention officer Sergeant Ber Leetch.

In a separate incident, the owner of a vacant house at main street in Oola discovered that the washing machine had been taken from the property.

"Most of us are spending more time at home than ever before so now is a good time to become a good neighbour or member of your community. Do this by keeping an eye out for others. If you see something suspicious in your area like a person or a vehicle, get as much descriptive detail as possible and contact your local garda station and let the gardai take it from there," said Sgt Leetch.

Hill+Knowlton Strategies (H+K), one of the worlds leading international public relations agencies, announces the introduction of their global specialism Content + Publishing Strategy to its India operations. Thenew offer will provide new and existing clients with innovative and integrated solutions.

H+Ks Content + Publishing Strategy specialty is built on the idea that content and where it is placed should be based on consumer behaviour. With the launch of this service, H+K India will deliver best-in-class content + publishing strategiesspanning the entire paid, earned, shared and owned model. The team is backed by experts in data andanalytics, digital media buyingand designersto ensure ideasspan across earned, owned,paid and shared spacesfor local and global clientsin various industries and sectors.

Shubhangi Mehta joins H+K Indiaas Director of Content + Publishing Strategy to drive this new offer within the country, and will lead, develop and deliver strategies for a wide range of clients. She will be connected to the H+K Innovation + Creative regional hub in Dubai, which fuels H+Ks future strategy for communications.It is hometoCreative Strategists working alongside Sector specialists, experts in Digital Planning + Optimisation paired with Public Affairs consultants, and Creative Directors partnered with Content + PublishingStrategists and Communication consultants  all focused on the same client-centric goals. A fluidity of skills between H+Ks global network ensures clients have access to the right people, at the right time, in the right place.

Shubhangi brings in-depth knowledge in Digital and Content Marketing, Brand Strategy and Leadership Communication, and has professional experience spanning 15 years, global organisations and brands including Reuters, Haymarket Media Group, ITC, ISWAI and PepsiCo.

Commenting on the announcement, Abhishek Gulyani, CEO for Hill+Knowlton Strategies India, said,I am very excited to launch our Content + Publishing Strategy specialism in India, furthering our content marketing capabilities across the country. We believe purpose driven communications along with high impact innovative campaigns help brands to standout and build key differentiators. With our new offering, not only will we deliverbest-in-classContent + Publishing Strategies, butwe will also be able to provide clients access to the best of our creative talent across H+Ks global network.

We welcome Shubhangi into the H+K family. Clients increasingly look to H+K for deeper understanding of content trends to help align their communications and business objectives. With Shubhangis extensive experience and in-depth knowledge, she will bringfresh thinking, perspective andideas for our clients across varied sectors.The new Content + Publishing Strategy offering is a part of our overall strategy to provide integrated communications to clients and we will continue expanding the space in the years ahead.

H+K has offices in more than 40 countries worldwide, delivering award winning campaigns to clients across all sectors and disciplines and with a focus on continued innovation for the industry.
Last years events impacted all areas, including sci-tech prospects in Vietnam. What was still achieved in 2020 despite the restrictions?

Tran Van Tung, Deputy Minister of Science and Technology

The Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) has taken the initiative in improving sci-tech capacity to solve difficulties and spur economic growth, ensuring social security and peoples livelihoods during the pandemic. As a result, some outstanding achievements were made: successfully cultivating and isolating the coronavirus; researching and manufacturing quick test kits to meet local demand and serve exports; testing Nano Covax  the first Vietnamese-made COVID-19 vaccine  on humans; and doing research, producing, and successfully testing robots used in hospitals and isolation areas, among other things.

The sci-tech market also saw a fall in connectivity and promotional activities at home and abroad. Moreover, technology transfer was also disrupted by a strong decrease in business demands.

The local market saw certain positive signals in the last months of 2020 when the pandemic was controlled. A number of events on sci-tech development were held, including the Week of Technology Connectivity, which attracted over 10,000 visitors and participants and showcased over 1,000 products. Meanwhile, Techfest Vietnam 2020 drew in over 6,500 participants and 300 businesses to showcase their products, with investment connectivity activities attracting many investors and startups with the investment value reaching $14 million.

While businesses are ready for technological innovation, their demands are yet to be met as the government had to focus on policies to prevent and fight against COVID-19. This has made big impacts on their plans for technology exchanges and transactions, on supply-demand connectivity, promotion activities for technology exchanges, and more.

To this end, the government issued resolutions, decrees, and decisions on continuing sci-tech market development. They include Resolution No.58/NQ-CP from last April on the government action programme to implement 2019s Resolution No.50-NQ/TW, giving directions to complete the legal framework to increase quality of foreign direct investment (FDI) attraction by 2030; and 2019s Conclusion No.50-KL/TW on the development of science and technology to serve the countrys industrialisation. The MoST also issued Decision No.1646/QD-BKHCN dated June 2020 on restructuring sci-tech services by 2025; and Decision No.2579/QD-BKHCN from last September on the Action Plan to implement Resolution 58.

Following the programme on sci-tech market development by 2030, intermediate units are established and are improving capacity; especially, technology transaction floors have been developed and connected online in cities and provinces such as Haiphong, Thai Binh, Nam Dinh, and Ninh Binh, thus creating a foundation for connecting transaction floors at home and abroad. In addition, the value of sci-tech products and services in transactions in 2012-2020 made up 20.9 per cent of the whole economy.

Resolutions are fostering encouragement between businesses for more tech cooperation. Photo: Shutterstock

What does the development strategy look like for the sci-tech market this year and towards 2025?

The organisation of events on supply-demand connectivity and technology transfer will likely still need to be made online because COVID-19 is still causing major problems worldwide. Innovation among businesses should be studied and assessed, and then proposals made on supporting policies to facilitate them in accelerating innovation activities, thus increasing technology capacity to improve productivity, product and service quality, and competitiveness in the market.

Industry 4.0 is taking place at unprecedented speed and breadth, forcing Vietnams sci-tech market to develop further and closely align with the development of the banking-finance market, the labour market, and the common goods market, thus importantly contributing to the national digital transformation path.

In this trend, some orientations on Vietnams sci-tech market development in the next five years have been worked out. To start with, its development should be in line with the law of objectivity and economic performance on the basis of increasing effectiveness of state management to align it with the socialist-oriented market economy.

Additionally, development will take a business-centric approach. The state has a facilitating role and builds a legal framework and supporting policies without deep intervention into market performance. To keep up with Industry 4.0 and increasingly global integration, the attraction of private investment and resources should be a focus to help speed up the process of product and service innovation with high technology content.

Sci-tech advances should also be in line with the resolutions of the Party and laws and policies of the state on sci-tech, economic development, and environmental protection; step by step boosting commercialisation of research, intellectual property, and increasing peoples awareness about the importance of sci-tech towards national socioeconomic development.

This work should also take place hand in hand with ensuring the intellectual property rights of organisations and individuals, which requires the synchronisation of technology infrastructure, economic infrastructure, capacity of intermediate units, readiness of the supply, and absorption capacity.

Finally, the sci-tech market needs to integrate with regional and international equivalents to lure in the necessary resources, strengthening sci-tech exports.

In the next five years, the sci-tech market will focus on developing new transaction exchange platforms with the application of Industry 4.0 technologies in order to tap into the advantages of the internet, AI, and blockchain, thus increasing global integration, reducing intermediate costs, increasing transparency, satisfying market demands, and enhancing goods flows.

Elsewhere, we must develop the market for the products of leading sci-tech groups to increase the international competitiveness of Vietnamese products while strengthening innovation activities and developing a startup ecosystem.

Also important is mulling over a regulatory sandbox, clarifying the schedule and space for its application in each sector and the pertaining conditions, after careful analysis of the specific policy situations.

What opportunities await domestic and foreign enterprises once 5G is widely commercialised in Vietnam?

IT infrastructure is an important foundation for us to perform digital transformation and develop the digital economy in Vietnam. 5G is the cornerstone technology in the countrys IT infrastructure development.

We should dream about 5G, and sales of made-in-Vietnam products and services in the international market. What concerns us is how we can successfully carry out digital transformation and tap into 5G in an efficient manner.

Evidently, we have a lot of work to do. From the macro perspective, tasks include restructuring financial, labour, and sci-tech markets to create new growth motivation while ensuring the reasonable allocation and use of national resources.

Regarding specific issues, powerful research teams are being developed; we are seeing the development of mechanical technology, metallurgy, material technology, and mold technology; and administrative reforms and intellectual property protection is also being carried out.

How can Vietnams commitments in new-generation free trade agreements (FTAs) expand business opportunities in tech?

Vietnam is increasingly integrating into the global economy. Trade liberalisation and global economic integration have created new advantages to spur the development of productive forces, trade flows among countries, thus contributing to optimising the competitive advantages of countries in the global economy.

However, this presents huge challenges for Vietnamese businesses, especially private ones. They have to face stiffening competition from more rivals on a larger scale even in the domestic market. In this context, we have to deploy many solutions in a synchronous manner such as stimulating of domestic consumption, spurring intra-regional trade, and connecting to the international market to tap into outside technology and resources amid the restructuring of international trade chains in the post-pandemic landscape.

In legislation such as resolutions 58 and 50, key tasks include encouraging technology cooperation and transfer and governance based on agreements with Vietnamese firms; enacting a standard system and national technical regulations for products, environmental protection, resources, and energy saving to align them with international and regional standards; completing regulations on startups; supporting policies for domestic suppliers to link with foreign-invested enterprises to enable them to increase their technology absorption; and completing policies to improve the operational efficiency of high-tech parks.

Membership in key FTAs will open opportunities for investors and businesses in Vietnam to approach flows of advanced technology and cheaper capital sources. Moreover, the agreements such as the one made with the EU also urge institutional reform, the renovation of the growth model, and inclusive innovation.
MBABANE - The Royal Eswatini Police Service (REPS) has warned the public against travelling in nine listed areas.

This is because as of Saturday, these places, which include inaccessible roads and flooded rivers, were not ideal for usage as they posed a danger.

These places have been worsened by the ongoing rainfalls which started on Friday.

In a notice issued by Deputy Police Information and Communications Officer Inspector Nosipho Mnguni, she singled out five bridges that people should not dare cross.

These are Mtimphofu at Siphofaneni, Tsambokhulu Bridge at Lomahasha, Mtindzekwa River, Dvokodvweni/Sidzakeni Bridge, Mbuluzi River at Luve/Mbelebeleni.

Mnguni also issued a list of damaged roads leading to some areas. The areas included Mambane, Maphungwane and Tikhuba in Siteki, Ndzangu, Magwanyane, and Dvokodvweni.

Asked about drowning incidents, Mnguni said police were still searching for the body of a 15-year-old who drowned at the Great Usuthu River at KaNdinda.

The teenager is believed to have drowned last Friday.

Recently, the country lost a number of people who drowned in flooded rivers during the course of the heavy rains caused by Cyclone Eloise.

Among those who drowned was well-known traditional healer Elliot Fakudze, popularly known as Black Cat (Ikati elimnyama). Fakudze drowned while crossing the flooded Mndobandoba Bridge.

He was driving his Toyota Fortuner with three passengers on board.

Two survived while one passenger died along with Fakudze.






Brattleboro, VT (05301)

Today

Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch..

Tonight

Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch.
Rajnish Kumar, former chairman, State Bank of India (SBI)

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Former State Bank of India (SBI) Chairman Rajnish Kumar had to secure a No Objection Certificate (NoC) from the central government before taking up his next assignment at the Kotak Mahindra Group just four months after he exited the top post of country's largest lender.

This is because the rules prohibit retired PSU bank chairmen from joining other companies within a year of retirement. An NoC from the Government of India was needed, which I have taken (Sic), Rajnish Kumar told Moneycontrol.

Kotak Investment Advisors (KIAL) on February 12 announced that Kumar would be the exclusive advisor for its $1 billion Special Situation Fund. KIAL is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Kotak Mahindra Bank Limited, a competitor to SBI, that focuses on the Alternate Assets business of the Group. It was set up in early 2005 to focus on the Groups alternate assets.

The former SBI chairman had taken up an advisory role with Baring Private Equity Partners India earlier this month. He retired from SBI in October 2020 and has nearly 40 years of experience. Kumar, who joined SBI as a Probationary Officer in 1980, is credited with the mega-merger of seven banks with Indias largest lender.

KIAL had recently announced that it has achieved closure of its new Real Estate Fund worth around $380 million (Rs 2,770 crore approximately), which will target a host of real estate financing opportunities across key cities in the country.

Kumar is not the first SBI Chairman joining private organisations. His predecessor at SBI, Arundhati Bhattacharya, is the India CEO of US Cloud-based service provider, Salesforce.com Inc. Bhattacharya joined the post in March 2020. Most other former SBI Chairmen too have taken up either advisory roles or directorship in different companies.

During Kumar's tenure, SBI moved ahead with its digital drive through SBIs YONO platform and consolidated its troubled corporate accounts. Kumars biggest challenge during his term was managing the bailout of Yes Bank in March this year. Yes Bank, ravaged by frauds by the previous management and critical financial position, was in ICU when Kumar got the call to lead the rescue. The bailout team comprised half of the banking industry and was guided by a time-bound plan framed by the banking regulator in consultation with the government.

Yes Bank will not be allowed to fail. Some solution will come, Kumar once said when there was still uncertainty over the banks future. He moved swiftly and spearheaded the bailout, which included appointing a former SBI executive Prashant Kumar, as the administrator of the bank. Rajnish Kumar received praise from all quarters for smoothly conducting the whole process and handing over Yes Bank to a safer management.
Wipro Limited (NYSE: WIT, BSE: 507685, NSE: WIPRO), a leading global information technology, consulting, and business process services company, today announced a five-year strategic partnership with Telefonica Germany O2, a leading provider of mobile telecommunications, broadband and landline in Germany.

As a part of this contract, Wipro will work with Telefonica Germany O2 and its wider ecosystem to transform its Business Support Systems and associated Quality Assurance to enable superior customer experience and growth in the B2B market segment. This Radical IT Transformation (RAITT) program brings Wipro and Telefonica Germany O2 together to allow for risk-mitigated self-funded transformation that will benefit both companies.

The RAITT program will ensure that Telefonica Germany O2 is well positioned to modernise and launch a range of new offerings including 5G products and services. As 5G networks and new IoT connectivity solutions start to roll out, this refresh provides not only an essential foundation for the new services but also enables new ways of work at a significantly lower cost of ownership to Telefonica Germany O2. Wipro will also invest in developing a state-of-the-art digital Business Support platform that will fuel Telefonica Germany's growth and provide the company with an outcome-based, committed plan.

Thierry Delaporte, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, Wipro Limited said, "This partnership builds on the bedrock of a 15-year relationship. It directly aligns us with Telefonica Germany's growth, and is a great example of how we are building for long-term success in Europe by embracing a collaborative approach with local industry leaders. I am also proud of the work ethic of both teams who made it possible to finalize this partnership during a global pandemic."

"We are pleased to partner with Wipro and benefit from its global experience. Our IT transformation project is a key milestone which will enable us to increase the reliability of our systems, improve customer satisfaction and accelerate innovation as we move towards achieving our goals for B2B customers and common services," said Mallik Rao, Chief Technology Information Officer (CTIO), Telefonica Germany O2

This is a high value and first-of-its-kind engagement for Wipro in the telecommunications space.

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 180,000 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 Telefonica Germany O2

Telefonica Germany O2 offers mobile and fixed services for private and business customers. With 44 million mobile accesses and 2.3 million broadband connections, the company is one of the leading integrated telecommunications providers in Germany. No other domestic wireless network operator connects more people. Telefonica Deutschland Holding AG has been listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (MDAX) since 2012. In the 2019 financial year, the company generated revenue of EUR 7.4 billion with almost 8,500 employees. The company is majority owned by the Spanish telecommunications group Telefonica S.A.

Forward-looking and Cautionary Statements

The forward-looking statements contained herein represent Wipro's beliefs regarding future events, many of which are by their nature, inherently uncertain and outside Wipro's control. Such statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding Wipro's growth prospects, its future financial operating results, and its plans, expectations and intentions. Wipro cautions readers that the forward-looking statements contained herein are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results anticipated by such statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding fluctuations in our earnings, revenue and profits, our ability to generate and manage growth, complete proposed corporate actions, 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. The conditions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic could decrease technology spending, adversely affect demand for our products, affect the rate of customer spending and could adversely affect our customers' ability or willingness to purchase our offerings, delay prospective customers' purchasing decisions, adversely impact our ability to provide on-site consulting services and our inability to deliver our customers or delay the provisioning of our offerings, all of which could adversely affect our future sales, operating results and overall financial performance. Our operations may also be negatively affected by a range of external factors related to the COVID-19 pandemic that are not within our control.

Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, including, but not limited to, Annual Reports on Form 20-F. 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 source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005210/en/

Contacts:

Shraboni Banerjee

Wipro Limited

Shraboni.banerjee@wipro.com
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Basel, Switzerland, February 15, 2021

Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. (SIX: BSLN) announced today that it has entered into an agreement to divest its Chinese research and development (R&D) subsidiary Basilea Pharmaceutica China Ltd. (BPC), by selling BPCs parent company BPh Investitionen Ltd. to the U.S.-based custom manufacturing organization PHT International Inc. (PHT). This will increase flexibility in sourcing R&D services in the future. All 72 employees and the facilities will be transferred to PHT. The initial payment is USD 2.5 million, which will be due upon closing of the transaction, which is expected in the second quarter of 2021 subject to customary closing conditions. Basilea is entitled to additional payments of USD 3.8 million over the course of the next three years, for a total purchase price of USD 6.3 million.

David Veitch, Chief Executive Officer of Basilea, said: We are very pleased with this transaction, which will increase our flexibility in sourcing external R&D services for our growing portfolio, while optimizing our future cost structure. Importantly, PHT has committed to maintaining R&D services through the existing site in China to Basilea. This ensures continued seamless support for our ongoing R&D projects and allows us to continue to benefit from the expertise that we have built in our Chinese organization over the course of the last two decades.

Dr. Laurenz Kellenberger, Basileas Chief Scientific Officer and Chairman of BPC, added: Since we founded BPC in 2002, our Chinese colleagues have been a great support for our R&D projects and I would like to thank them for their valuable contributions. We are convinced that their expertise will be even better leveraged within a structure that is entirely focused on providing contract research, development and manufacturing services such as PHT. We wish them all the best for the future and are looking forward to continue working with them on our projects.

PHT International Inc. is a privately owned custom manufacturing organization for chemicals for the pharmaceutical industry and other sectors. PHT was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, USA. PHT has five locations in China.

About Basilea

Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. is a commercial-stage biopharmaceutical company, focused on the development of products that address the medical challenges in the therapeutic areas of oncology and infectious diseases. With two commercialized drugs, the company is committed to discovering, developing and commercializing innovative pharmaceutical products to meet the medical needs of patients with serious and life-threatening conditions. Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. is headquartered in Basel, Switzerland and listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange (SIX: BSLN). Additional information can be found at Basilea's website www.basilea.com.

About Basilea Pharmaceutica China

Basilea Pharmaceutica China Ltd. (BPC) was founded in 2002 and is located in the Haimen Economic-Technological Development Zone of Nantong city, Jiangsu, a ninety minutes drive from Shanghai. Operating in an innovative R&D environment, the company builds on its highly qualified, well-trained and experienced professionals as well as a state-of-the-art scientific and technical infrastructure. BPC focuses on the chemical synthesis and analysis of complex molecules, analytical development and process research and development, so as to provide R&D services to worldwide customers.

Disclaimer

This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements, such as "believe", "assume", "expect", "forecast", "project", "may", "could", "might", "will" or similar expressions concerning Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. and its business, including with respect to the progress, timing and completion of research, development and clinical studies for product candidates. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Basilea Pharmaceutica Ltd. is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

For further information, please contact:

Peer Nils Schroder, PhD



Head of Corporate Communications & Investor Relations Phone +41 61 606 1102 E-mail media_relations@basilea.com

investor_relations@basilea.com

This press release can be downloaded from www.basilea.com.



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Press release (PDF)
WASHINGTON, D.C. - In a move that Democrats described as a blatantly partisan effort to deflect responsibility for the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol from former President Donald Trump, Ohios Rep. Jim Jordan and three other top U.S. House Republicans on Monday questioned whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi bears some responsibility for security failures that allowed rioters into the building where 2020 presidential electoral votes were being tallied.

Jordan, who is the House Judiciary Committees top Republican, joined his counterparts on the House Administration, Intelligence and Oversight and Reform committees in a letter that asked why a Capitol Police request for National Guard support during the protest was denied several days before before the incursion where five people died. The letter also asked what security guidance was provided by Pelosi and her staff.

Citing published reports that the House Sergeant at Arms denied the request for National Guard support because the optics of having the National Guard on site were not good and the intelligence didnt support the move, Jordans letter suggested that was done on Pelosis behalf -- something a spokesman for Pelosi said was not true. The letter also said Democrat-appointed House officers havent provided information that Republicans requested about the incident so they can properly conduct oversight on the January 6th events.

Five weeks have passed since the January 6th attack on the Capitol building, and many important questions about your responsibility for the security of the Capitol remain unanswered, said the Champaign County Republicans letter. As you are aware, the Speaker of the House is not only the leader of the majority party, but also has enormous institutional responsibilities. The Speaker is responsible for all operational decisions made within the House.

Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill dismissed the letter as effort to deflect responsibility for the riot from Trump. He observed that Jordan and another signer of Mondays letter voted to overturn the results of a fair election, just hours after the Capitol was sacked by an insurrectionist, right-wing mob, when the two opposed accepting electoral votes from states Trump contested. Hammill also questioned the four Republicans commitment to security at the Capitol in light of their votes last month against impeaching Trump for his role in inciting the mob. On Saturday, impeachment advocates failed to get the two-thirds majority vote they needed in the U.S. Senate to find Trump guilty of inciting insurrection.

Hammill said Pelosi is taking action to ensure accountability for the riot and enhance the Capitols security. Several officials responsible for security at the U.S. Capitol - House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving, Senate Sergeant at Arms Michael Stenger and Capitol Police Chief Steve Sund - were removed from their positions after the incident. Hammill said Irving has acknowledged he did not ask House leaders for a National Guard presence before the riot.

Hammill said that when the committees that oversee Capitol Hill security were briefed before the Jan. 6 incident, Sund and Irving told them the Capitol Complex had comprehensive security and there was no intelligence that groups would become violent at the Capitol during the certification of electoral votes. After the insurrection, Hammill said Pelosi asked retired Gen. Russel L. Honore to lead an immediate security review of the U.S. Capitol Complex and has called for a 9/11-style commission to investigate, with legislation creating such a panel to be introduced in the coming days. The USCP is also conducting an internal security review.

With this transparently partisan attempt to lay blame on the Speaker, who was a target of assassination during the insurrection fueled by the lies of House Republicans, the Ranking Members are trying to absolve former Police Chief Sund, former Sergeant at Arms Stenger and the leader who appointed him, Mitch McConnell, of any responsibility, said Hammill. We look forward to these Ranking Members asking these same questions of former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

When asked last week why the Capitol wasnt better prepared for potential violence on Jan. 6 and why the National Guard wasnt called in advance, Pelosi told a press conference the interagency cooperation, or lack thereof is being reviewed. She also suggested it would be beneficial if District of Columbia authorities could be empowered to call out the National Guard, without getting the permission of the federal government, as state governors are allowed to do.

Everything has to be subjected to the harshest review to make sure this doesnt come again, Pelosi continued. We couldnt be in better hands than General Honore, who has such experience and commands so much respect in this regard.

The GOP letter also faulted Pelosi for not consulting Republicans on her decisions to fire Irving, demand Sunds resignation, and appoint Honore to lead the security review.

To the Generals credit he has reached out to several Republicans to brief on his work to date, the letter said. We are hopeful his review will result in beneficial recommendations that are not influenced by political motivations. However, it is easy to understand why we and our Senate counterparts remain skeptical that any of his final recommendations will be independent and without influence from you.

Read more:

Rob Portman votes to acquit Trump, Sherrod Brown votes to convict: Read their statements

Ohios U.S. Senators speak out on Donald Trumps impeachment trial

Ohios Rob Portman backs argument that its not constitutional to impeach a former president, votes with most GOP senators

Senate banking chair Sherrod Brown would like to couple bank access for cannabis businesses with drug sentencing reforms

Ohios Sen. Sherrod Brown chides Sen. Rand Paul for not wearing a mask on the Senate floor

Ohio Republicans vote against removing former QAnon adherent Marjorie Taylor Greene from committee assignments

Senate Banking Committee approves Rep. Marcia Fudges nomination to be Housing and Urban Development Secretary

Ohios Jim Jordan endorsed QAnon-linked Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and continues to defend her

Rep. Jim Jordan will cheer on former President Trump from the sidelines during his Senate impeachment trial

Rep. Bob Gibbs gives thumbs up to border fence, thumbs down to Capitol Hill security fence

Rocky River Republican Rep. Anthony Gonzalez gets flak for voting to impeach President Donald Trump but doesnt regret taking a stand
[February 15, 2021] Work Anywhere for a Year; Create a New Work from Home Experience with AppSumo

AUSTIN, Texas, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, AppSumothe go-to software community for everyday entrepreneurslaunched the "Work Anywhere for a Year" Giveaway, offering two lucky individuals the chance to turn their virtual meeting backgrounds into reality with $24K in Airbnb credits each. As millions of Americans continue to work remotely, the home office can start to feel confined. The "Work Anywhere for a Year" Giveaway features a total of $60K in prizes that make working from home feel more like working from paradise. In addition to two grand prize winners, 10 digital nomads will win AppSumo's Office-to-Go Swag Bag, complete with a portable monitor, noise-canceling headphones, WiFi extender, and more. Participants can enter the giveaway online at appsumo.com/airbnb-giveaway from Monday, February 15 to Monday, March 15, 2021. "Remote work pssibilities have changed immensely during the last year. The entrepreneurs, small business owners, and freelancers who sought out the digital nomad life are now joined by millions of traditional employees working from home," said AppSumo CEO Ayman Al-Abdullah. "With our 'Work Anywhere for a Year' Giveaway, we hope to inspire others to experience a change of scenery, so that each work day can feel like vacation."



No purchase is necessary to enter. All entrants must submit their email through KingSumo. For more details, see Official Rules at appsumo.com/airbnb-giveaway . About AppSumo

AppSumo is the go-to software community for everyday entrepreneurs. Founded by serial entrepreneur Noah Kagan in 2010, AppSumo was built on the core idea that the tools you need to grow your business shouldn't put you out of business. Customers can shop Select Deals, which offer lifetime access to SaaS products, and browse the Marketplace, a collaborative digital space for up-and-coming entrepreneurs. AppSumo was named one of Built In Austin's Best Places to Work in 2021, including top rankings on the lists for Best Small Companies to Work For and Companies with the Best Benefits.

AppSumo Media Contact: Julie Richter, 4808188022, 291498@email4pr.com View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/work-anywhere-for-a-year-create-a-new-work-from-home-experience-with-appsumo-301228211.html SOURCE AppSumo

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NEW HAVEN  A jogger discovered a dead body near East Rock Park on Monday morning, police said.

The body was found in the area of Farnam Drive and Orange Street Monday morning, police said. The area has been closed as police investigate the death.
"Andy McGadney has demonstrated an uncanny ability to build momentum through visionary leadership, a talent for creating and spearheading student-focused, innovative programs that deliver results, and a deep understanding of the need to inspire a college community to attain aggressive goals through collaboration," said Chuck Smith '84, chair of the Knox College Board of Trustees. "His devotion to Knox providing a rigorous, highly personalized liberal arts education to an incredibly diverse student body will serve the College well now and in the future. We are delighted to welcome Andy to the Knox College community."

"This is a very exciting time in Knox's long and storied history," said Teresa Amott, who has served as its 19th president since 2011. "We are fortunate indeed that Andy will bring his remarkable record of vision and leadership to Knox. The future is very bright for the College we love."

"As a passionate advocate for the power of a liberal arts and science education, I am deeply honored and humbled to serve as the 20th president of Knox College," said Andy McGadney, incoming president of Knox College. "During the thoughtful search process, I engaged with members of the search committee, the full Board of Trustees, faculty, students, staff, and several members of the Galesburg community. The commitment and dedication for the College was felt from my initial conversations, and my interest continues to deepen with each and every interaction."

"A special thanks to President Teresa Amott for her extraordinary leadership, grace, and many contributions to Knox," continued McGadney. "Her generosity during the transition is also notable and greatly appreciated."

A native of Connecticut, McGadney earned his B.A. at Wesleyan University, majoring in sociology and African American Studies. He later earned a Master of Public Administration and Policy from Columbia University and an Ed.D. in Higher Education Management from the University of Pennsylvania, writing his dissertation on "Crisis Management at Small Liberal Arts Colleges: Perspectives on Presidential Decision Making."

Andy is currently vice president and dean of student advancement at Colby College, following three years as Colby's vice president and secretary of the College, a role that made him the principal liaison to the Board of Trustees.

In his current appointment at Colby, McGadney has provided strategic vision for DavisConnects, a signature initiative at the College, which was funded with a $25 million donor gift. This new liberal arts model affords every Colby student a set of integrated research, internship, and global experiences designed to enhance the academic experience and prepare students for post-graduate success. As part of his leadership, he also developed and launched the Pay It Northward initiative, which focused on securing post-graduate opportunities for Class of 2020 Colby graduates in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

As Colby's vice president and secretary of the college, Andy was responsible for implementing a series of complex strategic initiatives that emerged through the college's planning process and promoted, facilitated, and supported governance practices across the College.

Previously, he was vice president for university advancement at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, a Colleges that Change Lives institution. In that role, he led fundraising efforts and instituted new infrastructure to plan, launch and execute a $125 million comprehensive campaign. He also led efforts to improve student and alumni affinity at Clark. Earlier, he began his work in higher education as director of development and a major gift officer at his alma mater, Wesleyan, on whose Board of Trustees he has served since 2018. He has also served on several community boards, including Big Brothers/Big Sisters.

The presidential search committee was chaired by Tony Etz '83. Trustees on the committee were Chuck Smith '84, Board Chair; Barbara Baird '73, Nyerere Billups Sr. '99, Elzelien "Ellie" Hartog '66, John Lawler '88, Patrick St. Aubyn Lyn '84, Laurence Msall '84, Susan Plomin '86, Julie Rademaker '83, Laura Rosene '90, Board Vice Chair; and Adam Vitale, Galesburg community representative. Additional search committee members were Mary Crawford '89, Philip Sidney Post Professor of Chemistry; Todd Heidt, Associate Professor in Modern LanguagesGerman; Nick Regiacorte, Associate Professor of English and Director of Creative Writing; Katie Stewart, Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Relations; Anne Ehrlich, Vice President for Student Development; DeVone Eurales, Director of Admission; and students Bamise Afolabi '21 and Saxon Alvarez '23. The committee was advised by academic search firm C. V. O'Boyle, Jr., LLC.

Andy will be joined in Galesburg by his wife Camille A. McGadney, a Wesleyan alumna who has worked in career counseling at Wesleyan, Manchester Community College, Colby, and Thomas College. They have three children.

About Knox College

Knox College and the city of Galesburg, Ill., were founded by a group of pioneers from upstate New York, led by the Rev. George Washington Gale, after whom the city was named. The Illinois Legislature approved Knox College's charter on February 15, 1837. Among the members of the General Assembly was Abraham Lincoln, who would later rise to national prominence in the 1858 Lincoln-Douglas debates, one of which was held at Knox's Old Main building. Today, Old Main is the sole remaining site from the historic debates. A nationally ranked liberal arts college, Knox has 1,200 students from 45 states and 49 countries, more than 60 courses of study, 39 academic majors, and 49 minors. Knox also is one of the 40 colleges listed in the book Colleges That Change Lives by former New York Times education editor Loren Pope.

SOURCE Knox College

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Alesha Dixon teased her new health brand as she shared a post-workout selfie to Instagram on Monday.

The Britain's Got Talent judge, 42, looked naturally radiant as she flashed her toned abs in a tiny bralet, teamed with running tights and a cardigan draped across her shoulders.

'2021 REALLY IS the year of wellness!', the former Mis-Teeq member declared as she touched on juggling life at home with her career.

Exciting times ahead: Alesha Dixon teased her new health brand as she shared a post-workout selfie to Instagram on Monday

The former Strictly Come Dancing judge proved less is more as she went make-up free for the stunning shot.

On her upcoming venture, the media personality wrote: '2021 REALLY IS the year of wellness!

'In-between home-schooling, workouts and the occasional wine drinking, I've been busy working on developing a #wellness brand that I cant wait to share with you!  More details will be announced soon.' (sic)

The Lipstick hitmaker, who shares Azura, seven, and Anaya, 19 months, with long-term partner Azuka Ononye, has treated fans to glimpses of her exercise regime throughout the coronavirus pandemic.

Impressive: The Britain's Got Talent judge, 42, has treated fans to glimpses of her exercise regime throughout the coronavirus pandemic (pictured in December 2020)

In her element: '2021 REALLY IS the year of wellness!', the former Mis-Teeq member declared as she touched on juggling life at home with her career

Meanwhile, Britains Got Talent 2021 has been cancelled as the ongoing coronavirus pandemic continues to wreak havoc.

The hit ITV talent show had already been postponed due to safety concerns and the restrictions brought about by tier systems and lockdowns.

But after several weeks of speculation, it was recently confirmed now that the programme will now not return to screens until 2022.

Alesha, who has been a judge on the talent show since 2012, spoke about the postponement of the series on Steph's Packed Lunch this month.

Family first: The Lipstick hitmaker shares Azura, seven, and Anaya, 19 months, with long-term partner Azuka Ononye

The rapper explained: 'Its obviously not an ideal situation, but the most important thing is the well-being of everyone who works on the show, and the public who come along to the show.

'And we want to make the show the best it can possibly be, so if that means pushing it back and waiting a little bit, then you know thats what we have to do.'

BGT, which also features judges Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden and David Walliams, has already faced its fair share of issues over the past year as, in addition to the pandemic, Cowell was forced to bow out after breaking his back.

Past winner Ashley Banjo was drafted in at the 11th hour to serve as his replacement on the show last year when it aired several months later than usual.
Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) Commissioner Jeong Eun-kyeong speaks at a briefing on the vaccination plans held at its office in Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, Monday. Yonhap



Vaccinations to begin with people under 65 at nursing homes



By Lee Hyo-jin



Korea has decided to hold off on administering AstraZeneca's coronavirus vaccine to people over the age of 65, Monday, changing its initial plan to prioritize the elderly population in the first round of vaccinations set to begin later this month.



The changed plan has come amid growing controversy worldwide over the efficacy of the pharmaceutical company's product for senior citizens.



The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) announced detailed plans for the country's first round of vaccinations which is scheduled to roll out Feb. 26, as the first batch of AstraZeneca's doses available for around 750,000 people is expected to arrive on Feb. 24.



Patients and medical workers at nursing homes who are younger than 65 will be the first group to get the two-dose vaccines, while plans for inoculating older people will be decided later based on further data of clinical trials to be provided by late March.



As for the reason for the age limit, the health authorities cited a lack of statistical significance for efficacy in those aged 65 and older, as well as the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety's earlier recommendation to make a prudent decision on vaccinations for the elderly population.










Haiti - News : Zapping...





Important demonstration of the opposition

Important demonstration of the opposition and civil society in the streets of the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince. Incident at Delmas 60, throwing stones at the police officers with tear gas and rubber bullets, several injured. "Only the large private sector was absent from this white march which brought together tens of thousands of people in Port-au-Prince to say no to dictatorship. We must really continue the fight to break the socio-economic exclusion system in place since Oct. 17, 1806" declared Me Andre Michel Spokesman for the radical opposition of the so-called "Democratic and Popular" sector.



Soon the CINs in all the Consulates

"As part of the integration of the Haitian Diaspora in the internal affairs of their country and allow them to have their CIN, efforts are underway to bring the equipment for the manufacture of the identification card to the 48 diplomatic missions," indicates the Ministry of Communication.



Myrlande Manigat : Preliminary draft Constitution

"I sent the preliminary draft of the new constitution to Secretary General Eric Jean Baptiste and to Myrlande Manigat the Honorary President of the Rassemblement des Democrates Nationaux Progressistes (RDNP). I greet them patriotically" informed Mathias Pierre Minister Delegate to the Prime Minister, in charge of electoral issues and relations with political parties who recalls "Pursuant to the Law of 24 January 2014 on the operation and financing of Political Parties, it is understood to grant them financial support in order to organize restructuring congresses, training seminars and workshops necessary for the analysis and comments on the Preliminary Draft of the New Constitution."



Moise launches the 2019 National Carnival

On Saturday President Jovenel Moise accompanied by his wife Martine in the presence of members of the Government, of the Carnival Organizing Committee and various actors operating in the Haitian cultural world officially launched the National Carnival in Port-de-Paix "I am in Port-de--Paix to officially launch the national carnival. A historic moment for this city which in the past has always been treated like a poor relation. Today, it is jubilation at the level of this department which is hosting its 1st national carnival in the history of the country."



Follow the National Carnival live on HaitiLibre

As every year, HaitiLibre invites you to follow live on its site www.haitiLibre.com the retransmission of the National Carnival (except for unforeseen events preventing the conduct of the Carnival or its retransmission), which takes place this year at Port de Paix on 14, 15 and February 16. Happy Carnival everyone and be careful.



Atlanta : The consulate intends to help Haitian prisoners

The Consulate General of Haiti in Atlanta had a fruitful meeting with the penitentiary authorities of Abertville and Guntersville, Georgia. The Consulate took advantage of this meeting to obtain important information on the situation of Haitians in prison in these jurisdictions. The Consulate intends to provide assistance to imprisoned compatriots as well as to the entire Haitian community in these areas.



HL/ HaitiLibre


















Internet access in is returning to normal after a full-blown connection snap amid ongoing protests in the country against the military takeover, traffic tracker NetBlocks reported on Monday.

"Internet connectivity is being restored in # from 9 am local time; network data show national connectivity rising to ordinary levels after information blackout; social media still restricted for most users; incident duration 8 hours," Sputnik news reported citing NetBlocks.

On Sunday, the watchdog confirmed that a "near-total Internet shutdown" was in effect in the country starting 1 a.m. local time (18.30 GMT on Saturday) following "state-ordered information blackout," with national connectivity down to 14 per cent of normal levels.

On February 1, the military seized power hours before the new parliament was due to hold its inaugural session.

Myanmar's de facto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, was arrested alongside other senior officials, after the military accused her party of rigging the November elections.

Protests have since broken out nationwide to demanding restoration of the civilian government.

--IANS

int/pgh

(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.)
Separatists win again in Catalonia Socialists gain votes but not enough

(by Stefano De Paolis) (ANSAmed) - ROME, FEBRUARY 15 - Separatists have won again in Catalonia. Although the three parties Erc, Junts for Catalunya and Cup have competed separately in the election, an alliance after the vote would be more than enough to get the absolute majority in Catalonia's parliament, or 68 votes. Out of 135 seats, according to data released on Sunday night after votes were counted, the potential separatist bloc obtained 74 seats while all the others, including forces that are politically very distant (Socialists, Ciudadanos, Ecp, Vox and Popular Party) have stopped, all together, at 61 seats. The Catalan elections - marked by a drop in turnout compared to 2017 due to the coronavirus, which in Catalonia has so far registered more than 540 cases and nearly 9,900 deaths - appear to be yet another blow for Madrid. The Catalan Socialist party (Psc) affiliated to the Psoe of Spanish Premier Pedro Sanchez who backed as top candidate his popular Health Minister Salvador Illa, has registered a success compared to four years ago, nearly doubling seats (33 compared to its previous 17) and perhaps even winning in terms of votes. But this will not be enough to lead the rich Catalonia. The separatists of ERC (Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya, Catalan republican left) obtained 33 seats. The party is still led by Oriol Junqueras, in jail for the illegal referendum and the declaration of independence of 2017. The other separatists from Junts of Carles Puigdemont, who is in exile in Belgium, are the third most-voted formation, obtaining 32 seats. And the minority separatists of Cup obtained nine seats. The far-right Vox party won 11 seats in the Catalan Parliament.



The Psc could attempt a progressive coalition with Catalunya, Ecp and Erc, but the latter has clearly distanced itself from such an hypothesis during the electoral campaign. It is more likely to lead a separatist block: this would allow it to try and impose a more moderate agenda, far from a unilateral path to independence (pursued by the tough separatists of Junts) and in favor instead of putting pressure on Sanchez for a referendum agreed with the central government of Madrid. This is also a road that could be explored. (ANSAmed)
A look-back at the Newbury Weekly News' coverage of decimalisation

Change in new pence for one

On February 15, 1971, life in West Berkshire changed forever.

On that day, the UK finally phased out tanners, shillings and half-crowns and thruppeny bits and replaced the currency with a decimalised system.

From then on, most shops, banks and traders would only deal in the new system of pounds and pence.

The switch had been announced five years in advance and West Berkshire residents had plenty of time to prepare. In the run-up to 'D-Day', the Newbury Weekly News' coverage from the time reported on the various initiatives to help educate the public about the new decimal system.

An article dated November 19, 1970, reports that Newbury and Thatcham chambers of commerce sponsored a series of talks on decimalisation for local traders.

The chambers also organised events at the Fair Close Old People's Centre in the New Year, with elderly residents dropping in for mock-up shopping trips. A counter was set up inside the centre and 'shoppers' were able to purchase items in decimalised currency.

Instructional films and pamphlets were also rolled out at local social clubs. This engagement drive continued through to D-Day itself.

An article of February 11, 1971, highlights the work of Newbury's 'decimal training officers', eight shopworkers who took time out of their day to explain the new system of pounds and pence to the elderly.

The training was well received and William Grange, an Andover Road pensioner, said: "I have seen four films on decimalisation but I learned more in the two hours this afternoon than I did from them."

The change over created extra works for retailers and banks.

In another article from February 11 the NWN reported that as a result of the banks having to close for a few days in the run-up to D-Day to convert customers' accounts, they had to cope with firms drawing wages early - as opposed to the usual paydays of Thursday and Friday.

Newbury store Camp Hopson trained their staff well in advance and were ready to switch over by D-Day. Charts were put up in every department to help customers. Store owner David Hopson said: "There may be some initial inconvenience, particularly to old people. I think people will settle down quickly and soon everyone will acclimatise."

WHSmith - then known as W. H. Smith and Son - appointed a special ombudsman to deal with queries at the till and the local branch of Boots announced that it would continue to accept old pounds, shillings and pennies well into March.

The campaign to educate the local public was coupled with a drive to recycle obsolete coins. An 'Irish' fountain - complete with leprechaun statues - was put up in Newbury in the week leading up to D-Day. The public were encouraged to toss old pennies into the water and the money was donated to the local old people's welfare association to pay for holidays for pensioners who would otherwise not be able to afford one.

The three-day initial public offering (IPO) of the state-owned RailTel Corporation of India will open for subscription on Tuesday. The price band has been fixed at Rs 93-94 a share for the initial share-sale.

The is entirely an offer-for-sale through which the government will offload 87,153,369 equity shares, amounting to 27.16 per cent stake. At the upper end of the price band, the government would raise a little over Rs 819 crore.

Half of the issue is reserved for qualified institutional buyers, 35 per cent for retail investors, and 15 per cent for non-institutional bidders.

Railtel shares were changing hands at a premium of over 30 per cent to its price in the grey market, said people in the know. While the price band is Rs 93-94 per share, grey market operators are offering over Rs 122 per share. READ MORE

About the company

The mini-ratna PSU is one of the largest neutral telecom infrastructure providers in the country owning an optic fiber network on exclusive Right of Way (RoW) along railway track. The company provides broadband telecom and multimedia networks across the country. As on June 30, 2020, its optic fiber network covered over 55,000 kms and 5,677 railway stations across towns and cities in the country. In FY20, the company had clocked net profit of Rs 140 crore on revenues of Rs 1,128 crore.

Here's what leading brokerages say about the issue.

Angel Broking -- Subscribe

The company is going to play a key role in digital transformation of Indian Railways. Its margins and return ratios are better compared to other telecom players in India. The company also has a strong financial position (debt free) and has been consistently paying dividends since 2008.

RailTel has priced its issue at 21.4x PE on a FY20 trailing basis, which is quite reasonable by looking at the strong future growth rates of the company. We expect a good listing and are positive on the long-term prospects of the industry as well the company. We recommend "SUBSCRIBE" to the RailTel IPO for long-term as well as for listing gains.

Choice Broking -- Subscribe

At the higher price band of Rs 94 per share, RailTels share is valued at a FY20 P/E multiple of 15.8x (to its restated EPS of Rs 5.9). Other railway infrastructure companies (IRCON, RITES and RVNL) are trading at an average P/E of 9.5x. However, considering the futuristic service and growth plans of the IR and RailTels ability to monetize its existing assets through subscription plans and co-sharing with private operators, we feel that fundamentals are positive for the company. Thus we assign a SUBSCRIBE rating for the issue.

CapitalVia Global Research -- Subscribe

Gaurav Garg, head of research at CapitalVia, said, "I see growth potential in RailTel as the government's expansion plan is very aggressive w.r.t. building railway infrastructure over the next 5 years. This push is likely to benefit other railway infra stocks which includes RVNL, RITES, IRCON, IRCTC etc."

"Grey Market Premium (GMP) is Rs 35-40 which is convincing for investors to subscribe to IPO for listing gains. But in my opinion investors should hold this IPO for at least two years as this IPO might turn out to be a wealth creating IPO in railway space. The company showed decent performance in terms of top line as growth of 16 per cent from FY15-16 to FY19-20 with growth of 7 per cent CAGR in gross margin which looks promising to me. From a dividend perspective stock is good to invest as the company had distributed 68 crores of dividend in FY19-20, indicating decent dividend yield," he said.





Geojit Financial Services -- Subscribe

In FY20, RailTel had the highest net profit margin among key telecom companies and key IT/ICT companies in India, with a profit margin of 12.5 per cent. The company expects strong growth in the data center services in the future as the government plans to invest in smart cities, health, e-office projects, and education.

At the upper price band of Rs 94, RailTel is available at a P/E of 21.4x on FY20 basis, which appears fully priced. Considering, increasing data usage, GoIs digital India initiatives and further diversification plans of RailTel, we assign a Subscribe rating for the issue.

RailTel is coming out with an IPO of Rs 819.24 crore, an OFS by the Government of India to divest part of their stake. The company derives 66 per cent of its revenues from the telecom segment while the remaining portion is from railways and other projects. RailTel, if performs efficiently can benefit from the 5G growth in India from a fiberisation needs perspective. It could also play a key role in digital transformation of the railways. Besides, Covid-19 has had a minimal impact on the telecom industry and has infact triggered growth for certain players due to increased data usage and VPN services for people working from home.Since RailTel is a debt-free company and pays consistent dividends it could witness some traction, but for long-term investors there are a few red flags. Firstly, the company has delivered single digit revenue and PAT CAGR of 7.5 per cent and 2.5 per cent respectively from FY18 to FY20. There is high dependence on government entities and concentration risk given that 23.8 per cent of its revenues comes from top three customers. Its presence in a highly regulated industry is another cause of concern. Over all, the company is fairly priced at its FY20 P/E of 21.3 times. It has been commanding a good grey market premium indicating the offer will sail through but keeping the risks in mind, we recommend investors to subscribe for listing gains only.

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.
Their case was one of the first to stem from a joint task force formed in 2018 between Chicago police and federal law enforcement that sought to bring more carjacking cases in federal court. The initiative was touted as a way to win elevated prison sentences apart from the often-revolving door of the Cook County criminal justice and deter others from participating in such violent acts.

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry confirmed the joyous news that they are expecting their second child together on Valentine's Day.

And in honour of the announcement, Madame Tussauds in Sydney decided to give the former actress' waxwork figure a 'mummy makeover' - adding a blossoming baby bump complete with a maternity dress.

In a bizarre move, Meghan's wax figure was then transferred to the nearby WILD LIFE Sydney Zoo for an 'Aussie style' photo shoot - where the bump was sniffed and kissed by live kangaroos.

Haunting: In honour of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's pregnancy announcement, Madame Tussauds in Sydney decided to give the former actress' waxwork a 'mummy makeover'

'The news has us very excited, and we couldnt think of a better way to say congratulations than by sending kangaroo kisses the royal familys way,' a spokesperson for Madame Tussauds Sydney said on Monday.

The waxwork - based in Sydney's Darling Harbour - usually stands beside a figure of Prince Harry, alongside Her Majesty the Queen, Prince William and Kate Middleton.

The photo shoot comes after the duo confirmed their happy baby news, alongside a gorgeous black-and-white image taken by the couple's longtime friend, Misan Harriman.

Cute: In a bizarre twist, Meghan's wax figure was then transferred to the nearby Wild Life Sydney Zoo in Darling Harbour for an 'Aussie style' photo shoot - where the bump was sniffed and kissed by live kangaroos

Happy: 'The news has us very excited and we couldnt think of a better way to say congratulations than by sending kangaroo kisses the royal familys way,' a spokesperson for Madame Tussauds Sydney said on Monday

The pair - who are currently residing in California - are preparing to welcome a brother or sister for their son Archie, who will be two in May, later this year.

A spokesperson for Meghan and Harry said: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child.'

The couple shared their announcement - aptly on Valentine's Day - by posting an image of Harry resting his hand on Meghan's head as she lay in his lap underneath a tree.

Uncanny! The waxwork usually stands beside a wax figure of Prince Harry, alongside Her Majesty the Queen, Prince William and Kate Middleton. (Pictured: The pair's original waxworks in Sydney)

'The photograph of the Duke and Duchess was was taken by the couple's longtime friend Misan Harriman. What wonderful news for the Sussexes!!' their spokesperson added.

If born in the U.S., the baby will be entitled to U.S. citizenship as an automatic right.

It also comes on the 37th anniversary of when Harry's mother, Princess Diana, announced that she was pregnant with him on Valentine's Day in 1984.

The sex of the couple's second baby, as well as the due date, remain unclear.
Stockholm, Feb 15 : Over 200 children have been diagnosed with long-term Covid-19 symptoms here, statistics by Swedish Television (SVT) showed on Monday.

The Astrid Lindgren's Children's Hospital here has lately seen a surge in children seeking medical care for prolonged Covid symptoms, SVT reported.

Fatigue, a sore throat, headaches and nausea are among the most common symptoms. Concentration problems and memory gaps have also been reported.

The average age is 11-13 and in some cases, the symptoms are debilitating, said Malin Ryd Linder, chief physician at the clinic specialised in long-term disease in children.

"Some go to school, while some are completely bedridden," she told SVT News.

Noting the children's long-term Covid-19 symptoms might be more mild than adults', the physician said that "nevertheless, we must get the resources for these children." While the latest statistics showed 214 children have been diagnosed in the capital, the severeness of the problem is unknown as there are no figures for the rest of the country.

According to a recent British study, long-term Covid-19 symptoms may be more prevalent than previously thought. In December, the Office for National Statistics said one in five who had been tested positive for the virus exhibited symptoms for five weeks or longer. One in ten had symptoms for 12 weeks or longer, Xinhua reported.

Having noticed that long-term Covid-19 symptoms are a widespread problem, the Swedish government has decided that there is a need for further research.

"It is not currently known what these remaining symptoms are due to or how they should be treated," the government said last week, when presenting plans to fund research into the issue with 50 million SEK (6 million dollars).
A man gets his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine administered during mass vaccinations at Coors Field baseball stadium in Denver, Colo., on Jan. 30, 2021. (Chet Strange/AFP via Getty Images)

Racialized Adults on Revised Federal COVID-19 Vaccination Priority List

OTTAWAAdults from racialized communities disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic should be prioritized for shots in the second stage of the vaccination campaign, says new guidance from Canadas national advisory committee on immunization.

The advice also would see all essential workers who cant do their jobs from home moved into the second stage, instead of focusing on health workers with lower-risk jobs.

The second stage is expected to start this spring after provinces get COVID-19 vaccines into the arms of all the staff and residents of long-term care homes, adults aged 70 or older, front-line health workers and adults in Indigenous communities.

The committee added a third stage to its immunization recommendations that includes people between 16 and 59 years old with underlying conditions, those who are between 50 and 59 years old with no underlying conditions, and health workers and essential workers who are didnt got shots in previous rounds.

The new recommendations prioritize racialized adults from groups disproportionately affected by the pandemic ahead of some older non-racialized people.

Key populations are sequenced in three stages corresponding to increasing vaccine availability in each quarter of 2021, the committee said Monday.

By the end of the third quarter of 2021, it is anticipated that sufficient vaccine supply will be available to offer vaccines to the general Canadian population.

Canadas chief public health officer Dr. Theresa Tam said Friday the new recommendations take into consideration objectives to reduce serious outcomes of COVID-19 throughout society, and to reduce the burden of illness.

Health authorities in the provinces and the territories make the actual decisions on who gets vaccinated first.

Provinces have different demographics but they use the evidence, I think, to inform their vaccinations, Tam said.

For example, if you were in Toronto, if youre in Ontario, theyve already got data in relationship to where those higher risk populations are and that they be considered as part of the rollout for the prioritization of vaccines.

The new federal vaccination guidance comes as COVID19 vaccination efforts are expected to get a big boost this week.

The Public Health Agency of Canada says it expects Pfizer and BioNTech to deliver more than 400,000 doses of their COVID-19 vaccine this week and about 450,000 doses each week until April.
"Dr. Banks was a revolutionary publisher and giant for the African American church and community," said C. Jeffrey Wright, CEO of UMI." He was the first to create contextualized content that portrayed positive images of African Americans in the Bible. Because of his innovation, UMI has reached millions of Black churches and individuals with the Gospel."

For the last 50 years, under Dr. Banks' leadership, UMI has developed Christian education resources, including Bible studies, Sunday School, and Vacation Bible School curriculum, websites, magazines, books, and videos for its 40,000+ strong customer base. He wrote a number of books and devotionals and hosted a two-minute daily podcast called Daily Direction. In 1995, he brought on Mr. Wright as CEO to take on the day-to-day management of the company. Many evangelical organizations have recognized his pioneering work, including the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association (ECPA), which presented him with its inaugural Kenneth N. Taylor Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017.

"So many people have been introduced to the life-changing message of Jesus because of Dr. Banks' ground-breaking initiatives," said Terri Hannett, Vice President of UMI. "For 50 years, UMI has produced discipleship content that was intellectually rigorous and uniquely relevant for the Black experience."

Dr. Banks was born in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1934 and made a commitment to salvation at the age of 9 years old. He graduated from Moody Bible College in Chicago in 1955 and attended Wheaton College, earning a B.A. degree in theology in 1958 and his master's degree in biblical studies in 1960. After graduation, he took a job at Scripture Press Publishers, where he struggled to sell euro-centric Sunday School content to African American churches. This experience led him to create contextual resources for African Americans with imagery and stories unique to their culture. After a few years, he left the company to start his own to expand the publishing content for Black churches.

Dr. Banks had served as board chair since 1994 after the passing of Tom Skinner, the founding board chair of UMI. On February 14, 2021, the UMI Board of Directors voted to appoint Dr. Stanley Long to the role of Chairman after serving as Vice Chairman for the past 45 years.

"Dr. Banks has been one of my closest friends for nearly 50 years," said Dr. Stanley Long, Chairman of the UMI board. "I will miss him beyond what words can describe. He and I have shared the same vision and burden for as many years as we have been friends. As board chair, I will invest as much energy as he did to continue the work of UMI in the same direction it has journeyed from its inception, to impact the lives of as many men, women, and children as possible."

Dr. Banks also planted the Westlawn Gospel Chapel church in Chicago and co-founded the Urban Outreach Foundation to reach pastors, lay leaders, and Christian educators through conferences and other resources. He also co-founded Circle Y Ranch, a Christian camp and conference center for urban youth. Dr. Banks received an honorary Doctorate of Literature from Wheaton College in 1992 and served as a Board Trustee.

Dr. Banks died from a month-long illness and is survived by his wife Olive and his three children Melvin Jr., Patrice Lee, and Reginald. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be sent to Circle Y Ranch Bible Camp c/o UMI 1551 Regency Ct., Calumet City, IL 60409 or donate via the website: https://circleyranch.net referencing Dr. Banks. Resolutions and tributes can be sent to [email protected].

Contact: [email protected]

571-379-3748

SOURCE Urban Ministries, Inc.

Related Links

http://www.urbanfaith.com


Vodafone's infrastructure business Vantage Towers has revealed that the number of its sites it operates grew to 82,000 at the end of last year.

The Dusseldorf-based group said it added another 450 macro sites over the first nine months of the current financial year and has a 'leading' position in nine of the ten European markets where it has a presence.

It believes it is on course to reach its target of building around 550 sites and hit its current adjusted earnings target of 454million to 463million for the financial year ending in late March.

Vantage Towers said it added another 450 macro sites over the nine-month period and has a 'leading' position in nine of the ten European markets where it has a presence

Vantage, which Vodafone is due to spin off and list on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange soon for an estimated 3billion (2.6billion), also expects to achieve its full-year free cash flow guidance for 375million to 385million.

The company stated it had gained 1,400 new tenancies and signed new agreements with Dublin-based broadband firm Eir and internet service provider Three in Ireland, and the Spanish telecoms industry body AOTEC.

It has announced a further partnership today with the German division of Sigfox, an Internet of Things (IoT) services business, to help it expand its 0G wireless network.

Vantage described Sigfox's 0G technology as a 'key driver of the digitisation of the European economy,' whose users include industrial manufacturing giant Siemens and parcel delivery firm Deutsche Post DHL.

Under the decade-long agreement, Sigfox will build more than 350 sites in Germany by the end of the 2022 financial year and over 500 by the start of 2024.

Jan John, the chief technology officer of Sigfox Germany's owner Heliot Europe, said the deal with Vantage 'will help us to deliver reliable network service much faster to our major customers - and improve our performance, scalability, and reliability.'

Vodafone is suffering under a massive debt pile of over 40billion, and hopes the public listing of Vantage Towers will enable it to pay part of those liabilities down

Vantage's trading update comes just under a fortnight after Vodafone revealed that a drop in people travelling abroad caused its revenues to fall despite increases in data usage and broadband upgrades among its customers.

Total revenues dipped by 4.7 per cent to just below 10billion in the third quarter, though a solid performance in Germany helped its organic service revenues to rise by 0.4 per cent.

Vodafone asserted that it was 'firmly on track' to decouple its Vantage business and will include the 50 per cent share of its UK towers joint venture with Spanish telecoms group Telefonica in the IPO.

The world's second-largest mobile operator is suffering under a massive debt pile of over 40billion, and hopes the public listing of Vantage Towers will enable it to pay part of that down.

Vivek Badrinath, chief executive of Vantage, said: 'The growth opportunity in Europe is considerable, as the rollout of 5G accelerates and mobile operators look to expand their networks to manage ever-increasing data traffic.

'I am very pleased with the commercial momentum we are building at Vantage Towers. Customers are appreciating the high quality of our grid and their response to our focused commercial approach is encouraging.

'Adding Cornerstone, the UK's number one tower company, to our portfolio in early January was a significant step.'

Shares in Vodafone were up 0.6 per cent during the late morning to 134.7p.
As Hungary joined Serbia in spearheading mass inoculation with China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine in Europe, other European countries are struggling against a vaccine delivery crisis and exploring a way out of lockdown and into economic recovery.

In around a month, 14 percent of Serbia's 6.5-million population received their first doses of vaccine against COVID-19, thanks to the 1.5 million Chinese-made doses.

Following its neighbor, Hungary on Jan 31 announced that it has reached a deal with Sinopharm, which will enable a mass immunization of 2.5 million people.

As the first shipment is supposed to arrive next week, Hungary is bound to become the first European Union (EU) member to sign up for Chinese vaccines.

"This deal will speed up vaccination, which could save the lives of thousands of people and contribute to lifting restrictions sooner," said Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.

Also on Jan. 31, German Health Minister Jens Spahn said he is "open" to the use of vaccines from Russia or China in Germany, while Markus Soeder, minister-president of the German state of Bavaria, called on the European supervision body to test Russian and Chinese vaccines "as soon as possible."

A shipment of Sinopharm vaccines will arrive in Bosnia and Herzegovina soon too, as one of its two entities, Republika Srpska (RS), ordered them on Feb. 8, Minister of Health and Social Welfare of RS Alen Seranic told Xinhua.

RS institutions have been following all the scientific effects and references of vaccines from all producers, including Chinese ones, and the efficiency, quality, and safety of vaccines are the three criteria that all vaccines entering RS must fulfill, said Seranic.

"Based on other countries' experiences, where Chinese vaccines have been already approved, we decided that we also need to acquire a certain number of vaccines from China," said Seranic.

"We already ordered vaccines for 20 percent of our population," he said, adding that ordering vaccines from China "will make us happy to be able to offer different kinds of vaccines to the citizens."

Earlier this month, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron expressed openness of their countries to any vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), which has so far only given green light to vaccines of Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca.

The shortage of approved vaccines in Europe has been drawing increasing public criticism and prompting demands for alternative solutions.

Addressing such concerns, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen admitted on Wednesday that the EU is lagging behind in combating the virus and it was "too optimistic" about the mass production of the vaccine.

It takes an additional three or four weeks to get the EMA's approval, which is "an investment in trust and safety," she said, while announcing a new regulatory framework as a future solution to speed up the process.

And yet, the public in the EU member countries seems not equally patient, as saving lives and ending lockdowns have become imperative.

"If there are no vaccines, we cannot vaccinate," Todor Kantardjiev, director of the Bulgarian National Center of Infectious and Parasitic Diseases, said last month, complaining about the poor progress of the inoculation program.

"The state will look for other options and we will not hesitate to buy any vaccine that is effective and harmless and that is recognized by Europe, including, of course, from Russia and China," Kantardjiev said.

In Serbia, the Sinopharm's vaccine is welcomed with full trust, and the early inoculation is seen as an opportunity, according to Ivona Ladjevac, head of the center for the Belt and Road Initiative at the Institute of International Politics and Economics in Serbia.

"We should use this opportunity," said Ladjevac. "Serbia can do something like Israel, the first country that will finish this mass vaccination and get back to normal. We can achieve something like that too."

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said in an interview with Xinhua that most people in the country are vaccinated with Sinopharm vaccine.

"There is not such a country in Europe in which you can find that level of trust (in Chinese vaccine) that you can see here in Serbia," he said.

"People here are very satisfied and we are very proud that we succeeded in delivering such good things for the better health of our people and for the future of this country," said the Serbian president.


Large crowds refusing to wear masks have turned out to protest Victoria's third coronavirus lockdown, demanding premier Dan Andrews lift restrictions on their freedom.

The rally began on Monday afternoon at Eaton Mall in Oakleigh in the city's south-east with police arriving in force and arresting a number of protesters.

Victoria was plunged into a strict five-day Stage Four lockdown on Saturday in response to a cluster stemming from the Holiday Inn Melbourne Airport, which sits at 17 cases.

Residents only able to leave their houses for essential reasons and masks are mandatory in public.

Crowds of protesters turned out in Melbourne's south-east on Monday to protest the city's third lockdown (pictured)

Police arrested three men at the protest just after midday at Eaton Mall in Oakleigh (pictured)

Two men are seen wielding flags at the protest with one man brandishing the Australian, US and UK flags (pictured)

While the lockdown is scheduled to end at 11:59pm on Wednesday, a clause in the fine print of the health directive allows for the restrictions to be extended for up to two weeks.

Police confirmed three men were arrested in the protest for disobeying the directions of the Chief Health Officer by gathering in public and not wearing masks.

'Police were called to a shopping centre in Oakleigh after reports a group of people were gathered on Monday.' police said in a statement.

'Officers attended the Hanover Street centre about 12pm and arrested three men in relation to breaching the peace and breaching Chief Health Officer directions.'

'A 40-year-old Huntingdale man was released pending summons for breaching Chief Health Officer directions and failing to obey police direction.'

Police wearing masks responded in force to the protest (pictured). Gatherings are not allowed under the five day lockdown and masks are mandatory

Two police are seen detaining one man at the gathering (pictured) with officers confirming later that three men were arrested

'Two men, aged 43 and 65, were issued with an infringement notice for breaching Chief Health Officer directions.'

The rest of the crowd is understood to have dispersed without incident.

A police investigation into the protest is ongoing.

The protest follows similar rallies during Melbourne's second lockdown including on AFL Grand Final weekend in which hundreds of protesters violently clashed with police.

Australia's coronavirus vaccine rollout will begin next week after the first doses of the Pfizer jab arrived in Sydney.

'The eagle has landed,' Health Minister Greg Hunt told reporters in Canberra on Monday.

More than 142,000 doses have been taken to a secure location and batches will be assessed for damage and quality in the coming days.

Mr Hunt said 80,000 doses of the shipment would be released in the first week, with the remainder to be kept aside for second doses.

The states would receive 50,000 doses to begin the process of vaccinating hotel quarantine staff, frontline health workers, and aged care workers and residents.

A line of officers from Victoria Police keep an eye on protesters on Monday afternoon (pictured)

One man is seen being pushed into the back of a police wagon on Monday afternoon (pictured)

The five day lockdown is in response to a cluster of cases of the UK strain of Covid stemming from the Holiday Inn Melbourne Airport

Hotel quarantine workers are considered the highest priority because they pose the greatest risk of spreading the virus to the community.

The federal government will have about 30,000 doses available for aged care facilities.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison will receive the Pfizer vaccine early in the rollout in a bid to boost public confidence in the jab.

The Pfizer vaccine will be delivered through hospital 'hubs' across Australia, and in residential aged care and disability care facilities.

Logistics company DHL will help transport the doses across the country in portable freezers, as the vaccine needs to be stored at minus 70 degrees Celsius.

Mr Hunt said the first vials of locally made doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were also being manufactured.

The vaccine is awaiting final regulatory approval from the Therapeutic Goods Administration.

Local manufacturing of the University of Oxford developed vaccine has been under way since late last year at biotechnology company CSL's manufacturing facility in Victoria.

Mr Hunt said he would receive an AstraZeneca jab once available, imploring the public to have trust in the medical regulator's assessment that the medicine is safe and effective.

'It's a free country and anybody can take a different view,' he said.

'But that support for confidence will lead to uptake, will lead to protection and will lead to greater freedoms.'

Two protesters and a police officer have a tense standoff on Monday afternoon (pictured)

The Victorian government enforced the five-day lockdown as a 'circuit breaker' to allow contact tracers to get ahead of the virus and prevent a longer lockdown later

A man is seen being pushed into the back of a police wagon on Monday afternoon (pictured)

Labor's health spokesman Mark Butler says there are still many questions around the rollout that the government hasn't answered.

He wants to know how the flagged online booking system will work and when exactly the jabs will be administered.

Australia has secured more than 150 million doses of various vaccines.

That includes almost 54 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, with the vast majority to be manufactured in Melbourne, and more than 51 million from Novavax.

Australia is also part of the international COVAX facility, which provides access to a range of vaccines in order to immunise up to half of the population.
AS the white pirogue drifted in the waters just off Belle Garden in Tobago early yesterday morning, fishermen working nearby knew something was wrong.

What they saw in the small vessel stunned them.

Fourteen bodies, all of them male, along with a skull and other skeletal remains, were piled inside the vessel as it floated four miles off Belle Garden, police confirmed.

The bodies were all clad in tracksuits and green rain jackets and were severely decomposed, police investigators said.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 01:30:08|Editor: huaxia

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File photo taken on July 15, 2020 shows Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala attending a press conference in Geneva, Switzerland. The 164 members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on Monday agreed to appoint Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a former finance minister of Nigeria, as the next director-general, said the WTO in a press release. (WTO/Handout via Xinhua)

GENEVA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on Monday agreed by consensus to appoint Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a former finance minister of Nigeria, as the next director-general, said the WTO in a press release.

The decision was made at a special meeting of the WTO's General Council at which the World Bank veteran was formally selected.

"Dr. Okonjo-Iweala will become the first woman and the first African to head the WTO. She will take up her duties on March 1 and her term, renewable, will expire on Aug. 31, 2025," WTO said.

"I am honored to have been selected by WTO members as WTO director-general," said Okonjo-Iweala to the General Council, underlining that "a strong WTO is vital if we are to recover fully and rapidly from the devastation wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic."

"I look forward to working with members to shape and implement the policy responses we need to get the global economy going again. Our organization faces a great many challenges but working together we can collectively make the WTO stronger, more agile and better adapted to the realities of today," she said.

Okonjo-Iweala, 66, is a global finance expert, an economist and an international development professional with over 30 years of experience working around the world.

Twice served as Nigeria's finance minister and briefly acted as foreign minister, she has a 25-year career at the World Bank, including as Managing Director of Operations.

Extending the "warmest congratulations" to Okonjo-Iweala, General Council Chair David Walker said that "this is a very significant moment for the WTO."

"I am certain that all members will work with you constructively during your tenure as director-general to shape the future of this organization," he added.

Applauding the "timely" appointment, China's Ambassador to the WTO Li Chenggang noted that "the collective decision made by the entire membership demonstrates a vote of trust not only in Dr. Ngozi herself, but also in our vision, our expectation and the multilateral trading system that we all believe and preserve."

"As a contributor and beneficiary of a stable, non-discriminatory and rules-based multilateral trading system, China does believe trade, mutually-advantageous trade, will be a key tool that can help us to find a way out of the current situation and realize economic recovery soon," he added.

The General Council decision follows months of uncertainty triggered by the initial refusal of the United States to join the consensus around Okonjo-Iweala, throwing its support behind South Korea's Trade Minister Yoo Myung-hee instead.

On Feb. 5, Yoo decided to withdraw her candidacy and the new U.S. administration of President Joe Biden announced that Washington would extend its "strong support" to the candidacy of Okonjo-Iweala. Enditem
A day after reporting 4,092 COVID-19 cases, highest single-day tally in more than a month, saw the daily count fall on Monday but it remained above 3,000 for the sixth straight day as the state government termed the situation as "alarming" and warned of "harsh decisions" after the recent spike.

Describing as "alarming" the recent rise in fresh cases in some districts of Maharashtra, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar expressed displeasure over people not following COVID-19-related guidelines.

A meeting has been convened by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray in Mumbai on Tuesday to take stock of the situation, he said.

Speaking separately, Health Minister Rajesh Tope said the "3T formula" of tracing, testing and treatment will have to be implemented strictly to curb the COVID-19 spread.

On Monday, the number of daily cases stood at 3,365 in Maharashtra, where 4,092 infections, the highest single-day rise since the first week of January, were reported on Sunday.

Also, 23 more patients succumbed to the infection, while over 3,100 people recovered from the infection.

The new cases took the COVID-19 tally in the state to 20,67,643, an official statement said in Mumbai.

reported 2,216 new cases on February 8 and 2,515 a day later.

On February 10, the number of daily cases surged to 3,451 and the single-day rise has been above the 3,000-mark since then.

Apart from Mumbai, Nagpur and Amravati cities in the Vidarbha region reported over 400 new COVID-19 patients in a day on Monday.

In view of the recent spurt in cases, Pawar on Monday warned of taking some "harsh decisions" and asked people to be prepared.

Speaking to reporters in Aurangabad, Pawar said, "Harsh decisions can be taken and people should remain prepared. If certain decisions are not taken in time then we will have to pay a heavy cost later."



"I have come across ((reports that) people are not following the COVID-19 guidelines which are aimed at checking the spread of the infection. If the situation worsens, we may need to pay heavy cost for this carelessness.

"The number (of new cases in the state) is alarming. We have seen that lockdown was imposed in many parts of the world again in view of the second wave of the pandemic," the Deputy Chief Minister said.

Talking to reporters separately in Aurangabad, Tope said the state government had managed to flatten the curve in the last one month as far as daily addition of cases was concerned, but the recent rise in numbers in Mumbai, Wardha and some other pockets was "alarming".

"We have given instructions that the 3T formula of tracing, testing and treatment be implemented strictly, effectively. Testing needs to be increased. Meanwhile, people also need to follow COVID-19 guidelines," Tope added.

Notably, a central team which visited parts of earlier this month, had in a meeting with the Chief Minister on February 8 noted that rural areas of Vidarbha -- particularly in Amravati, Akola, Yavatmal and Bhandara districts -- reported higher positivity rate.

On the other hand, the number of patients discharged from hospitals across the state on Monday stood at 3,105, that is, more than double of those who headed for homes post recovery a day earlier.

A total of 1,355 patients were discharged on Sunday.

The number of recovered persons in the state stood at 19,78,708, the government said.

The number of active cases in the state increased slightly to 36,201 on Monday from 35,965 a day earlier.

According to the Maharashtra government, Palghar, located adjoining Mumbai, was the only district in the state which did not report a single COVID-19 case on Monday.

With 23 new deaths reported on Monday, the state's fatality count rose to 51,552, the government said.

The health department said of the 23 deaths, 7 were reported during the past 48 hours, while 3 were from the last week. The remaining 13 deaths were from the period before last week.

Mumbai city continued to report the highest single- day cases in the state with a spike of 493 on Monday, while Nagpur city saw a jump of 415cases.

Amravati city in Vidarbha saw a rise of 405 cases on Monday.

Pune city in Western Maharashtra and Buldhana district in the Vidarbha region also reported three-digit rise in daily cases of 202 and 173, respectively.

Raigad district in the Konkan region reported deaths of 11 persons, highest in the state on Monday, due to the disease.

In Mumbai and Marathwadas Aurangabad city, three and two individuals died due to COVID-19, respectively.

Out of the total 3,365 new cases, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), accounted for 880.

With this, the total number of cases reported in the MMR -- which includes Mumbai and its satellite towns -- till now has increased to 7,05,441. The region has reported 19,701 deaths till now.

The country's financial capital alone has witnessed 3,14,569 cases and 11,422 deaths till now.

The Akola division -- which covers Amravati, Yavatmal, Buldhana and Washim districts, besides Akola -- in Vidarbha reported a rise of 837 new cases.

The states recovery rate is 95.7 per cent, while the fatality rate is 2.49 per cent, the department said.

With 37,418 new tests on Monday, the number of samples tested so far in the state increased to 1,53,59,026, the government said.

Meanwhile, alarmed by the rising number of cases in Amravati since the beginning of February, the district administration has imposed a night curfew but ruled out the imposition of a fresh lockdown.

District Collector Shailesh Naval told PTI on Monday that the rise in cases in Amravati can be attributed to more number of people coming forward for testing.

Amravati district on Monday reported 449 fresh positive cases, taking the count to 25,743.

"The curfew is aimed at controlling crowding at public and market places. It does not mean closing down businesses or markets which will function as usual," the collector said.

Maharashtra's COVID-19 tally is as follows: Positive cases: 20,67,643; new cases3,365; deaths: 51,522; discharged 19,78,708; active cases: 36,201; people tested so far: 1,53,59,026.

(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.)
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Domestic travel industry has been one of the worst sufferers of Covid-19, as the pandemic and the ensuing lockdown hit their coffers hard. However, the economic activity picking up over the past few months, travellers  both leisure and business  are slowly returning. With an improvement in macro indicators in terms of business as well as COVID recovery rate, the hospitality sector is also expected to witness a revival in demand, though at a slower pace.

There has been a sharp surge in demand, our on-ground checks reveal. That apart, the room costs have surged as more and more people are now willing to travel. On their part, hotels are in no mood of giving discounts / offers on room rent. This is something unheard of in the last few years. All this augurs well for the hotel sector. Among the lot, those with less debt and focus on domestic market should do well given the current overseas travel restrictions, says A K Prabhakar, head of research at IDBI Capital.

At the bourses, most have gained ground from their respective March 2020 low. ITDC, Lemon Tree Hotels, Indian Hotels, EIH and Taj GVK have rallied 56 per cent to 163 per cent since then.





Data source: Capitaline; Compiled by BS Research

Indias hospitality industry, according to a recent report by realty consultants JLL, witnessed a decline of 54.9 per cent in Revenue Per Available Room (RevPAR) during January to December (CY 2020) as compared to CY 2019. But, things are slowing normalising.



We are already seeing signs of domestic business travel pick up in 2021. We expect that occupancies in business hotels will ramp up from March/April 2021 onwards as companies gradually lift travel embargo. Furthermore, domestic leisure travel will continue to drive occupancies across the country. Food & beverage (F&B) demand will continue to grow as eating out will increase, albeit cautiously, said Jaideep Dang, Managing Director, Hotels and Hospitality Group, South Asia, JLL.

Among regions, Goa emerged as the RevPAR leader in absolute terms, despite a decline of 33.3 per cent in December 2020 quarter (Q42020) compared to Q42019, the JLL report said. Bengaluru saw the sharpest decline of 77 per cent in RevPAR in Q42020 compared to the same period in 2019. However, the city has witnessed a month-on-month growth in performance during Q42020, JLL notes.

The revival of the sector has primarily been driven by leisure revenge travel during weekends, festive season, weddings and F&B demand. However, the sector would likely see a full recovery in demand only post full resumption of international flights as foreign tourist arrivals, especially from US, UK in October  March remains a top contributor to the revenues of premium segment hotel rooms, explains Rashesh Shah, an analyst tracking the sector at ICICI Securities.

As per ANAROCK Property Consultants, over 26,340 rooms were added in the organized or branded hotels segment during 2017-19, at a CAGR of 3 per cent. As of May 2020, supply was forecast to increase at an average of 2.8 per cent (adding approximately 44,000 rooms) during the 2020  2024 period.

EIH is best placed on the balance-sheet front. The Rs 350 crore fund raise thorough rights issue would improve debt/equity mix to 0.1x from 0.2x. While Indian Hotels has a strong promoter backing, its debt/equity is 0.7x, which combined with capex requirement could lead to further rise in debt-equity to 0.9x, if Covid persists for a longer period. Lemon Tree, being on a capex mode, is highly levered versus peers. However, it also has strong institutional backing for liquidity support, Shah of ICICI Securities says.


Resistance to the Covid-19 vaccine in Mahurangi has raised concerns.

A Mahurangi Matters Facebook poll that asked readers whether they were willing to be vaccinated against Covid-19 has shown a surprising number of people opposed to the vaccine.

Mahurangi Matters science columnist Professor Ralph Cooney, who has covered the vaccine issue for the newspaper, says he is somewhat concerned by the result.

The Mahurangi Matters poll found 34 per cent of respondents were opposed to having the vaccine versus 66 per cent in favour. This compares to a One News poll conducted in December, which found only 22 per cent would probably not or definitely not have the vaccine.

This represents a significantly increased local community health risk from persistence of Covid-19 over a much longer time. It would represent a special risk to older citizens over 65.

However, Professor Cooney noted that the Mahurangi Matters poll sample size was relatively small (131 respondents), so its result needed to be viewed as indicative rather than definitive.

The fierce anti-vaccine comments in the Mahurangi Matters poll included: My body is not to be used as a lab rat. I am not to be experimented on,  with all the new strains what you would be vaccinated for probably wouldnt help you and might make you even more vulnerable! and People are dying and having adverse reactions [to the vaccine] around the world. Human guinea pigs! Stop believing the imposter government.

In contrast, Professor Cooney suggests readers follow the advice of the US Mayo Clinic, which recommends individuals getting the Covid-19 vaccine as soon as it is available to them.

He says it is only human to be anxious about the vaccine, but those who are feeling this way dont need to be first in line to receive it. Instead, he recommends waiting until several close friends have been vaccinated, consult with them how they are feeling after a week or more and then join the queue to be vaccinated.

He says while in that queue, those with doubts should reflect on the fact that for every approved vaccine in existence, roughly 100,000 volunteers have already been safely vaccinated ahead of them and that extremely demanding regulators, such as the Federal Drug Administration, have thoroughly audited the clinical trials and given final safety clearance for the vaccine.

To those who have rejected the possibility of having the vaccine, Professor Cooney urges them to listen to New Zealand science experts, including Professor Michael Baker and Associate Professor Siouxie Wiles, and to read reputable science publications such as Nature, Lancet and Scientific American.

Professor Cooney also advocates listening to Maori health leaders and faith leaders such as the Pope and primates of the Anglican church.

Mahurangi epidemiologist Dr Jason Gurney echoes the need for people to listen to reputable sources.

We all need to ensure that we base our vaccination decisions on facts, not misinformation from sources such as anti-vax organisations or misguided people on social media, he says.

Dr Gurney says many vaccine experts are working with the Government as part of the countrys Covid-19 response team.

These experts hold the latest and best information in terms of vaccine safety. These are the people we should be listening to, he says.

He added that it was worth highlighting the fact that the majority of those surveyed said they would be happy to take the vaccine, which was an encouraging sign and showed New Zealanders were taking the disease seriously.

You say online poll

We asked our Facebook followers if they are willing to be vaccinated against Covid-19. Here are some of the responses:

Jess Drum Nope. Not enough testing and long-term affects not known. Also covid keeps mutating so whos to say the vaccine will work properly in the first place.

Jenni Francis Sure will. Immunocompromised people who are unable to be vaccinated rely on us to keep them safe.

Christine Colgate A cautious yes for me due to lack of clarity on longer term side effects, but we can only rely on each other for protection, so Id do it for the greater good.

See Mahurangi Matters Facebook for more comments and debate.
Hugh Bonneville is not impressed with Boris Johnsons handling of the pandemic, but Im surprised to discover who he thinks would have made a better job of it.

Lets face it, the decision-making has been catastrophically slow and confused and messy, says the star of Downton Abbey. Whenever Johnson has options, he will only make a choice when theres just one choice left to be made. And then its too late. Of course, you can talk about New Zealand having a smaller population. Nevertheless, there was very, very fast decision-making in New Zealand, as there was in Iceland, both run by women. I rest my case. Not quite. I was no fan of Margaret Thatcher in any way, shape or form, he adds, but my God, she would have led from the front on this, and she would have been decisive on day one.

Now the 57-year-old, who also plays the perpetually thwarted BBC bureaucrat Ian Fletcher in the sitcom W1A, has decided to roll up his own sleeves. Last week, he was photographed wearing a mask, a hi-vis jacket and a cowboy hat in his new job as a volunteer vaccinator in Midhurst, West Sussex. The tabloid headlines neatly summed up his surprise new role: Its Downton Jabbey!

As soon as Midhurst said, Were looking for volunteers at our vaccination centre, I said, Im in! recalls Bonneville. Im secretly very excited. I get to wear hi-vis and point at people!

The organisers, he adds, felt that people would be reassured to see a famous face. But I replied, Well, they wont know its me because Im wearing a flipping mask. Thats the whole pleasure of it. Ill be completely anonymous and can say, Oi, Grandad, get back in line. For years in my profile for Whos Who, I put that my favourite pastime was watching jobsworths in their natural habitat. And now I get to be one! Its almost like being a BBC commissionaire, getting people stuck in revolving doors.

Of course, hes not just in it for the hi-vis jacket. Im a big fan of Jonathan Van-Tam, the deputy chief medical officer, he says. He was very clear that the single biggest factor in helping to end the pandemic is getting people who have doubts to trust the vaccine. Its not just for you personally, its for everyone around you. That collective point needs to be communicated.

Bonneville makes for enormously entertaining company  which is no surprise given the utter joy he brings to films like Paddington and the wry charm he exudes in Twenty Twelve. Having read theology at Cambridge, he attended the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art. After a small role as an air warfare officer opposite Bond, James Bond, in Tomorrow Never Dies, the actor became a mainstay of British TV and cinema: in Notting Hill, as Hugh Grants hapless friend Bernie; as the wealthy Mr Rushworth in Mansfield Park; and as Iris Murdochs husband in the Oscar-winning Iris.

We return to the issue of vaccination. Remarkably, the subject features in Bonnevilles latest project. To Olivia, a moving new film that premieres on Sky Cinema on Friday, recounts a true story. Written and directed by John Hay, who was previously responsible for the Bafta and Emmy-winning Stig of the Dump, it is an elegiac account of the sudden death from measles of six-year-old Olivia  the daughter of author Roald Dahl (Bonneville) and his wife, Hollywood star Patricia Neal (Keeley Hawes). Her death renders Dahl limp with despair  to the extent that he cannot bring himself to utter her name. He lies in the fetal position, catatonic with grief, unable to react even when the kitchen is burning down.

Bonneville, who has been married to Lulu Williams for 23 years and has one son, is struck by the unforeseen prescience of the film. Its timeliness, he says, brings great potency to the idea of not having a vaccine. Even though To Olivia was completed before the pandemic began, that theme of vaccination is there underlying it. The fact that Roald and Pat became vocal supporters of the vaccination programme for measles has an extraordinary resonance now. The film emphasises the importance of it and how Olivias life would have been saved, had a usable or reliable vaccine been available.

Hugh Bonneville as Mr Brown in the acclaimed Paddington (Moviestore/Shutterstock)

The films central theme of grief also held a very personal significance for Bonneville. I certainly felt it very potently when I was doing it. I lost my brother very suddenly a couple of years ago, and both parents in the last five years, my dad just before Covid hit. I thank my stars that he didnt have to go through the Covid experience in a care home.

Grief, he says, is a fickle thing. As anyone whos been through it knows, it comes in waves. The thing that is so unpredictable and weird about grief is that one day you can have a memory about someone, and youll laugh your head off. And then a day later, the same memory will pop into your head, and youll burst into tears. Its these waves of emotion that ebb and flow.

A close friend of Bonnevilles once wrote to him about her own experience of grief. She said there are these waves that feel like theyre crashing in all the time. You think, No, this tsunami of loss thats hitting me will never go away. But she was right. They gradually recede, and youre left with these ripples that will always be there. Time never removes, but time heals. The wound will leave a scar of some sort, and of course, when you go through grief again, it inevitably reopens.

To Olivia is deeply affecting. Did Bonneville take the film home with him? No, I didnt feel I was coming home in a vale of tears. But nevertheless, I think the deftness and the honesty of the writing and the stages of grief that this couple go through are very, very recognisable. Having experienced grief, I felt very connected to it.

As a way of dealing with Olivias death, Dahl and Neal both lose themselves in creativity. In an astounding burst of imaginative energy after their daughter has passed away, Dahl writes Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, his first global bestseller, and Neal wins an Oscar for her starring role opposite Paul Newman (Sam Heughan) in Hud. If any good did come out of this pain and grief, muses Bonneville, there was a positive, creative energy that they both shared. That escape into the imagination is completely understandable.

But, he hastens to add, this is not a date movie. Unfortunately, there are a few people online who Ive noticed saying, Oh, I cant wait to show the kids that new Roald Dahl film. Its not that...

Bonneville as Roald Dahl in To Olivia (Sky TV)

The film does not sanitise the character of Dahl. It portrays an already difficult, cantankerous man bent out of shape by grief. Bonneville is adamant that it was the right decision to depict the author warts and all. He was clearly a very tough man. Ive yet to meet anyone who absolutely adored him, apart from his own family. Ive met two or three people who went to Dahls book signings when they were little. I said, Oh, how amazing. You got your book signed by Roald Dahl. What was he like? Very grumpy, didnt want to be there at all.

In addition, he was not an easy man to live with. He was sometimes a very selfish man, but a man with great love for his family clearly underneath it all and devastated by grief. And obviously, he had this enormous talent.

Nor does the film paint a picture of a blissfully happy union between Dahl and Neal. According to Bonneville, You have only got to read some of the biographies to see that theirs was not a perfect marriage. Pat didnt love Roald when she married him. She loved Gary Cooper, and she says so in her own autobiography. So were not dealing with rose petals here. People are ugly with each other in grief; they can say really nasty things. This is a marriage that, if not in crisis, has certainly got a fissure running through it.

In more recent years, Dahls reputation has been tainted by antisemitic remarks he made in the Eighties and Nineties. Indeed, in December his family issued an apology for his reprehensible remarks. While To Olivia does not address these comments because they were delivered long after the period in which the film is set, Bonneville makes clear that they are disgusting and unpalatable.

Next up, the actor is hoping to shoot a sequel to the successful Downton Abbey movie, written as always by Julian Fellowes. Nothing has thus far been disclosed about the films plot, apart from Bonnevilles co-star Jim Carters assertion that its very funny.

According to Bonneville, there are ducks beginning to quack into a row, but I think they need a vaccination! I described it last time as everyone joining hands and jumping in the pool together. That was the only way it was going to work. And this time, I think everyones holding hands and just hoping. If we can emerge blinking into some sort of sunlit uplands and be released from lockdown, then we really want to do it. Julians written a gorgeous script, and I think itd be the perfect return to cinema. The tone of it is lovely. But whether we get to make it or not, who knows? Theres a will, but is there a way?

Bonneville as Robert Crawley, Earl of Grantham, with his daughter Mary (Michelle Dockery) in Downton Abbey (Jaap Buitendijk/Focus/Kobal/Shutterstock)

In the meantime, Bonneville is praying for the reopening of the theatres. A patron of the excellent Primary Shakespeare Company which brings Shakespeare plays to primary schools, he has missed live performance. Ive really physically felt the need to be amongst other people, not just amongst friends, but also the collective experience of either being in a cinema or a concert hall or a theatre.

He is clinging on to signs of hope. When there was an easing back last autumn, Chichester, my local theatre, did open up a bit and we did some open-air stuff. You could feel the excitement and the connectivity between people. We are social animals. Lets keep our fingers crossed. If we can just get through this next few months, with a vaccinated population, we can begin to hold hands again.

Still, he adds, were not out of it yet. There are going to be some horrible Darwinian moments. I feel for anyone whos trying to maintain an arts organisation. But we are phoenix-like. The arts have always survived through adversity. There are parallels with Shakespeare in the plague years. His theatre was shut and open and shut and open, and were going through that again now. But we will bounce back, and the writing will be juicier and richer and the performances more passionate than ever.

Bonneville closes by pointing to the echoes of our current plight in To Olivia. These two characters emerge at the end of the film with a great sense of positivity, albeit in dark and straitened circumstances. I think its very helpful for an audience to actually see that there are ways through these horrendous waves of pain and physical and mental agony. It will ease with time. The challenge is to find the patience and the inner strength to navigate that. But I think this film does indicate that there is a path through.

There is a future for us, then, even if we dont all end up writing Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?

Yes, Bonneville deadpans. We may just end up eating chocolate.

To Olivia is on Sky Cinema from Friday 19 February

[February 15, 2021] Brian Allison of Snow Software Recognized as 2021 CRN Channel Chief

Snow Software, the global leader in technology intelligence, today announced that CRN, a brand of The Channel Company, has named Brian Allison, Vice President of Global Channels and Alliances, to its 2021 list of Channel Chiefs. The prestigious CRN Channel Chiefs list recognizes leading IT channel vendor executives who continually demonstrate outstanding leadership, influence, innovation and growth. Since joining Snow last year, Allison has overseen the planning, development and execution of a new partner strategy, which is reflected in the recent launch of the enhanced Snow Partner Program. A 20-year veteran in the channel, he has a track record of driving rapid revenue growth and establishing market leadership with his programs. His experience and most recent work at Snow demonstrate that Allison fosters success by elevating the needs of both customers and partners to create a "one team" mentality. With the complex challenges facing many enterprises today, from continued remote work to accelerated digital transformation initiatives, enabling customers and partners to tackle these business issues head-on is essential. "It's an honor to be recognized as a 2021 Channel Chief, and a reflection of the entire Snow Tribe listening to our partners and working tirelessly to make our strategy and program come alive," said Allison. "We look forward to continuing to strengthen or global partner community, and delivering even greater value for both our partners and joint customers. At Snow, we put customers at the heart of everything we do, and our program reflects and rewards partners that truly help businesses tackle their most critical technology challenges."



The 2021 Channel Chiefs are prominent leaders who have influenced the IT channel with cutting-edge strategies, programs and partnerships. All honorees are selected by CRN's editorial staff based on their dedication, industry prestige, and exceptional accomplishments as channel advocates. "CRN's 2021 Channel Chiefs list includes the industry's biggest channel evangelists, a group of individuals who work tirelessly on behalf of their partners and drive growth through the development of strong partner programs and innovative business strategies that help bring business-critical solutions to market," said Blaine Raddon, CEO of The Channel Company. "The Channel Company is proud to recognize these channel influencers and looks forward to following their continued success."

CRN's 2021 Channel Chiefs list will be featured in the February 2021 issue of CRN Magazine and online at www.CRN.com/ChannelChiefs. About Snow Software Snow Software is changing the way organizations understand and manage their technology consumption. Our technology intelligence platform provides comprehensive visibility and contextual insight across software, SaaS (News - Alert) , hardware and cloud. With Snow, IT leaders can effectively optimize resources, enhance performance and enable operational agility in a hybrid world. To learn more, visit www.snowsoftware.com. About The Channel Company The Channel Company enables breakthrough IT channel performance with our dominant media, engaging events, expert consulting and education, and innovative marketing services and platforms. As the channel catalyst, we connect and empower technology suppliers, solution providers and end users. Backed by more than 30 years of unequalled channel experience, we draw from our deep knowledge to envision innovative new solutions for ever-evolving challenges in the technology marketplace. www.thechannelcompany.com Follow The Channel Company: Twitter, LinkedIn. and Facebook.  2021. CRN is a registered trademark of The Channel Company, LLC. All rights reserved. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005030/en/

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By Elizabeth Kwiatkowski, 02/15/2021



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MIKE AND NATALIE

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JOVI AND YARA

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TARIK AND HAZEL

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STEPHANIE AND RYAN

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ANDREW AND AMIRA

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REBECCA AND ZIED

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Elizabeth Kwiatkowski is Associate Editor of Reality TV World and has been covering the reality TV genre for more than a decade.

featured Jovi Dufren and Yara Zaya fighting before their big engagement party, Natalie Mordovtseva and Mike Youngquist seeing a therapist and discovering they no longer loved each other, Rebecca Parrott getting jealous over another woman giving Zied Hakimi attention , and Stephanie Davison and Ryan Carr getting into an explosive argument during Sunday night's Season 8 broadcast on TLC.'s new season stars three returning couples from the franchise: Mike, a 35-year-old from Sequim, WA, and Natalie, a 35-year-old from Ukraine; Rebecca, a 49-year-old from Woodstock, GA, and Zied, a 27-year-old from Tunisia; and Tarik Myers , a 46-year-old from Virginia Beach, VA, and Hazel Cagalitan , a 28-year-old from the Philippines.Mike and Natalie previously starred on Season 7 of , Tarik Myers and Hazel Cagalitan found fame on Season 2 of : Before the 90 Days, and Rebecca and Zied first appeared on : Before the 90 Days' third season.The four new couples starring on Season 8 of are Brandon Gibbs, a 27-year-old from Dinwiddie, VA, and Julia Trubkina, a 26-year-old from Russia; Jovi, a 29-year-old from New Orleans, LA, and Yara, a 25-year-old from Ukraine; Stephanie, a 52-year-old from Grand Rapids, MI, and Ryan, a 27-year-old from Belize; and Andrew Kenton, a 32-year-old from Roseville, CA, and Amira Lollysa, a 28-year-old from France.features Americans who have fallen in love with foreigners bringing their fiances to the United States on K-1 visas.However, once the couple is in America together, the American must marry their overseas partner within the 90-day period allowed by the visa or the foreigner has to return to their home country.Below is the latest on several of 's eighth-season couples based on the tenth episode.Natalie said Michael didn't seem interested in talking about their future together and it left her feeling frustrated. She didn't think they were on the same page.Natalie brought up how she hadn't picked out a wedding dress yet, but Mike noted he didn't have a suit either and so it wasn't a big deal.Natalie reminded Mike that half of the 90 days on her K-1 visa were up and time was running out, so she suggested they should see a psychologist or family counselor together.Natalie said she would pay for it and it's important for them to work on their relationship, but Mike wasn't willing to open up to a stranger."No, I don't want to do it," Mike responded firmly, later adding, "I'm not going to spend a ton of money just to have a simple conversation with Natalie."Mike told Natalie that they had issues "beyond talking" and if she couldn't explain herself to him, she wouldn't be able to explain herself to a counselor.Natalie admitted she was pissed off and wished her relationship was easier and she and Mike could communicate better.While making dinner one night, Natalie said she and Mike had different priorities when Mike suggested he just wanted to chill, relax and have some fun. Natalie also pushed to see a counselor again.Mike thought it was "annoying" Natalie continued to bring this up when he simply wasn't willing to see a therapist, and he even walked away from her and the conversation at one point.Mike later got a haircut and shared with his stylist Jane how Natalie's arrival was a big transition and they even argued about the sky being blue. Mike revealed he had yet to return Natalie's engagement ring."I am not 100 percent ready to get married," Mike shared.Jane said Mike seemed more unsure than ever about marriage, which really threw her off considering that was supposed to be the goal to begin with. Jane jokingly asked Mike out on a date.Jane said seeing a counselor might actually be a good idea because they could find some common ground and discover what to talk about and how to communicate their differences better. Mike therefore began to consider the idea.Mike ultimately came around to the idea of a couples' therapy session, and he was excited about getting some stuff off his chest and hopefully a weight off his shoulders.At therapy, Natalie said she felt like Mike ignored her emotions and feelings as she was trying to adjust to a brand new country. Mike, on the other hand, said he was putting all of his energy into making her feel comfortable and so he was unhappy on the inside.Natalie thanked Mike for all of the effort he had put forth, and then Mike asked Natalie, "Are we still in love?""It's difficult for me a lot," Natalie replied."We're not in love right now. You often ask me why I don't want to talk about marriage or a wedding right now... and it's because we're not in love," Mike explained.Natalie said Mike's words were shocking and unexpected and she wished she had never heard it. Natalie felt horrible that Mike didn't love her, and she told Mike, "You give me pain."Mike told Natalie that she gave him pain as well and the problem was clearly that the couple didn't love each other anymore. Mike didn't know how to move forward from there, and he questioned whether they should just throw in the towel.Mike said his dream was to get married, have kids and have a happy family, but he was no longer certain all of that was going to be with Natalie.With 45 days left to wed, Jovi and Yara headed to Jovi's hometown for an engagement party. Yara just wanted to stay home and sleep, but she noted that she was excited to meet Jovi's dad, who works a similar job as Jovi and spends a lot of time away from home.Jovi planned to wait a few more weeks to tell his family about the pregnancy since it was too soon, so even his mother was unaware that Yara was carrying his first child.Jovi's mother Gwen apparently planned a huge bash for 50-60 people while Yara thought her engagement party was just going to be an intimate gathering. Gwen admitted Yara was going to be "surprised" and probably not happy.Jovi's dad told Yara that she dressed a little too sexy for the streets of New Orleans, explaining that some parts of New Orleans can be dangerous and she shouldn't walk around like that. Jovi's dad didn't like how much skin Yara showed.However, Yara said she dressed how she liked to dress and no one was going to change that about her.Yara also insisted she hated hearing the stereotype that Ukrainian women are after American men so they can trick them and move to America. Yara said it wasn't her dream to come to America and she heard stereotypes herself, like how Americans are allegedly "stupid."Yara said she'd actually like to live in Ukraine to be closer to her mom, and Jovi's parents panicked a little bit because they didn't want to lose their son and not live near their future grandchildren.Jovi assured his parents that he didn't want to move somewhere cold and he and Yara had more time to figure that out.Jovi wished Yara had brought up moving to Ukraine at a different time because it clearly made his parents concerned. But Jovi and his dad headed to a crawfish boil with Jovi's friends while Yara stayed back at the house to nap and do some decorating with Gwen.Jovi told his parents that Yara just needed time to adjust to living in the United States, but Jovi's dad pointed out the commitment must come before the time. Jovi said he was okay with taking a risk to marry the person he loved.Jovi's friends all joked that Jovi's relationship wasn't going to last and he wouldn't make it more than six months. Little did the guys know, however, that Yara was pregnant."Is this girl going to stop the Jovi ways?" one friend ask."Strip joints!" Jovi's dad interjected."I mean, you go out every night," the friend added.Jovi insisted he had changed a lot in the last two years, and Jovi's pals agreed Yara must have special powers in order to contain Jovi and his wild ways.While Jovi said he loved to travel, he couldn't picture himself living anywhere else than New Orleans. But since they had a kid on the way, Jovi said he'd do anything it takes to make his relationship work.Yara didn't feel comfortable in Jovi's parents' house, and she was a bit angry he had left her for the crawfish boil. Yara was upset Jovi brought her crawfish to eat instead of something that smelled better.Yara figured people would suspect she's pregnant because of her eating habits and decision not to drink at her engagement party, but Jovi wanted to wait longer to share the news with his loved ones.Yara was not in a good mood and called Jovi a "son of a b-tch" behind his back. Jovi said he just wanted to enjoy the party and it seemed like Yara was trying to pick a fight because she was unhappy.The couple bickered over food on the way to the party, and Jovi insisted he had asked Yara what she wanted to eat. Yara accused Jovi of lying and just drinking and partying too much.Yara called Jovi "an alcoholic," saying a beer was always in her fiancee's hand. Jovi said he wasn't drunk and hadn't been drinking, but Yara was offended that Jovi was treating her like she was stupid.Jovi didn't understand why Yara wanted to fight when they were on their way to a party to celebrate their upcoming marriage."If I was not pregnant, I would be already in Ukraine," Yara said in tears."Not so lucky," Jovi responded."Son of a b-tch," Yara said in tears.With 24 days in lockdown amid the coronavirus pandemic and 41 days left to wed on Hazel's K-1 visa, Tarik was shown teaching Hazel how to drive a lawn mower.Tarik had promised Hazel a happy and adventurous 90 days, but Tarik acknowledged, "COVID had another plan."The pair was stuck in the house with Tarik's daughter Auri and Hazel said it was sad that she couldn't leave the house and explore.Hazel said she didn't mind the situation but was worried for her son Harrey in the Philippines, where there had also been a coronavirus outbreak. Hazel had learned from Harrey's stepmother that Harrey has a fever."I feel brokenhearted. It is very hard being away from my son, and there is nothing I can do," Hazel cried in a confessional.Hazel asked Tarik to stop asking about her son because it made her emotional, and Tarik confessed he felt guilty because Hazel was in America -- away from her family -- for him and the sake of their relationship.Hazel was hurting, but she didn't live with her son in the Philippines either since she didn't have enough money to take care of him. Harrey therefore lived with his father and stepmother Ruby.Ruby shared with Hazel via FaceTime that Harrey was feeling better, and she got to see her son, who gushed with a big smile, "I am good!" Hazel was thrilled that her son was okay.Harrey was also in lockdown in the Philippines and so Tarik taught him how to exercise at home by doing jumping jacks. Tarik called him "the sweetest little guy in the world" and said he missed Harrey as well.Auri and Harrey also FaceTimed with each other and the pair adorably giggled and jumped up and down at the sight of each other."I will come and get you but it may take a long time, okay?" Hazel told her boy.Tarik and Hazel acknowledged they didn't have a plan because COVID-19 complicated everything.Stephanie was shown teaching Ryan how to hulu hoop on the beach, and she said she felt more connected to him and happy with him. Stephanie was after a world record for hula hooping, and Ryan said he had faith Stephanie could do it.The pair had a lot of fun on the beach and Ryan loved laughing with his fiancee."Right now, we are really rebuilding our relationship, and I am feeling very optimistic," Stephanie gushed.Ryan told Stephanie that he was looking forward to touring Michigan just like he toured Stephanie around in Belize. Ryan didn't know much about Michigan, but he also said he was excited to get a job in after his move.Ryan said his mother wasn't against the idea of him moving to the United States, but his mother apparently blocked Stephanie's number because Stephanie had texted her asking for money back that she had given to Ryan's family one time.Stephanie was angry that Ryan's mother never reached out to her and thanked her for the money, which made Stephanie want to ask for the money back. Ryan just pointed out that his mother didn't need to bow down to Stephanie.Stephanie said she worked hard for her money, and Ryan acknowledged that he understood where she was coming from because she had been very generous to his family."[But] I was expecting that was from the heart, you know? I feel if my fiancee is trying to control me and my family because of her money, then I would have to break it off. That's not a healthy relationship," Ryan told the cameras.Stephanie said she never meant to disrespect Ryan's mother, but Ryan assured Stephanie that his mother didn't hold grudges and the girls should just stay out of each other's hair.Stephanie's psychic Maria had previously warned Stephanie that another woman was around Ryan all the time and so she needed to keep an eye on him. Stephanie therefore decided to bring that up with Ryan at dinner since her reading was weighing heavily on her shoulders.Stephanie told Ryan that Maria had said Ryan was going to move to America and leave her for a younger woman, but Ryan said he didn't believe in that and thought it was the devil's work.Stephanie also said she had heard that Ryan's mother was pressuring him to have babies and so he might leave her for a woman, maybe a co-worker.Ryan insisted he didn't want to have children "right now," which Stephanie called him out on. But Ryan clarified he didn't want kids -- "not now and not forever."Stephanie said she didn't want to fight with Ryan but their 25-year age gap was difficult for her sometimes and made her feel a little insecure.Ryan promised Stephanie that he had no desire to go to the United States and leave her because she's a gorgeous woman and he'd always want to "rock [her] boat."Four hours later, Stephanie was yelling at Ryan, "Don't you f-cking lie to me! Are you afraid of the truth, Ryan? Why would you do that to me?"As Stephanie was flipping out, Ryan left and tried to get a cab.Andrew packed up his belongings to leave Mexico, and he was so upset about the idea of returning to an empty apartment in America and a "world of confusion" given there were only 27 days left on Amira's K-1 visa.Andrew's mother picked him up at the airport, and she could tell he felt defeated and sad. Andrew said he just wanted to be with Amira and missed her terribly.Andrew told his mother that Amira had not discussed her detainment in great detail and she was really "going through it" and had been a bit traumatized.Andrew revealed that he and Amira were tossing around the idea of going to Serbia, but his mother was surprised Amira would be "brave enough" to do that again. Andrew said he just wanted Amira to feel "safe, secure and comfortable" and would do whatever she's willing to do.Andrew admitted he was "desperate for other options" and Serbia would be a last resort."Hell or high water, I just want to be with her," Andrew said, adding that there was "nothing dangerous" about the Serbia plan.Andrew had a basket of goodies ready for Amira on his bed, including an iPhone and $500 debit card, and so it was sad those things were waiting for his fiancee and he couldn't give them to her."I have invested all of me in this relationship -- financially, emotionally. I've given a significant amount of my money, not only for the visa but for the travel and for the vacations and for the ring," Andrew explained."All of it has been incredibly expensive, and I'm going to do everything I can to figure out a solution. I am going to exhaust every outlet."Zied was shown FaceTiming with his family, and he admitted he was a little stressed. Zied was still struggling with the distance from his family and not having any of his relatives around.But Rebecca surprised Zied with some fake tattoos, and he thought that was really funny.Rebecca was glad to make Zied laugh and show him a good time, and she thought he looked "sexy" in the tattoos. But she was very nervous about going to dinner again with her daughter Tiffany, Tiffany's fiance Micah and some of her daughter's friends.The dinner took place just a few days after Zied's arrival, and Micah still wasn't sure whether Zied was "playing us." Zied revealed the biggest difference for him in America was that people aren't allowed to kiss in public in Tunisia and would go to jail for a public display of affection.Rebecca said she felt a bit uncomfortable a young and hot blonde at the dinner table named Hannah seemed so interested in Zied. Hannah even offered to help Zied move his things with her truck, which rubbed Rebecca the wrong way.Rebecca explained Zied's culture wouldn't allow a pretty, young single woman to be at his apartment, but Tiffany believed Hannah was just trying to be genuinely helpful and Rebecca was showing she was jealous and insecure.Rebecca warned Zied that women in America are not the same as the women in Tunisia.Want more spoilers or couples updates? Click here to visit our homepage!
The (ED) has arrested Sachin Joshi, an actor-producer hailing from a family having gutka manufacturing business, in connection with a case against the city-based Omkar Realtors and Developers, officials said on Monday.

They said Joshi, 37, was arrested under relevant sections of the Prevention of Act (PMLA) on Sunday after he was questioned for several hours by the investigating officer of the case.

A special anti- court here later sent him to the custody of the ED till February 18.

Joshi's father J M Joshi is the promoter of the JMJ Group which is into the business of manufacturing gutka, pan masala and some other products, besides operating in the hospitality sector.

Sachin Joshi is stated to have acted in some south Indian and Hindi movies and was producer of some of them.

The income tax department had conducted multi-city raids against the group and those linked to it for almost six days and the action ended on February 13.

Tax department officials claimed they detected "unaccounted" transactions of about Rs 1,500 crore after the action.

The ED, meanwhile, said it wanted to put Sachin Joshi through custodial interrogation in order to probe alleged "diversion" of about Rs 87 crore, allegedly misappropriated from a slum rehabilitation scheme fund, from the Omkar Group to a company linked to him, Viking group.

"It is established that loans availed from Yes Bank has been diverted and accused (Sachin Joshi) has helped promoters of Omkar Group in such diversion for an amount of at least Rs 87 crore," the ED claimed while seeking his remand.

"The interrogation of Sachin Joshi may reveal crucial facts which are in his exclusive domain."



This is "a behemoth scam" involving huge sum of money which has been siphoned off by the accused in connivance with other persons, the ED alleged.

Sachin Joshi, in his statement recorded with the ED, denied any wrongdoing.

The ED had last month arrested Omkar Realtors and Developers chairman Kamal Kishore Gupta and its managing director Babulal Varma after raids were carried out against them and the group.

The PMLA case pertains to alleged irregularities in the execution of the SRA (slum rehabilitation authority) scheme in development of a housing society in Mumbai.

The company and the two executives are also facing allegations of "diverting" over Rs 400 crore loan from Yes bank.

The ED case has been filed after studying an FIR of the Aurangabad district police in Maharashtra that was registered under various sections of IPC like cheating and criminal breach of trust, the agency had said earlier.

The ED had quoted the police FIR to say that "Omkar Realtors and Developers Pvt Ltd and its directors bought a firm 'Surana Construction' which had SRA rights for re-development of Anand Nagar SRA Cooperative Housing Society in Mumbai's Wadala area".

"However, Omkar and its promoters did not pay back the amount due to the seller and also mortgaged future FSI (floor space index) of the said SRA project and took huge amounts of loans," it said.

The ED also claimed its probe found that "loans to the tune of Rs 410 crore were diverted and not used for intended purposes".

"No work of SRA building was undertaken. The requisite rules and procedures under SRA were ignored by the accused and documents relating to names of slum dwellers were forged to claim more FSI for mortgaging the same with banks for taking the loans," the ED had alleged.

Reacting to the arrests of its top executives, the realty group had said that it was "emphatic that Omkar Group is not in violation of any lending norms and slum approvals".

(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.)
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 16:38:44|Editor: huaxia

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BEIJING, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The scale of China's privately offered funds reached 15.97 trillion yuan (about 2.48 trillion U.S. dollars) at the end of last year, industry association data shows.

Some 24,561 institutions managed these funds by the end of 2020, with the total number of registered privately offered funds hitting 96,852, according to the Asset Management Association of China.

In December alone, the association saw 3,609 newly registered privately offered funds, up 945 funds or 35.47 percent from a month earlier.

The volume of newly registered assets came in at 140.55 billion yuan in December, increasing 25.89 billion yuan from the previous month.

Established in 2012, the association is a self-regulatory organization representing the mutual fund industry of China. Enditem
Monday's update did not contain news about the upcoming IPO

( ) said its Vantage Towers Portfolio has expanded and confirmed guidance for 2021.

The statement revealed Vantage Towers' portfolio increased to around 82,000 macro sites, expanding its presence in 10 European markets - with leading positions in 9 of them.

Vantage said it is also focusing on becoming a 5G superhost in Europe, offering bespoke solutions for 5G connectivity across various verticals, including manufacturing, healthcare, e-gaming and agriculture.

READ: Vodafone confident on cash flow despite slow sales



In the nine months to December 31, the telecoms infrastructure firm added 1,400 new tenancies and 450 sites, so its confident of hitting its target of 550 new sites by the end of the financial year in March. Adjusted underlying earnings (EBITDA) came in at 620mln.

It also reaffirmed guidance of recurring free cash flow of 375-385mln.

The statement did not contain any updates on the Frankfurt IPO, which is expected for early this year.

Shares rose 1% to 135.4p early on Monday.

--Adds shares--

Channel 4 are reportedly looking to rival ITV's Love Island by spicing up Married At First Sight's UK format.

Married At First Sight Australia is famously explosive - with the UK version extremely tame in comparison.

But according to The Sun, Channel 4 want to bring the sexual tension and explosive tiffs to entice a younger, wilder audience.

Shake it up! Channel 4 are reportedly looking to rival ITV's Love Island by spicing up Married At First Sight's UK format [pictured: a scene from the Australian version]

A source told the publication: 'Married At First Sight UK started out as much more of a straight TV experiment looking at relationships.

'Producers were already looking to shake up the format, but the huge success of the Aussie version has convinced them they have the chance to reinvent the show and create one of this country's most talked- about TV hits.

'They're looking for particularly attractive and interesting characters to ensure the British reincarnation is as explosive as the one Down Under.'

Casting for the new E4 series is open now marriedatfirstsight@cplproductions.co.uk.

Sex it up! Married At First Sight Australia is famously explosive - with the UK version extremely tame in comparison. But according to The Sun, Channel 4 want to bring the sexual tension and explosive tiffs to entice a younger, wilder audience

By comparison, MAFS UK sees a handful of couples meeting on their wedding day before each couple is sent off to live in their pairs, just the two of them.

They are then asked whether or not they want to remain as a couple.

MAFS Australia throws 10 couples together and puts them up in one house - similar to Love Island's villa format.

They socialise together - which means some of the couples tend to stray - and have to attend weekly commitment ceremonies where they stay together or split.

Mix it up! A source told the publication - 'Married At First Sight UK started out as much more of a straight TV experiment looking at relationships'

This comes after Married At First Sight Australia's Sam Ball insisted he didn't really cheat on his wife Lizzie Sobinoff with Ines Basic.

Calling into UK's Talk Radio last week, Sam told Lizzie Cundy and Patrick Christys that his 'womanizing' storyline on the show was set up by producers.

Sam was on MAFS and shown to have betrayed his wife Lizzie with Ines, but said: 'I was taken into a dark room by producers and told [the cheating storyline] was going to happen...

Setting things straight: Married At First Sight Australia's Sam Ball has insisted that he didn't really cheat on his wife Lizzie Sobinoff with Ines Basic

'I threw [Ines] onto a bed and that was it... I actually went out for a night with the boys after that.'

Sam explained that he has been unable to speak out and defend himself because he was under contract.

'It's so binding, there's not much you can do at all. Your hands are tied. I couldn't talk out or do anything. I have literally been gagged for the last two years,' he said.

Interviewer Lizzie seemed taken with Sam, inviting him to the UK to stay with her.

Come on over! Interviewer Lizzie Cundy seemed taken with Sam, inviting him to the UK to stay with her.

'I actually really liked Sam': MAFS Australia star Ines branded Sam a 'f*** boy' and claimed he promised they could be together, even after he dumped her on the show

Telling him about the first time she clapped eyes on him, she said: 'It was more like love at first sight rather than married at first sight!'

She also told him she hoped his experience with wife Lizzie hadn't put him off people with the same name.

Sam didn't hold back with his thoughts on the producers of MAFs, accusing them of tricking him into 'fat-shaming' wife Lizzie.

'When they asked me about her I said she had nice eyes and everything... but the producers were like "come on mate shes not your usual type". They told me the cameras were off and said "she's a big girl" and that's how that happened.

He also revealed that Ines had blocked him - despite Ines telling MailOnline that he dumped her.

'He said we could make it work': Ines was left devastated after she and Sam forged a plan to leave the TV experiment and start a new life together, but he ghosted and blocked her

'There was so much chemistry': Ines slammed Sam for recently alleging their romance was 'staged' and revealed they first 'hooked up' off camera in the hotel swimming pool

Ines claimed they forged a plan to leave the TV experiment and start a new life together, but he ghosted her and they never spoke again.

Ines said: 'I actually really liked Sam. I wasn't expecting that because I thought I was done for.

'Sam and I started off camera. When we finished filming we had curfews and we were allowed out for a couple of hours and I randomly walked into this bar and he was there. We just kicked it off.

'Then we went back to the hotel pool and we started hooking up. There was so much chemistry.

'He is the ultimate f*** boy': The couple's attraction for each other resulted in them deciding to leave the show, and Sam would pretend he had lost interest  but he never spoke to Ines again

'The producers found out so they had to create this storyline of me messaging him on Instagram.'

At the point of their intimate liaison, Ines was married to Bronson Norrish.

Ines explained: 'Off camera he was telling me "lets leave the show and make this work on our terms."

'He said it was getting too dramatic and he wanted to be with me and we could move cities and make it work. I believed him.

'The only way out of the show was for him to reject me and say you're not interested in a relationship with me because there was no way they would let us leave. That's what happened.

Ex: Ines was married to Bronson Norrish [pictured]

'I was expecting a phone call from him but nothing. I didn't hear from him. I didn't call him and a few months went by and I still didn't call him.

'He is the ultimate f*** boy, major. Some of my friends know people that had been with him and they say he is an a***hole.

'I left the whole experiment believing we would be together. It was so bad and so much pressure.'

Viewers were made to believe Ines and Sam had sex  and while they didn't go all the way, the pair did explore their temptations towards each other.

But Sam has been keen to dispel the idea that his romance with Ines was genuine, as the 2019 Australian series continues to air for the first time in the UK.
 In a meet promoting unity and equality, the Pitt gymnastics team (2-5-1, 2-4-1 EAGL) tied its opponent, Temple (0-7-1, 0-4-1 EAGL), with a score of 194.525 Sunday afternoon at Fitzgerald Field House.The Panthers debuted black leotards emblazoned with the letters "BLM" on the arm to promote inclusion with the theme of "Until We Unite."The tie is Pitt's third in program history, and the first since Jan. 23, 2004, with West Virginia in a tri-meet hosted by the Mountaineers, where the teams each recorded a score of 195.300. Pitt's only other tie also came against West Virginia, this time on Feb. 15, 1986, with scores of 177.500.Three Panthers earned event wins:on uneven bars,on floor exercise, andin the all-around. Coca and Ceccarini each tied their season-high scores of 9.875 on their respective events. Beckwith recorded season-high scores on vault (9.700) and beam (9.950), as well as the all-around (38.125).Three Panthers earned podium spots on vault, with sophomorerecording a runner-up score of 9.825. All five competing Panthers recorded season-best or career-best scores. Juniorsandtied for third place with scores of 9.800, as Chamberlain's score marked a career high. Pitt ended the first rotation with a score of 48.875.The Panthers swept the top four scores on bars, with Coca leading for Pitt. Her season-best score of 9.875 was good for the individual event win. Chamberlain followed with a 9.850, and freshmanearned a career-best 9.800. Miller rounded out the top scores with a 9.775. Overall, Pitt earned a 48.400 for the second rotation to total 97.725.Beckwith led the way for Pitt with a career-high tying 9.850. Chamberlain followed with a 9.800, and Coca contributed a 9.775. Rounding out the top scores were junior(9.725) and Macy (9.675). Pitt totaled 48.825 on beam to bring its three-event score to 146.100.Ceccarini picked up the crown for the Panthers on floor exercise, recording a season-best score of 9.875. Beckwith was next with a 9.775, and Miller put forth a 9.700. Pitt's 48.425 score in the fourth rotation tied the meet at 194.525, marking the Panthers' third tie in program history and its first since 2004.The Panthers will travel to Towson, Md., for a quad meet with host Towson alongside No. 23 North Carolina and LIU, Friday at 6 p.m. ET.

Marjorie Taylor Greene has marked the third anniversary of the Parkland mass shooting with a tweet calling for more guns in schools.

The Republican made the inflammatory comment after President Joe Biden called for a 'common sense' approach to gun reform as he commemorated the 17 lives lost in the massacre.

Greene wrote: 'Joe Biden had 30,000 armed guards at his inauguration, he clearly believes in good guys with guns. The best way to prevent school shootings is to repeal all gun free school zones and protect our kids like he protects himself.'

The 46-year-old has previously suggested that the Parkland and Sandy Hook shootings were staged and has refused calls to resign over those comments.

Greene wearing a 'Trump Won' face mask on January 3, a month after the general election which he lost

It comes after Biden put out a statement saying his administration 'will not wait for the next mass shooting' before pushing forward legislation.

'We will take action to end our epidemic of gun violence and make our schools and communities safer,' the president said on Sunday.

Parents of the children killed in the rampage last month demanded that Greene resign over her comments that the February 2018 massacre was staged.

In May of that year, she posted online a story about disgraced Broward County sheriff's deputy Scot Peterson - who ran away when the Valentine's Day shooting began - receiving a retirement pension.

In the comments section, someone wrote: 'It's called a pay off to keep his mouth shut since it was a false flag planned shooting.'

Greene replied: 'Exactly.'

Another commented: 'Kick back for going along with the evil plan. You know it's not for doing a good job.'

Greene responded: 'My thoughts exactly!! Paid to do what he did and keep his mouth shut!'

Gun rights activists frequently claim that school shootings are 'false flag' events, orchestrated by Democrats with paid actors, rather than real victims. They believe the scenarios are staged to spur gun control.

Relatives of the 17 students and staff killed in the massacre furiously demanded she resign, and David Hogg, a survivor of the shooting, called on her to apologize.

'Apologize Now or continue to spread these conspiracies and we will be sure to make the next 2 years of your life not only your last in Congress but a living hell as well,' he said.

He added they would 'also accept your resignation in place of an apology.'

Earlier this month, Democrats voted to remove Greene from her committee duties, in part due to these remarks.

Biden on Sunday said he wants Congress to pass laws that would require background checks on all gun sales and ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.

President Joe Biden on Sunday called on Congress to enact 'common sense' reforms to the nation's gun laws. The president is seen above in the Oval Office on Friday

The confessed school shooter, Nikolas Cruz, who was 19 at the time, was armed with an AR-15-style rifle and fired between 100 and 150 rounds in a rampage that killed 14 students and three adult staff at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Biden said Congress must also eliminate 'immunity for gun manufacturers who knowingly put weapons of war on our streets.'

Cruz was able to buy the assault rifle legally, despite having known mental health problems.

Even in a country that has grown inured to mass shootings and gun violence, the Florida shooting sparked outrage across the US and prompted fresh demands for firearms control.

But with Donald Trump in the White House and the Republicans controlling the Senate at the time, legislation approved by the Democrats in the House of Representatives went nowhere.

People stand in the makeshift memorial in front of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland on the third anniversary of the shooting on Sunday. The confessed school shooter, Nikolas Cruz, who was 19 at the time, was armed with an AR-15-style rifle and fired between 100 and 150 rounds in a rampage that killed 14 students and three adult staff at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School

Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday said the House would try again.

'We will enact these and other life-saving bills and deliver the progress that the Parkland community and the American people deserve and demand,' she said in a statement.

Despite polls finding most Americans in favor of some sort of gun law reforms, successive US administrations have been powerless to pass legislation.

'The time to act is now,' Biden said.
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The interior ministries of Ukraine and the United Arab Emirates will unite their efforts to combat illegal migration.

Such an agreement was reached at a meeting between Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov and UAE Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Interior Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan, according to the Ukrainian Interior Ministry's liaisons department.

"We must intensify cooperation between our countries in the field of combating illegal migration, issuing and processing documents, protection of personal data. I also propose informing more actively our law enforcement agencies about the revealed facts of citizens of third countries using passport documents of Ukraine with signs of forgery," Avakov said.

Both parties separately outlined future areas of bilateral cooperation. The main points included the exchange of experience and information, the training of cybersecurity specialists, joint consultations and cooperation in combating hybrid warfare, conducting joint special operations to neutralize criminal groups operating in cyberspace, etc.

The Ukrainian interior minister briefed his colleague on successful operations conducted by Ukrainian cyber police.

In addition, Avakov met with Deputy Secretary-General of the Supreme National Security Council of the UAE Ali Mohammed Al Shamsi. Both parties outlined areas of bilateral cooperation, including in the fight against terrorist and extremist organizations and in the field of migration.

"I believe that it is necessary to deepen cooperation between the migration authorities of our countries, namely in the field of combating illegal migration, human trafficking, issuance and processing of documents, protection of personal data. I propose drafting and signing a respective document," Avakov said.

He informed his interlocutor about the fight against cybercrime and hybrid threats facing Ukraine against the background of Russian military aggression.

Photo: Ukrainian Interior Ministry, Facebook
Alarmed by the growing number of coronavirus positive cases in Amravati district of Maharashtra since the beginning of February, the district administration has imposed a night curfew but ruled out the possibility of imposition of a fresh lockdown.

District Collector Shailesh Naval said the rise in the cases can be attributed to more number of people coming forward for testing. Amravati district on Monday reported 449 fresh coronavirus positive cases, taking the count to 25,743.

"The curfew is aimed at controlling crowding at public and market places. It does not mean closing down businesses or markets which will function as usual," the collector said.

Naval said the call on functioning of schools in the district has to be taken by respective schools.

"In some schools, teachers and students have tested positive for coronavirus. We leave this decision to managements of schools," he said.

Responding to a query, Naval said there is no possibility of imposition of a lockdown again in the district.

"The first lockdown was imposed because there were no facilities. Now, we are equipped with all facilities. There is no dearth of oxygen cylinders and ventilators at hospitals. So there is no chance of another lockdown," he said.
Japanese Ambassador to India Satoshi Suzuki said on Monday that his country is looking forward to assist in projects related to enhancing skills and infrastructure in Assam.

For India, the development of North East is indispensable and the country is mobilising all the abundantly available resources in the region, including Assam, the envoy said.

"Abundant human and natural resources, as well as rich cultural diversity of Assam needs to be tapped to their full potential," he said at an international convention on Act East Policy and Indo-Japan Cooperation with special focus on Assam.Japan takes a "panoramic view in its diplomacy and this vision is free, open and inclusive at its centre. India's North East, including Assam, plays an important role in this vision", he said.

The envoy, who began his speech in Assamese saying how delighted he was to be in the state and ended it with 'Joi Aai Asom' (Hail Mother Assam), highlighted the various similarities between Japan and Assam and there can be a collaboration between the two to boost their mutual interests.He said that connecting India's eastern border with South East Asia and the Bay of Bengal makes sense both economically and strategically.

Japan is already supporting several connectivity projects in the region which will reduce travelling time and improve connectivity among Bhutan, India and Bangladesh.Referring to the Guwahati Water Supply Project assisted by the Japan International Corporation Agency (JICA), Suzuki said that he was very impressed with the progress of the project and clean drinking water would soon be supplied to households in the city.

On the Guwahati sewerage project, he said that this will not only support a more convenient life but also ensure better healthcare and sanitation.

"Due to the COVID-19 situation, healthcare and sanitation has assumed great importance and Japan will support these endeavours", he said.

Japan is also committed to human resource development and has collaboration with IIT, Guwahati which will create new eco-system of entrepreneurs in Assam.Acquiring and enhancing skill development through internships and training programmes will also help the youths of Assam, he said.

The envoy said that his country was also willing to partner with Assam to train its human resources to enable them to avail job opportunities in Japan.

"Abundant natural resources as well as skilled capital will connect the youths with new businesses and will also make them globally competitive," Suzuki added.

He also thanked India for its long good and friendly relations with Japan and said that his country would not have been in a position to get out of the ashes of the destructions caused by the Second World War without help from India.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
The Ministry of Health expects next week to receive the COVID-19 vaccine in Ukraine from AstraZeneca, which is produced at the facilities of the Indian company Serum Institute; Pfizer's vaccine is still delayed due to delays in Pfizer's COVAX contracts, Chief Sanitary Doctor, Deputy Minister of Health Viktor Liashko said.

"On Monday-Tuesday, the AstraZeneca vaccine will arrive. We are in constant negotiations with Pfizer as part of the COVAX mechanism," he told reporters on Saturday.

Liashko stressed that the delay in the delivery of the Pfizer vaccine under the COVAX mechanism is due to a change in the pharmaceutical company's approach to vaccine registration.

"Ukraine is among 17 priority countries where the COVAX mechanism supplies the vaccine. None of them has yet received the Pfizer vaccine for the same technical reason - the vaccine needs to be registered in the country. We thought that local Pfizer offices could do this. It was expected that the registration had take place last Thursday, but the Pfizer headquarters changed their approach - they have to settle certain bureaucratic approaches: sign an agreement between Pfizer and COVAX and Ukraine and Pfizer," he said.

Liashko recalled that within the framework of COVAX, Ukraine will receive 8 million doses, of which 117,000 doses from Pfizer. In addition, Ukraine may ask to increase the amount of Pfizer vaccine.

"Yesterday, the operational headquarters of the Ministry of Health made such an application. Today, I've signed such an application. We can simultaneously receive at least 600,000 doses of Pfizer vaccine in Ukraine," he said.

According to Liashko, Ukraine will also receive 2.2 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine under COVAX, this amount may be increased to 3.7 million doses by the end of the second quarter.

"We expect the COVAX AstraZeneca vaccine supplies to begin in late February/early March," he said.

At the same time, Liashko stressed that the logistics of the vaccination campaign against COVID-19 makes it possible to start vaccination both in the case of supplies of the Pfizer vaccine and the AstraZeneca vaccine.

He noted that within the framework of COVAX, the AstraZeneca vaccine produced at facilities in South Korea will be delivered to Ukraine.
Here's what you need to know this morning: Monday, Feb. 15

Miller, chairman of the House government reform committee that endorsed the proposal, said during a hearing that the bill absolutely strikes a balance between local control and restoring our private property rights, which is critical in maintaining our hard-earned reputation as being one of the most affordable housing markets in the country.
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Finite element analysis Market is forecast to reach $3.06 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 9.1% during 2020-2025. Increasing requirement of finite element analysis for efficient product development cycle and its applications in production of next generation automobiles and aerospace technology will be a key trend for the growth of finite element analysis software market. The increase in R&D investments in manufacturing sector and rise in initiatives by several countries are the major factors for the growth of the market. In 2018, China government has launched an initiative called Made in China 2025 to promote industrial growth. Similarly India launched Make in India initiative to promote the growth of manufacturing facilities. Such initiatives are likely to increase the demand for efficient manufacturing, thereby accelerating the demand for Finite element analysis Market.

Report Coverage

The report: Finite element analysis Market  Forecast (2020-2025), by IndustryARC, covers an in-depth analysis of the following segments of the Finite element analysis Market.





Key Takeaways

Asia-Pacific dominates the Finite element analysis market owing to rising production of automobiles and challenges on product design in manufacturing sector .

Design Optimization on the Finite Element analysis case is likely to register highest CAGR due to rising deployment of advanced technology in modern automobiles.

Finite element analysis in automotive industry is likely to grow at a highest CAGR owing to its applications such as reducing the product design time, operational costs, and also lesser marketing time.

Major companies in Finite element analysis market include ANSYS , Dassault Systems, MSC Software, Siemens PLM Software, Altair, Aspen Technology, Autodesk, CD-adapco, COMSOL Multiphysics, ESI Group among others.

Type - Segment Analysis

Design Optimization on the Finite Element analysis case is likely to register highest CAGR of 8.5% due to rising deployment of advanced technology in modern automobiles. The growing adoption of electric and hybrid vehicles and rising demand for safety and comfort in modern automobiles will be the key driving factors for design optimization on the Finite Element analysis case. Finite element analysis method is effectively used to solve the problem of whole deformation and stress distribution of complex parts and provides a strong support for the strength and stiffness analysis design of the transmission shell, suspension systems, brake systems, wheels and other auto parts in automobiles. Thus increased demand for cars will create an opportunity for Finite Element analysis. For instance BMW and Mercedes sold approximately 11000 and 15538 cars in 2018 with an increase of Y-o-Y growth of approximately 13% and 2% respectively.

Application - Segment Analysis

Finite element analysis in automotive industry is likely to grow at a highest CAGR of 7.5% in the forecast period. Increased adoption of FEA to enables a reduction in product design time, operational costs, and also lesser marketing time. Several automobile manufacturers use applications of Finite element analysis. For Instance Toyota Motors uses Opera FEA of Chelton to simulate Prius electric motors use in Prius hybrid vehicles. Similarly, General Motors automobiles have been evaluated and developed using the finite element method. On the other hand High R&D investments will also lead to the rise in purchase of FEA software and services; thus, fueling market growth in this industry segment.

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Geography - Segment Analysis

In 2018, APAC dominated the Finite Element analysis market share with more than 35%, followed by Europe. The economy of APAC is majorly influenced by the countries such as China and India. Automobile manufacturers in these countries faced with many challenges on product design such as superior performance, faster time to market and erosion in profit margins development for such challenges, Finite Element Analysis has become the mainstay to accelerate new product development in automobiles. On the other hand these countries are creating opportunities for this market by increased sales of automobiles. For instance, China is continuously creating opportunity for Finite element analysis market with the increased sales of automobiles in this region. The annual production of BMW in China increased to 450,000 vehicle units from 144,274 vehicle units, since 2017, from its house manufacturing plants. Along with the increase in the production, the company has also invested $1.14 billion for expanding its production line for its newer models. This plan will enforce automobile manufacturers to implement new technology to achieve the same, thereby creating opportunity for Finite Element analysis market.

Drivers Finite Element Analysis Market

Growing demand for simulation software in finite Element Analysis.

The adoption of simulation software in the automotive industry helps in vehicle development to ensure the proper functionality of the system. Automotive simulation software is now crucial as car and truck makers are majorly investing in the development of advanced vehicle technologies such as autonomous driving systems, safety-critical control software and smart electronics. In 2019, Siemens integrated MultiMechanics TRUE Multiscale simulation technology with Simcenter 3D software to accelerate innovation and adoption of advanced materials. Similarly, in electrical and electronics applications, simulation software is used for simulating electromagnetic performance across component, circuit and system design, and can evaluate temperature, vibration, and other critical mechanical effects. The innovation of electronic products set to create opportunities for simulation software thereby creating demand for Finite element analysis market during the forecast period.

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Increasing integration in manufacturing sector.

The demanding requirement from consumers and retail industries are bringing disruption in the manufacturing industry. At present, the manufacturing industry is focusing on enhanced design and early evaluation of critical design parameters of products in manufacturing sector. As finite element analysis is a widely used method for analyzing a structure or any complex system in this sector, several companies are adopting this method to overcome several design constrains. On the other hand several country governments are providing various initiatives to promote manufacturing industries. For Instance in India, the Government has launched the Make in India Program to promote manufacturing in India and develop it as an attractive hub for manufacturing and to raise manufacturing to 25% of GDP. Similarly China is promoting manufacturing industry by an initiative called made in china 2025 to develop higher efficient products due to high competition from countries like Germany. These initiatives are aiming at improving efficiency of products in manufacturing sector. So, most of the manufacturers are deploy technology like Finite Element Analysis to achieve higher efficiency.

Challenges  Finite Element Analysis Market

Availability of Open Source software

Availability of open source software online is one of the major factor which hamper the market in the forecast period. Several manufacturers adopt open source software for their design constraints. As open source software does not give accurate results in the design process and make the designers to adopt other alternatives. This could create a possibility of contraction of manufacturing unit and negatively affect the finite element analysis market growth.

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Market Landscape

Partnership, acquisitions and technology launches are key strategies adopted by players in the Finite Element Analysis Market. In 2018, the market of Finite Element Analysis industry outlook has been consolidated by the top five players accounting for 55% of the market share. Finite Element Analysis market top 10 companies include ANSYS, Dassault Systems, MSC Software, Siemens PLM Software, Altair, Aspen Technology, Autodesk, CD-adapco, COMSOL Multiphysics, ESI Group among others

Acquisitions/Technology Launches
Teaching throughout the COVID-19 pandemic has prompted reinvention and reform globally. Schools might be online for most, but the live-in tutors around the globe have faced huge changes in their teaching practice too. Tutors International reveals how some of their tutors are innovating to continue providing first-rate education in the home.

Novelty

Tutors International's tutors have identified the importance of distinguishing each teaching day from the other to maintain interest from the students.

One tutor explains the importance of introducing a sense of novelty to the school day:

"I am using music, movement and art as a 'hooks' to help my student learn key quotes. As we are inside so often it is important to create novelty and new experiences for the brain to remember information  for example, for Capulet quotes we engage in star jumps and sing Montague quotes."

One way to maintain interest in topics has been to individualise the content. One tutor in Luxembourg explains:

"I 'flipped' a lot of the learning, so that my student has been studying personalised videos on topics prior to coming to the online classroom."

Another tutor explains how they decided to use themes to give each week definition and focus:

"We focused on a different theme for each week, based on a story or a song to keep them engaged and excited despite being stuck at home."

Project work has also been a key strategy in sustaining focus and interest for students. One tutor based in Italy has a student who wants to be an architect. The tutor has identified the need for well planned and executed extended projects in this field, and implemented this into their schooling:

"It has been a good opportunity to focus on project work. There is a lot we still can do and it is fun to order materials and engage in fun learning experiences. We have tried new projects and recipes which have all gone well and as I have gotten to know the student even better."

Connecting to their Surroundings

Lockdown has meant that the world feels smaller for a lot of students  particularly ones used to travelling a lot with their families and tutors. To help their Austrian student feel connected to the wider world, one tutor paired them up with a pen pal from the UK.

One tutor has adapted their teaching and activities to make the most of the Hong Kong landscape, and reflect the more domestic setting they have found themselves in:

"We have moved from doing a lot of very active and social activities and a great deal of travel, to taking on challenges at home, such as knitting, piano, baking, gymnastics, skating, card tricks, and language learning. Since we are in Hong Kong, we are able to go hiking on a regular basis too. Since the pace of life has slowed, the pandemic has allowed us to focus on developing grit, perseverance, resourceful and creativity in learning and developing new skills rather than moving from one shiny thing to the next."

Online Teaching

The increased use of online materials has had its benefits and drawbacks. One tutor comments on how they have integrated physical and digital materials to optimise their teaching practice:

"I purchased a desk projector/document camera (Ipevo) to aid me with my lessons. As a Maths teacher, I find myself often reaching for pen and paper to work through questions or teach new concepts, and I felt limited by the online medium, and by my students often having to work from their phones, or tablets, or with bad internet connection."

As more schooling has had to move online, and the use of digital devices has inevitably increased, one London-based tutor stresses the importance of being mindful of screen time:

"I've implemented even more emphasis on time away from screens, learning outside where possible, and spending at least an hour outside every day."

Founder of Tutors International, Adam Caller, extends his gratitude to the tutors adapting and excelling in unprecedented conditions:

"Our rigorous and bespoke recruitment process ensures we hire only the best of the best. This means our tutors respond imaginatively and enthusiastically to change. I'd like to reaffirm how grateful I am to our tutors for their ongoing hard work and impressive response to the challenges of the pandemic."

About Tutors International

Tutors International provides an unparalleled bespoke service that matches the right tutor with the right child, in order for the student to fully reach their personal potential and academic excellence. Providing a service for children of all ages at different points in their educational journeys, Tutors International is founded on a commitment to finding the perfect tutor to realise the specific goals and aspirations of each student. Tutors are available for full-time tutoring positions, after-school assistance, and home-schooling.

Founded in 1999 by Adam Caller, Tutors International is a private company based in Oxford, a city renowned for academic excellence. Our select clientele receives a personally tailored service, with discretion and confidentiality guaranteed.

Contact Details

Web: www.tutors-international.com

Email: [email protected]

Phone: +44 (0) 1865 435 135

Tutors International

Clarendon House

52 Cornmarket Street

Oxford

OX1 3HJ

UK

Photo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1438198/TI_Tutors.jpg

Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/699064/Tutors_International_Logo.jpg

SOURCE Tutors International
The facility is a significant step, given the companys recent transition from developer to producer, with significant exploration upside.

Ora Banda Mining Ora Ltd ( ) (FRA:M6N) has signed a A$15 million credit approved offer with the ( ) (OTCMKTS:CBAUF) (FRA:CWW) for hedging and working capital purposes to support prudent risk and capital management during the ramp-up phase, subsequent to the first gold pour at Davyhurst on February 7, 2021.

In a separate statement, the company announced the appointment of Peter Nicholson as chief executive officer (CEO) with effect from April 2, 2021.

Support of Australias largest bank

Ora Banda managing director David Quinlivan said: As was foreshadowed in the definitive feasibility study announced in June 2020, the company sees the addition of these credit facilities as a prudent step in the management of risk and working capital.

We see this as a significant step, given the companys recent transition from developer to a producer with significant exploration upside.

We are pleased to have the support of Australias largest bank, the Commonwealth Bank, as the company ramps up production

Facility details

The offer has two components:

A$5 million for the purchase of put options; and

A$10 million for development expenditure and general working capital.

The maturity date is the earlier of 12 months from financial close or February 28, 2022, with repayment via a bullet payment.

This facility enables management to undertake discretionary gold hedging.

A minimum hedge requirement of 20% of forecast gold production for an 11-month period applies where the working capital facility is drawn.

The working capital and hedging facilities are both subject to the execution of formal documentation and conditions precedent customary for a financing of this nature.

Management change

Quinlivan, the current Ora Banda managing director and CEO, will continue in both roles until the appointment date, after which he will continue as managing director.

He will relinquish this position in the short to medium term, and take on the role as a non-executive director of Ora Banda, when Nicholson will take on the role of managing director as well.

The timing of that proposed change will be determined by the board to ensure an orderly transition of all executive functions.

An announcement of the end of the transition period will be made in due course.

Significant appointment

Ora Banda chair Peter Mansell said: This is a significant appointment for the Ora Banda and we look forward to welcoming Peter to the company and benefitting from his diverse suite of skills.

Peters strong combination of technical, commercial and operational expertise and experience will be a substantial contributor to the ongoing success and growth of Ora Banda.

Attracting someone of Peters experience and skills reinforces the calibre of the project and the potential of Ora Banda."

Look forward to Quinlivans involvement

David took on the role as MD and CEO of Ora Banda on an interim basis at the time of the administration of Eastern Goldfields," Mansell said.

It was not a role that he was seeking, but it is a role that he has performed exceptionally well and with passion.

That Ora Banda has achieved every deadline it committed to on time and on budget is testament to the competence and discipline of David and his team.

It is a measure of Davids commitment to the company that, while he is keen to move to a non-executive role, he is prepared to participate in any orderly transition to Peter.

We thank David for his contribution and look forward to his continued involvement with Ora Banda as a non-executive director."

Confident of companys success

Nicholson said: I am excited to be joining the team at Ora Banda.

The company is a debt-free new gold producer with a large tenement holding in a prolific gold producing region.

With available cash to fund exploration of the numerous near mill and regional targets, I am confident of the companys success well into the future.

25 years of industry experience

Nicholson has 25 years of industry experience in operational and mine management roles, coupled with deep experience in private equity across international mining and mining services.

He has been exposed to an extensive range of assets and commodities, spanning more than 50 countries, and has considerable experience in leading senior multi-disciplinary technical and commercial teams.

Prior to joining Ora Banda, Nicholson was with mining-focussed private equity firm Resource Capital Funds (RCF), where he is a partner and the managing director of Australia.

In his role, he has been responsible for several of the largest investments made by RCF, including within the Australia gold sector.

Prior to RCF, Nicholson held the roles of resident manager, underground manager and business development manager at Lion Ore Australia, where he built and managed a greenfield mining operation on time and budget.

Nicholson holds a Bachelor of Engineering (Mining) and Graduate Diploma in Applied Finance and Investment.
International superstar Shaggy will headline this years staging of Jamaica Rum Festival which will be a virtual one, starting from March 21, and culminating on March 27, 2021. Dancehall stars Shenseea and Sizzla are also rostered to perform.

The announcement came during the festivals launch, streamed live on its social media channels on Thursday. This virtual experience is being presented in partnership with Appleton Estate Jamaica Rum, the Jamaica Tourist Board and Tourism Enhancement Fund, in conjunction with leading local rum brands Appleton Estate, Wray & Nephew White Overproof Rum, Kingston 62, Rum-Bar, Hampden Estate, Rum Fire and Monymusk Plantation Rums.

As with previous stagings, Appleton Estate will present the live concert at the Jamaica Rum Festival.

Leleika-Dee Barnes, channel and customer marketing director, J Wray & Nephew Limited, spoke to the brands continued relationship with music.

Over the past 10 years, Appleton Estate has demonstrated the inextricable link between rum and Jamaican music, both of which are signposts of our culture. Most recently, our National Rum Day and Reserve the Night activations have been met with resounding success. These activities, along with Appleton Estate Signature Nights in the past, have showcased the power of music to drive education about our storied expressions. The Jamaica Rum Festival, therefore, would be incomplete without music, so once again, Appleton Estate is pleased to present the Festivals live concert, said Barnes.

Valon Thorpe, festival director and CEO of Mystique Integrated, assured viewers of the virtual launch, that despite the new format of the Jamaica Rum Festival, persons can expect a similar experience to its physical stagings over the past two years.

The festival will be presented as a virtual experience, with tweaks to match its prior physical counterparts which we expect to elicit the same immersive experience via mobile and traditional devices, he said.
Hilda Ramirez, an immigrant living illegally in the U.S, reaches out to son Ivan in the sanctuary at St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church in Austin, Texas, in 2017. (Eric Gay / Associated Press)

The notice from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to pay a $59,126 fine didnt bolster Hilda Ramirezs confidence that she could soon leave the church where she and her son had received refuge for almost five years.

I dont have one cent to pay this, said Ramirez. Why are they doing this?

Ramirez, 32, a native of Guatemala, is among dozens of immigrants facing deportation who have found sanctuary in recent years in houses of worship across the United States.

She is also one of a handful of high-profile female sanctuary beneficiaries all of them indigent and barred from working legally in the United States  whom the Trump administration hit with fines of tens of thousands of dollars for ignoring deportation orders.

Hilda and Ivan Ramirez are shown at St. Andrew's four years ago, when the boy was 10. They've taken refuge at the church since 2016. (Eric Gay / Associated Press)

Now, these activists and allied immigration advocates, joined by congressional Democrats, are calling on President Biden to rescind the fines  which, in Ramirez's case, were most recently dated December 2020, though she didn't receive the official notice until after Biden took office  and lift all deportation orders against immigrants in church sanctuary. They've sought out church protection because U.S. immigration policy has long proscribed enforcement at houses of worship.

Those in sanctuary have suffered enough, stated a Jan. 26 letter to Biden from more than two dozen representatives and senators. Your Administrations actions can bring them the relief they need and deserve.

A federal lawsuit, filed a day before Biden took office last month, demands that Washington cancel fines of about $60,000 each levied against Ramirez in Austin and women housed in churches in Salt Lake City; Columbus, Ohio; and Charlottesville, Va. The suit against the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement labels the fines excessive and retaliation for the womens public advocacy on behalf of sanctuary. It also alleges violations of constitutional rights of freedom of speech, association and religious practice.

Story continues

Ivan Ramirez, playing outside St. Andrew's when he was 10, is now 14 and attending middle school in Austin. (Eric Gay / Associated Press)

The intent of the fines was never really to collect money; it was to intimidate women who had taken sanctuary and spoke out, said Alina Das, co-director of the Immigrant Rights Clinic at New York University School of Law. ICE was signaling: We may not bash down church doors, but we will do something that prevents you from ever having a normal life in this country.

The Justice Department has yet to respond to the suit. The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment.

The Biden administration is in the process of reviewing scores of Trump-era immigration policies that critics have labeled draconian. Biden has also vowed to pursue legislation that would provide a path to citizenship for some 11 million immigrants authorities estimate are living in the country illegally.







The population of sanctuary beneficiaries is limited  about 40 to 60 families across the United States, some with children who are U.S. citizens or legal residents, according to estimates from advocacy groups and Congress.

But the sanctuary movement, which began in the 1980s as a kind of modern-day underground railroad as churches offered shelter to Central Americans escaping Cold War-era conflicts, still resonates deeply. Religious leaders revived sanctuary in the 2000s as immigration enforcement intensified, including during the Obama administration, when formal deportations spiked. (Immigrant advocates are hopeful that Biden is not as aggressive on enforcement as his former boss.) Underlying the concept are biblical tenets to welcome the stranger.

This is central to what we do, said the Rev. Jim Rigby, longtime pastor of St. Andrews Presbyterian Church in Austin, Texas, where Ramirez and her son have resided since 2016, prior to Trump taking office. You dont mistreat the sojourner.  I hope we can finally get back to the words inscribed on the Statue of Liberty.

Ramirez, a woman of slight stature who speaks Spanish with traces of the Mam tongue that is her first language, said she fled Guatemala with her son in 2014, escaping from domestic abuse and what she calls discrimination against Indigenous people of Mayan ancestry. Following a well-worn path, she traversed Mexico overland and made her way to the Rio Grande, where she said she crossed into Texas in 2014 and surrendered to Border Patrol, requesting political asylum.

In an interview last year with the Spanish-language Univision network, her son, Ivan, recalled his thoughts at the time, when he was 8.

It was an adventure for me, Ivan said. My mother told me we are going to a better place, a beautiful place. I imagined a house with butterflies.

Instead, he and his mother were held for 11 months in a privately run immigration lockup in south Texas. The conditions, she said, were wretched.

The place looks nice from outside, but inside it was horrible, Ramirez recalled during an interview at the Austin church. My son got sick from eating rotting food. He had a fever and was vomiting. I was afraid he was going to die.

She and other female detainees launched a hunger strike that made headlines. She credits the action and ensuing publicity with pressuring authorities to release her in 2015. She was outfitted with an ankle monitor to track her whereabouts as her asylum case made its way through the system.

Initially, Ramirez lodged in a shelter in Austin, the state capital and a liberal bastion in deep-red Texas. But she and her son were not shielded from eventual arrest there. Activists helped the two move into St. Andrews.

Hilda and her son were just bright lights, recalled Peggy Morton, who heads the Austin Sanctuary Network and first met the mother and son while they were in detention. I was very impressed by her, and heartbroken about her situation.

Hilda Ramirez, pictured in 2017, uses the kitchen at St. Andrew's. She helps out at the church, fighting off occasional bouts of depression. (Eric Gay / Associated Press)

In the final year of the Obama administration, lawyers representing Ramirez managed to secure a temporary reprieve from the deportation order issued after her asylum petition was rejected. The stay allowed her to leave the church grounds and travel with advocates to Washington, D.C., and lobby for her case and those of other sanctuary recipients. She also visited an older sister who had settled in Oklahoma with her three children.

The Trump administration, however, did not extend her reprieve, and she was again forced to remain on the church premises to avoid arrest and deportation. Other sanctuary beneficiaries across the country also lost temporary stays against deportation. By then, Ramirez had become one of the public faces of a revived nationwide sanctuary movement.

Overarching policies of sanctuary, with its scriptural provenance, were an especially vexing concept for Trump. He frequently railed against so-called sanctuary cities, jurisdictions across the country that have curtailed cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. His administration sought, mostly without success, to deny federal funds to pro-sanctuary cities and towns in California and elsewhere. At one point, Trump even mused on Twitter about shipping illegal immigrants en masse to sanctuary cities.

Behind the rhetorical bombast, activists allege, was an official campaign of surveillance and retribution targeting high-profile sanctuary beneficiaries, including Ramirez.

In the summer of 2019, ICE levied fines of up to $500,000 against Ramirez and other sanctuary recipients for failing to comply with deportation orders. The Trump administration turned to a seldom-used legal provision imposing financial penalties for each day someone refused to comply with orders to leave the country. ICE later reduced the levies to about $60,000 per person.

I first thought it was some kind of joke, Ramirez said of the fines. Then I realized that they were going after all of us who raised our voices against injustice.

Earlier this month, Ramirez received an invoice from the Department of Homeland Security, dating from the last weeks of the Trump administration; she owed $59,126 in civil penalties. Payment is due March 3.

Hilda Ramirez, shown with Ivan in 2017, became a public face of the nationwide sanctuary movement. Former President Trump railed against so-called sanctuary cities. (Eric Gay / Associated Press)

Ramirez spends her days caring for her son, helping at the church and sewing small dolls and masks embroidered with traditional indigenous patterns. She fights off occasional bouts of depression. Reared an evangelical Christian, she says she has embraced the Presbyterian faith community at St. Andrews. The pandemic has resulted in the suspension of Sunday services and other activities that once enlivened the church. Visits from advocates and others help blunt the loneliness.

Its very difficult, very stressful, said Ramirez. There are moments when I would like to just run away from here, when I think of abandoning everything. But then I think of my son. I want him to have a better life.

The school bus stops weekdays outside the church to pick up Ivan, an animated seventh-grader who turns 15 in April. A tutor visits the church to help with his lessons. The youth is on track for a special visa for juveniles to remain in the United States, advocates say. But mother and son cannot contemplate being apart. The specter of separation haunts them and is ever-present.

Ivan has posted online videos documenting his familys plight, the struggle to attain legal status, to remain together. Recently, Ivan accompanied activists to a protest in front of ICE headquarters in San Antonio.

When my classmates in school are worried about doing their homework, he told reporters, I am worried if my mom is going to be there when I come back from school.





This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Radically changing global scenario has drastically altered the notions of life and the entire gamut of the disciplines associated with it. Literature, especially poetry, being a highly sensitive genre, could not have remained unaffected. Urdu poetry, like all the literatures written in English and indigenous Indian languages, has kept its pace with the pressures of times---misinterpreting or misreading of it notwithstanding.

It has, very subtly and elementally, assimilated and accentuated the recently emerging linguistic and literary ethos in terms of the modes of perception and presentation. Urdu poetry has a rich tradition adorned with oriental philosophies, metaphysical depth and delicacies, socio-cultural complexities and linguistic niceties. Second half of the earlier century brought in the unprecedented advancement in the field of science, technology, politics, intellectual inquiries and cultural studies that had a direct bearing on the creative consciousness all over the globe. Unprecedented migration of the masses and creative writers to the West has also given a sharp turn to the very idea of literary concerns and commitment. It has, in fact, added a new dimension to what is now called literary productions. Parvin Sheres poetry is an excellent synthesis of the tradition and the current internationalism which invariably seems to be the dominant concern of the immigrant writers.



Parvin Sheres poetic concerns and thematic preoccupation, however, needs to be understood in terms of simultaneity of the emotional translucence and intellectual intensity that determine the tone and texture of her poetry and directions of her ideology. Her intellectualism and ideological stance, it should be noted here, cannot and should not be perceived in the Western political, polemical, theoretical or merely academic context. Her new culture, certainly, has sensitized her creative consciousness and sharpened her analytical and critical acumen, that many a time attributes subtlety and pungency to the balanced but highly devastating ironic phraseology of her poetic structures.



Like any other competent diasporic discourse, Parvins poetry embodies a bitter critique of the male dominated society. Her poems like,Mirage (Sarab) and Disposable represent her emotional and intellectual response to the womans predicament in the suppressive patriarchal system. These two poems betray two different dimensions of Parvins poetic reactions against the callous sexist society that resembles across the borders and nations. The very title Disposable is highly suggestive of the Western cultural reality that exemplifies the constitution of the western disposition and it also effectively communicates the nature and texture of human relationship in a culture where romance with consumption reigns supreme. The poem also makes a sarcastic statement on the culture that has reduced woman to the trivial position of a commodity; she is bought, used, abused and discarded:



Exquisite..

Sighting in a show case

He bought it and brought it home

Filling it up

.

He threw in the dustbin

Then left to get another one.

(Disposable)



Mirage offers another dimension of Parvins poetic vision. It reveals the intrigues of the cultural institutions shrewdly engineered by the exploitative male society to perpetuate subservient female psyche. The dominant system makes a woman internalize the submissive positions in absolutely natural way. Obliterating her own identity and independence, she willingly/unwillingly gets subsumed into the roles designed by the male conspiracy. Mirage bemoans this helplessness:



I am water, you a goblet



.



Towards the end, however, the poem takes a turn that unequivocally registers Parvins intellectual reaction:



Even so,

I am water,

a spring source of life

and you---------

a rock,

impervious to what life is!

(Mirage) trans. by: Hameed khan

Parvins poetry epitomizes the agony of a continually tormented and tortured womans soul:

How many more tests and trials of my patience

How many more skies are there over my head ?

Layers after layers are incessantly revealed

How many faces are there behind the faces?

Gazal, trans. by: Hameed khan

Is there an end to it ever! is a perennial question that keep appearing in her poems like a refrain.



The Last Station is an elegy on the decay and death of the human relationships. The values of love and mutual trust, disinterestedness and selflessness are a rarity in the contemporary world that is ruthlessly governed by materialistic drives and ulterior motives. We are all a lonely crowd, lost in the labyrinth of narcissism. John Updike has rightly pointed out that contemporary man needs assurance, without mutual lies we all will be suspended like planets in the azure skies. Octogenarians (Darul Zoafa) dialogizes yet another dimension of the rotting human concerns. The poem portrays the hear-shattering reality of the helplessness of the old people who are mercilessly abandoned by those who had been the pivot of their life. John Updikes first novel The Poorhouse Fair seriously addresses itself to these issues. The thematic canvas of this novel, however, is wider as he also takes into fictional account the larger issues of social homogenization and loss of faith. Parvins other poems like The Coffin (Tabut), Helplessness (Bebasi), No Exit (Sabhi Raste Moattal Hain), Dilemma (Kashmash), A Beautiful Dream-like House ( Khubsurat Khwab sa Ghar) are exquisite subjective expressions of the irresoluble tensions between the worlds within and outside.

Contemporary womans plight in the male dominated world is doubly worsened. Parvin Shere effectively employs the metaphor of train and journey motif. Everyday, right from morn a woman is continually shocked and shattered, dejected and disillusioned. By the end of the journey the train stands against the gloomy landscape tragically deserted and desolated :



left alone,

my wet eyes,

keep trying to locate---

from each and every window,

all human relations

lost in the thick mists of time.

(Last Station) trans. by: Hameed khan



Parvins scathing criticism of the gender-biased society, nevertheless, is not a projection or a manifestation of the radical feminist ideology. Because feminist ideology, ipso facto, aims at subverting the system perpetuated by patriarchy. In her indictment of the patriarchal designs Parvin is, one with her contemporary Canadian women novelists and poets like Margaret Atwood, Margaret Laurence, Aritha Vanherk, Nicole Brossard , Daphne Marlette and many others. But it should also be carefully noted that she is noticeably different from them in terms of modes of perception and presentation and also in terms of linguistic and generic experimentations. Many of these Canadian poetess are constantly engaged in ideological discourses that are vehemently directed towards annihilation of the murderous male supremacy. Deliberate transcendence or transgression is the launching pads of their poetic subversive endeavours. Debunking male-oriented language is also one of the major preoccupations of these women writers. They are often infuriated by the canon, the generic traits and their male association. Sexual deviation and moral digression is yet another point. These radical poets, however, have a well-defined logic and logistics for the subversion of the dominant system as well as for reconstruction of womans identity and her absolute independence. The alternative systems beyond the limits of family and morality, however, would not suit Parvins refined oriental sensibility and inherently feminine delicacy. Like many of the women poets from the sub-continent Parvin retains the she essential and intrinsic poetic idiom coupled with highly loaded phraseology assimilitated from her diasporic experiences in the world that is, ironically, looked upon as a haven of freedom and paradise of consumption. She is a solitary example who enjoys dexterity in painting, music and poetry. Her poetry presents a harmonious blending of these three different disciplines of the fine arts.



Parvin has been living in Canada for more that four decades now; she has been in live contact with the practicing women writers. As an intellectual poet she has been closely following the directions the creative consciousness in Canada and in the west at large. But her poetry does not provide any evidence of being carried away by the inflated intellectual intricacy or triviality. Nor does her poetry betrays any desire to sell-off her own culture to the western readers, as many of the immigrant writers are accused of. Her western exposure, on the contrary, has widened the horizon of her experiences. Like her Canadian colleagues she sharply interrogates the male hierarchies.



Rather than aiming at subversion, Parvins poetry betrays a creative consciousness questing for lasting and enduring human relationship. It is this relationship which, in its ultimate analysis, attributes dignity and integrity to human stature and makes his life meaningful, colourful and eventful.



Her insatiable quest for enduring relationships does not confine itself to the interpersonal or social extent. Imperialistic drives in the cultural, intellectual, political and economic spheres on the international level also reveal disconcerting upheaval owing to an obvious lack of sincerity and authenticity in human relationships. Her poems like Iraq, and Outrage (Andhera), are the moving portraits of the precarious conditions humanity is deplorably placed in. It immensely grieves Parvins heart to think,  what man has made of man!



Parvins poetry, in fact, is a heart-rending scream of a bleeding heart and agonized mind. It is a perennial quest for order, authenticity and equilibrium conspicuously missing in the contemporary spheres of human relationships. And it this quest that determines the aesthetics of her poetic art.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

* Dr. Hameed Khan is Professor at the Department of English, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University, Aurangabad (MS), India. A Ph.D. in American literature, Dr. Khan has one book, two text books and a number of research papers to his credit. His research papers, articles and reviews are published in various journals and magazines. He has also written preface/s and foreword/s to ten books in English, Urdu and Marathi. Dr. Khan is also known for his translations. His Urdu translations of Marathi short stories are published by Maharashtra State Urdu Academy, Mumbai. His English translations of interviews, Marathi and Urdu short stories have appeared in the different issues of INDIAN LITERATURE.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Editor's Note: Parvin Shere who studied at Patna University towards Psychology/Philosophy(1964-1966) is an artist, poet and musician. She formally developed her talent of paintings at the University of Manitoba, Canada, Fine Arts Program (1966-1967 Fine Arts, University of Manitoba). Her extensive travel throughout Europe and particularly in developing countries triggered in her a need to enlighten her audience about the dualistic nature of this world.
IF you still dont know how real or how scary Covid-19 is, then you should listen back to Brendan OConnors recent interview with Senator Marie-Louise ODonnell about her battle with the virus.

She said it was petrifying, and when it had sucked all the energy out of her, she was almost prepared to give up and drift away because it would have been easier.

Theres no doubt about it, the coronavirus is nasty. It makes us sick, sometimes with devastating consequences, it screws the economy and basically turns our world upside down. Nobody is immune from the fall-out.

Its devious too, in the way it divides communities and sets us against one another.

Everyone has faced criticism during the pandemic, the Government, public health advisors, the pubs, the restaurants, the congregating youngsters, sports fans, holidaymakers, and visitors. The teachers and the special needs assistants got it in the neck too.

Larissa Nolan wrote a piece in The Times UK recently about the continued closure of schools for children with special educational needs. She was very unhappy with the teachers unions who, she said, were making unreasonable demands to the detriment of the children.

According to Nolan, Education Minister Norma Foleys plan to reopen schools just for these children  who comprise just 4% of the entire school population  was clear-headed, reasonable and both morally and legally right.

She claimed it was a decent compromise by an Education Minister and a Taoiseach who are both former teachers themselves. Surely nobody could oppose the opening of special schools, which we knew to be an essential service?

But the teachers unions could, and Nolan said they rank the needs and interests of their members higher than those of special-needs children. The unions focus is furthering their own agenda.

Strong stuff, but thats her opinion and shes entitled to it. Looking at the other side of the coin, though, the INTO general secretary John Boyle, said the fundamental problem was conflicting health messaging. That had left many school staff totally unconvinced that the school environment was safe under current conditions.

Mr Boyle said an education department webinar, which attracted more than 16,000 participants, clearly demonstrated the level of fear and anxiety among school staff.

Their fear seemed reasonable to me, because there is no shortage of it in this current climate.

As someone who is retired, its easy for me to abide by the public health advice. I stay at home and I keep to myself, so I dont really have too much to worry about, but thats not the case for everyone.

Life is much more complicated for the essential workers. They operate at the coal-face every day so they are entitled to every possible support to ensure their environment is as safe as it can be.

Thats not easy during a pandemic, I know. Especially when there is such a lot of uncertainty and so much we still dont understand about the coronavirus.

Were not sure about the long term effects for those who have had it because it hasnt been around long enough yet. We dont know if we will ever be completely rid of it or if there will always be some variant lurking in the shadows.

With so many unknowns, Im slow to criticise those reluctant to go to work in circumstances that will bring them into close contact with others because, all along, the advice has been to keep our distance.

That has been drilled into us since last March. The virus doesnt travel, people do, which is why we were told to stay away from others, so I think its perfectly understandable that some are concerned about returning to the workplace. But then, I have a vested interest in this argument.

My wife, Gaye, is a special needs assistant and she would prefer to be in school, but safety is a priority for her.

Shes not getting any younger and the work is very demanding, but while she finds it tough at times, she loves her job. Shes normally up early every morning, looking forward to spending the day with the children and watching them progress.

Im told by people she works with that she is very capable and that doesnt surprise me because she doesnt do anything by halves. She always gives 100%.

Right now, she misses the children she is assigned to and takes no pleasure from being out of school. She wants to be back with them, but she is extremely nervous.

Larissa Nolan said every teacher she knows would go back into class for kids who need them, even if everyone had to wear hazmat suits. Its a vocation, she said. I absolutely agree with her that it is a vocation but none of the reassurances from the government at the time encouraged my wife or her colleagues to return to the classroom.

Nolan accepts that special needs assistants in particular act in loco parentis and sincerely care for the welfare and progress of their students. She must also be aware that this often includes toileting, peg feeding, cleaning and comforting these kids and you cant do that without being up close and personal. Social distancing in those circumstances is not possible. Nolan also believes that plenty of people feel teachers would change their tune if they were put on the Covid payment instead of getting their full salaries. Personally speaking, I think thats unfair but its an example of the division this virus is creating within our community.

Thankfully, a plan is in place for a gradual reopening of the schools and nobody is happier to hear that than the teachers and SNAs.

It would be nice to think that this will bring an end to the blame game, but I have my doubts.
Parler is back online after the social media site popular with supporters of former president Donald Trump was knocked offline last month.

Parler effectively fell off the Internet in January, when Amazon refused to provide technical cloud computing support to the site after the tech giant determined that Parler was not doing enough to moderate and remove incitements of violence.

The site was not fully functional on Monday, and some users reported technical glitches as they tried to log in and refresh feeds. Private messaging was disabled, but the basic outline of the site was live.

"We're in for a little bit of a bumpy ride for the next day or two, there's been a ton of backend work we've completed over the last couple of weeks," Parler Chief Technology Officer Alexander Blair posted on the site Monday morning.

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.

Parler, which said it had more than 12 million users when it was knocked offline, became especially popular with Trump supporters last year and emerged as a common place to discuss baseless election fraud claims after Trump lost the November 2020 election. The tipping point for many of its partners to pull technical support came after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, when users on Parler glorified the riot.

Apple and Google removed the app from their app stores, making it nearly impossible for new users to download the app. Then Amazon severed its hosting service from Parler, effectively turning off the lights. The companies cited Parler's lax moderation policies against calls for violence.

Parler did not immediately respond to a request for comment about its return or its hosting service.

Parler appeared to be using a Los Angeles-based cloud hosting company called SkySilk to return online. Hackers on Twitter, including the user who orchestrated a large-scale scrape of Parler's public data as it fell offline, identified SkySilk as the host. John Jackson, founder of hacking group Sakura Samurai, confirmed that the technical footprint points to SkySilk in public records.

SkySilk did not immediately respond to a request for confirmation.

Parler long prided itself on allowing users "free speech" in pretty much any legal form, and regularly railed against big social media sites including Twitter and Facebook for what it characterized as overmoderating what users posted online. It got an initial boost of high-profile users, including Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in summer 2020 after Twitter started labeling Trump's posts with fact checks.

The social media site was known as a friendly spot for conservative pundits and supporters who were fed up with "censorship" on other social media apps. But after the election, Parler also became a breeding ground for misinformation about the vote and calls for violence in the District of Columbia.

It's been a bumpy ride for Parler since the Capitol attack. After it was kicked offline, the site sued Amazon for the decision and launched a static Web page where it posted periodic updates about its efforts to come back online.

Then the board of directors, which includes investor and billionaire Republican megadonor Rebekah Mercer, fired CEO and co-founder John Matze. Matze told Axios that he advocated for Parler to adopt more automated moderating, which the big social media sites use together with human moderators to enforce their policies.

Parler is now being run by interim CEO Mark Meckler, who co-founded the right-wing Tea Party Patriots political organization.

"We are committed to continuing to fulfill our role as the premier platform for free speech, data sovereignty and civil discourse," Meckler posted on Parler Monday.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
After Opening "Pandora's Box" that resulted from former President Trump's Senate impeachment trial, Lindsey Graham warns that Kamala Harris' impeachment might soon take place if the Republicans continue to overwhelm and be the upper hand in the House of Representatives in 2022.

Yahoo! News shares that Graham's prediction is anchored on Harris' tweet supporting bail fund for the Black Lives Matter protesters.

Forbes notes that the South Carolina Republican expressed a valid concern that impeachment can be overused against elected officials. However, they also add that it was far from a call for impeachment against the elected Vice President.

READ ALSO: Mike Huckabee Suggests Idea of Impeaching Kamala Harris for Bailing Out BLM Protesters

Graham continues to be Trump's top ally

New York Post references Lindsey Graham's words with "Fox News Sunday," saying that the vice president's support for a fund that freed out protesters over the summer can leave her liable for the same punishment for President Donald Trump was given.

Graham furthers in The Daily Mail that utilizing the model, one of the protesters she bailed out went back to the streets and broke somebody's head open.

The vice president's tweet did not take so much time in engaging the people to react, resulting in accusations that Senator Graham did call for the impeachment of the elected Vice President. Her tweet was used to secure the relief of several convicted vehement criminals and protesters, rallying against the death of George Floyd.

According to Fox News, saying that a suspect who harmed an authority, a woman indicted of killing a friend, and a twice-convicted sex-offender are among the people who the Minnesota Freedom Fund bailed out.

Graham on Trump's Impeachment

Graham, being a top Trump ally, notes that the former president was the most potent force in the Republican party. He adds that Trump was the first president to be impeached without a lawyer, witness, and ability to confront those against him, noting the trial was a complete jest.

He continues to be one of Trump's trusted defenders, dismissing all the evidence showing Trump refused to act during the riot even though he spoke to several Republican about the dangers they may face. He also believes that the former president did not incite the riot and could have done more.

New York Post points out that Graham was one of the Republicans who voted to acquit because, according to him, the former president might have pushed narratives about the election which are not valid. However, he also has faith that Trump's words did not start or sparked the mob.

With Vice President Kamala Harris Impeachment possibility as per Lindsey Graham, it still shows that there is still a rift between the old and new administration. Will this rift be solved for the benefit of American society? Only time can tell.

READ MORE: McConnell, Schumer Fail To Seal Deal on Senate Power-Sharing

WATCH: Lindsey Graham: IMPEACH Kamala Harris in Fox News Chris Wallace Interview from Christo Aivalis
Effective engagement of the payload is the main military-technical task in any conflict of various intensity. It is also necessary to increase the number of munitions and maintain them in the required engagement readiness according to the number of launchers. The might of the Russian armed forces is determined by the latest weapons and hardware and the ability of the defense industry to design and produce modern munitions, PhD Technical Science V. Selivanov, PhD Technical Science V. Veldanov, and PhD Technical Science retired Colonel Yu. Ilyin write in the Voennaya Mysl (Military Thought) journal.

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The supremacy of Soviet artillery was a key factor of the success of the Stalingrad battle. During the war, close to 50 percent of metal supplied to the Soviet army from local origin and U.S. origin (Lend-Lease Act) was used to produce munitions (Picture source : Russian Seven)

The armies of the potential adversary also pay attention to the design, upgrade, production and engagement of munitions. The United States plans to buy Soviet-made munitions with corresponding weapons, which are used by many countries without a Russian license.

The munitions are necessary for the Department of Defense and other organizations, as well as allies to tests and trials, and combat engagement. It is planned to sign a five-year contract with several suppliers to procure and deliver munitions to the continental USA and outside it. In May 2019, the Pentagon announced plans to buy munitions for Russian and Soviet weapons. The contract envisaged supplies outside the USA as well.

Russia has always paid specific attention to the creation of new-generation munitions and the development of munitions industry. Without it, there were losses and catastrophes. In 1905, Russia lost a war to Japan mostly because of a lack of munitions. Unfortunately, the lesson was not learned. In the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the same reason allowed the Nazi troops to approach Moscow. In 1941, the Red Army had sufficient weapons, but lacked munitions (cartridges and artillery shells). There was a norm of three shells per day for a gun. The German Luftwaffe (air force) destroyed ammunition dumps in the first days of the war and 40 percent of the manufacturing plants were in the occupied territory.

In the first half of 1943, the industry produced everything necessary for the army and navy. The supremacy of Soviet artillery was a key factor of the success of the Stalingrad battle. It was the breakthrough in the war. During the war, close to 50 percent of metal supplied to the Soviet army from local origin and U.S. origin (Lend-Lease Act) was used to produce munitions. They swallowed close to half of defense appropriations.

Gunpowder production determined the general state of the munitions industry. The Soviet government decided in January 1939 to create the Ministry of Munitions. After the war and up to 1985, the munitions of the army and navy were replenished 3-4 times, specifically under Defense Minister Dmitry Ustinov. The country created such a potential of the munitions industry that NATO had to catch up.

Over a dozen ministries operated for the defense industry. Three-fourth of all Soviet R&D were related to defense. Research specialists were trained and the best of them were sent to design bureaus and research organizations of the military-industrial complex. It created a mighty defense industry and ensured military-strategic parity with the USA.

In post-Soviet period, the potential was lost. In 1990s, the workforce in the military-industrial complex reduced several times from ten million people (in the USSR) to 2.5 million (in Russia). The number of R&D radically decreased, as well as procurement orders for batch production of military products.

In Soviet time, it was banned to procure foreign components of munitions and equipment for the defense industry. Each enterprise had a workshop of non-standard equipment, which employed close to 500 people. They designed and created all the necessary technological tools. Imports of technologies create dependence on foreign supplies, which is fraught with dangerous consequences. It now happens with supplies of foreign digital tools and high-tech equipment. The Soviet experience has not been learned in full.

 Copyright 2021 TASS / Army Recognition Group SPRL . All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
on Monday ordered a of the books of Infrastructure Ltd (SIL) to ascertain whether there have been any manipulations and said the clouds surrounding the acts and intentions of the company and its connected entities need to be urgently removed.

The watchdog has asked BSE to appoint a forensic auditor to examine the books of accounts of the company for the period from April 1, 2019 to December 31, 2020, as per a order.

In the wake of a complaint alleging sale of the company's assets to promoters or its related entities on a slump sale basis at erroneous and reduced valuation, had conducted an examination of the matter.

SIL had entered into a framework agreement on June 23, 2020 with South Lake LLC (South Lake), Fenice Investment Group LLC (Fenice), Pashupathy Shankar Gopalan, Anil Jain, SILRES Energy Solutions Pvt Ltd, Pashupathy Capital Pte Ltd, Sherisha Infrastructure Pvt Ltd (SIPL), Sherisha Technologies Pvt Ltd and Avyan Pashupathy Capital Advisors.

The agreement was to restructure and transfer certain businesses of the company to SESPL -- a joint venture between SIPL and a company proposed to be set up in the UK by Pashupathy Pte, South Lake and Fenice. SIPL is a company promoted by an SIL promoter.

Further, SILRES Energy would receive an investment of USD 2,500,000 from Fenice and USD 10,000,000 from South Lake. Also, certain identified businesses of SIL would be transferred to SESPL ( Energy Solutions Pvt Ltd) on a slump sale basis.

As per the Sebi order, the valuation of various segments and subsidiaries of the company do not appear to be fair and transparent.

The suspicion that the listed company has been used as a device/ artifice to obtain various projects and then siphon out/divert these projects to promoter related entities through slump sale cannot be brushed aside at this stage, it noted.

"I observe that there are sufficient material on record to make a prima-facie view that the valuation of the assets of the company and its subsidiaries have been not fairly stated, giving rise to genuine suspicion that the assets of the company are being transferred out to give undue benefits to the promoter entity (STPL) and related entity (SESPL) at the expense of the public shareholders of the company," Sebi's Whole Time Member S K Mohanty said.

BSE has been directed to submit the report, including all annexures, along with its recommendation within 15 days from the date of receipt of the report. The company has been given 14 days' time from Monday if it wants to file a reply.

The forensic auditor should submit its report to BSE within three months from the date of this order, Sebi said.

Further, SIL has been restrained from disposing of, selling or alienating its assets, including effecting the transactions agreed upon under the framework agreement.

Among other directions, SIL, its management and all the signatories to the framework agreement have been directed to maintain status-quo in respect of all transactions and not to undertake any act in furtherance of the agreement till further directions.

Keeping in view the facts and circumstances surrounding the events pertaining to valuations and the frivolous justification put forth by the company, "it becomes incumbent now that the clouds surrounding the acts and intentions of the company and its connected entities be urgently removed", it said.

This will be possible only through a process of a detailed investigation into its financial transactions, valuations and other related affairs and conduct pertaining to those financial transactions, the watchdog said.

"This will not only be in the interest of the company but also in the interest of its shareholders to ensure that the matters are investigated within a definite timeline before the proposed deals are pushed through to execution.

"Such an investigation will not only bring clarity to all the issues and aspects pertaining to the financial statements, assets, valuations of assets and other transactions but also will help the Company itself to complete its business restructuring in a transparent manner to the satisfaction of its shareholders," it noted.

(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 series of winter weather advisories are in effect for west-central Illinois, as wind chills drop well below zero and snow moves into the region overnight.

A wind chill warning is in place until noon Monday, with a low temperature of minus 2 expected Sunday night into Monday morning and wind chills as low as minus 25 degrees.
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) may tweak the equalisation levy imposed on the sale of goods or services carried out using a non-resident e-commerce operator.

Currently, a levy of 2 percent is paid by non-resident e-commerce operators on the gross amount of the transaction. However, experts believe the imposition of a levy results in double taxation in cases where the buyer and the seller are both resident Indians but carry out a transaction using a non-resident e-commerce platform like Amazon.

According to a report by The Economic Times, Kamlesh Varshney CBDT joint secretary has acknowledged that it is a "valid point."

"(There) may be situations where e-commerce participants are Indians and their gross consideration gets into the consideration of the e-commerce operators... There are issues and the government is not saying that all issues have been handled by the proposal in the Finance Bill, Varshney had said. He said the issue will be considered at an "appropriate time."

The levy, when imposed in such cases leads to the non-resident e-commerce platform paying the levy collected from an Indian seller, who will again pay income tax on the profit generated from the transaction.

The United States Trade Representative (USTR) has called the levy "discriminatory, unreasonable, and burdens or restricts US commerce." The Ministry of Commerce & Industry has rejected the claim saying that it applies equally to all non-resident e-commerce operators, irrespective of their country of residence.

"The purpose of the Equalization Levy is to ensure fair competition, reasonableness and exercise the ability of governments to tax businesses that have a close nexus with the Indian market through their digital operations," the ministry had said in a statement.
Austin: A rare deep freeze in Texas that raised demand for power forced the US states electric grid operator on Monday to impose rotating blackouts that left nearly 3 million customers without electricity.

The PowerOutage.us website, which tracks power outages, said 2,802,978 Texas customers were experiencing outages at 12:18pm, local time.

Two people play in the snow in San Antonio. Credit:AP

President Joe Biden declared an emergency on Monday, unlocking federal assistance to Texas, where temperatures on Monday ranged from minus-2 to minus-22 Celsius.

Houstons George Bush Intercontinental Airport said it would remain closed until 1pm Central time while the citys Hobby Airport will cease operations until at least Tuesday due to the inclement weather.

Lesbian and gay young people are almost twice as likely to engage in volunteer work as heterosexual teens, new research by NUI Galway academics has revealed.

Bisexual youth were more likely than the other groups to be discriminated based on their age and gender, the report also found.

Of the 3,354 young people who participated in the study, 3% reported being attracted to the same sex, while 6.3% said that they are attracted to both boys and girls.

The report on the study entitled Connected, Respected, And Contributing To Their World: The Case Of Sexual Minority And Non-Minority Young People In Ireland also found that bisexual youth were less likely than their heterosexual peers to report high family support or having a caring adult whom they can trust and that they were half as likely to feel that they are valued and respected.

We should not think about LGBT+ young people as a uniform group Dr Andras Kolto

Bisexual youth were also less likely to report that they feel comfortable while being with their friends.

The findings are part of studies by the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) Ireland team, based in the Health Promotion Research Centre at the university.

Lead author of the report Dr Andras Kolto said: Not surprisingly, sexual minority adolescents were more likely to feel discriminated against based on their sexual orientation.

They were also more likely to report discrimination based on their age and gender.

However, a positive finding is that lesbian and gay youth are almost twice as likely to be engaged in volunteer work.

This is an aspect of lesbian, gay and bisexual young peoples lives that Irish studies have not previously explored.

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Lesbian and gay adolescents, probably because they have often faced discrimination and bullying, are often more aware of social inequalities and injustice than their non-minority peers and therefore may be driven to fight against injustice by volunteering.

Other studies had shown that LGBT+ individuals often have compassion and empathy towards other minority groups (e.g., people with immigrant background or living with a disability) and are ready to advocate for their interests.

LGBT+ communities often provide a safe haven and a source of support and care to them.

It is important to make bisexual youth also feel welcome in LGBT+ communities and in society.

Dr Kolto added: The results we have detailed are a key piece of research as part of the wider study of youth behaviour trends.

It suggests that we should not think about LGBT+ young people as a uniform group.

Our findings support that those identifying as bisexual are faring worse than those who identify as lesbian or gay.

It is important to note, however, that there are adolescents who are still exploring their sexual orientation, and it may change even in adulthood.

Those young people who feel that they are attracted to both boys and girls or identify as bisexual may need more help and support from their families, peers and teachers.

The study compared findings across sex and social classes in the overall sample of 15 to 17-year-olds.

While a large majority of young people were not likely to report experiencing discrimination, girls were more likely to feel discriminated against based on their gender and age than boys.

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Dr Elena Vaughan, contributing author of the report, said: This finding suggests that sexism is an ongoing concern among young people in Ireland.

Further studies to investigate how and in what contexts this is experienced by girls and young women would be helpful in identifying and implementing policy measures to address this issue.
PRAGUE (Reuters) - The Czech government plans to reopen schools for more students from March 1 with regular testing for coronavirus infections, which remain at high levels, ministers said on Monday.

Schools have been mostly closed since October as infections surged to among Europe's highest, despite shop closures and restrictions on public events and a nighttime curfew.

Gradual reopening of schools has been one of the main demands from opposition parties and the public increasingly weary with the country's lengthy lockdown.

In-class tuition is at the moment open only for children in the two lowest grades of elementary schools, along with kindergartens.

"If we secure enough (tests), nothing prevents children from beginning to return to schools," Interior Minister Jan Hamacek told a news conference.

Education Minister Robert Plaga said the return would start with final years of primary and secondary schools and be followed by other grades, hand in hand with the government's ability to secure enough suitable rapid-result antigen tests.

The plan for school reopening comes as hospitals in several regions creak under the inflow of COVID-19 patients, which is in part due to the spread of the more infectious British variant of the virus.

Germany on the weekend tightened entry restrictions on the Czech and Austrian borders due to spread of coronavirus mutations in the two countries.

The country of 10.7 million has reported 18,250 coronavirus deaths since the star to the pandemic, and daily cases were the second-highest in Europe after Portugal in the past two weeks according to data from EU's disease control agency ECDC.

(Reporting by Jan Lopatka; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
When the Supreme Court ordered California to allow places of worship to open their doors during the coronavirus pandemic, it may also have signaled a shift in the legal boundaries between church and state.

More than 30 years ago, the court, in an opinion by one of its most conservative justices, said states can impose restrictions on religious institutions and their followers under laws that apply to other individuals and institutions.

In a late-night ruling Feb. 5, a 6-3 majority said Gov. Gavin Newsoms ban on indoor worship services in counties hard-hit by COVID-19, an edict that covered most of California, was unconstitutional because it treated houses of worship more severely than retail businesses. The court was unmoved by the states scientific witnesses who said indoor worship services pose a far more severe threat of spreading COVID-19 than grocery stores.

Once more, we appear to have a state playing favorites during a pandemic, said Justice Neil Gorsuch, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito as part of the splintered majority ruling. He noted that the state has allowed retail stores to admit shoppers up to 25% of their buildings capacity, lets masked hairstylists treat customers, and even allows singing in movie studios that test their performers for the virus three times a week, while banning all singing and chanting in indoor worship services.

The majority left the ban on singing and chanting in place, at least for now. But Gorsuch, Thomas and Alito endorsed what appeared to be a new, more far-reaching constitutional standard for claims that a state is discriminating against religion: requiring the state to show that its policy is essential to the public welfare and cannot be served by any less-drastic measures.

That standard already applies to the federal government, under a law passed by Congress in 1993. But the Supreme Court ruled in 1997 that the law does not apply to state and local governments, whose laws affecting religious activities have usually been upheld unless they single out religions for harsh regulation.

The 1997 ruling remains in effect. But legal analysts say its future is in question after the California case.

Religion is going to be front and center of what the court will do over the next couple of years, said Rory Little, a law professor at UC Hastings in San Francisco and a former Supreme Court law clerk. This is the very beginning of the new court as constructed under President Trump.

Another Hastings law professor, Matt Coles, said at least some members of the current court think free exercise of religion is a privileged constitutional right that should be enforced more than many of the others.

Frank Ravitch, a professor of law and religion at Michigan State University, said the courts rulings for several years have given added weight to claims of religious discrimination, particularly claims by conservative Christians.

He cited a June 2020 ruling requiring states to allow tax deductions for donors to religious schools, a 2017 decision requiring Missouri  which bans financial aid to religious institutions  to fund a Christian schools resurfacing of its playground, and the 2014 Hobby Lobby ruling, which allowed most corporations to deny contraceptive coverage to female employees for religious reasons. The court also ruled last July that religious schools did not have to follow civil rights laws in hiring and firing teachers.

And in the California case, Ravitch noted, the court majority found that the ban on indoor worship services, while retail businesses remained open, showed an anti-religious bias even though the state was also prohibiting indoor gatherings in non-religious sites such as movie theaters and concert halls.

Were seeing a pattern of expanding what counts as discrimination against religion ... to a point where theyre now questioning the health authorities making these decisions about dangerous conditions during the pandemic Ravitch said.

The court treated the case as an emergency, accepting one brief round of written arguments and not holding a hearing before issuing its ruling shortly before midnight, a fragmented decision without a lead author.

In another church-state case, the court refused Thursday night to allow Alabama to execute Willie Smith III, convicted of a 1992 kidnapping and murder, because the state would not allow Smiths Christian pastor into the chamber to give him spiritual guidance as he was dying. Alabama has barred all ministers from the execution chamber, citing security concerns, since an earlier ruling that prohibited the state from allowing only Christian clerics and excluding others.

Smith is entitled to a pastor to ease what Smith calls the transition between the worlds of the living and the dead, and the state has no valid security concerns that justify interfering with his freedom of religion, Justice Elena Kagan said in the courts lead opinion. It was joined by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a Trump appointee and a self-described devout Catholic.

Under its precedents, the court is bound by a strict standard it adopted in a 1990 ruling, Employment Division vs. Smith, that upheld Oregons denial of unemployment benefits to two American Indians who were fired for their religious use of peyote. A 6-3 majority led by conservative Justice Antonin Scalia said the government does not violate the constitutional right to religious freedom by enforcing a law, like Oregons drug law, that applies equally to everyone and was not aimed at suppressing a particular religion.

That can be a difficult standard for religious groups to meet, and conservatives in recent years have urged the court to modify or abandon it. The court could revisit the Smith rule in a case it heard in November, a Catholic agencys challenge to Philadelphias refusal to refer foster children to the agency because it would not place them with lesbian, gay or transgender parents.

But the current court appears to be changing its approach to church-state disputes without formally repealing its 1990 standard. According to media reports of the November hearing, several justices indicated they could rule in favor of the Catholic agency even under the current standards. And they struck a similar note in the California case.

One possible signal came from Chief Justice John Roberts, who had deferred to California health officials judgment in a 5-4 ruling in May that upheld Newsoms limits on in-person worship services. Roberts joined last weeks majority rejecting more severe restrictions that were similarly supported by scientific testimony, and observed, Deference, though broad, has its limits.

Kagan, writing for the three dissenters, expressed her bewilderment.

Is it that the court does not believe the science, or does it think even the best science must give way? she asked. In the worst public health crisis in a century, this foray into armchair epidemiology cannot end well.

Little, of UC Hastings, said the ruling showed that the state needs to do a better job explaining the distinctions it draws between churches and train stations or retail stores, where customers sometimes wait in long lines. And Stanford Law Professor Michael McConnell, a former federal appeals court judge, said the religious institutions in the case told the court they were taking all necessary steps to protect the health of their congregations.

With a very wide range of worship styles, some are not conducive to precautions, McConnell said. While the ruling allows places of worship to hold in-person services, he said, it also sends a message to worshipers: Wear your masks and keep your distance.

Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @BobEgelko
Tunisia: premier fires five ministers Plan B Mechichi to overcome stalemate

(ANSAmed) - TUNIS, FEBRUARY 15 - Tunisian Premier Hichem Mechichi has announced in a statement that five ministers have been fired as part of a cabinet reshuffle and that their ministries will be in the meantime given to four sitting ministers and a secretary of State while procedures are completed for the swearing in of the new cabinet in front of the president of the Republic.



The five fired ministers are Mohamed Bousetta (justice), Saloua Sghaier (industry), Kamel Deguiche (youth and sport), Leila Jaffel (state property) and Akisa Bahri (agriculture). The interim justice minister is now Hasna Ben Slimane (who is already in charge of the public function), the industry ministry goes to Mohamed Bousaid (who is already minister of trade and the development of exports), public property to Ahmed Adhoum (already the minister of religious affairs), agriculture to Mohamed Fadhel Kraiem (the minister of technology and communication) and youth and sport to Sihem Ayadi (already secretary of State at the same ministry).



In the statement, the premier said he "remained open to all solutions to overcome the situation of stalemate and to enable the ministers to assume their function in conformity with the Constitution". It is the so-called "plan B" of Mechichi to go around the "institutional block" that sees him pitted against the president of the Republic, Kaies Saied, who is against the premier's reshuffle and refuses to schedule a date for the swearing in of the new 11 ministers that have already obtained a vote of confidence in Parliament on January 26.



According to Saied, the reshuffle violates article 92 of the Constitution. Moreover, for the head of State, some of the ministers are involved in cases of conflict of interest with one in particular accused of corruption. A further complication is that Tunisia doesn't have a constitutional court yet.(ANSAmed).





Ukraine to boost coal output to avoid imports from Russia-occupied part of Donbas  Vitrenko

In January and February, Ukraine had to import electricity from Belarus and Russia over the energy crisis.

Reporting by UNIAN

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Carnival floats mocking Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Angela Merkel feature in this year's German parade which has been scaled back this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The former US President is depicted naked as a suckling pig above a fire, while Putin is kicked in the groin by his jailed critic Alexei Navalny.

The Rose Monday parade in Dusseldorf normally attracts thousands of spectators who came to see the hotly-anticipated floats designed each year by Jacques Tilly, Germany's leading carnival float designer.

The festival takes place on the Monday before Ash Wednesday but the mass celebrations have been called off this year due to the raging virus.

But that has not stopped Tilly from preparing the satirical floats which traditionally take aim at political figures and current events.

The designs are a secret until their unveiling and the floats were revealed to the media on Monday without the usual crowds in attendance.

Organisers sent eight floats through the city - separately, rather than in a parade, and on routes that were kept secret in advance to prevent crowds from gathering.

A carnival float depicting former US President Donald J. Trump is shown to German media on Monday for the traditional Rose Monday carnival, which has been cancelled this year due to Covid-19

Jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny kicks the crotch of Vladimir Putin in a judo fight in another satirical float made by Jacques Tilly

Armin Laschet, the newly-elected leader of the Christian Democratic Union party, was depicted dressed up as Angela Merkel in disguise in the scaled-down carnival

A cartoonish coronavirus confronts a jester depicting the Rosenmontag carnival as organisers were forced to abandon plans for their usual festivities

One of the more provocative floats this year shows a Catholic bishop with a penis-shaped mitre with the message 'the core problem of the Catholic Church'

This year, one of the floats depicts a naked Donald Trump as a suckling pig roasting on a fire with the words 'Make America Great Again' in the flames.

Another shows the jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny kicking the crotch of Vladimir Putin in a judo fight.

The President is a black belt in the martial art and he has described it as his 'favourite sport'.

One of the more provocative floats this year shows a Catholic bishop with a penis-shaped mitre.

On his robe is a message which reads: 'The core problem of the Catholic Church.'

One of the floats showed the earth looking concerned at the coronavirus while a huge climate wave lurks behind the planet

The festival takes place on the Monday before Ash Wednesday but celebrations have been called off this year due to the still raging virus

The Rose Monday parade in Dusseldorf normally attracted thousands of spectators who came to see the hotly-anticipated floats

The controversial Polish abortion ban was depicted in the floats, with Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader of the ruling polish Law and Justice (PiS) party, shown holding a cross over a screaming woman

A carnival float depicts a conspiracy theorist whose brain is flying out of their head

Another float shows a cartoon depiction of the coronavirus gleefully wreaking havoc with the carnival.

Angela Merkel is also represented in the parade, with Armin Laschet, the newly-elected CDU leader, seen dressed as the Chancellor.

The 59-year-old is a fervent Merkel loyalist and is seen as the continuity candidate ahead of September's election which will see Germans deciding on their first new chancellor in 15 years.

Tilly, 56, says his main influences for his designs are classic British comedies including Spitting Image, Monty Python and Little Britain.

He told the German news agency of this year's event: 'It's a small signal that we're still alive.'

Officers in Germany have been attempting to shut down a number of clandestine carnivals this weekend as the traditional celebrations have been cancelled

In Cologne, another carnival display, designed by Greenpeace activists, showed a clownish Laschet bulldozing German towns

Carnival fools of the Schwarze Veri Zunft Ravensburg walk through the Obertor gate in Ravensburg before police broke up the gathering

Carnival reveller Erich walks with his ship, which symbolically sails through a sea of coronaviruses, through the Severinstor gate in Cologne

The 'fool's jump in Rottweil is normally one of the highlights of the Swabian-Alemannic carnival in the southwest German region. This year, some masked fools arrived but police tried to stop them from taking part in celebrations

One of Germany's first superspreader events stemmed from a Carnival celebration in a town west of Cologne in February 2020, where many people came into contact with an infected man.

This year, authorities are taking no chances, with public consumption of alcohol banned in some places.

Some have tried to hold clandestine carnivals which officers have been trying to shut down.

But police trying to bust a Carnival in eastern Germany were left red-faced when most of the revellers escaped police on skis.

German news agency dpa reported that police in the town of Marienberg, near the border with the Czech Republic, received information that about 100 people were partying without abiding by the requirements to wear face masks or respect minimum social distancing.

Police were unable to determine how many people had broken the law, however, because their arrival prompted a hasty on-ski departure by most of the party-goers.

Saxony, where Marienberg is located, has the second-highest infection rate of Germany's 16 states.

Germany has restricted entry from the neighbouring Czech Republic and Austria's Tyrol state to prevent the spread of variant viruses from those countries.
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The Jaguar Land Rover logo is seen at a dealership in Milton Keynes, Britain, on June 1, 2020. (Andrew Boyers/Reuters)

Jaguar Cars to Go All-Electric by 2025 as JLR Plans Full Range of E-models by 2030

LONDONJaguar Land Rovers luxury Jaguar brand will be entirely electric by 2025 and the carmaker will launch e-models of its entire lineup by 2030, it said on Monday, as it joined a global race to develop zero-emission vehicles.

JLR, owned by Indias Tata Motors, said its Land Rover brand will launch six pure electric models over the next five years, with the first one coming in 2024.

Known for its iconic, high-performance E-Type model in the 1960s and 1970s, Jaguar faces the same challenge as many other carmakersmaking the transition to electric vehicles while retaining the feeling and power of a luxury combustion engine model.

JLR said it will keep all three of its British plants open as it electrifies its range. Its time to re-imagine the next chapter for both brands, Chief Executive Thierry Bollore said.

Shares in Tata Motors rose as much as 3 percent after the announcement.

JLR said its electric plans for Jaguar would be centered at its Solihull plant, but dropped plans to build the XJ, the brands flagship full-size car, at its Castle Bromwich facility in central England.

Bollore, who took over as CEO in September, said the Castle Bromwich plant would focus instead on non-production activities in the long term. He provided few details.

JLR said it will spend around 2.5 billion pounds ($3.5 billion) annually on electrification technologies and the development of connected vehicle services.

The company said it was also investing in developing hydrogen fuel cells in anticipation of a future shift to hydrogen to power vehicles.

The carmaker will have prototypes using hydrogen fuel cells on Britains roads within the next year, it said, as part of a long-range investment plan.

Car groups worldwide are pursuing zero-emission strategies to meet stringent CO2 emission targets in Europe and China.

Luxury car brand Bentley Motors, owned by Germanys Volkswagen, said in November its model range will be fully electric by 2030, and last month General Motors Co said it aimed to have a zero-emission lineup by 2035.

A number of countries have also announced bans on new fossil-fuel vehicle sales. In the United Kingdom, that ban should take effect in 2030.

JLR said it was on a path towards a double-digit operating profit and positive cash flow, and aims to achieve positive cash excluding debt by 2025.

($1 = 0.7193 pounds)

By Nick Carey
Source: Reuters

Britain's Rolls-Royce named Panos Kakoullis as its new chief financial officer, picking the former head of Deloitte's audit and assurance practice to help steer its cost-cutting and simplification as it tries to ride out COVID-19.

The pandemic has shattered Rolls-Royce's finances because it is paid by airlines on a flying-hours basis, and the company warned in January that the start of this year was even more difficult than expected.

The aero-engines maker said Kakoullis would start on May 3.

Chief Executive Warren East said his experience made him a good fit.

"Panos delivered significant transformational change at Deloitte, streamlining and simplifying the business and we look forward to benefitting from his expertise and experience as we deliver on our fundamental reorganisation," East said.

Rolls's current CFO Stephen Daintith, who resigned last year after being poached by online retailer group Ocado, will leave Rolls-Royce on Mar. 19. Ben Fidler, currently acting deputy CFO, will be interim CFO in the six weeks until Kakoullis arrives.

Jefferies analyst Sandy Morris said of the appointment: "We suspect the market might have been more immediately reassured by a familiar name, one with corporate experience, but it is hard to question Mr Kakoullis's experience, technical credentials and knowledge of driving the adoption of AI and advanced analytics."

Despite the deepening travel crisis due to new strains of the coronavirus, Rolls has said its liquidity of 9 billion pounds gives it confidence.

It is selling assets worth 2 billion pounds and cutting more than 1 billion pounds in costs by axing 9,000 jobs, closing factories and planning a two week operational shutdown in the summer of some units.

Kakoullis joined Deloitte as a graduate and worked there until May 2019. He has since worked for PA Consulting.
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on has suggested that the Sangathan (KVS) should open schools abroad to cater to more students in the light of the fact that lakhs of Indians are settled across the world.

The panel headed by BJP MP Vinay Sahasrabudhe submitted its report to Parliament during the Budget session, in which it discussed various aspects related to the functioning of Kendriya Vidyalayas.

The committee said that since a significant numbers of Indians were settled in different parts of the world, a feasibility study should be conducted with regard to opening of Kendriya Vidyalayas in various countries.

The parliamentary panel also called for the expansion of the footprint of Kendriya Vidyalayas within the country, pointing out these schools had become a 'brand' and respected across the country for the quality of

On the issue of opening new Kendriya Vidyalayas abroad, the KVS maintains that it all depends on requests from the embassies concerned. The proposals so received are examined in consultation with the Ministry of External Affairs.

KVS started with 20 regimental schools in 1963, but has since expanded to more than 1,200 schools across the country, including three KVs in Moscow, Tehran and Kathmandu.

These three schools are inside the Indian Embassies in Russia, Iran and Nepal and their expenditures are borne by the Ministry of External Affairs.

KVS is an autonomous body that operates Kendriya Vidyalayas across the country. The schools were initially started to impart to children of central government employees but wards of private individuals too have been admitted in Kendriya Vidyalayas over the years.

According to the Education Ministry, 1,245 Kendriya Vidyalayas are in operation across the country at present.

The KVS informed the committee that the government of India had approved 50 new KVs in March 2019, of which 19 are yet to be opened. In addition, 13 KVs were sanctioned in August 2018, of which four are yet to be opened.

The Education Ministry said that 8,420 teachers in Kendriya Vidyalayas and 1,394 teachers in Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas will be appointed soon.

--IANS

gcb/anm/tsb

(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.)
The Houston Chronicle is tracking the historic arctic storm's impact on the Houston region and the rest of Texas. Check back regularly for updates. This post is free for subscribers and non-subscribers. Subscribe now for full access and to support our journalism.

5:51 p.m. Texas Democrats went on the offensive Friday, saying years of neglect and corporate deference by Republican state leaders directly led to a week of deadly power outages.

We have been failed not only over the last few days, but for decades, because Texas has been in the hands of people who dont believe in government in the first place, said former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro.

-Jeremy Blackman



5:30 p.m. Houston ISD plans to remain closed Monday and Tuesday, then hold online-only classes for the last three days of next week, as the district manages the fallout from water and power issues caused by freezing temperatures.

HISD officials announced the schedule Friday as employees continued to survey damage to the districts 260 campuses and the city of Houston remained under a boil-water advisory expected to stretch to at least Sunday.

-Jacob Carpenter

4:30 p.m. At an emergency meeting Friday, Harris County Commissioners Court unanimously extended a disaster declaration for this weeks winter storm through next Friday.

The order allows the county government flexibility to access recovery resources and activates the countys emergency management plan. The county engineer estimates 55,000 homes in unincorporated Harris County have pipe damage, while the budget office estimated tens of millions of dollars in property damage.

-Zach Despart

3:47 p.m. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas on Friday declared this weeks state of emergency over during a press conference and apologized for the misery Texans have suffered.

I want to acknowledge the immense human suffering we saw, ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness said. When people lose power, there are heartbreaking consequences.

Power has been restored to almost all CenterPoint Energy customers in Texas nearly a week after the winter storm left millions in the dark, the regulated utility company said Friday.

Fewer than 7,000 customers who still don't have power were expected to be reconnected by the end of Friday, the company said. CenterPoint, the regulated utility that transmits power to the Houston region, has more than 1.39 million customers. The last reconnections should be completed by the end of the day, the company said.

-Marcy de Luna

2:52 p.m. The Houston Food Bank will remain in "disaster mode" for days as residents confront food challenges following this week's storm, power outages and water problems.

After the winter storm iced roads and kept millions holed up without water and power, Texas officials anticipate major food shortages in the days and weeks to come, prompting the Houston Food Bank to kick start mass food giveaways that are already ramping up through the weekend.

The food bank and all the partners we work with, were almost like the last resort, said Brian Greene, CEO of the Houston Food Bank. It can, for a lot of households, be the difference between getting by and tragedy.

-- Samantha Ketterer

2:05 p.m. Domestic violence shelters in Texas are struggling to meet the immediate basic needs of survivors during the states winter crisis and fear the long-term impacts of the natural disaster will result in another spike in rates of abuse.

On top of prolonged periods without heat and power, many shelter facilities have flooded due to broken pipes, according to the Texas Council on Family Violence. All of the 40 organizations the council has been in touch with have limited food and water supplies as grocery store shelves are empty and water boil orders have been issued across the state. Hundreds of survivors were evacuated from facilities this week.

The sad part about this is that domestic violence doesnt stop during this, said Gloria Terry, CEO of the nonprofit.

Read more in this report from Hannah Dellinger.

1:55 p.m. Late last year, Gov. Greg Abbotts hand-picked utility regulators decided they no longer wanted to work with a nonprofit organization they had hired to monitor and help Texas enforce the states electric reliability standards.

The multi-year contract between the Public Utility Commission and the obscure monitoring organization, the Texas Reliability Entity, was trashed. Over the next months, right up until the crippling storm that plunged millions of Texans into the dark and cold, the state agency overseeing the power industry operated without an independent monitor to make sure energy companies followed state protocols, which include weatherization guidelines.

The decision to end the contract didnt cause the historic grid failures, but critics say the utility commissions move to strip away a regulatory layer was just the latest example of the consistently light touch Texas politicians have used to oversee the complex industry that generates and distributes power.

Read more from Jay Root and Eric Dexheimer.

1:45 p.m. State Rep. Gary Gates is under fire from his constituents for leaving House District 28 on Wednesday as much of Fort Bend County struggled without water and power.

After losing power Tuesday, Gates left his home via his private jet Wednesday night and traveled to Orlando, Fla., sparking outrage among many who believe the freshman lawmaker should have remained in his district.

-- Claire Goodman

1:33 p.m. Two bottled water distribution sites will open Friday afternoon for District C residents, according to city council member Abbie Kamin.

One site will open at 2 p.m. at the Evelyn Rubenstein Jewish Community Center of Houston, 5601 S. Braeswood Boulevard. The other will open at 3 p.m. at the Metropolitan Multi-Services Center, 1475 W. Gray Street.

Supply is limited and will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis for people with no access to running water or ability to boil water.

1:07 p.m. With warming temperatures and sunny skies, road conditions have improved significantly across much of the city. Houston TranStar reports eight remaining locations with icy patches, including U.S. 290 near State Highway 99 and Interstate 10 eastbound after State Highway 6, according to the traffic incident map.

Texas Department of Transportation crews continue to remove snow and ice from roads to prevent it from re-freezing when temperatures dip below 32 degrees late Friday. Drivers should continue to be cautious and move over or slow down for TDOT crews.

12:40 p.m. New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is flying to Houston today with more than $2 million to help Texas recover from a week of catastrophic blackouts and water outages.

Ill be flying to Texas today to visit with Houston Rep. Sylvia Garcia to distribute supplies and help amplify needs & solutions, Ocasio-Cortez said on Friday morning.

--Jeremy Wallace

12:10 p.m. Four more people died of hypothermia this week in Harris County, according to the medical examiner's office. These deaths are in addition to three county hypothermia deaths the Chronicle reported yesterday. In total, 30 deaths across the Houston area have been tied to weather-related incidents.

-- Alejandro Serrano

11:55 a.m. Drinking and non-potable water will be provided starting 1 p.m. Friday at three District A locations, according to city council member Amy Peck. Supply is "very limited" and residents must bring their own container for non-potable water, which is not for consumption but can be used to flush toilets.

The locations are:

Carverdale Community Center, 9920 Porto Rico Road (drinking and non-potable water)

White Oak Conference Center, 7603 Antoine Drive (drinking water only)

Trini Mendenhall Community Center, 1414 Wirt Road (drinking and non-potable water)

11:48 a.m. The following places are open as warming centers through 5 p.m. Friday, according to Houston emergency management officials. This is not a comprehensive list.

Texans YMCA, 5202 Griggs Road

Foster YMCA, 1234 W 34th Street

11:30 a.m. President Joe Biden said he will sign a major disaster declaration for Texas as soon as Friday afternoon, according to a White House pool report. The president said he was thinking of visiting Texas next week, but he does not want his visit to be a burden.

I plan on going, Biden reportedly said.

Per @emiliemunson: Biden says he'll sign a major disaster declaration for Texas as soon as today. Said he wants to visit Texas and was thinking of doing so next week but he does not want his visit to be a burden. I plan on going, he said.  Ben Wermund (@BenjaminEW) February 19, 2021

11:10 a.m. At least 4,900 people have called Houston officials to report burst pipes this week, said Mayor Sylvester Turner.

"That number is probably even higher than that," Turner said.

Water pressure continues to increase throughout Houston as crews worked through the night, Turner said. The city-wide average pressure increased to 32 to 34 PSI on Friday morning, although some spots remained below 20 PSI.

The boil water notice remains in place and the city's goal is to lift the notice by Monday after clearing state environmental regulations.

It will take longer for water to reach full pressure for residents who live above the ground floor, said director of public works Carol Haddock.

"We are making steady, sustainable progress," Haddock said. "We're taking this very deliberate action to make sure we can achieve getting out and staying out of the boil water notice."

Anyone who sees water coming from an unoccupied home or building should report it to the city.

10:40 a.m. The devastating winter storm that hit Texas this week may delay vaccine administration by at least a week, said Julie Swann, an expert in vaccine supply chains and logistics at North Carolina State University.

When you have a major disruption  a natural disaster like a hurricane, or a big storm with lots of ice and snow  lots of pieces of any supply chain may be disrupted, Swann said.

Read or listen to Lisa Grays interview here for a detailed discussion of the vaccine supply chain, the storms impact on the COVID-19 pandemic and more.

Also, heres what to know about rescheduling your vaccine appointment if it was canceled this week.

10:30 a.m. The Houston region should prepare for one more freezing night before temperatures climb back into the 60s this weekend, bringing welcome relief after a historic spell of deadly cold.

"Well, the worst is behind us weather-wise, Houston," meteorologist Matt Lanza wrote Friday morning in the Space City Weather blog.

"Hang in there, SE TX!" the NWS tweeted. "Next week looks downright toasty."

Read more details about the forecast here.

9:50 a.m. Houston's water distribution at Delmar Stadium will begin at 10:30 a.m., an hour earlier than it was originally scheduled, due to overwhelming demand, the city announced. The distribution is located at 2020 Mangum Road.

The city will also distribute water to senior living centers and provide supplies to city council members to distribute in their districts, officials said.

8:55 a.m. Food and water will be available at 11 a.m. at the West Houston Assistance Ministries, 10501 Meadowglen Lane, according to Houston city council woman Tiffany Thomas. There are supplies to feed 250 families.

Hot meals and water will be available for 200 families at noon at Viet Alley Restaurant, 11210 Bellaire Boulevard #133.

8:50 a.m. Two water distribution centers will open at 10 a.m. in Galveston, city officials said. Crews were unloading water supplies from a plane early Friday.

The sites will be located at the Schlitterbahn parking lot, 2109 Gene Lucas Boulevard, and the Island Community Center, 4700 Broadway.

Officials asked people not to arrive before the opening time.

8:42 a.m. Price gouging complaints have skyrocketed this week amid mass power and water outages. Harris County residents have lodged more than 500 complaints about exorbitant costs for gas, water and lodging, officials said. This is more than double the number of grievances filed at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

-- Nicole Hensley

8:30 a.m. Mayor Sylvester Turner told MSNBC that he has not spoken with Gov. Greg Abbott during this week's winter weather crisis.

"I have not talked to the governor at any time during this crisis," Turner told Stephanie Ruhle during a Friday morning live interview. "I have not talked to the governor, but were pushing forward."

Turner spoke about the current situation in Houston, saying he is most concerned about people impacted by this crisis who were "already on the margins."

"This the time for us to rally, to be supportive of one another and we're going to stay with it until we come through this crisis," Turner said. "For many families without means, this crisis will continue long past water pressure being restored and the lights being turned on."

7:50 a.m. Energy consumption across Texas is much higher Friday morning, according to a statement from ERCOT, but there is sufficient power to sustain the morning peak. There were no additional outages overnight, although some generating units "tripped." The grid operator expects to come out of emergency conditions later Friday, ERCOT said.

7:30 a.m. A mass water distribution begins at 11:30 a.m. at Delmar Stadium, 2020 Mangum Road, in northwest Houston, according to city officials.

The city remains under a boil water notice, most likely until Monday, said Mayor Sylvester Turner. The drive-through distribution will offer bottled water to people unable to boil water or those who lack water at home due to frozen pipes, officials said.

6:35 a.m. A hard freeze warning remains in effect until 9 a.m. Friday for a portion of Southeast Texas, including most of Harris County, where temperatures were expected to remain in the 20 to 25 degree range, according to the National Weather Service.

Expect a cold morning in Houston, with wind chill temperatures between 15 and 25 degrees, before the sun comes out and the temperature warms to 46 degrees this afternoon.

6:25 a.m. Houston TranStar is reporting 25 icy road locations across the Houston metro area, a significant improvement from the past few days. Many of the slick patches were in west and northwest Harris County. Check traffic conditions on this map.

Crews worked into the night to make sure icy conditions were held to a minimum, according to the Texas Department of Transportation. Bridges and overpasses tend to be most problematic.

However, don't let your guard down. Maybe wait until daylight and of course slow down and stay focused while driving, the agency said.

6:15 a.m. Power has been restored to 99.8% of CenterPoint Energy customers in the Houston area, leaving roughly 4,400 households in the dark.

In Texas, fewer than 190,000 households lacked power, according to an outage tracker.

Thursday, Feb. 18

9:30 p.m. FEMA supplies for Texas have arrived in Fort Worth to be distributed from there, according to WFAA-TV reporter Jason Whitely.

Supplies include meals, blankets, water and fuel, he reports. Most of the 60 large industrial generators are heading to Houston and Austin.

9 p.m. CenterPoint reports 7,244 residents remain without power, with 99.7 percent of customers' electricity restored, according to the company's website.

The company continues repair equipment damaged by severe weather. Another hard freeze is expected tonight into tomorrow morning.

"We ask that you continue conserving electricity - lower your thermostat & avoid using appliances," the company said.

8:05 p.m. Sundays snowfall blanketed the yard of Cristian Pavon Pinedas home in Conroe as the 11-year-old frolicked about, covered by a red hoodie.

Less than 24 hours later, his mom would find the sixth grader lifeless in his bed  a suspected victim of hypothermia from freezing temperatures in a home that suffered a power loss.

It was his first time (seeing snow). Thats why he was excited outside, said Maria Elisa Pineda, adding she filmed him on her phone as he played, snapping photos. Everything was well. He was happy that day. He was not at all sick.

7:45 p.m. Emergency mobile food markets are scheduled this week in Montgomery County for residents suffering from outages and hardship during a historic week of winter weather.

The Montgomery County Food Bank will distribute food and water starting at noon Friday at the North Montgomery County Community Center at 600 Gerald Street in Willis.

Some people have been without power and water since Sunday, said Willis Police Chief James Nowak in an email. The City of Willis has been working with our emergency management partners to bring assistance to our beleaguered citizens who have been suffering without power and water.

7:18 p.m. Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo spoke to CNN earlier Thursday about another freeze expected to impact the city tonight.

We are all hands-on deck," he told The Situation Room. "Everyones working. Everyones in uniform Not only are we helping to check on people and their welfare, helping with their warming centers, helping distribute water and food, were actually fighting crime."

6:10 p.m. Sen. Ted Cruz says the plan for his Cancun getaway -- as much of Houston was left in the frigid dark -- was to stay through the weekend.

"I have to admit, it was --," Cruz said, pausing during a mea culpa news conference at his River Oaks home. "The last week has been tough on a lot of folks."

He said he had power at his inner-loop home longer than most and that the electricity cut out as friends came over for dinner. It stayed out for two days, he continued. By the second day, the Cruz family was "clustered around the fireplace as the only source of heat."

His daughters suggested the family take a trip to somewhere warmer. Which is how Cruz and family landed a flight to Mexico.

"I started having second thoughts almost the moment I sat down on the plane," he said.

5:36 p.m. Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo on Thursday warned residents that the threat of this weeks cold snap has not quite subsided. With another night of freezing temperatures straining the power grid, blackouts remain possible.

We have to be cautious; its not mission accomplished right now, Hidalgo said at a news conference.

With many in the region with low or no water pressure, she urged residents to drain their pipes to prevent damage in the event of a freeze. County facilities will be closed again on Friday because of insufficient water pressure.

-- Zach Despart

5:25 p.m. Since the start of the winter storm in Houston and its devastating aftermath, authorities in Harris County have seen 580 carbon monoxide poisoning cases.

The Chronicle's Gwendolyn Wu reports that most cases stem from people using BBQ pits and generators inside their homes in a desperate attempt to stay warm, according to hospital officials.

Among those hundreds of cases, two include the deaths of a woman and an 8-year-old girl in Sharpstown.

5:11 p.m. About 20,000 power outages remain in the Houston area as CenterPoint continues to repair equipment damaged by cold weather, according to a tweet from the company.

"We ask that you continue conserving electricity - lower your thermostat & avoid using appliances," the company said.

You can view the current outage locations on the company's website.

5 p.m. A water distribution site has been set up for Bolivar Peninsula residents at the Crystal Beach Volunteer Fire Department, 930 Noble Carl Dr, emergency officials said.

Distribution will end at 7 p.m. this evening and restart tomorrow morning at 10:00 a.m.

4:28 p.m. Among the many Texans braving hardship following days of power outages is a Conroe family who lost their home and several pets in a Monday morning fire. They are now struggling to get medications for the disabled dad as they live in an old model SUV amid freezing temperatures.

It was as early as 4:30 a.m., a few hours after Morris Robertsons 41st birthday, when the power in the familys southeast Conroe mobile home went out after a winter storm struck the state.

- Jose R. Gonzalez

4:07 p.m. FEMA said a fake phone number is circulating online sharing false information that the agency is paying for hotels for disaster relief.

"The best information on legitimate sources of help in your area will come from local officials & @TDEM," the agency said in a tweet.

FEMA said it is providing generators and fuel to support critical sites like hospitals and water facilities. It is also distributing 729,000 liters of water and more than 50,000 cotton blankets.

3:53 p.m. Residents are finding ways to cope with freezing temperatures as power outages continue to affect the area. Sleeping in their cars, doubling up with neighbors, or heading to one of the county warming centers are just some of the ways people are trying to survive during the winter storm.

Maria DAngelo, 87, has lived in Houston for around 20 years and has never seen anything like this. When her power went out on Tuesday she traveled north to Spring to stay with a friend, but soon her friends power went out again Tuesday night. DAngelo needs oxygen for a chronic lung disease and her portable machine only lasts about two hours. After calling 911 she ended up at the temporary shelter set up at the Church Project in The Woodlands.

- Jamie Swinnerton

3:38 p.m. Gov. Greg Abbott is adding two more emergency items to the legislative session, he said during a news briefing. These include mandating winterization of generators and power system equipment and securing funding needed to ensure that winterization occurs, he said.

Separately, another official said during the briefing that roughly 13 million Texans remain under a boil water notice after water systems across the state were impacted in the winter storm.

3:09 p.m. Following Mayor Turner's announcement about city-wide water distribution sites, the Chronicle has asked each council members office for details about the distributions. Some locations have been announced but many officials still are coordinating and trying to confirm details, which are subject to change. Council members said each district is getting three pallets of water. Reporter Dylan McGuinness provides more details and available information about distribution locations here.

2:50 p.m. Even as power restorations continue and water pressure begins to improve, both systems remain "fragile," said Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo. People should continue to conserve both of these resources, she said. Ahead of tonight's hard freeze, do not drip faucets but prepare for plummeting temperatures by shutting off the water supply to your home, draining and insulating pipes.

The overnight freeze could increase demand on the power grid, although it's unclear what impact that may have on the system.

"Be mentally prepared for the possibility that there may be other challenges for tonight, but what I'm told is it's likely that well be okay," Hidalgo said.

Road conditions have improved, so people can drive to the store to re-stock on supplies this afternoon if necessary, Hidalgo said. The county has received reports of price-gouging on items like food, water, fuel and warm shelter, she added. Residents should report any incidents to authorities.

New updates from Judge Hidalgo on the power, water, and keeping your family safe. pic.twitter.com/pnloJNTFJQ  Office of Judge Lina Hidalgo (@HarrisCoJudge) February 18, 2021

2:20 p.m. Two people in Houston and another in Crosby died of hypothermia in their homes, the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences revealed Thursday. The death toll tied to arctic weather this week in the Houston region now stands at 25 people.

-- Alejandro Serrano

2:15 p.m. Whopping-high electric bills up to six figures that were reported by CenterPoint Energy customers are a mistake, according to the utility.

"We are looking into the issue to address it. Customers do not owe this amount, and it will not be drafted from their account," the company said.

-- Marcy de Luna

2:06 p.m. Residents of Bacliff and San Leon in Galveston County can get bottled water at a distribution site located at the Bayside Community Center at 4833 10th Street, according to county officials. Details on additional distribution sites are forthcoming.

1:20 p.m. Light snow and flurries are falling across north and northeast parts of Southeast Texas, according to the National Weather Service. Unlike wintry precipitation in days past, little to no accumulation is expected. Some people reported flurries or sleet in Montgomery County and northwest Harris County.

Roads conditions remain somewhat slick, with Houston TranStar reporting 82 icy locations across the city.

1:05 PM Radar Update: Areas of light snow/flurries will continue to move north-northeast across parts of the region this afternoon. Little if any accumulation is expected. pic.twitter.com/o8FoRMxzAa  NWS Houston (@NWSHouston) February 18, 2021

1:12 p.m. ERCOT said Thursday that it was able to restore power to millions of Texans more quickly than expected as more generation came online, and that it is no longer ordering additional power cuts.

"We recognized that we had more generation coming online. We realized we could go much faster," said ERCOT senior director of system operations Dan Woodfin said about the restoration process.

A remaining 444,000 households lacked power Thursday afternoon across the state, according to an outage tracker. Meanwhile, fewer than 27,000 Houston-area households were still in the dark, CenterPoint Energy said.

-- Marcy de Luna

1:01 p.m. Nine deaths in Galveston and Brazoria counties were related to harsh weather conditions, officials said. The victims died of suspected cold exposure and carbon monoxide poisoning, according to the county medical examiner's office. The deaths bring the total number of fatalities linked to the cold weather in the Houston region to 22 people.

-- Nick Powell

12:47 p.m. As water and power gradually return to Houstonians, city leaders are beginning to look ahead to recovery and assistance efforts required in the storm's aftermath.

The city is working to distribute water to other vulnerable populations, including senior citizens and those sheltering for warmth at Gallery Furniture. Each district council member is working to set up a water distribution site by 2 p.m. Thursday, Turner said. No addresses were provided.

The Mayor's Office for People with Disabilities has partnered with CrowdSource Rescue, a Texas disaster response nonprofit, to deliver bottled water to people with disabilities who don't have access to reliable transportation. People can sign up to help or receive help at this link.

Turner said he is coordinating with several philanthropic and corporate leaders to create a fund that would assist people without insurance, seniors and people whose homes sustained water-related damage to pipes and ceilings as many of those people ask, "How do I move forward?"

"We want to do everything we can to pull together as a city to help provide you with the support and assistance to repair your home," he said. "This is what we do in our city, this is how we make sure we don't leave anyone behind, and that we recognize people are already under a great deal of stress and strain."

12:12 p.m. U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz was feeling the heat Thursday as photos circulated online showing the Texas Republican traveling to Cancun while millions in his home state were left in the cold without power and water, reports Benjamin Wermund.

Houston police said they monitored the senators movement at the airport for his departing flight on Wednesday at the request of Cruzs staff.

11:42 a.m. The water pressure has improved across Houston, said Mayor Sylvester Turner, although residents should continue to conserve water as officials try to build up and stabilize pressure. Pressure has improved as crews brought on more generators to augment the power source. Hospitals and jails reported improved water supply by Wednesday night and Thursday morning, Turner said.

The boil water notice will likely remain in place until Monday because water samples must be tested for environmental quality even after pressure returns to functional levels, Turner said. Bacteria can seep into pipes when pressure drops.

11:12 a.m. A man was found dead early Thursday in a north Harris County parking lot. The Harris County Sheriff's Office said there were no signs of trauma and they believe the death was related to the cold weather. The wind chill in Houston dipped to 21 degrees at 6 a.m. this morning. The man was wearing a jacket with no shirt, no shoes and no socks, officials said.

Including this death, at least 13 people have died in weather-related incidents across the Houston area this week, including crashes, fires and carbon monoxide poisoning.

Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said the agency's homeless outreach team is assisting people experiencing homelessness with getting into shelter.

"This weather is not just cold, its deadly," he said.

10:58 a.m. Firefighters responded to an all-time record number of calls in the last three days, according to the Houston Professional Fire Fighters Association. Calls for fire and EMS clocked in at 2,186 on Monday, 3,299 on Tuesday and 2,793 on Wednesday, the organization reported.

The daily average call volume is around 980.

10:53 a.m. The Public Utility Commission of Texas on Wednesday evening ordered that customers can't be without power more than 12 hours during rolling outages. The order applies to transmission and distribution utility entities including CenterPoint, Oncor, AEP and TNMP.

Read more on the state's power situation from Marcy de Luna.

9:57 a.m. Expect an update on Houston's water system shortly after 11 a.m. when Mayor Sylvester Turner plans to answer questions at a news briefing and make an announcement about bottled water distribution. The Chronicle will provide updates as soon as this information is available.

9:47 a.m. Even as power returns and the weather forecast improves, Harris County is now facing a food and water crisis, said Judge Lina Hidalgo. Hidalgo encouraged out-of-state residents to consider donating to the Houston Food Bank.

9:04 a.m. Galveston is trying to avoid another shut-off by conserving water as they work to fix water line breaks and restore service, city officials said Thursday morning.

Some water was restored, but numerous residents remain without running water. Officials warned that intermittent disruptions or isolated shut-offs may occur as crews work to make repairs. Residents should conserve water, limit shower times and avoid letting faucets run. A boil water notice remains in place.

"Thank you for your resilience and patience," officials said. "We assure you we are working around the clock to secure water service."

The city gave no estimated time of restoration.

8:52 a.m. Significant progress was made overnight in state-wide power restorations, although some people remain without power and more rolling outages are possible, ERCOT said in a statement.

"Were to the point in the load restoration where we are allowing transmission owners to bring back any load they can related to this load shed event," said senior director of system operations Dan Woodfin. "We will keep working around the clock until every single customer has their power back on."

Those who remain in the dark most likely live in areas where the ice storm knocked out power or where the controlled outage will required a crew to come out and manually re-energize the line.

Some level of rotating outages may be needed over the next few days to keep the grid stable, ERCOT said.

8:27 a.m. One-fifth of Texas nursing homes have reported weather-related emergencies to the state following the onslaught this week of extreme cold, freezing rain and widespread blackouts. These include power loss, facility damage and environmental or other operational issues, according to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. The latest state tallies Wednesday showed 18 of roughly 1,220 nursing homes had relocated or evacuated residents.

-- Emily Foxhall

8:18 a.m. Water supply systems in Harris County sustained extensive damage during the extreme cold, said meteorologist Jeff Lindner with the Harris County Flood Control District. Lindner tweeted photos showing deep, splintering cracks in pipes and other pieces of equipment despite protection measures.

Some images showing the damage from the extreme cold to our water supply systems. Damage is extensive #houwx #txwx #hounews pic.twitter.com/9MhoUCFpv1  Jeff Lindner (@JeffLindner1) February 18, 2021

8:12 a.m. Flights will resume at Hobby Airport on Thursday after the airport was forced to shutter the day before due to water issues, the airport said. Overnight, crews restored water in a limited capacity to the airport. People should still check with their airline to confirm the status of their flight.

7:35 a.m. Cold temperatures and subfreezing wind chills will stick around in Houston until Saturday morning, meteorologists said, but the end of a lengthy period of deadly winter weather is within sight.

A hard freeze watch remains in place for Harris County and surrounding areas from Thursday night into Friday morning, according to the National Weather Service. The watch means that a prolonged stretch of freezing temperatures could kill crops and other vegetation and damage unprotected outdoor plumbing.

Thursday will be cold, breezy and cloudy in Houston, according to Eric Berger of Space City Weather. Temperatures should climb into the mid- to upper-30s in the afternoon but wind chills will stay between 21 and 27 degrees throughout the day.

A long awaited and very much needed warming trend is expected this Saturday. Daytime highs will be in the 50s and overnight lows will be above freezing for the first time in several days. Temperatures will continue to rise to the 70s by next Wednesday.#TXwx #HOUwx #BCSwx #GLSwx pic.twitter.com/ycfHBYa1uG  NWS Houston (@NWSHouston) February 18, 2021

6:37 a.m. Additional generators have been brought on to increase water pressure in Houston, Mayor Sylvester Turner said.

"As more facilities come online water pressure should increase," he tweeted early Thursday. City officials initially said they expect water pressure to return to fully operational levels by the end of Thursday.

The mayor urged people to continue to conserve and boil water and report water main breaks or leaks coming from homes. Hospitals and fire hydrants remain the top priorities for water.

The city will host multiple water distribution sites Thursday aimed at providing water to people who cannot afford to purchase it. Details and location information are forthcoming.

"Would encourage others who can to do the same," Turner said.

6:29 a.m. As temperatures hovered around freezing, some icing was reported on roads across Houston early Thursday, especially on bridges and overpasses. Officials encouraged people to stay off the roads or drive with caution if necessary. Houston TranStar reported 120 icy spots across Houston roads. Check traffic conditions here.

6:15 a.m. More power was restored to Houston-area and Texas households overnight. More than 98% of CenterPoint customers had power as of 6:10 a.m. Thursday, with roughly 47,000 households remaining in the dark.

"As more generation becomes available, we are working as quickly and safely as we can to restore your power. Conservation is still needed if your electricity has been restored."

Across the state, nearly 630,500 households lacked power early Thursday, a significant improvement from the nearly 3 million customers who lacked power 24 hours ago.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 22:22:54|Editor: huaxia

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BERLIN, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Total revenues of German car parts maker ZF declined by around 11 percent year-on-year to 32.6 billion euros (39.6 billion U.S. dollars) for the fiscal year 2020, according to preliminary figures published by the company on Monday.

After the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, revenues in the first half of 2020 even dropped by 27 percent, ZF figures showed.

The company's comprehensive cost-cutting and structural adjustment measures as well as a significant market recovery led to a "substantial improvement" in sales and earnings in the second half of 2020.

ZF said in a statement that it benefited from its "strong presence in the Chinese market." Since early summer 2020, China's economy "experienced a continued strong upturn," it noted.

"Like the entire German car industry, ZF benefited from China's rapid recovery," a ZF spokesperson told Xinhua on Monday. By the end of 2019, the company employed more than 13,000 staff at around 40 locations in China, according to the spokesperson.

Overall, ZF achieved a clearly positive adjusted operating profit in fiscal 2020. However, earnings after taxes would be negative, in particular due to "high upfront expenditures for future tasks."

The company is scheduled to release its final results for the fiscal year 2020 on March 18. Enditem
The Joint Forces had to fire back.

The Command of Ukraine's Armed Forces has reported three violations of the latest ceasefire agreement committed by Russia-controlled armed groups in the Donbas warzone on Sunday, February 14.

"In the past day, February 14, three ceasefire violations were recorded in the Joint Forces Operation (JFO) zone," the press center of the Ukrainian JFO Command said on Facebook in an update as of 07:00 Kyiv time on February 15, 2021.

In particular, the Russian occupation forces fired anti-tank grenade launchers and automatic rifles near the village of Vodiane.

Also, the Russian Federation's armed formations used grenade launchers of various systems and rifles near the village of Novo-Oleksandrivka.

Read alsoZelensky: Enemy seeks to disrupt ceasefireThe violations were reported to OSCE representatives through the Joint Center for Control and Coordination (JCCC) on the ceasefire and stabilization in Donbas.

The Joint Forces fired back, the report says.

What is more, three members of the Joint Forces were killed in a blast of an improvised explosive device near the village of Novoluhanske while advancing towards their positions. Senior officers and military law enforcers are working on the scene. All the circumstances of the incident are being investigated.

The JFO Command expresses its sincere condolences to the families and friends of the victims.

Since midnight, enemy forces have not attacked Ukrainian troops.

The Ukrainian military say the situation is under full control.

Donbas ceasefire: Background

Participants in the Trilateral Contact Group (Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE) on the peace settlement in Donbas on July 22 agreed on a full and comprehensive ceasefire along the contact line from 00:01 on Monday, July 27, 2020.

On the very first day of the newly-agreed truce, Russia's hybrid military forces mounted three attacks on Ukrainian positions in Donbas, eastern Ukraine. Ukraine has reported more such violations over the latest period.

Reporting by UNIAN
It has been one of the economic conundrums of the coronavirus pandemic: Unemployment rates rose to unprecedented levels, but some employers have been begging to fill jobs.

With the onset of the spread of COVID-19 triggering a state unemployment rate of 17.7% in June  the highest since the Great Depression  the pandemic led to a state-ordered shutdown of businesses. As a result, many companies furloughed workers, as others pivoted to find new ways of maintaining their business.

Unemployment benefits were extended and government stimulus kicked in to ease the pain for workers.

Now, even as the state has allowed companies to open up again, many Western Massachusetts employers  especially manufacturers  cant find enough workers to fill critical jobs, according to Patricia Canavan, president of United Personnel Services.

Responses from applicants for employment ads placed by United Personnel have fallen by 90% since the state-ordered initial business shutdown last March, Canavan shared as 2020 came to a close.

Patricia Canavan, president of United Personnel Services. (Don Treeger / The Republican file photo)

When the shutdown for businesses considered nonessential by the state eased up, employers began to look for more workers, she said. That quest, however, was stymied by the ongoing increase in COVID-19 cases.

Its been an unprecedented year, Canavan said. There are hundreds of job openings, but no one to place.

In late December, United Personnel had some 200 job openings, but, said Canavan, Its challenging to find people who are comfortable going to work. Contributing factors could be fear of contracting the virus, burdensome home responsibilities and the extension of unemployment benefits and government stimulus checks, she noted.

At the beginning of the pandemic, United Personnel helped clients considered non-essential find ways to make themselves essential.

For instance, toy and game maker Cartamundi in East Longmeadow converted some of its manufacturing capacity into making protective face masts and other equipment for responders. It was exciting to help with that, Canavan said of the pivot by the company in May.

4/21/2020 - A worker seals off one of a face shield package on the factory floor at Cartamundi in East Longmeadow. (Hoang 'Leon' Nguyen / The Republican file photo)

United Personnel, which has offices in Springfield, Northampton and Pittsfield, was also forced to lay off some of its own office staff members when the virus hit, according to Canavan. Those workers slowly returned on an as-needed basis.

In normal times, United Personnel employs about 36 workers in its office as well as some off-site, Canavan said. The agency operated for many weeks with a skeleton crew for two to four days a week, she added.

For companies forced to lay off employees, Canavan said her agency is helping provide clients with other resources, including encouraging them to seek unemployment benefits.

United Personnel, which helps companies in Massachusetts and Connecticut with different types of staffing needs, expects to see the hiring outlook to improve in 2021.

In the coming months, the company is ramping up its efforts to recruit workers for permanent jobs by helping companies form and staff search committees for new employees, schedule interviews and negotiate full-time offers with candidates, Canavan said.

In other instances, United Personnel helps employers recruit workers for specific management jobs.

For example, the company helped an area college fill a position for an interim vice president and a nonprofit with a statewide presence in Connecticut fill a chief financial officer position.

United Personnel also helps identify workers for temporary or contract positions for seasonal jobs or special projects. Sometimes people hired as temps can become full-time workers at a company, Canavan said.

While the state unemployment rate is relatively high  6.7% in December, it is a big improvement since June. Despite business setbacks due to the virus, Canavan says shes hopeful things will begin to get back to normal in the spring as more people receive the vaccine against COVID-19.

More than 30 years since its founding its founding by Canavans parents Mary Ellen Scott and the late Jay Canavan, United Personnel has faced economic ups and downs, Canavan said. She remains confident it will weather the current storm.

5/18/2017 -Springfield- Richard K. Sullivan Jr., president of the Economic Development Council of Western Massachusetts. (Don Treeger / The Republican file photo)

Like Canavan, Richard K. Sullivan Jr., president of the Economic Development Council of Western Massachusetts, is similarly upbeat about 2021. The outlook is bright for job seekers, Sullivan said. All of our members are looking to hire. When the region gets into a post-COVID future, well be working closely with manufacturers.

Lydia Rivera, media representative for CRRC MA, the Chinese-owned rail car company based in Springfield, said the shutdown due to the pandemic forced a delay in the delivery of subway cars for the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authoritys Orange and Red lines. But the outlook for 2021 is great, Rivera says.

At company job fairs held in August and September, for instance, CRRC hired 40 electrical engineers and 42 mechanical engineers to meet demands for the coming year and beyond. CRRC MA has 320 employees. The manufacturing facility in Springfield employs 258, including the production workers.

When workers are comfortable getting back into the job market, they will face many opportunities  especially in high-paying manufacturing jobs, business leaders said. Rivera said benefits at CRRC, for example, are generous and offer workers a good quality of life.

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She is never one to shy away from scantily clad selfies on social media.

And Ella Rae Wise sent temperatures soaring once more on Sunday as she sported semi-sheer lace underwear, complete with a frilled trim, while revealing her new hairstyle.

The TOWIE star, 20, showcased her slender curves and peachy bottom in her racy lingerie while celebrating Valentine's Day at her Essex home before going for a drive with a mystery companion.

Valentine's Day: Ella Rae Wise set pulses racing on Sunday as she sported lace underwear and revealed her new hairstyle before going for a drive with a mystery male companion

She boosted her height with classic Louboutin heels as she flashed a glimpse of her red soles.

Ella styled her new long bob in glamorous curls and sported a slick of red lipstick.

She captioned her upload: 'Cupid called, he says youve stolen my heart..'

Ella later captured the tattooed arm of a man, but failed to reveal his face or identity.

Sizzling: The TOWIE star, 20, showcased her slender curves and peachy bottom in her racy lingerie set, complete with a frilled trim, as she posed up a storm at her Essex home

She captioned the photo on her Instagram Story: 'You're the one I want'.

It is unclear if the duo are currently living together as current Covid-19 rules prevent citizens from leaving home to meet others socially, unless they are in their support bubble.

It was reported on Sunday that police officers would carry out spot checks on drivers to see if they were travelling to see their lovers.

A Metropolitan police source said: Im going to be spending my Valentines Day ruining peoples Valentines Days and joked that officers could end up asking male drivers: Is that your wife, sir?

Romance is in the air: She boosted her height with classic Louboutin heels as she flashed a glimpse of her red soles and she styled her new long bob in glamorous curls

The force has not routinely conducted regular spot checks on drivers as part of its Covid rule enforcement before now.

Ella's post comes after she recently returned to Essex following her sun-soaked vacation to Dubai.

Despite the coronavirus crisis worsening, stars of TOWIE, Love Island and Geordie Shore have been travelling around the globe in their droves.

Kym Marsh also hit out at influencers travelling to Dubai amid coronavirus restrictions in the UK and said she thinks the government should close the borders.

Rule breaker? Ella later captured the tattooed arm of a mystery man despite coronavirus rules preventing citizens from leaving the home to meet others socially, unless they are in their support bubble

The TV presenter, 44, admitted she was unimpressed by photos on social media of reality stars living it up in the UAE while Britain is in the midst of its third lockdown.

Kym said in her OK! magazine column she thinks work trips should be put off for the time being.

She wrote: 'Lots of influencers seem to be going abroad. If you've got to travel for work then fair enough, but I personally would be putting off that trip and staying home.

'From what I can see from the pictures of people in Dubai, every man and his dog is there and it doesn't look particularly socially distanced!'

From Monday, UK nationals or residents returning to England from 33 countries will be required to spend 10 days in Government-designated quarantine hotel at a cost of 1,750 for an individual.

The regulations were published just days before the scheme becomes law.
Well here we are again, looking at another tender photo of Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex. What now? This type of photo can only mean happy news. And indeed, Harry, 36, and Meghan, 39, are expecting a baby. A statement from a spokesperson was released alongside the image: We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child.

Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, have announced theyre expecting another baby. Credit:Misan Harriman/The Duke and Duchess of Sussex via Getty Images

Cute. And they announced this on Valentines Day? Thats right. Theyre in California and they chose to reveal the pregnancy on Valentines Day local time. By the looks of Meghans bump, they probably couldnt put off announcing this too much longer. But its likely this specific date is no coincidence. Prince Harrys mother, Princess Diana, announced she was expecting her second child on this day in 1984, exactly 37 years ago. And as we know by now with royals, theyre all about the subtle details.

Tell me more about the photo. A barefoot Harry. Adoring grins. Meghans head nestled in her husbands lap, her hands cradling her bump. Then theres the slouchy Sunday-vibes clothing and the idyllic garden (honestly, look at that tree). It could be the movie poster for a reboot of The Notebook. And according to Professor Daniel Palmer, who researches photography at RMIT University, theres a sense of relatability and casualness to the photo that is unlikely to be an accident. Remember, this is a couple who has been determined to set themselves apart from the royal family, having stepped down as senior royals in 2020. And this only widens the gap between them and the firm. Its kind of like theyre in the park doing what ordinary couples do and we know they see themselves as more ordinary than most royals, Palmer says.
The Los Angeles Police Department is investigating a complaint that a staff member posted an image of George Floyd with the caption You take my breath away and it was circulating among officers. The photo was in a style that resembled a Valentines Day card. Chief Michel Moore said the officer who made the complaint will be interviewed Monday to try to figure out how the photo made it to the LAPD offices and the people who were involved, reports the Los Angeles Times. If there is confirmation officers were circulating the image, people will find my wrath, Moore said.

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A local activist, Jasmyne Canick, posted a screenshot of an email that was apparently sent to LAPD employees by Capt. Jay Mastick, reports BuzzFeed News. Chief Moore was disgusted by the post and directed that a Department complaint be generated, Mastick wrote. As Cannick points out on Twitter, the email doesnt say anything about not being racist. Instead, it calls on officers to maintain  professionalism and use judicious restraint while posting online.

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So someone in the LAPD posted a photo of George Floyd on social media with the caption, you take my breathe away in a Valentine format.



Really? This doesnt help the situation. Im curious as to the division and rank of the person who made the post. Holla. pic.twitter.com/bclHH8U2Di  Jasmyne Cannick (@Jasmyne) February 14, 2021

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In a string of tweets, the LAPD said it was aware there were allegations that an employee was responsible for the post, but took pains to emphasize that had not been confirmed yet. At this point the Department has not identified any actual postings in the workplace or identified that it was in fact our department employee who created the image, the LAPD said. Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police on May 31 last year after an officer knelt on his neck for eight minutes and he repeatedly said, I cant breathe. The words became a rallying cry as protests against police brutality and systemic racism engulfed the country.

The Department has become aware of allegations that an image was being passed around the department and this image was in the workplace. There are also allegations that the post with the image was authored by a department employee.  LAPD HQ (@LAPDHQ) February 14, 2021
A Morris County school district is reviving its tuition-based, full-day kindergarten program in September after it stalled for a year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The School District of the Chathams is doling out by lottery up to 60 slots with a tuition rate of $7,000 per student, according its website.

Full-day kindergarten debuted in the K-12 district in the 2019-20 school year, also on a tuition basis, Schools Superintendent Michael LaSusa said. Prorated refunds were provided to parents last year after all New Jersey schools closed in March 2020, for the remainder of the school year, due to the pandemic.

School officials decided not to offer full-day kindergarten for the 2020-21 school year.

We did not do it again this year because of all of the uncertainty and we needed as much space as possible for social distancing, LaSusa said in an email, adding that 175 students are currently enrolled in the districts half-day kindergarten program, for which no tuition is charged.

The application deadline in the Chathams for the 2021/22 school year is March 5.

Whether, and how, to proceed with kindergarten has been among the many vexing challenges facing parents and school districts, in New Jersey and elsewhere. Nationally, about 17 percent of 1,000 families surveyed by the University of Oregon last fall said they had decided to put off enrolling their children in kindergarten.

Kindergarten enrollment statistics for the current school year in New Jersey are not yet available, the state education department said.

Full-day kindergarten is offered by most school districts in New Jersey, but is not required under state law. Most do not charge tuition.

Janet Bamford, chief public affairs officer for the New Jersey School Boards Association, said it is more common for school districts to charge tuition for pre-school programs, or assess a fee for extended-day programs offered to supplement half-day kindergarten.

In Wayne, district officials are proceeding with plans to debut full-day kindergarten starting in September, Superintendent Mark Toback said. Registration in Wayne is underway and more than 400 children are expected to enroll, Toback said. No tuition will be be charged.

The Passaic County school district is funding the new program via its annual budget, starting in 2019, after successive referendums in 2015 and 2016 were defeated. Wayne is not offering a half-day kindergarten option in September, Toback said.

The Cranford school district, in Union County, is offering two, full-day kindergarten classes in September, and charging a tuition rate of $750 per month. Like the Chathams, it is allotting slots by lottery, though the application deadline closed Jan. 5.

The School District of the Chathams is a regional district for more than 4,000 students in Chatham Township and Chatham Borough. The median household income in the township and borough  $189,297 and $192,321, respectively, according to U.S. Census reports  is more than double the statewide amount in New Jersey.

The school districts application for full-day kindergarten notes that tuition will be waived for anyone selected in the lottery who qualifies for the federal National School Lunch Program providing free and reduced-priced meals to students.

LaSusa said full-day kindergarten tuition goes back into the program.

The tuition charge is used to offset the costs of the program, such as the salaries of teachers, LaSusa said.

Single, full-day kindergarten classes will be offered at the Milton Avenue School, Southern Boulevard School, and Washington Avenue School, with up to 20 students per school, according to an overview on the school districts website.

Separate lotteries will be held at the schools, and are open to any child turning 5 years old by Oct. 1, 2021.

It a student selected from the lottery is a twin, or a higher-order multiple sibling, the sibling or siblings will also gain admission.

We will not break up twins or triplets, the application notes.

Full-day kindergarten students will remain with the same homeroom for the day, with time allotted for lunch and recess. Academic subjects will include math, English language arts (ELA), physical education, art and music.

The ongoing pandemic factors into a delated payment structure, with the $3,500  half the yearly tuition  not due until June 30. In explaining the later deadline, the district cites the ongoing pandemic and the uncertainty it has caused.

Please subscribe now and support the local journalism YOU rely on and trust.

Rob Jennings may be reached at rjennings@njadvancemedia.com.
Statistically speaking, Idaho is one of Americas greatest economic success stories. The state has low unemployment and high income growth. It has expanded education spending while managing to shore up budget reserves. Brad Little, the states Republican governor, has attributed this run of prosperity to the mix of low taxes and minimal regulation that conservatives call the business climate.

But there is another factor at play: Californians, fleeing high home prices, are moving to Idaho in droves. For the past several years, Idaho has been one of the fastest-growing states, with the largest share of new residents coming from California. This fact can be illustrated with census data, moving vans  or resentment.

Home prices rose 20% in 2020, according to Zillow, and in Boise, Idaho, Go Back to California graffiti has been sprayed along the highways. The last election cycle was a referendum on growth and housing, and included a fringe mayoral candidate who campaigned on a promise to keep Californians out. The dichotomy between growth and its discontents has fused the citys politics and collective consciousness with a question that city leaders around the country were asking even before the pandemic and remote work trends accelerated relocation: Is it possible to import Californias growth without also importing its housing problems?

I cant point to a city that has done it right, said Lauren McLean, Boises Democratic mayor.

Thats because as bad as Californias affordable housing problem is, it isnt really a California problem. It is a national one. From rising homelessness to anti-development sentiment to frustration among middle-class workers whove been locked out of the housing market, the same set of housing issues has bubbled up in cities across the country. Theyve already surfaced in Boise, Denver, Nashville, Tennessee, Austin, Texas, and many other high-growth cities. And they will become even more widespread as remote workers move around.

Housing costs are relative, of course, so anyone leaving Los Angeles or San Francisco will find almost any other city to have a bountiful selection of homes that seem unbelievably large and cheap. But for those tethered to the local economy, the influx of wealthier outsiders pushes housing costs further out of reach.

According to a recent study by Redfin, a national real estate brokerage, the budget for out-of-town homebuyers moving to Boise is 50% higher than locals  $738,000 versus $494,000. In Nashville, out-of-towners also have a budget that is 50% higher than locals. In Austin its 32%, Denver 26% and Phoenix 23%.

Frustrating as this is for prospective homebuyers, the real pain is felt among low-income tenants, a quarter of whom  about 11 million U.S. households  are already spending more than half their pretax income on rent. As rising costs filter through the market and the rent burden gets more severe, food budgets get squeezed, families double up and the most vulnerable end up on the streets.

In city after city, studies have shown that homelessness has a distinct financial tipping point. As soon as the local rent burden reaches the point where renters on average spend more than a third of their income on housing, the number of people on the streets starts to rise sharply, according to researchers at Zillow and elsewhere.

William Deshazer/NYT

Cities are built around jobs, and the nations inequality reflects that. In a trend that has been exhaustively documented by economists and journalists, over the past four decades the U.S. economy has bifurcated into high-paying jobs in fields like tech and finance and low-paying jobs in retail and personal services. It could be described as two separate societies, but in U.S. metropolitan areas these societies are intertwined.

This is as true in Boise as it is in San Francisco. Some work has to be done in person. No matter how high housing costs get, there is not, as of yet, a way to telecommute to a cleaning job. So unless the hordes of expatriate Californians flocking to cheaper cities expect their children to be in remote school forever, to never again eat at a restaurant, to always tidy their own homes  and unless companies leaving California expect to do without the services of janitors and security guards  the underlying problem will persist in every next city that has the misfortune of becoming desirable.

Scholars started documenting Californias affordable housing crisis in the mid-1970s, and since then liberal and conservative economists have identified stringent zoning regulations and not-in-my-backyard (NIMBY) politics as leading causes of the nations housing problem. Both Republican and Democratic administrations have taken up the NIMBY issue. Jack Kemp, secretary of housing and urban development for the first President George Bush, convened a housing advisory commission whose 1991 report was called Not in My Back Yard: Removing Barriers to Affordable Housing.

President Barack Obama spoke against rules that stand in the way of building new housing in a speech in 2016, and President Donald Trump, echoing Bush, signed an executive order in 2019 establishing a White House council on affordable housing. ( Trump reversed course a year later, ending an Obama-era program intended to combat racial segregation in the suburbs.)

The problem is that opposition to new housing also has bipartisan agreement. Blue cities full of people who say they want a more equitable society consistently vote to push housing costs onto others. They will vote for higher taxes to fund social programs, but also make sure that whatever affordable housing does get built is built far away from them. Red suburbs full of people who say regulation should be minimal and property rights protected insist that their local governments legislate a million little rules that dictate what can be built where. What does it mean to respect property rights? In zoning fights, it gets fuzzy.

Normally we think of ownership as determining who has a right to use a piece of property in a certain way, said Emily Hamilton, an economist and director of the Urbanity Project at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. But when a city tries to add density, she said, its common to see this framed as harming the property rights of people who could experience changes in their neighborhood.

Its a distant memory now, but in the weeks before the pandemic shut down the economy, housing policy was having a minor political moment. The field of Democratic presidential candidates, including President Joe Biden, had released a flurry of federal housing proposals that varied in their particulars but revolved around a series of tax breaks, affordable housing funds and promises to encourage intransigent local governments to make it easier to build.

The track record of previous administrations suggests that the federal government can accomplish only so much. Thats why Hamilton, who closely follows local housing policies, is encouraged that there are also a flurry of proposals coming out of state and local governments.

In 2018 the City Council in Minneapolis voted to outlaw the practice of declaring some neighborhoods off limits for apartment buildings  whats known as single-family zoning  becoming the first major U.S. city to do so. Since then, a half-dozen states have introduced bills to limit single-family zoning. Others have passed laws to prevent cities from banning backyard cottages and require them to permit more apartments. McLean, the mayor of Boise, recently started an effort to rewrite the citys zoning code.

The action might be local, but the message should carry nationwide: The only way to solve the housing crisis is to address it in every city it affects. Otherwise, were just spreading it around.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
The theme of Joey Broussard's home is "Throw Me Something Mister" as the Krewe de Canailles holds the "Cruise de Canailles", a safer version of the popular walking Mardi Gras parade on Friday, February 5, 2021, in Lafayette. Dozens of businesses and homes participated by decorating around the theme of "Oh the Places We Didn't Go" for people to drive or bike past and view the show.
Ukraines First Lady Olena Zelenska met with Minister of Culture and Youth of the UAE Noura bint Mohammed Al Kaabi to discuss cooperation in the field of culture and ideas for its deepening.

The initiatives to deepen cooperation between the two countries, which were put forward today by the First Lady of Ukraine, are the following: holding weeks of Ukrainian cinematography in the UAE; establishment of the Days of Ukrainian Folk Art and Traditional Ukrainian Cuisine with master classes in folk crafts and culinary skills, Easter painting, wreath weaving, shows of national costumes and jewelry, etc; organization of separate programs of Ukrainian art within the UAE art festivals, in particular with concert programs from national groups, the Presidents press service informs.

"All these activities can be combined into a separate project. For example, the Days of Friendship between our countries. They can and should be bilateral and held both in Ukraine and in the UAE," Olena Zelenska noted.

For her part, Noura bint Mohammed Al Kaabi supported the idea of Friendship Days and noted that it is a strong bridge for cultural cooperation.

Olena Zelenska called the introduction of Ukrainian-language audio guides in UAE museums another important project for Ukraine.

"Currently, the Ukrainian embassy is actively working to introduce Ukrainian-language audio guides in the UAE museums. At the same time, the epidemic situation in the world is making adjustments, but I am sure that after the lifting of quarantine restrictions, our citizens will be able to listen to tours of the Grand Mosque, the Louvre Abu Dhabi and Qasr Al Hosn in Ukrainian," First Lady Olena Zelenska said.

Expo 2020 is among the forthcoming large-scale events in the UAE, in which Ukraine plans to take part. It will include a number of artistic and cultural events. The domestic pavilion is planned to show the uniqueness and originality of the Ukrainian people and culture through the prism of modern technologies and innovative approaches to life, interaction with the outside world.

As reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and First Lady Olena Zelenska make a state visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15.

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Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 22:39:30|Editor: huaxia

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HONG KONG, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Carrie Lam said on Monday that Hong Kong will continue to leverage technology to achieve even better results in the anti-epidemic work.

Lam inspected the surveillance work to detect the COVID-19 virus in sewage on Monday to learn more about the identification of asymptomatic patients in the community through sewage surveillance. She said that the anti-epidemic work of the HKSAR government has all along been based on science.

"The sewage surveillance project is an extremely good example of our joint efforts with local scientific teams to fight the virus with technology," she said.

Lam visited a sewage sampling site in Central and Western District set up by the Drainage Services Department (DSD) of the HKSAR government to inspect the sampling workflow. She then went to the public health laboratory of the University of Hong Kong (HKU) to learn about the treatment of samples and testing matters.

The HKSAR government's Environmental Protection Department and the DSD have been collaborating with the cross-disciplinary team of HKU in the research of sewage surveillance since last year. The technology has been applied in monitoring the situation of the spread of the COVID-19 virus in the community and individual buildings, providing crucial support for local health authorities in the identification of buildings and places for compulsory testing and related operations.

From the end of last year till now, the HKSAR government has conducted compulsory testing operations on more than 110 buildings with positive sewage testing results, identifying more than 50 confirmed cases.

Technological research and application is part of the HKSAR government's strategy and response in the fight against the epidemic, according to Lam.

The Health and Medical Research Fund of the HKSAR government has approved a total of 170 million HK dollars (about 21.92 million U.S. dollars) to support 49 medical research projects on COVID-19 by local universities. In addition, Hong Kong's University Grants Committee and the Research Grants Council have to date granted 350 million HK dollars to subsidise research projects in relation to COVID-19 and other novel infectious diseases. (1 U.S. dollar = 7.75 HK dollars) Enditem
One-Eyed Willy, is that you?

An 18th century ship which sank off the coast of Cape Cod was found to have at least six pirate skeletons still aboard.

The Boston Globe reports how the wreck is the remains of a ship named the Whydah, which went beneath the waves near the New England town of Wellfleet in the 1700s. Although the ship itself was discovered in 1984, these skeletons are a recent development in the research behind the ships story.

Commanded by pirate Sam Bellamy, the Whydah was wrecked off Wellfleet in 1717, taking with her the treasure of 50 plundered ships, explains the Whydah Pirate Museums website, the establishment that made the discovery. According to Cape folklore, Bellamy was returning to his love, Maria Hallett, the Witch of Wellfleet, when his ship met disaster in one of the worst storms to strike the eastern seaboard.

Now Bellamy, his crew, and their bootywhich includes weapons, clothing, and, of course, jewelryare being researched by the team at the Whydah Pirate Museum to see what kind of treasures of history they can find.

However, apart from potentially learning more about the lifestyle of a scallywag during this point in time, the team at the museum are also using their research to find any of the pirates potential bloodlines.

We hope that modern, cutting-edge technology will help us identify these pirates and reunite them with any descendants who could be out there, states the museums underwater explorer, Barry Clifford.

Now, the big question isshould these descendants be found, do they technically have the right to inherit Bellamys treasure?

One could only hope.
Paducah Man Charged with Credit Card Fraud

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - A Paducah man was arrested Monday after police said he used a hospitalized person's debit card and vehicle without permission.The McCracken County Sheriff's Office said detectives learned the victim had been hospitalized since Feb. 1, but someone had been using his debit card after that date to make several transactions in the area.Deputies identified 67-year-old Phillip Parkinson as a suspect. On Friday they found Parkinson inside the victim's missing vehicle at a home on Key Drive. They said Parkinson also admitted to making multiple purchases with the debit card.Parkinson was arrested and booked into the McCracken County Regional Jail. He's charged with fraudulent use of a credit card over $500 and unauthorized use of a motor vehicle.
Jaipur, Feb 15 : Sparking off yet another controversy by raising questions on the Congress' future, Acharya Pramod Krishnam, a close aide of Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, has raised objections to Sachin Pilot being asked to leave the dais during the recently held Kisan Mahapanchayat in Rajasthan's Rupangarh when Rahul Gandhi was there.

"How can the farmers benefit when the farmer leader is brought down from the dais during the farmers' 'Panchayat'. This is not the question of Sachin Pilot's insult and neglect, but this is the question of Congress' future," Pramod Krishnam tweeted in Hindi on Sunday and tagged Rahul Gandhi, Ashok Gehlot and Sachin Pilot.

Soon after Pramod Krishnam's tweet, Sachin Pilot's supporters expressed their resentment on social media and questioned why their leader was ignored at the rally.

During Rahul Gandhi's Kisan Mahapanchayat in Roopangarh, Sachin Pilot and several other leaders were initially seen on the stage.

However, soon after Rahul Gandhi went on the stage, MLA Ramlal Jat and Rajasthan in-charge Ajay Maken asked everyone to leave the stage except four leaders, including Ashok Gehlot, K.C. Venugopal, Govind Singh Dotasara and Rahul Gandhi.

Pilot was very much present on the stage when the announcement was made.

As Rahul Gandhi started speaking, Pilot and Maken spoke to each other and both of them stepped down from the stage. This incident has been linked with the move to get Sachin Pilot off the stage.

Pramod Krishnam recently triggered speculation by showering blessings on former Deputy Chief Minister Sachin Pilot to become the Chief Minister of Rajasthan in the future.

"Mukhyamantri Bhavah" (May you become the CM): Acharya Pramod Krishnam tweeted while replying to Pilot's tweet which had a photo-video of a farmers' rally taken out in Bayana on February 9. The video showed a mammoth crowd listening to Pilot during the Kisan Mahapanchayat.

Pilot, along with his supporting MLAs, has been organising Kisan Mahapanchayats in Rajasthan which are receiving a huge response. The initiative has been taken to stand in solidarity with farmers protesting against the three contentious Central farm laws.

Pramod Krishnam, in fact, also asked Gehlot, who tweeted asking "young generation to come forward in the #JoinCongressSocialMedia campaign". The spiritual guru asked Gehlot whether he was referring to Sachin Pilot via the tweet.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
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Trump was a boaster, a puffer, and an exaggerator, but he was always straight about the essentials. Biden, on the other hand, is a stone-cold liar. For years he lied about his first wife's death, and, beginning in 2019, he lied consistently about Trump's stance on white supremacists. Biden has now added a new lie to his rhetoric: he claims that Trump is responsible for the death of Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, who died of unknown causes after the events on January 6.

On December 18, 1972, a true tragedy struck Joe Biden: his wife, Neilia, along with his daughter, Naomi, died in a car crash when her car collided with a truck. His two sons  Beau and Hunter  were both critically injured. (Hunter's extensive head trauma due to that crash may explain a lot about his addiction problems and moral failings now.)

One would think Biden would have treated this horrific event with the dignity of being honest about it, but that's not Biden's style. Beginning in 2001, Biden began to tell people that the reason for the crash was that the truck driver was drunk. For example, in 2007, he stated"

A tractor-trailer, a guy who allegedly  and I never pursued it  drank his lunch instead of eating his lunch, broadsided my family and killed my wife instantly and killed my daughter instantly and hospitalized my two sons.

The problem with that statement, which he repeated on other occasions, was that it was a bald-faced lie. In fact, the responding officers explicitly stated that the truck driver, Curtis C. Dunn, was not drunk. Indeed, he tried hard  and unsuccessfully  to avoid the accident and was deeply traumatized by it.

Another big Biden lie was his passionate embrace of the "fine people hoax." The details of the hoax are here. Briefly, Trump explicitly disavowed white supremacists and neo-Nazis back in 2017, saying they should be "condemned totally." Nevertheless, the media blatantly lied, accusing him of calling those same reprobates "fine people."

Throughout his campaign, Biden relentlessly repeated this blatant lie. When he announced he was running, he stated the lie, claiming that it had motivated him to run. He repeated the lie again in June. And then he repeated it again in August when he accepted the nomination.

Biden now has a new lie  and again, this lie originated with a dishonest media. The lie is that Trump-supporters beat Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick to death with a fire extinguisher on January 6. The Revolver completely debunked this story, showing (a) that the media's loudly repeated claims were fake, (b) that Sicknick said he was in fine shape after the events of that day, and (c) that there's a cover-up about Sicknick's actual cause of death.

The debunking was so comprehensive that, on Sunday, the New York Times was forced to admit that the other, fact-free narrative was wrong.

Law enforcement officials initially said Mr. Sicknick was struck with a fire extinguisher, but weeks later, police sources and investigators were at odds over whether he was hit. Medical experts have said he did not die of blunt force trauma, according to one law enforcement official.

It's noteworthy that, while the Times and other leftist outlets trumpeted the fake fire extinguisher story, the above paragraph is buried deep within a larger story about the violence that affected police officers. This solicitude for law enforcement is a sea change from the Times' cavalier attitude towards BLM's and Antifa's brutal and deadly assaults on police officers for large parts of 2020.

The fact that the Officer Sicknick narrative has been soundly debunked doesn't matter to Biden, a man comfortable with lies. Despite promising that his administration would be all about "unity," Biden opened his statement about Trump's acquittal by repeating the Officer Sicknick lie (emphasis mine):

It was nearly two weeks ago that Jill and I paid our respects to Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, who laid [sic] in honor in the Rotunda after losing his life protecting the Capitol from a riotous, violent mob on January 6, 2021.

The remaining language from the "unity-bringer" is equally divisive and inflammatory.

It begins with a total lie about Sicknicks death. https://t.co/GK9Ywr9DWM  David Reaboi (@davereaboi) February 14, 2021

Biden is now what he has always been: a dishonest, nasty, morally corrupt man. Obama was Dorian Gray  the pretty face of the left. Biden is the actual picture of Dorian Gray, dragged out of the attic and on display so all the world can see the rot that infects the Democrat party.

Image: Joe Biden. YouTube screen grab.

Help Net launches HelpLine, the first mobile application in Romania dedicated to patients isolated at home following a positive Covid-19 test.

According to a press release sent to AGERPRES on Monday, the application comes to the aid of patients affected by both the disease and the isolation itself, with concrete solutions, with direct access to optimal medical services and with the right treatment. Help Net patients can benefit from the help of a team of specialist physicians, who will respond to all their requests.

"We have joined the Help Net team, caring for patients and their welfare being at heart of our concerns. With the help of the HelpLine app, medics take over patients infected with SARS-CoV-2, giving them the opportunity to receive specialized help, appropriate treatment and direct monitoring, throughout the entire isolation period. We will be in constant contact with our patients and provide them with tailored medical services It is the right time to remember that each of us has an important role to play in keeping ourselves and others healthy," said Claudiu Ruscu, ICU medic, part of the partner medical team.

Thus, through HelpLine, any patient confirmed with Covid-19, who adheres to the Regulation of the "Covid-19 Support" Campaign, can communicate directly and at no charge with specialists, who will provide consultation, monitoring and support during the 14-day isolation. Following the medical recommendations received, patients can benefit from immediate treatment, which they can purchase from Help Net Pharmacies, with same-day delivery.

After registration in the application and enrollment in the programme according to the Regulation, the patient enters a preliminary medical screening process, through which he or she is classified in the appropriate medical category, depending on his/her medical history, being then taken over by a specialist. The medic will perform the consultation online, prescribe the appropriate treatment and will remain in direct contact with the patient. For the constant monitoring of the patient's health, a communication channel established by mutual agreement will be used via e-mail, telephone or through online messaging applications (Whatsapp, etc.).

"We had colleagues, relatives, acquaintances around us who faced this disease and the isolation that comes with it and we understood how important it is to have the support and help to get through this difficult period more easily. We launched this dedicated community service to ensure that our patients receive the attention and medical care they need, even during the isolation caused by SARS CoV 2 infection, when they are unable to get to a physician or to a pharmacy. The HelpLine App is and our response and way to be as close as possible to patients, to offer them premium products and services," said Sebastian Ring, managing director of Help Net.

The HelpLine application is available in Google Play, but also on www.helpnet.ro, where it can be accessed directly from the computer.

Founded in 1998, Help Net Farma operates one of the largest pharmaceutical chains in Romania. Help Net pharmacies are in the top 3 pharmaceutical chains in Romania, with over 400 units opened nationwide and a turnover of 209 million euros in 2020. The company has approximately 2,500 employees who provide services for over 3.7 millions of patients.

Since July 2018, Help Net, alongside drug distributor Farmexim, is part of the German concern Phoenix group, European leader in health services.
We have said this before, and we will say it again - Karan Johar has an expensive taste, and sure knows how to enjoy the finer things in life.



 Instagram/karanjohar

Time and time again, he has shown us that when it comes to fashion and style, luxury brands and A-Level designers are the only things that matters to him. And of course, just how dapper he looks.



 Viral Bhayani

Well, Karan gave us yet another example of why we consider him to be a connoisseur of sorts when it comes to luxury fashion brands.



 Viral Bhayani

Karan Johar was spotted at the Mumbai Airport decked out from head to toe in some of the choicest brands anyone can think of. However, it was the dope looking childrens school bag that he was carrying that caught our eye.



 Viral Bhayani

First, lets take a look at his outfit.



Karan Johar is seen here wearing a rather dope looking sweatshirt from Philipp Plein. Designed by the German designer, the sweatshirt retails for about $1,560 or roughly Rs 1.12 Lakhs.

 Viral Bhayani

Then there are those dope looking sneakers that look like they are straight out of Star Trek. Karans wearing the Track.2 Sneakers In Silver Grey from Balenciaga.



 Hypebeast

The Track.2 sneakers are a favourite among sneakerheads thanks to their rather unique design and broken panels, which gives its silhouette a dope aesthetic. The ones that Karan is wearing retails for about $975 or roughly Rs 71,000, before taxes and customs.



 Balenciaga

The main highlight, or the statement piece of Karans outfit, though, has to be the backpack that hes carrying. Here, we see the Soft Trunk Backpack from Louis Vuittons Spring-Summer 2021 collection.



 Viral Bhayani

Also called the Friends On Zoom collection, some of the components from this collection have zany looking cartoons, all designed by streetwear maestro, Virgil Abloh.



 Louis Vuitton

The bag is made of white leather, which has been treated in the quintessential Louis Vuitton manner. It is embossed with the LV monogram and has matching chains and zippers. The colourful cartoons stand out distinctly against the white backdrop.



 Louis Vuitton

A bag this exquisite will obviously be expensive. The bag normally retails for $4,950 or Rs 3.6 Lakhs. Add to that your customs and import taxes and youre looking at a price tag of Rs 5.3 Lakhs easily.



 Viral Bhayani

As expensive it is, the bag surely looks dope. But then again, given Karans taste and his sense of fashion, is it any surprise?


BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - Greece's consumer prices continued to decline in January, data from the Hellenic Statistical Authority showed on Monday. The consumer price index fell 2.0 percent year-on-year in January, following a 2.3 percent decline in November. Prices for transportation declined 5.7 percent annually in January. Prices of housing decreased 3.4 percent and clothing and footwear cost fell 3.5 percent. Prices household equipment and miscellaneous goods and services grew by 2.2 percent and 2.4 percent, respectively. On a monthly basis, consumer prices fell 1.3 percent in January, after a 0.4 percent growth in the prior month. The EU measure of harmonized index of consumer prices, or HICP, fell 2.4 percent annually in January, same as seen in the preceding month. On a monthly basis, the HICP declined 1.3 percent in January, after a 0.2 percent increase in the prior month. 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.
BEIJING (dpa-AFX) - Japan will on Monday release preliminary Q4 numbers for gross domestic product, setting the pace for a busy day in Asia-Pacific economic activity. GDP is expected to rise 2.3 percent on quarter and 9.5 percent on year after jumping 5.3 percent on quarter and 22.9 percent on year in the three months prior. Japan also will see final December figures for industrial production; the previous reading suggested a decline of 0.5 percent on month and 3.9 percent on year. Indonesia will release January data for imports, exports and trade balance. Imports are expected to sink 2.77 percent on year after easing 0.47 percent in December. Exports are called higher by an annual 13.59 percent after gaining 14.63 percent in the previous month. The trade surplus is pegged at $1.68 billion, down from $2.1 billion a month earlier. Thailand will provide Q4 numbers for gross domestic product, with forecasts suggesting an increase of 0.8 percent on quarter and a decline of 5.4 percent on year. That follows the 6.5 percent quarterly increase and the 6.4 percent yearly drop in Q3. New Zealand will see January results for the Performance of Service Index from BusinessNZ; in December, the index score was 49.2. Finally, the markets in Taiwan, China and Hong Kong remain closed for the Lunar New Year. 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.
Mumbai: Actor Sandeep Nahar, who was seen alongside late Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput in 'MS Dhoni: The Untold Story' and with Akshay Kumar in 'Kesari', has allegedly died by suicide on Monday (February 15, 2021).

The actor before his suicide had posted a long post along with a video on his Facebook page, in which he is talking about dying by suicide. Sandeep was reportedly found hanging at his residence in Mumbai's Goregaon West. He was taken to a hospital, where he was declared brought dead.

Actor Sandeep Nahar dies allegedly by suicide at his residence in Mumbai's Goregaon area. Case lodged, matter being probed," ANI news agency quoted Mumbai Police as saying.

Actor Sandeep Nahar dies allegedly by suicide at his residence in Mumbai's Goregaon area. Case lodged, matter being probed: Mumbai Police  ANI (@ANI) February 15, 2021

This is to be noted that earlier in 2020, Sandeep Nahar's 'MS Dhoni: The Untold Story' co-star Sushant Singh Rajput had also died by suicide at his residence in Mumbai.

(This is a developing story. Please check back for updates)

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Britain's Prince Harry and Meghan, Duke and Duchess of Sussex, are expecting their second child. A spokesperson for the couple confirmed the news on February 14: "We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child." (Image: Instagram)
Arkansas can't force businesses that contract with the state to not boycott Israel: court

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An appeals court has ruled against an Arkansas law passed in 2017 that prohibits the state from contracting with or investing in businesses that support boycotting Israel.

A three judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ruled 2-1 last Friday against the Arkansas Act 710 of 2017, reversing a lower court decision.

The case was centered on the University of Arkansas Board of Trustees' refusal to renew the advertising contract of the Arkansas Times when the paper would not agree to never officially boycott Israel.

Circuit Judge Jane Kelly authored the majority opinion, in which she argued that the Act imposes a condition on government contractors that implicates their First Amendment rights.

Supporting or promoting boycotts of Israel is constitutionally protected, wrote Kelly, yet the Act requires government contractors to abstain from such constitutionally protected activity.

 the Act prohibits the contractor from engaging in boycott activity outside the scope of the contractual relationship on its own time and dime  Such a restriction violates the First Amendment.

Circuit Judge Jonathan Kobes dissented, arguing that the Act was meant to reduce the companys business interactions with Israel in a discriminatory way and for any ambiguous parts of the law, it could be given a constitutionally-permissible interpretation.

 states have a broad mandate to enact legislation evincing the policy choices of their citizens. We may only hold states back in achieving those goals when they do so by unconstitutional means, continued Kobes.

Nothing in the text of the operative provision itself suggests overreach (regulation of protected speech) by the Arkansas Legislature, and we should not impute an unconstitutional meaning to a statute that is benign on its face.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas, which helped to represent the Arkansas Times, celebrated the appeals court panel decision as a win for freedom of speech.

Its a good day for the freedom of speech in Arkansas, said Holly Dickson, ACLU of Arkansas executive director, in a statement last Friday.

Arkansas politicians had no business penalizing our clients for refusing to participate in this ideological litmus test. Free speech isnt a privilege you pay for, its a right guaranteed to every Arkansan.

As of 2019, according to Human Rights Watch, 27 states have passed laws that prohibit entities from doing business with the government if they refuse to reject the pro-Palestinian Boycott Divestment Sanctions movement against Israel.

Proponents of the state laws argue that the BDS movement is inherently anti-Semitic, with the United States Senate passing a bill supporting such measures in 2019.
IMA announces 'non-cooperation, asks surgeons not to train Ayush practioners

Intensifying their protest against the Centre's order to train post-graduate practitioners in specified streams of ayurveda in general surgical procedures, the Indian Medical Association (IMA) has called for a non-cooperation movement, asking the surgeons and anesthesiologists to not cooperate in training the Ayush doctors.

The apex association of modern medicine practitioners also said that it will submit a list to the Union government of 1,000 modern medicine doctors to willing to serve in any remote areas of the country. "This is done to counter the false claim of lack of doctors which is cited as a reason to promote mixopathy," IMA President Dr J.A. Jayalal said.

The IMA had started a pan-India relay hunger strike from February 1 which concluded on Sunday. "It was our first step towards 'Save Healthcare India Movement' which was initiated this month. We are going to intensify it further with a next stage of non-cooperation," Dr Jayalal added.

The whole exercise by the IMA is to push for immediate withdrawal of the Centre's order which, the association claims, is impractical, unscientific and promotes "mixopathy" of different streams of medicine.

Last year, the Central Council of Indian Medicine (CCIM) amended the Indian Medicine Central Council (Post Graduate Ayurveda Education) Regulations, 2016, to allow PG students of ayurveda to perform a variety of general surgery including orthopaedic, ophthalmology, ENT and dental through notifying an amendment in a gazette notification issued in November.

The latest amendment allows PG ayurveda students to receive formal training for such procedures. The training modules for surgical procedures will be added to the curriculum of ayurvedic studies.

This move has drawn a lot of criticism from the doctors of modern medicine which also result in a series of protests the country witnessed last December, called by the IMA.

"We have categorically expressed our righteous say against this extremely serious move to allow Aayush postgraduates to perform 58 surgeries. The government policy of mixopathy of all systems is unethical in which the mutually unrelated in principles & mode of operandi are integrated unscientifically together as a one system. IMA opposes strongly the proposal to make single doctor practicing all systems together. The association has raised valid & simple questions arising out of this Mixopathy notification," the IMA stated.

Disclaimer: Information, facts or opinions expressed in this news article are presented as sourced from IANS and do not reflect views of Moneylife and hence Moneylife is not responsible or liable for the same. As a source and news provider, IANS is responsible for accuracy, completeness, suitability and validity of any information in this article.
Many feel theyre paying the price not of the pandemic, but of the measures taken against the pandemic, said Dr Nicolas Franck, the head of a psychiatric network in Lyon, France. In a survey of 30,000 people that he conducted last spring, young people ranked the lowest in psychological wellbeing, he said. A lone student at the Sarbonne in Paris. Credit:Andrea Mantovani/The New York Times In Italy and in the Netherlands, some youth psychiatry wards have filled to record capacity. In France, where the pandemics toll on mental health has made headlines, professionals have urged authorities to consider reopening schools to fight loneliness. And in Britain, some therapists said that they had counselled patients to break lockdown guidelines to cope. In the United States, a quarter of 18- to 24-year-olds said they had seriously considered suicide, one report said. In Latin America and the Caribbean, a survey conducted by UNICEF of 8000 young people found that more than a quarter had experienced anxiety and 15 per cent depression.

And a study conducted last year by the International Labor Organisation in 112 countries found that two-thirds of 18- to 29-year-olds could be subject to anxiety and depression. Loading The lasting effects on suicide rates, depression and anxiety are still being measured, but in interviews, a dozen mental health experts in Europe painted a grim picture of a crisis that they say should be treated as seriously as containing the virus. We are in the midst of a mental health pandemic, and I dont think its treated with near enough respect, said Arkadius Kyllendahl, a psychotherapist in London who has seen the number of younger clients double in recent months. A sense of limbo

Many European countries went into northern autumn with the illusion that they had curbed virus outbreaks, only to face an even larger wave of infections this winter. That led to mistaken expectations, young people said, that harsh restrictions would soon end. Lockdowns have offered some a respite from the stresses of school or work, which have made them more resilient, psychologists say. But for others, especially those who already struggled with mental health conditions or limited access to care, their fragility has been exacerbated. Skaters ride on the first day of the coronavirus pandemic lockdown in Barcelona in March 2020. Credit:New York Times Not being in control of something like this is anxiety inducing, said Dalia Al-Dujaili, 21, a student at the University of Edinburgh. As the pandemic has dragged on, so has the sense of limbo, she said, and she tried online therapy for the first time last year.

What am I doing? Why am I getting a degree, if theres not going to be any jobs? she asked. One blessing, she said, is that younger people are more open to discussing their struggles. Everybody talks about their therapists and their meds, she noted. Trafalgar Square in London. With the pandemic lockdowns set to drag on, mental health professionals are growing increasingly alarmed about the deteriorating mental state of young people. Credit:Andrew Testa/The New York Times That has not stopped some from feeling guilty, though, given that the pandemic has affected everyone.

There are people with bigger struggles: people who have lost their jobs, or a relative to the disease, said Marcelo Andreguetti, a Brazilian graphic designer who studies in Cologne, Germany. He said he began taking antidepressants after he was told he had depression and obsessive compulsive disorder this year. Loneliness brings them into despair Winter has worsened the situation, according to therapists and psychiatrists, who say they have seen young people manifesting more severe symptoms of anxiety, depression, eating disorders and addictions. In the Netherlands, Dr Robert Vermeiren, a professor of child psychiatry at Leiden University Medical Centre, said the acute ward he manages has been full for weeks  something he had never experienced.

The situation was so serious, he said, that his team did not send children home for Christmas, as it usually would. Isolation has also disrupted the usual teenage transition, when young people move from belonging to their family to belonging to their peers, Vermeiren added. Loading They feel empty, lonely, and that loneliness brings them into despair, he said. In Italy, calls doubled last year to the main hotline for young people who have considered or attempted harming themselves. Beds in a child neuropsychiatry unit at the Bambino Gesu Childrens Hospital in Rome have been full since October, said Dr Stefano Vicari, director of the unit. Hospitalisations of young Italians who harmed themselves or attempted suicide have increased 30 per cent in the second wave of cases, he added.

To those who say that, after all, these are challenges young people have to go through, that they will come out stronger, this is only true for some, those who have more resources, Vicari said. Catherine Seymour, head of research at the Mental Health Foundation, a Britain-based charity, said that young people living in poorer households were more likely to experience anxiety and depression, according to a study conducted among nearly 2400 teenagers. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video It may be that those in poorer households are more likely to lack enough space and internet access to help with schoolwork and communication with their friends, Seymour said. They may also be affected by their parents financial worries and stress. Studies from the first lockdowns suggest that they may have already left an indelible mark.

In France, a survey of nearly 70,000 students found that 10 per cent had experienced suicidal thoughts during the first months of the pandemic, and more than a quarter had suffered from depression. In Spain, one of the worlds toughest lockdowns last spring had a profound impact, especially for young girls, who were more likely to experience stress, anxiety and depression, according to a survey of 523 people by the University of Valencia. Konstanze Schoeps, one of the studys authors, said, They were developing their own freedom and space, and during lockdown they lost what they had just started to experience. It amounted to a process of grieving, she added. A search for remedies

The situation has become so dire that students and mental health advocates have asked authorities to moderate some measures, including by reopening schools and universities, even as officials worry that a premature easing of regulations will worsen the spread of new variants. Loading Building social relationships is at the centre of our lives, and that is gone, said Heidi Soupault, 19, who urged President Emmanuel Macron of France to reopen universities in an open letter that spread quickly on the internet last month. Starting this month, students in France can return to universities one day a week. They can also get three free therapy sessions. In Britain, where mental health organisations and experts have urged the government to divert funding to help address the issue in schools, officials have said that they will consider mental health support as part of plans to lift restrictions. In the Netherlands, the central government has pressed regional authorities to invest more in youth mental health.

Dr Silvia Schneider, a child and adolescent psychologist in Bochum, Germany, said that governments should share clear messages on television and social media. Loading We need to give very easy accessible information on how to handle the feeling that they are not alone with these challenges, Schneider said about young people. And that there are some things that can help them. To combat symptoms of anxiety and depression, some therapists, like Kyllendahl in London, are telling their clients to go outside as much possible  even if it involves breaking restrictions. Still, some young people see a silver lining.
A party has been refused permission to organize protests against government policies, writes North Press.

The Syrian government has refused to grant a Syrian political party permission to organize protests against government policies.

The rejection came in a letter from the Ministry of Local Administration and Environment in Damascus governorate, denying the request of the Youth Party for Building and Change to organize a protest against government policies.

The party announced its request at the end of last January, setting Saturday, February 13 as the date for the demonstrations in several Syrian cities.

The protests were to take place in front of the Prime Ministry building in Damascus, and in Saadallah al-Jabiri Square in Aleppo.

It also was to include stops in front of the governorate building in Tartus, near al-Ziraa roundabout in Latakia, and in front of the district directorate building in Qamishli.

Perwin Ibrahim, head of the political bureau of the Youth Party for Building and Change, said via a live broadcast on her Facebook page that they were not informed of the refusal until nine days after the party requested a protest at the Ministry of Interior in Damascus.

She added, It was planned to organize a peaceful protest against the government that does not meet the requirements of the population in light of the conditions from which they suffer.

The partys secretariat attached the request to a list of slogans to be raised at those demonstrations, including: Syrians deserve a better government; the government has brought the people to the brink of the abyss. Enough with the crisis, you are our real crisis.

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.
New York now has its first case of the coronavirus variant that emerged in South Africa, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced on Monday.

That makes New York the ninth state to announce a case of the more infectious, potentially vaccine-weakening variant. At least 17 cases of the worrisome variant have been reported across the US.

However the New York patient is someone who was transferred into a New York City hospital from Connecticut.

So far, there are no signs that the variant has spread to anyone else, Cuomo said.

Nonetheless, he noted that the variant, known as B1351, is the one health officials like Dr Anthony Fauci are most concerned about, because it may weaken the effects of vaccines.

So far, it appears that both Moderna's and Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccines will still prevent severe illness and death from even COVID-19 caused by the South African variant, but they do make the shots less potent.

The makers of COVID-19 vaccines are figuring out how to tweak their recipes against worrisome virus mutations - and regulators are looking to flu as a blueprint if and when the shots need an update.

Governor Andrew Cuomo on Monday announced the first case of the South African coronavirus variant in New York state, but said there are no signs it spread to anyone else

There are at least eight variants spreading in the US, including the South African B3151 variant (purple) which i now in at least nine states

SCIENTISTS DISCOVER 7 HOMEGROWN VARIANTS IN THE US AMID FEARS THEY WILL BE MORE INFECTIOUS Scientists have discovered another seven homegrown coronavirus variants that emerged across the US, and are concerned over identical mutations seen in the 'spike' protein that could make them more infectious. It's not yet clear whether these variants are in fact more contagious, or how common they are across the US as a whole, according to a pre-print posted to MedRxiv ahead of peer review on Sunday. But because the variants all share a set of mutations to the critical spike protein, the odds are that these changes to their genetics give the virus some evolutionary advantage that could make it harder to stop. Variants with a mutation known as Q677 have emerged in numerous states in the South and Southwest, with the highest concentrations in New Mexico and Louisiana 'We have lots of reasons that this region might be important but we don't yet have the evidence,' study co-author Dr Vaughn Cooper told DailyMail.com. 'As an evolutionary biologist, this sort of coincidence - parallel evolution of and independent origin of different lineages with the same mutation - is very strong evidence of it being adaptive and a virus adapting to humans usually does not bode well,' said Dr Cooper, director of the University of Pittsburgh's center for evolutionary biology and medicine. That said, the scientists say it is not likely that the variants will be able to evade or weaken the potency of vaccines, because their shared mutation is in a location that has little to do with the ability of antibodies to bind to and neutralize the virus. 'Vaccines are going to work just fine against these viruses,' Dr Jeffrey Kamil, study co-author and Louisiana State University immunologist, told DailyMail.com. Variants with a mutation known as Q677 have emerged in numerous states in the South and Southwest, with the highest concentrations in New Mexico and Louisiana The mutation seen in the seven variants is known by its location, Q677, which describes a part of the virus's genome that encodes the structure of the 'spike' protein on its surface. The Q677 mutation was first spotted through genome sequencing of viral samples on October 23 in the US. For months, it remained out of sight and did not recur significantly in other samples. But something strange happened in two states, around the same time and nearly 1,000 miles away. Suddenly, between December 1, 2020 and January 19, 2021, there was a sharp rise in the number of virus samples with the mutation. By mid-January, Q677 accounted for nearly 28 percent of virus samples sequenced in Louisiana and more than 11 percent of those sequenced in New Mexico. As of February 3, the mutation had been spotted in 2,327 out of the 102,462 US samples submitted to the GISAID database. In other words, in a matter of a few months, a one-off variant rose to account for about two percent of the cases that scientists have scanned in search for variants. Although most of these were found in New Mexico and Louisiana, the mutation has emerged independently in at least seven locations in total. Advertisement

New York also has at least 59 cases of the 70 percent more infectious B117 variant that emerged in the UK.

That variant is not thought to significantly affect the efficacy of the virus, but the CDC has warned the more infectious form could become dominant in the US by next month.

And collaborating scientists from Louisiana, New Mexico, New York and Pennsylvania discovered seven new homegrown variants with virtually identical mutations to one another that have emerged in the US.

It is not yet clear how the mutation in these new variants - found in the spike protein, the same part of the virus that is mutated in the South African and UK variants - will affect them.

But scientists are concerned they might make the virus more infectious. It seems less likely they will be able to escape vaccines.

Regardless, the emergence of variants around the world makes it increasingly likely that vaccine makers will have to make updates to their shots, potentially on a rolling basis, like the flu shots that are designed each year.

Flu vaccines may offer a blueprint, but the process isn't simple.

'It's not really something you can sort of flip a switch, do overnight,' cautioned Richard Webby, who directs a World Health Organization flu center from St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital.

Viruses mutate constantly and it takes just the right combination of particular mutations to escape vaccination.

But studies are raising concern that first-generation COVID-19 vaccines don't work as well against the mutant that first emerged in South Africa as they do against other versions circulating around the world.

The good news: Many of the new COVID-19 vaccines are made with new, flexible technology that's easy to upgrade. What's harder: Deciding if the virus has mutated enough that it's time to modify vaccines - and what changes to make.

'When do you pull the trigger?' asked Norman Baylor, a former Food and Drug Administration vaccine chief. 'This is a moving target right now.'

FLU OFFERS A MODEL FOR HOW TO MAKE ANNUAL ADJUSTMENTS TO KEEP UP WITH MUTATING VIRUSES

The WHO and FDA are looking to the global flu vaccine system in deciding how to handle similar decisions about COVID-19 shots.

Influenza mutates much faster than the coronavirus, and flu shots have to be adjusted just about every year.

National centers around the globe collect circulating flu viruses and track how they're evolving.

They send samples to WHO-designated labs for more sophisticated 'antigenic' testing to determine vaccine strength. The WHO and regulators then agree on the year's vaccine recipe and manufacturers get to work.

For COVID-19 vaccines, Webby said a critical step is establishing a similar surveillance and testing network to flag the mutations that matter.

Today, there's wide geographic variability in tracking and testing mutated versions. For example, Britain does more testing of the changing viral genome than the US.

Three variants first discovered in Britain, South Africa and Brazil are worrisome because of combinations of mutations that make them more contagious.

HOW COVID-19 SHOTS ARE HOLDING UP: VARIANTS APPEAR TO DIMINISH BUT NOT RUIN VACCINE EFFICACY

Just because a variant is more contagious doesn't mean it also will be impervious to vaccination.

But the variant first identified in South Africa is raising concerns.

Columbia University's David Ho put blood samples from people given the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines into lab dishes with the mutated virus. Vaccine-produced antibodies still protected, but they were much less potent.

Preliminary test results of two other vaccine candidates - from Novavax and Johnson & Johnson - soon backed up those findings. Both still protected but were weaker when tested in South Africa, where that variant dominates, than when tested elsewhere. A far smaller test of the AstraZeneca vaccine in South Africa has raised questions about its effect.

'If the virus were able to make an additional mutation or two, it could escape even more,' Ho warned.

THE REAL RED FLAG: SCIENTISTS ARE WAITING TO SEE IF VACCINATED PATIENTS WILL GET SICK ENOUGH TO BE HOSPITALIZED FROM VARIANTS

If fully immunized people start getting hospitalized with mutated virus, 'that's when the line gets crossed,' said Dr Paul Offit, a Children's Hospital of Philadelphia vaccine expert who advises the FDA.

Millions of Americans have been vaccinated against COVID-19, but if variants continue to emerge and get better at escaping the shots, updated boosters may be needed

That hasn't happened yet, but 'we should get ready,' he added.

Moderna is about to explore one option: Could a third dose of the original vaccine boost immunity enough to fend off some variants even if it's not an exact match?

Columbia's Ho said it's a good idea to test because people may 'still have plenty of cushion' if their overall antibody levels are very high.

SHOT-MAKERS ARE ALREADY WORKING TO ADJUST THE VACCINE RECIPES

Major manufacturers also are developing experimental variant vaccines, just in case.

COVID-19 vaccines produce antibodies that recognize the spike protein that coats the coronavirus. When the virus mutates, sometimes the spike protein is changed in key areas so the vaccine-produced antibodies have a harder time recognizing it.

The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are made with a piece of genetic code called messenger RNA that tells the body how to make some harmless copies of the spike protein that train immune cells. To update the vaccine, they can simply change the payload: swap out the original genetic code with mRNA for the mutated spike protein.

The AstraZeneca vaccine and the Johnson & Johnson shot expected to roll out soon are made with cold viruses engineered to sneak a spike protein gene into the body.

Adjusting their vaccines requires growing cold viruses with the mutated gene, a little more complex than the mRNA approach but not nearly as laborious as reformulating old-fashioned flu shots.

The Novavax vaccine also in final-stage testing is made with a lab-grown copy of the spike protein that also could be tweaked to match mutations.

TESTING VACCINES 2.0 WILL LIKELY GO MUCH FASTER BECAUSE THE BASIC FORMULA WILL BE UNCHANGED

First-generation COVID-19 vaccines were tested in tens of thousands of people to be sure they work and are safe - research that took many months.

Simply changing the recipe to better target virus mutations won't require repeating those studies in thousands of people, Dr Peter Marks, the FDAs vaccine chief, recently told the American Medical Association.

FDA still is finalizing requirements, but Marks said the agency intends to 'be pretty nimble.'

If an updated vaccine is needed, tests in a few hundred people likely would be enough to tell if it triggers a good immune response, he said.

But an even bigger question: If only some places face vaccine-resistant virus mutants, would authorities want variant-only shots or vaccines that protect against two kinds in one jab?

After all, flu vaccines protect against three or four different types in one shot.

Companies would first have to perform some basic research to be sure a variant-only version properly revs up the immune system, said the Immunization Action Coalition's John Grabenstein, a former Merck vaccine executive.

Then a combination shot would need more testing to be sure there's an equal response to both types.
Rape victims will be asked if they want to give evidence in closed courts in a drive to improve the shockingly low conviction rate.

It would see public galleries cleared to support complainants when they have to reveal intimate details of their ordeals from the witness box.

Judges have long had the power to close public galleries during sex attack trials to protect victims and ensure justice is done, but it rarely happens in England and Wales.

Now prosecutors and police say they will ask more victims if they want to use the measure as concern grows at how few rape allegations lead to charges or trials.

Judges have long had the power to close public galleries during sex attack trials to protect victims and ensure justice is done, but it rarely happens in England and Wales

Last night Victims' Commissioner Dame Vera Baird said: 'The power to close the public gallery during the complainants' evidence session has been available to judges since 1999  along with other special measures  but this power is rarely exercised. This needs to change.

'If victims are to feel they can give their best evidence, this power needs to be fully and frequently in use and victims need to feel protected. Giving evidence as a victim of crime can be a daunting and distressing experience.

'This is especially true for victims of serious crimes like rape and stalking, where intimate and upsetting events need to be recalled. Victims often worry that someone in the gallery may recognise them and render their anonymity meaningless, or there may be a fear of being watched by the defendant's family and feeling intimidated as a result.'

Now prosecutors and police say they will ask more victims if they want to use the measure as concern grows at how few rape allegations lead to charges or trials. Pictured: Newcastle Crown Court

Last year 55,130 rapes were recorded by police in England and Wales but there were just 2,102 prosecutions and 1,439 convictions  a record low. And as the Mail revealed last week, record numbers of witnesses and victims are dropping out of court cases because of Covid delays. The results of a government 'end-to-end review' of rape cases will be published in months.

Meanwhile, judgment is awaited in a legal challenge to the Crown Prosecution Service's rape prosecution policy, which campaigners claim led to 'weaker' cases being unlawfully dropped.

Director of Public Prosecutions Max Hill, QC, believes more courtroom privacy would help complainants give better evidence, although senior judges have expressed concerns it would lead to claims of secret trials.

Last year 55,130 rapes were recorded by police in England and Wales but there were just 2,102 prosecutions and 1,439 convictions  a record low. Pictured: Blackfriars Crown Court

A CPS spokesman said: 'We are raising awareness of available measures with our specially trained prosecutors, including the use of the clearance of the public gallery measure, and will continue to work across the justice system to ensure every victim receives the support they need.' Judges can clear public galleries during sexual offence trials under the 1999 law, with only the defendant, lawyers and one journalist allowed to stay in court.

But a report for the Victims' Commissioner last year found that the power 'appears to be very scarcely used in England and Wales'.

Some lawyers, however, have concerns about rape trials being partly held behind closed doors.

James Mulholland QC, chairman of the Criminal Bar Association, said it was better for witnesses to have their cross-examination recorded before trial.

He added: 'A system has been rolled out nationally ... which allows the evidence of children and vulnerable witnesses to be video-recorded before the trial and represents one of the greatest changes to the court process in a generation. This helps maintain open justice whilst guarding against the very real risk of complainants walking away from cases before they reach trial.'

The Centre for Women's Justice, involved in the judicial review against the CPS, said: 'Many survivors find giving live evidence to be deeply traumatic, so measures to mitigate this are welcomed.

'However, survivors usually chose video-link because they do not wish to be in the room with their assailant and clearing the gallery would not deal with that.'
Saxton's Rape, Assault Trial Begins May 25

By West Kentucky Star Staff

Thirty-nine-year-old Hasan Saxton's jury trial is set for May 25, and is scheduled to last for three days. A review of the case is set for May 3.





Saxton was arrested last July after Mayfield police responded to a domestic assault call. An investigation showed that Saxton had allegedly physically and sexually assaulted a woman.

Officers said Saxton also tried to hide a bag of marijuana under the seat of a police cruiser while detained.

Saxton was charged with first degree rape-domestic violence, first degree strangulation, fourth degree assault-domestic violence minor injury, third degree criminal mischief, tampering with physical evidence, possession of marijuana, and possession of drug paraphernalia.

MAYFIELD - A Mayfield man arrested last summer on rape, drug, and other charges will go to trial in May.
Icy conditions caused dozens of crashes in the Houston area Sunday, including a 10-car pileup reported on Interstate 45 south of downtown Houston, and emergency officials pleaded with residents to stay off roads that are expected to become increasingly treacherous Monday.

Harris County Sheriff's Office deputies responded to more than 100 weather-related traffic incidents over the last 24 hours, Sheriff Ed Gonzales said in a tweet Monday morning. The dispatches included 11 major crashes, 52 minor crashes and 40 reports of icy roads, he said.

As of 8:23 p.m. Sunday, Houston police officers were working 60 traffic crashes throughout the city, Chief Art Acevedo said.

"Please get off and stay off the roadways," Acevedo said in a tweet. "Crashes are already starting to drop, and they are all weather related. Slow down, get home, and please stay off the roads. The next 48 hours will be very challenging."

Several major roadways had reports of ice in the Houston area, including West Sam Houston Tollway southbound at Interstate 10 and South Loop 610 eastbound at Highway 288, according to Houston Transtar. Also, the ramp at FM1960 and the Hardy Toll Road is reportedly iced over. View more traffic updates on the Transtar map.

Freezing rain, sleet and snow continued to pour over the Houston area overnight and temperatures are not forecast to get above freezing Monday, according to the National Weather Service. More than 700 flights have been canceled at Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport due to the wintry conditions.

Both Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo and Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner have signed their own disaster declarations.

North of Houston, Montgomery County officials were also warning drivers to stay off the roadways.

By 10 p.m. Sunday the icy conditions closed all lanes on the San Jacinto River bridge on Texas 242. The Interstate 45 and Texas 242 was also closed and barricaded by the officials, according to the Montgomery County Sheriffs Office. The reports of closures stretched from Willis and Montgomery to The Woodlands and Magnolia.

Nicole Hensley and Meagan Ellsworth contributed to this report.
MOSCOW, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Moscow Cargo LLC has been issued the RA3 certificate by the German National Civil Aviation Administration (Luftfahrt-Bundesamt), which inspects and certifies airports and airlines on behalf of the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).

The RA3 certificate (Regulated Agent Third Country) confirms that the terminal of Moscow Cargo LLC fully complies with all aviation security requirements established by the European Union for cargo and mail destined for or traveling through the EU countries from the territory of non-EU countries (Implementing Regulation (EU ) 2015/1998).

Moscow Cargo's registration number is RU / RA3 / 00005-01.

The Luftfahrt-Bundesamt auditors paid special attention to the implementation of a security program by Moscow Cargo that includes measures to protect the cargo and preserve its integrity throughout the entire logistics cycle before the transfer to the airline. All cargo-handling operations from the moment of acceptance for transportation until the moment of delivery on board the aircraft take place in the controlled area of the airport (KZA), where unauthorized access to the cargo is prohibited during ground handling.

Moscow Cargo is the largest cargo operator in the Russian Federation with RA3 certification. The current certificate is valid until December 29, 2023, and allows new partner airlines of Sheremetyevo Airport to undergo simplified certification and receive the ACC3 status (Air Cargo or Mail Carrier operating into the Union from a Third Country Airport), which is required for the shipment of goods and mail to EU countries.

The Registered Agent Regime (along with the Known Consignor Regime) was originally introduced by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and its member states to support the implementation of the Air Cargo Secured Supply Chain (ICAO) concept.

The concept was developed after explosives were found in two parcels sent to the United States from Yemen by courier services UPS and FedEx on October 29, 2010, and the practice soon became widespread. Since July 1, 2014, the European Union has required that all air transport of goods and mail destined for or traveling through the EU countries from countries outside the EU be by carriers that have confirmed ACC3 status. This is in accordance with the EU-approved procedure for ensuring a secure chain of deliveries from third countries (Third Country EU Validated Secure Supply Chain).

Moscow Cargo LLC is a modern high-tech cargo aviation terminal and the main handling operator of Sheremetyevo International Airport, which serves 68% of the airport's cargo and postal turnover.

Today, the Moscow Cargo terminal has a total area of 42,300 m and is designed to handle 380,000 tons of cargo per year. It is the largest cargo terminal in Russia, the CIS and Eastern Europe and has no analogues in Russia in terms of technical equipment. High-tech equipment and production facilities for processing special goods allow Moscow Cargo LLC to effectively serve all types of cargo without restrictions.

All the latest industry requirements for the maintenance of temperature-controlled pharmaceutical products were included in the design and construction of the Moscow Cargo terminal. The terminal has a spacious cool zone with 26 chambers with an autonomously adjustable temperature regime in the range from -20 to +25 . The terminal also is equipped with 60 cells maintaining a temperature of +2 to +8 C for storing assembled pallets with temperature-sensitive goods. The terminal storage area can simultaneously accommodate up to 30 active containers, the maintenance of which is carried out by specially trained personnel. A wide range of additional services of the terminal includes adding dry ice to the transport packaging at the request of the customer.

Sheremetyevo Airport is among the TOP-5 airport hubs in Europe, the largest Russian airport in terms of passenger and cargo traffic. In 2020, the airport served 19 million 784 thousand passengers.

Sheremetyevo is the best airport in terms of quality of services in Europe, the absolute world leader in punctuality of flights, the recipient of the highest 5-star Skytrax rating.

You can find additional information at http://www.svo.aero.

Public Relations Department

Sheremetyevo International Airport

Tel. (495) 578-85-85, (495) 578-20-73

[email protected]

www.svo.aero

SOURCE Sheremetyevo International Airport

Related Links

http://www.svo.aero





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The Indian four-wheeler industry is abuzz with new brand launches for the past 18 months or so. First came the SAIC owned 100-year old MG Motor with a mid-premium SUV Hector. Then came the South Korean automaker Kia Motors with a mid-SUV called Seltos. Both of the brands brought something new to the table and instantly became a household name in India, revealing how stagnate our market had became.

Then came COVID-19 and market slumped. Citroen, the French carmaker, who revealed their India plans in April 2019 had to defer their plans. However, as soon as the market became normal, Citroen announced the launch of C5 Aircross, their debut product for the country. We recently got a chance to test drive the Citroen C5 Aircross and have brought you our first drive review.

Before we go ahead to explain what's this new car all about, here's a quick brand understanding since it's a completely new brand in India -

- Citroen is a 101-year old French brand named after its founder Andre Citroen

- Citroen C5 Aircross will be assembled at the brand's facility in Tamil Nadu

- The logo of Citroen are dual upward facing arrows inspired from a gear design

- And lastly and most importantly, the brand is pronounced as See-Tro-en, Citroen.

Citroen C5 Aircross side profile. (Photo: Arjit Garg/News18.com)

Design

The first thing you notice as soon as you look at the Citroen C5 Aircross is how premium it looks. It has a road presence without being too flashy or too bulky. You get a large connected chrome grille upfront that neatly integrates with the LED DRLs and the Citroen's catchy logo. Elements like sculpted hood, large air intakes done with brushed silver touch, and multi layered grille gives it a very unique road presence. At the side are 18-inch two tone diamond cut alloys, interesting use of body cladding and roof rails while the rear gets a spoiler, dual chrome exhaust pipes and large wraparound taillamps with four-element rectangular lights.

Citroen C5 Aircross logo.(Photo: Arjit Garg/News18.com)

All-in-all, the Citroen C5 Aircross comes as a breath of fresh air in a market crowded with SUVs. Citroen has enhanced the overall design with clever elements here and there and for me, the front profile really stands out. It wouldn't be wrong to say that Citroen represents a true European design language.

Cabin

As soon as you step inside the cabin of the C5 Aircross, you realize why the brand has been emphasizing on comfort. You will notice large padded leather seats done in charcoal grey colour. In fact the whole theme inside is a combination of various shades of grey. The dashboard layout in itself is neat with not many buttons. You see dual layered AC vents for a better air throw, both side flat steering wheel and a central tunnel with unique and sharp looking gear lever (which for me is a stand out design).

Citroen C5 Aircross cabin. (Photo: Arjit Garg/News18.com)

As far as the #ComfortClassDrive campaign goes, let me tell you, it's not just a marketing gimmick. The seats are super comfortable and spacious as well and not only this, you can individually slide and fold all the three rear seats which doesn't get the traditional 60:40 split. Apart from the seats, the flying carpet feel (which Citroen is calling its ride quality) is also a result of patented hydraulic suspension but that will be discussed below. Boot space in itself is spacious, in fact, the best-in-class at 580-litres.

Feature wise, the C5 Aircross is loaded to the brim with equipment like a 8-inch touchscreen infotainment system, hands-free electric tailgate, a 12.3-inch customizable TFT instrument display, panoramic sunroof among others. I liked really liked the toggle switches, while the touch buttons on the infotainment system takes some time to get used to. Also the fact that its a CKD unit, everything in the car is left mounted, right from push button start to engine hood opener and stuff.

Citroen C5 Aircross padded seats. (Photo: Arjit Garg/News18.com)

Performance

Citroen is it playing safe for their 1st innings in India and is not going all out in terms of engine options. There's only a 2.0-litre diesel engine producing 177 bhp and 400 Nm of output and gets a sole 8-speed auto gearbox.

As soon as you hop inside and press the accelerator, theres an eerie silence which is a tremendous achievement for a new brand entering India. Citroen says they are offering double laminated glasses and ample engine bay insulation which keeps the NVH levels at check.

The C5 Aircross also gets Citroen's patented Hydraulic Cushion technology that gives the aforementioned flying carpet feel and that's quite evident. But not just ride quality, the steering is also tuned in a way that it feels balanced for both city and highway driving. I also liked the massive matte finished paddle shifters which not only looks good, but feels good to operate. Citroen is claiming a segment best 18.6 kmpl mileage in the Aircross.

Citroen C5 Aircross 8-speed auto gearbox. (Photo: Arjit Garg/News18.com)

Theres nothing much to say about the engine performance itself and it is amply powerful and torquey enough for our roads. The gearbox complements the engine well and theres no turbo lag or rubberband effect or any other problem you will face with the engine. Citroen is not offering a 4-wheel drive/ AWD system and is pitching the car as an urban commuter for Tier 1 cities or at max some Tier 2 cities. However, there are traction modes being offered which includes Standard, Snow, All-Terrain and Sand modes. Citroen is also offering Eco and Sport driving modes.

In terms of safety, the Citroen C5 Aircross gets 6-airbags, TPMS, Blind Spot Information Display, Coffee Break Alert, Electronic Stability Program, Hill Hold and more.

Citroen C5 Aircross rear profile. (Photo: Arjit Garg/News18.com)

Verdict

While many are saying that Citroen is late to the party, I believe it's never too late and Citroen has left no stone unturned to capture the fancy of our diverse market. The C5 Aircross is easily the best looking Premium SUV in the domestic market today and gets all the bells and whistles. It's also fun and super comfortable to drive. Everything will now boil down to the pricing and Citroen will have to play its cards very carefully. For now, it's a big thumbs up from my side to the Citroen's honest attempt to offer a premium product to the Indian buyers.
Nikki Han pushes hard on the first day of the Hong Kong Four Trails Ultra Challenge. South China Morning Post





Nikki Han dragged herself to the end of the Hong Kong Four Trails Ultra Challenge for a second time, the only woman to finish once, let alone twice. But unlike 2019, this 298km run was "brutal."



"I've had a good one, then this one. I had to give every last little drop of blood I had to get through. Racing wise, the hardest thing I've ever done," she said.



The HK4TUC links all four major trails in Hong Kong - the 100km MacLehose, the 78km Wilson Trail, the 50km Hong Kong Trail and the 70km Lantau Trail. Runners are not allowed any support and there are no checkpoints, though they do have help travelling between the trails.



If they reach the postbox in Mui Wo on Lantau, which marks the end, in under 60 hours they are deemed a "finisher". If they reach it in under 72 hours, they are a "survivor". Only 16 people had finished before this year. Han finished in 58 hours and 20 minutes in 2019 - on Sunday she finished in 59:42. Other woman have survived. At 50 years of age, Han is also the oldest finisher.





Instagram    HK Four Trails Ultra Challenge(@hk4tuc)  







"I didn't beat my time. But god no, I don't mind.



"Given what the conditions were like it didn't bother me. Lantau Peak was like Mong Kok, unbelievably busy," she said.



Han ran most of the Lantau Trail with Hyun Chang Chung. They are good friends, often running and supporting each other's challenges as they both live in Discovery Bay.



"He pushed me. He made me sleep for the first time. A 10-minute power nap on Lantau," she said.



Word spread around the hiking and running community, as social media posts showed the HK4TUC runners across Hong Kong. Avid fans were following every second, glued to the tracker that showed dots moving slowly through the trails.



On section five of the Lantau Trail, Han and Chung turned a corner and masses of hikers who recognised them made a tunnel of honour, cheering them on.



"It was awesome. Amazing," Han said.





Instagram    HK Four Trails Ultra Challenge(@hk4tuc)  







But nothing could prepare her for the end, where a mask-wearing crowd had gathered. The organiser rang his signature cow bell to signify that a finisher was approaching and the crowd erupted into cheers. She reached the postbox and kissed it, as is the tradition for all finishers and survivors. The fans chanted "Nikki, Nikki!".



"Out of the whole thing, the finish, coming here, all the people, that was the best moment," she said.



Han attributes how tough it was to the cool first morning. With the 10th edition in mind and only previous finishers and survivors invited, runners were out to better their times. With the low temperatures, it was the perfect condition to move fast, but the temperature rose over the day and the rest of the weekend.



"The Wilson Trail, that was the hardest," Han said. "On the first day, it was cool in the morning and everyone just pushed crazy fast."



She finished the first 100km in 15:32.





Instagram    HK Four Trails Ultra Challenge(@hk4tuc)  





New Delhi:

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is all set to release detailed notification for UGC NET November 2017 exam today. The CBSE board is scheduled to conduct the next edition of University Grants Commission (UGC) National Eligibility Test (NET) exam on November.

According to the notification schedule, the online registration for the exam will begin from August 1. The last date for application will be August 30.

Once notification is out on cbsenet.nic.in. Interested candidates can check them on the link available.

"It is notified that CBSE will conduct the next UGC-NET for Junior Research Fellowship & Eligibility for Assistant Professor on 05th November, 2017 (Sunday). The candidates who desire to appear in the test may see the detailed notification available on the website https://cbsenet.nic.in from 24th July, 2017," said a short notification published on the CBSE NET official website.

"As per directions of the Ministry of HRD, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has been conducting the National Eligibility Test (NET) examination. There is no proposal under consideration at present to entrust responsibility of conducting the exam through any other mechanism," he said in a written response.

The NET exam is held twice a year in the months of July and December to determine eligibility for college and university level lectureship and for award of Junior Research Fellowship (JRF).

Meanwhile, UGC has brought some changes in the qualifying criteria of the UGC NET following which only six percent of the total candidates who appear in the UGC-NET examination will be declared qualified.
The 17th Annual Dr. Seuss Birthday Celebration at Cleveland State Community College will look a little different this year. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, the event is taking place in a drive-thru style format on the CSCC campus on Saturday, Feb. 27 from 9-11 a.m. Sponsored by Kiwanis of Cleveland, United Way of the Ocoee Region and the Maylyn and Carson Thacker Memorial Fund, the celebration is organized by students in the Early Childhood Education language and literacy class.



Officials said, "As with previous events, several famous characters like the Cat in the Hat, Thing One and Thing Two and the Grinch hope to join the fun on this day. Both children and adults are familiar with the uncontrollable and entertaining Cat from Dr. Seusss book, The Cat in the Hat. The Cat is accompanied by the twin mischief-makers, Thing One and Thing Two, and together they bounce from one catastrophic fun-making adventure to another. The Grinch, the title character from The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, is a cynical cave-dweller who has a sudden change of heart when he realizes the real meaning of Christmas."



I've enjoyed the Dr. Seuss event with my kids since they were in pre-school, stated Ryan Thompson, dean of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences. Last year they helped run the building block activity for other children. This year, I'm excited to help provide books to children in our community that will help them learn the alphabet, their colors, and how to count. And we have some books full of fun tongue-twisters to challenge older readers. Most of all, I'm happy to be part of a great event that celebrates and encourages learning with the people of our community.



Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss is free to children of all ages. Each child will receive a goody bag that includes a hardback Dr. Seuss book, as well as other literacy-related games and activities.



I loved the Early Childhood Education program at Cleveland State, and I enjoyed being a part of the Dr. Suess event when I was a student at Cleveland State, stated Angie Hawn, former Early Childhood Education student. The students of the ECED program dedicate an entire semester to Dr. Suess day. Mrs. (Suzanne) Wood and Ms. (Margaret) Horten dedicate a lot of their time, as well. They spearhead the entire event to make sure everything is perfect. It is such a great event for the Cleveland community and the surrounding areas. I always felt like that was a kick start to getting a child interested in reading or continuing to keep a child engaged in reading.



According to Dean Thompson, "The Kiwanis Club of Cleveland has generously given money to purchase books for the event, and members of the Kiwanis club will be there to give a free hardback Dr. Seuss book to every child that attends."



The Early Childhood Education Program at Cleveland State began in 1999 out of an initiative from the Tennessee Board of Regents requiring that all community colleges in the state have an early childhood program. Students may receive a Child Development Associate (CDA) designation by completing a four-course option and related credentialing procedures, a 24-credit hour Early Childhood Education Technical Certificate, or may pursue an Associate of Applied Science degree by completing the two-year, 60-credit-hour program. Starting this fall, the college will also be offering a two-year Associate of Science degree which will also transfer to four-year programs. The Early Childhood Education program is accredited by the National Association for the Education of Young Children.



Cleveland State also has transfer agreements with many area colleges that allow students to transfer and complete their degree to teach pre-K through third grade.



For more information about the Drive-Thru Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss event or the Early Childhood Education Program, contact Suzanne Wood, program coordinator, at 472-7141, Ext. 282. or email swood@clevelandstatecc.edu.



For more information on Cleveland State Community College, visit the website at clevelandstatecc.edu or email clscc_info@clevelandstatecc.edu. If you are interested in applying, visit mycs.cc/applynow. Students are currently enrolled online and on-campus through the CSCC main campus in Cleveland as well as CSCCs Athens Center in Athens and Monroe County Center in Vonore.
Our mom, Betty Lorraine Gardner, was a woman of grace and a woman of faith. She passed away Jan. 27, 2021, and is so deeply missed by family and friends.

Betty supported her husband, Richard, throughout their 63 year marriage, whether it was homesteading in Idaho or running a dairy farm in Washington. She developed close relationships with each grandchild as well as each great-grandchild. Betty lovingly crafted quilts for each.

In retirement, she traveled extensively with her husband, wintering in California many years and making many friends.

Her children, Rex (Pam), Diane (Steve), Marlis (Tom), and Debbie (Hal), would like to thank Kaiser Hospice nurse Sara and team for their professional and loving care.

A private service was held Feb. 5, 2021.
Opinion

"WHERE are you from?" I was asked.

"Canada," I replied.

"No! I mean where are you really from?"

I never understand that question, and why my answer isnt sufficient. I have to explain my heritage and the reasons why I dont fit the prototype of what a Canadian person must look like. Somehow, I cant be both Black and Canadian. I must position myself in a way that doesnt ruffle white Canadian fragility and its definition of Blackness.

Its this kind of all-too-common experience that regularly reminds me that theres a gap in the Canadian education system that prevents Black Canadians from being both Black and Canadian.

Its past time for this to change. Students at all levels need more opportunities to learn about race, not only in textbooks but also through experiential education. Teachers and professors need more institutional support to do this and do it well.

Black Canadian history education in elementary, middle or high school only happens in February (Black History Month), and seems to be dominated by the study of U.S slavery. Canadian Black history is erased  it never existed, therefore a Black Canadian cant exist within a white Canadian society.

Of course, this isnt true.

Canadian historian Afua Cooper talks about slavery as Canadas best-kept secret. Concealed racism is in the fabric of our education system and the strategic ignorance has an impact on Black students academic progress. This limits students reflexivity, critical thinking and understanding of multiculturalism in Canada. As a country, our collective consciousness is unable to understand racialized Canadians because our existence is erased from the very beginning of our educational journeys.

As I recall my academic journey from elementary to high school, Im reminded that my teachers never taught subjects related to Black Canadian scholars, Black historians and their contribution to the Canadian culture. I never learned about:

 Anderson Ruffin Abbott, first Canadian-born Black doctor in Canada;

 Elijah McCoy, Canadian-American inventor and engineer;

 William Peyton Hubbard, Canadian inventor and politician.

How come I never knew these Black Canadian pioneers? How come I never knew significant Canadian authors such as Dionne Brand, Afua Cooper and George Elliott Clarke? How was this colonial education practised and maintained? And for what purpose?

I learned that my skin doesnt permit me to be fully Canadian. Theres a distinction between my citizenship and the colour of my skin, reinforced by psychological gaslighting and polite racism.

Now I observe my childrens invisibility in the school system and their collective consciousness manipulated by false stereotypes, and I see them being placed at risk of a self-fulfilling prophecy. The lack of discussion of anti-Black racism in the Canadian educational system is a covert form of systematic racism contributing to the cycle of racism.

Today, as a PhD student, I also see ingrained racist structures in our post-secondary system preventing students and professors from openly engaging in anti-racist discussions. I recently conducted a survey with racialized university professors across Canadian universities. Alongside some very troubling results about these professors experiences of racism throughout their careers, they reported a lack of support when it comes to addressing issues of race and racism in the classroom.

Professors are not only victims of racism; theyre also not provided with the support or the tools to encourage classroom inclusivity. With the lack of resources available for racialized professors in Canadian post-secondary institutions, the cycle of racist curriculum and structural racism will continue.

There are solutions. We can draw on the rich work of racialized educators to do better. Educator, activist and theorist bell hooks writes about the importance of a transgressive approach in education where educators can teach students to "transgress" against racial, sexual and class boundaries in order to achieve freedom. The underlying philosophy is that education is a practice of freedom.

Paulo Freire, likewise, understands education as a practice of freedom, discusses the importance of dialogue between the oppressed and the oppressors, and argues that oppressors must be willing to rethink their way of life and to examine their role in oppression if true liberation is to occur.

Drawing on these kinds of writers, educational institutions could support experiential education approaches on race and racism that focus on reflection and introspection, and that teach learners to make explicit their usually unconscious social reactions and behaviours in various contexts.

The possibilities are endless.

Were educated to absorb social stereotypical behaviours and reactions. The subconscious is the guiding force in our social perception of various races. But stereotypes can be unlearned. Social conditioning such as self-policing and self-censorship can be unlearned through reflection, introspection and transformative learning.

However, Canadas educational systems remain governed by a narrative founded on white supremacy. Racist structures are maintained by oppressive systematic policies. Nevertheless, I believe that through collaborative community engagement and learning, we can overcome these structural barriers.

I no longer want to be a victim of structural racism, but rather a victor who contributes to fundamental academic change.

Karine Coen-Sanchez is a PhD student in sociology at the University of Ottawa.

 Troy Media
An advocate and an environmental activist on Monday moved the seeking transit anticipatory bail after they were named as suspects in a case filed by the Delhi police with regard to the "toolkit" shared by climate activist over the farmers' protest.

Advocate Nikita Jacob and environmental activist Shantanu Muluk, both Maharashtra residents, filed separate pleas in the HC, which will hear them on Tuesday, after a Delhi court issued non-bailable warrants against them in the case.

According to the Delhi police, the duo was allegedly involved in preparing the document and was in direct touch with "pro-Khalistani elements".

While Jacobs plea was filed in the principal HC seat in Mumbai, Muluk, a resident of Beed district in central Maharashtra, submitted his application in the Aurangabad bench of the High Court.

Jacob's plea seeking urgent hearing was mentioned before the Bombay HC's single bench of Justice P D Naik on Monday. The HC said it would hear her plea on Tuesday.

Muluk's plea was mentioned before Justice Vibha Kankanvadi of the Aurangabad bench and his application would also be heard on Tuesday.

Both the pleas sought transit anticipatory bail for a period of four weeks so that the applicants (Jacob and Muluk) can approach the court concerned in Delhi to apply for pre- arrest bail.

Jacob and Muluk, in their pleas, have claimed they are targets of political vendetta.



Jacob, in her plea, said she is unaware whether she has been named as an accused or a witness in the case.

"However, the applicant (Jacob) fears that she may be arrested due to political vendetta and media trial," her application said.

Muluk, in his plea filed through advocate Satej Jadhav, said he and others are not actual dissenters but have only come out in support of farmers agitating on Delhi borders for more than two months now against the Centre's new agri- marketing laws.

Vendetta has tricked down from politics to the house of a common man making a mockery of the rights and principles enshrined in the Constitution of India, the application said.

Jacob, in her plea, said the FIR registered in the case was "false and baseless" and that she has already cooperated with the cyber cell of the Delhi police and recorded her statement.

"Some entity named Legal Rights Observatory appears to have filed a false and baseless complaint with the Delhi police and seeks to pin the blame for violence on January 26, 2021 (during tractor rally in Delhi) upon the applicant as well," the plea said.

As per the application, on February 11, a team of Delhi police came to Jacob's house in Goregaon area of Mumbai with a search warrant and seized documents and electronic gadgets.

"The applicant has no religious, political or financial motive or agenda for researching, discussing, editing and circulating communication packs/toolkits for raising awareness, let alone to incite violence, riots and/or cause any other physical harm," the application said.

It said Jacob was a practising advocate in the who volunteers for environmental causes.

"The applicant was deeply concerned about the recent farm laws and villainising of farmers," the application said.

It said Jacob's personal information and details are being circulated on social media.

The application further said "absolute lies" are being spread to incite hate and violence against Jacob by claiming she has ties with political parties like the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

Muluk, in his application, said he and his colleagues are innocent and at the most have been kept in the dark by one notorious stake holder, but that cannot take away the bonafide intentions of the applicant.

The Delhi police on Saturday arrested 21-year-old environmental activist Disha Ravi from Bengaluru in connection with the case.

She was on Sunday produced before a Delhi court which remanded her in police custody for five days.

The Delhi case stems from the "toolkit" shared by Thunberg, the Swedish teenage climate activist, to lend her support to the protesting farmers.

Thousands of farmers protesting the new agri laws clashed with the police during their tractor parade on January 26.

Earlier, the Delhi police had asked Google and some social media giants to provide information about e-mail ID, URLs and certain social media accounts related to creators of the "toolkit" shared by Thunberg and others on Twitter in connection with the farmers' protest.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.

In the wildly successful 90 Day Fiance franchise, there are several fan-favorite couples, and Annie Suwan Toborowsky and David Toborowsky are definitely one of them. They first appeared in season 5 of the original 90 Day Fiance. And after that first appearance, theyve become extremely popular. They even received their own series on Facebook Watch called Spice it Up with David & Annie.

Annie, who is 28, recently posted a sweet tribute to her husband, David, who is 52, on Instagram for Valentines Day. What did she say? We have all the details.

How did David and Annie Toborowsky meet?

Annie Suwan on 90 Day Fiance | 90 Day Fiance/TLC/YouTube

David and Annie met for the first time when David decided to take a trip to Thailand after going through a divorce and also having a stroke. He went to a karaoke bar, and he heard his future wife sing. Things moved quickly from there, and only 10 days after they first met, they were officially engaged.

Annie came to the United States on the K-1 visa, and despite some major drama involving finances, housing, and the opinions of family, they were married on November 1, 2017. Theyve settled into a nice life together in Arizona and have become even more popular with their appearances on Pillow Talk, which are more than humorous.

Most recently, the couple can be seen in some new shows on Discovery+ that include 90 Day Fiance: Bares All and 90 Day Fiance: Love Games.

Annie Suwan Toborowsky posts sweet tribute to her husband, David Toborowsky

RELATED: 90 Day Fiance: David Toborowsky Opens Up About Falling In Love With Annie Suwan Immediately And Proposing After Just 10 Days On What Now?

On Valentines Day, Annie posted a picture of herself wearing a red outfit with her eyes closed and a smile on her face. She goes on to thank her husband for showing her love, hope, happiness, and the world, in a sweet tribute.

Annie captioned the post on Instagram: Thank you for show me Love, Hope, happiness, and the world @toborowsky_david .

She also recalls a moment from their first season in the series when David had to get two water buffalo as part of her dowry. They went shopping for the buffalo together, and David contributed $1500 to her family as part of her dowry (which in total they wanted 500,000 baht or almost $17,000), which was a sore subject at the time since David was unemployed and without a lot of money. But he paid a down payment essentially, and he was able to marry Annie.

However, Annies family now has more baby water buffalo that have come from the payment of the dowry. Back in 2018, David shared on Instagram that the water buffalo had a baby, and theyve since added a few more to the bunch.

4 years ago todays when we were shopping for water buffalo  and same like the family growing since then now they have 4 babies! Annie wrote. Should we thinking like a water Buffalo now????  Happy Valentine day .

She also added the necessary hashtags as well: #90dayfiancepillowtalk #90dayfiance #90dayfiancehappilyeverafter #90dayfiancetheotherway #90daypillowtalk #90dayfiancebeforethe90days #tlc.

David and Annie have come a really long way together. Well have to see what 2021 has in store for this happy couple.
NVIDIA has set a release date for the GeForce RTX 3060, but the wait won't be the biggest challenge. The $329 mid-tier GPU, the first at this price to feature ray tracing, will be available on February 25th at 12PM ET. You wont be able to pick up a Founders Edition this time, however, and will have to settle for a third-party video card. While some Reddit users have been able to grab the GPU as it inadvertently appeared on store shelves early in Europe and Asia, the challenge will be finding the RTX 3060 in stock. NVIDIA has been dealing with GPU shortages for months, due to both a surge of cryptocurrency mining and limited demand.

Thats why it resumed selling years-old cards, just to have something available. The company is re-releasing older GPUs including the GTX 1050 Ti and the RTX 2060 to its partners, but it has pointed out that both cards were not technically at the end of their life, so reviving seems like the wrong terminology to use here, it said. Of course.

What if you want a more up-to-date GPU? Production isn't expected to improve until late April. Elsewhere in tech, weve got the latest iPhone rumors, a new Chevy Bolt and automakers that arent afraid of Apple.

 Mat Smith

And maybe improved ultra-wide cameras.

Engadget

According to AppleInsider, well-known leaker Max Weinbach and EverythingApplePro have shared a flurry of next-gen iPhone leaks, focusing on an always-on display. Reportedly, a battery-efficient 120Hz display will mimic your iPhones current lock screen, to an extent, and deliver a handful of information without any input, much like what you see on some Android handsets, usually if they have an OLED display. Only the battery and clock would be consistently visible, but a "bar and icons" would show your notifications. Other points suggest an iterative update with improved cameras, a more powerful MagSafe connection between your phone and accessories and maybe a grippier, matte-effect Pro phone. Continue reading.

The goggles and even the controller get upgraded.

Engadget

DJI hasnt even announced a cinematic first-person drone, but regardless, Dominion Drones briefly shared a video (reposted by SpiderMonkey FPV) of the FPV Combo, which brings together a high-speed drone (rumored to reach a top speed of 93MPH), first-person view goggles (lighter than before) and a controller that, well, wouldnt look out of place connected to a games console.

Dominion didn't fly the drone to test its rumored 93MPH top speed. However, the clip shows the high-up first-person camera as well as additional front- and downward-facing sensors that are likely meant to help dodge obstacles. The new controller has sculpted grips, while the new racing goggles are apparently lighter than their predecessors. It looks like the new drone was built for racing. Continue reading.

The larger Bolt EUV will be Chevys first with 'Super Cruise' hands-free steering.

Engadget

Chevys 2022 redesign isnt just an update to the Bolt EVs features and capabilities, it includes a new, SUV-sized variant, dubbed the Bolt EUV. Under the hood, the 2022 Bolt EV and EUV are functionally similar. They use the same 65W, 288-cell lithium-ion battery pack and identical single front 200 HP (150kW) electric motor. Differences come from the form factor. The Bolt EUV offers its passengers a longer wheelbase, more headspace and higher ride height. It is also the first Chevy vehicle to offer the companys Super Cruise hands-free driver assist feature, allowing hands-free driving along some 200,000 miles of mapped North American roads. Continue reading.

Whether or not that view holds is another story.

If Apple does go ahead with an electric car, Volkswagen isnt worried about it. According to Reuters, VW chief Herbert Diess told Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung that his company was "not afraid" of an Apple car. The auto industry isn't a tech sector you can "take over at a single stroke," the CEO said. Hes probably right, but let us remember the lessons learned by Palm... Continue reading.

But wait, theres more...



Apple reportedly also spoke to Nissan about building a self-driving EVStudio Ghibli's first CG movie, 'Earwig and the Witch,' is an insultAmazon's 'Mentor' tracking software has been screwing drivers for yearsMercedes recalls nearly 1.3 million cars over emergency call tech

In 1787, Benjamin Franklin became the president of Pennsylvanias Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery. He threw himself into the ta
File image: Health workers proceed to screen people for COVID-19 symptoms in Mumbai's Dharavi area on June 24, 2020. (Image: AP Photo/Rajanish Kakade)

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has started deploying mobile COVID-19 testing vans in some pockets of Dharavi fearing a possible resurgence in novel coronavirus infections.

G Northward, which comprises Dharavi, Dadar, and Mahim has recorded a weekly growth rate of 0.12 percent, according to a report by The Times of India.

Civic officials told the newspaper that while new COVID-19 cases being detected in Dharavi are currently in single-digits, the testing vans are being deployed as a precautionary measure. Between February 13 and 15, these vans were sent to Dharavi's 90-feet road.

The news report cites officials as saying that some high-risk contacts were avoiding testing as they feared that the mandatory 14-day quarantine will lead to a loss of income.

The total number of COVID-19 cases reported in Dharavi as of February 14 stood at 3,970. There are 14 active cases in the area.

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

Follow our LIVE blog for the latest updates of the coronavirus pandemic

Dharavi, often considered as one of the largest slums in Asia, was one of the biggest infection hotspots in the country in the initial months of the pandemic -- before it was brought under control. The Dharavi Model of curbing the spread of COVID-19 was hailed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Centre.

Now, Maharashtra itself is witnessing a sudden spike in new COVID-19 cases. While the state has for long been worst-affected in the country due to the outbreak, the numbers being reported on a daily basis had fallen significantly over the last two months.

But on February 14, Maharashtra registered 4,092 new cases  breaching the 4,000-mark after 38 days. This also took the states COVID-19 tally to 20.64 lakh, which includes a death toll of 51,529. On the same day, Mumbai reported more than 600 new cases after 31 days.

A police detective is facing 44 allegations of conduct breaches and sexually harassing junior officers including telling one on a night out he wanted to 'f*ck her'.

The married officer is facing a catalogue of accusations such as making sexual comments - and asking a colleague to send him naked pictures of herself.

The officer - only referred to as DC X - is also said to have groped, partially undressed and kissed one witness on the lips without her permission.

The Avon and Somerset officer is facing a disciplinary panel today at a week-long hearing in Bristol.

Clare Hennessy, Counsel for the Appropriate Authority bringing the case against the officer, said his actions were 'inappropriate and uninvited'.

She said: 'The inappropriate behaviour started on a work night out where he said to witness A - 'I'd like to f*ck you.'

An Avon and Somerset police detective is accused of a string of sexual harassment allegations

'Thereafter he became close with witness A - he contacted her on regular basis and wanted her to contact back.

'He told her she should end her relationship and he proceeded to develop an overly friendly relationship with her, telling her he was thinking abut her and asking her whether she was thinking about him.

'He tried to spend significant periods of time with her both on and off duty.'

In relation to the alleged incident when DC X allegedly kissed witness A on the lips and partially undressed her, Ms Hennessy said: 'The physical contact was inappropriate, uninvited and plainly sexual and was a sexual assault.'

DC X is said to have asked her to send him a naked photograph of herself and accompanied her to locations of crime that did not require physical attendance.

On one occasion Witness A told DC X that he was pressuring her to do things she did not want to do, while he said he had 'never felt this way about someone before', it is claimed.

DC X is accused of reviewing a complex burglary case with Witness A in a private room, despite her suggestion it should be in the open.

The panel will also hear from Witness B that DC X asked her, 'Have you christened your new car yet?'

The disciplinary hearing began this morning and is expected to conclude on Friday (file photo)

He is also accused of making other 'inappropriate, sexual and predatory' comments to her.

DC X is also accused of making comments to Witness C - 'in relation to personal matters such as her hair or clothing,' which would amount to gross misconduct.

Of the allegations concerning witnesses B and C - Miss Hennessy added: 'It demonstrates this officer's attitude, which is entirely at odds with appropriate behaviour and expected standard of a long-standing officer with many years in service.'

The Appropriate Authority says the allegations mean DC X has breached the Standards of Professional Behaviour in three ways - Discreditable Conduct, Authority, Respect and Courtesy and Equality and Diversity.

The Avon and Somerset Police detective faced the hearing which commenced today and it is expected to last until Friday.
Arizona News

Phoenix, Arizona - Attorney General Mark Brnovich announced Friday that 30-year-old Jesse Anthony Garcia, of Goodyear, has been sentenced to 20 years in the Arizona Department of Corrections for sexual exploitation of a minor.

Garcia had previously admitted to recording a video in which a minor victim was engaged in exploitive exhibition or other sexual conduct, and attempting to record a video in which a minor victim was engaged in exploitive exhibition or other sexual conduct in 2016. Garcia pleaded guilty to one count of Sexual Exploitation of a Minor, and one count of Attempted Sexual Exploitation of a Minor.



Upon release from prison, Garcia is subject to special terms of probation for sex offenders, and will have computer usage restrictions. Garcia will also be required to register as a sex offender.

The case was investigated by Special Agents with the Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) based upon an investigation initiated by the Queensland (Australia) State Police. Assistant Attorney General Todd Lawson prosecuted the case.

"Criminals who commit despicable acts against children cannot hide behind computer screens," said Attorney General Mark Brnovich. "Our partnerships with local, federal, and international authorities have helped lead to the arrest and conviction of individuals who abuse and exploit our youth."

This investigation demonstrates Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) unwavering commitment to rid our community of child predators who seek to violate our most innocent population, Scott Brown, Special Agent in charge for HSI Phoenix. HSI wont ever relent when it comes to protecting children and prosecuting predators whose perverse behavior has no place in our society.

Below is a photograph of Garcia.
Authorities in the US have apologised to the Government for an incident in which US military personnel breached Irish Covid-19 regulations.

The troops stayed overnight in a Limerick hotel after landing at Shannon Airport without the legally required evidence of negative PCR tests or passenger locator forms.

The US Navy C40A aircraft arrived at Shannon Airport at 7.06pm on January 25 coming from Bahrain and carrying five crew and 48 military personnel.

They stayed overnight in a Limerick hotel before taking off for the US at 11.35am the following day.

However, Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney told Social Democrats TD Cian O'Callaghan in a parliamentary question response that the troops did not present negative PCR tests or fill out passenger locator forms as required.

Mr Coveney said the passengers were alerted to the fact that they had breached the law by An Garda Siochana and that the breach had happened "due to an error on the US side", but confirmed that they had left their hotel to purchase food.

"Once informed of this breach of regulations by An Garda Siochana, the issue was raised with the US authorities, both through the US embassy in Dublin and through our embassy in Washington.

"The US authorities have undertaken a review of the circumstances which led to this breach.

"They have also confirmed that the passengers concerned were operating in a 'clean bubble', were tested repeatedly during the period they were deployed in the location where the flight originated and, following instructions by An Garda Siochana, self-isolated in a hotel in Limerick overnight, only leaving once to purchase food, while masked, before returning to Shannon Airport the following day to travel onward to their destination."

Mr Coveney said that regardless of the explanation from the US authorities, the issue of non-compliance with public health guidelines was a serious one and that he had raised it with the US charge d'Affaires in Dublin and had received apologies for the incident.

"Any non-compliance is a serious matter and I made this clear in a discussion with the charge d'Affaires of the US embassy in Dublin on February 4.

"Our ambassador in Washington has also made this clear in his contacts with senior officials in Washington.

"We have emphasised to the US authorities that all landings must fully abide by the conditions put in place by the Irish authorities, including public health conditions.

"The US authorities have assured me that this is understood and will not happen again.

"It is clear that the requirements of the statutory instrument, which came into effect on 9 January, were inadequately communicated by the relevant US authorities across the entire US government system.

"My department and our embassy in Washington have received apologies, both orally and in writing, from the relevant US authorities, including the US military authorities.

"The US side has recommitted to full compliance in respect of future landings."

Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney told Social Democrats TD Cian O'Callaghan in a parliamentary question response that the troops did not present negative PCR tests or fill out passenger locator forms as required.

Mr O'Callaghan told the Irish Examiner that the incident is symptomatic of the Government's lax attitude towards US troops landing in Shannon.

"It is unacceptable that there isn't proper adherence to public health measures by anyone. It's an unnecessary risk and US troops have to be subject to the same approach as anyone else.

"People are putting in huge effort and making massive sacrifices, anyone coming here must abide by public health measures and that extends to the US military.

"I'm not surprised by it at all  the entire attitude to the US military has been completely lax in terms of monitoring or inspections throughout the years.

Edward Horgan of the Shannonwatch group, which first notified the gardai about the plane, said that a number of US flights have stayed overnight in the Shannon region in recent weeks and questioned whether the passengers on every flight had presented PCR tests.

"In my view these incidents were not once-off occurrences or mistakes," he told the Irish Examiner.

In an incident a number of days later, a group of US troops was forced back to Shannon after departing for an airbase in Spain due to bad weather, meaning the crew had to spend the night at a local hotel under an agreed local protocol for such occurrences, with a locator form signed off.
Egypts Social Solidarity Minister Nevine El-Qabbaj said on Monday that the ministry's vision for the Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) goes beyond granting them licenses and involves dealing with them as partners in the implementation of national projects.

Egypt is looking to have an "effective and transparent" channel of communication with civil society via the new NGO law to achieve the desired sustainable development, said Minister El-Qabbaj.

The minister's remarks were made during a meeting named Dialogue with International Partners ... New Horizons for Civil Society in Egypt, which was held on Monday to discuss the NGO law.

The event was attended by close to 130 international bodies and NGOS, according to a statement by the social solidarity ministry.

El-Qabbaj underscored that the articles of the NGO law represent a "leap" for civil society organisations.

The new law is also a reflection of the ministrys keenness to build a strong and sustainable partnership with [NGOs] under the principles of transparency and respecting human rights, she added.

The minister praised the prompt response of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi to the requests by civil society to amend the law, which was first approved in 2016.

In November 2018, during the second World Youth Forum in Sharm El-Sheikh, President El-Sisi voiced his support for amending the NGO law.

The House of Representatives approved a host of amendments to the law in July 2019. The Egyptian government ratified the articles of the amended NGO law in November 2020.

During Monday's meeting, the social solidarity minister vowed to provide all means of support for civil society and contribute to strengthening their organisational and financial capabilities.

She added that the recently ratified bylaws allow the NGOs to tap into the country's digital transformation plan by registering the associations and fundraising online.

The minister added that according to the new law, the associations cannot be dissolved without a court ruling.

The law also includes a number of penalties against entities and organisations that do not comply with the rules and instructions and those involved in crimes.

During the event, El-Qabbaj referred to mechanisms by which NGOs can be frozen or suspended as well as means for reconciliation.

Minister of International Cooperation Rania Al-Mashat, who attended the meeting, said that civil society has played a strong role in the ministrys international partnerships with multilateral and bilateral development partners over the past year to support the country's efforts in combating the coronavirus pandemic.

Al-Mashat affirmed the international cooperation ministry's keenness to strengthen economic cooperation ties with international partners through the principles of economic diplomacy.

Short link:


DENVER, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Kiosk Association announces initiatives for Kiosk EMV and Kiosk ADA.

EMV Initiative -- As a Participating Organization with the PCI SSC, KMA encourages deployment of EMV devices (PCI certified) for CATs (Cardholder Activated Terminals). The problem has been companies attempting to try and reposition web non-EMV shopping carts into a self-order terminal using just a standard magstripe reader.

On ADA Accessibility -- to kick off the new initiative the Kiosk Association has released a free 14 Point Kiosk ADA Checklist. This is a distillation of the Kiosk ADA Framework (Mandatory + Code of Practice) released to U.S. Access Board in 2019.

The initiative follows U.S. Access Board conference call in January introducing new Executive Director. A follow-up call in March is set. The intent of our initiative is to properly align the initial design process so that by default accessibility is accommodated, and not reduced to potential options dismissed or not explored. Like EMV, this also is impacted by casual relocation of web ordering which has not been optimized for accessibility onto self-service terminals.

See https://kioskindustry.org

News

NRF National Retail Federation -- KMA will be exhibiting at Virtual NRF 2021 Chapter Two as well as returning to New York in January 2022 as an exhibitor at the physical tradeshow.

in as an exhibitor at the physical tradeshow. Kiosk Market Report Release - The 2021 Edition of the Kiosk Market Research Report is scheduled for March 1st . Over 140 pages of market breakdowns by vertical with detailed company participant profiles and information. MSRP is currently $6000

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*LOGO link for media: https://www.Send2Press.com/300dpi/20-0315s2p-kioskma-300dpi.jpg

This release was issued through Send2Press, a unit of Neotrope. For more information, visit Send2Press Newswire at https://www.Send2Press.com

SOURCE Kiosk Manufacturer Association
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NSW cabinet minister Adam Marshall has bizarrely dressed up as his Nationals colleague Barnaby Joyce at a costume party on Saturday night

A cabinet minister mocked Barnaby Joyce with a hilarious costume complete with his ruddy red face, a blade of grass in his mouth, and a fake paunch.

NSW Agriculture Minister Adam Marshall imitated his federal Nationals counterpart at a heroes and villains costume party on Saturday night.

A photo taken at the event showed Mr Marshall with a beer in hand sporting Mr Joyce's go-to plaid shirt and a wide-brimmed Akubra hat.

The Northern Tablelands MP also appeared to have applied paint to his face to give it a reddish colour and stashed a pillow under his shirt to mimick Mr Joyce's midriff.

The image showed Mr Marshall in the bizarre outfit holding a beer with the caption 'hey there Barnaby Joyce'.

Mr Joyce lost his deputy PM job in February 2018 after having an affair with staffer Vikki Campion.

The affair prompted then-prime minister Malcolm Turnbull's infamous 'bonk ban' which prevented ministers from having relationships with their staff.

Mr Joyce stepped down as Australia's second most senior politician just weeks after the affair came to light.

Vikki Campion (right) was working as a staffer for Barnaby Joyce (left) when she had an affair with him and fell pregnant with his child Sebastian (centre). The family are pictured together at his christening in September 2018

Barnaby Joyce (third from right), his ex-wife Natalie Joyce (left) and their daughters (left to right) Odette, 16, Bridgette, 22, Julia, 20 and Caroline, 19

He now shares two children, Sebastian and Tom, with Ms Campion.

He has four daughters - Bridgette, 22, Julia 20, Caroline, 19, and Odette 16 - with his ex-wife Natalie.

Mr Marshall declined to comment on Saturday's costume choice when approached by The Sydney Morning Herald.

The pair have long-standing beef since they locked heads over energy policy in NSW's New England region.

Mr Marshall pictured in NSW Parliament in 2018. He has so far refused to comment on the reason why he decided to dress up as his colleague

Mr Marshall in December called his federal counterpart's opposition to plans for new forms of renewable power in the electorate 'irresponsible' and 'prehistoric'.

Mr Joyce a month earlier argued the scheme would turn the region into a 'sea of wind farms'.

Daily Mail Australia has contacted Mr Marshall for further comment.


Jack Miller, 16, has his boots signed by Tanielu Telea.



Rodney College year 12 students with players Tanielu Telea, Jacob Pierce and Karl Jacob Tenielu.



There was time to throw a ball around with the visiting players.

Rodney College students received a surprise visit from Blues Super Rugby players last week.

Midfielder Tanielu Telea, lock Jacob Pierce and prop Karl Jacob Tenielu handed out supporters gear and rugby boots.

The school visit was part of a tour by the Blues squad, which saw them visit 14 clubs and schools to hand out 250 pairs of recycled boots, which have been cleaned and repurposed.

Rugby balls are not permitted at Rodney College, as too many windows have been broken, but fortunately one student had a contraband ball, which was brought out for the occasion for a throw around.

The team was on its way to Kerikeri where it hosted an open training session for the public at the Kerikeri Rugby Club

The Blues Super Rugby season starts on February 27 at the Sky Stadium in Wellington with a match against the Hurricanes.

Meanwhile, former Blues and Wellsford player Rene Ranger has signed up with the Crusaders and will begin his season on February 26 against the Highlanders.

New Delhi: The Delhi Police on Monday (February 15, 2021) made major announcements about the Greta Thunberg 'toolkit' case and said that Disha Ravi along with Nikita Jacob and Shantanu created it. Delhi Police also said that Disha Ravi then sent it to the teen Swedish climate and environmental activist Greta Thunberg.

Disha Ravi, 22, who was remanded to 5-day police custody on Sunday, sent the toolkit to Greta Thunberg through Telegram app, according to PTI news agency,

During a press conference, Joint Commissioner of Police (Cyber) Prem Nath said that Disha Ravi deleted a WhatsApp group that she created to spread the following toolkit.

He also stated that Nikita and Shantanu attended a Zoom meeting organised by 'pro-Khalistani' group Poetic Justice Foundation (PJF). Prem Nath added that Nikita Jacob was also one of the editors of toolkit document.

"Disha, Shantanu and Nikita created and edited the toolkit. Disha sent the toolkit to Greta Thunberg through the Telegram app. Disha deleted a WhatsApp group which she created to spread the toolkit. The due procedure was followed during Disha's arrest," said Prem Nath.

According to him, many screenshots of the toolkit were available on open source and were investigated and when the probe was able to fetch enough information, a search warrant was obtained from Court on February 9 against Nikita Jacob.

He said that a team reached Mumbai and conducted searches at Nikita Jacob's residence on February 11.

"She and her associates Shantanu and Disha had created the doc. The email account created by Shantanu is the owner of this doc and all others are its editors," added Prem Nath.

He stated that a woman named Puneet who is based in Canada connected these people to the pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation.

"On January 11, Nikita and Shantanu attended a Zoom meeting organised by Poetic Justice Foundation in which modalities were chalked out," the Jt CP Cyber Cell informed.

The Delhi Police had earlier issued non-bailable warrants against Nikita Jacob and Shantanu for allegedly sharing the toolkit on social media.

This is to be noted that teen Swedish climate and environmental activist Greta Thunberg had shared the toolkit to lend her support to the ongoing farmers' agitation against Centre's three new farm laws.

Heres an updated toolkit by people on the ground in India if you want to help. (They removed their previous document as it was outdated.)#StandWithFarmers #FarmersProtesthttps://t.co/ZGEcMwHUNL  Greta Thunberg (@GretaThunberg) February 3, 2021

In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were reportedly listed which were needed to be taken to support the farmers' protest.

(With inputs from agencies)



Live TV
The Longford Slashers GAA grounds will be one of 37 vaccination centres nationwide.

Deputy Joe Flaherty has welcomed confirmation of a vaccine centre for the Longford Slashers ground with a contract being finalised with the club.

Also read: Breakdown of Covid-19 cases in Longford shows Ballymahon electoral area with highest incidence rate

He added, "Whilst GPs are busy this week administering vaccines for the over 85s the Longford centre will be used to vaccinate those registering online. Operational times will depend on vaccine supply and local needs."

Senator Micheal Carrigy welcomed today's confirmation from Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly TD, of the locations for the 37 vaccination centres across Ireland. He stated, "Up until late last week it had been suggested that there would not be a vaccination centre in Longford."

He added, "Following representation made by myself, along with my Fine Gael team in Longford, especially Cllr Peggy Nolan who has been consistently pushing for this centre to be opened I am delighted that the Minister has agreed to locate a vaccination centre in Longford town."

Meanwhile, The Abbey Hotel, Roscommon Town has just been confirmed as the location for the Covid vaccination centre for Roscommon.

To sign up and register for the FREE daily Longford Leader newsletter CLICK HERE or on the image below
All the action has been in stocks this year, as any bored foreign-exchange trader will tell you. The market is usually a hub for raucous retail trading but has been largely quiescent during the meme-stock phenomenon.

The risk of a rise in currency volatility is something worth considering for investors with overseas exposure, as well as for corporate treasurers.

Stocks are usually more volatile than currencies. But the gulf between the Cboe Volatility Indexthe familiar VIX fear gauge" that measures the volatility of S&P 500 optionsand the Cboe EuroCurrency Volatility Index, which does the same for euro-dollar options, is large by the standards of recent history. The same is true for volatility in other currency pairs.

The trend is relatively new. For most of the past decade, equity-market and currency volatility ground lower and lower in tandem, with occasional concurrent spikes. But after markets began to recover from last years pandemic-induced selloff, the relationship was disrupted: Foreign-exchange volatility resumed its decline, but equity-market volatility settled at a higher plateau.

It is easy to rationalize why the VIX remains elevated. The pandemic has unleashed a lot of uncertainties, most notably about the speed of the economic recovery as Covid-19 cases decline. Surely much of that applies to foreign-exchange markets, too?

Mark McCormick, head of foreign-exchange strategy at TD Securities, notes that the growth gap between different countries and the volatility of their currency pair have tended to bear some relation to each other in the past. This makes intuitive sense, given that currencies can be a barometer of economic strength. But any relationship has broken down, with the differences in growth rates between countries still extremely wide.

Given the US dollars pivotal place in the global financial system, foreign-exchange volatility is really volatility in the greenback. That means the obvious source of risk to low currency volatility is a stronger dollar. Investors are still convinced that there wont be interest-rate increases soon, but the U.S. yield curve has steepened considerably relative to those in other developed economies, as expectations for a stronger American recovery have increased.

It is clearly possible for volatility in equities and currency pairs to remain disconnected for long periods. But investors with any exposure should be cautious. The risk that foreign-exchange markets become choppier to match the volatility of the stock market, rather than the other way around, is worth keeping an eye on.

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.

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A possum quite possibly had the fright of its life after spotting a camouflaged snake ready to pounce just metres away on a family's front veranda.

Snake Catchers Brisbane and Gold Coast uploaded the image to its Facebook page, after staff were recently called out to a home in Sherwood, south-west of Brisbane's CBD.

The photos show a carpet python comfortably perched and hidden from view on the veranda, leaving the possum every reason to feel threatened.

The possum (pictured above) was nervous after spotting a snake ready to pounce on the deck below

The python (circled above in red) had the possum on edge as it patiently waited to strike

Snake catcher Jaedon Lunt, who collected the serpent, said it was 'highly probable' the seven-foot python was sizing up the possum as its next meal.

In May last year, experienced snake catcher Stuart McKenzie was called out to a home on Queensland's Sunshine Coast after reports of a massive carpet python slithering on a suburban roof.

On arrival, he kept a safe distance after seeing the python was feasting on a large ring-tail possum.

'When I arrived it was dangling there from the roof with the possum in its mouth,' he told 7News.

'It took about an hour to eat it completely, so I just sat with the residents while we watched and waited for it (snake) to be done with its meal.

'The people at the home were very good about it and were pretty intrigued by the whole thing.'

Snake catcher Jaedon Lunt (pictured above) who collected the serpent, said it was 'highly probable' the seven-foot python was sizing up the possum as its next meal
Crews are on the scene of a Sunday building fire in Gettysburg.

According to the Gettysburg Fire Department, a second alarm was called for a fire that broke out late Sunday morning on the 200 block of Steinwehr Avenue.

Working Fire: GFD Units operating on the 2nd alarm building fire in the 240 block of Steinwehr Ave. E1-1, E1-2, TK1 operating. Chief 1 with the command. Please use caution in the area.  Posted by Gettysburg Fire on Sunday, February 14, 2021

The fire department is asking that people use caution in the area.

Photos from the scene show an intense fire shooting from the second floor of a building. A sign on the building indicates it may be a collectibles shop.

There is no word yet on injuries.
The visit is also expected to cover information about the annually held Indo-Russia summit, which is to be hosted by India this time. Matters related to the Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS) summit that New Delhi will host this year are also expected to be discussed.

Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla is set to visit Russia this week. The main subject of his visit is expected to be revitalising the Chennai-Vladivostok Maritime Corridor and also improving the trading network that is valued at about $10 billion (Rs 7,000 crore).

Though investments between Russia and India have reached $30 billion, mainly in fossil fuel, but the trade between them is not so promising and is holding steady at just $10 billion. Economists cite the Russian economys build, the general ignorance of the Indo-Russian trades potential capabilities and the lack of interest from the private forms of India.

The visit is also expected to cover information about the annually held Indo-Russia summit, which is to be hosted by India this time. Matters related to the Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS) summit that New Delhi will host this year are also expected to be discussed. The meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Vladimir Putin had to be scrapped off in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic. As such, this diplomatic visit is being given high priority and will go over many important matters.

Also read: 2 years of Pulwama attack: PM Modi, Amit Shah and others pay tribute to CRPF jawans

Also read: #FreedomForTibet: Tibetans in-exile commemorate 108th Tibetan Independence Day, demand release from CCPs clutches

Although Russia is the primary rival of the US in its superpower status, India has maintained relatively close ties with both. Although, by hindsight, Russia is a much closer ally of India and has been since the days of the Soviet Union, helping India out in the United Nations. The new change in leadership in the US shows no sign of cooling down of relations with Russia, as Joe Biden has been accusing Russia of hacking into American servers for all sorts of purposes and also criticised Russia for arresting the dissident Alexei Navalny.

Also read: Canadian PM Justin Trudeau praises India for handling of farmers protest
BRUSSELS, FEB 15 - Maro Draghi is a real European and embodies wise policies, German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz said on the margins of a Eurogroup meeting in Brussels on Monday. Asked for his opinion on the new Italian premier, Scholz said the ex-ECB chief "represents very smart policies and he is a true European. "Italy has once more chosen a pro-European government, and that is an excellent sign," he said. "Italy is one of the countries that are benefitting the most from Euroepan solidarity and decisions taken in Europe" to tackle the COVID crisis, said Scholz, referring to the 209 billion euros Rome is set to get in EU recovery funds, pending approval of its spending plans. He said Draghi, who is credited with saving the eurozone with his famed 'whatever it takes' vow as central bank chief, "is certainly a very pro-European government leader". (ANSA).
As many as 13. 5 lakh students had appeared for the Class 12 or intermediate level exams which were held between 1 and 13 February 2021

The Bihar School Education Board (BSEB) is not going to release the Class 12 board results 2021 this month, as per media reports.

A board official has confirmed to The Indian Express, that the evaluation process will take some time and hence the results will not be out in February. The official further said that although the lockdown situation had affected the evaluation process last year, BSEB had announced the Class 12 result in record 40 days. This years results would be out soon as well, he added.

The official said: The evaluation process will take some time, but can be faster than last year as the pandemic phase is almost over.

In 2021, the Class 12 or intermediate level exams started on 1 February and continued till 13 February, 2021.

Once the results are announced, students can access them through the board's official website biharboardonline.bihar.gov.in.

As per a tweet by the official handle of BSEB, as many as 13.5 lakh students appeared for the BSEB Class 12 exams this year.

The Bihar board exams were one of the first board exams to be conducted in 2021, with several other state and national boards postponing the exams.

According to a report in Times Now, a total of 13.50 lakh students appeared for the BSEB Class 12 examinations that concluded on 13 February. The exams were held at 1,473 centres across the state.

As per the report, last year the Bihar Board result for Class 12 was announced in March and overall 80.44 percent of the students passed the exams. The results were declared in 25 days. Neha Kumari topped the Science Stream last year, while Kausar Fatma and Sudhanshu Narayan Choudhary topped in the Commerce and Arts stream respectively.
Taking action on Haryana minister Anil Vij for his tweet against climate activist Disha Ravi, social media giant Twitter on Monday, has sent a notice to Vij based on a complaint it received from a German user. The notice reads that under German 'Network Enforcement Act', Twitter has to provide notice to users reported by people from Germany. Vij had tweeted for 'eradication of those who thought against the nation, be it Disha Ravi or anyone else'. Twitter has investigated and found that it is 'not subject to removal'. Disha Ravi - founder of Friday for Future (India) has been remanded to police custody for five days by the Patiala House Court, after she was picked by Delhi police in Bengaluru in connection to the 'Toolkit' case.

Rajnath Singh backs Delhi Police to the hilt; slams 'neighboring nations' nefarious acts'

Anil Vij gets Twitter notice

Toolkit case: BJP MP likens 21-yr old Disha Ravi to Ajmal Kasab, says 'No one above law'

Disha Ravi arrested

Delhi police's special cell arrested 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi for allegedly disseminating the 'toolkit' related to farmers' protests on social media- the same one shared by climate activist Greta Thunberg in Bengaluru on Sunday. Arguing for the Delhi Police, the public prosecutor alleged a large conspiracy against the government of India to rebuild the Khalistan group via the toolkit and claimed that there were thousands of people involved in it. In her defence, Disha Ravi claimed that she had edited just two lines of the toolkit and said that she was influenced by the farmers' protests and thereby extended her support to them. She also argued that every party, including the BJP, had its own toolkit and that she was not aware of any large conspiracy behind the toolkit, breaking down in court.

Justifying her arrest, Delhi police stated that Ravi had done more than 'editing 2 lines of the toolkit' document. Alleging that Ravi had started a Whatsapp group to collaborate with 'toolkit' authors - pro-Khalistani group 'Poetic Justice Foundation', Delhi police added that she had shared the document with Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg and later asked to remove the 'main doc'. Police had already filed an FIR on the authors of the 'toolkit document', claiming it aimed to create disaffection and disharmony under sections like sedition, criminal conspiracy, spreading hatred among communities. Pointing out the 'prior actions' section of the tool-kit - authored by pro-Khalistani group Poetic Justice Foundation (PJF), police said that it was a 'planned conspiracy to execute such a plan'.

Subramanian Swamy responds on Tripura CM's 'BJP planning govts in Nepal, Sri Lanka' reveal

What is the 'toolkit'?

Under its 'AskIndiaWhy' campaign, PFJ had created a toolkit which was shared by Thunberg, titled 'Global Farmers Strike- First Wave' - which encouraged people to organise solidarity protests either at or near Indian Embassies, local government offices or offices of various multinational Adani and Ambani companies. It also urged people to participate in the farmers' tractor rally on Republic Day - which had ended in violence - killing one farmer and injuring 510 police officers. Later PFJ updated their 'toolkit' - which was again shared by Thunberg, aiming to get global attention on the ongoing farmers' protest urging people to tweet at PMO & Tomar, call or email govt representatives, sign online petitions, and on-ground action near the closest Indian Embassy, Media House, or your local Govt. office on 13th/14th February 2021. The updated 'toolkit' removed the Republic Day plan from the AskIndiaWhy's 'prior actions' - the 'plan' has now been denounced by PFJ.

BJP plans to expand into Nepal & Sri Lanka, form govts there: Tripura CM quotes Amit Shah
Corea helped enrich the lexicon of jazz, merging its harmonic language with the heaviness (and amplification) of rock and funk.

Chick Corea, the pioneering keyboardist and bandleader who died last Tuesday at 79, will be forever regarded as a crucial architect of jazz-rock fusion.

Its a fitting one-line tribute. Whether on his own, leading the collective Return to Forever or accompanying giants like Miles Davis (on landmark albums including In a Silent Way and Bitches Brew), Corea helped enrich the lexicon of jazz, merging its harmonic language with the heaviness (and amplification) of rock and funk. But no description, even one this broad, can encompass a vision so limitless.

After all, formal styles are only an afterthought  an outgrowth of the creative impulse, Corea told The New York Times in 1983. Nobody sits down and decides to specifically write in a predetermined style. A style is not something you learn so much as something that you synthesise. Musicians dont care if a given composition is jazz, pop or classical music. All they care about is whether it is good music  whether it is challenging and exciting.

For more than five decades, Corea modified his sound to follow that simple maxim  chasing whims from bebop to free jazz to fusion to contemporary classical. He recorded close to 90 albums as a bandleader or co-leader. And he always prioritised melody and musicality over empty-calorie showmanship (though few could rival his raw skill on the Fender Rhodes).

Here are 12 of his elite studio and live performances.

Miles Runs the Voodoo Down (1970)

Corea and Joe Zawinul form a wall of Rhodes on this slinky, funky cut from Miles Davis Bitches Brew, punctuated by John McLaughlins ice-pick guitars and Davis sighing trumpet. The rhythm section is so dense, its hard to savour it all: two electric basses (Dave Holland and Harvey Brooks), two drum sets (Don Alias and Jack DeJohnette) and the congas of Juma Santos. Good thing it lasts 14 minutes. The keyboardists shift from question marks to exclamation points  one moment prodding against the groove, the next soloing in colorful bursts of noise. Trust yourself was Davis philosophy, Corea said in 2020. When he says, Play what you dont hear, he means, trust your imagination. Trust yourself to say, I dont know what Im going to do next, but Im just going to do it because its fun. Because I love it.

Chris (1970)

Corea splatters electric piano all across this nine-minute monster from guitarist Larry Coryells Spaces, a pillar of early fusion. The arrangement seems to teeter between structure and improvisation, straight groove and cosmic freedom. The lineup is the definition of a supergroup: Corea and Coryell, plus McLaughlin on guitar, Miroslav Vitous (later of Weather Report) on double bass and Billy Cobham on drums.

Spain (1973)

The rare fusion tune with a shelf life as a jazz standard, Spain remains Coreas signature composition  covered by artists as different as Stevie Wonder and Bela Fleck. The original, from Return to Forevers Light as a Feather, is untouchable: Over nearly 10 minutes, the keyboardists hands joyfully pirouette across the Rhodes, his mellifluous melodies matched by Flora Purims tranquil coo and Joe Farrells fluttering flute. The chorus, with its clipped keyboard phrases and enthusiastic hand claps, ranks alongside Weather Reports main Birdland theme as one of the catchiest moments in fusion history.

Space Circus, Part I / Space Circus, Part II (1973)

In its infancy, Return to Forever already rivaled the intensity of most 70s rock bands. But it sounded positively massive on its third album, adding two new recruits (powerhouse drummer Lenny White and guitarist Bill Connors) and letting Stanley Clarke switch to electric bass. The group showed its full dynamic range on this two-parter from Return to Forevers Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy, opening with Coreas dreamy Rhodes theme before erupting into tightly clenched funk. Connors bruising guitar and Clarkes distorted bass drift into psych-rock territory  but even when the keyboardist lays back a bit, his steady chords remain the heartbeat of the ensemble.

Song to John (Part I) / Song to John (Part II) (1975)

Coreas acoustic piano slips into sumptuous New Age territory on the first half of these tracks from Clarkes Journey to Love, trading fanfare with Clarkes bowed bass and McLaughlins acoustic guitar. The group nails down an intense Latin groove on the second half, with McLaughlin and Corea sparking fireworks. In the liner notes, Clarke dedicated the two-part piece to John Coltrane  and it lives up to the billing.

Sorceress (1976)

The definitive Return to Forever lineup  Corea, Clarke, White and guitarist Al Di Meola  splintered after the 1976 album Romantic Warrior. But as this funky odyssey proves, they went out at a near peak. White is credited as composer here, and his fidgety drum groove certainly keeps the engine running. But Sorceress also finds Corea at perhaps his most versatile, keyboardwise  weaving in atmospheric pads, squiggly synth leads and Latin themes on acoustic piano.

Spanish Fantasy (1976)

Corea was always influenced by Latin music, explaining that flavour, I find, is mostly in everything I do, to Billboard in 2019. Its a part of me. I dont know how to differentiate it. But he never plunged in more deeply than on his 10th solo LP, My Spanish Heart. The record peaks with this whiplash four-part suite, which sprawls from elegant string and brass sections to acoustic piano interludes to the tastiest jazz-rock rave-ups this side of Steely Dans Aja.

Short Tales of the Black Forest (1976)

Composed by Corea for his Forever bandmate Di Meolas debut solo album, Land of the Midnight Sun, this miniepic makes good use of its virtuoso flash  both players sound like they could drift away from their instruments into the sky. But there are plenty of graceful melodies packed into these 5 1/2 minutes. Midway through, Corea slips into gentle chordal comping while Di Meola ascends and descends the scales. Corea even gets to showcase his marimba skills, adding extra drama to a climactic flourish.

Homecoming (1979)

Corea and Herbie Hancock, two of fusions elite keyboardists, embarked on an acoustic duo tour in 1978, and the pair, both veterans of the Miles Davis bands, interlock to a startling degree on the two live LPs that emerged from those dates. One highlight is a 19-minute version of Homecoming from CoreaHancock, expertly merging their instruments into one organism. They move from beauty to ugliness on a dime  midway through, the piece morphs into a section of guttural grunting, percussive pounding and prepared piano madness.

Rumble (1986)

Like most fusion giants who survived into the mid-80s, Corea embraced the colors and contours of the time, forming his Elektric Band with drummer Dave Weckl, bassist John Patitucci and alternating guitarists Scott Henderson and Carlos Rios. The rhythm section runs free on this neon-coated number from The Chick Corea Elektric Band, defined by its twisting, Zappa-like rhythms and Coreas comically bright synthesisers.

Spain (Live) (1992)

Corea stretched out Spain like taffy over the decades, retaining his interest by reworking it for various settings and band configurations. (By 1976 or so, I started to tire of the song, he told The Atlantic in 2011. I started playing really perverted versions of it  Id refer to it just for a second, then Id go off on an improvisation.) One of his most stunning later-day renditions is this live acoustic duet from Play with vocalist Bobby McFerrin, who breathes new life into the piece with his divine falsetto, rumbling bass lines and body percussion. For all the sublime technique, the biggest revelation is hearing these two giants lock into perfect symmetry on the main theme.

Crystal Silence (2008)

Corea reteamed with vibraphonist Gary Burton for the Grammy-winning, double-disc live LP The New Crystal Silence, built largely on reworked pieces from Coreas back catalog. The duo had collaborated on and off for decades, and the music here feels appropriately natural and lived-in  even full-blown Zen, like on the expanded take on Crystal Silence. Captured in crisp, studio-level fidelity, Corea and Burton trade phrases and counterpoint patterns, with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra rounding out that breezy conversation.

Ryan Reed c.2021 The New York Times Company

Disha Ravi, a 22-year-old climate activist, was recently arrested by the Cyber Cell team of Delhi Police from Bengaluru for allegedly sharing with Greta Thunberg the toolkit related to the farmers protest against the Centres three farm laws.

On Sunday (February 14, 2021), the activist was picked up from her house for questioning and later arrested. A senior police officer said that this was the first arrest in connection with toolkit case. 'Toolkit' is a term activists use for a campaign information document.

Disha Ravi, as claimed by the police force, was an editor of the 'toolkit Google doc' and 'key conspirator' in the documents formulation and dissemination.

The police also said that Ravi and others collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State.

The Delhi Police took to Twitter and stated that Ravi was the one who shared the toolkit document with Greta Thunberg, a teen climate activist, who had shared the toolkit to lend her support to the farmers agitation against the three farm reform laws.

Disha Ravi is a graduate in Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) from Mount Carmel College in Bengaluru. On her social media handles, she has described herself as co-founder of a group named Fridays For Future India.

She regularly writes columns and articles in leading news portals on climate action and is a familiar name in important climate forums frequented by youth activists across the globe.

In an interview with Auto Report Africa in 2020, Ravi spoke about how she found her passion for climate activism and said, My motivation to join climate activism came from seeing my grandparents, who are farmers, struggle with the effects of the climate crisis.

At the time, I wasnt aware that what they were experiencing was the climate crisis because climate education is non-existent where Im from. Only when I did my research, did I find out about it, she added.

Dishas role came under suspicion by Delhi Police after climate activist Greta Thunberg tweeted a toolkit document which the police alleged had led to the January 26 violence in New Delhi. Without naming Thunberg in the FIR, the Delhi Police went ahead to register the case against the authors of the toolkit.
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Lucknow, Feb 15 : Giridhari Vishwakarma, the main accused in the murder of another history-sheeter Ajit Singh last month in Lucknow, was shot dead by the Lucknow police in an encounter at 2.30 a.m. on Monday.

The police spokesman said they were taking Giridhari to Khargapur area in Vibhuti Khand in Gomti Nagar to retrieve the weapon used in the Ajit Singh murder on January 6, when the accused shoved aside a sub inspector, snatched his revolver and tried to flee at the railway crossing.

Other members of the police team chased Giridhari and shot him.

The police took an injured Giridhari to the Ram Manohar Lohia hospital where he was declared brought dead.

Two police personnel have also been injured in the encounter.

It may be recalled that a history sheeter, Ajit Singh, was shot dead in Gomti Nagar area on January 6.

The main accused, Giridhari, was arrested from Delhi on January 11.

Giridhari was in police custody from February 13 to 16 and the police was trying to retrieve the weapon used in the crime.
Inspector De Luca (Alessandro Preziosi) is billed in the miniseries bearing his name: Hes not a fascist. Hes not a partisan. Hes just a cop. (Radio-Television Italy)

Inspector De Luca: Fighting for Truth Amid Madness

In corrupt or brutal regimes, the truth is often a crime. The Inspector De Luca detective novels of Carlo Lucarelli (born in 1960) serve as a reminder of this fact. Although fun and stylish examples of the police procedural genre, these slim books are fictional examples of the eternal morality of justice and how often this morality gets perverted by politics.

While a student working on a thesis about the police during the Italian Social Republic (19431945, also known as the Republic of Salo), Lucarelli discovered a unique survivora real police officer who managed to serve Mussolini, the communist Italian partisans, and the democratic government of postwar Italy. In this man, Lucarelli found the germ of a character that would eventually blossom to become Inspector De Luca.

In the words of scholar Barbara Pezzotti, De Luca is the embodiment of apolitical professionalism, and in Lucarellis three novels (Carte Blanche, The Damned Season, and Via delle Ocha), De Luca manages to solve his cases while simultaneously trying to keep from being swallowed up by the rapid tides of Italian politics.

Carte Blanche

Carte Blanche (published in Italian in 1990 and translated into English in 2006) sees De Luca, a veteran of the infamous Black Brigades paramilitary unit, return to regular policing duties in Bologna. This is where De Luca would rather be instead of working with the political police.

Not long after arriving in the city, De Luca investigates the murder of Rehinard Vittorio, a notorious playboy. The crime is a classic whodunit that even features a locked room. Vittorio is the archetypal bad boy character who seems to take pleasure in breaking female hearts. Hes another type of scoundrel in that he also deals in narcotics.

The problem for De Luca is that Vittorio is a member of the Republican Fascist Party, which still rules northern Italy in 1945. Fascist politicos are convinced that interparty rivals are to blame for Vittorios murder, and they lean heavily on De Luca to confirm their suspicions. De Luca is too honest for such tactics, and he discovers a secret network of party members, including the deceased Vittorio, trying to save their skins from postwar war-crime trials by cooperating with the Vatican and the Allies.

De Luca knows too much and is marked for assassination, but he manages to survive and solve the case.

Just as De Luca brings the guilty party to the police station, he finds the city in full retreat from the advancing Allies and the mostly communist Italian partisans. In the face of such developments, nobody cares about a simple murder.

The Damned Season

In The Damned Season, De Luca, despite being targeted for execution because of his former work with Mussolinis government, winds up working with the communist partisans. Here, in a rural Italy rife with civil war and factionalism, De Luca must solve the murder of a popular local peasant.

It does not take De Luca long at all to anger the partisans, for one of his chief suspects is a powerful local commander and hero of the anti-fascist resistance. Once again, politics interferes with De Lucas job, and once again, he solves his case but winds up facing harsh punishment for his pains.

Via delle Ocha

The final De Luca novel, Via delle Ocha, has De Luca back in Bologna during the contentious 1948 Italian general election. The murder in this novel occurs in Bolognas infamous red light district (hence the novels title).

The victim is a boxer and member of the Italian Communist Party. Several of De Lucas comrades, especially the former members of the partisans, suspect the murder to be the handiwork of right-wing radicals, including unrepentant fascists.

De Luca suspects others, including a particular woman of the night, to whom he develops a strong attraction.

Sadly, Via delle Ocha turns out no different for De Luca, as he is pulled from his case and is sent to provide crowd control for a massive riot following the attempted assassination of Palmiro Togliatti, the leader of the Italian Communist Party.

From Paper to Screen

Lucarellis trilogy was turned into an incredible Italian television miniseries in 2008. Starring Alessandro Preziosi as De Luca, Inspector De Luca (currently available on Amazon Prime), perfectly captures the brilliance and absurdity of Lucarellis novels.

De Luca (Alessandro Preziosi) fights for justice in a time of political upheaval. (Radio-Television Italy)

As for the show, it stays faithful to the original novels while also adding a dose of noir grit and 1940s glamor. One would be hard-pressed to find a better way to spend a lazy Sunday than by binge watching this incredible miniseries. It also has maybe the best tagline in television history: Hes not a fascist. Hes not a partisan. Hes just a cop.

A Trilogy for Today

While Lucarelli belongs to a wider culture of left-leaning detective fiction writers who enjoy complicating a stuffy and reactionary genre, and while he toys with audience expectations by muddying up the typical detective novel formula, he saw beyond those views: His De Luca novels provide insight into themes that go beyond politics.

Carlo Lucarelli in 2008. (Niccolo Caranti/CC BY-SA 3.0)

De Luca is a hero because he is apolitical and loyal only to the truth. He earns the respect of fascists, communists, and democrats because he is honest and cannot be swayed by either strong-arm tactics or bribery. However, this same quality makes De Luca an enemy of multiple regimes, all of whom see his work as threats to their rule. This is why De Lucas cases never end cleanly, as politics trumps justice.

This is the dire warning hidden in these fun detective novels. Italy, which experienced a prolonged period of political instability and violence known as the Years of Lead, tore itself apart because of radical politics. The United States in 2021 is on the verge of its own Years of Lead. In such scenarios, the first casualty is often the truth; good, decent, and apolitical people tend to be caught in between and punished.

So, while you enjoy these well-written novels and the excellent television show, take the lessons and warnings of De Luca to heart.

Benjamin Welton is a freelance writer based in New England.
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Mr Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, the Majority Leader and Minister-designate for Parliamentary Affairs, has bemoaned the high attrition rate of experienced legislators from the House and called for measures to help retain them.



Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, who is also the Member of Parliament (MP) for Suame, attributed the loss of experienced MPs to the monetisation of politics in Ghana, which he described as a reality, and advised political parties to confront the issue to stem the tide.



Not until the parties confront this reality, it will be difficult to stop the high attrition rate, the Majority Leader told the Appointments Committee of Parliament during his vetting on Friday for the Parliamentary Affairs portfolio.



He held this position in the first term of President Nana Akufo-Addos Government, and has been nominated to serve again.



The Appointment Committee, chaired by Mr Joseph Osei-Owusu, First Deputy Speaker, recommends to Parliament for approval of persons nominated to serve as ministers, deputy ministers, the Chief Justice and other justices of the Supreme Court, among others.



Born on February 3, 1957, Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, trained as a planner from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, went into various professions and first became MP in January 1997.



The MP, whose constituents recognised him as Sompahene, meaning; King of Good Service, regretted the exit from the House of Dr Mark Assibey-Yeboah, the Chairman of the Finance Committee and MP for New Juaben, Mr Inusah Fuseini, former Ranking Member on the Committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, and Mr Joseph Yieleh Chireh, former MP for Wa West.



He proposed a discussion on what could be done to retain such MPs to maintain the quality of legislators in the House.



He advised his colleagues not to portray themselves as agents of development at the grassroots, adding: "Let us learn useful lessons from our conduct."



Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu noted that chief executives of the metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies were not hounded for developmental projects, but when MPs went to solicit votes, the people asked them if they were aware of their challenges.



He argued further that the MPs Common Fund, on which they fell to support development projects in their communities, was not enough.



The Parliamentary Affairs Minister-designate justified the existence of that ministry, explaining that he persuaded colleague MPs to support government policies brought to the House for approval.



It is absolutely important to have a Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs. 95% of public business in Parliament is government business. You need the leader of government business in order to be able to persuade his colleagues on a good policy that must be supported by Parliament, the Minister-designate said.



You need the Parliamentary Affairs Minister to be in Cabinet, where policy evolves to appreciate the underpinnings of any policy so that when he comes to Parliament to lead the business of the House, hell then be able to get the buy-in of his colleagues.



Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu argued that space should be created for heads of constitutional bodies to directly answer to the House.



On the review of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, he called for a holistic approach to its review.



The Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs is one of the specialised ministries set-up under Section 11 of the Parliamentary Service Act (Act 460), with the mandate of deepening good governance.



It is expected to be the main link between the Executive and the Legislature. The Ministry was proscribed in 2009 and recreated in January 2017, through Executive Instrument 28.

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.

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Police in Florida have arrested a mother and her live-in boyfriend on manslaughter charges after the woman's young toddler drowned in a swimming pool as the couple napped.

Amanda Davis and Charner Williams, both 30, of Titusville, were arrested on Sunday and booked into the Brevard County Jail on charges of aggravated manslaughter of a child in connection with the drowning death of the woman' 23-month-old daughter, Athena Blevins. The child would have turned two years old on Friday.

According to the police, Athena was found by the couple's roommate unresponsive in the pool at their home in the 700 block of Knox McRae Drive at around 1.30pm on Saturday.

Amanda Davis (left) and Charner Williams (right), both 30, have been charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child in the drowning death of Davis' 23-month-old daughter Athena Blevins

An arrest affidavit obtained by DailyMail.com states that the roommate initially thought it was a 'doll' floating in the pool, but quickly realized it was Athena.

The roommate pulled the child out of the water and performed CPR on the girl, who he noted was already turning blue, until paramedics responded to the scene and took over the life-saving measures.

'The parents did not wake up until paramedics arrived on scene,' police stated in a press release.

Athena was transported to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

According to investigators, Davis and Williams had taken no steps to prevent their daughter from accessing the pool, or running into the road.

During an interview with police, Davis told detectives she and Williams had been awake all night until 4 or 5am, and they last saw Athena asleep in her toddler bed in their room.

The mother explained that Athena had recently learned how to open the sliding door to the pool, but neither she not Williams had not taken any measures to childproof the door.

Davis told authorities she and Williams are both recovering heroin addicts and have been sober for 60 days.

Detectives later executed a search warrant at the couple's home, leading to the discovery of what police described as a 'myriad' of drug paraphernalia and small bags containing white powder, which they said was easily accessible to the toddler.

The couple's roommate found the toddler floating unresponsive in the pool at their home on Knox McRae Drive in Titusville, Florida, on Saturday

Both Davis and Williams then admitted to using heroin, cocaine and marijuana prior to their daughter's drowning, according to the affidavit.

Williams blamed his roommate for leaving an exterior door unlocked and 'took no responsibility for [Athena's] death.'

The parents remained jailed without bond on Monday. They are due back in court on March 11.

Arrest records indicate that Williams has a criminal history that includes convictions for possession of a controlled substance and driving while license suspended habitual offender.

Not everyone is a Middle East expert. In fact, few Americans are. But most if not all Americans should have some depth of knowledge about the Middle Eastern terrorist group Hezb'allah (translated as "party of god," which is often written as "Hezbollah").

We should be aware (because it should be taught and media should remind us) that on October 23, 1983, Hezb'allah murdered 241 U.S. servicemen and 64 others when it bombed the barracks housing the multinational peacekeeping force in Beirut, Lebanon. French servicemen and civilians were killed in the bombing as well. According to Marine Times: "The bombing killed 220 Marines, 18 sailors and three soldiers, and was the deadliest day the Marine Corps has seen since the fight for Iwo Jima, Japan, during World War II."

That alone should be reason enough for us  and particularly a journalist such as Virginia Heffernan who invokes the group  to know plenty about Hezb'allah. But as is often heard on commercials for new cooking gadgets: "Wait, there's more."

On April 18, 1983, a group tied to Hezb'allah bombed the U.S. embassy in Beirut. This time, 63 were murdered, including 17 Americans.

On June 25, 1996, Hezb'allah (Hezb'allah al-Hejaz  with the same ideology and inspiration as Lebanon's Hezb'allah) struck again  this time bombing Khobar Towers, a complex in Khobar, Saudi Arabia. Some 2,000 U.S. military personnel lived there while participating in Operation Southern Watch, which was enforcing the "no-fly zone" in southern Iraq. The attack left 19 American Air Force personnel murdered and 498 of many nationalities wounded.

Meanwhile, today, Hezb'allah sends fighters into Syria to murder and maim hundreds of thousands of civilians as it supports the Assad regime, and it has more than 120,000 sophisticated rockets in Lebanon aimed at our Israeli friends and allies. Hezb'allah has already instigated multiple wars with Israel. Hezb'allah's leader, Hasan Nasrallah, bent on committing genocide against the Jewish people, has said how thrilled he is that more Jews are moving to Israel because it will save him and his group the trouble of hunting down Jews throughout the world to kill them.

Hezb'allah has also driven most of the Christian community from Lebanon via violence, intimidation, and threats. A massive, devastating explosion that hit Beirut last year and made international news has been attributed to Hezb'allah weapons stockpiles. Hezb'allah is a proxy army and mercenary militia that does the bidding of Iran throughout the world  and it has a foothold in our hemisphere through its activities and interactions with drug cartels south of our southern border.

Hezb'allah has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada, Britain, Germany, and other countries.

Yet with this extensive a record of death and destruction, according to Los Angeles Times columnist Virginia Heffernan recently, Hezb'allah is little more than a social service organization that recruits candidates for elections amid a rivalry within Islam  and is on a par with a President Trump-supporting neighbor of Heffernan who was kind enough to have plowed snow from her driveway.

This is what Heffernan wrote about Hezb'allah:

Hezbollah, the Shiite Islamist political party in Lebanon, also gives things away for free. The favors Hezbollah does for people in the cities Tyre and Sidon probably don't involve snowplows, but, like other mafias, Hezbollah tends to its own  the Shiite sick, elderly and hungry. They offer protection and hospitality and win loyalty that way. And they also demand devotion to their brutal, us-versus-them anti-Sunni cause. Some of us are family, the favors say; the rest are infidels.

The trivialization of treachery, barbarism, and mass murder continues in some quarters of academia, punditry, and elsewhere, and often in those same quarters, everyone with an opposing political view is labeled a "Nazi" and the person they rally behind is a "Hitler."

While Hezb'allah fighters have run for office and been elected in Lebanon, that does not make Hezb'allah a "political party" any more than someone who folds a piece of paper into the shape of an airplane and flings it is a pilot. When Americans think of "political party," our inner word association comes up with Democrats or Republicans. On their worst days, those with a "D" or "R" following their name are as innocent as a newborn when compared to Hezb'allah.

Nor does Hezb'allah bear any resemblance whatsoever to the Salvation Army, the American Red Cross, or other actual social service organizations.

Yes, Virginia: Hezb'allah is a sophisticated organization of extremist Islamist killers and would-be genocidal maniacs.

How could Heffernan have gotten Hezb'allah so wrong? Could she really be that vacuous? After all, according to her own website, "Heffernan has been called 'America's preeminent cultural critic,' 'a public intellectual for the 21st century,' and among the 'finest living writers of English prose.'" Wikipedia says Heffernan "graduated summa cum laude from the University of Virginia (1991). She also received an English Literature Master's Degree (1993) and Ph.D (2002) from Harvard University."

Was Heffernan trying to be too cute by half in equating supporters of the former president with genocidal terrorists  meaning she knows full-well who and what actually Hezb'allah is? Or was she purposefully trying to dumb down her readers into thinking that these mostly Lebanese murderers and their Iranian masters are really merely MAGA hatwearing right-wingers and thus nothing to worry about?

Given the state of much of what passes for journalism today, one is forced to assume that it is option #2.

Iran is on the cusp of achieving development of a nuclear weapon, as it continues to violate "restrictions" placed on it by the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (known colloquially as "the Iran deal"). It is so close, in fact, that even some Europeans are nervous because it has produced missile advancements that could place a nuclear weapon in the center of Paris. Iran stands ready to unleash Hezb'allah and its missile arsenal on Israel and her nearly 9 million citizens should Israel try to pre-empt Iran.

Meanwhile, Hezb'allah continues its rampages in Syria and its repression in Lebanon, where it has a stranglehold on the government and has enfeebled the military. In South and Central America, it has committed terrorist atrocities, including the bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, and even in Mexico, where it has been linked to drug cartels. Hezb'allah operatives have been convicted of criminal activity here in the United States.

All of this has occurred and continues with the blessing of Iran  as the Biden administration announced its eagerness to get back into a worthless and dangerous Iran deal that President Trump realized America should not be party to. The Iranian ayatollahs and their Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps would love for Americans to think they are little more than a nuisance neighbor rather than attempting to complete their ambition to destroy America and Israel and dominate over Sunni Muslims.

Given all of the above, we are better off with political activists wielding a snow plow rather than actual terrorists  and journalists armed with snow jobs. Americans need to be vigilant against both.

Steve Feldman is executive director of the Greater Philadelphia chapter of the Zionist Organization of America and former newspaper reporter and columnist.

Image: Rafiq Sarlie via Flickr, CC BY-ND 2.0.
During the visit of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to the United Arab Emirates, a number of important bilateral documents aimed at developing relations between the two countries were signed.

The documents were signed following the meeting of Ukrainian and UAE delegations in Abu Dhabi chaired by President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the press service of the President of Ukraine informs.

In particular, a Protocol between the Governments of Ukraine and the UAE amending the Agreement between the Government of Ukraine and the Government of the UAE on the avoidance of double taxation and the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to income and capital taxes was signed.

The implementation of this document will reduce fiscal burden on businesses, promote business activity and intensify economic activity, the Presidents press service emphasizes.

Moreover, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine and the Government of the UAE signed an agreement on cooperation in combating crime and terrorism, which will have a significant impact on improving bilateral partnership in security and counter-terrorism activity, as well as regulate specific issues of such partnership.

In addition, a Memorandum of Understanding was also signed between the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine and the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the UAE on mutual recognition and exchange of national driver's licenses.

A Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture of Ukraine and the Office of the UAE Minister of State for Food and Water Security, aimed to encourage foreign investment in agriculture and promote trade in agri-food products, was also signed. As noted, the conclusion of this document will have a positive impact on cooperation between Ukraine and the UAE in the field of food security and on increasing bilateral trade.

A Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in the field of tourism development was signed between the State Agency for Tourism Development of Ukraine and the UAE Ministry of Economy, which aims to intensify cooperation in the tourism sector and increase bilateral passenger traffic, the statement reads.

In addition, a Memorandum of Understanding in the field of land management between the State Service of Ukraine for Geodesy, Cartography and Cadastre and the Ministry of Climate Change and Environment of the UAE was signed to provide for the exchange of experience in the use and protection of agricultural land, preservation, reproduction and improvement of soil fertility, introduction and improvement of electronic services in land management, monitoring of the ecological condition of lands and soils due to the impact of climate change and negative processes.

As reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and First Lady Olena Zelenska make a state visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15.

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Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies Ludovic Orban declared on Monday that the bonuses granted to state employees represent a "complex" issue, which will be addressed in the bill to improve the public sector Wage Law.

"The issue of bonuses is a complex issue that will be addressed in the bill to improve the public sector Wage Law. If we propose amendments in the parliamentary debate on the state budget law, we will do it by mutual agreement within the coalition, after we make a decision and we announce it. On the other hand, with regard to the public sector, there already is a decision that has been taken to postpone by a year the 25 percent increase which was expected from 1 January 2021 for the salaries of public sector employees, there is also a decision taken to keep the validity of holiday vouchers that have not been used and not to issue new holiday vouchers for 2021, because there are holiday vouchers that were issued in 2019 and 2020 that have not been used and for which we have extended their validity and can be used," said Orban in Parliament.

According to him, some "small" corrections are still needed for this year's draft state budget.

He said he wished the parliamentary debate on the draft budget to take place as soon as possible.

"Every parliamentarian, every parliamentary group has the right to formulate proposals for amendments that will have to be debated. (...) The sooner we can finalize the debate and the adoption, the better it will be," the PNL leader said.

He said that more budget proposals can still be made and that it would be better for government coalition lawmakers not to table many amendments.

"For the health of the coalition and for the health of the debates, especially considering Prime Minister Florin Citu's official visit to Brussels, where there are certain commitments that we have made in relation to our EU partners, it would be very good for the bill to be passed in a form, if possible, the form adopted by the Government," Orban said.

He specified that the Minister of Health, Vlad Voiculescu, was present at the meeting of the coalition for discussions on the simple motion against him submitted by the Social Democratic Party (PSD).

During the coalition meeting, Ludovic Orban added, it was decided that the parliamentarians of the three parties should vote against the PSD simple motion against the Minister of Health.

"From my point of view, in terms of allocation by ministries, by main authorizing officers, it is the best possible budget that could be drawn up in the given conditions, in which we have to fit in a deficit target as close as possible to 7%, we must meet a need to reduce the structural deficit, to reduce spending in the medium and long term, and at the same time to maintain the system of taxes and duties without raising or introducing any new tax or levy," the Liberal leader added.
Ukraine and Georgia pledge to join efforts to counter Russian aggression

By Veronika Malinboym

According to the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announcement on February 10, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Vasiliy Bodnar, and Deputy Head of Georgias Diplomatic Mission to Ukraine David Bochorishvili, agreed to join the countries efforts in countering Russian aggression.Bodnar noted that it is very important to facilitate the development of the bilateral partnership between the countries, especially in the areas which benefit both Ukraine and Georgia. He noted that the bilateral ties should also facilitate the countries Euro-Atlantic integration aspirations:Ukraine and Georgia are both suffering from Russian military aggression, which is why it is necessary for us to maintain our ties in order to be able to counter the Kremlins threats. Together we should move forward towards NATO membership, and that alone will make us resilient to any external efforts aimed at damaging our partnership, Bodnar said and added that Georgia is Ukraines strategic partner.On February 13, the Spokesperson of the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry Oleg Nikolenko stated that Ukraine condemns the sentencing of an illegally detained Georgian citizen Zaza Gakheladze in the occupied region of Tskhinvali. Nikolenko stated that this action grossly violated international law, as well as Russian obligations under the ceasefire agreement achieved in 2008. He went on to say that the sentencing of Gakheladze showed that Russia aims to destabilize the security within the occupied territories and the region as a whole.Nikolenko called for Russia to immediately stop the destabilizing activities and release the illegally detained Georgian citizen. In his statement, Nikolenko underlined Ukraines continuous support for Georgias sovereignty and integrity of its internationally recognized borders and called for the international community to increase pressure on Russia to stop its aggression against Georgia and Ukraine and demand the de-occupation of their respective sovereign territories.Zaza Gakheladze, a citizen of Georgia, was shot and illegally detained by Russian occupation forces in 2020. In a trial that took place earlier this month, Gakheladze was sentenced to 12 years and 6 months in prison. The international community condemned the courts verdict on Gakheladzes case and called for Russia to immediately release him. PM Gakharia promised to spare no efforts in ensuring that Gakheladze is released to go back home as soon as possible, and stated that the negotiations with the strategic partners on the matter are already in full motion.

Mumbai: In his upcoming directorial 1962: The War In The Hills", actor-filmmaker Mahesh Manjrekar on Monday said he has attempted to showcase the humane side of soldiers who risk their lives to protect the country. The Disney+ Hotstar series, fronted by actor Abhay Deol, is set against the backdrop of the 1962 India-China War. It narrates the untold tale of bravery and valour of Army of 125 Indians who fought with 3,000 Chinese soldiers. During a virtual press conference, Manjrekar said he was fascinated with the shows setting and connected with it emotionally". The show is about those 125 soldiers who fought the war. They all had families back home, so we wanted to show their personal lives. Soldiers are like us, but the only difference is that they are ready to sacrifice their lives so that we are safe. We needed that element, their emotions needed to be out. We concentrated more on the human angle. There is war too, but we also put spotlight on those who laid down their lives," the 62-year-old actor-director said.

The 10-part series also features Sairat" star Aakash Thosar, Sumeet Vyas, Rohan Gandotra, Mahie Gill, Meiyang Chang, Rochelle Rao and Hemal Ingle. Manjrekar, known for helming films like Sanjay Dutt-starrer Vaastav" and Astitva", said the series gave him an opportunity to helm a war epic, a territory he hadnt explored before.

The director said the 1962 War was not only a historic event but also a part of the development of the country". We were a young nation and this was the first major war. We were fighting an enemy who was 10 times bigger. It was an extraordinary motivation to jump and take the opportunity. When the series came (to me), I felt fortunate," he added.

Gill, who was last seen in the Bhumi Pednekar-led film Durgamati", features on the show as a wife of a soldier. The actor said 1962: The War In The Hills" offers an insight on the emotionally difficult lives of those who are left behind when soldiers are called for duty. She (the character) is a brave woman who understands that the Army life comes with pleasure and pain. She understands her husband is a soldier first. Army wives sacrifice a lot, we need to salute them because no matter what, they always put up a brave face.

Its so important for them to be strong when they know their husbands have gone to a sensitive area, without knowing if theyd ever return. They double up as both father and mother for their children," she said. The show is set to premiere on February 26.

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Announcement of Periodic Review: Moody's announces completion of a periodic review of ratings of Banco Nacional de PanamaGlobal Credit Research - 15 Feb 2021New York, February 15, 2021 -- Moody's Investors Service ("Moody's") has completed a periodic review of the ratings of Banco Nacional de Panama and other ratings that are associated with the same analytical unit. The review was conducted through a portfolio review discussion held on 9 February 2021 in which Moody's reassessed the appropriateness of the ratings in the context of the relevant principal methodology(ies), recent developments, and a comparison of the financial and operating profile to similarly rated peers. The review did not involve a rating committee. Since 1 January 2019, Moody's practice has been to issue a press release following each periodic review to announce its completion.This publication does not announce a credit rating action and is not an indication of whether or not a credit rating action is likely in the near future. Credit ratings and outlook/review status cannot be changed in a portfolio review and hence are not impacted by this announcement. For any credit ratings referenced in this publication, please see the ratings tab on the issuer/entity page on www.moodys.com for the most updated credit rating action information and rating history.Key rating considerations are summarized below.Banco Nacional de Panama's (Banconal) Baa1 deposit and debt ratings reflect its standalone baseline credit assessment (BCA) of baa2 and Moody's assumption of full government support to the 100% government-owned bank. This assumption is based on the government's explicit guarantee to the bank's liabilities, Banconal's important public policy role and its large domestic market share.Banconal's baa2 BCA captures its solid funding structure resulting from the bank's access to cheap customer and public entities' deposits. In addition, Banconal maintains ample and high-quality liquidity buffers, as well as solid capitalization supported by moderate loan growth, good profitability and conservative dividend policy. The standalone credit profile also benefits from the bank's historically solid asset quality based on the large portion of low-risk mortgages and payroll loans to public employees in its loan portfolio. However, asset risks have increased since the pandemic started as a consequence of the unfavorable operating conditions in the country. This has already led to higher provisioning expenses and hurt profitability, which has historically been strong on the back of low funding costs, high operating efficiency and exemption from taxes.This document summarizes Moody's view as of the publication date and will not be updated until the next periodic review announcement, which will incorporate material changes in credit circumstances (if any) during the intervening period.The principal methodology used for this review was Banks Methodology published in November 2019. Please see the Rating Methodologies page on www.moodys.com for a copy of this methodology.This announcement applies only to EU rated, UK rated, EU endorsed and UK endorsed ratings. Non EU rated, non UK rated, non EU endorsed and non UK endorsed ratings may be referenced above to the extent necessary, if they are part of the same analytical unit.This publication does not announce a credit rating action. For any credit ratings referenced in this publication, please see the ratings tab on the issuer/entity page on www.moodys.com for the most updated credit rating action information and rating history. Jose Angel Montano VP - Senior Credit Officer Financial Institutions Group Moody's de Mexico S.A. de C.V Ave. Paseo de las Palmas No. 405 - 502 Col. Lomas de Chapultepec Mexico, DF 11000 Mexico JOURNALISTS: 1 888 779 5833 Client Service: 1 212 553 1653 M. Celina Vansetti-Hutchins MD - Banking Financial Institutions Group JOURNALISTS: 1 212 553 0376 Client Service: 1 212 553 1653 Releasing Office: Moody's Investors Service, Inc. 250 Greenwich Street New York, NY 10007 U.S.A. JOURNALISTS: 1 212 553 0376 Client Service: 1 212 553 1653  2021 Moodys Corporation, Moodys Investors Service, Inc., Moodys Analytics, Inc. and/or their licensors and affiliates (collectively, MOODYS). All rights reserved.CREDIT RATINGS ISSUED BY MOODY'S CREDIT RATINGS AFFILIATES ARE THEIR CURRENT OPINIONS OF THE RELATIVE FUTURE CREDIT RISK OF ENTITIES, CREDIT COMMITMENTS, OR DEBT OR DEBT-LIKE SECURITIES, AND MATERIALS, PRODUCTS, SERVICES AND INFORMATION PUBLISHED BY MOODYS (COLLECTIVELY, PUBLICATIONS) MAY INCLUDE SUCH CURRENT OPINIONS. MOODYS DEFINES CREDIT RISK AS THE RISK THAT AN ENTITY MAY NOT MEET ITS CONTRACTUAL FINANCIAL OBLIGATIONS AS THEY COME DUE AND ANY ESTIMATED FINANCIAL LOSS IN THE EVENT OF DEFAULT OR IMPAIRMENT. SEE APPLICABLE MOODYS RATING SYMBOLS AND DEFINITIONS PUBLICATION FOR INFORMATION ON THE TYPES OF CONTRACTUAL FINANCIAL OBLIGATIONS ADDRESSED BY MOODYS CREDIT RATINGS. CREDIT RATINGS DO NOT ADDRESS ANY OTHER RISK, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO: LIQUIDITY RISK, MARKET VALUE RISK, OR PRICE VOLATILITY. CREDIT RATINGS, NON-CREDIT ASSESSMENTS (ASSESSMENTS), AND OTHER OPINIONS INCLUDED IN MOODYS PUBLICATIONS ARE NOT STATEMENTS OF CURRENT OR HISTORICAL FACT. 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The Farmak pharmaceutical company (Kyiv), thanks to the decision of Kyiv City Council to sell a land plot to the pharmaceutical company, plans to develop an R&D cluster project.

According to a press release on the company's website, on February 11 this year, Kyiv City Council, by an absolute majority of votes, decided to sell the company the land on which the production facilities of Farmak plant have been located for 95 years.

The intended use of land defined by the document is the operation and maintenance of a complex of buildings and structures.

"Farmak expresses gratitude to the deputies for supporting the development of a virtuous and transparent business. Production facilities, research facilities, the laboratory and technical complex of the enterprise are internationally certified and meet the high requirements of European standards. Now, thanks to the positive decision of the city council, we will be able to implement another ambitious project - the creation of a pharmaceutical R&D cluster to build up scientific and technical potential," executive director of the company Volodymyr Kostiuk said.

He recalled that over the past 25 years, Farmak has invested more than $ 300 million in the modernization of the enterprise.

Technical director of Farmak Andriy Goy, in turn, emphasized that the creation of the R&D cluster will be a step forward towards the development of biomedical research and development in Ukraine and an important step towards the transformation of Kyiv into the capital of the European level.

"The main capital of Kyiv should be precisely an intellectual product," he said.

The company is confident that the emergence of an R&D cluster will contribute to an increase in revenues to the city budget from knowledge-intensive sectors of the economy.

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Hes no stranger to television himself, having appeared on Tens Recipe to Riches and headlined his own program on Foxtels Lifestyle channel: Darren Robertsons Charcoal Kitchen . The British-born Robertson has also been a guest judge on MasterChef . Thats where, along with LaBrooy, he met Allen.

Sometimes moons have to align with regards to dates and budgets, but MasterChef has opened doors, and the power of Andy Allen helped, for sure, laughs Robertson.

Classically trained chef Darren Robertson doesnt begrudge Andy Allen his shortcut to success via a MasterChef win. He imagines that Allens profile now as a judge on that show was a factor in their restaurant chain, Three Blue Ducks  which they run with chef Mark LaBrooy  scoring a self-titled series on Network Ten. Over six episodes, the surf-loving trio sources produce and inspiration for new dishes to serve in their six establishments spanning NSW, Victoria and Queensland.

I was very skeptical when Andy first joined us, Robertson reveals. I thought: Hes only going to be with us for 10 minutes and then hell go on to bigger and better things. But he was a legit grafter and a really good cook. Within two years of winning MasterChef, he was running the breakfast section [at the Three Blue Ducks flagship cafe in the Sydney beachside suburb of Bronte], which isnt incredibly glamorous.

Having done his apprenticeship at a Michelin-starred restaurant outside London, before rising to head chef at Tetsuyas, then risking it all to join the pop-up guerilla dining movement, Robertson has witnessed an enormous shift in the industry. Hes seen a move away from pretty grim, quite irresponsible conditions for kitchen staff, towards a more respectful culture, Tetsuya Wakuda memorably warning that screaming doesnt make the food taste better. And hes been part of the revolution in casual dining.

Back then, the thought of a fine-dining chef going to work in a cafe was quite an unusual move. There was snobbery around cafes. Its not like it is now with cafes and bakeries respectable places. I felt like doing something different not just chasing hats  and the decision to join a group of mates and have a bit more fun paid off.

Throughout the series, the three maintain a jocular rapport, whether catching lobsters in Shoal Bay, or roasting lamb with CWA members in Tullamore. The emphasis is on ethically grown ingredients and getting to know the farmers.
Hungary is mourning Jesuit Fr Ferenc Jalics, who years ago counted Pope Francis among his students. He died in Budapest on Saturday at the age of 94.

By Stefan J. Bos - Budapest, Hungary

The Hungarian Society of Jesus confirmed that Jesuit Fr Jalics passed away following a turbulent but spiritually fulfilling life. He authored numerous books on Christian spirituality, and became the founder of a school of contemplative prayer.



Born in Budapest in 1927, he saw the impact of conflict when he was sent to Nuremberg at the end of World War Two, after attending military school.



He came back to Hungary in 1946, where he decided to live for Christ and join the Jesuit Order. But it wasn't easy. Hungary's then Communist dictatorship was cracking down on devoted Christians and religion.

The Jesuit priest was even forced to leave his native Hungary in 1948, along with many other young Jesuits. However, he didn't give up his spiritual journey.



He first studied in Germany before graduating in philosophy at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium. In 1956, the Jesuits sent the young man to Chile and then a year later to Argentina, where he was ordained a priest in 1959.



He became a professor of Theology and the spiritual director of many young Jesuits.

In a recent interview, Fr Jalics revealed that Jesuit Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio was among his students at one point. That student would one day become Pope Francis.



Teaching the future Pope Francis

Fr Jalics said: "I taught a few technical short courses in Theology, as we have long and short courses."

He confirmed that Jorge Mario Bergoglio, now Pope Francis, was among those attending one of his classes. "In this respect, we had known each other for a very long time," he added, laughing.



While doing social and educational work in Argentina in 1976, Fr Jalics was abducted along with a Jesuit companion. He was held for five months during massive state repression of left-wing activists, union leaders, and social activists known as the "Dirty War."



But that experience did not stop his Jesuit ministry. In 1977 Fr Jalics moved to the United States and a year later to Germany.

Contemplative retreat house

In 1984, he founded a retreat house in the German town of Gries. It became a place of pilgrimage for Christians looking for contemplation.

He finally returned to Hungary in 2017, which had become a European Union member state. He is now mourned in his native Hungary as a spiritual leader.


The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Ken Ofori-Atta, Minister-designate for Finance, has written to the chairman of the Appointments Committee of Parliament to reschedule his appointment with the committee originally slated for Tuesday 16 February 2021.



According to a letter dated 14 February 2021 and addressed to the chairman of the Appointments Committee of Parliament, Ofori-Atta said he wishes to respectfully bring to the attention of the committee that, he is unable to appear before them as scheduled for Tuesday, 16 February, 2021.



I will travel to the United States of America to undergo a required medical intervention curently not avallable in Ghana. I am expected to be away for two weeks. Therefore, I kindly request your direction on arranging a new date for my appearance before the Committee. The Ministry of Finance is available to discuss the necessary consequential processes to arrange an alternative date Ofori-Atta stated in his letter to the Appointments Committee of Parliament.



The Minister for Finance-designate, Ken Ofori-Atta, left Ghana on Sunday, 14 February 2021 to the United States of America to seek medical attention. Speculation was rife on social media today, the 15 February 2021, that he had passed on into eternity.



However, his personal assistant, Michael Badiako, who is on the trip with him, announced with photo evidence that the Finance Minister designate is alive and in good spirits.



Good morning, Honourable Minister-designates Delta 157 flight has landed, a text message from Bediako confirming Ofori-Attas safe arrival in the US said.



He is in good spirits. He sends his regards. the text message concluded.



The message was accompanied by a picture of the minister-designate and his wife sitting at a waiting area at the John F. Kennedy Airport in New York.



The letter is copied to the Rt. Honour Speaker of Parliament, Alban Kingsford Sumana Bagbin, the Chief of Staff at the office of the President, Akosua Frema Osei Opare, the Clerk of Parliament and the chief director at the Ministry of Finance.

Source: asaaseradio









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Children as young as six-years-old will be tested with the COVID-19 vaccine, with the University of Oxford launching a new clinical study to review the safety of its vaccine with AstraZeneca in children for the first time.

Oxford says the trial will assess immune response in kids ages 6 and 17. This is an age group hit hard by school closures due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to its new statement.

Around 300 volunteers are already enrolled in the program and expecting to get their first vaccinations in this month, according to a CBS News report.

Up to 240 participants will receive the COVID-19 vaccine in the single-blind, randomized study. Meanwhile, the control group will receive a meningitis vaccine, which is safe for children and creates the same reaction.

"While most children are relatively unaffected by coronavirus and are unlikely to become unwell with the infection, it is important to establish the safety and immune response to the vaccine in children and young people as some children may benefit from vaccination," Andrew Pollard, the trials' chief investigator was quoted on a report.

Pollard noted that these new trials will extend our understanding of control of SARS-CoV2 to younger age groups.

Meanwhile, its fellow vaccine maker, Janssen, part of Johnson & Johnson, is now looking into testing on newborn babies and even pregnant women. It revealed last month trials in adults and showed that its single-dose COVID vaccine is 66 percent effective in preventing COVID-19, according to a Daily Mail report.

Related story: AstraZeneca Vaccine Less Effective Against South African Variant





AstraZeneca Vaccine

Its vaccine is cheaper and easier to distribute as compared to its vaccine candidate rivals. The vaccine has a target to produce three billion doses this year as it has multiple orders from countries, including the United States, Canada, Japan, Brazil, and United Kingdom.

Meanwhile, independent experts are advising the World Health Organization about immunization on Wednesday, recommending the use of AstraZeneca's vaccine even in countries that turned up concerns on COVID-19 variants in their populations.

The WHO experts' advice is heeded by health care officials globally. However, it does not mean that it issues a green light for the United Nations and its partners to ship the vaccine to countries that have signed up to receive the doses, according to an Associated Press report.

The AstraZeneca vaccine is deemed important as it forms the bulk of the stockpile required by the UN-backed effort known as COVAX. This effort aims to deploy vaccines to people around the world.

Meanwhile, an early study suggested that AstraZeneca might be less effective against a variant first seen in South Africa, causing the South African government to change its vaccination program against the COVID-19 pandemic.

South Africa's health minister said Wednesday that the government would start vaccinating health care workers with the still-unlicensed shot from Johnson & Johnson, instead of administering the one million AstraZeneca doses as initially planned.

Meanwhile, countries such as Germany, France, and Belgium have said that the AstraZeneca vaccine should not be used in older people due to insufficient data on the vaccine.

Related story: Brazil's Fiocruz to Seek Regulatory Approval for Oxford/AstraZeneca Vaccine


Former Married At First Sight star Martha Kalifatidis has revealed her least favourite thing about being famous is 'getting papped' in public.

The social media influencer, 32, told the Shameless podcast that living in Bondi Beach - Sydney's paparazzi hotspot - means she's always looking over her shoulder.

However, her attitude is rather perplexing given that major Hollywood stars such as Hugh Jackman have been able to cultivate a friendly and professional relationship with photographers in Bondi over the years.

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It's a hard knock life: Former Married At First Sight star Martha Kalifatidis (left, with boyfriend Michael Brunelli) says her least favourite thing about being famous is 'getting papped' in public

'I hate being papped more than anything,' confessed Martha.

She said her rent in North Bondi is 'astronomical' but she and her boyfriend, Michael Brunelli, 30, choose to live there because it's 'close to the beach'.

However, she apparently can't enjoy the beachside suburb to its fullest because of the photographers staking out the place.

'Do you want to know how many times I've actually swam in the beach? Because there are paps there, a very limited amount of times,' she said.

Home, sweet home? The social media influencer, 32, told the Shameless podcast that living in Bondi Beach - Sydney's paparazzi hotspot - means she's always looking over her shoulder

The former makeup artist even claimed she can't 'just go out to the store' anymore.

When she visits restaurants, Martha also tries to sit like she's 'posing' because sitting in a casual manner isn't conducive to flattering paparazzi photos.

'I live in Bondi so I'm always in a T-shirt and no shoes, that's how I am most of my day, just chilling. You can't do that. You always have to be almost sitting in a way like you're posing,' she said.

Local dilemma: Martha apparently can't enjoy the beachside suburb to its fullest because of the photographers staking out the place

The reality star also tries to avoid smoking in public - not because it's bad for her health, but because she doesn't want to be 'crucified' if she's photographed.

Martha went on to complain about a recent paparazzi set which she said made her look like a 'swamp monster'. In reality, she looked perfectly fine.

She then made the extraordinary claim she's 'so hyper-vigilant I can hear the camera's shutter' from a distance, which is almost impossible.

Bad habit: The reality star also tries to avoid smoking in public - not because it's bad for her health, but because she doesn't want to be 'crucified' if she's photographed

Martha's woe-is-me attitude is in stark contrast to genuine A-list celebrities in Australia, many of whom have a convivial relationship with the paps.

Hugh Jackman, who owns a house in Bondi, said on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in 2018 that he cuts an informal deal with local snappers whenever he's in Sydney.

'I have a thing with the paparazzi, it's weird,' the Wolverine star, 52, said.

'Down in Australia they'll come to me  and they all know me at this point  and I'll say to them, "Okay, what do you need, guys?"

A-lister: Martha's woe-is-me attitude is in stark contrast to genuine A-list celebrities, many of whom have a convivial relationship with the paps. Hugh Jackman, who owns a house in Bondi, said in 2018 that he cuts an informal deal with local snappers whenever he's in Sydney

'And one of the main guys there, Shane, says, "Well we need you at Bondi [Beach], shirt off," and I said, "Alright, tomorrow morning, eight o'clock."'

He added: 'So they all turn up, it's embarrassing, there's like 30 of them, and then they leave me alone.

'I figured, that's a deal, I'll take it... It's very civilised down there in that way, or maybe it's because they all want two weeks off!'
Abortion opponents argue the bill ensures that women who may change their minds about ending their pregnancies have information about stopping the process by taking a different drug after having taken the first of the two drugs for a medication abortion. Abortion-rights supporters maintain doctors would be forced to provide dubious information to their patients.
Welcome to my genealogy blog. Genea-Musings features genealogy research tips and techniques, genealogy news items and commentary, genealogy humor, San Diego genealogy society news, family history research and some family history stories from the keyboard of Randy Seaver (of Chula Vista CA), who thinks that Genealogy Research Is really FUN! Copyright (c) Randall J. Seaver, 2006-2021.
The European Union's executive arm is urging Hungary to allow a liberal-leaning radio station to continue broadcasting after it was forced off the air on February 15 following a refusal by the authorities to extend its broadcast license.

European Commission spokesman Christian Wigand said that the commission sent a letter to Hungary's permanent representation in Brussels last week to express concerns over Klubradio, the countrys last independent news radio station.

The commission asked Budapest to take urgent action to ensure that Klubradio can continue using its frequency until final decisions become legally binding, said Wigand, who warned of irreparable damage to the radio station.

He said the stations loss of its license occurred on the basis of highly questionable legal grounds, and that Hungary should respect the EUs charter of fundamental rights, including the rights to freedom of expression, information, and the freedom to conduct a business.

The spokesman said Hungary had not yet sent an official answer to the commission's letter.

Klubradio's content is often critical of Prime Minister Viktor Orbans government.

In September 2020, Hungary's National Media and Infocommunications Authority (NMHH) refused to extend Klubradio's seven-year operating license, saying the station "repeatedly infringed" on the compulsory registration law by twice submitting documents late.

Such violations usually incur fines and the NMHH's announcement raised new concerns about political pressure from the government on the media in the EU member state, which is ranked 89th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders's 2020 World Press Freedom Index.

Last week, Klubradio's appeal at a Budapest court to force the NMHH to issue a temporary broadcasting license was turned down, taking it off the airwaves when its license expired on February 15, though the radio station continues its programming online.

Klubradio President Andras Arato has said the company planned to appeal the court ruling to Hungarys Supreme Court.

The suspension has drawn international condemnation, with the European Union and media watchdogs calling the move a further attack on media pluralism in the EU member state.

The NMHH has rejected accusations of political bias, while a Hungarian government spokesman said Klubradio's management was to blame for the station's demise "by flagrantly disregarding broadcasting regulations.

Hungary is under EU investigation for undermining the independence of the judiciary, media, and nongovernmental organizations, and Wigand suggested that further action could be taken against the country if the commission finds that Klubradio was silenced unlawfully.

"We are concerned about the situation, and we are looking into this -- into possible implications under union law," the spokesman told an online press conference in Brussels.

"We are looking into these legal possibilities," he added.

With reporting by AP, dpa, and RFE/RLs Hungarian Service
NORTH ADAMS  Ron and Rob Ferris thought they might cut hair for the rest of their lives.

The brothers, third generation barbers, worked together for decades in the family business. In the 1970's, Ronald, Robert and their older brother George took over the shop that their grandfather had started, and they remained a constant presence in North Adams, even as hairstyles evolved and the city changed.

Then the pandemic struck.

Business slowed to a trickle. George, their oldest brother, died in a car accident in the fall. And, just after Christmas, Ron, 78, and Rob, 66, both landed in the hospital with COVID-19.

"We talked, while we were in the hospital," said Rob. "In the beginning, we were thinking about coming back once we got over this."

After long days confined to hospital beds, their perspectives shifted.

"With everything going on, and our brother in the car accident, it opened our eyes," Rob said. "Every day, you just don't know. You could walk out that door, and it would be the end of it."

Now, the city's beloved barbers are packing up shop, storing decades worth of memories and preparing for the next chapter: Retirement.

The family business

George Ferris, their grandfather, first opened the barber shop nearly a century ago. His son, Louis, joined him and eventually took over the business.

The shop relocated time and time again, moves often dictated by a changing city. Its previous homes include: the old State Street, now American Legion Drive; the corner of Bank Street; Eagle Street just beside Jack's Hot Dogs; the former Sheraton Hotel; and the former Mohawk Center on Marshall Street.

The oldest of Louis' sons, George, joined the Ferris Barber Shop first. Neither Ron nor Rob thought they would follow him.

"You graduate from high school, you go from job to job, you don't know what you wanna do," Ron said. "To this day, I don't know what I really want to do with my life!"

After testing the waters with other jobs, though, both ended up in barber school, too. Ron joined the business in the '60s, and Rob completed the trio in the '70s. That decade, the family renamed the shop Man's World Styling Salon, and the three brothers took over operations.

In the mid-2000s, they moved the salon across Marshall Street to its final home. By the end of February, that space will be empty once again and the shop's physical footprint gone. Its mark on the city, however, remains indelible.

'They've seen a lot.'

Working alongside family for decades, the brothers say, was a blessing  usually.

"A lot of people couldn't believe how three brothers could work together for as long as we did," Ron said. "It wasn't easy! I would joke with them and say, 'As long as you do as I tell you, we'll get along well.' "

On a typical day at Man's World, the brothers would arrive just before opening, Ron would make coffee  he is still the only one who drinks it  and they would "shoot the breeze" about news, politics and the day before.

"The day went on," Ron said. "We'd break for lunch, work till 5, close up and go home for dinner."

Their routines remained the same as the city changed around them. The brothers joined the business when there were 17 barbers in town and haircuts cost a dollar, give or take a quarter. They remained open through the closure of Sprague Electric Co., the evaporation of industry, the opening of Mass MoCA  and the coronavirus pandemic.

"They saw the booming times in North Adams," said state Rep. John Barrett III, the city's former mayor and a longtime customer. "They saw the difficult times. They've seen a lot."

The haircuts changed too, and the brothers followed the trends, from Beatle cuts to flat tops, often matching their own hair to the fashions of the time. When long hair was in vogue, they stayed busy washing and styling tresses.

Through it all, the shop remained a gathering spot. Barrett described the brothers as his "unofficial pollsters," since they always knew how residents felt about local events.

"Everybody, from the bank president to the school custodian, went to the Ferrises at one time or another," he said.

Perhaps the happiest customers, however, were the kids.

"They took a kid who was crying and, by the time they had the haircut, they were laughing and holding a lollipop to go out the door with," said Barrett.

Toni Ciolkowski knew that magic well. One day, she got a harrowing call from her husband. Her son, then just five, had decided to emulate his favorite barber by giving her 2-year-old daughter a haircut in their North Adams home.

"He took a kitchen hand towel and put it around her like Rob always taught him to do," she recalled. "He then took safety scissors and chopped her beautiful hair off."

Ciolkowski left work, dashed home and hurried her daughter to Man's World.

"I ran her down to Rob and said 'Help!' And he did."

Her panic subsided, her daughter left the shop with a cute pixie cut, and her son, now grown, still chuckles at the story.

"I am so glad to have this memory," she said. "We will miss Rob so very much."

George Ferris

If you ask Ron and Rob, though, they would say that their older brother, George, was the best with kids.

During the decades when the brothers ran the shop, George handled the bills and paperwork. For years, he put off retirement, not stepping down until the pandemic hit. Even then, he would still drop by for lunch.

One day in late October, George ate lunch with his brothers and left to run some errands. That afternoon, while driving down Curran Highway, he collided head-on with another car and died.

George's son, Craig Ferris, said police told him that the other driver crossed into his father's lane and that he "did everything he could to avoid it." The Massachusetts State Police investigation is ongoing, local police said.

His family mourned as the pandemic surged. They missed everything about him, including his bottomless reservoir of humor. At parties, as Rob told The Eagle in November, "you'd almost have to pull the microphone away" to get George to stop talking.

Friends, family remember beloved North Adams barber George Ferris NORTH ADAMS  North Adams is reeling from the loss of George Ferris, a third-generation barb

"He retired because of the virus," Rob said. "He was afraid of that. Then he got killed in a car accident."

'You're heading for the box'

The virus struck the Ferris family just two months after George's death.

Ron's symptoms began the day after Christmas; he and his wife both tested positive a few days later. Soon, both he and Rob were in the hospital. They knew enough about the virus to fear the worst.

"When I went into the emergency room, I didn't know what to expect," said Ron. "You hear of everybody being ventilated. It was just a traumatic experience, really."

In the end, he never went on a ventilator, though he spent 10 days on oxygen at Southwestern Vermont Health Care. At the same time as Ron was fighting to breathe, doctors and nurses were caring for Rob in a COVID-19 unit at Berkshire Medical Center.

"When you test positive for COVID, it's like cancer," Rob said. "Somebody says cancer, you automatically think, you're heading for the box; You're gonna die."

Bedridden, he watched his arms and feet swell up as his body fought the virus. His hands swelled so much that he could not close them, his brother described. But he too remained ventilator-free.

"I was lucky," he said.

After 11 days, Rob was discharged. Though he suffers from shortness of breath at times, and Ron still needs supportive oxygen, they feel grateful to be returning to their old selves. Both plan to get vaccinated.

"If anyone says it's just the flu, have them talk to me," Rob said.

They are also grateful for phones and FaceTime. While hospitalized, the brothers would call to check up on each other. That was when they started talking seriously about closing the shop.

They knew that a long road to recovery awaited them. They also knew business had slowed considerably since the pandemic began. Ultimately, though, the decision to retire was about more than just practicalities.

"I had planned on cutting until I dropped behind my chair," said Ron with a laugh. "Really, I was going to cut for quite a while longer, if my hands worked, and my eyes were alright."

But the more they thought about it, the more the brothers realized it was time. After decades of work, they wanted to step back, spend time with their families and try something new.

"We get people calling us, 'Where am I gonna get a haircut? I've been coming to you my whole life!' " Rob said. "But everything comes to an end."

For a reminder of that, they need only to think of their brother.

"That kind of puts it into perspective," Ron said. "You never know what tomorrow's going to bring."

The pace of the last few months  the massive changes, the grief, the uncertainty  all of it has left Ron at a loss about how to feel about his next chapter, though he likes the part where he gets to sleep in.

"I don't know what retirement's gonna be like," he said. "I may be bored. I may wanna go back to work. It's kind of like a new venture for me."

For his part, Rob thinks, maybe they got a sign from their brother. It was as though George had called down and told them: "Fellas, it's time to move on."

They had never listened to him before, Rob joked. But this time, they would.
By Robert Shaffer

During my last years teaching history and social studies education, I always carried a U.S. Constitution in my pocket. Students chuckled when I took it out, often expecting that I would treat it as a form of holy writ, not to be challenged. But I generally used it to help students explain puzzling and controversial features of American government, and to question its nuances and ambiguities.

Here are two examples which often stymied and intrigued students.

Why does the 1st Amendment, which specifies only what Congress must not do, prohibit Pennsylvania, say, from shutting down a newspaper that has been critical of its elected officials?

That would be because of the 14th Amendment, which prevents states from restricting rights citizens derive from the national government.

Why were many Americans shocked when Prohibition outlawed beer?

Because the 18th Amendment specified that intoxicating liquors, which many believed referred only to distilled spirits, not brewed beer, were banned.

There are some clauses that never came up in my classes, but that are undoubtedly being discussed today.

Can the new Georgia Congresswoman, Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has liked calls to execute Nancy Pelosi and denied that students died during the Parkland massacre, be reined in?

Well, aside from stripping her of committee assignments, there is Article 1, Section 5, which says that a house of Congress can expel a member by a two-thirds vote.

Controversies over these and so many clauses show that Americans  in civics and history classes, and as citizens deliberating governmental functions  must approach the Constitution not as an infallible document, but as a set of rules that must be interpreted and updated to meet current needs. In the wake of the 2020 election, and subsequent false charges that state vote counts were marred by irregularities, a raft of new amendments are needed to extend democracy.

While these would be difficult to achieve  two-thirds majorities in both houses of Congress and then approval by three-fourths of state legislatures  they are necessary to avoid a repeat of the dreadful confusion between Election and Inauguration Days.

First, abolish the Electoral College.

Not only is it patently undemocratic, as a minority of voters can elect a president (as happened in 2000 and 2016), but it is clear now that it leads to more suspicion about  and even violence over  the validity of results than would be the case with a national popular vote.

With a thin margin of 12,000 votes in Georgia or 10,000 in Arizona, the losing side may refuse to accept the results, but with seven million votes nationally separating the leading candidates, as in 2020, those statewide margins are insignificant.

Second, the time between the election and inauguration must be reduced.

The 20th Amendment already shortened the original four-month period, designed when information and people traveled slowly, but todays two and a half months is still far longer than necessary given modern technology. The long interregnum this time not only gave Trump time to whip his supporters into a frenzy of false hope that results could be overturned, but prevented the Biden administration from starting to resolve the problems of the pandemic that Trump had allowed to spin out of control.

The interim also allowed Trump officials to institute new policies tying the hands of their successors, such as, on the very last day, a contract to prevent even minor changes in immigration enforcement.

Third, clarify the pardon power of the President (Article II, Section 2), which has been subject to wide abuse.

Trump announced scores of pardons on his two last days, many for political associates and some even relating to trials in progress, while Bill Clinton, too, waited until his last day to issue pardons, including some to political contributors. At the very least, no pardons should be issued between election and inauguration Days, so voters can take this information into account; ideally, any reform would prohibit presidents from pardoning their own family members, business partners, political appointees, and contributors.

Fourth, Supreme Court justices must have term limits.

That the accident of death allows some presidents rather than others to determine the Courts direction for decades to come is completely outmoded. Amendment 22 instituted a two-term limit for presidents, so a limit on justices terms  perhaps twelve years  is not outlandish.

Fifth, consider statehood for Puerto Rico (which has a greater population than twenty states) and voting rights in the House of Representatives, at least, for residents of Washington, D.C.

And then there is the Senate, in which Wyoming, with 600,000 residents, has representation equal to California, with 40,000,000.

Pennsylvania has twelve times more people than neighboring Delaware but the same number of senators. The Senate is arguably more undemocratic than Britains unelected House of Lords, which can delay passage of bills but almost never prevents the House of Commons from adopting legislation. Moreover, small rural states, which are overwhelmingly white, exercise disproportionate power in the Senate, rendering it a tool of structural racism. (The filibuster, which is not in the Constitution at all, compounds the problem of minority rule.)

Unfortunately, the Constitution prevents reform of the Senate through a normal amendment, but we must tirelessly remind Americans how the Senate distorts our democracy.

The refusal of many Americans to accept the outcome of the 2020 election, culminating in the Jan. 6 insurrection and behind-the-scenes efforts by Rep. Scott Perry and others to intimidate elections officials, has shaken the faith of many in the solidity of our democratic institutions.

While a new administration has been rightfully inaugurated, now is no time for complacency. Instead, we should discuss and debate ways to amend our Constitution to form a more perfect Union, fitting present circumstances.

Such debate would stir controversy, but it would also provide a more relevant education, in classrooms and in the public sphere, about the nature of our government and its Constitution than most students and citizens now receive.

The deployment of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning solutions is set to treble over the next three years among business in Ireland, according to Expleo, the technology partner for innovative companies.

Expleos survey of 200 business and IT leaders across the island of Ireland identified that 22% of businesses have already implemented AI/ML solutions within their organisations, with an additional 42% planning to do so within three years. This will mean that almost two thirds (64%) of Irish businesses will be leveraging AI and ML by the end of 2023.



The research also illustrates how 40% of companies are automating more processes as a result of the pandemic, with 17% believing that automation will reduce backlogs caused by COVID-19. Furthermore, almost one-in-five (19%) of business and IT leaders now view AI and Machine Learning as fundamental to their business success.

According to the research, the biggest impacts automation will have on organisations in the next three years are: help employees to focus on business-critical tasks (60%), speed up processes (69%), and reduce costs (63%).

Expleos survey also highlighted firm levels of trust among staff in the aptitude of their business leaders during this time of uncertainty, with 87% believing their leadership team has the skills and ability to succeed in the post-COVID world. The speed of their companys decision making was also broadly endorsed by respondents. Forty five percent believe their organisations acted faster than competitors to implement necessary changes brought on by the pandemic, while 42% viewed the speed of change implementation in line with that of competitors.

Commenting on the findings, Global Head of Process Automation at Expleo, Rebecca Keenan said, "This research clearly signifies that were close to reaching a tipping point as the majority of Irish businesses turn to AI and Machine Learning to enhance service delivery, expedite processes and empower staff in the coming years. They have already embraced automation in a significant way to help overcome many business challenges caused by the pandemic."

She added, "Its particularly interesting to see how many business and IT leaders view AI and ML as being fundamental to their business success. This mirrors what we are seeing in Ireland and across the group globally today, as more and more businesses harness technology to implement necessary changes to remain competitive and agile."

Source: www.businessworld.ie


Snow from a storm is seen blanketed across the White House North Lawn in Washington on Feb. 1, 2021. (Tom Brenner/Reuters)

2 People Arrested on Weapons Charges Near White House: Secret Service

Authorities said that two people were arrested on weapons charges in Washington near the White House on Feb. 13.

On Feb. 13 at approximately 5:24 p.m., two individuals approached U.S. Secret Service Uniformed Division officers near 15th St. NW and Pennsylvania Ave, said a spokesperson for the U.S. Secret Service to The Epoch Times. One of the individuals disclosed the possession of a weapon and was immediately detained and the second individual disclosed the location of an additional weapon in a vehicle nearby.

The spokesperson said that a vehicle was located and the weapon was seized. The first suspect was arrested for having a BB gun, while the second suspect was arrested for carrying a handgun without a license, possession of an unregistered firearm, and possession of unregistered ammunition, officials said.

Local outlet WRC-TV reported that police confirmed Sylvia Hall, 66, was arrested on the pistol and ammunition charges.

Washington has among the strictest gun laws in the United States.

During the course of the encounter and subsequent arrests, the individuals posed no immediate danger to any Secret Service protectee, said the spokesperson.

According to a police report from the D.C. Metropolitan Police, the suspects told agents that they were there to meet with the President of the United States and had a letter to deliver to him, reported The Hill.

The names of the arrested suspects were not provided.

President Joe Biden was not at the White House at the time after he departed for Camp David in Maryland on Friday.

Were going to be up at Camp David for Valentines Day, Biden told reporters, according to Bloomberg, saying he would just hang out with the family and do what we always do for the weekend.

It comes as thousands of National Guard members are still stationed in Washington, namely near the Capitol building following the Jan. 6 incident.
Implementation of sound data security practices is key to guarding against possible security breaches in the current and post Covid-19 era, says a cyber security expert.

There is an urgent need for companies to evaluate their data security status to bring about greater consumer trust in committing their data to the cyberspace. It is vital that companies protect their information on a timely basis utilising security operations center and security orchestration, automation and response and other cybersecurity protocols, says Cyber Security Director of Hilal Computers Shijas Mohidheen.

Cyber security laws are taking root in the GCC and bringing with them fines and penalties for companies and owners deemed to be in breach of protecting the data of customers and employees.

The Internet is an ocean of data solicited and unsolicited. Businesses often find themselves drowning in a sea of data making it impossible for them to keep track of what type of data and to what extent the data is being collected, adds Mohidheen. This highlights the need to select a trusted service provider to audit the security measures and compliance regulations that a business has in place.

Hilal Computers is constantly working on new projects and turnkey solutions that enable organisations to maintain stability and security. This commitment is exemplified in the companys investment to build a Networks Operations Centre (NOC) and a Security Operations Centre (SOC). The SOC and NOC both offer 24/7 monitoring and protection services, he says.

According to Hilal Computers experts, Cybersecurity is not only related to protecting the data of a business, it also encompasses data management and organisation. When businesses start complying with data security practices, they can come across valuable insights and statistics that can help them evaluate the performance of the business and take measures that help the business succeed.

Insights into the cybersecurity practices of businesses will yield financial benefits. The analytics can also be used to provide a snapshot on the promotion and marketing and businesses are then able to kill two birds with the same stone, concludes Mohidheen.  TradeArabia News Service
For, of course, Ms. Parton, who is 75, is first and most obviously a gifted entertainer. The philanthropist who has given away more than 150 million childrens books, built an amusement-park empire that provides jobs for people in her hometown, supported Tennessee wildfire survivors with a monthly stipend, and funded medical research that resulted in a coronavirus vaccine is also the creative genius who wrote Jolene and I Will Always Love You on the same day.

Its no wonder that for more than 50 years, diverse audiences  cowboys and drag queens, hillbillies and Goths, sorority girls and quick-stop cashiers  have loved Dolly Parton, and for more than 50 years, Dolly Parton has loved them all right back. No one in the entire state of Tennessee is more beloved. Its possible that no one in the entire country is more beloved.

Others in Tennessee history no doubt deserve a statue on state grounds even more than Dolly Parton does. Ida B. Wells-Barnett, the Black Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who risked her life to write about lynching in the early 20th century, comes to mind  a point elegantly argued by the former Tennessean columnist Dwight Lewis last year.

Even so, this troubled moment in history may be the perfect time for our state legislature to consider honoring Dolly Parton, a Tennessean who brings people together, someone whose creative work and public generosity remind us of what is good in human nature, someone whose very life prompts us to recall that what we share with one another will always be greater than what we allow to come between us.

As Sarah Smarsh notes in She Come by It Natural, her brilliant 2020 book-length meditation on Ms. Parton, Several of my friends  white, Black and Latina, with disparate class origins among them  commented in the weeks surrounding the 2016 election that Parton was a balm of sorts, a spiritual leader when political leaders are failing.

If anything, these words are even truer in the aftermath of the 2020 election than they were in 2016. And it would be so nice to think of Miss Dolly watching over us from that hill over the city. To believe her words in Light of a Clear Blue Morning, if only for a moment: Its gonna be OK.

Margaret Renkl is a contributing opinion writer who covers flora, fauna, politics and culture in the American South. She is the author of the books Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss and the forthcoming Graceland, At Last: And Other Essays From The New York Times.

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A Thai truck driver claims he has found a rare orange Melo pearl inside seafood, just weeks after a fisherman found a similar gem worth 250,000 on a beach.

Monthian Jansuk, 40, paid 50 baht (1.20) for the 'apple snail' shell from a market near his home in Chonburi province, Thailand, on February 10.

The worker and his wife, Wasana, 44, boiled the snail which they ate with their son who bit into something hard.

A Thai truck driver claims he has found a rare orange Melo pearl inside seafood he bought from a market

Monthian Jansuk, 40, paid 50 baht (1.20) for the 'apple snail' shell from a market near his home in Chonburi province

They had also bought half a kilo of fresh fish, prawns and clams, which they grilled over hot coals.

The family said they were shocked when their son spat out a beautiful orange pearl the size of a coin and weighing 7 grams.

They first thought it was just a 'snail egg' but realised it may have been one of the rarest pearls in the world, an orange melo pearl, after seeing news of another find last month.

The family said they were shocked when their son spat out a beautiful orange pearl the size of a coin and weighing 7 grams

They first thought it was just a 'snail egg' but realised it may have been one of the rarest pearls in the world

The delighted father is now having the suspected pearl authenticated but believes he could earn hundreds of thousands of pounds for it.

He said: 'My family and neighbours all gathered to take a look at the stone and agreed that it was something we've never seen before.

'Of course, we want to make sure that it is one of the expensive pearls, but I have an instinct that we could earn a lot of money for it.

It comes just weeks after Hatchai Niyomdecha, 37, discovered a similar pearl (pictured) on a beach in Nakhon Si Thammarat on January 27

Niyomdecha gave the shells to his father, Bangmad, to clean. When Bangmad opened the third shell, he found an orange pearl slightly bigger than a 10 pence peice

The family asked their neighbours about the pearl and realised that the pearl was worth 250,000

What are Melo pearls? Vivid orange Melo pearls fetch the highest prices Melo pearls are naturally occurring gems produced under the shell of a large sea snail species known as Melo Melo. The gems are formed when an irritant gets under the snail's shell, causing the animal to produce secretions to reduce its discomfort. Over several years the layers of secretions form a Melo pearl. The pearls range from brown to yellow or orange, depending on the colour of the snail shell the gem was grown in. Orange Melo pearls appear in only one of every several thousand shells, meaning these gems fetch the highest prices. Melo pearls cannot be farmed, like other pearls, because the gem has not yet been successfully cultured to be grown in foreign mussels or clams. This means the Melo pearl is only found when it naturally occurs. The gems are found in the South China Sea, in shallow waters off the coast of Vietnam, Thailand and Myanmar. Source: Obsessed by Pearls Advertisement

'I'm so glad I bought it. The pearl could change my life.'

Last month, a struggling fisherman found a Melo pearl while picking up oysters on a beach.

Hatchai Niyomdecha, 37, was offered up to 10 million Baht (256k) for the 7.68-gram precious gem.

The Thai fisherman was picking up shells with his family when they stumbled upon the rare find in Nakhon Si Thammarat province on January 27.

He found a discarded buoy washed ashore with a number of shell including three snail shells stuck to it, which his brother Worachat Niyomdecha, 35, took home.

They gave the snail shells to their father, Bangmad Niyomdecha, 60, who was in the process of cleaning them when he discovered the pearl - which is about the size of a 10 pence piece.

But its sale was delayed after he was allegedly caught celebrating the find by having a meth party with friends at his home in Nakhon Si Thammarat province on February 5.

Police reportedly found thousands of oral methamphetamine tablets at the man's house after being contacted by his neighbours who complained about the loud music and claimed they could smell drugs.

Niyomdecha denied that the boxes were his but when the police ran a forensic test on the packages - they allegedly found his fingerprint all over the boxes.

Police Colonel Chokdee Srimuang said they are investigating the fisherman over the unusual amount of drugs and also looking into the involvement of his family members who lived with him.

Niyomdecha denied the drug allegations. He was taken to the police station and held in custody while being questioned.

Melo pearls range from orange to tan to brown in colour - with orange being the most expensive shade.

They are usually found in South China Sea and Andaman Sea off the coast of Myanmar and are produced by predatory sea snails called Volutidae.
Myanmar's junta strengthened its grip on power over the weekend, ordering an Internet blackout overnight and making it easier for authorities to make arrests as it looks to quell surging protests against its Feb. 1 coup.

Tens of thousands of people continued to demonstrate in defiance of the military even as the regime stepped up detentions of civil servants, lawyers and other professionals. Telecom services were told to cut all internet between 1 a.m. and 9 a.m. on Monday, and armored vehicles were seen rolling through the streets of central Yangon on Sunday night, the BBC reported.

In a joint statement on Sunday, ambassadors from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and the European Union called on the military to avoid violence while condemning the arrests of dissidents as well as the disruption in communications. Real-time network data showed national connectivity at 14% of ordinary levels after the blackout order, according to London-based internet monitor NetBlocks.

"We support the people of Myanmar in their quest for democracy, freedom, peace, and prosperity," the ambassadors wrote. "The world is watching."

Myanmar army chief Min Aung Hlaing has struggled to gain control of the streets since ousting the civilian government led by Aung San Suu Kyi, whose party won a landslide victory in November elections. She has urged the country's 55 million people to oppose the army's move, calling it "an attempt to bring the nation back under the military dictatorship."

Suu Kyi and other political leaders are among 400 people detained since the coup, a number that rises by the day. While authorities have largely avoided confronting protesters in major cities who have ignored a ban on public gatherings, several demonstrators have been injured in crackdowns - including a woman shot in the head who is now on life support in Naypyidaw, the capital.

Min Aung Hlaing over the weekend amended a privacy law to suspend provisions that prevented authorities from taking actions including conducting searches without a warrant, detaining suspects for more than 24 hours without court approval and intercepting electronic communications. The amendments will remain in effect only during the reign of the State Administration Council, the body formed to govern Myanmar during a year-long state of emergency.

The military also warned the media against referring to their power seizure as a "coup," saying the state of emergency was declared in line with provisions of the 2008 constitution drafted under a previous junta. Last week, the junta proposed a cybersecurity law that could see social media users fined or jailed for posts containing what it construes as "misinformation or disinformation that causes public panic."

The junta late Saturday issued arrest warrants for seven activists including 1988 uprising leader Min Ko Naing and members of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party. Activists said the amendments on Saturday are a sign of tougher crackdowns to come.

"Anyone can be arrested anytime," said Maung Saung Kha, executive director of Athan, a Yangon-based freedom of expression advocacy group. "No one feels safe at this point."

The Biden administration was quick to denounce the coup and implement sanctions against its leaders. Global companies including Japanese beer maker Kirin have dialed back investment plans in the country since the military takeover.

"The Tatmadaw's strategy not only threatens to further inflame social unrest and elevate stability risks, but a crackdown on civil servants could also undermine policy delivery," said Peter Mumford, Southeast & South Asia practice head at risk consultancy Eurasia Group.
The Spanish royal family has been forced to deny that scandal-hit former king Juan Carlos is 'seriously ill' after rumours began circulating in the country's media.

Pilar Eyre, regarded as a leading expert on the Spanish royal family, sparked concern on Monday when she tweeted that the 83-year-old 'is in a serious condition and the Royal Household is considering the possibility of transferring him to Spain'.

The rumours were quickly downplayed by the royal household which insisted Juan Carlos is in good health, with Hola! magazine carrying a quote from the king which said: 'I'm perfect. I do two hours gym every day and I feel fine.'

Spain's Royal Household has been forced to deny rumours that former king Juan Carlos, 83, is 'seriously ill' after rumours began circulating in the country's media

Pilar Eyre, an expert on the royal family, sparked the rumours with this tweet, which added that the scandal-hit royal may return from self-imposed exile for treatment

The rumours began after recent images of the monarch - who abdicated the throne in 2014 and then fled to Abu Dhabi last year amid a tax investigation - have shown him looking frail.

One picture, taken in December last year, shows the King Emeritus in his Middle Eastern bolt-hole being supported by two bodyguards while walking in a marina.

It was the first photo to emerge of Juan Carlos since he was pictured arriving in Abu Dhabi at the start of August last year.

The monarch left Spain after Swiss prosecutors opened an investigation into bank accounts he allegedly held in tax havens.

He checked into a 10,000-a-night presidential suite at the seven-star Emirates Palace following his arrival.

The possibility he would return to Madrid for Christmas had polarised the political debate in Spain in the run-up to the festive season before it was ruled out by Juan Carlos himself.

He attributed his decision to the coronavirus pandemic and the fact he was a high-risk person because of his age.

Reports at the time, refuted by Spain's Royal Household, said he had been admitted to a private clinic in Abu Dhabi after testing positive for coronavirus.

Juan Carlos is facing three separate criminal probes in Spain.

Juan Carlos, who is married to Queen Sofia, 81, left Spain in August lat year after prosecutors announced investigations into his finances

One is related to the use of credit cards linked to foreign accounts after his June 2014 abdication when he lost his constitutional protection against prosecution as a serving monarch.

Prosecutors are trying to establish if the monarch accessed funds deposited in accounts held by a Mexican businessman and a Spanish Air Force official.

Spain has also launched its own investigation based in part on information shared by Switzerland about cash Juan Carlos allegedly received as part of his involvement in a high-speed Saudi Arabia rail contract.

In December, the ex-monarch's lawyer announced he had paid more than 600,000 in back-taxes with interest and surcharges for the years since his abdication.

Spanish authorities responded by saying they were analysing the tax payments to see if they were 'spontaneous, truthful and complete.'

Juan Carlos' shock departure from Spain at the start of August led to an intense questioning of the country's monarchy led by left-wing vice-president Pablo Iglesias.

Several interviews by the former king's ex-mistress Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, now living in the UK, have not helped.

She was implicated in the scandal surrounding Juan Carlos' rule after it emerged he had given her a gift of 57million.

The 57-year-old blonde has claimed he gave her the cash gift because he was 'adamant about taking care of her.'

She also insisted in a TV interview last year Juan Carlos was the 'architect of his own problems' and described his Middle East exile as the 'ultimate defeat.'

Juan Carlos abdicated the throne in 2014 for 'personal reasons' and passed control of the country to his son, who is now King Felipe VI (pictured right with daughter Leonor)

Spain's current king, Juan Carlos' son Felipe VI, made a veiled dig at his exiled father and the scandals surrounding his family in his Christmas speech.

He said in a televised address that 'ethics are above family ties.' The last photo of Juan Carlos was taken on December 29 on Yas Island in Abu Dhabi, home to the Yas Marina Circuit which is the venue for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

Juan Carlos, in his letter to Spain's current king Felipe VI announcing his decision to leave his homeland, wrote 'Guided by my conviction I can offer the best service to Spaniards, its institutions and to you as King, I am communicating my decision to move away from Spain.

'It's a decision I am taking with deep feeling but with great serenity. I have been King of Spain for almost 40 years and during that whole time, I've always wanted the best for Spain and for the Crown.'

He signed off the letter: 'With affection as always, your father.'

It later emerged he had already left Spain by the time the letter was released by the Royal Household.

His departure sparked mixed reactions, with monarchists and right-wing politicians accusing the government of forcing him into exile and critics of the former king accusing him of an amateur attempt to protect himself and his son from the corruption scandals threatening the future of Spain's dwindling royal family.

Barcelona-based author Pilar Eyre, an expert on the Spanish royal family, made an explosive claim about Juan Carlos and Diana in a book she published in 2012.

She said the Spanish monarch made a pass at her during a holiday Diana and Charles spent with their son at the king's summer palace in Majorca in 1986.

According to Eyre, the king made a 'tactile' advance to Diana, then just 25.

Diana herself denied anything untoward had happened but admitted that while the libidinous king was 'charming' he could be a 'little too attentive.'
Christian leaders call for repentance, overhaul following Ravi Zacharias sexual abuse report

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Christian leaders and a former associate of Ravi Zacharias' ministry are calling for repentance and an overhaul of organizational practices after a report released Thursday detailed the late apologist's pattern of sexual abuse.

In an email to The Christian Post on Friday, Carson Weitnauer, who previously led RZIM's U.S. speaking team, said he now believes that Zacharias was not only a fraud, as he articulated in an earlier op-ed published by CP, but that the organization bearing his name is as well. He further asserted that the ministry's apology is unacceptable in light of the revelations released in the report.

"The organizations apologetic-sounding statement was released by an anonymous board, is incomplete in its scope, avoids calling on the Zacharias Estate to release the Thompson's from the NDA, and announces no resignations or removals of those most responsible for this tragedy. 1 John 3:18 instructs us, 'Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth,'" said Weitnauer to CP.

"I pray that many churches and nonprofits will decide to learn from this catastrophe and take immediate action to mitigate the risk of personally repeating it," he added.

RZIM issued an apology Thursday with the announcement of the results of an extensive independent investigation in which victims claimed that Zacharias had engaged in sexting, unwanted touching, spiritual abuse, and rape over the course of many years.

The ministry hired the Atlanta law firm Miller & Martin to conduct the independent investigation. In the apology statement published as the report was released, RZIM said it was shocked and grieved" by the actions of the late apologist and that "corporate repentance was needed.

Weitnauer said it's crucial that churches and ministry organizations appoint senior leaders who bear responsibility and that they establish or strengthen policies against abuse of every kind  provide training on toxic cultural dynamics, and ensure board members and community leaders are informed and watchful advocates for survivors and other vulnerable members of their communities.

"The continued prevalence of sexual abuse within the church, and the weak response to it by church leaders, is a great discredit to our witness," Weitnauer said. "For the sake of the Gospel and the honor of God, and our commitment to the wellbeing of victims, may we instead courageously resolve to build communities that are full of truth and goodness."

Other Christian voices and thought leaders have expressed a variety of emotions. Many said they are disgusted and shaken, but noted that news of respected evangelical leaders falling has become common.

"Ive thought about this a lot since it all came out and I guess it sucks to say that Im not surprised when this happens anymore. Because it just keeps happening. God, have mercy," said author Jackie Hill Perry, tweeted Thursday.

She added in a subsequent tweet-thread Friday that she had attended the funeral for the late apologist last year and that the news of his misconduct left her feeling "thrown."

"Not because Im surprised per se but because its disorienting. Im reminded that giftedness will never translate to godliness. Neither is orthodox teaching the proof of righteous living...Ravis ministry was a gift to most of us but his fall is a warning to all of us. Take heed lest we fall too."

Teacher and popular speaker Beth Moore said in response to the report that, at base, "in every situation where a Christian leader has lived in gross hypocrisy, carrying on a double life, for years on end: They are out of fellowship with Jesus. Period. YOU CANNOT SUSTAIN THAT IN FELLOWSHIP."

"The Holy Spirit convicts of sin. Every believer has and will fall into strongholds of various kinds of sin but, in fellowship with Christ, we cannot bear to remain in it. We will repent. We can implement all the accountability systems & MUST. But what weve got on our hands are people using piety and outward appearances of righteousness to hide the fact that they have little to no intimacy with the Father and Son through the Holy Spirit," she added.

The board of the Zacharias Trust, the U.K. branch of the ministry, also put out a statement announcing that they had made the unanimous decision to separate from RZIM. Although the organization has always been a separate entity in terms of governance with its own trustees, the Trust said that current circumstances have led them to conclude they must operate without any link to the organization.

"The UK entity will also choose a new name. This process will take time to complete but the UK Board is convinced that this is the best and only way to ensure that the ministry can continue to serve the UK church with integrity. This will also give us the opportunity to review the lessons to be learned from these awful events," the Trust added.
As author Adrienne Maree Brown wrote, Things are not getting worse, they are getting uncovered. We must hold each other tight and continue to pull back the veil. For communities of color, COVID-19 has compounded the inequities prevalent in K-12 schools as virtual instruction has replaced face-to-face instruction for the foreseeable future. School closures and the transition to remote learning have resulted in millions of students losing access to education and crucial health resources.

While efforts have been focused on reopening Philadelphia schools, the district must be as focused on addressing the issues that were present before the pandemic and its long-term consequences.

COVID-19 has entrenched educational inequities for communities of color. In November, citing a surge in COVID-19 cases, Philadelphia schools reversed their decision to reopen school buildings, continuing virtual instruction until a later date. Ensuring the physical safety of students is paramount, making the decision to remain virtual during an uncontrolled pandemic prudent and necessary. But because of the preexisting lack of access to the internet and other services important for learning environments, students in communities of color have been disproportionately affected by school closures. Furthermore, students in need of services such as special education, including one-to-one care, are at an even greater disadvantage due to distance education. New evidence shows that the loss of learning caused by the pandemic may extend beyond the pandemic.

 READ MORE: It looks as if the reopening timeline for Philly schools could depend on the school

What we see repeatedly across national crises and disasters is that the most disenfranchised among the U.S. population are most harmed physically, emotionally, economically, and educationally. What the COVID-19 pandemic has unveiled is the critical need for improvements in fundamental infrastructure for K-12 schools in Philadelphia and throughout the nations communities of color.

While the district prepares to reopen schools, it should be moving forward on those longer-term improvements, too. For example, one major reason cited by officials for the indefinite closures of schools in the district was aging buildings that have inadequate ventilation. The solutions necessary to deal with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic must be long term and involve coordinated efforts from school administrators, teachers, and parents to bridge the opportunity gap with a culture of equity that supports the needs of all students, particularly those who have been marginalized in the current education system.

Another key issue for communities of color is the lack of access to computers alongside quality and reliable internet access, and environments conducive to optimal learning, such as designated remote learning spaces with limited distractions. A lack of access to computers and broadband wireless most strongly impacts communities of color, rural communities, and those in lower socioeconomic groups. And students with experience using smartphones  which can help get some people online who otherwise dont have access  are experiencing issues with the technological platforms used in virtual instruction that is typically designed for computers. These barriers expose the digital divide as a crisis for student learning.

 READ MORE: CDC gives new road map for schools without requiring schools to reopen

Additionally, the heightened stress that communities of color already experience due to systemic racism is unimaginably magnified during the COVID-19 pandemic, which has added new stressors. K-12 curriculums should therefore incorporate trauma-informed school strategies, such as training school staff to help traumatized students effectively deal with their emotions to ensure academic success and to address the socioemotional effects of these crises for students.

The opportunity gap for K-12 students in communities of color will continue to grow if the resources, both new and existing, are not sufficient to meet the needs of this population of students.

The traditional school experience, where access to education and health services were already at a minimum, is near impossible to obtain during the pandemic. Students who were at risk for failure have now lost a critical outlet that was provided by the school environment and resources that assisted them in achieving positive educational outcomes. The impact of racial, gender, and class inequalities in the education system was already well-documented before the pandemic. However, the pandemic has reinforced how desperate measures need to be taken to deal with the critical opportunity gaps in communities of color. The conversation about education inequity cant fade once the pandemic does. District leaders should commit now to long-term plans to address these issues.

Tajma Cameron is a doctoral student in the Drexel University School of Education.

Robert Russell Crans Jr. is storing a bounty of items once owned and touched by President Abraham Lincoln and his family that represent a time in American history and politics most can only read about in history books.

Through hundreds of years, the Lincoln personal items have been passed down through generations of family members. Mr. Crans is adopted, but his mothers stepfather, Robert Lincoln Beckwith, was the last known blood relative of the Lincoln family.

He said he was ready to part with the collection, mostly because of the financial strain of his medical bills and his need to refinance his home. So, hes taken some of these items to market, including a fan owned by the first lady, Mary Todd Lincoln, when she was in the White House; a sterling silver ladle from the wife of Robert Todd Lincoln, a son of the president and Ms. Lincoln; and a portrait of the first ladys half sister.

Health Minister Vlad Voiculescu declared today that the quality of the first version of the State Sanitary Inspection (ISS) report on the deadly fire at the 'Matei Bals' Institute is "unsatisfactory" and that he asked for an assessment of the implementation of all the measures ordered in hospitals by authorities such as the General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations (IGSU), ISS, or the Control Corps.

"We are talking about two reports. One is an IGSU report that looks rather at the risks of fire, and which is being produced every year. (...) There is also a report of the State Sanitary Inspection that came in a first version the week after the fire at 'Matei Bals', but the quality of that report is not satisfactory," Voiculescu said at the Palace of the Parliament when asked about the verifications at 'Matei Bals' and the promise that a report on the findings will be presented.

He added that he requested an assessment of the implementation of all the measures ordered by various authorities in hospitals and that he will present the findings this week.
Then there is the less straightforward question of branding. The Trump family name is a wild card  it will be a plus with loyalists and fundraising nationally, but it could be a liability in a battleground that the former president won by a mere 1.3 percentage points in 2020. There is also a possibility Trumps candidacy could help increase Democratic turnout, especially among the states large Black population.
Popular Marathi actor and Bigg Boss Marathi 1 finalist Aastad Kale tied the knot with his actress-girlfriend Swapnalee Patil on Valentine's Day (February 14, 2021) in Pune. For the unversed, the couple had already decided to have a registered marriage amid their close friends and family members. Aastad and Swapnalee's wedding pictures went viral on social media, and they are indeed looking adorable together.

Aastad Kale opted to wear ivory coloured sherwani paired with a maroon shawl. On the other hand, Swapnalee Patil looked stunning in a maroon and golden silk saree. Talking about the guests, Aastad and Swapnalee's close-friends from the industry, Harshada Khanvilkar, Abhijeet Kelkar and Sangram Samel attended the wedding, as they shared the newlyweds' photos on their respective social media handles. Interestingly, while exchanging rings with Aastad, Swapnalee said an ukhana (catchy line dedicated to the partner) for her husband. She said, "Baaget Baag Ranichi Baag, Aastad Cha Raag Mhanje Dhagdhagnari Aag." In this line, she talked about Aastad's anger and compared it to fire.

For the unversed, Aastad and Swapnalee were living together for the past 18 months before tying the knot. Earlier in an interview with Times of India, the Farzand actor had said, "We had taken this decision long back. Also, looking at the current situation we want to avoid an elaborate celebration. To be honest, both Swapnalee and I are not in favour of splurging on weddings. Instead, we may head for a good holiday a few months later. I love to lead a simple life."

On the professional front, Swapnalee Patil is playing a key role in Swarajya Janani Jijamata, while Aastad Kale is essaying an interesting character in Subodh Bhave's show Chandra Aahe Sakshila.

Also Read: Actress Manasi Naik Gets Married To Boxer-Beau Pardeep Kharera; See Pictures

Also Read: Siddharth Chandekar & Mitali Mayekar Get Married; Umesh Kamat, Pooja Sawant & Others Attend The Wedding
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Belfast's Deputy Lord Mayor has called for action to tackle the city's housing crisis.

Paul McCusker said he was shocked that only 115 homes were completed in north Belfast last year - representing fewer than 3% of the number of families on the waiting list.

He said at that rate of completion, it would take more than 35 years to house the current list.

The SDLP councillor obtained details after his party tabled Assembly questions to Communities Minister Deirdre Hargey.

Appealing for more work to tackle the crisis, Mr McCusker said: "We have one of the worst social housing waiting lists in the North with more than 4,000 families in need and I see no urgency from the Department for Communities or from the Minister to address the problem.

"In the middle of a global pandemic, we are asking people to stay at home. But for many families in our community that means being trapped in accommodation that doesn't meet their needs."

Donald Trump has reportedly voiced concern over the possibility of facing charges in connection with the riot at the US Capitol on Jan 6, which claimed five lives.

Even though Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, voted to acquit the former president in his impeachment trial, he said Mr Trump was practically and morally responsible for what happened. A similar view has been expressed by Liz Cheney, a member of the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives.

According to CNN, Mr Trump, who has largely stayed out of public view since leaving the White House, has mentioned his concern to aides.

Michael Sherwin, the acting US attorney general, has not ruled out Mr Trump facing charges.

Were looking at all actors here and anyone that had a role and, if the evidence fits the elements of the crime, theyre going to be charged, he said yesterday. Mr Trump was not at risk of criminal prosecution while he was in the White House, but legal experts have suggested that he is no longer exempt now that he has left office.

Despite speculation that he would seek to pre-emptively pardon himself before the end of his presidential term, Mr Trump did not do so.

The former president faces other legal threats in addition to the fallout from the Capitol insurrection.

Prosecutors in Georgia have opened an investigation into whether Mr Trump illegally attempted to influence the outcome of the presidential election when, in a phone call that was recorded on tape, he asked Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state, to find 11,780 votes needed to flip the result.

In New York, Manhattan prosecutors have hired forensic accountants to investigate Mr Trumps real estate business after allegations of tax fraud emerged.
LAS VEGAS, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- DelveInsight's Hemophilia A Market Analysis report offers an integrated view of epidemiological trends, treatment approaches, unmet needs present in the treatment market, and the pipeline therapies expected to have a tremendous impact in the Hemophilia A market in the coming next decade in the 7MM (the US, EU5 (the UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, and France), and Japan).

The Hemophilia A Market report offers a detailed mapping of the key companies at the forefront of the domain, major collaborations, deals, and tie-ups taking place, as well as clinical trials, and recent happenings ongoing in the Hemophilia A market landscape.

Some of the key highlights from the Hemophilia A Market Research report:

The mainstay treatment option has long been FVIII replacement therapy . Initially, FVIII replacement was accomplished by donated whole blood, subsequently by plasma and currently by recombinant human FVIII (rFVIII) replacement therapies, which revolutionized the treatment of Hemophilia A.

. Initially, FVIII replacement was accomplished by donated whole blood, subsequently by plasma and currently by recombinant human FVIII (rFVIII) replacement therapies, which revolutionized the treatment of Hemophilia A. About 30% of severe Hemophilia A patients develop neutralizing anti-FVIII alloantibodies (inhibitors), which render the FVIII replacement ineffective. The standard of care therapy for patients with inhibitors is to induce immune tolerance with high-dose, high-frequency FVIII and treatment with bypassing agents (e.g., recombinant activated factor VII such as NovoSeven, FEIBA)

of severe Hemophilia A patients develop neutralizing anti-FVIII alloantibodies (inhibitors), which render the FVIII replacement ineffective. The standard of care therapy for patients with inhibitors is to induce immune tolerance with high-dose, high-frequency FVIII and treatment with bypassing agents (e.g., recombinant activated factor VII such as NovoSeven, FEIBA) Some of the FDA-approved recombinant forms of factor VIII for the treatment of Hemophilia A, include Helixate FS , Recombinate , Kogenate FS , Advate , ReFacto , Eloctate , Nuwiq , Adynovate , Kovaltry , Jivi , and Xyntha .

, , , , , , , , , , and . FDA-approved Human plasma-derived preparations include Monarc-M, Monoclate-P, Hemofil M, and Koate-DVI .

and . Hemlibra, a bispecific factor IXa- and factor X-directed antibody, got FDA approval in 2017 to prevent or reduce the frequency of bleeding episodes in adult and pediatric patients who have developed inhibitors . Later in 2018 it was also approved in Hemophilia A without factor VIII inhibitors. Hemlibra is expected to disrupt the market mostly in the recombinant FVIII class. Owing to its strong clinical data, broad FAD label and dosing convenience expected to become a blockbuster worldwide.

a bispecific factor IXa- and factor X-directed antibody, got FDA approval in 2017 to prevent or reduce the frequency of bleeding episodes in adult and pediatric patients who have developed inhibitors Later in 2018 it was also approved in Hemophilia A without factor VIII inhibitors. DelveInsight's analysis estimates that the Hemophilia A treatment hemisphere is mainly driven by non-inhibitors drug candidates as the development of Hemophilia A gene therapies are mainly focussed on non-inhibitors segment.

Pharmaceutical companies such as BioMarin Pharmaceutical , Novo Nordisk , Pfizer , Sangamo Therapeutics , Sanofi/Alnylam Pharmaceuticals , Catalyst Biosciences , Roche/Spark Therapeutics , Sigilon Therapeutics, Takeda, and others, are actively exploring the waters in the Hemophilia A market with their novel therapeutic approaches.

, , , , , , , and others, are actively exploring the waters in the Hemophilia A market with their novel therapeutic approaches. Launch of emerging therapies like Valoctocogene Roxaparvovec , Concizumab, Fitusiran , BIVV001 , Marstacimab , SPK-8011 , SB-525 and others, are anticipated during the forecast period (2021-30).

, , , , , and others, are anticipated during the forecast period (2021-30). Some of the examples of the most anticipated pipeline therapies which are expected to launch during the forecast period include gene therapies like Valoctocogene Roxaparvovec , SPK - 8011 , SB-525 and Small interfering RNA agents Fitusiran .

, - , and Small interfering RNA agents . The Hemophilia A treatment market landscape is shifting towards extended half-life therapies as well as novel approaches, including siRNA, bispecific antibodies, and Hemophilia A gene therapy.

Request for Sample for more @ Hemophilia A Market Landscape

Hemophilia is a group of bleeding disorders. A congenital deficiency of certain clotting factors causes Hemophilia and the main form of Hemophilia is Hemophilia A and is due to the deficiency of factor VIII.

Hemophilia A Epidemiological Analysis

Over 80% of the total patient pool of Hemophilia has Hemophilia A. The total Hemophilia A prevalent population in the7MM in 2020 was 43,243. The prevalence is further expected to rise by 2030, during the study period (20182030). On the basis of severity, the Hemophilia A cases can be segmented in to mild, moderate and severe. Severe Hemophilia A cases are more prominent in comparison to mild and moderate. Additionally, moderate and severe accounts for 75% of the Hemophilia A patient pool.

The total Hemophilia A cases can be further bifurcated into with or without non-inhibitors, where the prevalent pool with non-inhibitors accounts for a higher number of Hemophilia A cases. In the 7MM, approximately 30% of severe Hemophilia A cases develop inhibitors; and the remaining 70% of the Hemophilia A cases were observed without inhibitors in 2020. The number of cases for both categories will increase during the study period.

The Hemophilia A Market report puts forward epidemiology division in the 7MM for the study period 2018-30 segmented into:

Total Diagnosed Hemophilia A Prevalent Pool

Severity-specific Hemophilia A Prevalent Pool

Inhibitor-specific Hemophilia A Prevalent Pool

Total Treated Hemophilia A Prevalent Pool

Hemophilia A Therapeutics Market Landscape

The Hemophilia A treatment landscape provides "On Demand" and "Prophylaxis" treatment options to the patients. However, the Prophylaxis treatment option has gained much absorption in the market as compared to the On-demand treatment option.

The treatment consists of replacing the missing clotting protein (factor VIII) and preventing the complications associated with the disorder. Replacement of this protein may be obtained through recombinant factor VIII, which is artificially created in a lab. Several recombinant forms of factor VIII are also approved for in the Hemophilia A treatment market.

The present Hemophilia A therapy market offers Factor Replacement Concentrates, and Bypassing agents as major treatment options. The market has several recombinant factor VIII (FVIII) products available with high specific activities. Plasma-derived clotting factors products are also present in the Hemophilia A treatment market. Furthermore, in adjunctive therapies, antifibrinolytic and supportive measures, which include icing, immobilization and others are also available. Besides, the market presence of approved treatment regimes, off-label products are also available for Hemophilia A.

However, the market is currently dominated by the recombinants of several generations (recombinant third-generation, and recombinant second generation).

Know more about the present market landscape @ Hemophilia A Drug Market Landscape

Hemophilia A Marketed Therapies

Jivi (formerly BAY94-9027): Bayer

Hemlibra (Emicizumab-kxwh): Roche (Chugai/ Genentech)

Esperoct (N8-GP; Turoctocog alfa pegol): Novo Nordisk

Sevenfact [coagulation factor VIIa (recombinant)-jncw]: HEMA Biologics/LFB Pharmaceuticals

And others.

Undoubtedly, there are several safe and effective treatment options, such as replacement therapy, available in the Hemophilia A treatment market. However, the main goal of the present Hemophilia A treatment options is to reduce complications arising from blood accumulating in joint spaces and/or other tissues & organs; and not to cure the disease. Hemophilia A continues to form a huge burden on the healthcare domain. Patients continue to fight this progressive bleeding disease, with high chances of inhibitor development.

Further, the formation of inhibitors is associated to reduce FVIII efficacy in blood coagulation, which as a consequence hampers patients' health and quality of life, adding significantly to the Hemophilia A treatment costs.

Got queries? Reach out @ Hemophilia A Market Scenario in the Next Decade

Hemophilia A Market Forecast

To bridge the gap, and meet the unmet needs in the Hemophilia A market domain, the scientific community, academia, and pharmaceutical companies are actively, and collaboratively seeking novel approaches, taking advantage of advanced technologies, and developing new pipeline therapies.

Pharmaceutical companies like BioMarin Pharmaceutical, Novo Nordisk, Pfizer, Sangamo Therapeutics, Sanofi/Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Catalyst Biosciences, Roche/Spark Therapeutics, Sigilon Therapeutics, Takeda, and others are busy investigating different candidates in Hemophilia A treatment market.

To accomplish and meet these unmet needs the future of Hemophilia treatment is continuing to incline toward extended half-life therapies as well as more novel approaches which include siRNA, bispecific antibodies, and gene therapy. The emerging therapies are expected to affirmatively challenge the presently Hemophilia A marketed therapies by snatching their market share. Although the Hemophilia A treatment market is already packed with many recombinant factor VIII therapy approaches, and upcoming treatment options based on similar MoA shall further cramp up space, it is going to affect the drug uptake without the strain of doubt.

Visit to get a picture of market forces @ Hemophila A Market Drivers and Barriers

In essence, an increasing observable trend of Hemophilia A prevalence is expected to soar the demand for effective treatment options that are curative in nature, which is lacking in the market at the moment. The advent of premium-priced agents shall dominate the Hemophilia A market in the upcoming years. However, it is not to lose sight of the fact that Hemophilia A gene therapies are heavier than expected on pockets. Thus, healthcare authorities will seek to restrict the pricing and usage of the high-cost agents. Further, the rarity of the disease facilitates accelerated approval, market exclusivity, clinical trials subsidies, and reduced regulatory fees, orphan drug designations, and several other leverages.

Visit for pictorial representation of Hemophilia A Market Outlook

Hemophilia A Pipeline Therapies

Valoctocogene Roxaparvovec (BMN 270): Biomarin Pharmaceutical

Concizumab: Novo Nordisk

Fitusiran: Sanofi/Alnylam Pharmaceuticals

BIVV001: Sanofi

Marstacimab: Pfizer

Marzeptacog alfa: Catalyst Biosciences

Giroctocogene fitelparvovec (SB-525/PF-07055480): Pfizer/Sangamo Therapeutics

RG6357 (SPK-8011): Roche/Spark Therapeutics

RG6358 (SPK-8016): Roche/Spark Therapeutics

SIG-001: Sigilon Therapeutics

NNC0365-3769 A (Mim8): Novo Nordisk A/S

TAK-754 (BAX 888/ SHP654 ): Takeda (Shire)

And others.

Rich insights @ Hemophila A Market Forecast and Pipeline Therapies

Scope of the Report

Coverage : 7MM ( The United States , EU5 ( Germany , France , Italy , Spain , and the United Kingdom ), and Japan

: 7MM ( , EU5 ( , , , , and the ), and Study Period : 20182030

: 20182030 Key Companies : Biomarin Pharmaceutical, Novo Nordisk, Sanofi, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer, Catalyst Biosciences, Sangamo Therapeutics, Roche, Spark Therapeutics, Sigilon Therapeutics, Takeda (Shire) and several others.

: Biomarin Pharmaceutical, Novo Nordisk, Sanofi, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer, Catalyst Biosciences, Sangamo Therapeutics, Roche, Spark Therapeutics, Sigilon Therapeutics, and several others. Hemophilia A Pipeline Therapies: Valoctocogene Roxaparvovec (BMN 270), Concizumab, Fitusiran, BIVV001, Marstacimab, Marzeptacog alfa, Giroctocogene fitelparvovec (SB-525/PF-07055480), RG6357 (SPK-8011), RG6358 (SPK-8016), SIG-001, NNC0365-3769 A (Mim8), TAK-754 (BAX 888/ SHP654 ) and others.

Valoctocogene Roxaparvovec (BMN 270), Concizumab, Fitusiran, BIVV001, Marstacimab, Marzeptacog alfa, Giroctocogene fitelparvovec (SB-525/PF-07055480), RG6357 (SPK-8011), RG6358 (SPK-8016), SIG-001, NNC0365-3769 A (Mim8), TAK-754 (BAX 888/ ) and others. Analysis : Comparative and conjoint analysis of Hemophilia A Emerging therapies

: Comparative and conjoint analysis of Hemophilia A Emerging therapies Tools used : SWOT analysis, Porter's Five Forces, PESTLE analysis, BCG Matrix

: SWOT analysis, Porter's Five Forces, PESTLE analysis, BCG Matrix Analysis methods.

Case Studies

KOL's Views

Analyst's Views

Table of Contents

1 Key Insights 2 Executive Summary of Hemophilia A 3 Competitive Intelligence Analysis for Hemophilia A 4 Hemophilia A: Market Overview at a Glance 5 Hemophilia A: Disease Background and Overview 6 Hemophilia A Patient Journey 7 Hemophilia A Epidemiology and Patient Population 8 Hemophilia A Treatment Algorithm, Current Treatment, and Medical Practices 9 Unmet Needs 10 Key Endpoints of Hemophilia A Treatment 11 Hemophilia A Marketed Products 12 Hemophilia A Emerging Therapies 13 Hemophilia A: Seven Major Market Analysis 14 Conjoint analysis 15 Hemophilia A 7MM: Market Outlook 16 Access and Reimbursement Overview of Hemophilia A 17 KOL Views 18 Hemophilia A Market Drivers 19 Hemophilia A Market Barriers 20 Appendix 21 DelveInsight Capabilities 22 Disclaimer 23 About DelveInsight

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New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Ministry of Finance on Monday released the 16th weekly instalment of Rs 5,000 crore to the states to meet the GST compensation shortfall.

Out of this, an amount of Rs 4,597.16 crore has been released to 23 states and an amount of Rs 402.84 crore has been released to 3 Union Territories with Legislative Assembly (Delhi, Jammu & Kashmir & Puducherry) who are members of the GST Council. The remaining five states, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland and Sikkim, do not have a gap in revenue on account of GST implementation.

Till now, 86 per cent of the total estimated GST compensation shortfall has been released to the states and UTs with a Legislative Assembly. Out of this, an amount of Rs 86,729.93 crore has been released to the states and an amount of Rs 8,270.07 crore has been released to these UTs.

The Centre had set up a special borrowing window in October 2020 to meet the estimated shortfall of Rs 1.10 lakh crore in revenue arising on account of implementation of GST. The borrowings are being done through this window by it on behalf of the states and UTs.
LG, SK should settle dispute through dialogue



The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled in favor of LG Energy Solution in a trade secret case against SK Innovation last Wednesday. The ITC banned SK Innovation from importation, domestic production and sales of its electric vehicle batteries in the United States for 10 years.



The ruling is expected to deal a blow to SK Innovation as the trade panel acknowledged LG's accusation that SK infringed on its trade secrets. SK seems to be expecting U.S. President Joe Biden to exercise his veto power against the ruling within the 60-day review period. Yet, such a possibility appears remote given that Biden has underlined the importance of protecting intellectual property rights and there has been no precedent of a president vetoing in intellectual property cases.



Furthermore, the ITC permitted SK to import components to produce battery packs for Volkswagen for two years and for Ford for four years. This will likely reduce the possibility of Biden exercising his veto right to protect U.S. client companies and jobs.



Now all eyes are fixed on whether the two Korean companies will sit together to find a way out of this mess in the wake of the ITC ruling. For SK, which is building two EV battery plants in the U.S. state of Georgia, it needs to reach a compromise with LG to avoid the import ban and complete the construction of its U.S. production facilities. Ford and Volkswagen have also been calling for immediate settlement of the dispute between LG and SK.



Prime Minister Chung Se-kyun also urged the two rivals to reach an agreement at an early date, indicating a prolonged dispute will only benefit their foreign competitors. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp has been calling on Biden to wield his veto power as SK has promised to create 2,600 local jobs with the two battery plants.



Lithium-ion batteries, which are called the "second semiconductor," have emerged as a key component of electric vehicles. Battery-making is seen as a lucrative future business following memory chips. Currently, three Korean makers along with Samsung SDI are accounting for 34 percent of the global market.



Yet the global competition has become intensified with major companies rushing to develop state-of-the-art batteries and making huge investments. For instance, U.S. electric carmaker Tesla recently announced its ambitious plan to develop its own EV batteries while the European Union is aiming to achieve 100 percent domestic battery supply for its companies by 2025.



Chinese and Japanese firms are also desperate to nibble at the Korean companies' global market share. In this situation, LG and SK should waste no time or efforts by continuing to haggle over the trade secret issue. Expectation has been growing over a "K-battery alliance" comprising the three battery makers and two domestic carmakers  Hyundai Motor and Kia. All told, the companies should find a negotiated solution. Most of all, SK needs to offer sufficient compensation to LG for misappropriating its intellectual property.


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Qatar's foreign minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani visited his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif in Tehran on Monday.

Iran's official news agency IRNA said Al-Thani's visit came after Qatar said it was ready to support a political and diplomatic process to bring Iran and America back to the 2015 nuclear deal.

The deal started unravelling when former U.S president Donald Trump withdrew from it in 2018.

Since then, Iran has been increasing its production of nuclear materials beyond the level specified in the agreement.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
Anand Mahindra to step down as Mahindra Group Executive Chairman from April 2020

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Fantastic: Mahindra on report claiming students turning down IITs for CMI

India

oi-Briti Roy Barman

Mumbai, Feb 15: Businessman Anand Mahindra reacted to a report that claimed that students are turning down IITs to study at Chennai Mathematical Institute, an institute funded substantially by the government.

"This is fantastic. A perfect marriage of resources," Mahindra tweeted. "Voila, you have an institute that is a world-beater," he added, as he praised CMI's Founder, late mathematician CS Seshadri.

Founded in 1989 by the late professor CS Seshadri, a mathematician and Padma Bhushan awardee, CMI was recognised as a university in 2006.

While the institute holds the distinction of having over 50 per cent of students pursue doctoral or post-doctoral research globally, the introduction of a post-graduate program in data science at CMI has made corporate behemoths too line up outside the institute.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

CMI offers undergraduate, post-graduate and doctoral, post-doctoral programs in mathematics, physics, computer science a and others, and focuses on implementing solutions for real problems.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 15:42 [IST]
A convicted bomber, who was caught attempting to renew a passport in the name of a man who died in 1986, has been ordered to complete 240 hours of community service.

Donal Gannon (58) was convicted in London in July 1997 for the offence of conspiracy to cause explosions and received a sentence of 35 years imprisonment.

Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that he was released under the Good Friday Agreement in 2000 and that he is a full supporter of the peace process.

Gannon told gardai that he falsely obtained the passport as he wanted to climb a mountain in the US and did not believe he would be admitted entry with his own passport.

Detective Garda Padraig Hanley told the court that he did not find this explanation plausible.

Gannon, of Shelton Drive, Kimmage, Dublin, pleaded guilty to providing information and documents which were, and he knew to be, false and misleading in connection with a passport application for the renewal of an Irish passport in the name David O'Brien at an unknown location in the State on an unknown date between May 7, 2017 and May 30, 2017.

He also pleaded guilty to using a false instrument at Kevin's Street Garda Station, Kevin's Street, Dublin 8, on May 7, 2017.

Passing sentence today, Judge Melanie Greally said that, since being released from custody, Gannon has led what can only be described as an exemplary life.

Judge Greally said the accused has a successful business, a good family life, pro-social interests and that excellent testimonials were submitted before the court. She said his skills and attributes would be best applied in a community setting.

She added that these are offences of a kind where general deterrence is an important consideration. She said it was a finely balanced case in which a court would be justified in imposing a custodial sentence.

Judge Greally ordered that Gannon complete 240 hours of community service within 18 months in lieu of three years imprisonment for the offence of providing false documents in connection with a passport application.

She also sentenced Gannon to three years imprisonment for the offence of using a false instrument, but suspended the entirety of the sentence on strict conditions.

Micheal O'Higgins SC, defending, said his client was released under the Good Friday Agreement in 2000 having been in custody in relation to the charge of conspiracy to cause explosions since 1996. He said his client is a full supporter of the peace process.

Counsel said his client had climbed three mountains which are part of the Seven Summits between 2001 and 2005 and that he wished to climb the next mountain on this list, which is in Alaska. He said this was when his client applied for the passport.

Mr O'Higgins said that his client then began to climb the Alps and other mountains in Europe and that his aspiration to climb the mountain in Alaska waned.

Counsel said his client has managed to build up a number of investment properties which provides him with an income from rent. He said his client has one daughter and that Gannon was adamant in his instructions that there is no risk of reoffending.

At a previous sentencing hearing, Detective Garda Padraig Hanley told Anne-Marie Lawlor SC, prosecuting, that in August 2017 he became aware of what appeared to be a false application.

Det Gda Hanley said the application in question was for the renewal of a passport in the name of David O'Brien with a date of birth of July 23, 1963. He said that Mr O'Brien was killed in a road traffic accident in 1986.
Tet greetings from Korean President Moon Jae-in (Screenshot photo)

Hanoi - Leaders of several foreign countries have extended their greetings in the Vietnamese language on the occasion of the 2021 Tet (Lunar New Year) festival.

On February 12, or the first day of the Year of the Buffalo, President of the Republic of Korea Moon Jae-in cabled his wishes in Korean, Vietnamese, Chinese and English on his personal social network sites.

Best wishes to all our neighbors who celebrate the Lunar New Year! May 2021 bring good health and peace to everyone. We look forward to the day we meet without masks!, he wrote.

The post hits dozens of thousands Likes on Facebook alone.

Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron extended his greetings on social media in three languages, namely Vietnamese, Korean and Chinese, in which he wished people good health, success and happiness.

His greetings in Vietnamese saw a high interaction rate. As of February 13 (the second day of the lunar year), it had documented 47 million Likes, 3.9 million comments and 2.8 million Shares on Facebook.

US President Joe Biden also sent his wishes on his Twitter account on February 13. He and his spouse appeared in a video clip together, wishing happiness, health and prosperity to those who celebrate the Lunar New Year.

Tet, the largest and most celebrated festival of Vietnam, falls on February 10-17 this year.
Each time I step away from my laptop after watching a video showing a Black person assaulting or robbing an elderly Asian person, Im left with a sense of dread.

The reality is horrifying. More than 30 violent crimes have befallen Bay Area residents of Asian descent this year. This is a community that has long felt unseen and ignored. A handful of these terrible incidents have turned into viral videos, all with Black aggressors.

As a Black man in America, Im familiar with how easy it is to have a narrative twisted against me based on a few anecdotes and scant data. I know that other communities of color are, too. The illegal Mexican immigrant. The model Asian trope. The marauding Black criminal. These are the stereotypes that reduce, discredit and pit marginalized communities against each other when we should be lifting each other up.

I dont want this to happen in the Bay Area. Not now, not after all our communities accomplished during last years reckoning on race and justice. But, as much as I want to shoehorn this dialogue to its evolved conclusion, I know the timing isnt right. Not yet. Now is the time to simply hear the pain.

I was reminded of this in my conversation with Clarence Kwan, who writes the anti-racist zine Chinese Protest Recipes and is a longtime ally of the Black Lives Matter movement. In the same way that, in Black Lives Matter, we were told to listen to Black people, listen to Black leaders, listen to Black women, in our fit of rage right now, the best thing people can do is listen to us, Kwan told me. If were willing to listen to each other, then thats the best way we can figure this moment out and how to move forward.

Liz Hafalia / The Chronicle 2020

Letting our Asian neighbors figure out their moment will lead where we need to go: to a nuanced dialogue about anti-Asian racism that isnt anti-Black. Or so hopes state Assembly member Alex Lee, D-San Jose, who, at 25, is Californias youngest Asian American lawmaker.

There are people who jump to the conclusion that because a Black person did (the crime), then all Black people must hate Asian people. Thats such a slippery slope that I just dont condone, he said. It is completely valid for people to feel upset ... to feel afraid and that is OK. But I believe from what Ive seen that whats happening are symptoms of larger issues.

Some of these larger issues involve the increased pressures that communities of color are under during the pandemic, but also the parallel trials that they endured fighting for rights in this nation of ours.

Black people understood the pain Asian Americans endured as immigrant laborers in the 19th century, and the racial violence they were subjected to through the racist Yellow Peril lens. Frederick Douglass denounced the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. A century later, Asian and Black folks marched together during the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, including on the UC Berkeley campus. It was two UC Berkeley students  Yuji Ichioka and Emma Gee  who, inspired by the Black Power movement, coined the term Asian American.

This kinship permeated the childhood of Margaretta Lin, executive director of the Just Cities/Dellums Institute, a social justice group in Oakland. I came to this country in 1968 after the Chinese Exclusion Act was lifted and the vestiges were finally removed, she told me. Growing up in Philadelphia, we experienced a lot of hate crimes and racial bullying. But the people who came to my to rescue as a 4-year-old were my Black neighbors.  I saw my Black neighbors as people who were safe, the people I could turn to when I was in trouble.

In that same spirit of solidarity, Black community leaders started a fundraiser this month for the Asian residents who were victims of violent crimes. The fundraisers goal was $3,000. In only a few days, it raised more than $15,000. The money will be divided among several organizations, including the Asian Health Center in Oakland and the Vietnamese Health Center in San Francisco, according to the fundraisers organizers.

The Bay Area knows how to have this conversation. It knows what to do next.

But the dread is still there. It flickers with every email that asks me to explain why all Black people are targeting all Asian people, or claiming that the region is only dangerous because of the crimes committed by people who look like me.

I wrestle with that dread, even as I trust my Asian neighbors and allies to steer us away from it. And so Im listening  and waiting to hear how I can help.

San Francisco Chronicle columnist Justin Phillips appears Sundays. Email: jphillips@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JustMrPhillips

The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Audi denies latest F1 project rumours

Audi has played down new speculation of a potential F1 project for 2025.

The rumours had been kick-started by new F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali's recent comments about potential interest from new manufacturers in the all-new engine format.

"It will be an increasingly hybrid F1," Domenicali has now told Il Giornale newspaper.

Prior to re-joining Formula 1, the Italian was CEO at Lamborghini - which like Audi is another Volkswagen brand.

"This will allow the big manufacturers to continue to develop a technology that, in my opinion, has a very great future ahead of it, especially in the transitory phase," Domenicali added.

"All of this will be part of the discussions we have started with the big manufacturers in order to attract new ones as well."

The obvious destination for Audi would be Red Bull, whose Dr Helmut Marko says the team's new 2022 engine program could be the precursor to full works status under the 2025 regulations.

"We are open to new partners," Marko insists.

Audi, though, is not playing ball with those rumours for now.

A spokesman for the German carmaker said he has been pulling out his standard Formula 1 denial "for ten years".

"At the moment we're not dealing with Formula 1. We have our motorsport strategy for the next ten years and that doesn't include F1," the Audi spokesman is quoted by RTL.
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The Nigeria Civil Defence and Security Corp (NCDSC) says it recovered 4,050 metres of power cables worth N5 million from vandals in Ningi Local Government Council in Bauchi State.

The Acting Commandant of the NCDSC in the state, Michael Atunde-Ade, disclosed this to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Bauchi.

Mr Atunde-Ade said that officers of the command received intelligent information on the activities of vandals and immediately switched into action to recover the items.

Our officers gathered that the cables were vandalised and packaged along Ningi  Burra road.

For three days, our officers were on surveillance but we could not apprehend anyone.

We later recovered the cables and it was handed over to the state Ministry for Power and Technology, the commandant said.

He further disclosed that the command also seized 300 bags of charcoal along Lame  Burra road and in Yankari Game Reserve in the state.

He said that the charcoal was part of the deforestation activities banned by the state government.

Mr Atunde-Ade confirmed that the items were handed over to the Bauchi State Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

Similarly, he said that the state command recently received palliative items from the North East Development Commission (NEDC).

The items include 100 bags of rice, 100 cartons of Maggi, 100 bags of salt, 300 cartons of groundnut oil and 100 cartons of spaghetti.

He said that the items would be distributed to 913 staff of the state command and zonal office in Bauchi.

(NAN)
If youre 75 or over and are registered at St. Lukes University Health Network, expect an automated call to schedule an appointment for your COVID-19 vaccine.

Starting this week, St. Lukes is launching Shot-Line, an automated scheduling system that will allow individuals to schedule their appointments over the phone.

Existing St. Lukes patients who have yet to be vaccinated and are eligible according to Pennsylvania Department of Health guidelines will receive a call on the phone number they listed on their St. Lukes patient records. During the call from 866-785-8537, an automated voice recording will ask if they would like to receive the vaccine.

If the person answers yes, they will undergo a COVID-19 eligibility check, and, if successful, will be given three appointment dates and times at the vaccine site nearest to the location on their record. They can then select the appointment time that is best for them by pushing that option number and be scheduled within 3 to 4 minutes.

St. Lukes is starting with people over 75 because a good number of people in that group have not yet been vaccinated.

As more vaccines become available, St. Lukes will follow DOH guidelines and use its Shot-Line system to schedule appointments for other groups, including those 65 and older and anyone between the ages of 16 and 64 with a condition that puts them at higher risk of the virus.
Ukrainians to be able to sign up for free vaccination against COVID-19 after March 1  Liashko

After March 1, Ukrainians will be able to sign up for a free vaccination against COVID-19, said Chief Sanitary Doctor, Deputy Minister of Health Viktor Liashko.

"We want to start registration from March 1, because from March 1 we will know exactly the volume of vaccine supplies per month," he told reporters on Saturday.

According to Liashko, citizens who are not included in the priority groups to be vaccinated will be able to register for vaccination. When registering, citizens aged 18-59 years old will be included in the waiting list, citizens over 60 years old will be assigned the time and place of vaccination.

Liashko said that it would be possible to sign up for vaccination in three ways: through a special vaccination website, which will open in the near future, through queuing system at disposal of family doctors, and also by calling the contact center.

Also, the possibility of recording through the Diia application is currently being studied.
New Delhi: About 4 million EPF subscribers are yet to receive the 8.5 percent interest on their PF account owing to mismatch of employee details in their KYC. The mismatch, reportedly has happened at the employers' end.

A report published in the Mint said that some 8 to 10 percent of EPF subscribers have not recieved their interest payout for 2019-20 FY due to the said KYC Mismatch.

On December 31, 2020, Modi government gave a big New Year gift to around six crore EPF subscribers who were eagerly waiting for the final nod from government on crediting of interest for 2019-20 in their employees' provident fund (EPF) accounts.

Labour and Employment minister Santosh Gangwar announced that PF subscribers will start receivig 8.5 percent interest on their PF account from the above day onwards.

I am happy to inform you that a notification has been issued & for year 2019-2020, our over 6 crore subscribers will receive 8.5 percent interest on PF amount. We have made such arrangements that you'll start receiving these benefits from today, Union Minister Santosh Gangwar said.

He added, We know that circumstances in 2020 weren't favourable for us. People were surprised when in 2020 beginning, we had said that we'll try to give 8.5 percent interest on Provident Fund amount for year 2019-2020. Today, I am here to fulfill that promise.

Meanwhile, if you are an EPFO subscriber, you could individually check all the details regarding your provident fund. EPFO subscribers can check their PF Balance from the comfort of home using four different ways --check PF balance using SMS, online, missed call and UMANG App.

Know how to check EPF account balance ONLINE

Log on to epfindia.gov.in

Feed in your UAN number, password and captcha code

Click on the e-Passbook

Once you file all the details, you will land up on a new page

Now open member id

Now you can see the total EPF balance in your account

How to check EPF balance through UMANG App

Open the UMANG App

Click on EPFO.

Click on Employee Centric Services

Click on the View Passbook option

Feed in your UAN number and password

You will get OTP on your registered mobile number

Now you can now check your EPF balance

How to check EPF balance through SMS

Apart from the mobile number, the members registered on the UAN portal may get their PF details by sending an SMS from their registered mobile numbers. For this, you are required to SMS EPFOHO UAN to 7738299899.

How to check EPF balance through MISSED Call

EPFO subscribers, registered on the UAN portal, may get their PF details available with the Employees Provident Fund Organisation by giving a missed call at 011-22901406 from their mobile number registered with UAN.

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.
An Egyptian delegation has arrived in Tripoli as part of preparatory discussions and plans to reopen the Egyptian embassy and consulate in Libya, local and regional media reported on Monday.

This comes 10 days after a new Libyan interim government was selected through a UN-sponsored vote, a step that Egypt has welcomed.

Egypt did not immediately issue any official statement on the visit. According to state-run news agency MENA, however, the delegation is set to discuss with Libyan officials the logistical procedures and arrangements to reopen the embassy in Tripoli and the consulate in Benghazi.

The embassy and the consulate suspended their operations in Libya in January 2014, after embassy workers were kidnapped by gunmen and the consulate was the target of a shooting.

Mohammed Al-Qiblawi, spokesman for the Government of National Accords (GNA) Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told the media that the Egyptian consulate will be opened inside the embassys Tripoli headquarters to serve the Egyptian community in the country.

He added that the consulate is expected to resume its work on Monday, as an initial step before reopening the embassy.

Following the selection of a new presidential council and interim government through the UN-led Libyan Political Dialogue Forum, the Egyptian foreign ministry has expressed Egypts readiness to work with the new Libyan authorities.

In a meeting with GNA Foreign Minister Mohamed Taher Siala, Egypts foreign minister said the country is ready to work with the Libyan interim government until a new government takes over after the elections, which are scheduled in December.

President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi has hailed the developments in Libya as a step in the right direction.

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by Sumon Corraya

Some 600 couples attend Mass promoted by Marriage Encounter in Tejgaon parish. Auxiliary Bishop Shorot Francis Gomes told the newlyweds to set aside at least ten minutes each day to listen to each other.

Dhaka (AsiaNews)  Catholic couples celebrated World Wedding Day yesterday, Valentine's Day.

The event, which was held in Dhakas Tejgaon parish, was organised by the local chapter of Worldwide Marriage Encounter (WME), a Church-based organisation.

We work to ensure that newlyweds can live their married lives with joy and peace, said Robi Alexander Dorse, a member of WME Bangladesh.

Some 600 people took part in the celebrations, wearing traditional sari and panjabi (kurta), all in red.

Upon arrival, each couple received a red rose as well as tokens of love with the words love does respect Love does trust, Love does accept, Love does waiting, Love brings peace, Love gives happiness etc.

Auxiliary Bishop Shorot Francis Gomes of Dhaka led the Mass. In the past, he served at Marriage Encounter.

Before marriage , he told the newlyweds in his homily, I always see men running after women. Then, a month or two passes and the husband no longer listens to his wife... Married life should not be like that.

Marriage is a holy sacrament that makes you one. For this reason, it will be made joyful by love, forgiveness, respect, tolerance and trust, said the prelate.

To make it work, I call on couples to set aside at least ten minutes each day to listen to each other. Share sorrows and joys. And know how to start every new day with forgiveness.

Some of the couples present shared their joy with AsiaNews. The fact that I wear a red panjabi and my wife a red sari makes us one heart, said Liton Corraya.

This is an opportunity to renew the pledge made during the wedding to love one another in poverty and illness, added Mala Gomes, a mother of two who, who, together with her husband, also participates in other initiatives promoted by Marriage Encounter.
As New Jerseyans search near and far for a coveted COVID-19 vaccine, some are asking if they can choose between the Moderna or Pfizer dose, the two types of vaccine currently available.

The short answer is no.

Currently, there is no way for a person to choose which vaccine they will get, said Donna Leusner, director of communications for the state department of health. The state does not recommend one vaccine over the other.

There are more than 200 sites offering the vaccine in N.J. Some are managed by the state, or county or municipality, some are run by hospitals, pharmacies or medical groups. Most vaccination sites offer either one type or the other. But the good news is, studies show there does not appear to be a tangible difference between the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, which both reported overall efficacy from 94 to 95%.

However, some sites tell you which vaccine you are going to get, giving you the option to bow out if for any reason, you dont want that particular vaccine. But, with demand far outstripping supply and appointments scarce to non-existent, that may not be an option many want to take and experts say there is no reason to make a choice anyway.

Stephanie Silvera, an epidemiologist and professor at Montclair State, agreed that both vaccines are equally effective and that residents shouldnt prefer one over the other.

The vaccine efficacy right now for both Pfizer and Moderna are pretty similar, Silvera said. And so at this point the goal is to get as many people as possible vaccinated. Theres not that much of a difference between the two.

Both the Moderna and the Pfizer vaccines require two shots: a priming dose, followed by a booster shot. The interval between Moderna doses is 28 days; for the Pfizer vaccine, its 21 days.

It is too early to tell if people will have more of a choice as other vaccines become available in the coming weeks. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine could receive emergency use authorization with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in late February. The advantage of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is that it only requires one dose, and it does not have the cold storage requirements of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines. However, it has a lower efficacy rate, with 72% protection against moderate to severe COVID in the U.S.A. and 85% protections against severe disease.

The vaccine rollout continues to lag in New Jersey and nationwide, as demand far outweighs supply. But Johnson & Johnson hopes to supply the U.S. with 100 million doses by April, it told CNBC last month.

Until we know the recommendations for use of the J&J vaccine, we dont know how it will change things, Leusner said. We do know that once it is available, we will have more vaccines to give.

Silvera added that if the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is approved later this month, she would advise older people or those in high-risk categories to seek out the Moderna or Pfizer vaccines, if possible.

My recommendation would be that for people who are in those higher risk categories, if it is possible to get the Moderna and Pfizer, which have higher efficacy against severe illness, that would be ideal, Silvera said. And for people who are less likely or dont fall into those higher risk categories for hospitalization, death or severe illness, the Johnson & Johnson likely is going to be sufficient.

But Silvera made one final point: Any vaccine is better than no vaccine.

At this point, if youre lucky enough to get an appointment, you should take it, she said.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.

Matthew Stanmyre may be reached at mstanmyre@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @MattStanmyre. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Last month, completion of dioxin cleanup on a 5,300-square-meter tract of land at Bien Hoa airport marked a significant milestone.

Chuck Searcy

Officials of both the Vietnamese and U.S. governments could derive satisfaction from knowing that the Agent Orange/dioxin legacy of war is now being addressed, after a troubling post-war history of misinformation and controversy, accusations and doubts.

Not just public officials, but veterans and ordinary citizens of both countries can take pride in looking back over the remarkable transformation that has taken place in the past two decades, from early years of mistrust and recrimination to a positive, working partnership between Vietnam and the U.S. today.

That relationship is now built on mutual trust and respect.

A cornerstone of our dramatically improved relationship is a clear, shared commitment between the people of both countries to address the legacies of war, Agent Orange/dioxin, explosive ordnance (EO), and wartime Missing In Action (MIA) personnel from all sides, in an open and honest manner. We now recognize that the humanitarian component of these challenges rises above politics and demands a concerted, selfless effort of all concerned.

How did we come to this point?

Twenty-five years after Vietnam and the U.S. normalized diplomatic relations on July 11,1995, is an appropriate moment to observe and reflect.

I have been a personal witness to this history: first, as a U.S. Army soldier in the war, in 1967-68, then as a veteran who returned to Vietnam in 1995 to try to contribute to the rebuilding, recovery, and reconciliation that was being painfully pursued by the Vietnamese. Working at the Swedish Childrens Hospital and Bach Mai Hospital in Ha Noi to provide orthopedic braces for disabled children, one of the first projects funded by USAID, I learned of the terrible toll in deaths and lifetime disabilities among ordinary people throughout Vietnam as a result of wartime bombs and mines still remaining in the ground.

I was shocked to discover that more than 100,000 Vietnamese had been killed or injured by explosive ordnance since the end of the war in 1975. When I and other Americans discussed this humanitarian tragedy with U.S. Embassy staff and other government officials, there was cautious agreement that this grim challenge needed to be addressed, yes, and it was an area in which the U.S. could provide assistance.

Quietly, there emerged a consensus among U.S. officials that America should take some responsibility for the consequences of the massive bombing that had occurred during the war, which left behind an estimated 800,000 tons of lethal, unexploded munitions that remained a threat to farmers, villagers, school children everywhere.

Peace Trees was the first American non-profit organization to receive approval from officials in Quang Tri Province to clear a small site of explosive ordnance and plant trees there. The door was opened for further cooperation, with the engagement of a German demining organization, SODI, soon to follow, then the British Mines Advisory Group (MAG), Golden West Humanitarian Foundation (GWHF), and other organizations including Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation (VVAF) and Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund (VVMF) which supported Project RENEW, and international aid organization Norwegian Peoples Aid (NPA).

Working together with Vietnamese officials and the Ministry of National Defense, these initiatives cleared a path for growing collaboration and a documented reduction in accidents and injuries caused by explosive ordnance.

The evidence is now clear: In the past three years, in Quang Tri Province, there have been zero accidents, zero injuries, and zero deaths caused by explosive ordnance. That is the result of everyone working together, at the national and the provincial level, Vietnamese and international colleagues arm in arm.

A team from Mines Advisory Group remove a Vietnam War bomb found in Quang Tri Province, central Vietnam, August 2020. Photo by Tran Van Minh.

The issue of Agent Orange/dioxin has been more complicated, and more controversial. Unlike the EO issue, which was embraced by many people of good will on all sides, AO/dioxin struck fear among the management and stockholders of U.S. chemical companies which had made the chemical defoliants, who were worried that they would be sued and would face huge financial liabilities. In fact, several court cases which were brought against these companies in the U.S., on behalf of U.S. veterans or Vietnamese plaintiffs, but they were either unsuccessful or partially so.

Yet the U.S. government stubbornly supported these companies in their utter denial of any connection between Agent Orange and birth defects, cancers and other diseases, lifetime disabilities, and other medical and mental limitations despite the evidence. The people of Vietnam knew these conditions existed widely, among their neighbors and extended families. U.S. refusal to acknowledge this problem and to face our responsibility to help the Vietnamese, especially when we were paying more than $10 billion a year in assistance to American veterans affected by Agent Orange, left a bitter taste with the Vietnamese.

The problem was eventually resolved with increasing involvement and pubic advocacy among a growing group of Americans, including veterans, medical experts, and media.

Of particular note is the role of the Ford Foundation and its Vietnam director at the time, Charles Bailey, who funded important field research, seminars and workshops, and professional studies to answer many questions posed by critics.

It became difficult for the U.S. government to remain on the outside, arguing against this humanitarian initiative, when the consensus was building so strongly that Agent Orange/dioxin was indeed a problem in Vietnam, and there are steps we can take to mitigate the disaster, including cleanup of the "hot spots" (such as Bien Hoa) and direct assistance to suffering families.

The U.S. government eventually came into the picture in a very visible and positive way, providing significant funding for the dioxin cleanup at the Da Nang international airport, and now the Bien Hoa airport cleanup which is underway.

USAID has pledged some $65 million over five years for disability programs in Vietnam, and the recent stimulus bill approved by the U.S. Congress contained $170 million for Vietnam to overcome the consequences of the war.

Meanwhile Vietnams 701 Committee on EO and Toxic Chemicals, the national umbrella organization that directs activities related to legacies of war, works closely with NGOs in Quang Tri and other provinces, to share data and other technological information, and the committee cooperates closely with the U.S. Embassy as well.

The collaboration is comprehensive and based on open exchange of information and tools to help both sides eventually bring "closure" to the war legacies that have been a powerful framework  nowadays a positive omen that benefits both governments, and the citizens of both Vietnam and the U.S.

Finally, we need to note a lingering, sad legacy that has also brought both sides together: the issue of Missing in Action (MIA), soldiers from all sides whose remains have not been found and not yet returned to their families or their homelands. When discussions began in the late 1980s, with the U.S. requesting Vietnams assistance in locating the sites of plane crashes or other incidents where bodies of U.S. personnel had not been recovered or accounted for, U.S. opponents of normalized relations with Vietnam were confident that this would be a "deal-breaker." They were sure the Vietnamese, citing national sovereignty and their own 300,000 MIAs, would refuse to cooperate. Normalized relations between the two countries would be impossible. How wrong they were!

Vietnamese officials agreed to permit U.S. military personnel to come and work with Vietnamese teams to search all over the country for remains for U.S. airmen and other personnel, which led to growing respect and friendship between the two sides. Instead of a barrier, this issue had become a bridge of understanding and cooperation.

Today the MIA effort goes on, with shared technologies and methodologies between both sides, including forensic research, and each side assisting the other in its recovery efforts. Twenty-five year ago no one thought this would be possible.

We can thank enlightened government leaders of both countries, students and veterans, ordinary citizens of good will. Many participated in exchange programs hosted by the Foreign Ministry, the Vietnam Union of Friendship Organizations, or the Veterans Association of Vietnam, who refused to accept permanent barriers between our two nations.

Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Chi Vinh, Deputy Minister of National Defense, and his colleagues have led the Vietnamese side of this collaboration, with leadership to ensure strong collaboration and new capacity-building. Soon-to-depart U.S. Ambassador Daniel Kritenbrink has followed in the steps of his predecessors to bring about greater cooperation and tangible results in our mutual efforts to achieve closure on these legacies of war. A critical contribution over the years has come from U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy whose leadership on the Budget Committee has ensured that funding would be available to meet these challenges.

We can also thank the open and generous spirit of the Vietnamese people, who refuse to carry bitter grudges, who always find ways to accommodate old enemies. As an endearing example to the world, the Vietnamese became friends with Americans again, sharing one aspiration to create a prosperous and peaceful future for all our children  free, at last, from the tragic legacies of war.

*Chuck Searcy is a U.S. Army veteran of the American war in Vietnam who has lived and worked in Vietnam since 1995. He is President of Veterans For Peace Chapter 160, and international advisor to Project RENEW in Quang Tri Province.
Perhaps youve been distracted by yet another partisan impeachment of Donald Trump, but if so I wanted to bring your attention to the latest evidence that the Democrats are not really after Trump; they are after each and every conservative in the country.

You may not know who Gina Carano is. I didn't know until recently, but she is an actress who plays the highly popular character Cara Dune on Disney's Star Wars spin-off "The Mandalorian." Carano first rose to fame as a mixed martial arts fighter, and has given women a role model for strength and musculature. In a galaxy far, far away, she kicks ass with grace and humor. In other words, she has broken boundaries and is a living advertisement for diversity.

But it turned out that one aspect of her diversity was too much for Hollywood to handle. She is a conservative. Thats her crime. The mob came for her not with torches and pitchforks, but with hashtags and hate.

This is really a scary story because it shows just how insane the left has become. Carano was fired from The Mandalorian because her social media posts offended some fake liberals who could not stand the idea of a woman who could think for herself. Lucasfilm, the Disney subsidiary that produces "The Mandalorian," called Carano's posts abhorrent and unacceptable." When the mob demanded #FireGinaCarano, Disney heard and responded. Her future as a role model for smart, sassy, strong women has been canceled.

So just what horrible thing did she say? Did she use racial slurs? Or threaten violence against an identity group? Did she post child pornography or support genocide?

Hell, no! Just the opposite!

What Lucasfilm and Disney found so "abhorrent" was an Instagram post opposing violence and rejecting stereotypes that reduce people to scapegoats who are seen as legitimate targets of hate. Here is the offending post:

"Jews were beaten in the streets, not by Nazi soldiers but by their neighborseven by children. Because history is edited, most people today dont realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?

Its unclear if Carano wrote the post herself, or shared someone elses ideas since it was framed by quotation marks. In either case, there is nothing abhorrent in that remark unless rational thought has become abhorrent.

Oh, wait, that is the problem. Because we now live within the arbitrary constraints of political correctness, facts no longer matter. It would be an easy task to prove that Hitler and the Nazi party spent the better part of two decades indoctrinating the German public to hate their Jewish neighbors. It is also an easy matter to demonstrate through a variety of historical precedents that genocidal hatred is not limited to the Nazi hatred of Jews. Yet Carano is criticized for warning that what happened in Germany could happen again, not necessarily in the same way but with the same devastating human consequences.

Carano did not equate the Holocaust with contemporary efforts to paint conservatives as dangerous, but that is what the cancel culture mob is claiming. They insinuate, oddly, that Caranos citation of anti-Semitism is itself somehow anti-Semitic.

This post on Twitter was typical: Gina Carano needs to be held accountable. The oppression my people have faced because of our religion and ethnicity is NOT the same as political disagreements.

No, it is not the same, but it is instructive. Religion and politics are both systems of belief, and if you are hunted down and persecuted, possibly killed, because of your beliefs, then you are a victim of a crime against humanity. Again, Caranos clearly drawn point was that targeting any group as an object of socially approved hate has proven to result in oppression and even violence.

Carano knows what she is talking about. As a conservative celebrity, she has been a lightning rod for progressive hatred herself. Its likely that Disney has been waiting for an excuse to dump her ever since she tweeted her apparent support for Donald Trump after the Nov. 3 presidential election:

We need to clean up the election process so we are not left feeling the way we do today. Put laws in place that protect us against voter fraud. Investigate every state. Film the counting. Flush out the fake votes. Require ID. Make Voter Fraud end in 2020. Fix the system.

Is it possible that the House impeachment managers will come after Gina Carano next? Just kidding, but Democrats have Twitter and Facebook to do their dirty work. Plus corporate America. Theyve gone after so many other conservatives already that its starting to look like a cheap remake of the 1950s Hollywood blacklist. Mike Lindell, Gateway Pundit, Lou Dobbs, Wayne Allyn Root, Project Veritas, Sen. Josh Hawley, plus thousands of ordinary Americans have all been targeted.

It brings to mind the famous poem of Martin Niemoller, the Lutheran pastor who opposed Hitler and saw the dangers of totalitarianism up close:

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out  because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out  because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out  because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me  and there was no one left to speak for me.

Thats the point Gina Carano was making. As for Niemoller, he spent from 1938 to 1945 in Nazi concentration camps. He readily admitted afterwards that before his own arrest, he had turned a blind eye to the oppression of others because he thought he was safe.

Likewise, many Americans today are not just unconcerned about cancel culture, but celebrating it. For now, they enjoy watching their political enemies silenced, but how long will it be before they themselves are the victims of the same monolithic groupthink?

To paraphrase Niemoller, First they came for Donald Trump, then they came for Gina Carano, then they came for free speech itself. And when they came for you, there was no one left to tweet about it.
The York County Republican Committee late Saturday censured U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey following his decision to find former President Donald Trump guilty at the end of the weeklong impeachment trial.

Trump was acquitted by a 57-43 Senate vote.

The committee in its press release said that Toomeys voting record over the past four years runs counter to the principles of the GOP and that hes out of touch with the core beliefs of Pennsylvania Republicans.

For the past four years Sen. Toomey sat silently as a hyper-partisan Democrat Congress relentlessly attacked President Trump, impeaching him twice on fabricated charges, said state House Representative Dawn Keefer, who proposed the resolution. Given [Toomeys] recent support of the second unconstitutional impeachment effort against a president who is no longer in office, the York County Republican Committee has reached the limits of its frustration.

Jeff Piccola, the committee chairman, said its so sad that Sen. Toomey has never attempted to reach out to the York County Republican Party to justify his vote to proceed with the Houses impeachment of President Trump with an investigation, evidence or due process.

He added that its imperative that Republican voters in York County know that the York County Republican Committee does not approve or condone many of the positions and recent actions of Sen. Toomey and no longer recognizes him as a creditable representative of our party.

The committees resolution follows:
ROME, FEB 15 - Screen diva Sophia Loren has got the L.A. Italia Legend Award for her extraordinary career and philanthropic work most recently demonstrated by her new film 'La vita davanti a se' (The Life Ahead), the jury of the Los Angeles, Italia - Film, Fashion and Art Festival 2021 said Sunday. The jury was headed by Italo-American actor Armand Assante, an Emmy Award winner for Gotti. Loren, 86, has won critical acclaim for her portrayal of a former prostitute who forms a bond with a young black migrant in The Life Ahead, directed by her son Edoardo Ponti. "Never as this year does Donna Sophia deserve the plaudits of the cinema world and we hope the SAcademy recognises her extraordinary performance with an Oscar nomination," said Naples-born Assante, who worked with Loren in the 1980 TV movie Her Own Story. This year's 16th edition of the "L.A. Italia Festival runs from April 18 to 24, leading into Oscar night on April 25. Two-time Oscar winner Loren is "on the crest of the wave again with her new film", organisers said. The Los Angeles Italia Film Festival or Los Angeles-Italia Film Fashion and Art Fest is an Italian film festival held in Grauman's Chinese Theatre, Hollywood, California. The festival honors the best of Italian and Italian-American culture every year through premieres, performances and exhibitions, during the pre-Oscar week. All of its events are open to the public free of charge. It is sponsored by the Italian Culture Ministry and Intesa San Paolo Bank. This year the festival will be inaugurated by The Life Ahead. (ANSA).


The hearing before the Financial Services Committee of the US House of Representatives will begin on Thursday and also feature the CEOs of several major hedge funds including Melvin Capital, a short-seller that suffered heavy losses after shares in the video game retailer spiked last month

The boss of social network Reddit, Steve Huffman, alongside the chief executive of trading app Robinhood, Vlad Tenev, and Keith Gill, a YouTube streamer better known as Roaring Kitty, are to form an unusual cohort of witnesses on Thursday when the Financial Services Committee of the US House of Representatives begins a hearing to investigate the recent trading frenzy in shares of ( ).

The virtual hearing, titled Game Stopped? Who Wins and Loses When Short Sellers, Social Media, and Retail Investors Collide which was originally announced last month, will also include the CEOs of several major hedge funds including Gabriel Plotkin, the boss of Melvin Capital, and Citadel LLC CEO Kenneth C. Griffin.

Congresswoman Maxine Waters, who chairs the Committee, said on January 28 that the hearing has been convened due to the recent activity around GameStop (GME) stock and other impacted stocks with a focus on short selling, online trading platforms, gamification and their systemic impact on our capital markets and retail investors.

Hedge funds have a long history of predatory conduct and that conduct is entirely indefensible. Private funds preying on the pension funds of hard working Americans must be stopped. Private funds engaging in predatory short selling to the detriment of other investors must be stopped. Private funds engaging in vulture strategies that hurt workers must be stopped, she added.

The hearing was sparked by a sudden surge in the price of GameStop shares in Janaury after an army of retail traders, encouraged by the Reddit forum r/wallstreetbets, began piling into the stock to inflict large losses on hedge funds that had heavily shorted the video game retailer. Particular ire was directed towards Melvin Capital, which was labelled by some as one of the biggest shorters of GameStop shares.

Trading apps such as Robinhood also found themselves at the core of the frenzy as retail traders increasingly turned to the apps, which allow users to purchase shares with no commission, to buy up GameStop stock and push the price higher. The app then sparked fury from several politicians and the wider retail trading community by blocking the purchase of shares in the company for a brief period, with some accusing Robinhood of caving to pressure from the hedge funds to prevent buying of the shares to avoid further losses on their short positions.

Tenev has said since that the app blocked the trades to preserve its balance sheet during usually high demand for orders, having also tapped its investors for over US$3bn in emergency funds during the frenzy.

Meanwhile, Gill, who aside from his Roaring Kitty pseudonym on YouTube also contributes to the r/wallstreetbets forum under the username u/DeepFuckingValue, is likely to have attracted attention due to his influence in the community as a financial investor and analyst, having begun posting about GameStop after investing US$53,000 in 2019, the value of which has since ballooned to around US$48mln as of the end of January.
As part of the World Customs Organization (WCO) Customs Operational Practices for Enforcement and Seizures (COPES) Programme, the WCO has launched the Customs Enforcement Curriculum for Assistant Collectors (CECAC) Project, aimed at assisting Pakistan Customs in building its capacity to enhance security and combat serious crime, particularly by preparing Pakistans future senior officers to address the challenges ahead.

The first official training related to this project was a two-week pilot training course for 23 Assistant Collectors from Pakistan Customs, held from 9 to 19 February 2021.

This event opened with a speech by Mr. Syed Muhammad Tariq Huda, Head of the Customs Administration of Pakistan, who expressed his appreciation to the WCO and the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INL) within the United States Department of State (U.S. DoS) for their efforts in implementing the CECAC Project.

Dr. Kunio Mikuriya, Secretary General of the WCO, then took the floor to reiterate his support for the Project and his confidence that it would fulfil the objectives set. Dr. Mikuriya also expressed special thanks to the U.S. DoS - INL for its financial support and expertise on the ground. Finally, Mr. Robert Silberstein, Consul General at the United States Consulate General in Karachi, encouraged Pakistan Customs to continue its efforts in combating fraud and fighting cross-border crime, with a clear focus on border control from now on.

After a welcome address by Mr. Khoso, Director of the Customs Training Centre of Pakistans Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), the training commenced with a presentation on the COPES Programme followed by a presentation outlining the CECAC Project and, finally, an introduction to the COPES Team, COPES Experts and participants.

When the training concludes on 19 February 2021, it is hoped that some of the lessons learned will feed back into the design of such training courses, so as to continuously improve their expected outcomes.

For more information on the COPES Programme and CECAC Project, please contact COPES@wcoomd.org.
(CNN)  Something you have on your 2021 bingo card? Netflix is adding another true-crime series to its ever-growing roster.

"Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel," which premiered this week, is a four-part docuseries about the mysterious death of Canadian college student and hotel guest Elisa Lam.

After disappearing from her room in the Los Angeles hotel in February 2013, the 21-year-old's body was found two weeks later drowned inside a water tank on the roof of the hotel.

Nearly a decade and dozens of conspiracy theories later, Lam's case remains unsolved.

The show's Oscar-nominated director, Joe Berlinger, however, certainly had enough material to work with for his new series given the hotel's grim history.

The Cecil Hotel's notorious past

The Cecil Hotel's dark past earned it a spot on Los Angeles tours long before a woman's body was found inside its rooftop water tank.

"It's the place where serial killers stay," Hollywood tour guide Richard Schave told CNN in 2013.

Schave and his wife Kim Cooper made it their job to compile details on those who have killed or been killed while staying at the Cecil.

The killers

The most famous on their list are serial killers Richard Ramirez and Jack Unterweger.

In 1985, Ramirez, known as the "Nightstalker," was living on the Cecil's top floor in a $14 a night room, Cooper said.

The Cecil, filled then with hundreds of transients living in the cheap rooms, was a good place for Ramirez to go unnoticed as he killed 13 women, Schave said. He was "just dumping his bloody clothes in the Dumpster at the end of his evening and going in the back entrance."

Jack Unterweger worked as a journalist covering Los Angeles crime for an Austrian magazine in 1991 when he moved into the Cecil.

"We believe he was living at the Cecil in homage to Ramirez," Schave said.

He is blamed for killing three prostitutes in Los Angeles while a guest at the Cecil.

The killed

During the 1950s and 1960s, the Cecil had a reputation as a place where people would kill themselves by jumping out upper-floor windows, Cooper said. "It's just what people do when they are at the end of their rope," she said.

Helen Gurnee, in her 50s, leapt from a seventh-floor window, landing on the Cecil Hotel marquee on October 22, 1954, Cooper said.

Julia Moore jumped from her eighth-floor room window on February 11, 1962, she said. Moore left behind a bus ticket from St Louis, 59 cents and an Illinois bank account book showing a balance of $1,800.

Pauline Otton, 27, jumped from a ninth-floor window after an argument with her estranged husband on October 12, 1962, Cooper said. Otton landed on George Gianinni, 65, who was walking on the sidewalk 90 feet below. Both were killed instantly.

Not everyone on Cooper's list committed suicide.

"Pigeon Goldie" Osgood, a retired telephone operator, was found dead in her ransacked room on June 4, 1964, Cooper said. Osgood, known for protecting and feeding the pigeons at nearby Pershing Square, was stabbed, strangled and raped. The crime has not been solved.

Not an ordinary hotel

Schave and Cooper have theories about why the Cecil's past has been so sordid.

It was built in the 1920s as a hotel "for businessmen to come into town and spend a night or two," Cooper said.

But it was soon upstaged by nicer hotels in a better part of town, she said. When the Great Depression hit in the 1930s, it became more of a transient hotel. Eventually, it transitioned into a single room occupancy business, known as an SRO. Long-term tenants rented individual rooms and shared bathrooms with neighboring residents.

"This was just a place where people who were really down on their luck were going," Schave said. "These hotels are filled with people who are at the edge of being integrated in society."

During the 1970s, '80s and '90s, hundreds of people who were "down on their luck" called the Cecil home, he said. "They were all hustling to make ends meet."

"It's not like that anymore, of course," Cooper said.

New owners converted three of the floors back to hotel rooms around 2007, but most of the building remains SRO, Schave said.

This story was first published on CNN.com, "How the dark and sordid past of the Cecil Hotel inspired Netflix's latest crime show"
Bharti Airtel informed that the meeting of the board of directors of the company is scheduled on 17 February 2021 to discuss the future strategic plans and reorganization of shareholding framework of subsidiary company(ies) which may result in consolidation/ acquisition of shares of subsidiary company(ies), the consideration of which may be discharged through issuance of equity shares of the company on a preferential basis and/ or cash.

Tata Motors said that Marc Llistosella has been appointed to the role of chief executive officer and managing director of the company effective 1 July 2021. Marc Llistosella will replace Guenter Butschek who informed his desire to relocate to Germany at the end of the contract for personal reasons. Butschek will continue to be a part of Tata Motors as the MD & CEO till 30 June 2021.

On a consolidated basis, ONGC's net profit dropped 31.06% to Rs 3,763.53 crore on 8.38% fall in revenue from operations at Rs 1,00,288.83 crore in Q3 December 2020 over Q3 December 2019.

On a consolidated basis, Glenmark Pharmaceuticals' net profit jumped 30.05% to Rs 248.17 crore on 1.87% increase in total revenue from operations at Rs 2,786.76 crore in Q3 December 2020 over Q3 December 2019.

On a consolidated basis, MOIL posted a 7.4% decline in net profit to Rs 51.38 crore in Q3 FY21 as against Rs 55.46 crore in Q3 FY20. Net sales rose by 4.5% to Rs 267.7 crore in Q3 FY21 over Q3 FY20.

On a consolidated basis, GMR Infrastructure reported net loss of Rs 1,120.51 crore in Q3 December 2020, higher than net loss of Rs 280.74 crore in Q3 December 2019. Net sales slumped 31.7% to Rs 1,359.10 crore in Q3 FY21 over Q3 FY20.

Deepak Nitrite reported 38.2% rise in consolidated net profit to Rs 216.56 crore on 10.3% rise in revenue from operations to Rs 1234.69 crore in Q3 FY21 over Q3 FY20.

Goodyear India's net profit surged 312% to Rs 48.97 crore in Q3 FY21 compared with Rs 11.88 crore in Q3 FY20. Revenue from operations grew by 20.7% to Rs 514.34 crore in Q3 FY21 over Q3 FY20.

Info Edge (India) reported 22.7% decline in standalone net profit to Rs 69.87 crore on 15% fall in net sales to Rs 272.30 crore in Q3 FY21 over Q3 FY20.

Siemens reported 10.4% rise in standalone net profit to Rs 290 crore on a 15.9% increase in net sales to Rs 2858.20 crore in Q1 December 2020 over Q1 December 2019.

On a consolidated basis, the Phoenix Mills reported 28.8% fall in net profit to Rs 65.42 crore on 34% decline in net sales to Rs 337.84 crore in Q3 FY21 over Q3 FY20.

Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders reported 32.3% fall in consolidated net profit to Rs 141.37 crore on 19.3% decline in net sales to Rs 1461.09 crore in Q3 FY21 over Q3 FY20.

Amara Raja Batteries' consolidated net profit jumped 17.98% to Rs 193.69 crore on 12.18% rise in revenue from operations at Rs 1,960.43 crore in Q3 December 2020 over Q3 December 2019.

RPP Infra Projects said its board will meet on 17 February 2021, to consider raising funds by issuing equity shares on rights basis.

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CAPE TOWN, South Africa  Jacob Zuma, the former president of South Africa whose nearly decade-long tenure was tainted by breathtaking corruption scandals, refused to appear before an inquiry panel Monday, raising the possibility that he would be imprisoned for contempt.

The panels leader, Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo, said he was seeking an order from the Constitutional Court, the countrys highest court, that would impose a term of imprisonment on Mr. Zuma.

Justice Zondos move catapulted the simmering theme of corruption during Mr. Zumas term, which lasted from 2009 to 2018, into a tense showdown over the accountability of the former president. His successor, Cyril Ramaphosa, has promised to purge the governing African National Congress of endemic problems of bribery and graft that have severely damaged its credibility in South Africa, one of the continents most important economic powerhouses.

Mr. Zuma, 78, had been set to appear before the inquiry panel, the Commission on State Capture, starting Monday for a week of testimony about his role in the corruption. The former president sent a letter from his lawyers instead, arguing that he was not legally bound to appear.
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind.  Higher education is responding to a growing demand from students and employers for shorter, more-focused opportunities to learn valuable skills.

Instead of being able to choose only from full degree programs, with the resulting finish line years away, certificates, credentials and short programs offer a closer finish line and specific skills that can help move students lives and careers forward more quickly. With talent shortages and skills gaps, employers are increasingly looking for creative and nimble new ways to meet their talent needs.

Many educational institutions have turned to micro-credentials as a way to provide new benchmarks of achievement for their students. Purdue University Global launched a new landscape of micro-credentials in 2020 in order to meet students needs with creative and innovative academic solutions. Purdue Global students earned over 6,000 micro-credentials in the past year.

What is a micro-credential?

Across higher education, a micro-credential can range from not-for-credit workshops completed in a few hours to a certificate-length curriculum that includes multiple full college-credit courses. Given this breadth of potential offerings, its not surprising that there is confusion about the purpose and value of a micro-credential. Purdue Global cuts through this confusion by defining specific types of micro-credentials that make it easier to see the value and to select a micro-credential that meets a particular goal. Many of these micro-credentials can be used as building blocks toward a full degree at Purdue Global.

Workplace Series: Includes courses designed in partnership between an employer and the university to meet specific job and professional development needs.

Foundation Series: Provides a student with introductory skills relevant to a particular industry-specific field.

Personalization Series: Allows a student to gain skills and experience in a specific area as a way to customize their degree program.

Pathway Series: Helps a student develop a strong academic pathway toward collegiate success.

Short-Course Series: Provides study in a particular subject of interest via select noncredit courses.

Micro-credentials are an increasingly important vehicle for student success at Purdue Global, Provost Jon Harbor said. By creating micro-credentials that are valuable on their own and that can also be stacked toward degree completion, were finding new ways to give students an opportunity to study in emerging fields as well as a chance to gain recognition for milestone achievements throughout their academic journey. Weve created a dynamic system of micro-credentials that will meet students where they are and help get them where they want to be.

Purdue Global currently offers over 30 different micro-credential options. Purdue Global has focused on developing micro-credential opportunities that expand students options in new and quickly developing spaces. This has included skills that are in high demand to address employer talent needs, as well as micro-credentials that build skills needed to respond to changing societal needs. For example, when the pandemic emerged in early 2020, Purdue Global quickly convened a team of faculty experts to design a contact tracing micro-credential course, which is offered free of charge to interested students. Additionally, in response to the civic unrest around racial injustice in mid-2020, Purdue Global launched a micro-credential focused on law enforcements role in society and social change. Students pursuing a program in criminal justice now have an opportunity to enroll in a targeted series of courses dedicated to studying the complex interaction between law enforcement and society.

In addition to serving many thousands of students through completion of micro-credentials, Purdue Global continues to develop innovative academic solutions that amplify the usefulness of degree progress for its students and give them more opportunities to pursue, achieve and celebrate success.

About Purdue University Global

Purdue University Global delivers personalized online education tailored to the unique needs of adults who have work or life experience beyond the classroom, enabling them to develop essential academic and professional skills with the support and flexibility they need to achieve their career goals. It offers a hyper-tailored path for students to earn an associate, bachelors, masters or doctoral degree, based on their work experience, desired pace, military service, previous college credits and other considerations  no matter where they are in their life journey. Purdue Global serves approximately 36,000 students (as of January 2021), most of whom earn their degree online. Purdue Global is a nonprofit, public university accredited by The Higher Learning Commission. It is affiliated with Purdue Universitys flagship institution, a highly ranked public research university located in West Lafayette, Indiana. Purdue University also operates two regional campuses in Fort Wayne and Northwest Indiana, as well as serving science, engineering and technology students at the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) campus. For more information, please visit purdueglobal.edu.

Media Contact: Tom Schott, 765-427-1721, tschott@purdue.edu

Sources: Jon Harbor, jon.harbor@purdueglobal.edu

Allegra Fowler, AlFowler@purdueglobal.edu
Actors Ishaan Khatter and Ananya Panday were spotted entering the same restaurant on Valentine's day. The actors have been rumored to be dating and had flown to the Maldives for a vacation in January.

Ishaan and Ananya were spotted on a lunch date where the two didn't shy away from the paparazzi when they started clicking their pictures together. Ananya was seen wearing a one-shoulder white dress, while Ishaan went out in white pants, a white cap, white shoes, and a blue T-shirt.

While making their way through the crowd, Ishaan could be seen being protective about Ananya and helped her get inside the car. This public appearance by the two have made fans wonder if both were making their rumored relationship official.

The duo worked together in their recently released film Khaali Peeli, where they played each other's love interest in the film.

In terms of the upcoming movie projects, Ananya will next be seen in Shakun Batra's untitled directorial movie that will also star Deepika Padukone and Siddhant Chaturvedi. She will also be seen in her next movie called Liger, with Vijay Deverakonda that will be releasing in theatres on 9 September, this year. Vijay announced the release date and shared a poster of the movie on Thursday that has been directed by Puri Jagannadh.

Ishaan, on the other hand, will be a part of Phone Bhoot starring Katrina Kaif and Siddhant.

Ananya started her Bollywood career with the 2019 teen drama 'Student Of The Year 2', while Ishaan Khatter started his acting career with 'Beyond The Clouds' in 2017. He went on to gain recognition with the 2018 drama 'Dhadak' opposite Janhvi Kapoor, who made her debut with the movie.

Ishaan and Ananya are often seen on each other's social media posts, however, they are yet to confirm their relationship.
Jefferies is now solely running the proposed 4bn stock market float which is claimed to be firmly on-track

Cybersecurity firm Darktrace is continuing to target a 4bn London initial public offer (IPO) despite broker UBS quitting the cybersecurity firm's proposed float for compliance reasons.

The Swiss bank has reportedly told Darktrace that its compliance department would not allow necessary suspicious activity reports (SARs) to be signed off.

It comes amidst scrutiny over the companys ties to British tech billionaire Mike Lynch.

The Swiss bank had been working on the market listing alongside Jefferies since November.

Previously, according to Sky News in September, ruled itself out of a role in the IPO due to potential legal ramifications.

Lynch, a founding investor in Darktrace and a former director, is presently facing possible extradition to the United States where he has been charged with 17 counts of securities and wire fraud.

It follows a 3.8bn UK civil fraud case related to his former company Autonomy which was bought by Hewlett Packard for 8.4bn in 2011 (HP subsequently wrote down US$8.8bn in connection to the acquired business, alleging accounting irregularities).

Lynch left the Darktrace board in 2018 and he retains an interest in the company via his investment fund Invoke Capital, one of the largest stakeholders in the pre-IPO group.

According to Sky News today, a source close to Darktrace has called the Swiss banks resignation a UBS issue, not a Darktrace issue meanwhile UBS declined to comment.

Insiders at Darktrace were reported to say the IPO is still firmly on-track and highlighted encouraging initial indications of interest from investors.

Jefferies now solely leads the London float which is expected to be backed by Berenberg and private-equity group KKR (which is already a major shareholder and has previously acquired shares from Invoke).

Darktrace is an artificial intelligence-led cybersecurity group, founded by University of Cambridge mathematicians.

Its technology, described as pioneering, is said to be able to identify a diverse range of threats including state-sponsored espionage at their earliest stages. The companys clients include , William Hill and US insurer AIG.

The company is headquartered in San Francisco and Cambridge. It has some 1,500 employees across 44 offices across the world.
The USCCB Subcommittee on Aid to the Church in Central and Eastern Europe focuses its Ash Wednesday collection towards providing hope to the Church in Kyrgyzstan where work continues to rebuild religious life and social activity after years of anti-religious persecution under Soviet rule.

By Vatican News staff writer

The US Bishops Conference Subcommittee on Aid to the Church in Central and Eastern Europe is highlighting the Catholic Community in Kyrgyzstan in its collection campaign slated for Ash Wednesday, 17 February 2021.

Kyrgyzstan, the Bishops said in a statement on Monday, is often compared to Switzerland for its beauty and to Siberia for its history as a Soviet gulag. Inadvertently, the Catholic Church was revived in the country when it was used as a prison for ethnic Poles and Germans deported from western Russia for refusing to denounce their faith during the communist regime.

The bishops noted that since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, countries in Central and Eastern Europe have been working to rebuild their religious life as well as government structures, social welfare activities and economies. More so, Catholics of that region, who have endured decades of anti-religious persecution under Soviet rule, are in urgent need.

The collection for Central and Eastern Europe, therefore, the bishops clarified, will support seminaries, youth ministry, social service programs, and pastoral centres, as well as church construction and renovation in 28 nations that were once under communist control.

A church filled with fervor

"During my visit to Kyrgyzstan in 2019, recounts Bishop Jeffrey M. Monforton, president of the USCCB Sub-Committee for Aid to the Church in Central and Eastern Europe, I was moved and humbled by the fervor of the people - including the young people - who filled the churches.

One of the most moving experiences of my ministry, he continued was to confirm an elderly woman in a nursing home. She had been baptized as an infant, but her parents were afraid to allow her confirmation. For many, many years, she prayed to receive the sacrament, and saw my visit as an answer to her prayers.

Encouraging support for the collection campaign, Bishop Monforton explained that the generosity of the faithful will impact the lives of many in Central and Eastern Europe.

Aid to churches in need

In 2020, the USCCB Sub-Committee for Aid to the Church in Central and Eastern Europe awarded $6.1 million in funding for 323 projects in 25 countries.

For the Ash Wednesday collection, the faithful who are unable to attend Mass in person are encouraged to contact their local parishes for giving options since many of them support online/electronic donations. Some dioceses have also selected different dates for the campaign to avoid conflict with local activities.

Further information about the collection campaign can be accessed on the US Bishops Conference website.
Naftogaz elaborates on Ukraine's further steps if Nord Stream 2 not implemented

Ukraine has made significant progress in the fight against Nord Stream 2, Kobolyev believes.

Reporting by UNIAN

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Some parts of Southeast Texas will see single-digit temperatures as a rare arctic storm continues throughout much of the region over the next several days.

An inch of sleet fell overnight in the Beaumont area, icing roads that will remain frozen for the next several days with highs just a degree above freezing, according to the National Weather Service.

Bitterly cold temperatures coming tonight and another round of winter precipitation coming sometime Wednesday morning, NWS Meteorologist Donald Jones said during a briefing Monday.

Those temperatures could be as low as 5F in Woodville, 8F in Jasper and 10F in Beaumont.

Cloud cover will probably clear out overnight, NWS Meteorologist Stacey Denson told The Enerprise. The main thing is that if there is precipitation on the ground it is going to stay there since temperatures will not get above freezing.

In Jasper, a light snow combined with low temperatures and icy roads has made much of the county undrivable.

We got quite a bit of snowfall, especially in the northern part of the county, Jasper County Judge Mark Allen told The Enterprise. Most of the roads really arent passable at this time. They put the salt brine out on the bridges which helps a little, but there was so much snow accumulation it really is difficult for anybody to drive.

Officials across the region are urging residents to stay at home if possible.

At a glance District's that will be transitioning to online learning Tuesday and opening Wednesday include Beaumont ISD, Sabine Pass ISD, Nederland ISD, Bob Hope School, Bridge City ISD, Buna ISD, Little Cypress-Mauriceville CISD, Newton ISD, Port Arthur ISD, Silsbee ISD and West Orange Cove CISD. Port Neches-Groves ISD staff will return Wednesday at noon. Students will return after additional updates are provided. See More Collapse

If they want to enjoy the snow and the scenery, do it at home, dont get in vehicles and drive around. Its just too much, Allen said.

Grocery stores, including H-E-B scaled back hours Monday and some hospitals altered operations as well as government buildings.

Christus Southeast Texas Health Systems has closed the St. Elizabeth Outpatient Pavilion, the St. Mary Mid-County Outpatient Center and the Beaumont Bone and Joint Institute.

The Jefferson County Courthouse was closed Monday afternoon, and trash pick-up in Port Neches and Beaumont has been delayed.

The potentially treacherous conditions have caused schools to move classes online Tuesday, with most planning to reopen campuses Wednesday.

Several districts, including Jasper ISD, are on winter break this week.

Southeast Texas has been spared the brunt of potentially dangerous power outages so far as utilities across the state reel from unprecedented demand with frigid forecasts throughout much of the state.

In Houston, nearly 1.2 million customers are out of power, with officials predicting a prolonged outage.

In order to prevent a total, statewide blackout, which could take several days if not one or two weeks to restore, the system is having to be very surgical on taking people off the system to reduce that demand on that limited supply, Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said. Otherwise, it could be considerably worse and this situation could be prolonged.

On HoustonChronicle.com:We didnt prepare for this: 1.2M in Houston left without power on coldest day since 1989

Utility companies, including Entergy, have been conducting intermittent planned power outages to try and keep up with the demand.

Were still continuing to monitor the conditions and are still under a directive from (Midcontinent Independent System Operator) to implement load reductions, Entergy Spokesperson Allie Payne told The Enterprise. Were certainly doing everything in our power to bring back generation which would reduce the need for those periodic outages. At this point we dont anticipate outages in the Golden Triangle area related to the periodic power outages.

In the event that any schools are impacted by power outages, the Texas Education Agency has authorized districts experiencing outages leading to full closures to apply for a waiver for a maximum of three days without make-up required or having to utilize bad weather days.

Otherwise districts will be able to apply for full-day funding waivers for virtual learning.

While most residents are huddled in their homes, some ventured out to explore the frozen city and run errands.

Daniela Uresti used a spoon to scrape ice off her windshield before heading out.

I grew up in Virginia, so we were used to the snow, she told The Enterprise. But now Im used to the heat.

Uresti stayed home with friends and drank hot chocolate Monday after her work told her to stay home because of icy roads.

I stayed inside, except to take my dogs out for their first snow, she said. They loved it.

With temperatures dipping even lower, organizations are opening to help those in need.

The Islamic Society of Triplex, located at 1270 W. Cardinal Drive, is offering lodging for up to 20 people (due to social distancing), food, clothing and blankets as long as the weather threat exists.

Shahid Javed, who is on the board of the Islamic Center, said they are always trying to do things to help out the community.

Temperatures will rise just above freezing Wednesday afternoon, and gradually warm up until the weekend when there will be a high of 58F Saturday and 67F Sunday.

Houston Chronicle reporters staff writers Zach Despart, Nicole Hensley and Enterprise staff photographer Kim Brent contributed to this report.

isaac.windes@hearstnp.com

twitter.com/isaacdwindes
[February 15, 2021] ActiveCampaign furthers commitment to customer success by bringing together 500+ automation recipes with 125+ new email design templates

CHICAGO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- ActiveCampaign , the leader in Customer Experience Automation (CXA), has added 70 email templates that are ready for predictive content to its library, reaching 125+ total templates. By enhancing the quantity and quality of these templates, alongside the company's 500+ automation recipes and Predictive Recipes functionality, ActiveCampaign is fulfilling its Customer Success Commitment to provide the most value, service and trust to its over 130,000 customers. These new designs enable businesses of all sizes to maintain a modern brand aesthetic in their marketing, thus positioning them as leaders in their industries. Templates range in aesthetic type to communication type to fit any business' unique needs and style, including deal/offer, cart abandonment, newsletter and event templates. ActiveCampaign also commits to adding automation recipes and email templates to its library on a continual basis. Future recipes and templates will include customer lifecycle activities such as contest, product feedback and loyalty programs. Additional benefits of these updated templates include: Full lifecycle automation : By pairing these templates with ActiveCampaign's 500+ automation recipes, users can unlock the power of full customer lifecycle automation.

: By pairing these templates with ActiveCampaign's 500+ automation recipes, users can unlock the power of full customer lifecycle automation. Customizable : Templates are customizable to any brand by simply swapping out colors, fonts and images.

: Templates are customizable to any brand by simply swapping out colors, fonts and images. Predictive and conditional content : A full team of designers and developers have designed, built, coded and QA'd the designs to display properly across devices, meaning marketers can rest assured that emails will make t to inboxes the way intended and focus more on the content.

: A full team of designers and developers have designed, built, coded and QA'd the designs to display properly across devices, meaning marketers can rest assured that emails will make t to inboxes the way intended and focus more on the content. Easy to use: Unlike other email templates on the market, ActiveCampaign templates do not require technical expertise to implement. Anyone can customize these templates to their brand in a few clicks with our drag and drop tools.



Jason VandeBoom , founder and CEO of ActiveCampaign. "These email template enhancements are a perfect example of that drive to make it easier for businesses of all sizes to create amazing customer experiences at scale." During the most recent company-wide hackathon, a group of ActiveCampaign employees came together to support customers wanting more templates to meet their unique needs by use case and industry. This demonstrates that all of ActiveCampaign's 750+ employees continually hunt for solutions to customer pain points and provide even greater value.

"As a growing team one of the things we think about is how can we build better processes, and that's really important to us," Casey Hill, head of growth at Bonjoro . "What's cool is that we've gotten to a point where ActiveCampaign has become a part of our marketing processes, which dramatically increases our marketing efficiency. Our marketing team can just jump in there, change the gears, and go." Learn more Templates

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Open Positions About ActiveCampaign ActiveCampaign's category-defining Customer Experience Automation Platform (CXA) helps over 130,000 businesses in 170 countries meaningfully engage with their customers. The platform gives businesses of all sizes access to 500+ pre-built automations that combine email marketing, marketing automation, CRM and machine learning for powerful segmentation and personalization across social, email, messaging, chat and text. Over 70% of ActiveCampaign's customers use its 300+ integrations including Shopify, Square, Facebook, and Salesforce. ActiveCampaign scores higher in customer satisfaction than any other solution in Marketing Automation on G2.com and is the 2020 Top Rated Email Marketing Software on TrustRadius. Pricing starts at just $9/month. Start a free trial at ActiveCampaign.com . Contact:

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activecampaign@nextpr.com View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/activecampaign-furthers-commitment-to-customer-success-by-bringing-together-500-automation-recipes-with-125-new-email-design-templates-301227947.html SOURCE ActiveCampaign

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South Africa: Travellers urged to present required documents as borders reopen

Home Affairs Minister, Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, has appealed to travelers to ensure that they have all the requisite travel documents, including valid COVID-19 tests, when they present themselves to officials at the countrys borders.

Truck drivers should adhere to laws, regulations and agreements in place in the border area. This will go a long way in minimising congestion, said Motsoaledi.

The call follows a Cabinet decision to reopen 20 land borders for ordinary travel on 15 February 2021. The ports of entry were closed on 11 January 2021, as part of efforts to curb the spread of COVID-19.

Motsoaledi will today lead the deployment of senior managers of the department to key land border posts

The Minister, including Deputy Minister Njabulo Nzuza and the Director-General Tommy Makhode are expected to visit the four busiest land ports to monitor the implementation of plans to process travellers through the ports.

Motsoaledi is scheduled to be at the Lebombo border post, while Nzuza will be at Beitbridge, and Makhode at Maseru Bridge and Ficksburg.

Motsoaledi emphasised that the active and orderly management of people through the borders is an important part of the countrys overall risk-adjusted approach to control the spread of COVID-19.

In the past four weeks, the department has increased its engagements with officials in neighbouring countries, provinces with land borders and other stakeholders to improve coordination of efforts.

The aim of these engagements was to share plans and ensure seamless movement of travellers and goods to minimise the chances of border crossings being super spreader events, Motsoaledi said.

He also warned that any person presenting themselves at any of the borders with fake COVID-19 certificates will be denied entry and barred from visiting South Africa for a period of at least five years.

The list of the 20 land borders scheduled to reopen can be accessed on : http://www.dha.gov.za/index.php/corona-virus-information - SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-02-15. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Mumbai, Feb 15 : The upcoming war drama web series 1962: The War In The Hills offers a glimpse into the lives of the soldiers who stood rock solid against Chinese troops dedicating their lives for the security of the nation. A trailer of the 10-episode series was launched on Monday.

Talking about the series, director Mahesh Manjrekar shared: "1962: The War In The Hills is the result of a life-long dream of bringing alive a part of history that has been long forgotten. The journey of these 125 soldiers, while inspired by true events, is a story that needed to be told." "This project has been monumental in every sense -- from shooting in real locations, to recreating the 1962 era through setups, costumes and more. But this story is not limited only to the battleground, it takes us beyond into the lives of these soldiers as they grapple with love, longing and loss," the filmmaker added.

The series casts Abhay Deol as Major Suraj Singh, the charismatic leader of a small battalion called C Company.

"To me, it feels like a personal responsibility to deliver the strength of Major Suraj Singh, to showcase his brave exterior as he leads his troop in a battle to the last stand, while also dealing with life as a father and husband. It's an extraordinary story about courage that is relatable to everyone, no matter which community or culture they belong to," said Deol.

The series is based on the story of 125 Indian soldiers who fought against 3,000 Chinese in a historic battle, and it also features an ensemble cast including Akash Thosar, Sumeet Vyas, Rohan Gandotra, Annup Soni, Meiyang Chang, Mahie Gill, Rochelle Rao and Hemal Ingle in key roles.

The Mahesh Manjrekar directorial has been written by Charudutt Acharya. 1962: The War in the Hills will stream on Disney + Hotstar VIP and Disney + Hotstar Premium from February 26.
A sore arm, headache, fatigue, nausea, dizzy spells, aching joints and sore muscles.

These are the common side-effects reported by some of the 15 million NHS patients to get their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, as well as the 500,000 or so who have had their scheduled second dose.

But rather than being something to dread, they could show you the vaccine is actually working.

A study in December by Imperial College London found that almost a third of UK adults had concerns about Covid vaccine safety. Yet having these mild, temporary side-effects after the jab could be a good thing  a sign that the vaccine is already getting to work

The Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), which monitors vaccine safety in the UK, says more than one vaccine recipient in ten experiences some of these adverse reactions when given either of the two jabs currently in use in the UK (Pfizer/BioNTech and AstraZeneca), but that they usually clear up on their own, or with over-the-counter pain medication such as paracetamol, in a few days.

A 10 per cent chance of feeling run-down, with flu-like symptoms, for up to 48 hours after the vaccine might sound of little consequence.

But this can make some people think twice about having it, even if it leaves them facing a far bigger threat from the virus itself.

A study in December by Imperial College London found that almost a third of UK adults had concerns about Covid vaccine safety.

Yet having these mild, temporary side-effects after the jab could be a good thing  a sign that the vaccine is already getting to work.

A vaccine is seen being administered in a taxi in London. Covid vaccine trial data shows those in their 20s, 30s and 40s are more likely to report side-effects than those in their late 50s and upwards

As the Oxford Vaccine Group, the research body which helped to develop the AstraZeneca jab, says on its website: 'Having these symptoms actually means your immune system is working as it should be.'

Christine Yorath, 70, the mother of TV presenter Gabby Logan, says she was a little taken aback when she started to feel unwell so soon after having the Pfizer jab on February 3.

'Four hours afterwards I felt very tired,' says the grandmother of five from Leeds, who runs a property business. 'That evening my right knee and ankle joints hurt and my leg felt heavy. And the next morning my left armpit became swollen and sore.'

It took six days for her to feel normal again but Christine is adamant that the minimal discomfort was worth it. 'A medic friend told me it was simply my immune system coming into play,' she says.

But how can feeling rotten after a jab be good for you? And does this mean those who breeze through feeling fine are less well protected?

DR MARTIN SCURR: I was glad I felt a little unwell Taking my temperature, it didn't surprise me to see a result of 38c (normal is about 37.2c or slightly lower), writes Dr Martin Scurr, pictured above Getting the Covid jab itself (I had the AstraZeneca vaccine on the Saturday, ten days ago) was all very straightfoward, from the GP surgery arranging the appointment to the volunteer stewards directing us all through the car park and into the queue, then the vaccine booth. So I returned home reassured by the efficiency of the system. But within six hours I was feeling cold and shivery. Taking my temperature, it didn't surprise me to see a result of 38c (normal is about 37.2c or slightly lower). I took 400mg of ibuprofen, as I had a slight headache, but an hour or so later I was asleep. There followed a hot, restless, sweaty night. At 1am my temperature was still 38c. But in the morning, at 7am, it was back to normal and I felt well enough to go out and walk for two or three hours in the frosty air. I was over it. Or so I thought. But after a while I realised my left shoulder joint was aching  not at the site of the injection but within the joint. After an hour my right knee was distinctly uncomfortable, enough to slow me down, but the shoulder pain had disappeared. An hour further on, my knee was now normal but my right hip was twingeing painfully as I walked home, limping. By Sunday afternoon, all was normal again. But none of this worried me  these were signs that my immune system had sat up and taken notice and the development of immunity was in full swing. The random nature of the symptoms just confirms that our immune systems are active throughout our body. The side-effects of the two vaccines currently in use are much the same, and include pain at the injection site (60 to 80 per cent), headache, muscle aches (30 to 40 per cent), chills (30 per cent) and joint pains (20 per cent). The experience of these is nothing other than a sign of a good immune response  with the implication that, according to the experts, good future protection is created; to experience side-effects is not a bad thing, so be reassured if it happens. And, importantly, don't let hearing about these reactions put you off. This is a very nasty virus and vaccines are key to helping us keep it under control and get back to normal life. I can't wait. Advertisement

A sign your immune system is firing up

Once a Covid vaccine has been injected into the body, it immediately starts to put the immune system on red alert for the virus (though it can take two weeks for immunity to kick in).

The immune system is a complex network of cells, tissues and organs that work together to help fight off infection from harmful bacteria or viruses.

If it senses their presence, it creates large proteins called antibodies which act like scouts, patrolling the bloodstream and marking out rogue organisms for destruction by other, more powerful elements of the immune system, such as T-cells.

But the immune system does not always win this initial battle on its own, especially if it has no memory of fighting a powerful enemy  such as Covid-19  in the past.

That's where vaccines come in. They work by introducing the immune system to tiny, inactivated fragments of the virus (as in the AstraZeneca jab) or its genetic material (the Pfizer jab), so it can respond to their presence and make the antibodies and T-cells needed before any full-scale invasion.

If and when that invasion occurs, the immune system is pre-armed and ready to see off the attack.

But to generate this response, it needs to release signalling molecules  cytokines  that help to prime cells such as T-cells for action. This rise in cytokines is what happens when we 'catch' an infection in the usual way.

'With a vaccine, you get an increase in cytokines, which the immune system uses to switch on or off different infection-fighting cells,' says Professor Andrew Easton, a virologist at Warwick University. 'It's an important part of the immune system's response to a vaccine.'

But cytokines can also have an inflammatory effect on blood vessels, muscles and other tissues and are thought to trigger the flu-like symptoms that can leave patients bedridden after a vaccine (and, indeed, after a normal infection) for a few days.

Scientists argue that, for all the discomfort this brings, it does at least prove the body's defence system has responded to the vaccine, and immune system 'troops' are being marshalled to defend against an attack.

I would do anything to not have Covid itself again Lynne Ewart, 65, an astrologer, lives in Prestwick, Scotland. The grandmother of three had the Pfizer jab on February 9 Lynne Ewart, 65, an astrologer, lives in Prestwick, Scotland. The grandmother of three had the Pfizer jab on February 9. Last year my husband Jim and I both came down with Covid  Jim in March, me on April 26. I had no cough but lost my senses of smell and taste on day eight. The chest wall pain was horrendous and I had a headache from hell. I wasn't right for about seven weeks, then, after two better weeks, long Covid set in. It was a rollercoaster  after a few healthy days, I'd relapse. I suddenly had low blood pressure, a very fast pulse, brain fog and headaches tipping into migraines. My whole body felt inflamed. After eight months the more severe symptoms began easing, leaving headache, fatigue and less frequent flare-ups of pain. I had a bit more energy, but long Covid has a habit of returning if you do too much. I had the Pfizer jab a few weeks after Jim had his. He had a sore arm and mild fatigue for a few days but that's all. My post-vaccine symptoms began about four hours later  I had nerve pain from top to toe, with muscle aches, nausea and a terrible headache. I felt exhausted. That night I was burning up, but paracetamol helped. After the jab I felt very much as I did when I caught Covid. The pain began easing after 48 hours but the next day I overdid things and suffered a full-on flu-like relapse. I've since been told it will take about a week for the response to the vaccine to ease off. Covid-19 is nothing like flu and you truly do not want to catch it. I am glad to have the vaccine to protect myself and others  and despite my reaction, I have no complaints. I'd urge others to protect themselves by having the vaccine. Advertisement

Young more likely to be affected

Covid vaccine trial data shows those in their 20s, 30s and 40s are more likely to report side-effects than those in their late 50s and upwards. Among those aged 18 to 55, 88 per cent reported at least one minor reaction  most commonly pain where the injection was done.

Among those aged 56 to 69, this fell to 73 per cent and for those aged 70 or over, it was 61 per cent.

The figures are thought to be higher than those reported in the general population because researchers were specifically looking at adverse reactions as well as effectiveness, which may have made participants more likely to report suspected problems.

One theory is that this is because younger people have more robust immune systems; the system is known to wane late in life, a process called immunosenescence.

This may mean younger people mount a more aggressive reaction to the vaccine, triggering the release of more inflammatory molecules such as cytokines that can cause the flu-like symptoms.

'Some scientists suspect that younger people are more likely to get side-effects because their immune systems are more robust,' agrees Dr Simon Clarke, an associate professor in cellular microbiology at the University of Reading. 'But it's a hypothesis only.'

Scientists know from previous studies on a wide range of vaccines for other illnesses that older people tend to get a weaker immune response than younger adults and children, and less protection.

That is because they are less likely to generate a specific type of Tcells  long-lived memory T-cells  which help the immune system to remember invading viruses for many years, ensuring long-lasting immunity. This weaker response is thought to be part of the ageing process.

Two days pain for long terms freedom Willy Mullan, 64, a broadband consultant who lives in Leeds, had the AstraZeneca vaccine on February 9 Willy Mullan, 64, a broadband consultant who lives in Leeds, had the AstraZeneca vaccine on February 9. On the dot of 10.33am  exactly to the minute of my appointment  I had the vaccine at my local GP surgery. I am classed as clinically vulnerable, as from time to time I have to take steroid medication because of eye problems that led to me needing surgery. Steroids can suppress the immune system, so I've been very cautious in trying to avoid the virus. I had no reservations about having the jab, as I knew it was better than the alternative  and I'd had the flu jab and had no reaction to that. Even so, although the vaccine side-effects were explained, I didn't expect them to be as severe as they were. About three hours after I was inoculated, I got flu-like symptoms which gradually worsened overnight and lasted for about 36 hours, with muscle pain throughout my body, shivering, sweating and a constant headache. I went to bed at 11.30pm but couldn't sleep as I felt so rough. But I knew it was temporary. Next day the symptoms were easing and by teatime I was OK, apart from a slight ache at the injection site. It has not put me off and I'll definitely have the second jab. It means freedom! Advertisement

Don't worry if you had no reaction

Whatever your age, does a stronger reaction mean greater immunity than your peers? And if suffering side-effects means the vaccine is doing its job, are those free of adverse reactions not getting adequate immunity?

Scientists say how people react is almost certainly down to tiny differences between their immune systems, and that there is no evidence that having no reaction means reduced protection.

'There is a real relationship between feeling rotten and having an immune response to the vaccine,' says Dr Alexander Edwards, a biomedical technology expert at the University of Reading. 'But you can't infer anything about how well your immune system has been primed from your symptoms, as our immune systems vary so much.'

Professor Easton adds: 'Getting a localised reaction [such as soreness around the jab site] may well mean your body is reacting to what's being introduced. But I've never seen any published evidence that links these side-effects with the strength of the immune system's response to the vaccine.'

Equally, 'you can get a perfectly good response [to the vaccine] with no obvious reaction', he says.

In fact, data from the AstraZeneca vaccine trial, published in The Lancet last November, showed all the volunteers' immune systems responded to the jab by producing similar levels of antibodies and T-cells, whether or not they experienced common side-effects.

On the other hand, if you have already been infected with Covid, you are nearly twice as likely to have side-effects after a jab, reveals data from the ZOE Covid symptom study, in which a phone app allows its 280,000 users to report infections, symptoms and vaccine reactions.

Among those given the Pfizer jab, 33 per cent suffered fatigue, chills, aches and pains if they had already tested positive for the virus in the past, compared with 19 per cent in those who had avoided Covid. (Official advice is that anyone who has tested positive must wait 28 days before having a vaccination.)

Professor Tim Spector, an expert in genetic epidemiology at King's College London, who leads the ongoing ZOE study, says: 'This could be good news, as a larger response like this suggests that those getting a first dose after having had Covid are generating a stronger immune reaction and may get greater protection from just a single shot of the vaccine.'

Other research released this month (but not peer-reviewed) also suggests Covid infection followed by a vaccine provides a stronger immune response. Professor Lawrence Young, a virologist at Warwick University, says: 'The antibody levels in previously infected individuals were rapidly elevated in response to a single vaccination, reaching ten to 20 times those in patients vaccinated without previous infection.'

'I CANT WAIT FOR THE SECOND JAB' Jon Davies, 39, a freelance graphic artist, who lives in Southampton, had the AstraZeneca jab on February 7. For the past 11 months, I have rarely ventured out. Id go for a very early morning walk to avoid people, and do my shopping late at night. Otherwise I stayed in, running my business from my flat. Jon Davies has had the vaccine at 39 because a blood clot in his heart puts him at high risk So I was delighted when I got the invitation to have my jab at the local hospital vaccination station. I saw it as a way of getting back to normal life and to see my family, who I havent seen in over a year. I shielded because as well as having asthma, I developed a blood clot in June 2019, which caused respiratory problems. I got a deep vein thrombosis after a 12-hour flight home from a business trip to Tokyo. I had to go to hospital where tests showed a blood clot had travelled to my heart. Fortunately I did not need an operation but I was given blood thinners. The asthma and blood clot together put me at a high-risk category for infections generally, including Covid. Eight hours after my appointment on Sunday at 12.30pm I began to get noticeable symptoms. It felt like flu and I felt very rough through the night and didnt get a lot of sleep. It wasnt pleasant  chills and then sweats, one after the other through the night. Bizarrely, on Monday morning I woke up at 6am and for the next two hours, I had never felt better in my life. I then went back to sleep and when I woke about 10am, I felt as if had bad cold. By Tuesday I was perfectly fine as if nothing had happened. I must say if the vaccine makes me feel like I have it then I cannot imagine what Covid itself would do  if I am honest, I wonder if I would survive Covid. I cant wait for the second jab. Advertisement

Side-effects the same for both jabs

Staff on the front line of the UK's vaccine programme have anecdotally reported that some patients request the AstraZeneca jab  developed in the UK  rather than the one from U.S. firm Pfizer, as they believe the 'home-grown' jab is safer and more effective.

But MHRA figures suggest no major difference between the jabs in terms of reported side-effects. Up to January 31, there had been about 7.1 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine administered and three million AstraZeneca jabs.

The MHRA's yellow card scheme allows medics and patients to report suspected drug reactions (it is named after the yellow forms used by doctors when it was first set up nearly 60 years ago).

To cope with the anticipated volume generated from vaccinating tens of millions of people, the MHRA has set up a dedicated Covid service where side-effects to the vaccine can be logged (corona virus-yellowcard.mhra.gov.uk). So far it has received 16,756 responses for the Pfizer vaccine and just over 6,000 for AstraZeneca.

A report on the data the agency published said: 'For both, the overall rate is around three yellow cards for every 1,000 doses. Most relate to injection-site reactions [sore arm] and generalised symptoms such as 'flu-like' illness including headache, chills, fatigue, nausea, fever, dizziness, weakness and aching muscles, and typically resolve within a day or two.'

Just over 100 reports to the MHRA so far involve potentially life-threatening allergic reactions to the Pfizer vaccine and 13 for the AstraZeneca one.

After two reports of anaphylaxis  a dangerous allergic response  to the Pfizer jab in December, the MHRA banned its use in anyone with a history of allergy to any of its ingredients. But it says: 'Widespread use of the vaccine now suggests severe allergic reactions are very rare; no more than one or two cases for every 100,000 doses given.'

The Pfizer jab contains a tiny amount of an alcohol, polyethylene glycol, that is widely used in medicines and household products as a thickening agent and to add moisture. Some people are allergic to it, but this is extremely rare.

There have also been 69 reports of Bell's palsy  a type of facial paralysis that can become permanent if not promptly treated  among recipients of the Pfizer jab, with six in the AstraZeneca group.

The MHRA stresses that this number of cases of Bell's palsy (thought to be triggered by infections or stress) would have happened in the population anyway, whether or not people were receiving vaccines.

So far just over 100 people have died soon after having the Pfizer jab and 34 after the AstraZeneca. 'Most involved elderly people with underlying illness and do not suggest the vaccine played a role in the deaths,' the MHRA said.

What about after the second dose?

Side-effects can be worse after the second jab than the first, according to the ZOE study by King's College London. Patient feedback revealed 45 per cent felt noticeable discomfort (sore arms) after the second dose, compared with 37 per cent after the first.

But again, this could be a positive sign that the immune system, having already been exposed to viral material in the first vaccine, is 'warmed up', having generated at least some of the antibodies needed to engage with the virus.

And for those like Christine Yorath, these minimal reactions will soon be a distant memory against the liberation the vaccine represents.

'I miss holidaying abroad, and going out to bars and eateries with friends,' she says. 'I can't wait to start my life again.'
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Scott Morrison has vowed to improve women's safety in parliament after discussing a young staffer's alleged rape with his wife Jenny.

Former Liberal Party staffer Brittany Higgins shocked Canberra on Monday when she alleged she was raped by a male staffer in a minister's office after a boozy night out in 2019.

Mr Morrison, a father of two daughters, revealed he was determined to take action after speaking to his wife about the incident on Monday night.

'Jenny and I spoke last night, and... she said to me, ''you have to think about this as a father first. What would you want to happen if it were our girls?''

'Jenny has a way of clarifying things. Always has. And so I've reflected on that overnight and listened to Brittany and what she had to say,' he told reporters.

Mr Morrison, a father of two daughters (pictured together), revealed he was determined to take action after speaking to his wife about the incident on Monday night

Scott Morrison has vowed to improve women's safety in parliament after discussing a young staffer's alleged rape with his wife Jenny (pictured with their two daughters)

Mr Morrison said he has asked Liberal MP Celia Hammond, who has dealt with similar issues in her previous role as Notre Dame University Vice-Chancellor, to work with party whips and MPs to improve processes for dealing with assault claims.

Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet deputy secretary Stephanie Foster will also review processes for workplace allegations.

An automatic reporting obligation to department officials will be established.

Labor MP Peta Murphy wants an independent body established within parliament to deal with complaints, describing workplace cultures in the building as a systemic and cultural problem.

'It's what we've seen in workplaces around the world and in Australia, that when there are power imbalances and no processes to deal with them, then incidents will happen,' she told reporters in Canberra.

'We need to not only show and behave in a way that Australians expect us to, we need to make sure that Australians are confident that there are processes in this place to hold people to account when they don't.'

Brittany Higgins, then 24, has alleged she was raped by a colleague inside Parliament House in March 2019

Ms Higgins said her leg was 'crushed' during the alleged rape and took a photo of an alleged bruise in the bathroom (pictured)

Ms Higgins' rape allegedly happened after she colleagues were on a night out.

She told news.com.au that she remembers the man buying several rounds of drinks.

When she announced she was leaving, he offered to get a cab with her because he was heading in the same direction, she said.

But instead of dropping her home, the man allegedly took her to Parliament House.

Ms Higgins said they went to their boss Defence Minister Linda Reynolds' office where she, intoxicated, fell asleep on the couch.

The former staffer said she woke up to the man raping her and begged him to stop but he carried on.

'I woke up mid-rape. I told him to stop. I was crying. He wasn't even looking at me. It felt like I was sort of a body that was there. It didn't feel like it was anything about me,' Ms Higgins told news.com.au.

She said the man left the building, leaving her to be discovered by security guards in her cocktail dress the next morning.

Ms Higgins said her leg was 'crushed' during the alleged rape and took a photo of an alleged bruise in the bathroom.

The following Monday after the incident, the man resigned for being in the office after hours.

Questions have now been raised about whether Senator Reynolds (left in right image) should apologise for her handling of Ms Higgins' allegations

Ms Higgins initially reported the incident to the Australian Federal Police but decided not to make a formal complaint, fearing that she would jeopardise her job.

She worked for Senator Michaelia Cash before resigning from government last month.

Ms Higgins said decided to speak out after being inspired by women's campaigner and Australian of the Year winner Grace Tame.

After the incident, Senator Reynolds summoned her to a formal employment meeting in the same room the alleged rape occurred.

Senator Reynolds says she did not know the alleged incident happened in her office at the time of the meeting.

'Of course I'm aware of today's reports, and I'm extremely concerned about the wellbeing of my former staff member. Women should be safe,' she told parliament on Monday.

'At the time of my initial meeting with the staff member I was not aware of the details or the circumstance of the alleged incident in my office. Had I known, I would have conducted the meeting elsewhere.'
Gardai seized more than 100,000 worth of cannabis herb in Portlaoise on Monday as part of an intelligence-led operation in what has been a busy few days in the battle against drugs crim in Laois and neighbouring counties.

An Garda Siochanas Garda National Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau (GNDOCB) assisted by Portlaoise-based gardai seized the 10kg of cannabis herb in the town on Monday, February 15.

Two individuals, not Irish, were detained during the operation.

The operation followed significant seizures in neighbouring Kildare and Tipperary in recent days.

Two men charged in connection with an alleged 8.2m drugs find in Straffan and Kill appeared before a special court sitting on Saturday, February 13.

Each was refused bail by Judge Desmond Zaidan at a Naas District Court hearing.

Eric Lawlor, 46, whose address was given as Baybush House, Baybush, Maynooth faces allegations of possessing cannabis and cocaine for the purposes of sale or supply and with a breach of the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Act at Cypress House, Baybush, Straffan, on February 11.

Eugene Mulligan, 49, whose address was given as Hillside Cottage, Carrigans Upper, Ballymote, Co Sligo, faces an allegation of possessing cannabis for the purpose of sale or supply at Kill Hill, Kill, on February 11.

Garda Donal Donoghue told the court that following an intelligence-led operation by the Garda National Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, some 314 kilograms of cannabis herb with a street value of 6.28m was found at the home of Mr Lawlor along with cocaine with a value of 770,000.

Some 18, 650 in cash was also found.

Meanwhile, Gardai also seized an estimated 29,800 in cannabis herb, 3,000 in cocaine and arrested three men, following searches at two residences in the Roscrea on February 13.

Shortly after a first search which yielded cannabis worth 20,000 and cocaine valued at 3,000, Gardai said a follow-up search was conducted at a nearby residence.

This led Gardai to the discovery of a grow house. A number of cannabis herb plants, along with other drug paraphernalia were seized at the property. The plants have an estimated worth of 9,800.

Three men were arrested during the operation led by Tipperary Garda.
BEND  An outbreak of COVID-19 traced to Summit High School students who attended a party a week ago had infected 24 students as of Saturday, and extended the closure of in-person classes at the Bend school through Friday.

School principal Michael McDonald said in an email that Deschutes County had confirmed 24 cases of COVID-19 among youth who attend Summit High and were primary or secondary exposures from the party, the Bend Bulletin reported.

While Summit had in-person classes Feb. 8 and 9, there was no confirmed spread of the virus at school, he said.

However, to prevent the potential spread of the virus, the school will return to distance learning through Friday, with an expected return to in-person classes and activities Feb. 22. That will allow the equivalent of a 10-day quarantine from the last time students were in the school building with academics or activities, McDonald said.

Students who did not attend the party or have contact with those who did, and who have no symptoms, are considered low risk for COVID-19 exposure, McDonald said. But health officials encouraged anyone who may have been in contact with others who were exposed or who live with elderly or medically fragile family members to consider isolating from those family members and assume the youth or adult may be contagious.

In preparation for the eventual return of in-person classes, school district staff has completed a deep cleaning of classrooms and common areas in the school and left air scrubbers on overnight.

--The Associated Press

Members of the National Guard listen to President Joe Biden give his inaugural address during the 59th Presidential Inauguration at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 20, 2021. (Greg Nash/AFP via Getty Images)

Rep. McClain Asks Pelosi Why National Guard Could Remain Deployed in DC Through Fall

Rep. Lisa McClain (R-Mich.) joined with other House Republicans in asking House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to explain why the National Guard needs to be deployed in Washington until possibly fall of this year.

The only briefings that weve had, through the media really, is that the troops may be staying there through the fall, McClain told Fox in a Feb. 15 interview. Which is extremely concerning because myself and several of my colleagues have asked Nancy Pelosi for a briefing as to: Why do we need these troops here? And we have received zero information, zero.

Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said last week that the estimated cost for National Guard protection at the Capitol complex through March 15 will cost taxpayers a total of $483 million. $284 million to cover personnel and $199 million to cover operations.

Its amazing to me that she can do this without any disclosure, without any information, and just continue to spend money with no briefing. [It] doesnt make sense to me, McClain said.

Tens of thousands of National Guard troops were deployed to Washington to assist with security in the wake of the Jan. 6 Capitol breach.

Around 5,000 troops were expected to remain in the city until March 15, but that period seems to have been extended by Pelosi. Its unclear whether theres any specific threat.

Just tell me why. I feel like theres a boogeyman under my bed, said McClain, who sits in the House Armed Services Committee.

Washington, D.C., is an absolute ghost town. I feel completely safe. Theres no one there.

Kirby said on Feb. 12 that there were more than 6,000 troops deployed in Washington.

I think the number today isI dont want to guess. Its 6,061. As of today, they continue to support the FBI, the Capitol Police, the Park Police, Secret Service, and the city of Washington, and I know of no changes to the mission requirements, said Kirby.

In late January, 42 House Republicans sent a letter to Pelosi urging her to remove the barricades surrounding the Capitol.

Rep. Ted Budd (R-N.C.), the primary signatory of the letter (pdf), said in a statement that the request is for Pelosi to remove what some fear is poised to become permanent military-style fencing.

In particular, we are concerned with recent reports that the fencing surrounding the Capitol may become permanent, they wrote.

Tom Ozimek contributed to this report.
Growing up, sisters Reagan and Kennedy King would sometimes find themselves in an awkward conversation with friends and classmates when it came to grandparents.

It almost felt like I never had grandparents to talk about, Kennedy said When people would ask about it, I had to say, Ones in jail. It was always like, Well, why is he in jail? and I didnt want to answer those questions.

I was never embarrassed, per se, Reagan said. But it was hard, because I never understood when I was younger. Now that Im older and I do understand, it takes a little toll. I just think, are we ever going to be able to meet him? Are we going to be able to have a conversation face to face? Am I ever going to be able to hug him? Its just something that wanders in my mind.

People who have loved ones in prison are left behind, said Heather Bobula, a volunteer at Steelton-Highspire High School and co-founder of the schools chapter of POPS the Club. They are, all of a sudden, down a parent or a loved one. They are alive, but not part of the childs life anymore. Sometimes for a short period of time, but sometimes for longer. As a child who experienced this myself, I can tell you that it comes with a lot of shame sometimes. A lot of guilt. And a lot of hurt.

A few years ago, Bobula joined with Jennifer MOrrison, then the schools art teacher, to found a chapter of POPS the Club at Steelton-Highspire. The group meets regularly to offer a safe place for students affected by incarceration of a family member or loved one.

POPS stands for Pain of the Prison System, said Amy Friedman, executive director of national organization. The organization was named by members of the first club launched in 2013 at Venice High School; they wanted the name to reflect both the pain they experience and the pleasure and pop/energy of their gatherings.

Steel-High High School assistant principal Jennifer Morrison is a club advisor for "POPS the Club" at the school. The Pain of the Prison System club is for students who have loved ones in prison. The club give students a pace to express thier experience through writing and art. February 12, 2021. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.com

Friedman explained that she founded POPS the Club eight years ago, and in that time several chapters have formed both in southern California, Georgia, New York and Alaska. The Steelton-Highspire club, launched in 2015, is so far the only chapter in Pennsylvania.

The number of children across the country with family members in prison may be larger than you think. The National Institute of Corrections, a part of the U.S. Department of Justice, estimates that more than five million children in the U.S. have had at least one parent in prison at some point, and that one in 50 children has a parent currently incarcerated. When you consider siblings, grandparents and other close family members, the numbers are even higher.

Students at POPS the Club meetings are welcomed to share or discuss their feelings and participate in group activities such as art or writing projects. Some activities involve poems or other writing prompts; other projects include bowls that students write on, then break and glue back together  a metaphor that the King sisters say speaks to their own familys experiences.

Every kid is different, Morrison said about how students join or participate in POPS the Club. Every kid has to find that moment where theyre finally comfortable to talk about it  or they might not even want to talk about it at all. They just might want to listen to other people, and thats okay too.

The writing and art of members of several POPS the Club groups is gathered and published in annual anthologies. The most recent, Dreamcatchers, features art and writing by the King sisters as well as other members of the Steelton chapter.

For 20 years, I was an art teacher, and I believe very strongly in the power of art as an outlet for kids to express their feelings and emotions and desires, Morrison said. We dont want kids to think, whats wrong with me? because they have somebody whos in prison. Theres a stigma thats attached to it. We want kids to share their stories with other people, so that they know that theyre walking around these halls with other people that are living a very similar life.

Steel-High High School assistant principal Jennifer Morrison is a club advisor for "POPS the Club" at the school. The Pain of the Prison System club is for students who have loved ones in prison. The club give students a pace to express thier experience through writing and art. February 12, 2021. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.com

Morrison, now an assistant principal at the school, added that she has seen members of the club grow in various ways. In addition to processing their feelings of grief, shame or confusion, she said, she has seen students grow academically, connect socially and gain confidence.

When I first met Kennedy, she was very, very, very shy, Morrison said. Very sweet and would talk to you individually, but to ask her to talk in front of a group would never have been something that I would have thought that she was comfortable with. And she actually really wowed us all. We got invited to Central Penn College  they invited our kids to read on stage, like a poetry evening reading event. It was a very full house, and Kennedy and another one of our students got on stage, and read some work from the anthology of that year.

At first, for a lot of people Im sure, you dont want to talk about what you feel, Kennedy said. But when one person starts getting it rolling, and they start expressing, and then the next person goes, it all comes together. It really helps get you open and get you going. So when a friend shares that they felt abandoned or lonely, or just, you know, like the oddball, it helps me express that I felt that way too sometimes. And [before POPS the Club], I felt like there wasnt many people I can go to to talk about this situation.

I see growth in our kids, Bobula said. They do better in school, they find self-confidence, and they make friends. Weve become a pretty tight-knit group over the years, and Ive been so proud to see the kids grow. For me, it isnt just about helping them through this one part of their lives. I want to see them do well in life after high school, too. Ive been impressed with their grades getting better, and with kids talking about different plans for after high school. In the beginning, we had kids who said there was no way they would go to college or could ever afford it. Weve been able to talk to them about those things, and now many of our kids are having a change of heart.

Both Kennedy and Reagan expressed how much the club and camaraderie has helped them, and both hope that that the Dreamcatchers anthology can spread a message of support to others.

It makes me feel inspiring, and that I can someday help someone else come out and they talk about how they feel, Reagan said. And that you dont have to. You dont have to always talk about it, but you could always write it out and express your feelings that way. And that you have a lot of people there that can support you.
Researchers at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York have provided evidence suggesting that severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)  the agent that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)  was infecting people in New York City (NYC) at least one month before the first case was officially documented in the city.

The teams molecular surveillance study, which included samples from more than 3,000 patients, detected SARS-CoV-2 RNA in specimens collected during the week ending 25th January.

The samples were respiratory pathogen-negative (RPN)-specimens taken from patients being evaluated for flu-like illness and respiratory symptoms during the first ten weeks of 2020.

Emilia Sordillo and colleagues say the findings indicate that SARS-CoV-2 infections were present among a small number of people seeking care at the Mount Sinai Health System (MSHS) several weeks prior to the surge of cases that flooded the NYC health system.

The researchers advise that systematically screening people with unexplained respiratory illness for the presence of emerging viruses must become an essential component of approaches aiming to stop local infections from becoming uncontrollable outbreaks.

A pre-print version of the research paper is available on the medRxiv* server, while the article undergoes peer review.

NYC quickly emerged as an early COVID-19 epicenter

Following the initial identification of SARS-CoV-2 in Wuhan, China, in December 2019, the virus spread to other Asian countries, Europe and North America, within a matter of weeks.

In the United States, the first infection identified on 20th January 2020 was followed by sporadic cases of infection throughout the country.

Following the first SARS-CoV-2 diagnosis in NYC on 29th February, the city quickly emerged as an early epicenter of COVID-19.

However, prior to mid-March, 2020, COVID-19 case detection was limited by restricted availability of diagnostic testing and overlap in symptom presentation with other respiratory and viral illnesses, writes Sordillo and colleagues. Thus, direct molecular evidence of SARS-CoV-2 in NYC prior to the first reported case is lacking.

What did the researchers do?

To systematically delineate the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 in NYC, the researchers applied a sample pooling strategy to screen RPN nasopharyngeal samples from 3,040 individuals who presented with respiratory symptoms or influenza-like illness at the MSHS during the first ten weeks of 2020.

This yielded 304 RPN pools that were then screened for SARS-CoV-2 RNA using nucleic-acid amplification testing (NAAT).

This assay tested for the presence of the SARS-CoV-2-specific ORF1ab gene (target 1) and the pan-Sarbecovirus envelope (E)-gene (target 2).

Results were categorized as positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA if target 1 or both targets were detected, presumptive positive if only target 2 was detected, and negative if neither target was detected.

Detection of SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acids in nasopharyngeal specimens collected in the first ten weeks of 2020. (A) Schematic representation of the study design. Nasopharyngeal swab specimens that tested negative for respiratory pathogens (RPN) were pooled. Each pool consisted of 10 specimens from the same week from one of five hospital sites. Nucleic acid amplification testing (NAAT) was performed and RNA was processed for SARS-CoV-2 genome assembly. (B) Select events and responses to the evolving SARS-CoV-2 pandemic are annotated over the timeframe surveyed. Confirmed cases in NYC for the last two weeks are noted. Absolute counts of pools that tested positive, presumptive positive, and negative by RT-PCR are depicted by week collected. (C) Distribution of positive (solid) and presumptive positive (hatched) pools across the five different hospital sites in NYC.

What did the study find?

Of the 304 RPN pools that were screened, nine (3%) tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA, eight (2.6%) tested presumptive positive and 287 (94.4%) tested negative.

Five of the presumptive positive pools included samples collected during the weeks ending 18th January, 25th January, and 1st February.

None of the RPN pools comprising samples collected over the following three weeks yielded detectable SARS-CoV-2 RNA.

Viral RNA was detected in 5.4% of RPN pools comprising samples collected in the week ending 29th February and in 33.3% of pools containing samples collected during the week ending 7th March.

To validate the NAAT results, the team performed genome sequencing of viral RNA extracted from all positive and presumptive-positive RPN pools.

Three pools containing samples collected during the weeks ending 25th January and 1st February yielded scattered SARS-CoV-2 reads throughout the viral genome, thereby confirming the presence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA.

What are the study implications?

Taken together, we provide clear evidence that SARS-CoV-2 infections were present in NYC at least 6 to 8 weeks prior to the surge of cases that flooded the NYC health system, writes Sordillo and colleagues.

The team says the high number of SARS-CoV-2 positive RPN pools during the first week of March explains the sudden exponential increase in the number of severe COVID-19 cases that were admitted to MSHS hospitals from mid-March 2020.

Systematic, unbiased surveillance of clinical specimens obtained from individuals presenting with unexplained or unusual clinical presentations of respiratory illness for the presence of emerging viral pathogens must be a key component of any future early-warning sentinel programs, say the researchers. These systematic measures will need to become essential components of our new normal in order to prevent local infections and transmissions from blooming into uncontrolled outbreaks, they conclude.

*Important Notice

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
A PC builder company revealed that AMD Ryzen 5000 X570 motherboards and Zen 3 desktop CPUs are currently suffering from high failure rates. The Zen 3 core architecture and the respective X570 motherboard platform received some positive reviews from the tech community.

Because of their great performances, this two hardware became AMD's best CPU lineup to date. But, AMD Ryzen 5000 Zen 3 desktop CPUs and X570 motherboards were found suffering from 3 doa to 8 DOA. Now, what is DOA? This term refers to "Dead on Arrival," which means that the three to eight units of each hardware were not functioning properly.

According to WCCF Tech's latest report, PowerGPU, a popular CP builder company, posted a tweet stating that the AMD Ryzen 5000 Zen 3 desktop CPUs and X570 motherboards are suffering from high DOA.

Zen 3 desktop CPUs and X570 motherboards' DOA

PowerGPU's official Twitter account revealed that the AMD Ryzen 5000 Zen 3 CPUs and X570 motherboards have an all-time high DOA or failure rates and it increases on the more high-end CPU offerings. To help you understand it more, here is the complete list of PowerGPU.

AMD Ryzen 5950x x50 units 8 doa

AMD Ryzen 5900x x50 units 4 doa

AMD Ryzen 5800x x100 units 4 doa

AMD Ryzen 5600x x120 units 3 doa

Hot Hardware reported that PowerGPU received 50 units each of the Ryzen 9 5950X and Ryzen 9 5900X, of which eight of the former were DOA.

The failure on the new AMD CPUs are still too high.



AMD Ryzen 5950x x50 units 8 doa

AMD Ryzen 5900x x50 units 4 doa

AMD Ryzen 5800x x100 units 4 doa

AMD Ryzen 5600x x120 units 3 doa



We had only 1 dead Intel CPU it was a 9700k in our time of business



Doa: Dead on arrival  PowerGPU (@PowerGPU) February 13, 2021

Also Read: Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Pre-Order, Release Date Revealed: European Retailers Raise Prices Prior to Launch

This means that 12 out of 100 chips within the Ryzen 9 family are affected. Aside from this, the PC builder company also stated that it already received 100 units of Ryzen 7 5800X, which four of them were DOA.

On the other hand, the company also received 120 units of Ryzen 5 5600X. However, three of them were defective.

Is this a serious issue?

PowerGPU said that even some non-DOA chips sometimes have problems. This means that the current issue is not that unique. But, it is hard to conclude that this should not be taken seriously. The giant PC builder's tweet caught the attention of a prominent Twitter leaker, who said that PowerGPU is not the only one that faces issues with the latest Zen 3 desktop CPUs.

"Actually, in Korea, it was quite quiet about this issue.As I checked urgently, there have been frequent postings complaining of problems mainly on B550/X570 mobo in recent months," said @harukaze5719 via his official Twitter account.

For more news updates about AMD Ryzen 5000 series and other popular desktop hardware, always keep your tabs open here at TechTimes.

Related Article: Nvidia RTX 3060 Release Date February 2021: Is It Better Than RTX 3060 Ti?

This article is owned by TechTimes.

Written by: Giuliano de Leon.

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Members of Britains Labour Party are backing a campaign by a family which is fighting a court ban against five words of Irish being used on their mothers headstone.

The partys Irish Society, which includes Armagh-born MP Conor McGinn, is stepping up pressure by holding an event tomorrow to highlight the case and broader issues arising from it.

It is showing its public support for the family of Margaret Keane, who have spent three years fighting for the right to have in ar gcroithe go deo or forever in our hearts as an epitaph above her grave in Coventry.

Their legal challenge against a ruling which denies them an Irish language-only inscription will be heard on February 24 by the Church of Englands ecclesiastical appeals court.

Ms Keane, born in Athboy, Co Meath, emigrated to Coventry in her teens, worked as a school dinner lady and raised a family of six, and died in 2018 aged 73.

The Labour Party Irish Society online meeting will be addressed by the groups president, Mr McGinn, SDLP leader Colum Eastwood, the familys legal team and Conradh na Gaeilge.

Expand Close The late Margaret Keane, whose family are seeking permission to inscribe their mothers gravestone with an Irish phrase / Facebook

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Westminster has only ever seen the Irish language issue through the prism of Northern Ireland and wrongly viewed it as something contentious. This has brought a whole new dimension to the view of the Irish language in Britain, said Mr McGinn.

Out of their adversity, the Keanes have introduced a positivity to the subject. They are highlighting the huge contribution the language, literature, music and Gaelic games of Ireland have made to Britain.

The BBC has Scots Gaelic programming and the Welsh have their own language channel, and an opportunity exists here to see there are Irish language speakers in every part of the UK.

A judge in an ecclesiastical court, which controls diocesan graveyards, denied the Keanes the right to put the phrase on the headstone because it could be "seen as a political statement" given the "passions and feelings connected with the use of Irish Gaelic".

The Keanes say they are motivated by a sense of injustice applying not just to them but the Irish community in Britain. Bez Killeen, Margarets daughter, said: This is about respect for the Irish language, identity and culture.

Margaret remained immensely proud of her Irish heritage despite a lifetime in England. A statement from her family says: That sense of deep pride is something shared by the Irish across Britain  they never forget home and what it means to be Irish.

The Keanes chose the inscription with care and love and the decision to reject it, along with the reasoning provided, caused great hurt.

That verdict has touched a raw nerve for everyone, said Liam Conlon, chair of the Labour Party Irish Society.

We want to bring people together to discuss not just the particulars of the case but the wider implications for the Irish community in Britain. It impacts on Irish language rights and the expression of cultural identity.

He said it suggested an othering of the Irish and had impacted on Irish communities throughout Britain.

The Keanes legal team has acted pro bono because it is regarded as a significant freedom of speech case.

The family is running a social media campaign under the #MessagetoMargaret hashtag.

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A crackpot who tried to set up a paramilitary-style gang in Australia has been kicked out of the country.

Bangor-born Gary Hall is back in Northern Ireland after the Australian Department for Home Affairs sent him packing.

The 47-year-old is holed-up in Coleraine, living under the assumed name Gary Huddleston. He has also tried to pass himself off as a peer, using the title Lord Hall.

Documentation seen by Sunday Life shows he had his latest Australian visa application rejected on 'character grounds'.

This was after he was convicted of a raft of criminal offences Down Under while at the same time boasting to this newspaper about attempts to form a UVF-style unit in Oz.

An interview in which he threatened to "kneecap" criminals and branded Aborigines "rapists" was central to the Australian government sending him back home.

Hall also admitted setting up the AVF (Alice Springs Volunteer Force) vigilante gang, which he modelled on the UVF.

Rejecting his visa application, the Australian government said he was likely to "engage in criminal conduct", "harass, intimidate, molest or stalk another person", and "vilify a section of the community".

In a damning assessment, officials added: "(You) represent a danger to the Australian community whether by way of being liable to become involved in activities that are disruptive, or in violence threatening harm."

Hall's criminal record while living in the town of Alice Springs in the Australian outback was also taken into consideration. His rap sheet includes multiple breaches of domestic violence orders, harassment, drink driving and making false police reports.

Expand Close Hall also admitted setting up the AVF (Alice Springs Volunteer Force) vigilante gang, which he modelled on the UVF / Facebook

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Since returning to Northern Ireland, the wannabe paramilitary has set up several companies and is listed as a director of an insurance brokerage that is not trading.

A source close to Hall said: "He gave himself the title of Lord Hall after Sunday Life exposed how he had set up a paramilitary gang in Australia.

"He was only able to live there for so long because he has a daughter with an Australian woman. God help the people of Coleraine, it will only be a matter of time before Hall is causing trouble there."

Speaking to Sunday Life in 2015 about his paramilitary-style gang, Hall said: "The organisation will carry out punishment beatings and shootings if needs be - and by that I mean kneecappings.

"That is a last resort. The AVF would prefer to limit itself to tarring and feathering but is prepared to take things further if necessary."

He also claimed the gang had 14 members and was well-armed, saying: "The organisation has access to legally held shotguns and small firearms, which it will use. Two of its members are from Belfast."

Hall also launched a racist tirade against the Aboriginal community, claiming they were "stuck in the 1700s". Ignoring his own domestic violence convictions, he said: "They harass women. They have carried out rapes, burglaries, assaults. It's got to the stage now that we, the public, are having to do something about it. That's why the AVF has been set up."

Hall's comments were picked up by Australian news organisations and led directly to him being deported home.
MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th February, 2021) The Russian Soyuz-2.1a carrier rocket has been launched from the Baikonur space center with the Progress MS-16 cargo spacecraft that is set to deliver food and supplies to the International Space Station (ISS).

The launch took place on Monday morning, at 07.45 a.m.

Moscow time (04:45 GMT), according to live coverage from Russian space agency Roscosmos.

It will take Progress two days to reach the ISS; the spacecraft is expected to dock with the ISS on February 17 at 09:20 Moscow time (06:20 GMT).

Last year, Russia sent two Progress MS resupply spacecraft to the ISS, in April and in July.
It turns out you cant tell a dingo from the colour of its pelt, with almost half of the wild dogs surveyed in south-eastern Australia carrying a hue other than the ginger usually associated with the animal.

Research published on Monday in the Journal of Zoology found that of 1325 wild canids  the family of animals taking in wolves, dingoes and your pet pooch  only 53 per cent sported ginger coats.

Researchers have found that only about half of dingoes in south-eastern Australia have the ginger-coloured coats most of us would associate with the animal. Credit:Michelle J Photography Cooma

The rest included 11 per cent with black and tan pelts, 14 per cent with black and brown stripes and even one per cent found to be white.

About three-quarters of the animals sampled in NSW, Victoria and the ACT had some domestic dog ancestry, while a quarter had no evidence of mixing with domestic dogs. Less than 1.5 per cent had no dingo ancestry.
COLUMBUS, OhioFew topics have generated more reader response than Ohios ongoing problems with unemployment benefits fraud.

Cleveland.com has been working to provide answers to the publics questions about the wave of bogus claims, which have sucked away hundreds of millions of government dollars and delayed processing of legitimate claims.

So far, about $331 million was paid out to nearly 57,000 fraudulent Pandemic Unemployment Assistance claims, as well as $6.57 million paid to more than 6,300 bogus traditional jobless claims, Ohio Department of Job and Family Services Director Kimberly Henderson told state lawmakers last week.

We found out more about who the scammers are and how they use Ohioans stolen personal information to collect (in some cases) tens of thousands of dollars per claim.

Here are some other questions were still trying to figure out:

1. Why did the state only figure out these claims were fraudulent after they were paid out?

State officials havent gone into many details about how they uncover fraudulent claims, likely in part out of concern that revealing such specifics would help scammers.

2. Has anyone who scammed Ohios unemployment system been arrested, charged, or faced consequences in any way?

ODJFS doesnt refer fraud cases to law enforcement  rather, it sends those cases to the U.S. Department of Labors inspector general for investigation. A Labor Department spokesman has not replied to questions about what the department has done with cases referred to it from Ohio.

3. Is there a way Ohioans can check to see if their name has been used to file a fraudulent claim?

ODJFS has set up a hotline and website for Ohioans who have been sent a 1099 tax form for benefits dishonestly filed for in their name. However, those options are not designed for people who have no evidence that theyve been targeted and just want to check out of interest.

4. Can we trust the states unemployment claims statistics, given the number of bogus claims?

ODJFS has released statistics showing the number of jobless claims each week since the start of the coronavirus crisis. However, its unclear how reliable those numbers are giving the amount of fraudulent claims. ODJFS has not yet said the degree to which their statistics have been inflated by scammers, nor said whether they have revised numbers omitting claims found to be fake.

5. In which state(s) were fraudulent claims filed in the name of Gov. Mike DeWine, First Lady Fran DeWine, and Lt. Gov. Jon Husted? Was any money paid?

DeWine and Husted said last month that fraudulent claims were filed in each of their names, as well as in the name of DeWines wife. Henderson told state lawmakers that a claim was filed in Husteds name in California, but its not yet clear where the fake DeWine claims were submitted. Its also unclear whether any benefits were paid to the bogus claims  DeWine spokesman Dan Tierney said a cleveland.com request for such information was under legal review to see what can be disclosed.

What questions do you have? Contact reporter Jeremy Pelzer at jpelzer@cleveland.com or via Twitter.

Read more Ohio politics and government stories:

Rep. Jim Jordan, in move dismissed by Democrats, questions whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should shoulder blame for Capitol Hill riot security failures

Secretary of State Frank LaRose again orders single ballot drop box per county for upcoming Ohio primary

Ohios corrected coronavirus death data unmasks how grim December was for COVID-19

Gov. Mike DeWine says he wont start vaccinations at Ohio schools that dont reopen March 1

Ohio reports 1,915 new coronavirus cases; second smallest increase of the year: Monday update
If you were looking for the Charlestown Democratic Town Committee website and ended up here, try this





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Los Angeles, Feb 15 : The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, have confirmed that they are expecting a younger brother or sister for their one-year-old son, Archie.

A spokesperson for the royal couple said: "We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child." Sharing a black and white picture of themselves under a tree with Harry resting his hand on Meghan's head as she lies cradling her bump, the couple sent social media into a tizzy with the good news.

Misan Harriman, a friend of the couple and the photographer who took the photo that accompanied their announcement, tweeted: "Meg, I was there at your wedding to witness this love story begin, and my friend, I am honoured to capture it grow. Congratulations to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex on this joyous news!" The Buckingham Palace, responding to the news, said: "Her Majesty, Duke of Edinburgh, Prince of Wales and the entire family are delighted and wish them well", The Guardian reported.

The Sussexes' baby will be the Prince of Wales' fifth grandchild and the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh's 10th or 11th great-grandchild, depending on whether he or she arrives before or after Zara Tindall's baby, which is also due in 2021. He or she will be eighth in line to the throne and entitled to be a Lord or Lady, but the duke and duchess are expected to again opt for Master, like Archie, or Miss, with the surname Mountbatten-Windsor, the Guardian report explained.

Harry retained his place in the line of succession despite him and Meghan stepping back as senior royals in January last year, and dropping their HRH style.

The Duke of York, Prince Andrew, who was second in line when he was born in 1960, will move down to ninth place.

In November, Meghan disclosed the devastation that the couple experienced after she had a miscarriage last summer.

Speculation that the duchess might be expecting a second child started after she applied for and was granted a postponement of her privacy trial against the Mail on Sunday until the autumn for a "confidential" reason, the Guardian report said.

Any trial was averted when, on Thursday, the duchess won her high court privacy case against Associated Newspapers Ltd over the Mail on Sunday and Mail Online's publication of extracts from a private handwritten letter she wrote to her estranged father, Thomas Markle, 76, after the judge, Lord Justice Warby, granted summary judgment in Meghan's favour.

Harry and Meghan's announcement comes just five days after the royal family celebrated the arrival of Princess Eugenie's first child - a baby boy.

This new baby, like Archie, is set to grow up thousands of miles away from the Queen, Prince Charles, and Prince William, as the Sussexes now live in Montecito in California after leaving royal life in a quest for personal and financial freedom.

The couple have been busy securing funding for their new life, signing a lucrative deal with streaming giant Netflix rumoured to be worth more than 150 million pound, and another multi-million-pound podcast deal with Spotify.

Recently, Harry was seen shooting with TV presenter and fellow Brit, James Cordon, atop an open bus, maintaining Covid protocall. The photos went viral on social media.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Kitty, my 18-year-old daughter, is a type 1 diabetic, an incurable but manageable affliction from which she has suffered since she was four.

It also means her immune system, like tens of thousands of other Australians, is significantly compromised, making her more vulnerable than the rest of us to COVID-19. She recently completed her VCE and is about to start studying at the University of Melbourne.

Melbourne has been plunged back into a five-day lockdown. Credit:Luis Ascui

Shortly after Christmas, she caught a throat infection. Because of the vulnerability of her immune system, that soon became a chest infection.

Last Thursday, hours before she was due to take a job interview, she woke up with a bad hypo; a condition to which all type 1 diabetics are vulnerable where their blood sugars drop to a life-threatening level. She could not remember her name, let alone the date or the name of the Prime Minister.
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Global Dental Carpule Information, by material (glass, plastic, metal and others), by end users (Hospitals, Dental Clinics, Home care and others)  Forecast to 2023

Dental carpule is a type of cartridge containing liquid medicine to be inserted using a syringe. Carpules are either made of glass or plastics and can control the drug delivery which makes the process less painful. Carpules are majorly used in anesthesia deliverance and other processes in the dentistry. Prefilled dental carpules can lessen the pain of local anesthetic injection, necessary in several dental procedures.

Augmenting demand for painless dental procedures is driving the market growth of Dental carpules over the past few years. Increasing prevalence of periodontal diseases is the major driving force pushing up the market growth. Furthermore, the increasing occurrences of needle-stick injuries are escalating the market on the global platform.

Acknowledging the increasing market size of the market, Market Research Future (MRFR) in its recently published study report asserts that the global Dental carpule market will garner USD 20 MN by 2023, registering approximately 4.9% CAGR during the review period (2017  2023). In 2016 the market had valued at USD 11 MN.

To Get Free Sample Report visit https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/sample_request/721

Spreading awareness among patients about the importance of safe administration of injectable drugs required in any dental procedure acts as a tailwind accelerating the market growth. Additionally, factors such as the growing population, geriatric populace, and urbanization, are fostering the market growth.

Improving economic conditions across the globe enable access to the quality life, improving the healthcare, are providing impetus to the market growth. Seminal efforts and investments by the market players to develop innovative carpules are paying off well, driving the market growth.

Additional factors positively impacting the market growth include technological advancements, improving outcomes and patients experience, beneficial reimbursement policies, and increasing awareness towards healthcare.

Key Players for Global Dental Carpule Market

Market Research Future (MRFR) recognizes the following companies as the key players in Dental Carpule Market: There are plenty of large and small market players which operate in this market all over the globe.

GlaxoSmithKline,

AstraZeneca,

Gilead,

Sanofi Genzyme,

Merck,

Roche,

Pfizer and

Segments -Dental Carpule Market

MRFR has segmented its analysis into three key dynamics for an easy grasp;

By Materials: Glass, Plastic, and Metal among others.

By End-users: Hospitals, Dental Clinics, and Homecare among others.

By Regions: North America, Europe, APAC and Rest-of-the-World.

Regional Analysis  Dental Carpule Market

By region, the global dental carpule market has been segmented into North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and, the Middle East and Africa. North America is the largest market for dental carpule globally. The region is likely to retain its dominance in the foreseeable future growing at 3.1% CAGR. The market has entered a maturity phase and is estimated to reach a valuation of USD 9.2 Mn through the projection period. Increasing awareness about the importance of safe administration of anesthetics in dental procedures is the driving factor of growth in North America dental carpule market. Other factors favoring the expansion of the market are the rapid development of dental industries, technological advancements, product innovations, etc.

Europe accounts for the second largest share in the dental carpule market. The dental health care in Europe is much more affordable than in any other regions, which is expected to catalyze revenue generation for market participants across the review period. Dental carpule market in Europe is estimated to thrive at 2.7% CAGR and reach a valuation of USD 3.1 Mn by 2023. Another factor complementing the market growth and expansion in the region is the increasing demand for dental cosmetics and oral health.

Asia Pacific is an emerging market for dental carpule which is primarily attributable to the presence of fast-developing economies such as India, China, etc. The developments in the dental healthcare sector witnessed in recent times are likely to encourage market proliferation throughout the assessment period. The Middle East & Africa will exhibit sluggish growth during the forecast period.

To Browse Complete Report visit https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/reports/dental-carpule-market-721

About Market Research Future:

At Market Research Future (MRFR), we enable our customers to unravel the complexity of various industries through our Cooked Research Report (CRR), Half-Cooked Research Reports (HCRR), Statistical Report, Continuous-Feed Research (CFR), and Market Research & Consulting Services.

Contact Us:

Market Research Future

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Phone: +1 646 845 9312

Email: sales@marketresearchfuture.com
Xiaomi is expected to bring a Lite member of its Mi 11 lineup, and the latest leaks gives us a better idea of its design. According to one trustworthy leakster, the Xiaomi Mi 11 Lite will look exactly like the Mi 11 from the back and the front with one major difference - the screen will have no curved edges, but a flat panel instead.

This is the second time such a render appears online - over a month ago another leakster suggested the same - flat screen and three shooters on the back, lined up similarly to the vanilla Mi 11.

The chipset is reportedly going to be Snapdragon 732G chipset, although that one has no 5G support, so we are not sure if it's to be believed.

The Mi 11 Lite is yet to be announced, and we expect it to come alongside a Mi 11 Pro with a periscope lens and probably even a Mi 11 Ultra with a secondary display on the back.

Source (in Chinese) | Via

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Rochester, N.Y.  An Upstate New York airport has officially been renamed in honor of civil rights hero Frederick Douglass.

The Democrat & Chronicle reports the former Rochester International Airport unveiled a new entrance sign on Feb. 14, the date Douglass chose as his birthday, that now says Frederick Douglass Greater Rochester International Airport.

Adding Frederick Douglass name to our airport shows our pride that this American icon once called this community home, Monroe County Executive Adam Bello told the Rochester newspaper.

The Greater Rochester International Airport has officially been renamed after Frederick Douglass. @SPECNewsROC pic.twitter.com/nZCWTHBQEH  Phillip Boudreaux (@PBoudreauxNews) February 14, 2021

According to the D&C, the signage changes cost about $25,000. The county next plans to add educational materials about Douglass in the airports concourse.

Monroe County legislators voted last year to rename the airport named after the famed abolitionist.

Each time residents and visitors arrive to our airport, they will be reminded of Douglasss life and legacy of fighting oppression, lawmakers Vincent R. Felder and Karla M. Boyce said in a statement. Our remembrance through the airport renaming serves as recognition of our past and a promise of the work our community will do to make Monroe County a welcoming place for all.

By honoring this particular historical figure in this way, I believe that Rochester is saying something important about itself: it wants to be a national center for individual rights and justice, said Douglass great-great-great grandson Kenneth Morris, president of Fredrick Douglass Family Initiatives.

Douglass was born a slave in 1818 on a Maryland plantation and escaped at age 20, eventually settling in Rochester, N.Y., where he lived for more than two decades and was buried. He founded an abolitionist newspaper there, became a national leader of the abolitionist movement and supporter of womens rights in Upstate New York, and gave his famous speech What to the Slave is the Fourth of July, in Rochester on July 5, 1852.

Frederick Douglass holds an unparalleled place of prominence in the history of Rochester and Monroe County, Bello said in a statement last year. He called Rochester home for more than a quarter-century and it was here that he founded and published his North Star newspaper, wrote some of his greatest works and speeches and continued his life-long fight for emancipation, suffrage, equality and human rights. His world-renowned leadership on social reform is a legacy that lives on throughout our community.

Like most African Americans born into slavery, Frederick Douglass was never told the date and year of his birth. He chose February 14. Today marks the 203rd birthday of the abolitionist leader. pic.twitter.com/F1Q2WsgTxP  University of Rochester (@UofR) February 14, 2021

RELATED:

Frederick Douglass statue vandalized in Rochester park

Bill proposes renaming NYS Thruway after Frederick Douglass

Rochester names school to honor Anna Murray Douglass, wife of Frederick Douglass





(Editors note: Jordan on Business is a new weekly column that will focus on business, development and workplace issues in New Jersey.)

Dr. John T. Nasr has faced several challenges in the months since the coronavirus took hold in New Jersey. Among his most troublesome: how to deliver care when his patients, nervous about the risk of infection, stayed home after his medical offices ended in-person visits.

Nasr, a Ridgewood-based neurologist, shifted his entire medical practice online last spring when the federal Medicare program and New Jersey eased restrictions that expanded virtual visits and ordered insurers reimburse on-par with in-person visits.

The transition has been a welcome change for his patients, who typically seek treatment for pain, mobility and neurodegenerative disorders. Telemedicine also has been an economic lifeline for Nasrs medical practice. He now sees 65% of his patients virtually, he said.

Its a nightmare to get people in, Nasr said. The way I look at it is you have patients who have unmet needs. Telehealth allows them to have easy access to care.

The pandemic has turned the health care industry upside down and the future of telemedicine figures to look vastly different once the widespread availability of coronavirus vaccines returns life to some semblance of normality. A bill pending in the New Jersey Legislature would permanently expand insurance coverage for virtual visits.

Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, the states largest health care insurer, says it plans to continue to support telehealth after the state of emergency ends. The company said as many as 20% of its claims were for virtual visits last spring, but that number is now closer to 5%-8% as more in-person visits have resumed.

Dr. Don Liss, vice president and chief medical officer at Horizon BCBSNJ, said in a statement the insurance company expanded telehealth before the pandemic and encourages doctors to incorporate the appropriate use of telemedicine into their practices in the future.

Whats suitable for telehealth depends upon who  or which insurance company  you ask.

Payers nationally are sending mixed signals. Some already are rolling back liberal telehealth reimbursement policies they launched at the start of the pandemic.

Outside of New Jersey, UnitedHealth Group Inc., Anthem Inc., Cigna Corp. and CVS Health Corp. all have increased some copays and adopted other rules that might cause some patients to delay or avoid telehealth visits unrelated to COVID-19. They also have imposed an array of deadlines, reimbursements and out-of-pocket expenses for telehealth, depending on the insurance plan.

Telemedicine has been a huge success. Its not going away, said Larry Downs, chief executive of the Medical Society of New Jersey, the states largest organization of physicians. We think that it will be a permanent thing. The discussion and dialogue now is how do we finance it appropriately and ensure people have access.

New Jersey is among 37 states and the District of Columbia that mandate private payer reimbursement for care delivered remotely by telemedicine. In practice, more often than not, that means reimbursement rates for telehealth services are lower than the rate a provider would receive for those same services if performed in-person.

Under New Jerseys state of emergency, insurance companies must cover telehealth visits as if such services were provided in-person. It is unclear what happens when Gov. Phil Murphy ends the states public-health emergency, and if insurers are no longer required to cover telehealth on-par with in-person visits.

Downs said the Medical Societys members are concerned that telehealth will decline rapidly without permanent federal and New Jersey legislation.

This is one of the silver linings of the COVID pandemic, that weve learned how to scale up and deliver health care remotely, he said.

Nasr, who is affiliated with The Valley Hospital, said telehealth allows him to tend to the emotional and physical well-being of his patients without the fear of contracting coronavirus. He said it creates additional headaches, such as talking patients through logging on to the secure online platform.

The fallacy is you spend less time with patients because they are on telehealth. In reality, you spend the same amount of time, he said, especially reviewing medications and explaining treatment options. They (insurance payers) dont tell you that. They dont want to tell you that.

Virtual visits also have limitations because, Nasr said, there is no replacement for a face-to-face visit in the physicians examination room.

For me, telehealth is not a 100 percent replacement, he said. You have to see the patient in person, you have to do the blood test and other tests they need, so you dont miss normal things on screening tests.

Columnist George E. Jordan at the NJPAC Ryan Gallery in Newark, N.J. February, 10, 2021Ed Murray | NJ Advance Media for

George E. Jordan writes a weekly column on business and development in New Jersey. He may be reached at george@griotmediaworks.com.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has released IB ACIO Mock test link for the recruitment examination of Bureau Assistant Central Officer Grade-II/ Executive (IB ACIO). Candidates who have applied for the IB ACIO 2021 examination can now go through the mock test to understand the paper pattern.

IB ACIO Mock test

Click here for direct link

Candidates may please note that the mock test is only for representative means and to acclimatize candidates in regards the process. Only single question has been provided as an example in each of the sections.

IB ACIO admit card 2021

Earlier, MHA has released IB ACIO admit card on the official website

Steps to download IB ACIO Tier I Admit Card 2021

Step 1: Click here for direct link of IB ACIO Admit Card

Step 2: Enter your User ID, password and click on login

Step 3: Your admit card will be displayed on the screen

Step 4: Check the date, time and city of your exam

Step 5: Download and take a print out of your admit card for further reference

The MHA is conducting the IB ACIO 2021 exam to fill up 2,000 vacancies. The IB ACIO 2021 Tier-1 examination will be conducted in the second half of February 2021. The candidates can find details about the exam date and the city mentioned in the admit card. Candidates who qualify in the Tier I examination will be eligible for the Tier II exam. Candidates shortlisted on the basis of Tier II exam will be called in for interview round and then a final merit list will be released on the official website of the MHA.

IB ACIO exam pattern





Section Total Questions General Awareness/ Current Affairs 20 General Studies 20 Numerical Aptitude 20 Reasoning Logical Aptitude 20 English 20 Total 100

IB ACIO exam marking scheme

Candidates would have to complete the 100 questions in 1 hour time. Each correct answer carries 1 point and incorrect answer gets a negative marking of 0.25 points.
BRUSSELS (dpa-AFX) - After a slightly positive start, the Switzerland stock market kept edging higher as the session progressed on Monday to eventually close on a fairly solid note, in line with the trend seen across Europe. Traders picked up stocks amid optimism about swifter economic recovery thanks to a drop in new coronavirus cases in several places, and greater momentum in vaccination drive across the world. The benchmark SMI ended with a gain of 60.62 points or 0.56% at 10,940.99, extending gains to a sixth straight session. Credit Suisse ended nearly 3% up. UBS Group and LafargeHolcim both ended higher by about 1.8%. Swiss Life Holding, Swiss Re, Richemont, SGS, Partners Group and Zurich Insurance Group moved up 1.1 to 1.3%. Roche Holding ended flat. Novartis gained about 0.5%. In the Swiss Mid Price Index, Dufry climbed 4.65% and Clariant surged up 2.7%. VAT Group ended nearly 2% up, while Adecco and Helvetia gained 1.8% and 1.6%, respectively. Julius Baer, Vifor Pharma, Galenica Sante, BB Biotech, SIG Combibloc and Kuehne & Nagel also ended notably higher. Meanwhile, the Swiss Federal Council is reportedly under increasing pressure to relax the restrictions taken to combat the spread of the coronavirus. With the Covid infection rate in the country falling, health ministers of various cantons are said to be urging authorities to re-open restaurants and non-essential businesses. Swiss Health Minister Alain Berset has said that the Federal Council hadn't ruled out a relaxation of at least some of the existing measures. 'The Federal Council understands the frustration in the population. The Federal Council would also like to see easing, that's clear,' he said. 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.
Pompano Park's annual pro-am team challenge for charity featuring greats Tim Tetrick and David Miller went down to the wire on Sunday night (Feb. 14) with Team Tetrick eking out a "photo finish" win.

The four-race competition featured Tetrick and Miller as captains of their respective teams with many of the finest amateur drivers in the sport benefitting New Vocations and the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

The final tally was 85-83 with Joe Pennacchio's win with his trotting mare leaving the Miller team just two points short as the Tetrick team managed to finish second and third in the final event to barely protect their precarious lead going into the final leg.

The four-race event kicked off with Miller and Tetrick finishing one-two with Verdi D Em and General Jackson, respectively. Forbidden Song (Kelly Walker-Team Tetrick) finished third as the first round ended in a 21-21 tie.

Verdi D Em, a 12-year-old gelded son of Neon Jiel, covered the mile in a season's best 1:56.3 for owner-trainer John Hallett to vault his career earnings to $349.336.

The winner paid $9.20 as third choice in the betting and completed a David Miller Daily Double returning $26.60.

In the second leg, Tim Tetrick sent Prince Of Minto ($11.20) zipping off the wings from post 8 into the lead, and that eight-year-old son of Angus Hall never relinquished and scored in 1:57.3 for his initial win of the year for Leon Cable, who trains for owner David Jarvis. Cashahallic (Ron Cusimano-Team Tetrick)) was moved up to second on a disqualification while Fleet Cessna (Billy Muggleston-Team Miller) also improved a spot to be placed third.

The Tetrick victory sent his team into a 49-35 lead after round two with that win putting Tim to within one win of 12,000 lifetime.

In the third leg, Dein Spriggs, (Team Miller) with 479 wins coming in, scored the victory with his own Uva Hanover, ($11.60) a 10 year-old altered son of Cantab Hall, stopping the timer in 1:55. Glide In The Wind (David Miller) was left in his wake, six lengths back, with Santini (Steve Oldford-Team Tetrick) third.

The classy Uva Hanover, trained by Allen Saul for Spriggs, vaulted his career bounty to $557,853.

After round three, the score tightened with Team Tetrick holding an eight point lead--67-59.

The final leg went to the bay mare named Grey ($7.00) for Joe Pennacchio (Team Miller) in a well-rated 1:56.1, a seasonal best. The four-year-old daughter of blasted off the wings to take charge, opened with a :28.3 panel, got a breather to the :58.2 half, was confronted by three-quarters in 1:27.3, and used a :28.3 finale to hold off Big Boy Rosco (Kelly Walker-Team Tetrick) by a neck. Tymal Tullo (Tim Tetrick) finished third with the final outcome resulting in that aforementioned 85-83 Team Tetrick win.

Representatives for New Vocations and the Make-A-Wish Foundation were in the winner's circle as each charity received a $5,000 donation from the Florida Amateur Drivers Club, in cooperation with the U.S.T.A.

The U.S.T.A. was also represented during the festivities with Mike Tanner and Wendy Ross, among others, in attendance with Tanner, in a winner's circle interview, remarking, "It's events and nights like this that make harness racing the grand sport that it still is. To be able to help great organizations like New Vocations and the Make-A-Wish Foundation through harness racing is absolutely outstanding and we are glad to be a small part of it. The Florida Amateur Driving Club deserves kudos for making this an annual tradition and it shows what gentlemen like David Miller and Tim Tetrick arenot only great horsemen but great individuals."

Wagering for the program was, once again, over $1 million, with the final total being $1,126,910 for the nine race program--the 13th time this season that handle has eclipsed $1 million with several near misses, as well.

Racing continues on Monday with a 13 race bonanza featuring twin $30,000 guarantees on the two Pick-4 events encompassing Races 6 through 9 and Races 10 through 13.

There is also a carryover in the Super Hi-5 finale of $8,236.47.

Post time is set for 7:20 p.m. (EST).

(Pompano Park)
The year 2020 changed many things. This includes the way we work, the way we study and the way we communicate with each other. It also changed the way we date.

Several reports in the past have indicated that the use of dating apps increased during the lockdown as people tried to battle loneliness by dating in the virtual world. This trend is likely to continue in the year 2021 as well.

That said, it is important to note that online dating comes with its own set of risks. So, ahead of this Valentines Day, here are some tips that will help you stay safe as you date online:

How to set up a safe dating profile online

As per a Kaspersky report, your dating profile on an online dating app such as Tinder broadly contains only three items -- your photo, your name and your interests.

 Your Photos: Use real photos of yourself, but pick the ones that dont give away information such as your address, employer, and so on. You can use photos from trips or of landmarks, with no personal data and no other people. Remember that someone can use the photos you post to find your social media profiles.

 Your Name: Whether you use a pseudonym or your real name is your choice. But dont give up your full name here.

 Your Interests: If youre looking for a relationship, fill in at least a few, keeping in mind that hobbies and interests may be important criteria for potential partners.

ALSO READ: Heartbreak capital? Delhi saw the most breakups in 2020, dating app survey reveals

Things you shouldnt do while dating online

-- Dont tie your Instagram or other social media account to your dating app profile as it gives away too much potentially usable information about you. Kaspersky says that even if you have already set up Instagram for privacy and security, theres more risk than reward in tying the accounts together.

-- Dont share your phone number or a messaging app handle. Stick to the dating apps built-in message platform until you are sure you can trust the person youre chatting with.

-- When you are ready to move to another messaging app, set it up to keep your private info secure.

How to communicate safely on dating apps

-- Once you have a match, dont rush to tell your whole life story. Consider how you would feel if it became totally public.

-- Remember that youre talking to a stranger. They might become the love of your life, but for now, they could be anyone, so, unfortunately, you have to keep doxing and stalking in mind.

-- The person youre talking to maybe every bit as kind and understanding as they seem, but they could also be a crook who has taken on someone elses persona. Crooks commonly build trust before asking for money (urgently) or information. Being asked for money or gifts in a dating app is perhaps the hugest of red flags, so, no matter the reason if they ask for money, cut off communications.

-- Crooks may also try to phish some of your private data, so be wary if your match asks you to install an app on your phone or to visit a certain website, or starts asking questions that seem like common website security questions.
Kathmandu, February 4

The nationwide general strike announced by the Dahal-Nepal faction of the split Nepal Communist Party has partially affected the daily life of the public across the country. Police detained dozens of leaders and cadres of the party who were on the streets to enforce the strike.

In the capital, the number of vehicles plying the road has significantly decreased. Most of the shops are open but schools and colleges are shut.

A few vehicles have plied the Kathmandu road during the general strike called by the Dahal-Nepal faction of the Nepal Communist Party, in Kathmandu, on Thursday, February 4, 2021.

The demonstrators have torched a taxi at Samakhusi of Kathmandu on the charge of violating the call for the strike.

Meanwhile, the government has mobilised additional troops of Nepal Police and Armed Police Force personnel in major cities. They have been directed to detain people obstructing roads and other businesses.

Shops are open during the general strike called by the Dahal-Nepal faction of the Nepal Communist Party, in Kathmandu, on Thursday, February 4, 2021.

Consequently, they have detained over 100 leaders and cadres of the party within a few hours in the morning. In Kathmandu, a senior leader of the party, Ashta Laxmi Shakya, has been detained. Likewise, police in Birgunj took under control popular youth leaders Rahbar Ansari and Arabinda Singh.

Most of the top leaders of the party are leading the protests in various places of Kathmandu.

Leaders and cadres of the Dahal-Nepal faction of the Nepal Communist Party stage a protest, in Kathmandu, on Thursday, February 4, 2021.

The party has been organising stage-wise protest programmes against Prime Minister KP Sharma Olis decision to dissolve the House of Representatives.

As the Oli government appointed over 30 officials of various constitutional bodies without a parliamentary hearing, the party modified its protest programmes and decided to resort to the strike.
The actress says she was pleasantly "shocked" to know the news of the event that had the group of fans also performing arati' and a cake-cutting ceremony before her idol.

Fans of Southern star Nidhhi Agerwal erected an idol of the actress to worship her on Valentines Day, in the Chennai suburb of Kattupakkam.

Nidhhi tells IANS: "I was extremely shocked and I never saw this coming. I think this is the best Valentine's Day gift I have got and I have only and only so much love for my fans."

The actress, who will soon be seen as the leading lady in Telugu superstar Pawan Kalyan's untitled next, feels that the gesture encourages her to give better films to her fans.

"It feels overwhelming," she says, adding: "I just want to thank them and tell my fans that I will give good films and content and this encourages me more to do better work and give them good movies," says the actress, who made her debut in the 2017 Bollywood film "Munna Michael" opposite Tiger Shroff, before finding success in the South.

For more stories click here: Kollywood l Malayalam l Bollywood l Telugu
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New Delhi, Feb 15 : Former army chief Ved Prakash Malik has taken up cudgels against those who are slamming the India-China agreement on troop withdrawal from Ladakh.

"Surprised to see criticism. Mostly due to ignorance of facts or politico-military understanding or sheer prejudice," tweeted the ex-army chief.

In his chain of tweets, Malik said that the criticism of the ongoing disengagement process at Pangong Tso, such as claims that India has ceded territories, was mostly due to ignorance of facts and politico-military understanding or sheer prejudice.

Explaining the process of disengagement of Indian and Chinese troops, Malik said that the temporary freeze on patrolling between Finger 4 and Finger 8 on the northern bank of Pangong Tso was essential to avoid clashes.

The troops around the lake are going back to pre-April 2020 locations, he wrote, referring to the understanding reached by the two countries, under which Indian soldiers will move back to their last permanent base in the Finger area, which is the Dhan Singh Thapa post of the ITBP, just short of Finger 4.

Similarly, Chinese troops will go back to their permanent post, which is beyond Finger 8 and is known as the Sirijap post.

While Indian troops are mainly based at Finger 2, the LAC is located at Finger 8. Indian troops used to travel by foot and were usually stopped by the Chinese at Finger 4 or 5. The Chinese had managed to build a road till Finger 5 during the Kargil War, and they would travel by vehicles whenever they used to see Indian foot patrols.

Indians cannot take vehicles beyond Finger 3 because the path to Finger 4 is very narrow and can be accessed only by foot.

While the Chinese claim the area till Finger 2 as their territory, they can only reach Finger 4 on land because vehicles can't go beyond that point.

Gen Malik pointed out that on completion of the Pangong disengagement, talks for withdrawal in the Depsang Plains, Gogra, Hot Spring and Galwan are to be held within 48 hours. He added that full disengagement and de-escalation is bound to take long.

Gen Malik said that China has been "compelled to restore status quo ante" and India has been able to assert that LAC violations will affect all relations and its own border infrastructure building will continue. He also said India has strengthened itself geo-politically, strategically and economically.

Meanwhile, disengagement by the Indian army and People's Liberation Army (PLA) on Pangong Tso has led to an easing of tensions at Naku La in Sikkim, which saw clashes between Indian and PLA soldiers last month. This incident took place at Naku La area at a height of over 5,000 metres on January 20 when Chinese soldiers attempted to intrude into the Indian territory but were pushed back. The Army clarified it was a minor face-off that was resolved by local commanders as per established protocols. The Naku La episode was the second such incident in the eastern sector in less than a year. Four Indian soldiers and seven Chinese troops suffered injuries during a May 9, 2020, confrontation that involved around 150 soldiers.

While the Modi government is tight-lipped about Naku La, Hindustan Times, after talking to top military commanders and diplomats, has learnt that the just like the Pangong Tso disengagement, the easing of tensions on Naku La has been dictated by the highest levels in Beijing with a renewed effort to build trust and normalise relations. The decision-making authority in the PLA's case is the Central Military Commission headed by President Xi Jinping, who is also the commander-in-chief of China's defence forces.

Quoting a former army chief, the report says: "The speed at which the PLA has moved its troops beyond Finger 8 on the north bank of Pangong Tso towards Srijap plains and beyond as well as withdrawal of no less than 220 Chinese light tanks from south banks of Pangong Tso clearly shows that the instructions have come from the highest level in Beijing." Government sources said the disengagement process, which began Wednesday, was not sudden but had actually been under discussion since September, the same month that the Indian and Chinese Foreign and Defence Ministers met in Russia. Since then, the sources added, there had been several rounds of discussion during which both India and China eased their stands.

Over the course of the stand-off, India and China had multiple rounds of talks at the military and diplomatic levels, but the stalemate was finally tackled during the Corps Commander dialogue last month.

According to senior military officers, Indian Army commanders raised the question of severe mistrust with their PLA counterparts, citing the continued friction at Naku La while the Pangong Tso disengagement agreement was reached on February 10. It is learnt that just to prove that the PLA was committed to genuine disengagement with the Indian Army, a battalion commander sought a meeting with his Indian counterpart at Naku La on the same day, assuring no further transgression from the Chinese side.

In Sikkim, there is agreement between India and China on aligning the border, which is essentially the watershed between the waters that flow into the Teesta, and those into the Amo Chu and other rivers in Tibet.

But as of now the border has not actually been demarcated on the ground. As it is, there have been issues in the so-called Finger Area to the east of Naku La. The Chinese have been contesting the boundary in the north-eastern arc of Sikkim, because this is in an area where terrain allows India to deploy armoured units that can threaten the roads connecting Tibet to the Chumbi Valley.

"Too early to hope for peace, tranquillity & as-before relations between India & China. LoC type deployment on LAC; strategic & economic measures adopted already must continue," tweeted Malik.

The challenge for India is to counter this effort and given the demands of manning the LAC in the same manner we do the Line of Control with Pakistan, it is not going to be easy.

(This content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com)
Routine CT scanning could catch 70 per cent of lung cancers at an early stage and save thousands of lives, NHS research has found.

The Summit study, run by lung cancer specialists at University College London Hospitals (UCLH) NHS trust, found that the scans could uncover growths in lungs when the disease was at stage one or two.

Now health experts are demanding the Government brings in routine CT scanning for smokers and ex-smokers.

Around 48,000 people a year are diagnosed with the disease in the UK and 35,100 die from it

Health experts are demanding the Government brings in routine CT scanning for smokers and ex-smokers

The senior investigator of the study, Dr Sam Janes, told The Guardian the findings were a major breakthrough for lung cancer.

He said: Lung cancer has never had anything that enabled us to detect this devastating cancer earlier and offer curative treatment to this number of lung cancer patients.

'Its important to highlight how effective CT scanning is. In my lung cancer clinic at UCLH, seven out of ten people have cancer thats been inoperable, incurable, from the first time they saw a doctor.

Whereas with the cancers that we see with Summit, seven out of ten are potentially curable, because they were detected earlier.

The study found 180 cases of lung cancer among 12,100 smokers and ex-smokers aged 55-78 in north central and north-east London, many of whom were from poorer backgrounds.

Dr Robert Rintoul, the chairman of the clinical advisory group of the UK Lung Cancer Coalition, said he hoped a lung cancer screening programme would now be introduced in England.

He added: Lung cancer is the UKs biggest cancer killer and early detection offers the best chance of curative treatment and saving more lives. Screening could lead to a 25 per cent fall in the number of men dying of lung cancer and 30-40 per cent fewer deaths among women. The studys findings are due to be published later this year.

An NHS spokesman said: The NHS introduced lung cancer scanning trucks in supermarket car parks to screen those at risk of lung cancer and catching cancers early has remained a priority throughout the pandemic. Lung cancer survival has not shown much improvement in the past 40 years, according to Cancer Research UK.

Around 48,000 people a year are diagnosed with the disease in the UK and 35,100 die from it  an average of 96 a day. Only 16 per cent of sufferers live for five years after diagnosis and only ten per cent survive for ten years.
Two people have been arrested for killing a pregnant homeless woman whose body was found stuffed in a suitcase near a North Carolina river last week.

Brittany Smith, 28, was six months pregnant with a baby boy when she vanished last week near Raleigh.

She was living in a tent with her boyfriend Cody Page in the backyard of another man's home,and the pair were overcoming drug addiction.

It's unclear what their motive was, but police have now arrested Thomas Clayton Johnson, 37, and Emmalei Grace Trevathan, 24, with her murder.

Police arrested the pair after looking through the victim's phone and discovering that Johnson had offered to pick her up on the day she went missing. Her boyfriend is now convinced she was living a 'secret life'.

Thomas Clayton Johnson, 37, and Emmalei Grace Trevathan, 24 have been charged with the woman's murder and with murdering her unborn child

Brittany Smith, 28, was six months pregnant with a baby boy when she vanished last week near Raleigh. Her body was found in a suitcase in the river

The female corpse was spotted by a passerby on Monday morning near the Neuse River Trail in Raleigh. Deputies with the Wake County Sheriff's Office are pictured at the scene

The suspects are shown in their drivers licenses. It's unclear how they knew the victim

'She had a secret life. She wouldn't keep me informed. She was doing stuff that I didn't agree with,' he told local network WRAL.

The pair were living in the backyard of Dale Williams. It's unclear how they knew him but he allowed them to do laundry and shower in his house.

Wake County Sheriff Gerald Baker said last week, after discovering her body: 'I can't sit here and tell you that's what's in there right now.

'We have not gotten to that point. We have information to believe it.

'It's not every day, it's not every morning, that you find what could be a person's body in a suitcase, in a river,' he added.

Police had put out an alert asking for the public's help in locating Smith on Saturday, four days after she was last seen in Wendell.

Smith was described as being 4'11" tall, about 115 pounds and 'noticeably pregnant'.

WRAL reported that neighbors said Smith had been living in a tent with her boyfriend in the 200 block of Fox Run Drive. WXII 12 News also published photos of the tent (above)

Police had put out an alert asking for the public's help in locating Smith (pictured) on Saturday, four days after she was last seen in Wendell

An aerial view shows detectives on the scene where the woman's body was found on Monday. ABC11 reported that Smith's family was also at the scene

Baker hinted that investigators suspect Smith may be the victim in the suitcase on Monday.

'If this is, in fact, this young lady that we've been looking for all weekend, someone is responsible for that,' he said.

The sheriff also said there is a 'person of interest' detectives want to speak with.

'We're going to work very hard. We're going to find out who was responsible. I can tell you that.

'Because these things just don't happen. Someone is responsible.'
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An electric car is a self-propelling transportation machine that is powered either by a collector system through electricity from charging station deployments or else can be charged by self-charging devices like regenerative braking systems and turbochargers.

Demand Scenario

The global electric car market was USD 134.32 billion in 2018 and is estimated to reach USD 413.95 billion by 2025 at a CAGR of 17.44% during the forecast period.

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Growth by Region

Asia-Pacific region accounted for the largest market in 2018 owing to the rising government incentives in the form of subsidies, grants and tax rebates, thus, continuously improving charging infrastructure in the region. North America, on the other hand, is also one of the lucrative markets owing to the USD 2.4 billion in federal grants to support the development of next-generation electric cars and batteries paired with USD 115 million for the installation of electric vehicle charging infrastructure in almost 16 different metropolitan areas around the country. Europe is also an important market for electric cars due to the introduction of new technologies focusing on zero-carbon emission vehicles in the region.

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Drivers vs Constraints

The global electric car market is mainly driven by rising government incentives in the form of subsidies and grants along with growing environmental concerns caused by conventional passenger carriers used for transportation purposes. Also, a volumetric surge in the automotive sector and the introduction of new technologies is also anticipated to propel the growth of the electric car market globally. However, the growth is hindered by the high manufacturing cost of the vehicle coupled with low fuel economy and serviceability of electric cars globally.

Industry Trends and Updates

Tesla, Inc., an American automotive and energy company is investing USD 5 billion in a factory located in Shanghai, China mainly to offer better access to domestic markets as well as to ease the effects of punitive tariffs for its customers located in China.

Lucid Motors, Inc., an American automotive company specializing in electric cars has got an investment amount of USD 1 billion by Saudi Arabias Public Investment Fund. This transaction represents a major milestone for Lucid Motors and will provide the company with the necessary funding to commercially launch its first electric vehicle (EV), the Lucid Air in the year 2020.

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The Karnataka government on Monday asked people possessing Below Poverty Line (BPL) ration cards, despite being ineligible on account of owning either a two wheeeler, TV, fridge or over five acres of land, to surrender them before March 31 or face legal action. "There are parameters for possessing a BPL card. They should not have more than five acres of land, motorcycle, TV or fridge. Those who don't qualify on these parameters should return the cards or else we will do it," Food and Civil Supplies Minister Umesh Katti said at a press conference in Belagavi. He said anyone earning more than Rs 1.20 lakh annually should not use BPL cards and has to return it before March 31.

Congress flayed the remarks and party workers staged protests in front of various ration shops in Bengaluru. Party workers also protested in Dharwad, Mysuru and Tumakuru, a Congress leader said.

Congress MLA U T Khader said the issue had come up before him when he was the Food and Civil Supplies Minister in the Siddaramaiah government and he had decided not to relax the norms as many poor people would be affected. He opined that when there are offers like interest free loans to purchase all these items, it was obvious that people would buy it.

The government is 'anti-poor', he charged and asked them to focus on identifying more beneficiaries instead of 'snatching away' their BPL cards.
Hundreds of people attended a rally in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek, to demand that authorities take measures against widespread corruption. Demonstrators condemned what they saw as the overly lenient sentence handed down by a Bishkek court to former customs official Raimbek Matraimov.
has introduced the medical visa category in a recently revised policy, easing rules for people seeking entry in the country for health emergencies and work, a media report said on Monday.

The new rules were approve by the federal cabinet on February 2, Dawn newspaper reported on its online version.

The report is based on a letter issued by the Ministry of Interior to the Director General of Immigration and Passports, the paper said.

Although the document does not explicitly state that the medical visa category has been introduced for the first time, interior ministry spokesperson Zafaryab Khan confirmed it was a new addition.

Under the new guidelines, security clearance would not be required for those seeking a short-term medical visa or an individual work visa. However, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and Intelligence Bureau (IB) would be intimated.

The government has also merged several visa categories, reducing the number from 18 to 11.

The new categories include: tourist/visit visa (for tourism, visit, mountaineering and trekking), visa in your inbox (for tourism and business purposes), family visit visa, business visa, work visa (work, domestic aide and journalism), study visa (students and deeni madaris), religious tourism visa (for tabligh, missionaries and pilgrims), official visa (for official and diplomatic purposes), NGO/INGO visa, medical visa and other.

Applicants applying for the 'visa in your inbox' category would be able to apply online and would receive authorisation on email, the report said.

Commenting on issuance of visa without security clearance, Khan told the paper that authorities follow due process before approving an application.

He said those visiting the country to get medical treatment could only go to certain authorised hospitals, therefore, risks were minimal and added that security checks were in place.

"Security clearance for medical visas is not required anywhere in the world," he said.

A short-term medical visa of up to three months can be issued to an individual, family and attendant "to cater to emergencies".

The visa would be issued within 48 hours of the application's submission, according to the new guidelines.

An extended medical visa of up to one year, meanwhile, would be issued within a month after clearance from agencies.

A single-entry work visa would be issued to an individual for up to three months, within 48 hours of the application's submission. Security clearance would not be required but intelligence agencies would be intimated, according to the document.

Khan said in its revised policy, the government had dropped all "unnecessary" requirements and applicants would only have to submit necessary documents. "We have to facilitate people as well," he said.

Security clearance, however, would be required if an individual, who has been issued a single-entry work visa, seeks an extension. An extension of up to two years with multiple entries may be granted.

(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.)
COLUMBIA  The city of Cayce plans to be among the first cities in the state to designate a day to recognize people who have died and others affected by the COVID-19 virus that has upended daily life.

A resolution being considered Feb. 17 by City Council will designate the first Monday in March as COVID-19 Memorial Day. The day will be held "in remembrance of those who have lost their lives and in honor of those who are forever marked by COVID and continue to suffer from the impact of this virus," the resolution reads.

"For us it's just an opportunity to highlight really the importance of what we're still going through," Cayce Mayor Elise Partin told The Post and Courier. "It's hard  people have done a great job of trying to be safe, and we want them to continue to do so.

"We're so close to making some progress and having some hope, but this was just really an opportunity to continue to highlight that our team really does make fact-based decisions when it comes to masks and social distancing requirements to protect our citizens, our businesses and our visitors."

The resolution is adapted from a template circulated by the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Folly Beach, outside Charleston, issued a proclamation Feb. 9 to designate March 1 as COVID-19 Memorial Day.

Municipal Association of South Carolina officials said they weren't aware immediately of other cities in the state participating.

A national memorial to COVID-19 victims was held on Jan. 19 ahead of President Joe Biden's inauguration and was recognized throughout the country, including some areas of South Carolina, with ringing church bells and lit-up municipal buildings.

More than 425,000 confirmed cases have struck South Carolinians, with more than 7,000 killed by the virus. In Lexington County, where Cayce is the third-largest municipality by population, 412 people have died of COVID-19 as of Feb. 13.

Cayce, a town of 13,600 on the opposite side of the Congaree River from Columbia, has had a mask requirement in public places within the city since July. The rule was recently extended until at least March 29.

There are no events planned as of now to mark the memorial, Partin said. If approved, Cayce's first COVID-19 Memorial Day would be March 1.

"For now it's just an opportunity to further the dialogue to recognize all the lives that have been lost, an opportunity to recognize all of the amazing first responders that are out in the community and are part of our hospital systems and have done such an amazing job," she said. "Because as tired as we are, they're definitely more tired."

Cayce has gone through other tragedies in the recent years as the site for a fatal 2018 Amtrak train wreck and the slaying of 6-year-old Faye Swetlik in 2020.

Clarification: This story has been updated to reflect that Folly Beach also recognized COVID-19 Memorial Day with a proclamation.
Many feel theyre paying the price not of the pandemic, but of the measures taken against the pandemic, said Dr Nicolas Franck, the head of a psychiatric network in Lyon, France. In a survey of 30,000 people that he conducted last spring, young people ranked the lowest in psychological wellbeing, he said. A lone student at the Sarbonne in Paris. Credit:Andrea Mantovani/The New York Times In Italy and in the Netherlands, some youth psychiatry wards have filled to record capacity. In France, where the pandemics toll on mental health has made headlines, professionals have urged authorities to consider reopening schools to fight loneliness. And in Britain, some therapists said that they had counselled patients to break lockdown guidelines to cope. In the United States, a quarter of 18- to 24-year-olds said they had seriously considered suicide, one report said. In Latin America and the Caribbean, a survey conducted by UNICEF of 8000 young people found that more than a quarter had experienced anxiety and 15 per cent depression.

And a study conducted last year by the International Labor Organisation in 112 countries found that two-thirds of 18- to 29-year-olds could be subject to anxiety and depression. Loading The lasting effects on suicide rates, depression and anxiety are still being measured, but in interviews, a dozen mental health experts in Europe painted a grim picture of a crisis that they say should be treated as seriously as containing the virus. We are in the midst of a mental health pandemic, and I dont think its treated with near enough respect, said Arkadius Kyllendahl, a psychotherapist in London who has seen the number of younger clients double in recent months. A sense of limbo

Many European countries went into northern autumn with the illusion that they had curbed virus outbreaks, only to face an even larger wave of infections this winter. That led to mistaken expectations, young people said, that harsh restrictions would soon end. Lockdowns have offered some a respite from the stresses of school or work, which have made them more resilient, psychologists say. But for others, especially those who already struggled with mental health conditions or limited access to care, their fragility has been exacerbated. Skaters ride on the first day of the coronavirus pandemic lockdown in Barcelona in March 2020. Credit:New York Times Not being in control of something like this is anxiety inducing, said Dalia Al-Dujaili, 21, a student at the University of Edinburgh. As the pandemic has dragged on, so has the sense of limbo, she said, and she tried online therapy for the first time last year.

What am I doing? Why am I getting a degree, if theres not going to be any jobs? she asked. One blessing, she said, is that younger people are more open to discussing their struggles. Everybody talks about their therapists and their meds, she noted. Trafalgar Square in London. With the pandemic lockdowns set to drag on, mental health professionals are growing increasingly alarmed about the deteriorating mental state of young people. Credit:Andrew Testa/The New York Times That has not stopped some from feeling guilty, though, given that the pandemic has affected everyone.

There are people with bigger struggles: people who have lost their jobs, or a relative to the disease, said Marcelo Andreguetti, a Brazilian graphic designer who studies in Cologne, Germany. He said he began taking antidepressants after he was told he had depression and obsessive compulsive disorder this year. Loneliness brings them into despair Winter has worsened the situation, according to therapists and psychiatrists, who say they have seen young people manifesting more severe symptoms of anxiety, depression, eating disorders and addictions. In the Netherlands, Dr Robert Vermeiren, a professor of child psychiatry at Leiden University Medical Centre, said the acute ward he manages has been full for weeks  something he had never experienced.

The situation was so serious, he said, that his team did not send children home for Christmas, as it usually would. Isolation has also disrupted the usual teenage transition, when young people move from belonging to their family to belonging to their peers, Vermeiren added. Loading They feel empty, lonely, and that loneliness brings them into despair, he said. In Italy, calls doubled last year to the main hotline for young people who have considered or attempted harming themselves. Beds in a child neuropsychiatry unit at the Bambino Gesu Childrens Hospital in Rome have been full since October, said Dr Stefano Vicari, director of the unit. Hospitalisations of young Italians who harmed themselves or attempted suicide have increased 30 per cent in the second wave of cases, he added.

To those who say that, after all, these are challenges young people have to go through, that they will come out stronger, this is only true for some, those who have more resources, Vicari said. Catherine Seymour, head of research at the Mental Health Foundation, a Britain-based charity, said that young people living in poorer households were more likely to experience anxiety and depression, according to a study conducted among nearly 2400 teenagers. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video It may be that those in poorer households are more likely to lack enough space and internet access to help with schoolwork and communication with their friends, Seymour said. They may also be affected by their parents financial worries and stress. Studies from the first lockdowns suggest that they may have already left an indelible mark.

In France, a survey of nearly 70,000 students found that 10 per cent had experienced suicidal thoughts during the first months of the pandemic, and more than a quarter had suffered from depression. In Spain, one of the worlds toughest lockdowns last spring had a profound impact, especially for young girls, who were more likely to experience stress, anxiety and depression, according to a survey of 523 people by the University of Valencia. Konstanze Schoeps, one of the studys authors, said, They were developing their own freedom and space, and during lockdown they lost what they had just started to experience. It amounted to a process of grieving, she added. A search for remedies

The situation has become so dire that students and mental health advocates have asked authorities to moderate some measures, including by reopening schools and universities, even as officials worry that a premature easing of regulations will worsen the spread of new variants. Loading Building social relationships is at the centre of our lives, and that is gone, said Heidi Soupault, 19, who urged President Emmanuel Macron of France to reopen universities in an open letter that spread quickly on the internet last month. Starting this month, students in France can return to universities one day a week. They can also get three free therapy sessions. In Britain, where mental health organisations and experts have urged the government to divert funding to help address the issue in schools, officials have said that they will consider mental health support as part of plans to lift restrictions. In the Netherlands, the central government has pressed regional authorities to invest more in youth mental health.

Dr Silvia Schneider, a child and adolescent psychologist in Bochum, Germany, said that governments should share clear messages on television and social media. Loading We need to give very easy accessible information on how to handle the feeling that they are not alone with these challenges, Schneider said about young people. And that there are some things that can help them. To combat symptoms of anxiety and depression, some therapists, like Kyllendahl in London, are telling their clients to go outside as much possible  even if it involves breaking restrictions. Still, some young people see a silver lining.
A chain of clinics offering cosmetic treatments is giving patients letters which allow them pass Garda checkpoints if they are travelling more than 5km from home for Botox.

It emerged this week that a cancer patient has been turned down for reconstructive surgery following a mastectomy, as it is deemed by health authorities to be "non-essential".

But image-conscious women and men are flocking to clinics to get Botox, lip fillers and other treatments.

Three months ago the Sunday World revealed a loophole in the law which allows aesthetic clinics to legally operate, as they claim to be carrying out "necessary medical procedures" with "injectables".

Our revelation was then raised in the Dail by Social Democrats leader Roisin Shortall, and featured for two days in a row on Joe Duffy's Liveline show on RTE Radio 1.

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This week, one of our reporters booked a consultation at Sculpture Clinic to be given instructions about getting Botox for the first time.

He was also advised that a letter would be given to him which would enable him to travel anywhere in the country to one of their clinics for an appointment.

Sculpture Clinics are located in Dublin, Cork and Tipperary and primarily offer Botox , an injectable muscle relaxant.

In initial enquiries our reporter enquired about Botox and lip fillers.

He was sent the following email: "As requested the price of lip enhancement is 300 with our current offer, and three areas of anti-wrinkle is 247 (normal value 350). You will find a full list of our services on our website sculptureclinic.ie."

Among its other 'February specials' on offer is IV Therapy, which is vitamin C, B and mineral boost infusion (190).

Its regular price list includes derma fillers, skin, eye and neck treatments, as well as procedures for hair thinning, teeth grinding, excessive sweating, and non-surgical rhinoplasty.

Our reporter booked a first-time consultation appointment, which would last 15 minutes and cost 50. Further emails were sent to confirm and remind him about the appointment.

Our reporter called Sculpture Clinic to say he had heard there was a letter the clinic gave to clients which allows them to travel outside their 5km zone to whichever clinic they choose.

He was told that was correct information and he could be furnished with a letter if he wished.

A letter was then emailed to him which read: "I would like to inform you that you have booked your appointment with Dr Nema on Saturday February 6 at 3.30pm at our Dublin clinic. Kindly inform us if you are unavailable on your appointment date booked by us or want to cancel or reschedule. Looking forward to seeing you."

On enquiring with a follow-up call if this letter was sufficient for the gardai, the receptionist replied: "That's the one we give to our clients, they produce the letter at any checkpoints and there has been no issues."

Our reporter made his way on a 15km journey from the northside of the capital to the southside suburb of Sandycove, where the Dublin branch of Sculpture Clinic is located, although he did not encounter a checkpoint on his journey.

On arrival at the clinic's modern foyer we were greeted by a friendly receptionist who asked to take our reporter's temperature and double checked to make sure he was not in contact with anyone who showed symptoms of coronavirus. He was told the doctor was running late and to take a seat.

A glamorous female client sauntered through the lobby and was told to "come back in two weeks for your next appointment".

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Our reporter met with Dr George Nema, who discussed Botox with him.

The doctor asked our reporter to remove his mask so he could look at his lips when our reporter asked about the possibility of getting fillers there.

"It's not just women who get lip augmentation, but a lot of men also," he informed him. "Loads of men come here for this, but mostly women."

Our reporter asked if he could settle the bill with the receptionist after his consultation, which lasted about 10 minutes, but when he tried to pay the doctor came out of his surgery and after whispering to the receptionist, informed him with a smile: "That is complimentary."

The clinic's website reveals Dr Nema grew up in Philadelphia and has medical qualifications from universities both in America and in Ireland.

Social Democrats leader Roisin Shortall, who is also her party's health spokesperson, was incensed at our revelations .

"It is really unbelievable that there are still people attending Botox clinics when the vast majority of these treatments are cosmetic and non-essential," she stormed.

"Meanwhile, there are reports that reconstructive surgeries following mastectomies have been put on pause. What does it say about the strategy behind current restrictions, where someone can get a cosmetic treatment but not reconstruction following a life- altering surgery? There needs to be tighter monitoring with deliberate consideration behind what is and is not allowable."

In a statement to the Sunday World, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said: "I understand that the administration of essential medical treatments is allowed for under Level 5 and that Botox is used as a treatment in a number of medical conditions. I do not believe that consultations for its use as a cosmetic treatment are in any way appropriate at this time and I will liaise with the Department of the Taoiseach in relation to the definition of essential services.

"In the meantime I would suggest that those engaging in practices that do not reflect the spirit of staying at home except for essential reasons should stop."

He said the vast, vast majority of people are doing what is asked of them. The Sunday World asked Sculpture Clinic for a comment but had not received a reply at the time of going to press.
Egypts ministries of international cooperation and finance inked on Monday an agreement with the Japanese government, represented by the Japanese Embassy in Cairo and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). The deal provides a development finance of $240 million for Egypt.

The agreement was signed by Minister of International Cooperation Rania Al-Mashat, Minister of Finance Mohamed Maait, and Chief Representative of JICA Egypt Office Omura Yoshifumi, in the presence of a number of Egyptian and Japanese officials.

The accord targets development financing policies in energy and budget support in Egypt, aiming to enhance the green growth and sustainable development as well as alleviating the repercussions of climate change and countering the impact of COVID-19.

Al-Mashat said the agreement comes in the aftermath of one-year negotiations despite the coronavirus crisis and the repercussion of lockdown globally.

She added that Japans current cooperation portfolio with Egypt amounts to $2.7 billion used in 14 projects in a number of developmental sectors, including electricity, education, higher education, scientific research, tourism and antiquities.

Al-Mashat emphasised Egypts appreciation of the development finances that the Japanese government has extended to Egypt to back the countrys efforts in fighting coronavirus.

During the first wave of the pandemic, Japan provided Egypt with a grant worth $9.3 million to be used in medical sets and supplies in the health ministrys hospitals, bringing the total amount of the Japanese grants current portfolio to $54.5 million, according to Al-Mashat.

Meanwhile, Maait said that the agreement is compatible with Egypts efforts to provide urgent development finances to contribute to mitigating the pandemics socio-economic impact and to back the most hit sectors.

The Japanese Ambassador to Egypt Masaki Noke asserted the importance of the new finance in supporting Egypts efforts towards green economy transformation and enhancing clean energy transformation policies.

The Ministry of International Cooperation secured $9.8 billion as development finances in 2020, including $3.2 billion for supporting small and medium-sized enterprises and $6.7 billion for other development sectors.

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ANKARA: Turkeys President Tayyip Erdogan accused the United States on Monday of supporting Kurdish militants who Ankara says executed 13 kidnapped Turks in northern Iraq, adding that a U.S. statement of condemnation was a a joke".

Turkey said on Sunday militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) executed the captives, including military and police personnel, amid a military operation against the group.

The United States said it stood by Turkey and that it condemned the killings if it was confirmed that responsibility lay with the PKK.

The United States and European Union have designated the PKK a terrorist organisation, but in Syria U.S. forces have been fighting alongside Kurdish YPG fighters who Ankara considers to be inextricably linked to the PKK.

Now there is a statement made by the United States. Its a joke. Were you not supposed to stand against the PKK, the YPG? You clearly support them and stand behind them," he told supporters of his AK Party in the Black Sea city of Rize.

Since Joe Biden was elected U.S. President last year, Turkey has repeatedly said it wants to improve strained ties with the United States, but U.S. support for the YPG has infuriated Ankara and remains a key disagreement between the allies.

Erdogan said that Ankara would continue its cross-border operations into Iraq against the PKK, which has waged a decades-old insurgency in the mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey, in which more than 40,000 people have been killed.

If we are together with you in NATO, if we are to continue our unity, then you will act sincerely towards us. Then, you will stand with us, not with the terrorists," Erdogan said.

He said nobody could criticise Turkeys cross-border operations in Syria or Iraq after the killings, and countries must choose between Turkey and the militants.

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The countrys COVID-19 vaccination rollout will begin next Monday after the first 142,000 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine landed in Australia.

Health Minister Greg Hunt said the vaccines landed in Sydney just after midday on Monday and would go through security and quality-assurance processes, including batch testing, before the rollout began on February 22.

Health Minister Greg Hunt expects the first phase of the rollout to take six weeks. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Today marks another important milestone; next week with the first vaccines marks an even more important milestone, he said on Monday afternoon. With those milestones we give Australians hope and protection.

The federal government will keep 62,000 doses of the initial shipment aside for second vaccinations. Thirty thousand will be used for aged care workers and residents, and the remaining 50,000 will be divided between the states and territories on a population basis.

EAST LONGMEADOW  The pandemic is setting the tone for many companies like Toner Plastics, where business has doubled as it took steps to respond to the manufacturing needs to fight the coronavirus.

COVID-19 drove business for us last year, says company president Jack Warren. That kept us very busy.

When children were stuck at home with little to do, parents turned to plastic crafting beads to keep them busy.

When supplies needed to make N95 masks for front line workers got hung up in China, Toner Plastics supplied elastics straps for the lifesaving Personal Protective Equipment.

The company has even made swabs required for COVID testing.

Beads, elastics and swabs  three reasons Toner Plastics business doubled in 2020 and is driving hard into 2021. The plastics manufacturing technology companys key to success was being nimble while retooling its machines and workforce.

We had to figure out very quickly how we could double our production of the elastic straps our customers use to make N95 masks, says Warren.

Toner Plastics pipeline to Walmart flowed steadily as well last year. When Walmarts customers tried to find crafts for their kids, they were met with largely empty shelves.

Competitive products were not on the shelves, but our products were because were a made in the USA supplier, explains Warren. Our kids craft products really exploded this year, so we had to work very hard to keep our customers in stock while products made in China were stuck there.

Toner also saw opportunity in the textile business and didnt mask its interest in making face coverings. Last year Toner Plastics established Toner Textiles, a brand-new business unit. The division makes protective face masks in three themes: patriotic; back to school; and animal. The masks became an instant hit at Walmart, according to Toners president.

That was a tremendous business for us. It was a completely new thing, says Warren. They asked for our help to bring a mask to them because they couldnt get masks quickly enough out of China, so we were able deliver.

Toner Plastics was founded in 1989 with one shop and one employee. The company has grown exponentially since then, with three manufacturing plants and 180 employees today. The business has grown 500% in the last five years through mergers, acquisitions, and increased sales of its product portfolio, according to Warren.

Beyond its pandemic related portfolio, Toner also makes a range of products, relying on its injection molding, extrusion, tooling and mold transfer and toll manufacturing capabilities.

The company never shut down during pandemic, relying on employees to keep the business going while following state and federal safety guidelines for safety.

Our supervisory and management teams were excellent, Warren says. They worked weekends, led by example and our employees responded. Our people felt like we had a purpose. We couldnt let our customers down.

Its anyones guess how long COVID will continue driving some businesses under while boosting sales for others. For now, Toner Plastics is committed to helping meet needs that have emerged amid the pandemic.

We know what were doing is important, says Warren. We dont know whats around the corner, but it will be another evolution in the history of Toner Plastics.

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STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.  Police have charged a 21-year-old man in connection with four stabbings within the citys subway system that left two people dead and two others seriously injured.

Rigoberto Lopez is charged with murder and attempted murder in connection with what police are calling unprovoked attacks from Friday morning to Saturday morning, NYPD Chief of Detectives Rodney Harrison tweeted Sunday.

The incidents were reported along the A subway line in Manhattans Washington Heights and Inwood neighborhoods as well as Queens.

Officials said Lopez is believed to be homeless, along with the two victims who succumbed to their injuries, ABC 7 reported.

Within 24 hours, Rigoberto Lopez was apprehended for stabbing four people in separate incidents occurring on the A Train, which left two dead and two with serious injuries. pic.twitter.com/qf4s1xa50f  Chief Rodney Harrison (@NYPDDetectives) February 14, 2021

The victims did not initiate contact with Lopez before being attacked, according to Deputy Chief Brian McGee, who told reporters that Lopez was previously hospitalized for mental illness.

Harrison credited several factions of the NYPD with Sundays arrest, including neighborhood coordination officers in the Washington Heights area, the Transit Bureau and investigators assigned to the Gun Violence Suppression Division.

The NYPD on Saturday announced a plan to deploy 500 additional officers to patrol the subway system.
DUBLIN, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Global Smart Education & Learning Market By Component (Hardware, Software, Service), By Deployment Mode (On-Premise v/s Cloud), By Learning Type, By Learning Mode, By Type of Content, By End User, By Company, By Region, Forecast & Opportunities, 2026" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The Global Smart Education & Learning Market is expected to grow at an impressive rate during the forecast period. The Global Smart Education & Learning Market is driven by the rise in the number of virtual schools.



Additionally, shifting preference of education institutes, students and corporates towards smart methods of learning is expected to propel the market through 2026. Besides, emergence of connected devices and BYOD concept is further expected to foster the market growth during the forecast period.



Furthermore, proactive initiatives by the different governments across the globe is expected to positively impact the market growth over the next few years. However, high infrastructural costs and implementation costs can hamper the market growth through 2026. Moreover, security and privacy issues can further impede the market growth.



The Global Smart Education & Learning Market is segmented based on component, deployment mode, learning type, learning mode, type of content, end-user, company and region.



Based on component, the market can be categorized into hardware, software and service. The service segment is expected to dominate the market during the forecast period. This can be ascribed to the increasing demand from end-users since it ensures effective functioning of software throughout the process.



Based on learning mode, the market can be fragmented into virtual instructor-led training, simulation-based learning, social learning, blended learning, adaptive learning, collaborative learning and others. The simulation based segment is expected to dominate the market through 2026 owing to the continuous technological advancements in the integration of cognitive and technical skills.



Based on end-user, the market can be split into enterprises and academics. The academics segment is expected to dominate the market owing to the continuous ongoing improvement in educational infrastructure and customization of learning and assessment processes.



Regionally, the Global Smart Education & Learning Market has been segmented into various regions including Asia-Pacific, North America, South America, Europe, and Middle East & Africa. Among these regions, North America is expected to dominate the overall smart education & learning market owing to the availability of adequate infrastructure and growing adoption of technologies in educational institutions.



The major players operating in the Global Smart Education & Learning Market are Blackboard, IBM Corporation, Samsung, SMART Technologies, Adobe Systems, Inc., Saba Software, Oracle Corporation, SAP SE, Microsoft Corporation, Cisco Systems, Inc. and others.



Major companies are developing advanced technologies and launching new services in order to stay competitive in the market. Other competitive strategies include mergers & acquisitions and new service developments.



The study is useful in providing answers to several critical questions that are important for the industry stakeholders such as service providers, suppliers and partners, end-users, etc., besides allowing them in strategizing investments and capitalizing on the market opportunities.



Years considered for this report:

Historical Years: 2016-2019

Base Year: 2020

Estimated Year: 2021

Forecast Period: 2022-2026

Key Target Audience:

Smart education & learning provider companies

Market research and consulting firms

Government bodies such as regulating authorities and policy makers

Organizations, forums and alliances related to smart education & learning

Key Topics Covered:



1. Product Overview



2. Research Methodology



3. Impact of COVID-19 on Global Smart Education & Learning Market



4. Executive Summary



5. Voice of Customer



6. Global Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

6.1. Market Size & Forecast

6.1.1. By Value

6.2. Market Share & Forecast

6.2.1. By Component (Hardware, Software, Service)

6.2.1.1. By Hardware (Interactive Displays v/s Interactive Projectors)

6.2.1.2. By Software (Integrated Solution v/s Standalone Solution)

6.2.1.3. By Service (Professional v/s Managed)

6.2.2. By Deployment Mode (On-Premise v/s Cloud)

6.2.3. By Learning Type (Synchronous v/s Asynchronous)

6.2.4. By Learning Mode ((Virtual Instructor-led Training, Simulation-based Learning, Social Learning, Blended Learning, Adaptive Learning, Collaborative Learning, Others)

6.2.5. By Type of Content (Audio-Based Content, Text Content, Video-based Content)

6.2.6. By End User (Enterprises v/s Academics)

6.2.7. By Company (2020)

6.2.8. By Region

6.3. Product Market Map



7. Asia-Pacific Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

7.1. Market Size & Forecast

7.1.1. By Value

7.2. Market Share & Forecast

7.2.1. By Component

7.2.2. By Deployment Mode

7.2.3. By Learning Type

7.2.4. By Learning Mode

7.2.5. By Type of Content

7.2.6. By End User

7.2.7. By Country

7.3. Asia-Pacific: Country Analysis

7.3.1. China Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

7.3.2. India Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

7.3.3. Australia Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

7.3.4. Japan Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

7.3.5. South Korea Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook



8. Europe Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

8.1. Market Size & Forecast

8.1.1. By Value

8.2. Market Share & Forecast

8.2.1. By Component

8.2.2. By Deployment Mode

8.2.3. By Learning Type

8.2.4. By Learning Mode

8.2.5. By Type of Content

8.2.6. By End User

8.2.7. By Country

8.3. Europe: Country Analysis

8.3.1. France Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

8.3.2. Germany Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

8.3.3. United Kingdom Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

8.3.4. Italy Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

8.3.5. Spain Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook



9. North America Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

9.1. Market Size & Forecast

9.1.1. By Value

9.2. Market Share & Forecast

9.2.1. By Component

9.2.2. By Deployment Mode

9.2.3. By Learning Type

9.2.4. By Learning Mode

9.2.5. By Type of Content

9.2.6. By End User

9.2.7. By Country

9.3. North America: Country Analysis

9.3.1. United States Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

9.3.2. Mexico Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

9.3.3. Canada Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook



10. South America Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

10.1. Market Size & Forecast

10.1.1. By Value

10.2. Market Share & Forecast

10.2.1. By Component

10.2.2. By Deployment Mode

10.2.3. By Learning Type

10.2.4. By Learning Mode

10.2.5. By Type of Content

10.2.6. By End User

10.2.7. By Country

10.3. South America: Country Analysis

10.3.1. Brazil Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

10.3.2. Argentina Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

10.3.3. Colombia Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook



11. Middle East and Africa Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

11.1. Market Size & Forecast

11.1.1. By Value

11.2. Market Share & Forecast

11.2.1. By Component

11.2.2. By Deployment Mode

11.2.3. By Learning Type

11.2.4. By Learning Mode

11.2.5. By Type of Content

11.2.6. By End User

11.2.7. By Country

11.3. MEA: Country Analysis

11.3.1. South Africa Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

11.3.2. Saudi Arabia Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook

11.3.3. UAE Smart Education & Learning Market Outlook



12. Market Dynamics

12.1. Drivers

12.2. Challenges



13. Market Trends & Developments



14. Competitive Landscape

14.1. Blackboard Inc.

14.2. IBM Corporation

14.3. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.

14.4. SMART Technologies Inc,

14.5. Adobe Systems, Inc.

14.6. Saba Software Inc.

14.7. Oracle Corporation

14.8. SAP SE

14.9. Microsoft Corporation

14.10. Cisco Systems, Inc.



15. Strategic Recommendations



For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/bkewnx

Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]



For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470

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For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900



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Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

SOURCE Research and Markets

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Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been urged to forget the feasibility of building multi-billion pound links to Scotland and instead spend the money on projects with a better chance of seeing light at the end of the tunnel.

Yesterday another idea was floated in the ongoing discussion of building a fixed link between Scotland and here.

Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon said it would be better for the Prime Minister to focus his efforts less on Tory glamour projects.

With Brexit and Covid, the challenges facing communities right across these islands are real, said the North Belfast MLA.

Investment is needed to protect businesses, workers, improve our roads, rail and connectivity and to build a better future as we look to recovery.

Its time the Prime Minister woke up to that reality, people here simply dont want a Boris bridge, a Boris burrow  frankly a Boris anything. They want jobs, opportunities, stability and a brighter future.

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It emerged a leading transport group was proposing a tunnel, with the Sunday Telegraph suggesting a feasibility study could get the green light as early as March. However, The Sunday Times reported it was just one proposal submitted as part of a wide-ranging review into connectivity of the four nations of the UK.

The Chair of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee Simon Hoare was scathing suggesting a train in any undersea tunnel could be pulled by an inexhaustible herd of unicorns overseen by stern, officious dodos.

The tunnel  which could be shorter than the link to France under the English Channel  could possibly be dubbed the Boris burrow.

Any new connection could also appease unionists who have expressed displeasure at the way the Government has allowed the European Union to impose new checks on ferry cargo heading to Northern Ireland, it was suggested.

However some have said checks on goods would remain.

Th study by the chairman of Network Rail Sir Peter Hendy will say whether a link between Stranraer in Scotland and Larne in Northern Ireland is workable.

Sir Peter has met with the Prime Minister to discuss the findings, which could recommend the Government commissions a feasibility study of the project, with his interim report set to be published within a matter of weeks.

Scottish Secretary Allister Jack threw his support behind the idea.

However, Conservative MP Mr Hoare blasted it, saying Puff the Magic Dragon could be the inspector.

Lets concentrate on making the [Northern Ireland] protocol work and put the hallucinogenics down, he tweeted.

Mr Hoare added: Also another minor hurdle is the NI railway gauge is an all-Ireland gauge which is different to that used in GB. Im not Brunel but I think this might be a bit of a problem.

Aodhan Connolly of the Northern Ireland Retail Consortium pointed out how it took 30 years for the channel tunnel to be built and it would not do away with EU checks.

Ulster Unionist Party leader Steve Aiken added: Can we just have 10% of the multi-billions that it [the tunnel] would cost to fix our infrastructure  oh, and maybe some zero emission ferries (built here)  now that would make more sense (also get rid of the Irish Sea border).

DUP MP Sammy Wilson said it was more important to make sure we are economically and constitutionally connected than physically.

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Beau Ryan spent a few months travelling around Australia while filming Channel 10's second season of The Amazing Race late last year.

And on Monday, the 35-year-old revealed the eye-watering six-figure sum he earned for hosting the popular show.

During an interview on KIIS FM's Kyle and Jackie O radio show, the former NRL star revealed he was paid $800,000 to participate in the Channel 10 program.

REVEALED: The staggering six-figure salary Beau Ryan (pictured) was paid for hosting Channel Ten's The Amazing Race

'When you are getting paid for something, you look at the hours... How long are we working here?,' he explained.

Radio host Kyle Sandilands then asked: 'Is that what you do? Do you look at that with the Amazing Race and consider how long [you're away for]?'

'Yeah... [I was away] for two and half to three months and I got paid $800,000,' Beau revealed.

What a pay packet! During an interview on KIIS FM's Kyle and Jackie O radio show, the former NRL star revealed he was paid $800,000 to participate in the Channel 10 program

It comes after Beau revealed he was genuinely scared for his life during some of the challenges on the Amazing Race.

Speaking to The Daily Telegraph last month, he said production staff 'tested a lot of the challenges' before contestants did them.

Before he took the plunge - Beau made farewell videos for his wife and children, just in case something went wrong, especially on challenges involving heights.

Terrifying: It comes after Beau revealed he was genuinely scared for his life during some of the challenges on the Amazing Race

'We had a social phone we used to record stuff to put out on TenPlay and social media before we do some of the challenges.

'And I always did a farewell piece to camera for my wife and kids, like if something did happen to me and I didn't survive the abseil or the cliff dive,' he said.

He added: 'But I was doing these challenges every second day so there were about 50 farewell videos all up. Lucky for me I didn't have to use them.'
A man is due in court this morning following a drugs raid in which gardai were forced to shoot and kill a dog.

The man is aged in his 40s, was arrested on Sunday afternoon after gardai in Dublin searched a house under warrant in the Coburg Place area of the city.
AIESEC in Bahrain has been awarded a grant to conduct a capacity building project for 8 NGOs in Bahrain.

The award under the Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) Grant from the US Embassy supports the projects undertaken by AIESEC in October 2020.

The NGOs taking part in the programme are: Rakaez Social Society, AlMutalaq Women Society, Bahrain Alwani Society, Bahrain Autistics Society, Fares AlFursan Center, Bahrain Food Bank, Bahrain Association of Parents and Friends of Disabled.

The NGOs were selected on their needs and concentrated on those groups that lacked the basic infrastructure in terms of tracking funds, HR capacity, reporting systems of their activities, and impact measurement, says Ahmed Shabbir, AIESEC in Bahrains Managing Director.

AIESEC is a global youth-run organisation with the main focus on youth leadership development. It has been in operation in Bahrain since 2006, and have managed and executed multiple development conferences, sessions and seminars covering various topics related to the United Nations Sustainable development goals (SDGs).

Applying for the MEPI program aligns entirely with what we believe to be part of our civic and social responsibility. The MEPI program responds to needs and emerging opportunities for citizens and organisations that target two core objectives: participatory governance, economic opportunity, added Shabbir.

Since receiving the grant we have held multiple workshops delivered by AIESEC team leaders whove completed two training courses run by professionals. The training sessions covered the topics of project management, design thinking, negotiations, communication, data management, reportability, crisis management, analysis skills, time management, tools and trackers usage, and presentation skills.  TradeArabia News Service
They shot to fame a decade ago for their fiery feuds which aired in front of the nation on E4's Made In Chelsea.

But Millie Mackintosh proved that she and Hugo Taylor were truly meant to be as she posted a sweet montage of their 'love story' to celebrate their 'first Valentine's Day as a family' with baby daughter Sienna, nine months, on Sunday.

The reality star, 31, shared a series of candid photographs and video clips with her husband, 35, including a previously unseen image of the moment they welcomed little Sienna into the world last May.

Loved-up: Millie Mackintosh posted a sweet montage of her 'love story' with Hugo Taylor to celebrate their 'first Valentine's Day as a family' with baby Sienna, nine months, on Sunday

Millie wrote alongside the video montage: 'Our first Valentines Day as a family!

'I had planned to get us all dressed up and take a family photo but none of us managed to get out of our pjs so here is a montage of our love story.' (sic)

Accompanied by romantic jazz music, the slide show flicked through photos of the couple from over the years.

From gorgeous sun-kissed snaps of the pair on holiday, to them hilariously gazing into each other's eyes in Burger King, the video offered an intriguing insight into Millie and Hugo's life.

Candid: The reality star, 31, shared a series of candid photographs with her husband, 35, including a previously unseen image of the moment they welcomed little Sienna into the world

Loved-up: Accompanied by romantic jazz music, the slide show flicked through photos of the couple from over the years

The Made in Chelsea stars originally dated for six months in 2011, before Millie dumped Hugo when she found out he'd cheated with her best friend and co-star Rosie Fortescue.

Millie then met her future husband, rapper Professor Green, 37, real name Stephen Manderson, who she tied the knot with in September 2013.

The ex-couple were married for two-and-a-half years, before finalising their divorce in May 2016, the same week Millie and Hugo went public with their rekindled romance.

Following their split, Millie admitted in an interview at the time that she would always love Hugo, explaining: 'I loved him - those feelings don't disappear  but I just always have to remind myself why we're not together.

Her (Burger) King: The video featured everything from gorgeous sun-kissed snaps of the pair on holiday, to them hilariously gazing into each other's eyes in Burger King (pictured)

Emotional rollercoaster: Millie and Hugo originally dated for six months in 2011, before he cheated with Millie's best friend Rosie Fortescue

'I do think that, for the rest of my life, every time I see him, I'll get that feeling in my stomach. I don't think I could ever not get that butterfly feeling.'

Millie and Hugo tied the knot in June 2018 at Hugo's uncle's country estate Whithurst Park, in West Sussex, one year after he proposed during a holiday to the Greek island of Mykonos.

Millie gave birth to the couple's first child Sienna in May 2020, during the coronavirus pandemic and national lockdown - something which she said was 'daunting'.

The former Made In Chelsea star recently revealed on Instagram how tiring balancing motherhood and her influencer career can be.

Irresistible: Millie and Hugo later rekindled their romance in 2016 and were spotted looking cosy at the British Polo Day in Dubai

Eternal flame: Millie and Hugo finally cemented their 12 year-long on-off romance when they tied the knot in 2018

'There's poo all over the place, sick down my top, and my morning smoothie has just redecorated the kitchen ceiling, why would any of you be interested in hearing about that?' she asked her followers last week.

'As with anything that you put your heart and soul into, there's an underlying pressure, for me it's to create and deliver the right content for you.

'I remind myself daily that it's ok to wake up and think 'what on earth am I going to talk about today?' she said.

'I am often conscious that social media can be seen as a platform that allows the unrealistic depiction of peoples lives to be shared, however, I am proud of the community it has allowed me to create, and the opportunities it has brought me.'

Happy family: Millie gave birth to the couple's first child Sienna in May 2020, during the coronavirus pandemic and national lockdown - something which she said was 'daunting'

Doting parents: Millie recently revealed on Instagram how tiring balancing motherhood and her influencer career can be

She said: 'I know that I have to make a conscious decision to put down my phone and create those boundaries, as I can't just log off a computer, shut my office door, forget about work and put my mummy hat on.

'I'm sure you mummies out there feel the same, with nearly all of us working from home, it can be hard to leave work behind especially when you've had a tough day.

'It's about finding the right balance between the two, we're not robots, we are only human, we can only try our best.'
The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
LAGOS (Reuters) - Nigeria's president appealed for calm on Sunday following reports of intercommunal violence between ethnic groups at a market in the southwestern state of Oyo.

Clashes between traders from the Yoruba and Hausa ethnic groups broke out on Saturday at Shasha market in Ibadan, the capital of Oyo, the state governor's spokesman said. Most Yoruba live in southwestern Nigeria, while the Hausa are concentrated in northern states.

Tensions have increased in southwestern states in recent weeks amid claims by public figures that nomadic cattle herders from the mainly northern Fulani ethnic group are carrying out violent crimes, which the pastoralists have denied. Many of the herders have moved south in search of dwindling grazing land.

Usman Yako, chair of the Hausa traders association at Shasha market, told Reuters by telephone at least 11 people from his ethnic group were killed in clashes at the market on Friday and Saturday that followed an argument between Yoruba and Hausa traders.

President Muhammadu Buhari appealed on Twitter to religious and traditional leaders, as well as elected leaders, "to join hands with the federal government to ensure that communities in their domain are not splintered along ethnic and other primordial lines".

"We will not allow any ethnic or religious groups to stoke up hatred and violence against other groups," he wrote.

Oyo state police did not immediately respond to calls requesting comment.

"The attacks, which led to the loss of lives and properties, must be investigated and perpetrators brought to justice," rights group Amnesty International said in a statement, referring to the violence at Shasha market.

Nigeria's security forces are already stretched by armed gangs of kidnappers in the northwest and an Islamist militant insurgency in the northeast.

(Reporting by Alexis Akwagyiram in Lagos, Ardo Hazzad in Bauchi, and Tife Owolabi in Yenagoa; Additional reporting by Paul Carsten in Abuja; Editing by Daniel Wallis)
BEARDSTOWN  Nearly 700 workers at JBS USAs Beardstown pork production facility have received the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine.

In partnership with the Cass County Health Department, team members were vaccinated on site, making it one of the largest efforts for essential food production workers, according to the company.

We are extremely grateful for the opportunity to vaccinate many of our team members in Beardstown and appreciate the Cass County Health Department and the Illinois Department of Public Health for their assistance and prioritization of our essential workforce, said Bob Krebs, president of JBS USA pork. We remain committed to providing a safe working environment for our team members and doing all we can to ensure our workforce across the country is given the opportunity to be vaccinated as soon as possible. They have worked tirelessly throughout the pandemic.

Vaccination is voluntary at the plant, and those who choose to be vaccinated receive a $100 incentive bonus.

The second dose of the vaccine will be provided to Beardstown team members in March.

The Cass County Health Department is proud to partner with JBS USA to implement a large-scale vaccination clinic for these essential employees in Beardstown, said Teresa Armstrong, administrator of Cass County Health Department. Our goal is to quickly and safely vaccinate as many JBS Beardstown employees as possible to prevent illness and spread of COVID-19.

JBS has implemented hundreds of safety measures and invested hundreds of millions of dollars to fight COVID-19, the company said.
An Bord Pleanala has upheld the decision of Longford County Council to refuse planning permission for the proposed development of a 169 metres single wind turbine within Kiernan Milling Mill Building at Granardkill, Granard.



Kiernan Milling, care of Galetech Energy Services of Clondargan, Stradone, County Cavan, appealed the July 14, 2020, decision of Longford Co Co planners.



However, their appeal was unsuccessful as the state body upheld the local authoritys decision and deemed that the proposed turbine development would seriously injure and interfere with the setting of Granard Motte and Bailey. It would also be contrary to the proper planning and sustainable development of the area.



Kiernan Milling had sought a10 year permission for the proposed erection of a single wind turbine with a maximum height of up to 169 metres together with all associated site development, access and reinstatement works, including turbine foundation, hardstanding area, one number site entrance and site access track, underground electrical cabling (including beneath R194) to connect to existing electrical switch room located within Kiernan Milling Mill Building and all ancillary works which will have an operational phase of 30 years, all at Granardkill.



A spokesperson for Granardkill Local Residents Group, who were very vocal in their opposition to the proposed turbine said:" We are delighted and extremely relieved with An Bord Pleanalas decision to refuse planning permission for the 169m industrial wind turbine.



This final decision refusing the developers appeal by An Bord Pleanala justifies Longford County Councils decision to refuse this proposal initially.



The spokesperson concluded, Granardkill is a very special and unique place which has a cherished history and we will continue to protect it from unwanted industrial construction going forward.



The Granard area is part of Ireland's Hidden Heartlands and the motte development of a 15 acre Norman Living History Village is set to become their flagship project which will complement the existing Center Parcs Longford Forest.



Granard Knights & Conquests centre recently received substantial investment from Failte Ireland and Longford County Council.



Failte Ireland also submitted a very detailed objection against the turbine plan to Longford County Council, highlighting that it would significantly undermine the success of their tourism vision for the area.

An Bord Pleanala Reasons and Considerations for refusing planning

1. Having regard to the location, height and design of the proposed development, it is considered that the proposed development would seriously injure and interfere with the setting of Granard Motte and Bailey, Recorded Monument LF 010-080001, which is subject to statutory protection in the Record of Monuments and Places, established under Section 12 of the National Monuments (Amendment) Act, 1994.



Furthermore, it is considered that the proposed development would be contrary to policy HER 1 of the Longford County Development Plan 2015 - 2021, which seeks to protect and conserve heritage sites, artefacts and monuments as well as the integrity of their setting, as listed in the Record of Monuments and Places. It would also be contrary to policy ARC 2 of the Development Plan, which seeks to protect the integrity and setting of archaeological areas, sites, structures, monuments, and objects in the County. The proposed development would, therefore, be contrary to the proper planning and sustainable development of the area.

2. The proposed development, by reason of its height, design and location, and on the basis of the information submitted with the application and the appeal, would have a negative impact on the scenic, heritage and cultural value of listed view F.S-14 of the Longford County Development Plan 2015 - 2021, and would be contrary to policy LCA 1 of the Development Plan not to permit proposed development which would have a detrimental impact on the landscape and to policy LCA 3, which seeks to preserve views and prospects. The proposed development would, therefore, be contrary to the proper planning and sustainable development of the area.
By Noah Browning LONDON (Reuters) - Oil prices soared to their highest in about 13 months on Monday as vaccine rollouts promised to revive demand and producers kept supply reined in. Brent crude was up 70 cents, or 1.1%, at $63.13 a barrel at 12:15 p.m. EST (1715 GMT) after hitting a session peak of $63.76, its highest since Jan. 22 last year. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures gained 63 cents, or 1.1%, at $60.10 after touching $60.95, the highest since Jan. 8 last year. Oil prices gained about 5% last week. U.S. markets were closed Monday for the ...
Think youre sick of Zoom calls? Try running for mayor of New York City.

The campaign has gone mostly virtual during the pandemic, forcing the crowded field of candidates to sit in front of their computers attending one online forum after another.

This is no exaggeration.

On a recent evening, three mayoral forums were somehow scheduled back to back to back: At 4 p.m., candidates gathered to talk about restaurants and nightlife; at 6 p.m., they participated in an event with Muslim groups; and at 8 p.m., they were hosted by Democrats in Staten Island.

The topics of the forums may be different, but there is also certainly a sameness about them all, with candidates appearing night after night, smiling (mostly) in their Brady Bunch boxes and struggling to unmute themselves or mute their cellphones.

Here are some observations and behind-the-scenes moments in the virtual mayors race:

Not another Zoom!

Running for mayor means always navigating a demanding gantlet of parades, church visits and neighborhood events  a preview of what life could be like if you are lucky enough to move into Gracie Mansion.
Nigeria has been allocated an additional 1.4 million doses of the approved Oxford- AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines, health minister Osagie Ehanire said on Monday.

Nigeria is expected to receive an initial 16 million doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines through the Vaccines Global Assess Facility, COVAX, by the end of February.

Mr Ehanire last week said an additional 42 million doses of the same vaccine will be delivered to the country through the African Unions African Vaccine Acquisition Task Team (AVATT).

Mr Ehanire, while speaking at a briefing of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19, said the expected 1.4 million doses are part of 7 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccines donated to Africa by telecom giant, MTN.

He said of the 1.4 million, an initial 500,000 doses will be delivered to the country by the end of February.

The Ministry of Health also engaged the Africa Vaccine Acquisition Task Team (AVATT), who informed us of the free allocation of 1.4 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccines, of which 500,000 doses are expected by the end of this month, courtesy of MTN donation of 7 million doses to Africa, he said.

The balance of 900,000 doses for Nigeria is expected by the end of March 2021.

At the briefing last week, the minister said Nigeria subscribed to two multilateral vaccine access platforms; the first being the COVAX facility which was set-up to divide over a billion doses of vaccines across 92 low-and middle-income countries.

The COVAX facility promised access to vaccines for up to 20 per cent of participating countries population with an initial supply beginning in the first quarter of the year to immunise three per cent of their populations.

The second platform is the AVATT, which has acquired 300 million doses of three types of vaccines to distribute to African countries based on their population, according to Mr Ehanire.

Expecting vaccines

Mr Ehanire noted that efforts are ongoing to ensure the effective roll-out of the COVID-19 vaccines when they finally arrive.

He said a Vaccine Coordination Committee has been inaugurated to address diverse issues peculiar to COVID-19 vaccine acquisition by Nigeria.

Their function is to advise on coordinating access to acquisition and distribution of vaccines when available, and on our immunization strategy.

Mr Ehanire recently said the country is experiencing a delay in receiving the first batch of the AstraZeneca vaccines because the manufacturers are yet to decide on when to deploy the vaccines.

He, however, said Nigerians should expect the first roll-out of the vaccines this month.

Vaccines efficacy

The minister stated that the National Agency For Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has begun an evaluation of some dossiers of the approved COVID-19 vaccines and some of them are nearly ready for results.

NAFDAC has received dossiers for some vaccines dossiers for Sputnik V vaccine of Russia, Astra Zeneca manufactured under license by Serum Institute of India, Covaxin by Bharat vaccines of India and the Sinopharm Vaccine of China, for evaluation and validation for use in Nigeria, he said.

He noted that the country received 100,000 AstraZeneca doses from India as a gift to Nigeria.

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Mr Ehanire explained that all COVID-19 vaccines carry a certain amount of risk and any vaccines not approved by the Federal Ministry of Health through its agencies such as NAFDAC cannot be used in Nigeria.

The government will not be responsible for the safety or efficacy of vaccines given outside the framework of the government.

All the needs of Nigeria have been carefully calculated by NPHCDA and it is possible to accommodate all interests in the framework, he said.
Theres a tendency, particularly when this windswept flatland province is in the grips of a Canadian Prairie cold snap, to look westward to the Pacific coast for hints of moderation and relief.

Editorial

Theres a tendency, particularly when this windswept flatland province is in the grips of a Canadian Prairie cold snap, to look westward to the Pacific coast for hints of moderation and relief.

"Why cant we have it like Vancouver does?" we wistfully ask, shiveringly oblivious to the 160-plus days of rain the B.C. coast receives annually. There are just times when Canadas westernmost province seems to have a better plan.

Such a moment arrived last week, and it had nothing to do with relative degrees of minus-Celsius weather. Rather, it had to do with B.C.s forward-thinking approach to illicit-drug criminality and a request to the federal government that Manitobas lawmakers would do well to carefully contemplate.

B.C. Minister of Mental Health and Addictions Sheila Malcolmson sent a letter to Ottawa asking Health Minister Patty Hajdu to grant the province an exemption from federal drug laws that would effectively decriminalize personal possession of small amounts of illegal drugs. The request is intended to help B.C. respond to a worsening addiction crisis that saw more than 1,700 overdose-related deaths last year.

"Are you willing to consider a Section 56 exemption to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act for B.C. to decriminalize the possession of small amounts of controlled substances for personal use, as a way to reduce stigma as a barrier to treatment?" Ms. Malcolmson wrote in the letter, which was obtained by the Globe and Mail. The minister said a more fulsome analysis of such an exemption would include a public-engagement process that would precede any change.

The idea of decriminalizing personal possession of illicit drugs is not new. Such a change has been suggested previously in other jurisdictions, and the concept has been endorsed by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police as a means for diverting drug users away from the legal system and into necessary support and treatment programs, which would therefore free up police resources for other crucial duties.

The city of Vancouver has already begun its own process of seeking a federal-law exemption to address its escalating drug-overdose crisis. "We would welcome such work by the province on this file as we all have to do everything we can to bring an end to this terrible health disaster," Vancouver Mayor Kennedy Stewart said in response to the provinces request.

Given the current Manitoba governments deep-rooted reluctance to explore innovative strategies to combat drug abuse and overdoses  the Progressive Conservatives remain resolute in their opposition to the establishment of safe-consumption sites  theres scant reason to expect it to take any inspiration or guidance from B.C.s pursuit of a new approach.

But it should. Manitobas drug crisis is serious and, as in every other city and province, has been made worse by the added pandemic stresses on social services and at-risk populations. One need look no further than last weeks report that the Winnipeg Police Service aims to begin construction this fall on new holding cells to alleviate the overcrowding and underservicing being experienced by individuals in custody, many of whom are in the grips of substance abuse.

Decriminalizing personal possession of drugs could be a significant factor in reducing the behind-bars population, as fewer people would be subject to arrest and more might be inclined to seek assistance that could help them break free of the cycle of addiction and crime.

Such an initiative deserves serious and purposeful consideration. In this regard, this time B.C. really might have a better plan.


Sensing Hardware EE (Health Sensing) Santa Clara Valley (Cupertino) , California , United States Hardware Summary

Posted: Feb 10, 2021 Role Number: 200002775 Design, develop, and launch next-generation Sensor Technologies in Apple products. The Health Sensing Hardware team develops Sensor solutions and technologies for Apple's products. Bring devices to life and enable them to interact with users and the environment in ways never imagined before. New challenges arise everyday that require sharp problem-solving skills of talented and smart individuals. Join us in a collaborative and hands-on environment that fosters engineering excellence, creativity, and innovation. We are looking for Sensing Hardware Electrical Engineers with analog and system level design skills, to help develop sensors and sensing systems for Apple's future products Key Qualifications Strong analog circuit and electrical engineering fundamentals. This means you have a deep understanding of why our discipline works the way it does; you've developed an intuition and can apply it to new topics because you understand the basics.

Experience with hands-on hardware bring-up, debugging, and functional verification. Your depth of expertise in electronic design, primarily analog and some digital, as well as PCB design and fabrication will serve you well.

Demonstrated ability to work as a key member of a team, ability to communicate with a broad audience and operate with astute interpersonal skills. Highly organized and be able to multitask. Coupled with strong analytical ability, attention to detail will be instrumental to success. Description -We are seeking a highly motivated engineer to help develop health, wellness, and fitness sensors, systems, and applications. You will engage in a collaborative, rapidly-changing environment to design groundbreaking new technologies. -You will become part of a hands-on hardware design and development engineering team that fosters engineering excellence, creativity and innovation. Join us to design and develop category-defining features that represent the groundbreaking edge of innovation in the emerging and dynamic consumer health field. -We will empower you to engage with a variety of internal teams and external partners to continually question the limitations of technology implemented in health products. You will thrive in this role thanks to your consumer, health electronics background and depth of expertise in hardware design. Education & Experience B.S. or M.S. in Electrical Engineering, Physics, or related field, or industry experience equivalent. Additional Requirements Apple is an Equal Opportunity Employer that is committed to inclusion and diversity. We take affirmative action to ensure equal opportunity for all applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, or other legally protected characteristics. If you'd like more information about your EEO rights as an applicant, please click here. Apple will not discriminate or retaliate against applicants who inquire about, disclose, or discuss their compensation or that of other applicants. For more information, please click here.

Apple will consider for employment all qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with applicable law.

Apple participates in the E-Verify program in certain locations as required by law. Learn more.

Apple is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodation to applicants with physical and mental disabilities. Learn more.






Gov. Ned Lamonts office announced Monday the first case of the so-called South African COVID variant has been detected in a Connecticut patient whose condition is improving.

In a news release, officials said this is the first known case of the variant in a Connecticut resident.

The patient, a Fairfield County resident between the ages of 60-70, has not reported any recent travel and is currently hospitalized out of state, according to officials.

New York health officials reported the variant case this past weekend and worked with the Connecticut Department of Health to complete contact tracing.

The B.1.351 strain  initially detected in South Africa in October 2020  was first discovered in the United States toward the end of January.

There is no evidence from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggesting the B.1.351 variant has any impact on disease severity at this time, the state said.

Dr. David Banach, head of infection prevention and an associate professor of medicine at UConn Health, said this variant has not been associated with being more serious.

Like the U.K. variant, the South African one is more contagious than the original COVID-19 virus, officials said.

Connecticut has reported 42 cases of the U.K.  B.1.1.7  variant within its borders and now is warning about the new strain.

Seeing another variant in our state reminds us yet again the severity of this pandemic and reinforces the need for us to take all of the necessary precautions which have proven to be successful over the past year, Lamont said.

The virus does not recognize state boundaries, and it certainly does not recognize international borders, which means the responsibility is on all of us to do what we can on a personal basis to mitigate the spread, he added.

Public health officials emphasized the need for continued caution and mitigation strategies including mask-wearing, social distancing, isolating when sick and avoiding gathering with individuals who do not live in your household.

Acting Department of Public Health Commissioner Dr. Deidre Gifford said Connecticut residents should follow recent CDC guidance calling for double masking in certain circumstances.

With the variants currently circulating in the United States and in Connecticut, it is more important than ever to prevent transmission of the virus. We do that by ensuring that masks are being worn correctly and are as effective as possible. Masks should always cover the nose and mouth completely. In some instances, a cloth mask along with a surgical mask may be the best approach according to the CDC, in order to prevent droplets from escaping or entering through gaps in masks, Gifford said.

The CDC found studies suggesting current COVID vaccines recognize the variants but continue to study each variants form to learn more about it.

Banach said data shows the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines generate high levels of neutralizing antibodies against this particular strain, the B.1.351.

We still have to learn about the overall impact of this strain in the vaccine response but, the fact that at least we identified those neutralizing antibodies implies theres going to be some protection from these variants, he said.

When asked if the state had plans to alter restrictions, Max Reiss, the governors spokesperson, said, were continuing to tell residents to keep wearing masks, avoid gatherings and take the common-sense approach which has worked successfully since the beginning of the pandemic.

News of the first South African variant case comes as the state topped over 100,000 vaccine doses distributed to long-term care residents since late December.

The state also reported 2,905 new coronavirus cases and 66 more deaths for a positivity rate of 2.98 percent since Friday. Hospitalizations continue decreasing and the state is experiencing fewer reported tests than in previous months.
In celebration of Black History Month, please join Associate Vice Chancellor Cecil Hicks in a conversation with Eric Ewing and Terri D. Sanders on Feb. 23 from 1-2:15 P.M. on Zoom.

This event is sponsored by the UNO Office of Diversity, Equity, Access, and Inclusion (DEAI).

About the Participants

Cecil Hicks, Jr., MBA, SPHR

UNO Associate Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity, Access and Inclusion (DEAI)

Eric L. Ewing

Executive Director of the Great Plains Black Museum

Terri D. Sanders

Head Publisher of the Omaha Star, Nebraska's only Black-owned newspaper

Additional Black History Month Events

View the full schedule of UNO events celebrating Black History Month.
The government hopes to monetise public sector assets  either land or projects  to raise money and plough it back into infrastructure investment. This sounds great in theory but how it works in practice is another question. The top edit examines the risks and rewards. Read it here.

Other views examine the PMs open support for the private sector, the outlook for the borrowing-driven growth plan, questions around the disengagement agreement in eastern Ladakh and the need for a bad bank.

spoke eloquently on the wealth-creating prowess of the private sector in Parliament.

But Debashis Basu points out that the rhetoric has not been matched by the kind of big bang reforms that would have enabled private business to function optimally. Which PM Modi should we believe, he asks here

History will judge this Budget based on whether the governments big bet on a public sector borrowing-driven growth revival works out, writes Mihir Sharma. Read it here

Why do we need a bad bank, owned by the banks themselves, when there are at least 28 Asset Reconstruction Companies around, writes Tamal Bandyopadhyay. Read his explanation of why a bad bank is a bad idea here

The second edit explains why the mutual pullback at Pangong Tso should be the starting not the end-point of continuing multi-pronged dialogue with Beijing. Read it here
In one hand Manuel Reyes Estrada carried a form and a pencil, in the other a bucket filled with small fish and a plastic Bucanero beer cup. It is like this, he said. We, the health brigade employees, are only allowed to write with pencils. His superiors, he explained, use pens. In the afternoon, the superiors visit the houses where the health brigade employees have worked earlier in the day  to check if we have done our work well.

Manuel stopped for a second on the unpaved road in the Cuban city of Holguin to fill in the house numbers on his otherwise empty form. He swept the sweat away from his face.




Haiti - FLASH : The ex-mayor of Port-au-Prince, Ralph Youri Chevry arrested in the Dominican Republic





Sunday evening the former mayor of Port-au-Prince, Ralph Youri Chevry, activist active in the radical opposition, accused of assassination, attempted murder, destruction of public and private property and criminal association, which was the subject of a research notice https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-32976-haiti-flash-the-former-mayor-of-port-au-prince-wanted-by-the-pnh.html issued by the Central Directorate of Judicial Police (DCPJ) on February 8, was arrested in the border town of Dajabon by the authorities while he was trying to take refuge in the Dominican Republic to escape the Haitian Police.



According to a source from the high command of the Haitian National Police (PNH), Ralph Youri Chevry will be taken to Santo-Domingo and could be handed over to a PNH branch this Monday, February 15 before being repatriated to Haiti.



See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-32976-haiti-flash-the-former-mayor-of-port-au-prince-wanted-by-the-pnh.html



SL/ HaitiLibre


















Tallahassee: Sorrow reverberated across the country Sunday as Americans, including President Joe Biden, joined a Florida community in remembering the 17 lives lost three years ago in the Parkland school shooting massacre.

In seconds, the lives of dozens of families, and the life of an American community, were changed forever, Biden said in a statement released on Sunday.

The President used the occasion to call on Congress to strengthen gun laws, including requiring background checks on all gun sales and banning assault weapons.

US President Joe Biden pauses to speak with reporters as he walks to Marine One for departure from the South Lawn of the White House. Credit:AP

There was no time to wait, the President said. We owe it to all those weve lost and to all those left behind to grieve to make a change. The time to act is now.
New:

India has witnessed more terror attacks than countries inlcuding Syria, Nigeria, Pakistan and Yemen  infamous for brutal terror attacks carried out by various internationally banned terror groups, Country Reports on Terrorism 2016 report released by US State Department says.

Terrorist attacks in India has increased by 16% in 2016 and total number of deaths went up by 17% in the same year, while, globally the trend has decreased by nine percent, according to the report.

India is only below Iraq and Afghanistan in the list of countries that have faced the most number of terrorist attacks in 2016.

The report stated that Jammu and Kashmir witnessed a 93 percent increase in attacks in 2016.

US States Department reported that half of the terrorist attacks in India in 2016 majorly took place in four states: Jammu and Kashmir (19%), Chhattisgarh (18%), Manipur (12%), and Jharkhand (10%).

Over 47% of the terrorist incidents that occurred in India involved either bombings or explosions. Only 18% were armed assaults. Kidnappings incidents were also prevalent in the country as it comprised of 15% of all attacks, compared to 10% globally. Facility and infrastructure attacks accounted to 12%, compared to 6% worldwide.

The report states, Compared to the other countries that face the most terrorist attacks, the diversity of perpetrator groups was much greater in India, with 52 active groups.

According to the state out of the total terrorist activated early two-thirds of the terrorist attacks carried out in India in 2016 (65%) were attributed to the Communist Party of India-Maoist.

The report further states that the deaths caused in the attacks, remained relatively low compared to the other countries. According to the report, in India 0.4 total deaths were caused per attack last year compared to 2.4 deaths per attack worldwide.

Nearly 73% attacks in India in 2016 were non-lethal, the report reads.

The report also states that kidnapping or taken hostage in terrorist attacks has decreased by 63%  from 866 in 2015 to 317 in 2016.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
Is the power of the people greater than the people in power?

We in Sri Lanka are no stranger to ordering milk tea with our meals, but we are fortunate over 73 years of independence, we have not taken the bait to military rule, although at some time or other, we have come closer to this reality, with majoritarian government.

by Victor Cherubim

We need to be ready to take on a new way of thinking and working in government and to communicate these shifts of authoritarianism to the people we govern, or else our countries become classed as the outcasts of society and remain dumped into oblivion.

This is becoming evident now more than ever before in our lives.

We see many countries sinking further into authoritarianism and are having to face the backlash of a new coded language of the people.The military option is an easy way out of difficulty but serves only the purpose of outside alien interests and not our own.

The newThree Fingers salute in Myanmar by the youth is the new coded language today, whilst when I was young and in my prime, I saw the Clenched Fist of the Che Guevara movement, as the symbol of people power.

Generations change but the essence of youth is to rebel against the old and antiquated ideas in society. Aswe seem to move with the times and today it appears to be the hashtag revolution which has transcended across national borders, whilst the COVID-19 pandemic has changed our lives and made national self preservation, rather than increased globalisation, the hallmark of the early 21st century.But things may change?

Myanmars anti-coup uprising is the latest staging ground for anti-authoritarianism, referred in local Myanmars parlance, as the Milk Tea Alliance.

We in Sri Lanka are no stranger to ordering milk tea with our meals, but we are fortunate over 73 years of independence, we have not taken the bait to military rule, although at some time or other, we have come closer to this reality, with majoritarian government.

The message of youth

Over decades we have seen youth around the world taking to the street in protest. History is full of movements led by students. The Anti-war Peace movement in the US, Apartheid in South Africa, The Che Guevara struggle,The Chilean Revolution against General Pinochet, Womens liberation, the Velvet Revolution of 1989 and the fall of the Berlin Wall, and recently Black Lives Matter are a few to mention.

Everywhere we see there are two types of liberation movements. They have been identified with and loyal to a population and its state, regardless of ethnic or racial composition of this population.

The word liberation means setting free, or release from colonialism, military rule, or oppression. Widespread grievances plus a pre-existing collective identity, or a sense of political empowerment and democracy has provided an important and ideological justification for uniting a people.

Despite the wide variation among liberation movements in terms of historical context, social base, strategies, and specific aims, a common feature uniting them all has been national building so central to the modern world or bringing back or seeking a form of political and social life and power into existence.

What are the symbols of this power?

In Myanmar today, (unlike in the despotic military regimes in South America of the past) the code symbol is the Three Finger Salute first used by the Thais during the 2014 Anti-Coup movement inspired by the movie trilogy The Hunger Games. This salute has become an iconic symbol of resistance against tyranny and dictatorship.

Other symbols of taking back the power of the people are seen around the world. They include the Yellow Shirts, the T Shirts, the use of social media, the Rubber Ducks and Oversized Umbrellas as protest symbols to protect the young protesters against water cannons used by Thai Police to disperse mobs of students.

The Three Finger Salute represents the three demands by young people of Myanmar and in Burmese, it is called:SuYwayHlout.

Itmeans, 1. Su release, Dawaung San Suukyi 2. Ywaymeans accept, the result of the general election and 3. Hlout, means open Parliament to form a new Government.

To make it more convincing, the youth in the forefront of Asias new pro-democracy movement are calling for more freedoms by banging pots and pans nightly to oppose the Junta, as a barrage of solidarity by making noise in the right places.

Will the power of the people topple the people in power?

History has shown that similar outcries last from a few days to months, if not years, or decades. They normal may fade into the background noise of politics, if the autocratic regimes have their way, but one thing becomes clear, Liberation is only a matter of time.

Lives may be lost, the country is treated by the States of the World as an outcast, until the generals find a way to bring back normalcy and a semblance of democracy.

In the meantime, suppression reigns supreme.
(CNN) -- Armored vehicles on the streets of major Myanmar cities, an internet blackout and nighttime raids on prominent critics on Sunday, did not stop protesters taking to the streets for a tenth consecutive day on Monday to oppose the recent military coup.

Over the weekend the military continued to escalate its crackdown on dissent, with security forces in the country's northern Kachin state firing on protesters at a power plant Sunday, after a crowd had gathered there believing the military would cut off the electricity, according to social media video and local reports.

In the confrontation, broadcast live on Facebook, soldiers and police in the state capital Myitkyina fired shots to disperse protesters, though it is unclear whether live rounds were used. Video shows security forces using water cannon and then protesters fleeing as several rounds of fire can be heard. Five journalists were reportedly arrested while covering the incident.

A witness at the scene said that the situation was "stable" until around 11 p.m. local time when the security forces used water cannon against protesters, who had built a barricade of tires and oil drums. Protesters started throwing stones, to which the security forces responded by firing rubber bullets, he said.

"It was very loud and people got really scared. It was quite horrifying to see because people were running with fear and screaming at the same time," said the eyewitness, who didn't want to be named for fear of retaliation.

The weekend's events marked an escalation in the military's continued crackdown on demonstrators and opposition leaders, since it seized power in a coup on February 1, ousting democratically elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi, detaining key government officials and forming a new ruling junta.

Suu Kyi's detention, due to expire Monday, will be extended until a court hearing Wednesday, her lawyer said. Khin Maung Zaw said he has still not been able to see Suu Kyi but has discussed the issue of representing her with the judge.

Western diplomats on Sunday warned Myanmar's junta that "the world is watching" and advised the military not to use violence against protesters.

"We call on security forces to refrain from violence against demonstrators and civilians, who are protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government," read a joint statement signed by the US, Canada, and the European Union that was published on the official Facebook pages of their embassies.

Since the takeover, hundreds of thousands of people have joined protests and civil disobedience campaigns. People could be seen on the streets in Yangon, Dawei and Myitkyina holding "Civil Disobedience Movement" signs and "Free our leader" banners, showing pictures of detained leader Suu Kyi. People also marched holding signs saying: "Stop arresting people illegally at midnight."

The protests have swelled to include people from all sections of society, including a strike by government workers as part of a mass civil disobedience movement.

While there have not yet been many reports of injuries, police have been recorded using water cannon against protesters on previous days and have also faced allegations that they have deployed live rounds.

A young woman named Mya Thweh Thweh Khine remains in critical condition at a hospital in the capital Naypyidaw with a gunshot wound in the head, a source with direct information about the victim told CNN Friday. Video of the incident circulated online showing a young woman suddenly falling to the ground while taking cover from a water cannon at a protest. Her image has been held up at protests as a symbol for those resisting the coup.

In response to the protests, the military has sought to limit access to the internet and news services, as well as floating a potential new cyber security law that observers fear could further limit the flow of information.

Internet and mobile services were disrupted overnight Sunday into Monday, and Monitoring NGO NetBlocks said network connectivity across the country had dropped to only 14% nationwide since 1 a.m. local time. Mobile services from all carriers were also disrupted, according to residents. By 9.30 a.m. local time Monday, some areas reported internet has since been restored.

Fear when the sun goes down

Residents have reported a palpable fear for their safety after dark, with many scared they will be dragged out of their houses by police in nighttime raids, or are terrified of reports of arson and crime following the release of thousands of prisoners in an amnesty on Friday.

Reuters reported that residents in some neighborhoods have banded together to form patrols and provide some security for their streets at night.

"All the streets near me are also making groups to defend themselves from these troublemakers," Myo Thein, a resident of the South Okkalapa township, told Reuters.

Hundreds of people have been arrested since the coup, and most held without charge, according to the United Nations human rights office. The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners Burma (AAPPB) said at least 400 people have been detained in relation to the coup and other reports suggested some activists and journalists had gone into hiding following news of their potential arrest.

One journalist in Yangon, who wanted to remain anonymous for fear of arrest, said rights defenders and reporters are struggling to let the people know what is actually going on.

"Journalists are in remote working and in hiding as they are scared of night arrests and their homes going to be raided. They can be arrested anytime for what they are reporting although (it's the) truth," the reporter said.

On Saturday, the military announced the arrest warrants for seven high-profile activists for using "their popularity on social media ... to undermine the peace and order of the country," according to the military's information page on Facebook.

Among those named is leading democracy activist Min Ko Naing, an organizer for the "Civil Disobedience Movement" Facebook page, which has more than 200,000 followers. Min Ko Naing spent more than 20 years in prison following the 1988 student uprising in Yangon that was brutally suppressed by the military.

In a Facebook post Sunday, Min Ko Naing called on people to continue their civil disobedience campaigns, saying the military was inciting anger to stir unrest.

"Last night, we had to face the horrifying events across the country. They are doing it with all they are capable of. They provoke our anger, and use people including police," he said. "This week is the most important week, this week will decide for us."

Over the weekend, the military suspended three laws that were aimed at constraining security forces from detaining suspects or searching private property without a court approval.

Reuters reported that among the three suspended sections is the law that mandates a court order to detain any prisoner beyond 24 hours and limits security forces' ability to enter private property to search it or make arrests.

The suspensions also free up spying on communications, according to the Reuters report.

The AAPPB said the suspensions were ways to instill "fear of police raids into the general public during the night" as it means that the Myanmar authorities can search houses "without the presence of the ward administrative officers and unlawful acts during inspection can be committed."

The human rights organization said these amendments display how the military "violates inalienable human rights and intensifies the suppressive apparatus towards the general public."

UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar Tom Andrews warned in a tweet that the military would be held accountable for its actions.

"It's as if the generals have declared war on the people of Myanmar: late night raids; mounting arrests; more rights stripped away; another Internet shutdown; military convoys entering communities. These are signs of desperation. Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable," Andrews said.

This story was first published on CNN.com, "As armored military vehicles roll onto Myanmar's streets, protesters return for 10th day"
(Alliance News) -A Dunelm Group PLC on Monday said Deputy Chair Will Adderley plans to sell 15 million shares in the home furnishings retailer via an accelerated bookbuild secondary placing.

The shares represent a 7.4% stake in Dunelm, and are currently held by WA Capital Ltd, a company controlled by Will and Nadine Adderley.

"The company has been advised that this proposed sale is aimed at achieving greater portfolio diversification on the part of Will Adderley," Dunelm said.

Shares in Dunelm closed 5.6% higher at 1,408.00 pence in London on Monday, the stock up 16% since 2021 began.

Will Adderley last sold shares in Dunelm in April 2016. Assuming the 15 million shares are sold, the Adderley family will retain a total interest in around 87.3 million shares, around a 43.2% stake.

Will Adderley took over the day-to-day running of Dunelm from his father in 1996, and remained as chief executive through the group's stock market float in 2006. He became deputy chair in 2011 and was reappointed CEO in late 2014, before reverting to his role as deputy chair in 2016.

"Will Adderley remains fully committed to Dunelm in his role as deputy chairman as well as a very substantial shareholder in the company and his working relationship with the company is unchanged. The seller has undertaken that, following completion of the placing, it will not dispose of further shares in the company for a period of at least 90 days, subject to customary exceptions," said Dunelm.

The placing will be managed by Barclays and Goldman Sachs International acting as joint global co-ordinators and joint bookrunners.

By Lucy Heming;A lucyheming@alliancenews.com

Copyright 2021 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
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February 15, 2021 New Documents Reveal More British Efforts To Undermine Russia In 2018 we wrote about: The 'Integrity Initiative' - A Military Intelligence Operation, Disguised As Charity, To Create The "Russian Threat". The reporting was based on the British Integrity Initiative's internal files which some 'anonymous' organization had acquired and published. Data acquired from Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office by the same group revealed large British propaganda programs in support of Jihadis in Syria as well as British influence operations designed to undermine the security institutions of Lebanon and to secretly influence its population. Now another large set of files has been published by the same source. These describe an extensive British government program designed to undermine Russia by organizing and financing 'independent' Russian language media, by 'training' Russian journalists and by secretly paying Russian influencers. It is certainly not the only British anti-Russia program but it probably has, secretly, the most public influence. The anonymous author has laid out the complete Undermining Russia program in four extensive parts: One, two, three, four. The information discussed is from government files which outlay various projects and from companies and -interestingly- from the media charities of Reuters and the BBC who made bids to run the FCO projects. All underlying files are available for download as one archive file (~80 MB). The most interesting files are the bids the companies make for projects. They reveal previous projects, methods and people and thereby create the larger picture. The budget for the various anti-Russian projects runs at dozens of millions pounds per year. The first programs were launched in 2016 and some continue through this year. A 'Supplier Event' for one of the projects laid out the general idea: Programme Strands ENGAGE  working through the British Council to implement people-to-people activities between ethnic Russians and local communities to develop links along the lines of 21st century skills  includes English language skills and media literacy, social enterprises and cultural activities;

ENHANCE  supporting independent media in Russias near abroad to bring balance and plurality to Russian language media, in the Baltic States and Eastern Partnership countries;

EXPOSE  by debunking and exposing Russian disinformation in real time, which can be reported in mainstream media with the goal to expose malign state disinformation in countries that are targeted by it. If you expose disinformation, it is less likely to be impactful; therefore, the Russian State becomes less credible.

ENABLE  working with allied governments through the Government Communication Service to improve their strategic communications to their populations. Note that 'Russian disinformation' is whatever Britain does not like about Russia. 'Exposing' such 'disinformation' is best done by spreading one's own. These are not defensive programs but attacks on Russia. Projects to achieve the above were to be implemented in nearly every country that borders Russia and has a Russian speaking minority as well as in Russia itself. The British government does not want you to know about such projects. The 'Supplier Event' sheet says: Security No unauthorised disclosures of activity on this work. Contract will need to take a look at who we are working with. Basic IT security reasonable steps should cover our requirements but the FCO may request an explanation of wat steps have been taken to ensure security and Duty of Care. It should be noted that for security reasons, some grantees will not wish to be linked to the FCO. It should be noted that the Programme Team would prefer the programme documents do not end up in the Russian media. We know that they are following us, and we are expecting an expose soon. What is the overall purpose of such secret programs? The author of the Undermining Russia series explains that with regards to the 'poisoning' of Alexei Navalny: Many years of painstaking work of HMG through its embassies and intelligence cutouts precede a chemical attack. They create Media, CSOs and pseudo humanitarian organisations that happen to be just at the correct place and in the correct time with their cameras ready when 'suddenly' a dreadful accident 'shocks every one into action'. Do you believe HMG staged the 'Navalny accident' as part of some kind of a secret operation? Did HMG create Media outlets, nurture bloggers and stringers that it controlled? Did it engage Russia's youth and CSOs? Did it try to demonise Putin just like it had done with Assad by labeling them Evil Dictators who poisoned their people with forbidden chemical weapons? Do you know what all of this is needed for? They need it to delegitimise a leader of a country and convince people around the world that 'no holds should be barred to fight a mad dictator'. Can you grasp the gravity of what is going on? Well, you ought to. They are preparing us for war with the Russians and the Chinese. They are looking for casus belli, and only the truth can stop them, because 'if wars can be started by lies, they can be stopped by truth'. (Julian Assange) That view is not even exaggerated. The 'west' has the knives out against Russia. We previous mentioned a report from the Pentagon think tank RAND which evaluated how to best 'unbalance and overextend' Russia. In the end it was clearly aimed at regime change in Russia, or if not otherwise possible, war. On Friday Gabriel Felbermayr, the president of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, was asked by a German radio station about new sanctions the EU might impose on Russia. He is skeptic that those might work because (my translation): The aims we have towards Russia are very big. We do not want anything less but regime change in Russia, which is difficult to achieve by economic pressure. The new documents also reveal some interesting new points on Navalny who seems to be on the British government payroll:

bigger These self-exposing documents show that the FCO has established a network of popular YouTubers in Russia who investigate corruption in the government, and the YouTubers get assistance from some journalists from the Baltic States. Also, the FCO has experience of instigating protests in Russia. By now you must have guessed the identity of one of the popular YouTubers investigating corruption. After obtaining EXPOSE Network files and examining the case studies two years ago, we didn't figure out which YouTuber the FCO supported through ZINC. We refrained from making any preliminary conclusions even when journalists discovered that Vladimir Ashurkov, a close ally of Alexei Navalny, was a part of the Integrity Initiative cluster. But when we saw Mr. Navalny and Bellingcat together, things started to make sense. By digging deeper, we discovered another Navalny's supporter who lives in London - some shadowy Maria Pevchikh who is promoting a system of smart voting in Russia. The Labour used a similar voting system to take the votes of the Conservatives. So, basically it is highly likely that the UK recommended the system to Mr. Navalny. It also turned out that Navalny began a smear campaign against the RT - one of the few media outlets in the West that allows those who disagree with the official position of western government to speak out. Note that Navalny's campaign was running in parallel with that of the Integrity Initiative. A reasonable question is - why Navalny who is mostly engaged in political battles inside Russia spends time fighting a TV network operating outside the country? Was RT really such a problem for him? No, it wasn't. It was a problem for the Western imperialists and apparently, they told Navalny to join in. Anyway. Here are again links to the four parts of 'Undermining Russia': One, two, three, four. They give extensive insight into the methods the 'west' is using to destroy foreign countries. Knowledge that one needs to really understand what is happening in this world. Posted by b on February 15, 2021 at 19:24 UTC | Permalink Comments next page  next page 
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With the recent discovery of the nano-chameleon (Brookesia nana), a new contender for the title of the world's smallest reptile, the interest for miniaturized versions of relatively bigger animals experienced a spike.

As of right now, the title of the "world's tiniest" is being contested by the nano-chameleon and the Jaragua dwarf gecko (Sphaerodactylus ariasae). However, it won't be a simple "who's smaller" contest.

Related Article: Nano-Chameleon: World's Tiniest Reptile Comes With Big 'Package'

According to herpetologist and evolutionary biologist Dr. Mark Scherz, it won't be easy to determine who wins the title because it is not a black and white situation. This is because of sexual size dimorphism.

Most female nano-chameleons are considerably bigger than their male counterparts. They are also bigger than Jaragua dwarf gecko females. "As a result, whether or not the new species is considered the smallest amniote (a group of limbed vertebrates) in the world depends on whether we define that based on the male or female body size, or the midpoint of the two," Scherz writes. Size dimorphism is a pretty common issue in the reptile kind.

Despite the complication, one thing is for sure, it points the spotlight to the fact that many animal species are shrinking. But, why is that?

Shrinking Animals

Lots of animals also developed smaller and smaller body sizes, from dwarf mammoths to miniature lizards. Here are some of the more unusual examples.

In the animal world, species whose body proportions are smaller copies of their ancestors and descendants are relatively widespread. But serious examples remain rare.

Typically, a smaller body size results in simpler morphology. This is more apparent in the forms of fewer fingers on the hands and feet, less skull bones, and some species develop less offspring than larger relatives (although these offspring appear to be physically larger in frogs, and some small species actually have higher birth rates)."

Benefits of shrinking

"Being small corresponds to a range of biomechanical, physiological, and ecological restrictions. So, growing a tiny scale would be evolutionarily beneficial. In certain ways, it may be a way to circumvent competitive environmental stresses or to take advantage of an ecological niche," says Felisa Smith of the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, USA, who has extensively studied animal body size.

Theories for the benefits of being smaller, she explains, include increased heat dissipation as body size decreases, earlier reproduction within a species' lifespan, as smaller animals tend to be more abundant, and possibly greater resistance to extinction.

Is smaller better?

The island rule is one hypothesis for the insular experimentation of evolution. The rule states that smaller species will evolve into oversized versions of their mainland ancestors after establishing themselves on an island. Larger species, meanwhile, will tend to develop into smaller variations. These processes, respectively, are known as insular gigantism and insular dwarfism. They do this to fill the available ecological niches for them, which often differ from those they serve on the mainland.

The implications of this phenomenon will, however, extend beyond the species themselves. This could result in ecosystem-wide changes. Body size is an essential measure of an animal's longevity, lifespan, and capacity to survive challenging conditions like food scarcity or drought. The body's size also determines how much food an animal needs, how vulnerable it is to predators, and what sort of food it may consume.

ALSO READ: The Mystery Behind Wombat's Cubed Feces

For the latest news from the animal kingdom, don't forget to follow Nature World News!
(Natural News) After blocking retail investors from purchasing any more GameStop (GME) stock last week, the Robinhood trading app was caught funneling nearly $700 million into its coffers from the sale of private user data to wealthy hedge funds.

As GME share prices rose to nearly $500 a piece last week, Robinhood blatantly interfered with the markets on behalf of Melvin Capital Management to prevent a full-scale short squeeze. The partial squeeze that did occur resulted in Melvin losing more than half of its $12.5 billion portfolio in January.

Recognizing that Melvin and others had shorted 140 percent of GMEs existing shares based on the assumption that their value would eventually decrease, retail investors swooped in to buy up the stock in order to prevent that from happening  which is perfectly legal.

What Melvin and other hedge funds had done was questionable at best, and possibly even illegal since shorting more than the number of shares available constitutes market manipulation. And Robinhood was complicit in the scam, as it screwed over its own users to try to protect Melvin and the hedge funds.

In a statement, Robinhood claimed that it halted all further buying of GME shares to meet clearinghouse deposit requirements. The company rejects all allegations that it tried to stop users from trading, even though it just so happened to help Melvin and the other hedge funds.

Since that time, retail investors have filed a class action lawsuit against Robinhood alleging that the companys actions were done purposely and knowingly to manipulate the market for the benefit of people and financial institutions who were not Robinhood users.

Robinhood is a scam and its executives are crooked

While there typically is not much good to say about him, CNNs Chris Cuomo grilled Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev over the matter, noting that the decision to block all further buying of GME shares came immediately after Melvin and the other hedge funds started to lose money from the short squeeze.

This looks like a move by an outfit called Robinhood, which is supposed to be taking from the rich and giving to the poor, and doing exactly the opposite, Cuomo is quoted as saying.

While Robinhood has long branded itself as an accessible platform that provides free financial services for the little guy, its entire business model is questionable. Rather than democratize finance for all, as its company mission claims, Robinhood appears to be a Trojan Horse that exists to screw over the little guy while making the wealthy even wealthier.

The latest quarterly revenue data provided by The Box reveals that Robinhood earned about $675 million in revenue from payments for order flow.

Trades may be commission free for Robinhood users but they are actually sold to market makers that often used their position as the middle man to generate profit, reports the Daily Caller.

Most of these market makers are hedge funds or other institutional investors that financially benefit from more trade and market volatility.

Back in December before the GME saga, Robinhood was fined $65 million by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for misleading statements and omissions regarding its payments for the order flow process.

The SEC concluded that Robinhood deprived users of $34.1 million after providing their order flow to clients that prioritized higher revenue over providing the best price for customers.

As it turns out, Robinhoods largest clients for order flow are all hedge funds and other institutional investors. More than half of the companys market orders were purchased by Citadel Securities, an affiliate of the hedge fund Citadel LLC. Janet Yellen, the new secretary of the U.S. Treasury under Joe Xiden, was paid $810,000 by Citadel to speak at several events between Oct. 2019 and Oct. 2020.

More related news about Robinhood and the stock market can be found at DebtCollapse.com.

Sources for this article include:

DailyCaller.com

NaturalNews.com
A family have launched a desperate appeal to bring a 'loving caring dad home' after a man they believe could be their missing father has been spotted in Glasgow nearly seven years after he vanished.

Paul Harley Jr, 37, saw a photo shared online of a man who he thinks bears a strong resemblance to his father Paul Harley Sr being assisted to shelter outside Glasgow Central Station last week.

The father-of-three, who worked as a welder for Network Rail and lived in Dumbarton, disappeared on September 28, 2014, then aged 53.

Mr Harley Jr, who lives in Coatbridge, said he has been into Glasgow city centre since the photo was shared on Facebook and spoken to two people who say they recognise the man in the image.

He pleaded: 'Hi, can everyone share this, let's get it all over Facebook please, we think it might be our dad Paul, he has been missing for nearly 7 years, this photo was taken we think outside Glasgow Central Station a few days ago.

Father-of-three Paul Harley Sr, who worked as a welder for Network Rail and lived in Dumbarton, vanished on September 28, 2014, then aged 53

Paul Harley Jr, 37, saw a photo shared online of a man who bears a strong resemblance to his father Paul Harley Sr being assisted to shelter outside Glasgow Central Station last week

'If you are in the Glasgow area I have been into Glasgow today and spoke to 2 people who recognise him, can you please look out for him, the trainers are quite distinctive, don't approach him as it may scare him, if you can take a photo of him and send me it with location, let's bring this loving caring dad home, thanks for reading.'

The photo of the man resembling Mr Harley Sr was shared by volunteer charity Homeless Project Scotland on Twitter around 2am last Tuesday.

It shows a man sitting near to the station entrance in freezing conditions during a snow blizzard clutching a paper cup.

Homeless Project Scotland tweeted: 'Our team along with Glasgow Street Aid assisted a man off the cold - 1 streets covered in snow in Glasgow we assisted the man to shelter with the help of Glasgow City Mission over Night Welcome centre and thank you to Police Scotland transport. Working together we saved a life on our cold streets.'

Police Scotland have been approached for comment.

At the time of his disappearance in 2014, Mr Harley Sr was described as white, around 5ft 3 tall and of slim build, with black receding hair, green eyes and a tattoo stating 'Kyla' on his right arm.

The photo of the man resembling Mr Harley Sr was shared by volunteer charity Homeless Project Scotland on Twitter around 2am last Tuesday

Mr Harley Jr, who lives in Coatbridge, said he has been into Glasgow city centre since the photo was shared on Facebook and spoken to two people who say they recognise the man

A missing person's appeal issued by police noted that Mr Harley Sr is 'a much loved father and is well known in the local community' and that he is known to travel throughout the country by train.

Last April, Glasgow Live spoke to Mr Harley Jr, who vowed to never give up the search for his father.

He said: 'You never give up hope. I remember seeing one case where a woman was missing for 12 or 14 years and her body was finally found, so it can happen.

'After two years, we [his family] no longer thought we'd find him alive. But we just want to find him, no matter what.

'I think about him every day. It never leaves you. As the years go on, you live with it, but it never leaves you.

'It's just hope that keeps us going. We're just waiting for the chap on the door to say he's been found.

He told Glagsow Live that the challenge of finding Mr Harley Sr was made harder by the cycle of coronavirus lockdowns.

'It's probably made it worse, because you're not working and have more time to sit around and overthink things,' Mr Harley Jr said.
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An infectious diseases expert and member of the federal governments powerful Infection Control Expert Group says the significant problem that led to the latest Victorian coronavirus outbreak was poor infection control, and not the more-contagious British variant blamed by the state government.

While evidence suggests the new variant is between 30 and 50 per cent more infectious than the original, Professor Peter Collignon said the real issue [in Victoria] is infection control. If you look at the three hotel outbreaks in Melbourne over the past week, all of them had infection control breaches.

Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton, Premier Daniel Andrews and testing commander Jeroen Weimar on Saturday. Credit:Getty

The three hotels are the Grand Hyatt, the Park Royal hotel and the Holiday Inn. On Sunday a three-year-old child and a woman in her 50s were the latest people to contract the virus, bringing the size of the Holiday Inn cluster to 16. The childs mother is being investigated to confirm whether or not she has the virus.

Professor Collignon pointed to security guards not wearing eye protection, poor governance and supervision, and a lack of awareness that positive pressure inside hotel rooms could push the virus into the corridor when the door was opened, along with a guest using a nebuliser in a room, as contributing factors to the spate of outbreaks.
The Metropolitan Transit Authority inspector general announced Monday that two employees have been terminated for falsifying time sheets in separate incidents.

MTA Inspector General Carolyn Pokorny found that a Metro-North Railroad employee brought a woman onto private company property for an intimate rendezvous while he was supposed to be working an overtime shift.

In a second, unrelated investigation, Pokorny found that a New York City Transit employee used sick time and Family Medical Leave Act time to travel to an Atlantic City casino.

All bets are off for these unscrupulous former MTA employees, Pokorny said in a statement released Monday morning. Intentionally falsifying time sheets is stealing and can result in termination  whether it is using sick/medical leave to gamble in Atlantic City or using overtime for an intimate rendezvous or 2+ hour lunches.

Taxpayers and riders should not have to ante up for such bad behavior, she added.

Pokorny said the Metro-North employee created a safety risk when he brought a woman and her car on private property. She said the employee, who is identified only as the Machinist in the investigation report, was later dishonest with investigators about the incident.

The Machinist resigned in the wake of the investigation, Pokorny said. Metro-North is in the process of recouping money for the stolen time, she added.

In the second incident, investigators found that a NYC Transit traffic checker had used sick and federal leave time on multiple occasions over two years to travel to go gambling in Atlantic City, Pokorny said.

Pokorny said the traffic checker was later dishonest about the situation. He was later fired for the offense.

In the wake of the investigations, Pokorny encouraged the public to reach out with complaints, tips or to report fraud in the MTA via the offices confidential tip reporting portals online, through email at complaints@mtaig.org, or via phone at 1-800-MTA-IG4U (1-800-682-4448).
He's well known for his witty one-liners on Gogglebox, but could Jad Nehmetallah be leaving his friends Matty and Sarah Marie Fahd on the couch to hand out roses on The Bachelor?

In an interview with New Idea on Monday, the 35-year-old businessman was quick to shut down the rumours.

'I am happy being on the couch at the moment with Sarah Marie, Matty and Malik,' he told the gossip magazine.

Setting the record straight: Gogglebox's Jad Nehmetallah has shut down rumours he is being considered as a candidate for this year's season of Channel 10's The Bachelor

He also confirmed he did not intend on joining I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here! either.

'I love my food too much to be on Im A Celeb and as for The Bachelor, I have my mum and all my friends always on the look out for potential suitors... who knows in the future, but for now, the couch is where I am at.'

Jad's admission comes after Channel 10 recently confirmed they've found a suitor for the popular dating show.

No way to the Jungle: Gogglebox's Jad Nehmetallah also revealed he has no intention of joining Channel 10's I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here

Earlier this month, Channel 10s Head of Programming, Daniel Monaghan, told TV Tonight, 'Were really happy with who has signed on to The Bachelor.'

Mr Monaghan confirmed the new suitor wasn't a celebrity or a former contestant from The Bachelorette.

'[You don't know him yet], but you will,' he said. 'I think he's a fantastic get for the franchise.'

Who is he? Earlier this month, Channel 10s Head of Programming, Daniel Monaghan, told TV Tonight, the new suitor wasn't a celebrity or a former contestant from The Bachelorette. '[You don't know him yet], but you will,' he said. 'I think he's a fantastic get for the franchise'

Mr Monaghan said he was confident the new season 'will deliver', but hinted the tagline 'Australia's most eligible bachelor' was 'open to interpretation'.

'Which is why it's such a good phrase! Maybe you can be more desirable, for whatever reason...' he teased.

This is not the first time Jad has spoken about potentially joining the dating show, as he's been plagued with these rumours for years.

In August, he first addressed the speculation in a chat with Foxtel.com.au. 'It's insane how many people online and in person have been mentioning it,' he said.

Not ready for it: Although Jad said he's 'interested in finding love,' he's not completely at peace with leaving his beloved seat on the Gogglebox couch. In August, he told Foxtel.com.au: 'And Malik's not ready to take over my seat just yet, so I'll be holding onto it for as long as I can!' Pictured Jad Nehmetallah and his Gogglebox co-stars Matty, Sarah Marie and their son Malik Fahd

'I am interested in finding love and starting a family but I'm having way too much fun with Matty and Sarah Marie on the couch to do anything else,' he added.

'And Malik's not ready to take over my seat just yet, so I'll be holding onto it for as long as I can!'

He previously told the website he had imagined his life at 34 to be different.

'I always pictured myself married by now with two to three kids,' he said at the time.

Match-making mum: 'I have my mum and all my friends always on the look out for potential suitors,' Jad told New Idea on Monday

It comes as his co-stars Matty and Sarah Marie jokingly said Jad wouldn't be the best candidate for the role as The Bachelor.

'I think his mum would get involved and knock back all the contestants and ask them to recast - that's my bet!' Matty, 33, told WHO magazine.

Matty, who has been Jad's best friend for more than 10 years, added: 'It would make good television, but I don't think Jad would be very happy by the end.'

Gogglebox returns on Foxtel's LifeStyle Channel on Wednesdays at 7.30pm from February 17 and Thursdays at 8.30pm on Channel 10.
The chair of a South African judicial panel investigating mass state corruption said Monday he would seek jail time for former president Jacob Zuma after he failed to appear before the commission.

The 78-year-old Zuma, who has repeatedly snubbed the commission probing graft during his nine-year tenure, refused to comply with a Constitutional Court order for him to appear on Monday.

"The commission will approach the Constitutional Court and ask it to impose a term of imprisonment on Mr Zuma if it finds that he is guilty of contempt of court," said Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo.

The ex-president has long accused the commission of bias and demanded that Zondo recuse himself.

In a 12-page statement on Monday night, Zuma accused Zondo of "political propaganda" against him.

"His conduct today fortifies my resolve and belief that he has always sought to prejudice me," said Zuma.

-'Political propaganda' -

Accusing some judges of being "lawless" Zuma said he was sure Zondo's wish to have him sentenced for contempt of court would be granted.

"Of course, he will get it," he said.

Zuma's lawyers said in a letter earlier on Monday that he would not be appearing before the commission, which had set aside February 15 to 19 for his testimony.

Zuma, who had approached the High Court to examine Zondo's refusal to step aside, argued that appearing before Zondo would "undermine and invalidate the review application".

In the two-page "matter of courtesy" letter, Zuma's lawyers concluded that his refusal to testify should not be "construed to suggest any defiance of a legal process".

But the commission's advocate Paul Pretorius said it was in the public interest for Zuma to testify because he was president at the time of the alleged state corruption.

Zuma has been implicated in evidence from some 40 witnesses, to which he was expected to respond.

Story continues

"Mr Zuma perhaps more than anyone else is able to assist the commission in understanding what happened in the period under review," Pretorius said.

"It's difficult to understand why he would need to rely on a right to silence."

- 'Counter-revolution' -

Zuma's refusal came a day after the ruling African National Congress (ANC) stressed the need for all members to cooperate with the commission.

"To allow anything else would lead to anarchy and open the floodgates easily for counter-revolution," the ANC said in a statement on Sunday.

Meanwhile local media showed images of dozens of people, some wearing military regalia and ANC party gear, staging a vigil in support of Zuma outside his rural homestead in Nkandla in southern Kwa-Zulu Natal province

The group chanted and performed the "toyi-toyi" dance, a protest move synonymous with the struggle against apartheid.

Zuma, who came to power in 2009, was forced to resign in 2018 over graft scandals involving an Indian business family, the Guptas, who won lucrative contracts with state companies and were allegedly even able to choose cabinet ministers.

He set up the commission shortly before he left power and only testified before it once in July 2019, but staged a walkout days later.

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Prime Minister Boris Johnson reiterated his commitment to the Northern Ireland Protocol while appearing on American television on Sunday.

Despite urging from unionists to scrap the protocol, when asked on CBS's Face the Nation programme if he would stick to the Brexit deal agreed with the EU in December the PM replied: "You bet."

Tensions are rising amid unionist claims the protocol cuts Northern Ireland off from the rest of the UK and is causing trade difficulties. Mr Johnson has been urged to invoke Article 16 to suspend the agreement.

The protocol prevents a hard border on the island of Ireland by keeping Northern Ireland aligned with EU rules.

The introduction of the Irish Sea border has led to the appearance of anti-protocol graffiti and posters across Northern Ireland, with MPs and MLAs offices also coming under attack.

Read More

New US President Joe Biden, who has strong Irish heritage, has previously stated that Brexit could not be allowed to threaten peace in Northern Ireland and that the Irish border must remain open.

During the appearance Mr Johnson was asked if he could reassure President Biden and the US Congress he would commit to sticking with the Brexit deal "in all circumstances".

"You bet. This is fundamental for us, the Anglo-Irish Agreement, the Peace Agreement, the Good Friday process, the Belfast Agreement, these agreements are absolutely crucial for our continued stability, and success as a UK," the PM replied.

"I have a great relationship with Dublin, with Michael Martin, the Irish Taoiseach. And we're going to work together to do some great things and be in no doubt we don't want to do anything to jeopardize the achievements of the Northern Irish peace process. It's absolutely vital."

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Asked specifically about the Northern Ireland Protocol and keeping the Irish border open Mr Johnson said: "We want to make sure that there's free movement, north south, free movement east west, and we guarantee the rights of the people of Northern Ireland, of course."

During the interview Mr Johnson was also asked about his relationship with the new president.

Im very delighted, to have a good relationship with the White House, which is an important part of any UK prime ministers mission, he said.

Ive had some good conversations already with President Biden  fantastic conversations about the way he sees things.

Theres been some important developments in the way the UK- US thinking has been coming together in the last few weeks, and particularly on issues like climate change, on Nato, on Iran, but above all, on the ways that the US and the UK are going to work together to deal with the environmental challenge that faces our planet."

Mr Johnson said that he also wanted to work with countries like the United States to ensure coronavirus vaccines were made available around the world.

The PM sought to play down Mr Bidens past description of him as a physical and emotional clone of Donald Trump and the former presidents acquittal by the Senate on impeachment charges.

I think the clear message that we get from the proceedings in America is that after all the toings and froings and all the kerfuffle, American democracy is strong and the American Constitution is strong and robust, he said.
After a weeklong bus ride from Honduras, Isabel Osorio Medina arrived in northern Mexico with the hope President would make it easier for people like him to get into the United States.

It seems the new president wants to help migrants, Osorio said as he got ready to check in to a cheap hotel in downtown Tijuana before heading to the U.S. They're saying he is going to help, but I don't know for sure how much is true or not.

The 63-year-old is among thousands of people who have come to the U.S.-Mexico border with the hope they will be able to ask for asylum and make their way into the U.S. now that former President Donald Trump is no longer in office.

While Biden has taken some major steps in his first weeks in office to reverse Trump's hardline immigration policies, his administration hasn't lifted some of the most significant barriers to asylum-seekers.

In fact, it's discouraging people from coming to the country, hoping to avoid what happened under both Trump and former President Barack Obama border agents getting overwhelmed by migrants, including many Central Americans with children.

Now is not the time to come, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at a recent briefing, and the vast majority of people will be turned away.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken struck a similar tone on February 6 as he announced official steps to end Trump-era agreements with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala that required many asylum-seekers to seek refuge in one of those countries instead of the U.S.

To be clear, these actions do not mean that the U.S. border is open, Blinken said. While we are committed to expanding legal pathways for protection and opportunity here and in the region, the United States is a country with borders and laws that must be enforced.

That message hasn't reached everyone.

More people have been arriving at a encampment in Matamoros, Mexico, a dangerous city just south of the Texas border where hundreds of asylum-seekers have been waiting under Trump's Remain in Mexico program.

It's possible even more may come after the Biden administration announced Friday that it would slowly allow an estimated 25,000 people to enter the U.S. as their cases are reviewed. The first wave is expected February 19.

Walter Valenzuela, a 37-year-old Honduran, said he had been waiting in Tijuana, across the border from San Diego, for months for a chance to either seek asylum or risk an illegal crossing.

For years, asylum-seekers who met the initial threshold of demonstrating a credible fear of persecution in their homeland could generally stay in the U.S. until an immigration judge decided whether they qualified for permanent residency, which can take years.

Trump administration officials believed many asylum claims were fraudulent or lacked merit, submitted by people simply looking to remain in the U.S.

But the issue is murky as tens of thousands flee violent gangs, natural disasters and political upheaval.

The Biden administration has signed several executive orders on immigration, including allowing in more refugees and establishing a task force to find the parents of about 600 children who were separated under Trump and still haven't been reunited.

But it hasn't ended a public health order Trump issued at the start of the coronavirus pandemic that allows U.S. Customs and Border Protection to immediately expel nearly everyone, including asylum-seekers.

Psaki said the government is still working to develop a humane, comprehensive process" to evaluate people coming to the U.S.

Asylum processes at the border will not occur immediately, she said. It will take time to implement.

Alan Bersin, who held top positions dealing with border security during the Clinton and Obama administrations, warned that Biden is headed for a crisis if he releases all asylum-seekers into the United States. That would invite fraud and abuse, he said.

There's such a pressing sense in the advocate community that is controlling the Biden immigration agenda they want to reverse all Trump actions, he said.

Meanwhile, pressure is mounting.

The number of people apprehended at the border has increased since January, though it's below some previous periods. Authorities say many are getting caught and returned multiple times.

Complicating matters, a law has taken effect in Mexico that prohibits holding children in migrant detention centers, and the U.S. has stopped sending back some families along parts of the border.

CBP, which doesn't have capacity to hold families because of COVID-19, in recent weeks has released dozens of people into the U.S. with instructions to appear in court later.

Authorities fear that as word spreads of those releases, more people will come. And asylum is not the only immigration issue creating headwinds for Biden's administration.

Texas and Arizona have both sued to stop Biden's 100-day deportation moratorium, which a judge temporarily put on hold.

Immigration and Customs and Enforcement officers are complaining about proposed rules to focus on detaining and removing people in the country illegally who pose national security threats or have been convicted of more serious crimes.

Jon Feere, a senior adviser to ICE under Trump, said such moves are part of a larger pattern that the Biden administration will come to regret.

When you send the message that you are not serious about immigration enforcement, you can't act surprised when you see a massive influx of people that you have to manage, he said.

Raul Ortiz, deputy chief of the Border Patrol, said last week that as a liaison to the Biden transition team, he found the staff to be very attentive to the issues. Some had experience with surges of asylum-seekers under Obama.

This wasn't uncharted waters," Ortiz said in an interview produced by the Border Patrol. "It wasn't like we were starting from scratch.

(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.)
Germany's Volkswagen is not concerned by any Apple plans for a passenger vehicle that could include the iPhone maker's battery technology, its chief executive Herbert Diess said.

Reuters reported in December that Apple may have progressed enough to build a vehicle for mass markets by 2024, helped by cost cuts in battery technology.

"The car industry is not a typical tech-sector that you could take over at a single stroke," Diess was quoted as saying an interview with Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.

"Apple will not manage that overnight," he added.

While Apple's plans are not public, Diess said its intentions as such were "logical" because the company had expertise in batteries, software and design, and that it had deep pockets to build on these competencies.

"Still, we are not afraid," he said.

Volkswagen plans to develop software needed for autonomous cars in-house to ensure it can compete against tech firms in the field of electric car data.

Also read: Mercedes-Benz recalls 1.3 million vehicles for emergency-call system error

Dalia Al-Dujaili, a student at the University of Edinburgh, on campus in Scotland on February 4, 2021. Image by Emily Macinnes  2021 The New York Times.

Life seemed promising last year to Philae Lachaux, a 22-year-old business student in France who dreamed of striking out on her own in the live music industry. But the onset of the pandemic, leading to the loss of her part-time job as a waitress, sent her back to live at her family home.

Now, struggling to envision a future after months of restrictions, Lachaux says that loneliness and despair seep in at night.

I look at the ceiling, I feel a lump in my throat, she said. Ive never had so many suicidal thoughts.

The pandemic feels like a big stop in our lives, she added. One that puts us so low that I wonder, Whats the point?

With curfews, closures and lockdowns in European countries set to drag into the spring or even the summer, mental health professionals are growing increasingly alarmed about the deteriorating mental state of young people, who they say have been among the most badly affected by a world with a foreshortened sense of the future.

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

Last in line for vaccines and with schools and universities shuttered, young people have borne much of the burden of the sacrifices being made largely to protect older people, who are more at risk from severe infections. But the resilience of youth may be overestimated, mental health professionals say.

Faced with a restricted social life and added uncertainty at an already precarious moment in their lives, many young people are suffering from a gnawing sense that they are losing precious time in their prime years.

Across the world, they have lost economic opportunities, missed traditional milestones and forfeited relationships at a pivotal time for forming identity.

Many feel theyre paying the price not of the pandemic, but of the measures taken against the pandemic, said Dr. Nicolas Franck, the head of a psychiatric network in Lyon, France.

In a survey of 30,000 people that he conducted last spring, young people ranked the lowest in psychological well-being, he said.

In Italy and in the Netherlands, some youth psychiatry wards have filled to record capacity. In France, where the pandemics toll on mental health has made headlines, professionals have urged authorities to consider reopening schools to fight loneliness. And in Britain, some therapists said that they had counseled patients to break lockdown guidelines to cope.

In the United States, a quarter of 18- to 24-year-olds said they had seriously considered suicide, one report said. In Latin America and the Caribbean, a survey conducted by UNICEF of 8,000 young people found that more than a quarter had experienced anxiety and 15% depression.

And a study conducted last year by the International Labor Organization in 112 countries found that two-thirds of 18- to 29-year-olds could be subject to anxiety and depression.

The lasting effects on suicide rates, depression and anxiety are still being measured, but in interviews, a dozen mental health experts in Europe painted a grim picture of a crisis that they say should be treated as seriously as containing the virus.

We are in the midst of a mental health pandemic, and I dont think its treated with near enough respect, said Arkadius Kyllendahl, a psychotherapist in London who has seen the number of younger clients double in recent months.

A Sense of Limbo

Many European countries went into the fall with the illusion that they had curbed virus outbreaks, only to face an even larger wave of infections this winter. That led to mistaken expectations, young people said, that harsh restrictions would soon end.

Lockdowns have offered some a respite from the stresses of school or work, which have made them more resilient, psychologists say. But for others, especially those who already struggled with mental health conditions or limited access to care, their fragility has been exacerbated.

Not being in control of something like this is anxiety inducing, said Dalia Al-Dujaili, 21, a student at the University of Edinburgh.

As the pandemic has dragged on, so has the sense of limbo, she said, and she tried online therapy for the first time last year.

What am I doing? Why am I getting a degree, if theres not going to be any jobs? she asked.

One blessing, she said, is that younger people are more open to discussing their struggles.

Everybody talks about their therapists and their meds, she noted.

That has not stopped some from feeling guilty, however, given that the pandemic has affected everyone.

There are people with bigger struggles: people who have lost their jobs, or a relative to the disease, said Marcelo Andreguetti, a Brazilian graphic designer who studies in Cologne, Germany.

He said he began taking antidepressants after he was told he had depression and obsessive compulsive disorder this year.

Loneliness Brings Them Into despair

Winter has worsened the situation, according to therapists and psychiatrists, who say they have seen young people manifesting more severe symptoms of anxiety, depression, eating disorders and addictions.

In the Netherlands, Dr. Robert Vermeiren, a professor of child psychiatry at Leiden University Medical Center, said the acute ward he manages has been full for weeks  something he had never experienced.

The situation was so serious, he said, that his team did not send children home for Christmas, as it usually would. Isolation has also disrupted the usual teenage transition, when young people move from belonging to their family to belonging to their peers, Vermeiren added.

They feel empty, lonely, and that loneliness brings them into despair, he said.

In Italy, calls doubled last year to the main hotline for young people who have considered or attempted harming themselves. Beds in a child neuropsychiatry unit at the Bambino Gesu Childrens Hospital in Rome have been full since October, said Dr. Stefano Vicari, director of the unit.

Hospitalizations of young Italians who harmed themselves or attempted suicide have increased 30% in the second wave of cases, he added.

To those who say that, after all, these are challenges young people have to go through, that they will come out stronger, this is only true for some, those who have more resources, Vicari said.

Catherine Seymour, head of research at the Mental Health Foundation, a Britain-based charity, said that young people living in poorer households were more likely to experience anxiety and depression, according to a study conducted among nearly 2,400 teenagers.

It may be that those in poorer households are more likely to lack enough space and internet access to help with schoolwork and communication with their friends, Seymour said. They may also be affected by their parents financial worries and stress.

Studies from the first lockdowns suggest that they may have already left an indelible mark.

In France, a survey of nearly 70,000 students found that 10% had experienced suicidal thoughts during the first months of the pandemic, and more than a quarter had suffered from depression.

In Spain, one of the worlds toughest lockdowns last spring had a profound impact, especially for young girls, who were more likely to experience stress, anxiety and depression, according to a survey of 523 people by the University of Valencia.

Konstanze Schoeps, one of the studys authors, said, They were developing their own freedom and space, and during lockdown they lost what they had just started to experience.

It amounted to a process of grieving, she added.

A Search for Remedies

The situation has become so dire that students and mental health advocates have asked authorities to moderate some measures, including by reopening schools and universities, even as officials worry that a premature easing of regulations will worsen the spread of new variants.

Building social relationships is at the center of our lives, and that is gone, said Heidi Soupault, 19, who urged President Emmanuel Macron of France to reopen universities in an open letter that spread quickly on the internet last month.

Starting this month, students in France can return to universities one day a week. They can also get three free therapy sessions.

In Britain, where mental health organizations and experts have urged the government to divert funding to help address the issue in schools, officials have said that they will consider mental health support as part of plans to lift restrictions. In the Netherlands, the central government has pressed regional authorities to invest more in youth mental health.

Dr. Silvia Schneider, a child and adolescent psychologist in Bochum, Germany, said that governments should share clear messages on television and social media.

We need to give very easy accessible information on how to handle the feeling that they are not alone with these challenges, Schneider said about young people. And that there are some things that can help them.

To combat symptoms of anxiety and depression, some therapists, like Kyllendahl in London, are telling their clients to go outside as much possible  even if it involves breaking restrictions.

Still, some young people see a silver lining.

At least the pandemic has given us the right to be sad, said Lachaux, the French student. We dont have to show all the time how strong we are.

By Isabella Kwai and Elian Peltier. Emma Bubola contributed reporting.

c.2021 The New York Times Company

If you are having thoughts of suicide, the following organizations can help. In India, call 24x7 toll-free mental health rehabilitation helpline 'Kiran' at 1800-599-0019.

In Britain, call Papyrus at +44 800 068 4141 (9 a.m. to midnight), or message Young Minds: text YM to 85258. You can also find a list of additional resources on Mind.org.

In France, call SOS Amitie at +33 9 72 39 40 50 (24/7) or Fil Sante Jeunes at +33 800 235 236 (9 a.m. to 11 p.m.). Ameli has a list of additional resources.

In Italy, call Telefono Amico at +39 2 2327 2327 (10 a.m. to midnight) or Telefono Azzurro at +39 19696 (a webchat is also available).

In Germany, call TelefonSeelsorge at +49 800 1110 111 (24/7) or NummergegenKummer at +49 116111.

In the Netherlands, call De Luisterlijn at +31 900 0767 or 113 Zelfmoordpreventie at +31 900 0113 (both 24/7). You can also chat on Ease, a service for 12- to 25-year-olds (afternoons).

In the United States, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 (TALK). You can find a list of additional resources at SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources.
Egypts Ministry of Finance launched on Monday the second stage of the e-invoice system that will be applied on 347 companies. Other companies will join the system in succession through the end of June.

Minister of Finance Mohamed Maait said the e-invoice system is a critical step towards digital transformation, part of Egypts Vision 2030. The first stage that kicked off on 15 November was accomplished successfully, he added.

The e-invoice system is also meant to upgrade Egypts taxing system and improve the efficiency of tax examination, which will help attain the governments economic and financial targets, said Maait.

The finance ministry is providing all facilities and support to the companies that need to join the system, especially that the subscription is obligatory. The ministry started to take the legal actions against companies that have not subscribed in the system yet, Maait explained.

Reda Abdel-Kader, head of the Egyptian Tax Authority (ETA) said that joining the e-invoice system enhances the companies tax positions by classifying them in the low-tax risk companies group.

In addition, the system facilitates VAT settlements among companies, upgrades invoice exchange between them, reduces transactions cost, allows the remote tax examination for companies, and eases the process of preparing and submitting tax returns, according to Abdel-Kader.

He added that subscribing in the e-invoice system is mandatory to deal with ministries, economic authorities, public sector companies, the public business sector and all state bodies, as decreed by the prime minister.

Egypts public e-invoice revenues jumped to EGP 4 billion per month in 2020, up from EGP 1 billion, growing by 250 percent owing to the coronavirus, Maait said in December.

The hike is the result of a number of new government services that have become available online to encourage the public to use e-payment.

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A strategic partnership with Microsoft was announced Tuesday by General Motors and Cruise aimed at speeding up the commercialization of shared self-driving vehicles.

In addition, Microsoft will be joining GM, Honda and some institutional investors in adding US$2 billion to Cruise's coffers, bringing the value of the shared self-driving vehicle company to $30 billion.

"The companies in this sector are going to need a long runway before they generate enough revenues to be self-sustaining so another $2 billion in the bank for Cruise is the single most important aspect of this," Sam Abuelsamid, principal analyst for e-mobility at Guidehouse Insights, a market intelligence company in Detroit, told TechNewsWorld.

"GM and its investors are trying to scare off competitors," maintained Roger C. Lanctot, director for automotive connected mobility at Strategy Analytics, a global research, advisory and analytics firm.

"This is an intimidation game," he told TechNewsWorld. "There are dozens of robotaxi wannabes, but there are also shuttle bus operators -- like Beep -- throughout the world building revenue-generating businesses around autonomous vehicles operating within narrowly defined, geo-fenced or fixed routes."

"The $2 billion investments buys Cruise more time but it will not magically create a functioning, revenue-generating service," he said.

Mutually Beneficial Pact

Mike Ramsey, a vice president and analyst for automotive and smart mobility at Gartner found it interesting that Microsoft is making a long-tern commitment to a company that's potentially a customer for its wares.

"Microsoft provides services -- like a giant cloud computing offering -- that is used to develop these self-driving vehicles," he told TechNewsWorld.

However, both companies may benefit from the new partnership.

"For Cruise, it may mean greater access to talent and resources from Microsoft; and for Microsoft, it helps to create expertise in high-performance computing related to autonomy, where one of their biggest competitors -- Google -- already has an in-house AV company in the form of Waymo," he said.

Abuelsamid explained that all the companies in this sector are going to have to use cloud providers, whether it be Azure, AWS, Google Cloud or Baidu in China.

"They need the cloud platforms during the R&D phase to handle all the data they're collecting from their test vehicles, to do simulation, to do AI training and all the other things they have to do," he said.

"Longer term," he continued, "if they do start to commercialize, they're going to need cloud platforms to do fleet dispatch and other things. It doesn't make sense for these companies to build their own clouds."

"Once you commercialize it and decide to go to multiple cities and multiple countries, scaling that platform is really hard," he added. "It's something that companies like Microsoft, Google and Amazon know how to do."

Question of Utility

Lanctot acknowledged that cloud resources are required to develop and launch an autonomous vehicle-based robotaxi operation, but added that it's not immediately clear that Azure has any extraordinary advantages over competing alternatives such as Google or AWS.

"While I'd be inclined to suggest that Microsoft has more to gain in desperately needed credibility in the automotive space than GM -- the $2 billion investment has clearly juiced GM's stock."

"So Microsoft gains automotive cred and GM gets a stock boost," he continued, "but it doesn't really move the needle on advancing autonomous vehicles or the actual creation of a robotaxi service."

"Microsoft has some useful cloud-based tools to support automotive vehicle development and operation, but the hurdles standing in the path of AV robotaxis do not reside in the cloud," he added. "They are right here on terra firma."

He added that robotaxis do not offer any clear benefits to consumers.

"If the goal is to deliver a robotaxi -- this is a replacement of an existing and perfectly adequate and affordable solution," he said. " It is not demand driven -- unless they want to make it free."

"Given the $250M quarterly burn rate, I don't see how they will ever be able to offer robotaxis at a competitive price -- at least not in this decade," he added.

Need for Trust

Cruise CEO Dan Ammann noted in a statement that his company's mission to bring safer, better, and more affordable transportation to everyone wasn't just a tech race but also a trust race.

"Microsoft," he said, "as the gold standard in the trustworthy democratization of technology, will be a force multiplier for us as we commercialize our fleet of self-driving, all-electric, shared vehicles."

Cruise self-driving test vehicle on the streets of San Francisco

Abuelsamid explained that before anybody is going to want to ride self-driving vehicles, they have to trust that they're safe.

"These vehicles are all connected," he said. "They have to be connected in order to dispatch them and provide software, map and traffic updates."

"Any device that's connected has attack surfaces for bad actors," he continued. "If you're going to be successful in this business, people have to trust not only the core technology in the vehicle, but that the system is secure and bad actors can't take control of these vehicles and do anything nefarious with them."

"Microsoft is generally considered a trustworthy company, a good partner for this sort of thing," he added.

Lanctot, though, doesn't believe trust is an issue.

"Existing shuttle operators have demonstrated that consumer acceptance of driverless operation is really no big deal," he said.

"A bigger deal is the level of tolerance within cities and regulators for driverless vehicles clogging up already heavily trafficked city streets seeking passengers," he explained. "It's a business model issue."

Bad News for Tesla

GM Chairman and CEO Mary Barra praised Microsoft in a statement, noting the high tech company will help drive the auto industry to a future with zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion.

"Microsoft will help us accelerate the commercialization of Cruise's all-electric, self-driving vehicles and help GM realize even more benefits from cloud computing as we launch 30 new electric vehicles globally by 2025 and create new businesses and services to drive growth," she said.

GM won't be alone in flooding the market with EVs, which isn't good news for the market leader, Tesla.

"Tesla been the dominate player the last several years, but it's been in market that's fairly sparse, without a lot of offerings," explained Abuelsamid.

"In the next 12 to 24 months, there's going to be a lot of new EVs coming to market from almost every automaker," he said.

"Tesla's going to continue to grow," he continued, "but their market share of EVs is almost certainly going to decline."

"Their market share in Europe declined significantly in 2020 because of the introduction of a number of new models from Volkswagen, Mercedes Benz and Audi," he added. "That's going to continue to be the case going forward. They'll probably grow sales, but they're going to have a smaller slice of a growing pie."

John P. Mello Jr. has been an ECT News Network reporter since 2003. His areas of focus include cybersecurity, IT issues, privacy, e-commerce, social media, artificial intelligence, big data and consumer electronics. He has written and edited for numerous publications, including the Boston Business Journal, the Boston Phoenix, Megapixel.Net and Government Security News. Email John.


GARDAI have been ordered to return more than 70,000 in cash which was seized at the home of a businessman in Limerick city more than 18 months ago.

Most of the cash was found in knotted socks which were located in a small safe during searches at the home of Martin Duggan in Moyross on September 30, 2019.

The safe also contained a variety of financial and business documents as well as bank cards and a birth certificate.

The 49-year-old operates a successful coal distribution business in the city and objected to an application by the State to have the money forfeited under Section 39 of the Criminal Justice Act, 1994.

Nine witnesses gave evidence during a hearing, which took place over a number of days earlier this year.

Garda Sinead Galvin, a member of search team, said the safe, which was found in a wardrobe in an upstairs bedroom, was locked but that Mr Duggan opened it when he arrived at the house having been contacted by gardai.

She said she decided to formally seized the money as she believed it was suspicious.

Ive never seen money concealed like that in my career, she said adding that some of the money was wrapped in cling film before being placed in a washbag.

The cash, she said, included a number of 500 and 200 notes.

Judge Tom ODonnell was told the money was initially detained to allow further investigations to take place and that a file was subsequently prepared for the Director of Prosecutions.

Mr Duggan was arrested and questioned as part of the criminal investigation and a bank account and credit union account in his name were frozen by gardai for a number of weeks.

Detective Sergeant John Cleary said a decision was taken in March of last year to apply to have the money forfeited after the DPP directed that no criminal prosecution should be brought.

He said the application related to the 70,000 which was found in the safe and the almost 3,000 which was seized from Mr Duggan when he was arrested.

He said gardai are of the view the money is the proceeds of crime and that Mr Duggans explanations as to where it had come from didnt add up.

Detective Garda James Hourihane said he had concerns given the volume of the money and the manner it was stored.

He accepted Mr Duggan is a hard working man and that he has been operating fuel-distribution business for the past decade.

However, he said he did not accept the explanation put forward by Mr Duggan who said some of the money was associated with his business while further amounts were related to the sale of a number of vehicles.

I believe the money to be the proceeds of criminal conduct, said Detective Garda Hourihane.

During the hearing a senior official with the Revenue Commissioners confirmed Mr Duggan is registered for tax purposes and that he has filed returns every year, as required.

He also confirmed that he has never been audited and that no Statement of Affairs had ever been requested from him.

Sergeant Kieran Crowley gave evidence that he carried out a search of the same house in March 2012 and found almost 20,000 in cash in the same safe.

He said Mr Duggan was questioned about the money and he confirmed it was not seized as he was satisfied as to it origins.

In his closing submission, Barrister Brian McInerney, instructed by solicitor Sarah Ryan, said there was an obligation on the State to prove its case and that suspicion alone was not proof.

He said the coal-delivery business is primarily a cash businesses and he said it was not credible for gardai to insist that not even a fiver of the money seized was related to Mr Duggans business.

Its not an offence to have money in a safe, he said submitting that Mr Duggan has worked from the age of 16, has no pension and that it is possible for him to have accumulated the money over a number of years.

He said there is no lavish lifestyle suggesting his client is involved in criminality.

Referring to suggestions by Mr McInerney that gardai had engaged in forum shopping by making separate applications before two different judges in the district court, Judge ODonnell said he was satisfied there was no deliberate attempt to mislead the judges.

Summarising the evidence, he commented that the State case was replete with suspicion adding that suspicion alone is not proof.

Having considered the evidence and the legal submissions in the case, the judge said he was not satisfied the State had reached the necessary burden of proof.

He refused the application and directed that the monies be returned to the respondent.

On Monday he was told the issue of costs has been agreed.
Pipeline

15 February 2021

The group's first urban luxury resort in Qatar and the Middle East - Banyan Tree Doha At La Cigale Mushaireb is also the first property developed under the Banyan Tree-Accor strategic partnership.

Located in the heart of Mushaireb, the resort sits within the Doha Oasis project, a premier city destination comprising a luxury department store, an indoor experiential theme park and a cineplex.

The 341-key property is in close proximity to the capital's commercial district and cultural attractions, such as the Museum of Islamic Art and Souq Waqif "standing market".

It will feature the signature Banyan Tree Spa with a Rainforest hydrotherapy facility, Saffron fine-dining Thai restaurant and Vertigo, a 28-storey rooftop bar overlooking Doha's panoramic city skyline.
COVID-19 vaccine (Representative image)

India has the capacity to produce vaccines not only for its own population but even for the other developing nations, and may emerge as the world's second largest COVID-19 vaccine maker, say analysts.

Prior to COVID-19 pandemic, India had been producing 60 percent of the world's vaccines for various diseases at an affordable rate, reported CNBC. "India has been a manufacturing hub for vaccines  even before the pandemic, and should therefore be a strategic partner in the global inoculation against COVID-19," the business news site quoted JPMorgan analysts' report published in January.

Another consulting firm, Deloitte, has predicted that India will emerge as the second largest vaccine maker after the US. Deloitte India's partner PS Easwaran said India may produce over 3.5 billion COVID-19 vaccines in 2021, compared to the US's 4 billion.

COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker: Over 82 lakh people have received the jab in India

Meanwhile, pharmaceutical firms have scaled up the production in India. "We are expanding our annualised capacities to deliver 700 million doses of our intramuscular COVAXIN," CNBC quoted Bharat Biotech as saying, which has developed COVID-19 vaccine along with the Indian Council of Medical Research.

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

However, COVAXIN has suffered some backlash due to the lack of transparency in providing efficient data.

India's vaccines for developing nations:

Apart from Bharat Biotech, Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII) had collaborated with AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford and developed Covishield. This vaccine has been granted emergency approval in India.

Adar Poonawallla's SII claims to produce around 50 million vaccines per month and is planning to raise the production to 100 million doses a month by next month.

US pharma firm Johnson & Johnson and Russian Direct Investment Fund have agreed to produce COVID-19 vaccines with Indian firms, however, they have not received approved for use as of yet.

"Even without successful vaccine development from their own pipelines, available capacity provides opportunity to partner as contract manufacturers with approved vaccine developers to meet supply needs particularly for India and other [emerging markets], said the JPMorgan report quoted earlier.

Public Health Foundation of India's (PHFI's) President K Srinath Reddy opined India's vaccines may be more suitable for developing countries, unlike that of Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech. Citing the reason for this, Reddy said the cold storage requirements for Pfizer and Moderna will restrain developing nations to buy vaccines from these pharma giants.

On the contrary, the PHFI President said vaccines made in India are not only affordable and easier to transport, but also require less cold refrigeration measures. This gives more advantage to Indian vaccines than those made in the US and Europe.

India's capability:

Recent examples of India sending vaccines to Sri Lanka, Maldives, Bhutan, Nepal and other countries, apart from vaccinating its own people has proven India's capability to provide vaccines to other nations. Till now it has already supplied 15.6 million doses to 17 countries, Reuters reported.

"Indias manufacturing capabilities are sufficient to meet domestic demand," CNBC quoted the Centre for Public Policy Research (CPPR) Senior Research Associate Nissy Solomon as saying.

"With a proven track record on the scale at which vaccines are produced, India should be able to ramp up production to meet international demand as well," she added.

Vaccine distribution/storage:

Looking at the current pace with which people in India are being vaccinated, Jefferies Equity Analyst Abhishek Sharma noted only 22 percent of Indias 1.38 billion population can be vaccinated in a year.

Among other major issues is the lack of storage, distribution and vaccine uptake. Though the Indian government claims to vaccinate more and more people, a survey shows that 'more than half of Indians are reluctant to get vaccinated immediately'.

The PHFI President, too, said if the issue of storage and distribution for vaccines could be taken care of, immunisation programmes may gain momentum. He suggested that existing cold chain for food products could be used for vaccine storage, as Indian vaccines require normal refrigeration, unlike Pfizer-BioNTech (minus 70 degrees Celsius) or Moderna (minus 20 degrees Celsius).
Michelle L. Roberts, Founder of Roberts Disability Law Michelles professional theme is fighting for the underdog.

Michelle L. Roberts, a Bay Area ERISA litigation attorney with a successful 16-year track record representing employees in benefit disputes, has established Roberts Disability Law (RDL) to provide individual clients with full-service representation. Michelles practice concentrates on the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), a complex federal law that governs most claims under benefit plans provided by employers. Over the years, Michelle has successfully represented hundreds of clients who were denied disability benefits, including obtaining many court victories.

Through RDL, Michelle will continue her lifes work of helping employees get the benefits that they deserve. Michelles professional theme is fighting for the underdog. She rigorously represents individuals against big insurance companies that use their resources to wear down insureds who might already be vulnerable due to an unexpected disability. Michelles commitment to advocating for the underdog is also reflected in her volunteer work for local non-profit organizations including, among others, Legal Aid at Work and the AIDS Legal Referral Panel (ALRP).

Like nearly all top-flight law firms and lawyers, Michelle has an unwavering commitment to providing legal services to those who need it most. We are grateful that she has been a part of a loyal group of attorney volunteers who lend their expertise to our Workers Rights Clinic.

Mike Gaitley, Staff Attorney, Legal Aid at Work.

Michelle has been representing ALRP clients for many years and, in every instance, she has provided them with the highest quality representation possible. Michelle is a true hero. Michelle represents the very best of the legal community and I can enthusiastically and wholeheartedly recommend her to anyone looking for help in ERISA matters.

Bill Hirsh, Executive Director, ALRP.

Michelle established RDL to provide focused hands-on high-quality representation to every RDL client from start to finish. The thing I love most about what I do is the relationship I build with my clients while fighting for their rights. I want to be at their side from the very first phone call to when I get to call them congratulating them on a final resolution. I want to know each clients case inside and out so I can effectively fight for them. As stated by Amy H., a former long-term disability client for whom Michelle obtained a favorable settlement,

I am an attorney, so have very high standards for any attorney representing me. Michelle exceeded my expectations at every turn. I always felt that no matter what was going on in her practice, my case was a priority, and she was on top of things. Any communication from me was returned within hours. Also, Michelle was willing to take the time to explain aspects of my case to me with great patience, which I really appreciated. She is also extremely skilled, experienced, and just a really good person. The most surprising thing about working with Michelle was that she actually cared about me as a human being and was absolutely dedicated to getting me justice. I am very grateful to her, and my advice would be that if shes willing to take your case, you couldnt find a more dedicated, skilled advocate.

Michelle is a Lawyer Representative to the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference and a member of the BASF Judiciary Committee. She is also a Senior Editor of the Bloomberg BNAs Employee Benefits Law book and Vice-Chair of the ABA Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Sections Employee Benefits Committee. Prior to starting RDL, Michelle was a partner at Kantor & Kantor, LLP.

Roberts Disability Law is based in Oakland, California and represents clients all throughout California.
In the background of nearly every major news event of the last year, working diligently and running complex logistical operations, have been National Guardsmen.

When the pandemic first struck, troops manned drive-through testing sites and understaffed nursing homes. During the states historic first vote-by-mail election, guardsmen helped count ballots. And, after the unthinkable  a breach on the U.S. Capitol  troops bused down to D.C. by the hundreds, to defend the nations capital from another potential attack.

New Jersey National Guard Soldiers and Airmen at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C.(U.S. Air National Guard photos by Master Sgt. Matt Hecht)

Now, nearly a year after the pandemic first started, New Jerseys National Guardsmen find themselves in the midst of another major effort, one that will hopefully usher the state back into normalcy. At all six of New Jerseys mega-sites, 330 National Guardsmen are there, helping to get shots in arms as rapidly as possible.

It is unusual in the military sense, but I think its exactly right in the National Guard sense  this is serving the community in the most pure way possible, Bryce Hillman, 32, of Hamilton Square, told NJ Advance Media. This, more than anything else, is what I had signed up for.

Members of the National Guard work in the observation area of the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center Covid-19 vaccination site in Edison, New Jersey, U.S., on Friday, Jan. 15, 2021. New Jersey will expand Covid-19 vaccinations to people 65 years old and over and those ages 16 to 64 who have "health challenges," Murphy said. Photographer: Mark Kauzlarich/BloombergBloomberg

Hillman, a nursing student who deferred school for a semester, volunteered for the mission back in September and now oversees a team of guardsmen at the Edison mega-site. He was deployed at the beginning of January, on orders through the end of March with the potential for an extension through June.

Even pushing back school for a semester, getting to jump in and do something historical, it felt worthwhile and I couldnt pass that up, Hillman said.

The 330 troops hail from all different units of New Jerseys National Guard, including from all five of its Army Major Commands and its two Air Wings, operating as a Joint Task Force, according to Public Affairs Officer Barbara Brown.

Members of the National Guard at the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center Covid-19 vaccination site in Edison, New Jersey, U.S., on Friday, Jan. 15, 2021. New Jersey will expand Covid-19 vaccinations to people 65 years old and over and those ages 16 to 64 who have "health challenges," Murphy said. Photographer: Mark Kauzlarich/BloombergBloomberg

At the sites, troops are helping direct traffic, coordinate registration, schedule patients for their second appointments and oversee all other logistics required to vaccinate hundreds of patients daily.

Officials running the sites say they couldnt get the job done without the help of the troops.

National Guards fabulous, Bonnie Geisler, Vice President of Special Projects for RWJBarnabas Health, who is running point at the Edison mega-site, told NJ Advance Media. Theyre just absolute treasures, every one of them. You really have to know how wonderful they are. No matter what is requested of them is done well, immediately and with a smile.

While some might find the sight of uniformed troops working alongside nurses in scrubs strange, vaccine distribution falls squarely within their mission: being at the ready to support our communities during times of natural disasters and emergency situations, according to Brown.

A person gets his temperature taken by a member of the National Guard before receiving a dose of a Covid-19 vaccination at the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center in Edison, New Jersey, U.S., on Friday, Jan. 15, 2021. New Jersey will expand Covid-19 vaccinations to people 65 years old and over and those ages 16 to 64 who have "health challenges," Murphy said. Photographer: Mark Kauzlarich/BloombergBloomberg

The forces purpose is to support state and federal missions while theyve seen their fair share of action, deployed internationally to Afghanistan and Iraq and domestically to the U.S.-Mexico border and New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina  this years public health and ballot-counting missions have been unconventional.

In todays military, our ability to serve is very agile, Captain Jiahua Ye, 28, of Watchung, told NJ Advance Media. We can transform ourselves into any task force required by the mission.

Members of New Jersey National Guard help patients in the observance area. Middlesex County's COVID-19 vaccine mega-site at the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center in Edison. Tuesday, January, 26, 2021 Patti Sapone | NJ Advance Media

As officer-in-charge, Ye is stationed at the Atlantic City mega-site along with about 50 other guardsmen. Last year, Ye also lent a hand, supervising a team at a specimen collection point at Kean University.

The reason why I put on this uniform along with my troops is being able to serve the community  our uniform says U.S. Airforce, whether its refueling a jet all the way downrange in the Middle East or being able to give out vaccines, Ye said.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.

Josh Axelrod may be reached at jaxelrod@njadvancemedia.com. Tell us your coronavirus story or send a tip here.
Genome & Company CEO Pae Ji-soo speaks during an interview with The Korea Times at the newspaper's newsroom in Jung-gu, Seoul, Jan. 25. Korea Times photo by Kim Kang-min



Genome & Company CEO pursues microbiome healthcare group



By Nam Hyun-woo



One of the most rapidly growing sectors in the biopharmaceutical industry is microbiome medicine. Big name tycoons including Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg have already noticed the potential of microbiomes and either invested or donated money to businesses and research in this field, which is quickly evolving into a new money magnet.



This is also the case of Genome & Company, a Korea-based microbiome biotech focusing on immuno-oncology drugs to treat cancers. In December last year, Genome & Company made its transfer to Korea's tech-heavy Kosdaq from the KONEX, the country's third bourse for startups and venture companies preparing to list on the junior bourse. In its Kosdaq debut trading session Dec. 23, the company's market cap reached 1.14 trillion won ($1 billion), which was the 44th-largest on the market.







Pae Ji-soo, a medical doctor and CEO of Genome & Company, says many investors are paying attention to microbiomes because they are anticipated to change the landscape of the healthcare industry in the next decade, highlighted by side-effect free and personalized medicine.



"One of the best advantages of microbiome medicine is that it has no side effects, because it is based on bacteria already living in the human body. So it can be used in combination with other cancer drugs." Pae said during an interview with The Korea Times. "With this technology, maybe in the next 10 years, we will be able to find personalized cancer treatments, and cancer will no longer be a severe disease."





Make your immune system work



Microbiome refers to the community of microbes, such as bacteria, living in the human body. The recent progress in DNA sequencing technologies has found that microbiomes have a huge impact on determining whether people develop various diseases and enabled scientists to find out which bacteria are beneficial and can be developed into treatments.



Genome & Company is focusing on three specific diseases  cancer, skin disease and central nervous system disorders such as autism  and garnering the most attention is the microbiome-based immuno-oncology drug candidate, codenamed GEN-001.



The human immune system is designed to attack tumor cells. To counter this, tumor cells have an arm (checkpoint) called PD-L1 which connects to PD-1, which is the arm of immune cells like T-cells, which then signal the immune cell to forget its role. Immuno-oncology drugs use antibodies to block the connection, so the immune cell can do its job and attack the cancer cells.



Pae said the company has learned that the efficacy of such drugs, called immune checkpoint inhibitors, are affected by the condition of a cancer patient's gut microbiomes, and the bacteria used for GEN-001 enhances the efficacy of such drugs, as well as its own efficacy to vitalize the immune system.



In December, Genome & Company signed a clinical trial collaboration and supply agreement with Merck and Pfizer. Following the agreement, Merck and Pfizer have been supplying their jointly-developed anti-PD-L1 Bavencio, worth 10 billion won, for GEN-001's Phase 1 and 1b clinical trials in the U.S., as well as accessing the trial data.



"Most of clinical phase 1 studies are targeting normal people. But GEN-001 is a cancer treatment, so we have enrolled cancer patients for the Phase 1 study," Pae said. "When the study progresses, we believe we can obtain much more meaningful data from the patients."



Recognizing the potential of GEN-001, LG Chem, one of the major pharmaceutical companies in Korea, signed a license-out deal with Genome & Company in December, allowing the LG Group unit to have commercial rights to GEN-001 in Korea, China and Japan.



"There are many companies attempting to combine immuno-oncology drugs. Since both drugs have side effects, however, combining them may result in unexpected side effects," Pae said. "The main advantage of a microbiome-based drug is that it has no side effects, because the bacteria already lives in the human body. So it can be used in combination with other cancer drugs."







A researcher in research at Genome & Company's lab in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, Feb. 4. Korea Times photo by Kim Kang-min

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Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.
Queen Victoria's jewellery commemorating the deaths of her mother and daughter Princess Alice are to be sold at auction.

The mourning jewels include a button, a brooch and pendants, some containing locks of hair, that 'brought solace' to the Queen at her time of loss.

The pieces were passed down through Princess Alice's descendants to her great-great-granddaughter Patricia Knatchbull, the 2nd Countess Mountbatten of Burma, who died in 2017.

They are to be sold as part of a Sotheby's auction of her possessions next month.

Queen Victoria's jewellery commemorating the deaths of her mother and daughter are to be sold at auction. Pictured, Queen Victoria (left) and Princess Alice who died in 1878 aged 35

Remembering Alice: A hardstone, enamel and diamond cross centring an onyx heart with Alice beneath a coronet, designed by Robert Phillips c1878, commemorating Princess Alice and containing a lock of hair. The brooch, estimated at 2,000-3,000, is one of four mourning jewels belonging to Queen Victoria which will be auctioned by Sotheby's in March

David Macdonald, Sotheby's specialist and head of sale for the auction, said the items, which have individual estimates ranging from 1,000 to 3,000, are special because of the personal significance they held to Victoria.

He said: 'You don't look at them and think, "Ahhh".

'It's only when you handle them, you realise they really are treasure with descriptions and the locks of hair And moreover to have them directly from the hand of Victoria, all the way down.

'To me, they speak not so much of Victoria, Queen and Empress, but Victoria, mother and wife.'

One of the objects, an agate and diamond pendant, was commissioned by Prince Albert for his wife to mark the death of her mother.

He died the same year he gave her the pendant, which contained a lock of her mother's hair, a miniature photograph and a 'touching inscription' from Albert.

An onyx and seed pearl button circa 1879 commissioned by Queen Victoria to mark the death of her daughter Princess Alice. The button, estimated at 1,000-1,500, contains a miniature photograph of Princess Alice. It has been passed down through her descendants

A banded agate and diamond memorial locket commissioned by Prince Albert circa 1861 for Queen Victoria to mark the death of her mother, Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. The locket, estimated at 1,000-1,500, contains a miniature photograph of the Queen's mother and an inscription by Prince Albert (right)

The portrait of Queen Victoria's mother, Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, inside the locket. Prince Albert died the same year he gave her the pendant (pictured)

'So that would have had multiple layers of significance to Victoria,' Mr Macdonald said.

Pendants and a button commemorate the death of her third daughter, Alice, from diphtheria at the age of 35.

'They are very biographical,' Mr Macdonald continued. 'You think of Victoria and you think of the great jewels of state, the diamonds, the Koh-i-Noor, all these stones.

'These jewels are much more intimate, their value isn't through large diamonds bTheir value lies in the full expression, an emotional, deeply personal expression about loss and love.'

The pieces were passed down through Princess Alice's descendants to her great-great-granddaughter Patricia Knatchbull, the 2nd Countess Mountbatten of Burma, who died in 2017. Pictured, Patricia Mountbatten with husband Sir John Knatchbull, 7th Baron Brabourne

The objects were kept 'in a drawer in a family home'.

Mr Macdonald said: 'Their existence wasn't known We came across these whilst working on the auction. So they're undocumented and a really interesting discovery.'

He added: 'I'd love them to go to a British institution, a British museum would be wonderful.(or) to end up with someone who is fascinated by British history, Queen Victoria, and particularly that sort of personal side.'

Sotheby's London will hold an auction of the collection of Patricia Knatchbull, 2nd Countess Mountbatten of Burma, on March 24 and the lots will be exhibited in New Bond Street from March 20 to 23.
A controversial academic was branded crass yesterday for comparing the British Empire with Japans brutal treatment of prisoners during the Second World War.

Corinne Fowler made the extraordinary conflation while discussing her belief that Britons were reluctant to talk about the countrys past links to slavery.

Professor Fowler was one of the publishers of a 115-page report last September that outed many National Trust properties for having links to slavery.

Among them was Chartwell  Winston Churchills home in Kent  because he had once been Colonial Secretary.

Controversial academic Corinne Fowler compared the British Empire with Japans brutal treatment of prisoners during the Second World War

In her latest comments on Britains links to slavery, she said: One of the parallels we might think about is perhaps Japan, thinking about how they treated prisoners of war.

Thats more uncomfortable for them to study and think about than the more obvious national successes.

Professor Fowler, an expert in post-colonial literature at the University of Leicester, told the Choppers Politics podcast that when pupils are taught about slavery, we tend to focus on abolition, rather than how formative it was in that much longer history of British involvement with slavery.

She added: Its perhaps just that we sometimes confuse patriotism with public relations. And history is something different because really I think its not unpatriotic to tell the truth or look at evidence.

But Sir John Hayes, chairman of the Common Sense Group of Tory MPs which was set up to defend the UKs history and traditions, criticised the blinkered and blinded comments.

He said: These are, frankly, slightly crass comparisons. Its an extraordinary conflation to compare British history over the last 400 years with Japans, which is what Corinne Fowler is effectively doing.

Another Tory MP, Giles Watling, said: The British Empire had its flaws but it wasnt the total militaristic domination of other people and it was of its time, not a thing to be ashamed of. The Japanese treatment of prisoners of war was just outrageous.

Professor Fowler also said she had recently discovered her familys connection to slavery.

My ancestors, for example, were slave owners in Haiti, they were pretty nasty about it, she said. But then there are descendants of people who were enslaved in this country.

So we can come together around these histories to really have a fuller, more global understanding of the past. And its just really important not to weaponise this subject but to talk about it sensibly and talk about evidence and understand in the fullest sense our 400 years of being an empire.

Mumbai's Vaitarna Dam to host 100 MW floating solar-hydro project: report

The Middle Vaitarna Dam that supplies water to Mumbai metropolitan region will have a floating solar-hydro hybrid power project with a combined generating capacity of 100 kWh, if a says a Mercom report.

The report said the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) has already given its nod for setting up the hybrid power project on the Middle Vaitarna Dam and has agreed to buy power from the project at Rs4.75 per kWh.

A joint venture between construction major Shapoorji Pallonji & Company and Mahalaxmi Konal Urja, will be implementing the project, says the report. Once the project is implemented, Mumbai will become the first civic body in the country to develop such a power project.

MCGM has approved a proposal to form a joint venture between Shapoorji Pallonji & Company and Mahalaxmi Konal Urja. The hydroelectric project will have a capacity of 20 MW, and the floating solar project a capacity of 80 MW. The project will generate 208 MUs of electricity and help MCGM save Rs24 crore (~$3.28 million) in power bills. The civic body will buy power at the rate of Rs4.75 (~$0.065)/kWh for 25 years from these companies, Mercom quoted an MCGB official as saying.

MCGM had, in November last year, floated a tender for developing a 100 MW floating solar-hydropower hybrid power project at the Vaitarna Dam, which supplies water to Mumbai metropolitan region. Of the 100 MW power proposed to be generated, 20 MW was to come from the hydro power project and the remaining 80 MW from solar installations.

The targeted electricity generation per year was 67.98 MUs from the hydro project and 140.58 MUs from the floating solar project.

The addition of floating solar projects on the top of water bodies, which already have hydropower stations, can annually generate around 7.6 TW of clean energy from the solar photovoltaic systems alone, according to a report by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).

The report further stated that Maharashtra government is planning to develop four floating solar power projects at four dams - the backwaters of Wardha, Bebala, Khadakpurna, and Pentakli dams.

Selection of the project implementation agency is done on the Swiss Challenge method, under which the government publishes the first detailed project proposal and asks others to add to the initial proposal. The final counterproposal is then presented to the first bidder, who is asked to accept it. If the first bidder doesnt accept it, the chosen counterproposal wins.

Given the difficulties involved in acquiring land for the development of large-scale power projects, floating solar project is an ideal solution for India considering the availability of a large number of dams, lakes, and reservoirs.
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Mumbai: Hours after a non-bailable warrant was issued against Shantanu Muluk for allegedly creating a 'toolkit' related to farmers' protests, the Maharashtra resident moved to the Bombay High Court to seek transit anticipatory bail.

According to the latest report, Muluk, a resident of Beed district, submitted his application to the Aurangabad bench of the Bombay High Court.

"Muluk's plea was mentioned before Justice Vibha Kankanvadi of the Aurangabad bench and his application would be heard on Tuesday," reported PTI news agency.

Besides Muluk, another accused in the case, Nikita Jacob, has also filed a plea in the HC, which will be heard on Tuesday. A Delhi court has also issued a non-bailable warrant against Nikita Jacob.

Both the pleas sought transit anticipatory bail for a period of four weeks so that Jacob and Muluk can approach the court concerned in Delhi to apply for pre-arrest bail.

"Jacob and Muluk, in their pleas, have claimed they are targets of political vendetta," said a PTI report.

A team of Delhi Police had also visited Shantanu's parents in the Beed district. The team which is looking for Shantanu, who's absconding, questioned his parents and also went to Shantanu's bank branch to inquire about his account details.

Shivlal, Shantanu's father told Zee News that the Delhi Police team came on February 12 and asked them a few questions. "We cooperated fully. Then they also went to Aurangabad and I also accompanied them. Two people came, of which, one was a police inspector and the other was a constable," said Shivlal.

Shantanu's mother also talked to Zee News and said, "I had a conversation with my son a few days ago when he came for the wedding of a cousin. We haven't spoken since then. We are worried about his whereabouts."

This is to be noted that Disha Ravi, Shantanu and Nikita Jacob, are accused of a creating a toolkit that was shared by Swedish teen climate activist Greta Thunberg. Greta had shared the toolkit to lend her support to the ongoing farmers' agitation against Centre's three new farm laws.

In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were reportedly listed which were needed to be taken to support the farmers' protest.

(With inputs from agencies)

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At peak times during the pandemic this past year, it seems the percentage of hospital beds filled with coronavirus-positive patients at the Ralph H. Johnson VA Medical Center in Charleston was often lower than most other hospitals in the area.

Experts don't know why this has been the case. Some believe that veterans are more apt to follow rules related to mask-wearing and social distancing. Others argue that the VA health system does a better job managing disease and offers more in the way of communication and telemedicine. This much is certain: Questions raised by preliminary data beg further research.

Take, for example, Dec. 4. The number of coronavirus cases recorded in South Carolina that day  more than 2,000  mirrored the height of the virus' peak in July. A combined 66 patients were hospitalized at Roper St. Francis, Trident Health and Medical University Hospital facilities on that day, according to data provided by those health systems. Meanwhile, there were no COVID-19 patients at the VA hospital in Charleston.

A similar picture was observed on Jan. 26, when more than 3,000 new cases were reported across the state. On that day, 41 people at Roper Hospital and 50 people at MUSC were hospitalized with COVID. At the VA hospital, which sits right next door to Roper and MUSC in the medical district, only 13 inpatients had the coronavirus.

It's important to note that the VA hospital in Charleston is smaller than other hospitals in the community. MUSC, for example, has 685 general inpatient beds, according to the state health department, compared with the VA's 155.

Even accounting for size, though, at three peak dates during the pandemic, the VA hospital in Charleston almost always had a lower COVID census than other hospitals in the Lowcountry.

That said, it's unclear how veterans who have been hospitalized with COVID-19 in South Carolina and elsewhere in the U.S. have gotten health care outside the Veterans Health Administration system. Some veterans dont qualify for VA health benefits.

Still, according to national data, there are fewer coronavirus cases relative to the VHA patient population than there are cases relative to the U.S. population.

Dr. Lancer Scott, an emergency room physician at the VA hospital in Charleston, said he thinks the numbers could be partly explained by compliance among veterans.

"They are compliant with masks. They are really compliant with staying at home," he said. "Theyre compliant on a population level that Ive never seen before. Its quite impressive."

Dr. Megan Gerber, a primary care physician who works for the VA in Boston, echoed the same idea in an essay she wrote last year for the Journal of Internal Medicine.

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"Unit cohesion is the bond that unites service members to one another and the mission," she wrote.

And for many veterans, Gerber told The Post and Courier, the pandemic feels like war.

"People who have served in the military have a sense of serving a greater purpose. ... There really is a sense of mission right now," she said. "For a lot of veterans, this really does feel like a deployment or active duty."

It isn't just this sense of serving the greater good that may be keeping veterans from becoming hospitalized with COVID-19. Gerber argued that the VHA does a better job following and monitoring its patient population. The VA is able to mail its coronavirus patients thermometers and pulse oximeters, she said. A VA team of health care staffers monitors any COVID-19 symptoms among their patients on a daily basis.

It sounds like common sense but it's actually rare for health care system to do that, she said.

"In my practice, Im not seeing my patients hospitalized or going to the ED (emergency department) partially because we have the systems and the ability to proactively monitor them," she said. "We were just incredibly well-positioned at the beginning of the pandemic. ... Outside VA, theyre a little bit on their own. That might be part of whats going on."

This doesn't mean some groups of veterans haven't been hit hard by the pandemic. In October, a state veterans home in Hawaii was cited by the federal government for posing "immediate jeopardy to resident health and safety" after 27 veterans and their spouses died during an outbreak. The home was fined more than $500,000.

In South Carolina, the Dorn VA Medical Center in Columbia had the second-highest number of active COVID-19 cases in the country in early February, according to an AARP report, and the fourth-highest number of known coronavirus deaths among VA hospitals since the start of the pandemic.

And nationally, while it seems VHA patients are less likely to contract coronavirus compared to the general population, veterans are also less likely to be tested for it and more likely to die if they do become sick with COVID-19.


The preliminary results of its proprietary cannabinoid treatment of glioblastoma have recently completed an independent peer review and been published in the MDPI (Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute) Medical Journal.

GBM is the most aggressive and, to date, therapeutically resistant primary brain tumour

s ( ) ( ) ( ) ongoing pre-clinical research program into the use of cannabinoids in the treatment of aggressive glioblastoma brain cancer has been expanded to explore the use of nanotechnology in relation to the most effective treatment delivery systems.

The delivery system is similar to the nanoparticle delivery system being used successfully in MGC Pharmas ArtemiC clinical trial into the treatment of COVID-19.

In-vitro results to date show that MGC Pharma formulated cannabigerol (CBG) can eliminate therapy-resistant glioblastoma stem cells.

Further, the preliminary results of MGC Pharmas proprietary cannabinoid treatment of glioblastoma have recently completed an independent peer review and been published in the MDPI (Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute) Medical Journal.

Significant step

MGC Pharma co-founder and managing Director Roby Zomer said: The publication of our research in such a prestigious medical journal such as MDPI is a great achievement and validates our findings of using cannabinoids on GBM.

Prior to its publication, all research is required to undergo a peer review process, where other medical researchers scrutinise the research procedures and subsequent findings.

Importantly, we are now moving forward with our next stage research, which will now incorporate a new and innovative drug delivery systems.

This is a very significant step for our research program and IP, as we look to transform and advance the way brain tumours are treated.

Shares higher

Shares are almost 7.7 per cent higher to A$0.07, a new high of more than two years while the company's market cap is approximately $144.9 million.

Since February 1, shares have risen from A$0.026 on the back of improving cannabis market fundamentals and the company becoming the first cannabis-sector company to float on Londons main market.

Expanded study

This important GBM research program is being conducted in collaboration with MGC Pharma, the National Institute of Biology (NIB) and the Neurosurgery Department at the University Medical Centre in Ljubljana, Slovenia.

It is focused on testing cannabinoid formulations on fresh glioblastoma tumour tissues, obtained from patients after surgical removal of the tumour, to determine the optimal cannabinoid preparation for effective treatment of the remaining cancer.

The program tests cannabinoids alone and in combination with chemotherapeutic temozolomide.

The objective of the pre-clinical in-vitro research is to develop novel formulations to define the clinical protocols for clinical trials for the treatment of high-grade brain tumours with cannabinoids.

This study has been expanded to include testing the effect of cannabidiol (CBD) and CBG on tumour cells when delivered via a nanoparticle delivery system.

Successful results of this testing would potentially lead to a significant breakthrough in the treatment of brain cancer through oral administration rather than invasive treatments.

Nanoparticles are believed to improve the bioavailability and the blood to brain barrier issues, which are being optimised using SNEDD (Self Nano-Emulsifying Drug Delivery).

GBM is the most aggressive and, to date, therapeutically resistant primary brain tumour.

Next steps

MGC Pharma and NIB will now begin testing of its CBD and CBG in nano emulsifying formulations on human tissue in-vitro.

A general aim of the research project is to reveal the effect of purified natural substances  cannabinoids CBD and CBG in nano-emulsion and their combinations for the treatment of high-grade brain tumours (glioblastoma) in-vitro with the goal of in-vivo translation to clinics.

The in-vitro preclinical study will specifically be focused on defining the most efficient cannabinoid nano-emulsion preparations of CBD and CBG that are likely to benefit to each individual patient that differ in glioblastoma sub-types and most relevant cannabinoid receptors.

Additional patients with grade IV glioblastomas will be recruited to the study and further divided into subgroups based on their tumour genotype and characteristics.

These will be carefully analysed to enable a personalised therapeutic approach.
MONTREAL, Feb. 15, 2021 /CNW Telbec/ - SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. (TSX: SNC) has been awarded an engineering services contract for three hydroelectric projects from Rye Development, LLC to add powerhouses to the existing dam and lock facilities at each of the sites, which are owned by the US Army Corps of Engineers. SNC-Lavalin's scope includes forward-thinking design and engineering using the latest multidisciplinary BIM technology, field investigation, environmental assessment and permitting support for the hydroelectric projects located in Pennsylvania.

"This contract, the first of its kind for us in the US, is in line with our strategy to grow and position our hydro capabilities and expertise in this important market. It also supports our broader sustainability goals to be an industry leader in the fight against climate change. We are proud to be able to provide cleaner and more sustainable solutions to all our clients," said Ian L. Edwards, President and CEO of SNC-Lavalin.

"SNC-Lavalin's first contracts, over 100 years ago, were for hydropower facilities. Today, the company is recognized as one of the world's foremost integrators of sustainable end-to-end solutions for hydro projects with a team of more than 400 hydro experts worldwide. We look forward to fostering a strong long-term relationship with Rye through the successful delivery of these projects that will have significant community benefit," said Dale Clarke, President, Infrastructure Services, SNC-Lavalin.

SNC-Lavalin's leading-edge expertise covers upgrades and rehabilitation of hydroelectric developments, dam safety assessments and operation and maintenance of hydro stations. Previous hydroelectric projects include: John Hart Generating Station Replacement, Waneta Expansion, Jimmie Creek, Site C, Karebbe, Chute a Caron Dam and Muskrat Falls.

"Our projects, bringing new hydropower to existing dams, will provide reliable, renewable energy for generations to come. We are excited to have SNC-Lavalin, with the depth of experience that they bring, as part of our team to help us deliver 24/7 renewable generation and significant infrastructure growth to the Pittsburgh region," said Paul Jacob, CEO, Rye Development.

About Rye

Rye Development is a leading U.S. hydropower developer with a current pipeline of over 22 projects in 8 States. Rye's development of new hydropower on existing dams, in conjunction with financing partner, the Climate Adaptive Infrastructure Fund, and Rye's development of new closed loop pumped storage, demonstrate Rye's commitment to the responsible development of untapped hydropower resources while maintaining rivers' balance of environmental and commercial requirements. Rye brings communities around the country substantial infrastructure, job creation, and a local source of renewable, non-consumptive energy.

About SNC-Lavalin

Founded in 1911, SNC-Lavalin is a fully integrated professional services and project management company with offices around the world. SNC-Lavalin connects people, technology and data to help shape and deliver world-leading concepts and projects, while offering comprehensive innovative solutions across the asset lifecycle. Our expertise is wide-ranging  consulting & advisory, intelligent networks & cybersecurity, design & engineering, procurement, project & construction management, operations & maintenance, decommissioning and sustaining capital  and delivered to clients in four strategic sectors: EDPM (engineering, design and project management), Infrastructure, Nuclear and Resources, supported by Capital. People. Drive. Results. News and information are available at www.snclavalin.com or follow us on Twitter @SNCLavalin

SOURCE SNC-Lavalin

For further information: Media, Harold Fortin, Senior Director, External Communications, 514-393-8000, ext. 56127, [email protected]; Investors, Denis Jasmin, Vice President, Investor Relations, 514-393-8000, ext. 57553, [email protected]

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TEL AVIV - Palestinian poet Mourid Barghouti died on Sunday in Amman. He was 77. He was born in 1944 in a village near Ramallah (West Bank) and in 1963 he started attending the faculty of English literature in Cairo. But during the six-day war (1967) he was suddenly unable to return home - a situation that would last for 30 years.



His book "I saw Ramallah" is famous for describing the condition of exiled Palestinians. In particular, one sentence has remained famous: "I have a degree but no wall to hang it on". He published several poetry books including the collection "I was born there, I was born here".



Barghouti was married to late Egyptian writer Radwa Ashour, a leading cultural personality in Cairo.



Palestinian Culture Minister Atef Abu Sayef said following his death that "Palestinian and Arab culture have lost a symbol of creativity, as well as of cultural and national activism".



"Mourid Barghouti - he added - will remain an intellectual and cultural light for generations to come".
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The NHS is making 'meaningful progress' in its drive to boost Covid vaccination rates among BAME people, its chief executive Sir Simon Stevens said today.

Sir Simon admitted 'there's a concern' among health chiefs about vaccine hesitancy in black and South Asian communities but that it was making extra efforts to get them immunised.

He pointed the finger at 'a pandemic of disinformation' which he said was being fought alongside the actual pandemic.

And Professor Chris Whitty, England's chief medical officer, said he would meet with medical chiefs after tonight's 5pm Downing Street press conference to make sure the message is clear that the risks of vaccines are 'massively lower' than of Covid.

A study published by the University Hospitals of Leicester found that vaccine uptake among black staff was only half as high as it was among their white colleagues, and it was significantly lower in South Asian workers, too.

SAGE warned the Government at the start of the vaccine drive that it would have to make extra efforts to immunise ethnic minority people because they have historically lower uptake.

The vaccination programme successfully hit its target for today of immunising 15million people, most of them in the highest risk groups.

And Sir Simon said there is a 'signal' that the protection given by the jabs is starting to lead to changes in the patients being admitted to hospitals. He did not outline the data but likely meant that fewer over-70s are getting severely ill with Covid.

Sir Simon Stevens, chief executive of the NHS, said the UK is fighting a 'pandemic of disinformation' about Covid vaccines as well as trying to tackle the actual virus outbreak

Scientists and doctors are worried about low uptake of Covid vaccines among ethnic minority people. Pictured: A woman gets a coronavirus vaccine in Ealing, West London

Sir Simon said vaccination teams were heading out into local communities to target groups that have lower uptake. Pictured: A rabbi administers a vaccine to an Orthodox Jewish man in London

Speaking about efforts to vaccinate people in BAME communities, Sir Simon said: 'Theres a concern about hesitancy on the part of some black and south Asian communities to accept the vaccine offer that theyre receiving, either at work if theyre a health and social care worker or as a member of the public.

'What is happening about that is that there is a huge effort involving community leaders, faith leaders, the way in which the NHS itself is administering the vaccine programme, to overcome that.

'And although the start was slower in terms of the uptake in some of those communities, I think we are now seeing meaningful progress.

'For example, in Hackney this past weekend we were vaccinating at a mosque and also at an Orthodox Jewish site after Sabbath had finished, vaccinating up until midnight.

'I was with one of the lead imams this morning in Oxford, whod arranged for a Zoom with one of the top sheikhs in the world to help explain why vaccines are safe, as well as why they work.

'So I think this will build momentum and, let's face it, part of what we're up against is a dual epidemic  we're up against the epidemic, the pandemic of Covid, and were up against a pandemic of disinformation and the deliberately sowing of mistrust. And weve got to fight both with equal vigour.'

SIGNAL VACCINES ARE WORKING IN NHS DATA, HEALTH CHIEF SAYS NHS bosses hope to publish data proving that Covid vaccines are working to thwart the outbreak within the next fortnight. Health bosses are collating data on the impact of the jabs  but say they 'want to let the clock run' before publishing the figures. Early signs already suggest the vaccines are working at stopping Britons from both developing symptoms. And promising data published over the weekend suggested the number of Covid deaths in the over-85s is falling twice as fast as it is in younger adults. Professor Whitty tonight said it was possible to calculate the effect of vaccines in the UK already  but cautioned that the calculations were 'quite complex'. He added: 'What we really want to get to is the point where we can see, in a sense with the naked eye, the big effect of the vaccines.' Professor Whitty said Israel  which is leading the way in the global vaccine roll-out  was already seeing the effect of jabs. Data has shown cases and hospitalisations are falling quickest among over-60s, who were prioritised in the nation's inoculation drive. Sir Simon: 'What we are seeing I think in some of the early data from the NHS is what looks like a signal in terms of the impact on vaccination. 'But we really want to let the clock run for another week [or] fortnight to be able to properly validate that.' Professor Whitty added: 'The impact on transmission will take longer to determine than impact than mortality and severe disease.' It can take several weeks for immunity from vaccines to kick in. And it can take up to three weeks for patients to die. Therefore, experts say it will take at least a month for any noticeable effect of the vaccine drive to crop up in data. Department of Health data shows fewer than 400,000 Brits had received their first dose of a Covid jab by January 3  roughly six weeks ago. The mammoth operation only began to pick up pace in the first full week of January, after regulators approved Oxford University/AstraZeneca's vaccine. The Prime Minister tonight said there were 'grounds for confidence' that vaccines were helping to curb the spread of coronavirus, not just in protecting those who received the jab. He said: 'Although the vaccination programme is going well, we still don't have enough data about the exact effectiveness of the vaccinations in reducing the spread of infection. 'We have some interesting straws in the wind, we have some grounds for confidence but the vaccinations have only been running for a matter of weeks. 'While we are learning the whole time, we don't, as I talk to you today, have all the hard facts that we need. And the level of infection remains very high.' Advertisement

In a paper published in January by Government advisers SAGE, scientists told ministers that vaccine uptake in the past has been lower in non-white communities.

And they said extra effort should be made to improve this now because of the desperate need to get as many people as possible vaccinated against coronavirus.

Low trust in the health service or scientists, fears about safety and difficulty getting access to vaccines have blighted acceptance rates in black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, researchers said.

Further complicating the problem was the fact that the same ethnic groups are more likely to die of Covid-19 than white people, so it is extra important that they get a jab.

SAGE said ministers should make sure there is equal access to for vaccines for all ethnic groups and cultures, and that efforts should be made to produce 'culturally relevant' advice, get local community leaders to help explain the science and tackle people's concerns, and make sure everything is available in multiple languages.

Doctors warned that fake news about vaccines containing meat or alcohol, or changing people's DNA, is putting Asian people off getting jabs.

Speaking today, Professor Chris Whitty said slower uptake did not necessarily mean people weren't getting vaccinated.

He said: 'Many people may not take it up immediately, but will take it up subsequently.

'So its not a matter of refusal, its a matter of thinking about it and then actually moving on to do so.

'All of us think this is critical to support people to make sure we combat misinformation.

'In fact, the next meeting Ive got this evening, after this one, is with leaders of the medical profession from lots of different ethnic groups to share experiences and share how we can work out how to make sure that people are getting absolutely accurate information that makes clear that the risks of the vaccine are massively lower than the risk of getting the infection.'

The health chiefs' comments come after a study published today found that white NHS staff are almost twice as likely to get a vaccine as their black colleagues.

Only 64 per cent of staff at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust had taken up the offer to get their first dose by February 3, a study showed.

While uptake was 71 per cent in white medics, the highest of any group, it plunged to half this level in black staff.

It was also lower among South Asians, among whom only 60 per cent had received their first dose.

Doctors at the trust  the only occupation with a majority of BAME employees  were also least likely to get the jab, after only 57 per cent turned up to appointments.

And under-30s were less likely to get the jab than their older colleagues, which experts feared could be down to perceptions they are not at high risk from the virus.

Professor Kamlesh Khunti, a SAGE member who led the study, today urged ministers to identify the reasons for the 'huge disparities' between groups.

'As well as all the other public health interventions, such as social distancing, hand hygiene, face coverings, and test and trace, vaccination is crucial if were going to get out of this pandemic,' he said.

'And this risk is not only to themselves and their families but to patients as well. Its crucial we get uptake in healthcare workers as high as possible.'

The results also showed no group had achieved the 85 per cent uptake experts say is needed for 'herd immunity', where the coronavirus stops spreading because enough people are protected.

Asked about the results, the Health Secretary Matt Hancock today called on doctors and nurses to get their jabs saying: 'It's important for your patients and of course it is important for the whole of society that we get this to as many people as possible.'
A healthcare worker receives Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine during a nationwide vaccination program at the American University Medical Center in Beirut, Lebanon, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

Coronavirus case numbers are stabilizing in parts of the Middle East but the situation remains critical, with more than a dozen countries reporting cases of new variants, the World Health Organization said Monday.

Ahmed al-Mandhari, director of WHO's eastern Mediterranean region, which comprises most of the Middle East, said in a press briefing from Cairo that at least one of the three new coronavirus variants was reported in the 13 countries in the region. He did not name the countries.

All three of the new variants are more contagious, according to WHO.

Al-Mandhari said there are nearly 6 million confirmed cases of coronavirus in the region and about 140,000 deaths. WHO urged people to continue taking precautionary measures against the virus.

The organization said 6.3 million vaccinations have been administered in 12 countries in the eastern Mediterranean.

"Vaccinations are a turning point in facing the virus but the vaccines alone are not enough," al-Mandhari said, adding that social distancing, wearing masks and keeping clean remain the main ways to fight the spread of the virus.

He said as many people as possible should be vaccinated before they come into contact with any of the new variants of the virus.

Al-Mandhari said 37,000 coronavirus vaccine doses from the global COVAX initiative will arrive in the Palestinian territories and 94,000 should arrive in Tunisia in the coming weeks. The program seeks to provide vaccines to developing nations.

Frontline medical workers start registration process to get the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine during a nationwide vaccination program at the American University Medical Center in Beirut, Lebanon, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

Al-Mandhari said overall the number of new coronavirus cases in the region has stabilized, despite increases in some Gulf nations and Lebanon.

Lebanon has been one of the hardest hit countries in the region in recent weeks with hospitals working at near maximum capacity amid a nationwide lockdown. Lebanon began a vaccination campaign Sunday.

A nation of 6 million people including a million Syrian refugees, Lebanon has confirmed nearly 340,000 cases.

Iran remains the eastern Mediterranean country with the highest number of confirmed cases at about 1.5 million.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Exactly 80 years ago, in 1941, the Uralzoloto trusts Teplogorsk diamond mine began its commercial diamond mining at the placer deposits of the Western Urals. That was the birth of the USSR diamond industry. This industry had an undeniable father whose personality and biography are so extraordinary that he must not escape our attention in connection with the glorious anniversary.

His name was Pyotr Fadeyevich Lomako. Born in 1904 in the Kuban area, he came from the Cossacks, which he liked to emphasize. As a teenager, in the troubled years of the civil war, he supported the Bolsheviks and was the commissar of the detachments of the special forces for the fight against the counter-revolution. And later on, he made a quick career for himself in the Communist party and as a functionary, he was both a Komsomol and trade union functionary, and was steadily promoted to take higher positions. He graduated from the Moscow Institute of Non-Ferrous Metals and Gold and in 1939, at the age of 35, he became a Deputy Peoples Commissar (Minister) of Non-Ferrous Metallurgy of the USSR, and a year later, he became the Peoples Commissar. He hold ministerial positions for over 46 years and set an absolute record for the Soviet establishment, which was registered in the Guinness Book of Records in 1986! He was a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU from 1952 through 1989. And, of course, he was awarded a lot of awards, he had seven Orders of Lenin.

Quite a lot of memoirs are devoted to Lomakos activities, and interestingly, the authors have starkly differing views. For some Lomakos contemporaries, he was an energetic, purposeful, extremely hard-working, talented leader, and a man of good morals who selflessly supported and defended his close associates. For others, he was a stupid and arrogant irresponsible bureaucrat, despot, and a boor. Such a wide range of opinions makes the task of the historical reconstruction of the personality of this undoubtedly outstanding Soviet statesman and political party official very interesting. And since we are interested in the diamond industry, we will focus on the memoirs reflecting the contrary opinions about Lomako.

In the memoirs the Diamonds and Leaders by S. Z. Borisov, first secretary of the Yakut Regional Committee of the CPSU P. F. Lomako, a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU and Minister of Nonferrous Metallurgy of the USSR, looks as follows. First, I went to my old acquaintance P. Ya. Antropov, Minister of Geology and Natural Resources Protection of the country. Pyotr Yakovlevich handed me an official letter, which, in particular, read that the ministry guaranteed the commercial reserves of rough diamonds. Soon, I entered the P. F. Lomakos office being confident that the document given to me was really valid. I put it on the table in front of the minister and added that the paper was signed by the Minister of Geology and Natural Resources Protection of the country. Lomako, without lifting his head or even giving a glance at the document, grabbed it and threw it to the floor. He is a fool that he has signed it, Pyotr Fadeyevich said and added such obscene, abusive words that at first I was dumbfounded whether the man in front of me was really a minister? Swearwords poured out of him so abundantly that there were simply no normal human words.

Well, at the end of the USSR, I worked under the direction of a member of the CPSU Central Committee who was also a general, and I can confirm that in high offices, an abusive language was often used at their closed-door meetings. In general, the evil was small, besides, swear words used by people having a real combat experience sometimes sounded rather normal. But in this case, the point was not in the Lomakos obscene language, but in the fact that Borisov directly and unequivocally accused the union minister of his unwillingness to develop the Yakut diamond deposits. And this reluctance was dictated, from the Borisovs point of view, exclusively by the Lomakos narrow-mindedness, bureaucratic intransigence who continued - with his perverted stubbornness - mining the poor Ural placers and ignored the Yakut deposits, which were richer by orders of magnitude. It was a grave accusation! And the grounds for it seemed to exist: indeed, the first placer deposits in Yakutia were discovered in 1950, the first primary deposit - in 1954, the Mir pipe and 14 more ones - in 1955, but there were no mining operations yet (at the time of that episode). Let us compare - the first Ural placers were discovered in 1937, the industrial production at the Teplogorsk mine started in 1941, and there were very little rough diamonds at that mine. So, the Yakut daredevil Borisov rushed to attack the gloomy Stalinist retrograde Lomako and, despite the torrent of invectives, he bravely complained to Khrushchev, wrote to the Pravda newspaper and spoke at the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU. And he had a good thing going and the mining of the Yakut diamonds started; he could beat, so to speak, Lomako! He did it, didnt he?!

Now lets look at this amazing Yakut epic and Lomako from the opposite side. There is a character sketch The Soldier of the Party by V. R. Airapetov dedicated to Lomako. The author was the Lomakos closest colleague as he was the Senior deputy head of the Foreign Relations Department of the USSR Ministry of Non-ferrous Metallurgy. In this sketch, Lomako appeared as a strange combination of a wingless angel and a faithful Marxist-Leninist, the author wrote, It could not have been otherwise - the Minister of Non-Ferrous Metallurgy P. F. Lomako is a SOLDIER OF THE PARTY! He was, is and will always be [a soldier of the party]! ... In fact, as for his harshness and steeliness, many people, including myself, were of the opinion that it was not just a mask, but his way of behaviour that did not reflect the real nature of this person ... P. F. Lomako looked closely at a new person for a very long time trying to figure out and understand by himself - and not from someones words - with whom he was dealing. And if he believed in a person, as a rule, it was forever; well, if he did not believed in a person, it was almost impossible to change his opinion. Another characteristic feature was that the Minister never, under no circumstances, sold out his own people, he always looked into a matter himself and, if he was convinced that the person was guilty, he punished him, but he never allowed any outsider to do this.... And the Airapetovs opinion about the conflict between Lomako and Borisov is as follows, If Semyon Zakharovich [Borisov], secretary of the small regional committee, as he called himself, did not know how the existing system worked at that time when no more or less large-scale undertaking did not start without deep careful preliminary studying, well-thought-out justification, material and financial support, and, most importantly, the decisions taken by the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee - then going negative on Minister Lomako can be understood. But those who did not know this undeniable truth in those distant times were not appointed as secretaries of the regional committees. So, he understood. Then, it was simply very bad, especially because this book written by him was published in 2000, when Pyotr Fadeyevich was not alive for ten years.

So, the Yakut daring person in his memoirs smeared Lomako - a rough diamond - with a lot of garbage without good reason, as the minister did not want the Yakut diamonds to be mined not because of his bureaucratic stubbornness, but because of the lack of thoughtful justification, material and financial support.

Where was the truth? At one time, Joseph Stalin having watched the film Lenin in 1918, summed up thoughtfully It was far otherwise. Absolutely wrong... One has a good reason to use the leaders words to comment on the quoted memoirs. Because in fact, it was so. In 1950, the Yakut placer deposits were discovered with the diamond grade by an order of magnitude higher than at the Ural deposits. The information about the discovery was laid on the table of S. N. Kruglov, Minister of Internal Affairs (MIA) of the USSR, who was in charge of the diamond industry (at that moment, Lomako had nothing to do with diamond mining). Kruglov made his decision to immediately transfer the Yakut deposits to the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, develop a project and start mining by GULAG prisoners. In 1951, the Special Chief Administration (SCA) of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was developing a project to make 8 prison camps for 5,000 prisoners in the Vilyui District, 6 placer deposits were planned for mining using dredges, as well as to construct support bases, roads, the Markhinskaya power plant, and the cargo port in Ust-Markha. All the detailed calculations were made, the dates, and material and financial support were quite real, since the main support base of the project was the Dzhugzhurzoloto trust (multicorporate enterprise), which was also part of the MIAs SCA. Just a few days were left until the establishment of the Vilyuylag and the arrival of the diamond dredges in Yakutia, but suddenly everything was suspended! Instead of a decree on the diamond mining in Yakutia, Stalin signed a decree of the Council of Ministers on the purchase of a huge amount (20 times more than the pre-war purchases) of industrial grade diamonds in England! In 1953, the SCA of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was disbanded, the diamond industry was again under the control of Lomako, but there was no urgent need for the development of the Yakut deposits as the Ministry of Finance reported that the State Precious Metals and Gems Repository (Gokhran) had accumulated industrial grade diamonds for 15 years ahead (due to British supplies of 1952-1953).

And here is another quote from the Airapetovs sketch, I can only say that by the mid-1950s, almost everyone believed that the greatest thing had been done, and in the conditions when the country was deprived of the opportunity to import rough diamonds (emphasis added), and Uralalmaz produced absurdly small quantity, only the earliest possible development of the Yakutias deposits can save our mechanical engineering, our defense potential, our country. And this was written by the former chief engineer of Glavzagrantzvetmet! It was written in 2015! He could have asked Lomako - whom he liked so much at that time - who prepared Resolution of the Council of Ministers No.1486-590ss on the additional purchases of rough diamonds in England and who initialed circular letter No.2117ss in 1953? Lomako initialed it!

Well, to make the picture complete, a fragment from the records of the December 1956 Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU is given. Borisov: I have to ask him such questions. Comrade Lomako, since you are more deeply involved in the future development of the diamond industry, answer my question, how many rough diamonds can be consumed by the economy of the Soviet Union? He says, its none of my business. I dont know. Or the question was asked, how many rough diamonds do we buy abroad, how much gold do we spend on these [purchases]? I do not know. Is possible that the minister cannot answer such questions?

So, he didnt know! He endorsed the Council of Ministers top-secret resolutions on the rough diamond purchases abroad, but did not know what was written in them? Nonsense... He said this at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU!

But the next fact is not funny: as soon as the SCA project on the development of the Yakut diamond deposits by the GULAG prisoners went into abeyance and the decision was made simultaneously to purchase rough diamonds in England, Kruglov signed an order on a significant intensification of the production at the Ural mines. How could this be explained? They did not want to develop rich Yakut placer deposits, they were going to buy industrial grade rough diamonds in England to have the rough diamond stocks for 15 years, and they were going to mine the poor Ural placers with all their might! The only rational explanation was that the Ural diamonds were exported and these exports were agreed with the global diamond market regulator, the channel capacity was small and, therefore, it was possible to intensify this production as much as needed as it did not affect the De Beers ability to control the market. The same could not be said about the Yakut diamond deposits.

So, Lomakos position on the development of the Yakut deposits was dictated not by his bureaucratic stubbornness or lack of funding. In fact, Lomako was one of the very few people in the country who knew the complete nuanced picture of the interaction of the USSR with the main diamond market players, both formal and informal aspects of it. And for a number of reasons, such knowledge was - and still remains - a very sensitive information.

A few words should be said about the Lomakos personality. The above Airapetovs words that Lomako never sold out his own people are not true. He sold out M. F. Shestopalov, the first director of the Teplogorsk diamond mine, as soon as the Minister of the State Control of the USSR L. Z. Mekhlis came down on him. Mekhlis had a reputation for being a Stalinist bulldog with very strong jaws, and Lomako did not defend his subordinate (whom, by the way, he respected very much for his professionalism); moreover, Lomako got ahead of himself and demanded to shoot Shestopalov although Mekhlis did not insist on such a harsh punishment. However, when the Shestopalovs case was presented to Beria for review and he regarded Shestopalov with favour, Lomako immediately backpedaled on his decision as Mekhlis, of course, was a bulldog, but a crocodile sure beats a bulldog! The soldier of the Party was very flexible at right moments, which, in fact, helped him occupy the ministerial chairs for over 46 years.

Lets open Lomakos memoirs Non-ferrous metallurgy during the Great Patriotic War. In this book published in 1985 and polished by the Soviet censorship, only a few paragraphs were devoted to rough diamonds, but one fact is worthy of a closer look.

Rough diamonds were of great importance for the defence industry. At that time, the diamond deposits in Yakutia had not yet been discovered. Geological prospecting was carried out in the Urals. By 1939, some small deposits were explored where the diamond mining was organized ...

It should be said that the technology for extracting rough diamonds was not well developed at that time. The employees of the Uralzoloto trust and the Sverdlovsk-based design organizations of the Peoples Commissariat for nonferrous Metallurgy were involved in its development. Their efforts resulted in manifold increase in the diamond production during the war. Subsequently, in 1951, a group of specialists was awarded the USSR State Prize for the development of the rough diamond extracting technology used in the Urals, and for the design and construction of the facilities for diamond mining.

The bogus stories about the use of the Ural rough diamonds in the defence industry was a usual tribute to the industry legend. However, the story about the State (then Stalin) prize for mining the Ural rough diamonds in 1951 is very interesting.

In 1951, the diamond industry was under the Ministry of Internal Affairs SCA and had nothing to do with the Ministry of Non-Ferrous Metallurgy headed by Lomako. Indeed, geologist I. S. Rozhkov, an employee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs SCA, was awarded the Stalin Prize in 1951 for the discovery and exploration of mineral deposits. In this case, however, it was about gold and platinum, and no Stalin Prize was awarded in 1951 for rough diamonds, especially for the creation of a diamond mining industry.

In December 1952, a group of employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs SCA were nominated for the Stalin Prize for Creating the Diamond Industry in the USSR and this prize could have been awarded in 1953. But after the Stalins death in March 1953, the Ministry of Internal Affairs SCA went into liquidation, and the diamond industry passed under the control of the Ministry of the Metallurgical Industry. At that time, I. F. Tevosyan was the minister and P. F. Lomako was his senior deputy minister and he oversaw the diamond industry. Tevosyan hated with a fierce loathing those people who had the shoulder straps of the punitive departments of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of State Security and had every reason for this hatred as his sister was tortured to death in prison in 1937 during the investigation. And all the potential winners of the Stalin Prize For the creation of the diamond industry in the USSR had these shoulder straps. Lomako, of course, knew about this, and when Tevosyan put a brake on the application for the Stalin Prize for rough diamonds, he did not stir a finger to support the diamond workers, who, of course, were worthy persons and had rather indirect relationship to the Stalins repressions. In his memoirs, the party soldier slightly bent the truth - well, it happens sometimes, besides, in 1985, the diamond industry information was still top secret and no one could check anything.

So, Lomako was neither a diehard bureaucrat, nor a knight without fear or reproach, he was a flexible politician, competent and professional, really fantastically hard-working, cruel and unscrupulous. And, certainly, he was not a coward. In 1985, N. I. Ryzhkov, a supporter of the perestroika and acceleration who was just appointed a prime minister, convened an extended session of the Council of Ministers, at which he cheerfully announced that all the ministers and deputy ministers who were over 70 years old should write a letter of resignation as that was the M. S. Gorbachevs decision, it was time to put an end to the aged in the government. Well, if you must, you must, the old-aged soldiers of the Party obediently wrote their letters of resignation. And only Lomako turned a deaf ear to the request of the newly-minted prime minister.

- Well, what about you, Pyotr Fadeyevich? I said - everyone who is over seventy ... - and Ryzhkov stopped speaking when he met Lomakos steely glance clearly telling him Bug off, cipher.... The tightness in the air and silence was broken by the voice of the last Stalinist Peoples Commissar, saying,

- Im over eighty.

Sergey Goryainov, Rough&Polished

1941. One of the first documents on the diamond industry signed by P. F. Lomako.














The date everything changed is entrenched in my memory  June 23, 2016, the day Britain voted for Brexit.

Before that moment I was a professor of British politics who loved his job, enjoyed spending time with his colleagues and looked forward to life in Britains universities, which are among the best in the world.

But since then I have fallen out of love with my job, avoid my colleagues and look to the future with a sense of dread. So what happened?

Unlike the vast majority of people who teach and research in Britains universities, I made the mistake of saying publicly that we should respect the Brexit referendum result.

I was no Brexiteer but, in a world where just one in ten academics backed a Brexit decision that more than half of the country supported, merely accepting the result was more than enough to make me an outcast.

For the next four years, I faced a constant wave of criticism that at times bordered on harassment.

Politics professor Matthew Goodwin says he was subject to online abuse and professional backlash after expressing the opinion that people should respect the Brexit referendum result

One professor told me to my face that I was disinvited from a workshop in my area of research because of my views on Brexit.

Others hurled insults on social media and still more concocted a plot to make it appear that I was a supporter of Donald Trump (I was not).

But it was nothing compared to what some of my colleagues have endured.

There is a long list of academics in Britains universities who have found themselves marginalised or intimidated by fellow academics, administrators or students.

They have been no-platformed, harassed or sacked because their views on issues like Brexit, gender or the legacy of Britains empire violate the woke orthodoxy.

Which is why, over the past year, a group of rebel academics began meeting to share ideas about how to push back against this illiberalism. I am proud to be a founding member of that secretive group.

Somerville College, Oxford, (pictured) told all students they must complete an 'unconscious bias' course to expose innate racism, homophobia, transphobia and disability discrimination

We worked to support freedom in our universities and ensure they remain places where students can be exposed to a full range of ideological views and where academics are not punished or mocked for holding different views.

And, thankfully, Boris Johnsons Government is listening. In 2019, the Conservatives became one of the first parties in the world to include a commitment to defend academic freedom in its manifesto.

In a policy paper this week, the Government details plans to bring in legislation that will defend academics and universities from the illiberal liberalism that is taking hold, with a free speech champion who will have powers to protect students and academics from the woke mob.

Ironically, the paper came as Mrs Thatchers old college, Somerville in Oxford, instructed all students to take what are widely regarded as flawed tests in unconscious bias to expose their innate racism, homophobia, transphobia and disability discrimination.

Somerville Colleges Principal, the Labour peer Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, initially told students they must achieve a mark of 100 per cent in a final test  although she has since made clear there was never even the slightest question of disciplinary action following a student not completing the test or scoring less than 100 per cent.

Academic staff, however, have not escaped disciplinary action for expressing non-conformist views.

Take Kathleen Stock, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sussex, hounded after challenging the narrow trans orthodoxy.

Or the Canadian Professor of Psychology and critic of political correctness, Jordan Peterson, who suddenly had his invitation for a fellowship at Cambridge University rescinded.

Dr Kathleen Stock a professor of philosophy at the University of Sussex (pictured), has been outspoken on gender identity issues and has been hounded over her views on the subject

Other colleagues at Oxford, Birkbeck, Exeter and elsewhere have been hauled in front of disciplinary committees, faced student mobs or been disinvited from conferences because of their challenging views. Some have even been forced to have security at their lectures.

By my count, there have been at least two dozen cases where academics have spoken out publicly about being mistreated after merely challenging the established group-think.

Many more suffered abuse but dare not say so for fear this will damage their careers.

Critics will say that all of this is exaggerated. But a string of recent studies show just how lop-sided our universities have become.

Today only about one in ten academics are Conservatives while at recent elections an astonishing three-quarters voted for liberal-Left parties like Labour, the Greens or Lib Dems.

One study found that more than two-thirds of our universities have had a free speech controversy over the past four years and more than half experienced a cancel culture event, whereby staff or students used open letters and petitions to try to shut down debate and visiting speakers.

Critic of political correctness Jordan B Peterson, a Canadian Professor of Psychology and Clinical Psychologist had his invitation for a fellowship at Cambridge University rescinded

This gulf between what is happening on university campuses and in wider British society is damaging higher education, making it harder to expose students to the diverse array of views that they will meet in the real world.

It also helps explain why so many academics, researchers and students now say they self-censor in their lectures and seminars, hiding their real views because of fears over the response.

Research by the think-tank Policy Exchange found that a shocking 80 per cent of the (very few) academics who supported Brexit would not feel comfortable sharing their views with colleagues on campus.

Nor are they wrong to think this way. About half of academics say they would feel uncomfortable sitting next to a Brexiteer at lunch.

Too often, our universities have lost sight of why they are there.

They are not supposed to be putting the emotional safety of their students ahead of free inquiry and the search for truth.

They are not supposed to be building ideological cocoons whereby academics close ranks against those who hold different views.

Only by encouraging every diverse idea to be presented and challenged can they possibly remain among the best in the world.

Matthew Goodwin is Professor of Politics at the University of Kent
\"Wish to be born in a world without humans\": Netizens fire up over death of TN elephant

Another elephant found dead in Karlapat sanctuary, 6 died in 2 weeks

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

Bhubaneswar, Feb 15: Another female elephant was found dead at Karlapat Wildlife sanctuary in Odisha's Kalahandi district, a Forest official said. Currently, as many as six elephants, five female and a calf, have died at Karlapat Wildlife sanctuary within 14 days of this month, the official said.

Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) Kalahandi South Division Ashok Kumar and his team and veterinary doctors are camping in the area undertaking surveillance. "The death of elephants is due to Haemorrhage Septicemia (HS)," the DFO said.

All India Power Engineers Federation threaten strike against Electricity Bill

However, the DFO said that there was no such report about the death of other animals in the sanctuary and also the cattle entering the forest from nearby villages.

Coordinator from Centre for Wildlife Health, OUAT (Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology), Bhubaneswar, Niranjan Sahu after visiting Karlapat sanctuary said, "The death of elephants is believed to be by HS. The postmortem report and laboratory report of one dead elephant is hinting at HS (Haemorrhage Septicemia)."

Ache din lauta do: Opposition attacks Narendra Modi's govt over rising fuel prices

Sahu further said that cattle do get infected by HS if not vaccinated, adding that this is perhaps the first incident where elephants are also infected with HS.

He said vaccination of domesticated cattle in the villages located inside the sanctuary and sanitization is in progress by veterinary staff supported by forest staff.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Local people and wildlife lovers, however, do not take the incident lightly. Pramod Kumar Singhdeo, a local from Karlapat belonging to the erstwhile Zamindar family of Karlapat and having in-depth knowledge on the flora fauna of the locality, said: "The forest department has dug salt ponds in different places to provide salted drinking water to the wild animals."

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 10:32 [IST]
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The Mandeville City Council, which set a cap of 10 short-term rentals citywide when it adopted an ordinance regulating them a year ago, has almost reached its limit.

The council granted two more permits Thursday night, bringing the total across the city to eight.

The council had approved six short-term rentals with little opposition from the public. But the applications that came before the council Thursday were a different story. Council members said that they heard some opposition from constituents ahead of the meeting.

Under the terms of the ordinance, property owners must obtain a conditional use permit, good for two years, and an administrative short-term rental permit, which is good for one year.

One of the applications was unique in that it had two buildings on one piece of property. Several council members said that they would not favor granting two permits for one property, with Councilman Skelly Kreller saying he thought approving that request would create a slippery slope and he had concerns about density and traffic.

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Council members also said that they believed the intent of the law, adopted by the previous council, was to spread the permits around and not limit them to a few people.

Frankie Cheek, the applicant, hoped to turn his house at 131 Lafitte St. into a short-term rental that could house up to six guests and also wanted to create a second short-term rental in a converted barn on the property that could house up to eight guests.

Cheek lives in the main house, which is not a requirement of the ordinance. When he is absent due to travel, he said, his daughter-in-law who lives minutes away would be able to deal with any problems.

"I've done everything required, in good faith," he told the council. He also had letters from two single-family homeowners nearby who did not object to his plan. "I want to allow folks to enjoy my lovely home and our beautiful little town," he said.

The City Council voted 5-0 to approve the license for Cheek's house but voted unanimously to deny the license for the barn. Council member Jill McGuire, who represents the council district where Cheek sought the two permits, said that the house was the least dense of the two requests.

The other applicant, Kingsmill Tchefuncte Harbor LLC, wanted to turn two small shotgun doubles into short-term rentals. The City Council approved the license for 117 Girod St. but rejected the application for 119 Girod, which currently has a long-term tenant.
On Sunday, February 14, 2021, the World Socialist Web Site held a live Q&A with David North and Eric London, entitled, Sylvia Ageloff and the assassination of Leon Trotsky.

Sylvia Ageloff and the assassination of Leon Trotsky

The meeting followed the publication of a four-part WSWS article series, exposing the role played by Sylvia Ageloff, a former member of the Socialist Workers Party of the United States, in the Stalinist assassination of Leon Trotsky. North and London discussed the significance of the latest revelations, in the context of the decades-long Security and the Fourth International investigation by the ICFI into Trotskys assassination.

The discussion was moderated by SEP (US) National Secretary Joseph Kishore, and Thomas Mackaman, a historian at Kings College in Pennsylvania and a contributor to the WSWS.
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Invented in the 17th century, well before the use of electricity, repeater pocket watches provided a practical means of telling the time at night, thanks to the sounds they produced. The quarter repeater (which sounded the hours and quarter-hours) was invented by English clockmaker Daniel Quare. It was later perfected by Thomas Mudge, another clockmaker, who in around 1750 introduced a mechanism that also sounded the minutes  hence the name minute repeater. At that time, repeaters used hammers to strike two different bells. Towards the end of the 18th century, the French horologer and physician Abraham-Louis Breguet had the idea of replacing the bells with gongs  strips of tempered steel nestled inside the case  which meant the size of the mechanism could be considerably reduced. By the end of the 19th century and into the 20th, this system was further miniaturised to fit inside the case of a wristwatch. The minute repeater generally comprises two hammers and two gongs, activated on demand by a pushpiece. The hours are sounded with a low tone, the quarters with a sequence of high and low sounds, and the minutes with a high tone. The minute repeater, because of the demands it places on watchmakers, remains one of the most complex watch complications, even today.

It continues to reappear in new and unusual forms, whether combined with a grande sonnerie, designed to offer superior resonance, integrated into an ultra-thin case or displayed on the dial.

Code 11.59 by Audemars Piguet Grande Sonnerie Carillon Supersonnerie  Audemars Piguet

The Grande Sonnerie, grand indeed

In 2020, Audemars Piguet and Patek Philippe gained something in common (apart from their reputations, which date back much further!). They both produced a Grande Sonnerie: the Code 11.59 by Audemars Piguet Grande Sonnerie Carillon Supersonnerie for the former, and the Patek Philippe Grande Sonnerie Reference 6301P for the latter. A Grande Sonnerie sounds the hours and quarters, and can be distinguished from a Petite Sonnerie in that it also sounds the hour before each quarter. Something else these watches have in common is that they both feature three gongs rather than the usual two. To these already fiercely complex creations is added a minute repeater (their third common feature), which strikes the hours, quarters and minutes on demand. Since 1892 and 1924 respectively, Audemars Piguet and Patek Philippe have continued to push the limits of expertise in the field of minute repeaters.

Patek Philippe Grande Sonnerie Reference 6301P  Patek Philippe

Resonance = performance

Launched by Armin Strom in 2019 to mark the tenth anniversary of the brands manufacturing site, the Minute Repeater Resonance is synonymous with precision. Thanks to its enhanced resonance, the watch also offers greater precision  of the order of 15 to 20%  and consequently greater energy efficiency. This is also beneficial for the operation of the minute repeater, whose sound is transmitted optimally through the extremely hard grade 5 titanium case. The generous volume of the case (which has a diameter of 47.7 mm) also improves sound propagation, further showcasing the complication.

Minute Repeater Resonance  Armin Strom

Ultra flat  and pitch perfect

Bulgari, which has set more than its fair share of records for thinness, continues to push our understanding of whats possible. In 2016 the brand introduced an ultra-thin hand-wound mechanical watch with a minute repeater: the Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater. The BVL362 calibre, measuring just 3.12 mm deep, propelled the minute repeater watch into a totally new realm: that of ultra-flat movements. In order to optimise the sound produced by such a slim watch, the resonance from inside the case was amplified by openworking the hour markers, creating tiny sound holes.

Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater  Bulgari

From shadow into light

The Endeavour Concept Minute Repeater Tourbillon by H. Moser & Cie, with its understated dial, might look simple. Appearances can be deceiving, however. This watch is anything but  in fact, its fiendishly complicated. This is clear from the dial, because that is where both complications (which are some of the most complex to achieve...) can be seen: the flying tourbillon at 6 oclock and the minute repeater between 10 and 11 oclock. The gongs are also visible from the dial side, making this technical feat even more astonishing. They had to be placed in a single layer in order to keep the watch within reasonable proportions, and they are curved in order to stay clear of the flying tourbillon. These feats of ingenuity are set against an Electric Blue dial  H. Mosers latest colour.
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President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo Monday left Ghana for NDjamena, Chad, to attend the 7th Session of the Ordinary Summit of the Heads of State of G5 Sahel.



He is attending the Summit in his capacity as Chairperson of the Authority of ECOWAS.



The Summit will deliberate on the progress being made against the ongoing Islamist insurgency in the region.



The President was accompanied by the Minister-designate for Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration, Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey, the Minister-designate for National Security, Albert Kan Dapaah, and officials from the Presidency and the Foreign Ministry.



The President will return to Ghana later on Monday. Vice President, Alhaji Dr Mahamudu Bawumia will act in his stead.

Source: GNA









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Tech giants are already in the news for providing a diverse range of technology services for the military and supplying law enforcement agencies with state-of-the-art facial recognition software.

Now, Amazon, which started as an online bookseller is focusing on security by hiring twenty-six FBI agents for its global security center in Arizona.

The expansion will help in facing new challenges such as:

Counterfeiting issues

Antitrust scrutiny

Work activism pressure

The tech behemoth has hired at least two FBI agents to keep the unions out by monitoring the labor-organizing activity of its employees.

Several former FBI agents like Cindy Wetzstein and Brian Brooks who held responsible posts in the FBI now work with Amazon in its Arizona security facility for developing better security measures.

So, it will come as no surprise that as many as 26 former FBI agents and employees hold key positions in different departments like software development, security division, advisory board, human resources, and so on in the Arizona security operation facility.

While Amazon started hiring FBI agents from the year 2007-2008, it ramped up the recruitment in 2019.

Amazon is one of the largest web hosts worldwide. It has hired ex-FBI agents to prevent attacks and theft on the wide range of merchandise.

While the new hires in the security division monitor employees and track their union activities to avoid pressure from the labor activists.

According to Amazon spokesperson, hiring FBI agents is a natural process to ensure the safety of the buildings and employees during natural disasters or other events posing a threat to security and safety.

But, Amazon is focusing more on tracking the employee activities related to labor activism.

The tech-giant is employing services of specialists to collect and monitor information on organized labor.

It came to public scrutiny when Amazon had to delete job listings after backlash from the labor groups as well as the general public.

The listing included the job listing of intelligence analysis with experience in security as the preferred qualification.

While the spokesperson for the company tried to smoothen the ruffled feathers by indicating the inaccuracy in the job description. The company is still posting jobs with similar requirements for its security division.

Not just Amazon, many tech-giants are monitoring and overcoming threats from perceived opponents by employing experts.

From major financial firms, oil & gas companies, to casinos, many organizations have tapped efficient ex-FBI personnel with ties and capability to track and overcome corporate threats.

For example, Walmart has a centralized system to track employees activities, including their political sentiment and sympathies.

This system allowed getting information regarding protest from demonstrators and squashing it by using combined effort from the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force.

Similarly, Amazon has fended off issues cropping due to unionization with tactics and union-busting strategies with the help of the ex-FBI employees.

It has an internal surveillance apparatus, developed by the known spy agency to detect workers activities.

It remains unclear how far Amazon can succeed in preventing the unionization using the tactics and strategies developed by the ex-FBI specialists.

Currently, the company is facing one of the largest union pushes with more than six thousand employees in the Amazon Birmingham facility voting to form a union.

Many workers may vote in favor of union formations due to the firms abusive work practices.

Many workers are fed up with the grueling work hours with no pay increase, while the company has recorded great profits.
Also, though not discussed in detail in the updated guidelines, the newest treatment with what are known as biologics is heralding new forms of personalized therapy for patients with severe asthma that is not well-controlled by other, albeit cheaper, remedies. Biologics are drugs made from modified molecules from the cells of live organisms designed to target specific disease pathways that culminate in asthma symptoms.

The last 13 years have seen an explosion of new strategies, new concepts, new understanding of mechanism, new drugs and new treatments, Dr. Wechsler said in an interview. In just the last five years, five new drugs have been approved for treating asthma.

The new guidelines can be especially helpful for people being treated for asthma, mild or severe, that is now not adequately controlled. More than half of asthma patients are treated by primary care doctors, with referrals to specialists like pulmonologists or allergists when their condition is severe or doesnt respond well to treatment, said Dr. Michelle M. Cloutier, professor emerita at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine who chaired the expert panel.

Asthma afflicts about 25 million people in the United States, including 5.5 million children. It is not an infection, although the body reacts as if an enemy had attacked it. Rather, asthma is a chronic respiratory disease in people whose airways become inflamed in response to various triggering substances or behaviors. The inflamed airways swell and narrow and the muscles surrounding them tighten, causing a bronchospasm. Unless the bronchospasm is quickly reversed, it can become very difficult to breathe and result in hospitalization or death.

Although people with asthma always have some degree of airway inflammation, they are particularly sensitive to certain factors that can make the inflammation much worse and result in labored breathing. Thus, some people with asthma have environmental allergies, for example, to pollen, animal dander, dust mites, rodents or cockroaches, that when encountered can trigger an asthmatic attack. Others are sensitive to irritants in the air, like tobacco smoke, air pollutants, or substances with strong odors.
Experts are calling for routine CT scans to be offered to smokers and ex-smokers to detect early signs of lung cancer, after a study suggested it could save thousands of lives.

An NHS study has found CT scanning identified 70% of lung cancers at an early stage, the Guardian newspaper reported.

It was described by one specialist as a major breakthrough, as three-quarters of lung cancer cases in England are currently diagnosed at stage three or four, when it is too late for people to be given potentially life-saving treatment.

Lung cancer is the third most common cancer in the UK with nearly 48,000 people diagnosed with the condition every year.

Smokers could benefit (PA)

Findings from the Summit study, run by University College London Hospital NHS trust (UCLH), found 180 cases of lung cancer among 12,100 smokers and those who have quit. Of those, 70% were at stage one and two.

Its really a major breakthrough for lung cancer, Dr Sam Janes, of UCLH, told the Guardian.

Lung cancer has never had anything that enabled us to detect this devastating cancer earlier and offer curative treatment to this number of lung cancer patients.

Its important to highlight how effective CT scanning is. In my lung cancer clinic at UCLH, seven out of 10 people have cancer thats been inoperable, incurable, from the first time they saw a doctor.

Whereas with the cancers that we see with Summit, seven out of 10 are potentially curable, because they were detected earlier.

The findings have prompted experts to call on the Government for routine CT scanning, which the UK Lung Cancer Coalition (UKLCC) believes could reduce the number of men dying by 25%, and 30-40% fewer deaths among women.

Dr Robert Rintoul, chairman of the UKLCC clinical advisory group, said: Now that CT screening for lung cancer has been shown to work, we very much hope that a lung cancer screening programme will be introduced in England.

The Summit study plans to enrol 25,000 people aged between 55 and 77, who are at higher risk of lung and other cancers due to a significant smoking history, from parts of London and the surrounding areas.

Its findings are due to be published in a medical journal later this year.
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Representative Image: A woman shops for bangles at a shop in the Laad Bazaar in Hyderabad (PC-NYT)

A dip in the number of coronavirus cases in the country has been enough to encourage people to move out and indulge in shopping outings, as stores and restaurants are full and hairdressers booked, a Bloomberg report noted.

The turn to almost back to normal is a curiosity, the report said, given that India is the country second-most affected by COVID-19 after the United States, as has logged 10,916,589 total cases with active cases numbering 139,637 as per the Union Health Ministry update on February 15.

India has not seen the virus make a stomping resurgence similar to its devastating second wave in Europe and the US and the death rate has been consistently lowering  something that has emboldened many to take increasingly bolder steps outside their homes.

Follow our LIVE updates on the coronavirus pandemic here

The government has predicted 11 percent economic growth for FY22 stating revival in consumer confidence and other economic indicators.

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

Among those who have benefitted from the renewed demand include Reliance Industries (RIL) which posted a record quarter ended December 2020; and the Aditya Birla Group which reported quarterly profits against losses for the same period in the preceding year.

Further, Hindustan Unilever saw 20 percent jump in Q4 sales, sales of electronics and passenger vehicles have revved up, airline travel has picked up and Indias Business Resumption Index as calculated by Nomura came close to 3.5 percentage points pre-pandemic levels.

Notably, Indias daily cases have not peaked since September 2020 (100,000), new transmissions have petered out by 90 percent and deaths are now 100/day from 1,000/daily; and scientists are puzzled over this steady decline, as worldwide, third and even fourth waves of the virus continue to wreak havoc.

Check here for the latest updates on all COVID-19 vaccines

Epidemiologists have also questioned the Indian governments official numbers, as the country has a tendency to under-report causes of deaths, especially in rural regions. The report however acknowledged that a tapering number of COVID-19 admissions in hospitals emergence rooms suggest the downward trend is legitimate.

Reasons for the vast difference in conditions in India and around the world is unknown  some reasons tossed about include Indias higher population of youth, the countrys tropical climate, and speculation that herd immunity has already been achieved.

But till any concrete proof appears it is also impossible to predict that the status quo is permanent.
New Delhi: Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan revealed India will start administering vaccines to the citizens who are above 50 years of age in March, while addressing the press on Monday (February 15).

The Health Minister applauded the health sectors effort in the war against the COVID-19. He said that despite a nationwide lockdown and unprecedented circumstances, India was able to work on two vaccines.

We will be in a situation to administer vaccines to those above 50 years of age in March, he said. It is crucial that people continue to follow COVID appropriate behaviour which I had called social vaccine, along with real vaccines, he added. He said that no new coronavirus infections were reported in 188 districts in the country during the last seven days.

Addressing the rumors against COVID-19 vaccine, he said, "Not one death reported due to Covid-19 vaccination. If there's death after vaccination, it's being investigated. Even routine side effects have a negligible number. Relevant stakeholders working on post-Covid symptoms."

80-85% frontline workers vaccinated and over 20-25 countries to be availed with vaccines. At least 18-20 vaccines are in preclinical, clinical & advanced stages and are expected in the coming months, he added.

Harsh Vardhan further added, "I believe, if the dream of 'Health for All' is ever to be fulfilled in world, its model will be developed in India. Our holistic approach, ancient medical wisdom, other health facilities & systems collectively will make a model emulatable for the world."

While applauding the efforts of the front-line warriors, he said, Covid strengthened the country's health potential. We turned a crisis into opportunity. From 1 lab to 2,500 labs, we improved. Genome sequencing, which is being talked about now, has been in Indian labs since May-June last year.

The COVID-19 caseload of the nation crossed the 10.9 million mark on Sunday (February 14) with 12,194 new Covid-19 cases and 92 deaths, according to the Union health ministry's COVID-19 dashboard. As per the health ministry, the country has been recording a steady decline in the number of daily deaths since early October.

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Tripoli, Libya (PANA) - Officials from the Libyan Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Government of National Accord (GNA) has met with a delegation from the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to coordinate the reopening of the Egyptian Embassy in Tripoli
Samsung Galaxy F62 just launched in India in the mid-range smartphone segment. At its asking price, it goes up against the likes of the OnePlus Nord that has reigned in this particular segment ever since it debuted in July last year. With the Galaxy F62, Samsung once again looks to grab a piece of the mid-range segment with features such as a massive 7,000mAh battery and 64MP quad-camera array.

OnePlus Nord isnt a slouch either and has aged really well as it offers 5G support, high-refresh-rate display, fluid OxygenOS 10, dual selfie cameras and a faster-charging battery. With that in mind, should you go with the Galaxy F62 or the OnePlus Nord if looking for a phone under Rs 30,000? Lets find out in this specifications and pricing comparison of the two phones.

Samsung Galaxy F62 vs OnePlus Nord: Pricing

The Samsung Galaxy F62 is priced starting at Rs 23,999 for the base variant (6GB RAM + 128GB storage) and Rs 25,999 for the 8GB+128GB variant. On the other hand, the OnePlus Nord is priced starting at Rs 24,999 for the base 6GB+64GB variant, Rs 27,999 for the 8GB+128GB option and Rs 29,999 for the 12GB+256GB storage variant.

Samsung Galaxy F62 vs OnePlus Nord: Design and Display

The Galaxy F62 and the OnePlus Nord, both have a plastic frame but the latter covers it up with a layer of Gorilla Glass 5. The F62 measures 9.5 millimetres in thickness and weighs 218 grams while the OnePlus Nord measures 8.2 millimetres and weighs 184 grams.

Samsung Galaxy F62 features a 6.7-inch Super AMOLED screen with a Full HD+ (2400 x 1080 pixels) resolution and a centre punch-hole cutout for the selfie camera. In contrast, the Nord has a 6.44-inch Full HD+ resolution display with support for 90Hz refresh rate, along with dual punch-hole cutouts for the two front-facing cameras. The AMOLED screen is further topped with a layer of Gorilla Glass 5 for added protection against wear and tear and is HDR10+ certified.

Samsung Galaxy F62 vs OnePlus Nord: Under the hood

Samsung Galaxy F62 is powered by the Exynos 9825 processor with an octa-core CPU clocked at up to 2.73GHz and Mali-G76 GPU. This is paired with upto This is paired with up to 8GB LPDDR4x RAM and up to 128GB UFS 2.1 storage. Moreover, there is an option to expand the storage by adding a microSD card of up to 512GB. It runs on Android 11 based OneUI 3.1 out-of-the-box.

The OnePlus Nord has the Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G chipset at its core with an octa-core CPU and Adreno 620 GPU. The octa-core CPU consists of a Kryo 475 cores with the prime core running at 2.4GHz, performance core running at 2.2GHz and six power-efficient cores clocked at 1.8GHz. This is paired with upto 12GB RAM and 256GB storage options to choose from.

While the Galaxy F62 already runs on the latest version of Android, the Nord is yet to receive an official update to the OxygenOS 11. Both phones have stereo speakers and the Galaxy F62s power-button doubles as a fingerprint reader while the Nord has an in-screen fingerprint optical sensor.

The OnePlus Nord is also future-proof for when the 5G networks are deployed in India but the same cant be said for the Galaxy F62.

Samsung Galaxy F62 vs OnePlus Nord: Cameras

The Galaxy F62 has a quad-camera array on the back with a 64MP primary camera with an f/1.8 aperture, a 12MP ultra-wide-angle camera with 123-degree field of view, a 5MP macro camera and a 5MP depth sensor. The rear cameras can record in 4K at 30FPS and 1080p at 30FPS.

As for the OnePlus Nord, its quad-camera setup is headlined by a 48MP camera with f/1.8 aperture and OIS, an 8MP ultra-wide-angle camera with 119-degree field-of-view, a 5MP depth sensor and a 2MP macro camera. The rear camera array is capable of recording videos in 4K UHD and 1080p at up to 60FPS.

Samsung Galaxy F62 also has a 32MP selfie camera on the front while the Nord has two selfie cameras. Theres a primary 32MP camera along with an 8MP ultra-wide-angle camera with 105-degree field of view.

Samsung Galaxy F62 vs OnePlus Nord: Battery

Samsung has equipped the Galaxy F62 with a large 7,000mAh battery that supports 25W fast charging and reverse charging as well. The OnePlus Nord has 4,115mAh battery at its disposal and it supports 30W fast charging out-of-the-box.
[February 15, 2021] Digital Infrastructure Advisors Ltd: What the Data Centre stakeholder needs to know about overlooked Cyber Security risks already prevalent elsewhere throughout industry

LONDON, Feb. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- For those with a significant stake or role in a Data Centre business, whether it's for their own organisation or for others, here is a burning question: 'Does the Cyber Security for your Data Centre Operational Technology get overlooked because it falls between your IT, Security and Engineering teams?' Throughout industry, Industrial Control Systems (ICS) have long been targeted with Cyber Crime. Now, however, more malicious and sophisticated strains of Malware and Ransomware are specifically targeting Operational Technology (OT) environments. As the Data Centre industry develops, forward-thinking operators are using techniques and approaches typical of more complex industrial facilities to drive innovation. It is time to reclassify the Data Centre Operational Technology (DCOT) environments, ensuring they are treated separately. The risks for Data Centres are growing Data Centre stakeholders should be seriously concerned about the impact of Cyber Attack on their DCOT, an impact which is compounded by a combination of downtime and severe financial hits. Dan Coats, the US director of National Intelligence warned of the danger of a crippling Cyber Attack in a speech in 2019, drawing a parallel with the increased Cyber Chatter detected amongst terrorist groups ahead of the World Trade Centre attack in 2001. "Here we are nearly two decades later, and I'm here to say that the warning lights are blinking red again. Today the digital infrastructureis literally under attack." In the Data Centre Industry, downtime is measured in seconds, minutes and for a serious outage, hours. When it comes to recovery from a Cyber breach, though, it is measured in days, weeks and months  a totally different landscape. Financial impacts are similarly compounded. The Uptime Institute reported that one in ten major outages at a Data Centre costs over 1m, and cited examples of substantially greater financial impact. It is clear, however that the average cost of downtime is dwarfed when we start to look at the costs associated with a Cyber breach. In April 2020, IT services and Data Centre provider Cognizant was hit by a ransomware attack that, it forewarned investors in July, could cost it between $50m and $70m. Data Centre owners in countries such as the UK are mistaken if they think it is really only US companies that are at risk; this is not true. Whilst the US has most attacks and suffers the highest losses, in the UK the average loss was slightly higher than the global average of $3.9m. And research shows that Data Centres are at a particular risk, with the average loss to a technology company being much higher than the average, standing at $5.04m, the fifth most 'at risk' industry after Healthcare, Energy, Financial and Pharma. Mike West, CEO of Digital Infrastructure Advisers, a company specialising in Data Centres asks, "Do you see the Cyber threat being a risk for your customers' or your company's data rather than for you, the building operator? "As a building operator, it's your Operational Technology that is at risk. There are scores of vulnerabilities in and around the Data Centre facility itself, where increasingly clever hackers are able to get in and cause devastation, and where there is grave doubt that you are protected." Mike explains: "Your DCOT comprises all the equipment and services embedded in your building, from your biometric, security and CCTV to your critical power and cooling, Internet of Things (IoT) devices and sensors, fire & life safety systems, remote monitoring tools, building management systems as well as control systems on multiple networks, which have many protocols and platforms such as BacNet, ModBus, SCADA, TCPIP, Distributed Control Systems (DCS), Remote Terminal Units (RTU) and Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC). "These terms are well-known and catered for throughout major industries, but they are still not widely recognised in the world of Data Centres. "The equipment that keeps your building running is very similar, if not the same, as the equipment that keeps a Power Station or car manufacturing plant such as Honda going. "Exactly as in these industries, your building's equipment will be at least partly maintained and serviced by external suppliers. They employ people who come in from outside with laptops, tablets and phones, and log naively into your systems, just doing their jobs. Increasingly, thanks to IoT, they maintain your systems remotely." Mike argues that the Data Centre operator is not only responsible for their own building's security, but are suddenly at the mercy of their security. He says, "You might be right in thinking that this area is beneath your notice, but your own DCOT is bringing a potentially devastating threat right there, beneath your nose." The burgeoning costs of Cyber crime in the Data Centre world Where a ransom demand is made, it is only the start of the financial cost of a Cyber Attack. In the well-documented Equinix case for example, attackers reportedly asked for $4.5m USD, but the additional financial consequence of this attack and the potential unseen long-term effect on its business were much greater. To ransoms and operational recovery costs may be added the severe fines imposed as a result of subsequent regulatory investigation. For example, the EU GDPR sets a maximum fine of 20 million or 4% of annual global turnover  whichever is greater  for infringements. This type of regulation is already extending beyond personal data theft, and considering the impact to safety and disruption to national critical infrastructure. Ou connected world has become a lucrative playground for criminals who can launch attacks on victims in multiple countries and jurisdictions, with little fear of being caught.



Cyber criminals steal an estimated $600 billion per year from governments, companies and individuals, while the overall loss of company revenues over the course of five years from 2019 to 2023 will reach $5.2 trillion. In fact, Cyber crime is one of the most disruptive and economically damaging criminal activities in the world today. Supply chain attacks which include the SME sector

Whilst those in Data Centres are fortunate enough to be working in a growing industry in that Data Centres are now essential to the fabric of society, and one of the foundations of our increasingly digital lives, we must recognise that an attack on the Data Centre infrastructure is an attack on all the businesses it supports, irrespective of the size, scale or location of the facility. This isn't about data security, it's about being a core component of the technology supply chain, which increasingly contains SME's as well as major corporates. Data Centre operators could be forgiven for thinking that it's the larger companies that are at risk of Cyber Attack; this simply is not true. Mid-sized organisations are essential components in any supply chain; they experienced the biggest increase in average breach cost, and smaller organisations had higher than average costs per employee. These are possibly the organisations that have take fewer steps to protect themselves. As an example, the UK MOD's Small and Medium-sized Enterprise Action Plan 2019-2022 aims to spend 25% of its 186b budget away from its 19 Strategic Suppliers, and with SME's, bringing a considerable number of additional players into the Cyber attackers' crosshairs. "The biggest loss to a Data Centre in the end, is that of trust," says Mike West. "If the very company that houses its customers' precious IT assets, has allowed a data breach in its own systems or facility infrastructure, the resultant loss in confidence can be difficult to recover from. With technology companies standing to lose more than the average in terms both of money and reputation, it is not a situation that a responsible stakeholder can ignore." The widely-reported SolarWinds attack clearly demonstrates the impact of a supply chain strike, and how Cyber gangs are becoming more sophisticated in approach as well as in the use of technology. No doubt there is more to come from this incident, because it highlights the disastrous and widespread impact of embedded Cyber infection or hacking at source. Why Data Centres may not be 'the most secure facilities in the world' Whilst some may hide behind the veil of physical security, (certain Data Centres mention being 'the most secure facilities in the world', with sophisticated multi-layer protection zones and high-end systems), ironically the IoT devices used on these networks can be used by Cyber criminals to get access to the broader DCOT network. We are all aware of the almost unthinkably destructive actions a malicious insider could take, but perhaps the real risk is latent, hiding in the code of an electronic IoT device, waiting to be activated, as the hack on the Scheider Triconex Safety systems demonstrates. In this incident, the hackers' software gave them remote control over the plant's safety instrumented systems, designed to defend against life-threatening disasters. As the sophistication of the Data Centre infrastructure develops, and many smart building techniques integrated with control and automation systems are adopted, there is further risk that attackers will use evermore imaginative ways to find a back door even to the most highly secure, so-called 'dark' sites. With so many engineers, from both operator and client teams, entering the facilities with uncontrolled hardware, and the prolific use of IoT devices and out-of-band network facilities on plant and equipment, a clear plan of defence measures have been compromised. Our world is now about novel and new Cyber Attacks and never-before-seen events, and so the landscape has become massively challenging for security teams to defend. With low and slow, hard-to-detect techniques, through to machine speed attacks, where criminals weaponize AI, it is clear that human speed responses are no longer adequate. Cyber criminals are taking an ecosystem approach Cyber crime is becoming evermore lucrative, and we are seeing Cyber gangs operate in concert, using Ransomware-as-a-service from the dark web, to conduct malicious attacks at scale, as the widely publicised case of WannaCry demonstrated; it is clear that traditional security approaches are inadequate. Of all the types of crime, Cyber continues to increase at the fastest rate. According to INTERPOL, as quoted within the World Economic Forum (WEF) Future Series: "'Cybersecurity, emerging technology and systemic risk', is an insight report published in November 2020, citing 'In less than a decade since cybersecurity first featured in the Global Risks report, it has emerged as one of the most important systemic issues for the global economy." Solutions for Data Centres to consider The WEF report comes to three conclusions, the third of which is Leadership action: "Business leaders need the ability to plan more strategically for emerging risk, so they can ensure that the organisations delivering the most critical infrastructures do not suffer failures that are catastrophic for societies." Mike West agrees. "Given the Data Centre industry is a strategic part of the world's technology infrastructure, and Industry has demonstrated high levels of collaboration tackling key challenges, there is no doubt that Cyber resilience and security are a shared responsibility that involves everyone and, as such, require an ongoing holistic, systematic and coordinated approach." Decide where the responsibility lies for the Cyber risk at DCOT level Because the infrastructure in a Data Centre is focused on keeping the computers going, there is usually little or no focus on the security around the Operational Technology. Mike West asks: "Whose responsibility are these networks? Is it the engineering department because it's to do with the mechanics of the building? Is it the IT department because it's got Cyber written on it? Or is it security, because they are in charge of protecting the building? This question must be answered at the top, where the key stakeholders sit. "It's an abnormal, overlooked risk and if you are leading a Data Centre business, it's time you got involved. You need to ensure it's clear where the overall responsibility for your systematic, coordinated approach lies." Don't be tempted to kick this can down the road The threats to a Data Centre business via its Operational Technology is urgent, and whilst it's understandable to consider this as a problem that can be dealt with 'later', it is alive and ready to kick right now. Mike West says, "We would argue that Data Centres are amongst the most critical infrastructures in society, because the data held in these facilities is increasingly vital to the way communities run. Tomorrow is too late to start looking at the risk to DCOT, which underpins the facilities." Data Centres are used to support utilities, hospitals & healthcare, food manufacturers, the logistics and transport industries, education, defence and communications  all examples of key sectors that affect the very fabric of how the world runs. Consider specialist DCOT Cyber protection Mike West has spent his career in Data Centres, and his company, Digital Infrastructure Advisors, has a unique awareness of where and how this new threat can devastate not only the Data Centre business, but also that of its customers. The organisation's deep knowledge of how Data Centres are built, how they operate and how they are maintained means that they can see things that most people overlook. Its Data Centre advisory and technical services extend to specific Cyber services including compliance, audit, testing and technology solutions. An opportunity to take protective action against Cyber in the DCOT Digital Infrastructure Advisors has partnered with one of the world's most powerful providers of Cyber AI security, and the creator of Autonomous Response Technology, Darktrace. Because Darktrace's AI technology doesn't look at yesterday's attack to predict that of tomorrow, it has the unique ability to find potential threats that have never been seen before. Every three seconds, Darktrace AI fights back against a Cyber-threat, preventing it from causing damage. With Digital Infrastructure Advisors' intimate knowledge of the potential risks to Data Centres and specifically their Operational Technology, the partnership between the two organisations is a powerful ally to the Data Centre stakeholder. The Darktrace technology with Digital Infrastructure Advisors' insight is uniquely positioned to support both the Industrial and DCOT environments as well as corporate networks including cloud, SaaS and email, providing a single unified platform to protect 'every corner of the network' for Data Centre business from Cyber threat. Case Study: Protection against one of the world's most notorious Cyber Attackers Shamoon is a highly destructive malware, which has been associated with the interests of the Iranian state. Shamoon 3 is so called because it seems to be a new version of the malware. At a global energy company, Darktrace's Industrial Immune system detected Shamoon 3 in its earliest stages, flagging the threat to the security team as soon as it detected the initial intrusion. Read more about this incident, and the indicators of compromise that most likely represent lateral movement activity in the weeks prior to the 'detonation'. Proof of value to the Data Centre As a way of enabling organisations to carry out due diligence on this collaborative solution, Digital Infrastructure Advisors and Darktrace have developed a two-step 'Proof of Value' opportunity, for no financial outlay to the Data Centre operator. Because of the self-learning nature of the technology, there is very little configuration needed, and it may be set up in under one hour. Virtual presentation to all relevant personnel in the Data Centre organisation

- This includes the opportunity for stakeholders to interrogate the solution

- This includes the opportunity for stakeholders to interrogate the solution Set of reports on the participating Data Centre's network, after a 30-day trial of the solution

Reports include identification of vulnerabilities

No financial outlay to the Data Centre operator To set up the initial virtual presentation of around an hour, please contact mike.west@dia.ltd or call +44 (0) 7768 557 191. https://www.digitalinfrastructureadvisors.com

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By Chandini Monnappa and Rupam Jain

BENGALURU (Reuters) - Indian politicians and activists on Monday condemned the arrest of a 22-year-old climate campaigner accused of sedition for helping edit an online document that Sweden's Greta Thunberg had promoted in support of farmers protesting in the country.

Thunberg had shared a "toolkit" or an action plan on Twitter which listed ways to help Indian farmers, who have been protesting agricultural reforms https://www.reuters.com/article/us-india-farms-protests-idUSKBN2A30QI they fear will ruin their livelihoods.

Over the weekend, police brought Disha Ravi, a leader of the Indian arm of Thunberg's climate crisis-related Fridays for Future movement, to the capital from her home in the southern city of Bengaluru to question her. Thunberg said she had no comment on the detention of Ravi.

Police said the arrest was part of an investigation into how a group of farmers stormed the historic Red Fort on the occasion of India's republic day last month.

"The main aim of the 'toolkit' was to create misinformation and disaffection against the lawfully enacted government," Delhi police official Prem Nath told reporters.

Police have registered a case of sedition and criminal conspiracy. The colonial-era sedition law carries a penalty of life sentence.

"The toolkit sought to artificially amplify fake news through various tweets which they have created in the form of a tweet bank. And they sought the public to participate in the action on Jan 26 that was the Republic Day of India," Nath said.

The crackdown comes as Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government faces allegations it is suppressing dissent. The government denies the charge and says people are free to protest if it is done peacefully.

Thousands of farmers overwhelmed police and reached the Red Fort complex in the old quarter of Delhi last month after tearing down barricades and driving tractors through roadblocks.

Story continues

Police said they were also looking to detain two associates of Ravi in a widening probe.

FEAR

Ravi could not be reached while in custody and her family was not immediately available for comment. Her tight circle of friends in Bengaluru said they were terrified over what she was going through and for themselves in case they will be dragged into the probe.

Ravi worked for a vegan food company in the city and was enthusiastic about environmental issues, her friends said, speaking on condition that they be not identified. On social media, her posts relate to climate change, helping animals and her love of Harry Potter books.

"The Indian state must be standing on very shaky foundations if Disha Ravi, a 22 year old student of Mount Carmel college and a climate activist, has become a threat to the nation," P.Chidambaram, a leader of the main opposition Congress opposition said.

A group of people gathered in Bengaluru and held placards seeking her release.

Activists have planned more protests across the country over the next few days and the hashtag #IndiabeingSilenced was trending on Twitter.

On Sunday, a Delhi court ordered that Ravi be held in police custody for five days.

"This is their way of trying to scare away youngsters from raising their voice about anything. This sends a message to all young people out there that, you know, shut up and stay at home or this is what is going to happen to you," said Leo Saldanha, a member of the Environment Support Group in Bengaluru.

Bhavreen Kandhari, a member of Thunberg's movement in India, said the organisation was awaiting clarity from the police before making any statement.

(Additional reporting by Nivedita Bhattacharjee and Samuel Rajkumar in Bengaluru, Devjyot Ghoshal and Mayank Bharadwaj in New Delhi, Colm Fulton in Stockholm; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Bernadette Baum)
Mr. Modis decision to demonetize big denomination currencies has cast a spell of black magic on the entire political opposition, and even the high-minded and hypocritical parties, have been forced into a stance they would not have taken in normal times.

Completely distraught, they seem to have dropped their guard. Who could have expected them to oppose and thus be perceived by their constituents, to be openly in support of Black Money? The fact that UP elections are just round the corner did not help matters much. The violent opposition by all political parties to demonetization is not only due to the fact that it has immobilized the vast funds of black money parked with them; they suspect a larger political mischief to be at work. Not only have they been robbed of their money they have also been robbed of their agenda.

To assess the full impact of this decision let us first briefly summarize the nature of electoral politics as it has been practiced in India for quite some time. Electoral politics involves inflaming of passions to boiling point around elections which are occasions for trial of strength; voting becomes an act of vendetta. The mutual suspicion between the various factions and group formations, backward vs. forward castes, Dalits vs. Hindus, Hindus vs. Muslims - the entire population is worked up to a feverish pitch, only to cool down after normalcy returns.

The concept of the enemy has been vital to the whole electoral exercise. With the coming of the so called Hindutva government, it has become particularly bitter and vicious. Be it also said that both sides have shown equal zest to slug it out. Now we have strategists like Prashant Kishore, the wonder boy who has his ears close to the ground, who works with his team of hundreds of grass root workers who report the mood and the changing affiliations of the voters in every village on a real-time basis. With their cool heads and colder hearts these strategists apply principles of management on how best to fragment the society and devise winning combination of fractions.

As we all know, Mr. Modi has a troubled, problematic record as the CM of Gujarat. Yet his smooth and swift rise from untouchability to respectability has been watched with dismay, even horror, by those who feel threatened by it. The only weapon in their armoury has been to rake up the sediment of his historical past, and keep it alive as a never-fading frame of reference for all his present deeds and decisions. They feel that this move liberates Mr. Modi from the secularism-Hindutva binary trap where he has been cabined and confined. It has created a clear divergence of interest between two groups, one very large and the other very small. The very large group threatens to leapfrog the barriers created and nurtured by political enterprise as homogenous group rooting for Modi. How can you tether the eradication of black money programme to a communalist or any other divisive agenda? Once you step out of the realm of political concerns into the realm of the economic, you leave your pre-modern competitors clueless, breathless and bereft of ideas. This proposal, whatever its outcome, has captivated the hearts and minds of Indian people and as of now it promises to bring economic democracy one step nearer. Should it work, it would become a game changer.

Not only his detractors but his main support base of hard core Hindutva needs to be both wary and worried, because should he choose to break loose, he will have enough countervailing popular support to take the plunge. Mr. Modi is a populist spellbinder and a clever fabulist. His opponents say he is a conman, which isnt such a bad thing after all, for going places in politics today. For all you know, driving the agenda of anti-corruption, and the broad based support that it is likely to arouse, he may tap into that same area of human awareness which converts common clay into gold.

Fantasizing? In our times when everything is available except hope, fantasizing is a natural avenue of escape!

India Today magazine once referred to Manoje Nath, a 1973-batch IPS officer, as being fiercely independent, honest, and upright. Besides his numerous official reports on various issues exposing corruption in the bureaucracy in Bihar, Nath is also a writer extraordinaire expressing his thoughts on subjects ranging from science fiction to the effects of globalization. His sense of humor was evident through his extremely popular series named "Gulliver in Patiliputra" and "Modest Proposals" that were published in the local newspapers.
Steve Coogan was pictured on the set of new ITV drama about the murder of Stephen Lawrence for the first time on Monday.

The actor, 55, held up a white face mask against his nose and mouth as he stepped out with crew members in Epping High Street for the three-part sequel to the ground-breaking 1999 drama, The Murder Of Stephen Lawrence.

Screen star Steve is playing the role of DCI Clive Driscoll - who put together an investigation that secured the convictions of two members of the gang who committed the death of 18-year-old Stephen on the evening of 22 April 1993.

Filming gets underway: Steve Coogan was pictured on the set of new ITV drama about the murder of Stephen Lawrence for the first time on Monday

The Stan & Ollie actor was dressed in a grey suit, a crisp shirt and a striped tie as he took a brief break in between takes.

Wrapping up against the chilly climes, the thespian rounded off his appearance with a thick black coat.

Steve joins fellow TV stars Hugh Quarshie and Sharlene Whyte in the programme titled Stephen.

The series has been endorsed by the murdered teen's parents Doreen and Neville Lawrence, played in the 1999 original by Marianne Jean-Baptiste and Hugh respectively.

Staying safe: The actor, 55, held up a white face mask against his nose and mouth as he stepped out with crew members in Epping High Street amid the coronavirus pandemic

Portrayal: The screen star is playing the role of DCI Clive Driscoll (pictured) - who secured the convictions of two members of the gang who committed the death of the 18-year-old in 1993

The drama will portray events starting from 2006, 13 years after his death in a racially motivated attack whilst waiting for a bus in Well Hall Road, Eltham.

While Hugh, 66, will reprise his role as Neville, We Hunt Together star Sharlene will take on the role of Doreen in the new drama.

Richie Campbell, Jordan Myrie, Sian Brooke and Adil Ray will also take roles in the production.

Executive producer Mark Redhead said: 'It's a privilege to be working with Doreen and Neville Lawrence to tell this chapter of the story of their campaign for justice for Stephen. It's a story that moves and inspires and is ever more resonant and relevant today.'

Keeping busy: The Stan & Ollie actor was dressed in a grey suit, a crisp shirt and a striped tie as he took a brief break in between takes

Wrapping up against the chilly climes: The thespian rounded off his appearance with a thick black coat

Continuation: The drama will portray events starting from 2006, 13 years after the racially motivated attack which took place as Stephen (pictured) waited for a bus in Eltham

Director Alrick Riley added: 'The case of Stephen Lawrence is a testament to the fortitude, persistence and determination of the Lawrence family. These films will chart the successes, disappointments and the emotional toll they endured.

'It's also the story of Clive Driscoll, the lead detective, who managed to forge a friendship with the Lawrence's over the years it took to achieve two convictions. It's an honour to have the opportunity to tell their story.'

Even though the Lawrences knew the identity of their son's killers, the original investigation failed to convict those responsible.

Their extraordinary campaign for justice led to a public inquiry which branded Metropolitan Police institutionally racist and brought about sweeping changes in the law and police practices and transformed thinking and understanding of racial inequality in the UK.

Sequel: The Murder Of Stephen Lawrence won a BAFTA for Best Single Drama (Hugh Quarshie as Neville Lawrence and Marianne Jean-Baptiste as Doreen Lawrence in the 1999 drama)

Yet six years on from the Inquiry no progress had been made into the case.

The drama tells the story of the ongoing struggle by Doreen and Neville to achieve justice with DCI Driscoll.

Producer Madonna Baptiste said: 'The Lawrences' campaign for justice totally transformed attitudes to race and equality in the UK and it's an honour to be able to help tell what is an untold chapter in their story.

'Current events only highlight how relevant and important Stephen's case remains and it is such a privilege to work with Hattrick, Frank and Joe Cottrell-Boyce, Alrick Riley and our amazing cast to bring this important story to screen.'

Paul Greengrass, award winning screenwriter and director, who wrote and directed The Murder Of Stephen Lawrence in 1999, will also serve as an Executive Producer, as will Line Of Duty's Jed Mercurio.

Fight for justice: Doreen and Neville's campaign for justice led to a public inquiry which branded Metropolitan Police institutionally racist (pictured in 2018)

Stephen's mother said of commission back in July: 'I am aware that the experience of police racism that we suffered as a family has been the experience of many in the UK.

'I hope that the film and the drama which has been commissioned will provide some insight into what we went through and give some hope to others that justice can eventually prevail.'

His father added: 'I welcome the announcement of this new TV series by ITV, made with members of the same team who wrote and produced the 1999 original drama.

'That first film was important in telling Stephen's story. It is important that the next part of the story is told, particularly at a time when, thanks to the Black Lives Matter campaign, concerns around institutional racism are so prominent.

'The recent BLM protests have served to remind people that black men and women continue to be subjected to racially motivated attacks. It was true when Stephen was killed and it still happens.

'It has always been my view that the most powerful response to racism is non-violent resistance and I am heartened to see people from all backgrounds who have come together peacefully across the country to show they will not tolerate racist attitudes. I hope this new film will further help raise awareness.'

The original drama won a BAFTA when it originally aired in 1999.

Neville and Doreen fought for justice after charges against her son's killers were at first dropped, with Nelson Mandela even meeting Doreen in London following the murder.

Stephen's death, and the controversial police investigation, became a watershed moment in British race relations and led to the Metropolitan Police being publicly damned as 'institutionally racist'.

It would be four years before an inquest was held into Stephen's death, when a jury returned a verdict of unlawful killing in a completely unprovoked, racist attack.

The gang of five suspects all refused to answer any questions at the inquest, and still the police seemed powerless to prosecute.

Front page: The Mail's front page in 1997 accuses Gary Dobson, Neil Acourt, Jamie Acourt, Luke Knight and David Norris of the killing of Stephen

Determined not to let the five escape scot-free, the Mail took an unprecedented step.

Their pictures were published on the front page, on 14 February, 1997, under the headline: 'MURDERERS. The Mail accuses these men of killing. If we are wrong, let them sue us.'

Two of the five accused by the Mail, Gary Dobson and David Norris, stood trial for Stephen's murder in 2011, following a 'cold case' review, and in the light of 'new and substantial evidence', they were found guilty and jailed for life.

Norris had been convicted and jailed with another of the five, Neil Acourt, for racially aggravated harassment, in another case.
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Biden Issues Emergency Declaration for Texas Amid Severe Winter Weather

President Joe Biden on Feb. 14 approved an emergency declaration for the state of Texas in response to the severe winter weather throughout the state that began on Feb. 11 and threatens widespread power outages.

The president responded to requests for federal assistance from Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Sen. Ted Cruz, and Sen. John Cornyn, ordering the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to supplement state and local response efforts.

The emergency declaration covers all 254 counties in the state.

The action follows the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the nonprofit organization that operates the states power grid, entered its highest alert level overnight Feb. 14 into Feb. 15 and has begun rolling blackouts to conserve power during this harsh winter storm.

Cruz said on Feb. 14 that more than 23,000 Texans had already experienced a loss of power.

We are experiencing record-breaking electric demand due to the extreme cold temperatures that have gripped Texas, ERCOT CEO Bill Magness said in a statement on Feb. 14. At the same time, we are dealing with higher-than-normal generation outages due to frozen wind turbines and limited natural gas supplies available to generating units. We are asking Texans to take some simple, safe steps to lower their energy use during this time.

Dan Woodfin, ERCOTs senior director of system operations, said that about half of West Texass wind turbine capacity (25,000 megawatts) was iced out on Feb. 14. Over the past decade, wind-generated power has gradually increased to overtake coal-generated power. In 2020, 23 percent of the energy supplied to the states grid was wind-generated.

Woodfin said the organization expects it will need to go into emergency operations until Feb. 16. It asked consumers and businesses to reduce their electricity consumption where possible until then.

During this fairly unprecedented cold weather event across the entire state, electric demand is expected to exceed our previous winter peak record set in January of 2018 by up to 10,000 megawatts, Woodfin said, The Texas Tribune reported. In fact, the peak demand on  [Feb. 16] is currently forecasted to meet or exceed our all time summer peak demand of 74,820 megawatts.

Woodfin noted that if demand for electricity is close to reaching its capacity, ERCOT can declare a level-one, level-two, or level-three energy emergency alert (EEA), which will see it tap into power reserves as well as allow it to import electricity from other regions and request extra power from transmission companies, according to the news outlet.

If the additional resources available during an EEA [are] still not sufficient to balance generation and load, and we still dont have enough resources to serve the demand, then we could have to implement whats called rotating outages  so that weve got enough resources to cover whats whats left, he said.

Bidens emergency declaration will ensure that protective measures are in place for mass care, and sheltering and direct assistance will be provided at 75 percent federal funding, according to a White House statement.

President Joe Biden speaks during a meeting with a bipartisan group of governors and mayors on his COVID-19 relief plan, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on Feb.12, 2021. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

Abbott on Feb. 12 had warned Texans to brace for a winter storm unprecedented in Texas history as he declared a disaster for the state. He urged Texans to reduce their energy usage as much as possible in order to conserve power.

Every part of the state will face freezing conditions over the coming days, and I urge all Texans to remain vigilant against the extremely harsh weather that is coming, Abbott said in a statement. Stay off the roads, take conscious steps to conserve energy, and avoid dangerous practices like bringing generators indoors or heating homes with ovens or stovetops. Our emergency response to this winter weather requires a collective approach between state agencies, local officials, and Texans throughout our communities to ensure the safety and security of the Lone Star State.

ERCOT, in its release, suggested that residents set their thermostats to 68 degrees or lower where possible, close shades and blinds to reduce the amount of heat lost through windows, turn off and unplug nonessential lights and appliances, and to avoid using large appliances such as ovens and washing machines.

Preparations to protect life and property should be rushed to completion, the National Weather Service said in an alert for parts of Southeast Texas. Prepare for power outages and have non-perishable food and water on hand. Do not travel unless it is an emergency. If you must travel, keep an extra blanket, flashlight, food, and water in your vehicle, in case you become stranded.
Good morning, North State. Here's what you need to know to start your day on Feb. 15.

Rate of new virus infections falling, but deaths remain high

Coronavirus deaths continue to climb in California, despite drops in the rate of new infections and hospitalizations. On Sunday, California reported another 408 deaths, bringing the total since the outbreak began to more than 47,000  the highest in the nation. Despite the grim death count, health officials are confident that we are emerging from the worst surge of the pandemic.

California GOP pumps $125K into recall against Gov. Newsom

The California Republican Party is giving $125,000 to the campaign aimed at recalling Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom. The infusion of cash comes at a critical time for organizers, who are required to collect 1.5 million valid petition signatures by mid-March to qualify the proposal for the ballot. The funds will go toward hiring workers to gather signatures instead of volunteers.

Congress' Covid relief negotiations: Stimulus talks get into full swing

In Washington, Democrats are now turning to COVID-19 relief, writing up details for a vote next week. Their proposal includes billions for schools, which the CDC says should be spent on ventilation. The agency says that, plus wearing masks, and vaccinating teachers, should get kids safely back to class.

Crews attack Monday morning fire

A house fire broke out early Monday in Oroville. It happened in the area of Baldwin and Yard St. Oroville dispatch says the call came in around 4:10 a.m. Action News Now is working to learn more.

Redding police looking for suspect in bank lobby break-in

Police are searching for a suspect in Sundays attempted break-in at the U.S. bank on Placer and Pine St. in downtown Redding. A witness reported a white male shattered the front glass doors then entered the bank. Officers say the bank was closed when the suspect broke the front door but the man was not able to make entry and no one was hurt. If you have information, call Redding Police. The suspect was described as a white male, wearing a black hoodie, tan pants, and a black neck gaiter.
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.
Updated at 1:52 p.m.:

Xcel Energy and electric co-ops and municipal utilities that purchase energy from the companys power plants will now start service interruptions.

Xcel Energy made the announcement just before 1 p.m. Monday.

The company will interrupt power to pre-selected electric circuits for up to one hour at a time. More than one service interruption is possible.

Reporting service disruptions during these controlled outage events is not necessary.

Customers who experience service outages for longer than one hour should call 1(800)895-1999, or report the outage at xcelenergy.com or through the Xcel Energy customer app.

The Southwest Power Pool declared a Level 3 Energy Emergency Alert at 10:08 a.m. Monday.

In our history as a grid operator, this is an unprecedented event and marks the first time SPP has ever had to call for controlled interruptions of service, said Lanny Nickell, executive vice president and chief operating officer of SPP, in a news release. Its a last resort that we understand puts a burden on our member utilities and the customers they serve, but its a step were consciously taking to prevent circumstances from getting worse, which could result in uncontrolled outages of even greater magnitude.

---

Regional energy companies are urging customers to conserve electricity. The winter storm thats gripped the entire state of Texas is overloading the power grid.

The Southwest Power Pool (SPP) declared an Energy Emergency Alert Level 2 at 7:22 a.m. Monday prompting its member companies, which include electric companies across the South Plains, to issue public appeals for energy conservation. SPP was mandated by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is a nonprofit regional transmission organization that oversees the bulk electric grid across its region, which includes Texas.

The level 2 alert is the second of three energy emergency alert levels. The third level would prompt controlled service interruptions.

The SPP has been encouraging energy conservation since Feb. 9 and declared a Level 1 alert on Sunday morning. Thats what Xcel Energy and area electric companies have been doing.

Xcel Energy issued an upgrade in its own energy alert around 9:15 a.m. Monday morning. The company has been urging its customers to conserve electricity.

SPP and Xcel Energy declare an Energy Alert only when a reduction in electricity use is urgently needed to maintain the continuity of the electricity system and service to customers, reads a news release from Xcel Energy.

David Hudson, president of Xcel Energy  New Mexico, Texas, asks that customers turn off lights and appliances unless it would be detrimental to their health.

Its noted that Xcel Energy is doing what it can to meet the increased demands for electricity. The company noted that its: bringing as many power plant generating units online as possible; buying electricity from other utilities; reducing electricity use across its facilities; interrupting power to industrial and agricultural customers who signed up for lower interruptible rates; and is asking commercial and industrial customers to curb energy use.

We take our responsibility to supply energy to our customers very seriously, and we declared this Energy Alert only after exhausting all other options, Hudson said.

Heres how the company says customers can help conservation efforts:

Set thermostats to 68 degrees or lower.

Dont use electrical appliances like dishwashers, washing machines, clothes dryers, vacuum cleaners, etc.

Put off work tasks that would demand electricity, like use of power tools or maintenance equipment.

Turn off TVs and other electronic items if possible.

Turn off unnecessary lighting.

According to the SPP, operating conditions are expected to tighten over the next several days.

National Weather Service data shows parts of the region have received anywhere between 2 to 6 inches of snow. An estimated 2 inches have been reported in Plainview over the last 72 hours with cities to the north and to west reporting as much as 4 to 6 inches as of 6 a.m. Monday.

The seven-day NWS forecast for Plainview shows mostly sunny weather expected throughout the rest of today (Monday) with more snow expected Tuesday (50% chance) and Wednesday (30% chance) before more anticipated sunny weather on Thursday.

Temperatures are anticipated to reach a high of 15 degrees with a low of 1 degree Monday, a high of 25 degrees with a low of 6 degrees on Tuesday, a high of 17 degrees with a low of 5 degrees on Wednesday and a high of 28 degrees with a low of 11 degrees on Thursday. Temperatures are expected to climb into the upper 40s and 50s by the weekend.
Dubai Airport saw the coronavirus pandemic push passenger traffic down by an unprecedented 70 per cent in 2020 compared to the previous year, its CEO announced Monday, even as the airport held onto its prized title as the world's busiest for travel.

While the key east-west transit point started to see an uptick in traffic after long-haul carrier Emirates resumed its routes last summer, the airport's 2020 passenger load of 25.9 million is still a trickle compared to 2019.

Airlines slashed their schedules and flights declined by more than 50 per cent with less than 80 per cent of seats filled.

In the past year, we have witnessed the most difficult circumstances the travel industry has ever faced, said Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports, adding that the 2020 figures are reflective of that testing environment, but also come with an element of hope and confidence.

For months as the travel industry collapsed worldwide, Dubai's massive airport, which saw 86.4 million passengers in 2019, became a ghost-town of shuttered shops.

But recovery gained momentum in December as the city promoted itself as a pandemic-friendly vacation spot for tourists fleeing tough restrictions back home.

In December alone, passenger volumes surpassed industry expectations at 2.19 million, the airport said.

Israelis flocked to the United Arab Emirates after a breakthrough normalisation deal and lockdown-weary travellers poured in to celebrate the holidays and New Year's Eve at crowded bars and luxury hotels.

Underpinning Dubai's reopening since last July has been an aggressive coronavirus testing campaign, with visitors welcome from anywhere as long as they get tested on arrival and in many cases before departure.

Now, Griffiths said, the airport is betting on a swift rollout of coronavirus vaccines to encourage more people to get on a plane, along with contactless and thermal imaging technology. The UAE has launched the world's second-fastest coronavirus vaccination drive, with 50 doses administered per 100 residents as of Monday.

Despite signs of life, and vaccines offering a glimmer of hope, the industry's outlook remains uncertain. Although overall demand is expected to rise this year, airlines are showing caution on routes. Wide-body jets used for long-haul flights, like Emirates' iconic fleet of double-decker Airbus A380s, stand idle.

Vaccination campaigns have sputtered worldwide and concerns have risen over more transmissible virus variants. Ever-changing quarantine requirements across the world have thrown itineraries into disarray.

Meanwhile, the UAE is struggling with a major surge in coronavirus cases, prompting countries to halt flights to Dubai and the city's government to impose restrictions that may disrupt its economy.

The United Kingdom banned all direct flights to Dubai last month, freezing the world's busiest international air route. London was ranked as the top destination city for Dubai's airport last year, with 1.15 million customers.

Dubai International Airport first surpassed London Heathrow as the world's busiest airport for international traffic in 2014. It has retained the crown ever since, with some 90 airlines flying into the commercial entrepot. Heathrow, hit hard by the pandemic, said it was overtaken as Europe's busiest hub by Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris last year.

For Dubai, a sheikhdom of skyscrapers in the UAE, the resumption of long-haul is built deeply into its business interest. Emirates remains the linchpin of the wider empire known as Dubai Inc., an interlocking series of businesses owned by the city-state.

(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.)

Infrastructure major Kalpataru Ltd (KPTL) has posted more than two-fold jump in consolidated net profit to Rs 308 crore for the December quarter.

The company said its revenue grew by 11 per cent year-on-year to Rs 3,501 crore in Q3 FY21 while core earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) stood at Rs 383 crore with margin of 10.9 per cent.

Significantly, KPTL's standalone net debt declined by 39 per cent to Rs 612 crore and consolidated net debt by 36 per cent to Rs 2,343 crore as December 31, 2020 due to better collections and efficient working capital management.

The company's order book stands at Rs 27,532 crore. The board of directors has recommended a dividend of Rs 8.50 per share (that is 425 per cent) for face value of Rs 2 per share.

KPTL's wholly-owned subsidiary in Brazil recently has signed a definitive agreement to acquire controlling stake of 51 per cent in Fasttel Engenharia Ltda for 8.8 million dollars (about Rs 64 crore)."The acquisition of Fasttel in Brazil is in line with our strategy to strengthen our core EPC business and becoming local in few geographies," said Managing Director and CEO Manish Mohnot.

is one of the largest and fastest growing specialised EPC from India engaged in & distribution, oil & gas pipeline, railways, infrastructure development, civil contracting and warehousing & logistics business with a strong international presence in & distribution.

The company is currently executing several contracts in India, Africa, Europe, Middle East, CIS, SAARC and Far East.

(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.)
Massey Cancer Center director Robert Winn, left, was one of the first seven at VCU Health to receive the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. Credit: Kevin Morley, University Marketing

Millions of people have received COVID-19 vaccines in the United States, but the information can be confusing. Johnson & Johnson is seeking emergency use authorization for its vaccine from the Food and Drug Administration. If approved, it would be the third available in the United States, joining vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer.

VCU News spoke with Michael Stevens, M.D., associate chair of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, about the differences between the vaccines and the benefits of the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Stevens' overall message was that people should get vaccinated as soon as the option is available to themno matter what type of vaccine they are offered.

What is the difference between how the Johnson & Johnson vaccine works and the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines?

The big difference is that the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines use mRNA technology. mRNA is essentially a little piece of code that is taken into your cell, and your cell's assembly plant, the ribosome, translates that into a little piece of the spike protein for COVID-19. Your body recognizes that and develops an immune response. It's almost like a little blueprint for your cells. It can't make you sick. It doesn't give you COVID-19 because it doesn't have the virus in it. It just tells your cells what to do.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine uses a harmless virus. It's a virus, but it can't replicate. The virus delivers a gene that carries the blueprint of the spike protein SARS-COV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. It's essentially delivering that genetic information to your ribosome, which subsequently makes the spike protein. It is a more traditional vaccine approach. The ultimate difference is the way that blueprint is delivered to your cells.

Does the difference between the two technologies make it easier to administer?

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is much more like a regular vaccine and is much easier to distribute and maintain. That has huge implications for rural areas of the country. Those areas might not have the ability to keep the mRNA vaccines at super cold temperatures.

Aren't cold storage and stability some of the reasons the rollout of the vaccine has been a challenge?

We have the cold chain capacity in a lot of the U.S. to get those mRNA vaccines out, but it can be a challenge in rural areas. When you start talking about a vaccine that is more stable and only involves a single shot, this is great news. The easier it is to give, the more people we are going to vaccinate in the U.S. But this is also true internationally where delivering a tricky mRNA vaccine can be a challenge in some areas due to the cold chain requirements.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine was found to be less effective than the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. What are your thoughts regarding that?

We have really done ourselves a disservice with how wildly effective the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are. No one is going to say they don't want a highly effective vaccine. We are all grateful, but at the start of the pandemic if you said you were going to produce a 60% effective vaccine, that would have been beyond most people's wildest dreams. Compare that to the flu [vaccine], which can be 50% to 60% effective some years.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine was found to be 72% effective at preventing moderate to severe cases of COVID-19. Across the board, it was around 66%. I think part of the reason is because it was studied later in the pandemic. Now there are more of these variants out there. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine was less effective in South Africa where one of the variants has appeared. It was 57% in South Africa. I think if you were to test the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines now, they might be less effective because of the variants.

Isn't one of the main advantages of a vaccine like Johnson & Johnson's that you are less likely to get severely sick from COVID-19?

In the study population of almost 44,000 people, some of who received a placebo and didn't get the vaccine, it was 85% effective in preventing hospitalizations and death across all regions. Even if the vaccine wasn't 100% effective at preventing disease, it looks like it reduces severe disease. That is really what you want from a vaccine.

Can people who have gotten the vaccine still transmit it?

We don't know, but you have to figure if someone has less virus, they are less ill, they might not transmit it as effectively, which could slow down the number of additional cases. That is really the idea with a vaccine, but nobody knows that for sure. That is the hope.

There will still be people who get sick, especially since there are so many cases. People are still going to need to wear masks and socially distance. It's not a passport to go back to normal living. If you are, in theory, one of the 5% who got the Pfizer vaccine [and still got COVID-19], you could still transmit the virus to people, and they could get super sick.

Aren't there some signs that mass vaccination slows the spread?

Places like Israel have had a very successful vaccine campaign and are starting to shows sign that the spread can be reduced before we hit herd immunity of 70% to 90%. Nursing homes are also an example.

When do you think the Johnson & Johnson vaccine might be available in the U.S.?

The federal government has a deal with Johnson & Johnson to buy about 100 million doses of vaccine. The hope is that they can do that by June.  The Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee plans to meet Feb. 26 to review and discuss [Johnson & Johnson's emergency use authorization] request. Any FDA approval would have to come after a recommendation from the committee. As a point of reference, the FDA approved the special use authorization for the Moderna vaccine the day after the committee met. You might see people getting the [Johnson & Johnson] vaccine in early March if everything goes well.

Will that mean people will be able to choose which vaccine to get?

We are not there yet. That will not be possible in the short term. I would say get what you can get when something becomes available to you. I really don't think people should wait. If you have access to get any vaccine, you should get it.  Even if it doesn't completely prevent it, you are much less likely to have a severe disease and die. Maybe you are just at home and feel terrible (as opposed to having to be admitted to the hospital with low oxygen). [Hospitals and clinics] are going to be limited in the short term on what they can provide folks.

Could there be a more strategic approach on who gets which vaccine?

Perhaps the Moderna and Pfizer ones will be targeted at high-risk populations like older people and people with co-morbidities. We don't know. Maybe people down the list like younger people will be offered the Johnson & Johnson vaccine if it becomes available. That all still needs to be sorted out. The bottom line for the general public is get what you can get when you can get it. The vaccine, from a population level, will help to start to get a handle on the pandemic. The vaccine should prevent the disease from spreading. That's what we need.

The more vaccines in arms the better. It could prevent the emergence of more variants that will be vaccine resistant. On the population level, vaccination will help prevent transmission. The more people who are vaccinated, the faster we will get out of this mess.

These vaccines are safe, correct?

If it has emergency use authorization from the FDA, it has been held to a very high safety standard. These vaccine trials have had just massive amounts of patients. There have been at least 30,000 patients in each one of these trials, and Johnson & Johnson's had 43,000 people. There were no harm signals in the Johnson & Johnson trials.

We have a few reports of possible severe adverse effects from the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, but there is a sophisticated system set up where anybody who gets the vaccine can report the information about side effects. Reports of severe adverse effects are being monitored and investigated closely. We still have to collect long-term safety data. For any immediate issues, those are usually collected in these vaccine trials. We have months of data now that show the vaccines are safe.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak
Lawmakers of Justice Party condole the death of Paek Ki-wan with a moment of silence during the party's meeting at the National Assembly on Feb. 15. Yonhap



Paek Ki-wan, who devoted his life to the reunification of the two Koreas, died Monday, hospital officials said. He was 88.



According to Seoul National University Hospital and his aides, Paek had been in the hospital since January of last year with symptoms of pneumonia.



Born in 1932 in what is now Unnyul in North Korea's South Hwanghae Province, Paek worked to educate the poor and farmers, as well as to reunify the divided peninsula.



In 1964, he protested against the signing of the treaty on basic relations between South Korea and Japan. In 1974, he was imprisoned while demonstrating against then-President Park Chung-hee's dictatorship.





In this photo from Aug. 15, 2008, Paek Ki-wan, who then was representing an institute for reunification of two Koreas, speaks during an event celebrating National Liberation Day and the 63rd anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japanese colonial occupation at Press Center in Seoul's Jung District. Yonhap

YEREVAN, 15 FEBUARY, ARMENPRESS. The Central Bank of Armenia informs Armenpress that today, 15 February, USD exchange rate up by 0.32 drams to 524.60 drams. EUR exchange rate up by 1.80 drams to 636.60 drams. Russian Ruble exchange rate up by 0.10 drams to 7.16 drams. GBP exchange rate up by 6.27 drams to 729.09 drams.

The Central Bank has set the following prices for precious metals.

Gold price down by 381.64 drams to 30635.07 drams. Silver price down by 0.65 drams to 456.57 drams. Platinum price down by 240.28 drams to 20593.73 drams.

A dozy driver narrowly avoided being smashed into on a railway track after failing to check if trains were travelling in both directions.

The driver of the red family car had slowed to nearly a halt near an open crossing in Lancashire as they waited for the tracks to clear.

But they did not realise another train was bearing down on their location from the other direction.

The driver had slowed as a first train came along the track but did not check if another was on its way

The red car was just seconds away from colliding with the train in the heart-stopping video

And this tense video shows they were just a few seconds away from being hit at high speed.

British Transport Police Lancashire tweeted the video to encourage others to ensure tracks are safe before moving away.

They said: This is the moment a car driver at an open #LevelCrossing (farm crossing with no barriers) made the dangerous assumption that because one train had passed that it was safe to cross. It wasnt!

The incident occurred in October and the driver opted to take a Level Crossing Awareness Course (84), completed successfully, instead of a 100 fixed penalty notice & 3 points.

Another train had earlier gone through the open crossing, making the driver think it was safe to cross

Car driver education is important in reducing these incidents.

Last month police slammed a video on TikTok of a car parked across a live railway track in Bolton.

The short clip was captioned: "Would you take the risk to get the shot no one else would?"

Inspector Becky Warren from British Transport Police said: "No picture or video is worth risking your life for.

"There is simply no excuse for not following safety procedures at level crossings. The behaviour shown by the individuals in this video is incredibly dangerous and reckless."
A 17-year-old boy was killed in a single-vehicle crash Friday near Gadsden.

A 2000 Toyota 4 Runner the boy was driving left the roadway, overturned and landed in a creek bank at approximately 3:07 p.m. The crash occurred on Pleasant Hill Road near Sanford Road, approximately one-mile north of Gadsden.

The Alabama Law Enforcement Agencys Highway Patrol Division, which is investigating the crash, determined that speed was a contributing factor.

No further information was provided.
Mamata Banerjee condemns Disha Ravi's arrest

India

oi-Madhuri Adnal

Kolkata, Feb 15: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Monday condemned the arrest of 22-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi and said the BJP government should first take action against its own IT cell which, she alleged, is spreading fake news.

She also came down heavily on the BJP government at the Centre for the rise in the prices of LPG and fuel.

"Arresting anybody who is protesting against government policies is not unacceptable. The BJP should first take action against its own IT Cell members who are spreading fake news. Why two sets of rules ?" Banerjee told a press conference here.

Banerjee alleged that the IT cell members of the saffron party are calling up people posing as TMC members and are maligning her party.

"I have asked Kolkata police to look into it," she said.

"Besides, every day LPG and fuel prices are going up and the Centre is not bothered about it. It is only interested in making false promises ahead of elections," she said.

West Bengal Assembly poll is due in April-May and BJP which made deep inroads in the politically polarised state is looking to deseat the 10-year-old TMC regime in the state.

Disha Ravi, a 22-year-old climate activist was arrested from Bengaluru recently for allegedly sharing with Greta Thunberg the "toolkit" related to the farmer''''s protest against the Centre''s agri laws, police said on Sunday.

Delhi Police claimed that Disha Ravi, who was arrested by a cyber cell team of the force on Saturday, was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and the "key conspirator" in the document''s formulation and dissemination. PTI PNT KK Thunberg, a teen climate activist, had shared the "toolkit" to lend her support to the farmers'''' agitation against the three farm reform laws. In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were listed which were needed to be taken to support the farmers' protest.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 17:31 [IST]
Chandigarh: Radio is a medium that reaches out to millions of people at a time. In the Corona era, radio not only entertained with songs, rather it did not back down in doing social work whether it is a mask, sanitize or convince the labourers on their way to the village or distribute food to the people.

Radio left no stone unturned to play its role. I would like to praise the radio jockey who expresses his words in such a way that everyone wants to listen. Today I am saying all these things because today is World Radio Day and on the second day of the 9th International Festival of Journalism, we are celebrating Radio Day said by Dr. Sandeep Marwah, Chancellor of AAFT University, who started Raipur Radio today.

PhotoIn this webinar, Senior Journalist Dr. Sunil Parashar, Journalist Sunil Dang, Film Critic Meena Iyer, Editor Omkareshwar Pandey, Journalist Rajesh Badal, Journalist Arvind K. Singh and Radio Broadcaster Anoop Boss discussed the topic of Fake News.

In this discussion, Dr. Sunil Parashar said that today every person is becoming a journalist because he has a creature called mobile that captures everything. I am calling mobile a creature because it does not have the ability to move, but it has a lot of ability to drive people. Fake news has emerged as a new threat, whose broadcasters present themselves as journalists and tarnish this great profession.

Photo

Rajesh Badal said that fake news has emerged as a new threat, which shows us globally even at low levels, whereas today the whole world is seeing us as the world GURU. Arvind K. Singh said that the mobile revolution will only promote fake news.

In other webinars of the day Film director Rahul Rawail, Writer and poet Lakshmi Shankar Vajpayee, Journalist Puran Singh Sarin, Abhijeet Thakar, R.K. Singh, Dayanand Vats, Atul Mohan, Model Angelique Monet, Vinod Agnihotri, Sahar Zaman, Prince Laye Bebor of Nigeria, Filmmaker Bensouda Mohammed Ahed Filmmaker of France participated.
The same Boot (taking its name from the original Baja Boot, driven back in the day by Steve McQueen, among others) is now under development as a Zero Emission Pickup Truck for the masses. And Glickenhaus isnt going down the same route as Tesla and others (such as Rivian , for example), with its electric Boot actually having a hydrogen fuel cell powertrain.For now, its yet unclear when exactly the Glickenhaus H2 pickup truck will arrive on the market. So far, all we have to show for are James Glickenhauss own sketches (theyre not done on a napkin, but theyre also not very far away) and a few virtual renderings that were recently revealed on social media.Some might want to poke a little fun at the odd design, which makes use of a double set of headlights positioned up high to make the truck look like an ogling frog. Still, were actually able to extract some details from the CGIs and the sketchy designs of the automotive visionary.For example, we can see the 2DR will have some sort of covered trunk space behind the front doors, while the 4DR will come with an extra pair of doors that seem to open up like on a Rolls-Royce Phantom VIII. Glickenhaus explains in the description the two trucks will arrive with very nice range, five minute refueling available 24/7 anywhere including at home and be quite capable.Surely, were just going to be taking all that with a grain of sand, but we also noticed that Glickenhaus has already set sights on the possible competition, as far as dimensions are concerned. Thats because the initial sketches call for an F430-like (the Ferrari, or maybe he wanted to write Ford F-450?!) length on the 2DR and Ford Raptor -rivaling for the 4DR.
President Emmerson Mnangagwa has extended Zimbabwes COVID-19 lockdown by two weeks in a nation that has so far registered 1,400 deaths.

In an address to the nation aired on the state-owned Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation and monitored from Washington, Mnangagwa said the lockdown measures are necessary in bringing down COVID-19 cases in the country.

He urged Zimbabweans to stay at home, correctly wear masks, use sanitizers and practice social distancing.

Mnangagwa said, Every life lost, is a big loss to us. I therefore extend the national lockdown by two weeks. This will see the reduction of active cases and monitoring of cases in incubation.

Since the implementation of the current lockdown which ends midnight today, we have witnessed a marked decrease in the number of Covid-19 infections and deaths. I thank you all for observing fundamental lockdown measures.

Businesses are now expected to operate between 8:00am to 5:00pm while only 30 will be allowed to attend funerals funerals. Intercity and provincial travels are still banned together with informal trading.

The Zimbabwean president further thanked China for donating 200,000 doses of Sinopharm vaccine, which he said is expected to be rolled out this week.

This morning we received the first vaccine consignment from China. Let me again thank the Chinese government for this gesture of great humanity. I am happy that the second consignment of vaccines procured from China will be received in a few weeks time. Vaccines from Russia, India and the UK are also on the way.

That should see our pace of vaccinating willing Zimbabweans increase in tempo thus bringing us nearer to herd immunity. The ultimate goal is the return to our normal lives, for our children to go back to school, for us to collectively work towards growing our economy towards Vision 2030.

The Ministry of Health reports that two people died and 68 tested positive for COVID-19 in Zimbabwe on Sunday. Zimbabwe has recorded 35,172 COVID-19 cases since March last year and 30,601 recoveries. Over 1,400 people have succumbed to the disease.
Heavy snow is expected to move into the lower third of Michigan during Monday evening and overnight into Tuesday. Some areas of Southeast Michigan are expected to see several inches stack up by sunset on Tuesday.

RELATED: Winter Storm Warning issued for Detroit, Ann Arbor, much of southeast Lower Michigan

Use the 48-hour snow forecasting map below to see how much snow is coming to your area. The maps update every six hours, and are designed to project snowfall totals to a 2-mile radius.

See a larger view of this map here.

The snowfall forecast map above predicts snowfall expected over a 48-hour period. It updates automatically every six hours. Click the play button to begin the hour-by-hour forecast. Put your cursor anywhere on the map to see the forecast total. You can get specific forecasts for your neighborhood by entering your address in the search window at the top of the map.

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NEW DELHI (AP)  What if COVID-19 never goes away?

Experts say it's likely that some version of the disease will linger for years. But what it will look like in the future is less clear.

Will the coronavirus, which has already killed more than 2 million people worldwide, eventually be eliminated by a global vaccination campaign, like smallpox? Will dangerous new variants evade vaccines? Or will the virus stick around for a long time, transforming into a mild annoyance, like the common cold?

Eventually, the virus known as SARS-CoV-2 will become yet another animal in the zoo, joining the many other infectious diseases that humanity has learned to live with, predicted Dr. T. Jacob John, who studies viruses and was at the helm of Indias efforts to tackle polio and HIV/AIDS.

But no one knows for sure. The virus is evolving rapidly, and new variants are popping up in different countries. The risk of these new variants was underscored when Novavax Inc. found that the company's vaccine did not work as well against mutated versions circulating in Britain and South Africa. The more the virus spreads, experts say, the more likely it is that a new variant will become capable of eluding current tests, treatments and vaccines.

For now, scientists agree on the immediate priority: Vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible. The next step is less certain and depends largely on the strength of the immunity offered by vaccines and natural infections and how long it lasts.

Are people going to be frequently subject to repeat infections? We dont have enough data yet to know, said Jeffrey Shaman, who studies viruses at Columbia University. Like many researchers, he believes chances are slim that vaccines will confer lifelong immunity.

If humans must learn to live with COVID-19, the nature of that coexistence depends not just on how long immunity lasts, but also how the virus evolves. Will it mutate significantly each year, requiring annual shots, like the flu? Or will it pop up every few years?

This question of what happens next attracted Jennie Lavine, a virologist at Emory University, who is co-author of a recent paper in Science that projected a relatively optimistic scenario: After most people have been exposed to the virus  either through vaccination or surviving infections  the pathogen will continue to circulate, but will mostly cause only mild illness, like a routine cold.

While immunity acquired from other coronaviruses  like those that cause the common cold or SARS or MERS  wanes over time, symptoms upon reinfection tend to be milder than the first illness, said Ottar Bjornstad, a co-author of the Science paper who studies viruses at Pennsylvania State University.

Adults tend not to get very bad symptoms if they've already been exposed, he said.

The prediction in the Science paper is based on an analysis of how other coronaviruses have behaved over time and assumes that SAR-CoV-2 continues to evolve, but not quickly or radically.

The 1918 flu pandemic could offer clues about the course of COVID-19. That pathogen was an H1N1 virus with genes that originated in birds, not a coronavirus. At the time, no vaccines were available. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that a third of the world's population became infected. Eventually, after infected people either died or developed immunity, the virus stopped spreading quickly. It later mutated into a less virulent form, which experts say continues to circulate seasonally.

Very commonly the descendants of flu pandemics become the milder seasonal flu viruses we experience for many years, said Stephen Morse, who studies viruses at Columbia University.

It's not clear yet how future mutations in SARS-CoV-2 will shape the trajectory of the current disease.

As new variants emerge  some more contagious, some more virulent and some possibly less responsive to vaccines  scientists are reminded how much they don't yet know about the future of the virus, said Mark Jit, who studies viruses at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

We've only known about this virus for about a year, so we don't yet have data to show its behavior over five years or 10 years," he said.

Of the more than 12 billion coronavirus vaccine shots being made in 2021, rich countries have bought about 9 billion, and many have options to buy more. This inequity is a threat since it will result in poorer countries having to wait longer for the vaccine, during which time the disease will continue to spread and kill people, said Ian MacKay, who studies viruses at the University of Queensland.

That some vaccines seem less effective against the new strains is worrisome, but since the shots provide some protection, vaccines could still be used to slow or stop the virus from spreading, said Ashley St. John, who studies immune systems at Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore.

Dr. Gagandeep Kang, an infectious diseases expert at Christian Medical College at Vellore in southern India, said the evolution of the virus raises new questions: At what stage does the virus become a new strain? Will countries need to re-vaccinate from scratch? Or could a booster dose be given?

These are questions that you will have to address in the future," Kang said.

The future of the coronavirus may contrast with other highly contagious diseases that have been largely beaten by vaccines that provide lifelong immunity  such as measles. The spread of measles drops off after many people have been vaccinated.

But the dynamic changes over time with new births, so outbreaks tend to come in cycles, explained Dr. Jayaprakash Muliyil, who studies epidemics and advises India on virus surveillance.

Unlike measles, kids infected with COVID-19 don't always exhibit clear symptoms and could still transmit the disease to vulnerable adults. That means countries cannot let their guard down, he said.

Another unknown is the long-term impact of COVID-19 on patients who survive but are incapacitated for months, Kang said.

The quantification of this damage  how many people cant do manual labor or are so exhausted that they cant concentrate  is key to understanding the full consequences of the disease.

We havent had a lot of diseases that have affected people on a scale like this, she said.

___

Larson reported from Washington.

___

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

As the COVID-19 death toll mounts and the world hangs its hopes on effective vaccines, what else can we do to save lives in this pandemic?

In UniSA's case, design world-first technology that combines engineering, drones, cameras, and artificial intelligence to monitor people's vital health signs remotely.

In 2020 the University of South Australia joined forces with the world's oldest commercial drone manufacturer, Draganfly Inc, to develop technology which remotely detects the key symptoms of COVID-19breathing and heart rates, temperature, and blood oxygen levels.

Within months, the technology had moved from drones to security cameras and kiosks, scanning vital health signs in 15 seconds and adding social distancing software to the mix.

In September 2020, Alabama State University became the first higher education institution in the world to use the technology to spot COVID-19 symptoms in its staff and students and enforce social distancing, ensuring they had one of the lowest COVID infection rates on any US campus. ASU President, Quinton T. Ross, Jr., described the software as a "godsend."

The collaboration between UniSA and its North American drone partner is helping to address potentially the number one threat to humanityhealth securityand usher in a new era of telehealth.

In this short documentary, Professor Javaan Chahl and his Ph.D. students discuss the extraordinary journey they undertook in 2020 with this world-first technology to curb COVID-19, along with commentary from Draganfly CEO Cameron Chell and Alabama State University.

Credit: University of South Australia

Explore further Pioneering remote screening for vital health signs indicating COVID-19
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Press Release

15 February 2021

Geneva - Serengeti National Park, Ngorongoro Crater, Lake Manyara and Tarangire are only a few highlights attracting travellers to visit the African country of Tanzania, where more than a third of the landscape is under conservation protection. With its 22 national parks, this year round destination guarantees wilderness seekers a stay in harmony with nature and the world's most diverse safari experiences. Amidst the well-known "Northern Circuit", Kempinski Hotels has now signed management contracts for three outstanding luxurious properties, two elegant lodges and a high-end tented camp, which will be open to wild life lovers and guests as of 2023.

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"We are delighted to be extending our international Kempinski portfolio in such an incredible country," said Bernold Schroeder, Chief Executive Officer ad interim and Chairman of the Executive Board of Kempinski Hotels at the signing of the management agreement with the owners. "In line with our brand promise of highest quality standards and to cater to our guests with outstanding destinations, we are continuing our selective expansion by adding high class hotels in exciting parts of the world. While we are happy to be currently extending long term contracts within Europe in partnership with our highly respected owners, we are at the same time moving forward with our expansion around the globe."

Lachezar Todorov, CEO of Helios Lodges Company, comments on the agreement: "With Kempinski Hotels we found a highly reliable and experienced partner, who since many decades delivers luxury experiences to guests around the globe. Their commitment and expertise in hotel industry meets our vision of a long-term partnership for our new projects in Africa, which we hope to become a market leader and a trend setter in this evergrowing market."

Set in extraordinary wilderness sites, the three new Tanzanian Kempinski properties will be ideal to be combined in a roundtrip and offer a luxurious stay in close vicinity to the most demanded attractions in the country. Inspired by the natural elements of surroundings and with a focus on sustainability, each lodge has its own expressive architectural language and distintive character that is unique to its particular, protected environment. With reference to the remarkable tree canopies of Africa, the architecture is dominated by expansive roof structures and projecting shade canopies which provide shelter from the African sun. Spacious terraces and magical outdoor living areas allow the guest to immerse themselves in nature.

19 tents with terrace and outdoor showers, two junior suite tents with an outside pool as well as two family tents with two rooms with more than 200 sqm await guests in the high-end Kempinski Msasa Lodge Lake Manyara. Placed on a ridge overlooking the lake and deep gorges, this luxurious tented camp offers access to world class game viewing and an exceptional birdlife variety.

A World Heritage Site and the world's most well-known wildlife conservation area, Serengeti National Park will be home to the 75 rooms Kempinski Longosa Lodge Serengeti. While the smallest guest rooms start at 71 sqm, the suites start from a size of 98 sqm followed by a three-bedroom villa of 270 sqm and a Presidential Villa of 400 sqm. Bars and lounges, dining area with decks and outdoor cooking, fire pit, outdoor pool, children's play corners and wellness area round off the facilities in the middle of an unspoiled setting of the animal migration corridor.

The third of the new Kempinski properties, surrounded by splendid Baobab trees in the heart of Tarangire National Park, is not only a haven for wildlife viewing, but also for bird enthusiasts who will be amazed by more than 550 species. With 75 guest rooms, suites and villas the offer at Kempinski Kitbong Hill Tarangire is similar to the one of the lodge at Serengeti allowing guests to stay in highest comfort in a scenically attractive environment and to relax in luxury after an exciting day in the wilderness.

"More than ever travellers are longing to reconnect with the earth and to spend their precious vacation time to immerse themselves in nature", adds Bernold Schroeder. "With these new Kempinski destinations in Tanzania, we are able to offer the best of both worlds to our guests by combining a stay in harmony with nature and the highest quality standards our brand has been known for over the last 125 years."

Main entry point for visitors to the Kempinski Lodges is Kilimanjaro International Airport or the airport of Dar Es Salaam with connections to Arusha or Lobo. Another option would be flights from Zanzibar.

About Helios Lodges Company

helios Lodges Company was established in 2019 with the specific aim to invest in the hospitality sector in Tanzania. The company is part of Bulgarian based TTS Group, founded in Sofia in 1995. TTS group has grown to currently own eight hotels in Bulgaria with a total of more than 2 300 units and pursues international development with projects in Tanzania and the Caribbean.
Father-in-law-son-in-law combo to new opposition leader; first session of 15th Kerala Assembly on May 24

Kerala to issue Covid vaccination certificates with passport number for people who plan to go abroad

Journalist Siddique Kappan gets 5-day interim bail to visit ailing mother in Kerala

India

oi-Deepika S

New Delhi, Feb 11: The Supreme Court on Monday allowed journalist Siddique Kappan, who was arrested en route to Hathras in Uttar Pradesh to report on the alleged gang-rape of a Dalit woman, to visit his ailing mother in Kerala for five days.

The top court, in its order, restrained Kappan from giving any interview, including on social media, during his visit to Kerala.

The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, said that Siddique will not meet members of the public except his relatives and doctors concerned.

It said Siddique will be escorted by a team of Uttar Pradesh police officers and police at Kerala will cooperate with them.

You may be a 3 trillion company...... SC notice to WhatsApp on privacy policy

Kappan was arrested on October 5, 2020 while he was on his way to Hathras, home to the 19-year-old Dalit woman who died after being allegedly gang-raped by four upper-caste men on September 14.

Her cremation at night by the authorities, allegedly without the parents'' consent, had triggered widespread outrage.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The police had said it has arrested four people having alleged links with the PFI in Mathura and identified the arrested persons as Siddique from Malappuram, Atiq-ur Rehman from Muzaffarnagar, Masood Ahmed from Bahraich and Alam from Rampur.

Mumbai-based The Group on Monday said it will invest around Rs 8,500 crore to develop industrial and parks in

The group has "entered into an MoU (memorandum of understanding) in the state of to set up logistics and hyperscale data center parks in the region", a company statement said.

It has signed an MoU to acquire a 100-acre land at Uttarpara, Kolkata to set up an integrated logistics and hyperscale data center park by group GreenBase and Yotta respectively.

"The combined investment by the group and their customers is estimated to cross Rs 10,000 crore," the statement said.

When contacted, the company spokesperson said the investment by the group will be around Rs 8,500 crore.

GreenBase will develop 3 million square feet of industrial and warehousing space, while Yotta, Hiranandani's hyperscale division, will build six hyper connected buildings bringing in 250MW of cutting edge data centre capacity over the next several years.

Darshan Hiranandani, Group Chief Executive Officer - Group said, Kicking off this project would not have been possible without the tremendous support of the Government of West Bengal"



" is the gateway to the east. It is an ideal hub for logistics and industrial development with excellent road, rail and riverine connectivity," he added.

Simultaneously, Darshan said the data centre business will benefit from the digitisation revolution, the upcoming Silicon Valley at New Town at Rajarhat and excellent fibre connectivity on land and the new submarine cable coming up at Tajpur.

"By setting up a data center park in Kolkata, we will not only serve the customers of the state but the entire eastern region including neighbouring countries," he said.

In 2020, Yotta inaugurated its Asia's largest and World's second-largest Uptime Institute Tier IV certified data center in Navi Mumbai. It has recently announced development of data centre parks in Greater Noida and Chennai.

Greenbase is a joint venture (JV) between Group and global private equity firm Blackstone. It is developing industrial and logistics parks across Mumbai MMR region, Pune, Nashik, Chennai and Bengaluru with a plan to deliver 15 million sq ft of space Pan India in the next five years, having an investment outlay of USD 500 million.

(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.)
Award presenters for the forthcoming 2021 Golden Globes have been asked by producers of the event to appear in person for a live telecast.

Earlier this month, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and NBC announced that this years 78th annual Globes, set to air on February 28, would be broadcast live from both Los Angeles and New York City.

30 Rock Star Tina Fey is scheduled to host the Big Apple leg of the show from the Rockefeller Centers Rainbow Room, while co-host Amy Poehler will be broadcasting from the Beverly Hilton.

While plans for how presenters and nominees would appear were not previously disclosed, according to Variety, the show's producers have asked all award presenters to appear in person at either location.

All nominees, meanwhile, will be appearing remotely, the outlet said.

30 Rock Star Tina Fey (left) is scheduled to host the Big Apple leg of the show, while fellow actress Amy Poehler (right) will present from Los Angeles

All of this year's nominees will be appearing remotely for the 2021 Golden Globes

Producers have reportedly assured all those invited that strict COVID protocols will be in place for the event.

The Golden Globes appears to be following the blueprints laid out by September's Emmy Awards ceremony, which became one of the first major award shows to be staged since the beginning of the pandemic last spring.

During that event, almost all of the invited presenters appeared in person at the Staples Center.

Earlier this week, the Academy of Motion Pictures also confirmed that its Oscars show set for April 25 will be live and in-person from multiple locations, including the Dolby Theatre in LA.

In this unique year that has asked so much of so many, the Academy is determined to present an Oscars like none other, while prioritizing the public health and safety of all those who will participate, the Academy said in a statement.

To create the in-person show our global audience wants to see, while adapting to the requirements of the pandemic, the ceremony will broadcast live from multiple locations, including the landmark Dolby Theatre. We look forward to sharing more details soon.

Earlier this month, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and NBC announced that this years Globes, set to air live on February 28, would be broadcast from both NYC's Rainbow Room (left) and the Beverly Hilton, in LA

The Golden Globes will air live on February 28 at 8pm ET on NBC.

The list of award presenters for this year's event has not yet been revealed by the Hollywood Foreign Press.

The event had originally been scheduled for its typical early January date but was postponed last year because of the ongoing pandemic.

The full list of major category nominees was announced by Sarah Jessica Parker and Taraji P. Henson on February 3, on the Today show.

Streaming giant Netflix received 42 nominations across film and television. David Finchers ode-to-cinema Mank goes into the ceremony with a leading six nominations across film, while The Crown also tops the TV categories with the same number of nominations.

The platforms smash-hit Emily in Paris found itself as one of the more controversially nominated shows, landing a nomination for best TV series, musical or comedy. The shows star, Lily Collins, has also been put forward for best actress.

Much of the uproar surrounding the nod stems from the snubbing of Michaela Coel, whose drama I May Destroy You failed to land any nominations.

Last years 77th Golden Globes, hosted by Ricky Gervais, averaged 19.2 million viewers, making it one of the most-watched network telecasts of 2020

The platforms smash-hit Emily in Paris (left) found itself as one of the more controversially nominated shows. The uproar came in response to the snubbing of Michaela Coel (right) , whose drama I May Destroy You failed to land any nominations

Deborah Copaken, one of the writers of Emily in Paris, even spoke out to criticize the Hollywood Foreign Press for shunning Coel.

Copaken tweeted that it was just wrong, and later expanded on her thoughts in an op-ed for the Guardian.

Am I excited that Emily in Paris was nominated? Yes. Of course. Ive never been remotely close to seeing a Golden Globe statue up close, let alone being nominated for one, she wrote.

But that excitement is now unfortunately tempered by my rage over Coels snub. That I May Destroy You did not get one Golden Globe nod is not only wrong, its what is wrong with everything.

We need art that reflects all of our colors, not just some. But we also need to give awards to shows (and music and films and plays and musicals) that deserve them, no matter the color of the skin of their creators, she went on to write.

Last years 77th Golden Globes, hosted by Ricky Gervais, averaged 19.2 million viewers, making it one of the most-watched network telecasts of 2020.



Rear Admiral Seth Amoama has handed over the baton of command of the Ghana Navy to Rear Admiral Issah Yakubu following his elavation to the high office of Chief of Defence Staff (CDS).



Rear Admiral Amoama has been serving the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) for the past 40 years, with two years as the Chief of Naval Staff (CNS).



President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo promoted him to become CDS following the retirement of Lt General Obed Akwa.



In line with the naval tradition, a farewell parade was held at the navy headquarters yesterday in his honour.



The occasion



Dressed in a ceremonial naval uniform, Rear Admiral Amoama was welcomed by the naval officers, representatives of various security agencies, government officials, as well as family, friends and well-wishers.





After taking the general salute and inspecting the parade, he was showered with gifts from individuals, institutions, as well as the various naval commands in acknowledgement of his contributions to the development of the naval force, the GAF and the security of the country.



Profile



Rear Admiral Amoama was enlisted into the GAF in 1981 and had his initial training at the Ghana Military Academy.



He was sent to the Pakistan Naval Academy on August 1, 1982 to continue with his training and was commissioned into the Executive Branch of the Ghana Navy in December 1984.



He won the Sword of Honour on graduation in Pakistan.



Rear Admiral Amoama has held several appointments at various stages of his career in the GAF, both afloat and ashore.



His peacekeeping experience includes serving as the UN Military Observer in Rwanda (1995-1996), the UN Liaison Officer in Lebanon (1997-1998) and the UN Staff Officer in Sierra Leone (2001-2002).



Achievements



In his farewell speech, the outgoing CNS commended the sailors for their smart turnout and for putting up a wonderful naval display at his farewell parade.



He recounted that two years ago when he took over as the CNS, the overwhelming euphoria that greeted his appointment was an indication of a huge expectation towards his assumption of office.



Although he recognised that there was not an immediate solution to every challenge and that some of the challenges of the navy required time and space, he had expressed the hope of living up to expectations because of his belief in professionalism, loyalty and the commitment of the entire naval fraternity.



Today, we can look back with pride at what we have achieved together. By dint of hard work and our collective determination, we have been able to complete most of the major projects that I inherited from my predecessor and new ones started with majority of them completed, he said.



Rear Admiral Amoama said in spite of the COVID-19 pandemic which affected the objectives and aspirations of the navy, it was able to deliver many projects, including the inauguration of the Naval Training Command and other training facilities at Yorve in the South Tongu District in the Volta Region.



In addition, he said there had been a modest effort to address some critical welfare related challenges in the navy.



Those included the inauguration of a 16-unit accommodation for officers at the wardroom in Accra and the Ratings Transit Quarters at the Ghana Navy Supply Depot in Takoradi, as well as an ongoing construction of a 20-unit accommodation block for Ratings at the Sekondi Barracks.



While the navy continued to pursue the government agenda to acquire Offshore Patrol Vessel and Security Patrol Boats to provide continuous security for offshore oil platforms, he said it had also worked hard to maintain the existing fleet.



He expressed gratitude to the sailors and called for their continuous support, adding that it has just begun so let us continue to paddle together and put our shoulders to the wheel.



Assurance



The incoming CNS, Rear Admiral Yakubu, said his predecessors had laid a solid foundation with their transformational agenda which had seen marked improvement in infrastructure, particularly in the Naval Training Command.



He gave the assurance that during his tenure, the long-awaited Offshore Patrol Vessel project and the Offshore Security Vessels for the protection of oil and gas infrastructure at sea would come to fruition.



All my energy would be directed towards these projects and I entreat my staff to double their efforts to support the government to fulfil its intention, the CNS said.

Source: Graphiconline.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.

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Her impressive artwork sparked debate over whether she had painted the scenic mountain landscape herself.

And it appears, despite the online debate, Kim Kardshian's daughter North West's painting has wowed those keeping Bob Ross' legacy alive, so much so they are keen to nurture her talent.

According to reports from TMZ on Monday, the seven-year-old has been given an invitation to visit the Bob Ross Experience in Muncie, Indiana.

Exciting: Kim Kardashian's daughter North West has been invited to the Bob Ross Experience after impressing with her stunning landscape oil painting, it was reported on Monday

Sarah Strohl, who works at Bob Ross Inc, told the publication that they are thrilled the late painter has had such an influence on a new generation of kids like North.

She added that if North were to accept the invitation she would be able to see the artist's work up close, as well as enjoy a special class teaching her about Ross' wet-on-wet technique.

Earlier this month, Kim spoke out to defend her daughter, informing fans who didn't believe she had painted the artwork that she had done so.

Opportunity: Sarah Strohl, who works at Bob Ross Inc, claimed they have sent the seven-year-old (pictured in March 2020) an invite to see Ross' artwork up close and have a painting class

My little artist: Kim drew criticism earlier this month when she posted this to photo to her Instagram claiming that her daughter North, seven, painted the landscape

'My daughter and her best friend have been taking a serious oil painting class where their talents and creativity are being encouraged and nurtured,' Kim, 40, wrote on her Instagram Stories.

The reality star had shared a photo of the painting to her Instagram stories earlier with the caption: 'My little artist North'.

The painting has already been compared by some to an artwork that famed TV artist Ross would have created.

Almost immediately, some on Twitter were expressing their disbelief that the impressive painting was created by Kim and Kanye West's eldest daughter.

No way! Almost immediately, some fans took to Twitter to express their disbelief that the impressive daubing was created by Kim's eldest daughter

Following lots of debate about the validity of the painting - with many comments suggesting Kim's child was not responsible for the painting - she added: 'How dare you see children doing awesome things and then try to accuse them of NOT being awesome!?!?!'

'Please stop embarrassing yourselves with the negativity and allow every child to be GREAT!!! NORTH WEST PAINTED THAT PERIOTDDDDDABCDEFGZFDT!!!!!!!'

Others leapt to her defence, including Kim's BFF Tracy Romulus and the daughter of the woman who taught North how to paint the artwork.

North West's picture was compared to the work of famed TV artist Bob Ross

'I'm supposed to work but i can't stop thinking about how north west did not paint this,' one person wrote alongside a screenshot of the painting.

'You're telling me North West is out here drawing like she is Bob Ross.. and I'm over here still drawing stick figures at 25?!?' another skeptical Twitter user posted.

Another person chimed in: 'Kim Kardashian's child did not paint this. You can even see the photo shop signature. And even if you didnt, it's Kim K so you have to take everything she says with a heavy spoonful of salt.'

Some online critics even questioned North's signature in the corner of the painting, claiming it to be fake.

She did make it! Earlier this month, Kim spoke out to defend her daughter (pictured with sister Chi), informing fans who didn't believe she had painted the artwork that she had done so

'When you zoom in you can see the border on the transparent "North =),"' one person noted, while another observed 'Why does it look like that when u zoom in.... hmmm...'

Others, however, declared the painting was definitely within the skill range of a seven-year-old.

Kim's friend Tracy Romulus, whose daughter Ryan is best friends with North, came to the E! star's defence, revealing that their daughters take the same art class together.

She insisted that the artworks were original because students start from a blank canvas and they spend weeks doing them.

Proud of their work: Kim's pal Tracy Romulus came to her defence, explaining that her daughter Ryan does the same art class with North

'I have that I have to comment but grown adults are putting a lot of energy into questioning whether or not my daughter and her best friend actually painted the works we have shared proudly as parents,' Romulus said on her Instagram stories.

'Both girls are in art class together and learning oil painting techniques from an instructor.

'They spend weeks at a time on a single painting and are incredibly proud of themselves once they complete a project.'

She added that the girls start with a blank canvas and 'the works are original'.

'They are following a curriculum but the works are original, starting from a blank canvas and each child's interpretation.'

Romulus called for people to stop spreading negativity and 'doubts on a childs ability.'

Meanwhile, Camryn Frederickson took to TikTok to say her mother was the art teacher who actually taught North.

'North West did not paint this': wrote one Twitter user who 'couldn't stop thinking' about the issue

Disbelief: Another compared the painting to the famed TV artist Bob Ross

Some stuck up for Kim while others were more skeptical: 'Kim Kardashian's child did not paint this. You can even see the photo shop signature.'

Hmmm: Other Twitter users pointed out it looked like North's signature had been digitally added

Frederickson revealed that she was taught how to paint the exact same scene when she was also seven years old by her mother Celeste Astor Frederickson.

'This is me at seven years old.' Camryn said as she flashed up a photo of her posing next to the same lake and mountain scene.

'And this is the infamous painting.

'My mom taught me how to paint this and she taught North how to paint the same one, just two weeks ago.'

'She's been an art teacher for 30 years and everyone who comes to her classes starts with the exact same painting when they're starting out.'

Another artist tweeted: 'Speaking as an artist who's made are my whole life, this is definitely withing the skill range or a 7 y/o w access to the best teachers & bets materials! A lot of times teachers do one example of each thing (like the one really good tree branch lol) & have the kid do the rest.'

It's legit! TikToker Camryn Frederickson revealed that she was taught how to paint the exact same scene when she was seven years old by her mother Celeste Astor Frederickson, who owns the For Arts Sake studio in Westlake Village

In 2019, Kim called North Kanye's twin as the couple discussed their kids in an interview for Vogue Arabia.

Speaking to Kanye she said: '[North is Kanye's] twin. She is so creative, expressive and has so much of your personality. Saint, I think, has more of my personality. What do you think?'

The reality star said she's keen to make sure her brood have a childhood they'll remember, as she wants them to be able to look back and say they had an 'awesome life'.

She added: 'I think about this all the time. I often reflect on the amazing childhood I had, and I want them to always be able to look back and say, "I had the most awesome life. My parents gave me all of the tools to be great and happy in life. They were fun, good, awesome parents and they were always there."'
Ferne McCann marked her first Valentine's Day with her boyfriend Jack Padgett on Sunday, just weeks after going public with their romance.

The First Time Mum star, 30, took to Instagram to upload unseen clips of their best memories together as she praised her 'understanding, kind and supportive' model beau in a heartfelt tribute.

Marketing manager Jack also toasted to 'the start of a new life' with his partner as he posted snaps from their recent South African getaway on his platform, before they transformed her studio into a home cinema for a candle-lit movie night at home.

'I am beyond grateful for this my love': Ferne McCann marked her first Valentine's Day with her boyfriend Jack Padgett on Sunday, just weeks after going public with their romance

Alongside a montage of cute videos, the reality star wrote: 'Happy Valentine's Day Babe @instapadge . I'm going to be soppy even though you're not here for it (well you are but in secret).

'Thankyou for being understanding, kind, supportive, respective & there when I need. I am beyond grateful for this my love. .' (sic)

The influencer also made a reference to Manchester United's Premier League match against West Brom as she added: 'Ps. I'm sorry ManU drew today I knew it meant a lot to you. I hope I can make it up to you.' (sic)

In the clips, the loved-up couple packed on the PDA as they kissed and cuddled during gym sessions and hotel stays.

Heartfelt: The First Time Mum star, 30, took to Instagram to upload unseen clips of their best memories together as she praised her 'understanding, kind and supportive' model beau

Romance is alive: In the clips, the loved-up couple packed on the PDA as they kissed and cuddled during gym sessions and hotel stays

Cheeky! The pair - who have known each other for years - also showed off their silly sides as Ferne danced in a purple wig in one video

The pair - who have known each other for years - also showed off their silly sides as Ferne danced in a purple wig in one video, while Jack picked her nose in another.

The former TOWIE star later treated her followers to a glimpse at her night in with her new man as they tucked into takeaway from Sheesh Chigwell, set up a cosy theatre from Backyard Cinema Hire Essex, and sipped on champagne.

Ferne went on to reach out to singletons who may be feeling 'lonely' during Valentine's Day as she admitted she would avoid social media on February 14 when she didn't have a boyfriend.

Dressed in PJs, the blonde said: 'This is a little Insta Story for all the singletons out there.

Goofy displays: The client relationship manager picked her nose as they laid on a bed in another throwback clip

Lively: They raised the roof as they partied up a storm in a flashback post

'I never enjoyed Valentine's Day. In fact, I would avoid Instagram all day as it actually made me sick of all the couples who are all in love... I know I'm in the category now, but allow me as I'm just celebrating the fact that I've got a boyfriend!

'I know that these days can be really tough when you're single, especially in lockdown when you're feeling lonely, but hold faith.

'Good times are coming your way. You can just imagine that every other singleton is going to be so excited to get out there again and just flirt, date, so yeah! I'm actually pretty jealous of you.'

'My Valentine': Marketing manager Jack also toasted to 'the start of a new life' with his partner as he posted snaps from their recent South African getaway on his platform

The businesswoman poked fun at Jack for joking about being 'jealous' of others who are not in relationships as she added: 'Now he's getting jealous that I said I'm jealous of all the singletons going on their first date out of lockdown.

'I didn't mean it like that! I just love that first date, it's so exciting. So, screw Valentine's Day!' (sic)

Ferne ensured she didn't leave out her daughter Sunday, three, on the special occasion as she shared a sweet photo of her 'numero uno' cradling her friend's dog.

The doting parent - who has her child from a relationship with Arthur Collins - wrote: 'No matter what, who or when this girl will always be my numero uno .

Wow-factor! Later in the evening, they transformed her studio into a home cinema for a candle-lit movie night at home

Intimate: The former TOWIE star treated her followers to a glimpse at her night in with her new man as they set up a cosy theatre from Backyard Cinema Hire Essex and sipped on champagne

'An obligatory @sheeshchigwell to welcome @instapadge to Essex!' The smitten duo tucked into takeaway from Sheesh Chigwell

Candid: The blonde went on to reach out to singletons who may be feeling 'lonely' during Valentine's Day as she admitted she would often avoid social media on February 14 in the past

'My number one Valentine. So here is a gorgeous pic of her and her best friend who we are so lucky to have stay with us throughout lockdown @carterchowchow. I'm pretty sure if I asked Sunday who her Valentine is for today she would say Carter.

'Last night, in the middle of the night my alarm went off. I found Sunday at the bottom of the stairs with this little pink bun bun ''Mummy, I want to give this to Carter''. She loves this dog so much.

'So whether it's a dog, pet, husband, girlfriend, friend, someone who has passed or YOURSELF. Today should be filled with nothing but love. Happy Valentine's Day darlings.' (sic)

'My numero uno': The businesswoman ensured she didn't leave out her daughter Sunday, three, on the special occasion as she shared a sweet photo of her mini-me cradling a dog

Her ex-boyfriend Arthur is currently serving a 20-year jail sentence for hurling acid over revellers in a packed nightclub.

Ferne recently launched a Dr Oetker Instagram challenge with charity FareShare, encouraging the nation to flip their pancakes three times, make a donation to the charity and nominate three friends to give it a go too to mark Shrove Tuesday.

On the initiative, the TV star said: 'We love pancakes in our house. When we got the call to have a go at a #TripleFlip we thought, why not!

'Its actually easier than you think and theres the added bonus of showing off, passing on the fun and, if youre up for it donating just a few pounds to a brilliant charity, FareShare.'
The UK's tougher new travel rules to contain the spread of COVID-19 variants came into effect from Monday, involving compulsory hotel quarantines for anyone returning to England from one of the 33 high-risk "red list" countries.

Those arriving will have to pre-book and pay 1,750 pounds to spend 10 days quarantining in government-sanctioned hotels, covering the cost of the hotel, transport and two separate tests post-arrival. Extremely serious breaches of the new norms could result in a 10-year jail term and fines of up to 10,000 pounds.

Those who have not visited a "red list" country, such as India, must still quarantine for 10 days at home and complete two mandatory COVID-19 tests on the second and eighth day after arriving.

With the emergence of new variants, we must go further. The rules coming into force today will bolster the quarantine system and provide another layer of security against new variants at the border, said UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock.

These new measures are important to protect our vaccination programme, which has now seen 15 million people vaccinated, we all work towards restoring normal life, he said.

Starting Monday, any UK or Irish resident who has been in a high-risk destination on the UK's red list comprising 33 hotspots with COVID-19 variants in circulation will have to enter England through a designated port and have pre-booked a quarantine package to stay at one of the government's Managed Quarantine Facilities.

Non-residents are currently not part of the essential-only travel rules of the lockdown.

The government said it has tough measures already in place requiring all travellers into the UK, from any location, to provide proof of a negative COVID-19 test taken no more than three days before departure and non-UK residents from the 33 red list countries are already banned from entering Britain.

New regulations equipping the Border Force and police staff with the powers needed to ensure people arriving in England conform to the new rules have also been put in place.

The Border Force have the power to issue fixed penalty notices to individuals suspected of lying on their Passenger Locator Form and where necessary detain them for up to three hours.

As part of the regulations, a requirement for quarantining individuals to self-isolate in their room is set out in law. There will also be a visible security presence at the Managed Quarantine Facilities to ensure that people are obeying these rules.

The government has struck deals with 16 hotels so far, providing 4,963 rooms for the new quarantine system, with a further 58,000 rooms currently on standby.

Passengers can book their rooms through an online portal in advance of arrival in England. Those who fail to quarantine in such hotels face fines of 5,000 to 10,000 pounds, while anyone who lies on their passenger locator form about having been in a country on the red list faces a prison sentence of up to 10 years.

All hotel staff will be fully trained in COVID-secure practices, and all contractors have been instructed to ensure their facilities and services are provided in a COVID-secure way. This includes plastic shields and PPE where necessary.

Heathrow Airport is one of five in England where people requiring hotel quarantine can enter the UK and is expected to receive the largest number of passengers. The other four are Gatwick, London City, Birmingham and Farnborough.

The devolved regions are also following similar strict rules for arrivals from red list countries, which include countries which have shown a high occurrence of new variants of such as South Africa.

Non-essential travel remains banned under the UK's strict lockdown to contain the very high infection rate as the vaccination programme is accelerated. There are reports that anyone leaving the UK will soon after be questioned about their reason for travel.

(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.)
Hong Kong: Alfred Sit visits 1823 centre

Secretary for Innovation & Technology Alfred Sit today visited the 1823 Government Call Centre to thank those handling public questions and complaints about government services.

Managed by the Efficiency Office, the 1823 centre provides one-stop round-the-clock service to answer enquiries for 23 participating departments and receive complaints, suggestions and compliments on all government services.

Mr Sit said that public demands for 1823 services are on the increase, in particular epidemic-related enquiries. In 2020, it received some 4.74 million calls and 500,000 emails and text messages from the Tell [email protected] mobile app.

He encouraged 1823 staff to serve the public with dedication on the front line to foster communication between the Government and the people.

In fighting COVID-19, the 1823 Government Call Centre supports related hotlines including the COVID-19 hotline for the Department of Health, the CuMask+ hotline, the Universal Community Testing Programme hotline and the Return2hk Scheme hotline.

While according priority in handling calls related to the pandemic, 1823 maintains normal services as far as possible.

This story has been published on: 2021-02-15. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
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Automakers production has been severely stunted by a global semiconductor shortage which emerged at the end of last year.

However, even after this supply issue winds down in Q3 and Q4 this year, automakers should do anything but return to the status quo. This situation is a symptom of future demand imbalances as automakers pivot towards Connected, Autonomous, Shared, and Electric (CASE) megatrends. This means they will become further dependent on chip foundries while total silicon demand elevates across all sectors.

In the short-term, automakers must build buffer stocks of chips. In the long-term, they must be prepared to act more like consumer-electronics companies and treat their semiconductor supply chain with the same protection and foresight. This is essential as vehicles tend towards the electric and software-defined paradigm.

Consumer electronics chip demand and profitability dwarfs that of automakers

The past year has seen automakers slash production to match falling demand, while that of consumer electronics has spiked. Many automakers, operating on just-in-time manufacturing principles, cancelled foundry orders in response to demand levels. However, demand increased in Q4 2020 and automakers sought  too late  to scale up production and chip orders. Chipmakers had already prioritized consumer electronics orders, which make up a larger and more profitable segment of their business by several orders of magnitude.



The largest foundry, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), has since upped its capital expenditure to extend capacity and has committed to prioritizing automaker orders at the behest of trade officials from the US, Japan, and Germany.

The US President will also sign an executive order directing a government-wide supply chain review for critical goods. Despite this, the state of affairs wont ameliorate quickly for the likes of Volkswagen, General Motors, and Ford, whose production will be selectively idled for several months.

Semiconductor price hikes puts low-margin business models at risk

Predictably, semiconductor suppliers hiked prices in response to burgeoning demand. This is bad news for automakers, who are effectively minnows in a captive market and whose low-margin business models will be further diminished.

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Moreover, the sectors dependence on semiconductor component providers is set to grow due to CASE megatrends. A premium vehicle needs up to 3,000 chips controlling functions from speed adjustments to steering; Deloitte estimates that 40% of vehicles production costs stem from electronics. With autonomous developments and the ever-saturating EV market, this proportion will only increase, with chips used for functions like battery management, infotainment, and advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS).

The dual prospect of rising costs per unit and units per vehicle does not sit well with the low presence of the automotive sector within foundries hierarchy of desirable customers. The combination of the automotive sectors supply chain vulnerability, eroding margins, and rising dependence on chips present a real challenge to all players.

Buffer stocks are only a short-term solution

Automakers must swallow the relatively low costs of storage to mitigate just-in-time failures. Take the example of Chinese technology and EV companies, which avoided supply problems by building stockpiles as a hedge against US sanctions. Similarly, Hyundai, Toyota, and BMW appear to be relatively unscathed given that they had the foresight to either avoid canceling orders during last years demand lull or secured good long-term access to supply.

Despite being the instigator of just-in-time production, Toyota itself was previously prescient enough to stockpile during the last financial crisis and therefore takes an agile and holistic view of balancing risk in supply chains.

As CASE megatrends take hold and the total demand for semiconductor hardware rises in the new normal, a picture emerges: this shortage episode is not the end of a pandemic-induced chapter but is, in fact, the opening symptom of a precarious, semiconductor-dependent era for the automotive sector. The winners will access and manage chip supplies most proactively and shrewdly; cross-sector technology disruption and the mounting reliance on chips means automotive companies need to become more like consumer electronics companies, not vice versa.
In a response to warnings by Israeli officials, Hezbollah recently published a Hebrew-subtitled video of Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah deriding Israel for being loquacious about its threats and intimidation against the Iranian-backed group.

The video begins by showing Prime Minister Netanyahu and other Israeli officials speaking about Lebanon. In the background, Nasrallah remarks about how Hezbollah is aware of recent Israeli threats and that they are nothing new.

What I want to say regarding all the threats and intimidations that we have heard: O Israelis, there is nothing new about what you said and what you are, Nasrallah stated.

Nasrallah continues by noting that Israel has done something that it hasnt done before; it has become overly vocal about its threats against Hezbollah.

But one new thing is that youve become loquacious, Nasrallah emphasized.

Nasrallah then alludes to Hezbollahs capabilities and its in-depth knowledge about Israel and its military.

The important thing is whats new, that is what information we have about you. The amount of information we possess about Israel, its army, its capabilities and its home front. What is important now is that as a resistance movement we know about you, Nasrallah remarked.

Lastly, Nasrallah ends the publication by lauding Hezbollahs militants, its arsenal and its trust in Allah to defeat Israel in a future conflict.

We know your soldiers and you know our mujhadeen. We know your huge potential and you know our capabilities, which if added to our mujahideen, our people, our faith, and our trust in Allah, then we expect nothing from this path but more defeats for you, Nasrallah concluded.

The publication is a part of a decades-old strategy of Hezbollah attempts to influence Israeli opinion  a reason why the video was subtitled in Hebrew  through social media. Using online pro-resistance channels such as Central-Media, Hezbollah has published messages, videos and other propaganda in an effort to reach an Israeli audience, especially the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

In response, the IDF also uses social media to convey messages to Hezbollah and other so-called Islamic resistance groups. The IDF routinely tweets operational activity it has conducted against Hezbollah and its affiliates.

Hezbollah and the IDF have recognized the effectiveness of social media by employing it as a part of their overall strategy to convey messages to one another. Its unlikely the strategy will be abandoned by either side and its usage will likely broaden if conflict breaks out between the two in the future.

Joe Truzman is a contributor to FDD's Long War Journal.

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By David Ljunggren

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada on Monday launched a 58-nation initiative to stop countries from detaining foreign citizens for diplomatic leverage, a practice that Ottawa and Washington say China and others are using.

Foreign ministers signed a non-binding declaration to denounce what Canadian Foreign Minister Marc Garneau called unacceptable behavior.

"Taking people from their families and using them as bargaining chips is both illegal and immoral," he said by phone, calling the effort the first of its kind.

Other signatories include Japan, Britain, Australia and virtually all members of the 27-nation European Union.

The declaration does not target any nation. Garneau said it was designed to increase diplomatic pressure on countries that detain foreigners as well as others who might want to do so.

But a Canadian official said the initiative had been sparked by concern over arrests of foreigners by China, Iran, Russia and North Korea.

Even before the declaration was formally released, the Global Times, a Chinese state-backed newspaper, cited unnamed experts as saying the initiative was "an aggressive and ill-considered attack designed to provoke China".

Ottawa is locked in a dispute with Beijing, which detained two Canadians in 2018 after Vancouver police picked up a senior Huawei Technologies Co Ltd executive on a U.S. warrant. Canada denounces what it calls "hostage diplomacy" while China insists the two cases are not linked.

Among the signatories is the United States. Last week the State Department called for the release of the two Canadians and rejected China's "use of coercion as a political tool".

The Canadian official said the declaration could help put pressure on Beijing.

"We want to make them feel a little uncomfortable. We want them to know that a lot of countries think this practice is unacceptable and hopefully over time it does contribute to a change in behavior," said the official, who requested anonymity given the sensitivity of the situation.

Story continues

Last December the British parliament's foreign affairs committee called on the government to declare Iran's "arbitrary detention of foreign nationals" as hostage-taking.

British-Iranian aid worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested in 2016 and sentenced to five years after being convicted of plotting to overthrow Iran's clerical establishment.

The Canadian initiative was started last year by Francois-Philippe Champagne, Garneau's predecessor. Champagne, now innovation minister, said by working together nations could better focus attention on the detainees.

"Their liberty may have been stolen but their voices won't be silenced," he said by phone.

(Reporting by David Ljunggren)
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Several MPs have teamed up on Monday to ask former parliament speaker Ali Abdel-Aal to resign, saying as long as Abdel-Aal has no interest in attending the Houses current plenary meetings he should resign and stop obtaining any money as MP.

Ali Abdel-Aal, who was speaker of Egypts 2015-2020 parliament, was elected MP in the parliamentary elections held between October and December 2021.

Abdel-Aal, however, was not re-elected as speaker of parliament when the House held its opening procedural meeting on 12 January. The majority party of Mostaqbal Watan (the Nations Future) chose to elect Hanafi Gibali, the former chairman of the Supreme Constitutional Court, as the new speaker.

Independent MP Mostafa Bakri said in a press interview on Sunday that he had visited Abdel-Aal at home and asked him to attend parliaments plenary meetings.

Abdel-Aals response was that as he was the Houses former speaker, it is inappropriate for him to attend meetings, said Bakri, adding that Abdel-Aal also said that he has decided not to obtain any money from parliament.

Bakri also cited Abdel-Aal as saying that he would go on acting as a statesman who sees no problem in electing a new parliament speaker.

Bakri, however, suggested that the reason why Abdel-Aal was not re-elected parliament speaker was that because he was in disagreement with the Mostaqbal Watan party.

In response, Ashraf Rashad, the parliamentary spokesman of Mostaqbal Watan, dismissed the notion that Abdel-Aal was not re-elected speaker because there was a disagreement between him and the majority party.

The majority Mostaqbal Watan party shows disagreement only when it comes to public interests and without any personal reasons, said Rashad, adding please, lets turn the page of Ali Abdel-Aal, because all can see now that the current parliament is completely different from the former one in terms of performance and debates.

Rashad also rejected Bakris argument that the current parliament is being manipulated by outside forces and that for this reason Abdel-Aal was not re-elected speaker of the new parliament.

Bakris argument in this respect is completely rejected because all MPs were freely elected and that it is Abdel-Aal who chose not to run for the post of parliament speaker, said Rashad.

Joining forces with Rashad, Mostaqbal Watan MPs insisted that Abdel-Aal should resign if he chooses to continue refusing to attend parliaments plenary meetings.

MP Abdel-Moneim Imam said the Houses internal bylaws state that if any MP chooses not to attend parliaments meetings without a prior notice, he should resign.

Abdel-Aal now has two options: either he attends parliamentary meetings or he resigns and let another one replace him, said Imam, adding that anyhow, we see how the new parliaments performance has become much better than the previous one and how the new speaker is doing much better than Abdel-Aal.

MP Yasser Omar also said Abdel-Aal has to choose between two options: to resign and stop obtaining any money from parliament or attend the meetings.

Let me tell Abdel-Aal that his insistence on refusing to attend parliaments meetings is completely rejected, said Omar.

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Oil and gas producer Beach Energy has discovered more than double the amount of gas it expected from a new gas field off the coast of Victoria, which it says will help buyers in south-eastern states avert winter shortfalls feared within five years.

Beach Energy, whose top shareholder is billionaire Kerry Stokes Seven Group, said the Enterprise gas field identified in the Otway Basin in December would add 97 petajoules of new gas reserves to the states gas supply.

ASX-listed Beach Energy posted a 54 per cent dive in first-half profit. Credit:James Davies

Chief executive Matt Kay described the new gas field as a cracker.

We are spending a billion dollars on offshore projects, we can see a decline facing east-coast gas supplies and we are here to fill the gap, Mr Kay said.
Following the parliamentary vetting of Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempeh on Friday 11th February 2021, the following facts must be made clear in response to the stories subsequently carried on various media platforms;



1. On 6th December 2018, Transnational Ltd wrote to the Minister, introducing Bluegrass Ltd and a scientific mathematical tool that is examination compliant (a maths set and a non programmable scientific calculator combined).



2. Minister then wrote to GES on this matter, as the GES has a seat on WAEC Internationals council and runs senior highs schools in the country. GES subsequently wrote to WAEC for further clarification.



3 On 5th February 2019, WAEC wrote back to GES and stated that the issue of malpractice had been discussed extensively in a retreat organised by the council in 2018 in Lagos. Members agreed that the council should formulate a policy requiring students to use only WAEC-approved sets of mathematical instruments.



4. Subsequently, WAEC wrote to GES explain that the mathematical sets were designed with Cornfill Ltd.



5. On 12th February 2019, the Director-General of GES wrote to the Minister, copying him in on the WAEC letter of 5th February 2019 and a letter from Cornfill Ltd, recommending the procurement of WAEC-approved mathematical sets to be used in WAEC exams as they fall in line with WAEC recommendations and requirements.



6. On 12th March 2019, the Ministry wrote to the PPA for approval to procure the items by sole sourcing due to urgency of having the instruments in place for the 2020 WASSCE, in accordance with the Public Procurement Act, at a price of GHC75 per item, totaling GHC63,975,675 for 853,009 pieces.



7. Unfortunately, the delivery of the items for the May/June 2020 WASSCE was delayed due to COVID restrictions which affected production abroad, and the first batch did not arrive in time for the benefit of the candidates. However, candidates for 2021 and beyond will benefit from them and the intention is to purchase them for all SHS students to enable them familiarize themselves with the items in preparation for their examinations.



8. The first batch that was received has been paid for and payment for the remainder will be made upon receipt.



9. The Minister does not know the CEO of Bluegrass Ltd in person and until his vetting on Friday 11th February 2021, was not aware of his earlier arrest by the National Intelligence Bureau (NIB) on 29th January 2021.







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By Dave Larsen

Six University of Dayton students will be honored this month as the first recipients of the Fr. Jack McGrath, S.M., Award for Research in Catholic Intellectual Traditions, which recognizes outstanding undergraduate student research in a Common Academic Program course related to Catholic intellectual traditions.

The students work ranges from a study of historical writing about the Black churchs role in the reconstruction era to a musical recital that showcased the performers spiritual and musical journey during her time at the University.

The awardees receive a $500 stipend and will present their research from 5 to 7 p.m. Monday, Feb. 22, and Thursday, Feb. 25, during two online Catholic intellectual tradition (CIT) celebrations.

The celebrations also feature prominent keynote speakers. On Feb. 22, Andrew L. Prevot, Boston College associate professor of theology, will address Mysticism and Ordinary Life. On Feb. 25, Robert Ellsberg, Orbis Books editor-in-chief, will discuss Writing About Holiness. Both events are on Zoom and open to the public.

These are celebrations of the raison d'etre of the University of Dayton, said Timothy Gabrielli, Gudorf Chair in Catholic Intellectual Traditions and associate professor of religious studies. At the heart of a UD education is inquiry driven by the conviction that careful reflection upon the breadth and depth of our lives  those lives we readily remember and those whom weve marginalized  is essential for growing in understanding, that profound gift of God.

Gabrielli sponsors the McGrath Research Award. He is co-sponsoring the CIT celebrations with Sandra Yocum, University Professor of Faith and Culture.

This years McGrath Award honors projects conducted from the 2019 fall semester through the 2020 fall semester in the context of the Common Academic Program (CAP), a learning experience shared by all undergraduate students, regardless of their major. Three awardees each were selected in the first-year/sophomore and junior/senior categories from 20 student submissions.

The 2021 awardees:

Maya Drayton , a sophomore health sciences major from Hazel Crest, Illinois. Her project, completed for the Development of Western Culture in a Global Context, is Reconstructions Black Church and its Role in the Healing Process.

, a sophomore health sciences major from Hazel Crest, Illinois. Her project, completed for the Development of Western Culture in a Global Context, is Reconstructions Black Church and its Role in the Healing Process. Margaret Feder, senior music education major from St. Louis. Her project, completed for the degree recital course, is Music as a Window to the Soul: The Story Behind My Senior Recital.

senior music education major from St. Louis. Her project, completed for the degree recital course, is Music as a Window to the Soul: The Story Behind My Senior Recital. Emily Georgopoulos , senior biology major from Cincinnati. Her project, completed for The Road to Hell: The Apocalypse in Classical and Contemporary Forms, is Natural Selection: The Eschatological Role of Nature in 1 Enoch and Snowpiercer.

, senior biology major from Cincinnati. Her project, completed for The Road to Hell: The Apocalypse in Classical and Contemporary Forms, is Natural Selection: The Eschatological Role of Nature in 1 Enoch and Snowpiercer. Emma Grace Geckle , senior religious studies and theology major from Cincinnati. Her project, completed for her capstone seminar course, is A Call for Renewal: How the Creation and Promulgation of Nostra Aetate Transformed Catholic-Jewish Relations.

, senior religious studies and theology major from Cincinnati. Her project, completed for her capstone seminar course, is A Call for Renewal: How the Creation and Promulgation of Nostra Aetate Transformed Catholic-Jewish Relations. Emily Rotunda , a first-year religious studies and theology major from Fallbrook, California. Her project, completed for the Roots and Development of Western Culture in a Global Context, is The Argument of a Modern Psychopath: I See God on Sunday.

, a first-year religious studies and theology major from Fallbrook, California. Her project, completed for the Roots and Development of Western Culture in a Global Context, is The Argument of a Modern Psychopath: I See God on Sunday. Mira Wilson, a first-year religious studies and theology major from Bellbrook, Ohio. Her project, completed for Faith Traditions: Topics in Religious Studies, is The Effects of Clerical Sexual Abuse on the God Question.

Gabrielli said Drayton and Feders projects presented unique perspectives on what it means to do research in conjunction with Catholic intellectual traditions.

They were all good, but of course the awardees were particularly impressive, he said. The committee had a fun time reading these pieces because we were all just so enamored of our students great work, which we dont always get to see when it happens in a particular class. The quality of the work was just astounding.

Feder, a cellist, said her project was the culmination of 12 years of musical training and a lifetime of faith practice. For her senior recital, she selected pieces that mirrored her personal journey and paired each with a Beatitude to remind listeners to witness Christ in all aspects of their lives.If I've learned anything from the last four years, it's that there is no right path, but rather a series of directions our lives can take through which God will work, Feder said. The Marianists have taught me that we are all missionaries called to witness Christ's beautiful and all-encompassing love for his people with the gifts we are given.

Drayton looked at how the Black church helped the Black community with healing during reconstruction and worked to build that community into what it is today. She also looked at how historians views of Black people have changed over time.

Personally, this recognition shows me that what I care about and the work I put into my research matters and that is something I will always be grateful for, Drayton said. Academically I think this award is the push I needed to see that not only do I belong at UD, but I can truly thrive here. This is also something that I will never forget and I thank the McGrath Award committee for giving me that.

The McGrath Award is named in honor of alumnus Fr. Jack McGrath (19352015), a dedicated teacher who celebrated and embodied Marianist education in the Catholic intellectual tradition.

The award committee included Corinne Daprano, associate professor of health and sport sciences; David Fine, associate professor of English; Julio Quintero, associate director for inclusive excellence education and initiatives; Bill Trollinger, professor of history and Core program director; and Pam Young, director of accreditation and assessment, School of Education and Health Sciences.

To attend the Feb. 22 CIT celebration, use the Zoom link https://rb.gy/nyruyp and the password 237132. To attend the Feb. 25 celebration, use the Zoom link https://rb.gy/rhiztp and the password 701719.

For more information about the McGrath Award, visit the website.

A Decatur man now faces capital murder charges in connection with the death of an 8-month-old child.

Cameron Almen Elliott, 22, of Decatur, also faces sexual torture, first degree marijuana possession and drug possession charges. Elliott is being held without bond at the Morgan County Correctional Facility.

Police officers were dispatched on a medical call for an unresponsive child to a residence in the 2200 block of Victoria Drive S.W. shortly before midnight Tuesday.

They found an 8-month-old girl who investigators say had severe bruising over much of her body, a bite mark on her arm and was gasping for air. The girl was carried to Childrens of Alabama in Birmingham, where she died this morning.

According to an affidavit by Detective Timothy Pace, the mother told police her daughter had been in good health with no injuries.

The mother told Pace, Cameron Almen Elliott took (the child) on a car ride and when he returned approximately 10 minutes later (she) was gasping for air and in her current state, according to the affidavit.

It Happened here is a weekly history column by Yakima Herald-Republic reporter Donald W. Meyers. Reach him at dmeyers@yakimaherald.com. Sources for this column include Early African Americans in Our Yakima Valley History by Gilbert B. Chandler and Ester B. Huey, the University of North Carolina, the Rev. Robert Trimble and the archives of the Yakima Herald-Republic.
New Delhi:

Two days after quitting the Congress, veteran leader and former Chief Minister of Gujarat Shankersinh Vaghela on Sunday resigned as the Leader of Opposition in the state Assembly. Vaghela send his resignation letter to party president Sonia Gandhi.



Vaghela, in his resignation letter alleged that some party leaders were conspiring against him ahead of the Assembly polls and this forced him to take such a decision. The elections are expected to take place in the state in December.



The former Chief Minister had quit the party at a public gathering of his supporters on his 77th birthday on July 21. He joined the Congress in 1998 and claimed that just like some party leaders conspired against him in 2009, when he lost Godhara (Panchmahal) Lok Sabha seat, similar attempts were made to oust him from the party in recent times.



Vaghela in his letter said, As I can see right now that once again history is repeating itself, as a well-planned conspiracy within the party is at work for ousting me during the forthcoming elections. Hence, I strongly feel that I should not remain in the party at the cost of my dignity and self-respect.

ALSO READ: 24 hours after leaving Congress, Shankarsinh Vaghela recalls strong RSS ties, says not hungry for power



Vaghela said since he has also decided to resign as the sitting Congress MLA of Kapadwanj seat, he will submit his resignation to the Gujarat Assembly speaker in the coming days. In his farewell speech on Friday, Vaghela announced he would resign as MLA on August 15, after the Rajya Sabha polls, to be held on August 8.



In the letter, Vaghela thanked Gandhi for making him Union minister in the UPA-1 government. Venting his anger on the Congress, Vaghela claimed he was left with no other option but to resign as his suggestions for the upcoming Assembly polls were not accepted.



On Friday, the former RSS leader, who left the BJP 20 years ago and later joined the Congress, also announced that he will not join any political party, not even the BJP. Though he refused to divulge details about his future plans, he maintained he is not retiring from public life.



Vaghela had been at loggerheads with the Congress leadership for quite some time over his demand that he be projected as the chief ministerial face in the poll-bound state. He had been contending that if he was projected as the CM candidate in the polls, the party would be able to take on the BJP effectively in Prime Minister Narendra Modis home state.



Vaghelas move comes close on the heels of the Congress failing to muster its entire strength in the presidential election held on July 17. Congress-backed candidate Meira Kumar could garner only 49 votes against the partys strength of 57 in the state assembly.



With PTI inputs.

ALSO READ: Sulking leader Shankersinh Vaghela calls meeting of supporters to show his might ahead of polls

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Police are examining a potential new piece of evidence in the investigation into the death of Belfast schoolboy Noah Donohoe.

It comes after a mobile phone thought to contain previously unseen pictures of Noah on the day he disappeared was handed into police.

The 14-year-old, a pupil at St Malachy's College, went missing in south Belfast on June 21 last year.

His body was found in a storm drain in the north of the city and close to the M2 motorway six days later following a massive search operation.

A post-mortem examination established that he died as a result of drowning.

A coroner's hearing was later told there was no evidence that he was attacked or that anyone else was involved.

Yesterday, the Sunday World newspaper reported that a woman had given a phone to police following an appeal from Noah's mum Fiona.

Fiona Donohoe had made the appeal via social media, appealing to an individual "that we know has a very significant photograph on their phone, to make contact and bring the phone to KRW Law".

She said: "The handset that contains the photo is as important as the picture to corroborate the time and date it was taken.

"You are aware of who you are ... as are we. You are the person who could change the direction of this investigation.

"We will continue to appeal to your conscience and moral duty every day if need be. You are not in any bother, and no one needs to know your identity."

The Sunday World reported the phone was given to the PSNI on Friday.

Noah's mother has also appealed for businesses in the Royal Avenue area to review any CCTV footage their cameras had captured on June 21, 2020 for images of her son as he made his way across the city.

Last month, recovering heroin addict Daryl Paul (33) was sentenced to three months' jail for stealing tragic Noah's backpack containing his laptop. He was released the same day, after time on remand was taken into consideration.

After discovering the rucksack, instead of handing it to police searching for the schoolboy, he tried to sell the laptop.

A full inquest into Noah's death has been scheduled for January 2022.

Below you will find the transcript of President George Washington's inaugural address Of 1789.

Fellow Citizens of the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Among the vicissitudes incident to life, no event could have filled me with greater anxieties than that of which the notification was transmitted by your order, and received on the fourteenth day of the present month. On the one hand, I was summoned by my Country, whose voice I can never hear but with veneration and love, from a retreat which I had chosen with the fondest predilection, and, in my flattering hopes, with an immutable decision, as the asylum of my declining years: a retreat which was rendered every day more necessary as well as more dear to me, by the addition of habit to inclination, and of frequent interruptions in my health to the gradual waste committed on it by time. On the other hand, the magnitude and difficulty of the trust to which the voice of my Country called me, being sufficient to awaken in the wisest and most experienced of her citizens, a distrustful scrutiny into his qualifications, could not but overwhelm with dispondence, one, who, inheriting inferior endowments from nature and unpractised in the duties of civil administration, ought to be peculiarly conscious of his own deficiencies. In this conflict of emotions, all I dare aver, is, that it has been my faithful study to collect my duty from a just appreciation of every circumstance, by which it might be affected. All I dare hope, is, that, if in executing this task I have been too much swayed by a grateful remembrance of former instances, or by an affectionate sensibility to this transcendent proof, of the confidence of my fellow-citizens; and have thence too little consulted my incapacity as well as disinclination for the weighty and untried cares before me; my error will be palliated by the motives which misled me, and its consequences be judged by my Country, with some share of the partiality in which they originated.

Such being the impressions under which I have, in obedience to the public summons, repaired to the present station; it would be peculiarly improper to omit in this first official Act, my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who rules over the Universe, who presides in the Councils of Nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human defect, that his benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the People of the United States, a Government instituted by themselves for these essential purposes: and may enable every instrument employed in its administration to execute with success, the functions allotted to his charge. In tendering this homage to the Great Author of every public and private good I assure myself that it expresses your sentiments not less than my own; nor those of my fellow-citizens at large, less than either. No People can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand, which conducts the Affairs of men more than the People of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency. And in the important revolution just accomplished in the system of their United Government, the tranquil deliberations and voluntary consent of so many distinct communities, from which the event has resulted, cannot be compared with the means by which most Governments have been established, without some return of pious gratitude along with an humble anticipation of the future blessings which the past seem to presage. These reflections, arising out of the present crisis, have forced themselves too strongly on my mind to be suppressed. You will join with me I trust in thinking, that there are none under the influence of which, the proceedings of a new and free Government can more auspiciously commence.

By the article establishing the Executive Department, it is made the duty of the President "to recommend to your consideration, such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient." The circumstances under which I now meet you, will acquit me from entering into that subject, farther than to refer to the Great Constitutional Charter under which you are assembled; and which, in defining your powers, designates the objects to which your attention is to be given. It will be more consistent with those circumstances, and far more congenial with the feelings which actuate me, to substitute, in place of a recommendation of particular measures, the tribute that is due to the talents, the rectitude, and the patriotism which adorn the characters selected to devise and adopt them. In these honorable qualifications, I behold the surest pledges, that as on one side, no local prejudices, or attachments; no seperate views, nor party animosities, will misdirect the comprehensive and equal eye which ought to watch over this great assemblage of communities and interests: so, on another, that the foundations of our National policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality; and the pre-eminence of a free Government, be exemplified by all the attributes which can win the affections of its Citizens, and command the respect of the world.

I dwell on this prospect with every satisfaction which an ardent love for my Country can inspire: since there is no truth more thoroughly established, than that there exists in the economy and course of nature, an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness, between duty and advantage, between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy, and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity: Since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven, can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained: And since the preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the Republican model of Government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.

Besides the ordinary objects submitted to your care, it will remain with your judgment to decide, how far an exercise of the occasional power delegated by the Fifth article of the Constitution is rendered expedient at the present juncture by the nature of objections which have been urged against the System, or by the degree of inquietude which has given birth to them. Instead of undertaking particular recommendations on this subject, in which I could be guided by no lights derived from official opportunities, I shall again give way to my entire confidence in your discernment and pursuit of the public good: For I assure myself that whilst you carefully avoid every alteration which might endanger the benefits of an United and effective Government, or which ought to await the future lessons of experience; a reverence for the characteristic rights of freemen, and a regard for the public harmony, will sufficiently influence your deliberations on the question how far the former can be more impregnably fortified, or the latter be safely and advantageously promoted.

To the preceeding observations I have one to add, which will be most properly addressed to the House of Representatives. It concerns myself, and will therefore be as brief as possible. When I was first honoured with a call into the Service of my Country, then on the eve of an arduous struggle for its liberties, the light in which I contemplated my duty required that I should renounce every pecuniary compensation. From this resolution I have in no instance departed. And being still under the impressions which produced it, I must decline as inapplicable to myself, any share in the personal emoluments, which may be indispensably included in a permanent provision for the Executive Department; and must accordingly pray that the pecuniary estimates for the Station in which I am placed, may, during my continuance in it, be limited to such actual expenditures as the public good may be thought to require.

Having thus imparted to you my sentiments, as they have been awakened by the occasion which brings us together, I shall take my present leave; but not without resorting once more to the benign parent of the human race, in humble supplication that since he has been pleased to favour the American people, with opportunities for deliberating in perfect tranquility, and dispositions for deciding with unparellelled unanimity on a form of Government, for the security of their Union, and the advancement of their happiness; so his divine blessing may be equally conspicuous in the enlarged views, the temperate consultations, and the wise measures on which the success of this Government must depend.

G. Washington

Editor's Note: This transcription is part of the National Archives.
Press Release

15 February 2021

Huka Lodge Acquired by Baillie Lodges in New Zealand

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Australia-based luxury lodge operator, Baillie Lodges ("Ballie"), has announced their acquisition of 18-key Huka Lodge, an award-winning accommodation on the outskirts of Taupo, in New Zealand, for an undisclosed sum. As part of its international expansion plan, this acquisition would be Baillie's second international property; following the acquisition of Vancouver Island's Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge in late 2020. Baillie's Founder, James Baillie, mentioned that the global reputation and fine heritage of Huka Lodge would be a good fit to the company's portfolio, and added that the company wishes to continue its global expansion across Australia, New Zealand, and beyond. In 2019, Baillie was acquired by an affiliate of US-based investment firm, KSL Capital Partners. Baillie's portfolio includes numerous other luxury lodges, including Longitude 131 at Uluru-Kata Tjuta, Capella Lodge on Lord Howe Island and tropical North Queensland luxury bolt-hole Silky Oaks Lodge in the Daintree. The company's flagship property, Southern Ocean Lodge on Kangaroo Island, is set to undergo its reconstruction, which was destroyed in the early 2020 bushfires.

Tourism Australia Launched AUD5 Million Tourism Campaign to Boost Domestic Tourism

Tourism Australia has recently launched its AUD5 million week-long advertising campaign running from 31 January to 6 February 2021, in an attempt to encourage Australians to plan and book domestic trips within the country. Coined as "Holiday Here This Year", this advertising campaign would run across print, online, billboards and television advertisement breaks and is narrated by Australian actor, Hamish Blake. The primary purpose of the campaign aims to capitalise on the pent-up demand by providing locals with the content and inspiration required to turn their desire for holidays into actual bookings. Minister of Trade, Tourism and Investment Dan Tehan mentioned that the domestic tourism industry is worth AUD100 billion and hosts over 621,000 jobs. He hopes this campaign would excite the locals about holidaying in Australia, which would support the businesses and jobs of their fellow Australians. This campaign follows the Australian government's announcement of the 2020 budget, where AUD230 million has been allocated to the Tourism Australia, to focus on boosting its domestic travel market.

NZD50 Million Events Fund Rolled Out to Regions in New Zealand

Contracts for the NZD50 million regional events fund were signed and allocated to nine groups of regional tourism organisations. This funding is part of the New Zealand Government's NZD400 million recovery fund to help businesses in the tourism sector reorient themselves to the domestic and Australian markets. Tourism Minister, Stuart Nash, confirmed that the first investment plan of NZD3.75 million approved in December was given to four regional tourism collaborating as the Thermal Explorer Highway group. The Southern Lakes group also received NZD8.5 million in funding. Northland and Auckland received the most funding with NZD19 million to host major events and business gatherings. Other regions such as Nelson and Marlborough with NZD1.5 million were working together to offer multi-day events while Wellington and Wairarapa, with NZD3.5 million were also looking into attracting more domestic tourists. Based on Tourism New Zealand's research, regional events such as festivals, concerts, exhibitions, food and beverage experiences and sporting events were major pull factors for Kiwis to go on domestic holidays. Therefore, Nash hoped that event funds would help capture the NZD9 billion that Kiwis spend overseas in previous years as events drive visitors and bring about demand across the accommodation, hospitality, and retail sectors.

Hua Hin Airport to be Further Upgraded in Thailand

Presently, three out of seven upgrading projects of Hua Hin Airport have been completed. On 6 February 2021, Deputy Transport Minister Thaworn Senneam revealed the plan to further upgrade Hua Hin airport in 2023 to accommodate larger aircraft serving long haul flights of between 10 and 12 hours. The airport's runway will be further expanded from 2,100 metres to 3,000 metres. Mr Thaworn mentioned that further upgrades are necessary as the demand for flights to Hua Hin significantly increased right before the Covid-19 disruption. Additionally, he believed that it will help boost economic recovery from tourism arrivals after the domestic demand returns to normal next year and the international market in 2023. Currently, Hua Hin airport is undergoing a THB250 million renovation that commenced last year. The renovation will widen Hua Hin airport's runway from 35 to 45 metres to accommodate larger aircrafts such as the Airbus A320 and Boeing 737. It is expected that the airport will be able to handle up to five of such aircraft at any one time once the improvements are completed. In addition, a new taxiway and passenger terminal are also amidst construction and it will allow the airport to accommodate three times its current capacity. When completed, the airport will be able to handle 900 passengers an hour and 2.6 million passengers annually, an increase from the current capacity of 300 passengers an hour and 860,000 passengers annually.
A list of more than 200 members of the over 550 million-strong Indian diaspora holding highest positions globally, including heads of state, will be unveiled on Monday, showcasing the achievements of the community leaders across different sectors. Indiaspora, a US-based organisation representing the community globally, will release for the first time ever a list of over 200 such leaders from 15 countries on the occasion of US President's Day on February 15.

The latest to join the list is US Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Indian-American to hold the post. The others in the list are elected officials, appointees or civil servants. All have risen to the call of public service and have been key agents in shaping politics and policy from a local to global scale. Their leadership will impact generations to come, Indiaspora said in an email.

It is incredible to see over 200 leaders from 15 countries answer the call of seva and public service. They represent over 550 million constituents," Indiaspora Founder M R Rangaswami, a Silicon Valley-based entrepreneur and investor told PTI. The list will be unveiled on Monday, he said.

It is a huge source of pride to have the first woman and first person of colour as the Vice President of the world's oldest democracy be someone of Indian heritage, said Rangaswami. We wanted to use this seminal moment on President's Day to highlight a host of others in the diaspora who also are in public service, he said.

The Indiaspora list highlights the accomplishments of leaders of the Indian diaspora from across industries and sectors. With each list, we pay tribute to leaders from a specific area, whether business, government, philanthropy, academics, or to the leaders of the next generation. Our aim is to bring greater awareness to the collective inspiration, influence and impact of our global community, it said.

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'Whoever harbours the seeds of anti-nationalism in their mind, that has to be exterminated from the roots, be it #Disha_Ravi or anyone else, Vij said in a tweet in Hindi

Twitter on Monday said that a post by Haryana home minister Anil Vij, in which he called for the "extermination" of anti-nationalism "from the roots", is not subject to removal under rules governing extreme speech on the social media platform.

Earlier on Monday, Vij had tweeted about the arrest of climate activist Disha Ravi, who has been named by the Delhi Police as a "key conspirator" in the toolkit case related to the farmers' protest.

"Whoever harbours the seeds of anti-nationalism in their mind, that has to be exterminated from the roots, be it #Disha_Ravi or anyone else, Vij said in a tweet in Hindi.

                  #_       ANIL VIJ MINISTER HARYANA (@anilvijminister) February 15, 2021

The tweet was initially deleted after a Twitter user in Germany filed a complaint against Germany's Network Enforcement Act, NDTV reported. The law "obliges social network providers to delete unlawful content within a short timeframe".

However, the social media platform then said that Vij's tweet was not subject to removal and restored the post.

The response from Twitter read, "We have received a complaint regarding your account, @anilvijminister for the following content. We have investigated the reported content and have found that it is not subject to removal under the Twitter Rules or German law. Accordingly, we have not taken any action as a result of this specific report."

Ravi was arrested by the Delhi Police on Saturday for allegedly sharing 'the toolkit' with climate activist Greta Thunberg. The stated aim of the toolkit was to enable anyone unfamiliar with the ongoing farmers protests in India to better understand the situation and make decisions on how to support the farmers".

However, the Delhi Police claimed that the 21-year-old was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.

In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were listed to support the protest.

With inputs from PTI

Acumen Research and Consulting, a global provider of market research studies, in a recently published report titled ECG Devices Market Global Industry Analysis, Market Size, Opportunities And Forecast, 2020-2027



LOS ANGELES, Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Global ECG Devices Market is expected to grow at a CAGR of around 5.6% from 2020 to 2027 and reach the market value of over US$ 7,271.2 Mn by 2027.

The ECG devices market is segmented based on product type, end-user, and geography. By product type, the market is divided into monitoring ECG systems, and diagnostic ECG systems including rest ECG Systems, Stress ECG Systems, and Holter ECG Systems. Based on end-user, market segments include hospitals, clinics, ambulatory surgical centers, and others.

Based on product type, monitoring the ECG systems segment is leading the ECG Devices Market with maximum revenue share (%) in 2019. The monitoring ECG systems are further segmented into remote data monitoring, event monitoring, and continuous cardiovascular monitoring systems. The declining cost of wireless technologies simultaneously increasing the incidence of cardiovascular diseases where monitoring of heart activities is important is the factor driving the segmental market value. The increasing demand for home ECG devices is boosting the segmental market value.

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In 2019, North America held the major share (%) of the global ECG devices market. The presence of major players in the regional market including AliveCor Inc., CardioComm Solutions Inc., GE Healthcare, and iRhythm Technologies Inc. are contributing to the regional market value. The rapidly increasing geriatric population, as well as rising incidences of cardiovascular diseases, is supporting the regional market value. Additionally, the well-established healthcare infrastructure in the US and Canada is further contributing to the regional market value.

Apart from these, the Asia Pacific region is anticipated to experience the fastest growth with a major CAGR (%) over the forecast period from 2020 to 2027. The emerging economies, developing healthcare infrastructure, increasing disposable income coupled with the increasing spending on healthcare solutions, favorable government policies, and increasing investment by the market players in the region to take advantage of available opportunities are the factors supporting the regional market value. The developing economies of the region including China and India are contributing to the regional market value.

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Some of the leading competitors are Aerotel Medical Systems Ltd, AliveCor Inc., BPL Medical Technologies, Cardiocity Limited, CardioComm Solutions Inc., GE Healthcare, iRhythm Technologies Inc., MediBioSense Ltd, Medtronic PLC, and Nihon Kohden Corporation. ECG devices companies have announced strategic mergers and acquisitions, partnerships and collaborations, and new product development to expand their position in the ECG devices industry. Major players are also moving into new regions with advanced technologies for gaining a competitive advantage.

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Some of the key observations regarding ECG devices industry include:

LifeSignals Group has received FDA 510(k) clearance for its ECG Remote Monitoring Patch Platform in 2020. The ECG Remote Monitoring Patch Platform is a wireless remote monitoring system that is used by healthcare professionals in ambulatory, hospital, home, and healthcare settings. The new platform records data that is transmitted wirelessly to a remote server for storage and analysis.





In 2020, the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) and a midsize medical device company have jointly developed a monitoring system, which includes a device consists of a biometric signal measuring device (VDR-1000) and a patient monitoring device (VMA-1000). The VDR-1000 measures the patient's electrocardiogram (ECG), pulse wave, pulse, respiration, and blood pressure and sends the recorded values to VMA-1000 which allows the healthcare professionals to monitor the COvid-19 infected patients condition in real-time.





In 2020, GS Elektromedizinische Geraete G. Stemple GmbH and VectraCor Inc. have announced an agreement, particularly to incorporate VectraCor's cloud-based version of VectraCor's derived 22-Lead ECG and Cardiac Electrical Biomarker technology into corpuls defibrillators.





In 2020, Withings, a French consumer electronics company has announced a $60 million Series B funding round that will be co-led by Gilde Healthcare, Idinvest Partners and Bpi France, through their Large Venture funds, as well as BNP Paribas Developpement, ODDO BHF, and Adelie Capital.





Philips has launched remote monitoring and defibrillator solution (Tempus ALS) for pre-hospital settings in the U.S. The company has received 510(k) clearance from the FDA for its pre-hospital wireless monitoring solution (Tempus LS- Manual). The software platform provides robust, real-time transfer of clinical data and events, interactive ECG measurement, and two-way communication among others.



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By Mehari Taddele Maru





FLORENCE  In a recent interview, Rwandan President Paul Kagame argued that U.S. President Joe Biden's new administration and the United Nations Security Council should take the lead in addressing the violence and deprivation in Ethiopia's Tigray region.



Kagame described the situation there as worrying, and said the death toll was too high for the conflict to be left only to Ethiopia or the African Union to manage. As the president of a country that is still dealing with the consequences of the 1994 genocide against its Tutsi population, Kagame speaks with considerable authority here, and deserves to be heard.



There are five reasons why immediate action by the Security Council regarding Tigray is necessary.



First, the likely presence of Eritrean armed forces in Tigray makes the war both a civil and international conflict, and hence within the U.N.'s remit. Eritrean troops have been implicated in killings and in the forcible return of Eritrean refugees, including through the burning of the Shimelba and Hitsats refugee camps. Some 15,000-20,000 Eritrean refugees are missing, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.



Second, the Tigray region is now facing a possible famine, with 2.3 million people in need of emergency aid. The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reports that 4.5 million people  67 percent of the region's population  need assistance. Ethiopian federal government forces are said to be obstructing access to aid and clean water. There are also reports of the deliberate destruction of U.N. food stores and markets.



Third, with up to two million people now internally displaced, Tigray poses a significant burden on the world's humanitarian resources at a time when the need for them in East Africa has never been higher, owing to COVID-19, locust infestation, and food insecurity. The Ethiopian government's apparent unwillingness to allow the international community to provide rapid, unconditional, unfettered, and sustained humanitarian access to all parts of Tigray has worsened a dire situation.



Fourth, some U.N. reports and those of other organizations in Tigray point to possible grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and other aspects of international humanitarian law that prohibit starvation of civilians and collective punishment.



There are also reports of what may constitute state-led ethnic cleansing and genocide, as well as a "high number of alleged rapes." Tens of thousands of Tigrayans serving in Ethiopia's peacekeeping, security, military, police, and intelligence spheres have been dismissed from their jobs and sometimes detained.



Fifth, Ethiopia is so consumed by the fighting in Tigray that it is no longer a source of regional stability, and appears to be renouncing its role as regional peacekeeper. Security tensions and border disputes are mushrooming in the region, mainly between Ethiopia and Sudan, Kenya, and Somalia, with an election-related crisis in Somalia and negotiations over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam increasing the risk of proxy wars. The fragile political transition in Sudan also may be destabilized.



Making matters worse, the withdrawal of Ethiopian forces from peacekeeping missions in Somalia, South Sudan, and Sudan seems almost certain to increase instability. In particular, Ethiopian troops' departure from Somalia, where the AU has conducted its AMISOM peacekeeping mission, could create an opening for the al-Qaeda-linked Al Shabaab to stage a comeback in that country.



When a state fails to prevent or alleviate atrocities within its territory (such as genocide, crimes against humanity, or war crimes), or if the state itself is the primary perpetrator of such acts, the U.N. must not stand idly by. After all, only the Security Council can successfully challenge a government's deliberate obstruction of humanitarian aid.



For these reasons, the Security Council must address the situation in Tigray immediately. It should adopt a resolution aimed at alleviating the suffering in the region through determined international action, and at convincing the Ethiopian government to restore peace there.



Concretely, the resolution should establish a monitoring and verification commission with a mandate to negotiate, observe, monitor, verify, and report on conditions in Tigray. The goals should be the immediate and definitive cessation of hostilities; rapid, unconditional, unfettered, and sustained distribution of aid to all parts of Tigray; the complete withdrawal of any and all external armed forces and groups; and a ceasefire agreement that can lead to a peaceful resolution of the conflict in Tigray.



Ethiopia's government says that it is ready to work with the international community to ease the suffering in Tigray. That promise must now be put to the test.





Mehari Taddele Maru is an adjunct professor at the Migration Policy Center of the European University Institute's Robert Schuman Center for Advanced Studies and academic coordinator of the Young African Leaders Program at the EUI's School of Transnational Governance. This article was distributed by Project Syndicate (www.project-syndicate.org).


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He said that Muslims want the development of the country and they want the welfare of every citizen living in the country and expect good treatment from others.

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New Delhi: The situation in the country is critical at the moment, but the history of Muslims shows that they have gone through many more difficult times. With courage and wisdom, we should be concerned about the current situation and take appropriate measures, especially to convey the message of truth to every individual in the country, and live with a benevolent character. This is our religious and faithful duty. This was stated by Maulana Syed Mohammad Rabi Hasni Nadvi, President of All India Muslim Personal Labor Board (AIMPLB).

Maulana Syed Mohammad Rabi Hasni Nadvi inaugurated the 15-day online sermons issued by the Boards social media desk on Series of Invitation and Action. In his address, he conveyed the message of humanity to all the people of the country. He pointed out that any country develops through humanity and morality. Our country is the cradle of different religions and different classes. This country can develop only if the followers of all religions consider each other as their own. Treat them well, and live together.

He said that Muslims want the development of the country and they want the welfare of every citizen living in the country and expect good treatment from others.

In a statement, Maulana Muhammad Umreen Mahfooz Rahmani, Secretary, All India Muslim Personal Law Board and Convener of Social Media Desk, said that the thought-provoking speech of the President of All India Muslim Personal Law Board is something that every Muslim should listen to and act upon.

He said that the Law Board has set up a social media desk on All India Muslim to try to make Muslims in India aware of the activities of the board and the Muslim Personal Law Board, protection of Shariah and unity. The nation is doing a great job of reforming the nation, relaying it to the people living in the country. Through various social accounts, efforts are being made to spread the message of the Muslim Personal Law Board and to point out the social evils prevalent among Muslims. They should be encouraged to stay away from them. Many important series are being successfully run by the social media desk and people are benefiting from them in large numbers, he said.

He said that the desk is launching a new and important series of online sermons called Series of Invitation and Thought, which was inaugurated last night by Maulana Muhammad Rabi Hasni Nadvi Damat Barakatham.

It is gratifying to announce that the next sermon Hazrat Maulana Syed Mohammad Wali Sahib Rahmani Damat Barakatham Kahoga, General Secretary Ameer Shariat of Sunal Labor Board on India Muslim will prove to be eye-opening and insightful in the current situation of the country, he said. He urged Indian Muslims to join the India Social Media Desk and be entitled to the reward by participating in the service of conveying the message of the Sun Law Board to all India Muslims far and wide.
had asked for USD 40 million (around Rs 290.41 crore) in compensation from for the deal with Reliance Industries, and Amazon's claim of not being informed of the deal is incorrect, documents submitted to the emergency arbitrator of SIAC by the Kishore Biyani-led firm said.

According to the submission by in October last year, was well aware of Future's Rs 24,713 crore deal with RIL.

In August 2020, two phone calls among the 3rd respondent (Kishore Biyani) and 8th respondent (Rakesh Biyani) and Abhijit Mujumdar on behalf of the claimant ( com NV Investment Holdings LLC), the claimant asked for USD 40 million as compensation in exchange for the and Reliance proceedings with the disputed transaction, the document said.

It further stated that the claimant's contention in the NOA and the application that it did not have any information in connection with the disputed transaction is incorrect.

The document - dated October 12, 2020 - also noted Future Retail had made a public announcement on August 29, 2020, about the deal after having informed the claimant's representatives that discussions were ongoing with Reliance.

So, leaving aside the messages, calls and e-mails referred the claimant was aware of the disputed transaction for more than a month before it initiated the present arbitration proceedings, Future said in its submission, a copy of which was seen by PTI.

Amazon did not respond to e-mailed queries seeking comments on the matter.

On August 29, 2020, Future Group had announced that its retail and wholesale business would be sold to Reliance Retail, owned by oil-to-chemical conglomerate RIL in a Rs 24,713 crore deal.

In October 2020, Amazon had dragged Future Group to arbitration at Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC), arguing that Future violated the contract by entering into the deal with rival Reliance.

On October 25, 2020, an interim award was passed in favour of Amazon with a single-judge bench of V K Rajah barring Future Retail from taking any step to dispose of or encumber its assets or issuing any securities to secure any funding from a restricted party.

In August 2019, Amazon had agreed to purchase 49 per cent of one of Future's unlisted firms, Future Coupons Ltd (which owns 7.3 per cent equity in BSE-listed Future Retail through convertible warrants), with the right to buy into the flagship Future Retail after a period of three to 10 years.

Even after the interim award, Amazon and Future Group remain locked in a legal tussle in the matter. Both parties have approached several legal forums.

On the other hand, the Future-Reliance deal has already received clearance from CCI, SEBI and bourses, and the scheme of arrangement is now awaiting the nod from the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) and shareholders.

(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.)
More than 110,000 doses of COVID vaccine have been administered in the states long-term care facilities since late December, and state official estimate they are about two-thirds of the way to completing vaccinations of those residents.

Data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last week show that 110,016 vaccines have been administered through the long-term care facility partnership through which CVS and Walgreens pharmacists have vaccinated residents staff at nursing homes and assisted living facilities in Connecticut.

First doses accounted for 70,237, and around half of those who received a first dose have received their second. The CDC data doesnt differentiate between nursing homes and assisted living facilities.

State officials have not released detailed data on vaccinations of people in long-term facilities other than to say they believe 90 percent of the residents have gotten at least a first dose and about 60 percent of the staff have been vaccinated.

DPH spokeswoman Maura Fitzgerald said its difficult to calculate vaccination rates among staff or residents in long-term care facilities because the numbers fluctuate daily  particularly in facilities with short-term rehabilitation wings with constant turnover.

She said the state doesnt have the exact number of staff that work in each long-term care facility, doesnt have the exact number of residents in residential care homes on any given day and that a constant influx of unvaccinated residents will bring down vaccination rates.

Fitzgerald said that at the beginning of last week, almost all nursing home residents have had at least one dose of vaccine. Around 70 percent of residents have received their second doses.

As for nursing home staff, DPH estimates over 70 percent of staff have received at least one dose, and over 50 percent of staff have received two doses.

In assisted living facilities, almost all residents have received at least one dose of vaccine, Fitzgerald said. With assisted living staff, over 50 percent have received at least one dose of vaccination, and second-dose clinics also are ongoing.

The vaccination of long-term residents started in December and is winding down, at least in Connecticut, with most facilities expected to finish three rounds of vaccines by the end of this month.

In Connecticut, there are about 17,000 nursing home residents and about 25,000 staff, who were among the first in the state to be vaccinated.

The numbers are less definitive in assisted living facilities, which do not face the same scrutiny that nursing homes do from the state Department of Public Health.

The state emphasized vaccinating the nursing home residents because of the devastating impact the virus has had on that population, with 3,873 deaths since March. There have been 471 deaths in assisted living facilities, bringing the total of COVID deaths in long-term care facilities to 4,361 as of Feb. 9.

More staff vaccinations

Earlier this month, the state DPH announced that it would allow nursing home workers to get their first vaccine during the third round of vaccinations at their facilities  as long as they made arrangements on their own to get the second shot a month later.

Several providers contacted Thursday said that the extra opportunity to get the shot has led to an increase in staff vaccinations.

David Skoczulek, Vice President of Business Development for iCare Health Network, said two of its facilities now have more than 75 percent of their staff vaccinated. All of iCares facilities have finished their third round of shots, and he estimates as many as 50 staff members got their first dose of vaccine this time around.

It behooves the staff to get vaccinated beyond just the safety of themselves, their families and the residents, Skoczulek said. As time goes on, it will mean more freedom of movement and unit assignment, less testing and, hopefully one day, less use of PPE.

State officials were concerned because the initial response to the vaccination among nursing home staff was tepid. In some cases, less than 40 percent of employees got vaccinated in the first round, but numbers have increased as others have seen that the vaccine didnt affect their co-workers.

Mag Morelli, president of LeadingAge Connecticut, which represents about 40 non-profit assisted living facilities, said the participation in those facilities has been at about the same levels as nursing homes.

The residents are getting vaccinated  they have been waiting for it, Morelli said.

Morelli said she believes the timing of the vaccine rollout had some effect on staff participation, because nursing home residents were the first people to get vaccinated  many right before the holidays.

They started really early, and you could see people wanted to wait, Morelli said. But we really have seen an uptick recently in staff (vaccinations) as well.

COVID numbers going down

The large-scale vaccinations of nursing home residents has led to a marked decrease in the number of infections in the facilities  and lately a decrease in deaths as well.

For the week of Feb. 3-9 there were only 52 new infections and 17 deaths  the lowest total of deaths in at least a month. The previous week, there were 101 new infections among nursing residents and 35 deaths.

The last week of January, the state recorded 166 new cases and 66 deaths among nursing home residents. When vaccinations started in late December, the state was averaging over 100 deaths a week.

Cases also have been decreasing among nursing home staff. There were 57 new infections among staff last week, down from 87 the previous week and 153 the week before that.
Arcadia Share & Stock Brokers Was Intentionally Filing Incorrect Information and Data: NSE

Mumbai-based Arcadia Share & Stock Brokers Pvt Ltd, whose trading rights have been withdrawn by the National Stock Exchange (NSE) for failing to adhere to its regulatory provisions, was found reporting incorrect data about clients funds, cash and cash equivalent balances, during the weekly enhanced supervision.

"Based on data collected by the forensic auditor, the amount payable to the clients was about Rs47.51 crore as on 31 December 2020, whereas the clients payable as reported in the cash and cash equivalent balances submission by Arcadia as on the same date were to the tune of around Rs11.17 crore. This clearly establishes that Arcadia has been intentionally filing incorrect information and data with a view to conceal the true position of the availability of clients funds and securities," says an order passed by the NSE's member and core settlement guarantee fund committee (MCSGFC).

The MCSGFC is headed by Mona Bhide and its members include Narasimha Murthy, Vikram Limaye, Ranganayakulu Jagarlamudi and Anuradha Rao.

During September and October 2020, NSE received an alert about an off-market transfer of securities by Arcadia. In its offsite supervision, NSE found off-market transfer of securities worth Rs5.51 crore to clients demat accounts without sufficient quantity of securities available in the client collateral account maintained by Arcadia on behalf of the clients. The Exchange then asked Arcadia for clarification through 16 emails sent between September and December 2020.

The NSE committee observed that Arcadia did not submit a satisfactory response (on the grounds of COVID-19 pandemic and personal and family problems), despite several follow-ups and reminders from the Exchange and kept seeking extensions for submission of data.

In the meantime, NSE also received an alert from depositories regarding invocation of pledged securities by banks from proprietary demat accounts of Arcadia between October 2020 and December 2020 worth Rs20 crore.

Arcadia provided limited information to NSE. Officials of NSE visited the brokerage office three times in December and obtained relevant supporting documents.

Based on the data taken from Arcadias back-office, NSE observed certain mismatches in the clients fund balances between trial and client ledger balances. NSE then decided to conduct forensic audit of Arcadia's books and appointed KPMG for the purpose.

A preliminary analysis of the data submitted by KPMG revealed that there was a shortfall of clients funds of about Rs27 crore against the non-related client payables of around Rs47.51 crore for around 10,000 clients, as on 31 December 2020.

NSE says, "The conduct of Arcadia, as well as the preliminary findings of the forensic audit, clearly indicated an early warning on the potential default prompting the Exchange to trigger actions as envisaged under the SEBI circular dated 1 July 2020, on standard operating procedure (SOP) in the cases of trading member or clearing member leading to default."

The Exchange called Antony Sequeira, founder-promoter as well as designated director of Arcadia, who promised to share the required data and information by 19 January 2021. In its email on 20 January 2021, Arcadia acknowledged the shortfall of clients funds of Rs37.92 crore as on 31 December 2020.

NSE again called Mr Sequeira for a meeting and asked Arcadia to provide a detailed plan of action to recoup the shortfall and tentative timelines to settle the client payables. During the meeting, Mr Sequeira assured the NSE that Arcadia would sell off their proprietary shares, currently pledged with banks and utilise the proceeds to settle the client payables within 15 days time.

However, Arcadia could not settle the clients as assured.

On 21 January 2021, KPMG, the forensic auditor, informed NSE that as per their preliminary findings as against the total client securities payable of Rs106.68 crore, the client securities shortfall amount of Arcadia as on 31 December 2020 was about Rs54.29 crore. Next month, the forensic auditor informed NSE that after reconciling the back-office records of Arcadia with the depository accounts maintained by the brokerage, the revised amount of client securities shortfall was Rs24.06 crore.

NSE also found Arcadia was engaged in the activity of borrowing securities from its clients not through the security lending and borrowing mechanism (SLBM) platform of the Exchange. Arcadia has entered into agreements with five clients for borrowing securities in lieu of interest being paid at the rate of 8% on 50% of the value of shares borrowed.

Based on the information shared by Arcadia and the preliminary analysis of the forensic audit, NSE found that as on 1 February 2021, the brokerage had a shortfall of client's funds of Rs41.89 crore and a shortfall of client's securities worth Rs24.06 crore.

Arcadia claims that it paid Rs10.20 crore to about 360 creditors between 27th January to 2 February 2021 as against the client payable of Rs47.51 crore as of December end. However, the brokerage did not provide any documentary evidence for the payment, NSE noted.

During January, NSE says it further received an alert from depositories about the invocation of Arcadia's pledged securities by banks. Since NSE had earlier observed off-market transfers between clients demat accounts and the proprietary demat account of Arcadia, it asked Axis Bank, Union Bank of India, State Bank of Mauritius, and Kotak Bank not to invoke the pledge on the securities from the demat accounts of Arcadia. It also asked these banks not to take any adverse action in relation to the said securities till the time NSE ascertains ownership of the pledged securities.

In its order, the NSE committee noted, "...despite giving sufficient directions and communication as well as opportunity to recoup the shortages, Arcadia has failed to demonstrate recoupment of any significant portion of the identified shortages. The Committee also finds that the action plan which was submitted by Arcadia vide its email dated 25 January 2021 per se remained empty assurances and does not inspire confidence to allow Arcadia to continue to operate its terminals in view of the conduct of Arcadia and its failure to recoup the client shortages."

It says, "Arcadia has failed to submit the requisite information and details or justifiable reasons for off market transfers to its clients and invocation of pledged securities by banks. The non-submission of the said information obstructs carrying on the inspection and offsite analysis which is necessary to verify or ascertain the veracity of the compliance by Arcadia including the financial condition of Arcadia. Accordingly, Arcadia has failed in its obligation as a trading member to facilitate the inspection and offsite supervision by the Exchange."

The MCSGFC then decided to disable trading terminals of Arcadia from 8 February 2021.

Moneylife tried to reach Arcadia via telephone, but none of the calls was answered by anyone from the brokerage. We then sent emails to Arcadia's managing director (MD) Mr Sequeira and director Narendra Brahmbhatta.

All we received from Mr Sequeira, the designated director of Arcadia, is the order passed by NSE's MCSGFC. On all other questions, he says, "we can discuss in the next week." Since, we all are working from home and a meeting is not possible, we had requested Mr Sequeira to reply on email on the questions we had asked. We will publish his reply here as and when we receive it.

Arcadia has around 147,000 registered clients, of whom, around 11,600 clients were active as on 31 January 2021.
Kids want to fish? You don't know how yourself? Here's a little help
Use mercy well. Cruelty too.

Thats the advice Renaissance Florentine statesman-philosopher Niccolo Machiavelli would tender as the Pentagon sets out to purge extremismshorthand for members of violent subversive groupsfrom the ranks. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin set the anti-extremism campaign in motion in response to the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, DC. The principle underlying the campaign is impeccable. The U.S. military should beand must bean apolitical institution that defends the U.S. Constitution. All uniformed personnel swear an oath to that effect, and that oath has no expiration date. The services should rid themselves of all groups that advocate the violent overthrow of the American system of government.

If mishandled, though, the anti-extremism campaign could be a cataclysm, wrecking a culture that is healthy on the whole at a time when strong, united, resolute U.S. armed forces are at a premium. A deflated military would court disaster in strategic competition against the likes of China and Russiato say nothing of open combat. Seldom do forces divided against themselves fare well on the battlefield.

Tread carefully.

Machiavelli holds forth on how to found and renovate institutions in The Prince, his best-known work, and in his Discourses on Roman and Italian history. Both are well worth any military chieftains time. Machiavelli is knownand commonly caricaturedfor his bareknuckles views on how to survive and thrive in a world ruled by vice, deceit, and lust for power. As a rule, though, his ideas are subtler, more interesting, and more actionable than the caricature. He depicts purifying a city or institution ridden with corruption as one of the foremost acts of statecraft, alongside founding a society anew or managing turbulence in the institutions surroundings. Such a purge, he says, demands measures that are at once harsh and discriminate. Otherwise animosity toward the leadership could festermaking the effort self-defeating.

Two passages from Machiavelli bear on the anti-extremist campaign. First, he considers whether a prince should enact policies that make him feared or loved by his subjects. Choose! The Florentine observes wrylyyou can almost see his Mona Lisa smile as he says itthat a sage ruler would prefer to have it both ways. Forced to choose, however, it is safer to be feared than loved. Love is not under the leaders control. People can grant their affections, withhold them, or grant them and then withdraw them for any reasonor for no reason at all. Fear is another matter. Whether the ruler provokes dread is under his control, and practitioners of statecraft should confine their efforts to domains they can control.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III delivers remarks to Department of Defense personnel, with President Joe. Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the Pentagon, Washington, D.C., Feb. 10, 2021. (DoD photo by Lisa Ferdinando)

The crucial thing for Machiavelli is to inspire a measure of fear among potential opponents without sowing hatred. The prince, he maintains, should make himself feared in such a mode that if he does not acquire love, he escapes hatred, because being feared and not being hated can go together very well. To avoid stoking hatred and the conspiracies to which it gives rise, he should forego seizing the property of his citizens and his subjects. Moreover, he should refuse to levy extreme punishments unless there is suitable justification and manifest cause for it. The prince should explain his purposes and methods in terms likely to command agreement within the citizenry. The bottom line for him: leaders should contrive to avoid hatred by pursuing temperate policies.

But there are limits to the temperate approach. Machiavelli warns leaders not to be guilty of an excess of mercy. He contrasts Scipio Africanusthe conqueror of Carthage and one of the greatest Roman captains of all timefor granting his army too much license in Spain. The army rebelled against him because of his leniency, whereas Hannibal, the commander of the Carthaginian host eventually vanquished by Scipio, made himself terrible in the eyes of his soldiers and never faced a similar challenge. Hannibal was venerated precisely because of his strictness. In military institutions as in cities, it is better to be feared than loved. Mercy is desirablebut only consistent with good order in the ranks. Using mercy well means setting limits on it.

Second, and more directly to the point, Machiavelli makes much of the concept of cruelty well used. The idea he puts forth is that, if compelled to take ruthless measures to consolidate his rule or reform the city, the prince should administer them sharply, sparingly, andpreferablyall at once. Such measures are an evil, if a necessary one, and wise princes resort to misdeeds as infrequently as possible. Harsh moves, he contends, can be called well used (if it is permissible to speak well of evil) that are done at a stroke, out of the necessity to secure oneself, and then are not persisted in but are turned to as much utility for the subjects as one can. Those cruelties are badly used which, though few in the beginning, rather grow with time than are eliminated.

Applied to the Pentagons anti-extremism campaign, Machiavellian insights suggest that senior leaders should keep the venture short and sharp while confining its scope to as narrow and well-defined a range of targets as possible. If they unduly widen the definition of extremism to cover legitimate political activity, or unduly string out the effort, tumults such as those foretold by Machiavelli could befall the armed services. A demoralized or disunited force seldom excels as a fighting force.

Lastly, then, the campaign must be evenhandedand be seen as such. You would hardly know it from news reporting, but January 6 was not the only instance of violent extremism to roil the country in recent months. The past year was soaked in political violence, including attacks on the White House perimeter and a protracted siege of the federal courthouse in Portland, Oregon. Unrest was mercifully brief here in Rhode Island, but police did deploy to protect our majestic statehouse in early June after receiving word that arsonists were plotting to burn it down.

In other words, the breach of the U.S. Capitol was reprehensible; it was hardly an isolated event.

It is doubtful in the extreme that active-duty military people were involved in last summers upheavals. My guess would be that the same holds for veterans as well. All the same, top military officials should make a point of investigating all types of violent extremism in the servicesnot just groups responsible for the attack on the Capitol. And they should state that explicitly and publicly. Evenhandedness would approximate the Machiavellian ideal of turning the campaign to as much utility as possible for the services. This would be cruelly well used.

And thats pretty good for troubled times.

James Holmes is Contributing Editor at 19FortyFive and the author of the forthcoming Habits of Highly Effective Maritime Strategists. The views voiced here are his alone.

This article appeared originally at 1945.
The proponents of the Essene theory depicted the stone ruins at Qumran as the remnants of an Essene monastery. But Dr. Golb pointed out that the site had the graves of women as well as men, an unlikely feature of a monastery.

Theres nothing to show that it was anything but a fortress, Dr. Golb told a symposium on the scrolls arranged by the Institute of Semitic Studies in Princeton, N.J., in 1989.

Instead of an Essene provenance, Dr. Golb argued, the scrolls reflect a period when the Jewish world, centered on the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, was in turmoil.

The Sadducees, loyalists of the priests in the Holy Temple and advocates of a strict application of the written law, including eye for an eye justice, were losing influence to the Pharisees, who saw the priestly class as aristocratic and corrupt and who were beginning to develop the rabbinic-centered Judaism, softened somewhat by oral traditions, that dominates today. This was the roiling atmosphere in which Christians  also opposed to the Sadducees  cultivated their faith.

Dr. Golb, an expert on medieval Jewish history who was a professor of Jewish history and civilization at the University of Chicago from 1963 until his retirement in 2015, produced many scholarly articles about the Dead Sea Scrolls and coalesced his thinking in the 1995 book Who Wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls?: The Search for the Secret of Qumran.

Although he gathered few supporters when he first expounded his theory in the early 1980s, Israeli archaeologists and other scholars later drifted toward his view  finding evidence, for example, that the Qumran ruins were most likely a pottery factory and not a monastery.

Image Dr. Golb produced many scholarly articles about the Dead Sea Scrolls and coalesced his thinking in a 1995 book.

The debate turned vitriolic and personal. When American museums in 2006 and 2007 announced exhibitions of the scrolls, Dr. Golbs son Raphael, a real estate lawyer with a Harvard doctorate in comparative literature, grew angry that his fathers perspective was being ignored and waged an internet campaign against his fathers rivals.
Thiruvananthapuram: The Kerala government on Monday (February 15) decided to dismiss from service the police officials responsible for the custodial death of a 49-year-old remand prisoner at a police station in Idukki district in July 2019.

A special cabinet meeting, chaired by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, took the decision, based on the report of the judicial commission which probed the custodial death.

"The cabinet has decided to accept the findings and recommendations of the Justice Narayana Kurup Commission. This includes the recommendation of dismissal of police officials responsible for the custodial death," the state government said in a release.

In January this year, the commission had submitted a 150 page report to the government.

The deceased, K Rajkumar, was taken into custody on June 12, 2019 by police at Nedumkandam in connection with a financial fraud case and was produced before a magistrate on June 16.

However, he was allegedly tortured for the next four days, following which he was admitted to the Peermade Taluk hospital, where he died on June 21.

After a public outcry, the state government appointed the judicial commission to look into various aspects related to the custodial death, including the circumstances leading to it.

Justice Kurup had ordered exhuming of the body and a re- postmortem as he found several lapses in the first autopsy report, one of which was that the internal organs of the deceased had not been sent for expert examination.

The second autopsy report had revealed new injuries.

The CBI, which was probing the case, filed the chargesheet in the case earlier this month before the Chief Judicial Magistrate court at Kochi, naming nine police officers.

The probe agency has named a sub-inspector, two assistant sub-inspectors, two police drivers, a home guard and three civil police officers.

The CBI has charged them under various provisions of the Indian Penal Code, including Sections 302 (murder), 343 (wrongful confinement), 348 (wrongful confinement for extortion), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), among others.

Live TV
Lockdown cooking and casual clothing inspired designer Jason Wus Autumn-Winter 2021 collection, which his models paraded live at New York Fashion Week on Sunday evening.

The creations were dished out in his 1950s-inspired Mr. Wus General Store" between rows of fresh produce set up in an empty Broadway shopfront.

During this past year, cooking has proven to be an amazing outlet for me creatively," the Taiwanese-Canadian designer, 38, said in a statement.

The joys that I experience from cooking and spending time with loved ones make me hopeful to celebrate the moments that really matter. This show represents who I am, not only as a designer but as a person."

The edible ingredients were donated to City Harvest, a New York charity fighting food insecurity, after the show, one of the few live events in this years Fashion Week.

Wu, who founded his eponymous label in 2007 and rose to global fame as the designer of the gown worn by former first lady Michelle Obama to her husbands first inauguration ball in 2009, has been documenting his pandemic-time cooking in a diary on his Instagram account MrWuEats".

In line with his 1950s Americana theme, Wu also partnered with Coca-Cola, diving into the U.S. brands archives to unearth prints, logos and styles.

These logos bring that multicultural aspect to the collection and a nod to what America means to me - a melting pot of diverse cultures," Wu said.

The show featured loose-fitting long dresses and skirts, combined with knitted sweaters and long masculine coats. Red and blue popped out against whites, black and greys. Long fringes and boots in yellow snakeskin and pink patent leather lightened up more somber styles.

(Production by Reuters Television: Editing by Richard Chang)
A man was hospitalized after he was shot on Interstate 93 in Boston over the weekend, according to authorities.

The shooting on I-93 was reported around 10 p.m. Sunday, a spokesperson for Massachusetts State Police told MassLive. It is unclear where exactly the man was shot on the highway.

The victim was taken to a Boston hospital for treatment after the shooting, according to the spokesperson. State police did not say how severe the mans injuries were.

Details remain under investigation at this time, the spokesperson said.

No further information about the shooting was immediately available Monday morning.

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.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : Highlighting a tenure marked by global crises and rapid globalisation, this is an insightful and important read for anyone looking for advice on how to lead in unprecedented times.

In "HOT SEAT" (Hodder & Stoughton), Jeff Immelt, the former CEO of General Electric shares the hard-won lessons he learned during his 16 years at the helm of one of America's most iconic companies. Beginning with Immelt's first Monday on the job -- the day before September 11th, 2001 -- the book offers a rigorous and candid self-interrogation of Immelt's tenure, detailing for the first time, his proudest moments, missteps, and the lessons he learned battling one crisis after another as he led GE into the 21st century.

Marked by straight talk and humility, "HOT SEAT" is not a typical business book. As Immelt admits in the prologue: "In October 2017, as I stepped down after thirty-five years at General Electric, I wasn't sure I could write this book. My sixteen years as CEO had given me a front-row seat to history, and I'd learned some tough lessons I believed others could benefit from. But my tenure ended badly.

"Many business books begin with a tacit promise: 'Let me tell you how to be like me: an unmitigated success!' Clearly, I couldn't say that. My legacy was, at best, controversial. GE won in the marketplace but not in the stock market. I made thousands of decisions impacting millions of people, often in the midst of blinding uncertainty and second-guessed by countless critics. I was proud of my team and what we'd accomplished, but as CEO, I'd been about as brilliant as I was lucky, by which I mean: too often I was neither," Immelt writes.

As the business world continues to be rocked by stunning economic upheaval and a global pandemic, the likes of which have not been seen in 100 years, "HOT SEAT" is an urgently needed, and unusually candid, guide for decisive leadership. It's also a must-read playbook on how to lead with integrity in the face of uncertainty.

"No one hands CEOs a playbook on your first day, you simply must figure it out. That takes a lot of love and respect for your people as well as perseverance in the face of second-guessing and withering criticism. I wanted 'HOT SEAT' to capture the peaks and valleys of what it is like to be CEO, with the hope that my story can help readers -- and leaders -- in one of the most turbulent times in recent history," Immelt writes.

Taking over at GE from the legendary Jack Welch, Immelt was arguably one of the first American CEOs to deal with the effects of rapid technical innovation. To capture the era, Immelt's co-author Amy Wallace interviewed more than 70 colleagues and members of the GE ecosystem. As such, "HOT SEAT" is a review of events from those who lived it.

"We all worked hard to help GE win in turbulent times. Some initiatives worked -- and some didn't -- but, importantly, leaders can learn from both. In business, as in life, truth equals facts plus context. By sharing the good and the bad, 'HOT SEAT' adds to the context of the era," Immelt writes.

"HOT SEAT" is a refreshing alternative to leadership books that provide checklists or management dictums. It delivers raw and honest reflections from the leader of one of the world's largest and most important enterprises during unprecedented times.
A Melbourne pastor has defied coronavirus lockdown by holding a packed church service, telling police he is obeying God, not man.

Christian Revival Church Pastor Paul Furlong was fined $1,652 and could face incitement charges for leading the service in the middle of Victoria's lockdown.

Dozens of officers swarmed to the Narre Warren church on Sunday morning, following reports of a mass gathering with few masks and minimal physical distancing in place.

Church and religious services were banned by Victorian Daniel Andrews when he enacted a snap five day lockdown last Friday until 11.59pm on Wednesday.

Police were called to the Christian Revival Church in Narre Warren following reports of a mass gathering. Pictured is a parishioner being questioned by police

The pastor confronted with officers in front of TV cameras and insisted the service wasn't a protest of lockdown restrictions.

'I guess the question is, do I obey God or do I obey man,' Pastor Furlong told the officers.

'If we do not do it, we disobey God. And that is sin.'

A bystander told officers: 'These people are allowed to do what they want to do. I don't care about this s**t.'

A defiant Pastor Furlong later told Nine News: 'Because I've chosen to obey God, I'll continue to obey God so the doors of my church will remain open.'

Daily Mail Australia has contacted Pastor Furlong for further comment.

Christian Revival Church parishioners who breached coronavirus restrictions by attending Sunday's service could face hefty fines. Pictured are parishioners at the service

Pastor Furlong insisted church would go ahead as normal, urging parishioners to exercise their 'constitutional rights of freedom of religion and obey God.'

'We will not submit to unconstitution (sic), evil and unlawful directives from a government that represents new world order Antichrist spirit,' he posted on Facebook on Friday.

Victorians can only leave their homes for four essential reasons until at least 11.59pm Wednesday.

There are 21 active cases across the state, with 16 linked to the outbreak at The Holiday Inn at Melbourne Airport.

The sate recorded one more locally-acquired case on Monday.

Pastor Furlong stood by his decision on Monday in a lengthy Facebook post quoting the Bible.

'Scripture is talking about the responsibilities and the purpose and devine (sic) appointment of a government,' he wrote.

'Although it was never God's idea or plan or purpose to have a government but his Church, the people rebelled against God asking for a government!'

Pastor Paul Furlong (second right) says he was obeying God, despite church gathje

'BUT government is out there to be and issue and police and enforce righteousness and good godly moral laws as it says clearly in the scripture everyone misquotes... This government scripture talks about, we must submit unto!

'An ungodly government that murders children and is ripe with filth, lies, deception and ungodliness we are never called to obey.'

Victoria Police said the congregation dispersed without incident.

'There were also several people seated at an adjoining cafe connected with the religious group,' police said.

'Officers have spoken with the organiser who will be issued an infringement notice for breaching the directions of the chief health officer.

'The investigation into the incident remains ongoing with inquiries being made in relation to possible incitement offences.'

A defiant Pastor Paul Furlong (pictured) stands by his decision to breach lockdown rules
The Irish SME Association (ISME) has released a new COVID-19 report. This survey was conducted in the final week of January with 362 SME owner-manager respondents.



The research shows that 27% of businesses have availed of a Restart Grant, a 7% decrease on the 35% who had applied in November. The survey found that 69% of respondents are availing of the TWSS or EWSS, making wages supports by far the largest liquidity solution availed of by business. Just 11% of those surveyed are availing of the COVID Restrictions Support Scheme.



Furthermore, the number of respondents who believe their business will cease trading has dropped from 5% in April to less than 1% in November. The number who believe they can keep trading for more than 9 months has increased from 20% in April to 58% in November.



Almost 64% of SMEs have yet to seek assistance from their banks. While 19% of businesses are owed money by the State. Of those, 32% are owed less than 10,000, and 47% are owed between 10,000 and 250,000.



Commenting on the research, ISME CEO, Neil Mc Donnell said, "The main liquidity support being availed of by small business is the EWSS. With more than two-thirds of SMEs on the EWSS, it is vital that this support, as well as the CRSS, should continue for at least two months beyond the lifting of lockdown. In addition, we believe the so-called VAT reduction to 21% should be made permanent."

He added, "The 23% rate was a temporary measure introduced at the same time as

the 9% rate for hospitality. While the latter rate has ceased, the 23% VAT appears to have been forgotten about. The continued viability of many SMEs remains in doubt."

Source: www.businessworld.ie
New York, Feb 15 : While it is known that the devastating impact of something huge that crashed into Earth 66 million years ago led to the extinction of dinosaurs, clarity on whether it was a comet or asteroid strike and where it originated was lacking.

Clearing the confusion, a new theory suggests that long-period comets originating from the Oort cloud, an icy sphere of debris at the edge of the solar system, could be behind the crash.

"Our paper provides a basis for explaining the occurrence of this event," said Avi Loeb from Harvard University.

The Chicxulub impactor, as it is known, left behind a crater off the coast of Mexico that spans 93 miles and runs 12 miles deep.

Its devastating impact brought the reign of the dinosaurs to an abrupt and calamitous end by triggering their sudden mass extinction, along with the end of almost three-quarters of the plant and animal species living on Earth.

In the study published in the journal Scientific Reports, the researchers put forth a new theory that could explain the origin and journey of this catastrophic object.

Using statistical analysis and gravitational simulations, the researchers calculate that a significant fraction of long-period comets originating from the Oort cloud can be bumped off-course by Jupiter's gravitational field during orbit.

"The solar system acts as a kind of pinball machine," explained Amir Siraj from Harvard University.

"Jupiter, the most massive planet, kicks incoming long-period comets into orbits that bring them very close to the Sun." During close passage to the Sun, the comets -- nicknamed "sungrazers" -- can experience powerful tidal forces that break apart pieces of the rock and ultimately, produce cometary shrapnel.

"In a sungrazing event, the portion of the comet closer to the sun feels a stronger gravitational pull than the part that is further, resulting in a tidal force across the object," Siraj said.

"You can get what's called a tidal disruption event, in which a large comet breaks up into many smaller pieces. And crucially, on the journey back to the Oort cloud, there's an enhanced probability that one of these fragments hit the Earth." The new calculations from Siraj and Loeb's theory increase the chances of long-period comets impacting Earth by a factor of about 10, and show that about 20 percent of long-period comets become sungrazers.

The pair say that their new rate of impact is consistent with the age of Chicxulub, providing a satisfactory explanation for its origin and other impactors like it.

Evidence found at the Chicxulub crater suggests the rock was composed of carbonaceous chondrite. Siraj and Loeb's hypothesis might also explain this unusual composition.

A popular theory on the origin of Chicxulub claims that the impactor originated from the main belt, which is an asteroid population between the orbit of Jupiter and Mars.

However, carbonaceous chondrites are rare amongst main-belt asteroids, but possibly widespread amongst long-period comets, providing additional support to the cometary impact hypothesis.
Chandigarh, Feb 15 : Punjab State Women's Commission Chairperson Manisha Gulati was denied permission by the Jail Superintendent in Haryana's Karnal town on Monday to meet 23-year-old labour rights activist Nodeep Kaur, who has been in custody for over a month.

"This morning the jail Superintendent of Karnal called up the office of Punjab State Women's Commission and said Gulati would have to get the approval of the Haryana government to meet Nodeep Kaur," a commission spokesperson said in a statement.

Nodeep Kaur was granted bail in an extortion case on Thursday but remains in jail because she is facing another criminal case.

The Haryana government allegedly forcibly picked up Nodeep and others on January 12 while they were protesting during the farmers' agitation. She has been charged under Section 307 (attempt to murder) and extortion of the Indian Penal Code.
The boss of Microsoft has called the SolarWinds hack 'the largest and most sophisticated attack the world has ever seen.'

The cyber raid identified in December exposed data from thousands of Wall Street's top companies and a handful of government agencies including the Treasury, Justice and Commerce departments.

The hackers, which the CIA said were 'likely' deployed by Russia, used SolarWinds' Orion platform as an open door to break into the computer systems of its 18,000 customers.

'I think from a software engineering perspective, it's probably fair to say that this is the largest and most sophisticated attack the world has ever seen,' Smith told 60 Minutes on CBS.

'I think from a software engineering perspective, it's probably fair to say that this is the largest and most sophisticated attack the world has ever seen,' Smith said during an interview that aired on Sunday on the CBS program '60 Minutes.'

The SolarWinds logo is seen outside its headquarters in Austin, Texas, U.S

The breach is believed to have involved more than 1,000 hackers and compromised 18,000 SolarWinds customers who use the Orion system which is used to manage computer networks.

Smith learned of the attack in November, by which time the intruders were spread throughout Microsoft's network and had extracted some of the source code which it uses to build software - a closely guarded secret.

Perhaps more alarming for Microsoft was that they had been exposed to hackers who were piggy-backing on third party software.

'When we analyzed everything that we saw at Microsoft, we asked ourselves how many engineers have probably worked on these attacks. And the answer we came to was, well, certainly more than 1,000,' Smith said.

Asked how a software titan like Microsoft could have been breached, Smith replied: 'I think that when you look at the sophistication of this attacker there's an asymmetric advantage for somebody playing offense.'

He added that 'almost certainly these attacks are continuing.'

GOVT AGENCIES KNOWN TO HAVE BEEN TARGETED BY HACKERS SO FAR Pentagon Treasury FBI Department of State Department of Homeland Security Commerce Department National Institutes of Health Department of Energy National Nuclear Security Administration Los Alamos National Laboratory Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Office of Secure Transportation Advertisement

Orion is made up of millions of lines of computer code, 4,032 lines of them were secretly re-written and sent to customers as part of a routine update which exposed all of the customers to the backdoor used by the hackers.

Microsoft has assigned more than 500 software engineers to probe the breach.

Brandon Wales, the acting director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency which is investigating the attack, said a staggering 30 percent of federal agencies and private firms now known to have been breached had no direct connection to SolarWinds.

Wales said there was evidence the hackers used Microsoft's cloud software as a way into some systems, sparking fears that millions of individuals, businesses and government agencies may have been vulnerable to the attack.

He told the Wall Street Journal last month, investigators have concrete evidence that hackers broke in using other systems besides SolarWinds gaining access to their targets 'in a variety of ways'.

'This adversary has been creative. It is absolutely correct that this campaign should not be thought of as the SolarWinds campaign,' he said.

Instead, Wales said hackers exploited known bugs in software products, guessed passwords and took advantage of issues in the configuration of Microsoft's cloud software.

Once inside the cloud-computing account, attackers were then able to leapfrog to other accounts and trick systems into gaining access to emails and documents in the cloud.

A handful of federal government agencies have officially confirmed having been affected, including the U.S. Treasury Department (above), the Commerce Department, and the Department of Energy

In January, cyber security firm Malwarebytes said it had been hacked and revealed it does not use any SolarWinds software.

The firm said hackers had instead broken into its internal emails by abusing access to Microsoft Office 365 and Azure software.

Another security firm CrowdStrike, which is also not a SolarWinds customer, also said hackers had tried unsuccessfully to access its email through a Microsoft reseller.

So far, investigators have not identified any cloud software other than Microsoft's targeted in the attack or any other tech company other than SolarWinds used to infiltrate other systems, Wales told the Journal.

Microsoft announced at the end of December that the perpetrators behind the massive cyber attack had broke into its own internal network and accessed some of its source code.

The source code - the underlying set of instructions that run a piece of software or operating system - is typically among a technology companys most closely guarded secrets.

Brandon Wales, the acting director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (above), said last month a staggering 30 percent of federal agencies and private firms now known to have been breached had no direct connection to SolarWinds

The revelation also went beyond previous announcements that Microsoft had just detected malicious SolarWinds software in its systems and removed it.

However, the company did say at the time it had found no evidence that the hackers had accessed its production services or customer data or that its systems were used to attack others.

A source told the Journal SolarWinds is carrying out its own investigation into the possibility that Microsoft's cloud software was the initial entry point into its own network.

At present, the true scope of the breach is still not fully known but Wales said it was 'substantially more significant' than the Cloud Hopper attack - where eight of the world's biggest technology service providers were hacked by Chinese spies.

Wales said the probe continues to show the hack was to enable spies to carry out 'long-term intelligence collection'.

'When you compromise an agency's authentication infrastructure, there is a lot of damage you could do,' he said.

The number of government agencies and private businesses affected is still not known.

So far investigators had found less than 10 US government agencies whose systems were compromised.

CISA has not disclosed which agencies were affected but some have admitted they were targets, including the State Department, Commerce Department, Treasury, Homeland Security Department, Defense Department, and the National Institutes of Health.

US intelligence officials have publicly blamed Russia for the attack.

In his first phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin as the 46th president of the United States, Joe Biden brought up the hack among 'other matters of concern'.

'President Biden made clear that the United States will act firmly in defense of its national interests in response to actions by Russia that harm us or our allies,' the White House said in a statement.



Earlier in January, all four US intelligence agencies the FBI, Directorate of National Intelligence, the National Security Agency and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency issued a statement saying Russia was 'likely' behind the attack.

Their investigation 'indicates that an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor, likely Russian in origin, is responsible for most or all of the recently discovered, ongoing cyber compromises of both government and non-governmental networks,' they said.

The agencies said they believe the hack was 'an intelligence gathering effort'.

'We are taking all necessary steps to understand the full scope of this campaign and respond accordingly,' the statement said.

Both Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and then-Attorney General Bill Barr had previously pointed to Moscow as the culprit.

Russia has denied all involvement.
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Zimbabwe on Monday received its first doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, donated to the southern African nation by China.

Zimbabwean Vice President and Health Minister, Constantino Chiwenga, personally received 200,000 doses of the Sinopharm vaccine at Robert Mugabe International Airport in the capital Harare in the early hours of Monday.

Health workers will be first in line to be inoculated, according to Chiwenga.

We receive this vaccine as a glimmer of hope that finally, we may be on the verge of returning to some semblance of normalcy, the vice president said.

Zimbabwe aims to vaccinate some 10 million citizens within a year to achieve herd immunity, according to health officials.

The country plans to purchase an additional 1.8 million doses of the Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine, which is produced by a state-owned Chinese manufacturer, of which 600,000 doses is expected to arrive by the end of March, according to government.

Zimbabwe has reported more than 35,000 cases of COVID-19 and 1,400 deaths.

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Actors Karanvir Bohra and Teejay Sidhu welcomed their third daughter in December 2020, but had not revealed her name yet on social media. However, on Valentine's Day, the couple took to social media to share adorable pictures with their daughter and even revealed her name as Gia Vanessa Snow.

Taking to Instagram, Karanvir shared a black-and-white picture with the newborn. He also explained the significance of her name in the caption. Meet my new #valentine.. @snowflake282219 isn't she something.... all of us is all your love. Gia= Mother Earth(mata parvati ka roop) Vanessa= born of Venus, god of love Snow= with love from her sisters.

Teejay Sidhu, on the other hand wrote, Happy Feb 14th to our little Valentine..GIA VANESSA SNOW.. the one who reminds us everyday what pure #love is.. the one whose name revolves around love itself.. Gia, meaning #heart.. Vanessa from Latin, meaning 'of Venus, the God of love'.. and Snow because her two older sisters named her that, much before we decided on a name!! (What a coincidence, it snowed today on #ValentinesDay!) May you spread love and sunshine everywhere you go, little one.. You are so so precious.

Karanvir's elder daughters, Bella and Vienna, who have their own Instagram account, wrote, Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! It's extra special for us because it's our first with our baby sister, Gia Vanessa Snow. Everyone calls her Vanessa, but we still call her #Snowflake. And do you know? Today on Valentine's, it snowed!

The former Bigg Boss contestant married Teejay on November 3, 2006. The couple welcomed twin daughters Bella and Vienna in 2016.
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COUNCILLORS are set to review the casual trading by-laws after operators of mobile coffee vans were allegedly threatened with sanction.

As revealed by the Limerick Leader, local authority planning inspectors informed three separate traders that they are not entitled to operate without permission.

Now, at this months metropolitan meeting, a discussion was had on this  and it was agreed that all members be given a copy of the trading by-laws with a view to acting in the future.

Independent councillor Elisa ODonovan had submitted a notice of motion seeking the extension of event casual trading licences during the Covid-19 lockdown to facilitate rate paying businesses to operate outdoor trade in specified areas.

She said: We are all aware there are people who have been casually trading. There has been a number in City West, and I believe in City North too, where people have set up coffee vans to facilitate outdoor trading in this time. I've received contact from people operating these vans. They've been saying there's a need and a demand for them. People are out and about, enjoying getting a coffee while they're out walking.

We have to allow a certain bit of flexibility. We can't return to business as normal. We are going to have to be adaptable and change how we approach hospitality and retail in the city," she added.

However, in a written reply, metropolitan district manager Kieran Lehane confirmed its an offence to trade without a casual trading licence, and said her motion would be hard to deliver upon.

The proposal to extend casual trading licences to rate paying businesses only is not provided for in the law, could be both illegal and discriminatory, and it would likely be subject to challenge under competition law. he current Covid advice recommends strongly against unnecessary gatherings, which this proposal could inadvertently facilitate, he said.

On foot of this, Cllr ODonovan suggested her motion be amended to changing the by-laws.

But Cllr Daniel Butler, Fine Gael, said this could take up to a year, while Mr Lehane added: It was very upsetting to established businesses that were trying to trade out of premises. The casual trading laws intended to deal with this, so we dont have unfair competition, where anybody can pull in and start trading.

Labour councillor Elena Secas supported the proposal to amend the by-laws to extend the event casual trading licences during restrictions such as the current lockdown and to facilitate businesses trading in specified areas.

"I completely understand and appreciate amending the by-laws take a long time, but this will open the debate and will give an opportunity to all stakeholders to have an input," she said.

But her party colleague, Cllr Joe Leddin said: "We need to step back a bit here. We have robust casual trading legislation there. There are an awful lot of us out walking and a lot of outdoor activity going on. But we have to be mindful of the existing service providers who are ratepayers to the council trying to keep business going in a difficult climate, trying to keep staff on the books. No-one out walking the three bridges is a million miles away from a coffee shop.

We cant have a pop-up unit arriving in an area, 50 yards away from an existing service provider, effectively displacing them. That is not acceptable. We have to be mindful of those legitimate ratepayers, he aded.

Metropolitan district leader Cllr Sarah Kiely concurred, saying: I don't think we have far to walk to support local businesses, who employ locally, who are ratepayers, and are very worried about these pop-ups.

Cllr ODonovan agreed to withdraw her first motion, and her subsequent request to change the by-laws.

Instead, she asked if a copy of the existing by-laws be circulated to all councillors, alongside information on special event trading licences.

From there, council members could decide what to do, she said.

We do a lot in terms of supporting business in the city. The council does bend over backwards to support ratepayers. There is healthy competition coming now. That's capitalism. It should be supported, concluded the City West member.
21 runners killed during mountain race in northwestern province of Gansu; Indian variant of Covid-19 found in Guangzhou; Beijing willing to arrange for vaccines to be sent to Taiwan

May 28, 2021 08:15 PM
Whats new at the library? Plenty if you ask Jersey City Public Library Director Jeffery Trzeciak.

Its amazing that in the 21 century, libraries, the repositories of all knowledge and print, have still managed to sustain themselves in the digital age. But, from fighting systemic racism to expanding offerings, the library even in this time of COVID has grown to help better serve the Jersey City community, Trzeciak said.

Trzeciak became director of the Jersey City library in November 2019, and moved to the city a year ago with his husband, Michael. Born and raised in Dayton, OH, Trzeciak attended a small public school that didnt have its own library. So, the teachers from the school would walk the students a few blocks over to Daytons public library.

I was in awe of all the kinds of books you could get there and they were all for free, said Trzeciak. That library was always closely connected to the community and it ended up being where I got my first job out of high school.

From that first time walking in to Daytons local library to that first job after high school, being a librarian was always the plan for Trzeciak.

Im one of those few people youll meet that wanted to be a librarian all his life, he says. That first job helped me afford college and when I got there, I realized I had all the basics for working in a library and went ahead to get the Masters degree I needed to make a career out of it.

Trzeciak spent time working at Wayne State University in Detroit, MI, after leaving Dayton. It was there that he recognized in order for libraries to succeed, they should have workers who represent the communities they serve. This has become one of the larger topics that the Jersey City Public Library has been tackling: fighting systemic racism.

When you hear the word librarian, you think of the little old lady with glasses. That has been largely true, he says. Its still very much true where librarianship is largely white and largely female, although thats beginning to change now.

The Jersey City Library has a staff that speak Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, Greek, and Russian just to name a few.

With a city like Jersey City, where theres a large population of immigrants, the best way to serve them is by speaking their language, he says. When I was in Detroit, I did a lot of minority recruitment for positions and getting people from underrepresented groups to become professional librarians. I had money through federal grants that I was able to use to offer scholarships and internships. Theres now about 30 librarians of color at work in the field because of that.

After Detroit, Trzeciak spent some time in Canada before settling in St. Louis, MO. He was working at Washington University during the time of the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson. That prompted him to start the project Documenting Ferguson.

That came about as a way of working with the community to document what was happening and to give them an outlet on how they were feeling, Trzeciak recalls. We were looking at what libraries could do for communities in times of crisis.

When it comes to fighting systemic racism, one of the important things to know is that we have to get our own house in order by looking at the barriers that exist within libraries and staff being able to move around, getting promoted, and advancing their careers, he says.

The Jersey City Library recently removed all of its fines and fees. That means no more overdue books and no more fees for videos or internet hotspots. Trzeciak was also behind this same move during his time at the Newark Public Library, where he worked before coming to Jersey City.

This was part of a larger initiative with libraries around the country, he says. Were not the first to do this by any stretch, but we did it to acknowledge that fines and fees impact communities of color, children, and individuals who can least afford it. When that happens, they just stop coming to the library.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the Jersey City Public Library saw how it highlighted the digital inequalities in the community. Not everyone had internet access, which is vital in the latest health updates during the pandemic as well as getting a job or applying for college. The library, along the Jersey City Housing Authority and Department of Health, distributed 300 wireless hotspots to communities in need.

The pandemic hasnt made life easy, but the library has tried to adapt. This past year the library received its 1 millionth book, 50 percent of which are e-books. Streaming media and e-book use has also seen a significant increase. Online programs include tutor.com, where students who are having trouble with their homework can log on and receive assistance from live tutors. Theres also live story time, and the STEAM program Fun Fridays.

We have more people in our virtual programming than we did when we were doing this face to face, says Trzeciak. I think its not just the convenience. Once the programs are done airing live, theyre still recorded, so people who miss it live can still check it out. We had a program that one of the librarians ran a few weeks ago that saw almost 1,000 kids logged in.

Trzeciak admits that libraries really havent changed in the role they play in the community. We continue to support people the same way we always have, but weve been focusing more on e-resources than print, he says. Weve moved away from just being repositories of information and more on being active community centers.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 21:58:24|Editor: huaxia

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Security staff guard the entrance of the Radisson Blu Edwardian Hotel in London, Britain, on Feb. 15, 2021. From Monday, all British and Irish citizens and British residents who arrive in England after being in the "red list" of more than 30 high-risk countries now have to self-isolate in hotels. The "red list" countries include South Africa, Portugal and South American nations. (Photo by Ray Tang/Xinhua)

LONDON, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Monday that his government will be "very prudent" in easing coronavirus restrictions to ensure a "cautious but irreversible" progress.

"We've got to be very prudent and what we want to see is progress that is cautious but irreversible," Johnson said on his plan for easing the current lockdown, which is expected to be announced on Feb. 22.

"I think that's what the public and people up and down the country will want to see," he told reporters.

Johnson said that "too many people are dying" due to the pandemic and while rates of infections are "coming down" they remain "comparatively high".

The road-map exiting the lockdown is expected to include the earliest possible dates for reopening schools and different sectors of the economy, according to Johnson.

"If we possibly can, we'll be setting out dates," Johnson said. "The dates that we will be setting out will be the dates by which we hope we can do something at the earliest, if you see what I mean -- so it's the target date by which we hope to do something at the earliest."

"If, because of the rate of infection, we have to push something off a little bit to the right -- delay it for a little bit -- we won't hesitate to do that," he added.

Meanwhile, the first travellers required to stay at quarantine hotels in England have begun arriving at London's Heathrow Airport.

From Monday, all British and Irish citizens and British residents who arrive in England after being in the "red list" of more than 30 high-risk countries now have to self-isolate in hotels. The "red list" countries include South Africa, Portugal and South American nations.

The new measures, designed to prevent coronavirus variants from entering the country, apply to arrivals who have been in one of those countries in the past 10 days.

Another 10,972 people in Britain have tested positive for COVID-19, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 4,038,078, according to official figures released Sunday.

Meanwhile, more than 15 million people of the most vulnerable groups in Britain have received a first dose of a coronavirus jab, according to the latest official figures.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out coronavirus vaccines. Enditem
The Junta de Andalucia is preparing the ground to begin a massive vaccination of the large population groups once it receives guarantees that it will receive sufficient doses.

The regional government's spokesman, Elias Bendodo, announced this Sunday (14 February) that the plan to locate large vaccination centres in each of the provincial capitals will be detailed at a meeting of the Juntas ministers this Tuesday.

Vaccination is synonymous with the beginning of the end of the crisis and Andalucia wants to be the first to take the road of recovery. For this reason, on Tuesday we will present a plan for the whole of Andalucia because we cannot waste a minute, said Bendodo.

"Andalucia is ready to vaccinate seven days a week, 24 hours a day in all provinces," reiterated Bendodo, who demanded more vaccines and more direct aid for sectors affected by the pandemic from the central government.

"We need the government of Spain to assume its responsibility, send us more vaccines and pitch in to give direct aid to sectors such as hotels and tourism that have been the most affected."

The Juntas spokesperson asked the government "to stand firm before the European Union to demand that the pharmaceutical companies comply with the delivery of the vaccines."

Along similar lines, the Minister of Health, Jesus Aguirre, explained that the Junta's requests for more vaccines are directed to the Spanish government because "it is the transmission belt with the EU, so they are asked to take the appropriate steps."

Maintain measures

Speaking to SER, Aguirre also pointed out the importance of undertaking this long-awaited mass vaccination. "The higher the volume of vaccination, the sooner the recovery will begin," he stressed, in addition to thanking the offer that the regional government is receiving from city, town and provincial councils as well as private institutions to make large venues available to be able to vaccinate large population groups.

The politician has again appealed to the public "not to lower their guard" against Covid-19 and has defended continuing with the containment restrictions.

"Until we are clear that the volume of people vaccinated is sufficient, we are going to maintain measures to minimise the number of hospital admissions and deaths," he said.
BRANFORD  Town native Milissa Bruckshaw says her family always joked about her getting a chance to appear as a contestant on Wheel Of Fortune.

Now everyone can see the college student take a spin on the giant wheel at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 18 on WTNH Channel 8.

The Branford native had stars in her eyes during the taping at the long-lived shows studio in Los Angeles, where she is a student at California State University.

Although Bruckshaw has long watched the show with her mom, Stacy Bruckshaw, who lives in Branford, she said she was not prepared for the rush of being a contestant on the iconic game show.

I was shocked to be there, Bruckshaw said. It was being on the actual stage - it felt a like a weird dream. It was a strange experience and it was really awesome.

The show, which she and her mother have been watching it since before I can remember, is kind of like a tradition my whole life pretty much, she said. We always joked about me going on it one day.

But being there was a lot different than watching from her living room.

Oh my gosh, its nowhere near like it is watching from home, Bruckshaw said. The whole process is so stimulating. Theres all the lights  theres the people around you and everything.

COVID-19 protocols are in place during the taping and there is no live audience, according to a spokesperson for the show. However, there are other contestants and the television crew. Since they tape several episodes in one day, the number of contestants is fairly large.

At the taping, there was a surprise in store: When youre there, the board is so much bigger I found myself looking back and forth to see the whole thing.

But the years watching helped, she said.

I told my mom I was so lucky that we had watched our whole life before I went on the show, she said. Because it was so overstimulating to be in the lights and all that.

It felt like I blacked outlike I didnt know what was happening but I still made it through, she said.

I knew the rules, like I didnt made mistakes, she said. Her advice to would-be contestants: The biggest thing is make sure you buy your vowels so that you can keep control of the wheel and think fast.

Bruckshaw applied by submitting a 60 minute video introducing herself to https://www.wheeloffortune.com/join/be-a-contestant. She later auditioned via ZOOM a process that she found easy and fun.

Meeting Vanna White and legendary host Pat Sajak was a thrill for her, she said.

Oh my gosh, she said, recalling what she told them, Ive watched this show forever and its really awesome to be here with you guys  and Im sure they hear this all the time and are sick of hearing that.

Theyre both nice and supportive through the whole thing, she added.

She was there for several hours and contestants took turns practicing spinning the wheel.

We kept reading that the wheel is so heavy, she said. I was short so it was a little bit tough.

And, she did wear her lucky tigers eye bracelet that she wears at the casinos here in Connecticut.

For those thinking about going on a game show, she advised, Go for things even if they seem weird or out of the box  like being on a game show. Be present as much as possible. Have as much fun as possible.

Her family will be watching Thursday evening, with her mother, Stacy, and her grandfather Bill Bruckshaw of Branford and her other grandparents in Clinton, Donna and Pete Gambordella.

Theyre so excited, everybodys been calling me and everything, she said. She couldnt share any spoilers about the show.

While Bruckshaw doesnt remember the Im a Wheel Watcher jingle from the 1980s, she is familiar with the catch-phrase as she and her mother are members of the Wheel Watchers Club.

But, she clearly enjoyed saying the shows instantly-recognized intro: Whee-eel of Fortune! she cried over the phone from her apartment in L.A.

NORTHWOOD, Iowa  A Minnesota man is charged with stealing checks in Worth County.

Brandon Lee Crews, 30 of Emmons, was booked into the Worth County Jail on Friday on $5,000 bond. Hes facing charges of 2nd degree theft and forgery.

On October 8, 2020, Worth County sheriffs deputies got a report of stolen checks being cashed in Albert Lea. Albert Lea police say the person cashing the checks reported getting them from Brandon Crews. Court documents state the checks did not belong to Crews and the signature on them was not even close to accurate.

Investigators say 10 stolen checks were made out for a total of $4,067.

A criminal complaint against Crews was filed on January 30.
After the acquittal of the former United States President, vandals targeted the home of the Trump impeachment lawyer. The word 'TRAITOR' spray-painted in red was discovered on his driveway in suburban Philadelphia.

House of Trump's Impeachment Lawyer Vandalized

Based on the information gathered by the police, the vandalism happened at around 8 p.m. on Friday at the residence of attorney Michael van der Veen in West Whiteland Township, Pennsylvania, which is located around 30 miles southwest of Philadelphia. According to ABC News, the detective of the West Whiteland Township Police Department, Scott Pezick shared to the news agency that no arrests have been made and private security has already been hired by the homeowner in order to protect the residence. He also added that the presence of the police has been beefed up in the neighborhood of van der Veen.

Pezick also stated that the wife of the Trump impeachment lawyer has reported the act of vandalism to the police after she saw it in their driveway at the time that she went home. She immediately called the police to report the situation.

The West Whiteland Township Police Department detective also mentioned that the 'TRAITOR' graffiti was the only vandalism that the officers have discovered on the property of the Trump impeachment lawyer. Meanwhile, attorney Michael van der Veen had spent the week in Washington D.C., defending Trump during his impeachment trial in relation to the January 6 incident wherein rioters breached the Capitol building.

READ ALSO: President Joe Biden Urges Americans to End 'Uncivil War' Following Trump's Impeachment Acquittal

On Saturday, Trump was acquitted by the Senate with 57-43 votes. Attorney Michael Van der Veen, who is a personal injury lawyer, spoke briefly of the incident during an interview on Saturday, Fox News reported.

The Trump impeachment lawyer said that his home was attacked and he'd rather not go into that. He also added that his entire family, business, and even his law firm are under siege right now.

Over the weekend, a group of demonstrators gathered outside of van der Veen's law office in downtown Philadelphia, wherein protesters and demonstrators called the Trump impeachment lawyer a fascist and even chats of 'When van der Veen lies, what do you do? Convict! Convict!' can be heard, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. Based on a report, the vandalism at the residence of van der Veen is not the first time, as a month ago, vandalism has also been discovered and reported in the homes of Minority leader of the Senate Mitch McConnell in Kentucky and the home of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in San Francisco.

Aside from the sprayed graffiti on the house speaker's property, vandals have also left a real pig's head and fake blood with it. Based on the police investigating the two separate vandalism incidents, no arrests were made in either case, wherein vandals made their reference to the failure of passing a bipartisan COVID-19 relief bill by congress.

RELATED ARTICLE: End of Trump's Impeachment Trial Frees Congress to Talk about $1,400 Stimulus Bill

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Christians in China are celebrating Chinese New Year under tighter restrictions and mass digital surveillance.

As the country of 1.4bn people celebrates Chinese New Year on Friday, Release International is calling for religious freedom to be respected, and for an end to "Orwellian techniques" aimed at suppressing Christian worship.

There are an estimated 100 million Christians in China, but many of them have to worship in secret or endure state interference and harassment.

Churches have been ordered to tear down the crosses from their rooftops, while lawyers who try to defend them have been disbarred and in some cases abducted and held incognito before being forced to make confessions without any legal representation of their own.

Release said there were "persistent and credible" reports that China is torturing lawyers to extract these confessions.



The crackdown has also seen children banned from church services and pastors told to display the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) flag in church. Some have also been told to pledge their loyalty in writing to the CCP and the ideology of President Xi Jinping.

The Early Rain Covenant Church in Chengdu has been repeatedly targeted since 2018 after its pastor, Wang Yi, criticised the Chinese government's religious intoleranc.

He is currently serving a nine-year prison sentence. At least 200 elders, pastors and deacons at the church have been arrested in the last three years, with around 80 reporting physical and mental torture.

"It has always been the mandate of the Church to speak truth to power," said Release CEO Paul Robinson.



"To fail to do so would be for the Church to fail in its God-given calling. When those in power try to silence the Church, they are also trying to silence the conscience of the nation."

The non-profit also warns that Covid-19 has been used as a pretext to clamp down on churches, and increase the mass digital surveillance of Christians and Uyghur Muslims.

According to one recent analysis, Chinese cities are under the heaviest surveillance in the world, with China being home to over half of the 770 million cameras in use worldwide.

The surveillance includes the use of facial recognition to track citizens' movements.

ChinaFile, a China-focused publication, reports that the use of facial recognition systems by local authorities "is growing more prevalent across China, complementing their ever-increasing procurement of conventional video surveillance systems."

Release warned that surveillance is being linked to China's social credit system so that authorities can punish so-called offenders by deducting their welfare or pension payments.

"The Chinese authorities have also been moving under cover of Covid to accelerate their crackdown against the Chinese Church," said Release CEO Paul Robinson.

"Our partners say persecution is now as severe as at any time since Mao's Cultural Revolution. Given the ongoing repression in Hong Kong and of the Uyghur people, increased persecution for the Church over the Chinese New Year seems inevitable.

"Not only have we seen continued attempts to eradicate the house church movement, but we've seen China taking increasingly public steps towards shutting down and controlling its officially sanctioned churches, including demolition."

In democratic countries, worship and prayer moved online during the pandemic. But in China online Christian gatherings have been banned, with cyber security forces monitoring the web for illegal religious online activities.

Release partner and pro-democracy campaigner Bob Fu said that "digital authoritarianism is a growing challenge" in China not only for Christians but for Uyghur Muslims.

"Many of the farmers in Xinjiang were forced to buy a smartphone pre-programmed by the Public Security Bureau with spy software," he said.

"The Chinese Communist Party has hundreds of millions of face-recognition cameras all over China. They keep watch over every street corner, from the four walls of church buildings and even from pulpits."

Last year also saw China tighten its grip of Hong Kong with the introduction of the national security law that has led to the arrest and imprisonment of democracy campaigners.

Fu said the crackdown has been so severe in some areas of Hong Kong that "freedom of speech and freedom of association is actually worse than in mainland China."

"There is arbitrary detention, massive surveillance and a huge crackdown of legally elected legislators," he said.

"One church has had its bank account frozen, just for considering helping victims of political persecution.

"What is happening in Hong Kong sends a chilling message all over the world.

"The world should take note: there is no rule of law anymore, no independence, no freedom of the press, no freedom of association, no freedom of speech anymore in Hong Kong. These are all gone."

Robinson added that people in China and Hong Kong are facing a "Chinese New Year of persecution".

"Across China we see essential freedoms being stripped away," he said.

"We continue to urge China to entrust its own citizens with that most basic freedom of all  freedom of worship."
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- via InvestorWire -- Hunter Technology Corp. (TSX-V: HOC; OTCQB: HOILF; WKN: A2QEYH, FSE: RWPM, ISIN: CA4457371090) (Hunter or the Company) is pleased to report that it is on track to launch a pilot service for selected customers, including governments, sovereign wealth funds, environmental agencies, regulators and self-regulatory organizations (Users), in Q3 2021.

The Company is developing its end-to-end service utilizing a proprietary blockchain-based modular software platform to supply Users with immutable data intelligence on the full lifecycle of the crude oil supply chain from reserve management through wellhead production, storage, transhipment, export and/or domestic consumption. Standardized, unchallengeable records will be held in a fully customisable reporting cloud using blockchain technology, supporting Users to report, monitor, trace and track the full hydrocarbon lifecycle from production source to ultimate destination.

The Supply Chain Intelligence service will be provided under the brand OilExchange (www.oilexchange.com). It is being designed to furnish its users with a full suite of data via exchange including analytics tools to structure and analyse raw data. Users will be able to monitor and analyse key performance indicators (KPI) and metrics through user-friendly visual dashboards.

By tracking the origin, transhipment and processing of the produced goods and the environmental, social and governance (ESG) compliance during the life cycle of hydrocarbons, as well as government royalty or tax payments and customs clearance, Users will have a real-time view of their hydrocarbon supply chain. In addition, the data sharing between Users through a secure and trusted platform will allow all stakeholders to enhance their information management practices. This in turn will allow for a greater utilization of existing reserves and reduce the need to expand drilling footprints, ultimately having a positive effect though a reduced carbon footprint as producers transition towards a more environmentally and ethically responsible ecosystem.

By allowing Users to derive insights about the economic and environmental viability and responsibility of Exploration & Production (E&P) companies, OilExchange can incentivise operators to consider developing and reworking economically viable legacy brownfields (as an alternative to greenfield production), capitalizing on the shifting investor appetite towards more socially and environmentally considerate operations. Upon completion of the Pilot service, the Company intends to enter into formal agreements with Users.

Hunter with its technology platform and Integration capabilities will support the hydrocarbons industry in its drive to digitalize its operations, increase trust and transparency between its stakeholders, and meet its regulatory requirements,said Alex Medana, Hunters Chief Executive Officer.

About Hunter Technology Corp.

Hunter Technology Corp. is a technology provider developing interactive blockchain platforms to enable the facilitation of physical oil transactions throughout the trade lifecycle, with more favorable economics for producers and access to a fair market for all. Through oilex.com Hunter will operate a physical oil marketplace to facilitate the buying and selling of physical oil by independent producers to corporate consumers, traders and sovereign purchasers. Through oilexchange.com, Hunter will offer robust supply chain management tools that track physical oil throughout the supply chain and automate the reporting process via this blockchain enabled platform.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Alex Medana

Chief Executive Officer

(888) 977-0970

For further information, visit our website at www.huntertechnology.com .



NEITHER TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Information.

This news release contains certain statements which may constitute forward-looking statements or information (collectively, "forward-looking statements") regarding Hunters business development plans. Forward-looking statements are statements that relate to future, not past, events. In this context, forward-looking statements often address expected future business and financial performance, including factors beyond Hunters control, and often contain words such as "anticipate," "believe," "plan," "estimate," "expect," and "intend," statements that an action or event "may," "might," "could," "should," "will" or be "on track to" be taken or occur, or other similar expressions. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, included herein are forward-looking statements. By their nature, forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements, or other future events, to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward looking statements (including execution risk, market risk, industry risk, market reaction, the impact of general economic conditions and competition from other industry participants, as well as stock market volatility). In this news release, forward-looking statements relate to, among other things, Hunters business development plans as well as Hunters future performance as it develops its business. Although Hunter believes that the expectations in its forward-looking statements are reasonable, they are based on factors, estimates and assumptions concerning future events which may prove to be inaccurate. Those factors and assumptions are based upon currently available information. Such forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that could influence actual results or events and cause actual results or events to differ materially from those stated, anticipated or implied in the forward-looking statement. Such factors include, but are not limited to: risks relating to delays, development and marketing risks, unforeseen requirements resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, commodity prices, inability to access, on favorable terms, sufficient capital from internal and external sources, the ability to access, hire and retain employees; regulatory changes and impacts, timing and completion of the Company's online platforms as well as general business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties. As such, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements, as no assurance can be provided as to future results, levels of activity or achievements. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release are made as of the date of this news release and, except as required by applicable law, Hunter does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or to revise any of the included forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. The forward-looking statements contained in this document are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. Trading in the securities of Hunter should be considered highly speculative. There can be no assurance that Hunter will be able to achieve all or any of its proposed objectives. As at the date hereof, Hunter has not signed any formal contracts to provide the OilExchange service to Users and there is no certainty that Hunter will enter into formal contracts with Users. Please review Hunters SEDAR filings including its management discussion and analysis available under the Company's profile at www.sedar.com for a more fulsome discussion of risk factors affecting Hunter.
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WINDHOEK, Namibia - The government of Namibia has closed the southern African country's state-owned airline, Air Namibia, saying that it can no longer afford the financial losses.

WINDHOEK, Namibia - The government of Namibia has closed the southern African country's state-owned airline, Air Namibia, saying that it can no longer afford the financial losses.

All Air Namibia flights have been cancelled, 10 aircraft have been grounded and the reservations system has been closed. Air Namibia's 644 employees have lost their jobs and will receive a severance package of a year's salary, according to a Cabinet announcement.

Air Namibia has announced on its social media platforms that customers who have paid for flights should register for refunds.

The decision to close the airline was taken after careful consideration, according to the minister of public enterprises Leon Jooste.

The national airline is not profitable and it has not been profitable since its inception. The net economic costs of Air Namibias operations far outstrip the net gains and it is thus unsustainable," Jooste said last week.

The government has spent more than the equivalent of $550 million to maintain the airline, said Jooste.

At this stage, the countrys economy can no longer afford to perpetually provide financial support to Air Namibia at the expense of supporting economic growth and critical social services," he said. Government considered all other options which included engagement with other airlines for potential investment partnership and various business plans to turnaround the company.

The cost of liquidating Air Namibia is estimated to be $137 million, according to local press reports.

The national airline has had financial problems for years, but the situation took a turn for the worse last year. A major problem has been the controversial lease in 1998 of a 351-passenger plane  a Boeing 767-300  from a private company, Challenge Air.

Air Namibia terminated the agreement after discovering the aircraft was defective and Challenge Air was liquidated soon afterward, but the transaction continued to haunt the national airline.

A settlement agreement was reached in December 2019, in which Air Namibia acknowledged it owed Challenge Air around N$333 million (US$22 million) and undertook to pay that sum in monthly instalments until September 2020.
A significant ice storm is a rarity in these parts, National Weather Service meteorologist Sarah Johnson said early Monday morning.

For conditions to be just right -- a warm layer of air above the surface to melt snowflakes into rain but it being 32 degrees or below on the ground to freeze the drop on contact -- for an extended period of time is difficult to maintain, Johnson said from the weather service office in Mount Holly, New Jersey.

Either the warm air gets down to the surface eliminating the freezing or the layer aloft erodes and the entire channel from 10,000 feet on down becomes all snow, she said.

But due to a condition Monday into Tuesday called cold damming -- with the wind blowing in a certain way to trap frigid air at the surface -- it is expected to be one of those rare times when a quarter to four-tenths of an inch of ice accrues on roads, trees, power lines, sidewalks and steps, Johnson said.

The weather service in a small way reduced its high-end figure overnight from a half-inch due to a slight warming trend, but EPAWA Weather Consulting meteorologist Bobby Martrich, whose top-end figure is 0.35 of an inch, said in his morning forecast video that valleys -- such as the Lehigh Valley -- likely will never change over to all rain before the storm moves out by 9 a.m. Tuesday.

So, what does this all mean?

Travel is strongly discouraged, the weather service said in its ice storm warning, which runs from 6 p.m. Monday through 10 a.m. Tuesday.

Ice storms of between a quarter and half an inch are labeled disruptive by weather.com. A half inch of ice can increase weight by 500 pounds on a power line, the weather website says. It can expand the burden on tree branches by 30 times, weather.com says. Power outages are possible, and the weather service tells people to plan for them.

The EPAWA Weather Consulting ice forecast Feb. 15-16, 2021.EPAWA Weather Consulting

More than a half inch of ice would be crippling, weather.com says. Fortunately that is not expected this time.

Tree branches weighted and snapped, power outages as a result, Martrich said when asked what he meant by a significant ice storm. Not as wide spread as a half inch or greater but significant.

Above a quarter inch -- but especially at a half inch -- We start to see significant impacts as far as power outages and tree damage, Johnson said.

But overall damage depends on the area and how prepared the infrastructure is for such a storm, Johnson said. Power companies work to trim and remove trees since Superstorm Sandy could lessen the impact of an ice storm, Johnson agreed.

It looks like several hours of freezing rain, Johnson said of a storm that will make its way from the northern parts of the Gulf states and set up overnight near the Delmarva and then southern New Jersey. Whenever we are talking about a wintry mix and freezing rain, its a game of inches. We do have pretty high confidence we will see prolonged freezing rain.

Its been about 10 years since such a storm has arrived in the Lehigh Valley and northwest New Jersey, she said, due to the nature of the storm tracks weve had.

The surface temperature isnt expected to lift above freezing until Tuesday, but its going to remain in the vicinity, with Mondays forecast high set at 31 degrees, the weather service said.

While there could be occasional wintry precipitation throughout the morning into the afternoon, there will be a lull before the main event arrives later Monday afternoon into evening, Johnson said. Martrich figures the major icing concern gets here by early to mid evening.

While the better known ratio is 1 inch of moisture to 10 inches of snow, the weather service is looking for about three quarters of an inch of rain creating the expected ice buildup before a changeover to all rain late Monday night or early Tuesday morning, Johnson said.

Driving is expected to be dangerous. Untreated roads and elevated surfaces such as bridges, which are surrounded by air and arent warmed by the ground beneath, are of specific concern, she said. With the storm beginning as snow or sleet, it might not be as likely to wash away the pretreating, she added, but deferred to departments of transportation on the subject.

Any time we see freezing rain, even if the road is treated, if you see a surface that is wet, assume that it is ice, Johnson said.

Pennsylvania and New Jersey are once again planning for highway restrictions -- for commercial vehicles at 8 a.m. in New Jersey on Interstates 78 and 80 and 6 p.m. in Pennsylvania.

While the storm ends on Tuesday morning, that rush hour could be very difficult as the snow pack keeps the temperature cold in the air just above the surface, Martrich said.

He summed it up: The morning is going to be crap.

And it could take some time for the ice to melt as the high reaches 39 but clouds stick around on Tuesday, Johnson said.

There are a lot of factors, not just temperature, she said of that process.

And then theres Thursday into Friday that could bring a thump of snow up front before changing over to freezing rain, Martrich said.

But lets get through the Monday into Tuesday storm first.

The weather service on Tuesday could have accumulation estimates for what comes next, Johnson said.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting lehighvalleylive.com with a subscription.

Tony Rhodin can be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com.
The Chinese and Indian armies continued with the disengagement process in the North and South banks of Pangong lake in eastern Ladakh as per plan and the entire pullback exercise is expected to take another six-seven days, sources in the defence and security establishment said on Monday.

The sources said the Chinese People's Liberation Army(PLA) has already removed several bunkers, temporary posts and other structures in the northern bank areas while gradually thinning down their troops in the region.

They said field commanders of both the sides are meeting almost on a daily basis to take forward the disengagement process which was finalised last week following nine rounds of high-level military talks. It will take at least a week for the disengagement process to be completed in the North and South banks of Pangong Tso, they said, adding both sides are carrying out verification of withdrawal of troops and equipment.

After nine months of standoff, the two armies reached an agreement on disengagement in the North and South banks of Pangong lake that mandates both sides to cease forward deployment of troops in a "phased, coordinated and verifiable" manner. The disengagement began on Wednesday last.

On Thursday, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh made a detailed statement in Parliament on the disengagement pact. According to the agreement, China has to pull back its troops to east of Finger 8 areas in the northern bank while the Indian personnel will be based at their permanent base at Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 in the region. Similar action will take place on the southern bank of the lake as well, Singh had said.

Last year, the Chinese military built several bunkers and other structures in the areas between Finger 4 and 8 and had blocked all Indian patrols beyond Finger 4, triggering strong reaction from the Indian Army. In the nine rounds of military talks, India was specifically insisting on withdrawal of Chinese troops from Finger 4 to Finger 8 on the North bank of Pangong Lake. The mountain spurs in the area are referred to as Fingers.

The sources said following completion of the disengagement process, the two sides will hold talks on the de-escalation exercise. Defence minister Singh had told Parliament that it was agreed to convene the next meeting of senior commanders of both sides within 48 hours of completion of the disengagement in the Pangong lake area so as to resolve all other remaining issues.

On Friday, the defence ministry said other outstanding "problems" including in Depsang, Hot Springs and Gogra will be taken up at the upcoming talks between military commanders of the two countries.
File photo of an airport taking off from an airport in New Zealand on Sept 20, 2017. (Reuters/Nigel Marple/File Photo)

Australia Shuts Border to Locked-Down New Zealand for 3 Days

Australia has shut its border to New Zealand (NZ) for 72 hours after the country recorded three new cases of the UK strain of the CCP virus, for a second time popping the travel bubble that had existed between the two nations.

Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Paul Kelly convened an urgent meeting with the CMOs of Australias states in the travel bubble and it was decided NZ would be declared a Red Zone for the next three days, Kelly announced on Sunday night.

All travellers from NZ will now need to enter a mandatory 14-day quarantine upon arrival in Australia.

States will determine how to manage people who have already arrived in Australia from New Zealand and who may pose a risk of transmitting the COVID-19 virus, Kelly said.

Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt told reporters on Sunday that state health ministers had also asked for the manifests of all Air New Zealand flights into Australia from the previous days and said the states would then be following up directly with passengers.

Hunt said so far the NZ authorities investigations had revealed that a three-person family associated with a facility near Auckland Airport, which does the laundry for the international flight arrivals, had tested positive. The NZ Herald reported that there have been no further cases of COVID-19 recorded as health authorities trace the familys close contacts.

NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has ordered the city of Auckland to undergo a stage three hard lockdownfor a second time. NZ enacted a nationwide lockdown for 51 days last year to combat the virus.

The rest of NZ will go to level two restrictions with mandated social distancing, limits on gatherings, and increased mask-wearing.

Impact on Repatriating Aussies

The move to close the bubble with NZ comes as Australian Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack said there is room to discuss decreasing the number of arrivals to Australia after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said he believed the arrival caps should be reduced to only those with compassionate reasons.

Wed obviously like to get every Australian back as soon as possible, but there are quarantine restrictions, of course. There are limits on those numbers coming back in, McCormack told ABC News Breakfast on Monday. Theres only a certain number of planes and Australia has helped that by facilitating paid-for flights to get back into the country.

Deputy PM @M_McCormackMP says there is room for a discussion on drastically lowering the number of Australians allowed back into the country. It comes after Victorian Premier @DanielAndrewsMP suggested it could be limited to compassionate grounds. pic.twitter.com/rgmKnLLCZQ  News Breakfast (@BreakfastNews) February 14, 2021

McCormack said the repatriation flights were a large logistical exercise and so far the government had brought home 450,000 Australians.

However, the Deputy Opposition Leader, Kristina Keneally, who is shadow minister for Home Affairs, believes the limits on returning Aussies is only a problem because the federal government refuses to take over quarantine from states.

The problems that exist in hotel quarantine today are because we have not had national leadership to take responsibility here, Keneally told Sky News.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 18:26:40|Editor: huaxia

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People wearing face masks walk across a street in Hong Kong, south China, Feb. 15, 2021. Hong Kong's Center for Health Protection (CHP) reported nine additional confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Monday, a new low in about three months. The new cases included four local infections and five imported ones, taking the total tally to 10,788. Three of the new local cases were untraceable and the five imported cases were from Indonesia, the Philippines, Poland and India, according to a CHP press briefing. (Xinhua/Lo Ping Fai)

HONG KONG, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Hong Kong's Center for Health Protection (CHP) reported nine additional confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Monday, a new low in about three months.

The new cases included four local infections and five imported ones, taking the total tally to 10,788. Three of the new local cases were untraceable and the five imported cases were from Indonesia, the Philippines, Poland and India, according to a CHP press briefing.

Controller of the CHP Ronald Lam told the press that upsurges of cases were usually seen after long vacations due to family gatherings, therefore, he would not rule out the possibility that the number of cases climbs again after the Lunar New Year holiday.

The first workday after the holiday started on Tuesday in Hong Kong. Lam urged the public to stay vigilant as workplaces were one of the high-risk places for COVID-19 outbreak.

According to Hong Kong's Hospital Authority, 348 COVID-19 patients are currently being treated in public hospitals and the community treatment facility at AsiaWorld-Expo, and 21 patients are in critical condition. Enditem
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The SECO-WCO Global Trade Facilitation Programme (GTFP) team has the pleasure to announce the publication of the WCO Time Release Study (TRS) Guide Version 3 in its Spanish and Russian versions.

The WCO TRS is an internationally accepted strategic tool to measure the actual time taken for the release and/or clearance of goods  from the time of arrival until the physical release of cargo  as well as the effectiveness and efficiency of border procedures relating to imports, exports and transit movements of goods. It helps in identifying associated bottlenecks objectively, and in addressing them in an efficient and effective manner.

The TRS Guide is already being actively used by Customs Administrations around the world, in line with Article 7.6.1 of the World Trade Organizations (WTO) Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA).

The GTFP has been providing tailor-made assistance to its beneficiary countries in various strategic topics including TRS. As a result, and with the aim to foster the outreach of the TRS instrument, the TRS Guide has been translated to Spanish and Russian to enable Customs Administrations to benefit from it in their own language and support sustainable national priority reform initiatives in the field of Trade Facilitation.

The Spanish version of the TRS has been translated by the GTFP with the financial support of the Switzerlands State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) and, in partnership with the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), the Russian version of the Guide has been made available for the benefit of all WCO Members.

The documents are available on the following links:

For more information on the GTFP please contact capacity.building@wcoomd.org.
Razor wire is shown atop a fence outside the Capitol in Washington during the fifth day of former President Donald Trump's impeachment trial on Feb. 13, 2021. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Lessons for Conservatives From the Trump Impeachment

Commentary

As I write, the Senate has just acquitted former President Donald Trump. The incident offers some lessons for conservatives. These lessons are presented in no particular order. All are important.

The final vote, like the entire impeachment process, demonstrated the degraded state of Congress. For example, 55 senators voted that they had jurisdiction over the case. But its clear that they didnt really weigh jurisdiction and the merits separately. Thats because all 55 voted to convict. It seems the vote for jurisdiction was driven purely by the desire to nail Trump.

Two senators who voted against jurisdiction nevertheless voted for conviction. Consider that for a moment: They conceded the process was illegitimatebut they still wanted to use it: Yes, I know this is a kangaroo court, but Im going to let it lynch you anyway.

Seven Republicans voted to convict. They will be hearing from the grassroots. How will Mitt Romney survive the Utah GOP primary in 2024? The answer is, he probably wont.

The most recent insurrection wasnt at the U.S. Capitol. (The Capitol incursion was more like a riot.) As Andy Ngos new book, Unmasked, documents, it is/was the insurrection waged by AntifaBlack Lives Matter (BLM). Its shocking to learn that some leading Democrats abetted, or at least tolerated, that insurrection.

On Friday, Trump lawyer David Schoen redeemed the defense teams poor initial performance by showing a devastating series of videos. They depicted top Democrats, including many in the Senate, doing almost exactly what they accused Trump of doing. One video showed horrifying scenes from last years AntifaBLM riots, juxtaposed with leading Democrats cheering the rioters on.

Its hard to avoid concluding that many leading Democrats are fundamentally hostile to Americas constitutional system. This is both a very great danger for America and a great political opportunity for Republicans. The Republican opportunity is not just national, but also exists in otherwise left-leaning states suffering from the AntifaBLM activities, particularly Washington and Oregon.

I taught for many years in colleges and universities, so Im intimately familiar with academic hostility toward our constitutional system. To a disproportionate degree, elected Democrats come to politics directly out of academia. Two of many examples are figures who played leading roles in the impeachment: Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) entered elective office (the New York State legislature) almost immediately after graduating from law school. Lead House impeachment manager Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) spent nearly his entire professional career as a law professor in Washington, D.C. Such people have been totally immersed in progressive puerilities, but have had comparatively little exposure to the mainstream of American life.

While nearly all leading Democrats buy into the lefts intersectionality, the Republican Party is todays big tent. Its leaders range from paleoconservatives to those who, by traditional measures, are moderate liberals. Legislative voting tabulations support this conclusion. When you correct for the bias of those issuing the tabulations, the evidence is even more decisive.

Donald Trump generates great loyalty. But a lesson from his short and turbulent presidency is that Republicans need to nominate presidential candidates with more political experience. The presidency is no place to learn on the job. Of course, Republican primary voters must distinguish between politically experienced candidates who will remain steadfast and those who will sell out to the Swamp. The GOP should nominate more Reagans, fewer McCains.

Heres a crucial fact that Trump (like many other Republicans) never understood: Its not enough for a Republican president and Congress to repeal regulations or limit governments growth. If the programs that feed the left arent abolished, they grow back quickly. (Think of how fast Joe Biden has reversed the Trump legacy.) When Republicans come into office, they must abolish bad programs, not merely reform or trim themdespite screams from Democrats, lobbyists, and the media. When taxpayer-funded programs go away, so does the social damage they cause. And so do the taxpayer funds that are the lefts lifeblood. I have a lot of suggestions for elimination, but a good place to start would be the federal programs that fund leftist academia.

Failure to grasp another fact landed Trump in trouble again and again. The fact is this: Expected standards of conduct are higher for conservatives than for liberals. Leading Democrats who have been promoting insurrection have gotten off scot-free; Trump was impeached for far less. I know this is horribly unfair. I know a major reason is media and bureaucratic bias. But an adept politician works with conditions as they are, not as hed like them to be. Any Republican candidate or officeholder should weigh, and re-weigh, everything he says and does before he says or does it. As a long-time conservative Republican leader and as a candidate for governor, I learned this the hard way.

Its always risky to count Trump out, but three factors work against a big come-back. First, many Republican activists will not want the negative baggage he carries. Second, Trump is 74, and his unlimited energy will not last forever. Third, and most importantly, there will be plenty of skilled candidates willing to take his place. To cite two: Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) rose in Republican esteem through their support for election integrity and opposition to impeachment. The Republican Party will produce other potential candidates as well.

Finally, and most importantly: As Ive noted before, the corruption of national politics highlights the need to save our country through carefully conceived action at the state legislative levelthrough election reform, allocation of presidential electors to contain big-city corruption, and the calling of a convention of states to propose corrective constitutional amendments.

Robert G. Natelson is a former constitutional law professor who has been in and around politics since 1964. He has successfully managed or led several political campaigns, and also has extensive private sector experience. He is a senior fellow in constitutional jurisprudence at the Independence Institute in Denver and author of The Original Constitution: What It Actually Said and Meant.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

A line of lorries in Kent, Britain. Photo: Toby Melville/Reuters

Retail bosses have warned the sector faces a perfect storm as new border regulations come into force in April with a raft of retailers still unable to serve customers in Northern Ireland.

Trade bodies and firms have called on the government to extend the current grace period amid continued uncertainty over the level of checks which will then be introduced.

It comes as a number of major UK retailers  including Halfords, John Lewis, Fortnum & Mason and AO  remain unable to deliver products to customers in Northern Ireland, more than six weeks after the Brexit deal was agreed.

Some retailers have said they are still developing and finalising IT systems which can deal with new trade requirements for Northern Ireland.

READ MORE: Wetherspoon boss calls for UK pubs to open at same time as non-essential shops

However, Aodhan Connolly, director for Northern Ireland at the British Retail Consortium (BRC), warned that the situation could become even more complicated in the coming months.

He told the Press Association that the IT systems being installed by retailers in order to fulfil restrictions put in place at the start of January, could need a complete overhaul just three months later.

We just dont know at all  it is entirely possible the systems they have put in place will not be whats needed in April, he said.

We need time. In an ideal world we would have an extension and retailers would have more time to prepare for what needs to be a long-term sustainable solution that allows us to continue giving Northern Irish households choice and affordability.

Retailers have been making the situation work because they are bending over backwards to make sure they can serve people here.

But they know that change is coming in April, and then we could have a perfect storm.

New rules on parcels and products of animal origin will come in as well pressure on the supply chain as hospitality will be reopening, schools will be reopening and we have the change of seasons for goods.

Story continues

READ MORE: European stocks surge on hopes of quicker economic recovery

Retailers have also expressed their frustration with government over the complexity of current regulations and the short-notice nature of its introduction.

One UK business, which asked not be named, criticised suggestions that there is nothing preventing the transport of parcels to Northern Ireland.

The BRC said that parcel regulations were only confirmed 18 hours before they came into force.

Another unnamed retailer accused the government of moving the goalposts just days before the UK officially left the EU.

Watch: What could scrapping EU labour laws mean for UK workers?
New Delhi, Feb 15 : The farmer protests have continued against the agricultural laws for more than 80 days on Delhi's borders. Now the crowd at the Ghazipur border protest site has become thinner than before, though BKU leader Rakesh Tikait has already told the farmers "to keep one eye on the border and one eye on their farm." The tents in which the farmers used to sleep, are now almost empty. Only a few people are seen eating food at the 'langars' or community kitchens.

However, the number of farmers on the border increases on Saturday and Sunday. There are some farmers who come from their villages in the morning and go back again the same evening.

In fact, after the violence on Republic Day, speculation was doing the rounds that the farmers have started leaving Ghazipur border and on January 27 it was clearly visible that people were departing the border.

On the night of January 27, after a passionate appeal from Tikait, the farmers again gathered at the border, coming on tractors, two-wheelers and four-wheelers.

Tikait had given a boost to the protest movement by gathering the farmers on the border, but to continue the movement, a new strategy was devised under which the farmers were clearly told to keep an eye both on their farms and on the border protest site. After that the farmers started returning to their villages and coming back after a few days.

At present, the number of farmers on the border is low, though it is difficult to say whether farmers are quitting the protest movement to go home or just to tend their farms.

According to other farmers at the border, the farmers who are returning to their villages on tractors will come back again. Due to the farm work they cannot sit here continuously.

When Tikait was asked about the lack of crowds on the border, he replied, "It is not that the crowd is decreasing, the farmers will keep coming, they have to manage their fields and also manage the movement." "They will not go home till the agricultural laws are repealed. The farmers are not on the streets but are sitting in their tents. We have asked all farmers to be on standby, when the need arises we will call them here."

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
New Delhi/Guwahati, Feb 15 : Ahead of the state assembly polls, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar during his visit to Assam along with a Japanese delegation on Monday said that the potential is immense for India's collaboration with Japan in this northeastern state.

IANS last week was the first to report that the Minister had ratcheted up a mega plan for a strategic partnership with Japan in the poll-bound Assam.

Jaishankar was accompanied by Japan's Ambassador to India, Satoshi Suzuki and others in Guwahati to review the several development projects funded by the Japanese government.

This was his first visit to the state as the External Affairs Minister.

"Our presence today not only reflects the strong cooperation that we have with Japan, but actually underlines how this India-Japan partnership can really make a difference not just to India, but specifically to the development of Assam," he said, at a meeting attended by Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, Minister of Finance Himanta Biswa Sarma, BJP vice president Baijayant Panda among others.

"Given Japan's many strengths and our very positive experiences of collaboration in other parts of India, it is evident that the potential for our collaboration in Assam is really immense. We are already contemplating capacity building in water supply and sewage treatment," he said.

Jaishankar added the two countries were also exploring plans for disaster management and urban planning, besides the Bamboo initiative proposed by Japan.

The Sonowal government in Assam, he said has taken some proactive steps on the Japan Industrial Township.

After highlighting the work done by the Modi government in Assam, he said on the infrastructure side, Japanese development assistance is central to the 20 km-long bridge on Brahmaputra between Dhubri in Assam and Phulbari in Meghalaya.

The four-lane bridge is on National Highway 127-B and the total project cost which is more than Rs. 6,000 crores, India and Japan have a loan agreement for Rs 1,600 crores. The contract for the civil work packages was signed in December 2020 and the project is to be completed by its deadline in 2028.

The Minister along with Ambassador Suzuki and minister Siddhartha Bhattacharya, inspected Guwahati's water supply project site. Its south-central and northern district waterworks facilities are being renovated and the executing agency is undergoing capacity development.

The loan amount is Rs 1,183 crore of a total project cost of Rs. 1,443 crores. For a variety of reasons, the project got somewhat delayed. "But we are very confident that we will be able to complete this hopefully by next year," he assured.

Also significant is the Guwahati sewerage project to provide reliable services by construction of facilities and an extensive sewer network in South Guwahati with a state of the art sewerage treatment plant.

The project cost is Rs 1,460 crore and the Japanese loan here again is in an excess of Rs 1,000 crore. The scope of the project has undergone revision, necessitating a revised DPR.

India and Japan, he said are looking at the approach road to the Dhubri-Phulbari bridge that is about 55 kms long. The preparatory survey is being conducted for this Rs 717 crore project by Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA).

"Another road under consideration is from Dudhnoi to Dalu, via Baghmara. The two laning of this 125 km stretch will cost about Rs 1,500 crore and is included in our rolling plan." The two countries are also discussing upgrading of major hospitals and many smaller clinics. The procurement for preparatory survey by JICA is already in progress. The two sides are also exploring an ambitious project on agriculture and fisheries which will be in excess of Rs 3,000 crore.

"Any relationship in the final analysis is of course sustained only by the closeness of the people. We have recently signed an agreement with Japan on Specified Skilled Workers that builds on an earlier we had an internship programme with Japan, but this is something much bigger, its far more expansive, it is likely to lead to much greater training and eventually to much greater employment.

It covers fourteen trades, which includes nursing; fisheries; agriculture; food services; food & beverage manufacturing; lodging; aviation; auto maintenance; ship-building and ship related industry; construction; electric & electronic information; industrial machinery manufacturing; material processing and building cleaning.

"Our expectation is that its early realization would open the way for Indian talent to access the Japanese economy. We are also hopeful that Japan would build further on its relationship with IIT Guwahati and other institutions in Assam in the coming days.

Indeed, as there is a growing focus on Assam, its tourism potential, especially its nature reserves, can be a greater source of attraction and there to whether it is nature reserves or cultural heritage we hope to have discussions with the Japanese side on how we can include it in our cooperation." The Minister said India is headed today towards a 5 trillion dollar economy. "But, remember this, remember our history, India was a great country only when eastern India was prosperous and secure. That revival must happen again and that is very much at the core of the Modi government's commitment to Assam." He said, "I am sure that the Ambassador looks forward to the day when we even have flights from Japan! Bringing more Japanese tourists to Kaziranga is certainly a prospect that we should all aim for in the coming years."
Bijnor : , Feb 15 (IANS) Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Monday reiterated her support to farmers and slammed the central government saying that those who cannot pay the cost of sugarcane, will not be able to understand the cost of human life.

Addressing a Kisan Panchayat in Chandpur, Priyanka said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had spent Rs 16,000 crores in buying two aircrafts for himself.

"With his money, the entire cane dues of farmers could have been paid. The Prime Minister has money to travel but not for farmers. These farm laws will enable capitalists to fill their coffers but farmers will not get the minimum support price," she said.

She further said, "I have not come here to make a speech. I have come here to talk to you. You have reposed faith in Narendra Modi twice because you thought that he would bring prosperity through his policies. But has this happened? Your faith has been shattered because the Prime Minister does not have money for you." She recited a couplet which said, "Bhagwan ka sauda karta hai, insaan ki keemat kya jane/ Jo ganne ki keemat de na sake, woh jaan ki keemat kya jane." This loosely translates into "One who doesn't know the worth of God, how will he treasure human life; One who can't pay for sugarcane, how can he decide cost of human life." Talking about the farm laws, she said that the government was forcing the new laws even when the famers did not want it.

"Why does the government want to force the new laws? Do crores of farmers not understand what is good for them? You will not be able to seek redressal in court under the new laws. This nation is not blind. People can see that the Prime Minister is working for the welfare of his capitalist friends. He can visit other countries but cannot come two kilometers to meet farmers," she stated.

She further said that she and her brother Rahul and the Congress party would stand in support the farmers and their demands.

The Congress leader observed silence as a mark respect for farmers who had passed away during the agitation.

Priyanka was also gifted five sticks of sugarcane by the farmers.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Freedom of speech was so important to Americas founders that it was not the tenth, or the fifth, but the First Amendment to the Constitution. It is under assault today from many quarters as evidenced by speech codes and the cancel culture ready to pounce on any words, spoken or written, not approved by the left.

Colorado State University, several years ago, prepared a draft Inclusive Language Guide. This is a modern-day version of George Orwells Newspeak, the official language of fictious Oceania, words designed to be politically correct without a hint of rebellion or opposition to the establishment.

Although the CSU guide is a few years old, it is worth revisiting as the cancel culture is in overdrive these days, invigorated by their supposed landslide electoral victory last November. Those with conservative views are being erased from the corporate world and academia simply because terms like free expression, tolerance, and diversity only flow in one direction, to the left.

YouTube screen grab

Disney actress Gina Carano was recently fired for comparing current cancel culture to Nazi pogroms a century ago while those on the left are free to compare Republicans and Donald Trump to Nazis, Hitler, racists, supremacists, and all manner of vile insults, without fear of losing their jobs or reputations.

The CSU guide was created by a group of university staff to avoid offending anyone who might hear or read words that have been part of the American lexicon for centuries. Here is the actual guide and some examples.

Note that it is not official policy or required practice, only a guide, but woe to those who disregard the suggestions. Its also a living document, meaning it can change based on the political winds, as in who occupies the White House.

Birth defect should be replaced with person with a congenital disability as it supposedly generalizes the population. Defect implies the person is sub-par or incomplete. Doesnt disability do the same?

Colored should be replaced with person of color, as it was decades ago. When was the last time you saw anyone use the term colored? Was a written guide necessary for this?

Cake walk somehow dredges up images of minstrel shows and racism. I had no idea instead thinking it a more colorful way of saying what CSU prefers, that was easy. Are walk in the park or day at the beach with similar meaning also racist or implying privilege?

Freshman should be replaced by first-year due to the man bit. They dont address the man in human or the son in person.

Ghetto should be avoided, instead referring to a specific neighborhood by name. What if one is simply referring to poor neighborhoods, not one in particular? Of course the New York Times is permitted to use the term ghetto as long as they tie it to Trump.

Handicap parking minimizes personhood, according to CSU, preferring accessible parking or parking for people with disabilities. Someone should tell local county officials in Colorado who describe handicap placards, or Amazon, which sells large blue signs with wording, handicapped parking. It would be difficult to fit all the preferred words on a placard or sign.

The traditional speech opening, ladies and gentlemen implies binary gender and should be replaced by everyone. Perhaps in the South, Yall would suffice.

Of course illegal immigrant/alien is offensive as it points out the truth, that the process by which someone entered the country did not follow the law, making it by definition illegal. Someone should have told then President Bill Clinton, who used the terms criminal alien and illegal alien freely. CSU wants them called simply immigrants, just as we would refer to those who followed all legal processes for residency or citizenship.

Bank robbery, by this logic, should be an unauthorized withdrawal, shoplifting an unauthorized purchase, and murder an undocumented death.

Common expressions, long time no see and no can do are somehow mocking Asians. No, that would be Joe Biden saying, You cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin' Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent.

CSU prefers person with a spinal cord injury over paraplegia or quadriplegia, which are medical terms specifying the level of spinal cord injury and function. How useful in non-medical discourse would C7 incomplete be compared to paraplegia? Should we lump pneumonia, COPD, and asthma, all different diseases, into person with breathing challenges to avoid minimizing personhood.

Pow wow is an term for a meeting or gathering, traditionally Native American but now a common expression. I have not heard of someone organizing a Zoom or Skype pow wow rather than meeting, so perhaps this expression isnt used much anymore, except as a culturally appropriating book title where Elizabeth Warren shared her Cherokee family recipes which were word for word copies of a famous French chefs recipes.

Rule of thumb, a popular expression for general rule is deemed offensive as it supposedly derives from English law allowing wife beating. Who knew? I looked it up and its a myth, not mentioned in English law, with the origin of the expression unknown.

Im starving should be replaced with Im hungry as it appropriates real hardship. Food coma, as in sleepiness after a big meal, supposedly alludes to stereotypes of laziness associated with African-Americans. Who knew laziness was racial? Asserting such a stereotype is itself racist.

Thug is also racist and should not be used, except by Barack Obama when he described Baltimore rioters. I didnt realize Obama was a racist.

American/America was included in the first draft, but ultimately deleted. The original thinking was that the Americas covered North, Central, and South America, rather than just the United States. Hopefully Joe Biden, when he gives the State of the Union address, wont begin with my fellow Americans instead saying my fellow persons from the United States.

Yes, this is only a guide, and not a mandate, but I wonder how many freshman writing class instructors correct students when they use words to avoid rather than suggestions for replacement?

Lets try the inclusive language guide, with the verboten words in parenthesis.

I am a first year (freshman) sitting in the audience (peanut gallery) of the huge lecture hall, feeling sleepy because I ate too much (Im in a food coma), listening to my boring and uncool (lame) professor presenting a choice of writing topics. I randomly select one (eenie meenie miney moe) to write about. I was nervous (a basket case) as I was experiencing a hostile environment with (at war with) my surprising and wild (crazy) roommate who parked my car in a parking for people with disabilities (handicapped) spot.

The police officer (cop) wrote me a ticket, cheating (gyping) me out of fifty dollars. I asked for a warning but ze (he/she) said I cant do it (no can do). What a boring and uncool law enforcement officer (idiot cop). Oh well, back to class.

Brian C Joondeph is a racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, white supremacist, privileged, extremist, insurrectionist, fascist, deplorable, smelly, bigoted, domestic terrorist (conservative) writer and physician.
I am honored to be recognized by my peers in the legal community. My focus is always on the client and fighting for their rights to receive the compensation they deserve, says Garon Muller

The Burnside Law Firm is pleased to announce that personal injury attorney, Garon Muller, has been selected for inclusion on the 2021 Super Lawyers Georgia Rising Stars list. Mr. Muller is a partner at Burnside Law Firm, and he has been working at the practice since April of 2016, focusing primarily on personal injury cases. Super Lawyers, part of Thomson Reuters, is a rating service of outstanding lawyers from more than 70 practice areas who have attained a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. The annual selections are made using a patented multiphase process, which results in a credible, comprehensive and diverse listing of exceptional attorneys. The Super Lawyers and Rising Stars lists are published nationwide in Super Lawyers Magazines and in leading city and regional magazines and newspapers across the country.

Mr. Muller and the Burnside Law Firm team specialize in helping clients recover from devastating losses, ranging from catastrophic injuries and wrongful death to medical malpractice and work-related accidents. Garon Muller has focused his specific practice on helping individuals that were injured due to automobile collisions, workplace injuries, premises injuries and defective products. Mr. Muller attended law school at Mercer University in Macon and became a member of the Georgia Bar Association in 2011. Prior to his current role as a personal injury trial lawyer, he served as an assistant district attorney for the Augusta Judicial Circuit. Mr. Muller is dedicated to his profession and serves on the Executive Council of the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association (GTLA) and is a graduate of GTLAs LEAD Program. Mr. Muller is also a member of the Executive Committee of the Augusta Bar Association. He is a former leader on the Executive Council of the Young Lawyers Division of the State Bar of Georgia and a past president of the Young Lawyers of Augusta.

I am honored to be recognized by my peers in the legal community. My focus is always on the client and fighting for their rights to receive the compensation they deserve, says Garon Muller

Link to profile - Top-Rated Augusta, GA Personal Injury Attorney | Garon Muller | Super Lawyers

More about Burnside Law Firm, LLP

Burnside Law Firm is a plaintiffs personal injury practice. The attorneys at this well-respected firm believe in going the extra mile for their clients and taking a personal, collaborative approach. They make the legal process as smooth and efficient as possible, ensuring that victims understand the status of their case and available options at all times. The legal team also performs thorough research and investigation into the circumstances surrounding an injury. With offices in Augusta, Atlanta and Athens, Georgia, and over thirty years of collective experience in personal injury law and a proven track record, the attorneys at Burnside Law Firm stand ready to help those in need of representation. For more information about Burnside Law Firm or Mr. Garon Muller, visit http://www.burnsidefirm.com or call (800) 569-1937.
Rosy Meurer, an up and coming Nollywood actress, was once again thrust into the limelight on Monday after Tonto Dikehs ex-husband, Olakunle Churchill, unveiled her as his wife.

The tattoo-loving actress made the news headlines for the first time in 2017 when she was fingered in Tonto and Churchills divorce brouhaha.

At the time, she was an ambassador of Churchills Big Church Foundations Mother and Child Project.

Tonto would later reveal in an interview on Media Room Hub that she was aware that her ex-husband abandoned her and their son because she (Meurer) had been sleeping with him.

Among other allegations, Tonto revealed that her ex-husband gifted Meurer an SUV on her birthday.

Meurer later debunked the allegations.

Four years down the line and several denials after, it appears Churchill and Meurer are tired of playing games and want the whole world to know that they are officially married.

And so Churchill, in a birthday message penned to Meurer on Monday, addressed her as his wife and then dropped a shocker. They had been married for two years!

In another post, the businessman and philanthropist penned another birthday wish for his young wife and tagged it two years and stronger.

He wrote, May God bless you today on your birthday and every day after. May you be comforted by His presence in your life. You have brought so much happiness, laughter, and wisdom into our life. Raising a glass in celebration of you, and sending many best wishes for your birthday. #twoyearsandstronger.

Meurer, 29, who has come under attack from Tontos die-hard fans on Instagram, responded to the birthday message showing off her wedding ring.

Who is Rosy Meurer?

So away from the husband-snatching scandal, who really is Rosy Meurer?

Meurer was born in The Gambia to a Dutch father and a Nigerian mother from Delta State. She is the first child in a family of three.

Meurer, who ventured into acting in 2012 when she starred in Emem Isongs movie, Spellbound, is commonly known more as Tontos ex-rival than as an actress.

She gained notoriety when Tonto accused her of sleeping with her then-husband in 2017. Meurer would later admit that she got more jobs and money after Tontos marriage crisis allegations.

She got her big break in The Gambia when some Nollywood actors came to shoot a movie.

One of the producers spotted her when they visited her mums restaurant. That was how she landed her debut movie role and also met a director, Desmond Elliot, who advised her to try acting in Nigeria.

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When he got back to Nigeria, he called me and said Emem Isong had a role for me in her movie. I traveled to Lagos and I starred in my first Nollywood movie titled Spell Bound, she said in a Punch interview.

Meurer, who describes herself as a Gambian-born Nigerian actress, is best known for her role in Ayo Makuns 2018 movie: Merry Men: The Real Yoruba Demons.

Her movie credits include Weekend Getaway (2012), TV series Oasis (2014), Damaged Petal (2015), Red Card (2015), and Open Marriage( 2015). Others are Karma (2018), Accidental Affair (2019), and Circle of Sinners (2020).

She has featured in over 15 movies to date and produced her first movie, Therapist Therapy in 2017.

Aside from acting, Meurer is also a philanthropist and an ambassador of Women and Child at Big Church Foundation, owned by Churchill.

Meurer, who bagged her first movie award as Next Rated Nollywood star at The Nigeria Goodwill Ambassador Award in 2016, speaks about five languages including English, Dutch, Gambian Dialect, Delta language, and Hausa.

She was signed as a Glo Ambassador in August 2019.


Ghulam Mohammad Bulla was arrested in February 1975 for leading a protest rally against the Indira-Abdullah Accord and was tortured and martyred in custody on February 15, 1975.

Senior Hurriyat leader and J&K Peoples Freedom League (JKPFL) Chairman Muhammad Farooq Rehmani in a statement issued in Islamabad while paying rich tributes to the martyred leader said, Today is Bullas 46th martyrdom anniversary. He was tortured to death during 15th of February, 1975, in the Central Jail Srinagar. He was arrested for joining an anti-Indra Abdullah-Accord demonstration in Sopore a few days before the tragic event.

He said, those were years of strong public waves and protests across Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir. 1974 and 1975 had become hallmark of impressive rallies against accord with Delhi, he added.

He said that he was a daring soldier of the Kashmir freedom movement and had inspired many people in 1980s. He said public protests in 70s and 80s paved the way for mass uprising in 1990. He condemned extending of Indian laws and post 5 August colonial measures by India in Jammu and Kashmir, urging all big powers to declare Indian steps as ultra vires. He said thousands of Kashmiris and heads of political parties had been languishing in jails facing fabricated prosecution charges to silence them.

Farooq Rehmani called upon the world to censure Modi regime, lift ban on political activities, release every Kashmiri from jails, stop killings, permit International probe into rights violations and create an environment conducive for the resolution of Kashmir in accordance with the UN resolutions and Charter of the United Nations. He warned that if the conditions were allowed in the present way, Jammu and Kashmir and its besieged Muslim population would be in terrible danger of being reduced to minority.

Meanwhile, a spokesman of the Peoples Freedom League in Srinagar said that meetings in different parts were held to commemorate martyrdom anniversary of Ghulam Muhammad Bulla and Fateha was held to pray for his eternal blessings.

(PR)
ROME, FEB 15 - A judge on Monday indicted Paolo Bellini, a former member of rightist militant group Avanguardia Nazionale, in relation to the Bologna train station bombing that killed 85 people on August 2, 1980. Bellini is accused of being one of the people involved in planting the bomb along with several members of the NAR right.wing terrorist group who had been previously convicted. The late P2 subversive rightist Masonic lodge head Licio Gelli and accomplices Umberto Ortolani, Federico Umberto D'Amato and Mario Tedeschi allegedly financed and organized the massacre. A former Carabiniere police officer and another man were also sent to trial for allegedly throwing the investigation off track. Last year a judge cancelled Bellini's 1992 acquittal in relation to the case after it emerged that a face on a frame from an amateur Super 8 film shot by a German tourist on the morning of the attack showed a "marked resemblance" to Bellini. (ANSA).
Tom Holland is thinking about becoming a stand-up comedian. Han Myung-Gu/WireImage

Tom Holland told Vanity Fair's Little Gold Men that he is thinking about doing stand-up comedy.

The actor said he wants to do many things that "challenge" him.

Holland said he is "coming to the end of a chapter" in his life, hinting at a change in his career.

Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

Tom Holland said that he is thinking about doing stand-up comedy in the future as he wants to do "all sorts of things" over the course of his career.

Holland was speaking to Vanity Fair's Little Gold Men podcast, and when asked what sort of project he liked to tackle next, Holland said he'd be up for anything that "challenges" him.

"It could be a comedy, [or] again another dramatic movie with a character that's a huge departure from myself. A play - I'd love to get back on stage and perform on stage again. I'm kind of flirting with the idea of trying a bit of stand-up comedy, following my old man in his footsteps."

Holland's father, Dominic Holland is a comedian and actor who recently published the comedy book "Eclipsed: Turns Out that Spider-Man Does Have a Dad After All."

Holland has previously spoken about projects he would like to take on and things he'd like to try. Last week, the actor said he wanted to play "a really short James Bond."

The Spider-Man actor told Little Gold Men that he constantly reminds himself that he's only 24 and has his "whole life" ahead of him, so tries not to rush anything: "I want to take my time and be very clever and strategic in what I do next."

He did hint, however, that big changes in his career could soon be coming.

Holland said: "I'm sort of coming to the end of a chapter in my life and I'm very excited to see what the future holds. I'm also a little bit nervous to sort of step away from things, but as anything, I like to improvise and take things in my stride and just get on with it, really."

Story continues

While Holland didn't specify exactly what the "end of a chapter" was, this could make Spider-Man fans a little nervous about whether the upcoming third "Spider-Man" movie could be his last in the role.

He has so far played Peter Parker in five MCU movies, with his most recent appearance as the web-slinger in 2019's "Spider-Man: Far From Home."

Holland was speaking to Little Gold Men about his new movie "Cherry," in which he plays an army medic suffering from PTSD and a drug addiction. Holland has been praised for his transformative performance in the Apple TV movie, with some tipping him for an Oscar nomination. After missing out on SAG, Golden Globe, and Critics Choice Awards nominations, however, he may fall just short.

Read the original article on Insider
The procedure for appointing an agency director could be changed.

The Cabinet of Ministers has approved for submitting to Parliament a bill that grants the National Anti-corruption Bureau the status of executive authority, at the same time providing for the first deputy director to lead the agency during the transition period.

The draft law intends to change the procedure for appointing a Bureau's director, according to Justice Minister Denys Maliuska.

The minister has recalled that the Constitutional Court, by two decisions, recognized as in breach of the Basic Law the presidential decree on the appointment of Artem Sytnyk as NABU Director, as well as provisions of the law on NABU in terms of the president's role in selecting and appointing the agency's chief.

"The government was faced with the task of fixing the loophole in the law and settling the issue of the status of both NABU and its director. The first attempt was Bill No. 4437, in which the government (in order to avoid any speculation about the legitimacy of NABU director) proposed at the legislative level to grant Artem Sytnyk powers of NABU Director until a new director is selected by the new procedure. Unfortunately, No. 4437 saw no support in parliament," the minister explained.

At the same time, the minister adds, the problem of the "loophole" in legislation and NABU status remained, and fixing it is one of the conditions for Ukraine's cooperation with the International Monetary Fund.

Read alsoZelensky's Office says Tatarov's statement on NABU doesn't reflect official position"Therefore, the government has made another attempt  a new bill that provides NABU with the status of an executive body and a new procedure for electing a NABU director. Also, a separate provision of the bill states that pending selection of a new NABU director, the director's powers will be performed by first deputy NABU director. Let's see how the Parliament reacts to this bill," wrote Maliuska.

The minister has referred to First Deputy NABU Director Gizo Uglava as an "impartial" official.

"A separate clarification: personally, I'm perfectly fine with Artem Sytnyk. He has demonstrated resilience and professionalism that many could only envy. And my favorite is bill No. 4437. But, as you know, politics is the art of the possible. And if the status of NABU as an institution can be fixed only by cutting Artem's term in office, this option shouldn't be rejected either. Moreover, it seems no one has any doubts about Gizo Uglava's independence and impartiality," Maliuska emphasized.

He stressed that the discussion around the content of the draft laws will continue in Parliament.

NABU row

On July 28, 2020, the Constitutional Court declared unconstitutional the presidential decree of April 16, 2015, on the appointment of Artem Sytnyk as NABU Director.

On September 16, the Constitutional Court ruled unconstitutional a number of provisions of the law on NABU", including those empowering a President to form NABU, appoint and dismiss its director, appoint three persons to the selection commission, appoint one member to the external control commission conducting an independent assessment (audit) of NABU's effectiveness, its operational and institutional independence, and approve the regulation on the Civil Control Council and the procedure for its formation.

On December 16, the CCU decision entered into force, invalidating the mentioned provisions of the law on NABU. At the time, Minister of Justice Denys Maliuska claimed this did not change the status of either NABU Director Artem Sytnyk or the Bureau.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has assured G7 ambassadors that once the provisions of the law on the National Anti-Corruption Bureau are terminated, Artem Sytnyk will retain his post.

What is NABU

The agency was established in 2014 after its predecessor, the National Anti-Corruption Committee was considered a failure. The Bureau was created on the request of the International Monetary Fund, according to Wikipedia.

The agency's government funding is mandated under American and European Union aid programs. It has an evidence-sharing agreement with the FBI.

Reporting by UNIAN
A former Cabinet minister has criticised what he called the shambles and discrimination of the national network of vaccination centres.

Michael Ring, who was minister for rural affairs in the last Government, highlighted that there was only one centre in Mayo  whereas the Wicklow constituency of Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has two.

The Health Minister lives in Greystones. So does the former minister for health, Simon Harris. Isnt that a coincidence? he said.

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That centre should come out of Greystones, which is a tiny place, and go to Erris, where it is needed, Mr Ring said.

If they want to get the vaccine in Greystones, they can jump on the Dart. Theres no Dart in Mayo, and my county shouldnt be treated like dirt.

It is pure discrimination. The people of rural Ireland are being treated as second class citizens and the people of Mayo as third class, Mr Ring told independent.ie.

Wicklow is next door to Dublin and all the city sites for injection. It is a short distance away. One of those vaccination centres should come out of Wicklow and go to Mayo, and let that be an end to it, he said.

The furious Fine Gael TD said he was reflecting the anger that had been expressed to him at the location of a single centre in Mayo, at Castlebar.

Wicklow people can be in Dublin in half an hour, but it takes an hour to an hour and a half for people living in Blacksod, or Belmullet or Achill to reach Castlebar, he said.

The Minister for Health has questions to answer here. He is saying it is all right for very elderly people in Mayo and rural Ireland, who may also be sick, to be stuck for hours in a car rattling over every pothole to get to a vaccination centre just because the bureaucrats cant be bothered playing fair.

Mr Ring pointed out that Kerry also has two planned mass vaccination centres, at Killarney and Tralee, which are only 21 miles from each other.

Meanwhile Cork had five centres, as had Dublin. It is not just a matter of population, and the Government  of which I am a member, I admit  has totally failed in this regard.

Mayo is the third largest county in the whole state. The Erris peninsula is larger than county Louth  but it can take two hours for the people of Erris to get to the eastern border of Mayo.

The whole thing is scandalous. There are two centres in Westmeath, even though Mullingar and Athlone are also close to each other, and the Arklow and Greystones locations in Wicklow are an out-and-out disgrace.

The people of Wicklow should be prepared to have one centre as many of them would go into Dublin anyway, but one way or another Mayo should have two centres as its population was being actively disadvantaged, he argued.

The population in Mayo is very dispersed and some are remote, but this is not showing any respect to elderly people in rural areas.

It is not acceptable. There has to be fairness.

Read More




[Images and video available: see notes to editors]

Wasps provide crucial support to their extended families by babysitting at neighbouring nests, according to new research by a team of biologists from the universities of Bristol, Exeter and UCL published today [15 February] in Nature Ecology and Evolution.

The findings suggest that animals should often seek to help more distant relatives if their closest kin are less in need.

Dr Patrick Kennedy, lead author and Marie Curie research fellow in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Bristol, said: "These wasps can act like rich family members lending a hand to their second cousins. If there's not much more you can do to help your immediate family, you can turn your attention to the extended family."

By closely observing twenty thousand baby wasps and their carers on colonies around the Panama Canal, the research team could determine the usefulness of workers on colonies of different sizes. They showed that workers become less useful as the number of colony members rises, due to a surplus of help.

Andy Radford, Professor of Behavioural Ecology, also from Bristol and co-author, explained: "By helping more distant relatives who are more in need--those living next door with fewer carers--workers can pass on more copies of their genes overall. We believe that similar principles of diminishing returns might explain seemingly paradoxical acts of altruism in many other social animals."

Dr Kennedy added: "The fact that these paper wasps in Central and South America help at other colonies is really bizarre when you consider that most wasps, ants and bees are extremely hostile to outsiders. To solve this puzzling behaviour, we combined mathematical modelling with our detailed field observations."

Dr Kennedy continued: "We ended up being stung a lot. But it was worth it, because our results show that worker wasps can become redundant at home. A wasp on a colony with few larvae but lots of other workers becomes almost useless: the best thing to do is to babysit the larvae of other relatives."

Since Darwin, biologists have been trying to understand how 'altruism' evolves in animals. At first glance, acts of selflessness to help other individuals do not seem to allow individuals to pass on their genes.

Professor Radford said: "In 1964, the legendary biologist W. D. Hamilton figured out the cardinal rule of animal altruism. Lavish help on your family because they share many of your genes. Copies of your genes will triumph in the population."

But the tropical paper wasps studied by the team baffled Hamilton back in 1964. In Brazil, he was surprised to notice that Polistes wasps were leaving their close family on their home nests and flying off to help the neighbours, who are less closely related.

Previous work by co-author Seirian '@WaspWoman' Sumner, Professor of Behavioural Ecology at University College London, showed that over half the workers in a Panamanian population were helping on multiple nests. Wasps usually viciously attack outsiders, so this babysitting suggested something unusual was going on.

Professor Sumner explained: "Wasps offer amazing windows into the evolution of selflessness. There is so much going on in a wasp nest: power struggles, self-sacrifice, groups battling against the odds to survive... If we want to understand how societies evolve, we should look more deeply at wasps."

###

This fieldwork was supported by the National Geographic Society and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama.

Paper

'Diminishing returns drive altruists to help extended family' by P. Kennedy, S. Sumner?, P. Botha, N. J. Welton, A. D. Higginson and A. N. Radford in Nature Ecology and Evolution
TOKYO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Prospect Co., Ltd., (the "Company") has announced third quarter results of fiscal year ending March 31, 2021 on November 11, 2020.

Sales improved over the same period of the previous year as a result of Glo-bels Co., Ltd. becoming a consolidated subsidiary and being added to the real estate busines in the second quarter, along with the strong performance of the renewable energy business, mainly solar power generation. The Group as a whole recorded 5,855 million yen in sales, an increase of 2,738 million yen from the previous fiscal year.

Regarding net income attributable to owners of the parent company, a valuation loss of 1,952 million yen was recorded in the first quarter due to the price decline of a listed Canadian security held by the Company. A net loss of 2,407 million yen was recorded, which is lower than the same period of the previous year.

The Group has reviewed the organizational structure of the Group under the new management system after July 1, 2020. As a result, the reporting segments were reclassified from the second quarter.

The reports and announcements can be downloaded from the below link

https://www.prospectjapan.co.jp/english/5284/

Media Contact:

Chief of General Affairs

Jiro Taketani

(TEL: +81-03-3470-8411)



SOURCE Prospect Co., Ltd
Paul Tasong Archives

Paul Tasong, a political figure and elite of Lebialem has called for reinforced cooperation and collaboration with defence and security forces in order to end the reign of terror in the division.

In a statement signed February 15, 2021, on behalf of the Lebialem people, Paul Tasong, who is Minister Delegate in charge of Planning at Ministry of the Economy, Planning and Regional Development, said they will do all to banish Ambazonia fighters from the division.

The son of Lebialem revealed that notorious separatist fighter Oliver Lekeaka alias Field Marshal killed Chiefs Fualasoeh Peter, Formin Benedict, and Simon Forzi on the night of February 13, 2021.

Tasong writes: In the night of 13 February 2021, a group of terrorists, led by Lekeaka Oliver a.k.a field marshal, acting under the instructions of his senior brother Christopher Anu who lives in the USA, invaded Essoh-Atah village in Lebialem Division. They targeted traditional chiefs, woke them up from sleep, took them to the market square at about midnight, shot three of them dead, and dropped their lifeless bodies in a nearby river.

In the morning of Sunday 14 February 2021, citizens of the village pulled out their lifeless bodies in the hope of organizing dignifying burials.

Their crimes were that they had refused to hand over the proceeds from the sales of cocoa for the 2020-2021 season and were encouraging other villagers not to succumb to pressure from the gang. Also, they were accused of organizing schools in the village as one of them was a school Headmaster.

In the face of this barbaric situation, all the people of Lebialem Division resident in Yaounde and their friends shall on Tuesday 16 February from 3 pm organize a public manifestation at the esplanade of the National Museum to denounce this heinous and odious act.

The peace-loving people of Lebialem, who are the moderate silent majority, are hereby called upon to remain extremely vigilant and to reinforce cooperation and collaboration with the defence and security forces to dig out these wicked people who have taken part of their division hostage.
Spain's National Police force has detained four men between the ages of 17 and 28 and managed to dismantle an alleged international criminal group dedicated to the large-scale import and distribution of nitrous oxide  commonly known as laughing gas - to nightclubs and private parties throughout Spain.

The Bombona investigation started when Torremolinos Local Police officers received several tip-offs from members of the public in a residential area of Benalmadena that a gang was storing suspicious merchandise.

Investigations confirmed that a group was importing a large number of cannisters containing the so-called laughing gas. Once the cylinders arrived in the Malaga town, they were stored in a garage in the residential development.

It is claimed that the gang painted and decorated them with the logos of luxury brands, thus making them more attractive for later sale in clubs, discos or private parties throughout Spain.

Balloons

The first phase of the police action culminated on 29 January, with the arrest of one of those investigated when he was caught red-handed while receiving a shipment of nitrous oxide bottles. In the search carried out in his garage and home 200 gas cylinders - containing about 1,600 kilogrammes of nitrous oxide were seized, aong with 5,000 balloons, 108 nozzles to fill the balloons as well as 67 grammes of hashish.

In subsequent investigations, the existence of a warehouse in Coslada (Madrid) was discovered where officers found several pallets containing more cylinders ready for distribution.

With the evidence obtained it was determined that the arrested man belonged to a criminal group, which would be supplied with nitrogen oxide in an irregular way through sellers in the Netherlands to later import it into Spain.

In addition to the Benalmadena property, storage facilities were also found on the Guadalhorce industrial estate and in the centre of San Pedro de Alcantara.

During the second phase of the police operation in Marbella three other men, all alleged members of the criminal group, were arrested. In addition, another 211 cylinders were seized.

Euphoria

Nitrous oxide has become one of the most popular recreational drugs in clubs, discos and private parties in Europe in recent years.

It is a colourless gas with a sweet and toxic odour. The substance can produce euphoria and a feeling of well-being and intoxication with its effects lasting up to three minutes.

Breathing the gas can cause light-headedness, dizziness and drowsiness and, in high doses, can cause fainting and even death.

The four people arrested have been charged with crimes against public health.
A Kildare-based cousin of new US president Joe Biden is looking forward to the day she can visit him in the White House when Covid-19 restrictions are lifted.

Brenda Blewitt, whose dad is a third cousin of the most powerful politician in the world, met Mr Biden when he visited Ireland on two occasions in 2016 and 2017.

Brenda, who is married to husband Ross Dunphy who works in the Defence Forces, has two children: Emma aged six and Charlie, aged eight.

Brenda told the Leader: We are all looking forward to going to the White House at some stage over the next four years, but as soon as the restrictions lift, Im so looking forward to going to Mayo to celebrate with all my family.

She recalled the first time she met Mr Biden in 2016 when he came to Ireland as Vice President of the US with his grandchildren, his daughter, his sister, brother and brother-in-law.

He came to Ballina, Co Mayo, where his great-great-great-grandfather Edward Blewitt, left from in the 1850s to go to America. Joe Bidens mother is Jean Blewitt and Joe was born in Scranton Pennsylvania, which is twinned with Ballina coincidentally.



Fantastic day

We had a fantastic day and got to experience all the logistics that go into making a trip like that happen. He couldnt believe the crowds of people to came out to see him in Ballina, the whole town shut down.

I got to meet him there, we had a very lovely family lunch and a few hours to sit and chat with him and our cousins.

Brenda couldnt go to the White House in 2017 when Mr Biden received the Medal of Freedom from Barrack Obama, as her husband was serving in the Lebanon at the time.

She explained: We have two little girls, Emma and Charlie who are now 6 and 8 but were a lot younger when the White House visit came up, hence why I missed that amazing opportunity, but my sister Laurita, my brother Joseph (both living in Mayo) and my brother-in-law Francis O' Flaherty from Galway had a fantastic time. They said it was such a surreal experience to be in the White House and to mingle with all the other invited guests.

Then we got to meet later in 2017 when Joe came back to Ireland in a private capacity as he had promised my sister Laurita who is involved with the Mayo/ Roscommon Hospice that he would do his very best to be there and to turn the sod on the Mayo part of the hospice that they were building.

So, he did and there is a beautiful plaque in memory to Joes son Beau who sadly lost his battle with cancer.

Early last year in February 2020, my sister Laurita got to go and spend a week in Nevada on the campaign trail with Joe and his team.

She enjoyed the experience and loved being involved and seeing what goes on in an American presidential campaign. She got to attend one of the live debates. At one event he took her up on stage to introduce her to the crowd!

He is so proud of his Irish roots and with the Irish values he was raised with.

Brenda originally came to live in County Kildare, because husband Ross works in the Defence Forces and her work as a pharmaceutical representative is also based here.

She added: Because of the restrictions none of us were in the US for the inauguration and we couldnt be together as a family to celebrate either, so we did separately in our own homes.

Us living outside Kildare town, we watched the whole thing with such interest, as did my sister Catherina and her family in Galway, and my sister Laurita, my brother Joseph, my sister-in-law Deirdre, and my dad in their respective homes in Mayo.

Mr Biden is extremely proud of his Irish roots and his first state visit as US president may be to Ireland  possibly as early as June.

The president is due to attend the G7 Summit in Cornwall on June 11 and he may stop over in Ireland on his way  and even make a quick trip to his ancestral town of Ballina as well as Co Louth where he also has links.

After his election, Taoiseach Micheal Martin congratulated Mr Biden and described him as a true friend of Ireland throughout his life and he said he looked forward to welcoming him back home .
The Indian diaspora which celebrates its 176th Indian Arrival Day in Trinidad and Tobago is not an abstract entity, but one that flowers the socio-economic and cultural growth and development of our peoples.

It remains a proud moment for all of uspoliticians, sociologists, economists, civic, religious and cultural leadersin world history.
Lockdown in Italy should be immediate and nationwide says top government health advisor.

Italy requires an "immediate total lockdown" on a nationwide level, according to Walter Ricciardi, a senior coronavirus advisor to the Italian health ministry.

Citing the "heavy number of deaths every day," Ricciardi said it is "evident that the strategy of living with the virus, adopted so far, is ineffective and condemns us to instability."

Ricciardi said the lockdown should be of "limited duration" and should include the closure of schools but keep essential businesses open, reports Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano.

He also said the measure should coincide with a "strengthening" of Italy's tracking and vaccination campaign.

Ricciardi, a lecturer in hygiene at Rome's Sacro Cuore University, said it was "urgent" that Italy changed the way it is combatting covid-19, adding that he would "talk about it this week" with health minister Roberto Speranza.

Walter Ricciardi calls for total lockdown in Italy

On Twitter Ricciardi posted a image of a 2017 cover from TIME magazine titled "Warning: We are not ready for the next pandemic," writing in his post that it was the "duty of public health scientists to tell the truth."

The intervention from Ricciardi came the same evening that the health ministry postponed the reopening of ski slopes in lower-risk 'yellow zones' until 5 March.

The last-minute decision was taken a matter of hours before ski resorts were due to reopen this morning, 15 February.

Ricciardi is a member of the technical scientific committee (CTS) advising the government on the coronavirus crisis, which urged the health ministry to close the ski slopes because of the "changed epidemiological conditions" due to the "widespread circulation" of covid-19 variants.

Ricciardi had earlier said the ski slopes should not reopen, saying: "Let us not forget that the English covid variant arrived in Europe precisely by 'passing' through the ski lifts in Switzerland."

Ricciardi's warning came the same day as the regions of Abruzzo, Liguria, Tuscany and the province of Trento turned 'orange' under the latest update to Italy's covid-19 restrictions.

Ricciardi's call for lockdown was heavily criticised on Italian television last night by Matteo Salvini, leader of the right-wing Lega, who said: "Before terrorising 60 million inhabitants, do us the favour of talking about it first with the prime minister."

Carlo Calenda, the prominent Italian politician, manager and candidate for Rome mayor, noted on Twitter that in June Ricciardi had "warned about the second wave, amid general disinterest."

For official updates regarding covid-19 in Italy see the Italian health ministry website.
By Prossy Kisakye

Financial experts say government cannot double tax Ugandans withdrawing money from banking financial institutions.

Last week, government through a letter dated 9th February written by the deputy secretary to the treasury in the ministry of Finance, Patrick Ocailip, to the governor bank of Uganda, revealed its intention of taxing cash withdrawals from banks.

According to the authorities, this will encourage cashless transactions and promote e-commerce, improve tax compliance in addition to raising government revenue.

Now the executive director of Stanbic bank Uganda, Emma Mugisha, tells KFM that the move is not applicable since on the current withdraw charges, the banks have been deducting excise duty tax .
The social media application logo from Parler displayed on a smartphone in Arlington, Va., on July 2, 2020. (Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images)

Social Media App Parler Is Back Online, With New Hosting Service

Parler, a social media platform favored by conservatives, resumed service on Feb. 15 with new managementcoming about a month after Amazon Web Services suspended the site from its servers.

The company moved to a new server farm, said interim Chief Executive Mark Meckler in a statement. He said that new users should be able to sign up for the service within a week or so.

We are off of the Big Tech platform, so that we can consider ourselves safe and secure for the future, Meckler said in the release. He didnt disclose which service provider is hosting Parler.

Meckler said that the firm is using artificial intelligence programs and human editors to investigate speech that violates its terms of service agreement.

Cancel culture came for us, and hit us with all they had. Yet we couldnt be kept down. Were back, and were ready to resume the struggle for freedom of expression, data sovereignty, and civil discourse. We thank our users for their loyalty during this incredibly challenging time, part owner Dan Bongino said in the release.

Meckler was tapped as the companys CEO after his predecessor, John Matze, was let go by the company several weeks ago.

On January 29, 2021, the Parler board controlled by Rebekah Mercer decided to immediately terminate my position as CEO of Parler. I did not participate in this decision, Matze said, according to Fox News. I understand that those who now control the company have made some communications to employees and other third parties that have unfortunately created confusion and prompted me to make this public statement.

Following the Nov. 3, 2020, election, Parler saw a significant spike in users as many moved from Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms because of censorship concerns. In the wake of former President Donald Trumps suspension from Twitter, Google and Apple removed Parler from their app stores, and days later, Amazon terminated its hosting service agreement with the company.

Parler, in response, filed a lawsuit last month against Amazon, arguing that the company violated antitrust laws and colluded with other Big Tech firms to deplatform the website. The company alleged in a court filing that Amazon was primarily concerned with whether Trump would have moved to Parler, rather than alleged violations.

Parler officials didnt immediately respond to a request by The Epoch Times for comment.
Mutual funds (MFs) went shopping in the primary market in January 2021 and spent Rs 1,200 crore in the various initial public offerings during the month.

Of the Rs 1,200 crore, Indian Railway Finance Corporation (IRFC) cornered the biggest chunk of Rs 927 crore, Indigo Paints garnered Rs 140 crore and Home First received Rs 120 crore, a note from brokerage firm Edelweiss said.

Among the stocks that witnessed buying interest from mutual funds were IRFC, HCL Technologies, Axis Bank, Asian Paints, Larsen & Toubro and HDFC.

On the flip side, Reliance Industries, Infosys, Bharti Airtel, Power Grid Corporation and TCS witnessed selling from MFs.

Domestic MFs trimmed positions in the Nifty heavyweights like Reliance Industries (Rs 2,081 crore), Infosys (Rs 2,011 crore), Bharti Airtel (Rs 1,200 crore), Power Grid and TCS (Rs 1,000 crore each). Mutual Funds were net sellers in telecom major Bharti Airtel, while FPIs increased bet in telecom stocks in January, said Edelweiss.

Equity mutual funds witnessed an outflow of Rs 9,253 crore in January, making it the seventh consecutive monthly withdrawal, primarily due to a massive pullout from the newly created flexi-fund category.

Also, investors pulled out Rs 33,409 crore from debt mutual funds after investing Rs 13,863 crore in December, data from the Association of Mutual Funds in India showed.

Overall, the mutual fund industry witnessed a net outflow of Rs 35,586 crore across all segments during the period under review, compared to Rs 2,968 crore inflow seen in December on investment from hybrid and other schemes.

In the last three months, mutual funds net sold Indian equities worth over Rs 70,000 crore. During the October 31, 2020-to February 10, 2021 period, the benchmark index Nifty TRI gained 30 percent, where 10 equity mutual fund schemes gave an absolute return of more than 45 percent. These include two schemes from UTI and ICICI AMCs.

Read more: 10 equity mutual fund schemes that gave best returns in January

"The Indian markets have witnessed record highs and the outflows are just on the back of profit-booking by investors. The contribution through systematic investment plans (SIPs) has been lesser than the previous month but still stays above the Rs 8,000-crore mark. This shows slow moderation in the SIP market as well and these numbers should stabilise in the coming few months," said brokerage firm Narnolia Financial Advisors.

In the last three months, a lot of funds recategorised themselves from multi-cap to flexi-cap to adhere to Securities and Exchange Board of India's norms for multicap funds. The uncertainty led to high redemptions in the flexi-cap category, the brokerage firm said.

Disclosure: Reliance Industries Ltd. is the sole beneficiary of Independent Media Trust which controls Network18 Media & Investments Ltd.

The above report is compiled from information available on public platforms. Moneycontrol advises users to check with certified experts before taking any investment decisions.
The Chief Executive Officer and Owner of Serum Insitute of India, Adar Poonawalla, on February 15 extended gratitude towards Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for the warm words towards India as well as its vaccine industry. Poonawalla noted that as soon as Canada gives a nod to the emergency use of AstraZenecas COVID-19 vaccine manufactured in India as Covishield, he will assure the delivery of the jabs in less than a month. The SII CEO said that he is on it.

India is likely to supply COVID-19 vaccines to Canada very soon and per a news report by ANI, sources have informed that decks have been cleared for the supply of vaccines following the personal request by Trudeau. However, reportedly, the final decisions on the quantum of supplies has not been taken.

Dear Honble PM @JustinTrudeau, I thank you for your warm words towards India and its vaccine industry. As we await regulatory approvals from Canada, I assure you, @SerumInstIndia will fly out #COVISHIELD to Canada in less than a month; Im on it!  Adar Poonawalla (@adarpoonawalla) February 15, 2021

Poonawallas assurance on Twitter came just a week after Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to his Canadian counterpart Justin Trudeau and assured that India will do the best of its capacity to supply the COVD-19 vaccines sought by Canada amid the pandemic. India has also become the global leader in supply the much-required coronavirus vaccines to more than 20 nations on a commercial and humanitarian basis. While the UK had previously lauded India as vaccine manufacturing hub, Canadian PM also expressed that he is seeking the supply of vaccines from the Pune-based institute.

Was happy to receive a call from my friend @JustinTrudeau. Assured him that India would do its best to facilitate supplies of COVID vaccines sought by Canada. We also agreed to continue collaborating on other important issues like Climate Change and the global economic recovery.  Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) February 10, 2021

On February 11, Michelle Rempel Garner, a Conservative MP and Shadow Minister for Health, in a meeting of the standing committee on health, asked if the Trudeau government had reached out to Prime Minister Modi for vaccines. At that time, Trudeau's minister Anita Anand could not respond to the question.

Update: after this exchange, Trudeau called @narendramodi. Thank you to the Indian government for taking the call! Opposition political pressure works. https://t.co/nKkkUicUD5  Michelle Rempel Garner (@MichelleRempel) February 10, 2021

Read - Air Travellers To Canada To Isolate At Hotels Starting Feb 22

Trudeau proceeded to call Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with the Indian government assuring Canada of its vaccine help despite ties between the two countries being somewhat frayed even before Trudeau attempted to wade into the farmers' protest on a fairly shaky premise, and with elements of the pro-Khalistani plot against India being based in Canada.

Read - Kangana Ranaut Replies To PM Modi's Tweet To Canada's Trudeau With Sanjay Dutt Film Song

Canada Inks Deal To Produce Novavax COVID-19 Vaccine Domestically

Earlier, Canada had said that it has signed a tentative agreement with the United States vaccine firm Novovax to produce millions of doses of COVID-19 vaccines at a facility in Montreal. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on February 3 announced the agreement which is also the first of several being developed the nation expressed its intention to repatriate vaccine production for several decades to come. In a news conference in Ottawa, Trudeau also said that Canada is clear that it will be developing domestic manufacturing to safeguard the nation on top of other partnerships and agreements.

"What we're very clear on is Canada will be developing domestic manufacturing, so regardless of what could happen in the future, we will have domestic production on top of all our partnerships and contracts signed with companies around the world," said Trudeau before stressing that it is essential for Canada to be self-sufficient in the production of vaccines.

Read - 'Thank You To Indian Govt': Canada MP Who Pushed Trudeau & Co To Call PM Modi For Vaccines

Read - China Voices Strong Opposition To Canadian Spy Chief's Warning Of Strategic Threat Posed By The Country
Police will allege Olympic swimmer Scott Miller was 'calling the shots' for a large scale ice syndicate involving $2million worth of drugs hidden in candles.

Miller, 45, was shocked when NSW Police broke down the door of his luxury unit on the waterfront in Rozelle, in Sydney's inner west, about 6am on Tuesday morning.

The one time swimming golden boy is expected to be charged with directing a criminal syndicate which allegedly planned to ship ice to towns in regional New South Wales.

Police will allege Albury, on the Victorian border, was a particular focus of the syndicate.

Miller was spirited to Newtown Police Station, where a source close to investigation said he had refused to speak to police about the allegations. A 47-year-old business associate of Miller's has also been arrested and is expected to be charged.

Plain clothes officers pored through Miller's possessions throughout the morning, allegedly discovering further drugs as well as cash.

One officer appeared to be carrying a set of scales out of the property as evidence.

Former Olympic swimmer Scott Miller (above with partner Michelle back in 2014) has been arrested in relation to an alleged $2million ice syndicate

Undercover police and a locksmith were raiding Miller's home in the luxurious Balmain Cove complex in Rozelle

A police officer inspects a packet of anti-inflammatory medication at Miller's home during the raid on Monday

The investigation began after police discovered candles which allegedly contained half a kilogram of high-quality methamphetamine earlier this year.

'For all intents and purposes the candles looked like normal candles, but they were laced with death and misery,' Drugs and Firearms Squad Commander John Watson said.

Undercover officers meticulously searched Miller's unit on Tuesday morning, lifting his mattress and inspecting a packet of an anti-inflammatory medication.

Miller's pug wandered around the unit excitedly during the raid.

A source with knowledge of Miller's arrest said he had said nothing to the police about the allegations and has been running a shipping company of late.

The candles looked like normal candles, but they were laced with death and misery.' NSW Police Detective Superintendent John Watson

Miller won silver and bronze medals at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics in the butterfly and the 4 x 100m medley relay respectively.

He was briefly married to socialite Charlotte Dawson in 1999 and 2000. She died by suicide in 2014.

Miller has had a troubled recent history. In an interview with 60 Minutes the same year as Ms Dawson's death, the athlete admitted he was battling a drug addiction.

Police raided Miller's waterfront apartment in Rozelle this morning. Above, the luxurious Balmain Cove complex

Police will claim Miller was directing a syndicate that allegedly planned to ship the drug ice to Albury on New South Wales - Victorian border

Miller was a silver and bronze medallist at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games (left, with his 100m butterfly silver). He is the ex-husband of the late socialite Charlotte Dawson (right)

Miller is Australian swimming royalty. In this 2003 photograph, he is pictured back row with Michael Klim and model Sarah Murdoch. Front row includes legendary Olympians Leisel Jones and Petria Thomas (on right)

Miller is one of the country's most accomplished butterfly athletes but his troubled private life has been well documented

Five years ago he worked as a drug awareness and prevention speaker with the Church of Scientology's Narconon program, according to his LinkedIn profile.

The role involved him 'showing people addicted to drugs or alcohol that there is another way to live life' and conducting drug interventions.

It is unclear whether he is still involved in the program. Local Scientology officials were approached for comment.

He claims on LinkedIn to have been a business development manager for a company called reinteractive, however sources said he only worked very briefly at the business on a trial basis for three weeks, and has not updated his profile.

Charges are yet to be laid against Miller.

Nero fiddled while Rome burned. The same thing applies when agencies in authority lose sight of their responsibility for the greater good while tending to their own distractions.

South Carolina DHECs punt of COVID-19 vaccine distribution to next month would be a perfect example.

DHEC board members and staff should keep working until this nonsense is sorted.

Unless, of course, they already have received their two vaccine shots. Under those circumstances, the issue is someone elses problem. Meanwhile, the rest of us wait while the state burns.

DAVID FISHER

Dunnemann Avenue

Charleston

Nurse shortage

Shari Costantinis Feb. 9 commentary, Nations nurse shortage compounds COVID vaccination problems, identifies the wrong obstacle.

It is the supply of vaccine that compounds the problems, not the shortage of nurses.

In my 44 years as a nurse, there has always been a shortage of nurses, and I dont see it ever changing.

Even a large medical institution in Houston in the 1980s recruited nurses from the Philippines and Canada. These nurses stayed for about a year, then returned home.

We were always short-staffed.

The 40 senators did not do their research when introducing an emergency stopgap bill last year that would make it easier for health care providers to recruit and hire qualified international nurses.

This will be repeating history.

If leaders would do an analysis of the problem, look into why men and women are not choosing nursing as a career and talk to working nurses and then make those necessary changes, we may be able to solve the shortage.

Bringing nurses to the U.S. from another country is not the answer.

The nursing shortage is not compounding the COVID-19 vaccination problem, the supply of the vaccine is. There are plenty of qualified medical personnel available to administer the vaccine.

DONNA KILLIP

Inverary Court

Charleston

Council unaccountable

I call upon all Charleston County Council members to resign immediately, with the exception of those elected in November.

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An attitude of imperious unaccountability continues to permeate the decisions being made through executive sessions.

I had hoped that the former chairmans absence would open up the inner sanctum in the Lonnie Hamilton Building and turn a corner to serve fully their constituents.

I thank Councilman Kylon Middleton for refusing to slide into the well-worn grooves of council operations as usual.

Meanwhile, Im still waiting for the new North Charleston library, which was approved as part of a 2014 county referendum to build five new libraries and renovate 13 others. It was to be built as a replacement for the rundown Cooper River Library on Rivers Avenue.

The current library serves some of our countys neediest citizens and their children. Based on need, it should have been the first of the five new libraries to be completed.

The citizens of Mount Pleasant wasted no time in recognizing the value of a new library. Their facility has been built and operating for several years.

Build our library now, council. Do the right thing or step aside for new leadership in Charleston County.

KAY HAUN

Celtic Drive

North Charleston

Beach life a privilege

Having previously been a resident of the Isle of Palms for many years, I must say it was a real joy and experience to enjoy the beach and ocean for 52 weeks a year.

Residents should understand that during the summer months, primarily on the weekends and holidays, a lot of folks will visit this paradise and this will create heavy traffic and trash.

As a resident, you have to pay a premium price for real estate and pay extra for cleanup, but residents should consider it a privilege to live on the island and not try to keep the public, who owns the beach, away by eliminating parking.

Mayor Jimmy Carroll misspoke when he said the state Department of Transportation was trying to cram whatever they want down our throat.

It seems that is what he is trying to do to the public.

DONALD SETZER

Palm Cove Drive

Charleston

Figured it out

Now I know why visitors from up North who have decided to stay and pay high prices for real estate have such attitude problems.

It drives them crazy when a 76-year-old Southerner says yes, maam; no, sir; thank you; can I help you; and no, you cannot tip for someone helping, even when asked to help translate what the delivery driver, who is from Johns Island, said.

LESTER FINKELSTEIN

Betsy Kerrison Parkway

Johns Island
https://www.christianhadjipateras.com/

I had the opportunity to sit down with motivational speaker and author Christian J. Hadjipateras to discuss his journey to build a successful career as a highly sought after speaker. He holds a Higher National Diploma in Business from Southampton Solent University and has also studied film and production at the London and New York Film Academies. Passionate about film and production, Christian is also working on his first screenplay. He has also been featured in Authority Magazine, contributed to HuffingtonPost.com, and has an active blog on Medium.com. Christian and his wife Stephanie split their time between Athens and London.

What has your journey as a motivational speaker been like? I was born with severe craniofacial anomalies including craniosynostosis, a bilateral cleft lip and palate, hypertelorism, a Chiari I malformation (structural defect of the cerebellum), profound hearing loss,s and a horseshoe kidney among other issues. I underwent some 50 reconstructive surgeries in London, Paris, Milan, Chicago, Houston, and Los Angeles up until my mid-20s. The surgeries inevitably had a big impact on my childhood and teenage years, both physically and mentally.

Growing up with facial differences presents many challenges and the psychological impact properly hit me during my adolescence. It wasnt until my mid to late 20s that I felt content within myself. Despite the interruptions to my education due to the surgeries, I managed to graduate from Southampton Solent University in 2009. I began my career in the maritime shipping industry, which my family has been involved with for generations. Although I enjoyed it, my real passion has always been writing and film, so I moved to Los Angeles for a couple of years and worked at a TV distribution company. I was also a writer on an ongoing travel series called The Kindness Diaries, which was picked up by both Netflix and Amazon Prime.

These days my wife Stephanie and I are based in Athens. My path to motivational speaking has been a long one, but I always harbored a determination to share my experiences and to be a voice for adults and children living with facial differences as well as being a mental health advocate. Society has come a long way in terms of tolerance and acceptance, but theres still a way to go. When I was born, organizations providing emotional support for children with facial differences and their parents were virtually non-existent but today they are everywhere, which is a huge plus. You split your time between London and Athens. How has traveling back and forth during the pandemic been?

As is the case with us all, our ability to travel has been severely limited, although we have made a couple of visits back to London over the past year. Ordinarily, we go back no more than a handful of times a year so it hasnt impacted us too much in that respect. I always enjoy going back to the UK; Im a born and bred Londoner and have friends and family there. But Athens has been home on and off for the best part of a decade now. My wife Stephanie is Greek but ironically when we met she was living in London! Were very settled here in Athens but we arent ruling out a move back to the UK in the future. Where are some of your favorite places to travel in Greece?

Since moving to Greece, Ive visited much of the mainland, which has so much to offer and is somewhat forgotten in favor of the islands. The islands are of course wonderful and unique, but the mainland is equally impressive. Not many know about the geographical uniqueness of Greece; its 80% mountainous and according to the Guinness Book of Records has the deepest gorge in the world relative to its depth. The northwestern region of Zagori, where the gorge is, is particularly incredible. Zagori is an area with some 40 villages and its worth a few days of exploring. The Peloponnese is also another region on the mainland worth visiting, especially the Mani peninsula in the south. Pelion is also another wonderful region to visit. I also cant disregard the islands because you cant visit Greece without experiencing the islands. Crete should definitely be on your list in that it really has its own identity. The Ionian islands, Corfu in particular, is worth a visit too. What are your favorite travel destinations?

Without a doubt, Id say Villars-Sur-Ollon, a resort in Switzerland. My family has been going there for generations and my father lived there for a few years in his youth. Being an avid skier and a winter person, its by far my favorite place. We are lucky enough to have a home there so we try to go at least a couple of times a year when we can. Another place that Ive already touched on is northwestern Greece and a few years ago we discovered a boutique hotel nestled in the mountains about an hour away from the city of Ioannina. My wife and I love it there and we try to go a couple of times a year. Its perfect for admiring the scenery and hiking the numerous trails. It's also a perfect getaway to get some writing done too. What else do you have planned for 2021? I'm working on a number of projects such as a screenplay. But you can find out more about my work and background on my website christianhadjipateras.com and Im also available on Instagram.
Ukraine and the United Arab Emirates have the potential to increase trade several times over the next five years.

This was discussed during a meeting between President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

The parties noted the importance and necessity of maintaining the high dynamics of the bilateral political dialogue. Special attention was paid to the issues of trade, economic and investment cooperation, the press service of the President of Ukraine informs.

"We have to bring our economic relations to a new level. Our people have many contacts, and economic contacts should be more friendly and warm. I am confident that together we can develop modern large-scale projects," the Ukrainian President stressed.

It was noted that the two countries have the potential to increase trade turnover several times over the next five years, the Presidents Office informs.

As noted, the parties spoke in detail about the issue of food security. Volodymyr Zelensky noted that Ukraine will continue to be a reliable supplier and guarantor of food security not only in the UAE, but also in other countries of the region. There are all opportunities to intensify agricultural investment in Ukraine and thus increase exports of Ukrainian agricultural products dozens of times.

The parties also discussed issues of cooperation in the fields of energy and infrastructure, military-technical cooperation and focused on specific joint projects that are already underway.

Topics of scientific and technical cooperation, cooperation in the field of artificial intelligence and joint space exploration were raised also.

Zelensky informed about the dynamics of reforms in Ukraine, in particular, the land reform and the legal framework for the protection of foreign investments. In general, the parties agreed to significantly intensify intergovernmental relations.

"Our relations are reaching a new quality level," the President of Ukraine said.

As noted, the issue of fighting the spread of COVID-19 and minimizing the negative impact of the pandemic was also discussed. In this context, Volodymyr Zelensky thanked Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan for the humanitarian assistance provided to Ukraine to combat COVID-19 and agreed on further cooperation in this area.

As reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and First Lady Olena Zelenska make a state visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15.

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The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have announced they are expecting their second child.

We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother, a spokesperson for the couple said.

The couple shared a black-and-white picture of themselves, sat under a tree, with Harry resting his hand on Meghans head as she lies in his lap cradling her bump.

Their new baby will be eighth in line to the British throne, one step down from their first child, Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor, who was born in May 2019.

A Buckingham Palace spokesperson said: Her Majesty, Duke of Edinburgh, Prince of Wales and the entire family are delighted and wish them well.

Last November, the duchess revealed she suffered a miscarriage in summer 2020 in an essay for the New York Times.

I knew, as I clutched my firstborn child, that I was losing my second, she wrote.

The couple quit their roles as senior working royals last year and now live in an 11m house in Montecito in California.

Harry retained his place in the line of succession despite quitting royal life, and dropping his HRH style.

When Harry and Meghans new child arrives, the Duke of York, who was born second in line in 1960, will move down to ninth place.

The first seven places will remain unchanged  the Prince of Wales, the Duke of Cambridge, Prince George, Princess Charlotte, Prince Louis, Harry, and Archie.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex announced they were expecting their second child days after Meghan won a privacy case against the Mail on Sunday over the publication of a personal and private handwritten letter to her estranged father.

Additional reporting by Press Association

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Researchers from Cuba, China, and France have demonstrated the potential of coupling a viral antigen with the tetanus toxoid protein as a vaccination approach to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)  the agent that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).

Tetanus toxoid (TT) is a chemically inactivated version of the tetanus toxin produced by the bacteria Clostridium tetani. This chemically inactivated antigen can be used as a protein carrier in vaccines to induce potent immune responses in vivo.

The SARS-CoV-2 infection process is mediated by a surface structure called the spike protein. The receptor-binding (RBD) domain of this spike protein contains a receptor-binding motif (RBM) that mediates the interaction of the RBD with the host cell receptor angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2).

This RBD-ACE2 interaction is the main target of the neutralizing antibodies that are generated following natural infection or vaccination.

Yury Valdes-Balbin from Finlay Vaccine Institute in Havana and colleagues have shown that a vaccine containing recombinant spike RBD conjugated to the tetanus toxin (TT) protein induces a potent immune response against SARS-CoV-2 in an animal model.

The team says the findings have paved the way for the evaluation of the RBD-TT conjugate in clinical trials.

This paper demonstrates that subunit conjugate vaccines can be an alternative for COVID-19, paving the way for other viral conjugate vaccines based on the use of small viral proteins involved in the infection process, write the researchers.

A pre-print version of the research paper is available on the bioRxiv* server, while the article undergoes peer review.

Memory B and T cells induced by RBD6-TT. a. Primary immune response to RBD6-TT/alum (green arrows). b. Classical passive transfer of splenocytes from RBD6- TT/alum BALB/c and stimulated with RBD/alum (strong secondary response after day 7). c. T-cell stimulation with RBD

More about recombinant subunit vaccine platforms

The researchers say that the key advantages of recombinant subunit vaccine platforms are their safety and stability when stored at 2-8 C and their suitability for large-scale production.

On the other hand, a disadvantage is a weak immunogenicity that would be expected for a small recombinant RBD protein (30 kDa), says the team. However, studies have demonstrated that administration of recombinant RBD with the adjuvant alum induced neutralizing immune responses in laboratory animals.

In addition to potentially weak immunogenicity, small recombinant RBD exposes camouflaged RBD to the immune system, which can fail to generate neutralizing antibodies.

Valdes-Balbin and colleagues hypothesized that once conjugated to TT, the orientation of RBD would improve the exposure of the RBM for immune recognition and increase the production of neutralizing antibodies.

Synthesis of RBD-TT conjugates. a. Reduction by use of TCEP b. Inhibition of anti- RBD binding by reduced RBD, using CS. c. Conjugation of RBD with TT and representation of RBD2-TT and RBD6-TT. d. Recognition of RBD-BSA conjugates by convalescent serum (CS), n=1-4. e. Binding to ACE2 of conjugated RBD from RBD2-TT and RBD6-TT.

What did the researchers do?

The team extended the 193-amino acid RBD sequence (residues Thr333 to Pro527) to include the spike residues 527 to 541 for the addition of Cys538, which is usually connected to Cys590. The RBD was also extended to include N-glycosylation sites at residues Asn331 and Asn343 and O-linked glycosylation sites at Thr323 and Ser325.

The resulting sequence yields a free Cys538 that can be used for chemical conjugation to the highly immunogenic TT carrier.

The researchers constructed RBD-TT conjugates bearing 2 or 6 mol of RBD per mol of TT (RBD 2 -TT and RBD 6 -TT).

To our knowledge, chemically conjugated constructs and the immunogenic effect of conjugating viral proteins such as RBD to a protein carrier have not been assessed for SARS-CoV-2 or other coronaviruses, says Valdes-Balbin and colleagues.

What did they find?

The analysis revealed that both the RBD 2 -TT and RBD 6 -TT conjugates showed slightly improved recognition of ACE2 than the original RBD. The team says this was probably due to improved exposure of the RBM.

Using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), the team compared the effects of immunizing BALB/c mice with RBD alone, RBD 2 - TT without alum, RBD 6 -TT with alum (RBD 6 -TT+alum) and RBD 2 -TT+alum.

Following one dose of the immunogens, RBD 6 -TT+alum induced the highest levels of anti-RBD antibodies.

After a second dose, all immunogens with alum induced higher anti-RBD immunoglobulin G (IgG) levels than those without alum.

The high and homogeneous early response for RBD 6 -TT+alum could be an important attribute for a vaccine in pandemic times, say the researchers.

When mice were immunized with two doses of RBD 2 -TT+alum, RBD 6 -TT+alum or RBD+alum, all of the antibody responses generated were effective at blocking the RBDACE2 interaction.

However, for RBD+alum, the neutralizing antibody titer was 232, whereas for RBD 2 -TT it was 1303, and for RBD 6 -TT it was 2568.

Furthermore, the neutralizing antibodies were mainly directed at the RBM.

The conjugates have entered clinical trials

Here we show that macromolecular constructs with recombinant RBD conjugated to tetanus toxoid induce a potent immune response in laboratory animals, write the researchers.

Valdes-Balbin and colleagues say that based on these findings, good manufacturing practices (GMP) batches of the RBD 2 -TT and RBD 6 -TT conjugates (with alum) entered clinical trials as final vaccine candidates.

Following the preliminary results of a phase I clinical trial initiated in October 2020, the vaccine based on RBD 6 -TT+alum was moved in December to a phase II clinical trial involving 910 participants.

The encouraging results of the clinical trial will be published in due course, says the team.

*Important Notice

bioRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.

Millions have spent lockdown up a ladder or wielding hammers to transform their living spaces in lockdown.

But DIY enthusiasts and professional builders face a shortage of key products from timber to radiators, taps, cookers  and even kitchen sinks.

While warehouses and builders merchants have remained open over the past year, the surge in demand has mixed with the effects of Covid-19 and Brexit  hitting manufacturing and imports  to create a shortfall.

Millions have spent lockdown up a ladder or wielding hammers to transform their living spaces in lockdown [File photo]

A snapshot survey of the websites of B&Q, Homebase, Wickes and Screwfix reveals many makeover essentials are either unavailable or in limited supply.

A spokesman for Kingfisher, the parent company of B&Q and Screwfix, said: We have taken measures to mitigate delays as much as possible...

Industry experts identified shortages of Bosch kitchen appliances, PVCu windows, roof tiles, bricks and external doors.

The head of housing and planning policy at the National Federation of Builders, Rico Wojtulewicz, said: All materials from Europe, such as tiles, sanitaryware and stone are taking a while to get into the UK; most with cost increases.

DIY enthusiasts and professional builders face a shortage of key products from timber to radiators, taps, cookers  and even kitchen sinks [File photo]

Some of this is  Brexit - teething problems with new paperwork and clearances, so we need the Government to work on solutions here and with EU exporters. However, due to Covid there is simply a global shortage of materials and products.

Insulation prices have increased significantly and members are having major issues with timber, such as MDF, veneers and solid wood. There are very long wait times of two to six months.

He added: Another issue having a major impact is the availability and cost of shipping containers. In some cases, the price per container has increased six-fold, in others there just arent any containers available.

Chief executive of the Federation of Master Builders, Brian Berry, said: Builders have faced almost a year of material shortages caused by the pandemic and exacerbated by Brexit uncertainty.

Timber has consistently been in short supply, although there have also been reported shortages of plasterboard, plaster, concrete products and bricks, and recently, some roofing materials and plastics too.
Guinea has declared an Ebola epidemic after four people died in the countrys southeast and seven others became ill from the disease. The head of Guineas health agency on February 14 announced that the country is declaring an Ebola epidemic with seven cases confirmed in the West African country nation, ANI reported citing Al Jazeera. The cases announced on Sunday by the health ministry are the first since the deadly Ebola epidemic ravaged the country, alongside Liberia and Sierra Leone, five years ago.

Earlier, while speaking to reporters, the countrys health minister, Remy Lamah had said that officials were really concerned about the deaths. West Africa was previously hit by the Ebola outbreak from 2013 to 2016 which led to over 11,300 deaths. As per reports, one of the victims was a nurse who fell ill in late January and was buried on February 1. Eight people who participated in the burial started showing symptoms following which they were admitted to the hospital. Three of them lost their lives while one escaped the hospital but was eventually traced.

Guinea declares Ebola epidemic after four deaths



Read more @ANI Story | https://t.co/dhhSaXak9n pic.twitter.com/O35fkT1X3E  ANI Digital (@ani_digital) February 15, 2021

READ: Guinea: 3 Dead, 5 Hospitalised As Ebola Virus Resurges, Experts Concerned

As a result, the Guinean government declared an Ebola epidemic and even started to contact tracing and isolating suspected cases. Lamah told the Associated Press, I confirm its Ebola. The results prove it. He further informed that the patients were tested after showing symptoms of hemorrhagic fever. Those who came in contact with them are already in isolation, the official said.

WHO African Region also tweeted about the Ebola outbreak. The WHO said that the staff is already on the ground supporting surveillance, infection prevention, and community engagement. The UN agency also said that it is supporting Guinea to procure the Ebola vaccine which has proven instrumental in controlling outbreaks in the DRC. Moreover, WHO Chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus also tweeted that the organisation has activated all levels to coordinate support, including access to the Ebola vaccine.

#Guinea has many years of experience battling #Ebola, with skilled incident managers and vaccinators who trained #DRC colleagues. Government is taking action. One of the first steps will be ensuring community understands the risks and will join in response. Their role is crucial. https://t.co/ObbcsLGT8b  Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) February 14, 2021

READ: Congo Confirms 2nd Death From Ebola In East Province, Concerns About Outbreak Escalates

Ebola epidemic

The Ebola virus was first identified in the 1970s in the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan. The latest outbreak occurred between 2013 and 2016, which was declared an epidemic by the World Health Organization (WHO). The outbreak primarily affected Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea, which posted a combined death toll of 11,308. The disease was also detected in the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, and the United States, where at least 1 person died.



READ: 'Disease X': Doctors Fear 'new Diseases' More Contagious Than Ebola And COVID-19

READ: 'Disease X': Scientist Who Discovered Ebola Warns Against More 'deadly' Viruses In Future
A luxury hotel in the Australian outback has been named the most romantic in the world - but three nights could cost you as much as a two-week honeymoon.

Longitude 131, on the edge of the UNESCO World Heritage Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, was awarded the top spot in Big 7 Travel's annual rankings which were released to mark Valentine's Day on February 14.

Judges determined the rankings based on a number of factors, including TripAdvisor reviews and the romantic experiences offered onsite, as well as the destination, room facilities and overall level of luxury - and Longitude excelled in every category.

Comprised of 16 tented pavilions built on scorched red sand dunes, the resort is the only place on earth where you can sleep - and bathe - under the stars while enjoying dual views of Uluru and Kata Tjuta.

Longitude 131 on the edge of the UNESCO World Heritage Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park (pictured) has been named the world's most romantic hotel

Sixteen tented pavilions are fitted with a range of ultra-luxurious features including floor-to-ceiling windows, outdoor day beds and private plunge spas (pictured)

Two styles of tent are tailored to suit different budgets.

The 'Luxury Tent' features a king-sized ensuite, private balcony with a day bed and floor-to-ceiling windows that frame unparalleled views of Uluru, with three nights starting from $4,590 per person sharing.

But the real showstopper is the 'Dune Pavilion', a breathtakingly opulent villa with two ensuite bedrooms, outdoor day lounges and day beds, a private plunge pool, deep outback bathtubs and rain showers.

The Pavilion is the only accommodation on earth that captures views of both Uluru and Kata Tjuta.

Guests can sleep and bathe under the stars at the unique outback resort (pictured), where three nights start from $4,590 per person

The world's 10 most romantic hotels 1. Longitude 131 - Uluru, Northern Territory, Australia 2. Plaza Athenee  Paris, France 3. Laucala Island Resort  Laucala Island, Fiji 4. Villa Cora  Florence, Italy 5. Adare Manor  Co Limerick, Ireland 6. Conrad Maldives  Rangali Island, Maldives 7. Azulik  Tulum, Mexico 8. Twin Farms  Barnard, Vermont, USA 9. Hippo Point House  Great Rift Valley, Kenya 10. Huka Lodge - Taupo, New Zealand Source: Big 7 Travel Advertisement

Guests can gaze over the sacred sites from the bed, the bathtub or the plunge spa, with unrestricted views from each vantage point.

This once in a lifetime experience comes with an eyewatering price tag, with three nights starting from $9,180 per person sharing.

A slew of activities are available on-site, including a spa where guests can have their skin treated with powerful indigenous remedies and an outdoor restaurant that serves Aboriginal dishes with Uluru in the background.

Big 7 judges said the unique location of Longitude 131 just outside the National Park heavily influenced their decision, calling the views 'unmatched'.

On-site is an outdoor restaurant that serves Aboriginal dishes with Uluru in the background

'Sixteen tented pavilions make up this luxury resort and provide unmatched views of the surrounding sacred dunes,' a statement about the winner reads.

'Wake up with your sweetheart to a beautiful Australian sunrise on this magical site. When it comes to the most romantic hotels in the world, this is pretty tough to beat.'

A Red Centre hotel clinching the top spot is sure to be welcome news for Australian travel enthusiasts, who could be locked in the country until at least 2022 as pressure mounts to tighten international borders even further amid Victoria's latest lockdown.
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife, Olena Zelenska, have visited the Expo 2020 exhibition in Dubai, the opening of which was postponed until October 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the press service of the head of state has reported.

During his visit to the United Arab Emirates, the head of state got acquainted with the presentation of the national pavilion and exposition of Ukraine at the exhibition, the report said.

"It is very important for Ukraine to be highly represented at an exhibition of this level. We are among the world's largest exporters of agricultural products and we make a significant contribution to food security in many countries," Zelensky said.

The Ukrainian pavilion is due to open in test mode in early August 2021.

According to the President's Office, this building, with a total area of 2,600 square meters (four floors, 15 meters high), will be decorated in Ukrainian style and ornament, and the architectural image of the pavilion embodies the idea of an ear of wheat.

"The idea is that a wheat grain planted in the ground is the beginning of a new life, and an ear filled with these grains is new ideas, thoughts, people who unite in an ear. It is an allegory of new thinking. We want to unite people around global issues and how to live, hear and feel smart today. After all, the theme of our pavilion is 'Smart Ukraine: Uniting the World'," said Alina Shyshkina, secretary of the coordinating committee for preparing for and ensuring Ukraine's participation in Expo 2020 Dubai.

She stressed that the "main goal is to rebrand Ukraine as a reliable partner country, with which you want to work, trade and which you want to see with your own eyes."

At the entrance to the pavilion, there will be a wheat field in the form of a map of Ukraine. Ears will be transformed from natural wheat into nano-wheat made of LED fiber.

"In fact, this is an allegory of the transformation of Ukraine. From agro-hubs to blockchains - such Ukraine is presented by our pavilion at Expo 2020 in Dubai," Zelensky said.

The pavilion will also have areas dedicated to culture and contemporary Ukrainian art to show the creativity and innovation of Ukrainians.

The president also got acquainted with the exposition of the Sustainability Pavilion dedicated to the issues of an effective and rational solution to global problems of sustainable development of the planet. The pavilion raises the issue of pollution and urges visitors to preserve the ecosystem of the planet - reducing food waste, avoiding the use of disposable plastic, polyethylene.

Zelensky watched the thematic sections of the pavilion dedicated to the fight against global climate change, the potential of using solar energy, efficient use of water resources, and new ways of sustainable development.

Zelensky is on an official visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15.

Photo courtesy: President's Office
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A late Bronze Age dagger, which was found beside the River Nore, has been sold at auction.

The dagger was found in 1903 south-west county Laois beside the Annagh bridge over the river Nore, and was located near the road leading from Coolrain to the Pike-of-Rushall.

Auctioneer Philip Sheppard said: "A common ritualistic practice in the later Bronze Age was the deposition of hoards in sacred places including river fords which formed part of the sacred landscape."

At 20 cm. long, the Jack Feehan dagger has a leaf-shaped blade with a mid-rib. The evolution of a mid-rib on metal daggers by the end of the Early Bronze Age, served to strengthen them for combat use. Many copper and copper-alloy dagger forms, are known from Europe in the late third to early second millennium BCE. As general purpose tools they would have had many uses including, but not restricted to, fighting.

The earliest daggers in Ireland had quite flat cross-sections and ranged from pieces with blades a few centimetres long to examples with blades over 20 cm, constituting serviceable weapons.

The Bronze Age denotes the first period in which metal was used with metalwork being one of the defining features of the Age, in Ireland, it lasted from about 2000 - 800 BCE.

Knowledge of how to make bronze, an alloy of tin and copper, came to Ireland from Europe. The copper was mined in Ireland, chiefly in county Kerry, while the tin was imported from Britain.

Irish metalsmiths created large numbers of weapons, perhaps because society became more violent. The commonest object forms produced were swords and spearheads, and daggers to a lesser degree making this new acquisition by the NMI from Sheppards auction house all the more significant.
PORTAGE, MI -- President Joseph Biden is expected to visit the Pfizer plant in Portage on Thursday, Feb. 18.

Portage City Manager Joe La Margo said the city and Portage Department of Public Safety received word of the visit late last week and have begun working with the Secret Service to prepare. Travel time and routes have not yet been released by the White House.

Pfizer is one of Portages largest employers with 2,500 employees who live in the city and surrounding areas, La Margo said. The presidents visit is a well-deserved recognition of those employees and the importance of their work in efforts to end the pandemic, he said.

We are beaming with pride, the Portage city manager said. Were very grateful for Pfizer and the whole Pfizer family for the sacrifices they have made so that we can finally get a vaccine out there to the market.

Related: President Biden to visit Pfizer coronavirus vaccine plant in Portage in near future

Bidens last visit to the Kalamazoo area was in 2009 at an honorary groundbreaking for the I-94 and Westnedge Avenue interchange reconstruction project. The project was the 2000th transportation construction project funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act stimulus package signed by former president Barack Obama.

The White House has not released any details on if Biden will visit any other parts of Portage Thursday.

The coronavirus pandemic, and the presence of pharmaceutical giant Pfizers facility in Portage, has cast the small city just south of Kalamazoo into the national spotlight.

The Pfizer plant has been a central hub for producing and distributing the COVID-19 vaccine.

Pfizer announced it was starting production on a vaccine in April and has progressed at an unprecedented rate making it the fastest produced vaccine in history. The vaccine was created in partnership with the Germany company BioNTech.

Trucks carrying the first batch of the much-anticipated vaccine left the massive facility on Dec. 13, with national TV crews and local residents watching.

Related: How Pfizers coronavirus vaccine was produced and distributed from Michigan plant in record time

The pharmaceutical giant reported $15 billion in revenue from its coronavirus vaccine in 2020.

More than 27 million doses of the vaccine have been administered in the U.S., according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The Pfizer-BioNTech product is the leading vaccine in Michigan, as well, with 957,774 shots administered as of Feb. 11, according to data from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services.

In January, Pfizer announced it was increasing its 2021 production goal from 1.3 billion coronavirus vaccine doses to 2 billion.

On Thursday, Biden spoke at the National Institutes of Health after touring the vaccine research center. He said the vaccination program was in much worse shape than anticipated. He criticized former president Donald Trump for not ordering enough vaccines during his time in office.

While scientists did their job in discovering vaccines in record time, my predecessor  Ill be very blunt about it  did not do his job in getting ready for the massive challenge of vaccinating hundreds of millions of Americans, Biden said in prepared remarks.

The president said there was no plan to vaccinate most of the country, calling it a big mess.

The Trump administration ordered a total of 200 million doses from Pfizer, and another 200 million from Moderna. The second half were contracted to arrive in June. Biden announced that both Modern and Pfizer agreed to expedite the process a month early for those doses to be delivered in May.

Biden said contracts for an additional 100 million Moderna vaccines and 100 million additional Pfizer vaccines were also finalized on Thursday. He said the country is now on track to have enough supply for 300 million doses by the end of July.

Distributing the doses to state health departments have also been slower and less consistent than anticipated. During his Thursday remarks, Biden said his team has increased the supply of weekly vaccine shipments to the states by almost 30%.

We wont have everything fixed for a while, but were going to fix it, he said.

More on MLive:

See inside large-scale West Michigan COVID-19 vaccine clinic

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One secret of Michigans relatively low COVID-19 rates: Less mobility compared to other states
KYIV -- Nearly seven years after the Euromaidan protests in the Ukrainian capital reached a bloody climax, the site where protesters clashed with security forces remains a crime scene.

There is no police cordon to give away the forensic significance of the vacant lot atop Instytutska Street, but investigators believe it may hold important clues to conclusively establish who gunned down dozens of anti-government demonstrators there on February 20, 2014.

The last and deadliest day of the months-long movement, it led to the toppling of Moscow-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych, who is widely held responsible for his security forces opening fire.

But an effort to honor the dead and their movement with a memorial and museum complex has stalled, highlighting the country's difficulties in getting closure.

"We need answers as to what happened, who gave the orders, who fired on people, and why this happened," said Serhiy Horbatyuk, a former prosecutor who oversaw state probes into crimes against Euromaidan demonstrators and who in 2019 asked a Kyiv court to halt development on the site.

Case Not Closed

The Ukrainian authorities have indicted more than 200 people related to crimes against demonstrators, Prosecutor-General Iryna Venediktova announced late last year, while Yanukovych has been convicted in absentia of treason for his role in trying to snuff out the protests against his administration's tilt toward Moscow.

But both post-Euromaidan governments have been accused of foot-dragging in delivering justice, and the Kremlin and its supporters in Ukraine continue to work to discredit the Euromaidan's legacy.

The three months of demonstrations erupted after Yanukovych's government reversed course on plans to sign a political and economic pact with the European Union in November 2013, uniting disparate political camps and citizens across the country against endemic corruption and Yanukovych's flirtation with Russia.

More than 100 demonstrators were killed in the course of the movement, with 49 of the "Heavenly Hundred" slain on February 20. Around a dozen law enforcement officials also died.

Researchers have painstakingly reconstructed the day's events, peppering the map with red marks denoting civilians shot dead by members of the Berkut "Black Company" from behind barricades set up on Instytutska Street, which leads up from Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square), the focal point of the protests.

Whereas more than 20 officers implicated in the killings escaped prosecution by fleeing to Russian-occupied Crimea, separatist-held areas of eastern Ukraine, or to Russia itself, benefiting from Moscow's rejection of extradition requests, five who remained in Kyiv were put on trial in 2015.

What emerged as the most high-profile and contentious case stemming from the violence appeared headed for a verdict when the five -- Serhiy Tamtura, Oleksandr Marynchenko, Pavlo Abroskin, Serhiy Zinchenko, and Oleh Yanishevskiy -- were released as part of a prisoner exchange with Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.

While two later returned, Abroskin, Zinchenko, and Yanishevskiy remain out of reach from Ukrainian prosecutors, prompting political infighting and torpedoing hopes for an imminent conclusion.

Yevhenia Zakrevska, a lawyer for a group of plaintiffs in the case, blames the Ukrainian leadership -- particularly President Volodymyr Zelenskiy -- for letting the Berkut officers slip away and showing "weakness" before Russia.

"This was a terrible insult to justice," Zakrevska said in written comments.

Further complicating the situation is that current legislation is murky when it comes to prosecuting people in absentia, so while Tamtura's and Marynchenko's fate could be determined by a court this year, proceedings against the other three remain frozen.

"Neither the president, who has a majority in parliament, nor pro-presidential deputies themselves have registered a bill that would solve this problem," Zakrevska wrote.

Never Forget?

Zakrevska believes it's crucial to follow through with the case, in part to help ensure that similar events never happen again. That's why she and her clients lobbied Horbatyuk to request a court order halting construction on the Instytutska Street site.

The lawyer says the area needs to remain untouched, at least until the first verdict involving the Berkut officers is handed down, to allow for additional ballistic experiments that could bolster their case and "prevent history from being rewritten" -- a reference to the proliferation of conspiracy theories emanating from Moscow, including a baseless one that holds that Ukrainian opposition leaders hired Georgian snipers to intentionally spark bloodshed.

Zakrevska also claims there is new data and photo evidence, as well as witness testimony, that still needs to be correlated with the scene.

This comes, for now, at the expense of completing construction of the permanent memorial and museum that would "deliver the truth" about the Euromaidan movement, according to Ihor Poshyvailo, the director of the complex.

Designers were chosen through an open competition and funds were even paid out to begin building the memorial, the first of the two-part project. Yet officials failed to lay out the conditions or a clear timeline for the work, and Poshyvailo said that "truly comedic situations" -- which Horbatyuk described as necessary forensic activities -- have contributed to delays.

A more serious development came on the anniversary of the beginning of the Maidan protests in November 2020, when police searched Poshyvailo's home and office nearby as part of a probe into allegations that money for construction had been stolen. At the request of a pro-Russian opposition party, state investigators also began looking into a claim that Euromaidan leaders had staged a "coup " -- the same language pushed by the Kremlin.

Poshyvailo says the funds were already in the pockets of contractors whose work was halted, and Zelenskiy's office has criticized the searches as poorly timed, but the incident has added to the controversy over a project originally planned to open in early 2019.

Dangerous Narratives

In the meantime, even those otherwise united in seeking justice for Maidan crimes find themselves divided on the matter, reflecting the politically charged nature of historical memory in Ukraine.

Vitaliy Tytych, an attorney who represents the families of several slain protesters, believes additional investigative work on Instytutska Street is unnecessary because of the extensive evidence investigators had already collected before sending the case to court.

He believes holding up plans to build the memorial plays into the hands of the Moscow-friendly narrative that radicals -- such as right-wing activists who have protested against the development of the area -- are calling the shots in Kyiv.

Much more useful, Tytych claims, would be to establish -- without mythologizing -- the context of the Euromaidan movement and the consequences the killing of protesters holds for future generations.

"Understanding exactly what the Maidan was, from beginning to end, is an exit from the situation into which [Russian President Vladimir] Putin has corralled us," he said.

ATV

You might remember similar pieces of seemingly deadly metal from the past. They were fitted by the same guy, as a means to entertain and be entertained, on a Honda FourTrax, and even on a Ford F-350 . Now, they get their time under the spotlight thanks to an unlike pairing with a Polaris RZR and the frozen surface of a Minnesota lake.Unlike the previous incarnations of these reaper wheels, which came in white and red, these ones are full-black and kind of remind us of an Edward Scissorhands on all fours. Only unlike Tim Burton character, this one is not into landscaping but shredding ice. Kind of, because as youll quickly see, metal is not that much of a match for ice and snow.Once the RZRs regular wheels are taken off and the reaper ones fitted, its white mayhem all around. The spiked metal makes a particularly unpleasant sound once it touches the snowy surface, but overall the contraption seems to be operating as expected. At least, there are no traction problems.But then, of course, disaster strikes, as the spikes on the wheels begin to bend, and depending on what the driver hits, even break and fly off in spectacular shards. Nothing heart-stopping happens at the end, as in the guy eventually gives up driving the RZR like this, but for the few minutes that it lasted, the Scissorwheels sure looked menacing, as if ready to wreak havoc if need be in a world coming to an end.For the reaper wheel action, skip to the 6-minute mark in the video below.
Bill Gates exudes optimism in discussing the world's ability to tackle climate change - until he hits on manufacturing. About that, he is worried.

There is currently no way to make steel or cement without releasing climate-warming emissions. Yet, neither governments nor investors are looking hard to solve that problem, Gates said.

"That's the sector that bothers me the most," Gates said in a video interview with Reuters ahead of the publication this week of his book, "How to Avoid a Climate Disaster."

The software-developer-turned-philanthropist has invested some $2 billion toward the development of clean technologies. But those investments are in electricity generation and storage, not in manufacturing.

Manufacturing- especially in the cheap construction staples steel and cement - accounts for roughly a third of global greenhouse gas emissions. That makes manufacturing more polluting than the power or transportation sectors, which receive far more attention in policies and investments. And the manufacturing sector is set to grow, as the global population climbs and countries further develop.

"People still need basic shelter, certainly in developing countries," said Gates, co-founder of Microsoft Corp. "It's unlikely we'll stop building buildings."

Gates plans to push for more research and innovation at the U.N. climate conference in Glasgow in November. "The idea is to get innovation, including R&D, onto the agenda not just looking at the easy stuff."

During the 2015 U.N. climate talks in Paris, Gates helped to launch a global initiative called Mission Innovation along with U.S. President Barack Obama, France's President Francois Hollande and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to link national governments with the private sector in pursuing and sharing clean technology.

We need "total coordination, and in fact some overlap is a very good thing to have," Gates told Reuters. But he said there should be diversity in the solutions being sought so governments do not end up duplicating efforts.

Right now, for example, "they're doing a lot of green hydrogen products," Gates said. "But who's doing the hard stuff?"

Some manufacturing plants may be able to lower their emissions by plugging into an electricity grid run on renewable energy. But that will not solve all emissions from steel- and cement-making, both processes that release carbon dioxide as a byproduct.

In the United States, it hasn't helped to have energy policy yo-yo between presidential administrations, he said. "This stop-start approach, that's too risky for the private sector".

On a personal note, Gates says in his book that, after years of dismissing activists' calls to divest from fossil fuels, he sold his direct holdings in oil and gas companies in 2019. The Gates Foundation's endowment did the same - but not because Gates became convinced that divestment would push companies toward clean energy.

Rather, "I don't want to profit if their stock prices go up because we don't develop zero-carbon alternatives," he writes. "I'd feel bad if I benefited from a delay in getting to zero".

Also Read: Tesla in India? Not likely anytime soon


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Thai Union Group signs MOU with two community groups to help strengthen the coastal fishing economy

February 15,2021 | Source: Bangkok Post

As part of its ongoing commitment to give back to the communities in which it operates, Thai Union Group PCL. has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with two community groups in Songkhla to provide them with a solar-powered fish-house dryer that will double the amount of fish they can sell by shortening the drying time and greatly increase the quality of the product. The agreement with the Ban Na Thap Womens Group Seafood Processing in Songkla Province and the Thai Sea Watch Association also establishes a framework of cooperation between the three parties to improve food safety standards and develop knowledge about seafood processing techniques. Together, the three partners will also work to conserve and restore community coastal resources and aquatic management.



Under the agreement, Thai Union will also help build a solar powered fish-house dryer for the Ban Na Thap Womens Group Seafood Processing to support their efforts to improve their dried fish products. Thai Union is committed to giving back to the communities in which it operates by improving the lives of those people, which is one of the key pillars of SeaChange, our sustainability strategy, said Peter Galli, Global Director of Corporate Communications for Thai Union. As such, we are very proud to be a partner in this project, which is vital to the community and supports them in developing a variety of value-added products. The solar powered fish-house dryer also helps reduce the contamination risk to the products from insects, shortens the drying and production time by 40 percent, and helps increase productivity.



Beeyoh Amphanniyom, President of Ban Na Thap Womens Group Seafood Processing, said: The community will take this opportunity to improve the quality of its products and raise awareness about fishery sustainability. This will not only add value to our products, but will also provide a better life for our people by providing them with a job and the ability to generate income for the local community.



Bunjong Nasae, Advisor of Thai Sea Watch Association, said: I am so pleased that a large company like Thai Union recognises the importance of local fishing communities and the benefits of utilising sustainable aquatic resources. Sustainable oceans are possible if everyone is aware of how best to use the resources in the ocean and to fish without using destructive tools. This initiative is a great collaboration between the local fishing community and a private company working to improve the quality of life for people and conserving aquatic resources in the ocean for future generations.

Theme(s): Post Harvest Technology and Trade, Landing Centres, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats, Communities and Organisations, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Fisheries Resources, Freshwater ecosystems and threats, Others, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods.

A traveller has expressed his sadness after checking into a quarantine hotel.

Roger Goncalves, who lives in London, entered the Radisson Blu Edwardian hotel near Heathrow Airport on Monday.

Speaking to the PA news agency over the phone, the 23-year-old delivery driver said: Im feeling sad, its not good as I need to stay in the room for 10 days.

I did my test for coronavirus. The test was negative. Why do I need to stay in my room for 10 days?

Mr Goncalves was required to stay in the hotel as he flew back to the UK from Brazil, which is on the Governments red list of countries with a high risk of coronavirus variants.

He attempted to fly back last week before the new rules came into force but his flight was cancelled.

He considered not travelling but said: I need to come back to work.

Mr Goncalves described the 1,750 cost of his stay was too high and crazy for 10 days.

He added: The people in the hotel will give food to me for lunch and dinner, everything, but I cant go out.

Asked how he will spend the time in his room, Mr Goncalves said he would watch TV, watch Netflix.

Zari Tadayon, from north London, also checked into the hotel on Monday, a day before her 67th birthday.

Zari Tadayon (Jonathan Brady/PA)

She was forced to quarantine as she had flown in from Dubai, via Frankfurt.

I tried to get back to London before the 15th but there were no flights available, everything was booked, she told PA.

Speaking over the phone from her hotel room, she said she had been in Dubai to attend to legal matters.

Asked how she felt about being isolated, she said: I feel horrible because I live here, I have my own individual home, and also I have some medical issues which I was hoping they would consider that.

How Im going to cope I dont know. Its going to be tough.

Im not prepared. I didnt bring books and stuff.

Asked again how she was feeling, she added: Not very happy because tomorrow is my birthday and I would have wanted to be with my family those are the rules, what can you do?

My room is quite basic. The hotel was nice, we were received quite nicely. They were organised.

We were taken to the ballroom, we filled out some forms, they gave us a welcome pack.

She said guests have been given breakfast, lunch and dinner menu options for the next 10 days, and the hotel said it could accept food and other deliveries on behalf of those quarantining.

Asked what she thought about the cost of her stay, she said: I think its quite high for what were going to be getting.
It was a highly politicised time , with New Caledonias indigenous people trying to gain independence from France. Their meeting was controversial but they fell in love and married. Dad migrated to Australia in 1990.

My dad, Marco , worked for the French military special forces before I was born. He is from the French island of Reunion and met my mum, Meredith, in the 1980s in New Caledonias capital, Noumea. She was a diplomat working in foreign affairs at the Australian Embassy.

Jennifer Atilemile: I was at an all-girls school and never learnt to socialise with men. Im still really nervous when it comes to dating.

Each week, Sunday Life asks a prominent Australian what they know about the opposite sex. Ahead, Jennifer Atilemile discusses her biggest lessons from past relationships.

Dad didnt speak English when he arrived in Australia. Id watch Play School with him as a toddler  its how we both learnt to speak English. He went to night school to become a chef.

Dad was raised by a single mother and never knew his father. When I was born, he tried to reconnect with him to tell him he had a granddaughter. When we visited my paternal grandmother, she set up a meeting with my grandfather but he didnt show up. He was married to another woman and didnt want to acknowledge my father as his child.

Mum spoke highly of her father, Peter. He was a firm man, kind and compassionate. He died aged 57 from bone marrow cancer; I never met him.

Dad always took me to the Queen Victoria Market. It was our Saturday morning ritual. He showed me how to shop for meat and fruit and decipher the good from the average. Id always watch him cook and prep dinner. He taught me how to embrace the kitchen.

Dad worked overseas as a head chef on cruise ships from when I was in year 8 to the end of year 12. It did take a toll on me because you want to grow up with your dad around.
Now that the Democratic Socialist controlled House of Representatives have completed their second Frivolous Impeachment of now Ex-President Donald John Trump, with the Article of Impeachment in the process of being delivered to the US Senate: Where do you stand? Ex-President Trump gave me TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) and deserves the worst of it. Ex-President Trump is no longer president, and the US Senate cannot constitutionally Impeach and remove an ex-president. I thought he was already Impeached, so ... What was the question? 309 total vote(s) What's your Opinion?



Presidents Day, this 2021, may be one of the most significant in the history of these United States. Think hard about this one immutable fact that a duly elected president, many will argue in ever election sought, was just Impeached for the second time and Acquitted likewise twice . This is a bad piece of history that we should all pray that will never be replicated.Additionally, all real Americans, not the non patriot fakes that openly, and seriously discuss how supporters of President Donald John Trump should re-educated in special camps, or through other measures of harassment by special and very negative dispensations, should pray that our Constitutional Republic in unified. Unified in the wisdom of what is the reality of what is the American experiment that so many of our forefathers have risked all to defend, and not the Pop version of what the unification of we republican patriots would consist of.Sadly, if one was to query these aforementioned vindictive, non patriot Trump haters, the vast majority of these Pop knowledge patrons would not even know what a United States president is elected to do; the vast power vested their hands, the limitations that bind them as by the United States Constitution. Without belaboring this expansive point, where knowledge of civic pride meets the reality of today's media saturated mess of a society, I will just hit on a few real points of what it means to be an American President.Primarily, the American President is the Chief Executive of the Executive Branch of government. The Executive Branch is one of the Federal Government's three branches of government; the other two branches - Legislative (congress), and Judiciary (federal court system). Of the 3 there interrelated, intergovernmental branches, our Founders set up the Legislative Branch as the most important, most powerful and why? Simply, the Legislative Branch (congress) is closest to the People.A close second in the most powerful branch of government is the Executive Branch - the president. The president is charged with great powers, primarily of those powers is to enforce the Law of the Land through the tremendous array of agencies, as administer by Cabinet, under the judicious and benevolent direction of the president; and as Commander and Chief of the military.The president can also draft Executive Orders (EOs) that act as laws and are enforceable as laws, providing they are not in conflict with laws written by congress; additionally, EOs would not take precedent over future conflicting laws legislated by congress. Executive Orders are an outstanding and hugely functional tool of the /Executive Branch; however, EOs have been well misused of late by the last two Democratic Socialist presidents.Much of the ire raised by duly elected President Trump was over his Executive Orders countermanding many of those originated by Democratic Socialist president Barack Hussein Obama. The infamous and non patriot engendered Russia Hoax, notwithstanding, was furthered, in near indefinite terms, by these non patriot politicians and in-league- bureaucrats. Most of the other Hussein Obama EOs were struck down by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional, many of which were to reward Illegal Immigration, but it takes time to adjudicate through the Federal Court system.Understanding the delays to adjudicate, Democratic Socialist President Covid Joe has originated a record 38 Executive Actions, many to reverse Executive Actions by President Donald Trump, many in conflict with the Legislative Branch, and will eventually be reversed. Even though the Democratic Socialist Propagandist Media , Orwellian in Scope, have applauded all Executive Actions as they are colluded to do. Most are silly, well actually stupid in concept, and, when reversed, will be an immutable stain upon the Open Borders Joe presidency.At least they will not have President Trump, his family, and his associates that aided in his election, and, or the success of his remarkable presidency,
By Kelly Voicheck

Much has been written about the plight of tenants during this COVID-19 pandemic, but what seems to get lost in this discussion is how badly small landlords are hurting right now. For the most part, these folks are hardworking residents who have scraped together enough money for a down payment on a rental home with the hope that one day this investment would put their children through college, serve as their retirement fund, or supplement their income.

Now, due to the pandemic and the governments inadequate response, these small landlords are watching that investment evaporate before their eyes. Instead of government doing something to help, property owners are being forced to comply with shortsighted government mandates that allow individuals to live rent-free with no consequences, leaving property owners scrambling for survival.

Advocates for the so-called Peoples Bill have been characterizing this legislation as a panacea for tenants and claiming that corporate interests are halting progress. I would argue that the reason the bill hasnt made it to the governors desk is because its terrible public policy. In the end, this piece of legislation temporarily helps tenants at the expense of landlords.

Assemblywoman Timberlake points to mortgage forbearance contained in the bill as the solution to all of the problems facing small landlords. But with an eviction moratorium in New Jersey that has no end in sight  how is that an adequate solution to this problem? Many property owners have already exhausted mortgage forbearance almost a year ago when their tenants stopped paying their rent. Moreover, landlords still must pay all of the other bills associated with operating and maintaining the building with no rental income or substantial rental assistance on the horizon.

And what about the taxman? Well, he wants his money, too!

Hardworking property owners are being saddled with an enormous property tax burden that government expects to be paid on time and in full, with no sympathy for what landlords are facing when tenants cant or simply dont want to pay their rent. Government isnt telling property owners that they are waiving their tax obligation or relieving them of their burden due to the pandemic. Government still has its hand in the small landlords pocket, but this time, the landlords pocket is empty. And what happens when a landlord cant pay their property taxes? Well, government threatens them with an 18% interest charge on top of what is owed and a lien on their property. Would the Peoples Bill address this? Sadly, the answer is no.

Additionally, this legislation does nothing to address a poorly crafted statewide eviction moratorium imposed by Governor Phil Murphy, which provides no parameters for identifying tenants in need of help. This blanket policy treats low-income individuals struggling to pay their rent the same as someone who makes $150,000 and hasnt lost their job.

In January, the Biden administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention correctly implemented specific parameters for their eviction moratorium to target those truly in need. But thats not the case in New Jersey. If the sponsors of the Peoples Bill are so concerned with helping those in need  why arent they seeking to right these wrongs? Why arent they trying to help landlords in the same way they seek to help tenants?

Op-Eds by housing advocates tout the Peoples Bill as the answer to a potential eviction tsunami, but they fail to acknowledge how this legislation shifts the burden without addressing the real problems we face. As small landlords, we are worried about an eviction tsunami, too. We are in the business of housing people and we want to continue to do that, but we dont want to end up homeless ourselves.

Simply put, the sponsors of this bill and housing advocates should be focused on one thing and one thing only, getting rental assistance into the hands of those who need it quickly and efficiently. Broad-based rental assistance is the only true solution to help tenants and landlords weather this storm. Our focus should be joining hands and working together to make sure that tenants and landlords in need are given the tools they require to survive. If not, we will all end up in the same place, without a roof over our heads. And in the end, that helps no one.

Kelly Voicheck is the executive director of the Property Owners Association of New Jersey, Inc.

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New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Income Tax Department has carried out search and survey operations in the premises of a Mumbai-based group involved in manufacturing tobacco-based product including pan masala and gutkha.

The raids on the group, which is also involved in the hospitality sector, were carried out during February 8-13.

The search and seizure action has led to detection of foreign assets lying with a company registered in tax haven British Virgin Islands (BVI) with an office in Dubai and controlled and managed by the group's Chairman. The net worth of the BVI company is Rs 830 crore created by siphoning of funds from India, said an official statement.

This fund has been round tripped to India in the form of share premium amounting to Rs 638 crore in the flagship companies of the group. During the search action, various digital evidences and forensic analysis have yielded email communications, establishing control and management of the company with the promoter of the group searched.

One of the employees, who was also a shareholder in the BVI company, was identified and cross-examined with the promoter. It has been accepted by the parties involved that the employee was not aware about being a shareholder in the company and he had signed papers on the instruction of the main promoter.

Further, it has been found that the group has availed bogus deduction under Section 80IC of the Income Tax Act, 1961 to an extent of Rs 398 crore. The group set up two entities in Himachal Pradesh and the group was found to indulge in sham transactions in order to claim the aforesaid false deduction.

Further, unaccounted production of pan masala of an amount of Rs 247 crore at two factory premises of the group has also been detected during the search.

It has also been seen that the assessee has falsely claimed deduction u/s 10AA of the Income Tax Act, 1961 of an amount of Rs 63 crore in the Gandhi Dham unit.

During the search action, cash of Rs 13 lakh has been seized and jewellery amounting to Rs 7 crore was found and has been put under prohibitory orders. Prohibitory orders have also been placed on 16 lockers and in 11 premises. Thus, the search action has led to detection of unaccounted transactions of around Rs 1,500 crore, so far.
Free World Should Draw Red Line Against Communist China: Former Pompeo Adviser

The world needs to wake up to the Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) bullying and lay down its own rules to deter the regimes aggressions, the China adviser to former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says.

Miles Yu, a Chinese-born academic who helped shape the Trump administrations China policy, called out the CCPs tactic of threatening the United States, telling it not to interfere in issues deemed to be the regimes internal affairs, including Hong Kong, Tibet, and Xinjiangwhich it dubs red lines.

This is [the] Chinese Communist Partys red line, thats all. Its not red lines based upon international law, Yu said in an exclusive interview with The Epoch Times American Thought Leaders program.

Most recently, the regimes top diplomat warned the Biden administration that any trespassing would end up undermining ChinaU.S. relations and the United States own interests.

When the regime tells countries that the topic of Xinjiang is a red line, what its really saying, according to Yu, is, Were going to lock up a million Uyghurs in concentration camps, we torture them, we suppress their freedom.

And you, the international community,  are not allowed to say a word in protest. Otherwise youre not respecting us.

Yu said, The world has to wake up to that kind of bullying and reject such rhetoric.

While the CCP claims that countries wanting to hold it accountable for human rights abuses in Xinjiang are interfering in domestic sovereignty, this is not the case, because at some point you cannot really kill people, commit genocide, in the name of sovereignty, Yu said.

He urged the international community to instead set its own red lines targeting the CCPs predations, forcing the regime to adhere to international rules.

Doing the Right Thing

Yu believes that the Trump administration has indelibly transformed the United States approach on China by recognizing the nature of the challenge posed by the CCPthat is, as the central threat of our time, a description often used by the former secretary of state.

Previous administrations, according to Yu, had been consumed by how to maintain a smooth relationship with the regime based upon a flawed framework. That framework was guided by what he called a missionary sentiment: the notion that economic engagement with Beijing would lead to China becoming more democratic and a responsible stakeholder in the world.

What we did is, we tried to change the framework, Yu said. Rather than focus on how to do things right. We focused on how to do the right thing.

For Yu, the previous thinking on China was completely off the wall, because it failed to understand the nature of the regime that ruled over the Chinese people.

We in the West, constantly, constantly underestimate the degree to which China is still a Communist Party, Yu said, adding that the CCP is the most dogmatic Leninist political party in human history.

Look at their domestic policy. Look at their international policy. Every single major policy move there is motivated by this kind of ideology, he said, adding that one needs only to read the speeches of CCP leaders to recognize this. Yet, Western policymakers have failed to take it seriously.

I think thats the ultimate shortfall of the U.S. foreign policy [prior to the Trump administration], he said.

Yu, who grew up in Chinas western Chongqing city during the Cultural Revolution, was in a unique position to offer this more realist assessment of the regime. He arrived in the United States as an exchange student in 1985. The Tiananmen Square Massacre four years later prompted Yu to become a student advocate for democracy in China.

He went on to study for a doctorate at the University of California, Berkeley, before becoming a professor of modern China and military history at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1994, where he has remained, excluding the last four years on transfer to the State Department.

Yu was at the forefront of the departments development of China policy. In the last year of Trumps presidency, Pompeo became the public face of the administrations tough stance toward Beijing, declaring sanctions and other measures targeting the CCP for its human rights abuses, suppression of freedoms in Hong Kong, military aggression in the South China Sea, and threats posed by Chinese technology.

While he was praised as a national treasure by one senior department official, Yu drew particular scorn from the Chinese regime. State media labeled him the number one traitor to the Chinese race in modern history, and the middle school he attended in Chongqing chiseled his name off a wall of honor.

Elite Capture

Yu said one of the non-public crowning achievements of the Trump administration was that it was able to minimize the unhealthy influence of the China lobby, which in many ways is beholden to the CCP.

The CCP has leveraged its exclusive control over market access to influence American companies and groups wanting to operate in China. This applies to Washington lobbyists who would have to go to the Chinese Communist Party elite, and to get any access to China, Yu said.

Thats created a very unhealthy and very dangerous permanent class, he said.

The entrenched lobbying groups have exerted tremendous influence in our countrys foreign policy, and particularly China policy formulation process, Yu said.

Working With Allies

The former adviser rebutted those who criticized the Trump administration of being too unilateral in carrying out its China policies. Biden officials have vowed to work with allies in confronting the regimes threats, which they say is a point of departure from the previous administration.

Yu said Pompeo spent most of his time attempting to foster global awareness of the China challenge and build a coalition to counter it.

We spent many, many efforts to form that multilateral coalition, he said. But the administration encountered much resistance from other nations early on.

Many of our friends and allies didnt see that way initially, Yu said, adding that they accused the United States of being unilateral. But they were the ones [who were] most unilateral, because they didnt want to go along.

It was not until after the COVID-19 pandemic that many countries came around to recognizing the global threat, he said.

For instance, the United States convinced NATO to address the China challenge in the Indo-Pacific, Yu said, something that would have been inconceivable a mere three years ago.

At the same time, America must be able to take the lead in confronting the regime, according to Yu.

When we take the lead, free nations will follow, he said.

Its not because were being arrogant. Its because  were the country that has the capability  to stem the Chinese expansion globally.

Yu expressed that his views above are his own and do not represent those of the U.S. Naval Academy, the Pentagon, or federal government.
We finally made it to the 911 and 911: Lone Star crossover episode! There were a lot of things in this episode that I really had fun with, and some I have reservations about, which may not even be the things youre thinking of. Onward!

The episode starts off at the fire off the bat, and Im not a firefighter, clearly, but it was truly a massive fire that seemed to go out in one episode? My friend and I were talking quite a bit about how there was no way it would be completely out by the end of this episode. And then it was. But Tommy did say the rain helped, so

Sorry, sorry, Im skipping ahead. Lets go back to where Owen was seeing Tims ghost. Because that happened. I understand why Owen was seeing him, and Im not saying I want anyone to see the ghost of a paramedic who died, but now I suppose his death makes sense. Kind of. Tim had to die so Owen could think he was invincible and address his guilt. Okay I get it. I dont love it, but I get it.

So Owen starts seeing Tim, and by the end of the episode, he and Hen (Aisha Hinds - Godzilla: King of the Monsters) discuss his guilt about Tim, Gwen, TK, including what happened on 9/11. I will say, I think Hen was the perfect person to have this conversation with Owen. Nobody else could really understand like Hen did, as everyone else has either dealt with too much or even too little compared to that, and as Hen discussed, she accidentally killed a girl once before.

At one point, Owen called Tommy to ask how she was doing since it was Tims funeral today  which makes sense as to why hes just started seeing Tim  and Tommy says shes okay. Just as she asked Owen if he was okay, he was called away, which left you wondering exactly how he was doing. This was resolved when Tommy shows up at the end of the episode, thinking Owen needed a friend, which I thought was a great way to bring Tommy and Owen closer together.

Elsewhere, Eddie (Ryan Guzman - The Boy Next Door) heard that a medic was necessary, and he hopped on with Judd, Marjan, and Paul to rescue teenagers who got stuck in the midst of the fire attending a camp for at-risk teenagers. On the way there, Eddie and Judd reminisce about growing up in Texas, and man, I love these characters. I wish we could do crossovers all the time.

Judd mentions that he knows what kind of things happen at camps for at-risk teens because he attended one. I cant wait to see when they finally get into this. I know weve seen a little bit of his background regarding the old firehouse, but Im really excited to see what else remains to be discovered from his childhood and upbringing.

There is a bit of flirting between Marjan and Eddie, which I get, but, eh. Then at the end of the episode, we see Eddie saying his goodbyes, and even asking Marjan for a picture. He said it was for Instagram, but lets be honest, we all know hes going to rub it in Bucks face for a while.



My favorite part of the crossover, though, was definitely the parts with Buck (Oliver Stark - Into the Badlands), TK, and Mateo. They all had amazing chemistry, and their conversations were so genuinely fun. It was especially funny when Mateo mentioned a cousin in LA named Marvin. If you dont know, Julian Works was on 911 before he came to 911: Lone Star and Athena (Angela Bassett - Black Panther) actually arrested him. I really enjoyed seeing the reference not only being acknowledged but also expanded upon

I also loved TK and Bucks scenes together. They flow with each other so well. I think theyre very similar  but not in a way that makes it seem like Lone Star just wanted their own Buck with TK. They vibe with each other amazingly, and I particularly liked seeing TK ready to go for his dad, and Buck being ready to go with him. It showed that theyre both willing to do almost anything for their respective teams  and other firefighters they meet and need to help -- and I loved it. Also, the end of the episode, with TK thinking Buck was asking him out? Absolutely impeccable. No further comments.

The parts I didnt love from the crossover were when Owen and Hen were talking in the cave. I didnt hate it, but I didnt love it, you know? It was great for Hen, and it was great of her to be there, but Im afraid the more we talk about how invincible Owen is, the more likely this will backfire in the future. Also, Im not a doctor, but I have to wonder if theres any chance all the smoke he inhaled (and, ya know, passing out from it) could negatively affect his cancer recovery. Im very worried about that.



Overall, it was really fun, but I wish they couldve gotten together for a different situation. I know crossovers can be difficult to achieve since there is a lot of plot and character entanglement that needs to take place, but I do wish that the way they had these shows intersect was a bit stronger. I feel like the fire was put out too soon, and I wish Carlos had gotten a chance to be here  or Chimney since they mentioned him in passing at one point in season one of 911: Lone Star.



Now, lets get into this weeks episode of 911: Lone Star: Friends With Benefits. Yall, I have a lot of thoughts about this episode. So many unexpected things happened that I really enjoyed and also really disliked. Lets get into it!



The episode opens on Grace & Judd, Owen & Gwen, and Tommy & Charles having a date night. I guess there isnt a pandemic in this show? Ugh. Well get to that. But first, I loved this scene so much. I always love seeing the firefighters and officers out of their jobs, and this was a fun scene that showed them as friends, not just colleagues.



Then, though, Owen mistakenly calls his relationship with Gwenyth a FWB relationship, and oof. It pretty much goes downhill for them from here. Gwen asks about what their relationship is later in the episode, and instead of clarifying, which I could swear he did two weeks ago, he tells her that hes not sure, and he doesnt know why they have to define it. Uh. Okay.



I thought Owen wanted to start again with their relationship  since she was basically living there and they were sleeping together, but I guess I was mistaken, as was Gwen. When Gwen asks him again later, hes irritated and short with her, almost upset that shes even asking. This moment felt extremely out of character for me. Owen has a lot of compassion for others  especially people he considers to be family  and now hes brushing her off as if shes asking for something huge and ridiculous, and not just a label on what theyre doing? It felt so weird to watch.



Also, are either of them thinking about TK in this situation? Because I dont think they are. Theyre not asking how he feels about his mom practically living with them again after years, or if hes even okay with this. And Im not saying they need permission from their son, because they definitely dont, but jeez, a little family talk might be nice. We realize too soon, though, that even if they had one, it probably wouldnt be helpful.



TK goes to both of them to discuss his fight with Carlos (something well address in a bit) and all he ends up getting is a bunch of hypotheticals that are clearly about Owen and Gwen, as opposed to TK. TK brushes it off, but I cant imagine how frustrating it is to go to the two people you trust most and have them brush you off.



Owen, on a high from a conversation with Judd that I know Judd will regret once he finds out what Owen did, proposes to Gwenyth. Literally proposes marriage. Then, because duh, Gwen says no, Owen asks why she was being so pushy in needing clarity and she says shes pregnant.

Look, this is fine, but also its not? I dont get it. Why? It is so confusing to me that they would bring Gwenyth back to get pregnant? With Owen? I wish I had more words to talk about my feelings but Ill just say this until we see how everything else pans out: this is worse than a marriage proposal. And I dreaded the marriage proposal.



Elsewhere in the episode Grace, at 911 dispatch, picks up a call from a submissive whose dominatrix has been stung several times by bees, and shes allergic. Her EpiPen fell out of her hands as she was collapsing. Grace eventually has to boss him around and degrade him in order for him to do what he needs to do for his dom  and I love her for it. Grace Ryder, best character in the entire show.



We also get some healthy communication this episode! Can we give it up for healthy communication in television, everyone? (claps) Thank you. So, of course, because the show cant go on without TK and Carlos having some drama, they were on a nice, fun, sweet date when Carloss parents showed up. Then, Carlos introduced TK as his work friend. Yeesh.



TK gets upset about it  which I would too. He tells Carlos this, but Carlos cant seem to understand why hes wrong. Not in an ignorant way  he really doesnt understand why TK is so upset. Then, after the horrible discussion with his own parents, TK comes back and explains to Carlos that the reason he got so upset was that he didnt feel safe in the relationship.



Then, shockingly, they talk it out and it gets better. Carlos explains that because of his upbringing  him coming out to his parents and them basically not reacting  he feels that he has to hide certain things until hes absolutely sure of them. TK tells Carlos that hell wait as long as he needs to, which on the show is nice, but realistically, its a thing that makes me go hmm. I love this relationship. I dont want to see it falter or go down the drain because Carlos made TK wait too long or TK was pushing him, and I can only hope they dont go in that direction.



On Marjans side of things: Mena Massoud (Aladdin) guest-starred as Salim, Marjans fiance. Yup, you read that right. Apparently, Marjan and Salims parents arranged their marriage when they were 12 years old, and they were ready to get married when they both turned 30, and Salim finished dental school.





Once theyre broken up and Marjan realizes what shes losing, she goes to Salim before he can go back to Miami and tells him she is in love with him. She just didnt realize til she knew what she was losing. Salim says hell break up with the girl he met, but Majran, understandably, doesnt feel comfortable with that. Who would when youre basically being told you're the other woman, even though you were technically there first? Well turns out Salim had other plans, or rather, met other plans. After he and Marjan go out to discuss actually getting married, Salim asks if Marjan has ever really been in love with him, and to both of our shocks, he says no. Salim, because hes been in love with her since they were 12 and me because how can you not be in love with Mena Massoud?Once theyre broken up and Marjan realizes what shes losing, she goes to Salim before he can go back to Miami and tells him she is in love with him. She just didnt realize til she knew what she was losing. Salim says hell break up with the girl he met, but Majran, understandably, doesnt feel comfortable with that. Who would when youre basically being told you're the other woman, even though you were technically there first?

This was an interesting look into Marjan, but it also felt a bit strange. While Marjan and Salim had history, and I didnt see where it was going  them breaking up I still felt they werent going to be together when they first introduced Salim. I really enjoyed her conversations with Paul and Mateo. I love that everyone in the firehouse really becomes a family, even for things they dont always understand.



Also, can we talk about how that scene where Marjan isnt wearing her hijab was highly unnecessary?

I saw it discussed a few days ago (a few months ago, a few years ago) the trope of Muslim women being forced to remove their hijabs for the dumbest of reasons on predominantly American shows, and this just proves that the trope exists. Theres no reason at all why Marjan couldnt have already been wearing her hijab in the scene where she reads the text from Salim. They did this last year, too, with the silo collapse. There was no reason Marjans hijab had to come off then, either, but it did, because of shock value!



This show has done very well with representation so far, however, thinking about this incident, the fact that Natacha Karem doesnt even regularly wear a hijab, and that this has happened twice now, makes me quite upset. Its not necessary, and its not okay. Especially when you consider that this writers room is filled with predominantly white writers.



Okay, so, before I end this review I HAVE to mention something I noted several times: the absolute lack of masks/social distancing happening with this show! Look, I get it, incorporating the pandemic was what you think was necessary, but if youre not going to wear the masks all the time you shouldnt have added it to the show! The entire team showed up to that wedding scene unmasked! And them unmasked at the roller derby?! Im not sure if this is intentional (have you guys seen Texas numbers lately?) but I wish they just never wouldve brought it onto the show if theyre not going to take it seriously. I know that its a TV show, but it annoys me! Especially when you compare it to 911 who are at least better at wearing their masks.



What did you think of the crossover? Did you like the groups that were together? Are you happy, or unhappy, with Gwen being pregnant? Are you looking forward to seeing how TK and Carlos progress with this behind them? Let me know in the comments below!



EDMONDS, Wash., Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Jetoptera has conducted a series of tests to measure the noise signature of its patented 200 lbf-class Fluidic Propulsive System (FPS) thrust augmentors as a subcontractor to Paragrine Systems, under a United States Department of Defense-funded research collaboration. The testing compared the Jetoptera FPS to a conventional reciprocating engine-driven propeller propulsion system and found an up to 15 dBA lower Overall Sound Pressure Level (OASPL) output based on equivalent power and before application of any additional noise mitigation technologies. Acoustic treatment will increase its advantage to more than 25 dBA OASPL over a rotor on a similar power basis.



The tests were conducted as part of Paragrines development of advanced parafoil platforms with highly efficient, low-noise propulsion as an important objective. Jetoptera has been selected for the program because of FPSs maturity and unique potential for integration into innovative propulsion system configurations. This round of testing evaluated an FPS geometry whose aerodynamic performance Jetoptera has previously demonstrated on a 7-meter wingspan unmanned aircraft used as flight test bed, in multiple VTOL and hovering flight tests, and in the University of Washington wind tunnel.

Optinav, Inc., conducted the acoustic evaluation by using its BeamformX Acoustic Array System, which is a sophisticated instrument that precisely and accurately measures emitted sound profiles and pinpoints the precise sources of audible vibration for actionable solutions. The data analysis was performed by Dr. Robert Dougherty, whose scientific contributions were recently recognized by the AIAA with the Aeroacoustics 2020 Award.

In addition to testing the FPS, the same setup and procedure was applied to a 11-kW internal combustion engine-driven 1.25-meter diameter propeller turning at maximum RPM with a resulting blade tip speed of Mach 0.46. Broadband and narrowband noise measurements were performed with directivity resolution. The test results show up to 15 dBA lower noise performance of the FPS versus the propeller, before any FPS noise abatement, based on equivalent power level. With the data collected and considering the directivity and atmospheric absorption normal day, we can now predict that at 300 meters the FPS would produce less than 50 dBA even before abatement hence, significantly lower than the 65 dBA goal of UAM communities. The FPS will be the most silent propulsor in the skies.

Unlike a propeller, the FPS can take non-round shapes for perfect integration with the wing and therefore is more amenable to further noise abatement via passive and active acoustic abatement techniques. The team applied a technique of placing the thrusters inside various enclosures which further reduced noise emissions by another up to 5 dB, at a modest cost to the thrust performance, said Dr. Andrei Evulet, CEO of Jetoptera. This is a very significant lower noise emission level compared to any propeller system, on a same thrust rating comparison, as the inevitable tonal noise from the propeller or rotor dominates the acoustics of such a legacy system, be it electric, piston or turbine driven, he continued. We have just demonstrated how our propulsion method will be quieter by a significant margin, even before we incorporate abatement methods. We also compared the aeroacoustic data collected to the noise signature of some advanced propellers that have been developed and reported in the past five decades by NASA and others and the FPS was found to have the potential to be up to 20 dB lower and having no tones, an advantage that cannot be matched by any rotor or propeller. Our next steps include the use of the FPS in conjunction with an Upper Surface Blown (USB) Wing, which will further reduce the noise levels, as NASA studies have confirmed over several decades of research.

Jetoptera thanks Paragrine Systems, LLC, who made this acoustic evaluation test possible. We look forward to advancing our collaboration and our unique combination of technologies.

For information about this press release please contact Todd Newton todd@jetoptera.com
The Ministry of Home (MHA) has released a number of mock tests for the upcoming recruitment exam for the Intelligence Bureau Assistant Central Intelligence Officers (IB ACIO).

This year IB ACIO exam will be held for filling 2,000 vacancies in the Intelligence Bureau.

Here is the link to IB ACIO mock test- IB ACIO Mock Test

The qualifying mark for the exam is 35 marks for unreserved category, 34 for the candidates belonging to OBC and EWS category and 33 for SC and ST categories.

MHA has also released the Intelligence Bureau's Assistant Central Intelligence Officer Tier-I 2021 exam date and admit card on its official website at www.mha.gov.in.

The IB ACIO Tier-I 2021 Exam is scheduled to commence from February 18. The last date for the exam will be February 20. The exam will be conducted in 3 shifts each day at various centers across the nation.

The successful applicants of IB ACIO 2021 can check their admit cards and other details like exam time, date, venue by using their registration number and password.

After downloading the admit cards the candidates are requested to read all the instructions carefully. Designated shift timings for the IB ACIO 2021 Tier-I exam will be notified to the candidate two days prior to the exam date.

Live TV

Metro Manila (CNN Philippines) - A home food drop is less risky than dining in food establishments amid the pandemic. But not all fast food chains and restaurants were able to adapt to the surge of online deliveries.

One of the reasons behind this was the heavy reliance on on-premise infrastructure, which required companies to invest heavily in space, equipment, frequent maintenance, and personnel -- a great challenge when office access became limited due to the pandemic.

"Multiple lockdowns made it difficult to manage our on-premise servers. Our infrastructure needed to be replaced, with our equipment requiring round-the-clock upkeep and maintenance in spite of the IT teams operating at full capacity," shared Patricia Calope, Managing Director of MDS Call Solutions, Inc. (MDSCSI).

Among their biggest clients is fast-food giant McDonald's that, fortunately, has been constantly future-proofing its services, including its customer support.

"Even before the lockdown, McDonald's had been investing in strengthening its delivery business across different channels. This, together with MDSCSI's more robust infrastructure, helped McDelivery benefit from having a strong ecosystem when the lockdown required customers to enjoy their McDonald's favorites from the safety and comfort of their homes," Calope added.

What saved the BPO from big losses was Globe Business's Cloud services, providing MDSCSI with AWS Virtual Private Cloud.

"Disasters like the pandemic happened very quickly and caught many companies by surprise," said Peter Maquera, Senior Vice President for Globe Business. "For companies without the Cloud, their employees were not allowed to work and therefore could not access their systems. Those with their systems on the Cloud, on the other hand, could access their information even if they had to work from home."

Maquera cited video conferencing platform Zoom as an example, saying it went from 10 million customers to 300 million customers. "They would not have been able to adjust this way without the Cloud. It would have taken a much longer time to procure new equipment, find more space and hire new people," he added.

MDSCSI praised Globe Business for its Cloud Solutions, which enabled the formers workforce to respond to calls for McDonald's delivery orders and develop the software that ensures delivery orders are processed efficiently. The contact center also did not have to invent anything new during the lockdown but, instead, enjoyed optimized ordering channels and operations to ensure the continued service to their clients' customers.

"If it weren't for Globe's assistance, we would've lost many business opportunities, as it was becoming clear that infrastructure was not enough to help our company scale with demand," Calope added.

Globe Business continues to support enterprises with digital solutions that help future-proof companies via cloud solutions; secure business outcomes using cybersecurity; establish first-world connectivity; and inspire collaboration through a growing list of remarkable business applications.

Globe believes a path towards a "braver tomorrow" is one that need not be faced alone. With the help of its globally-recognized partners, adept teams, and the trust of its customers, Globe Business is ready to shape a braver and better future, today.

Explore pandemic-proof digital initiatives you can achieve with a partner you can rely on. Visit the Globe Business website at www.globe.com.ph/business/enterprise to learn more about how it can help you digitally transform your company's future.
President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris recently paid a virtual visit to Arizonas only 24/7 coronavirus vaccination site. The tour crowned the state as one thats getting things right. It also provided an up-close view of hundreds of volunteers guiding thousands of vehicles into 10 vaccination pods that give out up to 9,000 daily shots.

About 10 miles away, a more modest drive-thru operation was wrapping up for the day at St. Marys Food Bank. Thats where, every weekday morning, 1,000 motorists pick up boxes full of canned soup and beans, pasta and peanut butter, eggs, milk and cheese, and fresh vegetables and fruits. The number of families served nearly tripled at the beginning of the pandemic and remains 30% higher than it was this time last year.

The St. Marys Food Bank line of cars begins to form at dawn, wrapping around a block on the west side of Phoenix, the largest city in a state where, pre-pandemic, one in five children went to bed without knowing where their next meal would come from. Feeding America says more than 1 million children in the United States could have joined the ranks of the hungry in the past year.

Eight vehicles at a time roll into the St. Marys Food Bank parking lot, trunks ajar, windows shut. Client-services representatives log each drivers information into a database to track who receives the food and how often theyre coming by to get it.

A block away, 50 volunteers pack one box after the next; before the pandemic, there would have been about 300 volunteers. We have a huge number of people who used to volunteer with us and are now coming by to get food from us, Jerry Brown, spokesman for the food bank, told me.

Michele Eaves started as a St. Marys volunteer in 2009, when Arizona was in the throes of the housing crisis. Back then, if we did 600 families a day, we thought we were busy, Eaves said. Now shes among those registering the people Brown describes as the new poor, the new hungry, the new I-lost-my-job-and-dont-know-what-to-do.

St. Marys opened its doors in 1967, the first food bank in the nation. The founder, John van Hengel, got the idea after a mother of 10 children with a husband on death row told him that she foraged for food for her family in the waste bins behind a local supermarket.

Until the pandemic, Brown said, St. Marys had never distributed 10 million pounds of food in a month. But that has been the monthly average since the pandemic hit. On the day I visited, the warehouse had about 7 million pounds of food.

Arizona deserves a victory lap for getting an around-the-clock coronavirus vaccination site running so efficiently. But lets not forget that the social unraveling caused by the pandemic will persist well after the pandemic recedes. The state ranks among the countrys highest in child hunger and lowest in educational attainment. Addressing these inequalities is whats going to shape Arizonas future, just as it will shape the future of the nation itself.

More than the plunge of a needle will be needed to take care of that.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 01:59:39|Editor: huaxia

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VILNIUS, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Lithuania expected to start mass vaccination against COVID-19 as early as this spring if vaccine producers can guarantee a stable supply, according to an updated vaccination plan by the country's Health Ministry on Monday.

All residents over 65 years will be vaccinated in the first quarter if stable vaccine deliveries are ensured, according to the plan.

The ministry had updated the public vaccination plan after taking into account the vaccine delivery plans submitted by AstraZeneca, BioNTech/Pfizer, as well as Moderna.

It was also decided to use AstraZeneca vaccines to inoculate those aged 18 and older with an interval of 12 weeks between the first and second dose, according to the plan.

Earlier this year, Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said he expected his country to get enough COVID-19 vaccine doses to inoculate 70 percent of its population during the first half of 2021.

So far, Lithuania has registered 190,937 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 3,080 deaths, according to the Department of Statistics.

As the world is struggling to contain the pandemic, vaccination against COVID-19 is underway in some countries with already-authorized vaccines.

Meanwhile, 242 candidate vaccines are still being developed worldwide -- 63 of them in clinical trials -- in countries including Germany, China, Russia, Britain and the United States, according to the latest information released by the World Health Organization. Enditem

NBC-- Human remains found in a rural area of Evangeline Parish, Louisiana in 2018 have been identified as belonging to Erica Nicole Hunt, an Opelousas woman reported missing in 2016, the Louisiana State Police Department announced last week.

The skeletal remains were found during a search for a missing child at the time, but not identified until two years later through the efforts of the Louisiana State Police Crime Lab, the LSU Forensic Anthropology and Computer Enhancement Services (FACES) Laboratory and the DNA Doe Project, Louisiana State Police Troop I spokesman Thomas Gossen stated in the release.

On February 5, 2021, State Police investigators announced they were able to positively confirm a forensic match to Erica Hunt.

The Louisiana State Police are investigating Ericas death as a homicide with assistance from the Evangeline Parish Sheriffs Office and the Opelousas Police Department.

The 20-year-old mother of then 2-year-old Breionna vanished the weekend of July 4, 2016. A Fourth of July gathering with her family in Opelousas on July 3 was the last time she was seen by her family.

Ericas mother and sister spoke to Dateline in the summer of 2020.

It was just a good day for our family, Ericas sister, Shantashia Isaac, told Dateline. Everyone was just hanging out and having a good time.

Shantashia said Erica seemed to be enjoying herself as she gushed about plans for her upcoming 21st birthday and was working toward moving into a new house.

Ericas mother, Shannon Isaac, told Dateline she remembers her daughter talking about her plans to go to Lake Charles the next day with a friend who also had a child. But those plans never happened.

In 2020, Chief McClelland told Dateline there were no suspects in Ericas disappearance. But following the discovery and identification of her remains, Ericas death is being investigated as a homicide and the public is asked to call authorities with any information that may be of assistance in the case.

In a statement shared on the Facebook page Bring Erica Hunt Home, the family said, To those of you, who has liked and shared. Today we received word that the remains of Erica Nicole Hunt has been found. Thank you all for the concern, shares and prayers.

Anyone with information about Ericas case asked to contact St. Landry Crime Stoppers at 948-8477(TIPS), online at stlandrycrimestoppers.com, or via Facebook by leaving a WEBTIP. Tips may also be submitted via text message by texting TIPS625 plus the tip to CRIMES (274637).

The Louisiana State Police online reporting system is also available by visiting www.lsp.org and clicking the Suspicious Activity link.

A new generation of meditation studios is popping up with features that mimic luxury gyms  but purely for your mind.

Nestled on the fringe of Sydneys CBD in Barangaroo is MYND Studios, which opened last week offering about 20 different teacher-led meditation classes throughout the day, with the aim of attracting city workers to sign up to its $50 weekly membership. The bright, large studio is carefully designed to promote calm, with a moss wall, nap pods and a post-class relaxation lounge.

MYND Studios opened last week in Sydneys Barangaroo. Credit:Brook Mitchell

You can come here, do a 25-minute class, get food and still get back to work in the hour, says co-founder James Harris, who was inspired by premium studios in London and New York City. [Its designed] to be a place to breathe when you walk in, a place where this time is for me.

Harris says he wanted to create a venue that is like a physical version of popular apps such as Calm and Headspace, and offers secular meditation, without Buddhist teachings, which he feels is more accessible.
UPDATE: Christopher Woitel's family announced Monday his body has been found. For an updated story, click here.

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At 8:38 p.m. on January 8, surveillance footage from the apartment building at 65 Guerrero Street shows Christopher Woitel returning to his residence. He hasnt been seen since  but surveillance video never shows him leaving his home.

The month-long disappearance of Woitel, 50, has only gotten stranger with time. Woitel, a San Francisco resident since the 1980s, was reported missing by his mother on Jan. 13. She says her last contact with him was on Jan. 9  the day after his last sighting on surveillance footage  and his bank account and credit cards have been unused since early January.

A statement from the Brisbane private investigator hired by the family raises more questions than answers. Scott Williams says he searched Woitels apartment and found it undisturbed. When Williams reviewed the buildings security footage, he saw the clip of Woitel walking in, but there was no trace of him walking out. Williams said the only other way out of the building was through the back door, but a review of that camera, which is triggered by motion at night, yielded nothing.

My gut feeling is something bad happened, Lara Haben, Woitels sister, told Mission Local.

The family told the San Francisco Examiner that Woitel is an extremely generous friend and has been known to extend his home to unhoused individuals, at least one of whom is on surveillance video coming and going from Woitels apartment.

It was always a little concerning, and he didnt really like to talk to me about it too much because I would always say What are you doing, why are you doing that? friend Jennifer Berg told the Examiner.

Google Street View

The private investigator says he was able to track down one of the last known individuals to visit Woitel at his apartment. That individual, who is reportedly living in a tent encampment in Emeryville, was allegedly found in possession of Woitels cell phone. The man allegedly said Woitel sold him the phone.

Williams statement says the man then claimed to have psychic abilities and believed Woitel had been "shot in the head and wrapped in plastic before his body was dumped in the water at the end of Mariposa Street in San Francisco.

It is clear [the man] suffers from mental illness and as such could be delusional, the report says. A friend of Woitel told Mission Local it is unlikely the man hurt Woitel, as he suffers from a leg injury which impedes his mobility.

In addition, Mission Local reports Woitels behavior was becoming increasingly erratic and paranoid in the days before his disappearance. Family members report him sending anxious texts about the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, worrying Trump supporters might also come to San Francisco. Woitels sister says on the day of his last contact, he said he heard a man on a loudspeaker telling people to get out now. Family members say he also asked for money to replace a lost cell phone.

Frustrated with the police investigation, Woitel's siblings flew in to San Francisco from the Midwest on Friday. They spent the weekend passing out missing person flyers near his residence.

"There isnt a day goes by at this point without wondering, 'What happened? Where is he?,'" brother Frank Woitel told KPIX.

Woitel is a white male with brown hair and brown eyes. He is 5-foot-10, 200 pounds, and is known to also frequent Emeryville and Sonora in Tuolumne County.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the San Francisco Police Department's 24-hour tip line at 415-575-4444 or send a text to TIP411 and start the text message with SFPD.
By Tom Balmforth

MOSCOW (Reuters) - A former Russian newspaper journalist accused of treason says state investigators have still not told him exactly what his alleged crime was, over six months after his arrest.

Ivan Safronov, 30, covered military affairs as a reporter before starting work at Russia's space agency last May. He was detained last July and is being held in prison, accused of passing military secrets to the Czech Republic.

Safronov, whose treatment has provoked an outcry among some Russian journalists, faces up to 20 years in jail. He denies treason.

"They say I committed a crime in 2017, but they don't say exactly what I did - they tell me to remember," Safronov said in an interview published on Monday by Kommersant newspaper, where he used to work.

"I spent three months trying to dig up something on myself, but I haven't remembered any crimes," he said in written responses to questions submitted by the daily.

The Kremlin declined comment on Safronov's remarks. It said it was up to Russia's courts to review the case.

Safronov, who said he cannot communicate with his close relatives as all of them have been made witnesses, suggested the accusations were linked to his acquaintance with a Czech journalist he met in Moscow in 2010.

When the Czech left Russia at the end of a work assignment, he set up a pay-to-view information agency for other media outlets containing analysis and press digests, Safronov said.

He said he was sent possible coverage topics and submitted texts from 2017-19 based on "information from open sources."

"Investigators see the fact of my acquaintance with (the journalist) as recruitment, his messages as intelligence missions, and a state secret was somehow found in my answers," he said.

Safronov said he had no access to state secrets as a journalist and that investigators had told him "the accusation is not linked to journalism work."

(Reporting by Tom Balmforth; editing by Timothy Heritage)
A woman called police from Jaycee Towers, 500 W Martin Luther King Blvd., and said she had lost her keys, possibly in the parking lot or inside the main hallway. She said there were approximately 25 keys on the key ring including a key fob, P.O. box key, three storage building keys and a key to her safety deposit box. She said she had retraced her steps and still could not find them. Police checked with the Jaycee Tower's management office and observed video of the woman entering the building, but there were no signs of the keys being dropped while inside the building.



* * *



A woman on N.

Germantown Road told police that she had money stolen from her card. She said two men and a woman had recently stayed in her apartment. She said during that time, she found the woman holding her debit card and she believes that the woman wrote down the numbers from her card. She said she checked her bank account and all of her money is gone. The woman said she did not have any proof or evidence that any of the three staying with her did this, but she strongly believes they did. She said that her card was never stolen, but it was used at multiple locations without her permission.* * *A man called police from a parking lot at 4510 Hixson Pike. He showed police a busted out window in his truck. He said that it must have happened the night before, after leaving his vehicle in the parking lot. He showed police the tool used to break the window. Police collected the tool for evidence processing. Nothing was taken from the truck.* * *Police were notified by a caller that a red Ford truck had been sitting on their lot at Suburban Club, 2002 E. Main St., for close to eight months and he wanted to make sure it wasn't stolen before having it towed. Police ran the VIN and the vehicle did not come back as stolen. The vehicle will be towed via "private property tow."* * *A woman called and said that a Chromebook laptop was stolen from her mother's house on Robbins Street. She said she is not sure who took it or when they took it. She said the laptop was given to her son by Orchard Knob Elementary for school work. She said she has notified the school and is in need of a report. She said she is not sure how much the laptop is worth and has no serial number at this time. The woman called police later and said that someone had returned the laptop to her by putting it inside a plastic bag and placing it under a chair on her front porch. She still has no idea who took it.* * *While at the Tiger Mart, 3725 Jenkins Road, police were handed an envelope of medicine. The clerk said that she attempted to hand it to the county officer prior and they told her to give it to a city officer. Inside the envelope were five packages of medicine with a name on them. The envelope was then turned into Property and made releasable.* * *A woman said that her car was broken into at Ochs Highway/Sanders Road while she and her husband were hiking. She said someone busted the front passenger window and took her wallet. She said the wallet contained her ID and $50 in gift cards.* * *Police were called to an apartment on Douglas Street by a woman who said she was being harassed by her roommate. The woman said the roommate has been sending CashApp requests for $300 over and over. She said the roommate has also been contacting her father asking for $300. The woman said the roommate has punched holes in the drywall in the common area inside the apartment. She also said she feels trapped inside her bedroom because she doesn't want to be in the common area when the roommate is home because she just wants to avoid the confrontation. The woman said she was going to talk to the property management about the problem, but wanted police to document what she is experiencing. During the time police were speaking to the woman, the roommate came to the door multiple times and opened the door, then locked the door. At the end of the conversation, the roommate exited the apartment and left the area on foot.* * *A woman on Lindsay Street called police to report finding a firearm in her home. Police located a FNH Fiveseven pistol behind a radiator heater in the kitchen of her residence. In close proximity to that gun, police located a Bryco 380 pistol as well. The woman said neither pistol belonged to her and they should not be in the residence. The woman said she did not know who the pistols belonged to, and did not know how they got into her residence. When asked if she knew how the firearms could have been brought into her residence, she said her aunt was in her apartment a couple weeks ago when she arrived home, however she did not know if the aunt placed them there. When asked if anyone else lives in the residence, she said her brother lives in the apartment with her, but then said it could not be his, stating "He has been in trouble where he can't own a gun." Before leaving the area police had dispatch check the firearms to see if they were stolen. The Bryco did not have a return. The FNH Fiveseven was found to be stolen since Sept. 23 of 2014. The owner was notified of the recovery. Both firearms will be submitted to Property.* * *Police responded to a report of a suspicious vehicle at 5953 Shaw Ave. Police found a white male was behind the wheel asleep. The vehicle was a red 2001 Chevy Tahoe red with TN plates. The man was identified and he told police he pulled off the highway to go to sleep. He said while driving, he was getting sleepy. The vehicle he was driving look like it had made contact with a concrete wall. The man said he did not hit anything. The vehicle had insurance and the man had a valid drivers license. The man was free to leave the area.* * *Police located a vehicle that came up as stolen traveling on Gunbarrel Road. Officers attempted to make a traffic stop, when the driver fled at a high rate of speed. The driver was traveling on Igou Gap Road when he lost control of the vehicle. The owner was notified of the vehicle recovery, however the vehicle was disabled due to damage. The vehicle was towed to Monteagle Towing, 6808 Conner Lane. Police removed the vehicle from NCIC.* * *A woman called police from 2000 Marshall St. When officers arrived, she pointed 10 feet past a "No Dumping" sign at a full garbage bag. Police opened the bag and discovered a dead dog. Police notified dispatch, who contacted McKamey Center.* * *A man called police and said his daughter had been driving his vehicle and the vehicle had broken down on Interstate 75 southbound. He said that he picked her up and took her home. When he went back to get the vehicle, he discovered that the tag on the vehicle had been stolen. He made arrangements for the vehicle to be towed back to his home. The vehicle is a blue Chevrolet Blazer. Police notified NCIC.* * *Police received a call about a suspicious vehicle and people on Norcross Road. Officers found a man outside of his truck trying to talk to a woman. The woman told police she was upset that the man had been mean to her. It appeared that the woman might have been intoxicated. The man and woman talked through their differences and the man agreed to take the woman to a gas station so that she could use their phone.* * *A man called police to report his lost wallet. He said he was at Walmart, 501 Signal Mountain Road, a week ago around 9 or 10 p.m. and he had his wallet out at the check-out line. He said he then left there and later realized that it was gone when he got home around midnight. He said he's not sure what happened to it and he must have lost it somehow after leaving Walmart.* * *A man on Provence Street wanted to report some suspicious activity. He had video footage of three people that supposedly came from the upstairs apartment above him. One of the three began to look inside the man's car and continued to stand next to it for a few minutes. The man does not know the individual and just wanted to have a report made.* * *The owner of Amigo Restaurant, 5874 Brainerd Road, said a female outside of his business was asking customers for money. The man said he wanted the woman to move from outside of his business. Police spoke with the woman, who said she would move and not cause further issues.* * *A person called and reported people had been sitting on the side of the building in their car for hours at Chatt Inn, 2000 E 23rd St. Police spoke with two women who were sitting in the car. The passenger was unable to answer police questions in a logical manner. The driver was instructed to drive their vehicle and find somewhere else to be since the business was closing and they had no reason to be at the location. Both left without incident.* * *A man on Chestnut Street told police that sometime overnight someone entered his unlocked 2015 Scion tC and scattered his papers all about. He said that his Glock 19 was the only thing taken. He said that it is in a black tyvec holster and loaded with 12 + 1 rounds. He said that he does not have the serial number, and police told him to call with the number once he had it.* * *A woman called police to her car on Shallowford Road and said her boyfriend's sister was acting erratically in the vehicle. She said she and the sister were in a verbal disorder. She said she didn't want anything to do with the sister, and also said she does not want the sister going back to her house in Whitwell. The sister said she was going to take a bus back home to Louisiana.

* * *

A man called police and said that while he was fishing at Ross's Landing, he reeled in a rifle. He said he wanted to turn the rifle into police. Due to the condition of the rifle, the manufacturer of the rifle is unknown, and a serial number cannot be located. The rifle was taken to Property.


GF's advanced manufacturing facility will produce semiconductor solutions for the nation's most sensitive applications Tweet this

The new supply agreement builds upon the longstanding partnership between the DoD and GF to provide chips for defense, aerospace, and other sensitive applications. GF currently supplies the DoD with chips manufactured at GF's other on-shore facilities, Fab 10 in East Fishkill, New York, and Fab 9 in Burlington, Vermont.

"GLOBALFOUNDRIES is a critical part of a domestic semiconductor manufacturing industry that is a requirement for our national security and economic competitiveness," said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who successfully passed new federal semiconductor manufacturing incentives in last year's National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). "I have long advocated for GLOBALFOUNDRIES as a key supplier of chips to our military and intelligence community, including pressing the new Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, to further expand the Department of Defense's business with GLOBALFOUNDRIES, which will help expand their manufacturing operations and create even more jobs in Malta."

In a supporting statement from the U.S. Department of Defense, "This agreement with GLOBALFOUNDRIES is just one step the Department of Defense is taking to ensure the U.S. sustains the microelectronics manufacturing capability necessary for national and economic security. This is a pre-cursor to major efforts contemplated by the recently passed CHIPS for America Act, championed by Senator Charles Schumer, which will allow for the sustainment and on-shoring of U.S. microelectronics capability."

"GLOBALFOUNDRIES thanks Senator Schumer for his leadership, his ongoing support of our industry, and his forward-looking perspective on the semiconductor supply chain," said Tom Caulfield, CEO of GF. "We are proud to strengthen our longstanding partnership with the U.S. government, and extend this collaboration to produce a new supply of these important chips at our most advanced facility, Fab 8, in upstate New York. We are taking action and doing our part to ensure America has the manufacturing capability it needs, to meet the growing demand for U.S. made, advanced semiconductor chips for the nation's most sensitive defense and aerospace applications."

The first chips from this new agreement are targeted to begin delivery in 2023. GF is in ongoing discussions with the DoD regarding Trusted Accreditation for Fab 8.

GF employs nearly 3,000 people at Fab 8, and has invested more than $13 billion in the facility. The company recently announced a land purchase option to provide additional flexibility to expand Fab 8's footprint to support growing demand from the U.S. government and industry customers. In total, GF employs more than 7,000 people across the U.S., and over the past 10 years has invested $15 billion in U.S. semiconductor development.

About GF

GLOBALFOUNDRIES (GF) is the world's leading specialty foundry. GF delivers differentiated feature-rich solutions that enable its customers to develop innovative products for high-growth market segments. GF provides a broad range of platforms and features with a unique mix of design, development and fabrication services. With an at-scale manufacturing footprint spanning the U.S., Europe and Asia, GF has the flexibility and agility to meet the dynamic needs of customers across the globe. GF is owned by Mubadala Investment Company. For more information, visit www.globalfoundries.com.

SOURCE GLOBALFOUNDRIES

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http://www.globalfoundries.com


Tom Hallberg covers a little bit of everything, from skiing to long-form feature stories. A Teton Valley, Idaho, transplant by way of Portland and Bend, Oregon, he spends his time outside work writing fiction, splitboarding and climbing.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 13:19:13|Editor: huaxia

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BELGRADE, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- As Hungary joined Serbia in spearheading mass inoculation with China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine in Europe, other European countries are struggling against a vaccine delivery crisis and exploring a way out of lockdown and into economic recovery.

In around a month, 14 percent of Serbia's 6.5-million population received their first doses of vaccine against COVID-19, thanks to the 1.5 million Chinese-made doses.

Following its neighbor, Hungary on Jan. 31 announced that it has reached a deal with Sinopharm, which will enable a mass immunization of 2.5 million people.

As the first shipment is supposed to arrive next week, Hungary is bound to become the first European Union (EU) member to sign up for Chinese vaccines.

"This deal will speed up vaccination, which could save the lives of thousands of people and contribute to lifting restrictions sooner," said Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.

Also on Jan. 31, German Health Minister Jens Spahn said he is "open" to the use of vaccines from Russia or China in Germany, while Markus Soeder, minister-president of the German state of Bavaria, called on the European supervision body to test Russian and Chinese vaccines "as soon as possible."

A shipment of Sinopharm vaccines will arrive in Bosnia and Herzegovina soon too, as one of its two entities, Republika Srpska (RS), ordered them on Feb. 8, Minister of Health and Social Welfare of RS Alen Seranic told Xinhua.

RS institutions have been following all the scientific effects and references of vaccines from all producers, including Chinese ones, and the efficiency, quality, and safety of vaccines are the three criteria that all vaccines entering RS must fulfill, said Seranic.

"Based on other countries' experiences, where Chinese vaccines have been already approved, we decided that we also need to acquire a certain number of vaccines from China," said Seranic.

"We already ordered vaccines for 20 percent of our population," he said, adding that ordering vaccines from China "will make us happy to be able to offer different kinds of vaccines to the citizens."

Earlier this month, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron expressed openness of their countries to any vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), which has so far only given green light to vaccines of Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca.

The shortage of approved vaccines in Europe has been drawing increasing public criticism and prompting demands for alternative solutions.

Addressing such concerns, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen admitted on Wednesday that the EU is lagging behind in combating the virus and it was "too optimistic" about the mass production of the vaccine.

It takes an additional three or four weeks to get the EMA's approval, which is "an investment in trust and safety," she said, while announcing a new regulatory framework as a future solution to speed up the process.

And yet, the public in the EU member countries seems not equally patient, as saving lives and ending lockdowns have become imperative.

"If there are no vaccines, we cannot vaccinate," Todor Kantardjiev, director of the Bulgarian National Center of Infectious and Parasitic Diseases, said last month, complaining about the poor progress of the inoculation program.

"The state will look for other options and we will not hesitate to buy any vaccine that is effective and harmless and that is recognized by Europe, including, of course, from Russia and China," Kantardjiev said.

In Serbia, the Sinopharm's vaccine is welcomed with full trust, and the early inoculation is seen as an opportunity, according to Ivona Ladjevac, head of the center for the Belt and Road Initiative at the Institute of International Politics and Economics in Serbia.

"We should use this opportunity," said Ladjevac. "Serbia can do something like Israel, the first country that will finish this mass vaccination and get back to normal. We can achieve something like that too."

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said in an interview with Xinhua that most people in the country are vaccinated with Sinopharm vaccine.

"There is not such a country in Europe in which you can find that level of trust (in Chinese vaccine) that you can see here in Serbia," he said.

"People here are very satisfied and we are very proud that we succeeded in delivering such good things for the better health of our people and for the future of this country," said the Serbian president. Enditem
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Prime Minister will



visit Coimbatore and address an election meeting on February 25, president L Murugan said on Monday.

The venue and time of the rally will be announced in a couple of days, Murugan told reporters here, after a meeting with party executive and senior leaders from 12 districts in the Western Region of the State.

During his visit to Chennai on Sunday, Prime Minister Modi had handed over to the Army, the home-made Arjun Main Battle Tank (MK-1A) and launched various projects and laid the foundation for several others in different sectors, including Railways, in

Similarly, Defense Minister Rajnath Singh will address a Youth wing conference in Salem on February 21, Murugan said.

To a question on alliance with the ruling AIADMK, Murugan said it was already decided and reiterated by party president J P Nadda and Union Home minister Amit Shah during their visits to the State.

Seat sharing will be finalised very soon and members will represent the assembly in double digits, Murugan claimed.

Assembly polls are likely to place in sometime in April-May.

On increasing fuel prices, he said it was dependent on International prices.

(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.)
An 8-month-old child injured in an assault last week in Decatur died from their injuries Monday morning.

Charges have been upgraded against the suspect in the case, Cameron Almen Elliott, 22, of Decatur. Hes now facing Capital Murder, Sexual Torture, Unlawful Possession of Marijuana 1st Degree and Unlawful Possession of a Controlled Substance charges.

Elliott is held without bond at the Morgan County Correctional Facility.

The 8-month-old child was taken on Feb. 9 in critical condition to a Birmingham hospital. Decatur police officers went to a home in the 2,200 block of Victoria Drive SW that day for a call about a child in medical distress. Read our previous story here.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : "I earn 500 rupees every day by cooking, washing dishes and other work in the farmers' agitation. Along with boys from my village, I am working on a daily wages basis," Shekhar Sharma, a resident of Shamli district of Uttar Pradesh, was employed at the airport but returned home during the Coronavirus pandemic, after he was sacked. Left to his own devices, he has found employment in the farmers agitation, albeit on a daily wages basis.

"I worked at the airport for the past three years, but in the Corona period, the company sacked me," he added. "There is no other earning member in the house and I have to take care of my mother and brother." Sharma isn't an aberration. Many other people like him are earning a living thanks to the farmers' agitation, which is going on at Delhi's borders for more than 80 days. Although there is no shortage of volunteers at the site of the agitation, with thousands chipping in at community kitchen for langars, for some people, the farmers protest is a means to feed hungry mouths who depend on them.

On each agitation site, meals are being cooked for hundreds of farmers. Thousands of people are cooking food, but the help of the workers and labourers is also being taken on a payment basis.

The scene is similar at the Ghazipur border, where farmers themselves are preparing langars, but some tasks are being outsourced to others who are paid on a daily wages basis.

"I've been present in the farmers agitation for the last one month, earning Rs 300 every day by cutting vegetables and washing dishes," says Ashok a resident of Bulandshahr in Uttar Pradesh. "Our contractor pays the eight-member team of cooks on a daily basis," adds Ashok.

Bulandshahr's Chandrapal also earns Rs 500 every day by cooking and washing utensils for farmers from morning till dusk. "I've been here for the past 15 days and came here searching for employment," says Chandrapal.

Since December 21, Anjul Kumar, is also working on a daily wages basis, earning Rs 500 every day. Though he also works back at the village, he has joined his other friends to work here.

Farmers have been protesting on the borders of the national capital since November 26 last year against three newly enacted farm laws. The 11 rounds of talks between the Government and the farmers ' organisations have remained inconclusive so far.
As new variants emerge of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the pathogen causing the current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, continue to circulate, early identification and sequencing have become a necessary part of research in this area. This virus is known to be shed from the nose, the lungs, the saliva, urine, and feces.

A new study, published on the medRxiv* preprint server, reports the use of metagenomics to detect the virus from wastewater samples, indicating community-level circulating variants that are not yet identified or are present in very low proportions on clinical databases.

Wastewater surveillance

Earlier studies showed that the detection of viral RNA in feces and urine is possible in COVID-19 patients as well as individuals with asymptomatic infection. This knowledge led to the use of wastewater in SARS-CoV-2 surveillance. This is not a novel application, with Wastewater-Based Epidemiology (WBE) being a valuable technique in epidemiological surveillance carried out on a broader scale.

Not only is wastewater a cheap and non-invasive source of samples containing the different viral variants in a community, but it yields real-time data on the strains of SARS-CoV-2 in circulation at the time of the study. This offers an important advantage in vaccine and antiviral development.

Massive sequencing helps identify new mutations

The maximization of the utility of this structure depends on the use of high-throughput sequencing, where multiple viral genomes are analyzed from a spectrum of clinical presentations. By detecting variants present at low frequencies in the population, as well as the number and type of variants in circulation at the current time, researchers can rapidly detect the emergence of a new variant or its importation into a population, and also detect polymorphic sites.

The current study includes 40 samples from 14 wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs), serving three different areas in Spain. The viral RNA was detected by reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction, targeting the nucleocapsid or N gene, the envelope or E gene, and a region called IP4, on the RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) gene.

Subsequently, the researchers sequenced the viral genomes recovered from the samples.

All samples belonged to clade 20A, characterized by the mutations C241T, C3037T, C14408T, and A23403G. However, variants were found in nucleotide positions carrying substitutions that define the virus clades. Two of the samples showed a mix of sequences, of clades 20A and 20C, at the position 25563.

With these two, the second defining clade 20C mutation could not be verified (C1059T), as it was not sequenced in one of the samples. In the second sample, it had low coverage. This made it difficult to verify the presence of the expected mutation here, despite the presence of the mixed sequences.

Substitutions and deletions detected by sequencing

After adjusting for the depth and quality of the readings, they found almost 240 nucleotide substitutions and six deletions, relative to the genome of the reference strain, SARS-CoV-2 isolate Wuhan-Hu-1.

There were over a hundred variant nucleotides in the ORF1a (open reading frame 1a) polyprotein, 67 in ORF1b, 21 in the spike protein, 13 in the membrane protein, 10 in the nucleocapsid gene, and others in other ORFs.

When strains containing these mutations were found in a sample along with sequences containing the nucleotide found in the reference genome, such samples were termed mixed.

With the membrane (M) protein, almost half of all mutations were non-synonymous substitutions, but in ORF7a and ORF10, all the substitutions were non-synonymous.

Of the 21 spike substitutions, 13 were non-synonymous. Ten of these corresponded to already known mutations, while three reflected novel amino acid substitutions. Seven of the 13 have not been reported in genomes from Spanish patients so far, though three amino acid changes have been identified to be found at low frequencies among genomes isolated from Spanish specimens.

Six nucleotide deletions were also reported, of which four were in the ORF1a, and one each in the spike and the ORF3a proteins.

What are the implications?

The study shows the potential importance of sequencing SARS-CoV-2 in sewage, in identifying new mutations and clades of the virus, as well as detecting the viral clades circulating in real-time.

The genomic sequencing of such strains could provide complementary information to the results of clinical laboratory testing. For instance, in the current study, three novel nucleotide substitutions were found in the spike gene in wastewater samples.

Another example is of the mutations found to be at low frequency in genomic reads from clinical specimens, but confirmed in the wastewater genomic sequencing results.

A limitation of the study is the variation in the coverage of the important genomic regions between different samples. This suggests that high-throughput sequencing efforts targeting a specific region, such as the spike protein, or the nucleotide positions that define a clade, would be more valuable in identifying and annotating the genomic variants, either unknown or detected at only low frequencies, within a region or community.

*Important Notice

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
WhatsApp: Merely going to court not a ground not to comply with law of the land

'We respect right of privacy, has no intention to violate it': Govt responds to Whatsapp

Fake: Govt is not recording WhatsApp calls and has not introduced additional tick system for messages

Google, FB, WhatsApp share details with IT Min; Twitter still not following new digital rules

You may be a 3 trillion company...... SC notice to WhatsApp on privacy policy

India

oi-Deepika S

New Delhi, Feb 15: The Supreme Court on Monday asked WhatsApp for an undertaking on oath that private data of users is not being shared with any third person.

"You may be a $2-3 trillion company but people's privacy is more valuable for them and it is our duty to protect their privacy," the top court told Facebook and WhatsApp.

The top court said that people have grave apprehensions that they will lose their privacy, and it is our duty to protect them.

The apex court issued notice to the government and the Facebook-owned app on an interim application filed by Karmanya Singh Sareen in a pending petition of 2017.

Senior advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for the petitioner, argued that the messaging app was applying lower standards of privacy for Indians and they be barred from sharing data with Facebook.

The bench observed, "We are impressed by Mr. Divan''s argument that it was proposed before us that a data protection law would be brought into force.

"Now under this policy you will share data of Indians."

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for WhatsApp, contended that Europe has a special law (General Data Protection Regulation) and it will follow law if the Parliament makes it a similar law.

The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, said that citizens have great apprehension about loss of their privacy and they think that their data and chats being shared with others and it has to be looked into.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The Centre told the apex court that the social media apps cannot share data of users and data must be protected.

The petitioner challenged privacy policy alleging that there is huge metadata of users which is being shared for profit.

The top court had in 2017 referred social media platform WhatsApp''s privacy policy matter to a Constitution bench saying it concerns the larger issue of privacy and right to personal liberty.

The appeal filed in the apex court by Karmanya Singh Sareen and Shreya Sethi assailed the Delhi high court verdict on the ground that no relief was granted for data shared by users post-September 25, 2016, and it amounted to an infringement of fundamental rights under Article 19 (Freedom of Speech and Expression) and 21 (Right to Life) of the Constitution.
Abuja, Feb 15 : Nigeria's army officials on Monday claimed that they have recently killed 81 Boko Haram militants in clearance operations in the country's northeastern region.

The operations covered "many villages" in the vast Sambisa forest in the northeastern state of Borno, said Farouk Yahaya, Theater Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole, Xinhua reported.

He did not say when the operations were conducted or how long they lasted.

"The relentless troops destroyed the terrorists' camps and recovered gun trucks and weapons as the air force aircraft continue to provide close air and interdiction support to the ground forces," Yahaya said.

During the operations, he said, one soldier was killed and four others wounded in an incident involving improvised explosive devices planted by the militants.

Boko Haram has been trying to establish an Islamist state in northeastern Nigeria since 2009. The terror group has also extended its attacks to other countries in the Lake Chad Basin.
Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar prorogued the West Bengal assembly from Monday, and observed that in the country's parliamentary history, an assembly has never been in session for over a year without being prorogued. Prorogation is discontinuing a session of the Parliament or a legislative assembly without dissolving it.

In a Twitter post, Dhankhar said he prorogued the assembly from February 15, taking note of a recommendation by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. "Never earlier in parliamentary history of this country an assembly has been in session for over a year without being prorogued," Dhankhar tweeted.

"In the process wholesome practices including Governor address in first session @MamataOfficial could not take place thereby depriving vital discussion," he said in the tweet. A two-day special session of the West Bengal Assembly was held from January 27 when the state government tabled a resolution against the Centre's new farm laws and discuss the issue of agitating farmers.

The governor was not invited to address the session on the first day of the sitting of the assembly this year. Facing criticism from opposition leaders for this, Speaker Biman Banerjee had said that no irregularity was committed as there is no provision for the address of the governor if a sitting is a continuation of a previous session even if it is in a new year.

The Speaker had said that the sitting was continuation of a session that was adjourned in September 2020 sine die and was reconvened from January 27 on a request by the government for conduct of important businesses.
The Chief Executive Officer of the Atta-Mills Institute and former Deputy General Secretary of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Koku Anyidoho, has told Dzifa Gunu that he can run but cannot hide.



He said the laws of Ghana will work and ensure that he avails himself for hearing in the GHC10 million defamation suit he filed against him.



Mr. Anyidoho was last week granted an order for substituted service on Dzifa Gunu, who he has sued for defamation.



The plaintiff had said all efforts to serve the defendant in the defamation suit have proved futile, hence he is praying the High Court to grant an order for the defendant to be served with the writ of summons.



Mr. Anyidoho dragged Mr. Gunu before the High Court over allegations that he (Anyidoho) murdered and used his eight-year-old daughter for ritual purposes.



However, the three attempts made by a bailiff of the court to serve the defendant have not yielded positive results.



Following this, the plaintiff instructed his lawyer, Yaw Awuku Asabera, to file an ex-party motion for substituted service.



The court upon reading the affidavit of Yaw Awuku Asabre, counsel for the plaintiff filed on February 4, 2021, in support for an ex-parte for an order for substituted service, ruled that the defendant be served with the writ of summons, statement of claim, and all other subsequent processes by substituted service.



The order of the court, a copy of the processes is to be posted on the High Courts notice board, Tema.



The order of the court also required that one publication of the said processes be placed in a National News Dailies precisely Daily Graphic.



Reacting to this, Mr. Anyidoho stated that the defendant can run but cannot hide.



He posited that no matter how long it takes, the law will deal with him because we are not in a Banana republic.



He said his lawyer has taken steps to effect the order by the court and soon, the defendant will have to face the law for accusing him of killing his (Anyidohos) daughter.















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New Delhi, Feb 15 : For those who faced sexual harassment at their workplace, 68.7 per cent decided not to file a written or an oral complaint.

The reasons for this included lack of trust in the procedure, concern for their careers, the lack of consequences for the accused, and concern for their physical safety.

This is part of the first edition of our Annual Review on the State of Sexual Harassment in India by the Council of Ethics, Women's Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (WICCI)'.

When asked if an employee had ever felt uncomfortable because of the presence of a colleague, more than 70 per cent of the respondents replied affirmatively, indicating that at least at one point, employees felt uncomfortable at their workplace due to another employee.

When asked regarding the witnessing of sexual harassment, the majority of the respondents answered 'Never'. However, when asked if they had ever witnessed a situation where someone made offensive remarks about someone's appearance, or repeatedly heard sexist stories or jokes, many answered 'Yes'. This shows how sexual harassment is viewed and understood in society.

It is important to note here that according to the Act, and its interpretation by the Judiciary, sexual harassment not only includes unwanted physical contact and/or advances, but also unwelcome physical, verbal or non-verbal conduct of a sexual nature, sexually coloured remarks, amongst others.

Regarding the categorisation of complaints as false/malicious, 46.2 per cent of IC/LC members stated that such categorisation stops women from coming forward with their complaints, while 38.5 per cent answered 'Not sure'.

A 51.1 per cent of employees stated that an individual should be given a year or more for filing a complaint of sexual harassment, which is more than the 3 months stipulated by the law. This seems to indicate that most employees recognise that in order for a target to file an official complaint, there are many institutional, mental and social barriers to be overcome, for which 3 months is too short a time period.

Since the Act only allows for written and formal complaints to be filed, 90 per cent of HR/CXO members stated that both informal and formal complaints, depending on the severity of the act, should be filed.

Statistics showed that 75 per cent of HR/CXOs, 50 per cent of employees and 45 per cent of NGO members, who responded, worked in organisations which had a Complaints Committee as constituted under the PoSH Act for the prevention and redressal of sexual harassment at the workplace.
People rally at the L.A. County Hall of Administration Monday in downtown to support in-person classes for students. (Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

Los Angeles County elementary school campuses are cleared to fully reopen for the first time in nearly a year because of dropping coronavirus rates, health officials confirmed Monday night.

County Supervisor Janice Hahn tweeted out the news before the official confirmation, with a celebratory tweet in the late afternoon: "L.A. County has officially reached the State's threshold for reopening elementary schools. Starting tomorrow, schools can reopen" if they have submitted and posted the necessary paperwork with county and state officials.

"This is what we have been working towards," Hahn added.

The milestone will not result in an immediate reopening of campuses in Los Angeles Unified, the nation's second-largest school system. District officials and the teachers union are in negotiations over what a return to campus would look like  and it isn't clear that either side is ready for an immediate resumption of in-person instruction.

Hahn's announcement was based on communications between her office and county Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer. Hahn also has been monitoring improving health statistics closely.

The county had to maintain the coronavirus metrics for five consecutive days, which happened as of Monday. The key threshold is a seven-day average of daily coronavirus infections below 25 cases per 100,000 residents. On Monday, the official daily rate  which is adjusted based on the number of tests  was at 20 cases per 100,000, according to Liz Odendahl, Hahn's director of communications.

Both the state and local health departments confirmed what the county department called "encouraging news."

"We are informing Los Angeles County schools tonight via an emailed letter that we expect to announce we have reached this threshold effective Tuesday, February 16," the county health department said in a statement. Elementary schools that have already submitted or posted necessary forms can open this week.

Story continues

The stunning turn of events capped a day of developments related to campus reopenings.

First, efforts to prioritize L.A. County school staff for COVID-19 immunization took a step forward with the announcement from the L.A. Unified School District that the first vaccination site based at a Los Angeles school will open this week.

Then, school leaders and their supporters  mostly from private schools  organized a demonstration urging the immediate reopening of campuses.

The location for the L.A. Unified vaccinations will be the Roybal Learning Center, just west of downtown Los Angeles, with a scheduled opening Wednesday. Those eligible for immunization will be school district staff age 65 and older and district employees currently working at coronavirus testing and vaccination sites, "consistent with current public health rules," said L.A. schools Supt. Austin Beutner in his weekly broadcast remarks.

Although school nurses of any age, and people 65 and older  whether or not they are school employees  have been eligible to receive vaccines elsewhere, the effort at Roybal is the first within L.A. Unified to target school employees. Overall, vaccine doses remain in short supply and it's been difficult for many of those eligible to book appointments.

As of Monday, district officials were not certain how many vaccinations would be available this week at Roybal. Participation is by invitation only  and will do little to speed the reopening of campuses that enroll about 465,000 students in kindergarten through 12th grade.

In-person instruction has been unavailable to the vast majority of about 1.5 million students in public and private schools countywide since March 2020.

The growing impatience of many families and school leaders over shuttered campuses was expressed Monday in a car caravan demonstration downtown and a news conference, which involved mainly private school leaders.

"We're all here today because of children ... children who do not have lobbies, children who do not have unions, children who need parents and adults to advocate on their behalf," said Paul Escala, superintendent of schools for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. "The kids can't wait."

The Archdiocese has been gradually reopening about 60 of its 188 L.A. County schools through previously approved waivers for students in transitional kindergarten through second grade. The vast majority of some 70,000 students remain at home.

Viewpoint School, a nondenominational private academy in Calabasas, also has partially reopened through an early elementary waiver.

"K-12 schools have shown that we have the skill to open schools now," said Head of School Mark McKee. "Now all we need is the will," he added referring to public officials.

Also speaking at the news conference were a Los Angeles public school parent, two prominent pediatricians, representatives from other Christian schools and a spokesman for 24 Orthodox Jewish day schools.

Standing in for students was Sophia del Rey, 18, a senior at Village Christian School in Sunland.

"I'd be willing to wear a mask," del Rey said. "I know my friends would be willing to wear masks. We're really tired of doing school from home. I know so many of my friends who have really gone into therapy since the pandemic has started because of the amount of anxiety and stress that they have. I know that I've stayed up till 2 a.m. to reteach myself a lesson because I didn't get to learn it in person at school."

Supporters in a car caravan honked incessantly as they circled the block around the county Hall of Administration. Some vehicles bore placards or painted messages such as "No More Zoom," "Let Me Go Back to School" and "Beutner Resign," while children waved from sunroofs.

Beutner, in his weekly broadcast remarks, had noted that state guidelines do not yet allow for a full reopening of any campus in L.A. County. But that was only as of Monday morning.

Both Beutner and the demonstrators praised new guidelines on schools from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and called for consistent directives at all levels of government.

Those at the demonstration, however, said they see the new CDC guidance as justification for an immediate return to campus, and sentiment was strong to open campuses at all grade levels. That does not appear to be Beutner's view.

Parents are sharply divided over the issue, while unions representing school employees point to gaps in the research around school safety and the deadly toll the pandemic has taken on low-income minority communities.

Beutner, who has called for using schools as inoculation sites, referred to vaccines for school staff as a "critical piece" of reopening. He has said that it would take about 25,000 immunizations to open the district's elementary schools  once it is otherwise safe to do so. Union leaders have demanded vaccinations as a prerequisite for reopening.

Neither state nor federal guidelines specify vaccines as essential for safe operation of campuses, provided that other comprehensive safety measures are carried out, a point emphasized at the rally.

"We believe that teachers should be prioritized in the vaccination schedule," said car caravan organizer Village Christian Head of School Tom Konjoyan. "We also know that the vaccinations are a major problem in the state of California, and we don't think schools should stay closed until they figure out how to vaccinate everybody. We think we can do it safely."

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Eagle-eyed shoppers have discovered Aldi's budget toilet paper rolls are actually made by the same Australian company that creates Quilton.

One customer shared a picture on social media showing two rolls of Aldi's Confidence toilet paper showing the 'Quilton' logo clearly printed on the cardboard in the centre of the roll, along with the brand's iconic slogan 'loves your bum'.

Upon closer inspection, Quilton, which is manufactured by ABC Tissue, and Aldi's exclusive label Confidence have similar cloud-like patterns on the tissues.

A 24-pack of toilet paper from the German supermarket store costs $7.99 - or 33 cents per roll - while Quilton's variety costs $12 - or 50 cents per roll - proving shoppers are saving $4.01 on almost identical products.

An eagle-eyed shopper has discovered Aldi's budget toilet paper rolls are actually made by the same Australian brand that creates Quilton. She shared a picture (above) showing two rolls of Aldi's Confidence toilet paper showing the 'Quilton' logo clearly printed on the cardboard in the centre of the roll, along with the brand's iconic slogan 'loves your bum'

'Is the Aldi Confidence toilet paper made by Quilton with a different print and cheaper price?' the shopper wrote in a Facebook group.

'Someone in manufacturing forgot to change the "core" for the Aldi toilet roll.'

An Aldi Australia spokesperson declined to comment on the toilet paper rolls when contacted by Daily Mail Australia.

Thousands of shoppers were amazed with the discovery, saying they never knew Aldi's version was made by same manufacturers of the well-known supermarket brand.

Many said they were 'gobsmacked' when they were told Quilton's toilet papers are 'disguised' under Aldi's exclusive brand.

'Oh wow! We only use Quilton as my boys are fussy with toilet paper. I might try the Aldi brand and compare it. They have definitely same prints,' one mother wrote.

A second said: 'These are my go to for toilet paper. I had a feeling they were made by Quilton but this confirms it.'

Some shoppers refused to believe the two brands are made by the one manufacturer - but they were shocked once they checked their toilet paper from Aldi.

'Wow, I didn't believe this but I just checked my toilet paper from Aldi and there's actually Quilton logo printed inside the rolls,' one wrote.

Upon checking the toilet paper from Aldi, shoppers discovered the 'Quilton' logo printed inside the cardboard rolls

A 24-pack of toilet paper from the German supermarket store costs $7.99 - or 33 cents per roll

While Quilton's variety costs $12 - or 50 cents per roll - $4.01 more than Aldi's toilet paper

Thousands of shoppers were amazed with the discovery, saying they never knew Aldi's version was made by same manufacturers of the well-known supermarket brand

However, many shoppers confirmed they already knew about Quilton producing Aldi's toilet paper range.

'It is indeed, a family member works at the production plant that makes Quilton and Aldi at ABC tissue in Sydney,' one woman claimed.

Loyal Aldi fans also weighed in, with one saying: 'I knew there was a reason I loved Aldi toilet paper', while another added: 'I've always loved both Quilton and Aldi Confidence - now I know why.'

Quilton was voted as the number one toilet paper brand in 2020 after more than 2,400 consumers rated their favourite supermarket label.

Consumer website Canstar Blue revealed the brand scored a stellar five star rating across most categories, including softness, strength and quality, packaging options and overall satisfaction. It got three stars for value for money.

Aldi's Confidence was named the third best toilet paper brand after it scored five stars for value for money and packaging options. The brand was rated four stars for strength and quality, softness and overall satisfaction.
Samsung is speculated to be planning on releasing a new smartphone in the coming months, and it would be its business flagship smartphone, the Galaxy Note 21 FE called the "Fan Edition." This Note would be the first release (if it pushes through) of the Note 21 series, which have no confirmation or reveal from Samsung for this year.

Rumors and speculations of the Samsung Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition is the first of the smartphone line, as there is a limited buzz from the Note series of the South Korean tech giant. The Galaxy Note's popularity is not as massive as it was back then, especially after the incident of the exploding batteries of the Note 7 and put the Galaxy S in the front lines.

Read Also: Nvidia RTX 3060 Pre-Order Now Available: Price, Specs, and Everything You Need to Know!

Samsung Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition First Look

According to Forbes, there is massive speculation that 2021 would also feature an upgrade to the Note 20, in the form of the Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition. The smartphone did not join the early January release of the Galaxy S21 and trails almost two months after the release of the Samsung Galaxy S series flagship.

Moreover, the Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition, as the name says so itself would only feature the "FE" name, which is not the top-of-the-line variant for all of Samsung's previously released smartphones. Notably, the FE is the smallest, with the least specification from the technology from Samsung. The "FE" is the budget-friendly version of the flagship smartphone that offers the S Series with fewer specs and price.

The report also mentioned that the Samsung Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition is a crossover of the S21 and the Note series, which would incorporate a dedicated slot for the S Pen, unlike the January-released smartphone. Moreover, as it is a crossover, it would feature the technology as seen on the Galaxy S21 Ultra and begin from there.

Samsung Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition: Last of the Note Series?

According to Dutch's Let's Go Digital's report, Samsung is speculated to be bidding farewell from the Samsung Galaxy Note series, and it would be with at least a special edition version of the smartphone. This is where the Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition comes in and is said to be a fitting farewell for the Note.

As Samsung poses silence over its Note series' releases unlike its teases early on, this year would indeed be a year that the Note would phase out of development.

Galaxy Note 21 FE Fan Edition: Specs, Price, Release Date, and MORE

While there are not much of the smartphone's leak for its release, the speculators have revealed that it would be based on the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra for size, dimensions, and components. The Exynos Chip and the 108MP camera are also coming, along with a dedicated slot for the S Pen.

*Note: All the information above is purely based on speculations and leaks, as there are no official announcements from Samsung.

Related Article: Samsung 870 Evo SSD Vs 860 SSD: Price and Speed Comparison

This article is owned by Tech Times

Written by Isaiah Alonzo

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
A family and local communities in Laois are in mourning following the death of a young boy following a tragic accident involving a quad motorbike last week.

The boy aged 9 suffered fatal injuries after an accident on a quad bike on his family's land, in Dooary, Ballyroan, last Wednesday, February 10. It is understood that the bike belonged to a family member and was for adult use.

He has today been named locally as Jokubas Sliosoras.

He was discovered after a search and airlifted by ambulance helicopter from Ballyroan GAA grounds to be taken straight to Temple Street children's hospital in Dublin, on Wednesday, February 10.

Sadly Jokubas lost his fight for life and passed away on Thursday evening.

Many messages of condolences have been offered to the family including from the Lithuanian community in Laois, on their private Facebook page.

The Co-chairperson of the LIthuania community in Laois is Rasa Strasunskiene.

We have very sad time now in our Lithuania community. Parents are in heavy mourning . We try keep respect and not disturb family at this time. But always stay beside if they will ask for any help. We grieving together, she told the Leinster Express.

Other messages include one from Pat Whelan is Chairman of Ballyroan Abbey GAA club.

"I offer our condolences to the family of this young boy who has tragically died, our thoughts are with them," he said.

Fr Paddy Byrne is Parish Priest for the area.

"The whole area is numbed and shocked by this tragic accident. Our hearts go out to his loving family, and this tragic loss of life is mourned by the entire Parish," Fr Byrne said.
Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds exchanged public Valentines Day messages on social media on Sunday  by lovingly trolling each other.

The actors, who have been married since 2012, are known for teasing each other online, and it seems this year was no different.

On Sunday 14 February, Lively shared a video on Instagram of Reynolds helping her dye her hair at home, presumably during lockdown, set to the Beach Boys song God Only Knows.

She captioned the video: That time I f*d my hairdresser.

In response, Reynolds shared a slow-motion video of Lively playing in the snow, set to Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgeralds Cheek to Cheek.

With the caption: My forever Valentine for the foreseeable future.

Both also shared more serious photographs posing together.

In October 2020, the Deadpool actor shared the news that he was voting in the US for the first time (he is originally from Canada) with his American wife, after getting his citizenship.

In a mocking post, he wrote: Id like to thank my wife Blake for making my first time so gentle and loving. It was super scary at first, then exciting and now Im a little tired. But proud.

The Gossip Girl actor also caught the attention of social media users for her voting photograph  but for a different reason  sketching on a fake pair of high heels to the picture where she was originally barefoot.

Fans pointed out that Lively  who tagged luxury footwear label Christian Louboutin in the photo  drew the heels with a red bottom, a signature feature of Louboutin heels.

The comedy couple have been married for nearly ten years, after meeting in 2011. They have three children together: Inez, James and Betty.

In August last year, Reynolds apologised for the couples decision to get married on a former slave plantation in South Carolina.

He said: Its something well always be deeply and unreservedly sorry for, he said. Its impossible to reconcile.

What we saw at the time was a wedding venue on Pinterest. What we saw after was a place built upon devastating tragedy.

According to Reynolds, the incident encouraged the couple to donate $200,000 to the NAACP Legal Defence Fund. They also got remarried at home several years later.

Research News

Leaders of UB-affiliated startup named to Forbes 30 Under 30 list

UB alums Rohan Shah (left) and Huy Duc Pham of Classavo have been named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for education.

By CHARLOTTE HSU

Wild things happen when ideas intersect. UB is a great place for that. With grit and determination, I think we can bottle magic. Sharing this news to my instructors who taught me was extremely satisfying.  Huy Duc Pham, director of product Classavo

As a UB undergraduate, Rohan Shah joined with fellow UB students to begin building an educational technology company. That startups first product  Classavo  is now serving college students and professors nationwide, providing cutting-edge tools for online education in the midst of a pandemic. And Shah and fellow UB alumnus Huy Duc Pham have been named to the 2021 Forbes 30 Under 30 list for education. Every opportunity I have, I want to empower and motivate students to follow their passion, to believe in themselves. Its been hard, but I have met so many cool people and learned so much in such a short time, says Shah, CEO of interactiveX, the company that created Classavo. He graduated from UB in 2016 with a bachelors degree in computer science and a minor in business. Wild things happen when ideas intersect. UB is a great place for that. With grit and determination, I think we can bottle magic. Sharing this news to my instructors who taught me was extremely satisfying, says Pham, director of product for Classavo. He graduated from UB in 2018 with a bachelors degree in media study. The Classavo team is based in UBs Incubator @ Baird, adjacent to the North Campus.

Meeting remote learning needs in a pandemic

Shah describes Classavo as an all-in-one teaching-and-learning platform that helps professors engage students better through interactive content. This includes digital textbooks that professors can edit, adding features such as videos, photos, graphics, notes and questions that students can answer in the text. The platform has features for taking attendance, polling and hosting discussions and office hours. Instructors can also access analytics that allow them to understand how much students are engaging with course materials  information that can guide improvements to future courses, Shah says. The pandemic has changed Classavos business, fueling a five-fold increase in requests from professors interested in the platform, Shah says. Previously, we had to explain to people what Classavo is and why they should use it. This year, its different. Universities and professors are coming to us, Shah says.

One goal: Reducing costs for students
COTTAGE, Ore. -- A death investigation is underway in Cottage Grove after one man was found dead and another injured in a home Sunday morning.

Just before 9:30 a.m. police responded to an agency assist for South Lane Fire Medical at 1063 Tyler Ave. When officers arrived, they found 48-year-old Conrad Schubkegel dead inside the residence.

KEZI 9 News has learned that paramedics transported 24-year-old Kyle Schubkegel to the Riverbend Hospital in Springfield for treatment of a gunshot wound. Police said he is expected to survive.

A witness told responding officers that they overheard calls for help coming from the residence and they called 9-1-1.

Neighbor Dick Gilkison said he could hear the sirens responding to the incident early Sunday morning, but he wasn't sure exactly what was happening.

"We were driving down Gateway, we noticed Tayler was blocked on both ends with police cars, and it's real unusual for this neighborhood," Gilkison said.

The case is under investigation, and at this time, the Cottage Grove Police have not confirmed the relationship between the two victims, or the details of the incident that occured. Stay with KEZI 9 News for updates.
The company is primarily focusing on bringing the high-grade East Sampson Dam Gold Project within the broader Silver Swan North Project into production.

( ) is another step closer to realising its ambition to mine East Sampson Dam.

As the junior mineral resources sector continues to blossom in the sunshine of happy investors, Moho Resources is gearing up to be a self-funded explorer. Work continues at the East Sampson Dam project to provide technical guidance for an upcoming JORC resource.

In this current episode of Coffee with , Ralph Winter fills us in on what is happening with the company since our last Coffee with Samso Episode 42. Our conversation touched on:

Drilling confirms consistency at East Sampson Dam. Exploration work at Burracoppin has started and there appears to be some early success in vectoring mineralisation. Water samples from Empress Springs have shown to be effective in delineating mineralisation models. Ongoing exploration planning for the projects.

Mohos exploration team continue to make excellent progress at East Sampson Dam. The initial phase 2 RC drill results extend gold mineralisation down plunge at the southern end of the prospect and highlight the potential to discover additional gold mineralisation at the prospect - Moho managing director Shane Sadleir.

PODCAST:

About Ralph Winter

Specialising in corporate affairs & finance, marketing & promotion and business development in both exploration and development companies, Ralph was involved in the listing of Trafford Resources Limited, Limited, Limited, Mineral Products. He is also currently a Director of Breast Cancer Care WA and Owner of Australian Remote Assistance.

About Moho Resources

Silver Swan North:

The Silver Swan North Project is about 50km northeast of the regional mining centre of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia. The project covers approximately 55sqkm and encompasses granted tenements within the Kalgoorlie terrane.

Moho believes that the Silver Swan North project area is considerably underexplored and highly prospective for gold and nickel mineralisation. Moho will focus on shear hosted and porphyry related gold mineralisation and identifying komatiite-hosted nickel sulphide deposits.

The Silver Swan North project sits on the eastern flank of the Kanowna/Scotia dome within the Boorara domain. The regional Mount Monger-Moriarty fault runs through the middle of the project area, which effectively straddles two major tectonic domains, the Kurnalpi terrane to the east, and the Kalgoorlie terrane to the west.

Burracoppin:

The Burracoppin project is within the Southwest terrane, the southwestern element of the Archean aged Yilgarn Craton in Western Australia. The project tenements consist of five granted exploration licences and two exploration licenses under application covering approximately 480sqkm.

The project is close to two regional shears and in particular on the aero-magnetic well-defined north-south regional shear which is also associated with Tampia gold mine mineralisation to the south. The operating Edna May mine is approximately 22km east of the Burracoppin project area, in the Westonia Greenstone Belt.

Empress Springs:

The Empress Springs Project comprises 13 adjacent exploration permits with a total area of 2,889sqkm. The project is about 25km due south of the town of Croydon and 700km west-northwest of Townsville in North Queensland. The Croydon Goldfield, which extends from north of the town, contained over 300 gold occurrences with historical production estimated at 1.2 million ounces of gold. The Empress Springs project is a joint venture with IGO Ltd ( ).

Moho considers Empress Springs has the potential to host large Tier 1 gold deposits due to the presence of the intersection of significant interpreted structures within the tenements, some of which penetrate down to the earths mantle and are potential fluid flow paths and traps for mineralisation, mafic dyke swarms reflecting major melting episodes and coherent gold, antimony and bismuth anomalies coincident with the regional structures and gravity anomalies.

Please let us know your thoughts and send us any comment to info@Samso.com.au. Remember to Subscribe to our YouTube Channel, Samso Media and our mail list to stay informed and make comments where appropriate. Other than that, you can also give us a Review on Google.

For further information about Coffee with Samso and Rooster Talks visit: www.samso.com.au

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Samso simplifies your story to customers or investors. Samso creates organic content for you to engage your audience and BRAND yourself to them.

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Working with allows exposing our Insights to over 1.2 million monthly unique views internationally.

Samso has nearly 30 years of experience in developing business ideas and concepts in the Australasian region.

Samso has worked primarily in the mineral resources industry, capital markets and corporate finance. Noel Ong is the founder of SAMSO.

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A view from Wrexhams Member of the Senedd

This article is old - Published: Monday, Feb 15th, 2021

Wrexham.com has invited Wrexham & Clwyd South constituency Members of Parliament and Members of the Senedd to write a monthly article with updates on their work in Parliament and the Senedd, and closer to home. (You can view an archive here).

Wrexham MS Lesley Griffiths writes

Since the turn of the year, the Covid-19 vaccine rollout has been the key issue for people in Wrexham. This week marks a significant moment as Wales has become the first UK nation to reach its target of offering the vaccination to the first four priority groups by mid-February. This is an outstanding achievement and is testimony to the hard work of the local health services staff, primary care colleagues and volunteers.

Throughout the rollout, I have been in regular contact with Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB) and have kept constituents up-to-date with the latest developments. I visited Wrexhams excellent Local Vaccination Centre at the beginning of the month and I met with Health Board officials this morning for the latest update (15 February).

The North Wales Health Board has fulfilled its target of offering the vaccine to everyone in priority groups 1  4. While take-up is extremely high with over 90% of all eligible people receiving their first dose, there is a small number of people in the top 4 priority groups that have yet to be vaccinated. This could be for a variety of reasons. Some people may have missed their appointment due to illness or they may have been unsure about having the vaccine. Whatever the reason, its important no one is left behind.

BCUHB is working hard checking its records and is re-inviting people for vaccination. Anyone in the top 4 priority groups who hasnt received their first dose, or does not currently have an appointment for it, should call the vaccination helpline on 03000 840004. The lines will be busy so if any constituent is having difficulties, please contact me.

 Important update from @BetsiCadwaladr  Anyone in #Wrexham aged 70 or over who hasnt had their first Covid-19 vaccination, or an appointment to have it, should call the vaccinations booking centre to arrange an appointment.  03000 840004https://t.co/fhFO4Flzqm  Lesley Griffiths (@lesley4wrexham) February 9, 2021

Attention inevitably turns to the second key milestone which is to offer the vaccine to everyone in priority groups 5 to 9 by the spring  thats everyone aged 50 and over, plus everyone who is at-risk because they have an underlying health condition. Subject to supply, the Welsh Government believes it is on track to reach this target by the end of April. This week, Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board will also start administering the second dose of the Pfizer vaccine.

Clearly, there is still a great deal of work to be done but everyone in Wales can be proud of the progress to date. Wales is currently vaccinating more people per population than any other UK nation and it was the first to vaccinate more than a quarter of its adult population.

Our vaccination teams have done an incredible job and I pay tribute to each and every person involved in the rollout.

Over three-quarter of a million of our most vulnerable people in Wales have now received their first life-saving dose of the coronavirus vaccine  This has been a massive effort involving so many people across the country. By working together, we can ensure a brighter future. pic.twitter.com/tW2NrBXIkT  Welsh Government #KeepWalesSafe (@WelshGovernment) February 14, 2021

During the first week of February, the Welsh Government announced children aged 3  7 could start to return to school after half term. However, Wrexham Council confirmed last week that schools will not reopen here until 26 February at the very earliest.

Although Covid rates are lowering, the number of cases is currently still higher in Wrexham than in the rest of Wales. On 12 February, the seven-day rolling figure for Wrexham stood at 199 cases per 100,000 of the population, almost double the national average.

The Welsh Government indicated its preference was to see Foundation Phase learners return to the classrooms from 22 February but was clear that schools and local authorities would have flexibility. Local education partners had the authority to organise their timetables slightly differently, in a way that best suited local needs.

Throughout this pandemic, the Welsh Government has implemented a cautious approach when relaxing restrictions. With current rates the highest in Wales, Wrexham Council has adopted a similar stance in this instance, which has to be respected.

The situation will be monitored closely in the days ahead. When schools do reopen, Welsh Government is funding a number of additional measures that are being introduced to provide staff with an added level of assurance for their safe return to face-to-face teaching.

SUNDAY NIGHT REMINDER FOR PARENTS: You are not teachers!

You are not superhuman! You are simply loving parents doing your very best in a very challenging time. Whatever your best looks like with remote is good enough and appreciated. Enjoy half term.#KeepWalesLearning pic.twitter.com/Gga9swjEgn  WG Education (@WG_Education) February 14, 2021

An additional 200m has been announced by Welsh Government to help businesses deal with the current lockdown, taking the overall support package from December to March to 650m. This funding is passed on to Councils so it can be automatically administered to local firms as quickly as possible. If you own a hairdressers, a florists, a restaurant or a gym, you could be eligible for this funding  all you need is to be registered with Wrexham Council.

The Welsh Government estimates there are thousands of eligible businesses missing out simply because they are not registered with their Local Authority, and I know this has unfortunately been the case in Wrexham. If you pay non-domestic rates but have not registered with Wrexham Council since before the firebreak in October, please do so now.

Do you pay non-domestic rates for your hospitality, leisure, tourism or non-essential retail business? If so you are likely to be entitled to between 6k and 10k for December to March. Find out more here https://t.co/IYl9gbU2vN pic.twitter.com/6f5mxsxgg9  Welsh Government Economy (@WGEconomy) February 2, 2021

Finally, it still doesnt seem real but last week Hollywood stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney became the new owners of Wrexham AFC. I am very grateful to have met virtually with the new owners. It was clear during our discussion they have done their research, they are very serious about this project and they recognise the clubs importance to the local community. They will do everything they can to be successful.

The coronavirus pandemic continues to affect all our lives. If you are a constituent and there is something I could help you with, please do not hesitate to contact me.

.

Wrexham.com has invited Wrexham & Clwyd South constituency Members of Parliament and Members of the Senedd to write a monthly article with updates on their work in Parliament and the Senedd, and closer to home. (You can view an archive here).
ERNew Delhi: The Supreme Court Monday (February 15) granted 5-day interim bail to journalist Siddique Kappan, arrested on his way to Hathras, Uttar Pradesh where a young Dalit woman had died after being allegedly gang-raped, to visit his ailing mother.

A bench headed by Chief Justice S A Bobde, however, said that during his visit he shall not give any interview to the media, including social media.

The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, said that Kappan will not meet members of the public except his relatives and doctors concerned.

It said he will be escorted by a team of Uttar Pradesh police officers and police in Kerala will cooperate with them.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ), stated that Kappan's mother could not talk on video conference and the doctors have said she might live only for two or three more days.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Uttar Pradesh government, said however that the condition of Kappan's mother was not as serious as was being projected and no medical certificates were provided.

"There are posters in Kerala and his wife is collecting money in his name as if he is a martyr... When he goes to Kerala to visit his mother political opinions would be formed," Mehta said.

The bench said it was taking Sibal's statements on face value and "we will not allow him (Kappan) to be paraded and he will go to his house under protection of armed guards".

On November 16 last year, the top court had sought a response from the Uttar Pradesh government on the plea challenging the arrest of the journalist on his way to Hathras.

Sibal had sought bail for the journalist saying that there was nothing against him in the FIR lodged at Mathura by UP Police.

The FIR has been filed under various provisions of the IPC and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) against four people having alleged links with the Popular Front of India, or PFI.

PFI had been accused in the past of funding protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act across the country earlier this year.

Kappan was arrested on October 5 while he was on his way to Hathras, home to the young Dalit woman who died after being gang-raped, allegedly by four upper-caste men.

The Kerala Union of Working Journalists had filed a habeas corpus petition in the top court against the arrest of the journalist and it also sought his immediate production and release from illegal detention.

The police, however, had said it had arrested four people having links with the Popular Front of India in Mathura and identified the arrested persons as Siddique from Malappuram, Atiq-ur Rehman from Muzaffarnagar, Masood Ahmed from Bahraich and Alam from Rampur.

Hours after the arrest, the prominent journalist body of Kerala identified Malappuram native Siddique by his full name as Siddique Kappan, saying he is a senior Delhi-based journalist.

The plea stated that the arrest was made in violation of the mandatory guidelines laid down by the apex court and with the sole intention of obstructing the discharge of duty by a journalist.

The petition alleged that family members or colleagues have not been informed of his arrest.

Hathras has been in the news following the death of a 19-year-old Dalit woman who was allegedly gang-raped on September 14, 2020, in a village in the district. Her cremation at night by the authorities, allegedly without the parents' consent, has triggered widespread outrage.

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UPDATE (6:31 p.m.): WFANs Sweeny Murti reports Yankees deal with Justin Wilson is done. Rejoins Yankees, pitched for them in 2015.

UPDATE (9:54 a.m.): MLB Networks Jon Heyman reports the Yankees appear to be moving toward a deal with Justin Wilson. Read more about that here.

The New York Yankees and New York Mets find themselves going head-to-head as spring training opens this week.

FanSideds Robert Murray reported Sunday Justin Wilson in serious talks with the New York Yankees. At the same time, the New York Posts Ken Davidoff reported the Mets have remained in touch with the representatives for southpaw Justin Wilson.

Introducing Yankees Insider: Get exclusive news, behind-the-scenes observations and the ability to text message directly with beat writers

Wilson spent the last two seasons pitching for the Mets. He was 2-1 with a 3.66 ERA over 23 games in 2020 after pitching to a 2.54 ERA with four saves the previous season.

Wilson has a 3.27 ERA over 480 career relief appearances in nine MLB seasons and was very good pitching for the Yankees in 2015, going 5-0 with a 3.10 ERA over a career-high 74 appearances.

After the 2015 season, Wilson was traded by the Yankees to the Detroit Tigers for two minor league pitchers who currently are in their bullpen, Luis Cessa and Chad Green. The Yanks acquired Wilson in November 2014 from the Pittsburgh Pirates for catcher Francisco Cervelli.

(NJ Advance Medias Randy Miller contributed to this report.)

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Mike Rosenstein may be reached at mrosenstein@njadvancemedia.com. Tell us your coronavirus story or send a tip here.
The Food and Drug Administration will convene an independent panel of experts Feb. 26 to recommend whether the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine should be authorized for use in the US.

The hearing comes 22 days after J&J submitted its application and supporting test data. Thats on par with the timetable the FDA set for review of the vaccine from Pfizer Inc. and partner BioNTech SE, but nearly a week longer than the one for the vaccine from Moderna Inc. Both were approved in December.

Some readers have questioned the amount of time needed to convene these review panels amid a global crisis and the urgent need to get vaccines distributed. Heres a look at some of the issues involved:

How long does it take to review vaccine test data?

FDA officials say they need the time to review the vaccine test data submitted by the company and make sure the conclusions are accurate. As part of that review, FDA scientists scrutinize data from individual study volunteers, paying close attention to those who have had side effects and to differences between various demographic groups.

The time frame is still much shorter than the usual FDA review of proposed new drugs and vaccines, which normally takes months.

But the FDA took only about 2  weeks to review the Moderna data. Why three weeks for J&J?

The circumstances have changed considerably since Dec. 17, when the FDA advisory committee recommended an emergency authorization for the Moderna vaccine about 2  weeks after the company submitted data.

At that time, there werent any known significant variants to the coronavirus. And both the Moderna and Pfizer vaccine approved earlier were home runswith effectiveness hovering around 95%and showed strikingly similar results across the board, regardless of race, age, sex and medical history.

The agency will also have to spend several days analyzing the J&J shots effectiveness against variants identified in South Africa, the U.K. and elsewhere, and on varying effects in different groups of patients. The J&J data, in short, are nuanced.

There is indeed a greater complexity here," said Peter Marks, director of the FDA biologics center.

What is this panel that will consider recommending approval of the J&J vaccine?

It is an independent committee of experts on vaccines, infectious diseases, pediatrics, epidemiology and other specialties that pertain. The committee advises the FDA on whether to authorize the use of the vaccine and in what groups of patients.

If the panel clears the vaccine for use, what happens next?

The FDA expects to act on the panels recommendations within a day after the hearing. If the FDA authorizes use of the vaccine, vaccinations could begin in a matter of days.

Ive heard the J&J vaccine isnt as effective as the others. Should I hold out for a Pfizer or Moderna vaccine?

Public health experts say no. To be sure, the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines reported stronger results. But in the world of vaccines, the J&J results66% effective in its international study, and 72% effective in the U portion of the studyare considered good, and exceed the 50% standard the FDA set for vaccine efficacy.

The J&J shot showed efficacy of 57% even in South Africa where a resistant mutation of the coronavirus has spread.

And in preventing severe Covid illnessinvolving respiratory failure, shock, organ failure or deaththe J&J shot was 85% effective. So in the very cases were most worried about, those involving hospitalization and death, the J&J vaccine was strikingly effective.

The J&J vaccine also has some significant advantages. It requires just one shot, not two as required for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. And it can be stored at regular refrigerator temperatures for longer periods than the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. That can be helpful in rural areas especially.

New variants of the coronavirus appear to be popping up on a regular basis. How effective will the vaccines be in preventing them?

The pharmaceutical companies say the vaccines can be tweaked to address new strains of the virus, and the FDA has said it would work to streamline the approval process for these updated vaccines, much in the way it does now for flu shots.

Pfizer and Moderna have found, at least in the lab, that their vaccines appear to cover the variant identified in South Africa. Their vaccines also showed good effects against the mutation that arose in England.

If new evidence shows variants to be more resistant to the vaccines, both Moderna and the Pfizer partnership are designing new vaccines that more specifically target the variant strains.

How does this vaccine fit into the bigger picture, including overcoming public resistance to a vaccine?

Getting a third vaccine on the market could reduce hospitalization rates and the need for intensive care, which had placed US hospitals in a precarious situation.

Polls have shown many Americansincluding significant numbers of healthcare workershave been resistant to taking a vaccine. FDA officials say one reason they are vetting the results carefully is to ensure that the vaccine is safe and effective in all groups it is authorized for, so that any disappointing results dont dampen peoples willingness to be vaccinated.

Thats not what you want as a public health professional," said the FDAs Dr. Marks.

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.

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WOOD RIVER  Nearly 30,000 COVID-19 vaccinations had been administered in Madison County as of Sunday.

According to the Madison County Health Department, a total of 29,817 vaccinations had been given heading into Tuesday. There were 23,917 first vaccine doses  or 9.1% of the population  given, as well as 5,900 second vaccine doses, or 2.24% of the population.

As of Sunday, 5.08% of Macoupin County had received both doses of the vaccine. Other fully vaccinated rates included Calhoun County at 4.56%, Jersey County at 4.6% and Greene County at 3.81%.

About noon Monday, Greene County health officials reported its shipment of 500 second dose vaccines did not reach the county because of an ice storm. A health department staff member on Saturday trucked it through the snow to attempt a pick-up, officials said, but only could get ancillary supplies of needles, wipes and cards.

We believed vaccine would still come by Monday, but we just confirmed with the UPS driver its not on the truck, county officials stated Monday at noon. We will not know when we are planning another clinic, as it will depend on many things

On Monday, the IDPH reported 2,027,725 doses of vaccine had been delivered to providers in Illinois. About 445,200 doses have been allocated to the federal governments Pharmacy Partnership Program for long-term care facilities. This brings the total Illinois doses to 2,472,925.

The IDPH on Monday reported a total of 1,823,208 vaccines administered, including 248,925 for long-term care facilities. The seven-day rolling average of vaccines administered daily is 66,320 doses.

Since Thursday, three COVID-19 related deaths have been reported by the Madison County Health Department, all on Friday. The deaths included a woman in her 70s and men in their 60s and 80s. A total of 453 COVID-19 related deaths have been reported in the county. Mondays figures were not available at presstime.

There are sometimes discrepancies in the number of cases and deaths reported at the state and local levels, in part because of the volume of cases, and also as each local department forwards the information and it is verified. Local health officials have said the cases eventually reconcile as the reporting catches up.

Madison County reported 63 new confirmed and probable cases on Friday, 65 on Saturday and 61 on Sunday. As of Sunday there were 27 COVID-19 patients in Madison County hospitals, two on ventilators. Total cases stood at 26,877 and tests totaled 250,998 tests.

More Information Vaccinations 1st Dose: 23,917 (9.1%) 2nd Dose: 5,900 (2.24%) Source: IDPH COVID-19 cases by county Madison - 26,887 (453 deaths) Jersey - 2,439 (44 deaths) Calhoun - 483 (5 deaths) Greene - 1,302 (46 deaths) Macoupin - 4,423 (107 deaths) Montgomery - 3,408 (67 deaths) St. Clair - 24,808 (449 deaths) Clinton - 5,522 (88 deaths) Bond - 1,863 (23 deaths) Monroe - 3,983 (80 deaths) Randolph - 3,933 (76 deaths) Washington - 1,562 (23 deaths) Source: IDPH & Madison, Greene, Macoupin and Calhoun county health departments See More Collapse

The three-day positivity rate for Madison County was 6.07% on Sunday, the lowest since Oct. 12. The seven-day rate was 7.31% and the 10-day rate was 6.84%.

The IDPH reported Monday that the preliminary seven-day statewide positivity for cases as a percent of total tests Feb. 8-14 was 2.9%. The preliminary seven-day statewide test positivity for the same period was 3.5%.

Statewide on Monday the IDPH reported 1,420 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 and 41 additional deaths, none in the Riverbend region. To date, the IDPH has reported 1,163,574 cases, including 20,002 deaths.

As of Sunday night, 1,789 people in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 389 were intensive care unit patients and 184 were on ventilators.

For move COVID-19 information, visit https://coronavirus-response-madcoil.hub.arcgis.com/, www.madisonchd.org or Facebook @madisonchd. Also visit www.co.madison.il.us or Facebook @madisoncountyil for more vaccination news and daily updates.

For The Telegraphs online vaccine tracker, visit https://www.thetelegraph.com/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker-alton-illinois/. For additional vaccine locations visit https://coronavirus.illinois.gov/s/vaccination-location.

Local and statewide information also is available at www.dph.illinois.gov. Click the coronavirus banner.

For health-related questions about COVID-19, people also can call the IDPH hotline at 1-800-889-3931 or email dph.sick@illinois.gov.
Mr. McNeil had one high-profile stumble last May when he appeared on CNN and called for the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to resign over the agencys handling of the coronavirus outbreak. His editors have discussed the issue with him to reiterate that his job is to report the facts and not to offer his own opinions, a Times spokeswoman said at the time. But he remained central to the biggest story in the world. The Times included his work on the pandemic in its Pulitzer submission, two people familiar with it said.

That high profile may have led to the leak of The Timess internal response to the Peru trip to The Daily Beast. Some employees then organized a letter saying that our community is outraged and in pain and asking why Mr. McNeils conduct hadnt prevented him from covering a crucial story with complex racial disparities. The letter didnt call for him to be fired, but for The Times to review its policies.

Other journalists considered the letter itself unfair, an attack on a veteran reporters career over speech that wasnt directly connected to his journalism. Some Black journalists felt their white colleagues were rallying to Mr. McNeils defense rather than worrying about his words impact. You often wonder what your white colleagues who are lovely to your face are actually thinking or saying about you  or people like you  behind your back, a national reporter, John Eligon, tweeted.

This is where a messy but, in some ways, ordinary management problem became something more. The employees letter leaked. The News Guilds own internal divisions over the matter leaked. Critics scoured Mr. McNeils old work, and complained on Twitter. The Times became the story.

After The Daily Beasts report, Mr. McNeil told The Times he saw no reason to apologize, but within 48 hours was beginning to draft an apology, a person with direct knowledge of that document said. He exchanged a series of drafts with Times management over the next week. By Feb. 5, The Times had made clear that he would be moved to a less prestigious beat, and that he could face ongoing questions from the companys H.R. department. Its not surprising that he resigned. Editors forwarded his apology note, which seemed by then both uncharacteristically profuse and oddly late, in an email that announced his resignation.

The questions about The Timess identity and political leanings are real; the differences inside the newsroom wont be easily resolved. But the paper needs to figure out how to resolve these issues more clearly: Is The Times the leading newspaper for like-minded, left-leaning Americans? Or is it trying to hold what seems to be a disappearing center in a deeply divided country? Is it Elizabeth Warren or Joe Biden? One thing thats clear is that these questions probably arent best arbitrated through firings or resignations freighted with symbolic meaning, or hashed out inside the human resources department.

The Times will have to navigate its identity in tandem with the next generation of its audience  people like Ms. Shepherd, who said that she was most surprised by the gap between Mr. McNeils views and what shed read in her favorite news outlet.

Thats not what I would have expected from The Times, she said. You have the 1619 Project. You guys do all this amazing reporting on this, and you can say something like that?
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Zimbabwe has received its first COVID-19 vaccines with the arrival early Monday of an Air Zimbabwe jet carrying 200,000 Sinopharm doses from China.

It is one of China's first shipments of vaccines to Africa, after deliveries to Egypt and Equatorial Guinea.

The first Sinopharm vaccines are a donation from China to the southern African country. President Emmerson Mnanagagwa's government has purchased an additional 600,000 doses of the Sinopharm vaccine that are expected to arrive early next month, according to the state media.

Zimbabwean Vice President Constantino Chiwenga was at the Harare airport for the arrival of the vaccines.

"It has not been lost on us that in times of need China's response has been swift," he said, describing China's donation as "yet another demonstration of the long bond of friendship and solidarity."

China's ambassador to Zimbabwe Guo Shaochun said that Zimbabwe is one of the first of 58 countries to receive donations of the Sinopharm vaccine.

"Zimbabwe is our brother so the supply of vaccines to Zimbabwe is not a problem," he said.

Zimbabwe's health professionals and immigration agents working at border posts will get first priority for the vaccines, according to a government rollout plan.

The Chinese vaccines are just the start of the millions needed for Zimbabwe to vaccinate 10 million people, representing 60% of the country's population, to achieve herd immunity, say health officials.

Zimbabwe "has also submitted its expression of interest" to be part of an initiative by the African Union to bulk buy vaccines for the continent, Information Minister Monica Mutsvangwa said last week.

The government says it has budgeted $100 million for vaccines and local businesses have also been asked to donate to the effort.

Since 2003 Zimbabwe has looked to China, and also Russia, for assistance after falling out with Western countries that imposed sanctions in response to allegations of human rights abuses and vote-rigging by then-president Robert Mugabe, who lost power in 2017 and died in 2019.

Mugabe's successor, Mnangagwa, has continued close ties with China and Russia as Western countries maintain sanctions, charging that he is as repressive as his predecessor.

Vaccination campaigns are just starting to be launched across Africa, with jabs being given in only a few of the continent's 54 countries, with a total population of 1.3 billion. A massive campaign is required to vaccinate an estimated 680 million people to achieve population immunity, according to the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Experts expect vaccines to start arriving on the continent in higher quantities later this year and next year.

Zimbabwe, like many other African countries, initially recorded low numbers of COVID-19 but has recently experienced a spike in cases.

There are fears that a new, more infectious variant of the virus came to the country when scores of thousands of Zimbabweans living in South Africa returned home for the holiday season.

Zimbabwe has reported 35,104 cases, including 1,398 deaths, on Feb. 14, up from the slightly more than 10,000 cases and 277 deaths at the beginning of December. The country's once-robust public health system has deteriorated along with the economy over the past two decades.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
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Obiwanne Okeke, standing trial for wire fraud in the U.S., said he has missed important milestones of the childhood development of his 19-month-old daughter.

Mr Okeke, 33, also known as Invictus Obi, has been in incarceration for 18 months while standing trial in the U.S.

He took responsibility for the multi-million-dollar scam that went on for many years by pleading guilty to the wire fraud crime in June 2019.

He is now due for sentencing by a Virginia Court Tuesday.

Ahead of his sentencing, Mr Okeke, through his lawyer, applied for a lenient jail term, contending among others, that he had not seen his daughter to witness the most important milestones of her early childhood since his trial began in August 2019.

PREMIUM TIMES, on Tuesday, exclusively obtained the court documents, which Mr Okekes lawyer, John Iweanoge, filed on his behalf to appeal for shorter sentence at variance with the sentencing guidelines the court uses.

The U.S-based lawyer stated that sending the convict on a long jail term would cost his 19-month-old daughter, who is an American citizen, the childish memory of his father.

Mr Okeke has not been able to see his daughter or enjoy the most important milestones of her early childhood, like seeing her take her first step, seeing her grow her first tooth, being able to carry her and rock her to sleep amongst other cherished moments.

A lengthy sentence will deprive Mr Okekes infant daughter the opportunity to have any childhood memories of his dad, Iweanoge stated.

He added, Since Mr Okeke is a deportable alien, and would be immediately removed from the United States after serving his sentence, a shorter sentence, would ensure that he is deported sooner so that his daughter will be able to travel to Nigeria to stay with his dad and enjoy what is left of his daughters early and tender years.

Moreover, Mr Okekes deportation is another consequence of his conviction since he will be immediately deported to Nigeria after his sentence and he will likely not be able to return to the United States for a 20 year period to life because of the nature of his offence and the immigration consequences it carries.

Plea for mercy

Mr Iweanoge noted that for his clients kind of offence that he had pleaded guilty to, the guideline provided imprisonment ranging from 97 to 121 months (about eight to 10 years) or 151-188 months (about 12 and a half years to 15 and a half years), depending on the merit the court attaches to his filings.

The lawyer contended that the period of imprisonment will be too much for someone of his age and status, adding, the ends of justice will be served if Mr Okeke is sentenced substantially below the guideline in this case.

Mr Iweanoge pleaded with the court to grant Mr Okeke a considerate sentence because he is already punished by collateral consequences enumerated above.

Okeke and the guilty plea

The 33-year-old and chairperson of Abuja-based Invictus Group was arrested in 2019, following allegations that he connived with some individuals, some of who remain at large, to defraud American companies and individuals over a period of at least four years.

Although he denied his involvement in the crime before a federal judge in the U.S. for months, he later pleaded guilty to the allegation of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and agreed to cooperate with American authorities last year June.

The guilty plea helped Mr Okeke, who was initially indicted on two counts of computer and wire fraud, to secure the withdrawal of the second charge that carries lesser sentence and fines.

As part of his deal with the U.S. government, he would enjoy immunity from prosecution on the same matter in the U.S. Eastern District of Virginia.

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The district will also confirm the validity of the plea agreement in case Mr Okeke is charged over the same offence in another jurisdiction.

Although his sentencing was initially scheduled for October 22, 2020, it was postponed to Tuesday for reasons unknown to PREMIUM TIMES.

PREMIUM TIMES had earlier reported how family members, an employee, a pastor, and others related to Mr Okeke have flooded the U.S. court with appeals for leniency ahead of his sentencing for wire fraud.

In a series of letters of attestation to character sent to Rebecca Smith, the judge handling the case at a Virginia court, they expressed shock about the involvement of Mr Okeke in the unlawful activities and pleaded he be given a second chance.

They also pledged he would not take part in any unlawful act again.
Pakistan: Vision for blue economy

February 15,2021 | Source: Pakistan Observer

ADDRESSING the inaugural session of 9th International Maritime Conference, organised by Pakistan Navy in tandem with multinational AMAN exercise, President Arif Alvi presented vision and way forward to acquire benefits from maritime sector saying Pakistan will adopt a responsible strategy on blue economy for sustainable use of ocean resources. The very concept of blue economy refers to promote usage of ocean resources for economic growth, social inclusion and preservation of livelihoods while at the same time ensuring environmental sustainability of oceans and coastal areas. Hence, the President in his address rightly emphasised for better management and protection of ocean resources for the benefit of whole mankind especially to secure the future of coming generations. This responsibility also rests with world community to craft eco-based policies for ocean and coasts.



There is no denying the fact that future belongs to oceans. In our view, maritime is not just a sector but also a parallel economy, where all other sectors of economy cross through it. Luckily Pakistan is blessed with a vast area of ocean with approximately 1,050 km long coastline and Exclusive Economic Zone covering about 240,000 square kilometres. With right kind of approach and required investment, we can turn maritime industry into a profitable venture. Our coastal areas are rich in bio-productivity and bio diversity as they provide huge breeding grounds for commercially important fisheries including crabs and shrimps with a potential resource worth more than $2b annually. It is unfortunate that despite vast fish export potential, our fishing sector only contributes 0.4 percent to countrys GDP. This again signifies how little we are growing regardless having immense potential in this realm which in turn is impeding our growth prospects. It is a known fact that shipping is the cheapest mode of transportation and this is the reason that most of the worlds trade takes place through this manner.



Given the geo strategic location of Pakistan, we can become a hub of trade in the region and beyond. Multi-billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project and development of Gwadar port have provided us an excellent opportunity to tap true potential of blue economy. President Arif Alvi appropriately highlighted the fact that Gwadar port provides shortest route to China and Central Asian States to import and export their goods. Therefore, it is important that a special focus is put into effect for development of this port city on modern lines. This will also pave way for many subsidiary industries like shipyard, ship-breaking, construction, tourism and hotel industry etc. Gaddani in past used to be one of the largest ship breaking industry but now it is placed below those of India and Bangladesh. If this industry is revived in modern lines and utilised to its full potential, it can provide immense job opportunities and contribute billions of dollars annually to national economy.



Then coastal tourism is another industry that shows great promise. The tourists around the world are attracted towards beautiful places especially seacoasts with vast biodiversity and attractive beaches. Our coastal area that starts from Rann of Kutch in Sindh province till Jiwani in Gwadar is full of scenic spots and tourist resorts. It includes diverse range of landscape such as sand beaches, rock cliffs, bays, deltas, islands, mud volcanoes etc. Under the umbrella of CPEC, we also need to develop and promote coastal tourism to attract tourists from far and wide. It is need of the hour that an all-encompassing strategy is evolved with dedicated institutional efforts to tap the full potential of blue economy and efforts should be fast tracked to complete all corridor projects within the given time frame to revitalise the blue growth. This is the only way that will steer Pakistan out of economic crisis and put it on road of sustainable growth and progress.
This Pancake Tuesday, February 16th people are been encouraged to get creative with their toppings and create their very own Smiley Pancake in support of Mental Health Ireland.

The Smiley Pancake initiative has been running for a number of years but unfortunately this year due to the Covid pandemic the fundraiser cannot take place in person. Instead people are being asked to design their Smiley Pancake, take a photo and text MHI to 5030 to donate 4 to Mental Health Ireland.

People can send their photos to jamie@stsg.ie, message the Sligo Traveller Support Group Facebook page or message/WhatsApp 0851053319 with your photos. They will then me shared on social media.



Jamie Murphy from the Sligo Traveller Support Group said This is a great initiative that we have been supporting over the past few years. The issue of mental health and suicide is something that impacts all communities across the country and is of serious importance to us with rates of suicide at least 7 times higher that the general population. We would encourage as many people as possible from across the region to donate to Mental Health Ireland and send us your photos! We would love to be doing it in person but we can still be creative, enjoy some delicious food and support a great cause."
Although agencies and localities have made many efforts, there are still existing problems that require more drastic actions to control the pandemic.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc at the online conference held in Hanoi on February 15.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc wanted to listen from agencies and localities new measures to stop the outbreak of Covid-19 in Vietnam, especially when a number of infected cases found in Hanoi in recent days, including a Japanese man who was confirmed posthumously to be positive for the virus in his third test.

Mr. Phuc was making the request at an online conference held in Hanoi on February 15 with the participation of Government officials, representatives of the National Steering Committee for Covid-19 Prevention and Control, ministries and 26 cities and provinces.

Mr. Phuc said although agencies and localities have made many efforts, there are still existing problems that require more drastic actions to prevent the Covid-19 outbreak.

The Government leader and participants discussed about problems making public concerns, including vaccines  an urgent issue, social distancing in localities following the Governments Instruction 16, and the cancellation of organizing festivals during Tet (Lunar New Year) holiday.

Localities must to take drastic actions in implementing prevention measures and against Covid-19, Mr. Phuc said.

Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long said in the past 16 days, 12 of total 13 cities and provinces were seen decrease in the number of newly-infected cases, excepting for the northern province of Hai Duong, where is currently the Vietnams Covid-19 hotspot.

Six cities and provinces have not reported new cases for several days including the northern city of Hai Phong, the northern mountain provinces of Hoa Binh, Dien Bien and Ha Giang, the southern province of Binh Duong and the northern province of Hung Yen.

The outbreaks in these provinces and cities have been basically controlled, said Mr. Long.

The minister said the outbreak in Hai Duong Province is relatively serious, with 10 out of 12 districts having cases of infection. Almost the districts have basically controlled the spread but Cam Giang district alone is seen being complicated as it has a large industrial park with 60,000 workers who have travelled crossing localities.

He said the Ministry of Health and localities have actively and drastically implemented prevention measures. However, the risk of spread is still very high, especially in big cities like Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, where there is only one day left until the end of Tet, all agencies, factories and people will return to work.

Localities are needed to handle the pandemic faster, speeding up the implementation of tracing, detecting, isolating, testing, zoning, and handling thoroughly, said Mr. Long.

Chairman of Hanoi Peoples Committee Chu Ngoc Anh said the citys entire political system has been activated with all stages of tracing, zoning, sampling and testing, keeping up the situation and controlling the oubreak. F0 and F1 cases have been managed and quarantined in centralized isolation sites.

The city has conducted the tracing drastically with support from more than 10,000 community monitoring teams and local police to ensure safety for residents, Mr. Anh said.

As for the case of the Japanese man who was confirmed posthumously to be positive for the virus on February 14, Mr. Anh said Hanoi has taken all 296 samples of guests and staff of Somerset West Point hotel where he stayed, giving negative results.

Relevant to his travel from Ho Chi Minh City to Hanoi, Mr. Anh said the city also quickly sampled all employees of Noi Bai International Airport in one day and night with 12,302 samples, giving negative results. We are still investigating and tracing cases related to him.

hanoitimes
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Security forces in intensified their crackdown against anti- protesters on Monday, seeking to quell the large-scale demonstrations calling for the military junta that seized power earlier this month to reinstate the elected government.

More than 1,000 protesters were rallying in front of the Economic Bank in Mandalay, the country's second-largest city, when at least 10 trucks full of soldiers and police arrived and started firing slingshots toward the protesters before they even got out of the trucks, according to a photographer who witnessed the events.

The soldiers and police then attacked the protesters with sticks and slingshots, and police could be seen aiming long guns into the air amid sounds that resembled gunfire. Local media reported that rubber bullets were also fired into the crowd, and that a few people were injured.

Police were also seen pointing guns toward the protesters.

In the capital, Naypyitaw, protesters gathered outside a police station demanding the release of a group of high school students who were detained while joining in anti- activities.

One student who managed to escape told reporters that the pupils thought to range in age from 13 to 16 were demonstrating peacefully when a line of riot police suddenly arrived and began arresting them. It wasn't clear exactly how many students were rounded up, but estimates put the figure at between 20 and 40.

Earlier Monday, Myanmar's military leaders extended their detention of deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose remand was set to expire and whose freedom is a key demand of the crowds of people continuing to protest the February 1

will now be remanded until Feb. 17, when she will likely appear in court by videoconference, according to Khin Maung Zaw, a lawyer asked by Suu Kyi's party to represent her. The Nobel laureate remains under house arrest on a minor charge of possessing unregistered imported walkie-talkies.

Suu Kyi's extended detention is likely to further inflame tensions between the military and the protesters who have taken to the streets of cities across the Southeast



Asian nation seeking the return of the government they elected. Protesters continued to gather across on Monday, following a night in which authorities cut the country's internet access and increased the security presence in major cities seeking to curtail demonstrations.

Thousands of engineers marched on the streets of Mandalay chanting and holding signs that read: "Free our leader," "Who stands with justice?" and "Stop arresting people illegally at midnight."



In Yangon, the country's most populous city, fewer protesters gathered on Monday due to the loss of the internet and reports of military vehicles on the streets. Nevertheless, more than 1,000 anti-coup demonstrators were outside the Central Bank of Myanmar building, where there were also military trucks full of soldiers, riot police, water cannon trucks and armored personnel carriers.

Demonstrators carried placards that read "#SupportCDM #SaveMyanmar." CDM refers to the civil disobedience movement that has seen doctors, engineers and in Myanmar refuse to work until the military releases elected political leaders and returns the country to civilian rule.

Some protesters posed for photographs in front of military vehicles while holding red signs that read "Join in CDM."



When the military seized power, it detained and members of her government and prevented recently elected lawmakers from opening a new session of Parliament. The junta, led by Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, said it stepped in because the government failed to properly investigate allegations of fraud in last year's election, which Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party won in a landslide. The state election commission refuted that contention, saying there is no evidence to support it.

The military justified its move by citing a clause in the 2008 constitution, implemented during military rule, that says in cases of national emergency, the government's executive, legislative and judicial powers can be handed to the military commander-in-chief.

It is just one of many parts of the charter that ensured the military could maintain ultimate control over the country it ruled for 50 years following a 1962 coup. The military is allowed to appoint its members to 25 per cent of seats in Parliament and it controls several key ministries involved in security and defense.

An order on Sunday that appeared to be from the Ministry of Transport and Communications told mobile phone service providers to shut down internet connections from 1 a.m. to 9 a.m. Monday. It circulated widely on social media, as did a notice said to be from service provider Oredoo Myanmar containing the same details.

On Sunday, ambassadors from the United States and Canada and 12 European nations called on Myanmar's security forces to refrain from violence against those "protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government."



They condemned the arrests of political leaders and activists as well as the military's interference with communications.

"We support the people of Myanmar in their quest for democracy, freedom, peace, and prosperity," they said in a joint statement issued late Sunday night. "The world is watching.

Minister of Foreign Affairs Bogdan Aurescu will hold on Tuesday political consultations with his Slovakian counterpart Ivan Korcok, on the occasion of the latter's visit to Bucharest, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs informs.

"The visit represents a new opportunity to reconfirm the excellent character of the bilateral relationship, the continuity of the dialogue between the two states and the historical ties between Romania and the Slovak Republic. The consultations between Ministers Bogdan Aurescu and Ivan Korcok are aimed at deepening bilateral political, economic and sectoral cooperation. The talks will also provide an opportunity to exchange views on a range of subjects of common interest on the regional agenda, with a focus on energy security, cooperation in the B9 format and the Three Seas Initiative, respectively on the NATO and international agenda," the Foreign Ministry specified.

Also tackled will be the coordination on European subjects of common interest such as: combating the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, implementing the Multiannual Financial Framework and the European Recovery Plan, the Conference on the Future of Europe, the Eastern Partnership, the enlargement of the European Union.

At the end of the bilateral consultations, the two top diplomats will deliver a joint press statement starting with 12:10
Moscow has discussed Chinas initiative to hold a multilateral meeting aimed at convincing the United States to rejoin the Iranian nuclear deal with Washington and Beijing and can take part in it, Russias Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said.

"We discussed it with both Chinese and American colleagues. We are open to taking part in this even, even though it is clear that it is crucial to at least set out indicative understanding of what this meeting can result in for it to have meaningful substance," TASS cited him as saying.

The senior diplomat underlined that the meeting is especially relevant as February 21 is approaching when the bill passed in Iran that frees Tehran from complying with the IAEA additional protocol enters into force unless the U.S. lifts its sanctions. "We are calling on the U.S. to show political will and send a signal to Iran and other members of the international community showing readiness to rejoin the JCPOA. It would be important to start by lifting all sanctions which formed the backbone of the so-called policy of maximum pressure towards Iran under the Trump administration," Ryabkov stressed.

The deputy minister is convinced that this step will stop the situation from deteriorating further as a result of pre-announced actions of Tehran. He added that Moscow is calling on the Iranian colleagues to show responsibility and restraint.
Posted Monday, February 15, 2021 8:38 am

On Christmas Eve last year, Washington State Auditor Pat McCarthy's office issued a dire warning that state agency computer systems and data make "attractive targets for cyberattacks."

The admonition, in a 26-page cybersecurity audit report titled Continuing Opportunities to Improve State IT Security, noted agencies collect "vast amounts of confidential data" from the public.

It recommended fixes for "vulnerabilities" at five unnamed state agencies, cautioning  presciently, as it turned out  that a sensitive-data breach would bring a "loss of public confidence" as well as "considerable tangible costs."

The next day, Christmas, unknown actors compromised the auditor's own computer files, exposing a vast trove of private information in what may be the largest-ever cyberbreach for a Washington state agency.

The data included driver's license, Social Security and bank account numbers of more than 1.4 million unemployment claimants. It also included audit data involving 25 state agencies and 100 local governments, including the city of Seattle, as well as adoption files of 30 children and their families.

The Christmas Day breach has created massive problems for the agency and frustration and anger for those whose data was stolen. Many say they learned of the breach only through media accounts and are frustrated by the lack of information from the auditor.

The breach has also highlighted concerns about the use of outside vendors for sensitive data and raised questions about the speed of the auditor's response.

McCarthy's office says it learned of the "security incident" on Jan. 12, but it did not disclose its scope until Feb. 1. In revealing the breach, McCarthy repeatedly pointed blame at Accellion, the California tech firm whose aging digital file-sharing service, known as FTA, the auditor's office had relied on for more than a decade.

But McCarthy's office also is culpable, cybersecurity experts told The Seattle Times. They criticized the auditor's reliance on two-decade-old technology to store and transmit sensitive data  and some questioned whether the auditor needed to amass so much detailed personal information in the first place.

"Given the nature of the data and the risk of harm, certainly there should have been heightened security and heightened care given to this type of data transfer," said Emory Roane, policy counsel for the California-based nonprofit Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.

Roane called the breakdown "frustrating and annoying" but "not surprising in the least," adding: "There are a terrifying number of agencies that are using old software."

Ironically, the auditor's office had collected that claims data while auditing the state Employment Security Department over last year's $600 million fraud scheme. That creates potential new headaches for an unfortunate group of Washingtonians, who had a fraudulent claim taken out in their name, and now have had their personal information exposed again.

Wendy Whitaker is among them.

The Kent resident was laid off in June from her Boeing contractor job and tried to file for unemployment  only to find that a fraudulent unemployment claim was taken out in her name last spring.

Whitaker is still waiting to receive unemployment payments (she has since found work), and is taking steps to protect her credit. She was surprised the auditor's office hadn't contacted her or set up a third-party credit protection. "You would think they would have some sort of plan for us," Whitaker said. "That just amazes me."

Kathleen Cooper, a spokesperson for the auditor's office, said the agency "will directly notify people who have been affected," and is providing 12 months of credit monitoring free of charge, through Experian.

The agency is also setting up a call center, Cooper said, adding that the agency has "no evidence at this time that any of the data has been misused."

Jamila Thomas, chief of staff to Gov. Jay Inslee, said in an email to state employees last week such notification is expected "before the end of February." Thomas noted that "tens of thousands" of state employees are among the people whose data was compromised.

Accellion under fire

The timeline of the Accellion breach and notifications have been a point of contention between the company and the auditor. Accellion said in a statement it notified "all FTA customers" on Dec. 23. But McCarthy's office says it wasn't told until mid-January, and learned over the next few weeks about the extent of the breach.

Accellion said it had been encouraging customers to upgrade to its newer, more secure software.

But McCarthy, a Democrat elected to her second term in November, said earlier this month her office "believed that we were getting a secure system and we expected that  and the citizens of Washington state should expect that as well." Her office paid Accellion $17,000 a year for FTA.

Accellion has come under increasing fire for the breach of its FTA system, as more public and private organizations have revealed their files were exposed. The data breach may have affected 300 Accellion customers, ranging from a bank in New Zealand to a Singapore telecommunications firm, to the University of Colorado, according to the technology site Gizmodo.

The company should have retired its aging FTA product sooner, wrote Jeremy Kirk, managing editor at Information Security Media Group, in an analysis at BankInfoSecurity.com.

The nearly 20-year-old product was still in use by "hundreds of organizations in the finance, government and insurance sectors," making it "a juicy target" for cybercriminals, Kirk wrote. The company has announced FTA will be retired in April.

Accellion initially downplayed the consequences of the vulnerability in its FTA system. It didn't respond to questions for this story, but in a Jan. 12 statement, the company said it had been made aware in mid-December of the problem and released a patch to 50 affected customers within 72 hours "with minimal impact."

The fiasco could lead to a cascading set of legal, financial and logistical repercussions for the auditor, Accellion and the million-plus people who now have to worry about identity theft and other crimes. Two class-action lawsuits already have been filed in King County Superior Court.

Past breaches of government data have been costly. In 2013, a hack of an Arizona community college district's databases  with more than two million records, including banking and Social Security numbers, being offered for sale online  led to a payout of nearly $26 million. In 2019, Washington State University agreed to pay $4.7 million when a hard drive containing personal information of more than a million people was stolen from a self-storage locker.

The identities of those who accessed the auditor's data have not been disclosed. Federal and state investigations are ongoing.

Several Washington financial institutions said they've seen an uptick in calls from customers worried about the data breach. For several days after the breach was first reported, the Washington State Employees Credit Union's call center received around 1,100 calls a day from worried members, said spokesperson Ann Flannigan.

WSECU stepped up security measures, including extra scrutiny of withdrawals, but the bigger risks for individuals may come later.

Frequently when criminals get "tons and tons of data," Flannigan said, they'll sit on it for months in the hopes that media stories and consumer attention will fade. "And then down the line is when the fraud potentially starts to occur."

Stolen personal data often is sold on the dark web or by data brokers, experts said. Cybercriminals can use it to defraud people or demand ransom  or use it to launch additional hacking schemes. "Sometimes we see chains of attacks," said Inga Goddijn, executive vice president with the Virginia-based cybersecurity firm Risk Based Security.

While the auditor's office has emphasized Accellion's culpability, Goddijn said "every organization has an obligation to understand the security posture of the vendors that they rely on, especially when it comes to those who handle sensitive or personal information."

In an era where cybercrime is an ever-present and well-publicized threat, governments and companies alike should reconsider how much sensitive data to collect and store, said David Kohlbrenner, an assistant professor in the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington.

"If you can avoid having a piece of sensitive data that you don't need  don't have it. You can't lose something you don't have," Kohlbrenner said.

Mike Hamilton, former chief information security officer for the city of Seattle, said an underappreciated potential impact of the breach could be its effects on the hundred-plus state and local agencies whose audit-related files were compromised.

Depending on what was taken, Hamilton said, the files could give hackers knowledge of companies doing business with governments, lending themselves to business email compromise scams.

"I think the state has got some reputation repairing to do with all these governments," said Hamilton, now chief information security officer for the Seattle firm CI Security.

There are already indications of new tensions.

Ross Hunter, secretary of the state Department of Children, Youth and Families, said his staff called all 30 families whose adoption files were exposed in the breach.

"It's deeply personal information. ... We're concerned about it. I am upset that this got released," said Hunter, a former Microsoft manager.

The adoption-file samples had been gathered as part of a routine audit. Hunter said he supports the work of an independent state auditor, but his department will look carefully at how data is shared with McCarthy's office going forward.

"We clearly are not using this product that the auditor would like us to use. We will negotiate a way for the auditor to have access to our files," he said.

The city of Seattle is among the local governments that had audit-related information exposed. But city spokesperson Anthony Derrick said in an email Friday, "To my knowledge, no information was included in the data breach that isn't already publicly available."

History of cyber attacks

Lawmakers of both parties say the auditor's fiasco is a bad look for state government, which has already had a history of problems with IT management in addition to the massive unemployment fraud, which led to the audit, and indirectly to the data breach.

Since 2016, nine state or local governments have reported data breaches, and many have reported cyber-related incidents, including frauds, according to the auditor's Dec. 24 report. In September, state agencies were attacked by a coordinated phishing campaign.

"Our state agencies are frankly getting lazy on cybersecurity. There are so many tools in our encrypted security toolbox they could have used," said Rep. Matt Boehnke, R-Kennewick, who directs the cybersecurity degree program at Columbia Basin College.

State Sen. Reuven Carlyle, D-Seattle, who is sponsoring legislation to centralize state cybersecurity practices, said the auditor's office must take responsibility to "fiercely deconstruct" what happened and ensure the mistake is never repeated. "In this situation nobody gets to point fingers outward," he said.

Whitaker, the Kent resident, said she wants to see the auditor make amends.

"I get that data breaches can happen. But everybody pretends as though, 'Oh, we couldn't let that happen!' Oh, yes you could and if you do, you need to do something about it," she said. "That's what makes me mad."

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Market Reports on Saudi Arabia Provides the Trending Market Research Report on Bottled Water in Saudi Arabiaunder Food & Beverage category. The Bottled Water Market in Saudi Arabia is projected to exhibit highest growth rate over report offers a collection of superior market research, market analysis, and competitive intelligence and industry reports.

Total volume and value sales of bottled water actually benefitted from the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, and this category recorded growth. This was due to stockpiling and bulk buying of bottled water as the government enforced curfews and implemented periodic lockdowns in major cities, including Makkah and Madinah, in early March. Consumers feared that supermarkets would be included in lockdowns, and they therefore boosted their home supplies in anticipation of this.

Bottled Water in Saudi Arabia report offers a comprehensive guide to the size and shape of the market at a national level. It provides the latest retail sales data (2016-2020), allowing you to identify the sectors driving growth. It identifies the leading companies, the leading brands and offers strategic analysis of key factors influencing the market  be they legislative, distribution, packaging or pricing issues. Forecasts to 2025 illustrate how the market is set to change.

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Table Of Contents

Bottled Water in Saudi Arabia

LIST OF CONTENTS AND TABLES

KEY DATA FINDINGS

2020 IMPACT

Stockpiling and bulk-buy consumer trends during lockdown give bottled water a boost in 2020

Changes in government regulations help increase total volume shares in bottled water in 2020

Leading players in bottled water maintain rankings but face multiple challenges in 2020

RECOVERY AND OPPORTUNITIES

Health awareness, climate change and tourist economy to drive growth in bottled water

Outlook for bottled water is bright as consumers see it as a staple and continue to buy in bulk

National Plant For Healthy Water shows the way forward in terms of business investment

CATEGORY DATA

Table 1 Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: Volume 2015-2020

Table 2 Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: Value 2015-2020

Table 3 Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 4 Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: % Value Growth 2015-2020

Table 5 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade Bottled Water: % Volume 2016-2020

Table 6 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade Bottled Water: % Volume 2017-2020

Table 7 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade Bottled Water: % Value 2016-2020

Table 8 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade Bottled Water: % Value 2017-2020

Table 9 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: Volume 2020-2025

Table 10 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: Value 2020-2025

Table 11 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

Table 12 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Bottled Water by Category: % Value Growth 2020-2025

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

COVID-19 impact on soft drinks

COVID-19 country impact

Company response

Retailing shift

Foodservice vs retail split

What next for soft drinks?

CHART 1 Soft Drinks Off-Trade Volume Sales Growth Scenarios: 2018-2025

CHART 2 Soft Drinks On-Trade Volume Sales Growth Scenarios: 2018-2025

CHART 3 Soft Drinks Impact of Drivers on Off-Trade Volume Sales: 2017-2025

CHART 4 Soft Drinks Impact of Drivers on On-Trade Volume Sales: 2017-2025

MARKET DATA

Table 13 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: Volume 2015-2020

Table 14 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 15 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: Value 2015-2020

Table 16 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: % Value Growth 2015-2020

Table 17 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (as sold) by Category: Volume 2019

Table 18 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (as sold) by Category: % Volume 2019

Table 19 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: Value 2019

Table 20 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: % Value 2019

Table 21 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: Volume 2015-2020

Table 22 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 23 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: Value 2015-2020

Table 24 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: % Value Growth 2015-2020

Table 25 Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: Volume 2015-2020

Table 26 Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 27 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks (RTD): % Volume 2016-2020

Table 28 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks (RTD): % Volume 2017-2020

Table 29 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks: % Value 2016-2020

Table 30 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks: % Value 2017-2020

Table 31 Distribution of Off-trade Soft Drinks (as sold) by Format: % Volume 2015-2020

Table 32 Distribution of Off-trade Soft Drinks (as sold) by Format and Category: % Volume 2020

Table 33 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: Volume 2020-2025

Table 34 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

Table 35 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: Value 2020-2025

Table 36 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: % Value Growth 2020-2025

Table 37 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: Volume 2020-2025

Table 38 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

Table 39 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: Value 2020-2025

Table 40 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: % Value Growth 2020-2025

Table 41 Forecast Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: Volume 2020-2025

Table 42 Forecast Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

APPENDIX

Fountain sales in Saudi Arabia

Trends

GLOBAL MACROECONOMIC ENVIRONMENT

GLOBAL INDUSTRY ENVIRONMENT

DISCLAIMER

SOURCES

Summary 1 Research Sources

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Market Reports on Saudi Arabia provides you with an in-depth industry reports focusing on various economic, political and operational risk environment, complemented by detailed sector analysis. We have an exhaustive coverage on variety of industries  ranging from energy and chemicals to transportation, communications, constructions and mining to Food and Beverage and education. Our collection includes over 3000 up-to-date reports all researched, analysed and published by top-notch international research firms.

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The Egyptian Armed Forces said on Monday that it destroyed four smuggling tunnels in North Sinai and thwarted several attempts at illegal migration at its borders nationwide in January.

According to an official statement, the Armed Forces said its border guards seized ammunition and weaponry, including 11 machine guns, three sniper rifles and other weaponry, 2,500 bullets of various calibers and 15 satellite phones.

They thwarted illegal migration and infiltration attempts by 3,740 people of various nationalities.

It also arrested 170 smugglers and outlaws, the statement said.

It added that border guards seized 1,558 kgs of narcotic substances during inspection operations of vehicles passing through the Suez Canal tunnels.

They also seized 140 vehicles used in smuggling attempts and large quantities of smuggled and non-duty paid goods, 535,000 narcotic pills, and seven kilograms of smuggled gold.

This comes under intensified efforts and measures by the border guards to secure Egypts borders in parallel with intensifying control on all border crossings, the statement said.

Short link:


BRUSSELS - The NGO Emergency and Rome's self-managed space Casetta Rossa are among the 23 winners of the Solidarity Prize attributed by the European Economic and Social Committee for their work in the fight against Covid-19 and to support society during the lockdown. Both won a prize worth 10,000 euros awarded Monday during a virtual ceremony by the president of the committee responsible for communication, Cillian Lohan. The winners were selected among 250 candidatures presented by civil society organizations, single citizens and private companies from the EU and the United Kingdom.



Emergency won in the "transnational" category for the assistance provided in Europe and in the world to contain the pandemic, according to a statement. Casetta Rossa won for the services it provided during the lockdown, with the distribution of free meals and a radio station. "Radio anticorpi" (radio anti-bodies) provided daily information on Facebook with reports, live interviews from the "red zones" of northern Italy as well as history, art and music programs and creative advice on how to keep children active.



"It invested in an innovative and creative way to confront the emergency, mixing social and cultural elements to its service for disadvantaged people, to suggest a starting point for society after the pandemic", said a statement.
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ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.  At many law enforcement agencies in the U.S., there are police who police the police.

In Albuquerque, there will soon be police who police the police who police the police.

The city and Department of Justice are proposing to bring in an outside team to temporarily assist the Albuquerque Police Departments internal affairs investigators, correct issues as they arise, and train detectives on how to better do their job.

A stipulated order  filed in federal court and agreed to by the city, the Department of Justice and the independent monitor overseeing the police reform effort  lays out the proposal.

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It comes in response to a scathing report published by the independent monitor in November that said APD had failed at every level to police itself. The monitor evaluates the progress the city has made complying with the Court Approved Settlement Agreement it entered after the DOJ found in 2014 that officers had a pattern and practice of excessive force.

In his latest report, monitor James Ginger  looking at the period from Feb. 1 through July 31, 2020  found that officers failed to report use of force, detectives in the Internal Affairs Force Division were going through the motions in their investigations, APD leadership allowed subpar work and the then-chief of police signed off on it.

Partly because of that report, Chief Michael Geier was asked to step down, and his deputy chief, Harold Medina, is now serving as interim.

In a recent statement, Chief Medina said the department welcomes the resources and expertise as they make changes to the use of force investigations.

While this is a temporary solution, our longer-term goal is to build an internal investigative process that addresses the overall reform of the department, Medina said.

Agreement with DOJ

Assistant City Attorney Lindsay Van Meter said that initially the DOJ lawyers said Gingers report findings are grounds to hold the city in contempt, which could lead to its being put under receivership.

Instead, the parties worked out an order proposing the creation of an External Force Investigation Team, or EFIT, which will be made up of investigation experts and overseen by an administrator. Its members will accompany APDs internal affairs investigators to the scene after officers use force that causes injury, hospitalization or death.

A status conference about the order that had been scheduled for early February was vacated and U.S. District Judge James Browning will still need to sign off on it before it can be implemented. But the city is hoping to have an administrator in place in early May to begin hiring investigators.

APDs internal investigators will take lead at the scene but will be required to share all documents, evidence and investigative notes with the external team.

For each use of force investigation, EFIT shall evaluate the quality of IA force personnels investigations and immediately notify APD and APDs legal counsel of any deficiencies or misconduct by IA force personnel related to their investigations, the order says. APD shall promptly address these deficiencies or misconduct through corrective action or discipline, consistent with the (Court Approved Settlement Agreement), APD policy, and the (Collective Bargaining Agreement).

The order says that the city should try to return full responsibility to the internal investigators within nine months but that the time could be extended if needed.

If were successful with this order, it will be a massive jump in the level of compliance, Van Meter said. I dont think it gets us to 100%  there are other paragraphs we have to work on still but it will be a massive jump. And that is what were looking to do.

Knee-jerk reaction

Shaun Willoughby, president of the Albuquerque Police Officers Association, acknowledged that the department has room for improvement but said he believes this order is a knee-jerk reaction to the criticisms in the last report.

I dont think we need it, Willoughby said. Could we do better? Yes. Could we invest more? Yes. Is this a challenge? Yes, it is. Were an understaffed police department, with a crime rate that is unprecedented in one of the most challenging processes in bureaucracies that this police industry has to offer.

He said that internal affairs detectives are unhappy about the plan and that some want to transfer back to the field. He said they feel like theyre being punished even though they were not given adequate training to do what they needed to do. Part of the order mandates that APD increase its Internal Affairs Force Division to 25 detectives  Van Meter said it currently has 15.

Theyre so frustrated, they dont know how its going to work, Willoughby said. Theyre being told they dont do a good job.  Its my fundamental belief that the Albuquerque Police Department has to prove to this community above all that we can police ourselves. So thats a huge cornerstone in this process. What we are witnessing is just another hurdle that is going to elongate this process and cost the taxpayers more money.

For their part, the city attorneys agreed that the investigators werent given enough training and said theres a big difference between what they were doing while investigating a backlog use-of-force cases as practice and what they are being asked to do now. The backlog cases could not result in any discipline, because their deadlines under the collective bargaining agreement with the police union had passed.

We need to be ensuring that we have the appropriate system in place where we can differentiate when someones intentionally obstructing versus when somebody doesnt understand, City Attorney Esteban Aguilar said. This is complicated stuff. Its not like a light switch  again we have a use-of-force policy, just because it goes live and active doesnt mean that everybody understands that its going to get started on Day One.  What were dealing with are these fundamental habit changes.

Few violations found

Over the past several years, IA investigators have found few instances of officers using force that they shouldnt have. According to the last court-mandated use-of-force report, published in October 2020, in 2018, 3.7% of force cases were found to be out of policy. In 2019, it was 1.7%.

Asked whether the attorneys expected these percentages to rise due to more rigorous internal investigations, Van Meter said that in the short term, yes.

It does appear that the failure is to call out-of-policy force out of policy, she said. That being said, theres also a feedback loop, and once officers understand the rules  what is out of policy  that means theyre likely to change their behavior and for them to not do that conduct anymore.

Van Meter said the details of the external force investigation team  such as how many investigators will be hired (more than three, fewer than 30) and how much they will get paid  are still being worked out. Ginger will also receive another contract and additional funding.

He has been paid about $7.5 million since 2015.

Aguilar stressed that while he doesnt agree with every adjective Ginger used to criticize the department, the data he used in his report was accurate and the city doesnt contest his findings.

What I want to push back on is the narrative that the monitor is extending this or changing the goal posts or changing the marks in a way that is prolonging the process for his own financial gain, Aguilar said. Hes an officer of the court, he represents the judge, and he is the eyes and ears. So he has a responsibility to accurately portray that information and communicate that.

Furthermore, Van Meter suggested that there is evidence that the reform effort is having some effect, namely that there has been a reduction in high-dollar payouts in lawsuits for excessive use of force over recent years. In the years leading up to the DOJ investigation and settlement agreement the city spent at least $28 million on officer misconduct lawsuits.

JOINT MOTION FOR ENTRY OF STIPULATED ORDER ESTABLISHING AN EXTERNAL FORCE INVESTIGATION TEAM by Albuquerque Journal on Scribd
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The dark underbelly of the infamous Chippendales all-male review is being laid bare in a new true-crime podcast that details how greed and jealousy among its founders led to arson, murder, and suicide.

Host Natalia Petrzela, a historian and fitness instructor, interviewed more than 60 people for her new podcast Welcome to Your Fantasy, including former dancers, investigators, and customers, according to Los Angeles Magazine.

'Chippendales wasnt just pecs and mullets and G-strings stuffed with dollar bills,' Petrzela explains on the show. 'It was a sordid world of greed, arsons, hired hitmen, a years-long FBI manhunt, and a feud that would leave two business partners dead.'

True crime: Historian Natalia Petrzela explores the dark underbelly of Chippendales in the new podcast Welcome to Your Fantasy. Chippendales dancers are pictured in Las Vegas in 2002

Looking back: The first Chippendales club opened in Los Angeles in 1979, pictured, and women would line up around the block to see the all-male revue

Owner: Indian immigrant Somen 'Steve' Banerjee, pictured, co-founded the company with his partner Bruce Nahin

Chippendales was co-founded by Somen 'Steve' Banerjee, an Indian immigrant who had moved from Bombay to Los Angeles in the late 1960s.

Banerjee worked as a janitor and owned two gas stations before he bought the failing bar, Destiny II, on the Westside of LA. He and his partner Bruce Nahin tried everything from female mud wrestling to magic shows to bring in crowds without any success.

Their luck changed when Paul Snider, a self-described 'Jewish pimp' from Canada, suggested an all-male strip night.

Banerjee heeded his advice, and in 1979, they opened Chippendales, which was named after the 18th-century furniture style to make it sound classy.

The all-male revue drew in crowds of women who lined up around the block to tuck dollar bills into the G-strings of the hunky, oiled up dancers, some of whom Snider discovered in gyms and beaches around the city.

The troupe started wearing Chippendales's signature bowtie and cuffs at the suggestion of Snider's wife, Dorothy Stratten, a Playboy Playmate of the Year.

While the concept was a hit, there was little to no diversity as the performers who were hired were primarily white.

Striking gold: Paul Snider, a self-described 'Jewish pimp' from Canada, gave Banerjee and Nahin the idea for the all-male strip night. He's pictured with his wife Dorothy Stratten

Troubles: Snider discovered Stratten in a Dairy Queen in Canada and took her to Hollywood. As she ascended to become Playboy Playmate of the Year, they drifted apart

Contribution: The troupe started wearing Chippendales's signature bowtie and cuffs at Stratten's suggestion

'Banerjee wanted a classy club, and for him, classy meant white,' Petrzela told Los Angeles Magazine. 'Although as the show matured, there was often one black dancer at a time.

'But its important to realize how deliberately this was constructed as a white space in a city that is extraordinarily diverse. What Chippendales was creating was a new masculine ideal, which was white, really buff, and clean cut.'

Just a year after the club opened, Snider, jealous of his estranged wife's success, shot and killed 20-year-old Stratten before turning the gun on himself in August 1980.

Snider discovered Stratten in a Dairy Queen in Canada and took her to Hollywood to try to make her famous. As she ascended to become Playmate of the Year and win Hugh Hefner's attention, they drifted apart.

Murder-suicide: In 1980, Snider shot and killed Stratten before turning the gun on himself. They're pictured celebrating her 20th birthday in their LA home where he later murdered her

Expanding: Banerjee hired Emmy-winning producer Nick De Noia to choreograph the troupe's tour and live show routines in 1981. De Noia is pictured with his ex-wife Jennifer O'Neill

Greed: Banerjee became jealous of the money De Noia was pulling in from the tour and resented how he took credit for the success of Chippendales

She eventually became involved with a movie director Peter Bogdanovich after meeting him at a Playboy mansion party.

Snider, angry to be left behind, murdered her at his home after she came over to negotiate a financial settlement with him and then killed himself.

The murder-suicide became the basis of the 1983 drama Star 80, which starred Mariel Hemingway as Stratten and Eric Roberts as Snider.

In 1981, as Chippendales continued to attract hoards of women, Banerjee hired Emmy-winning producer Nick De Noia to choreograph the troupe's tour and live show routines.

They launched a second Chippendales location in New York in 1983 follow by clubs in Dallas and Denver, but the company started facing competition from rival male strip clubs.

Hitman: Banerjee asked Ray Colone to hire a hitman to shoot De Noia in 1987. He's pictured with O'Neill in 1975

Crime scene: De Noia was shot in the face at his Chippendales office desk in midtown Manhattan. Police are pictured carrying out his body in April 1987

Still a success: Banerjee was arrested for racketeering, murder, and arson. He hanged himself in his jail cell in 1994. A Chippendales dancer is pictured performing in Paris in 1990

Worried about the future of his business, Banerjee attempted to burn down or vandalize competing clubs. During this time, his relationship with De Noia had also deteriorated, with Banerjee's partner Nahin sometimes having to serve as the middle man between the two.

Banerjee was jealous of the money De Noia was pulling in from the tour and resented how he took credit for the success of Chippendales. In 1987, he asked Ray Colone to hire a hitman to shoot De Noia dead at his Chippendales office desk in midtown Manhattan.

The Chippendales co-founder was also plotting to have Nahin and two other former associates killed, but an FBI sting led to his arrest.

Banerjee pleaded guilty to a racketeering charge that included orchestrating De Noias murder and attempted arson.

Success: New owners relaunched Chippendales in 2000. The dancers now perform for a whole new crowd at a $10 million theater in the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas

Famous faces: Tony Dovolani from Dancing With the Stars is pictured performing in a Chippendales show in 2018

He was to be sentenced to 26 years in prison under terms of a plea bargain, the Los Angeles Times reported in 1994.

Banerjee was found dead in his cell after he used a bedsheet to hang himself.

The Chippendales clubs closed after De Noia and Banerjee's deaths, but new owners bought and relaunched the brand in 2000.

The Chippendales dancers now perform for a whole new crowd at a $10 million theater in the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas that was built specifically for the troupe. They also continue to tour worldwide.

Welcome to Your Fantasy premiered on February 10 with the first of eight episodes chronicling the dark history of the campy male strip show.
How To Stay Safe from Online Phishing; What Are the Legal Remedies To Get Justice

Privacy is myth in India, because we do not have any law pertaining to it. The Supreme Court declaring privacy as a fundamental right is a good thing, but where is the law and the implementation to protect this so-called fundamental right? questioned advocate Dr Prashant Mali. While speaking at a webinar organised by Moneylife Foundation, the cyber law & cyber security expert, spoke in detail how one can protect oneself from online crimes and what steps you need to take to get justice.

In an enlightening talk, advocate Mali explained in detail how greed or bait act as base for increasing number of online frauds, and how we must be careful and vigilant abot becoming a victim to such a cybercrime.

Starting with the basics, advocate Mali first explained the difference between various cyber-attacks such as phishing, vishing (voice-based phishing), smishing (SMS based phishing) and spear phishing (targeted phishing).

Deriving from the word fishing, phishing is like its original word, in the way that there is a hook, a bait and you essentially are the fish. The hook can be an SMS, a WhatsApp message, a call or an email, which lures you in, while the bait could a lottery, income tax refund, a job or even free COVID vaccine, explained advocate Mali.

Speaking about vishing attacks, he explained how fraudsters calling from call centres, sweet talk people, especially senior citizens into revealing their personal identification (PIN) numbers, passwords, and bank details. Nowadays, with the advent of technology and the availability of leaked data on the internet, it has become relatively easy for fraudsters to lure people with rosy messages, including some personal information, which coupled with ones greed or unawareness can lead to a devastating incident of phishing.

Advocate Mali also briefly touched upon Olx-and Quickr-based scams, where a buyer or seller is defrauded by extracting money from bank accounts using an innocent looking link for unified payments interface (UPI). People, who are new to UPI based payments or online transactions, often fall victim to such frauds on platforms, which allow users to sell or buy second-hand products.

For example, many victims misunderstood the collect payment notification as receive payment. In UPI, one can transfer as well as receive payment from other users. Scamsters send pay requests, which transfer money directly into his account instead of the victim receiving any money.

The simple precaution to take in all such cases, according to advocate Mali is to mistrust everything and anything that you receive either on phone, SMS or email. Do not click on links, which you have received, unless you are certain of their source and validity, as you do not know where they lead.

Clicking on unsafe links on a mobile device can trigger hidden installation of files which transforms your device into a server, allowing the attacker direct access all information on your phone. It is also important to understand that banks will never call a customer and ask for their PIN number or OTP password. Such information should be kept confidential and never shared publicly either over phone or in a message, the cyber lawyer says.

Advocate Mali goes on to explain that if you do somehow become a victim of such online fraud, the first and foremost thing is to write down in detail the nature of the crime and the losses incurred due to it. Copies of this written incident report should be given to the bank when filing a complaint and also to the nearest police station, when filing a first information report (FIR), ensuring that an acknowledgment is received from both parties.

In case money has been transferred from your account to a mule account, do not panic but immediately rush to the nearest branch of your bank and speak to the branch manager. Force upon them the emergency of the situation and ask them to freeze the mule account immediately, said advocate Mali.

Freezing the mule account will help you recover the money faster, while the police are investigating or while you are filing a court case seeking return of property.

However, advocate Mali also commented that in India it becomes very difficult for a cybercrime complaint to be taken up through the proper channels, when the police sometimes are disinterested and even if the criminal is caught, they do not face severe punishment. According to him, deterrence will only occur when you put scamsters in jail, punish them and make an example of it. That is not happening as these people are getting bail and when they are free, they commit the same crime in an adjacent jurisdiction.

Advocate Mali also referred to a few websites, where people can submit suspicious links, emails, or incidents of phishing, so that some awareness is created and appropriate action might be taken to take down a website or page which performs phishing attacks. Using https://www.reportphishing.in , which is specific to the state of Maharashtra, victims or even people who suspect phishing scams can report such incidents through the online portal. The Central government equivalent of this site is https://cybercrime.gov.in , which serves as the National Cyber Crime Reporting portal.

Although these sites are useful, advocate Mali cautions that reporting on these sites does not mean that a police complaint or FIR is registered. These sites only forward your incident report to the nearest police station, from where it becomes the responsibility of that particular station to allocate resources and investigate the crime.

He stresses that in almost all cases, it is important to file a complaint directly with the nearest police station, rather than waiting for action after reporting incidents through online portals.

Video Recording of the Session:
Citizens who gave up the solace of their homes to sit outdoors on protest through the harshest Delhi winter in decades were, in fact, undertaking an extraordinary act on Gandhian lines, and this was noted around the world. (Photo:PTI)

Dismissing a review petition to its judgment of last October, the Supreme Court last week reasserted its earlier order and said that it was not acceptable that protests should lead to the continued occupation of public place affecting (the) rights of others. The constitutional scheme comes with a right to protest and express dissent but (also) with an obligation to have certain duties, the top court pointed out.

In the routine sense, these averments are in keeping with the constitutional scheme. The courts order was in respect of continued occupation of public space arising out of the Shaheen Bagh movement. A prolonged protest of mainly Muslim women against the Constitutional (Amendment) Act had led to the traffic flow being obstructed. The anti-CAA movement, however, needed to be placed in perspective.

The CAA is a law that strikes at the root of the basic precepts of citizenship as per the Constitution. The apex court is yet to offer a pronouncement on this subject although the matter has been before it (as is the thorny question of Kashmir) since last year. Citizens who gave up the solace of their homes to sit outdoors on protest through the harshest Delhi winter in decades were, in fact, undertaking an extraordinary act on Gandhian lines, and this was noted around the world.

To uphold judicial logic in the noblest historical sense, it may have been apposite if the apex court had first spoken on the constitutionality of CAA, upheld it, and then curbed the anti-CAA protesters. In the absence of this, it is the executive that may draw solace from the Supreme Court order, not the citizen.

To draw a parallel, in the current farmers agitation, the police have jammed streets to create discontent in a locality on traffic grounds. In the anti-CAA protest too, the police blocked traffic near the protest site in order to heighten the sense that the flow was being obstructed by the protesters  and this narrative prevailed, not least because the agitators were mainly from the minority community.

When the judiciary deals with a situation that becomes a point of departure  as the anti-CAA protest was  what should be the proportionality of the application of normal laws? This is a question to be contemplated.


Before anyone outside her hometown knew her name, Disha Ravi spent four years raising awareness among young people in Bangalore about the effects of climate change.

Now the 21-year-old activist is jailed in New Delhi. The allegation: She distributed a tool kit in the form of a Google Doc containing talking points and contact information for influential groups to drum up support for farmers who have been protesting against the Indian government for months.

The document  which the police say she shared with Greta Thunberg, the 18-year-old Swedish climate activist  resembles the kind that grass-roots organizations around the world have used for years to campaign for their causes.

But Ms. Ravi, the police contend, was using it to spread disaffection against the Indian State.

The arrest, the latest in a series of broader crackdown on activists, has triggered anger and disbelief among opposition politicians, student groups and lawyers, who say the government is using its law enforcement agencies to increasingly stifle dissent, in line with a broader deterioration of free speech in India. Ms. Ravis arrest, they said, has raised the crackdown to a new level.
[February 15, 2021] GSR Names Houlihan Lokey MD David Sola COO

GSR, a global leader in digital asset market-making, announced today that it has hired David Sola, former managing director of global investment bank Houlihan Lokey's Financial Institutions Group, as its new Chief Operating Officer. The company also announced the appointment of W. G. (Trey) Griggs, III, a former J. Aron and Calpine executive, as Chief Executive Officer of GSR Services USA, a subsidiary of GSR's global operation. Both appointments come as GSR continues its record-breaking pace of growth and business expansion. In 2020, the company recorded its first billion-dollar year in the creation and trading of custom cryptocurrency options, alongside its market making business that provides hundreds of millions of dollars to the crypto ecosystem daily. In the midst of a challenging global economy, GSR has rapidly expanded its team, which now numbers over 65 market professionals, technology experts and support staff. Already, the company has added 12 individuals in 2021 and plans to reach over 100 personnel by the end of the summer. Prior to joining GSR, Mr. Sola spent a decade as the head of Houlihan Lokey's deal-making team in London. His work has centered around the convergence of traditional and digital finance and other industries, helping firms navigate the technological, financial and regulatory aspects of this fast-growing space. He has been the lead M&A banker on over $80 billion of completed transactions across multiple geogaphies. He also spearheaded equity and debt financings for clients in the public and private markets and advised on financial restructurings and joint ventures. He brings an extensive network of contacts from across the European banking industry, which will be vital as GSR continues to expand its business among traditional financial firms entering the digital asset marketplace.



Prior to his time at Houlihan Lokey, Mr. Sola was a Managing Director for SoftBank Europe, overseeing the conglomerate's technology investments in the region. He also spent seven years at UBS Investment Bank, where he was the co-head of European M&A. Cristian Gil, GSR Co-Founder, said: "David's appointment attests to the transformative impact that digital assets are having on financial services and to the substantial role that GSR is playing in this transformation. His expertise will be essential as we further accelerate GSR's growth in this fast-moving space. We are thrilled to bring David on to our roster of team members from some of the top firms in finance."

Mr. Sola added: "There are a handful of firms bridging the gap between traditional and digital finance, and I believe GSR is among those leaders. I was impressed with the vision, values and caliber of the GSR team as well as its potential to impact the future of finance. Digital assets are transforming the financial industry and every vertical it serves, and I saw this as an exciting opportunity to drive that progress." The appointment of Mr. Griggs as CEO of GSR Services USA will also bring unparalleled experience to GSR's leadership team. Prior to joining GSR, Mr. Griggs led efforts to locate and evaluate acquisition opportunities at Kindle Energy, a Blackstone portfolio company. Mr. Griggs also worked at independent power producer Calpine in roles including President, Chief Commercial Officer and Executive Vice President. Earlier in his career, Mr. Griggs worked at Goldman Sachs' J. Aron division for 14 years alongside GSR founders Cristian Gil and Richard Rosenblum. Trey led Goldman's North American Energy Risk Management activities and went on to establish and lead the Houston based Commodities Sales & Trading Office from 2011 to 2015. "I'm excited to work once again with Rich and Cris, as well as the rest of the GSR team," said Mr. Griggs. "GSR's rapid growth is a testament to the company's standard of service and unique approach to digital asset markets. I look forward to building the company's global presence, with a primary focus on the US market." About GSR GSR, founded in 2013, is a global leader in digital asset trading. We specialize in providing liquidity, risk management and structured products to institutional participants in the digital asset ecosystem. Our team of veteran finance and technology executives from Goldman Sachs, Two Sigma, Citadel, IBM (News - Alert) and Oracle, among others, has developed one of the world's fastest and most robust trading platforms. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005333/en/

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Cebu (CNN Philippines, February 15)  Police have arrested seven people in an operation in a top Cebu school on Monday, where they said 19 Lumad children from Davao del Norte were rescued from alleged kidnapping by a militant group.

According to authorities, parents claimed their children were taken by members of the Salugpungan Ta' Tanu Igkanogon without their consent and were told they would be brought to Davao City for their schooling. They were instead found to have been staying at a retreat house of the University of San Carlos-Talamban Campus in Cebu since 2018, police said.

In 2019, 55 schools operated and owned by the Salugpungan Ta' Tanu Igkanogon Community Learning Centers in the Davao region were shut down by the Department of Education for allegedly teaching "left-leaning ideologies." Salugpungan claimed its schools were established to give indigenous groups in remote areas access to education.

The police were accompanied by personnel from the Cebu City Social Welfare Development Office, the Women and Children Protection Center Visayas Field Unit, and the Children Protection Desk of the Cebu City Police Office.

"According to their parents, their children were taken by the members of Salugpungan Ta' Tanu Igkanogon without their knowledge and consent," Police Regional Office-7 Director PBGen. Ronnie Montejo said in a press conference at Camp Sergio Osmena Monday afternoon.

Montejo said they were only answering the calls for help from the parents. He added the children would undergo basic interventions before they are sent home to Davao del Norte.

Authorities said those arrested would be charged with kidnapping and serious illegal detention, violation of the Anti-Human Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003, and the Anti-Child Abuse Law.

Meanwhile, the Save Our Schools Network, a group of child-focused NGOs, church-based groups and other stakeholders advocating for children's rights, is calling for the release of those apprehended in the operation which they described as a raid.

But police insist it was a rescue operation.

Montejo said they would look into the possible liabilities of the University of San Carlos.

The Society of the Divine (SVD) Philippines Southern Province, the religious community that operates the university, and the University of San Carlos issued a joint statement on Monday on what they called a "serious concern."

The SVD said they hosted last March 11, 2020 a delegation of 42 students, along with five teachers and three community leaders. This was because they were in support of the Archdiocese of Cebu-Commission on Social Advocacies (COSA) project of a 'bakwit' school program with Save Our Schools Network.

Bakwit is the term used for people displaced because of unrest in their communities.

The group was hosted at the retreat house and was supposed to complete their modular schooling on April 3 of the same year, and would then return to their communities.

But due to COVID-19 quarantine restrictions, the SVD community has since sheltered the group, "providing them with comfortable accommodation, and allowing them the use of its facilities." They added preparations for the group's return home were in progress and that it would be carried out in batches because of the requirements needed for travel.

They said at least four delegates have already returned home, and another batch will follow this week.

"It, thus, came as a surprise that reports about minors being 'rescued' surfaced today. While COSA mentioned that some parents were coming over to fetch their children, it did not dawn on us that the parents' visit will necessitate the presence of policemen," the statement read.

No rescue ever needs to take place in the area, the statement added, "because the presence of Lumads in the retreat house was for their welfare and well-being, and all throughout, they were nurtured, cared for, and treated with their best interest in mind."
Investigation launched after mans body found in drainpipe

PHUKET: Police are investigating the death of a man whose body was found in a drainpipe near Bang Che Lao mosque, in Moo 2, Rassada, on Saturday evening (Feb 13).

deathhomicidepolice

By Eakkapop Thongtub

Monday 15 February 2021, 11:45AM

UPDATE: Phuket Provincial Police Chief Maj Gen Pornsak Nuannu on Monday (Feb 15) confirmed that Mr Theeraphong did suffer a head injury and that medical examiners were investigating the injury as part of their investigation into Mr Theeraphongs cause of death.

The man was last seen drinking with friends last Thursday night (Feb 11).

Lt Wiroj Pornprapruk of the Phuket City Police was called to the scene, in Soi Bang Chi Lao 2, at about 6:30pm on Saturday.

Police arrived with Kusoldharm rescue workers and forensic police investigators to find the mans body inside a drainpipe measuring about 60 centimeters wide.

The body had already started to decompose, police noted.

Local resident Phichai Kaewmoonmuk, 55, confirmed the body recovered was that of his 35-year-old son, Theerapong.

Mr Phichai said he had been searching for Mr Theerapong for two days. He identified the body by his long hair and a tattoo on his sons right shoulder.

Mr Phichai explained that Theerapong was last seen last Thursday, when he was drinking with two friends at a small shack about 50 metres from the pipe.

Me and my neighbours together searched for him for two days, but we could not find him, he said.

Forensic police noted that no signs of assault were found on Mr Theerapongs body and no weapons were found in the area.

Mr Theerapongs body was taken to Vachira Phuket Hospital for further examination.

Forensic officers returned to examine the scene further yesterday (Feb 14). Tracks and what appeared to be scuffle marks on the ground near where the body was found are now believed to be nothing more than tracks caused by the people searching for Mr Theerapong, forensic police later explained.

Mr Theerapong was last seen on Thursday night drinking and talking with friends Saman Mood Khontrong, 43, and Prasit Blue Pensuk, 50.

Mr Saman told officers that he was walking back from fishing when he saw Mr Theerapong sitting talking with his friend Mr Prasit at the shack near the drainpipe at about 10pm, so he went to join them.

However, Mr Prasit told police that Mr Saman joined them at about 00:30am.

Mr Prasit also said that after about half an hour, at about 1am, he told Theerapong and Saman that it was time for him to go home, but he invited the two to join him at his house to continue their quiet evening.

Mr Prasit said he went home and waited for them until midnight, but they didnt arrive.

"I thought Theerapong went to Samans house, so I had a shower, ate dinner and went to bed," he said.

"Then in the morning a neighbor told me that Theerapongs motorbike had been found parked in the middle of the [dirt] road near the pipe," he added.

"I asked Saman if they kept drinking that night, and he told me that Theerapong was following him back to his house on his motorbike, but along the way Theerapong disappeared and did not turn up at his house later, Mr Prasit explained.

"Saman said he thought Theerapong came to my house," Mr Prasit said.

A search was launched for Mr Theerapong after Mr Saman reported finding Mr Theerapongs motorbike parked in the middle of the dirt track near the drainpipe.

"I, together with village chief [Phu Yai Baan] of Moo 2 Surach Saengnak and 30 other local residents, searched for Theerapong," Prasit said.

Mr Theerapongs father, Mr Phichai, suspects foul play. He said that his son was not very talkative, but liked spending time with his friends.

"I suspect that my son has been murdered, as I saw a big wound on his head. The wound doesnt look like one from falling from a motorbike," he said, despite forensic police in their initial report noting that no signs of assault were found on Me Theerapongs body.

"However, I still have to wait for the police report about his cause of death," Mr Phichai added.

Forensic police noted in their initial report that they will continue their investigation and question Mr Thereapongs friends and other people in the area further.

They are also to wait for confirmation of the cause of death from the medical examination being conducted on Mr Theerapongs remains at Vachira Phuket Hospital.

Offices will also check CCTV footage from the area, the report noted.

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By naming this Windows tablet the Surface Pro 7+, Microsoft mistakenly implies that its some sort of minor upgrade from the Surface Pro 7. Nothing could be further from the truth: We rarely see such massive upgrades in CPU and GPU horsepower, as well as battery life. It also offers an LTE option and an absolutely dead-silent, fanless chassis.

Sure, a few decisions made us scratch our heads. Why do we have to choose between an integrated microSD slot or the LTE option? Thunderbolt still isnt here, either. But even these flaws really cant mar an exciting leap in performance. This is the best Surface Pro of several generations, and for the moment the best Windows tablet on the market, too.

This review is part of our ongoing roundup of the best laptops. Go there for information on competing products and how we tested them.

Surface Pro 7+ specs and features

As we look at the Surface Pro 7+ specs, note that at press time, the only retail source we could find was Microsofts own online store. Incidentally, spelling the name as either Surface Pro 7+ or Surface Pro 7 Plus works, but the full name is Surface Pro 7+ for Business. It ships with Windows 10 Pro, which offers more management and security features than the Home version.

Unlike with past Surface Pro devices, where the base model was often inadequate, every Surface Pro 7+ configuration available is solid. While the $900 Core i3/8GB/128GB version is a bit tight on storage space, at least it doesnt skimp on RAM.

Mark Hachman / IDG Microsofts Surface Pro 7+ provides a bright enough screen to work outdoors on a sunny day, though shade is preferred.

Display: 12.3-inch multitouch PixelSense display (2736x1824)

12.3-inch multitouch PixelSense display (2736x1824) Processor: Intel Core i3-1115G4 / Core i5-1135G7 (as tested) / Core I7-1165G7

Intel Core i3-1115G4 / Core i5-1135G7 (as tested) / Core I7-1165G7 Graphics: UHD (Core i3), Iris Xe (Core i5/i7, as tested)

UHD (Core i3), Iris Xe (Core i5/i7, as tested) Memory: 8GB, 16GB LPDDR4x (Wi-Fi, LTE, as tested); 32GB LPDDR4x (Wi-Fi)

8GB, 16GB LPDDR4x (Wi-Fi, LTE, as tested); 32GB LPDDR4x (Wi-Fi) Storage: 128GB/256GB (Wi-Fi, LTE); 512GB/1TB (Wi-Fi)

128GB/256GB (Wi-Fi, LTE); 512GB/1TB (Wi-Fi) Ports: 1 USB-C, 1 USB-A, 1 Surface Connector, 1 Type Cover, microSDXC (Wi-Fi) or 1 nanoSIM (LTE), 3.5mm headphone jack

1 USB-C, 1 USB-A, 1 Surface Connector, 1 Type Cover, microSDXC (Wi-Fi) or 1 nanoSIM (LTE), 3.5mm headphone jack Security: Camera (Windows Hello)

Camera (Windows Hello) Camera: 5MP/1080p (user-facing), 8MP (rear-facing)

5MP/1080p (user-facing), 8MP (rear-facing) Battery: 50.4Wh (claimed), 48.9Wh actual

50.4Wh (claimed), 48.9Wh actual Wireless: WiFi 6 (802.11ax), Bluetooth 5.0; Qualcomm X20 modem (LTE bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, 19, 20, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 38, 39, 40, 41, 66)

WiFi 6 (802.11ax), Bluetooth 5.0; Qualcomm X20 modem (LTE bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, 19, 20, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 38, 39, 40, 41, 66) Operating system: Windows 10 Pro

Windows 10 Pro Dimensions: 11.5 x 7.9 x 0.33 inches

11.5 x 7.9 x 0.33 inches Weight: 1.7 pounds (Core i3/i5 w/ Wi-Fi) to 1.73 pounds (Core i5, LTE)

1.7 pounds (Core i3/i5 w/ Wi-Fi) to 1.73 pounds (Core i5, LTE) Color: Platinum, Matte Black

Platinum, Matte Black Price: From $900 at Microsoft $1,650 as tested

From $900 at Microsoft $1,650 as tested Optional accessories: Surface Pro Signature Type Cover ($160 on Amazon) Surface Pen ($64 on microsoft.com)

Surface Pro 7+ Design

Microsofts Surface Pro lineup of Windows tablets has remained largely unchanged since the Surface Pro 3. Its a 12-inch Windows tablet with a sturdy kickstand that reclines almost flat. Microsoft has always taken pride in the design of the Surface Pros hinge, and its justifiedit enables triple-duty as a tablet, drawing pad, and something close to a traditional clamshell laptop.

Mark Hachman / IDG Clamshell tablets usually recline to about 45 degrees. The Surface Pro 7+ can recline nearly flat, still sturdily supported by its kickstand.

Microsoft manufactured the Surface Pro 7+ out of what it calls a unibody magnesium design with hidden perimeter venting. The unibody construction gives the tablet structural strength, while the magnesium serves as a passive heat pipe to the outside world, bolstered by the tiny vents cut into the periphery of the chassis. Both the Core i3 and Core i5 models are entirely fanless designs, which absolutely depend on these passive heat distribution methods. As our performance tests reveal, such superb improvements without the distraction of a fan are truly worth applauding.

The Surface Pro 7+ display is as bright and beautiful as ever, offering both Enhanced and sRGB color modes. Microsoft continues the Surface tradition of carving out rather substantial bezels around the displayabout 1.5 centimeters to the sides in landscape mode, and about 1.2 cm at top and bottom. Aesthetically, they grow uglier each year as laptop display bezels continue to shrink. But theyre still handy when the Surface Pro 7+ is actually used as a tablet, so you can grasp it without accidentally triggering something.

Every time I test a Surface tablet I realize once again just how convenient it can be to tote a tablet, clicking out the kickstand to watch a video on a bedspread, lap, or side table. If I werent so worried about gunking up the display, I might have even brought it into the kitchen.

Mark Hachman / IDG Microsofts Surface Pro 7+ in a more traditional recline, where the narrow kickstand is visible. Note how the Type Covers hinge folds where it meets the keyboard. Visible are the Surface Connector slot, plus the USB Type A and Type C port.

Microsoft representatives told me the display was made thinner to accommodate a larger, 50.4-Watt-hour battery. (Windows reported that the battery was somewhat smaller than Microsofts claims, at 48.9Wh.) Microsoft rates the display at 400 nits, according to a company representative.

Unfortunately, Microsoft has stuck fast to its rapidly aging port choices. The integrated USB-A can be used with a keyboard or wired mouse. Microsoft still uses the legacy Surface Connector as either a charging port or as a connection to the Surface Dock 2.

Mark Hachman / IDG

The Surface Connector was once far ahead of its time, but it now lags somewhat behind. The USB-C port accommodates the vast ecosystem of USB-C hubs, but it isnt Thunderbolt-capable, as more laptops include these days. Any monitor output must route through the Surface Connector to the Surface Dock 2which, like a Thunderbolt 3 dock, drives two 4K displays at 60Hz apiece. Still, its a proprietary solution that locks you into the Surface ecosystem.

Mark Hachman / IDG Earlier LTE models of Microsofts Surface devices would ship with both an LTE SIM cubby as well as a microSD slot. No longer. Here, you can see the nanoSIM cubby underneath the kickstand to the left, as well as the removeable SSD compartment on the right.

Behind the kickstand, there are two changes. The LTE options ship with a small cubby to insert a nanoSIM, and that appears to be at the exclusion of the microSDXC slot, which is reserved for Wi-Fi-only models. (You can eject the nanoSIM cubby using a SIM ejector tool, though you have to insert it deeper than you might expect before it unlatches.) Thats a change from past Surface Pro tablets. In the Surface Pro (2017), Microsoft placed the LTE microSIM slot alongside the microSDXC slot, allowing you to have both.

On the brighter side, the Surface Pro 7+ ships with a removable SSD, a first for the Surface Pro series. While Microsoft intends this feature as a convenience for enterprise IT management, the company does provide general guidelines and device-specific instructions for removing the SSD. Like the nanoSIM cubby, you can access the SSD compartment with a SIM ejector tool, which is partially affixed by a strong magnet. The SSD looks like it can be unscrewed with a correctly-sized Torx screwdriver. We would have preferred the hybrid SIM/SSD cubby found within the Surface Pro X, itself a sort of Batman Beyond vision of the Surface Pro series.

Mark Hachman / IDG You can pop off the top to the SSD compartment with just a SIM tool. Its also held magnetically.

Unfortunately, the Surface Pro 7+ isnt a 5G-capable device, but you do get the option of using the devices embedded eSIM, or inserting a physical SIM into the tray. We used the latter method to test the LTE around town, performing a speed test and streaming a 4K video from YouTube at selected locations. The wireless performance was adequatejust above 20Mbps downstream unless I was in sight of the tower, when performance soared to 158Mbps. Video streamed without a hitch.

Mark Hachman / IDG The Surface Pro 7+ features the new Out of the Box Experience (OOBE) which promises to tweak aspects of your desktop for specific usesadding the Xbox Game Bar to your taskbar, for instance. We checked all of the boxes...but didnt notice any changes.

Surface Pro 7+ keyboard and touchpad

Microsofts Surface Pro tablets always ship with a hidden cost: the Surface Pro Type Cover. Though you can use Windows built-in, on-screen keyboard, a good hardware keyboard is an almost-but-not-absolute requirement for the Surface Pro for maximum productivity.

Microsoft supplies two: the Surface Pro Type CoverRemove non-product link ($130) as well as the Surface Pro Signature Type CoverRemove non-product link ($160), which magnetically connect to the tablets and protect the screen when not in use. (Youre free to use your own USB or Bluetooth keyboard, too.) Theyre otherwise identical, save for the fact that the Signature Type cover includes Alcantara fabric and a variety of colorscurrently Platinum, Ice Blue and Poppy Red. Microsofts vanilla Type Cover ships in a neutral black.

Mark Hachman / IDG Microsoft shipped our Surface Pro 7+ with this Surface Pro Type Cover, which offers a comfortable typing experience but a somewhat cramped touchpad.

While typing on a Type Cover doesnt offer the same comfort or stability as a laptops keyboard, they come surprisingly close. Microsofts Surface Pro hinge angles the keyboard slightly, connected via a second Surface Connector that powers the keyboards backlight and provides a wired I/O connection. (There are three backlighting levels with a miniscule amount of light bleed.) Microsofts Surface Book series offers the most keyboard travel, now at 1.55mm; but the slightly more flattish Type Covers spacious keys still function well for long-term work. The trackpad on all options is small, but functional.

None of the Surface Pro tablets, however, have quite solved the lap-ability problem of typing in your lap. The double hinge connecting the keyboard to the Surface Pro 7+ tablet still cant quite always hold the tablet if it flips forward over your knees. The thin, metal kickstand still digs into your thighs. Because the tablet is designed to recline, it simply cant work as well on a airplane tray table as a similarly-sized clamshell, or a smaller tablet like the Surface Go 2.

Surface Pro tablets offer a creative outlet with their pen compatibility. For that, youll need one of Microsofts $100 Surface PensRemove non-product link as well as the almost-forgotten Surface Dial. Using a Surface Pen and other styluses in house, we experienced consistent responsiveness compared to other, recent Surface tablets.

Keep reading to learn about the nifty 1080p webcam and of course, performance.
Formation of moire pattern by two honeycomb lattices. Credit: Microwave Nano-Electronics Lab, UC Riverside.

Materials having excess electrons are typically conductors. However, moire patternsinterference patterns that typically arise when one object with a repetitive pattern is placed over another with a similar patterncan suppress electrical conductivity, a study led by physicists at the University of California, Riverside, has found.

In the lab, the researchers overlaid a single monolayer of tungsten disulfide (WS 2 ) on a single monolayer of tungsten diselenide (WSe 2 ) and aligned the two layers against each other to generate large-scale moire patterns. The atoms in both the WS 2 and WSe 2 layers are arranged in a two-dimensional honeycomb lattice with a periodicity, or recurring intervals, of much less than 1 nanometer. But when the two lattices are aligned at 0 or 60 degrees, the composite material generates a moire pattern with a much larger periodicity of about 8 nanometers. The conductivity of this 2-D system depends on how many electrons are placed in the moire pattern.

"We found that when the moire pattern is partially filled with electrons, the system exhibits several insulating states as opposed to conductive states expected from conventional understanding," said Yongtao Cui, an assistant professor of physics and astronomy at UC Riverside, who led the research team. "The filling percentages were found to be simple fractions like 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, 1/6, and so on. The mechanism for such insulating states is the strong interaction among electrons that restricts the mobile electrons into local moire cells. This understanding may help to develop new ways to control conductivity and to discovery new superconductor materials."

Study results appear today in Nature Physics.

The moire patterns generated on the composite material of WS 2 and WSe 2 can be imagined to be with wells and ridges arranged similarly in a honeycomb pattern.

"WS 2 and WSe 2 have a slight mismatch where lattice size is concerned, making them ideal for producing moire patterns," Cui said. "Further, coupling between electrons becomes strong, meaning the electrons 'talk to each other' while moving around across the ridges and the wells."

Photo shows Xiong Huang (left) and Yongtao Cui. Credit: Microwave Nano-Electronics Lab, UC Riverside.

Typically, when a small number of electrons are placed in a 2-D layer such as WS 2 or WSe 2 , they have enough energy to travel freely and randomly, making the system a conductor. Cui's lab found that when moire lattices are formed using both WS 2 and WSe 2 , resulting in a periodic pattern, the electrons begin to slow down and repel from each other.

"The electrons do not want to stay close to each other," said Xiong Huang, the first author of the paper and a doctoral graduate student in Cui's Microwave Nano-Electronics Lab. "When the number of electrons is such that one electron occupies every moire hexagon, the electrons stay locked in place and cannot move freely anymore. The system then behaves like an insulator."

Cui likened the behavior of such electrons to social distancing during a pandemic.

"If the hexagons can be imagined to be homes, all the electrons are indoors, one per home, and not moving about in the neighborhood," he said. "If we don't have one electron per hexagon, but instead have 95% occupancy of hexagons, meaning some nearby hexagons are empty, then the electrons can still move around a little through the empty cells. That's when the material is not an insulator. It behaves like a poor conductor."

His lab was able to fine-tune the number of electrons in the WS 2 - WSe 2 lattice composite in order to change the average occupancy of the hexagons. His team found insulating states occurred when average occupancy was less than one. For example, for an occupancy of one-third, the electrons occupied every other hexagon.

"Using the social distancing analogy, instead of a separation of 6 feet, you now have a separation of, say, 10 feet," Cui said. "Thus, when one electron occupies a hexagon, it forces all neighboring hexagons to be empty in order to comply with the stricter social distancing rule. When all electrons follow this rule, they form a new pattern and occupy one third of the total hexagons in which they again lose the freedom to move about, leading to an insulating state."

Occupation patterns for various electron occupancy levels in the moire lattice. Credit: Microwave Nano-Electronics Lab, UC Riverside.

The study shows similar behaviors can also occur for other occupancy fractions such as 1/4, 1/2, and 1/6, with each corresponding to a different occupation pattern.

Cui explained that these insulating states are caused by strong interactions between the electrons. This, he added, is the Coulomb repulsion, the repulsive force between two positive or two negative charges, as described by the Coulomb's law.

He added that in 3-D materials, strong electron interactions are known to give rise to various exotic electronic phases. For example, they likely contribute to the formation of unconventional high temperature superconductivity.

"The question we still have no answer for is whether 2-D structures, the kind we used in our experiments, can produce high temperature superconductivity," Cui said.

Next, his group will work on characterizing the strength of the electron interactions.

"The interaction strength of the electrons largely determines the insulation state of the system," Cui said. "We are also interested in being able to manipulate the strength of the electron interaction."

Explore further Researchers trap electrons to create elusive crystal

More information: Correlated insulating states at fractional fillings of the WS2/WSe2 moire lattice, Nature Physics (2021). Journal information: Nature Physics Correlated insulating states at fractional fillings of the WS2/WSe2 moire lattice,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41567-021-01171-w , https//dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41567-021-01171-w
A terminally ill dog is spending her last days playing in the snow, attending cheese nights and steak dinners thanks to a new owner who rescued her just in time.

When five-year-old Bumble was seized from her owner and left in kennels, animal lover Charlotte, Mullarkey, 24, knew she had to step in to help.

In November 2019, just one month after taking the American Staffordshire Terrier into her home, Charlotte, from Exeter, was given the devastating news that Bumble had cancer in her kidney.

After an operation to remove one kidney, doctors confirmed that the cancer had spread to the second and the canine only had months to live.

Charlotte, who works at Blue Cross Animal Homing Centre, quickly compiled a list of adventures for Bumble to enjoy before she died including seeing snow for the first time, a visit to a National Trust site, a fancy dress party and two birthday celebrations.

Five-year-old Staffy from Exeter, Bumble, was diagnosed with cancer and only has a few months left to live. Her owner Charlotte Mullarkey, 24, decided to make a bucket of fun activities Bumble might enjoy before she passes. Pictured: Bumble after a cheese dinner

Charlotte, who works at Blue Cross Animal Homing Centre, rescued Bumble in 2019 before hearing her terrible diagnosis. Pictured: Bumble after a paw painting glass

Charlotte said: 'I've fostered hundreds of dogs and I never thought to keep one. But when Bumble came, I just made my mind up that she had to stay.

'I took her on there and then, but we knew she only had a few months left.

'We could have tried chemo but that wouldn't have been nice for her, so I just decided to give her everything she needed to make the last few months of her life special.

'If she had a few months left then I was going to give her what I could.

Bumble dressed up as a bee. Charlotte compiled a list of adventures for Bumble to complete before she passes

A very special birthday girl. Charlotte admitted Bumble was 'spoilt rotten.' Pictured on her birthday with several treats

Charlotte also said she let Bumble get in the water during their walks even though she didn't know how to swim (pictured on a walk)

'I've had to change the bucket list because we weren't expecting her to last this long but we've also had to tailor it to lockdown.

'So far, I've taken her to the beach because I didn't know if she'd ever been, to the pub, paw print painting, a cheese night, a visit to a National Trust site, pancakes on pancake day, she dressed up as a bee for a fancy dress party and she's had a Pupicino from Starbucks.

'We've even taken her swimming even though she can't swim. She's been spoilt rotten.

Soaking up the sun! Bumble was expected to only survive a few months after her diagnosis, but she surprised everyone by lasting more than a year

Bumble enjoying her dinner on steak night. Due to the coronavirus pandemic and subsequent lockdowns. Charlotte had to improvise activities for the Staffy to enjoy

Playing in the snow. Charlotte admitted she had to change Bumble's bucket list because the pup outlived the vet's prognosis

Bumble during a walk. Since being rescued by Charlotte, the Staffy had several grandiose parties

'One extreme plan was for her to meet a celebrity.

'We thought we'd only be able to throw her one birthday party but she'd had two now.

'She's loved everything we've done so far, she loves everything we do together anyway.'

Charlotte pictured with Bumble on a walk. As a Blue Cross worker, Charlotte had helped hundreds of rescue dogs, but know she had to keep Bumble for herself

The Staffy on a sunny walk. Charlotte said Bumble was a character and was hilarious and full of life

Bumble in the pub! Charlotte has been looking after Bumble since adopting her in 2019 and said the pup is still 'going strong'

Charlotte says that despite Bumble's diagnosis, the pooch still has a zest for life and is defying doctor's predictions by living for a whole year.

She said: 'She's a real character and she's hilarious.

'She's quite boisterous, when I come home from work, she'll do zoomies around the house because she's excited but she also loves cuddles, in the sofa or on the bed or wherever I am.

'One year on and she's still going strong.'

To donate to the Blue Cross Animal Homing Centre, you can go here.

The pup during a walk on the beach. Charlotte said Bumble had a zest for life and would do zoomies around the room when she's excited

Charlotte and Bumble together during a snowy walk. The dog lover said the Staffy also liked to cuddle

Bumble before going for a swim. Charlotte has had varied activities planned just for her loving dog

An eye for art! Charlotte showing off some art that Bumble's made during a paw painting session

Enjoying her first snow! Charlotte said she'd like Bumble to meet a celebrity, which would be her bucket list's most 'extreme' activity

Charlotte thought she'd only be able to give Bumble one birthday party, but the dog had two so far while living with her new owner

Bumble at Christmas! Charlotte said the kind dog loved everything they did together ans was enjoying the bucket list activities

Charlotte with Bumble and her partner James. The Staffy has beaten all the odds and is still going strong

James, Charlotte and Bumble out for a walk on a sunny day. Charlotte said the pup would seek her out for fun and cuddles
OTTAWA - The Canadian Armed Forces is dealing with a shortfall of several thousand troops as COVID-19 has forced the military to curb the training of new recruits for most of the past year.

OTTAWA - The Canadian Armed Forces is dealing with a shortfall of several thousand troops as COVID-19 has forced the military to curb the training of new recruits for most of the past year.

While the military says there has not been any immediate impact on its missions here and abroad as it manages the shortfall and training challenges, a spokesman acknowledged the potential for longer-term ramifications.

Members of the Canadian Armed Forces march during the Calgary Stampede parade in Calgary, Alta., Friday, July 8, 2016. The Canadian Armed Forces is facing a shortfall of several thousand troops thanks at least in part to challenges training new recruits during the COVID-19 pandemic. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh

"It is too early to determine how the reduced number of recruitment files being processed during the pandemic will affect CAF operations in the medium to long term," Maj. Travis Smyth said in an email.

The federal Liberal government has authorized the Armed Forces to have at least 68,000 regular-force members and 29,000 part-time reservists, which is based on available funding and the missions that the military is expected to undertake.

Yet the military was short of those targets by about 2,000 regular-force members and nearly 5,000 reservists at the end of December, according to figures provided to The Canadian Press.

One reason: The military was able to provide basic training to only about a quarter the expected number of new hires since March as COVID-19 forced recruiting centres and training camps to close or otherwise curtail their operations.

"The pandemic has limited training for large parts of the year in order to meet provincial and federal health and safety guidelines," Smyth said.

"The reduced training capacity, in addition to strict protocols that the recruiting centres are required to follow to ensure the safety and well-being of applicants and staff, has reduced the number of files being processed."

The pandemic has exacerbated a long-standing problem for the military, which has struggled for years to attract new recruits.

Federal auditor general Michael Ferguson flagged personnel shortages as a real threat to the Forces in November 2016, warning that it put a heavier burden on those in uniform and hurt military operations.

The military at that time was dealing with roughly the same number of unfilled positions as today, which resulted in a number of issues including a lack of personnel to fly or maintain various aircraft.

The shortfalls have persisted despite a 2017 Liberal government promise to expand the size of the Armed Forces to defend against growing global instability and emerging threats in space and online.

The recruiting challenge has contributed to a push by senior commanders to make the Armed Forces more inclusive, with active efforts to attract women, visible minorities, Indigenous Canadians and members of the LGBTQ community.

On the plus side, Smyth did indicate that the military had managed to make some progress on retaining more experienced members in 2019 and the first three months of 2020, though he did not have figures for the nine months of the pandemic.

Defence analyst David Perry of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute said the difficulties attracting and training recruits during the pandemic is not surprising given the restrictions that have been placed on society as a whole.

Yet he also noted that at a time of great economic uncertainty for large parts of the country, the military  and the federal government  represent stable employment, and that the military should at least be able to see better retention.

Either way, Perry said the continuing challenge getting new recruits in uniform underscores the importance of the militarys efforts to attract new recruits beyond what has been its traditional source: white men.

"The interest and the onus on the military organization to try and achieve some very longstanding goals ... to broaden its recruiting base, to make it more representative of the country as a whole, take on increased importance," Perry said.

He also worried that continued reports about hate and sexual misconduct in the ranks  including the recent allegations against former chief of the defence staff Gen. Jonathan Vance  send the wrong message to potential recruits.

Global News has reported allegations that Vance had an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate and made a sexual comment to a service member that he significantly outranked in 2012 before taking on the military's top post.

Vance has not responded to The Canadian Presss requests for comment, and the allegations against him have not been independently verified or tested in court. Global says Vance has denied any wrongdoing.

Military police are now investigating the allegations, while Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan has promised an independent probe into the matter.

Military police confirmed last week that they opened an investigation into Vances conduct during his time as deputy commander of a NATO force in Naples, Italy, before he was named defence chief. No charges were ever laid.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 14, 2021.
03/02/2021  Albania started exchanges under the standard of automatic exchange of financial account information (AEOI) in 2020. In 2014, Albania was among the few non-G20 developing countries, which do not host a financial centre, to commit to implement the AEOI Standard also known as the Common Reporting Standard (CRS) by a specific date. To support its commitment, it benefitted from a pilot project with Italy and the Secretariat of the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes (Global Forum).



During its AEOI implementation, Albania received comprehensive assistance on legal and practical aspects, including information security management, from the Italian Revenue Agency (Agenzia delle Entrate), the fully owned IT company of the Ministry of Economy and Finance (Societa Generale dInformatica  SOGEI) and the Global Forum Secretariat.



With the strong support of Italy and the Global Forum Secretariat, and thanks to the continued commitment of Albania, the pilot project successfully ended in 2020.



Ms Fabrizia LAPECORELLA, Director-General of Department of Finance of Italy, and Mr Ernesto Maria RUFFINI, Director-General of Revenue Agency of Italy stated that: Italy welcomes the great result obtained by Albania by meeting the 2020 deadline for starting its CRS exchanges. Italy is glad to have had the opportunity to support Albania and to cooperate with the Global Forum Secretariat for the achievement of this important milestone toward the implementation of the international tax transparency framework.



Ms Zayda MANATTA, Head of the Global Forum Secretariat, stated that: Thanks to the commitment of Albania and the great support provided by Italy, this successful AEOI project offered several important lessons that will help future projects with developing countries to implement the AEOI standard, which despite being demanding, is also extremely promising in terms of boosting tax compliance and revenue mobilization.



This is only the first part of Albanias AEOI journey. The countrys tax authorities will be provided with further assistance to receive and effectively use the AEOI data, and to fully benefit from this standard.



H.E. Ms Anila DENAJ, Minister of Finance and Economy of Albania, stated that: The implementation of automatic exchange in Albania was an ambitious project that was successfully completed thanks to the full support of our precious partners, Italy and the Global Forum Secretariat. This project enabled Albania to strengthen its technical capacities and its confidentiality framework. Now our goal is to receive and effective use financial information in 2021, and then improve tax compliance.



The Global Forum is the leading multilateral body mandated to ensure that jurisdictions around the world adhere to and effectively implement both the standard of transparency and exchange of information on request and the standard of automatic exchange of information. These objectives are achieved through a robust monitoring and peer review process. The Global Forum also runs an extensive technical assistance programme to support its members in implementing the standards and help tax authorities make the best use of cross-border information sharing channels.



 Status of commitments

 Assistance for the automatic exchange of information



For more information, please contact gftaxcooperation@oecd.org.
Britain's drug regulator is auditing manufacturing processes at Serum Institute of India (SII) which could pave the way for AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine to be shipped from there to the UK and other countries, according to two sources close to the matter.

SII, the world's largest vaccine manufacturer, is currently mass producing the AstraZeneca vaccine, developed in conjunction with Oxford University, for dozens of poor and middle-income countries but not the UK, which has been getting its supply of the shot primarily from domestic facilities.

If the UK's Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) gives SII's manufacturing process for the Oxford/AstraZeneca shot a greenlight it would allow the drug to be exported to the UK and to other countries which recognise MHRA's clearances, one of the sources said.

Reuters could not determine what was the rationale for the audit. SII did not respond to a request for comment on it. The MHRA confirmed that an inspection was happening but declined further comment.

"Due to commercial confidentiality we do not comment on inspections that are still ongoing," the regulator's chief executive Dr June Raine said in a statement to Reuters.

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

The two sources, who asked not to be named as the matter is private, said the audit should be relatively routine for SII, as its site already supplies other vaccines to the UK.

The inspection comes as countries around the world scramble to secure vaccine supplies amid supply disruptions and delivery cuts from leading drugmakers such as Pfizer Inc, Moderna and AstraZeneca.

It was not immediately clear whether an MHRA approval would allow the UK or AstraZeneca to route SII volumes of COVISHIELD - the brand name under which SII markets the AstraZeneca shot - to the EU, which has been pressuring the UK for supply from AstraZeneca's facilities in the UK, amid shortages in Europe.

The EU's drug regulator, the European Medicines Agency (EMA), audits sites from which it plans to source medicines but during the global pandemic, with multiple COVID-19 vaccines being developed, it is also partly leaning on inspections carried out by some other international regulators.

"Inspection outcomes for Covid-19 vaccines conducted by the MHRA will be considered by EMA," said the regulator. Any such approved sites would also need an EMA sign off before they can export to the EU, the regulator told Reuters.

MHRA declined to comment on specifics, but Raine said it was collaborating "with international partners in response to the global pandemic and on matters of mutual interest."

AstraZeneca, which has previously tapped SII to help fulfill some of its vaccine orders from Brazil, South Africa and Saudi Arabia, did not respond to a request for comment on whether it needs SII to help meet commitments in the UK, or in any other nations that would recognise an MHRA certification.

The second source, along with a government official in New Delhi, said the UK has expressed an interest in purchasing vaccines from SII. The two sources said the volumes or timelines for any such purchases were unclear.

A UK government spokeswoman said: "Any discussions that have taken place between the UK Government and India on vaccines are not related to securing extra vaccine supply to the UK."

The UK has so far ordered 100 million doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine.

"Most countries have approached us and India's government," SII told Reuters, but it did not comment on any UK outreach. "We are trying our best to meet demand, and supply the vaccine to as many countries as possible, keeping India as the priority."

SII's chief executive, Adar Poonawalla, told Reuters in late January, his family-owned firm was keen to support AstraZeneca's supply needs but its primary focus was on India and other poorer nations in Asia and Africa. He said at the time SII had no plans to divert supplies to Europe.
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In honor and celebration of Black History Month, TAMIU will be hosting virtual tours, Black heritage events and speaker events focusing on Black culture and Black lives.

A speaker event with Dr. Gabby Yearwood, director of Undergraduate Studies for the University of Pittsburgh Department of Anthropology and Gender, Sexuality and Womens Studies Program will take place on Feb. 19 at 7 p.m. Those interested can register to attend and participate at the TAMIU website. Additionally, a movie screening is slated for Friday.

According to Yearwood, during his lecture, the questions What are the ways in which liberation has been theorized, dreamt and longed for in Black social and intellectual life? and What can the actions of Black people inform us about how to think critically about liberation? will be discussed.

Between the beginning of February until Feb. 23, community members can take part in a virtual tour of Africa and the Cape Coast Dungeon. Additional resources are also available on the schools diversity website that focuses on showcasing Black culture.

We invite the public to actively participate in the various educational events weve organized, which are easily accessible to all as they are offered mostly virtually, Dr. Peter Haruna, co-chair of the TAMIU Diversity, Inclusion and Equity Committee said. Activities also include a movie screening and Social Justice Leadership dialogues on Hip-Hop and its importance in the Black community as well as the art of African head wrapping.

The Eye Opener tour provides an opportunity to learn facts about Africa through a video conference session where participants can ask questions about the country and culture from the safety of their own home.

The Cape Coast Dungeon tour will be a virtual tour of a slave dungeon off a coast in Ghana. Oiada, the nonprofit organization hosting the virtual tours states that the dungeon marked the beginning of enslaved Africans journeys during the slave trade.

These fortresses were the last memory enslaved Africans had of their homeland before being shipped off across the Atlantic, never to return again, Oiada writes. One of the most famous castles in Ghanas dark episode of slavery is the Cape Coast Castle or as it is locally called, Cape Coast Dungeons due the atrocities committed there.

TAMIU will also host two lecutres as part of the Social Justice Leadership Series that focuses on facing social justice issues and inequities. The series is an effort to incorporate values of service, respect and encourage personal growth in individuals, TAMIU states.

On Feb. 17 from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., the university will host the Heart of the Headwrap, an interactive workshop about headwraps that looks into the history of head wraps as well as a demonstration on how to wear one.

On Feb. 24 at the same time, the Hip-Hop Jam event will discuss the music genre and its importance to the Black community.

Complementing the tours and lectures are two additional events, a Martin Luther King Wall and a movie screening and trivia event for The Help.

The screening will be open to TAMIU students at the Student Center Auditorium and has only 30 spots available. It is hosted by the Campus Activities Board.

According to the university, the I Have a Dream wall invited students to visit the wall and share their dream in the footsteps of King. The event was hosted on Feb. 10.

Finally, for those interested in enriching themselves in the culture through reading, music listening and/or cooking, the website has suggestions including a short story, a playlist and a recipe.

It suggests visitors to read Zikora, a short story by Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. The story is about a Nigerian DC lawyer who struggles after her lover abandons her pregnant and the feeling of solitude.

The playlist is titled African American History Month and has 22 tracks of good listening, including Donna Summer, TLC, Outkast and more.

And while reading or listening, the current recipe is for Jollof Rice, a West African dish consisting of rice, vegetables and numerous spices. New recipes are uploaded throughout the month.

With over 8,400 students enrolled and some 31 countries represented in its combined undergraduate-graduate population (the largest number coming from Mexico), Texas A&M International University (TAMIU) celebrates the "International" in its name proudly, TAMIU states. It also promotes Diversity, Equity and Inclusion not only on campus but everywhere Dustdevils go!
Water graves: Nightmare for Mexican fishermen

February 15,2021 | Source: Havana Times

All of Erizos nightmares are the same. Since his return from the ocean  almost unrecognizable  every bad dream is identical. A wave punches his little boat and throws him into the deep sea where everything is so dark that he cant even see his own hands. Even when he swam with all his energy, this 31 year old fisherman was never able to set foot on the mainland and to him, the Mexican Pacific ocean slowly became a grave formed only of water. When Erizo dies in his nightmare, he wakes up in real life, opening his mouth like a dying fish that desperately tries to gasp some air. Then, he and his wife are on a midnight routine. Erizo stays in bed while Sandra walks over the sand floor of their home to reach for a glass of water for him. She can do that in total darkness without stumbling because there is barely anything; the furniture in this young couples home consists only of a bed, a small TV, a plastic table, two chairs, two hammocks, and a few plastic bags with clothes and shoes.



Their poverty reflects the 24-hour labor shifts that Erizo undertook each week sailing on his little boat -Esmeralda- named after his 4 year old daughter. Erizo is a fisherman in a small town 20 minutes away from Mazatlan, Sinaloa, where everybody knows his neighbors by their nicknames. Erizos name means hedgehog, a name given to him because of his short and straight black hair. His friends are Pelao and Rana (frog). On the surface or in plain sight, they look like a relaxed group of friends who drink beer by the ocean and listen to The Hermanos Cota music band. When you look closely at that community you can see the open wounds inflicted on these fishermen by labor exploitation. Pelao has been struggling for years with an unpayable debt that has led him to alcohol addiction and Rana suffers from terrible pain in his hands due to the frequent injuries suffered from handling the heavy fishing nets. Erizo is not the same person ever since fish sales dropped in March 2008 and he couldnt afford gasoline for his little boat to go to sea and return home every day with his catch. He decided to enter the deep sea and stay there for five days until he catches as many fish as possible. On the third day, a big wave hit him nearly pinning him to the seabed.



He managed to keep afloat for eight days, clinging on to a big plastic jug of water, eating his own vomit, biting and eating live and raw fish for eight days. During the first days, he prayed to God for survival. The next six days he prayed for death until on the last day when he closed his eyes and thought it was over  just to realize that a boat had rescued him and saved his life. I didnt die at sea, but a part of me is still there. Being a fisherman in this country is like having no life, he told me. Erizo and his friends are hired on verbal agreements by anonymous men who represent shady businesses. Its a common strategy in the fishing industry that exploits the most vulnerable ones without paying any social costs or support. Hiring companies pay between 0.7 and 1.4 dollars per kilo of fish and shrimp respectively, which goes to Central de Abastos  the largest fish market in America. There it is sold at 15 dollars per kilo. In a fancy restaurant located in the rich neighborhood of Polanco in Mexico City, a shrimp soup could cost 35 dollars.



Of the small profits that the Mexican fishermen make, they must take off the cost of gasoline, food, helpers, boat maintenance and the fee to anchor on shore. Often they work with clear financial loss. Such is life for the 300,000 fishermen in Mexico, the country that is globally ranked 16th in seafood production. They produce 800,000 tons of food for a multibillion dollar industry. Yet, the fishermen work like slaves. Most of them earn and live 10 dollars a day. They dont have health insurance, social security, or household credits. Also, no financial services are available to them nor any money to have fun or enjoyment in their lives, according to the Social Impact of the Fishing Industry in Mexico report.



The pandemic has deepened their poverty. The coronavirus has been a curse, but it can be a salvation: the fishing industry needs to transform and this is the ideal time to pay the long-time debt owed to these women and men, like Erizo. Its now or never to demand better work quality for them. Regulations and sanctions imposed on abusive companies are essential in the new world after this global crisis of Covid-19 is over. A country that devours the delicacies of the sea, leaving the people who bring it to their tables to starve only leaves a bitter rather than a good taste.

Theme(s): Post Harvest Technology and Trade, Fisheries Resources, Communities and Organisations, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Others, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats, Freshwater ecosystems and threats, Landing Centres, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods.
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A former governor of Ekiti State, Ayodele Fayose, has said some chieftains of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) may defect to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).

He disclosed on Channels Television Sunday Politics Programme that those exiting or planning to leave the opposition to the APC are driven by covetousness.

Mr Fayose made these comments when asked about the recent defection of Ebonyi State governor, David Umahi, and the rumour surrounding the defection of former minister of aviation, Femi Fani-Kayode.

The governor said he has achieved all expected of him in PDP, hence defecting is not an option.

May I say this to you, very clearly. In the book of James one from verse four. The Bible says a man is taken away in his own covetousness. Anyone who leaves PDP for APC at this time must be taken away by his own covetousness, he said.

Im over 60. What do I want to become? I was governor at 42. All the opportunities anybody could offer, PDP offered me

I will not go to APC. What is missing? Some people choose to be dishonourable. Not me. I will rather go and be the husband of my wife, Feyisetan Fayose, and my son.

He also disclosed that Mr Fani-Kayode has confided in him that he is not leaving PDP.

I know FFK is going nowhere. What they are saying is not true. I have spoken to FFK about six times. What they are saying is not true. Im 100 per cent sure.
Business Week '21 to focus on tech in business

Business Week is an annual event at Flagler College that allows students to showcase their entrepreneurial skills in a series of panels, dinners and competitions. This years theme is The Future is Now: Technology and Business.

From March 1-4, students will engage in professional discussion and pitch their products and ideas in competitions. The academic weeks culminating event is Lions Cage, in which finalists from earlier in the week compete for cash prizes. As a highly competitive event, it draws a crowd including the public, potential business mentors, college donors and Flagler faculty from across disciplines. The Business Week academic program is co-hosted by and supported with funds for the winners by the Flagler College Business Advisory Board. This years Presenting Sponsor is Rulon International.

March 1, 4  5:30 p.m.  Saints Panel hosted by Joe Bateman, Business professionals engage with students via a Q&A session based on this years theme

March 2, 6  7:30 p.m.  Own Your Future Workshop hosted by Ameris Bank, Students (in professional attire) hear guest speaker Gino Barbaro of Jake & Gino and author of TheHoney Bee inspiring students to own their own futures

March 3, 10 a.m.  1 p.m.  Saints Showcase hosted byScine & Associates, Students present business ideas to student body, faculty, staff and outside pros, competing for a chance to present in the Lions Cage

March 4, 6  8 p.m.  Lions Cage Main Event hosted by Bozard Ford Lincoln, Saints Showcase finalists present to a panel of judges from the business community and a live audience, competing for cash prizes. Audience will case a live vote for the top business pitch.

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Bengaluru, Feb 15 : Karnataka Food and Civil Supplies Minister Umesh Katti came under fire from his own cabinet colleagues after asking people to surrender their Below Poverty Line (BPL) ration cards before March 31 if they own either a two-wheeler, TV, fridge or over five acres of land or face legal action.

During his interaction with media persons on Sunday in Belagavi the minister had stated that those who possess BPL ration cards but own five acre farm land, fridge, TV and two-wheeler must surrender their cards before March 31.

However, after coming under fire from his own party men, Katti retracted his statement on Monday stating that these 'norms were not set by him' but they were existing even prior to he took over the charge of the ministry.

His own cabinet colleagues including Education Minister S. Suresh Kumar and Co-operation Minister S.T. Somashekar asserted that Katti's statement on BPL ration card was uncalled for. "Owning fridge, TV and two-wheeler cannot be yardstick to denounce BPL rations cards. This is inhuman, even the poorest man owns all of these things," Kumar told reporters.

While Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah quipped that Katti is free to make such inhuman laws when he forms his own state. "It was during my time, the poor got the most quantity of food grains. But after the BJP came to power in the state, they have not only reduced the quantity of grains but now are thinking of newer ways to keep poor people even poorer," he said.

Congress MLA and former Food and Civil Supplies Minister U.T. Khader said the issue had come up before him when he was the Food and Civil Supplies Minister but decided not to relax the norms as many poor people would be affected.

He said that when there are offers like interest free loans to purchase all these items, it was obvious that people would buy it.

"The BJP is inherently 'anti-poor'," he charged and asked them to focus on identifying more beneficiaries instead of taking away their right to eat.

Meanwhile Congress party workers also staged protests in front of various ration shops in Bengaluru, Dharwad, Mysuru and Tumakuru districts.
President Joe Bidens fight against climate change is headed down to the farm, and with good reason. In 2018, agriculture accounted for fully 10 percent of total U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions. One proposal for reducing that figure has recently intrigued both Bidens team and influential congressional Democrats: Why not pay farmers to preserve carbon in their fields?

The idea would be to establish a federal carbon bank that would commit to buying credits from farmers who employ sustainable agricultural methods, such as planting off-season cover crops or switching to no-till farming to prevent soil erosion. The more carbon a farmer sequestered underground, the more credits he could sell. Last week, soon-to-be Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack signaled his support for the concept.

As attractive as this idea may sound, its almost certainly a mistake.

Over the past 12,000 years, agriculture has accounted for the release of about 8 percent of the carbon stored in the worlds soils. Traditionally, clearing land and tilling soil played the biggest role in these emissions. But in recent years, meat production and yield-boosting technology have become even bigger threats. In the U.S., the two leading sources of agricultural carbon are nitrous oxide from fertilizer application and methane emissions (aka burps) from livestock. Management (and mismanagement) of manure has also contributed.

In theory, though, farms could be climate-positive. Plants absorb carbon from the air during photosynthesis and use it to create nutrients. Eventually that carbon is returned to the soil, and the volumes sequestered in this process are potentially massive. As of 2019, U.S. forests had banked a total of 58.7 billion tons of carbon, nearly 10 times the volume emitted by Americans in a given year. Farms should be able to do the same. One recent report argued that soil-sequestration techniques already in use could remove carbon equal to about 5 percent of 2018 U.S. greenhouse emissions.

Such estimates have caught the attention of companies eager to offset their own emissions by buying up carbon credits from farmers. Over the past year, private markets have proliferated to facilitate such exchanges. Bayer recently announced that it was helping 1,200 farmers in Brazil and the U.S. adopt regenerative farming methods and planned to purchase credits from them to fulfill its corporate climate pledges.

As laudable as these initiatives are, they rest on some shaky ground. First, the for-profit companies that set the terms of these markets might be viewed as self-serving, and their credits, well, less than credible. Second, the science of sequestration is hardly settled. Different soils in different places absorb, retain and emit carbon at very different rates. Even in what appear to be uniform fields, carbon content can vary five-fold.

Making matters worse, scientists now know that some sustainable practices - such as planting cover crops - dont work as well in some regions as in others. Even the techniques used to measure soil carbon are proving to be highly contentious. Such uncertainties undermine the value of a tradeable credit market - and increase the risk that carbon banks, government or private, will end up benefiting farmers and other private interests far more than the climate.

Thats not to say that the government shouldnt play a role in mitigating farm-based emissions. For one thing, the Department of Energys Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (or ARPA-E) is already funding research on measuring soil carbon. The Biden administration should make expanding such projects a priority.

It should also reform existing farm programs with climate issues in mind. Step one should be overhauling the massive federal crop-insurance program to reward farmers who incorporate sustainable practices. That could not only reduce emissions (the program insures more than 300 million acres), but also help mitigate soil erosion and other negative effects of irresponsible farming and climate change. Likewise, expanding the popular Conservation Reserve Program, which pays farmers to idle land and convert it to cover that reduces erosion (and sequesters carbon), could ensure that millions of additional acres are set aside for sustainable purposes.

Eventually, there may be enough data to make soil carbon credits a credible reality. Until then, farmers and sustainably minded companies need climate solutions they can actually bank on.
The Ministry of Finance borrowed 1.2 billion lei from banks on Monday, through a benchmark government bond issue with a residual maturity of 64 months, at an average yield of 2.30 ppa, according to data transmitted by the National Bank of Romania (BNR), potrivit Agerpres.

The face value of Monday's issue was 600 million lei, and banks filed bids worth over 1.491 billion lei.

An additional bidding session is scheduled for Tuesday, as the FinMin plans to raise another 90 million lei for the yield set on Monday.

The Ministry of Finance planned in February 2021, loans from commercial banks worth 4.6 billion lei, of which 600 million through an issue of discounted T-bills and four billion lei through seven issues of government bonds.

Another 600 million lei might add to this amount through additional sessions of non-competitive bids, related to bond auctions.

The amount, slightly above the one scheduled in January 2021 (5.115 billion lei), will be used to refinance public debt and finance the state budget deficit.
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New Delhi, Feb 15 : Elaborating on the 'Toolkit' investigation, the Delhi Police on Monday said that on January 11, Nikita and Shantanu attended a virtual Zoom meeting organised by the Poetic Justice Foundation in which the modalities of the 'Global Day of Action' were worked out and based on the course of action decided in the meeting, Nikita Jacob, Shantanu, and Disha Ravi and others collaborated together to draft the 'Toolkit' document.

The document that they drafted had secessionist and pro-Khalistan content embedded into it through links and texts, the police said.

The Delhi Police has already got non-bailable warrants issued against Mumbai-based lawyer-activist Nikita Jacob and engineer Shantanu who the police say are key figures along with Benguluru-based climate activist Disha Ravi, in drafting the 'Toolkit'.

During the investigation, many screenshots of this document available on open source were investigated by Delhi Police's Cyber Cell.

"The main aim of the 'toolkit' was to create misinformation and disaffection against the lawfully enacted legislations. The 'toolkit' sought to artificially amplify the fake news and other falsehoods and also sought to precipitate action on January 26, India's Republic Day," said Joint CP Cyber cell Prem Nath.

Based on incriminating evidence collected from Disha's device and in view of the fact that she has deleted her WhatsApp group, she was arrested in the case, the police said.

As soon as the investigation was able to fetch enough information, a search warrant was obtained from the court on February 9 against Nikita Jacob, one of the editors of the 'Toolkit' Google document.

A team headed by the Investigating Officer in the case reached Mumbai and conducted searches at Nikita's house on February 11 after due intimation to Mumbai Police. Two laptops and an iPhone were found during the search along with several incriminating documents.

The investigating team asked Nikita to make herself available at her house the next morning. As per police she gave a written undertaking to remain present at her house.

Based on the information gathered from searches at Nikita's house, separate teams were sent to Maharashtra's Beed district and Bengaluru, Karnataka, for investigation regarding Shantanu and Disha.

"The initial examination of Nikita revealed that she and her associates, Shantanu and Disha, had created the Toolkit Google document. The email account created by Shantanu is the owner of this document and all others are its editors," said Manishi Chandra, DCP Special Cell.

The police said that Mo Dhaliwal, the founder of Canada-based pro-Khalistan outfit Poetic Justice Foundation, had contacted Nikita through his colleague Puneet, a Canadian citizen, to create a storm on Twitter ahead of Republic Day.

Police said the woman named Puneet, who is based in Canada, connected these people to the Poetic Justice Foundation and through them, created the Google Toolkit documents titled 'Global Farmer Strike' and 'Global Day of Action, 26 January'.

According to Delhi Police, one portion of this Toolkit document mentioned action points named 'Prior Action', 'Digital Strike through Hashtags' on January 26 and earlier and creating a tweet storm from January 23 onwards. It included physical action on January 26 and entering Delhi for the farmers' tractor rally and return back to the border.

The Delhi Police further elaborated that the second part of the same document mentions tasks such as disruption of India's cultural heritage such as 'Yoga' and 'Chai' and targeting Indian embassies abroad in various capitals.

"The time-bound action points and programme given in this 'Toolkit', when viewed in the context of the actual developments in Delhi, clearly showed that the action plan that was formulated in the 'Toolkit' document has been executed in exactly the same manner," said Anyesh Roy, DCP, Cyber Crime.

The police also said that it was Disha Ravi who sent the 'Toolkit' document to global climate activist Greta Thunberg through Telegram app.

On being asked if the investigation would reach across borders, Delhi Police officials said that the probe would take place as per the law.
Tripura CM to keep cows at home to motivate cattle rearing in State

You are not labourer, why do you need holiday on May Day, Tripura CM asks govt employees

Amit Shah has plans to form BJP govts in Nepal, Sri Lanka: Tripura CM Biplab Deb

India

oi-Deepika S

New Delhi, Feb 15: Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Deb has kicked up a fresh controversy after he said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has not only planned to expand across the country but also in neighbouring nations like Nepal and Sri Lanka.

At a BJP event in Agartala, Deb claimed that Home Minister Amit Shah has plans to set up BJP governments in Nepal and Sri Lanka.

"We were talking in the state guest house when Ajay Jamwal (northeast zonal secretary of BJP) said that BJP had formed its government in several states of India. In reply, Shah said that now Sri Lanka and Nepal are left. We have to expand the party in Sri Lanka, Nepal and win there to form a government," NDTV report said.

Deb also said people of West Bengal would bid goodbye to TMC leader Mamata Banerjee in the upcoming elections, and that "lotus will bloom" across the country, including in Tamil Nadu.

Cops clash with sacked teachers in Tripura, over 40 injured

Biplab, who was considered a greenhorn in state politics at the time of his return in Tripura in 2015 has courted controversies on several occasions.

Deb had apologised for his statements comparing Punjabis and Jats with Bengalis, and said he did not intend to hurt sentiments.

Deb had stirred a controversy by saying Punjabis and Jats are physically strong but less brainy while Bengalis are known to be very intelligent.

In 2018, he said Internet and satellite television existed in the time of the Mahabharata.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

He had questioned the crowning of Diana Hayden as "Miss World" in 1997 and alleged that international beauty pageants were a farce.

Last year, he claimed that Mughals intended to destroy the cultural wonders of the state by "bombing" its arts and architectures.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 9:21 [IST]
has updated its iOS app for the first time in over two months, becoming one of the highest-profile apps to see an update since early December.

Although there's been speculation that the reason for the lack of updates to iOS versions of Gmail, Docs, Search, and Photos is an attempt to avoid Apple's new privacy labels, has explicitly denied that was the case. Last month, the company said in a blog post that it would add the labels to its apps when updates were available, reports The Verge.

As Google's iOS apps are updated with new features or to fix bugs, users will see updates to our app page listings that include the new App Privacy Details. These labels represent the maximum categories of data that could be collected -- meaning if you use every available feature and service in the app, the report said.

The data you provide to Google products delivers helpful services to users, and users can always control your privacy settings by visiting their Google Account or going directly to the Google products you use on iOS, it added.

Apple requires companies to apply the privacy labels, which it launched on December 14, before they can update existing iOS apps. Some of Google's other apps - Stadia, Authenticator, Translate, and Classroom, for example, have received iOS updates already.

--IANS

vc/kr

(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.)

This is one Presidents Day sale you DONT want to sleep on.

Bear Mattress is holding a huge sale on all mattresses through 11:59 p.m. ET Monday (Feb. 15, 2021).

Get 20% off on all mattresses sitewide. Plus get a $250 free gift set (FREE Cloud Pillows -- $125 value and FREE Mattress Protector -- $125 value --) when you purchase a mattress.

Use the code PD20 at checkout to receive the savings and the free gift set.

For those who are not familiar, Bear Mattress is an American direct-to-consumer mattress and bedding brand based in Hoboken, N.J. Bear is ranked No. 7 in Inc Magazines list of fastest growing companies in 2019 after a 13,000% increase in between 2016 and 2018.

Bear claims its mattresses are better because of the different technology.

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Check out our Presidents Day sales roundup below:

Avocado mattress: Save on mattresses, pillows and bed frames.

Casper: Get 15% off mattresses and save 10% sitewide.

Wayfair: Save up to 70% with this clearance sale.

Overstock: Get up to 70% off thousands of items and get free shipping.

Levis: Get 30% off sitewide.

Backcountry: Get up to 50% off gear and apparel.

North Face: Check out the retailers seasonal sale.

Crane & Canopy: Enjoy up to 70% off bedding, sheets, rugs, and decor. The sale runs from 2/12 through 2/15. Discount automatically applied.

My Sheets Rock: Enjoy 15% off luxury bamboo sheets with code PRES15 from 2/11 through 2/15.

Nordstrom: The luxury retailers Winter Sale is coming 2/12-2/21.

Home Depot: Check out the great deals on all appliances.

Lowes: More than 3,000 appliances are on sale.

Following a year of pandemic and lockdowns, South African employees and companies are looking ahead to the annual Budget Speech on 24 February with a sense of foreboding.

Yolandi Esterhuizen, registered tax practitioner & director: product compliance, Sage Africa & Middle East

Unemployment

Tax increases

Corporate tax rates

Working from home tax deductions

Temporary Employer-Employee Relief Scheme (Ters)

In the wake of the crisis, many jobs have disappeared, countless businesses have shut down, and billions of rand in tax revenue from sources such as VAT, PAYE, and excise duties have been lost. This at a time when government faces the challenge of sourcing more money to fund a mass vaccination programme.With near-record levels of unemployment, and limited fiscal room, finance minister, Tito Mboweni faces a difficult task in balancing the need to raise more tax revenue against the reality that most businesses and consumers dont have more to give.Here are a few points I am eager for the minister to address in the Budget Speech.Based on numbers from the third quarter of 2020, South Africas unemployment rate is currently at 30.8%. This is the single largest economic and humanitarian crisis the country faces. Government has committed R100bn to create jobs through public and social employment under the economic reconstruction and recovery plan. Based on a report in December, we are also seeing good progress in the Presidential Employment Stimulus and other programmes. Im expecting more news in the budget.A growing fiscal deficit and new funding requirements, such as the vaccine programme, mean government will most likely need to increase taxes somewhere. With PAYE receipts under pressure due to rising unemployment, it is likely to look at sources such as sin taxes and fuel levies. It would not be surprising to see a solidarity wealth tax implemented soon. A recent study indicated that such a measure could raise up to R160bn for the fiscus. However, a wealth tax might be complex and expensive to administer.In February last year, the government indicated it was planning to broaden the corporate income tax base through measures such as restricting net interest expense deductions and limiting the use of assessed losses carried forward. It would then use the boost in funding to reduce the corporate tax rate.In the Supplementary Budget Review, Treasury confirmed the postponement of measures to broaden the corporate income tax base until at least 1 January 2022. It would be good for the minister to give an update on these plans. Many businesses would welcome a lower corporate tax rate in these difficult times, and it would be a pity if they needed to wait much longer for relief.Many employees have yet to return to the office and are likely to continue working from home for most of the upcoming tax year. To claim a portion of your rent and certain other expenses as a work-from-home tax deduction, you need a dedicated area in your house used exclusively for work. This seems unfair to the many people who work in their lounge or bedroom because they are not privileged enough to live on a big property. I would welcome the relaxation of these rules, even if only as a temporary measure during the pandemic.Following the second wave of coronavirus infections and tougher lockdown restrictions, the finance minister is under pressure to offer more relief to businesses and employees to tide them over during this difficult time. Many businesses, especially in the tourism and hospitality sector, will not survive much longer without help from the government. As such, its reassuring that the presidents State of the Nation Address mentioned a Ters extension to 15 March for sectors that are unable to operate.The conditions and the sectors to be included will be announced after consultation with social partners at Nedlac. I wonder what type of relief, if any, will be provided to businesses that cannot operate to full capacity and that are also struggling to keep their heads above water. I hope the minister will announce further relief measures to help them, too.
A hospital nurse has been injured by a stray bullet fired during a possible gang-related shooting in Sydneys west on Monday night.

Police were called to a townhouse on Auburn Road in Auburn just before 8pm after receiving reports of a shooting.

Officers found several bullet holes in the front of the building.

One of the bullets also penetrated a window in Auburn Hospital, located behind the townhouse.
Labour rights activist Nodeep Kaur was granted bail on Monday in a second case registered against her, said her counsel.

The 23-year-old activist will, however, have to remain in Karnal jail as her bail plea in yet another case, registered on January 12, was rejected earlier by a sessions court.

Kaur is facing three cases that include charges of attempt to murder and extortion. She is a member of the Mazdoor Adhikar Sangathan and a resident of Giadarh village in Punjab's Muktsar district.

She, along with others, was arrested on January 12 for allegedly gheraoing an industrial unit and demanding money from the company in Sonipat district, the Haryana police had earlier said.

Kaur has two separate cases of extortion registered against her.

She was granted bail in a case registered on January 12 under various sections of IPC and for extortion. The same court had on Thursday granted her bail in another case registered on December 28 also under IPC sections for extortion and other charges, her counsel said.

The activist continues to remain in jail in another case which has been registered under various IPC sections, including attempt to murder.

On Thursday, Punjab minister Aruna Chaudhary had urged the Commission for Women to intervene and ensure the release of Nodeep Kaur.

The Punjab State Commission for Scheduled Castes had on February 8 asked an additional chief secretary in the state to intervene in the matter and ensure relief to her at the earliest.

(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.)
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President Biden's chief medical adviser, Dr. Anthony Fauci, tells "Axios on HBO" that despite the effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccines, emerging variants could pose a "stumbling block" and Americans shouldn't become complacent.

Driving the news: The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases also shared his thoughts on contemplating his own mortality, working with Biden, and talking to teachers about returning to school before everyone's been vaccinated.

Fauci called the suffering and death of recent months "stunning," with January and December the worst months since the start. "The number of cases were between 300,000 and 400,000 per day," he said. "The number of deaths were between 3,000 and 4,000 per day."

While "things are going in the right direction ... we're also going to be challenged by the appearance of variants or mutants that have appeared, some of which have a functional influence on how we're gonna respond to them," he said. "Fortunately, others are well covered by the vaccine, but not all of them."

"You don't want people to become complacent. We still have a long way to go ... We still might have a stumbling block coming with the appearance of variants that would dominate the picture."

The other side: Fauci, who has been vaccinated, expressed optimism that as more Americans receive their doses, friends or relatives who have both been vaccinated can finally reunite as they'd like.

"Can I have my daughter come down from Boston, who I haven't seen in a very long time?" he said. "Can I sit down and have a dinner with her without worrying about spreading infection? Can I give her a big hug the way I'd like to? I think the answer ultimately will likely be yes to that, but I think we'll wait to see what the recommendations show."

In talking with teachers, Fauci said, "You have to understand and empathize with them greatly, that they have a concern of their own safety, so you can't downplay that."

"You also have to fight for resources to be able to allow the schools to open up safely. So the provision of masks, of good ventilation, of good spacing of seats, all of those things together are going to get the schools open safely."

He said of his task in offering guidance to all Americans, "It's sometimes humbling because you have to make a decision based on incomplete data."

Fauci, 80, said he faced his fears that the virus could get him, especially during Donald Trump's presidency.

"I didn't fixate on that, but it was in the back of my mind because I had to be out there," he said. "I mean, particularly when I was going to the White House every day when the White House was sort of a super-spreader location."

He said he's committed to telling any president hard truths, but doesn't stress about that much now because Biden is "very wedded to the concept of 'science rules' and you act on basis of what the data and the scientific evidence tells you to do."

The bottom line: Fauci said he's aware that to some he's a cultural icon, while others have made threats against him and his family  but he tries to block both out and stay focused on the pandemic. "Right now, my responsibility is from a scientific standpoint to do whatever I can to end this."
The Microsoft Surface Duo was discounted to $1,000 in the US and this week it will launch in Canada, the UK, Germany and France (at full price, unfortunately). If you do decide to get one (or already have one), youll be glad to hear that Microsoft is working on an Android 11 update for its dual-screen phone.

Youll be less pleased to learn that the update wont arrive until the summer. This information was revealed to Dr. Windows at a presentation related to the launch in Germany. According to Windows Central sources, the Android 11 update is coming around in June or July (summer doesnt end until August).

Either way, that is not ideal, considering that Microsoft has been working on this update since June last year (before the Duo even became available). The software giant even bought Movial, the company that was originally developing Android for the Surface Duo. Things should have been moving faster with development in-house.

Apparently, the reason behind the delay is that Microsoft and Google have teamed up to port all developments related to dual screen operation into the Android core. This will make the functionality available to other Android makers (good news for LG and Asus, we guess, not so good for Surface Duo owners).

Source 1 (in German) | Source 2 | Via
Rabbi Bieberfeld receives a dose coronavirus vaccine at the John Scott Vaccination Centre in London, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. The dose was administered at an event to encourage vaccine uptake in Britain's Haredi community which has been hard hit during the COVID-19 pandemic. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

The U.K. announced Sunday that it had reached its goal of giving at least one COVID-19 vaccine shot to the most vulnerable people in the country, increasing pressure on ministers to clarify when they will ease a lockdown imposed in early January.

More than 15 million people, or 22% of the U.K. population, have received their first shot. The figure includes most people in the government's top four priority groups, including everyone over 75, frontline healthcare workers and nursing home staff and residents. Over 537,000 of them have also received their second dose.

"15,000,000! Amazing team,'' Nadhim Zahawi, the vaccines minister, said in a tweet that featured a red heart and three syringes. "We will not rest till we offer the vaccine to the whole of phase1 the 1-9 categories of the most vulnerable & all over 50s by end April and then all adults.''

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson plans to unveil his roadmap for easing restrictions on Feb. 22 amid signs that infection rates, hospitalizations and deaths have fallen sharply since England's third national lockdown began on Jan. 4.

"This country has achieved an extraordinary featadministering a total of 15 million jabs into the arms of some of the most vulnerable people in the country,'' Johnson said in a tweet.

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, visits a PPE manufacturing facility during a visit to the north east of England, in Seaton Delaval, England, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, Pool)

Johnson said in England, everyone in the four top priority groups had been offered the vaccine. He plans to release further details on the vaccination effort on Monday.

Jockeying has already begun between those who want the measures lifted as soon as possible and those who fear moving too fast will lead to a resurgence of the virus.

Britain got a head start on its vaccination effort in December, when it became the first country to authorize widespread use of a COVID-19 shot. It ranks behind only Israel, 73%, the Seychelles, 53%, and the United Arab Emirates, 51% in the percentage of people who have received one dose, according to Oxford University. The U.S. is fifth at 15%.

At the same time, coronavirus lockdown rules that have closed schools, restaurants and nonessential shops in the U.K. are starting to pay off. The number of new infections, hospital admissions and deaths recorded over the past seven days have all dropped by more than 20% from the previous week.

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, visits a PPE manufacturing facility during a visit to the north east of England, in Seaton Delaval, England, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, Pool)

When Johnson announced the lockdown, he said the government would review the measures in mid-February based on their success in controlling the pandemic and progress in the vaccination effort. Johnson's first priority is to reopen schools, and he has promised to give schools two weeks notice to give teachers time to prepare.

Britain has reported over 117,000 virus-related deaths, the highest pandemic toll in Europe.

Mark Harper, a lawmaker from the ruling Conservative Party, has warned the government against "moving the goalposts" for deciding when to ease the lockdown.

Johnson should start by reopening schools, then gradually lift other restrictions as more people are vaccinated, said Harper, who leads a group of about 70 lawmakers who have lobbied the government to consider the negative economic and social impacts of the restrictions along with the health benefits.

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson looks at a pipette before him, during briefing by a molecular biologist at the QuantuMDx Biotechnology company in Newcastle, England on Saturday Feb.13, 2021. Johnson is visiting manufacturing facilities in north east England to see ongoing Covid-19 responses in the region. (Ian Forsyth/Pool via AP)

"Once you have protected people from serious illness and from death, I don't think these draconian restrictions of not being able to meet your family, not see your friends, not see your children, not see your parents, not visit people in care homes, I don't think they are justifiable anymore,'' Harper told Times Radio.

After meeting the target for reaching the most vulnerable, U.K. authorities will progressively expand the vaccination drive to the next five priority groups until everyone over 50 and vulnerable younger people with health conditions that put them at higher risk from the virus have been offered the vaccine.

Public health officials say the top nine priority groups account for 99% of the deaths caused by COVID-19 so far.

While the vaccines currently authorized for use in the U.K. require two doses to ensure full protection against COVID-19, British authorities say one dose provides a significant level of protection.

A man from the Haredi Orthodox Jewish community, center, queues outside an event to encourage vaccine uptake in Britain's Haredi community at the John Scott Vaccination Centre in London, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. The event aims to breakdown some of the misconceptions about vaccines, as well as myths and negative publicity surrounding the Haredi community which has been hard hit during the COVID-19 pandemic. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

Because of this, they have made it their priority to give the first dose to as many people as possible as quickly as possible. To do this, Britain is planning to give second doses after three months, instead of one month as recommended by the manufacturers.

Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust health think tank, said the number of COVID-19 infections in Britain is still too high to think about lifting the restrictions.

"We've made enormous progress  but the transmission is incredibly high still and we've got to get it lower," he said.

There are other dangers on the horizon. U.K. government scientific advisers say the COVID-19 variant now predominant in the country may be up to 70% more deadly than previous variants, underscoring concerns about how mutations may change the characteristics of the disease.

Two men from the Haredi Orthodox Jewish community arrive at an event to encourage vaccine uptake in Britain's Haredi community at the John Scott Vaccination Centre in London, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. The event aims to breakdown some of the misconceptions about vaccines, as well as myths and negative publicity surrounding the Haredi community which has been hard hit during the COVID-19 pandemic. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson looks at a pipette before him, during briefing by a molecular biologist at the QuantuMDx Biotechnology company in Newcastle, England on Saturday Feb.13, 2021. Johnson is visiting manufacturing facilities in north east England to see ongoing Covid-19 responses in the region. (Ian Forsyth/Pool via AP)

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, visits a PPE manufacturing facility during a visit to the north east of England, in Seaton Delaval, England, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, Pool)

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, visits a PPE manufacturing facility during a visit to the north east of England, in Seaton Delaval, England, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, Pool)

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, visits a PPE manufacturing facility during a visit to the north east of England, in Seaton Delaval, England, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, Pool)

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, visits a PPE manufacturing facility during a visit to the north east of England, in Seaton Delaval, England, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, Pool)

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, visits a pharmaceutical manufacturing facility during a visit to the north east of England, in Stockton-on-Tees, England, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell, Pool)

The findings from the New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group, published Friday on the government's website, builds on preliminary research released Jan. 21. The group, known as NERVTAG, includes experts from universities and public agencies across the U.K.

The new report is based on analysis of a dozen studies that found the so-called Kent variant, named after the county where it was first identified, is likely 30% to 70% more deadly than other variants. The studies compared hospitalization and death rates among people infected with the variant and those infected with other variants.

The results of the analysis are worrisome, said Dr. David Strain, a clinical senior lecturer at the University of Exeter Medical School and the clinical lead for COVID at the Royal Devon & Exeter Hospital.

"The higher transmissibility means that people who were previously at low risk of catching COVID (particularly younger fitter females) are now catching it and ending up in hospital,'' Strain said. "This is highlighted by the latest figures for hospitalization that now suggest almost 50:50 male to female ratio compared to this being predominantly in men during the first wave.''

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Threatened by the emerging COVID-19 mutations, the British administration has ordered a new system of hotel quarantine. The new rule would be applied to all the British, Irish citizens and other UK residents who arrive in England after being in a high-risk COVID country. Pertaining to the same, the health officials have also released a list of 33 high-risk nations which includes countries of South Africa, Portugal, Mauritius, Chile amongst others.

What is UK's Hotel Quarantine rule

As per the government decree, all the aforementioned travellers would be required to quarantine in government-approved hotels for 10 days, with negative tests required for them to then be released. They are additionally required to pre-book and pay 1,750 to spend their designated duration of isolation. While England has released its red list of high-risk countries, Scotland has made it mandatory for all incoming travellers to hotel quarantine.

Read: UK's Chief Mouser Celebrates 10 Years On The Prowl

Read: UK PM Boris Johnson Describes Donald Trump's Acquittal As 'toings, Froings And Kerfuffle'

How does it differ from other nations?

The duration of hotel quarantine is higher in the Asian and Pacific nations. In Australia and New Zealand, isolation lasts for 14 days from the time of arrival, while Hong Kong requires 21 days in hotel isolation. In addendum, the range of people allowed to enter the country also decreases as one travels towards the east.

Both, Australia and New Zealand only allow citizens to enter the country, with a few exceptions. Meanwhile, Taiwan allows citizens in addition to international students. Hong Kong and some Australian states totally restrict guests from leaving their rooms during quarantine, while New Zealand in most cases allows regular outdoor exercise or smoking. In comparison, the UK allows supervised exercise only with special permissions.

Guests who test positive in quarantine in England are expected to prolong their stay for 10 days following the positive result. While, in New Zealand, hose who test positive  including staff  are transferred to a special quarantine facility in Auckland with heavier restrictions. Also, the UK does not mandate regular testing as compared to other nations. As per the latest tally by John Hopkins University, the UK has reported 4,038,078 and 117,166 fatalities since the COVID-19 infection was first reported in the country in January 2019.

Read: UK Begins To Impose Hotel Quarantine For Arrivals

Read: UK Health Sec On 'vaccine Passports' For Travellers
When is the baby due?

We dont yet know. An official statement on Valentines Day said: We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child. The baby will be eighth in the line of succession to the British throne.

Their first pregnancy was announced after the first trimester. The couple seems to be further into the second pregnancy, and no doubt made the most of the privacy afforded them to enjoy this pregnancy while they lived at their Santa Barbara home and out of the public eye during the pandemic.

Why did they share their news on Valentine's Day?

Other than a day celebrating love being a touching symbol for such a statement, Prince Harry's own parents revealed their second pregnancy on February 13, 1984. The next day, Valentine's Day, it was front page news all over Britain. Of course, the baby born to them 37 years ago was Prince Harry.

Will they only have two children?

In a Q&A for Vogue in September 2019, for the edition guest-edited by his wife, Prince Harry, 36, said he and Ms Markle, 39, would only have two children. Two, maximum! he told primatologist Jane Goodall.

Meghan and Harry with their son Archie during a tour of Africa.

The couple has been trying to grow their family in recent months. Ms Markle suffered a miscarriage last July, and described "an almost unbearable grief" in a deeply personal article for the New York Times following their loss. Soon-to-be older brother Archie Mountbatten-Windsor will turn two in May.

What names are thought to be in the mix?

Bookies in the UK are already giving odds on certain names they think might be given to the new baby. Some think the name may start with the letter A after the couple called their first child Archie.

The names Alfie and Alexandra are the frontrunners so far, while other names favoured by punters include Charles or Charlie, Florence, Freddie, Arabella and Doria. Royal family names cropping up include Elizabeth, Philip, Albert and Diana.

Why did the couple announce their pregnancy?

The short answer: why not? Theyre clearly excited about expanding their family and the news is a welcome reprieve from the grim atmosphere caused by the pandemic.

However, there has been much discussion on social media and in the tabloids about what is perceived by some to be hypocrisy in the young couple: they stepped down as senior members of the UKs royal family last year and moved to Ms Markles native Southern California and they have been vocal about their right to privacy. They have brought publications to court, including Splash UK which photographed Ms Markle and their son without permission during a "private family outing" while staying in Canada, and in 2020 they announced that they would no longer cooperate with the Daily Mail, the Sun, the Mirror and the Express.

Importantly, their decision to announce the pregnancy is not undermining their own privacy. It was announced on their terms, rather than leaked to the press or uncovered by paparazzi.

LONDON : British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will judge this week how fast England can exit COVID-19 lockdown after vaccinating 15 million of its most vulnerable people, but the health minister said death and hospital admission numbers were still too high.

With nearly a quarter of the United Kingdom's population now inoculated with a first dose of a COVID vaccine in a little over two months, Johnson is under pressure from some lawmakers and businesses to reopen the shuttered economy.

"We've got to watch the data," Health Secretary Matt Hancock told Sky News. "Everybody wants to get out of this as quickly as we safely can, and both as quickly, but also as safely, are important."

"The question is a judgement of how quickly and safely, how quickly we can do that safely. That's the judgment that we're making this week, looking at the data, ahead of the prime minister setting out the roadmap, on the 22nd," he said.

The biggest and swiftest global vaccine rollout in history is seen as the best chance of exiting the COVID-19 pandemic which has killed 2.4 million people, tipped the global economy into its worst peacetime slump since the Great Depression and upended normal life for billions.

Britain has vaccinated 15.062 million people with a first dose and 537,715 with a second dose, the fastest rollout per capita of any large country.

VACCINE CERTIFICATES

Hancock said the British government was speaking to other countries across the world about giving British people certificates showing they had been vaccinated so that they could travel abroad in the future to countries that require them.

"There is this international work going on because if other countries require (proof of vaccination) we want to allow Brits to be able to travel to those countries," Hancock said.

"We'd want to be able to facilitate that sort of vaccine certification, but it isn't anything we're planning to introduce here," he said, adding that a so-called vaccine passport was not something that would be required to access services in the UK.

The United Kingdom has the world's fifth-worst official death toll - currently 117,166 - after the United States, Brazil, Mexico and India.

A new COVID-19 hotel quarantine system for arrivals from 33 "red list" countries, intended to limit the spread of new variants of the virus, appears to be working smoothly a few hours after it was introduced, Hancock said.

"As of 6.30, when I got my latest update, this is working smoothly, we've been working with the airports and with the border force to make sure everybody knows the process," Hancock told Times Radio.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge and Kate Holton; Editing by James Davey and Peter Graff)

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The Chinese Supreme People's Court building in Beijing on Mar. 30, 2006. On Dec. 23, a public prosecutor in Chongqing indirectly stated that he could find no legal basis for the campaign of prohibition and persecution against Falun Gong, the traditional Chinese spiritual discipline. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)

China Adopts Trial In Absentia, in a Move Analysts Say Will Target Overseas Dissidents

The Chinese regimes highest court issued a detailed interpretation of a criminal procedure law on Feb. 4, stipulating that trial in absentia can be applied to defendants who seriously endanger national security and are based outside China, according to Chinese media reports.

Trial in absentia refers to criminal proceedings in which a defendant is not physically present to attend said proceedings.

China observers worry that the move is aimed at intimidating Chinese dissidents who live abroad.

In 2018, Chinas rubber-stamp legislature, the National Peoples Congress, enacted amendments to its criminal procedure law to allow more courts to try people in absentia. But it was not until this month that Chinas Supreme Court gave a clear legal interpretation of it. The guidance will be implemented on March 1 this year.

The court defined crimes of endangering national security as organizing, planning, and implementing division of the country, undermining national unity, inciting to split the country, subversion of state power, overthrowing the socialist system by spreading rumors, slander, and other means.

In an interview with The Epoch Times, China-based media commentator Wu Te said that the Chinese Communist Partys (CCP) move was clearly intended to intimidate overseas dissidents and to legalize its financial persecution of dissidents such as through suspending their Chinese pensions, confiscating their properties in China, and freezing their bank accounts.

For example, Cai Xia is a former professor at Beijings Central Party School, the top school for training Party cadres. Cai retired in 2012 and moved to the United States in 2019. Since retirement, she has become an outspoken critic of Beijing.

On Aug. 17, 2020, Cai Xia was expelled from the Party and her retirement benefits were cancelled, after she made speeches criticizing Chinese leader Xi Jinping and the CCP. Three days later, authorities froze Cais bank account.

Chen Jiangang, a former Chinese human rights lawyer currently living in exile in the United States, told Voice of America that such tactics were common methods for Beijing to pressure its critics. If the dissidents cannot be silenced by political means, it will use economic means to deprive them of their source of livelihood. The CCP makes an example of them to intimidate othersif you disobey, you have nothing to eat.

Chen said at times, Chinese authorities also cut off the income of their immediate family members, relatives, and friends, and confiscate their properties. As a result, some Chinese intellectuals are afraid to speak up against the CCP.

Wu believes that although the CCPs actions will cause considerable losses to overseas dissidents who have assets in China, it is impossible for the Party to completely silence them; as most of these dissidents live overseas, they have freedom of speech. In turn, the CCPs latest move would only make overseas dissidents even more angry and compel them to sever ties with the CCP completely, Wu said.

Luo Ya and Xiao Lusheng contributed to this report.
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Thunbergs toolkit and a close link of a climate activist to a pro-Khalistan outfit

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: Disha Ravi, who claims to be a climate activist arrested on charges of sharing a toolkit on the social media related to the farmers' protest was allegedly a key conspirator in the curation and distribution of the document.

The police alleged that she collaborated with pro-Khalsitani outfit Poetic Justice Foundation to to "spread disaffection against Indian state" and also shared the document with Thunberg.

"Disha Ravi, arrested by CyPAD Delhi Police, is an Editor of the Toolkit Google Doc & key conspirator in document's formulation & dissemination. She started WhatsApp Group and collaborated to make the toolkit doc. She worked closely with them to draft the doc. In this process, they all collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. She was the one who shared the Toolkit Doc with Greta Thunberg", said the police in a statement.

'Toolkit revealed a lot': Jaishankar on document shared by Greta Thunberg

Delhi Police has taken cognizance of a 'Toolkit Document' found on a social media platform that predates and indicates a copycat execution of a conspiracy behind the 26Jan violence. The call was to wage economic, social, cultural and regional war against India, the police also said.

Later, she asked Greta to remove the main Doc after its incriminating details accidentally got into public domain. This is many times more than the 2 lines editing that she claims, the police also said.

Several pro-Khalistan outfits have thrown their hat in the ring amidst the farmer protests. The likes of Mo Dhaliwal have been blamed for creating a toolkit, which was used by Greta Thunberg to speak in favour of the farmer protests. India has however made it clear that it will not tolerate any outside interference and the farmer protests are completely India's internal matter.

Intelligence Bureau officials tell Oneindia that the pro-Khalistan outfits were bound to take advantage of the situation. They have always looked to infiltrate the country and this has been seen for long.

While the Khalistanis have made several unsuccessful attempts in the past, the IB official cited above says that the bigger worry is about the separatism mindset that these persons are trying to set in.

Recently, a former top cop from Punjab, Shashi Kant said that the pro-Khalistan activists are trying to set up base in the United Kingdom, especially in Birmingham city.

India has been raising concerns about pro-Khalistan elements in Pakistan misusing the Kartarpur corridor project. India handed over a dossier detailing how Sikh pilgrims visiting shrines in Pakistan were being subjected to pro-Khalistan propaganda.

A detailed dossier listing out the activities of the pro-Khalistan groups was handed over to Islamabad by India. The dossier, which was handed over during the Kartarpur Corridor talks at the Wagah border speaks about the various activities of the pro-Khalistan groups, including the Sikhs for Justice. The SJF was recently banned in India.

It is carbon copy of Kashmir says the officer. On one hand, they are training the terrorists and helping them stage attacks in Punjab. There has been a sudden surge in activity in Punjab, which includes terror attacks, propaganda and also setting up of modules.

Agitate by night: Mo Dhaliwal, the pro-Khalistani whose toolkit Thunberg used

Close on the heels of these developments, the Intelligence Bureau has information about how the ISI would try and brainwash the Sikhs. This would be done to give the cause further legitimacy. The ISI would want the locals to speak up in favour of a separate Punjab nation. Once there is local support for such a cause, it makes the job of causing panic even more easier. The locals would be expected to provide support to the terrorists who claim that they are fighting for a separate Punjab nation.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Officials say that such protests are easy infiltration points. While the protesting farmers say that they have kept the Khalistan elements away, the problem is that these persons would look to infiltrate the protests. They will use all resources at hand, which also includes getting foreign personalities to tweet or speak about the issue, the official also said. By indulging in such acts, the aim is to create a separatist mindset, like what we got to witness in Jammu and Kashmir, the official also said.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 8:59 [IST]
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Fake German heiress Anna Sorokin spent her first weekend of freedom living it up in Manhattan hotel and shopping at Sephora after being released from prison eight months early last week - and making sure it was all caught on camera.

Sorokin, 29, - who went by the name Anna Delvey while duping people out of $275,000 before her 2017 arrest - was released from Albion prison in upstate New York on February 11.

In 2019, she was sentenced to a minimum of four years behind bars for duping friends, banks and hotels by posing as a European heiress to steal their money.

She was given time served for the 18 months she spent in Rikers Island before her trial, then was freed early due to COVID-19 and good behavior.

Immediately after leaving prison, Sorokin set up new social media accounts and reconvened with friends in Manhattan.

Over the weekend, she stayed at The Nomad Hotel - where rooms are $260-a-night - and shared photos of wine and caviar in her suite.

She was followed around by a German TV camera crew and reporter, and also posted on her own social media accounts about what she was doing.

Scroll down for video

Anna Sorokin, aka Anna Delvey, leaves prison on February 11 with her attorney (right) and a German reporter (left) who trailed her for the weekend

One of her first stops was to get her hair done at Valentino Jet Salon. It was filmed as part of the TV special

Sorokin, wearing a $1,000 Canada Goose coat, perused clothes after having her hair cut

Sorokin standing beneath a neon sign that reads 'It is OK for me to have everything I want' and right, with German TV reporter Daniela Hoffmann

Anna Sorokin, aka Anna Delvey, was released from prison on Thursday. She checked into The Nomad Hotel over the weekend

Delvey and her friend went shopping at Sephora in Nomad to stock up on make-up and skincare

She and one of her friends were seen buying make-up at Sephora on Sunday. A videographer trailed their every move.

She also asked fans on social media to tune in to a 'live' video where she promised a no-holds-barred Q&A but then disappointed them by only filming herself in the bathtub and not answering any questions.

How long Sorokin will be able to stay in the country remains a mystery.

She is a German citizen and has no legal status in the US but has never been deported. ICE did not immediately respond to inquiries about her status on Monday morning.

She tweeted that she wouldn't leave until 'black people have reparations'.

Sorokin declined an interview with DailyMail.com when she was released from prison on Thursday, saying she wasn't 'ready'.

But she spent the weekend with a German reporter who trailed her through the city, and has also been filming with the videographer for an unspecified project.

Netflix has already paid her $320,000 to consult on a series about her crimes.

She used most of the money to pay off her victims.

Cheers to the weekend: Sorokin and her friend drank a variety of wines in their suite

Posing for documentary: A film crew was in the convicted felon's hotel room to document her every move

Room service: Sorokin ordered yogurt, berries and granola for herself in the hotel

Sorokin told fans on Sunday she'd do a 'FULL Q&A' on Instagram live

When it came down to it, she said she was having 'tech problems'. She then just showed them her bathtub

Sorokin said she won't leave the US until 'they give Black people reparations'. Her legal status is unknown

Sorokin duped friends, hotels and even banks into giving her money between 2016 and 2017.

She pretended to be the daughter of a mysterious oil baron in Europe and lived an exorbitantly expensive lifestyle in Manhattan without ever actually paying for it.

It came crashing down in 2017 after she took a friend, a Vanity Fair photo editor, to Marrakesh with her, racked up thousands in charges at hotels and then gave the photo editor the $62,000 bill, promising to pay her back.

Sorokin also convinced banks to give her huge overdrafts, and would convince luxury hotels into giving her the keys to rooms, promising to pay later.

She always denied the charges and said she intended to create an arts club in New York that would be her legacy.

Sorokin is the daughter of a Russian truck driver.

Her parents say she left them to go to live in Paris and London years ago, and that they have had no contact with her.

Sorokin pleaded not guilty and maintained her innocence throughout trial, insisting it was all a misunderstanding.

Her trial took place in Manhattan in 2019 and included tantrums from Sorokin over her wardrobe.
The pandemic has not been kind to Fresno, the poorest major city in California. The unemployment rate spiked above 10% and has stubbornly remained there. Violent crime has surged, as has homelessness. Tax revenue has plummeted as businesses have shuttered. Lines at food banks are filled with first-timers.

But as bad as it's been, things could soon get worse: Having frozen hundreds of jobs last year, the city is now being forced to consider laying off 250 people, including police and firefighters, to close a $31 million budget shortfall.

"That," said Jerry Dyer, mayor of the half-million-population city in the Central Valley, "is going to be devastating."

The looming cuts explain why Dyer's eyes are fixed on Washington, where President Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief plan dangles the tantalizing prospect of a reprieve. Although Dyer is a Republican, he's rooting for the president to successfully push through federal aid that, after a nightmarish year for Fresno, will "help get us to the end."

The first-term mayor's stance reflects a broader split, one that gives Biden and his fellow Democrats a key tactical advantage as negotiations near an expected climax early next month.

Republicans in Congress oppose the relief bill, casting it as bloated and budget-busting, with some heaping particular scorn on a measure to send $350 billion in assistance to states and cities. Should Biden go ahead without their approval, GOP leaders say, it will prove that his mantra of bipartisanship rings hollow.

But to many Republicans at city halls and statehouses across the country, the relief package looks different. Instead of the "blue-state bailout" derided by GOP lawmakers, Republican mayors and governors say they see badly needed federal aid to keep police on the beat, to prevent battered Main Street businesses from going under and to help care for the growing ranks of the homeless and the hungry.

"It's not a Republican issue or a Democrat issue," said Dyer, who became mayor last month after a long career as the city's police chief. "It's a public health issue. It's an economic issue. And it's a public safety issue."

Surveys show that a majority of Americans support the assistance, including large numbers of Republicans. A minority among Republican voters agree with GOP lawmakers that the aid package is too large, polls have found.

Biden on Friday highlighted the rift, inviting a bipartisan group of mayors and governors to the White House to discuss the specifics of the bill.

"You folks are all on the front lines and dealing with the crisis since Day 1," he told the group, which included the Republican governors of Maryland and Arkansas, as well as Republican mayors.

Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, a Republican, later told reporters from the podium in the White House briefing room that he had spoken with Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris more in the first several weeks of their administration "than I had spoken to the prior administration in the entirety."

Biden said he brought the group to the White House to ask "what do they think they need most."

To many mayors and governors, it's a long list.

"I don't know of any city that hasn't been affected negatively," said Oklahoma City, Okla., Mayor David Holt, a Republican. "Some may be worse off than others. But we have all had to make cuts."

The impact has not been as severe as some economists initially projected, however. When the pandemic first struck American shores and much of the U.S. economy shut down last spring, the prognosis for states and cities looked dire. Analysts warned that cities - some of which had not fully recovered from the Great Recession more than a decade ago - could be forced into bankruptcy.

But some of the worst consequences have already been blunted by previous rounds of federal aid, as well as by the nature of the economic recovery, with high-income people - who contribute much of the state and local tax base - bouncing back relatively quickly while poorer families languish.

When 10 Republican senators visited the White House this month to lay out their slimmed-down $618 billion counterproposal to the president's plan, Mitt Romney of Utah came brandishing details from a J.P. Morgan analysis showing that most states had seen modest revenue declines.

Romney later told reporters that Biden's insistence on $350 billion in state and local aid was the biggest stumbling block in negotiations.

"That kind of number just makes no sense at all," he said. The Republican plan proposed to cut it entirely.

Yet as the J.P. Morgan analysis shows, the impact of the pandemic has been unevenly felt, with some states - especially those whose economies are heavily dependent on tourism or oil and gas extraction - suffering large declines.

A Brookings Institution analysis in September found that although income tax revenue had proved resilient during the pandemic, sales tax and transportation-related revenue had been hit especially hard. As a result, states and cities were projected to lose out on more than $450 billion over three years.

And the pain has not only been on the revenue side. New needs arising from the pandemic have created new costs.

"Cities were confronting some really big challenges even before this crisis - income inequality, homelessness, housing affordability," said Tracy Gordon, acting director of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center.

All have been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic, she said. But many cities now have fewer resources with which to address them.

In Oklahoma City, Holt said, revenue has been down by about 5%, a departure from the robust growth the city had become accustomed to before the pandemic. To compensate, he said, the city has had to leave jobs unfilled and cut funding for parks and recreation, even as the overall needs of citizens and businesses have grown.

"We don't do much fluff here," he said. "So whatever we've had to cut, residents have experienced it."

Republican lawmakers in Washington have dismissed aid to cities as a bailout for governments that have long spent beyond their means.

But Holt called that "a red herring." Most state and city governments - unlike the federal government - have to balance their budgets, just as a business would.

Unlike businesses large and small that have received grants or loans to make up for the damage done by the coronavirus, cities have been left out.

"In a sense, we're the only employer that hasn't been able to make an application to anyone to save our jobs and save our services," said Holt, who noted that the city government is one of his metro area's biggest employers. "Support for cities and states is way overdue."

There has been some relief. The Cares Act, signed into law by President Donald Trump in March, included $150 billion for states and for the nation's 38 largest cities. But money had to be spent directly on coronavirus expenses, creating logistical hurdles in getting it out the door. Nearly a year later, some of it remains unspent, a point Republicans make in arguing for why additional taxpayer dollars should not be allocated.

The aid proposed by Biden would not have the same restrictions. Mayors say that will make it easier to quickly get it into the hands of those who need it and to stimulate economic growth.

Betsy Price proudly calls Fort Worth, the Texas metropolis of nearly 900,000 people she has led for the past decade, "a fiscally conservative city." But the Republican mayor said the pandemic has forced the city government to spend more just to keep people afloat, doling out small-business support, rental assistance and help with utility bills.

Price joined more than 400 fellow mayors late last month - including many Republicans - in signing a U.S. Conference of Mayors letter that called on Congress to quickly pass Biden's coronavirus relief plan. She said she had spoken with both of Texas's senators - Republicans Ted Cruz and John Cornyn - and made the same case.

"We're not asking the Democrats or the Republicans to put money into city coffers," she said. "We're asking them to put it into the community to help people get back on their feet."

The National Governors Association has not released a letter similar to the one endorsed by the mayors. But the group did call for $500 billion in relief for states last spring. And individual Republican governors have spoken up to back Biden's relief plan, which can be enacted without GOP support. That includes moderates such as Maryland's Larry Hogan, as well as Trump-aligned conservatives such as West Virginia's Jim Justice, who has urged Congress to "go big."

Suarez, the Miami mayor, has pushed the same message and has put pressure on Florida's two Republican U.S. senators, Marco Rubio and Rick Scott, to follow through.

Suarez recently co-wrote an opinion article with St. Petersburg, Fla., Mayor Rick Kriseman, a Democrat, in which they addressed the senators directly and enumerated the problems facing their cities, including unemployment, bankrupt business and lines at food pantries that look like "gridlocked freeways."

"Florida's cities are in agony and are crying out for help," they wrote. "This is not sustainable."

In an interview, Suarez said both senators have been receptive to his message in private, though they also expressed concerns about the cost - concerns that Suarez said he could understand, to a point.

"Under normal circumstances, this kind of government spending would be completely unacceptable," he said. "But this is a crisis."


Minister of Justice Stelian Ion met on Monday with the Dutch Ambassador to Romania, Roelof Van Ees, with the two officials discussing on this occasion the process of amending the Justice package, but also the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code.

Bilateral cooperation in the field of justice was one of the topics of discussion, the ambassador expressing the openness of the Dutch Ministry of Justice to continue the discussions already underway.

The new European Rule of Law Mechanism, the strategic management of the judiciary, the recovery of claims, as well as environmental crime are the topics that will be developed in the bilateral dialogue, a press release of the Ministry of Justice sent to AGERPRES informs.

Strengthening the rule of law at the level of the European Union is our collective responsibility. Progress at national level brings added value to the entire Union. In this context, mutual support is very important, the Dutch ambassador said.

According to the cited source, the Dutch official was interested in the process of amending the Laws of Justice, the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code, as well as the schedule to be followed by the Government; the Minister of Justice presented the status of the draft law on the abolition of the Section for the Investigation of Judicial Crimes (SIIJ). as well as the timetable for finalizing the laws of justice and the draft laws on amending the two Codes. He also specified that the Justice bills will be sent, for opinion, to the Venice Commission and GRECO.

"Direct discussions on topics of interest to the CVM and the European Rule of Law Mechanism are very useful to us. Be assured that you will have in me an open and honest discussion partner. Amending the laws of Justice generates dialogue between the institutions of the judiciary, on the one hand, and between the latter and magistrates, on the other hand, aimed at discussing and identifying the legislative solutions that would lead to the consolidation of the independence and efficiency of the judiciary in Romania," declared the Minister of Justice.
Supporters of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny gathered in courtyards across Russia with candles for a Valentines Day protest, in the hope that smaller demonstrations would not be quashed like recent mass rallies.

Images of lights arranged in heart shapes on the snow from the far east of Russia to Moscow flooded social media with the hashtag Love is stronger than fear.

Some held up signs calling for Mr Navalnys release, and others spelt out freedom in sparklers or shared messages on LED light boards. Small gatherings in support of the activist also took place in the US, Europe and the UK.

The authorities had warned people against taking part in the protests, and a media regulator ordered outlets to delete articles that contained details of the event. At least a dozen people were arrested across the country over the demonstrations.

Read More

Protests broke out across Russia last month when Mr Navalny was arrested on his return after months in Germany recovering from a near-fatal nerve agent poisoning. He and his supporters say it was orchestrated by the state.

Within three weeks of his return he was jailed for three years over parole violations relating to an embezzlement conviction from 2014. Prosecutors said he had hidden from parole officers while recovering from the poison attack.

The police took tough action against the rallies, beating protesters with batons and detaining more than 10,000 people. Several other prominent opposition figures are under house arrest.

Although the demonstrations were originally called to demand Mr Navalnys release, many Russians came out to protest because of anger over the economy, quality of healthcare, freedom of speech and official corruption.

Leonid Volkov, a leading ally of Mr Navalny, who lives outside Russia and faces arrest if he returns, said that the 15-minute demonstration yesterday would prove there was widespread support for the opposition movement.

No riot police, no fear, he said on social media as he announced the event last week. Maybe it will seem like these 15 minutes will change nothing  but in fact they will change everything.

At a separate protest yesterday, about 200 people formed a human chain in central Moscow in support of Mr Navalnys wife Yulia and female political prisoners.

Ms Navalnaya was briefly detained during a protest in January and has since left Russia for Germany, though associates said her departure was temporary.

The Valentines Day gatherings came as Mr Putin accused the West of using Mr Navalny and exploiting Russias economic woes to stir up protests against the Kremlin.

Mr Putin admitted that there was growing discontent in Russia over declining incomes and living conditions, but said this was the fault of the pandemic rather than policies during his two-decade rule.

Our opponents and potential opponents have, since time immemorial...used people who are ambitious and thirsty for power to further their own interests, Mr Putin said at a meeting of media editors.



The EU is considering targeted sanctions against Russian officials in response to Mr Navalnys jailing and police violence against protesters.

Read More

Telegraph Media Group Limited [2021]
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SIUE Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Jessica Harris. SIUE will be well on its way to becoming a national model for equity and excellence in higher education

Southern Illinois University Edwardsville Chancellor Randy Pembrook has named Jessica Harris, PhD, as the Universitys first vice chancellor for equity, diversity and inclusion (VCEDI) after a national search conducted by Dr. Cornell Thomas, SIU School of Dental Medicine (SDM) chief diversity officer, director of the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and assistant dean for admissions and student services. The position is pending SIU Board of Trustees approval at its spring session on April. 29.

The national search, which began in mid-October 2020, produced 46 applicants. Thank you to our committee members who were committed to this search, Thomas said. It was a complete team effort. We had an outstanding pool of applicants, and we are excited about the energized direction that SIUE is traveling.

We are extremely excited about Dr. Harris serving as our inaugural vice chancellor for equity, diversity and inclusion, Pembrook said. There is much work to be done regarding SIUE diversity initiatives, and Jessica, with her academic and administrative experience at SIUE, is prepared to hit the ground running on day one.

Harris was named assistant provost for academic equity and inclusive excellence in the SIUE Office of the Provost in 2020 after serving as the interim assistant provost for the previous two years. An SIUE faculty member since 2011, Harris has served as an associate professor of historical studies in the SIUE College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) and director of the interdisciplinary Black Studies program.

I want to extend my sincere appreciation to Dr. Cornell Thomas and the members of the search committee for facilitating such a thoughtful search process, Harris said. I am also grateful to Chancellor Pembrook for this honored opportunity to serve SIUE in this capacity.

As I shared during my open forum presentation, my first task will be to work with stakeholders across the University to develop a comprehensive, multi-layered, integrative roadmap to clearly outline and define the next steps in our sojourn toward inclusive excellence. There is much work ahead, and I cannot do it alone. I am confident that if we dream together, and more importantly work together, SIUE will be well on its way to becoming a national model for equity and excellence in higher education.

Harris work at SIUE has included a special assignment as a Provost Fellow for Diversity and Inclusion. In this role, she collaborated with faculty colleagues, undergraduate and graduate students, the Honors Program, the Office of Academic Affairs and the Office of Student Affairs to launch a pilot of Sustained Dialogue, a powerful five-stage social action model encouraging dialogue across differences, as a curricular and co-curricular program. She received the Faculty Humanitarian Award at SIUEs 2018 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday Celebration.

The VCEDI will serve an integral role in two important current initiatives  the Anti-Racism Task Force (ARTF) and the Higher Learning Commission (HLC) Quality Initiative focusing on anti-racism. The VCEDI also will work closely with the SIU System and its new vice president for diversity, as well as the Diversity Advisory Council (DAC).

The VCEDIs direct responsibilities will include, but are not limited to:



Lead the Office of Diversity and Inclusion

Supervise and administer the offices of EOA/Title IX, Military and Veterans Services, and the Center for Student Diversity and Inclusion

Work with equity advisors for staff searches and the Impact Academy for staff positions

Through the Diversity Council, continue to advance the recently developed Diversity Strategic Plan and be responsible for SIUEs diversity goals

Lead ongoing Anti-Racism Task Force efforts, including developing training and professional development opportunities, and implementing the recommendations from that group in coordination with the ongoing Higher Learning Commission Quality Initiative (QI)

Coordinate the Institutional Diversity Leadership Team

Chair the Bias Incident Response Team (BIRT)

Participate in certain functions of the EOA/Title IX appeals processes in consultation with the EOA Director

Provide guidance in the Strategic Hiring Initiative as it pertains to SIUE staff

Assume responsibilities for anti-racism, equity, diversity, and inclusion programming, including growth of campus constituency groups

Harris participated in the 2017 Higher Education Resource Services (HERS) Institute, an intensive, residential leadership development program for female leaders across the United States. Additionally, in 2017, she was named to the Penn Center for Minority Serving Institutions Inaugural Aspiring Leaders Forum and Mentoring Program.

Harris is an accomplished teacher and scholar of 20th century African American History, and a dedicated servant leader committed to student success and inclusive excellence. Harris received the competitive Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundations 2014-15 Career Enhancement Fellowship for Junior Faculty for her research on the contributions of Black women to the struggle for civil rights in Oakland, Calif. prior to World War II.

In 2011, Harris earned a doctorate in history from Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. She also holds a masters from Cornell University and a bachelors from Dillard University in New Orleans.

Southern Illinois University Edwardsville provides students with a high-quality, affordable education that prepares them for successful careers and lives of purpose to shape a changing world. Built on the foundation of a broad-based liberal education, and enhanced by hands-on research and real-world experiences, the academic preparation SIUE students receive equips them to thrive in the global marketplace and make our communities better places to live. Situated on 2,660 acres of beautiful woodland atop the bluffs overlooking the natural beauty of the Mississippi Rivers rich bottomland and only a short drive from downtown St. Louis, the SIUE campus is home to a diverse student body of nearly 13,000.
WASHINGTON  A day after former President Donald Trump won his second Senate impeachment trial, bipartisan support appeared to be growing for an independent Sept. 11-style commission into the deadly insurrection that took place at the U.S. Capitol.

Investigations into the riot were already planned, with Senate hearings scheduled later this month in the Senate Rules Committee. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has asked retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore to lead an immediate review of the Capitols security process.

 READ MORE: Toomey cites Trumps betrayal of the Constitution in breaking with GOP on impeachment

Lawmakers from both parties, speaking on Sunday's news shows, signaled that even more inquiries were likely. The Senate verdict Saturday, with its 57-43 majority falling 10 votes short of the two-thirds needed to convict Trump, hardly put to rest the debate about the former presidents culpability for the Jan. 6 assault.

There should be a complete investigation about what happened, said Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump. What was known, who knew it and when they knew, all that, because that builds the basis so this never happens again.

Cassidy said he was attempting to hold President Trump accountable, and added that as Americans hear all the facts, more folks will move to where I was. He was censured by his states party after the vote.

An independent commission along the lines of the one that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks would probably require legislation to create. That would elevate the investigation a step higher, offering a definitive government-backed accounting of events. Pelosi has expressed support for such a commission while stressing that the members who sit on it would be key. Still, such a panel would pose risks of sharpening partisan divisions or overshadowing President Joe Biden's legislative agenda.

Theres still more evidence that the American people need and deserve to hear and a 9/11 commission is a way to make sure that we secure the Capitol going forward, said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a Biden ally. And that we lay bare the record of just how responsible and how abjectly violating of his constitutional oath President Trump really was.

House prosecutors who argued for Trump's conviction of inciting the riot said Sunday they had proved their case. They also railed against the Senates Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, and others who they said were trying to have it both ways in finding the former president not guilty but criticizing him at the same time.

A close Trump ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., voted for acquittal but acknowledged that Trump had some culpability for the siege at the Capitol that killed five people, including a police officer, and disrupted lawmakers certification of Bidens White House victory. Graham said he looked forward to campaigning with Trump in the 2022 election, when Republicans hope to regain the congressional majority.

His behavior after the election was over the top, Graham said. We need a 9/11 commission to find out what happened and make sure it never happens again.

The Senate acquitted Trump of a charge of incitement of insurrection after House prosecutors laid out a case that he was an inciter in chief who unleashed a mob by stoking a monthslong campaign of spreading debunked conspiracy theories and false violent rhetoric that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Trumps lawyers countered that Trumps words were not intended to incite the violence and that impeachment was nothing but a witch hunt designed to prevent him from serving in office again.

The conviction tally was the most bipartisan in American history but left Trump to declare victory and signal a political revival while a bitterly divided GOP bickered over its direction and his place in the party.

The Republicans who joined Cassidy in voting to convict were Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Its frustrating, but the founders knew what they were doing and so we live with the system that we have, Democratic Del. Stacey Plaskett, a House prosecutor who represents the Virgin Islands, said of the verdict, describing it as heartbreaking. She added: But, listen, we didnt need more witnesses. We needed more senators with spines.

 READ MORE: Senate acquits Trump in his second impeachment trial, a coda to a tumultuous presidency

McConnell told Republican senators shortly before the vote that he would vote to acquit Trump. In a blistering speech after the vote, the Kentucky Republican said the president was practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day" but that the Senate's hands were tied to do anything about it because Trump was out of office. The Senate, in an earlier vote, had deemed the trial constitutional.

It was powerful to hear the 57 guilties and then it was puzzling to hear and see Mitch McConnell stand and say not guilty and then, minutes later, stand again and say he was guilty of everything, said Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pa. History will remember that statement of speaking out of two sides of his mouth, she said.

Dean also backed the idea of an impartial investigative commission "not guided by politics but filled with people who would stand up to the courage of their conviction.

The lead House impeachment manager, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., called the trial a dramatic success in historical terms by winning unprecedented support from GOP senators. He said the verdict didn't match the reality of the strength of evidence.

We successfully prosecuted him and convicted him in the court of public opinion and the court of history, he said. Pointing to McConnell and other Republican senators critical of Trump but voting to acquit, Raskin said, Theyre trying to have it both ways.

Raskin and Plaskett defended the House teams last-minute reversal not to call a witness, Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash. They acknowledged they were aware they might lose some GOP votes for conviction if they extended the trial much longer.

Beutler's statement late Friday that Trump rebuffed a plea from House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy to call off the rioters was ultimately entered into the trial record.

I think what we did was, we got what we wanted, which was her statement, which was what she said, and had it put into the record, Plaskett said.

Cassidy and Dean spoke on ABC's This Week, Graham appeared on Fox News Sunday, Raskin was on NBC's Meet the Press, and Plaskett appeared on CNN's State of the Union.

Associated Press writers Alexandra Jaffe, Lisa Mascaro, Eric Tucker, Mary Clare Jalonick and Alan Fram contributed to this report.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has claimed Victoria's controversial Belt and Road Initiative agreement with China has no benefits and could be ripped up in a matter of weeks .

Victorian Premier Dan Andrews signed a memorandum of understanding in 2018 with China relating to its mega, $1.5 trillion 'One Belt, One Road' policy, but the deal - which would have given Beijing's funding and control of key Victorian infrastructure - came under heavy criticism.

Andrews, and other state premiers and chief ministers, must detail to the Commonwealth all agreements made with foreign powers by March 10, which will then be assessed by the Federal Government.

And Mr Morrison sent a blunt message to Victoria about the future of its deal with China.

Andrews (pictured in China's Tiananmen Square) made an agreement with China as part of the massive Belt and Road Initiative but with the PM unconvinced it looks doomed

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison emphasized he wants federal policy to drive any and all Australian deals with foreign nations

'I haven't seen the benefits of it,' Mr Morrison said to the Herald Sun.

'If there are benefits, what are they and what was paid for them? I don't have the answers to those questions at this point, but the assessment of those arrangements will continue.'

Andrews has so far defended the agreement and had promised it would mean 'more jobs and more trade and investment for Victorians', but there is growing concern state deals could become a back door to foreign nations increasing their influence in Australia.

Morrison confirmed his desire to see Australian federal policy driving all foreign relations and deals.

'That's a very important principle  There has to be consistency when national governments deal with other national governments,' Mr Morrison said.

'We didn't agree with it in the first place, still don't agree with it, and no doubt decisions on that will be made in due course,' Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said of the Victoria-China agreement.

The intervention was made possible when Federal legislation was passed in December allowing the foreign minister to review and scrap state, territory, local council and public university deals with other nations.

Victoria's Belt and Road agreement with China has come under sharp scrutiny Pictured: Premier Daniel Andrews and Chinese ambassador Jingye Cheng

China's mega Belt and Road Initiative, aka 'One Belt, One Road' has strategic and economic drivers, which has made other nations wary of the superpower's intent

China responded by accusing Australia of 'putting bacteria' in the relationship between the two nations after Morrison tabled the new legislation.

When asked in Beijing on Thursday about the Australian government's plan to tear up Victoria's deal, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Zhao Lijian sang the praises of the initiative and lashed out at Canberra.

'We hope Australia will view such cooperation objectively and reasonably, and stop putting bacteria into this relationship and do more to improve our mutual benefits,' The Australian reported.

'China's cooperation with the Victorian state under the BRI has enhanced the benefits for people on both sides of the deal.'

Prime Minister Scott Morrison (left) and Chinese president Xi Jinping (right) shake hands

Australian National University Professor Rory Medcalf argued premiers and first ministers need the best possible advice on foreign interference and a greater say on Australia's national security policy, as rival countries 'show no respect for the niceties of federation'.

This included security issues related to critical infrastructure, as well as those associated with espionage, propaganda and cyber threats.

Professor Medcalf says federal security briefings to state-based counterparts - such as those which occurred on the BRI - are not always taken seriously enough, often because state officials are not cleared to hear all details.

According to the Lowy Institute, the Belt and Road Initiative is motivated by strategic as well as economic factors.

'The combination of strategic and economic drivers is not always easy to reconcile,' wrote Peter Cai, the institute's Project Director, Australia-China Relations.

'In some cases, China's strategic objectives make it difficult to sell the economic aspects of the initiative to China's neighbours.'
Retired general on Pepsi board vows to win War on Thirst Duffelblog

US cold snap: Why is Texas seeing Arctic temperatures? BBC

Winter storm alerts, power outages cover the map as storms slam US AccuWeather

Historic Arctic outbreak brings dangerous cold, snow and ice to central and southern U.S. WaPo

Guinea declares Ebola epidemic after three deaths Al Jazeera

Americas oldest juvenile lifer, 83, who was jailed in 1953 aged 15 for his role in string of drunken, fatal armed robberies, is freed after 68 years Daily Mail

Pinhookers and Pets London Review of Books

An Enterprise of Solid Gold Laphams Quarterly

How to be a genius Aeon

How to Have a Meaningful Video Chat  With Your Dog Wired

Newly unearthed letter from Admiral Horatio Nelson to his mistress Lady Emma Hamilton in 1801 reveals how he urged her to give their baby daughter the recently developed smallpox vaccine Daily Mail

MTA wants triple the number of extra cops in subways after A-train rampage NY Post

Forget Self-Driving Carsthe Pentagon Wants Autonomous Ships, Choppers and Jets WSJ What could possibly go wrong?

Bill Gates: Rich nations should shift entirely to synthetic beef MIT Technology Review

Nepal Bans Two Indians From Mount Everest for Faking Summit Vice

The mystery of Australias flesh-eating disease BBC

#COVID-19

KILLd the BILL The Brockovich Report

The People the Suburbs Were Built for Are Gone Motherboard

The McMansion Hell Yearbook: 1978 McMansion Hell

Class Warfare

Hoisted from comments (flora):

this is a big story: biden admin is beginning to end physical mail for federal prisoners. theres a lot more to this, and its a story of corporate profiteering off human caging (1) https://t.co/uLElqsQspR  Alec Karakatsanis (@equalityAlec) February 12, 2021

Biden Transition

President Biden Only Just Beat His Granddaughter At Mario Kart Gizmodo

Syraqistan

Trump Transition

Public policy and health in the Trump era The Lancet (furzy)

Impeachment

Boeing 737 MAX

Myanmar

 Confirmed: A near-total internet shutdown is in effect in #Myanmar as of 1 a.m. local time; real-time network data show national connectivity at just 14% of ordinary levels following state-ordered information blackout; incident ongoing  Background: https://t.co/Jgc20OBk27 pic.twitter.com/wWWVzb0c0G  NetBlocks (@netblocks) February 14, 2021

India

Brexit

Catalonia

Antidote du Jour (via):



See yesterdays Links and Antidote du Jour here.
The NSW government has lured the World Surf League out of Queensland amid a coronavirus quarantine standoff, with its iconic Snapper Rocks event now set to take place on Sydneys northern beaches.

More than 50 of the worlds best surfers, including Kelly Slater and John John Florence, will compete at Narrabeen Beach in April. It is the second WSL event NSW has secured from interstate, with Victorias Bells Beach Easter competition being moved to Newcastle.

Kelly Slater surfs at the World Surfing League event at Bells Beach in 2019. Credit:Justin McManus

NSW poached the Gold Coast event, which usually opens the world championship tour, after the Queensland government refused to guarantee that tour athletes and staff could enter without quarantine from NSW after the Newcastle event, according to WSL Asia-Pacific general manager Andrew Stark.

Mr Stark said NSW had been the only state to allow a chartered flight of more than 100 professional surfers and staff from Los Angeles to land in Sydney and enter hotel quarantine in early March.
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Istanbul, Feb 15 : Turkish prosecutors have ordered detention of the 46 suspected members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), the state-run Anadolu agency reported on Monday.

Security forces have launched simultaneous large scale operations in 20 provinces to catch the suspects, Anadolu said.

It added that the operations continue under the direction of the Chief Public Prosecutor's Office in Turkey's northwestern province of Balikesir, Xinhua reported.

On Sunday, Turkish officials announced that PKK militants have executed 13 kidnapped Turks, including military and police personnel, in a cave in northern Iraq during Turkey's recent cross-border operation.

Turkey launched the cross-border Operation Claw-Eagle 2 in the neighboring country on February 10.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the United States and the EU, has been rebelling against the Turkish government for over 30 years.
Texas lawmakers will almost certainly be back for a rare special legislative session in the fall now that the U.S. Census Bureau has set a September deadline for releasing the 2020 census results.

Facing significant holdups in finalizing the decennial count, the bureau announced Friday that the detailed population numbers needed to redraw legislative and congressional districts to reflect the states growth in the last decade will be delivered by Sept. 30, a months-long delay that could upend the next set of elections for seats from Congress down to local offices.

The bureaus original plan was to get the data in lawmakers hands as soon as this month, giving them time to rejigger district boundaries and decipher Texans representation during the regular 2021 legislative session. But the census typical timeline was repeatedly upended by the coronavirus pandemic and interference from the Trump administration.

If this were a typical decade, we would be on the verge of delivering the first round of redistricting data from the 2020 Census, James Whitehorne, chief of the bureaus redistricting and voting rights data office, said in a statement. Our original plan was to deliver the data in state groupings starting Feb. 18, 2021 and finishing by March 31, 2021. However, COVID-19 delayed census operations significantly.

Instead, the bureau is still working to release the population numbers that determine how many congressional seats are apportioned to each state by April 30  blowing past the legal deadline for those numbers by many months. Census officials previously indicated the second set of more detailed numbers needed for redistricting wouldnt be available until after July.

The current timetable puts the data delivery far past the end of the 2021 legislative session on May 31, meaning Gov. Greg Abbott would need to call lawmakers back for legislative overtime in the fall.

Congressional and state House and Senate districts need to be reconfigured before the 2022 elections to account for the states explosive growth in the last 10 years.

Estimates show Texas has grown by more than 4.2 million residents since 2010, which could garner it up to three additional congressional seats that will need to be added to the states map. Because the states growth has been concentrated in the urban centers and suburban communities, the populations of existing districts are significantly uneven.

The census delays have taken the steam out of the ongoing legislative session during which the politically fraught redistricting process was expected to dominate lawmakers agendas, along with the state budget and the states response to the pandemic.

Still, the state is expected to end up back in court over its eventual mapmaking  potentially beginning with fights over whether the Legislature is constitutionally allowed to redraw state legislative political maps after a regular session and extending into lawmakers treatment of voters of color.

Decade after decade, the state has faced allegations  and subsequent federal court rulings  that lawmakers discriminated against those voters, intentionally working to dilute the power of their votes, in drawing up political maps.

That sort of legal wrangling pushed the 2012 primary elections back by more than two months even without any census-related delays at the time. Under the states current schedule, the filing deadline for candidates hoping to be on the 2021 primary ballot is Dec. 13.

The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
A week-long campaign to raise awareness of the mental health issues facing farmers has launched, highlighting the support available in the UK.

The annual Mind Your Head initiative will focus on prevention and early identification of the risk factors associated with those living and working in farming.

From 15  19 February, the Farm Safety Foundation, organisers of the campaign, will illustrate what is being done to break down mental health barriers.

A recent study by the Foundation - know as Yellow Wellies - found that mental health issues among farmers are of growing concern, and have a direct impact on safety.

A vast majority (88%) of farmers under the age of 40 now rate poor mental health as the biggest hidden problem faced by farmers today, up from 82% in 2018.

Meanwhile, 89% of young farmers believe that talking about mental health in farming will remove any stigma attached to it - an increase of 9% in the past two years.

The charity says this year will be remembered for the effort put in by key workers under difficult circumstances to ensure that the public all have the highest standards of food on shelves and plates.

However, it highlights the mental health effects on farmers who have suffered from anxiety due to unique stressors facing the industry during the pandemic.

In an industry that lost 20 workers to farm accidents in 2019, there were a total of 133 suicides registered in Britain in those working in farming and agricultural related trades, according to the Office of National Statistics and National Records Scotland.

Stephanie Berkeley, manager of the Foundation said this was of huge concern and one that the industry needed to keep talking about.

"In the last 12 months, calls to farming charities have increased so we need to be concerned about the numbers of people in our industry feeling high levels of distress.

"We need to keep pushing to ensure people know that help is available and encourage them to ask for it," she said.

The Farm Safety Foundation, set up by NFU Mutual in 2014, works closely with partners in the industry to educate farm safety messages.
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Governors Seyi Makinde of Oyo State and Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State on Sunday visited the scene of ethnic conflict in Sasha community, Ibadan, Oyo State.

The two governors met with the leaders of the Yoruba and Hausa communities and appealed to them to live in unity.

PREMIUM TIMES reported how several people reportedly died in a clash triggered by the fatal stabbing of a Yoruba cobbler by a Hausa cart pusher in Sasha market, Ibadan, after it degenerated into an ethnic conflict.

To forestall breakdown of law and order in the market and its environs, Mr Makinde on Saturday imposed an indefinite curfew in the area.

Speaking during the visit on Sunday, the governor pledged to give palliatives to those whose wares were affected during the crisis.

His Chief Press Secretary, Taiwo Adisa, in a statement sent to PREMIUM TIMES quoted his principal saying: Please, I want you to listen to me clearly. You cannot resort to self-help to solve the issue on the ground. All of you who are here are doing business with one another in one way or the other. The last time I came here, about six weeks ago, some shops belonging to Hausa and Yoruba people got burnt.

So, you have been living together peacefully and all I am pleading to you is, no matter what is making anyone angry, we will solve it with patience. I was reluctant to declare curfew here because I feel the economic wellbeing of everyone here is important, and because this is where you get what you use to feed yourselves.

I will engage with your leaders this evening. One thing is, if you allow those who dont have anything to lose here to blow this matter out of proportion, no one will be able to say where the crisis will end. By the grace of God, I pray we dont lose any more lives.

We must not lose any life needlessly anymore. What the government will do to ensure that those whose houses, shops were burnt, we will rebuild immediately. But please, I beg of you, let us stop fighting with ourselves. I can assure you that we will deal with the situation.

We must continue to maintain the peace here. Those who are hoodlums here will be dealt with but those who are law-abiding will be compensated for what they have lost, he said.

In the same vein, Mr Akeredolu, who was in the state on behalf of the South West Governors, said peace must be allowed to reign.

Concerning the issue on ground, we have come to beg you. We have been living together for a very long time and this is not the time to start fighting ourselves. So, let us consider that. There are some things that could be making us angry but dont let us look at that because things cannot be like this forever. I have come here on behalf of my colleagues in Ekiti, Lagos, Osun and Ogun. All of them have sent messages. Ogun has its own crisis it is battling with, so does Lagos. But as the chairman, I decided to come around to appeal to us.

Though we are here in our fatherland, our own sons and daughters are in another persons fatherland. So, let us think about this and continue to live in peace with one another. We dont need to fight ourselves. We have security agencies that you can call their attention to any issue that could cause crisis. Let us not take the law into our hands. I have a brother in Abuja and others living in Hausaland.

He enjoined the residents to cooperate with Mr Makinde in maintaining law and orders.

Nigerians on social media have also called for peaceful coexistence among all ethnic groups.
Tokyo: The Seoul government said it had found its first case of COVID-19 in a cat, shortly after offering free tests to pets in the South Korean capital.

Experts say there is no evidence cats or dogs can pass the novel coronavirus to humans, but they have nevertheless placed the cat in a 14-day quarantine. It was tested after having symptoms of vomiting and decreased activity, and after the family it lives with were all found to have contracted COVID-19, officials said.

A few pets have been infected with the virus that causes COVID-19, mostly after the animals were in close contact with infected humans.

The Seoul Metropolitan Government announced last week it would offer free coronavirus tests to symptomatic dogs and cats, shortly after a kitten at a religious facility in the south-east of the country was found to have contracted the virus.

In the United States, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention says a few pets have been infected with the virus that causes COVID-19, mostly after the animals were in close contact with infected humans, although globally such cases have been rare.
Larger frame of mind for logistics

Last year, the whole world suffered the consequences of the lasting pandemic, with even Vietnam facing economic uncertainties and natural disasters in the central region, causing huge damage to livelihoods.

In this context, logistics activities were affected significantly, with railways, roads, and air transport being the most heavily affected, while waterways and warehouses remained largely unscathed and even saw growing business due to rising inventory.

Different from five years ago, logistics have been given due attention by all state levels, as shown in the directive documents of the government, ministries, and branches, that all considered logistics a crucial aspect of the economy. From there, policy changes and significant investments in infrastructure could be accomplished, along with the easing of administrative procedures for businesses in this sector.

However, one of the current challenges is the lack of large-scale Vietnamese enterprises with influence in the logistics industry, while large foreign-invested enterprises (FIEs) such as FedEx, UPS, and DHL from the United States and Europe dominating the countrys logistics sector.

Weaknesses to remedy

In Vietnam, telecom, real estate, and manufacturing enterprises have built outstanding businesses that drive their respective industries. Within the logistics sphere, however, there is no such role model.

Companies like Saigon Newport, Gemadept JSC, Transimex JSC, and Sotrans Co., Ltd. are contributing their share but can hardly be called outstanding yet. The general picture of todays businesses is stiffening, with competing FIEs operating in Vietnam, while those from other countries are integrating into global markets.

Additionally, the domestic logistics sector remains rather small with limited international operations, while this industry is really about going global and partaking in imports and exports. So far, the number of Vietnamese enterprises operating in foreign markets is also small, with even the bigger names not providing services to foreign markets. In the era of global integration, we must go to the world to develop, and thus this remains the Achilles heel of the domestic industry. Moreover, weak links with other service providers elsewhere have not been established and utilised sufficiently. Although Vietnamese manufacturers have been able to export goods to Europe in large volumes, there is no logistical presence of local companies.

As such, logistics groups stop all operations at Vietnams gates, after selling and delivering goods to customers, resulting in low added value and a lack of competitiveness against foreign counterparts.

Against this backdrop, the largest difficulties relate not to capital but to the awareness of Vietnamese entrepreneurs, who are typically shy in new environments, especially when confronting foreigners. Many businesses dare to run their operations but mostly focus on the domestic market as they feel that doing business in their own country is easier. Problems here can be handled the familiar Vietnamese way, while they would have to follow foreign rules outside and establish new personal networks and relations. Within the current logistics community, FIEs and state-owned enterprises are relatively stable, but the private sector consists mainly of small-scale businesses, with some newly established or separated from others.

In Vietnam, the number of FIEs is increasing constantly, with nearly 40 multinational corporations and many smaller ones present in the market. However, companies from Japan and South Korea are very ethnocentric and prefer to use the services of their countrys enterprises, which support and protect each other. Meanwhile, European and American businesses are somewhat more open-minded. They use traditional services but do not pay much attention to their partners country of origin. Multinationals have financial advantages, so it is easier for them to establish a foundation and attract high-quality human resources than it is for domestic ones. They also make great use of experienced CEOs.

The great advantage of FIEs is their cooperative relationship with partners worldwide. From these relationships, they provide most of the services requested by manufacturers at competitive prices. The service quality of these enterprises is often at a higher level than that of domestic ones, reflected in their professionalism, the assurance of standardised service quality, and strict rules and norms, which provide credibility for these businesses.

Those businesses also pay special attention to customer care and focus on the long-term benefits, instead of immediate returns. Therefore, at some stages, they even accept losses to win customers sympathy and build a reputation. Meanwhile, some Vietnamese businesses follow a fast-paced approach that aims for quick profits rather than long-term relationships and market presence. Such a mentality will also not pay attention to quality.

Models to follow

According to one of the prime ministers decisions, it is a crucial task to form strong logistics groups and leading companies. Vietnam has a convenient location, with a long coastline, and the entire facade of the Southeast Asian peninsula serves not only as a service point for transit to and from China, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, and Myanmar but is also a stopover transshipment point for major transports from Europe to Australia and from Northeast Asia to South Asia. Currently, the other regional countries take advantage of this though they do not have the same premises as Vietnam.

With a growth rate of 12-14 per cent per year, Vietnams logistics sector is growing, albeit merely gradually. It may take another 5-10 years to see strong differences today. As this speed remains slow, Vietnams logistics needs to go faster to avoid lagging behind other countries.

Up to now, Vietnams logistics growth has mainly relied on the scale of commodity production, consumption, and import-export, which are natural factors for growth advantages. However, these are not intrinsic factors of the logistics sector, they are just objective ones.

If one of these factors changes  such as COVID-19, natural disasters, and the declining domestic demand  the sectors growth will suffer if it is not well established in foreign markets.

Thus, Vietnamese groups need to step out of their comfort zone, adapt quickly, and avoid thinking of themselves as small and inferior. Small does not mean weak.

At present, Vietnamese enterprises focus only on the domestic market, and give little thought to venturing abroad. Meanwhile, I am confident that Vietnams logistics can provide decent services to the regional market, such as Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand  all of which are close by and of similar development levels. Vietnam already has top enterprises in leather, footwear, steel, and automobiles. Thus, the logistics sector can build on their experience and develop leading groups from those sectors.

Singapore can also be a good example for Vietnam. Its government was determined to put all its advantages into developing the logistics sector and to turn Singapore into the largest transshipment port in the world. To do that, Singapore has largely sacrificed marine tourism. Nowadays, the island nation is housing some of the leading enterprises in logistics fields. It boasts PSA Co., Ltd., the worlds largest port operator, which also has a joint venture in Vietnams Cai Mep port complex in the south.

In the aviation industry, it has Singapore Airlines  a 5-star airline which for many years maintained its position as the worlds leading airline. Before the pandemic hit, Changi Airport was consistently one of the busiest airports in the world.

Another model is Taiwan, which has strong logistics development. Of course, there are also more developed economies like Japan or Germany whose level of development is already at a much higher level. The country needs it, the government needs it, and the businesses that want to grow strong also need to be bold and venture abroad with an outward-looking spirit. Vietnam opened its doors to global integration 35 years ago, but it is now up to businesses to step out or not. The government alone cannot do this.
Red Bull to run engine program from existing factory

Red Bull will operate its own Formula 1 engine program for 2022 out of a rejuvenated building at its existing team facility in Milton Keynes.

"We are happy with this decision," Dr Helmut Marko told the n-tv broadcaster after the FIA confirmed that teams voted to approve a 2022 engine development freeze.

Red Bull had warned that only a freeze would make taking over departing partner Honda's engine program viable.

"It a good day for Formula 1 - a day of common sense to freeze the engines, because the costs are simply reduced," Marko added.

As soon as the news was official, Red Bull pressed 'go' on plans for a brand new company.

"It will be called Red Bull Powertrains," Marko told motorsport-magazin.com, announcing that the facility will be built at the team's existing factory.

"Building eight, one of our existing buildings, is being adapted into an engine shop," he revealed, adding that the Austrian engine firm AVL will also be involved.

"Everything is happening now - it's starting now," Marko said.

When asked why Red Bull didn't simply take over Honda's locally-based operations, he explained: "The Honda shop is more geared towards the electric motors.

"There are not enough or even the latest test benches to carry out the necessary optimisation of the engines."

And Marko said the "one-time investment" of the facility and test benches should even prepare Red Bull to be able to handle the all-new engine regulations of 2025.

"The running costs will not be so much higher than if we had bought an engine from somewhere else," he insisted. "It costs more, but not significantly more."

And some of those extra costs may be recouped by selling the naming rights to the 2022 Honda-based engine.

"Not another automaker, of course, but some other interested company," said Marko.

Paul Kingsnorth, one of the most important English writers alive, was baptized as a Christian Orthodox at the Romanian Monastery in Shannonbridge, Ireland. As a Western newcomer to Orthodoxy, I have a lifetimes learning journey ahead of me, but I already feel like I have arrived home, said the writer.

I first discovered Christian Orthodoxy four years ago when I walked into a small church in Bucharest. That powerful experience stayed with me, but I could not have known that it would lead me on a journey that would lead to me becoming a member of the Romanian church, Paul Kingsnorth told Basilica.ro.

He was baptized on the Epiphany day by his spiritual advisor, Father Tudor Ghita, the parish priest of the Romanian community in Galway.

I felt both joyful and peaceful afterwards and cold! But a stronger sense that I had arrived somewhere I was meant to be. My receipt into the church has been a great privilege, and the [Romanian] community here in Ireland has been so welcoming to me and my family, confessed the writer.

Father Tudor Ghita told he never tried to convert the writer. They met at the Romanian Orthodox Monastery of Shannonbridge, Ireland, and had some long talks.

He was determined to enter Orthodoxy, but I advised him to moderate his enthusiasm and not to expect to see angels flying through the church, said the Romanian parish priest of Galway.

He wanted to make the writer understand that being a Christian is permanent work and the joy you feel is supposed to be one of a spiritual nature.

He is an obedient spiritual son, Father Tudor Ghita added. He observes the fasting days, reads the recommended prayers and makes full prostrations.

Even though he had many spiritual searches, Paul Kingsnorth had never been baptized in another Christian denomination. His previous searches took him towards Oriental religions and neopaganism.

In 2020, as the world was turned upside down, so was I. Unexpectedly, and initially against my will, I found myself being pulled determinedly towards Christianity, he recounted. I started the year as an eclectic eco-pagan with a long-held, unformed ache in my heart, and ended it a practicing Christian.

Then the ache was gone and replaced by the thing that, all along, I turned out to have been looking for, he added.

In January 2021 I was baptised and received into the Eastern Orthodox Church. I dont know where the path leads from here, but at last I know how to walk it.

Paul Kingsnorth (photo above, after the baptism) is 49 and has lived for several years in the rural parts of Galway, Ireland. He runs a family farm which he works by using traditional methods, such as cutting hay with a scythe, just like Romanian peasants did formerly.

He wrote visionary fiction books and essays on the environment. Between 2009 and 2017, he established an environmental activism project entitled Dark Mountain. But he says he has never been a Marxist materialist, like many other members of this movement.

I have never been a scientific materialist. My suspicion that there is more to the world than modernity will allow for has informed my sensibility since I was a child, and was the backdrop to all my environmental activism and writing, he wrote.

Conservative writer Rod Dreher describes him as one of the most talented and visionary writers of our time.

Journalist Aris Roussinos calls him a profoundly religious author and Englands greatest living writer.

Parintele Paroh Tudor Ghita (photo above) is from Campulung Moldovenesc, in northeastern Romania, where he ordered the mobile iconostasis sculpted in linden-tree wood for the St Nicholas and St Brigitte of Kildare Church in Galway. He can install it anywhere in 20 minutes.

He initially prepared for exact sciences, not for Theology. But God knows His works, he says.

He is shepherding Irelands biggest Romanian Orthodox around the feast of Epiphany, he can drive over 1,500 miles.

The Romanian parish priest is grateful to the representatives of the Anglican Church in Galway, who offered a space for religious offices to the Romanian Orthodox community.
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) speaks during her weekly press conference at the Capitol in Washington on Feb. 11, 2021. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

House Republicans Demand Answers From Pelosi on Jan. 6 Security Failures

Ranking Republicans on four key House committees concerned with security at the Capitol complex are demanding answers from Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) about her actions before, during, and after the Jan. 6 breach of the Capitol building.

It has been widely reported and confirmed by multiple sources that when [then-Capitol Hill Police] Chief [Steven] Sund requested the National Guard be activated ahead of the January 6th Joint Session of Congress, the response from the Sergeant-At-Arms (SAA), acting on your behalf, was that the optics of having the National Guard on-site were not good and the intelligence didnt support the move. The request was not approved, the four GOP representatives told Pelosi in a lengthy letter made public on Feb. 15.

Furthermore, on January 6th, in the middle of the on-going attack of the Capitol, Chief Sund again notified the SAA of his request for approval to authorize the National Guard. It took over an hour for his request to be approved because the SAA had to run the request up the chain of command, which undoubtedly included you and your designees.

The four signers of the letter are Rep. Rodney Davis of Illinois, the ranking Republican on the House Committee on Administration, Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Rep. Devin Nunes of California, the senior Republican on the House Select Committee on Intelligence.

The signers demanded answers from Pelosi on the following questions:

When Police Chief Sund made a request for National Guard support on Jan. 4, why was that request denied?

Did sergeant-at-arms Paul Irving get permission or instruction from your staff on Jan. 4 prior to denying Sunds request for the National Guard?

What conversations and what guidance did you and your staff give the sergeant-at-arms leading up to Jan. 6, specific to the security posture of the campus?

What conversations with the SAA and Capitol Police did you have during the attack on the Capitol, and what response did you give security officials on Jan. 6 when Sund requested National Guard support that required your approval?

Why are your House officers refusing to comply with preservation and production requests to turn over materials relevant to the events surrounding the 6th?

A spokesman for Pelosi didnt respond to a request for comment by press time.

Later in the day, Pelosi announced in a letter sent only to House Democrats that she has asked Gen. Russel Honore to head an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol breach.

The letter writers questioned the commissions independence, saying: While there is wide-spread support to conduct an independent security review of the campus, General Russel Honore was appointed solely by you, without consultation of the minority.

To the Generals credit he has reached out to several Republicans to brief on his work to date. We are hopeful his review will result in beneficial recommendations that are not influenced by political motivations. However, it is easy to understand why we and our Senate counterparts remain skeptical that any of his final recommendations will be independent and without influence from you.

The questions were addressed to Pelosi because as House speaker, she has a decisive role in ensuring the safety and security of all members of Congress, congressional staff and employees, people visiting the Capitol complex on business, and the thousands of tourists who routinely flood the historic grounds.

Five weeks have passed since the January 6th attack on the Capitol building, and many important questions about your responsibility for the security of the Capitol remain unanswered, the letter states.

As you are aware, the Speaker of the House is not only the leader of the majority party, but also has enormous institutional responsibilities. The Speaker is responsible for all operational decisions made within the House. We have observed for two years this very heavy-handed and tightly controlled approach to House operations that has been exerted by yourself, your staff, and an army of appointed House officials.

The Jan. 6 event occurred when hundreds of protesters, ostensibly seeking to disrupt congressional certification of electoral votes in the November 2020 presidential election, overwhelmed Capitol Hill Police officers and ultimately penetrated both the Senate and House chambers, as well as other historic areas of the Capitol building.

Five people, including Capitol Hill Police Officer Brian Sicknick, died as a result of actions during the breach. A 14-year Air Force veteran, Ashley Babbitt (also spelt Ashli), was shot and killed by another officer during the violence.

Contact Mark Tapscott at Mark.Tapscott@epochtimes.nyc
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On Saturday, Feb. 13, The Korean Business Research Institute released their individual male idol brand reputation rankings for the month of February. Keep on reading to see who the most popular male idols for the month are!

The Korean Business Research Institute crafted the brand reputation index by extracting and analyzing 117,162,545 pieces of big data spanning 653 idols from Jan. 13 to Feb. 13. They noted an individual idol's participation index, media index, communication index, and community index. Compared to the available 125,767,133 pieces of big data in Jan. 2021, this month saw a decrease of 4.86%.

The brand reputation ranking is an index that helps analyze the online habits of consumers and what impacts brand consumption. Though researching individual male idol's personal brand reputations, we can see the positive and negative influence an idol has on a brand, media and consumer interest, and their communication volume.

The Top 5 Most Popular Male Idols for the Month - BTS Dominates The TOP 5

Sitting at number one is BTS member Jimin with a brand reputation index of 7,051,880. Jimin has a participation index of 760,678, a media index of 1,056,425, a communication index of 2,289,078, and a community index of 2,954,699. Compared to his brand reputation index of 6,733,150 in Jan., his index rose by 4.73%.

ASTRO's Cha Eun Woo takes home second place with a brand reputation index of 6,785,560. Cha Eun Woo has a participation index of 3,212,768, a media index of 1,241,825, a communication index of 1,102,710, and a community index of 1,228,256. Compared to his brand reputation index of 6,303,509 in Jan., his index rose by 7.65%.

Third place goes to BTS member V with a brand reputation index of 5,334,558. V has a participation index of 524,007, a media index of 1,188,732, a communication index of 1,691,525, and a community index of 1,928,293. Compared to his brand reputation index of 6,305,855 in Jan., his index fell by 15.43%.

BTS's golden maknae Jungkook takes home fourth place with a brand reputation index of 4,994,727. Jungkook has a participation index of 397,579, a media index of 885,722, a communication index of 1,779,584, and a community index of 1,931,842. Compared to his brand reputation index of 6,278,503 in Jan., his index fell by 20.45%.

Fifth place goes to BTS member Jin with a brand reputation index of 4,721,685. Jin has a participation index of 400,159, a media index of 919,000, a communication index of 1,589,482, and a community index of 1,813,044. Compared to his brand reputation index of 4,769,595 in Jan., his index fell by 1.00%.

Here Are The TOP 30 Most Popular Male Idols For Feb. 2021:

1. BTS's Jimin

2. ASTRO's Cha Eun Woo

3. BTS's V

4. BTS's Jungkook

5. BTS's Jin

6. BTS's Suga

7. BTS's J-Hope

8. TVXQ's Yunho

9. BTS's RM

10. NU'EST's Minhyun

11. EXO's Baekhyun

12. EXO's Kai

13. HIGHLIGHT's Yoseob

14. Super Junior's Heechul

15. EXO's D.O.

16. SHINee's Minho

17. AB6IX's Daehwi

18. NCT's Jungwoo

19. BIGBANG's G-Dragon

20. NCT's Jaehyun

21. AB6IX's Woojin

22. SF9's Rowoon

23. EXO's Xiumin

24. THE BOYZ's Hyunjae

25. Super Junior's Kyuhyun

26. NCT's Mark

27. THE BOYZ's Juyeon

28. Golden Child's Y

29. BTOB's Changsub

30. SEVENTEEN's Jun

Did your favorite male idol make it to the top 30?

For more K-Pop news and updates, always keep your tabs open here on KpopStarz.

KpopStarz owns this article.

Written by Alexa Lewis
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Turkey: 700 arrested over 'links to Kurdish PKK' Op after death of 13 hostages in Iraq, Hdp members detained

(ANSAmed)- ISTANBUL, FEBRUARY 15 - In a major operation against alleged supporters and members of the PKK in Turkey, at least 718 people have been arrested in operations across 40 provinces, according to the Turkish interior minister. The operations were carried out after the bodies of 13 Turkish hostages of the Kurdish armed group were found during an operation carried out by the Turkish army in northern Iraq.



Among those arrested are several leading officials of the Hdp, the third main party in Ankara's Parliament, accused by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of links to "terrorists".(ANSAmed).




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South Africa's drugs regulator SAHPRA said on Monday it has approved an implementation study of Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine but was still reviewing its full market application.

The implementation study will target inoculating between 350,000 to 500,000 health care workers, with the first batch of 80,000 doses expected to arrive this week, President Ramaphosa told lawmakers on Thursday.

The South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA) said J&J has not yet submitted an application for emergency use authorisation of its vaccine, as Africa's worst hit country with coronavirus infections and deaths has yet to start its mass inoculation campaign.

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Parents in Middlesex County school district in New Jersey are calling for the resignation of assistant superintendent Paul Rafalowski

A New Jersey school official is being criticized after he hit out at a mother calling for in-person learning to return by sending her pictures of her family sledding with others without masks.

The parent had sent multiple messages to the Middlesex County school district about the failure to return to in-person learning, or even hybrid learning, after the holidays as was originally scheduled, according to NJ.com.

In response to her email on February 4, Paul Rafalowski, assistant superintendent of Middlesex Borough schools, said the reason for the postponement was because the community is not taking the coronavirus seriously  attaching two pictures of her family sledding outside without masks.

He accused the unidentified mother of being the 'precise reason our school community remains in Phase 1 (virtual)', according to the letter which was seen by NY Advance Media.

Parents in the district are infuriated and have called Rafalowski's actions an invasion of privacy as they continue to push for their children to be allowed back to schools.

It resulted in the district's most recent school board meeting last Tuesday being hit by an influx of complaints from angry parents, including a number from the parents of the other children pictured in the photograph.

Rafalowski sent this picture back to the unidentified mother (pictured center) and claimed that she was the 'precise reason our school community remains in Phase 1 (virtual)'. In the version he sent to the mother, the four other faces were blurred

Middlesex Mayor John Madden has also stated that the way the pictures were used was 'very unacceptable and very unprofessional'.

In his email, Rafalowski had claimed that the parent in question was also not following the same Centers for Disease Control guidelines she was pushing to reopen the district's schools and he attempted to use the pictures as evidence.

'For instance, we know that parents and students are not following the same CDC guidelines that you continue to share with us that detail the importance of social distancing and mask wearing,' he wrote.

'Case in point, we were provided a number of photos that illustrate the precise reason our school community remains in Phase 1 (virtual).

'As you can see from the attached photos, you and four other adults appear in close proximity without a mask. Further, the second photo illustrates 16 children all in close proximity without mask,' Rafalowski added.

He also referenced the local COVID-19 cases numbers in January as another explanation.

'Bottom line, we will not subject our school community to the potential risk and exposure that results from the blatant failure to follow the same guidelines you are asking us to reference,' Rafalowski concluded.

The pictures he attached showed the parent in question standing with four other mothers smiling for a photo and not wearing masks.

The second showed her child sledding with a group of other children after the recent snowfall.

The assistant superindendant also shared this photos with the mom of her maskless children. The picture above was not sent by Rafalowski to the mother but was in the same group of pictures posted by one of the mothers on Facebook after the sledding trip

He had said that 16 children were pictured together without masks as he attacked her for complaining that the district's schools had not returned to at least hybrid learning. The picture above was not sent by Rafalowski to the mother but was in the same group of pictures posted by one of the mothers on Facebook after the sledding trip

'He targeted an outspoken parent by sending her photos of her and kids outside while sledding during the snowstorm,' the mother told Patch.

Rafalowski's email fired up local parents up as they hit back that the children were doing nothing wrong in sledding on private property with their friends.

'My son is one of the 16 pictured. He is 7 years old. He was outside. Snow sledding. With some friends. On private property,' Roger Sanchez said in an email to the school board and borough council.

'It was worrisome to see my son's image used that way, to say the least.'

'My breath was taken away. I hope a parent never has to feel how I felt,' Sanchez added to New Jersey Patch.

'The kids were running around, out playing in the snow outdoors. They posed for a photo. The point is a government body should never be allowed to document the lives of private citizens and their children.'

Another parent, Robby McQuone, told Patch that he believed the school board was 'very unprofessional and out of line sending pictures of our kids to another parent'.

'My children were in the photo. My wife and I are very upset over this matter,' he said.

Sanchez believes parents who have remained vocal about the need to reopen schools are the ones being targeted, as all the parents of the children photographed in that picture have been publicly speaking at Middlesex Board of Education meetings for weeks.

'This is how Dr. Williams and Rafalowski deal with a very vocal group of parents. They deal with them by sending them threatening photos of their kids,' he said.

'Parents have been testifying, saying "my children are punching a wall; my son can't read." Parents are literally crying.

'All we're doing is looking for help for our children. And this is his response. He even referenced the album the Facebook photos were taken from,' said Sanchez. '

Almost as if to say "Shut up. We are watching you".'

District Superintendent Frederick Williams admitted to NJ Media on Wednesday that Rafalowski's email had been in response to a mother who had been extremely vocal about returning to school but still defended the assistant superintendent's actions.

'This (email) was about, "Let's wear face coverings. Let's reduce the spread". None of my administrators target children or retaliate,' Williams claimed, stating that he and Rafalowski did not know the names of the children in the pictures and that their faces were blurred before they were sent in the email to the parent.

Rafalowski's email had claimed that the photos had originally been 'provided' to district administrators by someone voicing concern after they were posted on social media.

However, frustrated parents continued to call for the resignation of school board members at last Tuesday's borough council meeting.

Their calls were joined by Middlesex borough Councilman Jeremiah Carnes who has said Rafalowski must apologize or resign immediately.

Middlesex County Superintendent Dr. Fred Williams has said in-person instruction may resume on March 1, if community virus numbers continue downward

'It's just plain inexcusable how I've seen our residents treated by some members of the Board of Ed.,' Carnes told Patch.

'Our children should be back in school and have the ability to freely play outside without judgement.'

'I feel very bad for the parents. They're very passionate about their kids getting back to school and I understand they are reaching out in frustration,' Mayor Madden said.

Yet he claimed that the school board remains independent of him and the borough council and there 'isn't any action we can take'.

Middlesex Borough was supposed to return to hybrid learning in January, after offering it for a few weeks in November but returning to 100 percent virtual learning over the holidays.

Superintendent William has claimed that the administrators, teachers and staff all want to return to in person learning as soon as possible.

'We want our children back in school. We don't want them to be home all the time,' Williams said.

'It's not the same environment and the current environment is becoming extremely stressful for everyone.'

Williams has said in-person instruction may resume on March 1, if community virus numbers continue downward.

There were 152 new cases of coronavirus Middlesex County on Sunday.

There have been 64,120 confirmed cases in total and more than 1,800 confirmed deaths.

Middlesex County has had only one confirmed outbreak at a school and three linked cases.

In the state of New Jersey, there have been 142 school outbreaks and 671 cases linked to schools.
New Delhi:

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Saturday assured the alleged victim in the sexual assault case, wherein Congress MLA M Vincent case has been arrested, will get justice.



"Strong action will be taken on atrocities against women. Miscreants will be brought to justice, no matter who they are," Kerala CM said a few hours after the Congress MLA's arrest.



CM Vijayan also expressed solidarity with women who dare sjhow courage to speak against attrocities in the State, "It is a good sign that women in the State have come to a conviction that the Govt, will stand by them."

This is due to pressure from CM's office, my fight to prove innocence starts here: M Vincent, Kerala Cong MLA arrested on rape charges pic.twitter.com/RF32GsSQJh  ANI (@ANI_news) July 22, 2017

Congress MLA M Vincent was on Saturday arrested by the Kerala Police on the charges of the alleged sexual assault of a 51-year-old woman and driving her to attempt suicide last week by consistently harassing her.

A case of rape, abetment of suicide and stalking was lodged against Congress MLA M Vincent of Kovalam assembly segment on Thursday night on the statement of the woman who had tried to end her life last week at Balaramapuram near state capital, the police said.



On Friday, the Congress party state leadership demanded a transparent and impartial probe into the matter. The office of state assembly Speaker said the police wrote to Speaker P Sreeramakrishnan informing him that a rape case has been registered against Vincent and his statement would be taken.



The witnesses statements have been taken and the victims medical examination was also conducted on Saturday, the police sources said.



Senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy told reporters here that he hoped an impartial and transparent probe would be conducted. Leader of the Opposition Ramesh Chennithala said Vincent is prepared for any probe.



Let the inquiry go on. It should be transparent, he said.



Vincent, a first-time MLA, however, alleged that there was a political conspiracy behind the allegation against him and filed a complaint with police, demanding a comprehensive probe into the matter.



He claimed that a CPI(M) local leader was present at the womans house when she attempted suicide by consuming sleeping pills. Her brother is also a Marxist activist.



The police had on Wednesday registered an abetment of suicide case against Vincent after the womans husband filed a complaint with police, alleging that the MLA used to repeatedly call her over the phone and harass her.



The city magistrate also recorded her statement at a hospital in Neyyatinkara, where she is undergoing treatment.

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Aleppo Governorate has witnessed clashes between two Turkish-backed militias, reports Al-Masdar.

Two Turkish-backed militant groups clashed in northwestern Syria this weekend, causing a new wave of violence in the western countryside of the Aleppo Governorate.

According to local reports from the Aleppo Governorate, the clashes broke out between Jabhat Al-Shamiya (Levant Front) and Jaysh Al-Islam (Army of Islam) in the Afrin region, resulting in a heavy exchange of gunfire in a number of neighborhoods.

The reports said the conflict between the two large militant factions occurred over the control of some residential buildings inside the Afrin region of the Aleppo Governorate.

Furthermore, a local from Afrin told RT Arabic on Saturday: The reason for these clashes between the Turkish-backed factions is due to their difference over the sharing of the properties of the citys original residents.

He added, members of Jabhat Al-Shamiya confiscated the money from a number of Jaysh Al-Islam elements coming from Libya, and after that, clashes erupted. 

Local Syrian activists also confirmed that two members of Jaysh Al-Islam were killed and about 12 others were wounded as a result of Jabhat Al-Shamiyas attacks on the formers headquarters in the city center.

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.
TeNerah Rice was sickened with the coronavirus in July. Isadore Sims spent two weeks hospitalized with the deadly virus in October.

Together, the top two officials with Alabamas largest Black Mardi Gras society are hopeful they can spread the message of vaccinating against the deadly virus this week. The Mobile Area Mardi Gras Association, an all-Black organization founded 82 years ago, is hosted the first of two membership parties on Sunday.

We know what the feeling is like, said Sims, vice-president with MAMGA. We would dare want to put anyone in harms way. Thats why we kept it as a private (gathering) for the organization. We are looking for it to be bigger in 2022.

Sims, a resident of New Orleans, said hes still feeling the effects of the novel coronavirus, which sickened him in October and nearly put him on a ventilator (he refused to have one). Hes still recovering from the aftereffects of the virus and is hoping to get vaccinated next month.

Rice, MAMGAs president, is a funeral director who has experienced a tragic year like none other. He said he is scheduled to receive his second COVID-19 shot on Friday, placing him among the less than 3% of Alabamians who have received both shots, according to data tracked by The New York Times.

The two have been chatting about their experiences with members as they arrive to the MAMGA float barn near Broad Street in downtown Mobile.

As members come through, we talk about it, said Rice. Those who have had the vaccine are giving details about their experience. Its about being knowledgeable about it so that hopefully we can come back and have a great season next Mardi Gras.

Early and incomplete statistics from the Alabama Department of Public Health show that few Black Alabamians have gotten the vaccine. The data, released Friday, shows that 11% of people who received the COVID-19 vaccine are Black, even though Blacks comprise of 27% of the states population.

Its a similar story in other nearby states. In Mississippi, for instance, 19% of the people who have received a COVID-19 shot are Black, even though Blacks consist of 38% of that states overall population.

The concerns vary over why people are avoiding the vaccines, but distrust still permeates among Black Alabamians over a history of racist and abusive medical practices underscored by the 40-year government-led Tuskegee syphilis study.

But the Alabama data is noticeably incomplete. While 54.4% of those vaccinated are white, another 34% of shot recipients are listed as either an unknown or not reported.

Dr. Scott Harris, on Friday, said he felt the 11% is not where we would like to be, but noted that its more than twice the national average. In the U.S., Harris noted, only about 5% of doses have gone to Black Americans.

Well continue to try to improve that uptake among Black Alabamians, he said.

Rice said that MAMGA has faced tragedies this year involving spouses and family members of the 135-member organization.

We know what the death rates are like in the country, said Rice. Just on an individual basis, not just from a funeral home standpoint, but you see people losing their loved ones and the impact this is having. Its truly unfortunate.

MAMGA traditionally hosts its Mammoth Parade on Fat Tuesday, and this years event would have featured 35 floats. Instead, this years coronavirus-interrupted Mardi Gras celebration will feature a few of the groups floats parked outside their float barn on Tuesday during the membership party.

Its about bringing morale up, said Rice. Were trying to show each other love so you have this sense of what Mardi Gras is all about. Its about family and community. Mardi Gras brings this city together as a whole. Without it, there is a hole. There is a gap. You are used to have people coming in from out of town and people you have not seen for years, you run into them.
Oil rallied to a 13-month high as cold weather in Texas disrupted flows from Americas largest shale patch, exposing the fragility of global supplies amid sharp cutbacks by OPEC and its allies.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures surged as much as 2.5% and rose above $60 a barrel for the first time since January last year. Brent crude in London, meanwhile, rose above $63. Permian oil production has fallen by as much as 1 million barrels a day as temperatures fall to minus 1 Fahrenheit (minus 18 degrees Celsius) in Midland, Texas, the de facto capital of U.S. shale production, according to the National Weather Service Midland.

The Arctic blast gripping the U.S. is threatening to crimp crude supplies and unleash a rush for everything from propane to heating oil, fuels that are used in mobile heating devices. In the past few weeks, harsh winter conditions across North Asia and parts of Europe have pushed some oil-product markets into a bullish backwardation structure. It comes amid a market thats now balanced with prices reflecting the current state of play, said Russias deputy prime minister Alexander Novak.

There were signs that some traders were caught off guard by the cold snap in the U.S., with the nearest WTI futures contracts surging against the next month. That gauge -- known as the prompt timespread -- surged by 15 cents at the open, when on a normal day it would only move by one or two cents.

WTI has climbed about 16% since the start of February and Brent posted four straight weeks of gains after Saudi Arabia led the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies in deep output cuts this year, causing once-swollen global stockpiles to rapidly normalize. On the demand front, American oil demand surged with refiners processing the most crude since March in anticipation of a vaccine-driven boost in gasoline use this summer. Both moves underscore the recovery from the destruction that saw U.S. crude prices briefly turn negative in the depths of the pandemic last year.

Energy prices have got another boost as a result of extremely cold weather in the U.S., said Warren Patterson, head of commodities strategy at ING Group. This colder than usual weather will be around for much of the week, and so should continue to be supportive for both gas and oil prices, particularly if we do see significant supply disruptions.

Rotating power outages were put into force in Texas as the states electricity grid operator grappled with surging demand amid a bitter arctic chill. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, its grid operator, ordered transmission companies to reduce demand on the system after reserves dropped below 1,000 megawatts, according to an alert posted Monday on its website.

Elsewhere, potential strikes in Norway were adding to supply risks for Europes biggest producer. Equinor ASA warned that union action could lead to shutdowns of its Johan Sverdrup and Troll fields, two of the most significant in the North Sea. Security in the Middle East, meanwhile, was in focus after Saudi Arabian authorities blamed Yemeni rebels for an attack at an airport in the kingdoms southern region.

Still, concerns remain over the sustainability of crudes rally. WTI futures 14-day Relative Strength Index remains well above 70 in a sign that the commodity is due for a pullback. Meanwhile, the threat of new virus strains and cases in parts of China may place a cap on whats been a dramatic recovery in fuel consumption, with the International Energy Agency last week cutting its demand forecast for 2021 and describing the market as fragile.

The cold snap, the additional Saudi cuts, the fresh U.S. stimulus promise are all helping, said Vandana Hari, founder of Vanda Insights in Singapore. But the single biggest factor -- and one the doubters have probably been missing or disbelieving -- is that Covid on a global level is in a retreat, for more than four weeks now.
Todays unprecedented snow probably would look like a light dusting to Houstonian on this day in 1895.

According to Matt Lanza, Houstons weather guru over at Space City Weather, the Bayou City was doused with more than 20 inches of snow on Valentines Day more than 100 years ago.

Lanza chronicled the record-holding day for SCW back in 2017 and is revisiting the post and incredible old-timey photos over on Twitter in light of the recent freeze. Houston Chronicle photos featured above captured the event, too.

About 126 years ago (give or take a day) the country was in the middle of a brutally cold winter. Starting on Tuesday, February 12, a cold front swept across the Lone Star State, reaching Houston the following eveningeven though, in classic Houston form, temps had reached 60 degrees in the city just a week prior.

By the morning, about a foot of snow had covered the city, creating what Lanza described as a winter wonderland and the snow kept coming down as the day went on, sticking around for the rest of the week.

Snowball (and gun?) fights ensued around town and Galvestons Victorian homes looked stunning in the gorgeous white fluff. But people and cattle did suffer and even died, as much like today, residents werent accustomed to the frigid weather.

February and Valentines Day have brought snowfall to Houston many times over the years. But after a big storm in 1960 the Bayou City went 12 years without seeing a snowflake.
The Deputy Director of Legal Affairs for the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Baba Jamal has described as unconstitutional, the Constitutional Instrument (CI) 99.



According to him, the Constitutional Instrument (CI) 99 which was introduced after the 2013 judgment of the Supreme Court on the 2012 election petition makes it difficult for any citizen other than a Presidential Candidate to petition the Supreme Court on Presidential Elections.



Speaking on Okay FMs 'Ade Akye Abia' Morning Show, the former Deputy General Secretary of the NDC explained that the CI99 cannot be bigger than the 1992 Constitution that allows any citizen to petition the Supreme Court on Presidential Elections in the country.



He added that it was due to the mistake of the CI99 that is why only the Presidential Candidate of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), former President John Dramani Mahama petitioned the Supreme Court on the 2020 Presidential Election.



The Article 64(1) of the 1992 Constitution says that any Ghanaian citizen can petition the Supreme Court to challenge the Presidential Election results but due to our experience in the 2013 election petition, CI99 was introduced to limit the Presidential Election petitioners to only those who contested in the presidential election, he posited.



"The CI99 is sick and unconstitutional and we will talk about it in the future because you should not implement any new law which is contrary to the 1992 Constitution. So, if the 1992 Constitution says any Ghanaian can challenge the presidential election results, the CI99 should not limit it to only those who contested in the presidential election, he argued.



He stressed that the persistent quest of the lawyer of the petitioner to demand certain answers from the Chairperson of the 1st Respondent in the 2020 election petition, Mrs. Jean Adukwei Mensa is to satisfy the constitutional mandate given to the EC to declare the Presidential Election results.



He reiterated that the petitioner has reasons to conclude that the constitutional requirement of the 1st Respondent was not met as the 2nd Respondent in the calculation of the petitioner did not cross the threshold of 50 percent to become the President of Ghana.



He was of the view that Mrs. Jean Mensa as the Chairperson of the 1st Respondent and also the Returning Officer of the Presidential Election should be made to answer certain questions with regards to the anomaly found in the Presidential Election as captured in the petition of John Dramani Mahama.



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The World Trade Organization's incoming chief on Monday warned against "vaccine nationalism' that would slow progress in ending the COVID-19 pandemic and could erode economic growth for all countries - rich and poor. Okonjo-Iweala told Reuters her top priority was to ensure the WTO does more to address the pandemic, saying members should accelerate efforts to lift export restrictions slowing trade in needed medicines and supplies. The former Nigerian finance minister and senior World Bank executive was appointed on Monday in a consensus process and starts her ...
Churches across Texas open doors amid dangerously cold weather: 'No one will be turned away'

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As Texas experiences record-breaking low temperatures and sweeping power outages, churches and ministries across the state are opening their doors, serving as warming shelters and providing food and supplies to those in need.

A spokesperson for Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas, led by Joel Osteen, told The Christian Post that on Sunday, the church opened as a designated Warming Center for anyone in need of shelter in the city. The church plans to stay open as long as needed, and no appointment or sign-up is necessary.

Approximately a dozen people arrived last night, and we expect more today with power outages, the spokesperson said. We are working with the Harris County Sherriffs department and local homeless organizations to be available. We have beds, blankets and other supplies. No one will be turned away.

On Sunday, the entire state of Texas was placed under a winter storm warning, with officials warning that people may die of hypothermia and carbon monoxide poisoning from improper use of generators. Residents were asked to avoid travel if at all possible due to hazardous conditions on roads, including snow and ice.

In Denison, Texas, St. Luke Episcopal opened their doors, providing beds and a hot meal to those in need. People can stay overnight at the church until 7 a.m. the following morning. From there they can go over to the soup kitchen where Center Cross Ministry serves breakfast.

The coffee pot will be on all night long, Father Don Perschell told a local news station, adding that the church is observing COVID-19 restrictions.

When they arrive, if they dont have a mask, were going to give them a mask, Perschell said. Theyre going to be given an opportunity to find a space here in the hall and they wont have to worry about somebody crowding in.

Perschell said the operation is a joint effort with other churches in the area and is funded completely through donations to the church.

In San Antonio, several organizations and ministries have stepped up to the plate amid freezing temperatures, including Church Under the Bridge, a church built specifically to minister to the spiritual needs of the homeless community.

The church has opened its doors to the homeless community, offering a warm place to stay, dinner and breakfast, and a movie.

No one should have to sleep outside unless they decide that on their own. There are many options available, reads the churchs Facebook page.

Nearby, Life Restored Church  a church that aims to reach the disenfranchised, the hurting, and the vulnerable people of San Antonio and bring them to a healing and transformational relationship with Jesus Christ  opened its doors over the weekend and through Monday to offer dinner, breakfast and a movie to those in need.

On Facebook, church worker Alex Fleming called for the local community to assist in helping those in need.

We need more help, he said, revealing he had barely slept as the church cared for dozens of members of the community over the weekend.

You're so vital and so important to helping us impact people's lives, he said. If you could survive this inclement weather, then we may have a chance to revive and to restore a life.

Unlike many homeless shelters, the goal of Life Restored Church, he said, is to re-humanize those it serves.

We feed them, we serve them, we pray with them, he said. We're loving on them, we're really humanizing them, that's a big difference that you see in a lot of other institutions that cattle prod people through versus rehumanize them and loving them.

Here is a list of warming shelters in Houston, Dallas and more.
A teenager is fighting for life in hospital after being shot with a crossbow in a 'shocking act of violence' near a London railway station.

The 18-year-old was found seriously injured on a bench at Abbey Wood station in south-east London on Sunday night, police said.

The British Transport Police said the young man was taken to hospital for treatment, adding that his condition is described as life-threatening.

In a statement released on Monday, Detective Superintendent Sam Blackburn said the investigation was at 'an early stage' and that police 'are keeping an open mind as to exactly where this violent incident began.

'Following a number of inquiries throughout the night, we believe the man sustained his injury from a crossbow bolt,' Blackburn said.

A teenager is fighting for life in hospital after being shot with a crossbow in a 'shocking act of violence' near Abbey Wood train station in South London (pictured)

The British Transport Police have appealed for any potential witnesses to come forward

'I'd like to appeal to anyone who may have witnessed anything suspicious along Abbey Road and Wilton Road between 9.45pm and 10.20pm to get in touch with us as soon as possible to assist the investigation.

'This was a shocking act of violence and I'd like to reassure the public we're doing all we can to find those responsible.

The station reopened on Monday morning after being shut while officers investigated the scene.

No arrests have been made.

Anyone with information can text BTP on 61016 or call 0800 405040 quoting reference 341 of 14/02/21. Alternatively you can call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.
India's Tata Motors said on Monday that its British luxury unit Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) aims to become a net-zero carbon business by 2039, as carmakers across the world race to manufacture clean-energy vehicles.

"Development is already underway with prototypes arriving on UK roads within the next 12 months as part of the long-term investment programme," Tata Motors said in BSE regulatory filing. It also mentioned that clean-hydrogen fuel-cell power being developed for JLR.

Future models of Jaguar will be built exclusively on a pure electric architecture, the company further stated.

Jaguar and Land Rover will offer pure electric power, nameplate by nameplate, by 2030. By this time, in addition to 100% of Jaguar sales, it is anticipated that around 60% of Land Rovers sold will be equipped with zero tailpipe powertrains, it said.

"In the next five years, Land Rover will welcome six pure electric variants as it continues to be the world leader of luxury SUVs. All Jaguar and Land Rover nameplates to be available in pure electric form by end of the decade; first all-electric Land Rover model in 2024," the company further stated.

The automaker also said that JLR is on a path towards double-digit EBIT margin.

The company seeks to be positive cash net-of-debt by 2025 with a "value creation approach delivering quality and profitover-volume."

It also said that it will begin closer collaboration with Tata Group.

"In order to realise its vision of modern luxury mobility with confidence, the company will curate closer collaboration and knowledge-sharing with Tata Group companies to enhance sustainability and reduce emissions as well as sharing best practice in next-generation technology, data and software development leadership," Tata Motors said.

The company also said that its heart of re-imagine plan will be the electrification of both Land Rover and Jaguar Brands. It also added that the Tata Group will allow JLR to explore potential synergies on clean energy, connected services.

Jaguar Land Rover has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Tata Motors, in which Tata Sons is the largest shareholder, since 2008. JLR's current CEO is Thierry Bollore.





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Pennsylvania movie theaters ditch mask mandate

Three chain movie theaters have announced that masks are no longer mandatory for moviegoers who have been vaccinated against coronavirus.
Another winter storm could bring slippery and dangerous conditions to central Pa. on Monday, according to the National Weather Service.

Starting Monday morning, some sleet and freezing rain will move into the area, but stay light until 8 p.m. in the Harrisburg area.

NWS Meteorologist Barry Lambert said the storm will change between freezing rain and normal rain as temperatures teeter around freezing across the Interstate 81 corridor from Schuylkill County to the state line in Franklin County.

More southeastern areas, like York and Lancaster counties, are more likely be warmer and see rain.

Further northwest in Selinsgrove and Huntingdon County, the storm will be more a mixture of snow, sleet and freezing rain. Closer to the New York border is more likely to be all snow, according to Lambert.

The storm will be in the area from Monday night until 5 a.m. or 6 a.m. Tuesday, Lambert said. In areas further west, like Bedford and Altoona, the storm could wrap up as early as 4 a.m. Tuesday.

Lambert said many parts of central Pa. could be looking at enough ice accumulation to bring down some tree limbs and power lines.

During daylight hours Monday, Lambert said a tenth of an inch or less of ice could accumulate.

Lambert said things could be slick, during the day, but the real danger will come overnight.

Monday night into Tuesday morning anywhere from three-fourths of an inch to an inch and a quarter could accumulate.

Its going to be a big problem, Lambert said. He warned that sidewalks and untreated driveways could be very icy Monday.

Temperatures will warm up Tuesday afternoon, which should help melt some of the ice.

Another storm system very similar to Mondays storm is expected to hit sometime Thursday morning, which could bring another mixture of precipitation across southern Pa., Lambert said.

Put the salt down early, Lambert said. He warned that especially for the elderly, there can be an increase in falls.

You can really hurt yourself, Lambert said. If it looks like its wet, it could be a solid sheet of ice.

PennDOT issued restrictions for many Pa. roads starting Monday evening.
If you were looking around the Free Press newsroom in the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, your eyes would eventually come to rest on a wavy-haired, bespectacled reporter, sitting at his desk with his arms folded across his chest and a faraway look in his eyes.

Opinion

If you were looking around the Free Press newsroom in the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, your eyes would eventually come to rest on a wavy-haired, bespectacled reporter, sitting at his desk with his arms folded across his chest and a faraway look in his eyes.

Mischievous colleagues, like this columnist, would sometimes gaze back at Paul Moloney, dressed in his trademark white dress shirt, a cigarette dangling from his lips, as he stared into the middle distance with laser-like intensity.

Eventually, realizing a colleague was staring back, Moloney would suddenly snap out of his reverie, an impish grin would spread across his face and hed offer the onlooker the faintest of nods as if to say: "You caught me!"

But make no mistake  the tall, slender reporter with a razor-sharp sense of humour wasnt given to daydreaming in the office; he simply had the unique trait of shutting out the world around him when his brain was sorting out the details of yet another complex story that would find its way onto the front page of the Free Press.

If a story involved a paper trail a mile long, it was handed to Moloney. If it involved enough numbers to overheat a computer, it landed on Moloneys desk.

During his 10 years at the Free Press  1976 to 1986  he became one of the most respected print journalists in the country, renowned for his ability to wade through mounds of confusing, often-tedious documents and surface with nuggets of news that delighted editors and readers alike.

Born in Peterborough, Ont., in 1953, Moloney returned to Toronto in the fall of 1986 and spent 27 years in his dream job as a reporter with the Toronto Star, where he rose to prominence for his ability to find front-page stories buried in city hall documents no one else bothered to read.

His Toronto colleagues  along with friends and former colleagues in Winnipeg  were shocked on Jan. 27 when his wife of 42 years, Alison, found him collapsed in their Toronto yard. Moloney, who had retired from the Stars city hall bureau in 2014, died from a heart attack. He was 67.

"I thought he was in perfect shape," Alison told The Star the following day. "I thought wed be living into our 80s together."

For Free Press publisher Bob Cox, Moloneys humble demeanour and rare ability to pull gripping stories out of a sea of random facts was an example of the way journalism was meant to be done.

"Paul was a veteran reporter by the time that I arrived at the Winnipeg Free Press in 1984," Cox recalled last week. "Youd call him a go-to guy, who was always on the big stories, the complicated ones and the ones that took time to unearth. When you needed to know who someone was, or get the background on an issue, youd find yourself reading a Paul Moloney story in the library, or consulting the man himself, sitting at his desk.

"He was the unflappable type, always calm, never seemingly busy, though you knew his mind was always buzzing. And he was always helpful  an inspiration to young reporters, showing by example the importance of doing your homework, knowing the facts, taking the time to dig in when others moved on. His wife (Alison) was among the worlds nicest people, teaching at an inner-city school, remaining as upbeat as her husband despite the challenges she saw amongst her kids every day."

Winnipegs loss was a big win for Toronto readers when Moloneys encyclopedic mind and enigmatic grin left the close-knit newsroom at the Free Press. When he left, then-Free Press city editor David Lee wrote arguably the most glowing letter of reference in history.

"If you have an opening for a reporter, hire Paul Moloney. If you dont have an opening, I would strongly suggest you do your best to create one," is how Lees letter began.

Former Free Press feature writer Andy Blicq, now an independent TV producer and author living in Gimli, laughed when reminded of Moloneys cheeky grin when caught in a work-related reverie in the 1980s.

"He had that dry, quiet sense of humour," Blicq recalled of the man who mentored many young reporters. "Looking back, I can see how much I learned from Paul and others. It (the Free Press) was an amazing place to be. There was an amazing cast of characters.

"Paul was quiet and deliberate and a really good reporter. He quietly went about his business and was a real star. Under that quiet exterior, was a lovely person. It was an exciting time to be at the Free Press, and it was humbling being around a reporter like that."

Gordon Sinclair Jr., who retired in 2018 after almost 37 years as an award-winning Free Press columnist, recalled Moloney as a slightly rumpled but always dignified reporter and a thoughtful friend and colleague.

"I remember he was a consummate professional in a newsroom filled with characters," Sinclair said when reached by phone last week. "He was very focused when he came to work. He was dogged and determined. Ill tell you, this (news) business is tough on people and I wouldnt be surprised if it didnt consume him and quietly do a number on him.

"For Paul, because he was so dedicated and so focused, it would have taken a lot out of him."

His colleagues at The Star described him in an obituary as a gentle, unassuming writer who was the master at decoding complex civic reports. "He was hard-working, very funny, coming out with the best zingers  and always fair," Vanessa Lu, Moloneys bureau chief for several years, recalled. "No ego."

For this columnist, whose reporting career began in 1982, Moloney was the rarest of creatures  a veteran journalist who was never too busy to teach a green-around-gills colleague the tricks of the trade.

And unlike most people, when caught in an embarrassing situation, he never failed to smile.

doug.speirs@freepress.mb.ca
With the Christian season of Lent beginning Wednesday, bakeries are preparing and selling paczkis for residents to celebrate Fat Tuesday.

Paczkis are traditionally eaten on the Tuesday before Lent, originating from Poland as a way for the household to use up all the shortening, eggs, and preserves before the 40-day long Lenten season begins. While they are filled with creme or fruit, paczkis are different from jelly donuts due to their shape and the richer dough used.

Murphys Bakery in Bad Axe is selling paczkis on both Monday and Tuesday, with custard, raspberry, apple, strawberry, lemon, peach, and cream flavors available. There will, however, be no paczki-eating contest like in years past due to the ongoing pandemic.

Petal N Bean in Cass City started selling paczkis for the first time last year and will be doing so again this year with raspberry and Bavarian cream varieties, which were the biggest seller from last year.

Owner Christine Anthony said selling paczkis last year was one of the biggest times of the year for the store and expects something similar this year.

Were expecting a great outcome, Anthony said, with curbside, delivery, and dine-in options available.

One place selling paczkis for the first time in a while is Outback Custom Meat in Snover. Owner Joanna Bechtel said they got back into it because they had the time.

Last time we made 100 dozen, Bechtel said, with the Outback Custom Meat staff starting to make their paczkis on Monday evening and planning to continue through Tuesday afternoon. I dont know how many well make this year.

Outback Custom Meat will have lemon, raspberry, blueberry, and custard flavors available.

None of the places the Tribune reached out to showed concern that the continuing pandemic would affect their business this year.

We all like to eat, Bechtel said.

Gardai investigating the horrific murder of a harmless drug user and father-of-two in Ballymun are now probing whether his 'gangland-style' murder arose out of a grudge.

Sources have described the execution style killing of Patrick 'Pappy' Lyons as "completely over the top" and "not commensurate with the lifestyle this man was living."

Officers are also examining whether Pappy was on his way to a pre-arranged meeting, when he was gunned down, and are seeking to establish, if so, whom he had arranged to meet.

Pappy (44) was shot once in the head and three times in the chest in an attack in the Belclare area, close to Poppintree and his family home, on Thursday evening.

Moments earlier he had left a house where he was watching television with a friend, saying: "I won't be a minute."

Gardai do not believe Pappy was contacted by phone in the lead up to the killing, or lured outside by a text, and believe it more likely his reasons for going outside were pre-arranged.

As the community of Ballymun yesterday rallied round to support Pappy's family, a GoFundMe page was set up to help pay for funeral costs and support his family.

The appeal, set up by a family friend had raised almost 3,000 by lunchtime yesterday,

"Normally, very quickly, within 12 hours of a killing like this, gardai would have some idea of a motive, but we're scratching our heads on this one," a security source told the Sunday World.

Expand Close Gardai examine the scene in Ballymun where Patrick Lyons was shot. / Facebook

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"There was a severe level of violence used here - it is essentially a gangland-style killing involving someone who was not involved in gangland.

"There are a number of lines being looked at. Could it have been over a small drug debt? Could it be something as simple as a stolen bike?

Expand Close Gardai preserve the scene of the fatal shooting in Ballymun. / Facebook

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"Regardless, the level of violence is puzzling; it's not commensurate with something like this. And it doesn't fit the nature of the lifestyle this man was living. He was involved in shoplifting but he never mugged anyone. Essentially, he stole to fund his habit so for him to be killed in the way he was is very unusual."

Speaking yesterday, a family friend said: "His dad is in intensive care at the moment and his mam would be looking after his son as well so this is an awful tragedy to befall that family. This whole situation is an awful tale of pain and suffering."

Gardai are appealing to anyone who was in the Belclare Terrace and Belclare Park areas on Thursday from 8pm-9.15pm to come forward.

After the impeachment, Senator Graham said the Vice-President might be next. He explained he warned that the DEMS opened Pandora's box and will face the consequences.

In trying former President Trump, the Democrats set a precedent that, according to Graham, is equivalent to opening Pandora's Box. He warned the DEMS will not like what would happen next.

Opening the Box Is a Big Mistake

Last Sunday, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham declared that the DEMS had opened Pandora's Box intentionally. After Trump, the DEMS didn't realize what the second impeachment trial and its aftermath will be for them, reported the Blaze.

Until the Trump impeachment, no one out of office has ever been tried. This is one of the arguments that many cautioned the House DEMS from going ahead with it. The constitution was ignored intentionally by the DEMS who wanted to go after Trump, even risking the constitution.

A monumental error and weaponizing of the U.S. Constitution to attempt a conviction on a wrong premise, essentially opening avenues to go after the Democrats as well. The lesson learned is convicting a citizen-based on "Trumped" up charges with no solid proof will go sideways. In Trump's case, he handed another defeat to the DEMS.

The basis for the limitation of who can be impeached is Article II, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution. Those impeachable as written are the president, vice president, and all United States, civil Officers. It never mentioned a private citizen as one of those impeachable. Trump's impeachment should have never happened; circumstances could be turned on those based on Article II. Senator Graham said the Vice-President might be the next one in the impeachment chair.

Also read: Trump's Acquittal Creates Aftershocks to the Republicans, Democrats in American Politics

Though not everyone shares this idea, according to former Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who alleged that Donald Trump is guilty of the events on January 6, he clarified for an acquit vote.

Democrat-led Senate is out of the line. The ex-president has a mistrial by the Senate; no one can impeach an ex-president. Sources say it will come back at the Democrats who cannot afford such fiascos.

Graham's Statement

Last Sunday, he said if the DEMS played safe and left Trump alone, the would-be was unmolested by something similar. But they still went despite the advice given. The precedent exists, but the ex-president was acquitted.

If the Republicans decide to go after anyone, it would be there and might haunt them. Graham added should the Republicans retake the House soon, then Kamala Harris is open season for prospective impeachment. Better yet, she will be charged with the same charges as Donald trump.

He stressed that the DEMS had intentionally and unwisely opened the Pandora's Box to future presidents. Graham stresses the model used to attempt a failed conviction will get Kamala Harris probably impeached. There is an evidence that she bailed out rioters who hurt people in jail and sent them back to the street. He added this Pandora's Box is open, and it will be something.

One of the reasons cited by Senator Graham why he said that was that the Vice-President was documented to ask for contributions to her bail fund. It was used to release violent leftists to continue rioting and hurting people. He expressed that the DEMS pursuing the impeachment case against Trump is uncalled for.

Related article: Trump Defense Triumph: Ex-President Acquitted in Second Impeachment Trial, Conservatives Hail Victory

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Three Phoenix police officers were caught on bodycam video saying they wanted to 'gas' and 'stomp on' Black Lives Matter protesters last year following the arrests of 15 people.

The officers also disparaged the protesters in the bodycam video by calling them 'd**kheads', a**hole kids' and 'liberal pieces of s**t' as they sat in their patrol car in downtown Phoenix back on October 17 last year.

The footage, obtained by ABC15, came to light at the weekend after attorneys for the 15 protesters used it in their case to argue the three officers were politically motivated during the arrests.

Just hours after the video was made public, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office announced it was dismissing the charges against the 15 people so they can review the evidence.

The officers have not been identified.

Three Phoenix police officers were caught on bodycam video in October last year saying they wanted to 'gas' and 'stomp on' Black Lives Matter protesters following the arrests of 15 people. The protesters are pictured above huddling under umbrellas

In the video, one officer can be heard asking: 'Why didn't we just stomp on them when they were leaving?'

Another said: 'Gas em. I don't give a s**t if we just gas them and let them run like crazy.'

As they drove past someone on the street that told them to 'go home', one of the officers referred to the person as a 'f***ing liberal piece of s**t'.

In the video the officers also bemoaned having to wear bodycams with one saying it brought the 'job down the drain'.

'We actually want to do the job like we did 10, 15 years ago, but it's never going to come back,' one officer said.

'If they ever came back and they said, 'Guys, just f***ing kick some f***ing a** out there and reduce crime,' I'd say, 'Okay.' '

The second officer replied: 'So you won't be in f***ing handcuffs and doing your job? 'Going, 'Oh, let me go watch that body cam video just in case he might have struck somebody.' I remember back when. It was so much nicer.'

The first officer then replied: 'I think this (body camera) has taken the job down the drain.'

Police moved in to arrest the protesters after the group huddled together and appeared to form a dome with their umbrellas. In the bodycam video taken after the arrests, the three officers could be heard talking about the umbrellas, describing them as a 'new trick' to deflect rubber bullets

The bodycam footage, obtained by ABC15 , came to light at the weekend after attorneys for the 15 protesters used it in their case to argue the three officers were politically motivated during the arrests

Prosecutors had argued to a grand jury that the protesters were dangerous and they were part of a criminal street gang.

The group had met in a park the night of October 17 before walking down the street chanting 'Black Lives Matter' and 'ACAB' or 'All cops are b******s.

Some of the protesters in the group were spotted carrying umbrellas.

Video from the night showed some protesters dragging barriers and toppling street signs.

Police moved in to arrest them after the group huddled together and appeared to form a dome with their umbrellas.

In the bodycam video taken after the arrests, the three officers could be heard talking about the umbrellas, describing them as a 'new trick' to deflect rubber bullets.

'I haven't seen the umbrella tricks yet. That's a new thing,' one officer said.

Another responded: ' Still you make (gas) go up in the air and come down on them. It would still get on them.'

The first officer then expressed concerns over the use of umbrellas and compared to a scene from Batman.

'I watch Batman. I saw what Penguin did with the umbrella. He's got a gun behind the umbrella,' the officer said.

Just hours after the video was made public, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office announced it was dismissing the charges against the 15 people so they can review the evidence

Pictured left to right: Kalixta Noemi Villasaez, Suvarna Ratnam and Amy Beth Kaper

Pictured left to right: Kaleb Isaiah Martin, Nathan Jon Aderholdt and Marysa E Leyva

Pictured left to right: Ryder Collins, Riley Morgan Behrens and Christopher Charles Roberson

In the wake of the footage being made public, Phoenix Police Chief Jeri Williams said there would be 'swift and decisive disciplinary action' in regards to the alleged behavior from the officers.

'I have been and will continue to be an advocate of the amazing work done in this department each day. However, I know that unprofessional, disrespectful and inappropriate behavior from even one of our officers tarnishes the badge but more importantly, it hurts the community we have sworn to protect,' Williams said.

'I will not allow the actions and speech of a few of the 4,000 men and women of the Phoenix Police Department destroy the trust and credibility of those we serve. When that conduct does not show respect, you can expect that I as the chief will take swift and decisive disciplinary action.'

It is not clear what action, if any, has been taken so far against the officers involved.

The Phoenix Police Department and the attorney's office had already been facing pressure to drop the charges after it emerged earlier this month that some of the officers involved in BLM arrests had a 'challenge coin' in 2017 that celebrated a protesters being shot in the groin.

Phoenix City Manager Ed Zuercher issued a statement saying there were 'deep rooted issues' within the department.

'The more information we learn, the more concerned I become. I believe the majority of Phoenix Police officers do great work for our community every day. But it's obvious we have deep rooted issues in the Phoenix Police Department that must be addressed.

'This department is going to change. I demand it. Chief Williams demands it. And the public expects it.'
Now that impeachment is just one more card in the political deck, to be played by whichever party controls the House of Representatives, the question naturally arises: what should Republicans do when they retake control of the House, very likely in 2022?

Lindsay Graham warns that if the Democrats could impeach Donald Trump with the false assertion that he incited violence, a far stronger claim along the same lines can be made against Kamala Harris:

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM: "I don't know how Kamala Harris doesn't get impeached if the Republicans take over the House, because she actually bailed out rioters" pic.twitter.com/hoitBgrkXJ  Breaking911 (@Breaking911) February 14, 2021



Tom Cotton, among many others, has also pointed out Harriss explicit support for rioting, looting and arson (not demonstrating or protesting, as no one was arrested for that), although not specifically in the context of impeachment:

Kamala Harris helped violent rioters in Minnesota get out of jail to do more damage. Don't believe her when she says she "condemns the violence"look at her record, not her words. https://t.co/lL2aYjxPZA  Tom Cotton (@TomCottonAR) August 31, 2020



Jeff Dunetz argues against retaliatory impeachment, and also says that Harris shouldnt be impeached for something she did before she was vice-president. That is certainly a plausible position, although interestingly, the Constitution doesnt say that the high crimes and misdemeanors that are the basis for removal from office must have been committed while the subject of the impeachment held his or her current office.

If we agree with the Democrats that it is proper to impeach a former president, House Republicans could consider impeaching Barack Obama. He plainly violated his oath of office and his duties under Article II of the Constitution (specifically, the Take Care Clause) when he essentially suspended enforcement of the countrys immigration laws. In my opinion he should have been impeached at the time, and, if the Democrats theory is accepted, it will not be too late to impeach him in 2023.

More to the point, though, is the fact that Joe Biden has committed the same impeachable offense as Barack Obama. In his first weeks blizzard of executive orders, he, perhaps to an even greater extent than Obama, purported to repeal the immigration laws. I think this was an impeachable offense, not just on the absurd theories argued for by Democrats, but on a sober reading of the impeachment clauses in the Constitution. And of course, by 2023 Biden in all likelihood will have committed many more illegal and unconstitutional acts that could be the basis for impeachment.

Some respected commentators argue that Republicans should take the high road. Rather than emulating the Democrats, they should, when they retake the House, attend to the countrys business and not waste time on politicized and futile impeachments. Those conservatives may well be right; theirs certainly is a reasonable and high-minded position. It also is consistent with the pattern we have seen for many years, where Republicans try to do the right and gentlemanly thing, while Democrats fight viciously for political advantage. This asymmetry has been an unfortunate aspect of our political scene for too long.

So, should Republicans wield impeachment as a weapon when they next control the House? I am undecided. The answer will be determined by the landscape as it exists two years hence, which at present, we cannot foresee. What we can say for certain is that the Democrats, with their two absurd impeachments of President Trump, have decisively changed how we all must view impeachment, if not forever, certainly for the foreseeable future. In 2023, or whenever Republicans re-take the House, it will very much be on the table.
Calling the shots around Charminar and Mecca Masjid are goons and self-styled pahelwans, who collect mamool.  DC Image

HYDERABAD: The Footpath Mamool mafia, operating around Charminar is back, almost immediately after the street side hawkers returned for business.

Goons and pahelwans are back to extorting mamools or protection money from hawkers while the shop-keepers too step in to imposing and collecting a little fee for allowing hawkers to peddle their wares in front of their shops.

In several cases, shopkeepers can collect anywhere from Rs 100 a day from each push-cart hawker, to a notch higher depending on location and nature of goods sold.

By an estimate, over 3,800 hawkers, including minors, do business on roads and footpaths from Nayapul to Shah Ali Banda, including on the Lad Bazar and Khilwat belt. The footpaths eastern side in Nayapul is occupied by fruit-vendors.

The roads leading to Charminar, near and around the monument itself have sprung back to life after being nearly deserted for months during the lockdown. Not just the older shopkeepers who had deserted their spots on the streets to sell during the lockdown, but newer businessmen are here too, mostly youth who had lost jobs on account of Covid-19, who too have taken to petty street-side businesses to make a living.

Meanwhile, space comes at a premium for these hawkers. At times, even at the cost of an arm or a leg if anyone dares to defy the goons. On February 8, some vendors scuffled over space, which ended with the police registering a case of attempt to murder on some of them.

A gang of five attacked two hawkers, Mohammed Majid and Mohammed Naveed, with iron rods. Majids leg was fractured in the attack.

The Hussaini Alam police registered a case under Section 370 of the IPC against Abdullah bin Mohammed, Sadiq bin Mohammed, Mohammed Safiuddin and Mohammed Naseer and remanded them.

When Deccan Chronicle spoke to a cross-section of hawkers in the area, they revealed that shop keepers collect money from them to park their carts or set up other mobile units in front of their shops. This fee can range anywhere between Rs 50 to Rs 100, going up to Rs 500 in some cases, depending on the product the hawker sells and the shops location.

Inquiries also revealed that in some places, shopkeepers collect fees from more than one street vendor. Not surprisingly, most hawkers were not comfortable while talking about the problems they face.

Speaking only on the condition of anonymity, a vendor said, there is a tier system in what they collect from us. If the stand on which I hang clothes to sell has more than one tier, then I have to give the shopkeeper Rs 200 per tier. In some cases, it can go as high as Rs 500.

These parking fees, he said, also depended on the type of wares being sold. Those who sell knick-knacks, popular with tourists, usually end up paying more than those selling materials like pajamas, socks and the like.

Calling the shots around Charminar and Mecca Masjid are goons and self-styled pahelwans, who collect mamool (protection money in their dialect). If anyone refuses to pay, the goons harass us. At times, even cops harass us, a hawker said.

Then there are facilitators, strong arming youth who extort money from hawkers and then manage the police.

Asked if they are left with anything after shelling out fees, a hawker explained that those who occupy a good spot can take home more than Rs 1,000 after meeting  these daily expenses.

Many tourists do not haggle as they are looking to buy something as a souvenir to commemorate their visit to Charminar. Most of us make enough, and on some days, the take-home is really good, the hawker said.

Jerusalem:

Escalating Israeli-Palestinian tensions over the Holy Land's most contested shrine boiled over into violence that killed six people -- three Palestinians in street clashes in Jerusalem and three Israelis in a stabbing attack at a West Bank settlement.

After nightfall, a Palestinian sneaked into a home in the Israeli settlement of Halamish in the West Bank and stabbed to death three Israelis, the head of Israel's rescue service said on Friday.

An Israeli news site said those killed were two men and a woman who were having dinner at the time. The army released footage showing a blood-covered kitchen floor.

Israel TV's Channel 10 said the assailant was in his late teens and had posted on Facebook that he was upset by the events at the shrine.

Eli Bin, the head of Israel's rescue service MDA, said an off-duty soldier next door heard screams, rushed to the home and shot the attacker through a window. Bin said the attacker was wounded and evacuated to hospital.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, meanwhile, announced that he is freezing ties with Israel, dealing a blow to fledgling Trump administration efforts to try to renew long-dormant peace talks.

Read more: Israel: Benjamin Netanyahu denounces Brussels criticism as anomaly

Abbas said contacts with Israel would be suspended on "all levels." It was not immediately clear if this means long-standing security coordination between Israeli troops and Abbas' forces will be halted.

At issue in the current round of violence are metal detectors Israel installed at the Jerusalem shrine earlier this week, in response to a deadly attack by Arab gunmen there.

The metal detectors are perceived by the Palestinians as an encroachment on Muslim rights and portrayed by Israel as a needed security measure following the attack that killed two Israeli policemen.

Earlier on Friday, several thousand Palestinians in Jerusalem and the West Bank clashed with Israeli troops, burning tires or throwing stones and firecrackers.

Troopsfired live rounds, rubber bullets and tear gas. Three Palestinians were killed and several dozen hospitalized with live or rubber bullet injuries.

White clouds of tear gas rose from Jerusalem streets and West Bank flashpoints. In one neighborhood, Palestinians threw stones from behind a mattress used as a shield.

Israel also faced growing criticism from the Muslim world, and thousands staged anti-Israel protests after Friday prayers in Jordan and Yemen. Turkey and Egypt also condemned the violence.

The confrontations in the Holy Land could escalate incoming days, as both sides dig in.

Israel said the metal detectors would remain in place.

Read more: Two Israeli police officers killed near Jerusalem holy site

Lawmaker Tzachi Hanegbi, a confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said Israel would not surrender to what he said were "violence and incitement" by those "attempting to drag us into a religious war."

Jerusalem's top Muslim cleric, Mohammed Hussein, said protests, including mass street prayers outside the shrine, would continue until the devices are removed. He told worshippers on Friday that they should prepare for a "longtest of wills" with Israel.

"We will not back off", he said.

The shrine, revered by Muslims and Jews, sits at the emotional epicenter of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, symbolizing the rival religious and national narratives of the two sides.

Disputes over the 37-acred (15-hectare) walled hilltop platform in Jerusalem's Old City have repeatedly triggered major confrontations in the past.

Earlier this week, Israel began installing metal detectors at the gates of the compound, saying extra measures were required to prevent further attacks.

Muslim leaders portrayed the metal detectors as part of a purported Israeli campaign to expand its control over the shrine, a claim Israel denies. Muslim clerics urged worshippers to pray in the streets near the shrine, rather than submit to the new security procedures.

The faithful complied. Thousands flocked to the Old City each day this week for street prayers, kneeling on mats spread on cobble stone and asphalt.

Yesterday, the highlight of the Muslim religious week, Israeli police severely restricted Muslim access to the Old City to prevent mass protests.

Some 3,000 officers were deployed at checkpoints in and around the city, turning away Muslim men under the age of 50, including those trying to reach the city from Israel and the West Bank.

In the end, thousands reached the Old City, a fraction of the typical Friday turnout of tens of thousands of worshippers.

After peaceful prayers, clashes erupted in several areas of Jerusalem and across the West Bank.

Palestinian health officials said three Palestinians were killed by live fire in different areas of Jerusalem.

The Red Crescent said 390 Palestinians were hurt, including close to 100 who were hospitalized for live fire or rubber bullet injuries. Israeli police said five officers were wounded.

The perceived threat to the shrine, home to the Al Aqsa and Dome of the Rock mosques, has galvanized Palestinians -- especially those in east Jerusalem which was captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war and quickly annexed.

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U.S. Forces Korea Commander Gen. Robert Abrams, third from left, inspects a joint military exercise between South Korea and the United States in this October 2019 photo. / Korea Times file



By Kang Seung-woo



While North Korea is expected to respond strongly to an envisaged combined military drill between South Korea and the United States, including a show of force, Seoul has few options to properly tame Pyongyang's anger which will likely lead to heightening tensions on the Korean Peninsula, according to diplomatic observers, Monday.



However, they say it is a silver lining that the North's possible provocation would not be enough to spoil the South Korean government's peace initiative as the totalitarian state also remains cautious about its acts negatively affecting the new U.S. administration's review of policy toward it.



The allies are now discussing holding the annual springtime drill, which will be proceeded under the form of computer-simulated command post training, in the second week of March, with them fine-tuning the details such as how to program it, according to military officials.



However, given that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un warned against the "war game," it is highly likely that the North Korean regime will stage a military provocation. The Kim regime denounced the joint exercise as a rehearsal for an invasion.



"There is not any good way to stop North Korea from taking more belligerent actions in response to the combined drill even if the South Korean military keeps it as low-key as possible," said Park Won-gon, a professor of international politics at Handong Global University.



Park added the lone solution to keeping North Korean provocations at bay could be U.S. President Joe Biden's State of the Union address, scheduled for later this month, where he could deliver a conciliatory message to the North stressing the need for dialogue to settle the issue of the North's nuclear weapons program.



"While holding a military exercise, the U.S. State Department may offer unconditional negotiation, which cannot be accepted by the North due to its leader's strong warning against the drill," Park said.



Cho Han-beom, a senior researcher of the Korea Institute for National Unification, also said the North's strong response is likely due to the proclamation of its "supreme dignity" during its recent party congress.



"As Kim Jong-un made it clear during the eighth party congress last month that he stands against the joint exercise, the North will not sit back during the drill," Cho said.



He suggested its response could start with a denunciation of the training from Kim Yo-jong, the North Korean leader's younger sister and de facto No. 2 in the reclusive state, who is in charge of the country's foreign and inter-Korean policies.



"According to circumstances, the North can stage a counter military exercise," he added.



The combined drill comes as South Korea is seeking to regain wartime operational control (OPCON) of South Korean troops from Washington, which requires frequent military exercises to test and prove the South Korean military's preparedness.



Cho said the South Korean government needs to use the inter-Korean military joint committee to temper the North's fiery response, fully explaining the necessity of the training for the OPCON transition. President Moon Jae-in said during his New Year press conference in January that he can consult on the issue with the North via the channel if necessary.



However, the experts concurred that North Korea will not cross the U.S. "red line" to keep the Biden administration's dialogue-first policy toward the country intact without adversely affecting President Moon's Korean Peninsula peace process.



"Even if North Korea opts for military provocations, it could be limited to using short-range missiles or costal artillery near the Northern Limit Line against South Korea without provoking the U.S. government," Park said.



Cho added, "The Kim regime would also control the level of military provocations as the Biden administration is still reviewing its policy toward the country."


The Health Ministry supports the vaccination law, Minister Vlad Voiculescu declared today, explaining that there is a vaccination bill under Parliament debate, which is not related to the SARS-CoV-2 vaccination, according to AGERPRES.

"It's good to clarify this. There is a bill under Parliament debate, but there is no connection between this piece of legislation and the COVID-19 vaccination. There was a confusion. We are talking about a law that is in Parliament, it could take one way or another," Voiculescu said when asked if the Ministry supports mandatory vaccination.

When asked if the Health Ministry supports the fast-track adoption of the bill in Parliament, Voiculescu replied that "the Ministry supports the vaccination law. (...) If you look at the current situation of the vaccination law in Parliament, you see that there is a requirement for getting informed."

Prime Minister Florin Citu said on Monday that vaccination for the novel coronavirus will not be mandatory.

"There is a bill that has been in Parliament for three years now, it has nothing to do with the ongoing vaccination campaign. It's a bill in the debate of the Romanian Parliament. That document is a copy and paste of the policies of the last three years, so it has nothing to do with what is happening now. (...) There were no such talks. I have also seen Secretary of State Raed Arafat saying clearly what I am saying now: the COVID-19 vaccination will not be mandatory; that is out of question," Citu said at the Parliament House when asked about the possibility of mandating mass vaccination.
Problems with a flagship carbon capture system operated in Western Australia by the countrys sixth-biggest polluter mean it is capturing only one-third of the pollution approvals required, venting up to millions of tonnes a year more, documents reveal.

Chevrons Gorgon oil and gas project on Barrow Island off the Pilbara coast was approved on the condition it used carbon capture and storage  injecting emissions underground  to bury 80 per cent of the carbon extracted from its reservoir gas over a five-year period.

Chevron's Gorgon LNG plant in Western Australia hosts one of the world's biggest carbon capture projects. Credit:

Reservoir gas is 27 per cent of total emissions from the project, WAs second-highest polluting, estimated to put out almost 10 million tonnes a year at full production.

The emerging technology of CCS is one of the federal governments key hopes to curb skyrocketing national emissions while still extracting fossil fuels.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 13:14:35|Editor: huaxia

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NEW DELHI, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- As many as 15 people, including seven men, six women and two children, died in India's southwestern state of Maharashtra on Sunday night after the truck they were travelling in overturned, confirmed a local cop over phone on Monday.

The mishap occurred in the state's Jalgaon district when the truck carrying a stock of papayas overturned near Yawal city.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed condolences over the accident. Enditem

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) was banned in China on February 12, one week after it was accused of false reporting and after the broadcasting licence of Chinas state owned CGTN was revoked by the British regulator. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) condemned the retaliatory move by Beijing and called on Chinese authorities to respect media freedom.

This photo shows the BBC logo at their Beijing bureau office on February 12, 2021. Credit: NOEL CELIS / AFP

On February 12, Chinas National Radio and Television Admission announced that it would prohibit BBC World News in China, claiming the public broadcasters reporting has damaged Chinas national interests and destroyed the unity of the Chinese community.

As the channel has failed to meet the requirements to broadcast in China as an overseas channel, BBC World News is not allowed to continue its service within Chinese territory, the Chinese agency said via a statement. It added it would not accept the BBCs broadcast application for the next year.

The BBC later said it is disappointed at Beijings action. The BBC is the worlds most trusted international news broadcaster and reports on stories from around the world fairly, impartially and without fear or favour, a BBC spokesperson said in a statement.

Access to the BBCs programmes had been restricted in China, and BBC World News was available only in international hotels and foreign residential compounds, according to the public broadcaster.

Shortly after China imposed the ban, Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) also stated it would suspend the relay of BBC World Service and BBC News Weekly starting February 12 at 11 pm.

We condemn this decision by the Chinese authorities, the BBC said in a statement. Our journalists have reported stories in mainland China and Hong Kong truthfully and fairly, as they do everywhere around the world.

Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs had previously dismissed the BBCs reporting on Covid-19 in China as fake news and threatened the use of sanctions should the public broadcaster not apologise.

The decision came one week after Britains media regulator, Ofcom, revoked the broadcasting licence of China Global Television Network (CGTN), the English-language service of Chinas state media China Central Television (CCTV), on February 4.

Ofcom concluded that Star China Media Limited (SCML), the licence-holder for CGTN, did not have editorial control over CGTNs output and was therefore not a lawful broadcast licensee. It also mentioned CGTNs links to the Chinese Communist Party.

The decision met with a strong protest by China, which threatened a response to the UK. Relations between the UK and China have plunged in recent months due to the sweeping national security law in Hong Kong, Covid-19, and other issues.

The BBCs recent coverage of the Uyghur community in Xinjiang has also infuriated Beijing. Chinese officials took to social media and called reports about Uyghur women suffering systematic sexual abuse and torture in the internment camp built and run by the Chinese government lies.

The IFJ said: The IFJ has previously expressed concern that China may have aimed its criticism at the BBC as retaliation in its recent disputes with the British government. Targeting a news organisation as part of a political strategy at the expense of media freedom is unacceptable. The IFJ condemns the retaliatory move by Beijing and calls on the Chinese authorities to respect media freedom.

Supporters of President Donald Trump flock to the National Mall by the hundreds of thousands for a rally in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

Aim of Impeachment Was to Paint All Trump Voters as Criminals: Rep. Mike Johnson

Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.) says Democrats used the impeachment of former President Donald Trump as a tool to paint all of his supporters with the brush of Capitol breach-related criminality.

Johnson told Breitbart News in an interview on Feb. 14 that the ultimate aim of impeaching Trump a second time was to associate the 75 million Americans who voted for him with those individuals who on Jan. 6 broke the law.

They really wanted to use impeachment as a vehicle because they wanted to equate all those tens of millions of Trumps voters and all of his supporters and everybody who came to the rally, they wanted to equate all of those people with the couple hundred criminals who came in and ransacked the Capitol, Johnson told the outlet.

Asked about the future of impeachment, Johnson said it would increasingly become a tool of partisan spats.

You weaponized this. You turned it into a political weapon to be used by the majority party against a president they dont like. You opened a Pandoras box that we may never be able to close again, Johnson said.

What [Democrats] tried to do [is] to raise cancel culture now to a constitutional level, Johnson said, echoing remarks made on Feb. 12 by David Schoen, one of the three attorneys representing Trump who accused Democrats of using impeachment as a tool to disqualify political opponents.

In short, this unprecedented effort is not about Democrats opposing political violence. It is about Democrats trying to disqualify their political opposition. It is constitutional cancel culture, Shoen said.

On Feb. 13, the Senate acquitted Trump with a 5743 vote, 10 votes shy of the 67 needed for a guilty verdict. The vote cleared Trump of the charge of incitement of insurrection, a charge that his lawyers denounced as a monstrous lie that didnt reflect the reality of what happened on Jan. 6.

An insurrectionunlike a riotis an organized movement acting for the express purpose to overthrow and take possession of a governments powers, Trumps lawyers wrote in filings, arguing that the former presidents speech was not an act encouraging an organized movement to overthrow the United States government.

Trumps acquittal was widely seen as a foregone conclusion ahead of the trial after 45 Republicans voted to declare the proceeding unconstitutional.

In a statement following his acquittal, Trump denounced the impeachment effort and thanked his supporters.

This has been yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our Country, Trump said.

I also want to convey my gratitude to the millions of decent, hardworking, law-abiding, God-and-Country loving citizens who have bravely supported these important principles in these very difficult and challenging times.


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Dozens of people gathered at San Franciscos Civic Center Plaza on Sunday to decry the surge in violence and verbal attacks against Asian Americans in the Bay Area and across the nation. Joined by the family of an 84-year-old San Francisco man who died after being shoved to the ground on the street, they issued a call for action and support.

The rally followed a similar protest in Oaklands Chinatown on Saturday as Asian Americans report an upswing of incidents since the start of the pandemic a year ago.

When one of us is attacked in this city, we are all less safe, said Tinisch Hollins, associate director of Californians for Safety and Justice, who cited disgusting acts of racism.

A joint letter from nearly 70 organizations denounced the violence against Asian Americans. The community is demanding action from our city agencies and elected officials that we need more investments in survivor and family supportive services, said Cynthia Choi, co-executive director for Chinese for Affirmative Action.

Advocates seek more intervention and prevention initiatives and school lessons on understanding of childrens cultural histories.

We have tremendous support from all communities from all faiths, Choi said. This is what this whole event is about  coming together and having a shared vision of what safety can look like in all communities.

Asian American communities feel traumatized and neglected because of the pandemic and living under a presidency that blamed China, said Lai Wa Wu of the Chinese Progressive Association. Former President Donald Trump constantly called the coronavirus the Chinese virus and the kung flu.

Growing attacks against Asian Americans nationwide include the assaults on a 91-year-old man who was shoved to the ground in Oakland Chinatown this month, and on Vicha Ratanapakdee, an 84-year-old San Franciscan who died after being knocked to the ground Jan. 28. Family members of Ratanapakdee, whose alleged attacker is in custody, attended Sundays rally.

An initiative from Chois group and San Francisco State University counts more than 2,800 incidents of hate or discrimination  verbal abuse, violence and more  against Asian Americans nationwide since the start of the pandemic. In the Bay Area, 708 incidents have been reported, including 292 in San Francisco, 58 in San Jose and 55 in Oakland.

Everyones feeling the pain, the anger, the frustration, the fear. ... We must remind ourselves and each other to not be reactionary, to not be guided by these negative feelings, to use these feelings and let these feelings inspire us, said Max Leung, founder of the SF Peace Collective.

San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Michael Cabanatuan contributed to this report.

Kellie Hwang is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kellie.hwang@sfchronicle.com
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Iraq will re-impose partial lockdown measures until early March after detecting a new strain of the coronavirus, including among children, its health minister announced on Monday.

"Unfortunately, government labs showed genetic mutations in the COVID-19 strain, detecting the new fast-spreading strain in Iraq," Hassan al-Tamimi told reporters.

He referred to the strain as the one "which spread in the UK," and said it had been detected in some Iraqi children, but did not give a total number of people who had been diagnosed with the new variant.

It emerged in southern England in December and is thought to be more contagious than earlier forms.

Iraq has been among the countries hardest-hit by coronavirus in the Middle East, with more than 640,000 reported cases and over 13,000 deaths.

After peaking in September at around 5,000 new cases per day, Iraq saw a remarkable drop with around 800 new cases a day in December but the numbers have been on the rise since then.

On Monday, Iraq announced more than 2,700 cases confirmed cases, a record since the start of the year.

The daily deaths have remained relatively low, with only six confirmed deaths on Mondaycompared to a peak in September of around 70 deaths per day.

The rise in cases prompted authorities to re-impose a series of measures to tackle the virus until March 8.

Masks will be obligatory in public places, with a fine of 25,000 Iraqi dinar ($17) for any violators.

From Thursday an overnight curfew will be in place from 8:00 pm until 5:00 am while Iraqis will be subjected to full lockdowns on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.

The measures will still be in place during Pope Francis' historic visit from March 5-8, which will include trips to Baghdad, the city of Mosul in the north and a meeting with the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani.

Iraqi officials told AFP on Monday they were still proceeding with the visit as planned.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 AFP


Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico could make one major policy change that would have a profound, immediate effect on national policy. It would be far more effective than a lawsuit winding through the courts and awaiting a sympathetic judge's ruling. The state governments should institute a policy, initially by executive order, then endorsed and reinforced by legislative action, that anyone who crosses the border from Mexico must be hustled onto a bus that, when full, is driven directly to Washington, D.C., emptied, and returned to the border for more passengers.*

We've seen that, for our federal political class, what stays distant from D.C. (such as riots, vandalism, violence, and hordes of drug-addled homeless occupying a city) is not a big deal. Instead, we're told the societal breakdown we see is mostly peaceful, normal expressions of "protest." But bring an "insurrection" close to the home of our elected leaders, and all hell breaks loose.

During the January 6 breach of the Capitol, nobody burned the building, trashed its contents, or stole the art off the walls, but our public flower children of politics got spooked, and now we have an armed military and razor wire guarding them. Moreover, these protections are apparently there to stay until the cows come home, optics be damned.

Imagine our senators' and House members' chagrin if, after a day of mindlessly undoing every accomplishment Trump achieved, as much to spite him as for policy reasons, they had to wade through teeming hordes of Guatemalan and Honduran refugee families whenever they left their sacrosanct lair. These people are penniless, uneducated, homeless, and carrying who knows what diseases, most likely along with plenty of COVID.

Our sheltered politicians would have to deal with the mess, just as the rest of us do. They would be the ones stepping around the piles of feces and crossing the street to avoid the tweaking, scary addicts. They would see rats run from one rank pile of garbage to the next. They, not ordinary people, would fear for their lives as the desperate got violent.

With this introduction to the real world, they might think twice about allowing the cartels to move massive amounts of Chinese oxycontin into our country. They might think twice about releasing the refugee hordes.

They might actually be forced to think about the consequences of their actions in real time rather than theoretically  just as they had to think about what it felt like to be invaded by a mob, a behavior that met with Democrats' approval throughout 2020. When the mob came near them, they certainly acted quickly to ensure that it never happened again. They even overreacted by the looks of it.

The benefit to Texas would be immediate. Instead of becoming responsible for housing and health care for the refugees that Biden et al. let in, they'd get to offload that responsibility right where it belongs: onto the people who invited the situation.

What type of policy shift would happen? Start with ICE. Congresspeople would need them, desperately, as crime rises. It's nice to say, in theory, that having a gang tattoo of MS13 on your forehead doesn't make you a gang member. But faced with a machete-wielding, tatted up thug or two, they might re-evaluate. Likewise, they might think, theoretically, that coddling addicts and housing the "unhoused" is the thing to do, but give them thousands of each, and how will they act? Is it not right that the people who make the rules for the rest of us get to reap the harvest of their misguided efforts?

Then they'd have to reconsider the wall. Wouldn't that be something?

_______________________

*Whether the states have the authority to do this is another question. If they don't, they should. Gov. Gavin Newsom would never dream of doing this, which is why California is excluded from this post.

Image: Unmasked illegal aliens heading for the USA. YouTube screen grab.
For over 50 years, constitutional scholars, and Supreme Court justices in particular, have used penumbral reasoning as one means to explain rulings expanding the Constitution of the United States. Law schools describe it as reasoning by interpolation. To put that in graphic terms, if youre drawing a graph on paper, reasoning by interpolation allows you to extend the line off of the paper. Im not a constitutional scholar, but I dont think thats necessary to see that this can lead to a very dark place.

In legal terms, when a justice says theyre using penumbral reasoning, theyre admitting that the next thing they say is not actually written in the Constitution. Theyre using it as an interpretive instrument to claim that if the Founders were alive today, They would put what Im about to rule in the Constitution.

Penumbras have been debated in legal papers for many years. But in 1965, Justice William O. Douglas used penumbral reasoning in the majority opinion of Griswold v. Connecticut to declare that a right to privacy exists in the Constitution -- even though its not written anywhere. He then used this newly discovered right to find that a ban on contraceptives was therefore unconstitutional. A right to privacy seems like a logical inclusion in the constitution. But rather than five justices declaring it a right, why didnt we add it to the Constitution with an amendment? It couldnt have been that difficult to get  of the population to agree that they wanted privacy. With an amendment, we could have avoided all the resulting controversy.

Instead, justices have been exploring the limits of penumbral logic ever since. Thats how they discovered that a right to abortion is included in the Constitution. Theyve become the test pilots, taking us for a ride while they push the envelope -- only we dont get a parachute.

To understand it better, lets take a look at what a penumbra is. The dictionary definition of a penumbra is the lighter area around the edge of a shadow. When a legal scholar uses it, theyre saying that they see something emanating from the shadows of the Constitution -- its there, even though its not written. Its a natural outgrowth of, or inherent in, something that is written. Heres the way I understand it: If you have a few drinks, squint your eyes, and look sideways, you can kinda sorta imagine what the Founders would write, even though they didnt write it. Its perfectly straightforward. The justices are saying that they can read the minds of political giants that have been dead for hundreds of years. How humble of them.

The Supreme Court decided that the Supreme Court can declare that the Constitution means something it doesnt say -- without concurrence of the citizenry. Isnt that a bit like a king granting himself unlimited power over the serfs, and then saying its legal because the king gave himself the authority to write the rules? What could possibly go wrong?

Maybe we can understand what could go wrong by looking at the application of penumbral reasoning to other legal venues. How do you think a penumbral argument would go in a civil case? Let me illustrate: You hire a builder to construct a new home for your family. You enter into a contract with the builder to construct a single-family dwelling with three bedrooms. But, by the time the home is completed, youve added another baby to the family. You inform the builder that hes in breach of the contract because you now need a four-bedroom home. You file a lawsuit. In court, you argue that the contract should have evolved with changing circumstances. The requirement for a four-bedroom home was always there -- as a penumbra, emanating from the requirement for a single-family dwelling. How do you think this lawsuit will turn out?

Penumbral reasoning is absurd for contract law, and its also absurd for constitutional law. If the words dont have concrete meanings, the documents they are written on become meaningless. Just because an argument originated with a scholar doesnt make it any less asinine. It just proves that Ivy League credentials do not bestow wisdom.

Lets look at what this type of interpretation has led to. It started innocuously enough. The justices used it to grant us a constitutional right to privacy. That doesnt seem like a bad thing. Who could argue with that? However, it did put us on the proverbial slippery slope. Now that the Supreme Court has granted itself the authority to read between the lines of the Constitution, theyve started finding other stuff. Now theyve discovered that we have a constitutional right to contraception, abortion, and same-sex marriage. Im not arguing that any of these things are good or bad. Im saying that they should have been debated by the citizenry, not nine Supreme Court justices.

What about the argument that the Constitution needs to evolve with the changing needs of our society? Of course, it does. But the use of penumbral arguments is an arrogation of power from the people to robed overlords. Its also a lazy mans method of achieving constitutional changes without selling them to his fellow citizens.

The correct way to evolve the Constitution is through the amendment process. Yes, its difficult and time consuming -- and thats a feature, not a bug. By requiring broad buy-in, public debate is driven and consensus is achieved -- or not. With consensus, future controversy is minimized.

Is it possible that Roe v. Wade was not an example of the Constitution evolving with society, but rather of the Supreme Court dragging society towards their worldview? How different would our debates about abortion be if  of the citizenry had agreed on the legality of the practice in 1973? If you answer, But we would have never gotten it passed, then youve just made my point.

John Green is a political refugee from Minnesota, now residing in Star, Idaho. He is a retired engineer with over 40 years of experience in the areas of product development, quality assurance, organizational development, and corporate strategic planning. He can be reached at greenjeg@gmail.com.

Image: Supreme Court of the United States
New Delhi:

A series of Nokia-branded android smartphones are making their presence felt in Indian market as promised by HMD Global. The company has already launched the Nokia 3, Nokia 5 and Nokia 6 smartphones along with the 2017 Nokia 3310 edition.

As per the rumors, yet another model is set to make its entry. In the latest leak, a sketch of what is believed to be the Nokia 2 smartphone has appeared online.

The sketch in question, shows off the purported Nokia 2 alongside the existing Nokia 3 smartphone in a leak made by China's Baidu website. According to the image, Nokia 2 will be slightly smaller than the Nokia 3 and feature curved corners for a better grip.

Read more: Nokia 8 leaks out in silver variant; likely to launch on July 31

Nokia 2 is also speculated to be HMD Globals most affordable Android-powered smartphone, as per the reports. With no fingerprint sensor shown in the sketch this speculation might be considered true.

It is expected that device will be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 SoC with four ARM Cortex-A7 CPU cores clocked at up to 1.1GHz and Adreno 304 for graphics.

Meanwhile, the company is expected to unveil three more smartphones by the end of this year including the widely rumored Nokia 8 and Nokia 9.
Dustin York

Since Jeff Bezos's Feb. 2 announcement that hell be stepping down as CEO of Amazon and transitioning to the role of executive chair, media commentators have been split in their assessments of him, with some calling him the best CEO ever and others calling him a managerial Mephistopheles.

While admirers and critics both have plenty to praise and condemn him about, there is one undeniable truth: just about no one else in history has had as big an overall impact on business as hes had.

Big doesnt mean good or bad per se; it just means big. Like it or not, for better or worse, Jeff Bezos really did change the world. And theres no reason to think hes anywhere close to being done.

The Magnitude of Amazons Reach

Its hard to overstate Amazons sheer size and scope. Its the second largest employer in the U.S. and the third most valuable U.S. company. 82 percent of American households subscribe to Amazon Prime (a staggering number thats almost hard to believe), and nearly 50 percent of the e-commerce market belongs to Amazon, meaning that basically one out of every two products sold online are sold through the company. What's more, its online store is not even its most profitable division. That distinction goes to AWS, its cloud computing and web hosting service.

Notwithstanding some of the criticisms against him, Amazon under Bezos's leadership undoubtedly did some good things. One of them was raising its minimum pay rate to $15 an hour. It also not only urged competitors to follow suit, but has been supporting the legislative push, via the Raise the Wage Act, to increase the national minimum wage to $15 an hour as well. These are not just empty gestures. As the National Employment Law Project (NELP) has pointed out, such actions can have a significant impact given the scope of Amazons size and reach.

The Road Ahead for Amazon

Any major move such as a CEO stepping down from a company as big as Amazon is understandably going to cause some concern, and the timing of Bezos's announcement is admittedly a bigger deal now than it would have been a few years ago, largely because competitors like Target and Walmart have been amping up their efforts to fight back. Still, theres plenty to feel reassured about.

Andy Jassy, who will take over as the new CEO, is a devoted follower of the 14 leadership principles that Bezos established, and it is these principles that are arguably the main keys to Amazons success. Jassy is also the driving force of AWS which, in addition to being the companys real cash cow, is stronger than ever. We should also remember that as executive chairman, Jeff Bezos will still be providing vision and making some decisions. Hes just stepping away from the day-to-day operations.

Then theres the companys foray, fueled by the COVID-19 pandemic, into the healthcare industry via Amazon Care and Amazon Pharmacy. Bezos was never meant to lead the charge for Amazon Health anyway, and theres no reason to think the company wont be successful in this area.

On the other hand, there will be some bumps ahead for Amazon which, quite likely, may have played a part in the timing of Bezos's decision to hand over the reins to Jassy. The U.S. House Judiciary Committee has been paying no small amount of attention to Amazon and is likely to step up its antitrust case against the company. I doubt Jeff Bezos will miss having to attend any more antitrust committee hearings anytime soon. Fortunately for him, that responsibility will now fall to Jassy.

The Road Ahead for Jeff Bezos

So what will Jeff Bezos do with his newfound time? Well, for starters Bezos himself has indicated that hell be devoting more attention to his spaceflight company, Blue Origin. The Washington Post, which he owns, might be another project hell spend more time on. Beyond that, its still anyones speculation at this point.

Its possible he may get more involved in philanthropic work and tackle the big problems of the world. Though he was one of the largest charitable donors in 2020, Bezos isnt yet known for his philanthropic work the way someone like Bill Gates is, for instance. But even Gates didnt focus on philanthropy until stepping down as Microsofts CEO back in 2000 (and his numerous other step-downs since then). With his level of drive, resources, and innovation, if Jeff Bezos wanted to he could go from being the most impactful businessman ever to being the most impactful citizen ever. But is that what hell choose to do? We can only wait and see.

***

Dr. Dustin York is an associate professor of communication at Maryville University.

President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump on stage after speaking to supporters at Joint Base Andrews before boarding Air Force One for his last time as President in Joint Base Andrews, Md., on Jan. 20, 2021. (Pete Marovich/Pool/Getty Images)

A Quieter, More Focused Donald Trump Will Defeat the Never Trumpers

Commentary

The battle lines were drawn within a couple of hours following the acquittal of former President Trump in his second impeachment case, between Trump and his followers and the recently returned ghost of the Never Trump movement.

The ex-presidents Republican enemies are pale and malnourished after four years skulking in the cave of Republican loyalism while counting the days until they could assault the Great Interloper. Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell finally threw down the mask and he clearly thinks that he covered off the loyalty requirement by voting to acquit but established his credentials as a Never Trumper by the obiter dicta in his remarks in the Senate on Saturday.

He effectively invited the Democrats to indict the ex-president in the criminal courts of Washington and devised the fatuous notion that Trumps entire post-electoral challenge of the integrity of the result was an incitement to violence against the U.S. government. These issues have been aired and none of it remotely meets the legal criteria for conviction on a charge of incitement to violence.

McConnell, a former prosecutor, is well aware of that. Like Speaker Pelosi, he exudes the air of someone suffering from lese majeste because of the assault on the Capitol. The building is much admired but the Congress is despised by 85 percent of the public. Trump isnt the source of this problem, McConnell and Democratic Senate leader Schumer and Pelosi are.

The real problem is that the Never Trumpers know that there are real questions about the Electoral College results in several of the swing states. But they are delighted that Trump was defeated yet are trying to hang onto the popularity that the Republican Party gained having Trump as its leader.

McConnell is alleged to be furious that he was ejected as majority leader because two Democrats won the Georgia Senate runoff in January. Trump apparently feels that since much of the congressional Republican leadership came snorting out of the undergrowth after the election expressing their delight at the prospect of life without Trump, the departing president had no obligation to help preserve McConnells preferments as majority leader.

Tweedle Dum, Tweedle Dee

It is quite possible that Trump thought that if the Republicans retained control of the Senate, the Biden administration would have an excuse for not enacting the radical-left Sanders-Ocasio program. He may have reasoned that it was preferable for the country to learn what implementation of the so-called Biden-Sanders Unity program would mean, including the Full Monty of the Green New Deal, quasi-open borders, drastic tax increases, truckling to the teachers unions over school openings, and official subservience to what amounts to white-hating anti-American historical revisionism, as well as the foreign flourishes of abject appeasement of Iran, the Palestinians, and possibly even China.

McConnell and Trump were able to agree on taxes, the confirmation of judges, and a united resistance to the initial (nonsensical) impeachment effort. But McConnell sat on his hands for the first six months of Trumps administration waiting to see whether he would be impeached or not. He gave no support whatever on healthcare and was complicit in making the Republican senators appear hypocrites in having voted many times to repeal Obamacare when they knew that their vote would be vetoed by President Obama, but stumbling on their faces when they knew that repeal would be approved by Trump.

McConnell has come out of the closet: he regards Trump as a dreadful aberration and now that the voters have apparently defeated him, the Republicans should go back to the comfortable Tweedledum to the Democratic Tweedledee in which McConnell and his cronies wallowed comfortably throughout the post-Reagan, McRomBush years.

Trumps Party

President Trumps statement immediately after the Senate verdict made it clear that he does not intend to relinquish control of the Republican Party and all polls indicate that the overwhelming majority of Republicans are Trump supporters. The only conceivable people who would now have any support if they ran for the Republican presidential nomination are themselves Trump supporters, especially Floridas governor Ron DeSantis, Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, and Texas Governor Greg Abbott.

The legitimacy of Bidens election victory remains a real question, despite superhuman attempts to suppress the question. A change of only 50,000 votes properly distributed between Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, would flip the election and it is very difficult to make the case that there is no chance that that happened.

The principal reason that Trump lost the popular vote apparently was that the electorate simply was exhausted by hima human tornado by day and a non-stop tweeter by night, constantly in the face of the entire country. He had a record that would normally easily have gained him reelection, but a public personality that he thought it was necessary to maintain to keep his followers behind him but that offended the narrow majority of Americans who require more dignity from their president.

In these circumstances, the ex-presidents quietism becomes him. If the new administration continues to open up fissures between its far left and traditional Democratic followers and leaves the Trump Republican movement with almost the complete support of gun-owners, religious practitioners, small businessmen, farmers, unabashed believers in the traditional virtues of America, and all those concerned about personal safety and law enforcement, Trump will gain steadily in the polls coming up to the midterm elections next year. He will have to be heard from often enough to remind his followers of his strong points but not so frequently that it refreshes the irritation that many millions felt at his constant combative presence as president.

If the Biden administration moves back from the left and is generally competent, the Trump phenomenon will decline. If it stumbles and is seen as ineffectual and to the left of the country, Trumps strength will grow steadily without his having to do much to reinforce it.

Of the seven senators who voted to convict Trump, Cassidy, Collins, McConnell, and Sasse were just reelected, Romney has four years to the end of his term, so they are safe enough. But Murkowski could have problems in her primary next year, along with Liz Cheney in the House. (Sen. Toomey is retiring next year.)

Trump has pledged that he will soldier on to remake the Republican Party along the lines that are now familiar. The Trump-haters that remain within that party are dependent upon President Biden to make their political lives safe for them. A quieter, wiser, and more focused Donald Trump is infinitely stronger than his Republican opponents who spent the last four years either in hiding and scheming, or in tedious public agonies like Senator Sasse, about why they are still in the Republican Party.

Since Trump has by far the greatest following of anyone in American politics today and is in robust health, the serene predictions of his evaporation should not receive much credence. That is more likely to be the fate of the theorys authors.

Conrad Black has been one of Canadas most prominent financiers for 40 years, and was one of the leading newspaper publishers in the world. Hes the author of authoritative biographies of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Richard Nixon, and, most recently, Donald J. Trump: A President Like No Other, which has been republished in updated form.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
MANZINI  While government has faced serious backlash from nurses and the public for the lack of certain critical drugs, an undisclosed stock of drugs was destroyed at the National Tubercolosis (TB) Hospital.

On Tuesday, the Ministry of Health was said to have disposed of an undisclosed amount of medication suspected to have expired. The medication was said to have been collected from the Mavuso Quarantine Facility, through the use of an ambulance.

According to impeccable sources, the medication was loaded into the ambulance in the presence of a senior official from the TB Hospital.

The official was said to have added more stock of medication from the TB Hospital to that which was destroyed in an incinerator. The said official supposedly led the destroying of the medication.

Reckless

In light of this, the Swaziland Democratic Nurses Union (SWADNU) said it was reckless of government to have stock in abundance which in turn expired.

President of the nurses union Bheki Mamba said the expiry of medication required heads to roll as there was lack of accountability from some of the people responsible for the procurement.

The nurses union leader said the biggest challenge was the management as this depicted inefficiency in the management of drugs. He said this must be accounted for as it did not make sense as the citizenry was offered prescription letters instead of drugs in hospitals, such that they (nurses) ended up approaching the courts about it.

He said: The medication disposed could be worth millions basing it on the value of what happened in the past when it was disposed of in one of the incinerators in the countrys largest companies. Worth noting is that the shortage of medication is well-documented in the country as on different occasions nurses would engage in industrial action expressing frustration over same.

Medication

However, to this allegation, the Director of Health Services, Dr Vusi Magagula, said medication that was disposed of was expired drugs. He said there were a number of reasons why this happened.

Among the reasons, Dr Magagula said it was because some medication was ordered due to the demand at the time, only to find that it later subsided while their shelf life shortened.

We project how much medication we may need and then it depends on whether people would get sick to that number projected. Also, there are drugs that are donated to the country, and when they expire, there is nothing you can do with them.

He said medication that was likely to expire included that for treating TB and ailments that had a variety of combinations when being treated. Dr Magagula said due to the variety of the combination, it was likely at times that there were extra drugs which may then expire.

When asked if antiretroviral drugs were part of the list of expired drugs, he said: It is likely, but what you should know is that those are highly monitored as most were donated to the country.

He said those that were bought by government were also monitored and it did happen that some would expire, but it was a very rare occurrence.

I cant say it does not happen as that would be a lie; it happens but at a low scale.

Making an example, Dr Magagula said, government had to destroy medication for H1N1, which was ordered in anticipation that the country could have infections of the virus.

According to the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2009, a novel influenza A (H1N1) virus emerged. It was detected first in the United States and the virus contained a unique combination of influenza genes not previously identified in animals or people. Additionally, CDC estimated that between 151 700 and 575 400 people worldwide died from an (H1N1) pdm09 virus infection during the first year the virus circulated. However, there were no infections locally and government had to destroy that medication. He said should it have happened that the medication was not ordered and the H1N1 made it into the country, it would have been disastrous. It was for this reason, he said, that medication had to be ordered and readily available for diseases.

Monitored

He said this was something known but needed to be monitored to make sure that it was not a substantial amount that expired. Dr Magagula said it was better when the medication that expired was within acceptable limits. When the director of health services was questioned on how much was the loss incurred by the ministry due to the expiration of medication, he said: I dont want to answer that as it may give a distorted account. It might come across that there is a shortage of medication in the country because it expires and is disposed of.

He admitted that where there was suspicion of negligence, the ministry investigated the issue and subsequent action was taken after the outcome. When ordering the medication, he said, it was a process that entailed a number of things, which included that the shelf life should exceed two years.







(Natural News) A new poll by AEI and YouGov has found that the vast majority of conservatives who support President Donald Trump are fully aware of the fact that White people are hated in the United States.

A whopping 87 percent of respondents agreed with the statement: I worry that discrimination against Whites will increase a lot in the next few years.

Conversely, 80 percent rejected the notion that White people have an advantage in todays America because of their skin color, apparently recognizing that non-Whites are now actively discriminated against due to the color of their skin.

Conducted between Jan. 11-14, just before China Joe was installed into the White House, the poll offers a dire take on the state of American morale, particularly among conservatives who see the America they once knew and loved swirl down the toilet.

Christianity is under attack in America today is a statement that 89 percent of Trump supporters agree with, while nearly the same percentage agree that Christianity is an essential part of American greatness.

Consequently, America will fail if it loses its Christian heritage, which is now happening at breakneck speed.

More than three-quarters of Trump supporters feel stifled and unable to express their political views in public, even as people with other political views are free to express theirs.

Nearly all Trump supporters say that ethnic minorities, which are quickly becoming majorities, have a mostly fair chance to succeed in todays America. Only about 30 percent believe that America is riddled with systemic racism  and they probably mean systemic racism against Whites.

Without Trump, the Republican Party is dead forever

An overwhelming 96 percent of those polled say that immigration levels need to be reduced, or at least stay the same. About 62 percent also want all 11 million illegal aliens to be deported and sent back to their home countries.

All employers should be required by the federal government to certify that their employees are either legal citizens or residents, indicated 89 percent of poll respondents. Only 3 percent said this should not be a requirement.

Even with Trump not visibly in the White House, 86 percent of his supporters still want a border wall built on Americas southern border. This may never happen under establishment Republican control, though, which is why 66 percent say they support Trump but not necessarily the Republican Party.

Less than half of all Trump supporters believe the Republican Party is headed in the right direction, while more than half are either unsure or think it is on the wrong track.

Less than one in four Trump supporters identifies as someone who supports the Republican Party, revealing a chasm between the populist choice on the Republican ticket in 2016 and 2020, and the establishment Republican Party that almost nobody likes anymore.

In summation, these poll results sound a death knell for the Republican Party. Without Trump, there is nowhere for the Republican Party to go but down, down, and further down  unless, of course, some fresh blood enters the ring to stand for We the People rather than the billionaires and big corporations.

I experienced wrongful firing and lying about my work history, wrote one Information Liberation commenter. No lawyer would take my case. One lawyer finally said: Youre a white male; theres no money in it for me. That was 1995.

Drove a black guy to take the exam for a U.S. Postal Service job, wrote another.

Took the test myself on a lark. I knew for sure I scored 100%. The test was really easy and I told the black women who issued the exam that I got em all right, when do I start. After grading the test and concluding I did indeed score 100% she informed me that this is the Post Office; we dont hire white people. That was in 1987.

For more related news, be sure to check out Trump.news.

Sources for this article include:

InformationLiberation.com

NaturalNews.com
's ( ) Peter Wall talks to Proactive London's Katie Pilbeam about the recent news that the company has entered into a non-binding letter of intent (LOI) with DPN LLC setting out terms to acquire 320 acres of land in West Texas, US.

The plan is to build a new 200-megawatt cryptocurrency mining facility in the next 12 months to take advantage of some of the lowest rates in the world with the majority coming from renewable sources.

Wall gives his opinion on Bitcoin after the cryptocurrency hit record highs after Tesla's Elon Musk's car company bought $1.5bn worth.
On Monday, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal called the arrest of climate activist Disha Ravi in the toolkit document case an unprecedented attack on democracy" and rightly so.



Arrest of 21 yr old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime," Kejriwal tweeted.

Arrest of 21 yr old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime.  Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) February 15, 2021

The 21-year-old activist was arrested on Saturday from her home in North Bengaluru for being allegedly involved in sharing the "toolkit" related to the farmer's protest on social media.

She is the first person to be arrested in the case and has been charged with sedition and conspiracy, as per the reports.

Ravi is a graduate of Bachelor of Business Administration from Mount Carmel College, one of Bengaluru's top women's colleges. The toolkit has been cited by some critics as a "proof" of her conspiracy to fuel protests in India.

In fact, several political leaders, celebs and common people slammed Delhi Police for arresting the climate activist and termed her arrest as "unwarranted harassment, unfortunate and shocking".

Congress leader P Chidambaram said, "The Indian state must be standing on very shaky foundations if Disha Ravi, a 22-year-old student of Mount Carmel College and a climate activist, has become a threat to the nation."

The Indian state must be standing on very shaky foundations if Disha Ravi, a 22 year old student of Mount Carmel college and a climate activist, has become a threat to the nation  P. Chidambaram (@PChidambaram_IN) February 14, 2021

Chidambaram also said, A tool kit to support the farmers protest is more dangerous than the intrusion by Chinese troops into Indian territory! India is becoming the theatre of the absurd and it is sad that the Delhi Police has become a tool of the oppressors.

A took kit to support the farmers protest is more dangerous than the intrusion by Chinese troops into Indian territory!



India is becoming the theatre of the absurd and it is sad that the Delhi Police has become a tool of the oppressors  P. Chidambaram (@PChidambaram_IN) February 14, 2021

Actor Swara Bhasker also took to Twitter to condemn this. She wrote, Shame on us!

According to the Delhi Police officials, Disha is a key conspirator in the "toolkit" case as she had admitted during the initial interrogation to editing, adding some things in the "toolkit" and spreading it further.
Mardi Gras Day activities in Mobile and beyond on Tuesday will be risky and could create unnecessary tragedy in the waning months of the coronavirus pandemic, two authors of eye-popping research on last years Mardi Gras in New Orleans said.

The study released last week, showed how the virus infected 50,000 people in Louisiana sparked by last years Carnival celebration. The analysis pinpoints the super spreader event to one possible carrier, likely traveling from Texas, who brought the virus to New Orleans about two weeks before Fat Tuesday on February 25.

While the study only looks at New Orleans, an early hot spot during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic last spring, the authors have concerns about Mardi Gras events leading to an uptick after Fat Tuesday. Though the formal balls and parades have been canceled in Mobile, unsanctioned street parties and impromptu parades have occurred in the lead-up to Fat Tuesday. And on Tuesday, the city is closing off the city streets so revelers can be socially distanced while they party. Face coverings are encouraged.

Gathering in large crowds continues to be pose a risk, especially in combination with eating and drinking, as you have to take off your mask, said Mark Zeller, study author and a researcher at Scripps Research Institute. The institute, along with Tulane University, LSU Health Shreveport and several other institutions partnered in the 26-page study that was first reported by the Times-Picayune/New Orleans Advocate.

It also very difficult to socially distance in such setting, Zeller said.

Jeremy Kamil, also a study author, said the propensity for people to let their guard down this year could carry deadly consequences. He said hes especially concerned about the arrival of the new COVID-19 variant - B.1.1.7, commonly called the UK variant  which is more contagious than others, and possibly more lethal. The first infections of the variant were discovered in Alabama about 10 days ago.

That virus is having a Mardi Gras, said Kamil, a professor of microbiology and immunology at LSU Health Shreveport who helped coordinate sequencing of coronavirus test samples. Its celebrating. You dont want to be part of celebrating with it.

Kamil added, My message is if you want Mardi Gras for people, wait a year.

The warnings from the two comes in the aftermath of repeated warnings from public health officials in the weeks leading to the final weekend of Mardi Gras. Dr. Bernard Eichold, the health officer of Mobile County, has said that if people feel uncomfortable during Mobiles Mardi Gras festivities, they should leave. State Health Officer Dr. Scott Harris, last week, said he hoped people will do the right thing in protecting themselves and others during Mardi Gras, noting that there was nothing magic in preventing the spread of the deadly virus whether its a parade or a gathering on the city streets.

Mobile, like New Orleans and elsewhere on the Gulf Coast, canceled all parades this year. But unlike New Orleans, Mobile is closing off city streets to allow revelers to have space to party during Fat Tuesday. In New Orleans, Mayor LaToya Cantrell ordered all restaurants and bars in the French Quarter closed after social media images were posted last weekend showing large gatherings of mostly younger revelers on Bourbon Street and surrounding areas.

Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson has said that the street closures are to allow restaurants and bars to expand food and drink options for more social distancing. Stimpson has also said that unlike New Orleans, the city does not have the ability to close down restaurants and bars.

Police are also going to be stationed at intersections throughout the closed off area and will be handing out face masks and shields, according to a city spokeswoman. The city also plans to stop any impromptu parades that might occur, similar to what they did on Sunday by shutting down an unsanctioned street party that occurred in the Oakleigh Garden District.

Police barricades are set up on Bourbon Street ahead of closure in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Friday, Feb. 12, 2021. New Orleans' annual pre-Lenten Mardi Gras celebration is muted this year because of the coronavirus pandemic. Parades canceled. Bars closed. Crowds suppressed. Mardi Gras joy is muted this year in New Orleans as authorities seek to stifle the coronavirus's spread. And it's a blow to the tradition-bound city's party-loving soul. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)AP

Kamil said he felt that Cantrells actions to shut down the bars and restaurants represented doing the right thing even if wasnt the most popular decision.

I think the message over and over again that weve been seeing in this pandemic is you want to look like youre overreacting in the rear-view mirror, he said. If you dont, it looks like youre under reacting. If you let (Mardi Gras) rip, you wind up with a lot of dead people who dont need to be dead. Its not just people in their retirement homes. Its people in their 30s.

Related: Mobile mayor: City wont tolerate unsanctioned Mardi Gras marches

Kamil said comments on social media and beyond, from people suggesting that Mardi Gras revelers should be allowed to have fun without impediments, ignore the deadly realities of the asymptomatic spread of the virus that has underscored the massive infection numbers during the pandemic. More than 480,000 Alabama residents have been infected with the virus since March, and over 9,200 have died from it.

The young and healthy people are like, it wont make me sick, said Kamil. Even if it aint their grandma, they are contributing the spread of this thing and it will make people sick. It could be five people or hundreds of people.

He added, You see these stories of some guy who is like, let them have their fun and then he ends up dead. People just dont think it will happen to them until they get incubated  that one guy who says he thought it was scam and then his blood oxygen goes down to 70 percent and cant talk anymore. Its a tragedy. Its not a conspiracy. Its a real pandemic.

Kamil is confident that the pandemic is concluding in the coming months. Mardi Gras in 2022, he said, is happening in a similar way people are used to celebrating it before the coronavirus pandemic erupted.

Just get the vaccine, he said. The vaccines are basically 100 percent effective from protecting you from death. Wait for it and then celebrate afterward. There is light at the end of the tunnel, and we will get there.

This story was updated at 2:45 p.m. on February 15, 2021, to include an updated statement and information from the city of Mobile.

More Mobile Mardi Gras content:

Black Mardi Gras society raising COVID-19 vaccine awareness during Mobile festivities

Its a sad, sad day: Joe Cain Day traditions continue in Mobile during pandemic

When Mardi Gras was last canceled: World War II and the return of frivolity in 1946

Mardi Gras: Its not just about parades and balls. Its the heart of the city

Mobile mayor: City not like New Orleans, bars to remain open on Mardi Gras Day

The Government will have "more options" for reopening society once people over the age of 70 have received their Covid-19 vaccines, the head of the health service has said.

Paul Reid said the over-70s should be fully vaccinated by mid-May and that the next priority groups should start receiving their first coronavirus jabs in April and May.

Monday saw the rollout of the national vaccination programme for people aged 85 and over officially get under way across the country.

The jabs will be administered at local GP practices and at 37 vaccination centres over the next three weeks.

Stocks of vaccine were delivered to about 84 GP practices today, according to the Irish College of General Practitioners (ICGP).

The majority of GPs are expected to start vaccinating patients from tomorrow onwards.

The HSE has said some 13,500 people over the age of 85 are due to receive their first dose of either the Pfizer BioNTech or Moderna vaccine by the end of the week.

All those over 70 are scheduled to have received their first dose by mid-April and their second dose by mid-May.

It comes as the vaccination programme continues among care homes and frontline healthcare workers.

On Sunday about 5,000 GPs and practice nurses received the jab at vaccination centres across the country.

A 'very important' week

HSE chief executive Mr Reid told Newstalk it is a very important week for the rollout of the programme, with a "significant" extra delivery of the vaccines allowing greater numbers of healthcare workers be vaccinated.

In total, more than 80,000 doses are due to be administered this week, including staff and residents in long-term care facilities and frontline health workers.

Mr Reid said once residents of long-term care facilities, healthcare workers and people over the age of 70 are fully vaccinated, the landscape will start to change.

"It gives Government more options because at that stage we'll be protecting the most vulnerable," he said.

"The people who we know have suffered the most in terms of mortality."

Mr Reid said the three main suppliers of vaccines have committed to supplying about 1.24 million doses by the end of March.

"That's largely a function of some improvement from the AstraZeneca delivery," he said.

"That starts to address the cohort one - around 92,000 people in long-term care facilities, residents and staff; frontline healthcare workers - there's about 175,000; and then there's almost half a million people in the 70-plus age cohort. It starts to address all of those.

"After that, the next cohort would be healthcare workers not in direct patient contact, and then 65 to 69-year-olds with vulnerable conditions."

The vaccination of healthcare workers not in direct patient contact and those aged between 65 and 69 years is scheduled to get under way in April and May.

Dr Nuala O'Connor, the ICGP's clinical lead on Covid-19, described the rollout of the vaccine for the over-85s as a "historic moment".

"GPs look forward to vaccinating this cohort of patients, who are particularly vulnerable to Covid-19," she said.

"This is a major exercise in vaccine delivery but we are very confident general practice can deliver safely and effectively."

Patients are urged to wait to hear from their GP for their appointment time.

New vaccination centres

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly today confirmed details of 37 vaccination centres across Ireland, which will be used for the rollout of the vaccines in the community. There will be five centres in Cork; at City Hall, Pairc Ui Chaoimh, MTU Campus Melbourn Building, Bantry PCC and Mallow GAA Club.

While currently vaccines are being administered in healthcare settings and by GPs, many people in the coming weeks and months will be offered their vaccination in these centres, having registered online.

Mr Donnelly said people can expect to see these vaccination centres "ready and waiting in their county".

"We have always said the vaccination programme would only be limited by the availability and reliability of supply in these early stages of the programme," he said.

"In the coming months supply will increase substantially and we will see these centres operating to full capacity and administering vaccines to the general population, following the Government priority list."

As of Friday, a total of 265,237 vaccine doses had been administered in Ireland.

Some 175,238 have received their first dose, while almost 90,000 people are fully vaccinated.
Syracuse, NY  Longtime Syracuse lawyer Robert Baska will face a perjury charge after an appellate court ruled there was enough evidence that he conspired with a client to lie to a judge and a jury.

Baska, 62, of Kirkville, had hoped to put the 2015 episode behind him after a local judge had tossed the perjury charge last year.

Baska had restarted a law practice that had once made him the busiest lawyer on the taxpayer dime in the county. Hed filed a lawsuit against the Onondaga County District Attorneys Office for malicious prosecution.

But a Rochester appellate court on Thursday ruled there was enough proof to prosecute Baska of conspiring with his client in 2017 in a sloppy cover-up attempt. That sends his case back to felony court for a trial.

Baskas alleged wrongdoing hinges on testimony by his client, a convicted repeat felon named Jeffrey Emmons who has spent multiple stints in prison.

The local court judge, John Crandall, ruled in 2020 that there was nothing corroborating Emmons account of Baskas wrongdoing, as required by law. Thats what led Crandall to dismiss the case.

But the appellate court ruled there was, in fact, evidence backing up what Emmons and prosecutors say happened.

Emmons went to trial in 2017 accused of felony driving with a revoked license. He told his lawyer, Baska, that he was driving but that he would blame it on a friend, the indictment against Baska alleges.

Emmons did, in fact, tell a jury that his friend was driving.

But after lying to the jury, Emmons came to believe (erroneously) that the friend hed implicated was actually dead. He called Baska and said they were screwed, according to the indictment.

Baska is then accused of telling Emmons to meet with him. And the lawyer then adopted Emmons lie, prosecutors say.

In a bench discussion with a judge, Baska claimed that the friend who was driving that day had died after the fact, and wasnt available for trial. Prosecutors say Baska knew, by that point, that Emmons was making that up.

Later, Baska showed the court an obituary for a man by the same name as Emmons friend, who had died in Pennsylvania. But prosecutors had, by then, located the actual friend, who was alive and prepared to testify that Emmons was lying.

The friend never took the witness stand. Emmons was convicted of felony aggravated unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle. He was sentenced to prison.

But Onondaga County prosecutors accused Baska of conspiring with Emmons to lie under oath -- the crime of perjury.

In reinstating the charge, the appellate court said there was other evidence to back up Emmons account: cell phone records of his calls with Baska, the trial transcript of Baskas own words and testimony from others at trial.

The five-judge panel noted that most of the corroborating evidence came after Emmons lied to the jury -- the actual act of perjury. But the panel ruled that evidence of Baskas involvement could come after the fact: the cover-up, not the planning.

Thats enough corroborating evidence to sustain the perjury charge against the lawyer. So Baskas case now heads back to Syracuse, where he faces up to 1 1/3 to 4 years in prison, if convicted of perjury.

Staff writer Douglass Dowty can be reached at ddowty@syracuse.com or 315-470-6070.
A look at some of the major movers in London on Monday

( ) soared 55% to 21.25p, prompting the company to put out a statement about the share price movement.

The developer of novel immunotherapies for the treatment of cancer and infectious disease noted the recent press coverage and the share price increase and referred shareholders to its interim results statement of January 29, where it gave a full update on the COVIDITY program and the goal of starting a Phase 1 clinical trial, to determine the safety and immune responses to the vaccine, as soon as possible during 2021.

READ Scancell Hlds  Interim Results

Subject to the result of the Phase 1 clinical trial future studies would be undertaken to establish efficacy, Scancell told shareholders.

UK company Scancell developing vaccine to fight COVID-19 variants https://t.co/lSivwbagwg pic.twitter.com/RMXVfSgxf9  New York Post (@nypost) February 14, 2021

2.30pm: Bluejay Mining flying high after provisional funding offer for the Dundas Ilmenite Project

Bluejay Mining PLC ( ) jumped 23% to 11.3p after its subsidiary, Dundas Titanium, received an offer of debt financing.

Dundas Titanium A/S has received a letter of interest from the Export-Import Bank of the United States for a provisional sum of around US$208mln in debt funding for the capital requirements of the Dundas Ilmenite Project.

Any potential debt financing would be eligible for a maximum repayment term of 8 years 6 months, Bluejay said.

1.35pm: Primorus slumps after quarterly update

PLC ( ) shares lost a tenth of their value at 4.05p after its quarterly investor update.

The decline meant the investment companys market capitalisation was 6.3mln, compared to the value of its cash and listed investments, which has been put at 4.8mln.

The new management said it would be abandoning regular quarterly updates as it does not feel its investments are particularly liquid and therefore subject to much volatility.

12.40pm: IDE lower after non-exec quits

Holdings PLC ( ) fell 5.3% to 1.8p after non-executive director, Sebastian White, quit with immediate effect.

The board intends to recruit a replacement non-executive director in due course.

11.45am: Mining, Minerals & Metals taking its time over its first acquisition

( ) slumped 22% to 9.5p after chairman Matthew Bonner quit the cash shell.

Another non-executive director, Andrew Monk, has also moved on but the company has added Johnny Smith, the chief executive of Sumner Group Mining, to its board.

The company has noted speculation about whether a reverse takeover transaction is being progressed and revealed there is not currently any specific acquisition in progress.

10.50am: Ebiquity on the comeback trail

( ) climbed 9.1% to 20.9p after it said it returned to profitability in the second half of last year.

The marketing and media consultancy said it still expects to make a full-year operating loss, albeit a modest one.

The group's net debt of 7.7mln at the end of 2020 was in line with expectations.

9.55am: MGC Pharmaceuticals expands its brain cancer research programme

MGC Pharmaceuticals Limited ( ) was 15% higher at 4.45p after it announced an expansion of its Glioblastoma research programme.

Its ongoing pre-clinical research programme into the use of cannabinoids in the treatment of aggressive glioblastoma brain cancer has been expanded to explore the use of nanotechnology concerning the most effective treatment delivery systems.

The delivery system is similar to the nanoparticle delivery system being used successfully in MGC Pharmas ArtemiC clinical trial into the treatment of COVID-19.

9.00am: soars as it enlists services of entrepreneur Michael Edelson

PLC ( ), which floated at the end of 2020, soared 69% to 1.65p after it appointed Michael Edelson as a senior business adviser.

The company, which is seeking to transform the way things are done within the petroleum industry with the implementation of block-chain technology, said Edelson has helped to float more than 20 companies during his career, one of which was ASOS.

The company will be drawing upon Edelson's extensive experience and connections to help it source investment opportunities and develop business partnerships.

Oilex Limited ( ) jumped 29% to 0.1225p after it said it is close to resolving its dispute with the Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC).

Oilex and GSPC are in advanced discussions where it is proposed that Oilex will acquire GSPC's 55% participating interest in the Cambay production sharing contract.

Oilex added it is in advanced discussions with third parties to provide finance, including working capital, to Oilex should a sale be agreed.

Proactive news headlines

( ) said dosing has commenced with its inhaled interferon beta product as part of a US Government-funded phase II/III coronavirus clinical trial.

Learning Technologies Group PLC ( ) announced it has agreed to acquire learning and talent development software provider Bridge for US$50mln (36mln) using existing cash resources.

Sativa Wellness Group Inc ( ) said it has submitted its novel food application for validation to the UKs Food Standards Agency (FSA) ahead of the March 31 deadline as part of what it said is a commitment to continually deliver the highest level of regulatory compliance and product quality.

( ) told investors that it is confident its careful approach to distribution would ultimately lead to better sell-through rates as it provided an update on the progress of its rollout of CBD products on both sides of the Atlantic.

( ) said it will launch its novel payments and loyalty solution powered by Open Banking in the second quarter of 2021, which it said will provide merchants with an alternative to rising card interchange fees" and boost loyalty amongst consumers.

( ) has signed non-binding heads of terms with mass spectrometer maker Microsaic Systems to enter a multi-year framework services agreement through which DeepVerge which be appointed as a non-exclusive agent to promote the latters technologies.

Limited ( ) said its tidal turbine and generation equipment has been successfully installed in the Goto Island chain in Japan.

Group PLC ( ) has acquired the remaining 16.7% of Pax World Management LLC that it did not already own.

( ) has agreed a new offtake agreement for tin concentrate from the Uis mine in Namibia with its existing trading partner, Thailand Smelting and Refining Corporation (Thaisarco), as well as signing an inaugural offtake agreement with AfriMet Resources AG for its future tantalum production.

s ( )(USOTC: SMCDY) 100%-owned subsidiary Cornwall Resources Limited has been notified that the 'Deep Digital Cornwall' project led by the University of Exeter's Camborne School of Mines, in which Cornwall Resources and are delivery partners, has been awarded funding by the European Regional Development Fund. Strategic Minerals Redmoor exploration licence area will be used as a field laboratory for collection of geochemical and geophysical data, which will also provide information relevant to a number of new prospects.

( ) has completed an initial soil sampling programme on its Jundee East gold project in the Eastern Goldfields region of Western Australia and has now commenced ground-based gravity surveying over key target areas.

( ) told investors that the ASH-3 production well at the Abu Sennan project, in Egypt, will begin initial testing in the coming days.

Holdings PLC ( ) achieved a sixfold increase in revenue in the six months to the end of November as it continued to establish partnerships with leading pharmaceutical and biotech companies in the key areas of oncology, autoimmune diseases and infectious diseases.

APQ Global Limited ( ) noted that, as at the close of business on January 31, 2021, its unaudited book value was 36.69 US cents (26.72p) per share.

( ) announced that it has received notification to exercise warrants over a total of 10,000,000 new ordinary shares at a price of 0.15 pence per share. The exercise of the warrants will add A$27,000 of funds to Mosman's existing cash reserves.

CentralNic Group PLC ( ) notified that its preliminary unaudited results for the 2020 calendar year will be on March 1, with the audited annual report and accounts published towards the end of April.

( ) has posted a circular to shareholders in respect of its firm placing, directors' subscription and open offer to raise up to 13mln.

The Mumbai-based diversified conglomerate, Hiranandani Group, has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding in West Bengal to set up an industrial, logistics and hyper-scale data centre park in the region. The combined investment by the group and their customers is estimated to cross Rs 10,000 crore.

The group has signed an MoU with Hindustan Motors to acquire a 100-acre land at Uttarpara, Kolkata, to set up an integrated logistics and hyper-scale data centre park by Hiranandani Group companies GreenBase and Yotta respectively, the company said in a statement.

The combined investment by the group and their customers is estimated to cross Rs 10,000 crore, the company said in a statement.

GreenBase will deliver 3 million sq feet of industrial and warehousing space along with essential utilities and support infrastructure built to international standards.

Yotta, Hiranandanis hyper-scale data centre division, will see a development of 6 hyperconnected data centre buildings bringing in 250MW of cutting edge data centre capacity over the next several years to the state.

The first phase of the industrial and logistics park will be up and running by June 2022 and the first data centre building will be ready by June 2023, the company said.

Kicking off this project would not have been possible without the tremendous support of the Government of West Bengal under the leadership of chief minister Mamta Banerjee. West Bengal is the gateway to the east. It is an ideal hub for logistics and industrial development with excellent road, rail and riverine connectivity, said Darshan Hiranandani, Group CEO, Hiranandani Group.

Simultaneously, the data centre business will benefit from the digitization revolution, the upcoming Silicon Valley at New Town at Rajarhat and excellent fibre connectivity on land and the new submarine cable coming up at Tajpur. By setting up a data centre park in Kolkata, we will not only serve the customers of the state but the entire eastern region including neighbouring countries, he said.

As India aims to be a $5 trillion economy by 2025, the logistic sector has an important role to play in connecting producers with consumers.

Greenbase Industrial and Logistics Park will not just help manufacturing and warehousing units build last-mile connectivity, it will also give a huge boost to the development of the logistics sector and create employment opportunities for the region.

A notable feature of this logistics park will be its well-designed infrastructure to support best in class security and facilitate optimisation of logistics and turnaround time by enabling Artificial Intelligence (AI) in customer processes, which is the new norm post the COVID pandemic.

In 2020, Yotta inaugurated its Asias largest and Worlds second-largest Uptime Institute Tier IV certified data centre in Navi Mumbai. It most recently announced its Greater Noida data centre park and Chennai data centre park.

Greenbase has a pan India presence providing industrial, logistics and warehousing solutions to clients.

A Joint Venture (JV) of the Hiranandani Group with global private equity firm Blackstone, Greenbase is developing industrial and logistics parks across Mumbai MMR region, Pune, Nashik, Chennai and Bengaluru and has plans to deliver 15 million sqft of space across the country in the next five years, having an investment outlay of $500 million.

Yotta Infrastructure is a new-age managed data centre provider.

It should be remembered that the massive digital push initiated by the COVID-19 pandemic coupled with the current governments data localisation policy has paved the way for construction of hyper-scale data centres across the country. Additionally, work-from-home (WFH) compulsions, online education, video-based medical consultations, a huge increase in e-commerce and business-related video conferencing and webinars have also enhanced the demand for data centres.

Given shifts in the economy, one would continue to see data consumption increase manifold for the foreseeable future, real estate experts said.

A report has said that an additional 9.3 million sq ft of real estate space is expected to be developed by 2025 for the rapidly growing data centre industry at an investment of about Rs 7,700 crore.

The data centre industry is expected to add 703 MW capacity by the end of 2025, translating into an opportunity of 9.3 million sq ft of real estate development, a report by JLL had said.
Its done: The 3.45 am call to NSA Doval after Balakot was hit and Operation Bandar was competed

Pakistans Jaish-e-Mohammad planning attacks in Delhi

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: Following the arrest of a top terrorist who had made a video of National Security Advisor Ajit Doval's office, it has come to light that Pakistan-based terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad is planning a strike in Delhi, J&K police chief Dilbag Singh said.

The Jammu and Kashmir DGP also disclosed that the terrorists in Kashmir have begun procuring weapons from Bihar and are using some students from Kashmir, studying in Punjab, for smuggling these illegal arms into the Valley.

DGP Singh made these revelations in a news conference over the arrest of self-styled chief commanders Hidayatullah Malik and Zahoor Ahmad Rather, respectively of terror outfits Lashkar-e-Mustafa (LeM) and The Resistance Front (TRF).

Jaish-e-Mohammad planned attacks after conducting reconnaissance of Dovals office

Malik was arrested on February 6 by the Anantnag police from Kunjwani in Jammu district while Rather was apprehended on February 13 from Bari Brahmana area of Samba district. The UT's police chief said these two groups, LeM and TRF, are frontal organisations of Pakistan-based JeM and Lashker-e-Toiba (LeT) to give "Kashmiri name' to their terror activities.

"Malik has been leading LeM floated last August although he had been an active militant for a long time. He had worked as an overground worker and floated the group on the directions of JeM," said Singh.

Malik was also planning to set up a base in Jammu to carry forward terror activities in the region besides receiving arms and ammunition, being smuggled from Pakistan through underground tunnels on the border or being dropped by drones before being smuggled to Kashmir, he said.

Singh said JeM was involved in various terror activities in 2018 and Malik's interrogation revealed that he was also a close associate of JeM commander Ashiq Nengroo who used to receive arms consignments from Pakistan in Jammu before escaping to the neighbouring country along with his family through an underground tunnel on the international border.

The BSF has detected six underground tunnels along the IB in Jammu region over the past six months.

After escaping to Pakistan, Nengroo alias doctor had been directing terror activities in Kashmir at the behest of Pakistani agencies, said the DGP, adding that Malik visited Delhi on Nengroo's orders and forwarded him a video of the NSA's office after recceing it.

That means JeM is planning attacks on targets in Delhi as well, he said, adding that Malik's arrest is a big breakthrough for police as it has exposed the terrorist group's plan.

Malik, a resident of south Kashmir, had also set up a network to get weapons from Bihar and sourced seven pistols from there till now and got them distributed among militants, the DGP said.

"He had also roped in some students from Kashmir, studying in Punjab, and had been using them for any action in Kashmir or Jammu or transporting weapons from outside," said Singh.

In this context, the DGP also cited the example of a Kashmir-based nursing student in Chandigarh college who was arrested along with a 7kg improvised explosive device from Jammu's general bus stand area.

The DGP said Malik was also involved in the looting of Rs 60 lakh from a bank's cash van last November.

This was established after the arrest of his four accomplices, including his wife, in this crime, he added.

Terming TRF chief Rather's arrest as another "major achievement", Singh said he is a Pakistan-trained terrorist and is known by aliases "Sahil" and "Khalid" among militants.

"He was also an active overground worker before crossing into Pakistan in 2002, where he underwent arms training and returned with five foreign terrorists through Rajouri route," DGP Singh said.

"He, however, had surrendered in 2006 and remained inactive before resuming his activities in 2019," the police chief said, adding his handlers in Pakistan know his potential and that is why made him the TRF's chief.

Embassy blast: Role of Jaish-ul-Hind under scanner, but it could be a false flag

The DGP said he had set up a vast network in Kashmir and so far eight members of the group have been identified at his disclosure and some have also been arrested whose interrogation is on in Kashmir.

Being a terrorist, who had surrendered earlier helped Rather escape security agencies' suspicion, said the DGP, adding that the TRF chief was directly involved in the killing of three BJP workers in Kulgam and a policeman in Kokernag areas of south Kashmir last year.

Rather is being questioned at present and his interrogation is likely to reveal new things, the DGP said.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The Union Territory's police chief also complimented his men for three major successful operations which led to the arrest of two self-styled commanders and recovery of IED to avert a major tragedy besides attempts by Pakistan to revive Al-Badr group.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 8:34 [IST]
Queen Victoria Market is undergoing a deep clean after it was revealed a woman who later tested positive for COVID-19 visited the markets fruit and vegetable section and a female toilet.

Market chief executive Stan Liacos said stallholders and employees from about 40 businesses who were working in the affected area between 8.25am and 10.10am on Thursday had been told to get tested immediately and isolate at home for 14 days.

Stalls at Queen Victoria Market being cleaned after it was listed as an exposure site by the Department of Health. Credit:Chris Hopkins

Authorities were working to identify everyone working at the market during the exposure period and any shoppers who were there at the time are also required to get tested and isolate for 14 days, regardless of the test result.

The Department of Health listed the A and B sheds at Queen Victoria Market, and Yarra Trams route numbers 11 and 58, as exposure sites on Sunday afternoon.
MONTREAL - Dorel Industries Inc. says it will continue to pursue its business strategy going forward after terminating an agreement to go private after discussions with shareholders.

The corporate logo for Dorel Industries Inc. is shown in this handout photo. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO

MONTREAL - Dorel Industries Inc. says it will continue to pursue its business strategy going forward after terminating an agreement to go private after discussions with shareholders.

"Moving ahead. Business as usual," a spokesman for the company said in an email on Monday.

A group led by Cerberus Capital Management had previously agreed to buy outstanding shares of Dorel for $16 apiece, except for shares owned by the family that controls the company's multiple-voting shares.

But Dorel chief executive Martin Schwartz said the Montreal-based maker of car seats, strollers, bicycles and home furniture pulled the plug on a deal on the eve of Tuesday's special meeting after reviewing votes from shareholders.

Independent shareholders have clearly expressed their confidence in Dorels future and the greater potential for Dorel as a public entity," he said in a news release.

Dorel's board of directors, with Martin Schwartz, Alan Schwartz, Jeffrey Schwartz and Jeff Segel recused, unanimously approved the deal's termination upon the recommendation of a special committee.

The transaction required approval by two-thirds of the votes cast, and more than 50 per cent of the votes cast by non-family shareholders.

Schwartz said enhancing shareholder value remains a top priority while it stays focused on growing its brands, which include Schwinn and Mongoose bikes, Safety 1st-brand car seats and DHP Furniture.

Dorel said the move to end the go-private deal was mutual, despite the funds' increased purchase price offer earlier this year.

It said there is no break fee applicable in this case.

Montreal-based investment firm Letko, Brosseau & Associates Inc. and San Diego's Brandes Investment Partners LP, which together control more than 19 per cent of Dorel's outstanding class B subordinate shares voiced their opposition to the amended offer, which was increased from the initial Nov. 2 offer of $14.50 per share.

"We believe that several minority shareholders shared our opinion," said Letko vice-president Stephane Lebrun, during a phone interview.

"We are confident of the long-term potential of the company and we have confidence in the managers in place.

Lebrun said Letko Brosseau had no contact with Cerberus during the process. Dorel's second largest shareholder also does not intend to demand changes despite the events of recent months.

"For the shareholders and the family, who are also shareholders, we believe that the best thing to do here is for (management) to continue their work."

Shareholder advisory firms Glass Lewis and Institutional Shareholder Services had recommended Dorel Industries Inc. shareholders vote against the revised proposal.

Glass Lewis described the increased offer as "a more pragmatic reassessment of the company's erstwhile effort to buttress the fundamental privatization narrative," but said it still failed to mitigate its core concerns.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 15, 2021.

 With files from Julien Arsenault.

Companies in this story: (TSX: DII.B, DII.A)


She recently went public with her new romance with beau Matthew Adesuyan.

And Shanina Shaik looked incredible as she showcased her supermodel frame for a stunning bikini snap on Monday.

The supermodel, 30, slipped into a tiny scarlet two-piece for the sultry snap as she posed on a sunshine break.

Wow: Shanina Shaik looked incredible as she showcased her supermodel frame for a stunning bikini snap on Monday

The scanty top revealed her perky cleavage and washboard abs, while a pair of matching bottoms emphasised her endless legs.

Her brunette tresses were worn in soft waves while a radiant palette of make-up enhanced her striking features.

The VS model looked ethereal as she posed up a storm for the camera, to the delight of her fans.

Shanina recently split with her businessman beau, Seyed Payam Mirtorabi, following a whirlwind romance.

On Valentine's Day Shanina revealed she has already found love again with her new beau Matthew.

Sharing a black-and-white picture of the couple, Shanina wrote: My Valentine... Happy Valentines Day.'

Feeling the love!On Valentine's Day Shanina revealed she has already found love again with her new beau Matthew Adesuyan

In the photo, the beauty looks off into the distance while Matthew stands from behind her with his arms clutching onto her waist.

She confirmed the identity of her beau was Los Angeles-based record label owner , Matthew Adesuyan.

When he isn't on tour with his artists, Matthew is also the creator of fashion brand Made By US.

Earlier this month, Shanina told fans she was in a new relationship during an Instagram Q&A.

'You'll meet him soon,' she wrote in response to a fan's question about her relationship status.

Quick moves! Shanina Shaik has not confirmed when the two became an item, but her relationship with Matthew comes shortly after her break-up from her business man beau, Seyed Payam Mirtorab

Revelation: Earlier this month the 30-year-old former Victoria's Secret model revealed she was in a new relationship during an Instagram Q&A. 'You'll meet him soon,' she wrote on Instagram

At the time, she posted a picture of his arm around her, but hid his face in the photograph.

Her relationship with Matthew comes shortly after her break-up from Seyed. In August last year she shared a cryptic Instagram post, hinting at a split between the two.

'What I have learned this week nothing ever goes away until it teaches us what we need to know,' she wrote at the time.

Over: Shanina hinted that she had split with her ex Seyed (pictured) in August last year in a cryptic Instagram post

The couple were last spotted in the South of France only two weeks before, sharing a kiss while at the exclusive, Hotel du Cap Eden.

She had debuted the romance in December 2019.

That relationship had come after she had announced her split from husband DJ Ruckus in June 2019, after just one year of marriage.

First marriage: Shanina announced her split from husband DJ Ruckus in June 2019, after just one year of marriage

She recently admitted that despite her first marriage ending in divorce, she is open to tying the knot again.

'What do you think about marriage?' a fan asked Shanina.

'I think marriage can be a beautiful union!' she replied, sharing a picture of herself from her wedding day.

'I'm not against it... and I would love to get married again one day.'

Open to it: She recently admitted that despite her first marriage ending in divorce, she is open to tying the knot again

Shanina, who walked the runway for Victoria's Secret five times between 2011 and 2018, announced her split from DJ Ruckus in June last year, after a year of marriage.

In October 2019, Shanina told The Herald Sun she'd leaned on her family and friends for support in the aftermath of the separation.

'Of course no one decides when they get married to get divorced,' she said.

'It was a difficult time but I've had amazing friends and family supporting me throughout the process and I have a great relationship with my ex-partner and that's important as well.

'We're all on great terms and we want one another to be happy.'
The Louisiana mother who sprayed her hair with Gorilla Glue has said she is donating $20,000 of her GoFundMe money to charity after a doctor carried out a $12,500 procedure to remove the adhesive for free.

Tessica Brown, 40, from Violet, will give the cash to the Restore Foundation, which helps those needing reconstructive surgery, her manager told TMZ.

Brown had started her fundraising page with a goal of reaching $1,500 to buy the wigs she was told she would need after using the superglue when she ran out of hairspray.

But, after the Tik Tok video about her plight went viral, Los Angeles based Dr. Michael Obeng reached out to say he could remove the adhesive without charge. She then flew to LA this week for the procedure that took four hours to complete.

As of Sunday she had raised more than $23,000 in donations, $20,000 of which she is now giving to the Restore Foundation, a charity which helps those needing reconstructive surgery and is the brainchild of Dr. Obeng.

The rest of the money will cover an ER visit she was forced to make after using the glue and her travel expenses to fly to LA for the surgery, her spokesperson added.

Tessica Brown has said she is donating $20,000 of her GoFundMe money to charity after using Gorilla Glue in hair when she ran out of hair spray

As of Sunday she had raised more than $23,000 in donations, $20,000 of which she is now giving to the Restore Foundation, a charity which helps those needing reconstructive surgery and is the brainchild of Dr. Obeng

Mom-of-five Tessica's ordeal went viral after a TikTok video in which she explained she had been left with rigid, immovable locks for more than a month.

She visited a local ER, burnt her scalp with acetone and hacked off her ponytail in an attempt to free her tresses.

In an Instagram post on Saturday, Tessica expressed her thanks to Dr Obeng, writing: 'Words cannot even explain how I feel about @drmichaelkobeng you really gave me my life back and I am forever grateful.'

Dr. Obeng, who offered Tessica the pricey treatment for free after seeing her plight online, used a custom mix of chemicals and natural products in order to dissolve the glue, having first practiced on a dummy head to ensure his formula would work.

'I looked up the compound, the main active ingredient in Gorilla Glue: polyurethane,' Dr. Obeng explained to TMZ. 'Then we figured out the science, how to break it down.'

He continued: 'We bought chemicals that have components to dissolve the solvent, we used medical-grade adhesive remover that we use in the operating room.

'Then we have another active ingredient, MGD. We added MGD to it - which is an aloe vera and olive oil mixture. Then we added a little acetone.'

Tessica explained in her viral TikTok video that she ran out of her Got2b Glued Spray and used Gorilla Glue instead, pictured

Brown had started her fundraising page with a goal of $1,500 to buy the wigs she was told she would need after using the superglue when she ran out of hairspray

In a video taken at Dr. Obeng's office, Tessica - who was given a light anesthesia before the treatment - is seen lying on an operating table after the successful procedure, running her hands through her freed locks and tearing up with relief while marveling at the sensation.

During the procedure, the mixture was applied to Tessica's hair using a spray bottle, while Dr. Obeng used medical tweezers and scissors to try and gently pull the matted hair apart, cutting the strands of glue that were holding her tresses together.

The doctor and his tea, then ran a comb through the hair to finally remove the glue, before applying a deep conditioning treatment to protect the locks.

Tessica was given painkillers and steroids to reduce the swelling and inflammation caused by the glue - and the chemicals that she used to try and remove it.

Remarkably, Dr. Obeng was able to salvage much of Tessica's hair - although she admitted after the procedure that she wishes she had visited him before asking her sister to chop off her lengthy ponytail in the hopes of removing the glue.

'I can scratch it!' Tessica told the camera while running her nails along her scalp. 'Now I wish I had waited for my sister to cut my ponytail off.'

'I never was going to take this to social media. The reason I took this to social media was because I didn't know what else to do,' she told ET's Melicia Johnson.

'And I know somebody out there could have told me something. I didn't think for one second when I got up the next morning it was gonna be everywhere.'

Mom-of-five Tessica's ordeal went viral after a TikTok video in which she explained she had been left with rigid, immovable locks for more than a month. She visited a local ER, burnt her scalp with acetone and hacked off her ponytail in an attempt to free her tresses

Los Angeles based Dr. Michael Obeng reached out to say he could remove the adhesive without charge. She then flew to LA for the $12,500 procedure that took four hours to complete

Gorilla Glue later released a statement about the situation on Monday after it was reported that Tessica wanted to sue. She has denied the report that she had hired an attorney

Tessica said she had used the Gorilla Glue before for other things and thought it would just 'wash right out.' When traditional shampoo failed to remove the glue, she tried olive and tea tree oils, but nothing worked.

It was then that she turned to TikTok looking for advice.

The morning after she posted the TikTok she went to to the emergency room at St. Bernard Parish Hospital in Chalmette, Louisiana, where healthcare workers tried removing the glue using 'little acetone packs' that burned her scalp.

Since then she has received plenty of support, including messages from Missy Elliott, Chance the Rapper, and Beyonce's hairstylist, Neal Farinah, who offered her a wig.

Gorilla Glue released a statement about the situation on social media Monday.

'We are aware of the situation and we are very sorry to hear about the unfortunate incident that Miss Brown experienced using our Spray Adhesive on her hair,' the brand tweeted.

'We are glad to see in her recent video that Miss Brown has received medical treatment from her local medical facility and wish her the best.'
NATO will not withdraw its troops from Afghanistan "before the time is right", alliance chief Jens Stoltenberg said Monday ahead of a defence ministers' discussion this week on the deployment.

"While no ally wants to stay in Afghanistan longer than necessary, we will not leave before the time is right," Stoltenberg told a press conference.

Short link:


Thousands of school students would learn lifesaving skills each year under a plan to build the states first ocean safety centre in Apollo Bay as Victoria grapples with its worst spate of drownings.

The projects proponents say the centre would bring a crucial economic boost and additional jobs to Apollo Bay on the Great Ocean Road, which is heavily reliant on domestic and international tourism.

David Gorrie is leading a push to build Victorias first ocean safety centre at Apollo Bay. Credit:Jason South

Coastal holiday hotspots have enjoyed a busy summer as Melburnians cut loose after months of lockdown, but face ongoing challenges with the end of the holiday season and the looming expiry of the federal governments JobKeeper wage subsidy program.

The Victorian Blue Ocean Safety Skills Centre would educate up to 3000 school students a year under the joint initiative proposed by the Apollo Bay Surf Life Saving Club and Apollo Bay P-12 College.
Rahul Gandhi is making a concerted bid to return as the 87th president of the AICC or the All India Congress Committee. The attempt to take centre stage in Parliament, on farmers issue, China and a range of other subjects indicates the young Gandhis intent to become a polarizing figure, instead of a popular face, against Narendra Modi.

This was an advice offered to him way back in 2012 when Stephanie Cutter, a reputed political consultant who served as a deputy campaign manager in Barack Obamas re-election campaign, had visited his 12, Tughlaq Crescent office-cum-residence. The UPA was then in power and Rahul Gandhi somehow could not follow Cutters guidance.

Also bracing for a bigger and visible role is Priyanka Gandhi Vadra. Rahul-Priyanka duopoly is set to replace the now nearly defunct Sonia-Rahul power equation that was largely steered by late Ahmed Patel and Motilal Vora. In Rahul Gandhis scheme of things, Priyanka is likely to play the multiple roles that were performed by Patel and Voraacting as an interface between the leader (Rahul) and party, a crisis manager, a listening post, and an effective number two. There is a growing viewpoint in the Congress that Priyanka Gandhis Mission Uttar Pradesh has outlived its utility. Contrary to a perception perpetuated by a section of media, Priyanka Gandhi had not harboured any ambition to be a leader or a chief ministerial nominee in Uttar Pradesh.

In Priyanka Gandhis scheme of things, if and when the Congress succeeds in Uttar Pradesh, incumbent UPCC (Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee) chief Ajay Kumar Lallu would be bestowed with the fruits of his labour, sacrifice and grit. In doing so, she hopes to set an example of how regional satraps can be built, nurtured and rewarded. As a student of Congress contemporary history, Priyanka Gandhi is well aware that the good old days of the grand old party can only be revived if the likes of Ajay Lallu are found across the length and breadth of the country, in every state, district and taluka.

Ajay Kumar Lallu is a diligent Hindi-speaking OBC leader, an elected representative, with grassroots connection. In the last five years, Lallu has spent more time in jail than most UPCC chiefs put together in the post-Independence era!

ALSO READ| Pact With Left, Understanding With Mamata and Upbeat BJP: Rahul Gandhi's Latest Dilemma is Bengal

After the completion of the assembly polls in West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Kerala, the AICC organisational polls are set to be announced and completed between June and August 2021. If the Congress does well in Kerala and becomes part of the winning alliance in Tamil Nadu and retains Puducherry, clamour for Rahul Gandhi dobara would gain momentum. On the other hand, an adverse verdict in all the five poll-bound states has the potential of making the Congress a no-hoper, leading to greater and louder disquiet in the grand old party.

The term of the new president will, however, last till December 2022. As per Article XVIII [h] of the Congress constitution, a regular president needs to be elected by an electoral college consisting of AICC delegates numbering around 1300. Rahul Gandhi was elected the 87th president of the AICC in December 2017 for a period of five years. He had resigned in May 2019, taking responsibility for the Lok Sabha poll debacle. Since then, interim AICC chief Sonia Gandhi has been heading the party.

The Congress leadership is keeping a hawkish eye on G23, a group of dissenters who had raised the banner of revolt against the Gandhis in August 2020. While some dissenters have been co-opted, Gandhis are reportedly aware that the appointment of Mallikarjun Kharge as the leader of the opposition (LoP) in the Rajya Sabha has not gone down well with the G23. Anand Sharma, who is a deputy leader of the Congress in the Rajya Sabha, was hoping to get elevated.

Sources in the Congress establishment say the dissenters missed a chance in demanding election for the leader of the Congress (who is also the LoP). If Sharma, Kapil Sibal and others had urged Sonia Gandhi, who is the Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP) chairperson, to hold election among the 37 party MPs in the upper house, she would have to consider their demand. As a tepid sop, Sonia Gandhi has decided to retain Sharma as Kharges deputy. Sharmas term ends in April 2022 when Shaktisinh Gohil is likely to succeed him.
Remedy delivered a record breaking financial year during 2020, despite the lack of a major new game launch.

According to its fiscal report for the full-year ended December 2020, revenues increased by 29.8 percent to 41.1 million ($49.8 million), while operating profit rose by 103 percent to 13.2 million ($16 million).

The Finnish studio explained Control, which has topped 2 million sales worldwide, played a key part in that success. The atmospheric shooter launched back in August 2019, but received two expansions in 2020 along with an 'Ultimate Edition' release.

Remedy said the title has been "selling well through new stores, platforms, and subscription and streaming services," and seemed particularly pleased with digital sales.

"In an increasingly digital market, great games have long life cycles: 15 months after Controls original release, November 2020 was a record month for digital game copies sold," said Remedy CEO Tero Virtala.

"Control is a high-quality game that provides a deep, immersive world and gaming-experience, and long-term business potential for years to come. While we continue to support and take Control further, its development team is gradually shifting to work on a new Remedy game."

Looking ahead, Remedy has outlined its strategy for 2021 to 2025 and said it intends to create "several successful games" along with one "major hit." It also wants to own a minimum of three successful franchises "all with long-term hit potential," while raising its profile as "the most attractive gaming industry employer in Europe."
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The Hanoi Department of Health has announced the travel history of a Japanese man who posthumously tested positive for the novel coronavirus last weekend and is tracking all people who had contact with him.

The foreigner was Vietnams COVID-19 patient No. 2,229, the Ministry of Health confirmed on Monday morning, adding that he was an imported case.

The 54-year-old, an expert of Mitsui & Co. Vietnam Ltd. Hanoi Branch, arrived at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City on January 17.

He was brought to a quarantine center in Tan Binh District following his arrival and tested negative for the novel coronavirus twice on January 17 and 31.

He stayed at IBIS Hotel in the metropolis after completing his quarantine period on January 31.

At 11:00 am on February 1, the man traveled to Hanoi via flight VN254 and stayed at Somerset Westpoint Hotel in Tay Ho District from February 1 to 13.

He went to Sun Red River Building in Hoan Kiem District on February 2 and Hachi Ju Hachi restaurant in Tay Ho District on February 3.

The Japanese expert paid visits to Raffles Medical Clinic on February 4 and 8.

On the evening of February 5, he went to Torikichi restaurant in Ba Dinh District.

The man was found dead at his hotel room at around 7:00 pm on February 13 and tested positive for the novel coronavirus on February 14.

Preliminary investigation showed he had died from respiratory failure, while no criminal signs were found at the scene.

The Hanoi Center for Disease Control made an urgent announcement on Sunday evening regarding his travel history and called on all people who had been to such locations to promptly contact local authorities.

As of Monday morning, Vietnam has documented 2,229 COVID-19 cases, with 1,534 recoveries and 35 deaths, according to the health ministry.

Among the COVID-19 cases in the country, 1,330 were local infections.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!
The visit is also expected to cover information about the annually held Indo-Russia summit, which is to be hosted by India this time. Matters related to the Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS) summit that New Delhi will host this year are also expected to be discussed.

Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla is set to visit Russia this week. The main subject of his visit is expected to be revitalising the Chennai-Vladivostok Maritime Corridor and also improving the trading network that is valued at about $10 billion (Rs 7,000 crore).

Though investments between Russia and India have reached $30 billion, mainly in fossil fuel, but the trade between them is not so promising and is holding steady at just $10 billion. Economists cite the Russian economys build, the general ignorance of the Indo-Russian trades potential capabilities and the lack of interest from the private forms of India.

The visit is also expected to cover information about the annually held Indo-Russia summit, which is to be hosted by India this time. Matters related to the Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS) summit that New Delhi will host this year are also expected to be discussed. The meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Vladimir Putin had to be scrapped off in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic. As such, this diplomatic visit is being given high priority and will go over many important matters.

Also read: 2 years of Pulwama attack: PM Modi, Amit Shah and others pay tribute to CRPF jawans

Also read: #FreedomForTibet: Tibetans in-exile commemorate 108th Tibetan Independence Day, demand release from CCPs clutches

Although Russia is the primary rival of the US in its superpower status, India has maintained relatively close ties with both. Although, by hindsight, Russia is a much closer ally of India and has been since the days of the Soviet Union, helping India out in the United Nations. The new change in leadership in the US shows no sign of cooling down of relations with Russia, as Joe Biden has been accusing Russia of hacking into American servers for all sorts of purposes and also criticised Russia for arresting the dissident Alexei Navalny.

Also read: Canadian PM Justin Trudeau praises India for handling of farmers protest
Kids want to fish? You don't know how yourself? Here's a little help
Retail fuel prices climbed again for the seventh consecutive day reaching new highs on February 15 in cities across the country.

The petrol price in Delhi was hiked by 26 paise reaching Rs. 88.99 per litre as compared to Rs 88.73 per litre on February 14, according to state-owned fuel retailers. Diesel price in the national capital also touched a new high at Rs 79.35, increasing 29 paise from the previous day.

In Mumbai, the prices rose to Rs 95.46 per litre and Rs 86.34 per litre for petrol and diesel respectively.

Meanwhile, automobile owners in Chennai shell out Rs 91.19 per litre and Rs 84.44 per litre of petrol and diesel. The prices in Kolkata reach Rs 90.25 per litre for petrol and Rs 82.94 per litre for diesel.

The difference in prices in states stem from local and VAT taxes imposed in states. Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan had ruled out the possibility of a reduction in taxes on petrol and diesel in order to reduce prices.

Petrol & Diesel Rates May 27, 2021 Petrol Rate in Mumbai May 27, 2021 Current Petrol Price Per Litre 100 100 View more Diesel Rate in Mumbai May 27, 2021 Current Petrol Price Per Litre 92 92 View more Show

"There is no such proposal at present," he said in Rajya Sabha. He added that taxes are increased or decreased depending on several factors like the requirement of the government and market situation.

There is a price hike for cooking gas or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) by Rs. 50, effective from February 15, news agency ANI reported yesterday. As per the revised rate, a cooking gas cylinder of 14.2 kg would cost Rs 769 in Delhi.

The subsidy on LPG for listed beneficiaries is transferred directly into their bank accounts by the central government.
At the same time, monitors have recorded a 55% decrease in ceasefire violations on year.

In 2020, the number of ceasefire violations recorded along the line of contact in eastern Ukraine's Donbas decreased by 55%, compared with 2019, the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission wrote in its Trends and Observations report.

Most of the armed violence recorded in 2020 was concentrated in four hotspots, which accounted for about 76% of all recorder ceasefire violations, including Popasna-Zolote-Pervomaisk area, Avdiyivka-Yasynuvata-Donetsk airport area, areas east and north-east of the strategic port city of Mariupol, and areas south-west, south, and south-east of Svitlodarsk, says the report.

"Ceasefire violations recorded outside the security zone were largely assessed as related to live-fire exercises," the report reads.

The SMM notes that after the latest ceasefire agreement was reached at the Trilateral Contact Group from July 27, 2020, the mission recorded the lowest levels of armed violence since the onset of hostilities.

The daily average of ceasefire violations plunged from 623 to 33 after that date.

Read alsoTerrorist's car blown up in Russia-occupied Horlivka (Photo)Civilian casualties due to shelling and small arms fire dropped 93%, however mines and unexploded ordnance continue to represent serious threat for the civilian population.

In 2020, the SMM observed over 1,800 weapons deployed in violations of withdrawal lines. About 87% of these weapons were observed in non-government-controlled areas.

Also, the report stresses incidents related to freedom of movement restrictions the OSCE monitors have faced, 96% of which took place in non-government-controlled areas.

Reporting by UNIAN
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton spent $36,000 of taxpayer's money to fly across the country, just to make a grants announcement.

Mr Dutton boarded the RAAF VIP jet from Brisbane before landing in Wynyard, northern Tasmania, on July 15, 2018.

He announced the combined $194,000 grants for Burnie and Waratah-Wynyard councils before flying back to Brisbane the following day.

Home affairs minister Peter Dutton spent $36,000 of taxpayer's money to fly across the country and make a grants announcement

Mr Dutton boarded the Royal Australian Airforce VIP jet from Brisbane, in Queensland, before landing at Wynyard, in northern Tasmania, on July 15, 2018

The jet was returned to Canberra and the total cost of the flight was about $36,340, Sydney Morning Herald reported.

The grants were for CCTV systems and announced during the 2018 Braddon by-election campaign.

Liberal candidate Brett Whiteley was making a bid for the seat but lost to the incumbent Labor politician Justine Keay.

Mr Dutton was later advised against approving the grants during a Home Affairs briefing in January 2019.

He was told the grants did 'not represent value for money in accordance with the program guidelines', but overruled the advice.

A spokesperson for Mr Dutton said the he had 'a number of official commitments in the Burnie region which necessitated his travel'.

'Including presiding over a citizenship ceremony in his capacity as the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection and meeting with community leaders regarding public safety concerns,' they said.

The jet was returned to Canberra and the total cost of the flight was valued at $36,340 (stock image)

'Decisions in relation to funding local projects to improve community safety under the Safer Communities Fund were made consistent with the relevant rules and guidelines.'

The spokesperson also pointed out former Labor leader Bill Shorten also made trips with VIP to Tasmania during the campaign.

'Minister Duttons travel was approved in accordance with the Special Purpose Aircraft guidelines, as was the case for Mr Shorten when he travelled by VIP to Burnie,' they said.

'The communities of Burnie and Waratah-Wynyard and many others around Australia are safer because of the Safer Communities Fund.

'Minister Dutton was joined on the flight by staff and AFP Close Personal Protection Officers.'
Iran said on Monday it will block snap inspections by the U.N. nuclear watchdog from next week if other parties to the 2015 nuclear deal do not fulfil their obligations, a challenge to U.S. President Joe Biden's hope of reviving the accord. "If others do not fulfil their obligations by Feb. 21, the government is obliged to suspend the voluntary implementation of the Additional Protocol," Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said. "It does not mean ending all inspections by the U.N. nuclear watchdog...All these steps are reversible if the other party ...



Restaurants will no longer be allowed to sell pre-packaged meals through arrangements with supermarkets and other outlets, as Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley definitively closed this loophole yesterday.

Rowley said this would not be allowed to continue, as it defeats the purpose of the public health regulations. Restaurants and street food vendors were among those businesses ordered to close to limit the movement of people and curb the spread of Covid-19.
ISTANBUL - Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said "the US clearly support PKK terrorists, even if they claim otherwise", after Ankara denounced over the weekend the discovery of the bodies of 13 Turkish hostages of the PKK during an anti-terrorism operation of the army in the region of Gara in northern Iraq.



"Nobody can question Turkey's operations in Syria or Iraq, after the massacres of Gara", said Erdogan. "From now on, if you want us to continue to remain united in the world and in NATO, you must not side with terrorists any longer", warned the president, accusing those who supported the PKK of having "hands dirtied by the blood of innocents".



According to the Turkish defense ministry, the hostages were shot to death after the start of a new military operation called 'Claw-eagle 2'. The victims were mainly members of the Turkish security forces who were abducted a few years ago. The PKK, classified as a terrorist organization also by the US and the EU, said the deaths were caused by Turkish air raids In a statement, the US State department expressed its "condolences", stressing its support to "Turkey, a NATO ally" and condemning "in the strongest possible terms" the incident, if Ankara's version will be "confirmed".



In the operation three Turkish soldiers died while Erdogan claimed on Monday that 42 "terrorists were neutralized". The new accusations risk to increase tensions with the US, tied to Turkey's acquisition of Russian missiles S-400 and to the denied extradition of Fethullah Gulen, which Ankara accuses of the failed coup of 2016.
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On Saturday, seven Republican senators voted alongside 50 Democratic caucus members to convict former President Donald Trump. The final 57-43 count dropped short of the 67 votes expected to convict Trump on the House impeachment accusation of inciting the U.S. unrest on January 6.

The count overall, however, has been touted in U.S. history as the most bipartisan impeachment vote. The acquittal of Trump signals the end of a five-day impeachment trial.

Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, Mitt Romney of Utah, Richard Burr of North Carolina, and Ben Sasse of Nebraska are the GOP senators who supported Trump's conviction. Here is the seven Republican lawmakers' stance on why they decided to convict Trump, according to Newsweek:

Lisa Murkowski of Alaska

Senator Lisa Murkowski addressed her reason for voting to convict Trump in a statement released Sunday. Murkowski believes that the facts are clear that the Capitol's violence on January 6 was not an uprising. Trump set the stage before the 2020 election by stating that the election was rigged, which cast doubt into American people's minds regarding the fairness of the elections, she said.

She continued that "President Trump was not worried about the Vice President; he was not concerned about members of Congress; he was not concerned about the Capitol Police. He was concerned with his election and retaining power."

Murkowski is the only one of the seven senators to be re-elected next year, raising rumors that she will face Sarah Palin's primary challenge.

Susan Collins of Maine

After the vote, Collins clarified her decision to convict the former President during a Senate floor speech on Saturday, saying that he created a 'dangerous situation' and put his 'selfish interest' before the country's interests. Collins added that Trump sought to discredit the outcome of the election and rile up his supporters to "fight" the fact of President Joe Biden's victory.

Read also: Trump, McCarthy Conversation Allegedly Shows Former President Unwilling to Call Off US Capitol Riot

Bill Cassidy of Louisiana

In a video posted to Twitter on Saturday, Cassidy echoed Collin's voting stance to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial. Cassidy noted during an appearance on ABC News' This Week with host George Stephanopoulos that he "carefully listened to all the arguments."

Our Constitution and our country is more important than any one person. I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty. pic.twitter.com/ute0xPc4BH  U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, M.D. (@SenBillCassidy) February 13, 2021

However, as he described the insurrections, he believes it was an attempt to prevent the peaceful transfer of power.

Mitt Romney of Utah

Romney expressed similar feelings on Saturday about his decision to vote against the former President. Referencing Trump's efforts to pressure the Secretary of state of Georgia to falsify the election results, Senator Mitt Romney said, "President Trump attempted to corrupt the election."

Richard Burr of North Carolina

Meanwhile, Senator Burr, who is planning to retire next year, voted to dismiss the impeachment trial based on constitutional grounds. However, yesterday, the Senator surprised many of the aisles by voting for Trump's conviction. Burr claims the Senate is an institution based on precedent and the majority in the Senate voted to proceed with his trial.

The constitutionality question is now an established precedent. "As an impartial juror, my role is now to determine whether House managers have sufficiently made the case for the article of impeachment against President Trump," Burr said in a statement released Saturday.

Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania

Toomey stated on Saturday evening, following his vote to convict the former President, to express his disappointment with Trump's actions. Last year, the Senator announced he would not seek re-election.

He called on Trump last month to resign, saying that he was no longer a "credible candidate" for elected office. Toomey said in a Tweet that he is one of the 74 million Americans who voted for Trump because of his massive accomplishments. But his behavior betrayed the confidence of millions placed in him. "His betrayal of the Constitution and his oath of office required conviction," he added.

President Donald Trumps defense team made several accurate observations at the impeachment trial. Many elected Democrats did want to impeach President Trump from the moment he won the 2016 election.  Senator Pat Toomey (@SenToomey) February 13, 2021

Ben Sasse of Nebraska

Sasse said he made a vow to "always vote his conscience even if it is against the partisan stream." The impeachment trial is a public declaration of what the President has an oath of office and the behavior that oath requires if presidents in the future, the Nebraskan Senator noted.

Sasse became the first GOP Senator to express his willingness to oust Trump, two days after the riot. He told CBS anchor Gayle King that if the House comes together and has a process, he will consider whatever they might move as he believes the President has "disregarded his oath of office."

Read also: Impeachment Trial: 44 Republicans Voted Against Proceeding, Indicates Senate Will Acquit Trump

7 Republican Senators join Democrats in convicting Trump

According to The Sun, 48 Democrats and two independent senators joined the seven GOP senators voting to impeach Trump, who was accused of inciting supporters to bring the Capitol under siege.

With Murkowski, the only one of the party facing voters in 2022, most of them is not up for re-election. Toomey and Burr are not running for another term.

Romney is the only one who voted during his two impeachment hearings to prosecute the President. Last February, at Trump's opening impeachment trial, his guilty vote made him the first senator ever to vote to indict a president of the same party.

Read also: Impeachment Trial: Trump Lawyers Argue 'Majority in the House' Is Afraid of Facing Him as Opponent in 2024

@ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
A quarter of New Zealand currently has poor levels of mental health and emotional wellbeing, according to a recent study commissioned by the Mental Health Foundation.

The study, conducted by global research company Ipsos, provides an insight into the wellbeing of New Zealanders and was administered at the end of 2020, following nearly a year of living through the COVID-19 pandemic.

"This data shows the government needs to up its game to fulfil its promises around mental health," MHF chief executive Shaun Robinson says.

While the average wellbeing score is positive, the MHF is concerned to see 25 per cent of New Zealanders have low wellbeing and are at risk of developing poor mental health.

Women (one in three) and those with a yearly household income of $50,000 or less are at particular risk of falling into this category.

Those who did not have good lifestyle habits to support their wellbeing were heavily represented in the at-risk quarter of the population.

Under 35s and Pasifika also have lower than average wellbeing scores.

"We can do better than this, and we must," Shaun says.

"Good mental and emotional wellbeing is proven to be an asset for personal, whanau, community and work-related success. If we are to recover from COVID-19 we cannot afford to ignore the signs that a significant portion of our population need support."

Shaun says this is a wake-up call to the government that it is long past time to take urgent action to implement He Ara Oranga and fulfil its promises around mental health.

We are disappointed. He Ara Oranga was a beacon of hope for a revolution of change for the mental health of New Zealanders but, in many ways, it seems to have stagnated. There is still no transparent and accountable plan for its implementation.

He Ara Oranga is the report of the Government Inquiry into mental health and addiction.

"The cold reality is that things at the coal face of mental health have not changed for many New Zealanders since He Ara Oranga was first published," Shaun says.

"Our most vulnerable people are still waiting, and more people are tipping into that vulnerable category. That is not acceptable."

The MHF was dismayed to learn that the government has allocated no funding at all for mental wellbeing promotion in the entirety of its $1.9 billion Wellbeing Budget.

Furthermore, the world-leading programme Getting Through Together, rolled out nationwide to help New Zealanders cope with the impacts of COVID-19, is due to lose all government funding by June 2021.

This is despite proven results: Getting Through Together successfully reached over a third of all New Zealand adults in 2020, with 58 per cent of those stating they were empowered to take action for their wellbeing as a result of the programme.

"This is truly a short-sighted waste of investment and a missed opportunity to build long-term positive mental wellbeing," Shaun says.

"Investing in wellbeing promotion now prevents people from needing more acute support down the line, it boosts our personal and community wellbeing - its the smart thing to do and the right thing to do.
Victorias second international airport is being put forward as a possible site for a remote quarantine base, complete with outdoor cabins for returned travellers, as the state grapples with the fallout from cases in hotel quarantine again leaking into the community.

Avalon Airport boss Justin Giddings said he was waiting to hear back from the state government after submitting a proposal for a facility to be rapidly built on the grounds of the airport, 50 kilometres south-west of Melbourne, which could house upwards of 300 standalone cabins.

The plan would create a quarantine centre similar to that at Howard Springs near Darwin.

Mr Giddings said the plan would involve returned travellers flying into Avalons international terminal and walking to nearby quarantine cabins, where people could cook their own meals, clean their own cabins and spend time outside at any time.
Chinese Ambassador to Vietnam Xiong Bo shared with VietNamNet his wish to promote the Vietnam-China relationship in the new year as well as interesting thoughts about the Lunar New Year (Tet holiday).

Chinese Ambassador to Vietnam Xiong Bo. Photo: Le Anh Dung

Over the past year, with the biggest disturbance being the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, how did Vietnam and China cooperate in the bilateral relationship, in dealing with common issues in the region and the world, to overcome difficulties, build trust and promote the resolution of problems and differences so that the comprehensive strategic partnership of the two countries continues to develop?

The Covid-19 pandemic took place last year, with a very far-reaching impact, arguably the biggest crisis facing the community and the international landscape after World War 2.

We are pleased to see that the two countries, under the leadership of the Communist Party have responded very well to this crisis. The most important thing is that the two Parties and the two countries put the safety and the health of their people first. At the same time, we have mobilized forces from the entire society to join forces to fight the epidemic.

The two countries took the lead in disease control, achieved great results in the fight against the epidemic, and at the same time took the lead in economic recovery.

In terms of bilateral exchanges between the two countries, in 2020, high-ranking leaders of the two Parties and two States maintained close interactions. Last year, the Secretary-Generals of the two parties conducted two important phone calls, gaining an important common understanding about enhancing the promotion of the bilateral relations between the two Parties and two countries.

The Prime Ministers of the two countries also made phone calls and the two sides reached an important common understanding about strengthening anti-epidemic cooperation, especially maintaining stable production and supply chains, and maintaining healthy development of economic and commercial cooperation.

Cooperation in multilateral and regional fields has become a new development point for the comprehensive China-Vietnam strategic cooperation partnership. The two countries are open economies and both support multilateralism and free trade.

We actively supported Vietnam to assume the position of non-permanent member of the UN Security Council and the ASEAN Chairmanship, actively participated in high-level conferences and multilateral and regional ministerial meetings chaired by Vietnam, and actively supported the initiative to promote regional cooperation to fight epidemics and restore economic development initiated by Vietnam.

What is your expectation of the cooperation relationship between China and Vietnam in the coming time? What areas of cooperation will you focus on in an effort to strengthen bilateral relations?

This year is a very important year for both countries. China will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the Communist Party, also the first year implementing the 14th 5-year plan. Vietnam has successfully held the 13th National Party Congress and will kick off the implementation of the socio-economic development in the year 2021-2025 and will take important steps toward the development goals when celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Party and the country's founding.

We sincerely hope that the socialist career of both China and Vietnam at the new beginning will gain new victories.

In the context of a changing world and complicated epidemics, I think that the two parties and two countries should further strengthen their solidarity and cooperation, further respect and continue to promote their traditional friendship that was nurtured by President Mao Zedong and President Ho Chi Minh, and should continue to implement the common awareness reached between the top leaders of the two Parties and States, further promoting the traditional friendship that the leaders of the two countries have built.

In particular, we should continue to focus on anti-epidemic cooperation, effectively responding to the Covid-19 epidemic, while maintaining the socio-economic development of the two countries.

We hope to accompany Vietnam, continue to maintain stability, and further improve the supply and production capacity between the two countries. In the past year, Vietnam's economy made great progress, particularly the positive foreign trade, the growth of imports and exports, especially imports and exports with China.

Chinese Ambassador to Vietnam Xiong Bo. Photo: Le Anh Dung

Have you experienced the Vietnamese traditional Tet?

Last year I had Tet in Vietnam

How do you feel about Tet's atmosphere in Vietnam?

Tet atmosphere in Vietnam is very special. The Tet customs of the two countries are also very similar, both derived from agricultural culture and agricultural civilization, and the biggest traditional holiday of the two countries, formed during the long history of culture.

I do not know if there is a saying in Vietnam like we have in China, "The plan for the whole year is made in early spring". The two countries have many similar customs on Tet holiday. Along with the change of times, the way of celebrating Tet has also changed and there are many new trends.

I see in Vietnam, during the New Year, people use the Internet more to deliver Tet wishes and give lucky money, which is very similar to China.

Many Vietnamese - especially young people - tend to simplify Tet procedures to take time for travel and rest. What about Chinese youth?

Recently, when New Year now comes, China has a seven-day holiday. Chinese peoples New Year custom is not just at home. Of course, on New Year's Eve, people still stay at home for family reunion, but after New Year's Eve, more people choose to travel. Many people choose to travel abroad. In previous years, many people also came to Vietnam.

This year is special due to the outbreak of Covid-19, so we do not encourage tourism, but encourage people to celebrate Tet on the spot, and strengthen contact with relatives and friends via the Internet, in order to welcome a happy and safe New Year.

Personally, this year I have no intention of traveling but will celebrate Tet in Hanoi. I look forward to learning through the media about the Tet welcoming activities of Vietnamese people.

Through VietNamNet, I would like to send Tet greetings to the Vietnamese people. I wish everyone a happy New Year, abundant health, and favorable work. I hope everyone will have a happy Tet.

Thai An/Hien Anh

US Ambassador describes his addiction to banh chung and four Tet holidays in VN I really love the Tet season, US Ambassador to Vietnam Daniel J. Kritenbrink told VietNamNet in an interview on the occasion of the lunar New Year (Tet).
Rebranding

15 February 2021

Dusit Princess Hot Springs Resort Fengshun, Guangdong slated to open in April 2021 in Meizhou City, Guangdong Province.

Dusit International, one of Thailand's leading hotel and property development companies, represented in China by Dusit Fudu Hotels and Resorts, has signed a management agreement with Fengshun Jindebao Kaiyue International Hot Springs Hotel Co., Ltd., to rebrand and manage its property under the new name of Dusit Princess Hot Springs Resort Fengshun, Guangdong, starting this April.

Located in the heart of Fengshun County in the east of Guangdong Province, Southeast China, the upper midscale resort is set within a new development zone of Meizhou City. The site is approximately 40 minutes by car from Jieyang Chaoshan International Airport. It is also a short drive from popular attractions such as Longgui Waterfall, Jigong Temple, numerous Hakka cultural sights, and the upcoming Jieling Feiquan Scenic Area.

Designed to meet the needs of business and leisure travellers alike, the resort, which first opened in 2014, comprises 190 well-appointed guest rooms and suites, plus an all-day dining restaurant, a grand ballroom, and a hot springs centre with spa.

By uniquely blending Dusit's unique brand of Thai-inspired gracious hospitality with local customs and traditions, the newly rebranded property is set to deliver distinctive stay experiences focused on comfort, convenience and value.
The mayor of Blackburn has resigned from his post after being fined by police for breaching Covid regulations.

Iftakhar Hussain was given a 200 penalty after he said he had inadvertently visited a wedding party so food could be delivered to a house.

Police attended the abode after receiving reports that up to 30 people would be attending address in Blackburn on Saturday night.

Mr Hussain apologised as he announced he would step down as first citizen of the borough following the breach of Covid-19 rules banning household mixing.

He said: Given recent events, I have taken the decision to step down from my position as the mayor of Blackburn with Darwen with immediate effect.

I believe this is the right thing to do and I no longer believe I can continue to serve as mayor to the best of my ability.

I do not want to make any excuses; I regret the momentary lapse of judgment - I should have known better and I accept full responsibility for my actions.

He added that he wanted to give his deepest apologies for any breaking of the lockdown restrictions.

Lancashire Police said a member of the public reported up to 30 guests would be attending a wedding celebration at the address, with nine people at the address when officers called.

Each was issued with a 200 fixed penalty notice and was instructed to leave.

Sayyed Osman, deputy chief executive of Blackburn with Darwen Council, said: We have been informed that Councillor Iftakhar Hussain has taken the decision to step down from the position of mayor of Blackburn with Darwen following the incident this weekend.

We believe this was the correct course of action and reinforces the Councils Members code of conduct, which highlights personal responsibility.

We do not endorse or condone any behaviour that falls outside this code and the coronavirus restrictions and guidelines.

Leader of the Council, Councillor Mohammed Khan, said: I have accepted Councillor Iftakhar Hussains resignation as mayor of the borough following the incident this weekend where he was found to be in breach of Covid restrictions.

I know he deeply regrets this mistake.

I would like to thank him for his dedicated service as mayor during this difficult year.

Additional reporting by PA

A poster for "Busan Biennale: Words at an Exhibition The Chicago Chapter" / Courtesy of Busan Biennal





By Kwon Mee-yoo







The 2020 edition of Busan Biennale, which garnered positive reviews for interweaving visual art with literary elements, heads to Chicago for a year-long project with artists, musicians and writers.







Organized by Danish artistic director Jacob Fabricius, the 10th edition of Busan Biennale was titled "Words at an Exhibition  an exhibition in ten chapters and five poems." Fabricus invited 11 authors, 67 visual artists and 11 musicians from 34 countries to unravel the port city's charms in the context of metropolitanism.







Busan Biennale partnered with the University of Chicago's Richard and Mary L. Gray Center for Arts and Inquiry and the Center for East Asian Studies Committee on Korean Studies to present "The Chicago Chapter" of the biennale.







Fabricius and Chicago-based curator and art critic Stephanie Cristello, who served as curatorial adviser at the Busan Biennale 2020, bring artists and art from the Busan event to reimagine the biennale for Chicago audiences with an emphasis on sound art and music.







"I am proud and very excited about bringing the Busan Biennale 2020 to an international audience. The first stop was Kunsthal Aarhus, Denmark, and now in 2021 it will be Chicago, U.S. I believe showing Busan-based artists like Bae Ji-min in an international context is of great importance to the art scene in Busan and Korea. Busan Biennale 2020  The Chicago Chapter aims to present both artists, musicians and writers from Busan and Korea," Fabricus said.







"Despite our success, COVID-19 meant many were unable to experience the biennale in person. I'm honored that the Chicago Chapter will cultivate a wider audience for the work that was done here in Busan," the biennale's exhibition team leader Lee Seol-hui said.







The Chicago Chapter will begin with an online public conversation event on March 5, featuring Fabricius and Cristello as well as artist-musician Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth and Korean artist Kim Hee-cheon. Gordon presented the film installation "July 24, 2020," created in collaboration with the exhibition team in Busan, while Kim interpreted the city's history and urban issues in his site-specific works such as an outdoor banner titled "A Drill" in Busan's Old Town.







Further events will be announced later.







"The Gray Center is thrilled to be working with our partners from the biennale to bring this multi-faceted and dynamic project to Chicago. The Busan Biennale's interdisciplinary approach makes it a kindred spirit to our organization and the international dialogue it will help cultivate is a perfect fit for our programmatic approach as we all work to support the arts and stay connected during the pandemic," said Zachary Cahill, director of programs and fellowships at the Gray Center.







This is the Busan Biennale 2020's second collaborative project, following "An Exhibition in Three Chapters: Works from the Busan Biennale by Carey Young, Kim Gordon & Jang Minseung" at the Kunsthal Aarhus in Denmark, home of artistic director Fabricius.







At the Danish exhibition, three video works by Carey Young, Kim Gordon and Jang Min-seung representing the biennale's topics such as gender, historical trauma and urban spaces are on display through March 14.




EU Sizes Up Impact Of New UK Free Trade Deal

by Jason Gorringe, Tax-News.com, London

15 February 2021

The European Union has released its Winter 2021 Economic Forecast, which says that Brexit will dent UK economic growth considerably, and more than for the European Union, despite the new free trade deal between the two parties.

The free trade deal between the UK and the EU provides for zero tariffs and zero quotas on all goods trade that complies with the appropriate rules of origin. However, the report highlights that non-tariff barriers have increased substantially for both imports and exports from and to the UK.

"In sum, while the FTA improves the situation as compared to an outcome with no trade agreement between the EU and the UK, it cannot come close to matching the benefits of the trading relations provided by EU membership," the report says.

The report estimates that, for the EU, on average, the exit of the UK from the European Union under the FTA will generate a loss of GDP of 0.5 percent by 2022. The UK, meanwhile, will see a 2.25 percent drop in GDP over the same period.

Compared to a scenario where the EU and the UK failed to agree an FTA, the FTA has cut the negative economic impact on the EU by about a third and for the UK by about a quarter. The report says those member states with a larger share of goods trade with the UK benefit relatively more from the FTA than those with a higher share of trade in services.

While the UK and the EU have agreed to impose no tariffs on goods trade, new non-tariff barriers are considerable, equal to a tax of 10.9 percent for EU imports and 8.5 percent for UK imports, the report says.
Michigan reported 1,265 new coronavirus cases and eight new deaths between Sunday and Monday, Feb. 14-15.

That means the average increase in cases over the last two days is 633.

The state is averaging 867 new COVID-19 cases per day and 36 new deaths per day over the last week. It is the lowest daily case average since Oct. 2.

Since the start of the pandemic, Michigan has reported 575,489 confirmed cases and 15,158 deaths related to COVID-19. Additionally, the state has reported 54,919 probable cases and 972 probable deaths, in which a physician and/or antigen test ruled it COVID-19 but no confirmatory PCR test was done.

(The above chart shows Michigans 7-day rolling average of new confirmed coronavirus cases. You can put your cursor over a bar to see the number. You also can click on the option just below the headline to see the actual number of new cases reported by day.)

Sixty-six of Michigans 83 counties reported new cases Monday. Wayne County led in new cases with 190, with the next closest counties being Oakland and Kent with 127 and 125, respectively.

Other top reporting counties included Washtenaw with 88 cases, Macomb with 85, Ottawa with 64, Ingham with 37, Genesee with 35, Saginaw with 30 and Livingston with 29 additional coronavirus cases.

Nine counties reported one new death each, including Oakland, Genesee, Saginaw, Lapeer, Newaygo, Calhoun, Eaton, Shiawassee and Barry.

(The above chart shows Michigans 7-day rolling average of deaths involving confirmed coronavirus cases. You can put your cursor over a bar to see the number. You also can click on the option just below the headline to see the actual number of new deaths reported by day.)

Hospitals statewide were treating 942 patients with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19 on Monday, including 258 patients in the ICU. Thats down from Feb. 8 when hospitals were treating 1,198 patients with 294 in the ICU.

Of the 30,895 diagnostic tests processed Monday, 3.52% came back positive for SARS-CoV-2. The average positivity rate over the last seven days is 3.49%.

As of Monday, Michigan had administered more than 1.6 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine. That includes about 1.1 million first doses, and 490,997 second doses. The Moderna and Pfizer vaccines recommend two doses administered weeks apart.

Case reporting

First is a chart showing new cases reported to the state each day for the past 30 days. This is based on when a confirmed coronavirus test is reported to the state, which means the patient first became sick days before.

You can call up a chart for any county, and you can put your cursor over a bar to see the date and number of cases.

(In a few instances, a county reported a negative number (decline) in daily new cases, following a retroactive reclassification by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. In those instances, we subtracted cases from the prior date and put 0 in the reported date.)

The next chart below shows new cases for the past 30 days based on onset of symptoms. In this chart, numbers for the most recent days are incomplete because of the lag time between people getting sick and getting a confirmed coronavirus test result, which can take up to a week or more.

You can call up a chart for any county, and you can put your cursor over a bar to see the date and number of cases.

For more statewide data, visit MLives coronavirus data page, here.

To find a testing site near you, check out the states online test finder, here, send an email to COVID19@michigan.gov, or call 888-535-6136 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays.

Read more on MLive:

Michigan reports 852 new coronavirus cases, 88 deaths

Beaumont Health changes visitation policy after inpatient COVID-19 numbers decline

12.5% of Michigan adults have gotten at least one Covid-19 vaccine dose; see numbers in your county

54% of Americans believe the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic is yet to come, survey says

Fully vaccinated individuals dont have to quarantine following COVID-19 exposure, CDC says
(ANSAmed) - ALGIERS, FEBRUARY 15 - The Algerian government has decided to reopen all mosques in the country and to authorize the resumption of hotel activities, scaling down restrictive measures to contain the spread pf coronavirus after the number of new cases dropped.



A statement released by the services of the prime minister's office said that "we are proceeding with the opening of all mosques on national territory and this is occurring under the rigorous respect of healthcare measures and protocols".



Also decided was the "resumption of all public and private hotel activities, with the exception of the celebration of ceremonies and festivals", the statement continued.



Moreover, the government is revoking restrictions on the activities of bars, restaurants and fast foods, in particular the obligation to close at 21:00 local time and to only offer takeout food and drinks. The curfew from 22 until 5 has been renewed for 15 days in 19 wilaya (prefectures) - out of 48 in the country - where it is still in place, including Algiers and Blida (in the center). The new measures come into effect on Monday.



All gatherings are still prohibited, including weddings, circumcisions and political rallies.



Algeria launched on January 30 its vaccination campaign in Blida, the epicenter of the epidemic, with a first provision of Russian vaccine Sputnik V. According to local media, authorities are negotiating with Moscow to produce this vaccine in Algeria.



Algiers has also received doses of British vaccine AstraZeneca.



In total, over 110,000 coronavirus cases and nearly 3,000 deaths have been registered in Algeria, Maghreb's most populous country with 44 million inhabitants. The cases and casualties were recorded since the first coronavirus patient was registered on February 25, 2020, according to the latest data provided by the health ministry. (ANSAmed).


Toolkit case: Disha Ravi first to be arrested, more to come say Delhi Police

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: The Delhi Police told a court that the arrest of Disha Ravi, one of the editors of toolkit used by Greta Thunberg was the first in the case. The police said that Disha have allegedly edited the toolkit on February 3 and many others are involved in the matter.

The court has sent Disha to five days police custody. She was arrested on Saturday. The police are looking for two more suspects in the case. While raids are being carried out in Mumbai and other places, the police are hunting for Nikita and Shantanu, two other accused in the case.

Disha Ravi, who claims to be a climate activist arrested on charges of sharing a toolkit on the social media related to the farmers' protest was allegedly a key conspirator in the curation and distribution of the document.

SKM condemns arrest of Disha in toolkit case, demands her immediate release

The police alleged that she collaborated with pro-Khalsitani outfit Poetic Justice Foundation to to "spread disaffection against Indian state" and also shared the document with Thunberg.

"Disha Ravi, arrested by CyPAD Delhi Police, is an Editor of the Toolkit Google Doc & key conspirator in document's formulation & dissemination. She started WhatsApp Group and collaborated to make the toolkit doc. She worked closely with them to draft the doc. In this process, they all collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. She was the one who shared the Toolkit Doc with Greta Thunberg", said the police in a statement.

Delhi Police has taken cognizance of a 'Toolkit Document' found on a social media platform that predates and indicates a copycat execution of a conspiracy behind the 26Jan violence. The call was to wage economic, social, cultural and regional war against India, the police also said.

Later, she asked Greta to remove the main Doc after its incriminating details accidentally got into public domain. This is many times more than the 2 lines editing that she claims, the police also said.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Several pro-Khalistan outfits have thrown their hat in the ring amidst the farmer protests. The likes of Mo Dhaliwal have been blamed for creating a toolkit, which was used by Greta Thunberg to speak in favour of the farmer protests. India has however made it clear that it will not tolerate any outside interference and the farmer protests are completely India's internal matter.
Dandanies, rejoice! EXO D.O will be seen on the big screen once again in an upcoming remake of a Taiwanese movie!

On Monday, Feb. 15, Hive Media Corp., the production company behind the film, announced that Do Kyung Soo has been cast in a Korean remake of the 2008 Taiwanese film titled "Secret." The original movie starred Jay Chou and Gwei Lun Mei.

"Secret" is a fantasy-romance film that tells the story of a piano genius who transfers into a new school and meets a girl who was playing a mysterious song in an old piano practice room. And that's where their love story begins.

Do Kyungsoo, commonly known as EXO D.O, will play the male lead role, which is similar to Jay Chou's role of Ye Xianglun. The female lead has not been decided yet and will be chosen through auditions.

The Korean remake of the Taiwanese film will be directed by Seo Yoon Min, who previously worked on several movies such as "April Snow," "Happiness," "You Call It Passion," and is currently working on the upcoming film "Memories of Tomorrow" (working title). "Secret" is set to start filming in the second half of this year.

"Secret" is EXO D.O's second acting project after he was discharged from the military, the first one is another new film titled "The Moon."

EXO D.O Films a New Movie Titled "The Moon" Following Military Discharge

After his military discharge on Jan. 25, EXO D.O already kicked off filming for a new movie titled "The Moon." Directed by Kim Yong Hwa, the upcoming film is about a man left alone in space after an unexpected accident (will be played by EXO D.O) and another man on Earth who is trying to get him back to the planet safely (will be played by Sol Kyung Gu).

"The Moon" is not only his first acting project after he returned from the military, but it is also his first one this year. With the Korean remake of the Taiwanese film scheduled to begin filming in the second half of the year, it looks like Do Kyungsoo will be productive this 2021.

From "Cart" to "Pure Love" to Major Small Screen Broadcasts: D.O's Previous Film and Drama Projects

EXO D.O made his big-screen debut with a supporting role in the movie "Cart" back in September 2014. In January 2016, he was chosen as one of the voice actors for the animated film "Underdog," which premiered in 2019. Later in February, he got his first male lead role in the romantic movie "Pure Love." Then in November of the same year, he was again cast in another film, titled "My Annoying Brother."

In the following years, the idol-actor continued to star in numerous movies, such as "Room No. 7" (2017), "Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds" (2017), and "Swing Kids" (2018), arguably one of his best works yet.

Besides appearing in films, EXO D.O was also cast in dramas, starting with a supporting role in the SBS drama "It's Okay, That's Love" back in 2014. His latest drama is "100 Days My Prince," which is the fifth highest-rated Korean drama in cable television in history.

Are you excited about EXO D.O's new movies? Tell us in the comments!

For more news updates about other K-Pop news, always keep your tabs open here at Kpopstarz.

Owned by Kpopstarz

Written by Mhaliya Scott
Australian film royalty Bryan Brown and his wife Rachel Ward are still mystified by false and malicious rumours claiming they started the coronavirus outbreak on Sydney's Northern Beaches in December.

They were wrongly named as being the couple who failed to self-isolate while waiting for their Covid-19 test results - sparking the region's spike in coronavirus cases in December.

The rumours falsely claimed the acting greats contracted the virus overseas before returning to Sydney and spreading it at a gym class at Anytime Fitness Avalon.

Ward at the time categorically denied the claims on social media and told trolls who spread the lies on Northern Beaches Facebook groups to 'pick on another witch'.

Bryan Brown and his wife Rachel Ward have broken their silence on claims they were responsible for a coronavirus superspreader event on Sydney's Northern Beaches

Australian silver screen legend Rachel Ward shared this picture of herself cuddling a marsupial to tell trolls: 'Pick on another witch'

Brown, 73, on Monday said the flimsy tale was made all the more implausible by the fact he and his wife do not actually live on the Northern Beaches.

'It was a load of rubbish... I have no idea how this started,' he told Sydney Confidential.

'I havent been overseas in 18 months. I didnt have Covid-19. I dont have a personal trainer. I dont live on the Northern Beaches. I have no idea how it happened.'

He said it was only when he started getting constant phone calls that he realised what was being said about him online.

'Im not on social media so I didnt know anything about it until suddenly I was getting phone calls from everyone,' he said.

One version of the fake story claimed they gave Covid-19 to their personal trainer while the star couple was cooped up in home quarantine.

Brown, 73, on Monday called the rumours 'a load of rubbish' - adding he doesn't even live on the Northern Beaches

Pictured: The photo Ward posted with Dr Zach Bush in March calling the coronavirus 'silly' and 'just another flu'

Ward, 63, said though she did not have a personal trainer and had not been to the US in more than five years.

Some followers suggested Ward may have intentionally been targeted by trolls after she posted to Instagram in March that the virus is 'just another flu and will pass as the northern hemisphere moves into spring'.

'You do realise you are being targeted after your post of March 12 went viral,' one follower informed her.

Anytime Fitness Avalon was forced to issue a desperate message telling followers the false rumour was 'not in any way correct'

That controversial post remains on her Instagram - but was published at a time when less was known about the virus which has since pushed Australia's two biggest states into lockdown on multiple occasions.

Anytime Fitness Avalon, which was sometimes named in the false stories, also refuted a false rumour about a personal trainer.

The gym posted to Facebook: 'THIS IS NOT IN ANY WAY CORRECT.'
The brutal murder of Patna Universitys Prof. Papiya Ghosh and her elderly maidservant at her home in Patna on December 3 shocked the academic community in Bihar. A brave and popular singleton, Prof. Ghosh taught history to postgrad students at Patna University.

In a state where college education is in a shambles and elite private tutors hire armed bodyguards as they teach batches of 200-500 students to rake in big bucks, the brutal murder of this popular academic has come as a huge blow to the already demoralised academy. That a serious academic could be killed in such a barbaric manner in one of the most upscale residential localities of the state capital has conveyed a chilling message: the state is still at the mercy of anti-social goons and criminals and the role of the police is merely to reconstruct crimes without much hope of successful arrest and prosecution of perpetrators.

Yet the silver lining to this cruelly-executed murder is that public protests in Patna continued for over a fortnight with widespread condemnation of the heinous crime pouring in from all over the country. The police was quick to describe the murders as robbery-related and arrested four local youth on December 15. Goods stolen from the professors modest home were recovered following intensive investigation driven by a sustained campaign by local media.

Born in 1953 the late professor was the daughter of an IAS officer and had received her school education in Patna. One of her sisters is also an IAS officer and currently posted as officer on special duty with Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chatterjee. A graduate of Patna Womens College, Ghosh pressed on to pursue her Masters and Ph D in history at Delhi University. Thereafter against the advice of all, she returned to teach history at her alma mater, Patna Womens College. It proved to be a fateful decision.

Although the police insist that the motive of the crime is common robbery, the local media is rife with stories of how she was threatened by some politicians and the land mafia to part with her house which is in a prestigious neighbourhood. In 2004 Ghosh had filed a complaint with the police in this connection. After that she never received any fresh threats. Nevertheless the opposition Lalu Prasad-led Rashtriya Janata Dal party has demanded a CBI probe with the state government insisting that the local police has already solved the case. Yet there is considerable disquiet  indeed fear  in the city that a murder most foul was committed in broad daylight in the upscale Pataliputra colony.

Yet this much-lamented murder and the intense speculation it has aroused is indicative of the reality that despite good intentions, the new Nitish Kumar-led state government which was voted to power in 2005, has a long way to go before restoring citizens faith in the police and law and order machinery.

Meanwhile the state governments effort to attract high quality teachers into the promised new Bihar has suffered a severe setback.

(Published in Education World online)
The Centre integre pour personnes agees (CIPA) resident in Rumelange received her first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine on her birthday.

Jacqueline Draut is a bit of a personality within the CIPA walls at the premises in the south of the country.

Having celebrated her 102nd birthday last Thursday, February 11, the bright as a button Draut is a breath of fresh air.

Born in 1919 in Paris, she arrived with her parents in Luxembourg at the age of three. Madame Draut then lived in Tetange where she had two children.

Part of a community of 62 residents in Rumelange,

Jacqueline assured the RTL team that neither the injection nor the vaccine scared her.

Since the second week of the year, all residents and staff of Servior establishments have been vaccinated.

The country's last residence will receive the first dose of the vaccine by next Friday (20 February).

Residents told RTL that they feel more secure thanks to the vaccine - the rate of vaccination among healthcare staff in nursing homes is now 60% across the Grand Duchy.

Two Servior residences are currently affected by a number of Covid-19 cases, but officials have assured that these people do not have serious symptoms and that the situation remains under control.

See the video report (in Luxembourgish) from RTL Tele Letzebuerg below:
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Mayor Tim Keller announced last month he was tightening down a program giving vendors competing for city contracts a preference if the disparity between salaries of their male and female employees did not exceed 7%.

The original incentive program to combat pay inequity was designed by activist Martha Burk and sponsored by City Councilor Diane Gibson in 2015. Under the new rule, a vendor must now have zero disparity to get the 5% preference.

The playing field wont be level until women, and especially women of color, earn fair wages compared to their counterparts, Keller said in a statement announcing the change. Part of that means rewarding companies that walk the walk.

Fair enough. In addition, the new rule mirrors rules adopted by Bernalillo County and the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority, providing consistency among partnering entities. On the surface, the citys change appears a good move.

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But there are two problems here.

First, both Burk and Gibson fear going to zero will essentially render the incentive program meaningless. It will be too hard to do; I think you have to incentivize people gradually to get them from point A to point B, and this to me seems like too big a step, said Burk, who also helped design the states gender pay policies.

A 7% disparity might sound like a lot  it is. But not in comparison to the average pay gap in New Mexico of 21%. (New Mexico as a state ranks 15th nationally.) Data collected through the city procurement process found gender pay gaps up to 40%. About 80 companies have received the citys certification since 2015.

I think it (the change) effectively just kills the whole program that we worked so very hard on, Gibson said.

And as for walking the walk, civil rights attorney Alexandra Freedman Smith is representing about 600 women who have joined a handful of individual plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit against the city of Albuquerque alleging significant and systemic gender pay inequity.

The lawsuit filed in 2018 and amended in 2019 claims that depending on how jobs are classified, women are paid $3 an hour to $6 an hour less than male counterparts who perform the same functions, and in many cases the women have been in the jobs longer.

The base pay also impacts overtime and pensions, and in some cases plaintiffs allege as much as a $7-an-hour difference. Freedman Smith says some of her clients are owed as much as $100,000 because of the pay differential.

The states Fair Pay for Women Act adopted in 2013 makes it unlawful to pay women less than men for equal work that requires equal skill, effort and responsibility and that is performed under similar conditions. There are exceptions, including seniority and merit.

The lawsuit was certified as a class action in July by state District Judge Clay Campbell  a decision the city is fighting in court. The city wont comment on litigation, but says the current administration has been at the forefront of the pay equity fight for years.

Freedman Smith, who served as staff attorney for the state commission that proposed a new state Civil Rights Act, sees it differently.

Its particularly egregious (Mayor Tim Kellers Office) came out with something saying we want to have pay equity for women by giving preference to contractors who pay men and women equally, she told New Mexico Political Report. Mayor Keller needs to lead by example instead of fighting the women who work for him and steadfastly refusing them what they should be paid under the law.

These are serious allegations with potentially taxpayer dollars attached, and the new policy brings the issue back into focus. Keller told the Journal we are working hard on legacy pay inequities.  Were working on that in our own house, and with contractors bidding for taxpayer dollars.

That is good to hear. In addition, the public, the women who work for the city and the City Council all need and deserve an honest accounting. And if inequities are found, a plan to fix them and compensate the victims. That would be walking the walk.
Four people in Oregon, who were fully immunized with the COVID-19 vaccine, have tested positive for coronavirus, health officials revealed on Friday.

This makes Oregon among the first states to report 'breakthrough cases,' which occur when people test positive for the virus at least 14 days after receiving their second dose of the vaccine.

Both vaccines approved for emergency use authorizations - Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna - are 95 percent effective, meaning five percent who get vaccinated may still get sick, which official says is serious but not surprising.

'[This is] not to be unexpected in a vaccine that while phenomenal, with 95 percent effectiveness, still means five percent may still be infected,' Dr Patrick Allen, director of Oregon Health Authority (OHA) said at a Friday press conference

Two of the breakthrough cases are in Yamhill County, about 40 miles from Portland, and the other two are located in Lane County, about 135 miles away.

Officials say the four people had few to no symptoms, which appear to back studies suggesting that the vaccine may help reduce the severity of the illness.

While the OHA wasn't able to give details about where these cases came from, their ages or when they got their last vaccine, they said 2 of the 4 cases are associated with a single location where a cluster is.

Four people in Oregon, who were fully immunized with the COVID-19 vaccine, have tested positive for coronavirus, all of whom had mild to no symptoms. Pictured: An Oregonian aged 80 or older receives a COVID-19 vaccinations at the Oregon Convention Center in Portland, February 10

Both vaccines, from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, are 95% effective, meaning 5% of all people will fall ill, so officials say there are bound to be more of these 'breakthrough cases' (above)

At the press conference on Friday, Dr Dean Sidelinger, the health authority's state health officer, said no vaccine provides 100 percent protection, which means there will be more breakthrough cases.

'What all this means is that we can expect to see more breakthrough cases,' Dean Sidelinger, the health authority's state health officer.

'Getting as many Oregonians as possible vaccinated remains a critical objective to ending the pandemic.

'Based on what we know about vaccines for other diseases and early data from clinical trials, experts believe that getting a COVID-19 vaccine may also help keep you from getting seriously ill, even if you do get sick.'

It is unclear yet if any of the four infections involved newer variants of the virus from the UK, South Africa or Brazil.

OHA is currently attempting to get samples from these patients and is sending them to the CDC to be tested in a genomic surveillance program.

Officials are hoping to have data about the cases available by this week

In addition, the health authority announced on Friday that the number of people receiving the COVID-19 vaccine in Oregon and the amount of doses being shipped to the state have increased.

However multiple vaccine locations were forced to close Friday and Saturday due to snowy and icy weather.

Currently, 10 percent of Oregon's population have received at least a first dose of COVID-19 vaccine.

Currently, an average of between 1.6 and 1.7 million Americans are being vaccinated every day

A total of 38.2 million Americans - 11.6% of the population - have received at least one dose while 14 million - 4.2% - have received both doses

'Although still scarce, vaccines are becoming more widely available. More Oregonians are getting vaccinated by the day,' Sidelinger said.

Health officials announced Friday that Oregon's weekly allocation of first doses is again increasing, from 75,000 to 82,000.

'These additional doses will help ensure our timelines stay on track and we may even get through our population of older adults sooner, but it's still too early to tell,' Allen said.

In the US, more than 70 million doses have been shipped to states and more than 52.8 million have been administered, according to the CDC.

A total of 38.2 million Americans - 11.6 percent of the population - have received at least one dose while 14 million - 4.2 percent - have received both doses.

Currently, an average of between 1.6 and 1.7 million people are being vaccinated every day.

Health officials say they want to reiterate the importance of getting vaccinated as soon as doses become available to you..

'The COVID-19 vaccine is safe and effective. The benefits of the vaccine far outweigh the risks of getting COVID-19,' general surgeon D. Mary Giswold told the AP.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : Amid involvement of environmental activists in the ongoing protests against the new farm laws, it is important to understand the impact of these laws on the environment as the government claims agricultural reforms will bring about a revolutionary change in the lives of India's small and marginal farmers.

IANS spoke to some experts in the field of agriculture, including scientists, officials and economists.

Farmers protesting along the borders of the national capital for nearly three months claim that the new farm laws of the Centre will not benefit farmers as APMC 'mandis' will collapse and farmers will not get Minimum Support Price for the crops they grow after enforcement of new laws, but experts are of the opinion that these laws will not only benefit farmers but also the consumers as new reforms initiated by the Modi government will also resolve several issues related to environment and health.

In the existing Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC) system, there is no direct communication between producers and consumers, this gap suppresses market signals and leads to rogue growing patterns which ultimately leads to financial crisis for farmers because of demand and supply mismatch, said agricultural economist Vijay Sardana who is in favour of the new agricultural laws of the Centre.

In a series of initiatives to bring crucial reforms in agriculture and allied sectors, the government enacted two newly-framed laws and one amended Act cleared by the Parliament last year in September. However, the Supreme Court has suspended these laws at present, and a committee set up by the apex court is examining the various issues related to these laws.

Experts say that the Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion & Facilitation) Act, 2020 and the Farmers' (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020 will enable a transformative shift in Indian agricultural sustainability and climate resilience.

They say that these laws will enable the creation of newer markets for farmers and better linkage of production to market demand. This will result in more holistic production planning and can lead to crop diversification away from water-intensive crops and towards crops that will be more suitable for the future in the Indian agro-climatic scenario.

For example, millets which are today in demand globally as health super foods can be grown in areas with lower water availability once there are improved linkages of farmers to markets. Premium for organic, pesticide-free crops can also be passed back to farmers to encourage them to grow using these practices.

Agricultural scientists say that even where more water-intensive crops continue to be grown, newer technologies will be introduced by market participants in a more economically viable manner to support precision farming and drip irrigation over larger land parcels, resulting in greater optimisation of water and input usage.

Dr Manoj Kumar, acting Director, ICAR-Central Potato Research Institute said, the new laws will encourage farmers for crop diversification which is the need of the hour.

The new farm laws will give impetus to diversification of the cropping system with increased cultivation and production of horticultural crops like fruits and vegetables. This will add to environmental sustainability, economic viability and ensure food and nutritional security of the country, he said.

A senior government official told IANS that contract farming can result in better overall environmental practices.

Starting with improved land planning and utilisation of land to grow the right crop mix. There will be a stronger focus on meeting grower requirements and many companies engaged in contract farming have a focus on Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance (ESG) and sustainability, these practices will be introduced through backward integration, he added.

Citing an example, he said that better pesticide management to ensure lower residue in line with global MRL standards or introduction of newer variants such as drought resistant pesticide through better access and availability of R&D.

More modern infrastructure will also be introduced in the value chain, and private participants can make investments to ensure these are climate-resilient and will support changing environmental conditions, thereby resulting in lower wastage e.g. due to unseasonal rains and flooding.

The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020 provides that the supply of foodstuffs, including cereals, pulses, potato, onions, edible oilseeds and oils, may be regulated only under extraordinary circumstances which may include war, famine, extraordinary price rise and natural calamity of grave nature, thereby removes fear of sudden imposition of stock limits on the players in the storage and food processing sectors.

Economist Vjay Sardana says that in a surplus economy, under Essential Commodities Act, excessive storage leads to food wastage and losses of surplus items, and on the other hand, there is shortage of storage facilities for other required commodities and this imbalance puts additional pressure on natural resources.

Most of the wastage occurs in the case of fruits and vegetables. Farmers suffer huge losses when there are bumper harvests of perishable commodities. With adequate processing facilities, much of this wastage can be reduced thus providing remunerative prices to producers, ensuring greater supply to consumers and reduce pollution. This will ultimately reduce the impact on environment.
New South Wales Labor leader Jodi McKay

New South Wales Labor leader Jodi McKay is under pressure to resign after writing a so-called 'letter of support' for a convicted paedophile.

Ms McKay became involved in the Tamil man's application for a bridging visa after his release from jail for assaulting a young girl in 2017.

The 22-year-old man met the 13-year-old girl as she waited for her train to school in western Sydney. He took her number and later asked for her address after chatting on WhatsApp.

The man turned up at the girl's house one night and assaulted her on her bed in the early hours of the morning.

He was jailed for a year and then taken to Villawood Immigration Detention Centre where he applied for a bridging visa while awaiting a Federal Court decision on a protection visa.

Ms McKay, as the MP for Strathfield, wrote a letter on a behalf of a constituent who knew the man.

The letter was sent it to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, which was reviewing the federal government's decision to deny him a bridging visa.

'To whom it may concern... I ask that you consider the attached documentation and [the man's] circumstances when considering his application for a bridging visa,' said the letter dated August 27, 2018.

The letter was listed in evidence as a 'letter of support'.

Liberal politicians have called for Ms McKay to resign after the Sydney Morning Herald revealed the letter in a report on Monday night.

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton told radio station 2GB that Ms McKay's leadership was 'no longer credible'.

He said her letter 'beggars belief' and that it's 'really hard' to take tough action on paedophiles when MPs support them.

The 22-year-old man met the 13-year-old girl as she waited for her train to school in western Sydney (stock image)

NSW Police Minister David Elliot asked: 'Why would a member of parliament defend anybody convicted of paedophilia?

'She cannot stand up in parliament and criticise Gladys and then turn around and justify how she defends paedophiles.'

Ms McKay said her letter was not a 'letter of support' and that she was merely passing on a letter from a constituent.

'I was forwarding documents, that's what MPs do,' she told 2GB.

She said Minister Elliot's comments were vile and claimed he had defamed her.

'I did not do anything wrong and I am horrified by the allegation,' she said.

Ms McKay said she did not check what the Tamil man had done before she sent the letter and did not know it was being sent to a tribunal.

'If you search his name, nothing comes up,' she said.

'I would never write a letter of support or a reference, that's the policy I have.'
TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

Under the patronage of Bahrain Defence Force (BDF) Commander-in-Chief Field Marshal Shaikh Khalifa bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, a ceremony was held to inaugurate modern training facilities that included a training wing, a lecture hall, a building similar to archery and a shooting field.

The ceremony coincided with the anniversary of the establishment of the Bahrain Defence Force on February 5.

Chief-of-Staff Lieutenant-General Theyab bin Saqr Al Nuaimi toured the premises where he was briefed on the modern training facilities, equipment and technologies in the military field.

During the ceremony where he represented the BDF Commander-in-Chief, Al Nuaimi affirmed the close follow-up by His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa of all BDF units and his interest in developing them in terms of management, advanced and modern weapons, preparedness and upgrading all military installations.
Thousands of California families chose to keep their children out of kindergarten this past year, opting instead for other in-person programs or no school at all.

That means thousands  or potentially tens of thousands  more children than usual will be hitting first grade next school year without having been through kindergarten, putting even more stress on an already strained system.

California is one of 32 states where kindergarten is optional. Its an option that experts have increasingly come to disagree with. Children who skip kindergarten, they argue, arrive in first grade behind their peers in key areas like reading.

Learning through play is so important for brain development and social emotional development, said Gennie Gorback, president-elect of the California Kindergarten Association.

Kids who have never gone to preschool or been in an organized setting need that kindergarten time to learn how to do school, said Gorback, a former preschool and transitional kindergarten teacher whose own child will start kindergarten in the fall. Things like how to sit crisscross applesauce, raise hands to get called on or to form a line.

You dont naturally know that, it takes time.

What happened to the children of California families who chose to skip Zoom school for their 5-year-olds largely depends on their familys income. Experts worry the most affected are children from low-income families, whose parents had to decide between continuing to work or sitting with their children through virtual learning.

Among those that didnt go anywhere at all there will be variances among the experiences they have at home, said Deborah Stipek, the Judy Koch Professor of Education at Stanford Graduate School of Education. There will be parents who try to fill in the gap and those who may not know how to do that.

The gap is expected to put pressure especially on first-grade teachers, who will be required to differentiate students skills and try to get them caught up on basics they would have learned in kindergarten.

How many kids skipped kindergarten? While an official number doesnt exist yet  the California Department of Education is still compiling enrollment data and said it will not be ready until March  talking to school districts up and down the state suggests the number will be large.

The states largest school district  Los Angeles Unified  saw its overall enrollment decline 14%. The most significant decrease was in the kindergarten ranks, which lost 6,000 students. The San Diego Unified School District showed a decline of 1,682 kindergarten and transitional kindergarten children. The Sacramento City Unified School District also lost a crop of the youngest learners. As of December, the number of kindergartners was down by 600, a decrease of 18% from the prior year.

These districts are hardly alone.

Anne Wernikoff / CalMatters

Declining enrollment hit more than 60% of the states 1,000-plus districts and most of the drop happened in the earlier grades, Michael Fine, CEO of Californias Fiscal and Management Assistance Team told a legislative education committee last month.

Los Angeles Unified Superintendent Austin Beutner said the biggest drops were generally in neighborhoods with the lowest household incomes.

We suspect some of this might be because families may lack the ability to provide full-time support for online learning which is necessary for very young learners, he said in August. This is yet another reminder that this crisis is having a disproportionate impact on low-income families.

Where did they go? Families with resources may have chosen to pay for private in-person schooling, small-group pods, or extended time in preschool programs, while low-income children, who stayed at home, may not be getting high-quality enrichment experiences, said Anna Markowitz, assistant professor of education in the School of Education and Information Studies at UCLA.

Low-income families where parents work essential jobs may have had to choose between virtual school, where a parent has to sit with their child, and continuing to earn money to pay rent and buy food. Many may have also faced internet connectivity issues that frustrated the process and chose instead to keep the kids at home with family.

A McKinsey & Co. study found that Black and Latino children are the most likely to experience learning loss because they have less access to quality remote learning or a conducive learning environment at home.

Kindergarten and preschool programs help to equalize kids, Markowitz said. Without those experiences you are going to see a bigger stretch in their abilities. It will be academic but also experiences in a school-based setting, the practice of being in school.

Why is kindergarten important? Kindergarten has become more academic in the last couple of decades as standards like No Child Left Behind and Common Core State Standards became the norm.

Kindergartners are expected to learn a fair amount, and the good news is they can, said Stipek, of the Stanford Graduate School of Education. We grossly underestimated how much they could learn in literacy, early math before.

The other piece of critical learning that takes place in kindergarten is social emotional learning, said Adria Taha-Resnick, president-elect of the California Association for the Education of Young Children and a professor of early childhood education at California State University Channel Islands.

This is the ability to relate to others, learn how to regulate oneself, build confidence in interacting with teachers and others, and to feel safe and secure enough to speak out, said Taha-Resnick. She said that while children can catch up academically its difficult to redo that important time when children are learning how to interact with their peers and teacher and learning about themselves in the process.

Experts worry that the achievement and opportunity gaps that already existed among low-income students and students of color will deepen under current circumstances.

This early learning window is so important for learning critical skills, said Jenny Hontz, a parent and spokeswoman for Speak Up, a Los Angeles parent advocate group. It could take years for the kids to catch up, and some kids may be permanently harmed by this.

COVID Resources Coronavirus Map Tracking COVID-19 cases across the Bay Area and California.

The group is advocating for schools to resume in-person learning as soon as possible, especially for special needs students and English language learners who have an even harder time with virtual learning.

Hontz said the district is considering mandatory summer school and extending next school year by several days. but its not enough.

Its going to take all-hands-on-deck thinking, longer school days or longer school years, really intensive intervention to make sure the kids get what they need, she said.

This is why theres been continuing efforts, including again this year, by legislators and advocates to make kindergarten mandatory in California.

State Sen. Susan Rubio, D- Baldwin Park (Los Angeles County) is behind the current bill in Sacramento to require it. Rubio said there is a misconception about kindergarten that needs to be updated, especially among her peers in the Legislature.

That in years past kindergarten is where you got to get a nap and play with kids, that is not the reality, she said. Kindergarten is where you learn the essentials for writing. You have to know your numbers, your alphabet. These are substantive things they need to know to transition to first grade.

How to prepare for the students return? That kind of intensive work is going to need to include differentiating among students, learning about their experiences and figuring how to best help them, Stipek said. But much of it is going to need additional resources.

Theres a lot of extra things that can be done to make up for some of the disadvantages, but they are costly, they are not free, Stipek said. So there will be huge variability in what districts do. We need to be extra vigilant to ensure that the kids who need it get the help.

Teachers, in particular, will face an extra burden this next year as students enter the classroom with greater variability in their skills than ever. Districts will need to help them by providing additional resources like summer school, tutoring and parental involvement, she said.

Taha-Resnick recommends that districts mix children who skipped kindergarten into classrooms with kids of all levels because young children tend to also learn from one another.

Gorback, of the California Kindergarten Association, said the organization is going to focus its spring development series on what teachers will need and how to best differentiate students when there are wide gaps between them.

Schools may need to build a kindergarten-like curriculum for first-grade teachers to use to cover some of the skills that were missed, Markowitz.This is a problem that will be evident in other grades but will be amplified in first grade, Markowitz said. We are not going to hold back an entire year of kids.

Elizabeth Aguilera writes for CalMatters, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.
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In this file photo dated Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2021, a mortuary employee wearing full PPE checks coffins containing the remains of COVID-19 victims in a refrigerated container in Johannesburg. The World Health Organization Monday Feb. 15, 2021, granted an emergency authorization to the coronavirus vaccine made by AstraZeneca, a move that should allow its partners to ship millions of doses to countries worldwide as part of a U.N.-backed program to stop the pandemic.(AP Photo/Jerome Delay)

It's nearly launch time for COVAX, the United Nations' unprecedented program to deploy COVID-19 vaccines for hundreds of millions in need around the globe.

More than two months after countries like Britain and the United States started immunizing their most vulnerable people, the U.N.'s health agency gave its approval Monday to a vaccine developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca, which should trigger the release of hundreds of millions of doses by COVAX.

COVAX missed its own target of starting vaccination in poor countries at the same time as immunizations were rolled out in rich countries, and numerous developing countries have signed their own deals to buy vaccine, fearing the program won't deliver.

The World Health Organization and partners hope COVAX can finally start shipping out vaccines later this month.

Here's a look at the project:

WHAT IS COVAX, AND WHY DOES IT MATTER?

It's a cooperative program aimed to make sure low- and middle-income countries get equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines. Some buy them, others get them for free thanks to donor countries and charities.

COVAX hopes to deploy some 336 million doses by the end of June, and around 2 billion doses by the end of the year.

In this file photo dated Sunday, Feb. 7, 2021, Afghan health ministry workers unload boxes of the first shipment of 500,000 doses of the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine made by Serum Institute of India, donated by the Indian government to Afghanistan, at the customs area of the Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan. The World Health Organization Monday Feb. 15, 2021, granted an emergency authorization to the coronavirus vaccine made by AstraZeneca, a move that should allow its partners to ship millions of doses to countries worldwide as part of a U.N.-backed program to stop the pandemic.(AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said last week that over 130 million doses of vaccine have been deployed globallythree quarters of them in only ten countries. Almost 130 countries with 2.5 billion people haven't administered a single dose, he said.

WHY IS WHO 'EMERGENCY USE' APPROVAL IMPORTANT?

Unlike most wealthy nations, many developing countries don't have the resources to assess whether vaccines should be approved. They rely on the WHO to determine if vaccines are safe, effective and have been made properly.

The most impactful moment for COVAX so far looms with Monday's approval of the AstraZeneca vaccine; the program has bought hundreds of millions of doses, although there is no guarantee when countries will receive them. The Serum Institute of India, which will produce the majority of them, has previously said its provision of shots to COVAX would be "calibrated" in line with India's own domestic and other needs.

In this file photo dated Sunday, Feb. 7, 2021, Boxes of the first shipment of 500,000 doses of the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine made by Serum Institute of India, donated by the Indian government, await distribution at the customs area of the Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan. The World Health Organization Monday Feb. 15, 2021, granted an emergency authorization to the coronavirus vaccine made by AstraZeneca, a move that should allow its partners to ship millions of doses to countries worldwide as part of a U.N.-backed program to stop the pandemic. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)

But questions have arisen recently about the vaccine's use, given the increasing spread of the virus variant first identified in South Africa. Early studies suggest the AstraZeneca vaccine is less effective against that variant and South Africa's government delayed plans to roll out its own supplies of the vaccine. The WHO said last week the AstraZeneca shot should still be used in countries that have detected variantsbut the head of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned the region's countries to prioritize other vaccines instead.

WHO GETS THE DOSES FIRST?

COVAX leaders haven't said.

Gian Gandhi, the UNICEF supply coordinator for COVAX, said a confirmation of the doses that the U.N. children's agency can deploy will come once the WHO has approved the AstraZeneca vaccine.

In this file photo dated Friday, Feb. 5, 2021, Vials of the AstraZeneca vaccine and loaded syringes wait to be administered to homeless persons at the Welcome Centre in Ilford, east London. The World Health Organization Monday Feb. 15, 2021, granted an emergency authorization to the coronavirus vaccine made by AstraZeneca, a move that should allow its partners to ship millions of doses to countries worldwide as part of a U.N.-backed program to stop the pandemic.(AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

in this file photo dated Saturday, Jan. 30, 2021, a Moroccan nurse administers the Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine to a health worker, at Cheikh Khalifa Hospital in Casablanca, Morocco. The World Health Organization Monday Feb. 15, 2021, granted an emergency authorization to the coronavirus vaccine made by AstraZeneca, a move that should allow its partners to ship millions of doses to countries worldwide as part of a U.N.-backed program to stop the pandemic.(AP Photo/Abdeljalil Bounhar)

In this file photo dated Friday, Feb. 12, 2021, Doses of AstraZeneca vaccines for COVID-19 sit in vials at the Fiocruz Foundation after being bottled in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The World Health Organization Monday Feb. 15, 2021, granted an emergency authorization to the coronavirus vaccine made by AstraZeneca, a move that should allow its partners to ship millions of doses to countries worldwide as part of a U.N.-backed program to stop the pandemic.(AP Photo/Bruna Prado)

In this file photo dated Thursday, Feb. 11, 2021, a health worker prepares a dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine to be administered in Fiumicino, near Rome's international airport. The World Health Organization Monday Feb. 15, 2021, granted an emergency authorization to the coronavirus vaccine made by AstraZeneca, a move that should allow its partners to ship millions of doses to countries worldwide as part of a U.N.-backed program to stop the pandemic.(AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

The WHO takes into account readiness and need, and has placed a priority on getting doses to health care workers and vulnerable people like the elderly.

The deployment "will vary from country to country," Gandhi said. "In some instances, the timeframe could be in the range of days and weeks; in others it could be several weeks."

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
One Republican woman had the courage to take on a corrosive bully in her own party, a fellow senator who had Washington firmly in his thrall, deftly using lies and intimidation to keep his opponents off balance and his fellow Republicans in check.

Her name, at least in 1950, was Margaret Chase Smith, the junior senator from Maine. On her way to the Senate floor to say what no one else had been willing to say, she was approached by the bully, whose name, at least in 1950, was Sen. Joseph McCarthy.

Margaret, you look very serious, he told her, according to a recounting by historian Jon Meacham. Are you going to make a speech?

Yes, she said. and you will not like it.

McCarthy growled to Smith, a potential vice-presidential pick, that any path to the White House went through him: Remember, Margaret, I control Wisconsins 27 convention votes.

For what? Smith asked.

Then she delivered her Declaration of Conscience, speech. Backed by six other GOP senators, it condemned attitudes of know nothing, suspect everything and McCarthys scorched-earth tactics that leveled wild accusations of communism and trampled democratic principles for political advantage.

In that moment, Smith guaranteed her place on the bad side of McCarthy  and on the right side of history.

Seventy years later, most Republican senators sided with the bully, whose name today is Donald Trump, absolving the former president from his role in the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters, which left five people dead, dozens injured and threatened democracy itself.

As for this editorial board, we side with the heroes, who, just like in 1950 were led by a courageous Republican woman, whose name today is U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming. The third-ranking House Republican stared down censure, calls to resign and promises of a primary challenge when she backed Trumps impeachment and called his siccing of a violent mob on Congress exactly what it was: an unprecedented betrayal of his office and of the Constitution.

We also applaud her GOP colleague, U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington state, who bravely came forward in the eleventh hour of Trumps Senate impeachment trial with a damning recounting of a conversation she said House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a Trump loyalist, told her he had with Trump in which the president sided with the mob over those trying to stop it.

We salute the seven Republican senators, some of whom are facing harsh backlash for choosing the right thing over the easy thing. They joined the majority of U.S. senators and voted to convict Trump of inciting insurrection. Together with steadfast Democrats, who presented a compelling case, they made it the most bipartisan vote ever in favor of convicting a president in a Senate impeachment trial. In their own words:

I cannot allow the significance of my vote to be devalued by whether or not I feel that this is helpful for my political ambitions, said Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

The President promoted unfounded conspiracy theories to cast doubt on the integrity of a free and fair election because he did not like the results, said Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina.

President Trump attempted to corrupt the election by pressuring the secretary of state of Georgia to falsify the election results in his state, said Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah.

He publicly and falsely declared that Vice President Pence could break his constitutional oath and simply declare a different outcome, said Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska.

When these efforts failed, President Trump summoned thousands to Washington, D.C. and inflamed their passions, said Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Instead of preventing a dangerous situation, President Trump created one, said Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. And rather than defend the constitutional transfer of power, he incited an insurrection with the purpose of preventing that transfer of power from occurring.

I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty, said Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana.

Because conviction required two-thirds of the chamber to agree, these brave senators were on the losing side  but then, so was the truth.

Their colleagues who voted to acquit either averted their eyes from the glaring evidence or cowered behind strained legal arguments. History will judge them, but the American people need not wait. We bore witness to the assault on our nations Capitol and the evidence presented in trial.

We will not forget Trumps crimes or the failure of most in his party to hold him accountable. Senators failed to show the same kind of courage that Republican state officials did as they resisted the former presidents pressure to overturn an election.

They failed to put their duty to safeguard democracy above partisan allegiance. They took no strength from former Vice President Mike Pence, who rebuffed calls to interfere in the Electoral College certification process, or from former Attorney General Bill Barr, who investigated allegations of voter fraud and, finding no evidence, chose to resign rather than perpetuate Trumps false claims.

They failed to honor the bravery of the officers who risked their lives to prevent further carnage, including Capitol officer Brian D. Sicknick who was killed and the almost 140 officers who were bruised, bloodied and bashed by a mob wielding bats and flag poles.

Perhaps the starkest profile in cowardice belongs to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell for voting to acquit and then delivering a damning speech proving he knew better. McConnell declared Trump practically and morally responsible for the Capitol riot but relied on a questionable legal interpretation to claim the Senate lacked the power to hold a former president accountable. Then he tried to pass blame on the House for delays when he himself

blocked the Senate from starting the trial while Trump was still in office.

Such excuses, including Texas

Sen. John Cornyns claim that Democrats were being unnecessarily vindictive in pursuing impeachment, arent fooling anybody whos been paying attention.

Their real motivation for acquittal is fear. Fear of losing political power, of facing a primary challenger backed by the partisan faithful, who at this moment overwhelmingly supports Donald Trump. A recent poll found that 7 in 10 Republicans do not consider a vote to impeach principled, but disloyal.

That could be because they still believe Trumps lies. And that could be because their Republican representatives in Washington have been afraid to set them straight.

What an awakening Senate Republicans could have engendered for their constituents still under Trumps spell if they had at last vouched for the truth and voted to convict.

Instead, they vouched once again the lies of a reality TV star who proved a master of delusion.

It took almost four years from when Margaret Chase Smith spoke up against McCarthy for popular opinion to turn against him, but turn it did. What is right bears out. What is wrong is found out.

Republican Senators who cast conscience aside may try to forget the violence, the destruction, the distrust Trump incited, but history will remember  and so will the American people.

As Smith said in her Declaration of Conscience, I do not believe the American people will uphold any political party that puts political exploitation above national interest. Surely we Republicans are not that desperate for victory.

Surely.

At least 30 Taliban fighters have been killed in an explosion at a mosque in Afghanistan during a bomb-making class.

The 209th Shaheen Corps - part of the Afghan National Army - said in a statement that 30 fighters including six foreign nationals who were expert mine makers, had been killed in an explosion on Saturday morning.

The blast happened at a mosque in the village of Qultaq in the Dowlatabad district of Balkh province.

The statement said the bodies of the six foreign nationals could not be identified because of damage caused by the blast.

The Taliban fighters had gathered at the mosque to be trained in how to make bombs and IEDs, the Khaama Press News Agency reported.

The blast happened at a mosque in the village of Qultaq in the Dowlatabad district of Balkh province on Saturday morning

In a separate incident, two children were killed by an IED planted by the Taliban in Qotar Blaq village in Kunduz province, security officials reported.

The deaths come as Taliban attacks and violence have surged across Afghanistan in recent months despite stalled peace talks with the Kabul government.

On Monday, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance will not withdraw its troops from Afghanistan 'before the time is right', ahead of a discussion by defence ministers on the deployment.

The 209th Shaheen Corps - part of the Afghan National Army - said in a statement that 30 fighters including six foreign nationals had been killed in the blast

The ministers of the 30 NATO member states will meet on Wednesday and Thursday to hold their highest-level talks since US President Joe Biden took office vowing to work closer with allies after four years of tensions under Donald Trump.

Top of the agenda for the virtual conference will be the fate of the alliance's 9,600-strong support mission in Afghanistan after Trump struck a deal with the Taliban to withdraw troops.

The deployment's future hinges on whether Biden agrees to stick to a May deadline to pull out foreign forces or risks a bloody backlash from the Islamist insurgents by staying put.

On Monday, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg (pictured) said the alliance will not withdraw its troops from Afghanistan 'before the time is right', ahead of a discussion by defence ministers on the deployment

Biden's administration says it is reviewing the deal, and the Pentagon has accused the Taliban of not fulfilling promises that include reducing attacks and cutting ties to insurgent groups like Al-Qaeda.

Defence ministers are not expected to make a concrete announcement on the deployment's future at their meeting.

The Taliban has warned NATO ministers not to seek a 'continuation of occupation and war'.

'The Taliban must reduce violence, negotiate in good faith and live up to their commitment to stop cooperating with national terrorist groups,' Stoltenberg said.

'Our common goal is clear. Afghanistan should never again serve as a haven for terrorists to attack our homelands.'
At the start of the trial on Friday, Justice Quinlan was told of Ms Petersens repeated attempts to get her son mental health support, with his first hospital admission at 15 years old. He went on to be admitted to hospital a further 11 times with psychotic symptoms, and was seen many more times in various emergency departments over the following years before killing his family when he was 19. Forensic psychiatrist Daniel de Klerk diagnosed Mr Petersen-Crofts with paranoid schizophrenia and said his presentation to St John of God Hospital Midland the night before the deaths should have been taken more seriously. In the first instance, hindsight is 20/20, however, in saying that, in a young man with repeated hospital admissions ... and talking about being followed by serial killers, the outcome could have been very different if he had been admitted, he said. He was not assessed by a psychiatrist, which would have been my first expectation.

People with psychosis do not walk around with a sign saying, I have psychosis ... he should have been taken more seriously. Instead, Dr de Klerk said an emergency department physician assessed Mr Petersen-Crofts walk and decided he was not in psychosis  a method not used by psychiatrists. He was held overnight at the hospital and released in the morning. He killed his family later that night. Mr Petersen-Crofts, who has been held in the Frankland Centre since his arrest, remains very unwell and continues to suffer hallucinations in 2021 despite being on medication. Dr de Klerk concluded the teenager was likely part of around one-third of people diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia who did not respond to treatment.

Loading Forensic psychiatrist Steve Patchett also gave evidence at trial and said the younger a person was when they first developed psychotic behaviours, the more severe the hallucinations and delusions tended to be. This is a very tragic story due to the level of psychosis at a very young age, he said. Despite all the best evidence-based medicines available, some people dont respond and that is the situation here. Dr Patchett said Mr Petersen-Crofts was extremely remorseful for his actions.

He sat on the couch for half an hour [before the deaths] and he really agonised, trying to stop [the voices in his head, commanding him to kill], he said. He believed he had to. He will say, I did it, I killed my mother, my sister and my half-brother, but he gets very distressed ... he cries, Ive seen him sobbing. He talks a lot about how he loves his family and feels intense remorse for what hes done. Both forensic psychiatrists concluded Mr Petersen-Crofts was not in control of his actions the day of the deaths and was suffering powerful hallucinations. Justice Quinlan found Mr Petersen-Crofts was deprived of the capacity to control his actions when he killed his family, believing the voices in his head telling him to kill them otherwise the rest of the world would suffer.
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Hes your hope and youre his hope. When it comes to J-Hopes birthday, there are a few surprises set up by the BTS ARMY, including worldwide charity projects. Heres what we know about this K-pop idols birthday celebration in 2021.

BTS member, J-Hope, is seen backstage during the 2019 Billboard Music Awards | Emma McIntyre/BBMA2019/Getty Images for dcp

The BTS member, J-Hope, was born on Feb. 18, 1994

Hes a rapper, dancer, and songwriter. Although it might look somewhat different from past years, J-Hope celebrates his birthday on Feb. 18. In the past, the BTS members would accept extravagant gifts from fans.

One ARMY even, reportedly, gifted Jungkook gold, in honor of his Golden Maknae nickname. Now, however, the fans celebrate the performers, predominately, by streaming their music on platforms like YouTube and Spotify.

Because J-Hope has solo music, as well as originals with the BTS members, fans are distributing their streaming time among songs like Chicken Noodle Soup, Airplane, and Outro: Ego.

Of course, just like for the other BTS members, fans planned for billboards across the globe to display pictures of this rapper, along with birthday wishes. That includes two large projections in the Philippines.

RELATED: What Are Some of J-Hopes Favorite Songs? Here Are Music Recommendations From the BTS Member

BTS fans helped rebuild a hospital in China in honor of J-Hope

Inspired by the generosity of the BTS members, fans often pick a few charities close to these performers to donate to. For J-Hopes birthday, that includes donating to hospitals used by low-income families.

According to a translation of one article, one hospital in Anhui Province in China was actually named after the BTS member. Jung Hoseok Hope Hospital was a project first started by the idols China-based fan club for his birthday.

The construction began last year when the fan club donated 500k yuan (~85M won) to Chinas Hope Fair Project, one tweet states. Donation and will be used to build and renovate Hyangjin Sanitation Center, install additional medical equipment, and train staff. Jung Hoseok Hope Hospital will help interior village residents and low-income families who dont have easy access to medical facilities.

RELATED: VIDEO: BTS Jin and J-Hope Wear Baby Sprout Ponytails in 1 Birthday Post

BTS fans are donating to other organizations for the Hope World Charity Project

For other ARMYs across the globe, there are other charity projects in the works. Fans in Las Vegas have projects to benefit NSW Rural Fire Service and the World Wildlife Foundation in support of Australia. Others are helping those impacted by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

The BTS ARMY in Malasia split their efforts toward three different non-profits  Pertubuhan Kasih Umat Malaysia (Ustaz Ebit Lew,) MERCY Flood Relief, and Food Aid by HUDA Malaysia. Most of those charities help families impacted by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

To celebrate with other ARMYs, some fans are hosting J-Hope-themed birthday parties at cafe, including one in Los Angeles. Music by J-Hope and other BTS members, including the mixtape Hope World, is available for streaming on Spotify.
An arbitration tribunal has ordered the government of Ghana (GoG) to pay $137.9million to Ghana Power Generation Company (GPGC), an independent power producer (IPP), for terminating a power purchase agreement (PPA) between the two parties in 2018.



Out of the amount, $134,348,661 represents early termination payment claim, which in itself is made up of $69,361,680 as early termination fee, $58,492,005.562 for mobilisation cost, $6,462,528 as demobilisation cost and $32,448 as preservation and maintenance cost.



The arbitration tribunal also awarded $614,353.86 against Ghana as the cost of the arbitration, and also awarded cost of $3million against Ghana, which is the legal fees expended by GPGC during the arbitration.

Source: graphiconline.com









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Protesters clash with police at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (Julio Cortez/AP Photo)

Support Grows for 9/11-Style Commission to Probe US Capitol Breach

Several lawmakers have indicated in separate television appearances that they support the idea of establishing a 9/11-style commission to probe the Jan. 6 breach of the U.S. Capitol.

One of these lawmakers, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), said on Sunday that he believes such a commission is necessary in order to unearth all the evidence surrounding the incident.

I do think that we need to spend months and months unearthing all the evidence that can possibly be gotten to through a 9/11-style commission, Coons told ABCs This Week.

Similarly, his Democratic colleagues in the House, Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) shared a similar view when appearing on ABC News This Week.

Of course, there must be a full commission and impartial commission, not guided by politics, but filled with people who would stand up to the courage of their conviction, Dean said.

Members on the other side of the aisle have also expressed similar support for such a commission. Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) also appeared on ABC News on Sunday, where he said a complete investigation about what happened on Jan. 6 is necessary.

I think there should be a complete investigation about what happened on Jan. 6. Why was there not more law enforcement, National Guard already mobilized, what was known, who knew it, and when they knew it  all that, because that builds the basis so this never happens again in the future, Cassidy said. The Lousiana senator was one of the seven Republicans to find Trump guilty of inciting the Jan. 6 breach.

Meanwhile, on Fox News, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) also said a 9/11 commission was necessary to find out what happened and make sure it never happens again.

The independent, bipartisan 9-11 Commission was set up in 2002 to prepare a complete account of the circumstances surrounding the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. It was established with the aim to provide recommendations that could guard against future attacks.

Bipartisan Policy Center, a D.C.-based think tank, on Friday sent a letter to the White House calling on President Joe Biden to convene such a commission in an attempt to uncover the truth of what happened that day. The letter was penned by the heads of the 9/11 commissionchair Tom Kean and vice-chair Lee Hamilton.

An investigation should establish a single narrative and set of facts to identify how the Capitol was left vulnerable, as well as corrective actions to make the institution safe again, the pair wrote (pdf).

The support adds to calls from lawmakers who have sought investigations to determine the circumstances surrounding the Capitol breach after they were forced to evacuate or shelter in place on Jan. 6. Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had previously vowed to hold a painstaking investigation and thorough review of the incident. Meanwhile, four House committees have already opened a joint investigation.

The Jan. 6 incident was at the center of the Senate impeachment trial against former President Donald Trump, in which Democrats and several Republican lawmakers attempted to pin the blame for the violence on the former president.

The Senate on Saturday ultimately voted 57-43 to acquit Trump on the impeachment charge that he incited the Jan. 6 breach. Sixty-seven votes were needed to convict.




Via Twitter, Astete released the following statement:

After being in contact with several COVID-19 positive officials in December 2020 and January 2021, including high-ranking officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, such as the Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister and the Director General of America, as well as with foreign diplomatic officials and escort personnel, I accepted the offer to receive the first dose of the Sinopharm vaccine, on January 22, 2021, from as I understood the remaining doses of the batch held by the Cayetano Heredia University.

-My decision was influenced by the fact that I had to undergo two molecular tests between January 8 and 26, as well as a serological test and an antigen test to check whether or not I was infected due to the contact I had for work reasons with different people who had tested positive for COVID-19. In addition to this, I had to travel to Tumbes to fulfill my responsibility as representative of that region at the Council of Ministers, and my limitations as a person at risk since I am 68 years old was another reason.





-On the other hand, it should be pointed out that, given that I had been responsible for negotiating the strategy to acquire the vaccines since late November 2020, I could not afford to get sick, especially if one takes into account that Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Manuel Talavera was absent, first because he was affected by the pandemic, and then because he had to undergo retinal surgery.

-I have always believed that no one is indispensable, but the last two months have been key to achieve concrete results and overcome various difficulties and issues that arose in the vaccine procurement process.

-It must be noted that, on January 6, supply agreements were signed with AstraZeneca for 14 million doses and with Sinopharm for 1 million doses and more recently, on February 4, with Pfizer for 20 million doses. Additionally, the efforts and coordination were tireless to settle on the supply of the first vaccines by the COVAX Facility multilateral mechanism for the first quarter of 2021.

-The acquisition of vaccines to immunize 24 million people in 2021 and to ensure their prompt arrival in the national territory with the aim of vaccinating at least 10 million people before July 28 is a priority goal of this Transition and Emergency Government and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which should not be affected or tarnished by a wrong decision, whose impact I did not anticipate at the time.

-As a result of the recent disclosure about the vaccination of (former) President Vizcarra and his wife, as well as the understandable impact that this news had on public opinion, I am aware of the serious mistake I made, which is why I decided not to receive the second dose. For the above-mentioned reasons, I have submitted my resignation from the post of Foreign Affairs Minister to the President of the Republic.





(END) JCR/RMB





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Foreign Affairs Minister Elizabeth Astete on Sunday night said that she has submitted her resignation to President Francisco Sagasti , after announcing that she had received a dose of the Sinopharm vaccine against COVID-19.Publicado: 14/2/2021
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 00:25:23|Editor: huaxia

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NAIROBI, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Kenya has partnered with the private sector to impart digital skills to the country's youth amid COVID-19 pandemic job losses, a senior government official said on Monday.

Betty Maina, cabinet secretary, Ministry of Industrialization, Trade and Enterprise Development told a media briefing in Nairobi that one million people who lost jobs in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic will be required to enhance their skills in order to boost their employability.

"The partnership will see private sector players address a digital skills gap within the market through the rich digital learning and skilling initiative. The program will target individuals who have lost their jobs during the COVID-19 economic downturn that led to numerous job losses in the country," Maina said.

The ministry will partner with Stanbic Kenya Foundation to provide digital skills training to over 50,000 entrepreneurs in the next one year and the number of beneficiaries will reach 500,000 in the next three years.

Maina observed that the digital landscape is transforming rapidly, and Kenya must adapt to the new changes to keep its citizens employable.

"The government believes technology will play a key role in transforming the economy and creating employment. In this regard, we welcome the private sector in supporting the government's efforts to advance our digital strategy," she added.

The government official revealed that in the advent of COVID-19, several institutions and organizations are changing their business models and turning to digital platforms to stay connected with their customers and other key stakeholders. Enditem

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Two of the three missions from Earth arriving at Mars this past week and in the next few days have Colorado connections.

While the higher profile of the two is NASAs Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover, (hopefully) landing on Mars on Thursday with the help of Lockheed Martin engineers in Colorado, the United Arab Emirates' satellite Hope entered the red planets orbit Tuesday, with the help of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) at the University of Colorado - Boulder.

The third mission came from China, an orbiter-rover combo, which arrived in orbit the day after Hope.

The Hope satellite will spend a Mars year (about two Earth years) in orbit collecting data to provide a complete picture of the lower and upper Martian atmosphere, according to a release from LASP. Unique to Hope is its orbit, which enables near complete daily and geographic coverage, providing a weather satellite-style view of the Martian atmosphere.

Chinese orbiter-rover enters Mars orbit, becoming 2nd spacecraft to arrive at red planet in 2 days

It can hover above a single geographic region like the big volcano, Olympus Mons, and study the atmosphere there at many times of day. Every nice day of the mission, the probe will have completely captured a picture of the Martian atmosphere, David Brian, EMM Deputy Science Lead, a LASP research scientist and an associate professor of astrophysical and planetary sciences at CU, said in a statement.

Its the UAEs first trip to Mars.

We are quite excited as engineers and scientists, at the same time quite stressed and happy, worried, scared, said Omran Sharaf, project manager for the UAE team.

China is also a newcomer to the red planet, where more than half of Earths emissaries have failed. Chinas first Mars mission, a joint effort with Russia in 2011, never made it past Earths orbit.

All three spacecraft rocketed away within days of one another last July, during an Earth-to-Mars launch window that occurs only every two years. Thats why their arrivals are also close together.

Called Amal  Hope in Arabic  the Gulf nation's spacecraft is seeking an especially high orbit  13,500 by 27,000 miles high (22,000 kilometers by 44,000 kilometers), all the better to monitor the Martian weather.

Im so pleased that Hope successfully arrived at Mars," Brian said via email. "Next, well turn to waking up our science instruments and practice using them from Mars orbit before we start our science observations in earnest. Im looking forward to the contributions that Hope will make toward understanding the Martian atmosphere as a global system.

China's duo  called Tianwen-1, or Quest for Heavenly Truth  will remain paired in orbit until May, when the rover separates to descend to the dusty, ruddy surface. If all goes well, it will be only the second country to land successfully on the red planet.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
When she takes office on 1 March, Dr Okonjo-Iweala will become the first woman and the first African to be chosen as Director-General. Her term, renewable, will expire on 31 August 2025.

This is a very significant moment for the WTO. On behalf of the General Council, I extend our warmest congratulations to Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on her appointment as the WTO's next Director-General and formally welcome her to this General Council meeting, said General Council Chair David Walker of New Zealand who, together with co-facilitators Amb. Dacio Castillo (Honduras) and Amb. Harald Aspelund (Iceland) led the nine-month DG selection process.

Dr Ngozi, on behalf of all members I wish to sincerely thank you for your graciousness in these exceptional months, and for your patience. We look forward to collaborating closely with you, Dr Ngozi, and I am certain that all members will work with you constructively during your tenure as Director-General to shape the future of this organization, he added.

Dr Okonjo-Iweala said a key priority for her would be to work with members to quickly address the economic and health consequences brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.

I am honoured to have been selected by WTO members as WTO Director-General, said Dr Okonjo-Iweala. A strong WTO is vital if we are to recover fully and rapidly from the devastation wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic. I look forward to working with members to shape and implement the policy responses we need to get the global economy going again. Our organization faces a great many challenges but working together we can collectively make the WTO stronger, more agile and better adapted to the realities of today. Her full statement is available here.

The General Council decision follows months of uncertainty which arose when the United States initially refused to join the consensus around Dr Okonjo-Iweala and threw its support behind Trade Minister Yoo Myung-hee of the Republic of Korea. But following Ms Yoo's decision on 5 February to withdraw her candidacy, the administration of newly elected US President Joseph R. Biden Jr. dropped the US objection and announced instead that Washington extends its strong support to the candidacy of Dr Okonjo-Iweala.

Amb. Walker extended his thanks to all eight of the candidates who participated in the selection process and particularly to Ms Yoo for her ongoing commitment to and support for the multilateral trading system and for the WTO. His full statement is available here.

The General Council agreed on 31 July that there would be three stages of consultations held over a two-month period commencing 7 September. During these confidential consultations, the field of candidates was narrowed from eight to five and then two. On 28 October, General Council Chair David Walker of New Zealand had informed members that based on consultations with all delegations Dr Okonjo-Iweala was best poised to attain consensus of the 164 WTO members and that she had the deepest and the broadest support among the membership. At that meeting, the United States was the only WTO member which said it could not join the consensus.

The consultation process undertaken by the chair and facilitators was established through guidelines agreed by all WTO members in a 2002 General Council decision. These guidelines spelled out the key criteria in determining the candidate best positioned to gain consensus is the breadth of support each candidate receives from the members. During the DG selection processes of 2005 and 2013, breadth of support was defined as the distribution of preferences across geographic regions and among the categories of members generally recognized in WTO provisions: that is (Least developed countries), developing countries and developed countries. This same process, agreed by all members in the General Council in 2020, was strictly followed by Chair Walker and his colleagues throughout the 2020-21 DG selection process.

The process for selecting a new Director-General was triggered on 14 May when former Director-General Mr Roberto Azevedo informed WTO members he would be stepping down from his post one year before the expiry of his mandate. He subsequently left office on 31 August.
DMK President M K Stalin on Sunday asked Tamil Nadu Chief Minister K Palaniswami if he has the courage to question the Centre on various issues affecting the interests of Tamil Nadu. Speaking at a party organised function at Thirukkadaiyur near Porayar in Mayiladuthurai district, he alleged that the AIADMK government had taken the state 50 years backwards in terms of economic development.

"The AIIMS hospital project was announced way back in 2015. Yet, not a single foundation stone has been laid. The Tamil Nadu assembly passed resolutions twice, demanding exclusion from NEET.

On the issue relating to the release of seven convicts in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, "the Governor is following the script given by the centre," he alleged. "The Union Government has brought the Cauvery Water Management Authority under its Jal Sakthi department, instead of making it an independent authority.

Is the Chief Minister ready to fight the centre on these issues?" he asked Stalin further said that the centre was not releasing Rs 19,000 crore due to Tamil Nadu by way of GST refunds. "The 14th finance commission related to the local bodies recommended an allocation of Rs 2,500 crore to Tamil Nadu three years back.

But the allocation has not been made yet. The state has been seriously affected by cyclones. The Union Government has not offered proper assistance.

Will the Chief Minister question the Centre?," he asked. Stalin alleged that the Chief Minister and his cabinet colleagues would have to face the CBI and other enforcement agencies if they questioned the Centre.

"To safeguard themselves, they are fighting for the rights of Tamil Nadu," he said. Stalin has been visiting Assembly segments across Tamil Nadu as part of his 'Ungal Thogudhiyil Stalin' (Stalin in your constituency) campaign for the Assembly polls likely to be held in April-May.

.
Councillors call for local government reform



By Chris Cave - Local Democracy Reporter

A number of councillors in Douglas have voiced their support for an overhaul of local governance on the Isle of Man.

However, its been questioned whether or not Tynwald would back the reform.

There are currently 21 local authorities on the Island, which provide service such as refuse collection and street lighting.

Council Leader David Christian believes reform would bring about greater consistency, but feels it would be met with resistance from central government.

Hes revealed his frustration at the length of time it takes for authorities to set by-laws.

Mr Christian said: [We have] had to wait years for the Department of Infrastructure to get by-laws through to Tynwald.

By-laws should be decided by each local authority. [At the moment] if the DoI doesnt like a standing order, they can just say no.

That is not the role of the DoI and it should never be their role. Its a draconian way of moving power away from local authorities.

Local government currently falls under the remit of the Department of Infrastructure, which is responsible for progressing its legislation.

Victoria Ward councillor Ian Clague agreed with Mr Christian that reform is needed.

[The DoI] is a massive department and local authorities are well down the pecking order. I think it should change responsibility should move to a different department, Mr Clague said.

He went on: We need reasoned, proper reform of local authorities.

Mr Christian added: There would be far greater consistency of all services if there was a single Eastern authority.

Id be in favour of single authorities for the North, South, East, West and Borough of Douglas.

However, there has never been the will up the road to reform local government.

We should 100 per cent look at the split between central and local government.

Tinkering at it is not addressing the fundamental problems.
The Duchess of Sussex used careful camera framing to keep her pregnancy private in a video appearance carried out just days before the news was made public.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who live in California, announced yesterday they are expecting their second child together, with a spokesperson saying: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother.'

The sex of the couple's second baby, as well as the due date, are unknown.

The photo shared to mark the exciting news shows the Meghan, 39, lying in Prince Harry's lap with a hand resting on her blooming baby bump.

Meghan was able to keep her changing figure private until the announcement by ensuring she was only seen from the chest up in her most recent video appearance, which took place on Saturday 6 February.

Meghan was able to keep her changing figure private until yesterday's announcement by ensuring she was only seen from the chest up in her most recent video appearance, which took place on Saturday 6 February (pictured). Her baby bump was hidden from view

The last time Meghan was seen prior to the call was on 13 December, when she shared a pre-recorded message on CNN Heroes series. The Duchess was filmed from the waist up and her midriff was in full view of the camera (pictured)

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who live in California, announced yesterday they are expecting their second child together, with a spokesperson saying: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother.' The photo shared to mark the exciting news shows the Meghan, 39, lying in Prince Harry's lap with a hand resting on her blooming baby bump, above

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex joined a digital event organized by poetry group Get Lit in honor of Black History Month, but only their head and shoulders were visible on the call, keeping any hint of their exciting news under wraps.

The last time Meghan was seen prior to the call was on 13 December, when she shared a pre-recorded message on CNN Heroes series, which praises those making a difference in communities.

The Duchess was filmed from the waist up and her midriff was in full view of the camera.

The news of her pregnancy comes just months after Meghan, 39, revealed that she lost her second child to a miscarriage in an article for the New York Times.

It also comes on the 37th anniversary of when Harry's mother, Princess Diana, announced that she was pregnant with him on Valentine's Day in 1984.

The baby boy or girl will enter the line of succession behind older brother Archie (pictured with Harry and Meghan in 2019) who will turn two in May

A spokesperson for Meghan and Harry said: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child.'

The couple shared their announcement - aptly on Valentine's Day - by posting a black and white image of Harry resting his hand on Meghan's head as she lay in his lap underneath a tree.

'The photograph of the Duke and Duchess was was taken by the couple's longtime friend Misan Harriman. What wonderful news for the Sussexes!!' their spokesperson added.

If born in the U.S., the baby will be entitled to U.S. citizenship as an automatic right.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have announced that they are expecting their second child - who will become eighth in line to the throne (order of succession pictured)

Harry and Meghan shocked the world last year when they stepped down as senior royals and announced they were moving to North America with baby Archie, who will turn two in May.

The couple have been hunkering down at a sprawling nine-bedroom mansion in Montecito that they purchased for $14.65 million last June.

Their baby announcement came just days after Harry's cousin Princess Eugenie welcomed a baby boy on February 9.

Meghan and Harry were said to have sent their congratulations to Eugenie privately, while keeping their own growing family under wraps.
Israel's cabinet has allowed up to 2,000 foreign air travellers to enter the country every day, the prime minister's office and the health ministry said Sunday.

"The ministerial cabinet has endorsed the transport minister's plan for inbound and outgoing flights ... Up to 2,000 people will be able to fly into every day," a statement read.

The defense ministry has been tasked with contracting hotels where arrivals will be quarantined.

largely closed Ben Gurion Airport, the Jewish state's main gateway, on January 25 in an effort to prevent mutant strains from entering.

(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.)

The protest march organized by some TNA-led Tamil political parties and NGO elements provoked a negative response from the young enlightened Tamils among the northerners in the form of counter-demonstrations.

by Rohana R. Wasala

The 73rd anniversary of independence was officially celebrated in Colombo on February 4 with some of the accustomed pomp and pageantry associated with the event. Faced by the still rampant Covid menace and the looming economic and political crises, the current regime, which is still struggling to reach its cruising altitude, couldnt have done better in the circumstances. This is so, particularly, in view of the fact that today the relevance of celebrating the 1948 dominion status independence to the emerging Sri Lanka is increasingly coming into question. The independence anniversary has become a virtual political-cultural anachronism that keeps Sri Lankans religiously reminded of the eminently forgettable fake independence grudgingly offered after the humiliating experience of one and a half centuries of rapacious British colonialism, whose evil legacy is still blighting their beloved motherland.

Meanwhile one could see that the occasion was observed in different, but ultimately complementary, ways in two particularly significant venues apart from Colombo where the national independence anniversary was perfunctorily observed. Lets for the moment forget about various other places that may have held customary annual freedom day functions. The two centres meant here are Jaffna and Kandy. A group of young Tamils including women and school children (as reported in the media) marked the day in Jaffna with a march displaying national flags and placards calling for national unity and peace and expressing opposition to conventional Tamil politicians who, they alleged, were working to create divisions and disharmony for narrow party political ends. The group was led by a young Tamil known by his birth name Arulanandan Arun or his alias Arun Siddharth, who claims that his grandfather was a toddy tapper, fiercely criticises the entrenched Tamil political elite of the north . (He revealed during a subsequent TV interview that he was not so young being forty-three already.) He has gained some popularity among ordinary people in the south as well as in the north as a sincere critic of the existing reactionary political elite of the north who reside in clover in Colombo or live in and/or operate from Europe, while doing nothing to improve the lot of the suffering Tamils in the north. His criticisms of prominent northern Tamil politicians are so authentic that one feels that he should be able to play an important liaison role, if he wishes, with similar minded young southerners of all three communities that will ultimately contribute towards forging national unity. Ordinary Tamils dont want separation; what they want is development and jobs, free from interference from India and the West.

It has long been argued that ordinary Tamils in the north actually suffer from casteist discrimination among themselves, and not from any Sinhalese majoritarianism as falsely alleged by separatists and their ignorant backers abroad. This is a truth that Arun has clearly pointed out. The same news sources reported that a supposedly anti-government protest march which had started from Pottuvil in Ampara in the east the previous day (February 3), was planning to finally arrive at Polikandi in Jaffna on the 7th after a five day trek.

Though police had obtained a court order prohibiting the march, it went ahead, nevertheless. These demonstrators were demanding a halt to what they called encroachment of Tamil lands under the pretext of archaeological excavations, fulfilment of the promised Rs 1000 daily pay for upcountry estate workers and for a relaxation of the mandatory cremation order in respect of corona-dead Muslims, etc. (Important: These are fake demands; there are no Tamil, Muslim, or Sinhalese lands in Sri Lanka; the whole island belongs to all the communities; archaeological sites come under the archaeology department, and lawful excavations are done under its supervision; the extensive archaeological relics of the country are now the common heritage and property of all Sri Lankans; much of the tourist industry depends on these, and as such, they are also a big economic asset to the country; the Rs 1000 daily pay demand is duly being met; the decree to burn corona-dead corpses is a scientific decision, not a political one; the PM revealed in parliament February 10 in reply to a Muslim MPs query that burial will be allowed hereafter, implicitly because it has now been established that the virus is not transmitted through water.)

The protest march organized by some TNA-led Tamil political parties and NGO elements provoked a negative response from the young enlightened Tamils among the northerners in the form of counter demonstrations. These northern Tamils held rallies against the seemingly anti-government march at the old bus stand in Vavuniya (February 6) and at Murungan in Mannar (February 7). According to them the march that started on February 3 from Pottuvil was completely unjustified. It was organized only to promote the exclusive interests of some regional political parties, and to hoodwink the common people. Of course, the march had little to do with independence day celebrations. It may be suspected that its actual aim was to further undermine Sri Lanka at Geneva in two or three weeks time. TNA MP M.A. Sumanthiran expects India to support West-sponsored anti-Sri Lanka resolutions at the UNHRC at its 46th session there next month, according to The Island/February 13. However, as public security minister Sarath Weerasekera says, more countries than before are likely to support Sri Lanka this time since the country has withdrawn from co-sponsorship of the those baseless resolutions under the present government.

Back to the Pottuvil to Polikandi march. Going by media reports, no one can deny that a fairly large number of Tamils and Muslims (strange bedfellows, no doubt, with conflicting long term ambitions) took part in the protest march though obviously it was well short of the highly exaggerated figure of 60,000 that MP Gajendra Kumar Ponnambalam mentioned in parliament on February 9, 2021. He however claimed that the march was not something against the government. GKP stated what he called the four core demands of the marchers: 1) recognition of the north-east as the Tamil and Muslim Tamil speaking peoples homeland, 2) the recognition of Tamils as a distinct nation, 3) the right to self-determination of the Tamil nation, and 4) the referral of Sri Lanka to the ICC and other international accountability mechanisms to look into and investigate the acts of genocide that happened and that continue to happen that is being committed by the state. GKPs risible nonsensical definition of alleged Tamil genocide as dismantling the identity of Tamils belied his charge. Listening to his loud speech in the House, I remembered the lines a tale / Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,/ Signifying nothing in the Shakespeare play Macbeth, and thought that probably he was himself in need of a referral letter from somebody to a specialist. But he was treated to a curative blast from MP Pramita Bandara Tennekoon who described him as a popular LTTE sympathizer. PBT pulverized him point by point and reduced him to silenced embarrassment. No need to say that the tired, backward, Tamil old guard are still bent on avenging the defeat of the terrorist LTTE, instead of looking forward to building, together with the rest of the communities, a peaceful and prosperous Sri Lanka for all its citizens as PBT urged, and as the young generation Tamils and their fellow Muslims and Sinhalese across the country are now focused on doing.

Nevertheless I personally believe that these actions and reactions in the north and east demonstrate, instead a revival of the dead terrorism, a healthy democratic trend that is developing among Tamils, particularly the Tamil youth, who are set to work with their counterparts in the south in together creating a unitary Sri Lanka without allowing outsiders (geopolitical, military and economic powers with axes to grind) to get involved in our internal affairs in pursuit of their own selfish ends at our expense. They need to be mindful of the new religious dimension of the growing overall threat to pan-Sri Lanka unity: The vulnerability of peaceful, non-violent, and non-extremist multiethnic Sri Lankans (including the majority Buddhists and Hindus) who form 98% of the population, is being aggravated by various extremist fundamentalist sects of both types (Christian and Muslim), through their intensified activism by effectively adding to the anti-Sri Lanka arsenal of interventionist powers while the country is engulfed in political and economic crises amidst the corona pandemic.

Meanwhile the independence day was remembered with a twist in Kandy on February 4, that too, only by default, when a small group of white clad, mostly young people led by a hitherto unknown Buddhist monk named Medirigiriye Sikhi, prepared to hoist the flag of Sinhale at the Dalada Maligawa premises, but were prevented from doing so by the police acting on a court order issued prior to the event. Two separate You Tube videos of the episode that I came across showed what happened outside and inside the Sri Dalada Maligawa that morning. Ven. Sikhi agreed to obey the court injunction after the head police officer on the scene explained to him that it was illegal to hoist his Sinhale flag in the Maligawa premises because it is not what the existing constitution decrees as the national flag, and that, besides, displaying a lion flag as the national flag without the two vertical bands is prejudicial to some sections of the society and so cannot be allowed even in terms of the ICCPR (International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights) to which Sri Lanka is a signatory. But still, as an alternative, the monk wanted to make an offering of the flag to the Tooth Relic while stating his alleged intentions on the occasion. Police let him display the controversial flag to the media and the few people around, which was the correct thing to do in the emotion charged context, because it enabled the monk to assert his and his partners right to freedom of expression. He took the opportunity to re-stress the One Country, One Law pledge that the present rulers committed themselves to during the elections.

The monk stated that he had concocted some indigenous medicines to fight the currently raging coronavirus disease, including a medicinal oil called ahivaataroganivarana thailaya at his own expense. He offered this hela osuwa (indigenous Sinhala medicine) to the rulers, advising them to use it on the local population against the coronavirus disease, presumably as a resistance/immunity builder, and to export it to other countries, which incidentally would, in his opinion, ease the debt burden on the country; but they didnt listen to him, he complained. He expressed his deep disappointment that his medicinal preparations still remain neglected. We dont like innocent people dying; we are against extremist activities and the destruction of the environment. Many prominent speakers and monks, as media have reported, argue that there is no real independence (in the country). This is true, Ven. Sukhi said. (Ill-wishers determined to harm Sri Lanka at every turn went to town in the media attacking the governments alleged reliance on superstition instead of science, when it implicitly allowed practitioners of traditional medicine to try their remedies on potential victims of Covid-19 to boost their immunity. However, its failure to manage the damage done by quacks who naturally exploit such situations cost the government dearly in terms of an adverse press in this regard. That was unfortunate. So is its apparent wavering on the burial non-issue.)

Then Ven. Sukhi offered kirihara (milk rice) and the medicines to the Sacred Tooth Relic and all other Buddha relics. Next, he placed three copies of the Sinhale Flag on the altar, offering it to the Dalada, though he had been prevented by the state authorities from raising it in the sacred premises. The monk exonerated the police officers from any blame for this, explaining that they were just doing their duty, but that they helped him do the offerings before the sacred shrine. His dedicatory words were: I am leaving one of these flags as a gift to the Tooth Relic, while taking the other two back; one of these two, I will hand over to the President, and I will keep the other with me. The flag that I am retaining with me is for honouring it and for getting all Sri Lankans to rally round it in unity. I solemnly pledge before you (the Buddha) to do this (i.e., dedicate myself for this solemn undertaking).

The symbolism of the monks act is likely to be lost on many who experience no empathy with the majority Sinhala Buddhist community. Kandy was the last seat of government of the island kingdom of Sinhale, which, by the time of the British imperial takeover or annexation in 1815 (executed through intrigue), was hemmed in on all sides by the littoral provinces successively occupied by various foreign powers over the previous centuries. Nationalist movements invariably have the non-political leadership or patronage of Buddhist monks because of the over two millennia old organic linkage between Buddhism and the majority Sinhalese who built up the uniquely humane and hospitable islands Buddhist civilization. What was brought down at Kandy when the British raised their union jack on signing the Kandyan Convention of 1815 was the royal standard of the last king of Sinhale, which had only the image of the sword wielding lion. This same royal flag was what was raised on February 4, 1948, the arbitrarily chosen day of independence. It remained the national flag of (at least nominally independent) Sri Lanka for the first three years before it was modified in 1951 by adding two vertical stripes to represent the two minorities (the green for Muslims and the orange for Tamils). It has been further modified since 1972 when Sri Lanka was declared a republic. Some nationalists argue that the 1951 addition of differently coloured bands to show minorities was an unnecessarily divisive innovation, because the lion image represents the whole country of Sinhale with all its diverse communities who are well protected and secure within its generously accommodating Buddhist culture (which is in that respect identical with the very tolerant Hindu culture of our big neighbour India that Jawaharlal Nehru described in his monumental Discovery of India as enfolding alien cultures within its generous embrace), so compatible with secular democracy.

The lion image in the Lankan royal standard is as old as the Sri Lankan states 2500 year written history. In classical Buddhist literature, the Buddha himself is described as a lion. The lion in the flag is as much associated with the Buddha as with the Sinhalese. However, we have to accept the fact that todays national flag is a product of historical evolution; an earlier form of it cannot be reintroduced a second time as it will be incongruent with the new realities. Historical wrongs cannot be corrected through individual arbitrary action. The government cannot allow it since it is against the existing constitution and is also in violation of the ICCPR treaty as explained to the monk by the police officer. Sri Lanka signed the particular covenant in June 1980.

As revealed in another You Tube video uploaded on February 4, 2021, something else had happened at Kundasale one day before, that anticipated the monks Sinhale flag scene in Kandy. Police (from Kandy or Teldeniya) delivered a restraining order issued by Additional Magistrates court No. 2/Kandy to Amith Weerasinghe, at his residence at Kundasale, warning him that he would be arrested if he participated in a certain independence day celebration event (different from the officially scheduled ones) in the Maligawa premises to be held on February 4. Amith Weerasinghe (30) is the leader of a nonviolent (in spite of the name) nationalist youth group (known as Mahason Balakaya or Mahason Battalion, named after an ancient Sinhala warrior) agitating against aggressive, unacceptable activities of Islamist extremists. As he credibly claims, among his 275,000 followers across the country are young Tamils and Muslims. His popularity makes him a challenge to the entrenched traditionalists among politicians in Kandy like his counterpart Arun Siddharthan in Jaffna to his established seniors there. He contested the last parliamentary election from the Kandy district as an independent candidate.

He didnt win a seat though he and his supporters had been sure he would. He firmly believes that he has been robbed of his certain victory by an unseen hand, and has initiated legal action demanding a recount of the vote. According to Weerasinghe, his case is to be taken up by the court next month.

Weerasinghe says that he knows nothing about the so-called nationalist organisation dubbed Sinhala jatikawadi sanvidhana (Sinhalese Nationalist Organization) mentioned in the court order, and that he was not due to take part in any independence day ceremony or protest in Kandy on February 4. He suspects that this could be the work of some senior politicians who are worried that he might contest the upcoming provincial council elections to their disadvantage, and who want him imprisoned so he would be neutralised and safely got out of their way. He is already facing twenty-seven cases filed under the ICCPR for his agitational activism against Islamist extremism over many years.For Weerasinghe to be arraigned under the ICCPR for opposing Islamist extremism is a sad irony, because it is actually Islamists who tend to violate all the five key human rights enshrined in that covenant (namely, freedom from torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, fair trial rights, freedom of thought, religion and expression, privacy, home and family life, and equality and non-discrimination). Weerasinghe doesnt want a twenty-eighth case to be filed against him for no reason. The last time he was similarly trapped, he had to serve nine months in prison. Incidentally, Ven Sikhi who led the protest against what he believed to be unfreedom calls his organization jatiye peramunagath sinhayo (Lions Leading the Nation), not what Weerasinghe was alleged to belong to by the police.

Weerasinghe does not approve of monks dabbling in politics or going to parliament. He says that he fights for only three key demands, occasioned by the need to neutralize the existential threat posed by religious extremists to the Buddha Sasana: a birth control law, a common marriage law for all, and an anti-unethical conversion law. The monks are agitating for the same, in addition to such issues as saving the overwhelmingly Sinhala Buddhist archaeological heritage sites of the country from vandals and landgrabbers for posterity, the preservation of the environment, and protecting innocent citizens of all communities from the depredations of totalitarian religious extremists. If they seem to fight for any political changes, that is incidental, but not central to their demands. Their methods are nonviolent, though the forces that they come into conflict with in the course of their activism have turned them into demons in the eyes of the world through adverse propaganda. The dead silence of the Ven. Mahanayakes who have so far failed to provide these well intentioned young monks the proper monolithic leadership they need is largely responsible for their present predicament. But now they are well positioned to facilitate the emerging enlightenment and desire for peace among the young of all communities. The fact that the Sinhalese are predominantly Buddhist and the Tamils predominantly Hindus is important to recognize. They are the common target of murderous Jihadists as well as fanatical Christian proselytizers. Unity among Sinhalese and Tamils, favourably viewed by peaceful mainstream Christians and Muslims, will be indispensable for defending themselves against their common enemies.
Parent company Coupang LLC registered in the U.S. state of Delaware changed its name to Coupang Inc. ahead of the filing. The number of shares to be issued and the subscription price have yet to be decided.

Coupang plans to list itself on the New York Stock Exchange. Korea's biggest online retailer on Feb. 12 said it applied to the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission to go public on the NYSE.

Coupang seems to have chosen the NYSE because it has a lower entry barrier than the Korean bourse to raise capital.

Securities industry sources said Coupang, which saw stellar growth since opening in 2010, is still saddled with huge debts, making it difficult to get listed in Korea.

Kosdaq listing requires a company to be evaluated based on profits, sales and equity.

So far Coupang has secured $3 billion in investments from Japan's Softbank, but its cumulative losses stand at $4.12 billion following aggressive investments in logistics centers in the Seoul metropolitan region and hiring delivery workers.

Last year alone, it suffered a net loss of $475 million, down from $699 million despite record sales amid the COVID-19 epidemic. On top of that, Masayoshi Son, the head of Softbank, said last year that he hopes to recoup his investment in Coupang.

The online retailer said in a filing to the SEC that it hopes to raise $1 billion from the initial public offering.

The SEC filing also revealed Coupang's earnings. Sales in 2020 totaled $11.97 billion, almost doubling from 2019 and up a whopping 275 times compared to 2013. As of the end of last year, it had 14.9 million "active" customers who had bought any product within the previous three months, with each of them spending an average of $256 per quarter.
Bir Lahlou (Liberated Territories), February 14, 2021 (SPS) - The President of the Republic, Secretary-General of the Polisario Front, Brahim Ghali, congratulated his Algerian counterpart, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, on his return to Algeria, after his stay in Germany where he underwent a successful surgery on his right foot, following coronavirus -related complications.



It is my pleasure to express to you, on my own behalf and on behalf of the people and government of the SADR, my warmest and sincere congratulations on the occasion of your auspicious return to your dear country, Algeria, after the completion of the treatment period, and your recovery from Covid- 19 and your successful surgery abroad, said the President of the Republic.



In these moments, we wish your Excellency success in your noble tasks in leading the Algeria and its great people to face all challenges, and to move forward to achieve the aspirations of the brotherly Algerian people and implement their will, by embodying your ambitious program to build a new, strong, and prosperous Algeria, enjoying its rightful place on the regional, continental and international arena, adhering to the principles and ideals of the glorious November 1st Revolution.



This is an opportunity for me to renew to you our sincere will and firm determination to consolidate brotherhood, friendship and eternal alliance between our peoples and our countries, and to work together to firmly address all the existing and emerging challenges and threats that target the region and its peoples, added the President of Republic in his message to his Algerian counterpart, Abdelmadjid Tebboune. (SPS)



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A Failed Experiment: Americas Final Resolution To Its Social Time Bomb by Stephen L. Newman is available now in e-book and audiobook through Fig Factor Media. I want my readers to understand that theres going to be many surprises found within the subplots. Were living in a very tense and controversial political atmosphere. We have to understand that we need to live together and work together, otherwise there could be disastrous consequences.

Stephen L. Newman, author of the new historical fiction novel A Failed Experiment: Americas Final Resolution To Its Social Time Bomb, available now in e-book and audiobook through Fig Factor Media Publishing, makes reference to President Abraham Lincoln and his conflicting positions concerning Blacks living in America.

Abraham Lincoln predicted that race relations between Blacks and Whites would be a

failed experiment and this reflects the title of my book, Newman explained. Examples of this dichotomy includes the fact that in 1854 he presented his moral, legal and economic opposition to slavery but then he clearly admitted that he didnt know what he should do about it. He felt that all Black men should have the right to improve their condition in society and enjoy their fruits of their labor. In this capacity they were equal to White men but, nevertheless, he followed the dictates of Henry Clay and Thomas Jefferson in seeing no way that Blacks and Whites could live together peaceably.

Citing important events such as Dred Scott case, the murder of Chicago teen Emmett Till, the birth of the Civil Rights Movement, and the election of Americas first Black President Barack Obama, Newman used these historical points as the backdrop for his book to create a parallel view based on Lincolns opinions on race relations.

The book takes readers through the generational ties of William Hilton Magruder, a successful lawyer, who eventually becomes President of the United States in the near future.

Readers learn about this courageous protagonist, his personal life and family history dating back to the 18th century and how he tries to find a permanent and positive solution to quell the racial tensions and unrest among the population. In the end, William must make a difficult decision that will dramatically alter the countrys future.

I want my readers to understand that theres going to be many surprises found within the subplots, he said. Were living in a very tense and controversial political atmosphere. We have to understand that we need to live together and work together, otherwise there could be disastrous consequences.

Fig Factor Media Publishing presents the e-book and audiobook versions of A Failed Experiment: Americas Final Resolution To Its Social Time Bomb. For more information visit https://afailedexperimentbook.com/.

About Fig Factor Media:

Fig Factor Media Publishing is an international publishing company with a beeping heart. Fig Factor Media has helped many authors achieve and support their dream of impacting their communities in the United States, Mexico, and Europe. Fig Factor Media is the official publisher of Todays Inspired Latina. For information, visit http://www.figfactormedia.com.

About Stephen L. Newman:

Stephen L. Newman graduated from the University of Southern California with Magna Cum Laude honors. As a Certified Public Accountant, Newman initially represented talent and production entities in a number of major motion pictures. More recently, he has concentrated on representing foreign interests and U.S. citizens in significant controversies with various tax authorities.

Newman has been married for 52 years, has five children and seven grandchildren. He and his wife reside in Orange County, California. For more information visit https:// afailedexperimentbook.com/. ###
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
The Los Alamos National Laboratory in Los Alamos, N.M., in an undated file photo. (The Albuquerque Journal via AP)

Top US Nuclear Lab Could Be Impacted by Wildfires, Audit Warns

A top nuclear laboratory in the United States is at risk from wildfires because some mitigation measures have been ignored in recent years, an audit found.

The Department of Energys (DOE) inspector general said the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in New Mexico is prone to future large, high-intensity wildfires that could threaten to seriously interrupt mission work, as a large fire did in 2000.

The Cerro Grande Fire that year burned more than 7,500 acres of department land, damaging or destroying more than 100 structures and ruining a variety of lab projects and scientific records and forcing the lab to close for 15 days.

Another wildfire in 2011, the Las Conchas Fire, burned an acre of department land, and its intensity and proximity to the lab forced it to close for nine days.

In light of the fires, the inspector general undertook an audit to determine whether its Los Alamos office and lab contractors were taking steps to try to avoid potential fire-related closures and losses.

The review found that mitigation measures such as tree thinning werent always performed, increasing the potential for a devastating wildland fire to spread. Other highlighted concerns included a lack of maintaining fire roads and a lack of documentation of what measures had been completed.

High fuel levels in the Los Alamos Canyon, which increase the risk of a devastating wildfire that could destroy or damage lab property. (DOE OIG)

Poor road conditions that could make fighting wildfires more difficult in Los Alamos Canyon. (DOE OIG)

Without documenting planning and preparedness activities, there was no assurance that all prevention and mitigation options were considered and that the site was fully prepared for wildland fire events, the inspector generals office stated.

The lab is located about 35 miles northwest of Santa Fe in rugged northern New Mexico. Promoting and protecting national security through work on nuclear weapons, lab workers research renewable energy, nanotechnology, and other subjects. The lab employs some 12,000 people and includes approximately 2,000 structures, including 13 nuclear facilities, strewn across 36 square miles.

The watchdog group Nuclear Watch New Mexico said the audit showed the need for a new site-wide environmental impact statement.

The lab and DOE have so far blocked a new site-wide environmental impact statement which, as the past has shown, is actually in their own best interests. We believe LANL and DOE have a legal requirement to prepare a new one and NukeWatch will be pursuing that, Jay Coghlan, director of the group, said in a statement.

Damage from the Las Conchas fire on a hillside in the Jemez Mountains near Bandelier National Monument in New Mexico on July 18, 2011. (Susan Montoya Bryan/AP Photo)

The lab and the department didnt reply to requests for comment. A lab spokesperson told The Associated Press that since the audit was performed in 2018 and 2019, the lab has been aggressively completing wildfire management tasks.

We continue to review our wildfire and forest health plans and have already implemented most of the recommendations the Department of Energy offered to improve our efforts to protect the public, the environment, and the laboratory, he said.

Managers wrote to the inspector general to say they concurred with the audits recommendations, and that many of the recommended actions, such as conducting a site-wide wildfire risk assessment, were already planned or started.

Because the audit focused on prior plans, most of the salient issues in the report had already been identified and captured, William Bookless, acting undersecretary for nuclear security and administrator at the National Nuclear Security Administration, wrote to Inspector General Teri Donaldson last month.

We have prioritized and implemented actions to protect employees, the public, and the sites critical infrastructure from the risks of wildland fire.
Sundays Indian Television Awards was a star-studded occasion as actors from the Indian television industry got together to honour the past years achievements. However, one picture from the event that has taken netizens for a nostalgia trip was that of Shweta Tiwari and Urvashi Dholakia. The actresses, who worked together in the 2001 hit Ekta Kapoor creation Kasautii Zindagi Kay as Prerna and Komolika, walked the ITA Awards red carpet on February 14, 2021.

A picture shared by Manav Manglani on his social media handle showed the two actresses dressed in glamorous outfits. Shweta was seen in a black glittering gown, while Urvashi wore a shimmering grey saree. The photograph has garnered over 3k likes as fans and followers express their reactions. One of the users wrote, "Prerna and Komolika together", While another user pointed out how both of them have won different seasons of reality show Bigg Boss.

Shweta also shared a few selfies that she took with her former colleague at the 20th ITA Awards. The two ladies looked ravishing in their alluring avatar. Captioning the post, Shweta wrote that a woman should be three things: Intelligent, strong and badass and all these three qualities can be found in her fellow actress, Urvashi. The post has received over 25.9k likes on Instagram. Commenting on the post, actor Karanvir Bohra wrote, "Both my mommies." Shweta played the role of Karanvirs characters mother in Kasautii Zindagii Kay.

One of the fans commented, I just went back 18 years.. Prerna and Komalika." Actress Barkha Sengupta commented, The originals .... gorgeous." Another fan commented, Wowwww prerna & nika saath saath.

Meanwhile, Urvashis latest Instagram post is all about her glamorous saree that she chose to wear for the occasion.

The 41-year-old actress posted a picture of herself in the grey and black saree and captioned it saying that one can never go wrong with the outfit.
21 runners killed during mountain race in northwestern province of Gansu; Indian variant of Covid-19 found in Guangzhou; Beijing willing to arrange for vaccines to be sent to Taiwan

May 28, 2021 08:15 PM

The gunman should never have been allowed to purchase the handgun used in the shooting, but was able to do so in 2014 after a background check failed to flag a prior felony conviction in Mississippi. His conviction was revealed months later when he applied for a concealed carry license and provided his fingerprints to expedite the process, prompting state police to deny the license and revoke his FOID card.
Future Retail Ltd on Monday said that e-commerce major Amazon had filed a petition on Supreme Court against 8 February order on Future group's 24,713-crore deal with Reliance.

The company also said that it will defend Amazon petitioner through legal counsel.

Future Retail's scrip on BSE was trading 1.83% higher at 77.85 on Monday during late trade.

On 8 February, the Delhi High Court stayed its single judge direction to Future Retail Ltd (FRL) and various statutory authorities to maintain status quo with regard to its Reliance Retail deal. The court ruled that statutory authorities cannot be restrained from acting in accordance with law.

A bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh passed the interim direction on FRL's appeal challenging the February 2 order of the single judge.

The bench also declined Amazon's request to keep its order in abeyance for a week so that it can explore appropriate remedies.

The court while staying the February 2 order said that statutory authorities, like National Company Law Tribunal, CCI and SEBI, cannot be restrained from proceeding in accordance with law with regard to the deal.

The court also issued notice to Amazon and sought its stand on FRL's appeal by February 26 when it will commence day-to-day hearing of the matter.

In a later development last week, Mint reported that Amazon has moved the Supreme Court in a bid to block the Future-RIL deal.

Amazon contended that the Delhi high courts division bench, according to the arbitration Act, did not have the authority to entertain Future Retail Ltds (FRLs) appeal against the e-commerce giant. Neither did it have the authority to pass any interim order that acted against the Singapore International Arbitration Centres 25 October emergency arbitration order that restrained Future Group from taking any step towards the asset sale deal with RIL, Amazon argued.

In its earlier order, the Delhi high court allowed Kishore Biyani-led Future Group to continue working toward its deal with RIL, stating that the US-based e-commerce giant cannot interfere in the deal and that regulatory authorities such as the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) and NCLT should not be prevented from discharging their statutory duties with regards to the deal.

Last month, Amazon had approached the Delhi High Court seeking enforcement of the interim order of the Emergency Arbitrator (EA) at the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) that had restrained FRL from going ahead with the deal with Reliance.

Justice Midha had directed FRL and other parties to maintain status quo till pronouncement of the reserved order.

Amazon and Future have been locked in a bitter legal tussle after the US e-commerce giant dragged Future Group to arbitration at SIAC, arguing that the latter had violated their contract by entering into the deal with rival Reliance.

Amazon had invested in Future Coupons in August 2019, with an option of buying into the flagship Future Retail after a period of three to 10 years.

In August last year, Future group had entered into a deal with billionaire Mukesh Ambani's RIL to sell its retail, wholesale, logistics and warehousing units in a 24,713-crore deal.

On October 25, 2020, an interim award was passed in favour of Amazon with a single-judge bench of V K Rajah barring Future Retail from taking any step to dispose of or encumber its assets or issuing any securities to secure any funding from a restricted party.

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Rapyd Financial Network (Fintech): $300M , D Round

, D Round Drivenets (Network Infrastructure): $208M , B Round

, B Round OwnBackup (Enterprise solutions): $167.5M , D Round

, D Round K Health (Digital health): $132M , E Round

, E Round Resident Home (Ecommerce): $130M , B Round

, B Round Melio (Fintech): $110M , D Round

It is the highest number of both mega-round and general investments made during a single month in Israeli start-ups. The year 2020 witnessed 21 'mega-round' investments during the whole of 2020, equivalent to 33% of capital raised. As a monthly comparison, there were three 'mega-rounds' in January 2020, none in January 2019 or January 2018. The mega-rounds in January were led by US investors.

Fintech was the dominant sector during January with two 'mega-rounds' and $413M raised (29% of the total fundraising in January). It is a continuation of Fintech's strong performance since September 2020 with $1.4B in investments compared to only $340M raised in the first eight months of 2020.

Director of Research at Startup Nation Central (SNC), Meir Valman: "The record level of fundraising in recent months is driven by two effects. One is the increasing maturity of the Israeli tech ecosystem, when rapidly growing startups are able to raise much larger rounds. The other is the effect of Covid-19 on Israeli companies, which pivot rapidly to address the challenges of the pandemic, but that will also stay relevant long after it is gone."

About Start-Up Nation Central (SNC) and the Finder Platform

Start-Up Nation Central is a non-profit organization that helps tackle global challenges by connecting Israeli technologies with multinational corporations, governments, investors, as well as NGO's from around the world.

Start-Up Nation Finder the Innovation Discovery Platform, is a leading source of in-depth information on Israeli Startups, investors, hubs, multinational corporations, and academic technologies. The open-source platform provides up-to-date information and insights into thousands of active Israeli companies. It serves as the gateway to the Israeli innovation ecosystem for global visitors seeking partnership with the local tech industry.

Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1438105/Start_Up_Nation_Central.jpg

SOURCE Start-Up Nation Central (SNC)

Related Links

https://www.startupnationcentral.org


The funeral of convicted criminal Philip Griffiths turned into a frightening spectacle and had to be abandoned by the priest on Saturday after dozens of mourners turned up at the Crumlin church, in breach of Covid regulations.

The priest refused to begin the mass because of the numbers who had gathered, and angry mourners said their own prayers and gave a eulogy before removing the coffin from St Agnes Church and taking it away for burial.

A church source said the burial took place without a priest.

Speaking about the stand-off in the church, the source said the gardai handled it very well and professionally.

It was over as quick as it started, but it was quite frightening. The gardai did a very good job under difficult circumstances, they explained.

Gardai later called to a house in nearby Sundrive Park where a large number of people had gathered to mark the death of father-of-three Griffiths (40).

Under Level 5 Covid restrictions, only 10 mourners are allowed to attend a funeral and house parties are banned.

Griffiths was found dead in an apartment in the Orwell Road area of Rathgar in south Dublin on February 8. His death was being treated as a personal tragedy and there was no foul play involved.

Two years ago he was named in High Court papers as a member of the drugs and crime gang led by Liam Byrne  the man now regarded as the right-hand man of Daniel Kinahan.

The Criminal Assets Bureau told the High Court that Griffiths was part of the Byrne gang.

He was previously jailed in 2001 for seven years, after he was caught with 1.5m of ecstasy and cocaine in a Dublin hotel in March 2000.

Read More

That seizure, in a hotel room on Pearse Street, Dublin, was the catalyst that led to the Crumlin/Drimnagh feud after internal gang allegations of an informant within the camp.

Gang member Declan Gavin (21) was in a different room when gardai raided the hotel, and as a result he was not prosecuted, which led to accusations of him being a rat.

Gavin was later stabbed to death in Crumlin and the feud spiralled out of control, leaving 15 men dead over the following years.

Gardai believe that Griffiths became active with the Byrne gang following his release from jail in 2005.

In a statement, gardai confirmed it was aware of the funeral that took place in Crumlin on Saturday.

Gardai attended the scene and engaged with those present. Gardai also attended a property in Sundrive Park on the night of February 13, following reports of a party in the property. Gardai discovered a number of people present in breach of current Covid-19 regulations, engaged with those present, and they eventually dispersed, the statement said.

It added that the Health Act provides certain restrictions on funerals but they are not penal regulations, meaning there would be no penalty for the breach.

Where Gardai identify potential breaches of the public health regulations, a file is prepared for the DPP in each case or a Fixed Payment Notice is issued where appropriate, the garda statement said.

The Covid-19 Pandemic remains a public health crisis and An Garda Siochana continues to appeal to all citizens to demonstrate personal and social responsibility to comply with public health guidelines and regulations, in particular essential journeys, in order to continue to save lives, it added.
Barcelona: The pro-union Socialist Party claimed a narrow win in regional elections in Catalonia late Sunday, local time, but the bloc of parties supporting secession by Spains northeastern corner widened their control of the regional parliament.

Election monitors swapped face masks for full personal protective equipment, including suits, masks, visors, goggles and black trash bags tied around their feet during the final hour of voting, the zombie hour, which was reserved for people with confirmed or suspected COVID-19.

Election workers wearing protective equipment clean their fogged goggles while waiting for voters during the final hour of voting at a polling station during regional Catalan elections in Barcelona, Spain. Credit:Getty

Other pandemic precautions during the day included temperatures taken on arrival, separate entrances and exits, hand gel and floor markings to ensure social distancing.

With 99 per cent of the votes counted, the three main parties pledging to carve out an independent Catalan state increased their number of seats in the regional parliament to 74. In 2017, those same parties won 70 seats of the 135-seat chamber, just two above the majority.
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MOSCOW  When the team of imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny urged people to come out to their residential courtyards and shine their cellphone flashlights in a display of unity, many responded with jokes and skepticism. After two weekends of nationwide demonstrations, the new protest format looked to some like a retreat.

But not to Russian authorities, who moved vigorously to extinguish the illuminated protests planned for Sunday.

Officials accused Navalnys allies of acting on NATOs instructions. Kremlin-backed TV channels warned that flashlight rallies were part of major uprisings around the world. State news agencies cited unnamed sources saying a terrorist group was plotting attacks during unapproved mass protests.

The suppression attempts represent a change of tactics for the authorities who once tried to weaken Navalnys influence by erasing him.

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Kremlin-controlled TV channels used to largely ignore protests called by Navalny. Russian President Vladimir Putin has never mentioned his most prominent critic by name. State news agencies referred to the politician and anti-corruption investigator as a blogger in the rare stories they ran mentioning him.

Navalny went from a person whose name is not allowed to be mentioned to the main subject of discussion on state TV, Maria Pevchikh, head of investigations at Navalnys Foundations for Fighting Corruption, said in a YouTube video Friday.

Pevchikh credited Navalnys latest expose for the sudden surge in attention. His foundations two-hour-long video alleging that a lavish palace on Black Sea was built for Putin through elaborate corruption has been watched over 111 million times on YouTube since it was posted on Jan. 19.

The video went up two days after Navalny was arrested upon returning to Russia from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin. The Russian government denies involvement and has said it has no evidence that Navalny was poisoned.

While the high-profile arrest and the subsequent expose were a double blow to authorities, political analyst and former Kremlin speech writer Abbas Gallyamov says that keeping Navalny and his activity off the airwaves to deprive him of additional publicity no longer makes sense.

The fact that this strategy has changed suggests that the pro-government television audience is somehow receiving information about Navalnys activities through other channels, recognizes him, is interested in his work, and in this sense, keeping the silence doesnt make any sense, Gallyamov said.

The weekend protests in scores of cities last month over Navalnys detention represented the largest outpouring of popular discontent in years and appeared to have rattled the Kremlin.

Police reportedly arrested about 10,000 people, and many demonstrators were beaten, while state media sought to downplay the scale of the protests.

TV channels aired footage of empty squares in cities where protests were announced and claimed that few people showed up. Some reports portrayed police as polite and restrained, claiming officers had helped people with disabilities cross busy streets, handed out face masks to demonstrators and offered them hot tea.

Once the protests died down and Navalny ally Leonid Volkov announced a pause until the spring, Kremlin-backed media reported that grassroots flash mobs titled Putin is our president started sweeping the country. State news channel Rossiya 24 broadcast videos from different cities of people dancing to patriotic songs and waving Russian flags, describing them as a genuine expression of support for Putin.

Several independent online outlets reported that instructions to record videos in support of Putin came from the Kremlin and the governing United Russia party, and that people featured in some of the recordings were invited to shoots under false pretenses.

The Russian presidents spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said the Kremlin had nothing to do with the pro-Putin videos.

After Navalnys team posted its video involving the palace allegedly built for Putin, state channel Rossiya aired its own expose of Navalny. Anchor Dmitry Kiselev said that while working on the investigation in Germany, Navalny lived in the luxury he so much despises.

The reporter sent to chronicle the allegedly luxurious lifestyle the politician maintained while abroad filmed inside a house Navalny rented but failed to capture any high-end items in the two-story building, which featured several bedrooms and a small swimming pool.

She pointed to two sofas, a TV, fresh fruit on the table in the living room and a kitchen with a coffee machine, and described a bedroom as luxurious even though it didnt look much different from a room in a business hotel.

In recent days, official media coverage has focused on plans for this weekends flashlights-in-courtyards protest. Reports extensively quoted Navalny ally Volkovs social media post announcing the event and accused him of acting on instructions from his Western handlers, pointing to an online conference with European officials he took part in the day before.

The political talk show 60 Minutes devoted nearly a half-hour to the topic, calling the flashlight rally an idea from a handbook on revolutions. It aired footage of protesters shining flashlights during the 2014 Maidan protests in Ukraine, mass rallies in Belarus last summer and other uprisings around the world.

On Thursday, state news agencies Tass and RIA Novosti reported, citing anonymous sources, that a terrorist group from Syria was training insurgents for possible terrorist attacks in Russian cities at locations of mass rallies.

The reports didnt refer to any specific protests. Neither did public warnings against unauthorized public events the Prosecutor Generals office and Russias Interior Ministry issued Thursday, although the ministry mentioned events planned for the nearest time.

The Kremlin is awfully scared of the flashlight action, because such a peaceful, light-hearted event would allow the opposition to build a rapport with new supporters who are not ready to be more visible and involved in the protests, Volkov said in a YouTube video.

He suggested that the heavy-handed response to the announcement actually helped dispel skepticism about the courtyard demonstrations.

I saw many posts on social media (saying) When Navalnys headquarters announced the flashlight rally, I thought what nonsense But when I saw the Kremlins reaction, I realized they were right to come up with it.'
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CFD said that the intimidating tactics used during the days of Emergency discipline journalists are being employed by the present central government without the declaration of a formal emergency.

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Citizens for Democracy (CFD) on Monday condemned the Enforcement Directorates (ED) raid at the offices of independent media house Newsclick.

In a statement, CFD said that, the ED raid on the premises associated with News Click, starting on the morning of 9 February 2021 with 25 officials, came to end yesterday at 1.30 am on 14th February  after nearly 114 hours.

The time taken in the raid is unusual, CFD said.

As per Newsclicks statement, some equipment vital to our functioning as a news organization was seized and communication devices of directors and senior management has also been seized, which has, therefore, limited their ability to return to work or indeed, respond to queries of the media.

The laptop and phone of Prabir Purkayastha Editor-in-Chief of News Click have also been taken away.

CFD said that during this so-called investigation, the ED officials were also busy issuing selective leaks to the media which act of ED officials has been described by Newsclick as malicious, misleading and a smear attempt. It has been condemned, and rightly so, that the leak constitutes a violation of the sanctity of the legal and investigative process, CFD said.

CFD noted that the Apex Court, as well as High Courts, have time and again cautioned investigative agencies against such attempts as leaks during investigation affect the right of the accused. The leak engineered in the case of Newsclick creates doubt about the motive of the raid and pollutes the investigation at the threshold, CFD said.

CFD said that Newsclick has emerged as a strong independent news portal fearlessly exposing falsehood in the realm of fake news and speaking truth to power. Its programmes have been truthful and popular.

Its coverage of ongoing farmers protests is exceptional. The raid on it reminds one of the emergency days (June 1975  March 1977) when the free press was ruthlessly suppressed. A major part of the media had surrendered to power and those who refused to succumb were harassed on one pretext or the other, CFD said, adding that, Cases were filed against Statesman and Indian Express on spurious pleas because they refused to toe the official line. Hindustan Times was pressurized to throw out its editor B.G. Verghese who had written a piece critical of the then government. The veteran journalist Kuldip Nayar was arrested and jailed for his unpalatable comments.

Prabir Purkasthaya, owner of the Newsclick himself had to suffer one-year imprisonment during those days of emergency as he had participated in protests as a student in JNU to oppose repressive measures, CFD said.

The intimidating tactics used during those days to discipline journalists are being employed by the present central government without the declaration of a formal emergency, CFD said.

The draconian laws like sedition, Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and NIA are being freely misused since the govt. came to power. A study by well-known journalist Geeta Seshu shows that out of 150 journalists arrested, detained and interrogated between 2010 and 2020, 40% of such cases were in the year 2020 alone, CFD said.

CFD said that the present government seems to be determined to terrorize the independent media like Newsclick. There is no doubt that the ED raid on Newsclick is part of the attack to throttle free expression. This raid is vindictive and scandalous, CFD said.

CFD said that it stands in solidarity with Newsclick and its editors and with all those who have become targets of governmental repression.

CFD further said that the present government must know that the people of this country have always refused to live in the shadow of dictatorship. They believe in what Gandhi had said, Freedom of the Press is a precious privilege which no country can forego, the statement read.

CFD called upon the Central government to stop harassing the honest journalists and independent media.

CFD also called upon all civil liberty and other activists and organizations to come together and resist this onslaught on the freedom of the press and Indian democracy.

A day after Punjab CM Amarinder Singh said the has lost the moral ground to rule, Haryana Chief Minister rejected the suggestion, saying it is people to judge and they are not worried about the allegations leveled against them.

Expressing shock at statements of senior leaders on the farmers who died at the Delhi borders protesting against the farm laws, Amarinder Singh had on Sunday said the party has lost the moral ground to rule at the Centre and in Haryana.

Responding to it, Khattar told reporters in Panchkula, Opposition people keep levelling baseless allegations, we are not worried about that.

The work which we do in the interest of people we keep that before people, he said on the sidelines of an event.

Khattar said ultimately it is the people who is to judge and added that in a few days that will be known in West Bengal, where the assembly polls are to held this year.

Amarinder Singh had said the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government at the Centre should step down in the interest of the nation, as should the Khattar government in Haryana, even as he slammed statements of Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Tomar and Haryana Agriculture Minister J P Dalal.

Amarinder Singh lashed out at Tomar over what he called was his outrageous statement citing Delhi Police information that only two farmers have died and one has committed suicide.

The Congress leader had also criticised Haryana minister J P Dalal, who had stoked a controversy on Saturday, saying the farmers would have died even if they had stayed back home.

Replying to a question on the state's budget to be presented next month, Khattar reiterated that it will take care of all sections of society.

Khattar, who also holds the finance portfolio, said like the previous year, the state budget would be prepared and presented after seeking suggestions from stakeholders.

Keeping in view the coronavirus pandemic, various stakeholders have been asked to send their suggestions in writing to the state government by February 20.

Their valuable suggestions will be incorporated in the budget, said the chief minister.

(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.)
Minister of Health Vlad Voiculescu declared on Monday that the "direct" author of the last 30 years' "disaster" in the Romanian health system is the Social Democratic Party (PSD).

"The direct authors of the last 30 years' disaster in the Romanian health system is PSD and the PSD mafia. I believe that the the authors of this motion misnamed it, and it could have been better named "Vlad Voiculescu - a danger for the Health Mafia". Speaking of authors, the motion was written by a gentleman who four years ago was the state secretary with the Ministry of Health, responsible for hospitals, namely Mr. Nicolae Banicioiu's advisor. We are talking about the Ministry of Health's team who promoted the lie : "We have everything". (...) I am being asked to take responsibility for something that happened in a hospital which was run for about 30 years by your colleague, by the colleague of those who initiated this motion, Dr. Adrian Streinu Cercel. In a city ran in the last 12 years by your colleagues, also: Mister Oprescu, Mrs. Firea," Voiculescu maintained during the simple motion debate on Health 'Incompetence and lack of commitment kill! Vlad Voiculescu, a danger to the Romanians' health and life', initiated by 109 PSD deputies.

He showed that he found the Romanian health system in a "much worse" state than when he left it after his first term.

"Party people who, since the Revolution until now, have had 12 Ministers of Health. Talking about assuming responsibility are the party colleagues of the last three Ministers of Health - all under investigation by DNA [the National Anticorruption Directorate]. (...) Talking about taking responsibility are the people who have led the Ministry of Health for 18 of the last 30 years, during which time they have created real mafia networks with their party branches, with their county councils, connected even here in Parliament. (...) You probably started writing this motion against me before I became a minister. You waited for a tragedy to come and blame me for the disaster you left behind. (...) I found the health system in Romania much worse than I left it. You made fun of almost everything we did in 2016 and it was the beginning of a real reform," said the Minister of Health.

Vlad Voiculescu said that he received one term, and regardless of how many people will ask him to resign, he will not stop.

"I received, ladies and gentleman PSD MPs, a mandate of reform and you can shout resignation 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, for four years, I will not stop," Voiculescu said.
Hilaria Baldwin cemented her returned to Instagram this weekend by posting a series of sweet videos and photos of her family enjoying Valentine's Day weekend together - after taking an extended break from social media in the wake of her fake Spanish heritage controversy.

The 37-year-old Boston-born yoga guru - whose real name is Hillary Hayward-Thomas - shared several glimpses into her family's life in the Hamptons, posting several sweet videos and photos of her children, as well as a romantic tribute to husband Alec Baldwin, 62, in honor of Valentine's Day.

Alongside a black-and-white snap of the couple lying down and cuddling, Hilaria thanked the SNL star for being her 'rock' during 'challenging' times, while joking that Alec is also a 'pain in the [a**]'.

'Through the amazing times, the challenging ones, all the many memories and tiny people we have made in between, thank you for being my rock, my courage, my joy, and my forever valentine,' she wrote.

'Ok...this was so mushy and I cant help but be me: you are my pain in the [a**] too. I love you.'

Family outing: Hilaria Baldwin, 37, made her first return to Instagram since apologizing earlier this month for her Spanish heritage controversy as she and Alec, 62, took their kids to a beach

The gushing post comes just a few weeks after it was revealed that the couple were living in separate houses in the Hamptons - with actor Alec revealing that he was quarantining away from his family while commuting into New York City for work.

Alec was staying in a rented house in Amagansett - an upmarket neighborhood that is located around a mile away from his East Hamptons estate, where his wife and children have been staying since she was first accused of faking her European background.

A source told Page Six that he rented a second home in the Hamptons so that he can quarantine away from his family while he continues to travel into the city for work.

It is unclear whether he is still using the property - however a second post shared by Hilaria over the weekend would suggest that Alec has returned to his East Hamptons estate to live with his wife and children once again.

After sharing her heartfelt tribute to her husband, Hilaria also shared a funny video of the couple dancing in the snow with their five children, using the Spanish diminutive of their name - Baldwinito - while joking that Alec was trying to copy their son's moves.

'We had a Valentines Day freezing Baldwinito dance party on the beach...Alec is trying to learn Romeos moves,' she wrote alongside the clip, which saw the SNL star wearing a face mask - perhaps an indication that he is still commuting into the city and is taking extra precautions as a result.

Hilaria - who went mask-free - kept warm in a long dark green puffer coat with black leggings and brown cowboy boots.

Letting loose: Hilaria set the sped-up clip to electronic dance music as they had a 'Baldwinito dance party'

Helping out: Hilaria held her youngest son, Eduardo, while Alec danced around with two of the older boys

Hilaria held her youngest son, Eduardo, while Alec danced around with two of the older boys.

Following her late-December departure from Instagram, Hilaria returned to the social media site on February 5, sharing a portrait of the whole family lying on the floor while addressing the controversy over her misrepresenting herself as a Spanish woman.

'Ive spent the last month listening, reflecting, and asking myself how I can learn and grow,' she began her caption.

'My parents raised my brother and me with two cultures, American and Spanish, and I feel a true sense of belonging to both. The way Ive spoken about myself and my deep connection to two cultures could have been better explained  I should have been more clear and I'm sorry,' she continued.

'I'm proud of the way I was raised, and were raising our children to share the same love and respect for both. Being vulnerable and pushing ourselves to learn and grow is what we've built our community on, and I hope to get back to the supportive and kind environment weve built together.'

Setting the record straight: Hilaria returned to Instagram on February 5 to apologize and address the controversy over her misrepresenting herself as a Spanish woman

Following the February 5 post, Hilaria began posting cute photos of her children, and Alec has also appeared with them, but her Valentine's Day posts were her first appearances on Instagram since her apology.

The original heritage controversy began shortly after Amy Schumer poked fun at an Instagram post from Hilaria in which she held her baby son Eduardo while showing off her unbelievably trim post-baby body.

But Hilaria's reaction video, which featured a suspiciously spotty 'Spanish' accent that seemed to disappear at times, led social media sleuths to uncover that she had been born in Boston, not Majorca, as had been listed online in some places.

Escalated quickly: The original heritage controversy began shortly after Amy Schumer poked fun at an Instagram post from Hilaria in which she held her baby son Eduardo while showing off her trim post-baby body

Long distance: On Saturday, Hilaria posted humorous photos to her Insta Stories of herself FaceTiming with Alec while he was in New York City to film his True Crime series Dr. Death

Complicated: The actor had to wash some clothes, but he needed some expert help from his wife to figure out the high-tech washing machine

On Saturday, Hilaria posted some humorous photos to her Instagram Stories of herself FaceTiming with Alec while he was in New York City to film his True Crime series Dr. Death.

The actor had to wash some clothes, but he needed some expert help from his wife to figure out the high-tech washing machine.

'I took these photos to document for myself me teaching Alec how to use the washing machine etc while he was in the city working...' she wrote.

'As you can imagine: teaching Alec Baldwin to wash his clothes is as epic as you can imagine.'

One photo showed a closeup of her husband just missing the correct button, which she was 'trying to get him to press.'

Heartbreaking: 'Eduardo felt my pain,' she joked in a closeup of the tot crying as his dad failed to wash his clothes

Success! But eventually Alec figured out how to get his laundry cleaned

'Eduardo felt my pain,' she joked in a closeup of the tot crying.

But eventually Alec figured out how to get his laundry cleaned.

'Even Alec realized how... um... yeah...' Hilaria wrote, adding a cartoon speech bubble at the bottom reading, 'just press the right [cursing emoji] button, honey.'

A Cork councillor has backed a campaign by Senator Mark Wall to change the law so that CCTV can be used by local authorities to tackle illegal dumping.

Labour Councillor John Maher said that the practice of illegal dumping continues to damage natural environments throughout the country and that councils must be empowered to address such harmful behaviour.

The Cork City North-East councillor said that there are areas within his ward where illegal dumping is causing untold damage to our environment.

Illegal dumping can potentially cause severe problems for those in rural areas, including preventing flood waters from draining effectively, and local authorities must be empowered to address this.

One tool long used by local authorities as an effective deterrent is CCTV. Despite this, it would seem that question marks are being raised around the use of CCTV by our local authorities due to data protection concerns.

The Labour Party has asked the Minister to investigate this, and our Senator Mark Wall has also prepared a new draft law that would address these concerns around data protection and GDPR.

Councils have to be authorised by law to allow the processing of personal data such as the gathering and using of images of identifiable individuals by CCTV to use as evidence in the prosecution of dumping cases, he said.

Following a recent case of illegal dumping on the northside of the city where residents suggested the use of CCTV, a spokesperson for Cork City Councils Parks and Recreation Department said that depending on the circumstances, CCTV may not prove effective.

In a similar area previously, CCTV was not effective as people covered faces when dumping rubbish and it made no difference to the problem, the spokesperson said.

Cllr Maher said, however, that being able to identify the culprits through the use of CCTV is a deterrent to this behaviour.

Some local authorities are now reporting 40 to 50 incidents of illegal dumping each week, many of these are at locations which have just recently been cleaned at a cost to us all.

Cleaning up illegal dumping is costing councils millions that could instead be invested in public services and amenities like our parks, Cllr Maher said.

The Minister needs to take a common sense approach to this problem, and a balance between privacy and the common good must be struck, he said.

Irans Foreign Ministry has denied Turkish media reports alleging that an Iranian citizen recently arrested in Turkey is a consulate employee linked to the 2019 murder of an Iranian dissident in Istanbul.

"What has happened is the arrest of an Iranian national upon entry," ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh told reporters on February 15, adding that Tehran was in contact with Turkish officials regarding the matter.

Khatibzadeh did not provide more details.

Last week, Turkey's pro-government Sabah newspaper reported that a man identified as Mohammad Reza Naserzadeh was arrested on suspicion of planning the killing of Masud Molavi Vardanjani, a critic of Iran's political and military leadership.

Reuters confirmed that Naserzadeh had been held over Vardanjanis killing, but the news agency said it could not confirm Sabahs allegation that the suspect worked at the civic registry department of the Iranian Consulate in Istanbul.

Vardanjani, a former Iranian intelligence operative who exposed corruption involving Iranian officials, was shot and killed in Istanbul on November 14, 2019 -- a year after leaving Iran. He had been put under investigation by Iranian authorities.

A Turkish police report published in March 2020 said Vardanjani had worked in cybersecurity at Irans Defense Ministry before becoming a vocal critic of the Iranian regime.

Two senior Turkish officials told Reuters last year that Vardanjani's killing was instigated by intelligence officials at the Iranian Consulate in Istanbul. One of the officials identified the two suspects by their initials, and one set of initials matched Naserzadeh's.

A senior U.S. administration official said in April 2020 that Washington had grounds to believe that Iran's Ministry of Intelligence and Security was directly involved in Vardanjanis killing.

Iran has denied that any consulate staff had been involved in Vardanjani's shooting death.

Last week, a Belgian court sentenced an Iranian diplomat to 20 years in prison on charges of planning an attack on an exiled opposition group.

It was the first trial of an Iranian official on terrorism charges in Europe since Iran's 1979 revolution.

With reporting by IRNA, AFP and Reuters
Biden administration revokes the designation of the Yemeni Houthis as a terrorist organization By Yoni Ben Menachem

There is considerable concern at the top political echelons of Jerusalem, the Saudi royal household, and the official Yemeni government over the Biden administration overturning the Trump decision declaring Yemens Houthi rebels a terrorist organization (also known as Ansar Allah). The Trump administrations decision came into force on January 19, 2021, the day before President Trump left the White House. Not many days passed, and on February 5, 2021, the Biden administration revoked the designation of Houthi rebels as a terrorist organization. The decision came after Joe Bidens first foreign policy speech as president, in which he announced that he was halting military aid to the Saudi-led military coalition leading the war in Yemen. A spokesman for the U.S. State Department announced last weekend that the administration had formally informed Congress of plans to revoke the Houthis classification as a terrorist organization, adding: The decision has nothing to do with our view of the Houthis and their reprehensible conduct, including attacks against civilians and the kidnapping of American citizens. He continued, We are committed to helping Saudi Arabia defend its territory against further such attacks. The Trump administration declared the Houthi rebels a terrorist organization and imposed sanctions on the rebel leaders; however, it took into account the position of the United Nations and human rights organizations and did not impose sanctions that would harm the supply of humanitarian aid, food, and medicine to the people of Yemen. The humanitarian crisis in Yemen is the most severe in the world: 30 million Yemenis live under siege, and 80 percent of the civilians are at risk of famine because of the war that has been going on for seven years. U.S. officials say President Biden decided on the move out of fear that declaring the Houthis a terrorist organization would undermine efforts to bring peace to Yemen and end the war. The United Nations welcomed the Biden administrations decision and continues to push for a ceasefire through its special envoy to Yemen. Another reason is President Bidens concern that failure to revoke the terrorist designation would sabotage his efforts to warm relations with Iran and sign an enhanced nuclear deal with it. The Houthis in Yemen are Irans proteges and are equipped with advanced Iranian weapons systems, including ballistic missiles and precision-guided drones.

A ballistic missile shot by the Houthis that hit a Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, apartment complex in March 2018 Designating the Houthis as a terrorist organization and imposing sanctions announced by the Trump administrations U.S. Treasury Department were acts based on reports from the intelligence community. The Biden administration will have to explain to the House of Representatives and the Senate its decision to revoke the classification of Houthis as a terrorist organization. Saudi Arabia Is the Main Target The Houthi rebels control several provinces in Yemen and have also controlled the capital Sanaa since 2014. Starting in 2015, a Saudi-led military coalition has been working to help Yemens legitimate government against the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels. Saudi Arabia is the country most affected by the Houthi rebels. In September 2019, there was a sizeable attack on Saudi Arabia with precision missiles and drones, for which the Houthis claimed credit. [There is strong evidence that the drones/cruise missiles were not launched from by the Houthis in the south, but from Iran in the north.] They attacked Aramcos oil facilities in the Al-Baiquiak region and caused considerable damage, resulting in a halt in oil output of six percent of global output. On January 22, 2021, the Saudi-led coalition intercepted a guided drone aimed at Riyadh, the Saudi capital. On February 4, President Biden announced that the United States would protect Saudi sovereignty and protect it from the forces operating against it and supported by Iran. General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the IRGCs Quds Force, armed and equipped the Houthi rebels with precision missiles and drones used to attack Saudi Arabia and threaten to attack Israel as well. Revolutionary Guard Officer Moves to Yemen In mid-October 2020, a senior officer of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Quds Force, Hassan Irlu, was appointed Irans ambassador to the Houthi rebels in Yemen. His arrival in Sanaa, Yemen, was seen as a military and political move, a kind of Iranian recognition of the Houthi state in Yemen. The new ambassador specializes in the manufacture of ballistic missiles and their launch and the production of anti-aircraft missiles. In this new phase in Iranian activity after the assassination of Qassem Soleimani, Iran is attempting to increase control of northern Yemen monitored by General Irlu. His presence and activity in the region pose a danger to Saudi Arabia and Israel, so the Trump administration was quick to announce in December 2020 the inclusion of General Irlu on the international list of terrorist operatives. This Iranian move indicates Irans attempt to recover from the assassination of Qassem Soleimani and increase its terrorist activity in the Middle East. It attaches great importance to the frontline in Yemen and wants to directly monitor the fighting and political negotiations conducted by the UN envoy to Yemen and the Yemeni governments covert contacts with Saudi Arabia. Irlu has already earned the title of the Iranian governor of Sanaa. He is also apparently directed to plan and carry out attacks on Israeli targets if necessary, making his activity also dangerous for Israel. President Bidens announcement of an end to support for the Saudi-led military coalition for the war in Yemen is interpreted in the Arab world as an American admission of the failure of the war. U.S. weapons supply did not translate to a Saudi victory. The Arab worlds assessment is that Iran will leverage the cessation of war in Yemen to the lifting of sanctions and a return to the 2015 nuclear deal without any change. Iran controls the Houthi rebels without constraints and now has more leverage over the Biden administration. Yoni Ben Menachem, a veteran Arab affairs and diplomatic commentator for Israel Radio and Television, is a senior Middle East analyst for the Jerusalem Center. He served as Director General and Chief Editor of the Israel Broadcasting Authority. Home
 Flash

Iran's presence in Syria is at the official request of the Syrian government, senior assistant of Iran's foreign minister, Ali Asghar Khaji, said on Sunday.

Asked by the Russian Sputnik about withdrawal of Iran's forces from Syria, Khaji said that "Tehran has received no message about the withdrawal of its forces from Syria," official IRNA news agency reported.

He said that "we are there (in Syria) at the request of the Syrian government, and this presence will continue as long as the Syrian people and government want it."

Those who have came to Syria and have illegally occupied its territories should leave the Arab state, Khaji pointed out.

The Syrian territory should be under the control and sovereignty of the Syrian nation and government, he added.

In July 2020, Iran and Syria signed an agreement to expand "comprehensive" military and security cooperation.

Iran has been a major ally of the Syrian government in its fight against the armed rebels since 2011.
Multiple vehicles blazing in a pile-up on the Turner Turnpike westbound near Post Road in Oklahoma on Feb. 14, 2021. (Courtesy of Oklahoma Highway Patrol)

Fiery Multi-Vehicle Crash in Oklahoma Forces Highway Closure, Injuries Reported

A fiery multi-vehicle crash led to several people being injured and rushed to hospitals as authorities shut down a major Oklahoma highway over the weekend, officials said.

The pileup happened on Sunday around 3 p.m. on the Turner Turnpike westbound near Post Road when two semi-trucks collided. The roads westbound and eastbound lanes were blocked for hours as first-responders worked on the injuries at the crash.

Oklahoma Turnpikes noted that traffic heading westbound was being diverted to Kickapoo Turnpike, while eastbound traffic was diverted to Interstate 35. All lanes on the Turner Turnpike were reopened to traffic early Monday, local authorities said.

Portion of Turner Turnpike closed in both directions around MM141. WB diverted to Kickapoo Tnpk. EB diverted to I35. Travel discouraged. Seek alternative route. Extremely poor visibility. Avoid area. pic.twitter.com/j5CK6Z1fyr  Oklahoma Turnpikes (@OKTurnpike) February 14, 2021

This is involving multiple semis and passenger vehicles, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol and Department of Public Safety said.

Just a reminderdo not get out if you dont have to, the agency added, warning drivers that conditions are definitely getting worse.

Officials shared several pictures of the dramatic crash showing an overturned tractor-trailer and large plumes of black smoke as firefighters worked to control the flames.

We are currently working this injury crash on the Turner Turnpike westbound near Post Road. This is involving multiple semis and passenger vehicles. Traffic is being diverted at Hogback Road. Just a reminder  do not get out if you dont have to. pic.twitter.com/lAtnol944f  OK Highway Patrol/DPS (@OHPDPS) February 14, 2021

State highway officials said they had responded to 14 injury collisions, 19 non-injuries, and assisted 46 motorists overnight until 11 a.m. on Sunday.

The crash came after Oklahoma declared a state of emergency for its 77 counties due to inclement weather conditions. Gov. Kevin Stitt also activated National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks including rescuing stranded drivers.

The National Weather Service said Sunday that weather forecasts through early Tuesday call for 8 to 12 inches of snow in central Oklahoma.

Youre doing pretty good Oklahoma. Heres what we worked from midnight until 11 am today. Injury collisions  14

Non-injury collisions  19

Motorist assists  46 Conditions are definitely getting worse out there so continue to stay off the roads if you can!  OK Highway Patrol/DPS (@OHPDPS) February 14, 2021

American Airlines also said wintry conditions are affecting flights, with operations reduced and canceled at airports across Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.

Also on Sunday, the Texas Highway Patrol reported several multi-car pileups in West Texas, including one that involved 25 vehicles and shut down a portion of Interstate 20 westbound. Officials strongly discouraged travel in current wintry conditions.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

From NTD News

BISHKEK -- One day after hundreds protested in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan's State Committee for National Security (UKMK) said a probe into former deputy chief of the Customs Service Raimbek Matraimov could be reopened.

In its February 15 statement, the UKMK said the criminal case against Matraimov, who was placed on the U.S. Magnitsky sanctions list for his involvement in the illegal funneling of hundreds of millions of dollars abroad, would resume if allegations are confirmed that he has numerous properties in Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Ukraine, and Russia.

The UKMK also said that investigations to establish if Matraimov had a deeper involvement in the illegal funneling of more than $700 million abroad continue.

The UKMK statement came a day after hundreds rallied in the Kyrgyz capital, protesting a Bishkek court ruling last week that ordered a mitigated sentence and no jail time for Matraimov.

Matraimov was fined just over $3,000 after pleading guilty to corruption charges. The court said on February 11 that Matraimov had paid back around $24 million that disappeared through corruption schemes that he oversaw.

In June 2019, an investigation by RFE/RL, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, and Kloop implicated Matraimov in a corruption scheme involving the transfer of hundreds of millions of dollars out of Kyrgyzstan by Chinese-born Uyghur businessman Aierken Saimaiti, who was subsequently assassinated in Istanbul in November 2019.

SPECIAL REPORT: Plunder And Patronage In The Heart Of Central Asia

The estimated $700 million scheme involved a company controlled by Matraimov bribing officials to skirt customs fees and regulations, as well as engaging in money laundering, "allowing for maximum profits," the U.S. Treasury Department said.

The participants in the protest in Bishkek condemned the court ruling, chanting, "Arrest Raim!" and "Raim must be held responsible!"

Recent reports said that the 49-year-old Matraimov had changed his last name to Ismailov, and that his wife, Uulkan Turgunova, had changed her family name to Sulaimanova in moves seen as an attempt to evade the U.S.- imposed sanctions.

Last month, Damira Azimbaeva, a spokeswoman for the state registration service, confirmed to RFE/RL that both Matraimov and his wife had changed their surnames.

There have been no official statements from lawyers for Matraimov's family to explain the name change.

Heath: Report Adds to Unemployment Problems

By Rep. Richard Heath

MAYFIELD - While most of Kentucky slowed down to face ice and snow storms, legislative activity sped up at the State Capitol. As a member of the House, I am pleased to report that we continue to pass legislation aimed at crafting good long-term public policy. This week, we sent legislation (HB 7) to the Senate aimed at encouraging a more comprehensive approach to substance use disorder prevention, treatment, and recovery in each of our 120 counties.We also approved HB 183, which would amend the state's Medicaid plan to allow Kentucky hospitals to draw down more federal funds without increasing the burden to the state budget. This measure would result in significant relief for hospitals and as well as provide additional Medicaid funds for the state. The Senate will now consider HB 209, which would allow the University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension Agency, the Kentucky State University Cooperative Extension Program, and the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife to receive and donate game meat for the purpose of food distribution and cooking demonstrations for those in need.These are just a few examples of the bills we passed this week that I believe show the variety of issues brought to us for consideration. I will write more about pending legislation, but I would like to use this update to share information about the ongoing issues with unemployment insurance (UI).We are all aware that the UI Program has been riddled with issues since the state shutdown in mid-March. With a handful of executive orders, the Governor put thousands of Kentuckians out-of-work without any apparent consideration of how a system designed to serve a relatively low caseload would handle skyrocketing claim numbers. As a result, more than 100,000 claims remain unprocessed, communication with the Office of Unemployment Insurance is non-existent, and we have more questions than answers.While we were legislating, Kentucky's Auditor Mike Harmon released a report that brought to light new concerns about the troubling lack of leadership over the state's unemployment insurance program. I think it is important to note that the Auditor is an independent office within the executive branch. Constitutionally charged with auditing the accounts and financial transactions of all spending agencies of the Commonwealth, the Auditor's Office performs hundreds of audits each year, and the UI issues were presented as part of the Statewide Single Audit of Kentucky.The Audit focused on several problems, but I have to say that the most infuriating news to learn was that the Office of Unemployment Insurance archived more than 400,000 unread emails. Yes, you read that correctly, they archived more than 400,000 emails without any regard for the people who sent them. These are messages from Kentuckians inquiring about their applications for benefits, many at the end of their financial rope and likely still wondering why their claims have not been processed.In addition to the unread emails, the UI Program also violated federal law and sacrificed program integrity by adopting an "auto-pay" approach that allowed benefits to be paid without requiring claimants to report the weekly wage information required to determine eligibility. That's right  claims were paid without verifying whether or not they were eligible. In fact, more than $655 million in claims were paid while UI was using auto-pay. Of course, many of these claims were valid.To determine how big a problem the auto-pay approach was, the Auditor's Office sampled 37 cases and found that in 16 people were paid unemployment benefits for the loss of part-time jobs despite still being employed. The net overpayment in this sample was more than $116,000.The Auditor's Office also rooted out multiple issues with security and data processing, finding that basic security protocols like vetting employees and requiring password resets were far too relaxed. This may or may not explain the security breach that was discovered only after someone filing a claim reported they were able to see social security numbers and other personal identity information belonging to other people.The number of unprocessed claims and the Auditor's report are disturbing enough on their own. Employers now face a $100 per employee increase in their unemployment insurance premiums, despite the fact the pandemic and the state's response to it caused the job losses. This increase is automatically triggered when the UI fund is depleted. It is required to pay back a federal loan taken out by the Governor to shore up the fund. Those loans already stand at more than $700 million and are expected to grow as unemployment numbers continue to remain high. Ultimately, this means already struggling employers are going to have a harder time making ends meet  which could easily lead to more businesses closing or eliminating positions.While we are limited in what we can do to address the unprocessed claims, and the Auditor's Office has already focused on areas of improvement in how the UI fund is administered, we are considering legislation aimed at keeping people off of unemployment by preserving jobs. The bill, HB 413, passed the House Economic Development and Workforce Investment Committee this week. The bill suspends an increase in the taxable wage base, which would have been $300 this year and keeps that rate at the same level for two years. HB 413 also suspends the state UI surcharge for two years. The bill would also require that unemployment insurance claims that are the direct result of state and federal emergencies be paid out of a pooled account, rather than the employer's account.I expect we will consider additional unemployment insurance legislation as we continue this session. In the meantime, I hope you will not hesitate to reach out to me to share your thoughts on the issues coming before us in Frankfort. I can be reached during the week from 8:30 a.m. until 4:30 p.m. (EST) through the toll-free message line at 1-800-372-7181. You can also contact me via e-mail at Richard.Heath@lrc.ky.gov.
Now micro-parties have a higher purpose, especially in parts with strict quarantine where people havent socialised in months.

There are times when simple ideas achieve greatness and success. Polo was a just a regular mint, but it was in the shape of a small tyre. "The mint with a hole," they called it. And for some reason that became a big deal.

Donuts were already sugary tyres. But someone thought of selling the centre cut out from them as donut holes, because we all know the US needed one more fatty food. In Mumbai a vada pav shop became famous just because its owner thought of packing in some chura, crunchy leftover bits of fried batter, in the sandwich.

Similarly, small social innovations, or the same activities but with a new name, have acquired special status in the COVID-19 pandemic.

Take the case of micro-parties, currently trending in different parts of the world and recommended by behaviour experts as a healthy way of experiencing some normalcy and cheer.

According to the BBC, a Pinterest trend report for 2021 shows that many people are having micro-parties. Lord Google, which observes the world through powerful telescopes and screens from its perch in the Googleplex, has also noted a growth in the number of micro-party queries.

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

In itself, a micro-party is not extraordinary. Micro-parties in some form have taken place all along, even before Coronavirus. Our coffee or drink meetings with our circle, weekend meals together, what else were they if not micro-parties? In bleak Nordic winters, when work conditions became difficult, locals started having Wednesday evening gatherings, calling them lillordag. Effectively, they reduced a working week from five or six days to a couple of days.

But now micro-parties have a higher purpose, especially in parts with strict quarantine where people havent socialised in months.

Also, pre-Coronavirus, micro-parties could be defined as any small gathering. Now they are also held to celebrate small achievements. Emmy award winning TV personality Kae Lani Palmisano held a party because she had finally learnt to bake bread.

It was just about celebrating that Ive progressed in my sourdough making, she told the BBC. It has taken me months to figure out how to deal with the dough, how long to let my loaf ferment, at what temperature it needs to rest before I put it in the oven.

Fred B Bryant, a professor of social psychology at Loyola University in Chicago, tracks down the history of celebration to ancient times. Across every culture, it goes back to the dawn of recorded time, he said. Theres the celebration of successfully hunting a mastodon, or a good harvest, celebrations of discovery, of good fortune.

But then there is the financial factor to consider. Many people would rather not spend on indulgences in the current situation. Even for a micro-party, you need to put out some decent drinks and food.

Mood is the other important point, and the most important ingredient of merry-making. Due to the uncertainty ahead and other related dampeners, it is natural if you are not feeling up to a celebration, however small. In that case your micro-party is going to be a pain, a plod through small talk and forced laughter, for you and your guests.

For many people, it makes sense to party when something significant happens. But these are different times. As Professor Bryant says, There are far more little things to celebrate than there are milestones. The wedding you get one shot at, but the little things you get every day.
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Scientists have accepted natural selection as a driver of evolution for more than 160 years, thanks to Charles Darwin.

But University of Cincinnati biologist Michal Polak says Darwin's book "The Descent of Man" only tells part of the story. Sometimes when the victor vanquishes his sexual rival, the quest to pass genes to the next generation is just beginning.

According to a new UC study published in the journal Current Biology, male fruit flies with the most impressive sexual ornamentation also have super sperm that can outcompete that of rivals in the post-mating fertilization game.

UC studied Drosophila bipectinata, a tiny red-eyed fruit fly from the South Pacific. The male's forelegs have a distinctive "sex comb," dark bristles that female fruit flies find appealing -- like the colorful train of a male peacock. Scientists previously found that female flies prefer males with more robust sex combs, which the males use to grasp the female's abdomen before mating.

UC researchers found a strong link between the most impressive sex combs and that male's competitive success at passing on his genes even after a female fly has mated with other flies. And this competitive edge persisted even after the male's sex comb was surgically removed with a high-precision laser in UC experiments.

"This is the first robust demonstration of a genetic link between a traditionally Darwinian trait and success in postcopulatory sexual competition," Polak said. "That's the surprising link: precopulatory and postcopulatory fitness."

In his groundbreaking 1859 book "On the Origin of Species," Darwin framed the idea of natural selection by describing how the "fittest" animals pass on their genes to the next generation. This fitness is manifested in having the largest antlers, the most vibrant colors or the vigor to defend a territory.

But Darwin's theory was incomplete, Polak said, because it failed to recognize that sexual selection continues during and after mating. Female fruit flies are promiscuous, often choosing multiple mates. Fruit flies are hardly alone in that regard, Polak said.

"Promiscuity is much more common across animal species than once was thought," Polak said.

Scientists living in prim and proper Victorian England did not give enough consideration to the microscopic race to fertilize that begins after mating among multiple successful suitors.

"You have to consider the social context in which Darwin was living," Polak said.

What females gain from mating with multiple suitors is not always clear, Polak said. But when they do, postcopulatory sexual selection provides a competitive edge.

"It's evident even in primates. Female chimpanzees and bonobos are promiscuous, so the males have large testes that produce big volumes of sperm," Polak said.

"And you have species like gorillas where females are not promiscuous. Silverback males enforce monogamy. And lo and behold, their testes are much smaller relative to body size compared to chimps."

And if you're wondering, the relative size of human testes falls somewhere between gorillas and chimps, Polak said.

Polak, a professor of biology in UC's College of Arts and Sciences, decided to study this species of fruit fly after encountering it while conducting fieldwork in Queensland, Australia.

"I was watching these flies mate on a fruit and looked under the microscope and saw these beautiful sex combs. I thought it would make a good model system to study," Polak said.

"Sexual selection picks up on these traits and they become really exaggerated," he said.

For their study, UC biologists artificially selected males with the largest and smallest sex combs in 11 successive generations of fruit flies to create high and low genetic lines.

Kassie Hooker from 2012 to 2015 worked in Polak's lab as an undergraduate biology student, undertaking the arduous task of categorizing generations of male fruit flies based on the size of the sex combs on their legs.

By counting the teeth in each comb, she separated the males with the largest and smallest sex combs to create distinct genetic lines.

To show that the male fruit fly's sex comb doesn't provide any reproductive benefit in mating, researchers used ultraprecise lasers to trim the sex comb in the high line males to mimic those found in the low line males. But these postsurgical males continued to fertilize more eggs even when females mated with lower-line males first.

The research was supported by the National Science Foundation.

UC assistant professor Joshua Benoit, a study co-author, analyzed the RNA of the flies and identified seminal fluid genes that may be responsible for giving high-line males a fertilization advantage.

There aren't many studies more interesting than this one, Sex, lasers, and male competition, which could describe most 1980s action movies." Joshua Benoit, Sudy Co-Author and Assistant Professor, University of Cincinnati

Darwin proposed the theory of sexual selection to account for the evolution of male weaponry and extravagant ornamental displays, Polak said. But UC's study found a far more complex and interesting battle among the sexes.

"We established a link between Darwinian traits and the postcopulatory arena, which Darwin didn't recognize was important in evolution at all," Polak said.
ORLAND, Calif. - The woman who was shot on Thursday in Orland, California has been released from the hospital, according to police officers. They said they are still searching for a suspect.

The shooting occurred at approximately 9:30 in the morning at East Mill Street and Woodward Avenue.

Action News Now reporter Jafet Serrato spoke with neighbors. Several said they did were not home at the time of the drive-by shooting, and only saw law enforcement at the scene.

Another neighbor, Bonnie Hawkson, said she was not happy about the situation, but said, "Things happen." She said she does not feel that she is in any danger now.

Police said witnesses told them they saw a red sedan pass by at the time of the shooting. Orland Police Sgt. Johnson said on Sunday that the woman who had been shot was in the red sedan.

The woman who was shot told police she did not know the suspect who shot her while she was inside of the car. Police described her as a transient.

The search for a suspect continued all weekend, but so far no one has been identified.
The Ministry of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture of Ukraine plans to support domestic producers by improving the public procurement system.

Minister of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture of Ukraine Ihor Petrashko noted that now state institutions and enterprises have an opportunity to apply non-price criteria for evaluating tender offers when making purchases, in particular, to establish such criteria as availability of own production facilities, use of local resources, environmental characteristics. However, currently, these criteria are advisory and, unfortunately, are not always used by customers, the Ministrys press service informs.

We need to work to make non-price criteria, which allow Ukrainian producers to gain an advantage, mandatory. At the same time, we should not forget that Ukraine signed the Association Agreement with the EU and received many preferences. Therefore, our position must be responsible and balanced. But there is a step towards a compromise," Petrashko said.

He also said that support for domestic producers, so-called protectionism, has intensified in the world amid the coronavirus pandemic. In such circumstances, Ukraine must also take effective and adequate measures to protect its domestic producers.

In G20 countries, the number of anti-dumping investigations to protect their producers has almost doubled. That is, we see a trend that countries start to defend themselves more actively. That is why we are also moving in this direction as the number of investigations we are currently conducting has also increased significantly, the minister commented.

To date, Ukraine applies 28 trade defense measures (including 25 anti-dumping and 3 special measures) in regard to the imports of goods with a potential value of over UAH 16.7 billion.

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Half Moon Bay, CA (94019)

Today

A few passing clouds, otherwise generally clear. Low 49F. Winds W at 10 to 15 mph, becoming S and decreasing to less than 5 mph..

Tonight

A few passing clouds, otherwise generally clear. Low 49F. Winds W at 10 to 15 mph, becoming S and decreasing to less than 5 mph.
Detention of illegal rally participant accused of beating National Guard officer upheld

   

15:37 15/02/2021

MOSCOW, February 15 (RAPSI)  The Moscow City Court on Monday dismissed an appeal against detention of Timur Salikhov, a particiant of the illegal rally held in Moscow on January 23, over an assault on an officer of the National Guard, the courts press service told RAPSI.

He will remain in jail until March 24.

According to investigators, on January 23, the accused taking part in the unauthorized rally in central Moscow kicked the law enforcement officer in the head and left the scene.

He was charged with the use of force against a representative of authority.
[February 15, 2021] International Solar Alliance Special Assembly Elects Dr Ajay Mathur As New Director General

NEW DELHI, Feb. 15, 2021 /CNW/ -- The International Solar Alliance (ISA) announces Dr. Ajay Mathur as its new Director General following his election at the first special assembly, held virtually. A coalition of 73 member countries, ISA was established at the end of 2015 to accelerate the demand for and use of safe, sustainable, and affordable solar energy for all. It aims to mobilize over USD 1 trillion of investment into solar projects by 2030 through focused advocacy, policy and regulatory support, capacity building, and by overcoming perceived investment barriers. Dr. Mathur replaces Mr. Upendra Tripathy, who has served as Director General since the ISA was founded in 2015. Dr. Mathur's leadership appointment to the ISA takes place in a year when addressing global climate change transition commitments will take center stage: 2021 started with the US's renewed climate focus through the Biden administration and will culminate with COP26, the UN's Climate Change Conference in the UK in November. As the sole multilateral forum dedicated to solar energy transition and building upon existing milestones, including pooling resources across its members, and creating economies of scale to reduce the cost for clean energy, ISA is poised to renew its commitment towards global solar transition through the new leadership. Speaking at the ISA's special assembly, Dr. Mathur, said: "I am honored to lead the International Solar Alliance and am ambitious about what we can achieve together with our members and partners to transition to a safer, sustainable, equitable and more prosperous future for all through solar energy. "ISA has a vital role to help establish the infrastructure and ecosystem for a zero-carbon emission future. With strong foundations already in place, my immediate focus is to identify and mobilize the opportunities and capital to acelerate our solarization goals in the interim and long-term."



Dr. Mathur who will take over the leadership of ISA on March 15, brings a wealth of leadership expertise across all key areas of energy transition, from policy, research, and technology commercialization to financing, international cooperation and institutional development. Currently Director General of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), a key driver of the energy transition to renewables and reduction in urban air pollution for the past five years, Dr. Mathur has held leadership appointments at the Bureau of Energy Efficiency and the Green Climate Fund. In 2020, he received an IconSWM-CE Lifetime Achievement Award for his contribution to environmental protection.

Ms Barbara Pompili, Minister for Ecological Transition of the French Republic and ISA Co-President added: "At a time when we have reached a new milestone with the recent decision to open ISA membership to all UN Member countries, France, as co-President of ISA, extends its full support to Dr. Mathur. We are fully confident that he is the right person to further the development of ISA, particularly through its universalization, robust governance and support to concrete initiatives to facilitate solar power deployment, such as the 'STAR-C' program."

Mr. R.K. Singh, Minister for Power and New and Renewable Energy for India and ISA President, said: "The ISA has grown to become an able global body working effectively towards energy access, energy security and energy transition. I look forward to working constructively under our new Director General and alongside other esteemed Members to take this important mandate forward against a backdrop of growing support around the world for the low-carbon transition." COP26 President Alok Sharma said: "I am delighted that Dr Ajay Mathur, an invaluable friend of COP26, is taking up this important post. The International Solar Alliance has been a key partner in driving the international collaboration we need to a low carbon future, and I look forward to working together ahead of COP26 this November." Outgoing Director General Mr. Upendra Tripathy commented: "I am grateful to all the member countries for their trust and support over the past five years which has seen ISA grow from an idea to the go-to international organization on solar energy that it is today. It is so pleasing to see more and more countries joining the ISA to work together to pool efforts and resources to bring solar to the next level." About the International Solar Alliance The International Solar Alliance (ISA), was launched at COP21 in Paris and has recently expanded its membership scope to include all UN member states. There are 90 signatories and 193 prospective members. The ISA provides a dedicated platform for co-operation, through which the global community, including governments, bilateral and multilateral organizations, corporates, industry, and other stakeholders, can contribute to help achieve the common goal of increasing the use and quality of solar energy in meeting energy needs of prospective ISA member countries in a safe, convenient, affordable, equitable and sustainable manner. ISA's Key Milestones ISA aggregated demand for 23GW across various solar programs worth USD 13Bn

ISA led the price discovery for a project for 272,000 solar pumps, with a cost reduction of more than 40%

ISA formed an International Steering Committee to institutionalize the World Solar Bank

ISA issued a Letter of Award to an EDF-led consortium to design a roadmap for India's ambitious Global grid (OSOWOG) Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1438106/ISA_Director_General_Ajay_Mathur.jpg View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/international-solar-alliance-special-assembly-elects-dr-ajay-mathur-as-new-director-general-301228040.html SOURCE The International Solar Alliance (ISA)

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A nanosatellite will carry a copy of Bhagavad Gita, a photograph of Prime Mister Narendra Modi, and names of 25,000 individuals to space by February-end. The nanosatellite called Satish Dhawan Satellite, or SD SAT is named after one of the founding fathers of India's space programme.

The Satish Dhawan nanosatellite will be launched on February 28 by the polar satellite launch vehicle (PSLV). According to a report by Hindustan Times, SpaceKidz India has developed the nanosatellite, and it will be its second satellite after Kalamsat to be launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). SpaceKidz India is an organisation dedicated to promoting space science among students.

The nanosatellite will also carry three scientific payloads - to study space radiation, magnetosphere, and to demonstrate a low-power wide-area communication network, the daily reported.

Dr Srimathy Kesan, founder and CEO of SpaceKidz India, expressing his excitement, said: "This will be our first satellite to be deployed in space. When we finalised the mission, we asked people to send in their names that will be sent to space. And, within a week we received 25,000 entries. Of these, 1,000 names were sent in by people from outside India".

On sending Bhagavad Gita, Kesan said this idea was inspired by other space missions that have carried holy books such as Bible.

Further, in the wake of the Aatma Nirbhar Bharat programme, the organisation decided to send PM Modi's photograph to space on the top panel along with the words 'Aatmanirbhar mission'. The satellite has been completely developed in India, including the electronics and circuitry, Kesan added.

Additionally, the names of ISRO chairperson Dr K Sivan and scientific secretary Dr R Umamaheswaran have been etched on the bottom panel.

On February 28, ISRO will be launching Brazilian satellite Amazonia-1 as the main payload and 20 other satellites from Sriharikota at around 10:23 AM Sunday. The launch of PSLV-C51 is the first dedicated commercial mission of NewSpace India Ltd, a Public Sector Unit under the Department of Space.

The 20 co-passenger satellites include one nanosatellite (INS-2TD) from ISRO, four commercial satellites booked by Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe), and 15 satellites arranged by NSIL.

Among the four satellites launched via IN-SPACe are three UNITYsats from a consortium of three Indian academic institutes, and one from Space Kidz India.

A satellite, 'Anand', built by another Indian startup Pixxel will also be part of the launch. Anand satellite will be used for detecting forest fires early, oil and gas leaks, crop disease on time, and water pollution levels. Pixxel is aiming to create a constellation of 30 earth observation satellites by December 2022 that will provide global coverage every 24 hours.

Also read: Tesla in India? Not likely anytime soon

Also read: Apple approached Nissan for electric car project; talks ended after disagreement
Prime Minister Florin Citu said on Monday that the budget appropriations for the Ministry of Health this year are higher than in the last two years, and that there are many people in the public square who "do not know how to read a budget "or "they just want to make a fuss", according to AGERPRES.

"It's not true and that shows that we have a lot of people in the public square who can't read a budget, it's also an explanation for where we are with Romania today. There are a lot of people who speak in the public square without understanding how a budget is made, without understanding how to read a budget and they throw around information. Once again, the Ministry of Health has 11.43 billion lei [in public money] a bigger budget than last year, a special year with the biggest health crisis in the last hundred of years. We have allocated more resources in a year in which we will not have the same situation; in addition, there are almost 2 billion more than there were in 2019, when it was a normal year, so all these discussions in public are either because people don't understand and don't know how to read a budget or do they just want to make a fuss, which is sad because we still have to move on; the economy has to move on and we don't have to sit and educate people every day in how to read a budget," Citu said at the Parliament House before a meeting of the Executive Bureau of the National Liberal Party (PNL).

He said that he had no problem with the minister of health and that he had not complained about the budget allocated to this area.

The prime minister underscored that there will be no problems with paying the bills.

"We have talked to everyone, the [ruling] coalition included, and we are still talking today. There is no dissension. The coalition leaders have committed themselves to a government deficit of 7.16%. (...) The budget was published last week to see if there are needs in some areas; some areas have been identified, but there are small amounts, some commitment appropriations. Yes, I think that the Ministry of Health will avail of more commitment appropriations, which means that they can make more contracts, but otherwise for the payment of bills to the Ministry of Development, to the Ministry of Transport, and to the Ministry of Health the money is allocated. There's no problem there. This is how we had discussions in previous years and you will see that there will be no problems with paying the bills," said Citu.
[February 15, 2021] Hexagon launches R-evolution, a new business venture focused on a sustainable future

NACKA STRAND, Sweden, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Hexagon AB, a global leader in sensor, software and autonomous solutions, today announced the launch of a new business venture focused on reinventing how industry addresses complex environmental challenges: R-evolution. R-evolution is founded to accelerate the transition to a sustainable economy, running profit-driven investments in green-tech projects where Hexagon's technology can be applied. The move to form R-evolution comes on the heels of Hexagon's recent announcements to further develop its sustainability agenda, including climate goals to significantly reduce its own carbon footprint. Targets to positively impact the environment now include supporting the world's sustainability journey through R-evolution. The first set of investments, centered around renewable energy, will involve the construction and operation of a portfolio of cutting-edge solar farms, targeted at producing energy with 50,000 tonnes less CO2 equivalents per annum than the grid's residual mix. "Hexagon is in the business of leveraging technology and data in ways that improve productivity and quality while making processes more efficient. The result is fewer inputs and less waste. The concept behind R-evolution is no different. Green-tech projects can benefit from many of the same sensor, software, and autonomous solutions our customers use today," says Hexagon President and CEO Ola Rollen. "We founded R-evolution because saving the planet is the biggest business opportunity of the 21st century. The systemic problems caused by climate change demand a sense of urgency - 2050 is the year of too late. We must think and act wisely now if we're to change our trajectory. R-evolution is an opportunity for industry to motivate rapid change, profitably, while giving back to the planet it's been depleting since the industrial revolution." Solar farms are just the beginning. R-evolution will leverage the returns generated from Hexagon's equity investments to fund further carbon reduction projects. The strategy is to expand focus to areas of sustainable agriculture, saving our oceans, protecting our forests, and more. In the future, R-evolution's ambitions also include inviting others to join the revolution - from companies to pension funds to individuals - providing all the opportunity to make a huge difference and profit in return. "Global commerce doesn't have to be the enemy to a sustainable future. Instead, it can be the solution. Managing for the long-term, in line with ESG goals, is key to any organisation's resiliency in the face of uncertainty. And companies like Hexagon, with solutions that can help the world achieve its environmental goals, enabling anyone to become a steward of the natural world, must step up to lead," continued Rollen. "Bringing together Hexagon's industry-leading technology and cutting-edge innovation with profit-driven projects that contribute to saving the planet is both a huge and important task. I'm pleased to announce my decision to appoint Erik Josefsson as R-evolution's CEO to motivate action through profitable change. Josefsson will be responsible for putting data to work using Hexagon's portfolio of sensors, software and autonomous solutions to save the planet while providing shareholder returns that reflect businesses' contributions to a sustainable future." Previously, Josefsson was Head of Advanced Industries at Ericsson, where he led the delivery of global Industrial IoT and 5G solutions for the manufacturing and process industries. He has a passion for global tech, has worked and studied in Sweden, Malaysia, China, and the USA, and has experience driving many smart initiatives like 5G factories, Connected Cars and Smart Sustainable Cities. R-evolution will operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hexagon, reporting directly to Hexagon's President and CEO, Ola Rollen. As R-evolution grows, the plan is to spin it off from Hexagon as more shareholders join the force for good. For more information, visit r-evolution.com. For further information, please contact: Maria Luthstrom

Head of Sustainability and Investor Relations

Hexagon AB

+46 8 601 26 27

ir@hexagon.com Kristin Christensen

Chief Marketing Officer

Hexagon AB

+1 404 554 0972

media@hexagon.com This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com https://news.cision.com/hexagon/r/hexagon-launches-r-evolution--a-new-business-venture-focused-on-a-sustainable-future,c3286600 The following files are available for download:







https://mb.cision.com/Main/387/3286600/1372824.pdf Press Release https://news.cision.com/hexagon/i/ola-rollen--erik-josefsson,c2877339 Ola Rollen, Erik Josefsson

View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/hexagon-launches-r-evolution-a-new-business-venture-focused-on-a-sustainable-future-301228119.html SOURCE Hexagon

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(Newser)  Impeachment acquittal No. 2 is in the books, and former President Trump says his movement has just begun to fight. But what does that mean in practical terms for Trump himself? A look at some of the opinions in circulation:

The conservative editorial page of the Wall Street Journal thinks Trump is done as an elected official. Trump "may run again, but he won't win another national election," write the editors. He did, after all, lose the election before the events of Jan. 6, and his job approval rating never went above 50%. "He may go on a revenge campaign tour, or run as a third-party candidate, but all he will accomplish is to divide the center-right and elect Democrats." The country is moving on from Trump, say the editors, and they urge the GOP to do the same.

story continues below

Yes, Trump will never be able to erase the "taint" of the riot and the second impeachment, writes Niall Stanage at the Hill. And for a normal politician, this would be a political death knell. "But Trump has never been a normal politician," he writes. "For all the abhorrence he sparks in his critics, he also speaks to parts of conservative America that other Republicans cannot reach. He can still channel the id of his base like no one else." The Trump base is very much alive and well, "and the former president is its standard-bearer for as long as he wants to be."

In the Washington Post, liberal columnist EJ Dionne sees the "end of Trumpism" in the weekend vote. "It's a sign of how far and how fast the ex-president has fallen that opponents of impeachment rationalized their votes by saying, as [Mitch] McConnell did, that Trump must still confront the 'criminal justice system' and 'civil litigation,'" he writes. "You're in trouble when your would-be friends are saying you should be prosecuted rather than impeached."

It's true that McConnell lashed out at Trump, but Charlie Sykes at the Bulwark agrees with Lindsey Graham that McConnell is an "outlier" in the GOP on that, as proven by the acquittal. "The institutional GOP is anxious to move on, but once again it lacks the will to actually do what it takes to stop Trump, while the party's base shows every sign of sticking with him."

As noted by Dionne, Trump does indeed have legal challenges ahead, and CNN rounds them up. They include his business dealings in New York, an investigation by Georgia officials into his pressure to overturn the state's results, and even possible criminal repercussions related to the Jan. 6 riot, if federal prosecutors conclude he played a role in inciting violence.

(Read more Donald Trump stories.)
Samsung will launch a new smartphone in India today. Called Galaxy F62, the phone will be unveiled at 12 noon. The company is hosting a virtual launch event, which will be live-streamed on Samsung.com, Samsung Indias YouTube channel and Flipkart.

Ahead of the official launch, Samsung Galaxy F62 has already been listed on Flipkart. The listing gives a closer look at the design of the phone. It also reveals some of the key specifications of the phone. According to the official poster, Samsung Galaxy F62 will have a square camera module on the back with four sensors. There is also an LED flash below the module. On the front, it has a punch-hole camera at the top centre.

As far as specifications go, Samsung has already confirmed the smartphone will come with a 7,000mAh battery. It will also run on the Exynos 9825 processor that is based on the 7nm process. It is coupled with Mali G76 GPU. Other confirmed features of the phone are sAMOLED display and 64-megapixel primary camera.

The Galaxy F62 is also Samsungs second smartphone in the new F-series. Samsung had debuted the new smartphone series with the Galaxy F41 in October last year.

Samsung Galaxy F41 comes with a 6.4-inch full HD+ sAMOLED Infinity U display. It has a 6,000mAh battery with 15W charging support. The phone features a 64-megapixel primary sensor, 8-megapixel ultra-wide lens with a 123-degree field of view and a 5-megapixel depth lens for the portrait shots. Galaxy F41 runs on an Exynos 9611 Octa-core processor. Galaxy F41 comes with 64GB/128GB internal memory and is expandable up to 512GB via microSD. The phone launched in India for a starting price of 16,999.
Workers at the Dukovany nuclear power plant dressed in radiation protection suits, during a nuclear accident exercise, 50km from the city of Brno, Czech Republic, on March 26, 2013. (MICHAL CIZEK/AFP via Getty Images)

Czech Republic Excludes China From New Nuclear Power Project, Citing Security Concerns

The Czech Republic is the latest country to exclude Chinese companies from its critical infrastructure due to national security concerns.

Following Pragues decision to ban Chinese telecom giants Huawei and ZTE from participating in the countrys 5G telecommunication network in 2019, Czech political parties recently agreed to exclude Chinese firms from bidding for a new nuclear power plant project.

The Chinese embassy in the Czech Republic said in response that it was seriously concerned and firmly against the decision.

The Czech Republic plans to build a new plant at the Dukovany Nuclear Power Station to replace the current one, sometime between 2035 and 2037.

In 2019, the Czech government first approved the project, and arranged the power stations current owner and operator CEZ to handle the bidding. CEZ is the largest utility company in central and eastern Europe, with the Czech government owning 70 percent of its shares.

Workers of the Dukovany nuclear power plant are pictured during a nuclear accident exercise on March 26, 2013. (MICHAL CIZEK/AFP via Getty Images)

According to publicly available information, the new nuclear power plant will cost at least $7.2 billion and will have a capacity of 1,200 megawatts after its put into operation. This is the largest project in the Czech Republic in decades.

In January, five companies expressed interest in the project: Westinghouse from the United States, EDF from France, KHNP from South Korea, Rosatom from Russia, and China General Nuclear Power (CGN) from China.

CGN is a state-owned energy company, and one of Chinas three nuclear power operators.

CGN was founded by the Chinese government to build the countrys first modern nuclear power station, the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant, in 1994.

The Chinese central government outlined how CGN entered into a cooperation agreement with French energy company Areva to transfer the second- and third-generation reactor technology needed to build the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant, as well as other nuclear power plants in China. EDF acquired Areva in 2017.

Countries have since become more wary of doing business with Chinese firms, concerned about the transfer of sensitive technology.

Hong Kong Police sail past nuclear reactors of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant as part of an inter-departmental Daya Bay Contingency Plan nuclear emergency drill off Hong Kongs Tung Ping Chau island on Dec. 20, 2017. (Anthony Wallace/AFP via Getty Images)

In August 2019, CGN was added to a U.S. entity list after the firm was determined by the U.S. Government to be acting contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the United States, the Commerce Department said in its announcement.

Companies on the entity list are not allowed to do business with American suppliers, unless it obtains a special permit in advance from the U.S. government.

In June 2020, Romanias state-run nuclear power producer Nuclearelectrica similarly announced the end of negotiations with CGN for building two new nuclear power reactors, after the countrys economy ministry cited national security concerns.

In the Czech Republic, lawmakers were debating whether to exclude Russias Rosatom and Chinas CGN due to national security risks.

On Jan. 27, Czech political parties agreed that CGN and other Chinese nuclear power operators should not take part in the Dukovany project. As of press time, they were debating whether to exclude Russian companies.

This article has been updated to more accurately describe the nuclear plants proposed power-generating capacity.

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Ashley Judd - Jae C Hong/AP

Ashley Judd is being treated in hospital for a shattered tibia after tripping over a fallen tree in the Congo.

Ms Judd, 52, who suffered massive catastrophic injuries", said she endured an incredibly harrowing 55 hours before she reached an operating table in South Africa for treatment.

The actress and environmental activist was in the Congo undertaking a research project on bonobos, endangered primates also known as pygmy chimpanzees.

"Accidents happen - and there was a fallen tree on the path which I didn't see and I had a very powerful stride going and I just fell over this tree," she told New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof in an interview.

"As I was breaking my leg, I knew it was being broken." She was left in agony on the ground for five hours.

Ms Judd said she was "howling like a wild animal."

She spent 90 minutes in a hammock before being carried out of the rainforest by barefoot Congolese members of the expedition.

Instagram post by Ashley Judd

Holding the two parts of her broken tibia in place, Ms Judd was transported to a trauma unit by motorcycle.

She was initially treated in a hut before being flown to Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

After 24 hours she was flown to South Africa to be treated in an intensive care unit. Ms Judd acknowledged that her privilege enabled her to pay for the ride to take her to safety.

"The difference between a Congolese person and me is disaster insurance that allowed me 55 hours after my accident to get to an operating table in South Africa," she said.

Ms Judd, who starred in Double Jeopardy, was one of the first women to accuse Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment.
DETROIT, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- University of Detroit Mercy has received a $25,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) for a series of events that will celebrate Detroit-based African American arts, culture and design.

The project will be led by the University's Detroit Collaborative Design Center (DCDC) and Live6 Alliance, a nonprofit community development organization that enhances the quality of life and economic opportunity in Northwest Detroit. The events will showcase the legacy of African American arts and culture found in the neighborhoods in the Livernois and McNichols area of Detroit and provide engagement opportunities through visual storytelling.

"An important part of this is neighborhood storytelling and preserving history by showcasing stories of the neighborhood and the HomeBase facility," said Caitlin Murphy, strategic partnerships manager for Live6 Alliance. "We will be telling a story that many of us don't know, and in doing so, bring together the community."

HomeBase contains the offices for both Live6 and the DCDC, and provides space for community meetings and exhibits. The building is the former Hawkins Apparel, which played an important role in the area and in Detroit's history. Celebrating that history will be part of the events planned over the next two years and Murphy says Live6 is working with the family to tell that story.

This application was in process before the pandemic changed everything  including plans for this project, said Ceara O'Leary, co-executive director of the DCDC.

"When this opportunity came up we reached out to Live6 to partner with because one of the goals of HomeBase is to tell stories and build community connections and Live6 was doing that work already," she said.

The group is looking for ways to get creative content to area homes and businesses through storefront displays, mailers or other mediums.

The NEA's Grants for Arts Projects awards range from $10,000 to $100,000 and are committed to diversity, equity, inclusion and fostering mutual respect for the diverse beliefs and values of all individuals and groups. Established by Congress in 1965, the NEA is the independent federal agency whose funding and support gives Americans the opportunity to participate in the arts, exercise their imaginations and develop their creative capacities.

For more about Detroit Mercy's Detroit Collaborative Design Center, please visit http://www.dcdc-udm.org/ . For Live6 Alliance, please visit https://live6detroit.org/ .

SOURCE University of Detroit Mercy

Related Links

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The intention behind the January 26 violence by protesting farmers in New Delhi was to do a "digital strike" and propagate a "toolkit" to malign the image of India, Delhi Police said on Monday. Police was providing details of its investigation into the circulation of the toolkit, shared by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg on Twitter with a tweet supporting the farmers' agitation.

Police said Disha Ravi, a 21-year-old Bengaluru-based who was arrested yesterday, Nikita Jacob, a Bombay High Court lawyer against whom the police has issued a warrant, Mo Dhaliwal, a Canadian-born Sikh associated with the pro-Khalistan organisation 'Poetic Justice Foundation' (PJF) and Shantanu, an engineer who runs an NGO, attended a Zoom meeting organised by the PJF in which the course of action for January 26 was decided.

Police further stated that the motive was to spread misinformation. During the meeting, the instance of a farmer's death during the Republic Day chaos was also discussed, and it was stated that he died due to bullet injuries. Police had earlier clarified that the farmer had died after his tractor crashed.

ALSO READ: 'There's Nothing Called Protocol': K'taka Home Minister Says Delhi Police Had Enough Evidence Against Disha Ravi

Police said, "On February 4, we came across a toolkit on social media. Initial investigation has revealed that it was formed by the PJF and the people associated with it. Whatever happened on January 26 was a copycat execution of the toolkit."

Police further stated that Jacob's house in Mumbai was searched, and several incriminating documents were recovered from it. "Her electronic gadgets were also scanned...The email account provided in the toolkit document belongs to Shantanu. On January 11, Nikita and Shantanu attended a Zoom meeting organised by the PJF in which the course of action for January 26 was decided."

ALSO READ: Nikita Jacob, Disha Ravi Part of R-Day Plan Meet, Say Sources as Delhi Cops Intensify Hunt to Arrest Lawyer

Separate teams were dispatched in Maharashtra and Bengaluru after police recovered information from Jacob's device. In Bengaluru, the team examined Disha Ravi and found out that she, Shantanu and Nikita had edited the toolkit. Disha had shared the toolkit with Greta Thunberg on Telegram and then deleted the WhatsApp group created to spread it. "Due procedure was followed when Disha was arrested. She was arrested in the presence of her mother and the SHO," they said. Disha's Telegram account has also revealed that other social media accounts associated with the toolkit were also deleted.

People with a large number of followers on social media were roped in to disseminate the toolkit, police said. Peter Frederick was responsible for planning the hashtags, which personalities to tag and how to propagate the contents of the toolkit, the said. Frederick has been on the radars of Indian security agencies since 2006, they added. "Peter is an associate of BS Bhinder...Whether Disha and Nikita were in touch with Peter directly or not is subject to investigation," they said.

The toolkit, police explained, was a dynamic document with hyperlinks to Google documents, a lot of which are pro-Khalistan. It was a private document, but was accidentally leaked to the public. "The document speaks for itself," the said.
Vigano warns of 'doctrinal abuse' undermining Catholic Church teachings, Robert Moynihan says

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The author of a new book about Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, a whistleblower on the sex abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church, contends that in addition to the sex abuse scandal, a doctrinal abuse scandal also plagues the 2,000-year-old institution.

Robert Moynihan, the editor of Inside the Vaticanmagazine, wrote a book last year titled, Finding Vigano: In Search of the Man Whose Testimony Shook the Church and the World.The book is based on conversations Moynihan had with Vigano, the Vaticans former ambassador to the United States, who has gone into hiding after publishing a letter accusing Pope Francis of covering for former U.S. Cardinal Theodore McCarrick despite the fact that he knew of the credible allegations of sexual abuse against him.

In an interview with The Christian Post, Moynihan spoke about the state of the Catholic Church in the United States as well as his conversations with Vigano. When asked what part of his conversation with Vigano surprised him the most, Moynihan responded that it was the  torment that he felt about whether or not to come forward with allegations.

Instead of just speaking about abuse in the [Catholic] Church, the abuse of young people by clerics, he started to realize that there was another abuse occurring, which was the abuse of doctrine. A doctrinal abuse that is not teaching the Catholic faith but teaching a kind of secular faith, changing the teaching on life issues, on moral issues, on the sacramental issues, and even on the divinity of Christ, he remarked.

And he said these modern thinkers are  committing a new type of abuse: spiritual abuse. So Vigano, who began as someone who was a whistleblower on cases of sexual abuse, became a whistleblower on the entire question of whether the Church is faithful to the teaching of all time or whether its becoming modernist and in some ways is abandoning and apostatizing from the traditional Catholic faith.

Moynihan described the election of President Joe Biden, a Catholic who supports abortion rights, as the latest development in the trend of compromising the Catholic faith in order to reconcile with the pluralistic society of the United States.

According to Moynihan, this trend began in 1960 when John F. Kennedy successfully sought to become the first Catholic president.

Kennedy had to stress that he was not an agent of the Vatican or of the pope and assure the public that he could be a reasonable leader in our country which included many non-Catholics, a majority of Protestants, many non-Christians, Jews (and) many atheists.

Moynihan contended that he never would have been able, I think, to win the election unless he had indicated that he was a member of this American pluralistic society.

While the Catholic Church had previously worked to respect and teach its doctrines with utter clarity, by guarding them in a high-walled castle, Moynihan maintained that the entire trend of the last 60 years has been to take down those walls, open the church up to the surrounding society, engage in dialogue with that society and then in the positive sense, hopefully influence that society in a positive way. Not remain separate from it or judgmental of it, but to be sort of a servant of that society.

The point we preach now is that a Catholic president and some leading members of Congress can say that they, as Catholics, would believe that abortion is immoral, that its the taking of a life, of an innocent child, but then support the legality in the general society, in a pluralistic society, of permitting abortion. And theyre even promoting it in a sense, theyre making sure its well-funded, easily available, etc., he said.

And therefore, theres become a ... sort of crisis in  our thinking and action as Catholics, because some people are criticizing the obvious inconsistency with believing in the value of life but then accepting that you can take that life.  Its a position that many people are taking, but it makes no  moral sense and some of our bishops have said this recently.

Moynihan told CP about how, after Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles had congratulated Biden on his victory in the 2020 presidential election while expressing concerns about his positions on abortion and the nature of the family, Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago criticized him (Gomez) and said this is not the time or place for you  to bring up any concerns about Bidens positions.

Cupich represents the trend to compromise the Catholic teaching as part of a larger vision of engaging with the society. Recogniz[ing] that the whole society isnt Catholic and that the Catholic Church, in some cases, cannot impose its beliefs and teachings on others who dont have those beliefs and teachings, he asserted.

Moynihan believes that on the issue of abortion, we have to say its Catholic teaching that we defend life and we cannot support this widespread openness to the taking of innocent human life.

He lamented that there is a growing division within the hierarchy of the Catholic Church about how to address the abortion issue. While he praised Francis for saying strong things about the defense of human life and the dignity of human life, Moynihan acknowledged that hes (the pontiff) received many people and embraced many people who have been favorable to abortion so-called rights. This paradox raises questions about the pontiffs pro-life witness, he asserted.

Archbishop Vigano has been outraged by this uncertainty and has said its something that he prays the pope will recognize and change, that he will repent of his lack of clarity  his apparent lack of clarity on this issue, he added.

The progressive Catholics may believe that they are being faithful to Christs teaching of love your neighbor and that they  therefore have to reach out with love toward  all people, sinful and sinning and imperfect people.

'So the key to the entire matter is to love the sinner but not the sin, and when we lead people in sin without encouraging them to repent, then we are being unfaithful to the teaching of the Church and to the people that we say we care about. Because in the battle for the life of the soul, we cannot affirm people in their sinful behavior, Moynihan added.

We have to say we love them, that we encourage them to follow Catholic moral teaching, and this is the battle line up and down where the progressives seem not to wish to condemn the sin, not even to call it a sin. The conservatives call it a sin and theyre accused of not being compassionate and loving toward the sinner.

Regarding the battle between the traditional Catholics and the progressives, Moynihan indicated that the progressives have the upper hand because of the influence of the mainstream media.

I think this debate, because of the enormous power of the media in our society and the websites and the internet, the trend has been to change our teaching in the direction of the LGBT proponents. And I would say, probably were up to 70% even of Catholics who are accepting of many of these teachings, which when you examine them closely, are not in keeping with traditional Catholic teaching.

While Vigano acknowledges the difficulties the Catholic Church faces, he is optimistic about its future, according to Moynihan.

He is hopeful that by a special grace, a special sort of divine intervention, that we will return to sanity, that we will return to our faith, that we will repent of our wayward ways and that (by) doing so, we will strive to bring about a new age of faith and love of God and neighbor in the future and that it isnt impossible.

Hes praying for this, he doesnt know for sure when it will occur, but hes praying; hes even praying for Pope Francis. Hes praying for everyone and for himself that we all strive to do the will of God and to remain faithful to the commandments of Christ.
A health worker is sprayed as he leaves the contaminated zone at the Ebola treatment centre in Gueckedou, Guinea (Jerome Dela/AP)

Guinea has officially declared it has an Ebola epidemic after at least three people died and four others were infected in the West African nation.

Neighbouring Sierra Leone and Liberia have put their citizens on high alert.

The three West African nations battled the worlds deadliest Ebola outbreak from 2014 to 2016, which began in Guinea and in which more than 11,300 people died.

Sierra Leones President Julius Maada Bio has flown to consult with Guinean President Alpha Conde.

The government reassures the population that all measures are being taken to stem this epidemic as quickly as possible Remy Lamah, Guinea health minister

Guineas new Ebola outbreak occurred in NZerekore, in southern Guinea, where health officials detected suspicious cases of Ebola with patients presenting symptoms of diarrhoea, vomiting and bleeding.

The sick had participated in the burial of a nurse on February 1 in Gouake, according to Guineas minister of health Remy Lamah, who added that the first investigation counted seven cases, all of people over the age of 25, including the two women and one male who have died.

The government reassures the population that all measures are being taken to stem this epidemic as quickly as possible. It invites the populations of the affected areas to respect hygiene and prevention measures and to report to health authorities in the presence of suggestive signs, Mr Lamah said in the ministry statement.

The epidemic was declared after a crisis meeting on Sunday.

All suspected cases have been isolated in NZerekore and Conakry, the capital.

Investigations have begun, a treatment centre has opened and supplies have been sent to the region.

Traditional funerals in which people wash and touch the body of the deceased facilitate the spread of Ebola.

It usually jumps to humans from infected animals, such as bats, and then spreads between humans via direct contact with bodily fluids.

Unless the response is swift, the health, economic and social impacts are likely to be immense for millions of people in a country with a relatively weak health system Mohammed Mukhier, International Federation of Red Cross

Liberias President George Weah has mandated health authorities to heighten the countrys epi-surveillance and preventative activities and also ordered health officials to immediately engage communities in towns and villages bordering Guinea and increase anti-Ebola measures.

Sierra Leone has activated emergency response systems and heightened surveillance for Ebola at the already closed border with Guinea, it said.

International humanitarian and medical organisations are also racing to help prevent further spread of the virus.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has said it is working to be sure that vaccines developed during the 2014 to 2016 outbreak will be readily available as quickly as possible.

Last month, the WHO said it was creating a global emergency stockpile of about 500,000 doses of the Ebola vaccine to help stamp out future outbreaks, but only 7,000 were available at the time of the statement.

The Ebola vaccine being stockpiled is made by Merck.

Time is of the essence. The resurgence of the virus in Guinea comes at the worst possible time when the country is already facing the Covid-19 pandemic, Mohammed Mukhier, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies regional director for Africa said, adding there is hope with scientific advances.

Unless the response is swift, the health, economic and social impacts are likely to be immense for millions of people in a country with a relatively weak health system, and where more than half of the population lives below the poverty line.

We know that community engagement is vital, so we will be trying to get the right balance between responding quickly and taking steps to make sure the community is a willing and active participant in both prevention and response Frederik van der Schrieck, Doctors Without Borders

The IFRC and Guinea Red Cross say teams that include more than 2,500 volunteers have been activated in Guinea to provide contact tracing, psychosocial support, water and sanitation.

The international medical organisation Doctors Without Borders said it is also sending teams to combat the outbreak.

We know from the past that the speed of response is important  We also know that community engagement is vital, so we will be trying to get the right balance between responding quickly and taking steps to make sure the community is a willing and active participant in both prevention and response, said Frederik van der Schrieck, the organisations head of mission in Guinea.

Guineas announcement comes more than a week after eastern Congo confirmed it has four cases of Ebola.

The outbreaks in the two countries are not linked.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Two new coronavirus infections which sent New Zealand's biggest city into lockdown Monday are due to the UK variant of the disease, the first to be detected in the country, officials said.

The Health Ministry said genomic sequencing identified the infections in Auckland as caused by the highly-contagious strain first found in the UK and said there was no link to any other positive cases detected so far in New Zealand.

"This result reinforces the decision to take swift and robust action around the latest cases to detect and stamp out the possibility of any further transmission," the ministry said.

There were no results yet from sequencing of a third case linked to the Auckland cluster, all members of the same family, which emerged Sunday and prompted Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern to order a three-day lockdown in Auckland.

It was the first clampdown in nearly six months in the Pacific island nation, which has been widely praised for its handling of the pandemic, with just 25 deaths in a population of five million.

Almost two million Auckland residents were told on Sunday to stay at home from midnight, when the level-three lockdown began, with schools and non-essential businesses forced to close.

The city has also been ring-fenced from the rest of New Zealand, with travel in and out of the metropolis highly restricted for the next three days.

Tracing source of infections

The remainder of the country was placed on alert level two, with people required to wear masks on public transport and gatherings limited to a maximum of 100 people.

"I know we all feel the same way when this happensnot again," Ardern said in announcing the measures Sunday afternoon.

"But remember, we have been here before, that means we know how to get out of thistogether."

Health officials said a motherwho works for a company providing laundry and catering services to international flightsand her daughter tested positive Saturday, before the father returned a positive sample Sunday.

New Zealand director-general of health Ashley Bloomfield said the initial focus was on the mother's workplace "because of its obvious connections to the border".

But he added it was "too soon to rule in or out" any source of transmission and the woman had not been at work for eight days before testing positive.

Auckland spent more than two weeks in lockdown last August after a virus outbreak was linked to a worker handling imported frozen freight, but New Zealand has largely been enjoying relaxed restrictions for months.

Several cases of COVID-19 were also detected in the city three weeks ago, before being traced back to a hotel where the people had completed quarantine after arriving from overseas.

Ardern has been widely praised for her management of the pandemic, with New Zealand recording fewer than 2,000 infections.

The country closed its borders and implemented a strict five-week lockdown in March and April last year, with occasional virus outbreaks since then being quickly contained.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 AFP
On February 7, Karen Lewis, the former president of the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU), died at the age of 67. Lewis, who retained the title of CTU president emerita, had been diagnosed in October 2014 with glioblastoma, a type of aggressive brain cancer. She officially stepped down from her union role in 2018, turning the office over to CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey, who had been named acting president after Lewis diagnosis.

Lewis death prompted an outpouring of sympathy and warm recollections from the corporate media, fellow union officials and others. Stacy Davis Gates, the current CTU vice president, referred to her as the most transformative leader that the city has seen in this century. Jacobin, the semi-official publication of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), has posted no less than four articles on Lewis as of this writing, while failing to post a single article on last weeks agreement by the CTU to send teachers and students back into dangerous classrooms.

In this September, 2012 photo, Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis informs reporters that the city's 25,000 public school teachers will strike. (AP Photo/Sitthixay Ditthavong)

Among the mourners there may be educators and other workers who mistakenly thought Lewis was simply a long-time rank-and-file teacher who became disgusted by the attacks on teachers and public education by Democratic mayors like Richard M. Daley and Rahm Emanuel. But this was only a carefully cultivated myth, the product of a sustained effort by the media, sections of academia and pseudo-left organizations.

Any objective appraisal of Lewis role as CTU president and the record of the Caucus of Rank-and-File Educators (CORE), the union faction with which she was closely identified, demonstrates the utter failure of the perspective promoted by the DSA and other pseudo-left organizations that the unions can be reformed or pressured into mounting any kind of defense against the financial aristocracys assault on jobs, wages, public education and democratic rights.

The CTUs role in negotiating and then ramming through the recent agreement with the current administration of Lori Lightfoot to reopen schools for in-person learning in the middle of a pandemic is the latest development in the decades-long degeneration of the unions as a whole and their transformation into tools of corporate management and the government. If Lewis remained healthy and was still in the leadership of the union, there is no question the CTU would have cut the same deal.

Starting with the election that brought CORE to power in 2010, the mythologizing around Lewis, CORE and the CTU has had the political aim of obscuring the role of the union in collaborating closely with the Democratic Party in carrying out the attacks on public education and teachers. The need for such a left cover stems from the role Chicago has played as a central, if not the primary, testing ground for pro-corporate education and social policies led by the Democrats.

In this context, from the perspective of the ruling class, it has been better to have the unions serve as a loyal opposition which can be depended upon to sell every betrayal as a win, even at the cost of the occasional rhetorical criticism or a limited strike, than to risk that educators and other workers abandon the unions entirely and to build far more radical organizations independent of the Democratic Party.

CORE was able to win the 2010 union election largely due to the anger of rank-and-file educators against the flagrant betrayals of teachers and public education carried out by the incumbent United Progressive Caucus (UPC), which controlled the CTU for 37 out of the previous 40 years. Its leadership, especially President Marilyn Stewart, had completely discredited itself during the negotiation of the 2007 CPS contract, a five-year deal which featured attacks on healthcare and allowed the Daley administration to continue with its right-wing Renaissance 2010 program.

Begun under then-Chicago Public Schools (CPS) CEO Arne Duncan, Renaissance 2010 saw the expansion of charter schools in Chicago and the employment of the widely hated school turnaround strategy, where schools with low test scores would have their entire workforces fired, and operation of the school turned over to private operators. Over a decade, CPS closed more than 70 schools and 6,000 teachers lost their jobs. Duncan would later serve as Secretary of Education in the Obama administration, where he used the lessons learned in Chicago to push attacks on public education at the national level, especially through the Race to the Top program.

Stewart notably rammed the 2007 contract through the unions House of Delegates, insisting that a clear majority of those in attendance were in favor of approving the agreement after she called for the Yes vote, and refusing calls from delegates to count the No votes or for a roll-call to get an exact count or establish whether all those present were in fact real delegates. Instead, Stewart rushed outside to brief reporters, while angry delegates were denouncing the sellout.

The actions of the CTU under the UPC leadership were the culmination of a long period in which the unions had been completely transformed into agents of management, acting to suppress teacher strikes and worker militancy. Despite all the attacks carried out during the Daley administration, the CTU had not gone on strike since 1987, a 19-day walkout that stands as the citys longest. This was a remarkable transformation for a union that before that point, had gone on strike in 1969 (the first official strike called by the union after it was recognized by the city in 1966), 1971, 1973, 1975, 1980, 1983, 1984 and 1985.

The CORE faction began to coalesce soon after the 2007 contract, comprising a coalition of various pseudo-left groups and elements linked to various union reform movements, including the Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU). Among its major early leaders were Jesse Sharkey, a member of the International Socialist Organization (ISO), and Jackson Potter, whose mother, Robin Potter, is a lawyer with longstanding ties to the CTU and other unions. Potters stepfather was Pete Camarata, one of the founders of the TDU.

After Lewis joined CORE, Potter and Lewis became the first co-chairs of the faction. Recruiting Lewis, a black teacher and CPS veteran, was crucial to their prospects. As Potter said in a recent piece in Jacobin, Lewis added the gravitas of a Chicago Public Schools (CPS) veteran to team CORE. She graduated from Kenwood Academy High School, a famous CPS school, grew up in the black middle class on the South Side, daughter of two CPS teachers.

Lewis' own strengths and qualities no doubt played a role in her selection as head of CORE's slate, and in her ability to serve as the union's main public face and spokesperson. A 1974 graduate of Dartmouth College, Lewis was known for her wide intellectual interests. After deciding not to pursue medical studies, she moved back to Chicago to become a chemistry teacher, officially joining the CTU in 1988. Several years later, in 1993, she earned a graduate degree in inner city studies from Northeastern Illinois University. Possessed with a great deal of energy, among her many hobbies was an interest in stand-up comedy, which no doubt contributed to her skills in addressing large meetings of teachers.

Lewis was not a neophyte when it came to CTU union factions, having served on the executive board of the CTU as a member of the ProActive Chicago Teachers (PACT) caucus. Under the leadership of Debby Lynch, who ran on an anti-corruption platform, PACT won the 2001 union leadership election, but served only one term after Lynch negotiated a contract in 2003 that sold out teachers health care benefits and the length of the school day in exchange for raises that failed to make up the ground lost in previous contracts. Many PACT activists aside from Lewis would eventually find their way into CORE.

Through its promotion of social justice unionism, the CTU sponsored and worked closely with various community groups aimed at pushing aldermen and local politicians to support the union at the same time that it promoted racial politics and sought to conceal the class character of the Democrats attacks on workers.

Despite running on a platform opposing the previous leaderships anti-democratic tendencies, less than a year after being elected Lewis was personally involved in negotiating behind the backs of teachers and endorsing a controversial state law then known as Senate Bill 7 (SB7). Looking back, this incident set the tone for every subsequent betrayal the union has carried out under the CORE leadership. It proved the union could not be salvaged through a reshuffling of its leading personnel who all shared the same fundamental positions of politically subordinating the working class to the Democratic Party and the capitalist profit system.

Even though SB7 attacked tenure rights and seniority, allowed the mayor to set the length of the school day and year and raised the bar needed to authorize a strike to 75 percent of its total CTU membership, Lewis, Illinois Federation of Teachers (IFT) President Dan Montgomery and the Illinois Education Associations (IEA) Ken Swanson all backed the bill.

Although CTU delegates would soon reject the CTUs support for the bill, CTU leaders defended Lewis. Claiming Lewis had simply not had time to read the fine print, Sharkey said, The CTU said we would not go for an attack on our collective bargaining rights, but on closer examination we see thats exactly what it is. Although he admitted she made a mistake in endorsing the bill, Sharkey nevertheless urged delegates not to scapegoat Karen.

The unions own statement claimed:

While the bill is far from perfect, it is far superior to the initial proposal that came out on December 3, 2010 that attempted to outlaw using seniority as a factor in staffing decisions, make tenure nearly impossible to attain and more improbable to keep, eliminate the right to strike statewide, and, for Chicago only, prohibit permissive bargaining issues.

This claim, that the outcome for educators would have been worse without the unions involvement, is not original. Under COREs leadership, however, the CTU has raised what amounts to a good cop/bad cop routine to an art form. Indeed, this logic is at the heart of the CTUs present claims that the recently concluded bargain with death was the result of its hard work at the bargaining table.

In 2012, following the aggressive moves of Mayor Rahm Emanuel to rescind teachers raises, continue layoffs and turnarounds and make it easier to fire teachers and close schools, CTU leaders were compelled to call a strike for the first time in 25 years. Despite being on strike for nine days, the CTU did all it could to prevent the struggle from turning into an open political confrontation with Emanuel and the Obama administration right before the 2012 presidential election.

During the strike, Lewis expressed the central concern of CTU leaders then and since, that no matter what sordid deal is put before teachers, the main objective is to maintain the unions seat at the table. Speaking on Emanuels planned school closures, Lewis said, We understand that whole movement of closing schools and doing it aggressively. The problem isI guess thats why were all herewe either do this together in some reasonable way or we will always be fighting, and I think the key is that the people that are making these decisions want to make them unilaterally. In other words, the CTU bureaucracy expected something in return for selling out the teachers.

Notably, the CTU leaderships first attempt to get delegates to approve an agreement to end the strike was defeated, largely due to the intervention of the Socialist Equality Party, which called for delegates to reject an end to the strike and demanded that teachers have a right to read the full agreement before voting.

The outcome of the CTUs betrayal under the CORE leadership, which even Lewis admitted at the time was an austerity contract was the largest mass school closure in US history, as the Emanuel administration moved ahead to shutter 49 schools and lay off thousands of teachers. Nearly all of Emanuels attacks on teachers were enshrined in the contract, including the lengthening of the school day and year, the further erosion of tenure and job security and the expansion of standardized testing.

But the CTU did get something in return. In exchange for accepting the closure of public schools, the city and charter operators agreed to increasingly drop their opposition to unionization drives by the Chicago Alliance of Charter Teachers and Schools, which would eventually merge with the CTU in 2018. After the strike, the CTU largely abandoned the pretense of fighting to halt the expansion of charter schools and other privatization schemes. This was in line with its parent organization, the national American Federation of Teachers (AFT), which by 2010 was taking money and working closely with the Gates Foundation on teacher evaluations and other school reform schemes pushed by the Obama administration.

After the 2012 strike, Lewis previously acrimonious relationship with Emanuel turned into personal friendship, with the two going to the ballet together and sharing Jewish prayers. Although Lewis had originally planned to run against Emanuel in the 2015 mayoral election, she withdrew from the race due to her illness. Nevertheless, following long, drawn out negotiations, Lewis helped reach a final agreement with Emanuel in 2016 on a concessions contract, which held salaries nearly flat, allowed health care costs to rise and involved the creation of a two-tier pension system, with new hires forced pay 7 percent of their salaries toward their pensions.

After this period, Lewis health began to decline. Suffering a stroke in late 2017, she officially retired in June 2018.

In bringing this review of Lewis life as a CTU leader to close, it is important to emphasize that her actions were the product not of personal failings but political ones. In the end, like her predecessors in the CTU bureaucracy, she completely accepted the capitalist system, opposed the struggle for socialism, and was entirely oriented to the Democratic Party, which has controlled Chicago politics since the 1930s. Above all, the chief responsibility for betrayal of Chicago teachers lies with the pseudo-left organizations like the defunct ISO and the DSA, which are endlessly in search of union reformers while preaching the lie that workers can somehow advance their interests through adapting to the anti-communist AFL-CIO and its political subordination of the working class to the Democrats and needs of American capitalism.

Chicago teachers today are at a crossroads. Following the abject capitulation of the CTU on the reopening of schools for in-person learning in February 2021, lessons must be drawn from the long struggle of educators and other workers to defend public education, as well as democratic rights and against the danger of fascism. New organizations of struggle, which are independent of the unions, must be formed, like the Chicago Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee. Above all, teachers need to break with pseudo-left politics and develop a genuine socialist orientation aimed at the revolutionary transformation of society and its reconstitution on the basis of social needs, not private profit.

We urge teachers to study the history and record of the Socialist Equality Party and make the decision to join.
WASHTENAW COUNTY, MI  Retail pharmacies in Washtenaw County are now offering COVID-19 vaccinations to residents eligible to receive them, according to a social media post from the Washtenaw County Health Department.

On Friday, Rite Aid pharmacy locations throughout the county began administering vaccinations to people in the current eligibility groups, which includes health care providers, long-term care residents and staff, public health employees, essential workers and those age 65 and older, health officials said.

Health care workers and people age 65 and older are also being scheduled for vaccinations at select Meijer pharmacies throughout Washtenaw County.

Supplies do remain limited as COVID-19 vaccine doses administered through the pharmacies are allocated by state and local jurisdictions. Retail pharmacies are relying on state and local jurisdiction qualifications to determine eligibility for the vaccine, health officials said.

Washtenaw County residents can click here to find the form necessary to schedule an appointment through Rite Aid. Click here to schedule an appointment at a Meijer pharmacy. Those attempting to schedule an appointment should ensure the responses are accurate or the appointment may be canceled.

As of Feb. 12, there have been 9,454 first doses and 6,148 second doses administered through the Washtenaw County Health Department.

In total, health providers in Washtenaw County have administered 75,253 doses of COVID-19 vaccine throughout the county. The Washtenaw County Health Department is currently hosting vaccine clinics at Eastern Michigan Universitys Convocation Center in Ypsilanti.

Residents should go to www.washtenaw.org/covid19vaccine to find out if they are eligible or to make an appointment with the health department. If you cannot complete Washtenaw Countys eligibility survey online, call 734-544-6700.

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What started out as a suspicious person near a Calera business ended up with a suspect and five police officers in near-freezing water late Sunday night.

In the end, all were OK but Calera Police Chief David Hyche said it could have had a much different ending. We narrowly avoided a great tragedy last night,' he said.

It all began about 11:30 p.m. when Sgt. Jay Cardwell spotted two people near the closed Chick-Fil-A entrance in Calera. Cardwell drove into the parking lot and one of the two people took off running.

Officer Nick James was responding and chased the individual on foot. The second subject complied and was detained.

James chased the second suspect to the Rolling Hills Campground where the 24-year-old suspect jumped into the lake and swam toward the middle. Officers yelled for the man to swim back to the shore, but he continued and was 30 to 40 yards from the shore, Hyche said.

The air temperature was around 35 degrees and the water extremely cold. The suspect told officers he would rather drown and started going under water.

Two more officers who had arrived at the scene - Cody Browning and Shayne Benton - removed their gear and jumped into the freezing water to save the man. The officers reached him and started to pull him to shore when they began to struggle to stay afloat and yelled for help.

Officers James, Grant Hogan and John McMinn then jumped into the freezing water and were able to get all three back to the shore.

Our entire on duty shift was now involved,' Hyche said.

The officers and suspect were all suffering from hypothermia and the suspect was quickly placed in a warm patrol car. The officers were also placed in heated cars and Calera Fire Rescue checked the officers and suspect. All were deemed to be OK.

The suspect, Austin McCarthy, was found to have numerous outstanding felony warrants and was charged with public intoxication, attempting to elude and resisting arrest. The second individual who complied was released with no charges. There was no evidence of damage or burglary found at Chick-Fil-A.

Had it not been for the heroic efforts of officers Browning and Benton, Mr. McCarthy would have drowned. If not for the efforts of Officers Hogan, James and McMinn, Mr. McCarthy, Officer Browning and Officer Benton would have drowned,' Hyche said. The Calera Underwater Recovery Team has been involved identical situations that have resulted in fatalities. We are all thankful that that is not the case today.

Delhi Police on Monday appeared to link activists Disha Ravi, Nikita Jacob and Shantanu Mallick, who are being investigated in the toolkit case, with a foreigner under Indian agencies' radar for his "connections" with the ISI, claiming that his name figured in the document they prepared in support of farmers' protest.

Under fire from the Opposition parties for "targeting" the youth activists, police also claimed that Mumbai-based Nikita and Shantanu, an engineer residing in Maharashtra's Beed, had a Zoom meeting on January 11 with pro-Khalistani outfit Poetic Justice Foundation when modalities for creating the 'toolkit' for farmers' protest was finalised.

Police on Monday also got non-bailable warrants issued against activists Nikita and Shantanu, who investigators claimed were absconding. They claimed Nikita absconded despite giving a written undertaking that she will join investigations on February 12 at her residence, while Shantanu could not be located at his residence in Beed.

Also Read | War of words between BJP, Oppn over Disha Ravi's arrest

Joint Commissioner of Police (Cyber Cell) Prem Nath told reporters that Disha, who was arrested from Bengaluru, Nikita and Mallick "collaborated" to create the toolkit, which was an online guide on how to support the ongoing protest. The email account created by Shantanu is the owner of this document and all others are its editors.

Manishi Chandra, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Cyber Cell), said the toolkit was a "carefully crafted" document, meant for circulation among a few people to guide them on which hashtag to be used on a particular day and who is to be followed.

Everything you need to know about Disha Ravi case | Meet Disha Ravi

"The document has a list to be followed, which included media houses, established fact-checkers and NGOs among others. There was one Peter Frederick also in the list. This person was under the Indian agencies' radar since 2006 for his links with Bhajan Singh Bhinder alias Iqbal Choudhary, a leading propagandist of K-2 desk (Kashmir desk of ISI)," Chandra said.

He said it is a matter of investigation whether the three people were in contact with Frederick. "Disha will tell us about this. We want to check why Frederick was put as a resource person and whether they have any direct connection with Bhinder," he said.

Prem Nath said search warrants were issued against Nikita on February 9 and two days later, searches were conducted at her residence in Mumbai. Two laptops and an iPhone were seized from her and a written undertaking was taken from her that she will join investigations the next day.

Also Read | Delhi Police draw flak over 'illegal' arrest of Disha Ravi

However, on February 12, he said, she fled from her house. Shantanu also could not be located at his residence in Maharashtra's Beed.

"We then acted against Disha, who had deleted a WhatsApp group meant to distribute the toolkit. She was arrested in the presence of her mother and the local Station House Officer. Due procedure was followed," Prem Nath said.

A senior Delhi Police official said Disha shared the document with Greta Thunberg through Telegram. There were hyperlinks in the toolkit and it was a private document to be distributed among select people.
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Crude oil futures edged higher to Rs 4,403 per barrel on February 15 after hitting a fresh high of Rs 4,424 for February series during the intraday trade on the MCX. Crude oil strengthened on the expectations of US stimulus, output cut and escalation of fresh tensions in the Middle East.

Crude oil prices witnessed a strong recovery, thus resuming weekly winning streak thanks to demand growth optimism and lower supply fears. The fresh concerns over standoff between West and Iran boosted buying in crude oil prices keeping aside demand worries.

The number of rigs drilling crude oil in the US jumped by 7 to 306 rigs for the last week (February 12), said Baker Hughes in a weekly report.

Money managers raised their net long US crude futures and options positions by 29,566 contracts to 383,715 in the week to February, according to data from US CFTC.

NYMEX crude trades higher near $60.6/bbl. Crude has surged to January 2020 highs on supply concerns amid a possible strike in Norway and increased tensions in the Middle-east. Also supporting price is severe cold weather in the US which has increased heating demand. Weighing on price is the rise in US rig count to May 2020 highs and lower Chinese travel activity prior to Lunar New year holidays. Crude may continue to trade higher however some of the positive factors are temporary in nature and could make crude vulnerable to profit taking in coming days, said Ravindra Rao, VP- Head Commodity Research at Kotak Securities.

West Texas Intermediate crude was up 1.83 percent to $60.56 per barrel, while Brent crude, the London-based international benchmark rose 1.30 percent to $63.24 per barrel.

MCX iCOMDEX Crude Oil Index inched higher by 87.49 points, or 1.78 percent, at 5,002.07 at 16:13 hours IST.

In the futures market, crude oil for February delivery touched an intraday high of Rs 4,424 and an intraday low of Rs 4,389 per barrel on MCX. So far in the current series, black gold has touched a low of Rs 3,486 and a high of Rs 4,424.

Crude oil delivery for February soared Rs 79, or 1.83 percent, to Rs 4,404 per barrel at 16:14 hours IST with a business turnover of 4,238 lots.

Crude oil delivery for March gained Rs 76, or 1.75 percent to Rs 4,411 per barrel with a business volume of 420 lots.

The value of February and Marchs contracts traded so far is Rs 719.60 crore and Rs 14.83 crore, respectively.

Trading strategy

Tapan Patel- Senior Analyst (Commodities), HDFC Securities

Crude oil prices soared on Middle East tensions after the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen said late on Sunday it intercepted and destroyed an explosive-laden drone fired by the Iran-aligned Houthi group toward the kingdom.

We expect crude oil prices to trade higher with support at $59 and resistance at $62. MCX Crude oil February has support at Rs 4,370, resistance at Rs 4,460.

For all commodities-related news, click here

: The views and investment tips expressed by experts on Moneycontrol.com are their own and not those of the website or its management. Moneycontrol.com advises users to check with certified experts before taking any investment decisions.
(Newser)  The first day of Lent is Wednesday, and for Christians who follow the observance, it's often a time to give up a bad habit for the six weeks that follow. That may be harder for people in some parts of the country, per WalletHub, which has ranked US states to see which are the "most sinful." The site looked at nearly four dozen metrics in seven categories that closely align with the Seven Deadly Sins: anger and hatred (which examines such factors as violent crimes, sex offenders, and bullying); jealousy (identity theft and fraud); excesses and vices (obesity rates, share of adult smokers, and drug OD deaths); greed (gambling disorders, embezzlement arrests); lust (time spent on porn sites, prostitution arrests); vanity (beauty salons per capita and money spent on personal care products); and laziness (time spent watching TV, share of adults who don't exercise). Perhaps unsurprisingly, Nevada (home state of "Sin City") nabs the top spot. See where other states fall in the ranking:

story continues below

Most Sinful

Nevada (No. 1 in "Greed" category) California Texas (No. 1 in "Lust" category) Georgia (No. 1 in "Jealousy" category) Florida Louisiana (No. 1 in "Excesses and Vices" category) Tennessee (No. 1 in "Anger and Hatred" category) South Carolina Illinois Mississippi (No. 1 in "Laziness" category)

Least Sinful

Minnesota Nebraska North Dakota Maine Iowa New Hampshire Utah Vermont Idaho Wyoming

See how the other states rank here . (Check out the most giving states .)
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Armoured vehicles pushed through crowds of protesters in Myanmar today as the country's military rulers threatened activists with 20 years in jail for opposing their coup.

Vehicles appeared on the streets of Yangon and other large cities on Monday as the armed forces ramped up pressure on tens of thousands of protesters to abandon their quest for democracy and accept military rule.

Meanwhile new laws were passed carrying harsh penalties for anyone found guilty of obstructing the armed forces or of inciting 'hatred or contempt' towards coup organisers, including general-turned-ruler Min Aung Hlaing.

It comes after soldiers opened fire on protesters gathered around a power plant in the city of Myitkyina overnight amid rumours that soldiers were about to cut the power.

Soldiers unleashed tear gas before firing on the crowd, though it was unclear whether live rounds or rubber bullets were used. Soon afterwards, an internet blackout was imposed as military vehicles rolled out.

Elsewhere, jailed leader Aung San Suu Kyi is expected to appear in court via videolink this week, which would be the first sighting of her since the coup took place two weeks ago.

She is expected to appear at a hearing held on either Tuesday or Wednesday, while jailed president Win Myint is also due to appear.

Defiance: Demonstrators surround an armoured vehicle in Yangon today to protest against the February 1 coup, with one placard calling for people to support a civil disobedience movement (CDM)

Crackdown: Soldiers set up barricades during a protest outside the central bank in Yangon where troops and armoured vehicles were stationed on Monday

A soldier sits in a military vehicle during a protest outside the Central Bank in Yangon, Myanmar, on Monday

The military junta has steadily intensified efforts to crack down on protests since seizing power two weeks ago, arresting civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi and hundreds of others.

But groups of protesters gathered outside the central bank and the Chinese embassy in Yangon today, with people holding placards calling on others to join a civil disobedience movement.

'Patrolling with armoured vehicles means they are threatening people,' said 46-year-old Nyein Moe, among the more than one thousand gathered in front of the bank.

'People are marching on the streets and they don't care to be arrested or shot. We can't stop now. The fear in our mind is going away.'

An armoured vehicle and about six trucks carrying soldiers were parked nearby, a witness said, in the first large-scale use of such vehicles since the coup.

More than a dozen police trucks with four water cannon vehicles were deployed on Monday near the Sule Pagoda in central Yangon, which has been one of the main demonstration sites in the city.

Soldiers climb onto an armoured vehicle during a protest outside the Central Bank in Yangon, Myanmar

Demonstrators spill onto a street lined with military vehicles during a protest in Yangon on Monday, with some protesters waving flags while another appeared to have made a placard out of a TV box

A group of engineers wearing hard hats and hi-vis jackets stage a protest in Yangon, with some holding signs calling on others to join the civil disobedience movement

There was a fresh rally in the southern city of Dawei too, a verified live-stream video showed, with hundreds of protesters accompanied by a marching band.

Some carried banners against the military that read: 'They kill in (the) day. They steal at night. They lie on TV.'

Protesters also came out in large numbers in the capital Naypyidaw and the second-biggest city Mandalay.

Monitoring group NetBlocks reported that a 'state-ordered information blackout' had taken Myanmar almost entirely offline early Monday.

Internet connectivity was later restored around the start of the working day, with Netblocks saying the blackout lasted around eight hours, but noting that most users in Myanmar were still barred from social media.

A joint statement from the US, British and European Union ambassadors urged security forces not to harm civilians.

UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres echoed that call. Through his spokesman, he also asked the military to 'urgently' allow Swiss diplomat Christine Schraner Burgener to visit Myanmar 'to assess the situation first hand'.

The US embassy advised American citizens to shelter in place and not risk defying an overnight curfew imposed by the regime.

Demonstrators dressed as demonic nuns hold up placards saying 'stop dictatorship' and calling for an end to military rule

Protesters line a street where soldiers and armoured vehicles were deployed in Yangon today amid an escalating crackdown

UN special rapporteur Tom Andrews said the junta's efforts to rein in the burgeoning protest movement was a sign of 'desperation' and amounted to a declaration of war against its people.

'Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable,' he tweeted.

Much of the country has been in uproar since soldiers detained Aung San Suu Kyi and her top political allies on February 1, ending a decade-old fledgling democracy after generations of junta rule.

The Nobel laureate spent years under house arrest during an earlier dictatorship and has not been seen in public since she was detained.

Suu Kyi's custody period was expected to expire today, but her lawyer said Monday that she has been remanded until February 17, citing a judge.

An internet blackout last weekend failed to quell resistance that has seen huge crowds throng big urban centres and isolated frontier villages alike.

Striking workers who spearheaded the campaign are among at least 400 people to have been detained since the coup, said the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners monitoring group.

A medical doctor holds up a picture of deposed civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi (left) in Yangon, where armoured vehicles were driving along roads today (right)

A demonstrators speaks on a loudspeaker while others hold up signs during a protest outside the Chinese embassy today

Fear of arrest did not deter big crowds from returning to streets around the country for a ninth straight day of street protests on Sunday.

In Dawei, seven police officers broke ranks to join anti-coup protesters, mirroring local media reports of isolated defections from the force in recent days.

Parts of the country have in recent days formed neighbourhood watch brigades to prevent the arrests of residents joining the civil disobedience movement.

'We don't trust anyone at this time, especially those with uniforms,' said Myo Ko Ko, member of a street patrol in Yangon.

The country's new military leadership has so far been unmoved by a torrent of international condemnation.

The junta insists it took power lawfully and has instructed journalists in the country not to refer to it as a government that took power in a coup.
Regional

Manipur newspapers on indefinite strike to protest against bomb attack

Manipur scribes during the protest in Imphal. (NP)

Correspondent IMPHAL, FEB 14 | Publish Date: 2/14/2021 12:20:50 PM IST

All newspapers in Manipur failed to hit the stands on Sunday as scribes and editors went on an indefinite strike in protest against the hurling of a hand grenade at the office of the Poknapham at Keishampat in the heart of the Imphal city.

On Saturday evening, miscreant(s) launched a China-made hand grenade at the office of Poknapham, a local daily which also housed its sister (English) publication, in Imphals Keishampat, but failed to explode. The police suspect hand of an armed outfit behind the bomb attack. However, none of them has so far owned up.

Terming it as a threat to media, scribes under the aegis of All Manipur Working Journalists Union and Editors Guild Manipur decided to cease work immediately on Saturday night.

Following the decision, all local dailies cancelled their publication and local TV cable networks suspended broadcasting news.

On Sunday, the protesting scribes gathered in Imphals Keishampat where they staged a sit-in protest to condemn the threat to media and demanded unconditional apology from the wrongdoer(s) while alleging that it was not only an insult to the media but also an attempt to strangulate the freedom of press.

Attack on journalism is an attack on democracy, one of the many placards held by the protesting scribes read. Others read like We demand unconditional apology from the wrongdoers, Threatening press, threaten democracy, Hand off press freedom, etc. After the sit-in, representatives of the scribes proceeded to chief ministers secretariat to submit a memorandum and draw his attention towards the latest threat to media in the State.

While strongly condemning the cowardly attack on the media, Manipurs I&PR minister Th Biswajit Singh termed it as an attempt to strangulate freedom of expression. This kind of attack on the fourth pillar of democracy through coercive means to dictate the media would never be acceptable, he asserted.

Condemning the attack, Indian Journalists Union (IJU) extended solidarity to the protesting media persons. IJU, in a statement, demanded the State government investigate the attack and bring the culprit(s) to book.
South African COVID variant hits Thailand

THAILAND: The South African COVID-19 variant believed to be resistant to vaccines was detected in a Thai returnee from Tanzania late last month, according to director-general of the Department of Disease Control, Opas Karnkawinpong.

CoronavirusCOVID-19healthSafety

By Bangkok Post

Monday 15 February 2021, 08:52AM

Officials spray water as part of a big cleaning effort at Wat Saket to prevent the spread of COVID-19 yesterday. Anti-government protesters on Friday called a rally including plans to string a red cloth banner at the temples Golden Mount, but had to change the plan and hold it on Saturday instead after the temple announced its big clean-up. Photo: Varuth Hirunyatheb.

The department is closely monitoring the situation following concerns the South African variant may have reached Thailand, he told the media in press briefing yesterday (Feb 14).

The infected patient is a 41-year-old Thai man who had travelled to Tanzania for business before returning to Thailand on Jan 29. He tested positive while staying in state quarantine and is currently in hospital.

Dr Opas insisted there is no evidence in the case of this patient that the mutated variant had led to more severe disease.

Mutations, such as the G variant from England, may make the virus spread faster but they are less severe, he said.

As of now, there is only a preliminary study suggesting the COVID-19 vaccine provided limited protection against the South African variant, Dr Opas said.

In the wider context of the outbreak, the Ministry of Public Health is now focusing on Pathum Thani province, in addition to Samut Sakhon, after a cluster of new cases was detected at the Pornpat fresh market in Thanyaburi district last week, prompting a temporarily closure order and widespread testing, Dr Opas said.

He said infections had soared at the Pornpat fresh market because a number of cases was among infected vendors who operated stalls at the centre of the seafood hub.

There were 1,333 people tested and 175, more than 10%, came back positive. Some 111 of the infected were Thai and the rest were migrant workers, he said.

The market now has a total of 182 confirmed cases, including people who had travelled there from from eight provinces - Nakhon Nayok, Phetchaburi, Saraburi, Bangkok, Ayutthaya, Ang Thong, Nakhon Ratchasima, and Phrae.

Disease investigators have speculated the contagion was exacerbated by the markets low ceiling and bad ventilation, the doctor said.

Some of the vendors sold products at various markets in different provinces, causing the virus to spread to other areas fast, he said.

Nakhon Ratchasima provincial public health chief, Narinrat Pitchayakhamin said the latest case in the province was a seven-year-old boy from Pathum Thani.

The boy travelled to Nakhon Ratchasima with his family on Feb 10 to attend a cremation ceremony and was later found to have contracted the virus.

District chief Sanit Sritawee said health officials are tracking 14 people who were in close contact with the patient during the cremation ceremony in the village.

Nakhon Ratchasima has recorded 11 more cases since the return of COVID-19 to the country.

Nine have recovered and two are still being treated at Maharat Nakhon Ratchasima Hospital, where the new patient was also admitted.

Nakhon Pathom, another province with a rise in cases, reported eight new positive tests yesterday, bringing the its overall tally to 88, 85 of whom are Thai. All of the new cases are relatives of the previous case, including a 68-year old man living in the same house in tambon Don Faek in Nakhon Chai Si district.

In Samut Sakhon, provincial public health officers sanitised all 22 markets in the municipality over the weekend and all of them, except Rot Fai market, will reopen today.

The Central Shrimp Market in which the first cluster of new cases was blamed for the re-emergence of the virus in Thailand is to remain shut for the time being.

Meanwhile, Thailand yesterday reported 166 new coronavirus cases, almost half of them from mass testing in Pathum Thani and Samut Sakhon.
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The Lekki Concession Company said resumption of tolling at the Lekki Tollgate could take three or even six months because of the extent of the damage done to the plaza.

Yomi Omomuwasan, the managing director of the LCC, said this on Monday during a press conference in Lagos.

The Lagos State Commissioner for Information, Gbenga Omotosho and the Chief Press Secretary to the state governor, Gboyega Akosile, were also at the press conference, saying they needed to clear so many misinformation in the public space about the LCC.

The Judicial Panel of Inquiry set up by the Lagos State government to investigate the October 2020 Lekki shooting incident on February 6 approved the reopening of the Lekki Tollgate.

At the Mondays press conference, Mr Omomuwasan said the tollgate would not be reopened immediately.

Our going back into operations will take some time, he said.

The assets of Lekki Concession Company before it got burnt was comprehensively insured.

The manager said the insurance companies need to examine the extent of damage done so as to know insurance claims will be made.

The assessment of things that are burnt will require a team of engineers from both the LCC and those working with us. What we operate is electronic tolling system that requires a lot of equipment to be brought together. We need to do this proper and critical assessment and it takes some time, Mr Omomuwasan said.

He said civil works, electrical works and other repairs that will happen at the toll plaza will take some months.

It is not something that will happen within a month. I am not sure this will happen within three months, because of the extent of what has been damaged, he said.

While speaking about the Saturdays event at Lekki Tollgate, Mr Omomuwasan said the LCC was not part of the institution being fought against, and it is worrisome why some people want the place to be closed till the panel finishes its investigation.

If the panel takes 20 years to finish its investigations, does that mean Lekki toll gate will be closed till then? he said, rhetorically.

The manager said there was no time the company was given any preventive order not to resume operation but that they only ceased operations in the interest of peace and agreement with the panel.

Speaking on the #occupyLekkitollgate and #DefendLagos protests, Mr Omomuwasan said the earlier appeal by the LCC worked as the youth did not come for the protests.

He emphasised that the company will not resume tolling immediately at the plaza until all repairs are done which might take months.
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24-time Grammy winner Beyonce Knowles-Carter looked bootylicious in a white underwire tank top and matching leggings from Ivy Park's third collaboration with Adidas.

The 39-year-old R&B diva also wore long mittens and a puffer scarf from the 'Icy Park' collection, which drops this Friday on adidas.com and this Saturday in select stores globally.

Beyonce has served as Adidas creative partner since 2019, and she originally launched her athleisure attire company in 2016.

Coming soon! 24-time Grammy winner Beyonce Knowles-Carter looked bootylicious in a white underwire tank top and matching leggings from Ivy Park's third collaboration with Adidas

Another view: And this look at the singer's backside was also shared on Instagram

Knowles-Carter - who also paired the sculpted tank with PVC pants - named her brand after her favorite number four (IV) as well as her nine-year-old daughter Blue Ivy.

The Houston-born Texan - whose company Ivy Park pays Sri Lankan factory workers $6.17/day - also showcased the sculpted tank with a reflective snow suit in the commercial.

Beyonce scored the most nominations of any artist - nine, including record of the year - at the 63rd Annual Grammy Awards, which air March 14 on CBS.

Wonder in white: They also shared an image of this stunning look

Excited? The 39-year-old R&B diva also wore long mittens and a puffer scarf from the 'Icy Park' collection, which drops this Friday on adidas.com and this Saturday in select stores globally

Sexy on a ski lift: Beyonce has served as Adidas creative partner since 2019, and she originally launched her athleisure attire company in 2016

Namesake: Knowles-Carter - who also paired the sculpted tank with PVC pants - named her brand after her favorite number four (IV) as well as her nine-year-old daughter Blue Ivy

Ready for the slopes! The Houston-born Texan - whose company Ivy Park pays Sri Lankan factory workers $6.17/day - also showcased the sculpted tank with a reflective snow suit in the commercial

Knowles-Carter is also up for best album, song, R&B performance, R&B song, rap performance, rap song, music video, and music film.

The Black Parade hitmaker and her husband Jay-Z - who originally met in 1998 - will celebrate their 13th wedding anniversary on April 4.

Beyonce and the 51-year-old rap mogul (born Shawn Carter) are also parents of three-year-old twins Sir and Rumi.
New Delhi: To mark the second anniversary of the Pulwama attack, people took out a candle march at the Singhu border (Delhi-Haryana) to pay tribute to the soldiers who lost their lives in the attack.

This year marks two years of the Pulwama terror attack. Pakistan-based terrorist group Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) had claimed responsibility for the dastardly terror attack in which 40 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel were killed.


VENTURA, Calif., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On Jan. 14, 2021, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) reconsidered the anti-parasitic drug Ivermectin as a possible treatment for COVID-19. Ventura Clinical Trials, owned and operated by Dr. Sabine Hazan, is one of the institutions researching Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquinewith remarkable success.

From Amazon: I'm a GI doc (and admitted colleague of Drs Hazan and Borody) but also a curmudgeon and general pop-medicine cynic particularly in the radically overhyped microbiome space. So I'm primed to be skeptical, but they really nailed it here! For one it's super readable and funny, which I wasn't expecting. Further, it's reasonable in its science and advice, no irrational promises, just the facts... But these are really amazingly interesting facts, so the story stands on its own. As a specialist in gastroenterology, internal medicine, and hepatology, Dr. Hazan has used her medical expertise in many regards over the last two decades. As the founder & CEO of Progenabiome, a genetic sequencing research laboratory, she leads 35+ studies investigating the role of the gut flora in various diseases. Since March 2020, she has been at the forefront of COVID-19 research, leading ongoing FDA-approved clinical trials for treatment and prophylaxis.

Dr. Stanley Frochtzwajg, the chief medical officer with Community Memorial Health System that operates Community Memorial Hospital in Ventura, Ojai Valley Hospital and numerous clinics across the California county is one of Dr. Hazan's patients. Dr. Frochtzwaig tested positive for COVID-19 last month. Following Hazan's protocol which includes a combination therapy and formulated (made in America) vitamins. Frochtzwajg says, "I definitely started to show improvements in my fatigue, my fever resolved . . . taste and smell returned about a week after starting treatment." Hazan has treated hundreds of patients from across the U.S. who tested positive for COVID-19. Go to https://vcreporter.com/2021/02/ventura-hospital-chief-with-covid-treated-at-home/ for the complete story.

Hazan, a gastroenterologist, has been sequencing the human microbiome looking for microbial answers to digestive and other disorders. When the COVID-19 outbreak began, Hazan decided to use her resources to seek a remedy. "We found 4 unique variants in eight patients very quickly and 33 mutations across all patients. We began trials to see if was possible that some people might respond to simple treatments or avoid the infection altogether." Go to https://progenabiome.com/clinical-trials for more information.

In a paper published by Gut Pathogens, "Detection of SARS-CoV-2 from patient fecal samples by whole genome sequencing," Hazan's team discovered the virus in stool samples taken 45 days after some patients tested positive for COVID. "The virus lingers in some people much longer than we originally thought. The chance for contagion by these people is still high over a month later." Hazan's paper can be seen at https://progenabiome.com/publications.

Hazan's recent book on gut health, Let's Talk Sh!t: Disease, digestion and fecal transplants is available on Amazon.

Contact Dr. Hazan for interviews at [email protected] or call 805.200.7436

For book information contact Sheli Ellsworth at [email protected]

SOURCE Dr. Sabine Hazan
The federal opposition has used the anniversary of Parliaments apology to the stolen generation to push for a referendum on constitutional recognition to be held before the next election.

Labors Indigenous Australians spokeswoman Linda Burney told Federal Parliament on Monday the healing power of telling the truth was within reach and a national vote on the issue could succeed if it had the support of First Nations leaders and major political parties.

Labors Pat Dodson, Anthony Albanese and Linda Burney on their way to attend a ministerial statement to mark the anniversary of the National Apology to the Stolen Generations. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The federal government had committed to a referendum during this term of parliament but plans were derailed last year, as well as several other election commitments, by the emergency response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Ms Burney said Labor remained committed to enshrining The Voice into the constitution, in line with the Uluru statement, coupled with a Makarrata Commission to achieve agreement on appropriate measures towards reconciliation.
South Africa: Motshekga pleads with learners to work hard in school

The Department of Basic Education (DBE) is encouraging learners to work hard to make up for the lost times after the COVID-19 outbreak affected last years academic year.

Minister Angie Motshekga is visiting schools in Gauteng as learners went back to school today.

Addressing learners at a school in Tshwane, she urged them to grab every opportunity at their disposal and make the best of it.

Scientists estimate that last year we lost almost 60% of our teaching time for that time you had to close for a long period and even when you came back you had to go into rotation and all sorts of things that takes away teaching time.

She believes the department has to do everything in its power to redeem itself.

It means we have to work for the 100% of this year and still clawback the 60% we lost last year. It is the big task, she admitted.

Meanwhile, she said the learners must do everything to pursue success.

I dont know any successful person who regrets and says this success is a problem. People who regret are those who squandered their opportunities and cant look after themselves and their children and it becomes a lifetime problem.

She also told the pupils that she was a teacher with a degree before she became the Minister.

Theres never a single month I never got a salary. So, even there were difficulties and I ran out of money, but I knew the 15th of every month was coming [for me to get paid].

You dont want to live a life where you dont know whats going to happen to you the next day.

She believes that education is the only ticket that can give you that life of certainty.

Meanwhile, she pleaded with them to join forces with their teachers and principals as the success of the nation depends on them.

Im standing here to say please cooperate with the school to give us results. The only way is education, she stressed.

She cited mining mogul Patrice Motsepe and told them that he did not become a billionaire overnight.

Hes a lawyer and he came to understand the world of mining when he was working with the mining companies. His wife is a doctor. Our President is a lawyer. His wife is a doctor.

Motshekga said she is proud to call herself a teacher and urged the pupils to attain qualifications.

The more educated and sophisticated you are the less you get involved in wrong things because you can look after yourself, family and environment.

She described herself as a fussy grandmother who only wants the best for her grandchildren.

I also want my granddaughter to say [her boyfriend] has passed matric and going to the University of Pretoria and then I smile. If he doesnt have matric, its a non-starter. He must have matric as a starting point.

Also, she said the quality of the matric pass also counts and told them to do well in Grade 12 to attract bursaries.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-02-15. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
TRP Scam: Times Network Sends Legal Notice to BARC; Demands over Rs431 Crore as Compensation

Bennett Coleman & Company Ltd (BCCL) that owns the Times of India newspaper and Times Now channel has sent legal notice to Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) alleging illegal and fraudulent viewership data manipulation and tampering of television rating points (TRP) of its TV channel, Times Now, by the Council. In the notice, BCCL has demanded a compensation of Rs431 crore along with an interest from BARC. It also asked refund of its licence fee of Rs21.83 crore paid to BARC along with the interest.

In the notice (seen by Moneylife), BCCL says, "Times Nows viewership numbers or TRP were clearly fudged and manipulated by BARC from 2017-onwards. Times Nows viewership numbers were deliberately and in a concerted manner, reduced for giving benefit to the newly launched channel, which has considerably and adversely impacted the revenue, growth, reputation, goodwill and image of the Times Now channel and the Times Group at the national and international level."

"By providing wrong data for years together even after receiving a huge licence fee, BARC is in complete breach of all obligations under the end user license agreements (EULAs), guidelines issued by the ministry of information and broadcasting (MIB) and the internal policies, rules, and regulations of BARC," the notice says.

Earlier in October last year, the Mumbai police busted a TRP scam where television news channels allegedly paid viewers to manipulate their viewership ratings. A first information report (FIR) was registered by Mumbai police at the instance of Hansa Research Group Pvt Ltd, which is the service-provider of BARC for monitoring the BAR-O-Meters installed for measuring TRP at the BARCs selective panel homes. After the FIR, on 15 October 2020, BARC unilaterally decided to suspend reporting of TRPs for news channels while the reporting in respect of non-news genre continued.

Mentioning the statement of joint commissioner (crimes) of Mumbai Police on 25 December 2020, the notice says polices ongoing investigation into the BARC TRP scam made it clear that proof had been unearthed exposing manipulation by BARC officials for the benefit of Republic TV in 2017-18.

In the notice, BCCL also shared a comparative table of average numbers of the 44 weeks (week 24 of 2017 till week 11 of 2018) which, it says, proves the viewership malpractices committed by BARC beyond any doubt. "The purported 'outlier policy' has been blatantly abused by BARC to deliberately and fraudulently reduce the weekly viewership impressions of Times Now week after week with the sole intent of bringing its numbers below the said newly launched beneficiary channel," it alleges.

BCCL, in the notice, has mentioned names of six officials from BARC as those involved in breaching code of ethics. This includes, Ramgarhia (chief operating officer- COO), Venkat Sujit Samrat (head of products for south), Rushabh Mehta (head of west), Partho Dasgupta (ex-CEO), Pekham Basu (vice president for strategy) and Manashi Kumar (chief people officer & strategy) at BARC.

It says, "BARC wilfully and deliberately did not take any disciplinary action against the errant parties e.g., benefiting subscribers and errant officials, even after having the knowledge of TRP manipulation through whistle blower complaints and external forensic audit report dated 24 July 2020 and instead, discreetly allowed some of the employees to resign and move out of BARC and BARC intentionally remained silent and inactive with respect to said report of 24 July 2020."

Even when the entire scam was unearthed in as early as July 2020 with clear proof, BCCL alleges that BARC suppressed the forensic audit report from all stakeholders, who were referring and relying on TRP numbers circulated by BARC, for claiming leadership, for earning revenue, for finalising marketing plans and other business activities. Therefore, it says, BARC has not only cheated clients but also all other stakeholders like advertisers, viewers, other member broadcasters and finally, the regulators.

"BARC was an actively involved participant of the TRP scam and chose to follow, adopt and continuously support all unethical, illegal practices for years together, including viewership manipulation and fudging of data and hence, the corruption has gone to the root of BARC. Even the present management and board of BARC are nurturing the same by hiding, suppressing all these facts and incidents very conveniently by avoiding any legal actions against the wrongdoers, for enjoying its undue selfish benefits, at the cost of genuine and innocent stakeholders, members, and subscribers," the notice sent by BCCL says.
Toolkit: Nikita Jacob moves HC seeks anticipatory bail

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: Activist and advocate, Nikita Jacob against whom a non-bailable warrant has been issued for her alleged role in preparing the toolkit, has moved the Bombay High Court seeking anticipatory bail.

The application while seeking protection from arrest for four weeks also seeks interim protection from any coercive action and a direction to The Delhi Police to provide her with the copy of the FIR registered against her.

Her advocate, Abhishek Yende said that the Delhi Police had completed their search operation at Jacob's house and also drew up a panchnama on February 11. He said that Jacobs had cooperated with the investigation and she is unaware of the allegations against her. The application will come up for hearing on February 16.

Toolkit case: After Disha Ravi, Delhi Police looks for activist Nikita Jacob

Earlier the police told a court that the arrest of Disha Ravi, one of the editors of toolkit used by Greta Thunberg was the first in the case. The police said that Disha have allegedly edited the toolkit on February 3 and many others are involved in the matter.

The court has sent Disha to five days police custody. She was arrested on Saturday. The police are looking for two more suspects in the case. While raids are being carried out in Mumbai and other places, the police are hunting for Nikita and Shantanu, two other accused in the case.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The 21-year-old activist was arrested on Saturday from Bengaluru and sent to five days police remand on Sunday by a Delhi court here.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 15:12 [IST]
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New Delhi: The Union Ministry of Education on Monday (February 15, 2021) announced that an average of 67% of 12th standard Kendriya Vidyalaya (KV) students are physically attending classes across India since the schools reopened after the COVID-19 hiatus.

The Kendriya Vidyalayas across India have resumed face-to-face teachings for various classes as per the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and state governments. The schools started reopening in October 2020.

"According to the data compiled on February 11, 2021, from all the KVs, an average of 42% students of Class 9, 65% students of Class 10, 48% students of Class 11 and 67% students of Class 12 are physically attending classes all over the country," the Ministry of Education said through a press release.

"These figures are dynamic and trends indicate consistent increase every day. Face-to-face classes for class 1 to 8 have also been started in some KVs where State Governments have permitted to open Schools for junior grades," it added.

The Ministry of Education stated that regular contact with the parents and guardians is being established by the schools in case of any apprehension from students or parents.

"Students are being permitted with the prior consent of their guardians," the official release added.

The Ministry informed that the SOPs issued by the state and central Governments are being followed completely in view of the COVID-19 outbreak.

"All KVs are clearly advised to follow staggered timings for the students of various classes and ensure adequate safety measures including maintenance of proper physical distance in the classrooms. However, for students who are not attending the school, the provision of online classes is also running. Students are also in touch with their teachers through various digital platforms," said the Ministry of Education.



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But Mont Albert resident Laurence Van Driel said he had lost confidence in Victorias contact tracers after it took Queensland authorities to notify him that he and his adult daughter had been at a tier one coronavirus exposure site last week. Loading Mr Van Driel was at Melbourne Airports Terminal 4 early last Tuesday morning, the same time an infected Brunetti cafe worker began their shift, before boarding a flight to Queensland. He said it was soon after returning to Melbourne last Friday that he received a text message from Queensland Health telling him he needed to get tested for coronavirus immediately. Three days later, he said he still had not been contacted by the Victorian Health Department, and was upset to be told at a testing site by an official that this was not surprising.

Had the Queensland Health department not notified us, we could have gone into Melbourne city and been potential spreaders of the virus, he said. Mr Andrews on Monday defended the states contact-tracing efforts during the Holiday Inn outbreak. He said 931 of the 933 close contacts identified on February 11 were contacted within 48 hours. It is the guideline, that is the standard, that is 99.8 per cent, so that is a very strong result, he said. He said South Australias result on the same measure was 98.7 per cent. Loading

Burnet Institute epidemiologist Professor Mike Toole said despite a new case being linked to the Holiday Inn outbreak, he was optimistic restrictions could be eased on Wednesday night. I am quietly optimistic because of the fact that most recent case I am aware of was acquired eight or nine days ago, Professor Toole said. Thats the basis of my optimism. But we have to remember this viruses ambushes you. We now know, from recent cases in Sydney and Melbourne, that people can go 14 to 16 days with negative tests, and then they can still return a positive. Professor Toole said whether Victoria was able to reopen again morning hinged on a number of variables, including that the over the next two days the state did not record any cases of community transmission; where the source of infection could not be found. University of South Australia biostatistics professor Adrian Esterman was less confident, estimating there was a 50 per cent chance Victorias lockdown would end on Thursday.

Loading If it carries on as one or two maximum cases a day then there is a good chance lockdown could be lifted on Wednesday as planned, the former adviser to the World Health Organisation said. But the one thing we dont want is a case where we cant trace the origins, in other words a mystery case. As long as all these cases are cases that are in quarantine and their contacts are isolation then I think there is a reasonable chance lockdown will end as planned. Professor Esterman said short, sharp lockdowns had worked extremely well after the virus leaked out of quarantine hotels in Western Australia, Adelaide and Queensland. There have been quite a few more cases in Victoria, but fortunately, so far they have all been linked, he said.

I cant see the lockdown in Melbourne lasting another three months, thats not going to happen again. It will either be five days as planned or not too many more days after that. Deakin University chair of epidemiology Catherine Bennett said the next two days would be critical to see whether there had been next generation of spread. The next assessment is getting the results back from the womans coworkers and from other close contacts around these latest three cases, Professor Bennett said. If they are all coming in negative then I think that does set us up quite well for a Wednesday relaxation.

The idea isnt that they get to zero cases or you having a certain number of days of zero cases. This about it ensuring that it is unlikely there will be cases beyond those close contacts. If all close contacts return negative results, if we dont see a next generation of spread, then it is looking pretty good. The coronavirus cluster linked to Holiday Inn at Melbourne Airport has grown to 17. Credit:Joe Armao A woman, whose three-year-old child contracted the virus at a family function on Sydney Road in Coburg on February 6, is considered to be the seventeenth case in the Holiday Inn cluster. Mr Andrews said the woman was asymptomatic and had been swabbed three or four times on February 13 and 14, returning negative and weak positive results. Given her exposure and the variability of those results, the public health team has taken the most conservative approach and have deemed her a positive case, Mr Andrews said.

A psychiatric unit at The Alfred hospital and psychiatric wards at the Northern Hospital in Broadmeadows, where the woman worked, are now in lockdown. About 150 primary close contacts across the three hospitals were all tested on Sunday night. Asked whether there was an acceptable number of cases that would allow the state to emerge from lockdown, the Premier said those public health parameters were being determined by Victorian officials. Victorian Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton said the lockdown was going as well as we could expect. Every single case has been linked. Those immediate social and household close contacts testing negative, thats all terrific news. I am always aware that we can have a day when something comes completely out of left field, so I hope that doesnt happen, Professor Sutton said.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
GRAND RAPIDS, MI  Roughly 13,000 people have received the COVID-19 vaccine at DeVos Place, the site of a large-scale clinic launched three weeks ago in a partnership between Kent County Health Department, Spectrum Health and Mercy Health Saint Marys.

But officials are eager to see those numbers climb once more vaccine becomes available.

Its frustrating to not have vaccine, said Mark VanDyke, who serves as manager of business assurance at Spectrum Health and helps oversee day-to-day operations at the clinic.

He said the clinic is operating at about one-third its capacity, with providers administering about 720 vaccines per hour. This week, the clinic is expected to provide 11,000 doses of the vaccine, which includes a mix of second and first doses, officials say.

Last week we didnt have any clinics. We were closed all week because we didnt have any vaccine to give, VanDyke said. However, we know that if the vaccine does become available, we need a spot for it to go. So, it was important that even though there was not supply right away that we get this stood up, and we are ready to provide it to the community when it comes available.

The update was provided Monday during a media tour of the clinic, known as the West Michigan Vaccine Clinic. The tour followed news last week that Kent County had renegotiated its lease for the clinic following public scrutiny of a $12,000 per-day rental fee included in the original lease for the space.

The county is leasing DeVos Place from the Grand Rapids-Kent County Convention/Arena Authority (CAA), the public authority that owns DeVos Place, as well as SMG/ASM Global, the company hired by the CAA to manage the venue.

The renegotiated lease eliminates the daily rental fee for the convention center. It replaces it with a system under which the county will only be charged to the extent services are requested or used in the clinics operations, the county announced in a news release issued Friday afternoon.

During Mondays media tour, officials touted the collaboration that launched the clinic.

Kent County Health Director Adam London said the clinic has capacity to vaccinate up to tens of thousands of people in a day if adequate supply of the vaccine were available.

He also said DeVos Place was the best location for the clinic.

When we thought of our region, this particular space became so apparent as the best location for this type of service, London said. The size of this airspace is unmatched here in West Michigan. This is important for us. We know that bringing people closely in to an indoor facility provides risk for COVID transmission.

London also said DeVos Place has filtration and ventilation in this facility thats unmatched to help reduce the risk of transmission.

The $12,000 a day lease agreement for DeVos Place was criticized by Joel Langlois, the owner of the DeltaPlex arena in Walker. He said on social media that he would have hosted the vaccine clinic at his venue, which has capacity for about 6,000 people, for $1,000 a day.

During Mondays media tour, officials said theyre recommending that people who are using the clinic give themselves about one hour to park, receive their vaccination, undergo a 15-minute post-vaccination observation, and leave.

The clinic consists of 40 vaccination stations, each of which is outfitted with sanitary wipes, goggles, exam gloves, bandages and more. As of now, the clinic is using just one of the DeVos Places cavernous showrooms. But officials say they can expand into other parts of the convention center once more doses of the vaccine are made available.

We can do about 720 vaccines per hour today, and we will hit that today, VanDyke said. If we were to expand into our second exhibit hall, we would be around 1,400. And then, if we were to be at full capacity, it would be at just over 2,100 vaccines per hour.

Kurt MacDonald, senior vice president of operations at Mercy Health Saint Marys, said the vaccine clinic represents one leg in its approach to COVID-19 vaccinations.

We have our own vaccination clinics that are sort of a micro-scale compared to this, he said. Then weve got embedded clinics in communities that really need some special attention.

He added, Its important to us to be part of this because, again, once the vaccines become available, this speeds up things dramatically.

Read more:

He pushed through COVID-19 to keep his Jackson business running, now hes earned a chamber award

73-year-old Michigan man dies after multi-vehicle crash on icy U.P. road

Spots for recreational marijuana businesses greatly expanded in city of Muskegon
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Post-budget cheer: Foreign investors pump in Rs 22,000 crore in February

Overseas investors pumped in Rs 22,038 crore into the Indian markets in February so far amid positive sentiments around the Union Budget. According to depositories data, overseas investors poured Rs 20,593 crore into equities and Rs 1,445 crore in the debt segment, taking the total net investment to Rs 22,038 crore between February 1-12.

Centre issues fresh SOPs to contain COVID-19 spread in offices

The Union health ministry has issued new 'SOPs to contain spread of COVID-19 in offices' and according to these, if one or two cases are reported, the disinfection procedure will be limited to the areas occupied and visited by the patient in the last 48 hours. Work can resume after disinfection has been completed as per laid down protocols, the standard operating procedures (SOPs), which were issued on Saturday, stated. If a larger number of cases are reported at workplace, the whole block or building should be disinfected before work is resumed, the ministry said. The seating arrangement has to be done to ensure a distance of at least six feet, the SOPs stated.

FM Sitharaman to address post-Budget RBI board meeting on Feb 16

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is scheduled to address the post-Budget meeting of the RBI's central board on Tuesday and highlight key points of Union Budget 2021-22, including the fiscal consolidation roadmap. Fiscal deficit - the excess of government expenditure over its revenues - is estimated to hit a record high of 9.5 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the current fiscal ending March 31 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Snapchat crosses 60 million users in India, clocks 150% growth in daily active users

With over 150 per cent growth in daily active users (DAUs), the US-based photo-messaging app Snapchat saw its user base crossing 60 million-mark in India in the December quarter. Globally, Snapchat had 265 million daily active users in the December 2020 quarter. Over five billion 'snaps' were created daily on average by users on the platform, according to a report in PTI news agency.

Joe Biden to discuss COVID-19 pandemic, China in G7 meet on Friday

President Joe Biden will hold his first event with other leaders from the Group of Seven nations in a virtual meeting on Friday to discuss the coronavirus pandemic, the world economy and dealing with China, the White House said on Sunday. The meeting is the first by top leaders from the G7 group of rich democracies since April, it said.

Uttarakhand glacier burst: Rescuers pull out 6 bodies from Tapovan tunnel; toll rises to 51

Death toll in the Uttarakhand glacier burst and the subsequent flooding of the Alaknanda and Dhauliganga rivers on February 7, rose to 51 as the rescue workers recovered more bodies on Sunday. According to the officials, more than 150 people are still missing. Bodies of victims were being found at different locations by the river over the past week, but rescuers had failed to reach anyone dead or alive in the tunnel network
The severe winter weather that hit Texas could help push oil prices higher this week as it forces drillers to curb production, analysts said.

Production in the Permian Basin could temporarily fall by as much as 1 million barrels a day, Bloomberg News reported Monday, citing unnamed traders and company executives. West Texas Intermediate ended trading on Monday above $60 a barrel for the first time since January 2020.

Brent crude, the international benchmark, closed about $63 a barrel.

Oil prices were already getting support from the prospects of a massive economic stimulus package in the United States and strike by oil and gas workers in Norway. A market rally has gained momentum in recent weeks despite more than a year of demand destruction by the COVID-19 pandemic.

With the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump concluding with an expected acquittal in the Senate, the Biden administration can now move in earnest on plans to roll out a $1.9 trillion stimulus package. The economic growth fueled by the federal spending would likely increase energy demand, analysts said.

Phil Flynn, a senior energy analyst at The PRICE Futures Group in Chicago, said Bidens decision to cancel the Keystone XL oil pipeline to the Gulf Coast and restrict drilling on federal lands is supporting the rally, possibly to the detriment of consumers as gasoline prices rise with crude. The average price of gasoline nationally was last week were 13 cents per gallon higher than month earlier and within 2 cents of prices a year earlier, not long before widespread shutdowns cratered demand, according to the fuel-price tracking website GasBuddy.

The Biden administration better get stimulus through, Flynn said. His voters might start blaming him for higher prices.

Crude oil prices spent much of the latter half of 2020 hovering around the $45 per barrel range, but have soared 66 percent since early November when the first vaccines to inoculate against COVID-19 were approved for the public.

Since January, the rally has been supported by the surge in stock markets and tighter supplies as the expanded cartel known as OPEC+ maintains production limits.

The supply constraints have pushed the market into a condition known as backwardation, in which the current price of a commodity is higher than prices in futures contracts for later months, signaling traders anticipate production will fall short of consumption. The situation further squeezes supply as traders sell crude now, rather than holding onto it for the future in the hope that prices will go higher.

Fundamentally, it is clear the market is getting too short on oil supply, Abhi Rajendran, a research director at Energy Intelligence, told us from New York.

A severe bout of winter weather pushing through the American south could also temporarily slow oil production in West Texas, where snow and single-digit temperatures were forecast, said Giovanni Staunovo, a commodities analyst at Swiss investment bank UBS.

Beyond North America, Norwegian oil and gas workers could go on strike this week if wage negotiations break down. The Norwegian national energy company Equinor said a failure to reach agreement Monday with a labor union could lead to the shutdown of oil fields, affecting production, refining and exports.
WASHINGTON  The World Trade Organization on Monday officially selected Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a Nigerian economist and former finance minister, to be its next leader. The first woman and first African to serve as director general, Dr. Okonjo-Iweala will assume the post on March 1 for a renewable term expiring on Aug. 31, 2025.

Dr. Okonjo-Iweala said in a statement that she was honored to have been selected and would work with the organizations member countries to address health issues brought about by the pandemic and get the global economy going again.

A strong W.T.O. is vital if we are to recover fully and rapidly from the devastation wrought by the Covid-19 pandemic, Dr. Okonjo-Iweala said. Our organization faces a great many challenges but working together we can collectively make the W.T.O. stronger, more agile and better adapted to the realities of today.

Dr. Okonjo-Iweala takes the helm of the W.T.O. at a particularly difficult time for the global trade body, which was created in 1995 to help settle trade disputes, write new trade rules and encourage the flow of goods and services worldwide.
An east Alabama man is under arrest after authorities say his young neighbor was injured by a bullet he fired on Sunday.

Cherokee County deputies responded to a 911 call of a minor shot on County Road 15 in Jamestown, said Sheriff Jeff Shaver. They arrived to find a wounded 13-year-old girl. She was taken by ambulance to the hospital for treatment.

Shaver said Alvin G. Wright, 63 of Gaylesville, was arrested on a second-degree assault charge. The investigation is ongoing, but authorities said the girl was injured when Wright fired into a neighboring patch of woods.

Wright was booked into the Cherokee County Detention Center Jail shortly after 7 p.m. Sunday. There is no bond listed in jail records.
Mumbai: Indian police have arrested a woman accused of editing and circulating a document tweeted by climate activist Greta Thunberg that authorities say is anti-government.

Swedish climate activist Thunberg tweeted her backing this month for the farmers, who have been demonstrating since December against agricultural reforms they say will harm their livelihood but benefit large corporations. She shared a document she said was a toolkit to create and spread awareness about the farmers complaints.

Activist Disha Ravi Credit:Facebook

New Delhi police arrested Disha Ravi, who a police source told Reuters is a senior leader of the Indian arm of Thunbergs Fridays for Future campaign movement. On Sunday, the 22-year-old was remanded in custody until a court hearing in five days time.

Police did not say what Ravi had been charged with but accused her of being a key conspirator in the documents formulation and dissemination.
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MEXICO CITY  Freezing weather in Texas led to a chain of events that left almost 5 million customers in northern Mexico without power Monday as a shortage of natural gas disrupted electricity production.

Mexicos government-owned utility, the Federal Electricity Commission, said its operations were left short as the winter storm in Texas froze natural gas pipelines. It said some private power plants also began shutting down Sunday night. Private plants supply about 80% of power in northern Mexico.

Mexico uses gas to generate about 60% of its power, compared to about 40% in the United States. Mexico built pipelines to take advantage of cheap natural gas from the U.S., often obtained by fracking in Texas, but Mexico does not allow fracking in its own territory.

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The utility said U.S. electricity demand also rose as temperatures plunged across the border, leading to much higher prices. It said gas prices had risen from about $3 per million BTUs to as much as $600 in recent days.

The commission said that by midday Monday it had restored power to about 65% of the 4.8 million customers affected by the blackout, mainly in the northern border states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas. A smaller number of users were also affected in Durango and Zacatecas.

The commission said it was seeking to make up for the shortfall by bringing on line more electricity from hydroelectric and coal-fired plants as well as gas supplied by tanker ships.

The utilitys director of fuel purchasing, Miguel Reyes Hernandez, suggested that what happened in Texas was a perfect storm of factors that choked off imports of gas that Mexico uses to run many of its power plants.

Electricity demand in the United States rose by a little over 20% in just four days, Reyes Hernandez said. The increase was due precisely to the drop in temperatures, and obviously the use of heating in the United States meant an increase in natural gas demand on the one hand, and precisely because of the low temperatures, there was a decrease in renewable energy.

He said U.S. wind turbines had their blades frozen  and there was freezing in many pipelines and even at wells.

It was the latest embarrassing failure for the Federal Electricity Commission, the government utility that has become a pet project for President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who wants to reduce the role of private power generation.

In January, the utility acknowledged it had presented a falsified report on a Dec. 28 blackout, which it had blamed on a purported brush fire beneath transmission lines that caused the two-hour power failure affecting one-fourth of Mexicos customers.

Lopez Obrador has not only defended the state-owned company, but he is seeking to eliminate competition from cleaner, privately built generating plants and renewable energy.

In January, he proposed a bill that would put cleaner, natural gas and renewable private plants  many built with foreign investment  last in line for electricity purchases. The private and renewable energy plants were encouraged by Lopez Obradors predecessors in order to reduce carbon emissions.

Lopez Obrador sought in an executive order in 2020 to shore up the government utility by limiting permits to bring other companies power plants online, including some wind and solar facilities. The president contends green-energy incentives give those plants an unfair advantage over the state utility.

With electricity use down overall during the pandemic, the state utility faces declining revenue and increasing stocks of fuel oil it has to burn in power plants. It has also come under pressure to buy coal from domestic mines.
The conclusion of Donald Trump's impeachment trial finally ends the ex-President's stranglehold on Washington's every waking moment and offers President Joe Biden a first chance to fully exercise his influence and power.

While the coming days in Washington may not be as wrenching as last week  which saw a horrific recreation of the terror inside the Capitol on January 6 by House impeachment managers  they will be even more critical to the nation's short-term fate. Biden can now claim the full attention of Congress and the public as he seeks to drive through his relief package and end the pandemic and will make his first official trip out of Washington since being sworn in, including to a CNN town hall in Wisconsin on Tuesday.

The new President is already moving aggressively to fill the post-Trump vacuum. He forcibly pushed his $1.9 trillion Covid-relief plan on Monday morning in a statement marking the reopening of open enrollment for the Affordable Care Act.

The legislation "will ramp up testing, tracing, and our national vaccination program," Biden said, adding that it would also "take big steps to lower health costs and expand access to care for all Americans, including those who have lost their jobs."

But the acquittal of Trump, who tried and failed to kill the ACA, at the hands of a majority of Republican senators Saturday proved the former president's personality cult will make him a dominant force in the civil war gripping the party in the run-up to the 2022 midterm elections. His staying power, even while out of office, will therefore still have a huge impact on the mood in Washington, and Biden's ability to bring the nation together and advance his priorities.

Prominent Republicans like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and potential 2024 presidential candidate Nikki Haley are already maneuvering to take the party in a different direction. Only time will tell whether Trump's influence will be quite so omnipresent when he is miles from the action in his luxury resort in Florida and Congress is no longer debating his political fate. And a flurry of legal concerns, stemming from his past business practices and attempts to steal last year's election could further damage the future political prospects of an ex-President who was willing to destroy US democracy in a bid to stay in power.

Biden's chance

The end of the impeachment trial means that for the first time since he became president last month, Biden will be able to bring the power of his office to bear, as he steps up his effort to win swift passage of his relief plan with a 50-50 Senate that Democrats control because of Vice President Kamala Harris' ability to break ties. The President will begin trips out of Washington this week  a rite of a new administration so far trimmed by Covid-19. On Friday, Biden will seek to restore US global leadership in another departure from the Trump administration, by taking part in a virtual meeting of G7 leaders to discuss the pandemic.

Sen. Chris Murphy made a case on "State of the Union" Sunday that Democrats had effectively managed the trial, advanced Biden's Cabinet nominees and are conducting negotiations on the Covid-19 relief package.

"We have been doing three things at once," the Connecticut Democrat said. But that balancing act would have come unstuck had the trial dragged on much longer  a factor in Democratic senators pushing back at a surprise bid on Saturday by House Impeachment managers to call witnesses.

There is no time to lose since the success of Biden's presidency  and the nation itself  will depend on his capacity to end the pandemic and rescue the economy. And the crisis is at a pivotal point. Cases of the virus are falling fast and death tolls, which typically lag new infections, will soon do the same. But new variants of Covid-19 that appear more contagious are spreading. This makes new funds for a vaccination drive contained in the congressional package increasingly crucial. With extended unemployment benefits set to run out in March, millions of Americans are relying on Congress. The bill also includes billions of dollars in funding to safely reopen schools  an increasingly troublesome political issue for the White House and a paramount concern for desperate parents.

"The American Rescue Plan has resources, $130 billion of resources, to facilitate and help schools get there," Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on "State of the Union" on Sunday.

Her comments reflected the new reality that with Trump out of the picture, Biden is about to experience the full glare of scrutiny over the pandemic, the economy and every other unsolved national problem that ends up on a president's desk.

The GOP's never-ending Trump dilemma

The trial showed that the Republican Party is in essentially the same place it has been since Trump descended his golden escalator in 2015. Many of its most prominent establishment leaders disdain the ex-President but remain scared to confront him because of his almost mystical bond with the conservative base. This has recently led the House GOP to legitimize its extremist, conspiratorial wing, by embracing pro-Trump Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene  a strategy that threatens to drive away more centrist voters. Members of the House and Senate who voted to convict Trump, meanwhile, have faced censure from state parties and a backlash from voters back home.

There is the tiniest of openings for those who want to take the party in a post-Trump direction. Haley, the former US ambassador to the United Nations and ex-South Carolina governor, used a Politico Magazine interview to distance herself from the ex-President ahead of his acquittal last week. And Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, another possible 2024 presidential hopeful, laid out the case for change on Sunday.

"This is not over. We're going to decide over the next couple of years what the fate of Donald Trump and the Republican Party is," Hogan told Jake Tapper on CNN's "State of the Union."

Trump is treating his escape from justice as a political win, promising to "emerge soon" into the spotlight. The ex-President plans to use upcoming midterm primaries to seek revenge on Republicans who turned on him and to prove his staying power as the GOP's de-facto leader.

Yet he has other worries. CNN has reported that the ex-President fears that he could face criminal charges over his incitement of the mob on January 6. And the legacy of the trial, and what it exposed, could permanently damage Trump. Stunning video evidence showed just how close to danger then-Vice President Mike Pence and lawmakers came -- and CNN's Friday night reporting of new details about Trump's January 6 phone call with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy raised serious questions about what the President knew and when. While it is conceivable that Trump could be a strong presidential primary contender in 2024, it's more of a stretch to see him as a viable national candidate given the extreme methods he took to cling to power in 2020.

McConnell's gamble

Republicans' unwillingness to constrain Trump has led to two impeachments, the loss of the White House, the House and the Senate, multiple abuses of power and Trump's botched handling of a pandemic that has killed nearly half a million Americans. But the party's demographic foundation means that the only route to power still relies on a juiced turnout by Trump's most loyal supporters.

This clash between power and principle is best underscored by McConnell's contradictory behavior in the trial. The Kentucky Republican voted to acquit Trump on the dubious basis that the Constitution bars trying an impeached President once he has left office.

But immediately after casting his vote, the GOP leader blasted Trump in a speech on the Senate floor, saying his actions before the riot were a "disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty." The straddle left McConnell facing charges of hypocrisy and extreme political expedience, especially since he set up the constitutional excuse for senators embarrassed to confront Trump's crimes by refusing to hold the trial when Trump was still serving.

But everything McConnell does is explained by his driving desire to keep his conference together in the service of maintaining or recapturing power  in this case in next year's midterms.

McConnell had seen how Rep. Liz Cheney had to fight for her No. 3 post in House Republican leadership after voting to impeach Trump. Had he cast a similar vote, he would have surely faced a fight for his leadership or at the very least seen his authority with his conference shattered.

McConnell laid out the naked pragmatism of his thinking in a Politico interview  effectively signaling an effort to purge Trumpian influence  unless he needed pro-Trump candidates to help win back the Senate.

"The only thing I care about is electability," McConnell said.

It is this kind of cynical strategizing that has made McConnell one of the most powerful congressional leaders since Lyndon Johnson. It has also led the Republican Party to a point where it cannot summon itself to punish a former President who staged an effective coup after losing an election.
To ensure liquidity in the system, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will conduct simultaneous purchase and sale of government securities under open market operations (OMO) aggregating Rs 10,000 crore each on February 25.

The central bank will purchase and sell government securities through multiple price auction method.

"On a review of current liquidity and financial conditions, the Reserve Bank has decided to conduct simultaneous purchase and sale of government securities under open market operations for an aggregate amount of Rs 10,000 crore each on February 25, 2021," the RBI said in a release.

Also read: RBI forms expert committee for urban co-operative banks to strengthen sector

Earlier on February 10, the central bank had purchased Rs 20,000 crore of bonds through OMO.

RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das, in his address after the meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee on February 5, had said that the central bank will continue to maintain an "accommodative liquidity stance" to support growth in the economy battered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The RBI's market operations amid the pandemic have dispelled illiquidity fears and bolstered financial market sentiment, he said. On government's market borrowing, Das said, the central bank will ensure "orderly" completion of Rs 12 lakh crore borrowing programme in a non-disruptive manner.

The government raises money from the market through bonds and treasury bills to fund its fiscal deficit. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her Budget speech, had pegged India's fiscal deficit at 6.8 per cent of GDP in financial year 2021-22, down from 9.5 per cent in 2020-21.

Also read: RBI to conduct OMOs for Rs 20,000 crore on February 10

Also read: Will retail investors take up RBI's offer to open gilt accounts?
11th round of India-China military commander level talks likely to be held on Friday

As India-China stalemate continues, top IAF officers grouping to be held this week

India stood up Chinas disruptive use of technology and my way or no way attitude: CDS

After Pangong Tso, more reduction of tensions at friction points between India and China

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: With the disengagement taking place at Pangong Tso, tensions have eased out at Naku La along the Line of Actual Control, where frictions were witnessed between the Indian and Chinese armies.

There has been a renewed effort by Beijing to ease off tensions at Naku La, just like in the case of Pangong Tso. The decision to reduce tensions at Naku La has been dictated by the Central Military Commission which is headed by Chinese President Xi Jinping.

On the other hand the disengagement at Pangong Tso by the armies of India and China will be completed by Friday. The disengagement is taking place as per schedule, sources have told OneIndia.

There is rapid movement of Chinese heavy vehicles beyond Finger 8, satellite images have shown.

Disengagement process at Pangong Tso to be complete by Friday

While armoured elements like battle tanks and armoured personnel carriers are being withdrawn from friction points in the south bank of Pangong Tso, troops are being pulled back from the north bank areas, sources said.

The sources said withdrawal of armoured elements from the south bank of Pangong Tso is almost complete and temporary structures erected by both sides will be demolished in the next few days.

"The disengagement process will take time as both sides are together carrying out verification of the withdrawal of troops and military hardware," said a source.

The disengagement of troops and armoured elements is limited to the friction points where the two sides were on an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation, sources said.

After a nine-month standoff, the two militaries reached the agreement on disengagement in the north and south banks of Pangong lake that mandates both sides to cease forward deployment of troops in a "phased, coordinated and verifiable" manner.

On Thursday, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh made a detailed statement in Parliament on the disengagement pact.

According to the agreement, China has to pull back its troops to east of Finger 8 areas in the northern bank while the Indian personnel will be based at their permanent base at Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 in the region.

Similar action will take place on the south bank of the lake as well, Singh said in Parliament.

Last year, the Chinese military built several bunkers and other structures in the areas between Finger 4 and 8 and had blocked all Indian patrols beyond Finger 4, triggering strong reaction from the Indian Army.

In the nine rounds of military talks, India was specifically insisting on withdrawal of Chinese troops from Finger 4 to Finger 8 on the North bank of Pangong Lake.

The mountain spurs in the area are referred to as Fingers.

The sources said following completion of the disengagement process, the two sides will hold talks on the de-escalation process.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

They said field commanders of both the armies have been holding talks on a daily basis in the last few days to coordinate the disengagement process.

The defence minister said the implementation of the pact started on Wednesday and it was agreed to convene the next meeting of senior commanders of both sides within 48 hours of completion of the disengagement in the Pangong lake area so as to resolve all other remaining issues.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 8:07 [IST]
Turkey summons U.S. ambassador after PKK hostages killed Ankara says Washington's statement 'too bland'

(ANSAmed) - ISTANBUL, FEBRUARY 15 - The Turkish foreign ministry on Monday summoned the US ambassador to Ankara, David Satterfield, to express "in the strongest possible terms" the protest of the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan against the US statement on the death of 13 Turkish hostages of the PKK in northern Iraq, which was considered as too bland.



In a statement, the State department said it condemned in "the strongest possible terms" what occurred, provided that Ankara's version of the events was "confirmed". Ankara claims the hostages were executed by the Kurdish armed group.(ANSAmed).






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[February 15, 2021] Time Manufacturing Company Completes Acquisition of Ruthmann

WACO, Texas, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Time Manufacturing Company ("Time") has completed its acquisition of Ruthmann, a European manufacturer of aerial work platforms. Time is a global manufacturer of aerial lifts primarily for the electric utility, telecommunications, infrastructure, and forestry sectors. Time goes to market via several brands, including Versalift, Aspen Aerials and BrandFX. Headquartered in Gescher-Hochmoor, Germany, Ruthmann has a long history of manufacturing high-quality, truck-mounted aerial work platforms in Europe, going to market under the brands Ruthmann, Steiger, Ecoline, and Bluelift. "Ruthmann brands stand for quality and reliability, and we are delighted to partner with Ruthmann to grow our respective businesses together," said Curt Howell, CEO of Time Manufacturing Company. "Together, Time and Ruthmann offer complementary products and services which allow both companies to better serve and to meet the demands of our global customers." "This acquisition brings together two complementary work truck and high access equipment manufacturers, expanding our product offerings, and better serving our customers," said Rolf Kulawik, Managing Director. "We look forward to partnering with the Time team to realize the many opportunities that the combination offers both employees and customers alike." The acquisition of Ruthmann is a significant step forward for Time Manufacturing Company in developing a robust product line that supports the many specialized access needs of telecommunications, electric utility and other essential end customers around the world. Time has international operations which represents a remarkable opportunity to expand and promote Ruthmann brands to a broader global audience. The company will showcase its product lines across all brands at the following expositions, where the press is always welcome and invited to attend: The APEX Show - Maastricht, Netherlands, June 15-17, 2021 The Utility Expo - Louisville, KY September 28-30, 2021







Media Contacts:





USA Brent Berger  +1(323) 791-3722  brentberger@versalift.com EUROPE Alexandra Ulbricht  +49 (0) 162 4009254  alexandra.ulbricht@ruthmann.de

Time Manufacturing Company is a global manufacturer of bucket trucks, digger derricks, cable placers, truck bodies, buckets, and other specialty equipment for electric utility, telecommunications, bridge inspection, tree care and other fleet-supported industries. Through Versalift, BrandFX, Aspen Aerials, Ruthmann, Steiger, Ecoline, and Bluelift brands, the company provides equipment to co-ops, municipalities, government agencies and corporations through its global network of facilities and distributors. Time Manufacturing Company now employs more than 1,600 associates worldwide. Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/548217/Versalift_Logo.jpg

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Teton County Reporter

Previously the Scene editor, Billy Arnold made the switch to the county beat where he's interested in exploring Teton County as a model for the rest of the West. When he can, he still writes about art, music and whatever else suits his fancy.
[February 15, 2021] OSE Immunotherapeutics Enters a Loan Agreement of up to 25 Million with the European Investment Bank

This loan will further support the progress and expansion of OSE Immunotherapeutics lead clinical development programs in diseases with high unmet medical needs,



Divided into three tranches including two tranches of 10 million each and a third tranche of 5 million,



Agreement part of the European Investment Banks strategy to support biotech companies developing a high-level of expertise in various areas such as OSEs immunotherapy programs, including its vaccine program against SARS-CoV-2.

NANTES, France, Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- OSE Immunotherapeutics (ISIN: FR0012127173; Mnemo: OSE) today announced that the Company has signed a loan agreement of up to 25 million with the European Investment Bank (EIB). The loan facility of up to 25 million is divided into three tranches including two tranches of 10 million each and a third tranche of 5 million. The first 10 million tranche, unconditional and which OSE will request payment before the end of May 2021, will help expand the clinical development of Tedopi in combination with a checkpoint inhibitor in additional cancer indications. This first tranche will also support the entry into Phase 1/2 of OSE-279, OSEs proprietary anti-PD-1 antibody, in a niche oncology indication. This development of OSE-279 will allow OSE Immunotherapeutics to have its own proprietary anti-PD-1 antibody and leverage it across OSEs product portfolio in combination with other drug candidates. Moreover, OSE-279 is the key anti-PD-1 backbone component of the bifunctional checkpoint inhibitor BiCKI platform, targeting PD-1 and other innovative targets, paired with novel immunotherapy targets. The remaining two tranches of 10 and 5 million, available upon achievement of specific clinical milestones, are planned to be used to accelerate the clinical development of the Companys other programs, in particular CD28 antagonist FR104 and new anti-ChemR23 agonist OSE-230. Alexis Peyroles, Chief Executive Officer of OSE Immunotherapeutics, comments: We are very grateful for EIBs support, a major financial European institution, as the Company is at an inflection point of its growth. The first 10 million tranche allows OSE to extend its financial visibility to Q2 2022. This new flexible funding tool will help expand and accelerate the development of our clinical stage portfolio and explore new therapeutic indications with strong medical need, reinforcing OSEs status as a key global player in immunotherapy. Ambroise Fayolle, Vice-President of the EIB, explains: The EIB is pleased to announce its support of OSE, a biotech combining a high level of research and innovation, highly qualified collaborators and cutting-edge expertise in the field of monoclonal and bispecific antibodies. The portfolio of products under development in various therapeutic areas such as immuno-oncology, autoimmune diseases and a vaccine project against SARS-CoV-2, means that OSE Immunotherapeutics is a potential major player in the health sector. This project is fully in line with the mandate set for the EIB by its shareholders - the EU Member States - to support innovation across Europe." This loan will carry a fixed interest of 5% per year paid annually, with a maturity of five years (each drawdown is treated separately in terms of maturity). The repayment of each tranche will therefore be made at the end of a period of five years after the date of disbursement of the said tranche. The loan agreement is supplemented by an agreement to issue warrants to the EIB for the first two tranches of the financing, in particular 850,000 warrants for the first tranche to be issued when drawn. 550,000 additional warrants could be issued if the second tranche of 10 million is drawn by OSE Immunotherapeutics. Each warrant will give the right to subscribe to one ordinary share of OSE Immunotherapeutics at the subscription price of 0.01 and at the exercise price calculated on the basis of the volume-weighted average of the 3 trading days preceding the pricing (which will take place at the end of May 2021), with a discount of 2.5%. The warrants will be exercisable for a period of 12 years. Subject to certain ustomary exceptions, the warrants will only be exercisable after a five-year period starting from the drawdown of the relevant tranche, thus limiting the impact in terms of dilution and volatility in the coming years.



The warrant agreement includes an exercise parity adjustment clause which could apply, under certain conditions, in case of capital increase. The EIB will be granted with the possibility, under certain conditions, to request OSE Immunotherapeutics to buy back its warrants for a maximum amount of 15 million and, beyond that amount, to find a buyer and pay interests on the price of the remaining warrants. ABOUT THE EUROPEAN INVESTMENT BANK

The EIB is the European Union (EU) long-term financing institution and its shareholders are the 27 EU Member States. Its mission is to contribute to the integration, balanced development and economic and social cohesion of EU Member States. It borrows large volumes of funds from the capital markets and lends them with very favorable terms to support projects which contribute to the achievement of EU objectives. The EIB is working to put the EU at the forefront of the next wave of innovation, especially in the health sector. In response to the Covid-19 health crisis, the EIB has released  6 billion for investments in the health sector to support medical infrastructure, additional research activities or other financing related to vaccines and treatments. As a European bank supporting the climate, the EIB is one of the main fund providers in the green transition towards a more low-carbon and sustainable growth model.

ABOUT OSE Immunotherapeutics

OSE Immunotherapeutics is an integrated biotechnology company focused on developing and partnering therapies to control the immune system for immuno-oncology and autoimmune diseases. The companys immunology research and development platform is focused on three areas: T-cell-based vaccination, Immuno-Oncology (focus on myeloid targets), Auto-immunity & Inflammation. Its balanced first-in-class clinical and preclinical portfolio has a diversified risk profile: Vaccine platform Tedopi (innovative combination of neoepitopes): the companys most advanced product; positive results for Step-1 of the Phase 3 trial (Atalante 1) in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer post checkpoint inhibitor failure.

In Phase 2 in pancreatic cancer (TEDOPaM, sponsor GERCOR) in combination.

Due to the COVID-19 crisis, accrual of new patients in TEDOPaM should restart in 2021.

(innovative combination of neoepitopes): the companys most advanced product; positive results for Step-1 of the Phase 3 trial (Atalante 1) in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer post checkpoint inhibitor failure. In Phase 2 in pancreatic cancer (TEDOPaM, sponsor GERCOR) in combination. Due to the COVID-19 crisis, accrual of new patients in TEDOPaM should restart in 2021. CoVepiT: a prophylactic second generation vaccine against COVID-19, developed using SARS-CoV-2 optimized epitopes against multi variants. Positive preclinical and human ex vivo results in August 2020, clinical trial expected to start in Q1 2021. Immuno-oncology platform BI 765063 (OSE-172, anti-SIRPa mAb on SIRPa/CD47 pathway): developed in partnership with Boehringer Ingelheim; myeloid checkpoint inhibitor in Phase 1 in advanced solid tumors.

(OSE-172, anti-SIRPa mAb on SIRPa/CD47 pathway): developed in partnership with Boehringer Ingelheim; myeloid checkpoint inhibitor in Phase 1 in advanced solid tumors. CLEC-1 (novel myeloid checkpoint target): identification of mAb antagonists of CLEC-1 blocking the Dont Eat Me signal that increase both tumor cell phagocytosis by macrophages and antigen capture by dendritic cells.

(novel myeloid checkpoint target): identification of mAb antagonists of CLEC-1 blocking the Dont Eat Me signal that increase both tumor cell phagocytosis by macrophages and antigen capture by dendritic cells. BiCKI: bispecific fusion protein platform built on the key backbone component anti-PD-1 (OSE-279) combined with new immunotherapy targets; 2nd generation of PD-(L)1 inhibitors to increase antitumor efficacity.

Auto-immunity and inflammation platform FR104 (anti-CD28 monoclonal antibody): positive Phase 1 results; ongoing Phase 1/2 in renal transplant, Phase 2-ready asset in a niche indication in autoimmune diseases.

(anti-CD28 monoclonal antibody): positive Phase 1 results; ongoing Phase 1/2 in renal transplant, Phase 2-ready asset in a niche indication in autoimmune diseases. OSE-127/S95011 (humanized monoclonal antibody targeting IL-7 receptor): developed in partnership with Servier; positive Phase 1 results; in Phase 2 in ulcerative colitis (OSE sponsor) and an independent Phase 2 planned in Sjogrens syndrome (Servier sponsor).

(humanized monoclonal antibody targeting IL-7 receptor): developed in partnership with Servier; positive Phase 1 results; in Phase 2 in ulcerative colitis (OSE sponsor) and an independent Phase 2 planned in Sjogrens syndrome (Servier sponsor). OSE-230 (ChemR23 agonist mAb): first-in-class therapeutic agent with the potential to resolve chronic inflammation by driving affected tissues to tissue integrity.

For more information:

Click and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn

https://twitter.com/OSEIMMUNO

https://www.linkedin.com/company/10929673 Contacts OSE Immunotherapeutics

Sylvie Detry

Sylvie.detry@ose-immuno.com

+33 153 198 757



French Media: FP2COM

Florence Portejoie

fportejoie@fp2com.fr

+33 607 768 283 U.S. Media: LifeSci Communications

Darren Opland, Ph.D.

darren@lifescicomms.com

+1 646 627 8387



U.S. and European Investors

Chris Maggos

chris@lifesciadvisors.com

+41 79 367 6254 BEI

Christophe Alix

c.alix@eib.org

+33 6 11 81 30 99



Forward-looking statements

This press release contains express or implied information and statements that might be deemed forward-looking information and statements in respect of OSE Immunotherapeutics. They do not constitute historical facts. These information and statements include financial projections that are based upon certain assumptions and assessments made by OSE Immunotherapeutics management in light of its experience and its perception of historical trends, current economic and industry conditions, expected future developments and other factors they believe to be appropriate.

These forward-looking statements include statements typically using conditional and containing verbs such as expect, anticipate, believe, target, plan, or estimate, their declensions and conjugations and words of similar import. Although the OSE Immunotherapeutics management believes that the forward-looking statements and information are reasonable, the OSE Immunotherapeutics shareholders and other investors are cautioned that the completion of such expectations is by nature subject to various risks, known or not, and uncertainties which are difficult to predict and generally beyond the control of OSE Immunotherapeutics. These risks could cause actual results and developments to differ materially from those expressed in or implied or projected by the forward-looking statements. These risks include those discussed or identified in the public filings made by OSE Immunotherapeutics with the AMF. Such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance. This press release includes only summary information and should be read with the OSE Immunotherapeutics Universal Registration Document filed with the AMF on 15 April 2020, including the annual financial report for the fiscal year 2019, available on the OSE Immunotherapeutics website. Other than as required by applicable law, OSE Immunotherapeutics issues this press release at the date hereof and does not undertake any obligation to update or revise the forward-looking information or statements.



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C.J. Cron, whose 2020 season with the Detroit Tigers was ended prematurely by a knee injury, has signed a minor-league deal with the Colorado Rockies.

Cron, 31, played just 13 games for Detroit, hitting four home runs and posting an .894 OPS.

The Tigers signed former Baltimore Orioles first baseman Renato Nunez to a minor-league deal two weeks ago, effectively ending any chance of a reunion with Cron.

Cron signed a one-year, $6.1 million contract with the Tigers prior to the 2020 season but was forced to settle for a minor-league deal in what has been a chilly free-agent market, especially for mid-tier players.

Cron is the last of five Tigers Major League free agents to sign a deal.

Catcher Austin Romine signed a big-league deal with the Chicago Cubs, while right-handed pitcher Ivan Nova signed a minor-league contract with the Philadelphia Phillies and Jordan Zimmermann signed a minor-league deal with the Milwaukee Brewers.

Jonathan Schoop recently re-signed with the Tigers.
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Pune : , Mumbai, Feb 15 (IANS) Legal luminary and former judge of the Bombay High Court and Supreme Court, Justice P.B. Sawant, who was one of the co-conveners of the Elgar Parishad in 2017, passed away here following a cardiac arrest on Monday, his family said.

A former Chairman of Press Council of India, Justice Sawant was 90 and breathed his last at his family home here around 9.30 a.m.

Justice Sawant is survived by his wife Jayashree, a lawyer son Vishwajeet and two daughters Sujata and Rajashri, his grandson Aditya told IANS.

His last rites will be performed in Pune on Tuesday after his son reaches here, said another family member.

After a thriving legal practice in Mumbai, Justice Sawant was appointed judge of Bombay High Court in 1973 and later elevated to the Supreme Court in 1989.

Among his notable early achievements was probing the crash of the Air India aircraft 'Gauri Shankar' on a Kuala Lumpur-Mumbai flight, which crashed during hard-landing at Mumbai's Sahar International Airport on June 21, 1982, during a thunderstorm, killing at least 17 passengers.

Associated with many human rights, civil liberties, public and social causes, Justice Sawant was one of the three judges - along with late Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer and late Justice H. Suresh - of an independent panel, Indian Peoples Tribunal that probed the post-Godhra violence in Gujarat in 2002.

In 2003, he headed the Justice P.B. Sawant Commission of Enquiry to probe social crusader Kisan Baburao alias Anna Hazare's corruption allegations against four ministers of the then Congress-NCP government in Maharashtra.

Later, the Commission's observations created a massive political furore and led to the resignation of two Cabinet ministers.

On December 31, 2017, Justice Sawant along with his colleague Justice B.G. Kolse-Patil co-convened the Elgar Parishad followed by a series of repercussions like caste riots in Bhima-Koregaon on January 1, 2018, the police swoop on alleged urban Maoists from different parts of India and culminated in a major socio-political churning.

"Justice Sawant was a very ideal, public-minded and dignified person. He excelled in every field as a judge, as an activist, as a social worker... The manner in which he conducted himself in public life serves as an example to all of us," said retired Justice Kolse-Patil, crusader and a personal friend of Justice Sawant.

Maharashtra Trade Unions Joint Action Committee (TUJAC) convener Vishwa Utagi described Justice Sawant as a "pillar of strength to the cause of the working class, a fierce upholder of civil and human rights for citizens" whose loss will be felt deeply.

Well-known activist lawyer Asim Sarode said Justice Sawant was a reformer in the socio-legal fields who regularly used to guide and mentor young lawyers, exhorting them to work for social justice through the legal profession.

Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh said he was pained to learn of Justice Sawant's passing and condoled the bereaved family.

Former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan described Justice Sawant's demise as a "great loss for Maharashtra's progressive movement" as he strove for secularism and equality after retiring as a judge.

Several prominent personalities from the legal, social and political arenas have condoled the demise of Justice Sawant.

-- Except for the title, this story has not been edited by Prokerala team and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed

One million people have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine in New Jersey, officials announced on Monday.

As of Monday morning, 1,003,232 people have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine. Of those, 369,113 have received both doses.

Both vaccines currently approved for use-- Pfizer and Moderna-- require two doses given either three or four weeks apart.

The highest single-day total for vaccine administration was Feb. 4, when over 60,000 received a shot. Many of those appointments were rescheduled from Feb. 1, when only 7,800 doses were given out during a major snow storm. There are currently 295 vaccination sites statewide.

Officials have said the goal is to vaccinate 70% of the adult population within six months. Thats about 4.7 million people. More than 11% of the state has received at least one dose of the vaccine since vaccination efforts began in late December.

Over 44,700 doses were given to out-of-state residents who either work or attend school in New Jersey, the state dashboard shows.

Health care workers, first responders, those over 65 years old, people with certain medical conditions and smokers are currently eligible for the vaccine. Gov. Phil Murphy has said teachers will be among the next group eligible but has not announced a timeframe for when that will happen.

The state hit one million doses of the vaccine given on Feb. 8. That number included both first and second doses given to about 813,000 people.

The roll-out has not been without hitches. Residents have complained of long wait-times, a difficult to navigate registration system, and demand that far outpaces the limited supply.

Although both vaccines currently approved for emergency use require two shots, it might not be long before residents can be vaccinated with a single shot. Johnson & Johnson is currently seeking approval for a single-dose vaccine. Approval could be granted by early March.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a subscription.

Katie Kausch may be reached at kkausch@njadvancemedia.com. Tell us your coronavirus story or send a tip here.
LENAWEE COUNTY, Michigan  A snowmobiler riding on a frozen lake in southern Michigan crashed into an ice-fishing shanty, killing the fisherman inside, reports say.

Sgt. Shane Webster with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources law enforcement tells WTOL Channel 11 the man fishing inside the shanty on Devils Lake was pronounced dead at the scene. The snowmobiler suffered minor injuries.

WTVG Channel 13 reports the crash occurred at about 7:30 p.m. Saturday. The name of the victim was not released Sunday.

The thickness of the ice on the lake was not a factor in the crash, reports say. Its unclear if alcohol was a factor, WTOL reports.

A fishing competition and winter festival was being held at the lake this weekend, according to WTOL. In 2015, a snowmobiler was killed during the festival after crashing into a pickup truck that was parked on the ice, WTOL reports.

Devils Lake is located in Lenawee County, which is borders Ohio. The lake is about 50 miles northwest of Toledo.
Suvendu Adhikari Hits Out At TMC; Says 'Mamata Govt Wants To Turn Bengal Into Bangladesh'

Ahead of the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Suvendu Adhikari while hitting out at the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) and said that it wants to turn the state into Bangladesh by importing "Jai Bangla" slogan. While speaking to media in Siliguri subdivision of Darjeeling district, the BJP leader asserted that the saffron party will come to power in West Bengal with a huge majority.

Suvendu Adhikari said, "No matter what they (TMC) do, people of West Bengal have decided to vote for double engine government. BJP will come to power with a huge majority. Modi Ji and Amit Shah Ji had given a slogan -- '2019 me half, 2021 me saaf' and that is going to happen."

Read full story here

After UP & MP, Gujarat Govt To Implement 'Love Jihad' Law Soon, Says CM Vijay Rupani

Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani while addressing a public gathering at Tarsali area of Vadodara said that the state government will soon bring a law against 'Love Jihad'. During his public address, Gujarat CM said, "Our BJP government will introduce 'Love Jihad' Act in assembly so that such activities are not tolerated in future." Responding to this the crowd cheered and raised slogans of "Jai Shri Ram".

Read full story here

First Kisan Mahapanchayat Organised By RKMM To Be Held In MP's Khargone Today

Rashtriya Kisan Mazdoor Mahasangh (RKMM) president Shiv Kumar Sharma has announced that the first 'Kisan Mahapanchayat' will be held in Madhya Pradesh's Khargone on Monday.

"The first Kisan Mahapanchayat in the Madhya will be organised on February 15 in Khargone district at 12 noon. The Mahapanchayat aims to explain the new farm laws to farmers in detail as most of them are unaware of them. I will attend the Mahapanchayat," the RKMM chief said in a press conference in Indore.

Read full story here

No News In Manipur As Journalists Cease Work Protesting Attack On News Daily Poknapham

There was no news produced or published in Manipur on Sunday as journalists ceased work in order to protest against the attack on Manipuri daily Poknapham. The decision to cease work was taken by the All Manipur Working Journalists' Union (AMWJU) and the Editors Guild of Manipur (EGM), as per state journalists.

On Saturday, a hand-grenade was lobbed at the office of Poknapham in Keishampat Thiyam Leikai in the Imphal West district around 6.30 pm, said police officials. Journalists held a sit-in demonstration at Keishampat Leimajam Leikai from 11 am to 3 pm to protest against the attack. Thereafter, a memorandum was submitted to Chief Minister N Biren Singh, urging him to ensure that the press in the state is free. The police informed that a woman on a two-wheeler was captured by the CCTV camera and she was seen lobbying the hand-grenade at the newspaper's office.

Read full story here

WHO Team Discovers Signs Of Wider COVID Outbreak In Wuhan In December 2019, Says Reports

World Health Organization (WHO) team who visited Wuhan in China to investigate the COVID-19 pandemic informed that after looking into the origins of Coronavirus in the country, they discovered that signs of the outbreak were much wider in the city in December 2019 than previously thought. According to local media reports, the investigators are urgently seeking access to hundreds and thousands of blood samples from Wuhan that China has not so far let them examine.

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South Carolina disability advocates say their needs have been left unaddressed in the state's vaccination plan, despite their repeated calls for attention.

Everyone who lives in a long-term care facility already qualifies to receive a vaccine in South Carolina. That includes people with serious disabilities who are residents of nursing homes and state-run institutions.

It does not account for everyone else. In fact, South Carolina's vaccination guidelines make no mention of disabilities at all.

Kimberly Tissot, executive director of the advocacy group Able South Carolina, said during a recent statewide vaccine meeting disability issues have been left out of vaccination plans.

"I feel like disability is not being represented or even being considered, really, because of the idea of what people think our lives are like," Tissot said. "We're all around you. We're not just in nursing homes or institutions."

She noted the state's vaccine sign-up website is not accessible to the blind, which could be a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act violation.

The outcry comes even as the waiting list for vaccines gets longer. The state's hospitals have had to pause or cancel appointments because shipments of the vaccine have slowed.

Meanwhile, state senators voted Feb. 9 to bump teachers up into the first phase of vaccination priority. The bill has yet to become law but would add 150,000 people to the list and bring the population in the very first phase to 1.4 million  about 30 percent of the state's population.

Pawleys Island resident Ken Leach argues the population of people with Down Syndrome is "a drop in the bucket" by comparison. One in 700 babies are born with the disorder.

The Centers for Disease Control & Prevention has highlighted a handful of conditions that make people at especially high risk for severe COVID-19 disease and death. Down Syndrome is among them. People with the disorder are four times more likely to be hospitalized and 10 times more likely to die from COVID-19, a large study done in the United Kingdom found.

Leach and his wife, terrified of that reality, have tried and failed to schedule a vaccine appointment for their 41-year-old son Corey. Leach said they also tried to access doses because they are caregivers to Corey but found their son would have to be a minor in order for them to qualify.

Leach said moving people like Corey up in the priority list would work to prevent hospitalizations and deaths, which burden the state's hospitals.

Corey has a job at a local Food Lion. But he hasn't been able to report to work because of the risks the virus poses to him.

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He wakes up every day asking when he can return to work, his father said.

"This seems to be heartless," Leach said.

Down Syndrome is the only developmental disability on the CDC's high risk list. MaryBeth Musumeci, a disabilities expert at the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation, said most diagnoses simply haven't been studied for COVID-19 risks.

Evaluating eligibility for a vaccine based on someone's diagnosis could be leading to some of the most vulnerable people falling through cracks, she said. "Another way is looking at it by functional need, and trying to treat people who are similarly situated the same way," she said.

For example: Can the person wear a mask? Is a health care worker visiting them at home?

Musumeci added most state vaccine plans are like South Carolina's and do not account for people with disabilities.

Dr. Linda Bell, chief epidemiologist at the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control, said her agency and its partners are faced with difficult decisions about who should be prioritized.

She said "disabilities" is a broad umbrella. Including everyone under the umbrella could lead to healthy people getting the vaccine ahead of those with other known risks, Bell said.

Deborah McPherson, a disability advocate and mother to a 36-year-old woman with Down Syndrome, pointed out thousands of people in South Carolina in need of serious care live at home by making use of Medicaid waivers.

Those waivers allow people to get the care they need in place and avoid institutionalization. But they have the same level of medical needs as someone living in a facility, McPherson said.

She said it would be a simple task to add them to the vaccine line-up.

"These same individuals have workers coming into their homes," she said. "Many of these workers are exposing the individual and their family to COVID."

McPherson's daughter has needed round-the-clock attention since she acquired a rare autoimmune condition at 17.

But with 1.9 million South Carolinians ahead of her in the vaccine line, and only 585,000 having received a dose as of Feb. 12, there is no telling how long she will wait.

Hundreds of Idleb residents have joined protests demanding the right to return to their cities and villages, according to Baladi News.

On Sunday afternoon, hundreds of people took to the streets, in a massive demonstration in the center of Idleb, to demand a safe return to their cities and villages, from which the regime forces and Russia had expelled them during their military campaigns that targeted the areas.

In an exclusive statement to Baladi News, a member of the popular movement of the Syrian revolution, Mohieddine al-Asaad, said, we organized a mass popular demonstration at the Sabeh Bahrat roundabout in the center of Idleb, on Sunday afternoon, in which hundreds of civilians  both local and displaced residents  participated under the slogan of safe return to our homelands, free from the Assad gang.

Asaad clarified that during the demonstration, the demonstrators held banners calling for a safe return to their homes without the rule of the regime forces, Russia or Iran, and under international protection. They also demanded for the trial of Assad and the key members of his regime, the rejection of Assads presidential candidacy, and a demand for his departure and those who supported him from both the Russian and Iranian forces, which committed massacres against the Syrian people.

Hassan Khattab, who was displaced from the city of Saraqib and participated in the demonstration, said that the Syrian revolution will not kneel no matter what, calling on the whole world to expel Russia, Iran, and the regimes militias from the cities and villages that they occupied during their military campaigns in the region. He appealed to the UN Security Council to prosecute Assad for war crimes committed against the Syrian people during the years of the Syrian revolution, calling on it to enable the return of the displaced to their homes under international protection and without the rule of the Assad regime, Iran or Russia.

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.
Imagine youre going to the Library of Congress and youre looking for A Tale of Two Cities, he said. The PCR (COVID-19) test tells you if A Tale of Two Cities is in the library or not. When we do the sequencing, thats when were reading the whole book and then asking, is this the original version of A Tale of Two Cities or is this a later version where they changed a sentence, or they had a mistake in the printing? Thats what were looking for: Which version of A Tale of Two Cities are we looking at?
Farmer unions from Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal participated in the meeting

The committee appointed by the Supreme Court to study the contentious farm laws on Monday held its seventh meeting with twelve farmer unions. The unions that participated were from states like Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal, The News Minute reported.

The committee held "detailed" discussions on the contentious legislations with the unions, reports said.

The three-member panel also held consultations with academicians and agri-professionals on the legislations against which farmers have been protesting at Delhi's borders for over two months, PTI reported. The meetings with stakeholders are being held both online and in person.

In a statement, the committee said it held a detailed discussion with academicians and professionals on Monday through video conferencing.

"In total, 7 eminent academicians and professionals in the field participated through video conferencing for detailed deliberations with the committee members," it said.

The committee members requested the participants to give their views on the three farm laws. "All the participating professionals and academicians gave their detailed views and suggestions...," the statement said.

The Supreme Court had on 12 January stayed the implementation of the three contentious farm laws for two months and asked the committee to submit a report within two months after consulting the concerned stakeholders.

Thousands of farmers, especially from Punjab, Haryana and parts of Uttar Pradesh, have been camping at Delhi's borders for over two months now seeking repeal of the new legislations, introduced by the Centre last year, saying they are pro-corporate and could weaken the mandi system.

The 11 rounds of the talks between the Centre and 41 protesting farmer unions has so far remained deadlocked even though the former has offered concessions including suspension of the legislations for 18 months, which the unions have rejected.

With inputs from PTI
New Delhi, Feb 15 : In view of the growing menace of drug trafficking in the country, the Central government is planning to "redesign" the "governance architecture" of the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) - India's specialised anti-drug trafficking wing.

The Ministry of Home Affairs is dealing with the plan, and a "revamped proposal is under active consideration", a government document accessed by IANS reveals.

"The proposal aims at redesigning the governance architecture of the NCB, its capacity of investigation and intelligence and making it more professional and effective," the document says.

Among the redesign plan, the MHA is considering changes on seven key points which is expected to increase the capacity of the organisation, set up on March 17, 1986 as the apex drug law enforcement agency to coordinate actions of various central and state agencies on the issue.

Once the proposal fructifies, the NCB will have necessary technical infrastructure, legal expertise and sufficient manpower to deal with the drug menace effectively.

Creation of 3,689 posts in various grades up to Level 15 is among the steps planned to be taken to redesign the NCB. With the move, its strength will increase from 1,107 to 4,751.

As part of the move, there are plans to set up four new regional offices for the NCB, increasing the number to seven.

In the proposal, it is also planned to create 17 new zonal offices and upgrade all existing 12 sub-zonal offices into zonal offices, raising the number of field offices to 42 (including 13 existing regional offices).

It also envisages creation of a dedicated Prosecution Wing to provide for in house legal expertise and taking up all cases filed under Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

The NCB will also be provided a canine wing to identify drugs soon after the proposal gets the nod.

There is also a plan to make its Drug Intelligence unit more effective, and the cyber technical cell more efficient to tackle the challenges arising out of modern technological methods used by drug traffickers.

These changes are planned to bolster the NCB's efficiency as India is signatory to various international drug-related UN conventions and the responsibility of implementation of the provision of these international conventions also lies with the central agency.

Sources said that NCB's Director General Rakesh Asthana last year submitted a detailed note to the MHA regarding needs of the agency to make it better equipped to deal with the drug menace.

For cooperation and information-sharing at international level, the NCB has entered into agreement or Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with 42 countries. In addition, the NCB liaise with International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) UNODC regularly.

The NCB has been in news for months last year since it started probing Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput drug case. The actor was found dead in mysterious circumstances at his flat in Mumbai on June 14 last year. A case was later registered by the NCB in August last year in disclosure by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) regarding procurement of drugs like buds. Since then, the NCB has unearthed roles of various people linked to the film industry for their involvement in the trafficking of drugs.

(Rajnish Singh can be contacted at rajnish.s@ians.in)
RailTel Corporation IPO-the seventh public offering of 2021-will be launched on February 16. The issue will close February 18. RailTel shares are proposed to be listed on BSE and NSE on February 26.

The Rs 819.24-crore issue of the state-owned RailTel Corporation of India is a complete offer for sale of 8,71,53,369 equity shares by the Government of India.

The minimum market lot size for the IPO is 155 shares, where an individual investor can apply for up to 13 lots (2015 shares or Rs 189,410).

As per the company's DRHP, 50% of the issue is reserved for qualified institutional buyers, while 35% portion has been fixed for retail investors segment and the remaining 15% for non-institutional bidders.

Net proceeds from the IPO of the Mini-Ratna category company will be used for carrying out the disinvestment plan and to achieve the benefits of equity share listing. The company will not receive any proceeds from the offer.

RailTel grey market premium rises to 50% ahead of IPO

KFin Technologies Private Limited is the registrar of RailTel IPO, while ICICI Securities, IDBI Capital, SBI Capital Markets are merchant bankers to the issue.

Expert take on RailTel IPO

Commenting on the IPO, Keshav Lahoti, Associate Equity Analyst, Angel Broking said, "RailTel is going to play a key role in the digital transformation of Indian Railways. Company's margins & return ratios are better compared to other telecom players in India. The company also has a strong financial position (debt-free) and has been consistently paying dividends since 2008. There are no listed peers for the Company. Company has priced its issue at 21.4x PE on an FY20 trailing basis, which is quite reasonable by looking at the strong future growth rates of the Company. We expect a good listing for the Company. We are positive on the long term prospects of the industry as well the Company, we recommend "SUBSCRIBE" to the RailTel IPO for long term as well as for listing gains."

Choice Broking said in its note today," At the higher price band of Rs. 94 per share, RailTel's share is valued at an FY20 P/E multiple of 15.8x (to its restated EPS of Rs. 5.9). Other railway infrastructure companies (IRCON, RITES and RVNL) are trading at an average P/E of 9.5x. However, considering the futuristic service & growth plans of the IR and RailTel's ability to monetize its existing assets through subscription plans and co-sharing with private operators, we feel that fundamentals are positive for the company. Thus we assign a SUBSCRIBE rating for the issue."

Reliance Research said in its note, "RailTel's financials are not that encouraging. While its revenue recorded 7% CAGR over FY18-FY20, its net profit clocked by a mere 3% CAGR during the same period. It has been maintaining strong margins profile with EBITDA margins remaining in the range of 28-30% and net margin at 12-14%. RAILTEL is a debt-free company despite being into capital intensive business, which offers an edge. Further, RoE at 10% in FY20 does not look to be impressive despite strong margins."

The brokerage further added, "The IPO is valued at 21.4x EPS and 8.9x EBITDA for FY20, which looks to be reasonable. However, given huge opportunity emanating from government's railway transformation agenda and programme to connect 6 lakh villages in 1,000 days in the vicinity of railway stations, RAILTEL is expected to sustain its growth trajectory. Further, there is no listed peer of the company. However, it enjoys a better return profile and balance sheet compared to other listed telecom players. The company has been paying a consistent dividend over the years and continues to remain profitable since FY07, which offers comfort. Hence, we recommend SUBSCRIBE to this issue."

Nirali Shah, Head of Equity Research, Samco Securities said,"RailTel is coming out with an IPO of Rs 819.24 Cr, an OFS by the Government of India to divest part of their stake. The company derives 66% of its revenues from the telecom segment while the remaining portion is from railways and other projects. RailTel, if performs efficiently can benefit from the 5G growth in India from a fiberisation needs' perspective. It could also play a key role in digital transformation of the railways. Besides, Covid-19 has had a minimal impact on the telecom industry and has infact triggered growth for certain players due to increased data usage and VPN services for people working from home. Since RailTel is a debt free company and pays consistent dividends it could witness some traction but for long term investors there are a few red flags. Firstly, the company has delivered single digit revenue and PAT CAGR of 7.5% and 2.5% respectively from FY18 to FY20. There is high dependence on government entities and concentration risk given that 23.8% of its revenues comes from top 3 customers. Its presence in a highly regulated industry is another cause of concern. Over all, the company is fairly priced at its FY20 P/E of 21.3 times. It has been commanding a good grey market premium indicating the offer will sail through but keeping the risks in mind, we recommend investors to subscribe for listing gains only."

Stocks in news: Tata Motors, Airtel, Vodafone, PowerGrid, ONGC, Godrej Industries

Share Market Live: Sensex above 52,000 for first time, Nifty at 15,280; Airtel, HDFC twins top gainers
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Property Damage

On Wednesday, the City of San Antonio launched an Emergency Resource Call Center and website to assist residents impacted by the storm. To access it, residents can call 311 and select option 5, call 210-207-6000 or visit the website. The call center will be open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

The Texas Division of Emergency Management is asking Texans  residents and businesses  to report damage from the recent winter event, which will help the state receive financial support from the federal government.

Homeowners with insurance should make a claim with their insurance carrier. For those without insurance or if additional assistance is needed, a claim can be filed with the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Individual Households Program. To file a claim, call 800-621-3362 or visit disasterassistance.gov. Applicants must have a social security number to apply.

Businesses and rental properties that suffered damages can also apply for the Small Business Administration's Disaster Loan Assistance Program, which provides low interest loans. For more information, visit the government agency's website or call 800-659-2295.

The SAWS Community Pipe Repair Fund is another avenue for individuals who don't qualify for FEMA's program. SAWS will prioritize emergency pipe repair that risks causing harm to life, health or safety of the occupants. To be eligible, applicants cannot qualify for FEMA assistance and their home value can't exceed $140,000, or have an annual income at or below 140 percent of the Federal Poverty Level, which is equal to $18,032 for an individual or $37,100 for a family.

To apply, visit the SAWS website or call 210-233-3499.

Here are more details about insurance and storm damage.

Power

CPS Energy has suspended its auto-pay feature for all customers. Anyone seeing a payment process through their account should call 210-353-2222.

Here is an explainer on what went wrong with the Texas power grid.

Water

The boil-water advisory has been lifted for 100 percent of SAWS customers.

The city, Bexar County and San Antonio Food Bank are operating 13 bottled water distribution sites through March 6. The sites will be open 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., daily. Limit: One case of bottled water per household, per day.

Wheatley Heights Sports Complex, 200 Noblewood Drive

Brooks, Challenger Drive at Research Place

Texas A&M University at San Antonio, One University Way

Port San Antonio, 205 Billy Mitchell Blvd.

SeaWorld San Antonio/Aquatica, 10500 Sea World Drive

Six Flags Fiesta Texas, 17000 Interstate 10 West

San Antonio Food Bank, 5200 Enrique M. Barrera Parkway

Our Lady of the Lake University, 411 S.W. 24th St.

Community Bible Church, 2477 N. Loop 1604 East

Heroes Stadium, 4799 Thousand Oaks Drive

Rolling Oaks Mall, 6909 N. Loop 1604 East

Bullis County Park, 27583 Old Blanco Road

Julius Matthey Middle School, 20350 Red Forest Lane

The city is also providing bottled water delivery to homebound seniors, SAHA properties without water, nursing homes, boarding homes, some dialysis facilities and residents with medical needs. Delivery can be requested by calling 311.

SAWS also announced a one-time bill relief program in which customers will only be charged the lower of two amounts on their next bill: either the total current charges for February, or January's current charges. The utility said the program will especially aid customers with unusually high bills due to a freeze-related leak. More details here.

Roads

All previously closed interchanges and roadways in San Antonio are now open.

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Vaccines

City vaccine sites: Some second dose COVID-19 vaccine appointments scheduled at the Alamodome last week have been moved to the same time at new dates below.

Feb. 15 rescheduled for Feb. 19

Feb. 16 rescheduled for Feb. 20

Feb. 17 rescheduled for Feb. 21

Feb. 18 rescheduled for Feb. 22

Click here for a full list vaccine site updates.

WellMed vaccine sites: WellMed-run community vaccination clinics have resumed. Cancelled second-dose appointments from last week have been rescheduled to the same time and location but at the new dates below.

Feb. 15 reschedule to Monday, Feb. 22

Feb. 16 reschedule to Tuesday, Feb. 23

Feb. 17 reschedule to Wednesday, Feb. 24

Feb. 18 reschedule to Thursday, Feb. 25

Feb. 19 reschedule to Friday, Feb. 26

Feb. 20 reschedule to Saturday, Feb. 27

Airport

The San Antonio International Airport is open and has resumed standard operations. Visit the airport website or your airline website for details on individual flights.

How to help

Blood donation: The San Antonio Metropolitan Health District has declared a blood shortage emergency as citywide power and water outages worsened what was already a dire shortage of blood amid the coronavirus pandemic. The center is extending hours through at least Monday at its seven donor rooms in hopes that people will volunteer to roll up their sleeves. Call 210-731-5590 or visit SouthTexasBlood.org to make an appointment.

San Antonio Food Bank: A Facebook fundraiser is collecting money to replenish food bank supplies. The food bank also is looking for 500 volunteers for mass distributions Friday through Sunday. Register here.

San Antonios Battered Womens and Childrens Shelter: The shelter sustained major damage after a pipe burst, causing a ceiling to collapse. Donations are being accepted here.

South Alamo Regional Alliance for the Homeless: SARAH is looking for volunteers to help in the shelters. Follow their Facebook page for ways to donate to other San Antonio organizations that help with housing assistance.

Jefferson United Methodist Church: The church is seeking donations at its GoFundMe after experiencing flooding due to the severe winter storm.
SII CEO Adar Poonawalla (File Image: Twitter)

Vaccine maker Serum Institute of India (SII) on Monday said it will send COVID-19 vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University to Canada in less than a month.



Dear Honble PM @JustinTrudeau, I thank you for your warm words towards India and its vaccine industry. As we await regulatory approvals from Canada, I assure you, @SerumInstIndia will fly out #COVISHIELD to Canada in less than a month; Im on it!

 Adar Poonawalla (@adarpoonawalla) February 15, 2021

SII CEO Adar Poonawalla in a tweet said, "Dear Honble PM @JustinTrudeau, I thank you for your warm words towards India and its vaccine industry. As we await regulatory approvals from Canada, I assure you,@SerumInstIndia will fly out #COVISHIELD to Canada in less than a month; Im on it!.

Covishield is the brand name for the AstraZeneca-Oxford University COVID-19 vaccine.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on February 10 had assured his Canadian counterpart Justin Trudeau that India would do its best to facilitate supplies of COVID vaccines sought by Canada.

Follow our LIVE blog for latest updates of the novel coronavirus pandemic

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

"Was happy to receive a call from my friend Justin Trudeau. Assured him that India would do its best to facilitate supplies of COVID vaccines sought by Canada, Modi had said in a tweet.

India has already provided over 229 lakh doses of coronavirus vaccines to various countries out of which 64 lakh doses have been supplied as grant assistance and 165 lakh on commercial basis, the Ministry of External Affairs had said on February 12.

India is a major manufacturer of vaccines in the world.

Follow our full coverage of the coronavirus pandemic here
The winter storm that hit the New Orleans area Monday morning with icy rain and freezing temperatures led to a number of flight cancellations and delays at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.

At least 33 flights had been cancelled during the day, according to airport officials, as temperatures dipped below freezing for the first time since January 2018.

Canceled arrivals included American Airlines morning and early afternoon flights from Dallas-DFW. Also, Southwest Airlines flights from Houston-Hobby, the noon Dallas-Love flight, the early afternoon flight from Nashville, and from Philadelphia were canceled.

Departing flight cancellations included Southwest's mid-morning flight to Chicago-MDW, as well as afternoon flights to Nashville, Houston-Hobby and Chicago-MDW. American Airlines had canceled afternoon flights to Philadelphia and Chicago-DFW.

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The airport said that the weather was affecting flights across the country and urged passengers to check in with individual airlines for updated status on their flights.

Officials said they could not predict when flight schedules would get back to normal weather conditions are expected to improve from late Wednesday, with rising temperatures through the week.
The Louisiana Department of Health reported 483 more confirmed coronavirus cases and 28 more confirmed deaths in its noon update Monday.

The number of hospitalizations decreased by 26, and the number of patients in need of ventilators decreased by 5.

There are also 56,925 total "probable" coronavirus cases in Louisiana, according to the agency's dashboard.

There will not be an update on Tuesday due to the Mardi Gras holiday.

These are another few key statewide statistics as of Monday:

Total confirmed cases: 363,469

Total "probable" cases: 56,925

Total confirmed deaths: 8,691

Currently hospitalized: 849

Currently on ventilators: 137

Vaccine series initiated: 482,010 (updated twice weekly)

Vaccine series completed: 217,324

Presumed recovered: 380,673 as of Feb. 8 (updated weekly)

Vaccine news in your inbox Once a week we'll update you on the progress of COVID-19 vaccinations. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up

Note: The Advocate and The Times-Picayune staff calculates daily case count and confirmed death increases based on the difference between today's total and yesterday's total of confirmed coronavirus cases and deaths. The Louisiana Department of Health releases a daily case count on its dashboard that includes probable cases as indicated by a positive antigen test. That case count can be different than the one listed here.

Here are some of the parishes with the highest single-day increase in confirmed coronavirus cases, based on the Monday report:

Jefferson: 51

St. Tammany: 50

Lafayette: 41

Orleans: 36

St. Landry: 36

Iberia: 30

Bossier: 23

Caddo: 18

Calcasieu: 17

East Baton Rouge: 16

You can view more graphs and charts breaking down the data by clicking here.

Louisiana began reopening for Phase 1 on May 15-16 then moved to Phase 2 on June 5. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards extended Louisiana's Phase 2 restrictions twice in August before moving the state to Phase 3 on Sept. 11. The governor then moved the state back to a modified Phase 2 near the end of November.

This is a developing story. More details and analysis to come.
In the recent past, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, both ruled by the BJP, have brought in laws to stop conversion through marriage or by any other fraudulent means

Ahmedabad: Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Sunday said his government will soon bring a strict law against ''love jihad'' in the state.

He made the announcement while addressing a poll rally in Vadodara ahead of the municipal corporation elections.

"We are going to bring a law against love jihad in the Assembly. Such activities being done in the name of love jihad will not be tolerated...The BJP government will bring strict laws against love jihad in the coming days," he said.

In the recent past, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, both ruled by the BJP, have brought in 'religious freedom' laws to stop conversion through marriage or by any other fraudulent means.

Rupani said his government has also framed strict laws against ''gunda'' (anti-social) elements and land grabbers with provisions of up to 10 and 14 years of imprisonment to protect the interests of the common man.

"In the past Assembly sessions, our government had come up with stringent laws. We have made an Act against gundas. To ensure that such elements do not cause trouble to the common man and get strict punishment of 10 years, we brought the Act.

"We also came up with the Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act so that people do not enter others' land and take over others' property using bogus documents. We brought this law with a provision of 14 years of punishment," he said.

The chief minister added that the BJP government at the Centre has fulfilled the promises made to the people regarding construction of Ram temple, scrapping of Article 370, and took revenge for Pulwama by launching an air strike.

According to Rupani, Gujarat will witness a 'golden age of development' when the BJP rules "from panchayat to the Parliament".

"This is the golden time for Gujarat because the Modi government at the Centre gives us whatever we ask for. The previous Congress-led Union government did not allow us to open the gates of the Narmada dam. But Modi gave permission within 17 days, which opened up the gates of development," he said.

"The BJP government in Delhi, Gujarat, in the cities and villages...when the BJP rules from panchayat to Parliament, then there will be a golden age for the development of the state," he said.

He also promised metro trains in Vadodara and other cities of the state.

The state government will work towards addressing the issue of recurring floods in Vishwamitri river that affects Vadodara city, he said.

"We are going ahead with the mantra of development. Roads, gutter lines, streetlights are our responsibility. But to make cities modern, we are constructing overbridges. The biggest overbridge in the state is being constructed in Vadodara at a cost of Rs 250 crore," he said.

"We will also resolve the issue of drinking water and flooding in Vishwamitri river...We are going to start metro trains in all the cities. They have started in Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar and Surat. Now, we will also start metro trains in Vadodara, Rajkot, Jamnagar and Bhavnagar," he said.

Elections to six municipal corporations in Gujarat are scheduled on 21 February.
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ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.  A groundswell of grassroots support for community solar development in New Mexico could propel enabling legislation across the finish line in this years session, reversing years of failed legislative efforts.

If successful, it could have a major impact on solar production and consumption around the state, allowing many residential and commercial consumers to directly purchase solar-generated electricity for the first time.

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Advocates call it democratizing solar power by providing renters, low-income households, and commercial and government buildings that lack capacity for rooftop installations to access solar systems built and operated by private developers for collective consumption.

That could extend the potential cost savings and environmental benefits of solar systems beyond the traditional focus on individual homeowners and businesses that have the income and roof space needed to install it. And it could ignite a new wave of local industry development, bringing significant economic impact as private companies aggressively market community solar throughout New Mexico.

But at least two of the states largest utilities  Public Service Co. of New Mexico and Xcel Energy subsidiary Southwestern Public Service  oppose the community solar bill now advancing in the state Senate. They say utility customers not connected to new solar installations could end up subsidizing those who are connected, because they take on more of the fixed costs for things like transmission and distribution as solar consumers reduce their payments to utility companies but still draw power from the grid.

And, given New Mexicos steady march to carbon-free generation under the states new Energy Transition Act, the utilities themselves already plan to build a lot more renewable energy around the state over the next two decades. The utilities say they can do that at much lower cost than community solar developers  and with the benefits shared by all ratepayers equally  making community solar unnecessary.

Still, with green initiatives on the rise in New Mexico and nationally, plus more progressive, pro-renewable Democrats winning seats in the state Legislature in last years elections, community solar legislation is riding a fresh wave of energy.

Legislative proposals

Democratic Sens. Linda Lopez of Albuquerque and Liz Stefanics of Cerrillos introduced the Community Solar Act in the Senate this year. And Democratic Reps. Patricia Roybal Caballero of Albuquerque and Andrea Romero of Santa Fe are co-sponsoring a duplicate measure, House Bill 106.

The Senate measure, Senate Bill 84, passed its first hurdle Jan. 28 on a party-line vote in the Senate Conservation Committee, with seven Democrats in support and four Republicans opposed. Its now in the Senate Tax, Business and Transportation Committee, its last stop before heading to the Senate floor.

I believe the time is right, said Lopez, who unsuccessfully sponsored community solar bills in two previous legislative sessions over the past four years. The Energy Transition Act has brought the issue to the forefront as legislators think and talk about what to do with renewable energy.  Its receiving a much more positive response than in the past, with definite interest and support from around the state.

Three more senators have since signed on as co-sponsors of the senate bill, Stefanics said.

The bill does have a lot of support, she said.  Were hearing from the public that many people want to participate in community solar projects.

Enabling legislation is needed, because only regulated utilities can directly sell electricity to groups of consumers under current state law.

How it works

Private developers are allowed to install individual solar systems that homeowners or businesses can own outright, or that the developers manage for sale of the electricity to a single customer. Thousands of residential, commercial and government consumers have taken advantage of that to install rooftop solar throughout the state.

Community solar, however, is based on the collective participation by groups of consumers who generally cant install individual systems on their own because they rent homes or buildings, they lack the finances to pay for a system, or their facilities cant accommodate an installation. To serve those markets, solar developers build facilities that usually generate between one and five megawatts of electricity, and then allow individual consumers to pay a monthly membership fee to become subscribers in the system.

Unlike individual rooftop solar installations where home or building owners directly consume the electricity they produce, electric output from community solar is not used by project participants. Rather, its sent to the local utility grid

for general distribution among all utility customers. The community solar subscribers themselves continue to receive electricity from the utility to power their homes and facilities.

But project participants receive a credit on their monthly utility bills for the solar energy generated from their portion of the community project. Even with the subscriber fee, that usually amounts to a 10% to 15% savings on their electric bills, according to solar industry representatives.

That allows many consumers who cant access solar on their own to participate in solar generation, including low-income households who otherwise couldnt afford it, said Kevin Cray, regional director with the Coalition for Community Solar Access, a trade group representing member companies in 17 states.

It provides new options for customers who can participate with no upfront costs and immediate savings, Cray said. Its something many consumers want. Many states have adopted enabling legislation because it can provide cost relief for low-income communities.

To date, 19 states and Washington, D.C. have adopted enabling legislation. Nearly 2.6 gigawatts of community solar have been installed nationwide, according to the national Solar Energy Industries Association. That could climb to 3.4 GW over the next five years, or enough power for roughly 650,000 homes, the association says.

Opponents cite equity

New Mexico legislators have pursued enabling legislation since 2013, but utility opposition has weighed against it.

Thats largely because community solar systems are tied directly into utility grids, with the utilities forced to buy all the power generated, including any excess electric production thats not directly assigned to project participants.

Community solar developers can build projects anywhere they want on the grid, and the utility has to purchase that extra energy whether it needs it or not, said PNM spokesman Ray Sandoval.

While the lower-priced solar generation may offset more expensive power the utility receives from other sources, the utility must still manage all transmission, distribution and other grid infrastructure to transport that solar electricity. And if any grid upgrades are needed to accommodate additional solar generation, it adds costs.

That creates cross subsidization by other utility ratepayers, because they pick up more of the expense for maintaining and operating the grid to make up for declining payments from community solar-connected customers who receive credit on their bills, Sandoval said.

Its a fairness issue, he said. Solar developers come in and build a two-to-five megawatt project on our system that benefits a small group of customers with huge infrastructure costs that other customers pay forCommunity solar subscribers dont pay their fair share of poles and wires, and they get a discount on their bills for the solar generation they consume thats subsidized by other customers.

Michael DAntonio, Xcel Energys manager of regulatory administration in Santa Fe, said community solar is an outdated concept that began a decade ago to accelerate solar development when utilities were still moving slowly on renewable adoption. But today, clean energy development is rapidly advancing, especially in New Mexico, where the Energy Transition Act requires public utilities to convert their grids to 50% renewables by 2030, 80% by 2040, and 100% carbon-free generation by 2045.

Under the ETA, when we add renewables to the system, all customers get a slice of it, and we can add it at very competitive prices, DAntonio said. With utility-scale solar, we get the benefits of economies of scale, making it two-to-three times cheaper than community solar development. Utilities feel like this Community Solar Act is kind of old news now and not really relevant anymore, because under the ETA, all customers gain access.

Issues addressed?

Community solar advocates say many of the utilities issues have been addressed in this years bill based on the efforts of a Community Solar Working Group that met bi-weekly from July-November of last year. The Legislative Council Service Convened the group in response to Senate Memorial 63, approved in last years session to encourage diverse stakeholders to examine ways to implement and scale a market-based community solar program in New Mexico.

Legislators, public utilities, rural electric cooperatives, renewable industry leaders, tribal representatives and community groups participated, culminating in a final report in December with recommendations on how to best balance utility and consumer interests.

As a result, SB 84 includes key safeguards to avoid cross subsidization by other ratepayers, said Beth Beloff, executive director of the Coalition of Sustainable Communities New Mexico, which unites the city and county of Santa Fe, Albuquerque and Las Cruces in joint efforts to develop government strategy, policies and action to fight climate change.

The bill requires the state Public Regulation Commission to develop rules to determine the credit rates that community solar customers will receive on their electric bills to ensure that utilities are held harmless for any costs associated with solar projects, Beloff said.

The intent is for it not to be a burden on other ratepayers, she said.

Community solar developers must also pay the full cost for grid interconnections, including any needed grid upgrades. And the amount of total community solar development will be capped at 100 MW annually for at least the first three years, with no more than 50 MW of community solar connected to PNMs grid, 40 MW on Excel subsidiary SPS grid, and 10 MW on the El Paso Electric Co. grid.

The 100 MW cap would represent a very small share, maybe 1%, of total electric retail consumption annually for those three utilities combined, Beloff said. Its a very small carve out for private developers to come in and create community solar facilities.

All solar projects will be limited to below 5 MW in size. And the bill provides specific carve outs for the amount of generation any individual consumer can buy from a community solar project to block large commercial or industrial customers from absorbing the majority of production, and to ensure that each project has a balanced mix of residential, commercial and government subscribers.

No single customer can consume more than 40% of generation capacity, and 30% will be reserved for low-income residential consumers.

As sovereign nations, all tribes will be exempt from those restrictions, allowing Native American communities to pursue more aggressive solar development if they want. And rural electric cooperatives will not be forced to participate in community solar projects, but instead be allowed to opt-in, which the cooperatives requested in the working group meetings.

Finally, the PRC will evaluate how the entire program is working after three years and make adjustments if needed.

If passed, advocates say the bill would create broad demand around the state, potentially generating thousands of new jobs and economic development opportunities, reducing electric bills for many low-income consumers, and helping the state meet its carbon-reduction goals.

Utilities say many of those things will be achieved anyway under the Energy Transition Act, and unlike with community solar, the benefits will be shared equally among all ratepayers.

Still, Native American and non-tribal communities alike are hoping to tap into community solar, said Kewa Pueblo member Mayane Barudin, regional director and tribal liaison for the national organization Vote Solar.

Demand on the ground is pretty robust, Barudin said. I see myself as the perfect candidate for community solar, because I rent my home and my personal finances are limited. It appeals to a lot of people in neighborhoods around the state where theres a strong sense of community and environmental awareness.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Supreme Court on Monday granted 5-day conditional bail to jailed scribe Sidhique Kappan to meet his terminally ill mother in Kerala. However, the top court imposed few conditions on Kappan -- no public meeting and no interview to media - after the Uttar Pradesh government claimed that his wife is collecting money in Kerala under his name and he has been projected as a "martyr", or may even be projected as a person who made a very big sacrifice.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ), submitted before a bench headed by Chief Justice S.A. Bobde and also comprising Justices A.S. Bopanna and V. Ramasubramanian that according to doctors, Kappan's mother is terminally ill. "Please allow him to visit his mother for 5 days and he will come back", said Sibal.

"Having given our consideration to the matter, we are of the view that the interest of justice would be served, if appropriate safeguards are built into the order for the proposed visit of the prisoner - Sidhique Kappan", said the top court in its order.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the UP government, contended before the bench that it is learnt that his mother is not in a serious condition as she has been projected and cited Kappan's PFI links. The Chief Justice replied, "We are willing to commit the error, what if she dies, what will you do?" Mehta said he understands the emotional aspect of the matter but insisted tough conditions should be imposed on Kappan when he visits his mother in Kerala. "Money is being collected under his name, as if he is some kind of a martyr," said Mehta, citing he may be paraded as person who has made a huge sacrifice.

The Chief Justice said: "We will ensure that this is not done." Mehta replied: "Big posters of his are being put up across the city, his wife is collecting money as if he has done service for the state and projected him as a martyr. He is not a journalist. Money is being collected and emotions are being stoked," said Mehta.

"We, accordingly, permit the prisoner Sidhique Kappan to go to Kerala for a period of five days only for the purpose of seeing his ailing mother ", said the bench. However, it also sought cooperation from Kappan's counsel that it should be ensured that nothing untoward happened in the view of apprehensions expressed by UP government. "During his visit, he shall not give any interview to any media including the social media. He shall not meet the members of the public. He will be entitled to meet his relatives and doctors and anybody else in connection with his mother's health", said the top court in its order.

The top court said the police may guard the house from outside, but shall not go inside the house, when the prisoner- Sidhique Kappan visits his mother. "The State police of Kerala shall co-operate with the U.P. police in the matter. It shall be the responsibility of the U.P. Police to ensure that the prisoner- Sidhique Kappan travel to and from his mother's house", said the top court.

Kappan, Secretary of KUWJ, was arrested by Uttar Pradesh Police last October while on his way to Hathras where a young Dalit woman had died after allegedly being gang-raped. The police have alleged he was visiting the village to stoke communal and casteist differences.

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The easy answer is what we all know to be true  that children of all ages learn best when they are in-person, and if we can bring students back to school safely, we should.

With infection, hospitalization and mortality rates all down and dropping, we have conditions that for the first time in many months allow for such a safe return  if we do it right. In addition, our understanding of the COVID-19 virus has steadily improved, putting us in a better position to develop and implement a comprehensive and flexible plan that adequately mitigates the risks of in-person learning  for students and teachers.

As a public health expert, I certainly understand the very real concerns that some teachers have about going back into the classroom and putting themselves at risk of contracting the virus. However, with almost a year of evidence behind us, we know that the risks of contracting the virus when proper precautions are firmly in place is acceptably low. A recent study in North Carolina showed no instances of child-to-adult transmission of SARS-CoV-2 reported within schools.

At the end of the day, thousands of essential workers, from health care workers to grocery store workers and others across the state, have made use of COVID Safe Practices to safeguard their well-being while continuing to provide the services we all count on.

From the start of this pandemic, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has rightly followed the science, and this decision to expand in-person learning is in lockstep with an evidence-based approach. This decision is not a sudden one, but the result of a concerted, monthslong effort by the states departments of Health, Human Services and Public Education to analyze the scientific evidence and medical data and closely monitor the evolving public health conditions. It is also not a decision made in a vacuum from the latest science. In fact, on the same day that the plan was announced, the top medical experts in the nation came to the same conclusion. The national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cited a preponderance of evidence that children can go to school safely if they wear masks and practice social distancing and if other steps are taken to control community spread of COVID-19.

New Mexicos plan is in sync with the CDCs guidance: It prevents crowding in classrooms and common areas, it requires steps to be taken to improve indoor air quality, and it expands screening to detect and isolate those who are infected but have no symptoms. Both maintain options for online learning, particularly for those at increased risk of the worst COVID outcomes. If we do those things, it is unlikely that schools will contribute meaningfully to increased community transmission, the CDC said.

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The governors plan provides districts and charter schools the flexibility to decide if and when to expand in-person learning at their schools based on their own individual conditions and circumstances. The success of this new, forward-leaning approach will depend in no small measure on how well these districts and schools manage their situations.

Impatience and frustration with the current school situation, which has been so hard on students and parents, is not reason alone to change course. But taken together with what we now know about mitigating the risks of the virus as well as the improving health conditions in our state, I believe the time is right to move forward with what is the right plan for New Mexico.

If in-person learning is best for our children, and the conditions for doing so are now deemed safe by our states health and education experts, as well as our nations top disease experts, perhaps the better question is, why wouldnt we move now to expand in-person learning?

Dr. Janis Gonzales is immediate past president of the New Mexico Pediatric Society.
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The YSRC won at least 63 gram panchayat sarpanch posts as against a total 70 seats in Dharmavaram assembly segment where Paritala Ravindras son Paritala Sriram was acting as the in-charge for TD. (Photo: ANI)

ANANTAPUR: The Telugu Desam has suffered a huge jolt after three decades as a majority of the seats were won by YSRC supporters in the second phase of the Grama Panchayat polls.

The YSRC succeeded in gaining many sarpanch posts in the district, much to the embarrassment of the TD. Significantly, the family of slain warlord Paritala Ravindra couldnt retain its influence while YSRC supporters won even areas that had in the past stood by Paritala in Rapthadu, Dharmavaram and Kalyanadurgam assembly segments.

YSRC supporters won 53 gram panchyat sarpanch posts out of total 58 in Rapthadu assembly segment. The Telugu Desam couldnt retain its hold even at Ramagiri, the native mandal of the Paritala Ravindra family.

The YSRC gained seven sarpanch posts while TD was satisfied with two seats in Ramagiri. TDs decades-old strongholds of Peruru, Ramagiri, Kuntimaddi, Polepalli, Cherlopalli and Ganthimarri crumbled this time and were were won by YSRC.

I feel satisfied about the local body polls for the first time after many decades. Voters had the opportunity to cast their votes in a free manner, Shesha Murthy, a veteran from Peruru area tweeted on social media.

Rapthadu MLA T. Prakash Reddy of the YSRC observed that the decades-old muscle-flexing by the Paritala family has come to a halt with the present polls. The 20-months-long efforts by the Jagan government in introducing welfare schemes helped the YSRC get support from the people of AP, he said.

He said the free and fair polls led the YSRC candidates to win with even a high of 1,500-votes majority in Ramagiri mandal. The winning majority for the YSRC has, overall, doubled this time as compared to the recent general polls.

Similarly, the YSRC won at least 63 gram panchayat sarpanch posts as against a total 70 seats in Dharmavaram assembly segment where Paritala Ravindras son Paritala Sriram was acting as the in-charge for TD.

Analysts pointed out that Anantapur district was the main stronghold of Telugu Desam in the state till the last general polls. Now, in a reversal of fortunes, more than 80 per cent of the sarpanch posts went to the YSRC, which won even sensitive areas like Ramagiri.
A Ukrainian delegation has signed a number of memorandums and contracts worth more than $3 billion as part of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's official visit to the United Arab Emirates, the presidential press service has reported.

According to the report, memorandums of understanding were signed between the State Property Fund of Ukraine and Mubadala Investment Company. They are aimed at deepening cooperation in the development of promising investment projects and ensuring the Emirati side's participation in the program of privatization of state property in Ukraine.

"At all international meetings, I call for investment in Ukraine. Our state has a huge potential: geopolitical position, natural resources, educated people. Now is the time to realize this potential and create a strong economy," Zelensky said.

He stressed that attracting investments is the key to Ukraine's economic growth. Therefore, the signing of a memorandum with the state-owned Mubadala Investment Company on the intention to invest in Ukraine is an extremely important step in paving the way for large-scale investment in Ukraine from Western Asia, Zelensky said.

The Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine signed a memorandum with INTELMAX Management Consulting on cooperation in creating a platform for the exchange of intellectual property based on the Fantom blockchain platform, which will provide increased security and transparency. It is also planned to introduce blockchain technologies in government processes and services.

The parties also signed documents in the field of defense and discussed the possibility of building joint plants.

In addition, a memorandum was signed in the agricultural sector, which provides for the establishment of an agricultural hub and a trading company to ensure food security.

The possibility of establishing a Ukrainian sovereign wealth fund for joint investments is being considered.

In addition, 18 Ukrainian private companies, including Interpipe, Dragon Capital, DTEK, Unit City, EastOne, UMG, Ufuture, Fortior, signed memorandums with Mubadala Investment Company.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and First Lady Olena Zelenska are on an official visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15.

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WASHINGTON - On a Saturday morning in August 2019, a 21-year-old White man with ear protectors, safety glasses and an AK-47-style rifle walked into a crowded Walmart in El Paso, Texas, his pockets bulging with ammunition. He had driven hundreds of miles across the state, prosecutors say, because he wanted to kill Latinos.

Kevin McAleenan, the acting homeland security secretary, was at a Coast Guard picnic in Virginia that day, and soon the urgent messages began arriving. A sinking feeling of horror set in as the magnitude of the attack became clear. "It was devastating," he said.

Twenty-three people were killed in the deadliest attack targeting Hispanic people in modern U.S. history.

About 5,000 U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) employees live in El Paso, and six lost family members that day. "To have an individual attack us, at one of the home bases of our agency and specifically going after Hispanic Americans who make up a majority of our employees in that area, was very personal for us, and it galvanized an effort that was already underway," McAleenan said.

 READ MORE: Toomey cites Trumps betrayal of the Constitution in breaking with GOP on impeachment

For years leading to the El Paso attack, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) - created to prevent another attack like the ones on Sept. 11, 2001 - had been under growing pressure to do more to address domestic extremism. Within seven weeks of the El Paso massacre, McAleenan released a plan for "countering terrorism and targeted violence" in the department's pivot from foreign threats to homegrown ones. It was the first time the DHS had identified the extent of the danger posed by domestic violent extremists and white supremacists.

The plan got little attention or support from the White House, and although the DHS was more direct about domestic threats, the effort made little difference on Jan. 6, when the department was one of several federal agencies caught flat-footed. Since the attack on the Capitol, calls have intensified for the DHS to turn its attention inward and do more to protect Americans from other Americans.

The Jan. 6 attack has left many lawmakers, and especially Democrats, insisting that domestic terrorism has eclipsed the threat from foreign actors such as the Islamic State and al-Qaida. The DHS and its agencies are responsible for securing the country's borders, ports, transportation and cybersystems, generally leaving the monitoring of extremist groups and terrorism investigations to the FBI. But the DHS and its agencies have nearly eight times as many employees as the FBI, and calls for the department to play a more muscular role in combating domestic extremism have policymakers looking at new ways to use its resources.

The proposals have revived some of the civil liberties concerns that arose after the creation of the department as a large, internal security bureaucracy with a broad mandate. And the possibility of the department scrutinizing Americans has added to the unease, because providing homeland security is less controversial when the threats are foreign.

The DHS used its National Terrorism Advisory System to warn the public about attacks by domestic groups for the first time last month, citing "a heightened threat environment across the United States" in a bulletin issued a week after President Joe Biden's inauguration.

"Ideologically-motivated violent extremists with objections to the exercise of governmental authority and the presidential transition, as well as other perceived grievances fueled by false narratives, could continue to mobilize to incite or commit violence," the warning stated.

Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., chairman of the House Homeland Security committee, has long insisted that the DHS should protect Americans from the gravest dangers they face; domestic extremists and white supremacists, he said, present the most urgent, lethal threat.

"A lot of them mask themselves under some guise of being patriots or some form of citizen, but the question is, what do they advocate? It's violence. It's overthrowing legitimately elected officials," Thompson said in an interview.

"So in my mind, those types of individuals who want to exercise violence to bring change, they are domestic terrorists, and we have the obligation to identify who they are and prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law."

During a hearing Thompson held this month, lawmakers of both parties spoke favorably of new legislation to address domestic terrorism. Experts warned that the Jan. 6 attack was viewed as a "victory" for extremists and a "watershed moment for the white supremacist movement."

Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, the committee's former chairman, joined lawmakers calling for specific federal sanctions for domestic terrorism, potentially applying the same penalties as exist for terrorism that originates overseas. Such legislation could include penalties for providing material support to domestic groups, as well as laws holding technology companies responsible for violent and extremist content on their platforms.

"It sends a strong message about where Congress is that we're going to treat domestic terrorism on an equal plane as international terrorism," McCaul said.

Preventive work

Contrary to some television portrayals, the DHS does not have a standing contingent of armed homeland security agents with a specific mandate to stop domestic terrorism. But it has agencies and programs that could expand to devote more attention and resources to risks posed by homegrown extremists.

The DHS's Office of Intelligence and Analysis collects information from the FBI, private contractors and state and local law enforcement agencies to organize and disseminate threat reports. Its employees and contractors generally lack the training and experience of FBI investigators, and they rely heavily on open-source material.

The office did not generate a specific warning about the possibility of right-wing groups storming the Capitol on Jan. 6 in an attempt to keep President Donald Trump in power.

 READ MORE: Senate acquits Trump in his second impeachment trial, a coda to a tumultuous presidency

Homeland Security Investigations, a branch of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), has about 6,000 agents nationwide who investigate drug smuggling, human trafficking and illicit goods or currency. The branch has not focused on countering domestic extremism, but it's an armed component of the DHS that, in theory, could have a more hands-on role stopping homegrown terrorists and white supremacists.

The DHS's most tangible institutional response is the Office for Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention, founded in 2019 to address "a growing threat from domestic actors - such as racially and ethnically motivated violent extremists, including white supremacist violent extremists, anti-government and anti-authority violent extremists, and others."

Its work is primarily preventive, not investigative, providing grants to state and local law enforcement programs and issuing threat briefings and assessments. The office remains relatively small, with a staff of about 30, but it's expected to grow in the coming years with more congressional funding.

"In the post-9/11 world, the threat was foreign terrorism," said Tom Ridge, the first DHS secretary. "The CIA and the military were the tip of the spear, and we filled the defensive gap. But now there's another adjective in front of terrorism: domestic terrorism."

The well-known failure of law enforcement and security agencies to properly share information ahead of the 9/11 attack was a justification for the creation of the DHS, Ridge noted. So an immediate challenge for the department will be coordination among federal agencies that collect and share information on domestic groups, he said.

Much of it arrives through state and local law enforcement agencies, and the DHS's biggest asset, Ridge said, "is its relationships with state and local authorities."

Yet Ridge cautioned against the DHS turning its attention away from foreign threats and other priorities. "What people don't understand - and people need to understand - is that DHS has so many other tasks embedded in its mission," he said. "It's a multitask organization, and DHS has to be careful moving in that direction because I still don't think it's their primary job."

Another risk is partisanship, and the perception that the DHS will be used to stigmatize or harass groups that do not support the party in power.

In September, the former head of the DHS's Intelligence and Analysis Office, Brian Murphy, filed a whistleblower complaint that included allegations that senior DHS officials sought to minimize warnings of the threat posed by white supremacists while giving more prominence to left-wing antifascists and anarchists. Murphy told his supervisors that it would constitute "censorship of analysis and the improper administration of an intelligence program," according to his account.

His claims remain under investigation with the DHS's inspector general. Other former DHS officials, including some who are critical of Trump, insist that the department did not play down the threats of right-wing and white supremacist groups. They point to new DHS programs and strong language in recent reports clearly identifying the threat posed by domestic extremists.

McAleenan, the former acting DHS secretary, also noted a major increase in FBI investigations of domestic extremists and white supremacists in recent years.

"What was missing was a whole-of-government approach and an emphasis from the White House that it was a priority," McAleenan said.

McAleenan had taken over the DHS after Trump soured on Kirstjen Nielsen and removed her in April 2019. Nielsen directed staffers to develop plans for countering targeted violence and domestic hate groups, particularly after the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas and the 2018 attack on the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh.

Then came El Paso.

"We'd been tracking domestic terrorist threats and increased threats from white supremacists, but El Paso brought it home in a visceral way," McAleenan said.

The gunman posted a missive before the rampage at Walmart espousing racist theories of demographic replacement that echoed Trump's statements about an immigrant "invasion."

"El Paso made it clear we needed a reorientation of DHS towards the current threat, both with respect to white supremacy but also domestic extremism more broadly," said Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a counterterrorism consultant who worked with McAleenan to come up with the plan for the DHS's expanded role countering targeted violence and terrorism.

An effort by a DHS analyst in 2009 to identify white supremacists and other extremists groups as a growing threat had fallen apart amid a backlash from Republicans who viewed it in partisan terms. The chilling effect lingered for years and discouraged analysts from devoting time and resources to domestic threats that lacked a link to foreign groups.

The Strategic Framework after the El Paso attack was a "green light" from DHS leadership, Gartenstein-Ross said, signaling that hateful, racist and violent Americans were an urgent threat, and a priority for the department.

A persistent threat

In October, the DHS identified violent extremism in the United States as the leading domestic terrorism danger, noting that white supremacists were responsible for more killings in 2018 and 2019 than any other type of attacker.

"The primary terrorist threat inside the United States will stem from lone offenders and small cells of individuals," said the department's first Homeland Threat Assessment. "Some U.S.-based violent extremists have capitalized on increased social and political tensions in 2020, which will drive an elevated threat environment at least through early 2021."

The coronavirus pandemic was making matters worse, the report noted, by creating an environment that could "accelerate some individuals' mobilization to targeted violence or radicalization to terrorism."

It was a description, in general terms, of the anger and fury that fueled the Capitol attack.

Chad Wolf, the former acting DHS secretary who published the threat assessment, said the DHS had a contingent of border officers and agents on standby on the day of the Capitol riot, but they were not called on by Capitol Police. "We don't have jurisdiction for the protection of the U.S. Capitol," he said.

During last summer's street protests after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody, Wolf was criticized by Democrats and former homeland security leaders for sending DHS agents and officers to quell civil unrest and use force against sometimes-violent protests targeting a federal courthouse in downtown Portland, Ore.

Trump was campaigning on a "law-and-order" message, echoed by DHS leaders, that fueled the politicization of the department's domestic role. And the scenes of CBP and ICE tactical officers in military fatigues stuffing suspects into rental vehicles in Portland quickly became a symbol of heavy-handed federal law enforcement.

Wolf said he welcomed the bipartisan calls after Jan. 6 for a greater DHS focus on domestic extremism. "On the same token, I get frustrated because when we were in the thick of it last summer in Portland, there were no huge calls, except for vocal Republicans, saying we have to call out violence. I think there's a fine line - and we dealt with it - between protected First Amendment speech and what is considered hate and criminal activity," he said.

In a House hearing this month about new domestic terrorism legislation, former DHS adviser Elizabeth Neumann warned committee members that the threat probably would persist for "10 to 20 years."

Neumann, who was a DHS counterterrorism adviser in the Trump administration, helped oversee the creation of a new contingent of DHS "regional coordinators" who work with state and local officials to prevent radicalization and recruitment by hate groups.

The approach places a greater emphasis on the social and psychological factors that lead to extremist violence. The DHS has a dozen regional coordinators across the country, and Neumann said the goal is to expand their presence to every state.

"What we have been seeing the last five to six years is individuals with unmet needs who quickly radicalize according to whatever ideology they stumble upon," Neumann said in an interview.

"We're dealing with a phenomenon in this country of vulnerable, disaffected individuals who are being preyed upon, or seeking it out themselves. And when it comes to prevention, what we've learned is that law enforcement agencies aren't necessarily the best to do interventions," she said.

"If someone has planned an attack, that is law enforcement territory. That person is too far gone. But when a person is on that journey to radicalization, their family members and loved ones notice changes in their behavior."

Neumann predicted that it will take five to 10 years to build out a more robust effort at the DHS to prevent radicalization and extremism. What's challenging about the current moment, Neumann added, is the speed with which radicalization occurs, as individuals can quickly go from embracing an ideology to planning an attack.

We have so many people talking online and using war metaphors, she said. Are they using those terms to actually mean war? Its very hard to discern when you have so many people participating in angry rhetoric.

TORONTO - Bitcoin-based exchange traded funds are getting the go-ahead from Canadian regulators, creating a path for a fund structure that investment managers say is unique in the industry.

Bitcoin tokens are displayed next to a Bitcoin ATM in Hong Kong, Friday, Dec. 8, 2017. Bitcoin-based exchange traded funds are getting the go-ahead from Canadian regulators, an opportunity investment funds say is unique in the industry. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP-Kin Cheung

TORONTO - Bitcoin-based exchange traded funds are getting the go-ahead from Canadian regulators, creating a path for a fund structure that investment managers say is unique in the industry.

Toronto-based Purpose Investments says its Bitcoin ETF will likely start trading this week under the symbol "BTCC," after the fund worked with regulators to make sure it could create something that follows the rules for both the ETF market and the digital asset industry.

An Ontario Securities Commission spokesperson says the regulator finished reviewing Purpose Investments' final plan to offer securities last Thursday and gave the fund a receipt that makes it a reporting issuer in Ontario.

After Purpose Investments announced the milestone, another Canadian fund, 3iQ, said it also received preliminary receipts for a Bitcoin ETF in all of the Canadian provinces and territories except for Quebec.

Both funds claim to be "physical" Bitcoin ETFs, setting them apart from some of the other cryptocurrency investments out there, such as the Bitcoin futures that trade on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

Purpose Investments Chief Investment Officer Greg Taylor says the fund is different from a derivative or futures contract, as Purpose Investments will buy Bitcoin every time someone puts money into the ETF.

Taylor says Purpose Investments will also store the Bitcoin codes themselves, not on the internet, using a process called cold storage. OSC has described cold storage as "a computer with no access to a network that is less vulnerable to hacking.

Purpose Investments says the end result of these Bitcoin ETFs is that investors will hold actual Bitcoin in their portfolios but can buy and sell it similarly to buying or selling a stock.

"The risk is for traditional investors that you have to open up a trading account to buy Bitcoin and youre in self-custody  meaning youre going to get the code and password for that coin. And youre responsible for doing that," says Taylor. "With the ETF structure, its going to be easier as well do that with our custodian."

CIBC Mellon is working as a fund administrator for Purpose Investments' Bitcoin ETF, as the firm looks for ways to meet rising demand for cryptocurrencies.

Ronald Landry, who runs Canadian ETF services for CIBC Mellon, says it is working on getting more cryptocurrency services up and running in Canada.

3iQ chief executive Fred Pye says a physical Bitcoin ETF is the natural progression from its other investment vehicles, which include a publicly listed Bitcoin investment fund and a fund based on cryptocurrency Ether.

Launching those past funds was not an easy feat.

3iQ had to argue before the Ontario Securities Commission to get approval several years ago for its trust that would "invest substantially all of its assets in Bitcoin." But that 2019 decision stopped short of signing off on an ETF structure, which the OSC decision said would have to undergo separate analysis since ETFs require continuous purchases and sales to balance and rebalance the portfolio frequently and daily.

At that time, the OSC said, there were two ways to hold Bitcoin, either by directly purchasing it in a digital wallet or investing in securities of companies or other entities that held Bitcoin, such as Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, available to "accredited investors through a small number of Canadian institutions.

While regulators initially tried to deny 3iQ a receipt for its earlier Bitcoin trust over concerns about the ability to value and safeguard Bitcoin and file audited financial statements, a 2019 "foundational" decision allowed it to move forward.

"Some novel asset classes and securities products fail. They become tulip bulbs or dot.com's. Others succeed and become gold or the next great technology. Securities regulators are not mandated to try to pick winners and losers," that decision said.

Pye said in a statement that 3iQ considered their closed-end fund to be a "success as the company moves into the ETF space.

Digital currency brokerage Coinbase says the price of Bitcoin has surged 368 per cent in the past year and 23 per cent in the past month, and at midday Monday sat at $61,443.79.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 12, 2021.

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version erroneously described Gemini Trust Co.'s parent company and incorrectly named the fund administrator of Purpose Investments' Bitcoin ETF.
Once Mundane Service Now Prized for Squeezing Out Last nth of Performance

Milpitas, CA. February 15, 2021  Alchip Technologies, Limited, the high-performance computing ASIC leader, revealed today that demand for post-GDSII backend services has increased exponentially across all high-performance computing ASIC applications. The company is meeting this uptick with invested emphasis on production, packaging and test and assembly services.

Given the complex demands place on todays high-performance computing ASICs, its not surprising that theres a keen focus on proven production, packaging, and test and assembly capabilities. These once-pedestrian practices are now highly prized for their capabilities to wring out every last nth of performance power and area, observes Johnny Shen, Alchip Technologies President & CEO.

Backend Keys Last Mile Success

As a result, Alchips post-GDSII services are experiencing high demand as systems and OEM companies face both technology challenges and engineering talent limitations associated with traditional backend services. Sophisticated high-performance frontend design resources are expensive and, depending on geographic location, somewhat scarce. The result is an uptick in companies outsourcing production, packaging, test and assembly responsibilities to ASIC companies who are far more experienced in these strategic areas.

Packaging isnt packaging anymore, declares Leo Cheng, Senior Vice President of Engineering at Alchip. With todays design complexity, packaging has become the most cost/efficient route to increasing performance, lowering power consumption and meeting real estate constraints. Every project, no matter how small, requires backend capabilities to conquer todays advanced manufacturing technology complexity.

Our key to success is knowing how to target advanced technology so that we can collaborate with the customers to develop a manufacturing protocol that is done their way rather than one monolithic approach that is done our way, explains Mr. Shen.

Alchip has elevated its packaging capabilities to include Chip-on-Wafer-on-Substrate (CoWoS) first developed by TSMC and this Spring is expected to announce a true 2.5D INFO capability.

Alchips CoWoS process runs on dedicated tooling and demonstrates IP performance equivalent to that of an original design. The process also includes online debugging and active thermal control. The companys in-house design substrate design capabilities assure compliance with all system requirements and establishes the frame work for critical foundry-to-final test flow.

The company has also unveiled a two sign-off verification options to accommodate both design economics and enhanced yield objectives. Standard sign-off verification includes DRC/LVS/ERC checks that guard against fatal manufacturing error. A second design options calls for additional focus on Electrical, DFT, STA and/or clock verification, depending on specific customer requirements.

Backend design is really a global challenge and thats why we have located a dedicated team in Hsin-Chu, Taiwan. Thats where all of the foundry, packaging and test innovation is taking place so we literally have feet on the street within an of all the innovators. Weve streamlined our process because of this proximity and are passing along those cost advantages to our high-performance computing ASIC partners, Cheng explained.

Alchips has aligned the backend of its high-performance computing ASIC services to tackle the increased for production, packaging, test and assembly that has emerged with transition to 5nm and below advanced technology nodes.

About Alchip

Alchip Technologies Ltd., headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan, is a leading global provider of silicon design and production services for system companies developing complex and high-volume ASICs and SoCs. The company was founded by semiconductor veterans from Silicon Valley and Japan in 2003 and provides faster time-to-market and cost-effective solutions for SoC design at mainstream and advanced, including 7nm processes. Customers include global leaders in AI, HPC/supercomputer, mobile phones, entertainment device, networking equipment and other electronic product categories. Alchip is listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE: 3661) and is a TSMC-certified Value Chain Aggregator.

For more information, please visit our website: http://www.alchip.com






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Mumbai, Feb 15 : In a fresh twist in the death of TikTok star Pooja Chavan, her father Lahu Chavan on Monday claimed that she was very disturbed due to some family debts which could have led her to take resort to the extreme step.

"We have lost our daughter. She is not going to return. We have no complaints or doubts against anybody regarding her death. Please stop defaming us in society," Chavan pleaded in a statement.

He also made it clear that the voice in the audio clips which have gone viral on social media does not belong to his daughter.

"We are not blaming anybody. Kindly leave us alone and don't give us more pain by such allegations against her," he said.

Chavan said that Pooja has five other sisters but she was the strongest in the family and her sudden death has shocked and shattered them all.

"We had taken a loan to rebuild our house and set up our poultry farm business. But things were very bad past couple of years, owing to the Covid-19 pandemic and then the bird flu," he added.

Breaking down, he said he had assured his daughter not to take stress over the loans and promised to clear them somehow, but she took the extreme step after going to Pune nearly a fortnight ago.

Chavan's statement came a couple of days after the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party mounted an all-out attack on the Maha Vikas Aghadi government, alleging that Forest Minister Sanjay Rathod was reportedly linked to Pooja's death on February 8.

Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray made it clear on Saturday that there would be a thorough probe into her death and anybody found involved will not be spared.

Home Minister Anil Deshmukh on Monday rubbished BJP allegations, saying that there is "no question of any pressures on the police", and reiterating that there would be a proper probe into the matter.

"There is no basis on the allegations leveled by the Opposition (BJP). The probe will be as per law... even the CM has said the same thing," Deshmukh said.

Hailing from Parli town in Beed, Pooja Chavan, 22, had gone to Pune for an English speaking course. She lived in Heaven Park society along with two persons, said to be a brother and his friend. On February 8, she allegedly jumped off the building to end her life.

A couple of days after her death, some purported audio clips of hers went viral on social media which the opposition took up and pointed accusing fingers at the Shiv Sena Minister Rathod, demanding an investigation.

However, Shiv Sena Ministers Eknath Shinde, Subhash Desai, farmers' leader Kishore Tiwari and others flayed the manner in which the Opposition leaders like Devendra Fadnavis, Pravin Darekar, Atul Bhatkalkar, Kirit Somaiya, Ram Kadam and others were politicising the issue.

"There is no complaint from her family, the police probe is not completed, we don't know the outcome of the autopsy report, the circumstances leading to her tragic death. Then, it is not proper for the Opposition to link a Minister's name in this manner," Tiwari said on Sunday.

In a veiled warning, Tiwari said that if the BJP is waving audio clips, "then, we also have your video-clips, but we don't indulge in such low-level politics".

Among other things, Fadnavis wrote to the Director General of Police submitting the purported audio-clips of the alleged conversations between Pooja and the Minister.
Exploring the impact and benefits of GA4 for data-driven marketing

(Image source: Pexels)

How people find your website

Tracking what users do when theyre on your website

Gaining data about your users

Discovering your most popular (and unpopular) pages on your site

Quantifying and tracking conversions

The era of measurement: basic and pragmatic, this was marked by the initial goal of measuring audiences and was superseded by The era of analysis: marked by custom data collection, static and dynamic reporting, and the dawn of Firebase, driven by the goal of evaluating performance, which has now given way to The era of activation: the current state of analysis that is marked by the interconnectivity of tools such as Google Ads, Optimize and Firebase AB - with the goal of making data into a lever for ROI

When collected and structured with the aim of building a single, short-axis linking media, onsite, and offsite navigation

When it can be transformed and sublimated to compensate for the loss of information caused by privacy

When its collection aids user-based vision in a world that will soon be cookieless.

After eight years at the forefront of first-party data processing, the Google Analytics Universal platform has given way to its successor: Google Analytics 4. The arrival of GA4 - initially called App + Web - marks a turning point in data-driven marketing.More and more companies have started using Google Analytics, with great success, as a tool for their online marketing assets, especially those brands operating in the e-commerce sector. Its free and relatively easy to use once you get the hang of it and it offers you the opportunity to gain valuable insights about your users, some of which relate to:The GA4 is an improvement on the current platform and is set to radically change data processing, from collection to activation. The switch also signals a much-needed adjustment to tectonic shifts in user behaviour, market player policies and legislative frameworks. Googles pivot also fits the larger business context since many brands have recently accelerated their digital transformations to data-based structures, decision-making and processes - also known to some as data-driven steering.GA4 offers many huge improvements to the digital analytics ecosystem, explains senior analytics and optimisation manager at Jellyfish , Hayden Goldberg. He goes on to explain that its all neatly packaged into one neat tool with minimum implementation requirements.In a time of massive global changes to regulation, as well as end-user sentiment towards privacy and first-party data, GA4 comes with an abundance of growing features that aim to assist organisations in starting off with future-fit analytics solutions.The Google Analytics Universal era has been highly beneficial but the platforms limitations have rendered it increasingly inadequate at keeping up with major evolutions in the digital marketing ecosystem.For instance, when it comes to conversion tracking in a privacy-first environment, legacy conversion tags, which many brands are still using, have a reliance on 3P cookies. In order to future-proof measurement, it is highly recommended to adopt the latest tagging and privacy-centric solutions based on 1P cookie measurement.What makes this all the more pertinent is that, due to changes in media consumption habits, modern customers have come to expect a homogenous experience, marked by relevant brand interactions in a broader context of runaway over-solicitation. These same customers demand to see their online privacy respected and flock to digital experiences that can better deliver on that promise.This ongoing development strained Google Analytics Universals ability to adequately collect data and, with the disappearance of the cookie and the rise of closed ecosystems, user data collection now relies on consent and suffers from differing technological limitations depending on point of origin.Google Analytics Universal has moved through the following successive eras:GA4 was built to serve the analytical needs of this third era, where the conditions and priorities for data collection, analysis and activation must change in accordance with evolving goals. This newest era emphasizes interconnections that enable machine learning, audience-based vision, and more direct data activation. The limitations of Google Analytics Universal helped reveal a new truth about first-party data - it can only create value for brands under certain key conditions:The new normal requires data collection methodology thats flexible, untethered and actionable in real-time. This allows marketers to properly value data assets in an ecosystem where privacy and data quality are core issues. GA4 is well-positioned to facilitate this as it provides access to increasingly hybrid data.GA4s widespread adoption involves testing out new features available right out of the box. The following practices will be better enabled by the new software:To build a more unified view of collection and performance, GA4 natively integrates multi-platform metrics. It also automatically standardises naming conventions, which enables pre-built reports based on machine learning to gather more integrated insights more easily.For example, the data engineering necessary for analysis such as churn probability is now greatly reduced and, as these insight types penetrate the digital marketing ecosystem, we can expect further layering of increasingly vertical reporting to reveal ever more powerful learnings.While GA4 has to integrate pre-built reports, it stands out from its predecessors in that it does so in order to build new ones on the fly. This new data exploration functionality will make data analysis and discovery more readily comprehensible, and reporting more responsive to the inquiry. New features include customisable, audience building tunnels and an exploration module, both of which are accessible in Data Studio.GA4 helps to fragment and multiply data access across an analytics ecosystem with refined roles for each tool. Thus, GA4 serves as more than just a basic exploration and analysis interface, while Data Studio organises outputs as a dashboard and sharing tool and Big Query layers over the top as an advanced analysis engine.While GA4 allows on-the-fly exploration and analysis, it will also serve as a hub between data and activation tools. It logically integrates a link with Google Ads and Big Query, which is now possible for the GA free version. However, more direct linkages within the Google suite are expected in the future, culminating in YouTube integration that will provide an integrated view of conversions.In order to meet present and future user privacy requirements, GA4 has streamlined the elimination of problematic user data capture. Data deletion is native, which allows marketers to delete unwanted parameters such as name, email, etc. from the collection process. Additional tools such as consent mode are likely to be integrated to the interface in the near future. GA4 was also built to address the needs of a cookieless future, centring the role of User ID.In rethinking the audience system, Google has restructured part of the integration with its other tools to be even more activation-centric. The audience creation system is now much more flexible. GA4 was designed for more flexible and media-centric use, offering an attribution window, view of overlap between audiences, cross-platform attribution and trigger signals when entering an audience.GA4s new collection framework is largely based on the Firebase. In a huge change from the former iteration, it is event-centric. The GA Universal collection framework was built around the analytics platform, not usage - in essence, it collects data upon page loads and waits for further user action to enrich it. This proved inadequate to modern analytical requirements, especially given the recent increase of single-page apps. Contemporary user experiences involve a logical sequence of events with different timing; from page loading events to responses from content recommendation tools, to CRM callbacks, to calculations of the user score, enrichment of the navigation contexts and more.GA4's event-centric collection meets the need for multi-contextual feedback on user behaviour within a complete and heterogeneous ecosystem. Moving to an event-centric dataset will have far-reaching consequences. The transition represents a change of mindset at all stages of data processing (collection, analysis, activation), allowing marketers to move from a logic of storage and analysis of data to one of reaction and creation when faced with it.Currently, GAU remains the reference analytical tool due to its maturity and while GA4 is still under development, and is still limited in terms of active integrations, the current state of the new platform does give marketers a glimpse into the analytics tool of the future. Taking the time to understand GA4 now will give early movers a head start once implementation becomes fully feasible. We recommend setting-up dual tracking to simultaneously collect data within Google Analytics Universal and Google Analytics 4 to ensure continuity of data access and explore the new possibilities offered by GA4.Join Jellyfish to learn more about GA4 with a free webinar dedicated to exploring the key upgrades, redesigned interface and supercharged tracking functionalities across your website and app properties. We invite analysts and those working in digital marketing to register online as Nick Comber, director or training: analytics and GMP provides expert advice on how to make the switch to GA4 as well as points about setting up the new system, creating reports and using the analysis hub.Wednesday, 17 February 20214pm GMT and 11am ET
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 13:29:02|Editor: huaxia

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DHAKA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The blazing red and yellow are the representative colors of the Valentine's Day and Pohela Falgun, the first day of Spring of Bengali month Falgun, in Bangladesh.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this year's Pohela Falgun and Valentine's Day celebrations were on a smaller scale compared to those in previous years.

In Dhaka, instead of formal celebrations, people held open air chorus, folk dance and music, dance of indigenous people and recitation of poems on Sunday under the government's health guidelines and other directives including wearing face masks.

Since Sunday morning, Dhaka's lush parks, restaurants and eateries were chock-full of people celebrating Falgun and Valentine's Day, especially young couples, who celebrated their relationship and the joy of togetherness.

As always, girls were seen in "bashonti" (yellow or orange) colored sarees and adorning floral ornaments, while boys wore colorful panjabis to welcome the arrival of spring coincided with the Valentine's Day.

They presented their beloved ones with candy, flowers, chocolates and other gifts to show the feelings of love and affection.

Since 2020, the Falgun occasion in Bangladesh has coincided with Valentine's Day on Feb. 14. Enditem
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Kangana Ranaut is the first celebrity to join the Twitter 'at 21' challenge. The Bollywood actress recently compared herself to Oscar winning-actress Meryl Streep, Wonder Woman actress Gal Gadot and Tom Cruise. Now, she has revealed that she quashed all her enemies at 21.

The latest challenge on Twitter is 'at 21', which began trending after Delhi Police arrested 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi. While many netizens have condemned the act, some have taken part in the challenge for the fun of it.

Ranaut while sharing her story wrote, "Left home at the age of 15 my father refused to help me in my struggle,was on my own,was captured by underworld mafia at 16, At 21 I had squashed all villains in my life,was a successful actress a national award winner owner of my first house in Mumbai city posh location Bandra."

However, Kangana's recent series of tweets didn't sit well with a group of netizens. Some trolled her for the same and said, "From a National award winner to a National nuisance, the journey has been rather quick!"

Another tweet read, "How does she manage to make every topic about her? Self centered and how!" A Twitter user wrote, "She could have been an inspiration to millions but chose to be a joke..Its all about the choice you make."

The backlash comes after Kangana challenged netizens to find an actress with better range than her. "Open for debate if anyone can show me more range and brilliance of craft than me by any other actress on this planet," she had tweeted while sharing stills from her upcoming films like Tejas, Dhaakad, Manikarnika Returns: The Legend Of Didda and Thalaivi.

ALSO READ: Kangana Ranaut On Protests Against Dhaakad Shoot In Madhya Pradesh: I Had To Change My Car

ALSO READ: Rang De Basanti Star Siddharth Slams Delhi Police & Celebs Organised Tweets After Disha Ravi's Arrest
As efforts continue to unravel the pathogenesis of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), a new study by researchers at the University of California Santa Cruz, USA, discusses the use of simultaneous sequencing of both human and viral genes. This allows the interdependent expression of these transcriptomes to be examined.

The findings, presented on the bioRxiv* preprint server, underline the important role of lipopolysaccharides in the pathogenesis of COVID-19, as well as indicating the prognostic utility of grouping patients by their chemokine expression profile.

Study: Dual RNA-Seq analysis of SARS-CoV-2 correlates specific human transcriptional response pathways directly to viral expression . Image Credit: CROCOTHERY / Shutterstock

Dual RNA-seq explores host-viral transcriptomes

The approach, called dual RNA-seq, seeks to understand how different genes in the host and virus are expressed in an interrelated manner in COVID-19. It involves the examination of both human and viral RNA transcripts simultaneously, in the same sample.

Previously, transcriptional pathways have been studied only in the human host, profiling the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in cells infected with SARS-CoV-2. Dual RNA-seq examines co-expressed genes, and can identify rare transcript classes, as well as more nuanced associations between genes.

Both infected cells in culture, and patient samples, were analyzed quantitatively for transcripts. With modern sequencing methods, the depth of each read is adequate to allow accurate quantification of the whole host and virus transcriptome without the need for auxiliary library enrichment steps. The method yielded a sensitive and specific network of associations, that showed important roles played by human genes and pathways in SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Comparison with earlier data on SARS-CoV-2 infection

The dual RNA-seq analysis pipeline (dRAP) study first examined data from an earlier study of two infected human cell lines, ACE2 receptor-enhanced alveolar basal epithelial cell line (A549) and bronchial epithelial cell line (NHBE). The amount of SARS-CoV-2 in the cell lines was controlled.

The re-analysis by dRAP showed agreement with the specific transcripts detected. However, since it quantified the amount of viral transcript in the host cell, the researchers found a dramatic shift in the magnitude of the changes within the A549 cell line, compared to the NHBE. This might be because the latter was supposed to be mock-infected but had actually been contaminated with the virus.

This difference in the findings validates the reliability of this method in exploring the changes in the regulation of co-expressed host and viral genes in an infected cell.

In both cell lines, the viral genes that are basic to infection are most highly expressed, such as the open reading frame (ORF) 10, spike, nucleocapsid and membrane genes. Eight of eleven viral transcripts were found in both cell lines, indicating this method can reliably identify viral genes in multiple cell types.

Detection of transcripts in human cells with known infections

The researchers then used the same method to study viral transcript amounts in human cells infected with known infections. The aim was to distinguish human cell transcriptional changes that directly reflect viral transcriptional alterations from those which are indirect effects of the expression of other genes.

They found, unexpectedly, that lung and peripheral blood samples often failed to show any viral gene expression at all, despite the lung alveolar cells being the primary target of the virus. On the other hand, bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) samples consistently showed overexpression of viral RNA, often in excess of that observed in infected cells in culture.

The most highly expressed viral transcript in BALF was ORF1ab, greatly exceeding that found in infected cell lines. The next in line was the S (spike) protein, followed by the N and M genes. Other genes that were found in excess in BALF samples relative to cell lines were the E, ORF6, and ORF7b genes.

(A) The dRAP pipeline follows a dual RNAseq methodology by creating a single reference index for RNAseq read alignment with STAR by appending guest genomes to the host genome. This allows for simultaneous, unbiased alignment of reads with multiple transcriptomes where the best overall alignment is selected. For example, aligning a single read would result in 3 mismatches (vertical lines in box under Worse Alignment) if aligned to the host genome (red x marks host alignment location) compared to 1 mismatch (vertical line in box under Better Alignment) aligning to the guest genome (green arrow). Both the human host genome (hg38) and the SARS-CoV-2 guest genome (NC_045512v2) are included, which has a set of genes that are designated as open reading frames, structural proteins, or accessory factors. (B) SARS-CoV-2 differential gene expression results for infected patient tissue and cell line samples compared with non-infected samples. Patient tissue types show dramatically different expression profiles with PBMC and Lung biopsy tissue rarely ever passing detection limits while BALF tissues show robust expression in infected patients. Cell lines also display strong SARS-CoV-2 expression although the magnitude of fold change was far less than that observed in BALF samples. DNQ stands for did not qualify, which indicates genes that failed Cooks distance filtering in DESeq2 analysis.

BALF and cell lines show concordance

Overall, cell line and BALF transcripts showed concordance, except for the overexpression of some viral transcripts in the latter.

Infected A549 cell lines showed similar but lower expression profiles to BALF samples. BALF transcripts were discordant with those in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs), which failed to reliably reflect the virus's presence.

The researchers used BALF as well as the two cell lines for further host-virus analysis via DEGs in the former. They postulated that these could reflect direct effects of infection better than lung cells or PBMCs.

There was significant concordance in the gene expression in the two cell lines, 23 and 51 genes in the NHBE and A549, respectively, showing changes in the same direction of expression (mostly upregulation), but with fold differences in the amount. Genes involved in the antiviral response played a large part in the DEG profile.

When BALF DEGs were compared with the two cell lines, both concordant and mismatched directional expression changes were observed.

However, when BALF DEGs were compared with lung and PBMC samples, respectively, most changes tended to show discordance with the former, but extreme discordance with the latter. This confirms the earlier discordance in viral detection between BALF and the lung cells/PBMC.

Human transcriptional network

The viral and host RNA study via coexpression analysis was found to complement DEG analysis by exposing less obvious shifts in the transcription of human genes in sync with viral genes, possibly due to regulatory effects.

Using three different approaches, they found that the gene expression profiles were highly comparable for chemokines, SPRRs, S100s, viral response, and interferon response genes. One result was the generation of a highly modular structure, with specific groups of genes being localized in a group of pathways. This is helpful to distinguish subsets of genes that act together in a specific pathway.

One such example is the pathway involved in a lipopolysaccharide response that is related to high cytokine and chemokine activity, which was found to be linked to another gene cluster regulating epithelial cell differentiation and keratinization, as well as one modulating antiviral host responses.

Ranking analysis showed that many viral genes were highly networked among the DEGs in the cell lines, but not in BALF. This could be due to the over 20-fold increase in the number of DEGs in the former but not in the latter. The increased noise would hide the regulatory interaction network between the genes, especially when interindividual variability is accounted for.

This suggests that many of the DE genes in BALF samples may be more indicative of patient variability than of a response to SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Consensus network modules

With all three approaches as well as DEG analysis, they showed several genes in common, including five viral genes and 14 host immune genes. Consensus network construction demonstrated several modules, comprising interlinked genes as well as pathways.

These modules consisted of pathways involving interactions between viral proteins and host cytokine and chemokine signaling pathways, and lipopolysaccharide responses, indicating host immune response and disease mechanisms; innate immune pathways, including interferon responses; pathways involving programmed cell death, epithelial differentiation and cornification, and antiviral responses; and viral genome replication and type I interferon-induced response.

These include conventional components such as inflammation and chemokine signaling, as well as unexpected pathways like epithelial cornification, perhaps indicating apoptosis of keratinocytes or other specific host cell population.

Putative model of COVID-19 pathogenesis

The network also suggests that the SARS-CoV-2 infection may trigger a lipopolysaccharide-mediated response that causes a rise in cytokine and chemokine levels. This leads to an intracellular influx of calcium that results in epithelial migration, cornification and apoptosis.

Chemokine abnormalities may thus be responsible for severe COVID-19 features, such as the mucosal immune response of the airways, inflammatory bowel disease, interstitial pneumonia and fibrosis, and eosinophilic pneumonia. The results are progressive dyspnea with acute respiratory failure in some cases, weight loss and other symptoms like fever, fatigue and night sweats.

What are the implications?

The dual RNA-seq analysis pipeline (dRAP) set up by the investigators was used to examine all the transcripts found in the sample, allowing simultaneous quantification of both host and viral transcriptomes, probably for the first time ever.

This new outlook revealed that the most strongly and consistently expressed transcripts were those that play essential roles in viral survival and propagation.

These include the viral spike, membrane and nucleocapsid genes, required for viral attachment, cell entry, replication, assembly and release.

The most robust viral responses were found in BALF samples, rather than in lungs or PBMCs. The human responses in SARS-CoV-2 infection were found in BALF, again, rather than the other tissues. Among cell lines, the NHBE had the highest expression of viral transcripts, as well as a DEG profile closest to that of BALF.

This may indicate that this cell line may offer an acceptable proxy for human tissues. Additionally, BALF would appear to be the tissue of choice for gene expression quantification.

The coexpression analysis enabled by dRAP produced a coherent hypothesis that predicted a possible mechanism by which COVID-19 may progress from the initial SARS-CoV-2 infection to patient symptoms. Taken together, these findings shed light on the molecular pathways implicated in COVID-19.

This study thus also demonstrates the importance of this method for exploring multiple transcriptomes simultaneously.

*Important Notice

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
Though their awards were postponed due to the pandemic, their achievements are timeless, said Rear Admiral Frank Thorp, President and CEO of the Navy Memorial. The presentation provides a great insight into the men and women who serve in our Navy today.

On Friday, February 12th, The United States Navy Memorial had the distinct pleasure to honor the 2019 Sailors of the Year.

Though their awards were postponed due to the pandemic, their achievements are timeless, said Rear Admiral Frank Thorp, President and CEO of the Navy Memorial. The presentation provides a great insight into the men and women who serve in our Navy today.

In a greater effort to give the public an eye into the internal processes of the Navy, the Sailors of the Year awards were presented through a digital production which was created by the Navy Memorial. The sailors honored were also given a platform to discuss the achievements that led to their selection as Sailors of the Year, and how their experiences in the Navy shaped how they view service today.

The first to be awarded was United States Fleet Forces Sailor of the Year, Aviation Structural Mechanic 1st Class Carolina Berrio. Having served in the Navy for over 20 years, Petty Officer Berrio spoke about how her experience shaped how she saw service in her own eyes. When speaking about her initial time in the service she said, At that time I knew I was there for something else. Everything just kind of changed and I realized this was what I wanted to do.

Next to be awarded was the Pacific Fleet Sea Sailor of the Year, Aviation Ordnanceman 1st Class Jason C. Webley. When asked what it felt like to receive the award he said, To be named Sailor of the Year is beyond my wildest dreams It was and is still is a blessing, 100 percent. He went on to speak about how his family and friends helped him persevere to find success through the Navy and helped him strive for the award.

The Navy Shore Sailor of the Year Award was awarded to Aviation Ordnanceman 1st Class Kimber N. Dominguez. She joined the Navy when she was in high school after she was recruited by a friend. She said that her daughter and friends had given her an Ah Ha! moment that made her realize that she was on the right career path.

Finally, the Navy Reserve Sailor of the Year was awarded to Naval Aircrewman 1st Class Amanda Alcantar. Petty Officer Alcantar joined the Navy because she did not want to be a part of the crime that was happening around her hometown. She talked about why she enlisted when she was 17 because the Navy has given me so much opportunity that I cannot even begin to explain. She spoke about the numerous places she has traveled while serving in the Navy and how the travel inspired her to work on aircraft. With the support of her commanding officer she was able to secure the position she wanted, which ultimately helped her be considered for this award.

To see the award ceremonies for these sailors and learn more about the vital roles they play in the Navy, the public can view the video on the US Navy Memorials website at http://www.NavyMemorial.org.

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Richwood, TX (77531)

Today

Partly cloudy early with increasing clouds overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 73F. Winds ESE at 10 to 15 mph..

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Partly cloudy early with increasing clouds overnight. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 73F. Winds ESE at 10 to 15 mph.
In 2017, a man named Willie Nash was booked into a Mississippi county jail on a misdemeanor charge. For reasons that arent clear, his cellphone wasnt confiscated as the law dictated. When he asked a jailer for a charger, the phonewhich he had been using to text his wifewas seized. Nash was then sentenced to 12 years for possessing the cellphone. The case went all the way up to the Mississippi Supreme Court, where the 12-year sentence was affirmed. While obviously harsh, Justice James D. Maxwell II wrote for the court, Nashs twelve-year sentence for possessing a cell phone in a correctional facility is not grossly disproportionate. Mr. Nash, a father of three, will be released back to his family in January of 2029, for the crime of texting his wife from jail.

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In all federal and state prisons and jails, personal cellphones are classified as contrabandillegal for incarcerated people to possess. Incarcerated people are allowed to communicate with loved ones via letters, expensive phone calls in a centralized location (done through a prepaid account or collect calls, for a limited amount of time), or sometimes through expensive email and video messages on a prison-issued tablet. Due to COVID-19, in-person visitation has been halted in most prisons and jails since last March.

These rigid policies isolate incarcerated people and weaken their ties to friends and family. And this isolation radiates harm well beyond each individual. The vast majority of the millions of people currently incarcerated in this country will, at some point, be released. Every year, roughly 600,000 people leave prisons across the U.S., and a much higher number cycle in and out of jails. Roughly 2.7 million children in the U.S. have an incarcerated parent. For people isolated from the world, hearing a loved ones voice or a grandbaby coo for the first time is healing, former death row resident Jarvis Jay Masters wrote in the Guardian. There is a wealth of research that confirms that the stronger the relationships and connections to loved ones and community, the better a person will fare once they are released from prison or jail. Weve known this for a long time. A study from 1972 noted that, The central finding of this research is the strong and consistent positive relationship that exists between parole success and maintaining strong family ties while in prison. Decades later, the findings remain the same. Incarcerated men and women who maintain contact with supportive family members are more likely to succeed after their release, a 2012 Vera Institute report found.

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There is one obvious way to facilitate these community ties: allow incarcerated people to have cellphones. For more than a decade, jailers and elected officials have attempted to incite a moral panic in the general public around the danger of cellphones, warning that incarcerated people would only use them to organize hits and buy drugs and run gangs on the outside.

Its true that some incarcerated people have used contraband phones to extort people on the outside. But targeting the tools rather than the roots of the corruption and violence within prisons is misguided. A full decade ago, the New York Times conceded that the harsh penalties and increased vigilance werent working to keep phones out of prisons: The logical solution would be to keep all cellphones out of prison. But that is a war that is being lost, corrections officials say. That hasnt changed. If you want to find a cellphone in prison or jail now, you can. One former sheriff in South Carolina even allowed detainees in his jail to purchase cheap cellphones from commissary, arguing access to cellphones actually improves safety. This adds another method of safety to our facility because it takes away the mischief of the inmates sitting back there 24 hours a day with nothing to do, he told a local TV station. Fighting. Different things. Confrontation with corrections officers.

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The reality is that prisons and jails are already saturated with cellphones (mostly smuggled in by correctional officers), and the vast majority of people use them in the exact same ways the vast majority use them on the outside: to stay connected. To stave off boredom. To learn. To laugh.

These contraband phones have become even more crucial over the past year as other methods of communication have shut down. When COVID-19 began to tear through cell blocks across the country last spring, prison and jail administrators responded in the only way they knew how: lockdowns. With visitation halted and access to phones and out-of-cell time restricted, panicked family members and loved ones were left in the dark, frantically posting to Facebook groups and calling facilities, desperate for news.

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Cellphonesparticularly smartphones, because of the ability to easily record and share videos and picturesprovide some modicum of transparency, a window into an otherwise opaque system. In April, CNN played video shot on a smartphone from inside an Alabama prison, where incarcerated people pleaded for help as COVID-19 spread: Death is imminent for us, one man said. Many more videos that incarcerated people have shared on social media over the past few years reveal the deplorable conditions they are forced to live in, from no electricity to backed-up toilets to rat infestations to moldy food. Video from Georgias Macon State Prison, where a record seven homicides occurred last year, shows brown sludge coming out of the faucets. When Jennifer Bradleys son, Carrington, was stabbed to death at Macon, she learned about it from his friends at the prison, who contacted her on a contraband cellphone. The Georgia Department of Corrections never gave her an explanation.

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While doing little to keep phones out of prisons, the ban on cellphones has mainly served as an excuse to punish incarcerated people for exposing the reality of life behind bars. One incarcerated man posted a video on Facebook Live pleading for help amid a massive coronavirus outbreak at a federal prison in Ohio. After the video went viral, his brother told Vice, he was sent to the hole as punishment for having a contraband phone. Incarcerated organizers have also used cellphones to help organize labor and hunger strikes, drawing further attention to the atrocities of prison. The charge of contraband has been used repeatedly as a pretext to crack down on uprisings and restrict rights.

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Its not all grim, though. A scroll through prison TikTok will reveal everything from how to MacGyver loose electrical wires to boil water to recipes for prison pizzaand then there are, of course, the TikTok dances. People are risking retaliation to show that they too have joy, in the midst of darkness.

The desire to punish is a deeply human one, but we should know by now that policies based on revenge never end well, especially when we know that those policies actually result in more harm. Access to cellphonesthat is, access to love, connection, transparency, and a window to the outside worldis one simple but vital step to reduce those harms. Those who believe incarceration should be maximally harsh and devoid of joy or connection must reckon with reality: The more we isolate and torture people in cages, the less safe we all become.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The Department of Health on Monday said one confirmed case of the UK variant can be traced to the COVID-19 outbreak in the Metro Rail Transit-3 (MRT-3) depot last month.

Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire gave updates on the six cases reported last week that were still undergoing verification. These six confirmed cases of the more transmissible variant are either residing in Metro Manila, stayed for long periods in the capital region, or undergoing isolation in Luzon.

The case linked to the infections in the MRT is a 46-year-old woman undergoing home quarantine in Pasay City. She was the mother of a personnel at the MRT-3 depot, where a clustering of cases was recorded. She tested positive for the coronavirus infection on Jan. 25.

"Connected po siya doon sa cluster ng MRT cases natin kasi ang anak niya was from the MRT, nagtatrabaho doon," she said in a media briefing.

[Translation: She is connected to the MRT cases. Her child worked in the MRT.]

The train depot recorded at least 36 infections last Jan. 27. It remains unclear if their samples were sent for genome sequencing to check if they have been infected with the more transmissible variant first detected in the United Kingdom.

Another variant case is a 47-year-old woman from Las Pinas who arrived from Morocco last Jan. 12. Vergeire said she completed her 10-day isolation, but her second swab test showed a positive result, so she was advised to extend her isolation at home.

The other patient is a 49-year-old male from Rizal. Health officials are checking if he returned from an overseas trip.

Another one is a 37-year-old male who is a resident of Bukidnon, but spent a long time in Metro Manila as part of his training before getting tested and turning out positive on Jan. 25.

A 25-year-old woman from Dasmarinas, Cavite is undergoing isolation in Region 3 after finding out she had COVID-19 on Jan. 31. Meanwhile, another 20-year-old patient who took a swab test in Metro Manila is under isolation in the Cordillera Region.

On Feb. 12, the Department of Health reported 19 new cases of the more transmissible variant. There are now a total of 44 cases of the B.1.17 variant in the country. However, Vergeire said there is still not enough evidence to prove there is community transmission.
Education firm Pearson has backed Mail Force with a fantastic double donation.

The company is offering 250 laptops and 50,000 cash on top. Both donations will go straight into the campaign to get lockdown schoolchildren online.

Pearson, which publishes everything from pupils textbooks to educational resources for teachers and companies, pledged to add more laptops at a later date.

The firm employs more than 22,000 in 70 countries and is the latest corporation to back the Daily Mails Computers for Kids campaign, which has now raised an incredible 10.7million in the three weeks since it launched.

Andy Bird, chief executive of Pearson, said: We are proud to support the campaign to provide laptops to children most in need across the UK.

Mail Force has been crisscrossing Britain making deliveries of laptops to schools. Among the most recent recipients is 12-year-old Eva Wielgosz (pictured)

Every child should be able to continue learning throughout this lockdown, and technology plays an increasingly vital role in achieving this with most learning now taking place virtually at home.

He added: We need to act quickly to ensure no one is missing out. We are determined to play our part in ensuring that the most vulnerable children have the tools they need to succeed and to ensure they are not unfairly disadvantaged.

Mail Force, a charity set up last year to help tackle the PPE shortages, is buying new laptops and also refurbishing used ones donated by companies.

Generous readers have sent in an extraordinary 1.6million, and every penny is spent on helping children get online, by giving schools computers or assisting with data deals so they can access internet lessons.

Companies large and small have flocked to the cause. London advertising company AKQA has kindly sent in 2,000.

Chief executive Ajaz Ahmed said: As the worlds fifth-largest economy, we have a responsibility to ensure disadvantaged children are equipped with the necessary resources to continue their education, access opportunities and enable digital literacy to help shape a better future.

Eva's mother Justyna (pictured together), who works in retail, and father Jozef, a handyman, welcomed the Mail Force delivery, as did squawking parrot Cookie

Mail Force has been crisscrossing Britain making deliveries of laptops to schools. Among the most recent recipients is 12-year-old Eva Wielgosz.

She shares a house with her parents, two siblings, a dog, a rabbit and a parrot  and getting any schoolwork done is a challenge.

Eva has been managing as best she can, but the familys sole laptop has been commandeered by sister Misia, 15, who is in Year 11 and needs it for her GCSEs.

Eva, who is in Year 8, said: Its not easy. We use PowerPoint and Word at school, and I cant do those things on a phone. Sometimes, it feels like its too tricky to get the work done.

Her mother Justyna, who works in retail, and father Jozef, a handyman, welcomed the Mail Force delivery  as did squawking parrot Cookie and yapping Nicko the chihuahua, to the amusement of the familys youngest child, Leon, seven. The rabbit Charli, was the only one who kept quiet.

Mrs Wielgosz said: It has been very hard, because I work and my husband works as well. We manage, but its tough.

Pearson, which publishes everything from pupils textbooks to educational resources for teachers and companies, pledged to add more laptops at a later date. Pictured: Andy Bird, chief executive of Pearson

There are certainly arguments over the laptop. Misia gets it mostly. We are very grateful for this laptop and thank you very much.

Amazon has also pledged to donate 10,000 new tablets to locked-down pupils.

The online giant was inspired to help with the haul, worth an estimated 500,000 at full price, after it was contacted by Mail Force last month.

The generous donation was sourced from equipment that would have been sold on its website.

Amazon will donate their tablets through their existing partner Teach First, a charity that trains and supports teachers in the most deprived areas of the country.

UK manager John Boumphrey said: Were proud to play our part in combating the digital divide. We hope these devices will support the immediate needs of children in disadvantaged communities across the UK.
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US president looks forward to close collaboration with Italy's new government.

Joe Biden, the president of the United States, has sent a message of congratulations to Italy's new prime minister Mario Draghi.

In his message on Twitter, Biden said he looks forward to "working closely" with Draghi "to deepen our strong bilateral relationship, cooperate during your leadership of the G20, and address global challenges from COVID to climate change."

A spokesperson from the US state department told Italian news agency ANSA: "The United States has a long and historic relationship with Italy. We congratulate the new Italian government and look forward to continuing cooperation to increase our results and address the many challenges we face as a global community."
The shared equity scheme proposed in the Affordable Housing Bill could raise house prices, an Oireachtas Committee will hear tomorrow.

The Affordable Housing Bill, which is due before the Oireachtas Housing Committee for pre-legislative scrutiny, sets out a new affordable purchase shared equity scheme.

This would see the State take a 30pc stake in the homes of first-time buyers, who will take out a mortgage with the bank for the remainder of the cost.

However, in its opening statement, the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) will warn the Oireachtas Committee tomorrow that this scheme will hike up house prices.

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While lowering the required loan amount, it would also act to alleviate both income and deposit constraints.

The Institute will state that, following a review of the Help to Buy scheme, households which availed of it may have been able to complete the transaction anyway.

The ESRI will also warn that, because housing supply is so constrained, increasing purchasing power through a shared equity scheme will hike costs.

This static approach does not take into consideration the fact that housing supply is so constrained in Ireland and increasing purchasing power for households (through a loosening of credit constraints by a shared equity scheme) will very likely lead to higher house prices.

Such rises in house prices are likely to exacerbate affordability problems down the line.

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Whatsapp Housing Minister Darragh OBrien. Photo: Gareth Chaney

The Affordable Housing Bill 2020, published by Minister for Housing Darragh OBrien several weeks ago, would see not only the implementation of a shared equity scheme, but cost rental homes and affordable housing built on local authority land.

The Governments Housing Agency will defend the shared equity scheme, saying that it targets purchasers who need support.

It stated: The Housing Agency supports the principle of equity being provided to moderate income earners facing housing affordability challenges.

It also recognises that it is necessary to have fairness and equality of treatment across society, in terms of having an equity charge to assist individuals to buy a home.

It will tell the Committee that the shared equity scheme, as well as affordable housing on council land, will seek to address the affordability gap that exists for moderate income households who are constrained from accessing sufficient finance to purchase homes at market prices.

In a survey conducted last year, the ESRI found that around 70,000 households, or one in four private renters, did not have sufficient income left over after rent and other housing costs to cover a minimum standard of living expenditure prior to the pandemic.

The Institute will also inform the Committee that the economic fallout from the pandemic has exacerbated existing affordability challenges.

While 40pc of renters wish to purchase a property, the lack of funds for a deposit and insufficient loan size-to-income level pose challenges, according to research conducted by the ESRI.

To tackle these challenges, it will suggest that separate policies covering the availability of loans and deposit supports can be of merit.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : With India liberalising policies that govern the collection, generation, preparation and dissemination of geospatial data, the industry on Monday hailed the move, terming it historic and visionary.

Local companies will no longer need license to collect, generate, store and share geospatial data within the country and the decision will unlock opportunities for applications of GIS (geographic information system) in sectors like agriculture, mining, water, urban, utilities, public safety and infrastructure which rely heavily on geospatial infrastructure.

Agendra Kumar, President, Esri India technology Pvt Ltd said that the new geospatial guidelines are historic and visionary.

"Private sectors like insurance, manufacturing, retail, banking can now tap into multitude of new opportunities enabled with location analytics. This would further boost the innovation in overall geospatial industry with Indian startups and software ISVs leading the development of GIS applications and solutions," Kumar said in a statement.

According to the Department of Science and Technology, it is announcing sweeping changes to India's mapping policy, specifically for Indian companies.

"What is readily available globally does not need to be restricted in India and therefore geospatial data that used to be restricted will now be freely available in India," it said in a statement.

The announcement came as the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and digital mapping and location-based deep-tech company MapmyIndia last week announced a new initiative to offer a fully indigenous, mapping portal and geospatial services.

The services will combine the power of MapmyIndia's digital maps and technologies with ISRO's catalogue of satellite imagery and earth observation data.

"Having successfully created 360 degree immersive street imagery of all major Indian cities and undertaking several path-breaking projects for the government, we foresee a positive impact on several industries and overall on the economy as well," said Sajid Malik, CMD of Genesys International, a 3D mapping company.
[February 14, 2021] Elcom Launches Version 11.5 of Their Leading Digital Experience Platform

The latest release enables administrators and publishers to efficiently deliver their digital-first strategies. SYDNEY, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Elcom, a leading Digital Experience Platform used by organisations to efficiently deliver their digital-first strategies through their intranets, digital workplaces, websites and portals, today announced the launch of Elcom V11.5. To remain competitive in the wake of COVID-19, organisations must provide personalised digital communication, connection and information access anywhere and anytime, while simplifying the task of managing these digital experiences. The Elcom team has invested significantly in enhancing the design and usability of the platform to work smarter and faster. Administrators and publishers can look forward to more choice and control around the management, delivery and access of content-related experiences, while audiences will have greater flexibility in how they interact with these sites. Ryan Bloch, COO & General Manager at Elcom, explains, "The powerful capabilities of Elcom means that it is used as the foundation to deliver great digital experiences to a wide audience, from staff and customers, to partners and suppliers. This means the platform must be intuitive and easy to use, while offering a wide range of functionality to meet multiple needs  from an effective digital workplace for staff, to a portal for suppliers or a website for customers and prospects. This is the basis for Elcom V11.5. We simply wanted to make it work smarter and faster for publishers, and more seamlessly for audiences." The Elcom Platform brings together all the best features of a digital experience solution into one user friendly esign tailored to an organisation's needs. Built from feedback from clients, the latest version of the Elcom Platform provides:



Enhanced publishing and authoring experience. Highlights include end users can easily publish articles by filling out a form and selecting new article attributes and metadata options. Publishers can also quickly change layouts and share drafts with external stakeholders securely.

Seamless design and usability of dynamic widgets. Dynamic widgets make re-purposing and reusing content across sites easy. Highlights include the ability to show featured articles, custom metadata to increase search options and the ability to favourite content directly from a widget.

More flexibility with the powerful forms tool. Highlights include the ability to pull in data from external sources, improved form validation rules and seamless rendering on mobile.

Streamlined and automated processes with workflows for forms and content. Highlights include the ability to access additional advanced workflow routing rules, easily capture comments across workflows and request approval for specific parts of a form or content.

Additional mechanisms to keep data safe and secure. Highlights include enhanced password security checks, new robust reports for administrators and the ability to add reports in dashboards to quickly view data. For more information on Elcom V11.5, please visit: https://hubs.ly/H0GtDmD0 For more information on the Elcom Digital Experience platform, please visit: https://hubs.ly/H0GtDmZ0

About Elcom For over 20 years, Elcom has been driving digital transformation across medium to large organisations, helping them to achieve significant cost and time savings. Our product, the Elcom Digital Experience Platform, is the backbone of over 1000 intranet, portal, website, mobile and learning management deployments; enabling our clients to deliver exceptional online experiences, while achieving operational and administration efficiency. Elcom is used by organisations across all industries including The Fair Work Ombudsman, Inner West Council, Ascham School, Cabrini, The Benevolent Society, Vita Group, Kia Motors, Forty Winks and Clayton Utz. SOURCE Elcom Technology

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Spains social service residences can breathe a little easier one year after being besieged by the coronavirus pandemic. The mass vaccination of care homes  the first priority group of Spains vaccination drive  is beginning to have an effect, with contagions falling. According to the Health Ministry, last week 103 coronavirus outbreaks were reported in such residences, which include care homes for people with disabilities and senior residences. This is half the number recorded the previous week.

Data collected by EL PAIS show that eight Spanish regions have registered this fall, which has been largely attributed to the vaccination campaign. Indeed, the regions  which are responsible for the vaccination drive and containing the coronavirus pandemic in their territories  have almost finished administering the second dose of the Covid vaccine in care homes. This has prompted some regional governments to consider easing restrictions to allow residents to receive visits and leave their centers. Experts, however, have called for caution.

With fewer contagions, there will be fewer fatalities. We have to start returning to normality Jesus Cubero, from industry group Aeste

While it is true that the epidemiological curve is on a downward trend across Spain and restrictions on social activities are also helping to curb transmission, the fall in contagions in care homes in the past 15 days has been greater than the total decline. Overall outbreaks in Spain have fallen 7.23% in this period, compared to 50% in social service residences, where a single case is classified as an outbreak. This is a bigger drop than that recorded during the week of November 12, at the end of the second wave of the pandemic, when outbreaks in care homes fell 26% in two weeks.

We have finished administering the second dose in residences. We are in a very good situation: going from 91 [active infections] in a week, with just four hospitalizations, said a spokesperson for the social rights department in Navarre on Friday. In Navarre, only one outbreak, with eight cases, was reported after the administration of the second dose.

The vaccination drive has provided care homes with the first glimpse of hope since the virus first started to prey on vulnerable residents  nearly 30,000 people have died in social service residences due to the coronavirus or with compatible symptoms. No significant impact on the number of deaths can be seen yet. It is too soon, says Jesus Cubero, the secretary general of Aeste, an industry group that represents 400 centers. But evidently, with fewer contagions, there will be fewer fatalities. We have to start returning to normality.

Visible impact on regions

It is not yet known whether Covid-19 vaccines stop the spread of the coronavirus, but it is clear that they prevent the most serious effects of the disease and as a result, will prevent deaths. This is already being seen in many of Spains regions.

According to the health department in the Balearic Islands, the number of active infections in social services residences has fallen by more than 60% in a month, and although a dozen people tested positive for the virus after receiving the second dose, all had minor cases or were asymptomatic.

In Catalonia, the regional government said on Wednesday that the vaccination drive was having a visible effect on care homes: only 358 centers had a positive case (0.7% of the total social service residences), 57.7% down compared to 10 days ago. The regions of Aragon and Castilla y Leon have also detected a fall in contagions. In the latter, outbreaks in care homes now represent 5.8% of all outbreaks, down from 16.6% in December.

In Valencia, a spokesperson said cases in care homes had fallen by half, but did not provide specific figures. Meanwhile, in the Basque Country, there were more than 400 active cases in residences before the start of the vaccination drive. Today that number is 119. And in Andalusia, the number of positive cases in care homes has fallen to 963, nearly half the figure from 15 days ago.

Debate about relaxing restrictions

The improved epidemiological situation has prompted some regions to consider relaxing coronavirus restrictions in social service residences. In the Balearic Islands, residents of care homes are allowed to leave the center if they are vaccinated, but must present a negative PCR test if they are gone for more than 72 hours. In Navarre, residents who have been vaccinated are allowed to leave and are not required to take a test upon their return. They are also allowed visits one day of the week.

A resident of a care home in Sabadell receives the second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid vaccine. Quique Garcia / EFE

Catalonia also has a plan to ease restrictions and in Extremadura, once all care homes are vaccinated, visiting rules will be relaxed and staff will no longer require periodic antigen tests. In Andalusia, residents who have received both shots of the vaccine are also now allowed to receive visitors and leave their centers.

But experts have advised caution. We are recommending that regions begin to prepare deescalation plans that allow visits. With prudence, we have to try to return to normality. We have to be more open, says Cubero.

Daniel Lopez-Acuna, a former official for the World Health Organization (WHO), agrees: It is too soon to be celebrating. People who are vaccinated could get infected or spread the infection and we cant relax the rules on leaving.

But not everyone supports this view. Maria Jose Carcelen, the coordinator of the residence 5+1, believes it is important for care homes to be opened. I have gone a year without hugging my mother, she says. It doesnt make sense that you cant touch them. They need to feel us close.

Vicente Botella, the head of the Juvany residence in Barcelona, says that while some are afraid to go out, most of the seniors are very keen to leave, to feel the air on their face, to go for a walk and go away for the weekend.

English version by Melissa Kitson.





Rome, Feb 15 : Romelu Lukaku took the center-stage at the San Siro as the Belgian scored two and set up another, helping Inter Milan conquer Lazio 3-1 to leapfrog AC Milan, into the top place of Serie A.

Both sides were in sharp form on Sunday as a win would secure Inter the top place while Lazio was coming off six consecutive Serie A victories, reports Xinhua news agency.

Inter players wore a special edition jersey with their names in Chinese characters to celebrate the Chinese Spring Festival.

The home side went ahead in the 21st minute as Lukaku laid it off for Lautaro Martinez, the Argentine broke into the box and was brought down by Wesley Hoedt. Lukaku stepped up to convert the resulting penalty, sending Pepe Reina the wrong way.

The Nerazzurri doubled the lead before the interval, when Marcelo Brozovic's tackle bounced off Manuel Lazzari, turning into an assist for Lukaku to drill home. The goal was initially ruled out for offside, but the referee corrected it after consulting the VAR.

The Biancocelesti seemed to be getting a lifeline on the hour mark, as Sergej Milinkovic-Savic's free-kick took a huge deflection off Gonzalo Escalante to go beyond a helpless Samir Handanovic.

But Inter shattered Lazio's hopes three minutes later with a textbook counter-attack as Lukaku sprinted from his own-half, resisting a shoulder-to-shoulder challenge against Marco Parolo, and squaring for Lautaro to tap in totally unmarked.

The win, coupled with AC Milan's stunning 2-0 defeat to Spezia, sent Inter to the top of the table with 50 points, one point clear of its city-rivals.

Also on Sunday, Roma swept Udinese aside 3-0, as Jordan Veretout's brace put the Giallorossi firmly in charge in the first half, and Pedro Rodriguez sealed the win before the whistle.

Elsewhere, Luis Muriel's last-gasp winner helped Atalanta edge past Cagliari 1-0. In Sunday's other fixtures, Sampdoria defeated Fiorentina 2-1, and Sassuolo won 2-1 away to Crotone.
People over age 60 wait to get the AstraZeneca vaccine for COVID-19 as Mexico begins vaccinating its elderly population for the new coronavirus in the outlying Milpa Alta borough of Mexico City, Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Mexico began vaccinating senior citizens in more than 300 municipalities across the country Monday after receiving some 860,000 doses of the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine.

Most of the effort was concentrated in remote rural communities, but in a few far-flung corners of the sprawling capital, hundreds of Mexicans over age 60 lined up before dawn for the chance to get vaccinated.

For all the fanfaremilitary planes, helicopters and trucks rolled out starting the night before to carry vaccines across the countrythe results were meager, By 4 p.m., only about 23,370 doses were administered. A few vaccination stations in the northern state of Nuevo Leon were unable to open because of a cold snap.

Mexico wants to apply all 860,000 doses in a week to 10 days, and Assistant Health Secretary Hugo Lopez-Gatell acknowledged that Monday's roll-out had been "slow," in part because vaccination personnel sometimes arrived late.

"Regarding the situation today, in effect we have to acknowledge in a self-critical way, it was not speedy enough and did not have the finesse required for the opening day of vaccination," Lopez-Gatell said.

Officials had encouraged people to not come all at once, but rather to spread themselves through the day, but with shots distributed first-come, first-served, the demand was immediate.

People over age 60 wait to get a shot of the AstraZeneca vaccine for COVID-19 as Mexico begins vaccinating its elderly population for the new coronavirus in the outlying Milpa Alta borough of Mexico City, Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

"Today is a day to celebrate," said farmer Jose Luis Gonzalez while waiting for his vaccine in Milpa Alta on Mexico City's south side. He said his family had so far been spared from the pandemic because they had isolated themselves at home, but he knows many neighbors who have died after contracting the virus.

"We feel very good and very grateful to the government," Gonzalez said.

Health workers were collecting personal data, checking temperature and blood pressure of those waiting for the vaccine and in some cases their photograph. After receiving the jab they had to wait 30 minutes as a precaution against any adverse reaction.

"We hope to live a little more peacefully," said Rosalba Flores.

The government has designated 1,000 vaccination sites, including schools and health centers, mostly in the country's poorest communities.

A soldier walks out of a health center where people over age 60 are being given the AstraZeneca vaccine for COVID-19 as Mexico begins vaccinating its elderly population against the new coronavirus in the outlying Milpa Alta borough of Mexico City, Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

The goal, as stated by Michoacan Gov. Silvano Aureoles on Twitter, is to lower the death rate among the most vulnerable. He noted that the elderly are often infected by the youth who continue gathering for parties or other large events.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador conceded Monday that bad weather and snow had kept the vaccine from arriving to some isolated areas in Mexico's northwest. He said the armed forces, which are in charge of logistics for the vaccination campaign, were working to access those areas.

Mexico started vaccinating health workers in mid-December with some 726,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine.

In addition to the AstraZeneca shots, 2 million doses of the Chinese CanSino vaccine are being bottled in Mexico. Another shipment of Pfizer's vaccine is also expected this week. Russia's Sputnik V vaccine and another from China that have received emergency approval from Mexican regulators are also expected eventually.

Lopez Obrador encouraged seniors to get vaccinated. "There aren't risks," he said, adding that the government's plan would make the vaccine available to everyone. "It's for the rich and the poor, it's for everyone."

People over age 60 wait to receive the AstraZeneca vaccine for COVID-19 as Mexico begins vaccinating its elderly population for the new coronavirus in the outlying Milpa Alta borough of Mexico City, Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Mexico has had over 1.99 million confirmed coronavirus infections and at least 174,657 confirmed deaths related to COVID-19. However, Mexico does so little testing that even government estimates of excess deaths places the real death toll at over 220,000.

The government hopes to have everyone over age 60 vaccinated by mid-April. The goal that would mean getting at least one dose into the arms of more than 15 million people in less than two months.

Mexico created a website for seniors to register for the vaccine, but it suffered from technological problems during the initial days due to the high demand. While some getting vaccinated Monday in the capital had registered on the site and received a text message confirming their slot, officials said seniors who showed up wouldn't be turned away.

Eduardo Clark, head of the capital's technology office, said on Milenio Television Monday that even those who didn't register online would be vaccinated.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

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Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 16:55:02|Editor: huaxia

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People dress up for a mini-parade during Mardi Gras season, New Orleans, Louisiana, the United States, Feb. 13, 2021. The Mardi Gras Season which lasts more than a month is held annually in the U.S. city of New Orleans from January to February. Most of the traditional Mardi Gras activities have been canceled this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some families here hosted a mini-parade at their yards or around their neighborhood to keep the spirit of carnival alive On Saturday. (Photo by Lan Wei/Xinhua)

Police will allege that Olympian Scott Miller was the director of a drug syndicate that was intent on delivering $2 million worth of ice to the town of Albury on the NSW-Victorian border.

Miller, 45, was arrested at his waterfront home in Rozelle on Tuesday morning during a police sting that was investigating a $2 million ice haul allegedly concealed inside candles.

Scott Miller has been arrested during a police drug sting. Credit:AP, Wolter Peeters

About 6am on Tuesday officers executed search warrants at a home in Balmain, a unit in Rozelle and a business in Bankstown. A 47-year-old man was arrested in Balmain.

Both men were taken to Newtown police station where investigations are continuing and charges are expected to be laid. Police are also expecting to make more arrests.
Mel Stride MP, chair of the Treasury Select Committee, outside Downing Street, London. Photo: Peter Nicholls/Reuters

Pressure is mounting on the UK government to explain how it plans to bring the country out of lockdown, amid concerns about the impact on the economy.

Mel Stride MP, a Conservative who chairs parliament's influential Treasury Select Committee, on Monday called on prime minister Boris Johnson to publish the steps he plans to take to get the UK out of lockdown. Stride said businesses needed certainty about the future to help them plan.

"After almost a year of restrictions, people and businesses need confidence that the government has a clear route of out the crisis," Stride said. To provide this confidence, the government must set out the criteria for how and when it will lift lockdown restrictions."

Johnson has promised to set out plans for exiting lockdown on 22 February but there is uncertainty about what this roadmap may look like. The government has signalled that a full lockdown will last until at least early March and reports last week suggested restrictions could remain in place until May.

READ MORE: UK economy shrank by record 10% in 2020

Britain's GDP shrunk by 9.9% in 2020, official figures confirmed last week, largely due to restrictions to curb the spread of COVID-19. It marked the biggest annual economic collapse since the Great Frost 1709.

A return to lockdown at the start of January means economic activity is almost certain to shrink once again at the start of 2021.

While generous government support has kept company collapses and job losses to a minimum so far, there are fears that more jobs and businesses could disappear the longer lockdown goes on.

Stride urged the government to carry out "combined economic and epidemiological modelling... showing how it would best optimise health and economic outcomes.

The comments came as the Treasury Select Committee published its latest report on the economic impact of COVID-19. The report chastised the government for its continued failure to address the gaps in support for many workers, including some self-employed and company directors.

WATCH: What government COVID-19 support is available?

MASON CITY, Iowa  A man charged with six crimes is pleading guilty to four of them.

Austin Stokka, 26 of Kanawha, has entered guilty pleas to two counts of 2nd degree theft, 3rd degree burglary, and credit card fraud. Charges of 4th degree theft and driving while barred will be dismissed.

Stokka was accused of breaking into a vehicle and using a stolen credit card in July 2020, then was caught in November 2020 with a stolen pickup truck and multiple items stolen from different places.

His sentencing is scheduled for March 29.

Apart from Bollywoods prominent couples who were celebrating Valentines day with beautiful posts, the newbie of the industry also left no stone unturned to celebrate the day with someone special in their lives. Rumoured couple Ishaan Khatter and Ananya Panday grabbed attention on social media after the two were spotted out in the city enjoying a lunch date together on Valentines Day. Ananya looked beautiful in a white dress which she paired along with a pair of sneakers. On the other hand, Ishaan Khatter opted for casuals and wore a dark blue t-shirt with white pants, white sneakers, and a matching cap.

Ishaan Khatter, Ananya Panday's lunch date

One of the Instagram users shared a video of the two stars stepping out from the restaurant and waving at the paparazzi who constantly asked the two to pose together. While placing his hands on Ananyas shoulders and safely guiding her to the car, Ishaan later posed for the shutter bucks. The duo also posed together for the lenses. Apart from their outing in the city, the rumoured couple had also ringed in the New Year together in the Maldives. The couple though didn't post a picture together but shared the same moments from their New Years' holiday. The two actors were spotted at the airport before leaving for the Maldives to ring in the New Year together.

Read: Ananya Panday Enjoys Family Time With Parents & Sister At Gateway; Shares Glimpses

Read: Ananya Panday-Rysa Look Adorable In Old Clips Shared By Mom Bhavana On Valentine's; Watch

Meanwhile, on the work front, Ishaan's recent performance in A Suitable Boy was praised by the critics as well as the audiences, with other memorable performances as well. He made his debut as a lead in the 2018 film Dhadak and was also recently seen in Khaali Peeli. The actor has also started shooting for his next film Phone Bhoot alongside Katrina Kaif and Siddhant Chaturvedi in Udaipur. On the other hand, Ananya Panday had earlier featured in the Bollywood movie Khaali Peeli earlier this year. She featured opposite Ishaan Khatter in the action-comedy film. Directed by debutant Maqbool Khan, Khaali Peeli is set in Mumbai and promises to be a "young, edgy roller-coaster ride that kick-starts one night, when a boy meets a girl.

Read: Ishaan Khatter posting Meryl Streep's quote On Her Success A Message For Kangana Ranaut?

Read: Ananya Panday And Ishaan Khatter Welcome 2021 In Maldives; Rumoured Couple Share Pictures

(Image credit: deluxeBollywood/ Instagram)

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.

 Close Anyone involved in Alex Salmond conspiracy should be sacked, MSP says

In a committee hearing which has now concluded, former first minister Alex Salmond called on senior members of the Scottish government and the SNP, including Nicola Sturgeons husband, to resign over allegations they conspired against him.

The list of those he said should consider their position included the Scottish governments permanent secretary, its chief law officer, Peter Murrell, the chief executive of the SNP who is married to the current first minister, and Ms Sturgeons ministers chief of staff.

He stopped short of calling on his successor to stand down, saying it was not for me to decide if Ms Sturgeon had breached the ministerial code and should be disciplined as such.

Mr Salmond appeared before the Committee on the Scottish Government Handling of Harassment Complaints as part of the Holyrood inquiry into the unlawful investigation of sexual harassment claims made against him.

He was acquitted of 13 charges of sexual assault in a criminal trial and awarded a 512,250 payout after successfully challenging the lawfulness of the government investigation.
Phuket marks a COVID Valentines Day

PHUKET: A total of 46 couples were married at special events held in Phuket yesterday (Feb 14) to commemorate Valentines Day.



By The Phuket News

Monday 15 February 2021, 04:02PM

The Muang District Office held its special mass wedding event at Promthep Cape, with its iconic views of the Andaman Sea.

A total of 32 couples were married at the event, which was overseen by Phuket Vice Governors Vikrom Jakthee and Piyapong Choowong, joined by Khenjutha Suwanjinda, Chief Judge of the Phuket Juvenile and Family Court.

Muang District Chief Somprat Prabsongkram noted, The Phuket Muang District Office understands the importance of Valentines Day and agreed to hold a special marriage registration event under the theme 2021 Valentines Day Love Happiness at Laem Promthep.

The event was held so that couples could register their marriage on the day of love, and realise the importance of their rights and duties to each other as husband and wife, Mr Somprat said.

It was held to also promote tourism to Phuket, he added.

The event included a traditional Thai wedding Khan Maak procession with two elephants leading the parade of the bride and groom and their wellwishers.

The Muang District Office, as is tradition, offered simple gifts to the newlyweds for them to use in starting their new lives together, and provided a professional photographer.

Meanwhile, further north in Phuket yesterday, 14 couples were married at a special event held at the Thalang District Office.

Of the couples, 12 were Thai, one couple were an Italian and a Thai, and another couple were one French national and a native of Madagascar, an officer at the Thalang District Office told The Phuket News today.

"The special wedding event and all activities were held only at the Thalang District Office, where all COVID-19 preventive measures were followed, the officer said.

There was a flower arch for the newlyweds to have their photo taken under and gifts were handed to the couples as well," the officer added.

The Kathu District Office, which also usually holds special wedding events for couples marrying on Valentines Day, this year did not hold any special event to mark the occasion.
WWE SIGNS FORMER EVOLVE STAR

Add Clint Barrow aka Harlem Bravado to the list of names recently signed to WWE for the NXT brand.

Originally trained by Delirious, Harlem and his brother Lance worked all over The United States, Japan and The UK for several years before Lance made the decision to retire from the business.

Since then Harlem, 31, had been a regular for PWX in the Carolinas as well as EVOLVE before that promotion shuttered last year. He captured the PWX Sixteen Tournament in January 2020.

A new WWE NXT class is slated to report to the WWE Performance Center on 2/23, so one would think Bravado would be officiallly announced around that time. Bravado joins Anthony Henry as another former EVOLVE and PWX regular to be recently signed for the NXT brand.

Earlier today, PWInsider.com broke that Taya Valkrie and Eli Drake have also been signed to NXT deals.

If you enjoy PWInsider.com you can check out the AD-FREE PWInsider Elite section, which features exclusive audio updates, news, our critically acclaimed podcasts, interviews and more by clicking here!
Shares of debt-ridden Vodafone Idea Ltd (Vi) were trading 5% lower in Monday's session after the telecom major reported a narrowing of its consolidated loss to Rs 4,532.1 crore in the third quarter ended on December 31, 2020. The company had posted a loss of Rs 6,438.8 crore in the same quarter a year ago.

This was also the 10th quarterly loss reported after the net loss of Rs 7,218 crore during the September quarter.

Following the updates, shares of India's third-largest telecom operator by market cap opened at Rs 12.14 and touched an intraday low of Rs 11.92, falling 4.9% against the previous close of Rs 12.54 on BSE. The stock price of Vodafone Idea also hit a high of Rs 12.90 intraday. The stock has fallen 5.81% in the last 2 days.

Vodafone Idea stock is trading lower than 5, 20, 50, 100, and 200-day moving averages. The stock price of Vodafone Idea has risen 2.39% in one week, 12% since the beginning of the year and 248% in one year. However, it has fallen 11.9% in one month.

The market capitalisation of the firm stood at Rs 34,712.35 crore as of today's afternoon session.

Driven by higher 4G wireless customer additions, improved service quality and cost optimization, Vodafone Idea Ltd (Vi) posted 1.7% YoY decline in its revenue from operations to Rs 10,894 crore during the reported quarter under review, from Rs 11,089.4 crore in the same quarter a year ago.

The company has proposed to raise up to Rs 25,000 crore. "The Board has approved fundraising to support our strategic intent and we are in active discussions with potential investors," Vodafone Idea MD and CEO Ravinder Takkar said.

Stocks in news: Tata Motors, Airtel, Vodafone, PowerGrid, ONGC, Godrej Industries

Share Market Live: Sensex above 52,000 for first time, Nifty at 15,280; Airtel, HDFC twins top gainers
NAIROBI, Kenya  When Ethiopias intelligence agency recently uncovered a cell of 15 people it said were casing the embassy of the United Arab Emirates, along with a cache of weapons and explosives, it claimed to have foiled a major attack with the potential to sow havoc in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.

But the Ethiopians omitted a key detail about the purported plot: who was behind it.

The only clue was the arrest of a 16th person: Accused of being the ringleader, Ahmed Ismail had been picked up in Sweden with the cooperation of friendly African, Asian and European intelligence services, the Ethiopians said.

Now American and Israeli officials say the operation was the work of Iran, whose intelligence service activated a sleeper cell in Addis Ababa last fall with orders to gather intelligence also on the embassies of the United States and Israel.

They say the Ethiopian operation was part of a wider drive to seek soft targets in African countries where Iran might avenge painful, high-profile losses such as the death of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, Irans top nuclear scientist, said to have been killed by Israel in November, and Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the Iranian spymaster killed by the United States in Iraq just over one year ago.

In Brazil, the National Federation of Journalists of Brazil (FENAJ) called on the government to develop a universal vaccination plan that considers journalists essential frontline workers during the pandemic.



"The inclusion of journalists among the priority groups is justified by the fact that similarly to other professions, such as health professionals, teachers, police or firefighters, media workers are obliged to put themselves at risk, guaranteeing every citizen access to reliable and public interest information," the union said.



In Peru, the National Association of Journalists of Peru (ANP) sent a letter to the President of the Council of Ministers, Violeta Bermudez, expressing its concern about the exclusion of journalists, photojournalists and other media workers in the priority groups for vaccination against COVID-19.



According to the union's records, 108 journalists have died nationally from the virus, the world's highest death toll per country in the profession. "It is therefore unusual that the high level of vulnerability to which our colleagues are exposed, who provide journalistic coverage from potential hotspots of infection, has not been taken into account," the ANP said.



The ANP added that while the Peruvian State has defined journalism as an essential service it is still "not treating us as such".



In Uruguay, the Central Board of Directors of the Uruguayan Press Association (APU) contacted the country's Minister of Health, Daniel Salinas, stressing that media workers are highly exposed to the virus when reporting on the ground.



"Providing society with quality information is an essential service. Journalists are daily exposed to the potential contagion of the disease," the APU claimed, adding that this should be considered by the authorities in their vaccination plans.



IFJ General Secretary Anthony Bellanger said: "From the onset of the pandemic, journalists have overwhelmingly proved the essential role they play in informing their citizens and fighting against disinformation over the Covid-19. Journalists are essential workers that should be treated as such within national COVID-19 vaccination campaigns worldwide.
Imperial Valley News Center

California Launches Interactive Map as Part of Safe Schools for All Plan

Sacramento, California - Governor Gavin Newsom Friday announced that California has launched the Safe Schools for All Plans interactive Safe Schools Reopening Map, an online tool providing a statewide snapshot of the status of school re-openings across California. The map supports local communities in making data-driven decisions to safely open classrooms and helps ensure public transparency. Todays announcement builds on the additional transparency, accountability and assistance measures incorporated in the Safe Schools for All Plan.

As COVID-19 conditions continue to improve and vaccinations ramp up throughout the state, this map will provide local communities with accessible, up-to-date information on how districts in their communities and beyond are adapting to the pandemic, including safety planning and implementation, said Governor Newsom. This map is one of many resources we have made available that will help school staff and families make informed decisions as we safely reopen our schools.

Safe Schools Reopening Map

The interactive map was developed in partnership with county offices of education and the California Collaborative for Educational Excellence. The map will display data from all school types  including school districts and charter and private schools  indicating status on reopening, safety planning and COVID-19 supports. Local communities and school staff will be able to leverage this tool when evaluating their reopening plans. The Safe Schools Reopening Map will help clarify the planning and implementation of safe reopening.

The California Department of Public Health will be adding other key data to the map, including outbreaks reported in each school district and whether the school has partnered with the Valencia Branch Lab for COVID-19 testing. To provide up-to-date information, schools will input their data every two weeks. Additional data  including student enrollment data  will be collected and displayed publicly, subject to legislative approval.

Since unveiling the Safe Schools for All Plan, the state has launched the Safe Schools for All Hub to serve as a one-stop shop for information about safe in-person instruction. The Governors 2021-22 State Budget proposes historic levels of funding for schools  nearly $90 billion, including $3.8 billion above the Prop 98 minimum  which builds on existing state and federal funds to support schools in responding to the pandemic. The State Safe Schools Team has also:

Issued updated guidance that consolidates requirements from Cal/OSHA and CDPH.

Provided direct technical assistance on key safety measures to hundreds of school leaders per week through an online portal.

Monitored and acted on feedback regarding school safety, which school staff and families can submit either via an online portal or a telephone hotline (with non-English options available).

Distributed an extra month of PPE and supplies to all public schools via county offices of education.

Onboarded over 800 schools in 41 counties to the state Valencia Branch Laboratory to support COVID-19 testing. The Lab continues to build supports tailored to schools, including dropboxes throughout the state to reduce logistical costs, an online platform that manages consent and data reporting, and certified support for testing students.

Published new COVID-19 testing resources for schools, including contact information for commercial laboratories and playbooks to support implementation.

The State Safe Schools Team will continue developing resources that support schools to plan and implement safe school reopenings, beginning with our youngest and most disproportionately impacted students. For more information, please visit the Safe Schools For All Hub: https://schools.covid19.ca.gov/

Conservative Nationalism and US Foreign Policy

Commentary

At its most exemplary, conservative nationalism is a democratically oriented and civic form of patriotism, a love of a particular place, maintaining that the world is best governed by independent nation-states and that only within the context of such states can a free citizenry experiment with constitutional forms of self-rule. In foreign policy, conservative nationalists focus on preserving and promoting their own countrys interests, rights, values, security, traditions, and way of life, in the belief that it is entirely legitimate to do so. Within the United States, a kind of conservative American nationalism was the mainstream bipartisan political and foreign policy tradition for most of the countrys history. But Americas Founders also hoped that the nations example of popular self-government would eventually spread worldwide, and they saw no contradiction between holding out that hope, or even pressing it forward, and preserving U.S. national sovereignty.

As a matter of historical record, the original American colonies were founded by English Protestant settlers, and this specific cultural and religious heritage provided the context for U.S. founding principles. Over the years, some U.S. nationalists have defined their identity mainly in religious or ethnic terms. This has long encouraged tensions between an ethnic definition of the American nation and a civic one. Yet in their Declaration of Independence, the American revolutionaries stated that all men are created equal, justifying their rebellion in part by claiming certain universal natural rights. These claims were informed by beliefs well described as classically liberal. There has consequently been within the United States, from the very beginning, a kind of American creed, a civic religion or national identity with some notably classical liberal elements, including the rule of law, individual freedom, majority rule, equality of right, enterprise, progress, and limited government. As 19th century Marxists such as Friedrich Engels noted, this classical liberal creed made it difficult to promote socialism within the United States. This is what Engels meant by American exceptionalismand he found it exceptionally frustrating.

In terms of its worldwide implications, the leaders of the American Revolution hoped that it would encourage the spread of republican forms of government and the creation of a new international system, characterized by peaceful commercial exchange, individual liberty, the rule of law, and human progress. They rejected the 18th century European state system as corrupt, militaristic, warlike, and autocratic. Of course, the pressing question was inevitably how to interact with states still part of that Old World system. To varying degrees, the Founders and succeeding generations embraced Americas westward continental expansion, to create what Thomas Jefferson described as an empire of liberty. They also embraced commercial opportunities overseas. In this sense, U.S. economic and territorial expansion beyond existing boundaries long predated Americas later rise as a global power. Simultaneously, however, these very same early statesmen cherished the preservation of U.S. independence, and for that matter held to a policy of prudent disengagement from European alliances, a policy laid out formally by George Washington in his 1796 Farewell Address, in which he said that the great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. This emphasis on avoiding what Jefferson later called entangling alliances became a key component of U.S. foreign policy throughout the 19th century. Early American statesmen saw no essential contradiction between expanding the sphere of republican governments and preserving their nations independence.

Partisan political debate over the precise foreign policy implications of American nationalism was evident from the start. Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton agreed on American exceptionalism, U.S. sovereignty, and the long-term expansion of republican governments. They did not agree on the foreign policy implications. Whereas Jefferson envisioned the United States as a vast, decentralized, agrarian republic, Hamilton looked to encourage a centralized treasury and nascent American manufacturing, along with the other apparatus of state power in the international arena, including a professionalized armed forces. During the 1790s, Jefferson tended to sympathize with revolutionary France; Hamilton, with Great Britain. It was precisely these differences between Jefferson and Federalists such as Hamilton that Washington hoped to quell in issuing his Farewell Address. To his mind, one advantage of non-entanglement overseas was the avoidance of domestic factional hostility inside the United States.

Each round of 19th century American territorial expansion was typically characterized by some significant internal debate over whether such expansion was constitutional, cost-effective, or appropriate. These genuine philosophical differences were often bound up with sectional interests and party politicsalong with support of, or opposition to, individual presidents. And presidents sometimes acted aggressively to direct American territorial expansion. Jefferson, for example, decried the centralization of executive authority, but when the opportunity presented itself in 1803 to purchase the vast Louisiana territory from France, he freely did so, admitting that he had stretched the Constitution until it cracked. Later waves of attempted territorial expansion and U.S. warfare against Britain, Mexico, and Native American tribes brought intense controversy and debate, pitting those Americans who favored expansion against those who did not. Both sides often argued that the other was betraying U.S. founding principles. And yet Americas nationalist foreign policy consensus held firm. It was a heated dispute between partisans who shared the same underlying premises.

Out of the heat of World War I, President Woodrow Wilson offered a fundamental alternative to the American nationalist foreign policy tradition. He conceived of and explained his decision to go to war in terms of his countrys ability not only to help defeat Germany militarily but also to lead in the creation of a transformed global order characterized by democratic governments, national self-determination, collective security, open trading arrangements, freedom of the seas, multilateral organization, the peaceful settlement of disputes, and general disarmament. A League of Nations was to be the capstone of this new U.S.-led order, containing at its heart what Wilson envisioned as a virtual guarantee of territorial integrity and political independence for each member state. Wilsons great innovation was not simply to argue that American liberal values needed to be vindicated by force on the European continent, though this was dramatic enough in itself. Nor was it simply to tie his League project to the achievement of progressive reforms inside the United States, though he did that as well. His innovation was also to say that only through binding, universal, and formal multilateral commitments on the part of the United States could progressive liberal values be vindicatedworldwide. And in the process, Wilson disparaged the goal of maintaining a balance of power. In the end, the U.S. Senate refused to pass the Versailles Treaty by the required two-thirds vote. But Wilson had laid down a marker, ideologically, that would not disappear. The Wilsonian vision would become an animating force in American foreign policy, politically and internationally, over the course of the next century.

Republicans, for their part, had grave concerns about Wilsons liberal internationalist vision from the beginning, along with its domestic implications. But they disagreed over how far exactly to correct or resist it. In particular, they were divided between hawkish forms of conservative American nationalism and more non-interventionist versions. As of 1918-19, the most common foreign policy view among Republican senators favored a limited postwar alliance with France and Great Britain. But the final outcome of the League debate was essentially a victory for non-interventionists like Senator Robert LaFollette. That outcome underpinned GOP foreign policy approaches throughout the 1920s and into the opening years of World War II. Then Republicans again divided, with one side arguing for U.S. aid to Great Britain against Nazi Germany and the other side opposing it. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor settled that debate in favor of the GOPs foreign policy hawks.

The rise of the Soviet Union after World War II reinforced the new predominance of national security hawks within the GOP. Strict non-interventionists were marginalized. But in reality, many conservative nationalists had to be dragged into a set of postwar U.S. commitments overseas, and the only thing that ensured their support was a fierce anti-Communism. No subsequent Republican president could entirely ignore the continued force of conservative American nationalism at the grassroots level, and most achieved political and policy success by incorporating aspects of it into their overall approach. The manner in which they did so varied considerably from one president to the next. Those who failed to strike effective balances on this scoresuch as Senator Barry Goldwater, the Republican presidential nominee in 1964tended to lose elections, whatever their other virtues.

In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, the most common Republican feeling with regard to the partys foreign policy record was one of satisfaction. But already in the 1990s, non-interventionists had resurfaced, led by social conservative Pat Buchanan, on the one hand, and libertarian Ron Paul, on the other. Though they seemed marginal at the time, over the long run, these voicesand Buchanans, in particularproved prophetic. President George W. Bush managed to rally most hardline GOP nationalists to his policy of a War on Terror, combined with the 2003 invasion of Iraq and a freedom agenda for the Middle East. But frustrations in Iraq raised some obvious criticisms, and once Bush left office the GOP again splintered into its most basic divisions. In 2016, insurgent candidate Donald Trump took advantage of these divisions to do what had previously seemed impossibleupend the dominance of foreign policy hawks in favor of other approaches. The actual foreign policy of the Trump administration, however, was a hybrid or mixture of these tendencies.

The Trump administrations foreign policy is therefore best understood as a resurgence of one specific form of conservative American nationalisma less interventionist versionagainst Wilsonian foreign policy legacies in both parties. Trumps foreign policy emphases appear unprecedented only if earlier historical experience is ignored. To be sure, Trump did not run as a liberal internationalist. But neither did most 20th century Republican presidents. Nor is doubling down on dreamy Wilsonian foreign policy assumptions the great necessity of our time. The liberal internationalist or Wilsonian tradition suggests that long-term global progress toward greater economic interdependence, democracy promotion, and multilateral organization ultimately combine to leave ancient patterns of power politics obsolete. Each post-Cold War president prior to Trump operated on some key premise within this tradition. President Bill Clinton hoped that expanding the zone of market-oriented U.S. allies through democratic enlargement would promote American values and interests at minimal cost. President George W. Bush hoped that preventive military action, combined with regime change in Iraq, would undermine support for jihadist terrorists inside the Muslim world. President Barack Obama hoped that international accommodations led by the United States would help to promote multilateral coordination around liberal policy goals. No doubt all three sets of hopes were sincere. And all three had certain foreign policy successes. Yet in the end, all three were overly optimistic in very significant ways.

To be specific: history never ended. Historically normal patterns of strategic competition, international conflict, and great-power politics never entirely disappeared. Authoritarian powers both large and small discovered new ways to adapt and survive. And contrary to post-Cold War expectations, the major powers of the world did not all converge upon a single liberal democratic model or ideal. If anything, the 21st century has seen a resurgence of great power competition. The conclusion of the Cold War did not bring an end to geopolitical realities. It only reconfigured them.

For conservative nationalists, as for all Americans, the realization that progress is not inevitable, and that history has not ended, ought to lead to a shift in foreign policy emphases. Expanding international cooperation and human rights are both worthy goals, but neither in itself can be the starting point for U.S. grand strategy. Greater weight must be placed on supporting Americas allies and pushing back against its rivals and adversaries within an internationally competitive environment. The answer is not to disengage. Nor is to think that rivals can be lectured into accommodationmuch less blasted away in a burst of regime change. Rather, the answer is for the United States to prepare for steady, long-term, robust competition with a range of serious competitorsabove all, Chinaso as to better protect existing democracies against a variety of threats. What is required is a carefully calibrated and tough-minded politics of prudence.

U.S. diplomatic efforts should start with traditional alliances, rather than obvious competitors. There is little point in being half-hearted while protecting American primacy. But there is also no need to prioritize strategies of preventive war or regime change as uppermost doctrinally, since unsuccessful interventions overseas only serve to undermine broader U.S. interests. The default preference should be regionally differentiated strategies of attrition, assertive containment, and peace through strength. Transformational global projects or promises from all directions must now be met with considerable skepticism. Todays great challenge is not to promote or transform any progressive world order but simply to defend existing democracies. The United States remains much stronger than some believe. If it pursues tough-minded foreign policy approaches, tapping into its profound capabilities, it can outlast its challengers and succeed. That will involve a bringing together of confidence and self-restraint, in the best traditions of American foreign policy.

From RealClearWire.

Colin Dueck is a professor in the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University and a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. His most recent book is Age of Iron: On Conservative Nationalism (Oxford, 2019).

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Bendable concrete and other CO2-infused cement mixes could dramatically cut global emissions

(Nanowerk News) One of the big contributors to climate change is right beneath your feet, and transforming it could be a powerful solution for keeping greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere.

The production of cement, the binding element in concrete, accounted for 7% of total global carbon dioxide emissions in 2018. Concrete is one of the most-used resources on Earth, with an estimated 26 billion tons produced annually worldwide. That production isnt expected to slow down for at least two more decades.

Given the scale of the industry and its greenhouse gas emissions, technologies that can reinvent concrete could have profound impacts on climate change.

As engineers working on issues involving infrastructure and construction, we have been designing the next generation of concrete technology that can reduce infrastructures carbon footprint and increase durability. That includes CO 2 -infused concrete that locks up the greenhouse gas and can be stronger and even bendable.

The industry is ripe for dramatic change, particularly with the Biden administration promising to invest big in infrastructure projects and cut U.S. emissions at the same time. However, to put CO 2 to work in concrete on a wide scale in a way that drastically cuts emissions, all of its related emissions must be taken into account.

Rethinking concrete

Concrete is made up of aggregate materials  primarily rocks and sand  along with cement and water.

Because about 80% of concretes carbon footprint comes from cement, researchers have been working to find substitute materials.

Industrial byproducts such as iron slag and coal fly ash are now frequently used to reduce the amount of cement needed. The resulting concrete can have significantly lower emissions because of that change. Alternative binders, such as limestone calcined clay, can also reduce cement use. One study found that using limestone and calcinated clay could reduce emissions by at least 20% while also cutting production costs.

Apart from developing blended cements, researchers and companies are focusing on ways to use captured CO 2 as an ingredient in the concrete itself, locking it away and preventing it from entering the atmosphere. CO 2 can be added in the form of aggregates  or injected during mixing. Carbonation curing, also known as CO 2 curing, can also be used after concrete has been cast.

These processes turn CO 2 from a gas to a mineral, creating solid carbonates that may also improve the strength of concrete. That means structures may need less cement, reducing the amount of related emissions. Companies such as CarbonCure and Solidia have developed technologies to use these processes for concrete poured at construction sites and in precast concrete, such as cinder blocks and other construction materials.

Carbon dioxide can make up a significant percentage of concrete mass. (Image: Lucca Henrion/University of Michigan, CC BY-ND) (click on image to enlarge)

At the University of Michigan, we are working on composites that produce a bendable concrete material that allows thinner, less brittle structures that require less steel reinforcement, further reducing related carbon emissions. The material can be engineered to maximize the amount of CO 2 it can store by using smaller particles that readily react with CO 2 , turning it to mineral.

The CO 2 -based bendable concrete can be used for general buildings, water and energy infrastructure, as well as transportation infrastructure. Bendable concrete was used in the 61-story Kitahama tower in Osaka, Japan, and roadway bridge slabs in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

The challenge of lifecycle emissions

These cutting-edge technologies can start addressing concrete infrastructures carbon footprint, but barriers still exist.

In a study published Feb. 8, three of us looked at the lifecycle emissions from infusing CO 2 into concrete and found that estimates did not always account for emissions from CO 2 capture, transportation and use. With colleagues, we came up with strategies for ensuring that carbon curing has a strong emissions benefit.

Overall, we recommend developing a standard CO 2 curing protocol. Lab experiments show that CO 2 curing can improve concretes strength and durability, but results vary with specific curing procedures and concrete mixes. Research can improve the conditions and the timing of steps in the curing process to increase concretes performance. Electricity use  the largest emissions source during curing  can also be reduced by streamlining the process and possibly by using waste heat.

Advanced concrete mixes, bendable concrete in particular, already begin to address these issues by increasing durability.

Merging infrastructure and climate policy

In 2020, a wide range of companies announced steps to reduce their emissions. However, government investment and procurement policies are still needed to transform the construction industry.

Local governments are taking the first steps. Low embodied carbon concrete rules and projects to reduce the amount of cement in concrete have cropped up around the country, including in Marin County, California; Hastings-on-Hudson, New York; and a sidewalk pilot in Portland, Oregon.

In New York and New Jersey, lawmakers have proposed state-level policies that would provide price discounts in the bidding process to proposals with the lowest emissions from concrete. These policies could serve as a blueprint for reducing carbon emissions from concrete production and other building materials.

Nationally, the crumbling of federally managed infrastructure has been a steadily growing crisis. The Biden administration could start to address those problems, as well as climate change, and create jobs through a strategic infrastructure program.

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As many as 40 per cent of Peruvians are estimated to have contracted the coronavirus, an expert with the National Institute of Health (INS) told the Andina news agency on Monday.

People who developed antibodies after infection represent 40 per cent of 32 million Peruvians.

This means that more than 12 million Peruvians have been infected with the novel coronavirus, infectious disease specialist Lely Solari said.

Peru has so far confirmed more than 1.2 million COVID-19 cases, including 1.1 million recoveries and more than 43,000 deaths.

Ms Solari explained that discrepancy between the true number of infections and confirmed cases exist across the world, as testing lags behind the virus spread.

(NAN)
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Cleveland State Universitys provost and senior Vice President for Academic Affairs will step down this fall to rejoin the faculty, the university announced on Saturday.

Jianping Zhu held the provost position for six years and worked for three years as the dean for CSUs College of Graduate Studies. Most recently, he co-chaired one of five committees which presented recommendations for CSU 2.0, a university-wide review of CSUs operations and offerings. He led the academic committee, which presented the longest set of recommendations, including potential reconfigurations for the schools colleges.

When we look back upon our collective achievements during his tenure  over 200 new faculty hired, many new teaching and research labs/classrooms renovated or added, numerous nationally recognized student success initiatives, the establishment of CSU Global, a successful transition to remote teaching and learning last spring and leadership of the CSU 2.0 process, to name a few  it is clear that none of this would have been possible without his steady leadership, President Harlan Sands wrote in a letter to campus.

Zhu, who holds a doctorate in applied mathematics, will join the faculty as a mathematics professor beginning in Fall 2021. The university will undergo a national search to replace him.

Dr. Zhu remains strongly focused on serving CSU in his remaining time as Provost and is committed to working closely with me and our Deans, Vice Presidents and faculty leaders to ensure continued momentum on our HLC reaccreditation, developing our CSU 2.0 roadmap and successfully completing spring semester, Sands wrote.

The next step in the CSU 2.0 process is for leadership to review recommendations made by the committees and to create a road-map for next steps. A note previously sent out about the process in January estimated that guide would come in mid-March.

Previous higher education coverage:

-- Cleveland State University releases preliminary recommendations for universitys future: Read the reports

-- Cleveland State University discussing consolidation of colleges under CSU 2.0 plan

-- Cleveland State basketball recruiting: A local talent, a massive center, a smart forward  Terry Pluto

-- Kent State president shares what fall semester could look like, approaching normal




By Baek Byung-yeul







Hyundai Motor Group's luxury brand Genesis is enjoying a favorable reception in the United States with its mid-size GV80 SUV being recognized as a strong candidate to compete with renowned luxury SUVs.







Autotrader, a U.S.-based online market place for car purchases and sales, announced a list of "Best New Cars for 2021" recently to help consumers find their match. The list of 12 new recommended vehicles included four from Hyundai Motor Group. Those models were the Genesis GV80, Hyundai's Santa Fe SUV and Kia's K5 sedan and Sorento SUV.







Autotrader said its Best New Cars for 2021 list names 12 vehicles selected by a team of experts from the online marketplace, who collectively tested and scored new models using a range of criteria.







Each chosen vehicle has unique features specific to different lifestyle needs, including interior comfort, build quality, tech features and driving experience, the website added.







Autotrader recognized the GV80 because the model is "a midsize premium SUV with available three-row seating that starts under $50,000, squarely competing with much more expensive European rivals." It added: "This imposing, slick, refined, and comfortable SUV may be completely new, but it's already at the top of its class."







Hyundai Motor Group rolled out the GV80 in the United States in November to vie with luxury SUVs such as the BMW X5, the Mercedes-Benz GLE and the Lexus RX. The GV80 has already attracted explosive popularity in the Korean market since its January 2020 release, with sales surpassing 30,000 vehicles from January to November.







Hyundai Motor Group said the Genesis GV80 has helped its luxury brand increase its presence in the U.S., selling more than 3,000 vehicles from November to January. "Sales of Genesis vehicles have increased significantly as the Genesis GV80 SUV has drawn popularity since its release in late 2020," the company said.


A woman gestures from her window towards reporters outside the Radison Blu hotel after arriving at Heathrow airport, and now quarantining, in London, on Feb. 15, 2021. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Hotel Quarantine Comes Into Force in UK

New rules requiring some incoming passengers to quarantine in hotels came into force in the UK on Monday morning.

The UK government announced the measure earlier this month in order to prevent variants of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, also known as the novel coronavirus, from entering the country.

From Monday, people arriving in England from 33 countries on the UKs red list, including southern Africa, South America, Portugal and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), must enter the country through a designated port and have pre-booked a quarantine package to stay at one of the governments managed quarantine facilities.

The UK government said it had reached deals with 16 hotels so far, providing 4,963 rooms for the quarantine system, with a further 58,000 rooms currently on standby.

As this deadly virus evolves, so must our defences, said Britains Health Secretary Matt Hancock.

The rules coming into force today will bolster the quarantine system and provide another layer of security against new variants at the border, he said in a statement.

He emphasised that the new measures are important to protect our vaccination programme.

The government announced on Sunday that 15 million people across the UK had received the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

But there have been concerns that the CCP virus variants first found in South Africa and Brazil, which scientists believe may be more transmissible and more resistant to antibodies, could reduce the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines.

Britains main opposition Labour party has criticised the governments new quarantine measures as too little, too late.

In Scotland, the devolved administration is enforcing more draconian measures than in England, requiring travellers from all countries except Ireland to quarantine in hotels.

Scottish officials have expressed concerns that passengers landing at an English airport could then travel to Scotland and avoid the need to quarantine.

Asked at her regular media briefing if she consider closing the border with England to close the loophole, Scotlands First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said: I cant rule it out.

I would like to have the most effective system in place here. It would be better if we had a three nations approach where the border across the island Scotland, England, and Wales share had the same provisions in place.

Matt Hancock, the UK health secretary, told the BBC that he was happy to have conversations with the Scottish government about closing the loophole by providing quarantine facilities for people arriving in England before onward travel to Scotland.

Aspen, CO (81611)

Today

Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 41F. Winds SSE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%..

Tonight

Thunderstorms during the evening will give way to partly cloudy skies after midnight. Low 41F. Winds SSE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 70%.
Japanese voice actress Ai Kayano was embroiled in controversy on Chinese social media after she revealed that she recently paid a visit to the Yasukuni Shrine.

The controversy came after Kayano said in a broadcast on February 11 that she paid a visit to the Yasukuni Shrine recently and regarded the visit as a comfortable one and that air is fresh there.

Yasukuni Shrine honors Japans most notorious war criminals.

The broadcast was deleted on YouTube and Twitter as of press time.

Some netizens on Chinese social media called for the withdrawal of the aminations that she dubbed in, saying her visit to the Yasukuni Shrine touches the bottom line of the Chinese people and that there is zero tolerance over the issue.

Political issues cannot be compromised for. How could she still want the Chinese market without respecting Chinese fans? A fan of animated films told the Global Times on Sunday.

Despite the outrage caused, some other Chinese netizens say withdrawal of all aminations is an overaction.
She previously said during an interview that she created a sex tape and was planning to sell it for 1million when her money ran out.

And now, Gemma Collins has seemingly revealed the saucy confession was completely made-up after she appeared on Piers Morgan's Life Stories last week and pledged to delete the explicit video.

The TV sensation, 40, said that she landed in 'hot water' after the Good Morning Britain host, 55, quizzed her on the concocted sex tape.

Coming clean: Gemma Collins confirmed her alleged sex tape was 'one god awful lie,' after she appeared on Piers Morgan's Life Stories last week and pledged to delete the explicit video

According to The Sun, she discussed the major fib on the new comedy show, Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable, which airs on Tuesday.

She said: 'So basically, I said in an interview once, thinking it was funny, "yeah I've done a sex tape like Kim K."

'Next thing, Im being interviewed by Piers Morgan on Life Stories and he leads me in it and he said, "you've done a sex tape haven't you".

'I thought, s**t, and now Im in deep. Ive got myself in hot water... There is no sex tape. Its just one big god awful lie.'

Caught out: The TV sensation, 40, said that she landed in 'hot water' after the Good Morning Britain host, 55, quizzed her on the concocted sex tape

Reveal all: According to The Sun , she discussed the major fib on Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable, which airs on Tuesday

Gemma's representatives declined to comment when approached by Mailonline.

During Piers Morgan's Life Stories on Thursday night, she discussed her tumultuous relationship with former TOWIE star, James 'Arg' Argent.

When asked by Piers if the tape featured an unnamed man, she responded: 'Well 'course, I might go skint one day, and Ive gotta do a Kim K. Do you know what? Sex sells.

'Its probably about 20 minutes long, but weve all done it with our partners, you know. Im normal.

Quizzed: When asked by Piers if the tape featured an unnamed man, she responded: 'Well course, I might go skint one day, and Ive gotta do a Kim K. Do you know what? Sex sells'

Emotional discussion: She also discussed her tumultuous relationship with former TOWIE star, James 'Arg' Argent

'Id like to set up a pay-to-view line where they ring in, I take 1.50 on the phone call and then 3 or a fiver to watch the thing, so Id be cashing in myself but I dont know if thats possible.'

However, when questioned as to whether 'everything' in her life is for sale, and if it is worth compromising her moral compass, the former TOWIE star added: 'Im not prepared to do it.

'Id rather go and work 24-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week, 365-days-a-year before Id have to resort to that.

'Im gonna go home and delete it after youve given me the riot act about it.'

In an interview on Loose Women in 2018, the reality star confessed once more that she completely fabricated her sex tape, after panicking that she needed to be funny during an interview.

When asked if her boyfriend at-the-time, James, 33, was the lucky man featured, the blonde simply said: 'I can't confirm or deny the sex tape.'

Leaving the panel confused, Janet Street-Porter then asked why she had confessed to filming a saucy video in the first place.

Gemma explained: 'I was being interviewed and thought 'I have to be funny and out there' so I said that and panicked and thought 'how can I give them something'.

In her usually playful style however, she added: 'When I'm in the bedroom there's not enough time to record  I'm going for it Beyonce style. I've not got time to be doing that and record at the same time.'
Pakistans Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi is set to start a three-day visit to Egypt on Tuesday upon an invitation by his Egyptian counterpart, Sameh Shoukry.

According to an official statement by the Pakistani foreign ministry on Monday, the visit comes on the back of the meetings held between Pakistans Prime Minister Imran Khan and Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi.

Both leaders met on the sidelines of the summit of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in Mecca in 2019 and then on the sidelines of the 74th session of the UN General Assembly in New York in the same year.

In 2020, PM Khan had a telephone conversation with President El-Sisi regarding the Global Initiative on Debt Relief for developing countries, which was proposed by Islamabad and was supported by Cairo.

During these meetings, the two leaders agreed to further strengthen bilateral cooperation and enhance high-level exchanges, the statement added.

The three-day visit will include detailed consultations with Egyptian counterpart officials and with leading Egyptian businessmen and members of the Pakistani community.

The visit is expected to further strengthen and diversify Pakistans bilateral ties with Egypt, noted the statement.

The statement added that Egypt plays a key role in the Middle East, while its deep linkages with the African continent make it a gateway to Africa.

Pakistan values its partnership with Egypt, which is in line with its desire to forge stronger ties with the Islamic world, as well as its initiative dubbed Engage Africa, the Pakistani foreign ministrys statement pointed out.

The two countries have similar perceptions on a range of regional and global issues, with more than 40 agreements signed between both sides in diverse fields, providing a firm basis for enhanced cooperation.

Bilateral cooperation is advanced through strong institutional mechanisms, including the Joint Ministerial Commission, Annual Bilateral Consultations, and Joint Business Council, the statement added.

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Erbil: A rocket attack at a US-led military base in Kurdish northern Iraq has killed a civilian contractor and wounded six other people, including an American service member, according to initial reports, the US coalition in Iraq said.

It was the most deadly attack to hit US-led forces in almost a year in Iraq, where tensions have escalated between them, their Iraqi and Kurdish allies on one side and Iran-aligned militias on the other.

A coalition spokesman said on Twitter the attack hit coalition forces in the Kurdish regional capital of Erbil, and that more details would follow.

One shell hit near a residential area in Erbil.

Kurdish security sources said at least three rockets landed near Erbil International Airport in the autonomous region late at night. Reuters reporters heard several loud explosions and saw a fire break out near the airport.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are to give their first televised interview about Megxit to chat show Queen Oprah Winfrey (Yui Mok/PA)

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are to give their first televised interview about Megxit, telling chat show Queen Oprah Winfrey the reasons why they walked away from the monarchy.

Harry and Meghans sit down chat with the famous broadcaster will be aired on March 7, just a few weeks from the one-year anniversary of the couple ending their roles as senior royals.

It is expected that the Queen will review Harrys honorary military titles before the anniversary.

Expand Close Harry and Meghan are expected to talk about the reasons why they moved to America with son Archie (Toby Melville/PA) / Facebook

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Whatsapp Harry and Meghan are expected to talk about the reasons why they moved to America with son Archie (Toby Melville/PA)

Harrys forces appointments  Captain General of the Royal Marines, Honorary Air Force Commandant of the Royal Air Force Base Honington, and Honorary Commodore-in-Chief of the Royal Naval Commands Small Ships and Diving  were put on hold for a year after Megxit, and he is not currently allowed to take on any roles using them.

The decision to speak publicly and the information revealed could widen the divisions between Harry and his brother the Duke of Cambridge, who are known to have a troubled relationship.

In the months leading up to the bombshell announcement in January 2020 saying they wanted to become financially independent, the rift in the royal family was laid bare when Harry said in an interview he and William were on different paths and have good and bad days in their relationship.

The interview will be staged in two parts, with the duchess  who announced on Sunday she is expecting her second child  being interviewed about stepping into life as a royal, marriage, motherhoodto how she is handling life under intense public pressure.

Later, they will be joined by Harry and the couple will speak about their move to the United States last year and their future plans.

Oprah With Meghan And Harry: A CBS Primetime Special  has been described as an intimate conversation by the US television network.

Winfrey is a personal friend of Meghan and attended her royal wedding in May 2018, and there was speculation at the time the couple were likely to be interviewed by the celebrity.

Expand Close Winfrey attending Harry and Meghans wedding (Ian West/PA) / Facebook

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The global chat show star has welcomed everyone from Tom Cruise and Madonna to former president Barack Obama to sit down and discuss their lives.

CBS said in the statement: Winfrey will speak with Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, in a wide-ranging interview, covering everything from stepping into life as a royal, marriage, motherhood, philanthropic work to how she is handling life under intense public pressure.

Later, the two are joined by Prince Harry as they speak about their move to the United States and their future hopes and dreams for their expanding family.

The last royal television interview aimed at setting the record straight failed spectacularly when the Duke of York appeared on a special edition of the BBCs Newsnight.

Andrews attempt to explain his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein led to him withdrawing from public life after he was accused of lacking empathy for Epsteins victims.

Expand Close Andrew being interviewed by Newsnight broadcaster Emily Maitlis (Mark Harrison/BBC/PA) / Facebook

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Whatsapp Andrew being interviewed by Newsnight broadcaster Emily Maitlis (Mark Harrison/BBC/PA)

His ex-wife Sarah, Duchess of York was interviewed by Winfrey in 2010 after she was left humiliated by a newspaper sting that caught her offering to sell access to Andrew for 500,000.

She repeatedly talked about herself in the third person and also broke down in tears during the confessional interview.

It is not known if Harry and Meghan informed the royal household in the UK about their plans to be interviewed, but as non-working members of the monarchy they do not have to give notice of their media commitments.

Buckingham Palace declined to comment.
Representative Image. (Image: Twitter)

HCL Technologies on February 15 announced it has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur (IITK) to collaborate in the area of cybersecurity.

As part of the MoU, HCL will work with C3iHub, a specialised cybersecurity research center at IITK, the compay said in a statement.

1.2 lakh HCL Tech employees to get one-time bonus

"This collaboration will bring together the countrys brightest minds, advanced research capabilities and global resources to develop advanced solutions in the area of cybersecurity. HCL and IITK will bring in real world industry exposure to carry out joint initiatives and research," the statement reads.

According to the MoU, the teams would develop a security framework and solutions for cybersecurity challenges in current and future operational technologies. Apart from this, the teams would also work together to discover and manage cyber threats, vulnerabilities, and risks for critical infrastructure.

Among other details, the information technology (IT) services firm stated that it would work with IITK to identify selective research projects in order to bring them to scale. These projects will be tested on international benchmarks for potential commercialisation to products and services. However, the testing and development will be performed in a special HCL environment.

On February 11, HCL Tech announced it has has been named a winner of the prestigious Quality Award at the 2020 Annual Cisco Procurement Supplier Day.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is under mounting pressure to lift all COVID-19 lockdowns in two and a half months as lockdown-sceptic Tories called on him to commit to a timetable for easing the restrictions with a complete end to controls by the end of April.

In a letter to the prime minister, leaders of the Covid Recovery Group (CRG) said the "tremendous pace" of the vaccination rollout means restrictions in England should begin easing from early March, the a local newspaper reported on Sunday.

They said ministers must produce a cost-benefit analysis to justify any controls that remain in place after that date, with a "road-map" stating when they would be removed, Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday.

The letter was organised by the CRG chair and deputy chair, Mark Harper and Steve Baker, and was said to have the backing of 63 Conservative Party lawmakers in all.

The letter was sent to the prime minister at a time when a government scientific advisor warned that Britain could face another coronavirus wave as big as the current one if lockdown restrictions were all lifted.

Professor Steven Riley, a member of the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Modelling, has said the rollout of the vaccination program did not mean coronavirus controls could be dropped.

"No vaccine is perfect," he told a BBC radio program. "We are certainly going to be in the situation where we can allow more infection in the community but there is a limit."

"If for some reason we were to choose to just pretend it (coronavirus) wasn't here any more then there is the potential to go back to a wave that is a similar size to the one that we are in now," he added.

The prime minister confirmed Saturday that the reopening of schools "is still his priority", followed by opening shops and then hospitality.

This was further reiterated by British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, who said on Sunday that the British government remained focused on reopening of schools on March 8.

The British ministers said they are confident they will meet their target of getting an offer of a vaccine to all 15 million people in Britain in their four priority groups, including all over 70s, by February 15's deadline.

During a visit to a vaccine manufacturing facility in Teesside on Saturday, Johnson said he was "optimistic" he could announce plans for a "cautious" easing of the rules when he sets out his "road-map" out of lockdown on February 22.

However, he said ministers would have to look at the data "very, very hard" before taking any decisions as they did not want to be forced into a "reverse ferret" if the disease started to spread again.

In contrast, the CRG, in their letter, said that the government's "national priority" of re-opening schools in England by March 8 "must" be achieved.

By Easter, they said pubs, restaurants and other hospitality venues should be able to open in a way that is Covid-secure but still allows them to operate "in a commercially viable manner".

And by the end of April, when all the government's top nine priority groups, including all over 50s, should have been offered a vaccine, they said there will be "no justification" for any legislative restrictions to remain.

"Covid is a serious disease and we must control it. However, just like Covid, lockdowns and restrictions cause immense social and health damage and have a huge impact on people's livelihoods," the letter said.

"The vaccine gives us immunity from Covid but it must also give us permanent immunity from COVID-related lockdowns and restrictions," it said.

By March 8, the government's top four priority groups, which account for 88 per cent of deaths and 55 per cent of hospitalizations, will have had their first dose of the vaccine at least three weeks earlier allowing time for protection to kick in, it said.

"All restrictions remaining after March 8 should be proportionate to the ever-increasing number of people we have protected," it added.

"The burden is on ministers to demonstrate the evidence of effectiveness and proportionality with a cost-benefit analysis for each restriction, and a roadmap for when they will be removed," it noted.

Downing Street refused to be drawn on reports suggesting that restrictions on meeting friends in a park could be among the first to be lifted once schools are back.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out coronavirus vaccines.
A leading Australian online betting agency has devised a series of hilarious market odds ahead of Wednesday's press conference where Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews will address his state's snap lockdown.

Andrews' briefings have become the norm in recent months during the Covid pandemic, and the spotlight will once again be on the Victorian leader as he discusses the latest developments.

He has become an easy target for many cynics due to his tendency to orchestrate press conferences in a similar fashion.

The odds devised by Sportsbet include whether the streamed briefing will begin at precisely 12pm or later ($1.40) or from 11.59am or earlier ($2.75).

Plenty of punters will be looking on with interest to see if Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews (pictured above) dons his famous North Face jacket on Wednesday

Melbourne's streets have been deserted the past few days as the state endures another lockdown

Face masks (pictured above) have been mandatory for residents in Victoria during lockdown

Other categories will draw wins if Andrews dons a tie ($4.85) or no tie ($1.15) as well as whether his infamous North Face jacket ($5) will get a start.

For punters chasing a bit of value, any jacket that is not a suit blazer or North Face jacket is paying a juicy $12.

Andrews' tendency to start every press conference in a similar vein is also acknowledged, with the premier asking if 'everyone is right/ready/good/set to go' paying just $1.02.

His well used catchphrases will also be under the microscope, including the likes of 'circuit breaker' ($1.02), 'vaccine' ($1.05) and 'overseas travel' ($1.20), virtual certainties to be uttered by Andrews according to the bookies.

Long shot offers include 'these are the rules' ($1.65), the 'virus does not discriminate' ($1.75) and 'ScoMo' at $7.50.

Victoria's health authorities haven't ruled out extending the state's snap five-day Covid lockdown beyond Wednesday.

Victoria's Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton confirmed the virus had 'sat in the air' of a quarantine hotel in Melbourne after a guest at the Holiday Inn used a nebuliser in their room, a device similar to an inhaler that turns liquid medications into an aerosol spray.

The 'aerosolised' virus could have escaped into the corridor when the door was opened to deliver a meal, Sutton said, before infecting a worker who then tested positive on February 7.

The decision was quickly made to plunge Victoria into a mandatory five-day lockdown, with schools closed and private gatherings banned from last Friday.

Since then, face masks have been mandatory and supermarket panic-buying for items such as toilet paper have again resumed.

The usually bustling Bourke St (pictured above) has resembled a ghost down during the latest lockdown

Some of the market odds (pictured above) devised by Sportsbet ahead of Dan Andrews' Wednesday press conference

The betting agency (pictured above) are sure to attract punters in the lead up to the streamed briefing

Ahead of the lockdown announcement, Prime Minister Scott Morrison offered his government's full support for Victoria's decisions on containing the outbreak.

'I think that proportionate, targeted responses are the most effective way to deal with this,' he said.

Victoria endured one of the world's longest lockdowns last year after an outbreak that killed more than 800 in the state, the vast majority of the national death toll.

Speaking last week, Andrews said the virus was likely 'moving at a velocity that has not been seen anywhere in our country over the course of these last 12 months'.

'I know this will be difficult. I know it will be painful. But there is no option. This things moves so fast,' he said.

'We must assume that there are further cases in the community than we have positive results for.

'We will be able to smother this. We will be able to prevent it getting away from us.'
Fenix is pursing all available opportunities to export its iron ore products to cover the likelihood that the Ya Tai 2 will not be able to complete loading as originally scheduled.

Operations at Iron Ridge are progressing well

s ( ) scheduled maiden iron ore shipment from the Port of Geraldton in Western Australia has been delayed due to mechanical issues with the bulk carrier vessel, Ya Tai 2.

The vessel, Ya Tai 2 chartered by the buyer under a free-on-board sales contract, has experienced mechanical issues resulting in a minor oil spill at Geraldton Port.

Around 5,004 wet metric tonnes (wmt) of lump product, grading in excess of 64% iron, have been loaded on the vessel but loading operations have been suspended by local authorities.

The vessel may require repairs at an international repair facility.

Fenix is pursing all available opportunities to export its iron ore products to cover the likelihood that the Ya Tai 2 will not be able to complete loading as originally scheduled.

Next shipment scheduled

Fenix entered a sales contract with its offtake partner Sinosteel International Holding Company Ltd on a free-on-board (FOB) basis, whereby the buyer has responsibility for chartering the vessel.

Therefore, the issue regarding the Ya Tai 2 vessel is not the responsibility of Fenix.

The company has ample product ready for loading and has a further scheduled shipment due to arrive on February 24 and scheduled for loading on February 27, after completion of a mandatory 14-day COVID restriction.

Iron Ridge Project

Operations at Iron Ridge are progressing well with road transport rates recently exceeding 3,400 wmt a day, around 90% of planned output.

Iron Ridge is a premium direct shipping ore (DSO) deposit which hosts a JORC resource around 490 kilometres by road from Geraldton port in Western Australia.

High-grade iron ore attracts a premium price on the seaborne market as Chinese steel works increasingly demand more pure inputs with lower emissions due to increasingly strict government regulations.

Production started on December 21 and road haulage continues on a routine basis.

Export capacity has been secured through binding agreements with the Mid-West Ports Authority for the use of its Geraldton Port facilities.

Product sales are planned to be conducted 50% through an offtake arrangement with Sinosteel International Holding Company Limited and 50% through a marketing agreement with Atlas Iron Limited.
There's no denying that Xiaomi's Redmi Note series is super popular in India. In fact, the Redmi series phones have been and are still continuing to be one of the best affordable smartphone options for people who don't want to splurge too much.

Now, it looks like the company is bringing the Redmi Note 9 Series' successors to India. Yes, we'll soon be able to buy the new Redmi Note 10 series in India. Xiaomi has officially confirmed that the new Redmi Note 10 series devices will be launched in India in early March.

Besides the March launch window, however, we don't have an official date yet from Xiaomi. But a leaked Amazon listing says that the new Redmi devices are coming out on March 10.

This particular listing was spotted in a now-deleted tweet that said "the Redmi Note 10 series is launching on 10th March. Of course, there's no way to confirm this info until we hear something from Xiaomi. That being said, the company's obsession with the number 10 for this series could hint at this being the correct launch date. Redmi Note 10 series on March 10. Get it?

As for the devices themselves, the company is planning to launch four variants - Redmi Note 10 4G, Redmi Note 10 5G, Redmi Note 10 Pro 4G, and Redmi Note 10 Pro 5G. So it looks like we won't be getting a Max Pro variant as we did with the Redmi Note 9 series from last year.

 MensXP/Akshay Bhalla

We're particularly excited for these because they'll be the first set of 5G devices in the Redmi Note series. Although 5G isn't here yet and we don't expect it to arrive in India anytime soon and work flawlessly, it's still a nice feature to have.



Coming to the prices, we sadly don't have any info regarding that. But if we go by the pricing of the previous Redmi Note devices, you can expect them to start at around Rs 13,000. The 5G-enabled variants, however, are expected to be priced well above Rs 15,000 mark.

Source: Gizmochina
Bexar County Sheriff's Office

Bexar County Sheriffs deputies and a local wildlife shelter rescued a tiger Saturday that was being held in a makeshift cage in Southwest Bexar County.

Deputies found the tiger outside a home in the 18200 block of Primo Street around 5:41 p.m. after a neighbor reported that they were hearing what sounded like a crying tiger, Sheriff Javier Salazar said.
The global oil market is balanced and the current price of oil fully reflects this market situation, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said in an interview with Russian television channel Rossiya 24 on Sunday.

We have seen low volatility over the past few months, which means that the market is balanced and todays prices undoubtedly reflect this market situation, said Novak who was promoted from energy minister to deputy prime minister last year. Novak is still in charge of coordinating Russias oil policy with OPEC and co-chairs the monthly OPEC+ panel meetings together with the Saudi Energy Minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman.

According to Novak, the price of oil will average in the range between $45 and $60 per barrel in 2021.

Oil prices have rallied in recent weeks, supported by the OPEC+ production cuts, the vaccine rollout and vaccinations, and more recently, by falling COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations in the worlds biggest economy, the United States.

Analysts say that the oil production curbs by OPEC+ and its leaders Saudi Arabia and Russia are set to tighten the market in the first quarter. Saudi Arabia has also said it would reduce its crude oil production by an additional 1 million barrels per day (bpd) beyond its quota in the OPEC+ pact this month and next.

Russia, the leader of the non-OPEC group in the OPEC+ pact, is estimated to have stayed within its 125,000-bpd allowed production rise in January. According to Reuters estimates, Russian oil production rose last month, but the 120,000-bpd increase in production from December was lower than the 125,000-bpd additional allowed rise. Under the latest OPEC+ agreement from January, Russia will be boosting its oil production by 65,000 bpd in each in February and March.

Oil prices crossed the $60 per barrel threshold earlier this month, yet analysts have started to warn that the market may have gotten ahead of itself with the recent rally.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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"Generating new business" in the current economic climate is the chief concern for the majority (40%) of Irish businesses as they embark into 2021, while 30% say that "managing a remote workforce" will be their primary challenge this year.

These are some of the headline findings of a new survey from the Association of Compliance Officers of Ireland (ACOI). The survey of more than 250 organisations, answered by ACOI members with responsibility for compliance in financial organisations throughout the country, sought to gain insight into attitudes around the challenges coming down the line in 2021, and whether they have changed significantly since respondents were last asked the same questions over 6 months ago.

The survey also revealed that 11% more organisations now believe that COVID is likely to have a bigger impact than Brexit on their success or otherwise in 2021  65% up from 54% in 2020.



The ACOI survey reported that just 8% felt that "cashflow" was their biggest concern, which, the experts say, could be down to good financial planning and cash flow projections on the part of business owners, plus an increase in the financial supports available.

As of January 2021, 65% of respondents said COVID was likely to have a bigger impact on business than Brexit, up from 54% in September 2020. Approximately 29% of remaining respondents now feel the COVID/Brexit split would have the greatest impact compared with 35% in the previous survey, and just 6% now feel that Brexit is their organisations biggest consideration.



Commenting on the research, CEO of ACOI, Michael Kavanagh said, "Last July we asked organisations what their top concern was - 39% said generating new business while 24% said managing a remote workforce. Since then, those percentages have risen to 40% and 30% respectively, so things are definitely not getting any easier in either regard. How to tackle these issues under the continuing spectre of COVID-19 is fraught with difficulties, but it is all our hope that as the year plays out, Government supports, coupled with greater economic certainty and stability, might assist these organisations to rise to and overcome these challenges."

Source: www.businessworld.ie
Ellie Young has announced that she's engaged to Matt Clow.

The Ibiza Weekender star took to Instagram on Sunday, to share the happy news with her followers after the candlelit Valentine's Day proposal at home, and explained that it was extra special because it was also her mum and dad's anniversary.

Ellie, 27, shared a video of the romantic moment and a series of photographs of herself of Matt celebrating their engagement, less than a year after they went public with their on-off relationship.

Congratulation! Ellie Young, 27, has announced that she's engaged to Matt Clow, after a candlelit Valentine's Day proposal at home

Taking to Instagram on Sunday, Ellie shared a video of Matt's romantic proposal, which saw him cover a room in the house in tealight candles and draped red material as he transformed it into 'Mattnagerie'.

He placed photographs of them all around, wrote out "I luv u" in candles and scattered red rose petals over the floor.

Her now-husband-to-be chose Ariana Grande's song Stuck With U to accompany the moment and Ellie could be seen in floods of tears as Matt got down on one knee to propose.

Ellie wrote alongside the video: 'The proposal. Today's my mum and dads wedding anniversary and the love of my life asked me to marry him...

Romantic! Ellie took to Instagram on Sunday, to share the happy news with her followers

Thoughtful: Ellie shared a video of Matt's romantic proposal, which saw him cover a room in the house in tealight candles and draped red material as he transformed it into 'Mattnagerie'.

Gorgeous: The reality star later uploaded a variety of photographs for their special day and thanked fans for their goodwill

Sweet! The Ibiza Weekender star explained that it was extra special because it was also her mum and dad's anniversary

'I have no words I can't stop crying I never thought I deserved this and you just made me the happiest girl in the world I promise to love you forever snd always @mattchristlow my one.'

The reality star later uploaded a variety of photographs for their special day and thanked fans for their goodwill.

She wrote: Thank you so much everyone for your messages I'm overwhelmed right now, my eyes are sore my cheeky are hurting from smiling but this was the easiest yes I could ever say @mattchristlow just thank you, I love you forever and always  xxxx

Happy lady: Ellie couldn't hide her delight as she posed next to her husband-to-be

Cute! Her now-husband-to-be chose Ariana Grande's song Stuck With U to accompany the moment and Ellie could be seen in floods of tears as Matt got down on one knee to propose

Sharing the video to his Instagram, Matt wrote:

Proposal. Just wow! I can not explain how stressed iv been today getting everything ready for this moment. I'm beyond happy that the love of my life said YES!

'Worlds can't explain how I feel right now, I get to marry my bestest and I feel so lucky! To my beautiful 'Fiance'...Happy Valentine's Day @ellieyoung1993.'

Commenting beneath, Ellie added: 'I love you so so much can't believe it honestly!!'

Loved up: 'Proposal. Just wow! I can not explain how stressed iv been today getting everything ready for this moment. I'm beyond happy that the love of my life said YES!' wrote Matt

Matt and Ellie first met when they went to the same school, but were never friends. After embarking on a relationship in 2020, Ellie ghosted Matt two months in.

But after spending the majority of 2020 apart, the pair decided to make a go of things and Ellie moved into his flat.

The two appeared on Lad Bible's Agree To Disagree: Ex Vs Ex, where it was revealed Ellie had originally ghosted the hunk.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : Alok Sharma, an Indian-origin minister in the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Cabinet, on Monday arrived in New Delhi for two days of climate discussions with Indian leaders.

Sharma, the COP26 President-Designate to lead the crucial UN climate talks, will meet senior Indian ministers, as well as leaders from business and civil society, to discuss strengthening the UK-India climate partnership and preparing for a successful COP26 summit later this year.

In his first visit to Asia as COP (Conference of the Parties) President, Sharma is expected to welcome India's significant progress on climate action and clean energy transition, an official statement by New Delhi-based British High Commission said.

He will highlight Prime Minister Narendra Modi's global leadership in setting up the International Solar Alliance (ISA) and the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), the latter of which the UK is proud to co-chair.

India's expertise is expected to be of great value to global discussions on a clean energy transition as part of COP preparations, it said.

In his meetings with business, Sharma will highlight the huge opportunities in the low carbon economy, celebrate existing commitments to achieve net zero emissions and encourage influential businesses to promote the growing movement of corporate climate action throughout their sector and supply chain.

Sharma will also meet with civil society, including experts and young thinkers, to discuss challenges and possible solutions to climate change, and to hear how they are trying to mobilise younger generations in support of climate action.

After a year of virtual meetings, the in-person visit signals a step-change in momentum to COP26 or UN climate change conference preparations, and reinforces Sharma's ambition to run an inclusive negotiating process that incorporates the views of all countries.

Sharma said: "When it comes to climate action, India is a key partner and a global leader. Together we can make change happen -- delivering real progress on reducing emissions and building global commitments.

"The UK and India are already a joint force for good against climate change, and we look forward to strengthening this partnership in the run up to COP26 and beyond." High Commissioner to India, Alex Ellis CMG said: "Alok Sharma's visit is the latest step in protecting our planet by making COP26 a success and will further develop the UK-India climate partnership on clean and resilient development.

"Hearing from the Indian government first hand, as well as civil society and business will be essential in informing the approach of the UK Presidency as we work towards a comprehensive, ambitious and balanced outcome at COP26." Sharma's visit follows those of the UK Foreign Secretary and International Trade Secretary, and paves the way for Prime Minister Boris Johnson's visit later this year, during which climate cooperation will be a focus.

As host of COP26, the UK is setting a strong example on climate action, with a legally binding target to cut emissions to net zero by 2050.

Between 1990 and 2018, the UK nearly halved emissions whilst growing the economy by 75 per cent, and will cut coal use in the power sector entirely by 2025.

The UK has committed to double its International Climate Finance to at least 11.6 billion pounds over the next five years, to help developing countries to take action.

The UK's Presidency of COP26 in 2021 and India's Presidency of the G20 in 2023 provide important platforms for driving global action and implementing the Paris Agreement.

India and the UK share many common priorities on climate action and are working closely together to ensure action in the run-up to COP26 and beyond.

Priority themes at COP26 with great potential for collaboration include: adaptation and resilience; corporate action; green finance; clean growth and technology; and nature-based solutions.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Thousands of counterfeit 3M respirators have slipped past U.S. investigators in recent months, making it to the cheeks and chins of health-care workers and perplexing experts who say their quality is not vastly inferior to the real thing.

N95 masks are prized for their ability to filter out 95% of the minuscule particles that cause COVID-19. Yet the fakes pouring into the country have fooled health-care leaders from coast to coast. As many as 1.9 million counterfeit 3M masks made their way to about 40 hospitals in Washington state, according to the state hospital association, spurring officials to alert staff members and pull them off the shelf. The elite Cleveland Clinic recently conceded that, since November, it had inadvertently distributed 3M counterfeits to hospital staffers. A Minnesota hospital made a similar admission.

Nurses at Jersey Shore University Medical Center have been highly suspicious since November that the misshapen and odd-smelling 3M masks they were given are knockoffs; the hospital said that mask lot numbers matched those the company listed online as possible fakes.

People have been terrified for the last 2 months, said Daniel Hayes, a nurse and union vice president at the hospital in Neptune, N.J. They felt like they were taking their lives in their hands, and they dont have anything else to wear.

According to 3M, the leading U.S. producer of N95s, more than 10 million counterfeits have been seized since the pandemic began and the company has fielded 10,500 queries about the authenticity of N95s. The company said in a Jan. 20 letter that its work in recent months led to the seizure of fake 3M masks sold or offered to government agencies in at least six states. After Kaiser Health News sent photos of the masks that the New Jersey nurses questioned, a 3M spokesperson referred to them as the counterfeits you identified.

At KHNs request, ECRI agreed to test the masks that sparked the New Jersey nurses concern. Tests of a dozen masks showed they filtered out 95% or more of the 0.3-micron particles theyre expected to catch. (ECRI is a nonprofit in Plymouth Meeting that helps health providers assess the quality of medical technology.)

ECRI engineering director Chris Lavanchy said several health organizations across the United States have recently made similar requests for tests of apparently fake 3M masks that the company warned about.

Lavanchy said the results have shown similarly high filtration levels but also higher breathing resistance than expected. He said such resistance can fatigue the person wearing the mask or cause it to lift off the face, letting in unfiltered air.

Were kind of scratching our heads trying to understand this situation, because its not as black-and-white as I would have expected, Lavanchy said. Ive looked at other masks we knew were counterfeit and they usually perform terribly.

3M spokesperson Jennifer Ehrlich said a critical feature of N95 masks, aside from filtration, is how well they fit.

Without a proper seal and fit, respirators are not filtering [properly]  gaps could allow air to enter, Ehrlich said by email.

The materials management team for Hackensack Meridian Health, which owns the Jersey Shore hospital, is working with an independent lab on validating the quality and compliance of specific lot numbers of 3M N95 respirators the company identified as potentially problematic, according to a company statement.

When the Washington State Hospital Association purchased 300,000 N95s in December, it sent samples to hospital leaders, who said they appeared legitimate.

Its not like we just ordered them sight unseen, said Beth Zborowski, spokesperson for the association. We had two major medical centers in Seattle  look at the quality, straps, cut them open and decide This looks like its the real deal before they bought them.

She said major hospital systems in the state bought more on their own, adding up to 1.9 million.

Throughout the pandemic, workers have also been provided with Chinese-made KN95 masks  approved by U.S. regulators on an emergency basis  that turned out to be far less effective than billed.

In April, the Food and Drug Administration, responding to dire shortages of high-quality masks for health-care workers, opened the door to KN95s, which are supposed to offer the same level of protection as N95s.

Yet, as months passed, researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Harvard, MIT, and ECRI discovered that KN95s did not meet the high standard: 40% to 70% of the KN95s failed their tests and some filtered out only 30% of the tiny particles.

More than 3,400 front-line health-care workers have died during the pandemic, KHN and the Guardian have found in the ongoing Lost on the Frontline project, and many families have raised concerns about inadequate protective gear. Yet the actual harm that any substandard or knockoff device presents remains difficult to assess.

Researchers say its unethical to conduct a study that involves giving health workers a product they know is less protective than another when lives are at stake. And short of performing in-depth genome sequencing on each workers viral strain, its hard to know exactly how any person got sick.

At the U.S. border, safeguarding the medical-gear supply is a high priority, said Michael Rose, a section chief in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcements global trade division.

His job for the last year has been investigating a wide variety of COVID-related scams. Of all those cases, Rose said, the flood of fake 3M masks from China has been the most consistent.

Its definitely cat-and-mouse, Rose said. Where we might get better [at intercepting counterfeits], they can ship elsewhere, change the name of the company, and keep going.

Many investigations lead to seizures in the nations massive ports of entry, where enormous cargo ships and planes carry giant containers of goods. There, agents might spot a dead giveaway such as a box just off a ship from Shenzhen, China, marked 3M and Made in the USA.

Id like to say that makes it easier, and it does, but the sheer volume of them coming in  , he said. Its like a needle in a stack of needles.

The demand for highly protective masks has surged twelvefold during the pandemic, said Chaun Powell, vice president of disaster response for Premier, a major hospital supply company. The national medical use of N95s used to be about 25 million a year, but it soared to 300 million last year, he said.

That meant hospitals and other health providers couldnt rely on their usual sources of products to meet their need for personal protective gear.

Health-care providers had to find alternatives, Powell said, and that created opportunities for fraudulent manufacturers to be opportunistic and sneak in.

Many of Roses investigations originate from customer complaints about apparent fakes to 3M, which forwards reports to his team. Others come from hospitals, health systems, or eagle-eyed first responders who email Covid19fraud@dhs.gov.

Border Patrol agents, working with Roses team and anticipating shipments from known counterfeiters, have seized thousands of fake N95s in recent weeks, including 100,080 at a port of entry near El Paso, Texas, in December and 144,000 flown from Hong Kong to New York. In all, federal officials say, they have seized more than 14.5 million masks, many fake 3Ms but other counterfeit cloth or surgical masks, as well.

In New Jersey, staff members began complaining in November about their masks to union leaders at Jersey Shore University Medical Center, said Kendra McCann, president of the hospitals Health Professionals and Allied Employees union local.

The masks, which seemed flimsy and made some workers faces burn, were turning up in every unit of the hospital. After a union member discovered a letter on the 3M website pinpointing their mask lots as potentially fake, managers began to remove the masks, but suspected fakes continued to turn up, McCann said.

Hackensack Meridian said a daily call with hospital leaders includes reminders to report any suspect PPE so that it can be removed immediately and evaluated.

The episode added stress to caregivers who are terrified about getting infected and bringing the virus into their own homes.

Nurses are scared to death, McCann said in mid-January as the masks continued to pop up, because theyre not being provided with the proper PPE.

Kaiser Health News (KHN) is a national health policy news service. It is an editorially independent program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation which is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.
Actions to ensure that Ireland can sustain a clean, healthy, diverse and productive marine environment now and in the future are outlined in a new report.

It outlines the steps that can be taken to assist the Government meet its target of 10% of Irelands maritime area to be protected areas as soon as is practicable, with a 30% attainment target by 2030.

At present, 2.14% of Irelands maritime area is designated for protection, primarily as Natura 2000 sites under European Union directives.

Marine protected areas are geographically defined and designed to protect vulnerable or endangered species, habitats and ecosystems.

They can also combat the negative effects of climate change, support economic activity and help nurture and maintain marine biodiversity.

Housing, Local Government and Heritage Minister Darragh OBrien and Minister of State Malcolm Noonan recently published the report of the independent advisory group, compiled after extensive consultation.

It explores the need to expand the countrys marine protected areas network, the benefits and costs involved and how Ireland should go about doing it.

Threatened habitats

A significant finding is that under current legislation many threatened and important marine habitats, species and ecosystems are not covered by the European Union Birds and Habitats Directives.

Accordingly, these areas cant be afforded the protection necessary to meet Irelands international commitments and legal obligations.

The report also identified the possibility to improve the level of stakeholder engagement and participation in the site selection and management process of protected sites.

Chaired by Professor Tasman Crowe, University College Dublin Earth Institute, the advisory group comprised 20 experts in life and ocean sciences, marine socio economics, maritime culture, governance and legislation.

It was tasked with providing technical advice and recommendations on the processes required and the challenges to be addressed in expanding Irelands network of MPAs, based on the groups own work and on the views of a wide range of stakeholders.

Prof Crowe said the groups aim was to provide a comprehensive and balanced synthesis of current thinking and relevant evidence.

We were particularly encouraged and inspired by the myriad of views and opinions shared with us by the wide range of stakeholder groups and organisations with whom we engaged during the process.

We are grateful that so many individuals and groups contributed in a real way to the development of the report.

These views really brought home to us the value of this process and what it could achieve.

Mr OBrien said Ireland, as a nation, has never before faced the twin global crises of climate change and accelerating biodiversity loss on land and at sea.

This comprehensive report represents a call for collective action, on behalf of our people and our natural marine environment, to ensure that we can sustain clean, healthy, diverse and productive oceans and seas around Ireland, both now and in the future.

The expansion of the MPA network is of great importance to us in Ireland, not least because the sea is in our blood and supports so many livelihoods and communities, but also because it unlocks future solutions to serious challenges that we face.

Not only can MPAs provide us with answers to the challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss they also hold a key to our future  as a maritime nation thats home to a bountiful and sustainable source of food, green energy and tourism activity for example, he said.

Public consultation

Mr OBrien said the public consultation process on the report will run for five months.

It will encourage all stakeholders and the wider public to review the contents, including its recommendations, and to submit their views on how Irelands network of MPAs should be expanded.

As an island nation, our seas are intrinsic to our environment, our culture and our economy," he said.

It is imperative that we do our utmost to keep our seas clean, healthy and productive.

Meanwhile, Minister of State Noonan said biodiversity, nature and the green recovery play a significant role in supporting and sustaining productive and healthy marine ecosystems into the future.

This is our ongoing vision for Irelands marine environment  one that can not only sustain nature and people and support livelihoods, but also one that brings us together to solve some very real crises of our time, he said.

The Irish Wildlife Trust welcomed publication of the report as a crucial step towards safeguarding more of Irelands diminishing marine life and urged the Government to act swiftly on its main findings.

It said a major concern, however, is that it has taken over three months for the report to be published while Mr OBrien is now proposing a five-month public consultation period.

The IWT said Irelands marine biodiversity, especially inside bays and estuaries, is impacted heavily by fisheries and aquaculture activities as well as from pollution and climate change.

Project officer Regina Classen said: We cannot delay further."

The Government must move from talking about protection to meaningful action on the ground.

The IWP said Ireland must develop a coherent approach to human activities in the marine environment.

It said current legislation before the Dail will provide for installations of offshore renewable energy, while Ireland must present its Marine Spatial Plan to the European Commission in March.

Proactive conservation

It noted that the latter plan requires that Ireland take a proactive approach to conservation and restoration of the marine environment.

But it warned that without even the mechanisms for creating MPAs, and with such an appalling track record in this field, the approach is fundamentally flawed.

The IWT said it is fully supportive of expansion in renewable energy generation, but this must be done in a way that also addresses the biodiversity emergency.

As the debate over marine conservation and biodiversity loss continues to increase globally, the words of the former United States president Bill Clinton remain more relevant than ever: We know that when we protect our oceans, we protect our future.

New Delhi: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) West Bengal President Dilip Ghosh has asserted that change will happen and the BJP shall come to power in the state after the elections, challenging West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo Mamata Banerjee ahead of the state assembly election.

Addressing a public meeting at Harirajpur in West Midnapore during `Paribartan Yatra` from Keshpur to Ghatal on Sunday, Dilip Ghosh said, "Yes, `Khela hobe, khela hobe` and `paribortan hobe` (will play, will play, and will change)."

"Let me tell the brothers of Mamata didi that the BJP will form the government. I know there will be attempts to stop the yatra so I have come to meet you. We will ensure that you are able to cast your votes," Ghosh said.

He further stated, "Opposition is telling us that our game is over but let me tell them that our game is on. Be ready. Tell mothers to keep their children under control if they want to see their faces after polls. We are civilised and follow law but it does not mean that we are weak, cowards."

The BJP is organising parivartan yatras in West Bengal as part of its efforts to oust the Trinamool Congress government. The first yatra was launched by BJP National President JP Nadda from Nabadwip in Nadia district in the first week of February.

Hitting out at Mamata Banerjee-led government, BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari on Sunday said the ruling TMC wants to turn West Bengal into Bangladesh by importing `Jai Bangla` slogan. Speaking to media in the Siliguri subdivision of Darjeeling district, Adhikari asserted that BJP will come to power in West Bengal with a huge majority after the Assembly polls.

"No matter what they (TMC) do, people of West Bengal have decided to vote for double engine government. BJP will come to power with a huge majority. Modi Ji and Amit Shah Ji had given a slogan -- `2019 me half, 2021 me saaf` and that is going to happen," he said.

"Khela hobe` slogan was coined by Narayanganj (in Bangladesh) MP Shamim Osman 4 years ago. TMC wants to turn West Bengal into Bangladesh that is why they have imported `Jai Bangla` slogan. Our slogan is -- ` Bharat Mata Ki Jai` and `Jai Shri Ram," he added.

Trinamool Congress workers, however, took out `Shanhati Rally` from Palta to Shyamnagar in the North 24 Parganas district on Sunday.

Live TV

On February 11, Union Home Minister Amit Shah had targeted Banerjee, saying that till the time elections end, `didi` will chant `Jai Shri Ram`. On January 23, Banerjee did not deliver her speech "in protest" at an event at Victoria Memorial here to mark the 125th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose after `Jai Shree Ram` slogans were raised when she was invited to speak.

Mamata had said "government programme should have some dignity" and it "is not fair to insult somebody whom you have invited."

Elections for 294 Assembly seats in West Bengal are likely to take place in April-May this year.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has visited the Masdar City innovation project as part of his official visit to the United Arab Emirates, the press service of the head of state has reported.

According to the report, the president got acquainted with the peculiarities of the implementation of the concept of the city with zero CO2 pollution and a full cycle of waste processing.

"Innovation, technology is the future. This is a new commercial market for mutual cooperation, which is created to save the future. We are very interested in the experience of the United Arab Emirates, which has spread these technologies to other countries," Zelensky said.

He got acquainted with the projects of Masdar, an energy company that is owned by the Mubadala investment fund and is an investor and operator of projects in the field of renewable energy sources and sustainable urban development.

Zelensky also visited the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI) in Abu Dhabi, where he met with the leadership of Emirati companies working in the high-tech sphere. The parties agreed to strengthen bilateral cooperation in the field of biotechnology, cybersecurity, IT, and artificial intelligence.

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NEW ALBANY, Miss. (WTVA) - The Mississippi Highway Patrol asks the public to stay off all roads unless there is an emergency.

'Weather conditions are continuing to worsen by the minute. Help us by staying at home," according to Troop F, which is based in New Albany.

We ask at this time if you are traveling and it's not an emergency, please do your part to help us by staying off all roads. Weather conditions are continuing to worsen by the minute. Help us by staying at home. #stayofftheroads pic.twitter.com/z5qMI9na7m  MHP New Albany (@MHPTroopF) February 15, 2021

Troopers have already responded to multiple wrecks across northeast Mississippi.
The FTSE 100 rallied today, closing up 2.5 per cent, or 166 points, to 6,756, while the FTSE 250 soared 1.8 per cent, or 381 points, to 21,418.

The pound also climbed today, rising above $1.39 for the first time in nearly three years, helped by dollar weakness and hopes of an end to the third national lockdown.

Just after the London market close, sterling was up by around 0.4 per cent against both the dollar and the euro, with 1 buying $1.3913 and 1.146.

Meanwhile, Japan's Nikkei 225 started the week on a roll as it closed above 30,000 for the first time since August 1990, with strong buying in Tokyo driven by news that the Japanese economy grew at a nearly 13 per cent annual pace in the last quarter.

Average asking prices for UK homes have 'surprisingly' increased in the past four weeks by 0.5 per cent to 318,580 after three consecutive months of falls, fresh data from property website Rightmove reveals.

Pub group Mitchells & Butlers has said it intends to raise 350million from its largest investors through offering shares at a 36 per cent discount to help shore up its finances as pubs and bars remain shut across the UK.

Ather Energy, makers of 450X electric scooter, has commenced production of their electric vehicles and batteries at their new EV manufacturing facility in Hosur, Tamil Nadu. The factory is spread over 1,23,000 sq. ft. and will have an annual capacity of 1,10,000 scooters and 1,20,000 battery packs.

The company will reportedly invest Rs. 635 crore over the next 5 years into their manufacturing facilities in India. Supporting the Make in India initiative, Ather already has 90% of their production localised in India. They have deliveries in 27 cities across India including Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Hyderabad, etc. and they plan to expand to 40 cities by the end of 2021.

The Hosur factory is built on Industry 4.0 principles and true to the companies vision, there are zero effluents generated and zero water discharge, thanks to clean E-waste management, in-house STP & treated water circulation.

Commenting on the start of factory operations, Tarun Mehta, CEO & Co-founder Ather Energy said:
NEW YORK : The makers of COVID-19 vaccines are figuring out how to tweak their recipes against worrisome virus mutations  and regulators are looking to flu as a blueprint if and when the shots need an update.

It's not really something you can sort of flip a switch, do overnight," cautioned Richard Webby, who directs a World Health Organization flu center from St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.

Viruses mutate constantly and it takes just the right combination of particular mutations to escape vaccination.

But studies are raising concern that first-generation COVID-19 vaccines don't work as well against a mutant that first emerged in South Africa as they do against other versions circulating around the world.

The good news: Many of the new COVID-19 vaccines are made with new, flexible technology that's easy to upgrade.

What's harder: Deciding if the virus has mutated enough that it's time to modify vaccines  and what changes to make.

When do you pull the trigger?" asked Norman Baylor, a former Food and Drug Administration vaccine chief. This is a moving target right now."

FLU OFFERS A MODEL

The WHO and FDA are looking to the global flu vaccine system in deciding how to handle similar decisions about COVID-19 shots.

Influenza mutates much faster than the coronavirus, and flu shots have to be adjusted just about every year.

National centers around the globe collect circulating flu viruses and track how they're evolving.

They send samples to WHO-designated labs for more sophisticated antigenic" testing to determine vaccine strength.

The WHO and regulators then agree on the year's vaccine recipe and manufacturers get to work.

For COVID-19 vaccines, Webby said a critical step is establishing a similar surveillance and testing network to flag the mutations that matter.

Today, there's wide geographic variability in tracking and testing mutated versions. For example, Britain does more testing of the changing viral genome than the U.S.

Three variants first discovered in Britain, South Africa and Brazil are worrisome because of combinations of mutations that make them more contagious.

On Sunday, U.S. researchers reported a still different mutation found in seven variants that have cropped up in several states. No one yet knows if this mutation makes the virus easier to spread but the report, not yet vetted by other scientists, urges further research to find out.

HOW COVID-19 SHOTS ARE HOLDING UP

Just because a variant is more contagious doesn't mean it also will be impervious to vaccination. But the variant first identified in South Africa is raising concerns.

Columbia University's David Ho put blood samples from people given the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines into lab dishes with the mutated virus. Vaccine-produced antibodies still protected, but they were much less potent.

Preliminary test results of two other vaccine candidates  from Novavax and Johnson & Johnson  soon backed up those findings. Both still protected but were weaker when tested in South Africa, where that variant dominates, than when tested elsewhere.

A far smaller test of the AstraZeneca vaccine in South Africa has raised questions about its effect.

"If the virus were able to make an additional mutation or two, it could escape even more," Ho warned.

THE REAL RED FLAG

If fully immunized people start getting hospitalized with mutated virus, that's when the line gets crossed," said Dr. Paul Offit, a Children's Hospital of Philadelphia vaccine expert who advises the FDA.

That hasn't happened yet, but we should get ready," he added.

Moderna is about to explore one option: Could a third dose of the original vaccine boost immunity enough to fend off some variants even if it's not an exact match?

Columbia's Ho said it's a good idea to test because people may still have plenty of cushion" if their overall antibody levels are very high.

ADJUSTING THE RECIPES

Major manufacturers also are developing experimental variant vaccines, just in case.

COVID-19 vaccines produce antibodies that recognize the spike protein that coats the coronavirus. When the virus mutates, sometimes the spike protein is changed in key areas so the vaccine-produced antibodies have a harder time recognizing it.

The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are made with a piece of genetic code called messenger RNA that tells the body how to make some harmless copies of the spike protein that train immune cells. To update the vaccine, they can simply change the payload: swap out the original genetic code with mRNA for the mutated spike protein.

The AstraZeneca vaccine and the Johnson & Johnson shot expected to roll out soon are made with cold viruses engineered to sneak a spike protein gene into the body.

Adjusting their vaccines requires growing cold viruses with the mutated gene, a little more complex than the mRNA approach but not nearly as laborious as reformulating old-fashioned flu shots.

The Novavax vaccine also in final-stage testing is made with a lab-grown copy of the spike protein that also could be tweaked to match mutations.

TESTING VACCINES 2.0

First-generation COVID-19 vaccines were tested in tens of thousands of people to be sure they work and are safe  research that took many months.

Simply changing the recipe to better target virus mutations won't require repeating those studies in thousands of people, Dr. Peter Marks, the FDA's vaccine chief, recently told the American Medical Association. (AP) IND IND

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Local communists have seized on the February 14 holiday hype to promote their agenda.

In a once major industrial city of Luhansk in eastern Ukraine, which is now one of the main strongholds of Russian proxy forces waging war against government troops, local adepts of communist ideas were spotted handing out to strangers in city streets what they called "Stalintine's" greeting cards with Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin' picture on them.

That's according to the Donbas News outlet.

The stunt was aimed at mocking Valentine's Day, traditionally ignored by communists as a "product of the Western world."

Read alsoRights activist: Russia's tactic in Crimea is to stigmatize Crimean TatarsThe cards circulated in Luhansk say February 14 marks the anniversary of the city's liberation from Nazi troops in 1943.

The "greeting" calls on residents to refrain from celebrating Valentine's Day, instead honoring "Soviet and Orthodox holidays."

Memo

The Communist Party has officially been banned in Ukraine as part of decommunization spree that was formalized in April 2015 when communist symbols were outlawed by Parliament.

Reporting by UNIAN
Faith Organization Calls for 8ft Razor Wire Covered Fence and Armed Troops to be Removed from Surrounding the United States Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.



Christian Defense Coalition celebrates the "Stations of the Cross" around a 15ft cross at the Capitol on Good Friday, 2020.



NEWS PROVIDED BY

Christian Defense Coalition

Feb. 15, 2021



WASHINGTON, Feb. 15, 2021 /Christian Newswire/ -- The Christian Defense Coalition has applied for a permit application from the U. S. Capitol Police to have a Good Friday Prayer Vigil and Service on the lower western terrace of the Capitol on April 2.



The Good Friday Service would be on the exact spot where the Capitol was violently breached on January 6.



Last year, the organization celebrated the "Stations of the Cross" around a 15ft cross at the Capitol on Good Friday. (See photo above).



After the tragic and troubling violent acts that occurred at the Capitol on January 6, it is critical the "People's House" be reopened to send a powerful message America will never let extremists crush and trample our freedoms and values.



Rev. Patrick Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense Coalition based in Washington, D.C., states;

"The time has now come to reopen the 'People's House' and remove the 8ft razor wire covered fence and armed troops from around the United States Capitol building. The tragic and violent events that occurred on January 6, should remind each of us how precious and sacred the freedoms and liberties every American enjoys are and that we can never let extremism and violence silence them.



"By allowing the Capitol building to be surrounded with fencing and armed National Guard troops, our leaders are sending the worst possible message to the nation and the world. America's message should be one of freedom and liberty and not one of fear.



"Having the Good Friday Service, at the exact location where the Capitol breech took place, also reminds us there are no political solutions for the deep divisions and struggles facing our nation. America's problems can only be healed spiritually as we embrace the amazing love and sacrifice that Christ exhibited on the cross."

For more information or interviews call:

Rev. Patrick Mahoney at 540.538.4741



SOURCE Christian Defense Coalition



CONTACT: Rev. Patrick Mahoney, 540-538-4741


Michelle Obama also shared her own Valentines Day message

In honor of Valentines Day, former President Barack Obama shared a family portrait in honor of the three special women in his life.

Happy Valentines Day to the three who never fail to make me smile. Your dazzling light makes everything brighter, he tweeted on Sunday.

Former President and First Lady Barack and Michelle Obama are shown last October closing the annual Obama Foundation Summit together on the campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

The tweeted included wife, Michelle, and daughters, Sasha, 19, and Malia, 22.

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Read More: Meghan Markle and Prince Harry are expecting their second child

Michelle also shared a Valentines Day message with a recent photo of her and Barack together.

Happy Valentines Day, @barackobama! Life is always brighter when Im by your side, she wrote.

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The Obamas have always been open about their love story and 28-year marriage. In his new memoir A Promised Land, he shared the tensions between him and Michelle during his two terms as president and how they worked on their marriage after leaving The White House.

There were nights when lying next to Michelle in the dark, Id think about those days when everything between us felt lighter when her smile was more constant and our loveless encumbered, he wrote. And my heart would suddenly tighten at the thought that those days might not return.

Read More: Couple Goals is a game show youve never seen before

In a November interview with PEOPLE, the former president spoke about the overwhelming pressure on him and Michelle to be on at every moment.

There were times where I think she was frustrated or sad or angry but knew that I had Afghanistan or the financial crisis to worry about. So, she would tamp it down, he said.

Obama said they found their way back to those lighter moments after the end of his presidency he described as a big exhale.

It took some time to talk about how she had felt. Once the presidency was done, there was the possibility of her opening upbut more importantly, just her being able to let out a breath and relax.

Have you subscribed to theGrios podcast Dear Culture? Download our newest episodes now! TheGrio is now on Apple TV, Amazon Fire, and Roku. Download theGrio today!

The post Obama tributes family on Valentines Day: To the three who never fail to make me smile appeared first on TheGrio.
The French government has started a process to ban the far-right group Generation Identity, renowned for being hostile to migrants, interior minister Gerald Darmanin has confirmed.

The group has tried to stop migrants from entering the country on numerous occasions, and has conducted high-profile raids in the French Alps and the Pyrennees.

"This organisation has now 10 days to respond," Mr Darmanin wrote on Twitter late on Saturday, as the ministry told French media outlet France Info the dissolution [of the organisation] is very likely within 15 days.

In January, French authorities began investigating the group on the grounds of incitement to racial hatred, following anti-migrant action in the Pyrennees where some 30 Generation Identity members travelled to the Col du Portillon mountain pass on the French-Spanish border, in an attempt to prevent migrants crossing.

In December 2020, three Generation Identity activists successfully appealed a six-month jail sentence after being convicted of trying to bar migrants from entering France through the Franco-Italian border in 2018 by renting two helicopters and a plane.

Last November, France banned Turkish far-right nationalist group the Grey Wolves following incidents in France involving the group as tensions mounted between France and Turkey, notably over the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Under French law, the Council of Ministers can ban an organisation by decree if it is deemed complicit in inciting discrimination, hatred or violence against a person or a group of people because of their ethnicity, nationality or religion, or propagate ideas or theories tending to justify or encourage such discrimination, hatred or violence.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 05:49:34|Editor: huaxia

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ANKARA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Turkey is reopening schools in rural areas in the first phase of a program amid a vaccination drive which is expected to include teachers, but experts cautioned against any easing of COVID-19 measures.

After reopening some schools last September, Turkey went back to distance learning as of late November last year, following a new wave of coronavirus infections which prompted a stricter health protocol such as night and weekend lockdowns.

Schools in villages started welcoming students as of Monday, but the general reopening of most schools across the country is expected on March 1, as teachers are to be included in the inoculation program later in February, health officials said.

Some 130,000 students are expected to go back to countryside schools. Another 5 million will return to school in March. In-person education will be two days a week, and students will spend rest of the week at home with remote education or live classes.

Despite a considerable decrease in daily infections, the number of daily cases in Turkey increased in early February again to above 8,000, with the trend rising particularly after the new strains were detected.

Moreover, medical experts and scientists continue to warn that it is too early to begin face-to-face teaching at schools and a new surge might emerge.

"We have 7,000 to 8,000 (daily) cases now. Because there is a new variant, I frankly think that it is too early to talk about lifting or loosening restrictions," Mustafa Necmi Ilhan, a Health Ministry's Social Sciences Board member, said, local press reported.

"For now, I think it will be a bit early to consider decisions about opening schools or lifting other restrictions," this expert warned.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced last week that schools in remote areas would be the first to resume education. Primary schools, between grades 8 and 12, will start in-person education on March 1 while the schedule for other grades is not clear.

Turkey has launched a vaccination rollout in mid-January and since then the number of people who have received their first doses of China's Sinovac COVID-19 vaccines has topped 3 million, Turkish Health Ministry announced.

Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said that Turkey aims to vaccinate at least 60 percent of its population of 83 million.

Ilhan said the vaccination of teachers will facilitate the reopening of schools.

"Children should not lag behind in education, but this does not mean that we should ignore the measures. Teachers, students and their parents should comply with rules," he told state-run Anadolu Agency.

Schools already have a set of guidelines and measures in place, such as enforced social distancing in classrooms, mandatory masks and delivery of hand sanitizers.

While schools are getting ready to a partial resumption of in-person education, teachers and parents seem worried about a new surge of infections.

"We are prepared but parents are still quite anxious and some have said that they are not planning to send their children's to school yet," Belgin Parlak, the headmaster of an Ankara private school, told Xinhua.

"We naturally believe that children belong to school and the best education is when teachers and pupils are physically in a classroom, but we are also a bit worried," she noted.

While some parents are hesitant to send their children back to school, others are more than happy to do so in order for their kids to fraternize with their schoolmates.

"My son is 13 years old and he is depressed at home. Online education may be the best method during this pandemic but it can never take the place of a proper school with interaction between teachers and students," said Leyla Cavlan, a mother of two.

"It's also a relief for parents because it's very tiring to deal with a bored grumpy teenager," she added. Enditem
WEST CHESTER, Pa., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Everett Stern, a famed whistleblower who has spent a career exposing fraud and corruption and bringing to light the presence of dangerous fringe groups in America, announced today that he is a candidate for the United States Senate. Stern, 36, a Republican, is running for the seat being vacated by Senator Pat Toomey in 2022.

"Protecting and defending the interests of the United States of America is my life's passion and the central purpose of my career," Stern said. "Now I want to take that dedication to the United States Senate and be a relentless voice for the benefit of the people of Pennsylvania."

Stern is the founder and CEO of private intelligence agency Tactical Rabbit. Part of the company's work has included gathering inside information on radical political groups including the anti-law enforcement group FTP and the white supremacist organization Sovereign American. Intelligence gathered by Stern's efforts was passed on to federal law enforcement.

In 2011, Everett Stern gained international notoriety when he brought to light the illegal efforts of his then-employer, HSBC Bank, to launder money and assist nations involved in supporting terrorism and drug trafficking. Stern's work resulted in the bank being fined a record almost two billion dollars.

"The people of Pennsylvania deserve a leader who will fight for them against the most powerful special interests, the most entrenched politicians, and a corrupt system whose leaders have forgotten that they answer to the people," Stern said. "There's never been a time when bold, unafraid new leadership has been more badly needed."

For more information on Everett Stern, please visit his campaign website, www.everettstern.com.

Contact: Michael Clement

[email protected].

SOURCE Everett Stern US Senate Campaign
A member of the Ashanti Region wing of the main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) has cautioned the Speaker of Parliament Alban Sumana Bagbin to refrain from contesting former John Mahama during the partys congress ahead of the 2024 elections.



This caution to the Right Honourable Speaker of Parliament was spearheaded by former Municipal Chief Executive for Asokore Mampong Nurudeen Hamidan.



Speaking on Akoma FMs weekend political show Wonsom, the former MCE dared: Let anyone decide to contest John Mahama in our upcoming congress, not even the Speaker of Parliament, he shouldnt dare else some of us will fight them head-on.



He also indicated that if he has been privileged to be elected as Speaker of Parliament, he should concentrate in Parliament and leave the presidential race to the former president to take NDC to the Promised Land in 2024.



The former MCE, who was a member of the NDCs regional campaign team for last years elections, further added that the former president has been able to brand the NDC into attractive entity and he has been the most popular personality in the party so it will be in the interest of the NDC for John Mahama to unopposedly go through the congress and once again lead the NDC into victory come 2024 but we will fight Alban Bagbin if he dares contest John Mahama.



According to Nurudeen Hamidan, his argument is based on intelligence circulating that some key members of the party have harboured the conviction to contest John Mahama ahead of 2024.



Although the NDC is contesting the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election results, the 2024 flagbearer race has already been heated as most of the grass-roots and key leadership of NDC in Ashanti Region have been praying for John Mahama to go through unopposed.

Source: 3news









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ISTANBUL (Reuters) - A Turkish court handed jail sentences on Monday to four employees of a now-defunct pro-Kurdish newspaper on terrorism charges, a lawyer in the case said, describing the verdict as politically motivated.

Ozgur Gundem newspaper was among more than 130 media outlets the government closed during a state of emergency it declared following a failed military coup in July 2016, in a crackdown whose scale alarmed Ankara's Western allies and rights groups.

Some two dozen Ozgur Gundem staff were detained in 2016 as part of an investigation into their alleged links to Kurdish militants.

At the time, a court closed the newspaper on grounds of spreading propaganda of the militant Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which is classified as a terrorist organisation by the United States and the European Union as well as by Turkey.

Eren Keskin, a rights activist and the newspaper's co-editor-in-chief, along with two other Ozgur Gundem officials, were each sentenced to six years and three months in jail for membership of a terrorist organisation, lawyer Ozcan Kilic said.

Zana Bilir Kaya, the other co-editor-in-chief, was sentenced to two years and one month for spreading terrorism propaganda, he said.

Kilic also told Reuters he believed the verdict was political and harsher than in other similar cases, and that he would appeal it.

"The court gave a very harsh verdict. We thought it was related to the developments in the operation in northern Iraq. Courts are influenced by conflicts," he said.

Turkish officials said on Sunday that militants of the outlawed PKK had executed 13 kidnapped Turks, including military and police personnel, in a cave in northern Iraq amid a continuing military operation against the group.

Critics say Erdogan and his government have eroded the independence of courts and the media since 2016. Officials say the courts are autonomous and that the arrests are a response to serious security risks.

Story continues

Ozgur Gundem had focused coverage on the PKK conflict in Turkey's mainly Kurdish southeast and long faced investigations, fines and arrests.

The PKK took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984 and more than 40,000 people have been killed in the conflict.

(Reporting by Ali Kucukgocmen; Editing by Jonathan Spicer and Gareth Jones)
Responding to Owaisi, the Secunderabad MP Kishan Reddy said on Sunday that the Narendra Modi-led Central government had no plans whatsoever to convert Hyderabad to a Union Territory. (Photo:PTI)

Hyderabad: Union minister of state for home affairs G. Kishan Reddy strongly criticised MIM chief and Lok Sabha MP Asaduddin Owaisi for his highly irresponsible remarks that the Central government was trying to convert Hyderabad into a Union Territory.

Owaisi had said that Hyderabad would be made a UT during a discussion in Parliament over the Jammu and Kashmir reorganisation bill on Saturday. The Hyderabad MP accused the Modi Government for having plans to take back powers from key cities like Hyderabad, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Ahmedabad and Lucknow and convert them into union territories.

Responding to Owaisi, the Secunderabad MP Kishan Reddy said on Sunday that the Narendra Modi-led Central government had no plans whatsoever to convert Hyderabad to a Union Territory. Reddy said that Asaduddin Owaisi had walked out while the union government was replying over his comments during the Saturday session.

Reddy said that the MIM and TRS made false allegations against the Central government to divert the attention of the people of Hyderabad and the state. He criticised both parties for indulging in false propaganda against the Modi government and spreading fake news.

He made it clear that there was no plan to carve out a UT out of Hyderabad. People have no reasons to worry this count, because the Centre was committed to the development of Hyderabad and Telangana.

Kishan Reddy was participating in a preparatory meeting for the graduate MLC elections. He exuded confidence that the BJP will win both the MLC seats. He exhorted the party leaders to work hard and gain back the MLC seat for the Hyderabad, Rangareddy and Mahabubnagar seat.

Reddy said that the people of Telangana had understood and realized that the TRS government led by Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao would do no justice to any section of society, and at the same time, shared the viewpoint of other people across that country that the BJP is the only party which provides good governance, corruption-free rule and is free of dynasty control.

Citing the examples of the Dubbaka and GHMC elections, he said that the TRS and MIM both cheated people before GHMC elections by pretending to be rivals but after the results were announced, reverted to their unholy alliance in the Mayoral elections.

People are observing the unholy nexus of TRS and MIM, he said.

He recalled that former chief minister K. Rosaiah gave 42 per cent PRC but the TRS government was not offering 7.5 per cent to employees after the formation of a separate state.

Reddy was vehement in his condemnation of Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Raos comment, in which KCR compared the post of Chief Minister with a pair of slippers, saying the remarks insulted the Constitution.Reddy also flayed Rao for insulting women, who we praise and worship as a mother with his unkindly and unbecoming words.

Kishan Reddy prayed tribute to former union Minister Sushma Swaraj on the occasion of her birth anniversary at the BJP state office. He recalled her efforts for the creation of a separate Telangana and her contributions for development of Telangana as a union minister.
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The World Bank has confirmed plans to invest $200 million into Ethiopias digital economy as the country liberalises its telecoms market, but has cautioned that policies aimed at encouraging new entrants to lease infrastructure from Ethio Telecom could prove counterproductive.

Ousmane Dione, World Bank country director for Eritrea, Ethiopia, South Sudan and Sudan, warned that deployments could stall if new operators were pushed to lease infrastructure from Ethio Telecom rather than independent tower firms, arguing that it would be best if market entrants were able to make rational decisions whether to build their own infrastructure.

To benefit fully from competition does not mean offering preferential treatment to Ethio Telecom but rather creating a level playing field on which it can compete fairly with its new rivals, argued Dione. He noted that rural areas could be particularly badly affected.

Ethio Telecom has long held a monopoly in the market, with the bidding process for two new universal licences currently underway as Ethiopia moves towards opening up its telecoms sector. Operator groups including Etisalat, MTN, Orange, STC and a consortium headed by Vodafone are competing for the licences.

However, Dione noted that regulations governing the construction of private infrastructure and restricting foreign ownership of finance providers would be damaging both to new entrants seeking to set up financial offerings as well as Ethio Telecom.

Ultimately, policies that seek to protect Ethio Telecoms infrastructure by allowing it to charge high prices for interconnection will end up harming the company, added Dione.

The country manager elaborated further on the World Banks pledge to invest $200 million into the market via the new Digital Ethiopia Foundations project, saying the strategy was aimed at creating the legal and regulatory building blocks for the digital ecosystem, in areas like e-commerce and Digital ID.
Married At First Sight's newest expert Alessandra Rampolla has spoken about the surgical procedure that helped her shed an astonishing 60kg.

Speaking to Woman's Day magazine on Monday, the Puerto Rican sexologist, 46, admitted she struggled with obesity for years before undergoing a gastric bypass surgery in 2008.

'It was such a transformation both physically and mentally,' Alessandra said of the procedure, which involves surgically altering the stomach and small intestine.

What a transformation! Married At First Sight's sexologist Alessandra Rampolla, 46, has spoken about how undergoing a gastric bypass in 2008 helped her shed an astonishing 60kg - changing her life forever. Pictured left in 2006, right in 2019

However, Alessandra insisted that her decision to go under the knife 'had nothing to do with aesthetics'.

'I did it for my health, and at the time I was married and I was thinking about having kids and I had learned about the complications of trying for a baby with that extra weight, so I made a decision,' she said.

Alessandra, who was married to her now ex-husband John Hernandez at the time of her procedure, didn't end up having any children.

'I tried a lot of different things before it': The Puerto Rican beauty admitted she struggled with obesity for years before undergoing a gastric bypass surgery in 2008

While gastric bypass surgery isn't for everyone, Alessandra said she has no regrets.

'I tried a lot of different things before it, but it really allowed me to get my weight under control,' she declared.

Gastric bypasses involve stapling the stomach to make it smaller, meaning that the patient gets full quicker and consumes less food.

'I did it for my health': However, Alessandra insisted that her decision to go under the knife 'had nothing to do with aesthetics'. Pictured left in 2006, right in 2019

What is gastric bypass surgery? Gastric bypass is a surgical procedure that helps people with obesity to lose weight and improve their health. The surgery involves decreasing the size of the stomach and changing the way the stomach and small intestine absorb food. During the procedure, staples are used to create a pouch in the top part of the stomach. The pouch is then attached to the lower part of the small intestine, causing food to bypass most of the stomach and the first part of the small intestine. As a result, less calories will be absorbed into the body, while the patient will feel full after eating a smaller amount. This procedure is primarily done as a keyhole surgery (using small incisions, but occasionally an operation is required. Advertisement

It also involves creating a shortcut from the pouch to the small intestine (a bypass), meaning less calories are absorbed.

The combination of consuming less food and absorbing less calories leads to weight loss over time.

Alessandra has previously spoken candidly about her gastric bypass, having posted a series of stunning before-and-after Instagram pictures in January 2019.

Worth it: While gastric bypass surgery isn't for everyone, Alessandra said she has no regrets. Pictured left in 2008, right in 2020

'Do you remember me like that? Fall 2006, a couple of years before traveling to Cali, Colombia to undergo a gastric bypass by the hand of the great Dr Eduardo Bolanos to take control of my obesity,' she captioned the post in her native Spanish.

'Go to the 2nd photo to see my current version, much healthier after losing 55 kg!

'On this Friday of memories, the first of 2019, I draw strength and inspiration from my own story of challenges overcome (some little ones, others - like this - not so much) and I dare to look forward and dream big.

Hard work pays off! Alessandra also regularly works out, often posting photos in activewear on her yoga mat. She is pictured with her dog Lola

'Because everything is possible... because we can do everything. Welcome, 2019.'

In addition to the bypass, she also regularly works out, posting many pictures in activewear while sitting on her yoga mat.

Alessandra will replace Dr Trisha Stratford and join experts Mel Schilling and John Aitken on Married At First Sight in 2021.
English Norwegian

Helena Nonka, global head of New business for natural resources at SGS, has been appointed Executive Vice President for Corporate Development in Hydro.

Nonka (45) will report to President and CEO Hilde Merete Aasheim and will join the Corporate Management Board. She will start the new position on April 1, replacing Arvid Moss, who has been acting in this newly established role since mid-2019.

Nonka is an experienced executive with a global career spanning more than 20 years in the natural resources industry, professional services, consulting, and academia.

Helena Nonka comes from a role as the Global Head of New Business for Natural Resources at Swiss based SGS. From 2007 to 2019, Nonka worked for Rio Tinto, where she held several senior commercial and leadership roles globally, including the last five years as General Manager Corporate Strategy.

Nonka holds a masters degree in political science from University of Quebec in Montreal, a masters degree in law from HEC Montreal and has worked in academia while studying towards a PhD in international relations.

Investor contact

Line Haugetraa

+47 41406376

Line.Haugetraa@hydro.com

Press contact

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+47 92979797

Halvor.Molland@hydro.com






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Nairobi: Kenya Airways said it will resume flights to Rome from its hub in Nairobi in June.

Julius Thairu, chief customer and commercial officer of the airline, said in a statement issued on Friday in Nairobi that Kenya Airways will continue to monitor and increase frequency to destinations as more jurisdictions open their airspace and ease travel restrictions, Xinhua news agency reported on Saturday.
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Press Release

Outside trading hours - Regulated information*

Brussels, 11 February 2021 (7.05 a.m. CET)

KBC to acquire NNs Bulgarian pension insurance and life insurance businesses

Yesterday, KBC Group and the Netherlands-based NN Group reached agreement for KBCs Bulgarian subsidiary, DZI  Life Insurance EAD, to acquire:

all the shares of NN Pension Insurance Company EAD (Bulgaria)

all the assets and liabilities of NN Insurance Co. Ltd.  Sofia Branch (Bulgaria)



The deal has a total consideration of 77.7 million euros and will only have an immaterial impact on KBCs solid capital position. Upon closure, KBC Insurances Solvency II ratio  which stood at an excellent 222% at the end of 2020 - will be reduced by approximately 6 percentage points, but remain well above regulatory requirements, while KBC Groups CET1 ratio will be maintained at an outstanding level (17.6% in 4Q2020, Basel III, fully loaded  Danish compromise).

Closure of the deal is subject to regulatory approval and is expected to be finalised in the course of 2021.

The acquisition of NN Pension Insurance Company EAD (NN PIC) allows KBCs Bulgarian franchise - in the shape of UBB and DZI - to broaden its extensive bank-insurance offering to customers with the addition of high-end pension fund products, while also providing additional cross-selling opportunities for banking and non-life insurance products in a one-stop shop approach.

The acquisition of NN Insurance Co. Ltd - Sofia Branch (NN Life) will allow DZI - KBCs Bulgarian insurance franchise - to further increase its share of the life insurance market in Bulgaria through a range of traditional life insurance and unit linked insurance products, thus reaffirming its leading position. It will also strengthen DZIs distribution power thanks to NN Lifes network of 300 tied insurance agents in Bulgarias main cities.

NN Bulgaria has developed its pension and life insurance business since entering the market in 2001. It has 138 employees, and boasts a customer base of over 400,000 individuals and 400 corporate entities, and approximately 1 billion euros in AUM.

Pending closure of the deal and the subsequent integration of the entities into KBCs Bulgarian operations, NN PIC and NN Life will continue to honour their commitments to the market while continuing to provide professional service of the highest quality to their customers.

The deal is fully in line with the strategy of the KBC group, which focuses on retail customers, small and medium sized enterprises and midcaps in its core markets of Belgium, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Ireland.

KBC has been present in the Bulgarian financial sector since 2007. In 2009, KBC redefined its strategy to include Bulgaria as one of its core markets. The acquisition will allow UBB and DZI to further increase cross-selling potential through their already well-established bank-insurance presence in the Bulgarian market, to serve more customers, and to benefit from economies of scale and increased visibility.

Johan Thijs, KBC Group CEO, commented as follows on the deal: I am delighted with this acquisition in Bulgaria. Weve become a strong player in this core market, distinguishing ourselves in our banking, insurance, asset management and leasing lines of business. Since our Groups entry in Bulgaria in 2007 our commitment to the Bulgarian market has been firmly stated many times. Today we are taking a next step and adding pension insurance to our already wide-spread presence in Bulgaria. This means that we will be in a position to offer all types of high-end integrated bank-insurance products to our Bulgarian customers. Were extremely happy to acquire a high-quality concern with an excellent reputation and management team, and we are looking forward to developing it in a responsible manner with our other Bulgarian entities, and so affirm our leading position on the Bulgarian financial market.

Luc Popelier, CEO of KBC Groups International Markets Business Unit added: This deal further strengthens our already strong position in Bulgaria and is a fine example of our strategic approach to our core markets. Were convinced that NNs customers and KBCs stakeholders will benefit from the amalgamation of our brands.

Peter Andronov, country manager for KBC in Bulgaria commented: This deal gives our 1.8 million customers access to pension insurance and additional life insurance opportunities, in addition to our broad range of stable, secure and fully integrated financial solutions. Expanding our activities in Bulgaria, building on the competence and dynamism of UBB and DZI, and leveraging our joint product and service offering will help us to achieve our objectives, diversifying our income and ensure future success. I look forward to collaborating with our new staff and management and am convinced that, together, we will affirm our leading position for all our customers and other stakeholders.

For more information, please contact:

Kurt De Baenst, General Manager, Investor Relations, KBC Group

Tel. +32 2 429 35 73 - E-mail : IR4U@kbc.be

Viviane Huybrecht, General Manager, Corporate Communication/Spokesperson, KBC Group

Tel +32 2 429 85 45 - E-mail: pressofficekbc@kbc.be

* This news item contains information that is subject to the transparency regulations for listed companies.



KBC Group NV

Havenlaan 2  1080 Brussels

Viviane Huybrecht

General Manager

Corporate Communication /Spokesperson

Tel. +32 2 429 85 45



Press Office

Tel. +32 2 429 65 01 Stef Leunens

Tel. +32 2 429 29 15 Ilse De Muyer

Tel. +32 2 429 32 88 Pieter Kusse

Tel. +32 2 429 85 44 Sofie Spiessens

E-mail: pressofficekbc@kbc.be



KBC press releases are available at www.kbc.com or can be obtained by sending an e-mail to pressofficekbc@kbc.be



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Eilat, Israel, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :Israeli environmentalists are warning that a UAE-Israeli oil pipeline deal threatens unique Red Sea coral reefs and could lead to "the next ecological disaster".

The agreement to bring Emirati crude oil by tanker to a pipeline in the Red Sea port of Eilat was signed after Israel normalised ties with the Gulf Arab nation late last year and should come into force within months.

With experts warning of possible leaks and spills at the ageing Eilat port, and the Israeli environmental protection ministry demanding "urgent" talks on the deal, activists mobilised last week.

They held a protest in a parking lot overlooking Eilat's oil jetty against what they see as a disaster waiting to happen, chanting that profits will be made "at the expense of corals".

"The coral reefs are 200 metres (yards) from where the oil will be unloaded," said Shmulik Taggar, an Eilat resident and founding member of the Society for Conservation of the Red Sea Environment.

"They say the tankers are modern and there won't be any problem," he said, warning however that "there's no way there won't be a malfunction".

He predicted that with the projected arrival of two to three tankers a week, traffic will be "back-to-back".

This, he said, would also impact the aesthetic of a city promoting ecological tourism.

"You can't sell green tourism when you have oil tankers by the dock," he said.
Bret: The other day I listened to a Malcolm Gladwell podcast on the Yiddish word chutzpah. The word has two distinct connotations. In its American usage, it suggests audacity, as in, It took a lot of chutzpah for her to walk into her bosss office back in 1962 and demand a raise, but  guess what?  she got it! In the Israeli sense, it usually means gall and shamelessness, as in, First the boy murders his parents. Then he pleads for mercy in court because hes an orphan.

Anyway, McConnells speech was chutzpah in the Israeli sense. He wanted to have his outrage and eat it, too. He wanted to ease whatever conscience he has left by denouncing Trump in a way that had no consequences, while using a legal dodge to advance his political interests in the way that really matters. Just pathetic.

Gail: Maybe we can call it the McConnell Two-Step.

Bret: Or maybe the Mitch Macarena. Where is Ted Sorensen when you need him to ghostwrite Profiles of Invertebrates? Its the story of todays Republican Party and conservative establishment, minus Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, Lisa Murkowski and the other brave ones.

Gail: But about the G.O.Ps cup  I ought to ask you. Where do you see your party going from here? Engineering a post-Trump turnaround or just sticking to the same brain-dead script thatll probably force you to vote Democratic again in 2024?

Bret: Gail, it isnt my party any longer, and youre obviously delighting in the thought of my being forced to vote for Democratic presidential candidates for three election cycles in a row. It might suggest a pattern.
BERLIN (Reuters) - Five Tajik nationals arrested in Germany have been charged with membership in Islamic State and preparing acts of terrorist violence by raising funds and recruiting people for attacks, the federal prosecutor's office said on Monday.

One of the charged, identified as Azizjon B., is suspected of having close contact with two high-ranking IS leaders in Afghanistan and operating a Russian- and Tajik-language online network to spread IS propaganda, it said in a statement.

The five suspects, who were arrested last year, were suspected of belonging to an IS cell in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia whose members received instructions and material to build bombs and plotted attacks in Germany.

The statement said they trained with paint ball games to improve their military skills and tactics. Some of the sessions' participants were believed to have had contact with the Islamist gunman who killed four people in a rampage in Vienna last year.

The prosecutors' statement said the network raised funds for Islamic State operations and recruited would-be militants.

It played an important role in radicalising a man who ploughed a vehicle into a crowd in the Swedish capital Stockholm in 2017, killing four people and injuring 15 others, it said.

Last week Danish police said they had arrested 13 people while German police had arrested one more on suspicion of trying to make explosives and planning a terrorist attack in either Denmark or Germany.

(Reporting by Riham Alkousaa; Editing by Mark Hein rich)
The cases marked the first known resurgence of the virus in West Africa since the 2016 epidemic that left more than 11,300 dead across the region

Conakry: The head of Guinea's health agency said Sunday that the country was in the midst of an Ebola "epidemic situation" with seven cases confirmed in the West African nation, including three deaths.

"Very early this morning, the Conakry laboratory confirmed the presence of the Ebola virus," Sakoba Keita said after an emergency meeting in the capital.

Health Minister Remy Lamah had earlier spoken of four deaths. It was not immediately clear why the toll had been reduced.

The cases marked the first known resurgence of the virus in West Africa since a 2013-2016 epidemic that began in Guinea and left more than 11,300 dead across the region. A World Health Organisation representative said it would rapidly send assistance.

Keita, head of the National Agency for Health Security, said one person had died in late January in Gouecke, near the Liberian border. The funeral took place in Gouecke on 1 February "and some people who took part in this funeral began to have symptoms of diarrhoea, vomiting, bleeding and fever a few days later," he said.

The first samples tested by a laboratory set up by the European Union in Gueckedou, located in the same region, revealed the presence of the Ebola virus in some of them on Friday, said Keita. He added that with a total of seven cases and three deaths, Guinea was now in an "Ebola epidemic situation."
Haryana Home Minister on Monday posted a tweet on activist Disha Ravi's arrest that appeared to urge exterminating those who harbour the seed of anti-nationalism, prompting an investigation by Twitter.

The remark in Hindi could also be read as exterminating that seed of anti-nationalism.

Twitter notified the minister about a complaint it received under the German law over the tweet but said after investigation it found that no guidelines were broken.

Congress leader Shashi Tharoor reacted sharply to Vij's tweet. "Surely tweets like this are far more harmful to our democracy than anything in the 'toolkit' Disha Ravi retweeted?" he said.

Desh virodh ka beej jiske bhi deemag mein ho uska samool nash kar dena chahiye fir chahe veh # Disha Ravi ho yaan koi aur, it said.

Roughly translated it reads, Whoever harbours the seed of anti-nationalism in their mind, that has to be destroyed from the roots, be it #Disha_Ravi or anyone else. It could also be read advocating the destruction of that person.

The minister's remarks follow's Ravi's arrest by the Delhi Police for allegedly sharing with German climate activist Greta Thunberg the toolkit related to the farmers' protest against the Centre's new laws.

The Delhi Police had claimed that the 21-year-old activist was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.

The minister posted a response from the Twitter, saying it had received a complaint over the tweet.

We have investigated the reported content and have found that it is not subject to removal under the Twitter Rules or German law. Accordingly, we have not taken any action as a result of this specific report, it said.

(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.)
Britain begins hotel quarantines

People flying into England from South Africa, Brazil and 31 other countries deemed by Britain to be hot spots for coronavirus variants now have to complete a 10-day quarantine in a government-sanctioned hotel.

The quarantines, which began on Monday, will cost nearly $2,500 for a single adult, including meals, security guards and testing. Travelers from elsewhere are also required to self-isolate in the place theyre staying for 10 days. Scotland is requiring all international air passengers, no matter where from, to isolate on arrival in a government-designated hotel.

The restrictions are among the first of this kind in Europe, modeled after strict requirements in other countries with a better grasp on their epidemics, like Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Context: Britain has suffered one of the worlds worst coronavirus outbreaks in terms of deaths per capita. But cases and deaths have plummeted in recent weeks amid a stringent lockdown.
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By Jan Schwartz and Christoph Steitz

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Volkswagen said bad planning on the part of its suppliers has compounded a computer chip shortage blighting the global auto industry, claiming it gave ample notice that the coronavirus' hit to car production would be limited.

VW was in December the first carmaker to warn of a chip supply crunch that has hit global automakers, forcing them to cut or halt production as the semiconductor industry struggles to keep up with a recovery in the car sector.

The German company told its suppliers in April last year - when much of global car production was idled due to the coronavirus pandemic - that it expected a strong recovery in the second half of 2020, a VW executive, who declined to be named, told Reuters.

Volkswagen, the world's second-largest carmaker, says it was made aware of the chip shortage by one of its suppliers at the end of November, but that that warning came too late.

"We have communicated our demand early on. We have passed on our forecasts which have confirmed that demand," said the executive.

"If suppliers do not trust our numbers and consult their own forecasts, we should have been informed straight away. This has not happened."

As well as identifying potential weaknesses in the automotive supply chain, the question over who is responsible for the shortages could play a decisive role in any legal disputes down the line.

The current shortages are seen as stemming from a combination of factors, as auto manufacturers compete against the sprawling consumer electronics industry for chip supplies.

The executive said differing demand forecasts could explain the current problem, which has led VW to warn that chip supply will remain strained during the first half of 2021.

"This has caused a lot of trouble. If the supplier didn't have a chip problem in its own supply chain, we would get our control units," the executive said.

Fellow German companies Continental and Robert Bosch are the world's two largest automotive suppliers.

Story continues

Representatives for the two firms said they would not comment on customer relations. Continental said it has been open and transparent vis-a-vis clients at all times.

Bosch said it was doing everything to keep its customers supplied and to keep impact to a minimum, adding it was in daily contact with suppliers and customers.

Volkswagen, which so far only procures chips indirectly via suppliers, said this month it would consider sourcing straight from manufacturers to protect its supply.

(Reporting by Jan Schwartz and Christoph Steitz; Additional reporting by Douglas Busvine; Editing by Keith Weir and Jan Harvey)
A Melbourne man cooking a sausage sizzle has bizarrely lashed out at a journalist who asked what he was doing outside during Victoria's strict five-day lockdown.

A Channel Seven camera crew approached the man as he made himself dinner at a public barbecue in a park on Monday.

Under the state's draconian stage-four restrictions, Victorians can only leave the house for one of four reasons - for essential shopping, work, care-giving or to exercise for two hours a day.

'You do realise there's a lockdown,' the reporter asked the man as he held out a microphone in front of him on an extendable boom arm.

A Melbourne man cooking a sausage sizzle in a park has bizarrely lashed out at a journalist who asked what he was doing outside

'Mmm these snags are going to be good as,' the man responded before suddenly slapping the microphone on the ground.

Footage of the outburst divided opinion online, with some defending the man's reaction and asking why the reporter was out in Melbourne himself with stay-at-home orders in place.

'"You do know there is a lockdown?" asked the guy walking around shoving microphones in peoples faces,' one person wrote on Reddit.

'The man is just tryna cook some snags. I wonder if they were good as,' another said.

Others though said the man was likely cooking for many more people given the number of sausages there were on the barbecue.

'With all those snags, he's obviously not alone,' the man said.

'This is why we're locked down, and looking down the barrel of an extension [of Victoria's restrictions].'

Footage of the outburst divided opinion online, with some defending the man's reaction while others said he may have been cooking for many more people

Police outside the Holiday Inn Hotel on Melbourne's Flinders Lane on Tuesday. Victoria is in a strict five-day lockdown to stem the spread of a Covid-19 outbreak

Victoria recorded two new locally-acquired coronavirus cases on Tuesday.

On Monday, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews refused to rule out whether his statewide lockdown will end on Wednesday.

'I'm not in a position to be able to confirm that but I can say that thanks to the hard work of those Victorians who are coming forward and getting tested,' he said on Monday.

'I think we are well placed. However, I've never been one to try and make bold predictions.'

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PARADISE, Calif. - A Paradise man who saved dozens of people from the Camp Fire, then started a non-profit, is moving back to the Ridge on a day that has multiple meanings for his family.

Action News Now spoke to Stephen Murray and his wife, who just moved back up to Paradise in a trailer. They said Valentine's Day is a special day for them.

"Valentine's Day 2018, I told him I was pregnant with our daughter and I made a big deal out of it, gave him a little box with our positive pregnancy test -- and today, on Valentine's Day, we are moving back to Paradise," said Audrey Murray.

Audrey and Stephen Murray lost their home about eight months later in the Camp Fire.

"So I worked at Apple Tree Village Mobile Home Park. It was a large -- the biggest mobile home park in Paradise -- so the morning of the fire I knew a lot of the seniors would not know what was going on," explained Stephen Murray.

That's when he rushed home to make sure his family was safe but then went right back to work to help save residents of the park. Since then Stephen Murray started a non-profit called the Coral Apple Foundation.

"With that, I have been able to bring in a lot of trailers for the community, and not just here, but for the Bear Fire that happened this year," he added.

Murray still runs his non-profit but says he took another full-time job too. Then, of course, he has his family, which keeps him pretty busy.

The couple explained despite the fire they still decided to go through with their wedding plans back in May of 2019. That is when they bought a new property in Paradise.

"The day we closed escrow we came to this circle of trees and we sat down... and I gave him this big long speech about life and I love... and got really close to him while he was sitting... and was like, we are going to have another one!" said Audrey Murray.

So for Valentine's day this year, in 2021, they were able to move back to Paradise. "There is a lot of love up here," said Stephen Murray. "My heart belongs up here, her heart belongs here. Why not come back up on Valentine's Day, to the place we love?" Stephen Murray explained.

Murray says they are planning to have their home built just in time for his wife to have their second child in May. They are planning a home birth, in a brand new home, made with sweat and tears and lots of love.

Murray and his wife recently rescued animals from another Camp Fire survivor who was moving out of the area. Being a rescuer and a hero just seems to be part of his DNA.

Many in the community have been helped by Stephen Murray, and are happy to see that he will soon be in a real home since he has provided so much for others, especially the elderly and most vulnerable populations.

If you want to help the Murray's you can click HERE.

If you want to check out Murray's non-profit you can click HERE.

Here are articles to show just some of what Stephen Murray has done:

Action News Now - Feb. 5, 2019 - Man brings supplies to those stuck in foothill snow (Click HERE).

Action News Now - Apr. 21, 2019 - 10,000 Easter eggs found their way to Bille Park in Paradise (Click HERE).

Action News Now - May 18, 2019 - 3,000 Camp Fire survivors showed up for food, gift cards and camaraderie (Click HERE).

Action News Now - Jun. 17, 2019 - Local Paradise hero begins non-profit organization (Click HERE).

KCRA - Nov. 6, 2019 - Paradise man devotes life to helping others after saving 281 from Camp Fire (Click HERE).

Action News Now - Jan. 11, 2020 - Camp Fire survivors gather for protest (Click HERE).

Action News Now - Dec. 8, 2020 - Heavy winds topped over trees on the Ridge; 1 home destroyed (Click HERE).
Following the roads sector, the Indian Railways, for the first time, is planning to introduce the build-operate-transfer (BOT) model for the construction of dedicated freight corridors (DFCs) by roping in private players.

Design, Build, Finance, Maintenance and Transfer (DBFMT), a type of BOT model, will be first experimented in a stretch of the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (EDFC) between Sonnagar in Bihar and Dankuni in West Bengal.

The entire EDFC will stretch from Ludhiana in Punjab to Dankuni.

Major industry players like GMR, Tata Projects, L&T and foreign players like DP World are expected to be keen on the current model. The 538-km stretch is estimated to cost Rs 15,000 crore.

If successful, the DBFMT model will be replicated in the three upcoming DFCs that were announced in the Budget early this month. The three projects are East-Coast Corridor, East-West Sub Corridor and North-South Corridor, which may attract investments to the tune of Rs 2.17 lakh crore.

It is for the first time the BOT model is being tested in the Indian Railways. Private players will be involved in everything, except operations, said Ravindra Kumar Jain, Managing Director of the Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Ltd (DFCCIL).

Generally, under the BOT model, a private player builds a project, operates it and later transfers it to the original owner after a certain period of time.

Jain added that based on the current DBFMT model, the private player will be even exposed to traffic risk and will be in charge of maintenance, too. This PPP model has got its nod from the Railway Board and is currently under the consideration of Niti Aayog.

DFCCIL will float a tender for this as soon as it gets cleared by the Niti Aayog. One of the plans DFCCIL is considering is an assured traffic of 80 per cent to private players.

Though the Viramgam-Mahesana Gauge Conversion Project, executed by DS Construction in 2002, is believed by many to be the first railway BOT project in India, it cannot be considered as a BOT model in the real sense as no risk was involved for the company.

It was more a financing model, where the company had invested some amount and we returned it in an equivalent annuity, Jain said. The Sonnagar to Dankuni stretch will be taken up in two phases  the 282.22 km from Dankuni to Gomoh as Phase-I and the 256.58 km from Gomoh to Sonnagar as Phase-II.

The Eastern and Western dedicated freight corridors are expected to be completed by June 2022. The finance minister, in her Budget speech, had proposed the asset monetization of the DFCCIL assets after the completion of the projects.

The 1,192-km Ludhiana (Punjab) to Mughalsarai (Uttar Pradesh) stretch of the Eastern DFC, DFCCIL is getting funding from the World Bank. The Western DFC is being partly funded through a loan from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
On the hard road towards the way out of the Covid-19 pandemic, Europe is now also evaluating the possibility of using the Chinese Sinopharm vaccine.

The choice has already been made by Hungary and Serbia, who have decided to use this administration in their national mass immunization campaign. In about a month, 14% of Serbia's 6.5 million inhabitants were given the first dose of the vaccine against Covid-19, also thanks to the use of 1.5 million vaccines produced in China. And following its Serbian neighbors, Hungary announced on January 31 that it had reached an agreement with the Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinopharm, which will allow the mass immunization of 2.5 million people.

"This agreement will accelerate the vaccination campaign, which could save the lives of thousands of people and help lift the restrictions sooner," explained Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.

And now signs of openness are also coming from other countries.

OPENING SIGNS - Already on January 31, the German Health Minister, Jens Spahn, said he was "open" to the administration in Germany of vaccines produced in Russia or China, while Markus Soeder, Minister-President of the German federal state of Bavaria , called on the European supervisory body to test Russian and Chinese vaccines "as soon as possible".

A shipment of vaccines produced by Sinopharm will soon also arrive in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where one of the two territorial entities, Republika Srpska, ordered them on February 8, as announced by Alen Seranic, the Minister of Health and Social Security of the Bosnian regional body. Republika Srpska institutions, Seranic revealed, have examined all effects and scientific assessments on vaccines from all manufacturers, including Chinese ones. The efficiency, quality and safety of vaccines, added the regional minister, are the three criteria that all vaccines entering the Republika Srpska must meet.

(Unioneonline / vl)
Loading States will receive 50,000 doses of the initial vaccine shipment and the federal government will distribute a further 30,000 for aged care staff and residents, while setting aside 62,000 doses for second vaccinations as phase 1a of the vaccination program begins. On Tuesday, consent forms will be distributed to aged care facilities and those residents and aged care workers included in the first week of the rollout are being contacted so they can also prepare for their vaccination. The aged care doses will cover more than 250 facilities across the country, including regional and metropolitan homes. As well as aged care residents and workers, phase 1a includes hotel quarantine workers, border staff and essential health care workers.

Mr Hunt said it was up to states to decide which groups from that phase would take priority. They have indicated  and we generally support it  that the greatest immediate risk is the border quarantine process, he said. President of the Australian Medical Association NSW Dr Danielle McMullen said doctors were supportive of NSW Healths management of the quarantine system and backed Ms Berejiklians decision to target quarantine workers with the first round of vaccines. Obviously if we see a big explosion of cases in the community we may change our advice, but the rates are so low in the community that our baseline risk of catching COVID is low so we have a bit of time to prioritise quarantine workers, Dr McMullen said.

University of Sydney public health expert Professor Robert Booy said it made sense to focus on hotel quarantine workers first. Quite honestly its practical and sensible, theyre the ones who are most exposed in Australia to COVID, he said. Mr Hunt expects the first phase of the rollout to take six weeks. Professor Booy said essential healthcare workers would not miss out by more than a week or so. Now that weve got enough for 10 million people we can cover all of those risk groups very well, he said. Dr McMullen expected doctors and nurses at RPA and Westmead hospital would be the first healthcare workers in the community to get the vaccine once quarantine personnel were covered, as they are likely to come into contact with cases that cannot be cared for in hotel quarantine.

Loading Frontline healthcare workers outside the quarantine system would receive either the Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine, she said, which is expected to be approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration within days. NSW on Monday recorded another day of zero community transmission and zero cases in hotel quarantine. More than 15,690 tests were recorded in the latest reporting period. Ms Berejiklian on Monday said NSW had returned to accepting up to 3000 returning travellers every week, a level with which the quarantine system could cope. Well just have to make sure that we dont fall behind the rest of the world when it comes to opening up our borders and leading as close to a normal life as possible, she said.
Copies of The Berkshire Eagle newspaper are placed in a machine before being bundled for distribution in April 2019.

Catalan separatist parties won a majority in the regional parliament after Sunday's election while the Socialists of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez are on track to garner the highest number of votes.

The two leading parties in favor of secession have 65 seats in the 135-member assembly with 84% of the vote counted, while a smaller left-wing group that also backs independence has nine more. The separatists need 68 seats for a majority. The Socialist party has 33 seats and the highest number of votes, but it will be outnumbered by the pro-independence bloc.

Esquerra Republicana and Junts per Catalunya have jointly governed Catalonia since 2016 and in 2017 pushed through an illegal referendum on independence that created deep anger across the rest of Spain. The result may pose a headache for Sanchez because it will mean tough negotiations between the two separatist groups, with Junts looking to set limits to the relationship with the central government.

Sanchez's Socialist party was aiming to clinch the top position after he asked Health Minister Salvador Illa to run for the regional presidency.

The outcome of the elections carry special significance for the premier because his fragile parliamentary majority relies heavily on support from Esquerra lawmakers to pass major legislation. Junts, on the other hand, opposes Sanchez and any prospect of working with the central government. It probably will demand assurances that its partner will not cozy up with the premier once a regional coalition is in office.

Although Esquerra has repeatedly backed Sanchez in the national parliament, the relationship has at times been difficult, with the Catalan group turning its back on the premier when its popularity in Catalonia looked at risk.

One big change is that Esquerra is set to overtake Junts to become the senior partner in the coalition. The party's leader Oriol Junqueras is in prison for his role in the botched proclamation of independence in 2017 and has for several years tried to position itself as a pragmatic party willing to negotiate with the national government. Junts's leader Carles Puigdemont is living in what he describes as exile in Brussels and has ruled out cooperation with Sanchez.

Esquerra is on course to claim 33 seats, matching the Socialists' tally, while Junts is heading for 32 seats.
A returned Australian in mandatory quarantine has been pictured wearing a large garbage bag over their head as they were evacuated out of a Melbourne hotel, as premier Daniel Andrews refused to confirm the end of Victoria's snap lockdown.

The traveller was one of 31 people being moved from the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane on Tuesday morning where Covid-19 infected guests were housed while water damage from a sprinkler system is repaired.

The hotel is a 'hot hotel', meaning it accommodates returned travellers who have tested positive for Covid-19 or are presenting with symptoms, as well as those with complex medical needs.

The evacuation came as Mr Andrews confirmed plans for a purpose-built 'quarantine centre' like the one in Howard Springs as the government desperately tries to plug the leaks in its inner-city hotel programs  where breaches have led to two crippling lockdowns.

But he again refused to commit to ending the current five-day lockdown on Wednesday, as Victoria recorded two new locally acquired coronavirus infections, family members of a previously confirmed case.

A returned Australian evacuated from a Melbourne quarantine hotel emerged wearing a large rubbish bag over their head on Tuesday morning

The individual was one of 31 people who were evacuated out of the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane in central Melbourne after water damage from a sprinkler system

The returned travellers were evacuated after a sprinkler system was activated on the hotel's fourth floor on Saturday, resulting in water damage to half of the eight levels.

The evacuated residents and staff are being transferred to the Pullman Albert Park Hotel, which Covid-19 Quarantine Victoria planned to bring online as an additional site after recently housing Australian Open participants.

The two local cases reported on Tuesday are close household contacts of a previously confirmed case linked to the Melbourne Airport Holiday Inn, taking the outbreak to 19 infections.

They have also been linked to a Coburg private dining function, where an infected member of hotel quarantine staff dined.

'They're not unexpected positives, although I will make it clear they did test negative some days ago, so they've been isolating and, as a result, there's no further exposure sites,' Mr Andrews said.

'There's no further risk, if you like, beyond them as close contacts.'

Mr Andrews declined to commit to ending the lockdown on Wednesday or reveal what restrictions will be lifted - but it is increasingly likely stay-at-home orders will be axed with other rules, such as mandatory masks, poised to stay.

'We are well-placed to be able to make changes tomorrow night. As I said yesterday, I'm not in a position to definitively commit to that, because these next 24 hours will, of course, be crucial,' he said.

'However, with a relatively small number of new cases... we are very well placed, but we won't know and we won't be able to make a final call on that until some time tomorrow.'

Residents and staff from the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane are being transferred to the Pullman Albert Park Hotel (pictured, staff at the Holiday Inn on Tuesday)

The hotel is a 'hot hotel' meaning it accommodates returned travellers who have tested positive for Covid-19 or are presenting with symptoms. Pictured: Police outside the hotel

Cops are seen in front of the Holiday Inn Hotel on Flinders Lane in central Melbourne on Tuesday morning as the evacuation got underway

'However, with a relatively small number of new cases... we are very well placed, but we won't know and we won't be able to make a final call on that until some time tomorrow.'

A final decision is expected to be made around lunchtime on Wednesday.

The function in Coburg was attended by 38 people including a worker from the Holiday Inn quarantine hotel at Melbourne Airport, who had returned a negative test result on February 7.

The venue was not listed as an exposure site until February 12, two days after the hotel quarantine worker eventually tested positive.

The woman is asymptomatic and was tested four times at the weekend, returning both negative and 'weak positive' results.

She worked in a psychiatric unit at the Alfred Hospital and on psychiatric wards at the Northern Hospital in Broadmeadows, which is run by Royal Melbourne Hospital.

Victoria's Covid-19 Testing Commander Jereon Weimar said 150 primary close contacts across the two hospitals have been identified.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews (pictured) defended plunging the entire state into a snap five-day lockdown, as one new locally acquired case of Covid-19 was recorded on Monday

A Covid-infected customer attended Sacca's Fruit World at Broadmeadows Central in Melbourne's north between 12.30pm and 1pm on Tuesday February 9

Health authorities have also identified the fresh fruit and meat section to the west side of Broadmeadows Central as a Tier 3 exposure site

Mr Andrews also revealed a delegation of senior government officials will head to the Northern Territory to examine the Howard Springs quarantine facility as Victoria looks to emulate the model.

'We are actively pursuing and examining the construction of a purpose-built quarantine centre, a centre that would serve to replace in at least significant measure - maybe not entirely but in significant part - the work of inner city hotels,' he said.

'It would be a cabin-style, village-style environment, where there would be fresh air, where there would be not zero risk but lower risk.'

He said there were two 'obvious candidates' for the facility at the moment, Avalon Airport and Melbourne Airport.

Mr Andrews did confirm international flights would not be returning to Melbourne on Thursday as was initially planned. Confirmation of when the flights will resume is expected later in the week.

Some 18 people linked to the Melbourne Airport Holiday Inn have tested positive for Covid-19

Melbourne's Bourke Street was deserted on Wednesday with residents ordered to stay home under tough stage four lockdown restrictions

Overnight, Sacca's Fruit World at Broadmeadows Central in Melbourne's north was added to Victoria's list of potential exposure sites after a Covid-infected shopper attended the location between 12.30pm and 1pm on Tuesday February 9.

The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has identified the venue as a Tier 1 exposure site - meaning all shoppers who were there over the same time frame must quarantine at home.

'Anyone who visited here during these times must isolate, test and remain isolated for 14 days,' DHHS said overnight.

Health authorities have also identified the fresh fruit and meat section to the west side of Broadmeadows Central as a Tier 3 exposure site.

Shoppers who visited that section of the centre between 12.15pm and 1.15pm on February 9 should monitor for symptoms.

The state had recorded just one locally acquired Covid case on Monday, as Mr Andrews clashed with ABC host Leigh Sales in a heated press conference.

NEW RESTRICTIONS FOR VICTORIA FROM 11.59PM ON FRIDAY FEB 12 From Friday February 12 at 11.59pm, new rules apply to Victoria for five days until 11.59pm on Wednesday February 17 due to a worrying new outbreak of the UK mutant strain of Covid-19. Stage Four lockdown for the entire state

Only four essential reasons to leave the house - essential shopping, essential work/education, care-giving or two hours of exercise per day

All residents must stay within 5km of their home other than essential work or shopper

Outdoor exercise must be with your household, intimate partner or one other person not from your household

Mandatory masks everywhere except your home

No visitors to anyone's home

All non-essential shops will be closed

Public gatherings banned

Work from home

Schools closed except for vulnerable children

Places of worship closed

Weddings banned

Funerals capped at 10 people

Community spaces including swimming pools and libraries closed Advertisement
Tallahassee: Sorrow reverberated across the country Sunday as Americans, including President Joe Biden, joined a Florida community in remembering the 17 lives lost three years ago in the Parkland school shooting massacre.

In seconds, the lives of dozens of families, and the life of an American community, were changed forever, Biden said in a statement released on Sunday.

The President used the occasion to call on Congress to strengthen gun laws, including requiring background checks on all gun sales and banning assault weapons.

US President Joe Biden pauses to speak with reporters as he walks to Marine One for departure from the South Lawn of the White House. Credit:AP

There was no time to wait, the President said. We owe it to all those weve lost and to all those left behind to grieve to make a change. The time to act is now.
The Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, has ordered the immediate deployment of four units of riot policemen to address the viole...

The Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, has ordered the immediate deployment of four units of riot policemen to address the violence in parts of Oyo State.

The intervention and stabilization forces also include the Force Intelligence Bureau operatives and one surveillance helicopter from the police airwing department.

Oyo State has been lately wracked by violence, including the killings of farmers by suspected herdsmen, abductions and the clashes between some Hausa and Yoruba traders at Shasha market.





But the force spokesman, CP Frank Mba, in a statement on Monday, titled, Oyo crisis: IGP deploys intervention and stabilization forces, said the operatives would reclaim the public space, reinforce security and bolster public confidence in the areas affected by the crisis.

It stated, The deployments, consisting largely of intelligence and operational assets of the Force, include four units of the Police Mobile Force, seasoned operatives from the Force Intelligence Bureau and one operational/surveillance police helicopter from the police Air-wing department.





The intervention force is being coordinated by a Deputy Inspector General of Police, David Folawiyo, who is expected to mobilize all relevant stakeholders towards achieving the mandate of the squad.

The statement said the IG assured that the force was committed to the safety of the lives and properties of the citizens in the country.

He called on the citizens and residents of Oyo State and other Nigerians to embrace peace and cooperate with the police and the security community as they redouble their efforts in ensuring that sustainable peace and security are restored to the affected areas.
Google has stepped back from a threat to shut down its search engine locally and is on the brink of striking commercial deals with some of Australias largest news organisations after months of hard fought negotiations over planned media bargaining laws.

The ABC, Nine Entertainment Co (owner of this masthead) and Guardian Australia are in eleventh-hour negotiations with the $1.8 trillion tech giant for use of their content on various Google services. Industry sources briefed on the talks indicated the deals could be reached within 48 hours. However, while the talks are in advanced stages, there is no guarantee the agreements will be completed.

Googles threats to pull search from the market are unlikely to go ahead if it signs a series of major deals. Credit:Getty

Google threatened to turn off its search engine in Australia in January in response to the laws. The search giant's progress on agreements with publishers will shift focus to Facebook, which is yet to strike any deals for its own news product and has threatened to pull journalism from its platform if the laws aren't revised.

Kerry Stokes Seven West Media became the first of the major media companies to ink an agreement with Google on Monday.
Turkey summoned the U.S. ambassador to Ankara on Monday to convey in the strongest terms its reaction to a statement on the killing of 13 Turks captured by Kurdish militants, which President Tayyip Erdogan called a joke.

Turkey said on Sunday militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) executed the captives, including Turkish military and police personnel, amid a military operation in northern Iraq where the group was holding them.

The United States said it stood by fellow NATO member Turkey and that it condemned the killings if it was confirmed that responsibility lay with the PKK.

Ankara, already angered by Washingtons partnership with Kurdish fighters in neighbouring Syria, was infuriated by the conditionality of the U.S. statement.

The United States and European Union have designated the PKK a terrorist organisation, but in Syria U.S. forces have been deployed alongside Kurdish YPG fighters who Ankara considers to be inextricably linked to the PKK.

Now there is a statement made by the United States. Its a joke. Were you not supposed to stand against the PKK, the YPG? You clearly support them and stand behind them, Erdogan told supporters of his AK Party in the Black Sea city of Rize.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu also complained on Monday about silence from countries that are supposedly claiming to battle terrorism, adding they were trying to gloss over the issue with ifs and buts.

Since Joe Biden was elected U.S. President last year, Turkey has repeatedly said it wants to improve strained ties with the United States, but U.S. support for the YPG has infuriated Ankara and remains a big disagreement between the allies.

Erdogan said that Ankara would continue its cross-border operations into Iraq against the PKK, which has waged a decades-old insurgency in mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey in which more than 40,000 people have been killed.

If we are together with you in NATO, if we are to continue our unity, then you will act sincerely towards us. Then, you will stand with us, not with the terrorists, Erdogan said.

He said nobody could criticise Turkeys cross-border operations in Syria or Iraq after the killings, and countries must choose between Turkey and the militants.

SOURCE: REUTERS
A new generation of meditation studios is popping up with features that mimic luxury gyms  but purely for your mind.

Nestled on the fringe of Sydneys CBD in Barangaroo is MYND Studios, which opened last week offering about 20 different teacher-led meditation classes throughout the day, with the aim of attracting city workers to sign up to its $50 weekly membership. The bright, large studio is carefully designed to promote calm, with a moss wall, nap pods and a post-class relaxation lounge.

MYND Studios opened last week in Sydneys Barangaroo. Credit:Brook Mitchell

You can come here, do a 25-minute class, get food and still get back to work in the hour, says co-founder James Harris, who was inspired by premium studios in London and New York City. [Its designed] to be a place to breathe when you walk in, a place where this time is for me.

Harris says he wanted to create a venue that is like a physical version of popular apps such as Calm and Headspace, and offers secular meditation, without Buddhist teachings, which he feels is more accessible.
On Monday morning, Robert Irwin gave a Komodo dragon a big cuddle and a belly rub.

Shes absolutely just gorgeous, I mean shes adorable, says the 17-year-old son of Steve, in confident tones that instantly recall the father who died when Robert was just two years old.

Robert Irwin, 17, has won a major international photography award. Credit:Robert Irwin

Irwin was helping a group of scientists study the way the huge predator (named Indah) moves.

Theyre quite vicious when you see them in a feeding response, he says. But after we collated all the data we just sat down in her enclosure [at Australia Zoo] and she came over and enjoyed some belly rubs and some scratches and just found her way into your lap for a cuddle.
Miller brings a deep reservoir of leadership to Shepard for the U.S. Senate. During his Army career, he deployed once as Aide-de-Camp to the Deputy Commanding General of Ground Forces in Iraq, and again as Detachment Commander & Communications Director for the Special Operations Task Force - Syria. Through these experiences, he began to understand what it means to be an American at home and abroad.

"I'm so excited to join Timothy Shepard for the U.S. Senate and support Timothy's vision to restore representative democracy, invest in jobs, education, and healthcare, and restore MainStreet back to its role at the center of our economy."

-Tim Miller - West Point Graduate, Army Veteran, Grassroots Organizer.

"Mobilizing the vote and building a new and larger coalition is our job in this campaign. I'm thrilled to have Miller as my Senior Advisor for Veterans Affairs and Director of Student Outreach. His experience in the military has equipped him as a leader for our grassroots movement."

-Timothy Shepard - Missouri Candidate for the Democratic Nomination for United States Senate

Learn more about Tim Shepard at https://tshepard.com/about-tim.

About Tim Shepard for United States Senate: We are building a grassroots movement to restore democracy, reform capitalism, and invest in our future for Missouri and all Americans. We are working to elect Tim to fight for us, not the political establishment and large corporate interests. Tim's platform puts everyday Missourians front and center with common-sense solutions to big problems that so many of us face.

Our motto as we take on the machine is to, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." - Margaret Mead.

Follow and share Shepard for Senate on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok @GaullShepard

Join our grassroots movement at https://tshepard.com/

contact: Christine Hyman

Hyman Anderson Consulting

[email protected]

314-882-9708

SOURCE Timothy Shepard for United States Senate
A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
Russia is going to carry out more than 10 launches of Soyuz-2 carrier rockets from the Baikonur cosmodrome this year, Ruslan Mukhamedzhanov, the head of the Center for the Operation of Ground-Based Space Infrastructure Facilities, said on Monday

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th February, 2021) Russia is going to carry out more than 10 launches of Soyuz-2 carrier rockets from the Baikonur cosmodrome this year, Ruslan Mukhamedzhanov, the head of the Center for the Operation of Ground-Based Space Infrastructure Facilities, said on Monday.

The first launch was carried out earlier in the day, when the Soyuz-2.1, a carrier rocket, lifted off the Progress MS-16 cargo spacecraft, delivering food and supplies to the International Space Station (ISS). Baikonur's 31st site is specifically reserved for Soyuz-2 rockets.

"Twelve launches will be carried out from this site [in 2021]. These are Federal launches, and commercial launches [in the interests of UK communications company] OneWeb," Mukhamedzhanov said, as broadcast by Russian space agency Roscosmos on YouTube.

In January, a source in the space and rocket industry told Sputnik that from 15 to 17 space launches from Baikonur were planned for 2021. In particular, three Soyuz manned spaceships, three Progress cargo spaceships, two modules of the ISS, Ekspress-AMU3 and Ekspress-AMU7 telecommunications satellites, three groups of OneWeb spacecraft and the Arktika-M meteorological satellite are set to be placed into orbit.

Baikonur is the world's first space launch site constructed by the Soviet Union in 1955. Russia is leasing the facility, which is located in Kazakhstan, until 2050.
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LONDON, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Umbria Network, a decentralized finance platform on the Ethereum blockchain - https://umbria.network, is proud to announce that it will be deploying its suite of applications on Polygon (previously Matic Network).

Polygon - which has vast experience and presence in the DeFi space - provides scalable, secure and instant Ethereum transactions using Plasma side chains and a Proof-of-Stake network. It is one of the most active layer-2 Ethereum scaling solutions in existence today. Its Developer Support Program is designed to help developers overcome difficulties they may face while developing Blockchain-based applications. It helps those building on Polygon to thrive via:

Early support grants

Technical guidance from its team and network

Security audit support

Marketing and promotional support

Help with investor connections

The Umbria team has decided to build its applications on the Polygon network due to its EVM compatibility; high speed, low cost transactions and the overall composability of the network.

The Umbria roadmap outlines a release of its DeFi platform with Polygon side-chain integration on the Mainnet by Q3 of 2021. The DeFi platform recently released its governance token on UniSwap, which will be used to vote on future changes to the protocol.

"We are incredibly excited about our new partnership with Polygon and look forward to collaborating with the team to achieve our common aim of bringing DeFi to the masses by removing barriers to entry," said Barney Chambers, co-lead developer at Umbria. "The technical and marketing support provided by Polygon will be invaluable in driving Umbria forward with the Polygon blockchain scalability platform making it the perfect solution for us."

"We are happy to help the Umbria team build their suite of DeFi applications and are excited to partner with them on their journey to mass adoption," said Arjun Kalsy, VP Growth - Polygon (previously Matic Network).

About Umbria

https://umbria.network

Umbria is a decentralized protocol, which enables DeFi (Decentralised Finance) applications on the Ethereum blockchain. It aims to demystify and simplify DeFi and get people earning income on their crypto. On the Umbria network, anyone will gain access to a developing suite of services created by smart contracts.

You can buy UMBR on UniSwap and add liquidity to earn fees. A user of Umbria will soon be able to swap tokens and earn interest on their cryptocurrency positions on the Umbria website with other facilities coming online (via developers and community initiatives) which will utilise the Umbria protocol and its utility token. One of the initial features of Umbria is that it will allow users to deposit cryptocurrency as liquidity in AMM (automated market making) pools to earn fees from token swapping and earn additional Umbria as an incentive for providing liquidity.

UK-publicly listed Online Blockchain plc (LSE: OBC) is acting as Umbria's coordinator, administrator and advisor.

Contact:

Francesca De Franco

+44 (0)794 125 3135

[email protected]

SOURCE Online Blockchain

Related Links

http://www.onlineblockchain.io


Lucknow: In an attempt to strengthen the roots of the Congress in Uttar Pradesh ahead of 2022 state assembly polls, party leader Priyanka Gandhi will visit Bijnor on Monday to address a Kisan Mahapanchayat at the Ramlila Ground in Chandpur.

The Congress general secretary and UP in-charge is expected to reach Bijnor from Delhi at around 1 pm.

On Wednesday, she attended a Kisan Mahapanchayat in Saharanpur where she criticised the BJP government at the Centre. The three agricultural laws enacted by the central government are monster-like and want to kill farmers, she alleged, adding that the laws will be abolished if her party comes to power at the Centre.

If voted to power, the Congress will scrap these laws. Farmers will get the MSP (Minimum Support Price). Laws will be made to help you, not oppress you, she said.

When the Congress government is formed, laws will not be made to grind you but to help you. We will not do politics with your life. In 1955, Jawaharlal Nehru enacted a law against hoarding, but this law has been abolished by the BJP government. This new law will help the 'billionaires' and they will decide the price of farmers' produce, She said during her address to the farmers at Kisan Mahapanchayat.

The rally was the first in a series of farmers' meetings planned by the Congress in western Uttar Pradesh, a year before the assembly elections in the state where the opposition party is struggling to revive itself.
This is like a virus, like COVID, a media pathogen, said Kang Liu, a professor at Duke University who studies cultural politics and media in China, comparing the spread of disinformation about the virus to the spread of the virus itself. We have a double pandemic  the real pathological virus and the pandemic of fear. The fear is what is really at stake. Spreading rumours On January 26, a man from Inner Mongolia posted a video claiming that the new virus ravaging central China was a biological weapon engineered by the US. It was viewed 14,000 times on the Chinese app Kuaishou before being taken down. The man was arrested, detained for 10 days and fined for spreading rumours. Peoples Daily, the Chinese Communist Partys mouthpiece, broadcast news of his detention in early February, showing the man, face pixelated, wrists shackled, and legs caged in a chair. It was a stern reminder to the citizens of China that fake news can lead to arrest and part of a broader effort by Chinese state media to debunk COVID-19 conspiracies. But just six weeks later the same conspiracy would be broadcast by Chinas foreign ministry, picked up by at least 30 Chinese diplomats and missions and amplified through Chinas vast, global network of state media outlets.

During those six weeks, Chinas leadership came under intense internal criticism. On February 7, Li Wenliang, a Chinese doctor punished for circulating an early warning about the outbreak, died of COVID-19. The outpouring of grief and rage sparked by Lis death was an unusual  and for the ruling Communist Party, unsettling  display in Chinas tightly monitored civic space. Loading Meanwhile, powerful voices in the US  from former President Trump to congressional Republicans  were working to rebrand COVID-19 as the China virus, amplifying fringe theories that it had been engineered by Chinese scientists. Social media accounts that appeared to be pro-Trump or QAnon followers pushed the disinformation, repeatedly retweeting identical content that claimed China created the virus as a bioweapon, researchers at the Australia Institutes Centre for Responsible Technology found. As US rhetoric intensified, China went on the offensive. On February 22, Peoples Daily ran a report highlighting speculation that the US military brought the virus to China, pushing the story globally through inserts in newspapers such as the Helsinki Times in Finland and the New Zealand Herald.

The New Zealand Herald said it has an ad hoc commercial relationship with Peoples Daily, labels their content as sponsored and reviews it before publication. Upon further review of the story that you have referred to, we have removed this particular item from our website, a spokesman said in an email. The Helsinki Times said it has a barter-exchange content agreement with Peoples Daily, whose content it labels but does not vet. We believe that the Western media coverage is at times extremely one-sided and biased, said Alexis Kouros, the editor of the Helsinki Times. Even though Peoples Daily is state-owned, like the BBC, we believe it is beneficial for the global audience to have both sides of stories. As China embraced overt disinformation, it leaned on Russian disinformation strategy and infrastructure, turning to a long-established network of Kremlin proxies in the West to seed and spread messaging. One was amplifying the otherHow much it was command controlled, how much it was opportunistic, it was hard to tell, said Janis Sarts, director of the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, based in Riga, Latvia. Long-term, he added, China is the more formidable competitor and adversary because of the technological capabilities they bring to the table. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video

The truth as I see it Loading In January, long before China began overtly spreading disinformation, Russian state media swept in to legitimise the theory that the US engineered the virus as a weapon. On January 20, the Russian Armys media outlet, Zvezda, announced that the outbreak in China was linked to a bioweapons test, citing a four-time failed political candidate named Igor Nikulin. Nikulin claims to have worked with the United Nations on disarmament in Iraq from 1998 to 2003, including as an adviser to former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

But the UN has no record of his service. Richard Butler, the lead UN weapons inspector at the time, told AP hes never heard of him. Neither has Hans Corell, who served as Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and Legal Counsel of the United Nations from 1994-2004, where he worked closely with Annan. Nikulin said records of his UN work may have been destroyed and stuck by his theory that COVID is a US bioweapon  a claim that has been repeatedly debunked. What other proof is needed?! he said in an email to AP. Over the next two months, more than 70 articles appeared in pro-Kremlin media making similar bioweapons claims in Russian, Spanish, Armenian, Arabic, English and German, according to APs analysis of a database compiled by EUvsDisinfo, which tracks disinformation for the European Union. Loading Online journals identified by the US State Department and others as pro-Russian proxies picked up the bioweapons narrative, enhancing its reach and resonance.

Russian politicians joined the chorus. Parliamentarian Natalia Poklonskaya argued that the novel coronavirus could be a biological weapon created by those who want to rule the planet to undermine China. Shortly after, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the nationalistic leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, suggested that the US and its greedy pharmaceutical companies were to blame. Meanwhile, Nikulin kept flogging his theory, which morphed as the pandemic spread from an attack on China to an attack on Trump. Despite his inconsistency and questionable bona fides, by April, Nikulin had appeared at least 18 times on Russian television. US officials also said Russian intelligence had been covertly spreading COVID-19 disinformation, including claims that the virus was a US bioweapon. On January 23, Beijing began to roll out the largest medical quarantine in modern history, sealing tens of millions of people at the epicentre of the outbreak in central China. The images were harrowing, as people desperate to slip out thronged train stations. Shortly after 11am the next morning, Francis Boyle, a Harvard-trained law professor at the University of Illinois, emailed a worldwide alert to 300 contacts warning, without evidence, that China had been developing the coronavirus as a bioweapon at a biosafety lab in Wuhan. Over the next few weeks, Boyle refined his theory, now asserting that Chinese scientists had not developed the virus themselves, but taken it from a North Carolina laboratory.

This is clearly an offensive biological warfare agent, Boyle told conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on a February 19 Infowars broadcast. The theory spread via outlets like One America News Network, a pro-Trump channel, Irans Press TV, Global Research and its erstwhile partner, the Strategic Culture Foundation, an online journal that masquerades as independent but is actually directed by Russias foreign intelligence service, according to the US State Department. Boyle told the AP his conclusions are based on research and that he cant stop conspiracy theorists or foreign governments from using his claims for their own ends. My job is to tell the truth as I see it, he said. Information laundering

On March 9, a public WeChat account called Happy Reading List reposted an essay claiming the US military created SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, at a lab at Fort Detrick, in Maryland, and loosed it in China during the Military World Games, an international competition for military athletes, held in Wuhan in October 2019. The account, which has been suspended, was registered in May 2019 by a woman from Henan province in central China, who did not reply to messages. Its not clear who first wrote the article, which can still be found on other WeChat accounts. Loading The next day an anonymous petition appeared on the White Houses now-defunct We the People portal. It urged US authorities to clarify whether the virus had been developed at Fort Detrick and leaked from the lab. The petition was lavishly covered by Chinas state media, despite getting only 1426 signatures, far shy of the 100,000 needed to merit a response from the White House. On March 11, Larry Romanoff, who claims to be a former management consultant based in Shanghai, posted an article on Global Research Canada that cribbed heavily from the Happy Reading List posting, citing it as a source.

There have been a number of stories where the origin of a story is in Russian-controlled space but its picked up by Global Research and then put forward as their own story. Then you get Russian media saying western analysts in Canada say that. We call that information laundering, said Sarts, the NATO StratCom director. They have been helpful for a long time to Russian information operations and recently to the Chinese as well. Neither Romanoff nor Global Research responded to requests for comment. The day of Romanoffs article, the World Health Organisation officially designated the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic. Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for Chinas foreign ministry, spent part of the next afternoon retweeting cute dog videos. Then, late that night, he sent out a series of tweets over 13 minutes that launched what may be Chinas first truly global digital experiment with overt disinformation. When did patient zero begin in US? Zhao wrote. How many people are infected? What are the names of the hospitals? It might be US army who brought the epidemic to Wuhan. Be transparent! Make public your data! US owe (sic) us an explanation!

The next morning, Zhao urged his hundreds of thousands of Twitter followers to read and retweet Romanoffs piece. An hour and a half-hour later he gave Global Research another boost, referring his followers to an earlier Romanoff article that cited Chinese state media reporting to cast doubt on the origins of the virus. Twitter later added a fact-check warning to Zhaos tweet about the US Army  but only in English. An identical post in Mandarin carried no such alert. Twitter also put a fact-checking label on only one of Zhaos two reposts of Global Research content. A Twitter spokesperson said that the platform has expanded its policies to deal with misleading COVID-19 information but did not address specific posts flagged by AP. Zhaos tweets were now global news, and they hijacked mainstream discussion of the coronavirus. On Twitter alone, Zhaos aggressive spray of 11 tweets on March 12 and 13 was cited over 99,000 times over the next six weeks, in at least 54 languages, according to analysis conducted by DFRLab. The accounts that referenced him had nearly 275 million followers on Twitter  a number that almost certainly includes duplicate followers and does not distinguish fake accounts. Influential conservatives on Twitter, including Donald Trump Jr., hammered Zhao, propelling his tweets to their largest audiences.

Chinas Global Times and at least 30 Chinese diplomatic accounts, from France to Panama, rushed in to support Zhao. Venezuelas foreign minister and RTs correspondent in Caracas, as well as Saudi accounts close to the kingdoms royal family also significantly extended Zhaos reach, helping launch his ideas into Spanish and Arabic. His accusations got uncritical treatment in Russian and Iranian state media and shot back through QAnon discussion boards. But his biggest audience, by far, lay within China itself  despite the fact that Twitter is banned there. Popular hashtags about his tweetstorm were viewed 314 million times on the Chinese social media platform Weibo, which does not distinguish unique views. Late on the night of March 13, Zhao posted a message of gratitude on his personal Weibo: Thank you for your support to me, let us work hard for the motherland ! Contagion The same day Zhao tweeted that the virus might have come from the US Army, Irans Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei also announced that COVID-19 could be the result of a biological attack.

State media outlets reinforced Khameneis message, drawing on foreign sources for validation. Tasnim News, for example, quoted Nikulin, the self-proclaimed Russian bioweapons expert, to suggest the US engineered the virus to target China. Javan Online quoted Zhaos tweets to claim Chinese officials had evidence the US was behind the pandemic. Military and religious leaders in Iran repeatedly referred to the virus as a US-made bioweapon. Their remarks were, in turn, amplified by Russian media and picked up in China, where they fuelled further speculation. The International Union of Virtual Media (IUVM), an Iranian network that has been purged repeatedly by Facebook, Google and Twitter, activated a network of websites and covert social media accounts to accuse the US of engineering the virus and praise the leadership and benevolence of China. Khamenei again cited the conspiracy theory that the virus was made in America during his annual Persian New Year speech on March 22  this time as justification for refusing US assistance. I do not know how real this accusation is but when it exists, who in their right mind would trust you to bring them medication? Khamenei told the nation. Possibly your medicine is a way to spread the virus more.

That same day, the first of two cargo planes loaded with doctors and supplies for a 50-bed field hospital from Doctors Without Borders landed in Iran. On March 23, Irans Ministry of Foreign Affairs tweeted a Global Research reprint of an article from Chinese state broadcaster CGTN that questioned the origin of the coronavirus, again suggesting it had been made in a US government lab at Fort Detrick. The next day, Irans Ministry of Health withdrew permission for Doctors Without Borders to deliver COVID-19 aid. A media pathogen Ten days after Zhaos first conspiratorial tweets, Chinas global state media apparatus kicked in to push the theory that Zhao, and now Khamenei, were broadcasting.

Did the US government intentionally conceal the reality of COVID-19 with the flu? asked a suggestive op-ed in Mandarin published by China Radio International on March 22. Why was the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick in Maryland, the largest biochemical testing base, shut down in July 2019? Within days, versions of the piece appeared more than 350 times in Chinese state outlets, mostly in Mandarin, but also around the world in English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and Arabic, AP found. The story flew across China, through social media accounts run by police, prosecutors, propaganda departments, anti-cult associations and Communist Youth Leagues. Seven prisons in Sichuan province, five provincial and municipal traffic radio stations, and a dozen accounts run by state media giant CCTV also pushed it out. Chinas Embassy in France promoted the story on Twitter and Facebook. It appeared on YouTube, Weibo, WeChat and a host of Chinese video platforms, including Haokan, Xigua, Baijiahao, Bilibili, iQIYI, Kuaishou and Youku. A seven-second version set to driving music appeared on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok. Clearly pushing these kinds of conspiracy theories, disinformation, does not usually result in any negative consequences for them, said Mareike Ohlberg, a senior fellow in the Asia Program of the German Marshall Fund.

AP found the story was viewed over 7 million times online, with more than 1.8 million comments, shares or reactions. Those numbers are an undercount because many platforms did not publish metrics, and they dont account for television viewership or circulation in closed groups. Accounts promoting the content had a combined total of over 817 million followers, though many are likely to be duplicates or fakes. Conspiracies brewing in the United States reinforced Chinas messaging. In late March, George Webb, a for-profit conspiracy theorist in Washington DC, doxed a US Army reservist as Patient Zero, claiming on YouTube that she brought the virus from Fort Detrick to Wuhan during the October military games. Webbs video circulated widely in China and was picked up by state-run Global Times. The falsely accused woman got death threats and Webbs video was pulled from YouTube, but its still live in China on Weibo, where it has accrued millions of views. In search of an ending In April, Russia and Iran largely dropped the bioweapon conspiracy in their overt messaging. They had a more pressing concern: Surging numbers of dead.

China carried on. Beijing was besieged by demands for accountability. In the US, there were calls for a pandemic tariff and cancelling US debt with China. Republicans in Congress began introducing legislation to strip China of its sovereign immunity so Americans could sue. Australian officials called for an inquiry into the origins and spread of coronavirus. Chinas ambassador to Australia, Cheng Jingye, issued a veiled threat. Maybe the ordinary people will say, Why should we drink Australian wine? Eat Australian beef? he said. Within a month, China banned beef from four big Australian producers and slapped an 80 per cent tariff on Australian barley  moves widely seen as retribution, though China has denied that charge. Chinese officials and state media continued to promote made-in-America COVID-19 conspiracies.

State broadcaster CGTN jumped in on May 16, releasing a slick documentary about Fort Detrick set to spooky music that has been viewed on its YouTube channel more than 82,000 times. YouTube has not flagged the video as state-sponsored content, despite a 2018 policy to label government-funded videos. A YouTube spokesperson said that because the video is about COVID-19, it was labelled with an information panel about the virus instead of the publisher. The video has been played on Chinas Bilibili platform 378,000 times and broadcast in English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Indonesian, Filipino  as well as by NTV, a Houston TV station that failed to note the content was Chinese government propaganda. NTV said it has removed the video flagged by AP. I have warned our newsroom department for the future, said Navroz Prasla, the CEO of NTV, which says it is the largest South Asian TV network in North America. In July and August, Zhao, the foreign ministry spokesman, rekindled the Fort Detrick conspiracy in Tweets that have not been flagged for fact-checking: Much remains unclear about US #FortDetrick and over 200 bio labs in the world, he wrote on August 11. On January 14, 2021, a team from the World Health Organisation landed in China to investigate the origins of the outbreak. The next day, in one of the final acts of the Trump administration, the US State Department put out a Fact Sheet stating that the pandemic could be the result of a leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which it claimed has collaborated on secret projects with Chinas military.

Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned those allegations as the last-day madness of Mr. Liar. Loading Id like to stress that if the United States truly respects facts, it should open the biological lab at Fort Detrick, give more transparency to issues like its 200-plus overseas bio-labs, invite WHO experts to conduct origin-tracing in the United States, spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at a January 18 press conference. Her remarks went viral in China. COVID-19 disinformation has been good for Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Within China, Zhao and his colleagues have a growing fan base and their followers on Twitter have soared. Zhao now has over 879,000 Twitter followers.
A Freemansburg man is facing assault charges after allegedly attacking a woman and biting off a portion of her lip during a domestic dispute.

Edward Clark, 27, of the 600 block of Ramblewood Lane, is charged with aggravated assault, simple assault and reckless endangerment in Saturdays crime.

Borough police were called to Clarks home at 11:38 p.m. following a 911 hangup call. Investigators knocking on the door could hear the female victim inside calling for help, police said. The woman was trying to open the door to officers but Clark kept blocking her attempts, according to police.

Officers eventually gained entry into the home and found the woman with bruising near her left eye, a portion of her lower lip severed and cuts to her hand. The victim reported to police that Clark allegedly came home intoxicated following a baby shower and a dispute ensued.

The victim grabbed a kitchen knife at one point to protect herself, which led to Clark punching her in the face and biting her lower lip until he severed a portion of it, police said. The victims hand also was cut by the knife during the altercation, according to police.

Clarks pants were found by investigators covered in blood, police said. He was taken to an area hospital for treatment, and police say the hospital confirmed the presence of alcohol in Clarks system. The victim was taken to Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest in Salisbury Township for treatment of her injuries.

Court records did not state the relationship between the pair or what led to the dispute.

Clark was arraigned before District Judge Alan Mege, who set bail at $25,000 with a 10% option if approved by PreTrial Services. In lieu of bail, Clark was taken to Northampton County Prison, where he remained Sunday.

Clark is due back in court before District Judge Nicholas Englesson, tentatively scheduled for 9 a.m. on Feb. 26

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Pamela Sroka-Holzmann may be reached at pholzmann@lehighvalleylive.com.
A voters puts a ballot into a box in a polling station at an elementary school in Seoul in this April 15, 2020, photo, to participate in the general election for the 21st National Assembly. This year's by-elections are set to be held on April 7, with early voting slated for April 3 and 4. Korea Times file



By Jung Da-min



With less than two months left ahead of this year's Seoul and Busan mayoral by-elections set to be held on April 7, political watchers are forecasting that voter turnout will be a key factor in determining the winners.



While there are several variables that could affect voter turnout, one of them is that the elections are being held on a work day, not on a public holiday.



Election days are usually public holidays here to encourage people's participation, but by-elections, which are held only in affected regions, are not classified as regular election days, meaning that the days of by-elections are regular working days.



Some said this could discourage public participation, especially voting by office workers in their 20s to 40s. But others said, considering keen public attention to the elections, many younger people would still vote by participating in early voting. Plus the voting hours are until 8 p.m., two hours longer than usual.



Oh Meoung-seok, 35, an office worker in Seoul, said he will vote for the Seoul mayoral by-election.



"I am planning to cast my vote for the Seoul mayoral post, as I think it is necessary for us to judge the current regime under President Moon Jae-in through this year's by-elections," Oh told The Korea Times.



Another office worker, Ryu Hee-bong, 32, said he will vote as he sees casting a ballot as his right as a Seoul citizen.



"I think many young office workers in Seoul will participate in the mayoral by-election as the election will take place on a working day and people will be staying in Seoul rather than going out of the city to enjoy a vacation day," Ryu said.



Political watchers said the turnout for the Seoul mayoral by-election could set a new record for a by-election, as it could be seen as a barometer for the upcoming presidential election set to be held in March 2022.



Political watchers also said early voting, slated for April 3 and 4, the weekend before the April 7 by-elections, could also see a higher turnout compared to previous by-elections, as a growing number of people are casting ballots during early voting  the turnout for early voting for last year's April 15 general election was 26.69 percent, the highest since its introduction in 2014, despite the COVID-19 pandemic situation.



Mayoral hopefuls competing for the Seoul mayoral post include former SMEs and Startups Minister Park Young-sun and four-term lawmaker Rep. Woo Sang-ho from the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK); former four-term lawmaker Na Kyung-won and former Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon from the main opposition People Power Party (PPP); minor opposition People's Party leader Ahn Cheol-soo; and independent former lawmaker Keum Tae-sup.



Among mayroal hopefuls competing for the Busan mayoral post are PPP member and former National Assembly Secreteray General Park Heong-joon, and DPK member and former National Assembly Secretary General Kim Young-choon.


The Asian Development Bank (ADB) on Monday said it will provide Rs 100 crore loan to hospital chain Medanta for healthcare services and medical equipment to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

The project will support the purchase of personal protective equipment, basic hygiene products, and patient care equipment such as ventilators and beds. It will also support staff training programmes on infection prevention and control.

"Private sector healthcare services play a life-saving role during health crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic," said Aniruddha Patil,



Head of Health and Education Investments at ADB's Private Sector Operations Department.

Medanta's proven expertise and leadership will further improve the resilience of India's health system, enabling it to respond effectively to the current crisis and future healthcare challenges, Patil said.

Naresh Trehan, Global Health Chairman and Managing Director of Medanta said the partnership with will meet its financing requirement.

Global Health Pvt Ltd operates and manages hospitals across India under the Medanta brand with a total operational capacity of about 2,000 beds.

"The financing will help us focus on increasing healthcare capacity to satisfy the strong Indian demand for both COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 related treatment," Trehan said.

The debt financing by is part of a USD 20 billion assistance package announced by the multi-lateral funding agency in April 2020 to help its developing members manage the pandemic.

The funding complements ADB's sovereign support to India, including a USD 1.5 billion loan approved in April last year for COVID-19 containment and prevention, and social protection for poor and economically vulnerable communities such as women.

Global Health Private Ltd has four Medanta multi-super-specialty hospitals in Gurgaon, Lucknow, Indore, and Ranchi, with out-patient services in Patna which started in 2020.

It also has three clinics at Delhi Airport, South Delhi, and DLF Cybercity. Its flagship hospital Medanta - The Medicity Gurugram, has over 1,300 beds, including 246 critical care beds.

(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.)
Imphal/Agartala, Feb 16 : World's largest all-women-run market 'Ima Keithal' or the 'Mother's Market', located in the Manipur state capital, was formally reopened on Monday after 11 months, bringing smile on the faces of over 3,600 women traders.

The market, which has a history of over 500 years, was closed on March 21, 2020, as a preventive measure amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Chief Minister N. Biren Singh, who was the chief guest at the reopening, announced that women vendors of the market would be exempted from the vendor's license fee for the year.

"The government took the decision considering the hardship faced by the women vendors during the pandemic as the markets remained closed for nearly a year," he said.

Singh also appealed to the women vendors to allot a day to the government once in a month for maintenance and cleaning work of the market area.

"Extremely glad to re-open Ima Keithel, Imphal from today with Covid situation significantly improving.

"Timely closure of Ima Keithel from March 21, 2020 helped control spread of the pandemic up to a large extent. Thanks to all the Imas for their unstinting support & cooperation.

"Following the shutting down of the trading activities in the big market, the economy of the entire state was badly hit, especially the women vendors of the Ima Market, who are the sole bread earner of their family," he had tweeted earlier.

A study by ocial researcher Serto Tondana Kom revealed that the closure of the large market has caused a loss of Rs 3,879 crore.

The study further stated that a total of 3,614 license holder women vendors registered with the Imphal Municipal Corporation and having stalls at Ima market had faced severe hardships in making ends meet for their families and urged the state government continuously to allow them to restart their business.

Septuagenarian Laishram Mema, who has been a vendor at the Ima Market for the past 45 years, said: "After the government announced the lockdown in March last year, daily wage earners were severely affected.

"The well-to-do vendors are doing relatively well. But a large number of Imas are facing a serious hardship. Though the state government had arranged bank loans for over a hundred vendors but the economic hardships of many hit the various activities including education and medical treatment of many families." Imphal-based writer and political commentator Iboyaima Laithangbam said that the Ima Market has three different complexes in the same area selling consumer items, local Manipuri items and products and mixed goods including clothing.

"Since the British period, the Ima Keithel has not remained only a simple marketplace or trading hub, but developed as an apex centre for the campaign on various societal issues and against unsocial activities," Laithangbam told IANS.

He said that the market has over the centuries been playing a pivotal role in empowerment of the women in the men dominated Manipuri society.

"For the socio-economic development of the Manipuri women, this market has always been playing a pioneering role," Laithangbam said.

Another Manipuri intellectual and writer Rajkuamr Kalyanjit Singh said that men can purchase anything from the "Ima Market" but they cannot be a vendor or seller.

"Manipuri women wearing their traditional attire operate their shops and stalls and occasionally organised various traditional festivals and events. The women vendors helped each others' necessities and guide the new vendors in doing the business," Singh told IANS.

The vendors in the Ima Market are known as 'imas' or mothers, and the majority of the sellers are between the ages of 50 and 70 years. Singh, editor of Manipuri newspaper 'Marup' said that in 1891, the British introduced stringent political and economic reforms leading to adverse impact on the market.

"Several measures including high taxation were imposed that eventually troubled the socio-economic fabric of the state in general and Manipuri society in particular. All these led to the formation of the 'Nupi Lana' (Women's War) movement in 1939 to revolt against the atrocities of the British. Protest rallies, mass gatherings and campaigns were held to denounce the British policies and measures.

"The British, in order to thwart the agitation, tried to sell the market's buildings to external buyers and foreigners but women of Manipur stood against the British and defended their market aggressively," the veteran scholar said.

(Sujit Chakraborty can be contacted at sujit.c@ians.in)


remaining of

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Deceased Japanese man confirmed as new Covid-19 infection case in Vietnam

A Japanese man who died at a hotel in Hanoi has tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, raising the total number of infection cases Vietnam to 2,229, the Ministry of Health reported on Monday morning.









Authorities in Hanoi lock down a hotel where the Japanese man was found dead with positive SARS-CoV-2 virus. Photo by Dantri





According to the ministry's report, the 54-year-old man arrived at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City on January 17 to work at Mitsui Vietnam. He was sent to a local quarantine area upon his arrival.

During his stay at a quarantine facility in Tan Binh District, he tested negative for the virus twice on January 17 and 31.



After finishing his quarantine period, the man flew to Hanoi on February 1 and stayed at a hotel in Tay Ho District from February 1-13. During this time he travelled from the hotel to his company.



On February 13, he was found dead at the hotel and subsequent tests later proved he had carried the virus.



The hotel has been locked down and disinfected while local authorities are tracing those who had contact with the deceased Japanese man for monitoring.



With these new infection cases, the number of imported Covid-19 patients in Vietnam has increased to 2,229, including 1,330 locally-transmitted cases with 637 cases reported since the new outbreak started in Hai Duong on January 28.



As of 6 am on February 15, a total of 1,534 Covid-19 patients had recovered and been discharged from hospital. There have been 35 deaths, most of them being the elderly with serious underlying diseases.



At present, as many as 152,690 people who had close contact with Covid-19 patients or returned from virus-hit areas are being monitored at hospitals, quarantine facilities, and at home.
Bill Hutchinson / The Chronicle

San Francisco police arrested a Fresno man late Saturday for allegedly shooting two men during an incident that took place on Drumm Street near the Embarcadero.

Police identified the suspect arrested as Tyler Gangell, 25, and booked him into San Francisco County Jail for suspicion of numerous violations, including committing two counts of attempted murder, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon, carrying a loaded firearm in a public place/vehicle, along with several other firearms-related violations.
The Projects Lisa Wilkinson last night interviewed former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins who alleges she was raped inside a Parliament House office in 2019.

The story was broken by news.com.au.

It reported that a man working for then-defence industry minister Linda Reynolds took a 24-year-old female media staffer into Parliament House after a Friday night drinking session in March 2019 and allegedly raped her inside the defence industry ministers office. The mans name has not been revealed.

Ms. Higgins says she did not make a formal complaint because she wanted to protect her job and the reputation of the Liberal Party. Alarmingly, a follow-up meeting was held inside the same office where the incident allegedly occurred -a decision the Government now regrets.

ACT Policing have confirm they received a report in April 2019 in relation to an alleged assault at Parliament House.

Ms. Higgins did speak to the Australian Federal Police and her chief of staff in the days that followed.

But she ultimately asked the police to halt the investigation on Saturday, April 13, just two days after the Prime Minister called the election.

ABC reports Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the Government takes all such matters, all matters of workplace safety, very very seriously.

Everyone should feel safe in their workplace, wherever that is.

The reports today are deeply distressing.

Last year Four Corners report Inside the Canberra Bubblewhich made allegations about members of parliament and staffers, drawing attention to their behaviour in the context of Malcolm Turnbulls bonk ban.

It led to questions from Communications Minister Paul Fletcher to ABC chair Ita Buttrose and senate estimate questions of ABC managing director David Anderson.

National Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence Counselling Service 24-hour helpline 1800 RESPECT on 1800 737 732

on Sexual Assault Support Services on 6231 1811 , or after hours 6231 1817

, or after hours Family Violence Crisis and Support Service on 1800 608 122

Lifeline on 13 11 14

Related
A serial pooper is on the loose in Michigan  relieving himself in cars  and police would like to have a word.

It started in November when employees at Mr. Friendly Auto Service in Warren noticed an unpleasant stench coming from a van as they pushed it into the shop, WJBK reported. After discovering poop in the vehicle, the team checked the surveillance cameras.

The video showed that a man had grabbed some sanitary napkins, then defecated inside the customers van, pants half-down, Chris Phillips, the manager, told the outlet. He wiped in the parking lot, dropped the napkins on the ground, picked it up and threw it in the dumpster.

He said the man showed up again in January but didnt poop in a car, WJBK reported.

The next month, Twins Tire Service Center became the target.

Just after 5 a.m. on Feb. 3, the repair shop caught the man on surveillance video walking to a white van and opening the door before taking a squat, WXYZ reported.

Police commissioner Bill Dwyer told WWJ the owner brought in the van for repair because its doors werent locking.

Following the incident, Twins Tire cleaned the customers car at no charge, police told WXYZ.

The incidents are under investigation, but police say theres no description of the culprit and the motive is unclear, according to WWJ.

Anyone with information is asked to contact Warren police at (586) 574-4895.

Warren is just north of Detroit.
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A recent market study published by Future Market Insights (FMI) on the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market includes global industry analysis for 2015-2019 & opportunity assessment for 2020-2030, delivers a comprehensive assessment of the most important market dynamics. After conducting a thorough research on the historical as well as current growth parameters of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market, growth prospects are obtained with maximum precision.

Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market: Segmentation

The global cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market is segmented in detail to cover every aspect of the market and present a complete market intelligence approach to the reader.

Product Type

Cryopreservation Media

Cryopreservation Storage Devices Dewars Cryogenic Liquid Cylinders Cryogenic Storage Tanks Vapor Tanks Storage Alarm Systems LN 2 Auto Fill Systems LN2 Sterilization System Cryo Control/Inventory Management Systems Storage Container Cryocanes Visotubes Cannisters

Consumables & Accessories Vitrification Carriers Sperm Straws Saw Freeze Straws Cryovials

Cryo-Shipping Dry Shipper Container Clinical Pack Over Wrap Cryogenic Labels



Application

Oocycte Cryopreservation

Sperm Cryopreservation

Embryo Cryopreservation

End User

Biobanks

IVF & Fertility Clinics

Research & Academic Institutes

Cryo-shipping/couriers

Cryo Monitoring /Inventory Management

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Report Chapters

Chapter 01  Executive Summary

The report initiates with the executive summary of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market, which includes a summary of key findings and statistics of the market. It also includes market size and revenue distribution of market segment of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market.

Chapter 02  Market Overview

Readers can find the definition and a detailed segmentation of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in this chapter, which will help them understand the basic information about the market.

Chapter 03  Key Market Trends

This chapter highlights the key trends impacting the growth of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market over the forecast period. This chapter helps reader to understand the trends of cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market.

Chapter 04  Key Success Factors

This section includes key success factors such as product adoption analysis, application road map, key promotional strategies, regulations, and many more. This section helps readers understand the key factors associated with the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market.

Chapter 05  Market Background

This chapter explains the key macroeconomic factors, drivers, restraints, and opportunity analysis that are expected to influence growth of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market over the forecast period. Moreover, in-depth information about the market dynamics and their impact analysis on the market have been provided in the successive section.

Chapter 06  Global Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market: COVID19 Impact Analysis

This section highlights COVID19 impact analysis that are expected to influence growth of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market over the forecast period. This section helps reader to understand the COVID19 crisis impact on the market across various regions.

Chapter 07  Global Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market: Pricing Analysis

This section highlights the global cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market pricing analysis by product. This section helps reader to understand the pricing variation of whole slide scanner in various geography.

Chapter 08  Global Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Value Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This section explains the global market value analysis and forecast for the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market during the forecast period. This chapter includes a detailed analysis of the historical cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market, along with an opportunity analysis of the future. Readers can also find the absolute $ opportunity for the current year (2020), and an incremental $ opportunity for the forecast period (20202030).

Chapter 09  Global Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030, by Product

Based on product, the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market is segmented into cryopreservation media, cryopreservation storage devices (dewars, cryogenic liquid cylinders, cryogenic storage tanks (vapor tanks, storage alarm systems, LN2 auto fill systems, LN2 sterilization systems, cryo control/inventory management systems), and storage container (cryocanes, visotubes, cannisters)), consumables & accessories (vitrification carriers, sperm straws, slow freeze straws, and cryovials), cryo-shipping (dry shipper container, clinical pack over-wrap, and cryogenic labels). In this chapter, readers can find information about the key trends and developments in cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market and market attractiveness analysis based on product.

Chapter 10  Global Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030, by Application

This chapter provides details about the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market based on application, and has been classified into oocyte cryopreservation, sperm cryopreservation, and embryo cryopreservation. In this chapter, readers can understand the market attractiveness analysis based on application.

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Chapter 11  Global Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030, by End User

This chapter provides details about the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market based on end user, and has been classified into biobanks, IVF & fertility clinics/centers, research & academic institutes, cryo shipping/couriers, and cryo monitoring/inventory management. In this chapter, readers can understand the market attractiveness analysis based on end user.

Chapter 12  Global Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030, by Region

This chapter explains how the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market will grow across various geographic regions such as North America, Latin America, Europe, South Asia, East Asia, Oceania, and Middle East & Africa (MEA).

Chapter 13  North America Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This chapter includes a detailed analysis of growth of the North America cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market, along with a country-wise assessment that includes the U.S. and Canada. Readers can also find the regional trends, and market growth based on the application and countries in North America.

Chapter 14  Latin America Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This chapter provides the growth scenario of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in Latin American countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and the Rest of Latin America. Along with this, assessment of the market across target segments has been provided.

Chapter 15  Europe Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This chapter provides the growth scenario of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in Europe in several countries such as Germany, U.K., France, Spain, Italy, Russia, and the Rest of Europe are included in this chapter.

Chapter 16  South Asia Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This chapter provides the growth scenario of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in South Asia in several countries such as India, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and rest of South Asia are included in this chapter.

Chapter 17  East Asia Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This chapter highlights the growth of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in East Asia by focusing on China, Japan & South Korea. This section also help readers understand the key factors that are responsible for the growth of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in East Asia.

Chapter 18  Oceania Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This chapter highlights the growth of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in Oceania. This section also help readers understand the key factors that are responsible for the growth of the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market in Australia and New Zealand.

Chapter 19  MEA Cryopreservation for In-vitro Fertilization (IVF) Market Analysis 2015-2019 & Opportunity Assessment 2020-2030

This chapter provides information about how the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market will grow in major countries in the MEA region such as GCC Countries, South Africa, Turkey and the Rest of MEA, during the forecast period.

Chapter 20 Key and Emerging Countries Analysis

This section include deep dive analysis of cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market for key and emerging countries. Reader can understand the market value and volume by product, application, and end user for key countries.

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Chapter 21  Market Structure Analysis

This chapter highlights the tier structure analysis, market concentration analysis and company share analysis along with sales footprint analysis of key player operating in cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market.

Chapter 22  Competition Analysis

In this chapter, readers can find a comprehensive list of all the prominent stakeholders in the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market, along with a detailed information about each company, which includes company overview, revenue shares, strategic overview, and recent company developments. Some of the market players featured in the report are the Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc., FUJIFILM Irvine Scientific, Inc., MilliporeSigma (Merck KGaA), Vitrolife AB, Kitazato Corporation, Brooks Life Sciences (Brooks Automation, Inc.), Worthington Industries, Inc., Corning Incorporated, Cook Medical LLC, Cryotech (Reprolife Co., Ltd.), Vitromed GmbH, TMRW Life Sciences, Inc., ColdStash (Forge, LLC), Kustodian Limited, Cryogatt Systems Limited, Cryo Solutions B.V. and Bio-Match Tech Limited.

Chapter 23  Assumptions and Acronyms

This chapter includes a list of acronyms and assumptions that provides a base to the information and statistics included in the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market report.

Chapter 24  Research Methodology

This chapter help readers understand the research component methodology followed to obtain various conclusions as well as important qualitative and quantitative information about the cryopreservation for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) market.
The campaigning father of Claudia Lawrence  who vanished 12 years ago  has died without finding out what happened to her.

Peter Lawrence, 74, passed away in a hospice after a short illness, it was confirmed yesterday.

The retired solicitor made regular appeals for information to keep the case of his daughter, a chef, in the public eye.

Retired solicitor Peter Lawrence, 74, (pictured) passed away in a York hospice after a short illness, it was confirmed yesterday

Miss Lawrence, 35, was last seen returning to her home in the Heworth area of York from her job at the city's university in March 2009. The search became one of the largest missing persons investigations by North Yorkshire Police.

The force has said it will never give up on the suspected murder case. Detectives say her 'complex' private life  which they believed involved at least one affair with a married man  was key.

Nine arrests were made, and in 2015 a file on four men was sent to the Crown Prosecution Service  but none was ever charged. Mr Lawrence channelled his experience into campaign and ambassador roles with the Missing People charity.

He received an OBE for helping to shape the 2017 Guardianship (Missing Persons) Act, known informally as Claudia's Law.

Peter Lawrence (left with daughter Claudia) made regular appeals for information to keep the case of his daughter, a chef, in the public eye

Friend and spokesman Martin Dales said Mr Lawrence will be 'sorely missed by his family and friends who request privacy at this sad time'.

Mr Dales added: 'I still think there is somebody out there... who has information which can help the police to crack this case.'

Mr Lawrence, a retired solicitor, made regular appeals for information in the years following his daughter's disappearance in an effort to keep the case in the public eye.

Speaking on the 11th anniversary of his daughter's disappearance last March, Mr Lawrence said he believed the answer to resolving the mystery lay in the local community.

Speaking on the 11th anniversary of his daughter's disappearance last March, Mr Lawrence said he believed the answer to resolving the mystery lay in the local community

He said: 'I think for someone sitting on information, it would take possibly a change in that person's relationship, or perhaps a fall out with a friend, for someone close to them to then come forward.'

Mr Lawrence was instrumental in shaping the Guardianship (Missing Persons) Act.

The law, known informally as Claudia's Law, created a new legal status of guardian of the affairs of a missing person, allowing someone to act in their best interests after they have been gone for 90 days or more.

The new legislation means families can oversee the financial and property affairs of their missing loved one, if the person has been missing for 90 days - lessening what can be a huge burden at a traumatic time.

Mr Lawrence died on Thursday in St Leonard's Hospice, York.
In a business still dominated by men, French chef Helene Darroze credits a feminine, "emotional" touch for her unprecedented leap from three to five Michelin stars this year

Paris, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :In a business still dominated by men, French chef Helene Darroze credits a feminine, "emotional" touch for her unprecedented leap from three to five Michelin stars this year.

Darroze is already a household name in France thanks to her appearances on "Top Chef" -- famous enough even to have a Barbie doll in her image.

And when the latest Michelin guide was published last month, the 53-year-old became the first woman to pick up two stars at once: a third for her London restaurant at The Connaught hotel and a second for Marsan in Paris.

That puts her in a tiny club of just seven women worldwide who run a three-star kitchen.

She is adamant that her womanhood is the reason for her success: "Men and women are not made in the same way," she told AFP. "And it shows on the plate." "A man primarily wants to show off what he can do, whereas a woman wants to please. It is more about emotion, to which technique is added, rather than technique with emotion added later," she said.

Darroze is careful to stress that she has "great respect" for male chefs.

But her message to the fast-growing generation of female chefs is "Live your passion as women.

.. do not try to be someone else." That attitude shows not only in her cooking, but in her approach to the workplace.

Not all her efforts at creating an informal atmosphere have worked, however: "I never wanted to be called 'chef', just Helene. But though I keep telling my colleagues that you don't earn respect with a title, a few still don't call me by my name." She now has more Michelin stars than any woman other than her compatriot Anne-Sophie Pic (who has eight) -- an achievement she still "can't quite believe." But because of the pandemic, Darroze has not even been able to travel to Britain to celebrate with her team at The Connaught, or with her friend Clare Smyth of London's Core who also became a three-star chef last month.

Darroze is the fourth generation of her family to go into the business, and her restaurants are renowned for the Basque flavours of her home region in southwestern France.

She almost didn't follow in the family footsteps, opting for business school in the 1980s ("It was the done thing"), until famed chef Alain Ducasse encouraged her to launch herself into haute cuisine at his Louis XV restaurant of Monte Carlo.

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Today, we all use our computer or our smartphone because we know how it helps us ease our lives. But very rarely do we think about what started this revolution -- what were the first-ever computers like and what was the journey from those devices to the ones we use today.

Penn Today

While this is a really deep rabbit hole to get into, today is a special day as it marks the 75 anniversary of the first-ever general-purpose computer.



On February 15, 1946, the worlds first general-purpose computer was introduced to the world. It was named ENIAC -- Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer -- and it was placed at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering which today is known as Penns School of Engineering and Applied Science.

Originally designed to calculate artillery firing tables

Designed by John Presper Eckert and John William Mauchly, this so-called computer ENIAC was actually financed by the United States Army, Ordnance Corps Research and Development Command under the leadership of Major General Gladeon M. Barnes. It cost around $500,000 then to come into existence.

The army was faced with the problem of the time it took for a human to calculate ballistic and artillery trajectories. In that time these calculations were done by human calculators who worked on thousands of mathematical operations day and night, for months at a time.

Frustrated, the government launched a contest (discreet, of course) in 1943 where it asked inventors to create a device that could accurately make these calculations for humans at a much faster pace.

Penn Today

John Presper Eckert Jr. was a student at the Moore School of Engineering. He got to know about the contest through a memo circulated by a professor, John W. Mauchly. He, along with Mauchly applied and got approved for his design and thus the worlds first general-purpose computer came into existence.



The ENIAC was put to work on December 10, 1945. However soon after, it was dedicated to the University of Pennsylvania on February 15, 1946 -- also the first time the world got to know about its existence.

Crazy calculations rate for the time

ENIAC was state of the art for the time. It was claimed to be a thousand times faster than the electro-mechanical machines that existed during the time. This paired with general-purpose programmability made ENIAC something to dream about for not just scientists but also industrialists. This combo also enabled it to take on thousands of calculations for a particular problem.

It was capable of calculating a trajectory in just 30 seconds that would otherwise take humans 20 hours. It essentially took the place of around 2,400 humans. It was able to operate 500 additions and 300 multiplications per second in just 20 minutes, which would otherwise take a human nearly three days.

Backed by female coders

History sadly only highlights the two men who created the machine, but most of the time fail to mention the six female programmers who ran this machine in the background. While it wasnt like coding in todays world, the women moved cables (using their physical and mathematical prowess) that reconfigured the device.

Penn Today

The six females were -- Jean Jennings Bartik, Marlyn Wescoff Meltzer, Betty Snyder Holberton, Ruth Lichterman Teitelbaum, Kathleen McNulty Mauchly Antonelli and Frances Bilas Spence.



These women were responsible to create the first set of routines, the first software applications as well as first classes in programming.

Life of ENIAC

ENIAC was formally accepted by the U.S Army Ordnance Corps in July 1946. Powering the ENIAC was no small feat as it would often cause blackouts throughout Philadelphia. The 170-square metre monster weighed a whopping 27 tons.

In November of the same year, it was shut down temporarily for maintenance and memory upgrade, after which it was shifted to the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland in the year 1947. It was again booted on July 29, 1947, and it continued its operations for almost a decade until 11:45 p.m. on October 2, 1955.

Today parts for the massive computer can be found at the School of Engineering and Applied Science at the University of Pennsylvania, The Smithsonian, the Science Museum in London, the US Army Ordnance Museum among others.
Many political party leaders have been sparring over the murder and many spokespersons have asserted different angles in the case as the reason behind the murder of 25-year-old Rinku Sharma.

Many political party leaders have been sparring over the murder and many spokespersons have asserted different angles in the case as the reason behind the murder of 25-year-old Rinku Sharma. The BJP and VHP Leaders attended the funeral of the deceased Rinku Sharma who was reportedly murdered by a group of five men in Mongolpuri . Several BJP leaders including President of Delhi unit, Mr. Adesh Gupta. MJA Vijender Gupta, Kapil Khanna and Lok Sabha MP Hans Raj Hans were present in the condolence meeting. The VHP working president demanded the speedy trial of the murder case and gave a 3-day ultimatum to Delhi police to make arrests of those accused.

AAP Spokesperson and MLA Raghav Chadha claimed that Sharma was killed for having participated in the donation drive of Ram Mandir and for chanting slogans. The Delhi police have categorically labelled these claims as having no credence and they are continuing the investigation. BJP and VHP members also held a prayer meeting for the deceased in the afternoon post protests carried out by the parties demanding death penalties for the accused.

People who conspired to kill Rinku Sharma will be caught and arrested. We want them to be hanged and we dont want to support any jihadi movement here said BJP Delhi President, Mr Adesh Gupta while addressing the crowd. Crime Branch unit of Delhi Police is currently investigating the Rinku Sharma case.

Also Read: India protest toolkit: 21-year-old Disha Ravi sent to 5-day police custody under sedition charges

A forensic science lab team was sent to Mongolpuri on Saturday by the Delhi police to Mongalpuri to further investigate the case. The family of the deceased also fears threat and retribution. Police have also increased deployment in the locality and are going to make more arrests based on the CCTV footage.
by Fady Noun

The interfaith prayer for the murder of Lokman Slim has sparked controversy. Many fear that extremism will defeat moderation. The Second Vatican Councils call to forget the past and strive for mutual understanding is mentioned. The goal is a new era of human fraternity in which citizenship replaces dhimmi status.

Beirut (AsiaNews) - Over the weekend, the Maronite patriarch, Card Beshara al-Rahi, renewed his criticism of Lebanons political leaders, unable to form a government of national unity, proposing again a special international conference for Lebanon, under the aegis of the United Nations.

We are not prepared to abandon the vision of the country as a message and sink into obscurantism, giving way to regional projects contrary to its spirit, the patriarch said.

In his Sunday homily from the patriarchal see of Bkerke, the prelate noted that a conference of this nature does not deprive the country of its sovereignty or independence but will instead re-establish them.

A series of events have prevented the formation of a new government so far, plunging Lebanons political and social life back into the darkest years of the countrys civil war. They include the double explosion at the Port of Beirut which led to the resignation of Prime Minister Hassan Diab and the assassination of Lokman Slim.

The interfaith prayer held during the funeral of Lokman Slim, who was murdered on 4 February, has sparked controversy because of the disturbing circumstances surrounding the crime and the accusations levelled against Hezbollah.

Criticised by circles close to this party, the person who related the story of the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the Prophet's nephew (in 680 AD), one of the highlights of the prayer, was forced to disavow his approach.

For his part, the Archbishop of Beirut Boulos Abdessater, stated that the priest who led the prayer, a Christian, is not member of his diocese and that he himself did not send anyone to the funeral.

In fact, some faithful chided ceremony organisers for choosing a traditional Good Friday hymn, Ana el-Oum el-Hazina (an eastern Mater Dolorosa), in which the Virgin expresses her sorrow before the crucifixion of Jesus, a particularly cruel death in which the torture victim, nailed to the wood, chokes to death amid unspeakable suffering.

Shocked by these two retractions, Justice Minister Marie-Claude Najm saw a kind of loss of identity of Lebanon as a message. We must concede that there is, in the course of things, something to worry about.

Incidentally, let us point out that these two recitations have raised a great stir. They affirm the pain of an unjustly inflicted death. Even though they are distinct at the theological level, they overlap on the thematic level, because they speak of the death of a just person, one of the reasons why the family of Lokman Slim, who was killed in cold blood and mercilessly, could instead desire them.

Why should we deprive the family of a man, so brutally torn from the affection of his loved ones, of the comfort that can guarantee the faith, expressed through a canticle showing the Virgin's compassion for her son or through the harrowing account of imam Hussein's martyrdom?

Of course, interfaith prayers are still too rare and can give rise to embarrassment. Nevertheless, do we have the right to say that the invocations in question have been desecrated? Isn't that a sign that extremism has won over moderation? Is living together already on the defensive?

Some on social media, by analogy, have gone so far as to question the validity of interfaith dialogue, thinking that dialogue itself leads nowhere between two closed theological systems, each self-sufficient and irreducible to each other.

However, does the difficulty of interfaith theological debates itself automatically presuppose their futility? Conversely, are the efforts made by the Catholic Church to promote human fraternity and respect for all religious traditions, in particular Islam, in vain and useless after the Second Vatican Council?

In the conciliar document Nostra Aetate, the Catholic Church says that she regards with esteem also the Moslems. They adore the one God, living and subsisting in Himself; merciful and all- powerful, the Creator of heaven and earth, who has spoken to men [. . .]. Since in the course of centuries not a few quarrels and hostilities have arisen between Christians and Moslems, this sacred synod urges all to forget the past and to work sincerely for mutual understanding and to preserve as well as to promote together for the benefit of all mankind social justice and moral welfare, as well as peace and freedom.

It is within the framework of this tradition of respect that Pope Francis signed the Document on human fraternity in February 2019, in Abu Dhabi, with the Grand Imam of al-Azhar Ahmad el-Tayyeb, in which Islam announces a new era of human fraternity whereby citizenship will replace dhimmi status (pact that enshrines current relations with non-Muslims and Islamic State).

Commemorating the first International Day of Human Fraternity on 4 February, an observance sanctioned by the United Nations, Francis issued an appeal to get involved in interfaith dialogue every day. It is in this spirit that he insists on going to Iraq, from 5 to 8 March, where he will meet upon arrival with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, one of the main Shia authorities.

Thanks to everyone for having bet on fraternity, said the pontiff in his videoconference on 4 February, because today fraternity is humanitys new frontier. Either we are brothers and sisters or we destroy each other.

These words aim above all to safeguard the spirit of harmony in the face of the emergence of jihadist terrorism in the world. The document on human fraternity has been criticised for claiming that religious diversity is desired by God in his wisdom, thus stripping Christ and the Christian faith of their uniqueness. Is this a concession to Islam? No, it is an adaptation of the mystery of unity in the diversity of the great human family described in Nostra Aetate, and to the need to behave fraternally towards all.

In its preamble, the Declaration states: Men expect from the various religions answers to the unsolved riddles of the human condition, which today, even as in former times, deeply stir the hearts of men. Ultimately, We cannot invoke God as the Father of all humans, if we refuse to act as brothers and sisters towards some of the people who are created in Gods image.

Humans attitude towards God the Father and towards other humans, his brothers and sisters, are so connected that Scripture says: Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love (1 Jn 4:8). Therefore, the foundation is removed from any theory or practice that introduces discrimination between man and man, and people and people, with respect to human dignity and the rights that come with it.

Today, much like last year, Guam wont be collectively gathering to thank and honor the troops who never came home. But that doesnt mean this Read more
SAN FRANCISCO (BCN)

San Francisco's COVID-19 Joint Information Center announced Sunday that the Moscone Center and City College of San Francisco high volume vaccination sites are pausing operations, but no existing appointments will be canceled. The sites will reopen once the vaccine supply is sufficient to resume operations.

Moscone is expected to be closed for a week, while the City College site expects to resume operations on Friday for second doses only. A third high volume site is launching this week, but with limited appointments available.

With the opening of two high volume COVID-19 vaccination sites -- Moscone and City College -- the city increased the number of vaccines administered by health care providers, pharmacies and the Department of Public Health to an average of 7,400 doses a day over the last seven days, officials said.

The city has the capacity to administer more than 10,000 vaccines per day but lacks the

vaccine supply, officials said. "The vaccine supply coming to San Francisco's health care providers and the Department of Public Health is limited, inconsistent and unpredictable, making vaccine roll out difficult and denying San Franciscans this potentially life-saving intervention," officials said in a statement.

According to officials, at the beginning of last week, San Francisco vaccinated 31% of the 65 and older population, and ended the week at 47%, nearly at the halfway mark. San Francisco health care providers, pharmacies and DPH has to vaccinate more than 760,000 residents over the age of 16, requiring more than 1.5 million doses. As of Feb. 13, San Francisco received 262,000 doses and administered more than 190,000 doses to San Franciscans and surrounding Bay Area residents. The remaining vaccine doses have been set aside for scheduled first appointments and scheduled second doses.

"I'm frustrated because we've shown that SF can administer shots as soon as they come in," San Francisco mayor London Breed wrote on Twitter Sunday afternoon. The City College of San Francisco site "has been running well for weeks. The reports from Moscone are overwhelmingly positive. The only thing holding us back is a lack of supply, and I'm hoping that will change soon."

Copyright  2021 by Bay City News, Inc. Republication, Rebroadcast or any other Reuse without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited.
As Gov. Ned Lamont rolls out his budget proposals for the coming biennium, education funding seems poised to become a battleground.

Lamont wants to freeze the states contribution to public schools, the pot of money called Education Cost Sharing, or ECS. Instead, he would boost districts by using federal coronavirus funds. And thats raising alarm among educators and advocates.

As districts continue to grapple with the devastating effects of the pandemic on both school costs and student learning, Fran Rabinowitz worries about Lamonts plan. She represents Connecticuts public school superintendents.

Im concerned about the domino effect of holding it off for two years, Rabinowitz told Connecticut Public Radio. Essentially, she says, filling that hole with federal funds robs Peter to pay Paul. The coronavirus money could have been used for child reading programs or to support students with disabilities during the summer.

That federal funding was meant to supplement, not supplant, she said. It was meant for us to move forward and put in the type of acceleration that our children are going to need.

The Lamont administration doesnt see it that way. Melissa McCaw, the governors budget chief, says that because the state hasnt recovered more than half a billion dollars in revenue lost to the pandemic, pulling in federal relief money represented the best path forward.

We have to use the resources that we have, which is significant funding coming from the feds, as the governor recommends, to meet the commitment that we made to the districts in the ECS formula, she said, adding that more state money may be forthcoming in the next biennium budget.

As far as helping kids whove been learning remotely to reduce the spread of COVID-19, McCaw says the state will require districts to identify which students have taken a step back in their education  and then develop a program to get them caught up.

Thats where Republican House Minority Leader Vincent Candelora thinks the state misses the boat.

What I was hoping to see in this budget is specifics on what programs were going to put forth throughout the summertime to catch all these children up  and I dont see that, he said.

Hes concerned about students who have become disengaged, saying that some estimates put the number as high as 16,000 kids.

Gwen Samuel, founder of the Connecticut Parents Union, also worries about how to connect funding to kids who are off the grid.

We have to make sure we are leaving no children behind  I dont mean punishing folks, Samuel said. Find out why theyre not back in school. Is it the community? Are there towers for internet? Does the family have instability issues?

She says a funding freeze on the state level makes that effort much harder.

The state had a 3 percent decline in enrollment at the start of this school year compared to last. A spokesperson for the Department of Education said that continues a trend the state has seen over the last five years.

Rabinowitz believes an even bigger problem may loom. Shes been racking her brain since the proposal came out: Even if the federal money does what the state intends, what happens when it runs out, specifically to urban school districts?

Some of the most challenged districts, for example Waterbury, if they are flat-funded, it will be a loss of $20 million.

Rabinowitz says a freeze in the ECS helps suburban districts, many of which would lose money if the formula changed.

Broken Promises

McCaw faced questions about the budget from the state legislatures Appropriations Committee. Rep. Brandon McGee (D-Hartford, Windsor) said he had a philosophical difference with McCaw over the focus of state education funding.

The formula is in fact what drives how we fund our districts and thats what weve been given to deal with, McGee said on a Zoom call with McCaw.

Like Rabinowitz, McGee said he doesnt believe the ECS formula benefits students from Connecticuts neediest school districts. So, hes proposed a new bill before the legislature that aims to address the achievement gap for students of color who live in these communities.

Earlier last week, McGee appeared at a press conference in Hartford and called on Gov. Ned Lamont to act in revamping the ECS formula.

We talk about evening the playing field but (we are) veering away from what is right because of politics. And for me that starts with a real conversation about equity  Until that is done, we have simply given our children lip service, something they can always see through, he said.

The ECS formula was implemented to distribute $2 billion to public schools across the state. McGee and others who joined him at the news conference dont believe the moneys being distributed equitably.

I refuse to raise my unborn child in a state that does not value her education, said Jamilah Price-Stewart, Executive Director FaithActs for Education. Yet our discomfort today pales in comparison to the sacrifices our families and communities have made for generations  to live in a state that would rather spend more to incarcerate us.

Parents at the news conference voiced their disappointment with socioeconomic divides in their towns.

(My child) Is Hispanic, (has) special needs and lives in Bridgeport. (Those are) the three factors (that are) up against my son for achieving success in his life. said Stephanie Nieves, a parent leader.

Rep. Antonio Felipe, D-Bridgeport, expressed support of McGees bill and said he intends to help students and parents achieve success within their school districts.

I want to make a promise today  to look out for everyone. An agenda that looks out for English language learners, to provide for special (education) students, he said. An agenda that recognizes all children regardless of their skin color, zip code or the size of the family bank account. I want to promise that we legislate (with) the interest of the students and parents.

Ultimately, parents at the press conference said they dont want any more broken promises. They want to see change within their communities and the proper aid given to support their childs success.

These are our children, these are their lives, Nieves said.
The Duke of Cambridge has paid tribute to a 'much loved' nurse who died after contracting Covid-19 as he urged NHS executives to speak out about mental health.

Prince William, 38, passed on his condolences after Estrella Catalan, 52, died earlier this month at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital (NNUH) where she had worked for 18 years.

The duke's words of sympathy came when he joined the weekly meeting of the East of England's NHS leadership, and he highlighted the importance of health bosses talking about mental wellbeing to encourage their workforce to 'feel emboldened and inspired to also take it seriously'.

He also said the nation faced a 'very big waterfall of mental health issues' in the future and asked the executives about their own wellbeing.

Speaking during the video meeting held on Wednesday, he said: 'I also want to just sort of pass on my thoughts to all of you and your teams about Estrella Catalan, who I believe was a much loved member of most of your teams and had been in the region for a long time at I think King's Lynn and N and N (Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital).

The Duke of Cambridge (pictured), 38, has paid tribute to a 'much loved' nurse who died after contracting Covid-19 as he urged NHS executives to speak out about mental health

Ms Catalan (pictured( was a staff nurse on the Gunthorpe and Heydon wards, as well as the emergency department and acute stroke team

'And I imagine that's hit everyone very hard so I'm very sorry to hear that, and my thoughts from my family are all with all of you who knew her and her family.'

In moving scenes, Mrs Catalan was interviewed from her hospital bed last month by the BBC and cried as she explained she only wanted to return to her patients: 'I want to help. But I don't know when.

'I don't mind working and doing even extra shifts to help the trust, but I'm here as a patient. I'm helpless.'

Ann Radmore, regional director of NHS England and NHS Improvement  East of England, led the meeting of around 35 senior NHS leaders who included Sam Higginson, chief executive of the NNUH where the nurse worked.

After the meeting, she said about the duke: 'He mentioned her death to us, and I think that was very appropriate and helpful actually, because she was a much loved member of staff over in Norfolk.'

William worked as a helicopter pilot for the East Anglian Air Ambulance ending his two-year stint in 2017 and is likely to have ferried patients to the NNUH, but had not met the nurse.

Estrella Catalan (right), 52, died after weeks in the critical care unit of Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, where she had worked since September 2002

The hospital took to Twitter to express their 'great sadness' following the loss of Estrella (pictured)

He paid tribute to the NHS staff he had worked alongside, saying he held them in 'high esteem' and told everyone at the meeting they were performing a 'brilliant, brilliant job'.

Ms Catalan, believed to be originally from the Philippines, joined the Norwich-based trust in September 2002 and worked as a staff nurse on the Gunthorpe and Heydon wards, and with the emergency department and acute stroke team.

According to a GoFundMe page created in her honour, which has raised more than 35,000 for her family, Mrs Catalan is survived by her husband Melvin and their sons John and Josh  adding that her eldest son Vince died two years ago.

William voiced his concerns about the mental health support for executives around the virtual table when he inquired 'who's asking you how you're doing?', and speculated it was probably 'quite difficult' to find the time to ask after each other during a busy video conference.

A GoFundMe page has raised more than 21,031 for funeral expenses and financial support for the family, and describes her as a 'caring, conscientious and hard-working person'

After the private meeting, during which the duke was told about initiatives to support the mental wellbeing of NHS staff and patients, he said:

'I'm pleased to hear the mental health processes are taken very seriously and as I said at the beginning, anything that you as CEOs can do to share your concerns, worries, mental health  whether positive, whether poor  would be a really big thing as well after this.

'You know, it leads from the top down as well as the bottom up. And so if any of you can shed light or be involved in that, it really opens the door that allows your workforce to feel emboldened and inspired to also take it seriously.'

The duke also said: 'As you know I'm trying to champion, trying to tackle the taboo and the stigma around mental health and my conversations so far up and down the country with your colleagues in the NHS has starkly shown  as Ann pointed out  we're facing a very big waterfall of mental health issues coming up.'

Expanding on the the Duke's 'waterfall' comment, Ms Radmore, speaking after the call, said for patients the pandemic will have 'exacerbated some people's mental health problems, and may have created some new mental health problems'.

While NHS staff will have been through an 'incredibly battering process' and the aim was to help them understand and articulate what has happened as part of their recovery, and then move forward.
Troops stare down anti-military junta protesters trying to enlist civil servants to join nationwide demonstrations rally in Myanmars largest city, Yangon, Feb. 15, 2021.

Thousands of protesters in Myanmars largest cities defied assembly bans and warnings from the military junta to demonstrate for the release of deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi and the restoration of her elected government Monday, two weeks after an army takeover in the fledgling Southeast Asian democracy.

Demonstrators in the commercial center Yangon and in Mandalay, the second largest city, tried to enlist civil servants to join the civil disobedience movement against the coup.

Large crowds gathered at the Chinese and Russian embassies to condemn those countries diplomatic support at the United Nations for the junta, which on Feb. 1 arrested leader Aung San Suu Kyi, suspended parliament, and imposed a one-year period of emergency rule.

While tanks, police cars and prison buses were deployed in urban centers across the country of 54 million people, protesters including celebrities called on bankers and bureaucrats to defy the regimes threats to punish state employees, dozens of whom were rounded up over the weekend.

Despite the show of force by the military in Yangon, major protests against the military takeover were held in front of the Chinese, Russian and U.S. embassies, as well as the Central Bank.

We are protesting against the military takeover and the loss of our freedom and our human rights, physician Kaung Myat San told RFA.

We want China and Russia to stop pulling the strings from behind the curtain and meddling in our countrys affairs. We strongly condemn the arrests of doctors and other civil servants too, he said.

Anti-military junta protesters trying to enlist civil servants to join nationwide demonstrations rally in Myanmars largest city, Yangon, Feb. 15, 2021. Credit: RFA

Movie star appeal

Celebrities joined crowds that marched past a convoy of military trucks to protest in front of central bank and Myanmar Economic Bank in Yangon and urge bank employees to join the civil disobedience movement, RFA reporters observed.

This Civil Disobedience Movement is very important for us. If I were a government servant, I would surely be the first to join the movement, said a women outside the central bank, who declined to give her name for fear of reprisals.

These people marching on the streets and protesting against the military are real heroes for the countrys future, she told RFA.

We do not want to see a repeat of Mya Thwet Thwet Khine, a girl about my granddaughters age, who was killed the other day, said Zin Waing, a film actor and former Chairman of the Myanmar Motion Picture Association. He was referring to a 20-year-old protester who was fatally shot in Naypyidaw last week.

We need to stop the hatred and grievances against one party and another, one individual against another, one race against another in our country. For this to happen, I want to sincerely and respectfully request and beg the Bank employees to join the Civil Disobedience Movement, he said.

Tens of thousands of people in Mandalay, including dozens of government employees, also continued their protests against the military takeover Monday.

I would like to invite all our fellow railway workers to join in the movement, said Win Ko Oo, a locomotive driver.

There were threats that we would lose our jobs and that we would have to live in fear. But we do not want our future generations to live in fear, and that is why we must take part in this, he told RFA.

Anti-military junta protesters trying to enlist civil servants to join nationwide demonstrations rally in Myanmars largest city, Yangon, Feb. 15, 2021. Credit: RFA

Fears of a crackdown

In the capital Naypyidaw on Monday, a crowd of nearly 10,000 people rallied in front of a jail holding some 40 protesters, including at least 27 high school and middle school students and eight civil servants who were, who were detained by the military while waiting for bus to return home after protesting.

The 27 students were released but others remained custody as of Monday night.

Myanmars telecoms firms imposed an internet outage from 1 a.m. to 9 a.m. Monday, amid reports about a looming internet shutdown and continuing restrictions on access to Facebook and other social media.

But a feared wave of mass arrests did not occur Monday, despite concerns raised by the deployment of armored vehicles and tanks and a series of decrees from the junta stiffening penalties for protests and making it easier for authorities to investigate and detain civilians.

Late on Sunday the U.S. Department of State authorized the voluntary departure of non-emergency U.S. government employees and their family members from the country, the embassy in Yangon said in a statement that warned citizens of the heightened potential for violence, continued telecommunications restrictions, and limited flights out of Burma.

Reported by RFAs Myanmar Service. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Paul Eckert.
Apple CEO Tim Cook took to Twitter to speak out against growing violent attacks against Asians in the San Franciso Bay Area. In his tweet on Monday, the Apple top executive said that his company would donate to groups providing support to those affected in the violent attacks.

"The rising violence against the Asian community is a painful and urgent reminder that we must unite against racism in all its forms. There is no place for hate in our society. The team at Apple stands together & we will be donating to groups providing support to those affected," Cook tweeted.

The rising violence against the Asian community is a painful & urgent reminder that we must unite against racism in all its forms. There is no place for hate in our society. The team at Apple stands together & we will be donating to groups providing support to those affected.  Tim Cook (@tim_cook) February 15, 2021

Cook's tweet came in the backdrop of rising unprovoked, violent attacks against Asians in the California's Bay Area. Videos depicting attacks on elderly Asians in the region surfaced across social media last week.

One video shows 84-year-old Vicha Ratanapakdee being shoved to the ground by a man in San Francisco as he was out for his morning walk. He later died, reported New York Times. Another video showed a 91-year-old man in Oakland's Chinatown being pushed to the sidewalk in an unprovoked attack, the daily further added.

Quoting a local business leader, NYT reported that more than 20 attacks have happened over the past two weeks in Oakland's Chinatown alone. It is one of the major cities in California and home of US Vice President Kamala Harris, who criticised the hate crimes in a tweet last week.

"Hate crimes and violence against Asian Americans and Asian immigrants have skyrocketed during the pandemic. That's why our Administration has taken actions to address these xenophobic attacks. We must continue to commit ourselves to combating racism and discrimination," Harris tweeted.

Hate crimes and violence against Asian Americans and Asian immigrants have skyrocketed during the pandemic. Thats why our Administration has taken actions to address these xenophobic attacks. We must continue to commit ourselves to combating racism and discrimination.  Vice President Kamala Harris (@VP) February 12, 2021

Reports show that violence against Asians flared across the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic amid the rhetoric by former US President Donald Trump, who preferred to term the coronavirus 'the China Virus' or the 'Kung Flu'.

Outrage against the attacks has grown, with communities demanding action to put an end to the hate crimes and violence against Asians.

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Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 17:01:57|Editor: huaxia

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ADDIS ABABA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) will deploy an advance emergency response support team of experts in Guinea to help the country fight a new Ebola virus outbreak.

The Africa CDC, the African Union (AU) Commission's specialized healthcare agency, said late Sunday that the AU Commission is ready "to offer the comprehensive support of all AU organs."

Guinea announced the new Ebola outbreak on Sunday in Gouecke, a sub-prefecture in its Nzerekore Prefecture.

The Africa CDC said it is closely monitoring the situation and will continue to mobilize its expertise and resources to support the response.

It will call for an emergency meeting of experts to better coordinate emergency responses in Guinea and in neighboring countries across the region, in collaboration with the West African Health Organization, Africa CDC said in a statement.

Guinea has so far reported seven Ebola cases and three deaths.

There have also been fresh cases of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo in its North Kivu province.

The 2014-2016 West Africa Ebola virus outbreak claimed over 11,300 lives, with over 28,600 recorded cases. Enditem
The Finance Ministry will infuse Rs 3,000 crore capital into state-owned general insurance companies during the current quarter in a bid to improve their financial health.

Last year, the Union Cabinet headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi cleared proposal to provide capital support to National Insurance, Oriental Insurance and United India Insurance.

The cabinet had also decided to increase the authorised share capital of National Insurance Company Limited (NICL) to Rs 7,500 crore and that of United India Insurance Company Limited (UIICL) and Oriental Insurance Company Limited (OICL) to Rs 5,000 crore each to give effect to the capital infusion decision.

Recently, the government sought Parliament nod for gross additional expenditure of Rs 6.28 lakh crore for 2020-21 as part of second and final batch of supplementary demands for grants. This included Rs 3,000 crore for providing additional funds towards recapitalisation of insurance companies.

The infusion will be done after the supplementary demands for grants is passed by Parliament which will reconvene on March 8. The capital infusion will enable the three public sector general insurance companies to improve their financial and solvency position, meet the insurance needs of the economy, absorb changes and enhance the capacity to raise resources and improve risk management.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Budget announced privatization of two public sector banks and one general insurance company in 2021-22 beginning April. In 2017, state-owned companies New India Assurance Company and General Insurance Corporation of India went public.
Phuket police officer under investigation for vehicle hit-and-run while drunk driving

PHUKET: A Phuket police officer is under investigation for alleged drunk driving when his car hit another car on Thepkrasattri Rd late Saturday night (Feb 13), causing the first car to be hit to plough into the back of another car waiting in front of it.

policealcoholtransportcrimeSafety

By Eakkapop Thongtub

Monday 15 February 2021, 05:49PM

The driver, Lt Nikorn Songkhao of the Thalang Police, allegedly attempted to flee the scene.

Phuket Provincial Police Chief Maj Gen Pornsak Nuannu confirmed to The Phuket News this afternoon (Feb 15) that he has ordered Thalang Police Chief Lt Col Phisit Chuenphet to investigate the incident.

The investigation follows a video being posted online showing Lt Nikorn and his heavily damaged Toyota Vios stopped on Thepkrasattri Rd just south of the turn-off intersection that leads to Phuket International Airport.

The video, a 3 minute 57 second clip posted on Facebook, was titled "Police hit and run, white sedan, police car (Phuket Airport Intersection)".

The video showed that Lt Nikorn had stopped in the right-hand lane on the southern side of the intersection.

On the north side of the intersection was a Suzuki Swift with heavy damage to its rear.

In front of the Suzuki Swift was a white pickup truck with minor damage to its rear bumper, from where the Suzuki Swift had struck it.

Meanwhile, on the south side of the intersection, the front of Lt Nikorns Toyota Vios had sustained heavy damage from the impact, and a long line of fluid had spilled from under his car, trailing all the way to where his car came to a halt.

The video also clearly showed Lt Nikorn who initially remained sitting in the car, and his police identification hanging from the rear-view mirror. Lt Nikorn appeared to be drunk in the video.

Thalang Police Chief Lt Col Phisit Chuenphet has set up a team to investigate the incident, Maj Gen Pornsak said today.

The team is in the process of collecting evidence, including video clips and obtaining statements from witnesses at the scene.

If it is found that a law enforcement officer actually committed a crime, the officer will face disciplinary and criminal penalties, he assured.
A Benin presidential candidate was wounded after shots were fired at his car soon after he filed his papers for the April presidential election, family members and the government said on Saturday

Cotonou, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 6th Feb, 2021 ) :A Benin presidential candidate was wounded after shots were fired at his car soon after he filed his papers for the April presidential election, family members and the government said on Saturday.

Ganiou Soglo, a former minister and son of ex-president Nicephore Soglo, was wounded on Friday on the way to his farm in Zinvie, 35 kilometres (22 miles) from the West African country's commercial capital Cotonou.

He was one of 19 politicians, who have filed papers for the April 11 ballot, including the incumbent Patrice Talon.

Soglo was treated at a hospital in Cotonou.

"He is out of danger, but to remove the bullet, that will have to be in Ghana or Morocco," a Soglo family member told AFP.

In a communique, Soglo said he was focused on his recovery and medical treatment after surviving a "vile" attack, without giving details.

"I assure you nothing will undermine my commitment to freedom."Many Benin opposition figures are either in exile or are barred from running in the election. That has prompted criticism that the former French colony, once seen as a model of democracy, has veered into authoritarianism under Talon.

Police have opened an investigation but have yet to issue a statement.
Aviation turbine fuel price has risen by three times since resumption of scheduled domestic flights on May 25, said Civil Aviation Minister on Monday, explaining the Centre's decision to raise lower and upper limits on domestic airfares by 10 to 30 per cent.

While announcing resumption of scheduled domestic flights in May last year, the Aviation ministry had placed limits on airfares through seven bands classified on the basis of flight duration.

The first band consists of flights that are of less than 40 minutes duration. On Thursday, for this band, the lower limit was increased on from Rs 2,000 to Rs 2,200 and the upper limit was increased from Rs 6,000 and Rs 7,800.

Puri said on Twitter on Monday, "When domestic flights resumed after lockdown price fare bands applicable only on economy fares were introduced to inspire public confidence and to ensure no inconvenience was caused to public."



"Since then, price of crude oil has risen from USD 30 to USD 60 per barrel. Prices of Aviation turbine fuel have gone up from Rs 17,000 per kilolitre to Rs 51,000 per kilolitre. However, fare levels have been raised by 10 per cent at lower band and 30 per cent at higher band. Due to higher supply, most travel takes place at lower band."



As an example Delhi-Mumbai fare at lower band has gone up from Rs 3,500 to Rs 3,900, he said.

"It is still comparable to 2nd class AC fares on Railways. In 2010, Delhi-Mumbai airfare was in the range of Rs 4,000. So, fares have remained unchanged for more than a decade," the minister noted.

The other fare bands are for flights with durations of 40-60 minutes, 60-90 minutes, 90-120 minutes, 120-150 minutes, 150-180 minutes and 180-210 minutes.

The fresh lower and upper limits set by the ministry for these bands on Thursday were: Rs 2,800 - Rs 9,800; Rs 3,300 Rs 11,700; Rs 3,900 Rs 13,000; Rs 5,000 Rs 16,900; Rs 6,100 Rs 20,400; Rs 7,200 Rs 24,200, respectively.

Before Thursday, the lower and upper limits for these bands were: Rs 2,500 - Rs 7,500; Rs 3,000 - Rs 9,000; Rs 3,500 - Rs 10,000; Rs 4,500 - Rs 13,000; Rs 5,500 - Rs 15,700 and Rs 6,500 - Rs 18,600, respectively.

Aviation regulator DGCA had said on May 21 last year that each airline would sell at least 40 per cent of its tickets on a flight at prices less than the midpoint between the lower limit and upper limit.

(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.)
(Newser)  It's like "having a thief in the family," says the deputy mayor of the tiny Italian island of Capraia. As the Guardian reports, he's referring to dozens of thefts on the island over the winter, a time when only about 400 residents live there. Unfortunately, the small population also applies to the police department, which has a grand total of three officers. The crimes appear to be well planned. In the most recent, the thieves disabled a security camera in a tobacco shop and made off with more than $70,000 from the safe. In another jobperhaps an inside onethey broke into the home of Deputy Mayor Fabio Mazzei and stole his safe, along with hidden jewelry. "They struck on the right day, as they knew I was going to Pisa for a visit," he told a local newspaper. "They knew the house very well."

story continues below

The island population typically multiplies during the summer tourist season, but in this case the thieves appear to have flipped the usual playbook by going after locals instead of visitors. One factor: The island's lone bank closed last year, forcing people to keep their money at home. Capraia is one of seven islands that make up the Tuscan Archipelago, notes the New York Times, which last year (in pre-pandemic days) sang the praises of a restored 16th-century fort on the island as a vacation rental. The island is actually closer to the French island of Corsica than the mainland of Italy and is accessible only by boat. Mayor Mardi Bessi says the island's three officers are doing the best they can. "The risk now is that the sense of community we have always had will be damaged," the mayor says. (Read more Italy stories.)

I would always hear him yelling and cursing, always. And it made me feel it was the way to interact, because thats how I saw him interacting, she told the paper in 2015.
Mount Greylock School Committee Focuses on Elementary Funding Requests

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.  The Mount Greylock Regional School District's two elementary schools want to overhaul their English language arts curriculum starting in the 2021-22 school year.

That was one of the budget priorities that the schools' principals shared with the School Committee on Thursday.

"The writing component is not strong at all, and the spelling part, the language acquisition is all over the place," Laneseborough Elementary Principal Nolan Pratt told the committee in its monthly virtual meeting.

Pratt and Williamstown Elementary School Principal Kristen Thompson laid out the priorities they developed along with their School Councils for fiscal year 2022.

Each principal is asking for an additional staff position, along with the district ELA curriculum upgrade, which is projected to cost between $100,000 and $140,000.

Pratt is seeking an additional $9,500 to support technology management and instructional technology at the Lanesborough school.

Thompson is looking for $3,000 for a new math screening program to assess pupils' competencies, $12,000 for teacher stipends to appoint grade-level teacher leaders and $4,000 to update reading material in the school library and classroom libraries.

The annual presentations followed last month's budget presentation from Mount Greylock Regional School Principal Jacob Schutz. The School Committee will take those priorities into account as it decides on a budget to put forward to the member towns next month.

The big ticket items for the elementaries are the new ELA curriculum and new full-time positions.

Last year, the district's director of curriculum coordination signaled that the current language arts curriculum needed to be addressed.

"We've decided to focus our [Student Opportunity Act] grant on research-based early literacy programs in pre-K and early elementary grades," Joelle Brookner said at the committee's December meeting. "Our goal is going to be to increase proficiency in reading across our early elementary students, hoping that we catch as many students as possible before Grade 3 and beyond.

"We are going to use our funds to do things such as align curriculum between Lanesborough Elementary and Williamstown Elementary. Specifically, we will be purchasing Fundations materials, which is a reading program we've been using in Williamstown for a couple of years and expanding, and Lanesborough has started using Fundations. We need to do some catchup with the purchases there and some training. I have been doing a lot of research on other programs.  Another goal of the grant will be to adopt a district-wide writing program for the schools, which is something we've been missing for a while, and also to consider a new core reading program. We currently use the Reading Street program, which was a purchase that was made a number of years ago and is becoming outdated; the research on it is not as great as it used to be."

The staff increases sought at each of the two schools would be in different areas.

At WES, Thompson is seeking room in the budget for an additional classroom teacher to support a large "bubble" class that is reaching sixth grade this fall.

"[The class] is larger than our current one, and we're also looking at needing to provide some additional support and accommodations for a wide range of supports for the students," Thompson said. "It could be possible we would need an additional FTE [full-time equivalent] in this area. We would look at what the class sizes would actually be and look at enrollment at that time whether we would need to hire additionally or whether we would be able to shift within our own staff to make sure we're providing the appropriate staffing for the sixth grade."

In Lanesborough, Pratt is looking to add a full-time social worker at the elementary school, something that the much larger school in Williamstown already has.

"This is one we had on the budget priority list last year," he said. "Last year, with the pandemic, we decided not to bring anyone in based on the fact that building relationships over Zoom is not the easiest thing to do, especially at a young age. So we're trying to get a social worker this year.

"And it's definitely more necessary with all the impact of stress in the pandemic.  It looks like based on just the parent survey, it is six students for every grade level who is not currently being seen by a school counselor who would need to be seen. That number is probably going to come down as teachers fill out the survey, but I'm looking at about 30 students who will need someone to talk to throughout the school day to help cope with all that is happening this year and will be happening."

Superintendent Jason McCandless said the staffing requests at both elementary schools will help pupils make up for emotional impacts and learning gaps caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

"The Lanesborough School Council wisely anticipates the need for a social worker to help students be fully attentive to learning and be able to work through and get past some of the challenges of the past year," McCandless said. "Even the Grade 6 FTE at Williamstown Elementary  it really represents the need to maintain at a minimum the class sizes we have now. If we can have smaller class sizes, allowing for more personal attention, that's a winner. If we can have more attention coming from a mental health expert, rather than less, that's a winner."

McCandless said he likely will have other budget priorities districtwide related to the pandemic, including summer programs and after-school enrichment to help fill learning gaps. The district will look first to COVID-19 relief funding from the federal government to help offset those costs.

Pratt said the addition of a social worker at LES will help with the school's efforts around diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging, a goal also addressed at Williamstown with the request to fund updates to the reading material at the elementary school.

"There is a good amount of research out there that would suggest if you ask a second grader, What does an author look like?' they are not necessarily going to be apt to describe an individual of color," McCandless said. "Speaking very generally and based on every school and district I've ever worked in, our libraries, be they individual classroom libraries or 'the library,' generally under-represent authors of color, authors of various religious backgrounds.

"Some easy work to do to say to kids and their families and our community that you matter, you belong here, you are represented here is to make sure there are books by people who look like them, by people who worship like them, by people who linguistically and culturally may share characteristics and books about individuals who share all those characteristics.

"It's one reason we're looking at a new ELA curriculum  it is about the quality of the curriculum but it's also about the cultural appropriateness of the curriculum and making sure all of our students in all of the ways they come to us are represented in positive, powerful, proactive ways through our ELA curriculum. We want our libraries to deliver those same messages."
Burma Journalists, Locals Detained Following Police Crackdown Released

Protesters continue their anti-coup demonstration in Myitkyina on Monday. / Supplied

Seven peoplefive journalists and two local residentsdetained overnight following Myanmar security forces Sunday crackdown on protesters in Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin State in northern Myanmar, were released on Monday.

All were released at around 10 a.m. on Monday, according to sources close to the reporters.

Among the detainees were Mizzima News reporter Sai Latt Aung; Eternally Peace News Network (EPN) reporters Ko Wai Yan and Ko Yan Kaung; The 74 Media editor-in-chief Htoi Awng; and The 74 Media cameraman Naw Seng. All are based in Myitkyina.

Mizzima and The 74 Media confirmed the release of the journalists.

The sources in Myitkyina said military officers confiscated the journalists cameras but returned them upon the detainees release. Before being freed, the source said, the seven were forced to sign a paper saying they wont violate Article 144 [of the Penal Code], under which the military government has imposed a curfew and banned gatherings of more than four people.

Since the military takeover of power from the democratically elected government on Feb. 1, the military has detained the countrys civilian leaders including State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and President U Win Myint. The coup leader then formed the State Administrative Council, which has imposed restrictions on internet access, telecommunications and mass gatherings, implemented a curfew, and amended legislation and re-imposed draconian articles to restrict public privacy and security.

The 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. curfew has been in effect in Myitkyina since Feb. 8.

Defying the militarys restrictions, Myitkyina residents continue to join their compatriots nationwide in daily mass anti-coup rallies, which began last week.

Meanwhile, public fears of a power blackout have mounted since soldiers were deployed at the electrical power transmission and system control (EPC) office in the citys Man Khain quarter.

We civilians are concerned about the soldiers presence at the electrical power office, as we are afraid that the power will be cut. We only want the police there in case they need to provide security. Therefore, people have started protesting in front of the EPC office, said Myitkyina resident Lum Zawng.

Protesters demonstrated in front of the office on both evenings over the weekend, calling for the soldiers to leave the compound.

On Sunday at around 8 p.m., police and military trucks and soldiers arrived at the scene. An hour later they dispersed the protesters with water cannons, tear gas and rubber bullets. According to locals, security forces also fired live rounds, injuring some people.

We saw the tear gas cannisters and live rounds. They fired more than 30 shots, including two heavy bursts [of gunfire], he said, adding several people were injured though he didnt know the exact number.

According to a local Facebook users live feed, one protester was injured in the leg and another in the head.

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An invasive spotted wing drosophila (Drosophila suzukii) on a raspberry. Credit: Hannah Burrack, NC State University

A recent study finds that the invasive spotted wing drosophila (Drosophila suzukii) prefers to lay its eggs in places that no other spotted wing flies have visited. The finding raises questions about how the flies can tell whether a piece of fruit is virgin territoryand what that might mean for pest control.

D. suzukii is a fruit fly that is native to east Asia, but has spread rapidly across North America, South America, Africa and Europe over the past 10-15 years. The pest species prefers to lay its eggs in ripe fruit, which poses problems for fruit growers, since consumers don't want to buy infested fruit.

To avoid consumer rejection, there are extensive measures in place to avoid infestation, and to prevent infested fruit from reaching the marketplace.

"Ultimately, we're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars in potential crop losses and increases in pest-management costs each year in the United States," says Hannah Burrack, co-author of a paper on the study and a professor of entomology at North Carolina State University. "These costs have driven some small growers out of business.

"The first step toward addressing an invasive pest species is understanding it. And two fundamental questions that we had are: Which plants will this species attack? And why does it pick those plants?"

One of the things that researchers noticed when observing infestations on farms was that the species' egg-laying behavior was different, depending on the size of the infestation.

When D. suzukii populations were small, there would only be a few eggs laid in each piece of fruit, and they would only be in ripe fruit. If there were more D. suzukii present, more eggs would be laid in each piece of fruit. The researchers had also noticed that large populations of D. suzukii were also more likely to lay eggs in fruit that wasn't ripe.

To better understand the egg-laying behavior of D. suzukii, the researchers conducted a series of experiments. And the results surprised them.

Specifically, the researchers found that, given a choice, female D. suzukii preferred to lay their eggs in fruit that other flies had never visited.

"It doesn't matter if the other flies lay eggs," Burrack says. "It doesn't even matter if the other flies are male or female. It only matters if other flies have touched a piece of fruit. If untouched fruit is available, D. suzukii will reject fruit that other flies have visited.

"We're not sure if the flies leave behind a chemical or bacterial marker, or something else entirelybut the flies can tell where other flies have been."

The researchers say that the next step is to determine what, exactly, the D. suzukii are detecting.

"If we can get a better understanding of what drives the behavior of this species, that could inform the development of new pest-control techniques," Burrack says. "We're not making any promises, but this is a significant crop pestand the more we know, the better."

The paper, "Social signals mediate oviposition site selection in Drosophila suzukii," is published in the journal Scientific Reports.
Michelle Crowley pictures a giant Day of Caring, the annual event where businesses loan employees to community service projects.

It will be ongoing  as long as it takes to administer COVID-19 vaccine throughout central Cumberland County, including bringing people back for second doses 3-4 weeks later.

Crowley is part of a local effort involving businesses, churches, service clubs and more. They are working with the state, the county and the local health care system to help set up and run vaccination clinics.

There are a lot of organizations trying to be good partners. They realize the significance, said Crowley, the president of the Greater Carlisle Area Chamber of Commerce.

Similar efforts are taking place all over Pennsylvania. They vary greatly in size and methods. Some parts of the state are comparatively rich in resources needed for large-scale vaccination. Some are viewed as vaccination deserts due to a lack of hospitals, medical offices and pharmacies to help with large-scale vaccination.

Lancaster County, for example, has four hospital systems within its borders. It hopes to soon finalize a collaboration between all four systems and county and municipal officials to set up a centralized vaccination site. Other partners include a staffing agency and Rock Lititz, which operates a rehearsal space used by some of the worlds biggest musical acts to prepare for tours.

The Vaccinate Lancaster Coalition hopes to test the program by doing up to about 1,000 vaccinations per day during the week of March 8. When enough vaccine becomes available, the coalition hopes to give up to 6,000 shots per day through June.

It will look starkly different in Perry County, where the population is much smaller and where people and towns are spread far and wide.

We have no health care system, says Rich Fultz, director of the Perry County Emergency Management Agency. Nor do they have even an empty Kmart store. And Fultz wants to avoid using schools, given how much education has already been disrupted by the pandemic.

But Perry residents want and need COVID-19 vaccine just the same.

So Fultz will help the small network of medical providers and pharmacies maximize their scheduling and vaccination capabilities. This week, he was finalizing plans for vaccination clinics at three locations, including a VFW near the middle of the county, a church in the western part and a third location in eastern Perry. He has secured use of the county fairgrounds if needed.

Fultz has turned to the HACC and Messiah College nursing programs to supply people qualified to give shots. He and others are mulling things such as whether they might use school buses to help people reach vaccination sites.

Were building an airplane while its flying, said Gary Eby, a county commissioner in Perry.

Local officials working in conjunction with the state are pursuing the same goal across Pennsylvania. They have visited and evaluated sites, put out calls for retired health care workers to help give shots and non-medical volunteers for tasks such as guiding people and traffic. Theyre urging volunteers to go to a state-run website, SERVEPA, to sign up.

County emergency officials, who participate in regional groups, are considering locations that might benefit multiple counties. Some clinics will likely be drive-through and some might be in tents. All vaccination sites must meet guidelines from the state, which has pledged to reach people of color and communities that face barriers to basic health care.

Officials express confidence

One thing is common across Pennsylvania: intense demand for vaccine. Upward of 3.5 million Pennsylvanians are in Phase 1A, which includes everyone over 65 and people 16-64 with chronic medical conditions, along with health care workers.

They have flooded hospitals, doctors offices and pharmacies with requests for vaccine. Unfortunately, there hasnt been nearly enough and it remains unknown when that will substantially change. Because of the shortage and uncertainty over when there will be enough to sustain mass vaccination clinics, officials are reluctant to identify likely mass vaccination sites.

Lancaster County officials, who have revealed some of the most detailed mass vaccination plans so far, have stressed all plans are contingent upon vaccine availability.

Pennsylvania received about 100,000 doses during the week it became available in mid-December. The weekly supply has grown to about 175,000 first doses, with the state receiving an additional amount to cover people due for their second of the two required doses. The supply has been growing by about 10,000 doses per week. Moreover, vaccination of health care workers and skilled nursing facilities is winding down, meaning more doses will be available for the non-health care population.

In addition, a third vaccine is nearing approval. It would not only increase the supply, but the vaccine, from Johnson & Johnson, requires only one dose, and lacks the cold storage requirements of the presently available vaccines, making it significantly easier to distribute.

Why cant we go to stadiums?

Meanwhile, Pennsylvanians are anxious and frustrated. Many who watch the national news have seen people lined up for vaccine at places such as Dodger and Yankee stadiums. They wonder why Pennsylvania isnt doing the same.

In Philadelphia, which is handling its own vaccine rollout and receives a separate vaccine supply from the federal government, officials are clashing over the idea of using Lincoln Financial Field, home of the Eagles, as a mass vaccination site. Some elected officials said it would speed up the rollout, but the citys health commissioner, Thomas Farley, is opposed to the move, The Philadelphia Inquirer has reported.

Farley argues using the stadium would draw more people from surrounding counties, and New Jersey and Delaware, while reducing vaccine supplies for city residents, including those in minority communities.

Randy Padfield, the director of the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, doesnt rule out stadium-sized vaccination sites when the vaccine supply becomes sufficient. But he says a different approach is probably best for most of Pennsylvania. Moreover, he said some cities have found their stadium events werent equitable in terms who received vaccine.

Pennsylvania officials say they about two weeks notice of vaccine deliveries and volume of doses, which is shipped by the federal government directly to vaccination providers.

With the supply expected to grow, it raises a burning question: If Pennsylvania was told tomorrow it will receive abundant vaccine in two weeks, would it be ready to hold large-scale clinics when the vaccine arrives?

A broad sampling of state and ground-level leaders interviewed this week expressed confidence.

In a majority of circumstances  yes, Padfield said. We know there are a lot of counties primed for this and weve been communicating with them, and they would be able to stand them up in a very short period of time.

Stephen Libhart, the director of public safety for Dauphin County, expects almost every county, if not every county, would say they would be up and running in 24-48 hours.

In Dauphin County, HACCs main campus just off Interstate 81 is the designated site for mass vaccination, Libhart said.

Theres no one solution

Contrary to many assumptions, Pennsylvanias mass vaccination sites, in most cases, wont be run by entities such as PEMA or the Pennsylvania National Guard.

Rather, much of the distribution will continue to be handled by major health care systems, which have medical offices and other facilities throughout their regions. They are expected to use those networks to push doses into the community. Pharmacies also will play a central role.

York-based WellSpan Health, for example, is already distributing vaccine from 22 locations across multiple counties. Its ready to double vaccination capacity at those when sufficient supply becomes available, according to Stephanie Andreozzi, who is helping to lead the effort.

Its also preparing to distribute vaccine from additional WellSpan locations, and is considering non-WellSpan sites if needed, she said.

We have a dual strategy. We would increase capacity at existing locations and we would look to supplement that capacity with community vaccinations at alternate locations, she said.

For example, she said WellSpan Good Samaritan Hospital in Lebanon County is well-positioned as a mass vaccination site for Lebanon city. WellSpan is considering an additional site a few miles outside town, she said.

She said WellSpan is collaborating with local emergency management officials and is open to additional partnerships.

Vaccine will be available to both WellSpan patients and people who dont normally use WellSpan, Andreozzi said.

Penn State Health, with a major presence in Dauphin and Cumberland counties, expects to soon announce plans for mass vaccination sites.

Padfield said PEMAs main role has involved collaborating with county officials, looking at their vaccination distribution plans and helping to find and fill gaps.

Were very cognizant, sitting here as a state agency, theres no one solution that works for everybody across the Commonwealth, Padfield said. So we have to be prepared to provide multiple solutions and fill in any gaps that exist in their current plans or anything that they come across where they would need those [state] resources.

One county official in central Pennsylvania, who didnt want to be quoted in order to avoid friction with PEMA, said he hasnt received much communication from PEMA or local hospital systems.

He said his county could open a mass vaccination site within 24-48 hours. But he didnt know where workers qualified to give shots will come from.

He pointed out counties across the state will likely have the same need at the same time. Moreover, the need will last for many weeks in a state with nearly 13 million people.

For example, there are about 235,000 people in Phase 1A in WellSpans main service area, according to Andreozzi. Lancaster County said it has about 200,000 people in Phase 1A and a total of 432,000 residents age 16 or older. Experts say 70-80% of the population must be vaccinated to eliminate COVID-19 as a severe threat.

Padfield said he was surprised to hear a complaint about lack of communication. He said PEMA holds weekly meetings with county emergency management officials and distributes additional information. With Philadelphia handling its own vaccine rollout and receiving a separate supply from the federal government, PEMA is largely focused on Pennsylvanias other 66 counties.

Regarding people to give shots, Padfield said many will come from the local health care work force. In addition, regional emergency response organizations have medical reserve corps of retired health care professionals and volunteers. The state has eased regulations to allow paramedics to give COVID-19 vaccinations and to enable retired nurses, pharmacists and doctors to help.

WellSpans Andreozzi said, We have worked to develop a long list of volunteers within our community who are interested in being part of that vaccination effort and feel really good about calling them to service and getting them working in our vaccine locations as we move to those community sites.

Padfield said Pennsylvanias national guard is a large one that could help with mass vaccination clinics. But he noted the health care portion is smaller, with 200-300 members per week already devoted to helping at nursing homes. So Padfield isnt expecting them to be available for tasks such as giving shots.

He said he believes most counties could be ready for mass distribution if told they would receive a major vaccine shipment in two weeks. They will need varying levels of help from agencies such PEMA. In the areas he characterizes as vaccination deserts, PEMA expects to deploy pop-up clinics, he said.

Weve had to be nimble

Asked this week about major gaps or likely problems, Padfield said hes aware of none and believes Pennsylvania is ready. His biggest concern, he said, is that Pennsylvania will eventually reach a point where the remaining unvaccinated people are reluctant.

Still, he said everyone must be ready to quickly adjust to challenges, such as the short notice for vaccine deliveries.

Everybody wants to have a plan and a solid plan and its a lot better if you dont have to modify or deviate from the plan, said. But unfortunately, weve had to be nimble and agile in how we adjust to changes that have occurred at the federal level, sometime in the guidance, the applications, those types of things.

In Cumberland County, county spokeswoman Samantha Krepps said planning has been extensive and she knows of no major gaps. She stressed county officials across Pennsylvania have long been responsible for emergency preparedness and response, including distributing medicine or vaccine. So the existing plans and staff are primed for this, she said.

But Krepps noted, We could use more volunteers.

Other ground-level participants are worried about things like liability protection for volunteers and vaccination site owners.

Crowley, the Carlisle-based chamber official, notes that some of the volunteers still arent vaccinated against COVID-19.

But she said she trusts the state, local health care systems and others will come through. Meanwhile, she and others focus on things such as traffic control and providing rides for people who lack transportation.

Crowley doesnt expect mass vaccination to go perfectly, especially in the beginning. But shes optimistic the end result will be a proven plan that can be applied to future emergencies, and an effort that will become a source of community pride.

You just hope everyone is talking and communicating, she said. Were gonna get there.

More from PennLive

Pa. will weed out slow COVID-19 vaccine providers, also require phone scheduling

CDC issues road map for how to safely reopen schools
A new paper refines estimates of when herbivorous dinosaurs must have traversed North America on a northerly trek to reach Greenland, and points out an intriguing climatic phenomenon that may have helped them along the journey.

The study, published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is authored by Dennis Kent, adjunct research scientist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, and Lars Clemmensen from the University of Copenhagen.

Previous estimates suggested that sauropodomorphs -- a group of long-necked, herbivorous dinosaurs that eventually included Brontosaurus and Brachiosaurus -- arrived in Greenland sometime between 225 and 205 million years ago. But by painstakingly matching up ancient magnetism patterns in rock layers at fossil sites across South America, Arizona, New Jersey, Europe and Greenland, the new study offers a more precise estimate: It suggests that sauropodomorphs showed up in what is now Greenland around 214 million years ago. At the time, the continents were all joined together, forming the supercontinent Pangea.

With this new and more precise estimate, the authors faced another question. Fossil records show that sauropodomorph dinosaurs first appeared in Argentina and Brazil about 230 million years ago. So why did it take them so long to expand into the Northern Hemisphere?

"In principle, the dinosaurs could have walked from almost one pole to the other," explained Kent. "There was no ocean in between. There were no big mountains. And yet it took 15 million years. It's as if snails could have done it faster." He calculates that if a dinosaur herd walked only one mile per day, it would take less than 20 years to make the journey between South America and Greenland.

Intriguingly, Earth was in the midst of a tremendous dip in atmospheric CO2 right around the time the sauropodomorphs would have been migrating 214 million years ago. Until about 215 million years ago, the Triassic period had experienced extremely high CO2 levels, at around 4,000 parts per million -- about 10 times higher than today. But between 215 and 212 million years ago, the CO2 concentration halved, dropping to about 2,000ppm.

Although the timing of these two events -- the plummeting CO2 and the sauropodomorph migration -- could be pure coincidence, Kent and Clemmensen think they may be related. In the paper, they suggest that the milder levels of CO2 may have helped to remove climatic barriers that may have trapped the sauropodomorphs in South America.

On Earth, areas around the equator are hot and humid, while adjacent areas in low latitudes tend to be very dry. Kent and Clemmensen say that on a planet supercharged with CO2, the differences between those climatic belts may have been extreme -- perhaps too extreme for the sauropodomorph dinosaurs to cross.

"We know that with higher CO2, the dry gets drier and the wet gets wetter," said Kent. 230 million years ago, the high CO2 conditions could have made the arid belts too dry to support the movements of large herbivores that need to eat a lot of vegetation to survive. The tropics, too, may have been locked into rainy, monsoon-like conditions that may not have been ideal for sauropodomorphs. There is little evidence they ventured forth from the temperate, mid-latitude habitats they were adapted to in Argentina and Brazil.

But when the CO2 levels dipped 215-212 million years ago, perhaps the tropical regions became more mild, and the arid regions became less dry. There may have been some passageways, such as along rivers and strings of lakes, that would have helped sustain the herbivores along the 6,500-mile journey to Greenland, where their fossils are now abundant. Back then, Greenland would have had a temperate climate similar to New York state's climate today, but with much milder winters, because there were no polar ice sheets at that time.

"Once they arrived in Greenland, it looked like they settled in,'" said Kent. "They hung around as a long fossil record after that."

The idea that a dip in CO2 could have helped these dinosaurs to overcome a climatic barrier is speculative but plausible, and it seems to be supported by the fossil record, said Kent. Sauropodomorph body fossils have not been found in the tropical and arid regions of this time period -- although their footprints do occasionally turn up -- suggesting they did not linger in those areas.

Next, Kent hopes to continue working to better understand the big CO2 dip, including what caused it and how quickly CO2 levels dropped.

###

Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory is Columbia University's home for Earth science research. Its scientists develop fundamental knowledge about the origin, evolution and future of the natural world, from the planet's deepest interior to the outer reaches of its atmosphere, on every continent and in every ocean, providing a rational basis for the difficult choices facing humanity. http://www. ldeo. columbia. edu | @LamontEarth
The Majority Leader and Minister-designate for Parliamentary Affairs, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, has bemoaned the high rate of attrition of experienced legislators from the House and called for measures to help retain them.



Not until the political parties confront the reality, it will be difficult to stop the high attrition rate, he said.



Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, who is also the Member of Parliament (MP) for Suame in the Ashanti Region, made this known to the Appointments Committee of Parliament during his vetting for the Parliamentary Affairs portfolio.



He attributed the loss of experienced Members of Parliament (MPs) to monetisation of politics in the country, which he described as reality, and advised political parties to confront the issue to stem the tide.



Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, who held the position in the first term of President Nana Akufo-Addo-led administration and has been re-nominated, proposed discussion on what could be done to retain such MPs to maintain the quality of legislators in the House.



He admonished his colleagues not to portray themselves as agents of growth and development at the grass roots but learn useful lessons from their conduct and indicated that chief executives of metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies were not hounded for growth and development projects.



When MPs go to solicit votes, the constituents ask them if they are aware of their challenges and the MPs Common Fund on which they fall for support and assistance of development projects in their communities is not enough, Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu decried.



Justifying the existence of the Ministry, he explained that I persuaded colleague MPs to support and assist government policies, programmes and social interventions brought to the House for approval.



It is absolutely important to have Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and since 95 per cent of public business in Parliament is government business, you need the leader of government business in order to be able to persuade my colleagues on good policy that must be supported and assisted by Parliament.



You need Minister of Parliamentary Affairs to be in Cabinet, where policy evolves to appreciate underpinnings of any policy.When he comes to Parliament to lead business of the House, he will then be able to get buy-in of his colleagues, Mr Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu noted.



He proposed that space should be created for heads of constitutional bodies to directly answer to the House and called for holistic approach to review the Constitution

Source: The Ghanaian Times









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Featured Video
Valerie Taylor is one of the first to capture great white sharks on film and dive with them without a cage. Along with her husband Ron, she was involved with the worlds first documentaries on great whites, and was called upon by Steven Spielberg to capture the shark footage seen in the 1975 blockbuster Jaws.

These days, Taylor is trying to secure protections for great whites and the rest of the marine world through her work as an activist and conservationist, work that has earned her the Order of Australia. She is the subject of the new documentary Playing With Sharks, which premiered at Sundance and was acquired by National Geographic Documentary Films.

Below, Taylor describes her first experience in the water with a great white shark, and what is was like to film those sequences for Jaws. Her story appears as told to Charles Thorp, and has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Valerie Taylor

I taught myself to SCUBA dive off the coast of Australia, along with my husband Ron, and our first was pursuit was spearfishing. Eventually became national champions in the sport, until we both decided to quit after winning the titles.

During my time as a spearfishing lady, there were always sharks around, because they were interested in the fish that I caught. I would usually just give them the catch  or swim away whenever they got too close.

The first time I saw a great white properly in the water, I was in a shark cage in Australia. It was like seeing an underwater freight train coming out from the mist. He swam straight towards the cage and crashed into it. I remember thinking, Wow, this is some beast. It is the epitome of a wild animal, and the epitome of an apex predator.

Ron and I started working on great white videos, some of the first, and the director Peter Gimbel saw one of them. This was in the early 70s, and he decided to cast us for his feature documentary Blue Water White Death. The movie followed us during some of our dives and spotlighted the work that we were doing at the time with sharks.

That was seen by two movie producers, Richard Zanuck and David Brown, who sent us the galley proofs for a new book coming out called Jaws. They asked us if we thought it would make a good movie. We both read it and thought, Yes! It was very interesting, not to mention we saw work for ourselves in it, so that helped to motivate us in giving the positive review.

Once the movie was going they hired us immediately. They smartly decided to get the live shark footage before filming the rest of the movie, because it would be much easier to adjust the acted scenes than to change what the real sharks were doing. We employed Rodney Fox, who was an abalone diver, to go on the shoot with us. He handled the baits, and helped with the other boat work.

We decided to stay on familiar ground in South Australia, off of Dangerous Reef, to get the footage. It was an area well known for great whites. They were attracted there by the great number of sea lions that lived there. Ron had his big film camera on hand, and that is what we used to get the footage that they needed.

The shark in the movie was supposed to be 25 feet long, and the sharks on the reef were closer to 15 or 16 feet long. So to keep the appearance right, we went out on a very small boat, built a smaller shark-proof cage, and hired a very short actor. We learned after the fact that he really didnt know how to dive, and was worried about being around the sharks. At that moment there were about three large great whites gliding around outside.

We didnt want to force anyone into the cage, and it was good that we didnt, because suddenly a huge 16-foot great white got caught in the wench that was connected to the cage. The shark started thrashing around, the wench broke off the side of the abalone boat, and fell down into a frothing mess in the sea. The cage was destroyed  clearly not as shark-proof as we had thought.

If that actor had been in the cage when this happened, he would have died. We were fortunate that he was so reluctant. We were even more fortunate that Ron was already in the water and filming. I had run across the boat to grab our other camera and started filming from above as well. It was some of the most incredible shark footage anyone had ever seen, so of course the studio was happy.

Taylor with the animatronic Bruce Valerie Taylor

They rewrote the script to reflect the shark breaking up the cage, because that was a pretty dramatic sequence, and would be silly not to use it. We captured a lot of great footage during those trips. There were a lot of large sharks, and was a lot of great, what we call action happening. Every time you see a full great white shark in the movie, it is an Australian great white playing the part of the American great white.

Our work didnt end with the shark footage. Ron went on trips to America to meet Steven Spielberg and help them build Bruce, which is what they nicknamed the mechanical shark that plays Jaws. Eventually the studio flew both of us over to Marthas Vineyard to check out the set and meet all of the actors. I got to know them all quite a bit, but Roy Scheider used to sit with us on the beach when we were playing extras. He was very interested in the marine world.

The film was very successful, which was good, but we were a bit horrified by the way that some people reacted to the film. They became afraid of the water. They became terribly afraid of sharks. One woman even told me that she was afraid to get into the bath after seeing it. That seemed ridiculous to me. You dont go to New York and worry about King Kong hanging off of the Empire State Building, because it is a fictitious story. In the same way, you dont go into the ocean and worry about Bruce.

The biggest shark that I ever saw in the ocean in Australia was probably around 20 feet long, and we called her Big Mama. But I have learned during all of my experiences that sharks arent looking to eat people. I myself have been bitten four times, but I have always been able to pull away after. They arent out there looking for us, but they are being hunted as trophies.

Great whites are an important part of the underwater ecosystem, and it is sad to see them killed for no reason. They are slow breeders, and their numbers are already low. I havent seen any sharks the size of what we had around when we were doing the movie. That is why I have dedicated my life to getting them protected. I hope people will open their minds, and help me save these great, wild animals.

This series is done in partnership with the Great Adventures podcast hosted by Charles Thorp. Check out new and past episodes on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts from. Past guests include Bear Grylls, Andrew Zimmern, Chris Burkard, NASA astronauts, Navy SEALs and many others.

The post What It Was Like to Film the Shark Sequences for Jaws appeared first on InsideHook.
A City of Tulsa snow plow clears Harvard Ave. near 16th street in Tulsa, Okla., on Feb. 14, 2021. (John Clanton/Tulsa World via AP)

Wintry Weather Blanketing US Making Rare Dip to Gulf Coast

DALLASSnow and ice blanketed large swaths of the United States on Sunday, prompting canceled flights, making driving perilous and reaching into areas as far south as Texas Gulf Coast, where snow and sleet were expected overnight.

Typically, we just dont have quite this much cold air in place that far south, said Marc Chenard, a meteorologist with the National Weather Services Weather Prediction Center.

The storm has prompted officials in Houston, where temperatures were in the 70s earlier this week, to advise residents to prepare for power outages and hazardous roads that could be similar to those experienced in the wake of a Category 5 hurricane.

As rain fell Sunday in the Houston area, the temperature hovered near freezing. This rain will be transitioning over to just freezing rain, sleet and snow during the overnight through early morning hours tomorrow, said National Weather Service meteorologist Josh Lichter.

Chenard said significant ice and up to 12 inches of snow were expected across parts of the southern Plains into Monday, with the most snowfall expected near the Oklahoma-Texas border.

Snow covered city streets including at 61st and Sheridan in Tulsa, Okla., on Feb. 14, 2021. (John Clanton/Tulsa World via AP)

Winter weather conditions are affecting large portions of the United States, but it is rare for them to extend so far south, Chenard said.

The Dallas area had a covering of snow by Sunday morning, with flakes still falling, and as much as 6 inches was forecast.

With the wintry conditions falling on Valentines Day, florists stayed busy even as the snow fell.

In Fort Worth, where it was already icy and snowy, Gordon Boswell Flowers general manager said delivery drivers were trying to wrap up before conditions got worse later Sunday afternoon.

It is icy and snowing and theyre calling for more snow, Cheri Kirkman said.

Despite the weather, she said they still had some people coming in to pick up gifts. Weve got plenty all made up, ready to go, Kirkman said.

Snow is shown along Main Street near the Tarrant County Courthouse in Fort Worth, Texas, on Feb. 14, 2021. (Yffy Yassifor/Star-Telegram via AP)

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who issued a disaster declaration for all of the states 254 counties, warned on Saturday: All of Texas is facing an extremely dangerous winter storm.

Abbott, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson have each activated National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks including rescuing stranded drivers.

The weather was affecting operations at airports across the area, with more than 760 flights canceled at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, and at Dallas Love Field most of the nearly 200 flights for Southwest Airlines, the airports main carrier, were canceled.

American Airlines said about 345 of their flights were canceled at DFW Airport, its hub, by early Sunday afternoon. The airline said the storm was also affecting their flights across the region, with operations reduced and canceled at airports across Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas.

Officials were discouraging travel in the wintry conditions. By early Sunday afternoon, the Texas Highway Patrol had reported several multi-car pileups in West Texas, including one that involved 25 vehicles and shut down a portion of Interstate 20 westbound.

The Oklahoma Highway Patrol said a portion of the Turner Turnpike was shut down due to a mutli-vehicle accident, while the Oklahoma Department of Transportation said the southern corridor of Interstate 35 was mostly snow packed in the left lane and conditions were expected to deteriorate.

The National Weather Service said Sunday that the forecast through early Tuesday calls for 8 to 12 inches of snow in central Oklahoma, and 4 to 8 inches in an area extending from eastern Texas to the Ohio Valley in the Northeast.

In Memphis, Tennessee, snow had started falling, and while main roads were still passable, lines were forming at grocery stores as people rushed to stock up.

In Mississippi, sleet in Jackson and other central parts of the state left roads and bridges slick. Bill Parker, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Jackson, said up to three-quarters of an inch of ice could accumulate in central Mississippi, bringing the possibility of power outages or falling tree limbs.

Parts of Kentucky and West Virginia still recovering from an ice storm last week are expected to get up to a quarter-inch of ice or up to 8 inches of snow by Tuesday. About 19,000 customers remained without electricity in southern West Virginia and about 9,000 in eastern Kentucky on Sunday from the storm that moved through on Wednesday and Thursday.

Utilities warned of the likelihood for additional power outages due to falling tree limbs. Hundreds of utility crews and contractors were traveling Sunday to be in place if additional outages occurred.

The Ratliff Stadium is seen covered in snow and ice in Midland, Texas, on Feb. 13, 2021. (Eli Hartman/Odessa American via AP)

In Texas, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages the flow of electric power in the state, was asking customers to reduce electricity use as much as possible through Tuesday, including closing shades to reduce the amount of heat lost through windows and avoiding the use of large appliances.

We are experiencing record-breaking electric demand due to the extreme cold temperatures that have gripped Texas, said ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness. At the same time, we are dealing with higher-than-normal generation outages due to frozen wind turbines and limited natural gas supplies available to generating units.

Meanwhile, in the Pacific Northwest, tens of thousands of people were without power after a winter storm blanketed the region with ice and snow and made travel treacherous.

By Jamie Stengle
New Delhi:

Amidst the speculations of rift in mahagathbandhan, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar will be meeting both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Saturday. Nitish will meet Rahul first before taking part in the dinner program called by PM Modi.

Janata Dal (United) and Rashtriya Janata Dal are having confrontations over resignations of Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav in corruption case.

Congress is trying to mediate the matter but has not been successful in doing so.

It is being conjectured that Rahul bring issue of alliance in the meet with Nitish on Saturday.

Nitish is constantly facing attacks of rival parties after CBI filed case against Tejashwi Yadav. When Nitish decided to support NDAs Presidential candidate, Congress and RJD had attacked him. Rahul had advised party leaders to refrain from making comments against Nitish.

PM Modi has planned Pranab Mukherjees farewell dinner on Saturday.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
New Delhi:

The month old India-China border standoff has managed to grab international headlines lately with countries like Australia, neighboring Pakistan and EU suggesting ways to defuse tensions between the two nations. But nothing could be drawn out of it and the situation remains the same.

Now, United States Department of Defense- the Pentagon has encouraged India and China to reduce ongoing border tension by indulging in a dialogue free of any coercive aspects.

We encourage India and China to engage in direct dialogue aimed at reducing tensions and free of any coercive aspects, news agency PTI quoted Gary Ross, a Defence Department spokesman as saying.

We refer you to the Governments of India and China for further information. We encourage India and China to engage in direct dialogue aimed at reducing tensions. We are not going to speculate on such matters, Ross said when asked if the Pentagon fears an escalation of tension between India and China.

Suggested Read: Does Farooq wants Kashmir to become Syria, says Mufti on third-party mediation between India, Pakistan

Over the past week, the US State Department too have been making similar statements, but Pentagon has sought direct dialogue between India and China on reducing tension free of any coercive aspects.

Notably, in recent past few years, almost all the Chinese neighbours have been accusing Beijing of coercive tactics to settle border disputes.

The month-long India-China border standoff in the Sikkim sector is seen as part of same Chinese coercive tactics to change the status quo. India has taken a strong stand against such a Chinese move.

(With PTI inputs)

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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.
This comes as the Crypto Finance brokerage has received the securities house licence from Swiss regulator FINMA. The timing couldn't be better. CEO Rupertus Rothenhauser explains why.

A new asset class is emerging  crypto assets. It is an asset class designed for the new digital age we are now entering. Bitcoin and other crypto assets have attracted retail investors and now the attention of institutional investors, who are drawn to the independence these assets enjoy from the policies of central banks and governments, and the blockchain technology shaping the future of finance.

Every bank will need a crypto asset strategy

Banks will need to both create the infrastructure for crypto assets and respond as trusted advisors to clients who are interested in investing in this asset class. This creates a challenging duality: the current financial system remains, and this new digital asset finance sector emerges. Securing the expertise of a specialised partner for trading and investing in crypto assets, and developing a digital asset strategy, is an efficient way to meet this need for innovation, in incremental steps.

Increasing regulatory clarity on crypto assets

With a new DLT law addressing crypto assets effective in February 2021, Switzerland is one of the few countries with this regulatory clarity. The securities house licence granted by FINMA to Crypto Broker AG  the brokerage firm of Crypto Finance Group  is one more step in making secure, reliable access to crypto assets possible for the finance sector.

Rupertus Rothenhauser, CEO of the brokerage comments, "It's now possible for banks to shape a crypto asset strategy within the regulated finance sector," based on the full suite of crypto asset financial services the Crypto Finance Group provides professional investors. Read more: https://www.cryptofinance.ch/en/why-every-bank-will-need-a-digital-asset-strategy/

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A big snow storm is on its way to Michigan.

The National Weather Service this morning issued a Winter Storm Warning for much of southeast Michigan, and predicted up to 9 inches to fall from 6 p.m. today through noon Tuesday in some counties.

MLive Meteorologist Mark Torregrossa is predicting a good old-fashioned heavy February snow. While this wont be an extreme snowfall, he said, it will make for dangerous driving conditions tonight and Tuesday morning.

RELATED: Winter Storm Warning issued for Detroit, Ann Arbor, much of southeast Lower Michigan

The Winter Storm Warning area includes Ann Arbor, Detroit, Oakland County, Flint, all of the Thumb except Tuscola County, and the southern border counties. Several other counties in the southern half of Lower Michigan are under a Winter Weather Advisory.

With the storm expected to impact a large portion of the state, we decided to check in with other forecasters around Michigan to see what they are predicting for their areas.

WOOD-TV 8 in Grand Rapids - More Snow and Cold This Week  Milder Next Week

This will be a significant snow for much of Lower Michigan, with 4 inches possible up to Grand Rapids and 8 inches possible for Coldwater, Hillsdale, Ann Arbor and Detroit. The heavier snow will arrive from south to north during the late afternoon and evening. So, well have some time, midday especially, when it wont be snowing.

FOX 17 in Grand Rapids - Snow arrives this afternoon, Arctic blast to follow

Snow can be heavy at times into the early morning hours of Tuesday. Another 3-5 in inches is likely in Grand Rapids areas by the time the snow winds down by mid-morning Tuesday. Around 5-8 inches is possible for Kalamazoo and Battle Creek areas.

WWMT in Kalamazoo - Heavy snow by your evening commute ... Snow ends early Tuesday ... Below zero Wednesday morning

Widespread snow, heavy at times, with an additional 3-5 inches or more, especially Kalamazoo and southeastward. Near 10 degrees. N 10-20 mph with higher gusts.

WJRT in Flint - More snow on the way

Snow pushes across the state from south to north, continuing overnight before moving out tomorrow morning. The further SE you are the higher totals will be, on the order of 5-9 inches, while closer to the bay you look to see 3-5 inches, and further NW totals drop off to less than an inch. We can look forward to more sunshine on Wednesday with highs near 20.

WNEM-TV 5, Saginaw - Snow this morning, quiet afternoon, bigger snow late tonight

As we head into the evening hours tonight, snow should start picking back up again from south to north after 6 PM. The heaviest snow will likely be around between 10 PM and 6 AM, where we could see some snowfall rates pick up to around 1 per hour. With winds staying breezy overnight and a fluffy snow, expect some of that to blow around and reduce visibility.

When all is said and done between both rounds of snow (this morning and tonight), snowfall amounts will be heaviest in the Thumb and to the south. Totals will taper off gradually as you head north and west. Our heaviest zones in the central and eastern Thumb will likely pick up between 6-10 of snow, with a zone of 4-7 in the western Thumb to Saginaw, 2-5 in places like Alma, Bay City, Midland, and Mount Pleasant, and lighter totals in our counties north of the Tri-Cities.

WILX in Lansing - Impactful Winter Storm Moves In This Evening

Plan for steady snow this evening through early morning Tuesday, and your Tuesday morning commute will be hazardous and slow. In addition to the light accumulation we pick up early today, well see another 4-6 inches tonight in the Lansing area, 5-8 inches in the Jackson area, and up to 6-10 inches possible in the southeastern corner of the state. The snow will taper off throughout the morning hours of Tuesday and Tuesday afternoon will just be mostly cloudy with highs in the mid-teens.

Fox 2 in Detroit - SE Michigan upgraded to Winter Storm Warning with new forecasts estimating 6-9 inches of snow

Monday night into Tuesday snow will be heavier and wetter than (on Monday morning). Preliminary totals were upgraded to an expected 6-9 inches for much of the Tri-County region. The National Weather Service announced that a Winter Storm Warning would go into effect Monday night around 6 p.m.

UPNorthLive in Traverse City

Cold and quiet for majority of N. Michigan (on Monday night). Overnight lows ranging from -5 to 9 degrees, with the coldest locations across the Eastern Upper Peninsula. The exception in the quiet weather is south and east of a Cadillac-Alpena line with light snow overnight; upwards of 1-2 inches possible.

9&10 News in Cadillac - Today: Some Sun, Some Lake Effect; Tonight: Light System Snow

Today, we will see mostly to partly sunny skies today with isolated lake effect. The U.P. and Tip of the Mitt will see a good bit of sun. The Lower Peninsula will see partly sunny skies away from any lake effect. Highs will range from 7 to 17 degrees with winds out of the Northwest/North at 5-10mph. Tonight, we will see mostly clear to partly cloudy skies in the U.P. Some light system snow will impact areas of the Lower Peninsula. Areas could see a trace to 2 inches into Tuesday morning.

WJMN in Marquette - Local 3 Mondays Weather Forecast 2/15/2021

Today, lake effect snow showers (mainly in the Keweenaw Peninsula and east of Marquette along/north of M-28). Otherwise, partly sunny to mostly sunny. Wind chills remaining below zero all day. High temperatures will range from around zero for some inland areas west of Marquette to 10 above zero for the Eastern U.P. West to northwest wind 5 to 15 MPH.

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Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The country's COVID-19 task force is postponing its initial order to reopen movie theaters after pushback from Metro Manila mayors.

Inter-Agency Task Force spokesperson Harry Roque on Monday said the enforcement of their resolution can only happen once operational guidelines have been crafted by local government units. He added the earliest cinemas can reopen in Metro Manila is on March 1  if the plan pushes through.

"Ang status po ang pagbubukas ng sinehan, kung matutuloy po, ay Marso 1. Kinakailangan po ipagpatuloy ang consultations at kinakailangan bumuo ng guidelines ang lokal na pamahalaan bago magbukas ang sinehan," he said in a media briefing.

[Translation: Cinemas will open on March 1, if it pushes through. We need to continue the consultations and LGUs need to come up with guidelines before it can reopen.]

All 17 local chief executives in Metro Manila opposed the IATF resolution allowing cinemas, arcades, and other leisure businesses to reopen starting Monday in areas under general community quarantine. Metro Manila Council Chairman Edwin Olivarez said they will defer the reopening of cinemas since the airconditioned and enclosed space can lead to a spike of COVID-19 cases in the capital region, which remains as the epicenter of the virus in the country.

The Department of Health also said concerned government agencies will release guidelines on how to ventilate theaters to ensure proper air circulation. Health experts advised against staying in enclosed spaces for long periods of time after growing evidence that COVID-19 infection can occur from airborne exposure to the virus.

They consulted with an epidemiologist so that they can provide this ventilation requirements for ventilation, specifically in enclosed spaces para lang makapag-prevent ng infection [so they can prevent infections], Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in a separate briefing.
Every student at Margaret Thatchers old Oxford college was ordered to take a course in unconscious bias to expose innate racism, homophobia, transphobia and disability discrimination.

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, principal of Somerville College, instructed students to complete the online class by this Friday, and told them they must achieve a mark of 100 per cent in a final test.

In her message the Labour peer, 65, who served in Ed Milibands shadow cabinet, also claimed there was irrefutable evidence that injustices in society were being fanned by individual unconscious biases that many or all of us have.

Somerville College, Oxford, (pictured) told all students they must complete an 'unconscious bias' course to expose innate racism, homophobia, transphobia and disability discrimination

Her claims were in conflict with the Governments belief that trendy unconscious bias training, which is aimed at rooting out unintentional discrimination, does not achieve its intended aims and should be phased out of use in the public sector. Other research suggests it could even make such problems worse.

During the test used by Somerville College, seen by the Daily Mail, students must admit that they are susceptible to bias and need to accept responsibility for monitoring our own behaviours.

They are also forced to admit to suffering from the bizarrely-named mini-me syndrome, because they automatically favour people like themselves.

In one section, students must concede that a black lecturer would be more likely to be disliked by students than her white colleagues.

In another section, they are also told that thinking their tutor doesnt look smart and is a bit unprofessional may not be appropriate.

Lady Royalls letter and the accompanying test prompted the Free Speech Union (FSU) campaign group to warn that her orders could be a breach of both the Human Rights Act and the Equality Act.

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, principal of the college, initially insisted students get 100 per cent

'Unconscious bias' quiz tells you what to think The Somerville College course presents a question about whether a black or white lecturer has the least satisfied class. Students are told to use what they know about unconscious bias to make a selection. The options are two white men, a white woman and a black woman. After clicking on the image of the black woman, the course says this is the correct answer, citing research that indicates students are less likely to rate courses positively if they are taught by black or ethnic minority academics. The accompanying quiz also tells students to confront mini-me syndrome  an apparent tendency to prefer people similar to oneself. The course asserts that stereotyping is present in our unconscious and affects everyone at a university. It claims that it can be difficult to override your unconscious biases when you are not aware of them. It suggests that all students accept in general terms that we are all likely to be biased in some respects. Advertisement

FSU general secretary Toby Young said the organisation had been contacted by a student who was understandably anxious that if they refuse to take this training course, or if they score less than 100 per cent in the assessment at the end of the course, they may face disciplinary action.

He added that evidence suggests that such courses do not lead to a reduction in real-world discriminatory behaviour and can lead to an increase in such behaviour.

Last night friends of Lady Thatcher, who studied chemistry at the then women-only college in the 1940s, said the training flew in the face of her libertarian beliefs.

Sir Bernard Ingham, the former PMs long-time press secretary, commented: I think it is entirely in keeping with the university that refused her an honorary degree. The best way to deal with them is to laugh at them.

She would have thought the country had gone mad. She believed in freedom, these people dont, they believe in dictatorship. To hell with them!

Last night, Somerville College backed down in the face of the FSU challenge, with Lady Royall saying she should have thought further about her order that all students must score 100 per cent.

She wrote in reply to the FSU: On reflection, it has been agreed that completing the test with less than 100 per cent will be seen as the opportunity for a chat about the issues involved, nothing more.

After initially telling students they were required to complete this course, Lady Royall also said she was happy to confirm that there was never even the slightest question of disciplinary action following a student not completing the test or scoring less than 100 per cent.

Friends of Margaret Thatcher (pictured), who studied chemistry at the then women-only college in the 1940s, said unconscious bias training flew in the face of her libertarian beliefs

Defending the ideology behind the course, she said it was clearly incontestable that a plethora of systemic injustices exist in our society. She emphasised the colleges commitment to free speech.

Responding to Somervilles U-turn, Mr Young said: I am pleased Baroness Royall has backed down on her insistence that students have to score 100 per cent on the test.

But she still says students who score less than 100 per cent will have to come in for a chat, which sounds ominous.

The row comes as many universities and student unions are being accused of trying to enforce Left-wing woke values across supposedly impartial institutions.

Today Education Secretary Gavin Williamson will unveil his plans for a free speech champion, who will work to fight censorship on campus and stick up for academics who find themselves vilified.

The tsar will work within universities regulator the Office for Students, now chaired by former Tory MP Lord Wharton of Yarm.

Recent examples of cancel culture include students at Clare College, Cambridge, trying to force a porter out of his job after he declined to support a pro-trans motion in his role as a city councillor.

Former Home Secretary Amber Rudd was also no-platformed by an Oxford University society last year. The society was later banned.

Academics like me live in fear of the woke hate mob

By Matthew Goodwin, Professor of Politics at the University of Kent

The date everything changed is entrenched in my memory  June 23, 2016, the day Britain voted for Brexit.

Before that moment I was a professor of British politics who loved his job, enjoyed spending time with his colleagues and looked forward to life in Britains universities, which are among the best in the world.

But since then I have fallen out of love with my job, avoid my colleagues and look to the future with a sense of dread. So what happened?

Unlike the vast majority of people who teach and research in Britains universities, I made the mistake of saying publicly that we should respect the Brexit referendum result.

I was no Brexiteer but, in a world where just one in ten academics backed a Brexit decision that more than half of the country supported, merely accepting the result was more than enough to make me an outcast.

For the next four years, I faced a constant wave of criticism that at times bordered on harassment.

Politics professor Matthew Goodwin says he was subject to online abuse and professional backlash after expressing the opinion that people should respect the Brexit referendum result

One professor told me to my face that I was disinvited from a workshop in my area of research because of my views on Brexit.

Others hurled insults on social media and still more concocted a plot to make it appear that I was a supporter of Donald Trump (I was not).

But it was nothing compared to what some of my colleagues have endured.

There is a long list of academics in Britains universities who have found themselves marginalised or intimidated by fellow academics, administrators or students.

They have been no-platformed, harassed or sacked because their views on issues like Brexit, gender or the legacy of Britains empire violate the woke orthodoxy.

Which is why, over the past year, a group of rebel academics began meeting to share ideas about how to push back against this illiberalism. I am proud to be a founding member of that secretive group.

Dr Kathleen Stock a professor of philosophy at the University of Sussex (pictured), has been outspoken on gender identity issues and has been hounded over her views on the subject

We worked to support freedom in our universities and ensure they remain places where students can be exposed to a full range of ideological views and where academics are not punished or mocked for holding different views.

And, thankfully, Boris Johnsons Government is listening. In 2019, the Conservatives became one of the first parties in the world to include a commitment to defend academic freedom in its manifesto.

In a policy paper this week, the Government details plans to bring in legislation that will defend academics and universities from the illiberal liberalism that is taking hold, with a free speech champion who will have powers to protect students and academics from the woke mob.

Ironically, the paper came as Mrs Thatchers old college, Somerville in Oxford, instructed all students to take what are widely regarded as flawed tests in unconscious bias to expose their innate racism, homophobia, transphobia and disability discrimination.

Somerville Colleges Principal, the Labour peer Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, initially told students they must achieve a mark of 100 per cent in a final test  although she has since made clear there was never even the slightest question of disciplinary action following a student not completing the test or scoring less than 100 per cent.

Academic staff, however, have not escaped disciplinary action for expressing non-conformist views.

Take Kathleen Stock, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sussex, hounded after challenging the narrow trans orthodoxy.

Or the Canadian Professor of Psychology and critic of political correctness, Jordan Peterson, who suddenly had his invitation for a fellowship at Cambridge University rescinded.

Critic of political correctness Jordan B Peterson, a Canadian Professor of Psychology and Clinical Psychologist had his invitation for a fellowship at Cambridge University rescinded

Other colleagues at Oxford, Birkbeck, Exeter and elsewhere have been hauled in front of disciplinary committees, faced student mobs or been disinvited from conferences because of their challenging views. Some have even been forced to have security at their lectures.

By my count, there have been at least two dozen cases where academics have spoken out publicly about being mistreated after merely challenging the established group-think.

Many more suffered abuse but dare not say so for fear this will damage their careers.

Critics will say that all of this is exaggerated. But a string of recent studies show just how lop-sided our universities have become.

Today only about one in ten academics are Conservatives while at recent elections an astonishing three-quarters voted for liberal-Left parties like Labour, the Greens or Lib Dems.

One study found that more than two-thirds of our universities have had a free speech controversy over the past four years and more than half experienced a cancel culture event, whereby staff or students used open letters and petitions to try to shut down debate and visiting speakers.

This gulf between what is happening on university campuses and in wider British society is damaging higher education, making it harder to expose students to the diverse array of views that they will meet in the real world.

It also helps explain why so many academics, researchers and students now say they self-censor in their lectures and seminars, hiding their real views because of fears over the response.

Research by the think-tank Policy Exchange found that a shocking 80 per cent of the (very few) academics who supported Brexit would not feel comfortable sharing their views with colleagues on campus.

Nor are they wrong to think this way. About half of academics say they would feel uncomfortable sitting next to a Brexiteer at lunch.

Too often, our universities have lost sight of why they are there.

They are not supposed to be putting the emotional safety of their students ahead of free inquiry and the search for truth.

They are not supposed to be building ideological cocoons whereby academics close ranks against those who hold different views.

Only by encouraging every diverse idea to be presented and challenged can they possibly remain among the best in the world.

Matthew Goodwin is Professor of Politics at the University of Kent

YANGON, Myanmar  Since the military seized power on Feb. 1, I have felt overwhelmed watching both the empowerment of a new generation of young protesters and a continuing failure of political leadership. I am torn between nostalgia and the urgent need for a concrete strategy.

Thirty-three years have passed since the 8-8-88 Movement, a nationwide uprising in 1988 that called for the end of military dictatorship and the restoration of democratic governance; I was 14 years old, a student, and I discovered political activism then. Today, I find myself in the streets again, marching alongside a new generation that is waging the same battle.

The junta detained Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the countrys de facto leader, and key members of her party, the National League for Democracy (N.L.D.), on the morning they were preparing to begin their second term in office after a landslide re-election victory in November. The army chief, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, has declared a state of emergency for a year. He has cited election fraud as the justification for the takeover and has promised a new election. Public outrage is growing by the day.

The new junta has imposed a nightly curfew and banned gatherings of more than five people in Yangon and elsewhere. A young woman was left brain dead after being shot in the head at a protest in Naypyidaw, the capital, last week. Some 400 people had been arrested as of Friday. On Sunday evening, armored vehicles rolled through several cities.
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Every April (and lets hope it happens this year), people from the mayors office in the southern Spanish hill town of Vejer de la Frontera tramp its streets in search of residents who have let the facades of their homes get a bit, well, grubby.

Those inhabitants whose walls fail to come up to snuff get a knock on the door and a polite request to rectify the situation with a fresh coat of paint.

After all, when youve made the official list of the most beautiful villages in Spain, you dont want to lose the accolade. And its not just the brilliant white of its buildings that helped this medieval pueblo blanco, 55 miles west of Gibraltar, gain a global reputation.

The bright side of life: Every April people from the mayors office in Vejer de la Frontera check that residents are keeping their properties dazzlingly white - and urge them to give them a lick of paint if they're looking grubby

Hey, good looking: Vejer de la Frontera made the official list of the most beautiful villages in Spain

It turns out that much of this is owing to a 55-year-old Scotsman called James Stuart. When, 30 years ago, he arrived in this town of 12,700 people in search of a snack after a days windsurfing on the coast, it had just one hotel.

Most visitors were forced to stay in small pensions and were lucky to get any hot water for a shower in one of the shared bathrooms.

Today, he is the Rick Stein of Vejer. Just as the British celebrity chef accumulated so many outlets in the Cornish port of Padstow that it has become known as Padstein, Vejer has become so dominated by Stuart it could almost be dubbed Jaime de la Frontera.

Vejer de la Frontera, which lies 55 miles west of Gibraltar, is great for birdwatching - 2,000 griffon vultures nest on the nearby hill of Sierra de Retin

Apart from owning the hottest restaurant in town, he and his partners have four other restaurants and bars, four hotels, and four homes for rent. He bought his first house in the town for 1,000 in 1989, selling it two years later to buy a four-floor property for 34,000 that became his first hotel, La Casa del Califa.

At the beginning, it had just eight rooms and no bar, but now it has 20 and a courtyard which houses one of the prettiest restaurants youre ever likely to see. Diners select from a Moroccan-inspired menu and eat in the shade of palm trees. Its no surprise to hear you wont get a table at El Jardin del Califa without a booking on any evenings from July up to October.

And another highlight of this gastronomic hotspot  whose labyrinth of streets teems with tapas bars  is Corredera 55, run by Jamess Scottish wife Ellie.

Scottish expat James Stuart is the Rick Stein of Vejer, writes Dominic Midgley. He runs the hottest restaurant in town along with four other restaurants and bars and four hotels. Plus four homes available to rent

Even Vejers most evangelistic cheerleaders concede it only takes a couple of days to do the rounds of the towns cultural attractions, but thats when its role as a base camp for other activities comes into play, writes Dominic

I stayed at his newest property, a luxurious boutique number called Plaza 18, situated just off enchanting Plaza de Espana.

Opened in 2019, it is a joint venture with British couple James and Nicky Dobree.

Nicky made her name designing the interiors of ski chalets  for the sort of people who spend 50,000 on a sofa. I cant vouch for the price of the sofas at Plaza 18, but the beds are a delight.

As the Plaza has only six rooms, there is no room service, but you can serve yourself from an honesty bar, which sits below a portrait of a distinguished looking seafaring gent.

There are tapas bars aplenty nestled amid Vejer de la Frontera's labyrinth of streets

The cities of Cadiz and Seville are within easy reach of Vejer de la Frontera (pictured), reveals Dominic, as is Jerez, the southern tip of the so-called Sherry Triangle

Dominic stayed at James Stuart's newest property, 'a luxurious boutique number called Plaza 18 [pictured], situated just off enchanting Plaza de Espana'

Plaza 18, pictured, opened in 2019 and is a joint venture with British couple James and Nicky Dobree. Nicky, reveals Dominic, 'made her name designing the interiors of ski chalets  for the sort of people who spend 50,000 on a sofa'

TRAVEL FACTS Doubles at Plaza 18 in low season from 140  including breakfast (hotelplaza18.com). EasyJet (easyjet.com) London to Gibraltar (just over an hours drive) from 75 return. Advertisement

As were only nine miles from Cape Trafalgar, the scene of Nelsons victory against the French in 1805, you could be forgiven for thinking it is Horatio himself.

But it turns out to be Admiral James Saumarez, a contemporary of Nelsons, who is a forebear of James Dobree. The original is in the National Portrait Gallery.

Even Vejers most evangelistic cheerleaders concede it only takes a couple of days to do the rounds of the towns cultural attractions, but thats when its role as a base camp for other activities comes into play.

Beaches with some of the best surfing and windsurfing in Europe are just six miles away on the Costa de la Luz and a 45-minute drive will get you to Tarifa, reputed to be the windiest resort in Europe.

History buffs will enjoy a visit to Cape Trafalgar, but to combine scholarship and pleasure, head for the village of Bolonia. It not only has one of Andalucias best preserved Roman ruins, Baelo Claudia, but can lay claim to one of the most beautiful beaches on the Atlantic coast.

Meanwhile, the cities of Cadiz and Seville are within easy reach, as is Jerez, the southern tip of the so-called Sherry Triangle.

As James Stuart and I talk on one of three terraces that line the back of Plaza 18, all with spectacular views of the town and countryside, large birds that look like eagles wheel overhead.

He identifies them as griffon vultures. It turns out that Vejer is a great spot for birdwatchers too. Two thousand griffons, almost extinct as recently as 1975, nest on the nearby hill of Sierra de Retin, also home to up to 50 pairs of the endangered northern bald ibis.

Clearly, our feathered friends have been as taken by this Spanish charmer as I have.
NASA, SpaceX Join Forces Again, This Time For Lunar Gateway Project News oi-Sharmishte Datti

NASA Artemis Program is the space agency's biggest mission for the near future. The mission will involve sending the first woman and the next man to the Moon to explore the lunar surface. The mission also involves the Lunar Gateway, which is an orbiting habitat on the Moon. NASA has just signed a deal with SpaceX to use the Falcon Heavy for the Lunar Gateway project.

NASA Lunar Gateway Project Explained

The NASA Lunar Gateway project can be understood as an established infrastructure on the Moon for sustained lunar exploration and development. The project involves an orbiting habitat, allowing astronauts to take regular trips to the Moon - just like their trips to the International Space Station (ISS).

NASA announced that it had selected the Falcon Heavy rocket to launch the Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) and the Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO). This, the space agency plans to launch the mission by May 2024 at the earliest.

NASA further explained that once the Lunar Gateway is setup on the Moon, it will play a key role in communication. The PEE element will provide power (60KW), high-speed communication, attitude control, and also solar-electric propulsion capabilities.

On the other hand, the HALO element will act as the docking hub for both living and working space for the crew. The HALO element also acts as the command and control module for science investigations. It is a key entity for providing communication support, distributing power, and so on. The vehicles that NASA plans to send will also be communicated with the HALO element.

NASA, SpaceX Sign Deal, Once Again

The most recent development regarding the Lunar Gateway is signing a deal with SpaceX to carry the foundational elements. The deal was signed between the premier and the private space agencies for around USD 331.8 million.

The NASA statement said once the PPE and the HALO elements are ready, they would be integrated on Earth and launch aboard the single Falcon Heavy rocket. The liftoff will be scheduled from the Launch Complex 39A at the NASA Kennedy Space Center, sometime in May 2024.

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Seguin, Texas (78155)

Today

A widely scattered shower or thunderstorm is possible this evening. Then cloudy skies overnight. Low 71F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Tonight

A widely scattered shower or thunderstorm is possible this evening. Then cloudy skies overnight. Low 71F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 40%.
One patient threatened to shoot Dr. Terry Hunt if physical therapy didnt relieve his pain as effectively as opioids did. Another harassed his staff, then roamed a hospital searching for Hunt after being told he would be weaned off painkillers he had used inappropriately.

Hunt was unharmed, but shaken enough to ask the central Illinois hospital system where he worked to dismiss both patients.

So when he heard about Tuesdays attack at a medical clinic in Buffalo, Minnesota, that left one person dead and four injured, the first thing I assumed is that it was something to do with pain medication, said Hunt, who now works for the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and a Mayo Clinic Health System facility in Red Wing, Minnesota. It makes us ask about our own workplace: How secure are we?

Authorities said Gregory Paul Ulrich, 67, was angry about his medical treatment before he shot five workers and detonated three apparent pipe bombs at an Allina Health clinic. A police report says he had threatened a similar mass shooting in 2018, allegedly as revenge against people who he said tortured him with back surgeries and prescribed medication.

A former roommate said Ulrich became upset when a doctor stopped prescribing painkillers, and that Ulrich also used other drugs and had untreated mental health issues. Law enforcement and the health system have not addressed the specifics of Ulrichs treatment or medications.

Doctors who treat pain say threats of violence escalated markedly in recent years as mounting legal and regulatory pressure stemming from the deadly opioid epidemic led many to prescribe alternatives and taper their patients off addictive painkillers.

While some patients benefit from careful use of opioids, and doctors dont want to stigmatize them, many would be better off treating pain with other therapies, experts say. But many become addicted to the drugs that are often intended for short-term use following surgeries.

It hijacks their brain, said Dr. Carrie DeLone, regional medical director at Penn State Health Community Medical Group. They dont see themselves as having a problem.

Pain specialist Dr. Andrew Kolodny, a professor at Brandeis University and a founder of Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing, said patients are convinced that opioids are treating their underlying problem because if they try to go without a dose or as their previous dose wears off, theyre feeling horrible, agonizing pain, when it can be the withdrawal that is causing pain hypersensitivity.

Its much easier to give the patient what they want. You write the prescription they walk out the door happy and there are no problems. To try and help a patient taper down is much harder, Kolodny said.

And when a doctor says no, things can turn ugly.

Weve had patients waiting for doctors in parking lots to harass them. Weve had them say Were going to shoot you or Were going to burn your house down, DeLone said.

Almost half of pain specialists surveyed during a violence education session at a 2019 American Academy of Pain Medicine meeting cited opioid management as the reason they had been threatened, said Dr. W. Michael Hooten, president-elect of the organization.

In response to threats, doctors have dismissed patients. But they have also installed alarm systems and panic buttons and set up exams rooms so doctors are closest to the door. Some even advocate carrying weapons, said Hooten, noting that smaller clinics are at greatest risk because they might not be able to afford security.

After his 2018 threat, police took Ulrich for a mental health evaluation, and Allina took legal action to bar him from the companys property. A restraining order prohibited Ulrich from contact with the doctor or going into the clinic and nearby Allina-run Buffalo Hospital, where he once frightened a nurse so much that a colleague hit a panic button for help.

Police said they had had no recent interactions with Ulrich that would have raised alarms before the attack in Buffalo, a small city about 40 miles (65 kilometers) northwest of Minneapolis.

St. Joseph County, Indiana, Prosecutor Ken Cotter said he didnt know that such threats were common until 2017, when a man shot and killed a doctor who refused to prescribe opioids to his wife. Michael Jarvis ambushed Dr. Todd Graham in a parking lot hours after the appointment, said Cotter, adding there was evidence that Jarvis also was using opioids. Jarvis took his own life soon after.

Before that, I do not recall ever reading a threat report from a doctor, said Cotter, who said he received calls from about 20 doctors after the shooting telling him how common they were. They took (threats) as a cost of doing business.

Cotter said about a dozen meetings were held with doctors, law enforcement officials and others to discuss how to keep doctors safe, including deescalating tense situations, but also alternatives to opioids, disposal of old medications, and tackling the addiction problems that plague their communities.

When youve got doctors calling to say we have to do something, this is ... literally our whole communitys crusade, Cotter said.

Kolodny, from Brandeis, said he has been compared to Hitler, threatened on Twitter, and a bag of nails was mailed to his home. Last month, protesters carried signs near his office demanding that he be fired because of his work advocating less opioid use and helping states sue opioid manufacturers.

The threats have gotten really scary, he said. Its just gotten really heated up.

___

Tammy Webber of The Associated Press wrote this story.

Webber reported from Fenton, Michigan. Associated Press Writer Amy Forliti contributed from Minneapolis.
People hold signs calling for China to release Canadian detainees Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig during an extradition hearing for Huawei Technologies Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou at the B.C. Supreme Court in Vancouver, Canada on March 6, 2019. (Lindsey Wasson/Reuters)

UK Backs Canadian Initiative Against State-Sponsored Arbitrary Detention

Britain announced on Monday that it had joined a Canadian-led initiative to condemn and deter state-sponsored arbitrary detention of foreign nationals for political purposes.

By joining the initiative, the UK government is doing more to safeguard the rights of British people abroad, the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) said in a press release.

Arbitrarily detaining individuals to gain leverage over another country is deplorable & will not be tolerated.

Today I stood with over 55 allies & partners in support of Canadas Declaration & I will work with @MarcGarneau to safeguard individual liberty https://t.co/YSc5RHZbOA  Dominic Raab (@DominicRaab) February 15, 2021

The UK, along with 55 allies, backed a new international declaration initiated by Canada that has sought global support to free Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, who are spending their 798th day in Chinese prisons today.

Kovrig, a former Canadian diplomat working for the non-governmental International Crisis Group, and Spavor, an entrepreneur specialising in exchanges with North Korea, were rounded up by Chinese authorities nine days after Canadian police arrested Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou at Vancouver airport in December 2018.

The practice of arbitrarily detaining individuals as leverage over another government is indefensible and the UK will not tolerate it, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in a statement.

The UK is proud to stand on solidarity with over 55 other countries to bring this unacceptable practice to an end.

The Chinese regimes detention of Kovrig, Spavor, and several other Western individuals sparked concern among observers who believe the Chinese regime is engaging in hostage diplomacy.

In a travel advisory issued in September 2020, the British government warned its citizens that foreigners should be aware of the risk of arbitrary detention in China.

Chinas authorities have under certain circumstances detained foreigners citing endangering national security, the British Foreign Office said in its advice on traveling to China.

National Security is interpreted broadly and you may be detained without having intended to break the law, the advisory stated.

The United States, Canada, and Australia also issued warnings to their citizens over the risk of arbitrary detention in China.

In August 2020, Cheng Lei, a Chinese-born, naturalised Australian citizen who had worked as a host of a business show on the Chinese state-owned network CGTN, was detained in China for carrying out criminal activities endangering Chinas national security.

Cheng Lei, a Chinese-born Australian journalist for CGTN, the English-language channel of China Central Television, attends a public event in Beijing on Aug. 12, 2020. (Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)

In September, the Australian government evacuated two journalists from China after a tense diplomatic stand-off.

After Chinese officials banned them from leaving the country, Bill Birtles from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and Mike Smith from the Australian Financial Review (AFR) spent five days sheltering at diplomatic missions until they were allowed to leave.

Victoria Kelly-Clark and Eva Fu contributed to this report.
Sauropod dinosaurs emerged in South America some 230 million years ago, but despite living during the supercontinent Pangea it took them 15 million years to reach Greenland  when it should have taken 20 years.

A team from Colombia University suggests a 'climatic phenomenon' may have allowed the enormous creatures to finally make the journey.

The Earth endured a 'tremendous' dip atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) around the time the sauropodomorphs migrated 214 million years ago.

The high CO2 conditions could have made regions above South America too dry to support the movements of the large dinosaurs, which locked them in the temperate areas.

But once the climate changed, the long-necked dinosaurs were able to make the 6,500 mile journey.

Sauropod dinosaurs emerged in South America some 230 million years ago, but despite living during the supercontinent Pangea it took them 15 million years to reach Greenland  when it should have taken 20 years

Dennis Kent, adjunct research scientist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory said: 'In principle, the dinosaurs could have walked from almost one pole to the other.'

'There was no ocean in between. There were no big mountains. And yet it took 15 million years. It's as if snails could have done it faster.'

Kent also notes that if a herd moved one mile per day, it would take less than 20 years for it to reach Greenland from South America.

Scientists have long been mystified to why there is a large time gap from when sauropodomorphs first emerged in Argentina and Brazil and then appeared in Greenland.

A team from Colombia University suggests a 'climatic phenomenon' may have allowed the enormous creatures to finally make the journey. The Earth endured a 'tremendous' dip atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) around the time the sauropodomorphs migrated 214 million years ago

Previous estimates suggested the long-necked herbivores arrived in Greenland sometime between 225 million and 205 million years ago.

Because fossils show they first appeared in South America about 230 million years ago, experts had been unsure to when the dinosaurs made the journey and why it took them so long.

Kent, along with Lars Clemmensen from the University of Copenhagen, analyzed ancient magnetism patters in rock layers at fossil sites across South America, Arizona, New Jersey, Europe and Greenland to narrow down a more precise date.

These results show that sauropodomorphs showed up in what is now Greenland around 214 million years ago.

The team then looked at the climate during this time period and found Earth was experiencing a dip in CO2.

These results show that sauropodomorphs showed up in what is now Greenland around 214 million years ago. The team then looked at the climate during this time period and found Earth was experiencing a dip in CO2. Pictured is a fossil uncovered in Greenland

Until about 215 million years ago, the Triassic period had experienced extremely high CO2 levels, at around 4,000 parts per millionabout 10 times higher than today. But between 215 and 212 million years ago, the CO2 concentration halved, dropping to about 2,000ppm.

In the study, researchers suggest that the milder levels of CO2 may have helped to remove climatic barriers that may have trapped the sauropodomorphs in South America.

On Earth, areas around the equator are hot and humid, while adjacent areas in low latitudes tend to be very dry.

Kent and Clemmensen say that on a planet supercharged with CO2, the differences between those climatic belts may have been extremeperhaps too extreme for the sauropodomorph dinosaurs to cross.

'We know that with higher CO2, the dry gets drier and the wet gets wetter,' said Kent.

Researchers note that 230 million years ago, high levels of CO2 would have made certain areas too dry for the massive dinosaurs, along with diminishing vegetation that the creatures need to survive.

However, because such conditions cause rainy and monsoon weather in the tropics, the dinosaurs could not travel far out of their temperate regions.

High levels of CO2 would have made certain areas too dry for the massive dinosaurs, along with diminishing vegetation that the creatures need to survive. But when levels dipped 215 million to 212 million years ago, it may have transformed tropical areas into more mild regions and arid places became less dry. Pictured is a cliff in Jameson Land Basin in central East Greenland, the northernmost site where sauropodomorph fossils are found

But when levels dipped 215 million to 212 million years ago, it may have transformed tropical areas into more mild regions and arid places became less dry.

The team also notes that there may have been passageways the herbivorous took along the 6,500-mile journey to Greenland, where their fossils are now abundant.

Back then, Greenland would have had a temperate climate similar to New York state's climate today, but with much milder winters, because there were no polar ice sheets at that time.

'Once they arrived in Greenland, it looked like they settled in,'' said Kent. 'They hung around as a long fossil record after that.'


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In a masterly job of lawyering, public education and civic performance, US House of Representatives impeachment managers got every available Republican vote to convict former president Donald Trump on Saturday.

Alas, there were only seven available  the other 43 Republicans apparently made up their minds before the trial had even started.

The Republican honour roll: Senators Richard Burr of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Patrick Toomey of Pennsylvania. It was the most bipartisan impeachment verdict in American history.

Two retiring senators (Burr and Toomey) showed some spine, but another who is not seeking re-election, Rob Portman of Ohio  who fancies himself a dealmaker  continues to underwhelm.

Even insulated from facing Trump supporters at the polls, he could not bring himself to render the obvious verdict. My Washington Post colleague Max Boots observation is utterly vindicated: Maybe the junior senator from Ohio and other mainstream Republicans couldnt have stopped the Trumpist takeover of their party if they had tried. But they didnt try.

Earlier in the day, House managers were compelled by Senate Democrats to accept the stipulated testimony of Republican Representative Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington rather than her live

testimony.

Read More

Many Americans, including the House managers, learned plenty in the development of the case against the disgraced former president. There was far more evidence of guilt than we had imagined. The White House intervened to allow the mob to gather on the Ellipse.

Scores of his Maga followers believed they were acting on Trumps command. We got even more evidence of his guilt and of the total irresponsibility of House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California when we heard Herrera Beutlers testimony read into the record: Trump knew the Capitol and his vice president were imperiled.

He seemed perfectly pleased and indeed scolded McCarthy for not being as committed to him as the violent insurrectionists were.

There was likely not a single senator who would have changed his or her vote had Herrera Beutler appeared live.

The number of Americans who were not persuaded by the mound of evidence to convict but would have been educated by her live testimony, instead of written, is likely zero.

House managers made their case to the country and for history.

In doing so, the managers convicted 43 Republicans of disloyalty to the US Constitution and utter cowardice. They were provided no factual or constitutional basis to acquit and yet they did just that.

Nothing could be more hypocritical or symptomatic of spinelessness than Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (Kentucky).

Having delayed the trial beyond Joe Bidens inauguration, McConnell voted to acquit on Saturday, arguing a president couldnt be tried once out of office.

And then he proclaimed: President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office... He didnt get away with anything yet. If that is not an admission of McConnells own failure to uphold his oath, then nothing is.

Given that seven Republicans found the courage to do what he could not is an indictment of his moral feebleness thorough partisanship.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California appeared at the House managers post-verdict news conference and tore into McConnell.

She excoriated him for the grounds on which he claimed to acquit, since he was the one who delayed the trial.

Pelosi mocked McConnell: So for him to get up there and make this indictment against the president and then say: But I cant, I cant vote for it because its after the fact. The fact that he established! The fact that he established that it could not be delivered before the inauguration.

Calling Republicans cowardly, she pointed out that McConnell affirmed the managers had proved the case. She rightly concluded McConnell and Republicans were bent on acquitting the former president, no matter the facts.

The House managers conducted themselves with grace and honour. We saw the intellectual and emotional strength of Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin, who had just lost his son (named after Thomas Paine, whom Raskin quoted frequently). Newcomers Stacey Plaskett, a non-voting Democratic delegate from the US Virgin Islands, and Colorados Joe Neguse proved themselves to be rising stars. Neguses closing argument was pitch-perfect.

We are reminded that the country has one functioning, pro-democracy party and another under the sway of the Maga mob and the instigator of a violent insurrection.

Never has the gap between the parties been so great, nor the need for one side to prevail so essential to the survival of the republic.
During his official visit to the United Arab Emirates, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky met with the leadership of the Dubai Health Authority, a significant part of which was devoted to the fight against coronavirus (COVID-19) disease.

According to the presidential press service on Monday, Zelensky was told about the measures taken in the UAE to counter the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, a significant increase in testing opportunities, security measures in hospitals and schools, vaccination strategies and the availability of vaccinations for the population that will get them free of charge.

The president spoke about the measures taken by Ukraine to counter the pandemic, and noted that our country produces many disinfectants.

"We helped many European countries at the beginning of the pandemic, sent disinfectants. We sent our doctors to Italy," he said.

Volodymyr Zelensky said that Ukraine has one of the lowest mortality rates in Europe, but it is impossible to completely overcome the pandemic without the vaccine.

"We are to receive the first vaccines this month and start vaccinations. We signed the first contracts. And we would like to speed up the vaccination period," he said.

Volodymyr Zelensky commissioned the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine and the Ministry of Health to establish a joint working group for cooperation and exchange of experience with the Emirati side on issues related to vaccination against COVID-19.

The president also inquired about the UAE's experience in the storage, transportation and use of the COVID-19 vaccine, as well as the issue of the Emirates' own production of the vaccine and the possible interest of the Emirati side in cooperating with Ukrainian companies.

The leadership of the Dubai Health Authority invited the representatives of Ukraine to get acquainted with the process of vaccines' storage and transportation in the UAE.

They also welcomed the initiative of the President of Ukraine on the possibility of joint production of the vaccine by Ukraine and the UAE and expressed willingness to work in this direction.
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Two doses of Pfizer's coronavirus vaccine is 94 per cent effective at stopping over-55s from falling unwell with the disease, according to a major study in Israel.

The data of more than half a million people who received two shots of the jab found patients were also 92 per cent less likely to develop severe illness.

The study, which suggests Pfizer's vaccine works almost as well in the real world as it did in clinical trials, compared 600,000 patients given two doses of the jab against a similar-sized group who had matching medical histories but were not inoculated.

The findings will be a boost to lockdown-easing plans in the UK, where ministers are waiting for concrete evidence the jabs work before lifting restrictions. The vaccines do not need to prevent symptomatic infection entirely to end the lockdown, though it would be an added bonus. Their main purpose is to drive down hospital rates and ease pressure on the NHS.

Researchers from Israel's largest healthcare provider, Clalit, who led the project, said Pfizer/BioNTech's coronavirus jab was 'even more effective two weeks or more after the second shot' and worked in all age groups.

This will be another boost to officials running Britain's vaccination programme, who delayed giving Brits the second dose in order to get wider vaccine coverage quicker after an outbreak of the highly-infectious Kent variant over winter.

So far more than 15million people in the UK have been given a single dose of either the Pfizer or Oxford University jabs since the programme started at the beginning of December.

Israel is only using the Pfizer vaccine and insists people must get the jab three weeks apart. Britain has said people must get their second shot within 12 weeks of the first.

Israel is dishing out more jabs per person than any other country, followed by the UAE and Britain

So far more than 15million people in the UK have been given a single dose of either the Pfizer or Oxford University jabs since the programme started at the beginning of December

UK ministers announced over the weekend the number of Covid deaths in over-85s is falling twice as fast it is in younger Brits, in the first sign of the vaccine drive taking effect

The 15m includes over-70s, care homes residents, health and social care staff and people who are extremely clinically vulnerable to Covid, including patients with terminal illnesses.

Over-60s in some areas leading the way in the vaccine roll-out have already been contacted. NHS bosses say local health teams can make their own way down the priority list, so long as they have attempted to reach everyone above them.

Mr Hancock said today uptake of the vaccine so far had been 'much higher than expected', with more than 90 per cent of over-70s turning up to their appointments.

The figure was 'a little bit lower than 90 per cent' among healthcare staff, he said, and only around two-thirds of social care workers have had the vaccine.

Over the weekend data showed the number of Covid deaths in over-85s was falling twice as fast it is in younger Brits, in the first sign of the vaccine drive taking effect.

But Mr Hancock said today it was still too early to see a clear-cut effect because of how long it can take for immunity to kick in and for patients to fall seriously ill.

Meanwhile, experts at the Weizmann Institute of Science who have been assessing national data in Israel, said there had been a sharp decline of hospitalisations for the first time for people aged 55 and older.

Ran Balicer, Clalit's chief innovation officer, said the study 'shows unequivocally that Pfizer's coronavirus vaccine is extremely effective in the real world a week after the second dose, just as it was found to be in the clinical study.'

Trials showed it was 95 per cent effective at stopping symptomatic infection.

Efficacy is normally always higher in controlled studies because researchers use more young and healthy people to make the trials run smoothly and quickly.

It comes as England's Covid vaccine roll-out enters its fifth phase today as ministers discuss plans to lead the country out of lockdown.

In another big step towards a return to normality, people aged 65 and over and younger people in at-risk groups will now be offered the Covid jab.

What are the UK priority groups for vaccinations? 1. Residents in a care home for older adults and staff working in care homes for older adults 2. All those 80 years of age and over and frontline health and social care workers 3. All those 75 years of age and over 4. All those 70 years of age and over and clinically extremely vulnerable individuals (not including pregnant women and those under 16 years of age) 5. All those 65 years of age and over 6. Adults aged 16 to 65 years in an at-risk group 7. All those 60 years of age and over 8. All those 55 years of age and over 9. All those 50 years of age and over 10. Rest of the population Advertisement

Almost 1.2million letters are due to have landed on the doorsteps of over-65s and the clinically vulnerable over the weekend, asking people to log onto the national booking service, NHS England has said.

A further 1.2million are due to arrive this week, with those to receive a letter able to choose from more than 100 vaccination hubs or almost 200 pharmacy services.

Wales, with its much smaller population than England's, started inviting over-50s today. Similarly , Northern Ireland has been inviting those aged 65 to 69 to book a vaccination at seven regional centres since the end of January.

Scotland, which has been accused of moving too slow with its slow roll out, is still to offer the jab to all four top priority groups.

Last night, Mr Johnson described the country's rollout - the third best in the world in terms of vaccination rate - as an 'extraordinary feat'. He also said that the country can go forward 'with great confidence'.

And, in a further boost to millions of beleaguered Britons, ministers are set to discuss plans to allow for shops to re-open, families to be re-united and self-catering staycations to be given the go ahead if Covid-19 infection rates continue to plummet amid the vaccine rollout.

Plans to ease lockdown were boosted yesterday by figures showing the dramatic impact vaccines are already having as Boris Johnson last night confirmed the country had hit its target of 15million vaccinations ahead of schedule.

The Prime Minister said the number of new cases has already dropped 'very considerably' preparing the way for lockdown measures to be relaxed.

It is thought that this could mean the re-opening of High Street shops within weeks as well as the easing of restrictions on outdoor exercise and socialising.

Ministers are also said to be considering plans to allow for families of a single household to travel across the UK for an Easter holiday in self-catered accommodation.

It has led to growing hope that families will be able to meet outside by Easter as early as next month to allow children to reunite with their grandparents.

It comes as Health Secretary Matt Hancock set out yet another ambitious goal as he aims to roll out 32 million jabs to all those at risk in just 10 weeks.

After the over-65s and 16-64s with underlying health conditions - two groups which together contain more than 10 million people - the Government aims to vaccinate the 55-60s and then the over 50s by the end of April.

The remaining adult population, around 21million people, will then be offered their jabs by autumn.

Boris Johnson said last week that it was too early to book holidays as he urged people to wait until the government had issued a 'road map' out of lockdown.

But there is now renewed optimism sparked by the UK achieving its landmark target of vaccinating 15 million a day early - hailed by the Prime Minister as an 'extraordinary feat'.


CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Harvest for Hunger begins its 30th annual 21-county food collection campaign virtually on Feb. 17 amid an ongoing pandemic thats resulting in unprecedented levels of need among Ohioans.

The campaign is a joint effort of four central food banks, including the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank, the Second Harvest Foodbank of North Central Ohio, the Second Harvest Foodbank of Mahoning Valley, and coordinated by the Greater Cleveland Food Bank.

Money raised through Harvest for Hunger provides food to hundreds of hot meal sites, food pantries, shelters, and other non-profit agencies throughout Northeast Ohio. The program not only plays a critical role for local food pantries and shelters but, more importantly, the individuals they serve.

The pandemic increased the need for help from food banks. Cleveland Food Bank spokeswoman said Karen Pozna in announcing the Harvest for Hunger food drive that her agency served a record 404,000 in 2020 during the pandemic, doubling the number of families seeking help in 2019. Many of them were children and senior citizens.

Those turning to food programs are making tough choices and trade-offs to keep food on the table, she said. Every dollar donated through the campaign can help provide enough food for four nutritious meals.

Families across the Midwest are receiving help from all over, from food banks and companies like retailer Meijer. The Greater Cleveland Foodbank received over 6,000 frozen turkeys donated by Meijer Feb. 4, part of the companys $1 million turkey donation series to 10 food banks within its footprint to help feed those in need.

Meijer made a donation of 6,000 turkeys to the Cleveland Foodbank on Thursday Feb 4th at the Muni Lot.

In total, Meijer plans to donate 50,000 frozen turkeys (Meijer and Honeysuckle) to 10 Midwestern food bank organizations, including:

 Community Harvest Food Bank of Northeast Indiana in Fort Wayne

 Dare to Care in Louisville

 Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin in Milwaukee

 Food Bank of Northern Indiana in South Bend

 Forgotten Harvest in Oak Park, Mich.

 Gleaners Detroit

 Gleaners Indianapolis

 Greater Cleveland Food Bank

 Hunger Task Force in Milwaukee

 Northern Illinois Food Bank in Geneva

Cleveland Browns Guard Joel Bitonio and team mascot Chomps attended the turkey giveaway at the Muni Lot, helping volunteers distribute food.

Volunteers delivered the turkeys to the Greater Cleveland Food Bank and immediately loaded them into the food banks clients vehicles.

Meijer made a donation of 6,000 turkeys to the Cleveland Foodbank on Thursday Feb 4th at the Muni Lot.

While progress is being made against the pandemic, we understand the impact its made remains a challenge for many people, Meijer President & CEO Rick Keyes said in a recent news release. Meijer cares about our communities, and we wanted to do our part to help those in need. We appreciate the partnership with the Cleveland Browns to help ensure the Greater Cleveland Food Bank has what it needs to serve the community.

In addition to turkey donations, Meijer donated more than $7.6 million during the holiday season with its Simply Give program to feed hungry families across the Midwest.

At least 200 people are expected to tune into the Harvest Hunger event via Zoom this year. You can RSVP for the event here.

Speakers for the event will include Bill Lacey, President, & CEO, GE, a Savant company, and Sean Richardson, Regional President, Cleveland, the 2021 Harvest for Hunger campaign co-chairs. Huntington will also be in attendance to kick off the campaign with Kristin Warzocha, President & CEO, Greater Cleveland Food Bank, and Metro Healths Janet Montoya. There will also be pre-recorded messages from County Executive Armond Budish and Mayor Frank Jackson, City of Cleveland, and the honorary co-chairs.
Republicans remain in a bind. Those who have openly opposed the ex-president have faced fierce blowback from the party's base. Many remain fearful of his tendency to exact payback

Washington: A day after the Senate acquitted Donald Trump in a historic second impeachment trial, America was weighing how long a shadow the former president will cast: over his party, and over the country.

The Senate on Saturday voted 57-43 in favour of convicting Trump for inciting the 6 January assault on the US Capitol.

It was a stinging rebuke, with seven Republicans joining all Democrats in the most bipartisan impeachment vote ever, but it fell far short of the 67 votes needed for conviction.

With Trump hinting afterward at a possible political future, even as other Republicans said it was time to move on, the stark divide facing the party was on full view.

One frequent Trump critic, Republican Governor Larry Hogan of Maryland, on Sunday predicted a "real battle for the soul of the Republican Party."

"This is not over," he told CNN, adding he would have voted to convict Trump.

'Need to work with Trump

Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana was one of the seven Republicans to vote to convict; he predicted Sunday that Trump's still-strong hold on Republicans would fade.

"I think his force wanes... I think our leadership will be different going forward," he told ABC's This Week.

Several Republicans, even while voting to acquit Trump, expressed dismay over his role on 6 January and in the weeks before, as he stoked anger with false claims the November election was stolen from him.

But one of the former president's fiercest defenders, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, insisted Sunday that Trump, with his fervent following, retains a huge political role as the party looks ahead to the 2022 midterm elections.

He called Trump the "most vibrant member of the Republican Party," adding, "We need to work with President Trump: we can't do it without him."

Despite Trump's acquittal, Democrats insisted Sunday they had achieved a moral and political victory by securing some Republican votes in the Senate trial while permanently tarring Trump's name and clearing the way for President Joe Biden to quickly advance his agenda.

"We clearly won in the court of public opinion," Representative Don Beyer told CNN.

Party base

Trump has flirted with the idea of running for the White House again in 2024. A conviction Saturday would have likely barred him from holding federal office again.

Merely hinting at a possible run will keep him in political conversations and allow him to continue raising large amounts of money.

Yet, a number of Republicans have distanced themselves from the former president, who after all lost the election to Biden by seven million votes while also seeing his party lose control of the Senate.

Several Republicans are lining up to seek the presidential nomination in 2024, and they are eager to leave him in the party's past.

One of them, Nikki Haley, a former governor who served Trump as ambassador to the United Nations, was blunt in an interview posted Friday by Politico, saying Trump was increasingly isolated and had "lost any sort of political viability."

But Republicans who have openly opposed Trump have faced fierce blowback from the party's base, and many remain fearful of his tendency to exact payback from critics.

Trump has been deprived, however, of a key weapon he used against political enemies: Twitter. It is unclear whether he can generate the same levels of enthusiasm among Republicans as he did in the past.

And Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who voted against conviction, saying a former president could not be impeached, nonetheless identified another major challenge facing Trump.

In a blistering attack Saturday, McConnell said "there's no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events" of 6 January.

He stressed that as a civilian Trump faces potential civil and criminal legal vulnerability on a range of issues, adding: "He didn't get away with anything yet."

As the party's de facto leader now, McConnell seemed determined to quash any future role for Trump and try to guide Republicans back in a more traditional direction.

Meantime, some members of both parties have called for creation of a bipartisan commission to examine the 6 January events, not unlike the panel that examined the 11 September 2001 attacks, which could further tarnish Trump's reputation.

Trump for now remains secluded in his Florida club.

In his statement Saturday, he welcomed the verdict, denouncing the proceedings as "yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our country."

He then added: "We have so much work ahead of us, and soon we will emerge with a vision for a bright, radiant, and limitless American future."
The Mexican arm of drinks company Anheuser-Busch InBev accused US firm Constellation Brands in a lawsuit filed on Monday of breaching a deal on the use of the Corona brand name by applying it to a product other than beer. Constellation has used the name for its Corona Hard Seltzer, a sparkling water with alcohol and flavouring, one of several seltzer drinks that have become very popular in the United States. The case is the latest in an increasingly competitive and litigious US brewing market. Grupo Modelo filed its suit in the US district court of the southern ...
Brattleboro, VT (05301)

Today

Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch..

Tonight

Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch.
February 15 : John Abraham is currently shooting for his upcoming film Attack. The actor has been sharing glimpses from the shoot on social media. Recently, he shared a sneak peek of the action sequence, where he was seen riding a bike and filming a chasing scene. Today, the actor shared a video and a picture giving a glimpse of the real sweat and blood that goes into shooting action scenes.

John, who has recently wrapped up Milap Zaveris directorial Satyameva Jayate 2, took to his Instagram handle and shared a picture and a video from the sets of Attack. In the picture, John is seen in a tracksuit, who is being hit by a goon with a tubelight from the back. Some other goons can be seen lying on the floor, injured. Immediately, after the shot, somebody from the crew filmed a video, showcasing how the Batla House actor got injured and bleeding from the back of his ear. While someone cleans the blood with cotton wool, the actor shows his fans the blood, and someone from the crew can be heard saying, See what goes into making an action scene.

Sharing the post, John wrote, How it started... how its going. Love this...all part of the fun! #Attack #ActionAddict. An impressed Tiger Shroff took to the comments section and wrote, Action man.

Attack is helmed and co-written by Lakshya Raj Anand, and produced by John Abraham, Jayantilal Gada and Ajay Kapoor. Along with john, Jacqueline Fernandez and Rakul Preet Singh will also be seen in pivotal roles in this action thriller. Based on hostage crisis inspired by true events, Attack was rolled in January 2020, but shooting was put on hold in March 2020 due to Covid-19 pandemic.

The actor is shooting for Attack in New Delhi and will likely to wrap up the shoot by this month. He will then move on to Pathan with Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone. John also has Mohit Suris directional Ek Villain 2 in the pipeline.
Dr Anthony Fauci has urged Congress to pass Joe Biden's Covid relief bill because US schools 'need more resources' to re-open safely after months of virus-enforced closures.

The nation's top infectious disease expert said re-opening schools 'can be done' but told ABC's George Stephanopoulos that school districts 'really do need more resources'.

'That's the reason why the national relief act that we're talking about getting passed - we need that,' Fauci said, as Democrats in Congress try to push through $130billion in funding to help schools upgrade buildings and buy protective gear.

'Obviously it's not a perfect situation, but it's really important to get the children back to school in as safe a way as possible,' Fauci said. 'Safe for the children, but also safe for the teachers and the other educators.'

Dr Anthony Fauci, pictured, has called on Congress to pass Joe Biden's Covid relief package which contains $130billion in funding for schools

Fauci's comments came after the CDC said on Friday that in-person schooling can resume safely with masks, social distancing and other strategies.

But teachers' unions say many schools still have outdated ventilation systems and lack the kind of testing programs suggested by the CDC.

Biden's $1.9trillion relief plan calls for at least $130billion in dedicated funding for schools which Democrats are now trying to push through Congress.

Democrats on the House Education and Labor Committee say schools need the money to repair buildings, buy protective equipment and meet CDC standards.

But Republicans on the committee want to re-open schools now and limit funding to schools that stay closed.

'We know the costs of keeping schools closed are high. So why are schools still closed,' said Rep. Virginia Foxx, the ranking GOP member on the committee.

Re-opening schools has become a politically heated issue, with some teachers' unions refusing to support a return until their demands are met (pictured, a classroom in Reno, NV)

Democrats hope to get the bill to Biden for his signature by mid-March, after the president promised to re-open most K-8 schools in his first 100 days in office.

'We have sacrificed so much in the last year,' Biden said. 'But science tells us that if we support our children, educators and communities with the resources they need, we can get kids back to school safely in more parts of the country sooner.'

The issue has become increasingly heated as some school districts face gridlock with teachers who have refused to support re-opening until their demands are met.

The White House has been accused of not acting aggressively enough after saying that schools would be considered opened if they teach in-person one day a week.

Biden's press secretary Jen Psaki later insisted that the president's 'objective' was to get schools open five days a week, but did not give a timeline for that to happen.

Psaki said the task of helping schools re-open would fall to the CDC and to Biden's pick for education secretary, Miguel Cardona.

President Biden, pictured boarding Air Force One on Friday, has vowed to re-open most K-8 schools in his first 100 days in office

The CDC road-map published on Friday was more emphatic than past guidance on the need for masks, with director Dr Rochelle Walensky saying that 'most clusters in the school setting have occurred when there are breaches in mask wearing'.

'We've used stronger languages than prior guidance. We've been much more prescriptive here as to putting some guardrails on what can and should be done to get to a safe reopening,' Walensky said.

Other recommended measures include hand washing, disinfection of school facilities, diagnostic testing and contact tracing to separate infected people.

It added that vaccinating teachers would provide an 'additional layer of protection', but is not a prerequisite for opening schools.

Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association union, welcomed the CDC's guidance but said that schools are failing to meet it.

'CDC standards still aren't being met in too many of our schools,' Pringle said.

'We can and must provide students the opportunity to return to in-person learning, but we also must ensure that every school has the safety measures in place to keep students and educators safe.'
Today show host Allison Langdon has revealed she's back home after having knee surgery following a hydrofoiling accident in Queensland two weeks ago.

The 41-year-old shared a photo to Instagram on Sunday of herself with her children, Mack, four, and Scout, two.

'So nice to get home to these two,' she captioned the post.

On the mend: Today show host Allison Langdon (pictured) has revealed she's back home after having knee surgery following a hydrofoiling accident in Queensland two weeks ago

In the picture, Allison sat on her bed and couldn't wipe the smile off her face as she embraced her two young children.

Last week, Allison underwent surgery days after seriously hurting her knee while filming a watersports segment for the Today show on the Gold Coast.

During a pre-recorded segment, the co-host 'badly' injured her leg while hydrofoiling - a relatively new watersport also known as foil surfing.

Back home: The 41-year-old shared this photo to Instagram on Sunday of herself with her children, Mack, four, and Scout, two. 'So nice to get home to these two,' she captioned the post

Balance is key on the board, and riders have to place more of their weight on their back leg.

Dramatic footage of the accident showed Ally being pulled from the water by her life vest by two male rescuers.

She was taken to hospital where she received treatment and flew back to Sydney on February 5 ahead of her operation.

Extreme sport: Last week, Allison underwent surgery after seriously hurting her knee while filming a watersports segment for the Today show

In a statement to Daily Mail Australia, Channel Nine described what had happened as 'an unfortunate accident'.

'After nearly an hour of incident-free filming of a segment about hydrofoiling, Ally fell awkwardly as she headed back to the marina at the end of the shoot,' they said.

'It was an unfortunate accident, and she was immediately taken to hospital.

The statement added that both Karl and Ally had a 'comprehensive safety induction and a thorough run-through of all aspects of hydrofoiling.

'As with every shoot, safety requirements, briefings and subsequent after-care, are strictly followed and prioritised.'
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.  Through the pandemic in this column, weve explored flavor and taste  and the deprivation of it with no indoor dining. Now that the option is back, coming back to a dining room might feel like experiencing a restaurant for the very first time. And that brings us to that love at first bite experience in Staten Island eateries.

For cupcake baker and Brooklyn transplant Laura Valois, that inaugural thrill of S.I. food officially happened at Trattoria Romana, formerly of Dongan Hills.

Flashback to 2018: The Daughters of St. Paul enjoyed lunch at the former Trattoria Romana with the owner Vittorio Asoli and his wife Pauline as they demonstrate how to make fresh mozzarella. (Staten Island Advance/ Jan Somma-Hammel) Staten Island Advance

It was with those little fried polenta things they put on the table....that and the stuffed artichoke, said Valois. She said friends used to joke with her about just ordering an iced tea and the delicious cornmeal bites, a complimentary prelude to the meal sent to all patrons by owner Vittorio Asoli.

Talking about the yummy food, Valois recalled fond memories of the restaurant. Her friend who dined at Trattoria annually for Christmas Eve dinner discovered a cooking class Vittorio hosted. They had to try it.

Vittorio...one night we did a cooking class there with him. We had a girls night out at his cooking class. That was amazing. He was so much fun and so nice, said Valois, who added, It was very very sad to see them close.

The restaurant shut in late November, 2020.

Inside the wood burning oven at the former Trattoria Romana (Staten Island Advance/Carol Ann Benanti) Staten Island Advance

Valois misses the smell of Trattorias woodsmoke, something that could be whiffed while parked the car, a fitting scent for Valois husband, Anthony, who is now executive chef and owner of smokehouse Corner House BBQ in Grant City.

ITALIAN FOOD FOR THE FIRST TIME

Fay Schiff of Emerson Hill hails originally from Texas. She explained, I never knew about Italian food until I moved to Staten Island. One birthday dinner my folks took me to an Italian customers restaurant where I had meatballs and spaghetti. It was delicious and such a treat. My mother was allergic to canned tomatoes so we never had any food at home with that ingredient. Living up here I became Italian.

But Schiffs segue into dining on the Isle of Staaten came courtesy of a place called Johns Rotisserie on Richmond Terrace in Port Richmond.

Fay Schiff of Emerson Hill relishes memories of John's roasted chicken and duck. (Staten Island Advance File Photo)

Schiff described, This was over 60 years ago and just the thought of his rotisserie chicken or duck still makes my mouth water. Even Costcos chickens dont come close. I always had to look for the hidden whole clove of garlic in his delicious sauce. Long gone but always fondly remembered John, Millie and Ann, his servers, in a small room full of delicious aromas.

An ad from Nov. 7, 1969 featured advertising for many Staten Island restaurants and nightclubs. There were old favorites such as the Shoals on the Great Kills waterfront and the Riviera Chateau on Amboy Road in Oakwood. And check out the play showing at Mike Bilotto's Staaten in West Brighton. (Staten Island Advance File Photo)Staff-Shot

Yes, the aromas grab me every time. They are transcending. I can recall the rich scent of Chicken Kiev at Riviera Chateau, formerly of Oakwood. The restaurant was leveled in 1996 and its land was absorbed into a strip mall called Riviera Plaza on Amboy Road.

Flashback to 1971: A new dining room assures plenty of room at Riviera Chateau to end long waits for tables at this popular South Shore restaurant (Staten Island Advance File Photo)Staten Island Advance

Riviera Chateau was owned by the Coppotelli family: Matriarch Marian, who ran Bowling on the Green in New Dorp with her son Bobby, passed away in August 2002.

And what a small place Staten Island is: Ed Kellerhals, the retired owner of former Corner House in Grant City had a connection to Riviera Chateau. (Now remember, Corner House is currently home to Laura Valois husbands restaurant, the aforementioned Corner House BBQ.) But anyway, Riviera was originally owned by Kellerhals mothers cousin Jerry and his grandfather was a cook there. Kellerhals dad even waited tables and his other family members also worked as servers.

In 1996, just before the Riviera Chateau was torn down. (Staten Island Advance File Photo)

See? That Chicken Kiev brings it all back, a memory from around 1980 when I was 9 or so. We ate at Riviera Chateau for my parents anniversary. Why that dish was the one selected is uncertain. But when the knife sliced into the round-shaped, breaded chicken, a pool of butter flooded out with all its delicious white fat solids  fantastical.

And after all that takeout and food packed to go since last March, I can so appreciate a future of deliciousness presented on a plate.

Keep in touch.

What Chicken Kiev kind of looked like at Riviera Chateau. (Star-Ledger/ Mike McLaughlin)Mike McLaughlin

Pamela Silvestri is Advance Food Editor. She can be reached at silvestri@siadvance.com.

Other stories to consider reading as a flashback through the pandemic:

Pamelas Food Service Diary: Thursday, March 26, 2020. Staten Island, NY.

Pamelas Food Service Diary: Sunday, April 5, 2020. Staten Island, NY.

Why some Staten Island foods taste better than others | Pamelas Food Service Diary
Listen to this article

State Rep. Douglas Gutwein (R-Francesville) represents House District 16, which includes all of Pulaski County and portions of Fulton, Jasper, Newton and Starke counties.
The 'cyber security expert' accused of trying to con The Block with fake receipts had an awfully tough 2020 dealing with major Australian and international banks.

Emese Fayk was beset with difficulties dealing with the Commonwealth Bank, ANZ, the UK's Starling Bank and international payment system Paypal, screenshots obtained by Daily Mail Australia show.

Mysterious Ms Fayk - who advertises herself as a senior adviser to the United Nations on LinkedIn - barraged the financial institutions with pleas for help on Twitter throughout last year.

Her many complaints, which are now no longer available online, focused on matters such as her bank card not working, her inability to log into Paypal and CommBank shutting her out of her account.

The complaints were lodged before her $4.2million winning bid on Jimmy and Tam's home failed to materialise late last year, despite Ms Fayk providing the show's producers with ANZ Bank screenshots showing the funds had cleared.

Nothing to celebrate: Emese Fayk's attempted purchase of Jimmy and Tam's home on The Block failed last year and in a blog she said had given up on continuing to try and buy it

Woe after woe: 2020 was apparently an annus horribilis for accused Block 'conwoman' Emese Faylk when it came with dealing with banks

With the Commonwealth Bank, Ms Fayk encountered problem after problem, which she recounted to a sympathetic social media manager last April.

'I've been locked out of my account since yesterday,' she fumed, before explaining a vital text wasn't received and a bank access code she was allegedly provided didn't work.

'How frustrating!' the bank tweeted in response, before advising Ms Fayk give them a call.

It was one of several occasions regional Victorian-based Ms Fayk's frustrations boiled over in plain view on social media.

But none of her day-to-day woes compare with what followed when she bid on The Block stars' winning Palm Springs style home late last year.

Ms Fayk's Starling Bank card wasn't working on Apple Pay, she complained in a tweet late last year. She joined a thread of complaints just 24 hours before her Block transaction failed

Popular payment transaction service PayPal copped a series of complaints in the middle of last year,a bove

'What's up with this?' Last July Ms Fayk also grappled with difficulties posed by ANZ Bank's online banking interface

In recent days, Ms Fayk published an entire website describing her misfortune with that settlement falling over.

'I didn't expect the process to be complex,' she wrote, 'because I knew the house was brand new, everything was under warranty, so there was no need for the usual, sometimes lengthy checks.

'I also did not know how electronic settlements work. Making sure everything is in place for settlement takes at least a week.'

The day the final transaction was going to take place, Ms Fayk sent a series of screenshots showing bank transfers to the show's executive producer Julian Cress.

But none of the payments ever arrived.

Ms Fayk claimed the money couldn't go through as she was given 'just one day to make things happen' with her settlement.

This is the screengrab of an ANZ bank transfer which Emese Fajk sent to Channel Nine as proof she had paid $4,072,951 to buy Jimmy and Tam's property on The Block. It never came

It wasn't all high finance - with Ms Fayk also using the platform to complain to Coles about rotten tomatoes

Two separate parties have come forward to claim Ms Fayk has sent them proofs of payment that were seemingly altered.

A European graphic designer claimed to Daily Mail Australia that Ms Fayk had sent her an ANZ receipt showing she had wired $1043.

The money never arrived. Asked about that, Ms Fayk, said: 'I'm more than happy to sit down with people, and refute any allegations against me.'

Ms Fayk did not respond to a request to a sit down interview with Daily Mail Australia on January 31.

Ms Fayk demanding a refund from budget carrier Jetstar toward the end of last year

A second former professional acquaintance claimed to have a received a Coutts Bank receipt from Ms Fayk.

The receipt was apparently meant to prove she had wired 50,000 pounds to him.

But the money never came, he claims. A Daily Mail Australia Photoshop audit of the receipt indicated it had been doctored.

Ms Fayk, a member of the Adobe Photoshop Group on LinkedIn, denies ever having sent such a payment.

'I have never provided any bank statements to any former partners, so any allegations of a photoshopped version is incorrect,' she said.

Comment was sought from Ms Fayk on her banking woes.
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Data on coronavirus infections are at a minimum, especially in the capital, although there is more uncertainty in Mumbai. Serological testing show that there was a very wide circulation of the virus. Doctor Carvalho: Immunity is widespread. Even without following the rules, most are willing to take a chance with the hope that they will be among the 95% who will recover without great problems."

Mumbai (AsiaNews) - While many nations are grappling with a second wave of Covid-19, India has reported the lowest levels in the spread of the coronavirus. Although appearing on the top of the list statistically speaking on the overall data since the beginning of the pandemic, the average of new daily cases in the last week has dropped to around 10 thousand and the deaths even below 100.

Half of Indian states no longer report victims and on Tuesday New Delhi, long the national epicentre, for the first time reported no deaths related to Covid-19. The situation in Mumbai appears more complex: in the city there are currently 500 new cases per day and it is estimated that they are only 10 or 15% of the real number. There has been no track or trace of the chain of infections and little news on the variants of the virus, while so far only 1% of the population of the metropolis have been vaccinated, almost all exclusively health workers.

A serological survey conducted on a sample of the Indian population showed that the circulation of the virus was widespread: antibodies were found in 21% of adults and 25% of children; a figure that rises to 31% in the slums and in some cities such as New Delhi or Pune even to 50%. These numbers would indicate a strong immune response that would have protected the Indian population.

However, even the approximately 150,000 deaths recorded so far, when compared to the total number of inhabitants, correspond to a mortality rate of 112 people per million, considerably lower than in the countries of Europe and North America.

"Correct analysis could be made only if everyone was tested, which is logistically highly challenging- Dr. Pascoal Carvalho, member of the Pontifical Academy for Life, said to AsiaNews. In general, there is a reluctance among the population to go to hospitals for any check-up as it could mean isolation and loss of income, besides all medical expenses involved. Not all have medical insurance coverage.

In spite of strict norms for social distancing, sanitisation and use of face masks- continues Dr. Carvalho - most people are unable to comply with them due to lack of adequate space in their homes or the need to work. Obviously, what counts is the real number of victims, net of other previous diseases. And for the Indian population it is too low to justify any special measures.

Father Christopher Jeyakumar, parish priest of the church of Sant'Antonio in the poor district of Dharavi in Mumbai, also underlines the disproportion between rules and daily reality. In church we are continuing to follow all the directives of the government and the archdiocese - he explains to AsiaNews - but immediately outside no one puts these protocols into practice and there is still no problem with Covid-19 here in Dharavi. I wonder if science isn't fooling us.

Immunity can be a factor; it has always been here - continues Father Jeyakumar - If we look at the mortality statistics over the years, the rates remain constant. Even before Covid-19 there were never any particular peaks. It would therefore be time for those who govern us and draw up the protocols to really deal with the facts. (N.M.)
Washington: US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says Congress will establish an independent, September 11-style commission to look into the deadly insurrection that took place at the US Capitol.

Pelosi said the commission will investigate and report on the facts and causes relating to the January 6, 2021, domestic terrorist attack upon the United States Capitol Complex  and relating to the interference with the peaceful transfer of power.

In a letter to Democratic colleagues, Pelosi said the House would also put forth supplemental spending to boost security at the Capitol.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has announced a commission to look into the January 6 riot unleashed on the Capitol. Credit:AP

After former president Donald Trumps acquittal at his second Senate impeachment trial at the weekend, bipartisan support appeared to be growing for an independent commission to examine the deadly insurrection.
The line began forming in the dark on Monday, hours before anyone would be allowed inside the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem. One 86-year-old member of the church awoke at 4:30 a.m. to ensure that she would be one of the first people on the line. She was the third.

As daylight broke and the cold persisted, the line grew around the block. Some people wore full-length, mahogany-hued furs; others wore sequined scarves and houndstooth checkered puffer coats. Only the best to see Cicely Tyson, whom they called their trueborn Harlem queen, one last time.

Ms. Tyson, who died on Jan. 28 at 96, lay at rest in the sanctuary of the church, surrounded by purple orchids, lilac roses and hydrangeas. Fans from New York and far beyond, all inspired by her seven-decade acting career, waited their turn to say their last goodbye to the revered actress.
Lead author FLEET PhD student Marina Castelli (Monash) examines samples in scanning tunnelling microscope (STM). Credit: Monash University

Could long-distance interactions between individual molecules forge a new way to compute?

Interactions between individual molecules on a metal surface extend for surprisingly large distancesup to several nanometers.

A new study, just published, of the changing shape of electronic states induced by these interactions, has potential future application in the use of molecules as individually addressable units.

For example, in a future computer based on this technology, the state of each individual molecule could be controlled, mirroring binary operation of transistors in current computing.

Measuring socially distant molecular interactions on a metal surface

The Monash-University of Melbourne collaboration studied the electronic properties of magnesium phthalocyanine (MgPc) sprinkled on a metal surface.

MgPc is similar to the chlorophyll responsible for photosynthesis.

By careful, atomically precise scanning probe microscopy measurements, the investigators demonstrated that the quantum mechanical properties of electrons within the moleculesnamely their energy and spatial distributionare significantly affected by the presence of neighboring molecules.

Single and paired MgPc molecules. While molecular structure remains unaffected by the presence of the neighbouring molecule (atomic force microscopy images, top), electron distribution (scanning tunneling spectroscopy maps, bottom) is significantly altered. Credit: Small

This effectin which the underlying metal surface plays a key roleis observed for intermolecular separation distances of several nanometres, significantly larger than expected for this kind of intermolecular interaction.

These insights are expected to inform and drive progress in the development of electronic and optoelectronic solid-state technologies built from molecules, 2-D materials and hybrid interfaces.

Directly observing changes in molecular orbital symmetry and energy

The phthalocyanine (Pc) 'four leaf clover' ligand, when decorated with a magnesium (Mg) atom at its center, is part of the chlorophyll pigment responsible for photosynthesis in bio organisms.

Metal-phthalocyanines are exemplary for the tunability of their electronic properties by swapping the central metal atom and peripheral functional groups, and their ability to self-assemble in highly ordered single layers and nanostructures.

Cutting- edge scanning probe microscopy measurements revealed a surprisingly long-range interaction between MgPc molecules adsorbed on a metal surface.

Quantitative analysis of the experimental results and theoretical modeling showed that this interaction was due to mixing between the quantum mechanical orbitalswhich determine the spatial distribution of electrons within the moleculeof neighboring molecules. This molecular orbital mixing leads to significant changes in electron energies and electron distribution symmetries.

The distinctive cloverleaf phthalocyanine (Pc), when decorated with a magnesium (Mg) atom at its centre, is part of the chlorophyll pigment responsible for photosynthesis in bio organisms. Credit: AFM image

The long range of the intermolecular interaction is the result of the adsorption of the molecule on the metal surface, which "spreads" the distribution of the electrons of the molecule.

"We had to push our scanning probe microscope to new limits in terms of spatial resolution and complexity of data acquisition and analysis," says lead author and FLEET member Dr. Marina Castelli.

"It was a big shift in thinking to quantify the intermolecular interaction from the point of view of symmetries of spatial distribution of electrons, instead of typical spectroscopic shifts in energy, which can be more subtle and misleading. This was the key insight that got us to the finish line, and also why we think that this effect was not observed previously."

"Importantly, the excellent quantitative agreement between experiment and atomistic DFT theory confirmed the presence of long-range interactions, giving us great confidence in our conclusions," says collaborator Dr. Muhammad Usman from the University of Melbourne.

The outcomes of this study can have great implications in the development of future solid-state electronic and optoelectronic technologies based on organic molecules, 2-D materials and hybrid interfaces.

Explore further Energy level alignment for molecular electronics

More information: Marina Castelli et al. LongRange SurfaceAssisted MoleculeMolecule Hybridization, Small (2021). Journal information: Small Marina Castelli et al. LongRange SurfaceAssisted MoleculeMolecule Hybridization,(2021). DOI: 10.1002/smll.202005974
Congratulations to the Stones on a vastly improved performance at their Sydney news conference when they hit this old town this week.

The British pop singing group the Rolling Stones arrived at Kingsford Smith Airport yesterday for their second tour of Australia. About 150 fans waited all night in the rain to welcome the group. The Stones will appear at Sydney Showground tomorrow and Saturday before leaving for Brisbane, Adelaide. Melbourne and New Zealand. They were last in Australia a a year ago.

First published in The Sydney Morning Herald on February 17, 1966

Even one hard-bitten newspaperman, with never a kind word about anyone, said he was amazed at their intelligence and interest.

Did you hear the interview Big Sam Kronja, John Mahon and I did with the Rolling Stones?

It was an in-depth probe which we called The Many Faces of the Stones, and we unearthed some interesting points.

For instance, we discovered that the Stones dont think much of older people and regard themselves as strictly kids playing to entertain kids.
Serious agreements can be reached at the upcoming meeting of the Russian and Belarusian presidents, Belarusian Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei said in an interview with RBC. According to him, protests within Belarus and events outside of it are pushing Minsk to closer integration with Moscow.



"The latest events that are taking place inside and around our countries can and will certainly push us towards closer integration processes in a bilateral format and sooner or later in a multilateral format within the framework of the Eurasian Economic Union," the minister said.



On February 12, Makei said a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko was scheduled for the end of February.

Patna, Feb 15 : The Bihar government has come up with a comprehensive plan to check all forms of pollution in the state.

S. Chandrashekhar, member secretary Bihar State Pollution Control Board (BSPCB), said that the department is going to install 24 monitoring stations at a cost of Rs 36 crore in different districts of Bihar to analyse air pollution. The officer said these monitoring stations will be installed in the next 2 months. Bihar already has 11 monitoring stations and 6 of them are installed in Patna.

"We signed an MoU with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) on February 12 to ensure a climate resilient and low carbon development pathway in the state. Under this, we will use GOAI technology of remote sensing and artificial intelligence to monitor air pollution. We have asked every industrial unit to use brickless technology," Chandrashekhar said.

Bihar is a rapidly growing economy and is committed to environmental sustainability by moving towards a climate resilient and low carbon development pathway. With an average of over 10% growth, Bihar has registered higher growth than the Indian economy in the last three years.

At the same time, Bihar is also a state that is highly vulnerable to climate change, which threatens to undermine its developmental efforts. Cities like Patna have a number of real estate construction projects and industrial units currently operational here.

Besides, the number of vehicles increased more than 10-fold in the last 5 years but the roads have not been widened accordingly. As a result, slow movement of vehicles generates higher carbon and sulphur components in gaseous form leading to air pollution. The air quality index of Patna, Muzaffarpur and Gaya remains poor to very poor throughout the year.

"Apart from air pollution, we generally consider solid and liquid wastes responsible for environmental pollution. The principal secretary of environment, forest and climate change has directed all agencies to ensure installation of maximum number of Sewage Treatment Plants in cities and sub towns so that only recycled water would come out and get used for other purposes like in horticulture, cleaning of vehicles and construction. We are making all possible efforts to ensure that recycled water does not go into the rivers or natural water bodies," Chandrashekhar said.

The officer said that states have a key role to play in identifying and addressing local adaptation and mitigation measures and the local impact of climate change. Bihar has taken this forward by adopting a pathway towards sustainable development.

Screenshot/ Twitter Chauncy Glover

It turns out that the normally balmy Bayou City looks pretty beautiful when covered in white fluff. Its the silver lining in this frigid day thats left hundreds of thousands of Houstonians cold and stuck at home without power.

Downtowns skyline, especially viewed from Buffalo Bayou Park, looks particularly pretty.
A pan-European consortium developing a COVID-19 vaccine is in talks with big pharma to support the late-stage development of its shot and ramp up manufacturing, the head of German biotech firm Leukocare told Reuters. Leukocare is working with Italy's ReiThera and Belgium's Univercells on a vaccine based on a so-called non-replicating adenoviral vector, the same technology that AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson have used. Chief Executive Michael Scholl said the companies were talking to potential big pharma partners about whether they could provide additional manufacturing ...
The Electoral Commission has rejected a controversial application to set up a Black Lives Matter (BLM) political party in Britain because its name would be 'likely to mislead voters'.

The independent election watchdog argued that a 'reasonable voter could assume that the party represents, or is in some way associated with' the grassroots BLM movement and its official UK affiliate.

A spokesperson told MailOnline that the party's proposed constitution and financial scheme were 'incomplete' and also rejected, as the manifesto did not determine the structure and organisation of the party.

The application was submitted to the election watchdog by applicants whose identities remain unknown just five months after the killing of black man George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis.

His death triggered a cultural revolution in Britain that began with a wave of statue toppling by protesters and culminated in the founding of a Commission of Diversity in the Public Realm by London Mayor Sadiq Khan.

Tory backbenchers claimed the application to set up the party proved that BLM was a partisan political project with Left-wing objectives, including 'deconstructing the concept of "family" and defunding the police'.

However, at the time the bid was lodged the main Black Lives Matter UK (BLM UK) group insisted it had no affiliation with the applicants.

BLM protesters dumping the toppled statue of slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol Harbour

The Electoral Commission rejected an application to set up a Black Lives Matter political party in Britain because its name would be 'likely to mislead voters as to the effect of their vote'

People participate in a Black Lives Matter protest rally in Trafalgar Square on June 12, 2020

An Electoral Commission spokesperson said: 'The application to register Black Lives Matter as a political party was refused by the Commission on the basis that the proposed name is likely to mislead a voter as to the effect of their vote.

'As part of our considerations we examined the existing groups by the same or similar names in the UK. Having contacted a number of groups, they confirmed that the party was not associated with them.

'Our assessment concluded that, whilst the BLM movement is a grassroots movement, it was still likely that the proposed name would mislead a voter as to the effect of their vote. This was on the basis that a reasonable voter could assume that the party represents, or is in some way associated with, these groups when that is not the case.

'If a name cannot be accepted, the associated application must be rejected. In addition, other elements of the application were rejected, including the constitution and financial scheme.'

The group's proposed descriptions included:

Black Lives Matter

Black Lives Matter/All Lives Matter

Black Lives Matter for the GLA

Black Lives Matter Great Britain

Black Lives Matter (United Kingdom)

The Black Lives Matter Party

Black Lives Matter party of Wales

Black Lives Matter party of Scotland

The plinth of Churchill's statue is defaced with the words (Churchill) 'was a racist' on June 7

Police clash with protesters during a BLM rally in Westminster, London on June 7, 2020

People take part in a kneeling protest for Black Lives Matter in Trafalgar Square on June 5

Memorials to politicians, war heroes and authors all targeted due to links to slavery and racist beliefs Since Edward Colston's statue was thrown into Bristol Harbour, there has been a wave of attacks from vandals on various monuments across Britain. A statue to Winston Churchill was defaced with the words 'was a racist' and 'f*** your agenda' written underneath the memorial to the war time PM in Westminster Square, London. Slave trader Robert Milligan's was covered with a shord and the message 'Black Lives Matter' was placed on it in West India Docks amid calls for it to be taken down. It was later removed by Tower Hamlets Council. Tower Hamlets Council removed a statue of slave trader Robert Milligan Less than a year after it was erected, 'Nazi' was scrawled underneath a statue of Nancy Astor, the first woman to take a seat in Parliament, in Plymouth. A monument to 19th-century politician Henry Vassall-Fox, the third Baron Holland, was left splattered with red paint in Holland Park. A cardboard sign reading 'I owned 401 slaves' was perched in the bronze statue's arms, with the number painted on the plinth alongside red handprints. A Grade II-listed monument to Admiral Lord Nelson, Britain's foremost naval hero, which stands in the grounds of Norwich Cathedral, was sprayed with a black 'V' in the middle of a circle - an anarchist symbol. Red paint spattered another stature of Lord Nelson at Deptford Town Hall in South London. In Kent, a former councillor wrote 'Dickens Racist' outside a museum dedicated to the beloved 19th century author. Letters sent by the Oliver Twist author showed he wished to 'exterminate' Indian citizens after a failed uprising. A statue of Civil War leader Oliver Cromwell in Wythenshawe Park, Manchester, had the words 'Cromwell is a cockroach,' 'f*** racist' and the Black Lives Matter acronym 'BLM' scrawled across it last month. Thousands of people were massacred during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland. BLM was also scrawled across the Worcester Civil War memorial in Royal Park. Advertisement

The Electoral Commission's website said the party would have existed across all of the UK if the application was successful.

Meanwhile, the names suggest it would have tried to set up splinter groups in Wales and Scotland to compete with Left-wing administrations in those nations.

It might also have tried to contest the upcoming London elections under the name 'Black Lives Matter for the GLA' (Greater London Authority).

BLM's UK affiliate denied having any knowledge, connection or affiliation to the registration until this afternoon.

A spokesperson told MailOnline: 'We has absolutely no connection, affiliations or other and no individual or group has informed or made us aware of their intentions of forming a political party under the name of Black Lives Matter. It is not us.'

In a statement, they added: 'Those of all ethnicities and from all nations who believe in racial equality are anti-racists, we stand together, we can choose to kneel together in peace and solidarity asserting black people are treated as equals to white people and is a human right to receive racial equality, social and criminal justice in the societies we live together, as full citizens of the country and as a united nation.

'We are operating as non-political, non-partisan, non-violence Black Lives Matter platform. Some content published on this website may have political elements by the nature of a society and state governed under a system of democracy; however we operate in a humanitarian capacity and concern before all else.'

To register as a party, applicants must fill out a form and pay a 150 non-refundable fee. They must have a party constitution, a financial system and submit any logos if they want to use them.

BLM activists have called for the defunding of police forces they accuse of 'systemic racism' and for an overhaul of UK culture including the removal of statues of imperial figures, the renaming of buildings and the 'decolonisation' of the curriculum.

In December, Sasha Johnson, the self-styled 'Black Panther of Oxford', called for a 'race offenders' register' that would see people barred from jobs based on having been accused of 'micro-aggressions' in the workplace.

The 26-year-old came to prominence as an organiser of the BLM protests, where she was seen addressing crowds while wearing camouflage trousers, a black beret and a stab-proof-style vest.

Ms Johnson, from the Taking the Initiative Party (TTIP), said the racial offenders list would be 'similar' to the sex offenders' register - which is used to bar paedophiles from professions like teaching.

Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, she also called for 'Holocaust-style' reparations for black people on the basis that capitalism racially discriminates against them, and called for the 'defunding' of Britain's police forces.

The Oxford Brookes graduate also attacked ethnic minority politicians such as Labour MPs David Lammy and Diane Abbott, saying 'as black people... they have been tokenistic'.

Ms Johnson, who is a TTIP executive committee member in charge of activism, said TTIP was 'not just a party for black people' and would also represent the working class.

The party operates a system of 'coalition leadership' so there is no one specific person in charge and different spokesmen sometimes air views that contradict the official party line.

Outlining the party's manifesto in her first interview with a national publication, she called for a national register of alleged racists that would ban them from living near people from ethnic minorities.

This would include people guilty of 'micro-aggressions', which the Oxford Dictionary defines as 'indirect, subtle, or unintentional discrimination against members of a marginalised group'.

'It's similar to the sex offenders register,' she told MailOnline. 'If you were to be racially abusive to someone, [the register] would question whether someone is fit enough to hold a particular job where their bias could influence another person's life.

London Trans+ Pride protest for Black Trans Lives Matter in central London on June 27, 2020

Sasha Johnson is among those spearheading the Taking The Initiative Party (TTIP)

Who is Sasha Johnson? Ms Johnson played a leading role in the summer BLM protests, including the Million People March, and rose to notoriety shortly before when videos showed her confronting a black man she was arguing with and repeatedly calling him the racial slur 'c**n'. The 26-year-old is now an executive committee member of the new BLM-inspired Taking the Initiative Party, in charge of activism. She is also a UK representative of the Black Panthers Party - modelled on a far-Left sub-set of protesters who campaigned against police brutality in 1960s America. Ms Johnson, an Oxford Brookes graduate, has campaigned for statues to be removed and is part of the secretive group Forever Family Force. Footage on Instagram shows her parading with female FFF members in military-style garb during a march in Brixton earlier this year for African Emancipation Day. Ms Johnson, a youth worker and cafe owner, has called for the establishment of a 'black militia' in the UK. In a video posted in July, she compared the police to the Ku Klux Klan and dismissed ethnic minority politicians David Lammy, Priti Patel and Sadiq Khan as 'tokenistic'. The mother of two also recently led chants of 'f*** the police' and 'one solution, revolution' in a fresh campaign to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes from Oxford University. Advertisement

'A lot of racism happens at work and places of education in a micro-aggressive way. If you exhibit an element of bias at work, you should probably receive a warning first [before later being added to the register] so people know in future that you hold these views.'

Ms Johnson said inclusion on the list would mean you could be excluded from 'certain fields' of employment - or even banned from living near people from ethnic minorities.

'If you live in a majority-coloured neighbourhood you shouldn't reside there because you're a risk to those people - just like if a sex offender lived next to a school he would be a risk to those children,' she said.

Ms Johnson acknowledged that the idea came as a contribution from Black Lives Matter, and it was presented to TTIP at a party conference where BLM representatives were present.

While the party does not provide a list of specific offences which would warrant inclusion on the register, its manifesto does state that anyone merely 'accused' of an offence would be added, as well as anyone 'charged' with a race crime.

The Taking the Initiative Party was formed last summer in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests.

The organisation previously called itself the first 'black-led' political party in the UK, although Ms Johnson now insists it is merely 'black founded'.

Ms Johnson also believes that black people should be given reparations by the British Government due to the legacy of slavery and because capitalism 'holds us down'.

She said current constraints on the national budget meant black people should not receive direct payments, but tax breaks instead.

'Reparations can take the form of tax free periods, which would give time to build back up economic stability in black communities,' she said.

'We have to remember that the Jewish community received reparations for the Holocaust, and no one speaks about forgetting the Holocaust.'

Ms Johnson also discussed her views of black and minority MPs, including Labour politicians Diane Abbott and David Lammy.

'I commend the work they attempt to do, but sometimes it's tokenistic,' she said.

'Diane Abbott has a seat at the table, but it gives us no confidence she has any decision-making power, or the ability to bring those issues to the forefront.

'How many reports, how many pieces of paper does it take before you come to the realisation that they know exactly what's happening.'

She then vowed to keep articulating things that were 'not politically correct', 'like saying that Diane Abbot, as a black person, has been tokenistic [and] David Lammy has been tokenistic'.

BLM protesters gather at the base of Nelson's Column in London on June 12, 2020

People gather for a Black Lives Matter protest in Brixton on August 1, 2020

Ms Johnson also spoke in favour of 'defunding the police' - although the TTIP manifesto specifically excludes this.

Ms Johnson played a leading role in the summer BLM protests, including the Million People March, and rose to notoriety shortly before when videos showed her confronting a black man she was arguing with and repeatedly calling him the racial slur 'c**n'.

In the past, her Twitter account have been suspended for tweets which discussed enslaving white people. She now claims these tweets were 'fake' and an 'attack from the Far Right'.

Ms Johnson has campaigned for statues to be removed and is part of the secretive group Forever Family Force.

Footage on Instagram shows her parading with female FFF members in military-style garb during a march in Brixton earlier this year for African Emancipation Day.

Comparisons have been made with the Black Panthers, the radical far-Left protesters who wore similar uniforms as they campaigned against police brutality in 1960s America.

Ms Johnson, a youth worker and cafe owner, is also the UK's representative of a new organisation called the New Black Panthers Party and has called for the establishment of a 'black militia' in the UK.

In a video posted in July, she compared the police to the Ku Klux Klan.

Ms Johnson, a mother of two, also led chants of 'f*** the police' and 'one solution, revolution' in a fresh campaign to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes from Oxford University.

BLM has distanced themselves from groups such as TTIP.
A more recent publication of this set of statistics is available. Latest publication: Turnover of trade 2021, April

Published: 15 February 2021

Turnover in trade decreased by 1.9 per cent in December

According to Statistics Finland, turnover in total trade adjusted for working days fell in December by 1.9 per cent from December 2019. In total trade, the working day adjusted volume of sales, from which the impact of prices has been eliminated, decreased by 0.5 per cent over the same period. In last year's November, turnover went up by 1.8 per cent, while sales volume rose by 3.4 per cent.

Annual change in working day adjusted turnover and sales volume in total trade (G), %

Working day adjusted turnover in retail trade has developed positively since May of last year due to strong growth in daily consumer goods and department store trade. The positive growth continued also in December as working day adjusted turnover rose by 2.0 per cent and working day adjusted sales volume by 2.8 per cent from the previous year's December. The growth in daily consumer goods trade has been quite rapid since March 2020. In December, working day adjusted turnover in daily consumer goods trade continued to grow strongly by 5.3 per cent from December 2019. Working day adjusted turnover in department store trade was 2.2 per cent up year-on-year in December. In specialised store trade, the positive development of working day adjusted turnover turned to a decline of 1.1 per cent, while working day adjusted sales volume grew by 1.1 per cent.

The working day adjusted turnover of the biggest trade industry in terms of turnover, that is, wholesale trade, has decreased throughout 2020 and in December it fell by 4.9 per cent. Sales volume adjusted for working days in wholesale trade decreased by 2.3 per cent. Working day adjusted turnover in motor vehicle trade grew slightly by 0.2 per cent year-on-year, while at the same time working day adjusted sales volume decreased by 0.9 per cent.

Annual change in working day adjusted turnover and sales volume in industries of trade, December 2020, % (TOL 2008)

Turnover and sales volume declined from the previous month

Seasonally adjusted turnover in total trade fell by 2.1 per cent in December from November. Over the same period, the volume of sales fell by 2.1 per cent. In November, in turn, turnover and sales volume increased by more than one per cent compared to the month before.

Change in seasonally adjusted turnover and sales volume in total trade (G) from the previous month, %

During January to December, turnover in total trade adjusted for working days decreased by 1.0 per cent and sales volume grew by 0.6 per cent from the corresponding period in 2019.

Trend of turnover and sales volume in total trade

The calculation of indices of turnover of trade is based on the Tax Administrations data on self-assessed taxes, which are supplemented with Statistics Finlands sales inquiry. The volume index of sales is calculated by removing the effect of price changes from the value index series.

The factors caused by the variation in the number of weekdays are taken into account in adjustment for working days. This means taking into consideration the lengths of months, different weekdays and holidays. In addition, seasonal variation is eliminated from seasonally adjusted series, on account of which it makes sense to compare observations of two successive months as well.

The data for the latest month are preliminary and they may become significantly revised particularly on more detailed industry levels in coming months.

Industries of enterprises have been revised in the data released in February

Starting from the statistical release published in February 2021, the latest industries defined by the Business Register have been taken into use in the turnover and wage and salary indices. The industry corrections are visible as revised data in some of the published industries for the years 20192020. The effects of the changes are taken into consideration in statistics production so that no breaks occur in the time series of the published index series. The interpretation of the statistics also remains unchanged in the renewal. Revisions to annual changes in industries are presented under Revisions in these statistics.

Source: Turnover of trade, Statistics Finland

Inquiries: Suvi Kiema 029 551 3509, Mauri Niiniaho 029 551 3409, palvelut.suhdanne@stat.fi

Head of Department in charge: Katri Kaaja

Publication in pdf-format (296.9 kB)

Updated 15.02.2021

Referencing instructions: Official Statistics of Finland (OSF): Turnover of trade [e-publication].

ISSN=1799-0939. December 2020. Helsinki: Statistics Finland [referred: 31.5.2021].

Access method: http://www.stat.fi/til/klv/2020/12/klv_2020_12_2021-02-15_tie_002_en.html
Private Legal Practitioner, Gary Nimako Marfo has said that former President John Dramani Mahama has a hidden agenda to contest for President again in 2024.



An agenda that has led him to deceive his supporters by going to court knowing very well that he has lost the 2020 general election.



Mr. John Mahama has petitioned the Apex Court of the land to grant his request for a second election because he believes that, neither President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo nor he attained the required numbers in the 2020 elections to be elected President of Ghana.



He has dragged the Electoral Commission and the President to the Supreme court.



Speaking on Okay FM's 'Ade Akye Abia' program, he explained that Mr. Mahama has no case but was rather seeking sympathy from his party supporters to enable him lead the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and contest again in the 2024 general elections.



"Mr. Mahama went to court, paraded himself as the President-elect, and even made statements to the effect that the election verdict was a subversion of the will of Ghanaians," he said.



"I was very surprised Mr Mahama went to court and changed his case saying that he didn't win the elections and doesn't believe President Nana Akufo-Addo won either, hence seeking a run-off," he added.



He emphasized that John Dramani Mahama has deceived Ghanaians and all NDC faithful because what he said publicly is different from the things he's saying in court.



"This is a preparatory ground for former President Mahama for 2024," he told Kwame Nkrumah.



Election Petition



The Supreme Court has in a unanimous decision upheld the application by the 1st and 2nd Respondents not to call any witnesses in the ongoing election petition hearing.



The decision by the Apex Court follows oral arguments made by the lawyers for the Electoral Commission and President Akufo-Addo that their clients cannot be compelled to testify.



Citing Order 38, rule 3 (e) sub-rule 1 and 5 of CI 47 as amended by CI 87, the two counsels had argued that the burden of proof in the petition hearing lies on the petitioner and therefore it will be wrong for the lead counsel for Mr. John Mahama to induce evidence from the Chairperson of the EC, Jean Mensa.



Watch Video Below





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.

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Here are todays leading news stories:

Society

-- Vietnams Ministry of Health confirmed on Monday morning that a Japanese man, who posthumously tested positive for the novel coronavirus after dying at a hotel in Hanoi last weekend, was an imported COVID-19 case. The countrys tally stood at 2,229, with 1,534 recoveries and 35 deaths.

-- A 92-year-old woman from the northern province of Hai Duong has tested positive for the novel coronavirus after coming into close contact with a COVID-19 patient, the provincial steering committee for COVID-19 prevention and control said on Sunday.

-- Professor Nguyen Tai Thu, a master of acupuncture in Vietnam, passed away at the age of 90 on Sunday morning, his family confirmed later the same day.

-- Six houses sank into the river after a ferry hit the riverbank and triggered subsidence in the Mekong Delta province of Vinh Long on Sunday afternoon.

-- Police in the Mekong Delta province of Tien Giang confirmed on Sunday they had apprehended 12 women and five men for gambling at an abandoned house. Officers also confiscated VND212 million (US$9,220) and relevant exhibits.

-- Vietnamese film director Hoang Dung died of cancer at the age of 65 at the National Institute of Hematology and Blood Transfusion in Hanoi on Sunday.

Business

-- Authorities in the central city of Da Nang are drawing up a detailed plan for the city's first international duty-free zone and smart urban area for investors.

-- As many as 22 wind power projects with a combined capacity of 907 MW are set to be put into operation in the north-central province of Quang Tri by the end of this year.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!



LANE COUNTY, Ore. --- 1,500 seniors over 80 years old received a COVID-19 vaccine during a mass vaccination clinic in Lane County Sunday. That is roughly 27% of eligible seniors in the county.

The invite only event was put on by Lane County Public Health and those in attendance were contacted by health officials about one week before the clinic.

Several seniors KEZI 9 News spoke with said they're thrilled it is finally their turn to roll up their sleeves.

"I'm in the upper end of the age range and qualified and was really looking forward to having the opportunity. I'm pleased that it's the two dose one, I think I feel more comfortable with that one," Lane County resident Betty-Coe Debroekert said.

Others said the clinic went smoothly and they're pleased with the way health officials are organizing vaccinations.

"I think it's well done and the people are doing a great job. I couldn't see it any better than the way it's being done," Lane County resident Bob Egger said.

Public health said they are planning on setting up an additional mass vaccination site in the coming weeks. This will allow them to give about 2,000 more shots every day both clinics are running.

As always, this is dependent on the supply they receive.

On Monday, seniors 75 and older will become eligible to get the vaccine.

RELATED: SENIORS AND THE COVID-19 VACCINE: HERE'S WHAT TO KNOW

Pharmacies in Oregon are also gearing up to start giving out vaccines as part of the federal retail pharmacy program.
The National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) has sensitized artisans and schools in Akim Oda on the new variant of Covid-19, as part of its first-quarter activity for the year 2021.



The sensitisation programme sought to raise awareness on the risks related to the new variant of the disease and highlighted the need for all to strictly adhere to the precautionary measures to stop the spread.



Madam Rejoice Biscoff, NCCE Director at Akim Oda, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA), said information obtained from the Ghana Health Service showed that the new variant was very dangerous and spreads quickly.



She, therefore, called on Ghanaians to abide by the safety protocols which included social distancing, mask-wearing, frequent hand washing and regular checkups, adding that many people would lose their lives if care was not taken.



The NCCE Director also discouraged the act of stigmatization against recovered Covid-19 patients and said it was better to reintegrate the recovered into society.



She mentioned post-election community engagement on good governance and peaceful co-existence, civic education on COVID-19, building public capacity to fight corruption and undertaking civic engagement of child protection, child rights and child marriage as some of the proposed activities in the first quarter of the year.

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.

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The company has recently signed an MOU with Urbix Inc as well as an agreement with Luxcarbon GmbH - key milestones for the development of its high-grade graphite project in Madagascar.

( ) has gained a new substantial holder in Holdings (Australia) on behalf of Credit Suisse Group AG (SWX:CSGN) and its affiliates.

Since October 12, 2020, Credit Suisse acquired a total of 13,273,206 shares for a voting power of 8.82% in the company.

Urbix MOU

BlackEarth signed a collaborative MoU in February 2021 with leading downstream graphite processor Urbix to initially supply its high-grade graphite concentrate to Urbixs downstream processing facility in the US, once the facility is completed.

The company will also source other high-grade graphite concentrate to supply to Urbix.

These parties also plan to develop an operational joint venture in the future  combining Urbixs technical excellence with BlackEarths substantial market, commercial and graphite operational experience.

Luxcarbon agreement

BlackEarth has also signed an agreement with German-based Luxcarbon for the procurement, supply and marketing of concentrate and downstream products, into the fast-growing European graphite market.

The deal further positions the company as a supplier of graphite concentrate and downstream graphite products to electric vehicles (EV) and alternative energy markets.

The supply arrangement will continue while BlackEarth fast-tracks the development of its own high-grade, large-scale graphite properties from its flagship Maniry Graphite Project in southern Madagascar  which will then form a regular supply to its proposed downstream graphite operations.
Naftogaz to cooperate with Southeast Europe's largest energy company

The two companies will look into the opportunities of mutual interest in promising areas in the Ukrainian part of the Black Sea.

Reporting by UNIAN

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Google has stepped back from a threat to shut down its search engine locally and is on the brink of striking commercial deals with some of Australias largest news organisations after months of hard fought negotiations over planned media bargaining laws.

The ABC, Nine Entertainment Co (owner of this masthead) and Guardian Australia are in eleventh-hour negotiations with the $1.8 trillion tech giant for use of their content on various Google services. Industry sources briefed on the talks indicated the deals could be reached within 48 hours. However, while the talks are in advanced stages, there is no guarantee the agreements will be completed.

Googles threats to pull search from the market are unlikely to go ahead if it signs a series of major deals. Credit:Getty

Google threatened to turn off its search engine in Australia in January in response to the laws. The search giant's progress on agreements with publishers will shift focus to Facebook, which is yet to strike any deals for its own news product and has threatened to pull journalism from its platform if the laws aren't revised.

Kerry Stokes Seven West Media became the first of the major media companies to ink an agreement with Google on Monday.
As many Malaysian workers and students are stranded in Singapore over the Lunar New Year, unable to travel home due to travel restrictions, one association called on people to host students for a meal in their homes to celebrate the start of the Year of the Ox. The Malaysian Association in Singapore matched 25 students to ten hosts.

One of them invited four Malaysian students over for lunch at her apartment. 31-year-old Malaysian woman Chan Jit Yen lives in Singapore with her husband, she was unable to visit her family in Kuala Lumpur due to the travel restrictions imposed to curb the spread of the coronavirus. Instead she opened her doors to four Malaysian students.

During lunch, they discussed university life, work prospects, and their favorite Malaysian cities and dishes. The Association made sure to match people sharing the same interests and with similar backgrounds. Chan, who has a civil and mechanical engineer background, celebrated with four engineering students.

Under strict pandemic rules households in Singapore, which has a handful of coronavirus cases reported daily, can welcome up to eight visitors a day. Students welcomed the initiatives, saying it was a way to meeting people from Malaysia in Singapore and explore other ways of celebrating the new Lunar Year.

Many Malaysians will be staying in Singapore over the Lunar New Year, some are spending the festivities abroad for the first time to avoid two-week quarantine requirements, although the two countries are joined by bridges. The city-state is home to Malaysia's largest diaspora community.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)

Australia's first 142,000 does of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine have arrived in the country and the first jabs will hit arms next Monday.

Pallets of the vaccines - which are stored at -70C and were made in Belgium - arrived at Sydney Airport on a Singapore Airlines plane just after midday.

They will be temperature and quality checked before being distributed to vaccine hubs around the country.

'The eagle has landed,' jubilant Health Minister Greg Hunt told reporters.

'Today is an important day. It is the next step in a careful plan based on safety, and this is about protecting Australians.'

Australia's first 142,000 does of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine have arrived in the country

Pallets of the vaccine arrived in Sydney just after midday on Monday, with photos showing them being loaded of a plane ready for transport

Prime Minster Scott Morrison added: 'The vaccine has landed and were stepping up our fight against the pandemic.'

Mr Hunt said the vaccines will undergo 'security and quality assurance, in particular to ensure that temperature maintenance has been preserved throughout the course of the flight, to ensure the integrity of the doses, and to ensure there has been no damage.'

Roughly 50,000 doses will be given to the states and territories who want to vaccinate quarantine workers as soon as possible and 30,000 will be used by the federal government for aged care residents and workers.

The remaining 62,000 vaccines will be kept aside to administer as second doses, 21 days after the first dose.

More Pfizer vaccines are on the way and the government also expects its first batch of the Astra Zeneca vaccine - which is awaiting regulatory approval - to roll out in March.

The Astra Zeneca vaccine will be imported and also made onshore at the CSL factory in Melbourne.

Mr Hunt said the decision to make the vaccine in Australia was crucial given the global supply shortage.

'I think the two most important decisions for Australia during the course of this pandemic were closure of the border with China and the decision to invest in onshore manufacturing by CSL of the AstraZeneca vaccine,' he said.

The vaccines will be temperature and quality checked before being distributed to vaccine hubs around the country

The first Australian shipment of Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines is seen being transported off the tarmac after landing at Sydney International Airport

Hospitals were told to prepare to start vaccinations next week after the Therapeutic Goods Administration conducts batch testing on some of the first vials.

Australia has secured 20 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine, which is enough to vaccinate 10 million people.

The vaccines must be kept at minus-70 degrees Celsius to preserve the mRNA responsible for inducing coronavirus immunity.

Logistics firm DHL will help with the transportation of the vaccines using dry-ice filled boxes.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison visits the CSL vaccine manufacturing facility which will make the AstraZeneca vaccine

Health Minister Greg Hunt (pictured) said 'the eagle has landed' as he announced the vaccines were in the country

The boxes have been fitted with thermal sensors which will send messages to a central control tower if they drop below the required temperature.

First in line to receive the jab are the elderly, vulnerable, frontline health workers, hotel quarantine staff, as well as aged and disability workers and residents.

Mr Hunt said the states and territories will chose who they give the jabs to first, but he said quarantine workers were the priority.

'There's general support that the greatest immediate risk is the border quarantine processes. And we all understand that,' he said.

Australia's major cities have endured lockdowns in the past six months after quarantine workers caught the virus from returned travellers.

First in line to receive the jab are the elderly, vulnerable, frontline health workers, hotel quarantine staff, as well as aged and disability workers and residents

Health Department boss Brendan Murphy has said it is unlikely people will get to pick if they get the Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine.

He will be among the first people to get the Astra Zeneca vaccine.

The government wants the vaccine rollout to be complete by the end of October.

Hospitals will be able to store the Pfizer vaccines in special low-temperature freezers, while aged care facilities will be able to keep them cool in their boxes for 15 days by regularly replacing the dry ice.

Mr Hunt said it is critical that communications around the vaccine program are also targeted for culturally, ethnically, and linguistically diverse communities.

'The government recognises that people from multicultural communities are a significant part of the health, aged care, child care and disability workforce and will be among the first people in Australia to receive vaccinations,' Mr Hunt said in a statement on Sunday.

Pictured: Packaging and fridges used to store Covid-19 vaccine at a DHL facility in Sydney, on Sunday February 14

Hospitals will be able to store the vaccines in special low-temperature freezers (one pictured at DHL facility in Sydney)

But shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers is concerned that Australia is languishing in rolling out the program, which is creating uncertainty in communities and the economy more broadly.

He said some 90 countries have their vaccinations program under way.

'After the prime minister said we were at the front of the queue 160 million people have been vaccinated around the world, while zero Australians have been vaccinated,' Dr Chalmers told Sky News' Sunday Agenda program.
The Samsung Galaxy Xcover 5 leaked in detail earlier this month, now WinFuture has some additional information. The rugged phone will reportedly be available only to businesses initially. It will support features like mPOS  mobile point of sale  which are aimed squarely at companies rather than consumers at large.

This model will have a smaller screen than the Xcover Pro from last year  a basic 5.3 LCD, down from 6.3. Also, the resolution will be downgraded to 720 x 1,600 px, this is a device built to a budget.

A budget of just under 300, specifically (the Pro costs 500). To get there, the phone will be powered by the Exynos 850  an 8 nm chipset with eight Cortex-A55 cores and a Mali-G52 GPU. It will be equipped with 4 GB of RAM and 64 GB storage, plus a microSD slot if a particular application requires more memory.



Samsung's Knox Capture is an enterprise-grade barcode scanning solution

The Xcover 5 will run Android 11 out of the box with corporate-friendly Knox features. Last year Samsung announced Knox Capture  an enterprise-grade barcode scanning solution that uses the camera.

Connectivity includes 4G LTE Cat. 7 (300 Mbps down) and NFC, which is a key part of the mPOS functionality as it allows the phone to act as a terminal and accept payment with credit and debit cards.

There will be a 16 MP camera on the back (f/1.8), which will probably be used for scanning barcodes more often than taking photos. A 5 MP (f/2.2) camera will be available on the front if theres an occasion for a selfie.

The 3,000 mAh battery will be user-replaceable. Inside the phone it will charge over USB-C at 15W and we wouldnt be surprised to see pogo pins for charging on a car mount. Also, Samsung usually releases a cradle that can charge a spare battery, so that theres no downtime when an Xcover phones battery dies.



KOAMTAC charging cradles for one phone + spare battery or multiple phones (shown with Xcover Pro)

Naturally, the phone will be IP68 dust and water resistant (no IP69, seemingly) and it will carry a MIL-STD-810G qualification. An LED flashlight is a neat addition that comes in handy sometimes.

Its not clear when Samsung will unveil the Xcover 5 or how long it will be after that before regular consumers can get their hands on one.

Source (in German)
The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has reportedly launched a cabinet post meant to alleviate loneliness and social isolation that have been the by-products of this coronavirus pandemic.

The pandemic, the need for social distancing and strict restrictions on mobility and social interactions have had an adverse impact on mental health with more and more people feeling stressed, isolated and lonely. In Japan, the pandemic and everything else that it brought on, led to an increase in the number of suicides.

For long, Japan has had one of the highest rates of suicide in the world, according to The Japan Times. However, the rate had fallen in the past one decade. The pandemic undid years of hard work as the rate surged for the first time in years and was much higher than the previous year. According to government data, 20,919 people died by suicide in 2020, which is 3.7% more as compared to 2019.

Keeping all this in mind, Suga appointed regional revitalization minister Tetsushi Sakamoto as a part-time Minister of Loneliness to address the issues of social isolation and loneliness among the citizens.

The data from the government also showed that more women died by suicide in 2020 as compared to men. According to reports, women suffered from isolation related stress more than men.

"Women are suffering from isolation more (than men), and the number of suicides is on a rising trend. I hope you will identify problems and promote policy measures comprehensively," Suga said to Sakamoto at a meeting.

The Japanese Prime Minister is also planning to organise an emergency forum in February in order to get experts to discuss the serious situation and suggest measures which could alleviate the problem that people are facing.

He also said that he hopes to promote activities among people that could eliminate loneliness and promote social interactions.

Japan is not the only country to have adopted policies for loneliness. In 2018, the United Kingdom government also appointed a minister of loneliness because of problems among its older generation. In Japan, however, the problem afflicts people of all generations, age groups and gender.
Imperial Valley News Center

Study Identifies Risk Factors for Elevated Anxiety in Young Adults During COVID-19 Pandemic

Washington, DC - A new study has identified early risk factors that predicted heightened anxiety in young adults during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. The findings from the study, supported by the National Institutes of Health and published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, could help predict who is at greatest risk of developing anxiety during stressful life events in early adulthood and inform prevention and intervention efforts.

The investigators examined data from 291 participants who had been followed from toddlerhood to young adulthood as part of a larger study on temperament and socioemotional development. The researchers found that participants who continued to show a temperament characteristic called behavioral inhibition in childhood were more likely to experience worry dysregulation in adolescence (age 15), which in turn predicted elevated anxiety during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic when the participants were in young adulthood (around age 18).

People differ greatly in how they handle stress, said Daniel Pine, M.D., a study author and chief of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Section on Development and Affective Neuroscience. This study shows that childrens level of fearfulness predicts how much stress they experience later in life when they confront difficult circumstances, such as the pandemic.

Behavioral inhibition is a childhood temperament characterized by high levels of cautious, fearful, and avoidant responses to unfamiliar people, objects, and situations. Previous studies have established that children who display behavioral inhibition are at increased risk of developing anxiety disorders later. However, less research has investigated the specific mechanisms by which a stable pattern of behavioral inhibition in childhood is linked to anxiety in young adulthood.

The authors of this study hypothesized that children who demonstrate a stable pattern of behavioral inhibition may be at greater risk for worry dysregulation in adolescencethat is, difficulties managing worry and displaying inappropriate expressions of worryand this would put them at greater risk for later heightened anxiety during stressful events like the pandemic.

In the larger study, behavioral inhibition was measured at ages 2 and 3 using observations of childrens responses to novel toys and interaction with unfamiliar adults. When the children were 7 years old, they were observed for social wariness during an unstructured free play task with an unfamiliar peer. Worry dysregulation was assessed at age 15 through a self-report survey. For the current study, the participants, at an average age of 18, were assessed for anxiety twice during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic after stay-at-home orders had been issued (first between April 20 and May 15 and approximately a month later).

At the first assessment, 20% of the participants reported moderate levels of anxiety symptoms considered to be in the clinical range. At the second assessment, 18.3% of participants reported clinical levels of anxiety. As expected, the researchers found that individuals with high behavioral inhibition in toddlerhood who continued to display high levels of social wariness in childhood reported experiencing dysregulated worry in adolescence, and this ultimately predicted increased anxiety in young adulthood during a critical stage of the pandemic. This developmental pathway was not significant for children who showed behavioral inhibition in toddlerhood but displayed low levels of social wariness later in childhood.

This study provides further evidence of the continuing impact of early life temperament on the mental health of individuals, said Nathan A. Fox, Ph.D.(link is external), Distinguished University Professor and director of the Child Development Lab at the University of Maryland, College Park, and an author of the study. Young children with stable behavioral inhibition are at heightened risk for increased worry and anxiety, and the context of the pandemic only heightened these effects.

The findings suggest that targeting social wariness in childhood and worry dysregulation in adolescence may be a viable strategy for the prevention of anxiety disorders. The findings also suggest that targeting dysregulated worry in adolescence may be particularly important for identifying those who might be at risk for heightened anxiety during stressful life events like the COVID-19 pandemic and preventing that heightened anxiety.
took in the win at Mar-a-Lago, surrounded by friends and family. His lawyers celebrated with hugs and smiles. One joked, "We're going to Disney World!



Now acquitted in his second Senate impeachment trial, Trump is preparing for the next phase of his post-presidency life. Feeling emboldened by the trial's outcome, he is expected to reemerge from a self-imposed hibernation at his club in Palm Beach, Florida, and is eyeing ways to reassert his power.

But after being barred from Twitter, the former president lacks the social media bullhorn that fueled his political rise. And he's confronting a Republican Party deeply divided over the legacy of his jarring final days in office, culminating in the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol. Searing video images of the day played on loop during his impeachment trial, which ended Saturday.

Trump remains popular among the GOP base, but many Republicans in Washington have cooled to him. Never before have so many members of a president's party seven GOP senators, in his case voted for his removal in a Senate trial.

Some may work to counter efforts by Trump to support extreme candidates in next year's congressional primaries.

Undeterred, friends and allies expect Trump to resume friendly media interviews after weeks of silence. He has met with political aides to discuss efforts to help Republicans try to take control of the House and Senate in the 2022 midterms elections. He remains fixated on exacting revenge on Republicans who supported his impeachment or resisted his efforts to overturn the results of the November election won by Democrat Joe Biden.

I imagine you'll probably be hearing a lot more from him in the coming days, senior adviser Jason Miller said.

In a statement after the vote, Trump offered few clues, but was defiant as he told supporters their movement has only just begun.

In the months ahead I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all of our people, he said.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, who spoke with Trump on Saturday night, acknowledged that Trump is mad at some folks, but also ready to move on and rebuild the Republican Party and excited about 2022."



In their conversations, Graham has stressed to Trump, who has threatened to start his own party to punish disloyal Republicans, that the GOP needs him to win.

I said, Mr. President, this MAGA movement needs to continue. We need to unite the party. Trump-plus is the way back in 2022,' Graham, R-S.C., told Fox News Sunday.

"My goal is to win in 2022 to stop the most radical agenda I've seen coming out of the Democratic presidency of Joe Biden. We can't do that without Donald Trump, so he's ready to hit the trail and I'm ready to work with him, Graham said.

Graham said Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who voted to acquit but then delivered a scalding denunciation of Trump, got a load off a chest, obviously. Graham said later in the interview: If you want to get something off your chest, fine, but I'm into winning."



At his Palm Beach club on Saturday night, Trump was in a joyous mood as he enjoyed dinner on a patio packed with people. After a mellow last several weeks, one member described a party atmosphere not felt since before the election.

Still, Trump isn't in the clear yet. No longer protected by a Justice Department opinion against the prosecution of sitting presidents, he now faces multiple ongoing criminal investigations.

In Georgia, the Fulton County district attorney has opened a criminal investigation into attempts to influence the election, including Trump's call to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger demanding that the official find enough votes to overturn Biden's victory.

In New York, Attorney General Letitia James is investigating whether Trump and his company improperly inflated the value of his assets on annual financial statements in order to secure loans and obtain tax benefits. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. continues his own investigation, which has included grand jury testimony.

He didn't get away with anything yet," McConnell, R-Ky., after the vote. We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation. And former presidents are not immune from being accountable by either one."



McConnell voted to acquit Trump on the grounds the trial was unconstitutional because he is no longer in office, but insisted, There's no question none that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day."



That sharp rebuke from his once-loyal defender underscores how dramatically Trump's stock has fallen in Washington since his first impeachment trial just over a year ago.

But the desire to be rid of Trump is not shared across the country, where Republicans who have dared to admonish him have faced swift rebuke.

Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., was forced to defend her third-in-line leadership position after she voted in favor of impeachment. On Saturday, Louisiana's Republican Party quickly censured Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of the seven Republicans senators who voted for Trump's conviction.

In an interview Sunday with ABC's This Week, Cassidy seemed at peace with his decision.

I think his force wanes, he said of Trump. The Republican Party is more than just one person. The Republican Party is about ideas.

(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.)
The Calabar Division of the Court of Appeal has refused to grant bail to a suspected fraudster, Scales Olatunji.

The court also in its decision delivered Friday affirmed the jurisdiction of the Federal High Court, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, to try the defendant for fraud involving N525million.

A statement by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) indicated on Monday that the ruling of the appellate court affirmed the key decisions of the lower Federal High Court in Uyo where Mr Olatunji is being prosecuted.

The trial court hearing

The EFCC had on July 2, 2019, arraigned Mr Olatunji on 45 counts of fraud involving N525million, impersonation, conspiracy and obtaining by false pretence N525m.

Mr Olatunji had pleaded not guilty to the charges and was remanded in the custody of the Uyo Correctional Centre.

The defendants lawyer on October 16, 2020 argued his bail application and challenged jurisdiction of the court to hear the entire case.

The court dismissed the applications as it held that the applicant failed to place sufficient facts before this court to warrant the grant of his applications.

Dissatisfied with the decisions, the lead defence counsel, Gboyega Oyewole, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, appealed to the Court of Appeal in Calabar, Cross River State, to challenge them.

Opposing the appeals, EFCCs lawyer, Nwandu Ukoha, urged the Court of Appeal to dismiss the appeals insisting that the appellant was flight risk.

If bail is granted, he will never be present at his trial due to his antecedents as all his cohorts are still at large, he argued.

Appeal Court ruling

Ruling on Friday, a three-man panel of the Court of Appeal led by Muhammed Shuaibu held that the Federal High Court in Uyo was a proper venue for the trial of the appellant.

Mr Shuaibu, who was on the panel with James Abiriyi and Mojeed Owoade, noted that the trial court possessed the territorial jurisdiction of the lower to hear the case.

Jurisdiction, territorial or otherwise, is statutory and is conferred on the court by the law, creating it, he added.

Dismissing the appeal on bail, Mr Shuaibu held that where it is believed that the appellant is likely to jump bail; (the) bail will properly be refused by the court.

And since there was an attempt by the appellant to evade his trial, the learned trial judge acted judiciously and judicially in refusing to exercise his discretion in favour of the appellant.

The court dismissed the appeals and directed the trial court to give the case an accelerated hearing in line with the Federal High Court (Criminal) Practice Direction, 2013.

Similarly, the appellate court also upheld the ruling of a Federal High Court, which granted an order of final forfeiture of a Mack truck with registration No. 324 X F, to the Federal Government, upon application by the EFCC.

The appellants, N. C Angus (W/A) Limited, Mohammed Suleiman and Suleiman Mohammed, who were convicted for illegal oil bunkering, had challenged the forfeiture of the truck.

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In 2012, when The New York Times was panicked about its financial future, this newspaper went into the travel business. It began selling Times Journeys, on which an expert beat reporter would be your guide to Berlin or the Galapagos Islands.

The trips brought in some money, but were expensive to run and complicated to manage  particularly in the summer of 2019, after The Times began hosting teenagers. In Seoul, two were detained by the police at an arcade after they were accused of stealing, a Times spokeswoman said.

Nor were the reporters always ready for the confident, hothouse politics of elite American high school students. One reporter was chided by counselors on a trip to Israel for his tone in an exchange about the future of the oil industry.

And then there was the trip to Peru that summer. The parents of adventurous young meritocrats paid $5,490 (plus airfare) for two weeks studying Public Health and Development in the Andes. On that trip, the reporter, Donald G. McNeil Jr., got into a series of heated arguments with students, none of them Black, on the charged question of race. Their complaints would ultimately end his career as a high-profile public health reporter for The Times, and again put The Times at the center of the national argument over journalism and racism and labor. The comments were first reported in The Daily Beast and covered in The Washington Post, Vanity Fair, CNN, Slate, the New York Post and others. The exhaustive coverage led The New Republic last week to ask, Can We Stop Obsessing Over Every Personnel Decision Made by The New York Times?

Not just yet.

The Times is an object of obsession because of its unusual, perhaps unhealthy, central place in American news, culture and politics. Its actions  and those of its internal factions  carry huge symbolic weight. Thats the thing that struck me most when I got here a year ago, and wrote that because The Times now overshadows so much of the industry, the cultural and ideological battles that used to break out between news organizations now play out inside The Times. The Times media ambitions have also intensified its status as a cultural lightning rod. It is no longer just a source of information. It seeks to be the voice whispering in your ear in the morning, the curriculum in your childs history class and the instructions on caramelizing shallots for the pasta youre making for dinner.

I assure you, there are interesting personnel dramas playing out at The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, but somehow they dont explode as public morality plays, with emotional Twitter debates, social media cheering sections and dueling public letters.

But The Times singular status has left its leaders, in a period of high-profile firings and departures, vainly insisting that the exits reflect the normal, confidential and complex workings of human resources. Times leaders will still, for instance, tell you that they didnt fire opinion editor James Bennet because of the content of an Op-Ed calling for a military response to the summers unrest over racial justice. But theyve found nobody wants to hear the more complex explanation.

I think its a sign that The Times unique position in American news may not be tenable. This intense attention, combined with a thriving digital subscription business that makes the company more beholden to the views of left-leaning subscribers, may yet push it into a narrower and more left-wing political lane as a kind of American version of The Guardian  the opposite of its stated, broader strategy.

One modest and early sign that The Times may be focusing a bit: A spokeswoman told me that it wont restart the Journeys program next year. The Times may contain multitudes, but running a travel agency that drops ornery 65-year-old journalists into the literal jungle with a pack of sharp teens is a bridge too far.

What happened in Peru, too, was a kind of collision between the old Times and the next generation of its core audience, the educated globally minded elite. The student at the center of this story is Sophie Shepherd, who isnt among the teenagers who have spoken anonymously to other news organizations. She and two other students said she was the person who spoke the most to McNeil and spent the most time with him on their student journey.

She was 17 at the time, and had just finished her senior year at Phillips Academy Andover, a boarding school sometimes rated Americas best. Shes the kind of teenager who is excited to talk to a New York Times correspondent about public health, and perhaps to put the adventure on a resume. She had even done the optional reading McNeil suggested, Jared Diamonds 1997 book, Guns, Germs, and Steel, a Pulitzer-winning history that argues that environmental and geographic factors produced the global domination of European civilization. The book has drawn criticism for a deterministic view that seems to absolve colonial powers of responsibility for their choices.

Shepherd said she noticed that McNeil was walking alone as they left their hostel on the first morning of the trip, so she caught up with him. She asked him, she recalled, about the criticism of the book.

He got very defensive very quickly about it, she recalled. Its just a book, its just making this point, its very simple, its not racist.

She said she backed down, apologized and felt terribly guilty  like I must have come off as a crazy liberal.

At lunch that day, she said she sat down the table from McNeil at a cafe overlooking the towns narrow streets, where he was talking to another student when he uttered the N-word, and used the word in the context of a discussion of racism. Some of the teenagers responded almost reflexively, she said, to object to his use of the word in any context.

Im very used to people  my grandparents or peoples parents  saying things they dont mean that are insensitive, another student, who was then 17 and is now attending an Ivy League college, told me. You correct them, you tell them, Youre not supposed to talk like that, and usually people are pretty apologetic and responsive to being corrected. And he was not.

Shepherd said she thought the word was inappropriate but hardly the worst thing that happened on the trip, which she documented in a diary that she referred to in describing details to me. She also felt sorry for McNeil. There was this atmosphere where people didnt like him, she said. He was kind of a grumpy old guy.

But Shepherd hadnt really connected with the others on the trip either, so she kept seeking him out. A few nights later, after a hike up Machu Picchu, she sat with McNeil at dinner at El Albergue, one of several rather nice restaurants in the town of Ollantaytambo in the Andes.

On the walk over, she said, she talked about her favorite class at Andover, a history of American education that covered racial discrimination. He responded, she recalled, that its frustrating, because Black Americans keep blaming the system, but racism is over, theres nothing against them anymore  they can get out of the ghetto if they want to.

Shepherd said she tried to argue, but he talked over her whenever she interjected, their voices getting louder and attracting the attention of other students, two of whom confirmed her account of the conversation.

This is the thing with these liberal institutions like Andover  they teach you the world should be like this but thats not how reality is, she recalled him telling her. (I sent McNeil a full account of Shepherds recollections; he said he wont be responding publicly until he has officially left The Times on March 1. Im sure well have different memories of conversations that took place that long ago, he said in an email.)

Those complaints could have been dismissed as the whining of entitled teenagers, or as an episode in the rolling national sitcom of aging baby boomers trying to reckon with fearless Zoomers. Theres obviously some truth to both.

But the complaints didnt fall on deaf ears at The Times for a reason that also hasnt come through clearly in the coverage  because they rang true. McNeil is known as a difficult character at the paper, a detail that is both irrelevant to the big ideological questions and important to understanding what had happened. A kind of Times-made man who was married for a time to a third-generation Times woman, he started at the newspaper in 1976. He had risen through the ranks from copy boy to become a night rewrite man, a theater columnist and a correspondent in Paris.

To some, he embodied the swagger of the mid-20th century Times man, whose very presence rendered a story news. He could be a generous colleague, and blunt honesty is welcome in a newsroom, but he also sometimes alienated his bosses and colleagues. He asked sharp questions of the former publisher, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., at the companys annual staff meeting, and was a union activist who attacked management during brutal contract negotiations in the dark years of 2010 and 2011. He was a devoted, effective organizer, others in the News Guild recalled, but also drove his brothers and sisters in labor crazy with his imperiousness, and voted against the unions 2016 contract, arguing that the union should have held out for more.

His impolitic views were also hardly a secret. When he published a book on the Zika virus in 2016, a puzzled reviewer in The Quarterly Review of Biology noted passages about feminists and gay sex, and wrote that it is McNeils seniority and journalistic experience that makes the occasional misstep, or indelicate deviation from the science, all the more surprising.

The sorts of views that raised eyebrows in The Quarterly Review of Biology had shocked the teenagers. And when a furious Dean Baquet, the executive editor, read the complaints about the Peru trip in 2019, he said he initially wanted to fire McNeil. But the union played its traditional role, fighting aggressively to protect him. The union, a person involved in the conversations said, was ready to take The Times to arbitration if the company attempted to terminate McNeil for his conduct on the trip. McNeil received a formal reprimand instead.

McNeil, who was not far from retirement, returned to his role as a reporter on the relatively unglamorous public health beat. He talked openly about taking a buyout the next time The Times offered them, and his career could easily have ended that way.

But then, just over a year ago, a strange new virus began spreading around the world. McNeil suddenly became a regular guest on The Times popular podcast, The Daily. His doomsaying was electrifying  stark, certain, sometimes alarming. He emerged as the voice of The Times coverage of the crisis.

McNeil had one high-profile stumble last May when he appeared on CNN and called for the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to resign over the agencys handling of the coronavirus outbreak. His editors have discussed the issue with him to reiterate that his job is to report the facts and not to offer his own opinions, a Times spokeswoman said at the time. But he remained central to the biggest story in the world. The Times included his work on the pandemic in its Pulitzer submission, two people familiar with it said.

That high profile may have led to the leak of The Times internal response to the Peru trip to The Daily Beast. Some employees then organized a letter saying that our community is outraged and in pain and asking why McNeils conduct hadnt prevented him from covering a crucial story with complex racial disparities. The letter didnt call for him to be fired, but for The Times to review its policies.

Other journalists considered the letter itself unfair, an attack on a veteran reporters career over speech that wasnt directly connected to his journalism. Some Black journalists felt their white colleagues were rallying to McNeils defense rather than worrying about his words impact. You often wonder what your white colleagues who are lovely to your face are actually thinking or saying about you  or people like you  behind your back, a national reporter, John Eligon, tweeted.

This is where a messy but, in some ways, ordinary management problem became something more. The employees letter leaked. The News Guilds own internal divisions over the matter leaked. Critics scoured McNeils old work, and complained on Twitter. The Times became the story.

After The Daily Beast report, McNeil told The Times he saw no reason to apologize, but within 48 hours was beginning to draft an apology, a person with direct knowledge of that document said. He exchanged a series of drafts with Times management over the next week. By Feb. 5, The Times had made clear that he would be moved to a less prestigious beat, and that he could face ongoing questions from the companys HR department. Its not surprising that he resigned. Editors forwarded his apology note, which seemed by then both uncharacteristically profuse and oddly late, in an email that announced his resignation.

The questions about The Times identity and political leanings are real; the differences inside the newsroom wont be easily resolved. But the paper needs to figure out how to resolve these issues more clearly: Is The Times the leading newspaper for like-minded, left-leaning Americans? Or is it trying to hold what seems to be a disappearing center in a deeply divided country? Is it Elizabeth Warren or Joe Biden? One thing thats clear is that these questions probably arent best arbitrated through firings or resignations freighted with symbolic meaning, or hashed out inside the human resources department.

The Times will have to navigate its identity in tandem with the next generation of its audience  people like Shepherd, who said that she was most surprised by the gap between McNeils views and what she had read in her favorite news outlet.

Thats not what I would have expected from The Times, she said. You have the 1619 Project. You guys do all this amazing reporting on this, and you can say something like that?

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
This year the California Senior Legislature passed a proposal specifically asking all California Public Health Departments to standardize releasing information to the public whenever any reportable infectious disease is found in any congregate older adult living facility.

The problem is, that it is at county discretion on whether or not this information is released. There are 58 counties in California, and each determines their own policy on releasing this information. Los Angeles County, for example, releases the information , and Napa, Marin and Solano (among others) do not. The CSL floated this proposal to every state legislator in California. Not a single one picked it up to as legislation.

Sad news for all of our older adults with family and friends in these facilities.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 21:05:12|Editor: huaxia

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ADEN, Yemen, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- A high-level commander of Yemen's pro-government forces was killed on Monday in the ongoing battles with the Houthi military in the country's northeastern province of Marib, a government official told Xinhua.

According to Marib's local authority, "the Houthis fired a missile and killed Brigadier Mohamed Asoudi, commander of the 203rd Infantry Army Brigade, along with a number of his bodyguards in Sirwah district, west of Marib province."

The official said on condition of anonymity that "Asoudi was killed by the missile strike while he was leading pro-government forces in the ongoing fighting with the Houthis in Sirwah."

Battles are still continuing intensively as Houthis are progressing to fully capture the strategic oil-rich province of Marib from the government's grip.

Dozens were either killed or injured from both warring sides in the non-stop armed confrontations in Marib amid heavy airstrikes carried out by the Saudi Arabia-led coalition.

Escalation of fighting between the Yemeni government and the Houthi militia has displaced nearly 400 families in Marib.

Yemen has been mired in civil war since late 2014 when the Iran-backed Houthi rebels seized control of several northern provinces and forced the Saudi-backed government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa.

The Saudi-led coalition intervened in the Yemen conflict in March 2015 to support Hadi's government.

The war in Yemen has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced 4 million others, and pushed the country to the brink of famine. Enditem

vivo launched the iQOO 7 smartphone back in January, and according to leaksters, there is another phone in the pipeline - the vivo iQOO Neo 5, a successor of the SD865-powered iQOO Neo3.

The new phone will arrive in the middle of March with a Snapdragon 870 chipset, a Samsung display, and some of the fastest charging rates on the market - 88W through the wire and 66W wirelessly for the 4,400 mAh battery.

vivo iQOO Neo3 5G

The screen will be a Super AMOLED panel with a 120Hz refresh rate and will have room for one 16MP shooter. While the screen is confirmed information, the camera setup is yet to be confirmed.

On the back, the vivo iQOO Neo5 is said to have three shooters - a 48MP main one with a Sony IMX598 sensor, a 13MP ultrawide-angle shooter, and a 2MP unit, likely for macro shots or assisting in portrait photos.

Other rumored specs include dual speakers and a frame made of aluminum for better endurance and heat dissipation. Prices are estimated to go between CNY2,998 and CNY3,698 (anywhere between $464 and $572).

Source (in Chinese) | Via
MONACO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Entrepreneur acquired another block of shares for developing the enterprise and promoting its products abroad.

Entrepreneur from Nizhny Novgorod, Elada Nagornaya, who is main shareholder in the JSC Khokhlomskaya Rospis (Kholhloma Painting), increased her share in the company up to 80%.

The purpose of increasing her share in the joint-stock company, she explains, is developing Khokhlomskaya Rospis, which is the largest enterprise of folk arts and crafts in Russia, and promoting its products on the international market.

"Despite the complicated economic situation both in the country and at the factory because of the pandemic, I decided to invest additional funds in the enterprise. We have a lot of work ahead: the factory must develop, there must be stable salaries for employees, and we need technological modernization as well as new jobs. One of the main tasks for us now is to increase the export potential of the Khokhlomskaya Rospis, to take the products to foreign markets. Now we are actively negotiating with potential partners in Europe and Asia, and plan to expand production," - said Elada Nagornaya.

In 2015, Elada Nagornaya acquired the control stock (54.6 %) of the enterprise JSC Khokhlomskaya Rospis.

In 2019, she launched a manufactory division based on the enterprise - Lada&Liza Fashion House, where honored artists create fashion accessories, jewelry, handbags, and souvenirs with hand-made Khokhloma paintings.

Elada Nagornaya said that one of the JSC Khokhlomskaya Rospis and Lada&Liza Fashion House areas of work is creative cooperation with famous designers and fashion houses.

"In December 2019, Lada&Liza Fashion House became one of the winners of the annual Matryoshka Fashion Week in Nizhny Novgorod. Now the artists of Khokhlomskaya Rospis are working on a new collection in partnership with the world-famous Russian jewelry house Yaroslavna. We will present this collection in Russia, as well as abroad, for example at the Promenade Della Moda show, which will be held during Milan Fashion Week on September 26-27, 2021," - said Elada Nagornaya.

SOURCE JSC Khokhlomskaya Rospis
A motorcyclist was seriously hurt and three other people, including two children, were taken to hospital after a crash on the M1 south of Brisbane on Monday.

After hours of long traffic delays, by 5pm congestion had eased on the northbound lanes through Springwood.

Some of the vehicles involved in the accident. Credit:Nine News Queensland

Only short delays remained on the stretch between Rochedale and Springwood.

Northbound delays had earlier stretched to 15 kilometres as only one northbound lane remained open.
Toolkit case: Shantanu seeks transit anticipatory bail, hearing today in Aurangabad bench of Bombay HC

India

oi-Madhuri Adnal

New Delhi, Feb 15: Pune-based engineer Shantanu Muluk has filled a transit anticipatory bail application before the Aurangabad bench of the Bombay high court on Monday. Non-bailable warrant has been issued against him in connection with the toolkit matter.

The plea is similar to that of activist and lawyer Nikita Jacob who sought circulation of her transit anticipatory bail application on Monday morning before the bench of justice PD Naik.

''Shantanu has moved the Aurangabad bench of the Bombay High Court seeking transit anticipatory bail; matter to be heard tomorrow,'' Satej Jadhav, Lawyer of Shantanu said.

Earlier in the day, the Delhi Police said climate activist Disha Ravi along with Mumbai lawyer Nikita Jacob and Pune-based engineer Shantanu created the "toolkit" related to the farmers' agitation and shared it with others to tarnish India's image.

Toolkit: Nikita Jacob moves HC seeks anticipatory bail

The police claimed that Disha Ravi, who was arrested on Saturday from Bengaluru, sent the "toolkit" to teen climate activist Greta Thunberg through the Telegram app, and also "coaxed her to act on it".

The data was also deleted, police said, adding that Disha''s Telegram account shows that many links related to the "toolkit" were removed.

This comes hours after 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi was remanded in five-day Delhi Police custody. Disha Ravi was arrested on Saturday for her alleged involvement in sharing a 'toolkit' related to the farmer's protest on social media.

The "toolkit" - a common term used by social activists for campaign material - was first tweeted by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg in support of India's protesting farmers on February 4.

Earlier this month, the Cyber Cell had lodged an FIR against "pro-Khalistan" creators of the "toolkit" for waging a "social, cultural and economic war against the Government of India". The case has been registered on charges of criminal conspiracy, sedition and various other sections of the Indian Penal Code.
Myanmar's junta deployed extra troops around the country and choked the internet for the second night in a row as it intensified a crackdown on anti-coup protests, but defiant demonstrators again took to the streets on Monday.

The military has steadily escalated efforts to quell an uprising against their seizure of power two weeks ago, which saw civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi detained along with hundreds of others, including members of her democratically elected government.

Suu Kyi and President Win Myint are expected to be questioned by a court "via video conferencing" in the country's capital of Naypyidaw this week, said lawyer Khin Maung Zaw, adding that he had not been able to make contact with either client.

Neither has been seen in public since they were detained in dawn raids on February 1, the day of the coup.

The generals imposed an hours-long internet shutdown Monday morning and ratcheted up the military's presence across the country overnight, including armoured vehicles in Yangon, the nation's commercial hub and biggest city.

On Tuesday, another internet blackout blanketed Myanmar, dropping connectivity to 15 percent of ordinary levels, according to UK-based monitoring group NetBlocks.

"#Myanmar is in the midst of a near-total internet shutdown for a second consecutive night" as of 1 am local time (1830 GMT), NetBlocks tweeted early Tuesday morning.

The shutdown comes after a day of protesters taking to the streets in defiance of heavy troop presence around Yangon -- although turnout was smaller than in recent days.

The United Nations denounced the choking of the internet.

The UN envoy for Myanmar, Christine Schraner Burgener, spoke with the deputy commander of the Myanmar army, Soe Win, and warned that "network blackouts undermine core democratic principles," UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said in New York.

The envoy noted that such shutdowns "hurt key sectors, including banking, and heighten domestic tensions. And, so, we've made our concerns about this very clear," said Haq.

"Patrolling with armoured vehicles means they are threatening people," said 46-year-old Nyein Moe, among the more than 1,000 gathered Monday in front of the Central Bank, staring down armoured vehicles parked there.

"We can't stop now."

By afternoon, news of a strong police presence at the city's headquarters of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) party drew thousands to the scene.

They chanted "End military dictatorship" as the officers stood guard.

"About seven police officers searched for about 30 minutes (for two MPs)," NLD member Soe Win told AFP after the security forces left without finding them. "Now everything is settled."

Across the country, people continued to take to the streets Monday to call for the release of Suu Kyi -- with some incidents of violence.

A demonstration led by student groups in Naypyidaw was met with force after the gathering had retreated. Police also arrested dozens of the young protesters, though some were later released.

Mandalay, the country's second largest city, saw a clash which left at least six injured after police used slingshots against protesters and fired rubber bullets into the crowd.

Demonstrators retaliated by throwing bricks, said a rescue team member who assisted with the injured.

"One of them needed oxygen because he was hit with a rubber bullet in his rib," rescue team head Khin Maung Tin told AFP.

Journalists on the scene also said police had beaten them in the melee.

- 'State-ordered information blackout' -

NetBlocks reported Monday that a "state-ordered information blackout" had taken Myanmar almost entirely offline for around eight hours, before connectivity was restored at the start of the working day.

Tuesday's internet blackout would be the fourth since February 1, when the military staged a putsch and detained Suu Kyi, ending a decade-old fledgling democracy after generations of junta rule.

But cutting out internet connectivity -- and a step up in arrests -- has done little to quell resistance that has seen huge crowds throng big urban centres and isolated frontier villages alike.

The anti-coup movement has continued apace despite intensifying fears of a harsher crackdown, like on Sunday night when troops in the northern city of Myitkyina fired tear gas and then shot into a crowd of protesters.

So far, more than 420 people -- including striking workers -- have been detained since the coup, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners monitoring group.

- Declaration of war -

A joint statement from the US, British and European Union ambassadors urged security forces not to harm civilians.

By late Monday night, the UK embassy in Myanmar took a harsher line, admonishing the regime for its attack on journalists and for imposing another internet blackout.

"The assault on freedom of expression must stop," it tweeted.

UN special rapporteur Tom Andrews said the junta's efforts to rein in the burgeoning protest movement was a sign of "desperation" and amounted to a declaration of war against its people.

"Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable," he tweeted.

The country's new military leadership has so far been unmoved by a torrent of international condemnation.

On Monday coup leader Min Aung Hlaing said "except the West", other members of the international community say Myanmar's affairs are "its internal matter", echoing China and Russia.

Short link:


New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Union government will begin vaccination drive for around 27 crore Indians above the age of 50 three weeks from now, Union Health Minister Harsh vardhan said on Monday.

"Three weeks from now, the government will start giving doses of coronavirus vaccines to 27 crore persons above the age of 50," he said at a press briefing here. An expert group on vaccination will discuss how to pay for the doses for those above 50, he added.

The vaccination for frontline workers began earlier this month.

Commenting on the private healthcare sector's role in the vaccination process, he said that such facilities and workers were already a part of the drive.

"During emergency use authorisations (EUA), it is the government's responsibility to keep things under control; open market sales are not part of the EUA," he added.

The Minister said that no new cases of COVID-19 have been reported in 188 districts of the country in the past seven days.

Vardhan emphasised the importance of social distance and appropriate healthcare behaviour amid the pandemic despite falling number of corona cases in the country.

"It is crucial that people continue to follow COVID-appropriate behaviour which I had called a social vaccine, along with the real vaccine," he quipped.

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry said that a new flagship programme -- Prime Minister Atmanirbhar Swastha Bharat Yojana -- has been announced in the Union Budget 2021-22. "The Budget refers to a holistic approach toward health and healthcare. Allocation to the health sector for 2020-21 is 1.8 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product," the Ministry added.

The Union government has prioritised vaccination of 30 crore Indians, dividing them into three categories -- one crore healthcare workers, 2 crore frontline workers, and 27 crore general populace above the age of 50.
(CNN)  Five thousand years after Stonehenge was built, archaeologists have finally pinpointed exactly where the bluestones that form part of the imposing UK monument came from and how they were unearthed.

The researchers revealed in 2019 the stones came from an ancient quarry on the north side of the Preseli Hills in western Wales, which meant the 43 huge bluestones had been moved a staggering distance of 150 miles.

Now, archaeologists have said they think some of the bluestones first formed another stone circle close to the same area as the quarries and were dismantled and rebuilt as part of Stonehenge on the Salisbury Plain.

The identical 110-meter diameters of the stone circle, known as Waun Mawn, and the enclosing ditch of Stonehenge, suggest that at least part of the circle was brought from its location in Wales to Salisbury Plain, according to new research published in the journal Antiquity.

What's more, both stone circles are aligned on the midsummer solstice sunrise, and one of the bluestones at Stonehenge has an unusual cross-section that matches one of the holes left at Waun Mawn, the paper said.

Chippings in that hole are of the same rock type as the Stonehenge stone, it added.

Telltale stone holes

Stonehenge is made of two types of stone: larger sarsen stones and smaller bluestone monoliths.

Some 43 bluestones survive today at Stonehenge, though many of these remain buried beneath the grass.

They were thought to have been the first to be erected at Stonehenge 5,000 years ago, centuries before the larger sarsen stones were brought over just 15 miles from the monument.

The Stones of Stonehenge research project is led by Mike Parker Pearson, a professor at University College London.

Discovering the dismantled stone circle at Waun Mawn happened through trial and error, the news statement said.

Only four stones were visible at the site. It was thought in 2010 that they were part of a stone circle, but initial geophysical studies were inconclusive and the team decided to focus their energies elsewhere.

A trial excavation at the site in 2017 found two empty stone holes, but ground radar surveys were still unsuccessful, leaving the team with no choice but to do it the old-fashioned way and dig.

Excavations in 2018 revealed empty stone holes, confirming that the four remaining stones were part of a former circle.

Dating of charcoal and sediments in the holes found the Waun Mawn stone circle was erected around 3400 BC, the study said.

The paper also suggested that the stones may have been moved as people migrated from that part of Wales, with the first people to be buried at Stonehenge thought likely to have once lived in this region.

"My guess is that Waun Mawn was not the only stone circle that contributed to Stonehenge," said Parker Pearson in a news statement.

"Maybe there are more in Preseli waiting to be found. Who knows? Someone will be lucky enough to find them."

This story was first published on CNN.com "Stonehenge may be a rebuilt stone circle from Wales, new research suggests"

New Zealands prime minister Jacinda Ardern confirmed on Monday that three new cases of Covid detected in Auckland were all the more infectious UK variant, as the city entered a strict new lockdown.

The cases are New Zealands first instances of community transmission since 24 January, and led Australia to suspend the quarantine-free travel corridor for New Zealanders late on Sunday night.

While Auckland has been put under level 3 restrictions, which requires everyone to stay at home except for essential shopping and essential working, the rest of the country has been put under level 2 restrictions. Alert level 2 mandates social distancing and limits social gatherings to 100 people.

Prime Minister Ardern, who announced the new lockdown measures on Sunday as health officials investigated the new outbreak, on Monday told RNZ National that they were right to take such precautions, as she confirmed they were indeed cases of the more infectious variant.

Read more: Follow live coronavirus updates

"However, we also know that based on that sequencing, we havent been able to link it to any other cases that weve had come through our managed isolation facilities and that tells us its unlikely, therefore, to have been some form of issue with our managed isolation, Ms Ardern told the radio network.

Ms Ardern said that health officials are still trying to figure out the source of infection and are working on two main leads. All three of the cases are members of the same family.

One possibility is that the virus entered New Zealand with a transit passenger, and another one was that it came from international aircrew. In some cases, those crews have their uniforms cleaned at the place where one of the people who tested positive for the virus works.

Ms Ardern added, however, that there has so far not been a reported case in which the transmission occurred from doing laundry.

"The most likely scenario is always human-to-human [transmission] ... but even with those less likely possibilities we dont rule them out, we try and explore every possible option, she said.

The lockdown is the first in New Zealand in six months and represents a significant setback in the nations largely successful efforts to control the virus.

We have stamped out the virus before and we will do it again, Ms Ardern told a news conference in the capital, Wellington on Sunday.

New Zealand had closed its international borders and introduced strict social distancing rules early in the pandemic, thereby dramatically reducing the spread of the infection. With a population of 5 million, the country has reported a total of 2,330 cases and 25 deaths since the pandemic began.
The vaccination campaign in Lebanon resumed on Monday at 15 medical centres, with health care workers and staff at the Rafik Hariri University Hospital receiving their first doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. Lebanon administered its first jabs of the vaccine on Sunday, with an intensive care unit physician and a 93-year-old becoming the first two people to receive Pfizer-BioNTech doses.

The country launched its inoculation campaign a day after receiving the first batch of the 28,500 doses from Brussels, near where Pfizer has a manufacturing facility.More Pfizer doses are scheduled to arrive in the coming weeks, in addition to vaccines from other companies.Lebanon, a country of six million people including a million Syrian refugees, has registered 339,112 cases and just under 4,000 deaths.

The country has been under lockdown since mid-January, after an unprecedented spike in cases blamed on holiday gatherings forced overwhelmed hospitals to turn away patients.Lebanons political, economic and health crises have converged, deepening the countrys troubles and public anger and mistrust of the ruling elites.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The countrys COVID-19 case count breached 550,000 on Monday after the Department of Health confirmed 1,685 new infections.

The official tally now stands at 550,860, of which 27,588 or 5% are active cases. This does not yet include the latest data from six testing laboratories which failed to submit their report on time.

Two more fatalities, both previously announced as recoveries, also raised the death toll to 11,517. This is the lowest single-day rise in deaths since July last year. Meanwhile, another 14 patients got well, pushing the number of survivors to 511,755.

After final validation, one duplicate entry was removed from the overall count.

Of the nationwide case tally, the DOH said 44 are confirmed cases of the new and more transmissible variant first detected in the United Kingdom. This was after the department reported 19 more on Feb. 12. Health Spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire, however, said there is still not enough evidence to prove there is community transmission of the new variant.

RELATED: One UK variant case linked to COVID-19 cluster in MRT-3 - DOH

Among Filipinos abroad, the Department of Foreign Affairs said confirmed cases rose to 14,671 after 13 more tested positive. It also listed 11 new recoveries, bringing the total to 9,231, while the death toll stayed at 979.

Worldwide, over 108.8 million have been infected with COVID-19, of whom 2.4 million died and 61.1 million have recovered, based on the Johns Hopkins University tracker.
Asian stocks have risen 12% so far this year to outperform global equities by 6.5 percentage points. Compared to the lows of March 2020, the MSCI Asia ex-Japan index is up 92%. As the Lunar Year of the Ox begins, investors may be understandably concerned that Asian equities are getting frothy. The whipsaw in global markets in recent weeks will have added to nervousness.

But its important to remember that we are only at the early stages of the economic recovery. Despite new COVID-19 clusters in some parts of the region, macro momentum in Asia is strong, and conditions are supportive of robust profits across sectors and regions this year.

There are several key reasons for our upbeat assessment of Asia:


The Brewers have agreed to a minor league deal with right-hander Brad Boxberger, ESPNs Kiley McDaniel reports (via Twitter). Boxberger will receive an invitation to the teams Major League Spring Training camp.

After signing a minors contract with the Marlins last winter, Boxberger posted a 3.00 ERA over 18 innings with Miami, plus 3 1/3 scoreless frames during the teams playoff run. It was a nice bounce-back performance for Boxberger in terms of pure results after struggling in 2019 with the Royals, though there wasnt much difference between the two seasons from an analytical perspective.

Boxbergers 22.8K% and 10.1BB% were both below average and there werent a lot of positives within his Statcast numbers, with the exception of a fastball spin rate in the 90th percentile. For added pluses, Boxberger posted a career-best 51% grounder rate, and his fastball averaged 92.5mph for his highest velocity since 2015.

It was during that 2015 season that Boxberger achieved All-Star status for a 41-save season with the Rays, but he then battled some injuries and became something of a journeyman since Tampa traded him to the Diamondbacks in November 2017. Since Opening Day 2018, Boxberger has now been a member of six different organizations, counting Milwaukee. The right-hander will compete for a job in a Brewers bullpen that has plenty of talent but relatively little MLB experience, so Boxberger could add a veteran element to the mix.
A sign indicates a designated parking space for vehicles owned by SoCar, a car-sharing service provider. Korea Times file



By Bahk Eun-ji



SoCar, a car-sharing app operator, is facing public backlash over its initial refusal to provide the police with the information of a user who was suspected of kidnapping an elementary schoolgirl, citing the "law on personal information protection."



In response, the girl's mother filed an online petition on the Cheong Wa Dae website, calling for a revision of the law.



According to the petition and media reports, Monday, the man in his 30s, who rented a car from SoCar on Feb. 6, picked up the 13-year-old girl from Seosan, South Chungcheong Province, after they met through an online chat room.



The man allegedly took her to his house in Gyeonggi Province and raped her. He released the girl the next day and she returned home.



The mother said she reported the girl missing to the police at 11:20 a.m. on the day she was taken. Police were able to connect the abduction to the driver of the rental car. When the police requested SoCar to provide GPS information and other details on the user, the company refused to cooperate without a search warrant, citing its obligation to protect private information.



"I called the SoCar call center eight times over two days. I cried and begged, and asked them to hand the man's information to the police if they're not allowed to tell me. But they kept saying they were unable to hand over the information due to the relevant law," she said.



The search warrant was issued on Feb. 7, after the missing girl had returned, but it took an additional day for the police to obtain the information of the perpetrator, as SoCar said the employee in charge of information management was off for the day.



The mother said the girl was able to return safely but the sexual assault could have been prevented if the company had provided the information when the police first requested it.



"Does it make sense to refuse to provide information according to the personal information protection law, when you're able to prevent a crime before it has been committed?" the petitioner said. "For whom does this law exist? I think it should be revised in a rational way."



As public criticism was building over the incident, SoCar CEO Park Jae-wook made a public apology, Feb. 10, for failing to promptly cooperate with the police investigation due to the personal information protection manual. Park said the company will change the manual after consulting with experts so that it can cooperate with law enforcement authorities if a crime has been committed.


Dhaka, Feb 15 : Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Vikram Kumar Doraiswami on Monday said that Bangladesh is India's true and special friend and the friendship is the cornerstone of India's Foreign Policy.

Doraiswami said: "India never showed any 'big-brother' attitude towards Bangladesh. We will do our best to carry forward our committment of strong relations with Bangladesh with 170 million people." The High Commissioner spoke on various aspects of the relationship between the two nations from connectivity to trade, water sharing, border killings, among others.

Doraiswami further said that India is working hard on the Teesta agreement. It is not only a matter of the Centre but the state government is also involved in it.

"Complexity of the Teesta problem is a domestic challenge for India." He made the statement at at the National Press Club organised by the Diplomatic Correspondent Association of Bangladesh (DCAB).

The Indian Envoy also expressed happiness over offering Covid vaccines to Bangladesh Armed Forces.

"We have offered the vaccines to the country. We will be happy to provide the doses to Bangladesh Armed Forces." Doraiswami also said that Bangladesh and India are working on finalising a slew of projects that will be inaugurated during the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Bangladesh on March 26.

Replying to the connectivity project using the Chittagong Port and Akhaura-Agartala route to be made operationalised, he said that a Statutory Regulatory Order (SRO) is needed to the issue and India wants a fair price. The cost of goods transport needs to be finalised first.
Kiki Morris has denied a report suggesting her cosmetic surgery days are behind her.

The former Bachelor star, 33, was said to be giving up plastic surgery and Botox in order to 'age gracefully', according to Sydney Confidential.

But Kiki told Daily Mail Australia on Monday she would 'never say never' to more surgery - but did clarify she had no imminent plans to go under the knife.

Scroll down for video

Never say never! Bachelor in Paradise star Kiki Morris has denied a report suggesting her cosmetic surgery days are behind her

In fact, she underwent a procedure as recently as Saturday.

The Bondi socialite visited Dr. Laith Barnouti over the weekend to receive the Miradry procedure, to reduce her underarm sweating.

The technology is a non-invasive and non-surgical procedure that provides permanent underarm sweat and odour reduction.

Kiki, who starred on last year's season of Bachelor in Paradise, acknowledged she was 'quite familiar with needles', but insisted she was now comfortable in her own skin.

Not so fast: Kiki, 33, was said to be giving up plastic surgery and Botox in order to 'age gracefully', according to Sydney Confidential. However, she underwent a cosmetic procedure to reduce her underarm sweating as recently as Saturday (pictured)

In 2016, Kiki told OK! magazine she underwent a boob job after being bullied for her 'flat chest' in high school.

'I used to get teased for being so flat-chested,' she said, adding that having the procedure 'definitely made me feel less self-conscious'.

In addition to plastic surgery, Kiki is also a fan of cosmetic injectables, including Botox and dermal filler.

Technology: Miradry is a non-invasive and non-surgical procedure that provides permanent underarm sweat and odour reduction

In 2017, she underwent Botox injections to reshape her jawline and relax the muscles around her jaw that had become tight over time.

She said at the time that one reason for getting the procedure was to relieve the severe headaches caused by jaw pressure.

'I'm a notorious jaw clencher in my sleep so much so I wake up with migraines and from that it's contributed to my strong jawline,' she said.

Enhanced: Kiki (left, in an undated calendar shoot; right, earlier this year) acknowledged she was 'quite familiar with needles', but insisted she was now comfortable in her own skin

She added that the procedure helped her 'achieve a slimmer jaw while correcting my jaw clenching habits'.

Meanwhile, Kiki keeps her skin looking smooth with regular laser treatments.

'I get SGA laser treatment on my skin, which helps me with my breakouts and really keeps my skin looking healthy,' she told OK! magazine in 2017.

In addition to this, the bombshell regularly undergoes radiofrequency cavitation to firm the skin around her buttocks.

This procedure is more commonly known as a 'non-surgical Brazilian butt lift'.
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A new item at Christian bookstores in 2020 shot straight to the top of the sales charts: face masks with faith messages.

Christian retailers across the country sold masks with the messages Not Today Satan and This too shall pass, as well as Faith Over Fear, Blessed Beyond Belief, and It is well with my soul, as stores found creative ways to continue business in a pandemic.

Two new industry surveys show that Christian retail was hard hit by COVID-19 and the subsequent safety restrictions, but store owners persisted with stubborn optimism. The Parable Groups 2021 State of Christian Retailing report found more than half of store owners are concerned about cash flow, but 87 percent predict a healthy or steady futureup 12 points from 2019.

More than a third of Christian bookstores were closed for more than two months because of the pandemic. Sales in March, April, and May were down 60 to 80 percent from the previous year. The Christian Retail Association (CRA) reports that sales stayed down for nine months in 2020, only recovering with Christmas shopping in December. Parables survey of 230 stores documented annual sales of $58 million13 percent below 2019 revenue.

Looking at the year, however, individual store owners could see silver linings and Gods faithfulness. Kevin VanDuyne, owner of Joy Christian Bookstore, reported that his two outlets in Indiana were closed for a total of eight months, but his sales were only down 17 percent.

Summary, he wrote on the CRA survey: GOD IS SO AMAZING, GOD IS SO....GOOD!!!

Stephanie Gann, owner of Living Water Bookstore in Paris, Texas, had a similar testimony.

Though I thought the COVID-shutdown would be the end of us, God has been SO faithful, she wrote. Weve been able to pay our bills on time every month, and we had a little leftover at the end of the year.

The industry is no stranger to struggle. Roughly 1,000 Christian bookstores closed between 2010 and 2020, including the two largest chains, Family Christian Stores and LifeWay Christian Stores. Neither recent industry report indicated how many Christian bookstores closed in 2020.

Parable Group president Greg Squires said there were at least a few that went out of business in the pandemic, but the number didnt seem a lot higher than the trend. Its possible the stores that survived the economic crisis and found ways to compete with Amazon in the last decade were the ones in the best position to survive a pandemic-related economic shutdown.

Christian booksellers adapted to COVID-19 conditions, offering curbside pickup and sometimes personal store reservations. One owner in Sheboygan, Michigan, had the store phone redirected to his personal cell and arranged to open the business for individual customers to shop. More than 40 percent of bookstores started delivery services. An increasing number also turned to email promotion, Facebook Live broadcasts, and social media marketing to connect with customers.

For some Christians, the bookstores social media presences served as an important connection point when they were cut off from other interaction. Vicki Geist, owner of Cedar Springs Christian Store in Knoxville, Tennessee, said her store only turned to Facebook Live broadcasts out of necessity, but then found the daily media posts mattered to their customers.

Squires observed that the stores met the spiritual needs of the moment. When customers couldnt go to their local church, they were encouraged and refreshed by finding fellowship in their Christian bookstore, he told Publishers Weekly.

Christian bookstores also saw changes in their customers needs. Homeschool curricula only accounts for a tiny fraction of Christian books, but the retail stores saw a 68 percent increase in the sale of homeschooling materials. Bible salesabout a quarter of Christian bookstores businessincreased by nearly 3 points, with the Zondervans compact New International Version and Tyndale Houses New Living Translation thinline reference Bibles topping the years bestsellers.

We have seen a great interest in Bibles since we opened back up, said Phillis Cowan, owner of Bread of Life in Melbourne, Arkansas. Also, prophecy and end times books are selling as well as books and gifts with the hope theme.

Retailers also saw an increase in sales of church supplies, despite the drop in sales of Easter items and vacation Bible school curricula. According to the CRA report, the top three items sold in 2020 were Bibles, masks, and single-serving fellowship cups.

According to the CRA survey, about a third of Christian stores plan to keep selling face masks for the foreseeable future, offering customers a chance to wear their faith on their faces, with messages like I can do all things through Christ, Wanna taco bout Jesus? and the straightforward Hope.

The retailers themselves are not just optimistic about the future. Theyre actively preparing. At the Christian Product Expo in Wilmington, Delaware, this winter, representatives from 56 stores placed more than 1,300 orders for books and items to sell in 2021.

It is a bright, shining new year, said Bob Munce, president of CRA, and therefore, a great opportunity."
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has been appointed as the director-general of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Okonjo-Iwealas appointment was an...

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has been appointed as the director-general of the World Trade Organisation (WTO).

Okonjo-Iwealas appointment was announced on Monday by the Geneva-based organisation.

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala from Nigeria is appointed as the next WTO Director-General. Dr Okonjo-Iweala makes history as the first woman and the first African to lead the WTO, the WTO announced on Twitter.

Her term starts on the 1st of March 2021.

WTO members took the decision to appoint @NOIweala at a special meeting of the General Council, following a selection process that included eight candidates from around the world.





BREAKING: Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala from Nigeria is appointed as the next WTO Director-General.



Dr. Okonjo-Iweala makes history as the first woman and the first African to lead the WTO.



Her term starts on the 1st of March 2021.



More details soon. #WTODG@NOIweala pic.twitter.com/2RJkkfK2Id  WTO (@wto) February 15, 2021





All WTO member countries except the US had voted Okonjo-Iweala as their preferred candidate in 2020.

However, the United States said it favoured her opponent; South Koreas Yoo Myung-hee because the WTO needs someone with real, hands-on experience in the field

More to follow
The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Ulema, civil society and local administration agreed to demonstrate exemplary unity on matter pertaining to restoration of historic Prahladpuri temple in the city

MULTAN, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :Ulema, civil society and local administration agreed to demonstrate exemplary unity on matter pertaining to restoration of historic Prahladpuri temple in the city.

Prahladpuri temple is located near shrine of Hazrat Bahauddin Zakariya (RA).

It is the historic temple of the Hindus, from where, the Holi festival commenced and spread from across the world.

Holi is festival of colours and is very much popular in Hinduism.

The temple was allegedly demaged by a protesting mob in retaliation to martyrdom of Babari Masjid in "Ayodhya" (India) by the Hindus extremists in 1992.

In a meeting of Peace Committee, it was agreed that exemplary unity would be demonstrated. The committee observed that minorities enjoyed complete religious freedom in the country. They also remarked that they had not any objection on restoration of the temple. The Peace Committee will facilitate in ensuring implementation on supreme court order related to restoration of the temple.

Special Assistant to Prime Minister of Political Affairs Malik Aamir Dogar addressing the Peace Committee sought cooperation from Ulema and Civil Society to maintain peaceful environment in the city. He stated that role of all religious school of thoughts was of very importance in restoration of the temple.

"The temple is not constructed but it is restored", he stated. Following Supreme Court direction, the restoration work was being started at the temple. Dogar stated that Prime Minister Imran Khan gave concept to develop country on the pattern of "State of Madinah".

Commissioner Javed Akhtar Mahmood in his remarks stated that Punjab government entrusted all powers to district administration for maintaining peace in the city. The country's constitution guaranteed protection and delivery of rights to minorities. The restoration of the temple will not only help restoration of historic "Versa" (Heritage) but also promote international tourism, stated Commissioner.

Regional Police Officer Syed Khurram stated that they all would have to play role for peace. In Pakistan, all the temples were safe and secure. The minorities were playing an important role in the development of Pakistan.

Ulema also spoke and stated that opening of Kartarpur Corridor also improved image of Pakistan at global level. islam is religion of peace, they stated. The restoration of temple in Pakistan was a slapped-on face of Modi government, they hinted.

The meeting participants also agreed to constitute Inter Faith Committee. On this occasion, officials of different departments were also present.
Chris Marquette / Hearst Connecticut Media

WESTPORT  A 33-year-old Philadelphia man is accused of hacking into his former employers computer system, police said.

Yigitali Ercan, 33, was arrested Feb. 9 and charged with second-degree computer crime.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Congress on Monday termed the arrest of climate activist Disha Ravi as 'shocking' and 'unfortunate' and asked if the 'state was so weak that a tweet threatened its security'.

"Is the state so weak that a tweet threatens its security? Is the state so paranoid that a 22 year is a national security threat? Is the state so intolerant that it cannot tolerate youth standing with farmers? Is this the "badlav" Modiji wanted?": Congress leader Kapil Sibal tweeted after mentioning Disha Ravi's name.

The party's Deputy leader in Rajya Sabha, Anand Sharma tweeted on Sunday: "Police should recognise her right to liberty and courts must respect the Supreme Court Judgement which says bail is the rule and Jail an exception. Arrest of climate activist Disha Ravi is most unfortunate and shocking. Custodial interrogation of a young woman without any criminal antecedents cannot be justified." Congress social media head in Kerala, Anil K. Antony told IANS: "Ridiculous to see these young activists bullied by the state machinery. The right to dissent is a basic right in a democracy." The role of two more activists is also under scanner in the 'Toolkit' document case shared by global climate activist Greta Thunberg in support of the farmer protests. Non-bailable warrants have been issued against activists Nikita Jacob, who is a lawyer by profession, and Shantanu as a police team is looking for them.

The development comes at a time when outrage is spiralling over the arrest of Disha Ravi, a Bengaluru college graduate and climate activist, on conspiracy and sedition charges. Disha Ravi was produced in a Delhi court on Sunday and was sent to five-day police custody.

Nikita's social media profile states that she is a practicing advocate enrolled with the Maharashtra and Goa State Bar Council and registered with the Bombay High Court.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
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Japan is contemplating a response to China's imposition of a new law that gives permission to its coast guard to open fire on any foreign vessel deemed a threat to its sovereignty. The controversial law that came into effect on February 1, allows the Chinese coast guard to open fire on foreign vessels sailing on waters claimed by Beijing. The law has raised an alarm in Tokyo because of the ongoing dispute between China and Japan over the Senkaku Islands, where Chinese and Japanese vessels regularly lock horns against each other.

Read: China Law Empowers Coast Guard To Use Force Amid Disputes

The concern in Japan has increased in the recent past, particularly because of Article 9 of the Japanese constitution that prevents the country's Self-Defence Forces (SDF) from engaging in violent responses. The calls to amend the Article, and in some cases to entirely remove it, have grown lately, since increased Chinese military presence in the Senkaku islands. Both China and Japan claim the islands as their own, but tensions between Tokyo and Beijing have reached a new height in the past decade.

Read: Japan Protests China's Two Coast Guard Ships Near Disputed Islands

'Must respect international law'

According to the US Department of Defence, China has doubled its coast guard fleet in the last ten years, from about 60 in 2010 to more than 130 as of 2020. Earlier this month, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato conveyed "strong concern" to China, saying Beijing must not use the new coast guard legislation in a way that goes against the international protocol established by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

Read: US Coast Guard Searching For 6 Boaters Off The Florida Coast

Japan is not the only country concerned with the new Chinese coast guard law. The move raises concerns for nations operating vessels in China-claimed waters, including Taiwan, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. The new law would also allow the Chinese coast guard to detain, and tow vessels. China says the law is meant to protect its marine resources, including the indigenous fishing industry.

Read: China Passes Law That Gives Coast Guard Free Hand To Open Fire On Foreign Vessels


Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (left) and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (right) spoke on the phone on Wednesday

The world's biggest vaccine manufacturer said Monday it would deliver COVID-19 shots from India to Canada "in less than a month", days after a phone call between the two nations' leaders following a diplomatic row over protests by farmers.

Indiaknown as the world's pharmacyhas stepped up worldwide shipments of the jabs manufactured by the Serum Institute of India, which has emerged as a major player in the fight against coronavirus, as a form of "vaccine diplomacy".

The Serum Institute's chief executive Adar Poonawalla said his company was awaiting regulatory approval from Canada.

"I assure you, @SerumInstIndia will fly out #COVISHIELD to Canada in less than a month; I'm on it!," Poonawalla tweeted.

Covishield is the name the Serum Institute uses for the vaccine developed by the British-Swedish firm AstraZeneca with Oxford University, which it mass-produces in India.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday tweeted that India "would do its best to facilitate supplies of COVID vaccines sought by Canada", following a phone conversation between him and his counterpart in Ottawa Justin Trudeau.

The number of doses to be shipped to Canada has not been disclosed, although the Hindustan Times reported Sunday that there could be an initial shipment of 500,000 shots to the nation of 38 million people.

Trudeau's government has faced growing criticism in recent weeks after its immunisation effort hit a bump, with no domestic production capabilities and deliveries of the first authorised Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna doses sourced from Europe delayed while the number of COVID-19 cases spiked.

The Canadian leader in December released a video on Twitter saying the farmers protesting in India against new agriculture laws should be allowed to stage peaceful demonstrations.

Tens of thousands of farmers have camped on roads leading into the capital New Delhi since late November in one of the biggest challenges to Modi's government since it came to power in 2014.

Trudeau's comments angered the Indian government, with the country summoning Canada's ambassador and warning of serious damage to diplomatic ties.

He had refused to back down, saying Ottawa would always back the rights of peaceful demonstrators.

In New Delhi's readout of the call between the two leaders on Wednesday, the farmers' demonstration was not specifically mentioned.

But the statement added that the "leaders discussed Canada and India's commitment to democratic principles, recent protests, and the importance of resolving issues through dialogue".

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 AFP
WHATELY  Covestro had quite a year in 2020 and is sailing into 2021 on strong winds from its work to assist during the COVID-19 pandemic. The company earned a legislative salute for helping to protect Americas frontline health care workers and first responders.

Based in Germany, Covestro is a global organization running U.S. operations out of its headquarters in Pittsburgh. There are several manufacturing plants in this country, including one in Whately. The company makes specialty films used in everyday products, spanning multiple industries including automotive, electronics, packaging and health care.

The company is playing a crucial role amid the pandemic, manufacturing materials used to make face shields and protective gowns. The business is running nonstop, with employees working 24/7 to handle demand. Being named Manufacturer of the Year in the Hampshire, Franklin and Worcester state Senate district was big news in Covestros world.

Our employees work hard and to be recognized as a manufacturer of the year in Massachusetts is huge, and it helps us from a recruiting standpoint too, says Robert Walker, head of external communications for Covestro in the U.S. As we look to filling open jobs and the future workforce, we can talk about the stability of the business, the quality of our work, and the recognition we receive. It goes a long way toward attracting new talent.

Covestro shuffled its manufacturing operation to handle increasing demand for personal protective equipment (PPE), increasing production of materials for the effort while dealing with a dip in the automotive industry.

Market research tells us the automotive industry is going to rebound in 2021 and were certainly well positioned to deal with the increasing demand, Walker says. I also think the medical business will remain relatively strong for the rest of the year.

Identification is another important industry for Covestro. Specialized security features embedded in documents like passports and drivers licenses make them more difficult to forge. Smarter IDs also means developing even more advanced products as identification becomes digital, according to Walker.

That whole market segment is headed strongly toward digitalization, turning to fingerprint identification in some applications. The film you actually put your fingerprint on is what were talking about here, he explains.

Covestro employs some 180 people in Whately, each encouraged to follow the companys lead and give back to the community. Covestro allows its employees 16 hours of paid time for community service.

We have a commitment to the business and the surrounding area. Across Covestro in the US weve got a really good history of giving back to the community and supporting community initiatives. We recognize the importance of being a good neighbor and that plays out strongly at the South Deerfield site, says Walker. (Covestro refers to the plant being in Deerfield, although it is physically in Whately.)

Walker is predicting a strong 2021 for Covestro. Its specialty films are found in thousands of products, from paints, coatings, adhesives and sealants to clothing, footwear and scratch resistant polycarbonate film for iPhone covers. Its an immensely diversified business with a strong, ongoing presence in Franklin County.


Saffron Schedewy-Johnson, right, feared her grandmother might die.



Pat Schedewy shortly after the accident.

Frustration over the state of Warkworths footpaths has again boiled to the surface after two women were hospitalised, following horrific trips and falls at the same place on Elizabeth Street within three days.

And Rodney Local Board member Tim Holdgate, whose wife, Yvonne, suffered in one of the falls, says a botched repair job by Auckland Transport has made footpath worse than it was before.

The first fall occurred on Wednesday, January 27, when Pat Schedewy, 76, tripped on an uneven patchwork of concrete and fell flat on her face.

She was accompanied at the time by her granddaughter Saffron Schedewy-Johnson, 16.

Saffron says she feared for her grandmothers life, as she subsequently went in and out and consciousness and suffered several seizures while Saffron cradled her in her arms.

Saffron had the presence of mind to call her mother, Katrina, who arrived within minutes from Life Pharmacy where she works.

An ambulance was called and then, following a long delay, called a second time when Pats condition deteriorated further.

Meanwhile, police arrived with resuscitation equipment and a defibrillator.

Pat subsequently spent two nights in hospital. Upon her release, her daughter, Vanessa, travelled up from Taupo to help take care of her when it proved she needed assistance getting washed and dressed.

She was very frustrated and weepy because she is a very independent woman. She does not like being a burden, Katrina says.

AT undertook some repairs to the footpath on Wednesday evening, but on Friday, Yvonne Holdgate, 64, tripped in the same area and broke her hip  putting her in hospital for several days.

Mr Holdgate says ATs repair on Wednesday was just a slap-happy job that placed some bitumen to even out one small area that required attention, but this simply exacerbated the uneven surface, and a much larger area needed to be covered.

AT is renowned for these little patch-up jobs, but that flies in the face of the importance of the thing, he says.

Mr Holdgate has lodged a formal complaint with AT, insisting they should be auditing Warkworths footpaths in a much better way.

His sentiments are echoed by Vanessa Schedewy, who notes that Warkworth has a large elderly population especially vulnerable to falls.

Is it going to take someone falling over and killing themselves before the footpaths are fixed properly? she asks.

Mr Holdgate says he will also lobby fellow Rodney Local Board members to allocate money from Rodneys Transport Targeted Rate to upgrading footpaths.

AT spokesperson Mark Hannan says AT was disturbed to hear that two people have been injured on the footpath and plans to replace a section of about 50 metres within the next month.

Mr Hannan says that in the meantime, the footpath has been made safe and the work was done within two hours of the first accident.

He did not comment on Mr Holdgates assertion that the repair job made the situation worse, nor, if it had been made safe why a second accident had occurred.

He did say Auckland Transport inspects footpaths regularly to ensure that they are up to the required standard.

In February 2019, Mahurangi Matters reported the case of an 85-year-old-woman who had to be hospitalised after tripping on a footpath hazard in Percy Street, Warkworth. The incident sparked an audit of footpath trip hazards in Warkworth and the repair of several danger spots.
One month after Ford announced the closure of all three of its remaining plants in Brazil, other companies linked to its production chain are dismissing their workers, unleashing a wave of layoffs affecting the most diverse sectors of the auto industry. According to research by the Interunion Department of Statistics and Socioeconomic Studies (DIEESE), the 5,000 layoffs announced by Ford spell the potential destruction of another 118,864 jobs, resulting in a loss of 2.5 billion reais (US$465 million) in annual wages.

Based on this perspective, one can predict a wave of opposition among Brazilian workers. On January 26, about 800 workers at the auto parts manufacturer Arteb, located in the ABC industrial complex in Sao Paulo, went on strike to protest against 200 layoffs. Founded in 1934, Arteb produces headlights and headlamps for major automakers, and blamed the layoffs on the Fords closures in Brazil. Workers were fired by mail.

The strike was led by the ABC Metalworkers Union (SMABC), affiliated to the Workers Party (PT)-controlled CUT federation, and was ended within just two days. The union acted quickly to keep the strike isolated, without making any call to other workers in the region who will soon face the same situation. Attributing the layoffs to the companys previous financial problems and the already normalized high unemployment rate in the industry, SMABCs general secretary, Moises Selerges, proposed ending the strike.

Ford assembly. Photo by: Sam VarnHagen/Ford Media

The situation was complicated. Its not only the issue of Arteb, but the industry as a whole. Industry is under water because this government has no industrial policy, said Selerges during a meeting with the workers. As I told you in the beginning, the union was heading to a possible agreement. So this was the possible agreement that we reached.

The possible agreement reached by the union accepted the 200 layoffs. Even in the face of this clear defeat for the workers, the union still tried to boast that the negotiation had guaranteed severance pay, the extension of medical benefits until September and payment for the days on strike.

An announcement on the SMABC website on January 21 had already warned about the generalized nature of the Ford effect, which is evident from the recent reduction of working hours in the factories in the ABC region that used to serve the automaker.

With the announcement of Fords closure, we are concerned about a domino effect on auto parts in our region, since several companies supply products to the automaker, including the auto parts plants, said another union official, Genildo Dias Pereira. In Sao Bernardo, just as an example, we have Samot, Fiamm, Rassini, ZHS, Mahle, Selco, among many others. Not to mention Arteb, which is already closing its Camacari plant [in the state of Bahia, where Ford had one of its factories] after the decision.

This statement reveals that the SMABC already foresaw the layoffs at Arteb and other plants. Their action during the strike exposes the decisive role of the unions in this process: any spark of resistance must be rapidly extinguished so that it doesnt spread into a generalized movement of the working class.

While the CUT fulfills its role in the ABC region, its branch in the city of Taubate, in the countryside of Sao Paulo, is working to control the anger of 830 workers fired from one of Fords plants. Since the closure was announced, a group of employees has taken turns to maintain a permanent vigil in front of the plant, preventing its machinery from being removed. The Taubate Metalworkers Union (Sindimetau), however, is working to divert the workers away from any concrete struggle against capitalism, and in fact pushing all earthly issues aside.

In a motorcade held on January 29, the Sindimetau union officials led the workers in a religious ritual, taking about 300 cars to Brazils largest cathedral in Aparecida. Reporting on the motorcade, the union declared: Messages from the Worker of Nazareth in the fight against the scourge of unemployment strengthened workers at the mass this Friday at the National Shrine of Aparecida.

As it tries to calm workers anger with religious sermons and hopes for a miracle falling from the sky, the union is increasingly disarming their struggle, trying to divert it into purely legal and parliamentary channels.

Three civil inquiries were opened by the Public Ministry of Labour in the regions where Ford is shutting down production. On February 5, decisions by two labor judges suspended the possibility of collective dismissal of Ford employees working in the Taubate and Camacari plants.

According to Judge Andreia de Oliveira, head of the Second Labor Court of Taubate, The size of the company, the number of direct and indirect jobs affected and the social impact to the country do not allow for a simplistic solution to the case. The judge responsible for analyzing the Camacari case, on the other hand, stated that any mass layoffs without communication and negotiation with the union will be full of insurmountable vices, violating the constitutional rights of the workers.

The court decisions, however, are temporary, conditioning the suspension of the layoffs on the negotiation of severance pay with the respective unions.

According to a report on the UOL Cars website, Ford has already allocated US$ 4.2 billion for the shutdown of its operations in Brazil. Most of this amount will go to compensation for dealerships, factory workers, suppliers and companies providing services at the plants, as well as paying off outstanding loans from the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES).

Everything indicates that the workers will confront a tentative agreement negotiated between the unions and Ford, similar to the one reached at the Sao Bernardo do Campo plant, which was closed in 2019. The unions are following the same political roadmap used by the SMABC then. On that occasion, the World Socialist Web Site analyzed:

When the news of the Ford closure broke, the SMABC did everything in its power to wear down the workers, who went on a 42-day strike. The union discouraged any move to occupy the plant or actions to widen the struggle. The union instead told striking workers to go home and wait for negotiations. It refused to call for any unified action with contract workers or the 20,000 affected in the auto parts industry. It finally shut down the strike on managements terms, acting in collaboration with the Sao Paulo government, which announced it would serve as an intermediary in Fords negotiations with Caoa [the company that first signaled interest in buying the plant].

As is now known, no other car manufacturer took over the plant, and the area was bought to be possibly transformed into a logistics center or a shopping mall. However, Julio Bonfim, president of the Camacari Metalworkers Union and Maoist Communist Party of Brazil (PCdoB) official, is now using this very promisethat another carmaker will take over production at the plantto deceive the workers.

While working with the governor of Bahia, Rui Costa of the PT, on a committee searching for companies interested in operating the automotive park, Bonfim is already taking the layoffs for granted, calling only for severance pay. If Ford has closed its activities and there is no chance of remaining in Camacari, then let them negotiate severance pay in a fair way, he said.

No severance pay can compensate for the overwhelming consequences of the massive unemployment to come. Of the nearly 6,000 workers employed by Ford in Brazil today, 4,600 (75 percent) of them work at the Ford Complex in Camacari. Much of the citys economy is dependent upon the industrial complex. The citys mayor has already announced cuts in public education and health care in response to the loss of 10 percent of tax revenue, while demand for these services will only increase as thousands of workers lose their medical care after being thrown out of work.

It is significant that while all the unions involved are associated with the same political forces, ultimately the Workers Party, no unified struggle is being organized among the workers they purport to represent. It is necessary that workers draw the lessons of the betrayal of the struggle against the 2019 closure of the Ford plant in ABC. This means breaking with the union leaderships that are leading them into another devastating defeat and building independent rank-and-file committees to organize a united struggle against layoffs and plant closures.
Modi has been winning election after election and as of now, he remains as an unchallenged national leader of India for all practical purposes.

by N.S.Venkataraman

For the last nineteen years, when Narendra Modi has been the Chief Minister of Gujarat and later on as Prime Minister of India, he has been receiving bouquets and brickbats from cross section of countrymen.

Modis ardent admirers have recognized every aspect of his personal life, public life and committed administrative capability. At the same time, his sworn critics have been trying hard to find negatives in him and have not hesitated to use the most abusive language against Modi, with the specific objective of tarnishing his fair image in the country. When Modi was Chief Minister of Gujarat, he was described as merchant of death by an opposition party leader. As Prime Minister , he has been constantly abused with various un savoury terms such as thief, liar and now as coward by section of opposition parties. A lady chief Minister of a state went to the extent of stating that Modi should be slapped on his face.

Nevertheless, Modi has been winning election after election and as of now, he remains as an unchallenged national leader of India for all practical purposes.

What is remarkable about Modi is that he has ignored his critics with what looks like an element of contempt and has not changed his path and style of functioning.

Now, many people believe that Modi would win the next parliamentary election also with thumping majority and Modi can be replaced only by Modi voluntarily quitting.

It is high time that the ardent admirers of Modi and his bitter critics dispassionately examine his attributes .

Certainly, one of the biggest trump cards for Modi is the discipline that he maintains in his personal life, clean image as non corruptible person as well as the impression that he is a determined achiever and hard task master. Many people believe that these are the qualities that an Indian leader needs and none of his predecessors had such attributes to the extent that Modi has. Certainly, Indians respect a honest and benevolent and strong leader, even if , sometimes, he is dictatorial with honest intentions.

Of course, Modi is a staunch Hindu and he cherishes the ethos of Hindu religion and has not concealed this. The fact that he participates in traditional Hindu rituals in temples indicates his courage of conviction. He has not bothered even after knowing that his critics would call such practice as anti secular stance and even describe him as Hindu extremist. Somehow, some activists in India seem to think that participating in rituals of Muslim religion or Christian religion mean one being non secular and participating in Hindu rituals mean one is anti secular.

Coming from a very poor family and having seen poverty in his younger days, Modi clearly understands the need of the poor people and their aspirations.

Clearly realizing the urgency to lift millions of poor people from poverty and negative conditions in life , Modi is trying to solve the problems of the poor people as early as possible. He has given considerable importance to construct millions of toilets for poor families , distribute free LPG connection to the poor, introduce free housing scheme for lower income group, to enable poor people to open zero bank account, so that the welfare benefits would be transferred to the poor people directly by avoiding middle men. etc. Further, his health insurance scheme for the poor is an extraordinary measure of far reaching significance to the poor families. All such welfare schemes are meant to give immediate relief to the poor people, as they cannot wait endlessly for better conditions.

Realising that corruption is deep rooted in the country and corruption cannot be eliminated without strong government policies , he introduced Binami Act and other measures and even resorted to demonetization in a desperate attempt to check the black money circulation.

Further , realizing that personal discipline is the utmost priority, he focused on promoting yoga culture , which has now caught the imagination of considerable section of country men. His Clean India campaign is a priority measure much needed .

While knowing that any move to promote private sector and privatization of public enterprises would be viewed by section of critics as anti poor strategy, Modi correctly thinks that the government should focus on governance and to the extent possible, leave the business and industries in the hands of the private sector. He recognizes the fact that private sector enterprises need not be suspected and they can be as loyal to the countrys cause as anyone else. He aptly and boldly calls them as wealth creators and inevitably such created wealth would dissipate to every strata of society in the course of time . He believes that this is the only way to promote rapid economic growth , which would inevitably help in lifting the poor section of people out of poverty.

There are several schemes of the past government such as Aadhar, MNREGA and agricultural reform measures, which Modi has recognized and implemented with much greater speed and dynamism.

Of course, the political parties which earlier wanted these measures to be implemented are now opposing the same and Modi remains undisturbed by such motivated criticism.

Modis Atmanirbhar scheme and Make in India campaign are very sound strategies that provide an opportunity to the countrymen at various level in building resurgent India.

Today, Modi is challenged on several fronts.

A section of farmers in two states with active support from some activists and separatist groups are creating problems, for whatever reasons. COVID 19 crisis has uprooted several of his development plans. The collusion between Pakistan and China are posing great threat to Indias security. A section of media and some opposition parties and section of activists are leaving no stone unturned to derail the development plans of Modi by constantly criticizing all his moves. The animosity of critics towards Modi is to such an extent that when Modi applauded the outgoing leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha and praised him in an emotional manner, the critics find ulterior motive and even have said that Hitler and Mussolini too have shed tears on certain occasions as a political tactic.

All said and done, it is a fact that Modi has not eradicated corruption totally in India, has not eliminated poverty to any appreciable level and the performance of the government machinery , particularly in the state level have not improved to the desirable extent. The streets in the country are still not adequately clean inspite of his Clean India campaign.

The criticism that Modi sometimes relaxes his approach for political reasons and to win elections could also be partly true.

Certainly, Modi still has a long way to go to meet the countrys needs and expectations in full measure. However, the fact that the present state is a case of work in progress is clearly evident.

Alleviating poverty in India is not a quick fix job and requires steady and forward looking policy measures.

Large section of countrymen seem to realize that the way forward is not to replace Modi and his stewardship but support him in his endeavours in all possible ways and cooperate with his strategies.

The personal credibility of Modi is still in tact. Large section of countrymen do not have an iota of doubt about the commitment of Modi for Indias short term and long term progress and the countrymen also clearly see that there is no other political leader in India today who measures upto Modis standards.

It is true that no leader is really indispensable in any country. However, the person would become indispensable, only if a better person would emerge as political leader. Where is the better leader in the horizon ?
Rose wines are typically among the first new wine releases of spring, a sign of warmer days to come. (Shutterstock/barmalini)

Wine Talk: Time to Think Pink

The arrival of Valentines Day marks a turning point for many wine enthusiasts, particularly those who have recently come to love dry rose wines.

Not only is dry rose a natural for the Valentines tradition, but it also signals the coming of spring and warmer days. Rose wines, which are seldom aged in oak barrels, are typically among the first new wine releases of spring.

This coincides with a natural move away from the heavier reds and richer whites we favor in the cold winter months, and a move toward fresher, brighter, zestier wines that are more in tune with the weather, and hence, our mood throughout the rest of the year.

Sales of dry rose have surged in recent years, as more wine lovers have discovered the remarkable versatility of these wines. Rose from France is typically made from pinot noir or one of the Rhone grape varieties, such as grenache or cinsault. Rose from Italy, where it is called rosato, is frequently made from sangiovese. In Spain, where it is called rosado, the favored grapes for dry rose are tempranillo and garnacha (same as grenache in France).

Rose made in the United States is all over the map. In the Eastern states, the Catawba grape is prominent. But that makes for a sweeter wine that isnt universally popular. In the Western states, the Rhone grape varieties and pinot noir tend to prevail.

A few prominent producers that make excellent dry rose include Etude of the Napa Valley in California (made with pinot noir) and Eberle of Paso Robles, California (made with syrah).

What makes these wines so appealing is their crisp, bright fruit structure and their versatility with food. You could enjoy the Eberle Rose of Syrah with virtually any grilled fish, game fowl, grilled sausages, or even a barbecued steak. Or you could simply quaff it on a warm spring day.

There might still be snow piled up in your driveway, but now that Valentines Day has come and gone, warmer days are just ahead. Its time to think pink.

Tasting Notes

Wines are rated on a 100-point scale. Wines are chosen for review because they represent outstanding quality or value, and the scores are simply a measure of this reviewers enthusiasm for the recommended wine.

Domaine Carneros by Taittinger 2013 Brut Rose, Carneros ($39): The common thread that runs through all of the Domaine Carneros sparkling wines is elegance. Always beautifully balanced, complex in aroma and flavor, and exquisitely proportioned, this is so very true of the 2013 Brut Rose. Delicate aromas of peach, strawberry, and red berry, and a touch of spice make this one of the most impressive domestic sparkling roses you are likely to encounter. Rating: 96.

Gloria Ferrer Blanc de Blancs, Carneros ($22): Rich and luscious with hints of lemon and brioche, Gloria Ferrers Blanc de Blancs is without a doubt among the greatest values in sparkling wine today. Rating: 94.

Gloria Ferrer Blanc de Noirs, Carneros ($22): Glorias Blanc de Noirs is a paragon of consistency and one of the great values in sparkling wine. This latest release shows mouthwatering red fruits with good balance and impressive length on the finish. Rating: 91.

Rodney Strong 2014 Chardonnay, Estate, Sonoma County ($17): You could make an argument that Rodney Strong invented the California chardonnay craze, but Kendall-Jackson might dispute it. That said, Rod Strong was certainly one of the earliest champions of California chardonnay, and that legacy has been maintained through the decades by winemaker Rick Sayre. This one shows rich notes of pear and apple, and a hint of wood smoke and spice. Its a crowd pleaser with a great price. Rating: 90.

Rodney Strong 2014 Chardonnay, Estate, Sonoma County. (Courtesy of Rodney Strong)

Follow Robert on Twitter at @wineguru. To find out more about Robert Whitley and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at Creators.com. Email Robert at whitleyonwine@yahoo.com. Copyright 2021 Creators.com
Oregon Promotes Teacher Training Program to Dismantle Racism in Mathematics

Oregons Education Department is promoting a training program that will offer a toolkit to help teachers develop an anti-racist math practice.

As noted in a newsletter sent by the department, middle school teachers are encouraged to register for a Feb. 21 course titled A Pathway to Equitable Math Instruction, which they say is designed to help them make use of key tools for engagement [and] strategies to improve equitable outcomes for Black, Latinx, and multilingual students.

According to the toolkit, one of the ways to achieve this goal is by visiblizing [sic] the toxic characteristics of white supremacy culture with respect to math. The alleged toxic characteristics include, among many others, focusing on getting the right answer, students being required to show their work, and teachers treating mistakes as problems by equating them with wrongness.

Upholding the idea that there are always right and wrong answers perpetuate objectivity as well as fear of open conflict, the toolkit states in reference to setting the focus on getting the right answer. Instead, teachers are recommended to have students come up with at least two answers that might solve the problem, and challenge standardized test questions by justifying other answers other than the right one by unpacking the assumptions that are made in the problem.

Teachers are also expected to learn to distinguish between a mistake and a misunderstanding because white supremacy culture shows up in math classrooms when addressing mistakes, according to the toolkit.

The toolkit links to a workbook titled Dismantling Racism for reference. The workbook similarly identifies the belief in objectivity as a characteristic of white supremacy, claiming that it is racist to believe there is such a thing as being objective or neutral, and that one should assume that everybody has a valid point.

Its unclear to what extent teachers are expected to incorporate the workbook into their teaching. One section of the workbook claims that only white people can be racist in our society, because only white people as a group have that power.

The newsletter gained media attention amid a heated debate over critical race theory (CRT) and its role in Americas social and cultural institutions. An outgrowth of the European Marxist school of critical theory, the CRT labels the very foundations of the American system, such as rationalism, constitutional law, and legal reasoning, as tools of racial oppression.

Last year, the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which is part of the taxpayer-funded Smithsonian Institute, came under fire because of a display about whiteness. The museum suggested that valuing things such as the nuclear family, objective, rational, linear thinking, and rigid time schedule are manifestations of the alleged white culture.
A pregnant mother from Alabama has been shot dead by her boyfriend in a suspected murder-suicide, but thanks to the quick actions of paramedics, the woman's unborn baby was saved.

Police in Scottsboro received a 911 call at 6.15am on Wednesday about a suspicious vehicle stopped in the roadway at Maple Street and North Houston Street.

Officers who responded to the scene discovered a man and a woman dead inside the car from gunshot wounds.

Police in Alabama say Owen Williamson, 33, shot and killed his eight-months-pregnant girlfriend, Amber Coffman, 35 (pictured together, left) before turning the gun on himself

Three days before the tragedy, Williamson shared a video of himself brandishing a gun while singing along with a rap song in his car

The female victim, identified as 35-year-old mother-of-three Amber Coffman, was eight months pregnant with her fourth child.

Paramedics who were called to the scene rushed Coffman to Highlands Medical Center and performed CPR on her in the ambulance to maintain blood flow and oxygen levels in an effort to keep her fetus alive, reported Al.com.

The child, a boy, was born weighing 4lbs and was transferred to Huntsville Hospital for further care. He was listed in critical condition on Friday.

Scottsboro police investigators say they believe Coffman's boyfriend, 33-year-old Owen Williamson, shot her before turning the gun on himself.

Paramedics and doctors were able to save Coffman's unborn son, who was born weighing just 4lbs. The woman and Williamson couple had been together since 2018

Coffman is survived by her four children, the eldest being her 13-year-old daughter

The case is being investigated as a murder-suicide, but the motive remains unknown.

Just two days before the tragedy, Williamson posted a status update mourning the death of his aunt.

A day prior, he shared a video on his Facebook page, showing him brandishing a handgun inside his car while singing along to a rap song.

Coffman's final Facebook post dated February 9 read: 'Without questions  please pray for our family.'

Coffman and Williamsons had been together since 2018, according to social media posts.

The woman is survived by her four children, the eldest being 13 years old and the youngest less than a week old.
It's being reported this today that France is pushing for the EUs upcoming regulations on Big Tech to be changed so that member states could wield more power to punish bad behaviour and police more types of content, according to the Financial Times.

Cedric O, the French minister for the digital economy, has met with senior EU officials and members of the European parliament in recent weeks to push Frances case. On Wednesday he met Thierry Breton, the European commissioner in charge of the upcoming legislation.

Breton told the Financial Times: "We are getting pretty active in terms of talking to various people about the upcoming tech regulation. Getting these laws passed is a major objective of ours for when France next holds the rotating presidency of the EU Council next year. He added: "They touch on vitally important subjects both for our economies and democracies."

Separately, France is also pushing for the DSA to widen beyond illegal content to the policing of harmful content and disinformation. Cedric O stated: "We think the text needs to be broadened to include other types of problematic content. If there is no legal framework there is nothing to stop Twitter or Facebook from censoring speech they do not like."

The expansion of the DSA has taken on new importance after Facebook and Twitter banned President Donald Trump, prompting EU leaders to wonder if a legal framework should underpin such decisions. For the full story, read the report by the Financial Times written by Javier Espinoza in Brussels and Leila Abboud in Paris.

Back in May 2020 Cedric O had a run in with Apple over their COVID app that needed Apple's co-operation which never came. Cedric O at the time was angry over the issue and reportedly stated that "they'll remember that" referring to France.

We posted a follow-up report on this issue in late September titled "France Seeks Payback for Apple refusing to Assist their Native Contact Tracing App by proposing a new EU Law to Force Apple's hand." The report noted that the European Union (EU) was reportedly set to consider new laws that would prohibit mobile device makers, like Apple, from restricting access to the NFC technology in their products.

(Click on image to Enlarge)

So while the newly proposed regulations are bound to hit all U.S. tech companies, we specifically know that France will use them to strike back at Apple, going by their past statements on record. The other EU countries should ensure that France doesn't abuse the new regulations as a means of payback to tech companies that don't bow to France's every command.
OTTAWA, ON, Feb. 15, 2021 /CNW/ - The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today issued the following statement on National Flag of Canada Day:

"Today we celebrate the 56th anniversary of our national flag, a Canadian symbol that unites us from coast to coast to coast, and around the world.

"Every day, the Maple Leaf flies in our communities, at Canadian diplomatic missions around the world, and on Parliament Hill. It represents the ideals of peace, justice, diversity, and equality that are central to our Canadian identity. As it was for previous generations, it is our duty to protect, promote, and practice these values everyday, so they can continue to bring us together and guide those who will come after.

"The past year has been difficult for many of us, but it has also shown us the courage, empathy, and generosity of Canadians  and together, we have remained strong and determined. All Canadians have made sacrifices, shown compassion, and helped their communities. Their actions to protect other people's health and safety are a testament to the values that make us Canadians, and the values embodied in our flag.

"As the Government of Canada continues to work with all orders of government, let us celebrate the flag that unites us and the values and ideals it represents. Together, we can build back better and make our country stronger, more inclusive, and more resilient."

This document is also available at http://pm.gc.ca.

SOURCE Prime Minister's Office

For further information: PMO Media Relations: [email protected]

Related Links

http://pm.gc.ca/


NXIVM leader Keith Raniere is recovering from COVID-19 in his Arizona prison.

And the convicted sex trafficker has some new attorneys to help him attempt to legally recover from his federal convictions and 120-year prison sentence.

The new lawyers, who will be working on Raniere's appeal, are closely tied to the fight against wrongful convictions  and are affiliated with Christopher Darden, a prosecutor in the O.J. Simpson trial.

Raniere, 6o, the disgraced personal growth guru known as Vanguard, was feeling good after contracting the coronavirus, according to Joseph D. McBride, a Manhattan lawyer who recently joined Ranieres legal team.

"Keith is still recovering from his bout with COVID-19, McBride told the Times Union. Our understanding of the situation is that Keith began experiencing symptoms shortly after being transported from MDC but somehow did not test positive until arriving in Tucson.

To put it lightly, his journey from New York to Arizona was grueling," McBride added. "Moreover, his legal team was unable to communicate with him for long periods of time. Be that as it may, Keiths spirit remains unbroken and he seems to be recovering well.

That legal team, which at trial included lawyers Marc Agnifilo, Paul DerOhannesian, Teny Geragos and Danielle Smith, now includes McBride and attorneys Steven A. Metcalf II, Martin H. Tankleff and Jennifer Bonjean, the latter of whom has represented comedian and convicted sex assailant Bill Cosby.

Metcalf's firm, which includes McBride, is affiliated with Darden.

Tankleff, while in high school, was wrongfully convicted in 1990 for the murder of his parents, Seymour and Arlene Tankleff and spent more than 17 years in prison before he was exonerated in 2007, was admitted to the bar in February 2020.

McBride noted on his firm's website that he became a lawyer after his younger brother, Anthony, was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

"Joseph shares a bond with each client he represents, because he knows what it is like to have his familys fate in the hands of an attorney," the bio said. "Consequently, his brand of representation is holistic, collaborative, and highly personalized. And his style of counseling displays an empathetic, innovative, and supportive ethos throughout the course of the attorney-client relationship."

Raniere, who lived for decades in Halfmoon and operated NXIVM on New Karner Road in Colonie, was convicted in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn in June 2019 on all counts, including sex trafficking, forced labor conspiracy and racketeering charges with underlying counts of extortion, identity and possession of child pornography. Senior Judge Nicholas Garaufis imposed the 120-year sentence on Oct. 27.

In early January, Bonjean asked the judge to keep Raniere in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where he had been serving his time, because it would be easier to visit with him and added "to speak nothing of the health risks posed to all involved." The judge rejected the request.

Ranieres contracting of the coronavirus was first reported earlier this month by western New York blogger Frank Parlato. Ranieres attorneys had previously not revealed whether their client had the disease.

Raniere co-defendant Clare Bronfman, the Seagrams' heiress and NXIVM director of operations is serving an 81-month sentence for her guilty pleas to conspiracy to conceal and harbor illegal aliens for financial gain, and fraudulent use of identification.

NXIVM president Nancy Salzman, her daughter, Lauren Salzman, actress Allison Mack and bookkeeper Kathy Russell all high-ranking NXIVM figures and members of Raniere's inner circle  have pleaded guilty to charges and await sentencing.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 07:31:36|Editor: huaxia

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Screenshot taken from a pre-recorded video message shows Sean O'Fearghail, speaker of the lower house of the Irish parliament, at an online gala held by the Confucius Institute of University College Dublin (UCD) to celebrate the Chinese New Year in Dublin, Ireland, on Feb. 14, 2021. O'Fearghail has said that he will continue to promote dialogue between Ireland and China for the benefit of the two peoples. In the message, O'Fearghail, who extended his warm New Year wishes to all the friends watching the performance, spoke highly of the important contributions made by the Chinese community in Ireland. (Xinhua)

DUBLIN, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- Sean O'Fearghail, speaker of the lower house of the Irish parliament, has said that he will continue to promote dialogue between Ireland and China for the benefit of the two peoples.

He made the remarks in a pre-recorded video message displayed at a Sunday night online gala held by the Confucius Institute of University College Dublin (UCD) to celebrate the Chinese New Year.

In the message, O'Fearghail, who extended his warm New Year wishes to all the friends watching the performance, spoke highly of the important contributions made by the Chinese community in Ireland.

"Many Chinese people, more than 60,000 people, have made a life for themselves here in Ireland -- some temporarily, some more long-term, and this is a special day for them, their families and friends. To them I say, you have made an enormous contribution to Irish society over many years in business, culture, education and technology, among other areas, and this occasion is a suitable opportunity to acknowledge and salute that important contribution to the Irish nation and to our Irish people," he said.

"In the current health crisis, I pay particular tribute to those Chinese men and women, and those of Chinese ancestry and heritage, who have worked so tirelessly in the healthcare sector. We look forward to safer days ahead," he added.

The speaker also said he "had the great pleasure of visiting China in 2018 and saw at first hand the work ethic, innovation and skills which have powered China's strong economic performance."

"Ireland and China have nurtured and developed links over many years and I assure you that I will continue to promote sensible, practical and respectful dialogue between our two nations for the benefit of all our peoples," he said.

In the message, O'Fearghail also thanked UCD Confucius Institute for organizing the annual celebration of the Chinese New Year which he believed "will be another memorable showcasing of Chinese culture in Ireland."

"We have much in common, not least our desire to celebrate important events with family and friends, and as we welcome the Year of the Ox, I wish each of you health, happiness and good fortune for the year ahead," he concluded.

Named Spring Festival Gala Ireland 2021, Sunday night's celebration is an annual event organized by UCD Confucius Institute since 2008 with one missing in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Over 20 video performances recorded by Chinese and Irish students of the UCD Confucius Institute were displayed to local audience through a social platform of the organizer. Enditem

Roseburg, OR (97470)

Today

Partly cloudy skies. Low near 55F. N winds at 10 to 15 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph..

Tonight

Partly cloudy skies. Low near 55F. N winds at 10 to 15 mph, decreasing to less than 5 mph.
Dozens of travellers who flew to Queensland while linked to the Melbourne coronavirus cluster have not been found by Queensland health authorities, despite the state government saying they were in contact.

A contact tracing effort was mobilised late last week as details of the Melbourne cluster became clearer, with Tullamarine Airport Terminal 4 identified as a potential transmission point.

There were 1477 passengers identified who passed through the terminal and then flew to Queensland, with contact tracing focusing on contacting them and telling them to quarantine and get tested.

Queensland Health released a statement on Saturday saying that after a mammoth effort it had contacted all the travellers identified.
Nicola Sturgeon today threatened to close the England-Scotland border unless Boris Johnson adopts her stricter hotel quarantine rules.

All international arrivals in Scotland have to self-isolate for 10 days in a government-approved quarantine hotel.

But in England the requirement only applies to travellers arriving from 33 'red list' countries which have recorded significant outbreaks of coronavirus variants.

The Scottish government is concerned that people could fly into England before then heading to Scotland, avoiding the tougher hotel quarantine rules north of the border.

As a result, Ms Sturgeon is urging Mr Johnson to adopt the same measures as Scotland or at the very least to work with Holyrood to put in place a system to stop people circumventing the restrictions.

However, she said this afternoon she would be willing to take the nuclear option of closing the border between Scotland and England should the two sides fail to reach an agreement.

Such an approach would likely involve the Scottish government introducing some form of border checks in a bid to keep track of international arrivals coming from England.

It is unclear how such a system of checks could work but any proposals would be likely to pose significant logistical and political challenges for Ms Sturgeon.

Nicola Sturgeon today warned she is willing to close the England-Scotland border if Boris Johnson does not adopt tougher hotel quarantine rules

Under Mr Johnson's scheme in England only arrivals from 'red list' countries have to spend 10 days self-isolating in a quarantine hotel. But in Scotland the scheme applies to all travellers

Could Nicola Sturgeon actually close the England-Scotland border? Nicola Sturgeon is insistent it would be within her powers as First Minister to close the border between England and Scotland should she deem it necessary. However, such a move would present the Scottish government with massive logistical as well as political challenges. Logistically, the land border between the two countries is more than 90 miles in length. It is crossed by some 21 roads as well as two railway lines. Ms Sturgeon said this afternoon that she does not rule out checking people coming across the border. But even if this was done in a relatively light-touch manner, with police patrols conducting random stops rather than installing physical border infrastructure, it would still require significant resources. Politically, any move to restrict movement from England into Scotland would almost certainly prompt a furious row with Downing Street, especially amid growing concerns over the state of the Union. Advertisement

Ms Sturgeon told her daily coronavirus briefing in Edinburgh she wanted to focus on finding a solution with the UK Government but that she does not rule out closing the border if Mr Johnson does not budge.

'There are two things that we want to continue to try to come to an arrangement around,' she said.

'Firstly, and this would probably be the best arrangement, if the UK Government decided to apply on a comprehensive basis as well, but if not then to work with us so that people who are destined for Scotland but come in through an English airport that that requirement to isolate can be imposed at the point of arrival.

'People will say why don't you check people coming across the England-Scotland border.

'Now of course we don't rule anything out in terms of how we might have to deal with the risk of travel but in a sense if that is the solution we are already undermining the policy because somebody will have travelled quite a distance before they get to that point.

'That is why isolation as close to the point of entry is so important here.'

Asked directly if she would be willing to close the border, the Scottish First Minister said: 'I don't rule it out. I would like to have the most effective system in place here so I am not sure it is the best solution to have, now, if it is the only one I can put into place then it may come to that, but why let somebody travel half way across the UK before you do that?

'It would be better if we had that four nations approach or certainly at least a three nations approach where the border of the island that Scotland, England and Wales share has the same provisions in place.'

Scotland's Transport Secretary Michael Matheson warned on Sunday that the 'loophole' allowing overseas travellers to avoid hotel quarantine still existed which could 'potentially undermine the public health approach here in Scotland'.

Unless exempt, arriving passengers in Scotland must pay 1,750 to quarantine for 10-days in a room at one of six government-designated hotels.

Those who arrive in England from a non-'red-list' country who then enter Scotland would still have to self-isolate for the 10-day period, but would not have to do so at a designated hotel due to a lack of agreement between Holyrood and Westminster.

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock said this morning he is happy to discuss the matter with the Scottish Government.

Six hotels have been block-booked in Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow, with up to 1,300 rooms available.
George Washington Carver (1864-1943) started his life as a slave and ended it as a respected and world-renowned agricultural chemist. Born in Kansas Territory near Diamond Grove, Mo., during the bloody struggle between free-soilers and slaveholders, George Washington Carver became the kidnap victim of night riders. With his mother and brother, James, he was held for ransom; but before they could be rescued the mother died. Merely a babe in arms, Carver was ransomed for a $300 racehorse by Moses Carver, a German farmer. Thus he was orphaned and left in the custody of a white guardian from early childhood.

His first school was in Neosho, Mo., some nine miles from his home.

Carver applied to study at the lowa State College of Agricultural and Mechanical Arts but was turned down when it was learned that he was of African heritage. He then applied to Simpson College at Indianola, lowa, where he was the second African American to be admitted. Tuition was $12 a year, but even this small amount was hard to come by. Carver raised the money by working as a cook at a hotel in Winterset, lowa.

After 3 years attendance at Simpson College, he once again applied for admission to lowa State. He was admitted and was placed in charge of the greenhouse of the horticultural department while doing graduate work. He earned his masters degree in agriculture in 1896.

In April 1896 Carver received a unique offer from the African American educator Booker T. Washington to teach at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. Carver accepted the challenge.

Through the years Carver was gaining national and international stature. In 1916 he was elected a member of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts in England; he went to Washington to the War Department to demonstrate his findings on the sweet potato in 1918. He was awarded the Spingarn Medal of the NAACP in 1923.

Carver utilized the materials at hand. He was interested in crop rotation and soil conservation. From the clay soil of Alabama he extracted a full range of dyestuffs, including a brilliant blue. He created 60 products from the pecan. From the common sweet potato he extracted a cereal coffee, a shoe polish, paste, oilsabout 100 products. From the peanut he developed over 145 products. Carver suggested peanuts, pecans, and sweet potatoes replace cotton as money crops. He published all of his findings in a series of nearly 50 bulletins.

The testimony of Carver before the congressional House Ways and Means Committee in 1921 led to the passage of the Fordney-McCumber Tariff Bill of 1922.

In 1935 Carver was chosen to collaborate with the Bureau of Plant Industry of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. He received the Theodore Roosevelt Medal in 1939 for distinguished achievement in science. During his lifetime Carver had made many friends. Henry Ford was his frequent host. Carver was a treasured friend of Thomas A. Edison. It was Edison who offered to make him independent with his own laboratories and an annual stipend of $50,000. Other intimates of his were Luther Burbank, Harvey Firestone, and John Burroughs. He was also a friend of three presidents: Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Dr. Carver had earned the salary of $125 a month from the beginning until the end of his service at Tuskegee. He might have had much more. In 1940 he gave his life-savings, $33,000, to establish the George Washington Carver Foundation at Tuskegee Institute to perpetuate research in agriculture and chemistry. He later bequeathed his entire estate to the foundation, making a total of about $60,000. He died on Jan. 5, 1943.

At the dedication of a building in his honor at Simpson College, Dr. Ralph Bunche, Nobel Prize winner, pronounced Dr. Carver to be the least imposing celebrity the world has ever known. Dr. Carvers birthplace was made a national monument on July 14, 1953.

Source: George Washington Carver. Encyclopedia of World Biography Online, Gale, 1998.

Compiled by Edwardsville Public Library.
Mr. Cassidy won re-election in November, as did two others who voted to convict the former president  Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Ben Sasse of Nebraska  meaning they have five years before their names will appear on a ballot. Two others, Senators Richard M. Burr of North Carolina and Patrick J. Toomey of Pennsylvania, are retiring. The other two, Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, have long since established their willingness to break with their party, and particularly with Mr. Trump.

Ms. Murkowski is the only one of the group facing re-election next year, making her vote the most politically risky of them all.

She famously returned to Washington even after losing a Republican primary in 2010 by defeating both the Republican and Democratic nominees in an audacious write-in campaign, and she has appeared untroubled by the potential political consequences of her vote.

That might be partly influenced by a change in Alaskas voting system: Voters in November approved a measure to eliminate party primaries and institute a ranked-choice contest in which any candidate could prevail, blunting the influence of the hard-right voters who decide most Republican primaries.

At the Capitol on Saturday, Ms. Murkowski said she owed it to her constituents to vote the way she did. If I cant say what I believe that our president should stand for, then why should I ask Alaskans to stand with me? she told reporters.

And in a blistering statement on Sunday, Ms. Murkowski explained why she deemed Mr. Trump guilty.

If months of lies, organizing a rally of supporters in an effort to thwart the work of Congress, encouraging a crowd to march on the Capitol, and then taking no meaningful action to stop the violence once it began is not worthy of impeachment, conviction and disqualification, she said, I cannot imagine what is.
The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).

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Downtown San Francisco feels like a tomb.

Once-crammed streets are desolate, with only the whoosh of automobile traffic stirring the air. Muni buses and BART trains run nearly empty. Storefronts are boarded up or vacant, from the 172-year-old Tadich Grill to the shells of trendy juice shops and fitness clubs. Almost all offices have been closed for 11 months, with no return date set. The patter of rain in recent days has made the mood even bleaker.

The pain could last beyond the pandemic.

The prospect of workers returning soon  after shelter-in-place lifts, after vaccines roll out, after schools reopen  has receded, and nonessential workers remain banned from offices. Remote work, made necessary by the health crisis, is becoming a permanent policy at many of the citys biggest employers. Once techs rising capital, downtown San Francisco may never return to its frenetic, bustling state.

Salesforce, the citys largest private employer, is the latest company to confirm that most of its 10,000 local workers will stay at home one or more days a week after the pandemic. The company said it remains committed to the city.

San Francisco has and will continue to be an integral part of our business strategy, Salesforce said. And when its safe to do so, were looking forward to reopening our doors.

Google, another huge office tenant with locations along the Embarcadero, is testing a flexible work schedule where most employees would stay home twice a week after offices reopen. Facebook, which occupies two Transbay towers near Salesforce, said it isnt reducing its Bay Area real estate holdings but will give employees more flexibility around remote work.

Twitter, Dropbox and Levis are seeking to give up some of their office space as workers stay home  indefinitely, not just during the pandemic, in many cases. Companies are embracing remote or flexible work for many reasons, but chief among them is competing for employees who value cutting their commutes and housing costs.

Roland Li / The Chronicle

Randi Weitzman, executive director of technology staffing services at recruiting firm Robert Half, said remote work is here to stay.

Not only have companies realized that employees can be more productive and dont need to be micromanaged, it allows them to recruit from a wider pool. Offering flexibility is also key to attracting talent, and not doing so puts businesses at a disadvantage, she said.

Trust has been built. The technology is there to support it, she said.

Somebody doesnt have to sit on the freeway for three hours or on BART for an hour and a half. They can get more work done, she said.

It isnt clear how widespread working from home will be after the pandemic. Ted Egan, the citys chief economist, said the citys current estimate is 25% remote work across all companies after the pandemic, or the average employee staying home a little more than one day a week. That estimate seems low when held against the big tech companies plans for flexibility, but not every employer will want to embrace long-term remote work as aggressively as they do.

Any reduction in workers will have seismic effects on the local economy. Citywide sales taxes, a measure of business health, dropped 43% in the second quarter of 2020 compared to the prior year. The biggest drops were in downtown, with losses over 70% and restaurants and hotels bearing the brunt of declines.

Roland Li / The Chronicle

A slew of downtown retailers are closing stores, including H&M, Uniqlo, Gap and Marshalls, which will eat further into tax revenue and cut employment. The time frame for the return of tourism and business travel, the citys biggest economic engine, is unknown. Moscone Center, a sprawling symbol of the citys worldliness and tech convention epicenter, has not hosted an event other than emergency planning meetings and mass vaccinations in nearly a year.

In a rare piece of positive news, city officials reported a $125 million budget surplus for the current fiscal year after improved property taxes and federal reimbursements. But the long-term outlook remains grim, with a $653.2 million deficit in the 2021-2023 fiscal years.

More than 600,000 people took public transit to work each day before the pandemic struck. The need for more public transportation in the face of booming jobs and population was undeniable.

Now remote work has unleashed a fiscal crisis across BART, Muni and Caltrain and thrown that assumption into disarray. The transit agencies have all seen big drops in ridership downtown.

There were signs of life in the Financial District on Thursday. One party sat for outdoor dining at the Italian restaurant Perbacco. A few people stood in front of Fog City News to buy chocolate for Valentines Day, a lifeline for the 20-year-old Market Street newsstand.

Sales are about half of pre-pandemic levels, a slight improvement from the spring, said Adam Smith, Fog Citys owner. There has been some recovery. I dont think its going to recede. I think its going to keep progressing, he said. I feel optimistic.

Hes been able to survive with nationwide mail orders and some business from downtown residents, who have been braver about venturing outside after statewide shelter-in-place orders were canceled.

A pandemic forces small businesses to get creative and improvise, he said. But the staff has been halved to two employees.

Roland Li / The Chronicle

Smith believes many workers will want to return when its safe, attracted to the urban vibrancy that will persist. Theres also this growing groundswell of people that are saying, Hey, I dont want to work from home entirely. Id like to come back to offices every once in a while, he said.

Salesforce doesnt provide employees free meals in corporate cafeterias, so a smaller number of employees coming downtown once its towers reopen could hit restaurants and cafes that much harder.

Salesforces office ecosystem is really important to the small businesses, said Lauren Crabbe, owner and CEO of Andytown Coffee Roasters. A cafe it opened in early 2019 inside the Facebook-leased 181 Fremont looks out over Salesforce Park. Salesforce Tower is a short stroll away. But the cafe closed in March, while Andytowns two locations in the Outer Sunset remained open.

Crabbe remains optimistic and committed to reopening that location.

It obviously makes me a little concerned. Maybe the offices are never coming back, she said. But, she added, people arent going to want to work from home forever. For every person who thrives at the work-from-home environment, 10 more are pulling their hair out and screaming at their children.

Interactive Vaccine Tracker: Latest developments Detailed information about the coronavirus vaccines as it becomes available.

Crabbe misses the energy of her cafe in 181 Fremont, and said her staff does too.

I miss being around tall buildings. The hustle and bustle of people walking all around you, she said. I hope when everything starts to open we can all get back together.

Community groups hope to attract both tourists and locals to eat, drink and shop to help offset a decline in workers when the pandemic ends.

Activating public space, when its safe to do so, and promoting the downtown area as a destination for visitors, residents and businesses are priorities for the organization, said John Bozeman, executive director of the Downtown Community Benefit District, which promotes the neighborhood and provides safety and cleaning services.

The group, established in 2019, plans to hold events that could include street fairs.

Enrico Moretti, a UC Berkeley economics professor, said the qualities that made the Bay Area a desirable place will endure: strong higher education, a talented workforce and abundant venture capital. For all the devastation among small businesses and low-income jobs, the stock market is near record highs and the biggest tech companies are seeing earnings soar. All these factors will help the region recover, even if some workers stay remote, he said.

Facebook, Google and Amazon are continuing to invest billions in planned expansions across the Bay Area.

I feel the underlying economic reasons for why this used to be a dynamic economic region are still there, he said. This is a good place to create new ideas and new products.

The regions pre-pandemic challenges remain. High taxes and housing costs are acceptable to some companies, he said, but those expenses should be offset by well-managed public spaces. In San Francisco, some crimes, such as burglaries, have spiked during the pandemic.

I think those are crucial considerations, if you are not trying to compete on cost, Moretti said. We should be much better at doing those things.

Pablo Romano, co-owner of Venga Empanadas, was set to open a new location in the Salesforce Transit Center in March 2018, but was delayed after two cracked steel beams were discovered and later fixed. His March 2020 opening was stopped by the pandemic.

Its a blessing in disguise. If we would have opened back then it would have been a bigger mess, he said. Despite the challenges, he hopes to open by this summer.

The citys bounced back from fires, from earthquakes, from all sorts of stuff. I dont think its going to turn into a ghost town any time, he said.

San Francisco Chronicle staff writers Tara Duggan and Mallory Moench contributed to this report.

Roland Li is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: roland.li@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @rolandlisf

Both the parties have flagged off their digital campaigns with two individual apps namely, Didirdoot( meaning didis messanger ) of Trinamool Congress and Modipara ( Modisneighbourhood) of the Bhartiya Janata Party.

Ahead of the West Bengal elections, after Trinamool Congress launched its app- Didirdoot on February 4th, Bhartiya Janata Party also initiated its digital campaign and introduced an app called Modipara which is meant to be a counter move and a clash in the digital space between the parties can be witnessed.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah set in motion the Modipara app during his visit to West Bengal 3 days ago. Its purpose is to boost Prime Ministers popularity in the digital world and to pilot the party to every neighbourhood. The app seems to be gaining popularity in West Bengal and the registrations are being received in large numbers.

Almost 1.8 Lakh users have registered so far on the app and the website of Modipara and 3.5 lakh visits have been recorded underlined Amit Malviya, head of BJP IT cell and co-manager of West Bengal division. The age groups that have been recorded seem to be consisting of people belonging to the 18-25 year age groups and more number of rural women have also registered.

Also read: Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla to visit Russia this week; Maritime corridor, expanding strategic ties on agenda

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It is a one-stop destination for all campaign activities in the state and it permits sharing of content and merchandise as well, he further added.

The Trinamool Congress on the other hand has cited that their application is witnessing a total of 1 lakh downloads in a record time. The part has stated that the application would help the people of West Bengal to connect with chief minister Mamata Banerjee through video conferencing and live a stream of conferences and meetings.

Also read: 2 years of Pulwama attack: PM Modi, Amit Shah and others pay tribute to CRPF jawans

While shipments of the COVID-19 vaccine are headed to our state prisons, my 96-year-old disabled mother seems to be forgotten. She lives in a state-licensed, extremely well-run four-bed care home. These small care facilities, where the most vulnerable and sometimes disabled elders live, are completely forgotten by the state. When it comes to vaccine distribution, the Oregon Health Authority says theres nothing it can do to get these seniors vaccinated. Really? Although my mother has been with Kaiser for 51 years, they too say, sorry, nothing we can do. My concern is these seniors are just like the inmates  they are stuck and cant help themselves. Why are these forgotten seniors in small facilities any less important than the ones in larger care facilities?

These are our seniors who can no longer help themselves. Come on, who among us cares enough to help them?

Marilyn Mason, King City
The emphasis should be on responsible parentage, leading to responsible citizens. People may undertake DNA tests to satisfy their moral curiosity. But they should not embarrass innocent children or disturb the rest of society with claims and counterclaims of parentage.

Over the past few months, Nigerians have been engrossed with salacious paternity stories. After many years, men suddenly realise that children from their wives regarded from birth as their biological children were products from other men. It is not just a simple tale of unfaithfulness. Instead, it is a deadly combination of adultery, betrayal, shock, shattered dreams, regrets and a turbulent future. This is the reality of paternity fraud!

Although these incidents became prominent recently, they are not new. In February 2017, a Nigerian man identified as Oscar found out that 32-year-old Valentine was not his biological son. The clip was from the Jeremy Kyle Show in the United Kingdom, which later went viral.

The perception that paternity fraud is high in Nigeria is not unfounded. Not long ago, a DNA expert from Lagos University Teaching Hospital claimed that 30 per cent of the Nigerian men who went to paternity testing centres were not the biological fathers of the children in their custody.

Reports have it that Nigeria has the second highest rate of paternity fraud in the world, after Jamaica. According to the American Association of Blood Banks, globally a third of all men are not the actual fathers of their presumed children. Many men have been unknowingly raising children that are not theirs. And to curb the trend, there have been calls for the introduction of mandatory DNA testing at birth.

In most traditional Nigerian settings, a childs paternity is commonly determined by acknowledgement, presumption, or proof. Acknowledgement is the most practised of these three modes of paternity. In most cases, it only needs a man to accept that he is responsible for a pregnancy to be regarded, legally, as the biological father of a child.

In most places, a man is presumed to be a childs father once the child is born within wedlock. It does not matter who impregnated the woman. If she is married, the husband is assumed to be the childs father. Questions of paternity do not arise unless the man has evidence to prove otherwise. There have been incidents where an unmarried woman with an unwanted pregnancy gets married to a man before giving birth, and the new-born legally becomes the mans child.

However, high paternity disputes occur in Africa because of the massive emphasis its societies place on biological children. Marriage is often viewed as incomplete if it does not produce any biological child.

In our patriarchal society, women are most times accused of being responsible when there are no children in a marriage. In some cases, the predominant view is that they must have engaged in excessive premarital sex, leading to infertility. Men are hardly under any comparable pressure from society like women .

In most societies in Nigeria, expanding the family unit is seen as a prerequisite for social acceptance. Therefore, in an instance where a woman suspects that her husband is infertile and fearing societal repercussions, she may get pregnant elsewhere to protect herself, her husbands reputation, and social standing, irrespective of how reprehensible the act is.

adultery, sexual immorality and fluid sexuality are becoming the norm, rather than the exception. We see many men and women of easy virtue transverse dark alleys and major streets in our big cities. It seems that having multiple sexual partners is becoming the rule rather than the exception.

Some men have severe reproductive issues. A few years ago, research revealed that the sperm counts of men in Africa had seen a decline in over half a century now, with Nigerian men taking the lead.

The study also found that the possible major causes are sexually transmitted infections (STIs), hormonal abnormalities, excessive alcohol consumption, and tobacco smoking. Some 2 per cent of men who visit clinics in Nigeria, according to a report, do not have sperm, even though they have semen.

The second primary reason for paternity dispute in Africa is due to the error of swapping children in the hospitals where they are born, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Although this is rare, it usually comes from carelessness or in some cases acts of commission like the incident in Zambia, where a nurse named Elizabeth Bwalya Mwewa confessed on her deathbed that she swapped over 5,000 babies over 12 years for the fun of it.

The third reason is the preponderance of unwanted pregnancies. A 2018 global family planning report by International Conference on Family Planning (ICFP) claims that Nigeria has recorded over 1.3 million unwanted pregnancies in 2017. Also, only 13.8 per cent of Nigerian women used contraceptives in the year under review. So, in trying to avoid the social stigma of unwanted pregnancies and for some other selfish reasons, some women pin their pregnancies on some men, who might not be the ones who got them pregnant.

Other reasons such as the stigmatisation of adoption, criminalisation of abortion, and our extreme cultural inclination towards reproduction and lineage longevity, contribute to increased paternity fraud.

Besides, our traditional core moral values are fast eroding, and society is adopting a laissez-faire attitude to issues of morality. There are contending morality agenda within our community. We can broadly define these agenda into two dichotomous camps. One is the strict religious idea of morality that condemns sex before marriage and sex outside marriage. The second is the free secular idea of morality that allows for the relativity and subjectivity of morality, whereby people can choose their brand of morality.

It is open to debate which agenda is gaining ascendancy. Although Nigeria is a vast religious society, it is evident that religious and traditional morality is waning here, at least in practice. The Westernisation and secularisation of our culture has forced a new normal morality on us that is neither conventional nor Western  a hyper hybrid morality that allows for anything and everything.

The sexualisation of our society is moving at a fast pace than ever before. A cursory look at our local movies and music videos indicates that they are almost soft porn and are consumed by children and adults without qualms. Many of our young men and women rebel against traditional and religious morality and are displaying crass debased morals.

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Therefore, adultery, sexual immorality and fluid sexuality are becoming the norm, rather than the exception. We see many men and women of easy virtue transverse dark alleys and major streets in our big cities. It seems that having multiple sexual partners is becoming the rule rather than the exception. Our sacred institution of marriage has not been spared the adverse effects of this social malaise.

Nigerians seem to have newly discovered DNA testing, and it is about to wreak significant havoc on families. The uproar appears to arise from a moral preoccupation with marital fidelity  this is justifiable as fidelity is at the core of the entire marriage enterprise.

Some men of low moral value target married women as sex partners. They erroneously see married women as safer to date than single ladies. In their thinking, unwanted pregnancies may not be an issue, and sleeping with married women may reduce the risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases like gonorrhoea, syphilis, and HIV. Most of them also believe that married women are not likely to want to cross the line with their partners marriages and that they also understand the issues at stake better than single girls do.

Some married women selfishly use men as puns for sexual gratification without minding the consequences of their actions. Others engage in extramarital affairs because of greed and the quest for money. Irrespective of the reason for having sex outside of marriage, the result is that when there is pregnancy, there is a chance that the husbands are not responsible for the pregnancies and consequently are likely to father the children of other men.

The argument continues to rage over whether DNA paternity testing is necessary. Some people question the usefulness of knowing a childs paternity  a painful truth that causes so much anguish, and shatters relationships and destroys life. They argue that DNA testing is irrelevant because even if a child is not a mans biological child, whatever the circumstances of birth, these are not the childs fault and the child does not deserve suffering from such shattering revelation. Every child deserves to receive both parents love and affection. Unless absolutely necessary, they should not be subjected to the inhumane act of shattering their world through DNA paternity testing, which could turn out unfavourable.

However, the reality of life is that whenever suspicion sets in, the human mind would not rest until the truth is uncovered. Most people become naturally apprehensive if there are credible allegations about the paternity of presumed biological children. Some people have sleepless nights, lack of appetite and lack of focus, until the allegation is cleared. They put the child under micro scrutiny: Every word spoken by the child, every action, every strand of hair, and every layer of skin, to see if they confirm or disprove his or her paternity. Only a conclusive DNA test will put these issues to rest.

There is also the desire to expose and shame the women whose unconscionable infidelity led to the unfortunate situation. Such unfaithful women may be condemned to the abyss of marital ignominy, and they deserve all the opprobrium they get. There is no acceptable explanation why a man should be treated so wickedly, deceived with a big lie that can destroy many lives at once and which, in some cases, have led to the victims committing suicide.

However, as in the example of the unconscionable Zambian nurse mentioned above, mismatched or swapped babies muddle the whole issue. This kind of situation can lead to an innocent woman suffering because of the crimes of a devilish medical officer.

There is also the economic angle to paternity fraud. Paternity testing (sometimes called parentage testing) scans the Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA), the biological basis of inheritance, to prove or disprove the relationship between a child and an alleged father; and it does not come cheap. On average, it costs about one hundred thousand naira to conduct one in Nigeria. So, we must spare some thought for men who have suspicions about their childrens paternity but do not have the resources to get DNA testing to confirm their suspicions or to clear their doubts.

Nigerians seem to have newly discovered DNA testing, and it is about to wreak significant havoc on families. The uproar appears to arise from a moral preoccupation with marital fidelity  this is justifiable as fidelity is at the core of the entire marriage enterprise. However, publicity given to instances of doubtful paternity rubs off negatively on the innocent offsprings of reckless parent behaviour. Therefore, caution is required.

In conclusion, there are novel societal imperatives. Parentage is more than natural insemination. These days, in the nurture/nature dichotomy, the nurture should take precedence over nature in parenting matters. Therefore, I advocate for an increase in adoption by couples who feel a necessity to nurture children but cannot have theirs biologically. The emphasis should be on responsible parentage, leading to responsible citizens. People may undertake DNA tests to satisfy their moral curiosity. But they should not embarrass innocent children or disturb the rest of society with claims and counterclaims of parentage.

Dakuku Peterside is a policy and leadership expert.
(Natural News) On Jan. 29, the German parliament ratified the implementation of Agenda ID2020, the next phase of the global Mark of the Beast rollout being ushered in on the back of the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

This centralized general electronic data collection program will profile every citizen in Germany and grant access to every government agency, police department, and three-letter agency, as well as to the private sector.

Up to 200 points of information, and possibly more as time goes on, will be included in the program. These include peoples bank accounts, shopping habits, health records, including vaccination records, political inclinations, and probably even dating habits.

If the government can use it against you, Germany wants to house it in the Agenda ID2020 database, which was designed by none other than billionaire eugenicist Bill Gates as part of his vaccination package.

Backed by the Rockefeller Foundation, Accenture, the World Economic Forum (WEF), and the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI), the program aims to inject every human being with microchips that can be remote-accessed using 5G and subsequent 6G technologies.

The programs private partners include many Big Pharma names such as Johnson & Johnson (J&J), GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Merck & Co., and of course the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

According to Peter Koenig, writing for Global Research (Canada), ID2020 is shaping up to be vaccine-implanted and remote-accessible by EM-geared computers, robots or algorithms.

The adoption of Agenda ID2020 still has to be approved by the German Federal Council, but there is little chance the Council will reject it, Koenig explains.

Switzerlands Agenda ID2020 mark of the beast to be voted on in early March

In nearby Switzerland, voters will have the chance on Mar. 7 to approve that countrys version of Agenda ID2020, an all-electronic identification system that will link everything to everything of each individual citizen.

Should the measure pass, the Swiss government plans to outsource management of the program to the private sector, meaning drug companies, big banks, and insurance companies will be buying and selling peoples private data for profit.

In the future, the program will likely include an implantable chip with built-in radiofrequency (RF) transmitters that will be used to track people, as well as manage their finances and allot them payment credits for the work they do so they can continue to buy and sell.

Early trials of such technology have already taken place in remote villages of Bangladesh, where poor people were injected with microchips under the guise of being vaccinated.

This is exactly the type of thing that Bill Gates and other genocidal maniacs want to see implemented around the world. Every person will eventually have to be ID-chipped and vaccinated, and the 5G / 6G systems being installed on every church rooftop and corner lamppost will be used to program and control this global herd of new world order beings.

All of this is for the purpose of keeping people safe against Chinese germs, of course. There is simply no other way to keep the virus at bay, the elite insist.

With an electromagnetic field and with 5G / 6G EM-waves allowing inputs and access of data in your body  the control of each individual is almost complete, Koenig warns. The almost refers to the planned access to your brainwaves.

This is supposed to be happening through a Brain Computer Interface (BCI), called Neurolink  developed by Elon Musk. It presents an interface of electronic waves with the human brain which, by then, will have been converted into an electromagnetic field (EMF), so that it can receive digital commands that will influence our behavior, or can be turned off  RIP  as maybe is most convenient for the Global Cabal.

More of the latest news about the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine scam can be found at Pandemic.news.

Sources for this article include:

GlobalResearch.ca

NaturalNews.com

[February 14, 2021] Consumer and Personal Loans Bolstered Fintech Lending in FY 2021 - Equifax SIDBI Fintech Pulse

MUMBAI, India, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- SIDBI and Equifax launched the second edition of "Fintech Pulse", a quarterly publication highlighting key trends of the fast growing NBFC (Non- Banking Financial Company) Fintech segment. "Fintech Pulse" aims to provide insights on trends in the Indian Fintech industry - from disbursements to delinquencies to top growing states and top loan categories. Key highlights: Consumer and Personal Loans continue to be strong for NBFC-Fintechs with 87% share in active loans

There is a 38% increase in outstanding portfolios value year on year, with personal loans growing while business loans showing a decline in value

Despite growing, consumer and personal loans have seen average ticket sizes come down by more than 40%, to less than INR 9000

Disbursements for personal loans are down 71% year on year

In overall industry, NBFC-Fintechs have market share of 2.44% in business loans by number of active loans and 1.2% by portfolio outstanding

Business loan disbursements by all lender types declined post pandemic began, but started recovering from Apr- June 2020 quarter for Public Sector Banks

quarter for Public Sector Banks 90+ delinquencies for business loans by NBFC-Fintechs deteriorated YoY

Top 5 states contributing 50% of total loans disbursed by Fintechs were Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Delhi , Gujarat and Rajasthan On the launch, Shri V. Satya Venkata Rao, Depty Managing Director, SIDBI said, "Fintech Lending has changed the approach of credit delivery in India through Innovative products and real time solutions. The industry has witnessed 38% YoY growth as on Sep'20, despite COVID pandemic. As we move in new normal, the Fintech Lending industry will play a crucial role in delivering credit to last mile borrowers. I hope the Fintech Pulse will provide key insights to stakeholders."



Shri KM Nanaiah, Managing Director, Equifax Credit Information services Ltd. and Country Leader, Equifax India and MEA said, "We are very pleased to present the second edition of 'Fintech Pulse' in partnership with SIDBI. This edition sheds light on how NBFC-Fintech lending fared during pandemic times. In addition, the report has greater insights on business loans with a section devoted to the Covid-19 impact on Fintech lending." About Equifax

At Equifax (NYSE: EFX), we believe knowledge drives progress. As a global data, analytics, and technology company, we play an essential role in the global economy by helping financial institutions, companies, employees, and government agencies make critical decisions with greater confidence. Our unique blend of differentiated data, analytics, and cloud technology drives insights to power decisions to move people forward. Headquartered in Atlanta and supported by more than 11,000 employees worldwide, Equifax operates or has investments in 25 countries in North America, Central and South America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific region. For more information, visit Equifax.com About SIDBI Small Industries Development Bank of India has been established under an Act of the Parliament in 1990. SIDBI is mandated to serve as the Principal Financial Institution for executing the triple agenda of promotion, financing and development of the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME sector) and co-ordination of the functions of the various Institutions engaged in similar activities. Over the years, through its various financial and developmental measures, the Bank has touched the lives of people across various strata of the society, impacted enterprises over the entire MSME spectrum and engaged with many credible institutions in the MSME ecosystem. Under Vision 2.0, SIDBI has spearheaded various Initiatives to address the Information Asymmetry in MSME sector like 'MSME Pulse', the health tracker of MSMEs and 'CriSidEx', for gauging the MSE sentiments & aspirations and 'Fintech Pulse', for credit data insights on Fintech lending segment, 'Microfinance Pulse', insight report on Microfinance sector and 'Industry Spotlight', a comprehensive report on major industry sectors.

[ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]
CHICAGO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Recognizing that the social impacts of COVID-19 are still great, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois (BCBSIL) is opening a second round of funding to support community-based organizations addressing crucial needs for people across the state.

"We've stepped up since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis to give our members, providers and communities access to care, coverage and social supports," said Harmony Harrington, vice-president government and community relations for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois. "Now in year two, as the pandemic has grown and evolved, I'm proud that we are offering additional funding to social service organizations offering support to our most vulnerable neighbors."

In May 2020, BCBSIL awarded $20,000 grants to 75 organizations providing critical services in the areas of access to health care, hunger and shelter as part of the BCBSIL COVID-19 Community Collaboration Fund.

BCBSIL today opened an additional round of quick-release funding to support community-based organizations supporting five focus areas - access to care, hunger, shelter and behavioral health, and COVID-19 health education and vaccine access. This grant cycle will again offer 75 grants of $20,000 and is open to prior recipients of BCBSIL's COVID-19 Community Collaboration funding, however prior grantees are not guaranteed a second award. Key dates for the program:

February 15, 2021  Application opens

Application opens February 26, 2021  Application closes

Application closes Week of March 22, 2021  Applicants notified of funding decisions

This builds on the work accomplished with round one of the funding program, as well as BCBSIL's $1M donation to the Illinois COVID-19 Response Fund and $500,000 to the Chicago COVID-19 Response Fund, as well as direct donations of PPE, food and school supplies to people in communities across Illinois. BCBSIL is also supporting access to COVID-19 vaccines for front line health care workers, in partnership with the Chicago Department of Public Health.

Learn more on our dedicated COVID-19 website about how we are responding to the pandemic for our members, including expanding access in areas such as testing, treatment, pharmacy and telehealth related to COVID-19.

About Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois (BCBSIL) is committed to expanding access to quality, cost-effective health care to as many people as possible in Illinois. BCBSIL is dedicated to innovation and exploring, nurturing and activating future possibilities to make the health care system work better for our members and our communities. BCBSIL is a division of Health Care Service Corporation, a Mutual Legal Reserve Company and an Independent Licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. Learn more at bcbsil.com and follow us on twitter and Facebook.

SOURCE Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois

Related Links

http://www.bcbsil.com


Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa, is joined by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo as she speaks to reporters during a news conference, in New York, on Sept. 14, 2018. (Mary Altaffer/File, AP)

Nursing Home Disclosures Taint Cuomos Pandemic Performance

ALBANY, N.Y.New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who wrote a book on his managing of the COVID-19 crisis, now faces intensifying accusations that he covered up the true death toll of the pandemic on nursing home residents.

State lawmakers called for investigations, stripping Cuomo of his emergency powers and even his resignation after new details emerged this week about why certain nursing home data was kept under wraps for months, despite requests from lawmakers and others.

Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa listens as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo speaks to reporters during a news conference, in New York on Sept. 14, 2018. (Mary Altaffer/File, AP)

Top aide Melissa DeRosa told lawmakers the data was delayed because officials worried that the information was going to be used against us by the Trump administrations Department of Justice.

The new salvos from Republicans and Cuomos fellow Democrats mark a stark turnaround from the early days of the pandemic, when Cuomos daily briefings helped cement a national reputation for leadership. The briefings, in which he promised to deliver just the facts, won him an International Emmy and helped lead to his book, American Crisis.

He stepped in it, more than a little bit. It would be bad enough if this had come out and he had not been publicly sort of celebrating, and been celebrated, for his handling of the pandemic, said Jeanne Zaino, political science professor at Iona College. But putting that aside, it doesnt get more serious than this. Youre talking about the deaths of 15,000 people.

The Cuomo administration for months dramatically underreported the statewide number of COVID-19 deaths among long-term care residents. It is now nearly 15,000, up from the 8,500 previously disclosed.

The new toll amounts to about one-seventh of the roughly 90,000 people living in nursing homes as of 2019 in New York, which has among the most care home residents in the nation.

Cuomo has pointed to a small but growing body of research suggesting unchecked community spread is the biggest factor in nursing home outbreaks, and he has said inadequate federal government help with travel restrictions, testing and protective gear left New York City and its suburbs particularly vulnerable.

He has dismissed criticism as political and noted that the thousands of nursing home residents deaths in hospitals were always counted in the states overall tally.

Died in a hospital, died in a nursing home  they died, he said Jan. 29.

The uproar might not have the same impact on the third-term Democrat as it would if he were facing reelection for the first time this year, Zaino said. But it could make him less likely to be tapped for a post in the Biden administration.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo speaks to reporters during a news conference at a COVID-19 pop-up vaccination site in the William Reid Apartments in the Brooklyn borough of New York, on Jan,. 23, 2021. (Mary Altaffer/Pool, AP)

And Cuomowho says he will run again in 2022is now facing criticism that is increasingly coming from members of his own party.

The governors lack of transparency and stonewalling regarding his administrations nursing home actions is unacceptable, said state Sen. John Mannion, one of 14 Democratic state senators who said Friday that Cuomos expanded emergency powers should be repealed as soon as possible.

The higher death tolls were only divulged hours after a report late last month from Democratic state Attorney General Letitia James examining the administrations failure to include nursing home residents who died at hospitals. The updated numbers backed up the findings of an Associated Press investigation last year that concluded the state could have been understating deaths by thousands.

Nursing home residents advocates and relatives have questioned whether the viruss spread in nursing homes was fueled by a March 25 state directive that barred the facilities from refusing people just because they had COVID-19. The directive was intended to free up space in rapidly filling hospitals.

Debra Diehl, 62, who lost her 85-year-old father, Reeves Hupman, to presumptive COVID-19 in May at a nursing home outside Albany, wants to know why Cuomo and the state didnt do more to separate residents who may have had the virus, perhaps by putting them in field hospitals.

They had people coming up, sent from downstate hospitals up here, Diehl said. It just seemed like Typhoid Marys, just spreading it further. He did not know what he was doing, or he did not care.

In reply to a Freedom of Information request from the AP in May, the state Health Department released records this week showing that more than 9,000 recovering coronavirus patients in New York were released from hospitals into nursing homes from March 25 to May 10, when Cuomo undid the directive.

The state issued a report insisting the patients didnt drive the viruss transmission in nursing homes, though it didnt rule out whether the directive played any role.

Cuomo has said the facilities had a responsibility to accept only patients they could care for. State health inspectors have uncovered infection control violations at dozens of nursing homes amid the pandemic and levied at least $1 million in fines.

Still, DeRosa has estimated that New York nursing home residents represent 40 percent of the lives lost this winter. New York has reported over 10,000 deaths since Dec. 1.

The disclosure of DeRosas comments this week in a conference call with Democratic lawmakers essentially brought months of complaints to a boiling point.

She said the state froze in responding to lawmakers August request for the number of nursing home residents who died in hospitals because officials were also responding to a Justice Department inquiry and fretted that what we start saying was going to be used against us, and we werent sure if there was going to be an investigation.

DeRosa issued a statement Friday saying that the state was slow to respond to the lawmakers because it was dealing with the Justice Department, and then with the viruss resurgence in autumn and with vaccinations. The governors office declined to comment further, and the Justice Department also declined to comment late Saturday.

It gave the impression of them trying to whitewash the information, said Sen. Rachel May, one of the 14 Democrats calling for rescinding Cuomos emergency powers.

Senate Republican Leader Rob Ortt said Cuomo needs to demand the immediate resignation of anyone involved in this cover-up, and if he was aware, he must be removed from office.

The criticism could resonate because it fits with a common complaint that for all of his ability, Cuomos controlling nature can undercut his effectiveness.

Cuomo has dismissed that idea, writing in his book: You show me a person who is not controlling, and Ill show you a person who is probably not highly successful.

To Fordham University political scientist Christina Greer, the recent disclosures call into question: Can we trust news coming out of the governors office? Not just out of nursing homes, but can we trust it about schools, can we trust it about prisons, can we trust it about other communities?

Its definitely cast a bad shadow on the administration, she said.

By Michael Hill, Marina Villeneuve, and Jennifer Peltz
An F-35B lands onboard HMS Queen Elizabeth on Sept. 26, 2018, in Portsmouth, England. (Kyle Heller/Ministry of Defence via Getty Images)

Australia to Join UK-Led Carrier Strike Group With US, Japan, Dutch Navies

Australia is joining forces with the United Kingdom, the United States, Japan, and the Netherlands for naval exercises in the Indo-Pacific in a show of strength that an expert says marks the UKs return as a global maritime power as it seeks to protect its interest in the face of an expansionist China.

The U.S. and UK defence secretaries co-signed the UK-US Joint Declaration for the Carrier Strike Group 2021 deployment on Jan. 19.

An Australian Department of Defence spokesperson told The Epoch Times that it welcomed the upcoming Indo-Pacific deployment by the HMS Queen Elizabeth Carrier Strike Group and said advanced planning is underway to determine how the navies can train together during the deployment.

Australia and the United Kingdom share a unique relationship based on shared history and values, with both nations committed to a rules-based international order that supports economic growth, security and prosperity, a Defence spokesperson said.

The Royal Australian Navy routinely seeks to train with partner navies to build interoperability, share mariner skills and enhance professional ties in the region, particularly in this case with the Royal Navys newest aircraft carrier.

Further details of Australias involvement are yet to be confirmed.

The HMS Queen Elizabeth Carrier Strike Group, as an instrument of the UKs strategic sovereign power, will field an array of military capabilities, ranging from two operational squadrons of F-35Bs, a nuclear-powered Astute class ballistic missile-carrying submarine, and the most advanced Destroyers and Frigates in the world.

It will be joined by personnel from the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy, including a detachment of the Marine Corps F-35B Lightning II aircraft and the Navys destroyer, USS The Sullivans.

Britains Defence Secretary Ben Wallace arrives for a cabinet meeting, in London, on Oct. 13, 2020. (Simon Dawson/Reuters)

UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said: I am delighted that the UK now possesses a 21st century Carrier Strike capability, which has been greatly assisted by the unswerving support and cooperation of the United States at all levels over the past decade.

This deployment embodies the strength of our bilateral ties and reflects the depth and breadth of this vital defence and security partnership, he said.

The UK-led carrier strike group comes amid a sweeping review of the UKs foreign policy dubbed the most radical assessment of the UKs place in the world since the end of the Cold War.

It also comes as the island nation sets out a new approach to warfighting in its Integrated Operating Concept 2025 announced last year, which the UK government calls the most significant change in UK military thought in several generations.

Robert Cark, defence fellow at the Henry Jackson Society in London.

Robert Clark, a defence fellow at London think tank the Henry Jackson Society, said the deployment represents a step change in the strategy behind utilising the Armed Forces, and in particular the Royal Navy, as a means of strengthening the Global Britain foreign policy agenda.

Whilst both the deployment and in particular re-emergence of aircraft carriers to the British fleet represents a return to great power projection for the UK, it is also hugely symbolic of how the UK wishes to engage with regional allies and partners in advancing shared interests, whilst mitigating against shared threats, Clark told The Epoch Times on Feb. 16.

Clark thinks the carrier strike group will serve as a nucleus for allied countries to step up their own maritime presence in the strategically critical Indo-Pacific region, which has seen China and its PLA Navy militarise vital sea lanes in the South China Sea.

The Royal Navy has conducted five freedom of manoeuvre operations across the South China Sea since 2018, and Clark expects they will occur again jointly with partnered navies this year.

This activity will almost certainly occur with the (carrier strike group 2021), and highly likely to include freedom of manoeuvre operations with partnered maritime forces across these contested waters, Clark said. Whilst this is not a show of force against the PLA Navy, it will actively demonstrate that the UK is committed to enforcing a free and open Indo-Pacific in light of aggressive Chinese expansionism, and their disregard for the UNCLOS.
All registration offices are witnessing a rush of property registrations for the past 3 months, after launch of Dharani portal in Nov. 2020.  Representational image

Hyderabad: One swallow does not make a summer. But a single transaction of a prime land in the city has soared hope in the financially parched soul of the state government.

A recent land transaction in Hyderabad, which has boosted the confidence of the state government, was recorded when a private property, measuring 1,837 square yards in Jubilee Hills, was purchased for a record price of Rs 41.3 crore, reflecting the start of another realty boom.

The unidentified buyer, who purchased the plot for the record sum, is purportedly the owner of a pharma company, who paid Rs 2.27 crore stamp duty and Rs 20 lakh towards registration fees to the government on January 28. Realtors say that this is an expensive deal for a plot of this size in these times.

The government is now hoping that it will now surely be able to mop up nearly Rs 15,000 crore through sale of prime government land parcels on the city outskirts this year. The state governments plans to sell off lands did not materialise for the past two years due to the economic slump in 2019 and the Coronavirus pandemic in 2020.

The government hopes that with a booming realty in the city, sale of state lands in the outskirts would easily fetch over Rs 10,000 crore this year, even if it falls short of its target for a variety of reasons.

Although realtors claim that it was not uncommon for plots to fetch between Rs 1.50 lakh to Rs 2 lakh per square yard in the posh Jubilee Hills area, what surprised everyone was the price shooting up to Rs 2.20 lakh in this latest transaction.

Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao had constituted a cabinet sub-committee on resource mobilisation in 2019, headed by finance minister T. Harish Rao, and comprising IT minister KT Rama Rao and other ministers, to recommend measures for generating additional revenue for the government. The committee had recommended sale of government lands for this purpose.

Accordingly, the government proposed to sell land parcels to raise nearly Rs 10,000 crore in the state budgets for 2019-20 and 2020-21. However, it did not materialise, with no realty boom and lack of demand for two years.

But the realty is now seemingly at the start of another boom and transactions as well as price lines have picked up across the state, especially on the city outskirts and surrounding districts, where the government owns thousands of acres.

All registration offices are witnessing a heavy rush of property registrations for the past three months, after the launch of Dharani portal in November 2020.

About 1.10 lakh sale deeds were registered for open plots between December 21, 2020 and February 10, 2021, which fetched Rs 456 crore revenue to the government. Majority of these transactions pertain to lands on city outskirts in the Ranga Reddy and Medchal-Malkajgiri districts.

The government wants to cash in on the realty boom and proposes to raise at least Rs 10,000 crore through sale of lands in the upcoming budget to cover up for financial losses suffered last year due to the pandemic and lockdown.
Opinion Article

15 February 2021

With the global roll out of COVID-19 vaccines underway, we are all hoping for brighter days ahead along with the return of travel. But it's also important to acknowledge that the experiences and customs we once knew may look different - either temporarily or permanently due to the pandemic. As the year progresses, what will travel look like? How can the hospitality industry restore traveler confidence while demonstrating resilience?

As COVID-19 wears on, 6 significant trends have emerged that will continue to shape hospitality for the months and years to come.

Go big (near or far): making travel dreams come true

As roads, skies, and borders eventually reopen to tourism, one thing is clear - travel desire and demand is there. In a recent Amadeus survey of 8,500 leisure travelers, 71% say they would travel immediately or within 1-3 months of travel restrictions being lifted.

Pent up demand will have people looking to tick off a bucket list trip by car or air, whether it's walking the Great Wall of China, tracking the Big 5 during an African safari, or spotting the Northern Lights. These experiences can be made even more rewarding with the help of knowledgeable travel agents who can handle complicated logistics or vaccination requirements, while finding the best deals that may have been out of budget pre-COVID-19.

Nomadic travel: embrace working from anywhere

Digitalization accelerated rapidly over the past year as workers stayed home and many companies chose to close or consolidate office locations permanently. What does it mean for workplace culture as we knew it?

Many hotel chains such as MGM got creative by offering "work, stay, play" packages to entice these new digital nomads and address their needs. Rooms are marketed as safe, quiet places to work, and come with food and beverage credits and free parking, among other upgrades.

The Caribbean nations of Barbados, Bermuda, and Anguilla were also quick to tap into this trend, offering visas to remote workers wishing to swap their scene for a temporary island getaway. Expect plenty of people with flexible working and living arrangements to take up these offers in 2021.

The loyalty shift: better service for all

Before COVID-19, hotel rewards and loyalty programs were major revenue generators. Now, hygiene has become the critical currency as health and safety remain top of mind. The rise of the "Generation Clean" traveler - a new travel segment valuing cleanliness protocols above all else - necessitates a new approach from hoteliers about the way they communicate, market, and implement sanitization safeguards.

As part of our Amadeus survey, 2 out of 3 travelers agree that COVID-19 prevention measures are very important to know before choosing a hotel, and can be more influential in their decision to book than price alone.

Swipe right on tech: touchless experiences will inspire traveler confidence

In addition to enhanced cleaning programs, major hotel chains including Hilton, IHG, and Accor have modified the guest journey to minimize the number of touchpoints. Standard contactless experiences now include check-in/out, digital room keys, room service, mobile payments, and more.

Not only does technology offer convenience for the guest, but more than 4 in 5 travelers feel it will increase their confidence to travel in the next 12 months.

Travel agents: don't leave home without one

Research shows that global travelers are seeking more recommendations, support, and advice from travel agents during this time of uncertainty. Rapidly changing COVID-19 restrictions and requirements can be a challenge for travelers to understand alone, making travel agents a critical lifeline to anticipate and adapt to changes in plans and communicate those accordingly.

Strong partnerships between travel agents and hotels will also play a key role in recovery. When hotels provide travel agents with the relevant information (cleanliness protocols, operating conditions etc.) needed to instill traveler confidence, they can support travelers in their desire to leave home and increase bookings through the GDS channel.

Travel for good: a commitment to sustainability

The pandemic has given us all an opportunity to think about how we move around the planet and the impact it has.

While the hospitality industry has made tremendous strides in the fight against climate change, commitment to green initiatives rank high in importance for many of today's travelers. In recent years, top hotel brands have pledged to reduce water usage, carbon emissions, and waste, while pursuing LEED certifications for properties, renewable energy sources, and locally sourced food.

As the world emerges from lockdown into a more cautious travel environment, both business and leisure travelers will be more committed to minimizing the footprint of their journeys and seeking out eco-friendly properties at their final destinations.

The year ahead

With 2021 comes optimism for the return of travel. What we know for sure is that people's desire to travel - whether to find the perfect beach, climb a new summit, or even resume face-to-face business meetings - will remain unchanged.

In the meantime, hoteliers can and should be thinking about ways to adapt their business strategies to better reflect the evolving traveler journey and their heightened expectations of cleanliness and service. For more information on these topics, plus how to engage the all important leisure traveler during COVID-19, click here.
Eaters who werent familiar with ghost kitchens prior to the pandemic now have a firm grasp on the concept, also sometimes described as a virtual brand. A ghost kitchen offers delivery exclusively, so you can order from the restaurant, but you cant go there.

In short, if youve ever come across a burger joint or chicken wing slinger on Uber Eats or DoorDash that you havent noticed in real life, youve just seen a ghost.

But to complicate the definition slightly, there is now a physical space in North Charleston by the name of Ghost Kitchen Charleston. The former owner of Duvall Catering & Events developed the facility to support incorporeal restaurants, as well as food trucks, independent bakers, small-scale caterers and artisan food producers.

My mission is to help small businesses grow and be successful while making their lives easier, said Steve Wenger, whos spent the last two years on what he describes as his retirement project.

Sign up for our food & dining newsletter. We publish our free Food & Dining newsletter every Wednesday at 10 a.m. to keep you informed on everything happening in the Charleston culinary scene. Sign up today! Email

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Wenger in 1991 purchased Stephen Duvall & Associates Catering from its original owners and remained at its head until selling the company to Dave Byron in 2018. During Wenger's tenure, Duvall was inducted into the Leading Caterers of America, a prestigious industry group.

Ghost Kitchen Charleston, 3555 Dorchester Road, features 10 cooking stations and plug-in stations for 20 food trucks. Rates vary from $300 to $1,500 a month, with additional fees for food truck parking and extra storage.

For more information, go to ghostkitchenchs.com or call 843-872-9598.
Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Credit Suisse Group AG is grappling with how to keep top bankers from fleeing to competitors and drastically reducing risk as new Chairman Antonio Horta-Osorio seeks to recover from a series of scandals.The lender is cutting ties with SoftBank Group Corp., a backer to Lex Greensills collapsed supply-chain finance empire, and its temporarily barring clients from withdrawing all of their cash from a fund that invests with Renaissance Technologies after the strategy tanked and investors rushed for the exit.Its also considering retention bonuses for top performers to stabilize the business as defections mount in the wake of the Greensill debacle and the implosion of Bill Hwangs Archegos Capital Management, which contributed to a first-quarter pretax loss of 900 million francs ($1 billion).Theyre looking a bit like a basket case right now, Octavio Marenzi, chief executive officer of capital markets consulting firm Opimas, said Friday in a phone interview. The Archegos thing is really bad, and what happens after an event like that is people start to pick on them. Theyre seen as the weakest kid in the class.Some of the firms senior talent is streaming for the exits. Its top financial services banker, Alejandro Przygoda, is leaving for Jefferies Financial Group Inc., along with at least three colleagues, people familiar with the matter have said. That followed the recent departures of at least four other members of the financial institutions group to competitors including Barclays Plc., Bank of America Corp. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc.Shares of Zurich-based Credit Suisse have tumbled about 14% this year, the only decline among 35 companies in the Bloomberg Europe 500 Banks & Financial Services Index, which has surged 26%.Credit Suisse will no longer do any new business with SoftBank, people with knowledge of situation said, a decision that may ripple across the firms investment bank. SoftBank has been a prolific dealmaker, and last year Credit Suisse and other banks held about $8 billion of SoftBank shares in collateral, pledged by founder Masayoshi Son.A SoftBank Group spokesperson wasnt immediately available to comment, while Credit Suisse declined to comment.Horta-Osorio, 57, who succeeded Urs Rohner as chairman last month, pledged a wide-ranging review after the bank was forced to suspend billions of dollars of funds it managed with Greensill and took a $5.5 billion hit on Archegos, raising questions about the oversight of key clients.Credit Suisse conducted an internal review into the Greensill funds after allegations of possible conflicts of interest involving SoftBank last year. A number of SoftBank portfolio companies received loans via supply-chain funds at Credit Suisse, while SoftBank was also an investor in the Credit Suisse funds.In the aftermath, SoftBank pulled $700 million from the funds and the bank changed its investment guidelines for Credit Suisses funds to reduce the maximum exposure to a single borrower.The overlapping financial relationships raised questions about whether SoftBank was using the Credit Suisse funds to prop up investments in the Vision Fund, including Greensill Capital, in which it had a substantial stake.SoftBank wrote down its $1.5 billion Greensill holding to almost zero after Credit Suisse was forced to unwind its four Greensill-linked funds in March, people familiar with the matter have said. SoftBank is now seeking $1.15 billion in claims as part of Greensills insolvency proceedings.Credit Suisse marketed the popular supply-chain finance funds as among its safest investments because the funds were insured and the loans they held backed by invoices typically paid within weeks. But as the funds grew into a $10 billion strategy, they strayed from that pitch and much of the money was loaned through Greensill against expected future invoices, for sales that were merely predicted.Greensills collapse forced Credit Suisse to liquidate the funds.Guptas BusinessThe Greensill debacle is also at play in claims that Credit Suisse executives ignored warnings from colleagues about troubled steel tycoon Sanjeev Gupta as they channeled $1.2 billion of client funds to his businesses. Bankers in Credit Suisses commodity trade-finance unit blacklisted Guptas Liberty Commodities Ltd. in 2016 because they suspected some of its deals werent legitimate, according to people familiar with the matter.When they learned roughly two years later that the bank was lending to his companies through a suite of investment funds, which eventually grew to $10 billion, they flagged their concerns to leaders in compliance and the division that housed the loans, one of the people said.The disclosure that Credit Suisse may have put clients at risk despite internal concerns over Guptas businesses adds a new twist to the debacle stemming from the March implosion of Greensill, the finance firm at the center of the three-way relationship. The U.K. Serious Fraud Office is now investigating Guptas group of companies for suspected fraud, including in its financing deals with Greensill, according to a May 14 statement.We are currently focusing our efforts on recovering our investors money, Will Bowen, a spokesman for Credit Suisse in London, said in an emailed statement, adding that the banks internal probe will focus on all of the issues linked to the funds. We are committed to learning the lessons and will share the relevant lessons learned at the appropriate time.Andrew Mitchell, a spokesman for the Gupta Family Group Alliance, or GFG Alliance, a collective of businesses linked to Gupta including Liberty Commodities, denied any wrongdoing.RenTech FundSeparately, Credit Suisse is temporarily barring clients from withdrawing all their cash from a fund that invests with RenTec.The bank has invoked a so-called hold-back clause, after assets in the CS Renaissance Alternative Access Fund slumped to about $250 million this month from approximately $700 million at the start of last year, according to people with knowledge of the matter. While investors will receive 95% of their redemption requests after two months, the remaining 5% is expected to be paid out in January, after the funds year-end audit, the people said.The fund lost about 32% last year, in line with the decline in the Renaissance Institutional Diversified Alpha Fund International fund that it invests into, the people said. Renaissance, regarded as one of the most successful quant investing firms in the world, was rocked by billion of dollars in redemptions earlier this year after unprecedented losses in 2020. Three of its funds open to external investors fell by double digits last year.Credit Suisse and Renaissance declined to comment.More stories like this are available on bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.2021 Bloomberg L.P.
It would be disingenuous, Ms. Montez said, to claim compensation played no role in her decision to become a surrogate. But its really just there to make sure Im financially stable during this time, said the mother of two, who lives with her family in the Bay Area.

Her real inspiration, she said, came as a child, after witnessing a surrogate carry twins for her aunt, who struggled with infertility.

Those are my cousins  they wouldnt be here without that lady who opened up her heart, Ms. Montez said. Its hard to put into words the feeling you get helping another family come to life.

Only a fraction of applicants qualify

That gestational carriers tend to be so altruistic by nature is not, as it turns out, by accident  they are carefully vetted that way, said Ms. Wippler.

Though the surrogacy industry remains loosely regulated by the federal government, it has come a long way since Baby M. Reputable agencies adhere to guidelines put forth by the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, or A.S.R.M. Applying these standards, along with those imposed by her own agency, means few applicants make it through the screening process. Out of the 300 to 400 candidates her agency receives each month, Ms. Wippler said, only 1 to 1.5 percent are accepted.

Candidates are disqualified for any number of reasons, the most common resulting from a health screening. A.S.R.M. guidelines say surrogates should be between 21 and 45 years old, have carried at least one child to term without major complications and maintain a healthy body-mass index. But the guidelines also require surrogates to undergo psychological screening  a process that closely examines a candidates motivations to pursue work as a gestational carrier.

Applicants who are deemed overly dependent on the compensation provided, including those who receive government assistance, are screened out as surrogates. We always go back to a do no harm mentality, Ms. Wippler said, noting that if a candidate receives food stamps or Medicaid, the payment provided for surrogacy would in many cases cause them to lose eligibility for those benefits.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu on Monday that "PKK terrorists" bore responsibility for the deaths of Turkish hostages in northern Iraq.

Turkey had accused the United States of supporting "terrorists" after Washington declined to immediately back Ankara's claim that Kurdish militants had executed 13 Turkish nationals in Iraq.

"The Secretary expressed condolences for the deaths of Turkish hostages in northern Iraq and affirmed our view that PKK terrorists bear responsibility," State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.

The Turkish anger was directed at a US State Department statement on Sunday saying Washington "deplores the death of Turkish citizens" but awaits further confirmation of Ankara's version of events.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan branded Washington's response "a farce" and the Turkish foreign ministry summoned US Ambassador David Satterfield to express Ankara's displeasure "in the strongest possible terms."

Price said Blinken spoke by phone with Cavusoglu on Monday and "emphasized the longstanding importance of the US-Turkish bilateral relationship" and "our shared interest in countering terrorism."

He said Blinken also urged Turkey "not to retain the Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile system."

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In a statement after the vote, Trump offered few clues, but was defiant as he told supporters their movement has only just begun. In the months ahead I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all of our people, he said. Im into winning: Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican on Trump. Credit:AP Senator Lindsey Graham, who spoke to Trump on Saturday night, acknowledged that Trump is mad at some folks, but also ready to move on and rebuild the Republican Party and excited about 2022. In their conversations, Graham has stressed to Trump, who has threatened to start his own party to punish disloyal Republicans, that the GOP needs him to win.

I said, Mr. President, this MAGA movement needs to continue. We need to unite the party. Trump-plus is the way back in 2022, Graham, a Republican, told Fox News Sunday. Loading My goal is to win in 2022 to stop the most radical agenda Ive seen coming out of the Democratic presidency of Joe Biden. We cant do that without Donald Trump, so hes ready to hit the trail and Im ready to work with him, Graham said. Graham said Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who voted to acquit but then delivered a scalding denunciation of Trump, got a load off a chest, obviously. Graham said later in the interview: If you want to get something off your chest, fine, but Im into winning. At his Palm Beach club on Saturday night, Trump was in a joyous mood as he enjoyed dinner on a patio packed with people. After a mellow last several weeks, one member described a party atmosphere not felt since before the election.

Still, Trump isnt in the clear yet. No longer protected by a Justice Department opinion against the prosecution of sitting presidents, he now faces multiple, ongoing criminal investigations. In Georgia, the Fulton County District Attorney has opened a criminal investigation into attempts to influence the election, including Trumps call to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger demanding that the official find enough votes to overturn Bidens victory. Loading In New York, Attorney-General Letitia James is investigating whether Trump and his company improperly inflated the value of his assets on annual financial statements in order to secure loans and obtain tax benefits. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance jnr continues his own investigation, which has included grand jury testimony. He didnt get away with anything  yet, McConnell, a Republican said after the vote. We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation. And former presidents are not immune from being accountable by either one.

McConnell voted to acquit Trump on the grounds the trial was unconstitutional because he is no longer in office, but insisted, Theres no question  none  that president Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. That sharp rebuke from his once-loyal defender underscores how dramatically Trumps stock has fallen in Washington since his first impeachment trial just over a year ago. But the desire to be rid of Trump is not shared across the country, where Republicans who have dared to admonish him have faced swift rebuke. No question of Trumps guilt, said the Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell after voting to acquit the former president. Credit:AP Representative Liz Cheney, a Republican, was forced to defend her third-in-line leadership position after she voted in favour of impeachment. On Saturday, Louisianas Republican Party quickly censured Senator Bill Cassidy, one of the seven Republicans senators who voted for Trumps conviction. In an interview with ABCs This Week on Sunday, Cassidy seemed at peace with his decision.

I think his force wanes, he said of Trump. The Republican Party is more than just one person. The Republican Party is about ideas. But how long Trump retains his grip remains an open question, especially with a slew of likely 2024 candidates now trying to take the mantle. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Some, like Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, are advocating a clean break from Trump, who ended his presidency with a record low 34 per cent approval rating according to Gallup polling. Others have stressed the need to keep his voters engaged, perhaps with candidates who trumpet the policies Trump championed, but with a less caustic style that might win back suburban voters.

In a sign of his enduring power, the Republican National Committee and other groups spent the trial sending fundraising appeals urging their followers to Stand with Trump and SAVE President Trumps Legacy in the words of the National Republican Congressional Committee. Oh, time is going to take care of that some way or another, Senator Chuck Grassley, a Republican, told reporters on Saturday. But remember, in order to be a leader, you got to have followers. So were gonna find out, whoever leads. But everybodys going to be involved. Were a big tent. While the Senate failed to bar Trump from running again for office, many believe he has done too much damage to be a credible candidate himself in 2024. Republican Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, who is retiring, said Trumps refusal to accept the results of the election had very badly damaged his reputation eclipsing his accomplishments in office. Instead, Toomey said, hell be remembered throughout history as the president who resorted to nonlegal steps to try to hold on to power.

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Robert Lighthizer, the Trump administration's trade representative, in Washington, Jan. 13, 2021. Lighthizer expressed no regrets for the role he played in suspending the World Trade OrganizationOs dispute settlement system. (Alyssa Schukar/The New York Times)

Ana Swanson

WASHINGTON  Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a Nigerian economist and former finance minister, is poised to become the first woman and first African to lead the World Trade Organization, when the members of the global trade body meet Monday to consider her candidacy for director-general.

The appointment would remove a key obstacle to the functioning of the WTO, which has been leaderless during a time of growing protectionism and global economic upheaval brought about by the pandemic. But even with Okonjo-Iweala at the helm and the renewed support of the Biden administration, the WTO, which was founded in 1995 to ensure that trade flows as smoothly and freely as possible, will face steep challenges surrounding its effectiveness as the worlds trade arbiter.

Trade negotiations, including an effort to restrain harmful subsidies given to the fishing industry, have dragged on without resolution. A key part of the organization for settling trade disputes, called the appellate body, remains crippled after the Trump administration blocked appointments of new personnel. And there are deep divisions over whether rich and poor countries should receive different treatment under global trade rules.

There is also growing consensus that the World Trade Organization has failed to police some of Chinas worst economic offenses, which many in the United States consider the worlds biggest trade challenge today. And there is deep uncertainty about whether the group can be overhauled to address those shortcomings.

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

There are a lot of issues that are begging for reform, said Wendy Cutler, a former U.S. trade negotiator and a vice president at the Asia Society Policy Institute. She said that the Biden administrations support for Okonjo-Iweala could be an easy way to gain goodwill and get everyone focused on the important substantive issues.

The Trump administration spent the last four years mostly criticizing or ignoring the World Trade Organization, ultimately weakening the institution by carrying out its most prominent trade policies outside of its boundaries. Rather than working with the WTO, President Donald Trump took on trading partners like China and the European Union one-on-one, deploying hefty tariffs that those governments argued contravened the WTOs rules.

President Joe Biden is likely to take a very different approach. He has criticized Trump for alienating allies and weakening the multilateral system, and is expected to make the United States a more active player in international groups including the WTO.

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That includes supporting the organizations new leadership. On Feb. 5, the Biden administration announced it would support Okonjo-Iweala, reversing efforts by the Trump administration to block her candidacy.

The former director-general, Roberto Azevedo, announced last May that he would leave the job a year early and departed in August. While the vast majority of the organizations members supported Okonjo-Iweala to replace him, Trump administration officials, particularly former trade representative Robert Lighthizer, had criticized her lack of trade experience, and supported the South Korean candidate, trade minister Yoo Myung-hee, instead.

On Feb. 5, Yoo withdrew from the race.

The United States stands ready to engage in the next phase of the WTO process for reaching a consensus decision on the WTO director-general, the Office of the United States Trade Representative said in a Feb. 5 statement. The Biden administration looks forward to working with a new WTO director-general to find paths forward to achieve necessary substantive and procedural reform of the WTO.

Okonjo-Iweala, 66, is a development economist who spent 25 years working at the World Bank, including as managing director, and served two terms as Nigerias finance minister, as well as the countrys foreign affairs minister. A U.S. citizen who earned a doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, she serves on the boards of Twitter and Standard Chartered and is an adviser to the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. Until recently she served on the board of GAVI, an international organization that distributes vaccines to poor countries.

In her first stint as finance minister, she led negotiations that resulted in most of Nigerias external debt being wiped out. Later, as coordinating minister of the economy in Nigeria  a powerful position created for her that has never been held before or since  many ministers took directives from her, according to Patrick Okigbo, a policy analyst based in Abuja.

In her 2018 book, Fighting Corruption Is Dangerous, Okonjo-Iweala wrote about how her reforms to tackle corruption and shore up the economy made her many enemies. When her mother was briefly kidnapped, she said, the kidnappers demanded Okonjo-Iweala resign.

Her years of navigating Nigerian politics, with its many internal factions and vested interests, had made her a pro at choosing and fighting the big battles, Okigbo said.

If she could handle Nigeria, she should be able to do a good job at the World Trade Organization, he said.

Okonjo-Iweala has said that her earliest priorities will be ensuring the free flow of vaccines, medicines and medical supplies to help deal with the pandemic and aid the global economic recovery. She has vowed to push for new trade agreements on fisheries and the e-commerce industry, and called for finding solutions to the stalemate over dispute settlement. She also said she would prioritize updating trade rules, encouraging members to be transparent and notify one another of changes to their policies, and strengthening the organizations bureaucracy.

Following Okonjo-Iwealas appointment, one of the most pressing issues for the World Trade Organization will most likely be the paralysis of its system for settling trade disputes.

Check here for the latest updates on all COVID-19 vaccines

The appellate body, a part of the organization that considers appeals by countries to WTO decisions on trade disputes, has been shuttered for over a year, after the Trump administration blocked new appointments to the panel that hears those arguments. The Trump administration argued that the appellate body had exceeded the mandate it was created with, ultimately engaging in a kind of judicial activism that undercut U.S. trade law, harming American workers and infringing on U.S. sovereignty.

Before leaving office in January, Lighthizer expressed no regrets for the role he played in suspending the WTOs dispute settlement system, saying in an interview that it had become a net negative for America, and getting rid of it was a positive for American interests.

He added that the WTO had been largely a failure, though he said that getting rid of the group entirely would create more problems than its worth.

I dont think it did what we said people wanted it to. It hasnt done anything on the negotiating front to speak of, Lighthizer said.

While the Biden administration is unlikely to be as critical or confrontational as the Trump administration about the issues plaguing the World Trade Organization, some Democrats share certain concerns about the organizations shortcomings, including whether the appellate body has unfairly constrained U.S. trade policy. And many officials in the Biden administration recognize the WTO has only limited power to push China to make economic reforms.

The Biden administrations nominee for U.S. trade representative, Katherine Tai, is intimately acquainted with both the strengths and shortcomings of the global trade body, having successfully litigated cases against Chinese export restrictions at the World Trade Organization during the Obama administration, when she served as general counsel for the Office of the Trade Representative.

Tai led a legal challenge, supported by Canada, Japan and the European Union, to a ban China had imposed on the export of rare earth materials, a key input for electronics. The United States won the case, and China dropped its quotas in 2015.

Last week, the Biden administration also announced that it was appointing Mark Wu, a Harvard Law School professor who has written about the World Trade Organizations shortcomings when it comes to China, as a senior adviser to the Office of the Trade Representative.

In an influential 2016 paper, Wu argued that the WTO had effectively disciplined China in areas where it has relevant rules. But for some of Chinas most egregious economic practices  in particular, the states prominent role in industry and its heavy subsidies paid to businesses  the group has fallen short, Wu said.

The WTO system works but only up to a point, Wu wrote. The WTO faces a challenge: Can the institution craft a predictable and fair set of legal rules to address new trade-distortive behavior arising out of China Inc.? If not, key countries may turn away from the WTO to address these issues. This will weaken the institution.

c.2021 The New York Times Company
Scientists have discovered life that shouldnt be there under a 900-metre-thick Antarctic ice shelf.

Immobile life forms including what appear to be sponges and possibly barnacles were spotted on a boulder beneath the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf, 260km away from open water that carries the food such organisms rely on.

The discovery was made after a team led by the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) drilled through the ice shelf and dropped a camera into the hole in order to explore the seabed below.

Huw Griffiths, a marine biogeographer at BAS, told the New Scientist there were all sorts of reasons they shouldnt be there, since the creatures likely survive on photosynthetic organisms that require sunlight absent at the bottom of the giant ice shelf.

According to the study, published in Frontiers in Marine Science, Antarctic ocean currents suggest the animals food source could be drifting to them from as far as 1,500km away.

The find suggests life at the worlds southernmost and harshest continent is more adaptable and diverse than initially believed.

Weve discovered this isnt some graveyard where a few things cling on, its more complicated than we thought, Dr Griffiths said.

The team want to further study the life forms, which face an uncertain future in the face of a climate crisis leading to the collapse of ice sheets.

Most of Antarcticas vital ice shelves remain frozen all year round and are stable, but fractures in their surfaces could make them vulnerable to rapid collapse if rising temperatures drive meltwater into the gaps, a separate study last year revealed.

Dr Griffiths now hopes to intensify the study of the creatures  a tough task in such an unforgiving and remote region of the planet.
According to information published by Bahrain News Agency on February 15, 2021, under the patronage of His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the Supreme Commander, a ceremony was held today to inaugurate Bahrains warships, namely the RBNS Al-Zubara, Al-Areen, Mashhoor, Al-Daibal, Askar, Jaw, Al-Hidd and Taghleeb, marking the kingdoms celebrations of the BDFs 53rd anniversary.

According to information published by Bahrain News Agency on February 15, 2021, under the patronage of His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the Supreme Commander, a ceremony was held today to inaugurate Bahrains warships, namely the RBNS Al-Zubara, Al-Areen, Mashhoor, Al-Daibal, Askar, Jaw, Al-Hidd and Taghleeb, marking the kingdoms celebrations of the BDFs 53rd anniversary.

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Ex-HMS Clyde now re-named RBNS Al-Zubarah and handed over to Bahraini Navy (Picture source: Twitter)

Bahrain's most modern warship RBNS Al Zubara (Ex-HMS Clyde River-Class offshore patrol vessel of British Navy) and a number of patrol vessels in the Royal Bahraini Navy of the Bahrain Defence Force (BDF) were inaugurated yesterday.

It was held under the patronage of His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the Supreme Commander. The inauguration ceremony, which took place at the Royal Bahraini Navy, was attended by BDF Commander-in-Chief Field Marshal Shaikh Khalifa bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, coinciding with the 53rd anniversary of the establishment of BDF.

During the inauguration, the BDF Commande-in-Chief raised the Kingdom of Bahrain's flag onboard Al Zubara and on the other ships. He was briefed about Al Zubara and its capabilites during his tour of the various sections of the ship. He also inspected the other warship's modern facilites.

The commissioning ceremony showed RBNS "Al-Zubara patrol warship has now been rearmed with an Aselsan Smash remotely controlled weapon station (RCWS), .50 cal machine guns (MGs), and M134 Miniguns.

The HMS Clyde is a decommissioned offshore patrol vessel and is the tenth ship in the British Royal Navy to bear the name. She was launched on 14 June 2006 in Portsmouth Naval Base by VT Group shipbuilders in Portsmouth, England, and is the fourth vessel of the River class, with a displacement of 2,000 tones and a 30 mm Oerlikon KCB gun in place of the 20 mm gun fitted to Tyne River-class ships.

The HMS Clyde has length 81.5 m (267 ft 5 in) hull, a top speed of 21 kn (39 km/h), a 30 mm cannon, two miniguns, and mountings for five general-purpose machine guns. Clyde's elongated hull permits a 20-meter strengthened flight deck able to accommodate a Merlin-sized helicopter.

The ship has a full load displacement between 1,850 and 2,000 tones. She is powered by two Ruston 12RK 270 engines developing 4,125 kW (5,532 hp) at 1,000 rpm.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The country's COVID-19 task force is postponing its initial order to reopen movie theaters after pushback from Metro Manila mayors.

Inter-Agency Task Force spokesperson Harry Roque on Monday said the enforcement of their resolution can only happen once operational guidelines have been crafted by local government units. He added the earliest cinemas can reopen in Metro Manila is on March 1  if the plan pushes through.

"Ang status po ang pagbubukas ng sinehan, kung matutuloy po, ay Marso 1. Kinakailangan po ipagpatuloy ang consultations at kinakailangan bumuo ng guidelines ang lokal na pamahalaan bago magbukas ang sinehan," he said in a media briefing.

[Translation: Cinemas will open on March 1, if it pushes through. We need to continue the consultations and LGUs need to come up with guidelines before it can reopen.]

All 17 local chief executives in Metro Manila opposed the IATF resolution allowing cinemas, arcades, and other leisure businesses to reopen starting Monday in areas under general community quarantine. Metro Manila Council Chairman Edwin Olivarez said they will defer the reopening of cinemas since the airconditioned and enclosed space can lead to a spike of COVID-19 cases in the capital region, which remains as the epicenter of the virus in the country.

The Department of Health also said concerned government agencies will release guidelines on how to ventilate theaters to ensure proper air circulation. Health experts advised against staying in enclosed spaces for long periods of time after growing evidence that COVID-19 infection can occur from airborne exposure to the virus.

They consulted with an epidemiologist so that they can provide this ventilation requirements for ventilation, specifically in enclosed spaces para lang makapag-prevent ng infection [so they can prevent infections], Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said in a separate briefing.
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In almost two decades working in nursing homes, I've never been through a time as dire as last spring. Facilities like mine, in the greater Boston area, were working with minimal to no protective gear, very little infection-control training, limited laboratory services and constantly changing public-health guidelines. Residents with covid-19 deteriorated so quickly that they'd crash right in front of me, before we even got their test results.

Staff members got sick, and others stayed home because they were scared to get sick. While many doctors stopped going into nursing homes out of fear for their own safety, my team of physicians and nurse practitioners felt it was our duty to continue seeing patients every day. The need was so great: Units that usually had one certified nursing assistant for every eight to 10 residents suddenly had one person in charge of 30 to 40; we were also short on nurses. People weren't getting their meals or personal care on time; they suffered from dehydration, bedsores and social isolation. It was a heartbreaking time. I lost over a hundred patients.

As we learned more about the virus - treatments, proper infection control - conditions improved. Then the vaccine offered our first real hope that this pandemic would eventually end. I got my shots in January, as soon as I could.

But I soon realized that not everyone shared my enthusiasm. About half the staff in the four facilities where I serve as medical director said they would not take the vaccine. This might seem shocking: We work in the medical field, and we saw some of the worst ravages of this disease up close. And yet, despite the misery we'd witnessed, my colleagues were wary of the one intervention that offered a light at the end of the tunnel.

Health authorities across the country have reported widespread vaccine hesitancy among nursing home staff. Uptake among residents is high. But a national survey of certified nursing assistants late last year found that nearly 72 percent didn't want to be vaccinated. The governor of Ohio reported in late December that around 60 percent of his state's nursing home staffers had elected not to take the vaccine yet. Last month, a union representing nursing home staff in Maryland and D.C. estimated that up to 80 percent of its members opted not to be vaccinated in the first push at their facilities. One Miami health system found that only half its employees wanted to get vaccinated immediately; about 15 percent said they were not interested in getting vaccinated at all.

Those statistics are much less surprising when you consider who works in nursing homes. A lot of the certified nursing assistants I work with are people of color. Their mistrust has deep roots: The United States has a long, ugly history of doctors experimenting on Black people without regard for their consent or needs. And working with the elderly - another population our society marginalizes and neglects - has done little to shore up my colleagues' faith that the government is acting in their best interests. Nursing homes were among the first and hardest-hit settings in this pandemic, and we never had enough N95 masks or even simple surgical face coverings. So when nursing home employees are informed that they'll be among the first to get the vaccine - that they're in the highest-priority group - they're skeptical. It doesn't help that many of the most widely available educational materials about the vaccine are produced only in English, shutting out my co-workers who primarily speak Spanish or Haitian Creole.

I started running town halls, in person and over video, to talk to the staff in various Massachusetts nursing homes about the vaccine. Some people come with questions about their specific situations: autoimmune conditions, allergies to food or medicine, pregnancy. I've heard more lurid worries, too. Some people thought the shot had a GPS tracker in it that would allow the government to follow their movements. Others claimed that the vaccine changed your DNA and that any future children could inherit the mutation.

No matter how outlandish some fears seem, I can't shrug them off. People's concerns aren't totally random; it's counterproductive to just dismiss them. Instead, I try to figure out where their understanding went wrong and to offer an explanation for that misunderstanding. For example, vaccines definitely don't contain GPS-enabled chips, but the Pfizer boxes carrying the doses do have a tracking device so that we can follow shipments to our facilities. After I show the staff videos of the boxes and their bar codes, that seems to assuage their fears. I also talk about the differences between RNA and DNA - people often confuse the two, I say, but the vaccine won't affect the latter.

Some people have more general concerns: Did some stringent standard fall by the wayside to speed up the development and approval process? A nurse asked me: "So, Dr. Merchant, was there any point in time when you didn't want to take the vaccine? And at what point did that change?" It helped, I think, that I could answer honestly: Yes, I was skeptical, especially in the spring of 2020. It seemed like President Donald Trump was making unrealistic promises about the timeline for a vaccine and the whole development and approval process might be politicized. But as more data emerged about the vaccines' efficacy, and as I read up on their safety, the more I trusted the science behind them.

I also talk about why I took the vaccine: I see covid-19 patients every day. I got the shot to protect myself, of course, and to protect my family members - especially my parents, who are elderly and live at home with me. I also want to keep my nursing home residents and co-workers safe; I have a responsibility to my community. And, I add, I'm tired of all the precautions that have become life-or-death necessities in the pandemic. We all want normalcy. Vaccine uptake is our ticket there.

These conversations are incredibly time-consuming - hours that I could've used elsewhere, seeing to patients - but they're worth it. Usually, at the end of the town halls, at least a couple of staff members will say they now feel more comfortable with the vaccines. Others say that they'll at least consider taking it, or that they don't want to be the first in line but they'll get the shot the next time it's available to them. When you talk to people, when you take them seriously, you can change their minds. I really believe that. I have to believe it.

- - -

Asif Merchant is a geriatrician who serves on the COVID-19 Vaccine Advisory Group for the governor of Massachusetts.
Disaster struck Uttarakhands Chamoli district on February 7 in the form of an avalanche and deluge, after a portion of the Nanda Devi glacier broke off. The sudden flood in the middle of the day in the Dhauli Ganga, Rishi Ganga and Alaknanda rivers  all intricately linked tributaries of the Ganga  triggered widespread panic and large-scale devastation in the high mountain areas. Since then, rescuers are trying to locate missing people, even as the death toll continues to rise.

Here are the latest updates on glacier burst

1. Death toll rises to 54

Rescue teams on Sunday recovered 13 more bodies, including the first ones to be pulled out from the sludge-choked Tapovan tunnel where a massive operation to reach about 30 people trapped inside began after a flash flood in Chamoli district a week ago.

Six bodies were recovered from the Tapovan power project tunnel, six from Raini upstream and one from the riverbank in Rudraprayag, taking the confirmed death toll in the disaster to 56. Officials say over 150 people still remain missing.





ALSO READ: Uttarakhand glacier burst: Rescue operation underway at tunnel in Joshimath

2. 64 persons frm UP missing

Sixty-four persons belonging to Uttar Pradesh are still missing almost a week after the floods in Uttarakhands Chamoli district, a government official said on Saturday.

So far, five persons from the State have been declared dead, while 23 others were traced, said Sanjay Goyal, U.P. Relief Commissioner.

The majority of the missing people belong to Lakhimpur Kheri district (30), located on the India-Nepal border in the Terai region, followed by Saharanpur (10), Shravasti (5) and Gorakhpur (4).

3. flood disaster | Relief operation continues in Chamoli

The rescue operation at the Tapovan hydel project tunnel in Uttarakhands Chamoli is underway. Joint teams comprising about 1,000 officials and personnel from different Central and State agencies are currently involved in the search, rescue and relief operations.

4. Hydel projects damaged

Two power projects  NTPCs Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel project and the Rishi Ganga Hydel Project  have been extensively damaged.





ALSO READ: An SC order ignored, and the state of Uttarakhand's flood-hit hydel plants

5. What caused the floods?

A part of the Nanda Devi glacier broke off on February 7 at around 10:45am triggering an avalanche and sudden floods in the Rishi Ganga, Dhauli Ganga and Alaknanda, all tributaries of the River Ganga. "The glacial burst led to the rising of water levels in the river Rishiganga, which washed away the Rishiganga small hydro project of 13.2 MW, the Union ministry of home affairs said.

6. Relief measures announced

Uttarakhand chief minister Trivendra Singh Rawat has announced Rs 4 lakh as compensation for the kin of the deceased. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had also announced an ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakh for the family of those killed in the disaster and Rs 50,000 to the injured.

7. Impact on Delhi

High turbidity likely to affect water supply in parts of Delhi

Flash floods in Uttarakhand's Chamoli have increased turbidity of raw water fetched by Delhi from Upper Ganga Canal to "unprecedented levels" which is likely to hit water supply in many parts of the national capital, DJB vice chairman Raghav Chadha said.

8. Flood impact on Chardham road project

The deluge of pictures of the glacier burst from Uttarakhand may raise fresh troubles for the ongoing Char Dham road project. The project is not one but a smorgasbord of 53 road projects in Uttarakhand at a cost of Rs 12,072 crore. While about 50 per cent of the project has been completed, the difficult ones demanding the most money and widening of the roads near glaciers and landslide-prone zones up in the hills are yet to be attempted.





ALSO READ: Uttarakhand glacier burst may spell more trouble for Char Dham road project

9. Hydropower dams face public anger after Uttarakhand flood tragedy

The flash flood has raised public anger over hydropower projects that the government considers essential to decarbonize the nations electricity generation. Experts say the incident, induced by the effect of global warming on melting glaciers, was made worse by construction of infrastructure.

Hydropower projects, which use large-scale blasting, tree felling and tunneling, most certainly added to the proportion of the impact, said Himanshu Thakkar, coordinator of the New Delhi-based South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People, which studies the social and environmental impact of water-related projects. They became a force multiplier in the destruction.

10. Fate of NTPCs Tapovan project hangs in balance after Rs 1,500 crore loss

The fate of NTPCs 520-MW Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel project hangs in balance as Indias largest power company is estimated to have suffered a loss of Rs 1,500 crore due to damage to the construction caused by the flash flood.
He is followed by Petro Poroshenko and Yulia Tymoshenko.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is still in the lead in the presidential rating.

"Among the candidates, Volodymyr Zelensky would get relatively more votes, since 16.2% of all respondents and 22.7% of those who have made up their mind would have supported him," according to findings of a poll conducted by Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).

Another 13.1% and 18.3%, respectively, would vote for former President, leader of the European Solidarity Party Petro Poroshenko, while 10.3% and 14.5% would back leader of the Batkivshchyna Party Yulia Tymoshenko.

Read alsoZelensky tops public trust ratingSome 8.1% and 11.4% would support co-chair of the Opposition Platform - For Life Party Yuriy Boyko. Another 5.9% and 8.2% would cast ballots for leader of the Syla i Chest (Strength and Honor) Party Ihor Smeshko, 3.7% and 5.1% would root for Chairman of the Opposition Platform - For Life Party's political council Viktor Medvedchuk, 3.2% and 4.5% would vote for leader of the Ukrainian Strategy Party Volodymyr Groysman, and 2.9% and 4.1% would back leader of the Hromadianska Pozytsia (Civil Position) Party Anatoliy Hrytsenko.

Other candidates would get lower support.

Poll: Details

The survey was conducted on February 5-7 through computer-assisted telephone interviews (CATI) using a random selection of cell numbers.

The sample is representative of the adult population (aged 18 and older). The survey was conducted in settlements across Ukraine with the exception of Russia-occupied Crimea and certain districts in Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

The study involved 2,005 respondents.

The margin of error (with a probability of 0.95 and with a design effect of 1.1) does not exceed 2.4% for indicators close to 50%, 2.1% for indicators close to 25%, 1.5% for indicators close to 10%, and 1.1% for indicators close to 5%.

Reporting by UNIAN
South Africa: Motshekga calls on parents to pay school fees

Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga has urged parents to continue paying school fees during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Speaking at a briefing on an array of issues, she said there are two types of public schools in the country, the fee-paying and no-fee paying schools.

She explained that fee-paying schools are allowed to charge school fees as determined at the annual general meeting of the School Governing Body (SGB).

Therefore, the payment of school fees in such schools is mandatory, she said at Sundays briefing.

She also cited the South African Schools Act (SASA) of 1996, which states that SGBs of fee-paying schools have the powers to enforce parents to pay school fees through legal means.

The liability of parents is determined through an affordability formula, which can be used to determine whether a parent can be exempted partially or fully from paying school fees.

Meanwhile, she also raised concerns about schools that are charging registration deposits and exorbitant amounts to pay staff the Section 42 bonuses.

This was despite the moratorium placed on the public service salary bill.

We must advise schools to avoid such temptations, as the first is illegal. Secondly, it is completely unreasonable especially as it is done and enforced under the devastation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Basic Education Employment Initiative (BEEI)

The Minister announced that 290 000 young people have been employed on contract as education assistants and general school assistants in the response to President Cyril Ramaphosas Fiscal Stimulus Package announced in April 2020.

The aim of the initiative is to address COVID-19 related academic disruptions by providing assistance in dealing with lingering systemic challenges and support to workers directly impacted by the pandemic.

In addition, the portion of the R7 billion allocated for the BEEI is targeted at saving SGB funded posts in public and government subsidised independent schools.

We are working hard to ensure that the delayed payments of some of these young people are addressed immediately.

NSC exam results

The Minister confirmed that the 2020 National Senior Certificate exam results will be released on 22 February 2021.02.15

Candidates who sat for the exams can expect to receive their statements on 23 February 2021 from their schools.

Motshekga said the pandemic requires the entire nation to support its children, and indeed cooperate and support schools on a sustainable basis.

I urge every one of us, to play our part in keeping our communities safe and healthy, she said.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-02-15. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- via InvestorWire -- Hunter Technology Corp. (TSX-V: HOC; OTCQB: HOILF; WKN: A2QEYH, FSE: RWPM, ISIN: CA4457371090) (Hunter or the Company) is pleased to report that it is on track to launch a pilot service for selected customers, including governments, sovereign wealth funds, environmental agencies, regulators and self-regulatory organizations (Users), in Q3 2021.



The Company is developing its end-to-end service utilizing a proprietary blockchain-based modular software platform to supply Users with immutable data intelligence on the full lifecycle of the crude oil supply chain from reserve management through wellhead production, storage, transhipment, export and/or domestic consumption. Standardized, unchallengeable records will be held in a fully customisable reporting cloud using blockchain technology, supporting Users to report, monitor, trace and track the full hydrocarbon lifecycle from production source to ultimate destination.

The Supply Chain Intelligence service will be provided under the brand OilExchange (www.oilexchange.com). It is being designed to furnish its users with a full suite of data via exchange including analytics tools to structure and analyse raw data. Users will be able to monitor and analyse key performance indicators (KPI) and metrics through user-friendly visual dashboards.

By tracking the origin, transhipment and processing of the produced goods and the environmental, social and governance (ESG) compliance during the life cycle of hydrocarbons, as well as government royalty or tax payments and customs clearance, Users will have a real-time view of their hydrocarbon supply chain. In addition, the data sharing between Users through a secure and trusted platform will allow all stakeholders to enhance their information management practices. This in turn will allow for a greater utilization of existing reserves and reduce the need to expand drilling footprints, ultimately having a positive effect though a reduced carbon footprint as producers transition towards a more environmentally and ethically responsible ecosystem.

By allowing Users to derive insights about the economic and environmental viability and responsibility of Exploration & Production (E&P) companies, OilExchange can incentivise operators to consider developing and reworking economically viable legacy brownfields (as an alternative to greenfield production), capitalizing on the shifting investor appetite towards more socially and environmentally considerate operations. Upon completion of the Pilot service, the Company intends to enter into formal agreements with Users.

Hunter with its technology platform and Integration capabilities will support the hydrocarbons industry in its drive to digitalize its operations, increase trust and transparency between its stakeholders, and meet its regulatory requirements, said Alex Medana, Hunters Chief Executive Officer.

About Hunter Technology Corp.

Hunter Technology Corp. is a technology provider developing interactive blockchain platforms to enable the facilitation of physical oil transactions throughout the trade lifecycle, with more favorable economics for producers and access to a fair market for all. Through oilex.com Hunter will operate a physical oil marketplace to facilitate the buying and selling of physical oil by independent producers to corporate consumers, traders and sovereign purchasers. Through oilexchange.com, Hunter will offer robust supply chain management tools that track physical oil throughout the supply chain and automate the reporting process via this blockchain enabled platform.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Alex Medana

Chief Executive Officer

(888) 977-0970

For further information, visit our website at www.huntertechnology.com .



NEITHER TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Information.

This news release contains certain statements which may constitute forward-looking statements or information (collectively, "forward-looking statements") regarding Hunters business development plans. Forward-looking statements are statements that relate to future, not past, events. In this context, forward-looking statements often address expected future business and financial performance, including factors beyond Hunters control, and often contain words such as "anticipate," "believe," "plan," "estimate," "expect," and "intend," statements that an action or event "may," "might," "could," "should," "will" or be "on track to" be taken or occur, or other similar expressions. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, included herein are forward-looking statements. By their nature, forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements, or other future events, to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward looking statements (including execution risk, market risk, industry risk, market reaction, the impact of general economic conditions and competition from other industry participants, as well as stock market volatility). In this news release, forward-looking statements relate to, among other things, Hunters business development plans as well as Hunters future performance as it develops its business. Although Hunter believes that the expectations in its forward-looking statements are reasonable, they are based on factors, estimates and assumptions concerning future events which may prove to be inaccurate. Those factors and assumptions are based upon currently available information. Such forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that could influence actual results or events and cause actual results or events to differ materially from those stated, anticipated or implied in the forward-looking statement. Such factors include, but are not limited to: risks relating to delays, development and marketing risks, unforeseen requirements resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, commodity prices, inability to access, on favorable terms, sufficient capital from internal and external sources, the ability to access, hire and retain employees; regulatory changes and impacts, timing and completion of the Company's online platforms as well as general business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties. As such, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the forward-looking statements, as no assurance can be provided as to future results, levels of activity or achievements. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release are made as of the date of this news release and, except as required by applicable law, Hunter does not undertake any obligation to publicly update or to revise any of the included forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. The forward-looking statements contained in this document are expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. Trading in the securities of Hunter should be considered highly speculative. There can be no assurance that Hunter will be able to achieve all or any of its proposed objectives. As at the date hereof, Hunter has not signed any formal contracts to provide the OilExchange service to Users and there is no certainty that Hunter will enter into formal contracts with Users. Please review Hunters SEDAR filings including its management discussion and analysis available under the Company's profile at www.sedar.com for a more fulsome discussion of risk factors affecting Hunter.

Wire Service Contact

InvestorWire (IW)

Los Angeles, California

www.InvestorWire.com

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The company is confident that the projects environmentally-friendly tailings reprocessing to produce ultra-high-purity manganese products will enable it to become Europes only primary producer.

The company believes that the projects location in the heart of Europes growing EV production hub make it a globally strategic asset.

( ) ( ) (OTCMKTS:EROMF) (FRA:E06) is progressing towards its goal of developing the Chvaletice Manganese Project in the Czech Republic and a final environmental impact assessment (EIA), which is targeted for completion by the end of the year, could enable final permitting for the project in 2022.

The project is expected to reprocess tailings to produce ultra-high-purity electrolytic manganese metal (HPEMM) with specifications exceeding 99.9% manganese and ultra-high-purity manganese sulphate monohydrate (HPMSM) - which are critical components of lithium ion (Li-ion) batteries.

Chvaletice is also expected to result in the environmental remediation of a polluted former mine site, bringing it into full compliance with modern Czech and European Union environmental standards and regulations.

Meeting European demand

Few sources of manganese are suitable for the sustainable and economic production of high-purity manganese products and the demand for high-purity manganese products is growing rapidly.

This is largely fueled by the Li-ion and electric vehicle (EV) markets, particularly in Europe where 100% of high-purity manganese products are imported.

The company has worked closely with key global customers on product development and supply chain qualification and, based on the results of its pilot plant tests, is confident that it can produce the ultra-high purity manganese products to meet demand.

Processing plant land secured

The company has secured the land required for its processing plant site (already zoned for industrial use) and has initiated the rezoning process for the tailings land.

Both adjoining municipalities have voted unanimously to proceed with the required land-use plan change after an intensive community consultation.

The company has been undertaking community consultation for several years and has seen overwhelmingly positive feedback and valuable input from local residents.

Government support

Additionally, the company has experienced ongoing collaboration and support for the project at various levels of the Czech Government.

The government issued a key preliminary mining permit in 2018 and issued and then extended two exploration licences to 2023.

It has also approved the companys application for some investment incentives in the form of investment tax credits on eligible project expenditures, and in March 2020 issued a ruling under European Unions Natura 2000 which determined that the project is not expected to adversely impact endangered and protected species habitat.

Environmental impact assessment

The environmental impact assessment (EIA) regulatory review process is underway with the results of the review process by several government ministries and agencies, as well as local municipalities, communicated to the company in January 2021.

Based on the results, the company can now move forward to the next stages of the permitting process.

Public and regulatory feedback from the screening procedure will be incorporated into the Final EIA, which is targeted for completion by the end of 2021 and could enable final permitting for the project in 2022.

Funding the feasibility study

The net proceeds of C$10.6 million raised from a recent offering enabled the company to continue the work on the feasibility study, place the order for the demonstration plant and advance the EIA and permitting process.

However, the company anticipates it will be required to raise additional funding as the current capital resources will not be sufficient to fully complete the feasibility study and the installation, commissioning and operation of the demonstration plant.

The expected funding of the external costs of the feasibility study and the operation of demonstration plant for one year is estimated at C$11.2 million, with internal costs to complete these stages of the project estimated at C$6 million, bringing the total costs to C$17.2 million.

Subject to additional financing, the completion of the demonstration plant and commissioning, as well as the completion of the feasibility study, is now expected by the end of 2021.

Optimisation opportunities

As it moves through the feasibility and project development stages, the company intends to evaluate potential value-enhancing opportunities for the project, with the aim of reducing costs and technical risks.

The company is also evaluating the possibility of producing high-purity manganese carbonate.

In collaboration with one or more potential consumers of high purity manganese products.

The company will evaluate the feasibility of building one or more satellite manganese metal dissolution plants at customer nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) precursor plants which could provide certain customers with manganese sulphate solution instead of granulated manganese sulphate monohydrate - eliminating the energy-intensive crystallization step.

Securing a strategic partner

Following the receipt of expressions of interest from various parties to partner in the development of the project in 2020, the company initiated a process to secure a strategic partner to assist with the further development of the project.

The company is also continuing discussions on technical collaboration with several parties (including battery, chemical and automobile manufacturers) with the intent to enter additional memorandums of understanding (MOU) for the eventual offtake of high purity manganese products from the project.

Project financing outlook

Once permitted and offtake agreements have been entered into and a bankable feasibility study demonstrating has been completed, the company expects to turn its attention to project financing.

The company believes that the capacity for project financing is likely to compare advantageously to the majority of mining projects - given its safe jurisdiction, the quality of potential offtake agreements, environmental benefits, and its strategic position within the European battery supply chain.

The projects debt capacity would be influenced by:
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The French have long made a habit of complaining about the backward puritanism of American sexual mores, and plenty of Americans, aspiring to continental sophistication, have stood ready to back them up when it comes to matters like making a place for the prime ministers girlfriend at his funeral. Lately, however, Gallic attitudes have been looking a bit ragged. Vanessa Springoras memoir, Consent, electrified the French literary world when she published it a year ago. An account of an affair she had at the age of 14 with the acclaimed author Gabriel Matzneff, who was then 50, Consent became a bestseller. It also forced prominent French intellectuals to confront their culpability in Matzneffs long, open history of sexual relations with children, male and female. Now available in an English translation by Natasha Lehrer, Consent is both a captivating story in its own right and an account of how the pride of French cultureits worldliness and its respect for the arts, in particularmade it corrupt and craven in the presence of a predator.

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With the acute instincts of the experienced pedophile, Matzneff instantly identified Springora as easy prey. Her father, an elegant, temperamental martinet, was controlling when he wasnt completely absent. Her mother took a job in book publishing after divorcing him and moved in circles where Matzneff was an admired figure. The author encountered mother and daughter at a Parisian dinner party in the mid-1980s, and Springora suggests that her mother at first flattered herself that Matzneff was interested in her.

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But Matzneff was no Humbert Humbert, obliged to craftily insinuate himself into Lolitas life by wooing and wedding her mother. He was public about his desires. In 1974 he had published an essay, Under 16 Years Old, in which he maintained that to sleep with a child, its a holy experience, a baptismal event, a sacred adventure. In 1977 he had drafted an open letter calling for the release of three men detained for having sexual relations with boys aged 13 and 14. He was overt in his published diaries about his interest in very young girls and about the 11-year-old boy prostitutes he exploited when traveling abroad. Instead of serving as leads for vice cops and red flags to the parents of any young person unfortunate enough to cross his path, Matzneffs revelations were regarded with amused tolerance. On the television talk show Apostrophes, where Matzneff was a frequent guest, the host, Bernard Pivot, teased him about his preference for high school students and kittens. (The aptly named Pivot has since expressed his regret for condoning the writers behavior.)

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Matzneff bombarded Springora with adoring letters, begging her to meet with him. While such documents might sound incriminating, Springora believes the correspondence served a strategic purpose. A letter composed with passionate lyricism makes its recipient feel duty-bound to respond and, as the relationship progresses, to show herself to be worthy of such attentions. Then the girls own letters would become proof that she consented to the affair. Roland Barthes, were he still alive, could write an essay about the role of letters in Springoras story: from Matzneffs status as a man of letters who refused to communicate by telephone, to the fan mail from a former French president that he carried around in his wallet, to the letters he used to seduce the insecure 14-year-old, to the notes he continued to pester her with after she left him, to his practice of publishing the love letters she wrote to himwithout her permissionas part of his diaries.

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And then theres that open letter arguing for the decriminalization of sex between minors and adults, written by Matzneff but signed by such prominent French intellectuals as Gilles Deleuze, Simone de Beauvoir, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Barthes himself. Even in the 1970s, vanishingly few American writers would have agreed to support such a cause. In France, however, leftist thinkers have for generations conceived of themselves as the mortal enemies of the petite bourgeoisie, whose twin pillars were property and propriety, a stifling ideal of respectability in compliance with the Catholic Church. Any transgression against this oppressive morality, any willingness to be branded as sexually depraved, has been viewed as a blow for freedom. This explains why the existentialists were intrigued by the Marquis de Sade, even if they didnt wholeheartedly embrace him.

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This childs notion of freedom, focused entirely on rebelling against authority and neglecting the truly free individuals obligation not to impinge on the freedom of others, had a profound impact on the attitudes of artsy French people. Although Springoras mother initially objected to her daughters relationship with Matzneff, she was herself a product of these cultural forces. The fight against any curb on desire, any kind of repression, was the watchword of the era, Springora writes of her mothers youth in the time of the May 1968 uprisings. Springora herself was adamant about her own desires at the time. Matzneff loved her and she loved him and he was the man she was determined to lose her virginity to; to deny this misbegotten passion would be to oppress Springora herself, as her mother saw it. Eventually, their relationship, which lasted two years, became an open secret, and Matzneff was often a guest for dinner at Springoras mothers house.

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Matzneff parroted the usual litany of pedophile excuses and justifications, explaining that past cultures, like the Ancient Greeks, considered the sexual initiation of children by adult men to be a noble practice, and dismissing objections to such abuse as mere prudery. He also exploited the French tendency to regard turbulent, embattled passion, however selfish and performative, as the ultimate form of love. This was a romantic ideal inculcated in Springora by the many, many French novels she read and loved. Today, I view books with suspicion, she writes. I know they can be poison. This distrust is mostly directed at the way Matzneff has depicted her in his own books, but it also describes the literary tropes that helped him groom her to become his victim.

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A few months into their relationship, the police began to receive anonymous letters accusing Matzneff, correctly, of committing a crime by having sex with a child below the age of 15. The police did not appear to take the accusations seriously andaccording to Matzneff, at leasttold him, We receive hundreds of letters denouncing high-profile people every day, you understand, Monsieur. Letters again! The writer of these missives claimed to be a friend of Springoras mother and reported the couples movements in surprising detail. Only after leaving him did it occur to Springora that Matzneff himself might have written them. Their frequency and their intrusiveness, she writes, conferred on the beginnings of our love affair a dangerous, novelistic glamour: we were alone against the world, united in the face of the revulsion of decent, law-abiding people. This also served to isolate Springora from others, a quintessential abusers gambit. He moved into a hotel in order to evade surprise visits from the police, and she spent most of her time there with him, rarely attending school yet never attracting the concern of any of the adults in her life. When she complained to a noted literary critic about her situation, he told her Matzneff was a great writer and that it is an immense honor to have been chosen by him. Your role is to accompany him on the path.

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Springora is not sorrowful and suffering. Shes pissed off.

But if books helped snare Springora, they also helped to open her eyes and set her free. She surreptitiously read some of Matzneffs works that hed held back, claiming they were not fit for her tender sensibility. In them she found his troubling history with boy prostitutes in Africa and Asia, and a parade of indistinguishable girls. Hed told her their affair was unique and sublime, but in the context of G.s life, I now knew that his desire for me had been repeated an infinite number of times, was pathetically banal, and revealed a neurosis that took the form of an uncontrollable addiction. She felt complicit, somehow, in the abuse of the nameless, faraway boys. Finally, she left him, had a nervous breakdown and a series of unsatisfactory relationships, and eventually found a man with whom I felt completely secure. She now runs a publishing house in Paris.

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There are scenes in Consent that feel incorrigibly French. Snooping in his diary, Springora discovered that Matzneff was cheating on her with another underage girl and she hoisted a leg over the window balustrade and prepared to jump. (Matzneff pulled her back into the hotel room.) She speculates that if he had been a 50-year-old man whod previously only been involved with women his own age, who, in spite of knowing it was morally questionable, had succumbed to my youth, fallen madly in love, and yielded just this once to his love for a teenage girl, then in that case, I admit, our extraordinary passion might have been sublime. No! Yet despite such moments, Springora is not, for the most part, all about the drama. Her memoir has something steely in its heart, and it departs from the typical American memoir of childhood abuse in exhilarating ways.

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Where an American memoirist might emphasize the trauma shed endured under the influence of this imperious older man, Springora is not particularly interested in her status as a victim or in finding an official psychiatric diagnosis to define them both, an authoritative superstructure to establish control over their shared narrative. Shes not content with merely reclaiming her own story, the story Matzneff stole, along with her childhood. Shes gunning for his story, too. For many years I paced around my cage, she writes, my dreams filled with murder and revenge. Until the day when the solution finally presented itself to me, like something that was completely obvious: Why not ensnare the hunter in his own trap, ambush him within the pages of a book?

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In Consent, Springora is not sorrowful and suffering; shes pissed off. Shes sarcastic and derisive on the mystique surrounding Matzneffs alleged genius. She demolishes what remains of his literary reputation by illustrating that its an edifice built of lies and vanity, with himself the Mary Sue at the center. The aim of G.s literary process, she observes, was to distort reality to flatter himself. It was never about revealing even a scrap of truth about himself. Or if it was, it was always cloaked with too much narcissism to lay claim to any genuine honesty. In one of his few unguarded moments, she managed to secure one scrap of candor from him: the admission that as a child he, too, had been molested. That essential confession has not appeared in any of Matzneffs books, but here it is in hers. In a highly gratifying scene, Springora describes meeting up with another of Matzneffs former victims to compare notes. Together, the two women confirm that the writer is a terrible lover, mechanical, repetitive, and boring. Half the time he cant even get it up. If, as Matzneff claims and Springora herself seems to concur, I will never be relegated to V.s past, nor she to mine, she will at least make him pay for it, and while this vengeance might not be therapeutically healthy, I couldnt resist cheering her on.

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Furthermore, Consent and the enthusiastic response to it from readers has snapped the French authorities out of their complacency, at least where Matzneff is concerned. The month after Springoras book was published in France, he was sued in a Paris court for promoting the sexual abuse of children by an anti-pedophilia organization accusing him of hampering their work. French prosecutors raided his publishers office in search of evidence to support criminal charges. Matzneff, hiding out in a hotel in Italy, has been stripped of various grants and honors and dumped by three of his publishers. But Matzneff apparently will not go down without a fight. He just announced plans to publish a response to Consent. It doesnt matter. Its Springora whos masterfully claimed the last word.

Former Independent News & Media (INM) chairman Leslie Buckley has failed in an application seeking to revoke the appointment of inspectors investigating a major suspected data breach at the company in 2014.

Mr Buckley wanted the appointment of barrister Sean Gillane SC and solicitor Richard Fleck revoked on grounds of objective bias, claiming they omitted key evidence from a draft interim report.

However, the application has been rejected by the High Court with Mr Justice Garrett Simons finding it had to be refused as it was irreconcilable with case law of the Supreme Court.

The decision paves the way for the inspectors to continue their investigations.

They are examining several issues, including the interrogation of INM data at the direction of Mr Buckley and paid for by a company controlled by former INM shareholder Denis OBrien.

Mr Buckley claimed this was done as part of a cost-cutting exercise where he was seeking information about a contract.

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But the discovery of a spreadsheet which suggested 19 names, including those of journalists, were searched for in the data raised doubts over this explanation.

Among other issues being investigated are claims Mr Buckley put pressure on former INM chief executive Robert Pitt to pay an inflated price for Newstalk, a radio station owned by Mr OBrien. The deal was ultimately abandoned.

Mr Buckley, who stepped down as INM chairman in March 2018, has denied any wrongdoing.

Mr OBrien is no longer involved with the company, which was bought by Belgian-Dutch group Mediahuis in 2019.

Mr Buckleys application centred on draft statements circulated by the inspectors to interested parties between December 2019 and February 2020.

He claimed the draft statements contained numerous errors, and that there was an evident trend, persistent and dominant pattern and consistent pattern whereby evidence had been misstated and misrepresented.

The former INM chairman claimed this was done in a manner which unfairly bolstered the strength of the allegations against him and diminished evidence in support of his position.

While objective bias was alleged, Mr Buckleys legal team emphasised that no allegation of actual bias was being made. They also stopped short of alleging the issues had been predetermined by the inspectors.

In response, lawyers for the inspectors submitted that the revocation application was irreconcilable with what they described as a settled and robust line of judgments on the proper scope of objective bias.

Mr Justice Simons said he was satisfied the inspectors objection was correct.

The inspectors were appointed following an inquiry by the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement, prompted by protected disclosures made by Mr Pitt.

Mr Buckley has rejected Mr Pitts allegations and has sought to challenge the former chief executives credibility.

According to the judgment, Mr Buckley has co-operated fully with the inspectors, attending interviews and provided documentation.

Mr Buckley has also acknowledged the inspectors observed fair procedures and were courteous, considerate and respectful during interviews.

However, he took issue with the contents of draft statements circulated by them, summarising evidence gathered from documents and interviews.

The inspectors said these were provided to interested parties to give them the opportunity to supplement or amend the inspectors understanding of the facts.

They also emphasised they had reached no conclusions in relation to disputed or contradictory evidence or any of the matters under investigation.

Mr Buckley, through his solicitors, made a very detailed submission of over 100 pages in respect of the draft statements in March of last year.

His solicitors subsequently called upon the inspectors to recuse themselves, and ultimately issued a motion the following month seeking orders directing their recusal or the revocation of their appointment.

Mr Justice Simons said Mr Buckleys argument was broadly that the draft statements offered an important insight into the inspectors mindset.

While conceding that errors are likely to occur in draft statements, Mr Buckley attached great significance to what he characterised as errors in the presentation of the evidence.

He alleged there was a consistent pattern of misstating and misrepresenting the evidence in a manner adverse to him.

Mr Buckley further claimed this was so pronounced that a reasonable and fair-minded observer could not avoid concluding the thinking of the inspectors had been infected, even unconsciously, by a particular form of bias, namely, an attitude of ill will toward him or goodwill toward his accusers.

However, the judge said this argument ran into difficulties as there was a well-established line of case law to the effect that bias may not be inferred from a pattern of erroneous decisions.

He said the Supreme Court had consistently rejected the argument that it is necessary to extend existing rules to allow objective bias to be inferred from legal or other errors made within the decision-making process.

Mr Justice Simons said it followed from this that the High Court should not embark upon a detailed examination of the draft statements, even if this was the exercise Mr Buckley was inviting the court to undertake.

This would involve the court trespassing upon the inspectors role, he said.

The judge said the default position was that the inspectors were entitled to recover their legal costs from Mr Buckley, but he gave the parties two weeks to file submissions on the issue and the final orders to be made.

While COVID-19 vaccinations have begun in at least 47 countries, some two months ago, the first stage of Australias inoculation roll-out will not start until the end of February. The first shipment of the Pfizer vaccine arrived in Australia today but according to Health Minister Greg Hunt, distribution and inoculations will take some further weeks.

Only the Pfizer vaccine has thus far been approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) for use in Australia. Even with the announcement early this month that the Australian government had ordered an additional 10 millions doses of the Pfizer product, at least one other vaccine will be required to cover the entire population.

Australia has also ordered 53.8 million doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine, which is cheaper and easier to store than the Pfizer drug, but may be less effective, according to clinical trials. The TGA has not yet approved the AstraZeneca vaccine for use in Australia.

COVID vaccine (Stock image credit: Envato)

The country also has an agreement with Novavax to supply 51 million doses, but the companys vaccine is still in Phase 3 trials and has not yet been approved for use anywhere in the world.

Global COVID infections have reached almost 110 million with deaths almost 2.5 million as a result of the herd immunity policy adopted by capitalist governments worldwide. The rollout of the vaccine is yet another example of the inability of the capitalist system to address the global pandemic. In last years race to secure lucrative vaccine contracts, these companies promised far more than they could deliver. In response to the resulting shortages, governments are engaging in nationalist squabbles as the global daily death toll continues to increase.

The reality is that no vaccination program will be successful unless it is carried out on a global scale and accompanied by serious measures to limit the spread and mutation of the coronavirus.

Already, variant strains of COVID-19 have emerged with some degree of resistance to the vaccines, and as long as the virus is allowed to flourish anywhere in the world, the globalised nature of modern production will allow it to spread, causing new outbreaks, even among vaccinated populations.

South Africa has temporarily halted rolling out the AstraZeneca vaccine over concerns it does little to prevent mild to moderate infection from the B.1.351 variant (also known as 501Y.V2) most common in that country.

A small study conducted by Wits University in Johannesburg appeared to show that the vaccine only prevented 10 percent of the 2,000 volunteers participating in the trial from developing at least one symptom of COVID-19.

Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt attempted to downplay these reports with a cautiously-worded statement that did not address the South African worries about mild infection and transmission among vaccinated people.

Hunt said: There is currently no evidence to indicate a reduction in the effectiveness of either the AstraZeneca or Pfizer vaccines in preventing severe disease and death.

In fact, the South African study was only focussed on mild to moderate symptoms, and did not attempt to draw any conclusions about severe cases. In other words, there is no evidence relating to severe disease and death because it has not been investigated.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison recently told 2GB Radio: Our vaccination program will not be completely hostage to the production schedules of countries overseas. That sovereign capability to produce the vaccine here, we made high priority.

Clearly it was not made such a high priority that any serious effort was made to scale up and modernise Australias vaccine manufacturing capacity. CSL is the only pharmaceutical company in the country able to manufacture vaccines on even the scale necessary for seasonal flu shots. It does not have the technology to produce messenger RNA vaccines, such as the Pfizer and Moderna products.

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is planning to open an Advance Biologics Manufacturing Facility at the end of this year, but this will not have the capacity to produce vaccines for Phase-III clinical trials, let alone on the scale necessary to inoculate the entire population.

A year ago, CSIRO was at the forefront of global research into COVID-19, as the first organisation outside of China to produce enough of the virus to begin pre-clinical studies, and the first in the world to establish that ferrets react to SARS-CoV-2 and could be used for animal testing.

The research organisation was hampered, though, by years of wage caps and funding cuts, including the removal of eight biosecurity research positions in 2014.

While Pfizers trials show efficacy of 95 percent 12 days after patients receive their second dose, the AstraZeneca vaccine was found to be effective in only 62 percent of trial participants receiving the standard regimen of two full doses a month apart.

A more promising efficacy of 90 percent was found among a smaller number of patients who first received a half dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, followed by a full dose a month later. Further analysis of the data has revealed that many of those who initially received the smaller dose also received their second dose later, suggesting that the time interval between doses may have a substantial impact on the efficacy of the vaccine.

Only limited conclusions can be drawn from this data, because the reduced doses and greater time interval were accidental and therefore not properly randomised.

The massive difference in efficacy between the two cohorts does imply that failing to administer the vaccine precisely and on schedule could result in lower levels of immunity than expected.

Doing so will present major challenges to Australias underfunded health system, and the lack of detail released so far about the roll-out suggests that many questions about priority, distribution, and record-keeping are still unresolved.

The distribution of the Pfizer vaccine presents considerable logistic problems as it must be stored at ultra-cold conditions of minus 70 degrees Celsius with a rigid distribution regimen. Once the vaccine thaws it has to be used within five days.

The federal government announced $1.9 billion in funding for the vaccine rollout early last week, bringing the total expenditure on COVID-19 vaccines and treatments to $6.3 billion. This pales in comparison to almost $500 billion dollars handed over to major corporations during the pandemic, in the form of direct bailouts, tax cuts, and wage subsidies.

In order to fulfil the federal governments plan to complete the vaccine rollout by the end of October, around 200,000 doses will need to be administered each day, a similar rate to that currently being achieved in the UK, which has more than twice Australias population distributed across 1/32 of the land mass.

While Australia and New Zealand have avoided the catastrophic infection rates and death tolls seen internationally, both countries have been repeatedly hit by outbreaks stemming from failures at quarantine hotels housing returned travellers and international passenger and cargo transport workers.

Widespread vaccination against COVID-19 will become increasingly critical as all other measures to limit transmission of the virus continue to be eased as part of the back-to-work drive of big business.

Sydneys short-lived mask mandate in shopping centres and supermarkets was lifted last month although the states chief health officer conceded that it was too premature to say that community transmission had been eliminated.

Morrison remains adamant that the JobKeeper wage subsidy and the Coronavirus Supplement for welfare recipients will not be extended beyond the end of March, stepping up pressure on workers and small business owners to put aside their health concerns and return to work.

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Ghana's COVID-19 death toll has risen to 533 following the confirmation of 15 more deaths by the Ghana Health Service (GHS) on Sunday.



Additionally, 101 people are in severe conditions with 33 of them in critical conditions.



The latest update by the country's health management body via its designated COVID-19 portal, said an additional 718 new cases of infections have also been recorded, pushing the active case count to 8,216 from a previous 7,754 as of Saturday, February 13.



The new infections are from tests conducted as at February 10, this year.



The active cases are being managed in treatment sites, isolation centers across the country, while some were under home management, the GHS said.



Meanwhile, 241 new recoveries have been recorded, bringing the total of clinical recoveries and discharge to 67,087.



Ghana has so far recorded a total of 75,836 cases of the virus since it confirmed its first two cases in March 2020.



Out of the total confirmed cases, 27,781 were from the General Surveillance; 46,883 cases from the Enhanced Contact Tracing, while 1,172 have been recorded from international travellers disembarking at the Kotoka International Airport since it was reopened on September 1, 2020, the update stated.



A total of 832,760 tests have also been conducted, of which 256,608 are from routine surveillance, 416,951 from contact tracing, while 159,201 are from international travellers arriving through the Kotoka International Airport.



The positivity rate is 9.1 per cent.

Currently, all sixteen regions have an active case.



The Greater Accra Region remains the hotspot for the virus in the country accounting for more than 50 per cent (4,103) of active cases and with a cumulative case count of 43,497.



Ashanti Region has 1,576 active cases, while its case count now stands at 13,593 followed by the Western Region with 665 active cases and cumulative cases of 4,442.



Others are: Eastern Region has 296 active cases, cumulative cases is 3,252; Central Region with 341 active case count, total cases now 2,550; Volta Region, 346 active cases, total cases stands at 1,323; Bono East Region with 129 active cases and 951 case count and Northern Region has active case count of 172 active cases and cumulative cases of 827.

The rest are:



Bono Region- 103 active cases, 767 cumulative cases



Upper East Region  29 active cases, 755 case tally



Western North Region - 37 active cases, 747 cumulative cases



Ahafo Region- 73 active cases and 624 cumulative cases



Oti Region- 13 active cases and 257 cumulative cases



Upper West Region  89 active cases and 257 cumulative cases



Savannah Region  Two active case, 68 cumulative cases



North East Region - 15 active cases, 42 cumulative cases



Also, there are 227 active cases and 1,172 cumulative cases from international travellers via the KIA.

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.

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Los Angeles, Feb 15 : Robert Maraj, father of rapper Nicki Minaj, was killed in a hit-and-run case near New York.

According to police, Maraj, 64, was hit by a car on Friday when he was walking on a road in Mineola, Long Island, reports hollywoodreporter.com.

He was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead on Saturday.

While Minaj's representative confirmed her father's death, she has yet to comment on the incident.

Previously, Minaj had opened up about how her father was abusive towards her mother, and recalled how he once set fire to their house while her mother was inside.

"I remember when my mother would let my father be violent with her and she always brings up this story about when I was a little girl and I would stand in front of my mother (with my arms out to protect her)," Minaj said in a clip that features in her documentary that she posted on Instagram in 2018.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
In the 1980s, Israeli immunologist Zelig Eshhar took a giant step toward finding the Holy Grail of cancer treatment: a way to make the immune system attack when its own bodily tissue turns malignant. But it wasnt until almost two decades later that his American colleagues, Carl June and Steven A. Rosenberg, figured out how to make that attack so potent that it would eradicate advanced, recurrent blood cancers.

On Monday, the three pioneers of chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy  CAR T cells  shared a $1 million prize awarded by the Dan David Foundation, headquartered at Tel Aviv University. It annually bestows awards in three categories  past, present and future  to honor outstanding contributions that expand knowledge of the past, enrich society in the present, and promise to improve the future of the world.

June, 68, Rosenberg, 80, and Eshhar, 80, won in the future category.

June led the groundbreaking work at the University of Pennsylvania and Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia that culminated in the FDA approval in August 2017 of Kymriah, the first personalized cellular therapy for cancer. It treats adult and pediatric blood cancers such as leukemia.

Rosenberg, chief of surgery at the National Cancer Institutes Center for Cancer Research, took the field even further by identifying an elite subset of immune cells, called tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes, that could wipe out solid tumor cancers. Iovance Biotherapeutics licensed Rosenbergs TIL technology and is now working to manufacture and clinically test the first TIL therapy, a metastatic melanoma treatment called lifileucel, at its new facility at the Navy Yard in South Philadelphia.

I am honored and humbled to receive the Dan David Prize, said June, who is also director of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at Penn. This is especially meaningful to me to be given the award along with Steven Rosenberg and Zelig Eshhar, who have been my long-term mentors and colleagues over the past 30 years.

Eshhar, an immunologist at the Weizmann Institute in Israel, was the first to prove that an audacious idea could work. He removed a cancer patients T cells, the rugged soldiers of the immune system, and genetically engineered them to carry and execute instructions for destroying the cancer. These terminator cells were called chimeric after the Chimera, the Greek mythological fire-breathing monster composed of parts of a lion, a serpent, and a goat.

Although the T cells worked in lab experiments, the results were disappointing when tested years later in patients with ovarian, kidney and other cancers. By then, many labs, including Junes, were pursuing Eshhars approach.

June said that he and Eshhar bonded over professional and personal meetings. Its the perfect example of how some basic idea in science that doesnt yet have a practical application should be fostered.

As it turned out, CAR T-cells need two genetic signals to become fully activated. Junes lab discovered that a relatively obscure secondary booster signal, called 4-1BB, could turbocharge the engineered T cells.

This years Dan David prize in the present category went to Anthony Fauci, National Institutes of Health infectious disease expert, for his role in battling the current coronavirus pandemic, including supporting the development of the novel mRNA vaccines for COVID-19.


(Photo : Pexels/Thought Catalog) Snapchat illegal drug trade

Relationship therapist and celebrity doctor Dr. Laura Berman shared a warning to parents after her 16-year-old son Sammy died of a drug overdose.

Snapchat's danger

Berman posted an emotional tribute to her late son on Instagram on February 8, 2021. Berman said that her son had passed away and despite being sheltered at home, was contacted by a drug dealer on Snapchat and gave him fentanyl laced Xanax and unfortunately overdoses in his own room.

Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is the same as morphine but it is 50 to 100 times more potent, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse or NIH. Synthetic drugs like fentanyl are the most common drugs that are involved in overdose deaths.

Also Read: Snapchat Cameo Selfie: How to Use or Delete It

According to the National Safety Council, people are more likely to die from an accidental opioid overdose than a car crash.

Berman noted that her son Sam was a straight-A student and that she and her husband monitored him closely. At the time of Sammy's death, he was getting ready for college and he was planning for his future.

Berman wrote that what happened to her son was experimentation gone bad and that he got the drugs delivered to the house. She reminded parents to watch their children and watch Snapchat because that is how dealers get to children.

Dr. Berman has now started a Facebook group for parents called "Parents for Safer Children" that focuses on parents who have been affected by their children's addiction and those who want to know how to protect their children from drugs.

Drug trade on Snapchat

Fentanyl is not the only drug that is prevalent on social media, especially Snapchat. Teens can also buy cocaine, marijuana and MDMA on the platform as the dealers target them specifically.

According to a report by 2News, drug dealers reach out to children and they find it common to see ads about drugs. The teens said that drug dealers randomly adds them and if they accept, they will slide into their DMs and offer them drugs. Drug dealers are called plugs and they use the plug emoji for identification.

The plugs add people on Snapchat and they categorize their victims by zip code. The drug dealers do not have a limit and they sell it anyone, no matter the age. The method of plugging is used to get a lot of potential customers.

The teens said that people will swipe up on the post and they will send a text under the post. The drug dealers will see the text, they'll discuss details like the order and the payment, and they will agree to meet somewhere. Most of the drugs sold on Snapchat are vape cartridges that are laced with THC.

Sgt. Dough Howell from Utah's County Sheriff's Office is focused on drug arrests. He said that drug dealers nowadays are no longer in the streets, waiting for customers, they are now online posting advertisements on social media, and they will post pictures of their products.

Sgt. Howell said that social media is used in 90% of their drug busts. He said that it is easy for them to spot dealers online because it is just out in the open.

Related Article: Singapore Court Sentences Man to Death via Zoom Call Amid Coronavirus Lockdown - Reports

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Written by Sieeka Khan

 2021 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
Thought Leaders Dr. Michelle Peace Forensic Scientist Virginia Commonwealth University

In this interview, News-Medical Life Sciences talks to Michelle Peace on her Pittcon presentation in the session, "Innovations in Forensic Examination of Seized Drugs and Forensic Toxicology". Her presentation is entitled "A Six-year Retrospective of the Untargeted Chemical Analysis of E-liquid Compositions: The Trends and Issues".

What are some trends in the forensic examination of seized drugs in the field of forensic toxicology?

There are two big, current trends that are entwined, one of which is a move towards the adoption of faster, more sensitive instrumentation.

This is going to give examiners a more complete data set to identify unknown substances; for example, time-of-flight and Q-trap mass spectrometry and LC tandem MS, which are being adopted in the forensic toxicology industry.

It is entwined with a second trend because more sensitive and structure elucidating analyses are needed due to the current rising epidemic in novel psychoactive substances (NPSs, historically referred to as designer drugs).

NPSs are chemicals used for some kind of psychoactive effect. It is important to remember that oftentimes these chemicals are specifically manufactured to not be illegal. In the United States, they are not always identified on the Controlled Substances Act as being an illicit substance.

These new or novel psychoactive substances have an array of different chemical structures, some of them being very similar in chemical structure.

Identifying these unknown chemicals has become very challenging, particularly in forensic toxicology labs without sensitive and specific instrumentation that allows them to elucidate that molecular structure.

Image Credit: Elpisterra / Shutterstock.com

You recently published a study titled The analysis of commercially available natural products recommended for use in electronic cigarettes. Can you tell us more about these natural products and their role in e-cigarettes?

My research in electronic cigarettes, their use, and their adoption for other substances started began before electronic cigarette technology began to be used to vape other substances. My laboratory refers to them as DOTNs or drugs other than nicotine.

Something we saw early in the evolution of the e-cigarette device was a trend towards users wanting to be able to modify the device to have a different experience, whether that was with nicotine itself or with other substances.

The electronic cigarette evolved and other industries saw the electronic cigarette as a viable tool for the delivery of pharmacologically active substances such as vitamins, caffeine and herbal remedies.

As part of the grant that we have received from the National Institute of Justice, we began looking at the different ways that electronic cigarettes were being used and what other substances were in them.

We found that a handful of companies were targeting herbal products and natural remedies, so we began monitoring them and purchasing some of these products.

We started to ask what was in these natural products and what chemical agent is causing a psychoactive or physiological response. Our focus was on identifying the active ingredient and whether or not the electronic cigarette was able to aerosolize that compound. We discovered that this was very complicated.

If there is a natural product or herbal remedy that is suspected of prompting a reaction, or even an overdose, a forensic toxicology lab must be able to investigate that herbal product. This requires the rapid adoption of efficient extraction processes.

The literature has an array of extraction procedures for natural products that are long and/or complicated. We are about to publish a manuscript that defines a very fast, very efficient extraction product analyzed by time-of-flight mass spectrometry.

Good research has been conducted for decades on aerosol and aerosol technology, so the electronic cigarette itself is not necessarily new. The condensation aerosol is definitely not new, so the question is, how to leverage the technology and use that condensation aerosol to deliver a pharmaceutical product.

Analytical Advancements in Forensic Toxicology Play

Michelle Peace Interview from AZoNetwork on Vimeo.

Why are natural products like leaves, flowers, roots, bark, and seeds used to promote health, and how has this strategy been used in relation to e-cigarettes?

Natural products have been used for millennia for therapies, whether it is to facilitate wound healing, to help with asthma, or to reduce headaches, among other medical maladies.

Today, it seems like the word natural is used for many different things. When people think about a natural product, they generally believe that, because it is natural, it cannot be harmful.

As a professor, I like to remind people that in the 16th century, there was a physician, scientist, and philosopher by the name of Paracelsus who said, "All things are poison, and it is solely the dose that determines whether or not that substance is poisonous."

If someone takes too much of that natural product, they may have some kind of unanticipated or unwanted reaction.

One of the concerns with regards to electronic cigarettes using natural products (for example, leaves, roots, bark, and seeds) is that extracting the pharmacologically active ingredient out of a plant material results in it becoming highly concentrated. This high concentration can result in a toxic experience or an overdose.

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We are very concerned about people using natural products in e-cigarettes, and we advise them to be well informed with regards to what it is that they are vaping. Vaping should always be done with a modicum of caution.

E-cigarettes and vaping have become more popular and widely used in the recreational sphere. How has this product affected cigarette and seized drug markets?

Sales of the traditional cigarette are down for multiple reasons, including educational campaigns demonstrating their detrimental effect on health. The worldwide success of the e-cigarette has certainly contributed to this.

I have some concerns about people choosing to adopt the electronic cigarette in order to get away from the traditional cigarette because, while the electronic cigarette is widely considered to be less harmful than smoking, we do not know that definit.

I think that e-cigarettes are still harmful due to chemicals in the e-liquids that cause damage to lung tissue. Consumers should be able to make informed decisions about what they are consuming in the electronic cigarette, and I do not think that is currently the case.

It is erroneous to hear that the e-cigarette is safer than the traditional cigarette, then assume that it is therefore completely safe. We have to do a lot of work in terms of educating consumers about the dangerous chemicals in the e-liquid and the harm they can cause to lung tissue.

Regarding the impact of e-cigarettes in seized drug markets, there is a definite rise in the electronic cigarette, in all of its different forms, being collected as drug paraphernalia.

We know that this is happening worldwide and that our crime labs in the United States are seeing an increasing number of electronic cigarettes in their controlled substances sections.

We frequently receive questions about opening the devices. The devices themselves and the technology evolves quickly, so it has been especially challenging to keep crime labs informed on how to open the devices. We have published a number of manuscripts outlining good ways to analyze those e-liquids, as well.

Image Credit: Diego Cervo / Shutterstock.com

What are some of the common health concerns that arise over e-cigarettes and the materials used within them?

E-liquid manufacturers have been able to use the term G.R.A.S., (Generally Regarded As Safe) which the FDA uses for chemicals that can be in food products that are eaten. However, these are generally regarded as safe to eat, not to inhale.

E-liquids have become increasingly complex and over five years of research, my lab has compiled a list of all of the chemicals that we have found in e-liquids. Some include flavoring chemicals or preservatives and some have had as much as 30% ethanol in them.

According to safety data sheets and Occupational Safety and Health (OSHA) guidance, these chemicals are known lung irritants or toxicants and will damage the lung tissue.

There are two different mechanisms discussed in the literature as to how this damage and the gross manifestation of the injury occurs. One is that when somebody inhales one of these chemicals, the damage to the alveoli and that tissue interface with the capillary bed becomes so inflamed that there is an immediate reaction.

The other mechanism is that inhaling these known irritants and toxicants creates a baseline irritation in the lung tissue. If a consumer changes a product and inhales a different kind of chemical, this new chemical might be the one to create gross damage.

Consumers need to appreciate that they might have symptomology that they may not necessarily attribute to vaping.

Clinical complaints from significant irritation to the eyes to the drying out of nasal cavities or a persistent cough, or even hyper-production of mucus, could be related to these chemicals in e-liquids.

If a patient is experiencing some symptomology they need to be upfront with physicians and physicians certainly need to ask if the patient vapes. Historically, this has not been asked in doctor's offices, so there could potentially be a larger attribution of certain symptoms to vaping than we realize.

Forensic toxicology laboratories employ advanced methodologies like electron microscopy and mass spectrometry. How are you using these technologies to fulfill your research aims?

My research lab has an LC Triple MS that was lent to us by Shimadzu. That instrument is critical; I have a direct analysis in real-time, time-of-flight mass spectrometer that we use as a screening tool to evaluate the chemicals that could potentially be in substances received in the lab or what their pharmacologically active ingredient is.

I have got a workhorse GCMS that I use both for screening and identification purposes and a Headspace GC with dual FID that is critical for the research that I am doing currently.

I am also testing driving a new instrument from Thermo Scientific that is a Headspace GC MS with an FID.

A forensic toxicology lab is not a one-trick pony. You need multiple instruments in order to evaluate different substances or different biological tissue, and you have to use each instrument differently depending on the substance in question.

One of the fascinating things to me about forensic toxicology is that you just cannot use one instrument; you need a suite of instruments to be able to answer your questions. Your problem-solving skills are always in gear to assess the best protocol for an analysis.

What are some future steps you will be taking with your research into seized drugs?

I am very excited about my current research project, which is funded by the National Institute of Justice. One of the questions that came up when we discovered that some e-liquids have a lot of ethanol in them was around the impact of that ethanol on somebody vaping it.

Our experience with ethanol is that when you drink it, it reaches your gut, it goes through the first-pass metabolism, and enters your bloodstream, reaching the brain and creating an impairment that we have very well characterized.

The correlation between blood alcohol concentrations and that impairment is very well described in the literature. What is not described well is what happens when you inhale ethanol.

I work with some law enforcement agencies and train in police academies, so my first set of questions regarding vaping ethanol was around the standardized field sobriety test and impact on the preliminary breath test and the evidentiary breath test.

I used my relationship with the police department to explore collaborations with them, allowing us to investigate whether or not somebody vaping ethanol would be detected via a standardized field sobriety test and whether this would impact the protocol that the police use for the preliminary breath test and the evidentiary breath test.

That is our first series of experiments. For the second series of experiments, we are having people vape ethanol before we collect tissue, urine, blood, and oral fluid. We'll also correlate those analyses to the breath test. With this experiment, we are looking to determine whether vaping ethanol results in enough of its metabolites showing up in tissues to impact a drug test.

There are some agencies and a lot of situations in which you have to test negative for ethanol, from pilots to probation and parole.

If somebody is a regular vaper and they do not know that their e-liquid has ethanol in it because it is not disclosed as an ingredient on the bottle, and they then fail a drug test because they are positive for the metabolites of ethanol, it would pose a serious problem.

We are also evaluating how ethanol changes the particle size and the droplets of the aerosol condensation, so there is a lot going on in my research lab. I have a fairly large research team, and I collaborate with VCU's Department of Psychology because they have the Center for the Study of Tobacco Products that is funded by the NIH.

This collaboration means that we can use their clinic and benefit from their expertise in doing these kinds of studies.

Image Credit: Stephen Barnes / Shutterstock.com

What do you envision forensic examination will uncover in the coming years?

One thing that I think is particularly exciting about the world of forensic science is that it uses advancements in science from other sectors. Exploring the future of forensic science prompts us to look at what is happening in adjacent fields of science.

For example, the implications of artificial intelligence and digital evidence are significant when we consider the ability to alter video, alter audio and hide data, and the use of machine learning to make certain decisions.

Scientists can determine the geographic origin of cocaine or olive oil that can lead investigators to the bad actors. The evaluation of unique isotopes and chemical profiles to determine the physical origin of things like soil, drugs, wine, and guitars will tell us more about the products we use than we may want to know.

In terms of the biological sciences, we are used to DNA fingerprinting or DNA profiles that we attribute to identification; but there are other things happening in the biological sciences that are leveraging physics and microscopy, such as the development of optical tweezers.

Genetic platforms that evaluate the full DNA sequence for identification enable us to evaluate microbes and ancestry, as well as get inferences to physical characteristics that someone could have.

I also think that forensic science will benefit from miniaturization. There is a lot of really good research devoted to the concept of a lab on a chip, and we are constantly working on becoming more efficient both in terms of process and cost.

Why did you choose to present your findings at Pittcon this year?

I have the great fortune of being funded by the National Institute of Justice and they have a symposium at Pittcon. I am really thankful for being able to present in that forum.

Forensic science needs to draw on what is happening in other industries and scientific sectors, take those technologies and apply them to forensic science questions. When I attend other people's talks at Pittcon I think about how I can use their work to answer questions in forensic science.

Are you looking forward to virtual Pittcon? What new trends do you think it will bring?

One of the benefits of Pittcon and so many other events being virtual is that most people have developed skills in different technologies. We are leveraging these virtual platforms for other applications and purposes, particularly now that their security has been improved.

For example, I could be hired to testify in court hundreds or thousands of miles away, and, instead of traveling to that site, I could attend virtually. This is now viable because a secure platform is available and we have become comfortable with this way of communicating.

In terms of Pittcon and other conferences being virtual this year, one of the things that I have certainly appreciated about the virtual experience has been that you get a lot of great questions. People that would otherwise not ask a question from the audience in a live forum have seemed to feel more confident in the virtual environment.

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Things look a little different in 2020 this year. Why are events like Pittcon important for the science community to come together, now more than ever?

It is important for Pittcon and all conferences to keep moving forward so that we can aspire to some mode of normalcy. Just saying, "Well, things are hard right now, so let's take a pause," does not demonstrate a brave, courageous or forward-thinking solution to where we are.

Even though my research team has not been in a lab as much as usual and have only been able to meet virtually, we are still making advances. That kind of effort has helped us develop new skills; not just practical skills and physical advancements, but also in terms of our ability to deal with adversity.

When Pittcon and other associations find these solutions we are able to recognize that we are all in it together. We can approach this with the spirit of flexibility and we remember that we are going to come through the other side of it. That says something about us, and it demonstrates something to those in science who consider us role models.

Coming together, debating our work and having conversations about science, even virtually, is how science advances, and that is how we advance as humans.

As much as I do not like the virtual experience and talking through the screen, I have also learned a great deal of compassion that I do not know that I would have necessarily always turned towards if I were in a face-to-face setting. I am thankful that the folks running these associations have said, "We are going to do this. We are going to continue to be leaders, and we are going to lead through the adversity."

About Michelle Peace

Dr. Peace received her B.A. in Chemistry from Wittenberg University, a Master of Forensic Science from George Washington University, and her Ph.D. from the Medical College of Virginia at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). The focus of her doctoral work was to study entomological evidence as an alternative matrix for toxicological analyses.

Dr. Peace is currently an Associate Professor for the Department of Forensic Science at VCU (FEPAC-accredited). She is one of the founding faculty for the Department and has served as Associate Chair and Chair for more 10 years.

Dr. Peace has served as a manager in a private SAMHSA-accredited forensic drug testing laboratory and has worked as a scientist for Procter & Gamble, where she holds 3 patents.

Dr. Peace is currently the PI for an NIJ grant studying the efficacy of electronic cigarettes, particularly as they pertain to substance use. Her current project is a clinical study to evaluate the impact of vaping on roadside impairment evaluations for suspected DUI.

Michelle is a Past President of the Society of Forensic Toxicologists (SOFT) and is a member of the International Association of Forensic Toxicologists, and the Toxicology Section of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences.

She is a member of the National Safety Councils Alcohol, Drugs, and Impaired Driving Division and has served on the Scientific Working Group for Forensic Toxicology (SWGTOX) for 4 years to help develop standards in the practice of forensic toxicology.
Song Joong Ki dropped an unexpected surprise to his fans on valentine's day!

Prominent actor and Korean heartthrob Song Joong Ki is doing his best in preparing more interactions with his international fans. In fact, on Feb 14, he finally joined the Instagram community and personally opened his account.

Welcome to Instagram Song Joong Ki!

After the news circulated online, Song Joong Ki was able to garner half a million followers in just a matter of 24 hours after creating his account. His international fans can't hide their happiness, knowing that their idol will be one step closer to them anytime and anywhere.

Supporting his new account, Song Joong Ki's home agency HiSTORY D&C shared on their official Instagram page the newly launched social media account of their artist. And to give more excitement to the international fans, "Vincenzo" star uploaded three photos of himself.

In the series of photos uploaded by Song Joong Ki himself, it can be seen that he is genuinely showing his smile to let the people know that he is currently enjoying his life and career. Fans continue to show their support by sending lots of messages in the comment section.

Great Year Ahead for Actor Song Joong Ki

Meanwhile, the 'Descendants of the Sun" actor welcomed the year 2021 with a bang and a lot of new projects. Starting from his sci-fi movie "Space Sweepers," where he portrayed the role of a father. According to him, it was the first time that he took the role to play as a father, which was very challenging yet fulfilling for him.

The movie was aired on the famous international streaming site Netflix which already gained attention and various comments from the international audience. Following his blockbuster movie, Song Joong Ki is about to star in tvN's newest suspense and thrilling drama, "Vincenzo."

He will be playing another interesting role as the dark hero named Vincenzo Cassano. An Italian lawyer and mafia advisor, he was adopted by an Italian family when he was still a child, but originally he is a Korean citizen. Because a problem occurred in his workplace in Italy, Vincenzo decided to fly back to his hometown and start a new life.

Joining him in the drama project is actress Jeon Yeo Bin, who is expected to be his onscreen partner. She will be portraying the character of a brilliant and straightforward lawyer named Hong Cha Young. 2PM's Taecyeon will also star as Jang Joon Woon, a judicial apprentice in Cha Young's law firm.

"Vincenzo" is set to kick off on February 20. It will air every Saturday and Sunday at 9 p.m (KST).

2021 is indeed a good year for Song Joong Ki, with all the blessings that he is currently receiving. He humbly gives it back to his beloved fans, who are always there throughout his journey. Don't forget to follow Song Joong Ki on Instagram @hi_songjoongki!

Are you excited to see more updates about Song Joong Ki? Let us know in the comments!

For more K-Drama, K-Movie, and celebrity news and updates, keep your tabs open here at Kdramastars.

Kdramastars owns this article.

Written by Shai Collins.
Carl Marrows was originally said to have died from natural causes but in reality he lost his life because of errors by hospital staff, an inquest heard

A family has won a 43-year fight to discover the truth about a five-year-old boys needless death following a hospital operation.

Carl Marrows was originally said to have died from natural causes but in reality he lost his life because of errors by hospital staff, an inquest heard.

A coroner, who reinvestigated the boys death after a legal battle by his family, concluded Carl had been the victim of neglect and gross failure of care.

The ruling at a new inquest in Hull last week was welcomed by the boys father who said there had been a cover-up by hospital staff.

The youngster, who had spina bifida, died following an operation in 1978 at Scunthorpe General Hospital to correct his gait.

He suffered massive blood loss due to a known complication of the procedure. An inquest in 1986 put the death down to natural causes but, driven by a sense of injustice, his family challenged the decision years later.

Carls father John approached coroner Professor Paul Marks who uncovered records of the case, agreed the verdict was not sustainable and backed his bid to have the inquest finding overturned at the High Court.

The youngster, who had spina bifida, died following an operation in 1978 at Scunthorpe General Hospital to correct his gait. The hospital is seen above in later years

They succeeded and a fresh inquest was ordered. It heard how precautionary measures should have been taken in case Carl suffered bleeding after surgery.

Instead of having a tube fitted to allow for the emergency treatment, he was simply sent to a ward.

When a nurse realised something was wrong, there was a delay before a doctor arrived and staff were unable to save his life.

Professor Marks said had the proper procedures been carried out Carl would not have gone into cardiac arrest and died. He also noted some medical records were incomplete.

The coroner recorded a narrative conclusion including that neglect had led to the childs death.

Describing the death as sad and tragic, he added: If Carl had survived this operation he would have been 49 this July. His family have conducted themselves with the deepest integrity and dignity throughout these proceedings.

Carls father John approached coroner Professor Paul Marks who uncovered records of the case, agreed the verdict was not sustainable and backed his bid to have the inquest finding overturned at the High Court

After the hearing Mr Marrows, 74, a retired HGV driver from Howsham, Lincolnshire, described Carl as a very bright little lad.

He said: The whole thing has been a cover up. They just did not want the hospital or the NHS to look bad. I am glad the truth has finally come out but it grieves me that my poor lad could still have been with us now.

He said his ex-wife Jennifer, who died several years ago, was hit hard by the tragedy and they split up.

Dr Peter Reading, of Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Trust, said: We hope that this new inquest verdict brings the family some closure.

Lalla Nouhaila is King Mohammed VI's niece, who ascended the throne in 1999

The bride wore a stunning emerald caftan paired with an elegant tiara and veil

Only close family were able to attend the wedding due to Covid-19 restrictions

King Mohammed VI of Morocco's niece tied the knot in an intimate Valentine's Day ceremony, which was only attended by close family due to Covid-19 restrictions.

The Ministry of the Royal House, Protocol and Chancellery announced on February 14 that Lalla Nouhaila, 28, the daughter of Princess Lalla Asma, had married Ali El Hajji.

King Mohammed VI, who is the brother of Princess Lalla Asma, was said to have given his blessing to the happy couple, Hello! magazine reported.

The Ministry of the Royal House, Protocol and Chancellery announced on February 14 that Lalla Nouhaila, 28, the daughter of Princess Lalla Asma, married Ali El Hajji (wedding pictured)

The surprise Valentine's Day wedding is said to have taken place in an intimate and family setting due to strict Covid-19 restrictions.

A picture from the big day showed the newly married couple holding hands, while Lalla Nouhaila donned a stunning emerald caftan embellished with gold stitching.

The bride also donned an elegant tiara, which held her veil in place, and an array of statement emerald and gold jewellery to match her wedding attire. Her groom wore a white Moroccan traditional djellaba.

Morocco is currently under a state of emergency regulations which prohibit large wedding parties or mass gatherings in a bid to curb the spread of coronavirus.

Lalla Nouhaila does not bear the title of Princess or Royal Highness, but she does have the honorary title of Lalla Cherifa.

Her mother, Princess Lalla Asma, 55, is the second daughter of Hassan II of Morocco and Lalla Latifa, and the sister of the King of Morocco Mohammed VI.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex met King Mohammed VI and his family during their first trip to Morocco in 2019 (pictured), when Meghan was pregnant with her son Archie

Mohammed VI, 57, belongs to the Alaouite dynasty and ascended the throne on July 23, 1999, following the death of his father King Hassan II.

Mohammed VI and Princess Lalla Asma share three other siblings - Prince Moulay Rachid, Princess Lalla Meryem and Princess Lalla Hasna.

The King of Morocco's eldest child and the Crown Prince of Morocco Moulay Hassan, 17, is next in line to the throne and is expected to reign as Hassan III.

Mohammed VI also shares a 13-year-old daughter, Princess Lalla Khadija of Morocco, with his wife Princess Lalla Salma, 42.

Their wedding wasn't the only big royal news on Valentine's Day, as Prince Harry and Meghan Markle also revealed on February 14 that they are expecting their second child.

The couple, who are currently residing in California, are preparing to welcome a brother or sister for their son Archie, who will be two in May later this year.

On Valentine's Day, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle also announced that they are expecting second child (both pictured while Meghan was pregnant with Archie during Morocco trip)

A spokesperson for Meghan and Harry said: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child.'

Their announcement came on the 37th anniversary of Harry's mother, Princess Diana, revealing she was pregnant with him on Valentine's Day in 1984.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex met King Mohammed VI and his family during their first trip to Morocco in 2019, when Meghan was pregnant with her son Archie.

Princess Lalla Salma, the wife of the King of Morocco, was also among the royal guests who attended the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge's wedding back in April 2011.
Americas oldest juvenile lifer has been released from prison after spending 68 years behind the bars. Eighty three-year-old Joseph Ligon was just 15 when he was sentenced to life imprisonment for taking part in a spree of robberies and assaults with a group of drunken teens in Philadelphia, which left two people dead and six injured with stab wounds. Imprisoned in 1953, Ligon refused to apply for parole as he denies killing anyone.

However, Ligon walked free from the State Correctional Institution- Phoenix in Montgomery County on February 11, Thursday. The old man is among the more than 500 other juvenile lifers whose life sentence was reduced after the Supreme Court order.

In 2012, the Supreme Court, as a part of resentencing, ruled that life sentences imposed on juveniles were cruel and unusual and thus were unconstitutional. While some states accepted the ruling, many states like Pennsylvania refused to reduce the life sentences. In 2017, after a court order, Pennsylvania reduced Ligons sentence to 35 years from life. Unlike others, he refused to seek parole as per Daily Mail.

Joe Ligon was released from prison today. He has been there since he was 15 years old. Falsely convicted in 1953.My 70 year old father was 3 years old. Eisenhower had just become president.68 years.Today's his first day out of prison since the Jim Crow era.God damn America pic.twitter.com/wEqRzzDLsz Ted for stack (@TeddyRedder) February 12, 2021

Stating that he likes to be free, Ligon added that one cant leave the city without permission from parole and thats part of freedom for him. Im a special guy, Ligon sighed while coming out of the prison with a dozen large boxes, which the inmates arent usually allowed to.

Bradley Bridge, a lawyer with Defender Association of Philadelphia, who has represented Ligon since 2006, said I guess you accumulate a lot of stuff in 68 years. Bridge motion was accepted by the Philadelphia District Attorneys Office in November when it ordered Ligon to either be resentenced or released within 90 days.

Brighton hopes that his clients release will cause re-evaluation of the way people are incarcerated pointing out the absurdity of over-incarcerating.

To update himself about the happenings around the world over 70 years, Ligon would stay informed through news he watched in his cell.Unilad reports, after being freed, he sighed looking at all the tall buildings sharing how that is all new to him. This never existed, he said looking out of the elevator.
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London, UK, Dec. 14, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Washington, London - On Human Rights Day, thirty members of the U.S. House of Representatives signed a dear colleague letter to the U.S. government calling for an end to human trafficking and labor exploitation in the Gulf region of the Middle East. Representative Raul Grijalva, who serves as Vice Chair in the International Workers Rights Caucus, led the effort. I led my colleagues in a letter urging Sec. Pompeo to urge the Gulf States to uphold human rights for migrant workers and abolish the discriminatory Kafala System, he tweeted. The letter was supported by International United Nations Watch, Just Foreign Policy, Amnesty International, Freedom Forward, South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT), Freedom Initiative, the Saudi American Justice Project, Win Without War, GLJ-ILRF, and Demand Progress.

In addition to highlighting on GCC region, the letter made particular focus on both Saudi Arabia and UAE due to the high levels of human rights abuses regarding the Kafala System (Modern Slavery) and human trafficking of female victims from east Europe to UAE.

In the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the number of sex trafficking prosecutions and convictions increased, yet authorities allegedly jailed unidentified trafficking victims for offenses of prostitution, extramarital sex, or absconding from their employers. Furthermore, there were no reported convictions of labor traffickers during the period of the recent TIP report, and cases of labor violations and forced labor were not treated as trafficking offenses. While labor trafficking offenses remain a primary concern in the country, the government took no new steps to dismantle the [Kafala] sponsorship system. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Human Rights Watch and other prominent organizations expressed their concern about vulnerable low-paid migrant workers in the UAE and the cramped and unhygienic conditions of detainees. The UAE upheld a policy of no minimum wage for migrant workers, who comprise 90% of its population said the letter

The letter which was signed by 30 congress members stated, In Saudi Arabia, the Kafala system ensures that a migrant worker cannot leave the country without permission from their sponsor, paving the way for exploitative practices. The government continues to fine, jail, and/or deport migrant workers for prostitution or immigration violations, pertaining to cases of unidentified victims of labor or sex trafficking. Saudi Arabia miscategorized trafficking cases as administrative violations rather than criminal offenses. The TIP report further asserts that Saudi Arabias Kafala system has continued to exacerbate trafficking vulnerabilities in the large migrant worker communities.During the COVID-19 pandemic, Saudi Arabia also increased penalties and taxations imposed on migrant workers.

It also added, Similar requests have been recently spearheaded in the European Parliament and the U.K. Parliament. The United States and the international community must uphold human rights across the globe and protect victims of trafficking and exploitative working conditions in the Gulf. This letter requests that the Department of State urge the GCC to make significant and lasting improvements in regards to legal protections, gender equality, labor rights for migrant workers, and to completely reform or abolish the Kafala system in the region.

Maya Garner, spokesperson for International United Nations Watch, stated: It is encouraging to see progressive members of Congress stand up to human trafficking and labor exploitation in the Gulf Region. This letter is important for directly addressing the Kafala sponsorship system as a root cause of this abuse, and for looking at the contributing factors of gender inequality, and labor and migrant rights violations. Widespread reform is urgently needed, as is respecting the rights of domestic workers. I hope to see more members of Congress and American civil society urge GCC member states to fully comply with international human rights standards.

The letter was initiated by International United Nations Watch is a London-based monitoring organization which issued a report A Journey to the Unknown: Trafficking from the Fringes of Europe which focused specifically on case studies of the sex trafficking of Moldovan women to the UAE, petitions in the EU parliament, UK parliament, as well as the French, German, Belgium, Danish and Swedish parliaments have accumulated more than 100 signatures from parliamentarians.

According to Amnesty International, women continued to face discrimination in law and in practice. For example, the Personal Status Law of 2005 states that a husbands rights over his wife include the wifes courteous obedience to him (Article 56), and places conditions on a married womans right to work or leave the house (Article 72). Under Article 356 of the Penal Code, debasement of honour with consent is punishable by one year or more in prison. On the basis of this law, a Swedish-run hospital in Ajman Emirate was forced to report pregnant, unmarried women to the police. In some cases these referrals have led to prosecution and deportation. The government failed to adequately protect women from sexual and domestic violence. Under Article 53 of the Penal Code, a husbands discipline of his wife is considered an exercise of rights, language that can be read as official sanction of spousal abuse.

Letter endorsed by:

Lead: Rep. Raul M. Grijalva

Co-signers:

Rep. Janice D. Schakowsky

Rep. Barbara Lee

Rep. James P. McGovern

Rep. Jamie Raskin

Rep. Jim Cooper

Rep. Deb Haaland

Rep. Hank Johnson

Rep. Ilhan Omar

Rep. Ro Khanna

Rep. Jared Huffman

Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton

Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney

Rep. Steve Cohen

Rep. Alan S. Lowenthal

Rep. David N. Cicilline

Rep. Ayanna Pressley

Rep. Mark Pocan

Rep. Jesus G. Chuy Garcia

Rep. Pramila Jayapal

Rep. Bobby L. Rush

Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman

Rep. Joe Neguse

Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson

Rep. Peter Welch

Rep. Suzanne Bonamici

CONTACT INFORMATION

Call us for imidiate support on this number

+447547282209



Maya Garner



Email: info@intunwatch.com

Address: 1 Burwood Place, London, W2 2UT, United Kingdom

This news has been published for the above source. International UN Watch [ID=15761]

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In a shocking revelation, Haryana Congress leader Vidya Rani on Saturday, urged party workers to strengthen the farmers' agitation by taking care of their needs - be it money, vegetables, or liquor. Stating that Congress was almost destroyed after the (state or Centre) polls, she said that the farmers' agitation had given a new lease to the party. Chalking out a plan to hold padyatras in all districts in Haryana, she said that 'this was not just a farmers' agitation, but a people's agitation'. Protests continue for the 79th day at Delhi's borders - Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur.

Rajnath Singh backs Delhi Police to the hilt; slams 'neighboring nations' nefarious acts'

Congress neta: 'We can give money, liquor'

"We should do padayatra in every district, as they come under control, This will give Congress a new direction and Congress will be reborn. When we lost this time, our existence has almost been destroyed. This agitation was finished on January 26, but it was reignited because farmers' ideals were strong. We should not leave any stone unturned. Be it money, vegetables, liquor-we can contribute to them as we like and strengthen this agitation. This is not just a farmer agitation, but agitation for all of us," she said.

Can we not say anything for a while?: Disha Ravi-Greta Thunberg's 'toolkit' WhatsApp chat

Farmers protests intensify

After completing a peaceful 'Chakka Jam' across India except in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, farmers have intensified the protests with BKU leader Rakesh Tikait announcing a tour across Western India from February 14 to 23 - covering Haryana Maharashtra and Rajasthan, holding Kisan Mahapanchayats in these places to encourage more farmers to join the protests. Moreover, after the violence witnessed on Republic Day, Delhi police fortified the city borders by cementing nails near barricades, deploying additional troops, adding barbed wires etc at Ghazipur (Delhi-Uttar Pradesh) and Tikri (Delhi-Haryana) borders, blocking access to the roads completely. MHA had snapped off internet across all three border areas - Tikri, Singhu and Ghazipur and later extended the ban to 1-2 days more. Farmers have reiterated 'No Ghar Wapsi till Law Wapsi', as the protests have caught several international celebrities' interest online.

'Dushyant's resignation is my pocket', claims JJP chief amid Centre-farmer stalemate

After Tikait's breakdown at Ghazipur due to Yogi govt's diktat to 'vacate Ghazipur protest site', politicians thronged Ghazipur border, where Tikait and other UP farmers are camped at. While Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh addressed the Kisan Mahapanchayat at Muzaffarnagar, politicians like Abhay Singh Chautala, Chaudhary Ajit Singh, Sanjay Singh, Arvind Kejriwal spoke to Tikat after he broke down. Many other leaders like Indian National Lok Dals Abhay Singh Chautala, Rashtriya Loktantrik Partys Hanuman Beniwal, Congress' Ajay Lallu and Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut have visited Tikait at Delhi borders. After 11 rounds of Centre-farmer talks, the two parties failed to reach a middle ground after a five-hour meeting with the associations refusing to agree to the Centre's proposal for suspending the implementation of the aforesaid legislation for one and a half years.

'16 farmers missing since Jan 26' claims SKM; extends legal aid to 122 jailed farmers
Stephanie Vogt is set as a lead in Gloria, Netflixs upcoming historical spy thriller drama series from SPi productions and RTP.Vogt will play Anne. The wife of James, Anne comes from a wealthy and liberal family. She is a Harvard grad in International Relations, recruited by the CIA.Written by Pedro Lopes and directed by Tiago Guedes, Gloria takes place in the 1960s, at the height of the Cold War, in the small village of Gloria do Ribatejo, where RARET is located, an American broadcasting center that broadcasts Western propaganda to the Eastern Bloc. Joao Vidal, an engineer from families linked to the Estado Novo, but recruited by the KGB, will take on several high-risk espionage missions that could change the course of Portuguese and world history.

Photo: (Photo : Screenshot from YouTube)

A father and daughter duo work together to clean waterways in Florida.

Dad, Jason Garcia, and his 10-year-old daughter, Lauren, work every week to clean the Northeast waterways in Florida.

The father and daughter duo are from St. Augustine in Florida, and are using magnet fishing to help in cleaning the waterways.

ALSO READ: Father and Son Artists from Denver Open an Exhibit of Their Quarantine Artworks

Finding all sorts of stuff

While the father and daughter duo are on their weekly adventure, they are not only helping clean the waterways in Florida. Instead, they are also pulling up treasures from the river.

According to Jason, they find it surprising to pull up items from the river they suppose are thrown there. The dad said in an interview with News4Jax, "Every time we pull that magnet up, it could be anything from a rusty nail to a gun."

Once, the father and daughter duo pulled up a revolver, which the owner left loaded with ammunition.

The 10-year-old daughter, Lauren, finds these memories of magnet fishing and pulling up guns from the river exciting. "Because that means we can help solve a crime," she said.

ALSO READ: Viral Video: Father and Daughter Duo Dancing Together

The Florida dad said that in their pursuit of helping clean the waterways in their area, they hope that they will find a weapon that can help solve a crime.

Authorities say that when weapons like these are turned over, they are processed and sometimes become potential leads.

All of the weapons that Lauren and Jason got from the river have been turned over to the authorities. As of writing, they have already found three guns in their magnet fishing adventures.

The father and daughter bonding

Lauren's weekly routine of helping clean the waterways through magnet fishing in Florida served as her bonding with his dad. She said, "It helps clean up the environment, and I get to make memories with my dad."

The duo's love for water and the environment is what keeps them close.

Part of their bonding is filming what they do. The father and daughter duo even has a YouTube channel, Daddy and Daughter Plus Water.

ALSO READ: Son Raises Money to Buy a TV as Birthday Gift for Dad Who Has Cancer

Filming their adventures together

Seven months ago, Jason and Lauren started uploading videos of their adventures.

Their first video was an adventure tubing and snorkeling at Itchetucknee Springs in Florida. The family shared some of their photos during their day out.

Some of the most recent uploads in the YouTube channel are strange finds that they had in what they suspect as a dumpsite.

In another video, they also found some Acetylene tanks that are still loaded with gas.

Some of the videos uploaded by the father and daughter duo received thousands of views.

Those who have seen their videos thought that what they are doing is cool. Some netizens even said they are interested in trying magnet fishing too.

ALSO READ: Dad Gets the COVID-19 Vaccine, the Doctor Is His Daughter
(ANSAmed) - BEIRUT, FEBRUARY 15 - At least six pro-Iranian militants have died in Syria from air raids attributed to Israel, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Monday.



According to the UK-based monitoring group, the air raids occurred shortly after midnight local time near the Syrian capital Damascus. For its part, the Syrian government-run Sana news agency confirmed the attack, stating that Damascus's air defense system responded to the raid, hitting various missiles fired by enemy aircraft.



The raid occurred near the airport of Damascus, in the southeastern outskirts of the city where there are many positions and arms deposits of pro-Iranian militias in Syria.



According to the observatory, the six victims are not Syrian nationals. The sources said that several arms depots and munitions were targeted, without elaborating. Raids in Syria are attributed on a daily basis to Israel and for about a year the raids have intensified in the area of Damascus, in central Syria, and in the eastern regions at the border with Iraq.



(ANSAmed)

Life Upended. The coronavirus outbreak has had a devastating impact on our nation, and it has touched Staten Islanders in countless ways. In this series, reporter Tracey Porpora will share the stories of those who have been thrust into situations that were unimaginable just a few months ago -- those who have seen their life completely upended. This is the thirty-fifth story of Life Upended.

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- When Kimberly Kallaitzakis, 48, who runs the New Dorp-based Lukes Copy Shop -- which her father, Loucas Callas, 72, started in 1973 -- goes home after a long day of work, she needs to figure out which bills she can pay.

The shops main business is printing everything from fliers and brochures to business cards and menus.

With more than 50% of the business lost due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, she has been seeking ways to pay the companys bills and keep the business -- which her father started at the age of 20 out of his garage -- open.

And shes not giving up. She wont let her fathers legacy die.

Loucas and Roberta Callas started Luke's Copy Shop out of their garage in 1973. (Courtesy of Kimberly Kallaitzakis)

I definitely will not give up on my business. This is something my father built for us. At the age of 16 my fathers parents -- who were from Crete, Greece -- lost their business, and he was homeless for a little while, said Kallaitzakis.

He had to quit school and give up a scholarship to work three jobs. At the age of 20 he built this business. ...My fathers worst fear in life is us -- his four kids -- being hungry the way he was as a kid. There is just no way Im giving up on this business; I wont let this business go down, she said.

And the shop comes from humble beginnings. Her father first ran the business from his Great Kills homes garage, which he still lives in today.

From left: Cheryl Kallaitzakis, Kimberly Kallaitzakis, Angela Kallaitzakis and George Kallaitzakis. (Courtesy of Kimberly Kallaitzakis)

My parents bought a press and put it in the garage, said Kallaitzakis. Once they made a little money, they rented a place. My father had to work seven days a week. And when I was a little girl, I had to go to work with my father on Saturdays so I could see him. ...The shop is all myself and my siblings know.

LOST BUSINESS

But with so many businesses and school activities closed or cancelled due to the pandemic, the shop has lost the lions share of revenue.

When everything first shut down in March, restaurants were calling and ordering 30 menus, when they used to order thousands, said Kallaitzakis. We would print these small orders, and Id bring them home and leave them on my doorstep for pick up, or we would deliver them. I wanted to make sure that everyone else [other business owners] who were hurting, had whatever they needed. Weve been in business so long we have customers who come over our house for barbecues. ...Our customers are like our family.

Kimberly Kallaitzakis has kept a drive-up window open for Luke's Copy Shop customers during the coronavirus pandemic. (Courtesy of Kimberly Kallaitzakis)

She noted that the customer base includes many senior citizens, who Kallaitzakis said still call and want to come in just for one copy.

Weve always been the people they could come and talk to, she said.

For safety against the virus, Kallaitzakis -- who runs the business with two of her siblings, George and Angela Kallaitzakis -- has kept only a drive-up window open during the pandemic to service customers. In addition, Lukes Copy Shop makes deliveries every day, she said.

Some days you only make $40; some days you make more. I have some loyal customers who have placed orders for things like mailings that helps me pay the bills. But when business is cut in half, you feel it, said Kallaitzakis.

We are just surviving and trying to pay our bills. But we are not making anything, she added.

George Kallaitzakis at work at the copy shop. He owns the business with his sisters Angela and Kimberly. (Courtesy of Kimberly Kallaitzakis)

She said the shop received some money from the government Paycheck Protection Program, and her parents had to take from their savings to keep the business afloat.

The only way Kallaitzakis said she can recoup lost business, is when venues, such as catering halls, reopen and schools are back to full in-person learning.

We have all full-color machines and we do blueprints as well. We also print on calendars, keychains, pens and more, said Kallaitzakis. We do same-day invitations. A lot of weddings that had to be rescheduled need new invitations. We also do same-day fliers.

EXPANDING OFFERINGS

To help boost business, she is working to create personalized T-shirts, sweatshirts and hats.

A lot of catering halls order stuff like that, so thats something Im going to be looking into, she said, noting she is also doing outreach to her customer base to let them know the shop will make deliveries for any orders.

*** CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE COVERAGE OF CORONAVIRUS IN NEW YORK ***

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This is the moment maskless guests party at a lockdown-breaching ultra-Orthodox Jewish wedding in London.

Video shows dozens of guests dancing together as they mark the occasion with the 'illegal' event, which reportedly took place in January.

Weddings are currently banned under Covid lockdown rules, with marriage ceremonies only allowed under 'exceptional circumstances' - such as as terminal illness. Even these weddings are limited to a maximum of six people.

But the video, shared by the BBC, shows at least 30 people celebrating during a wedding, which is said to have taken place in the Stamford Hill area of north London.

The latest footage comes after a police raid on another wedding in January, this time with 150 guests, which also took place in the Stamford Hill.

The area is home to a large strictly-Orthodox Jewish community - a group within Orthodox Judaism characterised by a strict adherence to Jewish law and traditions, as opposed to modern practices.

Meanwhile, researchers at a top London university found the past infection rate of Covid in one unnamed ultra-Orthodox community in the capital was 64 per cent - up to five times higher than the capital average at the time.

The figure matches similar research in ultra-Orthodox communities in New York and Israel, which saw higher than average infection figures last year.

And today a human rights barrister claimed members of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community were being given 'bespoke legal advice' in a bid to get round Covid restrictions on weddings.

Adam Wagner said couples were being offered advice suggesting 'any number of people' can attend celebrations if they have a 'prayer element'.

Mr Wagner, who is himself Jewish and has recently been reviewing Covid rules on social media, told the BBC the guidance 'hit the wrong tone'.

The claims come after a police raid on a 150-strong Jewish wedding celebration last month. The event took place at a school in the north London area of Stamford Hill - which is part of a large strictly Orthodox Jewish community. Pictured left and right: Police carry out the raid

Human rights barrister Adam Wagner said couples were being offered advice suggesting 'any number of people' can attend celebrations if they have a 'prayer element'.

He said: 'It was inaccurate, in quite some significant ways. It hit the wrong tone, it was really about getting around the rules, rather than keeping to the rules because of the dangers of the virus.'

However Mr Wagner says the advice to ultra-Orthodox Jewish community members has been changing after incidents of large gathering were reported in the media.

What are the rules on having a wedding during lockdown? Under lockdown rules introduced on January 4, weddings are banned in England. However, you can hold a wedding in 'exceptional circumstances'. The Government included the example of a seriously ill partner who is not expected to recover as one example. Another example of an exceptional circumstance included those undergoing 'debilitating treatment or life-changing surgery'. However, even these weddings are limited to just six people. The Government still advises people to stay local where possible, but says people can travel outside their area to attended permitted weddings. People can also leave the country to attend a wedding, though they do face the normal travel restrictions for the country they are returning from. Advertisement

He added: 'The latest advice I've seen in the last few days is much better and I think the media attention has told on the individuals who are responsible for it.'

One case which received particular attention was a police raid on a lockdown-breaking wedding of 150 people at a Jewish girls' school last month.

The guests were found packed inside Yesodey Hatorah Girls' Senior School in Stamford Hill, north London.

The centre was being used as a coronavirus testing centre, while the school's principal, Rabbi Avrohom Pinter, had died 10 months earlier of Covid-19.

Police said the organiser faced a 10,000 penalty. Five others faced 200 fines after officers busted the address following a tip-off.

The incident sparked wide-spread condemnation from leaders in the Jewish community, including Chief Rabbi Mirvis, who tweeted last month: 'At a time when we are all making such great sacrifices, it amounts to a brazen abrogation of the responsibility to protect life and such illegal behaviour is abhorred by the overwhelming majority of the Jewish community.'

Marie van der Zyl, president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, said the breach 'goes against Jewish teaching that preserving life is of the highest value'.

'The reckless and dangerous behaviour of those behind this event does not represent the attitude of the vast majority of British Jews, including from within the Strictly Orthodox community, who are fully aware of the terrible toll of this pandemic.'

Rabbi Herschel Gluck OBE, who is president of Shomrim in Stamford Hill, chairman of the Arab-Jewish Forum and chairman and founder of the Muslim-Jewish Forum, told the BBC weddings should 'not go on under these circumstances'.

It comes after an investigation by the Jewish News last month claimed there had been more than 50 strictly Orthodox lockdown weddings in London since last year.

The paper reported that groups were using 'lookouts' to sound the alarm in case police were called.

A source intimately involved in the Orthodox wedding scene told the Jewish News: 'These illegal weddings have been going on for 10 months. We're not talking about one or two. We are talking multiple weddings every day.

'All have 150-200 guests. At one wedding the bride was Covid-positive.'

Meanwhile a report earlier this year found two-thirds of London's ultra-Orthodox Jewish community had Covid last year - nine times the national average and around 0.3 per cent of those infected died, a study has shown.

Researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine found the rate of past infection in London's ultra-Orthodox Jewish community was 64 per cent

Jewish men and women suffered the highest death rates in the first wave of the pandemic in Britain

Entire basis of ultra-Orthodoxy is communal gatherings While the researchers insist the reasons behind such high rates of infection are unclear, others suggest crowded housing and socio-economic deprivation as possible causes. Ultra-Orthodox families have significantly larger households than the UK average - with five to six individuals per house compared to a UK average of 2.3 - and tend to live in areas of increased population density. Communal events and gatherings were regularly attended in pre-pandemic times, though there have been a number of high-profile breaches in recent weeks, too. Israel Frey, an ultra-Orthodox journalist who has been critical of the community's response to the pandemic, told the Jerusalem Post he does not see 'even a gram' of introspection or change in direction in the leadership's attitude to the crisis. He added: 'Ultra-Orthodoxy in 2021 is about the energy of communal gatherings and celebrations: everyone being together. 'That is what sustains ultra-Orthodoxy  its entire basis is communal gatherings.' Last week also saw the death of two of the most senior and revered ultra-Orthodox rabbis in the world - Rabbi Meshulam David Soloveitchik, 99, and Rabbi Yitzhak Scheiner, 98 - both of whom had previously being diagnosed with the virus. A number of other religious leaders have fallen victim to Covid in Israel and the US, with funerals attended by thousands despite restrictions on gatherings, the JP reports. Advertisement

Researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine found the rate of past infection was at 64 per cent in the community of around 15,000 people.

This compares to rates of 11 per cent in London more generally and just seven per cent across the UK, according to estimates by the Office for National Statistics.

Suspected infections in the community peaked in early March, just before the first lockdown, when rates then began to fall sharply, before rising again in the autumn once restrictions were lifted.

The researchers say the reasons for such high rates of infection are unclear, but crowded housing and deprivation are thought to be contributing factors.

Ultra-Orthodox families have significantly larger households than the UK average - with five to six individuals per house compared to a UK average of 2.3 - and tend to live in areas of increased population density.

Communal events and gatherings were regularly attended in pre-pandemic times, though there have been a number of high-profile breaches in recent weeks, too.

Israel Frey, an ultra-Orthodox journalist who has been critical of the community's response to the pandemic, told the Jerusalem Post he does not see 'even a gram' of introspection or change in direction in the leadership's attitude to the crisis.

He added: 'Ultra-Orthodoxy in 2021 is about the energy of communal gatherings and celebrations: everyone being together.

'That is what sustains ultra-Orthodoxy  its entire basis is communal gatherings.'

Michael Marks was one of co-leads in the study.

He said he found the Covid rate to be up to five times higher than the London average at the time.

But he said this was likely down to the increased chance of households in the ultra-Orthodox community having inter-generational living arrangements.

He told the BBC: 'In the UK the immediate average household size is just over two people, whereas in this community it's more like seven or eight people.

'Do I think people in this community have broken the rules, yes, because lots of people all over the UK have broken the rules.'

Rabbi Herschel Gluck OBE, who is president of Shomrim in Stamford Hill, chairman of the Arab-Jewish Forum and chairman and founder of the Muslim-Jewish Forum, told the BBC weddings should 'not go on under these circumstances'

The issue has been one brought up in other countries as well. Densely populated ultra-Orthodox neighbourhoods in Brooklyn, Queens and key suburbs in New York emerged as leading viral hot spots, last year, according to NBC News.

According to reports, the areas were reporting virus test results averaging 4.7 percent positive, compared to just over 1 percent in the rest of the city.

And according to NBC, though many within the ultra-Orthodox community were said to be following the rules, and mixed generational households were factored, leaders in the communities had criticised the restrictions.

One New York Jewish tabloid is said to have accused city Mayor Bill de Blasio of 'wanting to destroy our schools and way of life' because of the Covid rules.

Meanwhile, Agudath Israel of America, the main advocacy body representing ultra-Orthodox Jews, argued that while the ban on large services 'discriminates against all religions,' it 'disproportionately impacts the religious services of Orthodox Jews'.

Meanwhile, ultra-Orthodox communities in Israel also saw larger than usual Covid spikes, according to the Times of Israel.

According to reports in March last year, at the start of the pandemic, one Rabbi initially ordered thousands of followers to defy demands to close schools and seminaries by Israel's Health Ministry.

The order sparked Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and police officials to hold meetings with ultra-Orthodox leaders to convince them to obey the restrictions.

According to Israel's Ministry of Health, figures from last October show ultra-Orthodox Israelis account for about 11 per cent of the population but more than 50 per cent of Covid patients aged 65 and older.

When asked for a comment on the Stamford Hill wedding claims, the Met Police referred MailOnline to its general advice on illegal large gatherings.

Speaking after the Government announced it would be giving police powers to hand-out 800 fines for those attending large parties, as well as the 10,000 maximum fines for organisers, Commander Alex Murray, the Met's lead for Covid-19 enforcement, said: 'If you are planning on attending an illegal gathering, party or raves you are not only taking a very serious health risk but also a much bigger financial risk.

'I hope that these increased fines will discourage some of the events we've seen in recent weeks - events which are no doubt adding to the already huge pressure on our health services and potentially leading to avoidable deaths.'
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Ready to offer job, financial support to family of deceased DYFI activist: Mamata Banerjee

India

pti-Madhuri Adnal

Kolkata, Feb 15: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday said her government is ready to provide financial support to family members of DYFI activist Maidul Islam Midda, who succumbed to injuries sustained during a clash between police and members of Left parties.

Banerjee said the police has launched an investigation and the exact cause of his death would be known only after the post-mortem examination. "I do not support any death. A probe is underway... I have come to know that even his family members were not informed where he was admitted. No police complaint was made in this connection, too," she said at the state secretariat.

"I have spoken to Sujan Chakraborty (Left Front leader), and told him that I am ready to provide job and financial support to the family," the chief minister said. Midda, who was critically injured in a clash with the police during the Left parties' march to the West Bengal secretariat on February 11, died on Monday morning.

Mamata card' matters in Bengal, not Modi's 'Ram card': Trinamool Congress

He had suffered renal failure, following which he died due to cardiac arrest, CPI(M) leader Dr Fuad Halim, at whose medical facility Midda was being treated, said. Banerjee said it is also important to ascertain whether Midda, who is survived by wife and two children, had any health complication.

Student and youth wings of Left parties had clashed with the police during the rally, leading to injuries on both sides. The police lathicharged, burst tear gas shells and used water cannons to disperse the activists. The Left Front had called a 12-hour state-wide bandh on February 12 in protest against the police action.
Sylvia Asubwa shares her long and painful journey to motherhood after she had lost all hope of conceiving.

******************************

My name is Sylvia Asubwa. I am in my mid-30s. I am a mother of three children: Favour, Reuel, and Tendai. I consider these children miracles from God because shortly before I got married in 2013, I had lost hope that I would ever have children of my own.

My story begins in February 2010, when I met my husband Jackson Nyamai at a Valentines dinner that the Deliverance Church Langata Youth Summit had organised. I was a new member at the church and it happened that during the dinner event, I was placed at the same table with Jackson.

We had a good, casual chat and exchanged contacts. We quickly became friends and within a year, our friendship blossomed into love. On August 10, 2013, we were wedded at Deliverance Church, Langata.

We had started our wedding plans earlier that year. About three weeks to the wedding, Jackson decided that we should see a gynaecologist for advice on family planning. We were both undertaking postgraduate studies and wanted to delay getting children.

At the hospital, we were taken through a routine check-up and the gynaecologist said that I looked like I was 26 weeks pregnant. This shocked me. I was not sexually active and knew that I couldnt be pregnant. It caught Jackson off guard. We did a scan to check if indeed I was pregnant. The outcome showed that I had multiple fibroids. The smallest was 7 cm and the largest was 9 cm.

Messed up system

The gynaecologist said that my reproductive system had been messed up badly by fibroids and chances of ever having children were almost zero. He recommended that we postpone the wedding to December 2013 and rush in for emergency surgery. He then sent us for additional tests.

While going for the tests, I interacted with another gynaecologist who was not convinced about the rush for surgery. He advised that I could still go on with the wedding and honeymoon, and return for treatment later. We took this advice and went home.

My condition kept bothering me. I didnt want to enter marriage in a manner that would cause my husband to feel like I had lured him into marrying a barren woman. But Jackson kept reassuring me that he had faith in the woman he had fallen in love with and chosen to marry. I prayed and pleaded with God to make me whole again. On August 10, we held our colourful wedding. I fell sick a week after our honeymoon. I went to the hospital for tests but nothing was found. Four weeks into my marriage, I was invited for an interview by the Kenya Military to work as an arbitral specialist. I passed the initial interview and was asked to go for the medical check-up final stage before I could join a three-month training program with the military.

We have some bad news for you. We cannot admit you to the military because youre pregnant! the team leader pulled me aside and said. What was supposed to be bad news gave me indescribable joy. I burst into song and dance and cried tears of joy. I was elated and couldnt wait to tell my husband. God had answered my cry.

Complications

Six weeks in, I developed complications. I would bleed daily. I remember one of the doctors I saw saying that my pregnancy would abort in the next 2 to 3 weeks. I changed doctors several times. My appointments to the doctor were so many that my job contract was not renewed after expiry in December 2013.

As complications mounted, the doctor suggested that he would remove the baby at 28 weeks and incubate him for about three months. I was losing too much blood and he felt that the pregnancy was becoming a threat to my life, too.

This suggestion devastated me. If it happened, I was afraid that people would think I had conceived out of wedlock and was using incubation as an excuse. By sheer miracle, though, at week 26, the bleeding stopped.

On May 16, 2014, my water broke while we were having dinner at home. Jackson rushed me to a hospital which was about a ten minutes drive from home. On arriving there, I was told that I had already dilated to 10 cm. I was taken straight to the delivery room. Within another ten minutes, I had already pushed out the baby without any trace of labour pains.

But this was not the end of it. I developed a complication known as placenta accreta, where the placenta grows too deeply into the uterine walls and fails to come out after delivery. This causes excessive bleeding and can lead to maternal mortality.

Excessive bleeding

After failing to remove it without surgery, I was rushed to the theatre where I stayed for four hours due to excessive bleeding. The doctor would later tell us that at some point, they had lost my pulse. I was bleeding to death.

After delivery, I started going for routine check-ups. The doctor wanted to explore the option of surgery to remove the fibroids before we could think of having another baby. He had advised that we have our babies as soon as possible due to the complications I had.

We agreed to try out a baby every nine months. It seemed that my prayers were working because, after delivery, the fibroids kept getting smaller and smaller until they disappeared. Nine months later, I conceived my second born child.

This pregnancy and birth of our second born, Reuel, in March 2016, was smooth and without complications. When he turned nine months old, I conceived yet again. This pregnancy went on smoothly until the last week of my pregnancy in August 2017. I had gone to the hospital in Nairobi for my final clinic when the doctor decided to do a quick scan. The scan revealed that my baby was dead.

Sorry, your baby is dead, and we have to do a quick dilation and evacuation procedure to remove it, the doctor told me. For a moment, I lost my mind. I picked my bag and ran out of the room, went straight to my car and drove out of the hospital.

Silent delivery room

After driving for a while, I pulled off the road and called my husband to explain my predicament. He immediately called my gynaecologist who was attending to an emergency in another hospital. The gynaecologist asked us to proceed to where he was, and after fresh tests were done, it was confirmed that indeed the baby was not alive.

This was one of the darkest days of my life. I remembered the nine months journey and could not reconcile the fact that suddenly, there was no child. The gynaecologist had me induced into labour and after about four hours, I delivered the baby.

There was silence in the delivery room. No baby crying. It broke my husband. We had planned to name this baby Liam. We did a post-mortem and took tests to find out what had caused the stillbirth. Nothing was found. We contracted the hospital to bury the baby, and I was discharged to heal from home.

All this while, my uterus was clean without any trace of fibroids. A few months later, we started trying for another baby. This time, though, I was unable to conceive. About a year later, I noticed that my tummy was getting bigger each day as if I was expectant. This was followed by heavy bleeding. I went to my doctor and after doing a scan, he informed me that I had a growth in my uterus. He recommended immediate surgery.

In February 2019, I went in for surgery. Tired of all that I was going through, I asked the doctor to do a tubal ligation and a hysterectomy since I did not want to imagine myself pregnant again. After surgery, the doctor said that he thought the growth was cancerous. It was whitish and quite big. He said he had never encountered one like it in all his practice life, and recommended that tests be done to determine if it was cancerous or not.

Fortunately, the tests showed that it was not cancerous. The doctor also said that he did not do tubal ligation. He saw no need for it because 80 per cent of my uterus had been removed during the surgical procedure. This part had been badly damaged by the growth and cutting it off was the best solution. I was asked to prepare for menopause.

Proud mother of three boys

Fortunately, within weeks, my periods came back. It was consistent for the next few months. I did not take a family planning method because nearly my entire uterus had been removed. Moreover, my doctor had ruled out the possibility of conceiving again because I had no functional uterus.

But God works in mysterious ways. Nine months after my surgery, I conceived yet again. I took six pregnancy tests to ascertain the positive results. My gynaecologist termed my positive test as a sheer miracle.
Similar debates are taking place over other gendered languages such as Spanish

Reformists say that reinforces sexism while traditionalists argue that alternatives have so far been unwieldy and don't reflect the way people actually speak

Duden (pictured), which is similar to the Oxford English Dictionary, has scrapped the masculine form of nouns to be used to describe whole professions [Stock image]

Germany's most influential dictionary has stirred debate by issuing guidance to make the language more gender neutral.

Duden, which is similar to the Oxford English Dictionary, has scrapped the use of the masculine form of nouns to describe whole professions.

The change applies to some 12,000 words and has exasperated traditionalists and some linguists.

German is a gendered language, meaning all nouns fall into either masculine, feminine and neuter forms.

Some nouns, like jobs, have both a masculine and feminine form, with the masculine form being used to describe the occupation in general terms.

The Times pointed to the example of 'doctor'. A male doctor is 'ein Arzt' while a female doctor is 'eine Arztin'. In sentences such as: 'I am going to the doctors' or 'Where is the doctors?', German-speakers use the masculine form of the noun.

Likewise, the masculine form is also used in plural when referring to two or more doctors, provided at least one is a man.

For example, a group of three female doctors would be referred to by the feminine form of the word 'doctor' but a group of two female doctors and a male doctor would be described using the masculine form.

If there is one male and one female doctor present, the masculine form would be used to describe them both collectively.

Reformists say such language reinforces sexism while traditionalists argue that alternatives have so far been unwieldy and have failed to reflect the way people actually speak.

A similar debate is taking place in Spain and other Spanish speaking countries, which has seen some speakers replace the masculine 'o' or feminine 'a' at the end of nouns with an 'x'.

German linguists - and those working in other gendered languages - are reigniting the age-old debate as to whether the role of language is to shape a society or to reflect it.

In recent years, German media and public documents have used an asterisk in an attempt to make gender divided nouns - so 'Artz' or 'Arzt' would become 'Artz*in'.

But in August, The Association for German Language (GfdS) scrapped the asterisk option, saying it 'does not conform either to German grammar or to the rules of spelling,' Deutsche Welle reported.

While Duden (pictured) does not control how German speakers express themselves or exert the same influence it once did, it remains an important reference tool, particularly for non-native speakers seeking to learn the language [Stock image]

The GfdS has also sharply criticised Duden's recent move to abolish the generic masculine, which means 'Artz' can now only be used to explicitly refer to a male doctor.

Kathrin Kunkel-Razum, the dictionary's chief editor, said it was determined to bring the dictionary up to date, The Times reported.

The masculine form will continue to be used in plural to describe groups of multiple genders, Kunkel-Razum said, while acknowledging that this can also lead to confusion about whether a group is made up of solely men and/or boys or also includes people of other genders.

The GfdS described gender-neutral definitions as the product of an 'elitist milieu' and accused Duden of attempting to impose 'politically correct expressions,' The Times reported.

'The society Kunkel-Razum thinks she is addressing doesn't follow these rules. These gender terms are not used in normal interactions in the supermarket or the garage,' it said.

'Over the past two years numerous surveys have shown that this gendering has no support in society,' the GfdS has claimed.

While Duden does not control how German speakers express themselves or exert the same influence it once did, it remains an important reference tool, particularly for non-native speakers seeking to learn the language.
There is always so much more to do than one has time for. Time management is a skill that no one teaches you at school (and if parents do, we dont listen to them) but we are expected to be good at it. Effective time management requires that we know our short term and long term goals, be organized and overcome procrastination, a tall task indeed!

You will never find time for everything. If you want time, you must make it. The famous 20:80 rule states that 80 percent of our outcomes come from only 20 percent of our inputs. Most of the other time is spent procrastinating or working inefficiently doing activities that provide very little benefit. That calls us that most of us need to distinguish between hard work and smart work. Effective time management strategies can make us smart workers and help us find a balance between study and other activities we want to do.

In creating, the hardest part is to begin. So where can we start? It is always good to try and break our tasks into smaller chunks so that we dont get overwhelmed. To begin with, you can start with monitoring your daily activities for two-three days to get an idea of your typical day. You can make a chart in your notebook and note down your activities every half an hour. Refrain from noting nothing in case you feel you did not anything of consequence. Note whatever it was, whether be it chatting, napping or day dreaming. You can start by noting things that have specific start times, like if you know you eat breakfast at 7:00, then fill in that square with breakfast. Similarly go ahead and fill in your sleep timings, bus rides, play or TV timings. In the next step, try and answer some of the questions about how you currently spend your time.

I feel like I spend too much time on 

I feel like I dont have enough time for.

I feel I spend too much time on homework. How can I better spend time on homework.

How do I like to spend my free time.

Whenever we are doing out time scheduling, we know that there are certain Have-To's and there is no escaping them. These may include family responsibilities like household chores, keeping your room clean or helping a younger sibling. Sleeping, eating, maintaining personal hygiene and doing schoolwork and homework are also essentials of a students life. Then there are the Want-To's. "Want-To's" make our lives a little more fulfilling, like following a hobby and being with people we enjoy ourselves. It is important that we learn to set goals for ourselves if we want to make time for our haves and wants. Short-term goals are things we want or need to do that can be accomplished in a few hours or days, like finishing home work for the day. Long-term goals are part of the "bigger picture" of our lives - our dreams and aspirations like learning a language or taking that final exam. Although they may take months or years to accomplish, they still take up time on a regular basis. Goals like these can't be achieved by setting aside one big block of time but rather, smaller blocks of time over a period of days, months, or even years. Working on our short term and long term goals are often interconnected.

Once we have defined our goals, we need start with making an effective time schedule for the week. This time schedule should reflect our goals and accommodate our haves and wants. It should be realistic and one that you are most likely to follow successfully. Remember what gets rewarded gets done. So decide on how you want to reward yourself once you have followed your schedule for a week successfully. Be flexible about it and make changes with things that dont work in the schedule. In case you do not finish a given task, try to make time for it somewhere else rather than just leaving it.

Time cheaters and how to beat them

The questions that you answered earlier would have helped you identify some of the time cheaters like, spending time on the phone with friends who wont go away. The first thing you should say to a friend who calls is Im in the middle of studying now. Ill call you back. Or start by saying, I have only five minutes right now and Ill call you later. You may realize once you get down to work you get panicky and try to do everything together. We need to keep our anxiety at bay, prioritize our work and attack them one by one. Thats the only way you will get anything done. It may not seem like you have achieved all that you want to in a given day but if you keep at it you will soon find your pile of work disappearing!

Writing and rewriting notes or arranging notes over and over again does not give anything in return but waste our time. So does working aimlessly without objectives, priorities or deadlines. Many times we spend so much time in doing preparations that we have little left for the actual task! It is not enough that we are busy, so are ants. The question is: What are we busy about?

Time management strategies are ineffective if we are chronic procrastinators. Procrastination is the thief of time. If you are forever postponing tasks, you may never get down to making that time log that we discussed above. Often there are hidden doubts and fears which make us procrastinate. Try to ask yourself, Why am I reluctant to do this. You are most likely to find some things that are unpleasant to you in the task which leads to the delays. Say to yourself, I will do the unpleasant task first. Keep TV watching and talking to friends as rewards after you have finished with your studying. Be firm with yourself for some time and you will find that you enjoy your free times without guilt once you have finished your tasks.

Time wasted is existence, time used is life.

Giving structure to your day and following a study technique is a great way to be focussed on the task at hand and be efficient. However, we can still find ourselves struggling with our concentration form time to time. There are some techniques we can follow to directly improve our concentration.

Keep a notepad: Any time a thought comes which seems distracting or urgent and is unrelated to the work at hand, write it down. The truth is, every other though that flits our mind seems important when we are studying! Recording worrisome obligations means you don't have to use your brain as a "reminder" bulletin board, which means you can give your undivided attention to your top priority task.

Take breaks: It is prudent to divide your study schedule into small chunks of half an hour each especially when you are struggling to concentrate! Take a break after every half an hour of studying and dont forget to pat yourself on your back for staying focused for this long. However, dont leave the place, but sit back in your chair, relax, deep breathe and keep your focus. Take longer breaks every hour when you can get up from your seat and stretch your legs.

Worry time: For those of us who tend to worry about things incessantly, set aside a worry time. Whenever your mind slips into worrying remind yourself that you have a special time devoted to worrying and you can worry then!

The five more mantra: This is something I came across and I felt its a great way to build sustained attention and build frustration tolerance. If you're in the middle of a task and tempted to give up- just do FIVE MORE. Read FIVE MORE pages. Finish FIVE MORE math problems. Work FIVE MORE minutes". By implementing this strategy, you are building mental stamina and exercising your brain muscles and endurance just like athletes built their muscles and stamina.

Mind and Body exercises: Keep aside all tasks, select a thought and keep it in your mind for as long as you can. It can be thought like, how to keep fit. Now stay focused on this idea and develop it for as long as you can. Be aware of times when your mind wavers off and then bring it back to the topic.

Sit in a comfortable chair and see how still you can keep. This is not as easy as it seems. Watch and see that you are not making any involuntary muscular movements. The first time I tried this, I moved five times in the first minute! With some practice you will find you are able to sit still without a movement of the muscles for longer and longer and it is a great way to develop concentration. In many ways the practice of asanas in Yoga which requires holding postures does exactly this!

Similarly, you can sit in a chair and place a clock with a second hand on the table. Follow the second hand with your eyes as it goes around. Keep this up for five minutes, thinking of nothing else but the second hand. As there is little that is particularly interesting about the second hand, it is hard to do this, but in the extra effort of will power required to make it successful lies its value. Always try to keep as still as possible during these exercises.

Reading requires that we first concentrate our thoughts on the subject on hand. An excellent exercise is to read an article in a newspaper (like this one!) and see in how few words you can express it. Reading an article to get only the essentials requires the closest concentration. In order to focus on every statement thats written, you have to keep all other thoughts out. If you are unable to write out what you read, you will know you are weak in concentration. Instead of writing it out you can express it orally if you wish. You will also find yourself developing your ability to think creatively and critically!

Visualisation is an extremely effective technique to prepare the mind to concentrate. Before starting your studies, close your eyes and imagine yourself in a situation when you experienced deep concentration. It could have been playing a sport, a musical instrument or gazing at a bird sitting in a pond. Try to picture this state of total concentration in your minds eye and stay with it for about five minutes. Then open your eyes, take a few deep breaths and start studying.

If you will utilize your spare time in practicing exercises like those suggested you can gain more control over your mind and become more efficient. Of course, success in all of the above depends largely upon cultivating your concentration which is hard work.

If you always do what youve always done, youll always get what you have always got.

Recommended reading:

The One Minute Manager, Kenneth Blanchard and Spencer Johnson, Berkeley Books, 1981.

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey, Simon & Schuster, 1989.



Mrigaya Sinha is a Clinical Psychologist with a PhD in Clinical Psychology from NIMHANS, Bangalore. She is from Patna and has done her graduation from Patna Women's College. She is one of the very few psychologists from Patna with training from a premier national institute and experience of working in several big institutes apart from NIMHANS including KMC, Manipal; VIMHANS, New Delhi; and Mahavir Cancer Santhan, Patna over a period of eight years, to name a few. She is currently setting up her private practice in the US.
(CNN)  President Joe Biden will participate in a virtual G7 event on Friday (Saturday in the Philippines) where he plans to discuss efforts to combat the Covid-19 pandemic and rebuild the world economy.

It's his first meeting with leaders from the Group of Seven nations as president.

He'll specifically focus on areas, including "coordination on vaccine production, distribution, and supplies, as well as continued efforts to mobilize and cooperate against the threat of emerging infectious diseases by building country capacity and establishing health security financing," a White House statement released Sunday evening said.

When it comes to rebuilding an economy badly battered by the pandemic, the President, the statement continued, is set to focus on "the importance of all industrialized countries maintaining economic support for the recovery."

The virtual meeting, hosted by the United Kingdom, will also include leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the European Commission and European Council.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a statement this weekend he will use the virtual event to call for global cooperation in the battle against the "common foe" of coronavirus. Johnson will charge the leaders to "work together on a joined-up global approach to pandemics that brings an end to the nationalist and divisive politics that marred the initial response to coronavirus," the statement said.

"Quantum leaps in science have given us the vaccines we need to end this pandemic for good. Now world governments have a responsibility to work together to put those vaccines to the best possible use. I hope 2021 will be remembered as the year humanity worked together like never before to defeat a common foe," Johnson said.

Even as global Covid-19 cases have declined in recent weeks, the virtual meeting comes as new variants are threatening to throw a wrench in government vaccination plans.

This story was first published on CNN.com 'Biden to join virtual G7 event Friday with global leaders on Covid-19 efforts'
The mysterious and once perilous life of William O`Neal, 40, a key federal government informant who infiltrated the Black Panthers in the late 1960s, ended in Maywood earlier this week when he was struck by a car on the Eisenhower Expressway, police said.

The Cook County medical examiner`s office ruled O`Neal`s death a suicide. O`Neal was living under the name of William Hart, at least the second pseudonym he had used in the last 17 years.

He began a life of crime as a car thief on Chicago`s West Side and then worked undercover for the FBI before being whisked into the Federal Witness Protection Program in 1973. That life, still shrouded in secrecy, ended when O`Neal apparently walked in front of a speeding car, officials said.

With a husky voice and a sense of the theatrical, O`Neal was part moxie, part bravado, part con man and one of the most extraordinary informants developed in Chicago by the FBI.

O`Neal`s death brought public and private expressions of shock from friends, relatives and law enforcement officials.

''He was always a mysterious guy,'' one official who knew him well. ''He could play all the roles, every part they (FBI agents) needed. I think he never got it out of his system and was confused.''

In 1984, O`Neal was living in California under an assumed name, but about four years ago he moved back to the Chicago area. He made some attempts to contact acquaintances, but he kept mostly to himself, friends said.

''It was going good,'' said O`Neal`s uncle, Ben Heard, of Maywood. ''I don`t know what caused him to go off like that.''

O`Neal`s wife, speaking through a family friend, said she believed her husband`s death was accidental. ''She knows her husband loved her and loved their new son and was looking forward to life together,'' the friend said.

Though the medical examiner`s office has issued its ruling, an investigation is continuing, according to Dr. Robert Kirschner, assistant Cook County medical examiner.

On Monday evening, a second man who lived in the same apartment complex where O`Neal had been visiting before his death, apparently committed suicide by running onto the Eisenhower and was struck by a truck in virtually the same place as O`Neal, Kirschner said. Relatives said the two men did not know each other.

For most of his adult life, O`Neal lived an existence that left him hated by some and highly praised by others.

It all began in 1966 when FBI Agent Roy Martin Mitchell tracked O`Neal down for stealing a car and driving it across state lines to Michigan. Mitchell agreed to forget about the stolen car charge if O`Neal would work for the FBI.

His relationship with Mitchell was a study in contrast. Mitchell had a Southern background, wore a crewcut and was a typical FBI man of the 1960s. O`Neal was a fast-talking, conniving West Side black kid who thought he knew all the angles.

O`Neal really carved his niche in Chicago history when he agreed to infiltrate the Black Panthers, then viewed as a violent radical group.

And he helped convict Chicago police Sgt. Stanley Robinson, who was accused of murdering drug dealers. O`Neal testified that he watched Robinson kill two men.

After becoming accepted in the Panther Party, O`Neal served as the group`s chief of security. Eventually he supplied the floor plan to the West Side Panther Party headquarters that was the target of a controversial December 1969 predawn raid in which Panther leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were slain in a fusillade of law-enforcement bullets.

In a 1984 interview with the Tribune, apparently the last comments he made publicly, O`Neal acknowledged that he had thrived on the law enforcement work, was left thirsty when it was finished and believed that in the end he had been ''just a pawn in a very big game.''

''He was a man of courage,'' said Gregory Adamski, an attorney who worked with O`Neal while O`Neal was in the government`s witness protection program.

''When he said he would do something, he would do it.''

Heard and Adamski said O`Neal rarely spoke of his undercover years.

''Very seldom did he make anything of the past,'' Heard said. ''He didn`t like to talk about it. He`d evade the questions.''

But on an upcoming episode of the public television series ''Eyes on the Prize,'' which is scheduled to be broadcast in Chicago next month, O`Neal discussed the ambivalence he felt about his actions.

''In the film he said he felt very bad about his role in infiltrating the Panthers. . . . He felt remorse about the deaths. . . . But he felt the Panthers were a threat. He seems to have thought about himself as a law enforcement person,'' said a member of the series production staff.

''There was always some risk to him going on camera and doing this,'' the staff member said. ''He was very cautious about the interview. . . . He said he had to be careful.''

Bill Hampton, brother of the slain Panther leader, speculated Wednesday that guilt over his role as an FBI informant sparked the suicide.

''The act (of being an informant) he committed was unjust and ignorant,'' Hampton said. ''It`s something he tried to live with and couldn`t.''

The end of his informant work left him restless, but without remorse, he said in 1984. ''If you ask me if the gains outweigh the loses, I think so,''

he said then. ''I think if I look back at myself . . . I say, if I had never met Mitchell I would probably be in jail or dead.

''If you ask me if I`m a happy man-I`m not happy; no, I`m not even content.''

Four years ago, according to relatives and friends, O`Neal returned to the Chicago area. He and his first wife had parted when life in the witness protection program became too strained, one acquaintance recalled Wednesday.

O`Neal had remarried in California and then moved back to the Chicago area with his wife. He also is survived by a 5-month-old son. Until recently, according to friends, he worked for an attorney in downtown Chicago.

''He was working for the lawyer up until three weeks ago,'' Heard said.

''But he and the lawyer had a falling out about something.''

On Saturday, O`Neal went to his uncle`s residence in Maywood where he relaxed and watched television.

On Sunday night, ''he kept going to the wash room,'' Heard recalled. ''He stayed in there for a long time. The last time he came out he tried to go out the window. I pulled him back, but he broke loose and ran toward the expressway.''

According to the Illinois State Police, O`Neal ran down the embankment near 5th Avenue, crossed the eastbound lanes, and was struck by a car in the westbound lanes.

This was the second time his nephew had run onto the highway, Heard said. In September, O`Neal was struck by a car but not injured, Heard said.
The Madison County Sheriff's Office, along with the police reform and reinvention collaborative, released a draft plan on police reform in the county.

Officials say after getting feedback from the community, a main focus is on mental health.

Over the next three years, the Madison County Sheriff's Office says it's committed to having all of its full-time deputies receive Crisis Intervention Training (CIT). CIT trains officers on how to handle emotionally disturbed people in a number of situations in the community.

Another focus on mental health is a "call diversion policy" put together by the Madison County Mental Health Department and 911. This is expected to begin in March 2021.

Also found in the plan, the Sheriffs Office says they will look into purchasing a new records management system that makes it easier to create reports on date and demographics. Also, the Sheriffs Office has amended its complaint process.

There will be two public comment periods held virtually for comments on the drafted plan. The first is happening Thursday, Feb 18 at 6 p.m. The second virtual session will be on Friday, Feb. 19 at 12:30 p.m.

Comments from the public will assist the committee in finalizing the plan.

If you would like to comment, email policereform@madisoncounty.ny.gov. A Zoom link will be sent to you. For more information, click here.

If you would only like to watch, these sessions will be streamed live on the Madison County YouTube page.

Governor Andrew Cuomo issued the executive order in 2020, requiring each local government across New York State to adopt a policing reform plan by April 1, 2021.
Matthew Rowley, wanted on murder charge in Corona.

An hours-long manhunt that prompted the lockdown of five Tierrasanta schools ended Tuesday night with the arrest of a Riverside County murder suspect.

Matthew Rowley, 22, of Corona, was taken into custody shortly before 6 p.m. by San Diego police, said Officer Dino Delimitros.

1 / 15 SDPD searched the neighborhood around Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta Tuesday afternoon in search for a murder suspect. (Sean M. Haffey) 2 / 15 SDPD searched the neighborhood around Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta Tuesday afternoon in search for a murder suspect. (Sean M. Haffey) 3 / 15 SDPD searched the neighborhood around Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta Tuesday afternoon in search for a murder suspect. (Sean M. Haffey) 4 / 15 photo (Sean M. Haffey) 5 / 15 SDPD searched the neighborhood around Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta Tuesday afternoon in search for a murder suspect. (Sean M. Haffey) 6 / 15 SDPD searched the neighborhood around Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta Tuesday afternoon in search for a murder suspect. (Sean M. Haffey) 7 / 15 Parents wait to pick up their kids after Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta was on lockdown following a search for a murder suspect. (Sean M. Haffey) 8 / 15 A SDPD helicopter hovers over Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta as SDPD searched a park and homes for a murder suspect from Anaheim California. (Sean M. Haffey) 9 / 15 Kumeyaay Elementary School parents wait patiently for their children to be released from school after it was on lockdown while SDPD searched for a murder suspect that had been seen at the park next to the school. (Sean M. Haffey) 10 / 15 Kumeyaay Elementary School were released to their parents after the school was on lockdown while SDPD searched for a murder suspect that had been seen at the park next to the school. (Sean M. Haffey) 11 / 15 SDPD guarded the Kumeyaay Elementary School as parents picked up their children after a lockdown was lifted. SDPD had not found the murder suspect at this time. (Sean M. Haffey) 12 / 15 Anxious parents rushed to the school to pick up their children after the lockdown was lifted. (Sean M. Haffey) 13 / 15 Kumeyaay Elementary School were released to their parents after the school was on lockdown while SDPD searched for a murder suspect that had been seen at the park next to the school. Michael Torhan and his daughter Keira who is a kindergarten student at Kumeyaay Elementary School in Tierrasanta. (Sean M. Haffey) 14 / 15 San Diego Unified School District Police officer guards Kumeyaay Elementary School after a lockdown in January 2013. (Sean M. Haffey) 15 / 15 Kumeyaay Elementary School were released to their parents after the school was on lockdown while SDPD searched for a murder suspect that had been seen at the park next to the school. (Sean M. Haffey)

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He was found in an apartment building on Camino Playa Carmel and surrendered to police, Corona police said.

An Orange County law enforcement task force had received a tip that Rowley, who was wanted for a homicide in Corona, was in Tierrasanta, Corona police Sgt. Kim Velasco said.

Task force members, including Anaheim police, saw Rowley near Antigua Boulevard and Camino Playa del Oro, but he ran from them. They asked San Diego police to assist them about 12:45 p.m., San Diego police spokesman Gary Hassen said.

Rowley was believed to be running through yards to elude officers. A police helicopter and dogs helped in the search.

Meanwhile, students at Serra High School, DePortola Middle School and three elementary schools  Tierrasanta, Kumeyaay and Vista Grande  were placed on lockdown, a school district spokesman said.

Officers went door to door on Camino Playa del Oro and made announcements for residents to stay in their homes. They were asked to call police if they saw the suspect. He was described as white, 5 feet 5 inches tall, 145 pounds, and wearing a green-and-white plaid shirt and jeans.

The lockdowns were lifted a couple of schools at a time after 2 p.m. The last lockdown, at Kumeyaay, was lifted at 3:10 p.m. Roads that had been blocked were reopened about the same time.

Corona police issued a news release last week identifying Rowley as a suspect in the Jan. 16 shooting death of Daniel Stordahl, 20, of Corona. A second suspect, Patrick Kohler, 22, of Riverside, has already been jailed in Riverside County. Police identified Kohler as the getaway driver and Rowley as the shooter.
Kolkata: 'Krishak Soho Bhoj', a major outreach programme, is being organized by Bharatiya Janata Party's Kisan Morcha on February 18. This comes ahead of West Bengal assembly elections.

In their bid to reach out to farmers, 40,000 villages have been roped under 'Krishak Surakkha Abhiyan'.

Initially, Soho Bhoj aimed at gram panchayats, but after its success, mandals are also being considered.

In Soho Bhoj, farmers' families come together, cook 'ek muthi chal' (a fistful of uncooked rice), and sit together for a meal.



BJP's Kisan Morcha president, Mahadev Sarkar, said, "Our aim is to avail the farmers of all benefits being planned by the Centre."

Attacking the TMC-ruled state government, he further said that it has not come up with any proper plan for farmer's benefits and that the farmers of the state are being deprived of Centre's welfare programmes.

He further asserted, that even fasal bima or crop insurance has not been given to any farmer. Through this Abhiyan, the BJP claims to have reached twenty-five lakh families and 7,000 farmers.

(With inputs from agencies)

Live TV
The UNs special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran has expressed concern over reports that the country has subjected lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) children to torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

In a report released last week, Javaid Rehman said such practices, which violate Irans obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, reportedly include electric shocks and the administration of hormones and strong psychoactive medications.

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Rehman said that members of Irans LGBT community are often advised that their gender nonconformity or same-sex attraction represents so-called gender identity disorder, which necessitates reparative therapies or sex reassignment surgeries, to cure them.

The report quoted the Iranian government as claiming that there were no restrictions on medical services and that any treatment was administered with consent.

Iranian officials have not yet commented on the report, which is to be discussed during the 46th session of the Human Rights Council from February 22 to March 19.

Gays and lesbians are forced to hide their sexual orientation in Iran, where homosexuality is punishable by death.

According to the U.S. State Departments 2019 Country Report on human rights practices, Iranian security forces have harassed, arrested, and detained individuals they suspected of being members of the LGBT community.

In some cases, security forces raided houses and monitored Internet sites for information on LGBT persons, the report said.
German prosecutors say they have charged five Tajik men with being members of the Islamic State (IS) extremist group, accusing them of preparing acts of violence in Germany by raising funds and recruiting members for attacks.

Federal prosecutors filed the indictment at the Duesseldorf state court on February 15, where an alleged associate of the five, also a Tajik citizen, was handed a 7 year prison sentence.

The suspects now charged were identified only as Farhodshoh K., Muhammadali G., Azizjon B., Sunatullokh K., and Komron B., due to German privacy rules. They were arrested last year.

"The aim of the cell members, who were in contact with IS leaders in Syria and Afghanistan, was to take up the armed struggle against what they saw as 'infidels' and to commit attacks in Germany," the indictment read.

The prosecutors said the network raised funds for IS operations and recruited would-be attackers. They also allegedly acquired components for an unconventional bomb.

They also said the five Tajiks trained with paintball games to improve their military skills. Some of the sessions' participants were believed to have had contact with the dual national of Austria and North Macedonia who killed four people in a rampage in Vienna in November 2020.

Azizijon B. is accused of being an IS member since at least March 2017 and of carrying out instructions from high-ranking IS leaders in Afghanistan. He also allegedly recruited members for IS in Germany, leading to the founding of the cell in January 2019.

Farhodshoh K. and Ravsan B. are accused of traveling to Albania in 2019 to carry out a contract killing that was intended to finance IS to the tune of $40,000.

The men had allegedly already begun spying on the intended victim and had planned to circulate pictures of the body on the Internet as IS propaganda.

That killing was called off because doubts arose over the intended victims identity.

IS-linked militants have committed several violent attacks in Germany in recent years, including a ramming attack at a Berlin Christmas market in December 2016 that killed 12 people.

With reporting by Reuters, AP, and AFP
The junta is now declaring it illegal to use "incorrect words" such as coup when referring to the new government, the Ministry of Information announced Friday. The message further claimed the newly issued one year 'state of emergency' is "in accordance" with the constitution. The United States among other nations recently formally declared it recognizes that a coup d'etat has occurred.

Armored vehicle next to the Sule Pagoda, via AFP

The army further said new laws are pending that will target "acts of instigation that may arouse civil unrest" - which presumably is aimed at media sources that use "coup" or related language in their reporting.

Already a new law unveiled last week took aim at internet content disparaging the military takeover, which saw the civilian leadership including Aung San Suu Kyi detained on Feb.1, as Bloomberg reports:

Earlier this week, the junta proposed a cyber security law that could see social media users fined or jailed for posts containing what it construes as "misinformation or disinformation that causes public panic." Ms Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party said the cyber security law is another attempt by the junta to limit freedom of speech and access to the internet.

The military is now attempting to clamp down on protests in support of the detained civilian leaders.

TW // Gun shot .

This is a video currently happening at Mandalay where a citizen was recording a video of the tanks going around and then a gunshot is heard as soon as they found her out. Nowhere in Myanmar is safe .

JUNTA STARTS VIOLENCE. #Feb14Coup #WhatsHappeningInMyanmar pic.twitter.com/fA1498dEsm  Ukiyo (@Ukiyo43879775) February 14, 2021

A telecommunications blackout is still on after the internet was earlier cut to broad swathes of the southeast Asian nation which the US still refers to as Burma. Armored vehicles and tanks are now being reported on city streets.

"Armored vehicles have rolled into Myanmar cities amid fears of a crackdown on anti-coup protesters after nine days of mass demonstrations demanding a return to civilian rule," Al Jazeera reports Sunday of the worsening situation.

Statement by Ambassadors to Myanmar: "We support the people of Myanmar in their quest for democracy, freedom, peace, and prosperity. The world is watching." pic.twitter.com/OtRzSEIf1H  U.S. Embassy Burma (@USEmbassyBurma) February 14, 2021

"Western embassies  from the European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada and 11 other nations  issued a statement late on Sunday calling on security forces to 'refrain from violence against demonstrators and civilians, who are protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government'," the report continues.

Currently the US embassy is also urging any Americans in the country to "shelter in place".

Internet shut down across entire country of Myanmar during large anti-coup protests pic.twitter.com/8zxY23t2FY  Breaking911 (@Breaking911) February 14, 2021

This also as there are emerging reports of "shots fired" amid the growing protests and clashes with police and military security. "Security forces opened fire to disperse protesters outside one plant in Myitkyina, capital of Kachin state, footage aired live on Facebook showed, although it was not clear if they were using rubber bullets or live fire," Al Jazeera describes.
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Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 04:44:18|Editor: huaxia

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Photo taken on Jan. 16, 2021 shows Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic speaks during a welcoming ceremony of China's Sinopharm inactivated coronavirus vaccines in Belgrade, Serbia. (Photo by Predrag Milosavljevic/Xinhua)

The 170 individuals and institutions whose work was recognized by Serbia included physicians Peng Zhiqiang, Hou Cailan, Guo Yubiao, Xiong Yan, Lin Bingliang, Long Qisui, Liu Dayue, Tang Kejing and Cheng Shouzhen. They arrived in Serbia at the very beginning of the pandemic and for months shared their knowledge and experiences with their local colleagues.

BELGRADE, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- On the occasion of Serbia's Statehood Day, President Aleksandar Vucic on Monday decorated nine Chinese physicians and Chinese biotech company BGI Group for assisting in the country's battle with the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 170 individuals and institutions whose work was recognized by Serbia included physicians Peng Zhiqiang, Hou Cailan, Guo Yubiao, Xiong Yan, Lin Bingliang, Long Qisui, Liu Dayue, Tang Kejing and Cheng Shouzhen. They arrived in Serbia at the very beginning of the pandemic and for months shared their knowledge and experiences with their local colleagues.

The gold medals for merit were conferred on nine members of the doctors' team in absentia.

The BGI Group, which helped Serbia build two state-of-the-art "Fire Eye" laboratories for COVID-19 PCR (polymerase chain reaction) testing, received the first class of the Order of the Serbian Flag.

"Thank you, heroes of our time, who gave a lot to Serbia and lived not only for yourselves, but for us," President Vucic told the award recipients. "To give a lot to Serbia without asking for anything in return, to incorporate one's work in its name, to sacrifice for it -- is the most that someone can do in life and that is why Serbia responds with gratitude and the greatest recognition it can give. Their names will be written in the eternal book of praise, courage and honor."

File photo taken on April 11, 2020 shows a local citizen greets Peng Zhiqiang, chief of the Chinese medical expert team to Serbia, in Belgrade, Serbia. (Chinese medical expert team to Serbia/Handout via Xinhua)

Celebrated since 2001, Statehood Day marks the anniversary of the first constitution that the Principality of Serbia adopted in 1835.

The central ceremony of Serbia's Statehood Day traditionally takes place in the village of Orasac, some 80 kilometers south of the capital Belgrade, where the Serbian people launched a rebellion -- known as the First Serbian Uprising -- against Ottoman rule in 1804.

A state delegation, led by Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic, laid wreaths at the monument dedicated to Karadjordje, leader of the uprising.

"Our ancestors would be proud if they witnessed how we are fighting today using our resources and the knowledge we have," Brnabic said.

File photo taken on March 21, 2020 shows Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic (L) greets members of the Chinese medical team via elbow contact in Belgrade, Serbia. (Xinhua/Shi Zhongyu)
During meet with Antony Blinken, Jaishankar thanks US for strong support

India recognised by US as important part of conversation on Afghanistan: Jaishankar

Assam's all-round development is central to success of Act East Policy: Jaishankar

India

oi-Deepika S

New Delhi, Feb 15: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Monday asserted that Assam is the springboard of India''s Act East Policy and its all-round development is central to the success of the policy.

Addressing a press conference here, the minister said, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is deeply committed to the development of Assam, and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)-aided projects in the state are examples of how international policies and partnerships can contribute to the development of states.

The minister, accompanied by Japanese Ambassador to India Satoshi Suzuki, was here to review JICA-assisted projects in Assam.

In order to bring in more investments to the region and to make the Act East Policy a success, there was a need to create an enabling environment by ensuring better connectivity, Jaishankar said.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Asked about the impact of political developments in neighbouring Myanmar, which is an important component of the Act East Policy, he said, "These are early days and hopefully development projects will not be affected".
It became a topic that was really hard to raise with her and she was sort of my only point of contact in terms of HR or anything, my only person I could go to, Ms Higgins said of the acting chief of staff. The minister clearly didnt want to hear about it anymore. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video And it was dismissed, it was played down and it was made to feel like it was my problem. One source familiar with some of the internal correspondence, but who was not authorised to speak on the rape allegations, defended Senator Reynolds acting chief of staff for the support shown for Ms Higgins.

A government spokesman confirmed that on March 26, 2019, Senator Reynolds senior staff became aware the office was accessed after hours and that an incident had occurred involving two staff members. It was initially treated as a breach of the ministerial staff statement of standards. After further consultation with Ms Higgins over the following days, it became clear to senior staff that there were previously unknown elements of the incident that may be of a more serious nature, the spokeswoman said in a statement. Ms Higgins also made an unofficial statement to police in early April but ultimately decided not to pursue an official complaint. She told The Project she felt she had to choose to protect her job and career by not pursuing the complaint. Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Senator Reynolds separately told Parliament on Monday women should feel safe in their workplaces at all times.

Loading My only priority throughout this matter was the welfare of my then staff member and ensuring that she received the support that she needed, Senator Reynolds said. That included ensuring that she was clear about the support available to her and her right to make a formal complaint to the Australian Federal Police should she choose to do so. Mr Morrison said the matter was under consideration by police. The government has aimed to provide Ms Higgins with her agency, to provide support to make decisions in her interests and to respect her privacy, he said.

The Department of Parliamentary Services said it had had extensive consultation with the AFP on the matter. The relevant security camera footage relating to this incident was viewed by the Australian Federal Police in April 2019 and has been stored on an ongoing basis at the direction of the Presiding Officers and with the agreement of the AFP for their access as required for any investigation, a DPS spokesman said. Ms Higgins told The Project she had asked to see the footage several times because she knew others had seen it, but she said her request was denied. It really hurt. It felt like a betrayal for them to withhold this one really small thing they needed for myself to process to move on or just to understand what had happened to me, she said. It really upset me.

Loading Former Liberal advisers Dhanya Mani and Chelsey Potter, who have previously spoken out about their own sexual assaults by fellow party members, said they heard the same kinds of responses again and again. Ms Mani said it was a frustrating cycle where a woman spoke publicly about her experience, received a tokenistic response, then the government rode out the wave of scandal and nothing changed. If processes existed that worked, these things wouldnt happen and we wouldnt be in a position where we feel that weve got no option left but to leave and then try and advocate so that women dont have to go through the same thing, she said. All that happens time and time again is that the womans career is collateral damage and falls apart and she needs to leave with enduring mental health issues ... before shes able to do anything about it or say anything.

Ms Potter said if the government didnt think it had a problem, it wasnt paying attention to its own female members. We all go to the same offices, we all go to the same parties, we all go to the same branch meetings and ultimately I just cant see how they dont see this culture because its so clear to us, she said. Whats it going to take? If theyre saying this about rape, I shudder to think what its actually going to take for them to do something. The Liberal Party updated its code of conduct for handling complaints just over a year ago, but it was slammed as ineffective and unenforceable by women in the party. Ms Potter said if she had read it at the time she was deciding what to do, it would have reinforced her decision not to make a complaint. Cabinet minister Ken Wyatt said the party had to do better.
Bupa Arabia for Cooperative Insurance Co launched its new health insurance product covering parents for the first time in Saudi Arabia. It gives its members the opportunity to cover their parents with a plan thats customised for their needs easily through Bupa Arabias website.

Ali Sheneamer (Chief Business Development Officer at Bupa Arabia for Cooperative Insurance Co) explained that ensuring the care and comfort of Bupa Arabia's customers is a priority for the company, confirming that this strategy will remains true with the new "Bupa Parents product.

Sheneamer stated: "This new health insurance plan is designed to meet the needs of the elderly by covering conditions that usually increase with age. The coverage includes diagnosis and treatment in the Kingdom's best hospitals and clinics, as well as coverage for conditions like cardiovascular diseases, Alzheimer's, and vision problems."

This new product will support members to try to repay their parents for all the care and love they have provided for them as children by taking care of them in their older age" he added.

One of the advantages of this new product is the provision of specialised medical care for fathers and mothers through the "Tebtom" and "Rahatkom" programs and other high-quality services. It will also enable parents to enjoy a high level of safety, to have easy access to a wide range of health care services in the kingdom without having to bear the long waitlist to get the proper treatment.

A study conducted by the Saudi Elderly Support Organisation (WAQAR) in 2019 predicted that the percentage of the elderly in the kingdom would increase by 11.1% in 2030 to reach 20.9% in 2050. The study revealed a number of challenges facing this group of citizens, the most important of which are: poor quality health care for the elderly, which Bupa Arabia is trying to address through the launch of its new product. -- Tradearabia News Service

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VISAKHAPATNAM: Municipal administration minister Botsa Satyanarayana on Sunday asserted that YSRCP-backed candidates have swept the second phase of gram panchayat elections also by winning most sarpanch and ward members posts in villages.

Addressing a press conference in Visakhapatnam on Sunday, he said ruling party nominees won 2,639 of 3,328 panchayats that went to polls on Saturday. TDP won 536 panchayats, Jana Sena 36, BJP 6, and 108 went to others. The minister said in the first phase, YSRCP supporters won 2,637 of 3,244 panchayats while TDP-backed candidates bagged 508 panchayats and 99 went to others.

Backing his claims, Satyanarayana said YSRCP has put up photos of first phase winners on its website. It will do the same with second and subsequent phases to disprove any false claims by opposition parties.

He maintained that results of the first two phases of gram panchayat polls have gone in favour of YSRCP as Chief Minister Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy fulfilled every promise he made to people and doubled their expectations by way of various welfare schemes.

TD chief N. Chandrababu Naidu is misleading public saying TDP has won 35 per cent of gram panchayats. The actual results show TDP will disappear from AP, he stated.

With regard to ongoing agitation against privatisation of Visakhapatnam Steel Plant, the minister said though it is true that VSP is incurring losses, privatisation is not the solution. YSRCP is opposing the move by the centre and is with agitating organisations on the issue, he added.
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Shiv Kumar is a Dalit labour rights activist who is named in the same FIR as incarcerated activist Nodeep Kaur, but according to eyewitnesses, Shiv was not at the site where the protest happened. The police denied allegations of mistreatment and torture.

Suprakash Majumdar, TwoCircles.net

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New Delhi: On January 30, sitting on a cot, Rajbir heard a knock on the door. He opened the door and saw a familiar face. The man at the door gave him a piece of a newspaper on which something was written by hand. The man told him, Shiva ko jail mei rakha hai (Shiva is in jail).

The man was referring to Rajbirs son Shiv Kumar, who president of Mazdoor Adhikar Sangathan (MKS), an organization working for the labour rights of workers.

Shiv Kumar is a Dalit labour rights activist in the Kundli Industrial Area (KIA). His colleagues and family claim that Shiv is missing since January 16 and accused the police of kidnapping him.

He is partially blind and he was kidnapped without any knowledge to his family, says Sangeeta, a member of MAS.

Shivs note says, Arrested on 16/1/21. Kept in SIA 7 near KFC building. CIA stands for Crime Investigation Agency, as per the lawyer.

We think he tried to say CIA 7, says Advocate Vikas Attri who is handling Shivs case. Vikas is a junior lawyer under Advocate Jitender, who is handling incarcerated activist Nodeep Kaurs case.

Vikas and MAS think Shiv was held in the CIA offices or quarters near the KFC building at the Singhu Border.

He was kept in illegal captivity for 8 days. He was beaten very badly and tortured. Are these people not human? He is a disabled Dalit activist. Everyone deserves basic human rights, Sangeeta told TwoCircles.net.

The police, however, denied the allegations made by the family and MAS. He was arrested on January 23, and was presented in court the next day where he was sent to remand, says SI Shamsher Singh of police station Kundli.

Accused can say anything but we arrested him on January 23 only, he added.

Shiv has 3 FIRs against him  FIR no 649 dated 28/12/2020 and 25 & 26 dated 12/01/2021. He has been charged under IPC sections 148 (Rioting, armed with a deadly weapon), 149 (a member of unlawful assembly), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 332 (voluntary hurt to public servant), 384 (extortion), 379-B (theft), 454 (trespassing), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 307 (attempt to murder).

Shiv is named in the same FIR as Nodeep Kaur, but according to eyewitnesses, Shiv was not at the site where the protest happened.

He was not there at the time of the incident for which he is charged in the FIR. We have video evidence that he was at the Singhu Border protest site, says Sangeeta.

The family and the members of MAS allege that Shiv was tortured. The person who handed the note from Shiv informed the family that, he was beaten continuously.

He was also denied warm clothes and spectacles inside the jail, the family said.

For Rajbir, the situation is very tense as he is not aware of what is happening in Shivs case.

We dont have enough money to fight his case in court. MAS is only handling his case, he says.

MAS claims that his glasses were found in his room, and without which he cant see anything. When TwoCircles.net asked the police if they are aware of his disability, SI Shansher said, Bohot dikhta hai use (He can see well enough). Later, the SI admitted that he (Shiv) cant see from one eye.

I am not aware of whether he has been given glasses in the jail or not, he added.

The family and the lawyers have not been able to meet Shiv till now.

We went to the meet him in Sonepat District jail along with his father, but the jail authorities said that he is under 15 days quarantine and therefore we cant meet him, says Vikas.

Vikas, in order for Rajbir to meet Shiv, took Rajbir to the court on the next hearing and made him sit outside the courtroom where Shivs hearing was going on. Vikas hoped that when the hearing ends, Rajbir would be able to see Shiv. However, the police took Shiv out from a different gate.

We think they are trying to hide something and thats why they are not letting us meet him, Vikas says.
CONWAY  Horry County Government has received an official inquiry  which it has since responded to  from the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control after a note promising the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to all employees was made public by Johnny Vaught, the District 8 representative on Horry County Council.

The scrutiny comes as thousands of Horry County seniors and others in the Phase 1A category, which is determined by DHEC, are awaiting their first vaccine dose.

At Conway Medical Center and Tidelands Health, the waiting list is at 20,000 each  with Tidelands not yet registering those 65 and older due to a backlog in the supply of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine.

The demand outweighing the supply has pushed DHEC to pay close attention to all distribution, so it is now investigating a Jan. 15 note from Horry Countys Human Resources Department to all 2,250 employees that said the county's Moderna vaccine allotment is available to full-time, part-time, and temporary employees as well as volunteers and interns who work within the capacity of County departments.

According to the note, only county identification was needed to receive the vaccine.

A weekly newsletter sent by the county on Feb. 12 indicated that 2,202 individuals affiliated with Horry County Government have volunteered and received the vaccine.

It is unclear if all personnel received their vaccine through the Emergency Operations Center in the M.L. Brown Public Safety building, with Horry County Fire Rescue administering the doses.

Fire Rescue is one of three county government entities throughout South Carolina that have received permission from DHEC to receive and administer the Moderna vaccine, joining Clarendon County Fire and Rescue and Cherokee County Fire and Rescue.

DHEC indicated that HCFR must abide by the same rules as any other vaccine provider, limiting the distribution to those in Phase 1A, which includes state/local government employees and their contractors who are mission-critical for maintaining operations of COVID-19 vaccinations and testing in SC.

Horry Countys aggressive approach for its employees piqued the interest of DHEC, which sent a note to Ben Lawson, HCFRs chief coordinator for vaccine distribution, on Sunday asking for an explanation for potentially intentionally vaccinating individuals outside of the Phase 1A priority groups identified by the Vaccine Advisory Committee and promulgated by the Agency.

The note goes on to ask for information on who has been vaccinated, how the effort was planned and executed, and whether any incidental administrations were necessary to prevent or reduce vaccine waste.

According to DHEC, as of Feb. 14, HCFR had distributed 1,818 first doses and 123 second doses.

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While awaiting answers from HCFR, DHEC told the Post and Courier Myrtle Beach that it is monitoring providers closely to assure the general public that the vaccines are going to the proper Phase 1A individuals  and a lack of adherence could have repercussions.

Our number one priority is to prevent additional deaths, DHEC said. Future vaccine allocations to individual providers may be reduced based on any lack of adherence to DHEC's phase guidelines.

Late Monday afternoon, Horry County released an email from Lawson to DHEC, explaining HCFR's marching orders from Horry County Government and process  a voluntary one that began on Jan. 13, according to the email.

Horry County Government employees are essential to maintaining function of government and mission-critical efforts of COVID-19 vaccination and testing. We also considered the depth of bench criteria in Phase 1A as part of the planning process," Lawson said in the email.

Lawson also indicated that HCFR had conferred with DHEC about the process of distributing the vaccine.

Before any vaccines were administered, we spoke with Alexandra Hayes and Donna McNeil of SCDHEC about how the county planned to use the allotment of vaccines with the understanding from them to do so as quickly as possible and with as little waste as possible," Lawson wrote. "In consideration of that guidance, employees who opted to receive the vaccine were granted a designee to also receive a vaccine with an emphasis on those who met Phase 1A criteria. We recognize and appreciate the criteria system and will continue to assist the state in this critical mission.

Vaught said his intent in providing the email to the media wasnt to out the county for its vaccine-distribution practices, but instead to comply with public domain laws.

Vaught said he believes the county should be following the rules.

I feel like that we should be following the guidelines, whatever those are, said Vaught, who indicated that he was not yet aware whether or not the county was indeed following DHECs guidelines.

The 71-year-old said he has chosen not to get the vaccine for two reasons  a personal belief that it does not prevent the spread of the virus, as well as not wanting to take away a dose from anyone else who might need it.

I didn't feel like, as an elected official, that I was entitled to get the vaccine ahead of anybody else, Vaught said. Police, fire and emergency personnel  those people should be the first that really should get it.
Scientists have discovered another seven homegrown coronavirus variants that emerged across the US, and are concerned over identical mutations seen in the 'spike' protein that could make them more infectious.

It's not yet clear whether these variants are in fact more contagious, or how common they are across the US as a whole, according to a pre-print posted to MedRxiv ahead of peer review on Sunday.

But because the variants all share a set of mutations to the critical spike protein, the odds are that these changes to their genetics give the virus some evolutionary advantage that could make it harder to stop.

Variants with a mutation known as Q677 have emerged in numerous states in the South and Southwest, with the highest concentrations in New Mexico and Louisiana

'We have lots of reasons that this region might be important but we don't yet have the evidence,' study co-author Dr Vaughn Cooper told DailyMail.com.

'As an evolutionary biologist, this sort of coincidence - parallel evolution of and independent origin of different lineages with the same mutation - is very strong evidence of it being adaptive and a virus adapting to humans usually does not bode well,' said Dr Cooper, director of the University of Pittsburgh's center for evolutionary biology and medicine.

That said, the scientists say it is not likely that the variants will be able to evade or weaken the potency of vaccines, because their shared mutation is in a location that has little to do with the ability of antibodies to bind to and neutralize the virus.

'Vaccines are going to work just fine against these viruses,' Dr Jeffrey Kamil, study co-author and Louisiana State University immunologist, told DailyMail.com.

Variants with a mutation known as Q677 have emerged in numerous states in the South and Southwest, with the highest concentrations in New Mexico and Louisiana

The mutation seen in the seven variants is known by its location, Q677, which describes a part of the virus's genome that encodes the structure of the 'spike' protein on its surface.

The Q677 mutation was first spotted through genome sequencing of viral samples on October 23 in the US.

For months, it remained out of sight and did not recur significantly in other samples.

But something strange happened in two states, around the same time and nearly 1,000 miles away.

Suddenly, between December 1, 2020 and January 19, 2021, there was a sharp rise in the number of virus samples with the mutation.

By mid-January, Q677 accounted for nearly 28 percent of virus samples sequenced in Louisiana and more than 11 percent of those sequenced in New Mexico.

As of February 3, the mutation had been spotted in 2,327 out of the 102,462 US samples submitted to the GISAID database.

In other words, in a matter of a few months, a one-off variant rose to account for about two percent of the cases that scientists have scanned in search for variants.

Although most of these were found in New Mexico and Louisiana, the mutation has emerged independently in at least seven locations in total.
EL PASO - Tens of thousands of asylum seekers who have been forced to wait in Mexico under a Trump-era immigration policy will soon be able to enter the United States to pursue their cases, the Biden administration announced.

Launched by the Trump administration, the Migrant Protection Protocols forced asylum seekers to wait in Mexico border towns for their hearings in American courtrooms. The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement last Friday that about 25,000 migrants in the program have active cases.

More than 70,000 migrants, including more than 20,000 in the El Paso-Ciudad Juarez area, have been placed into the program since it was announced in late 2018. Officials in Mexico have said that many migrants have since gone back home or decided to cross illegally instead of waiting.

The DHS advised asylum seekers in the program to remain where they are for now while a virtual registration process is rolled out next week. Once theyve registered, the migrants will be told where to go, the DHS statement says. Asylum seekers will be tested for COVID-19 before being allowed to cross the border.

This latest action is another step in our commitment to reform immigration policies that do not align with our nations values, said DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Especially at the border, however, where capacity constraints remain serious, changes will take time. Individuals who are not eligible under this initial phase should wait for further instructions and not travel to the border.

The announcement comes after Biden has already initiated a series of executive orders rolling back several Trump immigration policies, including construction of a border wall and limits on admitting refugees.

But Bidens moves have sounded alarm bells among Texas Republicans, who say Bidens policies so far will lure more migrants north and lay the groundwork for another border crisis. U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Austin, sent a letter to Biden last week co-signed by 50 colleagues warning his policies are sending the wrong message.

The Biden administration directives on stopping the building of border infrastructure, revoking policies aimed at carrying out interior enforcement, halting deportations for 100 days and suspending the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) enrollment have all communicated that our borders are open, he wrote.

The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
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That line right there demonstrates to me that either he didnt care, which is impeachable, because you cannot allow an attack on your soil, or he wanted it to happen and was OK with it, which makes me so angry, she said.
The start of community vaccination in Ireland marks represents a sense of hope that normal living can return, according to Laois-based GP Dr Sumi Dunne.

The Portarlington based doctor is known nationally as the medical adviser to Operation Transformation leaders on RTE. She also contributes to the work being done to battle Covid-19 by assisting the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET).

Dr Dunne attended the latest NPHET briefing on February 15. She also spoke of the hope vaccination brings in a statement issued by NPHET.

As of this morning, (February 15), the beginning of the over 85s cohort began to receive their vaccines at selected GP practices. The level of vaccine confidence and enthusiasm for vaccination in this group has been widely reported, along with a sense of relief as hope for a normal life returns, said the doctor who practices in the Laois Offaly town.

Dr Lorraine Doherty, National Clinical Director Health Protection HSE - Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC), said about 72,500 people aged 85 and over will receive their first vaccine over the coming weeks. She said a total of 116 GP practices will participate in the rollout with an estimated 374 GPs taking part this week.

She added that nearly 500,000 older people will be inoculated against the coronavirus in the weeks ahead.

2,491 GPs spread across 1,373 practices will administer vaccines to approximately 490,000 people over 70 years old, in the weeks ahead, she said.

Dr Ronan Glynn, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health, said vaccination of people aged over 85 in the community is a landmark day. He cautioned that suppression would continue to be a challenge.

"Today marks a significant milestone as we seek to protect the most vulnerable from this pandemic. It is an extraordinary testament to science that less than one year since our first case in Ireland, we are now in the process of rolling out three effective vaccines. The challenge now is to continue to suppress this disease so that as many people as possible can benefit from these vaccines over the coming months, he said.

Professor Philip Nolan, Chair of the NPHET Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group, said people will not be safe until everybody is protected.

The current patterns remind us of the care we need to take to stay safe. In our workplaces and our colleges especially, we need to take care to stay safe until we are all protected by a vaccine, he said.

As of Friday, February 12, 265,237 doses of COVID-19 vaccine had been administered in Ireland. These included 175,238 people have received their first dose, 89,999 people have received their second dose.
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THE Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ) has ridiculed the recently-launched Government Employees Mutual Savings (GEMS) fund which it says was another scheme meant to dupe the already suffering civil servants of their savings.

PTUZ president Takavafira Zhou told NewsDay that the GEMS was intended to divert the attention of teachers and other civil servants from demanding salaries above the poverty datum line currently pegged at over $20 000.

Secretary to the Public Service Commission, Jonathan Wutawunashe last week launched the scheme, saying that it will enable civil servants to get loans that will cover a broad spectrum of issues such as home improvement, solar electrification, borehole installation, property acquisition, and livestock rearing, among other issues.

The GEMS project will also include a teachers housing scheme, which was mooted in February last year.

Treasury then provided $75 million as seed capital for the GEMS scheme, of which $13.7 million has been allocated for the teachers housing scheme.

Zhou said if the $13,7 million is allocated to more than 136 000 teachers employed by the Primary and Secondary Education ministry, it will only amount to a paltry $125 per teacher, which is only enough to buy one loaf of bread.

He said, therefore, the project is only meant to spin money meant to benefit the government as it will rake in millions of dollars if the 136 000 teachers contribute 2,5% of their gross salaries towards its funding as envisaged.

The government has been silent on monthly contributions from willing teachers at 2,5% of gross salary for three months, after which a member wishing to access loans must submit an application through the Primary and Secondary Education ministry. Above all, submission of applications is no guarantee of getting a loan, Zhou said.

To make matters worse, the duration of repayment of the loan is not clear, except that the loan would attract interest of between 10 and 15% per annum depending on how much one would have borrowed.

It is sad that instead of paying teachers a living wage or restoring their purchasing power in parity to pre-October 2018 levels, the government is busy planning to further impoverish teachers through indebtedness, he said.

Zhou also said the Primary and Secondary Education minstry was littered with previous futile housing schemes that never materialised.

He said these included the late former Education minister Aneas Chigwederes Gwindingwi housing scheme of the 1990s in which teachers lost everything they had invested in and another scheme by former Information deputy minister Energy Mutodi and the $60 million loan facility with a local bank, the National Building Society of 2019, among many other schemes.

As of now it is very difficult to advice PTUZ members on what they should do, as the housing schemes are shrouded in secrecy and unilateralism.

But unless there is engagement and transparency, teachers may participate in this facility at their own peril. To be forewarned is to be forearmed.

As leaders we will continue to share with members any information we get on housing scheme projects, Zhou said.

Wutawunashe said contributions would be voluntary. He said participants would access the loans at concessionary rates that are far below the prevailing market rates.

A concessionary lending rate of 10% per annum has been set, with the expectation that lending thresholds will range between that rate and 15% per annum, depending on the actual amount applied for and the desired repayment period, Wutawunashe said. Newsday
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RIGA (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th February, 2021) Latvia's ban of the Russian RTR-Planeta (Rossiya-RTR) tv channel has come into force and it is no longer available on cable TV in the country, a Sputnik correspondent reports.

A message pops up on screen when RTR-Planeta is selected on the Riga Balticom cable TV provider.

"By the decision of the National Electronic Mass Media Council, the rebroadcast of 'Rossiya RTR' in Latvia was suspended for 1 year. From 16.02.2021 it will be replaced by the '1+2' TV channel," the message reads.

Earlier this month, Latvia's National Electronic Mass Media Council (NEPLP) prohibited 16 Russian channels from airing in the country for one year, starting from February 15. The banned broadcasters include REN TV Baltic, NTV Mir Baltic, and Karusel International.

On Friday, a sit-in picket, led by former member of European Parliament Miroslav Mitrofanov, was organized in front of the Latvian media watchdog's office in central Riga in protest against the ban.

NEPLP has imposed a one-year rebroadcast ban on RTR-Planeta and prohibited the largest Latvian cable provider, Tet, from rebroadcasting Russian television channels PBK, NTV Mir, Ren TV Baltiya, Kinokomedia and Kinomiks, starting from February 1.

Last week, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that the ban on the rebroadcasting of the Rossiya-RTR channel in Latvia is a political action that grossly violates Riga's international obligations.


Furquan R. Stafford - C.P. Plasma Center, Inc., Owner and Chief Executive Officer Foreign Companies have monopolized the U.S. plasma industry. Over 860 plasma donation centers in the U.S. supplies 90% of the world's plasma production. 80% of that 90% are from the descendants of those who were once human capital, and not one is "Black-owned."

On December 8, 2020, Furquan R. Stafford, the Owner, and CEO of C.P. Plasma Center, Inc. in College Park, Georgia, filed a 197-page monopoly complaint (Docket # 1:20-CV-4970-SCJ) about a Sherman Antitrust violation Act in the U.S. District Court, Northern District of Georgia. The complaint is against four of the worlds largest European based human blood plasma life-saving biotherapies companies and four of their U.S. subsidiaries, totaling eight separate entities. Its been a 27 year journey that started in 1994, but recently the odds may be in Staffords favor.

The international companies are the Grifols of Spain, Kedrion SpA of Italy, CSL of Australia, and Octapharma of Switzerland. Without a plasma contract from these companies, C.P. Plasma Center, Inc., the worlds first African American owned blood plasma company, remains stifled.

This historical case responds to Staffords entering into a Non-Disclosure agreement with Kedrion in 2008. Instead of awarding a contract to C.P. Plasma, Kedrion opened a plasma center in the same area researched and submitted by Staffords detailed in the NDA. Stafford then pursued contracts with other Plasma companies. He was denied by each and discovered that each parent and subsidiary companies were both one entity with different business structures.

Endorsed by former United States Representative John Lewis (1940-2020). Staffords audacious complaint also cites the late 19th century Sen. Charles Sumner (1811-1874), who draws parallels between monopolies and slavery. It was Africans who were monopolized for their human capital. Today the United States supplies over 90% of the worlds plasma from 860 U.S. donation centers. 80% of that 90% are from the descendants of those who were once human capital, and not one is black-owned. The industrys business model depends on there being plenty of socio-economic distressed people. These international companies rake in Billions annually is a gross disparity, says Stafford.

The only way Stafford sees to fix this is inclusion. Once called the Ghost of Dr. Charles R. Drew (1904-1950). Stafford points to the U.S. War Department Directive and American Red Cross 1941 policy of segregating blood plasma. The blood plasma industry for African Americans has gone from exclusion to segregation and is now a multi-billion dollar industry discovered by Dr. Charles R. Drew, an African American. This paradox also fuels his pursuit of equal economic growth. There is no alternative for plasma, but huge amounts are needed for production to treat rare medical conditions. I saw a grave injustice for black plasma donors in the black community, and you know what, let me be the voice for the black community. If were good enough to donate plasma, then we should be good enough to be at the global leader's table. http://www.thereslifeintheblood.com

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YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. Minister of Economy Vahan Kerobyan received Ambassador of Sweden to Armenia Patrik Svensson, the ministry told Armenpress.

The economy minister congratulated the Ambassador on starting missing in Armenia, attaching importance to the projects being implemented by Sweden in Armenia which, he said, contribute to the continuation of economic reforms in the Republic.

The officials discussed issues relating to the Armenian-Swedish cooperation agenda and emphasized the necessity of expanding the bilateral economic cooperation framework.

The Swedish Ambassador said they are ready to cooperate with the Armenian government in a number of directions, in particular touching upon the projects in the fields of agriculture, IT, trade, territorial administration.

The minister also attached importance to the entry of the Swedih IEKA and H&M companies to the Armenian market, as well as introduced the ongoing programs, in particular the venture fund government process, and invited the Swedish companies to participate in this process.

In his turn the Ambassador informed that the Swedish companies wish to participate in economy digitization, waste reprocessing, airport launch processes in Armenia.

At the end of the meeting the sides once again reaffirmed their readiness to develop the Armenian-Swedish commercial cooperation.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan
The Ukrainian side works, first of all, in the interests of the state and does everything possible to reach agreements with the International Monetary Fund, adviser to the head of the President's Office Tymofiy Mylovanov.

"At the same time, as in any negotiation process, there are fundamental issues related, among other things, to the state administration independence, which always make our negotiations delicate and complex. Everyone defends his position, does it firmly, respectively, negotiations take time. And this is normal. Both sides need to find compromises in common interests. This is the essence of negotiations," Mylovanov said in a commentary, transferred to the Interfax-Ukraine agency.

According to him, Ukraine and the IMF are constantly in process of negotiating their positions.

"There are no significant risks. The situation is absolutely under control. And financial - macroeconomic stability is maintained, there are no systemic risks, the situation with the budget is normal. As well as negotiations with the IMF. The Ukrainian side works, first of all, in the interests of the state and does everything possible to reach agreements with the IMF," Mylovanov said.

Later, the advisor to the head of the President's Office said on Facebook that talks about the need to "make a complete revision" of cooperation with the IMF are groundless. "There are quite solid and complex negotiations going on. It is difficult, but good. And this does not mean in any way that it is necessary to make a complete revision.' The IMF is our strategic partner."

"The mission has suspended work. Both sides can do more for success. There are difficulties, but they are tactical in nature. Probably, there will be some actions from the Ukrainian side in order to strengthen the success of the negotiations in the coming weeks. What exactly? I think it will be known in the coming days," he said.

As reported, the head of the IMF office in Ukraine, Josta Lyngman, announced on Saturday the completion of the mission on the first revision of the stand-by program, which had lasted since the end of last year, without recommending a second tranche. According to him, additional discussions and more progress from Ukraine are needed.

The adoption of this banking bill was previously indicated as one of the conditions for the provision of the second tranche. However, in addition to this, according to the Interfax-Ukraine agency, it is also necessary to adopt a law on the High Council of Justice, progress in the anti-corruption sphere, refusal to return to price regulation in the energy sector, as well as greater clarity regarding the 2022 state budget and the audit of the COVID audit.
The official says the facts established by law enforcers were enough to impose the sanctions.

Ukrainian Minister of Culture and Information Policy Oleksandr Tkachenko says the recently sanctioned Ukrainian TV channels owned by MP Taras Kozak, who is believed to be an ally of Vladimir Putin's crony Viktor Medvedchuk, were indirectly financed from Russia.

Speaking in an interview for the Ukrainian media outlet LB.ua, Tkachenko said he had seen the documents while working with the parliament's ad hoc commission on those TV channels.

"I was interested in the very fact of their acquisition since it is a long and controversial story. I have every reason to speak about indirect financing from Russia at least at the stage when the TV channels were acquired," he said.

Tkachenko added it had taken more than two months to discuss what to do with the "Kremlin's propaganda machine," and there had to be the political will to address it.

Read alsoPresident's Office hints at harsh decisions to be taken at NSDC meeting Feb 19The minister also stressed Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) had imposed the sanctions based on law enforcement officers' conclusions.

"They are not directly disclosed as they are part of the investigation. But the fact that NSDC members have access to this information, referring to what they say and what the president says, we may conclude there is enough such evidence," he said.

Sanctions against pro-Russian TV channels: What is known

On February 2, Zelensky enacted a National Security and Defense Council decision of February 2, 2021, to impose sanctions on Member of Parliament Taras Kozak and a number of TV channels Kozak owns, such as 112 Ukraine, NewsOne, and ZIK.

The broadcasting of these TV channels in the digital multiplex and cable networks was suspended in the early hours of February 3. At the same time, these TV channels continue YouTube broadcasts.

On February 4, two unnamed individuals filed lawsuits with the Supreme Court of Ukraine contesting the presidential decree enacting the sanctions against the TV channels.

On February 10, the Supreme Court ruled not to open proceedings on a claim seeking the cancellation of the sanctions against the pro-Russia TV channels.

Reporting by UNIAN
BELGRADE: Hundreds of people held a minutes silence in front of Serbias government building on Monday to pay their respects to doctors and nurses killed by COVID-19 and to demand more is done to protect health workers.

People placed white roses at the entrance to the building and lit candles.

Of the 4,245 people who have died in Serbia from COVID-19, around 2.5% or 105 were doctors, according to official figures.

The Union of Doctors and Pharmacists, which organised the protest, says the death toll among doctors is higher than in other countries in the region.

For a small country such as Serbia, this is a huge number of people we have lost because of bad organisation," said Ferenci Tot, a respiratory diseases specialist, who was among the protest organisers.

In neighbouring Croatia only one doctor has died from COVID-19, in Albania 24 doctors have died and in Bosnia 23 doctors, according to local media reports.

Doctor Dejan Zujovic, a pulmonologist who has worked in COVID-19 red zones in Belgrade, said long working hours and poor protection equipment were the main reasons for such a high death rate among doctors.

People do not go on holidays, they are exhausted and their immunity suffers," he said.

Government officials have said they will investigate the deaths of medical workers but little has been done so far.

The head of the governments Crisis Committee, Predrag Kon, drew public criticism when he said doctors and nurses became infected while having coffee rather than while working with patients.

To prevent further deaths, hours spent in COVID-19 red zones should be limited to six a day, with a one-month time limit on rotas, said Doctor Gorica Djokic, a secretary general of the Union of Doctors and Pharmacists.

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Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 17:52:31|Editor: huaxia

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PHNOM PENH, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The number of domestic and foreign tourists traveling in Cambodia during the Chinese Lunar New Year celebration dropped by 2 percent to 892,638, according to a Ministry of Tourism's report on Monday.

Some 880,553 locals and 12,085 foreigners travelled within the kingdom during the celebration from Feb. 12-14, the report said.

The country's popular tourist destinations are the famed Angkor Archeological Park in northwestern Siem Reap province and the coastline stretching over four southwestern provinces.

"Overall, security and public order were good, no any remarkable problem or disruption during the celebration," the report said.

Although it is not an official holiday in Cambodia, the Chinese New Year, or the Spring Festival, is broadly celebrated in the Southeast Asian country. Enditem
Over 20 foreign diplomats stationed in New Delhi are all set to visit Jammu and Kashmir on February 17, Wednesday, on a two-day visit, government sources in New Delhi have confirmed to CNN-News18. The delegation mainly comprises foreign diplomats from African, Middle-eastern, and European countries.

This will be the fourth such visit of top foreign diplomats to Jammu and Kashmir since the abrogation of Article 370 and 35 A from the erstwhile state on August 5, 2019. A delegation of European MPAs had visited Kashmir in October 2019 on a two-day visit which was followed by a visit by 16 foreign envoys, including the US Ambassador to New Delhi, on January 9 last year. A 25 member-delegation of foreign envoys had also visited Kashmir on February 12, 2020. This delegation included diplomats from Germany, Canada, France, and Afghanistan. Top Indian diplomat from the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), Vikas Swarup, had led the delegation, which met several civil society delegations and was briefed by bureaucrats and security establishment in Jammu and Kashmir.

The foreign diplomats who will be reaching Kashmir on February 17 evening will be welcomed in the snow-clad mountains of Gulmarg, which have witnessed record tourism in the recent weeks. The delegation is likely to also visit Baramulla in North Kashmir.

"The focus of the visit will be around grassroots democracy thriving in Jammu and Kashmir after the successful District Development Council (DDC) elections in a free and fair manner," government sources said.

The diplomats are likely to be given a detailed presentation on the political process beginning in Kashmir which paved the way for 4G Internet restoration across the Union Territory after 18 long months. The delegation will also meet and personally interact with victorious DDC representatives from across Jammu and Kashmir.

The foreign diplomats who will also be visiting Jammu are likely to call on the Jammu and Kashmir Lt. Governor Manoj Sinha and be given a briefing on developmental initiatives and the present security situation, especially in the Kashmir valley, by top bureaucrats, cops, and army officials.

Pakistan Propaganda: Lies, Deceit and Deception

Meanwhile, intelligence agencies have flagged a motivated misinformation campaign launched due to the visit of the foreign diplomats to Jammu and Kashmir. In the absence of any separatist or fundamentalist elements to instigate violence in Kashmir, Pakistani intelligence agencies have resorted to social media for a propaganda campaign against the visit.

"Several tweets with posters spreading misinformation about the visit and ground situation in Kashmir have been tracked down to servers in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia," intelligence sources said.

CNN-News18 has accessed the posters and directions from the Pakistan deep state, which calls for a shutdown in Kashmir on February 17, and gives a guide on how to plan the motivated campaign against India.

"We have also pinpointed two individuals living abroad and who are absconding from India after committing several terror crimes. They are pushing this fake narrative against India at the behest of Pakistan ISI. One of the reasons why the internet was shut down in Jammu and Kashmir was to avoid any violence or loss of life due to such motivated and propaganda posts by Pakistan deep state," sources added.

Indias security apparatus over the last many months has observed sudden desperation from Pakistan to instigate violence in Kashmir in the run-up to the summer of 2021.

"Lack of violence or any internal rebellion in Kashmir in the recent months is being seen as a loss of face by Pakistan Army and ISI. They are desperate to act but facing a lack of support on the ground in Kashmir," sources said.

For now, India welcoming diplomats after successful DDC elections and restoration of 4G internet in Jammu and Kashmir is being seen as a positive development, which has even been welcomed by the administration of US President Joe Biden.

"We are keenly observing developments in Jammu and Kashmir with concern. The restoration of democracy and the internet are important steps on the ground suggesting a peaceful environment. We look forward to our visit and understand the challenges on the ground," said a foreign diplomat on the condition of anonymity.

Aditya Raj Kaul is Contributing Editor, News18 group with more than a decade long experience in covering Conflict, Foreign Policy, and Internal Security. He can be reached at Aditya.Kaul@nw18.com
CHICAGO  Former state Sen. Paul Schimpf, R-Waterloo, on Monday announced he is running for governor of Illinois.

The retired Marine was the lead American attorney advisor to the Iraqi prosecutors in the trial of Saddam Hussein. He announced his candidacy in a Zoom press conference before beginning a two-day press tour throughout Illinois.
New Delhi:

Income Tax (IT) department in massive searches, seizures and surveys founds Rs 71,941 crore of "undisclosed income", the Centre informed the Supreme Court. During the period of demonetisation from November 9 last year to January 10 this year, "The total undisclosed income admitted was more than Rs 5,400 crore" and the total quantity of gold seized stood at 303.367 kgs, the Finance Ministry has said in an affidavit to the apex court.

It gave the details of the unaccounted income for three years from April 1, 2014 to February 28 this year, including the demonetisation period. The affidavit said that during the three year period,searches were undertaken by the IT department in over 2,027groups "which led to the admission of undisclosed income ofmore than Rs 36,051 crore". "This is in addition to the seizure of undisclosed assetsworth Rs 2,890 crore," it said.

Similarly between April 1, 2014 to February 28 this year, the IT department conducted more than 15,000 surveys which led to "the detection of undisclosed income of more than Rs 33,000crore". Highlighting the achievements of the demonetisation period, the affidavit said in about two months from November 9 last year, "significantly large number of enforcement actionswere undertaken by the IT Department". "They included 1,100 searches and surveys and more than5,100 verifications.

The total seizure through these actions was of about Rs 610 crore, including cash of Rs 513 crore. The cash seizure included seizures in new currency of more than Rs 110 crore. The total undisclosed income admitted was more than Rs 5,400 crore," it said. The Finance Ministry, which recently refused the demand to give more grace period for depositing the scrapped Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes, said the Ministry of Home Affairs in its July 11 communication has reported that as per intelligence agencies, there were reports of large scale misuse of thewindow for exchange of the demonetised currency notes.

"Seizure of cash during the month of November andDecember 2016 was to the tune of Rs 147.9 crore and Rs 306.897 crore and seizure of gold for the month of November and December 2016 was 69.1 kg and 234.267 kg respectively," it said. It said that over 400 cases were referred to the CBI andthe Enforcement Directorate (ED) after several instances ofmanipulation for conversion of unaccounted cash held in specified bank notes into legal tender by various entities was detected during the investigation.

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The Winter Storm Warning is now in effect until 6 AM Tuesday as this powerful winter storm begins to move into North Alabama.

We expect Round 1 to begin between 4 PM and 7 PM tonight in northwest Alabama. The brunt of the impacts from Round 1 will remains west of I-65. However, some freezing rain can't be ruled out in the Metro, especially in the higher elevations of Madison County, where temperatures have been below freezing all day. Future radar at 7 PM, 10 PM and 1 AM tonight is below.

Round 1 Impacts remain unchanged. We have lowered ice accretion amounts slightly in the Shoals. This will still be enough to cause slick spots to develop. Many areas east of I-65 will still see plain rain only with Round 1.

Round 2 is arriving a little bit FASTER in data sources for Monday. Freezing rain may arrive in the Shoals and along I-65 as early as 7 AM Monday. The freezing line will push closer to Huntsville through the morning. Rain will transition to freezing rain here in the Metro around lunchtime. This is also when some freezing rain in the Shoals will begin to transition to sleet and maybe a few snowflakes too. Sand Mountain will transition to a rain/freezing rain mix during the early afternoon hours. Future radar at 9 AM, 1 PM, and 4 PM Monday below.

Some freezing rain may briefly transition to sleet along the I-65 corridor tomorrow evening before all precipitation winds down by Midnight. Round 2 impacts are below.

When all is said and done, some parts of North Alabama (mainly Huntsville points west) could see anywhere between 0.25" and 0.4" of ice accretion in addition to 1" to 2" of sleet and snow. This will cause significant travel problems and power outages now through Tuesday morning. Here's one last graphic explaining the impacts certain amounts of ice have on roads and power outages.

Stay with WAAY 31 for continuous updates throughout the night and into Monday.
Queen Victorias mourning jewels, which reveal the intimate side of the monarch, are going under the hammer.

A button, a brooch and pendants, some containing locks of hair, brought solace to the Queen following the death of her mother and three of her nine children.

They are being sold for the first time, having been passed down the late monarchs descendants, through Princess Alice, for generations.

Queen Victoria was famously associated with mourning, wearing black every day for 40 years after husband Albert died, until her own death.

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But these are almost another level, David Macdonald, Sothebys specialist and head of sale for the auction, told the PA news agency of the mourning jewels.

They are very biographical.

He added: You think of Victoria and you think of the great jewels of state, the diamonds, the Koh-i-Noor, all these stones.

These jewels are much more intimate, their value isnt through large diamonds

Their value lies in the full expression, an emotional, deeply personal expression about loss and love.

They will go under the hammer in an auction of the collection of the great-great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria, Patricia Knatchbull, 2nd Countess Mountbatten of Burma.

The objects were kept in a drawer in a family home.

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Mr Macdonald said: Their existence wasnt known We came across these whilst working on the auction. So theyre undocumented and a really interesting discovery.

He added: Id love them to go to a British institution, a British museum would be wonderful.(or) to end up with someone who is fascinated by British history, Queen Victoria, and particularly that sort of personal side.

One of the objects, an agate and diamond pendant, was commissioned by Prince Albert for his wife to mark the death of her mother.

He died the same year he gave her the pendant, which contained a lock of her mothers hair, a miniature photograph and a touching inscription from Albert.

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So that would have had multiple layers of significance to Victoria, Mr Macdonald said.

Pendants and a button commemorate the death of her third daughter, Alice, from diphtheria at the age of 35.

Mr Macdonald added of the objects, which have individual estimates ranging from 1,000 to 3,000: You dont look at them and think, Ahhh.

Its only when you handle them, you realise they really are treasure with descriptions and the locks of hair And moreover to have them directly from the hand of Victoria, all the way down.

To me, they speak not so much of Victoria, Queen and Empress, but Victoria, mother and wife.

Sothebys London will hold an auction of the collection of Patricia Knatchbull, 2nd Countess Mountbatten of Burma, on March 24 and the lots will be exhibited in New Bond Street from March 20 to 23.
Cyclone Yaas: Rahul Gandhi urges Congress workers to provide all help in ensuring people's safety

Rahul Gandhi demands withdrawal of new regulations in Lakshadweep; Writes to PM Modi

Rahul Gandhi stoking fear on vaccine, all will be vaccinate by December: Union Minister

Rahul Gandhi to launch Cong campaign in poll-bound Puducherry on Feb 17

India

oi-Madhuri Adnal

Puducherry, Feb 15: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will visit poll-bound Union Territory of Puducherry on February 17.

Chief Minister V Narayanasamy said Gandhi would address fishermen in neighbouring Solai Nagar in Muthialpet assembly constituency and then proceed for an interaction with students of the Bharathidasan Government College for women.

Narayanasamy said the students had through an e-mail requested that Rahul Gandhi address them when he visits Puducherry and this has been conceded by the leader. After the interaction, the AICC leader would address a public meeting organised by the ruling Congress, he added.

Govt insulted farmers, ministers called them them traitors: Priyanka Gandhi

The Union Territory, along with neighbouring Tamil Nadu, will go to the Assembly polls in the next few months.

Narayanasamy said Congress would fight the polls in alliance with the parties constituting the secular democratic alliance including the DMK.

AICC Secretary Sanjay Dutt, who is in charge of party affairs in Tamil Nadu, PCC president A V Subramanian and lone member from Puducherry in the Lok Sabha V Vaithilingam were present during the press meet.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 17:34 [IST]
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Since the early days of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States, no two states have been more different in their approaches than California and Florida.

In early March, California Gov Gavin Newsom limited gatherings, closed bars and indoor dining at restaurants, implemented mask mandates and implored residents to stay at home.

Comparatively, Florida Gov Ron DeSantis has enacted few measures, lifting an ordinance that prevented people from operating businesses and restaurants as well as lifting COVID-19 related fines and penalties in September.

Looser restrictions mean schools have not been shut down statewide and mask mandates have never been imposed.

In November, he even criticized states like California with harsher restrictions and said he trusted his residents to 'use common sense.'

In an interview on Fox News Business on Sunday, DeSantis argued that Florida 'focused on lifting people up' during the pandemic but 'lockdown states' are 'putting people out of business.'

'There's a whole bunch of things we've been doing for COVID, but at the same time, we've lifted our state up, we've saved our economy and I think we're going to be first out of gate once we are able to put COVID behind the country,' he told Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo.

Despite these different approaches, both states ended up with roughly the same outcome. A DailyMail.com analysis shows that, over the last two months, the states have each seen cases, deaths and hospitalizations fall by about one-third.

So were lockdowns necessary and did they work? The answer is a complicated one, but researchers say that they were beneficial in the early months due to our lack of knowledge about how COVID-19 spread and how to treat it.

Studies have shown that stay-at-home orders and restrictions saved numerous lives, but that they might be less useful now as more of the population gains natural immunity through infection or immunity via vaccination - but that social distancing and masks are still necessary to continue driving down case and death rates.

Over the course of the pandemic, California (left) has had a rate of about 8,499 COVID-19 cases per 100,000 residents while Florida has had about 8,306 (right) per 100,000. Currently, both are seing a rapid declines with fewer than 10,000 cases being reported every day. The dashed line represents the national seven-day average and the solid line represents California's and Florida's seven-day averages

Both California (left) and Florida (right) have been recording anywhere between 10 and 20 deaths per million people over the last two months. Historically, Florida has recorded about 130 cases per 100.000 people and in comparison with 117 deaths per 100,000 in California. The dashed line represents the national seven-day average and the solid line represents California's and Florida's seven-day averages

The hospitalizations cures of California (left) and Florida (right) bear a striking resemblance to each other with peaks seen around early-to-mid January and declines ever since. The dashed line represents the national seven-day average and the solid line represents California's and Florida's seven-day averages

When looking at raw numbers, California appears to be doing worse than Florida.

The Golden State has 3,399,878 total cases and 46,843 total deaths - both figures are the highest in the nation.

By comparison, Florida is reporting 1,827,373 total infections and 28,779 fatalities.

However, population size must be taken into consideration. California has about 40 million residents and Florida has about 22 million.

When adjusted for this metric, the states have very similar case rates.

FLORIDA GOV SAID STATE 'FOCUSED ON LIFTING PEOPLE UP DURING PANDEMIC' In an interview of Fox News Business on Sunday, Frorida Gov Ron DeSantis argued that Florida 'focused on lifting people up' during the pandemic but 'lockdown states' are 'putting people out of business.' 'There's a whole bunch of things we've been doing for COVID, but at the same time, we've lifted our state up, we've saved our economy and I think we're going to be first out of gate once we are able to put COVID behind the country,' DeSantis told Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo. He said the because he 'kept the state open', new businesses - such as restaurants and hotels were able to open. 'So people view Florida as the place where they can follow their dreams, DeSantis said. 'It is a free state.' Advertisement

According to The COVID Tracking Project, California and Florida are both reporting an average of between 200 cases and 400 cases per million people, and each have been seen declines over the last several days.

Both states followed a similar curve with a spike in cases around January 1 - as the winter surge led to rapidly rising rates of cases and deaths - with infections starting to tail off a few weeks later.

Dr Stuart Ray, a professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins, told DailyMail.com in a previous interview that Americans are currently seeing the effect of their good behavior, which is why curves and rates in states look so similar.

'What we're seeing in this epidemic is that it goes in cycles,' he said.

'When people are not careful, the virus infects lots of people, but we've seen multiple peaks dampen when people got serious.'

Deaths tells a similar story. Historically, Florida has recorded about 130 cases per 100,000 people and in comparison with 117 deaths per 100,000 in California.

Over the last 90 days, both states have been recording anywhere between 10 and 20 deaths per million people, COVID Tracking Project data shows.

Once more, their curves appear similar with fatalities spiking around mid-January, which were a few weeks behind the rise in cases due to deaths being a lagging indicator.

Ray said early on in the pandemic, there were relatively asynchronous peaks on the East Coast and West Coast.

It wasn't a matter of whether states were or weren't going to peak, just a matter of when, he explained.

'We didn't have a coherent message at the federal level so it was a whack-a-mole approach to control,' Ray said.

'What we're seeing with this is when people are receiving different stimuli messaging rates of infection population stories that gain foot holds...then people get more careful.

'It's the motivator that convinces you to not go to that gathering or to wear your mask. News was a contributor to a message that people thought: "You know what? [Coronavirus] is a big deal."'

California Gov Gavin Newsom has issued very strict orders during the coronavirus pandemic (orange lines) such as bars and indoor dining shuttered and gradually loosening as cases decline (blue lines). Once rates increase, he issues lockdowns again

California has restricted the way most businesses operate during the crisis. Pictured: Manhattan Beach Pier is seen in the distance at Hermosa Beach, California, January 29

Florida Gov Ron DeSantis has issued very few closures (orange lines) and has been very critical of states like California with harsh restrictions, with both states following similar curves, In fact, even with rising rates, he has chosen to reopen (blue lines) much of his state

In an interview of Fox News Business on Sunday, DeSantis argued that Florida 'focused on lifting people up' during the pandemic but 'lockdown states' are 'putting people out of business.' Pictured: Fans of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers celebrate the team's Super Bowl win in early February

How do the states compare when it comes to COVID-19 hospitalizations?

The COVID Tracking Project, which has been recording hospitalizations in every state, does not have a figure for all hospitalizations ever reported in California while, in Florida, this data was not made publicly available until July.

At its peak on January 7, California reported a single-day total of 22,851 people hospitalized due to the virus while Florida reported 7,762 people on January 14.

When adjusted for 100,000, the states have a similar hospitalization rate.

About a month ago, California had a rate of about 56 hospitalizations per 100,000 while Florida had about 35 per 100,000. Now California's rate is 24 hospitalizations per 100,000 while Florida's is about 22 per 100,000, a DailyMail.com analysis found.

However, The Tampa Bay Times notes that Florida's rate has been historically higher until recently.

For example, in late July, Florida was reporting about 44 hospitalizations per 100,000 while California had about 22 per 100,000 before peaking again in late December and early January.

Worth noting when it comes to hospitalizations is age.

More than one-fifth, or 21 percent, of Florida's population is at least 65 years old with at least 4.6 million out of the state's 22 million identifying as senior citizens.

Comparatively, just 15 percent of California's population is elderly with six million out of 40 million aged 65 and up.

This means more residents in Florida are susceptible to a virus that preys on the elderly.

Over the last few months, the two states have quite similar trajectories despite their different approaches with spikes in April for California and May for Florida, with another spike during the summer and in early January before declining.

She became a household name after her breakout role in the '95 flick Desperado.

But Salma Hayek admitted filming certain scenes were more than nerve-wracking as she chatted with Dax Shephard and Monica Padman on the Armchair Expert podcast.

The 54-year-old actress recalled being so terrified to recite an intimate sex scene with her co-star Antonio Banderas that she began crying on set.

Tough: Salma Hayek admitted filming certain scenes were more than nerve-wracking as she chatted with Dax Shephard and Monica Padman on the Armchair Expert podcast; seen in 2018

Salma recalled not being told there was a particular scene to shoot between their characters.

She portrayed Carolina in the Robert Rodriguez-directed film which followed Antonio's El Mariachi character on a vengeful quest.

'So, when we were going to start shooting, I started to sob ... I don't know that I can do it. I'm afraid,' Salma recalled.

She continued, 'One of the things I was afraid of was Antonio  he was an absolute gentleman and so nice, and we're still super close friends  but he was very free. It scared me that for him, it was like nothing.

A love story: She portrayed Carolina in the Robert Rodriguez-directed film which followed Antonio's El Mariachi character on a vengeful quest.

'So, when we were going to start shooting, I started to sob ... I don't know that I can do it. I'm afraid,' Salma recalled.

'I started crying, and he was like, "Oh my God. You're making me feel terrible." And I was so embarrassed that I was crying.'

Hayek added that Rodriguez and Banderas 'were amazing' and that the director 'never put pressure on me' despite the traumatic experience.

'I was not letting go of the towel,' she said. 'They would try to make me laugh. I would take it off for two seconds and start crying again. But we got through it. We did the best with what we could do at the time.'

'I was not letting go of the towel,' she said. 'They would try to make me laugh. I would take it off for two seconds and start crying again. But we got through it. We did the best with what we could do at the time.'

'When you're not you, then you can do it. But I keep thinking of my father and my brother,' she added. 'And are they going to see it? And are they going to get teased? Guys don't have that. Your father will be, 'Yeah! That's my son!'

All seemed to be resolved decades later as she presented Banderas with the International Star Award at the Palm Springs International Film Festival last year.

The Mexico-born star appeared in the film alongside Cheech Marin, Steve Buscemi, Danny Trejo and Quentin Tarantino.

Hayek has appeared in multiple films with Banderas, including the 2003 Rodriguez film Once Upon A Time In Mexico, 1995's Four Rooms, 2011's Puss In Boots and 2002's Frida.

They will again share the screen in The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard, the sequel to 2017's The Hitman's Bodyguard, which is due in theaters in August 2021.
A woman has revealed how she lost 800 in four months selling products from a health and wellness brand on social media.

Charlotte Dickerson, from South East London, signed up as a consultant for Arbonne UK, a multi-level marketing scheme (MLM), last year after being recruited by an acquaintance on social media.

She was encouraged to buy various products sold by the company to test out and offer as samples, but also to recruit more sellers to the scheme- despite finding it difficult to flog any of the products herself.

MLM firms encourage reps not just to sell the companys product, but to recruit more people under them. For every rung of the ladder people climb, they get paid a higher percentage of sales profits.

Charlotte, who is in her early 20s, warned on This Morning today that only a 'tiny percentage' of sellers make 'liveable income' from the company, and claimed that some are left out of pocket after the scheme.

Charlotte Dickerson, from South East London, signed up as a consultant for Arbonne UK, a multi-level marketing scheme (MLM), last year

Charlotte, who is in her early 20s, warned on This Morning today that only a 'tiny percentage' of sellers make 'liveable income' from the company

'Arbonne is a health and wellness brand and they operate with a multi-level marketing business model', said Charlotte.

'So the idea is you sell this product to your friends and family and you want to introduce more people to sell the products as well, because that sort of boosts you.

'I got a message from an acquaintance on social media telling me about this business she had started, and she thought I would be great at it and wanted to know if I would be interested in knowing a bit more about it.'

Charlotte works in the performing arts industry, and was attracted to the flexibility of the business, as well as the fact the products were vegan and cruelty-free.

She told hosts Ruth Langsford (pictured) was encouraged to buy various products sold by the company to test out and offer as samples, but also to recruit more sellers to the scheme

Charlotte works in the performing arts industry, and was attracted to the flexibility of the business, as well as the fact the products were vegan and cruelty-free

'Any side jobs I have need to be quite flexible because you can be called for auditions and need to take time off work, so this sounded brilliant.

'The products were vegan and cruelty-free and I'm vegan and wanted to encourage other people to use vegan products.

'It sounded really positive, I didn't really do much research outside of what this acquaintance of mine was telling me.'

However Charlotte quickly came to realise that selling the products over social media was difficult, and that the 'focus' of the business model was recruiting other people to become sellers.

'I started selling the products', she said. 'It was quite difficult to sell the products and very quickly it became apparent to me it wasn't about selling the products.

Charlotte now speaks about her experience on her YouTube channel and encourages others not to join MLM schemes

'The focus was on growing your team and encouraging other people to do it, which is also very difficult because the market is very saturated at this point.'

The actress had to pay a joining fee of 30, but says she soon found herself spending more and more on Arbonne products.

She said: 'With Arbonne UK it's 30 and you hear reps say "It's only 30" and of course nobody ever just signs up, if it's your business you need to try the products you're selling.

'You're encouraged to try them, I spent a couple of hundred on products and you're encouraged to keep buying the products, partly to try and also to lend out to people as samples.

'I was buying anti-ageing skincare, I'm in my early 20s I don't need it but I had to buy it in order to lend it to people.'

She added: 'If you look at the income disclosure statement, I think the second level they don't earn a liveable income. Tiny percentages of people get to the top levels.'

Alice Beer told on the show that only 12 per cent of consultants in the UK in 2018 earned any money at all, before costs of buying products and other fees.

Charlotte said on the show: 'If you look at the income disclosure statement, I think the second level they don't earn a liveable income. Tiny percentages of people get to the top levels.'

The Direct Selling Association (DSA) estimates roughly 400,000 people in the UK are currently involved in direct selling in some way  around 76 per cent women.

In a statement provided to This Morning, Arbonne said: 'Arbonne do pay commission to Arbonne independent consultants who are not employees, they are independent contractors.

'Arbonne doesn't pay commission for recruiting other distributors, only for products sold. Arbonne is a member of the Direct Selling Association (DSA), it upholds the highest standards of integrity. There is a code of conduct with Direct Selling Association.

'Each independent Arbonne consultant must sign a comprehensive business agreement with the company and adhere to a strict internal code of ethics. Arbonne say any unethical or improper behaviour or negative experiences should be reported to them immediately. '
Prime Minister Florin Citu said on Monday that the vaccination against the novel coronavirus will not be mandatory, according to AGERPRES.

"This is a law that has been with Parliament for three years; it has nothing to do with the ongoing vaccination campaign. It is a bill in the Romanian Parliament. That document is a copy and paste of the policies of the last three years, so it has nothing to do with what is happening. (...) There were no such talks. I have seen senior official Raed Araft saying clearly what I am saying now: the COVID-19 vaccination campaign will not be mandatory; that is out of question," Citu said at the Parliament House before a meeting of the National Liberal Party (PNL) Executive Bureau.

The prime minister was asked about the possibility of the population being mandated to get vaccinated.
AKRON, Ohio, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- FirstEnergy Corp. (NYSE: FE) utility personnel are prepared to respond to service interruptions caused by Winter Storm Uri, a powerful winter storm that is expected to bring heavy snow and damaging ice across the company's six-state service area Monday and Tuesday.

Company meteorologists are tracking the winter storm, which has already impacted significant portions of the country and moved into the region Monday afternoon. The storm is expected to bring up to 12" of snowfall in Ohio and Pennsylvania with a mix of rain, sleet and ice accumulation in areas of FirstEnergy's Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland and New Jersey service territories. Meteorologists are also monitoring a similar weather event that may bring additional mixed precipitation to FirstEnergy's service area later this week.

All of FirstEnergy's electric utilities are implementing storm response plans, which include staffing additional dispatchers, damage assessors and analysts at regional dispatch offices, and arranging to bring in additional line, substation and forestry personnel, as needed, based on the severity of the weather. The company has also notified contractors who work throughout FirstEnergy's footprint building power lines and installing new equipment to enhance service reliability for customers to be on deck to assist with restoration efforts.

Due to the widespread impact of Winter Storm Uri, mutual assistance groups are deploying crews to restore service to customers across the country. FirstEnergy has secured approximately 100 additional line workers to assist with storm restoration efforts in New Jersey, and the company will continue coordinating with contractors and electric industry mutual assistance organizations based on their availability due to the magnitude of the storm.

"We are monitoring the weather conditions closely and will deploy resources to the areas that could get hit the hardest," said Sam Belcher, senior vice president of FirstEnergy and president of FirstEnergy Utilities. "The goal of our planning efforts is to restore electric service as quickly as safety allows and to minimize inconvenience our customers experience due to the storm."

Company representatives also have been in contact with emergency management officials, state officials, regulators and local officials about the storm preparation efforts.

During severe weather, customers who are without power are encouraged to call 1-888-LIGHTSS (1-888-544-4877) to report their outage or click the "Report Outage" link on www.firstenergycorp.com. Customers are also encouraged to stay far away from a downed or low-hanging power line. Always assume downed lines are energized and dangerous and report them ASAP by calling 911.

For updated information on the company's current outages, FirstEnergy's storm restoration process and tips for staying safe, visit the 24/7 Power Center at www.firstenergycorp.com/outages.

FirstEnergy encourages customers to plan ahead for the possibility of electric service interruptions from winter weather by following these tips:

Keep electronic devices such as cell phones, laptops and tablet computers fully charged to be ready for any emergencies.

Keep a flashlight, portable radio and extra batteries handy in the event a power interruption occurs. Tune to a local station for current storm information.

Gather extra blankets or a sleeping bag for each person. Do not use gas stoves, kerosene heaters or other open-flame heat sources to prevent deadly carbon monoxide gas from building up in your home.

If you have a water well and pump, keep an emergency supply of bottled water and/or fill your bathtub with fresh water.

Stock an emergency supply of convenience foods that do not require cooking.

Mobile phones can be charged in your vehicle using a car charger when the power is out. If you have a smart phone, this will ensure you have access to online information sources.

Customer Generators

Emergency power generators offer an option for customers needing or wanting uninterrupted service. However, to ensure the safety of the home's occupants as well as that of utility company employees who may be working on power lines in the area, the proper generator should be selected and installed by a qualified electrician. When operating a generator, the power coming into the home should always be disconnected. Otherwise, power from the generator could be sent back onto the utility lines, creating a hazardous situation for utility workers.

FirstEnergy customers also can subscribe to email and text message alert notifications for updates on scheduled or extended power outages. Customers can also use two-way text messaging to report outages, request updates on restoration efforts, and make other inquiries about their electric accounts. More information about these communications tools is available online at www.firstenergycorp.com/connect.

FirstEnergy is dedicated to integrity, 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. Visit FirstEnergy online at www.firstenergycorp.com and follow FirstEnergy and its operating companies on Twitter @FirstEnergyCorp, @ToledoEdison, @IlluminatingCo, @OhioEdison, @MonPowerWV, @JCP_L, @Penn_Power, @Penelec, @Met_Ed, @PotomacEdison, @W_Penn_Power.

SOURCE FirstEnergy Corp.

Related Links

http://www.firstenergycorp.com


KYODO NEWS - Feb 15, 2021 - 18:34 | All, Japan, 3/11 Fukushima

Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako have suspended a plan to meet with survivors of the 2011 quake-tsunami disaster online following Saturday's powerful earthquake, the Imperial Household Agency said Monday.

Ahead of the 10th anniversary of the March 11 disaster, which triggered a nuclear crisis, the imperial couple had planned to meet with residents of Fukushima Prefecture online on Tuesday as the coronavirus pandemic has made it difficult for them to visit northeastern Japan.

Meetings via video conference with residents of Iwate and Miyagi prefectures had also been scheduled by the end of March.

The imperial couple suspended the event in consideration of damage inflicted by the recent quake, wishing authorities to concentrate on recovery activities, according to the agency, which has not determined a new schedule for the event yet.

The magnitude 7.3 temblor that struck at 11:07 p.m. Saturday, registering upper 6 on Japan's seismic intensity scale of 7 in parts of Fukushima and Miyagi, injured more than 150 people and cut power and water in some areas of the country.

East Japan Railway Co. has suspended a section of the Tohoku shinkansen bullet train line since Sunday due to damage sustained by the railway systems, predicting it will take about 10 days to resume full operations.

The emperor and empress, who had visited the region as crown prince and crown princess since the March 11 disaster, were expected to pray for victims and offer words of encouragement to the survivors.

In January, the couple held a videoconference meeting with survivors of a heavy rain and flood disaster that devastated Kumamoto Prefecture last July to offer encouragement.

Related coverage:

Imperial couple planning to meet with 2011 disaster survivors online

Emperor's birthday event canceled for 2nd year due to virus surge

Male-only rule should be prioritized in imperial succession: Suga
This month we learned that Tesla, a $400 billion public company run by one of the richest people in the world, has done away with its media relations departmenteffectively formalizing an informal policy of ignoring reporters. Though we should all be grateful for the chance to hear less about Tesla, we should also recognize this for what it is: one more glaring data point showing that powerful people no longer think they need the mainstream press, especially critical and ethical outlets like the Washington Post.

This presents a problem. Because the mainstream press still needs powerful peoplequite literally, in the case of the Post, as its owned by the worlds richest man, Jeff Bezos, who is no fonder of difficult stories about his companies than any other billionaire.

We are living through a historic, technology-fueled shift in the balance of power between the media and its subjects. The subjects are winning. The internet in generaland social media platforms in particularhave destroyed one of the medias most important sources of power: being the only place that could offer access to an audience. When Elon Musk can say whatever he wants to forty million Twitter followers at any time with no filter, it is little surprise that he does not feel compelled to listen to unpleasant questions from some reporter who wants to know why he busts unions and wildly accuses people of pedophilia.

As journalists, we all view this as a horrifying assault on the publics right to know, and on our own status as brave defenders of the public good. And that is all true, for what its worth. But this is about power. We need to take some back, lest the rich and powerful run away from one of the last forces restraining them.

Because journalism, particularly at the highest level, is about raw power. It is about bringing important people to heel, on behalf of the public. Politicians and officials and business leaders dont want to talk to the press, subjecting themselves to the possibility of being made to look bad; they do it because they have always felt they had no choice. They felt that way because papers like the Post could offer the carrot of great exposure to those who needed it, but also, always, the stick of negative coverage to those who spurned them. There is nothing devious or ignoble about this; a powerful press, for all its flaws, is good for democracy, and tends to promote equality by holding the big shots in check. Anyone who has ever negotiated to land a contentious interview with a famous person knows that you only get those interviews when your subject fears what will happen if they dont do the interview. Today, that fear is disappearing. We all need to figure out what to do about that.

Trumps incredible accumulation of power in the face of countless well-documented scandal stories is a proof of concept that will surely be used by smarter characters in the future.

The Washington Post and its competitorsthe elite level of national news, the places that have traditionally set the agendaare the most vulnerable to this shift. They are the relatively small portion of the media that is able to command both access and editorial independence. Politicians feel that they must deal with the Post, but the Post still feels like it can say what it wants, critical or otherwise. That state of affairs, which has been taken for granted for decades, is evaporating.

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Donald Trump, unfortunately, looms large in this. His imperviousness to the usual blows from the press was evident five years ago. (One of my colleagues at Gawker got so exasperated with Ted Cruzs accusation that the media was sitting on secret Trump scandals during the Republican primary that, in 2016, he wrote a story listing the many scandalous Trump stories we had already publishedto no effectwith the headline Ted Cruz, Please Help Us, We Have No Idea How to Stop Donald Trump.) It turns out that being utterly shameless and uttering the words fake news nonstop, while having an entire right-wing media ecosystem amplify your message, really works. Trump himself, a pure creature of the New York tabloids, is too vain and dumb to realize that he could probably ignore the normal elite press altogether. But his incredible accumulation of power in the face of countless well-documented scandal stories in the Post and the New York Times and elsewherestories that would have brought down earlier presidentsis a proof of concept that will surely be used by smarter characters in the future.

The question for the Post is: What are you gonna do about it? When the fear that was instilled in generations of politicians by Watergate wears off, and the federal government becomes ever more populated by officials who have discovered that no matter how meticulous David Fahrentholds reporting is, it wont move the needle that much on entrenched public opinion? When the full flowering of the social media age turns even the most prestigious paper into just another midsize Facebook page struggling to catch up to the reach of Dan Bongino?

I must admit I do not know the answer. All I know is that there is only one way the press maintains its power in society: by metaphorically putting the heads of powerful people on pikes. If the Post and all the other respectable media outlets lose their ability to do that, powerful people will, by extension, stop caring what the well-informed segment of the public thinks. Democracy dies in dumbness.

PREVIOUSLY: When outrageous politicians are outrageous

Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today

Hamilton Nolan is CJR's public editor for the Washington Post.
Ninth Avenue School celebration is today

Hendersonville Middle School is inviting Ninth Avenue School alumni and their families to a drop-in Ninth Avenue School Day Community Celebration from 3 to 4 p.m. today at the middle school.





Celebrating the Ninth Avenue School heritage in Henderson County, the socially distanced outdoor event will feature a walking tour of historical Ninth Avenue School markers by alumnus Ronnie Pepper plus a chance for alumni to share their voices with the current school community.



For several years, HMS has invited local Tiger alumni to speak to students. In 2019, HMS teachers crafted a more purposeful look into their schools history, celebrating on Feb. 15.



The celebration takes place just a few days before the official Ninth Avenue School Day on Feb. 18, as proclaimed in 2006 by then-Mayor Greg Newman, and coincides with Black History Month lessons on tolerance, North Carolina history, civil rights, segregation and more.



Instead of bringing Tiger alumni into the school to speak to students this year, HMS staff will host Pepper and alumni on a guided tour of historical markers located on the campuses of Hendersonville Middle School and nearby Oakland Cemetery.



The community event is designed to provide Tiger alumni an interactive opportunity to reminisce, meet current HMS staff, and share their Ninth Avenue School experiences and memories while following proper safety precautions in a socially distanced environment.



A separate, virtual event is planned for HMS students to learn about Ninth Avenue School history and hear the voices of alumni sharing their past. Students will interview alumni and examine primary resources from Ninth Avenue School, including digitally catalogued yearbooks.



In celebration of our schools heritage and for a localized study during Black History Month, we want to remind community members with ties to the Ninth Avenue School that they can digitally access The Tiger  the Ninth Avenue School Annuals from 1950 to 1965, said Principal Joni Allison. The link to The Tiger digital yearbook issues can be found on the Hendersonville Middle School website. For questions Principal Joni Allison at kjallison@hcpsnc.org.
ZERO Covid could be achieved in Ireland in three months if we continue the lockdown, a UCC expert has said.

Professor Ivan Perry, Dean of Public Health at University College Cork, who is a member of the Zero Covid Island group has said that Taoiseach Micheal Martins comments to The Echo regarding a zero Covid strategy being a permanent lockdown were a misinterpretation of the approach to curbing the virus.

Mr Martin stands by the Governments decision to continue living with Covid and said he believes a zero Covid approach would mean that, as soon as Ireland comes out of it youre back open to the potential of the disease coming back in again because of our geography.

He added: Were going for prolonged suppression of the virus now. We have vaccines now which will help to give us choices in time.

However, Prof Perry said: The whole point is to set a clear policy of aggressive suppression of the virus with a target of zero. The reality is living with the virus is going to leave us in lockdown or near lockdown or yo-yoing for a much longer time than a zero Covid strategy.

The UCC professor said the country is currently at 1,000 cases a day and another 6-8 weeks would get that down to single figures.

The question is what do we do then  relax measures or hold out for a few weeks of no cases? asked Prof Perry.

He said it is very important that the Covid debate does not become a combat of slogans but highlighted that the Covid strategy is short-term pain for long-term gain.

The idea of zero Covid is not to stay in lockdown forever, the whole point is to get Covid to zero and keep it there. It is a difference in mindset and if we have learned anything over these past months, it is that living with Covid doesnt work.

I know people are saying we have the vaccine now, but we could have one or two more nasty waves before we feel the full impact of the vaccine. Also, there is an increasing risk of other strains emerging.

We are all delighted about the vaccine, but we cant put all our eggs in the vaccine basket. We still have to do what we can.

Prof. Ivan Perry, Professor of Public Health at UCC.

In terms of what should be done, Prof Perry had some suggestions.

He called on the Government to invest in public health infrastructure and the public health medical department as well as introducing mandatory quarantine for those travelling into the country.

There is not much point in the Government and the zero Covid campaign having a shouting match.

We want to get the Covid numbers down and we want the public infrastructure to be improved so we can keep it down and mandatory quarantining to keep it out of the country.

He said the issue of having a land border is just an excuse.

The border with Northern Ireland is a problem, but it can be overcome. Every country has its own unique problems. We are acting as if we are the only country with a border.

He said, from what he could see, the message of zero Covid is being well received.

I think the message is getting through; most people say a mandatory quarantine should be necessary for all countries and most people accept the need to invest in the public health medicine department. That is our first line of defence.

The UCC professor said that while it is a struggle for people to continue to live in isolation and in bubbles, part of the mental health issue is a lack of intent on the part of the Government.

The Government have no strategy, they are just reacting, he said.

There is a danger that if we ease off too quickly, we will be back in another peak of infection in the summer or autumn.

If we attempt to live with the virus, we will spend much longer in lockdown.
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Edison, NJ -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/15/2021 -- HTF MI Analyst have added a new research study on Title Global Nuclear Medicine Market Report 2020 with detailed information of Product Types [, Tc-99, I-123/131, In-111, Xe-133, Th-201], Applications [Diagnostic, Therapeutic] & Key Players Such as GE Healthcare, Bracco Imaging, Mallinckrodt, Lantheus Medical Imaging, Bayer, Triad Isotopes, Nordion, Jubilant Pharma, Eli Lilly, SIEMENS, China Isotope & Radiation & Dongcheng etc. The Study provides in-depth comprehensive analysis for regional segments that covers North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Africa and Rest of World with Global Outlook and includes Clear Market definitions, classifications, manufacturing processes, cost structures, development policies and plans. The facts and data are well presented in the report using diagrams, graphs, pie charts, and other pictorial representations with respect to its Current Trends, Dynamics, and Business Scope & Key Statistics.



If you are a Nuclear Medicine manufacturer and deals in exports imports then this article will help you understand the Sales Volume with Impacting Trends. Click To get SAMPLE PDF (Including Full TOC, Table & Figures)@ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/sample-report/1418670-global-nuclear-medicine-market-7



Covid-19 Impact Update  Global Nuclear Medicine Market Research

Analysts at HTF MI constantly monitor the industry impacts of current events in real-time  here is an update of how this industry is likely to be impacted as a result of the global COVID-19 pandemic:



Demand from top notch companies and government agencies is expected to rise as they seek more information on COVID-19. Check Demand Determinants section for more information.



Key Highlights from Nuclear Medicine Market Study.



Revenue and Sales Estimation  Historical Revenue and sales volume is presented and further data is triangulated with top-down and bottom-up approaches to forecast complete market size and to estimate forecast numbers for key regions covered in the report along with classified and well recognized Types and end-use industry. Additionally macroeconomic factor and regulatory policies are ascertained in Nuclear Medicine industry evolution and predictive analysis.



Manufacturing Analysis the report is currently analyzed concerning various product type and application. The Nuclear Medicine market provides a chapter highlighting manufacturing process analysis validated via primary information collected through Industry experts and Key officials of profiled companies.



FIVE FORCES ANALYSIS: In order to better understand Market condition five forces analysis is conducted that includes Bargaining power of buyers, Bargaining power of suppliers, Threat of new entrants, Threat of substitutes, Threat of rivalry.



Competition  Leading players have been studied depending on their company profile, product portfolio, capacity, product/service price, sales, and cost/profit.



Demand & Supply and Effectiveness  Nuclear Medicine report additionally provides distribution, Production, Consumption & EXIM** (Export & Import). ** If applicable



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Geographically, the following regions together with the listed national/local markets are fully investigated:

- APAC (Japan, China, South Korea, Australia, India, and Rest of APAC; Rest of APAC is further segmented into Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, New Zealand, Vietnam, and Sri Lanka)

- Europe (Germany, UK, France, Spain, Italy, Russia, Rest of Europe; Rest of Europe is further segmented into Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Norway, Sweden, The Netherlands, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania)

- North America (U.S., Canada, and Mexico)

- South America (Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Rest of South America)

- MEA (Saudi Arabia, UAE, South Africa)



The Latest Trends, Product Portfolio, Demographics, Geographical segmentation, and Regulatory Framework of the Nuclear Medicine Market have also been included in the study.



Market Growth by Applications: Diagnostic, Therapeutic



Heat map Analysis, 3-Year Financial and Detailed Company Profiles of Key & Emerging Players: GE Healthcare, Bracco Imaging, Mallinckrodt, Lantheus Medical Imaging, Bayer, Triad Isotopes, Nordion, Jubilant Pharma, Eli Lilly, SIEMENS, China Isotope & Radiation & Dongcheng



Market Growth by Types: , Tc-99, I-123/131, In-111, Xe-133, Th-201



Book Latest Edition of Study Global Nuclear Medicine Market With COVID-19 Impact Analysis @ https://www.htfmarketreport.com/buy-now?format=1&report=1418670



Introduction about Global Nuclear Medicine



Global Nuclear Medicine Market Size (Sales) Market Share by Type (Product Category) [, Tc-99, I-123/131, In-111, Xe-133, Th-201] in 2018

Nuclear Medicine Market by Application/End Users [Diagnostic, Therapeutic]

Global Nuclear Medicine Sales (Volume) and Market Share Comparison by Applications

Global Global Nuclear Medicine Sales and Growth Rate (2014-2025)

Nuclear Medicine Competition by Players/Suppliers, Region, Type and Application

Nuclear Medicine (Volume, Value and Sales Price) table defined for each geographic region defined.

Global Nuclear Medicine Players/Suppliers Profiles and Sales Data

Key Raw Materials Analysis & Price Trends

Supply Chain, Sourcing Strategy and Downstream Buyers, Industrial Chain Analysis

........and view more in complete table of Contents



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Thanks for reading this article; HTF also offers Custom Research services providing focused, comprehensive and tailored research according to clientele objectives. Thanks for reading this article; you can also get individual chapter wise section or region wise report like North America, Europe or Asia
Agartala: Opposition Left and Congress parties on Monday criticised the Bharatiya Janata Partys leadership after Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Debs reported comments to extend the base of the saffron party in Nepal and Sri Lanka.

The opposition parties said that the ruling BJPs plan and target to expand its base in Nepal and Sri Lanka are against Indias foreign policies and these cannot be done as the two countries are sovereign nations.

Chief Minister Biplab while addressing a party meeting here on Saturday reportedly quoted Union Home Minister Amit Shah, and said: When Home Minister was the BJPs National President he during a meeting with us in Agartala had said that we have extended our base across India. Now we have to go to Sri Lanka and Nepal. He said that the BJP would form government in West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the party would remain in power in Tripura for 30 years as the CPI-M would be finished in the next assembly elections in 2023.

The BJP is the largest party in India now. It has maximum numbers of MPs, MLAs and other elected members, Deb said. The BJP, however, also supported the Chief Ministers views. Party spokesman Nabendu Bhattacharjee said that not only Sri Lanka and Nepal, the BJPs philosophy is being extended in many Asian and African countries.

Our targets and plans are not to form governments in those states. Our Pracharaks (functionaries) are broadening BJPs philosophy and belief in those states. If the people of those countries accept our principles and viewpoints then the future course of action would be shaped, Bhattacharjee told the media on Monday.

Sharply criticising the Chief Ministers announcement, Communist Party of India-Marxist central committee member Jitendra Chowdhury said that Debs speech is a combination of arrogance and ignorance.

Priyanka Gandhi joins farmers mahapanchayat, Tikait says 'Cant stop political leaders'

CM Mamta claims 'Bengal is ahead in health sector in entire country'

SC allows journalist Siddique Kappan to meet his Ailing Mother
Cebu City (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The Court of Appeals has issued a freeze order on a multi-million peso property owned by members of the Parojinog clan in Cebu City.

The order covers a house allegedly worth 5 million owned by Artemio and Daisy Parojinog-Salas, who both have pending arrest warrants. Daisy Parojinog-Salas is the sister of Reynaldo Parojinog, who was killed in a police raid in July 2017 in Ozamis City.

The Parojinog clan is accused of being involved in the illegal drug trade.

Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency Director General Wilkins Villanueva, along with officials from the Anti-Money Laundering Council, personally went to the high-end subdivision in Nichol's Park, Guadalupe to implement the order.

Villanueva said the freeze order on the Cebu City property will be just one of the many freeze orders on properties of the Parojinogs. The PDEA chief believes "they have properties in Ozamis, Maasin and Cebu."

"This just shows that this drug group has been operating in Cebu, Leyte and Ozamis," said Villanueva, adding the couple allegedly laundered the proceeds of the drug group.

According to Artemio Baculi of the AMLC's Anti-Drug Trafficking Division, the Salas couple has seven bank accounts, 12 vehicles, and firearms that have already been frozen by the court.

Baculi said the bank accounts involved millions of pesos.

"Our bank inquiry is ongoing, but this involves millions that did not commensurate with their source of income," he said.

Baculi said the couple's declared income was around 20,000 per month. "But they managed to transact millions and they were able to acquire these properties," he added.
In a house on Dame Street, 18 people are living under one roof in 21st-century Dublin. Some of them are frontline workers and since the coronavirus pandemic started it was inevitable that if one person in the house got infected, everyone else would.

Eight people in the house share one bathroom and there are up to four people in some of the bedrooms.

Pratheeksha Naveena (27) lived there for six months last year. She came across an advert for the property on Facebook and because the rent was only 350 each month, it made sense for a young student living in one of the most expensive cities in Europe.

People in the house were working in restaurants and hospitals and we didnt like talking about the virus at the start as we knew we were high risk and everyone could end up getting it, it was kind of scary, she told the Irish Independent.

In 2018, researchers from Trinity College Dublin mapped out the residential addresses of those who fell victim to the Spanish Flu in the capital during the 1918 influenza pandemic.

Many lived in Dublins tenements, which were a breeding ground for infection as dozens of families were crammed into one building, often eating, sleeping and washing in the same room.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed how limited affordable housing options in Dublin city is still compromising peoples health more than 100 years later, with students and low-income workers forced to resort to crowded rentals.

Ms Naveena knew she had to leave the house on Dame Street but finding alternative accommodation during a global crisis wasnt easy.

She now lives in a two-bed apartment with three other tenants, with two in each room.

Her housemate recently contracted Covid-19 and for two weeks, life was like hell.

We were all locked inside, we couldnt go outside for a jog, we had to wear masks around the house and it was really difficult to get groceries as ordering online is much more expensive and as our rent is 500 each it is hard.

There is only one bathroom too. Two of us are relatively new to the city and dont have a lot of friends so we couldnt ask anyone to drop things over.

Read More

Ms Naveena, originally from India, is studying data analytics at Dublin Institute of Technology. She worries it may be another year before she sees her family.

With restrictions I cant go, tickets are also very expensive and with the quarantine period needed, I cant afford it, so I dont know when I will get home again.

Kennethy Souza, also 27, moved to Ireland from Brazil five years ago and was sharing a house with up to eight people at the start of the pandemic.

He moved to another house last August that he shared with six people, but moved out after Christmas because there was a problem with mould in his bedroom.

My past experience of sharing houses was good for helping me learn English but you have no privacy, you cant get a shower whenever you want, you cant cook whenever you want, and sometimes you have to stay in your room if someone wants alone time with their partner, Mr Souza said.

The interior design student said the pandemic had been one of the worst experiences of my life.

In his old house, a tenant contracted Covid and had to be confined to the living room.

For two weeks Mr Souza and his housemates couldnt use the living room and because there was only one shower in the house, life was difficult.

We were making food for him and leaving it on the table or outside. It was awful.

We had two bathrooms but just one of them had a shower, the other one was only for washing your face, hands and brushing your teeth. We had to make a schedule for the shower and disinfect it a lot.

In December, Mr Souza also tested positive for Covid. I picked up a headache and thought it was normal flu, but then I realised that I couldnt smell and taste. I contacted my GP and he booked a test and I had to quarantine for two weeks. It was not nice.

He recently moved to another house on North Circular Road, which he shares with three other people. He has his own bedroom and therefore is paying a higher rent of 500 each month, before bills.

It is a bigger space so it is much better and I am much happier, he said.

Housing charity Threshold said house sharing arrangements have proven problematic during the pandemic. Many renters have sought advice about their rights in the last year, with some concerned about housemates flouting regulations.

They were recently contacted by a nurse living with a number of other tenants.

One of her housemates travelled abroad on at least two occasions during the latest lockdown.

On the first occasion our client had to wait two weeks before she could return to work on the wards, a Threshold spokesperson said.

On the second occasion her housemate indicated that he intended to return and quarantine in the house they all shared. Initially our clients landlord did not want to get involved in what he perceived to be an inter-tenant dispute.

However, acting on Thresholds advice, the landlord agreed to intervene and the housemate made alternative arrangements to self-isolate on his return from overseas.

In another case, a tenant moved in with a friend under the impression that the number of people in the house would be limited to three people.

When the woman, who is a frontline worker, moved in, the landlord hired a property manager who informed the tenants of their intention to convert two rooms into bedrooms to try to accommodate more people.

One of the rooms due to be converted is a utility room.

Worried about the lack of space and the prospect of additional people moving in during the Level 5 restrictions she contacted Threshold for advice and support. We have advised that the conversion of additional rooms under current restrictions does not constitute essential work.
After former President Donald Trump was acquitted on a charge of inciting insurrection at the Capitol Hills, President Joe Biden's urged Americans to end the uncivil war against his predecessor and rival at the latest Presidential election. Biden also mentioned that the efforts of Trump in overturning the election results of the November 2020 presidential election and the Capitol Siege in early January had not only sparked the uncivil war but also had been a sad chapter for the United States as it reminded them that democracy is fragile.

Trump was acquitted to the charges after the majority of Senators at 57-43, including seven Republican Senators, fell short of 10 additional votes to reach their target two-thirds majority for the conviction.

Biden's Message

In the initial remarks of his message posted in the White House's website, Biden stated that the substance of the charge is not in dispute, wherein he cited comments by Republican Senator Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader. McConnel voted for the acquittal of Trump but also accused the former president of a 'disgraceful dereliction of duty' and 'morally and practically responsible for provoking' the mob.

In addition, in a statement released on Saturday night, Biden has mentioned that the chapter in their history has reminded them that democracy is fragile and should always be defended. Biden also emphasized that the people of America must remain vigilant as extremism and violence has no place in their country.

The U.S. President also reminded Americans that they have a duty and responsibility as people of America, and especially as leaders in defending the truth while defeating the lies. He also urged Americans that it is their task to move forward and they need to do it together, as the United States of America.

READ ALSO: Trump's Acquittal Creates Aftershocks to the Republicans, Democrats in American Politics

Meanwhile, Newsweek reported that Biden's message started when he mentioned Brian Sicknick, the police officer who died during the Capitol siege, and was praised later on after standing his guard bravely during the riot. He also mentioned that some individuals are still living with terror they lived through that day.

The Capitol Siege took place in the middle of the relentless pursuit of Trump in proving the widespread election fraud, which he believed the reason behind his defeat to Biden, as pointed out by prosecutors during the Senate trial. Moreover, Biden has praised the courage exhibited by Republicans and Democrats, election workers, and judges who defied the efforts of Trump in overturning the result of the election, stating that they had protected the integrity of American democracy, Hindustan Times reported.

Included in the seven Republican senators who voted for the conviction of Trump, were Pat Toomey, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Mitt Romney, Ben Sasse, Bill Cassidy, and Richard Burr. On the other hand, after his father's acquittal vote, Donald Trump Jr., posted on Twitter that RINOs should be impeach from the Republican Party as they have used the acronym to insult those who were not in favor for the Trump acquittal, as it means 'Republicans In Name Only.'

RELATED ARTICLE: End of Trump's Impeachment Trial Frees Congress to Talk about $1,400 Stimulus Bill

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Burma Myanmar Court Extends Suu Kyis Detention, Delays Hearing for Two Days

Myanmar State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi / The Irrawaddy

YANGONA district court in Naypyitaw has postponed a hearing in Myanmar State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyis case until Wednesday, despite her initial two-week remand expiring on Monday.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyis lawyer U Khin Maung Zaw told the media on Monday morning that he had been informed by the district attorney that the hearing was delayed until Wednesday, when her remand will end.

On Feb. 3, both President U Win Myint and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi were remanded in custody from Feb. 1-15 for further investigation by the Dekkhina District Court in Naypyitaw.

It was not clear why the remand was extended for another two days, or whether the move also applied to the President.

The duo has been under detention since the coup on Feb. 1. The military regime sued the President and the State Counselor under the Natural Disaster Management Law and the Export and Import Law respectively, two days after their arrest.

The lawyer said he was told by the district attorney that the case will be heard at the Zabhuthiri Township Court via a videoconference.

He said during the hearing that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi will be asked whether she wants a lawyer to represent her at the court, the lawyer said.

U Khin Maung Zaw said he hasnt met his client so far.

Its important to meet her because I need to receive her instructions as her lawyer, he added.

The lawyer said he planned to approach district police to arrange a meeting.

Since the cases were filed with the court, the international community has condemned them.

The United States said it was disturbed by the charges.

We call on the military to immediately release them all, US State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters, referring to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the other civilian leaders.

UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Britain condemns the detention of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and other elected officials and demanded their immediate release.

In Myanmar, anti-coup protesters have thronged the streets across the country for more than a week to denounce the military regime and call for their leaders freedom.

You may also like these stories:

At UNHRC, Russia and China Still Dismiss Myanmars Military Coup as an Internal Affair

Veteran Student Leaders, Rocker, Social Influencers on Myanmar Militarys Arrest Warrant
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AUSTIN, Texas  U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement was prepared to release three men convicted of sex offenses against children, Texas officials said, in an apparent misapplication by authorities of enforcement directives from President Joe Bidens administration.

The three were not released after discussions in recent weeks between the state prison system and immigration authorities. But the process of keeping them in custody raised alarms that ICE was declining to detain convicts contrary to immigration law, officials said.

ICE has dropped detainer requests against 26 people in Texas in recent weeks, said Jason Clark, chief of staff at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. Immigration authorities issue detainers to local or state law enforcement agencies holding a person who is potentially in the U.S. illegally. When a person in the U.S. illegally completes their sentence for a crime, ICE can seek to take them into immigration custody.

In previous years, including under the administrations of Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump, ICE would not drop that many detainers from the Texas prison system in a year, Clark said.

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Most of the 26 were convicted of drug charges or drunken-driving offenses, according to state records obtained by The Associated Press. But two were convicted of sexually assaulting a teenager and a third was convicted of indecency with a child.

Our concern is that you have individuals that have offenses in which we believe they would pose a public safety threat, Clark said. And so dropping the detainer, in turn, is threatening public safety and we expressed that to immigration officials.

On Bidens first day in office, the Department of Homeland Security issued a memorandum directing immigration agencies to focus their enforcement efforts on three categories: threats to national security, threats to public safety, and immigrants who entered the U.S. illegally on or after Nov. 1. The memorandum was a departure from practice during Trumps administration in which immigration agencies were given wide latitude on who to arrest, detain, and deport.

But people convicted of sex offenses against minors still qualify for enforcement. The memorandum defines public safety threats as incarcerated people who have been convicted of an aggravated felony' as defined by a specific section of immigration law. That section begins: The term aggravated felony means  murder, rape, or sexual abuse of a minor.

Steve Yale-Loehr, an immigration law professor at Cornell University, said a conviction for sexual abuse of a minor would normally qualify as an aggravated felony, and that such individuals remain immigration enforcement priorities.

Word of the impending release of one of the men led Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to tweet on Feb. 5 that Bidens immigration policy is threatening safety in Texas. The Republican governors widely shared post alleged that a prisoner convicted of child sex assault should have been transferred to ICE custody, but Biden is releasing him into our community.

The man to whom Abbott was referring, Jose Lara-Lopez, was transferred directly from the state prison system to ICE on Tuesday. He pleaded guilty two years ago in Houston to sexually assaulting a teenager.

An Abbott spokesperson said in a statement: Last Friday, the Governor was alerted to ICEs intention not to uphold an ICE detainer under federal law. We are happy that ICE decided to change course and put our communities safety and our nations laws first.

Juan Marroquin Vega, convicted of indecency with a child, was also transferred to immigration custody, Texas officials said. Luis Manuel Almanza, who was convicted of sexually assaulting a teenager, had his parole approval rescinded after ICE dropped the detainer against him, and is now set to remain in prison for at least another year, according to the state.

ICE declined to comment Friday on whether it had initially dropped detainers on the men convicted of sex crimes. In a statement, the agency said it makes arrest and custody determinations on a case-by-case basis, based on the totality of the circumstances and does so in compliance with federal law and agency policy.

Civil-rights groups have criticized the use of detainers as violating due process rights and noted that ICE has at times wrongly placed detainers on U.S. citizens. Texas Republican-led Legislature passed a law in 2017 requiring local and state law enforcement to comply with detainer requests.

ICEs implementation of Bidens new guidance is affecting criminal cases elsewhere. On Friday, a Colorado judge decided against dropping charges against a mentally ill Danish man accused of starting a large wildfire in 2018, reversing course after a prosecutor said the man would not be deported if released from jail.

Application of the memorandum appears to be uneven across the country, with immigration lawyers in other states reporting that ICE has declined to release immigrants the lawyers believe should be newly allowed to go free.

Former Trump administration officials and some within ICE have objected to Bidens immigration approach. An officer in ICEs Houston field office, which was involved in Lara-Lopezs case, wrote last month in an email first given to Fox News that agents were to stop all deportations and release them all, immediately. That guidance was later retracted by a superior.

Texas successfully won a restraining order barring the Biden administration from enforcing a 100-day moratorium on deportations that was also a part of the same Jan. 20 memo. U.S. District Judge Drew Tiptons order did not bar the implementation of the enforcement priorities.
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A Horton man was arrested Sunday after authorities say he assaulted a woman and took a six-month-old child.

According to the Marshall County Sheriffs Office, deputies responded to a domestic assault call off Fairview Road in the Nixon Chapel area around midnight Sunday.

They found there a woman left on the side of the road with multiple head injuries. According to authorities, a man, who was intoxicated, drove off in her vehicle with their six-month-old child inside.

The vehicle broke down at Nixon Chapel and Fairview Road, and the man left on foot with the child. Deputies began a search and called in other deputies and a dog team.

After several hours in cold temperatures, authorities said, the man tried to go to his brothers residence on Nixon Chapel Road, where deputies took him into custody. The child was found safe with him, and was returned to the mother.

Sergio Lopez, 25, has been charged with second degree domestic violence, endangering the welfare of a child, and unlawful imprisonment. He is being held without bond in the Marshall County Jail.
Economic downturn due to the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted corporate social responsibility (CSR), evidenced by businesses charity spend for FY20 dipping by 50 percent of FY19 numbers, data showed.

CSR for FY20 was a little over Rs 7,800 crore against Rs 18,655 crore in FY19, Mint reported. This spend usually addresses societal concerns such as education, health, hunger, malnutrition and poverty.

As many as 248 entities, including large corporations in the auto, food and tech space spent well below the amount, data from the Corporate Affairs Ministry showed; while 98 percent of companies in the pharma, insurance and cement space contributed nothing towards CSR.

Further, the overall share of public sector companies contribution towards CSR dropped to 6 percent in FY20, compared to 20 percent in FY19.

Among segments for which funding was severely affected include health, where livelihood, especially for the differently abled, slumped by 50 percent to Rs 3,582 crore.

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

The report noted that data may be incomplete as the required timeline to file data for CSR is October  this was extended by the Centre till January, due to the pandemic.

The ministry had in fact in January 2021 encouraged corporates to boost CSR spend despite the pandemic by amending CSR rules and allowing credit for extra spending this year to be set off against spending obligation in future years.

Corporate have however been conservative in spending since CSR funds are sourced from overall liquidity which has been impacted due to the pandemic, Pavan Kumar Vijay, founder of consulting firm Corporate Professionals Group told the paper. He however noted that the new amendments require designated provision for CSR funds separate from overall liquidity.

Taking the carrot and stick approach, the ministry has also imposed fines of at least Rs 1 crore on companies that default on their CSR, while defaulting officers could be fined at least Rs 2 lakh each. Names of top spenders and defaulters will also be made public.
Three months after the Trump administration rejected her, former Nigerian finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala received unanimous backing on Monday to become the first woman and first African director-general of the World Trade Organization. A self-declared "doer" with a track record of taking on seemingly intractable problems, Okonjo-Iweala will have her work cut out for her at the trade body, even with Donald Trump, who had threatened to pull the United States out of the organisation, no longer in the White House. As director-general, a position that wields limited ...
Students say they look into price more than crime in apartment searching
STAMFORD  A few years after the end of World War II, a young Polish immigrant who had survived the Holocaust opened a watch-repair store underneath a diner on Main Street.

The business that Harry Weinroth founded in 1949 not only lasted, but also grew and thrived.

But after more than 70 years in operation and with more than 100,000 customers served, Bedford Jewelers at 838 High Ridge Road is winding down. Its last day will be Saturday. The current owners  Harry Weinroths two oldest children, Larry Weinroth and Ruth Weinroth Adatto  are proud of the business that their family has built, but they are ready to retire.

Were closing because were done, Larry Weinroth said in a recent interview at the store. Its just time.

Stamford stalwart

Bedford Jewelers has operated since 1998 in a 1,500-square-foot storefront in the Ridge Plaza shopping center.

It had previously done business for more than 40 years at two downtown locations on Bedford Street  from where it takes its name  after moving from its original location and another spot on Main Street.

Weinroth, 66, and Weinroth Adatto, 64, who are both Stamford natives and residents, have each worked in the business for more than 40 years.

Its something weve always all done, Weinroth Adatto said.

Its a classic family business, Weinroth said. Everything revolves around the business.

While the owners have never lost their passion for the enterprise, they said they have been considering retirement in the past few years.

It wasnt really a COVID-related thing, but COVID was kind of the last straw, Weinroth said. With cleaning constantly, making sure customers come in with masks and stay behind the yellow tape, its just become more of a bother and less fun.

Another jeweler, Nagi Jewelers, operates yards away at 828 High Ridge. But the proximity did not contribute to Bedfords closing.

They do a lot of designer jewelry, which we stay away from. Theres certainly never been a conflict, Weinroth said. Weve co-existed. Everyone has their own niche. Its never been an issue whatsoever.

Tyler Sizemore / Hearst Connecticut Media

Management at Nagi Jewelers were not available to comment.

Bedford Jewelers primarily draws its customers from Stamford and neighboring towns such as Greenwich, Darien, New Canaan, and Pound Ridge, N.Y.

Diamond jewelry has produced the most sales during its closing sale in the past few weeks, a culmination timed to span the holiday season and Valentines Day. Other items such as gold chains have done brisk business as well.

A sign on the back wall advertises the make us an offer sale, in which all reasonable offers (are) considered. Everything must go! The more you buy, the more youll save.

The owners quip that Murphy  a beagle-pug who belongs to Weinroths son, but likes to hang out in the store  has helped to boost sales. The display cases growing number of empty shelves confirms that activity.

Its a funny thing is that hes managed to help sell jewelry, Weinroth said. We call him the little ambassador.

But most patrons have not needed much canine salesmanship to keep returning. In the past few weeks, hundreds of them have visited the store, according to Weinroth and Weinroth Adatto.

We have very long-term customers. We have families were on the third generation with, Weinroth Adatto said. My father used to compare it to being a family doctor because you had to trust somebody to be the customer of a jewelry store.

Those longtime supporters include Stamford resident Ronald Murray.

My wife and I have always been very satisfied with their service. Were very sorry to see them close, Murray said on a recent weekday while picking up some watches that had needed batteries. We wish we could talk them out of it, but I dont think we can. We dont know what were going to do. Its a great place. Theyre lovely people.

Proud history

The stores existence testifies to its founders courage and resilience.

Harry Weinroth survived his teenage years spent in several concentration camps, including Bergen-Belsen, Bisingen and Dachau during World War II. He was born in Sosnowiec in southern Poland.

Shortly after immigrating in 1949 with his sister to the U.S., Harry Weinroth opened the business on Main Street, on a piece of land that is now part of Stamford Town Center mall. He paid a monthly rent of $25. The tiny storefront for the originally named Harrys Jewelers was accessed by walking down under a diner.

Tyler Sizemore / Hearst Connecticut Media

At that point, he spoke little English. But he had a trade, as a watchmaker. He was carrying on a family tradition, as his father had owned a jewelry store in Poland before World War II.

He had a very active watch-repair business when he started. The jewelry store grew from the watch repairs, Weinroth said. Slowly, the jewelry business built up to the point where the jewelry business was eventually bigger than the watch-repair business.

Their mother, Luba Weinroth, a native of Warsaw, also worked in the business. She and Harry met in a displaced-persons camp in Germany shortly after World War II and later reunited and married in New York City.

Harry Weinroth retired in 2014. Even in retirement, he and Luba kept a keen interest in the business.

They could not drive anywhere near here without stopping in, Weinroth Adatto said. Theyd say Is it busy, do you need help? 

At the age of 91, Harry Weinroth died in 2018. A number of customers attended his funeral.

My father loved the customers, Weinroth said.

Today, Luba Weinroth lives in the Edgehill retirement community in Stamford.

They felt that getting married, having children and building a life was how they won, Weinroth Adatto said. That was what was important to them.

pschott@stamfordadvocate.com; twitter: @paulschott
EP Global Opportunities Trust plc (the "Company")

Total Voting Rights

As a result of the purchase of 75,000 Ordinary 1p shares placed into Treasury on 12 February 2021 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 38,242,725 1 38,242,725 26,266,917 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.

15 February 2021

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
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Kika Ngakani, a refugee mother of six from the Democratic Republic of the Congo poses outside her newly constructed shelter.

Kika stands outside her door and waves at her neighbours before opening the blue door that leads to her living room. At the far end is a solar-powered television set neatly surrounded by a group of plastic seats. Since her new house was completed nearly a year ago, Kikas life has changed for the better.

This house makes me feel human and dignified. It makes me feel at home even though I am in another country, she says as she sits down to watch TV.

When she arrived in Kenya four years ago from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kika, a mother of three, had nothing but hope. Like other newly arrived refugees, she was given transitional shelter in Kenyas Kalobeyei settlement, which houses both refugees and local people.

For three years, Kika and her family of five lived in a temporary house made of plastic tarpaulin and iron sheets. But there were problems in that home, Kika explains. Thieves would cut through the plastic sheet to steal.

Now that her turn arrived, Kika converted her transitional shelter into a stone house using the cash she received in her bank account under a cash-based intervention project of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). Kikas new house took less than 14 days to build, thanks to skilled masons from the refugee and the surrounding host community. Her bright blue door and windows coupled with the extended veranda make her house stand out in the neighbourhood.

Cash for construction of houses and latrines is disbursed in installments. The process allows refugees to negotiate directly with local suppliers and masons for better prices. Savings made from the construction process is mostly used to improve the houses and purchase essentials like clothes and shoes.

The Kalobeyei settlement was launched in 2015 by UNHCR and the Government of Kenya in order to relieve overcrowding in the nearby Kakuma camp.

UNHCRs Senior Operations Coordinator, Kahin Ismail, says the programme has twin benefits: It provides economic opportunities for refugees, who get a home, and for the host community because most or even all of the cash is spent locally for building materials and skilled labour.

Apart from cash for shelter, UNHCR distributes cash to all refugees in Kalobeyei for basic needs such as soap and sanitary needs. This cash is easily accessible from local bank agents in the settlement.

We get money on a monthly basis from UNHCR to buy soap, Kika says.

My first priority is always to buy soap that would last my family for a month.

To date, over 7,700 refugee families in the Kalobeyei settlement have open bank accounts under the programme. Over 3,000 live in the houses built through the programme, and another 1,500 are in the process of converting their temporary shelters into houses.

Now the cash programme is being extended to the Kakuma refugee camp on a larger scale. UNHCR, in partnership with a local bank, is opening bank accounts and issuing ATM cards for the 37,500 refugee households who live in Kakuma.

There, the World Food Programme (WFP) disburses funds through vouchers or mobile banking so refugees can buy food. These funds supplement the in-kind food rations distributed to refugees. In Kalobeyei, people receive 100% of their monthly food rations in form of cash deposited directly to their bank accounts.

When refugees come to a new country, there are bound to be tensions with the people who already live there, the host community, says UNHCRs Kahin Ismail. There are differences in culture, language, status. The main concern is about competition over jobs and resources. It is important to explain how everyone benefits if there are good relations between people. That is why the UNHCR program has refugees hire both locals and other refugees to build their homes.

The same idea is at work in an agriculture project sponsored by WFP and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), which brings together farmers from the refugee and host communities to grow food for people in the Kalobeyei settlement.

Refugees can use other unrestricted funds for other household needs beyond just homes, latrines, and daily essentials.

Kika has some ideas about what to buy. I have an account that I opened in October, she says. I want to save enough to buy a refrigerator and a motorbike which I will use to start a business.

From the outside, this wish list might sound simple. But for Kika, an ATM card is more than just a piece of plastic. It means the chance for a better future.

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To strengthen Vestas presence and market position in strategic and fast-growing markets in Asia Pacific and drive operational alignment across the value chain, Vestas has appointed Purvin Patel as Regional President of Asia Pacific. Mr. Patel joins Vestas from a position as CEO of ISS UK & Ireland, bringing more than 25 years of commercial and operational leadership experience from this role, as well as previous leadership positions at Walmart, Kingfisher Group (UK) and RadhaKrishna Foodland. Mr. Patel takes up the role today and succeeds Clive Turton, who will leave the company after heading Vestas Asia Pacific since 2017.

Vestas President and Chief Executive Officer, Henrik Andersen, said Asia Pacific is a very exciting region from an energy perspective, because countries like India, Japan, Vietnam, Korea and Australia are either expanding or transforming their energy systems with renewables. Vestas has a strong footprint across regions, including large manufacturing facilities in India, and I am therefore delighted to welcome Purvin Patel to the team as he brings substantial commercial and operational experience that will be key to grow our presence in India and the rest of Asia Pacific.

Im delighted to welcome Purvin Patel on board to lead Vestas Asia Pacific as renewables continue to expand their reach in a region with growing electricity needs. Wind and renewable energy have become mainstream, and Purvins solid operational background will be a strong asset as we broaden our presence in the regions existing fast-growing markets and leverage our joint venture in Japan. Id also like to thank Clive Turton for his contributions to Vestas throughout the last four years and wish him the best of luck in his future endeavours, said Juan Araluce, Executive Vice President and Chief Sales Officer.

The demand for renewable energy is expected to grow significantly across the Asia Pacific region in the coming decade, including in key markets such as India, Japan, Vietnam, Korea and Australia. Vestas will continue to invest in offering the right solutions for our customers and expand our footprint in the region to meet this demand. Mr. Patel will play a key role in this process with his strong commercial and operational competencies, driving a stronger and more consolidated regional setup in Asia Pacific.

Vestas has established itself as the global leader in onshore wind and pioneered wind energy in many markets in Asia Pacific region. Together with our strong manufacturing footprint and increased emphasis on offshore wind and development, theres a huge potential for Vestas to grow profitably in Asia Pacific, and together with the great team in Asia Pacific, I look forward to grasping these opportunities, said Purvin Patel, incoming President of Vestas Asia Pacific.

During his time at ISS, Patel also served as Country Manager & Chief Executive Officer of ISS Facility Services India, which employs approximately 60,000 employees, and has been responsible for driving key strategic and transformation projects at board level.
New Delhi: Basant Panchami, the festival which marks the arrival of the spring season in India, would be celebrated on February 16, this year. Held on the fifth day (Panchami) of the Magha maas (month), Basant Panchami is also celebrated as Saraswati Puja in some parts of the country.

Festivals in India are all about harmony and togetherness, in fact, the fun of the occasion is simply incomplete without good food and happiness. As per the Hindu Mythology, Lord Brahma is believed to have created the universe on this day.

Apart from that, the reason for the celebration of Saraswati Puja in some parts of the country is because it was believed that on this day Goddess Durga gave birth to Goddess Saraswati. The significance of the occasion is huge in Hindu culture, as the day is considered extremely auspicious to start new work, get married or perform house warming ceremony (Grah Pravesh).

Basant Panchami is predominantly, celebrated in eastern parts of India as Saraswati Puja, particularly in West Bengal, Bihar and north-eastern states like Tripura and Assam. The goddess Saraswati is dressed in yellow, and flowers, sweets of the same colour are offered to her. People visit her temples and worship her.

The colour yellow holds great importance in the celebration of Basant Panchami. It marks the harvest time of mustard crops that have yellow blooms, which is Goddess Saraswatis favourite colour. Hence, yellow attire is worn by the followers of Saraswati.

Moreover, a traditional feast is prepared for the festival wherein the dishes usually are yellow and saffron in colour. In North India, especially in Punjab and Haryana, Basant Panchami is celebrated as a festival of kites. Sweet rice is one such mouthwatering dish served in Punjab. Other dishes include Makki ki roti and Sarso ka saag. The sight of wide patches of fields filled with mustard crops is another characteristic of this season.

In Rajasthan wearing jasmine garland to celebrate this festival is a part of the rituals.In the southern states of India, the festival is celebrated as Sri Panchami. Yagnas are done in schools and colleges as students celebrate with great sincerity and fervour. It is believed that Goddess Saraswati bestows her devotees with lots of wisdom, learning and knowledge, as the goddess is considered to be an epitome of wisdom.

Students and teachers wear new clothes, offer prayers to the goddess of knowledge and various programs of song and dance are organised to please her. Usually, toddlers start learning from this day in a unique ceremony named Khadi-Chuan/Vidya-Arambha.

The festival is celebrated by people in various ways depending upon their region in the Indian subcontinent. Basant Panchami also marks the start of preparation for Holi, which takes place forty days later.

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Corteva Agriscience supports grower choice by offering natural-origin products that work side-by-side with conventional crop protection solutions.

Corteva Agriscience and Simbiose Agro, the largest producer of microbiological technologies in Brazil, announced today a multi-year collaboration benefiting Brazilian farmers.

Working closely together, the two companies will commercialize and develop Simbioses portfolio and pipeline of biostimulants and biological control solutions for crops such as sugarcane, soybeans, corn and other specialties. Additional details of the agreement were not disclosed.

Corteva Agriscience supports grower choice by offering natural-origin products that work side-by-side with conventional crop protection solutions, said Susanne Wasson, President, Crop Protection Business Platform, Corteva Agriscience. Were excited to begin working with Simbiose to develop sustainable options that will help farmers meet changing market expectations while keeping their land productive and healthy.

This collaboration represents another step forward for Cortevas newly created global Biologicals portfolio, which is dedicated to developing biostimulants, biocontrol and pheromone products with proven, predictable performance. Simbioses portfolio of technologies will play a key role, bringing viable and differentiated solutions for integrated pest management and maximizing yield potential and productivity, as well as enhancing sustainability, in line with the Corteva Agriscience 2030 Sustainability Goals.

The production of biotechnologies that offer high yield in agriculture combined with low environmental impact is in our DNA, said Marcelo de Godoy Oliveira, CEO Simbiose Agro. We know that Corteva Agriscience also holds the same commitment; its the reason why we are so excited to contribute to the portfolio of a company that is the benchmark in the industry. With this collaboration, growers have a lot to gain, as they will have access to sustainable inputs and families will have healthier and better-quality foods at the table. We firmly believe that this will be the first of many collaborations between Simbiose and Corteva Agriscience.

About Corteva Agriscience

Corteva Agriscience is a publicly traded, global pure-play agriculture company that provides farmers around the world with the most complete portfolio in the industry - including a balanced and diverse mix of seed, crop protection and digital solutions focused on maximizing productivity to enhance yield and profitability. With some of the most recognized brands in agriculture and an industry-leading product and technology pipeline well positioned to drive growth, the company is committed to working with stakeholders throughout the food system as it fulfills its promise to enrich the lives of those who produce and those who consume, ensuring progress for generations to come. Corteva Agriscience became an independent public company on June 1, 2019, and was previously the Agriculture Division of DowDuPont. More information can be found at http://www.corteva.com.

Follow Corteva Agriscience on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube.

About Simbiose

Simbiose Agro is a reference company in the development and formulation of microbiological pesticides in Brazil. It develops sustainable and highly performing microbiological technologies for agribusiness since 2007. With a differentiated portfolio when it comes to formulated pesticides based on microorganisms, the company is present in all regions of Brazil, as well as in some Latin American countries. To learn more about Simbiose visit http://www.simbiose-agro.com.br and visit our page on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube.

# # #

02/15/21

TM  SM Trademarks and service marks of Corteva Agriscience and its affiliated companies.


In a flyer sent to residents and posted on social media sites, the district stated schools buildings were anywhere from 18 to 93 years old and that some have outlived their useful lives becoming too expensive to maintain. Some schools were said to have flooding and plumbing problems. Only two schools have air conditioning.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told lawmakers Monday that a September 11th-style commission would probe the Capitol riot.

She told her colleagues of the need for the probe in a President's Day letter days after the Senate voted to acquit President Donald Trump of 'incitement of insurrection.'

'It is clear from his findings and from the impeachment trial that we must get to the truth of how this happened,' she wrote.

She said the outside commission was needed 'to protect our security, our security, our security'.

With impeachment now behind the Senate, the only looks back at the riot during the counting of the electoral votes are an internal security review she ordered and federal prosecutors who are rounding up individual rioters, charging some small groups with conspiracy.

House Republicans are pushing Pelosi on the need for a continuing National Guard presence in Washington, D.C more than a month after the riot.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) says an independent Sept. 11th-style commission will probe the Jan. 6th Capitol riot

And Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, one of 43 Republican senators voting not to convict Trump, said the riot 'didn't seem like an armed insurrection to me.'

He told WISN radio: 'The group of people that supported Trump, the hundreds of thousands of people who attended those Trump rallies, those are the people that love this country. They never would have done what happened on January 6. That is a group of people that love freedom; thats a group of people we need to unify and keep on our side.'

Rep. Lisa McClain, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, wants Pelosi to brief lawmakers on the lingering security presence, which has been estimated to cost nearly $500 million.

The force rose in size to 26,000 National Guard forces in the days after the January 6 riot and leading up to the inauguration, amid what top homeland officials said was a rise in the threat assessment amid ongoing risks.

A contingent of 5,000 troops is expected to remain until mid-March.

'Myself and several of my colleagues have asked Nancy Pelosi for a briefing as to why do we need these troops here, and we have received zero information, zero,' said McClain in an appearance on Fox & Friends Monday.

She hit Pelosi for failing to provide lawmakers with more information. She called it 'extremely concerning' that troops could be in the region through the fall.

'Just tell me why. I feel like there's a boogeyman under my bed,' she told the network. 'Just explain to us why we have the National Guard troops,' she said.

Pelosi says the independent commission will probe the Jan. 6th riot

To protect our security, our security, our security, our next step will be to establish an outside, independent 9/11-type Commission' to probe the riot, she said

Thousands of National Guard forces fortified the Capitol after the riot

President Trump was acquitted on 'incitement of insurrection'

'Just tell me why. I feel like there's a boogeyman under my bed,' said Rep. Lisa McClain (R-Michigan), who is demanding Pelosi provide a justification for the ongoing presence of National Guard troops

'It's amazing to me that she can do this without any disclosure, without any information and just continue to spend money with no briefing,' she said, adding: 'I would rather put those National Guard men and women to help my constituents in my state help with the distribution of the COVID relief vaccination.'

Her complaints came a day after the Senate voted to acquit President Donald Trump of 'incitement of insurrection,' in a trial in which Democratic managers played jarring footage of the MAGA mob rampaging the Capitol. Some members of the mob were even shown talking about doing harm to Pelosi herself, while others were shown chanting 'hang Mike Pence!'

Among the issues raised by House managers was why guard forces were not immediately deployed after the breach. The MAGA rioters breached the Capitol while Congress was meeting to count the electoral votes making Joe Biden president.

Pelosi referenced Capitol security in a President's Day letter to colleagues, where she again called for a probe of the events of Jan. 6. She has implemented other measures, positioning magnetometers outside the House chamber and establishing fines for lawmakers who refuse to go through them, after several GOP members refused to honor the rules.

'Now, as always, security is the order of the day: the security of our country, the security of our Capitol which is the temple of our democracy, and the security of our Members,' Pelosi wrote.

She referenced an internal security review being overseen by retired Gen. Russel Honore about the riot and its aftermath.

'It is clear from his findings and from the impeachment trial that we must get to the truth of how this happened. To protect our security, our security, our security, our next step will be to establish an outside, independent 9/11-type Commission to 'investigate and report on the facts and causes relating to the January 6, 2021 domestic terrorist attack upon the United States Capitol Complex and relating to the interference with the peaceful transfer of power, including facts and causes relating to the preparedness and response of the United States Capitol Police and other Federal, State, and local law enforcement in the National Capitol Region,'' she wrote.

'As we prepare for the Commission, it is also clear from General Honore's interim reporting that we must put forth a supplemental appropriation to provide for the safety of Members and the security of the Capitol,' she said, without putting a price tag on it.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) also called for the return of Guard forces. 'The National Guard answered the call at a critical time but its mission is now complete. It's time to reopen the Capitol grounds to the American people,' Cotton wrote in an op-ed. 'It's time to send home the troops.'
Bengaluru-based digital lending startup KreditBee has raised Rs 544 crore ($75 million) from investors including the Indian business tycoon, Azim Premji's PremjiInvest, The Economic Times reported.

Other investors in the Series C primary and secondary funding round were Mirae Asset Venture from South Korea, US-based Alpine Capital and Arkam Ventures, the report added.

Moreover, KreditBee's parent company Finnov slashed its Chinese investors that now hold only 10 percent, as compared to previously holding 40 percent. China's Shunwei Capital and Kunlunn also slashed their holding in the startup, the report said citing a source.

Following the stalemate between India and China, several Chinese nations were arrested who were running such digital platforms on grounds of alleged malpractices. Google took down several personal loan apps from its Play Store.

KreditBee provides instant personal loans upto Rs 2 lakh and claims to currently sustain a user base of over 20 million. The company plans to enter the secure loans and insurance using the newly acquired funding.

The startup hosts multiple non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) that have a license from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), states KreditBee's official website.

With a larger portfolio of loan products, our objective is to provide credit to over 180 million new-to-credit (NTC) customers who were not provided formal credit earlier, KreditBee CEO and cofounder Madhusudan Ekambaram said.

This investment would help us take more positive steps towards achieving that, he added.
Balmex.com Home Page Balmex is all about providing fast relief and reliable, proven solutions. The brands willingness to go the extra mile for new parents is just one of the many reasons parents have been trusting Balmex for over 50 years. Past News Releases RSS

Code18 Interactive, a boutique digital agency based in New York City, announces the launch of new health and wellness websites for Balmex Complete Protection and Balmex AdultAdvantage. Both are fully custom and fully responsive WordPress websites  https://balmex.com helps elevate and refresh a legacy brand while providing helpful diaper rash solutions and peace of mind for new parents, while https://balmexadult.com showcases over-the-counter relief for adults who experience skin irritation and chafing caused by incontinence or light bladder leakage. Both sites also feature e-commerce capabilities powered by WooCommerce, enabling the brands to offer Direct-to-Consumer sales for the first time.

The Balmex Complete Protection and Balmex AdultAdvantage brands are both part of the Randob Labs portfolio. Randob Labs is a private, family-held company that specializes in revitalizing and maintaining heritage brands in the OTC healthcare space. Collaborating and working with Randob Labs has been an exciting adventure. Both Balmex and Balmex Adult provide big relief from common, irritating issues, says Code18 Interactive founder Steve Pilon. And providing relief and solutions to everyday problems is exactly what Randob Labs is all about. Were thrilled to be a part of this process.

As a well-established presence in the baby aisle, Balmex Complete Protection offers pediatrician-recommended diaper rash cream and multi-purpose healing ointment to help protect, soothe and heal babys delicate skin. Many health and wellness websites only talk about what their product can do for consumers. However, Balmex is all about providing fast relief and reliable, proven solutions. Therefore, the website needed to clearly explain the causes of diaper rash and skin irritation, as well as provide simple steps parents can take to help prevent diaper rash in the first place, says Pilon. The brands willingness to go the extra mile for new parents is just one of the many reasons parents have been trusting Balmex for over 50 years.

Clinically proven Balmex AdultAdvantage offers the same key benefitsa cream that protects, soothes and heals irritated and chafed skinas its 50-year-old sibling brand. Available as a standalone skin relief cream or as part of an innovative on-the-go, 3-in-1 kit, Balmex AdultAdvantage helps older adults live life more comfortably. For many older adults incontinence or bladder leakage controls their life, and unfortunately, many people just accept this fate, says Pilon. With the Balmex Adult website we really focused on awarenessawareness of this fantastic product, awareness of the benefits, and mostly, awareness that you can take back control of your life with Balmex AdultAdvantage.

Code18 Interactive is a New York WordPress Agency that caters primarily to national consumer and media brands. The agency specializes in the design and development of enterprise-level WordPress and E-Commerc websites. They have the pleasure of working with many wonderful brands, including: Boursin Cheese, Public Radio International, The Laughing Cow, Grove Atlantic Publishing, C.O. Bigelow, GoGo squeeZ, and many others.

For more information, please visit http://www.code18.com
Sean Penn became a star playing an empty-headed stoner in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Over the years, he's given every indication that this part was typecasting. The hard-leftist actor, who's never meant a dictator he hasn't liked, took aim at Evangelical Christians in a tweet that has percolated up from "the bowels of hell" for everyone's enjoyment. It's probable that he's trying to insult Trump in his tweet, but, honestly, it's impossible to tell.

Here is Penn's magical, mystery tweet:

Evangelical leaders should themselves be impeached by the Vatican if they themselves dont follow Nikki Haleys lead & clearly state they should not have followed Satin into the bowels of hell. But, perhaps they are too busy at sex parties.  Sean Penn (@SeanPenn) February 13, 2021

Let's see if we can unpack this:

Nikki Haley is the starting point because, on the same day Penn set fingers to keyboard, Haley criticized Trump, the most popular Republican politician in America, saying that he has no future in America. If Haley thinks insulting Trump is her e-ticket to the White House, she might be just as deluded as Penn himself. But Penn clearly agrees with her that Trump is bad news.

Who are those Evangelical leaders? Penn's not naming names, but it's clear that he resents the fact that Evangelical Christians support Trump. He doesn't understand not only that Evangelicals recognize that Trump has reformed his formerly wild ways, but also that he was the only president since Reagan to govern in a way that does not offend Evangelical sensibilities.

Additionally, because Evangelical Christians are more familiar with the Bible than Penn, they know that God has often sent unexpected leaders, whether reluctant, stuttering Moses; a highly imperfect David; or even a non-Jewish Persian, such as King Cyrus. I'm not saying Trump was sent by God, but if God can give leaders leeway, so can we.

What about that impeachment by the Vatican? There's so much wrong there. First, the Vatican excommunicates; it doesn't impeach. Second, in 1517, when Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the chapel door in Wittenberg, he pretty much had the excommunication thing locked up. As far as Protestants go, it's a done deal  the Vatican holds no power over them.

Who is this Satin who hangs out in Hell's bowels? Could she be a stripper? Penn doesn't say.

Unimaginative people are surmising that Penn really meant to say "Satan," but I have my doubts. Any man who can talk about the Vatican impeaching Evangelical Christians would never write something as boringly hackneyed as "following Satan into the bowels of hell."

Lastly, there's the contention that Evangelical leaders are "too busy at sex parties." Sean, Sean, Sean. Evangelical sex scandals are so 1980s. No one cares anymore about what Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart did. Those things are as dated as your (almost) forty-year run as Jeff Spicoli.

Twitter, predictably, had fun:

Oh no what ever will evangelical leaders do if the Vatican won't allow them to be Catholic anymore? pic.twitter.com/Psa6EQYZwS  Dan (@TractorLaw) February 14, 2021

This kind of thought process happens Sean, when you're high on your own brand and no one tells you no for decades. pic.twitter.com/z5IWpfGba5  Misty (@mialynneb) February 14, 2021

Even the Church of Satan had something to say about this one:

I was going to say Penn should stick to acting, but that would be so wrong. This kind of ill informed idiocy has brought a little joy to the world. For that, we should be grateful.

Image: "Hail, Satin" internet meme.
Mam | Media And Advertising

What creators want out of brand collaborations While improv genius, comedian & writer Abish Mathew, also known as a bankable influencer in the marketing world, stated that he is willing to sell his soul to the devil for a running price of Rs 3 crore, he is not quite excited about compromising on his creative and artistic values for brand collaborations. Read More...

Mam | Media And Advertising

Brands celebrate all forms of love this Valentine's Day It's Valentine's Day and along with love, there are numerous ad campaigns in the air trying to woo their love-soaked customers. Like every year, brands across categories have curated some special campaigns to spread a little more cheer during theseason of love. Read More...

Mam | Media And Advertising

Digital Refresh Networks expands its reach to Kolkata Digital Refresh Networks (DRN) has launched its full-scale operations in Kolkata, effective February 2021. With offices across multiple cities, DRN has been delivering successful digital campaigns across Mumbai, Indore and Bangalore, and is now bringing that expertise to the region. Read More...

Mam | Media And Advertising

Rana Daggubati dons the role of a godman in Ceat's new ad film Ceat Tyres has signed actor Rana Daggubati as its brand ambassador for promoting the puncture safe range of bike tyres across media platforms. As part of an integrated marketing campaign across all five southern states of India, Daggubati will feature in the new commercial for puncture safe tyres to be aired across TV and digital platforms. Read More...

Mam | Media And Advertising

#ThePerfectMatch: Hero Cycles offers bikes that match your personality Bicycle lovers are on the constant look out for the perfect machine to suit their lifestyle and riding requirements. Hero Cycles' new campaign is a shout out to those bikers searching for a bicycle that perfectly matches their needs. With its focus on introducing India's bikers to the diverse and versatile world of premium bicycles. Read More...

Mam | Marketing

Mia by Tanishq partners with Voot Studio to celebrate love Viacom18's branded content arm, Voot Studio ,and Mia by Tanishq have collaborated for an exclusive Valentine's Day brand film that defines celebration and true love. The 40-second film released as part of a campaign not just showcases Mia's The Cupid Edit Valentine's Day collection but brings out the brand's thought and value proposition for Indian consumers. Read More...
Myanmars junta deployed extra troops around the country and choked the internet on Monday as it intensified a crackdown on anti-coup protests, but defiant demonstrators again took to the streets.

The military has steadily escalated efforts to quell an uprising against their seizure of power two weeks ago, which saw civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi detained along with hundreds of others, including members of her democratically elected government.

Suu Kyi and President Win Myint are expected to be questioned by a court via video conferencing in the countrys capital of Naypyidaw this week, said lawyer Khin Maung Zaw, adding that he had not been able to make contact with either client.

Neither has been seen in public since they were detained in dawn raids on February 1, the day of the coup.

Fear is going away

The generals imposed an hours-long internet shutdown on Monday morning and ratcheted up the militarys presence across the country overnight, including armoured vehicles in Yangon, the nations commercial hub and biggest city.

Fresh protests  though much smaller than in previous days  again flared in the city, including near the central bank where troops were deployed.

Patrolling with armoured vehicles means they are threatening people, said 46-year-old Nyein Moe, among the more than 1,000 gathered in front of the bank.

People are marching on the streets and they dont care to be arrested or shot. We cant stop now. The fear in our mind is going away.

Large crowds also gathered outside the Chinese and US embassies in Yangon, carrying signs that read Get out dictator.

By afternoon, news of a strong police presence at the Yangon headquarters of Suu Kyis National League for Democracy (NLD) party drew thousands to the scene.

They chanted End military dictatorship as the officers stood guard.

About seven police officers searched for about 30 minutes (for two MPs), NLD member Soe Win told AFP after the security forces left without finding them. Now everything is settled.

A protest led by student groups in Naypyidaw on Monday was met with force after the gathering had retreated. Police also arrested dozens of the young protesters, though some were later released.

We were peaceful and even apologised but then they fired water cannon, a high school student told AFP, refusing to provide a name for fear of repercussions.

Violence also broke out in Mandalay, the countrys second-largest city, leaving at least six injured after police used slingshots against protesters and fired rubber bullets into the crowd.

Demonstrators retaliated by throwing bricks, said a rescue team member who assisted with the injured.

One of them needed oxygen because he was hit with a rubber bullet in his rib, rescue team head Khin Maung Tin told AFP.

Journalists on the scene also said police had beaten them in the melee.

State-ordered information blackout

Monitoring group NetBlocks reported that a state-ordered information blackout had taken Myanmar almost entirely offline early Monday.

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Internet connectivity was later restored around the start of the working day, with NetBlocks saying the blackout lasted around eight hours.

Intensifying fears the military was going to impose a far harsher crackdown, troops in the northern city of Myitkyina fired tear gas then shot at a crowd on Sunday night.

READ ALSO: Myanmar junta blocks access to Facebook as pressure mounts

A journalist at the scene said it was unclear whether police had used rubber bullets or live rounds.

Local media outlets said at least five journalists monitoring the protest were detained and released Monday.

Much of the country has been in uproar since soldiers detained Suu Kyi, ending a decade-long experiment with democracy after generations of junta rule.

An internet blackout last weekend failed to quell resistance that has seen huge crowds throng big urban centres and isolated frontier villages alike.

So far, 400 people  including striking workers  have been detained since the coup, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners monitoring group.

France vows to keep supporting protests

France will keep supporting the people of Myanmar in their struggle for democracy, a spokeswoman for the Quai dOrsay, the foreign ministry, said on Monday.

The deployment of armoured vehicles in several cities and increasing use of violence was of serious concern, the spokeswoman added.

Together with its European and international partners, France will continue to support the people of Myanmar in

their struggle for democracy and the rule of law, spokeswoman Agnes von der Muhll said in a statement.

A joint statement from the US, British and European Union ambassadors urged security forces not to harm civilians.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres echoed that call, asking the military to allow Swiss diplomat Christine Schraner Burgener to visit Myanmar to assess the situation first hand.

UN special rapporteur Tom Andrews said the juntas efforts to rein in the burgeoning protest movement was a sign of desperation and amounted to a declaration of war against its people.

Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable, he tweeted.

The countrys new military leadership has so far been unmoved by a torrent of international condemnation.

The junta insists it took power lawfully and has instructed journalists in the country not to refer to it as a government that took power in a coup.

On Monday coup leader Min Aung Hlaing said except the West, other members of the international community say Myanmars affairs are its internal matter, echoing China and Russia.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP and REUTERS)

France 24 is Premium Times syndication partner. We have permission to republish.
Congress leader will visit the poll-bound on February 17, said sources on Sunday.

The former Congress president is likely to address public meetings while kick-starting the party's campaign for the Union Territory, where Assembly polls are scheduled to be held in the next few months. Currently, Congress is heading the government in under Chief Minister V Narayanasamy.

Chief Election Commissioner of India (CEC) Sunil Arora has said that the election will be held at the same time in Tamil Nadu and However, the dates of the polls are yet to be announced.

Recently, visited Assam, Kerala and Tamil Nadu where polls are likely to be held in April-May.

During his visit in these stats, Gandhi targetted the central government on many issues including farm laws, against which farmers have been protesting at Delhi borders for over two months.

(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.)



The UK should help Ireland out with vaccines as it has purchased 407 million doses, said Dr Gabriel Scally.

The President of Epidemiology and Public Health at the UKs Royal Society of Medicine said Ireland should be making relationships with the vaccine companies and asking the UK for help.

"My first stop would be to have a conversation with Boris Johnson, the UK has purchased 407 million doses, he said on RTE Radio 1s Today with Claire Byrne.

"Thats enough to vaccinate the total adult population of the UK about four times with two doses each time, so thats a lot of surplus vaccine.

Read More

Dr Scally said it would be in the UKs best interest to help Ireland with its vaccine roll-out.

"I think itd be very beneficial, the last thing the UK wants is Ireland lagging behind and having a lot more cases.

There is only one EU land border that the UK has and thats with the Republic of Ireland, its a common travel area and its absolutely in the UKs interest to help Ireland with vaccines.

The Public Health Doctor said Ireland is at a very worrying point when it comes to international travel as the UK has put 33 countries on the list for mandatory quarantine while Scotland as banned all international travel. He added: The Republic of Ireland hasnt moved on this.

When told that the government is working on having 18 countries on the mandatory hotel quarantine list, Dr Scally said thats no good.

He added: The variants are on their way and the variants move far faster than the Irish government.
THE proposed location of the Covid-19 vaccination centre for Limerick has been strongly criticised.

The Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly has confirmed the centre will be located at the Radission Blu Hotel which is actually located in County Clare.

Social media has been awash with criticism of the location and Deputy Richard O'Donoghue says having it in County Clare makes "no sense" and is "an insult" to people living in Limerick.

"They couldn't have picked a worse location," he said. "It will take a person from Abbeyfeale an hour to get there and even longer from Kilbehenny. They would be faster going to centres in Tipperary and Kerry. The Radisson is at the wrong side of the city for most people. I've nothing against the Radisson - it is a fabulous hotel - it is the location I have a problem with," said the independent TD.

He asks if the Limerick Greyhound Stadium or Limerick Racecourse was looked at by the HSE. "The greyhound stadium is available free of charge to the HSE as it was funded by Government. It is ideally located on the Dock Road. It has a spacious ground floor, allowing for easy entrance and exit, and parking for hundreds of vehicles. Limerick Racecourse is just off the motorway and again has lots of space and parking.

Deputy O'Donoghue has also criticised his fellow County Limerick TDs - Niall Collins and Patrick O'Donovan.

"We have two junior ministers in County Limerick, yet our vaccination centre ends up being in another county and a lot of extra inconvenience for people travelling there. How can they stand over that?" he told the Limerick Leader.

On social media, several people have pointed out that the Radission Hotel in hard to access by public transport while other are concerned about the distance people in some parts of the county will have to travel.

"I get their thought process in that it will not cause massive traffic jams in the city as it is out by the motorway and people can use the tunnel and it will not have a negative effect on the city while also catering for Clare people as well. However I do think they should have looked at opening one in the South Court as it is right on the city boundary and services all of limerick county and city better Could then look at opening a secondary one in NCW or the surrounding area," wrote Paul Fitz on Facebook.

Another Facebook user, Jen Ni stated: "That's 5 miles from the city centre, on a motorway with no local bus route. How is this supposed to be accessible to people?? Have they learned nothing from putting the testing centres out of reach of those without the priviledge of a car that they're doing the same now with the vaccination? This is absolutely disgraceful."

This is a hotel outside limerick in County clare, also the same hotel where the American troops stay overnight. A very strange choice of venue, who owns the Radisson?  Chris TOBIN (@ChrisTO12069355) February 15, 2021

Labour Councillor Conor Sheehan has also criticised the location.

"This site is located off a busy dual carriageway on the outskirts of the city with no public transport or even provision of a footpath to walk to the site. Its not even located in Limerick, its technically in County Clare. Many of our citizens including our elderly do not and cannot drive. How are they supposed to access the centre if they do not have a car?," he said.
By Abdul Qadir Sediqi

KABUL (Reuters) - The United Nations on Monday denounced attacks on Afghan journalists and human rights activists at a time when dialogue was needed more than ever amid talks to try to end two decades of war.

The Afghan government and Taliban militants began peace talks in Doha last September, but negotiations have largely stalled. Washington is reviewing a deal that would have seen Western troops leave the country by May.

The Afghan people need and deserve a flourishing civic space - a society where people can think, write and voice their views openly, without fear, said Deborah Lyons, the UN Secretary-Generals Special Representative for Afghanistan.

The voices of human rights defenders and the media are critical for any open and decent society."

Between Jan. 1, 2018, and Jan. 31, 2021, 65 human rights defenders and media professional were killed, the UN report said. Five human rights activists and six journalists were killed in the four months after the peace talks began.

Afghanistan is experiencing a new wave of "intentional, premeditated and deliberate targeting of individuals with perpetrators remaining anonymous", prompting professionals to quit their jobs and leave their homes, and journalists to exercise self-censorship.

Many of the attacks involve small improvised explosives called "sticky bombs," which are typically attached to the underside of vehicles.

Few have ever been claimed by any warring party, although the government has said the Taliban are responsible. The group says it only targets government officials.

The Taliban, who ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, are seeking to topple the Western-backed government in Kabul and reimpose Islamic rule.

Islamic State militants also operate in Afghanistan, and government officials have said they have ties to the Taliban, another charge the Taliban denies.

Afghanistan's spy agency said it broke up two cells in the past week in Kabul that were jointly operating between Islamic State and the Taliban-linked Haqqani network. It said they were responsible for assassinations of officials and activists and rocket attacks in the capital.

(Writing by Umar Farooq; Editing by Nick Macfie)
Chandigarh: Hitting out at the climate activist Disha Ravi who has been arrested for being allegedly involved in sharing the 'toolkit' related to the farmers' protest, Haryana's Home Minister Anil Vij on Monday (February 15, 2021) said that whoever harbours the seed of anti-nationalism in their mind, that has to be destroyed.

Anil Vij took to his official Twitter account and tweeted in Hindi that roughly translates to, "Whoever harbours the seed of anti-nationalism in their mind, that has to be completely destroyed, be it Disha Ravi or anyone else."

                  #_       ANIL VIJ MINISTER HARYANA (@anilvijminister) February 15, 2021

Later, the minister also posted a response from Twitter after a complaint was raised against his tweet.

The response from Twitter read, "We have received a complaint regarding your account, @anilvijminister for the following content (Vij's particular tweet in Hindi). We have investigated the reported content and have found that it is not subject to removal under the Twitter Rules or German law. Accordingly, we have not taken any action as a result of this specific report."

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader's comments came following the arrest of the climate activist, Disha Ravi, from Bengaluru.

The 22-year-old who was remanded to 5-day police custody on Sunday is according to Delhi Police, one of the Editors of the Toolkit Google Doc that was shared by the teen Swedish climate and environmental activist Greta Thunberg.

Delhi Police said that Disha Ravi is a key conspirator in the document's formulation and dissemination and that she started a WhatsApp Group and collaborated to make the Toolkit doc.

"She worked closely with them to draft the Doc. In this process, they all collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. She was the one who shared the Toolkit Doc with Greta Thunberg," stated Delhi Police.

They added, "Later, she asked Greta to remove the main Doc after its incriminating details accidentally got into the public domain. This is many times more than the 2 lines editing that she claims."

In this process,they all collaborated with pro Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. She was the one who shared the Toolkit Doc with Greta Thunberg. @HMOIndia @LtGovDelhi @CPDelhi  #DilKiPolice Delhi Police (@DelhiPolice) February 14, 2021

Earlier on February 3, Greta Thunberg had shared the toolkit on the ongoing farmers' protests on her official social media account.

Heres an updated toolkit by people on the ground in India if you want to help. (They removed their previous document as it was outdated.)#StandWithFarmers #FarmersProtesthttps://t.co/ZGEcMwHUNL  Greta Thunberg (@GretaThunberg) February 3, 2021

In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were reportedly listed which were needed to be taken to support the farmers' protest.

This is to be noted that thousands of farmers have been protesting on three borders of the national capital since late November 2020, against the three newly enacted agricultural laws.

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The Muzaffarnagar police celebrated the third birthday of its sniffer dog Dicky with a special cake.

Dicky, whose birthday was celebrated on Saturday, was helped by his handler, Sunil Kumar, in cutting the cake.

Wearing a colourful paper cap and a solemn expression, Dicky 'cut' the birthday in the presence of her handler, and other police personnel at the police line kennel here.

The Labrador Retriever received a new coat and a leash as gifts. As a treat, she had boiled chicken along with her daily meal, comprising boiled eggs, mutton, vegetables, flatbread and milk.

The function was in keeping with Muzaffarnagar SSP Abhishek Yadav's directive that the birthday of all police personnel be celebrated at his duty premises -- the police station or outpost concerned or police line.

Abdul Raees Khan, police line in-charge, said, "Dicky has been trained by Indo-Tibetan Border Police at Panchkula in Haryana. She was posted to Muzaffarnagar in August 2019. Since then Dicky has been a part of operations to sniff out explosives at bus stands, railway stations, markets and other important places."

She was a part of the then US president Donald Trump's security drill when he visited India in 2020, he added.

Dogs in the Indian army are now also being trained to sniff out coronavirus infection, among other things. Dogs of the Indian breed Chippiparai and cocker spaniels are being trained to sniff out coronavirus by identifying metabolic biomarkers in personnel's sweat and urine samples, within seconds.

The dog brother and sister-duo of Mani and Jaya along with Casper, are among Indias first seven military canines to be trained in Covid-19 detection. They have been preparing for the task since September last year. Casper is a cocker spaniel, while Jaya and Mani are indigenous Chippiparai hounds from Tamil Nadu.

Many countries use dogs for the detection of diseases such as cancer, Parkinson's, and diabetes. In India, this is the first time we have used dogs to detect a disease. We really see hope in this. We have found great results. We started training these dogs in September, and now they have become experts. Within seconds, they can detect the virus. These dogs have been trained to sit next to a positive sample kept in a container, while they move forward if it's negative, Lt Colonel Surinder Saini, an instructor at the RVC Center in Meerut told News18.

This is the first time in India that the olfactory capability of canines is being used to detect tissues infected with pathogens releasing volatile metabolic biomarkers.

Several nations such as the UK, Finland, Russia, France, UAE, Germany, Lebanon have already started training dogs for coronavirus detection by screening passengers at airports and railway stations.

(With inputs from IANS)
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines) - A significant milestone marked the country's efforts in improving its broadband connectivity.

The Philippines has the 10th fastest median 5G download speed among Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation member-countries in the third quarter of 2020, based on a speed test intelligence report made by web analytics firm Ookla.

Median 5G download speed is the aggregate speed measured in the 50th percentile of all tests taken with speed tests on a 5G connection.

The Ookla report stated the Philippines holds a 182.50 Mbps median 5G download speed.

Leading Filipino telecommunications company Globe celebrated this latest feat as it continues to support the government's initiative to improve the country's state of connectivity.

"Ranking among APEC countries is a huge feat and shows that our investments and network improvements are bearing fruit. We will continue to make 4G and 5G as pervasive as possible to meet the demand of our customers for better connectivity," shared Ernest Cu, president, and chief executive officer of Globe.

Globe has led the Philippine telco industry in new site builds last year and strengthened its network with extensive 4G LTE and 5G upgrades. These sustained and vigorous efforts have resulted in improved internet speeds and higher consistency scores as confirmed by various independent analytics firms.

The telco was the first mobile operator in Southeast Asia to commercially launch 5G for home back in 2019, and 5G for mobile in 2020. Globe has the widest 5G coverage in the country today, covering 80% of Metro Manila.

Globe is also committed to uphold the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDG), particularly UN SDG No. 9, which highlights the roles of infrastructure and innovation as crucial drivers of economic growth and development.

With this achievement, Globe promises to continue to lead the country's digital transformation by introducing innovative solutions in the areas of financial technology, telemedicine, e-commerce, digital advertising, cyber-security, enterprise cloud applications, customer service, and even technology for social good.
Many U.S. voters believe that punishment should not await public officials who claim that the 2020 Presidential Elections were "stolen" from former President Donald Trump, a recent Rasmussen Reports survey reveals.

America is still divided. A new national telephone and online survey conducted by Rasmussen Reports revealed that up to 61% of Republicans believe Biden "did not win the election fairly." Following an exciting, edge-of-your-seat kind of race to win the elections, Joe Biden was declared victorious during the 2020 Presidential Elections, but it wouldn't be days after November 3 when the vote was decided. According to NPR, "vote tallies in several swing states were slowed by an unprecedented surge in mail-in ballots."

Trump was able to capture contested states such as Florida, Ohio, and Texas, but lost Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Georgia showed a very close race and in the end, Biden supposedly won 306 electoral votes over President Trump, who would have gotten a second term if he earned at least 38 more electoral votes.

Since then, Trump made it clear that Biden didn't win fairly and proceeded to question the election results and file cases on election fraud. According to Reuters, "Most lawmakers cited legal arguments that some states' expansions of mail-in or early voting during the coronavirus pandemic violated the U.S. Constitution."

Meanwhile, many Americans still believe Biden didn't win fairly.

Following former President Trump's second impeachment case, in which he was again acquitted, American voters were asked if "Should public figures be punished for saying they believe the 2020 election was stolen?" The survey results gave new insight on how the public perceives last year's election.

According to Breitbart, 54% of likely voters answered "No," while 35% said "Yes," and finally, 11% said they were unsure. Interestingly, 54% of Democrats believe that public figures who made claims that Biden didn't win fairly and that the election was "stolen" should be punished, versus only 21% of Republicans. 28% of those who were unaffiliated with the Democrats or Republicans agreed.

In addition, the Rasmussen Reports survey revealed that 73% of Republicans and 59% of independents do not believe that those who say Believe Biden Didn't Win Fairly or those who are questioning elections should not be punished. President Biden has been Commander in Chief for only three weeks and a majority of GOP likely voters still believe that Biden didn't win fairly. About 33% of survey respondents said that they don't believe he won the election fairly and 8% said they are unsure. Up to 61% of Republicans do not believe Biden was fairly elected compared to 11% who said yes and 11% who are still unsure.

Despite President Biden's calls for unity amidst a divided America, it looks like there is still a huge rift following the 2020 Presidential Elections. This is largely due, in part, to lawsuits and cases regarding the massive voter fraud that occurred in the recent elections to propel Biden to the White House.

This is also largely due to controversial executive orders such as those forcing Americans to pay for abortions regardless of their convictions, those forcing schools to let biological males compete against biological females in sports, and orders forcing the military to spend its budget on transgender medical procedures should an armed force member ask for it.

These orders are seen to put religious freedoms in danger.

Nile Gardiner, director of the conservative Washington think tank called the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at the Heritage Foundation, told Nikkei Asia his prediction, that a "tremendous clash of ideologies awaits in the next few years, under which Republicans will look to set a fresh agenda to counter Biden's policies."
A nurse has been hit in the leg with a stray bullet during a drive-by shooting on Monday night.

Several rounds were fired into a home on Auburn Road in Auburn, in Sydney's west, at about 8pm.

A stray bullet went through a window at the nearby Auburn Hospital - causing shrapnel to hit a nurse's leg. She was treated for minor injuries.

A stray bullet went through a window at the nearby Auburn Hospital - causing shrapnel to hit a nurse's leg

Witnesses saw two men dressed in black getting out of a car near the driveway of the home before firing the shots.

Officers found a number of bullet holes in the home.

Police haven't yet ruled out the incident being gang-related.

'It's a very serious incident and this type of behaviour won't be tolerated,' Superintendent Adam Johnson told reporters.

'We will conduct a thorough investigation in relation to identifying the people responsible and put them before the court.'
Admin gears up as Hisar farmers get set to protest today

Punjab MLA Navjot Singh Sidhu hoists black flag at his residence in support of protesting farmers

Who is Disha Ravi? 22-year-old activist linked to Greta Thunberg

India

oi-Deepika S

New Delhi, Feb 15: Disha Ravi, a 21-year-old climate activist shot to fame on Sunday after she was arrested on charges of sharing a toolkit on the social media related to the farmers' protest.

According to Delhi police, Disha was an editor of the 'toolkit Google doc' and a key conspirator in the curation and distribution of the document.

Ravi and others "collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State."

Who is Disha Ravi? 22-year-old activist linked to Greta Thunberg

Ravi, who is a graduate in Bachelor of Business Administration from Mount Carmel College in Bengaluru. She is also one of the founding members of a group named 'Fridays For Future India', the climate campaign Thunberg launched by staging a protest at her school every Friday.

Diha has been vocal about environment issues and regularly writes column about climate change. She is quite a popular in the relevant climate forums frequented by youth activists.

She featured in an article by the British Vogue magazine on four activists of colour who highlight the climate crisis.

Reportedly, She started her activism because the water crisis affected her family.

Ravi once told Auto Report Africa, "We live in a country where dissent is suppressed We in Fridays For Future India were labelled terrorists for objecting to the draft environmental impact assessment (EIA) notification. Only a government that puts profit over people would consider asking for clean air, clean water and a liveable planet, an act of terrorism."

Disha's role came under police scrutiny after after Greta Thunberg tweeted in support of Indian farmers, whch the police say lead to Republic Day violence.

Why is police probing Diha Ravi?

The police alleged that she collaborated with pro-Khalsitani outfit Poetic Justice Foundation to to "spread disaffection against Indian state" and also shared the document with Thunberg.

"Disha Ravi, arrested by CyPAD Delhi Police, is an Editor of the Toolkit Google Doc & key conspirator in document's formulation & dissemination. She started WhatsApp Group and collaborated to make the toolkit doc. She worked closely with them to draft the doc. In this process, they all collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. She was the one who shared the Toolkit Doc with Greta Thunberg", said the police in a statement.

According to the police, the "toolkit" has a particular section that mentions "digital strike-through hashtags on or before January 26, tweetstorms on January 23 onwards, physical action on January 26 and watch-out or join farmers march into Delhi and back to borders".

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The "toolkit" was aimed at spreading disaffection and ill-will against the government of India and creating disharmony among various social, religious and cultural groups, the police had added.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 11:01 [IST]
The New York Times

A team of experts selected by the World Health Organization to investigate the origins of the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic returned last week from Wuhan, China, site of the worlds first outbreak. The team, having broken the ice with Chinese scientists, plans to produce a joint report on the possible origins of the virus. The two groups of scientists, from China and the WHO, agreed to pursue some ideas that the Chinese government has been promoting, like the possibility that the virus was transported on frozen food. But the WHO team also became frustrated by Chinas refusal to turn over raw data for analysis.

Peter Daszak, a member of the WHO team and president of EcoHealth Alliance in New York, is primarily concerned with the animal origins of the virus. A specialist in animal diseases and their spread to humans, Daszak has worked with the Wuhan Virology Institute, a collaboration that last year prompted the Trump administration to cancel a grant to his organization.

In an interview after his return to New York, he said that the visit had provided some new clues, which all of the scientists, Chinese and international, agreed most likely pointed to an animal origin within China or Southeast Asia. The scientists have largely discounted claims that the virus originated in a lab, saying that possibility was so unlikely that it was not worth further investigation.

He reflected on the atmosphere in Wuhan and his first glimpse of the seafood market where the initial outbreak occurred last year, although it was not the site of the first cases. He also said the path ahead would be straightforward scientifically, but not politically.

A transcript of the conversation, condensed and edited for length, follows:

Q: Youve been to China and to Wuhan many times before. How was this different?

A: Well, this was weird. Theres certain things when you go into China that youre supposed to do. The first thing you do is have a meeting and then have a meal. And if you dont have a meal, its considered extremely rude. This time we spent two weeks in Zoom calls from our quarantine hotel. Then we went to meet in person and still didnt have meals with our host. We had meals in a separate room.

So it was just a very difficult, very intense, very emotional trip. In Wuhan, theres this feeling of post-traumatic shock.

The city went on lockdown, I think, 76 days. They were locked in their apartments  people died, and they didnt know about it. And from then on, theyve been accused of starting a pandemic, and its been called the Wuhan virus, the China virus, and there was just a sense of outrage and sadness.

Q: Did that make it difficult in terms of the scientific purpose of the trip?

A: No. Youve got a task to do. Youve volunteered. You know what its going to be like. You get caught up in the historical importance. I dont know if we were the first foreigners to walk around the Huanan seafood market, which is blocked off even to Chinese citizens. The only people that have been in there have been the Chinese disease investigators. We met with the doctors that treated the first known COVID patients.

These people have been through harrowing conditions, and theyre now lauded as heroes in China, and then the rest of the world now is fighting that war. And China, of course, is absolutely petrified of this virus catching hold again.

When you arrive at the airport, they come on the plane in full PPE; youre escorted down a separate quarantine pathway; you get tested. Youre driven to the hotel, you go in your room, and youre locked in for two weeks. Its just severe. The people who come to your door are in full PPE. The waste from your trash, from the hotel room, goes into a yellow bag with a biohazard sign on it.

It was a totally different experience when I returned home, where I didnt even get a notification that Ive got to quarantine. I signed on to the New York state app, but no one is going to knock on my door and tell me, Stay indoors.

Q: Did you learn anything from this trip that you didnt know before?

A: From Day One, the data we were seeing were new that had never been seen outside China. Who were the vendors in the Huanan seafood market? Where did they get their supply chains? And what were the contacts of the first cases? How real were the first cases? What other clusters were there?

When you asked for more, the Chinese scientists would go off, and a couple of days later, theyve done the analysis, and weve got new information. It was extremely useful. At the time, you couldnt really say much. We were trying to not undermine the process by revealing anything while we were on the trip.

Q: What can you say now about the market and what you saw?

A: The market closed on the 31st of December or the 1st of January, and China CDC sent a team in of scientists to try and find out what was going on. It was a very extensive study, swabbing every surface of this place. We knew early on that there were 500 samples collected, and there were many positives, and in that sampling were some animal carcasses, or meat. But there was not really much information publicly about what had been done. So we got all that information. And that, to me, was a real eye-opener.

Theyd actually done over 900 swabs in the end, a huge amount of work. They had been through the sewage system. Theyd been into the air ventilation shaft to look for bats. Theyd caught animals around the market. Theyd caught cats, stray cats, rats, they even caught one weasel. Theyd sampled snakes. People had live snakes at the market, live turtles, live frogs.

Rabbits were there, rabbit carcasses. A farm with rabbits could have been really critical. There was talk about badgers, and in China, when they say badger, that means ferret badger. Its a mustelid, related to weasels. Animals were coming into that market that could have carried the coronavirus. They could have been infected by bats somewhere else in China and brought it in. So thats clue No. 1.

There were 10 stalls that sold wildlife. There were vendors from South China, including Yunnan province, Guangxi province and Guangdong province. Yunnan province is where the closest relative to SARS-CoV-2 is found in bats. Guangxi and Guangdong are where the pangolins were captured. They had close viruses.

Youve got animals coming in to the market which are susceptible. Some of these are coming from places where we know the nearest relatives of the virus are found. So theres the real red flag.

Now the Chinese group did swab those animals, and they were all negative, but its just one small group of animals in the freezer that were left behind. We dont know what else was for sale there. So these two clues are really important.

When we got to actually visit the market, to me it was quite striking. The pictures you see of that market closed now are of quite orderly buildings with shutters, and you think, This a very efficient, typical city market. It doesnt really look like a live animal market. Once you get there on the ground, its different. Its pretty ramshackle.

It looks like a place that would sell live animals. Theres plenty of evidence of live aquatic animals, the turtle tanks, the fish tanks, the snakes, which we know were available. What we now have are a clear link and a potential pathway.

Q: What about the cases that appeared before the outbreak in the seafood market?

A: There was other spread going on outside of Huanan market. There are other patients who have no links to the market, quite a few in December. There were other markets. And we do know that some of the patients had links to other markets. We need to do some further work, and then the Chinese colleagues need to do some further work.

When we sat down as a group, the China team and the WHO team on the last full day of work, and said, Lets go through the hypotheses, the one that received the most enthusiastic support was this pathway  wildlife, through a domesticated wildlife link, into Wuhan.

Q: What is the next step?

A: For the animals chain, its straightforward. The suppliers are known. They know the farm name; they know the owner of the farm. Youve got to go down to the farm and interview the farmer and the family. Youve got to test them. Youve got to test the community. Youve got to go and look and see if there are any animals left at any farms nearby and see if theyve got evidence of infection, and see if there is any cross-border movement. If the virus is in those southern border states, its possible that theres been some movement across neighboring countries like Vietnam, Laos or Myanmar. Were finding more and more related viruses now. Theres one in Japan and one in Cambodia, one in Thailand.

For the human side, look for earlier cases, for clusters; look in blood banks for serum, if possible. Anything like this is going to be sensitive in China, and its going to take some persuasion and diplomacy and energy for them to do that because, to be honest, looking for the source of this virus within China is not a great, high priority I think for the Chinese government. Anywhere this virus is shown to emerge is a political issue. Thats one of the problems, and that is clear and obvious to anyone who has been looking at this.

Q: Do you have a particular animal that you suspect right now as an intermediate link, more strongly than others?

A: Its too up in the air. We dont know if civets were on sale. We know they are very easily infected. We dont know what the situation is with the mink farms in China or the other fur farms, like raccoon dogs, even though theyre normally farmed in a different part of China. That needs to be followed up on, too.

But if you were to say which pathway would you put the most weight on, I think the virus emerging either in Southeast Asia or Southern China from bats, getting into a domesticated wildlife farm. Ive been to many of these, and they often have mixed species  civets, ferret badgers, raccoon dogs. Those animals would be able to get infected from bats.

Either the people that work there get infected and bring it in, or animals are shipped in, live or recently killed, that bring the virus into a market. Once its in a market  either Huanan or another one in Wuhan  youve got a dense population of people moving through those markets. And its going to be a real potential for an amplification.

Q: The new data that you saw, for instance, on the vendors and their supply chains, will that be in your full report?

A: I hope so. Therell be some things that are going to be confidential, without a doubt. Patient records are kept highly confidential in China. We have an image in the West of China being authoritarian and they are videoing everyone. They can have access to anything. But patient records are very private, and some are not accessible.

We wanted to meet with certain patients. They didnt want to meet, so they werent pushed to meet with us. Theres no reason to believe that was shenanigans. Im hoping all the information about vendors, vendor chains will be there. But if not, weve seen it. Weve got it. And we will be following up.

James Gorman. c.2021 The New York Times Company
Grants for debris removal and COVID-19 mitigation will be up for discussion at the county board's next meeting on Tuesday.

During their next regular meeting on Feb. 16, the Midland County Board of Commissioners will consider the acceptance of a grant award in the amount of $7,500 from DuPont Specialty Products. The purpose of the grant would be to assist with debris removal throughout the county park system resulting from the mid-Michigan dam failures of May 2020, according to the upcoming meeting agenda.
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Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 15 : Kerala's rebel NCP MLA Mani C. Kappen on Monday constituted a 10-member committee which was given the task of floating a new party and also to decide its name and symbol.

Kappen expects results from the committee in a week's time.

"The committee is chaired by Kappen and hold a meeting in the state capital soon and by two weeks we expect to finalise even the state office bearers," said a NCP leader on condition of anonymity.

The decision of floating a new party was taken soon after Kappen met top UDF leaders on Sunday.

Last week the Kerala unit of the NCP, presently an ally of the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF), split when Kappen who leads the breakaway faction announced his decision to quit the LDF.

On Sunday he joined the Congress-led UDF at a rally led by Leader of Opposition Ramesh Chennithala.

The entire top brass of the UDF was present to receive Kappen at his home in Pala Assembly constituency in Kottayam district.

Each of them spoke against the raw deal given by the CPI-M leadership for dumping Kappen in favour of a party which he had defeated in a bypoll in 2019.

Kappen opened up on Saturday after arriving from Delhi, where the state NCP leadership had a meeting with its national president over the impasse in the state unit.

NCP in Kerala over the years has been an ally of the Left and had two legislators, including a state minister, while a third seat is vacant after the death of one of their sitting legislators in 2019.

NCP got a major boost when Kappen won the Pala Assembly seat in 2019, following the death of veteran K.M. Mani who was the legislator from Pala since its inception in 1967 and had not lost a single Assembly election.

Kappen who lost to Mani in 2011 and 2016, won the seat in 2019 as K.M. Mani's party - Kerala Congress (Mani) failed to capitalise on the sympathy factor.

But things nosedived for Kappen ever since K.M. Mani's son, Jose K. Mani, who now leads the Kerala Congress (Mani) along with his supporters, became an ally of the LDF, while its other faction led by P.J. Joseph continued in the UDF.

And it became more evident after the LDF's success in the local body polls in December, especially in districts like Kottayam and Pathanamthitta, where Jose K. Mani was able to bring in more seats for the Left.

There were also whispers that Kappen would have to vacate his seat in the upcoming Assembly polls in April-May for Jose K. Mani who has already quit the Rajya Sabha and is all set to contest from Pala.

Kappen also announced that he would launch his election campaign as part of the opposition UDF next week.

With Kappen also announcing a new party it would be the 25th political party presently aligned to one of the three political fronts in the state which has a representation in the 140-member Kerala Assembly.

While the ruling Left has 12 parties, the UDF has seven, while the BJP-led NDA has five with 18 other parties which are not part of any political front.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Lucknow, Feb 15 : Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath plans to construct a medical college in each of the 75 districts of Uttar Pradesh.

The medical colleges will soon be opened on the Public-Private-Partnership model in 16 districts of the state that do not have any college till now while others will be upgraded. The Uttar Pradesh Government will soon introduce a new policy on this.

According to the government spokesman, the state government wants to strengthen health facilities at the grassroots level and the government will increase the number of health centres in rural and urban areas. Super-specialty hospitals will be constructed in districts including Gorakhpur, Agra, and Varanasi.

Two months ago, while interacting with some top businessmen in Mumbai, the chief minister had said, "Out of a total of 75 districts in Uttar Pradesh, many still require medical colleges. There is an opportunity for investors to make these medical colleges on the PPP model." He had said that the state needs super-specialty hospitals and the government will extend full support if somebody wants to set up these hospitals.

The state government now is working towards making Uttar Pradesh a hub of medical education, where not only the people of the state but people from other countries can get all types of medical facilities.

The establishment of AIIMS in Gorakhpur and Rae Bareli is already proving to be a milestone in terms of the state's medical education and health facilities.

The government also plans to set up labs in hospitals of every district to deal with a situation like the COVID-19 pandemic.

For this, the Department of Medical and Health will seek the cooperation of Rs 20 lakh crore from the central government.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Almost two years after he had clinched a "historical" judicial ruling in favour of pensioners, renowned Egyptian labour rights leader El-Badri Farghaly passed away on Monday at the age of 74 due to complications following surgery.

The news was announced by the leftist political party Al-Tagammu, which Farghaly was an prominent member of since its foundation in 1978.

Born in 1947 in Port Said governorate, Farghaly started his career in the 1960s as a worker at the port of the Suez Canal city before he drifted into public affairs work through the country's local councils in 1979.

Eleven years later, he was elected in the People's Assembly, presently known as the House of Representatives, four times in a row during the 30-year tenure of former president Hosni Mubarak.

From 1990 to 2010, the late MP was an advocate of labourers' rights and a voice of dissent against the economic policies and performance of Mubarak-era ministers.

Mubarak-era finance minister Youssef Boutros-Ghali had repeatedly been assailed by the late MP in objection to his performance, especially the pension law that Boutros-Ghali proposed back then and his management of pension funds.

Farghaly was also elected in the 2011 People's Assembly, Egypt's first post-Mubarak legislative body, which was dissolved a year later by a verdict issued by the Egyptian High Constitutional Court.

Following his parliamentary role, he presided over the Egyptian General Union of Pensioners.

On 21 February 2019, Farghaly won a court ruling in favour of pensioners, under which they were paid overdue bonuses at a rate of 80 percent of the basic salary. He later described the verdict as a "historical" step.

In his latest TV interview in 2018, Farghaly said he would defend workers' rights "from the cradle to the grave."

Several Egyptian political parties expressed their condolences for the passing of the former MP.
Gov Bala Mohammed of Bauchi state, on Sunday, explained himself over a comment he made about Fulani herdsmen carrying Ak-47 rifles for self-defence

The Governors clarification was contained in a statement issued by Mukhtar Gidado, his Senior Special Assistant (SSA) on media, said.

Mr Mohammed said the primary objective of his comment was to avert the dangerous prospect of a nation-wide backlash and generalisation of the Fulani clan as criminals.

According to the statement, Mr Mohammed said it would be inappropriate to label an entire tribe as criminals, based on the crimes of a few members of the ethnic group.

The attention of the Bauchi State government has been drawn to reactions from various members of the public to gov. Mohammeds speech, at the closing ceremony of the Press Week of the Correspondents Chapel of the NUJ in Bauchi State, last Thursday.

The Governor used the occasion to weigh in on the contentious issue of clashes between herdsmen and farmers, particularly against the backdrop of the eviction and other forms of restriction orders, issued by some state governments and non-governmental entities.

The primary objective of the Governor was to avert the dangerous prospect of a nation-wide backlash as tempers flared and given that the phenomenon of inter-ethnic migration, is a national pastime involving all ethnic groups in Nigeria.

By extension, the Governor made it abundantly clear that it will be inappropriate to label any one tribe based on the crimes of a few members of the ethnic group, said the SSA.

The statement further stressed that the governors reference to AK47 was simply to put in perspective the predicament and desperation of those law-abiding Fulani herdsmen who, while carrying out their legitimate cow-rearing business, have become serial victims of cattle rustling, banditry, kidnapping and assassination.

He said these were the people who, in the absence of any protection from the security agencies, are forced to resort to self-help, to defend both their means of livelihood and their lives.

As a Constitutionalist which, he has proved over time, all through his political career, gov. Mohammed will be the last person to advocate a subversion of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. He did not do so in the past; he will not do so today, Gidado said.

The statement explained further that Mr Mohammeds description of forests, as no mans land is a carry-over from his own geo-political environment where a pastoralist could set up camp, in any forest, for a few weeks without causing any uproar or opposition.

To interpret such a temporary stay as a form of land grab by the Fulani herdsmen is completely incorrect.

In actual fact, neither does such temporary habitation of the forest inconvenience anyone nor does the itinerant Fulani sojourner, bother anyone about his plight in the forest characterised by life without access to electricity, pipe borne water, good roads or hospitals.

On the contrary, Mohammed is very familiar with the Land Use Act, including the criteria for land acquisition and cannot, therefore, seek to undermine the statute which, as governor, he has sworn to uphold, he said.

Mr Gidado said the governors statement was intended to caution all stakeholders to guard against escalating the tension, just as many patriotic stakeholders, particularly from the North, have been working round the clock to avert reprisal actions that could throw the entire country into a cauldron of unimaginable proportions.

Rather than vilify Gov. Mohammed, it is incumbent on all those criticising him to admonish those governors whose lack of restraint is responsible for the escalation of this crisis.

Mohammeds antecedents, as a bridge-builder, humanist and nationalist, are so well known that he will never, under any circumstances, deliberately fuel any national crisis or subvert the Constitution, the statement said. (NAN)

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WESTFIELD  Columbia Manufacturing Inc. began as the countrys first bicycle maker in 1877 and switched gears to school furniture in the 1950s, a line that became the companys mainstay.

In 1993, so it could focus solely on school furniture, Columbia authorized another company to make bicycles.

The company has a tradition of reinventing itself, says Ali R. Salehi, president and CEO.

That tradition of reinvention was harnessed again during the COVID-19 pandemic. Columbia was faced with a decline in demand for school furniture as districts switched to remote learning and budgets tightened amid economic uncertainty.

Volume took a major, major hit, he explains. School construction stopped or slowed. And, school systems steered funding toward the purchase of personal protective equipment (PPE).

In March and April, as the coronavirus spread worsened, Columbia Manufacturing looked to see what it could make to help prevent virus transmission and assist front-line workers, according to Salehi.

Because of COVID, we did design several new PPE designs, he says. You have to use every resource at your disposal. You have to think outside the box.

In March, Columbia renewed its focus on a mobile nursing cart, something which had been in the works. The company also began making polycarbonate shields in customizable sizes for libraries, schools, offices and other workplace environments. It also produced foldable privacy panels, face shields for retailers and over-the-bed pull trays.

A major metropolitan hospital was in dire need of privacy panels and reached out to Columbia for the product, Salehi recalls. In addition, the company made 32,000 disposable gowns for a Western Massachusetts healthcare system.

To this day, the orders for face shields continues, he says.

Protective shields were sold throughout New England and as far away as North Carolina and Texas, according to Salehi. He says Columbia will continue producing them as long as there is a demand. In this region, the buyers are as diverse as Suffield Academy and Westfields Short Stop Bar & Grill, which is using the shields between booths and tables.

The PPE segment is a small part of what we make right now, Salehi says, noting school furniture remains its core product. You have to reinvent yourself. If you stay stagnant, you will be written off the face of the Earth, he says.

This isnt the first time Columbia has contributed during a time of crisis for the nation, according to Salehi.

During World War II, Columbia was the only manufacturer permitted to make bicycles for the government. They made the first foldable bicycle for paratroopers, who attached them to parachutes and then used them on the ground in the fight against the Nazis in Europe. Columbia also made shell, bomb and bazooka casings here for the war effort, he said.

Last year, as Columbia was pivoting its production to PPE and other products, Salehi said he was faced with the difficulty of finding skilled workers, particularly welders, over the summer months, Columbias busiest time. Potential workers had fears about going to work and contracting the virus. Others may have been collecting unemployment, exacerbating the lack of available workers, he said. Overtime was utilized to cope with the worker shortage, he said.

Columbias business is seasonal because of the nature of the work, and usually employs between 75 and 80 employees during its peak.

Trends have completely changed from a year ago as a result of the coronavirus.

Before, Salehi says, collaborative learning was emphasized with conjoined desks, but now districts want individual desks and units, to practice social distancing. For example, a unit that promotes social distancing that they didnt sell more than 500 of over the past five years has become popular, with Columbia selling 2,000 in a short period recently, he said.

All of Columbias products are made here in Western Massachusetts with pride and integrity. Says Salehi, Columbia is truly the only remaining all-American manufacturer of school furniture in this country. We manufacture all of our frames here.

Weve always been a leader in this industry, Salehi says. Years ago, they may have had only five or six competitors, whereas now there are more than 20 competitors around the world.

The products we make are like Sherman tanks, he says. They dont die.

Columbias school furniture can be found in districts such as Springfield, East Longmeadow, Easthampton, Westfield, West Springfield, Agawam and Longmeadow. The company also has contracts with Boston, and New York City, the largest school system in the country.

In 1897, company founder Col. Albert Pope opened the Westfield plant, which today has more than 250,000 square feet of manufacturing, office and storage space at the Cycle Street facility. Company legend states that automaker Henry Ford visited Columbia to learn assembly line technology.

Salehi, who has been with Columbia for more than 25 years, was recently appointed to a five-year term on Westfield State Universitys board of trustees by Gov. Charles Baker.

Until COVID hit, the business forecast for 2020 was very good, according to Salehi. As a private company, Columbia does not release sales numbers.

He is anticipating a much better year for 2021 due to pent-up demand for his products as schools return to in-person learning. The lasting power of a small manufacturing company in Massachusetts is always a concern, but Salehi says Columbia is a survivor.

The company, over the course of its almost 150-year history, has proven resilient, surviving the challenges of several recessions as well as the Great Depression, he notes.

Our outlook is great. We have a very bright future, Salehi says. We are a hidden gem in Western Massachusetts.

Related Content:

Inside Columbia Manufacturing: Westfield school desk maker looks to future
A passenger walks past a sign directing people to a CCP virus testing site adjacent to Terminal 1 of Manchester Airport in Manchester, northern England on Dec. 3, 2020. (Oli Scarff/AFP via Getty Images)

Save Our Summer! UK Firms Demand PM Reopen Travel by May

More than 100 British businesses in the travel industry have teamed up to launch a Save our Summer (SOS) campaign, calling on the government to lift travel restrictions by May to save millions of jobs in the industry.

The travel firms are urging Prime Minister Boris Johnson to signal that consumers can book overseas travel for holidays, business trips, and family visits from May 1, when the most vulnerable will have received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Johnson is due to reveal his plan for exiting lockdown on Feb. 22.

Official figures show that the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus infection rate has been dropping steadily in recent weeks. And the government announced on Sunday that 15 million people across the UK had received the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Were launching #SaveOurSummer to get @BorisJohnson to re-open the UK and overseas travel sector by 1st May. You can book now with confidence. Sign up to support via the https://t.co/S7mfW90PGj website and please retweet. pic.twitter.com/bb9p3GYjdk  SOSTravel (@SOSTravel3) February 14, 2021

The SOS group are asking the prime minister to replace blanket quarantine with extensive testing, if needed for arrivals and departures, as demonstrated successfully in countries like South Korea, according to group co-founders Paul Charles, CEO of The PC Agency, and Henry Morley, CEO of True Travel, writing in The Telegraph on Monday.

Without a target date being set, millions of jobs and businesses in the travel sector are under immediate threat of collapse and the prime minister is the only person who can save them, they wrote.

The travel bosses complained that government ministers have done their best to torpedo the entire travel sector by telling UK citizens not even to book a holiday in the UK or abroad, adding, An industry which employs more than 1 in 10 jobs in the UK and represents 10 percent of our GDP has been pummelled from pillar to post in the last 12 months. Enough is enough.

They said that their newly launched Save Our Summer campaign is an SOS from the entire travel sectorfrom aviation to tour operators, hotel groups to cruise linesas the government appears to have no strategy for rebuilding and boosting the travel sector as we emerge out of lockdown.

They accused government ministers of breaking their promise.

We were told that once the vulnerable had been vaccinated that restrictions would be eased and we could recommence operations. Yet the current tone is one of keeping travel bans in place, and relying on a failing quarantine strategy.

This rhetoric brings into question what the point of vaccinating the top nine vulnerable groups is if we cant then resume our lives and livelihoods? they asked.

The travel firms that have so far signed up to the SOS group have promised to offer a refund or rebooking if travel booked for the summer is cancelled due to COVID-19 restrictions.

Also on Monday, Brittany Ferries, an operator of ferry services across the English Channel, called on the government to re-open travel corridors between the UK and continental Europe.

Citing progress in vaccination not just in the UK but also in France and Spain, Brittany Ferries CEO Christophe Mathieu said that by spring we think there will be a clear case for the adoption of vaccination-led travel corridors.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the Department for Transport for comment.

Lily Zhou contributed to this report.
On February 5, three Democratic Party US Senators introduced legislation called the Safeguarding Against Fraud, Exploitation, Threats, Extremism and Consumer Harms (SAFE TECH) Act, which would modify laws that provide internet companies with legal protections for content posted on their platforms by users.

In a press release accompanying the draft legislation, US Senators Mark Warner of Virginia, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota state that their proposal aims to allow social media companies to be held accountable for enabling cyber-stalking, targeted harassment, and discrimination on their platforms.

Senator Warner says in the press statement that the Section 230 provisions are outdated and ineffective and have enabled internet companies to do nothing to address foreseeable, obvious and repeated misuse of their products and services to cause harm. Warner claims that the 1996 law has provided a Get Out of Jail Free card and allowed scam artists, harassers and violent extremists to cause damage and injury on the giant social media monopolies platforms.

This Oct. 23, 2019, file photo shows Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifying before a House Financial Services Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo)

Furthermore, Warner states the proposed bill doesnt interfere with free speech, but holds the online firms accountable for harmful, often criminal behavior enabled by their platforms to which they have turned a blind eye for too long.

The language of Section 230 as contained in the 1996 Communications Decency Act is brief. It states, No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information speech provided by another information content provider. This statement has functioned for twenty-five years as a legal shield for internet companies, including the social media platforms, to both moderate content that violates the law and their own community standards without also being liable for everything that users post on their systems.

In an example of the way Section 230 works, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in July 2019 affirmed a lower courts decision that Facebook could not be held liable for violent attacks coordinated and encouraged by user accounts linked to Hamas, the militant Islamist group. A court majority opinion said Section 230, should be construed broadly in favor of immunity.

Another explanation of the law says that as long as it cannot be proven that an internet service provider is knowingly helping a user commit a crime, any illegal content posted on a platform is the responsibility of the user alone.

The key modification to Section 230 by the SAFE TECH Act proposal is that it would lift the immunity protections for service providers where payments are involved. The edits would reduce the phrase information speech to just speech and then add the following to the end of the sentence: except to the extent the provider or user has accepted payment to make the speech available or, in whole or in part, created or funded the creation of the speech.

Some online information experts argue that these changes are significant and would effectively destroy the speech protections that have been in place since 1996. Jeff Kosseff, a cybersecurity law professor at the US Naval Academy who authored the book The Twenty-Six Words That Created the Internet, told TechCrunch, A good lawyer could argue that this covers many different types of arrangements that go far beyond paid advertisements. Platforms accept payments from a wide range of parties during the course of making speech available to the public. The bill does not limit the exception to cases in which platforms accept payments from the speaker.

Meanwhile, Oregon Democratic Senator Ron Wyden, who is one of the original authors of Section 230, also told TechCrunch that, while the SAFE TECH Act draft bill may be well-intentioned, it would, devastate every part of the open internet, and cause massive collateral damage to online speech.

Wyden also said, Creating liability for all commercial relationships would cause web hosts, cloud storage providers and even paid email services to purge their networks of any controversial speech. Others have warned that the language of the bill would impact many other paid services from Substack and Patreononline platforms that enable bloggers, artists, musicians, podcasters, writers and videographers to offer their exclusive content to audiences for feesto other kinds of premium online content to web hosting.

The latest proposal from Warner, Hirono and Klobuchar is not the only legislative initiative aimed to fix Section 230. In June, Senators Brian Schatz (Democrat, Hawaii) and John Thune (Republican, South Dakota) introduced the Platform Accountability and Consumer Transparency (PACT) Act as a bipartisan effort to update the pivotal sentence in the 1996 law.

At the time, Schatz and Thune described their bill as strengthening transparency in the process online platforms use to moderate content and hold those companies accountable for content that violates their own policies or is illegal. Critics of the proposal said the PACT Act would do more harm than good and referred to the provision that internet service providers had to publish an acceptable use policy and also set up a call center with live human beings responding to anyone who is upset about user moderation choices as dumb.

Another proposal championed in July by Senators Lindsay Graham (Republican, South Carolina) and Richard Blumenthal (Democrat, Connecticut) and supported by the Senate Judiciary Committee called the Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies (EARN IT) Act was widely criticized as both an attack on online speech and a stealth effort to force through back door access to strong encryption on consumer-level electronic devices and software providers by law enforcement.

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal on Saturday, there are 34 different legislative proposals to update Section 230 from Democrats and Republicans in the House of Representatives, the Senate and the White House. The Journal which describes Section 230 as the foundational covenant between the government and internet platformmakes the point that the question of how to fix the internet with updates to Section 230 is far-reaching and complex.

Many experts have commented on the fact the provisions of the 1996 Communications Decency Act were adopted in an era of the internet and World Wide Web when the distinction between online service providers and online content publishers was much clearer than today. The emerging contradictions over liability for illegal content as well as moderation policies express, in part, the blurring of the lines by social media platforms such as Facebook that simultaneously exhibit the attributes of both a service provider and a publisher.

The clash of these objective characteristics of social media with outdated and inadequate legal framework are further exacerbated by the conflict between the private ownership and management of the online platforms for profit and the national base of this property relationship with the mass daily content creation and consumption activity of billions of people across the entire globe.

While many of the proposals to update the US law focus on harassment, intimidation and cyber-stalking, a far more important consideration for the Democrats and Republicans is making changes that will rein in and control online content, especially to prevent the development of anti-capitalist and socialist political ideas from going viral on the platforms.

It is no accident that the stepped-up drive to overturn the Section 230 immunity provisions is taking place amid the general breakdown of democratic forms of rule and the growth of fascist political movements within the US and around the world. These are both a response of the ruling establishment to the emerging struggle of the working class against global capitalism.
11th round of India-China military commander level talks likely to be held on Friday

As India-China stalemate continues, top IAF officers grouping to be held this week

India stood up Chinas disruptive use of technology and my way or no way attitude: CDS

Disengagement at Pangong Tso taking place faster than expected: Sources

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: India is keeping a close watch on the disengagement at Pangong Tso. Sources tell OneIndia that the disengagement is taking place faster than expected. There is a good chance that the process will be completed at the north and south banks of the Pangong Lake by Friday, the source cited above also said.

There is rapid movement of Chinese heavy vehicles beyond Finger 8, satellite images have shown.

While armoured elements like battle tanks and armoured personnel carriers are being withdrawn from friction points in the south bank of Pangong Tso, troops are being pulled back from the north bank areas, sources said.

Disengagement process at Pangong Tso to be complete by Friday

The sources said withdrawal of armoured elements from the south bank of Pangong Tso is almost complete and temporary structures erected by both sides will be demolished in the next few days.

"The disengagement process will take time as both sides are together carrying out verification of the withdrawal of troops and military hardware," said a source.

The disengagement of troops and armoured elements is limited to the friction points where the two sides were on an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation, sources said.

After a nine-month standoff, the two militaries reached the agreement on disengagement in the north and south banks of Pangong lake that mandates both sides to cease forward deployment of troops in a "phased, coordinated and verifiable" manner.

On Thursday, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh made a detailed statement in Parliament on the disengagement pact.

Disengagement process on at Pangong Tso

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

According to the agreement, China has to pull back its troops to east of Finger 8 areas in the northern bank while the Indian personnel will be based at their permanent base at Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 in the region.

Similar action will take place on the south bank of the lake as well, Singh said in Parliament.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 8:49 [IST]
Press Release

15 February 2021

London, UK - The highly-anticipated World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) 20th Global Summit, will now take place in April - one month later than the originally planned date.

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The Global Summit is being organised in partnership with the Government of Quintana Roo in Mexico and will be held in Cancun, Mexico on 25-27 April.

WTTC, which represents the global Travel & Tourism private sector, has taken the decision to move its Global Summit from March into April to coincide with the expected relaxation of travel restrictions and the beginning of the sector's recovery.

While Cancun is ready to host the Global Summit now, the international organisation is confident that rescheduling the event will enable more international participants to take part and help lead the sector into recovery.

The Global Summit will be a fantastic opportunity to showcase what both Mexico and Cancun have to offer as a destination, along with the world-class health and safety protocols that have been implemented to host such an event.

The event will take place in a hybrid format, allowing those unable to travel to benefit from the content virtually.

WTTC's annual Global Summit is the most important Travel & Tourism event in the calendar, where the highest-level industry leaders meet with key government leaders to act on the biggest and most important issues across the global agenda.

Gloria Guevara, WTTC President & CEO, said: "While Cancun is ready to host our Global Summit as planned, we believe that moving the event back by just a few weeks, will enable people from many more regions around the world to attend the event, in beautiful Cancun, one of the most popular destinations in the world."

"As the global vaccination rollout picks up pace and with international mobility rules expected to be relaxed over the coming weeks, more people from key regions will be able to participate and add to the conversation for the path to recovery."

"Those unable to attend the event in person, will be able to join virtually from anywhere in the world."

"The Travel & Tourism sector has been devasted by the COVID-19 pandemic, with more than 174m jobs impacted, making our Global Summit more relevant and important than ever. The WTTC Summit is the most important global platform for leaders of the sector to set the path forward, share the future of travel with the world and accelerate the sector's recovery."

"WTTC also wants to showcase how we can use this experience to adapt to COVID-19 and lead the global Travel & Tourism sector back to recovery and restore millions of jobs and livelihoods which have been thrown into turmoil since the beginning of last year."
The Nigerian Police has deployed its intervention and stabilisation forces to Oyo State to restore law and order after the ethnic crisis that affected parts of the state capital.

The police stated this in a statement on Monday by its spokesperson, Frank Mba.

Mr Mba said the forces would reclaim the public space, reinforce security and bolster public confidence in the areas affected by the recent crisis in the state.

PREMIUM TIMES reported how several people reportedly died in an ethnic clash between Hausa and Yoruba ethnic groups last week.

The crisis was triggered by an alleged stabbing of a Yoruba cobbler by a Hausa cart pusher in Sasha market, Ibadan.

To forestall breakdown of law and order in the market and its environs, Governor Seyi Makinde on Saturday imposed an indefinite curfew in the area.

Reinforce, stabilise security

In the statement by Mr Mba, the forces, which include four units of the Mobile Police Force, are to ensure that security is stabilised in the area.

It said the intervention and stabilisation forces would be coordinated by a Deputy Inspector General of Police, David Folawiyo, who is in charge of the south-west.

The deployments, consisting largely of intelligence and operational assets of the Force, include four (4) Units of the Police Mobile Force (PMF), seasoned operatives from the Force Intelligence Bureau and one (1) operational/surveillance Police helicopter from the Police Air-wing department.

The Intervention Forces are charged with the responsibility of reinforcing and stabilising security in the State, preventing further breakdown of law and order, protecting lives and properties and ultimately enhancing public safety and general security in the state.

The Intervention Forces are being coordinated by a Deputy Inspector General of Police, DIG David Folawiyo, mni who is expected to mobilize all relevant stakeholders towards achieving the mandate of the squad..

The IGP assures that the Force is committed to the safety of lives and properties of the citizens in the country. He calls on the citizens and residents of Oyo State and other Nigerians to embrace peace and cooperate with the Police and the security community as they redouble their efforts in ensuring that sustainable peace and security are restored to the affected areas, the statement read.

PDP laments Ibadan crisis, calls for calm, investigation

Meanwhile, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) said it was deeply disturbed by the ethnic clashes in Ibadan, which led to loss of several lives.

The party described the clashes as disconcerting and called for calm while the authorities unravel the remote and immediate cause of the crises.

The PDP, in a statement by its spokesperson, Kola Ologbomdiyan, lamented the escalation of ethnic crisis in various parts of the country, which it said was largely traced to indignations occasioned by the divisive policies and tendencies of the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led federal government.

Our party urges the APC and its federal government to bring a lasting solution to the growing tension in the country by ending its policies, body language and preferences that promote divisiveness, lawlessness, injustices as well as infractions against our federal sensibilities, the statement said.

The PDP, however, commended Mr Makinde of Oyo State for his proactive steps to restore order in the state.

It added, Our party commiserates with the victims of the clash and call on all people of good faith to rally in ensuring peaceful co-existence in our country by instilling justice, adherence to rule of law as well as respect for our federal sensibilities.

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GSI is one of the largest gemological organizations in the world with 13 laboratories globally. GSIs four pillars  integrity, innovation, professional service, and research & education  serve as the backbone of its business and provide a layer of protection for their customers.

Because GSI utilizes leading-edge technologies and automated processes and software - its able to offer uncompromising accuracy, reliability and consistency.

GSI offers a variety of products and services including natural diamond grading reports, laboratory-grown diamond reports, gemstone identification and origin reports, educational courses and much more.

In this interview given to Rough&Polished, Debbie Azar shares her insights on diamond grading and the industry.

Please give a brief overview of Gemological Science International for our readers.

Gemological Science International (GSI) is one of the largest gemological organizations in the world with 13 laboratories globally. As an industry leader, GSI focuses on research, education, grading and certification of natural diamonds and laboratory-grown diamonds as well as colored gemstone identification and origin. Founded in 2005, GSI has grown to become one of the largest gemological entities in the world. We are committed to advancing gemological research and to offer educational programs for trade professionals at all levels.

What made its founders start this business? And what niche is GSI now occupying in the market?

In early 2005, Mark Gershburg and I together founded GSI as a new and innovative lab designed to leverage new technologies, improve trade efficiencies, enhance consumers experience, and meet the rapidly changing needs of the jewelry industry in the 21st century. We noticed that there was a significant gap in the industry in certification, testing, as well as research and education.

How many laboratories does GSI have around the world?

Headquartered in New York, GSI has 13 laboratories making us one of the largest independent gemological organizations in the world.

It sometimes occurs that the characteristics of a diamond reported by one lab differ from those reported by another lab. Why is this happening?

Your observation is correct. Different labs grade differently. There can be many reasons, including different laboratory or organizational standards, different types of ownership and stakeholders, and differences between global locations.

The reality is that there is no standardization when it comes to gemological laboratories and diamond grading and that is something that has been a polarizing issue in our industry for a few reasons.

At GSI we have processes to provide consistent grading in all our laboratories globally with quality control and quality assurance protocols. We ensure every grader grades to GSIs high standards.

Your laboratories are grading natural and lab-grown diamonds. Which ones are generally better in terms of 4Cs?

Natural and laboratory-grown diamonds are graded on the same scale for the 4 Cs. Whether a diamond is natural or laboratory-grown, it is assessed for cut, color, clarity, and carat weight the same way. We encounter natural and laboratory-grown diamonds with the same grades every day. The main differences can include subtle color undertones and different types of inclusions. Both natural and laboratory-grown diamonds come in all sizes, shapes, cuts, clarities, and colors.





GSI lab Image credit: GSI

In a recent press release, GSI mentioned cases where natural diamonds were admixed to laboratory-grown diamonds. How often do your laboratories encounter such phenomena and how can this be explained?

We first saw this happening back in 2018 but on a very small scale. Lately, during our normal grading process for laboratory-grown diamond jewelry we have been seeing this much more frequently. This is why we decided to share our findings with the jewelry industry  because it is important to know what to look for, especially with something as counterintuitive as looking for undisclosed natural diamonds amongst lab-grown diamonds. It signifies the growing prevalence of mixing natural diamonds and laboratory-grown diamonds. This discovery highlights the importance of proper gemological testing and disclosures. And, of course, how imperative it is for us to continue our research and to stay ahead of new developments.

Should there be separate natural and lab-grown diamond markets, or should there be one market for both?

Im completely unbiased here since GSI issues grading reports for both! And I do believe that each has their place in the market. Its similar to cultured pearls and natural pearls or natural-colored gemstones and created-colored gemstones. In my opinion, laboratory- grown diamonds are here to stay and the best thing we can do is make sure there is clear transparency so the two can co-exist without confusion. Thats one of the reasons GSI made the decision to disclose growth process and any post growth treatments on its grading reports back in March 2020 -- we were the first laboratory to do this and are happy the other laboratories followed our lead recently.

How do you think the market has changed since De Beers launched the production of lab-grown diamonds and how has this influenced the competition between natural and lab-grown diamonds?

De Beers launched the production of laboratory-grown diamonds for industrial purposes with a patent in 1959 and started commercial production by 1961. Gem-quality laboratory-grown diamonds were first developed in the 1970s and did not emerge onto the jewelry market until about the 1980s. That means that laboratory-grown diamonds have been around a long time. As technology evolves, so do laboratory-grown production methods, which improves the quality of the laboratory-grown diamonds and makes them more cost effective to grow. As the availability of laboratory-grown diamonds increases and the marketing of them creates desire for them, competition will inevitably happen.

That being said, I believe that natural and laboratory-grown diamonds are two separate products that can complement each other through their unique features and benefits.

They both increase demand for diamonds and jewelry, which is a good thing! There may be a period of price adjusting, but I believe they will both eventually settle into their own place in the market.

As a gemologist, what kind of gemstones do you prefer - natural or lab-grown?

I like working with both. You can learn or see something new every day from a natural diamond or a laboratory-grown diamond. Through our daily testing of all natural and laboratory-grown diamonds that flow through our global laboratories daily we are constantly detecting nuances and phenomenon.

At GSI, our gemologists, scientists and researchers appreciate and study all gem materials.

The past year marked by the COVID-19 pandemic has brought about great changes for many companies in delivering their services. How has this influenced your business?

The pandemic was definitely a challenge at the beginning, primarily because we have laboratories across the globe. Some had to shut down for a bit, some of us had to work from home, and others remained open with limited staff. We have an incredible team and overall, the year ended up being positive.

We took the down time to take the opportunity to focus on developing things that we would not otherwise be able to focus on when we are working on our daily routine.

We were able to focus more on research and education. We developed some new educational initiatives that we launched in the beginning of the year as well as some research articles that we plan to publish soon.

Tell us about your hopes and vision for the current year, 2021.

We hope the world will recover and we can regain some semblance of normal and embrace the new normal. We have so many exciting projects, from launching our Laboratory-Grown Essentials course to complement our Diamond Essentials course, to continuing research and development work, and even opening new global GSI locations. Stay tuned for more information!

The sky is the limit. We plan to continue to support the overall health of the jewelry industry and contribute to it through our research and education. Most of all, we have hope that the jewelry industry will thrive, and we are honored to be a part of it.

Vladimir Malakhov, Rough&Polished

Tributes have been paid to Sir William Macpherson, the judge who led the damning report into the Metropolitan Police after the murder of Stephen Lawrence, after his death at the age of 94.

Sir William produced an historic report into the death of the teenager in which the country's biggest police was described as 'institutionally racist'.

The bombshell inquiry in 1999 paved the way for sweeping reform at Scotland Yard and led to the abolition of the double jeopardy law.

Sir William Macpherson of Cluny and Blairgowrie served as an officer in the Scots Guards and Special Air Service in the Second World War, before pursuing a career in law and going on to become a High Court judge.

But his career-defining moment came when he was chosen to lead the inquiry into the racially-motivated murder of 18-year-old Stephen, who was stabbed to death while waiting for a bus in Eltham, South-East London, in 1993.

A statement on the Clan Macpherson website said that the clan's 27th Chief, Sir William Macpherson of Cluny and Blairgowrie died 'peacefully at home' on February 14, surrounded by his family.

Sir William Macpherson of Cluny and Blairgowrie, who served as a High Court judge, passed away at his family home at the age of 94

Sir William was a Judge of the High Court of England and Wales (Queen's Bench Division) where he served as presiding judge of the Northern Circuit until his retirement in April 1996

Sir William Macpherson led the inquiry, advised by Tom Cook, a retired deputy chief constable, Dr John Sentamu, the Bishop for Stepney, and Dr Richard Stone, the chair of the Jewish Council for Racial Equality

It said: 'We were fortunate to have had his guidance, support and leadership for an incredible 50 years and the world will have benefited from his 94 years on this earth.

'His phrase 'first amongst equals' doesn't even start to mark the presence he had.

'Through his work in law (what better epitaph could someone wish for than the phrase used by a journalist 'He made Britain a better place for me to live') to his leadership at the after-ceilidh-ceilidh he was a man who left his mark on those he met.'

Sir William served in the Scots Guards between 1944 and 1947 before pursuing a career in law

Sir William was a Judge of the High Court of England and Wales (Queen's Bench Division) where he served as presiding judge of the Northern Circuit until his retirement in April 1996.

Before his appointment as a judge he was a Queen's Counsel practising in London and abroad.

He served in the Scots Guards between 1944 and 1947, transferring to the 21st Special Air Service Regiment (Territorial Army) with whom he served until 1965 and served as the Honorary Colonel of the 21st SAS from 1983 onwards, according to the clan website.

His appointment to the Stephen Lawrence inquiry followed an unprecedented Daily Mail front page which garnered international attention when it labelled five men as Stephen's killers.

Neville and Doreen Lawrence had spent several years fighting for justice after charges against their son's killers were initially dropped.

It would be four years before an inquest was held into Stephen's death, when a jury returned a verdict of unlawful killing in a completely unprovoked, racist attack.

The gang of five all refused to answer any questions at the inquest, and still the police seemed powerless to prosecute.

Determined not to let the five escape scot-free, the Mail took an unprecedented step. Their pictures were published on the front page, on 14 February, 1997, under the headline: 'MURDERERS. The Mail accuses these men of killing. If we are wrong, let them sue us.'

None of the five took legal action over that headline. In the public eye, their silence no longer protected them: it was as good as an admission.

The effects of that front page were momentous. A far-reaching inquiry into racism within the Met followed, with the Macpherson Report of 1999.

The report also led to changes to the law that ended the ancient legal tradition of double jeopardy, the rule that a suspect could not stand trial twice for the same murder.

Two of the five accused by the Mail, Gary Dobson and David Norris, stood trial for Stephen's murder in 2011, following a 'cold case' review, and in the light of 'new and substantial evidence', they were found guilty and jailed for life.

Front page: The Mail's front page in 1997 accused five men of the killing of Stephen Lawrence

Fight for justice: Doreen and Neville's extraordinary campaign for justice led to a public inquiry which branded Metropolitan Police institutionally racist and brought about sweeping changes in the law and police practices

Norris had been convicted and jailed with another of the five for racially aggravated harassment, in another case.

Public figures have taken to social media today to pay tribute to Sir William.

Tottenham MP David Lammy tweeted: 'Sad to hear Sir William MacPherson has died.

'His seminal report was a watershed moment that unflinchingly raised the spectre of institutional racism in the Met police and across public services.

'Twenty years on and in the wake of BLM there is much more to do.'

David Davis, Conservative MP for Haltemprice and Howden, tweeted: 'Sir William Macpherson passed away yesterday. He was a great man, and will be missed.'

Scotland's Deputy First Minister John Swinney MSP tweeted: 'Very sorry to hear of the death of my constituent, Sir William Macpherson, distinguished High Court judge, who led the Inquiry into the Stephen Lawrence case.

'The challenge, rigour and humanity of his report was a product of who he was. He did much good locally in Blairgowrie.'

Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a soft, stretchy skin patch that can be worn on the neck to continuously track blood pressure and heart rate while measuring the wearer's levels of glucose as well as lactate, alcohol or caffeine. It is the first wearable device that monitors cardiovascular signals and multiple biochemical levels in the human body at the same time.

"This type of wearable would be very helpful for people with underlying medical conditions to monitor their own health on a regular basis," said Lu Yin, a nanoengineering Ph.D. student at UC San Diego and co-first author of the study published Feb. 15 in Nature Biomedical Engineering. "It would also serve as a great tool for remote patient monitoring, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic when people are minimizing in-person visits to the clinic."

Such a device could benefit individuals managing high blood pressure and diabetes--individuals who are also at high risk of becoming seriously ill with COVID-19. It could also be used to detect the onset of sepsis, which is characterized by a sudden drop in blood pressure accompanied by a rapid rise in lactate level.

One soft skin patch that can do it all would also offer a convenient alternative for patients in intensive care units, including infants in the NICU, who need continuous monitoring of blood pressure and other vital signs. These procedures currently involve inserting catheters deep inside patients' arteries and tethering patients to multiple hospital monitors.

"The novelty here is that we take completely different sensors and merge them together on a single small platform as small as a stamp," said Joseph Wang, a professor of nanoengineering at UC San Diego and co-corresponding author of the study. "We can collect so much information with this one wearable and do so in a non-invasive way, without causing discomfort or interruptions to daily activity."

The new patch is a product of two pioneering efforts in the UC San Diego Center for Wearable Sensors, for which Wang serves as director. Wang's lab has been developing wearables capable of monitoring multiple signals simultaneously--chemical, physical and electrophysiological--in the body. And in the lab of UC San Diego nanoengineering professor Sheng Xu, researchers have been developing soft, stretchy electronic skin patches that can monitor blood pressure deep inside the body. By joining forces, the researchers created the first flexible, stretchable wearable device that combines chemical sensing (glucose, lactate, alcohol and caffeine) with blood pressure monitoring.

"Each sensor provides a separate picture of a physical or chemical change. Integrating them all in one wearable patch allows us to stitch those different pictures together to get a more comprehensive overview of what's going on in our bodies," said Xu, who is also a co-corresponding author of the study.

Patch of all trades

The patch is a thin sheet of stretchy polymers that can conform to the skin. It is equipped with a blood pressure sensor and two chemical sensors--one that measures levels of lactate (a biomarker of physical exertion), caffeine and alcohol in sweat, and another that measures glucose levels in interstitial fluid.

The patch is capable of measuring three parameters at once, one from each sensor: blood pressure, glucose, and either lactate, alcohol or caffeine. "Theoretically, we can detect all of them at the same time, but that would require a different sensor design," said Yin, who is also a Ph.D. student in Wang's lab.

The blood pressure sensor sits near the center of the patch. It consists of a set of small ultrasound transducers that are welded to the patch by a conductive ink. A voltage applied to the transducers causes them to send ultrasound waves into the body. When the ultrasound waves bounce off an artery, the sensor detects the echoes and translates the signals into a blood pressure reading.

The chemical sensors are two electrodes that are screen printed on the patch from conductive ink. The electrode that senses lactate, caffeine and alcohol is printed on the right side of the patch; it works by releasing a drug called pilocarpine into the skin to induce sweat and detecting the chemical substances in the sweat. The other electrode, which senses glucose, is printed on the left side; it works by passing a mild electrical current through the skin to release interstitial fluid and measuring the glucose in that fluid.

The researchers were interested in measuring these particular biomarkers because they impact blood pressure. "We chose parameters that would give us a more accurate, more reliable blood pressure measurement," said co-first author Juliane Sempionatto, a nanoengineering Ph.D. student in Wang's lab.

"Let's say you are monitoring your blood pressure, and you see spikes during the day and think that something is wrong. But a biomarker reading could tell you if those spikes were due to an intake of alcohol or caffeine. This combination of sensors can give you that type of information," she said.

In tests, subjects wore the patch on the neck while performing various combinations of the following tasks: exercising on a stationary bicycle; eating a high-sugar meal; drinking an alcoholic beverage; and drinking a caffeinated beverage. Measurements from the patch closely matched those collected by commercial monitoring devices such as a blood pressure cuff, blood lactate meter, glucometer and breathalyzer. Measurements of the wearers' caffeine levels were verified with measurements of sweat samples in the lab spiked with caffeine.

Engineering challenges

One of the biggest challenges in making the patch was eliminating interference between the sensors' signals. To do this, the researchers had to figure out the optimal spacing between the blood pressure sensor and the chemical sensors. They found that one centimeter of spacing did the trick while keeping the device as small as possible.

The researchers also had to figure out how to physically shield the chemical sensors from the blood pressure sensor. The latter normally comes equipped with a liquid ultrasound gel in order to produce clear readings. But the chemical sensors are also equipped with their own hydrogels, and the problem is that if any liquid gel from the blood pressure sensor flows out and makes contact with the other gels, it will cause interference between the sensors. So instead, the researchers used a solid ultrasound gel, which they found works as well as the liquid version but without the leakage.

"Finding the right materials, optimizing the overall layout, integrating the different electronics together in a seamless fashion--these challenges took a lot of time to overcome," said co-first author Muyang Lin, a nanoengineering Ph.D. student in Xu's lab. "We are fortunate to have this great collaboration between our lab and Professor Wang's lab. It has been so fun working together with them on this project."

Next steps

The team is already at work on a new version of the patch, one with even more sensors. "There are opportunities to monitor other biomarkers associated with various diseases. We are looking to add more clinical value to this device," Sempionatto said.

Ongoing work also includes shrinking the electronics for the blood pressure sensor. Right now, the sensor needs to be connected to a power source and a benchtop machine to display its readings. The ultimate goal is to put these all on the patch and make everything wireless.

"We want to make a complete system that is fully wearable," Lin said.

###

Paper: "An epidermal patch for the simultaneous monitoring of haemodynamic and metabolic biomarkers."

This research was supported by the UC San Diego Center of Wearable Sensors and the National Institutes of Health (grant no. 1R21EB027303-01A1).

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.  For the last five years, Jeannie DeVito has been making homemade blankets for babies born prematurely, or preemies, on Staten Island to help their families.

But her inspiration to make the blankets started many years ago. DeVito, of Tottenville, explained that she was a preemie when she was born, and both of her daughters were also preemies. Half of her grandchildren, she added, are preemies.

I know as a first-time mother, I was devastated that she was in the NICU ... It was very upsetting. It was very distressing to me, she said.

Thats when she decided to do something for preemies and their parents  crocheting blankets.

She began to crochet the preemie blankets in 2016  challenging herself with different designs and patterns for the families. And she even names the blankets after different people and animals who made a difference in the world  like 9/11 heroes, cops, television and movie characters who did good deeds, animals that saved people, and kids who did extraordinary things.

DeVito is shown here (pre-COVID-19) with her oldest grandchild during a visit to the NICU at Staten Island University Hospital to donate preemie blankets. (Courtesy/Jeannie DeVito)

Her current goal is to make 80 blankets  40 for girls, and 40 for boys  to donate to the Staten Island University Hospital (SIUH) NICU in Sea View. She started making the blankets last week, with each blanket taking anywhere from 90 minutes to two hours.

It will take her a couple of months to finish all 80, she said.

I try to do four at a time, I try do to four of the same pattern. Theres 10 different patterns, with four [of each pattern], she said.

When she completed a batch of blankets in the past, DeVito would go to the NICU at the hospital to deliver the blankets. But during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, she meets nurses down in the lobby.

Shown here are preemie blankets for girls pre-packaged. (Courtesy/Jeannie DeVito)

Each preemie blanket is wrapped in cellophane to look like a present for the families. The gift tags include a picture of the blanket, who the blanket is named after, a poem, and washing instructions, DeVito said. They are all washed after completion before being wrapped.

And DeVito said staff members at the NICU are very grateful.

Theyve written me several letters...When I get the nurses on the phone, they say, Oh my God, theyre so beautiful. I love the blanket. Theyre very nice about it, DeVito said.

Shown here are preemie blankets for boys pre-packaged. (Courtesy/Jeannie DeVito)

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uschools/iStockBy KENDALL KARSON, ABC News

(WASHINGTON) -- Driven by sharp divisions that reflect the persistent partisan fissures within the country, the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump solidified public support for convicting him of inciting insurrection, a new ABC News/Ipsos poll finds.



Over half of Americans (58%) say that Trump should have been convicted, which tracks with the 56% who said the same last week before the 57-43 Senate vote to acquit left Trump free to possibly run for office again. Last year, after Trump was acquitted in his first Senate impeachment trial, Americans were evenly split on the outcome, with 49% approving of the Senate's judgment and 47% disapproving, according to a Monmouth University poll.



The Senate fell 10 votes short of reaching the two-thirds majority needed to convict, when all but seven Republicans found Trump not guilty -- an outcome that still marked the most bipartisan verdict ever in a presidential impeachment trial.



The seven Republicans, who make up 14% of the GOP conference in the Senate, mirrors the 14% of Republicans nationwide who believe Trump should have been convicted and barred from holding future office in the poll, which was conducted by Ipsos in partnership with ABC News using Ipsos' KnowledgePanel.



An overwhelming 88% of Democrats and 64% of independents also say the former president should have been convicted after being impeached for his role in the deadly assault on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.



The decision by the 43 Republican senators to acquit Trump signals the firm grip he maintains over the party, even after his electoral defeat. But for some of them, the vote was not as much a defense of his behavior, but rather a decision based on a constitutional technicality.



Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, one of the Republicans who ultimately sided with Trump by arguing that it was unconstitutional to try a former president, excoriated Trump for his "disgraceful dereliction of duty."



"There's no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. No question about it," he said from the Senate floor shortly after the final vote. "The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president."



Even though far more Republican senators are disturbed by Trump's actions than the final vote tally might show, polling suggests that the Republican base remains solidly behind him.



Among Republicans, 86% say Trump should not have been convicted and disqualified from holding future office, an attitude shared by only 11% of Democrats and 35% of independents.



More than eight in 10 Republicans (83%) actually go even further, believing that the trial shouldn't have even happened, viewing the single charge against Trump as not serious enough to warrant impeachment proceedings.



It's an opinion at odds with most of the country: overall, 61% of Americans believe Trump's conduct warranted the historic second impeachment for one president, with that view held by 92% of Democrats and 65% of independents.



More than two decades ago, when former President Bill Clinton faced his own impeachment trial for lying under oath and obstructing justice to cover up an extramarital affair, less than half (43%) of the country viewed the charges against him as serious enough for a trial, while a majority (56%) believed they were not serious enough, according to an ABC News poll conducted right after the trial.



As the nation remains deeply polarized, uniting most Americans is the view that the outcome in the Senate was motivated more by party loyalties than the evidence presented at the trial.



More than 3 in 4 Americans (77%) say that most senators voted on the basis of partisan politics. The question also breaks through party lines, with 76% of Democrats, 78% of Republicans, and 79% of independents saying the same.



In the case itself, the evidence brought by the House impeachment managers was seen as "strong" among a clear majority of Americans (56%), compared to 37% who cast it as "weak."



Still, slightly more Americans say that the trial rehashed information already known to the public rather than providing new information, 43% to 38%.



This ABC News/Ipsos poll was conducted by Ipsos Public Affairs KnowledgePanel February 13-14, 2021, in English and Spanish, among a random national sample of 547 adults. Results have a margin of sampling error of 4.8 points, including the design effect. Partisan divisions are 31-26-36 percent, Democrats-Republicans-independents. See the polls topline results and details on the methodology here.



Copyright  2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.
As many of the nations pupils close in on a year of virtual remote learning, public policy analysts are highlighting the scope of the digital divide and ways in which policymakers can close it.Boston Consulting Group, the education nonprofit Common Sense Media and the Southern Education Foundation released a detailed report last month titled Looking Back, Looking Forward: What it will take to permanently close the K-12 digital divide to examine the magnitude of the divide and potential solutions moving forward.While policymakers have made efforts to expand access to computers and broadband since the COVID-19 pandemic began last year, analysts say up to 12 million K-12 students remain underserved.Titilayo Tinubu Ali, senior director of research and policy at the Southern Education Foundation, said the report showed that digital inequity is most pronounced in the southern states and rural areas. The report noted the divide has disproportionately affected rural states and 40 to 50 percent of students in Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Mississippi since the start of the public health crisis.Sometimes in conversations about education equity, it can be a very bicoastal conversation or a big-city conversation, Ali pointed out. Its really impacted rural and southern states in a disproportionate way.The divide also severely affects Black, Latino and Indigenous students, who make up about 55 percent of disconnected students, while representing about 40 percent of total affected students, according to the report. Sixty percent of disconnected K12 students families are unable to afford digital devices, and about 25 percent, many of them rural and Native American, lack access to reliable broadband service entirely. Approximately 40 percent also face insufficient digital literacy or language barriers.Schools across the country received $1.5 billion in federal CARES Act funding last year to help close these gaps as schools pivoted to virtual learning amid school closures. States also took the initiative to mitigate the divide with limited resources.Texas launched Operation Connectivity, which provided about 1 million laptops and 500,000 hot spots. Oklahoma used grants to award 50,000 devices and data plans across 175 districts. Vermont provided $3,000 per family to offset line extension fees, while Alabama allocated $100 million and Ohio allocated $50 million for efforts geared toward expanding connectivity and access to devices.In December, federal lawmakers approved additional COVID-19 relief funding for schools, including $50 billion which can be used for pandemic-related expenses including distance learning.But analysts say more than 75 percent of existing efforts aimed at closing the gap will expire within three years, meaning many students who've benefitted from these programs will lose digital access. More will be needed to close the divide and keep it closed in the years ahead.Amina Fazlullah, director of equity policy at Common Sense, said the good news is that districts and states have helped lay the groundwork for closing the divide.Its not because of some technological barrier or something we have to innovate around, she said. With some policy changes and commitment to providing funding and support to address the divide, we can close these (gaps).Addressing tech adoption and affordability gaps for students nationwide will require an additional $6 billion to $11 billion in the first year and $4 to $8 billion annually after that. Funds will need to go toward installation, service fees, devices, repairs and support for Internet connectivity and e-learning devices. Additional funding will be needed to connect all students with broadband infrastructure capable of 100/100 Mbps.While prior analyses estimated that it would cost $10 billion to $20 billion at the low end and $80 billion at the high end to expand broadband infrastructure, these assessments did not fully account for costs related to home access to adequate speeds and ongoing maintenance to ensure sustainable, universal broadband access, the report noted.But failing to tackle digital inequity could cost even more in the long run.According to the report, students without reliable tech and Internet access have lower GPAs than those with access. Those lower GPAs could eventually lead to a 4- to 6-percent drop in expected annual income, which will amount to a $22 billion to $33 billion annual loss in GDP.If you take that against the cost of doing it, even on the high end, theres value, Fazlullah said, adding that technology will play a role in mitigating the significant learning loss that has occurred during school closures.Boston Consulting Group Managing Director Lane McBride said that when most students return to a full in-person learning model, the homework gap that existed before the pandemic will grow. Failing to close the divide, he said, will exacerbate systemic inequities.The digital divide predated the pandemic, leading to lower academic performance and learning loss for affected families, he said. And it will continue after the pandemic if we do not act.The benefits of digital equity go beyond just education, according to Fazlullah. Achieving digital equity could improve students' quality of life after high school when they seek access to jobs, telehealth services, social services and more. It will also enable families to safely access various public resources when there are risks or hurdles to doing so in person, for example during a pandemic.A lot of these things can be done through the Internet, and if you cant do these things from home when people are socially distanced, you have to jump through a lot of hoops or put yourself in harms way to access these benefits, Fazlullah said.But closing the virtual gap is a multifaceted challenge that will depend on more than just funding. McBride said expanding broadband availability will require policymakers to incentivize tech-agnostic investment and encourage shared deployment. Public-private partnerships will also likely be necessary to assess specific student needs.To address non-financial adoption challenges, policymakers should also designate funds to offer technical and digital training, increase trust in technology solutions and design solutions to address distinct student needs  all with the aim of ensuring usage, he said, adding that putting a timeline on closing the divide could still prove difficult.All of this considered, analysts are confident that President Joe Bidens newly minted administration will get the ball rolling in the right direction. They expect federal E-rate funds administered through the Federal Communications Commission, for instance, could help provide broadband services to students without reliable connectivity.The new administration recently selected Miguel Cardona as its education secretary, bringing his experience as an educator in Connecticuts high-tech Meriden Public School District and as Connecticuts education commissioner to the table. Jessica Rosenworcel, a vocal proponent of expanding connectivity during her time with the FCC, also now serves as director of the FCC.The FCC issued a public notice last week asking for comments about how E-rate funding should be used for digital equity.Theyve been really receptive to ideas and trying to get this right, Ali said.Fazlullah believes policymakers should examine how systemic inequities played a role in the digital divide, particularly for many students of color. She said this could influence how lawmakers respond to the infrastructural and tech needs of communities throughout the nation.We need to make sure policies stop the redlining of children out of education, Fazlullah said. Because weve allowed for redlined communities to have less access to connectivity through our policy choices, that has resulted in the digital divide.Im hopeful that policymakers are going to end that practice and that they invest in support for services and devices, and that they invest in the deployment of robust infrastructure to every community in the United States.Some digital equity advocates and policymakers see this as an opportune moment to start closing the divide for good.McBride said policymakers, educators and parents will also need to maintain an interest in the problem over the months and years ahead, even after students return to schools and vaccines are widespread. He said there's no "silver bullet" when it comes to digital equity.We are in a unique moment to close the divide  while there is focus and urgency on the issue, McBride pointed out. To succeed in bridging the digital divide, efforts must take advantage of the momentum on the issue today and maintain the need even beyond the pandemic."Government TechnologyGoverning
It is five years since Darebin, a jurisdiction in the northern suburbs of Melbourne, became the first council to declare a climate emergency. Cities in New Jersey and California followed. In 2019, the United Kingdom was the first country in the world to recognise the emergency at a national level, through all four of its parliaments at Westminster, Holyrood, Cardiff Bay and Stormont. Now, 1,868 jurisdictions in 33 countries have followed suit.

But declaring a climate emergency does not in itself make the climate crisis a priority. It merely opens the way to prioritise actions and legislation that will bring about change. In October 2019 the Government introduced its flagship Environment Bill to Parliament. It was delayed by the general election, and then by the first lockdown. This January, ministers again hit the pause button, meaning the Bill will not pass into law until two full years after it was first proposed.

What is frustrating is that the legislation has so much promise. It pledges a green industrial revolution. It will set a legal framework for protecting our environment outside the European Union, with better air quality and testing targets on waste reduction. But each day of delay has a negative impact on the start-up businesses whose mission is to develop the solutions for sustainable growth. Plans are dashed, investment is jeopardised and confidence is sapped.

Despite Brexit uncertainty, the UK has repeatedly topped European venture capital investment charts for startups, and the South East in particular continues to be a hub for innovation. In the last budget the Government promised a 1bn support package for UK start-ups, eager to support science and technology, research and development. These measures demonstrate the Governments ambition to build back better, but making a reality of the rhetoric is near-impossible while businesses are without the legal framework and guidance they need.

The nations startups and innovators are the engine behind a green industrial revolution. But in the absence of the legislation, they are stuck in limbo. Investors need clarity on the opportunities for the businesses that may hold the key to sustainable growth.

The delay also risks the UK falling behind the rest of the world on environmental standards. The EU has put the wheels in motion to place a ban on microplastics added to cosmetics, paint, detergents and nearly all other consumer and commercial products. This change could come into effect later this year, and is set to have massive impact on the 1.9m microplastic fragments found on every square meter of the ocean floor. Likewise, the Bill is an opportunity for the UK to follow the EU in banning so-called oxo-degradable plastics, which again break down in to harmful microplastics.

Both these measures are clear examples of solid sustainability legislation. European law sets out clear objectives, with a defined impact and a well-established timetable. In turn, industry and innovators have a chance to react and plan, in this case catalysing the growth of alternatives to plastic.

This November, the UN Climate Change Conference, Cop26, will be held in Glasgow. It is imperative that the Environment Bill is on the statute book by then, so the UK can show itself as a world leader in sustainability. And before the parliamentary process resumes there is a big opportunity for government to engage with cross-party calls for the legislation to contain specific targets on the reduction of plastics pollution. Far from lagging behind the European Union, the UK should be seeking to lead the continent.

We are fortunate in the UK to have some of the best science and tech innovators on the planet. Together we can export new solutions  like natural replacements for plastic  all around the world. The government should not delay its environmental agenda, but instead should grasp the great opportunity for Britain to lead the globe in a real response to the emergency our country was first to recognise.

Simon Hombersley is Chief Executive of Cambridge-based Xampla, which makes natural replacements for plastic
Ed Young reveals daughter struggled with depression; trusting in God after her death

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In an emotional message delivered Sunday, Pastor Ed Young and his wife, Lisa, revealed the heartbreaking circumstances surrounding the death of their 34-year-old daughter, LeeBeth, and reflected on God's continued faithfulness amid their grief.

On February 14, Ed and Lisa Young spoke publicly from the pulpit of Fellowship Church in Grapevine, Texas, for the first time since announcing their firstborn daughter passed away on January 19.

I would say in these 30 plus years of ministry and leading at Fellowship Church, we probably have never been as weak and as vulnerable as we are right now, Lisa said. We've experienced difficulty and we've walked through pain, but not like this, and only by God's grace are we doing it.

This ... was an out of order death, she added. It wasnt supposed to happen, and dealing with that adds another messy layer. So today we just thought we would share some of [what has] led up to this time.

The Youngs revealed that LeeBeth, whom Ed described as an original creative thinker who loved the Lord and was gifted with discernment, struggled with depression and anxiety  issues her father said got worse as she got older.

After getting out of a tumultuous relationship five or six years ago, LeeBeth called her mother and said, Mom, I think Im an alcoholic.

That rocked us ... because LeeBeth had never been a drinker, or someone who partied, zero, Ed recalled. That was something that definitely snapped our heads.

While on her way back from seeing a doctor after binging on alcohol, LeeBeth had a seizure and ended up in the ICU. There, the doctor told her, If you continue to do this, you will die.

So she had her first episode that I described of binge drinking, [and a] second episode which led to rehab, Ed said. After going through rehab, LeeBeth saw a great therapist and participated in counseling, along with her parents.

When COVID hit, LeeBeth began conducting her ministry duties at home, away from the church office  something Ed admitted he knew intuitively would be a struggle for her. About three weeks ago, the couple said they noticed LeeBeth acting a little bit different.

After receiving a strange FaceTime from her daughter, Lisa, who was in South Carolina visiting her mother, urged Ed to go check on her.

I called Ed and I said, Honey, LeeBeths not good. He goes, What do you mean? And I said, It's just not good, you need to go. And so he did and he found her, she said.

Ed revealed that after finding LeeBeth in a state that "as a parent, you pray you never have to get involved in," he took her to see her therapist. At that time, she told her parents, I want to live, I want to be better. I want to get over this. I want to do what's right. That evening, Ed laid his daughter down in the room next to his office.

She was shaking, he recalled, I said, You're just coming off, LeeBeth, this alcohol that you've consumed." LeeBeth didn't want to go to the hospital, so Ed "sat down by her and kissed her, rub her back a little bit before going into his office to work on his sermon.

While working on his sermon, the pastor heard a noise and ran into his daughters room.

I knew something was wrong, he said. She had a seizure. When I saw her, I thought she was gone right there.

Eds nurse daughter-in-law, who lived in the guest house, attempted CPR on LeeBeth as they waited for the ambulance. Once the paramedics got there, they couldnt find LeeBeth's pulse but heard a faint heartbeat. Because of COVID, the family was unable to be with LeeBeth at the hospital. However, Ed revealed that the family was able to FaceTime her, singing praise songs to her as she took her last breath.

The doctor came in and I'll never forget what he said, Ed said. He said, 'we can't do anything else.'

Through tears, Lisa said nothing that occurred was what they, or LeeBeth wanted, but stressed that God has provided amid their grief.

We can't judge LeeBeth based on that last bout, that last thing that she did, Ed said. But it's really about the last thing that Jesus did on the cross. That's what her life is about. She should be judged by that.

The pastor admitted he still struggles with the images of finding his daughter, expressing frustration that many people can drink like a fish and consume drugs and walk around healthy as a horse, yet LeeBeth struggled with three known binge episodes and shes gone.

Still, the couple said they find peace in the fact that God is on the throne and bigger than their whys. They said LeeBeth dedicated her life to Christ on February 14, 1991, a fact they find great comfort and consolation in.

God is faithful, Ed said, and asked the church to continue to keep them in their prayers. The pastor added that he and his wife will do church with greater urgency than ever before because weve been so close and we are so close to eternity.

One moment, LeeBeth was alive the next moment, she's in eternity, he said. And all of us have a tissue-like veil separating this life from the next, it doesn't matter who you are ... Every single person dies and death is the great equalizer. Youre not ready to live ... until you're ready to die.
The Cassation Administrative Court within the Supreme Court has received a lawsuit from New Communications LLC (ZIK TV channel) against the President of Ukraine, in which the plaintiff challenges the decree enacting the decision of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) on sanctions in relation to 112 Ukraine, NewsOne and ZIK TV channels.

"By the decision of February 15, 2021 in case No. 9901/33/21, the claim of New Communications LLC of was not pursued and the plaintiff was set a deadline from the date of receipt of this decision to eliminate the shortcomings. The decision is motivated by the fact that the funds transferred by the plaintiff to pay the court fee were not credited to the relevant treasury account, and therefore it needs to provide evidence confirming payment of the court fee for filing the claim," the press service of the Supreme Court said on Facebook.

In addition, as noted, the plaintiff did not provide the court with evidence confirming the necessity and expediency of involving the NSDC, the SBU, and the Verkhovna Rada to participate in the case as third parties who do not make independent claims on the subject of the dispute on the defendant's side.

As reported, on February 2, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky put into effect the NSDC decision, which effectively blocked the activities of three TV channels - 112.Ukraine, NewsOne and ZIK, which are associated with one of the leaders of the Opposition Platform - For Life party Viktor Medvedchuk.

According to the decision, personal special economic and other restrictive measures will be applied, in particular, to Taras Kozak and such legal entities as Ariadna TV LLC, Novy Format TV LLC, TV Vybor LLC, 112-TV TV and Radio Company LLC, Lider TV LLC, Partner TV LLC, News 24 Hours LLC, and New Communications LLC.
The American Halal Institute (AHI), a Halal certifying and research organization promoting the Halal label and products in the United States, commends the Honorable Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, for her inquiry to the acting Secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Honorable Kevin Shea, on the importance of Halal and Kosher labels on food that is distributed through the Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) and the Farmers to Families Food Box programs. "Making sure that everyone has access to healthy food options in this pandemic is a matter of health and equity," said Senator Gillibrand. Furthermore, Senator Stabenow (D-MI) was joined by Senator Gillibrand in July of last year for a similar request from then-Secretary Perdue.

The President of AHI, Salah Obeidallah stated that he was highly concerned with the lack of proper meals to both the Muslim and Jewish community who rely on TEFAP and other programs for the nutrition of children. EB Nasir, the business development manager of AHI, will facilitate the necessary support for Secretary Shea in implementing the Halal label in TEFAP and Farmers to Families Food Box Program. AHI is a subsidiary of NAIT which has been serving the American Muslim community since 1973.
The new wave of coronavirus could kill tens of thousands of Britons by late summer if the lockdown is lifted too soon, an Imperial College expert has warned.

The government has vowed to release its plan to exit lockdown on February 22, but reports indicate the Government is taking a cautious approach to returning the country to normality.

Professor Azra Ghani revealed how a new model called COVIDSIM, made at Imperial College London, forecasts a significant wave of deaths by summer 2021 if restrictions are eased in July - even despite a successful vaccine rollout.

But a more positive result can be achieved if most restrictions are kept in place until most Britons are vaccinated in September, ITV News reports.

Professor Ghani said: 'My advice would be to be cautious... to open up slowly, because in the long term this will be the better way out of the pandemic.'

Professor Azra Ghani revealed how a new model called COVIDSIM, made at Imperial College London, forecasts a significant wave of deaths by summer 2021 if restrictions are eased in July - even despite a successful vaccine rollout

Using a graph that pinpoints reported deaths, Professor Ghani said that from the current time forward, with current measures in place and with the help of the vaccination programme, we could expect to see a 'really rapid decline in deaths'

She added: 'The problem is that it is highly transmissible, we now have these new variants in place that we know are even more transmissible than previously, and not everybody will be vaccinated for various reasons.

'That can lead to subsequent epidemics if we just relaxed everything straight away.'

Using a graph that pinpoints reported deaths, Professor Ghani said that from the current time forward, with current measures in place and with the help of the vaccination programme, we could expect to see a 'really rapid decline in deaths'.

The model comes as Boris Johnson warns the public to be 'optimistic but patient' as he cautioned against cutting any corners when it comes to lifting the lockdown.

The Prime Minister struck a blunt tone as he warned that he wanted the current shutdown to be the last - while admitting he could not 'guarantee' that it would be.

Mr Johnson is planning to reveal the guts of his 'roadmap' out of lockdown in a week's time but is facing heavy pressure from politicians and industry leaders to raise restrictions as soon as possible.

They see the announcement that the 15million vaccinations' target being hit on time as a sign that lockdown can be totally lifted by May, with key sectors of the economy back on their feet much sooner.

Britain on Monday recorded just 9,765 coronavirus cases in the smallest daily rise since October, with 230 lab-confirmed deaths. Both daily tolls were down by 30 per cent on last Monday's 14,104 infections and 333 fatalities.

But what may be seen as a swipe at fidgeting Tory backbenchers of the Covid Recovery Group (CRG) he said 'we don't today have all the hard facts that we need' and urged caution with freedom at last within sight.

The PM also urged people to take reports on the dates and order of the easing of lockdown restrictions 'with a pinch of salt'.

Fronting a Downing Street press conference tonight, he said: 'This moment is a huge step forward but it's only a first step. And while it shows what the country can do we must be both optimistic but also patient.

'And next week I will be setting out a roadmap saying as much as we possibly can about the route to normality even though some things are very uncertain.

'Because we want this lockdown to be the last. And we want progress to be cautious but also irreversible.'
The founder of Strategic Communications Africa Limited (Stratcomm Africa), Ghanas premier total communications agency, Esther Amba Numaba Cobbah, has been voted to the Board of the globally respected International Public Relations Association to serve a two year term. This follows her previous term as a co-opted member of the Board between 2019 and 2020.



In 2019, the multi award winning Communication Specialist became the first Ghanaian to serve on the board of this prestigious organization. She has also been a judge on the Associations globally acclaimed Golden World Awards since 2015.



Peter Agbeko, a member of IPRA in Ghana says, I feel really proud to see a fellow Ghanaian serving on the Board of an Association whose membership is drawn from the world over. Esther will, without doubt, fly the flag of Ghana high with her exceptional capabilities in communications.



Esther says, it is indeed an honour to have the opportunity to serve on this Board and to help advance the positive impact that public relations can have in well-being globally. I look forward, particularly, to joining hands with other Communications professionals in Africa and globally in helping stimulate development, peace, good health and well-being on the Continent using communication as a vital tool. I will be challenging the membership with an insistence that Africa matters!



Phillipe Borremaus, President of IPRA says, We are delighted to have Esther voted on to the Board after her service as a co-opted member. We will continue to be enriched and inspired by her impressive contributions to our work. At IPRA, our global reach is something we celebrate. We aim to use this to be of benefit to the countries from which our membership is derived and to the world at large. We know that ethical, open and trustworthy communications can save and improve lives, bring peace and break down walls of ignorance, especially during this period of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Source: Peacefmonline.com









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United Arab Emirate, UAE, Sunday inaugurated the countrys first envoy to Israel, several months after both countries established diplomatic ties.

Mohammad Mahmoud Al Khajah was sworn before UAE Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid.

The Gulf country last month approved the opening of its diplomatic mission in Tel Aviv.

The move came following both countries September and historical diplomatic agreement to establish ties. The deal was brokered by former US President Donald Trump.

Khajahs appointment also follows the designation of Eitan Naeh who served in Turkey as Israels interim ambassador to the Gulf country.
It is the third US deal in six months for the investment company

( ) has agreed the acquisition of US sausage and bacon manufacturer GBS Partners, which trades as Boulder Sausage.

The investment holding company said it is the third US deal in six months, following the acquisition of real estate investor association Meeting of the Minds and real estate brokerage Everyday Realty Services in September.

MBH said it now has 24 companies in its portfolio and with this deal has also established a new food manufacturing vertical.

Boulder launched over 50 years ago and has been committed to the same sausage recipe ever since, alongside additional firm commitments to minimise processing of ingredients.

Sausages are a popular food in the States, with analysis of consumption data revealing that 36% of the population ate more than 2lbs of bangers in 2020.

Boulder is looking to grow through e-commerce platforms in addition to the existing sales to brick and mortar retailers and through acquisitions to diversify its product range and customer base.

In the year to December 31, Boulder generated sales of US$4.8mln (3.4mln) with underlying earnings (EBIT) of US$0.4mln (0.2mln).

The total consideration will be 2.1-2.6mln which will be settled by way of a listed bond in accordance with the MBH bond programme with a five-year maturity with principal payable at maturity and 5% coupon rate per annum payable semi-annually.

"Boulder Sausage is the latest example of our agglomeration policy of acquiring long-established and successful businesses with exceptional leadership and ambition for further growth, said MBH chief executive Callum Laing in a statement.
As part of its students centeredness policy to combat the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, the management of the University of Education, Winneba (UEW) has drafted student leaders from all levels into its university-wide COVID-19 task force.

The task force, which is made up of university management, Deans, Directors, Heads of Departments, all security personnel and student leaders from all levels, is mandated to ensure strict compliance with the safety protocols outlined to control the spread of the coronavirus among staff and students.



The student leaders will be empowered to serve as ambassadors together with the management to ensure strict adherence with the COVID-19 protocols as a way of keeping the university community safe for all categories of staff and students.



Accommodate students



At a brief ceremony to launch the initiative at the Jophus Anamuah-Mensah Conference Centre, the Vice Chancellor of the UEW, Rev. Fr Prof. Anthony Afful-Broni, said the move was to enable the university management to accommodate the concerns of students in the management of the pandemic on campus.



He noted that the fight against the pandemic, which had wreaked havoc across the world, was herculean which required an all hands on deck approach in the management of the pandemic in the university to protect the lives of users of the university.



The involvement of the students in combating the pandemic on campus is the most effective way towards ensuring that the students follow through all the safety measures spelt out to stop the further spread of the virus, he said.



He said student leaders were being called upon to be part of the decision-making process, implementers and ambassadors of the safety protocols so as to ensure that preventive measures were adhered by their colleagues.



Directives



The Vice Chancellor said As a public university, we are under strict obligation to follow through laid down directives to control the spread of the virus to prevent loss of lives of staff and students or the closure of the university and consequent disruption of the academic calendar.



He noted that the task could not be executed alone by the management and the staff and that all stakeholders must come on board to ensure that all the preventive protocols were complied with for the safety of all.



He added that we want to raise awareness of the COVID-19 safety protocols to a new level and we believe that the responsibility was on everyone to adhere to it that there will not be the situation that students would be forced to go home due to disregard for the protocols.



He further warned that the management of the university would not hesitate to trigger the appropriate processes to be meted out to students found disregarding the safety protocols in so far as it would keep the university safe to carry out its mandate.



Initiative



As part of this initiative, class representatives will be supplied with sanitisers and thermometer guns in addition to existing structures to ensure that students follow the safety protocols in lecture hall settings.



All student leaders would also be wearing special task force tags and empowered with the needed logistics to enable them to advocate and ensure the enforcement of the COVID-19 safety protocols.





Source: Graphiconline.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.

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India is likely to supply Covid-19 vaccines to Canada soon. As per a report in ANI, sources informed that decks have been cleared for the supply of vaccines following a personal request by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. However, the final decision on the quantum of supplies has not been taken yet. The exact quantities and delivery schedules will be finalised this week.

Last week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to his Canadian counterpart Justin Trudeau and assured that India will do its best to facilitate supplies of Covid-19 vaccines sought by Canada.

Also Read | Why Mumbais mojo lies beyond its locals

"Was happy to receive a call from my friend Justin Trudeau. Assured him that India would do its best to facilitate supplies of COVID vaccines sought by Canada," PM Modi said in a tweet.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had assured his Canadian counterpart that India will support the Canadian vaccination programme. Trudeau had made a telephone call to PM Modi and asked for his support.

Expressing his appreciation, the Canadian Prime Minister said that if the world managed to conquer COVID-19, "it would be significant because of India's tremendous pharmaceutical capacity, and Prime Minister Modi's leadership in sharing this capacity with the world".

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Photo: The Canadian Press Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., returns to the chamber as the Senate voted to consider hearing from witnesses in the impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump, at the Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

WASHINGTON - A day after former President Donald Trump won his second Senate impeachment trial, bipartisan support appeared to be growing for an independent Sept. 11-style commission into the deadly insurrection that took place at the U.S. Capitol.

Investigations into the riot were already planned, with Senate hearings scheduled later this month in the Senate Rules Committee. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has asked retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore to lead an immediate review of the Capitols security process.

Lawmakers from both parties, speaking on Sunday's news shows, signalled that even more inquiries were likely. The Senate verdict Saturday, with its 57-43 majority falling 10 votes short of the two-thirds needed to convict Trump, hardly put to rest the debate about the former presidents culpability for the Jan. 6 assault.

There should be a complete investigation about what happened, said Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump. What was known, who knew it and when they knew, all that, because that builds the basis so this never happens again.

Cassidy said he was attempting to hold President Trump accountable, and added that as Americans hear all the facts, more folks will move to where I was. He was censured by his states party after the vote.

An independent commission along the lines of the one that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks would probably require legislation to create. That would elevate the investigation a step higher, offering a definitive government-backed accounting of events. Pelosi has expressed support for such a commission while stressing that the members who sit on it would be key. Still, such a panel would pose risks of sharpening partisan divisions or overshadowing President Joe Biden's legislative agenda.

Theres still more evidence that the American people need and deserve to hear and a 9-11 commission is a way to make sure that we secure the Capitol going forward, said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a Biden ally. And that we lay bare the record of just how responsible and how abjectly violating of his constitutional oath President Trump really was.

House prosecutors who argued for Trump's conviction of inciting the riot said Sunday they had proved their case. They also railed against the Senates Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, and others who they said were trying to have it both ways in finding the former president not guilty but criticizing him at the same time.

A close Trump ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., voted for acquittal but acknowledged that Trump had some culpability for the siege at the Capitol that killed five people, including a police officer, and disrupted lawmakers certification of Bidens White House victory. Graham said he looked forward to campaigning with Trump in the 2022 election, when Republicans hope to regain the congressional majority.

His behaviour after the election was over the top, Graham said. We need a 9-11 commission to find out what happened and make sure it never happens again.

The Senate acquitted Trump of a charge of incitement of insurrection after House prosecutors laid out a case that he was an inciter in chief who unleashed a mob by stoking a monthslong campaign of spreading debunked conspiracy theories and false violent rhetoric that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Trumps lawyers countered that Trumps words were not intended to incite the violence and that impeachment was nothing but a witch hunt designed to prevent him from serving in office again.

The conviction tally was the most bipartisan in American history but left Trump to declare victory and signal a political revival while a bitterly divided GOP bickered over its direction and his place in the party.

The Republicans who joined Cassidy in voting to convict were Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Its frustrating, but the founders knew what they were doing and so we live with the system that we have, Democratic Del. Stacey Plaskett, a House prosecutor who represents the Virgin Islands, said of the verdict, describing it as heartbreaking. She added: But, listen, we didnt need more witnesses. We needed more senators with spines.

McConnell told Republican senators shortly before the vote that he would vote to acquit Trump. In a blistering speech after the vote, the Kentucky Republican said the president was practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day" but that the Senate's hands were tied to do anything about it because Trump was out of office. The Senate, in an earlier vote, had deemed the trial constitutional.

It was powerful to hear the 57 guilties and then it was puzzling to hear and see Mitch McConnell stand and say not guilty and then, minutes later, stand again and say he was guilty of everything, said Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pa. History will remember that statement of speaking out of two sides of his mouth, she said.

Dean also backed the idea of an impartial investigative commission "not guided by politics but filled with people who would stand up to the courage of their conviction.

The lead House impeachment manager, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., called the trial a dramatic success in historical terms by winning unprecedented support from GOP senators. He said the verdict didn't match the reality of the strength of evidence.

We successfully prosecuted him and convicted him in the court of public opinion and the court of history, he said. Pointing to McConnell and other Republican senators critical of Trump but voting to acquit, Raskin said, Theyre trying to have it both ways.

Raskin and Plaskett defended the House teams last-minute reversal not to call a witness, Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash. They acknowledged they were aware they might lose some GOP votes for conviction if they extended the trial much longer.

Beutler's statement late Friday that Trump rebuffed a plea from House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy to call off the rioters was ultimately entered into the trial record.

I think what we did was, we got what we wanted, which was her statement, which was what she said, and had it put into the record, Plaskett said.

Cassidy and Dean spoke on ABC's This Week, Graham appeared on Fox News Sunday, Raskin was on NBC's Meet the Press, and Plaskett appeared on CNN's State of the Union.

___

Associated Press writers Alexandra Jaffe, Lisa Mascaro, Eric Tucker, Mary Clare Jalonick and Alan Fram contributed to this report.
Photo: Monty Waldin, Biodynamics and Organics obsessed show host, on air every Tuesday We need change and we need it now. I want to see more diversity and inclusion in the industry Its time to embrace true diversity and to enact real change.

The Italian Wine podcast celebrated its 500th episode on February 9th, 2021. Gill Gordon-Smith returned to mark this all-important milestone. In 2021 listenership swelled to 450,000+, attracting wine lovers all over the globe including China which can access shows through the Ximalaya platform. The podcast began in March 2017, as a unique storytelling project dedicated to the Italian wine world. Originally conceived as a series of interviews with Italian wine producers at the OperaWine event in Verona, Italy. The programming has since expanded its range to include key players in the wine industry from around the world.

There have been so many interesting personalities on the Italian Wine Podcast since its inception, Gordon-Smith, a McLaren Vale, Australia, based winemaker, who often works with Italian grape varieties, is no exception. She began her journey as a hostess for Qantas Airlines but soon developed their Sommelier in the Sky program, and from this wine education starting point, she went on to found Fall From Grace Wines, her winery in McLaren Vale. In 2020 she was named as the Woman of Inspiration at the Australian Women in Wine Awards.

It seems poetic coincidence that her acceptance speech message happens to juxtapose one of IWPs very own goals; she remarked on the roles and realities women face in todays wine sector: Im actually fed up with having the same conversations constantly. We need change and we need it now. I want to see more diversity and inclusion in the industryIts time to embrace true diversity and to enact real change. Gordon-Smiths personal journey has continued to evolve; the Italian wine podcast believes stories such as hers and so many others, embody a message of community, education and passion for wine, the same things that drive the podcast.

The Italian wine podcast is set to continue on an ever-increasing upward trajectory, building on its already strong foundation. New programs set to air this month include narrated content from the second Jumbo Shrimp Guide to Italian Wine book, International Grape Varieties; the Get US Market Ready with Italian Wine People series with Steve Raye; Business Talk in collaboration with Colangelo & Partners, as well as a brand new series entitled, Inclusion-Diversity hosted by Rebecca Lawrence, a series that aims to interview prominent personalities in the wine industry, focusing on issues such as inclusivity, diversity, allyship and female leadership. There are more shows yet to come in the coming months, so stay tuned.

About: the Italian Wine Podcast: Cin Cin with Italian Wine People! (https://www.italianwinepodcast.com/) is a podcast project dedicated exclusively to the Italian wine world. The program uncovers the unique world of Italian wine in conversation with some of its key protagonists from all over the world. Italian Wine Podcast aims to inform, educate, and entertain listeners with content for wine professionals and casual listeners alike. Content includes interviews by organic and biodynamic wine writer Monty Waldin; interviews focused on women in the wine industry, hosted by Rebecca Lawrence DipWSET; chats between influencers, educators, and entrepreneurs in the wine world; deep examinations of individual grape varieties; a guest blog; Q&A sessions with vine geneticist Prof. Attilio Scienza, and audiobooks. Italian Wine Podcast is available on SoundCloud, iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, XimalayaFM (for China), and on the official website. It now boasts almost 500 recorded episodes with a growing online following. Listeners interested in providing feedback about the show are encouraged to access a demographic survey on the podcast website. Donations to the show are welcomed and help fund a portion of the shows equipment, production, and publication costs. To advertise on the show, please request a prospectus and/or customized advertising plan from info@italianwinepodcast.com.
SPRINGFIELD  Mayor Domenic J. Sarno has joined more than 250 mayors nationwide in signing a statement condemning anti-Semitism and urging collective vigilance in confronting the issue.

We stand in solidarity with our Jewish brothers and sisters and recognize that acts of antisemitism harm us all and they cannot and will not be tolerated, Sarno said in a statement Monday. I know many understand the ever-present need to speak out against hate and will join me today in explicitly condemning antisemitism in all its forms. In addition, we will continue to promote values of acceptance, coexistence, and community as well as educate and learn from each other.

Mayors United Against Antisemitism said its members issued a statement five years ago that condemned acts of anti-Semitism in Europe, but have now seen vicious attacks on American soil. That included in 2018 when 11 Jews were killed in the deadliest attack against the Jewish community in U.S. history at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh.

Other Massachusetts mayors who have signed the declaration are: David J. Narkewicz of Northampton; Alex B. Morse of Holyoke; William C. Reichelt, West Springfield; Joseph M. Petty, Worcester; Michael P. Cahill, Beverly; Yvonne M. Spicer, Framingham; Gary Christenson, Malden; Jon Mitchell, New Bedford; Ruthanne Fuller, Newton; and Kimberley Driscoll, Salem.

The declaration states in part that the mayors express our deep conviction that antisemitism is not only an attack on Jews but an assault on the core values of any democratic and pluralistic society.

We call upon mayors, municipal leaders, and other elected officials in the United States and around the worldand all people of good faithto join us in declaring unequivocally that antisemitism is incompatible with fundamental democratic values, the mayors stated in the declaration .

The mayors said in part they:

Condemn antisemitism in all its forms;

Support national, state, and local government efforts directed at eradicating antisemitism and preventing extremist indoctrination and recruitment; and support expanded education programs

Reject the notion that opinions about the policies, actions, or existence of the State of Israel can ever justify or excuse antisemitic acts;

Recognize the ever-present need to be vigilant about efforts to prevent and report acts of antisemitism and other hate crimes;

Affirm that a climate of mutual understanding and respect among all citizens is the bedrock of pluralistic communities.

The group said it is committed to work within and across our communities to advance the values of respectful coexistence.
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(Newser)  A tragedy for rapper Nicki Minaj, whose father was killed Friday night by a hit-and-run driver in New York. Robert Maraj, 64, was walking in the roadway in Mineola on Long Island when a driver hit him and fled the scene, police say. He was initially listed as being in critical condition at a local hospital but died the following day, the New York Times reports. The Nassau County Police Department's homicide squad is investigating, CNN reports. Police are asking anyone with information about a collision at the intersection of Roslyn Road and Raff Avenue to contact them; so far, they have no description of the vehicle involved. Minaj has not commented publicly on his death, though her rep has confirmed it to the media.

story continues below

Page Six describes Minaj's relationship with her father as reportedly "rocky," but TMZ notes they've been pictured in public together over the years, and judges that it must have been at least "decent" at times. The Times notes Minaj has spoken publicly about her father being "abusive" when she was a child, though she says he didn't physically abuse her. She has also talked about crack cocaine use at the Queens home where she grew up after she and her parents moved to the US from Trinidad, as well as domestic violence and an incident in which her father attempted to burn down their home. She once said the thing that "drove" her to become a star was the idea that she could take care of her mother and they could leave her father. (Read more Nicki Minaj stories.)


Burma Tycoons Close to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi Interrogated by Myanmar Military

U Zaw Zaw (left) and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi (right) during a donation ceremony for the Union Enterprise for Humanitarian Assistance, Resettlement and Development in Rakhine State in 2017.

Since the military staged a coup in Myanmar early this month, some well-known business tycoons close to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi have been interrogated. U Zaw Zaw, U Chit Khaing and U Maung Weik have been taken to undisclosed locations and interrogated for several hours.

U Zaw Zaw, chairman of Max Myanmar Group, a major conglomerate in Myanmar, has been interrogated three times since the military seized power on Feb. 1 , according to several business sources in Yangon.

U Chit Khaing, the president of Eden Group and one of the countrys wealthiest people, was also interrogated. The former National League for Democracy member did a stint in prison in the 1990s.

U Maung Weik, a real estate developer, was also briefly detained and released. He was among the prominent tycoons who made donations to fund the construction of the Eternal Peace Pagoda in Naypyitaw in 2019.

All three worked with the military regime in the past and were under US sanctions at one point. The US lifted all sanctions in 2016 when the NLD came to power.

The three tycoons have all reportedly been released and maintained a low profile since their questioning.

The businessmen are all believed to have made donations to the Daw Khin Kyi Foundation, a charitable organization established by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in honor of her late mother, for whom it is named. Military officials are currently investigating the charitys finances on suspicion that it received donations from abroad. The foundations senior officials have been interrogated.

U Maung Weik is also close to Yangon Chief Minister U Phyo Min Thein and Mandalay Chief Minister Dr. Zaw Myint Maung. Military sources say the close relations have raised suspicions of bribery.

Reacting to the overthrow of the elected government of Myanmar, US President Joe Biden announced last week that he was imposing sanctions that would prevent the generals who engineered the coup in Myanmar from gaining access to US$1 billion (1.4 trillion kyats) in funds their government keeps in the United States, and said he would announce additional actions against the military leaders and their families.

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The Market Report with Katie Pilbeam. FTSE 100 jumped higher as the UK widened its vaccinating programme after it hit its target of offering the first dose to 15mln priority people by mid-February. Londons leading index jumped 78 points to 6,668 in early trading.

In total, more than 15 million people in the UK have now had their first dose of the Corona Virus vaccine. From now on the over-65s and younger people in at-risk groups will be offered the jab.

The pound also hit its highest level in nearly three years on the back of the vaccination news. Against the US dollar it now trades at US$1.39.

Infamous fund manager Neil Woodford has announced plans to set up a new investment business advising professional investors instead of retail customers. He also apologised for the collapse of Woodford Equity Income Fund two years ago.

All Bar One and ONeills owner PLC ( ) is to raise 350mln through an open offer to cope amid the current lockdown. boss Tim Martin meanwhile said the pub industry is on its knees and needs a clear re-opening timeline.

Among the small caps, ( ) achieved a sixfold increase in revenue in the six months to the end of November. The global immuno-diagnostics group said the period saw a marked increase in commercial activity for its ImmunoSIGHTS services. Mode-

Global-Holdings-PLC ( ) will launch its novel payments and loyalty solution powered by Open Banking in the second quarter of 2021. This will provide merchants with an alternative to rising card interchange fees" and boost loyalty amongst consumers, it said.

Synairgen ( ) said dosing has commenced with its inhaled interferon beta product as part of a US government-funded phase II/III coronavirus clinical trial. The sub-study will evaluate the drugs potential in people with mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms not yet requiring hospitalisation.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : Mexico received a consignment of 870,000 doses of the Pune-made AstraZeneca-Oxford Covid-19 vaccine from India on Sunday, the government of the Latin American country said.

Mexico is the second Latin American country to get India-made vaccines after Brazil as it struggles with its inoculation drive against the deadly coronavirus amid an acute shortage of doses.

Sunday's shipment amounts to about 42 per cent of the 2 million doses of the AstraZeneca and Oxford University vaccine the country plans to import from India, in addition to packaging it locally, the government said.

Mexico and Argentina also have an agreement with UK pharma giant AstraZeneca to produce 250 million doses of the vaccine for distribution in Latin America. Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim is extending financial support for the venture.

Mexico is one of the world's hardest hit countries by the coronavirus with a death toll that is next only to the US and Brazil.

It started vaccinating healthcare workers in December but could not meet targets due to global shortages and delays of Pfizer's vaccine.

The country has so far received just 1,636,350 vaccine doses, according to government data, but has agreements with China's CanSino and the Russian Sputnik V.

India-made vaccines in demand While Brazil has already got shipments of the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine from the Pune-based Serum Institute of India, it has also signed an agreement for a second India-made vaccine from Bharat Biotech.

The Hyderabad-based company has already supplied 5.5 million doses of its vaccine Covaxin, developed with the government-run Indian Council of Medical Research, to the inoculation campaign in India. The Indian government will be buying another 4.5 million doses for the ongoing domestic vaccination programme, the Bharat Biotech spokesperson said.

There is a growing demand for Indian vaccines amid the huge shortage that has developed for the shots worldwide. Besides, Indian vaccines are much cheaper and easier to handle as they can be stored at ordinary refrigeration temperatures of 2 to 8 degrees Celsius unlike the western-made vacccines like Pfizer and Moderna which have to be kept at minus 80 degrees Celsius and require expensive cold-chain infrastructure.

India has in a sense emerged as the "pharmacy of the world" as 15 countries have already received India-made vaccines, including neighbours like Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka while another 25 nations are in the queue for the shots.

Bharat Biotech has applied to conduct a Phase III trial for Covaxin in Brazil, a country which plans to import 8 million doses of it in February and another 12 million in March. Besides, Bharat Biotech has sought emergency use authorisation in the Philippines.

The Bharat Biotech vaccine has been cleared for emergency use in the country and the company expects results from an ongoing trial involving 25,800 participants in India to be completed by March. A study on 26 participants has also found the vaccine to be effective against the UK strain of the coronavirus.

The Indian regulator is also expected to approve Russia's Sputnik V vaccine which is being made by Dr Reddy's Labs in India for use in the coming weeks. India pharma major Cadila Healthcare is also likely to get approval for its ZyCov-D vaccines soon.

(This content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com)

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
The regulator has reasoned that the step will not only bring down the cost but also help speed up claim settlement process

Insurance sector regulator Irdai has asked insurers to issue digital policies to their policyholders and also tell them how to use these documents. The regulator has reasoned that the step will not only bring down the cost but also help speed up claim settlement process.

In its circular issued to all insurers excluding GIC Re, Lloyd's (India) and FRBs (foreign re-insurance branches), Irdai said that Digilocker will drive reduction in costs, elimination of customer complaints relating to non-delivery of policy copy, improved turnaround time of insurance services, faster claims processing and settlement, reduction in disputes, reduction in fraud and improvement in customer contactability.

On the whole it is expected that it will lead to better customer experience, said the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (Irdai). In order to promote the adoption of Digilocker in the insurance sector, the Authority advises all insurers to enable their IT systems to interact with Digilocker facility to enable policyholders to use Digilocker for preserving all their policy documents.

The insurers should inform their retail policyholders about Digilocker and how to use it. Insurers are also advised to enable the process by which the policyholders can place their policies in the digilocker, said the regulator. As per the circular, the Digilocker team in NeGD (National e-Governance Division) under Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology will provide necessary technical guidance and logistic support to facilitate adoption of Digilocker.

Digilocker is an initiative under the Digital India programme by the government where citizens can get authentic documents/ certificate in digital format from original issuers of these certificates. It aims at eliminating or minimising the use of physical documents and will enhance effectiveness of service delivery, making these hassle free and friendly for the citizens.

Notably, the decision of Irdai has came against the backdrop of a letter written by Sanjay Dhotre, Minister of State for Electronics & IT, Communications and Human Resource Development, to Anurag Singh Thakur, Minister of State for Finance and Corporate Affairs with regards to issuance of digital insurance policies to citizen's DigiLocker accounts.

In the letter, Dhotre had requested Thakur to advise Irdai to issue an advisory to all insurance companies to make available the digital insurance policy of all policy holders via their Digilocker account and acceptance of Digilocker issued documents as valid documents.

"This will provide an alternate channel to access and manage all their insurance policies in a safe and authentic manner and will be of a great value to their customers," Dhotre had written in the letter.

Also read: Saral Jeevan Bima for low-income earners fills need gap; insurers ready policies
Yangon: Myanmars military leaders have extended their detention of deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose remand was set to expire on Monday and whose freedom is a key demand of the crowds of people continuing to protest this months military coup.

Suu Kyi will now be remanded until February 17, according to Khin Maung Zaw, a lawyer asked by Suu Kyis party to represent her. He told reporters of the extension outside a court in the capital, Naypyitaw.

Engineers hold posters with an image of deposed Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi as they hold an anti-coup protest march in Mandalay, Myanmar on Monday. Credit:AP

Whether it is fair or not, you can decide yourself, Khin Maung Zaw said.

Suu Kyis extended detention is likely to further inflame tensions between the military, which seized power in a February 1 coup, and the protesters who have taken to the streets of cities across the south-east Asian nation seeking the return of the government they elected.
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In some ways, Wienerschnitzel is to hot dogs what In-N-Out Burger is to hamburgers.

Both are decades-old restaurant chains founded in Southern California, with multiple locations, signature menu items and fiercely loyal customers.

Now, Wienerschnitzel has something else in common with In-N-Out: a presence in Colorado Springs.

Wienerschnitzel, known for its variety of hot dogs and whose chili dogs and chili cheese dogs are top sellers, is targeting a mid to late April opening at 4095 Austin Bluffs Parkway, east of Academy Boulevard.

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Burger battles intensify in Colorado Springs

The restaurant will occupy a remodeled, single-story building that will feature Wienerschnitzels familiar A-framed roof; the building most recently housed Fat Cats Coffee & Sandwiches, though some residents might remember it as the longtime home of a Farm Crest convenience store.

It will be the first present-day Wienerschnitzel in Colorado Springs, though a Circle Drive location closed several years ago after operating under the chains original name of Der Wienerschnitzel.

Franchisees Scott Wohlman and Manny Singh will own and operate Wienerschnitzel in Colorado Springs. Both have backgrounds with 7-Eleven; Wohlman worked in franchise development for the convenience store chain for 25 years and owns a 7-Eleven at 8th and Cimarron streets, while Singh operates four local 7-Elevens.

The pair, who have been friends since 2005, started looking five years ago for opportunities to bring a new-to-market concept to Colorado Springs, Wohlman said. In 2018, they began exploring Wienerschnitzel and were intrigued with the chain after visits to successful franchisees in New Mexico, he said.

Wohlman and Singh became more impressed after visits to California, where they spoke with franchisees and Wienerschnitzel executives, including the chains CEO. They now have franchise rights in El Paso County, and have plans for at least two more locations, Wohlman said.

Based in Irvine, Calif., Wienerschnitzel bills itself as the worlds largest hot dog chain.

Its menu features a variety of hot dogs that range from the simple Mustard Dog (topped with Frenchs yellow mustard) to the Junkyard Dog (billed as everything-but-the-kitchen-sink, with french fries, chili sauce, a slice of American cheese, mustard and grilled onions).

In between are Wienerschnitzels chili and chili cheese dogs topped with a secret recipe chili, along with the Chicago-style, Texas BBQ, Aussie and Kraut dogs, all of which are served on steamed buns. Corn dogs and mini corn dogs also are available.

Its a good-quality fast food, Wohlman said. And the other thing is the value. For the working guy, youve got got five chili cheese dogs for $5.99. Theyre always running some type of special like that. Families especially like the menus variety and prices, he added.

Wienerschnitzels menu also features cheeseburgers, two varieties of which are topped with chili; several types of fries, including the classic chili cheese fries; a Polish dog sandwich; and soft drinks, tea and lemonade.

Breakfast sandwiches and burritos also are part of the menu that Wohlman said he and Singh hope to offer when the restaurant opens or soon after.

Tastee Freez ice cream products  including soft-serve cones, milk shakes and sundaes  are a major part of the Wienerschnitzel brand and will be offered in Colorado Springs, Wohlman said. Customers can even buy cans of Wienerschnitzels chili for cooking at home.

Wienerschnitzel will have indoor seating for about two dozen people and a patio with tables that will accommodate about 20 more. But like most Wienerschnitzels, the Springs restaurant will do a majority of business via its drive-thru, Wohlman said.

The Austin Bluffs Parkway location has high visibility and traffic counts and a Walmart Neighborhood Market across the street and other area businesses will help draw customers, he said.

Founded in 1961 with a single location south of Los Angeles by former Taco Bell employee John Galardi, Wienerschnitzel is a family-run business that franchises most of its locations.

The chain has about 330 restaurants in 10 states, mostly in the Western U.S., according to its website. Roughly two-thirds are in California; six restaurants operate on Colorados Western Slope. The Original Hamburger Stand, Wienerschnitzels sister company, has a half-dozen Denver-area locations.

Wienerschnitzel has several parallels to In-N-Out Burger, which arrived in Colorado in November and opened its first two restaurants in Colorado Springs and Aurora.

In-N-Out also is a family run company that began in 1948 with a single location outside Los Angeles. Known for its Double-Double burgers, In-N-Out now has about 360 locations in mostly Western states, though its restaurants are company owned.

Ted Milburn, director of U.S. franchise development for Wienerschnitzel parent company The Galardi Group, said the chain is growing and the area from Colorado Springs to the northern portion of New Mexico is underserved, he said.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Wienerschnitzel enjoyed its best year in 2020, with sales climbing 15% on a year-over-year basis, Milburn said.

At a time when many restaurant dining rooms were closed, Wienerschnitzels reliance on drive-thru service was a big reason for last years soaring sales, he said.

Wienerschnitzels menu also offers family favorites at an affordable price, Milburn said.

People love comfort food in this time of the pandemic, he said. A hot dog was very nostalgic. People, if you think about it in general ... they yearn for the things that make them happy. People have good memories eating a hot dog at a ball game or on the Fourth of July.
Mitsubishi Electric to Establish FA Products Service Center in Malaysia

Mitsubishi Electric Corporation (TOKYO:6503) announced today that it will establish the Malaysia FA Center on the premises of its subsidiary Mitsubishi Electric (News - Alert) Sales Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., which is located in Selangor state on the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia. The new facility, which is scheduled to start operating on March 1, will strengthen sericing and support for Mitsubishi Electric factory automation (FA) products in Malaysia and thereby facilitate expansion of the company's local business in FA systems.







The Malaysian FA market largely comprises an expanding base of local and Japanese enterprises. These firms span numerous industries, including electrical, electronic, automotive, food and beverage, and more, each of which requires various services for the FA products they use.

For the full text, please visit: www.MitsubishiElectric.com/news/

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210214005004/en/
ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :Weeks after the coronavirus vaccination roll out in the country; the experts have started urging media to play its due role for sensitizing the masses about the importance of taking a jab to achieve the required immunity against the COVID-19.

"To counter black propaganda, media has a crucial role to neutralize the conflicting statements about COVID-19 vaccine with proper facts," said Prime Minister's Focal Person Naseem ur Rehman in an interview with Power 99 radio channel.

Naseem, who is an international professional with specialization in development and humanitarian issues, said the world over immunity against various contagious diseases like measles and polio were achieved with the invention of vaccination.

"Invention of vaccination against various epidemics was a major achievement in the medical field during the last two hundred years," he added.

He said unfortunately, in Pakistan, "We are yet to eliminate polio completely and that is mainly due to the negative propaganda and myths about the vaccination." Therefore, as a proactive move, the government, civil society and media should launch massive awareness drives to curb the disinformation, stemming out of the social media about the COVID-19 vaccine.

He said there were multiple countries in the world, where the vaccination was mandatory and people had to face plenty for refusing to get vaccinated against a particular disease.

Naseem said the coronavirus was still a looming threat and "It is early to celebrate the victory against the contagion." The focal person said vaccination was imperative for one's own safety as well as of their loved ones. The vaccines were launched after proper clinical trials so there was no need to be afraid of, he added.

He also feared that economic dividends, achieved by the government after successfully coping with the first and second waves of coronavirus, might get reversed in case of public resistance against the vaccination.

Currently, the frontline health workers are being vaccinated against the coronavirus under the first phase which was initiated by the government at the beginning of this month after receiving 0.5 million doses of Sinopharm vaccine from China.

According to the National Vaccination Strategy, health workers would be vaccinated in the first phase, while people aged 60 and above to get vaccine in second-round and those from 18 to 60 years to be immunized in third phase.

Recently, Minister for Planning Asad Umar announced registration of 65 years old citizens and above for the national vaccination drive in the days to come. So far, the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (Drap) has given approval to four, out of total eight most effective vaccines in the world, for their use in the country that included China's Sinopharm, and CanSinoBio, Russia's Sputnik-V and the Oxford University-AstraZeneca.
Aveva, a global leader in engineering and industrial software, has signed partnership agreements with Egypt-based BASS and UAE-headquartered Peritus, to effectively deliver the companys flagship engineering portfolio to customers.

BASS will specifically meet the increased demands for Avevas solutions in Egypt while Peritus will cater to customers in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Both companies will build awareness for Avevas solid portfolio and strengthen the companys channel network and presence across the MEA region.

The MEA region is an important region for Aveva. We are investing heavily into our resources and channel network to be able to successfully expand our customer base and address the increasing demands for our pioneering solutions, said Dr Tariq Aslam, Head of MEA, Aveva. Some of the most important criteria that we look at while selecting partners, who can grow together with us, include market expertise, alignment of business values and customer-first approaches. Our newest partners, BASS and Peritus not only meet these requirements but also boast unique strengths that will play a key role in helping us to achieve digital business outcomes for our customers.

BASS is a global IT company providing quality software solutions across a broad spectrum of technologies and a well-recognised market player in the field of software development and custom development software projects.

Mohamed Abdel Salam, Managing Director of BASS said: Aveva bridges a genuine gap in the Egypt market and supports our business objective to be the digital partner of choice for our customers in their transformation goals. Our extensive channel partner network will also be able to leverage all the benefits that come with working with a global leader such as Aveva. We look forward to strengthening this relationship to create joint opportunities.

Peritus is dedicated to helping organisations in their journey towards digital transformation. The IT distributor helps companies to streamline processes, increase efficiency through innovation and modern technologies.

Muhammad Saleem, Director of Peritus said: We are excited to begin this collaboration with Aveva and assist our customers in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to take advantage of Avevas best-in-class portfolio as they fortify their digital journeys. We look forward to building this relationship and scaling it to new heights, together with our partner ecosystem.

Aveva provides innovative industrial software to transform complex industries such as Oil & Gas, Construction, Engineering, Marine, and Utilities. The companys integrated portfolio capability harnesses the power of technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), machine learning, mixed reality, advanced simulation and cloud computing. Avevas software solutions and platform enable the design and management of complex industrial assets like power plants, chemical plants, water treatment facilities and food and beverage manufacturers  deploying IIoT, big data and AI to digitally transform industries.

The Aveva Partner Network today boasts over 5,000 members providing opportunities for Alliances, Systems Integrators, Distributors, Solution Providers and Technology Partners to participate in the Aveva community. -- Tradearabia News Service

New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Delhi Police Special Cell procured five-day custody of 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi from the court to identify Pro-Khalistani Group - Poetic Justice Foundation and its active members, and to recover the deleted WhatsApp Group.

Ravi was arrested from Bengaluru on Saturday in connection with allegedly editing and sharing a 'toolkit' on social media related to the farmers' protest. She was produced before the court the next day and was remanded to five days police custody.

During the course of proceedings, the police told Duty Metropolitan Magistrate Dev Saroha that her custody is necessary to recover the deleted WhatsApp Group having "vital information" along with other devices and mobiles used in the offence.

"It is further stated that for proper investigation, her detailed interrogation is required to get information by the Pro Khalistani Group Poetic Justice Foundation and their active members are to be identified," according to the court's order copy.

The court, while remanding her to the custody of the police, directed medical test to be conducted. She will now be produced before the court on February 19 at the end of the custody period.

While seeking her custody for interrogation, the Delhi Police told the court that, "It is a larger conspiracy against the government of India." The accused broke down in the courtroom and told the judge that she did not make the toolkit but only "edited two on February 3".

Legal Aid Counsel (LAC) Pramod Singh appeared for the accused, while Delhi Police Investigating Officer (IO) Praveen Kumar came to court with the case file.

The Cyber Cell had lodged an FIR against "pro-Khalistan" creators of the "toolkit" for waging a "social, cultural and economic war against the government of India".

On Sunday, the Delhi Police took to microblogging website Twitter to elaborate on the case. It wrote, "Disha Ravi, arrested by Delhi Police, is an Editor of the Toolkit Google Doc and key conspirator in document's formulation and dissemination." She started the WhatsApp Group and collaborated to make the Toolkit document, the police said, adding that she worked closely with them to draft it.

"In this process, they all collaborated with pro Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. She was the one who shared the Toolkit Doc with Greta Thunberg," the police wrote on Twitter.

The role of two more activists is under scanner in the 'Toolkit' document case. Non-bailable warrants are out against activists Nikita Jacob, who is a lawyer by profession, and Shantanu as a police team is looking for them.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has expressed his opposition to Ravi's arrest saying the move by the Delhi Police was an "unprecedented attack on democracy".

"Arrest of 21-yr-old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime," he said in a tweet.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
She been married to Sacha Baron Cohen for the past decade.

And on Sunday, Isla Fisher proved the couple are as wildly in love with each other as ever.

Taking to Instagram, the 45-year-old actress shared a rarely-seen throwback of the pair from their dating days before getting hitched.

Love: Isla Fisher, 45, shared a rarely-seen vintage throwback with husband Sacha Baron Cohen, 49, (both pictured) as the couple celebrate Valentine's Day on Sunday

Isla looked incredibly youthful in the image, while Sasha looked handsome in an open-neck shirt.

'19 Valentine Day's later,' she captioned the throwback.

Isla and Sasha met in 2002, then got engaged two years later in 2004.

Tribute: '19 Valentine Day's later,' she captioned the throwback. They met in 2002, then got engaged two years later in 2004

The pair tied-the-knot six years later in a ceremony in Paris, following Isla's conversion to Judaism.

Isla only recently celebrated her 45th birthday.

She shared several photos to Instagram of her celebrations.

Birthday girl: Isla celebrated her 45th birthday with Sasha earlier this month

Isla put on an age-defying display as she flaunted her trim pins in a floral mini-dress and black stilettos while cuddling up to her husband in one photo.

The red-haired beauty wore her hair in loose curls and looked glamorous with a full face of makeup including a smokey eye and pink pout.

Youthful: Isla put on an age-defying display as she flaunted her trim pins in a floral mini-dress and black stilettos

Meanwhile, Sasha looked chic in a white collared shirt and navy chinos that he paired with white sneakers.

A third image showed a behind the scenes look at Isla mucking around while getting ready with hair dresser Travis Balcke.

Isla and Sasha relocated from Los Angeles to Sydney late last year.

Behind-the-scenes: A third image showed a behind the scenes look at Isla getting mucking around while getting ready with hairdresser Travis Balcke

And while it's been widely speculated that they moved Down Under to escape the coronavirus pandemic ravaging the US, new reports claim they were actually fleeing America's tumultuous political climate.

'They didn't want to raise their kids in Trump's America,' an insider told The Sydney Morning Herald of the couple's decision to move to Australia on Sunday.

The couple relocated to Australia in December, and have since enrolled their three children at a school in Sydney.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
(CNN) - The AstraZeneca/Oxford COVID-19 vaccine was listed by the World Health Organization for emergency use on Monday, meaning that it can be rolled out globally through COVAX.

Today we have even more reason to be hopeful of bringing the pandemic under control, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a news briefing in Geneva on Monday. Today, WHO gave emergency use listing to two versions of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, giving the green light for these vaccines to be rolled out globally through COVAX.

Tedros explained that the two versions are the same vaccine being manufactured by two different producers  AstraZeneca-SKBio and the Serum Institute of India. They require separate reviews and approvals, as they are being made in different production plants.

Emergency use listing assesses the quality, safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines and is a prerequisite for the vaccines to be part of the COVAX supply, as well as allowing countries to expedite their own regulatory approval, according to a WHO news release, also on Monday.

For the two AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccines, WHO assessed the quality, safety and efficacy data, risk management plans and programmatic suitability in less than four weeks. On Feb. 8, the vaccine was reviewed by WHOs Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE), who recommended the vaccine for all groups age 18 and above.

SAGE recommended use of the vaccine for all people ages 18 and older, and that the two doses are administered eight to 12 weeks apart. Their interim recommendations say that it has an efficacy of 63.09% against symptomatic infection.

Along with the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, these are the second and third vaccines to receive emergency use listing by WHO, Tedros said. Experts say they could have a major global impact because they cost less and are more easily distributed, since they do not have ultra-cold chain requirements.

This story was first published on CNN.com, "WHO gives emergency use listing to AstraZeneca/Oxford COVID-19 vaccine"
Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.
Two people have tested positive for the novel coronavirus after coming into close contact with a Japanese man who was recently confirmed as a COVID-19 patient following his death at a local hotel.

The municipal Department of Health on Monday morning recorded two new COVID-19 cases  a 24-year-old Hanoi woman and 43-year-old Japanese who work at Mitsui Vietnam Company.

They had direct contact with patient No. 2,229  a 54-year-old Japanese expert of Mitsui Vietnam  during a meeting on the ninth floor of Red Sun River Building in Hoan Kiem District on February 2.

Patient No. 2,229 arrived in Ho Chi Minh City on January 17 and stayed at a quarantine center until January 31.

He tested negative for the novel coronavirus twice during his quarantine period.

The foreigner flew to Hanoi on February 1 and was found dead at his hotel room on February 13.

He posthumously tested positive for the novel coronavirus on February 14 and was confirmed as a COVID-19 patient on the following day.

Preliminary investigation showed he had died from respiratory failure, while no criminal signs were found at the scene.

Authorities in Hanoi have made an urgent announcement highlighting seven locations where the patient had gone to prior to his diagnosis.

His direct and indirect contacts have been tracked, quarantined, and tested for COVID-19.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!
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After having her life threatened online during the height of the interstate border closures last year, Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk wants to do more to curb online bullying.

She says tackling the issue will be one of her priorities during this term of government, after getting the coronavirus-ravaged economy back on its feet.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk laments that online communication means children can no longer leave their problems at the school gate. Credit:Getty

Ms Palaszczuk, who has vowed to stay on as Premier for as long as Queenslanders want me, will not face re-election until the end of 2024.

The next four years are years of action, she said.
The Russian economy will decline about 3.4% in 2020, CEO of Russias top lender Sberbank Herman Gref said on Sunday in an interview with Rossiya-1 TV channel.

"We see that according to the results of last year, Russias gross domestic product (GDP) will drop by about 3.4%, which is quite good in comparison with other countries. And the support measures were surgical, but rather effective," Gref said.

He noted that banks were forced to accumulate large reserves because of borrowers, who will require support and restructuring this year.
Shots Fired At Murray Home

By West Kentucky Star Staff

MURRAY - Police arrested an Alabama man Saturday morning after a report of shots fired at a home in Murray.The Murray Police Department said officers responded at 2:40 a.m. to find multiple bullet holes in a home on Center Drive.Officers said no one was injured.Detectives charged 20-year-old Glenn Adams of Orrville, AL with first-degree wanton endangerment and tampering with physical evidence.He was booked into the Calloway County Jail.
The rapid onset and growth of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has occupied the attention of medical and public health researchers to an unprecedented extent.

The protean manifestations of the disease, and its fairly unpredictable progression to severe and critical disease, has rendered reliable and consistent diagnostic criteria difficult to apply. A new study by researchers from Emory and Yale Universities in the USA discusses a design for quickly launching serological surveys to assess the prevalence of this infection in a given population.

The research team has released their findings on the preprint medRxiv* server.

Challenges in clinical research during a pandemic

The absence of diagnostic algorithms has made SARS-CoV-2 tracking difficult in the USA. At the same time, some groups, especially elderly and frail people, are known to be at higher risk of adverse outcomes following SARS-CoV-2 infection. The exact impact of these risk factors, and the mechanisms by which they operate, are alike unknown.

The need to observe social distancing, avoid infection, maintain personal protection despite the shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE), and the changing guidelines for more rapid regulatory review, have added to the challenges associated with rigorous research.

The various hindrances addressed include the shortage of testing kits and reagents, poor test sensitivity, and the entry of many substandard commercial kits into the market by virtue of the US Food and Drug Administrations older COVID-19 Emergency Use Authorization procedure.

Especially with lateral flow testing, the sensitivity may be only about 65%. Poor access to testing in the early part of the pandemic, with inequities in testing within minority ethnic or racial groups, further aggravated the poor outcomes in these communities.

Thus, those with suspected and confirmed COVID-19 are mingled in the same group, making the validity of studies based on such definitions suspect. To overcome such issues, the researchers carried out a cross-sectional serological survey, on a cohort of 369 people from Georgia.

The current preprint is aimed at demonstrating how a well-thought-out design for prospective serological surveys can promote successful implementation even while the pandemic is still active.

Study design

The study cohort was rapidly gathered from asymptomatic individuals in the community, between April and May 2020, before the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in Georgia. The survey was conducted in two phases.

The first included ~300 healthy middle-aged and older adults in the community, 57% of which being female. The mean age of the subjects was 43 years. Over 90% were non-Latino/Hispanic, and 77% were white. Over 90% had four or more years of a college education. About 60% were healthcare workers (HCWs).

About half had been exposed to COVID-19, and roughly the same proportion had a history of one or more symptoms related to this condition. The most common symptom were cough, stuffiness of the nose, and myalgia, in 60% to 75% of the participants.

The second was carried out on 70 first responders at the DeKalb County Fire and Rescue team. These included firefighters, emergency medical technicians [EMTs], and police officers. While 84% were male, the vast majority were non-Latino/Hispanic, and about 70% were white. Here again, 64% were HCWs.

Over half reported exposure to, and less than 30% reported symptoms of, COVID-19. Interestingly, all symptomatic participants reported anosmia, pneumonia, and dizziness, followed by cough and nasal stuffiness in 75% and 70%, respectively.

The prerequisites

The design of the study required attention to several key areas. For instance, the researchers found that they had to fulfill several criteria for a suitable outpatient space where the subjects could be tested. These included having cleaning services and being equipped with adequate HVAC, being away from areas on other floors that may be in use, distant from any COVID-19 testing center in use, and approved by the relevant authorities.

Another challenge is the need for strong partnerships between the researchers and the community, which in this case led to a doubling of the participants in the first phase of the study, and made phase two possible.

Thirdly, logistical challenges must be anticipated and overcome, and extra care must be taken to ensure the modified protocols are adhered to by all researchers. For the specific challenge of sample collection and biobanking the samples, while a pandemic is going on, they recommend bundling all the paperwork for each participant for the time of use, and pre-labeling sample collection tubes.

Finally, feasibility must be addressed. Since a prospective observational study is cheaper and less complex than a randomized, double-blinded placebo-controlled clinical trial, it may be a better choice during such a situation as a pandemic. The data it yields is often adequate to supplement that gained from retrospective studies and epidemiological studies.

What are the implications?

The process of conducting the current study was often more fragmented and reactive than would have been the case before the COVID-19 pandemic began. However, with careful attention to the details, the researchers managed to complete a cross-sectional serological survey within the required ethical and regulatory framework.

They also achieved a somewhat modified community framework for the survey, while holding scientific rigor firmly in the study design and implementation. The requirements for this type of successful research during such times include unified teamwork, involving both scientific and logistical tasks. Less tangible needs include encouragement and ideas to overcome tangles and hurdles while the study is being planned and executed.

The current study was planned to be repeated towards October/November of 2020. This was in order to explore the presence of persistent antibody responses in those already tested seropositive in this cohort, as well as the change from early to late antibody responses. Finally, this follow-up study could help detect new serological responses in previously seronegative individuals in the same cohort.

Lessons here could help others launch similar rapid prospective studies, while others  including dedication and collaboration of co-investigators who brought willingness and skillsets to the frontline  do not have easy prescriptions.

However, with the right spirit and support, a prospective study can be designed with safe sample collection and biobanking, to provide scientifically valuable data during a pandemic.

*Important Notice

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
Melissa Caddick 'absolutely' had help if she fled Australia despite the borders being slammed shut, the police commissioner has said.

NSW Police chief Mick Fuller revealed on Monday that missing persons detectives are investigating several different scenarios in the whereabouts of the missing Dover Heights woman.

Mr Fuller confirmed Caddick, 49, may have drastically changed her appearance to disguise herself in the local community - or that she somehow fled the country.

He told Radio 2GB detectives don't have specific leads as to who, if anyone, was assisting her.

But the veteran cop added if the suspected runaway conwoman has in fact fled overseas, she likely had help.

'You have to safely assume if her journey was to leave Australia and go overseas - particularly with the challenge of getting out of the country without specific Border Force approval - one would think she would have to have the help of someone,' Mr Fuller told breakfast host Ben Fordham.

Melissa Caddick vanished from her $6.2million Dover Heights property more than three months ago placing her in a rare category of missing person considered to have disappeared 'long term'

Where is she? On left Caddick's last official sighting, when the Federal Police and Australian Securities and Investment Commission raided her Dover Heights home on November 11

Caddick vanished more than three months ago now, placing her in the rare 'two per center' club of people considered long-term missing persons by police.

Left in Caddick's wake are potentially dozens of victims of her allegedly fake financial advisory business - as well as her teenage son and elderly parents.

Daily Mail Australia revealed on Monday each of them could lose their homes due to Federal court action against Caddick and her company by the corporate regulator.

It's time to come home NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller on Melissa Caddick

Mr Fuller today confirmed that the Financial Crimes Squad is now working with the corporate regulator in its investigation into her alleged multi-million dollar fraud, amid recent suggestions a warrant could soon be issued for her arrest.

'At some stage, she will realise she's gonna have to turn herself in and face these allegations,' Mr Fuller said. 'I think the sooner she does that, if she's alive, the better.

'She's not the first person alleged to have engaged in fraudulent activity.

'I think for her, and her family, it's time to come home'.

Mr Fuller's remarks came as receivers are poised to report back to the Federal Court on Monday about Caddick and her company Maliver Pty Ltd's remaining assets.

The receivers' report will contain information about Caddick's assets and and will outline the amount of investors' funds she personally received from Maliver.

Liquidators will also report back on the likely returns due to creditors and will identify the investors who gave funds to Maliver, and to what extent.

Investors recently urged receivers to immediately sell Caddick's two mortgaged properties: the $6.2million property where she, husband Anthony Koletti and her son lived; and the $2.55million Edgecliff parents her elderly parents and older brother call home.

It's not suggested that Caddick's husband Anthony Koletti or family played a role in her disappearance or have any knowledge of where she is. In a legal letter, investors admitted Caddick's relatives too are 'victims'.

Who's who in Melissa Caddick's family?

Suspected runaway conwoman Melissa Caddick (centre) with her husband, Anthony Koletti (right) and her brother, Adam Grimley (left), on holiday in Fiji

The husband: Anthony Koletti

Melissa Caddick's husband of seven years, Anthony Koletti

Melissa Caddick's husband, Anthony Koletti, has many feathers to his cap.

Super car enthusiast, DJ, Joh Bailey hairdresser, 'prawn farmer', step-dad, dog lover and deserted spouse.

Mr Koletti, 38, and Caddick, 49, have been married for seven years. She fell for him while he was doing her hair close to a decade ago.

'It was about the way he massaged her head,' a source familiar with the family claimed.

In the wake of Caddick's disappearance, Mr Koletti has somewhat cruelly been described as her 'toy boy'.

He is not suggested to have any involvement in his wife's disappearance or have any knowledge of her company's alleged financial misappropriation of investor funds.

However, there is little doubt he benefited from his wife's apparent wealth. He drove a $300,000 Audi R8 and they holidayed as a family each year in Aspen, Colorado.

Mr Koletti has been a DJ  producing a music video in 2015  and a stay-at-home husband for the past year.

He put down his scissors at a Bondi Junction salon when the pandemic hit last March.

Caddick's disappearance left him broke. In the weeks after his wife vanished, Mr Koletti told the Federal Court he had just $1.95 left in his only transaction account.

He's living off a court ordered allowance of $1700 per week which is paid from Caddick's frozen assets.

Caddick's disappearance has led Mr Koletti to have several conversations with police about his missing wife.

Last November, he publicly called for the 'communities of Australia' to come together, find Melissa and bring her home but has kept his counsel since.

'We just want her back', he said.

There has been some intrigue over why it took 30 hours for Mr Koletti to report his wife's disappearance to police.

But Detective Inspector Gretchen Atkins told 60 Minutes that Mr Koletti was 'doing what he can to assist us when we ask for help.

'I think he's struggled to be what you would expect  to be proactive,' the police officer added.

Off to the races: The once happy couple attending an event together

As Daily Mail Australia revealed on Tuesday, Mr Koletti has turned to his in-laws, Ted and Barbara, for support, rather than his immediate family.

Look what she did to the people she professed to love An investor in Caddick's company who spoke on the condition of anonymity

He was photographed meeting Caddick's parents for an 'animated' two hour discussion on Sunday.

Prior to that, he had been spending a considerable amount of time at their Edgecliff home  rather than the $6.2million mansion where he lives  sources said.

Mr Koletti's own family claim they only met Caddick a handful of times, his father previously slamming him as 'delusional' about her alleged activities.

'If Anthony is guilty of anything, it is for being in love with his wife, wanting her safely back at home, and being delusional about the truth of what she may have done,' tax agent dad Rodo Koletti said.

The brother: Adam Grimley

Caddick's brother, Adam Grimley, has been left to clean up the mess, as manager of her estate

Melissa's older brother had only recently returned to Australia for health reasons.

He was living in Singapore, where he worked as a governance consultant.

But a source familiar with the family said Adam was unable to return to the south east Asian metropolis due to Covid.

Since then, he has been lugged with a series of even bigger problems.

His little sister is missing, and he has been left managing her estate in her absence.

Mr Grimley wrote to the Federal Court last year and urged a judge to hike up the living allowance for Mr Koletti and Caddick's teenage son.

He succeeded - with the family granted $1700 a week in payments, rather than a previous $800.

But by mid-December, Mr Grimley had already incurred $55,000 in legal costs dealing with his sister's matter, which receivers may pay for.

Complicating matters further, Mr Grimley has a one per cent stake to Melissa's 99 per cent stake in her Dover Heights mansion.

Mr Grimley's lip quivered during his only press appearance last November, calling for his sibling to come home.

'Melissa, please let us know you are safe and sound,' he said. 'We love you,'

The parents: Ted and Barbara

Barbara and Edward Grimley, Melissa's parents

Ted and Barbara Grimley sold their house in Sydney's south and moved into an apartment in Edgecliff, in the city's inner east, in order to be closer to their daughter.

Caddick bought them the top-level unit. Now the retirees' $2million home is at risk of being sold from under them.

The couple are said to be desperately worried by their daughter's disappearance and the predicament they have been left in.

'They had explicit trust in her,' said a source who invested in Caddick's company and was acquainted with her family. 'And I think they're realising that they're as much victims to that trust as well.'

The investor noted Mr and Mrs Grimley faced possible eviction from their home to pay down Melissa's debts.

'Where are they going to go? They're 80 plus years old. They're not in good health.

'You've got Adam who has been left to clean up this mess - emotionally and technically.

'I kind of just sit there and go, we got done out of money. Look what she did to the people she professed to love.'

Receivers will report back to the Federal Court on Caddick's assets on Monday.


The Senate's failure to convict former President Donald Trump for inciting a deadly insurrection is a miscarriage of justice. By any standard, managers from the House of Representatives established that Trump bears responsibility for the violent assault by his crazed supporters on the Capitol in attempt to stop Congress from ratifying Joe Biden's victory in a free and fair election.



The 43 Republican senators who voted to acquit Trump  some of them hiding behind specious constitutional objections and ignoring the precedents for convicting a former officeholder  have shamed themselves rather than offend Trump's base. The Constitution rightly requires a supermajority for conviction in an impeachment trial; but the overwhelming case against Trump should have easily produced that margin.



Yet the trial was not in vain. Seven Republican senators did their duty and voted to convict, making it impossible for Trump and his apologists to claim that this impeachment was a purely partisan exercise. The trial's greatest value, however, was in establishing for a national television audience just how great a threat Trump posed to American democracy  and might pose again.



Had the Senate convicted Trump, it could have proceeded to disqualify him, under the Constitution, from holding "any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States." Ideally the powerful case mounted by the House will persuade voters and the Republican Party to bring about the same result.



The managers proved in devastating detail that Trump incited the Jan. 6 riot, not only in his inflammatory speech that day, but also in his long and duplicitous campaign to discredit the election and cling to power. They established that rioters thought they were acting at Trump's direction. They proved that Trump behaved as recklessly after the assault on the Capitol as he did before his supporters followed his exhortation to "stop the steal."



Finally, they made it clear that winking at and encouraging violence is a pattern for Trump, one that preceded his attempt to overturn the election results. As Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said: "Jan. 6 was not some unexpected radical break from his normal law-abiding and peaceful disposition. This was his essential M.O. He knew that, egged on by his tweets, his lies and his promise of a 'wild' time in Washington to guarantee his grip on power, his most extreme followers would show up bright and early, ready to attack, ready to engage in violence, ready to 'fight like hell' for their hero."



In their defense, Trump's lawyers offered a grab bag of unconvincing arguments. They engaged in whataboutism (for example, by noting how Democrats have used the word "fight" when talking about their candidacies or their policies); made specious appeals to the 1st Amendment to excuse Trump's fomenting; portrayed the impeachment as an attempt to disenfranchise Trump's supporters; and suggested that in impeaching Trump the House was motivated by hatred for the former president rather than revulsion at the violence he incited and a determination to punish him for it.



Trump's lawyers seized on a throwaway line in Trump's speech about peaceful protest to transmute the incendiary demand to "stop the steal" at the Capitol into an appeal for ordinary political action. And they suggested, fallaciously, that the fact that some of the rioters may have planned violence before Trump's speech  or showed up at the Capitol before the speech  meant that Trump couldn't have incited others to storm the Capitol.



Fair-minded Americans  including many Trump voters  should come away from this revealing trial resolved never to allow Donald J. Trump to be treated as a legitimate participant in American political life, let alone be returned to the White House.



Sadly, given the polarization that Trump both promoted and profited from  and a stark divide in the media landscape  many of the former president's most fervent followers will see his acquittal as vindication of a president who was subjected by the House to "constitutional cancel culture."



Nor is it clear that the Republican Party is ready to relinquish its connection with Trump. Consider the way some state party organizations have reacted to members of Congress who voted their conscience in the impeachment process.



Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., the third-most senior Republican in the House, was censured by the Wyoming Republican Party for voting to impeach Trump; the state party also called on her to resign. After Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., voted that it was constitutional for the impeachment trial to proceed, the Republican Party of Louisiana issued a statement expressing profound disappointment and adding that "former President Trump is innocent of the politically motivated, bogus charges now pending against him in a kangaroo court presided over by an openly hostile political opponent."



A president who has been twice impeached and who fed lies to his supporters about a rigged election  ultimately delivering a harangue that sent some of them to invade the Capitol  should be shunned and shamed despite this acquittal. Republican senators who voted to acquit Trump because of a supposed constitutional objection should be in the forefront of the effort to ostracize him from their party.



As for the millions of voters who supported Trump, they need not renounce their past support for him  or their agreement with his policy positions  to recognize that he betrayed them as well when he lied about a "rigged" election and incited the mob. He is not worthy of their loyalty.





This editorial appeared at the Los Angeles Times and was distributed by Tribune Content Agency.




WASHINGTON (AP)  Donald Trump's acquittal at his second impeachment trial may not be the final word on whether hes to blame for the deadly Capitol riot. The next step for the former president could be the courts.

Now a private citizen, Trump is stripped of his protection from legal liability that the presidency gave him. That change in status is something that even Republicans who voted on Saturday to acquit of inciting the Jan. 6 attack are stressing as they urge Americans to move on from impeachment.

President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office, as an ordinary citizen, unless the statute of limitations has run, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said after that vote. He insisted that the courts were a more appropriate venue to hold Trump accountable than a Senate trial.

He didnt get away with anything yet, McConnell said. Yet.

The insurrection at the Capitol, in which five people died, is just one of the legal cases shadowing Trump in the months after he was voted out of office. He also faces legal exposure in Georgia over an alleged pressure campaign on state election officials, and in Manhattan over hush-money payments and business deals.

But Trump's culpability under the law for inciting the riot is by no means clear-cut. The standard is high under court decisions reaching back 50 years. Trump could also be sued by victims, though he has some constitutional protections, including if he acted while carrying out the duties of president. Those cases would come down to his intent.

Legal scholars say a proper criminal investigation takes time, and there are at least five years on the statute of limitations to bring a federal case. New evidence is emerging every day.

They're way too early in their investigation to know, said Laurie Levenson, a law professor at Loyola Law School and former federal prosecutor. The have arrested 200 people, they're pursuing hundreds more, all of those people could be potential witnesses because some have said Trump made me do it."

What's not known, she said, is what Trump was doing during the time of the riot, and that could be the key. Impeachment didn't produce many answers. But federal investigators in a criminal inquiry have much more power to compel evidence through grand jury subpoenas.

Its not an easy case, but thats only because what we know now, and that can change, Levenson said.

Trump urged the crowd on Jan. 6 to march on the Capitol

The legal issue is whether Trump or any of the speakers at the rally near the White House that preceded the assault on the Capitol incited violence and whether they knew their words would have that effect. Thats the standard the Supreme Court laid out in its 1969 decision in Brandenburg v. Ohio, which overturned the conviction of a Ku Klux Klan leader.

Trump urged the crowd on Jan. 6 to march on the Capitol, where Congress was meeting to affirm Joe Biden's presidential election, Trump even promised to go with his supporters, though he didnt in the end. Youll never take our country back with weakness, Trump said.

He also had spent weeks spinning up supporters over his increasingly combative language and false election claims urging them to stop the steal.

Trump's impeachment lawyers said he didn't do anything illegal. Trump, in a statement after the acquittal, did not admit to any wrongdoing.

Federal prosecutors have said they are looking at all angles of the assault on the Capitol and whether the violence had been incited. The attorney general for the District of Columbia, Karl Racine, has said that district prosecutors are considering whether to charge Trump under local law that criminalizes statements that motivate people to violence.

Let it be known that the office of attorney general has a potential charge that it may utilize, Racine told MSNBC last month. The charge would be a misdemeanor with a maximum sentence of six months in jail.

President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a rally Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Trump's top White House lawyer repeatedly warned Trump on Jan. 6 that he could be held liable. That message was delivered in part to prompt Trump to condemn the violence that was carried out in his name and acknowledge that he would leave office Jan. 20, when Biden was inaugurated. He did depart the White House that day.

Since then, many of those charged in the riots say they were acting directly on Trump's orders. Some offered to testify. A phone call between Trump and House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy emerged during the impeachment trial in which McCarthy, as rioters stormed the Capitol, begged Trump to call off the mob. Trump replied: Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.

The McCarthy call is significant because it could point to Trumps intent, state of mind and knowledge of the rioters' actions.

Court cases that try to prove incitement often bump up against the First Amendment. In recent years, federal judges have taken a hard line against the anti-riot law. The federal appeals court in Virginia narrowed the Anti-Riot Act, with a maximum prison term of five years, because it swept up constitutionally protected speech. The court found invalid parts of the law that encompassed speech tending to encourage or promote a riot, as well as speech urging others to riot or involving mere advocacy of violence.

The same court upheld the convictions of two members of a white supremacist group who admitted they punched and kicked counter-demonstrators during the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Atlanta prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into Trump

It's possible federal prosecutors will decide not to bring charges, and if Trump were indicted in one of the many other separate investigations, federal prosecutors could decide justice would be done elsewhere.

Atlanta prosecutors have recently opened a criminal investigation into Trumps attempts to overturn his election loss in Georgia, including a Jan. 2 phone call in which he urged that state's secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to find enough votes to reverse Bidens narrow victory.

And Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., is in the midst of an 18-month criminal grand jury investigation focusing in part on hush-money payments paid to women on Trumps behalf, and whether Trump or his businesses manipulated the value of assets  inflating them in some cases and minimizing them in others  to gain favorable loan terms and tax benefits.

GOP Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who voted to acquit along with McConnell and 41 other Republicans, argued that because Trump is no longer in office, impeachment is not the right way to hold him to account.

The ultimate accountability is through our criminal justice system where political passions are checked and due process is constitutionally mandated. No president is above the law or immune from criminal prosecution, and that includes former President Trump.
India on Monday recorded 11,649 new Covid-19 cases and 90 deaths in the last 24 hours, according to the fresh figures released by the Union Health Ministry.

With this, the total tally of positive coronavirus cases in the country touched 1,09,16,589 and the Covid death toll stood at 1,55,732. The coronavirus case fatality rate stands at 1.43%.

On Monday, a total of 9,489 people, who had tested positive for coronavirus, have been discharged from hospitals across India after recovering from the deadly virus.

With this, a total of 1,06,21,220 people have been discharged/recovered from the infection in the country, which translates to a national Covid-19 recovery rate of 97.29%, the data from the Union Health Ministry showed.

The active number of coronavirus cases stands at 1,39,637 in the country, which comprises 1.28% of the total caseload, the data stated.

India's coronavirus caseload had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 30 lakh on August 23, 40 lakh on September 5 and 50 lakh on September 16. It went past 60 lakh on September 28,70 lakh on October 11, crossed 80 lakh on October 29, 90 lakh on November 20 and surpassed the one-crore mark on December 19.

Meanwhile, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has said that 20,67,16,634 samples have been tested up to 14 February with 4,86,122 samples being tested on Sunday.

So far, a total of 82,85,295 people have been vaccinated against Covid-19 in the country.

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The cowtown criminal class are forced to get their love on the run as, similarly, we want to share these local links quickly on the topic of mugshots, allegations, court action and all manner of alleged misdeeds.

Deadly Weekend Gunfire Follow-Up Report

Jackson Co., MO Sheriff's Office: Suspect in Jackson County fatal shooting surrenders JACKSON COUNTY, Mo. - The suspect in a Friday night fatal shooting in an unincorporated part of Jackson County, MO has been located and surrendered, Jackson County Sheriff's Office says. Sarah Devera, 27, was identified as a suspect in the shooting death of an unidentified victim.

Tragic Rock Chalk Double Murder Update

2 dead, 1 injured in Douglas County triple shooting KANSAS CITY, Mo. - UPDATE: February 14, 10:30 a.m. | The Douglas County Sheriff's Department says another one of the adult males injured in the shooting died overnight from apparent gunshot wounds. The identity of the two killed will not be released until next of kin is notified.

Kansas City Deadly Domestic Drama Mugshot Aftermath

Police: Woman charged in shooting death of Kansas City man KANSAS CITY, MO (AP) - A woman has been arrested and charged in the shooting death earlier this week of a man inside a Kansas City home, authorities said. Marvina Stemmons, 30, has been charged in Jackson County with second-degree murder and armed criminal action in the Sunday shooting death of 48-year-old Charles Harris.

Local Working-Class Killing Testimony

Teen in truck witnessed Parkville double murder that stemmed from firewood dispute PARKVILLE, Mo. - Parkville police are on their second day of an investigation into a double homicide that started because of a dispute over firewood. The shooting happened around 6:30 p.m. Wednesday right off 9 Highway near Park University. According to police, the dispute started in the Hidden Valley subdivision west of Parkville.

Northland Murder Search

Investigation underway after human remains found in Clay County The Clay County Sheriff's Office said it is investigating after human remains were found in a rural part of the county.Authorities said the remains were found near Cameron and Easley roads.

Golden Ghetto Scams Cost BIG BUCKS To Taxpayers

Nearly $1 Million In Fraudulent Pandemic Relief Loans Leave Johnson County Victims Searching For Answers In September, Suzanne Sanders received a notice in the mail. It said she needed to start paying back a $9,100 coronavirus relief loan to the federal Small Business Administration (SBA) by August 2021. The notice went on to say the loan had gone to support her small business: Suzanne Sanders Farm.

Show-Me Desperate Need For Pandemic Old School Protections

Opponents argue Missouri's proposed COVID liability bill would protect bad nursing homes KANSAS CITY, Mo. - By the time a nursing home sent a 69-year-old Harrisonville man to the hospital, his body was covered with gaping bedsores. One was so bad, maggots were found inside. He died not long afterward. His family has filed suit, accusing the nursing home of negligence.

Developing . . .
Marine science, technology key for sustainable development

The marine economy has become key to Vietnam's economic structure and exploitation of the country's seas and islands has created a new driving force for development amid deep international integration, experts have said.













A drilling rig of Vietsovpetro under the Vietnam Oil and Gas Group at the Bach Ho oil field.  VNA/VNS Photo Huy Hung

To realise the goal of Vietnam becoming a strong coastal country by 2045, experts, scientists, businesses and State agencies all think it is important to pay attention to the role of science, marine technology and marine human resources.



Deputy director of the Vietnam Administration of Sea and Islands under the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment Vu Truong Son said to ensure solid policy-making and planning, science, technology and marine research in Vietnam need to be one step ahead.



To make the most of advanced scientific and technological achievements and to be among the leading countries in ASEAN and form a contingent of highly qualified marine science and technology staff, the Vietnam Administration of Sea and Islands was assigned to take charge of building a master project on marine science and technology research to 2030, with a vision to 2045.



The project aims to promote innovation and apply scientific and public achievements, promote research, establish scientific grounds for planning and completing policies and laws on the sustainable development of the marine economy and research associated with an investigation of marine resources and the environment.



The project includes several goals, such as prioritising research on the application of science and technology for the marine economy, with a focus on improving the efficiency of co-ordination among sectors, linking the goal of marine economic development with the protection of the sovereignty of sea and islands and environmental protection.



Along with the master project, in recent years, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment has worked with the Ministry of Science and Technology to develop a programme of national-level science and technology research on sea and islands in 2021-25. They are also researching a project of technological development of natural resources, sea and island environments amid emerging challenges in the marine environmental security.



Associate professor Nguyen Duy Dung, chairman of the Vietnam Association of Marine Aquaculture, said from a geopolitical perspective, the topographical structure and geographical space of Vietnam has unique features and many advantages with a coastline of 3,260km and a large sea space.



Vietnam is among the 10 countries with the highest index of coast length relative to its territorial area. On average, there is 1km of coastline for every 100sq.km of land, six times higher than the world average. Vietnam has more than 3,000 islands and more than 1 million square kilometres of exclusive economic waters, three times the size of the mainland.



In the mainland as well as in the sea, the country contains many important ecosystems and rich and diverse natural resources, said Dung.



Nguyen Thach ang, director of the Department of Management and Basic Investigation of Sea and Islands under the Vietnam Administration of Sea and Islands, said foreign activities and international relations have contributed to maintaining sovereignty, jurisdiction and national interests at sea, maintaining a peaceful and stable environment for development.



ang said Vietnam has exploited the potential and advantages of the islands from ancient times up to now in many different aspects.



This has created a solid foundation for Vietnam to build the marine economy into an important part of the country's economic structure. That will create a position and force for Vietnam in its integration with ASEAN and the world, contributing to the protection of sea and island sovereignty.



Vietnam has also expanded maritime co-operation with countries inside and outside the region such as the Philippines, Malaysia, China, Australia, India and the US in many fields including fishing, joint patrols, scientific research and marine environmental protection.



Plans and programmes have been realised by the International Cooperation on Sustainable Marine Economic Development of Vietnam to 2030 approved by Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc in the Resolution No 647/QD-TTg on May 18 last year.



The exploitation of the potential advantages of sea and islands should be further strengthened in research and implementation of policies and plans for Vietnam's marine economic development at present and in the future, said ang.
Xinja shareholders have banded together to put pressure on the board to retain its banking license and overhaul the leadership of the ailing startup ahead of a shareholder meeting this week.

The fallen neobank has asked shareholders to vote on two options for the future of the company in a non-binding poll on Wednesday  wind up and expect nothing back or pay more and launch new products, such as a US share trading platform.

Investors who own more than 20 per cent of Xinjas shares are now calling for a third option that includes retaining the companys banking license, raising more capital and flushing out the board.

Xinja shareholders feel like they have a gun to their head. Credit:

Xinja surprised shareholders and customers in December when it announced plans to exit banking and has since become the first Australian bank to return all its customers deposits.
Donald Trump could still face legal action over his role in the Capitol riot (AP)

Donald Trumps acquittal at his second impeachment trial may not be the final word on whether he is to blame for the deadly Capitol riot, with court action possibly ahead.

Now a private citizen, Mr Trump is stripped of his protection from legal liability that the presidency gave him. That change in status is something that even Republicans who voted on Saturday to acquit him of inciting the January 6 attack are stressing as they urge Americans to move on from impeachment.

President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office, as an ordinary citizen, unless the statute of limitations has run, Republican Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell said after that vote.

He insisted the courts were a more appropriate venue to hold Mr Trump accountable than a Senate trial.

He didnt get away with anything yet, Mr McConnell said. Yet.

Expand Close Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has stressed Donald Trump may still face consequences over his role in the riot (J. Scott Applewhite/AP) AP/PA Images / Facebook

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Whatsapp Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has stressed Donald Trump may still face consequences over his role in the riot (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

The insurrection at the Capitol, in which five people died, is just one of the legal cases shadowing Mr Trump in the months after he was voted out of office.

He also faces legal exposure in Georgia over an alleged pressure campaign on state election officials, and in Manhattan over hush-money payments and business deals.

But Mr Trumps culpability under the law for inciting the riot is by no means clear-cut.

The standard is high under court decisions reaching back 50 years. Mr Trump could also be sued by victims, though he has some constitutional protections, including if he acted while carrying out the duties of president. Those cases would come down to his intent.

Legal scholars say a proper criminal investigation takes time, and there are at least five years on the statute of limitations to bring a federal case. New evidence is emerging every day.

The legal issue is whether Mr Trump or any of the speakers at the rally near the White House that preceded the assault on the Capitol incited violence and whether they knew their words would have that effect.

Mr Trump urged the crowd on January 6 to march on the Capitol, where Congress was meeting to affirm Joe Bidens presidential election, and said: Youll never take our country back with weakness.

He even promised to go with his supporters, though he ultimately did not.

He also had spent weeks agitating supporters through his increasingly combative language and false election claims urging them to stop the steal.

Mr Trumps impeachment lawyers said he did nothing illegal. Mr Trump, in a statement after the acquittal, did not admit to any wrongdoing.

Federal prosecutors have said they are looking at all angles of the assault on the Capitol and whether the violence had been incited.

Let it be known that the office of attorney general has a potential charge (against Donald Trump) that it may utilise District of Columbia attorney general Karl Racine

The attorney general for the District of Columbia, Karl Racine, has said district prosecutors are considering whether to charge Mr Trump under local law that criminalises statements that motivate people to violence.

Let it be known that the office of attorney general has a potential charge that it may utilise, Mr Racine told MSNBC last month. The charge would be a misdemeanour with a maximum sentence of six months in jail.

Mr Trumps senior White House lawyer repeatedly warned Mr Trump on January 6 that he could be held liable. That message was delivered in part to prompt Mr Trump to condemn the violence that was carried out in his name and acknowledge that he would leave office on January 20, when Mr Biden was inaugurated. He did depart the White House that day.

Since then, many of those charged in the riots say they were acting directly on Mr Trumps orders. Some offered to testify. A phone call between Mr Trump and House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy emerged during the impeachment trial in which Mr McCarthy, as rioters stormed the Capitol, begged Mr Trump to call off the mob.

Expand Close Congressman Kevin McCarth(Odessa American/AP) AP/PA Images / Facebook

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Whatsapp Congressman Kevin McCarth(Odessa American/AP)

Mr Trump replied: Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.

The McCarthy call is significant because it could point to Mr Trumps intent, state of mind and knowledge of the rioters actions.

Elsewhere, Atlanta prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into Mr Trumps attempts to overturn his election loss in Georgia, including a January 2 phone call in which he urged that states secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to find enough votes to reverse Mr Bidens narrow victory.

And Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R Vance Jr is in the midst of an 18-month criminal grand jury investigation focusing in part on hush-money payments paid to women on Mr Trumps behalf, and whether Mr Trump or his businesses manipulated the value of assets  inflating them in some cases and minimizing them in others  to gain favourable loan terms and tax benefits.

(@FahadShabbir)

The European Union has admitted the drawbacks of its migration policies and decided to implement a new strategy on migration, but it is not able to improve the humanitarian situation in Greece that is overloaded with migrants, EU migration policy advisor of the Oxfam charity, Raphael Shilhav said on Monday

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th February, 2021) The European Union has admitted the drawbacks of its migration policies and decided to implement a new strategy on migration, but it is not able to improve the humanitarian situation in Greece that is overloaded with migrants, EU migration policy advisor of the Oxfam charity, Raphael Shilhav said on Monday.

In September, the European Commission proposed a new Pact on Migration and Asylum to improve the EU migration policies. The new regulation is designed to implement efficient border procedures and oblige all the EU states to contribute to the migration system.

"The EU has acknowledged the failure of its old policies. While the new migration pact aims to balance responsibility-sharing across the EU, it is copying many of the previous flawed policies with member states already questioning its purpose," Shilhav said, adding that "Greece, overwhelmed with a backlog of asylum applications, has harshened its stance on asylum. Reforms to Greek asylum law, increased use of detention and more barriers to access asylum are just some of the measures taken.

"

According to the Advocacy Officer at the Greek Council for Refugees Spyros-Vlad Oikonomou, the 2016 agreement between the EU and Turkey on the migration to Europe through Greece only aggravated Europe's refugee crisis as Athens failed to deal with the huge flow of migrants.

"Particularly since the EU-Turkey deal was struck, the EU and its member states have been trying to export its responsibility to protect refugees and asylum seekers. In Greece, the deal saw harsher laws, overcrowded camps and a failing reception system. Europe must overhaul its asylum laws to protect the rights of those seeking safety, while honoring the principle of solidarity between member states," Oikonomou said.

According to the International Rescue Committee, over 50,000 refugees are now living in Greece, including over 3,000 women and children migrants traveling alone. The humanitarian situation in Greece harshly deteriorated after, in September, a fire on the island of Lesbos destroyed Moria refugee camp, which hosted more than 12,000 migrants.
Stoltenberg said China and Russia are at the forefront of an authoritarian pushback against rules-based international order

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has suggested increasing NATO's funding for "core deterrence and defense activities."

"This would support Allied deployments in our battlegroups in the eastern part of our Alliance, air policing, maritime deployments and exercises," Stoltenberg said at a press conference in Brussels on Monday ahead of the defense ministerial set to be held February 17-18.

"Spending more together would demonstrate the strength of our commitment to Article 5, our promise to defend each other," the NATO chief said, adding that it would contribute to fairer burden-sharing.

Read alsoStoltenberg reiterates: 'NATO's door remains open' for UkraineThe Bloc also needs to take "a more global approach to deal with global challenges," Stoltenberg stressed, noting that "China and Russia are at the forefront of an authoritarian pushback against rules-based international order."

"So we should enhance our political dialogue and practical cooperation with like-minded partners to promote our values and protect our interests," Stoltenberg concluded.

Memo

Enhanced Forward Presence (EFP) is a NATO-allied forward-deployed defense and deterrence military posture in Central Europe through Poland and Northern Europe through Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, in order to protect and reassure NATO's Central and Northern European member states on NATO's eastern flank of their security, as per Wikipedia.

Following Russia's invasion of Crimea and its war in Donbas, NATO's member states agreed at the 2016 Warsaw summit to forward deploy four multinational battalion battle groups to those NATO member states perceived to be most at risk of a possible Russian attack or invasion.

Reporting by UNIAN
New Delhi:

On the eve of demitting office, outgoing President Pranab Mukherjee will address the nation at Rashtrapati Bhavan at 7:30 pm on Monday. After addressing, Mukherjee will host dinner for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and cabinet ministers.



Members of Parliament on Sunday bid adieu to Mukherjee at a gala ceremony in the Central Hall of Parliament as leaders recalled his contribution in upholding democratic values.



81-year-old Mukherjee was received by Vice President Hamid Ansari, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar at Parliament for the farewell ceremony.



The outgoing president expressed gratitude to the parliamentarians for the farewell. After Independence, we undertook to promote fraternity, dignity and unity of the nation. These ideals became the lodestar for the country, he said.

ALSO READ: I am a creation of this Parliament, says President Pranab Mukherjee in farewell speech



He asked the members to avoid frequent disruptions in Parliament saying it hurt the opposition more. During my years in Parliament, I learnt that it stands for debate, discussion and dissent. I also learnt that disruptions hurt the opposition more, he said.



PM Modi also gave farewell to Mukherjee on Saturday. PM Modi hosted a dinner for Mukherjee. The function at Hyderabad House was also attended by President-elect Ram Nath Kovind and Vice President Hamid Ansari. On the occasion, the Prime Minister presented a memento to the outgoing president, the PMO said. In keeping with tradition, PM Narendra Modi presents a memento to President Pranab Mukherjee at the farewell hosted by him for the President, Press Information Bureau tweeted. Mukherjee also signed the visitors book.

ALSO READ: Nitish Kumar in Delhi, meets Rahul Gandhi, attends PM Modis dinner

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Adolfo Sgambelluri served as a Marine colonel who returned to his Guam home in 1980 after having served 26 years of military service.

On Guam, he served many roles in law enforcement, including as the island's police chief and director of the Department of Corrections. Following his leadership at DOC and GPD, he was appointed federal security director for the Transportation Security Administration on Guam for four years, through 2005.

His public service legacy on Guam and service to the nation is being remembered in his death which was confirmed Monday.

"Sgamby," as he was called, left behind gifts of friendship.

"The community is losing a great crime fighter and a tough but always fair taskmaster," stated businessman Lee Webber, a former newspaper publisher under Gannett Corp., and former Navy corpsman who knew Sgambelluri well among a circle of Vietnam War veterans.

Bringing out the best in the people

"He was an excellent Marine and a man of his word," Webber said. "He had a knack for bringing out the best in the people he worked with."

Former Sen. Robert Klitzkie, a Marine and friend, said, "It was an honor to work for Sgamby at GPD. He typified the slogan, 'Once a Marine, always a Marine.'

If a person could only have one friend in his life, he couldnt do any better than Sgamby, Klitzkie added.

Sgambelluri received a Bronze Star Medal for combat action as a Marine.

He was an advocate for naming Route 10 the Vietnam Veterans Highway.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 22:48:52|Editor: huaxia

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TOKYO, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Japan on Monday reported 965 new daily COVID-19 cases, with the death toll rising by 72 to a total of 7,055 people.

The country's cumulative total of infection now stands at 418,458, with Tokyo, the hardest hit by the pandemic among Japan's 47 prefectures, contributing an additional 266 infections on Monday.

The Tokyo metropolitan government said that Monday's daily infection count marked the ninth successive day that new cases have remained below the 500-mark.

The latest figure in the capital of 14 million is also the first time the tally has dipped below 300 new daily cases since Monday last week, the local government said.

The capital's cumulative total of infections since the outbreak of the pandemic here now stands at 106,771 people, the latest statistics Monday evening showed.

According to health officials, there are currently 97 COVID-19-positive patients designated as being in a "serious condition".

This is the first time since Jan. 2 the number has fallen below 100 and is six less than the previous day, the Tokyo metropolitan government also said.

The country's first COVID-19 vaccinations will begin here on Wednesday with front-line medical workers being given first priority for the jabs, the government said Monday.

A batch of 400,000 doses arrived on Friday at Narita airport near Tokyo from Brussels, with the health ministry panel green-lighting the use of the vaccine, jointly developed by U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech SE, amid the ongoing pandemic here, which is weighing heavily on the country's medical system.

Japan's Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, thereafter, formally approved the country's first vaccine on Sunday for people aged 16 or older.

The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine having already been successfully rolled-out in a number of countries including Britain and the United States also factored into the panel's approval of the inoculations being administered in Japan.

The Japanese government has said it aims to start administering jabs to around 20,000 medical staff from Wednesday this week.

Those doctors and nurses have agreed to be monitored for potential side effects, with the first jabs to be administered in Tokyo before being introduced in other prefectures.

In March, around 3.7 million health workers will begin receiving the vaccine, followed by 36 million people aged 65 or older, possibly from April.

Following the elderly, those with preexisting conditions and those working at elderly care facilities will be next in line to be vaccinated, followed by the rest of the population.

The government has arranged for around 20,000 freezers to be in place across the country, as the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine needs to be stored at a temperature of minus 75 degrees Celsius.

Deals have been inked by the Japanese government with Pfizer, AstraZeneca Plc. and Moderna Inc. to receive enough doses to vaccinate Japan's population of 126 million against the virus. Enditem
France and five allies gather on Monday to discuss the Sahel's jihadist insurgency, with Paris looking for support enabling it to cut French troop numbers in the strife-torn region.

Leaders of the so-called G5 Sahel -- Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger -- are to attend the two-day summit in the Chadian capital N'Djamena, with French President Emmanuel Macron attending via videolink.

The meeting comes a year after France boosted its Sahel deployment, seeking to wrench back momentum in the brutal, long-running battle.

But despite touted military successes, jihadists remain in control of vast swathes of territory and attacks are unrelenting.

Six UN peacekeepers have been killed in Mali this year alone, and France has lost five soldiers since December.

Armed groups' zones of influence in the Sahel /  AFP

Islamist fighters in the Sahel first emerged in northern Mali in 2012, during a rebellion by ethnic Touareg separatists which was later overtaken by the jihadists.

France intervened to rout the insurgents, but the jihadists scattered, taking their campaign into the ethnic powder keg of central Mali and then into Burkina Faso and Niger.

Thousands of soldiers and civilians have been killed, according to the UN, while more than two million people have fled their homes.

The crushing toll has fuelled perceptions that the jihadists cannot be defeated by military means alone.

Jean-Herve Jezequel, Sahel director for the International Crisis Group (ICG) think tank, told AFP that conventional military engagement had failed to deliver a knockout blow.

The jihadists "are capable of turning their backs, bypassing the system, and continuing," he said.

Last Tuesday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian called for a "diplomatic, political and development surge" to respond to the situation.

Last year, France upped its Barkhane mission in the Sahel from 4,500 troops to 5,100 -- a move that precipitated a string of apparent military successes.

French forces killed the leader of the notorious Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), Abdelmalek Droukdel, as well as a military chief of the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Group to Support Islam and Muslims (GSIM).

- Troop drawdown? -

But the latest attacks have also brought the number of French combat deaths in Mali to 50, prompting soul-searching at home about Barkhane's cost and usefulness.

Macron last month opened the door to a drawdown, suggesting France may "adjust" its military commitment.

French losses: Defence Minister Florence Parly pays tribute to three soldiers killed by a roadside bomb in Mali in December /  AFP

Despite persistent rumours, France is not expected to announce any troop withdrawal at N'Djamena.

Instead, to lighten the load, France is hoping for more military support from its European partners through the Takuba Task Force which assists Mali in its fight against jihadists.

The Sahel armies, for their part, are unable to pick up the slack.

In 2017, the five countries initiated a planned 5,000-man pooled force, but it remains hobbled by lack of funds, poor equipment and inadequate training.

Chad, which reputedly has the best armed forces among the five, promised a year ago to send a battalion to the "three border" flashpoint where the frontiers of Mali, Niger and Burkina converge. The deployment has still not happened.

Paris also hopes last year's successes can strengthen political reform in the Sahel states, where weak governance has fuelled frustration and instability.

In Mali, the epicentre of the Sahel crisis, army officers overthrew president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita last August after weeks of protests over perceived corruption and his failure to end the jihadist conflict.

The interim government has pledged to reform the constitution and stage national elections, but critics say the pace of change is slow.

A 2015 regional deal between Mali's government and northern rebel groups has also barely advanced, yet it is one of the country's few options for escaping the violence.
A 92-year-old woman from the northern Vietnamese province of Hai Duong has tested positive for the novel coronavirus after coming into close contact with a COVID-19 patient.

She was among the seven people who tested positive for the novel coronavirus in Hai Duong on Sunday, according to the provincial steering committee for COVID-19 prevention and control.

They reside in Tuan Viet, Kim Lien, and Ngu Phuc Communes and Phu Thai Town, located in Kim Thanh District.

The elderly woman  Ta Thi B.  is the oldest person in Hai Duong to test positive for the novel coronavirus.

She previously had direct contact with a COVID-19 patient who is a factory worker in Cam Giang District and was brought to a quarantine center on February 8.

Following her test result, B. was taken to a medical center in Kim Thanh District and is currently in stable health conditions.

Authorities in Kim Thanh District have asked all residents who go to work in Cam Giang District to stay home until further notice.

Vietnam has documented 2,229 COVID-19 cases as of Monday morning, with 1,534 recoveries and 35 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health.

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Zimbabwe received on Monday its first delivery of China's COVID-19 vaccine, Sinopharm.

The plane carrying the vaccines arrived at the Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport.

The southern African country's first vaccines will be 200,000 doses of the vaccine donated by the Chinese government, while another 600,000 doses of the same vaccine have been purchased by the government and will arrive early next month, the state-run Sunday Mail reported.

Frontline workers such as health professionals and immigration agents working at borders will get first priority for the vaccines, according to a government rollout plan.

It was China's first shipments of vaccines to Africa, after deliveries to Egypt and Equatorial Guinea.

The 200,000 doses arriving from China are a far cry from the millions needed to administer jabs to the ten million people, or 60 percent of Zimbabwe's population, to achieve herd immunity.

The country, whose once robust public health system has deteriorated along with the economy over the past two decades, reported 35,104 cases, including 1,398 deaths, on Feb. 14, up from the slightly more than 10,000 cases and 277 deaths at the beginning of December.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
New Delhi, Feb 15 : As invite-only audio chat app Clubhouse becomes popular globally including in India, researchers at Stanford University in the US have warned that the app may be leaking users' audio data to the Chinese government.

The Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO) has confirmed that Agora, a Shanghai-based provider of real-time engagement software, supplies back-end infrastructure to the Clubhouse app.

"The SIO has determined that a user's unique Clubhouse ID number and chatroom ID are transmitted in plaintext, and Agora would likely have access to users' raw audio, potentially providing access to the Chinese government," the researchers said in a blog post.

The users' metadata is sent over the internet in plaintext (not encrypted), meaning that any third-party with access to a user's network traffic can access it.

"In this manner, an eavesdropper might learn whether two users are talking to each other, for instance, by detecting whether those users are joining the same channel," the researchers warned.

In at least one instance, SIO observed room metadata being relayed to servers we believe to be hosted in the People's Republic of China (PRC), and audio to servers managed by Chinese entities and distributed around the world via Anycast (a wireless display receiver).

"It is also likely possible to connect Clubhouse IDs with user profiles," the researchers noted.

In a response to Stanford report, Clubhouse said it is deeply committed to data protection and user privacy.

"Given China's track record on data privacy, we made the difficult decision when we launched Clubhouse on the (Apple) App Store to make it available in every country around the world, with the exception of China," the company said.

"Some people in China found a workaround to download the app, which meant that -- until the app was blocked by China earlier this week -- the conversations they were a part of could be transmitted via Chinese servers," it added.

Last week, the drop-in audio chat app "Clubhouse" enabled rare unfettered Mandarin-language debate for mainland Chinese iPhone users, before being abruptly blocked by the country's online censors on February 8.

Alongside casual conversations about travel and health, users frankly discussed Uighur concentration camps in Xinjiang, the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, and personal experiences of being interrogated by police.

The Chinese government restricts open discussion of these topics, maintaining a "Great Firewall" to block domestic audiences from accessing many foreign apps and websites.

"Although last week Clubhouse had not yet been blocked by the Great Firewall, some mainland users worried the government could eavesdrop on the conversation, leading to reprisals," the researchers noted.

In recent years, the Chinese government under President Xi Jinping has shown an increased willingness to prosecute its citizens for speech critical of the regime, even when that speech is blocked in China.

"Clubhouse app's audio messages, unlike Twitter posts, leave no public record after speech occurs, potentially complicating Chinese government monitoring efforts," the Stanford team emphasised.

Clubhouse said that it was rolling out changes to add additional encryption and blocks to prevent its clients from ever transmitting pings to Chinese servers.

"We also plan to engage an external data security firm to review and validate these changes," the company said.
 by Lasana M. Sekou.

PHILIPSBURG:--- Poet, renaissance scholar, dramaturge, novelist Charles Matz died at his home in Southampton, New York on February 12, 2021. He was 96.

He leaves his children, Margaret Matz (architect, New York), Charles Carlino Matz III (professor, NYIT; architect, New Jersey), and Clare Ann Matz (multimedia artist, film director, Italy). He leaves Antonio Lai da Teulada among family members; and a number of friends and colleagues.

At House of Nehesi Publishers we are saddened by the passing of Professor Charles Matz, said Jacqueline Sample, president of House of Nehesi Publishers (HNP). Columbus, the Moor by Charles Matz was published here by HNP in 2015 and launched to an international audience at the St. Martin Book Fair that same year.

It took courage for Matz to publish his definitive poetry in the Caribbean, said Sample, with the English original and the Spanish, French, and Italian translations in one book.

Now Columbus, the Moor, his last published title, shares with us joy of knowing the poet. It places Charles Matz, as a US author, among the few to master the kind of Atlantic World epics that are rare pillars of the Caribbean and Latin American poetry, said Sample.

Charles Matz as a poet, performer, and teacher was on the scene long before his introduction to the Caribbean. Audiences in the USA, and European cities, especially in Venice, London, Paris, and Madrid where he lived and worked, have known his work, especially in the theater.

In 1966, Matz taught creative writing at the University of Notre Dame, intent on fusing oral poetry and electronic age media, and founded the CAM Art Company.

After a stint in Italy  where, starting in 1968, Matz worked in theater and taught at the Istituto Universitario delle Lingue Moderne  the multi-media performance arts CAM settled in New York City in 1984.

In addition to obtaining his doctorate at Notre Dame, Matz studied at Rutgers University, Columbia University, and the Sorbonne. His education and daring work at CAM were arguably critical in his creation of the shout poetry that dominated in rock-music concerts with its emotional impact. (camartco.com)

Matz told HNP that the poetry form uses oral and music composition techniques based in part on traditional forms from the European Mediterranean area and Africa.

Matz contributed articles on contemporary artistic concepts to Opera News, Vogue, Testuale, and Digraphe-Mercure de France. Over the years his acquaintance with or work related to the likes of Ezra Pound, Peggy Guggenheim, Norman Mailer, and Andrea Zanzotto, could be seen as part of the avant-garde circles in which he moved.

To the Italian poet Zanzotto, The literary works of Charles Matz are extremely complex.  What distinguishes his work is his plunging into the bottomless pit of lasting orality, the long, varied history of poetry-song-ritual. (Columbus, the Moor)

In his poetry, he does indeed pour forth such a flux of words, ideas, and multiple language-use that it could leave any unsuspecting or willing reader in a literary rapture.

Columbus, the Moor, set on the day that Christopher Columbus and crew arrive in the New World, is such a work.

The Trinidadian literary critic Shivanee Ramlochan has called the book-length dramatic poem an interpretive and lyrically lavish fusion of fact and speculation. (Caribbean Beat)

In his poetry there are the inextricable dialogue, drama, visceral imagery, and music that tenant his theater, certainly to be found in his librettos. (youtu.be/f6TUebdX4tM)

So not by chance, in a comment about his poetry, the author Dr. Jay B. Haviser might have best summed up the work circle of a life well adventured: Matz mystically takes us to those moments when the stars moved and gravity shifted, beyond the invisible to where dusty breath warnings  fell on deaf ears filled with grandeur.

Charles Matz taught literature at Long Island University up to 2020his specialties were Dante and Comparative Western Literature (chiefly Italian and French). He is a recipient of the Chevalier de la Legion dHonneur of France.

Farewell, Professor Charles Matz.
Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Credit Suisse Group AG is grappling with how to keep top bankers from fleeing to competitors and drastically reducing risk as new Chairman Antonio Horta-Osorio seeks to recover from a series of scandals.The lender is cutting ties with SoftBank Group Corp., a backer to Lex Greensills collapsed supply-chain finance empire, and its temporarily barring clients from withdrawing all of their cash from a fund that invests with Renaissance Technologies after the strategy tanked and investors rushed for the exit.Its also considering retention bonuses for top performers to stabilize the business as defections mount in the wake of the Greensill debacle and the implosion of Bill Hwangs Archegos Capital Management, which contributed to a first-quarter pretax loss of 900 million francs ($1 billion).Theyre looking a bit like a basket case right now, Octavio Marenzi, chief executive officer of capital markets consulting firm Opimas, said Friday in a phone interview. The Archegos thing is really bad, and what happens after an event like that is people start to pick on them. Theyre seen as the weakest kid in the class.Some of the firms senior talent is streaming for the exits. Its top financial services banker, Alejandro Przygoda, is leaving for Jefferies Financial Group Inc., along with at least three colleagues, people familiar with the matter have said. That followed the recent departures of at least four other members of the financial institutions group to competitors including Barclays Plc., Bank of America Corp. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc.Shares of Zurich-based Credit Suisse have tumbled about 14% this year, the only decline among 35 companies in the Bloomberg Europe 500 Banks & Financial Services Index, which has surged 26%.Credit Suisse will no longer do any new business with SoftBank, people with knowledge of situation said, a decision that may ripple across the firms investment bank. SoftBank has been a prolific dealmaker, and last year Credit Suisse and other banks held about $8 billion of SoftBank shares in collateral, pledged by founder Masayoshi Son.A SoftBank Group spokesperson wasnt immediately available to comment, while Credit Suisse declined to comment.Horta-Osorio, 57, who succeeded Urs Rohner as chairman last month, pledged a wide-ranging review after the bank was forced to suspend billions of dollars of funds it managed with Greensill and took a $5.5 billion hit on Archegos, raising questions about the oversight of key clients.Credit Suisse conducted an internal review into the Greensill funds after allegations of possible conflicts of interest involving SoftBank last year. A number of SoftBank portfolio companies received loans via supply-chain funds at Credit Suisse, while SoftBank was also an investor in the Credit Suisse funds.In the aftermath, SoftBank pulled $700 million from the funds and the bank changed its investment guidelines for Credit Suisses funds to reduce the maximum exposure to a single borrower.The overlapping financial relationships raised questions about whether SoftBank was using the Credit Suisse funds to prop up investments in the Vision Fund, including Greensill Capital, in which it had a substantial stake.SoftBank wrote down its $1.5 billion Greensill holding to almost zero after Credit Suisse was forced to unwind its four Greensill-linked funds in March, people familiar with the matter have said. SoftBank is now seeking $1.15 billion in claims as part of Greensills insolvency proceedings.Credit Suisse marketed the popular supply-chain finance funds as among its safest investments because the funds were insured and the loans they held backed by invoices typically paid within weeks. But as the funds grew into a $10 billion strategy, they strayed from that pitch and much of the money was loaned through Greensill against expected future invoices, for sales that were merely predicted.Greensills collapse forced Credit Suisse to liquidate the funds.Guptas BusinessThe Greensill debacle is also at play in claims that Credit Suisse executives ignored warnings from colleagues about troubled steel tycoon Sanjeev Gupta as they channeled $1.2 billion of client funds to his businesses. Bankers in Credit Suisses commodity trade-finance unit blacklisted Guptas Liberty Commodities Ltd. in 2016 because they suspected some of its deals werent legitimate, according to people familiar with the matter.When they learned roughly two years later that the bank was lending to his companies through a suite of investment funds, which eventually grew to $10 billion, they flagged their concerns to leaders in compliance and the division that housed the loans, one of the people said.The disclosure that Credit Suisse may have put clients at risk despite internal concerns over Guptas businesses adds a new twist to the debacle stemming from the March implosion of Greensill, the finance firm at the center of the three-way relationship. The U.K. Serious Fraud Office is now investigating Guptas group of companies for suspected fraud, including in its financing deals with Greensill, according to a May 14 statement.We are currently focusing our efforts on recovering our investors money, Will Bowen, a spokesman for Credit Suisse in London, said in an emailed statement, adding that the banks internal probe will focus on all of the issues linked to the funds. We are committed to learning the lessons and will share the relevant lessons learned at the appropriate time.Andrew Mitchell, a spokesman for the Gupta Family Group Alliance, or GFG Alliance, a collective of businesses linked to Gupta including Liberty Commodities, denied any wrongdoing.RenTech FundSeparately, Credit Suisse is temporarily barring clients from withdrawing all their cash from a fund that invests with RenTec.The bank has invoked a so-called hold-back clause, after assets in the CS Renaissance Alternative Access Fund slumped to about $250 million this month from approximately $700 million at the start of last year, according to people with knowledge of the matter. While investors will receive 95% of their redemption requests after two months, the remaining 5% is expected to be paid out in January, after the funds year-end audit, the people said.The fund lost about 32% last year, in line with the decline in the Renaissance Institutional Diversified Alpha Fund International fund that it invests into, the people said. Renaissance, regarded as one of the most successful quant investing firms in the world, was rocked by billion of dollars in redemptions earlier this year after unprecedented losses in 2020. Three of its funds open to external investors fell by double digits last year.Credit Suisse and Renaissance declined to comment.More stories like this are available on bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.2021 Bloomberg L.P.
4WD

Validated over 2 million kilometers (1.2 million miles), the Landtrek isnt thoroughly French despite the Sochaux Lion on the front grille and steering wheel. Developed in collaboration with Changan Automobile for the Chinese market as the Kaicene F70, the one-tonne pickup is available with a single cab, a double cab, and a chassis cab. Lots of accessories are offered at launch, including thermoformed body protection and a sports bar.Entry-level versions of the mid-size workhorse feature unpainted plastic bumpers, halogen headlights, and steel wheels with six lug nuts. Even in this specification, Peugeot sweetens the deal with three years or 100,000 kilometers (62,137 miles) of warranty, whichever comes first.Capable of towing 3.5 tons (7,716 pounds), the Sino-French pickup is gifted with 235 millimeters (9.3 inches) of ground clearance. Off-road enthusiasts may also be interested to hear that the maximum fording depth is 600 millimeters (23.6 inches), while attack and departure angles dont exceed 29 or 30 and 27 or 26 degrees with 2WD and four-wheel drive, respectively.In the Middle East and Africa, the Landtrek can be had with a 1.9-liter turbo diesel or a turbo gasser with 2.4 liters of displacement. These mills are rated at 150 and 210 PS (148 and 207 horsepower), while torque favors the smaller plant at 350 Nm (258 pound-feet) compared to 320 Nm (236 pound-feet).The standard transmission is a six-speed stick shift supplied by Getrag, and the only level up from there is a six-speed Punch Powertrain automatic thats exclusive to the gasoline engine. In addition to Manual, Sport, and Eco modes for the torque-converter automatic, the all-new bakkie offers 4L and 4H modes when optioned withthanks to a two-speed transfer case. Peugeot hasnt mentioned a word about pricing in these parts of the world, but fret not because the Mexican model is available to purchase at the time of reporting. Including VAT, the most Spartan configuration will set you back 504,900 pesos, which converts to $25,305 at current exchange rates.
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SANTA FE  With U.S. Rep. Deb Haaland poised to take the reins of a key federal agency, a bill that would overhaul the process for picking her potential successor passed its first Senate committee Monday.

However, the narrow margin of approval  the bill passed via a 6-5 vote  could prove problematic for supporters who hope to have it in place for the looming congressional vacancy.

Thats because the legislation, Senate Bill 254, would need to be approved by a two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate and signed into law by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham to be implemented in time for a special election that would likely happen this summer.

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The bipartisan bill sponsored by Rep. Daymon Ely, D-Corrales, and Sen. Mark Moores, R-Albuquerque, would require Democrats, Republicans and other major political parties to pick their candidates for a vacant congressional seat in a special primary election.

Under the bill, winning candidates in the primary election would then face off in a general election, which would be held at least 63 days later.

What were trying to do is restore democracy in this one circumstance, Ely said during Mondays hearing of the Senate Rules Committee.

For his part, Moores said holding primary elections for vacant U.S. House seats would result in better candidates, adding, It should be opened up.

He also pointed out that, unlike with vacant U.S. Senate seats, the Constitution requires that U.S. House seats be elected by eligible voters.

Under New Mexicos current law, Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver would have to call a special election to fill Haalands seat no later than 91 days after it is vacated.

The states major political parties would hold central committee meetings behind closed doors to nominate their own candidates before such an election.

During Mondays committee hearing, Toulouse Oliver said she believes changes should be made to the system but expressed concern about changing the states election laws in midstream.

This is going to be really difficult to do right now, said Toulouse Oliver, adding planning is already underway for the special election to pick a new member of New Mexicos congressional delegation.

In addition, Sen. Daniel Ivey-Soto, D-Albuquerque, the Senate Rules Committees chairman, pointed out the bill would extend the timeline for filling a vacant congressional seat  from a maximum of 91 days to a minimum of 136 days.

After being nominated by President Joe Biden as interior secretary, Haaland is awaiting a U.S. Senate confirmation hearing and has not yet stepped down.

However, about a dozen candidates have already launched campaigns for her Albuquerque-based 1st Congressional District seat, including four Democratic state lawmakers.

The bill now advances to the Senate Judiciary Committee with just over 30 days left in the 60-day legislative session.
A new Candidate Conservation Agreement with Assurances for the dunes sagebrush lizard is now available for participation.

After more than a year on the effort, a new CCAS that will act in conjunction with the current Texas Conservation Plan received approval from the US Fish and Wildlife Service last month and is now seeking enrollees.

Chris Jensen, director of Canyon Environmental, a consulting firm, said that the new agreement was crafted to address the concerns of the sand miners who have arrived in the Permian Basin in recent years and opened facilities in or close to lizard habitat.

Were now reaching out to folks interested in enrolling, he told the Reporter-Telegram in a telephone interview. That includes oil and gas operators, sand mining companies, transmission companies and pipelines, among others. On the conservation side, he said ranchers and landowners interested in conservation are invited to enroll.

We want to head off a listing, explained Jensen, who will serve as administrator of the of the plan. With a change in administration, there is concern whether the lizard could be listed as threatened or endangered. This agreement gives operators a guide to continue operating, preserve the lizards habitat and head off a listing.

Among those Jensen has been working with on the new agreement has been the Permian Basin Petroleum Association.

As you know, weve been front and center on this issue for a decade and weve gone through several agreements, Ben Shepperd, president of the PBPA, told the Reporter-Telegram in a telephone interview.

Shepperd said he was pleased the service approved the plan and encourages association members to consider it if they work in or near lizard habitat. Indeed, he said several large acreage holders have already taken a look at the agreement.

Jensen said he wants to engage everyone and demonstrate to the Fish and Wildlife Service that the industry can undertake conservation measures without the onus of a species being listed as endangered or threatened.

At the end of the day, were still talking about the most prolific oil basin in the country. Its critical we demonstrate to the service and to the public that this is a primary energy source that can thrive and do conservation and do good work, Jensen concluded.

Success in conservation will depend not only on financial support but operational decisions on whether or not to work in lizard habitat and, if so, exactly how that work is done, said Shepperd.

We view this as a win-win as the industry gets a roadmap to continue operations and landowners receive funding to improve habitat conditions and conservation efforts. He said he expects the agreement  along with the existing TCP  will undergo modifications as conditions change.

I expect the Biden administration will work with us on this issue, Shepperd said, This began under the Obama administration. Its just good policy that transcends administrations and I expect it to continue.
Ruth Langsford and Eamonn Holmes returned to This Morning on Monday for the first time since they were axed from their Friday slot.

The presenters, aged 60 and 61 respectively, delighted viewers as they enthused: 'It's lovely to have them back where they belong!', after the pair were replaced by Alison Hammond and Dermot O'Leary in December following a 14-year stint.

Stepping in for Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield, the broadcasters will front the programme from Monday to Friday during the course of the half-term period this week.

They're back! Ruth Langsford and Eamonn Holmes returned to This Morning on Monday for the first time since they were axed from their Friday slot

The couple made a cheery comeback, with Eamonn sharing: 'Half term its Eamon and Ruth on your screens until Friday.'

Ruth - who has been married to the Northern Irish host since 2010 following a 13-year relationship - added: 'It certainly is and its lovely to see you all.'

The journalist went on to reflect on receiving the Covid-19 Oxford/ AstraZeneca vaccine after being called early to a jab centre in Surrey on Saturday.

'I was absolutely delighted. There I am with the lovely Stephanie', the Loose Women panellist said.

'It's lovely to see you all': The presenters, aged 60 and 61 respectively, delighted viewers as fans enthused: 'It's lovely to have them back where they belong!'

Take over: The couple were replaced by Alison Hammond and Dermot O'Leary (pictured last week) in December following a 14-year stint

Update: The couple made a cheery comeback, with Eamonn sharing: 'Half term its Eamon and Ruth on your screens until Friday'

The vaccine is prioritised for citizens over the age of 65, but the mother-of-one revealed she was called early after receiving a message from the NHS.

Ruth said: 'I questioned this. I got the text, Im 61 [in March] and said, this is too early. I phoned my surgery they said no no, thats absolutely right. Everyone was lovely. It was quick, it was painless, I feel very lucky Ive got mine.'

Viewers took to Twitter to voiced their joy over their return as they wrote: 'Eamonn and Ruth actually give me life. It's like watching my mum and dad on the TV.

'How wonderful, I missed Eamonn and Ruth, and now they reappear! ITV by cable in Switzerland. @thismorning (of course, I love Allison too). It's nice to laugh out loud early in the morning.

'I was absolutely delighted': The journalist went on to reflect on receiving the Covid-19 Oxford/ AstraZeneca vaccine after being called early to a jab centre in Surrey on Saturday (pictured)

Brief break: Stepping in for Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield (pictured last week), the broadcasters will front the programme from Monday to Friday over the half-term period

'loving Ruth and Eamonn today and for the rest of the week- they should be more permanent.

'Thank goodness! @thismorning is good again and I can watch. Lovely to have Ruth and Eamonn back where they belong. #ThisMorning

'So nice to see Ruth and Eamonn back on #thismorning I shall be watching again this week.

'I hope the ITV bosses see Eamonn and Ruth trending and do the right thing and give them a day a week back! #thismorning... so lovely to see Eamonn and Ruth back, Ive missed you both!'

'It's like watching my mum and dad on TV': Viewers took to Twitter to voiced their joy over their return

The duo later took part in their game It's Behind You with a caller when a picture of Kate Middleton came up.

The fan attempted to help Ruth guess the Duchess of Cambridge's identity as they said: 'She's thin... she's married to...', before time ran out.

A cheeky Eamonn rubbed a few fans the wrong way as he quipped: 'She's very thin, well it's not you darling!'

One wrote: 'As if Eamonn Holmes just said to Ruth well its not you then when the clue was shes very thin .... how bl***y rude!!' (sic)

In the zone: The duo later took part in their game It's Behind You with a caller when a picture of Kate Middleton came up

'How rude!' A cheeky Eamonn rubbed a few fans the wrong way as he quipped: 'She's very thin, well it's not you darling!'

They marked their final Friday show in December, and have since expressed their gratitude towards fans for their 'overwhelming' support following their demotions.

After it was confirmed that former Big Brother personality Alison, 45, and presenter Dermot, 47, would be replacing the couple, a media storm exploded with talk of rage behind-the-scenes.

The TV stars began their coveted jobs on January 8, joining the line-up that also includes main hosts Phillip, 58, and Holly, 40, while Ruth and Eamonn only present the show during school breaks.

Since their debut, Alison and Dermot reportedly received higher ratings on This Morning than their predecessors.

They've proven to be a hit on the show as they were said to have drawn in 1.41 million viewers during their first show last month.

According to reports from The Sun , the pair received 200,000 more viewers tuning into their show than Ruth and Eamonn's final Friday appearance.

The publication claimed that while the This Morning newbies drew in more viewers, the veterans had a bigger audience share of 23 per cent compared to their successor's 21 per cent. MailOnline contacted ITV representatives for comment at the time.

DUBLIN, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Mesenchymal Stem Cells - Advances and Applications, 2021" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are multipotent cells that can differentiate into a variety of cell types, including but not limited to osteoblasts, chondrocytes, myocytes, and adipocytes.



In addition to secreting factors that can stimulate tissue repair, MSCs can substantially alter their microenvironment, exerting effects that are both anti-inflammatory and anti-fibrotic. MSCs are advantageous over other stem cell types for a variety of reasons, including that they are immuno-privileged, making them an advantageous cell type for allogeneic transplantation.



MSCs appear to be an exceptionally promising tool for cell therapy, because of their unusual advantages, which include availability, expandability, transplantability, and ethical implications. Interest in therapeutic applications of human MSCs arises from their diverse ability to differentiate into a range of cell types, as well as their ability to migrate to sites of tissue injury/inflammation or tumor growth.

Naturally, a broad range of research products has been developed around MSCs and their differentiated cell types. Growing attention is also being given to manufacturing technologies to support the commercial-scale production of MSCs. MSCs are well-suited for use in the exponential growth field of 3D printing, because of their capacity to form structural tissues.



Numerous market competitors are exploring commercialization strategies for MSC-derived extracellular vesicles (EVs) and exosomes because these extracellular "packages" represent a novel strategy for accessing the therapeutic effects of stem cells without the risks of administering whole cells to patients. Finally, gene editing of MSCs for overexpressing antitumor genes or therapeutic factors is broadening their application.

As the most common stem cell type being used within regenerative medicine today, there is huge potential for growth within the MSC market. There are more than one-hundred thousand scientific publications published about MSCs, as well as over 1,100 MSC clinical trials underway worldwide. Current "hotspots" for MSC clinical trials include the U.S., E.U., China, Middle East, and South Korea.



While many early-stage MSC trials have demonstrated safety and efficacy, only a small number of MSC products have reached commercialization, indicating that the therapeutic market for MSCs remains early-stage. Population aging and an increasing prevalence of chronic disease are also driving interest in MSC-based therapies.



Furthermore, Google Trend data reveals that MSC searches are more than twice as common as the next most common stem cell type. The demand for both MSCs and MSC-based research products have surged in recent years.

Today in 2021, nearly one-hundred different market competitors are developing various types of MSC-related products/services, therapies, and manufacturing technologies. Within this ever-changing landscape, having a thorough understanding of the competition and their relative strengths and weaknesses is essential.



Therefore, this global strategic report details the activities of 98 leading MSC companies. It also presents detailed market size figures for the global MSC market, segmented by geography and business segment, accompanied by five-year forecasts through 2027.

Key Topics Covered:

1. REPORT OVERVIEW

1.1 Statement of the Report

1.2 Target Demographic

1.3 Report Sources

1.4 Purpose of the Report

1.5 Executive Summary

1.6 Introduction

2. MESECHYMAL STEM CELLS (MSCS): AN OVERVIEW

2.1 The Impact of MSCs on Regenerative Medicine

2.2 Timeline of MSC Nomenclature

2.3 Sources of MSCs

2.4 Cell Surface Markers in MSCs

2.5 In Vitro Differentiation Potentials of MSCs

2.6 Soluble Factors Secreted by MSCs

3. MANUFACTURE OF MESENCHYMAL STEM CELLS

3.1 Methods of Isolation of MSCs

3.2 From Conventional Cultures to Bioreactors

3.3 Main Features of Commercial Bioreactors

3.4 Microcarriers used for the Expansion of MSCs

3.5 Downstream Processing of MSCs

4. COMPARISON OF AUTOLOGOUS AND ALLOGENEIC MSC MANUFACTURE

4.1 Manufacturing Cost Compared

4.2 Comparison of the Two Business Models

4.3 Cost Breakdown in MSC Manufacturing

4.4 Opportunities for Cost Reduction

4.5 Partial Automation vs. Full Automation

5. SMALL SCALE PROCESSING OF MSCS

5.1 Model Design

5.2 Culture Media

6. LARGE-SCALE EXPANSION OF MSCS

6.1 The Four Common Bioprocessing Strategies for Large-Scale Expansion

6.2 Commonly Used Sources of MSCs for Large-Scale Expansion

6.3 The Commonly Used Culture Medium for the Large-Scale Expansion of MSCs

6.4 Comparison between Large-Scale Bioprocessing Strategies

6.5 Contract Manufacturing for Cell Therapies

6.6 Global Cell Therapy Manufacturing Capacity

7. ESTIMATED CONSUMPTION OF MSCS IN THE INDUSTRY

7.1 Consumption of MSCs in Academic and Preclinical Settings

7.2 MSC Consumption in Clinical Settings

7.3 Consumption of MSCs by Target Indications in Clinical Trials

7.4 Future Consumption through 2030

7.5 Cost of MSCs per Patient used in Clinical Trials by Indication

8. PUBLISHED SCIENTIFIC PAPERS ON MSCS

8.1 Number of Papers on MSCs & iPSCs Compared

8.2 Number of Papers on MSCs by Source

8.3 Number of Papers Published on Clinical Trials Involving MSCs

9. CLINICAL TRIALS OF MSCS, MSC-BASED COVID-19, MSC-EXOSOMES

9.1 Analysis of Data from ClinicalTrials.gov

9.2 Sources of MSCs for Clinical Trials

9.3 Autologous vs. Allogeneic MSCs

9.4 Regional Distribution of MSC-Based Clinical Trials

9.5 Types of Funding for MSC-Based Clinical Trials

9.6 Types of MSC-Based Clinical Trials

9.7 MSC-Based Clinical Trials by Phase of Development

9.8 Clinical Trials Involving MSCs for the Treatment of COVID-19

9.9 Clinical Trials Involving MSC-Derived Exosomes

9.10 NIH Funding for MSC Research

9.11 CIRM's Funding for MSC Projects

10. CURRENT SUB-OPTIMAL CLINICAL OUTCOMES & SOLUTIONS

10.1 To Overcome Challenges Arising from MSC Manufacture

10.2 Cryopreservation and Culture Rescue

10.3 Overcoming Clinical Challenges Related to Infusion

10.4 To Overcome Clinical Challenges from the Host

11. MODIFICATION OF MSCS

11.1 Genetic Modification

11.2 Preconditioning Modifications

11.3 Therapeutic Application of Modified MSCs

12. MAJOR DISEASES ADDRESSED BY MSCS IN CLINICAL TRIALS

12.1 Clinical Trials using MSCs for Autoimmune Diseases

12.2 Clinical Trials using MSCs for Cardiovascular Diseases

12.3 Clinical Trials using MSCs for Neurodegenerative Diseases

12.4 Clinical Trials using MSCs for Bone and Cartilage Diseases

13. PRESENT STATUS OF MESENCHYMAL STEM CELL INDUSTRY

13.1 Sources of MSCs for Research and Clinical Applications

13.2 Allogeneic Products Gaining Traction

13.3 MSC-Based Products with Marketing Approval

13.4 Currently Marketed MSC-Based Bone Matrices

13.5 From Whole Cell MSC Therapy to MSC-Derived Exosome Therapy

13.6 MSC-Based Therapy for COVID-19

13.7 MSC-Based Clean Meat Production

13.8 Stem Cell-Based Cosmetics

14. MARKET ANALYSIS

14.1 Price Tags for MSC-Based Cell Therapy (CT) Treatment

14.2 Price Tags for MSC-Based Matrices

14.3 Market Size of MSC-Based Therapies

14.4 Global Market for MSC-based Therapeutics

14.5 Global Demand for Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs)

14.6 Market Share of MSC-Based Business Segments

15. COMPANY PROFILES

101 Bio

Adipomics, Inc.

Aegle Therapeutics

Aethlon Medical, Inc.

AgeX Therapeutics, Inc.

Alexerion Biotech Corp.

AlloSource, Inc.

American CryoStem Corporation

American Type Culture Collection (ATCC)

AMS Biotechnology, Ltd. (AMSBIO)

Anemocyte S.r.l

Anjarium Biosciences

Anterogen, Co., Ltd.

Apceth Biopharma GmbH

Aruna Bio

Athersys, Inc.

Avalon GloboCare Corp.

Axol Bioscience, Ltd.

Azymus Therapeutics

Baylx, Inc.

BioEden

Bio-Techne

BioCat GmbH

BioFluidica

BioVision, Inc.

BrainStorm Cell Therapeutics

Capricor Therapeutics

Catalent Pharma Solutions

CCRM

CellResearch Corporation, Pte Ltd.

Celularity, Inc

Celltex Therapeutics Corporation

Ciloa

CO- DON AG

Codiak Biosciences

Cognate BioServices, Inc.

Corestem, Inc.

Creative Bioarray

Creative Biolabs

Cynata Therapeutics, Ltd.

DePuy Synthes

Direct Biologics

EVerZom

Evox Therapeutics, Ltd.

Exerkine Corp.

ExoCan Healthcare Technologies, Pvt. Ltd.

ExoCoBio, Co., Ltd.

Exogenus Therapeutics

EXoPERT

Exopharm

Exosome Diagnostics, Inc.

Exosome Sciences

ExosomePlus

Exosomics S.p.A

Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology

HansaBioMed Life Sciences, Ltd.

Hope Biosciences, LLC

Japan Tissue Engineering, Co., Ltd.

JCR Pharmaceuticals, Co., Ltd.

Kimera Labs , Inc.

, Inc. Lonza Group Ltd.

Mantra Bio

MDimune

Medipost, Co., Ltd.

NanoSomix, Inc.

NanoView Biosciences

NeurExo Sciences

Nipro Corporation

Novus Biologicals, LLC

NuVasive, Inc.

OmniSpirant Limited

Orthocell, Ltd.

Orthofix Medical, Inc.

Osiris Therapeutics, Inc.

Pharmicell, Co., Ltd.

Pluristem Therapeutics, Inc.

Regeneus, Ltd.

Regenexx

Regrow Biosciences, Pvt., Ltd.

ReNeuron

RoosterBio

RoslinCT

RTI Surgical, Inc.

Sentien Biotechnologies, Inc.

STEMCELL Technologies, Inc.

Stemedica Cell Technologies, Inc.

Stemmatters Biotechnologia e Medicina Regenerative SA

Stempeutics Research, Pvt., Ltd.

System Biosciences, LLC

Takeda Pharmaceuticals U.S.A. , Inc.

, Inc. Tavec Pharma

Tempo Bioscience

United Therapeutics Corp.

Vericel Corporation

Versatope Therapeutics

Vesigen Therapeutics, Inc.

Waisman Biomanufacturing

WuXi Advanced Therapies

XOStem, Inc.

Zen-Bio, Inc.

Zimmer Biomet

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/kdx0s6



Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]



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Retired Navy Lt. Cmdr. Thomas Edward Caldwell had a plan leading up to the violent Jan. 6 takeover of the U.S. Capitol, according to federal prosecutors.

The 66-year-old former Reserve intelligence officer wanted to transport weapons into Washington, D.C., by boat -- possibly with three four-man sniper teams who could "go hunting after dark" for "cockroaches who prey on the weak." That's according to new court documents that allege Caldwell and other veterans who forcibly busted into the Capitol last month relied on military training to prepare for the breach.

Caldwell, who lives in Virginia and left the Navy in 1995, is a member of the Oath Keepers, according to federal agents. The far-right anti-government militia group is one of several that recruits people with military and law enforcement experience. Two more veterans are named as Caldwell's co-conspirators: Jessica Marie Watkins and Donovan Ray Crowl.

Watkins, a 38-year-old from Ohio, is an Army veteran. Crowl is a former Marine corporal who worked on Huey helicopters.

The trio are among at least 32 alleged participants in the U.S. Capitol breach who served in the military. The number includes Ashli Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Force veteran, who was shot and killed by law enforcement inside the Capitol, stopping her apparent attempt to reach the House of Representatives chamber. She was one of five who died in the riot.

Many of the rioters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, including Babbitt, believed that President Donald Trump won the 2020 election. There is no evidence to support the former president's claims of widespread voter fraud. Trump was impeached by members of the Democratic-led House for the second time in his presidency over his comments leading up to and after the Jan. 6 mob, but the Senate failed to get the necessary two-thirds majority to convict him, and voted to acquit Feb. 13.

Each of the military services is now facing an order to address extremist ideologies in the ranks. The Joint Chiefs have called the Capitol mob "a direct assault on the U.S. Congress, the Capitol building, and our Constitutional process."

Leaders remain concerned, Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said Friday, that extremist groups are actively working to recruit those about to join the military. The defense secretary and Joint Chiefs are considering whether soon-to-be veterans need to be warned about the risks, he said.

"[Do we] need to do a better job educating future veterans as they get ready to leave," Kirby said, as to "what's waiting for them and who's waiting for them on the other side of that?"

'Detailed and Organized'

Court documents describe Caldwell as "a key figure who put into motion the violence that overwhelmed the Capitol."

Had the retired naval officer's plans come to life, as prosecutors put it, he appeared ready and willing to wreak even more havoc.

"The detailed and organized nature of Caldwell's planning for the January 6 operation and Capitol assault was uniquely dangerous and continues to impact security in the District and beyond," federal prosecutors alleged in a Thursday court filing. "Everything he did, he did in concert with an anti-government militia. Specifically, Caldwell helped organize a tactical unit of trained fighters that stormed and breached the Capitol on January 6, 2021."

Thomas Plofchan Jr., Caldwell's lawyer, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But he has argued that his client is not a member of the Oath Keepers. Caldwell is a disabled veteran who suffers from post-traumatic stress tied to a failed spinal-fusion surgery to treat a service-connected injury, Plofchan said.

Caldwell has no criminal history, and held a top security clearance for decades while working for the FBI after leaving the Navy, the attorney added. His physical injuries, Plofchan said, would have prevented him from storming barriers or forcibly entering the Capitol.

Prosecutors claim Caldwell messaged Watkins in November, telling the former soldier he was "very worried about the future of our country."

"I believe we will have to get violent to stop this," he's quoted as writing in the court documents. "Stay sharp and we will meet again. You are my kinda person and we may have to fight next time. I have my own gear, I like to be ON TIME and go where the enemy is, especially after dark."

FILE - In this Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, file photo, with the U.S. Capitol in the background, lights from police vehicles illuminate Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, following an insurrection. Federal agents have accused an Arkansas man of beating a police officer with a pole flying a U.S. flag during the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)

Watkins and Crowl, who both live about 50 miles outside Columbus, Ohio, in Champaign County, are allegedly members of a local militia group. Members of the organization, called the Ohio State Regular Militia, pay dues to the Oath Keepers, court documents state.

Watkins claimed on the now-offline social media site Parler that she was the commanding officer of the Ohio State Regular Militia. She's also accused of holding a basic training class in January, telling one potential prospect that she needed the recruit to be fighting fit by President Joe Biden's inauguration.

Crowl, 50, is accused of attending a training camp in North Carolina in December.

On the day of the riot, court documents add, Watkins claimed they had a group of about 30 or 40 people organized. She and Crowl "equipped themselves for battle before heading to the Capitol by carrying communication devices and wearing reinforced vests, camouflage helmets, and goggles."

They joined up with others wearing Oath Keepers clothing, the court documents state, and moved in an "organized and practiced fashion up the steps on the east side of the Capitol," where they forcibly entered the rotunda and pushed past a law enforcement agent.

"We are sticking together and sticking to the plan," Watkins said, according to court documents, before taking a video with Crowl in which they yelled, "We took on the Capitol! We overran the Capitol!"

'Misled by the President's Deception'

Other groups present at the Capitol last month also boasted military members and veterans in their ranks.

Retired Marine Capt. Christopher Kuehne, an alleged member of the Proud Boys, was arrested Thursday for his role in the Capitol breach. The Proud Boys call themselves "Western chauvinists," and have appeared at extremist gatherings, including the deadly 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Kuehne, a 47-year-old from Kansas, moved in coordination with four others during the riot, gesturing to communicate. Kuehne allegedly carried rolls of bright orange tape, which the suspects are said to have worn strategically, along with tactical-style gear, including helmets and gloves.

Rioters try to break through a police barrier, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, at the Capitol in Washington. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

The five suspects allegedly positioned themselves to prevent U.S. Capitol Police officers from lowering metal barriers to prevent the crowds from advancing. Kuehne, according to court documents, grabbed a podium and placed it on the track of one of the barriers to prevent it from closing.

The Purple Heart recipient served as a rifleman and scout sniper before becoming a field artillery officer. He deployed to Iraq twice. He retired in 2013 after 20 years of service.

Kuehne's father told The Associated Press his son was recently laid off, which added a lot of stress to his life. The Washington Post reported this week that most of the people arrested after the Capitol riot had a history of financial trouble.

"I'm in tears right now," he told the AP reporter when learning of his son's arrest. "I can't believe he went to DC. It's just unbelievable."

Dominic Pezzola, who goes by the name Spaz, was arrested last month for his role in the riot -- another alleged Proud Boys member with a military history.

Pezzola, who's accused of breaking a Capitol window with a riot shield, was seen in images wearing clothing with Proud Boys and Marine Corps logos, court documents show.

Michael Sherwin, the acting U.S. attorney for Washington, said in a January court filing that Pezzola "showed perseverance, determination, and coordination in being at the front lines every step along the way before breaking into the Capitol," according to the AP.

The former Marine corporal, who served in the Reserve until 2005 as an infantry assaultman, never deployed. He's now being held without bond after prosecutors said investigators found a thumb drive at Pezzola's New York home that contained materials about making weapons, explosive devices and poison.

Jonathan Zucker, the Marine veteran's attorney, argued that the 43-year-old has no criminal record or history of violence. As a veteran, Pezzola "acted out of the delusional belief that he was a 'patriot' protecting his country."

"Defendant is former military who is sworn to protect his country," Zucker added. "He was responding to the entreaties of the then commander in chief, President Trump. The President maintained that the election had been stolen and it was the duty of loyal citizens to 'stop the steal.' Admittedly there was no rational basis for the claim, but it is apparent [the] defendant was one of millions of Americans who were misled by the President's deception."

Pezzola didn't act out of criminal intent, his attorney added, but "a frighteningly confused and distorted sense of conscience."

"Hopefully, as a result of this experience he has learned not to be so gullible and will not be so easily duped again," he said.

Zucker isn't the only attorney representing a military veteran linked to the Capitol riot to make that argument. Albert Watkins, who represents Jacob Chansley -- a Navy veteran better known as the Qanon Shaman -- said his client was willing to testify at Trump's impeachment hearing.

When the former president didn't grant Chansley a pardon for his role in the Capitol mob, Watkins told Military.com his client felt let down.

"Mr. Chansley is deeply disappointed in former President Trump and feels as though the former president turned his back on those that heeded the call of the president to support the presentment to help save our nation," Watkins said.

-- Hope Hodge Seck contributed to this report.

-- Gina Harkins can be reached at gina.harkins@military.com. Follow her on Twitter @ginaaharkins.

Related: National Guardsman Is 1st Current Service Member to Be Arrested After Capitol Riot


US Secretary of State Antony Blinken affirmed in a phone call with his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu Feb. 15 that the United States believes that the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) is responsible for the deaths of 13 Turkish citizens who perished during a Turkish offensive against the militants in Iraqi Kurdistan that was launched Feb. 10.

The US State Department said in a readout of the call that Blinken expressed condolences for the deaths of Turkish hostages in northern Iraq and affirmed our view that PKK terrorists bear responsibility.

The statement appeared to walk back the State Department's statement from a day earlier that suggested the US government did not necessarily buy Turkeys version of how the Turks being held by the PKK had died. If the reports of the death of Turkish civilians at the hands of the PKK, a designated terrorist organization, are confirmed, we condemn this action in the strongest possible terms, the Feb. 14 statement said.

The wording was interpreted by Ankara as lending credence to PKK claims that Turkish forces are to blame for the deaths, and prompted a fierce reaction from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Speaking at a convention of his ruling Justice and Development Party in his native Rize province on the Black Sea, Erdogan accused the United States of siding with the PKK and its Syrian offshoot, the Peoples Protection Units (YPG). The US statement on the PKKs execution of Turkish citizens in northern Iraq is ridiculous. They claim they do not support the PKK, but they certainly do. Erdogan continued, If you want to continue our alliance globally and within NATO, then you must stop siding with terrorists.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry summoned US Ambassador to Turkey David Satterfield to register its protest.

Thirteen Turkish citizens were confirmed dead Feb. 14 and their bodies brought back to Turkey for autopsies and burial. Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said they were shot dead by PKK militants in a cave complex where they were being held in Iraqi Kurdistans mountainous Gara region.

Turkish special forces backed by US-made attack helicopters and fighter jets have been carrying out operations in Gara since Feb. 10.

Both Erdogan and Akar confirmed that the purpose of the operations was to rescue the hostages. We kept trying to figure out how we can rescue our brothers from the hands of the terrorists. We tried very hard, but we failed, Erdogan noted in his Rize address.

Top Turkish officials, including presidential adviser Ibrahim Kalin, initially described the victims as civilians. The government, however, identified its dead citizens as seven service members, two policemen and three civilians. One of the civilians has yet to be identified.

The deaths have triggered a wave of public fury. Much of the ire is directed at the PKK, which has been waging an armed campaign against the Turkish state since 1984. The group is designated as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union.

The pro-Kurdish Peoples Democratic Party (HDP), the third-largest party in parliament, has also come under fire for failing to condemn the PKK.

Erdogan and his far-right nationalist ally Devlet Bahceli accuse the HDP of being in league with the militants. Hundreds of HDP officials including former Co-chairman Selahattin Demirtas, numerous other former HDP lawmakers and popularly elected mayors remain behind bars on scantily evidenced charges of PKK membership.

On Feb. 15, Turkish authorities detained more than 700 people with alleged links to the PKK. They included HDP officials. The Interior Ministry said the suspects were detained in operations in 40 provinces. Their connection to the slaying of the hostages is unclear.

The question of why the Turkish army attacked the area where, by Akars own admission, the hostages were believed to be held remains unanswered. Erdogan said all would be explained during a special session of the parliament that is to be held this week.

What is known is that Turkish forces entered the cave complex on the fourth day of the operation after heavily bombing the area. That is when Turkish officials say they found the corpses. On Feb. 11, the PKK put out a statement saying that Turkish war planes were hitting the camp where the hostages were being held.

The HDP said the government ought to have used diplomacy rather than force to secure the hostages release. Ankara says it does not negotiate with terrorists. In 2014, however, it bargained with the Islamic State (IS) for the release of 49 hostages who were captured by the jihadis when they seized the Turkish Consulate in June 2014. It later emerged that Turkey had freed several IS prisoners in exchange.

It remains unclear how many Turkish nationals the PKK is still holding. They are believed to include two high-level operatives of Turkeys National Intelligence Agency, MIT, who were nabbed in August 2017 in Iraqi Kurdistans Sulaimaniyah province.

Turkeys Human Rights Association called on the PKK to free all the hostages in a Feb. 15 statement. It also called for an inquiry to be launched into the Turkish General Staffs handling of the rescue mission. It said all documents including video footage from the scene of the slaughter should be handed over to prosecutors for assessment.

The Human Rights Association had been pressing for the hostages freedom but the PKK refused saying it would only negotiate their release with government officials. Kurdish politicians and rights groups have mediated the release of Turkish prisoners held by the PKK in the past.

The Human Rights Associations president, Ozturk Turkdogan, said that both sides bore responsibility for the deaths. He said the governments assertion that the hostages were shot dead by the PKK rests on the testimony of a PKK militant who was captured during the operation.

Turkdogan told Al-Monitor in a telephone interview that the father of one of the dead Turkish servicemen had told him that he had seen a bullet hole in the head of his son, Semih Ozbey, when he was summoned by the authorities to identify his body.

We really dont know what happened. Anything is possible, the militants might have panicked and shot the hostages dead, or they might have died during the aerial bombings, Turkdogan said. But the main point is not who killed them but rather why the Turkish military carried out this operation to bring the hostages back alive in a manner that led to their deaths.
Out of 400 known distinct cancers, 380 are considered rare according to the American Cancer Society's metric of an incidence of less than 6 per 100,000. Rare cancers affect almost one in three new patients, or over half a million Americans each year. Despite the prevalence of rare cancers, 2012-2016 data shows that 75% of all clinical trials did not specifically include even one rare cancer by name.

Childhood cancer is considered a rare disease that accounts for about 1% of all U.S. cancer diagnoses. Every year, cancer takes the lives of 90,000 children and adolescents worldwide, despite treatment advances in recent decades. Although cancer is the leading cause of death by disease among children in the United States, pediatric oncology treatments are lacking: Only five pediatric-specific drugs have been granted U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval in the last 20 years versus more than 200 for adults.

Oncoheroes and SHEPHERD's collaboration advances a paradigm change in drug development for rare cancers. The companies will use DELVE, SHEPHERD's next-generation, precision-oncology platform that integrates bioinformatics, machine learning and mathematics, to unveil unprecedented insights into rare cancers, including childhood cancer. DELVE enables the companies to move beyond a single target-based approach to identify all of the primary mechanisms of action responsible for drug response and resistance within the human transcriptome.

The companies' first project of the collaboration will identify additional pediatric and rare adult indications for Oncoheroes' lead asset, volasertib. Volasertib is an inhibitor of Polo-like-kinase 1 (PLK1), an enzyme known to be involved in disease progression in a number of cancers. Volasertib has recently been granted Rare Pediatric Disease Designation (RPDD) and Orphan Drug Designation (ODD) by the FDA for the treatment of rhabdomyosarcoma, the most common soft tissue sarcoma in children and young adults, representing 3-4% of all childhood cancers.

"Getting a diagnosis of cancer as a child should not be a death sentence, yet too many lives are being lost or diminished because of a dearth of pediatric cancer research and treatments," said David Hysong, CEO of SHEPHERD. "SHEPHERD and Oncoheroes are coming together in hope and in action, leveraging the full extent of our combined technology, experience and expertise to help save lives."

"We are excited about this partnership between two mission-driven companies determined to address high unmet medical needs in the rare oncology space. We are confident that SHEPHERD's technology, combined with Oncoheroes' expertise in the pediatric oncology space, will deliver new therapeutics options to children and adolescents with cancer," stated Ricardo Garcia, CEO of Oncoheroes.

About Oncoheroes Biosciences

Oncoheroes is a ground-breaking biotech company exclusively focused on the discovery and development of better drugs for children and adolescents with cancer. Our vision is to deliver benefits to young cancer patients and create value in the process. The company is headquartered in Boston, US, with a discovery lab in Barcelona, Spain. Oncoheroes is actively looking for in-licensing opportunities in the pediatric oncology space while working to generate new proprietary assets for a number of pediatric cancer indications with high unmet medical needs. For more information please visit:oncoheroes.com

About SHEPHERD

SHEPHERD is on a mission to change the way rare cancer is treated. Through SHEPHERD Therapeutics and the SHEPHERD Foundation, we attack rare cancer from every angle, with the goal of saving millions of lives. SHEPHERD Therapeutics pursues drug development differently than any other company: Using our precision-oncology platform, DELVE, we are moving beyond a single-target-based approach to identify complex and interconnected mechanisms responsible for drug response and resistance revealed in the human transcriptome, which inform the identification of promising potential treatments for specific cancers. The SHEPHERD Foundation is a non-profit fighting to generate industry-wide change related to rare cancer awareness and therapeutic availability. The Foundation drives transformative healthcare policy at the federal level, connects and advocates for rare cancer patients and their families, and ultimately aims to accelerate the availability of and access to rare cancer-related data, basic science and therapies  to ensure that no patient is left to die. Visit www.SHEPHERD.bio to learn more and join the fight.

About DELVE

DELVE is SHEPHERD's next-generation, precision-oncology platform that integrates bioinformatics, machine learning and mathematics to unveil unprecedented insights into cancer. DELVE moves beyond a single-target-based approach to identify complex and interconnected mechanisms responsible for drug response and resistance revealed in the human transcriptome. Using DELVE, SHEPHERD can identify the cancers for which each therapy potentially will work best  and the therapies that will work best for each cancer. This approach enables SHEPHERD to work faster and differently across over 100 cancers, multiplying the potential patient impact for any therapy, speeding development, and improving patient outcomes by optimizing for maximum clinical trial success.

Media Contact:

Janell Barrett

[email protected]

SOURCE SHEPHERD Therapeutics

Related Links

https://shepherd.bio


New Delhi:

The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) on Friday tabled its audit reports in Parliament. In these reports, the CAG has red-flagged many issues -- one among them is critical shortage of ammunition in the Indian Army.

Apart from that, lack of hygiene and low-quality food in trains, shortage of essential drugs and irregularities of telecom firms are few other issues CAG highlighted in its audit report.

Here are the top 5 observations of CAG Comptroller and Auditor General:

1.) Critical Shortage of ammunition in the Indian Army: The Comptroller and Auditor General has slammed the state-run Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) for critical deficiency in the supply of ammunition to the Army. CAG also criticised the OFB for inadequate quality of ammunition supplied to the Army since March 2013. Read full story here

2.) Six telecom firms understated revenues by over Rs 61,000: The CAG on Friday has observed that food served in the Indian Railways is not fit for human consumption and catering units at stations were not achieving acceptable levels of cleanliness. Read full story here

3.) Shortage essential drugs: Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India finds that essential drugs for patients were not available in 24 states and medicines were issued without prescribed quality checks or observing their expiry dates, exposing patients to health risks. Click here to read full article

4.) Lapses led to INS Sindurakshak explosion: Indian Navys frontline submarine INS Sindurakshak which sunk after two explosions in 2013 in Mumbai was caused by the leakage of oxygen from a torpedo. Indian Navys ships and submarines were involved in 38 accidents between 2007-08 and 2015-16, adversely affecting the operational preparedness of the force, CAG report said. Read full story

5.) Holes in crop insurance schemes: CAG slammed the government for poor implementation of crop insurance schemes in 2011-16, saying funds to the tune of Rs 3,622.79 crore were released to private insurers without verification. Both the central and state government had incurred an expenditure of Rs 32,606.65 crore towards payment of premium subsidy and claim liabilities in the said period.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
By Ian Ransom

MELBOURNE (Reuters) - For a player who was all doom and gloom about his fitness on the eve of the Australian Open, Rafa Nadal emerged as an unlikely pillar of strength on day eight as injuries cut a swathe through the men's draw on Monday.

Nadal's bid for a record 21st Grand Slam crown gathered pace with a 6-3 6-4 6-2 demolition of Fabio Fognini that pushed the Spaniard into his 13th quarter-final at Melbourne Park.

The lower back strain that forced Nadal to miss the ATP Cup is now disappearing in the rear-view mirror and he heads into his next clash against fifth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas without having dropped a set.

"The first set without a doubt has been my best level in the tournament," Nadal told reporters after routing 16th seed Fognini on a sun-bathed afternoon at Rod Laver Arena.

"It's normal, too, because I was able to practise for two days in a row.

"I'm excited about playing that quarter-finals match.

"If we compare how I was five days ago and how I am today's situation, it's different, and my perspective and excitement is completely different, too."

While Nadal booked his 43rd Grand Slam quarter-final with two hours and 16 minutes of work against Fognini, Tsitsipas did not lift a racket against ninth seed Matteo Berrettini, who pulled out with an abdominal strain. [L1N2KL0CV]

Norwegian Casper Ruud's hopes of a maiden Grand Slam quarter-final were also undone by an abdominal injury as he retired two sets in against Russian Andrey Rublev.

Players' fitness at the Grand Slam has been under the microscope after they spent two weeks in mandatory hotel quarantine, with some blaming their exits on limited preparations.

Defending champion Novak Djokovic, who said he had torn an abdominal muscle against Taylor Fritz, has soldiered on and was able to despatch Milos Raonic on Sunday to book a quarter-final against Alexander Zverev.

Djokovic was cagey about his injury when probed about it after the Raonic match, saying he did not want to "speculate" and that it was a "gamble" to play on.

Story continues

Having had his fair share of injuries over the years, Nadal felt there was little point in trying to conceal their true nature.

"Well, it's difficult to hide things," he said.

"I think it's not healthy to hide a lot of things because it's difficult.

"Even if you want to hide, at some point you're going to have questions to answer.

"I don't want to play that game, honestly."

Although speculation over Djokovic's fitness will continue to fill the vacuum, Nadal was adamant that no player could grit their teeth and win a Grand Slam if properly injured.

"If you really have physical problems, you will not win," said the 34-year-old.

"If you have some pain and it's not putting you in a situation that limits you, the movements, maybe you can find a way.

"But when you really, really have an injury, it's impossible to win a tournament like this."

(Reporting by Ian Ransom; editing by Richard Pullin and Ed Osmond)
Carpetbagging BLM leftists have been heading to Vermont and seem determined to subjugate Vermont's existing (mostly white) population by shaming them. Lost on these new arrivals is the stark contrast between the urban metropolises from which they come and the backwoods of Vermont, a form of ignorance that may explain their toxic, albeit poetically expressed, dislike for Vermonters.

Rajnii Eddins is a perfect example of this trend. This black "artist" moved to Vermont from Los Angeles and now sees it as his job to "educate" Vermonters about their culture:

The homogeneity has increased my awareness of the need to speak up about white supremacy and to hold space more intentionally for a myriad of underheard voices and narratives. [snip] The land itself being the original home to the Abenaki people has often spoken to me in profound ways and being in nature I feel there is so much to be gained from the spirit that existed here prior to colonization and is still here.

This New Age fanaticism is grossly ignorant. This guy entered a white area and immediately judged that everyone there is racist simply by virtue of being homogeneously white. A person could hardly be more wrong about Vermont.

This newly ruralized urbanite then applies his urban life to the Green Mountains. While emphasizing the importance of "having empathy," Eddins'S poetry exhibits something quite different:

Stop murdering us in cold blood Stop kneeling with your knees on our necks for writing good or bad checks or whatever the excuse of the day is Stop running up in our houses for fitting the description of your insane fear Stop killing us while running or jogging or walking or standing or being Stop threatening to have us killed when your comfort convenience or fake-ass concept of superiority is threatened. Stop telling us to stop. Do not pass go. Go directly to jail or be killed. [snip] Tell [ your children ] there is nothing supreme about white Tell them Black is divine And that if you think everything is fine then you have already lost your mind

Did this guy just get off the bus from Soweto? Because not only is this not a picture of Vermont, but we have watched mobs of black people with bullhorns harassing white people in their houses. Has there been a single case in Vermont of white people "running up in our houses for fitting the description of your insane fear"? A single recorded Vermont case of a lynching or murder of a black person for racist motives, ever?

Many liberals celebrate Rajnii's Malcolm X rhetoric, oblivious to the fact that it rewrites history and constitutes slander against an entire heritage and people. Major Jackson, the poetry editor of the Harvard Review, is stunned by Rajnii's "humbling consciousness":

Rajnii's tongue is ancestral, and his spirit is free. In the tradition of sacred word-warriors, he names the fallen and the martyrs with extraordinary grace and a humbling consciousness that manifest light in all directions. His fiery poems ration out eternal wisdoms that call forth simply a substitution of love for hate and a spiritual reckoning so that we all can breathe.

If that ain't lipstick on swine, what on Earth is? Jackson just put his seal of approval on Rajnii's baseless claim that, in Vermont, "white hands are still caked with blood," calling this calumny a "substitution of love for hate and a spiritual reckoning?" Okay  who smoked dog poop in his weed again? If Vermonters have any blood "caked on their hands," it is from a farming injury, or perhaps serving in the Civil War to abolish slavery.

This toxic insanity arises from an ideology seething with contempt for the Bill of Rights. Just as Vermont's history is being turned upside-down to comply with this newfangled "substitution of love over hate," so too is the national effort to supplant the Constitution with this "new" and undefined kind of love  one in which race and identity are the dominant determiners of societal position, where wealth will be reallocated to achieve an impossible "equity," and where free speech will not be tolerated when it makes left-leaning people uncomfortable.

If true Vermonters heard Rajnii, they'd be alarmed and offended  not because they are clutching their purses, but because his toxic lies are an abuse of the privilege of living in the Green Mountain State. Vermont is not free of racists (especially since Rajnii arrived), but it is not systemically racist, any more than America is. Our Constitution has evolved to oppose all systemic racism. By definition, it aspires toward equality.

BLM and the far left seek to exploit the scars of slavery to impose a new Orwellian racism on America in the name of progress. It is a dark path, and the words of BLM  and its poets  only thinly disguise the hate and anger that fester within.

If you think everything is fine with BLM, you have become disconnected from reality. The United States Constitution can help you be well again.

Image: Rajnii Eddins. YouTube screen grab.
In a separate report filed with the Australian Charities & Not-for-profits Commission a fortnight ago, St Basils directors predicted the Fawkner home would have to cut jobs. It is anticipated that staff will need to be made redundant given the low numbers of returning residents, St Basils directors wrote. All steps will be taken to ensure that St Basils remains financially viable. The home reported it made a loss of $615,000 in 2020 and said careful consideration needed to be given to whether it should continue operation. A St Basils spokeswoman said there have been no redundancies and no plans for future redundancies, but did not explain why they had told the charities regulator there would be.

The Victorian Coroner is investigating the 45 deaths at the home from coronavirus, while a separate federal probe in December found St Basils was inadequately prepared for emergencies. The chairman of St Basils during the deaths, Kon Kontis, stood down in September and is no longer a director, while the homes manager, Vicky Kos, has also departed. St Basil's Homes for the Aged in Fawkner, where 45 residents died. Credit:Joe Armao St Basils sits on three hectares of land overlooking the Merri Creek and is owned by the Greek Orthodox church, which also operates the facility. An investigation by The Age last year found the annual rent of $2.5 million paid by St Basils to the church was nearly twice the amount both a council rates valuation and one of the states most senior commercial agents said it should pay.

In its most recent report, St Basils confirmed the church had cut the rent to $1.85 million in the latest financial year. The accounts were signed off in October and submitted to the charities regulator at the end of January. Christine Golding, whose 84-year-old mother Efraxia died after contracting coronavirus at the home, said St Basils had paid less to the archdiocese because so many residents were either deceased or families had taken them to another home. Former state government minister Theo Theophanous, a prominent member of the Greek community, has previously described the aged care homes handling of the pandemic as a debacle, and described the rent paid to the archdiocese as exorbitant. Last week Mr Theophanous said he was unsurprised the federal government had cut off payments to St Basils for new residents. Proper accountability and responsibility needs to be taken by St Basils if they are going to be allowed to continue operation, he said.

A St Basils spokeswoman said it was continuing to upgrade the facility and that its priority was the health and wellbeing of residents. St Basils had been working well and adhering to government regulations until residents were removed in July 2020, the spokeswoman said. The board is committed to executing the recommendations of the [Aged Care Quality and Safety] Commission and is engaging clinical and professional experts to ensure the safety and highest quality care of residents. The spokeswoman also said the archdiocese received rent based on market value for St Basils and the cut in rent it received was due to falling income at the home. Funds contributed to the archdiocese have been reduced to accommodate lost income and to ensure the organisations financial future. About 95 per cent of St Basils $13 million annual income comes from federal government grants, its financial reports show. St Basils was bought by the Greek Orthodox archdiocese of Australia for $525,000 in 1993. Senior church figures sit on its board. A council valuation puts the value of land and buildings on the site at about $24 million.

Fotini Atzarakis who died in the Austin Hospital at the end of July, after contracting coronavirus at St Basils. Aged care operators in the Greek community have attracted a steady flow of new residents to their homes, as the wave of migrants that came to Australia from the 1950s onwards enter their 70s and 80s and 90s and need more intensive care. Kathy Bourinaris mother, Fotini Atzarakis, was 77 when she died in the Austin Hospital at the end of July, after contracting coronavirus at St Basils. Ms Atzarakis went into the home for a brief round of respite care on June 29. A month later she was dead, following a 10-day battle with coronavirus in the Austin Hospital. She had Parkinsons and we just needed a bit of a break. We thought if she is going to be safe anywhere, its going to be a nursing home, Ms Bourinaris said

Ms Bourinaris said her father, who was married to her mother for 62 years, felt lost. The couple, who had three children and eight grandchildren, came to Australia in the late 1960s. St Basils didnt know what they were doing, said Ms Bourinaris, who has been interviewed by the coroner about her mothers death. Kathy Bourinaris mother Fotini Atzarakis died in the Austin Hospital in July 2020 after contracting Coronavirus at St Basils Credit:Chris Hopkins She was not contacted by St Basils about her mothers death  but she did receive a call from the home in November. Ms Bourinaris thought the home was calling to ask how she was coping after her mothers death. Instead, they were ringing to see if her mother was interested in coming in for a tour, to see if she wanted to come and live at the home.

I was shocked. I told them, My mum passed away there you morons. St Basils was contacted for comment but did not respond. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Lawyer Tony Carbone is leading a class action of relatives who died at the home. He said there had been a large number of complaints made to the aged care quality commission about St Basils, but until now no meaningful action had been taken against the operator. So for the commission to come up with this sort of conclusion appears to show a massive shift  up until now, no one has expressed any joy dealing with the commission.

Mr Carbone said that, if breaches continued, he would consider taking action against the commission as well as part of the legal case. Loading If there were any other breaches, we will pursue them too  they are supposed to be overseeing all of these homes and if theyre not making homes comply, surely theyve got to be in the gun. Aged Care Services Minister Richard Colbeck said the health of older Australians and the workers who care for them was of the utmost importance. St Basils Homes for the Aged remained subject to a notice to agree issued by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission, he said.
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BAKU -- A court in Azerbaijan has rejected a journalist's appeal after he was imprisoned on charges of high treason, which he and rights groups have said were politically motivated.



The Baku Court of Appeal on February 15 upheld a lower courts decision to convict Polad Aslanov and sentence him to 16 years in prison.



His wife told RFE/RL that the ruling would be appealed in the Supreme Court.



Gulmira Aslanova said that the journalist has been on hunger strike for 15 days in protest of his sentencing, is complaining of kidney and stomach pains, and is not receiving medical care.



Aslanov, the editor of the xeberman.com and press-az.com online news portals, is critical of the authorities in a country where Reporters Without Borders (RSF) says many media outlets have been silenced or have had to relocate abroad, the main independent websites are blocked, and at least two other journalists are currently in prison.

Aslanov was working on a story allegedly implicating members of the State Security Service in extortion when he was arrested in June 2019.



In November 2020, he was convicted on what RSF and the Committee to Protect Journalists called trumped-up charges of high treason for allegedly providing information to Iran.



Azerbaijan is ranked 168th out of 180 countries in RSFs 2020 World Press Freedom Index.
The deputy national publicity secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Yekini Nabena, has berated the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, over his demand for the cancellation of the ongoing membership registration and validation exercise in Kwara State.

Mr Nabena advised the minister to put himself in the position of the governor and submit to his leadership of the party in Kwara.

Mr Mohammed had at a press conference on Monday in his hometown, Oro, said the committee supervising the exercise in the state should also be disbanded.

He accused the committee led by a senator, John Danboi, of condoning irregularities, saying it has taken the side of Governor AbdulRazaq in the crisis that has broken the party into four factions in the state.

The factions, which Mr Mohammed referred to as four tendencies are the Fagbemi group, named after Mr AbdulRazaqs Chief of Staff, Adeniran Fagbemi; Lai Mohammed group; Akogun group, led by a former Chief Whip of the State House of Assembly, Iyiola Oyedepo; and Gbemi Saraki group headed by the Minister of State for Transportation.

After the botched attempt to have a meeting of stakeholders, due to orchestrated violence, the Registration Officials failed to consult with all stakeholders before the commencement of the membership registration exercise, opting instead to work with only one of the four tendencies here in Kwara, the Fagbemi Group to which the Governor belongs, thus excluding the three other tendencies  The Akogun Group, the Gbemi Saraki Group and the Lai Mohammed Group, without which the O To Ge Movement would not have succeeded. Ironically, the Fagbemi Group is the weakest of the four tendencies, he said.

Mr Mohammed said the reports from the monitoring teams showed that they did not comply with the rules.

According to him, the implication is that the registration is being carried out without Party Membership Register, while temporary membership slips, to be signed and detached from the forms after registration, are not being given to those who have purportedly registered.

According to our findings, since the commencement of the registration, over 80% of the registration units do not have either membership register or membership registration slip.

Citing specific cases, the minister said in Baruten LGA, registration materials were handed over to the Speaker of the State House of Assembly who is from there.

In Oyun, the materials were given to one Olayiwola Ojo, a member of the State House of Assembly. In Shao, in Northern Kwara, the registration materials were taken to the police station, where the DPO of that station presided over membership registration, in contravention of the party guidelines.

Instead of using the partys membership registers, conniving registration officials are using exercise books or foolscap sheets to register members, he said.

PREMIUM TIMES confirmed that some lawmakers and the governors aides wrote their details in exercise books or foolscap sheets, in clear violation of the guidelines.

The minister said the actions of the Danboi-led committee were a deliberate policy of exclusion by the Registration Team from Abuja and their collaborators to de-register even high-ranking members and stakeholders.

Knocks

Reacting to the ministers outburst, Mr Nabena said Mr Mohammed should submit to the leadership of the governor in the state instead of condemning the registration exercise.

It is not business as usual. Nobody can monopolise the system. The minister should submit to the governor. He should put himself in the position of the governor too, he told this newspaper on Monday.

On discrimination in distribution of materials, the party spokesperson said there was nothing of such.

No one is using notebooks. There is a party register in every unit across the country, he said despite multiple pictures proving him wrong.

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Also, the spokesperson of the party in Kwara, Tajudeen Aro, said the minister had been fed with lies.

The minister is not (resident) in Kwara State. He is only being fed with lies. There is no one hoarding registration materials. That was how he was able to get his registration done. I dont know what informed his suggestion to cancel the registration.

The registration is going on well and cancelling it is not possible, Mr Aro said.

Asked about cases of members denied access to the party register, Mr Aro said: If there are places where that is happening, it is most likely because of security concerns. But I can tell you that there is no place where people are denied to write down their names.

Mr Danboi and the spokesperson of the governor, Rafiu Ajakaye, did not respond to telephone calls and text messages from this newspaper to get their comments for this story.

It should be noted that alleged irregularities in the distribution of materials was one of the major reasons for the indefinite suspension of the exercise in Delta State.

Background

The development in Kwara has as its backdrop a rift between Mr AbdulRazaq and a group of party leaders led by Mr Mohammed.

It recently escalated when Bashir Bolarinwa, who is loyal to Mr Mohammed, was removed as the party chairperson and replaced with Abdullahi Samari.

Although the national body and executives of the North Central zone of the party have intervened in the matter, they are yet to achieve reconciliation of the warring members.

This newspaper also reported how some aggrieved members of the party headed to court to challenge the sack of Mr Bolarinwa and the ongoing registration exercise.

Observers said the lingering crisis threatens the membership registration and revalidation exercise which began last Tuesday.

Many also feared that if not resolved, the crisis might thwart Mr AbdulRazaqs chances of securing a second term.

But Mr Nabena said the crisis does not pose a threat to the unity of the party in any way.

It does not pose any threat. We disagree to agree. Both of them will get to a point where they will eventually agree, he said referring to the governor and the minister.
Apart from challenges, many opportunities will be offered to the Vietnamese economy in 2021, experts have said.

Such agreements as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) and the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) to which Vietnam is a signatory will open up wide doors for the country to further integrate into the world.

Economist Nguyen Minh Phong forecast that Vietnams agriculture, industry, export-import, and the domestic financial, stock and real estate markets will grow further in the year.

Notably, with the current growth rate of the local processing sector, Vietnam would join the group of newly-emerging industrialised countries in the coming years.

Pham Dinh Thuy from the General Statistics Office said that the GDP growth target of 6.5 percent set by the Government is feasible in the normal situation. However, this would be a challenge for the country as 2021 is the first year of implementing the 2021-2025 socio-economic development plan.

The official pinned hope on the development of such sectors as food, garment-textile, wood processing, metal production, construction and electricity production.

To achieve the set economic targets, it is a must to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, he said, suggesting stepping up economic restructuring, churning out typical products, streamlining administrative procedures, improving the domestic investment environment, and improving the countrys competitiveness.

Thuy also highlighted the significance of trade promotion and foreign investment attraction, which, he said, needs specific plans.

Pham Viet Hoai, Chairman of Kym Viet JSC, said the application of digital technology would bring about positive results to any firm.

According to Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment Tran Duy Dong, after the PM adopted the national digital transformation programme, many sectors have reaped significant outcomes, benefiting people and the entire economy.

Digital transformation is vital as it helps enterprises improve their business governance and adapt to the latest changes in technology, market and consumer taste, he said./.VNA
When the Covid-19 pandemic struck in early 2020, doctors and researchers rushed to find effective treatments. There was little time to spare. "Making new drugs takes forever," says Caroline Uhler, a computational biologist in MIT's Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and the Institute for Data, Systems and Society, and an associate member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. "Really, the only expedient option is to repurpose existing drugs."

Uhler's team has now developed a machine learning-based approach to identify drugs already on the market that could potentially be repurposed to fight Covid-19, particularly in the elderly. The system accounts for changes in gene expression in lung cells caused by both the disease and aging. That combination could allow medical experts to more quickly seek drugs for clinical testing in elderly patients, who tend to experience more severe symptoms. The researchers pinpointed the protein RIPK1 as a promising target for Covid-19 drugs, and they identified three approved drugs that act on the expression of RIPK1.

The research appears today in the journal Nature Communications. Co-authors include MIT PhD students Anastasiya Belyaeva, Adityanarayanan Radhakrishnan, Chandler Squires, and Karren Dai Yang, as well as PhD student Louis Cammarata of Harvard University and long-term collaborator G.V. Shivashankar of ETH Zurich in Switzerland.

Early in the pandemic, it grew clear that Covid-19 harmed older patients more than younger ones, on average. Uhler's team wondered why. "The prevalent hypothesis is the aging immune system," she says. But Uhler and Shivashankar suggested an additional factor: "One of the main changes in the lung that happens through aging is that it becomes stiffer."

The stiffening lung tissue shows different patterns of gene expression than in younger people, even in response to the same signal. "Earlier work by the Shivashankar lab showed that if you stimulate cells on a stiffer substrate with a cytokine, similar to what the virus does, they actually turn on different genes," says Uhler. "So, that motivated this hypothesis. We need to look at aging together with SARS-CoV-2 -- what are the genes at the intersection of these two pathways?" To select approved drugs that might act on these pathways, the team turned to big data and artificial intelligence.

The researchers zeroed in on the most promising drug repurposing candidates in three broad steps. First, they generated a large list of possible drugs using a machine-learning technique called an autoencoder. Next, they mapped the network of genes and proteins involved in both aging and SARS-CoV-2 infection. Finally, they used statistical algorithms to understand causality in that network, allowing them to pinpoint "upstream" genes that caused cascading effects throughout the network. In principle, drugs targeting those upstream genes and proteins should be promising candidates for clinical trials.

To generate an initial list of potential drugs, the team's autoencoder relied on two key datasets of gene expression patterns. One dataset showed how expression in various cell types responded to a range of drugs already on the market, and the other showed how expression responded to infection with SARS-CoV-2. The autoencoder scoured the datasets to highlight drugs whose impacts on gene expression appeared to counteract the effects of SARS-CoV-2. "This application of autoencoders was challenging and required foundational insights into the working of these neural networks, which we developed in a paper recently published in PNAS," notes Radhakrishnan.

Next, the researchers narrowed the list of potential drugs by homing in on key genetic pathways. They mapped the interactions of proteins involved in the aging and Sars-CoV-2 infection pathways. Then they identified areas of overlap among the two maps. That effort pinpointed the precise gene expression network that a drug would need to target to combat Covid-19 in elderly patients.

"At this point, we had an undirected network," says Belyaeva, meaning the researchers had yet to identify which genes and proteins were "upstream" (i.e. they have cascading effects on the expression of other genes) and which were "downstream" (i.e. their expression is altered by prior changes in the network). An ideal drug candidate would target the genes at the upstream end of the network to minimize the impacts of infection.

"We want to identify a drug that has an effect on all of these differentially expressed genes downstream," says Belyaeva. So the team used algorithms that infer causality in interacting systems to turn their undirected network into a causal network. The final causal network identified RIPK1 as a target gene/protein for potential Covid-19 drugs, since it has numerous downstream effects. The researchers identified a list of the approved drugs that act on RIPK1 and may have potential to treat Covid-19. Previously these drugs have been approved for the use in cancer. Other drugs that were also identified, including ribavirin and quinapril, are already in clinical trials for Covid-19.

Uhler plans to share the team's findings with pharmaceutical companies. She emphasizes that before any of the drugs they identified can be approved for repurposed use in elderly Covid-19 patients, clinical testing is needed to determine efficacy. While this particular study focused on Covid-19, the researchers say their framework is extendable. "I'm really excited that this platform can be more generally applied to other infections or diseases," says Belyaeva. Radhakrishnan emphasizes the importance of gathering information on how various diseases impact gene expression. "The more data we have in this space, the better this could work," he says.

###

This research was supported, in part, by the Office of Naval Research, the National Science Foundation, the Simons Foundation, IBM, and the MIT Jameel Clinic for Machine Learning and Health.

Written by Daniel Ackerman, MIT News Office
Mumbai: Horror comedy "Roohi", starring Rajkummar Rao and Janhvi Kapoor, is set to have a theatrical release on March 11, the makers announced on Monday.

The film is one of the first Bollywood projects to arrive in theatres after the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting allowed cinema halls across the country to operate at full capacity from February 1 with adherence to Covid-19 safety protocols.

Rajkummar RaoPresented by Jio Studios & Maddock Films, "Roohi" also stars Varun Sharma.

Hardik Mehta has directed the film from a script penned by "Fukrey" helmer Mrigdeep Singh Lamba, who also serves as a co-producer on the movie.

Producer Dinesh Vijan of Maddock Films said "Roohi" takes the genre of horror comedy a notch above the banner's 2018 hit "Stree", which also featured Rao.

Janhvi Kapoor

"While 'Stree' was a genre bending tale that gave audiences something never seen before, 'Roohi' takes this vision a step further by offering the same brand of spine chilling scares and quirky comedy.

"With a partner like Jio Studios that shares our passion for the eponymous 'bada parda', we hope 'Roohi' rekindles the audience's long standing romance with the silver screen. It is a film tailor made to be viewed at your nearest theatre," Vijan said in a statement.

The film revolves around a singing ghost who puts grooms to sleep so it can possess their brides.

Janhvi KapoorIt was scheduled to be released last year but was postponed due to the coronavirus-induced nationwide lockdown.

According to the makers, "Roohi" will release in over 1,500 screens across the country.
A Grand Bay woman was killed in a two-vehicle crash Friday in Mobile County.

Theodore A. Trotter, 42, was killed when the 2011 Cadillac CTS she was driving crashed with a 2011 GMC Yukon driven by a teenager on Gold Mine Road East, approximately three miles west of Mobile.

Trotter was pronounced dead on the scene. Nothing further was provided by the Alabama Law Enforcement Agencys Highway Patrol Division, which continues to investigate.
An international team of scientists has sequenced the genome of a capuchin monkey for the first time, uncovering new genetic clues about the evolution of their long lifespan and large brains.

Published in PNAS, the work was led by the University of Calgary in Canada and involved researchers at the University of Liverpool.

"Capuchins have the largest relative brain size of any monkey and can live past the age of 50, despite their small size, but their genetic underpinnings had remained unexplored until now," explains Professor Joao Pedro De Magalhaes, who researches ageing at the University of Liverpool.

The researchers developed and annotated a reference assembly for white-faced capuchin monkeys (Cebus imitator) to explore the evolution of these traits.

Through a comparative genomics approach spanning a wide diversity of mammals, they identified genes under evolutionary selection associated with longevity and brain development.

"We found signatures of positive selection on genes underlying both traits, which helps us to better understand how such traits evolve. In addition, we found evidence of genetic adaptation to drought and seasonal environments by looking at populations of capuchins from a rainforest and a seasonal dry forest," said senior author and Canada Research Chair Amanda Melin who has studied capuchin monkey behaviour and genetics for almost 20 years.

The researchers identified genes associated with DNA damage response, metabolism, cell cycle, and insulin signalling. Damage to the DNA is thought to be a major contributor to ageing and previous studies by Professor de Magalhaes and others have shown that genes involved in DNA damage responses exhibit longevity-specific selection patterns in mammals.

"Of course, because aging-related genes often play multiple roles it is impossible to be sure whether selection in these genes is related to ageing or to other life-history traits, like growth rates and developmental times, that in turn correlate with longevity," said Professor De Magalhaes.

"Although we should be cautious about the biological significance of our findings, it is tempting to speculate that, like in other species, changes to specific aging-related genes or pathways, could contribute to the longevity of capuchins," he added.

The team's insights were made possible thanks to the development of a new technique to isolate DNA more efficiently from primate faeces.

FecalFACS utilises an existing technique that has been developed to separate cells types in body fluids - for example to separate different cell types in blood for cancer research - and applies it to primate faecal samples.

"This is a major breakthrough because the typical way to extract DNA from faeces results in about 95-99% of the DNA coming from gut microbes and food items. A lot of money has been spent sequencing genomes from different organisms than the mammals we're actually trying to study. Because of this, when wildlife biologists have required entire genomes, they have had to rely on more pure sources of DNA, like blood, saliva, or tissue - but as you can imagine, those are very hard to come by when studying endangered animals," explained the study's lead author, Dr Joseph Orkin, who completed work on this project as a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Calgary, and in his present location at Universitat Pompeu Fabra-CSIC in Barcelona.

"FecalFACS finally provides a way to sequence whole genomes from free-ranging mammals using readily available, non-invasive samples, which could really help future conservation efforts," he added.

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Market Reports on Saudi Arabia Provides the Trending Market Research Report on RTD Coffee in Saudi Arabiaunder Food & Beverage category. The RTD Coffee Market in Saudi Arabia is projected to exhibit highest growth rate over report offers a collection of superior market research, market analysis, and competitive intelligence and industry reports.

Arla Foods Amba, the national brand distributor for Starbucks, strengthened its leading position over Nestle Saudi Arabia LLC, amid the closure of foodservice outlets and a channel shift to off-trade supermarkets and hypermarkets. Arlas surge in value sales was partly thanks to social media fans on Instagram and TikTok, creating videos and a Secret Starbucks Menu containing recipes on how to make innovative RTD coffee drinks at home during the COVID-19 lockdown.

RTD Coffee in Saudi Arabia report offers a comprehensive guide to the size and shape of the market at a national level. It provides the latest retail sales data (2016-2020), allowing you to identify the sectors driving growth. It identifies the leading companies, the leading brands and offers strategic analysis of key factors influencing the market  be they legislative, distribution, packaging or pricing issues. Forecasts to 2025 illustrate how the market is set to change.

Data coverage:

market sizes (historic and forecasts), company shares, brand shares and distribution data.

Request a free sample copy of Saudi Arabia RTD Coffee Market Report @

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Table Of Contents

RTD Coffee in Saudi Arabia

LIST OF CONTENTS AND TABLES

KEY DATA FINDINGS

2020 IMPACT

Arlas Starbucks brand strengthens its lead in 2020, thanks to strong online marketing and new product development

RTD coffee is increasingly popular among younger consumers, and new varieties are generating interest

Unit prices of RTD coffee increase, but off-trade growth continues

RECOVERY AND OPPORTUNITIES

Growth will slow in current value terms as players are forced to meet rising production costs and taxes

A gloomy economic outlook poses significant challenges for RTD coffee in the future

New entrants in RTD coffee will generate fierce competition in the coming years

CATEGORY DATA

Table 1 Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: Volume 2015-2020

Table 2 Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: Value 2015-2020

Table 3 Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 4 Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: % Value Growth 2015-2020

Table 5 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade RTD Coffee: % Volume 2016-2020

Table 6 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade RTD Coffee: % Volume 2017-2020

Table 7 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade RTD Coffee: % Value 2016-2020

Table 8 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade RTD Coffee: % Value 2017-2020

Table 9 Forecast Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: Volume 2020-2025

Table 10 Forecast Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: Value 2020-2025

Table 11 Forecast Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

Table 12 Forecast Off-trade Sales of RTD Coffee: % Value Growth 2020-2025

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

COVID-19 impact on soft drinks

COVID-19 country impact

Company response

Retailing shift

Foodservice vs retail split

What next for soft drinks?

CHART 1 Soft Drinks Off-Trade Volume Sales Growth Scenarios: 2018-2025

CHART 2 Soft Drinks On-Trade Volume Sales Growth Scenarios: 2018-2025

CHART 3 Soft Drinks Impact of Drivers on Off-Trade Volume Sales: 2017-2025

CHART 4 Soft Drinks Impact of Drivers on On-Trade Volume Sales: 2017-2025

MARKET DATA

Table 13 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: Volume 2015-2020

Table 14 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 15 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: Value 2015-2020

Table 16 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: % Value Growth 2015-2020

Table 17 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (as sold) by Category: Volume 2019

Table 18 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (as sold) by Category: % Volume 2019

Table 19 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: Value 2019

Table 20 Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: % Value 2019

Table 21 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: Volume 2015-2020

Table 22 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 23 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: Value 2015-2020

Table 24 Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: % Value Growth 2015-2020

Table 25 Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: Volume 2015-2020

Table 26 Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: % Volume Growth 2015-2020

Table 27 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks (RTD): % Volume 2016-2020

Table 28 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks (RTD): % Volume 2017-2020

Table 29 NBO Company Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks: % Value 2016-2020

Table 30 LBN Brand Shares of Off-trade Soft Drinks: % Value 2017-2020

Table 31 Distribution of Off-trade Soft Drinks (as sold) by Format: % Volume 2015-2020

Table 32 Distribution of Off-trade Soft Drinks (as sold) by Format and Category: % Volume 2020

Table 33 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: Volume 2020-2025

Table 34 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Channel: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

Table 35 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: Value 2020-2025

Table 36 Forecast Off-trade vs On-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Channel: % Value Growth 2020-2025

Table 37 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: Volume 2020-2025

Table 38 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks (RTD) by Category: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

Table 39 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: Value 2020-2025

Table 40 Forecast Off-trade Sales of Soft Drinks by Category: % Value Growth 2020-2025

Table 41 Forecast Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: Volume 2020-2025

Table 42 Forecast Sales of Soft Drinks by Total Fountain On-trade: % Volume Growth 2020-2025

APPENDIX

Fountain sales in Saudi Arabia

Trends

GLOBAL MACROECONOMIC ENVIRONMENT

GLOBAL INDUSTRY ENVIRONMENT

DISCLAIMER

SOURCES

Summary 1 Research Sources

Browse our full report with Table of Contents: http://www.marketreportsonsaudiarabia.com/marketreports/rtd-coffee-in-saudi-arabia/757473

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You could be forgiven for thinking that the Bergin report that damned Crown casinos last week was only about greed and crime. It was not. Its bad enough that Crown casinos effectively had become bankers to some of the worlds worst crime syndicates.

International gangsters have been using Australias respectability to turn criminal billions into clean money, processed through the gambling tables, that they can then spend and invest with impunity.

Illustration: Dionne Gain Credit:SMH

Worse, this Australian funpark for felons could be open to exploitation by hostile foreign powers. ASIO suspects their agents gamble cash in Australian casinos to disguise its origin. They could then give it to politicians and political parties as donations or favours, seeking to buy influence.

Their aim isnt just business favours. Their aim is to turn Australian policy in favour of a foreign government. In short, to subvert Australian sovereignty. As the former ASIO chief Duncan Lewis put it, the way that foreign interference works is that you wake up one day and find decisions made in our country that are not in the interests of our country. Foreign influence takes over, basically, pulling the strings from offshore. The threat to Australia was, he told me, existential.
Please note The Sun Chronicle is providing this story and all of our local coronavirus coverage for free so that all readers have access to this important information about the pandemic. Please visit our dedicated coronavirus coverage page for more stories. If you'd like to support our mission, please subscribe.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 16:16:44|Editor: huaxia

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XI'AN, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- An infrared camera has captured photos and videos of a wild leopard in a nature reserve in northwest China's Shaanxi Province.

The administration bureau of the Changqing National Nature Reserve said its staff, while going over recent information collected by the reserve's infrared cameras, found images and footage of the leopard taken by one of its cameras on Dec. 7 last year.

The camera was installed in a deciduous broad-leaved forest at an altitude of 1,180 meters.

Experts with the reserve said it is the seventh time that wild leopards have been spotted in the reserve since infrared cameras were set up in 2008. It is also the first time that the big cat has been discovered in the reserve's low-altitude areas, as the animal was spotted in places at altitudes of more than 1,900 meters the previous six times.

The experts said the leopard may have followed its herbivore prey to the low-altitude areas as the latter migrated downhill for more food resources during the winter.

The leopard sightings in multiple locations in the reserve show their population is steadily growing thanks to the region's conservation efforts, according to the experts. Enditem
Travellers may have be forced to wait in 'totally unacceptable' queues for up to five hours and will be free to mix with passengers from 'red list' countries as the Government's quarantine hotel system comes into force today.

Heathrow Airport warned of long queues at Border Control and said there were no protocols in place to segregate passengers from the 33 high-risk countries from others despite the stringent quarantine measures being introduced.

It is feared the safety of up to 8,000 passengers a day could be compromised as airport staff carry out extra checks on those entering the country.

Union bosses warned the new system, which will see all passengers from the 'red list' countries having to quarantine for ten days in a hotel, will not be enough to stop the mutant variants from spreading.

Travellers may have be forced to queue for up to five hours as the Government's quarantine hotels comes into force today. Pictured: Passengers arrive at Terminal 5 at Heathrow Airport

A traveller arrives at Heathrow Airport this morning after Britain introduced its quarantine programme for a number of 'high-risk' countries

Real Housewives of Cheshire star Dawn Ward - who has been in Dubai - posted an Instagram video yesterday with the caption 'I'm coming home'

Officials estimate that checks carried out to identify if a traveller has arrived from one of the Government's 'red list' zones could double the standard time taken to 15 minutes per arrival, The Times reports

A Heathrow spokesman told The Times: 'Our key concern remains the ability of Border Force to cope.

'Queues at the border in recent days of almost five hours are totally unacceptable.

'Ministers need to ensure there is adequate resource and effective processes at the border to avoid compromising the safety of passengers and those working at the airport, which could necessitate the suspension of some arriving flights.'

A total of 16 hotels will accommodate guests arriving in England. Venues believed to be taking part in the scheme include Novotel Heathrow and the nearby three-star Thistle.

Vincent Madden, managing director of Aurora Hotels, which has opened its Renaissance Hotel Heathrow travellers, said staff were trying to make things 'more homely' for guests.

'We've got crockery and cutlery in rooms so people can enjoy meals as they would at home,' he said.

'We've also got some high street branded shampoos, conditioners and body washes as well so again it's a bit more homely and added a few touches like electronic newspapers, games and puzzles for people to do so there are some activities for people to do.'

Yesterday frantic travellers made a desperate dash to return to the UK before the stringent rules came into force.

Real Housewives of Cheshire star Dawn Ward - who has been in Dubai - posted an Instagram video yesterday with the caption 'I'm coming home'.

Stephanie Lvovich, 50, and her daughter Ava, 13, who flew into Heathrow Airport from Dubai, told The Sun: 'We booked a flight as soon as we heard about the hotel quarantine.'

Meanwhile Tom Weston, 24, who arrived from Doha, Qatar, told the paper: 'I've been very keen to get in. I wouldn't cope well with two weeks in a hotel . . . and the expense.'

From today, passengers arriving from the 33 'red list' countries will be forced to quarantine in one of the Government's designated hotels for 10 days (11 nights).

Flights will have to arrive at five airports in England, which alongside Heathrow are Gatwick, London City, Birmingham or Farnborough in Hampshire. All international arrivals in Scotland will have to quarantine in hotels.

All guests arriving in England will have to pay an individual fee of 1,750 and will have to eat airline-style food left at their door, change their own sheets and towels and be accompanied by security if they want fresh air or a cigarette outside.

Ahead of the new rules being introduced, Meher Nawab, chief executive of the London Hotel Group, warned that many airport hotels rely on central air flow systems.

Pointing to Australia's system - which is currently under review amid an outbreak linked to quarantine hotels - he warned such systems could increase the risk of the virus spreading between guests and hotel staff.

Mr Nawab also warned that airport hotels often use central air conditioning systems - rather than individual units - and sometimes have windows that cannot be opened.

Union chiefs have warned that the quarantine measures will not be enough to prevent Covid variants spreading. Pictured: Passengers walk through Terminal 2 at Heathrow Airport

A plane flies over the Renaissance Hotel near Heathrow Airport as it prepares to welcome travellers from the 33 'red list' countries

Union chiefs meanwhile warned that the quarantine measures were not enough to prevent Covid variants spreading in the UK.

The GMB union, which represents hotel security and staff, also raised concerns about its members interacting with arrivals from 'red listed' countries which are included in the quarantine hotel scheme.

Nadine Houghton, GMB national officer, told The Observer: 'If you've got people getting off planes from the red list countries, then being crammed into areas with passengers who aren't going into quarantine  and staff as well - you've failed at the first hurdle.

'Our members working at, the ground staff, security staff, have been raising concerns about this for two weeks now. Heathrow just isn't safe at the moment.'

Despite the rising criticism Matt Hancock said: 'As this deadly virus evolves, so must our defences.

'The rules coming into force today will bolster the quarantine system and provide another layer of security against new variants at the border.'

This month analysis carried out by the World Health Organisation found dozens of countries where the highly-infectious South African and Brazilian variants had been found were not on the list.

They included Austria, Denmark, France, Greece, Japan, Kenya, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Canada and the United States.

Labour Shadow Home Secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds reacted with fury at the news, branding the Government's quarantine measures 'dangerously inadequate'.

While former Labour leader Ed Miliband told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show: 'At the moment the government is proposing a quarantine system that covers just five per cent of arrivals that happen each day in the UK.

'That is not an effective quarantine system.'

It came as Jeane Freeman, the Scottish health secretary, said UK ministers' refusal to help track arrivals who cross from England into Scotland was 'deeply disappointing'.

Ms Freeman said she would go ahead with plans for checks at the border in Scotland after no agreement was reached in talks last Thursday.

The majority of those required to quarantine will arrive at Heathrow, but bosses yesterday said there were 'significant gaps' about how the scheme would operate remain. Pictured: Novotel Hotel near Heathrow Airport which is being prepared for use as a Government-designated quarantine hotel

MailOnline understands that the 3-star Thistle Hotel at Heathrow could also be used as part of the scheme

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon also warned that police in Scotland could be asked to 'do more than they're doing right now' to make sure travellers were not trying to cross the border.

Speaking at a coronavirus briefing, Ms Freeman said: 'It's deeply disappointing that as part of a family of equals, one partner isn't prepared to help the other partner enforce the policy that they think is the right policy for the people they represent.

'The discussions will continue, because we are, as we have always been, keen where we can to reach a four-nation approach to deal with a virus that doesn't respect boundaries and borders.

'But in the meantime, we will work through what the options are to mitigate where the UK government stance creates a loophole.

'We can't have people coming in, getting on public transport, coming to Scotland and we don't know about that and they are not required to quarantine in way that we can't manage so we have to consider what our options are about that land border.'
The Ogun State government has commenced the process of finding a lasting solution to the alleged incessant killings and maiming of residents of some villages by suspected herdsmen.

To this end, a government delegation comprising top government officials and representatives of security agencies visited the affected areas on Sunday on a confidence-building mission.

The Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Afolabi Afuape, speaking at the palace of Olu Ilaro pointed out that clashes between the farmers and herders are a national problem.

Mr Afuape said the state government was looking at ways of finding an enduring solution to it, stressing that the government was not happy with recent happenings in some parts of the State.

Government is not happy with what is happening in this area. Government is not happy with what is going on in this part of the State. We have come on the instruction of the State Governor to see what can be done to address this crisis because the State government is not happy with what is happening, he said.

I must stress the need for peaceful co-existence among all our people irrespective of where you come from. Though this crisis is a national issue, government is putting security plans in place to secure the lives of our people in this area, he said.

The commissioner stressed the need for the people to be vigilant by reporting strange faces and movements to security officials, as government cannot afford crisis in any part of the state.

In his own remarks, the Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Abdulwaheed Odusile, appealed to the people not take the law into their hands, but to allow security agencies and traditional rulers to handle the situation.

Mr Odusile, while calling for peaceful co-existence among the indigenes and people from other ethnic groups, said that an all-inclusive stakeholders meeting was scheduled to hold soon to find solutions to the problems.

He expressed appreciation to the royal fathers in the area for dousing the tension that arose as a result of herdsmen attack, calling for the sharing of necessary information that would lead to the end of the crisis.

The commissioner said the state government was poised to finding a permanent solution to the crisis in the state.

The Olu of Ilaro and paramount ruler of Yewaland, Kehinde Olugbenle, acknowledged similar challenges in other parts of the country but added that it was becoming pronounced in the state in recent times.

The monarch called for the immediate setting up of the Amotekun Corps in the state while appealing to the government to involve traditional rulers in selecting its operatives who know their different terrains.

The state governor has done well by putting in place mechanism to address this problem. I want to plead with the Governor to commission the Amotekun Corps. When doing this all critical stakeholders including the traditional rulers should be involved in recommending people who know the terrains. Round pegs should be put in round holes, he said.

Mr Olugbenle called for the meeting of all traditional rulers to discuss the issue, advocating the inscription of owners name on each cattle, maintaining that this would help in identifying the owner in event of destruction of farms by cattle.

The Eselu of Iselu, Ebenezer Akinyemi, in his own contributions during the visit to his palace, traced the crisis to cattle feeding on farmers produce and called for the creation of special area for the herders to graze their cattle.

The royal father also called for the rehabilitation of schools in the area to attract more children, pointing out that out of school children were increasing in the area.

The Special Adviser to the Governor on Security, Sola Subair, said a Joint Security Task Force which would be stationed in the affected areas would take off next week.

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The Ogun State Commissioner of Police, Edward Ajogun, while speaking, noted that policemen have been deployed to the affected areas as the government has given security agencies the wherewithal to bring peace to the areas.

The Special Assistant to the Governor on Inter-ethnic Affairs, Hadi Sani, who spoke in Hausa and Yoruba languages, pleaded with the people to be peaceful as no meaningful development could take place in a violent ridden environment.

The member, representing Yewa North State Constituency 2, Haruna Egungbohun, who commended the efforts of the state governor at combating the menace of the herdsmen, called on the state government to continue to beef up the axis with security operatives to prevent further loss of lives.

The delegation in the course of the visit had a town hall meeting with the people of Oja Odan, addressed the people at Ibeshe and Ilaro Garage, as well as the Hausa community at Dangote Cement Factory at Ibeshe and Kara, Abeokuta, where they appealed for calm and support in finding amicable solutions to the crisis

Some of the people who spoke at the meeting called for the protection of farmers and their produce in the areas, assuring that they were ready to live in peace with their neighbours.
[February 15, 2021] Berrien County Needs Resident Survey Participation to Assist in Broadband Internet Expansion Efforts

BERRIEN COUNTY, Mich., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- In establishing their Operational Objectives for 2019-2020, the Berrien County Board of Commissioners included "to focus on support and improvement of County infrastructure, including but not limited to staff and financial resources being utilized to pursue all options available to bring high speed Internet in the unserved areas of the County." With that, Commissioners Jim Curran, Teri Freehling, and Ezra Scott were appointed to work with other agencies on the subject, and the Berrien County Broadband Internet Task Force ("Taskforce") was formed. The task force has identified that data demonstrating the need are necessary in order to satisfy requests to the federal government for funding. To obtain that data, the Berrien County Board of Commissioners contracted with Merit Network, Inc., and is seeking countywide input from the residents, in the form of a survey. The task force knows that in some areas in Berrien County, high-speed Internet is not available. In order to bridge this "digital divide", they need to gain a better picture of who has access in Berrien County. A survey was developed by Merit Network that will provide accurate data regarding which properties do and do not currently have Internet access. Information gathered will only be used to support broadband Internet expansion efforts and will aid the task force in seeking grant funding to increase broadband availability in Berrien County. The Berrien County Board of Commissioners urges residentsto participate in this survey, once it is available, to help measure broadband access. Their goal is full connectivity provisioning for all of Berrien County by the year 2024.



"Now, more than ever, Broadband Internet is an essential and crucial service to those who live, learn and work in, as well as visit Berrien County. Understanding which households are connected to the Internet at broadband speeds (25/3 mbps) is the first step in building support to seek funding to increase access in our area. Providing high-speed broadband Internet service throughout Berrien County has become a priority for the Berrien County Commission as well as leaders throughout southwest Michigan, like the Pokagon Fund," said R. McKinley Elliot, Chairman, Berrien County Board of Commissioners. The survey is being conducted through a partnership with the Michigan Moonshot initiative, that aims to bridge the digital divide in Michigan. With the participation of Berrien County residents, these organizations will collect the necessary data to develop a realistic representation of current broadband coverage and speeds. Accurate, unbiased data will assist in drawing necessary state and federal funds to the community.

Residents are being asked to visit MichiganMoonshot.org/Berrien to complete the brief survey, whether they pay for Internet access at their property or not. The survey results will provide granular information about residents' broadband speeds and availability to aid the task force in gathering the necessary data for grant applications. ABOUT THE MICHIGAN MOONSHOT: The Michigan Moonshot is a collective call to action which aims to bridge the digital divide in Michigan. Stakeholders include Merit Network, the nation's longest-running research and education network, the Quello Center at Michigan State University and M-Lab, the largest open Internet measurement platform in the world. Learn more about the Michigan Moonshot at Merit.edu/Moonshot. For more information:

MichiganMoonshot.org/Berrien MEDIA CONTACT: Pierrette Renee Dagg, (937) 212-0631, prdt@merit.edu View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/berrien-county-needs-resident-survey-participation-to-assist-in-broadband-internet-expansion-efforts-301228088.html SOURCE Merit Network

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This seemingly endless COVID pandemic is causing immense stress for millions of ordinary Americans. In past articles, I have discussed the fact that surveys have shown that Americans are drinking more alcohol and taking more drugs during this pandemic. Even more alarming, we have seen suicide rates spike over the past 12 months as well. Sadly, this isnt just happening here in the United States. All over the globe, more people are ending their own lives during this pandemic. But of course most people arent going to go that far. Instead, most people are just going to quietly struggle along, but in the process many of them are making huge changes to their lifestyles.

For example, this pandemic appears to be greatly affecting both marriage and divorce rates. Here are just a couple of examples

In Oregon, divorces in the pandemic months of March through December were down about 24% from those months in 2019; marriages were down 16%. In Florida, for the same months, divorces were down 20% and marriages were down 27%.

I can understand why so many Americans are putting off marriage right now. A wedding can be extremely expensive, and many Americans may be hesitant to permanently tie the knot with so much economic uncertainty in our future.

But why are divorce rates down by so much?

That is a very good question. Limited access to courts during the lockdowns was certainly one factor, and many Americans are also concerned about what a divorce would mean for them financially

One reason for fewer divorces: In many states, access to courts for civil cases was severely curtailed during the pandemics early stages. Another reason, according to marriage counselors, is that many couples backed off from a possibly imminent divorce for fear it would only worsen pandemic-fueled financial insecurity.

Meanwhile, this pandemic has also caused more Americans than ever to put off having children.

In fact, birth rates are way down all over the country

According to a Bloomberg analysis, births decreased by 19 percent in California between December 2019 and December 2020. Data from Florida, Hawaii, Arizona, and Ohio show large declines in birth rates since the pandemic started compared to the previous years data, too. A survey conducted by Modern Fertility, a company that sells fertility tests directly to consumers, found that 30 percent of nearly 4,000 people surveyed stated they changed their fertility plans due to COVID-19. One in four of those respondents said theyve become unsure about having children at all; the most commonly cited reason was uncertainty about the world.

At the beginning of this pandemic, some had suggested that we may see a baby boom, but it appears that we are experiencing a baby bust instead.

The rising cost of living is causing a tremendous amount of stress for ordinary Americans as well.

Thanks to the crazy spending that Congress has been doing and the reckless money printing that the Federal Reserve has been engaged in, the money supply is skyrocketing and prices are aggressively rising all over the country.

Just look at what has been happening to natural gas prices. The recent cold snap has created a dramatic spike in demand, and this has pushed natural gas prices to unprecedented levels. The following comes from Zero Hedge

 we hit the proverbial offerless market where any natgas that was available would be purchased at virtually any price, which is why midcontinent prices such as the Oneok OGT nat gas spot exploded from $3.46 one week ago, to $9 on Wednesday, $60.28 on Thursday and an insane $377.13 on Friday, up 32,000% in a few days. This is one of those places where having a limit up circuit breaker could actually be useful, even though there simply is nowhere near enough product to satisfy demand at any price hence the explosive move. Hubs across the Midcontinent led the surge in prices again Feb. 12 as weather forecasts predicted the coldest temperatures in more than a decade would hit the region over the upcoming holiday weekend. Platts reported that at locations across Kansas, Oklahoma and Eastern Arkansas, hub prices were trading at single-day record highs around $200 to $300/MMBtu. Regional hubs, which typically service only limited local demand, saw fierce competition among shippers, utilities and end-users looking to meet weekend requirements.

This is a reminder of what can happen when things get crazy.

If a short-term cold spell can cause this much chaos, what would happen during a long-term national emergency?

That is something to think about.

Other Americans dont need to worry about heating their homes, because this pandemic has forced them to live in their vehicles

Americans are being driven into their vehicles by pandemic-fueled woes. And their ranks are likely to grow as the government safety net frays and evictions and foreclosures rise. Its in times of crisis that the fragility of our systems are laid bare, said Graham Pruss, a postdoctoral scholar with the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative at the UC San Francisco Center for Vulnerable Populations.

Particularly on the west coast, government officials have been setting up huge parking lots where those that live in their vehicles can sleep safely at night.

Many of those that are now sleeping in their vehicles were once living comfortable middle class lifestyles, but now this crisis has changed everything. Nicholas Atencio and Heather Surovik are two examples

For months, Nicholas Atencio and girlfriend Heather Surovik spent nearly every minute of their lives together in a 2000 Cadillac Escalade. After Atencio, 33, lost his job as a plumber in May, he and Surovik, 36, delivered for Grubhub by day and at night curled up with their puppy on an air bed in the back of their car parked in a lot in Longmont, Colorado, dreaming of being reunited under one roof with Suroviks teenage son who was living with his grandmother.

Have you ever spent a night in a vehicle?

If you have, then you already know that it isnt pleasant.

Unfortunately, once eviction moratoriums are finally lifted all over the country we are going to see the largest tsunami of evictions in American history.

So that means that a lot more people are going to end up sleeping in their vehicles.

These are very troubled times, and they are about to get even more troubled
Driven by the understanding that people need moral and emotional support when a loved one dies, Appasso has often pitched in with his own funds for others' funerals.

This story is part of a series on the everyday heroes of rural Maharashtra.

Every February, Appasso Bandgar would submit an application to the municipal council. In 2019, when it was rejected for the 15th year in a row, he decided he'd had enough. His demand was simple: the Nagarpalika should set up a fund to give the family of deceased individuals Rs 2500, to complete the anth vidhi (last rites).

His fight towards this began in the 1990s, when Sundarabai Dhale passed away. An agricultural labourer from the Kurundvad town in Maharashtras Kolhapur district, Sundarabai belonged to the Mahar caste, which is listed as a Scheduled Caste. Devasted, her son Govinda was afraid of the social stigma that would follow, during the rituals that must be performed when someone dies. Three decades later, he recalls, We used to get aath aane (50 paise) for working ten hours in the fields. I couldnt afford the expenses for the last rites.

Upon seeing this, Appasso made a decision within seconds. He reached out to six daily wage earners, who were also his closest friends. We contributed Rs 50 each and raised Rs 300 for the last rites, he remembers. Rs 300 was a fairly large amount at the time, Appasso says as he puts things in perspective. A kilo of wheat would cost 50 paise. Within minutes, they arranged for 300 kilos of wood, ghee, and other items, including those needed for the cremation. He walked up to Govinda to tell him, Everything has been taken care of.

In the last three decades, Appasso has helped over a thousand families in Kurundvad to bid goodbye to their deceased family members in a dignified way. Many people dont have the money to take the body to the cremation ground or to pay for the ambulance. However, a persons dignity should never be compromised, he says. He pitched in with his own savings and started crowdfunding the funerals when he ran out of money. For the rituals involving burials, seven metres of white cloth is required. The labour charges for digging a 7 x 4 feet grave are also high. How will a daily wage earner afford this? he asks. Appasso doesnt interfere with peoples personal beliefs and helps them finish the last rites as per their traditions.

When someone passes away, their family members are already grief-striken. How can anyone ask for money during such a time? he asks, adding that people need moral and emotional support during such moments. A daily wage earner who juggles selling dry food items and insurance, Appasso earns an average monthly income of Rs 7000. A lot of people pay me after a few months for all the funeral expenses. I dont accept this money.

Doing this work has meant facing innumerable challenges, and opposition from people. Every time I am asked about my caste and religion, I always respond by saying, I am an Indian. However, for many with a "conservative mindset", this is not a satisfactory answer. This is when Appasso asks them, If you are a Dalit, Bahujan, Brahmin, Koli, Hindu, Maratha, Christian, or from any religion or caste, will the colour of your blood be different from mine? Using this simple analogy has helped him to a certain extent.

We discuss an incident from the early '90s when someone from the Terwadkar family, a Brahmin family, passed away. Later, they found out that the deceased was the grandmother, and there was no senior relative at home to complete her last rites. Sanjay, Appasso's elder, 47-year-old son, recalls, No one from the entire Brahmin community even came forward to lift the body, because, Terwadkar sarkar would never attend anyones funeral.

When Appasso, who himself has been at the receiving end of casteism, as he belongs to the Dhangar community (listed as a nomadic tribe), saw this, he immediately called his friends. These friends, who are Dalits, Muslims, Hindus and Shikalgars, volunteered to do the last rites and spent Rs 500 collectively for the funeral.

He takes inspiration from Babasaheb Ambedkar and says, People should be made to read Indias Constitution. As per the Constitution, we are all equal. Then how can someone discriminate?

After helping several families, he decided that this issue needs to be regulated by the law. This is when he began the annual task of writing applications to the Kurundvad Municipal Council every February, before the Councils budget was decided  demanding a discussion on the monetary compensation for last rites. When nothing worked, he called a meeting of 25 people in 2019, where they discussed what could be done next.

He suggested protesting by taking out a "different sort of rally" and reached out to Govinda Dhale for help. Govinda, who has previously been helped by Appasso, lent his unconditional support.

Tirdi morcha kadhlo aamhi (We marched with a bier), Appasso says with pride. To everyones surprise, it was Govind Dhale wrapped in a white cloth, lying on the bier. The instructions from the protestors to Govinda were simple: to keep his eyes shut the whole while.

Everyone thought they were going to the cremation ground on the Krishna Ghat. However, 50 protestors disguised as mourners marched two kilometres in the Kurundvad town. Surprised, the onlookers began inquiring about the person wrapped in the white cloth, and asked why the mourners aren't proceeding to the cremation ground. 'Govinda was alive five minutes ago, how did he die all of a sudden?' was the discussion that raged on. People laughed when they found out about the reality of the situation.

Soon, several hundreds of people joined this unique protest, motivated by a shared solidarity for the cause that Appasso was fighting for. Of note is the reaction of Govinda's son, which was also the reaction of the larger town  shock and horror, and subsequent laughter. A protest like this had never been witnessed before.

After garnering enough support, many people gathered outside the Nagarpalika, while Govinda was still lying on the bier. Soon the officials took note of the demands. At first it was decided that a law will be passed sanctioning funds only for those who possess yellow ration cards. However, Appasso opposed this, saying, All the 6400 households of the town should get this service. If they can afford it, they will not accept the fund. Initially, his demand was rejected, but with mounting pressure, the member body soon passed a resolution. We demanded Rs 2500 as compensation, but they brought it down to Rs 2000, he adds.

Now, the family of a deceased person in Kurundvad is entitled to Rs 2000, which is deposited in their bank account. For this, one of the family members has to submit identity proof, a copy of the death certificate, and fill a form.

Appasso credits his partner, Vatsala Bandgar, 60, for always being a pillar of support. Its only because of her that we could help so many people. A modest Vatsala responds, We should first help others and then think about ourselves. She has always been a part of protests and has mobilised women farmers and labourers. More than 400 women would join the protests each time because our fight was genuine, she says.

The setting up of the fund has not meant that Appassos work is now over. In case of delay in payments, I go to the Nagarpalika and inquire, he says. Another hindrance is the delay on the part of hospitals. Sometimes, the hospitals are overworked, and the management is late in giving the death declaration form. During such times, he quickly intervenes and gets the work done at the earliest.

Appassos fight for an egalitarian society is five decades old. He remembers fighting for fee waivers and appealing to his school to grant more scholarships to the marginalised when he was in Class 10. After dropping out that year in school, he began voicing the concerns of agricultural labourers and farmers. My mother (the late Akkubai) would always inspire me and support me in my fight for the poor, he says. He has also helped over 500 senior citizens in Kurundvad to avail their old age pension. While others charge Rs 500 - Rs 1,000 for helping them with the paperwork, Appasso does not charge a fee.

The nature of his work is not easy, and he wonders if the next generation will take it forward. One of the biggest hindrances is rampant casteism. If you look at the society, there is a huge gap between the working class and the industrialists. I want to fill that gap with my work, he says.
The first batch of Pfizer vaccines arrived in New Zealand on the first day of lockdown, the government is urged to increase its use of saliva testing, and thousands turned out to get tested.

Here's a recap of Monday's COVID-19 developments in New Zealand.

New Zealand transitioned into new alert levels overnight - Auckland moving to level 3 lockdown, and the rest of the country moving to level 2.

The change came after three new community cases were reported on Sunday. They are a mother, father and daughter who live in the South Auckland suburb of Papatoetoe.

The alert level changes are in place until midnight on Wednesday, with Cabinet reviewing the situation every 24 hours. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said today there would be no change to the current levels.

She announced this morning that genomic sequencing for two of the community cases showed they have the COVID-19 variant B1.1.7 first detected in the UK.

There is no direct link to any other positive cases in New Zealand, so ESR is looking at an international genome database to see if there is a match.

Investigations into how the trio contracted the virus are ongoing, but remain a puzzle at this stage. Director General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said health officials were focusing on the mother, who works for laundry and catering company LSG Skychefs, which services planes at the airport, and the daughter, who attends Papatoetoe High School as being the first of the family to contract the virus.

As part of her work, the mother handles napkins from passengers on international flights. Otago University public health professor Nick Wilson has discounted the possibility of Covid-19 being contracted through laundry.

The most likely source was person to person, such as from an infected air crew member or transit passenger, or someone in an MIQ facility who had been somehow missed, he said.

Experts say the source of the infection may never be known.

Government urged to do more saliva testing

Otago University epidemiologist professor David Skegg told Nine to Noon New Zealand was "dragging its feet" on saliva testing and was lagging behind Australia, where mandatory daily saliva testing for border and hotel workers had been rolled out.

Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone.

There was voluntary saliva testing at the Auckland Jet Park quarantine facility and it had also recently been adopted at the Christchurch quarantine facility, and will soon be available at the Wellington quarantine facility, Bloomfield told media this afternoon.

"We're testing it at the moment," he said.

Ardern reiterated saliva testing was taking place but there were questions around the accuracy of saliva testing results.

"There seems to be an attempt here to build a case for our opposition to saliva testing - there isn't one," she said.

"But there's of course a view we need to make sure we integrate it, that we've got the right capacity to do it safely and we're not compromising other parts of the system, and I think that's all fair."

First batch of vaccines arrives in NZ

The first batch of Pfizer vaccines - 60,000 doses - arrived in the country. Following safety checks, it was expected border workers will start to be vaccinated from Saturday, Ardern said.

The Ministry of Health said it was expecting to receive about 225,000 vaccine courses by the end of March. Ardern said enough vaccines had been purchased for everyone in New Zealand. It's expected the public will start to be vaccinated around the middle of the year.

"When we say the vaccine is available for everyone, we mean everyone... as long as you are here with your feet on this soil we want you to be vaccinated and you will be able to be vaccinated for free, with no questions," Ardern said.

New Zealand could get to a level where there was enough herd immunity, even if some people refused to be vaccinated, she said.

Thousands get tested

Almost 4000 people have been swabbed for Covid over the last two days in Auckland.

They included many Papatoetoe High School students and staff. One of the new community cases is a year 9 student at the school.

Photo: RNZ / Rowan Quinn.

Seven of nine co-workers of the mother returned negative test results.

There are 42 close contacts outside of the household, including the daughter's classmates and teachers. The mother, father and daughter have been moved to quarantine, while another household contact who has tested negative remains in isolation at home.

All of the nine non-school related close contacts have returned negative test results, Bloomfield said this afternoon.

Only two people from the school have returned negative test results, while results for the others were pending.

There were no new community cases reported in New Zealand, but there were five in managed isolation.

COVID-19 data modelling expert Shaun Hendy said people should be prepared for a lockdown of several weeks if a large cluster like the August one eventuated.

Police move checkpoint boundary after confusion

Police said they were moving three checkpoints north of Auckland back to where the legal boundary sits - the sites used during the last lockdown.

While the health order to implement the alert level changes showed maps with Mangawhai Heads outside of the Auckland area, police checkpoints had been set up to encompass the town within the Auckland zone, creating confusion for local residents.

Photo: RNZ / Dan Cook.

Ardern said the checkpoints would from now be stationed at the legal boundary of Auckland.

The error was down to "miscommunication", it was not her place to apportion blame, and was not the police's fault, she said.

National calls for tighter border controls

National is calling for all people in contact with airline travel, no matter the extent, to be included in the testing regime.

Photo: RNZ/ Samuel Rillstone.

The woman who works for LSG Skychefs and tested positive for the virus was tested every two weeks as part of her work's health regime.

National's COVID-19 Response spokesperson Chris Bishop said: "There seems to be a question whether the person at the centre of this outbreak should have been tested or not. The suggestion last night was they should have been, then it has been clarified that they were outside of the scope of the order today.

"Our strong recommendation is that that order... be widened so that everyone, no matter if they have contact with international airlines or international travel, anyone working in and around the border, no matter which part of the company, they are tested.

National also called for stricter monitoring and auditing of companies and government agencies working at the border.

-RNZ


Kids want to fish? You don't know how yourself? Here's a little help
While todays freezing precipitation is expected to be spotty, things are likely to get more seriously slippery once the sun goes down, the National Weather Service is warning.

Up to a tenth of an inch of ice accumulation is expected in the Carlisle-Harrisburg-Hershey-Lebanon region before a winter weather advisory is lifted at 1 p.m. Tuesday.

Occasional light sleet and freezing rain is forecast for the region through the daylight hours. The heaviest ice is expected later this evening through tonight, the weather service office at State College predicts. Precipitation may change to rain southeast of I-81 and I-78 early Tuesday morning.

Ditto for the Lancaster-York-Gettysburg region.

Travel could be very difficult, the feds are warning. The hazardous conditions could impact parts of the Monday evening and Tuesday morning commute.

PennDOT and the Pennsylvania Turnpike are responding by announcing vehicle restrictions starting at 6 p.m. Monday.

Northern sections of the area are in for a harder hit. The feds say the region including Shamokin, Sunbury, Mifflintown, Huntingdon and Bloomsburg up to 2 inches of snow and sleet with a coating of ice to boot. Moderate amounts of sleet and freezing rain are expected overnight through Tuesday morning.
Press Release

15 February 2021

Sunce Hotels in Croatia being acquired by KSL

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US private equity firm KSL Capital is reported to be buying Sunce Hotels, a portfolio of 13 resort properties across Croatia, from local entrepreneur Jako Andabak. The transaction includes 12 hotels managed under the Bluesun Hotels & Resorts brand, the TUI Blue Jadran hotel (held under a joint venture) and a campsite. The majority of the hotels are located in Croatias Dalmatian coast, with KSLs local operating partner, Valamar Hotels, continuing to manage the hotels post-acquisition.

Commerz Real acquires two InterCity hotels in the Netherlands

German open-ended real estate fund manager Commerz Real has acquired the 115-room InterCity Hotel Leiden and the 174-room InterCity Hotel Breda in the Netherlands. Both hotels are currently under construction and are set to open in 2023, with the developer and seller in Leiden being Synchroon BV and in Breda JP van Eesteren. The hotels will be placed into a Commerz Real-managed fund in which Steigenberger Hotels AG is a 12% co-owner. Both hotels will be managed by Steigenberger Hotels AG, a subsidiary of Deutsche Hospitality, under long-term lease agreements.

FCR Immobilien sells Hotel Wasserschloss in Westerburg, Germany

German real estate investor FCR Immobilien has sold the 57-room Hotel Wasserschloss near Hanover in northern Germany. Located in a medieval castle, the property includes 5 meeting rooms, an extensive spa and a renaissance inner courtyard. Although FCR acquired the hotel in early 2019, the sale is in line with their stated strategy of exiting hotel investments.
Spains Socialist Party (PSOE)-Podemos government is preparing to incarcerate rapper Pablo Hasel over tweets and a song supposedly glorifying terrorism, inciting violence and insulting the Spanish crown and state institutions. He would become the first musician imprisoned in Spain since the end of Francisco Francos fascist dictatorship in 1978. He faces up to two decades in prison.

The deadline for him to report to jail has now elapsed. Hasel, whose real name is Pablo Rivadulla Duro, has refused to turn himself in, saying that he will have to be kidnapped by police. He has denounced the PSOE-Podemos governments promises to reform the penal code to halt his imprisonment as empty, instead calling on artists, workers and youth to mobilise independently. He received a widespread response among artists and workers who correctly see his jailing as a fundamental attack on democratic rights and a major step towards dictatorship.

Painting in defense of Pablo Hasel. (Image Credit: Twitter/VDefensa)

The states allegations that his calls to release Maoist prisoners support terrorism, or that his criticism of Spains corrupt monarchy is an insult to Spain, are false and reactionary. While King Juan Carlos has fled Spain for his corrupt business deals with Saudi Arabia, the Spanish state is moving to prosecute Hasel for exercising his artistic liberty. This has provoked mass anger. Recent weeks have seen hundreds of protests in cities across Spain including Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Zaragoza, Granada, Sevilla, and Malaga to defend Hasel.

Nearly 300 actors, musicians and artists signed a manifesto titled Without freedom of expression there is no Democracy. Signatories include film directors Pedro Almodovar and Fernando Trueba (Belle Epoque, The Artist and the Model); actors Javier Bardem, Luis Tosar (The Minions of Midas, Adu), Alba Flores (La Casa de Papel), Aitana Sanchez Gijon (The Machinist); and musicians Joan Manuel Serrat, Isamel Serrano, Josele Santiago, Coque Malla, Brisa Fenoy, Pedro Guerra or Fermin Muguruza. The manifesto starkly warns:

The persecution of rappers, tweeters, journalists, as well as other representatives of culture and art, for exercising their freedom of expression, has been relentless. The Spanish state has come to head the list of countries that have most retaliated against artists 

It is evident that with the imprisonment of Pablo Hasel, a sword of Damocles hangs over the heads of any public figure daring to publicly criticize the actions of any state institution.

This situation must be widely publicized internationally, to highlight where we find ourselves. We are aware that, if we let Pablo go to jail, they can go after any of us tomorrow, until any dissenting voice is silenced.

That is why the undersigned, as representatives of the world of art and culture in the Spanish state, have come together to show our support for Pablo, demand his freedom, as well as oppose these types of crimes that not only curtail the right of freedom of expression, but also of ideological and artistic freedom.

Separately, 140 writers and journalists, including Jordi Evole, Rosa Maria Calaf, Manuel Rivas and Maruja Torres, released a statement in support of Hasel, saying rapping is not a crime, even if you dont like the lyrics of the person rapping. Street artists also showed their support for Hasel. Numerous murals have emerging throughout Spain, including in Barcelona.

The outpouring of mass support for Hasel is a political indictment of both the reactionary judiciary machine that condemned him and above all of the PSOE-Podemos government. A class gulf separates the social democrats and petty-bourgeois left populists from the working class and more serious layers of artists, who are moving to the left.

It is ever more evident that the ruling elite can impose its ruleincluding the murderous herd immunity policy that has let COVID-19 run rampant across Europe, killing over 750,000 peopleonly with fascistic dictatorships and an assault on fundamental democratic rights. The incarceration of artists like Hasel, who has denounced police violence, the murder of migrants, fascism and the Spanish monarchy, is part of this process.

The urgency of the warning in the artists manifesto is fully justified: there is a rising, international danger of a turn to fascist dictatorship. The US Senate voted Saturday to acquit former President Donald Trump on impeachment charges, even after Trump incited a far-right insurrection on January 6 at the US Capitol, trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election. The ruling elite is preparing coup attempts, repression of left-wing protests, and violent targeting of political opposition.

Events have fully vindicated the International Committee of the Fourth Internationals warnings that opposition to fascistic and police-state methods can only develop in opposition not only to social democratic parties like the PSOE, but to petty-bourgeois left populist parties like Podemos.

It is significant that many of the artists who signed the manifesto defending Hasel previously supported the PSOE or Stalinist forces allied to Podemos. Bardem and Almodovar famously supported the PSOEs election in 2004 as a way of opposing the Iraq War, which the previous right wing Popular Party government had joined. Today, however, artists and workers are increasingly aware that this opposition to fascism and police state methods requires building an independent movement against the PSOE and Podemos.

Nearly two decades after the Iraq war, the PSOE and Podemos are implementing the criminal herd immunity policy, bailing out banks and corporations with billions, intensifying internet spying and persecuting migrants. Last year, protests against PSOE-Podemos austerity, herd immunity and back-to-work policies were met with police violence and threats to deploy the army.

This naked turn towards fascistic policy has gone hand-in-hand with the official re-legitimisation of fascism. Spanish courts have sentenced Catalan nationalists to a decade in prison for peaceful protests, claimed Francisco Francos 1936 fascist coup was legitimate, and declared that his regime did not commit crimes against humanity.

Last week, a court freed a former right-wing officer who posted to social media photographs of himself firing a shotgun at pictures of PSOE-Podemos government ministers. The court ruled he had no other purpose than killing time. It added that he did not act with a view to intimidate the authorities.

The same court, however, ruled Hasels tweets and songs are a potential risk because one of his 50,000 followers on YouTube could be emboldened by his words and end up using violence.

The PSOE-Podemos governments response has been utterly cynical. In an attempt to calm mounting outrage over Hasels jailing in the run-up to this weekends Catalan regional elections, it briefly announced that it was preparing measures to ban prison terms for crimes involving freedom of expression. On Sunday night, however, the Spanish attorney generals office announced that the PSOE-Podemos government supports jailing Hasel. In Barcelona, a mural in support of Hasel was painted over under the direction of Podemos-backed Mayor Ada Colau.

Hasel rightly dismissed the PSOE-Podemos governments promises as lies. His latest song, Ni Felipe VI, with nearly a quarter-million visits, denounced the misnamed progressive [PSOE-Podemos] government which has perpetuated repression. Feeling nervous as the streets fill up for freedom of expression, they have promised to do something, trying to stop the mobilisation, but only with this will we win this struggle.

For artists and youth seeking to defend Hasel and freedom of expression, the turn is to the working class and the building of a movement in defence of democratic rights and for socialism against the social democrats and their corrupt petty-bourgeois allies like Podemos.
Ahead of the West Bengal assembly election 2021, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday virtually launched the 'Maa' scheme under which her government would provide a meal at a nominal cost of Rs 5 to poor people. They will get a platter of rice, dal, a vegetable and egg curry for Rs 5, Mamata Banerjee said adding that the West Bengal government will bear a subsidy of Rs 15 per plate.

Self-help groups will operate the kitchens from 1 pm to 3 pm every day and such kitchens will be set up everywhere in the state gradually, CM Banerjee said.

She also said her government is ready to provide financial support to family members of DYFI activist Maidul Islam Midda, who succumbed to injuries sustained during a clash between police and members of Left parties. CM Banerjee said the police has launched an investigation and the exact cause of his death would be known only after the post-mortem examination.

"I do not support any death. A probe is underway... I have come to know that even his family members were not informed where he was admitted. No police complaint was made in this connection, too," she said at the state secretariat. "I have spoken to Sujan Chakraborty (Left Front leader), and told him that I am ready to provide job and financial support to the family," the chief minister said.

Midda, who was critically injured in a clash with the police during the Left parties' march to the West Bengal secretariat on February 11, died on Monday morning. He had suffered renal failure, following which he died due to cardiac arrest, CPI(M) leader Dr Fuad Halim, at whose medical facility Midda was being treated, said.

Banerjee said it is also important to ascertain whether Midda, who is survived by his wife and two children, had any health complication. Student and youth wings of Left parties had clashed with the police during the rally, leading to injuries on both sides. The police lathi-charged, burst tear gas shells and used water cannons to disperse the activists. The Left Front had called a 12-hour statewide bandh on February 12 in protest against the police action.

Earlier, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) West Bengal President Dilip Ghosh has asserted that change will happen and the BJP shall come to power in the state after the elections, challenging Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo Mamata Banerjee. Addressing a public meeting at Harirajpur in West Midnapore during `Paribartan Yatra` from Keshpur to Ghatal on Sunday, Dilip Ghosh said, "Yes, `Khela hobe, khela hobe` and `paribortan hobe` (will play, will play, and will change)."

"Let me tell the brothers of Mamata didi that the BJP will form the government. I know there will be attempts to stop the yatra so I have come to meet you. We will ensure that you are able to cast your votes," Ghosh said.

He further stated, "Opposition is telling us that our game is over but let me tell them that our game is on. Be ready. Tell mothers to keep their children under control if they want to see their faces after polls. We are civilised and follow the law but it does not mean that we are weak, cowards."

The BJP is organising parivartan yatras in West Bengal as part of its efforts to oust the Trinamool Congress government. The first yatra was launched by BJP National President JP Nadda from Nabadwip in Nadia district in the first week of February.
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The Oyo State Independent Electoral Commission (OYSIEC) said it plans to hold election into the 33 local government councils of the state on May 15.

Isiaka Olagunju, chairperson, OYSIEC, said this on Monday when he addressed a news conference at the commissions headquarters in Ibadan.

Mr Olagunju said the election would hold in compliance with Section 30 of Electoral Act 2010(as amended) and Paragraph 1(1) Schedule 2 of the State Independent Electoral Commission Law CAP 154, Laws of Oyo State of Nigeria 2000.

He said the election would be conducted in all the 33 recognised Local Government Areas (LGAs) of the state, assuring a transparent, free and fair election.

We are preparing for election in the 33 LGAs of the state and not LCDAs.

We do not have the power to conduct election into the LCDAs. We only have power to conduct election into the 33 LGAs, he said.

The late former governor of the state, Abiola Ajimobi, in 2016 approved the creation of 35 local council development areas out of the existing 33 LGAs.

Mr Olagunju said the choice of May 15 for the election was to take care of pending judgment of the Supreme Court in a case instituted by dissolved democratically elected local government executives in the state.

He said candidates can obtain nomination forms at the commissions office up till Monday, April 30.

He said the cost of nomination forms was N250, 000 for chairmanship and N100, 000 for the councillorship positions.

Let me conclude by appealing to all stakeholders that we need their support in other to organise and conduct free, fair, credible and transparent local government election in the state, he said.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the last local council election in the state was held on May 12, 2018 under the administration of Mr Ajimobi.

NAN reports that the Supreme Court had slated May 7, for judgment in the suit filed by the dissolved democratically elected local government executives in the state.

(NAN)
THE parents of two siblings who missed nearly two thirds of all school days before the Covid-19 pandemic have each been fined 1,000,

Proceedings against the mother and father were initiated by Tusla over 12 months ago before the first closure of schools.

At Newcastle West Court, solicitor Peter Sherry said there was some improvement in the childrens attendance when schools reopened last August but that there was still a 37% rate of absenteeism.

Solicitor Michael ODonnell said his client are making an effort and that a lot of the absences late last year were related to Covid issues

Imposing the fines, Judge Mary Larkin, commented that she doesnt understand the attitude of parents who dont send their children to school.

We all would like our children to have better prospects in their lives then ourselves why would you say I dont want my children to succeed? she asked.

Turkey's foreign ministry summoned the US Ambassador to Ankara on Monday to convey "in the strongest terms" Turkey's reaction to a US statement on the killing of 13 kidnapped Turks by Kurdish militants in northern Iraq, the ministry said.

Turkey said on Sunday militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) executed the captives during a military operation against the group.

The United States said that it condemned the killings if it was confirmed that responsibility lay with the PKK.

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Foreign Minister S Jaishankar who is in Assam today attending various functions said: "Assam has long been the bridge between India and the world to our East."

He pointed out, the advent of colonialism and the subsequent emergence of nation-states had effectively disrupted the seamless connection between eastern India, Assam and the world to our East.

"But things are changing since 2014," he says.

Speaking about Act East Policy, he said, "It is an approach to create connectivity within Assam, to the NorthEast then to Myanmar and Bangladesh but eventually push by road, sea, air to Vietnam and Japan. It won't just be an economic activity but make Assam more connected, energetic, contributing and employed."

Before this, he had visited the Japan International Cooperation Agency funded Guwahati water supply project site along the Brahmaputra river in Guwahati. The EAM also reviewed its progress along with Japanese Ambassador to India Satoshi Suzuki.

In the morning, Jaishankar visited the Kamakhya Temple in Guwahati and posted pictures from there tweeting: Began the day with the blessing of Maa Kamakhya at Nilachal hills, Guwahati.

State Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma was also present with him during the visit. Later in the day, the External Affairs Minister is set to attend various programmes in the state.

Last week, Union Home Minister and BJP leader Amit Shah visited the state.

Prior to that, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched several development projects in the state on February 7. During his visit, the prime minister inaugurated Asom Mela and laid foundation stones for medical colleges and hospitals in Biswanath and Charaideo.

"This will boost Assam's health infrastructure. In the last few years, the state has made rapid strides in healthcare. This has benefitted not only Assam but also the entire Northeast," the PM had said.

















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The concept of a hierarchy of Irishness is set to be discussed at a conference on citizenship.

Campaigner Emma DeSouza has questioned why those in Northern Ireland cannot vote for the Irish president and called for a reform of the current electoral system.

The discussion will come at a digital event on March 1 around Irish citizenship, the role of emigrants and voting rights.

The Republics Minister for the Diaspora Colm Brophy and Minister for Electoral Reform Malcolm Noonan will be among those in attendance at the conference organised by VotingRights.ie and the Clinton Institute for American Studies at UCD, in association with Epic: The Emigration Museum and Vica (Votes for Irish Citizens Abroad).

Ms DeSouza is set to chair a session on Northern Voices and the extension of voting rights to citizens north of the border.

As more and more people in Northern Ireland claim their birthright to Irish citizenship its essential that we establish what that citizenship entails and explore how to fully engage and recognise the legitimacy of all Irish citizens both in Northern Ireland and abroad, she said.

The Irish nation is broad and diverse and a most essential proponent in what it means to be an Irish citizen.

As someone who has successfully campaigned to reaffirm Irish citizens rights in Northern Ireland it strikes me that the current electoral system in Ireland perpetuates a hierarchy of Irishness.

That those of us who live half an hour up the road or across the Irish sea cannot vote for the President of Ireland is an outdated and discriminatory practice that undervalues the commitment and contributions of Irish citizens resident outside the State.

The people of Ireland have taken progressive leaps in shirking the once conservative shroud which dominated Irish society in order to carve out a more inclusive, rights-based society  embracing a more inclusive concept of Irish citizenship is a logical next step for a country ushering in change.

Other discussions on the day will focus on voices of emigrants, the constitutional and legal issues around citizenship and electoral reform.

Dr Liam Kennedy, of the Clinton Institute at UCD, added: For too long the issue of emigrant enfranchisement has been pushed to the margins as Irish governments celebrate our global diaspora.

It is time to consider how we can enlarge and honour our ideas of democratic citizenship and test the states political will to give emigrants voting rights.
However, the demonstrations were mostly against Kremlin's policies and less in Navalny's support. In most cities, demonstrators expressed frustration with Russia's coronavirus-related lockdown measures, anti-Putin sentiments and government's actions against other anti-establishment political activists.

Over the last two weeks, many Russian cities including Moscow and St. Petersburg witnessed a second wave of public demonstrations in support of opposition figure Alexei Navalny.

Putin-Navalny fight

Russian opposition leader, politician, lawyer, and anti-corruption activist, Alexei Anatolievich Navalny came to international prominence by organising anti-government demonstrations and running for office to advocate reforms against corruption in Russia, President Vladimir Putin and his government.

Navalny's video of Putin's alleged palace on Russia's Black Sea coast has now been viewed more than 111m times. His detention and court appearance prompted the biggest street protests in Russia since 2011-12, with demonstrations in 180 towns and cities across Russia.

Navalny has also antagonised the Kremlin by calling on the west to impose personal sanctions on 35 individuals linked to Vladimir Putin. They include oligarchs, the judge who remanded Navalny in custody last month, and senior government figures.



Navalny poses a serious threat to the country's political elite. They don't seem to know how to handle him. If Navalny is kept in prison or released, his movement will be strengthened, and it has the potential to fuse to broader public dissent over Russia's long-term economic performance and government ineffectiveness.

Besides pro-Navalny support, other factors fuelling public anger are falling living standards, pandemic-related troubles, diminished political freedom, and Putin's decision to effectively remain in power beyond 2024. Many Russia observers are of the view that these demonstrations represent a new stage in Russian public dissent.

Emil Avdaliani, a professor at the Tbilisi State University in his recent paper for BESA Centre on the continuing demonstrations opines that the first indicator that these rallies are different is their sheer size. Totalling nearly 100,000 people, they were the largest nationwide displays of dissent in recent years. The detention of 3,700 people greatly exceeds the detentions that occurred during the wave of anti-Kremlin protests that rocked Russia in 2011 and 2012.

Moreover, these protests have spread countrywide. According to latest reports Russians in nearly 100 cities across the country took to the streets. Avdaliani opines that historically, Putin enjoyed the advantage of Russia's geography, which precluded the spread of public dissent. Much has changed, however, as modern technologies have enabled the coordination of simultaneous protests across Russia's vast territory.

The manner in which Putin and his cliques have handled the issue has catapulted Navalny into a celebrity. Currently, Navalny is Russia's second most prominent face and voice abroad after Putin, and has become a politician with global reach.

Initially, for nearly a decade, the Russian authorities treated Alexei Navalny like a minor political headache. The county's political elite addresses him in an imperious manner by not referring to him by his name, but then the decision to assassinate him catapulted him to the status of a national figure. Not long ago, many Russians had any idea who Alexei Navalny was, but he is now famous enough to pose a direct threat to the leadership.

At present, Russia is experiencing what it experienced in the 1990s and the early 2000s - a struggle for a more effective government, more accountability, transparency over public spending, and most of all, the ability to change the government through elections, and Putin's gambit to remain in power indefinitely has added fuel to the public dissent, in which the Navalny episode has acted as a catalyst.

EU's response

Meanwhile, the internal affairs of Russia had an after effect on the manner in which the European Union functions. So far, the UK and EU have already introduced targeted sanctions over the poisoning of Navalny, and the EU is considering additional measures over his jailing and the subsequent crackdown.

The Guardian reported that the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, has said that his country was prepared to break off relations with the bloc if there were any new sanctions.

But the inner EU wrangling may perhaps take a toll on the organisation's ability to handle international issues, as a unified response to the Russian affair has been missing, as the EU member states can't agree on how to handle Putin.

More European sanctions on Russia may be announced soon, but not even the humiliation of the EU's foreign policy chief Joseph Borrell's recent visit to Moscow looks likely to sharpen the bloc's woefully divided policy towards the Kremlin, analysts say.

EU unity on Russia can't be expected any time soon. Despite mounting concern at Moscow's behaviour in many capitals, there is widespread disagreement over how to respond, with national strategic and economic interests far from aligned.

Germany, which played a major role in EU sanctions against Russia after the annexation of Crimea in 2014, is resisting calls to back out of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project, preferring targeted sanctions against wealthy Kremlin supporters.

Meanwhile, Emmanuel Macron of France still favours dialogue and a strategic 'reset' in EU-Russia relations, while Poland and the Baltic states want far tougher action.

Judy Dempsey of the think-tank Carnegie Europe opines that Moscow prefers dealing separately with each member state, instead of EU as a bloc, and on the other hand most EU states don't know what they clearly want from Russia.

According to Dempsey, like his predecessors, Borrell's visit was bound to fall short because the bloc lacks a genuinely European strategy. Until now, national interests in Europe have prevented that from happening and it's hard to see that changing.

Nicu Popescu of the European council on foreign relations argues that European attempts to reset relations with Russia were doomed to failure because they are "predicated on the idea of mutual concessions". Instead, a more muscular approach might yield better results, he added.

Meanwhile, Russia issued an international arrest warrant for Leonid Volkov, one of Navalny's senior allies, who is currently based in Lithuania.

However, European nations' hope that dissent may generate a liberal movement to replace Putin may not be fulfilled. Though some degree of a liberal mood might be present amongst the demonstrators, they are clearly not either pro-West or pro-democracy. Instead of the young crowd, the demonstrators have included middle-aged, middle-class Russians. These people are frustrated with the government's economic performance and corruption and the end result may not be what Europe wants -- an end to the Putin era.

(Asad Mirza is a political commentator. He can be contacted at asad.mirza.nd@gmail.com. The views expressed are personal)

--IANS

asad/pgh


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Srinagar: Family members of detained youth Zahoor Ahmad Rather staged a protest demonstration in Srinagar said that he is innocent and has nothing to do with any unlawful activities.

The family members who gathered at press enclave in Srinagar strongly rejected the claim of Indian police that he is involved in the killing of BJP workers, last year. The family said that Zahoor, a resident of Islamabad district, was taken away from the rented accommodation in Samba area in Jammu where he was living with his wife and two small children, on midnight of February 13.

Meena, Zahoors sister accompanied by other family members, told media that Zahoor was selling dry fruits like walnuts to sustain the family comprising his wife and two minor children.

He is suffering from various ailments like high blood pressure, diabetes and had an eye surgery also, she said and broke down.

Meanwhile, Indian police arrested two youth in Chadoora area of Budgam district.

(agencies)

CLEAR LAKE, Iowa - A Mason City man is facing seven felony charges in connection to burglaries along with assaults with a screwdriver.

Richard Sigler, 56, is being held on $60,000 for a plethora of crimes.

Police said Sigler committed multiple burglaries from late January to early February.

On Feb. 2, Sigler was breaking into an attached, occupied garage when he was caught by a resident and a foot pursuit ensued on 9th St. N.

Police said Sigler used a screwdriver and struck the victim several times in the head. A second resident observed the situation and tacked the defendant before Sigler allegedly bit him in the arm and wouldnt release his bite.

Sigler then hit the second victim in the head with the screwdriver before fleeing.

He was arrested Friday.
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The Rs 100-crore initial public offering of Nureca, the solution provider of home healthcare products in India, has been subscribed 5.73 times so far on February 15, the first day of bidding.

The full subscription of public issue is largely backed by retail investors whose reserved portion has been subscribed more than 31.23 times, and that of employees' is 91 percent subscribed.

The portion set aside for non-institutional investors witnessed subscription of 54 percent, while qualified institutional buyers are yet to put in their bids.

The offer has received total bids of 80.33 lakh equity shares against IPO size of 14.01 lakh shares, the subscription data available on the exchanges showed.

Nureca IPO: Top 10 things to know before subscribing the issue

The offer size excluded anchor book through which the company already raised Rs 44.55 crore on February 12. The price band for the issue has been fixed at Rs 396-400 per share.

The company has reserved Rs 1 crore worth of shares in the IPO for its employees who will get those shares at a discount of Rs 20 per share.

The company will utilise IPO proceeds for funding incremental working capital requirements.

It is the smallest public issue in size among IPOs launched so far in 2021. Indian Railway Finance Corporation, Indigo Paints, Home First Finance Company, Stove Kraft and Brookfield India Real Estate Trust, so far, launched in the current year since January.

Nureca is a B2C company engaged in the business of home healthcare and wellness products. It enables customers with tools to help them monitor chronic ailments and other diseases, to improve their lifestyle.
BRUSSELS: The EU is holding talks with Moderna on buying more COVID-19 vaccine and AstraZeneca, with which talks have stalled, has suggested delivering doses of its own vaccine made outside Europe to make up for supply cuts, two EU sources said.

The European Union has set a target of vaccinating 70% of its adult population by the end of the summer, but has struggled to secure the doses promised by pharmaceutical companies.

It is now trying to expand its reserve of vaccines, which already amount to nearly 2.3 billion doses from six drugmakers for its population of about 450 million.

The EU is negotiating a new supply deal with Moderna that could nearly double the volume of vaccine doses from the U.S. biotech firm, two senior EU officials involved in the talks told Reuters.

They asked for anonymity as the talks are confidential.

Under the deal being negotiated, the EU would secure 150 million additional doses from Moderna, on top of 160 million that have already been booked and have started being rolled out last month.

One of the two officials said some of the doses under the new deal could be delivered by June.

The second was more cautious, pointing to difficulties Moderna has faced delivering just 10 million doses to the EU in the first quarter of 2021.

The volume of shots available could, however, be boosted if the number of doses that can be extracted from each Moderna vial is increased.

Moderna declined comment on the talks with the EU. But it said it was holding discussions with regulatory authorities in different countries on the possibility of increasing the number of doses in vials to 15 from 10.

The Commission did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The EU is also close to finalising talks with Novavax for 200 million doses, one of the officials said, confirming a Reuters report from last week.

BUILT ON SAND"

On Friday, officials in Brussels and executives from AstraZeneca discussed the cut in deliveries announced by the Anglo-Swedish drugmaker last month, when it told the EU it had reduced its supply targets for the bloc because of a production problem.

That would have cut deliveries to 31 million doses through March instead of the at least 80 million initially agreed.

Under pressure, AstraZeneca, which developed its vaccine with Oxford University, later offered to lift supplies to 40 million for the first quarter.

The EU and AstraZeneca are now holding weekly meetings to find ways to boost production quickly, the two sources said.

AstraZeneca executives told EU officials on Friday that to accelerate supplies to the bloc, it could provide it with some doses manufactured outside Europe, the two sources said. One said the Serum Institute of India (SII) could be a supplier.

The British drugs regulator is also auditing manufacturing processes at the SII plant, a move that could pave the way for AstraZenecas vaccine to be shipped from there to Britain and other countries, two sources said.

SII is the main provider of vaccines to poorer countries under a scheme co-led by the World Health Organization. It is unclear whether these supplies could be affected by possible deliveries to wealthier countries.

AstraZeneca also mentioned a U.S. manufacturing facility as a possible supplier for the EU, but did not indicate volumes or timing of deliveries, one of the sources said.

AstraZeneca and the SII were not immediately available to comment.

Both EU sources said the companys new offers lacked clarity. One source said it was still not clear whether AstraZeneca could deliver the 40 million doses pledged for the first three months of 2021, and there were only vague commitments for the second quarter.

Its all built on sand," the official said.

EU officials have said the U.S. vaccine factory AstraZeneca has mentioned is in Baltimore, but have given no more details.

Under deals announced last year, Catalents Maryland facility will make the drug substance used in AstraZenecas vaccine and Emergent BioSolutions Inc is making the shot at its Baltimore facility.

Deliveries from factories outside the EU would need to be authorised by the EU drug regulator, EU officials said.

The EU has said two factories producing AstraZenecas vaccine in Britain should supply the EU under its contract with the company. AstraZeneca has said the British government prevented exports of the vaccine citing its own supply contract.

The British government has declined to say whether its contract with AstraZeneca gives priority to British supplies.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 16) - While the Philippines awaits the arrival of the first batch of COVID-19 vaccines, the country's vaccine czar is reporting a possible shortage of vaccine supply until this year's second quarter.

Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said Western countries like those in Europe and the United States are using a large bulk of COVID-19 vaccines produced by several pharmaceutical firms.

"Sa first quarter, second quarter, magkakahirapan pa rin po tayo dahil kasi 'yong karamihan ng mga Western vaccines ay ginagamit po ng mga taga Europe at America," Galvez said during the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases meeting on Monday.

[Translation: In the first quarter, second quarter, it will be difficult for us to procure vaccines because most of the Western vaccines are being used by Europe and America.]

Despite the possible vaccine supply shortage, Galvez remained confident that all Filipinos can be vaccinated at the end of the year. His statement upgrades recent government pronouncements of vaccinating 50 million to 70 million Filipinos this year.

"So kung titingnan po natin 'yung supply and demand sa 2021, may possibility po na 'yung ating vaccination program ay makakaya po sa 2021," he said.

[Translation: So if we will look into the supply and demand this 2021, there's a possibility that we can complete our vaccination program this 2021.]

The vaccine czar elaborated that six vaccine makers with whom the Philippine government are negotiating, can produce around 10 billion vaccine doses this year. The vaccine developers who are engaged in talks with the Philippines are Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson (J&J), Novavax, Sinovac, and Gamaleya.

"At the same time, 'yung trial data ng Phase 3, Novavax at J&J, may additional capacity na another 3.2 billion. So, more or less, meron po tayong total na 13.2 billion na capacity for 2021," Galvez said.

[Translation: At the same time, based on the Phase 3 trial data of Novavax and Johnson & Johnson, they have a combined additional capacity of 3.2 billion vaccines. So, more or less, we have a total of 13.2 billion vaccine capacity in 2021.]

Galvez added around 4 billion out of the 5.5 billion global adult population are willing to be vaccinated against COVID-19.

The first batch of vaccines expected to arrive in the country are 117,000 doses of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine from the World Health Organization's vaccine-sharing facility COVAX. The delivery is facings delay because the government is still finalizing details of the indemnity agreement with the international health body.

WHO Country Representative Rabindra Abeyasinghe earlier explained that manufacturers require indemnification funds "for their own safety" since not all vaccines have been approved for the market.

Another batch of 600,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses from Chinese manufacturer Sinovac are also expected to arrive in the country on February 23, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said on Monday.

Under the government's immunization plan, health workers will be the first to get the shots against COVID-19.

Councils in England are to be allocated 500million to repair some 10 million potholes scattered across the country's local roads, the Government has said this morning.

The funding is the second instalment from the 2.5billion Potholes Fund launched by the Chancellor last year and is not a newly announced cash injection.

The AA welcomed the news that more potholes will be filled but said local roads are in desperate need of resurfacing. However, this takes place on average less than once in a lifetime.

Half a billion for pothole repairs in 2021/22: The Government has today revealed the allocation for a 500million cash injection for authorities to fill craters on local roads

The Potholes Fund was part of Rishi Sunak's financial package for the 2020 Budget to be spent on roads from 2020 to the financial year ending 2025.

Today's statement is merely a confirmation of where the 2021/22 financial year spending will be allocated by region.

The Department for Transport says an average pothole costs 50 on average to repair. Using this figure as the measure, it says 10 million craters in thousands of local roads will be fixed.

In terms of the areas that will benefit most from the latest release of government funds, the South West will receive just over 90million - more than any other region.

The South East will be allocated 82.5million, the East of England nearly 68.5million and the North West 28.5million.

The lowest level of funding will go to the North East, receiving just 28.5million, which is less than a third of what has been allocated to the South West.

The DfT says an average pothole costs 50 on average to repair. The 500m allocation should see 10 million filled

A recent study suggests the South West is most in need of funds to repair crater-riddled routes.

According to research by MoneySuperMarket last year, some 210,331 potholes have were reported to Cornwall Council over a three-year period.

Funds issued to councils to fix potholes by region South West: 90,031,000 South East: 82,693,000 East of England: 68,534,000 North West: 66,467,000 East Midlands: 57,358,000 West Midlands: 54,486,000 Yorkshire and The Humber: 51,940,000 North East: 28,492,000

Cambridgeshire and Derbyshire councils followed, receiving 184,402 and 172,297 pothole-related complaints over 36 months.

On the flip side, the fewest potholes reported were in the super-posh Kensington & Chelsea London Borough Council, with just 141 potholes reported in the same period.

Commenting on the allocation of funds for 2021/22, Transport Minister Baroness Vere said: 'We know potholes are more than just a nuisance  they can be dangerous to drivers and cyclists alike, and cause damage to thousands of vehicles every year.

'The funding allocated today will help councils ensure roads in their area are kept up to standard, and that the potholes that blight road users can be dealt with promptly.'

The total amount provided to councils in the 12 months from April is almost double the 296million Pothole Action Fund that was created for local authorities to repair cratered roads in the five years from 2015/16 to 2020/21.

Cornwall has been named the pothole capital of the UK with 210,000 reported over the course of three years - but Lancashire has staked a claim for Britain's worst crater

The worst and best areas in the UK for potholes  as Cornwall comes top with 210,311 The worst areas for potholes in the UK, in terms of the number reported to local councils, were as follows: 1. Cornwall - 210,311 2. Cambridgeshire - 184,402 3. Derbyshire - 172,297 4. Devon - 147,779 5. Oxfordshire - 110,106 6. East Riding of Yorkshire - 106,144 7. Durham - 99,630 8. Rotherham - 83,964 9. Hertfordshire - 72,230 10. Fife - 70,254 The least potholed roads in Britain, in terms of how many were reported over the last three years, were: 1. Kensington & Chelsea - 141 2. Isle of Anglesey - 290 3. Sunderland - 320 4. Rutland - 687 5. Portsmouth - 811 6. Bexley - 882 7. Hammersmith & Fulham - 1,283 8. Haringey - 1,451 9. Lambeth - 1,607 10. Bracknell Forest - 1,706

The AA says local roads are in desperate need of being resurfaced. However, that happens less than once a lifetime, it said

The AA acknowledged the half a billion spend on potholes in the coming year but warned that the local road network is in 'desperate need of repair' that is beyond filling in craters.

Jack Cousens, head of roads policy for the AA, said: 'Last month, just 15 per cent of our members told us that residential roads were in a good condition with drivers in the North West, South East and East Midlands giving their streets the lowest ratings.

'Patching up roads may seem like a quick fix, but in reality, it is just a sticking plaster.'

Cousens said that in order for roads to remain safe and smooth, they need to be completely resurfaced.

'However, studies show that residential roads in England get resurfaced on average every 119 years,' he said.

'If youre street is lucky enough to be chosen wed recommend a socially distanced celebration, as it will probably be a once in a lifetime event!'

A week earlier, Grant Shapps, Transport Secretary, pledged 93million to revamp three major transport routes in North Yorkshire, Hampshire and the Midlands.

He said the injection of funds will 'make journeys safer and more reliable for motorists'.
A group of concerned citizens realised the value of neglected water bodies and came together to form a citizen action group called Catch2o to revive water systems in and around their villages.

By Rashi Goel

When Goan artist Harshada Kerkar looked out of her home window, she was used to seeing the scorched, parched buffaloes gravitating to the pond in front of her house in large numbers. During the summer months last year, when she didnt see them lounging in their favourite watering hole, their absence concerned her. This pond is their respite during the summer months. she says. Harshada, who is now in her fifties, reminisces the old days when traditionally there was a pond in every village in Goa. Buffaloes used the water to wallow in, other cattle came to drink from it, farmers used it to water their crops. Now it seems that the water woes may have left these animals stranded.

Harshadas vivacious niece, Sharada Kerkar, an artist in her early twenties, also lives nearby and faces the same pond in the Saligao village of Goa. There are around 30 households around this pond and the village has around 1,500 households in total.

While the two had previously had many conversations around reviving the dying ponds and nallahs in their village, the COVID-19 instigated lockdown allowed them the much-needed time to reflect on, discuss and develop a plan for the revival of the key waterbodies that have been in a state of disuse for years. Along with some like-minded people for support, they decided to revive these as biodiversity hotspots.

The idea serendipitously ended up being an income-generating activity for migrant workers who had lost their jobs and were stranded in Goa during the pandemic. The project hired some of the labourers to revive ponds, helping them earn during the desperate times.

The group admits that bringing the stranded migrant workers as labour was incidental. While they hadnt planned it this way, it was a blessing in disguise for both parties. The COVID-19 lockdown had left daily-wage migrant workers from states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, homeless and pretty much at the mercy of good samaritans for food and water. They are always eager to find work, and at this time, even more so.

For the first month of the project, the team hired around 15 migrant workers who worked on draining the ponds, cleaning them, and repairing or building the boundary walls as well as bringing in their own expertise.When the workers from UP and Bihar were afraid to jump into the water, the ones from West Bengal, who knew how to swim well, came to the rescue, Sharada recalls with a smile.

The work started on 1 May as a pilot phase which lasted until 15 June. During this time they cleaned the Grandmorod pond in Saligao after which they moved on to identifying other water bodies. A pond in the nearby Pilerne village was cleaned.

So far, five water bodies  three wells and two ponds  have been cleaned and eight more ponds have been identified for cleaning in the next phase.

Community ponds of Goan villages

The rain-rich state of Goa has been seeing water scarcity of varying levels for over two decades now. Some of the reasons for this scarcity are increasing population, standard of living, climate change, and pollution of the existing water bodies.

The number of tourists that visit the state is roughly four times that of its resident population. This also puts immense pressure on the water supply.

Adding to the challenge of low per capita supply of water in Goa, is the fact that the villagers tend to neglect the upkeep of the water bodies. The pond in Saligao, like many other water bodies in Goa, is community-owned.

Sharada says that the problem is quite basic in nature  there are homes surrounding ponds and these contribute to the ponds getting dirty  some of the homes have their sewage drains being emptied out into the pond, some were emptying their dry waste beside the pond. It is the responsibility of the residents to keep their communidade water body clean. Often, this doesnt happen simply because the residents dont get along with their neighbours, so they choose to carry on living with the stench rather than fixing the issue, she says.

The coming together of specialists

With the goal of saving the biodiversity and water systems in and around Goan villages, a motley crew of people forms this citizen action group, which they call CatcH20.

While Sharada, a social-sector worker, spearheads administrative responsibilities, fundraising and logistics for the project, Harshada chooses to stay behind the scenes and work on identifying the ponds in need of revival; mobilising the community, building on-ground contacts as well as hiring labour.

Joining the duo in the effort is Goan architect Hyacinth Pinto known for her environmentally-friendly mud houses. Pinto, a passionate environmentalist since her college days, speaks matter-of-factly about her involvement in the project, emphasising on the issues of water shortage and contamination of freshwater bodies in Goa.

Pinto brings her structural expertise into deepening the ponds and building their walls. She teaches the workers how to use the mud and silt from the ponds themselves to construct the walls of the water body. The soil is clayey in nature and when it is combined with the vegetation and moulded into balls, it forms a great material for the banking walls of the pond, says Pinto, who is passionate about traditional building techniques and encourages the workers to use the methods that they would normally use in their villages. She was certain that they wanted to avoid using a JCB to help with the clearing since it would destroy the flora and fauna of the region too.

The goal of the project had been not only to revive the water bodies, but also to enhance the biodiversity surrounding them. A chance encounter with ecologist Aaron Lobo helped with an intervention at the right time as the team was going to plant ornamental plants around the cleansed ponds. Lobo, now a team member, shares that his role in the project is from a biodiversity perspective to promote the non-invasive species of plants as well as fish because the interconnectedness of certain species will help truly revive the ecosystem. With his expertise, the project helps rare, indigenous species survive and be revived. Success so far has been evident in one of the ponds they have cleaned, where birds like the marsh harrier and jacana are returning.

The initiative was open to employing anyone who had no other income coming in and along with stranded migrant labourers, who were paid daily wages, it also brought on board the Lamani (Banjara) women, who would normally eke a living collecting bottles and other waste from the roadside. With the lockdown, they didnt have much work because there werent any tourists.

Apart from the workers, supervisory support came from the community residents. A 65-year-old woman supervised the work at the first of five ponds that are being cleaned. The financial support for the project came from members of the group as well as from the residents of the community. Since these are freshwater bodies belonging to the communidade, their cleaning and upkeep require no special permissions from the local panchayat. Once the residents understood what the end goal was, they were quite open to contributing. The group also managed to raise some funds from the Rotary club.

Some help from the Goa State Biodiversity Board came in the form of plants and saplings. The government is also looking into giving the project a grant. Pradip Sarmokadam, member secretary of the board said this is a model project that can be a case-study and we are keen to extend our support. If the project goes well, the government could encourage its replication in other parts of Goa.

The stakeholders have been further encouraged by the response to their efforts so far. They are looking to employ even more scientific methods moving forward and plan for the work to resume in March 2021 when the ponds are dry and can be cleaned out efficiently.

This article was originally published on Mongabay.com.

Mongabay-India is an environmental science and conservation news service. This article has been republished under the Creative Commons license.
No one ever said the love of your life had to be a person. Men have come and gone but one love story has endured through decades of my life - with a rural village in Catalunya.

After 30 years, I can still recall the moment I fell for Ager. Gazing at the Sierras del Montsec on the final day of my holiday, I wondered if I could somehow live in this place that seemed lost in time.

Back in the 1980s, a group of Irish hang- gliding pilots had discovered the area for themselves. Set in the pre-Pyrenees, two hours inland from Barcelona, Ager would become established as one of the top flying sites in Spain, Europe and the world.

I didn't fly but I wanted to see the area my friends raved about. In the summer of 1991, we piled into hang-gliding instructor Peter's van and travelled through France and the Vielha tunnel to reach an ancient land of gorges, lakes, red earth and extremely cheap red wine.

The van was heaving with hang-gliders and filled with the sound of 'A Rainy Night In Soho' by the Pogues as we approached the village. The excitement as Ager's Romanesque Castell i Col-legiata de Sant Pere came into view was infectious.

We poured out of the van straight into the Speed Bar which was run by Irish man Declan Doyle. It was a moment in time - new friends, places and adventures.

Expand Close As free as a bird, hang-gliding over Ager / Facebook

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On the face of it, this was a tiny farming village but the presence of pilots from around the world created a special buzz. At every opportunity in the following years, I would return to get that feeling, often for months at a time.

Occasionally, puzzled drivers stopping for directions would ask what I was doing there. They saw a little wreck of a village in a remote valley. I saw a world of magic.

And anyway, looks don't matter when it comes to true love.

Once settled by the Romans, Ager enjoyed a strong strategic position. It became a Muslim citadel in the 9th century and two centuries later, a frontline in the Christian-Muslim conflict.

Today, when I walk along narrow cobbled streets, I imagine myself following in the footsteps of Arnau Mir de Tost, a knight to the counts of Urgell who captured Ager (or "Ajira" as the Muslims called it) from the Moors in 1034 and established it as a Christian stronghold.

When I hike up to the Port d'Ager, I ascend the Via Romana, stepping on stones laid during the expansion of the Roman Empire. I usually have this incredible stretch of history all to myself and can sing along as loud as I like to Jarabe de Palo, whose songs have provided much of the soundtrack to my years in the Ager valley.

When I walk up Calle Sant Marti, I may even follow in the footsteps of Gaspar de Portola, the first governor of California and founder of San Diego, whose family had links to the village in the 18th century.

Expand Close Paddling through Congost de Mont-Rebei in Catalunya. Pictures by Oriol Clavera / Facebook

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I walk the same paths as Sandro Rosell, the ex Barcelona FC president who in 2017 was jailed for and later acquitted of alleged money laundering charges. His family has deep roots in the village.

Beyond Ager, the region is rich in history. In Balaguer, capital of the county of La Noguera, I walk across a bridge that Franco's troops crossed to enter Catalunya in 1938. In Lleida, capital of the province, I find a proud Roman history and a city that battled Franco troops during the Civil War.

From medieval stronghold to outdoors Mecca, Ager is now a haunt for paragliding pilots, hikers, mountain bikers, trail runners, climbers, kayakers, astronomers, geologists and birdwatchers. It has been designated a geopark and is also a Dark Sky Park. Wonderful night skies are a given and it's possible to visit the local observatory.

The place where I feel most connected to the area's past is in the Congost de Mont-Rebei, a rugged remote gorge created by the Ribagorcana river.

One of the most popular activities is kayaking from the lake at Corca through the gorge, a 7km paddle. I also enjoy testing my head for heights on the Pasarela de Montfalco, a vertiginous wooden staircase built on the side of a sheer rock face. Here, as I descend narrow stairs, I cross from Catalunya into Aragon and have great views of the gorge.

I hike to La Cova dels Enamorats or "lovers' cave", occasionally with a man by my side. And although I never learned to fly, I sometimes go up to Sant Alis (1,678m) to watch hang-gliders and paragliders taking off and to soak up dreamy views of Catalunya and the Pyrenees.

If I can drag myself out of the valley, there's a lot to do - canyoning in Perves, white water rafting in Sort, both around an hour away. I can go hiking in lush Vall Fosca or in the spectacular Aiguestortes national park. There are small ski areas an hour from the valley, while Baqueira Beret in Val d'Aran and Andorra are both about two hours away. Not to mention Tarragona and Girona.

Of course, no love affair is without its ups and downs and there have been more than a few scrapes along the way; a tandem hang-gliding flight with our friend 'Fly' who promptly dipped the glider into a dive when I joked that the experience was boring; an ex-boyfriend who had a minor heart attack in mid-air while flying a hang-glider (he's still going strong and still flies).

Most of my scrapes have been the result of overly enjoying the annual fiesta. Each village in the valley, including Corca, La Regola and Agullo, holds a fiesta during August, resulting in long, hot summer nights filled with live music and partying in the square.

Ager's legendary Correfoc ("running with fire") is a piece of fireworks theatre where locals are chased through the narrow streets by devils. In its early days, before health and safety was a thing, it was wild and memorable.

One of the best things about visiting the same place over 30 years has been witnessing the cycle of life - many Barcelona families return to spend holidays in the village that they, their parents or grandparents grew up in.

Among the generation of children I've watched grow up are Angel and Marco, sons of local goat farmers Jose and Marina. I can set my watch to Jose's goats as he walks them by my friend Peter's farmhouse most afternoons.

When I'm not in Ager, I yearn for the colours, smells and tastes of the land - red fields of poppies, vast blue skies and white blossoming almond trees in springtime; the aroma of pines at Terradets; the taste of pomegranates, figs, capers, cherries and mushrooms, all picked locally. I'd give anything to smell the wild rosemary, thyme and lavender that have filled my senses on off-road motorbike rides around the Montsec.

Thirty years on, I'm still what the locals call a "guiri" (foreigner) but my friends and I have somehow become a small part of the fabric and story of the village. The love affair continues...

Getting there

Ager in Lleida, Catalunya, is a two-hour drive from both Barcelona and Reus.

Visitors should expect simple village life with a couple of local bars and restaurants, including Lo Torres and Casa Xalets. Stay at Casa Lucas in the centre of the village, Maciarol outside the village for astronomy and paragliding courses, Hotel Terradets (a 20-minute drive away) for good food and lake views or Casa Guilla in the tiny hilltop village of Santa Engracia near the town of Tremp for a lovers' escape.

For activities, check Montsec Activa. There are numerous companies offering paragliding courses - FlyAger, Albatros, Entrenuvols...

For further information, go to aralleida.com; catalunya.com
UAEs state-owned Mubadala Investment Company has signed a number of Memoranda of Understanding with the Government of Ukraine and Ukrainian private entities.

Three Memoranda of Understanding were signed with Ukrainian government entities that aim to explore mutually beneficial investment opportunities, the Emirates News Agency reports.

The documents were signed by Faris Al Mazrui, Head of Mubadalas investment program in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Roman Leshchenko, Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine, Dmytro Sennychenko, Chairman of the State Property Fund of Ukraine, and Sergiy Tsivkach, Executive Director of UkraineInvest.

"It is a big honour for us to be partnering with people who share our values and priorities on food safety, developing trade relationships and beginning new investment projects," Leshchenko stated.

"Ukraine has very promising potential for foreign investment, and the signing of MoUs with leading entities in Ukraine represents a commitment to explore potential investments and areas of cooperation on a case-by-case basis. We are impressed by the quality and caliber of Ukrainian businesses," Faris Al Mazrui noted.

Mubadala also signed a number of other MoUs with private companies that aim to explore investment opportunities in the private sector in Ukraine, namely with DTEK, EastOne, Interpipe, Ufuture, Unit.city, Dragon Capital, Fortior, UMG.

As reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and First Lady Olena Zelenska make a state visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15.

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MORE than 100 students attending third level education in Limerick have tested positive for Covid-19 over the past week, the Department of Health has confirmed.

Details of two large outbreaks involving students from Limerick and Galway were revealed at a NPHET media briefing this Monday evening.

Public health teams in Limerick have been working with the affected students and educational institutes since the cluster was first identified to ensure all contacts are traced and tested for disease.

"We are concerned about the rise in infections in the third level institutions, We have 120 positive students in Limerick and they are offering widespread screening in the university since the end of last week," said Dr Lorraine Doherty, National Clinical Director for Health Protection at the HSE.

In addition to the students who have tested positive for Covid-19 there are a number of suspected cases while others are awaiting testing.

"There are a lot of links between these young people in relation to infection. The average cluster size is two to three households so there is definitely household mixing for these young people wo are at university," added Dr Doherty who said 135 cases have been linked to the Galway outbreak to date.

Speaking at the same briefing, Dr Ronan Glynn, Deputy CMO, praised the response of public health teams to the outbreaks in Limerick and Galway.

"The response we have seen there really shows the value of reactive dynamic public heath teams and the efforts that they have put in over the past week - firstly identifying there was an issue and then responding to it and making widespread testing available and communicating that really effectively to the student bodies," he said.

Earlier a further 53 confirmed cases of Covid-19 were confirmed in Limerick.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton speaks to reporters at a news conference outside the Supreme Court in Washington on June 9, 2016. (Gabriella Demczuk/Getty Images)

Biden Wont Undo the Second Amendment in Texas: AG Paxton

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton responded to the push to restrict gun rights by President Joe Biden, who on the Feb. 14 anniversary of the mass shooting at a Parkland, Florida, high school called on Congress to impose tougher laws on ownership of firearms.

The Parkland shooting 3 years ago was an act of unspeakable evil, Paxton wrote in a tweet late Feb. 14. But Democrats cannot be allowed to use this tragedy as an opportunity to cram down unhelpful and unconstitutional gun laws.

Biden wont undo the #2A in TX on my watch, the Republican attorney general said, referring to the Second Amendment.

Feb. 14 marked three years since former Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student Nikolas Cruz opened fire at the Parkland, Florida, campus, killing 17 people and leaving another 17 wounded.

Biden took the opportunity to call on lawmakers to enact what he called commonsense gun law reforms. This includes background checks on all gun sales, eliminating immunity for gun manufacturers, and banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.

We owe it to all those weve lost and to all those left behind to grieve to make a change. The time to act is now, Biden said in a statement.

Parkland parents have been divided over how lawmakers should respond.

Ryan Petty, whose daughter Alaina was 14 when she was killed in the shooting, addressed the president in a tweet on Feb. 14.

Mr. President, thank you for remembering the loved ones taken from us 3 years ago, he wrote. Alaina loved this country and the freedoms it guarantees. Common sense tells us that honoring her life does not require infringement on the rights of law-abiding citizens.

In an interview on Feb. 14, Petty said the presidents proposals wont prevent more tragedies.

Its wrong to focus on the weapon, said Petty, who is now a member of the state school board. For those who understand what happened that day, there were mistakes. This was the most preventable school shooting in the history of our country. The warning signs were there. It was clear the killer had intentions to attack the school.

Mass shootings have galvanized gun control advocates, who argue that guns are too easily accessible and say more needs to be done to keep assault-style firearms away from potentially bad actors.

The passage of time has done little to heal the heartbreak we felt upon hearing the shocking news three years ago today, nor dulled our sense of outrage at the lack of consequential legislative action from lawmakers since that horrible morninglaws that would prevent another Parkland from ever happening again, said Manny Diaz, chair of the Florida Democratic Party.

Last week, administration officials met with gun control advocates, with White House press secretary Jen Psaki telling reporters later that the administration is ready to move on the ambitious plan Biden laid out during the campaign.

The main part of Bidens gun control agenda includes banning the manufacture and sale of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, regulating possession of existing assault weapons under the National Firearms Act, buying back these weapons and high-capacity magazines from citizens, requiring background checks for all gun sales, ending the online sale of firearms and ammunition, and providing more funds to enforce these laws.

John R. Lott Jr., former president of the Crime Prevention Research Center, argued in an op-ed that the reasoning behind Bidens gun control agenda is flawed.

Far less than 1 percent of guns are ever used in crimes, suicides, or accidents, and when they are, its virtually always the result of the users actions, he wrote, arguing that plenty of other products are used to commit crimes, including cars and computers, or are associated with accidental deaths, such as swimming pools.

Many other products, such as motorcycles, have much higher probabilities of causing harm. The death rate per motorcycle is 0.05 percent; the death rate for guns is 0.008 percent, a figure that, in addition to homicides, includes accidental deaths and suicides.

Guns are also used defensively about 2 million times in the average year, according to the FBI. Will government reward gun makers when their products are used to save lives? Lott said.

Masooma Haq and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
A day after reporting 4,092 COVID-19 cases, highest single-day tally in more than a month, Maharashtra saw the daily count fall on Monday but it remained above 3,000 for the sixth straight day as the state government termed the situation as "alarming" and warned of "harsh decisions" after the recent spike.

Describing as "alarming" the recent rise in fresh cases in some districts of Maharashtra, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar expressed displeasure over people not following COVID-19-related guidelines.

A meeting has been convened by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray in Mumbai on Tuesday to take stock of the situation, he said.

Speaking separately, Health Minister Rajesh Tope said the "3T formula" of tracing, testing and treatment will have to be implemented strictly to curb the COVID-19 spread.

On Monday, the number of daily cases stood at 3,365 in Maharashtra, where 4,092 infections, the highest single-day rise since the first week of January, were reported on Sunday.

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

Also, 23 more patients succumbed to the infection, while over 3,100 people recovered from the infection.

The new cases took the COVID-19 tally in the state to 20,67,643, an official statement said in Mumbai.

Maharashtra reported 2,216 new cases on February 8 and 2,515 a day later.

On February 10, the number of daily cases surged to 3,451 and the single-day rise has been above the 3,000-mark since then.

Apart from Mumbai, Nagpur and Amravati cities in the Vidarbha region reported over 400 new COVID-19 patients in a day on Monday.

In view of the recent spurt in cases, Pawar on Monday warned of taking some "harsh decisions" and asked people to be prepared.

Speaking to reporters in Aurangabad, Pawar said, "Harsh decisions can be taken and people should remain prepared. If certain decisions are not taken in time then we will have to pay a heavy cost later."

"I have come across ((reports that) people are not following the COVID-19 guidelines which are aimed at checking the spread of the infection. If the situation worsens, we may need to pay heavy cost for this carelessness.

"The number (of new cases in the state) is alarming. We have seen that lockdown was imposed in many parts of the world again in view of the second wave of the pandemic," the Deputy Chief Minister said.

Talking to reporters separately in Aurangabad, Tope said the state government had managed to flatten the curve in the last one month as far as daily addition of cases was concerned, but the recent rise in numbers in Mumbai, Wardha and some other pockets was "alarming".

"We have given instructions that the 3T formula of tracing, testing and treatment be implemented strictly, effectively. Testing needs to be increased. Meanwhile, people also need to follow COVID-19 guidelines," Tope added.

Notably, a central team which visited parts of Maharashtra earlier this month, had in a meeting with the Chief Minister on February 8 noted that rural areas of Vidarbha -- particularly in Amravati, Akola, Yavatmal and Bhandara districts -- reported higher positivity rate.

On the other hand, the number of patients discharged from hospitals across the state on Monday stood at 3,105, that is, more than double of those who headed for homes post recovery a day earlier.

A total of 1,355 patients were discharged on Sunday.

The number of recovered persons in the state stood at 19,78,708, the government said.

The number of active cases in the state increased slightly to 36,201 on Monday from 35,965 a day earlier.

According to the Maharashtra government, Palghar, located adjoining Mumbai, was the only district in the state which did not report a single COVID-19 case on Monday.

With 23 new deaths reported on Monday, the state's fatality count rose to 51,552, the government said.

The health department said of the 23 deaths, 7 were reported during the past 48 hours, while 3 were from the last week. The remaining 13 deaths were from the period before last week.

Mumbai city continued to report the highest single- day cases in the state with a spike of 493 on Monday, while Nagpur city saw a jump of 415cases.

Amravati city in Vidarbha saw a rise of 405 cases on Monday.

Pune city in Western Maharashtra and Buldhana district in the Vidarbha region also reported three-digit rise in daily cases of 202 and 173, respectively.

Raigad district in the Konkan region reported deaths of 11 persons, highest in the state on Monday, due to the disease.

In Mumbai and Marathwadas Aurangabad city, three and two individuals died due to COVID-19, respectively.

Out of the total 3,365 new cases, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), accounted for 880.

With this, the total number of cases reported in the MMR -- which includes Mumbai and its satellite towns -- till now has increased to 7,05,441. The region has reported 19,701 deaths till now.

The country's financial capital alone has witnessed 3,14,569 cases and 11,422 deaths till now.

The Akola division -- which covers Amravati, Yavatmal, Buldhana and Washim districts, besides Akola -- in Vidarbha reported a rise of 837 new cases.

The states recovery rate is 95.7 per cent, while the fatality rate is 2.49 per cent, the department said.

With 37,418 new tests on Monday, the number of samples tested so far in the state increased to 1,53,59,026, the government said.

Meanwhile, alarmed by the rising number of coronavirus cases in Amravati since the beginning of February, the district administration has imposed a night curfew but ruled out the imposition of a fresh lockdown District Collector Shailesh Naval told.
SHANGHAI, China, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --CIIE, the world's largest import expo, is sending best wishes as Chinese across the globe are celebrating the Year of the Ox.

One of the new year greetings Chinese use during Spring Festival is "May you prosper in new year." For foreign firms interested in tapping into the booming Chinese market, the CIIE might be just the way to make your dreams of prosperity come true. Here's why:
Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani fainted on stage on Sunday while addressing a rally for upcoming civic polls in Nizampura area of Vadodara, following which he was flown to Ahmedabad and admitted in a hospital, BJP leaders said. Rupani, 64, was given first aid on the stage after he collapsed. He was later seen descending the stairs of the stage on his own.

He was then flown in a helicopter from Vadodara to Ahmedabad and admitted in U N Mehta Hospital. No medical bulletin was issued by the hospital till late night.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi enquired about Rupani's health over phone, said a statement issued by the Chief Minister's Office. Modi told Rupani to get himself thoroughly checked and to take proper rest, it said.

This was Rupani's third political rally during the day in Vadodara. "Rupani fainted on stage and I gave him a primary medical treatment. He was fine and walked back to his car from the stage," said Vadodara city BJP president Dr Vijay Shah who was present on the dais at the time of the incident.

BJP leader Bharat Danger told reporters that the CM collapsed while addressing the public meeting in Nizampura area. "Rupani's security guards caught hold of him when he fell. He was given first aid and was taken to the airport (from where he flew to Ahmedabad)," he said.

"Rupani was unwell for the last two days, but instead of cancelling his public meetings held in Jamnagar on Saturday and in Vadodara on Sunday, he preferred to continue," Danger said. Elections to six municipal corporations including Vadodara will be held on February 21 while those for municipalities, districts and taluka panchayats will be held on February 28.

Also read: PM Modi wants to hand-over agri business to his 'two friends': Rahul Gandhi
U.S. President Donald J. Trump holds a copy of the USA Today newspaper fronting with his impeachment acquittal, as he arrives to the 68th Annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, DC, USA, Feb. 6, 2020. EPA-Yonhap



A day after the Senate acquitted Donald Trump in a historic second impeachment trial, America was weighing how long a shadow the former president will cast  over his party, and over the country.



The Senate on Saturday voted 57-43 to convict Trump of inciting the January 6 assault on the US Capitol.



It was a stinging rebuke, with seven Republicans joining all Democrats in the most bipartisan impeachment vote ever, but it fell far short of the 67 votes needed for conviction.



With Trump hinting afterward at a possible political future, even as other Republicans said it was time to move on, the stark divide facing the party was on full view.



One frequent Trump critic, Republican Governor Larry Hogan of Maryland, on Sunday predicted a "real battle for the soul of the Republican Party."



"This is not over," he told CNN, adding he would have voted to convict Trump.



'Need to work with Trump'



Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana was one of the seven Republicans to vote to convict; he predicted Sunday that Trump's still-strong hold on Republicans would fade.



"I think his force wanes... I think our leadership will be different going forward," he told ABC's "This Week."





Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., walks in the Capitol as the Senate proceeds in a rare weekend session for final arguments in the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump, at the Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. AP



Several Republicans, even while voting to acquit Trump, expressed dismay over his role on January 6 and in the weeks before, as he stoked anger with false claims the November election was stolen from him.



But one of the former president's fiercest defenders, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, insisted Sunday that Trump, with his fervent following, retains a huge political role as the party looks ahead to the 2022 midterm elections.



He called Trump the "most vibrant member of the Republican Party," adding, "We need to work with President Trump  we can't do it without him."



Despite Trump's acquittal, Democrats insisted Sunday they had achieved a moral and political victory by securing some Republican votes in the Senate trial while permanently tarring Trump's name and clearing the way for President Joe Biden to quickly advance his agenda.



"We clearly won in the court of public opinion," Representative Don Beyer told CNN.



Party base



Trump has flirted with the idea of running for the White House again in 2024. A conviction Saturday would have likely barred him from holding federal office again.



Merely hinting at a possible run will keep him in political conversations  and allow him to continue raising large amounts of money.





U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) speaks to members of the media as he arrives for the second impeachment trial of former U.S. President Donald Trump the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S., February 13, 2021. REUTERS-Yonhap



Yet a number of Republicans have distanced themselves from the former president, who after all lost the election to Biden by seven million votes while also seeing his party lose control of the Senate.



Several Republicans are lining up to seek the presidential nomination in 2024, and they are eager to leave him in the party's past.



One of them, Nikki Haley, a former governor who served Trump as ambassador to the United Nations, was blunt in an interview posted Friday by Politico, saying Trump was increasingly isolated and had "lost any sort of political viability."



But Republicans who have openly opposed Trump have faced fierce blowbacks from the party's base, and many remain fearful of his tendency to exact payback from critics.



Trump has been deprived, however, of a key weapon he used against political enemies  Twitter. It is unclear whether he can generate the same levels of enthusiasm among Republicans as he did in the past.



And Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell  who voted against conviction, saying a former president could not be impeached  nonetheless identified another major challenge facing Trump.





Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell arrives on the fifth day of the impeachment trial of former U.S. president Trump in Washington, DC, USA, Feb. 13, 2021. EPA-Yonhap
Assad has attempted to boost his popularity in the South, by cancelling outstanding penalties for wanted people, writes Enab Baladi.

Not a lot of time separates us from the next presidential elections in Syria, which are expected to take place next April. In the meantime, the Syrian regime has been trying to increase the number of measures it is taking to calm tensions in the southern regions of Syria, namely Suweida and Daraa.

These moves beg questions about the way the two regions are being managed in southern Syria. Furthermore, does the regime really care about the votes of the people, whose living conditions are on the decline, with 90 percent of them already below the poverty line? What are the tools and the means that the head of the Syrian regime, Bashar al-Assad, is using to market himself before the south for a new term?

The Syrian regime is keen on imposing control over southern Syria ahead of the presidential elections. On February 7, the regime, through its security branches, began to settle the conditions of wanted persons in Suweida.

The settlement provides for the abolition of the penalties for those who fail to attend the compulsory and reserve services as well as overriding the absconding punishment and the acquittal of those wanted for security reasons, in return for their joining the military service in the ranks of the regime.

The location of the military service will be in southern Syria (the areas of Suweida, Daraa, and Quneitra), according to the Suweida Network 24s Facebook page.

Abduls Wahab al-Assi, a researcher at Jusoor for Studies Center, told Enab Baladi that the so-called settlement announced by the Syrian regime in Suweida is an initiative rather than an agreement, because it is limited to an understanding with Sheikh al-Aql, Hikmat al-Akl, while several Sheikhs al-Aql are still neutral and refuse to adopt coercive measures to impose compulsory service on the people of the province.

On January 28, Suweida residents were up in arms after the head of the Military Intelligence branch in the southern region, Brig. Gen. Luay al-Ali, insulted the head of the Unitarian Druze community, Hikmat al-Hijri, by phone, according to local pages in Suweida.

Efforts were made to calm the situation, with officials in the regime offering an apology to the spiritual leader, after crowds and delegations flocked to Hijris house in the town of Qanawat in the countryside of Suweida.

Daraa

On February 8, and in the presence of a Russian delegation, the Central Committee and the Syrian regime in Daraa reached an agreement that might quell the existing tension in the western part of the governorate, following reinforcements and crowds that the Syrian regime brought to the region.

The Enab Baladi correspondent in Daraa reported that, according to the Central Committee  which is negotiating the implementation of the settlement agreement with the Syrian regime  a joint meeting between the regime and the committee led to an agreement to prevent the displacement of the people of Daraa to northern Syria, to stop the exit of those wanted from the western region, and to allow the exit of the wanted from the western region based on a guarantee from their clans as long as they remain within the borders of the governorate.

According to the committee, the agreement stipulated that 4th Division forces be allowed to search a number of southern farms in the city of Tafas, in the presence of the people of the region, to ensure that no violations are being committed against civilians and their property.

The agreement also provided for the handover of 14 anti-aircraft weapons used in the disputes between the Zoubi and Kiwan clans and the handover of government headquarters.

A safe environment

The Syrian regime now needs to ensure the restoration of sovereignty over all the areas it controls, especially those that signed settlement agreements, in addition to the Suweida governorate, which was able to form a position of strength, relatively independent from its local politics, according to Assi.

The Jusoor researcher said that the Syrian regime is working to consecrate itself as an indispensable need for Syrians in its areas of control, by fulfilling the minimum needs  such as pensions, incentives and services  while promoting the discourse of the consequences of the absence of state authority from other conflict areas. This discourse, according to Assi, would give birth to major concerns and fears of any change to the governance model or the current form of authority.

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.
National Anthem

Regarding Vague patriotism, (C1, Feb. 12): Jerome Solomon totally misses the point of the anthem being played. Just because some people dont respect our anthem, including players and owners, is no reason not to play it. Thats like not flying the American flag because some people dont believe in what it stands for. We are able to play a game because of what the anthem represents! So tell me, do you stand and put your hand over your heart when the anthem is played?

Brian Binash, Houston

I guess my idea of respect is passe.

Respect, displayed by standing, for The National Anthem, is now viewed as a detestable fringe group action.

I am truly amazed how far my ethics have been shifted. Once considered a middle of the road person, I find myself categorized as an extremist!

The strangest part is that I havent moved at all.

Rusty Knight, Missouri City

Health care

Regarding How Texas can cure medical cost issues, (A11, Feb. 12): Dr. David Callender paints a comprehensive picture of the factors contributing to heath care costs in hospitals. Everyone agrees about who should pay for hospital care: someone else. Most interesting was the fact that compliance with government regulation adds $1,200 to the cost to hospitals for each admission. We should not be surprised that the government charges for everything it provides.

Richard E. Ralston, executive director, Americans for Free Choice in Medicine

Regarding Medicaid expansion would give Texas a jolt, (B1, Feb. 7): I have been reading about the issue of Gov. Greg Abbott not allowing the expansion to Medicaid and I dont get that. Preventive care paid for by any source will save money in the long run. When an uninsured person becomes very ill, they have to resort to going to the emergency room. That costs every taxpayer more. If the illness is debilitating because the person could not afford maintenance medication and treatments, they can possibly no longer work. They may have to go on disability and other forms of government assistance. That also costs more for the taxpayer. Health care should be afforded every American. Its being penny-wise but dollar foolish to not provide basic preventive health care to every American who needs it. Its just wrong. Its un-Christian and plain wrong, especially in the great United States. People should not have to resort to the emergency room or have to create GoFundMe accounts to just live.

Connie Huch, Houston

Gokal should be lauded, but penalized

Regarding Judge tosses doctors vaccine theft case, (Jan. 25): District Attorney Kim Ogg correctly faced criticism from a judge for pursuing the case against Dr. Hasan Gokal. In the countys refusal to furnish the public with the vaccination protocols Gokal allegedly violated, theyre making him out to be a thief without clarifying that, even if such a protocol exists, it encouraged wasting an already-scarce resource instead of vaccinating people who wouldve otherwise been eligible  bureaucracy over people. Like all doctors, Gokal took an oath, and asking him to adhere to such a protocol  that in subsequent retellings of this story reveal he kept his superiors apprised of his activity until the issue of equity was raised. According to the New York Times story, he asked if the names were too Indian, to which they responded in the affirmative as a way to penalize him for doing his job. It is a gross injustice, and he deserves the support of the community, not penalized, for his heroism.

Joseph Marhee, Houston

The department has come under heavy criticism for arresting the climate change activist. Speaking on the arrest, Joint Commissioner of Police (Cyber) Prem Nath said that Disha deleted a WhatsApp group she created to spread the 'toolkit' and added that due procedure was followed during her arrest

New Delhi: Climate activist Disha Ravi along with Mumbai lawyer Nikita Jacob and Pune-based engineer Shantanu created the "toolkit" related to the farmers' agitation and shared it with others to tarnish India's image, the Delhi Police said on Monday.

The police claimed that Disha Ravi, who was arrested on Saturday from Bengaluru, sent the "toolkit" to teen climate activist Greta Thunberg through the Telegram app, and also "coaxed her to act on it".

The data was also deleted, police said, adding that Disha's Telegram account shows that many links related to the "toolkit" were removed.

Non-bailable warrants have been issued against Nikita and Shantanu for allegedly creating the "toolkit", the Delhi Police said.

Addressing a press conference, Joint Commissioner of Police (Cyber) Prem Nath said 22-year-old Disha also deleted a WhatsApp group she created to spread the "toolkit", which was a dynamic document with hyperlinks to Google docs, a lot of which are 'pro-Khalistani".

"The toolkit was aimed at tarnishing the image of India," he said.

The department has come under heavy criticism for arresting the climate change activist.

Thunberg had shared the "toolkit" to lend her support to the farmers' agitation against the three farm reform laws. In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were listed which were needed to be taken to support the farmers' protest.

The "toolkit" has been cited by some critics as "proof" of her conspiracy to fuel protests in India.

Earlier this month, the Cyber Cell had lodged an FIR against "pro-Khalistan" creators of the "toolkit" for waging a "social, cultural and economic war against the Government of India".

The case has been registered on charges of criminal conspiracy, sedition and various other sections of the Indian Penal Code.

"The email account created by Shantanu is the owner of this Google document," Nath said, adding that "pro-Khalistani group Poetic Justice Foundation (PJF) founder Mo Dhaliwal had contacted them through a Canada-based woman named Punit."

Before the Republic Day violence, that left 500 police personnel injured and a protestor dead, Nikita and Shantanu had on 11 January attended a Zoom meeting organized by PFJ in which modalities were decided to create the "toolkit" titled "Global Farmer Strike" and "Global Day of Action, 26 January", Nath said.

"Nikita, Shantanu, Disha and others collaborated towards the draft of the toolkit. Based on information gathered from Nikita and her device, several teams were sent to Maharashtra's Beed district and to Bengaluru. Shantanu wasn't found at his house in Beed and we are still searching for him," he said.

Police said Disha, Shantanu and Nikita created and edited the "toolkit". Disha, who is also associated with the environmental movement called 'Fridays for Future', "sent the toolkit to Greta Thunberg through the Telegram app and also coaxed her to act on it."

Disha Ravi was arrested in the presence of her mother, area station house officer (SHO) in Bengaluru. All due procedures were followed, he said.

During a search of Nikita's house on 11 February, two laptops and an iPhone were found along with several "incriminating documents", police said.

"Keeping in mind that the person whose premises was being searched as per court order was a woman, the investigating team wound up the day's search and requested Nikita to make herself available at her house on the next morning. She gave a written undertaking to be present at her house," Nath said.

Nikita is still absconding, he said.

Police said they are also probing the role of a man named Peter Friedrich in connection with the "toolkit" case. Police said Friedrich has been on the radars of the Indian security establishments since late 2006 when he was noticed in the company of Bhajan Singh Bhinder alias Iqbal Chaudhary.

"He (Bhinder) has been a very leading proponent of the K2 desk of ISI. Friedrich was associated with him," police said.

"Why his (Peters') name is there on the document or why should he (Friedrich) be followed will be answered by Disha and her associates. Did they contact him Friedrich through Mo Dhaliwal or directly contacted him is a matter of investigation," a senior police officer said.

Thousands of farmers protesting the Centre''s new agri laws had clashed with the police during their tractor parade on 26 January.

Their parade had dissolved into unprecedented scenes of anarchy as protesters fought with police, overturned vehicles and delivered a national insult hoisting a religious flag from the ramparts of the Red Fort, a privilege reserved for India's tricolour.
NEW DELHI: After several years of steady growth, India's smartphone market hit a rough patch in 2020, with shipments declining nearly 2% year-on-year (YoY) to 150 million units, as per International Data Corporations (IDC) quarterly mobile phone tracker published on Monday.

The slump was concentrated in the first half of 2020, when sales fell 26% YoY, due to supply chain disruption and manufacturing shutdowns amid the coronavirus pandemic. As production resumed gradually, the market recovered with a 19% YoY increase in shipments in second half of the year. Shipments during December quarter grew a record 21% YoY.

Also Read | Why Mumbais mojo lies beyond its locals

Despite the decline, India remains the second biggest smartphone market after China. Global smartphone shipments were down 5.9% YoY in 2020, as per IDC.

The rebound of the smartphone market in the latter half of 2020 underscores the importance of devices in our day-to-day lives. In 2021, IDC expects the smartphone market to grow in high single-digit YoY, driven majorly by upgrading consumers, in the mid-range segment and affordable 5G offerings ($250)," Navkendar Singh , research director, Client Devices & IPDS, IDC India, said in a statement.

Online sales outpaced total sales in calendar year 2020, growing at 12%. Though the online market share at the end of year was 48%, in the December quarter it accounted for 51% of all shipments, a record high as per IDC. Prolonged sales events, promotions and exchange/upgrade programmes were some of the factors that made people turn to online platforms.

IDC noted that footfall in retail stores gradually picked up during the pre-Diwali weeks of October and November, resulting in a 5% YoY growth in December quarter for offline channels. During most of the first half of the year, offline channels were hit as most stores remained shut due to lockdown and social distancing norms.

IDC expects offline retail to bounce back in 2021. Revamped offline channel play is anticipated, to bring back growth in the very important brick and mortar counters for long term sustainability," said Singh.

With the roll out of 5G services expected sometime in 2022, demand for 5G devices also grew. Shipment of 5G smartphones crossed 3 million in 2020. As more 5G devices enter in 2021, the ASP for smartphones is expected to rise," said Upasana Joshi, associate research manager, Client Devices, IDC India.

Among brands, Xiaomi was the undisputed leader with 27% of market share, both during calendar year 2020 and December quarter. Though Xioami grew 12% sequentially, among the top five, Samsung was the fastest growing brand growing at 35%. The South Korean companys market share in December quarter was at 17%. However, in terms of annual shipments, both Xiaomi and Samsung witnessed a fall in market share, indicating a tough year for the two brands. Apple was the fastest growing brand in 2020, rising 93% YoY to become the 7th leading smartphone brand in India.

Hong Kong-based Transsion was the 6th leading and second fastest growing brand after Apple with 64% growth in 2020. Transsion owns multiple brands such as the online-exclusive Infinix and Itel and Tecno-branded budget smartphones, aimed at buyers in smaller towns and rural areas.

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President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev laid the foundation of the Horadiz-Aghband railway in Fuzuli district, according to the presidential website.

This 100-kilometer railway is of great strategic importance because this transport infrastructure will play an important part in enabling the movement of Azerbaijani citizens to and from the liberated lands and, most importantly, contribute to the establishment of a direct railway connection between the main part of Azerbaijan and the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic.

"This railway is of great strategic importance. First of all, because it will be of great importance both for the travel of citizens to the liberated lands and for cargo transportation. On the other hand, this railway will extend to Nakhchivan," the statement reads.
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A vaccination centre for Louth will be located at the Fairways Hotel in Dundalk, it has emerged.

The Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly TD, has today confirmed locations for 37 vaccination centres across Ireland for the COVID-19 Vaccination Programme.

The 37 centres have been confirmed by the HSE, with at least one in every county. These centres will support the vaccination of the general population in a safe and efficient manner. While currently vaccines are being administered in healthcare settings and by GPs, many people will be offered their vaccination in these centres, having self-registered online.

All of the centres vary in size and operating hours and have been selected based on population density, ease of access, transport and parking. The design and layout of the centres also incorporates learnings from the COVID-19 swabbing centres. It is important to note that the centres will be of different sizes and operating hours will be based on vaccine supply and catchment area need.

Minister Donnelly said: I would like to thank the HSE for their ongoing work in developing these vaccination centres across the country. These centres will be ready well in advance of vaccine supply when they will be used as part of our programme. People can expect to see these vaccination centres ready and waiting in their county.

We have always said the vaccination programme would only be limited by the availability and reliability of supply in these early stages of the programme. In the coming months supply will increase substantially and we will see these centres operating to full capacity and administering vaccines to the general population, following the Government priority list.
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.

The Los Angeles Police Department is investigating the circulation of a photo depicting George Floyd, who was killed in the hands of Minneapolis police officers last year, with the words, "You Take my breath away," law enforcement officials said Saturday.

The incident was reported by an officer who made an internal complaint about an image of Floyd styled in a "Valentine-format" being "passed around" by officers, according to an internal memo signed by Capt. Jay Mastick posted on Twitter on Saturday and later confirmed by Chief Michel Moore.

Moore said that the officer who made the complaint will be interviewed on Monday and that the department is determined to find out exactly where and how the image was generated, "online or otherwise," and who may have been involved.

"Our investigation is to determine the accuracy of the allegations while also reinforcing our zero tolerance for anything with racist views," the chief told the Los Angeles Times on Saturday.

If the department confirms that officers were circulating the image, "people will find my wrath," Moore said.

Moore instructed "that supervision reinforce the need for professionalism on online behavior," and said messages with "inappropriate" content may result in discipline, according to the memo.

On Saturday night, the department said in a tweet that it had not yet identified "any postings in the workplace" or identified that it was an LAPD employee who created the image, but added that it has "directed commands to survey the worksites for it."

The LAPD did not immediately respond to a Washington Post request for comment.

Floyd died May 25 after he was handcuffed and pinned to the ground under the knee of Minneapolis Officer Derek Chauvin for more than eight minutes, after he repeatedly said, "I can't breathe."

The county medical examiner ruled Floyd's death a homicide caused by excessive use of force, as well as the presence of fentanyl and methamphetamine in his system, and underlying health conditions. And an independent autopsy determined that he died of "asphyxiation from sustained pressure," after being held down by his neck and back.

Floyd's death sparked a wave of outrage, unrest and protests in more than 100 cities nationwide, including Los Angeles, and led to a nationwide reckoning over racial injustice and systematic police brutality, prompting police departments across the country to address the issue and ensure more accountability for their forces.

In the days after Floyd's death in the summer, widespread protests in Los Angeles prompted a massive police response that included the use of foam bullets and arrests of peaceful protesters.

Moore then came under fire after he said looters were as responsible for Floyd's death as were the Minneapolis police officers, but he walked back his comments shortly after.

"While I did immediately correct myself, I recognize that my initial words were terribly offensive. Looting is wrong, but it is not the equivalent of murder and I did not mean to equate the two. I deeply regret and humbly apologize for my characterization," he wrote on Twitter.

Minneapolis is anticipating unrest and protests as the city prepares for Chauvin's trial and jury selection, set to begin March 8, with members of the National Guard set to be deployed to downtown Minneapolis and across the city.

Chauvin, 44, has been charged with second-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter, and he will be tried separately from the three other former officers charged in Floyd's death.

12:41 | Lima, Feb. 15.

The ceremony was held at the Government Palace in Lima.

Allan Wagner is a career diplomat. He has served as Minister of Foreign Affairs twice (1985-1988 and 2002-2003), and as Minister of Defense between 2006 and 2007.





He was also Peruvian Ambassador to Spain (1988-1990), Venezuela (1990-1992), the United States (2001-2002), and the Netherlands (2008-2014).





Moreover, the newly sworn-in minister served as Peru's Diplomatic Agent before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, in a case of maritime dispute with Chile.
Last weekend, the British Council took part in the 25th NileTESOL conference, which is the largest English Language Teachers gathering in the region, for the 11th year in a row.

The opening of the virtual ceremony of the 25th NileTESOL conference was attended by Tarek Shawki, the Egyptian minister of education, and over a period of two days, the conference recorded over 10,000 participants in the live sessions.

NileTESOL is proudly offered through a partnership between the British Council and the American University in Cairo and seeks to provide opportunities for professional development, networking, and scholarly discussion and debate within the area of English language teaching.

It also aims to promote active involvement and participation by offering opportunities for the exchange of ideas and expertise within this area in Egypt, the Middle East, and worldwide.

This year, the British council sponsored Sophia Mavridi, the renowned expert in learning technologies, as an international speaker. Her plenary talk gave practical ideas on blended learning and attracted 180 participants.

John Shackleton and Hala Ahmed from the British Council also gave a session on strengthening and establishing teachers networks in the MENA region, which attracted 170 attendees.

In the conference, Country Director of the British Council in Egypt Elizabeth White said, NileTESOL has grown over the last 25 years as a result of wider acceptance of the English language as beneficiary and advantageous to those who learn it. This year, we are delighted to continue to share our expertise with public and private sector educators, despite the challenges posed by the pandemic.

Over the last 10 years, the British Councils English programmes, connecting classrooms and the National Teacher Training Programme, in partnership with Egypts Ministry of Education, provided professional development training to more than 100,000 teachers in Egypt.

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Thousands of students and academics have signed petition for Dr Kerr to keep her job

A university has sparked a global row after axing the only female professor on a gender studies course.

More than 1,000 students and academics have signed a petition condemning the decision by St Andrews not to renew their contract with Dr Alison Kerr.

They say Dr Kerr, an American philosopher, had a crucial role in setting up the institute in 2018 and has led its postgraduate masters course.

But having been employed on a fixed-term contract, Dr Kerr's hope of being made a permanent staff member were dashed when she was told her employment would come to an end in June.

More than 1,000 students and academics have signed a petition condemning the decision by St Andrews not to renew their contract with Dr Alison Kerr

It is understood the academics duties are being covered by several colleagues, both women and men, from disciplines across the university while a replacement is sought.

The institute has denied claims she has been replaced by two men, adding it is bigger than any one member of staff and in the long term should be run by a 'cohort of suitably qualified individuals'.

It has been reported that the course will now be taught by two men who, critics say, do not have a background in the subject.

But authorities have dismissed this claim, saying the institute is bigger than any one member of staff and in the long term should be run by a 'cohort of suitably qualified individuals'.

The move has sparked anger among students and several high-profile gender studies academics, with some launching a campaign called StAndwithAlison.

More than 1,000 students and experts have also signed a petition condemning the decision.

Among the signatories, Elinor Mason, a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, said: 'I want to stress how valuable this programme is, and what a shame it would be to squander all the work that Kerr has put into it.'

Andrea Peto, from Central European University in Budapest, said: 'Gender studies is under attack globally. Very sad that this is also happening at University of St Andrews. Maybe it is not too late to change this decision.'

Professor Kirstein Rummery, from the University of Stirling, said: 'At a time when gender studies and interdisciplinary feminist scholarship are badly needed, growing in popularity and under epistemic attack, this seems a questionable decision from a prestigious institution that should be leading the way.'

A spokesman for the university did not discuss the specifics of Kerr's case, which is subject to an appeals process, but he said: 'We are aware of various communications circulating about this case, including an open letter.

The move has sparked anger among students and several high-profile gender studies academics, with some launching a campaign called StAndwithAlison. Pictured: St Andrews

'There are several fundamental misrepresentations in these communications. The impression given is both misleading and unfairly damaging to the university and to other respected academic members of staff.

'The MLitt was never set up to be operated by a single person. The longterm plan was always that a cohort of suitably qualified individuals would teach and direct the programme.'

Who is Dr Alison Kerr? After gaining her doctorate in philosophy at Ohio State, Alison Duncan Kerr joined the university as a lecturer before taking up an offer to move to St Andrews University in 2016. In 2018, she secured a three-year Research Fellowship in order to establish the Institute of Gender Studies (StAIGS), which would become part of the philosophy department. As part of the institute, Dr Kerr launched and has run a Gender Studies MLitt course. According to campaigners, the fees from the first cohort to sign up for the course was large enough to cover the cost of her fellowship, with numbers on the lucrative course set to double in the next academic year. The course was proved incredibly popular, and is the largest interdisciplinary research institute at St Andrews with more than 130 academics from 19 different schools. During her time as director of the institute, Dr Kerr has written on subjects of Artificial Intelligence and gender and the psychology of guilt while supervising three PhD students. With her fixed-term contract ending on 31 June, supporters says Dr Kerr had expected to be offer a permanent role, but was told the university did not intend to make the offer, and are proposing redundancy. Advertisement

He added: 'The colleagues teaching on and directing the MLitt programme currently are suitably qualified to do so, and have taken over at extremely short notice.'

They added that the MLitt in Gender Studies course Dr Kerr taught is 'in very good hands and is continuing, with contributions and support from excellent, highly-qualified staff'.

Dr Kerr's supporters reject the university's reasoning, saying she had every reason to expect a permanent position following the end of her three-year contract, as she would help correct the gender imbalance in the overarching Philosophy department.

Only four of its 19 permanent faculty members are women, and the only junior female faculty are on temporary contracts.

One of Dr Kerr's masters students, Aimee Louise Lewis, said students were appalled at their teachers treatment.

'I undertook this degree as a career change, to help eradicate the exploitation of women which I have witnessed around the world and experienced in the workplace myself,' Lewis said.

'I am outraged that this type of exploitation can be found at St Andrews. Dr Kerr is an exceptionally talented and dedicated individual, and I know I speak for the majority of my cohort when I say we are deeply concerned by the universitys actions.'

In a statement Kerr said: 'The decision by the university to end my contract and put the entire gender studies programming at risk is a slap in the face for all of us who took them seriously when they promised to promote diversity among staff and the curriculum they deliver.'

Kerr added: 'I perceived St Andrews as a safe place for gender studies students and research on gender.

'In talking with various colleagues who work on gender studies around the world I am reminded of the threat that keeps rising for research in this area, despite the fact that it is a field that clearly yields substantial income. This type of exploitation has struck a nerve with many.'



Google has stepped back from a threat to shut down its search engine locally and is on the brink of striking commercial deals with some of Australias largest news organisations after months of hard fought negotiations over planned media bargaining laws.

The ABC, Nine Entertainment Co (owner of this masthead) and Guardian Australia are in eleventh-hour negotiations with the $1.8 trillion tech giant for use of their content on various Google services. Industry sources briefed on the talks indicated the deals could be reached within 48 hours. However, while the talks are in advanced stages, there is no guarantee the agreements will be completed.

Googles threats to pull search from the market are unlikely to go ahead if it signs a series of major deals. Credit:Getty

Google threatened to turn off its search engine in Australia in January in response to the laws. The search giant's progress on agreements with publishers will shift focus to Facebook, which is yet to strike any deals for its own news product and has threatened to pull journalism from its platform if the laws aren't revised.

Kerry Stokes Seven West Media became the first of the major media companies to ink an agreement with Google on Monday.


Now that the Democrats have now tried twice and failed to convict President Trump of impeachment it is time for the nation to take a step back and assess this atrocity and figure out how it can be prevented from ever happening again. And we have a suggestion.

The states should immediately launch a process to amend the U. S. Constitution, and in North Carolina the State Legislature should do the same for the N. C. Constitution, to provide for recall of U. S. Representatives and Senators. This is particularly true for the U. S. Senate.

Senators serve six year terms. Representatives serve two-year terms. Thus, a Representative can be removed in the next election by the people. But six years is too long for the nation to wait to correct a tragedy such as we witnessed with Richard Burr voting to convict President Trump. That is not fidelity to the people who elected him, especially since he is a registered Republican. The Legislature should, by a super majority be empowered to submit a recall to the people for a vote within 90 days of its passage in the State Legislature. The decision of whether to recall should rest exclusively with the People. If recalled no official should be allowed any perks of the office, including their pension.

It is past time for We The People to take back our government from entrenched politicians who, once elected, usually do not fear the they will be held accountable for how they represent those who elected them.

If you study the tenure of U. S. Senators since the 17th Amendment was added to the U. S. Constitution in 1913, you will find that seldom does a sitting U. S. Senator who chooses to run for re-election every get defeated. One can debate the reasons for this but the fact remains: Elections do not hold U. S. Senators accountable for their behavior or their performance. Absent that threat, they pretty much vote how they want, regardless of the sentiments of the people back home.

There is a compelling need for more direct democracy in our system of government. In fact, we think all public officials should be subject to recall and moreover we believe the constitutions should be amended to guarantee the initiative and referendum.

Initiative is the process whereby the People can, via obtaining enough names on a petition have the matter submitted to the people for a vote. Referendum is similar except it is designed to repeal a legislative action. We need all three: Recall, initiative and referendum.

Moreover, we believe we also need term limits, but that is an issue for another day.

These sanctimonious politicians have yelled long and hard about the radicals who stormed the Capitol on January 6. The reasons were actually as numerous as those in Washington that day, but we think many of them traveled there simply because they are disgusted with the way government and those who run it operate. They, like us, are simply fed up. And this impeachment nonsense is not going to help change that feeling. In fact, we fear it will grow and fester until something is done to restore Americans faith in their government. It is not sufficient now, on either the Left or the Right.

The fact that a large percentage of Americans do not believe the 2020 elections were honest and legitimate exacerbates this alienation of We The People. If we dont believe our vote matters what else is there to do?

It is past time that our august salons in Washington and Raleigh wake up and address the credibility issues we have mention above. If they dont we fear we are headed for serious trouble in the not too distant future. And we fear it will be much worse than on January 6.





poll#131
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Complementary And Alternative Medicine Market Growth & Trends

The global complementary and alternative medicine market size is expected to reach USD 404.66 billion by 2028, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc. It is expected to expand at a CAGR of 22.03% from 2021 to 2028. The market has witnessed a significant expansion in its consumer base in recent years owing to the benefits and philosophies that have the potential to attract customers.

The core philosophies of alternative medicine practices and complementary therapies include high preference to natural products as compared to synthetic ones, avoiding implementation of quick-fix type therapies, ensuring sufficient duration is given for healing, the onset of any illness is attributed to body-imbalance, the body has the ability to heal itself, the whole patient has to be treated and not just a specific diseased body part, and gentle therapies have to be administered before the harsh ones.

The most commonly administered and popular complementary therapies include Alexander technique, acupuncture, herbal medicine, homeopathy, aromatherapy, reiki, naturopathy, and yoga. Profitable business expansion strategies are being adopted by not only market participants but also by medical settings to ensure effective marketing and promotion of alternative medicine therapies.

Yoga, mind, and body-oriented traditional medicines are expected to gain significant traction in the coming years. Expanding applications of yoga and mind healing across chronic ailments, such as cancer, diabetes, COVID-19, and cardiovascular diseases, are set to contribute to the growth of the mind healing intervention segment.

More than half of physicians based in office set-ups in the U.S. have recommended at least one complementary health intervention to their patients, as reported by a survey published in January 2020. Additionally, a large number of female physicians integrate alternative medicine approaches, whereas male physicians most commonly recommend osteopathic manipulation and chiropractic treatment interventions. An increase in the number of such surveys is expected to enable physicians, consumers, and medical schools to gain a better understanding of the potential differences in complementary and alternative medicine use.

Companies are initiating strategic product developments to sustain the market competition. For instance, in July 2019, Colombia Nutritional launched a new process solution having a multi-phase onboarding feature designed for the efficient online launch of the latest products. The key objective of this strategic product development was to maintain minimum order quantity (MOQ) that would further improve the quality of service provided.

Request a free sample copy or view report summary: Complementary And Alternative Medicine Market Report

Complementary And Alternative Medicine Market Report Highlights

By intervention, traditional alternative medicine or botanicals dominated the market with a share of 38.48% in 2020. Botanicals are among the prominent forms of alternative treatment practices, inclusive of natural and herbal treatment supplements, coupled with therapeutic interventions, incorporating herbs, oils, and other curative supplements

In the body healing intervention segment, yoga held the largest share of 36.27% in 2020. In the mind healing segment, hypnotherapy is expected to exhibit the fastest CAGR of 22.44% from 2021 to 2028

Europe held the largest share of 33.35% in 2020 owing to the extended research efforts targeted toward bringing CAM practices to the mainstream medicine

The Middle East and Africa is expected to expand at the fastest CAGR of 24.78% from 2021 to 2028

Based on distribution method, distance correspondence and e-sales are expected to witness significant lucrative opportunities in the near future, particularly attributed to the lockdown and social distancing implications associated with the recent pandemic outbreak of COVID-19 across the globe

Complementary And Alternative Medicine Market Segmentation

Grand View Research has segmented the global complementary and alternative medicine market on the basis of intervention, distribution method, and region:

Complementary And Alternative Medicine Intervention Outlook (Revenue, USD Billion, 2017  2028)

Traditional Alternative Medicine/Botanicals Ayurveda Apitherapy Bach Flower Therapy Naturopathic Medicine Traditional Chinese Medicine Traditional Korean Medicine Traditional Japanese Medicine Traditional Mongolian Medicine Traditional Tibetan Medicine Zang Fu Theory

Mind Healing Autosuggestion Hypnotherapy Neuro-linguistic Programming Self-hypnosis Spiritual Mind Treatment Transcendental Meditation

Body Healing Acupressure Acupuncture Alexander Technique Auriculotherapy Autogenic Training Chiropractic Cupping Therapy Kinesiology Osteomyology Osteopathy Pilates Qigong Reflexology Yoga

External Energy Magnetic Therapy Bio-magnetic Therapy Magnetic Resonance Therapy Radionics Reiki Therapeutic Touch Chakra Healing

Sensory Healing Aromatherapy Music therapy Sonopuncture Sound Therapy



Complementary And Alternative Medicine Distribution Method Outlook (Revenue, USD Billion, 2017  2028)

Direct Sales

E-sales

Distance Correspondence

Complementary And Alternative Medicine Regional Outlook (Revenue, USD Billion, 2017  2028)

North America US. Canada

Europe France Germany Switzerland Austria Spain Norway Denmark Sweden Belgium Netherlands UK. Ireland

Asia Pacific Japan China India Australia Hong Kong Singapore New Zealand

Latin America Brazil Mexico Argentina

Middle East & Africa Israel UAE South Africa



List of Key Players of Complementary And Alternative Medicine Market

Columbia Nutritional

Herb Pharm

Herbal Hills

Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute

John Schumacher Unity Woods Yoga Centre

Yoga Tree Studios, Inc.

Helio USA Inc.

NatureKue

Nordic Nutraceuticals

Pure encapsulations, LLC.

The Healing Company Ltd.

Quantum-Touch

BIOTAILOR

Bikram Yoga

True Yoga

Amrita Ayurveda & Yoga

AYUSH Ayurvedic Pte Ltd.

Sheng Chang Pharmaceutical Company

LKK Health Products Group Limited

Body & Soul Yoga Club

Namat Fitness Management (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. (Y+)

ALCES LLP

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.
LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WLFI) - Lafayette Mayor Tony Roswarski issued a snow emergency for the city Sunday night. It went into effect at 8 p.m. on Sunday and does not give a time for when the emergency is to be lifted.

Residents have 12 hours to move their vehicles from marked Snow Emergency routes. If people do not move their vehicles by 8 a.m. Monday, it could result in fines and towing.

The city is asking residents and businesses to move cars off non-snow route streets as much as possible.

Mayor Roswarski issued the following statement:

We have the possibility of experiencing a significant amount of snow over the next 24 hours. Citizens are asked to remove their vehicles from the city streets to assist our snowplowing efforts throughout the community. High winds, blowing snow and bitter temperatures all reduce the effectiveness of salt, requiring crews to make more passes to clear the streets.

Longmeadow health officials say they managed to vaccinate people and set up a second appointment in 35 minutes through their municipal clinics. With a team of 450 volunteers, the Hampden County town prided itself on smoothly administering the COVID-19 vaccine to some of its most at-risk residents.

Then Longmeadow officials learned from the state Department of Public Health Friday night the town wouldnt get its weekly shipment of 100 doses a week.

We have no information on when first doses will be committed to the town again, officials wrote on the town website. We have been informed by DPH that second doses would be honored for our clinic and appointments already scheduled for a second dose will be maintained for the time being.

Longmeadows Board of Health is the latest to lose out on COVID-19 vaccine shipments as the state shifts priority to its super vaccination sites and private partners. Longmeadow noted that CVS Pharmacy recently announced 30 locations will offer vaccinations, including ones in Springfield, Holyoke and Palmer. Those three pharmacies in Hampden County are the only CVS locations administering the vaccine in all of Western Massachusetts.

MassLive has reached out to the COVID-19 Command Center for comment.

Asked about its Western Massachusetts locations, CVS spokesman Matt Blanchette said the company received a limited number of doses for the 11 states under the federal pharmacy program. Blanchette said the store chose the locations based on population density and demographics.

As more vaccine doses become available, the company expects to add more locations in each state, Blanchette said.

CVS locations have a collective 2,000 available appointments for COVID-19 vaccines across Massachusetts over the next two days.

Blanchette would not commit to adding more locations in other parts of Western Massachusetts, but he said the company is looking to add more locations nationwide.

We will eventually be vaccinating in all of our nearly 10,000 locations nationwide, he said.

When asked whether CVS would offer transportation for residents who cant drive to a CVS Pharmacy, or vaccinate homebound residents, Blanchette said, we are consulting national disability thought leaders and advocacy groups as we continue to develop our Vaccine Equity Strategy. We will share more as we build out our strategy.

Before Fridays call, Longmeadow had run four vaccination clinics and vaccinated 201 residents, saying it avoided wasting vaccine doses.

Longmeadow officials touted the towns ability to help vaccinate its oldest residents, arranging transportation for those who couldnt drive and getting homebound residents vaccinated. Town officials credited the towns volunteers and several local leaders, including first responders and public health officials.

These are some of the reasons that municipally-run clinics can be so successful, we know our residents and understand their needs, the town wrote.

The Greenwood Center clinic is canceled, but the town will still get vaccine doses to honor appointments for the second dose of the vaccine.

If the state makes changes to the vaccine allotment for municipal clinics in the future, we will review our clinic plans and provide an update to the residents, and Town of Longmeadow staff, the town wrote. Thank you for your continued support.

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She has amassed over 4.9 billion likes on TikTok.

And Addison Rae wowed in 70s clothing for a photoshoot with Glamour on Monday as she disclosed the 'inspiring' advice she received from her pal Kourtney Kardashian, to cope with the pressures of fame.

The TikTok influencer, 20, admitted she 'looks up' to the oldest Kardashian sibling, 41, as she discussed their unlikely friendship and posed up a storm.

Candid: Addison Rae wowed in 70s clothing for a photoshoot with Glamour on Monday as she disclosed the 'inspiring' advice she received from pal Kourtney Kardashian, to cope with fame

Sporting her brunette tresses in a bouffant hairdo, she said for the February digital issue of the magazine: 'It's really inspiring to see people that are so happy in their lives and are so put together after everything they've been through.

'That's why I look up to Kourtney a lot and her entire family  throughout everything you can lean back on your family and friends to really have that emotional and mental support. It really pulls you through at the end.'

The brunette beauty wowed in a metallic silver coat and striped jumper, which she teamed with a pink and coral patterned skirt.

Accessorising tastefully, she rocked a white headband and red hoop earrings.

Chic: The TikTok influencer, 20, sported her brunette tresses in a bouffant hairdo as she admitted she 'looks up' to the oldest Kardashian sibling, 41, during the February digital edition of the magazine

21-year age gap: Kourtney and Addison struck up a friendship in 2020 and frequently grab dinner in Los Angeles or post social media uploads together

Addison continued: 'Something that she told me was, "make sure you're always enjoying what you're doing because this is the life you're living. Make sure it's something that you're proud of and you're continuing to do the things you love."'

Kourtney and Addison struck up a friendship in 2020 and frequently grab dinner in Los Angeles or post social media uploads together.

The social media star has also created TikTok videos with Kourtney's eldest son, Mason, 11.

Family: The social media star has also created TikTok videos with the mother-of-three's oldest son, Mason, 11 (pictured in 2020)

Addison revealed the secret to staying strong and positive while in the limelight, is having a great support network of family and friends, who she credits for 'keeping myself happy.'

The Louisiana native admitted she has received lots of social media hate and drama from others who 'don't want people to be happy'.

Interview: Read the full interview in the GLAMOUR UK February Digital Issue online now at www.glamourmagazine.co.uk/magazine

Addison, who is a trained dancer, revealed she would receive critical comments and comparisons at an early age due to the competition nature of the sport.

However, she said she doesn't let the negativity define her or tear her down, because she knows her true intentions.

Reflecting on her 'proudest' accomplishment, the 20-year-old confirmed that staying mentally healthy is her biggest achievement, as well as staying 'grounded'.

She also admitted there were times that she wanted to give up, after finding social media 'mentally challenging', but she now feels empowered to take every opportunity and accomplish everything she has dreamed of.

Addison joined TikTok in the summer of 2019, and proceeded to upload dance videos to trending songs on her the platform. Within three months she topped over one million followers.

Since then she has amassed a staggering 75.7 million fans and followers on TikTok, which has earn $5 million in one-calendar-year ending in June 2020, according to Forbes.

Her popular dances caught the attention of multiple celebrities and even landed her a role in He's All That.

Read the full interview in the GLAMOUR UK February Digital Issue online now at https://www.glamourmagazine.co.uk/magazine
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  President Rodrigo Duterte will no longer be taking the private route when it comes to vaccination against COVID-19 and will get his shots in full view of the public, Malacanang said Monday.

I think the President has said that he will now have himself vaccinated publicly. He only has to announce when it will be done, said Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque during his virtual briefing Monday.

The spokesman earlier said Duterte intended to receive COVID-19 vaccine shots in private, and in the buttocks instead of his arm.

Ninanais po ng Presidente na lahat ng Pilipino ay magkaroon ng kumpyansa na magpabakuna dahil ang bakuna po ang solusyon dito sa pandemya ng COVID-19, Roque further explained.

[Translation: The President wants all Filipinos to have confidence in getting vaccinated because vaccines are the solution to this COVID-19 pandemic.]

Roque has said the chief executive will be among the first to receive the vaccine in the country given his status as a senior citizen, a priority sector in the governments vaccination plan. He likewise said earlier that Duterte prefers a Chinese COVID-19 vaccine brand.

Apart from the President, other government officials both in the national and local levels have expressed willingness to get COVID-19 shots in public to help boost Filipinos' confidence in the process. Leaders of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines also want to set the same example, noting this would help urge their followers to roll up their arms and receive COVID-19 shots.

Roque asked that the efforts not be perceived as attempts of authorities to be treated as VIPs, as these will be only be done to help encourage more Filipinos to get inoculated.

The countrys first doses of the Pfizer vaccine from the COVAX facility are slated to arrive this month, while initial Sinovac doses donated by China are expected to arrive around Feb. 23.

The government hopes to vaccinate 50 to 70 million Filipinos by year-end.
Apple is reportedly working on a new battery coatings alongside US Government. A new patent from Apple explains how cathode active materials can be used for lithium-ion batteries.

This invention was made with U.S. government support under WFO Proposal No. 85F59. This invention was made under a CRADA 1500801 between Apple Inc. and Argonne National Laboratory operated for the United States Department of Energy. The U.S. government has certain rights in the invention.

It is very common for transition metals from the cathods to dissolve into the electrolyte. Typically dissolution is minimized by applying a aluminium oxide or aluminium flouride coating. However, such a coating results in energy density loss in the battery. Thus we need to develop a coating that doesnt affect battery performance.

The patent mentions certain coatings that will help achive better energy retention and average voltage. It covers a blend of surface coaring and lithium-ion cathode material that will help retain energy and improve cycle retention as opposed to the traditional alumina coating. In other words, the battery will last for more charging cycle while being more effiecient.

The battery cell is made up of different layers stacked on one another. It includes an active anode material, cathode material and a separator. Furthermore, the battery replaces alumina coating with LLGO or lithium-ion oxide containing lanthanum and germanium. This arrangement helps increase average voltage and better energy retention.

According to Apples patent the coating can be used on batteries powering iPhone, iPad, iPod, Apple Watch, and even Macs. Since US government has rights to the invention the new battery coating could be used in military equipments and other related applications.

[via USPTO
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Russia has launched an unmanned cargo ship to resupply the International Space Station (ISS).

Space officials said the Progress MS-16 ship blasted off on time from the Baikonur launch facility in Kazakhstan on February 15.

Loaded with food, water, equipment, and other supplies, Progress is scheduled to dock at the orbiting station on February 17.

The station currently has seven crew members on board -- from Russia, the United States, and Japan.

Russian space vehicles such as Progress have long served as workhorse transportation for getting people and supplies to the ISS, particularly since the United States grounded its space shuttle fleet in 2011.

However, the U.S. space agency has given approval to private companies like SpaceX to provide transport to the station, which will reduce reliance on Russian spacecraft in the coming years.

With reporting by AP and Interfax
Lucknow, Feb 15 : The Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh has settled over 6.9 lakh land disputes under the ambitious 'Varasat' campaign that involved issuance of land documents to its possessors.

The programme was launched by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on December 15 last year.

A government spokesperson said the novel idea aimed at resolving pending land disputes in rural areas with the promise of "Aapki zameen, aapka adhikar, sabko mile apna uttaradhikar".

"The Varasat campaign is being conducted in five stages with a battery of 24,000 lekhpals and 2,700 revenue inspectors of revenue department who are visiting villages to gather information and dispose of complaints," the spokesman said.

According to the government, 6,98,164 complaints were disposed of in last two months and the remaining are in different stages of being solved.

More than 10,000 cases have been referred to various revenue courts. Besides, the government is also giving the facility to people to apply through customer service centres (CHCs).

The district administration will now randomly identify 10 per cent of revenue villages and check the facts given in the report of lekhpal.

Cases have been settled amicably in Azamgarh, Prayagraj, Hardoi, Jaunpur, Ghazipur, Ambedkar Nagar, Ayodhya, Sultanpur Gonda, Ballia, Gorakhpur, Kaushambhi, Pratapgarh, Unnao, Lakhimpur Kheri and Sitapur districts.
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New Delhi, Feb 15 : Alok Sharma, an Indian-origin Minister in the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Cabinet, on Monday arrived here for two days of climate discussions with Indian leaders.

Sharma, the COP26 President-Designate to lead the crucial UN climate talks, will meet senior Indian Ministers, as well as leaders from business and civil society, to discuss strengthening the UK-India climate partnership and preparing for a successful COP26 summit later this year.

In his first visit to Asia as COP (Conference of the Parties) President, Sharma is expected to welcome India's significant progress on climate action and clean energy transition, an official statement by New Delhi-based British High Commission said.

He will highlight Prime Minister Narendra Modi's global leadership in setting up the International Solar Alliance (ISA) and the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), the latter of which the UK is proud to co-chair.

India's expertise is expected to be of great value to global discussions on a clean energy transition as part of COP preparations, it said.

In his meetings with business, Sharma will highlight the huge opportunities in the low carbon economy, celebrate existing commitments to achieve net zero emissions and encourage influential businesses to promote the growing movement of corporate climate action throughout their sector and supply chain.

Sharma will also meet with civil society, including experts and young thinkers, to discuss challenges and possible solutions to climate change, and to hear how they are trying to mobilise younger generations in support of climate action.

After a year of virtual meetings, the in-person visit signals a step-change in momentum to COP26 or UN climate change conference preparations, and reinforces Sharma's ambition to run an inclusive negotiating process that incorporates the views of all countries.

Sharma said: "When it comes to climate action, India is a key partner and a global leader. Together we can make change happen -- delivering real progress on reducing emissions and building global commitments.

"The UK and India are already a joint force for good against climate change, and we look forward to strengthening this partnership in the run up to COP26 and beyond." High Commissioner to India, Alex Ellis CMG said: "Alok Sharma's visit is the latest step in protecting our planet by making COP26 a success and will further develop the UK-India climate partnership on clean and resilient development.

"Hearing from the Indian government first hand, as well as civil society and business will be essential in informing the approach of the UK Presidency as we work towards a comprehensive, ambitious and balanced outcome at COP26." Sharma's visit follows those of the UK Foreign Secretary and International Trade Secretary, and paves the way for Prime Minister Boris Johnson's visit later this year, during which climate cooperation will be a focus.

As host of COP26, the UK is setting a strong example on climate action, with a legally binding target to cut emissions to net zero by 2050.

Between 1990 and 2018, the UK nearly halved emissions whilst growing the economy by 75 per cent, and will cut coal use in the power sector entirely by 2025.

The UK has committed to double its International Climate Finance to at least A11.6bn over the next five years, to help developing countries to take action.

The UK's Presidency of COP26 in 2021 and India's Presidency of the G20 in 2023 provide important platforms for driving global action and implementing the Paris Agreement.

India and the UK share many common priorities on climate action and are working closely together to ensure action in the run-up to COP26 and beyond.

Priority themes at COP26 with great potential for collaboration include: adaptation and resilience; corporate action; green finance; clean growth and technology; and nature-based solutions.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Hasan Gokal. His attorneys said the doctor did nothing wrong and was only trying to ensure that vaccine from a punctured vial was not wasted. (Harris County Public Health photo)
FAIRFIELD  A portion of the Post Road was closed Monday morning after a crash involving injuries, police said.

Police said eastbound travel lanes on the Post Road will be closed between Old Post Road in Southport and Rennell Drive until further notice due to a crash. Westbound traffic will be reduced to one lane, police said.

The crash happened at the intersection of the Post Road and Jelliff Lane, according to police.

Police did not comment on the seriousness of the injuries suffered in the crash.
On Feb. 13, Israel's national security adviser Meir Ben-Shabbat held a video phone call with his American counterpart, Jake Sullivan. The conversation reportedly dealt with regional security issues. It was the second time Ben-Shabbat and Sullivan spoke on the phone since Sullivan was appointed to his position. The first one took place on Jan. 23. In that first conversation, the two men agreed to discuss soon the many topics on the agenda, including Iran, regional issues and advancing the Abraham Accords.

The Feb. 13 conversation was significant because of publications made the day before. Reportedly, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had appointed Ben-Shabbat as his main interlocutor for the upcoming negotiations between the United States and other major powers with Iran. Ben-Shabbat is now tasked with conveying Netanyahus positions on Iran to the new Joe Biden administration, with the hope of establishing a productive dialogue channel on Tehran between Jerusalem and Washington.

According to the Israeli press, Netanyahu has been deliberating for several months over the identity of his envoy on Iran, hesitating between Mossad chief Yossi Cohen and Ben-Shabbat. On the one hand, English-fluent Cohen is perhaps the closest and most trusted associate of Netanyahu currently. He is also well-known in Washington and at the Pentagon and has a large and efficient network in the American capital. In fact, associates of Cohen had told the press on several occasions in these past few months that only Cohen is capable of persuading the Americans to change course on Iran. On the other hand, Ben-Shabbat has proven to be no less loyal to Netanyahu. More important perhaps, unlike Cohen, who could be appointed this summer upon finishing his term as Mossad chief, Ben-Shabbat could get to the job right away under his title of national security adviser.

Evidently, for Netanyahu, the time factor was decisive. A debate is ongoing in Jerusalem as to whether the Biden administration would start talks with Iran before or after elections there scheduled for June. The statement by Secretary of State Anthony Blinken about Iran being just a few months, perhaps even weeks, from a breakout toward nuclear bomb capabilities could signal that the administration is not going to wait. The administration might fear the outcome of the elections of Iran, thus would rather put its foot in the door now before it potentially closes.

The American sense of urgency on Iran affects Israel, but only to some degree. Netanyahu was quick to appoint Ben-Shabbat as his envoy but did little to further the creation of similar dialogue channels with the Europeans. Much like his modus operandi during the Trump administration, Netanyahu believes that the United States, and the United States only, has the fate of the nuclear deal in its hands.

Statements made on both sides of the Atlantic indicate that the new Biden administration is coordinating its moves on Iran and on other strategic issues with the Europeans. Ahead of the United States renewing talks with Iran, France, together with the United Kingdom and Germany, has taken a tough stance. On Jan. 16, the three European powers warned Iran against starting work on uranium metal-based fuel for a research reactor. "Iran has no credible civilian justification for these activities, which are a key step in the development of a nuclear weapon," stressed the European statement. On Feb. 12, European powers condemned again Irans decision to produce uranium metal in breach of commitments made to the international community. In light of the statements over trans-Atlantic coordination, one could portray these current developments as a good-cop-bad-cop strategy  the United States in the role of the good cop, eager to relaunch the nuke talks; the Europeans in the role of the bad cop, warning Iran over uranium metal production.

So why is Israel not rallying with the French? Why is Netanyahu sitting and waiting for a phone call from Biden instead of constantly calling his European counterparts? Jerusalem kept silent over French President Emmanuel Macrons proposal to act as an honest broker in talks between the new US administration and Tehran. It also did not react to Macrons comment over the need to involve Israel and Saudi Arabia in these talks.

One could argue that Jerusalem does not want to damage Macrons credibility in the eyes of Tehran over acting like an honest broker. Allegedly, an Israel-dissociated Macron would have better chances of dialoguing with Tehran than an Israel-friend-Macron. Still, if Jerusalem does care about the French position, and if it does believe that Macron could carry some weight in the shaping of the next nuclear agreement, then how come the embassy in Paris has been left without an ambassador for more than a year? Ambassador Aliza Bin-Noun left her position at the end of 2019. The embassy is currently managed by the very capable and very experienced Charge daffaires Daniel Saada. Still, Netanyahu keeps blocking the appointment of a permanent ambassador to France. Clearly, dialoguing with Paris is nowhere near the top of the prime ministers priority to-do list.



Stephen Donnelly has said he will cooperate with the Garda investigation if asked (Julien Behal/PA)

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has said he will co-operate with a Garda investigation into the leak of a confidential document by Leo Varadkar if asked.

Stephen Donnelly said he was not made aware of a complaint from a whistleblower in his department that has prompted the Garda investigation.

He said he has not been approached to speak to Gardai, but will do so if asked.

The controversy relates to the leaking of a GP contract for the Irish Medical Organisation to the head of a rival group by Mr Varadkar in 2019, while he was Taoiseach.

Higher Education Minister Simon Harris has given a statement to gardai investigating Tanaiste Leo Varadkars admission that he leaked a 210m GP contract.

Read More

Mr Harris provided gardai with a signed written statement on his knowledge of the events leading up to Mr Varadkars decision to send a copy of the contract to the former National Association of General Practitioners (NAGP) Dr Maitiu O Tuathail.

Mr Donnelly said no one in his department had made him aware of a complaint to Gardai.

He told RTEs The Week in Politics: Im not aware of anything like that.

I think a complaint has been made to the guards, theyre looking into it, and I think we need to let them just get on with their inquiries.

He added: The first I heard about it was was it being reported through the media.

Asked if he had been approached by the Gardai, Mr Donnelly said: No, I havent. Obviously I will, it goes without saying, if they do.

This did happen I think, quite some time before I came into came into the role. But needless to say, I will if theyre looking for anything.

A spokesperson for the Gardai said: An Garda Siochana has received correspondence which is currently being assessed to determine what if any Garda action is required.

An Garda Siochana has no further comment at this time.

Mr Varadkar has previously admitted to giving a copy of the document to his friend Dr Maitiu O Tuathail, who at the time was president of the National Association of General Practitioners (NAGP), a rival of the IMO, in April 2019.

The Fine Gael leader came under fire for passing the documents, regarding a GP pay deal with the Irish Medical Organisation to a rival organisation.

The Government won a confidence motion in Mr Varadkar on the issue by 92 votes to 65 in October last year.

The Tanaiste said he recognised his actions were not best practice, but insisted he had nothing personally to gain from the leak and said he did so in order to secure backing for the deal from all GPs.
The founder of the Eden Project has had a driving ban quashed despite being caught speeding six times in three-and-a-half years.

Sir Tim Smit, 66, received a six-month ban under the totting up rule but appealed on the grounds of 'exceptional hardship'.

Smit, a diabetic, succeeded after telling the judge at Truro Crown Court that his life would come 'to a standstill' if he lost his licence because he was shielding from Covid.

He also said he was responsible for driving his blind father and stepmother, who has Alzheimer's, to hospital.

The founder of the Eden Project has had a driving ban quashed despite being caught speeding six times in three-and-a-half years. Sir Tim Smit (pictured), 66, received a six-month ban under the totting up rule but appealed on the grounds of 'exceptional hardship' [File photo]

The businessman, who is well-known throughout Cornwall, was clocked driving his Audi A5 at 88mph at Dunheved Bridge on the A30 on December 3, 2019. His driver's record showed he already had nine points on his licence relating to speeding matters in June 2017, June 2018 and September 2019, meaning he should have been given a disqualification.

Smit's case was previously heard by magistrates in Bodmin who fined him 320 and ordered him to pay costs of 85. He was also disqualified under the totting up procedure, but his ban was put on hold to allow for the appeal to be heard.

Representing Smit, Michael Gregson said his client wished to appeal the ban due to 'exceptional hardship'.

Giving evidence, Smit said: 'My father is blind and is 90 and step mother six years younger but in the latter stages of Alzheimer's that has created a number of problems. She, like I, is Dutch by birth and has forgotten English and gets angry when people speak English to her.

Sir Tim, pictured in 2000 outside his most famous creation, the Eden Project, in St Austell, Cornwall [File photo]

'I speak Dutch so my visits have gone up to daily, sometimes twice daily, and losing my licence would be catastrophic.'

Smit added that he was responsible for taking his parents to hospital appointments and that his stepmother would not go anywhere unless it was with him.

He finished his evidence by saying that he was diabetic and was shielding, and that losing his licence would bring his life 'to a standstill'.

Judge Robert Linford said: 'The appellant's record shows a worrying lack of concern for speed limits.

'If times were different this appeal would have been dismissed but in these times we find exceptional hardship would exist if a disqualification is imposed.'

The appeal was granted.
This screen grab from the website shows the main web page for the HealthCare.gov. HealthCare.govs market for subsidized health plans reopened on Feb. 15, 2021. (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services via AP)

Online Health Insurance Marketplaces Reopen for Special Enrollment Period

Online health insurance marketplaces have reopened for a special enrollment period through May 15, after President Joe Biden signed an executive order last month.

Biden, in a statement on Feb. 15, said that he will do everything he can to ensure that all Americans have access to the quality, affordable health care they deserve.

That is especially critical in the midst of a deadly pandemic that has already taken the lives of more than 470,000 of our fellow Americans and infected more than one out of every 12 additional Americans, often with devastating consequences to their health, he said.

The three-month special period will help people secure some peace of mind as we work to beat the pandemic and strengthen and build on the Affordable Care Act, he said, encouraging people to sign up through the HealthCare.gov website if they dont currently have health coverage.

The act is colloquially known as Obamacare.

Bidens order affects the 36 states that use the federal marketplace.

At least 13 states and the District of Columbia, which operate their own platforms, are following the federal governments lead and offering similar special periods for signing up.

President Joe Biden puts down his pen after signing executive orders relating to health care, at the White House on Jan. 28, 2021. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

Acting Health and Human Services Secretary Norris Cochran said in a recent statement: President Biden was clear: we need to strengthen the Affordable Care Act and give more Americans access to health care, especially during this pandemic, which has further demonstrated the importance of having the right coverage. This Special Enrollment Period will give Americans who need affordable, quality health insurance an opportunity to get covered, and we encourage folks to head to HealthCare.gov starting on Monday to explore their options.

Some 90 percent of people enrolled in coverage through the website receive financial help, and three-quarters of consumers buy plans that cost $50 or less per month when counting the assistance.

Each year, theres a set period of time where people can sign up for health insurance. The period for 2021 had already elapsed prior to Bidens order.

People interested in looking for health care can go to the website directly or use a phone to reach the marketplaces call center. A network of over 50,000 agents and brokers are ready to help, according to HHS.

To promote the special enrollment period, health officials are spending $50 million on a mix of advertisements and other outreach methods.

The administration plans on releasing data on how many people utilized the special period on a monthly basis, with the first report expected early next month.

Author's Note: This story draws directly upon my experience of investigating the targeted Public Distribution programme in Bihar between 1996- 2002. The cost of lost opportunity to the poor in this grievously miscarried programme may have been to the tune of Rs. 3,500 to 4,000 crores. Midway the government divested me of the investigation and handed it over to the Vigilance. Not much has been heard of it since then. A thumbnail version of a larger project - the parable of the well paid public servant - implementation of poverty alleviation programmes in Bihar. The wise Mr Dang has a counterpart in real life as indeed any one who cares to read my post The Poor Must Prevail.

Blessed be the Poor

The poor who failed to enter the Kingdom of God ended up in the Republic of Banana, which is perhaps just as well, because the camels that had got past the eye of a needle also, unaccountably, landed in this same Republic.

I make haste to add that this is by no means being cited as a double refutation of any religious text. A brief explanation as to how this state of things came to pass is, therefore, necessary. The camels getting past the eye of a needle has never been historically ascertained, but a very assiduous and devoted priest carried out his research into this strange coincidence. For his efforts, he received his Doctor of Divinity degree from the University of Belsund.

He was interviewed for the popular channel As It Happened.

Interviewer: Dr Blunderbuss, welcome to our popular programme "Celebrities".

Dr. Blunderbuss: Thanks very much.

Interviewer: Could you tell us something about your area of research and the findings?

Dr. Blunderbuss: In the seventh century b. p (Before the Year of the Poor) (Corresponding to 3rd century b.c) the Republic of Banana exported great quantities of spiritual wisdom to neighbouring countries as aid and charity. So, despite being the market leaders in spiritual property, the Republic was in huge deficit of forex. My research has shown that it is during this period that all these straying camels landed up in the Republic of Banana. The Republic was flush with spiritual assets but little material wealth. So, any addition to its material resources was welcome, but never openly acknowledged. In this land, the slaughter of animals was forbidden, even though it made no economic sense. So, some clever entrepreneurs took to the smuggling of these plentiful straying camels across to the neighbouring republic and made fast bucks from the profitable, but clandestine, trade in raw hides. It appears that the strict scrutiny at the various check posts that the republic had established to prohibit this contraband trade was spoken of, metaphorically, as the eye of the needle.

Interviewer: But getting past the needle of the eye refers to the exiting camels. Does not that present a discrepancy in the narration, Dr. Blunderbuss?

Dr. Blunderbuss: Exactly, but over a long period of time such extrapolations and temporal mix-ups do occur. Eminent historians have encountered such difficulty in the account of the rise of Minoan civilization and the dating of the events of the time of the Sumerian Kings. The cultural anthropologists and the experts at hermeneutics also throw their weight behind this thesis of the "exiting camels."

Interviewer: So this simple flaw in the linearity of the narration does not affect the basic thesis?

Dr. Blunderbuss: Absolutely not. This is how the Republic of Banana came to have, broadly speaking, only two categories of people. Those who had defied the Biblical injunction indulged in contraband trade and other illegal activities and become rich. They became the ruling class. Those who had taken the Biblical road map seriously and had abstained from theft remained poor and provided the ruling class with endless scope for working for the welfare of the poor.

Interviewer: Thanks very much Dr. Blunderbuss, for your very informative and convincing exposition. Hope to have you with us on some other occasion.

The rulers of the banana republic knew that it was the poor who would ultimately inherit the earth. The Directive Principle of the Constitution of the Republic enshrined as its goal the determination to create conditions for the poor to multiply by leaps and bounds. A beatific smile spreading across the face of a poor man dreaming of bread was embossed at the centre of the impressive national emblem.

Professor Lal Singh, Director of the National Art Gallery, was paid an honorarium of One Billion Rupees for this inspirational motif. The banana republic, it may be added, had got rid of the out-dated Christian calendar, Vikrami Samvat, Gregorian and Julian calendars. The year in which it made the first survey to locate the poor was designated as Year 1. In all official business it was obligatory to mention in the year of the poor i.e. "y.p."

The census of people living below the poverty line, in fact, was a very happy, even pious pastime, which was undertaken from time to time. The economists and the planners engaged with the ferocity of the great ecclesiastical debates of the middle ages on what constitutes poverty, who was poor, and whether there was a failsafe method to recognize the poor when one actually encountered one.

So when in the Y.P.2060 the Republic decided to have a fresh survey, it was not an easy task to choose the right man - someone who was practical and not dogmatic, had no-nonsense approach and could deliver results. The President retired to his chamber, put on his thinking cap, smoked long and hard from his favourite pipe. After days of waiting, he finally said "Let Mr. Dang conduct this survey. He is the most responsible and the wisest of all the civil servants."

Many who were opposed to Mr. Dang on account of professional rivalry, and many more who were jealous of his go-getter image, raised several objections, but the president was curt and dismissive. "Mr. Dang has been nominated, and Mr. Dang it shall be".

So this onerous task fell to the lot of Mr. Dang.

Mr. Dang, it must be said, had many sterling qualities and had distinguished himself in many a critical assignment. He was a conjuror of sorts. Admittedly, he could not produce a rabbit out of hat, but surely he, and only he, could make a budget for Rs. 8000 Crores, with virtually nothing in the kitty. He would often add nothing to nothing and produce something. Some of his uncharitable critics attributed this to the fact that he was arithmetically challenged. But there were a large number of people who could vouch that he was a mathematical genius. However, the fact that he had occupied all the key positions in the government and gone on to head the civil service gave lie to the claims of his detractors. The government could err once, even perhaps twice, but could it err all the time?

Mr. Dang, meanwhile, took up the most challenging assignment of his life time with his characteristic verve and enthusiasm. He declared that he would very soon announce the methodology and all that. Saying so, he went into a long hibernation. Insiders say that he locked himself up in a room with all the available literature on the subject, an abacus, and thousands of marbles.

He burned the midnight oil struggling with calorific values and genie co-efficient, grappled with exclusion and inclusion criterion. He started off by making bunches of six; one bunch designated a poor family of six. He made a few bunches of seven marbles to account for the decimal in the average family size of 6.28. By the time he had got to seven families he discovered that 7 bunches of 6 each, and 6 bunches of 7 each added up to the same number. How can 7x6 be same as 6x7?

Mr. Dang spent reams of paper in lengthy calculation but he could not come up with a suitable formula to account for this anomaly and just when he was about to give up, a beautiful and failsafe method of identifying the poor was born out of his despair.

He decreed that a long rope-earlier used as a clothes line - be strung at a particular height. Those who could walk under the line in an upright position without touching the rope would be designated as living below the poverty line.

This method was found to be the most objective, safe and impartial. It was an instant hit with the bureaucracy because, apart from saving them from back breaking paperwork, it was also flexible, and what better incentive to keep the bureaucratic brotherhood together than the occasion of fiddling with flexible rules.

The task of identifying the poor was going on at a brisk pace. The bureaucracy could lower the rope or let them crouch, as and when it suited them. This came to be known as the bureaucratic rope-trick. It consisted in raising the rope suitably to let those people crossover who otherwise would not have but for the fact that they had ingratiated the rope man. It could be lowered to stop those who did not find favour. It was an act doubly blessed and the offerings meant for the poor were split equally between the performers and the participants of the rope trick.

The list of the poor was ready in record time and the Republic of Banana went into an overdrive to provide them with various benefits. Mr. Dang was not lacking in fame, earned by such popular innovative schemes in his earlier assignment. But this was his crowning glory and earned him accolades from his peers and common people alike.

The banana republic launched a massive programme of housing the poor. In a given timeframe, the President decreed, each one of them must have a roof over his head. It appears one of the district officers took his statement quite literally, and built roofs without walls and was quite surprised to see that they came crashing over the heads of the poor dwellers. Even while the government was grappling with this tragedy where in about 400 poor people had died, Mr. Dang received the following communication from the D.M. of a far-flung district.

Sir,

We have found that the programme to provide decent housing to the poor has run into some difficulty. Seventy thousand houses built in the last three months have not been occupied by them. They say that these are no good because they provide shelter neither from the sun nor rain from above. Many of them in fact most of them save one claimed that they could not even see them. It is worthwhile to mention here that we had constructed these houses with utmost care and used the most durable material available. But it appears that because of some as yet undiagnosed ocular infection or mass delusion the poor have refused to occupy these houses. The government may like to get this matter investigated by an expert committee.

Yours faithfully etc

The great discrepancy between the two views of reality was proving to be very intractable. In view of the great urgency and extreme sensitivity of the matter a full-fledged multi-disciplinary research project, with a budgetary provision of Five Billion Rupees, was commissioned at the National Physical Laboratory, to which experts in optics and ophthalmology, economists and ethnographers, psychologists and psychiatrists, entomologists and even ventriloquists, faith-healers and shamans were appointed.

That was in the year 2064Y.P.In the year 2069 Y. P. it was announced that the findings were due any time, but as the final touches were being given to the report it was discovered that some of the data was fake, some out-dated, and some based on erroneous assumptions. The committee was reconstituted with even wider terms of reference. Optimistic estimates suggest that it wont take more than a few years now for the experts to submit their report.

Meanwhile Mr. Dang himself chose to inquire into the death of the poor people in the house collapse accident. He made a local inspection; spoke to the relatives and the survivors; wondered aloud how and why they had survived. Photographs were taken, the whole scene of occurrence was videotaped and Mr. Dang flew back to the capital. In his report he held the speech writer of the president squarely guilty of the mishap. He recommended his immediate dismissal and launching of a criminal prosecution for the murder of 400 innocent poor. It was he who had put that bit about "roof over the head of every poor family", in the speech of the President which had led to the misunderstanding leading to the accident.

As to the district officer, he commended him for his financial prudence and acumen-"if at all", the report said, "Someone can be commended in such unhappy circumstances, regrettable though the incident is, the District Officer managed to save Rs. 699, 99, 99,600.00 of the taxpayers money. The following is the detailed break up.

By merely building the roof the officer had saved Rs. 700 Crores. Subtract the figure of 400 the number of lives lost from the money thus saved and you arrive at the figure quoted above."

The report was placed in all the public fora where the matter had been agitated. The President of the Republic himself congratulated Mr. Dang for his sagacity, his judgment and above all his great compassion for the poor. It was decided to present the budget to the people at large in a rally, which should be known as the mother of all rallies. To showcase the activities of a compassionate, caring Republic, the administration took out massive advertisements, published souvenirs and sponsored sporting events.

The administration conveyed the poor to the central park in their full regalia of tattered clothes. Great feasts and cultural events were staged in their honour. Every district of the Republic, to showcase its achievements, took out expensive advertisements in newspapers and other media. The World Bank sent observers to independently assess the numbers, because there were complaints that some of the republics were deliberately inflating the numbers to earn some brownie points. Mr. Dang got to put a maddening chorus of applause to enlighten those assembled there about the efforts made by government. The report on the measures taken for the welfare of the poor was read out of the total budget amount of Rs. 50 billion, Rs. 49.995 billon were spent on designing a suitable emblem, hoardings, and other publicity materials. The organization of rallies and commemorative souvenirs, holding of enquiries etc. publicizing the scheme and educating the journalists were the other significant items of expenditure.

The rest was spent for the benefit of the poor. The huge congregation went into raptures as shouts of "long live Mr. Dang", rent the sky making God himself feel a little uncertain whether his oversight in booking the poor for a wrong destination wasnt better for the poor after all.

India Today magazine once referred to Manoje Nath, a 1973-batch IPS officer, as being fiercely independent, honest, and upright. Besides his numerous official reports on various issues exposing corruption in the bureaucracy in Bihar, Nath is also a writer extraordinaire expressing his thoughts on subjects ranging from science fiction to the effects of globalization. His sense of humor was evident through his extremely popular series named "Gulliver in Patiliputra" and "Modest Proposals" that were published in the local newspapers.
The COVID-19 pandemics myriad effects on society and the economy have accelerated Pennsylvanias other tragic public health emergency  deadly opioid addiction.

State Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs Secretary Jennifer Smith disclosed recently that 2020 might have eclipsed 2017 as the states worst year for drug overdose deaths. In 2017, more than 5,400 Pennsylvanians died from overdoses, mostly of opioids. Due to increased treatment, new prescribing protocols, prescription tracking and broad access to the opioid antidote naloxone, the death toll fell to 4,400 in 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic began a year ago.

The state officially has recorded 3,954 overdose deaths for 2020, but Smith said that count is far from complete and is certain to rise. In 2019, the daily Pennsylvania death toll from overdoses had declined to 11 people a day in 2019 from 14 people a day in 2017. Smith said the incomplete 2020 figures stand at 13 a day.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported more than 81,000 overdose deaths nationally for 2020, a record.

Simply put, the pandemic has wiped out significant progress that the state government, the medical community and activists had made against opioid addiction.

Social isolation, unemployment, increased poverty and reduced access to treatment all have contributed to the higher death toll, according to Smith.

As increasing vaccine distribution begins to turn the tide against COVID-19, state and local governments and the health care community must prepare to pick up the fight against the earlier crisis, just as aggressively as in the past.

State lawmakers, using proceeds from pending settlements with pharmaceutical companies and other entities that spawned the epidemic, should ensure that the agencies and people on the front line of the crisis have all the resources that they need, and that anyone seeking short- or long-term treatment to control their addiction has ready access.
The governor's comments didn't satisfy state Assemblyman Ron Kim, a Democrat and outspoken critic of the administration's approach to nursing homes during the pandemic. Kim's uncle died of a presumed case of COVID-19 in a New York nursing home in April.

"I didn't think it was much of an apology," Kim said. "It doesn't pass the smell test."

"But what gets lost, ultimately, is: If they were transparent, if they did disclose everything in real time, we could have had different policies ... and that would have had a different outcome in how we protected our communities."

The head of a major association of New York nursing homes said the state erred by focusing too much on hospitals early in the pandemic and leaving nursing homes "scrambling to safeguard their residents and staff."

"Policymakers and legislators must stop the blame game" and work more closely with nursing homes, said Stephen Hanse, CEO of the New York State Health Facilities Association and New York State Center for Assisted Living.

State lawmakers have been calling for investigations, stripping Cuomo of his emergency powers and even his resignation after new details emerged this week about why certain nursing home data wasn't disclosed for months, despite requests from lawmakers and others.
DIRECTING 22 final year BA theatre and drama students in a play at the CIT Cork School of Music is particularly challenging in the pandemic.

But director, Regina Crowley, is rising to the task, making sure that the production will be of high quality while embracing the digital format of our current lives.

The play is Love And Information, written in 2010 by renowned playwright, Caryl Churchill. It examines the role of love in an age where, overloaded with information, peoples attention spans are short. It provokes us to think about the way we make sense of our universe and our place within it.

The play will be streamed from the CIT Cork School of Music to peoples homes in Cork, Ireland, or anywhere in the world.

But before delving into the themes, Regina had to figure out a way of working with the students that would be in line with social distancing.

There are over 50 scenes in it, mostly with two people in each one. There are no named characters and no location. Nor is there any clear direction. Also, you can put the scenes in whatever order you wish.

There are seven sections and you can change what order they happen in. In many ways, its a snapshot of life, very much in the digital age. Theres a pull between information and love as the human tries to navigate their way. Theatrically, its very challenging because theres no clear narrative or story structure. But that is liberty in that it allows you to make the play your own.

The play will be streamed from the CIT Cork School of Music to peoples homes in Cork, Ireland, or anywhere else in the world. It will be performed within a three square metre cube which changes.

Sometimes, is covered in balloons, sometimes its covered in greenery and sometimes it gets quite surreal. At other times, its quite matter of fact, soap opera-like with little scenes. Its a question of how to find a way to make them breathe.

There is a stunning array of costumes in the production too.

With a stunning set and costumes, Regina says the production is probably the most important moment in the students lives.

But it nearly didnt happen.

On New Yearss Day, Regina had a Zoom meeting with the students.

They all felt it couldnt go ahead. I wasnt sure either, particularly around Christmas when the goalposts changed. I was in constant communication with the students.

It wasnt until January 9 that we decided to definitely go ahead. We decided we wouldnt come into the school for the first week of rehearsals.

I had rehearsed the play over the term on Zoom. In many ways, I feel that stretched the students as creatives and performers. What is actually coming out of it is something more real. I have always encouraged the students to think of themselves more as creative artists.

The production almost didn't happen due to Covid.

While Regina put in place as many safety structures at the Stack Theatre in the School of Music as she could, there are people who may be immuno-compromised and have to stay at home. Regina has facilitated these students through Zoom.

I have one student doing a scene in her bath at home and another student was in his car for a scene. Weve put the people who couldnt come in to the Stack theatre on two huge screens on the set. I have been directing with WhatsApp and through text. Technically, its hugely complex.

Were shooting for three weeks from 10am-8pm nonstop. It takes a huge amount of time.

"Sometimes, one minute or two minutes of footage would have taken two to three hours. Some of the scenes are only one minute long.

The experience has been a real creative stretch for me. But in one way, Ive found it more creative than ever. Also, the students are thrilled. They thought this play wouldnt happen.

With the production being filmed, what is the difference between what Regina is doing and what a film maker would be doing?

The play of choice has given them huge freedom, says Regina Crowley.

Its still theatre. Theres theatre for film as well but thats more of a bastard form of theatre. We are drawing in elements from film. We have a broadcast technician on site all of the time so were working with radio microphones. There is subtlety and nuance that the actors get.

Curiously, they think its going to be a better show because of the Covid restrictions. Its just taking more time, more energy and such adaptability.

Aoife Cahill is doing the filming. Were working with four high grade cameras so we have long shots and close-ups.

Its not just a stationery camera looking on.

Every day of rehearsals, Regina has to make sure that the actors are blocked and are two metres away from each other.

Weve been rehearsing in masks all along. Then, just before the shoot, people take their masks off and put them aside.

While the wonders of technology are making this production possible, Regina questions whether were all that different from people 100 years ago in the emotional complexity of understanding. Theres a short piece in the play on grief. Its only about eight lines. It gets me every time.

The nature of Love And Understanding has given Regina huge creative freedom. I dont think we could have done a play if we had gone for a more usual text. Caryl Churchill is quite famous for playing with the theatrical mode.

The plays exploration of love in the digital age asks, what is it to be human?

That is being challenged by all of us now, says Regina.

Love And Information streams from CIT Cork School of Music from February 23-27. Tickets from csm.cit.ie.
One of Pfizer's top executives has said that the New York-based company is confident it can deliver two billion doses of the COVID-19 vaccine by the end of this year, and insisted that the company was well-positioned to deal with possible mutations in the virus.

Mike McDermott, president of global supply, has spent 30 years working for Pfizer and said he was pleased with the way the company has stepped up to the challenge.

Pfizer, in December, became the first pharmaceutical firm to get approval for their vaccine against COVID-19.

Mike McDermott, Pfizer's president of global supply, says the drugmaker is 'expanding everywhere possible' to make more doses of COVID-19 vaccine

A patient is seen receiving the Pfizer vaccination in Los Angeles on Saturday

People wait in the observation area after their COVID-19 shot in Pomona, California, on Sunday

Pfizer's drug, made with its German partner BioNTech, was approved first by Britain, followed by the United States, Europe and other countries.

Pfizer makes the vaccine's main component - a piece of genetic code called messenger RNA or mRNA for short.

It uses other companies called contract manufacturers to make the vaccine's protective shell and to fill, inspect and package vials.

'There is a dire need to vaccinate more people quickly,' McDermott told AP.

'We are expanding our capacity to make more vaccine as quickly as possible. We are making process improvements, adding more manufacturing lines within the Pfizer and BioNTech facilities, expanding use of contract manufacturers and adding more suppliers.'

McDermott said a large part of their success in scaling up vaccine production came from 'getting more productivity from our existing lines.'

He said: 'We look at reducing wait times when changing over between batches, doubling of our batch size, increasing yields per batch.

'We're reducing cycle times, from the start of manufacturing to shipping.'

Their main U.S. plant, in Kalamazoo, Michigan, has increased the number of production lines from one to four and the number of shifts from one to three shifts.

'We are expanding everywhere possible. We haven't taken a day off since October,' he said.

McDermott said that Pfizer was confident they could cope with mutations in the virus.

Concerns exist that new variants, found initially in South Africa, Brazil and the United Kingdom, could be resistant to the vaccine.

But McDermott said that he felt their technology made adapting the vaccine relatively straightforward.

'Our mRNA platform technology is the perfect science to be able to make modifications quickly,' he said.

'In essence there would be no changes to the manufacturing network. That altered genetic material would come into the system - and production would begin immediately on a new vaccine version.'
Abiy Ahmed

Venable is providing US government outreach to Ethiopia under a $35K per-month contract that went into effect Feb. 1.

Ethiopia prime minister Abiy Ahmed launched an invasion of the separatist Tigray region of the country in November. That attack has triggered a humanitarian crisis as more than 60K Ethiopians, who are largely Christian, fled across the border to Sudan, which is a Muslim nation, seeking refuge.

Abiy took the helm of Africas second-most populous nation in 2018 with a promise to unite Ethiopia, but has struggled to contain growing ethnic violence, reported the New York Times.

US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken spoke with Abiy on Feb. 4 and expressed grave concern about the humanitarian crisis in the Tigray region and urged immediate, full, and unhindered humanitarian access to prevent further loss of life, according to the State Dept.

Venables contract runs through April 30 but may be extended upon mutually agreed to terms.

The engagement letter notes that Venable has agreed not to perform governmental affairs work for any client that may be in opposition to the Embassy of Ethiopia.

Venable partner Thomas Quinn, a long-time Democratic activist who worked on the Hubert Humphrey and Ted Kennedy presidential campaigns, heads the Ethiopian work.

Policy advisor Loren Aho, a former aide to Democratic congressman Bart Stupak, assists Quinn.

They report to Fitsum Gebrekida, Ethiopias ambassador extraordinary plenipotentiary.
The political fortunes of former U.S. President Donald Trump are now an open question, even after the Senate acquitted him of allegations that he incited insurrection last month by urging hundreds of his supporters to confront lawmakers at the U.S. Capitol as they were certifying his election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.

Moments after the Senate voted 57-43 on Saturday to convict Trump but falling short of the required 67 votes needed to do so, the former president said he was not done with political life. Trump gave no explicit hint that he might attempt another run for the presidency in 2024, as he suggested he might when he left office last month. The House of Representatives impeached Trump in January on the single charge of incitement of insurrection.

Trump called the impeachment case against him another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our country. No president has ever gone through anything like it."

He added, "Our historic, patriotic and beautiful movement to make America Great Again has only just begun. In the months ahead, I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all our people.

One of his staunchest Republican supporters, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, told the Fox News Sunday show that he spoke with the former U.S. leader after the Senate impeachment trial ended. He said that Trump is ready to move on to build the party to try to retake control of both the Senate and House of Representatives from Democratic control in the 2022 elections halfway through Bidens first four-year term in the White House.

If you want to win, you have to work with President Trump, Graham said. The Trump movement is alive and well. The most potent force in the Republican party is Donald Trump.

But Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, a Republican critic of Trump, told CNN that with Trumps election loss and controversial end to his presidency, "We're going to have a real battle for the soul of the Republican Party over the next couple of years, questioning whether Republicans are going to be a party that cant win national elections."

Or somehow, Hogan asked rhetorically, Are we going to get back to a real traditional Republican party with common-sense conservativesto push for the things that weve always believed in and to try to compete with Democrats?

National polls show that many Republican voters remain supportive of Trump, but Hogan said, I think thats going to change over time. Were only a month into the Biden administration. I think the final chapter of Donald Trump and where the Republican Party goes hasnt been written yet.

One of Grahams fellow Republicans in South Carolina, former Governor Nikki Haley, who served as Trumps ambassador to the United Nations, turned on the former president last week, although Graham said he thinks her assessment is wrong.

Haley, a possible 2024 Republican presidential candidate, said of Trump, We need to acknowledge he let us down. He went down a path he shouldnt have, and we shouldnt have followed him, and we shouldnt have listened to him. And we cant let that ever happen again.

Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, who voted to convict Trump, told Fox News she does not think Trump will remain a key player in the Republican Party.

The American people have seen what this man has done, she said. He is done.

Graham said Trump was mad at some folks who turned against him in the Senate trial as seven of the 50 Republicans in the chamber voted with all 50 Democrats to convict him. But Graham said Trump is ready to hit the trail in support of Republican candidates.

I dont think he caused the riot, Graham said of Trumps admonition to hundreds of supporters to march to the Capitol January 6 and fight like hell to upend Bidens victory as lawmakers were certifying that Trump had become the fifth president in U.S. history to lose his re-election bid after a single term in office.

It was politically protected speech in my view, Graham said, referring to the U.S. Constitutions guarantee of freedom of speech.

Other Republican senators disputed Grahams assessment.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, after voting to acquit Trump because he did not believe the Senate had the right to sit in judgment of Trump since his term had already ended, criticized his long-time political ally for his role in fomenting the attack that left five people dead, including a Capitol police officer.

McConnell said Trump was practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president.

On Sunday, Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, one of the seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump, said in a statement, If months of lies, organizing a rally of supporters in an effort to thwart the work of Congress, encouraging a crowd to march on the Capitol, and then taking no meaningful action to stop the violence once it began is not worthy of impeachment, conviction, and disqualification from holding office in the United States, I cannot imagine what is.

She added, By inciting the insurrection and violent events that culminated on January 6, President Trumps actions and words were not protected free speech. I honor our constitutional rights and consider the freedom of speech as one of the most paramount freedoms, but that right does not extend to the president of the United States inciting violence.
Former Dancing On Ice star Max Evans has announced hes going to be a dad with his dancer girlfriend of less than a year - making his brother uncle Thom and Nicole Scherzinger aunt Nicole.

A thrilled Max, who won forty four caps for Scotland as a Rugby Union player, announced the news to friends on Sunday as he posed alongside his girlfriend of less than one year Debora Casimiro.

Max got together with Debora in May 2020 shortly after his messy split with fiancee Lauren Jamieson, the sister of Scots Olympic swimmer Michael Jamieson, who he dated for eight years.

Delighted: Former Dancing On Ice star Max Evans has announced hes going to be a dad with his dancer girlfriend of less than a year - making his brother uncle Thom and Nicole Scherzinger aunt Nicole

The retired rugby player, who was previously married to glamour model Katy Johnson in 2014, also hit the headlines with Debora in August 2020 when he shared a shocking video of himself groping her breasts as she drove at 70mph down the motorway.

Thom, who is also the cousin of DJ Chris Evans, later deleted the video while road safety experts branded his behaviour 'incredibly irresponsible'.

Now he has found happiness with Debora, who he met on the beach on Portugal whilst meditating.

Over the moon: A thrilled Max announced the news to friends on Sunday as he posed alongside his girlfriend of less than one year Debora Casimiro

Banter: Max also teased brother Thom, who is set to be an uncle to the couple's first child

Addressing Instagram followers on Sunday, he wrote: 'Baby Girl in August Overjoyed My Valentine @deboracasimiro #hotmumma #happyvalentinesday.'

Below the post, his rugby playing brother brother Thom who is dating Nicole Scherzinger after taking part in Strictly and Celebrity X Factor said: Amazing news. Uncle Thom is overjoyed.

Max then replied: 'Uncle Thommy, son' while a fan joked: 'Congrats uncle Thom and aunt Nicole.'

Reaching out: Amongst those to congratulate her were Maxs friends John Terry and Dragons Den star Peter Jones

Special lady: Debora was presented with croissants and roses for a romantic breakfast as the couple celebrated Valentine's Day on Sunday

Max also teased Thom: 'Lets have a chat uncles.'

Debora, who was presented with croissants and roses for a romantic breakfast, posted a picture of her with Thom touching her pregnant tummy and said: 'Im so happy! Were waiting for you baby girl my love @maxevans13. #love #weloveyoudaddy #babygirl.'

Amongst those to congratulate her were Maxs friends John Terry, Love Islands Laura Anderson and Dragons Den star Peter Jones.
A registered sex offender from Philadelphia has been arrested in connection with human body parts, including deep-fried hands and feet, that were found in the back of a U-Haul truck, inside a burglarized home and in a dumpster.

Taray Herring, 47, was arraigned on Saturday on abuse of a corpse and burglary charges, as well as counts of criminal trespass, theft, and evidence-tampering. He was ordered held without bail.

Police responding to a burglary call in the 1000 block of Sanibel Street in the Somerton neighborhood at around 9am on Thursday followed a U-Haul truck that drove away from the property. Herring was the passenger in the vehicle.

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Taray Herring, 47 (left), has been charged with abuse of a corpse and burglary charges, as well as counts of criminal trespass, theft, and evidence-tampering in connection with the discovery of human remains reportedly belonging to Peter Gerold, 70 (right)

Herring was arrested after police investigating a burglary in Philadelphia pulled over this U-Haul truck on Thursday and discovered a man's torso in the back

'Driver side door opened up, driver came out with his hands up and said, I didnt do it, it wasn't me. I was paid to move a body,' Philadelphia Police Sgt. Eric Gripp said, reported Philadelphia Inquirer.

Police opened the back of the moving truck and found a man's dismembered body in a trash bag. An unspecified weapon was also recovered.

The vehicle's two occupants were arrested, but the the driver was released without charges after questioning.

Although the victim has not been officially named, neighbors have identified him as 70-year-old Peter Gerold, who they say ran a massage therapy practice out of his home on Sanibel Street.

Police said that on Wednesday, someone from a out of state called them, asking to perform a welfare check on Gerold. Officers arrived at the residence but did not force their way inside because the home seemed secure and there were no signs of a break-in or foul play.

After interviewing Herring, police found body parts inside Gerold's unattached garage and evidence that someone had tried to burn the remains, reported 6abc.

Police went to Gerold's home and reportedly recovered additional human remains inside an unattached garage on Sanibel Street

Deep-fried human hands and feet were found in this dumpster behind a Wawa store near Gerold's residence

Police also went to search dumpsters behind the Wawa store on Kelvin Street near Gerold's home and uncovered additional remains, including deep-fried hands and feet.

On Friday, police and Animal Care and Control Team of Philadelphia returned to Gerold's residence and removed more than 60 exotic animals, including 30 parrots, as well as bearded drag lizards, tortoises and koi fish.

Neighbors described Gerold as a kind person who shared honey from his beehives with them, and who was known for offering work to random people seeking to make some money.

They said they had not seen him for about a week and had grown concerned for his well-being.

'He helped out a lot of people, so you know it was somebody that he probably helped out at one point that came back and did this to him,' one neighbor told CBS Philly.

On Friday, animal control officials removed more than 60 exotic animals, including parrots and lizards, from Gerold's home

Records indicate that Herring has a lengthy criminal record dating back to 2001, which includes convictions for aggravated assault, indecent assault, harassment and simple assault.

In 2015, he was found guilty of indecent assault and harassment stemming from a 2013 incident, and was sentenced to nine to 18 months, but was immediately paroled. He was also registered as a sex offender.

Herring got in trouble with the law again in May 2020, when he was arrested on charges of burglary, criminal trespass, and theft. That case against him is still pending.

Herring is due in court for a preliminary hearing on March 1.

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Good morning, Bay Area. Its Monday, Feb. 15, and recent attacks on Asian Americans in the Bay Area are drawing community outcry. Heres what you need to know to start your day.

San Francisco will temporarily pause coronavirus vaccinations at Moscone Center and City College of San Francisco beginning today, with plans to reopen the high-volume sites after the next vaccine resupply from the federal government.

Such supply problems continue as the Bay Areas first infections from the new coronavirus variant from South Africa are ringing fresh alarms over the urgent need to detect mutations that may hinder efforts to control the pandemic.

Californias ability to hunt down these variants relies on widespread and rapid genomic sequencing. But the state, like the rest of the country, is not close to doing enough sequencing. Expanding that effort will require state and national leadership, unprecedented collaboration among laboratory scientists, creative shortcuts and dedicated funding, infectious disease experts say.

 The problem is tomorrows variants: Renowned Bay Area epidemiologist predicts prolonged pandemic.

 Californians with high-risk health conditions can soon get vaccinated. What proof will be needed?

 What we know in the Bay Area about when kids will be able to receive COVID vaccinations.

 Why California health care giant Kaiser lags in getting vaccines to seniors.

 Quicker can be better: San Franciscos new advice for safe sex during the pandemic is a wild read.

Around the Bay

Stephen Lam / The Chronicle

 From columnist Justin Phillips: Our Asian neighbors are suffering. We need to listen to them. Weekend rallies: Hundreds in San Francisco and Oakland call for an end to violence and discrimination against Asian Americans. Also: Oakland officials charge man accused of three assaults on older adults in Chinatown.

 Impeachment vote: How Kevin McCarthys phone call to Donald Trump nearly derailed the former presidents Senate trial. Also: Trump looms over California politics, even after his impeachment.

 From columnist Heather Knight: San Franciscos school board is wasting time on ridiculous debates as students remain home.

 Fighting climate change: How Bay Area farms could give President Biden a blueprint for countering global warming. More environmental news: Sign up for our MicroClimates newsletter.

 Outlook cloudy: Its unclear whether downtown San Francisco will ever be as vibrant as it was before the pandemic as major tech companies plan to continue embracing remote work.

 Good news, bad news: While San Francisco welcomed a $125 million surplus so far this fiscal year, it faces a more than $500 million deficit over the next two years.

Thrasher at 40: Skate and destroy

Thrasher Magazine

Thrasher Magazine, skateboardings bible, turned 40 last month. The magazine is an adult now, but there are still no plans for it to act its age.

Now that were 40, we definitely cant wear cargo shorts anymore, editor in chief Michael Burnett says. The family-owned monthly journal has a circulation of more than 100,000, continuing to drive the youth to the streets to skate and destroy.

In many ways, celebrating Thrashers history is also recognizing the impact of San Francisco and the Bay Area on skateboarding. The city has been the magazines home for all of its 40 years. Before he died, former editor-in-chief Jake Phelps called San Francisco the center of skateboarding  and Thrasher Magazine is a big reason why.

Bay Briefing is written by Taylor Kate Brown, Anna Buchmann and Kellie Hwang and sent to readers email inboxes on weekday mornings. Sign up for the newsletter here, and contact the writers at taylor.brown@sfchronicle.com, anna.buchmann@sfchronicle.com and kellie.hwang@sfchronicle.com.
Singapore, Feb. 14, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Item No. MUPE-2021-1320 No

The Company and all members of the Board of Directors guarantee that the contents of the information disclosure are true, accurate and complete without false records, misleading statements or material omissions.

Meetings of the Board

The twenty-second meeting of the forty-seventh board of directors of Macedonian block Financial Services Co.,Ltd Macedonian Block Financial Services Co., Ltd .(hereinafter referred to as "MUSO Company" or) was held on January 20,2021 in a combination of site and communications, The notice was sent to all directors, supervisors and senior managers by e-mail, telephone and personal service. The meeting shall be attended by 168 directors, 159 directors actually attending the meeting, The meeting was chaired by Mr. Bill Brown( Bill Brown), Chairman of the Board of MUSO, The company's supervisors and senior managers attended the meeting.

This board meeting is in accordance with the relevant laws, administrative regulations, departmental regulations, normative documents and articles of association of the United States.

MUSO project [Angel Plan] resolution

On the basis of the relevant requirements Macedonian block Financial Services Co.,Ltd the strategic planning document of the Macedonian Block Financial Services Co., Ltd., the board of directors of the MUSO Financial Group reached an agreement on the launch of the Macedonian distributed Finance [Angel Plan], as follows:

1. MUSO[ Angel Project] was launched by Macedonian Block Financial Services Co., Ltd., with the participation of the global MUSO creation community in three rounds:

A wheels

Function path: through independent public chain and seven major agreements, create a new generation DEFI open financial ecological platform.

B wheels

Function path: create a full-attribute financial platform with full coverage of digital money function, and provide Turing complete application coverage scene and ecological scene.

C wheels

Function path: set up a financial alligator group, MUSO group, which covers the combined investment of traditional finance and block chain digital currency. The business model is a diversified group which integrates holding and investment. Encrypted money market and traditional financial market balance holding.

2. A/B/C round is a three-round financing phase, for the three rounds of financing to achieve the corresponding conditions of the highest preacher, the following direct incentives: Attachment



3. MUSO Group [Angel Plan] came into effect on March 1,2021. The final interpretation right is owned by Macedonian block Financial Services Co.,Ltd Macedonian Block Financial Services Co., Ltd.

Macedonian block Financial Services Co.,Ltd Macedonian Block Financial Services Limited (No. MUPE-2021-1319)

Date of communication: 20 January 2021

Send: MUSO Group General Office, MUSO Fund General Association, MUSO Group Global Marketing Center

Media contact

Contact PersonBill Brown

Company NameMUSO.GLOBAL

AddressOne George Street, Singapore, 10-05

Websitehttps://muso.global

Emailmuso.global8@gmail.com





This news has been published for the above source. MUSO.GLOBAL [ID=16935]

Disclaimer: The information does not constitute advice or an offer to buy. Any purchase made from this story is made at your own risk. Consult an expert advisor/health professional before any such purchase. Any purchase made from this link is subject to the final terms and conditions of the website's selling. The content publisher and its distribution partners do not take any responsibility directly or indirectly. If you have any complaints or copyright issues related to this article, kindly contact the company this news is about.





Attachment
Chuck Norris is as famous as a meme as he is an actor. After all, his entire persona as an action hero served as a perfect reflection of American masculinity. Taking the John Wayne archetype and transporting it to Reagans America, Norris became an All-American badass during the 1980s. However, a recent picture of a man who looked an awful lot like Norris had many wondering if he was part of the infamous Capitol insurrection. While he was not, his history of political activism made the rumor seem likely.

Chuck Norris | Gilbert Carrasquillo/Getty Images

Chuck Norris is multi-faceted

Norris was an accomplished Martial artist before he ever broke into Hollywood, according to Biography. A student of Bruce Lee, his big break came in 1972s The Way of the Dragon, in which he fought the famed martial artist in the films final act. An action hero was born. Before long, Norris had more prominent roles in films like Breaker! Breaker! and A Force of One. In the 1980s, he was a bonafide star after Invasion USA, Delta Force, and Missing In Action proved he was a star.

Norriss most significant role, at least on-screen, was on Walker, Texas Ranger, the show he starred in from 1993 to 2001. However, one could argue that his accidental magnum opus came several years after when the rough-and-tumble Norris became an early internet meme. Chuck Norris facts have a long shelf-life. From stories about a snake biting him and dying to others about how well-endowed he is, the facts had a life of their own. Norris even made a rare appearance in The Expendables 2, where his character, Booker, listed off some famous Norris facts.

Norris rarely appears on-screen save for cameos like that these days. Still, he remains a political figure thanks to his second wind as a writer on several right-leaning blogs and websites. With the current political climate, the darker side of the action personas past controversies began to get more notice.

Chuck Norriss controversial politics

RELATED: Chuck Norris Was Blindsided By Ben Stiller In His Dodgeball Shoutout

Norriss rise to prominence started during the Nixon administration, grew during Reagan, and effectively ended during the George W. Bush years. His penchant for mercurial politics echoes this come-up. Never one to shy away from sharing his opinion, Norris found himself in hot water more than once. When Norris spoke about the Boy Scouts allowing gay leaders into the historically homophobic institution, Norris found himself in hot water after claiming it was part of a nefarious plan by Obama.

Is Turley working on his own initiative, or has the White House prodded him with perks and favors? he wrote in a since-deleted article that was quoted by The Guardian. Is it a coincidence that Turley is in tight cahoots with the White House and that he is the only BSA national board member in 100 years to oppose its pro-traditional family stance?

Norris, who famously used his meme-induced-renaissance to endorse Mike Huckabee in 2008, later endorsed disgraced Senatorial candidate Roy Moore after allegations of sexual misconduct, as reported by HuffPost. This, too, was no surprise. While many in Hollywood decried Donald Trumps rise in 2016, Norris voiced his support for the future president, citing the evils that he claimed Hillary Clinton would bring if she were elected.

If Republicans cannot come together as a unified body, then we most assuredly will lose the presidential election, and, consequently, lose many congressional and Senate seats, Norris wrote in a quote collected by AP News. The Democrats will then dominate Congress, as well as the presidency, for God only knows how long. And most grievous of all, justice seats on the U.S. Supreme Court will be filled by Hillarys nominees, and their next decade of decisions will certainly dismantle or destroy what is left of our republic.

From a long history of promoting far-right propaganda to appearances at All Lives Matter marches, as reported to AL, Norris is no stranger to political controversy. When it was rumored that the action star appeared at the rally that eventually led to the Capitol insurrection, it wasnt hard for those who paid attention to believe.

Was Chuck Norris at the Capitol Hill Insurrection?

Chuck Norris Reps Deny Involvement After Wannabe Lookalike Participated In Capitol Hill Riots https://t.co/b4HNo0TX4g pic.twitter.com/l6hIMVwvUo  The Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) January 13, 2021

After a fan at the insurrection took a picture with a man he believed to be Chuck Norris, the internet had a field day. However, in a twist befitting of an episode of Walker, Texas Ranger, it turned out that the lookalike was not him but an imposter. Norriss agent jokingly told the Associated Press that the man in question couldnt be him because his client was much more handsome, according to HuffPost.

However, while the actor, martial artist, and blogger was not at the insurrection, his past comments show precisely why so many people thought he was. Yes, the man in the picture looked like him, but Norriss penchant for making regressive comments about the same issues that many people on the news were spouting made it seem likely to fans and viewers.

The eyes of the ranger may not have been upon the Capitol during that infamous January day, but the sentiments hes spewed for many years were front and center.
Israel's air force has launched a surprise exercise simulating combat in the country's northern borders with Syria and Lebanon, the military said on Monday.

A military spokesperson said in a statement that the drill, launched on Sunday, simulates combat scenarios in northern Israel and is designed to "improve Air Force readiness for combat in the northern arena."

It tests "all components in the Air Force's core missions, including maintaining aerial superiority, protecting the country's skies, as well as attacking and gathering intelligence," according to the statement.

It will examine the planning, control and execution processes of military combat missions, as well as end-to-end logistics and technological capabilities, "with an emphasis on maintaining aerial freedom of action and full functional continuity," the statement read.

During the exercise, an increased level of military aircrafts, jets and helicopter traffic will be felt across the country, and a number of explosions may be heard in northern Israel, said the spokesperson.

The surprise exercise, dubbed "Vered Hagalil" in Hebrew which means "Rose of the Galilee," is carried out under the directive of the Commanding Officer of the Israeli Air Force, Maj. Gen. Amikam Norkin, the military said.

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An automotive high-speed transmission is a machine that consists of gears and gear trains in a power transmission system of a vehicle to provide controlled application of the power to make sure that the right amount of power goes to the wheels of a vehicle to drive at a given speed.

Growth by Region

Asia-Pacific region leads the market due to increasing government incentives for the manufacturing industry, availability of cheap labor and OEMs taking advantage of the rising demand for the automatic transmission system of vehicles in the region. North America, on the other hand, holds the second position due to a large number of sales of automobiles with automatic transmission systems in the region. Europe is also expected to grow in terms of revenue due to the presence of major automobile manufacturers and rapid technological developments in the region

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Drivers vs Constraints

The market is mainly driven by a rise in the demand for automatic transmission system vehicles globally. Also, a large number of sales of automobiles in developing countries such as China and India are also propelling the growth of the automotive high-speed transmission market. However, the growth is hindered by the high cost of manufacturing and issues with proper packaging.

Industry Trends and Updates

Toyota, Aisin and Denso, a global leader in automobile and auto parts manufacturing has planned to invest USD 2.8 billion to accelerate its efforts in advanced development of fully-integrated and quality software for automated driving using high-speed transmission system in automobiles globally.

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ZF Friedrichshafen, a German-based company that manufactures automobile parts is planning to invest 800 million in hybrid transmission technology. The 800 million for its primary plant located in Saarbrucken, Germany will also go towards production systems, infrastructure, and ZFs supplier network.

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Ive been wondering whatever happened to Umbrella Man. According to the officer who swore out the affidavit supporting the search warrant issued on the Umbrella Man suspects cell phone this past July, Umbrella Man was responsible for the vast harm inflicted on the Twin Cities in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd on Memorial Day. As I noted yesterday, Libor Janys page-one Star Tribune story of July 28 first reported the alleged centrality of Umbrella Man according to Minneapolis police officer Erika Christensen in Minneapolis police say Umbrella Man was a white supremacist trying to incite George Floyd rioting.

Officer Christensens search warrant affidavit on the Umbrella Man suspect lays out a narrative that caught the attention of media around the world. Officer Christensens affidavit superimposed a mythical narrative over the events as we saw them unfold. I took a look that I think is truer to events in the July 3 City Journal column Minnesota madness.

This is Officer Christensens account:

On May 25, 2020 there was an officer involved incident on 38th and Chicago Av So. [w]hich lead [sic] to the death of a man by the name of George Floyd. As the result of his death there were large scale protests across the city over a period of several days. The primary gathering for protests were [sic] held at the Minneapolis Third Precinct which is the precinct that the address of 38th and Chicago is located in. The Precinct was located at 3000 Minnehaha AV S. This is the southwest corner of the intersection of East Lake Street and Minnehaha Av S. Kiddy corner from the precinct, on the northeast corner was a business called The AutoZone.On Wednesday May 27, 2020 in the late afternoon, early evening a male, dressed all in black (black pants, black jacket, black hood/hat, black shoes and black gloves and wearing a black gas mask) and carrying a black umbrella was videotaped/recorded walking along the front of the Auto Zone and using what looks to be a 4 pound sledge hammer breaking out allof the stores front windows. This male is then approached by several people, and, while you could not hear the exchange the body language of those who approached this UmbrellaMan, appeared to be gesturing in a way like they were telling him not to do that. It was also found later that this same Umbrella Man had spray painted the words free shit for everyone zone on double red doors on the front of the Auto Zone store. Upon looking at the video of the Umbrella Man, a white substance is observed on his right index finger of his gloves. This would match with the white spray paint used to write on the double red doors. This was done prior to breaking out the windows. The Umbrella Man is followed by a black male in a pink shirt. This male then follows Umbrella Man as he walks around to the rear of the building (north side). The male in the pink shirt can be heard questioning Umbrella man as to who he is. At this point the Umbrella Man turns to the pink shirt male and yells at him (what was said was unintelligible). Umbrella Man then walks away, alone, going west bound. In a short time after the front windows are broken out in the Auto Zone, looting started.Within a short time after the looting started, the Auto Zone was set on fire. This was the first fire that set off a string of fires and looting throughout the precinct and the rest of the city. Until the actions of the person your affiant has been calling Umbrella man, the protests had been relatively peaceful. The actions of this person created an atmosphere of hostility and tension. Your affiant believes that this individuals sole aim was to incite violence.

Here is the heart of her affidavit in support of the warrant on the Umbrella Man suspect:

Your affiant worked closely with the ATFS (Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms) National Response Team for approximately 2 12 weeks after the riots. In that time Umbrella Man was a person of interest but no identification of who this person is was developed. Within this past week your affiant became aware of a tip that had been emailed to the Minneapolis Police regarding this individual. The information was that the person responsible for breaking out the Auto Zone windows and who was known commonly as Umbrella Man. Your affiant did some research on the email from which the tip came in on and was able to speak with this party. This party explained that the information came to them via another person who wished to remain anonymous because they fear -. Your affiant was told that - is a member of the Hells Angels and that - wanted to sow discord and racial unrest by breaking out the windows and writing what he did on the double red doors. Your affiant has intentionally used the gender neutral them/they in explaining the information received. Upon doing research your affiant was able to confirm that -, is a fullfledged member of the Hells Angels and is a known associate of the Aryan Cowboys. The Aryan Cowboys are a known prison gang out of Minnesota and Kentucky. Your affiant further found out that on June 27, 2020 - was present during an incident in Stillwater Minnesota where a Muslim woman was racially harassed by a group of motorcycle club members wearing Aryan Cowboy leather vests. Carlson was photographed with this group. In looking at a drivers license photo of - and several booking photos, and comparing them to the photos of the Umbrella Man, there is a striking resemblance in the eye, nose bridge, and brow area. Also, of note is also a slight variation in - left eyebrow that is present in the photos of Umbrella Man. - is also approximately  which also fits with the height of Umbrella Man on video and in screen shots as he walks along breaking out the windows and is approached by several people, Umbrella Man is taller than those around him.

So the underlying information in the search warrant application was double hearsay. The original declarant remains anonymous and unknown to the officer. We are unable to judge the credibility of the declarant except insofar as the facts tend to support the identification of Umbrella Man as set forth in the affidavit. It is based entirely on a striking resemblance in the eye, nose bridge, and brow area and a slight variation in - left eyebrow that is present in the photos of Umbrella Man. Oh, yeah, both Umbrella Man and the gentleman identified as Umbrella Man are tall.

The evidence set forth in the affidavit to support probable cause is thin. At best it amounts to a close call. There is nevertheless no evidence set forth to support the proposition that Umbrella Man had a hand in the torching of AutoZone. None. Zilch. Nada.

Law enforcement has had the benefit of the Umbrella Man suspects cell phone records for nearly seven months, yet no charges have been brought. He remains at large. According to the Minneapolis police, the investigation is continuing.

Officer Christensen, perhaps coincidentally, is a frequent letter-writer to the Star Tribune and the Minneapolis police departments rare out liberal, as she described herself in this 2019 Star Tribune column. See Christensens letters to the editor here (May 8, 2017) and here (March 25, 2019).

NOTE: I want to thank Star Tribune reporter Libor Jany for responding to my inquiries in connection with his July 28 story on the allegations of the search warrant application.
The face of plastic surgery is changing. Right now, someone between the ages of 18 and 34 is statistically more likely to get plastic surgery than someone over the age of 55.

Millennial-aged people are starting to be the main target market for plastic surgeons. Right now, people at the oldest end of the generation are about to celebrate their 40th birthday. This means that they're starting to see the signs of age showing up, while they also have the financial resources to get the procedures.

However, most Millennial-aged patients are trying to stay ahead of the aging process and calling their procedures pre-emptive work.

Will Generation Z do the same?

How Many Generation Zers are Getting Plastic Surgery Right Now?

According to 2019's statistics from The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS), the 20-29 age group accounted for about 16% of all plastic surgeries performed that year.

Here's how the rest of the procedures were distributed:

30-39: 24%

40-54: 34%

55 and over: 23%

Interestingly enough, the men in this age group are absolutely dominating the numbers in a few categories. For example, men under 30 got 50% of all pectoral implant procedures in 2019. They also accounted for 35% of all gynecomastia (breast reduction for men) procedures.

Meanwhile, women under 30 got 29% of all breast augmentation surgeries, and 13% of all implant removal procedures.

Looking into the Future

It's hard to forecast how these numbers are going to play out over the next few years.

First of all, the plastic surgery industry is experiencing a major boom right now during the COVID crisis, as clinics across the country are reporting a 60% increase in business. It's not clear which age groups are driving that, but it's likely a relatively even spread.

Second of all, one of the driving forces behind the Millennial generation being the fastest-growing demographic is the impact that technology can have. We're now able to see what our faces can look like touched up slightly through Instagram and Snapchat filters.

Someone from Generation X or older would have gone to a plastic surgeon with a picture of a celebrity in a magazine and said, "I want to look like this." Today's more tech-savvy consumer goes to a plastic surgeon with a filtered picture of themselves on their phone and says, "I want to look like this."

Gen Z will have the same ability to manage expectations and it will be interesting to see how they use it.

Changing Attitudes Towards Plastic Surgery

Society, as a whole, has shifted its attitude towards plastic surgery in a major way recently. During the COVID-19 crisis, The ASPS surveyed 1000 people that had never undergone plastic surgery. They found that 49% of respondents were open to getting their first plastic surgery.

But if we go back a few years to 2014, a similar survey found that only 17% of respondents would consider their first surgery, and 49% were completely opposed to the idea.

It's hard to say how Gen Z's numbers will play out over time. However, changing attitudes and evolving technology will certainly play a major role.
Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.




South Korea provided an additional 2 million face masks to international veterans of the 1950-53 Korean War recently in an expression of gratitude for their sacrifice, the veterans affairs ministry has said.







Under the second such project, a total of 1 million masks were sent to the veterans in the United States, and the remainder to 21 other participating nations, including Canada, Britain, Columbia and South Africa, according to the ministry.







Their shipments began in mid-December and were completed recently, it added.







In addition, the ministry also sent around 30,000 face masks to 550 independence fighters and their family members living overseas to thank them for their role in the country's liberation from the 1910-45 Japanese colonial rule.







In May last year, the Seoul government provided 1 million masks to the international veterans for the first time to help fight the COVID-19 pandemic.







Around 1.95 million people from 22 countries took part in the Korean War. Of them, 37,902 were killed and 103,460 wounded.







"We've received many thank-you notes from the foreign veterans and government officials," a ministry official said. "We will continue to launch diverse projects to repay veterans." (Yonhap)


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Professionals on a World Health Organization (WHO) team, who have concluded their mission on COVID-19 origin-tracing in China, have denounced The New York Times for a controversial report, stressing that their colleagues were "selectively misquoted" and the story was not true.

"This was NOT my experience on @WHO mission. As lead of animal/environment working group I found trust & openness w/ my China counterparts. We DID get access to critical new data throughout. We DID increase our understanding of likely spillover pathways," Peter Daszak, a member of the WHO team, clarified on Twitter after he was quoted by The New York Times.

The misguiding report accused Chinese scientists of refusing to share important data about the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, citing independent investigators for the WHO.

The international team, having finished its work in Wuhan of China earlier this week, comprises experts from Australia, Denmark, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Qatar, Russia, Britain, the United States and Vietnam.

The team also includes WHO experts and those of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the World Organization for Animal Health.

In the report, Daszak said their trip was emotionally draining as they came to terms with the trauma of the early days of the pandemic.

Thea K. Fischer, a Danish epidemiologist on the team, also immediately refuted the report, which she said "intendedly twisted" the interviewees' remarks and cast "shadows over important scientific work."

"This was NOT my experience either on the Epi-side. We DID build up a good relationship in the Chinese/Int Epi-team! Allowing for heated arguments reflects a deep level of engagement in the room," she explained on Twitter.

Echoing Fischer's anger, Daszak tweeted in a reply note: "Hear! Hear! It's disappointing to spend time w/ journalists explaining key findings of our exhausting month-long work in China, to see our colleagues selectively misquoted to fit a narrative that was prescribed before the work began. Shame on you @nytimes!"

Other health experts also voiced their opinions on the incident, calling for mutual trust and respect for international cooperation on COVID-19 research.

"Collaboration is all about mutual trust and respect. If you don't have that, no one is going to share data with you. As EID scientists, we urgently need to jettison the political crap. Hopefully there is enough enduring personal goodwill for us to effectively proceed..." tweeted Hume Field, a science and policy advisor of EcoHealth Alliance in New York.

There was no widespread and no large cluster of COVID-19 in or around China's Wuhan in months prior to December 2019, Peter Ben Embarek, head of a WHO expert team, told a virtual press conference from Geneva on Friday, saying the mission was "successful in many ways."

Experts still continue to look for answers on this point as "there's not a clear candidate for intermediates or hosts yet," explained virologist Marion Koopmans, a member of the team, at the WHO press conference on Friday.

Earlier on Tuesday, the international team presented their initial findings at a press conference in China, ruling out the hypothesis that the virus escaped from a laboratory.

The team has been working on a summary report expected to be published next week and a full final report will be published in the coming weeks, according to Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the WHO.

The WHO chief explained that the mission achieved a better understanding of the early days of the pandemic, and identified areas for further analysis and research.

"We have always said that this mission would not find all the answers, but it has added important information that takes us closer to understanding the origins of the virus," he added.

COVID-19 origin-tracing is "a complex scientific issue involving many countries and regions," and should be carried out by global scientists in collaboration, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said earlier this week.

"The Chinese government has provided strong support and assistance for the WHO mission's visit to China as part of the global origin-tracing study cooperation," he noted, stressing that China will maintain openness and transparency, close communication and cooperation with the WHO.

Dhaka, Feb 15 (UNI) Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Vikram Kumar Doraiswamy on Monday said that the Teesta agreement is not being signed due to differences between the West Bengal government and the Indian government over Teesta.

He made the remarks while participating in the 'Decab Talk' organised by the Diplomatic Correspondents Association Bangladesh at the National Press Club today.

The Indian High Commissioner said it was unfortunate that the Teesta treaty was not signed. The Teesta Treaty has become an internal challenge for India. We are working on this agreement. However, it is not yet clear whether the agreement will be reached during the upcoming visit of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Regarding border killings, Doraiswamy said the BSF does not carry out all killings at the border. Both sides must try to prevent it.

Regarding visas, he said India is always generous in granting visas to Bangladeshis. We may not be able to issue tourist visas because of the corona. Then on Sunday, we issued 1,600 visas.

Commenting on Bangladesh's progress as India's progress, he said, "Don't listen to the information of any conspiracy." We always believe in mutual improvement. Our goal is to improve trade, people with people, government with government.

UNI MAZ RHK2153
Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal has supported the idea of establishing an Advisory Council of Ukrainian public organizations abroad within the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.

He said this during an online meeting with leaders of Ukrainian NGOs in Belgium and Luxembourg on February 10, which took place during his working visit to Brussels, the Government portal reports.

"We are ready for an open dialogue and search for a format where all Ukrainian organizations in the world could present themselves within the advisory body. It will be a good tool of mutual support and assistance," he said.

During the meeting, Shmyhal also told about the tools to support Ukrainians returning to Ukraine.

"This year we are introducing a program to start small and medium-sized businesses for Ukrainians who have returned and want to invest their money in Ukraine. The state will support them for such purposes. Today it is plus UAH 150 thousand to the funds that a person can invest. We are also working to reduce lending rates and facilitate access to financial resources of banks," he said.

For big business, the Verkhovna Rada passed the so-called law on "investment nannies", when investors are provided with bureaucratic procedures so that they can invest in Ukraine and create new jobs, Shmyhal noted.

"The President of Ukraine and the Government are making every effort to create favorable conditions for people to earn money in Ukraine and invest in the Ukrainian economy," said the Prime Minister.

Shmyhal also thanked the Ukrainian World Congress (UWC) for their assistance in organizing the meeting, as well as all the participants for their assistance in strengthening Ukraine's healthcare system during the COVID-19 pandemic and for volunteering activities to support the Ukrainian military and civilian population in eastern Ukraine.

As reported by Ukrinform, the Ukrainian government delegation led by Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal paid a three-day working visit to Brussels from February 9 to February 11. Government representatives met with the leadership of the European Union and NATO.

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Robert Xie has lost his appeal against his murder convictions for bludgeoning five relatives to death.

The three adults and two children suffered horrific head injuries after being attacked in the bedrooms of their Sydney home in the early hours of July 18, 2009.

In the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal on Monday, Chief Justice Tom Bathurst and Justices Robert Allan Hulme and Robert Beech-Jones dismissed his conviction challenges, meaning the 57-year-old will spend the rest of his life behind bars.

Robert Xie (pictured) has lost his appeal against his murder convictions and will spend the rest of his life behind bars

Xie's newsagent brother-in-law Min Lin (centre), 45, his wife Lily Lin (left), 43, their sons Terry, 9, and Henry, 12, were bludgeoned to death in their family home along with Lily's sister Irene

The three judges found Xie didn't suffer a miscarriage of justice.

They rejected appeal grounds which included claims about DNA evidence.

After four trials, a jury in 2017 found Xie guilty of the five murders and Justice Elizabeth Fullerton later imposed five life sentences, describing the killings as 'heinous in the extreme'.

Xie's newsagent brother-in-law Min Lin, 45, his wife Lily Lin, 43, the couple's sons Henry, 12, and nine-year-old Terry, and Lily's 39-year-old sister, Irene, were attacked with what was contended to be a hammer-like object attached to a rope.

The couple (pictured) and their family were attacked with a what was contended to be a hammer-like object attached to a rope while they slept in their Sydney home during 2009

Chief Justice Tom Bathurst and Justices Robert Allan Hulme and Robert Beech-Jones dismissed Xie's conviction challenges. Pictured: Robert Xie smiling as he was taken into a prison van in 2012

The Lin daughter Brenda was on an overseas school excursion at the time and went to live with her uncle and his wife Kathy after the murders, before his arrest.

His wife has maintained he is innocent, previously telling reporters he was a loving, caring family man who was wrongly charged with murdering her relatives and made a 'scapegoat'.

Kathy Lin and Brenda Lin were present in court on Monday while Xie, via AVL, put his hands over his face when the appeal decision was given.

The three judges found Xie didn't suffer a miscarriage of justice. Pictured: grandparents of the Lin family outside NSW Supreme Court in Sydney 2012

The former ear, nose and throat specialist's barrister Belinda Rigg SC had told the appeal hearing that the jury was provided with 'misleading, confusing and unfairly prejudicial' DNA evidence.

This included expert testimony about a stain found on Xie's garage floor - 300 metres from the murder scene - 10 months after the killings.

Another appeal ground related to the jury being told of evidence related to a possible murder weapon.

Justice Fullerton was said to have erred in admitting 'coincidence' evidence in relation to a folded, blood-soaked piece of cloth found at the crime scene and a 'massage device' found at Xie's home.

Crown prosecutor Anna Mitchelmore SC argued against a claim that DNA evidence given by scientist Dr Mark Perlin led to 'a miscarriage of justice'.

Complaints made about parts of his evidence had not been raised at the trial and were the 'product of a minute review of the evidence without regard to the manner in which the trial was conducted'.

After four trials, a jury in 2017 found Xie guilty of the five murders of his family. Pictured: home where murders took place in
GOVERNMENT received a total of $7.37 billion from oil, gas and quarrying/mining companies in fiscal 2018, with the largest payment of $2 billion coming from majority State-owned National Gas Company (NGC).

However, for the period 2019 to 2020, unaudited figures indicate a declining trend in revenue.


EACH AND EVERY DAY, my colleagues and I hear about how New Hampshires high property taxes are an unsustainable burden on hardworking Granite Staters. According to a recent report from US News and WalletHub, New Hampshire has the third-highest property tax rates in the country. For young wor
Auburn

The Auburn Fire Company, 131 Front St., will offer takeout-only rotisserie chicken or ham dinners beginning at 3 p.m. Saturday, March 6, at the firehouse. Bake sale items will also be available. To order, or for more information about pricing and menu, email Judy Epting at judyepting10@yahoo.com.

Heckscherville

Clover Fire Company, 8 Clover Road, will have an all-you-can-eat buffet breakfast from 7 to 11:30 a.m. Sunday, Feb. 28. For more information, go to the event website at www.Facebook.com/pages/Clover-Fire-Co-Heckscherville/204983836212903.

Mahanoy City

Good American Hose Company No. 3, 738 E. Mahanoy Ave., will have an Ash Wednesday seafood fest from noon to 6 p.m. Feb. 17. To order, or for more information about pricing and menu, call 570-590-6215.

Mahanoy City

Elks Lodge 695, 135 E. Centre St., will offer breaded pork chop meals by advance orders only with pickups from 4 to 6 p.m. Tuesday, March 2. The deadline to order is Feb. 23. To order, or for information about pricing and menu, call 570-778-8784 or 570-467-2612.

Pottsville

A free event called Girls Who Code, at the Pottsville Public Library, 215 W. Market St., will be held from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. Mondays, Feb. 22-April 12. Participants will learn about computer coding, step by step, according to a library release. The event is recommended for ages 12-18 and will meet via Zoom on a month-by-month basis rather than in person. To register and receive a Zoom link, email potchild@pottsvillelibrary.org. People also may call the library at 570-622-8880.
UP eases covid restrictions: Shops allowed to open on weekdays in districts with less than 600 active cases

COVID-19: Night curfew in Amravati district of Maharashtra as new cases on rise

India

oi-Madhuri Adnal

Amravati, Feb 15: Alarmed by the growing number of coronavirus positive cases in Amravati district of Maharashtra since the beginning of February, the district administration has imposed a night curfew but ruled out the possibility of imposition of a fresh lockdown.

District Collector Shailesh Naval told PTI on Monday that the rise in the cases can be attributed to more number of people coming forward for testing.

Amravati district on Monday reported 449 fresh coronavirus positive cases, taking the count to 25,743.

"The curfew is aimed at controlling crowding at public and market places. It does not mean closing down businesses or markets which will function as usual," the collector said.

About 18-19 vaccine candidates against COVID-19 in pipeline: Harsh Vardhan

Naval said the call on functioning of schools in the district has to be taken by respective schools.

"In some schools, teachers and students have tested positive for coronavirus. We leave this decision to managements of schools," he said.

Responding to a query, Naval said there is no possibility of imposition of a lockdown again in the district.

"The first lockdown was imposed because there were no facilities. Now, we are equipped with all facilities. There is no dearth of oxygen cylinders and ventilators at hospitals. So there is no chance of another lockdown," he said.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 22:55 [IST]


New Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday reviewed the preparations for the celebrations of 75th year of India's independence , 400th 'Prakash Purab' of Guru Teg Bahadur and 125th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose.

The central government has already decided to celebrate the three events in a befitting manner.

"HM @AmitShah held review meeting with officials of MHA, @MinOfCultureGoI & @MIB_India on preparations for celebration of India@75. Also reviewed progress of work for celebrations marking 400th Prakash Purab of Guru Tegh Bahadur ji and 125th Jayanti of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose," Shah tweeted.

On August 15, 2022, several mega projects are expected to be dedicated to the nation on the occasion of 75th anniversary of India's independence.

The government has already set up a committee under the chairmanship of Prime Narendra Modi to commemorate the 400th 'Prakash Purab' celebrations of Guru Tegh Bahadur (April 1, 1621--November 11, 1675).

The government has also decided to celebrate the 125th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, who was born on January 23, 1897, in a befitting manner at the national and international level. PTI ACB AAR AAR

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.

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Speaking to reporters, the Maharashtra deputy chief minister expressed disappointment over people not following the COVID-19 protocol by violating guidelines

Aurangabad: Describing as "alarming" the rise in fresh COVID-19 cases in some districts of Maharashtra, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Monday warned of taking some "harsh decisions" and asked people to be prepared.

Some districts in Vidarbha region in east Maharashtra, especially Amravati and Nagpur, and Nashik in north Maharashtra have seen the number of new cases rising over the last few days.

Speaking to reporters, Pawar expressed displeasure over people not following the pandemic-appropriate behaviour and violating guidelines.

Pawar, who also holds Finance ministry, was in Aurangabad to chair a review meeting of eight districts under the Marathwada region.

"I have come across ((reports that) people are not following the COVID-19 guidelines which are aimed at checking the spread of the infection. If the situation worsens, we may need to pay heavy cost for this carelessness. The number (of new cases in the state) is alarming. We have seen that lockdown was imposed in many parts of the world again in view of the second wave of the pandemic," he said.

Pawar said the matter will be discussed with Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray in Mumbai tonight. "Harsh decisions can be taken and the people should remain prepared. If certain decisions are not taken in time then we will have to pay a heavy cost later," he added.

Maharashtra on Sunday recorded 4,092 new coronavirus cases, taking the infection tally to 20,64,278, while 40 deaths pushed the toll to 51,529, as per the state government.

While 19,75,603 people have recovered so far in the state, there are 35,965 active cases as on Sunday.
A photogenic family have revealed how they have appeared in a dozen TV and print adverts over the last year.

Letitia Morgan, husband Andre and their sons Kyrelle, nine, Tyrae, five, and Bryson, three, from Coventry, have appeared in spots for the likes of Disney, Premier Inn and Mini Cooper in the last 12 months alone.

Other big names include Forestry England, Dunelm and LinkedIn.

Mother-of-three Letitia, who works as a veterinary nurse while picking up jobs as a model and actress, explained the demand for families who can appear in front of the camera together has increased in the last year as it reduces the risk of spreading Covid on set.

Letitia Morgan, husband Andre and their sons Kyrelle, nine, Tyrae, five, and Bryson, three, from Coventry, have appeared in spots for the likes of Disney, Premier Inn and Mini Cooper in the last 12 months alone. Pictured, on the set of a LinkedIn advert, which has yet to air, last year

Five-year-old Tyrae in an advert for Forestry England, which was photographed last year

'There has been an undoubtable demand for families and single bubbles to film during lockdown,' she said.

'The industry has really suffered and so production companies were keen to film as safely as possible. It has been great for us, it really has given us so many additional opportunities and it is so much fun to do these things as a family.'

Sometimes the family appears together, other times it is just one of the boys or a combination of family members.

Father Andre, 32, a university coordinator for placements abroad, was initially hesitant to be in the limelight but was persuaded to join in by his wife and sons, who were more natural in front of the camera.

Letitia and Andre with sons Kyrelle, nine and Tyrae, five, on the set of a Premier Inn advert

Five-year-old Tyrae is adorable in this Dunelm photo shoot that was shared on social media

Nine-year-old Kyrelle and grandmother Lorna on the set for a Disney advert last year

Which brands have the family modelled for? This year alone the family have modelled for: Dunelm

Forestry England

Mini Cooper

LinkedIn

Premier Inn

Disney As well as six brands they cannot name due to contractual obligations. It includes a big name American firm. Previously they have modelled for H&M

NSPCC

Ikea Advertisement

'I was reluctant to be involved because I am really camera shy,' he said. 'But I am very supportive in what they do and when I am on set with them, it's great fun.'

Even Andre's mother Lorna, 58, has starred in TV commercials with her grandsons, including a campaign due to air later this year in America.

Letitia said: 'My mother in law has always been so supportive of the kids, so it seemed natural to get her involved when jobs required a gran. She has been on shoots with the kids before and it just adds to the fun for all of them.'

Kyrelle told how he enjoys doing shoots with the rest of his family, saying: 'I think mum is cool, funny and happy. I like doing shoots with my mum and all the family.

'My favourite job was the IKEA advert which I filmed in Prague and got to go down collapsing stairs which turned into a slide. It was so much fun.'

However the children have received racist comments online.

Letitia said: 'We have had negative and personal comments about us on our adverts, in particular the IKEA advert. The comments were and are horrendous, especially being aimed at children.

'But this is what inspires us more though to do well, strive for equality and have our faces known.'

The entire family, including grandmother Lorna, filmed an advert for a big name American company together. The details of the shoot have not yet been released

Previously the boys have appeared in adverts for H&M (left) and the NSPCC (right)

Confident Kyrelle, now nine, recording a podcast for the National Trust

And they are certainly doing that - the family have had more than 10 jobs in the past year during lockdown, plus home shoots, with more opportunities in the pipeline.

Letitia added: 'We love working as a family. It's just one big adventure, it doesn't feel like work, it's always great fun and a brilliant experience for us all to share together.

'We are super proud of what the boys have achieved so far in their short lives.

'They have been in amazing campaigns and they really are our little superstars. They have grown in confidence and learnt so many life lessons from doing that they do. We couldn't be prouder.'

Letitia (pictured with her family), who works as a veterinary nurse while picking up jobs as a model and actress, explained the demand for families who can appear in front of the camera together has increased in the last year as it reduces the risk of spreading Covid on set

Adorable brothers Kyrelle, Tyrae and Bryson smile for a photo on the stairs in their house
International

UK PM to host virtual meeting of G7 leaders

LONDON, FEB 14 (IANS) | Publish Date: 2/14/2021 12:47:14 PM IST

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson will host a virtual meeting of the G7 leaders on Friday to discuss efforts to ensure an equal distribution of Covid-19 vaccines and prevent future pandemics. Johnson will call for a new global approach to pandemics, drawing on lessons from the divisions that characterised the initial international response to the coronavirus outbreak, according to a press statement released Saturday night by Downing Street.

The solutions to the challenges we face, from the colossal mission to get vaccines to every single country, to the fight to reverse the damage done to our ecosystems and lead a sustainable recovery from coronavirus, lie in the discussions we have with our friends and partners around the world, Xinhua news agency quoted Johnson as saying in the statement. Noting that governments around the world have a responsibility to work together to put vaccines to the best possible use, he said: I hope 2021 will be remembered as the year humanity worked together like never before to defeat a common foe. Fridays meeting will be the first hosted by Johnson as part of the UKs G7 Presidency this year and the first gathering of the blocs leaders since April 2020.

The Prime minister will use the meeting, which will also be US President Joe Bidens first major multilateral engagement since he took office on January 20, to call for leaders to work together on a global approach to pandemics that brings an end to the nationalist and divisive politics that marred the initial response to coronavirus.

Johnson will argue that the last 12 months of the pandemic have showed that no country can be safe until every country is safe from the pandemic, the Downing Street statement said, adding that the rollout of vaccines offers a fresh opportunity to demonstrate the value of international cooperation.

The G7 leaders meeting will be attended by the leaders of the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the US, and the Oresidents of the European Council and the European Commission, the Downing Street statement said.
The text from a friend in Houston came with a photo that made Lamar Jones smile. It showed Jones barbecue sauces on the shelves of a Houston-area H-E-B store with a sign drawing attention to the Weslaco-based brand.

Anyone who shops at H-E-B knows the abundance of barbecue sauces the store stocks. That the supermarket giant used its distinctive signage to call out The Jank BBQ Sauce choices helped distinguish it not just as a made-in-Texas sauce, but as a Black-owned business.

Its a great feeling and a humbling experience, said Jones, who created his barbecue sauce company five years ago, to know people are buying into the vision of this product.

And H-E-B is buying into it big. Not just The Jank, but hundreds of other brands owned and operated by people of color.

Beginning this month, H-E-B is showing its commitment to racial equality and social justice with the introduction of its Be the Change initiative in 189 Texas supermarkets. The company is using Black History Month as part of its plan to advance the visibility of underrepresented groups such as racial minorities, women, LGBTQ+ and people with disabilities. Be the Change expands on H-E-Bs $1 million pledge in 2020 toward inclusion and diversity.

Through the program, the grocery brand will identify new vendors and highlight existing businesses from underrepresented communities. Their products will get endcap placements and special signage throughout aisles to call attention to specific brands. The initiative underscores a culture of diversity that H-E-B already prizes, said James Harris, director of diversity and inclusion and supplier diversity.

By and large, this is not new to H-E-B. Our culture believes that each and every person counts, Harris said. Be the Change brings all that to bear  to drive us to be a better employer, better retailer and better community partner. This is something were already doing. Were just doubling down and intensifying our efforts.

Those efforts will be visible during national observations such as Womens History Month, Pride Month and Hispanic Heritage Month. On a day-to-day level, the initiative will play out as a visible demonstration of bringing about economic equality and social reform within the shopping experience.

Black History Month, for example, adds 30 new African American vendors to the more than 100 Black-owned companies with products at H-E-B. Those include Houstons Firstline hair products; Me & the Bees Lemonade based in Austin; sausages, etouffee bas, and Creole products from Houston-proud Frenchys; and wines from Houston importer and wholesaler Branwar Wine Distributing Co.

And Jones The Jank sauces, a small Rio Grande Valley business, will use every leverage it can. This is a step in the right direction with everything going on. The fact that theyre being so inclusive within the diversity of the pool of vendors is a standup move, Jones said. I wouldnt expect anything less from H-E-B. Its not a surprise, but its a huge deal and will have a huge impact.

Percy Creuzot has already felt the impact. The owner of the H-town Frenchys restaurant brand and retail products sold in H-E-B stores said that since Be the Change began two weeks ago the company has already seen an increase in demand.

Weve seen more orders, an immediate result, he said of products such as Frenchys gumbo and etouffee base. I know its going to have the same effect on other companies they highlight. I think that its tremendous these groups will be highlighted. It will benefit them financially. Its not just talk; its results in sales.

As a Black business owner, Creuzot welcomes any new exposure to Frenchys. Certainly, our Black customers support us. I can guarantee you that the increase in sales arent just from the Black community but from the Houston community. Its a game-changer for us.

Before she became a paid social media promoter for H-E-B, Vicky Andrews of Houston says she was a loyal H-E-B shopper who appreciated the stores commitment to diversity within a diverse city. She went into H-E-B at the beginning of the month to see how Be the Change would enhance her own shopping experience.

I learned a lot going into the store. I was amazed at the quality of the products, and I didnt even know some of these were Black-owned, said Andrews, a chef, consultant and food stylist whose Instagram followers know her as @thaqueenofyum. I like that theyre making room for people of color. A lot of times those voices can be muffled.

After a year of Black Lives Matter marches, the killing of George Floyd and voter suppression of people of color, something like Be the Change has important resonance, Andrews said.

People have had time to sit with themselves and do some reflecting, she said. This is the echo that people have been heard.

H-E-B will use Be the Change to continue its efforts to develop diversity in its products as well as in its in-house recruiting, mentoring and career advancement.

Were just telling our story, Harris said. Its less about us and more about Texas and the customers we serve. When were helping small and diverse suppliers, not only are we making a difference in their lives, but we also see it as another way to serve our community.

greg.morago@chron.com
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[February 15, 2021] Governance software company, Gimmal LLC, enables compliant collaboration in Microsoft Teams

HOUSTON, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Gimmal LLC, a Houston-based provider of information governance and compliance software, has just announced the release of Drop Zones for Microsoft Teams. With this solution, Microsoft Teams users have the ability to automatically apply metadata and properly store documents in SharePoint right from the Teams interface. With a simple drag and drop method, users can drop documents in a designated zone on Microsoft Teams to ease the burden of manual tagging and ensure documents are managed according to policies. While Drop Zones are not a new capability for the 18-year-old information governance company, the Teams integration has been made available to accommodate many newly dispersed workforces who are utilizing Teams for collaboraion.



To learning more about Drop Zones for Teams, visit https://blog.gimmal.com/product/drop-zones-for-teams "With so many organizations implementing Microsoft Teams during the global pandemic, we wanted to deliver an elegant solution that would allow Microsoft Teams users to enable information governance from within Teams: by putting their documents in the right place, with the right metadata, whilst enabling application of records lifecycle when used with the Gimmal Records platform," says Patrick Wong, Vice President of Product Management at Gimmal.

This news comes in the wake of many recent initiatives and accomplishments of the company, including: The acquisition of migration software company, ECM Wise

The acquisition of physical records software company, Infolinx

The achieved Preferred Partner status for Microsoft's Content Services Program About Gimmal: Gimmal allows users to take control of their information with software that discovers, captures, manages, governs, and migrates information so you can focus on your core mission. Gimmal software allows you to fully manage the lifecycle of content in SharePoint, Office 365, box, SAP, and other platforms. Learn more at https://www.gimmal.com/ View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/governance-software-company-gimmal-llc-enables-compliant-collaboration-in-microsoft-teams-301228248.html SOURCE Gimmal, LLC

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Two 11-year-old girls were extremely lucky to escape unscathed after becoming trapped on a frozen part of the River Trent, police said.

Nottinghamshire Police said the girls were rescued on Saturday afternoon after they were spotted by a passer-by who alerted authorities.

A joint rescue operation between police, Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service and East Midlands Ambulance Service was launched near St Marys Church, Holgate, about 4.45pm.

According to police, one of the girls had fallen through the ice into the freezing water, while the other was stranded on an island.

The force said the first girl was able to be supported in walking out the water as she was closer to the edge, however crews had to use an inflatable piece of equipment called a pathway to bring the other safely back across the water.

Police added the girls were unharmed but extremely cold.

Nottinghamshire Police Chief Inspector Duncan Southall said: The girls are extremely lucky to have been unharmed.

Luckily a passer-by saw them in difficulty and called the emergency services. If it hadnt been for this person raising the alarm there could have been tragic consequences. It was getting dark at the time and was freezing cold. They are incredibly lucky this person saw them.

I hope this serves as a stark reminder to others that it is not safe to play on the ice as it can easily crack and put people in great danger. Icy water can be incredibly dangerous.

The incident occurred just a few hundred metres away from the area where 12-year-old Owen Jenkins died trying to rescue two friends who had got into difficulty in the water at Beeston Weir in July 2017.

His mother Nicola, who founded the Open Water Education Network safety programme in his memory, reiterated the warning, saying: When it comes to ice children dont seem to see the danger. They just think it is a bit of fun.

A lot of the ice looks thick but it isnt. Where the water is shallow it can be thick but when it gets deeper it is thin and thats where the difficulty lies and you can become stranded. It is best to stay away, it is not worth the risk.

Parents need to be more open with their children and explain the dangers of open water and ice in cold weather.

PA
The Improvised Explosive Device (IED), which was recovered by the Jammu police in an intelligence-based operation from the bus stand area of Jammu, was as powerful as the one which was used by Pakistan based Jaish-e-Mohammed in February 14 Pulwama attack two years ago.

The details were shared by a team of forensic experts who investigated the nature of this IED recovered by the Jammu police. Forensic experts told Jammu Kashmir police that this IED was as powerful as the one which was used to carry out a terror strike on CRPF convoy in Lethpora of Pulwama.

'Our forces on the ground were vigilant'

A senior official of the Jammu and Kashmir Police on the condition of anonymity told Republic Media Network that a major tragedy has been averted as the extent of damage could have been way more than it was in Pulwama attack as the area, which was on the target of these terrorists, is a busy place with the footfall in thousands per day.

READ | WHO team discovers signs of wider COVID outbreak in Wuhan in December 2019, says reports

READ | No news in Manipur as journalists cease work protesting attack on news daily Poknapham

On Sunday, on the second anniversary of Pulwama Fidayeen attack, Jammu police arrested a terrorist -- Suhail of terror outfit Al Badar who was in a bid to carry out another major terror strike in Jammu. Upon his investigation, an Improvised Explosive Device was also recovered from the bus stand area which was scheduled to be triggered by Suhail before leaving for the Kashmir Valley to join Al Badar.

"The IED was made in such a manner that it will explode 15 minutes after activation, but was averted as our forces on the ground were vigilant enough to foil this plot of terrorists," the official added. In this case, three more terrorists have been arrested by the Jammu police from Kashmir as well as from Chandigarh. They all were part of this plan of Pakistans proxies in Kashmir Valley.

READ | After UP & MP, Gujarat govt to implement 'Love Jihad' law soon, says CM Vijay Rupani

READ | CEC Sunil Arora says, election officials on duty to be treated as frontline workers
Five reasons why a financial advisor can make a big difference to your small business

As a small business owner, accurate financial planning and strategic budgeting will help you spend your investments wisely. And spending wisely will help you achieve the growth you want for your company in the long run. Therefore, hiring a financial advisor can be invaluable. But many people have been misled when it comes to financial advisors. They may believe that advisors charge huge fees and may even have ruled out hiring one to save money  which is counterintuitive given the savings that financial advisors can achieve for you. Its especially easy to rule out hiring a financial advisor if you think you can manage your finances effectively alone. But this is unlikely. We dont fix our own electrical devices, make our own clothes, or build our own computers  yet many of us do take on our own finances.

Financial advisors have a wealth of experience and knowledge that the rest of us dont have. Thats why hiring a professional allows you peace of mind while you get the most out of your advisors knowledge and enjoy complete financial protection. If one things for certain, its the fact that hiring the right person will save you money. In fact, the International Longevity Centre (ILC) think-tank concludes that those who seek professional financial advice save an average of 40,000 in total, compared to those who dont take financial advice at all.

Here, private equity and distressed M&A investor Scott Dylan explores exactly what financial advisors do for their clients, why you need one for your small business, and how to choose the right finance professional for your business.

What Financial Advisors Do

The term financial advisor encompasses professionals who provide a range of financial services. Each of these professionals will have a different background and/or education that qualifies them to provide services in their financial niche.

All financial advisors do have one thing in common though. Theyre all there to help you make the most of your initial investment  a capital injection that you must spend wisely to kickstart your success journey. Financial advisors can analyse the viability of your business model and project how to best grow your business. Theyll highlight your risk exposure and cover scenarios you may not even have thought about.

There are two main types of financial advisor in the UK: independent and restricted. Independent financial advisors offer a full range of financial products and providers. They can recommend a range of investment products to meet your goals and should offer unbiased advice pertaining to all relevant firms in the market.

On the other hand, restricted financial advisors specialise in a small selection of products and providers. They only recommend certain products/providers and should clearly explain the nature of their restriction. For example, they may only work with one product provider or with a small number of product providers. Alternatively, the financial advisor may focus on one market, such as pensions, and only advise on products in the pensions sector.

Either way, all financial advisors must achieve at least a Level 4 national qualification and attain a Statement of Professional Standing (SPS) to certify them in the financial arena. A SPS is a code of ethics that shows a financial advisor has completed a minimum of 35 hours professional training each year. Advisors must renew their SPS every year, so check your advisors is up to date.

When looking at your options, its important to hire someone who offers the services you need. You should also be able to see yourself building a healthy working relationship with this person. They must be trustworthy, familiar with your industry, and understand your business financial needs. Plus, they should be regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), which protects clients against harm that can arise from poor conduct in the finance sector.

Why You Need a Financial Advisor

Knowing where to invest your funds is crucial when running a small business. Its easy to over- or under-spend if you dont have guidance from a professional. So, without further ado, here are Scotts five top reasons why you need a financial advisor.

1. Financial Advisors Help in Multiple Ways

Its a common misconception that financial advisors exist only to invest your money. Its true that this is one of their responsibilities, but they do so much more. Not only can a financial advisor help you to invest advantageously, but they can also help you with capital allocation, cost-cutting, and sales growth.

Not only can financial advisors offer key guidance when it comes to business acquisitions  whether youre selling or buying  but they can also:

Rebalance your investments  you might have a blend of cash , bonds, and mutual funds in your investment portfolio. But youll probably want to rebalance the ratios of these now and again to protect your wealth. A financial advisor will be able to advise you on how and when to adjust these ratios.

 you might have a blend of , bonds, and mutual funds in your investment portfolio. But youll probably want to rebalance the ratios of these now and again to protect your wealth. A financial advisor will be able to advise you on how and when to adjust these ratios. Tax planning  tax can be complicated, especially when it comes to understanding the tax laws that apply to your financial situation and identifying which investments will be taxed most heavily. A financial advisor will help you navigate which of your assets have the biggest tax implications, when taxes are due, and how much youll owe.

 tax can be complicated, especially when it comes to understanding the tax laws that apply to your financial situation and identifying which investments will be taxed most heavily. A financial advisor will help you navigate which of your assets have the biggest tax implications, when taxes are due, and how much youll owe. Estate planning  as you build your wealth, youll need to decide who will receive your estate. Your financial advisor can collaborate with an estate-planning solicitor to work out how to distribute your assets according to your wishes.

 as you build your wealth, youll need to decide who will receive your estate. Your financial advisor can collaborate with an estate-planning solicitor to work out how to distribute your assets according to your wishes. Long-term care planning  a financial advisor can help you learn how to protect your wealth should you ever require long-term medical care, which can quickly burn through your pension fund and other savings.

 a financial advisor can help you learn how to protect your wealth should you ever require long-term medical care, which can quickly burn through your pension fund and other savings. Spending strategies  when you retire, youll need to know which of your investments require annual minimum withdrawals and which income streams you should use first. A financial advisor can help you draw up a plan for where and when you should withdraw funds when you retire.

2. Financial Advisors Set You Up for the Long Run

Financial advisors can help you find the answers to the questions you dont want to get wrong. How much should you save for retirement? How should you adapt your investments portfolio over the upcoming years? How can you make up for lost time if you started investing later than you would have liked? Get these questions right, and youll be on track for financial success for years to come.

3. Financial Advisors Offer a Valuable External Perspective

Even if you have a solid understanding of finances yourself, its always best to get a second opinion. Doctors dont diagnose themselves. Dentists dont remove their own teeth. Hairstylists dont cut their own hair. Pretty much any expert seeks consultations from other professionals in their field. We all have blind spots when were personally invested in our businesses, projects, and plans. These blind spots can lead to huge mistakes in financial planning. Even the best need outside advice. No matter how strong your financial ability, an advisor with an outside perspective will be able to offer valuable assistance.

4. Selling Up? Financial Advisors Can Help You Close a Great Deal

If youre thinking about selling your business, choosing the right financial advisor can help you close a successful sale. Pick an inexperienced advisor, and you might not sell your business for as much as its worth. Therefore, its usually a good idea to opt for a business broker or corporate finance adviser. These financial advisors can help you with credible sales documents; researching, identifying, and vetting buyers; and negotiating a great sale on your behalf. When selling up, the cost of a financial advisor should soon pay for itself.

5. Financial Advisors Reassure You When Stocks Fall

Investments require continuous monitoring, and you may have to act quickly when the stock market takes a large drop. An economic crisis can leave you tearing your hair out, but a financial professional can advise you accordingly and give you peace of mind over how to protect your assets in any scenario. Theyll know when to leave your investments alone, when to rebalance, and when to liquidate.

How To Choose Your Financial Advisor

Its natural to feel unsure how to approach and choose a financial advisor, especially if youre not sure which questions to ask. These are some great questions to get you started.

Which financial services do you provide?

What are the smallest and biggest portfolios that youve worked on?

What is your pricing structure? Do you offer different services?

Tell me about your educational background. Which certifications do you have?

How long have you been a financial advisor?

Could you provide me with contact information for three client references?

How often would you evaluate my financial situation and update forecasts?

Arranging Appointments with Your Financial Advisor

Once youve chosen your financial advisor, youll arrange another appointment to discuss your financial situation and goals. During this appointment, your financial advisor will put together a plan to manage your finances effectively.

Scott recommends meeting your financial advisor at least twice a year to discuss your portfolio and any changes youd like to make. You should also meet your advisor whenever you find yourself in a situation that requires financial navigation.

Hiring a Financial Advisor

Its usually best to hire a financial advisor when you start building your companys wealth through investing. Keep in mind that when this time comes, the only person who can decide to seek financial assistance is you.

You can get in touch with Scott Dylans capital investment organisation Fresh Thinking Group to learn more about protecting your wealth and investing strategically to grow your business.

About Scott Dylan

Scott Dylan has channelled his impressive background in investments into his role as the managing partner of Fresh Thinking Group (FTG), which prides itself on financially revitalising companies.

As FTGs CEO and group partner, Scott helps start-ups, businesses looking to expand, and businesses in need of capital injections to streamline their finances, scale their outputs, and redefine their positions in digital and logistics markets. He has achieved significant results for each of FTGs acquisitions, which include Laundrapp, Cuhu, and GLB Transport, to name a few.

By Sumeet Manhas

 2021 Copyright Sumeet Manhas - All Rights Reserved

Disclaimer: The above is a matter of opinion provided for general information purposes only and is not intended as investment advice. Information and analysis above are derived from sources and utilising methods believed to be reliable, but we cannot accept responsibility for any losses you may incur as a result of this analysis. Individuals should consult with their personal financial advisors.

 2005-2019 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.




The Los Angeles Police Department is investigating the circulation of a photo depicting George Floyd, who was killed in the hands of Minneapolis police officers last year, with the words, "You Take my breath away," law enforcement officials said Saturday.

The incident was reported by an officer who made an internal complaint about an image of Floyd styled in a "Valentine-format" being "passed around" by officers, according to an internal memo signed by Capt. Jay Mastick posted on Twitter on Saturday and later confirmed by Chief Michel Moore.

Moore said that the officer who made the complaint will be interviewed on Monday and that the department is determined to find out exactly where and how the image was generated, "online or otherwise," and who may have been involved.

"Our investigation is to determine the accuracy of the allegations while also reinforcing our zero tolerance for anything with racist views," the chief told the Los Angeles Times on Saturday.

If the department confirms that officers were circulating the image, "people will find my wrath," Moore said.

Moore instructed "that supervision reinforce the need for professionalism on online behavior," and said messages with "inappropriate" content may result in discipline, according to the memo.

On Saturday night, the department said in a tweet that it had not yet identified "any postings in the workplace" or identified that it was an LAPD employee who created the image, but added that it has "directed commands to survey the worksites for it."

The LAPD did not immediately respond to a Washington Post request for comment.

Floyd died May 25 after he was handcuffed and pinned to the ground under the knee of Minneapolis Officer Derek Chauvin for more than eight minutes, after he repeatedly said, "I can't breathe."

The county medical examiner ruled Floyd's death a homicide caused by excessive use of force, as well as the presence of fentanyl and methamphetamine in his system, and underlying health conditions. And an independent autopsy determined that he died of "asphyxiation from sustained pressure," after being held down by his neck and back.

Floyd's death sparked a wave of outrage, unrest and protests in more than 100 cities nationwide, including Los Angeles, and led to a nationwide reckoning over racial injustice and systematic police brutality, prompting police departments across the country to address the issue and ensure more accountability for their forces.

In the days after Floyd's death in the summer, widespread protests in Los Angeles prompted a massive police response that included the use of foam bullets and arrests of peaceful protesters.

Moore then came under fire after he said looters were as responsible for Floyd's death as were the Minneapolis police officers, but he walked back his comments shortly after.

"While I did immediately correct myself, I recognize that my initial words were terribly offensive. Looting is wrong, but it is not the equivalent of murder and I did not mean to equate the two. I deeply regret and humbly apologize for my characterization," he wrote on Twitter.

Minneapolis is anticipating unrest and protests as the city prepares for Chauvin's trial and jury selection, set to begin March 8, with members of the National Guard set to be deployed to downtown Minneapolis and across the city.

Chauvin, 44, has been charged with second-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter, and he will be tried separately from the three other former officers charged in Floyd's death.


Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-14 22:28:05|Editor: huaxia

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TOKYO, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- More than 150 people were reported injured on Sunday after an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.3 hit northeastern Japan late Saturday night.

No deaths have occurred related to the quake that took place at 11:07 p.m. Saturday local time, logging Upper 6 on Japan's seismic intensity scale that peaks at 7 in parts of Fukushima and Miyagi prefectures, the government said.

Although no tsunami has accompanied the temblor, the quake has caused blackouts, water cuts and bullet train suspensions in stricken areas.

The quake was also felt in several other areas including the country's capital Tokyo.

Apart from Fukushima and Miyagi prefectures, injuries were also reported in six others, including Chiba, Kanagawa and Saitama, which all neighbor Tokyo.

According to Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc., water in a used nuclear fuel pool spilled over but has not leaked in the Fukushima Daiichi Power plant, which has suffered nuclear meltdowns in a massive earthquake and tsunami catastrophe that hit the region 10 years ago.

Other nuclear utilities have reported no irregularities so far.

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said at a meeting of Cabinet members that the government has received reports of many injuries but no deaths.

He urged people to stay alert, noting quakes with a seismic intensity scale of Upper 6 could happen over the next seven days or so.

"We want people to take action swiftly without letting their guard down by paying close attention to information provided by local authorities," said Suga.





Produced by Xinhua Global Service




Beautiful South Korean actress Song Hye Kyo is the new brand ambassador for the luxury fashion brand Fendi!

On February 15, a source from Fendi shared that Song Hye Kyo is the image that embodies great personalities such as finesse, strength, and confidence. She has the values that Fendi appreciates. We all know that the actress is no stranger to endorsing luxury fashion brands. Carrying different brands like the fine jewelry Chaumet, the model to Daniel Lee's Bottega Veneta luxury fashion, and the face of high-end Korean skincare line Sulwhasoo, the 39-year-old actress, is definitely the perfect image to represent their brands.

Now, Song Hye Kyo can add Fendi to the growing list of brands that she endorses. Congratulations again Song Hye Kyo! This is a partnership that we're all looking forward to!

Song Hye Kyo Graces the March issue of Harper's Bazaar in collaboration with FENDI

The actress will also grace the March issue of Harper's Bazaar Korea and showcases her unique qualities through a pictorial done in partnership with Fendi. Song Hye Kyo sat down with a quick interview with the magazine and showcased her independent yet stable attitude.

The actress shared that when she works abroad with respectable directors and actors, things may look lavish on the outside. However, it is not quite easy working with a different culture with imperfect language skills. Song Hye Kyo added that she does her job because she wants to and not because someone pushed her or forced her to do it. That is why she thinks he takes on a good path. Though she has many experiences as a model and actress, she thinks that she still lacks a lot, and acting is even harder the more she does it.

Song Hye Kyo explained that as she ages and ventures on more mature roles, she is aware that more expectations come with it. The actress continued that she used to thinks that acting would get easier as she ages; during that time, she was still very confident. But as time goes by, it gets even harder and harder, and she realized that she still has a long way to go.

Song Hye Kyo's Previous Works as an actress

South Korean actress Song Hye Kyo was born on November 22, 1981. The 39-year-old actress has gained worldwide recognition for portraying leading roles in hit television dramas such as television dramas Autumn in My Heart (2000), All In (2003), Full House (2004), That Winter, the Wind Blows (2013), Descendants of the Sun (2016), and Encounter (2018). She also graces the big screen through films, namely Hwang Jin Yi (2007), The Grandmaster (2013), My Brilliant Life (2014), and The Queens (2015).

The actress ranked 7th in Forbes magazine's Korea Power Celebrity list in 2017 and ranked 6th the following year (2018). Her successful television dramas that became a massive hit internationally established her as a top Hallyu star.

KDramastars owns this article.

Written By Liza Parker
It was tens of miles wide and forever changed history when it crashed into Earth about 66 million years ago.

The Chicxulub impactor, as it's known, left behind a crater off the coast of Mexico that spans 93 miles and goes 12 miles deep. Its devastating impact brought the reign of the dinosaurs to an abrupt and calamitous end by triggering their sudden mass extinction, along with the end of almost three-quarters of the plant and animal species then living on Earth.

The enduring puzzle has always been where the asteroid or comet that set off the destruction originated, and how it came to strike the Earth. And now a pair of Harvard researchers believe they have the answer.

In a study published in Scientific Reports, Avi Loeb, Frank B. Baird Jr. Professor of Science at Harvard, and Amir Siraj '21, an astrophysics concentrator, put forth a new theory that could explain the origin and journey of this catastrophic object and others like it.

Using statistical analysis and gravitational simulations, Loeb and Siraj show that a significant fraction of a type of comet originating from the Oort cloud, a sphere of debris at the edge of the solar system, was bumped off-course by Jupiter's gravitational field during its orbit and sent close to the sun, whose tidal force broke apart pieces of the rock. That increases the rate of comets like Chicxulub (pronounced Chicks-uh-lub) because these fragments cross the Earth's orbit and hit the planet once every 250 to 730 million years or so.

"Basically, Jupiter acts as a kind of pinball machine," said Siraj, who is also co-president of Harvard Students for the Exploration and Development of Space and is pursuing a master's degree at the New England Conservatory of Music. "Jupiter kicks these incoming long-period comets into orbits that bring them very close to the sun."

It's because of this that long-period comets, which take more than 200 years to orbit the sun, are called sun grazers, he said.

"When you have these sun grazers, it's not so much the melting that goes on, which is a pretty small fraction relative to the total mass, but the comet is so close to the sun that the part that's closer to the sun feels a stronger gravitational pull than the part that is farther from the sun, causing a tidal force" he said. "You get what's called a tidal disruption event and so these large comets that come really close to the sun break up into smaller comets. And basically, on their way out, there's a statistical chance that these smaller comets hit the Earth."

The calculations from Loeb and Siraj's theory increase the chances of long-period comets impacting Earth by a factor of about 10, and show that about 20 percent of long-period comets become sun grazers. That finding falls in line with research from other astronomers.

The pair claim that their new rate of impact is consistent with the age of Chicxulub, providing a satisfactory explanation for its origin and other impactors like it.

"Our paper provides a basis for explaining the occurrence of this event," Loeb said. "We are suggesting that, in fact, if you break up an object as it comes close to the sun, it could give rise to the appropriate event rate and also the kind of impact that killed the dinosaurs."

Loeb and Siraj's hypothesis might also explain the makeup of many of these impactors.

"Our hypothesis predicts that other Chicxulub-size craters on Earth are more likely to correspond to an impactor with a primitive (carbonaceous chondrite) composition than expected from the conventional main-belt asteroids," the researchers wrote in the paper.

This is important because a popular theory on the origin of Chicxulub claims the impactor is a fragment of a much larger asteroid that came from the main belt, which is an asteroid population between the orbit of Jupiter and Mars. Only about a tenth of all main-belt asteroids have a composition of carbonaceous chondrite, while it's assumed most long-period comets have it. Evidence found at the Chicxulub crater and other similar craters that suggests they had carbonaceous chondrite.

This includes an object that hit about 2 billion years ago and left the Vredefort crater in South Africa, which is the largest confirmed crater in Earth's history, and the impactor that left the Zhamanshin crater in Kazakhstan, which is the largest confirmed crater within the last million years.

The researchers say that composition evidence supports their model and that the years the objects hit support both their calculations on impact rates of Chicxulub-sized tidally disrupted comets and for smaller ones like the impactor that made the Zhamanshin crater. If produced the same way, they say those would strike Earth once every 250,000 to 730,000 years.

Loeb and Siraj say their hypothesis can be tested by further studying these craters, others like them, and even ones on the surface of the moon to determine the composition of the impactors. Space missions sampling comets can also help.

Aside from composition of comets, the new Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile may be able to see the tidal disruption of long-period comets after it becomes operational next year.

"We should see smaller fragments coming to Earth more frequently from the Oort cloud," Loeb said. "I hope that we can test the theory by having more data on long-period comets, get better statistics, and perhaps see evidence for some fragments."

Loeb said understanding this is not just crucial to solving a mystery of Earth's history but could prove pivotal if such an event were to threaten the planet again.

"It must have been an amazing sight, but we don't want to see that side," he said.

###
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PHOENIX, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- This spring, Best Western Hotels & Resorts is rewarding Best Western Rewards (BWR) members with a $25 Best Western Gift Card each night they stay at a Best Western-branded hotel from now through May 9, 2021 (Limit 4 gift cards). Building off of BWR's tagline "Because We Care About Rewarding You," this promotion is the latest example of the brand's ongoing commitment to caring for guests and supporting them through the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Caring for our guests has always been at the core of everything we do at Best Western Hotels & Resorts, and this caring spirit continues to inspire our BWR perks as well," said Dorothy Dowling, Best Western Hotels & Resorts Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer. "As the world begins to heal and more travelers set their sights on a much-needed getaway, we look forward to welcoming them with a clean and safe stay, and this exciting offer which delivers superior savings."

This BWR promotion comes on the heels of the program's 50 percent reduction to its Elite Status eligibility requirements - another way Best Western is showing travelers they care about providing valuable rewards. With this change, travelers can earn Elite Status with just five nights, three stays or 5,000 points. Additionally, the reduction in thresholds applies to each BWR Elite Status tier  making it easier than ever for guests to climb the loyalty ladder.

Also inspired by the brand's caring spirit, Best Western was the first in the industry to extend loyalty status to its BWR members whose travel plans have been greatly impacted by travel restrictions and cancellations resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, the company launched an industry-leading cleaning program, We Care CleanSM, which delivers an enhanced commitment to keeping guests safe and healthy when staying at Best Western-branded hotels across North America.

Best Western Hotels & Resorts has transformed into a vibrant hospitality company with 18 distinct brand offerings across every market segment from economy to luxury. In recent years, the company has revitalized its properties across North America as owners invested a staggering $2 billion in property improvements and renovations. Best Western's commitment to innovation and improvement has enabled the company to achieve record RevPAR Index, unrivaled industry recognition and unprecedented guest satisfaction.

For more information on BWR or to sign up, please visit bestwesternrewards.com. Visit travelcard.bestwestern.com for complete Best Western Travel Card terms and conditions.

About Best Western Hotels & Resorts:

Best Western Hotels & Resorts headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona, is a privately held hotel brand within the BWH Hotel GroupSM global network. With 18 brands and approximately 4,700 hotels in over 100 countries and territories worldwide*, BWH Hotel Group suits the needs of developers and guests in every market. Brands include Best Western, Best Western Plus, Best Western Premier, Executive Residency by Best Western, Vib, GLo, Aiden, Sadie, BW Premier Collection and BW Signature Collection. Through acquisition, WorldHotelsTM Luxury, WorldHotels Elite, WorldHotels Distinctive and WorldHotels Crafted collections are also offered. Completing the portfolio is SureStay, SureStay Plus, SureStay Collection and SureStay StudioSM franchises**. For more information visit www.bestwestern.com, www.bestwesterndevelopers.com, www.worldhotels.com and www.surestay.com.

* Numbers are approximate, may fluctuate, and include hotels currently in the development pipeline.

**All Best Western, WorldHotels and SureStay branded hotels are independently owned and operated.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Courtney McCurry

Communications Manager

602.957.5639

[email protected]

SOURCE Best Western Hotels & Resorts
A World Health Organization (WHO) team sent to Wuhan to investigate the origins of the coronavirus pandemic has sent out mixed signals regarding the transparency of the probe, Chinese commentators said on .



"It's pretty clear that different things were being said when [the WHO team was] in China and after it had left China," Wuhan-based campaigner Zhang Hai, who lost his father in the early days in the COVID-19 pandemic, told RFA.

"This means that the experts would have had a lot of worries about speaking out when they were still in China, because they would have been under enormous pressure."



"I saw the reports that officials didn't want to hand over detailed information on the early cases," he said.



According to Dominic Dwyer, an Australian member of the WHO team, China refused to hand over raw data on early COVID-19 cases, making it harder to figure out how the outbreak began.



Raw patient data on 174 early cases from , known as "line listings," was unavailable, with a summary provided instead, Dwyer told Reuters on .



"Why that doesn't happen, I couldn't comment," Dwyer said. "Whether it's political or time or it's difficult ... one would only speculate."



Zhang said the omission had left doubts in his mind, too.



"It makes you think, they may have allowed the WHO team to go to Wuhan in search of the origins of the virus, but why didn't they want to give them this data?"



Transparency concerns

International concerns are growing over the level of transparency afforded the 14-member WHO team during their visit, which spanned 27 days in January and .



White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on that Washington had deep concerns about the way in which the early findings of the COVID-19 investigation were communicated and questions about the process used to reach them.



It is imperative that this report be independent, with expert findings free from intervention or alteration by the Chinese government," he said.



"To better understand this pandemic and prepare for the next one, China must make available its data from the earliest days of the outbreak." Sullivan's statement said.



Retired Guizhou University professor Yang Shaozheng agreed.



"They have a duty to provide this data," Yang said. "Doing so will enable different experts from different countries to cooperate and continue this work."



But Beijing said Sullivan's comments had done "grave damage" to international cooperation on COVID-19, accusing the U.S. of "pointing fingers at other countries."



Peter Daszak, a member of the WHO team with ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, tweeted that the team had worked "flat out under the most politically charged environment possible."



Cosmetic exercise?

He has also said in media interviews that the team was given access to crucial fresh evidence about the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19, and not denied access to any key sites during the research trip.



Daszak was tweeting in response to an article quoting State Department spokesman Ned Price as saying that the White House shared concerns about transparency, and said "U.S. intel" shouldn't be relied upon.



"I think the jury's still out," Price was quoted as saying when asked if ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials had been open and transparent with the WHO team.



A Hubei-based scholar surnamed Ding said the trip was likely more of a cosmetic exercise than a genuine attempt to discover the truth about the early days of the pandemic.



"This so-called investigation is just a way for the WHO to endorse the CCP," Ding said. "We have seen that China provided U.S.$50 million in financial assistance to the WHO before [the trip], and pledged another U.S.$20 million a year for the next two years."



"They were just going along with the whole charade."



The WHO experts have agreed that the virus likely jumped from bats to an unknown animal species, before being transmitted to humans.



They have also said that it was "extremely unlikely" that the virus came from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which has been at the center of international speculation around the origins of the pandemic.



For its part, China has sought to direct the narrative away from Wuhan as the originating point of the virus, calling for a probe into imported frozen food and a possible U.S. origin for the pandemic.



WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has said that all hypotheses remain open about the origins of COVID-19, while Washington has requested that its experts be allowed to review data from the mission.



Reported by Qiao Long for RFA's Mandarin Service, and by the Cantonese Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
COVID-19 vaccination in India (Representative Image: Reuters)

Rajasthan Health Minister Raghu Sharma said the second dose of the coronavirus vaccine will be administered in the state from today.

Sharma said an action plan has been prepared for the vaccination. Under this, those beneficiaries who were given the first dose of the vaccine on January 16, will be administered the second dose.

In addition to this, beneficiaries of the Social Justice and Empowerment and the Agriculture departments will be administered the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine, he said in a statement.

The second dose is given to a beneficiary 28 days after the first.

The Health Minister said all those health workers and frontline workers will be vaccinated this week who have not been administered the first dose of the vaccine. He said a big vaccination session will be organized for such 8 per cent health workers and 20 per cent frontline workers.

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

Sharma directed the officers to ensure vaccination of all the beneficiaries coming to the session site. He said it should be ensured that the list of all health workers and frontline workers is ready by Tuesday.

He said those beneficiaries, who were given the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine on January 18, will be given the next dose on February 17. School teachers will be prominently included, the minister said.

The Health Minister said directions have been given to administer the first dose of the vaccine to all the remaining healthcare workers and frontline workers by February 19.
London, Feb 15 : Another 10,972 people in Britain have tested positive for Covid-19, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 4,038,078, according to official figures released.

The country also reported another 258 coronavirus-related deaths. The total number of coronavirus-related deaths in Britain now stands at 117,166. These figures only include the deaths of people who died within 28 days of their first positive test, Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday.

Meanwhile, more than 15 million people of the most vulnerable groups in Britain have received a first dose of a coronavirus jab, according to the latest official figures.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson described the latest development of the country's vaccine rollout as an "extraordinary feat".

"In England, I can tell you we have now offered jabs to everyone in the first four priority groups, the people most likely to be severely ill from coronavirus, hitting the first target we set ourselves," said Johnson in a video posted on Twitter.

The vaccines had been "delivered by the most extraordinary army of vaccinators who have jabbed like there's no tomorrow", Johnson said.

Also on Sunday, Vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi tweeted that the government would "not rest" until the vaccine was offered to all over-50s by the end of April. Britain aims to offer all adults their first dose by autumn.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out coronavirus vaccines.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Marine le Pen could win France's next presidential election, a senior member of Emmanuel Macron's cabinet has admitted.

Bruno Le Maire, the French finance minister, warned that victory for the far-right leader in next year's poll is a 'political possibility' that must be 'opposed'.

Throwing his weight behind Emmanuel Macron, Le Maire warned of a 'difficult' election campaign in a country that is 'crossed by movements of anger, of doubt which are very deep.'

Polls have revealed that Macron (left) is most-likely to face off against Le Pen (right) in next year's presidential election, with her support at record levels

Speaking to France's BFM TV on Saturday, he said: 'The election of Marine Le Pen, as we all know, is a political possibility. It must be fought.

'Fought with ideas, convictions, results, with men and women who are committed.

'I hope that in this fight against Marine Le Pen, our ideas will prevail. It is in the field of ideas that we must go, in the field of what we want for France, of the European construction.

'In 2022, I would like Emmanuel Macron to be a candidate for the election, for presidency of the Republic, and I will be at his side to ensure that he is re-elected.'

Le Marie spoke out after polls taken ahead of the first round of voting, due in April next year, showed support for Le Pen at record levels.

An average of polling data showed support for Le Pen at 26 per cent, narrowly ahead of Macron on 24 per cent.

France's election system works on an elimination basis - with candidates receiving the lowest number of ballots knocked out of the competition and their votes redistributed among those still left in the race.

Macron is expected to receive a larger share of those votes than Le Pen, meaning he remains ahead in second round voting - but only by a very slim margin.

French far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen looked bewildered during a debate this week as she was accused by a Macron ally of being 'too soft' on Islam

Bruno Le Maire, the French finance minister, has warned that victory for Marine Le Pen in next year's presidential election is a 'political possibility' that must be 'fought'

An Ipsos poll put Macron at 56 per cent compared to Le Pen's 44 per cent, while a Harris poll had the gap even narrower - 52 to 48 - which is within the margin of error and puts Le Pen within touching distance of victory.

Sensing pressure from the right, Macron's party has radically shifted its stance on immigration and Islamism in recent months to adopt a much tougher line.

During a TV debate with Le Pen last week, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin even went so far as to accuse Le Pen of being 'soft on Islam' - a statement which left her visibly stunned.

Darmanin said her efforts to rebrand the National Rally party had led to a watering down of her hardline position that would 'disappoint' her base.

Le Pen responded by defending the rights of Muslims to practice and confirmed she 'does not intend to attack Islam, which is a religion like any other'.

It comes after a series of terror attacks on France in 2020, including the beheading of a teacher at a school near Paris and stabbings at a cathedral in Nice.

Teacher Samuel Paty was killed in October last year after showing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed to his class, sparking a furious backlash from Muslim parents.

Three weeks later, knifeman Brahim Aioussaoi stabbed three people to death at a cathedral in Nice in a copycat attack.

The attack came amid widespread anger and protests in Islamic countries after Macron defended the Mohammed cartoons. He later called Islam 'a religion in crisis.'
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 18:40:21|Editor: huaxia

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Xi Jinping (R), general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the CPC Central Military Commission, visits the family of Tang Rongbin, an impoverished villager in the Luotuowan Village of Longquanguan Township, Fuping County, north China's Hebei Province. Xi made a tour to impoverished villages in Fuping County from Dec. 29 to 30, 2012. (Xinhua/Lan Hongguang)

BEIJING, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- An article by Xi Jinping on the poverty alleviation work during his visit to Fuping County of north China's Hebei Province will be published Tuesday in this year's fourth issue of the Qiushi Journal.

The article is a transcript of a speech by Xi, general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission.

It is the essential requirement of socialism to eradicate poverty, improve the people's livelihood and achieve common prosperity, the article says.

With regard to completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, the hardest and most arduous tasks lie in the rural areas and the poverty-stricken regions in particular, the article adds.

The article stresses helping people in difficulties, especially those in the old revolutionary base areas and poverty-stricken areas, to break away from poverty.

Underscoring the importance of Party organizations in poverty alleviation work, the article says they should become the backbone leading villagers to shake off poverty and strive for a better life.

The fundamental purpose of the Party is to serve the people, the article says, adding that cadres at all levels should often ask themselves whether they have been wholeheartedly working for the people. 
[February 15, 2021] IGEL to Receive Growth Investment from TA Associates

IGEL, provider of the next-gen edge OS for cloud workspaces, today announced that TA Associates ("TA"), a leading global growth private equity firm, has signed a definitive agreement to make a majority investment in the company. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005060/en/ TA joins existing IGEL investor C. Melchers GmbH & Co. KG ("Melchers"), which has been IGEL's primary investor since its founding in 2001 and will maintain a significant equity interest in the company. After handing over the position of IGEL CEO to Jed Ayres last year, founder and former CEO of IGEL Heiko Gloge also remains as a minority stake holder and board member. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. IGEL also announced that Bill Veghte (News - Alert) will join the IGEL Board as Executive Chairman. Veghte has decades of experience developing operating systems and bringing industry-leading technologies to market as a senior leader at Microsoft and HP, as a board member for a wide variety of companies including Xero, and as the founder of Athene Partners. "With his network and his extensive knowledge of the industry, Bill will contribute to expanding and deepening the strong relationships that IGEL has built with technology partners," said Gloge. "IGEL is the market-leading edge operating system, delivering simplicity with manageability, security, and the flexibility that delivers a richness of experience at a time when customers need these capabilities more than ever before," said Veghte. "I am pleased to be joining the IGEL Board at such a transformational time for the company and the industry, and to be supporting Jed and the team in accelerating IGEL's growth." In addition to the naming of Veghte as IGEL Executive Chairman, Jonathan Meeks, Managing Director, TA Associates, and Stefan Dandl, Principal, TA Associates, will be added to the IGEL board. They will join existing IGEL board members Heiko Gloge, Managing Partner, and Nicolas Helms, Melchers Managing Partner. Together with Ayres and the leadership team, they plan to accelerate the company's growth globally through increased operational and development bandwidth and significant go-to-market investments, including the further activation of channel partners, to ensure the wide-spread adoption of IGEL OS across increasingly remote and distributed end-user device estates. IGEL has been on an expansive trajectory with triple-digit growth over the past five years in billings, margin and units. For the year ended December 31, 2020, IGEL increased revenues from recurring software products and services by over 150% year-over-year worldwide, supported by IGEL's growing channel partner ecosystem. Today, IGEL OS is operating on more than 4 million edge devices and counting. "The world's digital workers have gone remote and we believe this new paradigm is here to stay. IGEL is at the center of this EUC revolution with solutions that meet the need for secure, simple to manage and cost-effective cloud workspaces," said Ayres. "With new backing by TA and the experience of Bill to guide us, we believe that we have the resource depth needed to not only capitalize on this exploding global market need but also innovate quickly to remain strategically positioned for the future of edge computing." With the widespread shift to remote work and hybrid work scenarios,the EUC market is in transition, with increasing investments in virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and cloud workspaces. IGEL is a key enabler of this movement, providing the next-gen OS for cloud workspaces that reduces hardware costs and operating expenses with a more secure endpoint management and control platform for nearly any x86 device.



"We believe IGEL is setting the benchmark for the new era of computing on the endpoint, and is primed to drive rapid and sustainable organic growth," said Meeks. "With strong market leadership and a solid history of innovation and execution, IGEL is uniquely positioned to fulfill the ubiquitous need for secure, manageable cloud workspaces to support remote workers from anywhere. TA is pleased to be partnering with IGEL on this journey." "IGEL was founded based on a vision to help customers realize the benefits of a more secure, manageable and productive edge device infrastructure," said Gloge. "Today, we are delivering on this vision with both passion and prowess."

"After supporting IGEL since its founding in 2001 as principal investor, we are excited by the opportunities presented with TAs investment in IGEL," Helms stated. "We expect that the partnership with TA will provide IGEL with the experience, market access and resources to help propel IGEL through the next phase of growth." IGEL on Social Media Twitter (News - Alert) : www.twitter.com/IGEL_Technology

LinkedIn (News - Alert) : www.linkedin.com/company/igel-technology

YouTube (News - Alert) : www.youtube.com/user/IGELTechnologyTV

IGEL Community: www.igel.com/community About IGEL IGEL provides the next-gen edge OS for cloud workspaces. The company's world-leading software products include IGEL OS, IGEL UD Pocket ( UDP (News - Alert) ) and IGEL Universal Management Suite (UMS). These solutions comprise a more secure, manageable and cost-effective endpoint management and control platform across nearly any x86 device. Easily acquired via just two feature-rich software offerings - Workspace Edition and Enterprise Management Pack - IGEL software presents outstanding value per investment. Additionally, IGEL's German engineered endpoint solutions deliver the industry's best hardware warranty (5 years), software maintenance (3 years after end of life) and management functionality. IGEL enables enterprises to save vast amounts of money by extending the useful life of their existing endpoint devices while precisely controlling all devices running IGEL OS from a single dashboard interface. IGEL has offices worldwide and is represented by partners in over 50 countries. For more information on IGEL, visit www.igel.com. About TA Associates TA Associates is a leading global growth private equity firm. Focused on targeted sectors within five industries - technology, healthcare, financial services, consumer and business services - TA invests in profitable, growing companies with opportunities for sustained growth, and has invested in more than 500 companies around the world. Investing as either a majority or minority investor, TA employs a long-term approach, utilizing its strategic resources to help management teams build lasting value in high quality growth companies. TA has raised $33.5 billion in capital since its founding in 1968 and is committing to new investments at the pace of over $3 billion per year. The firm's more than 100 investment professionals are based in Boston, Menlo Park, London, Mumbai and Hong Kong. More information about TA Associates can be found at www.ta.com. About C. Melchers GmbH & Co. KG Headquartered in Bremen, C. Melchers & Co. has been a private, owner-managed partnership since 1806. Melchers is one of the leading service providers for all those companies seeking to gain a foothold on the markets of the future. Their know-how and infrastructures have grown in the course of two centuries and today comprise a wide range of services and trading know-how in diverse areas of business. Their network of more than 50 subsidiaries in Germany and abroad with a focus on Asia makes Melchers a powerful, dependable partner for market expansion services. More information on Melchers can be found at www.melchers.com. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005060/en/

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The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on Friday ended flat while the National Stock Exchange (NSE) closed in the red. The indices on Monday, February 15 are expected to open on a higher note as the SGX Nifty was trading 74.50 points or 0.49 percent up at 15,232.50 at 7:00 am. On February 12, the BSE Sensex was up 12.78 points or 0.025 percent to close at 51,544.30. Whereas, the NSE Nifty fell 10.00 points or 0.066 percent to settle the day at 15,163.30.

Top stocks to look for the day are:

Glenmark Pharmaceuticals: The company reported a 30.01 percent rise in its consolidated net profit to Rs 248 crore for the quarter ended December 2020 against Rs 191 crore for the corresponding period of the previous fiscal. The consolidated revenue of the company stood at Rs 2,787 crore in Q3FY21 compared to Rs 2,735.5 crore for the same period a year ago.

Bharti Airtel: The Companys board members will meet on February 17 to discuss the future strategic plans and reorganisation of the shareholding framework of the subsidiary companies.

GMR Infrastructure: The company said that its consolidated loss for the quarter ended December 31 has widened to Rs 1,120.51 crore compared to Rs 280.74 crore during the October-December period in FY20. Revenue from the Airports segment was also down to Rs 816.19 crore during the quarter.

Tata Motors: Marc Llistosella has been appointed as the Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of the company effective from July 1, 2021.

Hindustan Aeronautics: The company reported 85.3 percent jump in its consolidated profit to Rs 853.46 crore and 21.8 percent rise in its revenue from operations which stood at Rs 5,425.46 crore in Q3 FY21 over on yearly basis.

ONGC: The company's December Quarter net profit fell 52.1 percent to Rs 1,378 crore from Rs 2,878 crore. The revenue of the company also declined to Rs 17,023.8 crore from Rs 17,148 crore on a quarterly basis.

Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders: The company reported a consolidated profit of Rs 141.4 crore in Q3 FY21 compared to Rs 208.7 crore in the same period a year ago. The revenue of the company also fell to Rs 1,461.1 crore from Rs 1,810.9 crore.

Vodafone Idea: The company reported a consolidated loss of Rs 4,532.1 crore in the December Quarter against Rs 6,438.8 crore on yearly basis.

Indiabulls Housing Finance: The company reported a profit of Rs 329 crore in the December Quarter against Rs 273 crore in Q3 FY20. The net interest income of the company rose to Rs 809 crore from Rs 731 crore.

Siemens: The company reported a consolidated profit of Rs 295.5 crore in December quarter 2020 compared to Rs 265.8 crore in December quarter 2019. The revenue of the company rose to Rs 2,925.5 crore against Rs 2,537 crore.

Deepak Nitrite: The company reported a consolidated profit of Rs 216.56 crore in Q3 FY21 against Rs 156.71 crore in the same period a year ago. The revenue of the company also rose to Rs 1,234.7 crore against Rs 1,119.86 crore.

Quarterly Results: Jet Airways, Alora Trading Company, Advance Syntex, CDG Petchem, JIK Industries, Kerala Ayurveda, PG Foils, Archana Software, etc will announce their quarterly earnings on February 15.

Nicosia [Cyprus], February 15 (ANI): Joe Biden's US Secretary of State Antony Blinken last Friday, recognizing the dire humanitarian situation in Yemen, announced the reversal of former President Trump's designation of Ansarallah (the Houthis Movement) as a foreign terrorist organisation and specially designated global terrorist group. The decision comes into effect on 16 February.

Two weeks before stepping down, President Trump, designated Houthis as a terrorist group, disregarding the fact such a decision could lead to the death of thousands of starving Yemenis. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had stressed a few days earlier that was "in immediate danger of the worst famine the world has seen for decades."

Many humanitarian organisations, such as "Save the Children" had made it clear that the decision would be catastrophic for countless children and their families in Aid organisations argued that they have no choice but to deal with the Houthis, who are the de facto government in 80 per cent of Yemen, and that the designation would put them at risk of prosecution in the United States. Trump's decision already has had a chilling effect on humanitarian workers and importers of food, who would be risking prosecution if their goods fall into Houthis hands.

Announcing the reversal of the designation, Antony Blinken said: "We have listened to warnings from the United Nations, humanitarian groups, and bipartisan members of Congress, among others, that the designations could have a devastating impact on Yemenis' access to basic commodities like food and fuel...By focusing on alleviating the humanitarian situation in Yemen, we hope the Yemeni parties can also focus on engaging in dialogue."

The new US administration made it clear that, although Ansarallah was removed from the terror blacklist, three of the movement's key leaders would remain under sanction. Furthermore, it stressed that it does not forget Ansarallah's "malign actions and aggression, its crimes and repression of the people of and the attacks against US partners in the Gulf."

Earlier in the week, President announced that the US would end its support for the Saudi-backed offensive operations in Yemen, including a freeze on arms sales to the Kingdom, but stressed that the US would continue to support the Kingdom, as it continues to face attacks on its soil.

It should be noted that, although the Houthis welcomed the approach of the new US administration and said that they were cautiously optimistic, they warned that they will not stop firing their missiles until there is a ceasefire. "They started the war and they are the ones who should end it," their official spokesman said. Just days before the announcement of the removal of the designation as terrorists, the Houthis launched drone attacks on the Abha Airport and the King Khalid Airport in Riyadh and resumed an offensive against the Yemeni city of Marib.

The internationally recognised government of Yemen, which is backed by Saudi Arabia and controls about 20 per cent of Yemen's territory, welcomed Biden's statements, stressing the importance of supporting diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis.

For its part, Saudi Arabia said it welcomed Biden's "commitment to cooperate with the Kingdom to defend its sovereignty and counter threats against it."

It is fortunate that the misguided decision of Donald Trump was lifted before it could have a widespread effect. It could not really harm Ansarallah's military leaders, who continue to receive all kinds of support from Iran, but could have been disastrous for food and fuel importers as well as on aid workers in Yemen.

Antony Blinken had realised this, and pointed out that his concern about Trump's designation was that "at least on its surface it seems to achieve nothing particularly practical in advancing the efforts against the Houthis and to bring them back to the negotiating table, while making it even more difficult to provide humanitarian assistance to people who desperately need it."

Obviously, the Biden Administration should think hard about the effectiveness of sanctions and designation of terrorists, because as a rule, they do not have the desired results.

Sarah Leah Whitson, Executive Director of Democracy for the Arab World, says that "like the economic sanctions and terrorist designations applied to Iran, Venezuela and Cuba and entities within them, the State Department's designation of Ansarallah has nothing to do with an impartial assessment of the facts on the ground or merits of such a policy. Instead, it has been deployed as an economic tool of warfare against international nemeses in the hopes that they will say uncle to US demands and give up power. Every one of these targeted governments remains in power, while the sanctions against them have only harmed ordinary people who have little to no say in what their governments do or do not do."

There is no doubt that Biden's decision to revoke the Houthis' designation has prevented the acceleration of the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen, but the situation of famine in Yemen, the poorest Arab country, with about 30 million people, continues to be critical.

As David Miliband, President of the International Rescue Committee, points out "the designation of Ansarallah would have done nothing to tackle terrorism and everything to make humanitarian aid and commercial traffic impossible. The next steps are to raise aid flows, negotiate a permanent ceasefire, and get the diplomatic process moving to establish a sustainable political settlement.

(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.)
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, Fla., on Oct. 7, 2019. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Rep. Matt Gaetz Suggests Idea of Gov. DeSantis Running for President

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), an outspoken supporter of former President Donald Trump, suggested that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis could be a viable Republican candidate for president in 2024.

He is a strong potential presidential candidate in 2024, Gaetz said Feb. 14 on Fox News. The Biden team knows that, and so theyre trying to somehow cast aspersions on the Florida experience because you know what, throughout America, theres a lot of Florida envy right now.

He was referring to DeSantiss orders to keep Florida open during the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus pandemic and reports that the White House may be considering placing travel restrictions on the state. The Epoch Times has reached out to the White House for comment.

People see Florida businesses are opening and unemployment is dropping, and home buying is increasing, Gaetz said. That type of prosperity is attractive to people who are having to endure a lockdown in other parts of America.

DeSantis on Feb. 14 praised his states response to the virus and responded to reports of the White Houses travel restrictions.

One, it would be unconstitutional, it would be a political attack against Florida.  We also have 26 other states and the District of Columbia that have higher per-capita COVID mortality than we do. We have 28 states that have higher per-capita cases that we do, DeSantis told Fox Business.

Theres no basis in medical, no basis in economics, theres no basis in reality to do this except to punish a state who is doing it better than what his experts have recommended.

DeSantis hasnt said whether he would run for president.
Jaguar Land Rover bosses have outlined the car maker's future plans, including the intention for Jaguar to be an 'all-electric luxury brand' to rival Tesla from 2025.

The move will see Jaguar completely axe the petrol engines that made its name within the next four years.

Land Rover will also launch six new pure electric models in the next five years and every car in its range will have an electric option by 2030.

New JLR CEO Thierry Bollore made the announcement on Monday, with the new 'Reimagine' strategy also committing to retaining its production facilities in the UK.

Jaguar to be a direct Tesla rival from 2025: The British marque will be an all-electric car maker in 2025 as part of the UK's biggest car maker's wider plans to shift to battery-powered vehicles announced this morning by new French boss, Thierry Bollore (right)

At the same time, he said that Land Rover will phase out diesel engines from 2026 and invest more heavily in hydrogen fuel cell technology.

Jaguar Land Rover is one of the car makers hit hardest by the downturn in demand for diesel vehicles in recent years.

Its range of models across both brands relied heavily on diesel engines, which have seen sales tumble in the years since the VW emissions cheating scandal rattled the industry in 2015.

Ballore, the brand's new French boss, was drafted into JLR last July having been ousted from Renault after less than a year in the top job. He took over from Carlos Ghosn  who last year famously fled from Japan to the Lebanon in a spectacular escape to evade criminal corruption charges there.

Bollore said the aim of the Reimagine strategy will not only revive the fortunes of JLR - owned by the Indian Tata Motors group - but will steer it on course to becoming a net zero carbon businesses by 2039.

The headline announcement is the dramatic shift for Jaguar, which is to be reimagined as an all-electric luxury brand by 2025.

The statement said: 'By the middle of the decade, Jaguar will have undergone a renaissance to emerge as a pure-electric luxury brand with a dramatically beautiful new portfolio of emotionally engaging designs and pioneering next-generation technologies.

'Jaguar will exist to make life extraordinary by creating dramatically beautiful automotive experiences that leave its customers feeling unique and rewarded.'

This will pit the iconic British maker directly against Tesla, which currently has a stronghold on the premium EV market.

Jaguar Land Rover will phase out diesel engines from 2026 and invest more heavily in hydrogen fuel cell technology, bosses said on Monday

Jaguar will be a 'pure-electric luxury brand' from 2025 while Land Rover's switch to EVs will take place later

Ironically, Jaguar's reliance on diesel over the past decade only came after the firm had lost out initially to rivals such as BMW and Mercedes the early 2000s shift away from petrol engines.

For many years Jaguar was famous for its smooth and powerful inline six cylinder and V8 petrol engines, but its XF and XE saloons can now only be ordered with either a four cylinder petrol engine or mild hybrid diesel engine.

Currently, Jaguar sells just one fully-electric model - the i-Pace SUV launched in 2018. Prices start from 65,195.

One model that definitely won't be pitched against Tesla's Model S is an all-electric XJ limousine.

JLR's statement has confirmed that the well-developed plans to launch the XJ EV later this year has been ditched entirely.

'Following a thorough technology review against the exponential change in the automotive industry, we concluded that the planned XJ replacement does not fit with our vision for a reimaged Jaguar brand,' the statement read.

'We have made the tough decision that it will not form part of the line-up, as the brand looks to realise its unique potential. However, the nameplate may be retained.'

The I-Pace SUV (pictured) is currently the only electric vehicle in Jaguar's range. Launched in 2018, prices start from 65,195

All JLR models will be offered with a pure electric version by the end of the decade, it says, while Land Rover will launch six pure electric vehicles, with EV variants of five with the first all-electric Land Rover due in 2024.

By the end of the decade the firm is aiming for 100 per cent of Jaguar sales to be fully electric, along with three in five Land Rover registrations.

Who is Thierry Bollore? Jaguar Land Rover CEO, Thierry Bollore New JLR boss Thierry Bollore hails from Brittany in France and studied for an MBA at Paris Dauphine University. Among the most pressing items in his in-tray when taking over at the helm of JLR are the challenge to return Britain's biggest car maker to profit after a big hit from the Covid-19 pandemic and a concern about sales in one of its biggest markets  China  at a time of international tension. But Bollore's experience of electric powered cars, charging networks, and changing patterns of mobility  where future generations may use vehicles but may not own them  gleaned at Renault and through family links is likely to have been a strong suit in his appointment against a strong line up of rival external and internal candidates. He has a strong track record of working in the automotive industry in China where, in the current political climate, JLR may feel exposed. He also has a proven track record for quality control of outputs, with the British brand infamous for making less-than-reliable motors, which tend to prop-up the dependability standings in owners surveys. Bollore is a cousin of French billionaire Vincent Bollore, whose family owned investment firm Bollore, has big interests in electric car and charging networks, including providing those for the UK capital, though its Bluecity car-share scheme in London ended in January after poor take-up. His wide ranging international experience on many continents  but particularly China - should stand him in good stead.

Part of the switch to battery cars will see the brand use just three architectures: two dedicated to Land Rover and a new pure-BEV platform that will be exclusive to Jaguar.

'It's time to re-imagine the next chapter for both brands... British brands steeped in a rich tapestry of timeless designs,' Bollore added.

JLR said it will spend around 2.5billion annually on electrification technologies and development of connected vehicle services.

Shares in Tata Motors rose as much as three per cent after the announcement.

And in a boost to post-Brexit Britain, bosses said there are no plans to close any of its 'core manufacturing facilities', which includes the Solihull and Castle Bromwich plants in the West Midlands and its Halewood factory near Liverpool.

However, Bollore, hinted that the Castle Bromwich plant in would focus on 'non-production' activities in the long term - though added no further details.

'From a core manufacturing perspective that means Jaguar Land Rover will retain its plant and assembly facilities in the home UK market and around the world,' it said.

Solihull will also be the home to the 'future advanced Jaguar pure electric platform'.

Jaguar Land Rover has said that it will not discontinue any current products and does 'not plan to stop production' of any existing models.

Jim Holder, editorial director at Autocar, said the wider impact on the JLR workforce remains to be seen as the strategy clearly signals there will be reductions in manufacturing capacity and a shrinking of its UK footprint outside of its manufacturing facilities.

'While details were scarce in today's announcement, it is clear that Jaguar Land Rover, in common with most car makers, has come to the realisation that its business model needed to be completely ripped up in order for it to have any chance of thriving into the future,' he said.

Mr Bollore also confirmed that JLR has committed to phasing out diesel powertrains by 2026 and will also invest heavily into the development of hydrogen fuel cell technology, with the firm's first hydrogen tech mules due to be running on public roads by the end of 2021.

Jaguar Land Rover is the UK's biggest car manufacturer.

In 2020, it produced 243,908 vehicles across its three manufacturing sites.

While this was more than any other UK maker, it was 37 per cent lower than production in 2019.

Commenting on JLR's announcement, trade body boss Mike Hawes said the news that the country's largest automotive business has confirmed its long-term commitment to the UK is 'very welcome' and 'an injection of confidence into the wider sector'.

The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders chief executive added: 'Its roadmap to a future that is built around sustainability, with electrified and hydrogen models as well as investment in connected and digital technologies, aligns with Government ambition and increasing consumer expectations.

'Delivering this ambition, however, will require the UK to improve its competitiveness.

'The UK automotive industry is essentially strong, innovative and agile, but the global competition is fierce. Government must ensure advanced manufacturing has its full support, with a policy framework and plan for growth that reduces costs, accelerates domestic battery production and electrified supply chains, and incentivises R&D and skills development.

'Every effort must be made to create the conditions that will enable the entire sector to flourish.'
The principal of a disadvantaged state school in outer suburban Melbourne pocketed almost $23,000 in school funds and spent the money on gambling and an overseas family holiday, in a case that has exposed poor oversight by the Education Department.

Victorian Ombudsman Deborah Glass revealed the theft in a report she tabled on Monday, which she said highlighted systemic weakness in the financial governance of our schools, rather than a systemic problem of senior staff stealing school funds.

Victorian Ombudsman Deborah Glass says there are systemic governance problems in Victorias state schools. Credit:Simon Schluter

I do not think many principals help themselves to school funds to support a gambling addiction and overseas holidays, having failed to disclose in their selection process they are a discharged bankrupt, Ms Glass said.

According to the investigation, the principal asked his staff to counter-sign cheques for school purposes on multiple occasions in 2017 and 2018 and took the cash for himself.
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Israeli environmentalists are warning that a UAE-Israeli oil pipeline deal threatens unique Red Sea coral reefs and could lead to "the next ecological disaster".

The agreement to bring Emirati crude oil by tanker to a pipeline in the Red Sea port of Eilat was signed after Israel normalised ties with the Gulf Arab nation late last year and should come into force within months.

With experts warning of possible leaks and spills at the ageing Eilat port, and the Israeli environmental protection ministry demanding "urgent" talks on the deal, activists mobilised last week.

They held a protest in a parking lot overlooking Eilat's oil jetty against what they see as a disaster waiting to happen, chanting that profits will be made "at the expense of corals".

"The coral reefs are 200 metres (yards) from where the oil will be unloaded," said Shmulik Taggar, an Eilat resident and founding member of the Society for Conservation of the Red Sea Environment.

"They say the tankers are modern and there won't be any problem," he said, warning however that "there's no way there won't be a malfunction".

He predicted that with the projected arrival of two to three tankers a week, traffic will be "back-to-back".

This, he said, would also impact the aesthetic of a city promoting ecological tourism.

"You can't sell green tourism when you have oil tankers by the dock," he said.

- Unique reefs -

The Jewish state and the UAE established ties last year as part of the US-brokered "Abraham Accords".

One of the deals that followed was a Memorandum of Understanding between Israel's state-owned Europe-Asia Pipeline Company (EAPC) and a new entity called MED-RED Land Bridge Ltd -- a joint venture between Abu Dhabi's National Holding company and several Israeli firms.

In October, EAPC announced a "binding MoU" with MED-RED to bring crude from UAE to Eilat and then transport it by pipeline to Israel's Mediterranean city of Ashkelon for onward export to Europe.

Story continues

Taggar argued that deals benefitting the fossil fuel industry at the expense of the environment are "not in the spirit of our times".

"It might have been appropriate in the 1960s and 1970s, before we were a developed state," he said.

Activists argue the deal evaded tough regulatory scrutiny because of EAPC's status as a state-owned firm working in the sensitive energy sector.

While coral populations around the world are under threat from bleaching caused by climate change, the reefs in Eilat have remained stable due to their unique heat resistance.

Eilat's coral beach reserve extends some 1.2 kilometres (almost a mile) off the city's coast, protecting reefs that are home to a rich variety of marine life.

But their proximity to the EAPC port puts them at grave risk, Nadav Shashar, professor of marine biology at Beersheba's Ben Gurion University, told AFP.

The infrastructure is not set up to prevent accidents and only designed "to treat pollution once it's already in the water," said Shashar, who is also head of marine biology and biotechnology at Eilat's Interuniversity Institute for Marine Science.

Shashar, one of 230 experts who petitioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu against the deal, argued that with the increase of shipments, "the result will be a constant leak of oil pollution".

- 'Get in the way' -

After the agreement was struck in October, EAPC said it could increase oil flow through Eilat by "tens of millions of tonnes per year".

Contacted by AFP, the company declined to discuss the deal's specifics but stressed that its equipment was "state of the art" and up to international standards.

The environmental protection ministry said it had fulfilled its oversight role but also called for an "urgent discussion of all relevant governmental bodies" to review the deal.

The talks, a statement said, "would examine all angles -- including the environmental ones -- of increasing the volume of crude oil being transported".

Shashar said the goal was not to close down EAPC but to "limit the extent of its use to something that can be handled".

Some activists have voiced more militant views, including Michael Raphael of the international Extinction Rebellion movement.

Raphael, who came to the recent rally armed with a bullhorn, said he was aiming to set up an Extinction Rebellion chapter in Eilat to resist the UAE deal.

"If the problem isn't solved, we'll have to get in the way of things," he said. "We don't just demonstrate ... we disrupt the work of those who pollute."

jjm/bs/hkb/fz

Delhi Police has claimed that the lawyers of the 21-year old activist Disha Ravi, who was arrested in the Greta Thunberg toolkit case, skipped court proceedings on purpose so that Disha would be sent to judicial custody instead of police remand.

The 21-year old was produced before Delhi's Patiala House court. Disha Ravi was sent to five days of police custody even though her lawyer was not present.

Senior officials of the Delhi Police claimed that the absence of her lawyers was well planned and not out of coincidence. An official told India Today that upon realising Disha Ravi's lawyer is absent from the court, the court appointed a lawyer from the Delhi Legal Cell to present her. He also dismissed claims that Disha Ravi had to argue her case on her own. He added that as soon as Disha was taken to Cyber Cell in Delhi's Dwarka, her lawyers reached there immediately.

This is in complete contradiction to the claims of her legal team. Her legal team claims that they didn't know what court she was to be produced in and she argued her own case in the court. They have also questioned whether proper procedure was followed or not when she was taken by the Delhi Police from Bengaluru. Her lawyer Rebecca John wrote a Facebook post and alleged "shocking abdication of judicial duties" by the Patiala House Court magistrate. She went onto claim that the court failed to ensure legal representation for Disha Ravi.

John further said, "Magistrates must take their duties of remand seriously and ensure that the mandate of Article 22 of the constitution is scrupulously followed. If the accused was not being represented by counsel at the time of the hearing, the magistrate should have waited till her counsel arrived or, in the alternate, provided her with legal aid."

Also read: Greta Thunberg toolkit case: Delhi Police arrests 21-year-old climate activist from Bengaluru

Also read: Canadian Khalistani outfit behind toolkit on farmers protests shared by Greta, says Delhi Police
IFA president, Tim Cullinan said the EU Commission must address the serious contradictions and lack of policy co-ordination under the Green deal, CAP and trade policies.

Commissioner Wojciechowski admitted to MEPs that of all the sectors considered in the Cumulative Impact Assessment on EU Free Trade Agreements, the beef sector stands out as the most affected, he said.

The study, conducted by the EUs Joint Research Centre, updated the European Commissions Assessment from 2016 and looks at the impact of 12 EU Free Trade Agreements with partner countries with modelling conducted out to 2030. The report estimates the beef sector to reduce production by 0.5%. (tonnes)

Under the Green deal, the EU is driving up costs and wants organic production standards at conventional prices, while at the same time under trade deals, the Commission is importing beef that fails to meet EU standards and would be illegal to produce in the EU, said Mr Cullinan.

He said the Mercosur trade deal cannot progress and the existing access granted to beef not produced to our standards, including environmental, societal, traceability and animal health and welfare must be stopped.

IFA national livestock chairperson, Brendan Golden said the full benefits of the strong supermarket trade for beef in the UK and throughout the EU is undermined by the acceptance of these substandard products.

UK supermarkets over the Christmas period increased beef sales by 1.4k/t or 18%, but Irish beef farmers are not seeing the full benefits of this as a result of the flawed and contradictory EU policies on trade.

He said this clearly highlights the dysfunction of the EU beef market caused by the double standards of policy makers who continue to ignore how beef is produced in these countries, while increasing demands on Irish beef farmers.

Mr Golden said the EU Commission cannot defend current or future trade agreements when by 2030, beef imports into the EUcould increase by up to 100,000t, reducing beef prices for Irish and EU farmers.

The Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce announced Marion Munley has been selected as the recipient of the 2021 Athena Leadership Award .

The award honors an exceptional individual who has achieved excellence in their business or profession, has served the community in a meaningful way and has assisted women in their attainment of professional goals and leadership skills.

Marion is an exceptional example of a community leader paving the way for others, said Bob Durkin, president of the Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce. She fights for her clients, commits time to the Lackawanna County community, and ensures the mentorship of young women with careers in law.

Skilled litigator

For more than 30 years, Munley has made her mark in the male-dominated area of trucking law as a dedicated and skilled litigator, taking lead on some of Pennsylvanias largest and groundbreaking legal victories.

For a decade, she provided free legal services to those in need at the Hope Center for Northeastern Pennsylvania. She has supported Lackawanna Pro Bono for more than 20 years, sponsors scholarships at the University of Scranton, Marywood University and Johnson College, and contributes to many other local charitable organizations.

Munley mentors young women interested in beginning a career in law. At Munley Law, she makes herself available for advice and questions and ensures they have a role in the firms big cases, local networking events, and national conferences. In 2020, she received the AAJs Marie Lambert Award for her commitment to the legal profession, her community and the advancement of women in law.

I think its so important to have a mentor when you start your career, Munley said. I came into the profession when there wasnt a lot of mentorships for women. It gives me great personal pleasure and pride to be able to help young women in the profession. If you dont have someone to show you the way, you can definitely be lost.
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PHOENIX  The number of inmates in Arizonas prisons has declined 11% since the start of pandemic, reflecting a slowdown in the states court system that has held far fewer criminal jury trials over the last year as it took steps to prevent the coronavirus from spreading at courthouses. Corrections officials say they are seeing fewer sentenced inmates being sent to prison from counties and fewer revocations of probation and community-supervision releases that would send people back behind bars. Defense lawyers say people charged with crimes are reluctant to accept plea offers out of fear that they might be exposed to COVID-19 if they were sentenced to Arizonas prisons, where 31% of inmates have tested positive over the course of the pandemic and where 50 inmates have either been confirmed or suspected to have died from the virus.

Pima County hasnt held a criminal jury trial since March 2020 and has called them off through next month. Maricopa County went a few months in 2020 without criminal trials, but it resumed them during the fall in limited numbers, because it has a small number of courtrooms that are equipped with plexiglass barriers and spacious enough to allow jurors to be distanced.

The entire system is slowing down, said Pima County Public Defender Joel Feinman.

In the four years before the pandemic, Arizonas prison population hovered around 42,000. It started dropping in March and stood at 37,224 on Friday, according to corrections records.

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While at least 300 non-violent inmates have been released from country jails in Arizona over the last year in a bid to lower virus risks, the state has refused calls for early releases of prisoners as a prevention measure.

Corrections officials say its difficult to say whether the state will have roughly 42,000 inmates some time after the pandemic ends. But lawyers and officials who work in county criminal justice systems said they believe the numbers of will creep back up.

Everything that I have seen contributing to the decline is based on temporary things, so I think this is temporary, said Christine Jones, a trial supervisor in the Maricopa County Office of the Public Defender.

More than half of Arizonas 15 counties also have seen decreases in the number of inmates in their jails.

The jail population in Maricopa County, which operates the largest county jail system in Arizona, has had a 24% decrease in its jail population, from 7,100 in December 2019 to about 5,400 this week.

The most significant factor in lowering the countys jail population has been police agencies that are citing and releasing people for certain nonviolent offenses, rather than booking, in an attempt to limit their contact with jails during the pandemic, said Sheriff Paul Penzone.

Penzone said his office is examining data to determine whether the cite-and-release approach taken during the pandemic will have any effects on crime rates and to examine the financial savings from having fewer people locked up.

While acknowledging that some offenders still need to be imprisoned, Pima County Attorney Laura Conover, a newly elected prosecutor who believes the state should rely on prison far less, said the decline in the prison population offers a chance to consider whether the state wants to keep so many people locked up.

Yavapai County Attorney Sheila Polk, whose office didnt hold a felony trial for three months last year but has since resumed, said her office is already working with others in the legal system to reduce the backlog.

Polk said the Arizona Supreme Courts suspension of a speedy-trial rule is set to expire at the end of March, meaning her office needs to be prepared to take a number of cases to trial unless the rule suspension is extended.

You cant stop arresting people and you cant neglect public safety, Polk said. And you when you arrest somebody, there are a series of things in the courtroom that have to occur. We have managed to do it.

State prisons and some county jails in Arizona have been hard hit by the virus.

More than 11,000 inmates in Arizonas prisons have tested positive for the virus during the pandemic, leading to 31 confirmed COVID-19 deaths and another 19 deaths suspect to have been caused by the virus.

More than 2,600 people who work in state prisons also have tested positive. Corrections officials have declined to say whether any staff members have died from the virus.

In county jails across Arizona, more than 3,500 inmates and nearly 900 employees have tested positive since last spring.

Two Pima County jail inmates, a Maricopa County jail officer and a Camp Verde Detention Center employee in Yavapai County have died from the virus.
Telecom companies in India are pinning hopes for 5G (fifth generation broadband technology on cellular networks) to be rolled out in 2021 with companies like Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel doing tests to prepare 5G for launch.

This comes as the government announced that it will not be selling 5G spectrum in the upcoming auctions which are expected to begin in March this year.

However, a Parliamentary Standing Committee in its report has recently said that India is not prepared to roll out 5G anytime soon.

To better gauge 5G, it is first important that we understand how different it is from the previous technologies, how better is it and what is the status of 5G rollout in India.

What is 5G and how is it different from the previous technologies?

5G refers to the fifth generation network technology which offers high speed internet connectivity. As learning and working has moved online in a socially distanced world, higher internet speeds have become imperative for smooth interactions.

According to experts, another advantage of 5G is that it is better at handling simultaneous connections (heavy load).

Unlike the already existing technologies, 5G is said to pave the way for its application in automated vehicles, building smart cities etc.

What is the status of 5G rollout in India?

IT & Telecom Minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad in June 2019 had announced that 5G spectrum auctions would be conducted in the same calendar year and had also announced a 100 day deadline to begin 5 trials.

However, in the spectrum auctions announced by the cabinet in December 2020 which are expected to be held in March this year, only 4G airwaves in 700MHz, 800MHz, 900MHz, 1800MHz, 2100MHz, 2300MHz and 2500MHz will be auctioned.

All the big telcos in India namely - Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea have been urging the government to spell out a clear roadmap for the spectrum auctions for 5G airwaves.

Meanwhile Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio have announced that they have begun the trials for rolling out 5G in the existing network infrastructure.

What are the challenges for 5G in India?

A Shashi Tharoor-led Parliamentary Committee report from earlier this month has concluded a variety of reasons which include inadequate availability of spectrum, high spectrum prices, among others as the reason for slow 5G rollout in India.

The report has said that the government has been laid back and very little steps have been taken to launch 5G in India.

Lack of adequate spectrum

The DoT had informed the committee that in mid band (3300-3600 MHz), about 25 MHz is used by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Ministry of Defence has asked Department of Telecommunication to allocate 3,300-3,400 MHz to them. This means that only 175 MHz is available for vendors which may not be sufficient for them to offer their services.

High price of 5G

Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), submitted a report that Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) earmarked spectrum in 3.3-3.6 GHz band for 5G. TRAI recommended the reserve price at INR 492 crore per MHz which is far higher than the auctioned spectrum price in other country, the committee report concluded.

The report further concluded a comparison of unit pricing of 5G in India with that of the other countries.

The unit price of 5G spectrum in India is 70 times costlier than Austria, 35 times costlier than Spain and 14 times costlier than Australia.
VIJAYAWADA: Andhra Pradesh High Court has sought video footage and transcripts of derogatory remarks made against the State Election Commission (SEC) and its commissioner N. Ramesh Kumar by civil supplies minister Kodali Sri Venkateshwara Rao.

A single bench headed by justice D. V. S. S. Somayajulu held a hearing on Sunday as the minister had moved a house motion on Saturday challenging the SECs gag order on him until completion of gram panchayat polls on February 21.

Kodalis counsel had maintained that the minister did not make any derogatory remarks targeting either SEC or the state election commissioner.

On this, SECs counsel N. Ashwani Kumar suggested that the court examine the video footage of the ministers statement. It would then know whether or not Kodali had really made the adverse remarks lowering the esteem of SEC and its commissioner.

Accordingly, the court asked authorities to submit for its examination video footage and transcripts of remarks made by the minister. It then adjourned the case to Monday.
A senior police officer has allegedly committed suicide by shooting himself at Borteyman, near Ashaiman, in the Greater Accra Region on St Valentines Day.



Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Divine Asiam was with the Legal and Prosecutions Unit of the Ghana Police Service until he allegedly shot himself in his room at Borteyman yesterday.



The Tema Regional Police Command confirmed the incident via a statement by the commands acting Public Relations Officer, Chief Inspector Stella Dede Dzakpasu, indicating that investigations had commenced to uncover events leading to the death of DSP Asiam.



Chief Inspector Dzakpasu urged the public to be sensitive and circumspect in their commentary on the matter, while investigations continued.



Information



Meanwhile, information gathered by the Daily Graphic indicated that at about 07:45 a.m. of yesterday, the Adjei Kojo District Police Command received information to the effect that there had been a shooting incident in the room of DSP Asiam.



Personnel were dispatched to the scene and met the officer with a gunshot wound around his left eye suspected to be self-inflicted and bleeding profusely, but still alive.



He was rushed to the Police Hospital for medical attention where he was admitted, but died shortly after.



The team of police personnel returned to the room of the deceased where the incident happened and retrieved a Pietro Berretta pistol covered with blood on the floor.



Four live rounds of ammunition were found in its magazine.



Suicide note



The team discovered a suicide note dated Sunday, February 14, 2021, with a 1:30 a.m. timeline indicated on the document, while a spent shell was also retrieved at the same scene.



A team led by the District Crime Officer, DSP Akrofi Ansah, proceeded to the Police Hospital where DSP Asiam was seen on a stretcher in a supine position.



An examination on the body revealed gunshot wounds to the under of the chin and the top of his left eye, appearing to suggest a shot under his chin, with the bullet exiting through the top of his left eye.



Suicide trends



The incident brings to three the number of policemen suspected to have committed suicide in 16 days.



The Half Assini District Police Commander, Supt Cyprian Zenge, was reported to have shot himself in his house on January 30 this year.



There was also the incident of Constable Eugene Yelnona, who allegedly shot himself in the washroom at his duty point at Ridge in Accra on Monday, February 1, 2021.









Source: Graphiconline.com









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POTTSVILLE  A COVID-19 case at D.H.H. Lengel Middle School has resulted in 15 people having to quarantine.

A student at the middle school tested positive for the disease, Acting Superintendent Jared Gerace said in an email to parents Monday.

Contact tracing by the state Department of Health resulted in 11 students, three staff members and an outside agency worker needing to quarantine, he said.

The case comes as the district prepares to transition to have students, currently attending two days a week, in school more frequently.

Beginning Thursday, John S. Clarke Elementary Centre students will come to school four days a week, going up to five days a week Monday, March 1.

Students at the middle school will start four days a week March 1 and move to five days March 8.

Pottsville Area High School students will go to four days of in-person instruction on March 8, moving to five days March 18.

Case update

Statewide, 1,945 new coronavirus cases reported Monday raised the total to 896,860, and 23 new deaths pushed that total to 23,119.

In Schuylkill County, the number of cases rose from 11,621 on Friday to 11,722 on Monday, a gain of 101 over the three days. The number of deaths rose from 353 to 356.
History is stamped with special landmarks. For Vietnamese diplomacy, 2020 was one of the most memorable milestones.

Vietnam successfully assumed the role of both ASEAN Chair in 2020 and non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council for the term 2020-2021.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc (L), the Chair of ASEAN 2020, witnesses the signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. (Photo: Duc Anh)

Strong leadership in the region

This is the first time Vietnam has assumed such a "dual role". This coincidence is quite special but not surprising as it is an inevitable consequence of the tireless efforts of Vietnam over the past decades, the result of an open and multilateral foreign policy to diversify international relations and actively integrate into the world, initiated and successfully implemented by the Communist Party of Vietnam. It shows the recognition from and appreciation by the international community for Vietnam's global role and its practical contribution to international and regional affairs, while demonstrating Vietnam's increasingly high position and prestige in the international arena.

However, even with great opportunities, history has always challenged Vietnam's bravery and wisdom. When Vietnam officially assumed its "dual role", it was also a time when the world was to face an unprecedented challenge in the form of the outbreak of COVID-19. The rhythm of life was turned upside down, the world economy stagnated, international traffic was paralysed, and many global and regional security issues had to be put to one side temporarily to make room for the epidemic response.

In that unexpected context, as Chair of ASEAN 2020, Vietnam quickly shifted the agenda and focus of ASEAN to COVID-19 prevention and control. The pandemic poses an unprecedented challenge, so the response also requires unprecedented measures. Under the leadership of Vietnam, many "firsts" have come about to help the bloc adapt in this difficult period: It was the first ASEAN Summit to meet three times in one year instead of twice as usual. There were many high-level conferences and ministerial meetings held online for the first time. And in particular, many important ASEAN documents were signed online for the first time in history.

As well as effectively controlling the epidemic, Vietnam also actively promoted international cooperation to overcome it together. One piece of proof of the ASEAN Chair's active and responsible role in 2020 was the Vietnams initiative to convene an ASEAN Special Summit on the COVID-19 Response in April 2020. From this, a series of specific measures to control the epidemic were introduced, such as setting up a COVID-19 response fund, a regional reserve of medical supplies, building a standard disease response process, and issuing a comprehensive post-COVID-19 recovery plan, that will not only help the region deal more effectively with COVID-19, but will also solidify the spirit of the slogan "a Cohesive and Responsive ASEAN", a trademark of ASEAN in the COVID-19 epidemic era.

With the strong will and action of the entire ASEAN community, effective cooperation from partners and the firm steering of "captain" Vietnam, ASEAN has substantially overcome the storm. Looking back, it can be affirmed that Vietnam's ASEAN Chairmanship Year 2020 has been a comprehensive, resounding, complete and substantial success. Vietnam is not only a member seriously implementing committed-to agreements, but is also becoming a solid and reliable support for the region, especially in a moment when ASEAN faces challenges like COVID-19.

Recognising Vietnam's successful role as ASEAN Chair 2020, ASEAN Secretary-General Dato Lim Jock Hoi commented that Vietnam showed its strong leadership in leading a regional collective response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The November 2020 issue of Diplomat magazine ran a headline article on Vietnams ASEAN Chairmanship 2020. With its title Vietnams Virtual Charm Offensive, the article praised the country for its surprising creativity in making the impossible possible, as it skilfully reached consensus in the region as well as with partners, using an online dialogue platform never tried before.

From "active participation" to "proactively contributing to shaping the rules of the conduct"

In January 2020, Vietnam returned to the meeting room of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) as a non-permanent member, while at the same time serving in the role of rotating presidency of the council for the month. This is not the first time Vietnam has participated in the UNSC (non-permanent member of the UNSC for the 2008-2009 term), and while the roles and duties of UNSC non-permanent members have not changed compared to before, the situation was much different.

Fierce strategic competition among major countries has downgraded solidarity and unity within the UNSC to a lower level than 10 years ago. On many issues, major countries have conflicts of interests, so it is difficult for them to find a common voice. Meanwhile, tensions in the Middle East, Africa and Latin America have not "cooled down", along with 68 conflicts and a series of backlogs in the 75 years since the UN's founding still remaining on the agenda.

In particular, the COVID-19 pandemic has become an unprecedented global challenge. Not only does it affect every aspect of international life, it also reveals how multilateral spirit has been eroded. Faced with the challenges of powerful politics, populism, declined political commitment, and pragmatism, amongst others, multilateralism and international cooperation have been seriously affected.

How to offer both practical ideas and initiatives to solve global issues while balancing the interests of stakeholders is not an easy task for Vietnam, especially when as the UNSCs decisions are always associated with particularly important and sensitive issues, such as war and peace, anti-terrorism, and imposing sanctions or not.

However, few countries have advantages like Vietnam has. Having been through two wars, more than anyone, Vietnam understands the value of peace, so the country always strives for the advancement of humanity. There are also some countries that can put aside the past to heal relations and establish cooperation with "former foes", similar to how the Vietnamese people have. Therefore, although it is not a big or rich country, Vietnam can actively participate in the UNSC.

In fact, together with other non-permanent members, Vietnam has become a bridge to assist the P5 group (the permanent members of the UNSC) understand each other better, thereby minimising deadlocks and inefficiencies in the council due to disagreements among these countries. Not only that, the responsible participation, contribution and "rational" voice of Vietnam on seemingly very distant issues in Africa, Latin America or the Middle East has been recognised by the international community. It can be said Vietnam's role has contributed to solving many important global problems, shaping the development of the future world.

On the UN forum, the world has seen more about a steadily growing Vietnam with its new posture  the position of a nation with mastery over its destiny, as well as a being an independent, autonomous, peaceful and stable country on its development path, while having the influence of a partner shifting from "active participation" to "actively contributing to building, shaping new structures, new rules of conduct", a partner always having a responsible role in regional and global "playgrounds".

This dual role brought about a successful year for Vietnam's multilateral diplomacy, opening up great opportunities for the country to continue to promote its precious experience in "combining national strength with the fortes of the era" to enhance Vietnam's position in the international arena, contributing to promoting national development and placing it ahead in the global race.

Nhan Dan
Escape to the Chateau's Dick Strawbridge has said that he has 'no intention' of leaving him and wife Angel's French home anytime soon.

The father-of-two, 61, rose to fame alongside his wife, 42, after Channel 4 documented their move the Chateau-de-la-Motte Husson in the Pays de Loire region of France with their children Dorothy, 6, and Arthur, 7,.

The show then followed the monumental effort that went into readying the place in just nine months for their own wedding the following autumn.

Now Dick has told how the thought of giving up the property after nearly six years of work and renovations gives him a 'headache'.

Speaking to Hello!, Dick said: 'I've got no intention of going anywhere.

Escape to the Chateau's Dick Strawbridge has said that he has 'no intention' of leaving him and wife Angel's French home anytime soon (pictured together)

'I'm going to be planted here. I get a headache even thinking about moving.'

The couple moved from a two-bedroom flat in Essex to relocate to the stunning French countryside and they are determined that their chateau will now be their forever home.

He added that their two children already have plans of what they would do when it is their turn to run the chateau.

Dick continued: 'Arthur and Dorothy have plans. Arthur wants the orangery as his restaurant.'

Angel said: 'He's a real gourmand and has even started his own branding.'

The father-of-two, 61, rose to fame alongside his wife, 42, after Channel 4 documented their move the Chateau-de-la-Motte Husson (pictured) in the Pays de Loire region of France

Now Dick (left) has told how the thought of giving up the property after nearly six years of work and renovations gives him a 'headache'

'Dorothy wants one of the outbuildings, which will be very modern and contemporary. I'm allowed to babysit the two children she's going to have.'

The seventh series of Escape To The Chateau started last November, and with 3 million viewers the show is one of Channel 4's biggest hits.

There's also a daytime spin-off show Escape To The Chateau DIY, in which Dick and Angel offer advice to others who are transforming properties.

The couple moved from a two-bedroom flat in Essex to relocate to the stunning French countryside with their two children Dorothy and Arthur (pictured)

Dick and Angel bought the run-down 45-room chateau (pictured) for just 280,000 in 2015

Dick and Angel bought the run-down 45-room chateau for just 280,000 in 2015 but are now raking in huge profits by charging couples fat fees for a fairytale wedding at the moated property in the Pays de la Loire region.

The sprawling 19th century building has now been valued at 2million, with Dick and Angel receiving up to 38,000 per wedding. The average price, however, comes out at around 19,000.

The couple - who swapped their two-bed home in east London after searching for the chateau for four years - also cash in through TV rights from Channel 4 for the series and its day-time spin off.

TV presenter Dick and author Angel now employ a PR to market their thriving business empire which includes not just weddings but personalised homeware, gifts, soft furnishings, calendars, diaries and cards.
All India Power Engineers Federation threaten strike against Electricity Bill

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

New Delhi, Feb 15: In what comes as a recent development, the All India Power Engineers Federation (AIPEF) has demanded that the Electricity (Amendment) Bill, 2021 must be put out in the public domain before starting the discussion on it in Parliament.

According to reports, the AIPEF Chairman Shailendra Dubey in a statement here said that the Bill is not available on the Power Ministry website.

After Pangong Tso, more reduction of tensions at friction points between India and China

He said the Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 is included in the list of 20 new Bills to be placed in the current Budget session of Parliament. Now the Union Power Minister is to hold a video conference on February 17 with power secretaries of the state and CMDs of the discoms to discuss the proposed amendments in the Electricity Act 2003.

AIPEF national executive meeting has been called on February 27 at Mumbai which will decide the future agitational course of action. Dubey said all power engineers across the country will go for nationwide struggle along with 1.5 million power employees against Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021.

AIPEF in its letter to the Prime Minister has mentioned that this is a shortcut and rushed through amendments without due consideration or deliberation and is not acceptable.

PM Modi catches fleeting view of 'interesting' India-England 2nd Test

There have been reports that the Power Ministry has circulated Electricity (Amendment) Bill proposing amendments to the Electricity Act 2003. The proposed amendments entail de-licensing of the distribution business.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

A copy of the letter addressed to the Prime Minister has been endorsed to all Chief Ministers with the request to use good offices to ensure that Bill is placed in public domain and all stakeholders including consumers and employees are given the due opportunity to submit their comments on the Bill.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 9:12 [IST]
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ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.  Albuquerque-based OE Solar built New Mexicos only existing community solar project to date at Picuris Pueblo north of Santa Fe.

The 1 megawatt array, which came online in 2018, now provides solar-generated electricity to about 600 homes in the Pensaco Valley. The pueblo financed the $2.2 million project with assistance from the U.S. Department of Energy, and about $500,000 in front-end funding from OE Solar to get development going while the tribal government sought commercial loans, said OE founder and CEO Adam Harper.

Picuris Pueblo owns the solar array, which is connected to Taos-based Kit Carson Electric Cooperatives grid. As a sovereign nation, the pueblo could build and operate the project independently of current state law that prohibits community solar development in non-tribal areas around the state.

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But if enabling legislation is passed in this years legislative session, developers like OE solar are ready to build a lot more community solar installations across New Mexico.

Theres significant pent-up demand here for community solar, and were passionate about seeing new legislation passed to open the local market for it, Harper said.  All these people who live Downtown or in apartment complexes and lower income housing around Albuquerque dont have direct access now to the benefits of solar. But I believe wed see substantial growth in demand in these communities if the Community Solar Act is approved.

A new study released in January by the University of New Mexicos Bureau of Business and Economic Research found that, if allowed to move forward, community solar development could have a statewide cumulative economic impact of anywhere from $155 million over three years to more than $517 million over a five-year period, depending on the size of installations. At the upper end, solar projects could generate nearly 4,000 jobs and generate more than $2.9 million in annual tax revenue for the state, according to the BBER study, which was financed by the Coalition for Community Solar Access, a trade group representing member companies in 17 states.

Senate Bill 84, which would permit community solar for the first time in New Mexico, would set an annual 100 MW cap on total project development across the state for the first three years to fully gauge the benefits before expanding the market. But if the cap is raised, Harper said BBERs estimates are likely conservative.

Indeed, out-of-state companies are ready to move aggressively in a newly-opened New Mexico market.

Colorado-based Pivot Energy, a community solar developer that currently operates in 14 states, is awaiting enabling legislation to launch local operations, said Jon Sullivan, vice president of project development.

We want to make a play here, Sullivan told the Journal. We see real opportunities in New Mexico. If all goes well, well open a satellite office with boots on the ground.

The company would rapidly staff-up with local employees, Sullivan said.

We always hire locally, he said. Wed need a lot of New Mexicans for construction and for all the trades, from general contractors to surveyors, environmental consultants, technicians and sales people. New Mexicans are the ones who have the local knowledge that we need.
The Northern Territory will double the number of returning Australians it can accommodate in hotel quarantine after the Victorian premier suggested they should not be allowed to travel home at all.

About 1,700 overseas returnees are expected to be able to isolate at Howard Springs' Covid-19 quarantine facility from April.

NT Chief Minister Michael Gunner said he wanted to wait until cyclone season ended before increasing the capacity.

'[We've had] very positive conversations with the Australian Government on how we expand the intake,' he said.

About 1,700 overseas returnees are expected to be able to isolate at Howard Springs' Covid-19 quarantine facility from April

The Northern Territory will double the number of returning Australians it can accommodate in hotel quarantine after the Victorian premier suggested they should not be allowed to travel home

Chief Minister Michael Gunner said he wanted to wait until cyclone season ended before increasing the capacity

'I'm conscious of personnel issues and cyclone shelter issues. We are working towards at least double.'

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, by contrast, suggested 40,000 Australians still stranded overseas should not be allowed to travel home unless they are granted a compassionate exemption.

Mr Gunner said his territory experienced a fall in the number of people quarantining from interstate, which freed up more room for repatriated Australians.

About 850 people are able to quarantine at the Howard Springs former mining camp on Darwin's outskirts, which has been renamed the Centre of National Resilience.

'We've also had an allocation within the centre for a possible Territory scenario which never eventuated,' Mr Gunner said.

Mr Andrews argued the government needed to have a 'cold hard discussion' about tightening international borders - even to citizens - as new 'mutant' Covid strains from the UK and South Africa threaten to derail Australia's coronavirus response.

Mr Andrews argued the government needed to have a 'cold hard discussion' about tightening international borders - even to citizens - as new 'mutant' Covid strains from the UK and South Africa threaten to derail Australia's coronavirus response

He added it was up to the federal government to make a decision on what happens to Australia's international borders, but he suggested a 'smaller program' may be necessary.

Australia already has one of the strictest flight caps in the world with only citizens, permanent residents and their spouses or dependents allowed to enter Australia.

This week Australia's intake will be increased slightly to 6,300 people - but that decision may rolled back in the wake of the Victorian outbreak.

Over the course of the pandemic about 200,000 Australians have gone through mandatory hotel quarantine.

HEALTH WORKERS AND QUARANTINE STAFF TO GET THE JAB FIRST

Health workers and staff at the Howard Springs Covid-19 quarantine facility will be among the first Northern Territorians vaccinated against the virus.

The first Pfizer vaccine jabs are expected to be administered next week although which day is still being worked out with the federal government, Chief Minister Michael Gunner says.

Age and disability care residents, hospital staff and border control workers, including police and airport personnel, will also be prioritised during the first stage of the vaccine rollout to about 3000 people.

'We are starting small but the most important thing is, we are starting,' Mr Gunner told reporters on Monday.

'Phase 1A covers our most vulnerable and at-risk frontline workers based on expert health advice.

'We aren't releasing the full plan yet because nobody has the full plan yet.

Over the course of the pandemic about 200,000 Australians have gone through mandatory hotel quarantine

'This is the largest and most complex vaccine rollout seen in the Territory, in the country, in the world.'

Logistics for rolling out the vaccine to remote Indigenous communities are still being worked out.

'The Commonwealth will be a huge part of the rollout in the Territory, more so than any other jurisdiction given the unique challenges we face here,' Mr Gunner said.

'We will need to implement some pretty complex storage and delivery methods across the Territory.'

Royal Darwin Hospital will be the hub for the first phase of the rollout of the Pfizer vaccine, which must be stored at minus 70C.

Breaking down the Pfizer trays of 50 vaccine vials - which are very fragile and cannot be shaken - is also expected to be challenging.

Mr Gunner said the Commonwealth's second allocation of vaccine should allow NT Health to deliver the second dose of the virus to the first recipients and start on the second phase of the rollout about 21 days after the first jabs are administered.

Alice Springs will become the second hub, with the second phase expected to start in mid-to-late March to health care workers not vaccinated in the first phase: police, firefighters emergency workers and Defence personnel.

Health workers and staff at the Howard Springs Covid-19 quarantine facility will be among the first Northern Territorians vaccinated against the virus

Territorians aged 70 and over, Indigenous Australians over 55 and young adults with medical conditions or a disability will also be vaccinated.

Currently, only Darwin and Alice Springs have facilities able to store the vaccine at Pfizer vaccine.

Territorians are also expected to be vaccinated with the AstraZeneca vaccine once the Therapeutics Good Administration review is completed.

Its less extreme refrigeration temperature requirements are likely to see it used in remote communities.

Vaccine rollout chief Michelle McKay said health officials were awaiting more information from vaccine manufacturers and the Commonwealth about safely transporting the vaccines.

General practitioners and Aboriginal health clinics are expected to deliver the jabs.

Darwin may also become a hub for Australia to roll the vaccine out to other nations.
A mother who she stripped her three children naked and forced them into the snow in minus 15C cold is facing an attempted murder probe.

Natalia Vazina, 33, was fully undressed in the extreme frost in a forest near Moscow along with her children Grigory, ten, Lazar, two, and Marfa, 11 months.

The family were saved after a man walking his dog late in the evening saw them and raised the alarm.

Vazina had reportedly become 'religious' and was unhappy about 'living in sin' after having an affair with a married man.

The three children suffered serious frostbite and hypothermia and would have died of exposure if they were not rescued.

Maria Vazina (pictured), 33, is facing an attempted murder probe after she stripped her three children naked and forced them into the snow in minus 15C cold

Vladimir Putin's children's ombudswoman Anna Kuznetsova visited the children in hospital (pictured with the eldest child, Grigory)

The three children suffered serious frostbite and hypothermia and would have died of exposure if they were not rescued (pictured: Kuznetsova with Marfa)

The woman is also being treated in hospital suffering and suffered frostbite to her back, legs and feet.

Her younger son Lazar was in a medical coma, say reports.

A criminal case has been launched against her for attempted murder, say reports.

Vazina is the lover of prominent jeweller Ilya Klyuev, 43, who is married with four children, say reports citing law enforcement.

She worked for his jewellery house Cluev and he is the father of her two youngest children.

He was reported to be 'shocked' over the distressing incident.

Vazina is the lover of prominent jeweller Ilya Klyuev (pictured), 43, who is married with four children, say reports citing law enforcement

The woman (pictured) is also being treated in hospital suffering and suffered frostbite to her back, legs and feet

Vladimir Putin's children's ombudswoman Anna Kuznetsova went to see the frostbitten family in hospital, and was shown in footage from REN TV.

She posted: 'I managed to talk to the elder. He suffered the most, because he walked barefoot in the snow.

'His feet have to be treated seriously, and the forecasts (from doctors) are cautious ...

'The kids are wonderful, the older one is open, caring.

'He told me how he comforted his little sister in his arms, because she doesn't like to sleep in a crib.

The family were rescued from a forest near Moscow (pictured) naked in the 15C cold

'The doctors told how the children are close to each other, but I saw it right away.'

Reports said that Klyuev had not divorced his wife but paid for a luxury apartment for Vazina and her three children in New Moscow suburb, close to where the family were found in the snow.

She had become 'religious' and was unhappy about 'living in sin', which led to a breakdown in her relations with her lover, say reports.

Moskovsky Komsomolets reported that the jeweller has offered to take custody of the children, including her son Grigory by her previous marriage.

But he told 360TV when asked if the two younger children were his: 'You know, these questions are awkward to answer.'

About media reports linking him to Vazina, from Cheboksary, he said: 'You never know what they write there, I cannot say.

'This is some kind of misinformation.

'I know this woman, she worked for us a long time ago.'

But he said he was 'shocked' and had been to the hospital, adding: 'Of course we won't leave the children.'
Bennington, VT (05201)

Today

Periods of rain. Low around 45F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch..

Tonight

Periods of rain. Low around 45F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch.
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OCEAN CITY, N.J.  A half-dozen people stood on an oceanfront deck with a million-dollar view, asking a hundred questions about whats on the horizon. On this clear, winter afternoon, it was the Atlantic as far as the eye can see.

By 2024, nearly 100 of the worlds largest, most powerful wind turbines could be spinning 15 miles off the coast. With blades attached, the windmills could reach as high and wide as 850 feet, and simulations created by Orsted, the Danish-based power company behind the Ocean Wind project, show the turbines are visible, faintly, from beaches in Brigantine, Avalon, Stone Harbor, and Joe and Tricia Contes deck in Ocean City.

Some of those pictures are deceptive, though, because they were taken on a cloudy day, Joe Conte said. The pictures they have of a clear day give you a much more vivid view of what its really going to look like.

The project will power a half-million homes in New Jersey and, according to Orsted, create thousands of jobs, both offshore and on during the initial construction process, which could begin this year. It has the support of both Gov. Phil Murphy, who has actively pushed for alternative energy in the state, and President Joe Biden.

Murphys office did not return a request for comment for this story, but Jeff Tittel, director of the Sierra Clubs New Jersey chapter, said there was talk of offshore oil wells under past administrations.

The alternative is more pollution, Tittel said.

But a campaign called Go Green and Unseen created by the Conte family raises concerns about the wind farm and its impact on tourism. The campaigns website advocates not against wind energy, but the turbines location. Instead of 15 miles from the coast, the website advocates for 35 miles away, where they would likely not be seen at all.

The wind farm will be VERY VISIBLE and create significant visual pollution! they wrote on the website. This wind farm is going to set the precedence for all NJ offshore wind farms. Basically, visual pollution could be coming to a NJ beach near you.

One woman visiting the Contes home who asked not to be identified said the sight of offshore wind turbines would harm more than the view for people on the beach, one of the last places people arent reminded of the worlds industrialization.

They will not be able to look out on the horizon and dream, the woman said of beach-goers.

Science says the human eye can generally see three miles out to sea, but various factors can increase or decrease that range. The height of the observer impacts sight line, along with the weather, and even the curvature of the Earth. Summer haze and evaporation from the ocean will limit views of the turbines.

Many on the Contes deck pointed out that Ocean Casino, Atlantic Citys tallest structure at 718 feet, was clearly visible on this Saturday. That building was 16 miles up the coast, as the crow flies.

And youre looking at one structure right there, not hundreds, said Gregory Cudnik, a charter boat captain out of Long Beach Island

Gabriel Martinez, an Orsted spokesperson, said the company voluntarily agreed to move the wind farm from 10 to 15 miles off the coast. The company is confined to an area of 108 acres it was leased by the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, and is also limited by offshore, commercial fishing interests, particularly New Jerseys substantial scallop business.

At this distance, only on the clearest of days the turbines will be only faintly visible on the horizon, Martinez said in an email.

A University of Rhode Island study found that Orsteds Block Island Wind Farm, which was completed in 2016, actually increased tourism. That study looked at Airbnb rental data and noted that its one thing to look at a turbine for a few days and be mesmerized by it. But to have it there constantly may be different.

Tricia Conte pointed out that Orsteds Block Island project consists of five turbines.

Were talking about an industrial park here, she said.

A Facebook group started by the Contes under the same go green and unseen banner, now with about 1,000 members, has a slightly different mission. Called Save our shorelines-Stop the wind farms off the coast of NJ!, the groups concerns have extended beyond Ocean City and questions another offshore wind project called Atlantic Shores has been proposed farther north, between Atlantic City and Barnegat Light.

Their concerns over the turbines are more pressing than the view, ranging from the turbines effects on commercial and recreational fishing, whether blades will interfere with migratory bird patterns, and where and how the project will run its power lines to inland transfer stations.

It warrants, at the least, spending more time looking over all these concerns, said fisherman Tony Butch of Evesham.

Suzanne Hornick, the chairperson of Ocean City NJ Flooding Committee and a lifelong resident, brought to the Contes home a four-page letter of concerns, which included electromagnetic fields caused by the turbines and their potential effect on marine life.

Im a product of the 60s, Hornick said. I firmly believe we can change this if we all band together.

Orsted, according to its Ocean Wind website, has promised to ensure any [electric and magnetic field] emissions are below required thresholds and avoid any impacts, onshore and offshore. The company says power will be transferred to land via buried submarine cables that are tunneled below the beach using a process called horizontal directional drilling that avoids impacts to sensitive coastal habitats.

Ocean City Councilman Bob Barr said he shares many of the concerns the Facebook group has raised, including any effect the turbines could have on tourism.

We have a lot of questions, Barr said. What does this do to the carbon footprint? What will it do to the birds? What is the lighting like at night? We have an airport nearby.

Recreational anglers are welcome to fish inside the wind farm and there has been talk of sightseeing tours taking daily trips there, too, much like at the Hoover Dam.

I think it might actually increase tourism, Tittel said. This, overall, is a really good thing for New Jersey.

Teaching unions cast doubt yesterday on ambitious plans to get all pupils back into school on March 8.

Downing Street hopes that all primary and secondary children in England can return to classrooms three weeks today as long as Covid rates continue to decline.

But unions were sceptical and asked why ministers have abandoned the idea of a 'phased' return of year groups which was used last year.

Geoff Barton, leader of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: 'There is no point in bringing all children back at once if this causes a spike in coronavirus infection rates which forces another lockdown. It is vital all options are kept open.'

Teaching unions cast doubt yesterday on ambitious plans to get all pupils back into school on March 8 [Stock image]

Dr Patrick Roach, general secretary of the NASUWT union, said the Government must show decisions 'are led by the scientific evidence and advice'.

He also called for 'evidence of sustained' cuts to the R rate, nationally, regionally and locally.

Steve Chalke, who runs the Oasis academies trust , described No 10's timetable as 'impossible'. He told The Sunday Times: 'We should be driven by scientific data, not dates.'

In a blog last week, the Department for Education appeared to be trying to dampen expectations, saying: 'We hope to be able to start welcoming back more pupils from 8 March at the earliest.

'It is important to reiterate that we do not see this as a 'return to school' but more of an expansion of the numbers of pupils already in school.'

The debate over school reopenings came as the outgoing Children's Commissioner warned that one in six children may never catch up on lost school time without the right support [Stock image]

The debate came as the outgoing Children's Commissioner warned that one in six children may never catch up on lost school time without the right support.

Anne Longfield told Sky News that many youngsters needed help to 'build back those social skills and that confidence'.

However Sir Kevan Collins, the education catch-up tsar, cautioned against seeing longer days and time spent at summer schools as a panacea.

'You've got to increase the quality as well as the time,' he told Times Radio:

Some scientific advisers are concerned about the possible impact on the R rate, the Sunday Times reported, but Boris Johnson favours keeping other controls in place in exchange for the return of schools, even if it does increase overall infection rates.

'Getting pupils in class is the PM's top priority. We know that will increase infections and we need to move cautiously with everything else,' a source told the paper.

The Department for Education said it would not comment on speculation ahead of the Prime Minister's roadmap, due on February 22.
Workers wearing protective gear are seen in the compounds of The Jade Boutique Hotel, where members of the World Health Organization (WHO) team investigating the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic are due to complete their quarantine, in Wuhan, China, on Jan. 28, 2021. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

WHO Investigators Say CCP Virus Was Circulating Widely in Wuhan by Late 2019

An investigator with the World Health Organization (WHO) said the CCP virus was circulating widely in Wuhan, China, in late 2019.

Lead WHO investigator Peter Ben Embarek told CNN that his team found signs of a wider outbreak in the Hubei Province city in late 2019, noting that there were at least 13 strains of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, or the novel coronavirus that causes the disease COVID-19, around Wuhan by late 2019.

The virus was circulating widely in Wuhan in December, which is a new finding, he added, saying that around 1,000 people may have been infected at that time. Some of them are from the markets  some of them are not linked to the markets, he said.

There [are] about 200,000 samples available there that are now secured and could be used for a new set of studies, Ben Embarek said. It would be would be fantastic if we could [work] with that.

The new report adds to a growing body of evidence that the CCP covered up the origins of the virus and its severity during the start of the pandemic. Human rights activists have expressed concern about how CCP officials moved to silence doctors and other whistleblowers in Wuhan last year.

The CCP didnt report on the COVID-19 outbreak until Dec. 31, 2019, to the countrys WHO officeamid speculation that a new virus was circulating in the country. On Jan. 14, 2020, the WHO passed on a CCP-backed declaration that there was no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the virus, triggering criticism against the United Nations-backed health organization.

Ben Embarek was at the center of some controversy last week when he said that a theory the virus leaked from Wuhan-based virology lab does not require more investigation. Days later, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Feb. 12 appeared to walk back that claim and said more investigation is needed.

The independent expert team to study the origins of the COVID-19 virus has completed its trip to China  The expert team is still working on its final report, and we look forward to receiving both the report and a full briefing, Tedros remarked, while adding that the investigation has been a very important scientific exercise in very difficult circumstances.

He went on to say, Some questions have been raised as to whether some hypotheses have been discarded. I want to clarify that all hypotheses remain open and require further study.

A report from The Associated Press stated that Ben Embarek and other WHO officials were tightly controlled by the CCP during their visit to Wuhan.

This prompted Gordon Chang, author of The Coming Collapse of China and notable China critic, told The Epoch Times that the mission was designed to fail.

This is a parroting of a Beijing narrative, Chang told The Epoch Times American Thought Leaders program. This just shows you that the WHO mission is completely worthlessactually is worse than worthless because its throwing people off the trail.
Two separate funding rounds in September, led by Silver Lake and BlackRock, respectively, valued the startup at $11 billion.

Byju's, one of India's leading e-learning startups, is close to signing a deal to buy rival Toppr Technologies in a deal valued at roughly $150 million, according to a person familiar with the matter.

According to a Bloomberg report, Toppr provides online learning materials to students in standard 5 through 12. It is also backed by SAIF Partners and Helion Ventures.

Toppr has also been a key target for Byju's, which has been expanding aggressively in recent months.

In January, Byju's was also on its way to acquire Aakash Educational Servies for $1 billion.

Byjus and Toppr representatives did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.

Online education has become the hottest sector during the COVID-19 pandemic as students under lockdown have taken to online learning platforms at unprecedented levels. Companies like Byju's, Unacademy, Vedantu and WhiteHat Jr. have doubled and tripled growth in the last three months.

In September 2020, Bengaluru-based Byju's raised $500 million in the current funding round, which was led by Silver Lake, according to media reports.

It also spent the latter half of 2020 raising capital from notable names including Mary Meeker and Yuri Milner. In fact, two separate funding rounds in September, led by Silver Lake and BlackRock, respectively, valued the startup at $11 billion, the report said.

ALSO READ: Is Byju's really worth over $10 billion, what is its true worth and other key questions answered

A person who did not wish to be named due to the deal's private nature told Bloomberg that the deal to take over Toppr was close, but it has not yet been finalised.
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YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. Authorities are denying the online reports which claim that a major earthquake is going to hit Armenia following the 4.7 magnitude quake that rattled Yerevan on Saturday. At the same time, light and average intensity earthquakes cant be ruled out, they say.

The Seismic Protection Service of the Ministry of Emergency Situations is once again officially denying this information, the ministry spokesperson told ARMENPRESS, noting that the reports on a forthcoming major quake are fake news. Note that now the stress of the earthquakes source continues getting relieved.

Ministry of Emergency Situations spokesperson Anna Baghdasaryan told ARMENPRESS that on Saturday alone 100 aftershocks were recorded after the earthquake. The tremors are gradually decreasing, and the seismic activity in the Parakar source is decreasing. The aftershocks were of very low magnitude and the population didnt feel them.

Nevertheless, the chance that minor and moderate earthquakes in Armenia and the entire region arent ruled out shouldnt be ignored, she warned. Not only in Armenia, but in the entire region the seismic activity remains and analyses shows that minor and moderate intensity earthquakes could happen, Baghdasaryan said.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan
Nigerians on social media are calling for an end to killings and civil disturbances, following reports of another inter-ethnic violence in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.

The Ibadan crisis began on Thursday when a cart pusher stabbed a cobbler with a knife, following a misunderstanding between the two.

Fight broke out between cart pushers and cobblers after the victim was confirmed dead in a hospital on Friday morning, as the cobblers vowed to avenge the death of their colleague.

Shops and houses were burnt in the ensuing disturbance which degenerated into an inter-ethnic clash with reports of hoodlums attacking themselves along ethnic lines.

According to reports, at least three persons were feared dead and seven trucks burnt in the clashes.

Governor Seyi Makinde ordered the closure of the market and declared a 6 p.m. to 7 a.m curfew in the area.

His Excellency, Governor Seyi Makinde, has directed the immediate closure of Shasha market indefinitely following reports of a breach of peace in the area.

The governor has also approved the imposition of (a) curfew on Shasha. It will run from 6 p.m. to 7 a.m. Residents of the affected area are enjoined to go about their legitimate businesses within the hours stipulated by the law.

Anyone caught disrupting the peace of the community will be made to face the wrath of the law, the statement issued by his spokesperson read.

#StopKillingNortherners

The latest inter-ethnic violence drew reactions from Nigerians on social media.

This made the hashtag, #StopKillingNortherners, trend on Twitter with over 90,000 tweets as of Sunday morning.

Most of the tweets were from people preaching peace among the Yoruba and Hausa ethnic groups.

Some others also called on the authorities to be proactive, warning that the incident in Oyo can ignite violence in other parts of the country.

@Waspapping: Yoruba people need to call their people in Oyo state to order. Ethnic cleansing of Hausa people in that state does no one good. Call them to order before it escalates further #StopKillingNortherners

Yoruba people need to call their people in Oyo state to order. Ethnic cleansing of Hausa people in that state does no one good. Call them to order before it escalates further #StopKillingNortherners  Sarki. (@Waspapping_) February 13, 2021

@al_shekarau: The moment Northerners start retaliating about the ongoing killings, burning of properties and chasing Hausas peoples from their houses that Yorubas are currently doing in Oyo state Nigeria will be destroyed, but they dont want that, theyve chosen peace #StopKillingNortherners

The moment Northerners start retaliating about the ongoing killings, burning of properties and chasing Hausas peoples from their houses that Yorubas are currently doing in Oyo state Nigeria will be destroyed, but they don't want that, they've chosen peace #StopKillingNortherners  Hustler (@al_shekarau_) February 13, 2021

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@Mareeyarhh: Dont say you gonna retaliate and destroy Yorubas property cus of what happened in Oyo state ,the northerners greatest virtue is humility and humanity, bad governance affects us all #EndSARS and pls #StopKillingNortherners 

We should all advocate peace and not tribalism

Don't say you gonna retaliate and destroy Yorubas property cus of what happened in Oyo state ,the northerners greatest virtue is humility and humanity, bad governance affects us all #EndSARS and pls #StopKillingNortherners  We should all advocate peace and not tribalism  QUEEN IN THE NORTHHH (@Mareeyarhh) February 13, 2021

@Al_ameen_Yabo: Dear my Hausa people.

Remember that our religion didnt encourage retaliation on people that know nothing or has nothing to do with what happened somewhere, dont engage in destroying yorubas properties and businesses, our religion didnt encourage that.

#StopKillingNortherners

Dear my Hausa people. Remember that our religion didnt encourage retaliation on people that know nothing or has nothing to do with what happened somewhere, dont engage in destroying yorubas properties and businesses, our religion didnt encourage that.#StopKillingNortherners  Al'ameen (@Al_ameen_Yabo) February 13, 2021

@MFaarees_: Dear Northern governors, this is the right time to meet and call on Buhari and Oyo State governor to stop the killings of innocent Hausa people in Ibadan, its time to take actions, dont let them push us to where we all dont want to be. #StopKillingNortherners

Dear Northern governors, this is the right time to meet and call on Buhari and Oyo State governor to stop the killings of innocent Hausa people in Ibadan, it's time to take actions, don't let them push us to where we all don't want to be. #StopKillingNortherners  F A A R E E S   (@MFaarees_) February 13, 2021

@Adaugetsoo: We just want a Nigeria where every citizen will live in whichever part of it he wills without having fear of being attacked or killed. #StopKillingNortherners in the southern part of Nigeria.

We just want a Nigeria where every citizen will live in whichever part of it he wills without having fear of being attacked or killed. #StopKillingNortherners in the southern part of Nigeria.   GTS (@Adaugetsoo) February 13, 2021

@moderate_ustaz: Killing the hausas in oyo will bring nothing but hate for the yorubas in north, and if the hausas are to start retaliating?believe me the safety of the entire country will be at risk, we dont take laws at our hands, but we are force to do so? Shi kenan 

#StopKillingNortherners

Killing the hausas in oyo will bring nothing but hate for the yorubas in north, and if the hausas are to start retaliating?believe me the safety of the entire country will be at risk, we don't take laws at our hands, but we are force to do so? Shi kenan #StopKillingNortherners  Moderate Ustaz (@moderate_ustaz) February 13, 2021

@Shariif_mahmud: We have to come to our right senses, some people are still wallowing in the drastic damage cased by the previous protest, Im of the view that some people are fueling this protest with political ambition underground. #StopKillingNortherners

We have to come to our right senses, some people are still wallowing in the drastic damage cased by the previous protest, I'm of the view that some people are fueling this protest with political ambition underground. #StopKillingNortherners  Agwai (@Shariif_mahmud) February 13, 2021

@hajjahaauwa: Do you know that Northerners in Oyo and other parts of this country are being denied their right to property, right to freedom from discrimination, right to freedom of movement, right to dignity of human person and even their right to life???#StopKillingNortherners

Do you know that Northerners in Oyo and other parts of this country are being denied their right to property, right to freedom from discrimination, right to freedom of movement, right to dignity of human person and even their right to life???#StopKillingNortherners  Aunty Hauwa (@hajjahaauwa) February 13, 2021

@Ladyposhhhhh: Every tribe has a place they call home and every tribe is in other tribes domain. #StopKillingNortherners

Every tribe has a place they call home and every tribe is in other tribes domain. #StopKillingNortherners  Ummita (@Ladyposhhhhh) February 13, 2021
Omans national carrier, Oman Air, has abandoned its plans to upgrade its feet and is rather contemplating a reduction to 36 down from current 50 as part of moves to curb contamination from the pandemic, Bloomberg reports.

Going to 70 aircraft, the risks would have been quite high for the country and the airline, Chairman Mohammed Al-Barwani told local website WAF Oman.

Aside from reducing the fleet to 36, the airline also plans to focus more on code-sharing with other airlines, Bloomberg notes.

The Gulf country, US media notes, decided to dissolve its air transportation services company, Oman Aviation Group, and divide its operations between the national carrier and the countrys airport management firm.
Over 200 children have been diagnosed with long-term Covid-19 symptoms here, statistics by Swedish Television (SVT) showed on Monday. The Astrid Lindgren's Children's Hospital here has lately seen a surge in children seeking medical care for prolonged Covid symptoms, SVT reported.

Fatigue, a sore throat, headaches and nausea are among the most common symptoms. Concentration problems and memory gaps have also been reported.

The average age is 11-13 and in some cases, the symptoms are debilitating, said Malin Ryd Linder, chief physician at the clinic specialised in long-term disease in children.

"Some go to school, while some are completely bedridden," she told SVT News.

Noting the children's long-term Covid-19 symptoms might be more mild than adults', the physician said that "nevertheless, we must get the resources for these children."

While the latest statistics showed 214 children have been diagnosed in the capital, the severeness of the problem is unknown as there are no figures for the rest of the country.

According to a recent British study, long-term Covid-19 symptoms may be more prevalent than previously thought. In December, the Office for National Statistics said one in five who had been tested positive for the virus exhibited symptoms for five weeks or longer. One in ten had symptoms for 12 weeks or longer, Xinhua reported.

Having noticed that long-term Covid-19 symptoms are a widespread problem, the Swedish government has decided that there is a need for further research.

"It is not currently known what these remaining symptoms are due to or how they should be treated," the government said last week, when presenting plans to fund research into the issue with 50 million SEK (6 million dollars).
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 17:43:33|Editor: huaxia

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BUNIA, DR Congo, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- At least 14 people were killed on Sunday in an attack by Ugandan rebels in the northeastern Ituri province in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo), according to a local army spokesman.

The victims killed in the attack by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) included 11 civilians and three members of the DR Congo armed forces, Jules Ngongo said.

Four ADF rebels were killed and several others arrested when the DR Congo army fought back.

The DR Congo military is in pursuit of the other attackers, who have fled to the forest between the provinces of Ituri and North Kivu, Ngongo said.

Last week, ADF rebels twice attacked an army position in Halungupa, a village in Beni territory in North Kivu. They also destroyed several houses and shops before being driven out by the army. Enditem
London's selfregarding Labour Mayor, Sadiq Khan, last week unveiled his much-vaunted Commission For Diversity In The Public Realm.

The 15-strong commission includes a human rights activist who shouted abuse at the Queen in Westminster Abbey and a 'financial inclusion' expert who has blamed Britain for 'atrocities' across the world.

They are tasked with reviewing the capital's statues, plaques and street names that 'largely reflect a bygone era' and 'increasing representation among Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) communities'.

Saqiq Khan is the chairman of Transport for London (TfL) and of its 14 directors, one is black, two others are from an ethnic background and the rest are white

But if Khan, London's mayor since 2016, really cared about BAME representation, then there are surely more pressing matters to address.

After all, Khan is the chairman of Transport for London (TfL) and of its 14 directors, one is black, two others are from an ethnic background and the rest are white.

That's not all. The pay scales at TfL until March 2020 show only 9 per cent of BAME staff in the 90,0000-100,000 category, and only 8 per cent over 100,000.

At the other end of the pay scale, though, 46 per cent of black and ethnic staff are in the 20,000-30,000 category.

Rather than virtue-signalling over statues, shouldn't Khan instead focus on improving the career prospects of ethnic minority staff?

Nothing like a Dame

Double Oscar-winner Glenda Jackson was less successful on the political stage, rising no higher than junior transport minister in her 23-year career as an MP. So would she like to become a Dame in honour of her political and theatrical work? Jackson, who was made a CBE in 1978, says: 'I'd only want to be a Dame if it was in a panto.'

Ministers certainly worked hard to try to persuade former Daily Telegraph editor Charles  now Lord  Moore to become the new BBC chairman.

Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden lunched him last August, then Media Minister John Whittingdale invited Boris Johnson's favoured candidate to a further repast a month later, according to Whitehall's hospitality register. But Moore decided that, as a critic of the licence fee, the job was not for him. Ministers, of course, denied he had ever been privately offered the role.

Ed Miliband opposed the early closure of coal mines, but last week opposed the opening of a new coal mine in Cumbria

Red Ed spins into a pit stop

When he was Labour leader in 2015, Ed Miliband was vehemently against the proposed early closure of coal mines.

'The miners feel they have had the rug pulled from under them,' he said. 'I do not believe that the decision makes economic or industrial sense and nor is it morally right.'

This is the same Ed Miliband, now shadow business secretary, who last week opposed the opening of a new coal mine in Cumbria.

'We have to be clear,' he said. 'We can't be opening new coal mines and then claim to be a big climate-change leader. We have got to find alternatives.'

The mine  if it goes ahead  will create about 500 new jobs.

BBC Radio 4 has found a 'working-class comedian', Tom Mayhew, to entertain listeners with his 'journey through the benefits system'. Will his show reflect the voice of 'Red Wall' communities that voted for Brexit? Of course not. Mayhew is a Tory-hating Leftie. No wonder the out-of-touch BBC faces a challenge from Andrew Neil's new GB News channel.

Overheard in the Commons: Two Tory MPs talking about the mixed messages from ministers over summer holidays. 'A holiday can restore balance, discernment and judgment. I commend one to the Health Secretary.'

Best known for posing in a red swimsuit as a Tory MP, Charlotte Leslie once worked as a TV researcher. 'I had to do internet searches that in most workplaces would get you thrown out,' she told The Political Party podcast about her time on Sky One's Britain's Wildest series.

One night she was filming at a fetish club and a naked clubber kept running in front of the camera. When she told him to stop, he replied: 'I love it when you're angry. Spank me!'

She thought at the time: 'I've really reached the bottom of my career.' Then she became an MP.
Medics take a patient from an ambulance into the Royal London hospital in London on Jan. 19, 2021. (Tolga Akmen/AFP via Getty Images)

Updates on CCP Virus: Vitamin D Significantly Reduces Deaths, Study Claims

Providing high doses of vitamin D to patients admitted to hospitals after contracting the CCP virus could reduce deaths by 60 percent, according to a study by the Social Science Research Network.

As part of the research, 551 patients admitted to a hospital in Spain were given calcifediol, a prehormone generated from vitamin D3, resulting in 80 percent of the patients not requiring ICU treatment. The research stated that 36 of the patients treated with calcifediol died from the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, compared to 57 patients out of 379 in the control group.

World Needs Pandemic Treaty to Ensure Transparency: UK

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday that world powers should clinch a global treaty on pandemics to ensure proper transparency after Chinas CCP virus outbreak, which causes the disease COVID-19.

Johnson said he would be keen to agree with a global treaty on pandemics where countries agreed to share data, amid British and U.S. concern over access given to a World Health Organization (WHO) mission to China.

Average US Cases Below 100,000 for 1st Time in Months

Average daily new COVID-19 cases in the United States dipped below 100,000 in recent days for the first time in months, but experts cautioned Sunday that infections remain high and precautions to slow the pandemic must remain in place.

The seven-day rolling average of new infections was well above 200,000 for much of December and went to roughly 250,000 in January, according to data kept by Johns Hopkins University. That average dropped below 100,000 on Friday for the first time since Nov. 4. It also stayed below 100,000 over the weekend.

Virus Was Circulating Widely in Wuhan by Late 2019: WHO

An investigator with the World Health Organization (WHO) said the CCP virus was circulating widely in Wuhan, China, in late 2019.

Lead WHO investigator Peter Ben Embarek told CNN that his team found signs of a wider outbreak in the Hubei Province city in late 2019, noting that there were at least 13 strains of the CCP virus, or the novel coronavirus, around Wuhan by late 2019.

Variants-Wary Germany Turns Back 5,000 at Border

German authorities say police have turned back some 5,000 people at the countrys borders with the Czech Republic and Austrias Tyrol region since tight controls were introduced on Sunday.

Germany imposed checks to slow the spread of the UK CCP virus variant from the Czech Republic and the South African variant from Tyrol. It is restricting entry to German citizens and residents, truck drivers, transport and health service workers, and a few others, including cross-border commuters working in systemically relevant sectors.

CDC Director Defends Changing School Distancing Recommendation

The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Sunday defended telling educators last year that social distancing in schools of three feet was quite safe, while her agency in new reopening guidance says six feet of distancing is recommended.

The CDCs new guidance, published last week, repeatedly says six feet of distancing should be targeted when reopening schools. Dr. Rochelle Walensky told reporters in a call about the guidance that, along with masking, physical distance of at least six feet should be required across the school environment.

UK Starts Hotel Quarantine for Arrivals From High-Risk Countries

People arriving in the UK must quarantine in hotels starting Monday as the government tries to prevent new variants of the CCP virus from derailing the countrys vaccination drive.

People arriving in England from 33 high-risk countries must stay in quarantine hotels for 10 days at their own expense. In Scotland, the rule applies to arrivals from any country. Critics say the move comes too late, with the South African variant already circulating in the country.

Israeli Study Finds 94 Percent Drop in Symptomatic Cases

Israels largest health care provider on Sunday reported a 94 percent drop in symptomatic CCP virus infections among 600,000 people who received two doses of Pfizers vaccine in the countrys biggest study to date.

Health maintenance organization Clalit, which covers more than half of all Israelis, said the same group was also 92 percent less likely to develop severe illness from the virus. The comparison was against a group of the same size, with matching medical histories, who had not received the vaccine.

Stimulus Bill Must Be Passed For Schools to Safely Reopen: Fauci

Infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci said Sunday that in order for schools to safely reopen nationwide, a stimulus bill must first be passed to provide further resources.

Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, made the remarks in response to the Feb. 12 guidelines released by the CDC on the reopening of schools in the United States.

Isabel van Brugen, Jack Phillips, Lorenz Duchamps, Zachary Stieber, The Associated Press, and Reuters contributed to this report.
Arohan Financial Services, a non-banking financial company, has filed draft papers with regulator SEBI for its proposed initial public offer (IPO).

As per market sources, the Kolkata-based company plans to raise between Rs 1,750 crore and Rs 1,800 crore.

The public offer of the Aavishkaar Group promoted company comprises a fund raise through a fresh issuance of shares amounting to Rs 850 crore.

The company will have an offer for sale of 2,70,55,893 equity shares by Maj Invest Financial Inclusion Fund II K/S, Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, Tano India Private Equity Fund II, TR Capital III Mauritius and Aavishkaar Goodwell India Microfinance Development Company II Ltd, according to Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP).

The net proceeds from the fresh issue will be utilised for augmenting the company's capital base to meet their future capital requirements.

Edelweiss Ltd, ICICI Securities Ltd, Nomura Financial Advisory and Securities (India) Private Limited and SBI Capital Limited are the managers to the issue.

(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.)
Despite the challenges posed by the pandemic in 2020, Wenzhou-Kean University has risen from the hardships and made significant achievements, which was highly appreciated by Dr. Repollet. He believed, by putting the new graduate programs and research initiatives that have just launched, the reputation of WKU will be further enhanced and it will move faster to build a world-class university.

During the pandemic prevention and control period, WKU and KU have worked closely to tide over COVID-19 difficulties. This precious partnership has become ever stronger under the test of the pandemic and will provide a solid foundation for the closer bond between the two sides in the future.

In the letter, Dr. Repollet expressed his expectation to see Kean campus usher in more WKU exchange students, and likewise, Kean students also look forward to joining the WKU community for short-period study. Eventually, he promised that once the pandemic allows, he will visit WKU campus in person.

Chairman WANG and Chancellor WANG replied to the letter, in which, WKU reviewed the main headways made in the previous year. 2021 is the Year of Ox. Chairman WANG went on explaining, Ox in Chinese culture is the symbol of diligence, resilience, and loyalty. The contemporary Chinese literary giant LU Xun once said in a poem, head-bowed, like a willing ox, I serve the children whole-heartedly. Upholding this kind of spirit, WKU educators are committed to better serving students, to accomplishing greater success.

Chancellor WANG said that the past year saw significant breakthroughs on WKU campus. The grand construction of the School of Architecture and Design -- Ge Hekai Hall has been successfully completed and is ready to open its door to the WKU community. The year 2021 marks WKU's 10th year in operation. Chancellor WANG invited President Repollet to attend the anniversary celebration ceremony in person, visit the brand-new campus, and celebrate WKU's "birthday" together. He expected the two parties to enhance cooperation and achieve win-win results.

Wenzhou-Kean University is a joint venture between Wenzhou University in Zhejiang and Kean University in New Jersey, the United States. More than 90 percent of its curriculum has been introduced from Kean University and more than 90 percent of its faculty members are recruited internationally.

SOURCE Wenzhou-Kean University
Christian Abraham / Hearst Connecticut Media

BRANFORD  A 22-year-old town resident was killed Saturday when she was struck by an Acela train, an Amtrak spokeswoman said Sunday.

Alexandra Trippodo, 22, was killed in the accident, which occurred east of the New Haven station around 1:10 p.m. Saturday, according Beth Toll, a spokeswoman for Amtrak.
The U.S. Senate voted Saturday to acquit former President Trump on a charge of incitement of insurrection in connection with the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol by his supporters, concluding the second impeachment trial of his term in office. A majority of senators found Trump guilty, but the vote fell short of the two-thirds margin required to convict.

A total of 57 Senators voted to convict Trump of the impeachment article brought by the U.S. House of Representatives, with seven Republicans joining all 48 Democrats in the chamber and independent Sens. Bernie Sanders and Angus King. It was the most bipartisan impeachment vote of the five in the nations history. Trump claimed in a statement that it was another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our country.

But Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., issued a blistering speech on the Senate floor just after the vote in which he lashed out at Trump and said he held him directly and uniquely responsible for the riotous insurrection.

There is no question  none  that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. No question about it, McConnell said. The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president. And having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories and reckless hyperbole which the defeated president kept shouting into the largest megaphone on planet Earth.

McConnell went through the defenses mounted by Trumps attorneys, dismissing each. He expressed agreement with many of the House managers arguments.

McConnell also dismissed the Trump attorneys' claim that impeachment was an attempt, as David Schoen put it, to disenfranchise 74 million-plus American voters who voted for Trump in the 2020 election.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Ky., speaks after the Senate acquitted former President Donald Trump in his second impeachment trial in the Senate at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (Senate Television via AP)

Thats an absurd deflection, McConnell said. Seventy-four million Americans did not invade the Capitol. Hundreds of rioters did. Seventy-four million Americans did not engineer the campaign of disinformation and rage. ... One person did. Just one.

Story continues

But in the end, after intense reflection, McConnell said he ended up concluding the Constitution did not allow the Senate to convict a former president. The irony is that McConnell on Jan. 13 rejected the notion of beginning the Senate trial immediately while Trump was still president. His office said the issue was that "the Senate would not be able to reach a 'final verdict' before Donald Trump left office."

Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., one of the seven Republicans who voted to convict, addressed this constitutional question directly in a statement.

"This trial is constitutional because the president abused his power while in office, and the House of Representatives impeached him while he was still in office," Sasse said. "If Congress cannot forcefully respond to an intimidation attack on Article I instigated by the head of Article II, our constitutional balance will be permanently tilted. A weak and timid Congress will increasingly submit to an emboldened and empowered presidency. Thats unacceptable."

McConnell was not the only Republican who cast a "not guilty" vote and then issued a statement condemning Trump's actions and holding him responsible for the insurrection.

"The actions and reactions of President Trump were disgraceful, and history will judge him harshly," said Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va.

Minority Whip John Thune, R-S.D., said: My vote to acquit should not be viewed as exoneration for [Trumps] conduct on January 6, 2021, or in the days and weeks leading up to it. What former President Trump did to undermine faith in our election system and disrupt the peaceful transfer of power is inexcusable."

Minority Whip John Thune, R-S.D., leaves the chamber as the Senate voted to consider hearing from witnesses in the impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump, at the Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

Saturdays vote marked the second time Trump was both impeached in the House and then acquitted in the Senate, with the first occurring one year and one week ago.

A month ago, however, Congress had moved ahead with the second impeachment on the assumption that there was a real possibility the Senate would convict Trump and bar him from holding future office. The events of Jan. 6 were unspeakably horrific, and many Republicans openly blamed Trump for sparking the insurrection.

At that time, McConnell signaled he wanted an impeachment and that he was open to voting to convict. McConnell was one of just many Republicans who minced no words in holding Trump directly responsible for the violent and deadly attack that left five people dead, including one police officer, and injured scores of others, including around 150 police.

Trump lied for months to his supporters that the election was stolen, disregarding over 60 court cases that found no evidence of cheating, and summoned his supporters on Jan. 6

But within days, political considerations began to push their way back into the minds of many Republican members of Congress. And it dawned on many of them that Trump and right-wing media organizations that support him still controlled the way many Republican voters view reality. Their conclusion: Many of them would lose their jobs if they voted to hold Trump accountable.

Trump lawyer Bruce Castor referred to this reality on Friday. "Nobody in this Chamber is anxious to have a primary challenge. That is one truism I think I can say with some certainty," Castor said.

And so just a week after the vicious and unprecedented assault on democracy, only 10 House Republicans voted to impeach Trump, rather than the flood that appeared ready to do so in the hours after Jan. 6, when lawmakers of both parties feared for their lives as the mob ransacked the Capitol.

McConnell, who holds significant sway over other Senate Republicans, began to waffle, and on Jan. 26 he voted that it was unconstitutional for the Senate to hold a trial for a former president.

U.S. Senate votes during former President Donald Trump's second impeachment trial. (Reuters Video)

Still, other Republicans and the public remained in suspense over what McConnell might do, even if it appeared increasingly unlikely he would vote to convict. And then on Saturday morning, the Kentucky Republican confirmed it: He would vote to acquit, even though he did say it was a close call.

For roughly two hours on Saturday morning, it appeared that the trial would extend for more than one day, and possibly for weeks or longer. House managers proposed calling witnesses, and the Senate approved the request by a vote of 55 to 45.

But after it became clear that it would require 60 votes to actually approve the rules for calling witnesses, the managers backed off. Hardline Trump loyalists such as Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., had made it clear they would seek to bring the Senate to a grinding halt and not allow It to do any other business other than the trial, turning it into a partisan circus and blocking any progress on a COVID-19 relief bill.

During closing arguments, Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo., gave a stirring speech in which he dismissed the defense of Trumps attorneys as a collection of distractions and excuses and pleaded with Republican senators to put the countrys welfare above their own political interests.

The consequence of not doing so is just too great, Neguse said.

He also responded to the barrage of accusations from Trumps attorneys that the impeachment was motivated by irrational animus for Trump.

This trial was not born from hatred. Far from it. It is born from love of country, Neguse said. It is our desire to maintain it, our desire to see America at its best.

And he warned the senators that if they did not repudiate Trump and hold him accountable, the horrors of Jan. 6 could be repeated.

Rep. Joe Neguse. (via Reuters Video)

The cold hard truth as to what happened on January 6 can happen again. I fear, like many of you do, that the violence that we saw on that terrible day may be just the beginning, Neguse said. We have shown you the ongoing risks and the extremist groups that grow more emboldened every day. Senators, this could not be the beginning. It can't be the new normal. It has to be the end, and that decision is in your hands.

The Republican senators who found Trump guilty were Richard Burr of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Burr and Cassidy were the big surprises. Burr, who is retiring in 2022, voted that the trial was unconstitutional but then voted guilty anyway. Cassidy was the surprise Republican vote in favor of constitutionality, but then earlier this week he was photographed with notes suggesting he was leaning toward a not guilty vote.

The guilty vote was the biggest political risk for Cassidy, Murkowski, Sasse and Romney, who all represent conservative states and have not indicated any intent to resign. But Cassidy and Sasse were just reelected last fall, and will not be up for reelection until 2026.

Cassidys statement explaining his vote was just two sentences. Our Constitution and our country is more important than any one person. I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty, he said.

Thumbnail Credit: (Photo illustration: Yahoo News; photos: AP, Eric Baradat/AFP via Getty Images)

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In a shocking incident, a 15-year-old girl in Maharashtra's Nagpur district allegedly committed suicide after being scolded by her mother for watching TV for long hours, police informed on Sunday.

The incident occurred in New Totladoh town in the district on Friday evening, an official said.

Suicide"Around 7 pm on Friday, the girl's mother reprimanded her for watching TV too much instead of focusing on her studies," he said.

"Soon after that, the minor goes to her room and locked it from inside. She hanged herself to death from the ceiling using a rope," he added.

The incident came to light around 8.30 pm. A case of accidental death was registered at Deolapar police station.


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Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 19:50:57|Editor: huaxia

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ABUJA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Government troops killed 81 Boko Haram militants in recent clearance operations in northeast Nigeria, the military said on Monday.

The operations covered "many villages" in the vast Sambisa Forest in the northeastern state of Borno, said Farouk Yahaya, theater commander of Operation Lafiya Dole.

He did not say when the operations were conducted or how long they lasted.

"The relentless troops destroyed the terrorists' camps and recovered gun trucks and weapons as the air force aircraft continue to provide close air and interdiction support to the ground forces," Yahaya said.

During the operations, he said, one soldier was killed and four others wounded in an incident involving improvised explosive devices planted by Boko Haram militants.

Boko Haram has been trying to establish an Islamist state in northeastern Nigeria since 2009. The terror group has also extended its attacks to other countries in the Lake Chad Basin. Enditem
Jason Kipnis has signed a deal with the Braves, as the veteran infielder announced himself via his Twitter feed. The MLB Networks Jon Heyman tweets that the contract is a minor league pact with an invitation to the Braves Spring Training camp.

After signing a minor league deal with the Cubs last season, Kipnis ended up getting regular work at second base, getting a bit more playing time than young platoon partner Nico Hoerner. Albeit in the smaller sample size of only 135 plate appearances, Kipnis delivered his best offensive performance in four seasons, hitting .237/.341/.404 with three home runs, good for a slightly above-average 101 OPS+ and 103 wRC+. On the down side, Kipnis didnt make much hard contact and his strikeout rate ballooned to a career-high 30.4%.

Much of Kipnis production last season came against right-handed pitching, so he could move on from platooning with Hoerner to platooning with another promising youngster in Atlantas Austin Riley at third base. The wrinkle is that third base would be a new position for Kipnis, who has never played the hot corner in the big leagues and last played third base for four games of Arizona Fall League action back in 2010.

Ozzie Albies naturally has second base locked down in Atlanta, but since Kipnis has experience playing center field with the Indians in 2019, the Braves could deploy him as a backup outfielder. Rookie Cristian Pache (another right-handed bat) is slated for regular center field duty, and Kipnis could occasionally spell Pache against some right-handed starters.

A two-time All-Star back in his prime years in Cleveland, Kipnis began to decline as he entered his 30s, hitting just .236/.305/.403 over 1485 PA from 2017-19. Now entering his age-34 campaign, Kipnis will look to provide some experience and multi-positional versatility off the Braves bench.
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#AT21.: Disha Ravis arrest shows age is just a number and an offence is an offence

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: The arrest of Disha Ravi, a 21 year old climate activist for allegedly editing the toolkit shared by Greta Thunberg over the ongoing farmers' agitation has triggered sharp reactions across the country.

While several politicians from the Opposition have come out in her support, the police has maintained that it does have a strong case against her. While stating that she is being probed for conspiracy, the Delhi Police also looking for another activist, Nikita Jacob.

21 year old ...environment activist ... student ..Are these credentials for becoming a part of breaking India forces..? How does she get the access for editing tool kit ..?Why she is part of anti national WhatsApp groups ..?Many questions ..But only one answer ..21 year old ..!!  B L Santhosh (@blsanthosh) February 15, 2021

Following the arrest of Disha, there were a barrage of tweets that questioned the actions of the Delhi Police for arresting a 21 year old activist. Delhi Chief Minister was one of the first to condemn the attack stating that the arrest of 21 year old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy.

This led to a backlash, with many stating that age is never a factor for crime. Some users said those who are feeling sympathetic about the arrest and citing her age must recall the Adil Dar, the Pulwama bomber, who was also 21.

Arrest of 21 yr old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime.  Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) February 15, 2021

Others took the example of Hima Das, the 21 year old sprinter from Assam who is nicknamed as the Dhing Express. She holds the current national record in 400 metres. These exchanges let to #21 and #DishaRaviArrested being the top trends. Many even shared images of women in the Indian Army and said that 21 is the same age group. On one hand, these women have made India proud by joining the Indian Army and on the other hand there is the 21 year old Disha Ravi who is an alleged traitor.

Others asked how a 21 year old girl could have access to edit Greta Thunberg's toolkit, which is a detailed plan to cause unrest and riots in India.

One user spoke about how Indian soldier, Ankush Sharma (21) was martyred at Galwan fighting for the country and on the other hand, leftists are supporting Disha Ravi (21). There were also comparisons drawn to Ajmal Kasab and Burhan Wani, who were in their early 20s.

The Left has been using young impressionable minds as cannon fodder for their deranged politics for a long time. From JNU to Jamia, AMU to Nadwa and now Disha Ravi, are all part of their sinister plot...



Unfortunately they are abandoned soon after they have served their purpose!  Amit Malviya (@amitmalviya) February 14, 2021

The war of words was not restricted to Twitter alone. Accusing the government of "murdering democracy" by using force against a 21-year-old, the opposition on Monday said the voice of India cannot be silenced even as the BJP defended the action, saying a crime is a crime no matter at what age.

At 21,

Someone made India Proud and Someone tried to defame India.



Yes, Age is just a number...KARMA is what get backs to You.#DishaRavi #HimaDas #DishaRaviArrested pic.twitter.com/qwsvBHqVN8  Prity Singh (@pritsi2101) February 15, 2021

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi led the opposition offensive following the arrest of 21-year-old Disha Ravi in the case and said the country will not be silenced.

"Your lips are free to speak. Say that the truth is still alive. They are scared, not the country," he said in a tweet in Hindi.

"India will not be silenced," he added.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said, "Arrest of 21 year old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime."

Union minister and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Gajendra Singh Shekhawat tweeted: "if age is the criteria then Param Veer Chakra Second Lt Arun Khetarpal, martyred at 21 is who I am proud of. Not some toolkit propagandists."

BJP general secretary B L Santosh tweeted: "21 year old...environment activist...student...Are these credentials for becoming a part of breaking India forces? How does she get the access for editing tool kit...? Why she is part of anti-national WhatsApp groups...? Many questions...But only one answer...21 year old."

BJP spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia said, "A criminal is a criminal, gender and age are immaterial if not a juvenile. Just for your knowledge, Kasab was 21 when he attacked Mumbai."

"Supporting ''farmers'' is not a crime but conspiring against India and inciting others surely is," he said.

BJP''s IT cell in-charge Amit Malviya said, "The Left has been using young impressionable minds as cannon fodder for their deranged politics for a long time. From JNU to Jamia, AMU to Nadwa and now Disha Ravi, are all part of their sinister plot...Unfortunately they are abandoned soon after they have served their purpose."

Americans largely think senators did not do the right thing. Almost three in five Americans, or 58 percent, say former President Donald Trump should have been convicted in his second impeachment trial, according to an ABC News/Ipsos poll. That means opinions on the matter only solidified during the trial considering that its within the margin of error of the 56 percent of Americans who had the same opinion last week, before the Senate voted 57-43 and acquitted the former president.

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The proportion of Americans who believe Trump should have been convicted is far higher now than it was after he was acquitted in his first impeachment trial. After the Senate voted to acquit Trump last year, only 47 percent of Americans disapproved of the outcome, according to a Monmouth University poll.

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Even though the divisions are obviously marked along party lines, 14 percent of Republicans across the country believe Trump should have been convicted. That was in line with the seven Republican senators who joined all Democrats in voting for conviction, which just happens to amount to 14 percent of all Republicans in the Senate. But the number shows how Trump continues to have a solid base of support among Republicans. In contrast, 88 percent of Democrats and 64 percent of independents said Trump should have been convicted.

If theres one thing Americans of all political stripes can agree on is that senators voted along party lines rather than on the evidence that was presented during the trial. Seventy-six percent of Democrats, 78 percent of Republicans, and 79 percent of independents all agree the votes came down more to partisan politics than anything else.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
With very low temperatures predicted for Fat Tuesday, theres been much conversation around town of the remember when variety as families recall their weather experiences on the big day.

Personally, the coldest Mardi Gras I have ever experienced was in 1986, my first year with WWL-TV Channel 4. I was incredibly honored to share the open-air media platform opposite Gallier Hall with Angela Hill and Garland Robinette, where we covered the Zulu and Rex parades on February 11. With a wind chill in the low-20s, my thermals, neck scarf and leather gloves did not keep me from shivering. The low was 32 degrees that morning and the high was only 40 degrees. The four hours of airtime seemed like an eternity. The average temperature that day of 36 degrees is the second lowest in Fat Tuesday history.

Considering Mardi Gras can fall on any Tuesday between Feb. 3 and March 9, wide temperature ranges and conditions are hardly surprising. And not just from year to year. There has twice been a 30-degree swing between highs and lows on Fat Tuesday itself: in 1994 (33 degrees to 63 degrees) and 2009 (38 degrees to 68 degrees).

The warmest Fat Tuesdays were Feb. 20, 1917, and Feb. 9, 1932, when the temperature reached 83 degrees. The coldest was on Valentines Day, 1899, with a low of 22 degrees and a high of 38 degrees, resulting in an average temperature of 30 degrees.

Temperatures of 32 degrees or below have occurred only nine times since 1857 when the Mistick Krewe of Comus presented the Citys first formal Mardi Gras parade.

The wettest Mardi Gras was March 1, 1927, when 2.12 inches of rain fell. The longest string of consecutive wet Fat Tuesdays was from 1951-1957. The only rainout in Rex history occurred in 1933.

Whatever happens this year will not likely eclipse the record-setting Great Blizzard of 1899.

In his book, Extreme Weather, historian Christopher Burt described February as witnessing the greatest cold wave in modern U.S. history. There were 45 states at that time and all of them recorded a temperature below zero during this event. The Mississippi River was frozen north of Cairo, Illinois. Large chunks of ice backed up the river at New Orleans and some made their way down to the Gulf of Mexico.

On Mardi Gras Eve, February 13, the lowest temperature ever registered in New Orleans was recorded at seven degrees. The Krewe of Proteus postponed its parade that night until the first Friday of Lent, partially because of fear the mules that were to pull its floats would slip on the slick surfaces.

Historians tell us that the next day Rex rode with a frozen mustache as three inches of snow covered the ground. Comus paraded in the bitter cold that evening.

Willis L. Moore, chief of the United States Weather Bureau in 1899, extolled the benefits of the freezing temperatures to the Times-Picayune that day.

This polar wave  should be looked upon as a god-send to the southern people," he said. "Its sanitary effects as a germicide have been immense, and I doubt if any lurking bacteria could have withstood the killing agency of the high pressure and cold at 10 to 6 degrees above zero.  Now, can you grasp the enormous hygienic benefit due to such intense cold? The south will be as free from bacteria next summer as the summit of Mount St. Elias in Alaska will be free of germs. Without being a bacteriological expert I may hazard the opinion that not only the fever germs have been annihilated, but that all kinds of gases and effluvia noxious to an animal life have been driven away, dispersed and rendered innocuous by the inrush and influence of the cold wave.

Legendary New Orleans meteorologist Nash Roberts, who for decades provided up-to-the-minute forecasts for the Rex organization, said in 1964, parade weather forecasts call for pin point accuracy at the most hazardous time of the year for the forecaster. I am sure most forecasters feel, as I do, that they would like to don their Mardi Gras costume about three weeks early and masquerade as someone else until Ash Wednesday.
Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 00:07:46|Editor: huaxia

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A staff member of BIOR, Latvia's Institute of Food Safety, Animal Health and Environment, operates smart automated DNA extraction equipment provided by China's MGI Tech Co., Ltd. in Riga, Latvia, Feb. 19, 2021. When the second COVID-19 wave hit Latvia last autumn, Latvia's testing capacity proved insufficient. To help solve this problem, China's MGI Tech Co., Ltd. provided BIOR with smart automated DNA extraction equipment to increase its testing capacity. (Photo by Janis/Xinhua)

RIGA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Since the outbreak of the coronavirus epidemic in Latvia, Chinese companies have been helping the Baltic country to fight COVID-19 by supplying equipment for automated sample extraction and gene sequencing.

When the second COVID-19 wave hit Latvia last autumn, the country's testing capacity proved insufficient. To help solve this problem, China's MGI Tech Co., Ltd. provided BIOR, Latvia's Institute of Food Safety, Animal Health and Environment, with smart automated DNA extraction equipment to increase its testing capacity.

"The COVID-19 testing equipment provided by MGI can prepare nearly 10,000 samples every day. It saves manpower significantly, has high testing accuracy and eliminates human errors," Olga Valcina, BIOR deputy head in charge of laboratories, said lately.

MGI has also provided Latvia with gene sequencing equipment to help scientists of the Latvian Biomedical Research and Study Centre (BMC) sequence the virus samples to determine the origins of the virus and identify new mutations.

"MGI's gene sequencers provide the Latvian scientists with an opportunity that has not been available before. It's very helpful for us to manage the situation and the costs are at least three times cheaper and the quality is even better compared to other technologies," said Professor Janis Klovins, director of BMC.

At the end of January 2021, MGI Latvia, the subsidiary of China's MGI, launched the production of automated and integrated container laboratories, aiming to improve the local COVID-19 testing capacity and help Latvia and other European countries fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

MGI Container Labs are made by converting shipping containers into laboratories capable of processing 3,000 samples (single tube) a day. The laboratory's automated process greatly reduces lab technicians' risk of infection and minimizes the manual workload. Test results can be obtained in four hours and the labs can be transported and deployed conveniently in various locations for large-scale testing.

Hou Yong, head of MGI Europe and Africa, told Xinhua recently that the Chinese company wants to help Latvia fight the pandemic by boosting its testing capabilities. Enditem
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KALAMAZOO, MI -- Nearly two decades ago, the home of Kalamazoos first Black settlers was burned down during a firefighting training exercise.

Though that physical piece of the communitys history was lost, it was not forgotten. Today, a scale replica of the 1860s farmhouse is on display as part of the Filling in the Gaps exhibit that aims to bring to life Kalamazoos Black history.

The exhibit is an online exclusive from Kalamazoo Valley Museum. Artist Murphy Darden has spent decades collecting and reimagining artifacts, images, and historic documents chronicling the achievements of Black Americans.

At 93, Darden has lived through a great deal of history himself. His multimedia collection spans baptisms in the rivers of Mississippi to his boyhood fascination with Black cowboys to boycotts demanding equality for Black workers in 1960s Kalamazoo.

I dont want to be someone that leaves here with no history left behind, Darden said. It shows where we come from and where we are today.

Related: 7 ways to celebrate Black History Month in Kalamazoo

The Filling in the Gaps collection begins with a painting of Deborah and Enoch Harris, who were among the first documented Black settlers in Kalamazoo County.

They arrived in Oshtemo Township around 1830 and created the first apple orchard in the area. Some of their descendants still live in Kalamazoo County, according to the Kalamazoo Public Library.

The settlers house stood in the same spot until 2006. By then, the Harris farmhouse had fallen into disrepair and a local fire department received permission to burn it down during training exercises.

Darden learned about the house and its historical significance through an article he read in the Kalamazoo Gazette. He created his replica based off a photo the newspaper printed when the house was burned.

We have this generation that dont know anything about the history of Kalamazoo, he said. We lose our history because we dont talk about it, we dont save it.

In addition to touching on local history, Dardens art features civil rights figures with a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. and a model of the bus Rosa Parks took. He is currently working on a bust of Vice President Kamala Harris.

His art celebrates the achievements of and pays tribute to the fight for equality.

Darden has made a model of the first Black female millionaire, Madam C. J. Walker, driving her car and paints the colorful spirit of Kalamazoos Bombardiers Drum and Marching Corps marching downtown.

In 1963, he watched Black workers protest outside the Northside drugstore where he cashed his checks from the Hotel Harris. Although Van Avery Drugstore served the predominantly Black neighborhood, it refused to employ Black residents. Darden painted the boycott based on a photo from the Kalamazoo Gazette.

Art and history were intertwined for Darden at a young age. He and his twin brother, Irvin, grew up in Mississippi playing cowboys, watching Western movies and drawing their mostly white heroes. His fascination with the American West led Darden to research more about the history of the cowboy.

Through collecting Western magazines and books, he learned a third of the 35,000 cowboys who worked on ranches and rode the trails were of African descent.

He began seeking out images of Black cowboys like Detroit actor Herb Jefferies, who starred in Black westerns like Harlem Rides the Range, Harlem on the Prairie and Two-Gun Man from Harlem.

Darden recreated these cowboys in multiple mediums until he eventually decided to make life-size cutouts.

The cutouts and scale models make the history feel more real with a sense of touch and feel, he said.

The overarching goal of the artists work: to leave behind a record of all that history, which could otherwise be forgotten.

Im trying to fill the gap and leave something for the next generation, Darden said. Im trying to save that stuff that I didnt know of until I grew up into a big man and got into collecting. [Im] trying to save history.

More on MLive:

One of Saginaws oldest Black female barbers, 72, reflects on a beautiful career

Saginaw Art Museum features works by Black artists in Wonderfully Made exhibit

Discuss Black history and culture at these Jackson-area Black History Month events

Inside Michigan mans prison sentence: No visitors for nearly 20 years, losing a son and COVID-19 battle

Saginaws African American fine art exhibit shows the life-changing value of art during Black History Month

Female activists said they wanted to express solidarity with Navalnys wife Yulia and other women who have become victims of the crackdown. By forming a chain we want to show that we are for love and against violence, Darya Obraztsova, a 22-year-old student, said in Moscow. Photo: AFP
New Delhi: It's February, spring is around the corner. It's that time of the year when officially the winter season is over. To be precise, Basant Panchami marks the occasion of onset of summers.

This year, the festival would be celebrated on Tuesday, February 16. Basant Panchami is celebrated across north India in different ways and moods.

Also known as Saraswati Panchami, Goddess Saraswati is worshipped on this day. She is considered a goddess of knowledge, virtue, music and fine arts.

Children's books and study material are kept under the portrait of Saraswati. The day is also celebrated as a big event across schools and colleges. Students are often heard singing Saraswati Vandana while offering prayers and flowers to the goddess.

Saraswati Puja 2021 muhurat:

Panchami tithi would begin on Feb 16 at 3:36 am and would end at 5:46 am the next day.

Why is Goddess Saraswati worshipped?

Saraswati is considered the goddess of knowledge and arts. Seeking her blessings during this time of the year is believed to be auspicious. She is depicted in a white sari, sitting on a lotus symbolizing truth and purity. These are some virtues which everyone wants to imbibe, hence Goddess Saraswati is worshipped.

Significance of Saraswati Puja

According to Hindu mythology, when Lord Brahma created the universe he wanted to see it with his own eyes. He later set out on a journey, where he found everyone lonely and silent. He then sprinkled some water from his kamandal, and played an instrument at the request of an angel. This angel was believed to be Goddess Saraswati, who blessed the people of Earth with her music.

Spring is considered an auspicious time for marriages, griha pravesh and other such occasions. Yellow-coloured clothes are worn by people, while yellow coloured food like khichdi is eaten as a meal.
First reader-voted awards for the Indian travellers for airlines, loyalty programmes and credit cards



(TRAVPR.COM) INDIA - February 15th, 2021 - Live From A Lounge, a leading travel and lifestyle digital platform for the Global Indians, has today launched The Blue Medallion awards, a celebration of travel and lifestyle brands operating in India. The inaugural awards will honour the best in travel, loyalty and credit cards.

LiveFromALounge.com, launched in 2011, is Indias only digital platform that focusses on loyalty programmes and travel credit card analysis and combines it with up to date information about air travel and hospitality to make it the go-to website for the affluent Indian travellers across the globe.

Voters will have a month to vote for their favourite brands on the awards website at thebluemedallion.com. Voters will pick their winners in 25 categories which include their picks of the best economy class product, best airline and hotel loyalty programmes, the best implementation of COVID-19 protocols and best credit cards amongst others. The winners will be announced in April 2021.

On this occasion, Ajay Awtaney, the founder-editor of LiveFromALounge.com said, The Blue Medallion will celebrate the best of the travel and lifestyle business in a first-of-its-kind awards programme that makes a comprehensive attempt to highlight The Choice of the Indian Traveller and recognise the effort of the organisations that power our travel.

Shipra Baranwal, the co-founder of LiveFromALounge.com, added, With everything that happened over 2020, there is no better time to recognise the efforts of the travel and lifestyle industry which kept their spirits up and marched on in spite of the difficult circumstances. As travel bounces back, we want them to know that their efforts were appreciated by the customers, even though they perhaps did not see each other much last year.

A full list of the award categories to be voted upon can be found below:

Best Domestic Economy Class

Best Domestic Business Class

Best implementation of CoVid-19 Hygiene Protocols on an Indian Airline

Best International Economy Class operating from/to India

Best International Business Class operating from/to India

Best Airline Alliance serving India

Best Airline Loyalty Programme from an Indian Airline

Best Airline Loyalty Programme from an International Airline

Best Luxury Hotel Chain operating in India

Best Premium Hotel Chain operating in India

Best Boutique Luxury Hotel Operator in India

Best implementation of CoVid-19 Hygiene Protocols by a Hotel chain

Best Hotel Loyalty Programme by an Indian Hotel Operator

Best Hotel Loyalty Programme by an International Hotel Operator in India

Best Home Rental Facilitator in India

Best Home Dining Experience in India

Best Lifestyle Rewards Card in India

Best mid-tier Credit Card for travel benefits

Best entry-level Credit Card for travel benefits

Best Premium Co-branded Travel Credit Card in India

Best mid-tier Co-branded Travel Credit Card in India

Best entry-level Co-branded Travel Credit Card in India

Best Card Benefit offered in 2020

Best Travel Rewards currency earned via Credit Cards

Best Self Drive Car Rental Service.

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Authorities in Armenias Syunik province said on Monday that Azerbaijani servicemen deployed near Agarak, an Armenian village several kilometers east of the provincial capital Kapan, continuously fired small arms in the air on Saturday for unknown reasons.

According the provincial administration, Russian border guards deployed in the area documented the sporadic gunfire and established an additional outpost at the border section in response to the incident.

The village chief, Hayk Sahakian, told RFE/RLs Armenian Service that there was no further shooting there on Sunday and Monday. Despite the relative calm many, villagers remain concerned about their security, he said, arguing that the nearest Azerbaijani position is only about 1 kilometer from Agarak.

The office of the Armenian human rights ombudsman, Arman Tatoyan, released what it described as a mobile phone video shot by an Armenian border guard deployed outside Agarak. The short video caught the sound of intense automatic gunfire.

In a statement, Tatoyan said that such gunshots are a regular occurrence in Syunik villages bordering three districts southwest of Nagorno-Karabakh which were retaken by Azerbaijan during and after the autumn war. He condemned the incidents as a security threat to the local population.

They shoot sporadically, said Sahakian. When they use tracer bullets we can see that they fire towards the village.

During the six-week war Russia deployed soldiers and border guards to Syunik to help the Armenian military defend the region against possible Azerbaijani attacks. Russian troops currently also patrol sections of the main regional highway running along the Armenian-Azerbaijani frontier.
The new goal is to offer the first dose to another 2mln people by April while administering the booster to the 15mln inoculated so far

The UK started the week on a positive note after reaching its vaccination target set for mid-February.

Health authorities offered the first dose of a COVID-19 jab to all 15mln people in the first four priority groups, so it has now moved to the second phase of the rollout, involving those aged over 65 and the clinically vulnerable.

Over 90% of the over-70s accepted the vaccine, but the uptake was lower among other groups, with two-thirds of care workers and four-fifths of NHS staff receiving the inoculation.

There are concerns over ethnic minorities, with health secretary Matt Hancock telling Sky News improving the take-up rate is a priority for the government.

According to a study, 37% of black staff was administered the jab compared to 71% of white staff in a pool of 19,000 workers at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust.

The next target is to reach 17mln people by the end of April while distributing the second dose to those who have already received the first within the 12-week window.

Lockdown pressure

As a result, Boris Johnson is under pressure by some fellow Conservatives who are asking to ease lockdown measures faster than planned.

A group of 63 MPs said there is no justification for not lifting all restrictions if the April target is met, Bloomberg reported.

The number of deaths is falling, but Hancock said it is too early to say whether its because of the vaccination programme.

"It is too early to be able to measure the direct impact but of course we are looking at that and we can see overall that the number of cases is coming down sharply, the number in hospitals is coming down but it is still too high - at the latest count there were 23,000 people in hospital with COVID," he told Sky News.

Johnson is set to announce a roadmap out of lockdown next Monday while schools could reopen as early as March 8.

"The question is a judgment of how quickly and how safely - that's the judgment we will be making this week, looking at the data ahead of the prime minister setting out the road map on February 22, a week from today, Hancock said.

Travelling safely

The government is also discussing with other countries on measures to verify whether passengers have received a COVID-19 jab before travelling.

The UK would not require vaccine proof for entry but outbound travellers may have to provide certification for other countries.

In that case it will be important for people from the U.K. to be able to show whether or not they have been vaccinated in order to travel, Hancock told Sky News on Monday.

We are working with countries around the world on the basis for this and how that vaccine certification can happen in a way that is assured.

As of Monday, travellers coming to the UK from 33 countries deemed high risk have to quarantine in hotels for ten days at their own expense.
Minister of Culture Ines Abdel-Dayem met with batch number 53 of diplomatic attaches to review the efforts taken by the state to encourage cultural exchange between Egypt and countries of the world.on Thursday

At the Institute of Diplomatic Studies in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Abdel-Dayem met with the members of the 53rd batch of diplomatic attaches within the framework of the institute's efforts to give the opportunity to young diplomats to meet with the states senior officials in order to learn about public policies in various fields.

It is also a chance for the attaches to be made aware of the pivotal efforts that are being exerted to continue the development of the country and its citizens from all aspects, whether culturally or academically, as well as informing them about the crucial role played by culture and arts in the civilisational formation of the country, given that they are some of the most important elements of Egypt's soft power.

Abdel-Dayem also expressed her happiness with meeting representatives of Egyptian diplomacy, stressing the need to continue communicating with the nations of the world to maximise the cultural and artistic activities that are presented to them that reflect the aspects of the excellence of Egyptian creativity and civilisation, relying on them to promote Egypt's culture and arts.

It is important to note that the meeting dealt with a review of the efforts and activities carried out by the Ministry of Culture in Egypt and abroad.

It also reviewed the permanent cooperation and coordination between the Egyptian Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to enhance the Egyptian presence abroad, and to shed light on the great diversity of Egyptian cultural products and their role in achieving rapprochement with other cultures and nations.

For his part, Khaled Rady, the assistant minister of foreign affairs and director of the Institute of Diplomatic Studies, welcomed the culture minister, praising her efforts in improving the performance of the various sectors of the Ministry of Culture.

Rady also hailed her initiatives to offer cultural activities and services to remote areas and regions across the country.

It should be noted that the visit came after holding a number of lectures that were given by senior officials from the Ministry of Culture to members of the 53rd batch of diplomatic attaches as part of their training programme that aims to provide the best experiences for young diplomats and to qualify them to present a good image of Egypt abroad.

Short link:


Fathers should be entitled to the same amount of parental leave as mothers so more women can return to work, parents' charities claim.

Children's charity UNICEF and Parents at Work called on the federal government to support the proposal for 'gender-balanced leave policies'.

Mothers are allowed 18 weeks of leave with minimum wage, but fathers are only allowed two weeks.

Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed the gap in parental leave led to more women becoming the primary carer in 2017.

Fathers should be entitled to the same amount of parental leave as mothers so more women can return to work, according to advocacy groups

Only one in 20 fathers took primary carer leave to look after their newborn child.

UNICEF Australia director of programs Nicole Breeze said labels such as 'maternity' and 'paternal' only added to the gap, The West Australian reported.

She suggested governments should be more focused on 'gender-balanced shared parental leave'.

'When both men and women are supported more equally to balance the demands of work and family, women's workforce participation improves,' she said.

'This leads to a reduction in the inequality between male and female lifetime earnings and means that women are just as able to access opportunity for promotions and career development as their male counterparts, helping to address the gender pay gap.'

Parents at Work founder Emma Walsh pointed out several countries in Europe closed the gender gap with generous parental leave polices.

Finland allows the father and mother to take 164 days of parental leave each. A single parent is allowed double that amount of time.

Parents at Work will work with UNICEF to create a national guideline on creating a more gender balanced workforce, and lobby the government to implement it.
A California tech executive has admitted his "COVID Immunity Bubble" turned into a superspreader event, infecting over two dozen conference-goers in the process.

In a blog posted on his personal website, Peter Diamandis, who co-founded several space companies and the Silicon Valley business incubator Singularity University, says he didn't want to nix the in-person portion of his yearly business conference. Instead, despite California's guidance against doing so, he put together a hybrid event for his annual Abundance 360 Summit, with some attendees watching sessions virtually and a number flying in to attend in person.

In order to accommodate the 80 or so in-person employees and guests, some of whom reportedly paid $30,000 to attend, Diamandis set up the conference at his offices in Culver City.

"I thought creating a COVID 'Immunity Bubble' for a small group in a TV studio setting was possible," he wrote on his blog. "I was wrong."

All attendees were required to take a COVID test daily from Jan. 23-26 (along with show a negative test result upon arrival). Because of the daily negatives, Diamandis says, people were lulled into a "false sense of security" and became lax about wearing masks. "We did not make it a requirement to wear masks 100% of the time at the studio," he wrote. "This is definitely one of my biggest failings and one of the most important lessons learned."

Diamandis says the first case was reported two days after the conference wrapped up. Many of those individuals had already taken flights home, potentially exposing others in the process.

In the process of its reporting, the MIT Technology Review linked 32 cases back to the conference. When asked about this number, "Diamandis responded that 'to include the family members who have had cases,' a total of 32 'seems probably low.'" Diamandis himself has also tested positive and experienced symptoms.

The publication also notes Diamandis' tweets in the early days of the pandemic fretted about economic impacts over public health measures.

"Today we are witnessing the viral spread of fear that is definitively damaging both national economies and global markets," he tweeted on March 16.

"Personally, Ive been heads down in research and conversations to distinguish 'Fear from Reality,'" he added.

It is possible the conference violated California COVID rules, but it's not yet clear if Diamandis will be fined.
AAP convenor and Delhi Chief Minister will address a 'kisan mahapanchayat' at Meerut on February 28 in support of farmers protesting the Centre's new agri laws, the party said on Monday.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has strongly come out in favour of the farmers protesting the new farms laws. Kejriwal has visited Delhi's Singhu border, a major protest site, twice and expressed his support to the farmers.

"AAP Convenor @ArvindKejriwal to address a Kisan Mahapanchayat in Meerut, Uttar Pradesh on 28th February, 2021. Aam Aadmi Party has convened a Mahapanchayat to support the demands of the protesting farmers," the AAP said in a tweet.

(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.)
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Some people only want to be a digital subscriber to get access online and others want to also receive the print edition.

If you are already a print subscriber and want online access, it is free, you simply have to create an online account and then attach your print subscription account number to the online account you create.
Mumbai-based Group has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Hindustan Motors to acquire land from it for a and hyperscale data centre park.

The MoU has been signed for a 100-acre land at Uttarpara, West Bengal, where Group will set up an integrated and hyperscale data centre park called Greenbase and Yotta.

Direct investment by the Group in the venture is pegged at Rs 8,500 crore. The combined investment by the group and its customers is estimated to cross Rs 10,000 crore, a statement said.

Greenbase will deliver a modern and self-sustainable ecosystem consisting of 3-million square feet of industrial and warehousing space along with essential utilities and support infrastructure.

Yotta, Hiranandanis hyperscale data center division, will develop six hyper connected datacenter buildings bringing in 250MW of cutting edge data centre capacity over the next several years to the state.

Commenting, Darshan Hiranandani, Group CEO  Hiranandani Group said, Kicking off this project would not have been possible without the tremendous support of the government of West Bengal under the leadership of Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee.

West Bengal is the gateway to the east. It is an ideal hub for and industrial development with excellent road, rail and riverine connectivity. Simultaneously, the data centre business will benefit from the digitization revolution, the upcoming Silicon Valley at New Town, Rajarhat and excellent fibre connectivity on land and the new submarine cable coming up at Tajpur, he added.

By setting up a data center park in Kolkata, we will not only serve the customers of the state but the entire eastern region including neighbouring countries, Hiranandani further added.

The first facility of the industrial and logistics park will be ready by June 2022 and first data centre building will be ready by 2023.
Oil and natural gas are essential and irreplaceable to our lives, economy and environmental progress. Every Texan should be alarmed by efforts to undermine the oil and natural gas industry, as these misguided attempts will only threaten jobs, the economy and the environment.

As the Texas Legislature begins its work in earnest, we are encouraging lawmakers to consider a three-part Roadmap to Recovery policy to drive oil and natural gas investment to power Texas economic recovery, and provide critical state and local tax revenue Texans need.

Oil and natural gas taxes and state royalties anchor the Texas budget and provide funding that directly supports Texas schools, teachers, roads, infrastructure and essential services. These resources will be vital to meeting our states budget deficit due to the economic downturn caused by COVID-19. As challenging as last year was, the Texas oil and natural gas industry paid $13.9 billion in state and local taxes and state royalties.

Our states Economic Stabilization Fund  commonly known as the rainy day fund  the Permanent School Fund, or PSF, and the Permanent University Fund, or PUF, are funded almost exclusively with taxes and royalties paid by the oil and natural gas industry.

Last year, the PUF received $771 million and the PSF received $942 million. The rainy day fund received $1.66 billion from oil and natural gas taxes, bringing the balance to more than $10 billion.

In this legislative session, Texas lawmakers have several opportunities to advance economic and environmental progress. To meet the needs of our booming population, lawmakers must ensure continued, responsible development of essential infrastructure.

Every Texan relies on electric transmission lines, roads, high-speed internet, drainage and flood control, and pipelines for water, oil, natural gas and transportation fuels. The expansion of this infrastructure is essential to the states continued growth and success.

The Legislature should embrace smart tax policy, such as renewing the economic development program known as Chapter 313, that attracts investments and jobs to Texas and resists calls to increase taxes on an industry that pays 6.3 times more in taxes on a per-job basis than the average of the rest of the private sector.

We are also urging lawmakers to maintain their commitment to science-based policy and rational discussions related to environmental issues, with the leading oil and natural gas innovators at the table.

A healthy oil and natural gas industry isnt just good for the economy. The industry is advancing environmental progress as the nations leading investor in emission-reducing technologies.

As a result, Americans are breathing the cleanest air in decades and the U.S. leads the world in reducing energy-related carbon dioxide emissions. Methane emissions rates were down nearly 70 percent in five of the nations largest oil- and natural gas-producing regions between 2011 and 2019, according to data from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Energy Information Administration.

Alternative energy sources depend on Texas oil and natural gas, too  not just to provide reliable backup power, but also for their very composition as wind turbines and solar panels are made from oil and natural gas products.

These advancements are occurring while the United States enjoys more energy security than ever and American-made energy is powering economic prosperity and environmental improvements around the world.

This progress  and ways to build on it  must be part of more rational discussions about the future of our energy, environment and economy. Thanks to continued technological breakthroughs, driven largely by oil and natural gas companies, our energy choices do not have to be either/or. Oil, natural gas and alternative sources will all be part of our energy future.

Smart policies will only further encourage investment in and innovation by the oil and natural gas industry, and will power us toward the cleaner, stronger and better future every Texan deserves.

Todd Staples is president of the Texas Oil & Gas Association and former Texas agriculture commissioner.
Japanese Ambassador to India



Satoshi Suzuki said on Monday that his country is looking forward to assist in projects related to enhancing skills and infrastructure in

For India, the development of North East is indispensable and the country is mobilising all the abundantly available resources in the region, including Assam, the envoy said.

"Abundant human and natural resources, as well as rich cultural diversity of needs to be tapped to their full potential," he said at an international convention on Act East Policy and Indo- Cooperation with special focus on

takes a "panoramic view in its diplomacy and this vision is free, open and inclusive at its centre. India's North East, including Assam, plays an important role in this vision", he said.

The envoy, who began his speech in Assamese saying how delighted he was to be in the state and ended it with 'Joi Aai Asom' (Hail Mother Assam), highlighted the various similarities between and Assam and there can be a collaboration between the two to boost their mutual interests.

He said that connecting India's eastern border with South East Asia and the Bay of Bengal makes sense both economically and strategically.

Japan is already supporting several connectivity projects in the region which will reduce travelling time and improve connectivity among Bhutan, India and Bangladesh.

Referring to the Guwahati Water Supply Project assisted by the Japan International Corporation Agency (JICA), Suzuki said that he was very impressed with the progress of the project and clean drinking water would soon be supplied to households in the city.

On the Guwahati sewerage project, he said that this will not only support a more convenient life but also ensure better healthcare and sanitation.

"Due to the COVID-19 situation, healthcare and sanitation has assumed great importance and Japan will support these endeavours", he said.

Japan is also committed to human resource development and has collaboration with IIT, Guwahati which will create new eco-system of entrepreneurs in Assam.

Acquiring and enhancing skill development through internships and training programmes will also help the youths of Assam, he said.

The envoy said that his country was also willing to partner with Assam to train its human resources to enable them to avail job opportunities in Japan.

"Abundant natural resources as well as skilled capital will connect the youths with new businesses and will also make them globally competitive," Suzuki added.

He also thanked India for its long good and friendly relations with Japan and said that his country would not have been in a position to get out of the ashes of the destructions caused by the Second World War without help from India.

(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.)
Berger said when he read the findings of the first probe, "it was pretty clear to me we needed to do a follow-on...

Hyderabad, Feb 15 : The heart transplant performed on a critical cardiac patient early this month, with the cadaver heart transported through Hyderabad Metro Rail, was successful and the heart recipient is recovering fully, doctors of Apollo Hospitals said on Monday.

For the first time in the history of organ transplantation, anywhere in the world, metro rail was used to transport the organ on February 2. A green corridor was specially created by Hyderabad Metro Rail and Hyderabad Police, for the cadaver heart to reach Apollo Hospitals at Jubilee Hills, expeditiously from Kamineni Hospital at LB Nagar.

Heart recipient Singareddy Kanakareddy was also present at the press conference addressed by Apollo doctors and officials.

The 44-year-old, who was discharged on Monday, was suffering from dilated cardiomyopathy. He desperately needed a heart transplant to survive and was kept alive for over 45 days with continuous infusion of medicine, till he got transplanted with a new heart, said Dr Alla Gopala Krishna Gokhale, Senior Consultant, Heart and Lung Transplant Surgeon, Apollo Hospitals.

He said the speedy transportation of the heart by a dedicated metro train during peak traffic hour played a critical role, it enabled to bring the cadaver heart intact and aided in the overall success of the surgery.

"We created a new green channel of bringing the cadaver heart by Metro Rail, instead of the usual ambulance, helicopter etc, because the situation demanded and by road from one part of the city to another part would have taken lot of time. For a heart transplant, we can bring the heart within 4 hours and transplant, but this patient was critical, he was on a death bed and needed the heart to be transplanted within 1 to 2 hours to get best results," he said.

He recalled that it was a spontaneous thought of exploring the metro option to speed up the transportation which helped. Even Metro Rail responded in less than 10 minutes to support the cause.

Dr K. Hari Prasad, President, Apollo Group Hospitals expressed gratitude to the donor and his family for coming forward to donate despite their distress, doctors of Kamineni Hospital for counselling the donor family and convincing them, Metro Rail which came forward to transport by a dedicated train to reduce the time, the city police for creating a dedicated green channel. He also thanked Jeevandatha the nodal agency managing organ donation.

Anil Kumar, Additional Commissioner of Police, (Traffic) Hyderabad said Hyderabad Traffic Police has been creating green channel for organ transportation for the last 2 to 3 years. Last year it created the green channel 25 times.

Anil Kumar Saini, COO, L&T Metro Rail, said it is a great occasion that a life has been saved through a dedicated train. Metro Rail which is the life line of the city and proves it can play a critical role in saving lives.

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. Foreign Minister of Armenia Ara Aivazian will depart on February 17 for Russia on a working visit to meet with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign ministry reports.

The Foreign Ministers will discuss issues of bilateral, regional and international agenda. Special attention will be paid on the 2020 November 9 and 2021 January 11 trilateral statements of the Russian, Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders, putting the focus on the humanitarian assistance, infrastructure restoration and unblocking of the region, the statement says.

The officials will also discuss the activities within the frames of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairmanship.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan


Activities section winner, Tom Rouse.

Runner-up, Kayla Hunia.



In third place, Aaron Stephenson.

Congratulations to Tom Rouse, of Auckland, who snapped the winning photo in the first section of the Bayleys This is Us photo and video competition.

Chief judge Peter Young says Toms photo of a sunset surfer at Te Arai captured a beautiful moment in time  a stunning evening on one of the regions best surfing beaches.

It has great energy, a fresh perspective and is well composed, Peter says.

Coming a close second was Warkworths Kayla Hunia, with her entry taken at Takatu Point, on the Tawharanui Peninsula.

Of her photo, Kayla said: By taking an invigorating trail up and around the hills of Tawharanui, you are able to see the stunning views of the Mahurangi/Matakana east coast. What I especially love about this photo is that it tells you yes, you are in New Zealand because here in NZ youll find cows everywhere.

In third place was Aaron Stephenson, of Mahurangi West, with his photo of the Mahurangi Regatta.

The judges were impressed with the overall quality of entries, over a range of photos, and are looking forward to viewing entries in the remaining three sections  hidden gems; outdoors  nature, landscape and wildlife, and food and beverage.

The competition is organised by the reinvigorated Matakana Coast Tourism.

Keep those entries coming

There is still plenty of opportunity for photographers to submit entries to the Bayleys This is Us competition. The remaining three sections are:

 Hidden gems (entries close February 28)  Outdoors  nature, landscape and wildlife (closes March 31)  Food and beverage (closes April 30).

Monthly winners will each receive $500, while second and third placegetters receive $300 and $200, respectively. There is no limit on the number of images a person can enter. To find out more, including terms and conditions, go to: bayleys.co.nz/inthenorth/thisisusphotocompetition
GPs are referring on average one person a day to get Covid tested. Stock image

GP practices are referring on average one person a day to get tested for Covid-19, according to a Dublin GP collating data on the referrals.

This is down from an average of 8-10 patients a day at Christmas time.

Speaking on RTE Radio 1s Morning Ireland, Rathfarnham GP, Dr Shane McKeogh, who is also the founder of GP Buddy, a website that collates and shares this information between practices, said this decrease is very good news.

At Christmas, GPs were referring on average 8-10 patients a day to Covid testing and thats been coming down with the very serious restrictions following the level 5 guidelines, and the approximate number that GPs are referring is now one case a day, so thats good, he said.

Vaccination begins in clinics for the over 85s group this week, however, Dr McKeogh said his practice wont be receiving them until next week.

This group will be vaccinated by the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine after HSE Chief Clinical Officer Dr Colm Henry recommended that the AstraZeneca vaccine not be used.

This is due to there being insufficient evidence of its efficacy in over 65s, despite it being proven to be safe.

Five days ago, scientists who advise the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended the use of the Oxford AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine for all adults.

To the best of our knowledge, the practice in Rathfarnham is receiving vaccines on Monday the 22nd to start the following day or potentially that day depending on when we get the vaccines.

Most surgeries will be contacting patients over the next few days and letting them know they will be in the first group to be vaccinated, anyone over the age of 85.

When asked if there is hesitancy among his patients to receive the vaccine, Dr McKeogh said no.

No, I think people are absolutely thrilled to be getting it, they can't wait to come in and get the vaccine.

The Rathfarnham GP said it will probably only take half a day to vaccinate the over 85 group in his practice, as he only has 110 patients in that group with five doctors and two nurses administering the vaccines.

Simon Institute hosts presidential historian, author Alexis Coe on Friday

by Pete Rosenbery

CARBONDALE, Ill.  Alexis Coe, a presidential historian for CNN, will discuss her writing and two books during a virtual discussion on Friday, Feb. 19, hosted by Southern Illinois University Carbondales Paul Simon Public Policy Institute.

Coe will join John Shaw, Simon Institute director, as they discuss her writings and her books, including You Never Forget Your First: A Biography of George Washington.

The discussion, part of the institutes Understanding Our New World series via Zoom, is at 10 a.m.

Coe is also a consulting historian for The History Channel and co-hosts the No Mans Land podcast. She previously was an oral historian at the Brooklyn Historical Society and in the exhibitions department at the New York Public Library in Bryant Park. Coe is also author of the 2014 book, Alice + Freda Forever: A Murder in Memphis.

Alexis Coe is one of the most interesting and provocative presidential historians in the United States today, Shaw said. She has worked in archives, designed exhibitions, hosted podcasts, consulted for documentaries and written wonderful travel essays and biographies. We are eager to explore her wide-ranging interests and original interpretations of American history and politics.

Registration is open

Registration for the free Zoom meeting is available in advance. After completing registration, participants will receive an email confirmation with information about joining the meeting, along with the meeting ID and password.

Participants can submit a question to Coe by email at paulsimoninstitute@siu.edu or by including it in the Questions and Comments section on the registration form.

More information on the Simon Institutes events is available at paulsimoninstitute.siu.edu/event-information/.
On March 9 at 6:30 p.m. CT, Alabama Media Group and Books-A-Million will host a live conversation with current Nieman Fellow and Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist, John Archibald, to celebrate the launch of his new memoir, Shaking the Gates of Hell: A Search for Family and Truth in the Wake of the Civil Rights Revolution.

Register online here.

The virtual event will be hosted by John Hammontree and R.L. Nave, hosts of the award-winning Reckon Interview podcast, and Archibald will be joined in conversation by Dr. Wayne Flynt, Professor Emeritus in the Department of History at Auburn University.

Archibald has written for the Birmingham News since 1986 and became a columnist for the paper in 2004. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary in 2017. The book, published by Alfred A. Knopf, is his first.

Ive wanted my whole life to walk into a bookstore and see a book by me. I wonder if I can call myself a writer now? joked Archibald.

The memoir is an examination of family, love and responsibility from Archibalds life growing up in the South during the civil rights era. Archibald grew up in Alabama, born the same year that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. penned his famous Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Coming from a long line of Methodist preachers, Archibald interrogates what it means to have a pulpit during turbulent times and how each of us can use our voices to serve a greater purpose.

People think its about my dad. But its not. Not really, said Archibald. Its about all of us, and the struggle to find the strength to say what needs to be said when it needs saying. It is about love. And disappointment. And more love.

Long time readers of Archibalds columns will find humor and grace in his family stories. He writes about weighty issues like race, religion and power, but also of sledding and snakes, of kindness and grace.

Registration for the virtual event includes a signed copy of Shaking the Gates of Hell, plus shipping and handling from Books-a-Million. The conversation will later be published as an episode of the Reckon Interview podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts.

Register online here.
New Delhi:

A Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) jawan has allegedly committed suicide by shooting himself with gun in Chhattisgarh, worst insurgency-hit Sukma District, ANI reported.

A case has been registered in this connection and further investigation is on. The exact reason which prompted him to take the extreme step is yet to come.

Chhattisgarh: CRPF jawan allegedly committed suicide by shooting himself in Sukma, investigation on.  ANI (@ANI_news) July 23, 2017

Atleast 25 CRPF personnel were killed and six other wounded in an ambush by Maoists in Chhattisgarh's Sukma district on 24th April, 2017.

For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
Queenslands Opposition Leader has backed calls for the federal government to stump up cash for tourism operators after data revealed more than a quarter of a million jobs would be on the chopping block next month when JobKeeper ended.

A total of 259,000 Queensland workers relied on JobKeeper in December, data compiled by the Australian Tax Office and released by the federal government on Monday revealed.

The tourism industry has been begging for extra support once JobKeeper ends in March. Credit:Attila Csaszar

Of those, there were 49,200 recipients on the Gold Coast, 21,300 on the Sunshine Coast and 16,600 in Cairns.

While there was a 64 per cent drop in employees paid through the scheme from phase one (April to September) and phase two (October to December), tourism-reliant cities remained disproportionately affected.
The scheme comes into effect on Monday (Steve Parsons/PA)

The first guests will check into Government-designated accommodation on Monday as the hotel quarantine regime begins.

UK and Irish nationals and UK residents returning to England from 33 red list countries  hotspots with Covid-19 variants in circulation  are required to quarantine in hotels for 10 days.

Anyone who has been in a high-risk location has to enter England through a designated port and have pre-booked a package to stay at one of the Governments managed quarantine facilities.

The Government has struck deals with 16 hotels so far, providing 4,963 rooms, with a further 58,000 rooms currently on stand-by, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said.

Travellers who have not visited a red list country must still quarantine for 10 days at home and complete two mandatory Covid-19 tests on the second and eighth day after arriving.

In Scotland, people returning from any destination must follow the hotel self-isolation rules.

The rules coming into force today will bolster the quarantine system and provide another layer of security against new variants at the border Health Secretary Matt Hancock

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said: As this deadly virus evolves, so must our defences. We have already taken tough action to limit the spread, protect people and save lives.

With the emergence of new variants, we must go further. The rules coming into force today will bolster the quarantine system and provide another layer of security against new variants at the border.

People must quarantine in the hotel room but exceptions allowing them to leave include the need for urgent medical assistance, to exercise or attend the funeral of a close family member.

The regulations state that leaving for these exceptional reasons should only happen if the person has been given prior permission by a person authorised by the secretary of state for this purpose.

People may only arrive into Heathrow Airport, Gatwick Airport, London City Airport, Birmingham Airport, Farnborough Airport or any military airfield or port, according to the legislation.

Passengers arriving in England face fines of up to 10,000 for failing to quarantine, and those who lie on their passenger locator forms face up to 10 years in jail, Mr Hancock announced earlier this week.

The cost for a quarantine hotel stay is 1,750 for a single adult.

On Saturday, Heathrow Airport said significant gaps remain in the hotel quarantine plan and a spokeswoman said it is yet to receive the necessary reassurances from the Government.

On Sunday night, the Heathrow spokeswoman said: We have been working hard with the Government to support the successful implementation of the managed quarantine policy from Monday.

Good progress has been made to address a number of issues. Queues at the border in recent days have been almost five hours and this is totally unacceptable.

Border Force today have given us assurance that they will have resource and effective processes at the border to avoid compromising the safety of passengers and those working at the airport, which could necessitate the suspension of some arriving flights.

One of the Heathrow Airport hotels taking part in the scheme is Novotel London Heathrow T1 T2 T3.

The hotel charged 65 for members of the public staying on Sunday night, while travellers using it to quarantine from Monday must pay 1,750 for 10 days.

The PA news agency understands that the Renaissance London Heathrow Hotel is also participating in the programme.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab dismissed the idea of a blanket ban on travel into the UK ahead of the hotel quarantine plan kicking in.

Mr Raab was asked if it is time for a blanket ban due to the South Africa variant of Covid-19 being detected in Austria for example which is not on the Governments red list.

He told Sophy Ridge On Sunday on Sky News: Im not sure thats proportionate, and of course having blanket bans on any, for example, air travel into the UK would be very difficult for the supply chains, things like freight.

Mr Raab said the data is assessed very carefully and they want to make sure the measures are as targeted as possible.

He said: We think weve got the right balance  robust measures, but targeted measures.

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Xi Jinpings control over the China Coast Guard, together with a new law that authorises the coastguard to use force against foreign ships in places China defines as in its own, is a big change that has so far attracted far less attention than it deserves.

Maybe thats because Xi has acted on several fronts to assert Chinese power and take risks in the dying weeks of Donald Trumps term as US president and in the early days of Joe Bidens tenure. Some moveslike the one to put sanctions on senior Trump officials, their families and companies that employ themhave rightly attracted attention as vindictive measures. Others, like the Peoples Liberation Armys incursions into Taiwanese airspace, are about furthering Beijings campaign to isolate and intimidate Taiwan and test US and international resolve.

Taken together with these moves, Xis boldness with the coastguard shows that hes ratcheting up the risk hes willing to take in confronting other nations and using the levers he has to project Chinese power. And the coastguard move is one that gives him very practical new tools to cause damage and insecurity and act in ways that othersparticularly militariescant, and probably shouldnt, match.

Chinese state media has downplayed the law, saying its similar to other nations practicesbut its not, because it signals that the Chinese state will ignore international law of the sea and international tribunal rulings when using force and define the coastguards jurisdiction to use force through Chinas unilateral characterisation of its maritime boundaries. And the way the Chinese coastguard is likely to operate in practice will be quite different too.

Weve got used to stories of Chinese fishing fleets and Chinese militia vessels intimidating other nations vessels and even bumping into them to get their way, particularly in the South China Sea in waters claimed by Vietnam and the Philippines, but also down into the Natuna Islands in Indonesias exclusive economic zone.

Chinese vessels have sunk Philippine and Vietnamese fishing vessels in the last year, and not seemed too bothered about meeting obligations to provide assistance to sailors needing help afterwards. Weve also got used to the Chinese coastguard shadowing Chinese fishing fleets, ready to intervene if they come into contact with other nations vessels.

Whats different now, though, is that with this new law Xi has told his coastguard to be wolf warriors at seaand to use force, including lethal force, to assert Chinese interests.

The Chinese coastguard has been building some novel ships that let it apply force not just with the weapons on board, but with the ships themselves. Coastguard vessels like the 10,000-ton Haixun arent just bigger than many naval ships operating in the South and East China Seas, but they also have strengthened hulls that are designed for deliberately hitting other vesselsshouldering is the naval term of art.

Imagine a specially designed large vessel like the Haixun shouldering a Vietnamese, Philippine, Indonesian or even US naval vessel, enabled by Xis law and his command to Chinese agencies and officials to engage in a difficult struggle against the world.

Ships operated by those navies (and the Royal Australian Navy) dont have such strengthened hulls. Theyre designed to withstand some damage, mainly from weaponsand the primary approach is to prevent missile hits.

To see the kind of damage a collision with a large vessel causes to such ships, weve got the example of the Norwegian frigate Ingstad, which collided with an oil tanker in 2018 before being deliberately grounded and sinking. The images tell the story. It ended with the frigate being scrapped because the damage (from the collision and from being underwater for four months) was too extensive to be repaired.

So, we may need to be thinking less about the Chinese coastguard firing on other nations vessels and more about how to handle coastguard commanders who are full to the brim with wolf warrior spirit and licensed by Xi to get into trouble, and how to deal with ships designed to hurt others without using their weapons.

The ability to inflict damage without weapons gives the Chinese coastguard the easy ground in an encounter. A naval vessel that cant bump back without damaging itself is left with the choice of backing off and handing the encounter to the Chinese or using its weapons and being the first to fire. Neither is a great place to be.

The Chinese coastguards use of this new law and its ships in this way might get cheers in Beijing and make strident nationalists there happy. But if any Chinese leader thinks this nonlethal use of force is a low-cost, politically free good, that would be a mistake.

Coastguard ships bumping into, damaging and perhaps sinking not just fishing vessels but other countries naval vessels would be a hugely escalatory and aggressive set of behaviours, especially in contested waters, no matter how Beijing characterises them. Maybe Xi needs to hear this from the leaders of other countries before we start seeing such antics on the water.

More crystal-clear Biden phone calls to Xi, and maybe calls from leaders like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who could mention it while celebrating investment agreements, are paths here. In his first conversation with Biden, Xi said the US needed to show cautionwell, thats a message he might take up himself.

At a basic tactical level, capturing video of the Chinese coastguard in action on smartphones and developing a communication plan that gets that footage out before Beijing spins disinformation tales of It wasnt us. It didnt happen. They did it first also make sense.
ALTON  State Sen. Rachelle Crowe, D-Glen Carbon, is hosting a hygiene product drive to aide the Oasis Womens Center in Alton.

Donation items in high demand include African American hair products, deodorant and lotion. Other items sought include feminime hygiene products, toothpaste, toothbrush, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner.

The products can be dropped off during February at Wood River City Hall, 111 N. Wood River Ave., Wood River; Bethalto Village Hall, 213 N. Prairie St., Bethalto; Boheme Boutique, 6120 Shoger Drive, Edwardsville; and White Birch Interiors & Home, 701 W. Delmar Ave., Alton.

Crowe will donate the collected items to the Oasis Womens Center on March 1.
NXIVM leader Keith Raniere is recovering from COVID-19 in his Arizona prison.

And the convicted sex trafficker has some new attorneys to help him attempt to legally recover from his federal convictions and 120-year prison sentence.

The new lawyers, who will be working on Raniere's appeal, are closely tied to the fight against wrongful convictions  and are affiliated with Christopher Darden, a prosecutor in the O.J. Simpson trial.

Raniere, 6o, the disgraced personal growth guru known as Vanguard, was feeling good after contracting the coronavirus, according to Joseph D. McBride, a Manhattan lawyer who recently joined Ranieres legal team.

"Keith is still recovering from his bout with COVID-19, McBride told the Times Union. Our understanding of the situation is that Keith began experiencing symptoms shortly after being transported from MDC but somehow did not test positive until arriving in Tucson.

To put it lightly, his journey from New York to Arizona was grueling," McBride added. "Moreover, his legal team was unable to communicate with him for long periods of time. Be that as it may, Keiths spirit remains unbroken and he seems to be recovering well.

That legal team, which at trial included lawyers Marc Agnifilo, Paul DerOhannesian, Teny Geragos and Danielle Smith, now includes McBride and attorneys Steven A. Metcalf II, Martin H. Tankleff and Jennifer Bonjean, the latter of whom has represented comedian and convicted sex assailant Bill Cosby.

Metcalf's firm, which includes McBride, is affiliated with Darden.

Tankleff, while in high school, was wrongfully convicted in 1990 for the murder of his parents, Seymour and Arlene Tankleff and spent more than 17 years in prison before he was exonerated in 2007, was admitted to the bar in February 2020.

McBride noted on his firm's website that he became a lawyer after his younger brother, Anthony, was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

"Joseph shares a bond with each client he represents, because he knows what it is like to have his familys fate in the hands of an attorney," the bio said. "Consequently, his brand of representation is holistic, collaborative, and highly personalized. And his style of counseling displays an empathetic, innovative, and supportive ethos throughout the course of the attorney-client relationship."

Raniere, who lived for decades in Halfmoon and operated NXIVM on New Karner Road in Colonie, was convicted in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn in June 2019 on all counts, including sex trafficking, forced labor conspiracy and racketeering charges with underlying counts of extortion, identity and possession of child pornography. Senior Judge Nicholas Garaufis imposed the 120-year sentence on Oct. 27.

In early January, Bonjean asked the judge to keep Raniere in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where he had been serving his time, because it would be easier to visit with him and added "to speak nothing of the health risks posed to all involved." The judge rejected the request.

Ranieres contracting of the coronavirus was first reported earlier this month by western New York blogger Frank Parlato. Ranieres attorneys had previously not revealed whether their client had the disease.

Raniere co-defendant Clare Bronfman, the Seagrams' heiress and NXIVM director of operations is serving an 81-month sentence for her guilty pleas to conspiracy to conceal and harbor illegal aliens for financial gain, and fraudulent use of identification.

NXIVM president Nancy Salzman, her daughter, Lauren Salzman, actress Allison Mack and bookkeeper Kathy Russell all high-ranking NXIVM figures and members of Raniere's inner circle  have pleaded guilty to charges and await sentencing.
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The Indian Air Force, in a first, has decided to induct and press into service the Mudhol Hound, a breed of sighthound to keep flightless birds and animals at bay from runways, thereby reducing risks of such animal accidents during flights.

Deputy chief minister of Karnataka Govind M Karajol handed over two male and two female Mudhol puppies to IAF on Friday via the Canine Research and Information Centre (CRIC) in Bagalkot district. It is a unit of the Karnataka Veterinary, Animal and Fisheries Sciences University, Bidar (KVAFSU) from where the puppies were flown to the Agra airbase on Sunday.

Also Read: In a First, IAF Inducts Mudhol Hounds from Karnataka to Rule Out Bird-Hits on Runways

What are Mudhol Hounds?

This is not the first time that Mudhol hounds are working with the Indian security forces. The hounds were first introduced in the Indian Army's inventory in 2017. After undergoing rigorous training at the Armys Remount and Veterinary Corps Centre (RVC) in Meerut for over a year, six Mudhol hounds were given to the Army by the KVAFSU.

At that time, the director of the universitys Canine Research and Information Centre Mahesh Dodmani was quoted by The Hindu as saying, "It will be the first Indian breed to serve the nation. All these years, the armed forces used Labrador, German Shepherds and Belgian Shepherds.

Also Read: Indian Army Trains Indigenous Dogs to Sniff Out Coronavirus in Seconds

Even though the lean, indigenous breed of dogs are quite popular in and around the Mudhol taluk in Karnataka where they are raised in many households to market the pups, the canines became the talk of the town after PM Narendra Modi spoke of them in his Mann ki Baat address last year. Pushing for desi breeds to be adopted, Modi had endorsed Indian breeds like the Mudhol Hound, Himachali Hound, Rajapalyam, Kanni, Chippiparai and Combai and said how they required much less upkeep and were loyal. He had also mentioned how the Indian security forces have also inducted and trained these animals for their dog squads.

Are Mudhol Hounds a truly Desi breed?

These dogs come from the region bordering Karnataka and Maharashtra. According to several popular beliefs, these hounds were originally bred in the Middle East and accompanied traders on their travels through the Indian subcontinent and this is what inspires one of their early names- Caravan hounds. Some legends even say that the hounds became popular with the India royalty too, so much so that Maratha warrior Shivaji Maharaj got them trained and made them a part of the Maratha army.

The dogs were also interbred with Persian and Turkish dogs that gave rise to the feathery Mudhol Hound, which also came to be known as Pashmi hound. With the introduction of European breed of canines, however, the Mudhols began to grow lesser in favour with the Indians. But in the 1920s, the hounds were revived once again by Shrimant Rajesaheb Malojirao Ghorpade of Mudhol. He observed that the local tribe of Bedar used the dogs for hunting. Sensing their agility, he helped restore the royal Mudhol hounds and while visiting England in 1900s, presented it to King George V, who christened them as Mudhol hounds, thereby bringing them into prominence once again.

What roles can Mudhol Hounds play in security forces?

Mudhol Hounds are similar looking to Greyhounds with a slim built and a smaller head but a tall legs and body overall. Their breed is known for their endurance, stamina and agile movements along with a razor-sharp bite. They are very well suited for tropical climates, however, they are not very well adept at handling cold weather conditions. They have also earned a reputation for being fiercely loyal to their owners and also for being great hunting dogs.

The RVC has also trained the hounds to sniff out explosives. Apart from the Army, the National Security Guard (NSG) also have taken in the hounds and are training them to track enemy movements along the border, search and rescue and infantry patrolling among others.

Also recently, the Central Reserve Police Force had also said that they will be inducting local dog breeds including the Mudhol hounds in the canine force to strengthen their squads.
We are proud to continue our partnership with Dr. Cristina Antonescu and her research team at Memorial Sloan Kettering as theyve continued to make research advancements to combat angiosarcoma and identify novel therapeutic targets. Past News Releases RSS Ken Pribil Jr. Foundation Grants...

Ken Pribil Jr. Foundation Supports...

The Ken Pribil Jr. Foundation recently made its seventh annual Sarcoma Research Grant, in the amount of $10,000, to support angiosarcoma research being performed at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) in New York, NY. This grant fulfills the organizations mission of commemorating the life of Kenny Pribil Jr., from Rockville Centre, NY, who died at age 19 of a high grade angiosarcoma, through annual grants that support sarcoma research. With the addition of this 2020 Ken Pribil Jr. Sarcoma Research Grant, the Ken Pribil Jr. Foundation has supported sarcoma research with over $55,000 in grants to research facilities in the New York area.

We are proud to continue our partnership with Dr. Cristina Antonescu and her research team at Memorial Sloan Kettering as theyve continued to make research advancements to combat angiosarcoma and identify novel therapeutic targets, said Kevin Pribil, President of the Board of Directors of the Ken Pribil Jr. Foundation. Their efforts have not gone unnoticed, and we are confident they will compound to make a real difference in peoples lives.

This 2020 Ken Pribil Jr. Sarcoma Research Grant supports the research of Dr. Antonescu, Director of Bone and Soft Tissue Pathology at MSK and one of the leading experts in angiosarcoma, a sarcoma subtype that derives from the inner lining of the blood vessels. Her research is focused on the molecular mechanisms driving these tumors, how and why resistance begins, and genetic underpinnings that can be used to target angiosarcoma.

Since its inception in 2006, the Ken Pribil Jr. Foundation has given research grants to benefit sarcoma research at various institutions, including the Childrens Hospital at Montefiore in the Bronx, NY. The foundation has also supported business-focused undergraduate study with college scholarships and plans to give its 21st scholarship to a graduating student from South Side High School in Rockville Centre, NY, in June 2021.

The Ken Pribil Jr. Foundation is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt nonprofit organization operating in New York State. To learn more, visit: http://www.kenpribiljr.org
(Newser)  New Zealand has instituted a lockdown for the first time since August after three members of an Auckland family tested positive for the coronavirus. It's not clear how the parents and their teenage daughter contracted COVID-19, the first case of apparent community spread in the country in months, but the mother works for a company that provides laundry services for international flights. Auckland, New Zealand's largest city, will go on lockdown for three days, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced Sunday, per NBC News. During that time, businesses will close, travel will be restricted, residents will be asked to stay home, and other measures will be taken while mass testing and contact tracing is carried out to determine whether the outbreak extends beyond the one family, another member of which is also experiencing symptoms but tested negative, NPR reports.

story continues below

Most new cases of the virus in New Zealand are detected in returning travelers, who are then required to quarantine, but no one in the family had traveled recently and the mother reportedly did not go into planes herself, or have any contact with travelers. She had not been at work for eight days prior to testing positive; the company she works for is temporarily shutting down to investigate, the New Zealand Herald reports. A writer for the Spinoff notes in a column some of the possibilities, including the chance that the mother came in contact with someone who does interact with travelers or crew members. At least two of the cases are the more transmissible UK variant, known as B117, Al Jazeera reports. The rest of New Zealand will be placed on Alert Level 2, the third-highest of the country's system, for three days as well, and some large events have been canceled as a result. "We have stamped out the virus before, and we will do it again," Ardern said. (Read more New Zealand stories.)
A more recent publication of this set of statistics is available. Latest publication: Building cost index 2021, April

Published: 15 February 2021

Building costs rose by 0.6 per cent in January year-on-year

According to Statistics Finland, building costs grew by 0.6 per cent in January 2021 from one year back. Labour costs increased by 0.8 per cent and material costs by 0.5 per cent. The prices of services fell by 0.3 per cent compared to one year ago. Employer's social insurance contributions for 2021 have been updated in the calculation of the index, which explains the growth in labour costs in January.

Long term development of the Building Cost Index

From December to January, the total index of building costs rose by 1.2 per cent. At the turn of the year, the Building Cost Index was raised especially by labour costs, which grew by 2.3 per cent from the previous month. The prices of materials went up by 0.5 per cent and those of services by 0.3 per cent compared with December.

The most significant explanation for the rise in labour costs compared to the previous month is the removal of the reduction in pension insurance contributions applied from May to December 2020. Pension insurance contributions have now returned to the same level as they were in January 2020.

Other employer's social insurance contributions have also been revised in January. The increase in labour costs compared to one year ago is explained by the rise in sickness insurance contributions and unemployment insurance contributions paid by the employer from 2020. The labour costs of the Building Cost Index are measured with the index of wage and salary earnings, which is raised with social insurance contributions updated annually in January.

Building cost index 2015=100, January 2021

Professional construction of new buildings Weights Index Monthly change, % Annual change, % Total index 1000 105.1 1.2 0.6 By type of cost Labour inputs 400 105.1 2.3 0.8 Materials 510 105.4 0.5 0.5 Services 90 103.6 0.3 -0.3 By purpose of use Residential building 440 105.3 1.3 0.6 Other building construction 560 105.0 1.1 0.5

Source: Building cost index, Statistics Finland

Inquiries: Liina Arhosalo 029 551 3612, Merja Jarvinen 029 551 2458, info@stat.fi

Head of Department in charge: Hannele Orjala

Publication in pdf-format (300.0 kB)

Updated 15.02.2021

Referencing instructions: Official Statistics of Finland (OSF): Building cost index [e-publication].

ISSN=1799-5841. January 2021. Helsinki: Statistics Finland [referred: 31.5.2021].

Access method: http://www.stat.fi/til/rki/2021/01/rki_2021_01_2021-02-15_tie_001_en.html

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West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday has expressed her condolence over the death of the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) leader Maidul Islam Midda and announced that the State government will provide compensation and job to one of the family members.

She said, It is unfortunate that we lost a young leader. My condolences are with his family members. I have spoken to CPI(M) leader Sujan Chakraborty and told him that the State government will provide all kinds of assistance if his family members approach us.

It is also a fact that his family members were not informed when he was admitted in the nursing home for the last three days. They should have informed his family members, she added.

Meanwhile, a Kolkata police officer was roughed by the Left youth leaders in a fit of rage when he went there to control the agitated crowd demanding action against Maidul Islams killers. The policeman somehow freed himself from the agitated crowd and took shelter at a restaurant. Later, he was rescued and taken to the local police station.

RELATED NEWS Senior Kolkata Police Officer Dies Due to Covid-19, Nine Personnel Have Succumbed to Disease Till Now

DYFI leader Maidul, who was allegedly received multiple injuries in a clash with the Kolkata police during Nabanna (state secretariat) protest march organised by the Left on February 11, was succumbed to his injuries in a private nursing home on Monday morning.

Maiduls death has invited sharp criticism from the Left leaders who called for a massive protest rally across the State. They have also approached the State Human Rights Commission for their intervention in this matter.

The incident has put the ruling Trinamool Congress on back foot ahead of the crucial Assembly polls in the State.

Maidul is a resident of Kotalpur in Bankura and he was one of the most active DYFI leaders in the States politics.

Fuad Halim, a senior CPIM leader and a doctor by profession, said, He received severe muscle injuries near his kidney. This led to excessive secretion of protein from injured muscles, which affected the normal functioning of his kidney. Later, he suffered complete renal failure.
XR Central and Lyxel&Flamingo have announced strategic partnership, that will enable their clients to accelerate journeys in the virtual world. Lyxel&Flamingo is today well known for its creative solutions on digital and mainline advertising, next-gen production capabilities, deep strategic partnerships with important platforms like Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Flipkart, state of the art in-house studio, technology solutions for brands as well as its proprietary media and reporting tools. With more than 210 employees and 150 odd clients, L&F is one of the largest independent digital agencies in India.

As a part of this strategic partnership, XR Central will re-direct all the creative design, storyboarding, and storytelling processes to Lyxel&Flamingo. These new processes will enable XR Central to focus entirely on its core competency of building XR (Augmented, Virtual and Mixed Reality) technology solutions, on their own platform  CUBE, for enterprises across the industries and also providing this suite of services for L&Fs clients

Anshul Agarwal, Co-Founder, XR Central said Design is at the heart of any solution we build. We at XRC pride ourselves on delivering world in class solutions to our clients. Lyxel&Flamingo is one of the best in the world when it comes to creativity, design, experiences, storytelling, and a lot more. This partnership has come just at the right time for us as we are on a growth trajectory. This partnership not only helps us add a world-class team of creative and innovative minds but also opens up limitless possibilities to take our solutions to the next level

Dev Batra, Founder & CEO, Lyxel&Flamingo said:XR Central is a new age AR, VR, and immersive experiences technology company and we are very happy to be their strategic partner. The entire XRC team is young and enthusiastic with a mindset of making things happen. With this partnership, we expand our XR technology arm that will add innovation and speed and at the same time enable us to build a comprehensive business opportunities pipeline across the globe

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The citys tram fleet is ageing and desperately needs an overhaul, Melbournes tram operator has warned the Andrews government, while the push to ramp up services is making it difficult to properly maintain the networks 500 trams.

A confidential document released to The Age under freedom-of-information laws reveals deep concerns about the companys capacity to deliver increased tram services without a major injection of new, low-floor trams over the next decade.

Old and new: Two models of trams in Melbourne. Credit:Chris Hopkins

The document, titled MR4 - Franchise Rolling Stock Strategic Plan, was prepared by Keolis Downer - the company that owns Melbournes tram operator, Yarra Trams - as part of its bid for a seven-year contract to run Melbournes tram network, estimated to cost $2.7 billion.

It has been withheld by the government since late 2018, but has now been released following a review by the Office of the Victorian Information Commissioner, who found it should be made public.
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The prime suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has been pictured inside an abandoned box factory where he stored child porn.

Christian Brueckner, 44, can be seen standing in the rubbish-strewn and graffitied warehouse in Neuwegersleben some time around 2009 - the same site where police would later find USB sticks containing images of child abuse.

The image shows the inside of a concrete building, stood on land that Brueckner had earlier bought at auction. Painted white walls can be seen covered in cobwebs, filled-in holes and snipped wires in the background.

On the floor are what appear to be decorating tools - pots of paint, rolls of paper, loose wiring and an electrical heater. A ladder stands next to Brueckner, while behind it are what appears to be a spare window and a paint roller, alongside other pieces of rubbish.

Danish TV journalists were shown the image by one of Brueckner's ex-girlfriends, now 62 and identified only as M, who lived with him in a motorhome near the factory for a time around 2009.

An image of Christian Brueckner standing inside an abandoned factory where police later discovered he had buried a stash of child porn has been revealed for the first time

The image will feature in a new documentary, Prime Suspect: The Madeleine McCann Case, which will air on Discovery Plus.

Brueckner's ex said she met him at an over-30s dating event in 2009 and agreed to go with him after he offered to let her live in the motorhome for free.

He later showed her the inside of the factory where he asked her to take photos of him and said he wanted her to 'do the place up'.

'He then started drinking more and more and he would come home at 2 and 3 in the morning. By this time I had had too much' and she split up with him, she told the film-makers.

The documentary also features Brueckner's friends, his defense lawyer, the German prosecutor for the case and former Portuguese investigator Goncalo Amaral.

German police searched the factory site in 2016 while investigating Brueckner over the disappearance of another girl - Inga Gehricke, known as the 'German Maddie'.

During the search police uncovered a red and white RV, and inside officers found a stash of girls' swimming costumes - despite the fact that Brueckner does not have any children.

The image was revealed by one of Brueckner's ex-girlfriends, who lived with him in a nearby motorhome for a time (pictured, the vehicle where they are thought to have stayed)

Police searching the motorhome years later while investigating the disappearance of German girl Inga Gehricke found a stash of girls' swimming costumes inside

Those who knew the convicted paedophile said he had previously bragged that he could hide 'drugs and children' inside the van.

It is unclear when exactly he bought the vehicle, a 30-year-old Tiffin Allegro, but he was known to drive it between Germany and Portugal, where Maddie vanished.

Police have previously released images and a description of another van - a yellow and white VW camper - which he is thought to have owned around the time that Maddie disappeared, in 2007.

Also during the factory search, police found USB drives containing 8,000 images - mostly depicting child porn and other abuse - which had been buried.

The drives were wrapped in a plastic bag and were in a shallow grave that also contained the body of Brueckner's dog, which had died some time earlier.

Brueckner, now 43, was convicted of possessing the child porn but not charged in relation to Inga.

German prosecutors have also said they believe Brueckner kidnapped and killed Madeleine, though have not charged him with the crime.

German prosecutors have identified Brueckner as the prime suspect in Madeleine's disappearance, but have not yet charged him and are appealing for more information

Brueckner has a long history of offending including convictions for child abuse that date back as far as 1994, and was known to frequent the Algarve

They are currently appealing for anyone who knows Brueckner and was around the resort of Praia da Luz on the night of May 3, when Maddie vanished, to contact them.

Prosecutors also claim to be in possession of evidence that Madeleine is dead, but have yet to reveal what it is.

Brueckner is currently serving a seven-and-a-half year sentence in a German prison for the 2005 rape of an American tourist in the Algarve.

He has previously been convicted of molesting a six-year-old girl in his native Germany, and has convictions for drug smuggling.

Brueckner's lawyer Friedrich Fulscher says his client has denied any involvement in Madeleine's disappearance.
(Adds quote, detail, context)

GABORONE, Feb 15 (Reuters) - Botswana will move ahead with

plans to use AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine, the

southern African country's health minister said on Monday,

despite neighbour South Africa pausing the rollout of the shots.

South Africa's decision to suspend use of the AstraZeneca

vaccine was based on preliminary data showing it offered minimal

protection against mild to moderate illness caused by the

dominant coronavirus variant there.

That more contagious variant - called 501Y.V2 - has been

detected in Botswana too.

Asked whether Botswana would be using the AstraZeneca

vaccine, Health Minister Edwin Dikoloti said in parliament: "Our

intended outcome is well-covered by what AstraZeneca offers."

"Recommendations we have received from the WHO (World Health

Organization) and the Africa CDC as well as our local scientists

and academia is that we can go ahead and use the AstraZeneca,"

he added.

The Africa CDC, the African Union's disease control body,

said last week it would not be "walking away" from the

AstraZeneca vaccine.

Botswana is due to receive AstraZeneca doses from the COVAX

Facility, a global vaccine distribution scheme co-led by the

WHO.

Dikoloti said that the first doses should start arriving

from COVAX in about four weeks' time and that they would be used

to start vaccinating frontline workers in health and other

important economic sectors.

AstraZeneca says it believes its vaccine protects against

severe COVID-19 and that it has started adapting it against the

501Y.V2 variant first identified late last year.

(Reporting by Brian Benza; Writing by Alexander Winning;

Editing by Emma Rumney)
The father of missing Claudia Lawrence died 'believing she could be still alive' and hoped the 12-year long search would one day be solved.

Peter Lawrence OBE, 74, was adamant investigators should continue looking for his daughter whatever happened to him.

It was confirmed on Sunday he had passed away in a hospice after a short illness. It was not related to coronavirus.

Retired solicitor Mr Lawrence had tirelessly campaigned for information to try to find his daughter and had battled for legislation to help families in similar positions. The new law saw him awarded an OBE in honour of his instrumental role in pushing it to become reality.

Miss Lawrence, a 35-year-old chef, vanished 12 years ago after last being seen near her home in York in March 2009.

Her father's friend Martin Dales told MailOnline: 'Peter always took the view in the absence of any crime scene that Claudia could be alive somewhere.

Peter Lawrence made regular appeals to keep the case of Claudia in the public eye

Peter Lawrence never gave up hope his daughter was still alive and wanted her to be found

'She could be anywhere, you hear about cases like this in the States and Germany. I think that was his hope. That is certainly what he was feeling the times we would talk about it.

'He has been one of my familys closest friends and has been for over 37 years. Claudia was the babysitter for our children.

'He lived a good life in terms of achievements but its a rather tragic situation he did not know what happened to Claudia when he departed this world.'

Miss Lawrence's case - which is being treated as a suspected murder - has never been closed by North Yorkshire Police.

Peter Lawrence, at his home near York, holds a photograph of his daughter Claudia in 2019

The 2019 TV programme Claudia Lawrence: Missing or Murdered on Channel 5 featured her father Peter Lawrence

Peter Lawrence at York Police Station for a press conference in April 2009 alongside Superintendent Ray Galloway

Claudia Lawrence's route home from work and matched by her now missing mobile phone

The disappearance of Claudia Lawrence 18 March, 2009, 14:31  Claudia leaves work 18 March, 14:35  14:36  Claudia walks through university campus 18 March, 14:47  Claudia walks home and appears to post something 18 March, 19:27  21:12 Claudia uses her telephone 18 March, 21:01  White Vauxhall Astra Van parked near Claudias home 19 March, 05:35  Left handed smoker  seen with a woman on Melrosegate bridge 19 March, 05:42  Old-style light coloured Ford Focus seen braking outside Claudias home 19 March, 06:00  Claudia fails to turn up for work 19 March, 06:10  Man and woman seen arguing outside University of York 19 March, 06:45  06:55  Man seen outside Claudias house 19 March, 12:10  Claudias mobile phone is switched off. 20 March, 14:07  Claudia is reported missing by her father, Peter Lawrence Advertisement

She was reported missing by her father on March, 20, 2009, after her friends said they had not heard from her for two days.

Miss Lawrence had never turned up to her 6am shift at the University of Yorks Goodricke College on March 19.

A man seen standing outside her house between 6.45am and 6.55am that day has never been identified by police.

Another male filmed by a CCTV camera in Lime Court, Heworth Road, very close to her house has also never been traced.

Miss Lawrence's phone  a silver Samsung D900  and blue and grey Karrimor rucksack have never been found by officers.

Her father would frequently appeal for information in the hope someone would remember something that could aid the investigation.

He had suffered a heart attack two years ago and had been taking life easier in recent years.

Mr Dales added: 'I think these things, the strain of it is palpable. In this case, obviously trying to help people with the legislation side of things, its not straightforward.

'He never wanted to look at himself at all of this, he just wanted to find Claudia.

'I last spoke to him last month over the phone. The stresses and strains of it certainly played its part in things. It has been an enormous strain not knowing anything.

'Most missing people cases are solved, most people come back quite quickly, but you do have people for which thats longer. He was a man of faith, he did practice that and he always said that helped him hugely, as it would be helpful for everybody. The key thing is that this needs closure, for his sister, his mother, his friends, everybody.

A CCTV image shows a man walking near the house of murdered chef Claudia Lawrence

This person has never been identified and is still being hunted by investigating officers

'The police can only act on information that is passed to them. We all feel that there is someone withholding information in all of this.'

Detectives think Miss Lawrence's 'complex' private life is key to the investigation, as they believed she was having an affair with a married man.

There have been a total of nine arrests with a file on four men sent to the Crown Prosecution Service in 2015.

Mr Lawrence received an OBE for helping to shape the 2017 Guardianship (Missing Persons) Act, known informally as Claudia's Law.

The law, known informally as Claudia's Law, created a new legal status of guardian of the affairs of a missing person, allowing someone to act in their best interests after they have been gone for 90 days or more.

The new legislation means families can oversee the financial and property affairs of their missing loved one, if the person has been missing for 90 days - lessening what can be a huge burden at a traumatic time.
What if you'd put your $1,200 stimulus check into these 8 stocks? You'd have cashed in big

With a fresh round of stimulus checks on the horizon, you might be planning to stash your next relief payment away for a rainy day.

According to the National Bureau of Economic Statistics, roughly a third of Americans saved their first $1,200 stimulus check.

But parking your relief payment in the bank is not a smart move if you want to make the most of your free cash.

Why? Because traditional bank accounts pay next to nothing in interest.

If you want your stimulus check to grow over time, youd likely be better off investing some (or all) of it in the stock market.

We decided to find out exactly how much someone would have made if theyd invested all $1,200 of their first stim check into some of todays most buzzed-about stocks.

We compared Alpha Vantages historical stock data for April 13, 2020  the Monday after the first round of relief payments went out  to data for Feb. 8, 2021, the date this article was written.

Heres what we found.

GameStop (GME)

Hanson-Leung / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $15,189.87

Total increase: 1,165.82%

Total profit: $13,989.87

Thanks to the efforts of armchair investors on Reddit and Twitter, GameStop has now become infamous as the stock that broke the market  at least for a week or two.

The American video game retailer had been struggling for years, and when the pandemic hit things began to look increasingly grim for GameStop.

But when a subreddit called WallStreetBets urged small-time traders armed with low- and no-commission trading apps like Robinhood to snatch up shares of GME, the price skyrocketed, and hedge funds that had bet against the stock found themselves caught in a short squeeze.

GameStop stock has been a rollercoaster of ups and downs since the story first broke, and even though its nowhere near the heights it reached a few weeks ago, as of Feb. 8 you would have made close to a $14,000 profit if youd invested your entire first stimulus check in GME. Thats almost enough to buy a PS5 on the black market.

Story continues

Tesla (TSLA)

john smith williams / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $7,958.40

Total increase: 563.20%

Total profit: $6,758.40

Despite the pandemic, 2020 was a banner year for Tesla. Elon Musks pioneering electric vehicle company split its stock in August and had its biggest year ever in terms of production.

Even with the factory shutdowns that plagued the auto industry during the first wave, Tesla managed to deliver close to 500,000 cars in 2020.

On top of that, the company shattered its previous quarterly sales record by more than 40,000 vehicles, selling 180,570 cars in Q4 alone.

If youd invested your first economic impact payment in Tesla stock, youd now be up by $6,758  the equivalent of more than five and a half $1,200 stimulus checks.

Apple (AAPL)

ymgerman / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $2,423.61

Total increase: 101.97%

Total profit: $1,223.61

Tech giant Apple also had a big year in 2020  it became the first U.S. company ever to reach a $2 trillion valuation.

Whats even more impressive about that stat is that all of Apples second $1 trillion came between March and August, at the height of the pandemic.

Apple also saw a huge surge in stock prices in December, which many analysts chalked up to industry buzz suggesting the company has begun working on an electric vehicle that would give Tesla a run for its money.

Investing your $1,200 stimulus check in Apple stock on April 13, 2020, would have netted you a profit of more than $1,200, effectively doubling the value of your relief payment.

Amazon (AMZN)

Tada Images / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $1,838.53

Total increase: 53.21%

Total profit: $638.53

With most of the country stuck in lockdown for the bulk of 2020, online shopping became the new normal for millions of Americans, and Amazon raked in huge profits as a result.

The e-commerce juggernaut saw sales for the full 2020 fiscal year total $386.06 billion  a 38% increase from 2019.

As an added feather in its cap, in Q4 Amazon became one of only two tech companies ever to post more than $100 billion in quarterly sales. (Not surprisingly, the other was Apple.)

If youd invested your first stimulus check in Amazon, youd now be up by $638  enough to go on quite an online shopping spree.

Alphabet (GOOGL)

Sundry Photography / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $2,066.59

Total increase: 72.22%

Total profit: $866.59

After a major slowdown in Q2 due to the pandemic, the parent company behind Google and YouTube finished 2020 strong, racking up $56.9 billion in revenue during Q4  an impressive 23% growth over the previous year.

YouTube ads were particularly profitable for Alphabet in Q4, bringing in $6.89 billion, and marking a 46% increase from the same period in 2019.

Following Alphabets announcement of its fourth-quarter earnings earlier this month, its stock jumped more than 7% in a single day, hitting a record high of $2,106.62 per share.

By investing your first stimulus check in Alphabet, you could have made a profit of more than $866 dollars.

Walt Disney Co (DIS)

chrisdorney / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $2,202.90

Total increase: 83.57%

Total profit: $1,002.90

Theres no question that the pandemic hit several Disneys divisions hard. In 2020, movie theatres were shuttered, cruise ships were docked, theme parks were forced to operate at reduced capacity, and the film and television industries both ground to a halt.

Fortunately for the house of mouse, it still owns massive properties like Pixar, Star Wars, ESPN, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe  not to mention a streaming service that currently boasts more than 86 million paid subscribers.

In fact, by December, Disneys stock had climbed up to a new record high, so theres no need to worry about Mickey and Pluto winding up on the streets.

If youd used your first stimulus check to buy stock in Walt Disney Corp., youd now have an extra grand in your pocket.

Macys (M)

Spinel / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $3,023.38

Total increase: 151.95%

Total profit: $1,823.38

Like many retail chains, Macys stock took a nosedive in the wake of the pandemic.

Along with countless other big-name brands, the decline in retail sales caused by COVID forced Macys to permanently shutter a number of its physical locations, with more closures on the way in 2021.

However, the companys decision to streamline its operations and focus on e-commerce and its best-performing stores seems to have paid off  share prices have seen significant growth since the start of the new year.

Using your first relief payment to invest in Macys stock back in April would have earned you a profit of $1,823.

Carnival Corp (CCL)

Yevgen Belich / Shutterstock.com

What your $1,200 investment would be worth today: $2,254.96

Total increase: 87.91%

Total profit: $1,054.96

The pandemic couldnt have been worse for Carnival Cruise Lines  with border closures and travel restrictions taking a devastating bite out of its bottom line, Carnival reported a net loss of $10.2 billion for the 2020 fiscal year But despite the fact that shares of CCL are currently trading at half of what they were going for in February 2020, theyre still up more than 100% from the low point they hit in early April.

And as the COVID vaccine continues to roll out and Americans inch closer toward a time when they can safely embark on a cruise again, Carnival stock will stay on the rebound.

If youd invested your first stimulus check in Carnival Cruise Lines, youd now be cruising along with an extra $1,054 in your bank account.

How to start investing today

Bro Crock / Shutterstock

While we cant guarantee that investing your next stimulus check will result in as much profit as the examples listed above, putting a bit of it into the market could earn you some serious coin.

Dont worry if you dont have much (or any) investing experience  these days there are mobile apps that make it easy to start buying and trading stocks in minutes.

Some of them even offer fractional shares, which means you can buy stock in any of the companies mentioned above for $5 or less.

As for expertise and advice? The internet is stuffed ith information that can help you make the right choices on the market. Some reputable sites provide stock-picking services, allowing you to outsource all the time-consuming research to experts who have proved themselves capable of delivering market-beating returns.

So dont let your next relief payment fester in your bank account  put it to work on Wall Street.
The Pangong Tso disengagement is by no means the end of the Ladakh standoff, as both troops are still deployed offensively at Gogra-Hot Springs, Galwan Valley and Depsang Plains, that should be part of the next stage of extrication

Almost nine months into the military standoff in Ladakh along the LAC, India and China have announced that a limited and phased disengagement of troops is under way from February 10 on the northern and southern banks of Pangong Tso  the first tentative strides of a multi-step, protracted process expected to last weeks, if not months, before a final disengagement and de-escalation is achieved on terms suitable for both sides.

Much scepticism exists on the Indian side  the wounds of Galwan betrayal are still fresh  but China is reportedly moving at an alarming speed. By Thursday, one day after the process kicked off, the PLA had pulled back more than 200 armoured tanks from the south banks of Pangong Tso and had positioned 100 heavy vehicles to ferry troops from fingers on north banks to Sirijap sector, east of Finger 8. In fact, the sequential procedure is going so smoothly  owing chiefly to the intent shown by the Chinese side  that South Block and the top brass of Indian Army expect the entire Pangong Tso disengagement to be completed by February 19, within 10 days of its announcement.

The Pangong Tso disengagement is by no means the end of the Ladakh standoff, as both troops are still deployed offensively at Gogra-Hot Springs, Galwan Valley and Depsang Plains, that should be part of the next stage of extrication. In Depsang, especially, where the PLA is blocking Indian troops from reaching three traditional patrolling points, there has reportedly been no substantial discussion with China.

That said, the Pangong Tso stalemate was thought to be the most volatile where a conflict between heavily armed troops (on both the northern and southern banks of the lake) was just one misunderstanding or provocation away. The swift developments since Wednesday, therefore, reflect a movement towards solution to a problem that seemed intractable for almost nine months and until even last week.

Naturally, this has given rise to scepticism in certain quarters and much politicking, with the Opposition calling it a bad deal and targetting the Narendra Modi government.

Political hyperbole aside, the importance of this third stage of disengagement  the first aborted process led to the deadly Galwan clash and the second disengagement procedure saw China withdraw from the Galwan Valley but stay put at Gogra friction point  should not be underplayed.

It is the first step towards a long process subject to multi-stage verification mechanism due to the trust deficit that exists between both sides, but it also reflects India and Chinas willingness to defuse tension along a key friction point and reduce chances of an armed conflict.

Before we go into key takeaways of the Pangong Tso disengagement, the unfolding of events is worth noting. Indian media outlets began reporting about the disengagement process quoting the Chinese side on Wednesday. Chinese and Indian frontline troops at the southern and northern bank of the Pangong Tso Lake started synchronized and organized disengagement from 10 February. This move is in accordance with the consensus reached by both sides at the 9th round of China-India Corps Commander level meeting, according to a statement attributed to PLAs Senior Colonel Wu Qian on Chinese defence ministry website.

At this stage, there was no official confirmation or denial from India. Understandably, since the Parliament was in session. Source-based media reports such as one in The Hindu proclaimed that this is the first phase of disengagement with some tanks and armoured elements on the south bank being withdrawn as well as thinning down of troops on the north bank.

It wasnt until the defence ministers statement in Rajya Sabha the day after that India made it official. Singh clarified that both sides have now been able to reach an agreement on disengagement that envisages ceasing forward deployment of troops in a phased, coordinated and verified manner and added that it has also been agreed to convene the next meeting of the Senior Commanders within 48 hours after the complete disengagement in the Pangong Lake area so as to address and resolve all other remaining issues.

The defence minister assured the Parliament that in these talks we have not conceded anything and made it clear that there are still some outstanding issues with regard to deployment and patrolling at some other points along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh. Nevertheless, the announcement was met with derision from the Opposition that accused the government of ceding territory to China.

In a news conference, Rahul Gandhi claimed that Finger 4 is our territory, that is where our post used to be. Now we have moved from Finger 4 to Finger 3. Why has Prime Minister Narendra Modi given up Indian territory to the Chinese. This is the question that needs to be answered by him and the Defence minister. Not for the first time has the Congress MP leveled accusations unmoored from facts, but the political bickering and an ill-informed debate arising from it on social media has the potential to muddy the disengagement process at a sensitive time.

It forced the defence ministry to release another statement where it was stressed that the assertion that Indian territory is up to Finger 4 is categorically false Even the LAC, as per the Indian perception, is at Finger 8, not at Finger 4 Permanent posts of both sides at the north bank of Pangong Tso are longstanding and well-established. On the Indian side, it is Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 and on the Chinese side, east of Finger 8. The current agreement provides for cessation of forward deployment by both sides and continued deployment at these permanent posts. India has not conceded any territory as a result of this agreement.

Within this context, a few takeaways from the disengagement process are worth noting.

A conditional success in battle of attrition

The biggest takeaway that emerges is that India can claim (albeit conditional) success in the battle of attrition. The facts are clear. China is rolling back its troops from Finger 4 to Finger 8 in the northern bank, acquiesced to a similar procedure on the southern bank, and crucially, has agreed to demolish the structures that had been built by both sides since April 2020 on both banks of the lake. This must qualify as a win in Indias battle of attrition because the standard operating procedure of Chinas territorial expansion involves erecting structures on ground and creating faits accompli to change facts on the ground and implementing gray-zone tactics to tire out its rival.

China had put up a massive 81x25 metre signage written in Mandarin and a map of China between fingers 4 and 5 in a clear attempt for the illustrations to be spotted in satellite imagery and create an illusion of their control over the area over which India asserts sovereign control.

The demolition of these structures is a forced reversal of the tactical procedure and a clear setback for China. As Lt Gen P R Shankar, retired Director General of Artillery, points out in his blog, in this era of perception battles, this was proclamation of sovereign Chinese territory. Today they are in the process of vacating it after obliterating that map! Sovereignty gained and sovereignty lost!

On Indias side, it has agreed to a temporary moratorium on patrolling between Fingers 4 and 8. This has been criticised by the Opposition as an evidence of Indias ceding territory to the Chinese. On the contrary, this seems to a prudent outcome under the existing circumstances.

Dhan Singh Thapa, Indias permanent post in this area, is just on the east of Finger 3, while Chinas is at Sirijap, east of Finger 8. While Indian troops did patrol up to Finger 8 to mark their territory, it used to be on foot and conducted once every two months. Indias foot patrol suffered from mobility issues because of lack of road from Finger 3 to Finger 5 on the Indian side, while the Chinese could come up to Finger 5 swiftly and frequently since they had managed to build a road from Finger 8 in the 2000s (after starting to lay a track in 1999, according to a report by strategic analyst Nitin Gokhale.

Since the Chinese agreement also involves evacuating from the area they were squatting on since May 2020 and demotion of the structures PLA had erected to create fait accompli, the creation of a no-patrol zone works more in Indias favour. Moreover, there is a case to be made for a no-patrol zone in such flashpoints and the need for a practical working agreement on the patrolling schedule of both sides, including an agreement for a no patrolling zone in the disputed areas along the LAC, as Colon S Dinny, who commanded an infantry battalion at Pangong Tso until 2017, pointed out in this article in 2019.

On the southern bank India is giving up some crucial locational advantage by vacating the strategically important heights of Kailash Range at Gurung Hill, Magar Hill, Mukhpari, Rezang La and Rechin La. It is obvious that this leverage was used to secure a favourable outcome on the northern bank, and there is apprehension that the PLA may attempt to secure these heights by conceit as soon as Indian troops descend from the peaks. On this specific issue, Gokhales report points out that Indias newly installed sensors and surveillance platforms will alert troops stationed at the base of Chushul mountains and they may move up to the peaks if any Chinese misadventure is detected.

Amid this give and take, we must not lose sight of the larger picture. Chinas troop mobilization, probing attempt to change the LAC and drawing India into a protracted standoff that led to the first human casualties between both sides have yielded no tangible benefits for the aggressor. If Beijings attempt was aimed at achieving politico-military dominance at a low cost to itself, that has ended with a realization that India is ready to look China in the eye and has the ability and the determination to match its steps. By raising the cost of Chinas territorial aggression, India has hopefully lessened Chinas appetite for provocative behavior, but this assumption will have to pass the test of time. What isnt in doubt at this stage that India has gained in strategic confidence and has been able to build deterrence that should set the template for future skirmishes.

The restoration of status quo ante is still subject to the fulfilment of sequential disengagement but the synergy that India has struck with the US in coordinating its response  be it information and intelligence from its strategic partner or cold weather gear  may further deter China in launching such misadventures. Since China practices the rules of hard power, not normative power, a close Indo-US partnership and better coordination with Indo-Pacific democracies will impose additional costs on its behavior.

In fact, Beijing would have noted that the Joe Biden administration has taken an early hard line against China and promised extreme competition. The White House readout of Biden-Xi Jinping call states that the US President referred to Beijings coercive and unfair economic practices, crackdown in Hong Kong, human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and increasingly assertive actions in the region, including toward Taiwan.

Unless Xi Jinping is playing a 64D geopolitical chess where none of the outcomes that we see before our eyes are what they seem, all that Beijing has managed to do is push India and the US closer at a time when Washington is revising its strategy towards China as a threat to its position as the global hegemon.

Hard-nosed bargaining backed by integrated approach

The second takeaway that emerges from the development is that contrary to the impression being created in certain quarters, the disengagement process was anything but sudden. In fact, a closer look at the turn of events since the middle of last year suggests painstaking bargaining by both sides and Indias success in eventually coming out on top in hard-nosed negotiations.

The disengagement formula wasnt a sudden epiphany but a slow grind of nerves, resolve and hard haggling stretched over several months, during the course of which both sides proposed and cancelled several plans to break the deadlock.

Gokhale, for instance, quotes a key negotiator in his article who reveals that in the seventh round the Chinese proposed a formula whereby they would withdraw to their post at Sirijap but wanted to patrol up to Finger 5 at least once a month, while confining India to Finger 3. India refused the bait and kept chipping away at their proposals and putting forth counter-demands until they agreed to pull back completely to Sirijap.

Indias acquiring of the strategic heights in Chushul sector no doubt played a big role in strengthening the hands of negotiators. The Print reports that China was first to propose a phased disengagement during the call between National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi in July last year, but it wasnt until November, when temperatures started to drastically drop that China became amenable to Indias conditions.

According to the report, Chinese troops were being posted to such forward locations for the first time and, contrary to belief that they were well-settled, the medical casualties were higher. The current stand-off marks the first time that India and China have deployed soldiers in forward areas in Ladakh during the regions bitter winter.

While this gives a clue behind the eventual breaking of deadlock, Indias politico-military approach to hammer out a resolution also deserves mention. The later stages of the negotiations saw an integrated approach where MEA representatives accompanied generals during military-level talks to ensure that there were no gaps in communication and no forward movement falls prey to bureaucratic hurdles. This breaking of silo could be an important pointer in future negotiations.

Undertake thorough assessment of ties

Finally, the third takeaway must be a thorough assessment of bilateral ties even if the disengagement process stays true to plan. In dealing with Chinas territorial aggression, India sent out a clear message through its key ministers that any disturbance in peace and tranquility along the LAC in the border areas is bound to have adverse implications for the direction of our bilateral ties, as the defence minister said in Parliament. Foreign minister S Jaishankar had laid out the framework of three mutuals and eight principles to repair bilateral ties and it is conceivable that this presents Indias roadmap in defining the relationship with China, going ahead.

Indias tying of bilateral ties to the boundary question, and laying of the ground rules, are aimed at mitigating Chinas effort at freeing the boundary issue  which it identifies as a source of discomfiture for India and a leverage for itself  from the confines of bilateral ties. Through its economic steps and resolute defence of territory leading to the disengagement, India seems to have prevailed in this ideological jousting. This should bring clarity of purpose in mitigating future challenges.

However, worth remembering that China has not abandoned any territorial claims and there are examples galore of it reneging on deals. Therefore, India must lay down clear green, amber and red lines given the internecine conflict situations, as JNU professor Srikanth Kondapalli points out and remain ever cautious. The price for peace is eternal vigilance.
The federal opposition has used the anniversary of Parliaments apology to the stolen generation to push for a referendum on constitutional recognition to be held before the next election.

Labors Indigenous Australians spokeswoman Linda Burney told Federal Parliament on Monday the healing power of telling the truth was within reach and a national vote on the issue could succeed if it had the support of First Nations leaders and major political parties.

Labors Pat Dodson, Anthony Albanese and Linda Burney on their way to attend a ministerial statement to mark the anniversary of the National Apology to the Stolen Generations. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The federal government had committed to a referendum during this term of parliament but plans were derailed last year, as well as several other election commitments, by the emergency response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Ms Burney said Labor remained committed to enshrining The Voice into the constitution, in line with the Uluru statement, coupled with a Makarrata Commission to achieve agreement on appropriate measures towards reconciliation.
A person takes out a book in this undated photo. Gettyimagesbank





By Park Ji-won







Han Ye-chan, a children's book writer who penned more than 100 works, was jailed in December after being found guilty of molesting an 11-year-old child, a local newspaper revealed Monday.







According to the Hankyoreh, the 52-year old was sentenced to two and half years in prison in December for violating laws preventing sexual violence against minors aged under 13. He was also ordered to undergo a correctional program for 40 hours and banned from working in facilities related to children, teenagers and people with disabilities. Both Han and prosecutors appealed the ruling.







Han was reported to have inappropriately touched the 11-year-old 27 times, including putting his tongue into the minor's mouth. Han pleaded not guilty, but the court sided with the victim, saying that the testimony given was specific and consistent and the writer had enough power to coerce the victim into unwanted sexual relations.







Han has written numerous books aimed at teenage girls, including the series "Seoyeon." After the revelations, criticism mounted against the publisher which had knowledge of the allegations, but continued to publish new books by Han after he was prosecuted in July 2019.



DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)  Iowa health officials have reversed a decision to withhold COVID-19 vaccines from some counties that were reported as not having used up to 80% of their allocation last week.

The Iowa Department of Public Health informed five counties on Friday that it would withhold this weeks allotment of vaccine.

The decision drew criticism from several county health administrators, who said either that the state was mistaken or that bad weather had temporarily slowed their progress.

The Des Moines Register reports that as of Monday, three of the counties  Buchanan, Washington and Chickasaw  reported that state officials had informed them they would be getting their allotment of vaccines this week.
Sinn Fein publicly opposed partition and sought a united Ireland when Ireland was divided in 1921. It fought the first election to the Northern Ireland parliament on an anti-partitionist stance and was successful in reopening the issue of Ulster during the Treaty negotiations from October to December 1921, much to the dismay of Ulster unionists.

Its policy on partition, however, when one existed, was generally incoherent and its public commitment to a united Ireland was not matched by much of its actions in 1921.

From its rise in popularity after the 1916 Easter Rising through to 1921, other than the counter-productive Belfast Boycott, Sinn Fein had no clear policy on how to deal with the unionist minority in the north-east of Ireland. Sinn Fein leaders stuck steadfastly and naively to the view that Ulster would readily come into an all-Ireland parliament once Britain was removed from the island.

This was partly due to the party's lack of penetration in the north, clearly demonstrated by the profiles of the six Sinn Fein members elected to the northern parliament in May 1921; Eamon de Valera, Michael Collins, Arthur Griffith, Eoin MacNeill, Sean Milroy and Sean O'Mahony.

Most of them were high profile figures in the south. The main northerners in Sinn Fein were Eoin MacNeill, Ernest Blythe and Sean MacEntee.

They took an interest in the north, but their commitment was to southern politics. Sinn Fein MP for Fermanagh and Tyrone Cahir Healy attacked the party's policy towards the north in the years since 1916, "The truth is that none of the Irish leaders understood the northern situation or the northern mind".

In 1921, Sinn Fein leader de Valera moved from a stance of 'Ulster must be coerced if she stood in the way' to one of ruling out the use of force against Ulster.

This was not replaced with any meaningful policy to engage with Ulster unionists.

Strategically, Sinn Fein was all at sea on how a united Ireland could be achieved. The Ulster unionist position was greatly aided by the absence of a coherent Sinn Fein northern policy.

During the Anglo-Irish Treaty negotiations from October to December 1921, once the Sinn Fein delegation stated that its allegiance to crown and empire was contingent on Ireland's 'essential unity', Lloyd George and others within the British government appeared open to changing Northern Ireland's status.

Lloyd George unsuccessfully tried to convince the Northern Ireland prime minister James Craig into accepting an all-Ireland parliament.

Craig refused to concede any ground and instead won a major victory with Lloyd George agreeing to transfer services to Northern Ireland in November. Services such as policing, local government, agriculture and education were not transferred by the British with the birth of Northern Ireland.

The Irish delegation were aware that the northern jurisdiction was not fully functioning when the conference began in October, services being withheld demonstrated that partition could be negotiable, but they appeared unaware on how to use this to their advantage.

With the avenue of reaching a settlement by pressurising Craig now closed, Lloyd George dangled the idea of a boundary commission to Sinn Fein instead. Arthur Griffith believed there would be benefits to it, that it "would give us most of Tyrone, Fermanagh, and part of Armagh and Down".

The Anglo-Irish Treaty's main provision relating to Ulster was Article 12, stipulating that if Northern Ireland opted not to join the Irish Free State, a boundary commission would determine the border "in accordance with the wishes of the inhabitants, so far as may be compatible with economic and geographic conditions".

Central to the problem with the boundary commission was its ambiguity. No plebiscite was asked for, the clause was open to a number of different interpretations, and no time was specified for the convening of the commission.

The Sinn Fein delegation blundered greatly in acceding to such a vague and indefinable clause.

By signing the Anglo-Irish Treaty, Sinn Fein officially recognised partition but it was consoled and overly optimistic, as it would transpire, on the outcomes that would be achieved from the boundary commission.

The optimism in many ways explains the fraction of time devoted to partition (just nine out of the total 338 pages of the Treaty debates) during the acrimonious Dail Eireann debates over the Treaty. Both the pro and anti-Treaty sides supported the boundary commission as a means to an end or at least limit partition.

The split arose over sovereignty. It is astonishing that there was so little scrutiny over such a vague clause that ultimately resulted in no change to the border in 1925.

Perhaps it demonstrated that Sinn Fein's real commitment to a united Ireland was illusory and at odds with its public rhetoric.

Northern nationalists increasingly detected this waning commitment and abandonment by southern leaders, with Cahir Healy concluding that "we must look after ourselves".

Cormac Moore is author of Birth of the Border: The Impact of Partition in Ireland (Merrion Press, 2019)
Stratovolcano 4835 m (15,863 ft)Kamchatka, 56.06N / 160.64E(1 out of 5)1697-98, 1720-21, 1727-31, 1737, 1740, 1762, 1767, 1770, 1772, 1785, 1787, 1788, 1789-90, 1791, 1807, 1812, 1813, 1819-22, 1829, 1840, 1848, 1852, 1853-54, 1865, 1877, 1878, 1879, 1882, 1883, 1890, 1896-97, 1890, 1896-97, 1898, 1904, 1907, 1909, 1910, 1911, 1913, 1915, 1922, 1923, 1925, 1926, 1929, 1931, 1932, 1935-36, 1937-39, 1944-1945, 1946, 1948, 1949, 1951, 1953, 1954, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1960-63, 1963-64, 1965-1966, 1967, 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1971-73, 1974, 1977-80, 1981, 1982, 1982-83, 1984-85, 1986, 1986-90, 1991, 1992, 1992-93, 1994-95, 1996-97, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2002-04, 2005 - ongoingDominantly explosive, strombolian and vulcanian activity, sometimes lava flows from fissure vents. At present in a phase of near-persistant activity.(volcano expedition to Kamchatka)

If you havn't done it yet,to get one of the fastest volcano news online:

Kliuchevskoi is Kamchatka's highest and most active volcano. Since its origin about 6000 years ago, the beautifully symmetrical, 4835-m-high basaltic stratovolcano has produced frequent moderate-volume explosive and effusive eruptions without major periods of inactivity. Kliuchevskoi rises above a saddle NE of sharp-peaked Kamen volcano and lies SE of the broad Ushkovsky massif. More than 100 flank eruptions have occurred at Kliuchevskoi during the past roughly 3000 years, with most lateral craters and cones occurring along radial fissures between the unconfined NE-to-SE flanks of the conical volcano between 500 m and 3600 m elevation. The morphology of its 700-m-wide summit crater has been frequently modified by historical eruptions, which have been recorded since the late-17th century. Historical eruptions have originated primarily from the summit crater, but have also included numerous major explosive and effusive eruptions from flank craters.

NASA photo of the eruption of Klyuchevsky volcano on 30 September, 1994, the volcano's largest explosion in 40 years. The large

The Azores are famous for their very pleasant climate, breathtaking green and unspoiled landscapes and nature. Guided by a photographer and volcanologist, discover five islands: Sao Miguel, Faial, Terceira, Pico and Flores - each with its distinct character.

One of Central America's most active volcanoes, Fuego in Guatemala is in near-permanent explosive eruption with intermittent phases of increasing activity that generate lava fountains, lava flows and pyroclastic flows.

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NTU Singapore expands interdisciplinary curricula for students with 13 new degrees

Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) announced plans to expand options for interdisciplinary study with 13 new degree offerings for graduates. These include two new degree programmes incorporating Data Science to train students to become professionals skilled in the use of data analytics and technologies.

These new programmes add to the University's move to offer a university-wide common interdisciplinary core curriculum to all freshmen from the new academic year starting in August 2021. Photo courtesy: NTU

NTU is also offering 10 new Double Major combinations in the arts and humanities to give students greater flexibility and choice in customising their education based on their interests and aspirations, an official statement read.

In addition, NTU is launching a Second Major in Entrepreneurship with an emphasis on technopreneurship to nurture innovation-driven entrepreneurs who can contribute to Singapore's Smart Nation goals.

The new offerings are in line with the recently announced NTU 2025 strategic plan to transform learning at the University.

"Through the new interdisciplinary combinations and degree programmes, students will enrich their disciplinary training, gain an appreciation of taking different perspectives, and maintain intellectual and learning flexibility. This is so that they will be better prepared to respond to the changes and challenges brought about by rapid technological change and uncertainties in the post-COVID-19 world," Professor Ling San, NTU deputy president and Provost, said

These new programmes add to the University's move to offer a university-wide common interdisciplinary core curriculum to all freshmen from the new academic year starting in August 2021. The core curriculum will cover topics such as digital literacy, communication and inquiry, ethics and global challenges.

Starting from the 2021 cohort enrolling this August, all undergraduates will be required to complete internships before graduation.

Students will also have more opportunities to pursue research internships through corporate laboratories and other joint laboratories established on NTU's campus, in partnership with industry.

As students are unable to travel during the pandemic, more remote internships with overseas-based companies are being offered as well.

The new double majors are:

Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Linguistics and Multilingual Studies and Philosophy Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Linguistics and Multilingual Studies and English Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in History and Linguistics and Multilingual Studies Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Chinese and Linguistics and Multilingual Studies Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in English and Philosophy Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Philosophy and History Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Philosophy and Chinese Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in English and History Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Chinese and English Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in History and Chinese

Unlike a second major, which is meant to supplement a single major, the double majors are two full majors taken in a single course of study. The double majors deliver a comprehensive curriculum in both majors, while requiring only 10 per cent more academic credits than a single major.
A criminal organization dedicated to international drug trafficking was vanquished by the Foggia police as part of the "Ultimo outpost II" operation.

From the early hours of the day, the agents are carrying out a series of precautionary measures.

As ascertained during the investigations, the suspects sent large quantities of hashish from Morocco, via Spain, to be sent to the shop in the Foggia area through a dense network of coverage and complicity that also reached Campania and Lombardy.

There were sales for a total of about 640 kilograms of drugs, the market value of which exceeds 4 million euros.

Also seized firearms of stealth origin arrived from the clandestine market in Naples.

(Unioneonline / ss)
Opinion Is Civil Disobedience Myanmars New Normal?

Myanmar Railway staff join the civil disobedience movement on Feb. 15 in Mandalay. / The Irrawaddy

What is the new normal for Myanmar today? As people have been trying different forms of civil disobedience to fight the military coup it has become a new normal in Myanmar.

The words civil disobedience comes from State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyis appeal before she was detained. She urged people to oppose the military coup together in any way possible. For her, as she often said, the people are the most important force.

A veteran journalist asked another National League for Democracy (NLD) leader, U Win Htein, about the message and what Daw Aung San Suu Kyi wants people to do. U Win Htein said she wanted a civil disobedience movement rather than mass street protests because of COVID-19 and the potential for bloodshed.

As her message was not clear enough, people were puzzled about what to do.

NLD members have waited for instructions from the partys central executive committee who are being held in Naypyidaw.

The strict hierarchy of the NLD left people feeling bereft on the first day of the coup. My 78-year-old mother kept asking me, Is there any luck? She cried the whole day because her beloved leader, Mother Suu, was detained. It is heartbreaking for her because she did not expect to return to military rule.

One day after the coup, people started banging pots and pans and honking car horns to oppose military rule. Banging pans is a traditional way of driving out ghosts. That initiative reached the international media and was dubbed the drum revolution.

Thais have followed suit in an attempt to drive out Thailands military regime.

But pots and pans are not enough for young citizens who have been hit the hardest by the forced internet shutdown ordered by the authorities. My son and his student friends have lost their online jobs, they cannot play virtual games and their online shopping businesses have folded.

Food Panda delivers lost their jobs as online ordering has broken down and most bank cards have stopped working because of connection failures. Shops only want cash as the banking system is unstable and the Grab taxi app just says, no connection found. The internet shut down is causing a long list of problems.

Facebook was blocked after the authorities forced telecoms operators to ban the most popular social media network. People immediately searched for virtual private networks (VPNs) to bypass Myanmars networks. Anti-coup posts and protest photos returned to Facebook.

Feb. 6: street protests

As the regime ignored anger for the first five days, young people lost patience. At 9am on Saturday, young activists organized the first street protests in Hledan near the Yangon University campus. They shouted Boycott military coup, Students are united, We have a future and We dont want military rule and sang revolutionary songs by the deceased student activist, Htoo Ein Thin. Others joined with three-finger salutes, clapping, shouting slogans and singing revolutionary songs. It touched me deeply as I did the same during the 1988 student uprising. The 21 generation student uprising was born. I was now covering the protests as a journalist.

I saw a fellow journalist who I worked with during the 2007 saffron revolution and said I did not want to keep meeting him in this kind of situation.

We came because we know our cameras and words can help protect these brave young people but both protesters and journalists are in danger. Six police cars on Insein Road were a few meters from the protest. Fully armed riot police blocked the road with barricades. Soon the protest swelled to hundreds and a young woman handed red roses to police in a car. The officers at first did not dare to take the flowers until one in the front seat took them. People cheered, pyithu ye (our police).

The traffic police tried to address the congestion caused by barricades and protests on Insein Road. Drivers blocked Hledan junction, continuously honking in support of the protest. Soon the traffic police urged protesters to leave the road and riot police to remove the barricades. The protesters moved to a car park at the Hledan center on Pyay Road but Hledan junction remained crowded with hundreds of protesters until the late afternoon.

Feb. 7: mass demonstration

On day two the protests broadened with more than 100,000 people. In downtown Yangon on the Sunday afternoon, a sea of red shirts marched from Sule Pagoda Road to Bogyoke Road. Cars followed and horns were sounded. Bystanders showed three-finger salutes. Demonstrators called for the release of detained leaders. I saw no police.

Feb. 8: demonstrations and civil disobedience

Early on Monday morning, Yangons streets became noisy with cars honking. Students in black gathered around Yangon Universitys campus and they were ready to march for a third day. Placards read Free Aung San Suu Kyi, free our leaders, Justice for Myanmar, Say no to military dictatorship, We want our elected government and Support the civil disobedience movement.

At the Hledan Center, state high-school teachers and their pupils protested in white and green uniforms. A teacher told me: We want to take part in this movement with the people. The civil disobedience movement had started.

Banks were closed as staff were not coming to work. Doctors and nurses in uniform joined the demonstration. Nuns outside a church held up three fingers and held signs saying, Reject dictatorship. At City Hall near Sule Pagoda security was tight but tens of thousands of protesters gathered in front of the police barricades. Young mens placards said, Fuck military coup, Dick head? We prefer the term Min Aung Hlaing and Our dreams are higher than MAHs height. They also often use MAL to refer to military chief Min Aung Hlaing. Yangon inspired other cities to mobilize. That evening, the regime imposed an 8pm to 4am curfew and limited gatherings to five.

Feb. 9: general strike

Civil disobedience means citizens refuse to recognize the militarys orders with no recognition and no participation.

I saw staff from different universities protesting near the Hlaing campus.

Students marched from Hledan to the US Embassy and others gathered at the NLD headquarters before marching to Sule.

Police cars were parked near the eastern entrance of Yangons Shwedagon Pagoda where the saffron revolution began in 2007. Sule Pagoda Road was crowded with protesters with little room for cars to pass.

Yangon Railway Station staff in blue and black uniforms joined the Sule protest. The countrys main transport system broke down.

Health, education and transport sectors joined the movement and private banks have closed since Monday.

At around 11:30am, riot police blocked University Avenue Road to stop people joining the US Embassy protest. More than 200 riot police, about 50 soldiers and two white police cars with water cannon were in position at Hledan Junction.

Plastic sheets were handed out to protect protesters from the water jets. The situation was very tense under the blazing sun. Young activists ran messages to the police and were able to keep the serious situation calm. Similar scenes were happening in Mandalay, Magwe and Naypyidaw.

According to DVB, about 30 protesters and the DVBs correspondent were arrested in Mandalay. The reporter was soon released. Police fired on demonstrators in Naypyitaw at 1pm on Tuesday, leaving more than 20 injured and two in a critical condition. Riot police in Magwe used water cannon. Three police officers tried to protect demonstrators and later joined the protest. Political defiance rose with protests in more than 300 towns.

Feb. 10: general strike

The hospitals are empty, trains are not running, the banking system has broken down, post offices are closed and air traffic controllers stopped work. The central bank appealed to staff to return to work. The COVID-19 vaccination process stopped but no news about the general strike or civil disobedience movement appeared in the regime-controlled media.

Activists protested at the United Nations offices and the US, UK, Chinese, Indian and Japanese embassies to avoid confrontations with the riot police. The young people became more organized and disciplined.

The division of labor is impressive. They divide into frontline groups to lead the protests in targeted areas, leaflet delivers, food and water suppliers and rubbish collectors. Others tweet to raise international awareness with hashtags like #HearTheVoiceMyanmar, #RejectTheMilitaryCoup, #WeNeedDemocracy, #CivilDisobedienceMovement, #RespectOurVotes and #SaveMyanmar. Some groups organize street performances and protests reach more than 500 towns.

Feb. 11: general strike

While demonstrations continue during the day, arrests are made at night. Key members of the Union Election Commission and NLD MPs are detained at military bases. The regime tries to generate fear using unlawful arrests and unjust orders but it cannot stop the movement. Street vendors, civil servants and MPs are all at high risk of arrest.

Opposition becomes more creative. Artists take over Pansodan Road in Yangon to raise funds to support striking civil servants. Poetry recitals are held and actor Paing Takhon organized a Chinese New Year feast in front of Chinas Embassy and street dancers perform across Yangon.

Feb. 12: general strike

On the seventh day of mass protests, I hear car horns and revolutionary songs in my neighborhood on Yangons outskirts from 10am. People refuse to recognize the military regime.

They do not join the regimes attempts to mark Union Day and disobey unjust laws imposed by the military. They show no fear: it is becoming the new normal. I am keen to explore the city and see peoples creativity.

The militarys State Administrative Council has failed to keep banking, health care and transport operating so it cannot pretend to be ruling the country. All directives face constant disobedience. No recognition, no participation is a mantra for civil servants and more than 300 MPs try to maintain their legitimacy. There is a determination among people from all walks of life to end military rule. People say: This is the end game. We must end military rule or the military will end our lives. They are determined to continue with civil disobedience until the dictatorship falls.

You may also like these stories:

You Messed With the Wrong Generation, Myanmars Youth Tell Coup Makers
They tied the knot during a romantic ceremony in Paris on Valentine's Day back in 2009, two months before they would go on to renew their vows in Venice.

And Salma Hayek, 54, showed she remains as loved-up as ever with her billionaire husband Francois-Henri Pinault, 58, when she shared a snap of herself with him as they celebrated 12 years of marriage on the romantic day on Sunday.

The Frida star took to Instagram to post a snap of herself wearing a black bikini under a cream crocheted cover-up as she kissed her smiling partner on the cheek.

Special day: Salma Hayek shared a snap pf herself with her billionaire husband Francois-Henri Pinault as they celebrated 12 years of marriage on the romantic day on Sunday

With her raven locks tied in a bun, the Mexican-born actress donned a pair of stylish sunglasses as she stood before her husband, who went casual in a grey T-shirt.

Captioning the heart-warming image, the screen star made no mention of their anniversary as she simply wrote: '#happyvalentinesday.'

Oscar-nominated star Salma and her husband have hunkered down together amid the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic.

Pinault is CEO and chairman of luxury fashion conglomerate Kering, which is the owner of high-fashion brands including Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Balenciaga, and Alexander McQueen.

Dashing: They tied the knot during a romantic ceremony in Paris on Valentine's Day back in 2009, two months before they would go on to renew their vows in Venice. Pictured in 2019

The pair are famously private about their relationship, but have revealed that they first met during a lavish gala in Italy in 2006.

They got engaged in 2007, right around the same time that they announced Salma's pregnancy with daughter Valentina, now 13.

Lavish nuptials followed on Valentine's Day, 2009, in Paris. They then renewed their vows two months later in Venice.

Stunning screen star Salma has previous gushed about their marriage - and even revealed the secrets to its success.

Beautiful family: They are the proud parents of daughter Valentina, now 13. Pictured in 2019

'[Pinault] is the best husband in the world,' she told Allure in 2015. 'I get to be who I am with him, and I dont feel that somebody tries to limit me.'

She has also insisted on remaining financially independent from the hugely successful businessman.

Salma revealed: 'I have a system in my life that I've chosen, where my expenses from before the marriage are my expenses. And he goes, "I know. That's why I want to marry you."

'Maybe that's also part of what works great in my marriage. I still have my independence. But he likes it. I get a lot of respect from him.'
Bill Gates exudes optimism in discussing the worlds ability to tackle climate change  until he hits on manufacturing. About that, he is worried.

There is currently no way to make steel or cement without releasing climate-warming emissions. Yet, neither governments nor investors are looking hard to solve that problem, Gates said.

Thats the sector that bothers me the most," Gates said in a video interview with Reuters ahead of the publication this week of his book, How to Avoid a Climate Disaster."

The software-developer-turned-philanthropist has invested some $2 billion toward the development of clean technologies. But those investments are in electricity generation and storage, not in manufacturing.

Manufacturing  especially in the cheap construction staples steel and cement  accounts for roughly a third of global greenhouse gas emissions. That makes manufacturing more polluting than the power or transportation sectors, which receive far more attention in policies and investments. And the manufacturing sector is set to grow, as the global population climbs and countries further develop.

People still need basic shelter, certainly in developing countries," said Gates, co-founder of Microsoft Corp. Its unlikely well stop building buildings."

Gates plans to push for more research and innovation at the U.N. climate conference in Glasgow in November. The idea is to get innovation, including R&D, onto the agenda  not just looking at the easy stuff."

During the 2015 U.N. climate talks in Paris, Gates helped to launch a global initiative called Mission Innovation along with U.S. President Barack Obama, Frances President Francois Hollande and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to link national governments with the private sector in pursuing and sharing clean technology.

We need total coordination, and in fact some overlap is a very good thing to have," Gates told Reuters. But he said there should be diversity in the solutions being sought so governments do not end up duplicating efforts.

Right now, for example, theyre doing a lot of green hydrogen products," Gates said. But whos doing the hard stuff?"

Some manufacturing plants may be able to lower their emissions by plugging into an electricity grid run on renewable energy. But that will not solve all emissions from steel- and cement-making, both processes that release carbon dioxide as a byproduct.

In the United States, it hasnt helped to have energy policy yo-yo between presidential administrations, he said. This stop-start approach, thats too risky for the private sector."

On a personal note, Gates says in his book that, after years of dismissing activists calls to divest from fossil fuels, he sold his direct holdings in oil and gas companies in 2019. The Gates Foundations endowment did the same  but not because Gates became convinced that divestment would push companies toward clean energy.

Rather, I dont want to profit if their stock prices go up because we dont develop zero-carbon alternatives," he writes. Id feel bad if I benefited from a delay in getting to zero."

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.

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Apparently, Netflix film The Dig has prompted an upsurge of interest in archaeology.

The moving 1939-set period drama stars Carey Mulligan as Sutton Hoo landowner, Edith Pretty, and Ralph Fiennes as Basil Brown, the self-taught Suffolk archaeologist she hired to excavate the strange mounds on her land.

The treasure trove uncovered remains one of the most significant finds in all of European archaeological history.

The Dig is adapted from a 2007 novel by John Preston who has a personal connection to the Sutton Hoo excavations: his aunt was archaeologist Margaret 'Peggy' Guido, the first to find gold on site. Lily James plays her in the film.

In the past year, I have read three other engrossing, but very different, novels set on archaeological sites.

Patricia Nicol has selected the best books about archaeology, such as The Dig by John Preston, which inspired the Netflix drama by the same name, and Jodie Picoult's The Book Of Two Ways

Ghost Wall, by Sarah Moss, is a slim, spare, suspenseful tale, mud-flecked with disquieting horror.

It is set in rural Northumberland where teenager Silvie, her mother and father are spending a fortnight's summer holiday on an 'experiential archaeology' programme, alongside a professor and his students.

Silvie's working-class family are so different from the rest: their presence an indulgence to her disciplinarian father, an obsessive ancient Briton hobbyist.

As a distant past is 'lived', alternative potential futures appear on the heat-hazed horizon.

The Book Of Two Ways, by Jodi Picoult, looks to the past to explore the future. As a young woman, Dawn had to drop her Egyptology studies. She married, had a daughter and forged another career.

But did she leave the love of her life, British archaeologist Wyatt Armstrong, and her life's passion, in a dig house in the Egyptian desert? A personal crisis compels her to find out.

Death In A Desert Land, by Andrew Wilson, meanwhile, casts Agatha Christie as a real-life sleuth, while riffing on her second husband Max Mallowan's career as an archaeologist.

In it, she travels to Baghdad, then the sites of ancient Mesopotamia, to investigate the death of explorer Gertrude Bell.

If your present feels overfamiliar, these are novels to dig.
Fr Brian Brady came up with the idea for Ash Wednesday

A Donegal priest has come up with a novel way of ensuring people don't miss Ash Wednesday  by providing his parishioners with takeaway ashes instead.

Because of Covid restrictions, holy ashes cannot be taken in churches on Ash Wednesday next.

Normally parishioners would receive the sign of the cross from priests at masses on the day.

But Clonmany Parish priest of Clonmany on the Inishowen Peninsula, Fr Brian Brady has come up with a solution.

Having teamed up with his local Centra convenience store, Fr Brady is delivering takeaway ashes.

The blessed ashes have been placed in sealed containers and left in local churches so they can be picked up by parishioners.

Read More

However, it will be strictly limited to one container per family to deal with the demand.

Among the Donegal churches in the Clonmany Parish are St Marys Church, Clonmany, St Michaels Urris and the Oratory of the Assumption, Ballyliffin.

The containers will be left during Sunday at each of the churches for pick-up before Wednesday, Fr Brady said.

Unfortunately they will be available only on a first come first serve basis, one container to each family, and whenever they run out there will be no more.

Receiving the ashes has been an important part of our way of being Catholic and this is an attempt to ensure that those who wish to continue this valuable tradition will have the opportunity to do so, he added.

As well as the holy ashes, the containers will have a prayer to be said by the family on Wednesday when the ashes can be given out to each person in their homes.
President Bidens recent executive order to rescind the permits for TC Energys Keystone XL, including a section of the pipeline that has already been constructed, will cause serious economic consequences not only for Montana but also for the United States.

While some leaders in government believe they can create jobs, it is the private sector that is the job creator. Private investment in infrastructure such as the Keystone XL pipeline puts people to work in good paying jobs, provides a much-needed service, and creates wealth domestically without increasing the national debt. Through tax revenue, it funds much needed government services such as education, health and human services, and emergency services.

Just Since 2008 About 42,000 miles of pipeline have been put into service in the U.S. carrying crude oil, natural gas, and other petroleum products. In todays global economic climate abundant energy supplies and North American energy independence will have a huge influence geopolitically and economically.

Keystone XL will enhance the existing pipeline system and provide new ways to safely transport the energy to fuel Americans daily lives, now and in the future. Keystone XL will provide a reliable source of fuel from a stable neighboring country that shares Americas values as well as facilitating the delivery of Montana and North Dakota crude oil supplies to southern markets.

Since TC Energy filed its first Keystone XL application in 2008 there has been years of rigorous review and the facts have never changed. A four-year certification process through Montanas rigorous Major Facility Siting Act and every federal study done under both the Obama and Trump administrations has concluded Keystone XL can be built and operated safely, with NO significant impact to the environment.

 In 2008 the permitting process for Keystone XL started.

 In 2011, the U.S. State Department (DOS) determined the project could be built with no significant impact to the environment.

 In 2014, DOS again finds Keystone XL can be built safely.

 In 2018, DOS again finds Keystone XL can be built with no significant impact.

 In 2019 the State permitting processes have been completed in all three affected states, Montana, South Dakota, and Nebraska.

 In 2019 a supplemental EIS was released adding another 648 pages to the voluminous original EIS that reviews geology, soils, water resources, wetlands, wildlife, air quality and noise, terrestrial vegetation, fisheries, species at risk, cultural resources, greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.

In its 2014 environmental impact statement, the U.S. State Department determined that GHG emissions from the movement of this oil by other modes of transportation such as rail would generate 28 percent to 42 percent more GHG emissions than Keystone XL. The construction techniques identified in the permitting requirements of the affected states will ensure proper operating parameters. Environment and climate change concerns are met by adhering to regulations in the United States, not by not exporting this crude oil directly to foreign nation lacking those same restraints.

Keystone XL is good business for the U.S. It will create thousands of high-paying construction jobs, pay millions into three rural states tax coffers, and inject billions into the nations economy. During construction, Keystone XL will create over 42,000 U.S. based jobs. Approximately 12,000 of the jobs will be created in Montana, South Dakota, and Nebraska. Wages supported by Keystone XL construction will generate $2 billion in earnings for U.S. workers. Construction of Keystone XL will inject approximately $3.4 billion into U.S. GDP and over $25 million in taxes paid to Montanas state and local coffers in just the first year of operation will pay for education and social services programs as well as infrastructure needs.

We are deeply concerned that the Biden administration would play politics with this very important project. At a time when Americans are struggling to find work, especially the good paying jobs that this project would provide, we cannot understand why the Biden administration would turn down private investment in critical infrastructure.
PITTSBURGH, Feb. 15, 2021 - A paper published today in Nature shows how chemicals in the areas surrounding tumors--known as the tumor microenvironment--subvert the immune system and enable cancer to evade attack. These findings suggest that an existing drug could boost cancer immunotherapy.

The study was conducted by a team of scientists at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, led by Greg Delgoffe, Ph.D., Pitt associate professor of immunology. By disrupting the effect of the tumor microenvironment on immune cells in mice, the researchers were able to shrink tumors, prolong survival and increase sensitivity to immunotherapy.

"The majority of people don't respond to immunotherapy," said Delgoffe. "The reason is that we don't really understand how the immune system is regulated within this altered tumor microenvironment."

The immune system is made up of many kinds of cells, chief among them T cells. One type, called killer T cells, fights off invaders, such as viruses, bacteria and even cancer. Another type, called regulatory T cells, or "T-reg cells" for short, counteracts killer T cells by acting as protectors of the cells that belong to the body. T-reg cells are important for preventing autoimmune diseases, such as type I diabetes, Crohn's disease and multiple sclerosis, where overactive killer T cells assault the body's healthy tissues.

For all of these different immune cells to do their jobs, they need to produce energy. Delgoffe's team studied how these different types of T cells have different appetites, and how tumors--which have large appetites--compete for nutrients with infiltrating immune cells. The researchers found that killer T cells and regulatory T cells have very different appetites, and cancer cells exploit this.

"Cancer is wise to the whole situation," Delgoffe said. "Cancer cells don't just starve T cells that would kill them but actually feed these regulatory T cells that would protect them."

In short, Delgoffe's team found that tumors gobble up all the vital nutrients in their vicinity that killer T cells would need to attack. Further, they also excrete lactic acid, which feeds the regulatory T cells, convincing them to stand guard. T-regs can turn the lactic acid into energy, using a protein called MCT1, so nuzzling up with the tumor is a good way for these immune cells to stay fed.

"What better way to recruit a cell than food?" Delgoffe said.

Then, using mice with melanoma, the researchers found that silencing the gene that codes for the MCT1 protein caused tumor growth to slow down. The mice also lived longer.

"We starved the T-regs," said Delgoffe. "When T-reg cells are not being sustained by the tumor, killer T cells can come in and kill the cancer."

Importantly, when Delgoffe's team combined MCT1 inhibition with immunotherapy, the anti-cancer effects were stronger than either strategy alone.

Clinically, the same effect might be achievable using drugs that inhibit MCT1--one of which is currently being tested in people with advanced lymphoma, and it appears to be well-tolerated.

###

Additional authors on the study include McLane Watson, Paolo Vignali, Steven Mullett, Abigail Overacre-Delgoffe, Ph.D., Ronal Peralta, Stephanie Grebinoski, Ashley Menk, Natalie Rittenhouse, Kristin DePeaux, Ryan Whetstone, Ph.D., Dario Vignali, Ph.D., Timothy Hand, Ph.D., Amanda Poholek, Ph.D., and Stacy Wendell, Ph.D., of Pitt and UPMC; and Brett Morrison, M.D., Ph.D., and Jeffrey Rothstein, M.D., Ph.D., of Johns Hopkins University.

Funding for this study was provided by the Sidney Kimmel Foundation, National Institutes of Health (DP2AI136598, P50CA121973, P50CA097190 R01DK089125, R01CA203689, P01AI108545, T32CA082084, F31AI149971, F30CA247034, F31CA247129, T32AI089443 and F31AI147638), the American Association for Cancer Research (SU2CAACR-IRG-04-16), the Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy, the Mark Foundation for Cancer Research, Cancer Research Institute, the Sy Holzer Endowed Immunotherapy Fund and the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation.

Additional Contact:

Cyndy Patton

Mobile: 412-415-6085

E-mail: PattonC4@upmc.edu

About UPMC Hillman Cancer Center

UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, ranked 7th by U.S. News & World Report in 2019 for excellence in cancer care, is the region's only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center and is one of the largest integrated community cancer networks in the United States. Backed by the collective strength of UPMC and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, UPMC Hillman Cancer Center has nearly 70 locations throughout Pennsylvania and Ohio with cancer centers and partnerships internationally. The more than 2,000 physicians, researchers and staff are leaders in molecular and cellular cancer biology, cancer immunology, cancer virology, biobehavioral oncology, and cancer epidemiology, prevention, and therapeutics. UPMC Hillman Cancer Center is transforming cancer research, care, and prevention -- one patient at a time.

About the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine

As one of the nation's leading academic centers for biomedical research, the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine integrates advanced technology with basic science across a broad range of disciplines in a continuous quest to harness the power of new knowledge and improve the human condition. Driven mainly by the School of Medicine and its affiliates, Pitt has ranked among the top 10 recipients of funding from the National Institutes of Health since 1998. In rankings recently released by the National Science Foundation, Pitt ranked fifth among all American universities in total federal science and engineering research and development support.

Likewise, the School of Medicine is equally committed to advancing the quality and strength of its medical and graduate education programs, for which it is recognized as an innovative leader, and to training highly skilled, compassionate clinicians and creative scientists well-equipped to engage in world-class research. The School of Medicine is the academic partner of UPMC, which has collaborated with the University to raise the standard of medical excellence in Pittsburgh and to position health care as a driving force behind the region's economy. For more information about the School of Medicine, see http://www. medschool. pitt. edu .

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Disha Ravi took part in agitations on environmental related issues in Bengaluru: Activists

India

pti-Madhuri Adnal

Bengaluru, Feb 15: Climate activist Disha Ravi, arrested for allegedly sharing with Greta Thunberg the "toolkit" related to the farmer's protest against the Centre's three agri laws, had been taking part in environment related agitations in the city, some environmentalists said on Monday.

Not much is however known about "Fridays for Future (FFF)", a campaign led by Thunberg which Disha Ravi reportedly co-founded in India, even among many of the environment groups here.

The Delhi Police said Disha Ravi, who was arrested by a Cyber Cell team of the force on Saturday, was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.

Police alleged that Ravi and others "collaborated with the pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State." An environmental activist said here on Monday: "We have seen her (Disha Ravi) taking part in the environment related agitations here.Sometimes, it was in solitude and she appeared to maintain distance from others".

Activists in jail, terrorists on bail: Shashi Tharoor on Disha Ravi's arrest

Disha Ravi graduated from a leading college here. Another environmental activist said: "FFF is not a well-known organisation in Bengaluru and their activists were hardly seen anywhere.I have seen some of its members agitating alone on the streets without much support."

Meanwhile, Bengaluru police have declined to comment on the issue and would not say whether they knew beforehand about her arrest by their Delhi counterparts. Condemning her arrest, the "All India Students' Association" on Monday staged a protest here.

Holding placards and wearing black masks, the agitators raised slogans, "Free Disha Ravi". Their placards read, "Standing for Farmers is not sedition", and "When injustice becomes law, Resistance becomes duty".
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People living in Derry have expressed growing concern about the placement of criminals in temporary accommodation around the city.

The Derry News has learned that in one case a notorious paedophile was placed in a street just doors away from young families.

Other violent offenders from different parts of Northern Ireland have been granted court bail to reside in B&Bs and hostels in the city.

Residents are outraged and have questioned whether risk assessments were carried out prior to these placements.

They also expressed dismay that people with such dubious criminal records could be re-housed in built-up neighbourhoods.

One local mother, who wished to remain anonymous, said: It is an issue which collectively as city centre residents is causing us real concern.

These residents of the B&Bs are often from outside the area.

The normal process of referrals through NIHE has not been adhered to and B&Bs allegedly are being contacted directly and accommodation is secured irrespective of the support needs and risks of the individual.

The B&B residents are forced onto the streets from morning to evening with nowhere to go.

Surely as a starting position this is unacceptable within the current Covid guidelines.

She added: New young families in the street are scared they have made the wrong choice and many vulnerable older people anxious about their security.

Sadly the front doors normally open - even through Covid - are closed. I just want to see them open again.

Similar issues were flagged earlier this year when councillors spoke of assaults and anti-social behaviour in and around pop-up B&Bs in the city.

Working on behalf of Foyleside residents, Sinn Fein Councillor Mickey Cooper said he has asked why a known sex offender was allowed to reside in an area with children and sought assurance from the police and probation board that it wont happen again.

It is the first time such a high-risk case has been brought to his attention.

I wanted to make sure that police were checking his bail conditions were being adhered to and if possible that this individual could be moved out of the area as soon as possible.

Further discussions will take place in the coming weeks to ensure there is no repeat of this incident.

The Probation Board for Northern Ireland (PBNI) along with Housing Executive (NIHE) are responsible for finding temporary accommodation for convicted criminals.

According to NIHE, the pandemic has led to mounting pressure on these services with demand for temporary accommodation increasing significantly in the past year.

This is in part due to reduced capacity in some hostels to ensure the safety of residents and staff as part of social distancing guidelines.

Responding to the concerns of locals, PBNI said it works within the public protection arrangements for NI to risk assess and risk manage certain violent and sexual offenders.

We work with the police, prisons the housing executive and others within these multi agency arrangements. We share information and work together to protect the public.

If individuals are subject to a Licence or an Order supervised by PBNI, a condition of that Licence or Order may restrict where they can reside.

RISK MANAGEMENT

The Derry News put it to PBNI that it has become common practice to relocate offenders from one city to another where they reside in B&Bs and hostels.

It is suspected that it has become more prevalent during the pandemic when hospitality businesses have struggled for any other form of custom.

PBNI said it is not aware of this becoming an issue for individuals under its supervision during the pandemic.

In response a spokesperson said: It is not common practice for people under PBNI supervision to be relocated to other towns.

It is more likely that people will continue to live in their own community or if they have been in prison return to their local community.

When asked about the specific case of the man previously described as a prolific sex offender being placed in a built-up area with children, a spokesperson said PBNI cannot discuss details of individual cases.

She added: However sex offenders who are subject to the public protection arrangements in Northern Ireland go through a very rigorous risk assessment and risk management process.

The public protection arrangements are multi agency arrangements whereby police, probation, Health and Social Care Trusts the housing executive, prisons and other come together to assess and manage the risks posed by an individual.

A risk management plan is put in place which would consider issues such as housing and victim impact.

Each person has a designated risk manager who may be a police officer or probation officer.

If anyone has any concerns about an individual in the community they should immediately contact the police. 

In court a police officer strongly objected to the man being granted bail and suggested he should be in supervised accommodation.

However, PBNI said Northern Ireland does not have any bail hostels.

Such hostels exist across the UK, providing a structured regime, including an overnight curfew and 24-hour supervision.

INCREASED DEMAND

The Housing Executive has a statutory duty to provide interim or permanent accommodation for certain homeless households.

This duty extends to individuals who are subject to public protection arrangements, such as convicted sex offenders.

A spokesperson explained: As with anyone wishing to avail of social housing in Northern Ireland, people who have offended can choose to live where they wish unless there are restrictions or conditions imposed upon them by the courts.

If people are subject to a Licence or an Order, a condition of that Licence or Order may restrict where they can reside.

NIHE has access to 205 units within Derry City & Strabane District Council area for temporary accommodation for homeless households.

Approved premises provide supported housing where behaviour can be managed and monitored in the interests of public safety, and from where permanent approved accommodation can be sourced. Other mainstream accommodation providers also provide accommodation that supports the management of offenders, the spokesperson explained.

The Housing Executive also provides placements in single lets as part of our temporary accommodation provision.

In cases where a voluntary sector hostel or single let placement is not possible the Housing Executive will avail of non-standard accommodation (B&B/Hotels).

She added: Demand for temporary accommodation for those households facing homelessness has increased significantly during the ongoing pandemic.

Any use of non-standard accommodation for people who have offended is in the absence of other suitable options, at the agreement of the Designated Risk Manager, and for as short a duration as possible.

The Housing Executive has recently commissioned independent research which seeks to deliver an evidence base on difficulties associated with move-on accommodation for applicants subject to PPANI.

This research will assist key stakeholders in identifying actions which, depending on the outcomes of the research, may involve establishing supervised accommodation for such offenders here.

NOTE: The Derry News has learned that the sex offender referred to in the article has since been remanded into custody after again breaching his bail conditions. The problem remains for residents who say that other offenders have to leave their B&Bs during the day and are therefore roaming the streets.
Chandigarh: The Punjab State Election Commission on Monday (February 15) ordered repolling at three booths of the Municipal Councils of Patran and Samana in Patiala.

The repolling will be held on February 16 from 8 am to 4 pm, and counting will take place on February 17.

An official spokesperson of the State Election Commission said reports were received from the Returning Officer (RO) of Patran that some miscreants damaged the electronic voting machine (EVM) at polling booth number 11 of ward number 8.

Reports were received from the RO of Samana about damaging of EVMs by miscreants at polling booth number 22 and 23 of ward number 11.

Taking serious note of these incidents, the commission announced that the polling conducted at these booths would be nullified and repoll held under section 59(2)(A) of the Punjab State Election Commission Act, 1994, the official said.

Over 70 percent voting was recorded in the elections to over 100 civic bodies in Punjab on Sunday amid stray incidents of skirmishes at some places.

The Opposition parties have accused the ruling Congress of capturing booths and indulging in violence.

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Graves County Arson Suspect's Trial Set for July

By West Kentucky Star Staff

MAYFIELD - A Graves County man facing an arson charge will go to trial this summer.Thirty-nine-year-old Mitchell Meyer's jury trial is set to begin July 6, and is expected to last three days. A review of the case is set for June 22.

The Graves County Sheriff's Office said Meyer, of Lowes, set a truck on fire that was parked in the driveway of a home in May 2019. Deputies said the truck belonged to a third party who was not present at the home. Video footage of the incident allegedly showed Meyer using gasoline and a lighter to set the fire. Witnesses also reportedly saw Meyer taking items belonging to a family member and throwing them into the fire.

Firefighters responded and extinguished the blaze before it was able to reach two nearby homes. The vehicle was a total loss.

Meyer was arrested and charged with 2nd degree arson and 3rd degree criminal mischief.

New Orleans reported its fewest murders citywide of any year since 1971 in 2019, but the murder rates in other parts of the state have slowly crept up. The state capital, Baton Rouge, logged its worst three-year stretch on record between 2017 and 2019, and the combined metropolitan parishes (such as Jefferson, East Baton Rouge and St. Tammany) reported more murders in 2019 than New Orleans for the first time on record.

It is poverty and its twin sister or brother of mass incarceration, said Marc Morial, who served as mayor of New Orleans from 1994 to 2002 and is now the National Urban League president. And its easy access to guns.

Louisiana and Mississippi tend to rank among the poorest states in the country. Louisiana has ranked in the bottom five in poverty rate in 37 of the last 40 years, including last or second to last 19 times over that span. Only Mississippi had a higher share of its population below the poverty line in 2019, according to census estimates.

There is not a clearly established causal link between poverty rates and murder rates, however. Things like high unemployment and poor education factor into the states poverty rate, which in turn could contribute to higher rates of murder in Louisiana.

(Mississippi may now actually have more murders per capita than Louisiana. Its the only state where individual agencies, not the state itself, submit data directly to the F.B.I. Mississippi had the nations second-highest murder rate in 2019, but only 29 percent of Mississippi agencies representing 54 percent of the states population reported data.)

Worlds prison capital

Louisiana has also had the highest or second-highest incarceration rate in each of the last 19 years, according to Bureau of Justice Statistics.

An article in The Times-Picayune in 2012 called Louisiana the worlds prison capital and reported that more than half of the inmates in the state are housed in local prisons run by sheriffs, and the states correction system has created financial incentives for those sheriffs to keep prisons full.
Sacco Societies Regulatory Authority(Sasra) CEO John Mwaka faced questions about the Sacco sector from members of the public via Sunday Nation.

The limitation on the number of saccos one can belong to (no more than one serving similar purpose) is discriminative and nowhere else is such a principle applied. What is so unique about saccos? Joan Nafula, Maseno

The rationale is to avoid SACCOs from competing in an unhealthy way. For, instance, if we allow this practice, an employer will be in a dilemma on which deduction should be implemented first if both of them require loan repayment from the same payroll. However, a person can belong to more than two cooperatives if they do not serve the same objective. An employee with a tea plantation can belong to an employer-based Sacco and also one that receives payment for tea proceeds.

The Covid-19 pandemic saw companies retrench their employees, who were members of various Saccos. How has the pandemic affected Saccos? Victor Muchui, Kathwana

The severity of the impact of Covid-19 on Saccos has been varied depending on the sector each draws its membership from and the extent of business diversification. But the most adverse impact has been felt in rising non-performing loans to 6.9 percent as of December 2020, the highest in the last five years. This has equally meant reduced earnings for most Saccos. The impact was, however, most severe in Saccos serving members in micro and small enterprises, otherwise referred to as community Saccos, as well as those serving private firms.

Financial institutions have leveraged on fintech to increase their efficiency thus boosting their profits. How has this technology impacted on Sasra? Komen Moris, Eldoret

Saccos being financial institutions have followed suit in investing in technology to better serve their members and enhance operational efficiency. Further, the regulations require Saccos to invest in management information systems capable of facilitating deposit-taking business and accounting for all transactions in a safe and secure manner.

This has thus meant that Sasra has to invest in appropriate skills and competencies to effectively evaluate performance and compliance of the Sacco businesses, which are increasing in complexity by the day. However, several guidelines have been issued to ensure regulatory expectations are understood by the Saccos.

But challenges abound starting with lack of standards for the technology systems, what has meant that some Saccos simply go for the price without careful analysis of provider capability and/or system capabilities, a common problem for the small and mid-tier Saccos. Additional challenges have come with several incidences of mobile fraud and cyber-frauds being experienced in the recent past.

Some people have bitter and painful experiences with Saccos, especially those institutions that collapsed with members cash. How are you dealing with rogue institutions and managers? Komen Moris, Eldoret

Kenya has one of the highest Sacco penetration rates  at 28 per cent of the adult population. But this popularity of Saccos across all income groups has become an opportunity for some enterprising Kenyans, who lure unsuspecting citizens into their outfits with unrealistic promises. Sasra has taken actions on corrupt officials of Saccos. But more importantly, we have established the Sacco Fraud Investigation Unit as a critical step in addressing this challenge and good progress is being made in the one year that this unit has been in operation. Second, the recent expansion of Sasras mandate to include non-deposit taking Saccos is another policy measure to protect Kenyans from losing their cash. Always join a tried and tested Sacco.

I used to be a member of Macadamia Sacco, which changed its name to Jijenge and was eventually put under Sasra. However, I have never received my shares worth over Sh200,000 back after withdrawing membership in 2014. What should I do? Osanya Luke Wilson, Bungoma County.

Sasra is working very closely with the State Department of Cooperatives to operationalise the deposit guarantee fund, which will compensate members for the deposits upon failure of regulated Saccos, who will mandatorily have to be members of the deposit insurance fund.

I am an employee of Laico Regency and a member of Regency Sacco, which has been running without holding AGMs and without paying dividends to its members for years. At the same time, the management of Laico Regency has failed to remit all the deducted money to the Sacco. These are things Sasra should know. Why have you not compelled such employers to remit monies they deduct from workers? Concerned worker

Corporate governance is key and the Sacco should follow the law as well as the by-laws in place. We request that you report the issue to the county director of cooperatives or the cooperatives commissioners office since Laico Regency is not regulated by Sasra.

Exponential growth of digital lending is adversely affecting financial institutions like banks and Saccos. How can Saccos remain competitive? Dan Murugu, Nakuru

Deposit-taking Saccos by their nature offer banking services to their members and our records show that they have greatly adopted mobile financial services to remain competitive. However, digital lending is a growing space and we have noted a number of Saccos deploying solutions to offer digital credit. But to scale up digital financial services in a safe and secure way, Sasra is working with Saccos to develop a legal framework on shared technology platform to open opportunities including strategic partnership with fintechs.

Many Saccos face poor governance, lack of liquidity for funds transfers and low automation of services. How can Saccos overcome these hurdles? Dan Murugu, Nakuru

The introduction of the prudential regulatory framework for Saccos in 2010 was a strong policy signal that this industry has become of age. Some Saccos have thus made tremendous progress in improving governance, financial management and automation of services thus are recording annual growth rates of 10 per cent plus in key parameters including membership, deposits, capital, loan portfolio and earnings.

That is why less than 100 deposit-taking Saccos account for about 95 per cent of the Sh630 billion assets for the Sasra regulated Saccos. The small Saccos are therefore struggling as they lack the financial and human capabilities to effectively compete in the deposit and credit market. Sasra is thus promoting the concept of shared technology platform amongst Saccos as a sustainable strategy to address these challenges.

Can you take action against an auditor who gave misleading financial report to a Sacco? Irungu Maina

He should be reported to his superiors either at the county or at the national government. All technical staff are supervised by the commissioner for cooperatives development.

The proposed establishment of the Central Liquidity Fund (CLF) for Saccos is big and could have far-reaching consequences on the institutions. But as a Sacco member, how will inter-Sacco lending benefit me? Steve Mwaisaka, Kitengela

The strength of Saccos lies in cooperating to address market and or policy challenges. The proposed Sacco shared services is designed to facilitate cooperation among them to enhance service delivery. This will unlock huge opportunities for the Saccos, which are essentially community-based institutions.

Hundreds of Kenyans have lost their life-savings after Saccos collapse. The latest is Kumisa Savings and Credit Cooperative. Where is Sasra before Saccos collapse? Bernadette Musembi, Nairobi

Kumisa Savings and Credit Cooperative was not a deposit-taking Sacco under Sasras jurisdiction up to December 2020. However, starting January, there is a law that has come into force allowing Sasra to regulate specific non-deposit taking Saccos and decisively deal with any malpractices. Hopefully, this will save the public from such losses.
[February 15, 2021] HERE Technologies is powering the Lynk & Co 01 SUV in Europe

Gothenburg and Amsterdam  Lynk & Co, the global mobility brand, and HERE Technologies, the leading location data and technology platform, have teamed up to create a unique and seamless driving experience. The Lynk & Co 01 SUV, the brands first car, is now powered by HEREs premium map content and connected vehicle services. Lynk & Co launched its membership-based mobility concept with a car that has it all and a business model based on sharing rather than on ownership. Focusing on building up local communities, Lynk & Co recently opened its first member clubs in Amsterdam and Gothenburg. In its search to make mobility a harmonious experience, Lynk & Co has identified parking as a key pain point for its members. As a result of this, all 01 models are now equipped with HERE Parking. This connected service shows drivers where they are most likely to find on- and off-street parking places, along with information on pricing and restrictions such as maximum parking duration, no parking zones and loading zones. This service also takes into account the time it will take to park and provides an estimated time of arrival (ETA) so that journeys can be planned more accurately. The service is based on historical and near real-time data coming from a variety of sources, including vehicle sensors. In addition to its parking services, HEREs connected vehicle services include HERE Real-Time Traffic, search, weather services and departure alert services. These services come on top of the HERE map that displays roads, 3D buildings, speed limits and traffic patterns  some of the many attributes Lynk & Co drivers will now benefit from.



Everything we do at Lynk & Co is about providing our customers with a seamless, hassle-free mobility experience. Finding a parking space is one of the major pain points of urban living. Thanks to HERE, our customers can now leverage their connected services to go beyond real-time traffic information and make parking a smooth and fluid experience, said David Green, Chief Data Officer at Lynk & Co. We are very proud to contribute to Lynk & Cos vision of hassle-free mobility. We look forward to providing Lynk & Cos customers with a seamless driving experience including effortless parking, both on- and off-street, said Knuth Sexauer, Vice President for Automotive at HERE Technologies.

Media Contact

Adrianne Montgobert

+49 151 7211 6781

adrianne.montgobert@here.com About HERE Technologies

HERE, a location data and technology platform, moves people, businesses and cities forward by harnessing the power of location. By leveraging our open platform, we empower our customers to achieve better outcomes - from helping a city manage its infrastructure or a business optimize its assets to guiding drivers to their destination safely. To learn more about HERE, please visit www.here.com and http://360.here.com. About Lynk & Co

Lynk & Co was created to provide mobility solutions for the connected generation. We do make really, really good cars (the kind that have all the features you want without you having to ask for them), but we also offer a new way of using those cars. Our membership-based approach makes it simple to get on the go. Members can access a car on a flexible, month-to-month basis and share with friends, family, and the Lynk & Co community. Attachment HERE Technologies is powering the Lynk & Co 01 SUV in Europe



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Appeal over investigators actions as to incident with Navalny to be reviewed

 RAPSI

13:55 15/02/2021

MOSCOW, February 15 (RAPSI)  The Novosibirsk Regional Court has ordered reconsideration of an appeal filed by lawyer Vyacheslav Gimadi over alleged inaction of investigator as to the summer incident with Alexey Navalny, according to the courts official website.

The matter is to be reviewed by the citys Leninsky District Court.

Earlier, the court dismissed the lawyers appeal against the investigators inaction in the investigation of the hospitalization of Navalny in Omsk.

In late August, investigators of the Siberian Federal District transport police started a pre-investigation check over hospitalization of Navalny in Omsk on August 20. As part of the probe, the police searched a hotel room where Navalny stayed and examined objects and sites on his route. Over 100 items which may be evidence were seized; video records were analyzed. More than 20 criminal examinations are conducted including medical forensic, biological and physical and chemical evaluations. By today, no potent or narcotic substances were found, the police statement reads.

On August 20, a plane departed from Tomsk to Moscow with Navalny onboard urgently landed in Omsk after the blogger became heartily sick. He was taken to a hospital in coma. Later, he was transported to Berlin. Russian medics said no poison was found in the bloggers body.
Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Monday refused to quash an FIR lodged against late actor Sushant Singh Rajputs sister Priyanka Singh for allegedly forging and fabricating a medical prescription for her brother. A division bench of Justices S S Shinde and M S Karnik, however, quashed the FIR against Meetu Singh, another sister of Rajput.

The court said while there was prima facie evidence against Priyanka Singh, the case against Meetu Singh does not stand. We are of the considered opinion that the FIR against petitioner Meetu Singh does not survive," the bench said.

However, the FIR against petitioner Priyanka Singh is not quashed as we prima facie find that a case is made out," the court said. The bench said its judgment shall not cause an impediment for the investigating agency to probe the FIR and submit whatever report it deems fit.

The sisters had approached the HC seeking to quash the First Information Report (FIR) lodged for alleged forgery and fabrication of a medical prescription for their brother for anxiety issues. The FIR was lodged against Priyanka Singh, Meetu Singh and doctor Tarun Kumar of Delhis Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital by the Bandra police in Mumbai on September 7 last year, based on a complaint filed by Rajputs girlfriend Rhea Chakraborty.

As per the complaint, Rajputs sisters and the doctor prepared a forged and fabricated prescription for anti- depressants for the actor a few days before his death. Rajput, 34, was found dead at his home in suburban Bandra on June 14 last year.

His father K K Singh later lodged a case of abetment of suicide and cheating against Chakraborty and her family members. The CBI is conducting a probe into the case. After registration of the FIR against Rajputs sisters, the Bandra police forwarded the case papers to the Central Bureau of Investigation, as per directions of the Supreme Court which had said all cases pertaining to the death of Rajput shall be probed by the CBI.

Senior counsel Vikas Singh, appearing for Rajputs sisters, had argued that telemedicine practice guidelines permitted a doctor to prescribe medicines after online consultation. He had claimed that due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Rajput could not go for physical consultation.

Even assuming that such a prescription was procured, there was no evidence to show Rajput consumed any medicines, Singh told the court. Senior counsel Devdutt Kamat, appearing for the Mumbai police, had opposed the plea and said there was no online consultation done.

Rhea Chakrabortys advocate Satish Maneshinde had also opposed the plea of Rajputs sisters, and said one of the circumstances that may have led to the actors death was the dangerous cocktail of drugs, narcotic substances and medicines".
Hyderabad, Feb 15 : A nurse, who sedated an old couple in Hyderabad with a fake Covid vaccine shot and stole 80 grams of gold jewellery from them, has been arrested, police said on Monday.

The incident occurred at Lalitha Nagar under Meerpet police station limits of Rachakonda police commissionerate on Saturday.

Accused Anusha was arrested on Sunday, within hours of the couple lodging a police complaint.

K. Laxman (80), a retired government employee and his wife Kasturi (70) complained to police on Saturday night that the nurse duped them in the name of Covid vaccine.

Anusha, who is undergoing an auxiliary nurse midwife (ANM) course at a private college and earlier used to be a tenant near Laxman's house, approached the couple with an offer to arrange Covid vaccine doses for them. When they agreed to take it, she came to their house on Saturday at 3 p.m. and administered one dose each to Laxman and Kasturi.

"Before giving the jab, she told us that we will be drowsy for some time. We don't know what happened after that but when we woke up late in the evening, we found that we have been robbed," Kasturi said.

Kasturi realized that her mangalsutra, gold ring, ear rings and toe rings, all weighing about eight tolas, were missing.

The couple immediately approached Meerpet police station and lodged a complaint. Police took up the investigation and cracked the case with the arrest of Anusha.

Police investigations revealed that Anusha and her husband knew the victims as they used to live on rent in their neighbourhood. The young couple later shifted to another area.

The accused and her husband were reportedly facing financial problems and she decided to target the old couple as they were living alone.

Police have advised people not to believe those who promise to arrange Covid vaccine as the vaccine is not available in open market and only the health authorities are authorised to administer the vaccine. At this stage the vaccine is being given only to healthcare workers and frontline workers of various departments tackling the pandemic.
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Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has ordered the health sector to conduct all necessary measures to make COVID-19 vaccines available in Vietnam this month either through purchasing or from UN organisations.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc chairs the meeting

He made the request while chairing a meeting of permanent Government members on pandemic prevention and control work held in Hanoi on February 15, in response to complicated developments recorded in several localities nationwide.

The PM also required accelerating the research and production of domestic vaccine.

He assigned the Health Ministry to decide options, partners and types of imported vaccines; identify priority subjects for vaccination; and coordinate with the Finance Ministry in arranging needed financial sources.

Lauding prompt and drastic efforts made by the health sector and many localities since January 27 to date, he underscored the fact that necessary social distancing measures have been implemented while thousands of medical personnel have been sent to COVID-19 hotspots.

However, the situation remains complicated with a number of pandemic-hit areas like Hai Duong and Hanoi yet to curb their local outbreaks, Phuc noted.

The Government leader highlighted the need of more drastic implementation of his Directive 05 on urgent COVID-19 prevention and control measures, particularly in quickly zoning off outbreaks, larger scale testing, and speedy contact tracing.

He agreed to proposals to halt the organization of festivals and activities of mass gatherings, and told the education ministry to coordinate with localities to carry out online teaching in some localities.

He ordered restriction to Lunar New Year visits and travel in the first lunar month and strict adherence to COVID-19 prevention measures, particularly wearing masks in public areas, with stricter sanction of violations.

The PM ordered localities to re-conduct COVID-19 testing for foreign experts and tightly manage quarantine sites to avoid cross infections, with the army tasked with managing these sites.

He approved the enforcement of social distancing under Directive 16 in the entire Hai Duong province, adding that Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City can implement the measure in high-risk areas.

Ensuring food security, promoting local farm produce consumption, and tight monitoring of entry-exit activities are also necessary, according to PM Phuc.

In the past 12 hours to 6pm on February 15, 40 cases of COVID-19 were recorded, raising the national count to 2,269, according to the National Steering Committee for COVID-19 Prevention and Control.

Among the new cases, 38 are in Hai Duong province and two in Hanoi./.VNA


Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Tran Hong Ha

How has the sector approached the challenging times and managed environmental issues during the past five years?

From the first year of implementing the 2016-2020 plan, the natural resources and environment sector had confronted mounting challenges. Scores of problems have existed for years like incomplete policies, growth models, a lack of sustainability, and heavy reliance on local resources, cheap workforce, and overuse of the environment.

In addition, our ministry has dealt with dragging land disputes with complex proceedings, severe drought in the southcentral and Central Highlands provinces, and unprecedented saltwater intrusion in the Mekong Delta.

Serious incidents with the ocean environment also caused critical consequences to localities in the central region, threatening environmental security. The coronavirus pandemic wreaked havoc socially and economically, slowing down growth and causing a recession.

It was inevitable for Vietnam, with its increasingly open economy and broadening international integration, to be hit by detrimental impacts. Natural calamities like droughts, storms, and land erosion also left huge impacts on peoples lives in many localities.

In this context, with close guidance from the Party, the National Assembly, and the government, as well as the support from other ministries, sectors, and localities, the natural resources and environment sector availed of its initiative and creativity, ensuring the settlement of these numerous issues in a well-conceived manner, with a high sense of responsibility and a focus on removing barriers and serving socioeconomic development.

The sector has been working diligently to consult with the Party and the state for the enactment of major policies and orientations of long-term strategic importance to feed the countrys new development period.

Early in the new tenure, a series of environmental incidents took place at several locations and different projects, such as with the case of the Taiwan-backed steel complex Formosa in the central province of Ha Tinh, which caused serious environmental pollution with long-lasting effects.

Other burning issues are related to land such as disputes, the loose management of minerals, and growing complexities concerning climate change and natural disasters. These have all caused serious headaches for the sectors top leaders and staff. Thus, we focused on solving these incidents on a case-by-case basis.

With regards to environmental protection, we understood that the price would be too high if we let development happen first, before considering environmental protection.

From Formosas lessons, we paid due regards to learning from other nations experiences, and from there made suitable policy adjustments as well as presented management tools to screen projects that could potentially turn out harmful to the environment.

Could you shine some light on policy moves after the Formosa case to spur on sustainable development?

Preventive measures must be considered key to ensuring efficiency in natural resources management, environmental protection, and coping with climate change impacts and as such, economic development must be in harmony with environmental protection.

In fields like land, water, and mineral resources, the ministry has worked with localities to fix bottlenecks within the legal system, striving to gear resources towards serving development needs and ensuring the effective usage of natural resources.

Until now, the sectors management authorities have changed mindsets and management methods, recognising the importance of environmental issues which are now set as one of the three pillars for Vietnams sustainable development, with the other two pillars being economy and society.

Green growth, green economy, and the circular economy are real buzzwords today. However, towards achieving these it is essential to push the application of IT in management, basic surveys, supervision, administrative reforms, and more.

One remarkable achievement of the sector is the shift from passive behaviour towards taking the initiative in research activities to give birth to suitable policies that consider market mechanisms, enabling the sector to grow into a spearhead of the economy.

To ensure sustainability, it is important that all legal aspects  from investment proposals and development planning to environmental impacts assessment  must be made with high prudence. These also need to leverage technology and global experience as we do not have sufficient information to select the most eco-friendly technology.

It is also necessary to encourage specialists and scientists to take part in evaluating project impacts and increase exposure of information, allowing people to participate in supervision.

The next step is clearly defining the responsibilities of businesses in investment to assess and forecast possible impacts, particularly regarding thorny issues such as wastewater, gas emissions, and solid waste.

We have listed 17 types of industrial production that need special supervision mechanisms with impact assessments, supervision, post-construction control, and licensing.

Flexibility in investment project approval is another factor. In some areas, we might consider approval for investment in a particular field but such a project must not get the go-ahead in other sensitive locations. This must be made from the very early stages as we engage in regional and environmental planning to avoid the occurrence of possible conflicts.

Do you have any concerns about the efficient management of natural resources and environment issues at this point?

I have many concerns. As natural resources and environmental issues are quite a huge field with heavy reliance on other economic sectors, finding the right growth mindset and model while fixing environmental issues is not an overnight task.

Natural resources are a national asset. How can we get hold of these to ensure their efficient use? Towards this goal, it would demand a colossal volume of surveys and assessments, while we still lack the annual resources to even carry out basic surveys on the mainland, let alone in the sea areas.

Regarding climate change impacts, despite our concerted efforts, these impacts remain largely unpredictable, leaving a burden on the sector. It mandates us to further improve the quality of forecasts and warnings. More importantly, we need to properly assess climate change impacts and present smart plans for adaption, instead of just being passive in dealing with its implications.

Vietnam is one of the countries bearing the toughest brunt of climate change, so we must ramp up efforts to eliminate the causes leading to these phenomena and need to do a smart job with supervision activities.

Natural resources and the environment are closely related to people, but we also must ensure economic growth. It is therefore important to reach a balance between putting resources into development while harmonising the demands for preservation.
Vietnam reports 40 more Covid-19 infection cases, total reaches 2,269

40 more people have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 in Vietnam, raising the total number of patients in the country to 2,269, the Ministry of Health reported on Monday evening.













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According to the ministry's report, all of the new patients are infected in the community including two in Hanoi and 38 in Hai Duong Province.

The two new patients in Hanoi include a 25-year-old Vietnamese woman and a 43-year-old Japanese man who had close contact with a Japanese man who was earlier confirmed as Covid-19 patient.



38 other patients link to a virus hotspot of Chi Linh City in Hai Duong. As of 6 am on February 15, the province has reported 475 patients including 234 cases in Chi Linh City.

Authorities in Hai Duong have announced to impose social distancing in the province beginning midnight on February 15.

The patients are now being treated at the Hanoi-based National Hospital for Tropical Diseases and two hospitals in Hai Duong.



With these new infection cases, the number of Covid-19 patients in Vietnam has increased to 2,269, including 677 locally-transmitted cases reported since the new outbreak started in Hai Duong on January 28.



As of 6 pm on February 15, a total of 1,541 Covid-19 patients had recovered and been discharged from hospital. There have been 35 deaths, most of them being the elderly with serious underlying diseases.



At present, as many as 154,992 people who had close contact with Covid-19 patients or returned from virus-hit areas are being monitored at hospitals, quarantine facilities, and at home.
An Indian air ambulance on Sunday made an emergency landing at the Islamabad airport for refuelling.

According to Dunya News, the Indian air ambulance had contacted the Civil Aviation Authorities (CAA) Pakistan and requested permission to make the emergency landing at the Islamabad airport because it was low on fuel.

Also Read | Why Mumbais mojo lies beyond its locals

The Indian air ambulance with a British patient, a doctor and two nurses was heading to Dushanbe, capital of Tajikistan from Kolkata, India.

After receiving permission from the CAA, the air ambulance landed at the Islamabad International Airport. However, it took off after refuelling after two hours, Dunya News reported. (ANI)

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DALLAS  A suspected intoxicated driver has been arrested after he struck and killed a Dallas police officer who was blocking the scene of an accident early Saturday, police said.

Officer Mitchell Penton was standing next to his patrol car with the emergency lights activated when the suspect slammed into Pentons vehicle, causing it to strike the officer, police said in a statement.

Witnesses said the driver, 32-year-old Phillip Mabry, was driving very fast, police Sgt. Warren Mitchell said in the statement. Police have not said Mabry was speeding.

Penton was taken to Baylor Hospital, where he died.

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Police said Mabry was arrested on warrants for intoxication manslaughter on a police officer and intoxication assault. Jail records do not list an attorney who could speak on Mabrys behalf and police did not immediately return messages seeking comment.

Mabry and a female passenger were not injured. Police havent released the passengers name, but said she was being questioned.

Chief Eddie Garcia said the Dallas Police Department is in mourning.

Godspeed my brother, Garcia wrote in a tweet.

Our hearts are heavy right now. This young officer had such a bright future ahead of him, Garcia said in a statement.

Pentons death is devastating, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson said.

This officer dedicated his time to serving our great city in an inherently dangerous job. We are forever indebted to him and forever heartbroken by this tragedy, Johnson said in a statement.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott offered prayers.

This terrible loss is a solemn reminder of the risks our brave law enforcement officers face while serving and protecting our communities, Abbot said in a statement.
Disgraced fund manager Neil Woodford is still under investigation by the City watchdog  but that hasn't stopped him setting up an investment firm in a bid to revive his career.

Woodford's original investment empire collapsed in 2019 and since then, savers who entrusted him with their money have lost at least 1billion.

That is on top of any losses they suffered during his years of under-performance in the run-up to the 2019 implosion.

He's back: Neil Woodford's original investment empire collapsed in 2019 and since then, savers who entrusted him with their money have lost at least 1bn

In a tearful interview with the Sunday Telegraph this weekend, Woodford, 60, said he was 'sorry for what I did wrong'.

But as he plots his comeback, serious questions over the scandal remain.

DID WOODFORD MISLEAD INVESTORS?

When he launched his original investment empire, Woodford Investment Management, in 2014 after years of success at Invesco, he claimed to be building it on transparency.

It was true that he showed all the fund's holdings on his website  a rarity in the industry  and outlined its charges in a way which was easier to understand than many of his peers.

But despite this, many investors claim they didn't get what they were expecting, which was a mainstream equity income fund, investing in safe, rather dull companies that paid reliable dividends.

The fund was heavily weighted towards smaller stocks, which can be hard to sell or less 'liquid'. Woodford had previously been known for spotting undervalued stocks in the FTSE 100 or FTSE 250 indexes, which tend to be far easier to offload at will.

And while the fund's fact sheet said it invested 'primarily in UK listed companies', Woodford was dedicating increasing amounts of investors' money to riskier, unquoted companies.

Although the evidence of this drift was there on Woodford's website for anyone to check, it would be a near-impossible task for ordinary savers to analyse every single company the portfolio on a regular basis.

In his interview this weekend, Woodford denied claims that his investment approach changed, saying the dynamic of the stock market had simply shifted and what he thought were undervalued shares just happened to be at the smaller end of the market.

In an interview on Sunday, Woodford said he was forced to sell his main home  a 30m farm with stables near Tetbury in the Cotswolds

WAS HE HOLDING TOO MANY ILLIQUID STOCKS?

The proportion of hard-to-sell or 'illiquid' stocks in the Woodford Equity Income Fund was one of the key reasons it collapsed, as he was unable to sell the stocks fast enough to return money to investors who wanted to leave.

There are City rules designed to protect investors from this. These state that a maximum of 10 per cent of a fund should be invested in unlisted stocks, which are harder to sell because they do not trade on a stock exchange.

Woodford repeatedly breached this rule. Hargreaves Lansdown, the investment platform which had been one of his biggest cheerleaders, was alarmed enough to step in behind closed doors and urge him to address the problems.

He eventually agreed to stop investing in unlisted stocks in May 2019, but by that time it was too late.

WHAT HAPPENED IN GUERNSEY?

In an effort to get around the 10 per cent rule, Woodford hit upon an unusual and highly controversial strategy.

To reduce the proportion of unlisted firms he held, he decided to list his stakes in some privately owned companies on the Guernsey stock market.

This was a maverick move  usually all a company's shares are listed on an exchange, not just one investor's portion.

Directors at the Guernsey exchange claimed they tried to get in touch with the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to check whether Woodford's move was allowed  and later hit out at the watchdog for failing to respond.

As it turned out, barely any of the shares were traded  implying that listing them had made them no more liquid.

Andrew Bailey, then the boss of the FCA and now governor of the Bank of England, said in 2019 that Woodford may have been 'following the letter, but not the spirit, of the rules'.

While Woodford is vowing to do things differently with his new firm, one thing remains the same - his business partner and right-hand man Craig Newman (pictured)

SHOULD HE HAVE TRANSFERRED ASSETS BETWEEN FUNDS?

In another effort to improve the liquidity of his Equity Income Fund, he sold some of its unlisted assets to another of his investment vehicles, the Woodford Patient Capital Trust  a separate fund which is listed on the stock market and is better placed to own illiquid stocks due to its structure. In return, the doomed Equity Income Fund was handed shares in the trust.

But the Equity Income Fund paid a rich price for those shares, raising eyebrows around the City. Instead of buying them at the prevailing market value, it bought them for the underlying value of their assets, which was 15 per cent higher.

Equity Income Fund investors felt short-changed by the deal.

WHAT IS CRAIG NEWMAN'S ROLE?

While Woodford is vowing to do things differently with his new firm, one thing remains the same  his business partner and right-hand man Craig Newman (below).

Newman, 50, was chief executive of Woodford Investment Management. The two worked together at Invesco, where Newman was the sales director  though he left amid rumours that he was he was facing disciplinary proceedings for allegedly taking sales and client data. A Woodford spokesman denied there had been any wrongdoing.

Newman is listed as a director of the new firm, WCM Partners.

HOW MUCH DID WOODFORD MAKE?

In his interview on Sunday, Woodford said he was forced to sell his main home  a 30million farm with stables near Tetbury in the Cotswolds. But few savers who lost their nest-eggs will have much sympathy.

During the six years which Woodford ran his firm, he and Newman pulled more than 111million out of the business in dividends and profits.

And to add insult to injury, the pair insisted on continuing to charge fees even as investors' money was locked in the fund and was rapidly slipping away.

From the time the fund was suspended until Woodford was fired, helpless investors forked out around 8million in fees.

In his interview, Woodford argued that he hadn't been paid since May 2019, and all of these fees had gone towards staff costs and the running of the business.
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(Bloomberg) -- Oil rallied to a 13-month high as freezing weather in Texas disrupted flows from Americas largest shale patch, exposing the fragility of global supplies amid sharp OPEC cutbacks.

Trading of West Texas Intermediate futures ended the day up 1.1%, above $60 a barrel for the first time since January 2020, while Brent in London passed $63. Permian oil production has fallen by as much as 1 million barrels a day as sub-zero temperatures hit Midland, Texas -- the heart of U.S. shale output. The Arctic blast also threatened to unleash a rush for fuels from propane to heating oil.

But there was a hit to demand too: the largest refinery in the U.S. began shutting down and other plants and pipelines reported issues. With refineries feeling the pressure, the profits in making U.S. oil products like gasoline and diesel jumped.

Its the latest in a series of cold snaps across the northern hemisphere that have provided a bigger-than-expected boost to oil consumption since the start of the year. And its coincided with global oil stockpiles showing signs of declining.

As prices surged, the key North Sea oil market, which helps price more than two-thirds of the worlds crude, also saw its biggest spate of bullish activity in years. Traders lined up to place bids for 20 cargoes in the market, with virtually all of them going unanswered. Swaps markets in the region soared higher after the activity, brokers said.

U.S. crude has climbed about 15% since the start of February, while Brent posted four weeks of gains after Saudi Arabia announced deep output cuts, helping swollen global stockpiles to normalize. That comes amid a balanced global oil market, with prices reflecting the current state of play, Russias Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said Sunday, underscoring the recovery from the destruction that saw U.S. crude prices briefly turn negative last year.

This colder-than-usual weather will be around for much of the week, and so should continue to be supportive for both gas and oil prices, particularly if we do see significant supply disruptions, said Warren Patterson, head of commodities strategy at ING Group.

The cold was so extreme in Texas that the state suffered dramatic power outages as the grid operator grappled with surging demand, and 13 other states also saw blackouts.

Elsewhere, potential strikes in Norway were adding to supply risks. Equinor ASA warned that union action could lead to shutdowns of its Johan Sverdrup and Troll fields, two of the most significant in the North Sea. Security in the Middle East, meanwhile, was in focus after Saudi Arabian authorities blamed Yemeni rebels for an attack at an airport in the kingdoms southern region.

Still, concerns remain over the sustainability of crudes rally. WTI futures 14-day Relative Strength Index remains well above 70 in a sign that the commodity is due for a pullback. Meanwhile, the threat of new virus strains and cases in parts of China may cap whats been a dramatic recovery in fuel consumption, with the International Energy Agency last week cutting its demand forecast for 2021 and describing the market as fragile.

The cold snap, the additional Saudi cuts, the fresh U.S. stimulus promise are all helping, said Vandana Hari, founder of Vanda Insights in Singapore. But the single biggest factor -- and one the doubters have probably been missing or disbelieving -- is that Covid on a global level is in a retreat, for more than four weeks now.

2021 Bloomberg L.P.
Black-owned companies are spotlighted on the Built Oregon Marketplace in celebration of Black History Month. These makers, who have invented food, books and captivating products, can arrange a pickup at their shop or a delivery to your door.

The builtoregon.shop site also makes it easy to find up-and-coming small businesses by region.

The virtual Built Oregon Marketplace is open to makers across the state and is part of Built, a nonprofit with 150 business experts who volunteer to support the growth of the states consumer product industries.

Storyteller, artist and designer Steven Christian participates in the Built Oregon Marketplace and has his portfolio of work displayed at his Iltopia Studios in Northwest Portland.

His Black Superheroes Matter Artbook ($30) has 110 color illustrations to empower and inspire young readers and redefine popular superheroes through the eyes of black children. Each book is handmade, numbered and signed by the artist and includes a coloring book and a mini sticker pack.

Christian also creates comics and cartoons such as the little creature Roscoe, his friend Vanessa and Cadbeary, an escaped circus bear, who seek to stay out of trouble on the island of Iltopia in Eyelnd Feevr, a visual art series that uses comics, animation and augmented reality. Shop the entire line of Iltopia Studios products.

Here are more Black-owned companies with interesting products listed on the Built Oregon Marketplace as well as Amazon and Etsy.

Sauces and Spices

Best Damn BBQ Sauce of Salem received first place at the 31st annual American Royal World Series of Barbecue Sauce Contest in 2018.Best Damn BBQ Sauce

Best Damn BBQ Sauces West Coast Tang ($40 for four 20-ounce bottles) enhances steaks, tri-tip, chicken, pulled pork, lamb and other meats. The Sweet Lady Love sauce received first place at the 31st annual American Royal World Series of Barbecue Sauce Contest. See more of the Salem companys barbecue sauces.

Elenis Kitchens Berbere ($5.95 for 2 ounces) is a blend of medium-hot chilis and other authentic Ethiopian herbs and spices. It can add spicy warmth to sauces, stir fry and stews. Mix with olive oil for an easy dip. See more of the Hillsboro companys Ethiopian food offerings.

Coffee, Tea, Brews and Mixers

Exilior Coffees medium-dark Champion coffee, with beans grown in Kenya and roasted in Oregon ($15 for 8.8 ounces) has notes of blackberry, brown spice and berry fruit. The Dundee company also produces light-medium Savannah coffee with notes of blackberry, sweet orange and honey graham cracker. A portion of the proceeds go to youth scholarship and mentorship programs in Kenya.

Hibisblooms Cocktail Mixer and Soda syrup ($15 for 16 ounces) uses premium hibiscus flowers and Savanna cinnamon. See more of the Tigard companys flower-based drinks and mixers for cocktails and lemonade.

Honeybee Lemonade Syrups Jamaican Sorrel Syrup ($14 for 8 ounces) works as a drink mixer or topping. It is free of preservatives, added sugars, gluten and GMOs. See more of the Portland companys vegan, all-natural syrups made with whole fruit.

Mamancy Teas 3-ounce package of Truffle Praline Black Tea is on sale at $17.80. See more of the Beaverton companys premium loose leaf and full leaf teas along with hand-made chocolates.

Mathildes Kitchens Hibiscus Flower and Ginger Brew (12-pack for $48, regular price is $60) has West African flowers and seeds, Caribbean spice bark and Asian roots. See more of the Portland companys Haiti-inspired brews.

Jewelry, Face Masks and Pins

The Baked Clay Studio in Portland offers handcrafted, polymer clay earrings and vintage jewelry on Etsy and at thebakedclaystudio.com.

Crystal Ball Botanicals hydrating Elbows, Knees and Toes Balm ($15) is made of calendula-infused oil, shea butter, coconut oil, sweet almond oil, caster oil, beeswax and lemongrass essential oil. See more of the Portland-based companys self-care products.

Big Cat Insignia of Portland sells handmade Black Pride, Black Girl Magic and other buttons, pro-math and other pins, and PDX Airport Carpet stickers and other graphics, starting at $3.25.

Hero Masks Studio of Portland has handcrafted, reusable face masks with a filter pocket ($15).

Home and Yard

Ritual + Fancys Apple Spice candle is topped with a pressed floral design. Ritual + Fancy

Leonard and Andrea (Dre) Allens EcoVibe shop at 1906 N.E. Alberta St. in Portland has ethically made, sustainable products, from indoor plant pots and home decor to apparel and gifts. They select unique items made by local designers, minority- and family-owned businesses as well as small makers and manufacturers, and they donate to 1% For the Planet to support environmental causes.

Ritual + Fancys Apple Spice candle in a glass votive is on sale at $26 (regular price $32). The five-ounce, hand-poured, small-batch candle is made of 100% soy wax and pure aromatherapy-grade essential oils. Each candle has a wood wick and is topped with a pressed floral design. Read more about the Portland company Ritual + Fancy.

R&ARIEs Intentionally Made Candle ($13.49) is hand-poured and adorned with metaphysical ingredients. The votive or wax melt is unscented unless ordered with vegan fragrance oil. See more of the Portland-based companys self-care products.

Signs Of Justice in Portland sells yard signs (two for $48) that declare No Justice No Peace, MLK Love, Healthcare is a Human Right, Protect Kids Not Guns, Hate Has No Home Here and other statements. Bumper stickers start at two for $16.

Books

African Americans of Portland: Images of America by Kimberly Stowers Moreland, published in 2013 ($21.99 paperback), includes Black residents enduring hostility and Oregons exclusion laws and the tragic Vanport flood.

A Kids Book About series of well-designed, thoughtful books deals with topics such as racism, bullying, voting and white privilege. Learn more about the Portland publishing company at akidsbookabout.com

Black People In Oregon? by rapper, music video director, photographer and screenwriter Marlon Prxscott Abah focuses on a state with a 3% Black population and Black Life Matters protests.

Survival Math: Notes on an All-American Family by Mitchell Jackson is a memoir about growing up Black in Oregon.

 Janet Eastman | 503-294-4072

jeastman@oregonian.com | @janeteastman

Arrests made at public schools dipped 36 percent statewide during the last school year, according to the 2019-20 state Department of Educations Safe Schools report.

The drop, mostly connected to the outbreak of COVID-19, might indicate that in a post-virus world the number and types of crimes reported at schools will look different in the next few reports as law enforcement officials learn how to respond to calls for help during a pandemic, state education officials and local law enforcement said.

The Pennsylvania Department of Education defines one incident as one act where misconduct is perceived. There are 46 misconduct categories  non-academic infractions  reported by school officials and local law enforcement.

The criminal infractions include, for example, fighting, bullying, bomb threats, burglary, and various types of assaults. Before the novel coronavirus, law enforcement officials were more inclined to respond to school campus incidents in person, but COVID-19 has transformed their approach.

While misconduct is generally handled on a case-by-case basis, authorities after COVID-19 arent rushing into every situation. Other factors that affect how crime report totals are managed include whether the district has a school resource officer or hired security guards stationed in a building, or whether the district has a local police department.

Authorities at every level  Pennsylvania State Police, county, and local  are taking additional steps to avoid physical contact as well as working to de-escalate situations before making an arrest.

Liberty High School in Bethlehem, which was ranked No. 3 last year with 60 arrests, notched the No. 1 position with 51 arrests. It was followed by Wyoming Area Secondary School in Luzerne County, which reported 45 arrests; Connellsville Area Middle School in Fayette County reported 38 arrests; Red Lion Area Senior High School in York County reported 36 arrests; and Carlisle Area High School in Cumberland County reported 33 arrests.

During the previous school year, in 2018-19, Carlisle Area High School reported 34 arrests, according to the Safe Schools report. Officers are now limiting face-to-face interactions and arent approaching school incidents as they have in the past, said Carlisle Borough Chief of Police Taro D. Landis.

Our officers will wear the prescribed personal protective equipment and we carry extra masks for when we encounter people without protection, he said. Many calls for service are handled by phone when there are no safety concerns and that helps limit COVID-19 exposure.

That trend is seen in the numbers reported from across the state. There were 3,757 arrests made in 2018-19 compared to 2019-20, where authorities made 2,401 arrests.

Calls for help that involved local law enforcement decreased from 14,345 in 2018-19 to 9,935 last school year. Part of that was due to Gov. Tom Wolfs order to shut down school buildings to prevent the spread of COVID-19, authorities said.

And, the total number of misconduct incidents  not an academic infraction  decreased from 58,426 in 2018-19 to 44,875 in 2019-20.

The states report does not break down arrests by gender, age, grade, or race.

In March, when school buildings closed their doors, students began learning remotely. The change in students learning environment was evident in reported crime statistics dropping, said the state department of education spokeswoman Kendall Alexander. The state requires every Pennsylvania school to supply the state with crime statistics every year.

The arrest data indicates consistency in all months prior to schools transitioning to remote instruction, she said. This shift to remote instruction from mid-March through the end of the school year could be one of the indicators for the change in reporting for the 19-20 school year.

Harrisburg School District reported 52 fights and 55 disorderly conduct incidents during the 2019-20 school year, yet reported only one arrest. Harrisburg didnt make the top 25 lists of the most arrests made last year.

The fact that students were in school on a limited basis likely resulted in the reduced number of school arrests, said Harrisburg Sgt. Kyle Gautsch.

Officers are protecting themselves, students, staff, and the public from the spread of COVID-19 by wearing personal protective equipment and scrutinizing when and how to respond to incidents, Gautsch said.

I feel very confident in saying the majority of officers responding to a school for a disorderly conduct call do everything they can to mitigate the situation, he said. And, if needed take the steps to contact a parent or guardian to take custody of the student rather than arrest. Unfortunately, though, the conduct of the student sometimes dictates the steps and direction the officer has to take.

For example, he said, if a student chooses not to calm down and continues to swing at staff or other students, that leaves us little choice  we have an obligation to protect the staff and fellow students.

Possession, use, or sale of tobacco or vaping accounted for 8.34 percent of all misconduct incidents reported statewide in 2019-20, followed by fighting at 8.14 percent, and then minor altercations at 5.42 percent.

Cumberland Valley High School had a dramatic reduction in the number of arrests reported in 2019-20 versus 2018-19. The district reported two arrests in 2019-20, whereas in 2018-19 the district reported 19 arrests made.

Reasons for our lower numbers are twofold: One is a quarter of the year was lost to students being sent home, Silver Spring Township Police Chief Christopher E. Raubenstine said. The second reason is that our SRO retired in September of 2019 and was not replaced full time until February 2020 and then of course shut down in March. We now have a full-time SRO in the schools every day. The SRO and all our officers still respond to the school and, while using recommended safety measures such as masks, deal with students and staff as normal.

During the final months of 2020, remote learning played a big part in fewer arrests reported by schools across the state, said Pennsylvania State Police spokeswoman Megan Ammerman.

Moving forward, if police are called: we respond, she said. That aspect of our job has not changed.

Mitigation efforts are going to be ongoing for troopers based on guidelines supplied by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, she said. Now that in-person instruction has resumed at schools for the 2020-21 school year, troopers are encouraged to avoid physical interactions with students and staff as much as possible.

In most cases, juveniles who are arrested are not physically taken into custody, she said. After speaking with the child and their parents or guardians, charges are filed and it is handled via the court system and juvenile probation. Of course, if there are incidents that troopers have to physically arrest someone, they will.
(Natural News) Two grocery stores owned by Kroger are shutting their doors after a local city council forced them to increase hazard pay for employees in response to the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19).

Both a Ralphs and Food 4 Less in Long Beach, Calif., will no longer be serving up groceries to the local community because their parent company says it cannot afford the mandatory wage increases being forced on them, especially since the economy is already in the tank due to continued hysteria over the Chinese virus boogeyman.

As a result of the City of Long Beachs decision to pass an ordinance mandating Extra Pay for grocery workers, we have made the difficult decision to permanently close long-struggling store locations in Long Beach, the company indicated in a statement.

To be clear, both of these stores were already struggling and appear to have been on the verge of potential closure. The decision by the City of Long Beach simply accelerated the process, even as other Kroger stores in the area will remain open for business.

This misguided action by the Long Beach City Council oversteps the traditional bargaining process and applies to some, but not all, grocery workers in the city, the company further added.

The ordinance requires that all grocery stores with at least 300 employees nationwide, and more than 15 employees in Long Beach, pay their workers an extra $4 per hour as a form of hazard pay.

Back in January, nearby Santa Monica did the same thing, as did Seattle up in Washington.

A disproportionate number of people of color are essential workers, and Seattle must continue to lead the way to provide relief and respect to those that have served our community throughout this pandemic, Mayor Jenny Durkan indicated in a statement about her citys decision.

Grocery store workers have continued to work every day of this challenging time and I am glad we are finally able to recognize and compensate the effort that has kept stores open and communities fed over the past year.

California Grocers Association sues Long Beach

Grocery companies disagree, contending that forcibly increased wages hurt not only businesses but also the people they employ, along with their families.

The Long Beach City Council put politics ahead of families and jobs in the middle of a pandemic, indicated the California Grocers Association, which recently filed a lawsuit against the City of Long Beach.

A $4 / hour increase represents about a 28 percent increase in labor costs for grocers. Theres no way grocers can absorb that big of a cost increase without an offset somewhere else, considering grocers operate with razor thin margins and many stores already operate in the red.

According to reports, the two Long Beach stores in question are slated to close on April 17.

Meanwhile, Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) fearmongering is showing no signs of relenting. The communist regime of China is now anally swabbing people in search of the germs, while here in the United States, China Joe is doubling down on trying to force Americans to wear masks for the rest of their lives.

If the state wanted an extra $4 an hour, they should have paid it out of taxes and not required businesses to pay, wrote one commenter at The Post Millennial (Canada). More unintended consequences.

Everything is about people of colour this month, wrote another. Evil whitey hogging all the vaccine for Wuhan flu. Thankfully Joe solved all this on Jan. 20 and it went away.

More related news about how this contrived pandemic is destroying the United States right before our very eyes, be sure to check out Pandemic.news.

Sources for this article include:

ThePostMillennial.com

NaturalNews.com
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A Tennessee man who left $5 million to his 8-year-old border collie Lulu when he died was a successful businessman who was known for having a controversial statue of Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest on one of his properties.

Bill Dorris, 83, died late last year in Nashville but made headlines last week after it emerged he had left behind $5 million to his dog Lulu.

The late businessman, who was unmarried and ran a bathtub company for the disabled, had left his border collie in the care of his 88-year-old friend Martha Burton.

His will specified that his $5 million fortune should be put into a trust for Lulu's care.

Bill Dorris, who left $5 million to his 8-year-old border collie Lulu when he died, was a successful businessman who was known for having a controversial statue of Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest (above) on one of his properties. Photo courtesy of ABC15

Bill Dorris, 83, died late last year in Nashville but made headlines last week after it emerged he had left behind $5 million to his dog Lulu

'I don't really know what to think about it to tell you the truth. He just really loved the dog,' Burton told local news outlet WRCB.

Burton admitted that she doesn't know if she could ever spend $5 million on Lulu - even with a lifetime supply of treats and toys.

'I'd like to try,' Burton said, adding 'she's a good girl'.

Dorris' will specified that Burton should be reimbursed for monthly expenses to take care of Lulu.

All purchases made for the dog will need to be approved by a conservator.

It isn't clear what will happen when Lulu dies.

Burton had already been taking regular care of Lulu when Dorris was still alive when he was away traveling.

His will specified that his $5 million fortune should be put into a trust for Lulu's care. All purchases made for the dog will need to be approved by a conservator

The late businessman, who was unmarried and ran a bathtub company for the disabled, had left his border collie in the care of his 88-year-old friend Martha Burton

Prior to his death, Dorris was known in the local area for having owned land along Interstate 65 where a controversial statue of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest has been erected for more than two decades.

Forrest, who was also an early Ku Klux Klan leader and a longtime slave trader, was blamed for the Fort Pillow Massacre in which some 300 African-American Union solders were slaughtered after they surrendered.

The statue on Dorris land is visible from the interstate.

It has been vandalized several times of the years, including in 2017 when pink paint was thrown across it.

Dorris never cleaned the paint off.

The fate of the statue and the rest of his estate will likely be determined in probate court.
Former Gogglebox Ireland star and Fine Gael councillor Yemi Adenuga is calling for stringent legislation and social media curbs after being targeted by racist trolls.

Councillor Adenuga had been one of the most loved personalities on Virgin Medias Gogglebox Ireland before she was headhunted by Fine Gael.

The 49-year-old made history in 2019 when she became the first black migrant woman to become a councillor on Meath County Council.

However, she has continuously been targeted by racists online and is now calling for social media companies to ban trolls and for hate legislation to include tough punishments for online harassment.

Ms Adenuga told how an attempt was even made to blackmail her online by a group who targeted her.

They said I wasnt Irish and they ordered me to pay a lot of money to an account and to step down, Ms Adenuga said.

They said I had no right to be a councillor and gave me a deadline to pay.

They said they knew where I lived. I went to the guards. I was scared for my family.

For weeks the mother of four was too afraid to let her younger children play outside.

She kept phoning her children to make sure they were safe as they made their way home from school.

My husband said I couldnt let them win, Ms Adenuga said.

We prayed and my confidence was boosted but I was still worried for my family.

Last September, Ms Adenuga was included in a new schoolbook for sixth class students.

I was so honoured, she said. I could never have dreamed of being known as a history maker and that children would read about me.

I tweeted about this honour  it was a big deal for me. Here I was, a migrant to Ireland and I was going to be read about in a school book.

A lot of people were excited for me but then someone tweeted a picture of a golliwog doll and wrote happy little golliwog doll.

They said I was like a really black golliwog.

Expand Close There is an undercurrent of hate: Cllr Yemi Adenuga received racist abuse after being included in a new schoolbook. Photo: Mark Condren / Facebook

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Whatsapp There is an undercurrent of hate: Cllr Yemi Adenuga received racist abuse after being included in a new schoolbook. Photo: Mark Condren

She said she was shocked this was the state of someones mind.

It was a really hateful thing for someone to say in response to such positive news.

When these comments get too hateful, I pull them down, I delete them. My mental health is too important to let anyone depress me.

Ms Adenuga mentors women and young people, bidding to empower them through the (YAMAL) Yemi Adenuga Mentorship and Leadership Program.

Yet, despite this community work, she repeatedly has to block trolls.

A group of around 12 trolls had repeatedly commented on all of her tweets.

Even when I blocked them, they kept coming back with new Twitter profiles, she said.

They make the time to do this to people. Theyre so full of hate.

When she was first announced as a councillor, Ms Adenuga was mercilessly harassed online by racists.

I posted that I had won the election and it went viral, she said. She received so many positive reactions but there was an undercurrent of hate.

Oh my God, it was horrific, she said. Someone from Fine Gael rang me to check I was OK. They said not to let anyone make my victory bad.

I said this is my victory and I worked hard for it. I put my heart and soul into it.

I took down every single racist comment I could find. I didnt want my children to see them.

I blocked everyone I could whod been racist or abusive. This behaviour speaks of some peoples mindset. Its not about me, you, its a part of them.

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The councillor, who moved from Nigeria to Ireland in 2000, said she had entered a country of cead mile failte and fell in love with the Irish culture and spirit.

It was genuinely welcoming, she said. I have a lot to thank Ireland for and I want to put back into the country and Navan.

But shes worried the far-rights growth may have had a very detrimental effect on society, online and off.

She said not enough work has been carried out by the State and the media to build relations between the Irish and different races and cultures.

Even her children have experienced racism, with one child being asked could another child get an N pass?

I didnt even know what this was. When I learned a child wanted a pass to call my child a n****r, I couldnt believe it.

I was disgusted. For that word to come from the mouth of a child? That has to have come from somewhere.

I had to explain to my children that sometimes, sadly, theyre going to experience racism. They shouldnt have to, theyre just kids but sadly this is our reality.

I told them its OK to cry if theyre hurt, that Ill always be there for them but to never let the racists win, to hold their heads high.

She said social media companies need to listen. They owe it to their users to protect them online.
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The Queensland hospital that cared for Tom Hanks while he recovered from COVID-19 will be the first in the state to receive the coronavirus vaccine.

The Gold Coast University Hospital, which managed the first cluster of cases in January 2020, was expected to receive the first vials of the Pfizer vaccine next week.

The Gold Coast University Hospital will be first for Queenslands COVID-19 vaccine rollout. Credit:Getty Images

On Monday Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk confirmed the hospital would be the first of six hubs after Queensland Health last month denied the Gold Coast would be at the front of the line.

Ms Palaszczuk said the rollout would be trialled at the Gold Coast Hospital to ensure everything is fine before the vaccine was sent to hubs in Cairns, Brisbane, Townsville and the Sunshine Coast.
Bitcoin on Monday fell by over 6 per cent to $45,893 contracting its advance so far this year to about 60%.

The worlds largest cryptocurrency had reached a new record on Sunday at about $49,344, reaching closer to the $50,000 mark.

Rival cryptocurrency Ether hit a record on Saturday and was up about 150 per cent year-to-date.

Bitcoin has been buoyed in recent months by endorsements from the likes of Paul Tudor Jones and Stan Druckenmiller. Bloomberg reported earlier that Morgan Stanley may bet on Bitcoin in its $150 billion investment arm, following news late last week that BNY Mellon plans to service cryptocurrencies for its clients. And thats after Tesla Inc. put about $1.5 billion into Bitcoin.

Meanwhile, the Indian government does not consider cryptocurrencies legal tender or coins. So, the government wants to eliminate the use of cryptocurrencies and doesnt want such currencies to become a part of the payment system. It has thus listed a bill in Parliament, seeking to bar all private cryptocurrencies in India, and also lay the groundwork for an official digital currency. The detailed provisions of the bill have not yet been released to the public.

Earlier, even RBI had stated that it was working on a digital version of the rupee and results were expected soon. A summary of the bill stated that it sought to create a facilitative framework for the creation of the digital currency to be issued by the Reserve Bank of India. Such official currencies are being contemplated by several central banks globally, such as Canada, USA, Singapore and China.
Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.

Since the military seized power on February 1, I have felt overwhelmed watching both the empowerment of a new generation of young protesters and a continuing failure of political leadership. I am torn between nostalgia and the urgent need for a concrete strategy.

Thirty-three years have passed since the 8-8-88 Movement, a nationwide uprising in 1988 that called for the end of military dictatorship and the restoration of democratic governance; I was 14 years old, a student, and I discovered political activism then. Today, I find myself in the streets again, marching alongside a new generation that is waging the same battle.

The junta detained Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the countrys de facto leader, and key members of her party, the National League for (NLD.), on the morning they were preparing to begin their second term in office after a landslide re-election victory in November. The army chief, Senior Gen Min Aung Hlaing, has declared a state of emergency for a year. He has cited election fraud as the justification for the takeover and has promised a new election. Public outrage is growing by the day.

In the aftermath of the military takeover in 1988, I spent eight years in hiding to evade arrest and then 16 years in exile. I wasnt allowed to return to until 2013, after a previous military government announced a move toward democratisation. I hope the protesters today soon realise what we learned then: Public pressure alone cannot lead to a genuine political transition. Without a sound strategy for achieving concrete goals, we will always end up, sooner or later, on the receiving end of repression and under some form of military rule.

On the streets, I have been running into dozens of 1988 activists  we look into one anothers eyes with sadness. Many of them have said to me things like, We are back at square one or, We all have failed this new generation. They also said they were protesting against our new dictators rather than for Ms

Many young protesters I have talked to say the military takeover will lead the country into a dark age and destroy their future, much as the 1988 did to my generation. The Tatmadaw, they say, didnt only stage a coup; it also declared war against the youth of They see the current face-off as the final battle between and dictatorship.

The makers immediate objective seems to be to prove voting fraud, or improprieties on the part of the NLD government, in order to invalidate the results of the November election, as well as to crack down only modestly on protesters. The idea is to simultaneously quiet and quell political unrest, and to ride it out. That may be difficult to achieve given public sentiment, but the Tatmadaw knows that a widespread crackdown, especially if it brought bloodshed, would be costly for it, too.





Illustration: Binay Sinha

The militarys plan longer term is a classic divide-and-conquer approach that preys on the NLDs shortcomings. Instead of trying to build a pro-military coalition, as it did after the 1988 and again after the beginning of political liberalisation in 2010, it seems intent today on creating a kind of anti- coalition.

The pro- camp is divided, partly of the NLDs own doing. Many ethnic political parties and ethnic armed groups, and even some Bamar political groups, have felt marginalised and alienated by what they see as Ms Aung San Suu Kyis insensitive majoritarianism. Some leading figures of the democracy movement set up alternative parties ahead of the November election.

The junta has already begun co-opting some of these players. The new cabinet comprises not only members of the military but also, for example, Thet Thet Khine, once a member of Parliament for the NLD, and Padoh Mahn Nyein Maung, a former political prisoner and the ex-leader of the Karen National Union. The junta, even as it holds on to the numerous prerogatives and expansive veto powers it has under the 2008 Constitution, is likely to look for ways to lure smaller political players away from the NLD. It may well begin electoral reforms ahead of the next election, abandoning the first-past-the-post (or winner-take-all) system, which typically favors major parties, to endorse some version of proportional representation.

In the face of that, what can the pro-democracy camp do? Several foreign diplomats I have spoken to in recent days who are willing to act as mediators said they werent sure what to say on the NLDs behalf because the partys leaders didnt seem to have a plan.

Yet democracy advocates must quickly rally to develop a strategy to foil the Tatmadaws. Rather than making rhetorical demands (like, restore power to the people) or demands that the military simply wont accede to at this point (like endorsing the results from the November election), they must use the current protests as leverage to obtain, via international negotiators, that the Tatmadaw wont disband or otherwise sideline the NLD.

The all-out exclusion of Ms Aung San Suu Kyis party, no matter its failings, would strip future elections of any semblance of legitimacy, disenfranchise large swaths of the population and set back even further civilian-military relations. It would be a dead-end. And a major crackdown would only bring more international sanctions, in turn encouraging a siege mentality among the generals.

Short of some mediated compromise soon between the Tatmadaw and the NLD  or defections among the military top brass or, the least likely option, a counter-coup to restore the party to power  I fear a dangerous escalation.

The New York Times
A man has died in an explosion in Melbourne on Monday afternoon.

Emergency services rushed to the scene after receiving a call about 12.30pm and attempted to resuscitate the man.

The incident happened in Truganina, a suburb about 30 minutes directly west from the Melbourne CBD, Ambulance Victoria confirmed.

Ambulance crews rushed to Truganina in Melbourne about 12.30pm on Monday after reports of an explosion (pictured)

The area is predominantly industrial and is the location of Port Phillip Prison.

The source of the explosion is yet to be confirmed, however, authorities reportedly suspect chemicals reacted causing the blast.

'The man was working at a Troups Road farm when the explosion occurred,' police said in a statement.

The police investigation is ongoing and a report will be prepared for the coroner.
Her estranged husband Tom Girardi has been placed under a temporary conservatorship in the wake of a medical emergency - with his brother Robert Girardi in charge of his estate and day-to-day care.

And two weeks later, Erika Jayne was spotted receiving a large bouquet of red roses from a secret admirer.

The 49-year-old Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star donned a silky red robe with black fluffy slippers as she picked up the extravagant gift left on her doorstep in Los Angeles.

Giddy: Her estranged husband Tom Girardi has been placed under a temporary conservatorship in the wake of a medical emergency - with his brother Robert Giraldi in charge of his estate and day-to-day care. And two weeks later, Erika Jayne was spotted receiving a large bouquet of red roses from a secret admirer

The star looked absolutely giddy as she picked up enormous bouquet of red roses, which sat in a large pink metal bucket with a note attached to it.

Erika rocked a thigh-grazing ruby red robe with a black fabric belt, wearing coordinating slippers.

She styled her long blonde hair loose around her in waves with perfectly dark red manicured fingers.

Last month, Erika began selling bags off her Instagram account as she reportedly faces financial woes amid her divorce from Tom.

Happy lady: The 49-year-old Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star donned a silky red robe with black fluffy slippers as she picked up the extravagant gift left on her doorstep in Los Angeles

She helped advertise Lily And Bean luggage bags on her Instagram stories, which included a code for 15% off their items.

In December, Erika and Tom were accused in a class action lawsuit of embezzling money meant for families who lost loved ones in the 2018 Lion Air plane crash and of having a 'sham' divorce to protect their money.

A class action lawsuit filed by Edelson PC last month in Illinois accuses Erika and Tom of embezzling money meant for his law firm clients because he's 'on the verge of financial collapse' and needed to finance their lavish lifestyle.

Surprise at her doorstep: The star looked absolutely giddy as she picked up enormous bouquet of red roses, which sat in a large pink metal bucket with a note attached to it

It further claims that last month's announcement that Erika filed for divorce from Tom, 81, in November after 21 years of marriage is an act to protect their money from debt collectors.

'At the heart of this deception is Defendant Girardi and his need to fund outrageous lifestyles for himself and his soon-to-be ex-wife, Erika Jayne,' the complaint, obtained by DailyMail.com, says.

The complaint says Tom allegedly embezzled proceeds of the settlements meant for the Illinois-based family members of victims who died in the tragic Lion Air Flight 610 airplane crash for his own personal enjoyment.

Currently: Last month, Erika began selling bags off her Instagram account as she reportedly faces financial woes amid her divorce from Tom

The flight went down into the Java Sea shortly after taking off on October 29, 2018, killing all 189 passengers and crew on board. The crash was due to a design flaw in the automated flight control system on the Boeing 737 Max Series that led to the grounding of the model.

The settlement was meant to help family members, many of whom were left widowed or orphaned, after the crash.

'Tom and Erika have reached celebrity status in the glitz-and-glam world of Hollywood and Beverly Hills...To keep up their celebrity status, Tom and Erika must project a public image of obscene wealth at all times, and at whatever the cost,' the complaint said.

The lawsuit says that Tom and his law firm Girardi Keese 'are on the verge of financial collapse and locked in a downward spiral of mounting debts and dwindling funds', and allegedly owe tens of millions of dollars to clients, co-counsel, and others.

The suit claims that due to the financial turmoil Tom allegedly resorted to embezzling money intended for his clients.

Earlier this month, Tom was placed under a temporary conservatorship in the wake of a medical emergency he suffered, according to US Weekly.

The outlet reported that his brother Robert Girardi was in charge of his estate and day-to-day care by Los Angeles judge Daniel Juarez in January 2021.

Former couple: In December, Erika and Tom were accused in a class action lawsuit of embezzling money meant for families who lost loved ones in the 2018 Lion Air plane crash and of having a 'sham' divorce to protect their money

Tom's lawyer Rudy Cosio said he was unable to appear after the medical incident.

The temporary conservatorship was previously requested by Robert amid what he told the court was his brother's deteriorating condition; the conservatorship extends through March 30.

Tom Girardi has 'deteriorated to the point where he cannot care for himself without assistance,' Robert Girardi said in court docs obtained by People. 'His short-term memory is severely compromised and, on information and belief, he is often not oriented as to date, time or place.

'Left to his own devices, it is highly doubtful that Tom could manage most of the activities of daily living for any significant period of time without assistance.'

The case heads back to court for a March 15 hearing where Robert's other asks will be taken into consideration, including the legal say whether he can place his brother into a facility that deals with problems such as dementia.

In December, US Weekly cited court docs in reporting that his brother - who is also in the midst of a divorce and embezzlement case - 'is incapable of realizing and understanding the repercussions of the bankruptcy filings pending against him and the Debtor.'
25 years ago: Wildcat strike over safety issues shuts down Warren Truck plant

On February 17, 1996, workers at the Warren Truck Assembly Plant, located in the northeastern suburbs of Detroit, went on a wildcat strike. The three-day walkout cost the company 1,800 units of production and came as a response to the firing of two union officials for opposing Chryslers speed-up drive.

The company terminated United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 140 President Randall Pearson and committeeman Herman Ector on the grounds that they had instigated an illegal strike on February 9, when they ordered workers to go home with one hour left on their shift. Union officials said they took the action because of safety concerns.

According to a Chrysler spokesman, the firing of Pearson and Ector had the support of the UAW international leadership.

When workers on the February 17 day shift learned of the victimizations, they walked off the job and turned away second shift workers at the gate. When workers stayed home February 19, UAWs Chrysler director, Jack Laskowski, issued a statement to the press declaring that the strike had not been authorized by the international union. He ordered Local 140 members to report to work immediately. Only about 450 of the plants 4,100 production workers obeyed the February 19 instruction.

Management had imposed brutal speed-up in the months leading up to the job action in order to drive up production. The Dodge Ram and Dakota assembled at the Warren Truck plant were among the companys best-selling and most profitable vehicles.

Warren Truck workers complained that management often required them to shift production from one model to another without permitting any slowing of the line, almost an impossible task.

Since the 1993 contract just three years prior, Chrysler had hired hundreds of younger workers at the Warren Truck plant, taking advantage of the lower starting wage negotiated by the UAW while simultaneously attempting to drive out older workers.

50 years ago: US-orchestrated invasion of Laos bogs down

US helicopters and vehicles at Khe Sanh, February, 12 1971

During the week of February 15, 1971, intense fighting continued in Laos after the invasion one week earlier of South Vietnamese ground troops backed by United States air support. The invasion by the South Vietnamese puppet troops was an attempt to break up North Vietnamese supply routes that brought arms and other military support to National Liberation Front (NLF) fighters in South Vietnam.

Under the recently passed Cooper-Church amendment, which followed massive anti-war protests opposing the US invasion of Cambodia, US troops were not permitted to directly enter Laos. Only South Vietnamese military forces entered Laos on the ground. However, the US military organized and commanded the invasion. The US military gave direct orders to the South Vietnamese forces, collected military intelligence, organized logistics, and provided weapons and direct support from the US Air Force.

The invasion of Laos had been preceded by years of secret bombing missions carried out into the country. As early as 1964 the US mounted numerous bombing raids that dropped huge amounts of explosives on the small, impoverished country. While the pretext was to destroy the Ho Chi Minh trail supply line, the main result of the US raids was to kill and maim Laotian civilians.

The US aerial bombardment was so extensive that Laos became the most bombed country in world history. Despite being officially neutral in the Vietnam War, Laos was hit with the equivalent of one planeload of bombs every eight minutes for nine years. By the end of the war in 1975, at least 200,000 Laotians, or one in 10 of the total population, had been killed, and one in four were made refugees. Yet despite the massive death toll and destruction, the American bombing raids had been largely ineffective at disrupting the supply lines of the NLF, which spanned nearly 10,000 miles from North Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia.

The land invasion aimed to achieve what the bombings had failed to do: break the Ho Chi Minh trail supply route. Instead, it turned into another debacle for the US intervention. During the first week, the South Vietnamese and their US air support were able to force a retreat of North Vietnamese and NLF forces and capture some weapons caches. However, by February 18 the North had begun its counterattack and stalled the advance of the ground invasion force.

On February 25 an even larger counteroffensive was launched, forcing the South Vietnamese ground troops to begin a retreat back into South Vietnam. Despite claims by Nixon to the media of a Vietnamization victory and that the Ho Chi Minh trial had been disrupted, by the end of March 1971 the South Vietnam invasion force had been repelled back across the border with the North retaining the vast majority of their supplies and in control of the trails connecting North Vietnam to South Vietnam.

75 years ago: Indian naval mutiny against British colonial rule

Protesters in Mumbai during naval mutiny

On February 18, 1946, around 1,100 sailors in the Indian Royal Navy stationed at the HMIS Talwar and the Signal School, both in Mumbai, launched a hunger strike against the conditions imposed upon them by the British colonial authorities. This was accompanied by a slow down, involving a refusal to carry out duties promptly.

The protest, organized by a group of 20 sailors, or ratings as they were known, would quickly spread. At the conclusion of World War II, Britain began sacking ratings, including those who had been compelled to take dangerous actions during battles in the conflict. Ratings were provided poor accommodation, were often given demeaning tasks, and were subjected to the racism and tyranny of British naval commanders. Commander Arthur Frederick King, in charge of the Talwar, had a reputation as a stern disciplinarian.

The protest spread within days and quickly involved some 20,000 sailors. The rebels effectively took control of 74 ships, stationed not only in India, but throughout the region and internationally, including in Indonesia and Yemen.

The mutiny triggered a movement in the working class, with a major sympathy strike erupting in Mumbai on February 22. Public transport in the city ground to a halt, and mass demonstrations were held. The unrest spread, including to Karachi, and rioting against British occupation broke out.

The British responded with a brutal crackdown. Attacks on protests, including colonial police opening fire on demonstrators, killed up to 300 civilians and wounded as many as 1,500. Ratings on the Talwar and other nearby ships surrendered on February 23, but in more distant areas, the unrest continued for weeks.

The sailors had demanded the immediate liberation of India from British colonial rule, and the replacement of the British ensigns on their ships with the flags of the bourgeois oppositional Congress Party and the Muslim League, as well as the Stalinist Communist Party. The mutiny was one part of a wave of opposition to colonial rule, throughout Asia and internationally, in the wake of World War II.

100 years ago: British government report advises independence for Egypt

Alfred Milner, 1st Viscount Milner

On February 18, 1921, an important and long-awaited report on Egypt was issued by a commission headed by Alfred Lord Milner. Milner was the former Colonial Secretary of the British cabinet who negotiated on behalf of British imperialism at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. The Conference had assigned Egypt to Britain as a protectorate and rejected the appeal of Egyptian nationalists for independence.

When the British then sought to exile nationalist leaders, the result was a mass uprising in Egypt in March and April 1919. While British imperialism was able to suppress the revolution, it was profoundly shaken, and by November had sent the Milner Commission to investigate conditions in the country.

The reporta document of forty closely written pages, according to the New York Times  suggested that Egypt would become ungovernable by the colonial regime. The Times continued, The spirt of nationalist Egypt, [the report] notes, cannot be extinguished  and an attempt to govern the country in the teeth of a hostile people is a difficult and disgraceful task. (Two days after the Times published these words, it reported that British forces had murdered 13 IRA fighters in County Cork in Ireland.)

Milners conclusions were that Egypt should be given formal independence with guarantees to British interests, set down in a peace treaty between Egypt and the British government. The report stated: It is essential to ensure that independent Egypt does not pursue a foreign policy hostile or prejudicial to the interests of the British Empire. It continued, We do not attempt to conceal our conviction that Egypt is not yet in a position to dispense with British assistance in her internal administration. The commission had concluded that [the Egyptians] insisted that internal order was a matter for Egyptians themselves.

The report was critical in the decision of Britain to issue the Unilateral Declaration of Egyptian Independence in February 1922, which set up the Kingdom of Egypt that year. The Kingdom, however, was only nominally independent, with the British controlling foreign relations, the military, and the region to the south of Egypt known as the Sudan.
Image: Canva

Now that Donald Trump has left the White House, how should Evangelicals outside the United States of America view this experience, and what counsel might they be able to offer their American brothers and sisters? Many non-Americans ask for my view on what has been transpiring recently in the US. Here are some thoughts.

In my role as global ambassador for the World Evangelical Alliance, as I attempt to explain the United States to others, a number of factors help in my understanding of Americans and, more importantly, American Evangelicals.

For the last four years, too many American Evangelicals have been caught up in passionate contests about the use of raw political power. This has embarrassed many of us and confused others. Never before have I heard so many people say that they either avoid or despise Evangelicals. There have been bizarre debates, sometimes pitting evangelical leaders against each other. Some self-proclaimed prophets even declared that Gods anointing was on President Trump; they predicted that he would win a second term as if this was a word from the Lord.

To understand where American Evangelicals are today, it is helpful to look at their heritage. The United States of America was founded amidst historic aspirations towards freedom, a founding myth that twentieth-century leaders traced to John Winthrops famous statement that they were a city set upon a hill for all to observe. This powerful religious vision, filtered through the dynamism imparted by mass migration and vast resources, implanted in American rhetoric and ethos a sense that their land had special divine promise and design.

The fact that the USA been predominantly Christian from its beginning has powerfully reinforced this belief. Even in an age of increased secularization, it still enjoys strong denominations and has many megachurches. After World War II, the influence of the American South spread throughout the nation as many Evangelicals moved away from that region. White Evangelicals moved mostly to the West and Southwest, Black Evangelicals mostly to the North as well as the West. And here is another major point of confusion. Pundits often speak of Evangelical as if it simply equalled white Evangelicals. But there are many African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans who share Evangelical beliefs and practices, but not the political loyalties of white Evangelicals.

This sort of background information assists my non-American friends to understand the power and innovative skill of the American national persona, the unmatched creativity and productivity of Americans, and their unvarnished generosity and desire to be a force of good in the world.

In the wake of a discredited president to whom a remarkable number of (though far from all) white Evangelicals gave support, what are we Evangelicals in the rest of the world to do?

American politics divides into two primary sidesthe Republican Party or the Democratic Party. In recent decades adherence to these parties has become much more important for defining social, cultural, and religious convictions. (A generation ago, maybe 15% in each party hated or gravely distrusted members of the other party. Now it is way over 50%.), From the start of Trumps rise to power, while a determined and loyal rank-and-file of white Evangelicals latched on to Trumps populism, other Evangelical leaders were profoundly concerned and attempted to warn America.

A number (seemingly too few) of highly visible pastors, educators and agency leaders were vocal in protesting that people were putting too much stock in one man. They critiqued those who attributed prophetic greatness to the president or the belief that he was under a divine call. They also warned against giving loyalty to any political party, political platform, or political leader a higher priority than loyalty to Christ.

Today, America is a wounded country. Many Evangelicals express embarrassment for their unguarded support others continue to be angry that their candidate didnt win. A large minority of Americans in general (including Evangelicals) now have a profound distrust in their governmental institutions.

Second, because America is such a global cultural force and its role in evangelical expansion has been so influential, it is easy to overlook the fact that the real growth among Evangelicals recently has been in the Global South. Although the current malaise among American Evangelicals will inevitably influence us all, there is a strong tendency for the media to assume that a trend in the US is the same elsewhere.

But the United States is not the world. In a Christian community of 600 million Evangelicals, Americans dont define who we are or should be for the rest of the world. As the term Evangelical has become mixed up with all sorts of political groups, views, political pressure and personalities, Evangelicals elsewhere in the world should insist that Christian belief and Christian practice deserve first place. Evangelicals elsewhere should not be looking to recent American history for what it means to be in the world, but not of the world.

A nagging question coming out of the Trumpian mobilization, however, relates to the brand value of the name. Should we replace the name Evangelical? Arguments in the affirmative say that the term lacks definition, that it has been coopted by political debate, and that it is now a term driving some away from the Gospel. Others, given this American debacle, feel that the name has been simply emptied of its usefulness.

I disagree. First, its a biblical name. The word euangelion, or Evangel, meaning the good news, has been used for centuries, particularly for the followers of Martin Luther and then more broadly at the time of William Wilberforce. Today, in many parts of the world, it remains an important means of identity. For example, if you are in a Muslim or Hindu majority country, and you are not Roman Catholic or liberal Protestant, what name do you use? As a threatened minority, the ability to identify with over 600 million fellow Evangelical Christians provides shelter in identity and bonding in fellowship. As a friend noted, every time a priest takes a misstep, do Roman Catholics wonder about a name change?

Finally, to my Evangelical friends in the rest of the world, lets not be naive about the temptation that we too might get caught using our church base and witness to gain political power. We have seen this happen in other countries: Kenya, South Korea, and Brazil, to name a few. As the number of Evangelicals continues to grow, there is a natural inclination to turn size and presence into political power. We may think that the Gospel inhibits us from being seduced by power, but we must recognize our own vulnerability as we seek to parlay our global growth into greater political influence.

Americans need space and time to make sense of the choices they confront. Let us pray that they will make choices based on the Christ they serve and the Bible they read. My prayer is that this hurtful and damaging American moment will be followed by a time of national confession, spiritual healing and a resolute will to make the first priority biblical in faith and Christ-honoring in words and actions.
Catalonia, yesterday at the polls for the renewal of the Parliament of the autonomous region, welcomes the victory of the separatists. Out of 135 seats, 74 went to the bloc made up of the three parties (the absolute majority was 68 votes), while the remaining 61 went to all the others (i.e. socialists, Ciudadanos, Ecp, Vox and Popular Party).

The elections, which confirmed the collapse in turnout compared to 2017 - as expected - due to the coronavirus pandemic - thus trim another "slap" in Madrid.

The Catalan Socialist Party (PSC), affiliated with the PSOE of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, has recorded a decisive leap forward compared to four years ago, almost doubling the seats (33 compared to the 17 it had) and perhaps even winning in terms of votes. But it will not be enough to get the lead of rich Catalonia.

The separatists of ERC (Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya, Catalan republican left) also obtained 33 seats, while the other Junts separatists of the exile in Belgium Carles Puigdemont are the third most voted formation, obtaining 32 seats. Those of the Cup get 9 seats.

Vox's far right in turn enters the Catalan parliament with 11 seats.

(Unioneonline / ss)
The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Whether the United States pulls forces from the Middle East to counter China may well depend on the success of Biden's diplomacy with Iran



Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is keeping a close eye on the US militarys presence in the Middle East as new Pentagon leadership prepares to review the distribution of American forces across the globe.


Kolkata (West Bengal) [India], February 15 (ANI): The West Bengal Pradesh Committee (WBPCC) on Monday will hold a meeting with its district wings ahead of the talks with the Left parties regarding the seat-sharing in the upcoming Assembly in the state.

The meeting will be chaired by the president of WBPCC, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury.

According to the sources, the meeting is being held to discuss the on-going preparations of the upcoming Assembly elections, including the seat-sharing with the Left parties.

and Left parties will soon decide on the seat-sharing through a couple of meetings scheduled next week.

Earlier, the party and the Left Front alliance held two rounds of meetings regarding the seat-sharing agreements for 193 of the total 294 seats in Assembly scheduled this year.

In the 2016 Assembly polls, the Left parties and Congress came together and bagged 76 seats whereas Trinamool Congress then bagged 211 seats.

The state of West Bengal is gearing up for the upcoming Assembly for 294 seats this year.

(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.)
The Global Footprint Network calculated that Luxembourg has consumed its yearly allowance of ecological resources by February 15, which is one day earlier than in 2020.

In other words: Luxembourg consumes the resources of eight planets per year. If the global population were to consume as many resources as Luxembourg did, the yearly sustainable resources available to the planet would be exhausted by 15 February.

According to Extinction Rebellion Luxembourg, a civil protest group, Qatar is in first place, followed by Luxembourg. The group calls on the political sphere to speed up the country's ecological transition, or it will fail to meet the goals jointly set at the Paris Climate Accord.

On a global scale, last year's Earth Overshoot Day fell on 22 August, compared to 29 July the year prior, due to the global health crisis.

Indonesia is last in the list, with its date falling on 18 December. The next European country to mark "Overshoot Day" will be Denmark on 26 March, followed by Belgium on 30 March.

An overview of all countries here.
LONDON - Britain's fast-running coronavirus vaccination campaign appears to have hit its early target, offering a first dose to 15 million elderly people and health-care workers by Monday, as the government promised.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson hailed the National Health Service for nailing the deadline, calling the rapid rollout of two vaccines an "unprecedented national achievement," but he warned that now was "no moment to relax."

The British government has been promoting its vaccine numbers hard while it faces criticism for other aspects of its response. Britain has one of the highest death tolls in the world.

Most of those who have received the vaccine have received one dose of the two needed to achieve the full effect. The first doses were offered to all those older than 70, alongside nursing home residents, caregivers, front-line medical workers and those with serious illnesses that might make them more vulnerable to covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.

Despite early fears about vaccine hesitancy, a spokesman for 10 Downing Street called the takeup "very high." Like the United States, Britain has a small but vocal anti-vaccine community. Many of the hesitant, however, have told pollsters that they are taking a "wait-and-see" approach vs. outright refusing the shots.

Britain leads Europe on vaccine deployment per capita, and trails only smaller countries, such as Israel and the United Arab Emirates, worldwide.

The quick rollout, combined with the high uptake, is clearly a win for the Johnson government. Britain has been plagued with problems as it confronts the coronavirus, and on many days it has suffered the highest death toll from the virus in the world. The country is in its third national shutdown, with all schools and universities closed and stay-home orders enforced by fines.

Uptake has surpassed expectations, officials said. Infectious-disease analysts anticipated 75% participation, said Simon Stevens, the chief executive of NHS England. But uptake among those 70 and older has been almost 90%, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said Monday. Among people ages 75 to 79, he told the BBC, "over 97% have taken up the offer."

Participation among residents of hard-hit nursing homes who were "clinically eligible" for the vaccines has been more than 90%, Hancock said.

Within the National Health Service, takeup has been 80% for health-care workers at doctor's offices and hospitals, he said. That's considerably higher than for seasonal flu vaccines for medical workers. Last year, 74% of NHS front-line medical staff members received a flu shot, but in previous years it was about 60%.

One group that appears to be lagging is low-wage workers who care for residents of nursing homes. The health secretary reported that about two-thirds of the staff members who work in social care had received their first dose.

Johnson's government insists that vaccines will never be mandatory, even for health-care workers. Officials want all of them to take their doses voluntarily.

But some nursing homes have begun to insist on a shot. Barchester Healthcare, a private provider that runs more than 200 homes nationwide, says it has changed its hiring policy. "New staff have to have been vaccinated" if they medically can, a spokesman said, "but this does not currently apply to existing staff."

Johnson wants all those 50 and older - alongside all other risk groups - to be vaccinated by April. Then the government will tackle the rest of the population. Already, general practitioners are texting, calling and writing to urge those in their 60s to make appointments.

Britain changed its strategy at the start of the new year to reach more people by delaying the second dose by up to 12 weeks after the first. The previous interval was three weeks.

British regulators have approved the Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines for emergency use. A third, made by Moderna, has been approved but will not be administered until the spring.

Analysts have expressed concerns about disparities between White Britons and Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) communities.

One study, not yet peer-reviewed, found significant disparities in vaccine uptake among health-care staff members of different ethnicities at NHS University Hospitals of Leicester. Leicester is one of the most ethnically diverse cities in Britain. More than 19,000 staff members have been offered a vaccine. Researchers found that 71% of White staffers came forward to get a shot, compared with 59% of South Asian staffers and 37% of Black staffers.

University of Leicester professor Kamlesh Khunti, one of the authors of the study, tweeted: "Urgently need to identify barriers & overcome these."

Nadhim Zahawi, Britain's vaccine minister, told Sky News that those not taking the vaccines "skew heavily toward BAME communities." "If one particular community remains unvaccinated," he said, "the virus will seek them out and it will go through that community like wildfire."

Public health analysts said uptake in some BAME communities, which include immigrants, might be affected by issues of trust and misinformation. There are also concerns that a number of young people might not want to take the vaccine.

"Older people are more likely to get the vaccine, partly because they are at high risk, and also because they have had a prolonged period of lockdown," said Martin Marshall, chairman of Royal College of General Practitioners. "Many [have] not been out in a year, desperate to go out to see friends. Likely we'll see a lower uptake in younger people, but we don't know for sure yet."

To beat the pandemic, it's not enough for the world's top scientists to develop an effective vaccine in record time. People need to take it.

"The more people who have [been] vaccinated, the higher chance you have of the virus not circulating," Marshall said. "If young people don't accept the vaccine, it could potentially be a problem because there will be more people susceptible, and a larger reservoir for the virus to continue circulating."

Azra Ghani, chair of infectious-disease epidemiology at Imperial College London, advised focusing on two numbers: the vaccines' efficacy rates and how many people take them.

"Uptake is as important as vaccine efficacy" in slowing the spread of the virus, she said.

It's especially worrisome if the uptake is low in clusters in individual communities, giving the virus an open field to spread.

Paul Hunter, a professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, said vaccinations alone may not be enough to stop the coronavirus.

"If you've been vaccinated, and if you can still get infected and infect other people, then you will not achieve herd immunity," he said. But he said it was right for Britain to prioritize the most vulnerable, because the vaccines have been proved effective at stopping people from becoming severely ill and dying.

"The dangerous time for people is getting their first-ever infection with no prior immunity and in a vulnerable category," he said. "The critical thing is protecting those people so they don't die when they first get the infection."

Hunter said the virus probably will not disappear, but might be made manageable. "Our grandchildren's grandchildren will be getting covid, but by then, or probably a lot sooner, it won't be much different than the common cold."
The India Today Group has yet again, emerged victorious at the 20th edition of Indian Television Academy (ITA) Awards by sweeping both Popular News Channel - Hindi for Aaj Tak and Popular News Channel - English for India Today TV, etching the undisputed leadership position of the Group in television news journalism.

Aaj Tak, India s most watched and trusted Hindi News Channel in India has been awarded the Popular Hindi News Channel Award, 19 times in the last 20 editions of ITA Awards. Aaj Tak and its brave journalists with their ground reporting have brought a ringside view of every defining news event for the last two decades. This pursuit of truth and credible journalism has won the channel many accolades ever since the channels launch in Dec2000.

India Today TV, the nation's leading English News Channel has bagged this honour for the 4th consecutive time at ITA awards. The driving force behind its success is the Gold Standard of Journalism powered by a superior ground coverage - stories from the heart of the action.

The Groups crowning achievement at the award ceremony came with Mr. Aroon Purie, Chairman and Editor in Chief, being honoured with the Hall of Fame Award. Under Mr. Puries leadership, the India Today Group has created an enviable legacy of trust, credibility, leadership and admiration since the group's inception over four decades ago. The launch of the India Today magazine in 1975 started the Group's journey into a multi brand, multi-platform media group, with brands that command undisputed leadership across categories and reach out to more than 500 million viewers, readers, listeners, visitors and subscribers.

A true pioneer, Mr. Purie has been instrumental in changing the face of journalism in India and was awarded the Padma Bhushan - amongst Indias highest civilian honours - by the President of India in 2001.

Commenting on this milestone, Mr. Aroon Purie, Chairman & Editor-in-Chief, India Today Group said, I thank the ITA for this honour of putting me in the Hall of Fame. To tell you the truth, Ive never aspired for fame. Ive always preferred to stay in the background. Ive done my job as a journalist the best way I could. Fortunately I love news and I love journalism. I am no Amitabh Bachchan or Sachin Tendulkar or Roger Federer - persons with great individual talent. In my line of work, Ive always believed that the institution is bigger than any individual. So this honour goes to all of you, the talented people Ive worked with. Theyve all had a commitment to journalism, which is without fear or favor, and for the relentless pursuit of the truth. I believe journalism done well is a noble profession which makes a difference to the society we live in It is a force for the good.

Kalli Purie, Vice Chairperson, India Today Group commented, As the depth of echo chambers increases, the need for a shared platform where both sides can be heard is essential. A place where people can agree to disagree is the need of the hour. India Today and Aaj Tak are those listening rooms, that middle ground for the two sides to continue a meaningful dialogue. What else is a society if not a vibrant conversation in progress? The ITA Awards for most popular Hindi and English news channels decided by over one core votes is a real honour.
New Delhi: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Suvendu Adhikari hit out at Trinamool Congress (TMC) saying that the party wants to turn West Bengal into Bangladesh.

He alleged that the TMC has imported the "Jai Bangla" slogan taking a cue from Bangladesh politician Shamim Osman's "Khela hobe" slogan.

"'Khela hobe' slogan was coined by Narayanganj MP Shamim Osman four years ago. TMC wants to turn West Bengal into Bangladesh, that is why they have imported 'Jai Bangla' slogan. Our slogan is ' Bharat Mata Ki Jai' and 'Jai Shri Ram'" Adhikari was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.

No matter what they (TMC) do, people of West Bengal have decided to vote for double engine govt. BJP will come to power with a huge majority. Modi Ji & Amit Shah Ji had given a slogan -- '2019 me half, 2021 me saaf' & that is going to happen: BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari (14.02) pic.twitter.com/N0LPMuv3FE  ANI (@ANI) February 14, 2021

BJP will come to power with a huge majority

Adhikari said that the people of West Bengal have decided to vote for the double engine of the BJP and that the party will come to power with a huge majority.

"No matter what they (TMC) do, people of West Bengal have decided to vote for double engine government. BJP will come to power with a huge majority. Modi Ji and Amit Shah Ji had given a slogan - '2019 me half, 2021 me saaf' and that is going to happen," he told media in the Siliguri subdivision of Darjeeling district.

Earlier this week, Union Home Minister Amit Shah took a dig at West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee saying that by the time assembly elections end in the state, 'Didi' will chant 'Jai Shri Ram'.

Adhikari, who is a former transport minister of West Bengal, had switched from TMC to BJP last year. He along with a host of other rebels TMC leaders joined BJP in presence of Amit Shah at a rally in Midnapore.

(With inputs from ANI)

Live TV
The Duke of Cambridge has paid tribute to a nurse who died earlier this month at the Norfolk Norwich University Hospital after contracting Covid-19.

Estrella Catalan, 52, had been working at the hospital for 18 years.

Now, Prince William has offered his condolences as he joined a weekly meeting for the East of Englands NHS leadership.

Speaking on a video call to the team, the Duke said: I also want to just sort of pass on my thoughts to all of you and your teams about Estrella Catalan, who I believe was a much-loved member of most of your teams and had been in the region for a long time at I think Kings Lynn and N and N (Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital).

And I imagine thats hit everyone very hard so Im very sorry to hear that, and my thoughts from my family are all with all of you who knew her and her family.

Ms Catalan worked as a staff nurse on the Gunthorpe and Heydon wards. She also worked with the emergency department and the acute stroke team.

A GoFundMe page has been launched for her family - she had two sons, John and Josh, with her husband Melvin, in her memory and raised more than 35,000 thus far.

It is with great sadness to share that our dear friend Estrella Catalan passed away yesterday ( Friday) 5th February 2021, after her long and hard battle with COVID-19, the description reads.

The family already suffered the great loss of their second son Vince two years ago( May he rest in peace). Our deepest condolences to the whole family.The video meeting attended by the Duke was led by Ann Radmore, regional director of NHS England and NHS Improvement, East of England, and included 35 other senior members of staff.

Ms Radmore said of the Duke: He mentioned her death to us, and I think that was very appropriate and helpful actually, because she was a much loved member of staff over in Norfolk.

Elsewhere during the call, Prince William expressed his concerns for the mental wellbeing of NHS staff and encouraged those on the call to feel emboldened and inspired to also take it seriously.

You know, it leads from the top down as well as the bottom up, he said.

And so if any of you can shed light or be involved in that, it really opens the door that allows your workforce to feel emboldened and inspired to also take it seriously.

Prince William continued: As you know Im trying to champion, trying to tackle the taboo and the stigma around mental health and my conversations so far up and down the country with your colleagues in the NHS has starkly shown - as Ann pointed out - were facing a very big waterfall of mental health issues coming up.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 09:17:33|Editor: huaxia

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ADDIS ABABA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Ethiopia reported 788 new COVID-19 cases over the last 24 hours, taking the national tally to 147,092, the Ministry of Health said on Sunday.

The death toll from COVID-19 rose to 2,194 after 13 new fatalities were recorded, the ministry said.

It said 723 more recoveries were registered, taking the national count to 128,742.

Ethiopia, Africa's second most populous nation, has so far reported the highest number of COVID-19 cases in the East Africa region.

The Ethiopian government has been urging the public to implement COVID-19 precautionary measures to contain the spread of the virus.

According to latest figures from the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Ethiopia is one of the countries which have conducted the most COVID-19 tests in Africa, only next to South Africa and Morocco. Enditem
South Africa's state power firm Eskom aims to complete the legal separation of its transmission unit by the end of 2021, its Chief Executive Andre de Ruyter said on Monday, with the generation and distribution units following in 2022. President Cyril Ramaphosa announced a plan to divide the cash-strapped utility into three units in 2019, but the process has stalled and nationwide blackouts have continued, damaging the already fragile economy. The plan to split the company, which supplies over 90% of South Africa's electricity but is straining against the burden of ...
South Africa: Two of the five sluice gates at Vaal Dam closed

The Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) has closed two of the five sluice gates, which were opened at the Vaal Dam to make way for the water inflows expected from rainfalls over the Orange River System (ORS).

The release of water from the Vaal Dam is due to heavy river flows from the Upper Vaal which is rapidly filling the Vaal Dam. The first gate was closed at 10am this morning, 15 February 2021, followed by the second at 12pm at midday, the department said in a statement on Monday.

Five sluice gates were opened for the release, with three on 11 February 2021 and two the next day on 12 February 2021.

Initially, the department planned to open three gates, but based on continuing monitoring and analysis of the dam, two more were later opened.

Before the initiation of the flood control measure of releasing of water, the Vaal Dam had breached the 100% mark. The dam water levels now stand at 105%, which is down from last Thursdays 106.0%, the department said.

Department spokesperson, Sputnik Ratau, said the release of water from the dam was proceeding according to plan, with the inflow presently at 427 m3/s and outflow at 701 m3/s.

We are progressively moving to a stage where enough water is being released from the Vaal Dam to accommodate the expected rains that would have an effect on the ORS, as well as adding to the already rising water levels in the IVRS, Ratau said.

Ratau said opening of the sluice gates was impacting positively on protecting infrastructure and the dam continued to operate optimally.

The release continues to be meticulously carried out as there had been no reports of incidents of flooding or damage to property and we reassure the public that the dam will not collapse under the additional pressure, he said.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-02-15. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
New Delhi: The complete disengagement at the Pangong Lake in eastern Ladakh as agreed between India and China last week is expected to be over by end of this week. Last week it was agreed that as part of disengagement, Chinese forces will move east of Finger 8 of the north bank of the Pangong Lake, while India will base its troops at the permanent base--Dhan Singh Thapa post near Finger 8.

Right now, on the ground, between Finger 4 and Finger 8, things are in various stages of dismantlement. Remember as part of the agreement, it was agreed that any structure built by both sides after April 2020 will be removed. This was the month when Chinese attempts to change things on the ground unilaterally started.

Once the disengagement is over at Pangong Lake, no patrolling will take place in the area from Finger 4 to Finger 8 till both sides agree via diplomatic and military talks.

The 10th round of military talks, which was agreed to happen 48 hours after complete disengagement will happen, expectedly next week. The talks will focus on disengagement on Gogra, Depsang, and Hot Spring. On Friday, the defence ministry said other outstanding "problems" including in Depsang, Hot Springs and Gogra will be taken up at the upcoming talks between military commanders of the two countries.

2020 saw heightened tensions between India and China due to aggressive actions by Chinese forces at the Line of Actual Control (LAC). The Galwan incident saw the death of 20 Indian soldiers, and while China also suffered casualties, it did not come up with any number.

The government had on February 12 emphatically stated that India has not "conceded" any territory following the disengagement agreement with China in the Pangong Tso Lake area in eastern Ladakh. After a nine-month standoff, the two militaries reached the agreement on disengagement in the north and south banks of Pangong lake that mandates both sides to cease forward deployment of troops in a "phased, coordinated and verifiable" manner.

On February 11, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh made a detailed statement in Parliament on the disengagement pact. According to the agreement, China has to pull back its troops to the east of Finger 8 areas in the northern bank while the Indian personnel will be based at their permanent base at Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 in the region. Similar action will take place on the south bank of the lake as well, Singh said in Parliament.

In 2020, the Chinese military built several bunkers and other structures in the areas between Finger 4 and 8 and had blocked all Indian patrols beyond Finger 4, triggering a strong reaction from the Indian Army. In the nine rounds of military talks, India was specifically insisting on the withdrawal of Chinese troops from Finger 4 to Finger 8 on the North bank of Pangong Lake. The mountain spurs in the area are referred to as Fingers.

The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
MALTA  GlobalFoundries has received approval to make computer chips for the U.S. military at its Fab 8 factory in Saratoga County, a certification that could one day lead to an expansion of the plant, which employs 3,000 people.

GlobalFoundries says the first chips under the arrangement  which is likely to expand  will be shipped starting in 2023.

GlobalFoundries already makes chips for the U.S. military at its two former IBM factories in East Fishkill in Dutchess County and outside Burlington, Vt.

Those two facilities had the required security certifications needed to make such sensitive chips before GlobalFoundries acquired them in 2015.

But Fab 8, the most advanced of all of GlobalFoundries' factories worldwide, will provide the Defense Department with a new source of the most advanced chips available.

GlobalFoundries is a critical part of a domestic semiconductor manufacturing industry that is a requirement for our national security and economic competitiveness, said U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer. I have long advocated for GlobalFoundries as a key supplier of chips to our military and intelligence community, including pressing the new Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, to further expand the Department of Defenses business with GlobalFoundries."

In order to obtain this first level of military manufacturing certification, Fab 8 had to become compliant with U.S. International Traffic in Arms Regulations.

The next step would be to achieve so-called Trusted Foundry status that requires more security verifications, although GlobalFoundries is working toward that goal.

IBM's Vermont factory  located in Essex Junction  was the first-ever chip factory to achieve Trusted Foundry status, which allows it to make the military's most sensitive chips. The East Fishkill fab, in Dutchess County, also has Trusted Foundry status.

Last year, the Defense Department significantly increased the potential ceiling on its current chip contract with GlobalFoundries by $400 million to $1.1 billion, some of which accounts for the additional output from Fab 8, which will be installing a new production line just for military orders.

Fab 8's addition to the Defense Department's capabilities is not just a huge win for GlobalFoundries but a very important step for the federal government's efforts to maintain a long-term supply of chips for its weapon and defense systems.

Maintaining that chip supply has become more problematic over the past decade as the chip industry has consolidated and companies like IBM, and before that Advanced Micro Devices, have decided to exit the massive expense of manufacturing in favor of outsourcing their supply to so-called foundries  like GlobalFoundries  that make chips for a variety of customers, including AMD and IBM.

And although military orders are lucrative work, they represent only a small fraction of the orders that GlobalFoundries and others receive from commercial customers, which still drive innovation in the industry.

The Defense Department wants to reverse that trend, especially since most of the foundry market is dominated by Asian companies like Samsung and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., although both are considering building new factories in the United States. Samsung is reportedly looking at a site in western New York.

The coronavirus pandemic has exacerbated this troubling U.S. chip supply dynamic by putting a squeeze on the global supply chain and causing shortages in the auto industry, for instance. That led Congress late last year to pass the CHIPS for America Act, a $25 billion program that would subsidize new chip factories on U.S. soil and fund new semiconductor research programs to maintain the longtime technological advantage that the U.S. risks losing to China and other parts of Asia.

The CHIPS program, which was passed as part of the latest federal defense bill with the backing of Schumer, could be used by GlobalFoundries to potentially build a second factory at its Fab 8 campus that it might otherwise not justify building. Current chip fabs cost about $15 billion apiece.

Although expensive, the industry subsidies would be cheaper than the federal government building its own factories to make chips as it rolls out a new policy called "zero trust" in which the Defense Department ensures complete control and oversight of every chip used in every weapon and military system. Just one compromised chip could be used to infiltrate entire networks, the military reasons.

This agreement with GlobalFoundries is just one step the Department of Defense is taking to ensure the U.S. sustains the microelectronics manufacturing capability necessary for national and economic security," the Defense Department said in a rare statement about the GlobalFoundries contract. "This is a pre-cursor to major efforts (by Schumer and others to pass the CHIPS Act) which will allow for the sustainment and on-shoring of U.S. microelectronics capability.
Grogan, Sheila

Sheila Raye Polly Grogan died peacefully in her home on Wednesday, February 10, 2021, with her husband and three children by her side. She was 74 years old. Born in Murray, Kentucky on April 29, 1946, Sheila was a proud Murray High Tiger, class of 1964. She graduated from Murray State University with a Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education. In 1965 Sheila married her lifelong sweetheart, Jerry Pat Grogan, and they were happily married for 55 years. The loving mother of three children, Sheila considered this role her greatest privilege and most important life work. She spent many years serving in community activities including the PTA and the Murray Womens Club. She was a member of Glendale Road Church of Christ. In 1994, Sheila and Jerry moved to Louisville, Kentucky where she lived the rest of her years. She was an active member of Southeast Christian Church. A two-time cancer survivor, Sheila was inspired to bring the Sterling Service Tea Ministry to Southeast for women affected by cancer. She and a team of faithful friends lovingly served in this ministry for many years. When she wasnt spending time with her husband, three children and 12 grandchildren, Sheila enjoyed creating art in all forms. She also loved spending time with her friends in Bible study, small groups, walking group, Grandmothers Club, Abigail Circle and Peacemakers class. She was an example of grace and love to whomever she encountered and lived an exemplary life that honored Christ. She faced three difficult battles with cancer with a gentle and quiet strength. Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her. Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all. Proverbs 31:28-29 Sheila is survived by husband Jerry, her three children Eric Grogan (Maria) of Paducah, KY, Heather Bates (Trent) of Louisville, KY, and Adam Grogan (Kelle) of Henderson, KY and 12 grandchildren: Joshua, Piper Shanks (Keagan), Sophie, Wes, Theo, Jeremiah, Polly, Owen, Meryl, Maggie and Edie. She is preceded in death by her parents W.L. (Dub) and Margaret Polly. Visitation will be on Sunday, February 21, 2021 from 8:30 am until the time of the memorial service at 10:00 am at Newcomer Cremations, Funerals & Receptions East Chapel (235 Juneau Drive Louisville, KY 40243).

A graveside service for family and friends will be held on Sunday, February 28, 2021, at 1:30 pm at the Green Plains Cemetery in Hazel, Kentucky with John Dale officiating.

The J.H. Churchill Funeral Home and Cremation Services are in charge of local arrangements. Online condolences can be made at www.thejhchurchillfuneralhome.com

In lieu of flowers donations in Sheila's memory can be made to Fellowship of Christian Athletes by visiting https://www.westkyfca.org/donate or by mail at P.O. Box 8206 Paducah, KY 42002.

Singaporean Sue-Anne Chng used to wear a different outfit on all 15 days of the Lunar New Year, when it is customary to don new clothes to symbolise a fresh start.

But this year she will wear second-hand items exchanged for her old clothes at a store catering to people concerned about the impact of fast fashion on the environment.

Several swapping initiatives, from permanent shops to pop-up events, have appeared in the affluent city-state in a bid to encourage consumers to make the most of what is already in their closets.

The fashion industry is responsible for up to a tenth of global carbon emissions, according to the United Nations' environment programme.

Clothes cause emissions in a wide variety of ways -- from their manufacture to transportation and washing by the consumer.

On a recent trip to her favourite store, The Fashion Pulpit, Chng took along several dresses and a matching blouse and skirt, which a staff member assessed before crediting points to her account.

She spent her points on 17 items, including a yellow and green dress to wear for the first day of the new year as it looked like "an auspicious pineapple".

The fruit, seen as a symbol of prosperity, is typically given as a gift or displayed during Lunar New Year in Singapore.

'Insane consumption'

"I've always been brought up by my parents to have a new set of clothes every [Lunar New Year], and I fell into that behaviour of consumerism," the 35-year-old told AFP.

"In the past I probably made sure I have 15 days of outfits even if I'm not visiting (relatives), which is too much."

But now, "as long as the item is new to me, I think it's good enough," added Chng, who works for a tech company and is married.

Chng first learnt about clothes swapping at a work event five years ago, and decided to change her ways after realising her wardrobe was filled with unworn items.

"Prior to switching over to swapping, my consumption habit was insane," she said.

"I realised I had more than 50 percent of my wardrobe unworn, but I still felt like I didn't have anything to wear."

She pays Sg$599 (US$450) for a yearly membership at The Fashion Pulpit, which allows her unlimited swaps and visits -- about 80 percent of her wardrobe is now from the shop.

"Swapping allows me to be like a chameleon when it comes to fashion but allows me to be environmentally conscious as well," she said.

Tiny Singapore alone produced 168,000 tonnes of textile and leather waste in 2019, according to authorities -- the weight of more than 400 Boeing 747 planes.

'Not dirty, not dusty'

Filipino clothes designer Raye Padit founded The Fashion Pulpit nearly three years ago after learning about his industry's impact on the environment and poor treatment of garment workers.

"In Singapore, the problem is overconsumption and waste," he told AFP.

"We want to provide a platform where you can still dress up, express yourself... through clothes. But at the same time, it's not damaging to the planet and to your wallet."

His company now has more than 1,500 members and has started turning a profit. It also holds workshops where customers can learn how to mend or upcycle used clothes.

People have swapped everything from casual clothes made by high-street brands to top-end items such as Prada bags and Louboutin shoes, Padit said.

One-time swap events are also popping up in the city-state while a group of volunteers host monthly swap gatherings.

"When I join a clothing swap it reminds me to consume consciously because when I give away clothes, I think about whether I'm still wearing them," said Nadia Kishlan, a 30-year-old participant at one clothing swap.

Challenges remain in persuading Singaporeans to swap rather than shop, however, and the city's industry is still in its infancy.

Second-hand shops are not as popular in Asia as in the West, in part because many believe used clothes from strangers could bring bad luck, or be unhygienic.

But Padit said attitudes in Singapore were changing, driven by rising environmental awareness and a wave of trendy new thrift shops marketing their goods on social media.

"It's slowly changing the perception of what second hand is all about," he said.

"It's no longer dirty, it's no longer dusty -- it's a cool thing."
The Missourians Opinion section is a public forum for the discussion of ideas. The views presented in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Missourian or the University of Missouri. If you would like to contribute to the Opinion page with a response or an original topic of your own, visit our submission form
Coca-Cola has been dragged into a culling row after backlash from animal campaigners led it to call off plans to kill foxes it said were 'causing damage,' to its London factory.

The soft drinks giant was branded 'barbaric,' by campaigners - but it claims it only initially set out to kill one fox at its plant in Sidcup, in South-East London.

The multi-billion-dollar company said it had ordered the cull to stop foxes damaging the site, which dates back to 1961.

It has now apolgoised and committed to finding a more humane alternative to keep the on-site fox population under control.

Coca-Cola was branded 'barbaric,' by campaigners - but it claims it only set out to kill one fox at its plant in Sidcup, in South-East London.

It is not known if any foxes were exterminated before campaigners forced Coca Cola into a climbdown.

A Coca Cola European Partners spokesman said: 'We have listened to what people told us - completely understand the concerns they have raised - and are sorry if anyone has been upset by the approach we took to control foxes.

'We can confirm that we have stopped the practice of culling foxes with immediate effect and will never do so again.

'We are now in the process of finding an alternative, and more humane, control.'

A Coca-Cola spokesperson also suggested claims it had planned a 'mass cull' were exaggerated - saying it only initially wanted to cull one fox.

It is legal to use traps and snares to catch foxes but they must then be killed humanely, according to Government guidance.

It is also legal to shoot free foxes using suitable firearms and ammunition but guns shouldn't be used in urban areas for obvious reasons of public safety.

Despite the U-turn, campaigners are still furious and continued to slam Coca-Cola European Partners' online.

It is legal to use traps and snares to catch foxes but they must then be killed humanely, according to Government guidance. Coca-Cola committed to finding a more humane alternative to keep the on-site fox population under control

Connie McLennan: 'This is absolutely barbaric! How could you be so cruel, your monsters if this goes through!

'But we're just the little people fighting these huge corporations and CEOs who have no moral responsibilities!

'It's all money, politics, power, shame on you Coca-Cola.'

Pauline Kempley added: 'Monstrous!

And Pauline Cross blasted : 'My God what century are we in? So barbaric!'

MailOnline has approached Coca-Cola for comment.
Press release

Synairgen plc

('Synairgen' or the 'Company')



Synairgen announces that dosing has commenced with its inhaled interferon beta product in US Government-funded NIH ACTIV-2 trial in COVID-19 outpatients

Southampton, UK - 15 February 2021: Synairgen plc (LSE: SNG), the respiratory drug discovery and development company, today announces that dosing has begun in the inhaled interferon beta formulation (SNG001) sub-study of the ACTIV-2 Phase II/III trial, evaluating patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms not yet requiring hospitalisation.

Richard Marsden, CEO of Synairgen, said:"We are delighted that our inhaled interferon beta formulation has been entered into this US Government-funded Phase II/III study and that dosing has now commenced. With mutations of COVID-19 now emerging, and the concern that mutations may render the vaccines less effective, the need for broad spectrum treatment options remains very high. Our product is a potentially effective treatment as it is a virus agnostic and, we believe, strain agnostic antiviral, which is easy to use in the hospital or home setting. We look forward to tracking the progress of the ACTIV-2 trial alongside our other COVID-19 trials."

As announced by Synairgen on 25 January 2021, ACTIV is a public-private partnership to develop a coordinated research strategy to speed up the development of the most promising COVID-19 treatments and vaccines. ACTIV-2 is sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), one of the National Institutes of Health, and is led by the NIAID-funded AIDS Clinical Trials Group (ACTG).

If an investigational agent shows promise by demonstrating safety and reducing COVD-19 symptoms through 28 days following administration, the ACTIV-2 trial is designed to expand seamlessly from a Phase II to a Phase III study to gather additional critical data from a larger pool of volunteers without delay. Phase II sub-studies enrol up to 220 volunteers, while exact enrolment size of Phase III sub-studies will vary depending on mode of administration of the investigational agent. The adaptive nature of the ACTIV-2 trial allows for comparison of multiple interventions with a shared group of placebo recipients. In addition to safety and symptomatic efficacy signals, the sub-studies in ACTIV-2 assess whether an investigational agent can reduce the amount of SARS-CoV-2 virus detectable in the nasopharynx.

For more information on the ACTIV-2 study, please visit www.riseabovecovid.org, or visit ClinicalTrials.gov and search identifier NCT04518410.

Synairgen is also running an international 610 patient Phase III trial, which is progressing well, assessing the efficacy of inhaled interferon beta in hospitalised patients with COVID-19. The Company also recently completed recruitment of a 120 'at-risk' COVID-19 patients study evaluating SNG001 as a treatment for use in the home setting, results are expected on track in Q2 2021.

Information within this announcement is deemed by the Company to constitute inside information under the Market Abuse Regulation (EU) No. 596/2014.

For further enquiries, please contact:

Synairgen plc

Richard Marsden, Chief Executive Officer

John Ward, Finance Director

Tel: + 44 (0) 23 8051 2800

finnCap (Nominated Advisor & Joint Broker)

Geoff Nash, James Thompson, Charlie Beeson (Corporate Finance)

Alice Lane, Sunila de Silva (ECM)

Tel: + 44 (0) 20 7220 0500

Numis Securities Limited (Joint Broker)

James Black, Freddie Barnfield, Duncan Monteith

Tel: +44 (0) 20 7260 1000

Consilium Strategic Communications (Financial Media and Investor Relations)

Mary-Jane Elliott, Sue Stuart, Olivia Manser

synairgen@consilium-comms.com

Tel: +44 (0) 20 3709 5700

Notes for Editors

About Synairgen

Synairgen is a clinical-stage respiratory drug discovery and development company founded by University of Southampton Professors Sir Stephen Holgate, Donna Davies and Ratko Djukanovic. Synairgen is currently fully focused on progressing its inhaled interferon beta1a broad spectrum antiviral drug as an effective treatment for people suffering with COVID-19 infection.

Synairgen's differentiating human biology BioBank platform and world-renowned international academic KOL network has broader applicability for lung viral defence in other respiratory disorders including asthma and COPD. Synairgen is quoted on AIM (LSE: SNG). For more information about Synairgen, please see www.synairgen.com

COVID-19

COVID-19, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, is a global threat and there is an urgent need to assess new treatments to prevent and effectively treat the severe lower respiratory tract illness that can occur with this disease. Older people and those with co-morbidities such as heart and lung complications and diabetes are at greatest risk of developing severe or fatal disease.

SNG001 (inhaled Interferon beta) applicability to COVID-19

Interferon beta ('IFN-beta') is a naturally occurring protein, which orchestrates the body's antiviral responses. It is used widely systemically for the treatment of multiple sclerosis and is a safe and well tolerated drug. There is growing evidence that deficiency in IFN-beta production by the lung could explain the enhanced susceptibility in 'at-risk' patient groups to developing severe lower respiratory tract (lung) disease during respiratory viral infections. Furthermore, viruses, including coronaviruses especially SARS-CoV-2, have evolved multiple mechanisms for suppressing endogenous IFN-beta production in the lung thereby helping the virus to evade the innate immune system. The addition of exogenous IFN-beta before or during viral infection of lung cells in vitro either prevents or greatly reduces viral replication to reduce the severity of infection and accelerate recovery. Recognising the importance of achieving high concentrations in the lung where SARS-CoV-2 exerts most of its tissue damaging effects, Synairgen's SNG001 is a formulation of IFN-beta-1a for direct delivery to the lungs via nebulisation. It is pH neutral, and is free of mannitol, arginine and human serum albumin, making it suitable for inhaled delivery direct to the site of action. Phase I and II trial data have shown that SNG001 activates lung antiviral defences as measured in sputum cells, and that SNG001 has been well tolerated in approximately 280 asthma/COPD/COVID-19 patients to-date.

In July 2020, Synairgen announced the results of its Phase II double-blind, placebo-controlled study of 101 randomised COVID-19 hospitalised patients, which showed that SNG001 given for 14 days, was associated with greater odds of improvement versus placebo on the WHO Ordinal Scale for Clinical Improvement and more rapid recovery to the point where patients were no longer limited in their activity, with a greater proportion of patients recovering during the 28-day study period.

The results were published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine: "Safety and efficacy of inhaled nebulised interferon beta-1a.
A former state senator from southern Illinois is launching a campaign for governor.

Paul Schimpf of Waterloo made the announcement about his candidacy in a Zoom meeting Monday. He then planned to start a statewide tour in Algonquin with stops Monday in Rock Island and Morris. He was scheduled to be in Decatur and Waterloo on Tuesday.

Schimpf is a Marine Corps veteran and was elected state senator for the 58th District in 2017. He did not seek reelection.

He is the second Republican to announce a run for governor in 2022. Gary Rabine of Bull Valley, CEO of the Schaumburg-based business Rabine Group, said Feb. 7 that he is seeking the office.


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A 22-year-old bus conductor, Obinna Igwe, who pleaded guilty to extorting money from members of the public at cutlass-point, was remanded at the Kirikiri Correctional Centre in Lagos, on Monday.

An Ikeja Magistrates Court, which gave the ruling, said that the defendant should remain behind bars pending review of the facts of the case and sentencing.

Mr Igwe had pleaded guilty to a three-count charge of conspiracy, breach of peace and unlawful possession of dangerous weapons.

Magistrate A.S. Odusanya remanded him until February 23.

According to the prosecutor, Emmanuel Ajayi, the defendant and others still at large committed the offences on January 23 on Awolowo Way, Ikeja.

He said the defendant conducted himself in a manner likely to cause a breach of peace by using cutlass to harass and extort members of the public.

The defendant and his gang members always come to the garage with dangerous weapons to extort money from motorists, traders and passengers, among others.

They always threatened to kill anyone who refused to comply.

On that fateful day, the defendant with his group members came as usual but policemen, who have been receiving calls from members of the public about the activities of the defendant, stormed the scene.

ALSO READ: Four police officers on trial for extorting teenager

The defendant was arrested while others escaped; a cutlass was recovered from him.

The alleged offences contravene Sections 168, 330 and 411 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2015.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Section 330 provides for seven years imprisonment for unlawful possession of dangerous weapons while Section 411 prescribes two years of jail term for conspiracy.

(NAN)
Couples who conceive through IVF or surrogacy can find themselves in legal limbo, with no parental rights, despite new laws that came into effect last year, writes Aine Kenny

Couples in Ireland who conceived through IVF and surrogacy fear that they may never be legally recognised as their children's parents, due to a gap in legislation.

New laws on the issue were passed in 2020, however, the new law does not encompass all couples, according to campaigners.

Also in today's Special Feature:

'It's about allowing children to have a legal relationship with both their parents' - Gearoid Kenny and his husband Seamus Moore live in Dublin with their twins who were conceived through surrogacy at an IVF clinic in London as Irish fertility clinics felt they could be legally exposed with the use of egg donations

- Gearoid Kenny and his husband Seamus Moore live in Dublin with their twins who were conceived through surrogacy at an IVF clinic in London as Irish fertility clinics felt they could be legally exposed with the use of egg donations Legal lacuna: Law was never designed for surrogacy - Dr Andrea Mulligan, assistant professor at Trinity's law school, says there is no law in Ireland governing surrogacy.

- Dr Andrea Mulligan, assistant professor at Trinity's law school, says there is no law in Ireland governing surrogacy. How the law in Ireland currently stands

This new law, the Children and Families Relationship Act (2015) provided a legal framework for registering the births of children who are born through IVF, where the birth mother is an intending parent.

The act also allows the intending and birth mother to name their spouse, civil partner or cohabitant as the second parent of the child.

However, this law doesn't have any provision for surrogacy, where the woman who gives birth is not the intending parent.

Many people also go abroad to get IVF as it is significantly cheaper, but this new law doesn't recognise their parentage.

The fight is not just a symbolic one.

The parents who are not on their child's birth certificate or who can't get guardianship technically do not have the right to vaccinate their children or take them on a foreign holiday.

A campaign called Equality for Children is trying to bring attention to the issue.

The issue affects straight and lesbian couples who use IVF abroad or use surrogacy abroad and at home.

Gay couples will always be affected, as they will have to use surrogacy in order to have children.

However, because it only affects a minority, it is not seen as a big-ticket election issue, according to campaigners.

Meanwhile, families are left floundering.

Ranae Von Meding and her wife, Audrey, with their two children, Ava, 4, and Arya who is almost 2.

Ranae von Meding, head of the Equality for Children campaign, says pre-marriage equality, there was no way gay parents could become the legal parents of children.

"It had to be a mother and father," she said.

However, once marriage equality was gained in 2015, legislation was brought forward to try and rectify the issue.

"They rushed through the Children and Families Relationship Act, which had a very narrow criteria for parental rights.

"They didn't look at surrogacy at all, or conception outside of an Irish fertility clinic."

This bill enabled couples who used an Irish fertility clinic and a traceable sperm donor to be named as parents. It also allowed female same sex couples who undertake reciprocal IVF to became joint legal parents.

"It was a step forward, that bill passed in 2015 but wasn't commenced until May of this year," says Ranae. This meant families were waiting five years for legislation.

Many families fall outside this law, leaving parents in a precarious legal situation.

"If you decide to go to an IVF clinic abroad because it's cheaper, or if your child is born abroad, or if you choose to conceive at home, there is no provision for both parents to become legal parents."

Only traceable sperm donations are accepted under the legislation. In the 90s and early noughties, only anonymous sperm donation was allowed in Ireland, however the converse is now true.

There is a stay in the law, whereby anyone who meets the other criteria but used anonymous sperm donation prior to the bill being commenced can still apply to be legal parents.

However, if people received IVF abroad and/or used an anonymous sperm donation after the bill was enacted, they will not be able to apply for parentage.

Ranae is in this precarious legal situation herself, but is hopeful it will be resolved soon.

Four-year-old Ava plays with little sister Arya.

She has two children with her wife, Audrey, a four-year-old girl called Ava and a two-year-old called Arya. The children were conceived through reciprocal IVF in a clinic in Spain.

"I'm considered their only legal parent, as I gave birth.

"My wife is actually their biological parent, we used her eggs and donor sperm, and I carried the babies.

They are her biological children but since they were born she's been a legal stranger to them.

Thankfully, Audrey should be able to become a legal parent of their children, under the Children and Families Relationship Act 2015, which passed last May.

They are waiting on a court date in order for Audrey to get a declaration of parentage.

Ranae says they had to fight for five years to get this far.

If I die today, my wife would not have automatic guardianship over the children.

Ranae adds that there are many other parents who don't fall under this new legislation.

There are a few measures these parents can put in place.

"You can apply for emergency guardianship, if your partner is incapacitated or in a coma. The legal parent can also put it in their will that their wish is for the children to stay with their partner, this is called testamentary guardianship."

However, a guardian does not have the same rights as a parent. Ranae says once the child turns 18, the legal relationship is severed, meaning children will not have a say in a parent's end of life care.

Inheritance can also be an issue, as can citizenship, which is as often granted based on the parent's place of birth.

It is also not possible for parents to use adoption as a solution. While gay parents can adopt a child under normal circumstances, they cannot apply to 'adopt' their own children conceived through IVF and a donor egg or sperm, as there is no provision for this under Irish law.

"The Adoption Authority has refused to process these types of adoptions. They don't have the framework.

"In other adoptions, there is a birth family who give up the child for adoption, and an adopted family.

"In our case, we aren't giving up our children for adoption, because we are the birth family. Legislation is needed."

She says children are being discriminated against simply because they have LGBTQ parents, as they have to use some form of IVF.

Ranae also adds that children of straight couples who use IVF abroad or surrogacy are also affected.

'It's about allowing children to have a legal relationship with both their parents'

Gearoid Kenny and his husband Seamus Moore are in a similarly precarious legal situation. They live in north Dublin with their twins, Mary and Sean, who were conceived through surrogacy at an IVF clinic in London.

Gearoid Kenny and Seamus Moore.

The couple had to go to England, as Irish fertility clinics were unwilling to use egg donations as they felt the legislation was not yet in place, and they could be legally exposed.

"Our children were created through an egg donation. A friend of mine from London carried our babies, but has no biological connection to them, and doesn't want to have any parental responsibility."

Seamus is the biological father of both Sean and Mary, and he is their legal guardian due to UK law. Had the twins been born in Ireland, Seamus would only have become their guardian if the surrogate allowed him to, by signing a legal document.

"But guardianship is not the same as parentage," Gearoid says.

Meanwhile, Gearoid has no legal relationship with his children and their surrogate will be held legally responsible for the children if anything happens to Seamus.

Gearoid adds that while there is a narrow group of LGBT people who can be named as parents, this does not include his family, and straight couples who avail of IVF abroad and surrogacy are in the same predicament.

The lack of parental rights does have ramifications, he says.

Technically, you don't have the right to bring the child to the hospital, or bring them to a medical appointment or consent to medical procedures.

When Gearoid's children needed to be vaccinated, only their biological dad could sign the forms and attend the vaccination.

"When the children were born, we were very honest with our doctor and said 'we didn't give birth to them'," Gearoid says.

"We told him very clearly who is the dad. He was very supportive, but there were times when the biological dad had to present for vaccinations.

"Another time, Mary was getting a scan as they were worried she had heart murmur. Thankfully it turned out to be nothing, but we were told the biological father had to be present in the event any procedures had to take place.

"If you travel abroad, it is only the biological parent who can bring the children out of the country legally. If the other parent wants to do that they have to get a signed letter from the biological parent saying they can do this."

Only the biological parent can register the child for school.

Now that the twins are two, Gearoid can apply to become their guardian. The couple are in the process of submitting this application, but he still won't be their legal parent.

"The next thing the Government plans to do is introduce a piece of legislation called the Assisted Human Reproductive Act," Gearoid says. He met with Simon Harris when he was minister for health in relation to advancing this bill.

"He said under the draft legislation, what they will do potentially is allow surrogacy arrangements to be formalised in the future, but not retrospectively."

This means he won't be covered under the new legislation.

Not an election issue

Gearoid doesn't think it will become an election issue, as it only affects a small minority of people, so there's not much political will to solve it.

He adds that there is not much trust placed on LGBTQ couples, even for the same sex female couples who can apply for parental rights.

"They must go to court, gather vast amounts of paperwork, documents, get proof from the IVF clinic that they used... there is a certain inherent distrust, maybe even homophobia, at the bureaucratic level."

Seamus, as the biological father of both children, can get a declaration of parentage, as currently he is only their guardian. However, to do this would be quite onerous.

"That costs 15,000, as you have to get a barrister to do it. Also, despite having letters from the IVF clinic saying he was the sperm donor, he would still have to go through another parental test to ensure what he is saying is true, and all of his brothers would be required to submit a sperm sample, to rule out the possibility that they might be the father."

Read More Progressive New Child and Family Laws, but Some Families are Left Behind

However, despite these legal challenges, Gearoid says having children was one of the best things that ever happened to him. He is a stay at home dad and looks after the kids full-time.

He says other countries can put forward legislation to solve this problem, so Ireland should be able to do the same.

"Really it's about allowing children to have a legal relationship with both their parents. I don't ever see a situation where I am recognised as the legal father to both my children."

Legal lacuna: Law was never designed for surrogacy

Dr Andrea Mulligan, assistant professor at Trinity's law school, says there is no law in Ireland governing surrogacy.

"There was one case on surrogacy, and a written judgment from the supreme court in 2014. There was a really famous statement from Judge Adrian Hardiman.

He said that Irish law and surrogacy was as if the Road Traffic Act didn't reflect the invention of the motorcar.

Dr Mulligan says the only way solicitors can use the law to establish parental rights is when the surrogacy can be fitted into the pre-existing law.

"It's never a law designed for surrogacy."

Currently, genetic fathers whose children are conceived through surrogacy can apply for parentage and then guardianship.

However, Dr Mulligan says the same is not true for genetic mothers who don't carry the child.

Intended mothers, even if there's a genetic connection, have no way of becoming a legal parent.

She says the Children and Family Relationships Act 2015, which was enacted in 2020, covers parentage in donor assisted reproduction in Ireland, which has helped some couples including same sex female couples who undertake reciprocal IVF, but not those who use surrogacy.

Dr Andrea Mulligan says there is currently no law governing surrogacy in Ireland.

Dr Mulligan adds that there was a general scheme of a surrogacy bill published in 2017 (the Assisted Human Reproduction Bill), but it has not been progressed yet.

She says there needs to be more regulation of surrogacy in general. Currently in Ireland, IVF and surrogacy is commercialised and privatised.

Due to how expensive it is, many couples choose to go abroad. However, Dr Mulligan says it would be very difficult for the Irish State to regulate things that happen outside of the country, which is why laws that govern assisted reproduction in Ireland may not address IVF or surrogacy abroad.

"Donors have to be identifiable in Ireland, to vindicate the child's right to identity," she said.

Dr Mulligan says that in other countries, there can be ethical concerns. "There can be exploitation of surrogates, or a situation where the child can never contact the donor, or know anything about their background."

She believes IVF should be available to couples on the public health system, to stop them having to travel abroad in search of more affordable services.

Dr Mulligan also adds that legislation is vital, in order to ensure IVF and surrogacy is properly regulated in Ireland.

"The new law regulating surrogacy proposes the establishment of a new, independent regulatory authority to regulate the industry," she said.

She adds that because the industry in Ireland is largely private, there is a lack of information on how many couples are availing of their services, as well as how many people are going abroad.

Department's response

In response to this issue, the Department of Health, which governs this area, said in a statement: "The Children and Family Relationships Act 2015 was enacted to modernise family law."

"The Department of Health has responsibility for parts two and three of the Act, which commenced on May 4, 2020. These provisions provide a legal framework for registering the births of children who are born as a result of assisted human reproduction involving donated eggs, sperm, or embryos, and where the birth mother is an intending parent.

"Parts two and three also requires records to be kept in relation to the identity of donors and prohibits the use of anonymous gametes or embryos, subject to some exceptions."

The Department said these provisions apply to heterosexual couples, female same-sex couples, single women and to female same sex couples who undertake reciprocal IVF.

The act also allows the intending and birth mother of a donor-conceived child to name their spouse, civil partner or cohabitant as the second parent of the child, subject to the consent of both parties.

"A parent under this section shall have all parental rights and duties in respect of the child. The donor of a gamete or embryo shall not be a parent of that child and shall have no parental rights or duties."

The Department added that the provisions of the act only apply to donor assisted procedures undertaken in Ireland, and does not encompass surrogacy.

However, another bill, called the Assisted Human Reproduction Bill, is intended to cover more ground.

"The General Scheme of this bill will make provision for non-commercial surrogacy in Ireland, and heterosexual couples, female and male same-sex couples and single people can avail of these arrangements if they meet the criteria set out in the legislation.

"The scheme also sets out a court-based mechanism through which the parentage of a child born through surrogacy may be transferred from the surrogate (and her husband, if applicable) to the intending parent(s)."

How the law stands

Under Irish law, the woman who gives birth to the child is their legal mother, even if they do not bear any biological relationship to the child and were a surrogate.

Civil partnerships for same-sex couples was introduced in January 2011, under the Civil Partnership and Certain Rights and Obligations of Cohabitants Act 2010.

In May 2015, a referendum on the issue of marriage equality was held. 62.07% of people voted yes and 37.93% voted no to marriage equality.

The Marriage Act 2015 was commenced in November of the same year, making marriage between same sex couples legal. Since this Act, gay couples in Ireland can't register a civil partnership, and couples already in a civil partnership can apply to marry, or remain as they are. If they marry, their civil partnership is automatically dissolved.

The Children and Family Relationships Act from 2015 had provisions for allowing same-sex couples to adopt children, to apply for guardianship of children related to their partner if they have been co-parenting for two years, as well as giving female same sex couples the ability to obtain parental recognition in assisted reproduction methods, subject to certain criteria. It did not encompass surrogacy.

The Adoption (Amendment) Act 2017 was signed into law in 2017, which commenced the provision allowing gay couples to adopt from the 2015 act.

The parts of the Children and Family Relationships Act from 2015 which concerned IVF and female same sex couples was enacted in May 2020.
JERUSALEM (AP)  After surging ahead in the race to vaccinate its population against the coronavirus, Israel is blaming online misinformation for a sudden slowdown in the campaign. Now, officials are fighting back.

Israel's Health Ministry, which is spearheading the vaccination efforts, is employing both warnings and incentives as it tries to persuade reluctant holdouts to get immunized. It has beefed up a digital task force to counter spurious claims about the vaccines, while local governments are turning to DJs and free food to lure people to vaccination centers. Concerts and museums could soon be off limits to the unvaccinated.

Decide whether you are part of the celebration or whether you will be left behind, Health Minister Yuli Edelstein declared on Twitter. Just lend a shoulder to the vaccine.

Since launching its COVID-19 vaccine campaign in December, over a quarter of the population  2.5 million people  has received both doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, according to the Health Ministry. Over 42% have received the first shot.

The vaccination rates are among the highest in the world, and many countries are looking at the Israeli experience to understand what may lie ahead in the future.

But in a cause for concern, Israel has seen a drop in immunization rates since making the vaccine available to everyone over the age of 16 this month. In February, Israel averaged just over 106,000 vaccinations per day, down from January's daily average of more than 127,000 per day, according to Health Ministry statistics.

The reluctance of some groups in the population to get vaccinated is a key reason why infection rates remain high.

Israel, a country of 9.3 million people, has reported over 5,000 new cases each day over the past week, according to the ministry. In all, the country has recorded over 723,000 cases of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic and nearly 5,400 deaths  over 20% of them in the past month.

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Last week Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has pinned his reelection hopes on the vaccination campaign, said the only obstacle to completing the task was the fake news and the superstitious and sometimes malicious beliefs that are planted in the public and on the internet.

The Health Ministry has reportedly invested millions of dollars in its efforts to educate the public.

The task has been complicated because different segments of society have resisted vaccination calls for different reasons.

In the case of the ultra-Orthodox, some influential religious leaders have called on their followers not be immunized. Meanwhile, Israel's Arab minority tends to suffer from a lack of trust in the Jewish leadership. And younger Israelis often think they can't get seriously ill.

Einav Shimron, the Health Ministry's deputy director for international relations, said the ministry is working with physicians and religious leaders to counter misinformation, such as claims that the vaccine can cause infertility.

The ministry manages a command center with 11 trackers who monitor social media activity for anti-vaccination posts in Hebrew, Russian, Amharic, Arabic and English on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Telegram. The center is adding more staffers in the coming days.

The undertaking is akin to whack-a-mole for conspiracy theories.

Shimron said center alerts the Justice Ministry to any misinformation, and the ministry immediately presses the social media networks to remove the false claims. There are several times we even called the police" on grounds that the false claims are a public health risk, she said.

In the ultra-Orthodox community, where internet use is low, the response is often more low tech. Anti-vaccination rabbis have posted false claims on posters  known as pashkevils  commonly used to spread messages among the faithful. The ministry is countering with pashkevils of its own.

Rabbi Yuval Hacohen Asherov, a popular Jewish preacher with an online following who has stated that germs do not cause diseases, has posted numerous anti-vaccine videos with hundreds of thousands of views. A recent video falsely claimed the COVID-19 vaccine caused death.

Why run? Why vaccinate now? Lets do it in another half a year  maybe. Lets see what happens, Ashrov said. Why should the Swiss and Chinese use us as guinea pigs to see what happens?"

The Health Ministry has asked the Justice Ministry to try to get Asherovs videos pulled from YouTube and said that he endangers the public."

Asherov declined requests for comment. It was not clear if YouTube has been formally approached.

But Avishai Matia, another anti-vaccine activist, said his Facebook and Twitter accounts with thousands of followers were suspended this month in what he called a violent reaction by the technology giants in cooperation with the WHO and other groups.

Matia has wrongly claimed the Pfizer vaccine is an experimental drug that is being tested on Israeli citizens.

In fact, it has been granted approval for emergency use in the U.S. and Europe. In exchange for getting sufficient quantities for its population, Israel has agreed to share data with Pfizer, though it is not conducting any experiments.

Facebook did not respond to requests for comment about its collaboration with Israeli authorities.

At the same time, authorities are devising incentives for people to get the jab. The Health and Culture ministries said Sunday that museums, libraries, concert venues and other cultural events will reopen later this month  but only to those who have been fully immunized.

The Health Ministry is also enlisting dozens of Israeli social media influencers to promote immunization in concert with its own online video campaign.

One new message released on Valentine's Day showed a man presenting his girlfriend with a small box appearing to contain an engagement ring. Will you get vaccinated with me? he asks, as she opens the box to find a vaccine vial.

The ultra-Orthodox town of Bnei Brak has tried to encourage immunization by serving free cholent  a hearty stew  to residents who turn up for a vaccine. A municipal spokesman said Thursdays Operation Cholent brought in three times the typical number of recipients.

Holon, a Tel Aviv suburb, has enlisted the help of DJs and a party atmosphere to draw over-16s to receive immunizations. Ministry figures show Israelis between 16-30 have been vaccinated at levels far below the national average.

For many young and middle-aged Israelis, however, the availability of coronavirus vaccines has been enough of an incentive to line up.

At an immunization center in Tel Aviv, Moran Keret, 44, said that a friend convinced her to go. The corona is not going away. So if its not disappearing, Im here.

Yahoo Life 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.

Wake up on the right side of the bed with sheets you deserve. (Photo: Getty Images)

Shopping for the perfect set of bed sheets can be hit or miss  usually a miss: The affordable ones feel like scratchy tissue paper, and good quality sheets are nearly the same price as a car down payment.

Thankfully, these 1000-thread count luxury sheets have garnered over 4,000 rave reviews on Amazonand today only, theyre a whopping 40 percent off! Originally $120, theyre only $75 for Presidents' Day.

Reviewers love the feel of the Egyptian cotton. One fan raves, I can say they are the best and most comfortable sheets we have ever had. I highly recommend these sheets and, as needed, we'll purchase them again.

When it comes to sheets, pure Egyptian cotton is considered to be the bestits long fibers are spun into extra-fine yarns, which are then woven into a super-soft, long-lasting fabric. And this sets high thread count makes for a tighter and more reliable weavethe higher the thread count, the smoother and more durable the sheet.

Crisp and comfy. (Photo: Amazon)

Another reviewer says: These are the most incredible sheets I have ever slept on. Extremely soft, luxurious feel on the skin, and the color matches perfectly with my comforter set, so win win. Great value, dealing with the seller was easy, and the product arrived on time. Great buying experience, and I will definitely be a return customer. Cannot recommend these sheets enough!!!

After looking for years for sheets to replace our excellent quality sheets that are just too old, I bought these, one five-star reviewer wrote. They are heavy enough (not tissue-thin like so many other sets I tried) but not scratchy or hot. I washed them before putting them on the bed, following the directions on the package. The color (gray) remained strong and looks great. Planning to buy more in the near future!

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Made of a luscious sateen weave and available in 20 colors, these anti-pilling sheets are perfect for pillow tops, as they have deep pockets and fit mattresses up to 18 inches thick. Sweet dreams!

These sheets are sooo soft. (Photo: Amazon)

Shop it: Thread Spread True Luxury 1000-Thread-Count 100% Egyptian Cotton Bed Sheets Set, $54 for Queen (was $90), amazon.com

The reviews quoted above reflect the most recent versions at the time of publication.

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Bengaluru, Feb 16 : Even as the scenario post arrest of 22-year-old Bengaluru based climate change activist Disha Ravi is evolving elsewhere in the country, a full-blown twitter war has erupted in Karnataka between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the opposition Congress party.

Coming out in support of Ravi, Karnataka Congress launched #DishaRaviArrested Twitter campaign, as Leader of the Opposition Siddarmaiah said that her arrest has exposed the cracks in the Indian democracy under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

He wondered how can the act of supporting farmers be charged under sedition? "I strongly condemn this politically motivated act by Delhi Police," he said in his tweet.

In his twitter, former minister Priyank Kharge charged that this country is becoming a joke. "Why is the establishment targeting kids? How come they have not bothered asking questions on how a news editor gets prior information on #PulwamaTerrorAttack," he said.

AICC Tamil Nadu in-charge Dinesh Gundu Rao in his tweet said, "Disha Ravi arrested. Two more activists in Mumbai fear arrest. Can't believe what is happening to #India." "Farmers are terrorists, journalists are anti-nationals, activists are seditious, Opposition are 'desh drohis' (anti-national) and students are traitors. Under BJP, India has changed," he said.

While All India Mahila Congress general secretary Sowmya Reddy in her three-part tweet quipped that arresting climate activist @climatedisha for editing an online document. Wah Modi ji wah, too much of democracy?! She added that this is a clear message that the @BJP4India led Central government will send anyone to jail who dissents and will be punished even if you are a 21-year-old climate activist/animal lover.

"Students and activists peacefully protested today at the police station. Students, it's time to speak up at least now. Terrorists are free and activists are in jail? This is the promised #Achhedin, dear youth!," she tweeted.

In a strong rebuttal to Congress' campaign, the BJP national general secretary B.L. Santhosh said in his tweet that as the great drama of #Toolkit unfolds many anarchists who are rallying behind #DishaRavi as a 21-year-old, sole breadwinner, daughter of a single mother, climate change activist will run for cover. "WhatsApp groups, editing options, conversations will unravel many characters," he said.

Karnataka BJP termed that Greta Thunberg's toolkit was nothing but a tool to create instability in the country. "Disha Ravi has confessed with the Delhi police that she too had a role in preparing that toolkit. Is Congress supporting terrorists?," the Karnataka BJP questioned.

Union Parliamentary Affairs and Coal Minister Prahlad Joshi tweeted that the only thing that this arrest has exposed is @INCIndia's poor planning to keep this anti-India conspiracy a secret.

"If you had thought about farmers half as much as you claim their condition in the State would have been different. Wake up @siddaramaiah ji, the nation already has," he sarcastically said in his tweet.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Ukraine and the United Arab Emirates have signed memorandums and contracts worth $3 billion or more, the presidential press service said.

"As part of the official visit of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to the United Arab Emirates, the Ukrainian delegation signed a number of memorandums and contracts totaling $3 billion or more," the press service said in the statement.

In particular, memorandums of understanding were signed between the State Property Fund of Ukraine and the Mubadala investment company. They are aimed at deepening cooperation in the development of promising investment projects and the participation of the Emirate side in the program of privatization of state-owned property in Ukraine.

"At all international meetings, I urge to invest in Ukraine. Our state has enormous potential: geopolitical position, natural resources, people of knowledge. Right now is the time to understand this potential and create a strong economy," Zelensky said.

He said that attracting investment is the key to Ukraine's economic growth. "The signing of a memorandum with the Mubadala investment company of the government of Abu Dhabi on intentions to invest in Ukraine is a very important step in opening the way for major investments in Ukraine from Western Asia," Zelensky said.

In addition, the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine signed a memorandum with INTELMAX Management Consulting, which provides for cooperation on the creation of a platform for the exchange of intellectual property based on the Fantom blockchain, which will provide increased security and transparency. It is also planned to introduce blockchain technologies into government processes and services.

The sides also signed documents in the defense sector, discussing the possibility of constructing joint factories outside Ukraine.

As the President's Office said, the possibility of opening a Ukrainian sovereign fund for joint investments is also being considered.

"Along with this, some 18 Ukrainian private companies, including Interpipe, Dragon Capital, DTEK, Unit City, EastOne, UMG, Ufuture, Fortior, signed memorandums with the Mubadala state investment fund," the President's Office said.
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Medical research charity, LifeArc, announces today that it is providing 5 million funding to support the work of the GenOMICC COVID-19 Study, led by the GenOMICC consortium in partnership with Genomics England. The study, launched in May 2020, is using genomics to investigate why some people are affected more severely by COVID-19, and increase our understanding about the disease.

GenOMICC is a global collaboration of doctors and scientists working together to understand and treat serious illnesses, including emerging infections like SARS, MERS and now COVID-19. The partnership with Genomics England was formed to enable large scale and rapid whole genome sequencing and analysis for NHS COVID-19 patients, leveraging Genomics England's sequencing and analysis ecosystem available to researchers.

LifeArc's funding complements 4.6 million of additional funding already announced by the UK Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), and will support the costs of patient enrolment, sample acquisition, sample processing, and bioinformatics analysis of patients.

The aim is that, with a patient cohort and data set of this size, scientists will be able compare the genomes of people who had severe illness with those who had more manageable symptoms, to try to identify genetic factors associated with the body's reaction to the virus.

It is anticipated that the output from this work will provide valuable insights into the fight against COVID-19 and potentially other coronavirus infections. This is the first time that a systematic whole genome analysis of patients of a viral pandemic has been undertaken and it is hoped that this may also provide therapeutic and preventative strategies for future pandemics.

Chris Wigley, CEO at Genomics England, said:

At Genomics England, we are proud to be working with the NHS, the University of Edinburgh and other partners in the fight against COVID-19, to understand why people respond so differently to this terrible infection. Genomics is already giving us critical insights, as the partnership's recent Nature paper and many others have shown. LifeArc's support will allow us to accelerate and scale these insights and continue to feed them into clinical trials, clinical practice and fundamental research."

Melanie Lee, Chief Executive Officer at LifeArc, said: "At LifeArc we focus on translation - advancing promising science into medical interventions that improve patients' lives. This initiative moves us forwards to better understand the heterogeneity of responses to COVID amongst people, considering that genetic variation may play a key differentiating and therefore predictable role. "

It is hoped that this programme will provide rapid insights that can inform accurate diagnostics, and potential targets for drug development. We hope this work will also help inform the 15 clinical studies that we have funded into investigating existing drugs for efficacy in COVID patients, as part of the 27 million LifeArc has now allocated to research projects to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic."

Dr Kenneth Baillie, Chief Investigator of the study and Academic Consultant in Critical Care Medicine, University of Edinburgh, said:
A Buddhist monk holding a sign stands next to an armoured vehicle during a protest against the military coup, in Yangon, Myanmar, February 14, 2021. Photo: REUTERS

Security forces in Myanmar opened fire to disperse protesters at a power plant yesterday and armoured vehicles rolled into major cities as the new army rulers faced a ninth day of anti-coup demonstrations that saw hundreds of thousands on the streets.

Soldiers were deployed to power plants in the northern state of Kachin, leading to a confrontation with demonstrators, some of whom said they believed the army intended to cut off the electricity.

The security forces fired to disperse protesters at one plant in the city of Myitkyina, footage broadcast live on Facebook showed, although it was not clear if they were using rubber bullets or live fire.

As evening fell, armoured vehicles appeared in the commercial capital of Yangon, Myitkyina and Sittwe, the capital of Rakhine state, live footage broadcast online by local media showed, the first large-scale roll-out of such vehicles across the country since the February 1 coup.

The government and army could not be reached for comment.

The US embassy in Myanmar urged American citizens to shelter in place.

As well as the mass protests across Myanmar, the countrys military rulers were faced with a strike by government workers, part of a civil disobedience movement to protest against the coup that deposed the civilian government led by Aung San Suu Kyi.

Trains in parts of the country stopped running after staff refused to go to work, local media reported.

The junta ordered civil servants to go back to work, threatening action. The army has been carrying out nightly mass arrests and on Saturday gave itself new powers to detain people and search private property.

But hundreds of railway workers joined demonstrations in Yangon yesterday, even as police went to their housing compound to order them back to work. The police were forced to leave after angry crowds gathered, according to a live broadcast by Myanmar Now.

Richard Horsey, analyst with the International Crisis Group, said the work of many government departments had effectively ground to a halt.

This has the potential to also affect vital functions. The military can replace engineers and doctors, but not power grid controllers and central bankers, he said.

Hundreds of thousands of people protested across the nation as residents formed patrols. Many of the protesters held up images of deposed leader Ms Suu Kyi.






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A Singaporean activist was jailed for three weeks Monday after pleading guilty to holding a small protest aboard a metro train against the controversial 1980s arrest of alleged communists.

The tightly controlled city-state has tough laws against dissent that make it illegal for even one person to hold a demonstration without a police permit.

Jolovan Wham -- who has had numerous run-ins with authorities -- and a group of fellow activists staged a protest aboard the train in June 2017.

They were demanding "justice" for a group of 22 people arrested in 1987 under tough laws that allow for detention without trial.

The group was accused of being part of an alleged communist plot to overthrow the government.

While the government insists the arrests were aimed at stopping a Marxist plot, critics say they were politically motivated.

Wham was also charged with vandalism for pasting notices on the train's window, and with refusing to sign a police statement related to the protest.

He pleaded guilty to all three charges, and was ordered to pay Sg$8,000 (US$6,049), or serve 32 days in jail. He chose to pay part of the fine and serve 22 days in jail.

The judge described Wham as a "repeat offender".

He served a 10-day jail sentence last year for organising an event in 2016 that featured prominent Hong Kong democracy campaigner Joshua Wong, speaking via Skype.

Wham, 40, told the court: "I am not ashamed of what I have done... I believe my conscience is still clear".

Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch, criticised Singapore authorities for "pursuing an arbitrary, discriminatory, and vindictive campaign against" Wham.

mba/sr/fox
(Newser)  Even as they continue to fight the coronavirus pandemic, health officials in Guinea have declared an epidemic on Ebola. The numbers so far are small: After a nurse died of the disease in late January, seven people who attended her funeral have since been diagnosed, reports NPR. Three of them have died. The government reassures the people that all measures are being taken to curb this epidemic as quickly as possible, said an online post over the weekend from Guineas Health Ministry. A big reason for the concern is that the outbreak occurred in the same rural region where a devastating 2014-16 epidemic also began, notes the New York Times. Staff from the World Health Organization already are on the ground in Guinea, hoping to avoid a repeat of the 2014-16 spread to neighboring Liberia and Sierra Leone.

story continues below

Before that earlier outbreak was contained, it spread to 10 nations and killed more than 11,000 people. As these new cases illustrate, funerals can serve as spreaders of the disease because the bodies of those infected are "particularly toxic," per the BBC. And it might take up to three weeks for symptoms to show. However, two reasons for optimism surround this new outbreak: It was discovered far earlier than the previous one, and vaccines have since been developed to combat the virus once it surfaces. Those should be arriving within days, per the Times. Meanwhile, two unrelated cases recently sprung up elsewhere in Africa, in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The fight in Guinea comes as the nation of 13 million has reported about 15,000 cases of COVID and 85 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins stats. (Read more Ebola stories.)
In his half-century at the New Orleans Museum of Art, William Fagaly built its collection of African art and worked with artists from all over the world.

But theres one attribute for which the retired curator probably is best known: his laugh, a loud explosion of joy that his former boss, E. John Bullard, calls the best laugh in creation.

Fagaly, 82, a good-humored man, owns up to this distinctive characteristic in The Nightcrawler King: Memoirs of an Art Museum Curator (University Press of Mississippi, $28):

People often say to me, Oh, the other night at that party, I didnt see you, but I knew you were there. I heard your laugh. You know, if Im going to be known for something, Im glad mine is a laugh!

But Fagalys 353-page book shows theres much more to him than gleeful outbursts. Besides increasing the museums African art holdings from two pieces to several hundred, he was on hand when the museum in City Park morphed into a renowned, vastly expanded institution that has not only showcased local talent but also hosted blockbuster traveling exhibits like The Treasures of Tutankhamen, which drew 870,594 visitors from September 1977 through January 1978.

That four-month experience, which let the world know that the New Orleans museum could accommodate shows that would attract crowds, was mind-blowing, Fagaly said in a recent interview in his French Quarter house.

Because the museum was short-staffed, he and every other curator had to report at 6 a.m. one day each week to sweep the floor and polish the plexiglass exhibit cases to prepare for that days horde.

Fagalys duties also included imposing order on the crowds that had shown up, before dawn, outside the museum, forming a queue that went down one side of Lelong Avenue and up the other and, sometimes, trailed across a nearby bridge.

The whole thing was a phenomenon, he said. I knew why it was popular  I knew why these were great works of art  but the magnetism of King Tut was just overwhelming.

In addition to encountering art, Fagaly has met and befriended a long list of artists and celebrities. He had drinks with the surrealist Salvador Dali, spent a morning with the legendary artist Georgia OKeeffe at her New Mexico ranch, escorted Linda Ronstadt and Ginger Rogers (separately) through the Tut exhibit, and took Kitty Carlisle Hart to dinner at the Pontchartrain Hotel, where the New Orleans-born entertainer was the object of all eyes when she swept into the Caribbean Room in a blue taffeta evening gown.

He drops more names and discusses more encounters in his book, and he acts as if it were perfectly normal to be dining with the pianist James Booker or showing off a crime scene to the wide-eyed pop artist Andy Warhol.

Ive always been an artist groupie, Fagaly said matter-of-factly. I love art, and I love people. Im an art person, and Im a people person.

He delivered those pronouncements as he sat on a chair in a corner of his house, surrounded by piles of books on every horizontal surface. Dozens of pieces of African art loomed over him. Nestled between two stacks of books atop a nearby table was a salute to Fagalys work in his chosen field: the badge proclaiming him a Chevalier of the French Legion of Honor.

Its a long way from his childhood in rural Indiana, which, among other things, provided him with the title for his book.

I became known as the nightcrawler king in Dearborn County, Indiana, because my nightcrawlers for fishing were the best in the county, he said. Mine came from Canada, where they have very good nightcrawlers, and so mine were better than anybody elses.

As an art history major at Indiana University, Fagaly studied under Roy Sieber, who, Fagaly said, was the first trained historian of African art in the United States.

The subject intrigued him, and after earning bachelors and masters degrees, Fagaly went looking for work. When he got to New Orleans in 1966, interviewing at what was then the Isaac Delgado Museum of Art, he realized he had found not only a good job but also a home.

First of all, I fell in love with the city, he said. I just adore all aspects of it.  The other reason was that African art which wasnt recognized by very many museums in the United States at that point.  I thought, well, what better place for me to try to establish an African art collection in a city that is majority African-American population? 

He really blossomed here, the New Orleans artist Dawn DeDeaux said. He came into his own.  The space here allowed him to bloom.

He expanded his interests to include self-taught artists, most notably Sister Gertrude Morgan, a street preacher who became an artist and poet. By the time she died in 1980, she had won acclaim for her folk-art paintings, most of which were religion-oriented.

In 2004, Fagaly, who had become a friend, curated a retrospective of her work at the American Folk Art Museum in New York City. DeDeaux said it was one of his crowning achievements as a curator.

Fagalys rapport with Sister Gertrude and other contemporary artists made him invaluable as a curator, Bullard said.

He idolizes artists as creators and wants to know them and be friends with them, Bullard said. Many curators deal with art by dead artists, so they dont have that connection. Those who are focused on objects dont make good directors. Bill could have been a good museum director, but he loved working with the artists.  Hes a pretty amazing guy.
Crime has exploded in Minneapolis in the wake of the riots that destroyed a swath of the city when George Floyd died of a drug overdose in police custody. Incorrectly[i] blaming the police for murder, vengeful mobs demanded defunding the police, and Mayor Jacob Frey allowed a violent mob to sack and burn the Third Precinct Station, which unleashed days and nights of looting, arson, and violence.

The City Council reacted stupidly, with some calling for complete dismantling of the Police Department, and City Councilor Lisa Bender gaining worldwide fame and the kind of immortality that attaches to idiocy of a high level by claiming that calling the police when an intruder breaks in comes from a place of privilege. On CNN:

CAMEROTA: Do you understand that the word, dismantle, or police-free also makes some people nervous, for instance? What if in the middle of night, my home is broken into? Who do I call?



BENDER: Yes, I mean, hear that loud and clear from a lot of my neighbors. And I know -- and myself, too, and I know that that comes from a place of privilege. Because for those of us for whom the system is working, I think we need to step back and imagine what it would feel like to already live in that reality where calling the police may mean more harm is done.

The Council voted to slash $8 million from the police budget, and large numbers of rank-and-file officers began taking early retirement and medical leave (some of it stress-related), leaving the city protected by only 638 cops, down from 876 on duty in 2019, a 27% decline in the force available to keep the peace.

With fewer cops protecting the citizenry and the city's politicians unsupportive, criminals took advantage. As the U.K. Daily Mail noted:

By the end of the year, police had recorded 532 gunshot victims, more than double the same period a year ago. Carjackings spiked to 375 by December, up 331 per cent from the same period last year. And violent crimes topped 5,100, compared with just over 4,000 for the same period in 2019.

City residents complained, and the City Council apparently heard them, voting unanimously to spend millions on recruiting more cops. Liz Navratil of the Star-Tribune reported two days ago:

Minneapolis will hire dozens more police officers after City Council on Friday agreed to release $6.4 million to bring on additional recruits. The unanimous vote came eight days after Minneapolis police requested the funding, saying they were down 200 police officers from recent years. The additional funding comes at a time when some City Council members and activist groups are pushing to replace the Police Department in the wake of George Floyd's death. Minneapolis police said they began the year with 817 officers on their payroll, 60 fewer than the prior year. But, only 638 officers are currently available to work, the department said. Some officers resigned or retired early in the year, while another 155 remain on some form of extended leave.

It should be noted that recruiting and training new employees is expensive, so the $6.4 million allocated may not pay for salaries and other personnel expenses for the slightly enlarged police force. According to Fox News:

With new recruit classes, the city anticipates it will have 674 officers available at the end of the year, with another 28 in the hiring process, the Star Tribune reported.

The 674-officer goal would still be only 77% of the force that protected the city a couple of years ago. Add in the other 28 the plan hopes will join the force, and it is still down almost 20% from the normal level of two years ago.

Then there is the question of what sort of cops will be hired. Michael Lee in the Washington Examiner:

In a bid to convince council members to approve to hire more officers, Mayor Jacob Frey and Police Chief Medaria Arradondo vowed to roll out an updated application process that would ask potential applicants whether they have degrees in criminology, social work, psychology, or counseling. The updated application would also ask whether prospects ever volunteered or participated in programs such as the Police Activities League.

How effective will such people be? John Hinderaker comments:

It occurs to me that the average police officer knows more about social work, psychology and counseling than most degree holders in those fields, but that is a topic for another day.

And the abolish the police faction is not yet done. Liz Navratil of the Star-Tribune:

Three City Council Members  Phillipe Cunningham, Steve Fletcher and Jeremy Schroeder  have written a proposal that would replace the Police Department with a public safety department that includes police and other services. It would also remove the mayor's "complete power" over city police operations. Yes 4 Minneapolis, a coalition of local community groups, is also collecting signatures to try to get a similar proposal on the November ballot.

The Daily Mail adds:

According to The Star Tribune, the Yes 4 Minneapolis committee is being fueled by a half-million dollar grant from the Washington, DC-based group Open Society Policy Center, which is associated with billionaire George Soros. Organizers hope to collect 20,000 signatures by March 31. 'We have a policing system that doesn't work for us and we need alternatives,' said Rachel Bean, who signed the petition Saturday. 'I'm a social worker and I feel like we have lots of tools that we could try to create more community safety.' The petition would remove police department language from the city's charter and create a public health-focused Department of Public Safety, 'including licensed peace officers if necessary to fulfill the responsibilities of the department'.
He says there are signs it may happen this spring.

Spokesman for the Ukrainian delegation to the Trilateral Contact Group (TCG) Oleksiy Arestovych says there is a new escalation in Donbas looming as the Kremlin will not give up its attempts to use force against Ukraine.

"I think it [further escalation in Donbas] is not just probable  it is almost inevitable, sooner or later. The Kremlin will not give up attempts to use force against us. I'm not going to give an exact date, although there are signs it may happen this spring, maybe closer to the summer," he told Ukraina 24 TV channel.

The Kremlin has not yet achieved its goal in eastern Ukraine, he said.

"And [why] is it inevitable  remember how it all began? Voices were heard that the president [Volodymyr Zelensky] and his team would surrender everything to the Kremlin. A year and a half passed, they have not surrendered anything," Arestovych said.

At the same time, he admits the negotiations on Donbas lack progress.

Read alsoDonbas war update: Ukraine records three ceasefire violations on Feb 14According to him, the Russian Federation makes everything dependent on the political provisions, while setting negotiations with terrorists' representatives as a main condition.

"But I am 100% sure Russia is preparing some kind of bad surprise, and anyway this will result in an escalation at the front. There are many scenarios, starting with the fact that they intensify the impact so that there are victims, so that alarmists start putting pressure on the leadership," he said.

Arestovych says he thinks Russia has already made up its mind on Donbas.

"No doubt it will go for escalation. We know all the means they have been using for the six years, [they] need to come up with something new," he added.

The situation in Donbas: Update

In recent days, the situation in the Joint Forces Operation (JFO) zone has escalated: Russia-led forces have intensively been attacking positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and enemy snipers are also active.

On Sunday, February 14, alone, three Ukrainian soldiers were killed in an explosion of an improvised explosive device.

Their death is being investigated by the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI).

Reporting by UNIAN
Amaravati/New Delhi, Feb 15 : Andhra BJP president Somu Veerraju on Monday met Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan along with other leaders of the party and submitted a memorandum seeking reconsideration of privatising the Vizag steel plant as it "pertains to the sentiments of the state ".

"People of Andhra Pradesh are opposing the privatisation of the steel plant. We have informed that their sentiments must be protected," said Veerraju.

He was accompanied by Daggubati Purandeshwari, Sunil Deodhar and others, as they apprised Pradhan of the alternatives available to protect the plant.

"We have requested the protection of steel plant employees' welfare," said the state BJP chief.

Meanwhile, Telugu Desam Party (TDP) leader Palla Srinivas Rao's indefinite fast to stop the plant's privatisation has entered the seventh day.

As Rao's health is deteriorating, TDP state president Kinjarapu Atchannaidu held an emergency meeting.

Atchannaidu informed that Rao suffered vomiting and this matter was discussed in the meeting.

"We have also decided to call the TDP national president N. Chandrababu Naidu on Tuesday to extend his support to Rao," said Atchannaidu.

I am a firm believer that anti-corruption compliance and social justice are synonymous with one another. And when we address the crimes of bribery and corruption, we have to ask; do bribery and corruption speak to the collective welfare of the state and, in turn, make an impact on social justice?

Rui Lopes, managing director, Lopes Attorneys

Anti-corruption compliance  an absolute necessity

Ignorance should not be bliss

Where does the anti-corruption compliance policy begin?

The current climate

Modern states around the world are required to gear their societies to advance the health and welfare of their citizens. Welfare touches on a broad spectrum of personal and public aspects of life. There can be no doubt that acts of bribery and corruption in a state, regardless of whether these offences happen in the public or private sector, are detrimental and have a domino effect on public welfare and social justice.States punish the offences of bribery and corruption because they are subversive to the democratic principles of public administration. And in the private sector, this has a considerable impact on the free-market economy.The importance of anti-corruption compliance cant be stressed enough. Companies are required to ensure that they have a robust and properly thought-out anti-corruption compliance programme that prevents bribery and corruption by employees at all levels.Organisations need to know that implementing an effective anti-corruption compliance programme is fast becoming the norm, and so it should be, especially in light of the scathing revelations coming out at the State Capture Commission of Inquiry. Compliance policies ensure that businesses are protected and are viewed as more transparent and trustworthy. And it can cut legal expenses for the company in the long run when instances of corruption and/or bribery dont occur or are eradicated as much as possible. Ethical and transparent practices also help employee motivation and satisfaction.Having a robust anti-corruption compliance policy is not quite enough. Too often, companies dont implement policies fully in practice. And many employees are not even aware that the policy even exists. Companies must ensure that their employees are aware of the policy and the mechanisms for reporting and investigating that are available to them in the workplace. Companies are also required to provide training around bribery and corruption so that employees are able to identify it in their day-to-day dealings. Without these measures in place, the policy has no value.The first step is ensuring that an anti-corruption compliance policy is properly drafted. This takes some mental work on the part of the company. The company needs to scrutinise their business from the top down and ensure that every level of their company and every aspect of their business is covered. This means undertaking risk evaluations and unpacking the structural organisation of the company. In doing this, the company needs to examine the third parties they engage with and whether there are contracts governing these relationships; the quantity of cash payments and the level of public sector involvement the company has.Once a policy is drafted and adopted, the company should conduct an assessment of whether any other documents would need to speak to the policy. These include instructions, ethics codes and the like. And the company should ensure that internal reporting lines and investigation procedures for any contraventions of the policy are firmly in place and are adhered to at all times.Policies should be implemented from the top down, as employees should ideally see that leadership and management are abiding by the policies they have implemented. And it should be strictly enforced. The adoption of a Social and Ethics Committee (where it is not obligatory to be created as per the provisions of the Companies Act), should also seriously be considered to ensure oversight and compliance with policy.Additionally, the company could consider establishing a whistle-blower hotline so that employees are able to report contraventions. In these cases, the company should put adequate measures and policies into effect for whistle-blower incidents to assure the employee that they can remain anonymous and to safeguard the integrity of the entire process.We are noticing a marked increase in bribery and corruption, money laundering and cybercrimes, which, in most instances, seem to be an indication of the current economic climate. In South Africa, the spotlight is currently on state capture, and the instances of bribery and corruption within the public sector. These are extremely far-reaching and involve several private sector players as well. What we will likely see coming from this is that once the State Capture Commission of Inquiry has finalised testimony, a number of prosecutions are likely to arise.We have also noted an uptake in the quantity of cases being heard by the specialised commercial crimes courts. The latest report issued by the Financial Intelligence Centre notes an alarming increase in money laundering in South Africa. Companies are required to take active steps to curb this and should not be caught off guard as the repercussions are potentially catastrophic.Social justice has many dimensions, particularly in an economic downturn, where incidents of bribery and corruption are on the rise. Now, more than ever, firm anti-bribery and corruption policies are needed in the bigger picture.
MBABANE  The fortunes of 250 employees at Kelloggs Tolaram Eswatini will change for the better since the company has hit the ground running.

As soon as recruiting and training its staff members, the Kelloggs Tolaram Eswatini factory produced its first noodles. The newly-established factory, which is based in Matsapha, has an investment of over E200 million so far. Specifically, the factory produces instant noodles ready for consumption for both the local and export regional markets.

Kelloggs Tolaram is a joint venture between Kelloggs, originating from the United States of America and Tolaram, whose headquarters are based in Singapore.

Last year, this publication reported that the recruitment process was done within the remainder of 2020, and the selected candidates would join the Kellogg Tolaram family in January 2021.

Progress

Minister of Commerce, Industry and Trade Manqoba Khumalo was quoted having listed Kelloggs Tolaram Eswatini as one of the investments in the kingdom that made great progress in terms of establishing their factory.

One of the employees, who is employed as a cleaner, expressed that after two years of being unemployed, this job would help her support her family of four.

The job opportunities at the Kelloggs Tolaram factory have tremendously changed the lives of emaSwati, as they shared that they would now have financial freedom.

Some of the employees said they were blessed to have been employed as they were now out of the unemployment statistics and this would enable them to live decent lives.

For the past two years, I relied on the father of my two children for all our basic necessities. I am happy that finally, I will also make a contribution to my family, the excited employee said.

Another employee, who is in the administration department, expressed that there was nothing more fulfilling than waking up in the morning and getting ready to go to work.

This job will provide me with financial stability and security, which will make my life easier. I will be able to pay my bills on time! the employee said.

He added that the job had helped him to become financially independent. The employee said: This independence isnt only limited to the finances, it relates to decision-making. Earning money and having an identity brings so much liberty.

The employee, who is a graduate in one of the countrys main universities, said he had been job-hunting for two years. He said having this job made it easier for him to plan for his future on his own terms and work towards the goals he had set for himself.

Reliable

Having this steady, reliable job has given me the security I have been longing for. Now I have stopped worrying about the present and Im focusing on my future, he said.

He added that his job would build a history of employment and make his curriculum vitae stronger, which in turn would make it easier to get into bigger industries.

The job will help me polish up my skills as I will have the opportunity to learn new skills that I did not learn in tertiary, he added.

Another employee, who is in the packaging department, said the job was not about merely working for a few hours.

It is more than that. Doing this job has certainly helped me in fulfilling my purpose. No matter how basic it looks, knowing that I add value to this big organisation which is international, gives me satisfaction, happiness and most definitely, has helped me financially, she said.

She elaborated that even her self-esteem had improved because waking up each morning gave her a day-to-day purpose.

Meanwhile, Kelloggs Tolarams Xolile Mbatha said a total of 250 employees at the Eswatini factory were trained. She mentioned that they started commercial production and the products would be in the market in the coming weeks.

There are various departments in the facility. Some are in the production section and others do administration and support, said Mbatha.

She added that the factory had 16 500 tonnes of noodles capacity per annum.

Meanwhile, the operations of the new factory will be beneficial in improving the countrys unstable economy, according to an economist who preferred condition of anonymity.

The economist stated that the manufacturing industry was one of the most influential sectors in the kingdom as it helped support the global and national economies, as well as individuals and families.

The operations at the Kelloggs Tolaram factory will not only provide employment to emaSwati, but will also lead to diversification of the economy of the country and reduce reliance on one type of product, said the economist.

Self-sufficiency

He elaborated that this would also lead to self-sufficiency.

This means that the country will reduce its reliance on imported goods and this can lead to stabilisation of the economy, the economist said.

He further articulated that this would lead to contribution to the earning of foreign currency to the country. The economist made an example of Japan, which earned a lot of foreign currency because of exporting manufactured products. He said the operations of the factory would stimulate the development of transport and communication like the construction of roads, railways and ports. The economist highlighted that there would be development of other economic activities like tourism and trade. He said expenses on imports would be reduced, as they would be produced locally.
The UK Government has announced an additional 300m is being made available to the Northern Ireland Executive to support people, businesses and public services affected by coronavirus.

The funding brings the total allocated through the Barnett formula to the Executive since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic to 3.3bn.

The Treasury said that in recognition of the exceptional circumstances and in response to calls for flexibility, the Executive will be able to carry over any of the 300m not spent this year into the 2021/22 financial year - on top of their existing tools to transfer funding between years.

It is the responsibility of the Executive to decide which projects will receive funding, officials said.

Chief Secretary to the Treasury Steve Barclay said last night: "UK Treasury schemes such as furlough, support for the self-employed and business loans have helped to protect jobs and livelihoods across Northern Ireland.

"But we recognise that the Northern Ireland Executive also has a vital role to play.

"That is why we are continuing to give them the resources and flexibility they need to support people and businesses through this pandemic.

"I would urge the Executive to use this additional 300m to help those most in need in Northern Ireland."

Secretary of State Brandon Lewis welcomed the funding announcement.

He said: "The UK Government has stood side by side with people and businesses across Northern Ireland throughout the coronavirus pandemic, shielding them from its worst effects."

Mr Lewis continued: "The Northern Ireland Executive has received unprecedented levels of funding from the UK Government this year.

"This additional money, which can be carried over into the next financial year, will give the Executive the certainty and flexibility to deliver on its priorities for the benefit of all in Northern Ireland."
Sahayb Abu (pictured), 27, allegedly wrote knives do not do 'much damage'

A rapping jihadi accused of plotting an attack during the coronavirus pandemic chatted to an undercover police officer on a Telegram group, a court has heard.

Unemployed Sahayb Abu, 27, allegedly wrote knives do not do 'much damage' on the chat group after six people were seriously injured during an attack in Glasgow last year.

He has been accused of buying an 18-inch sword, a knife, balaclava, gloves, hat and combat body armour before he was arrested on July 9 last year.

The Old Bailey heard how he chatted about firearms with an undercover police officer he met through an Islamic State supporters' Telegram chat group.

Giving evidence from behind a screen, the officer, known as Rashid, said he was already a member of the 1,300-strong Servants of the Unseen group when Sahayb joined.

Sahayb bought a Persian Qama knife and a smaller blade after chatting to his older sibling on iMessage about their fervent belief in the death cult, it was said.

Muhamed Abu, 32, knew all about his relatives views and was under a legal obligation to tell the authorities what Sahayb was up to but did not, jurors heard.

Muhamed Abu (left), 32, knew all about his relatives views and was under a legal obligation to tell the authorities what Sahayb (right) was up to but did not, jurors heard

In one discussion about guns, Sahayb, using the handle Tariq Bin Ziyad, said that in the UK 'cops are seizing Skorpions and Uzis just lying around collecting dust'.

Sahayb has been accused of buying an 18-inch sword (pictured) before his arrest

On June 26 last year, he allegedly commented on an image of a male being beheaded saying: 'Ha ha ha that kuffar (non-believer) is gone, head taken off its body.'

In the group chat, the court heard he referred to a stabbing incident at a Glasgow hotel that occurred that day in which six people, including a police officer, were seriously injured.

'That's the thing, there's only knives in the UK, it's not going to do much damage,' he allegedly wrote.

Rashid, using the handle Abu Hamza, replied: 'There's guns trust me.'

The jurors were told that Sahayb responded: 'Yes, there is guns but it's underground bro. Criminals are selling it.'

The officer went on: 'The truth bro, I would never buy a gun from the UK.'

The court heard that Sahayb said: 'It's possible but wallahi (I swear) these kuffar (non-believers) got jinns and shaytaan (devils) working for them, they don't sleep Akhi (brother). They constantly plot and plan like human devils.'

The Old Bailey heard how Sahayb (pictured) chatted about firearms with an undercover police officer he met through an Islamic State supporters' Telegram chat group

The discussion continued about smuggling guns, the court was told.

Tariq Bin Ziyad, Sahaybs alleged user name, wrote privately to the undercover policeman: Im only telling you this for the sake of Allah and because youre my Muslim brother.

Me and my family have had a whole world turned upside down, because my brother and sister and her brother were disseminating videos and pictures to each other.

The feds came and locked them all up, even my sister for a year.

Believing Rashid was in the US, he allegedly wrote: Im from the UK its different here, you cant express nothing from IS, all that crap about freedom of speech, expression goes straight in the trash, in the bin.

Muhamed Abu (pictured), from South Norwood, southeast London, denies failing to disclose information about acts of terrorism under the Terrorism Act 2000

You cant do anything close to what you can do to express your support. You go to prison straight away under article blah blah blah. Are you telling me you can go out with a black flag?

If you try that here sharing content you going straight to jail man. I just came out recently, come out three months ago, Im just enjoying my freedom.

Sahayb told police he was an online troll parodying drill rappers who often wield weapons during their music videos.

The Old Bailey has heard he sent his brother videos of himself rapping about sending bombs and eliminating foes.

Muhamed also allegedly recorded drill tracks, including one in which he rapped: Lets get merky [murderous], lets get hurty, Ive got bombs that are just worthy.

Jurors heard Sahayb joined a Telegram group called Servants of the Unseen where users shared extremist views and materials.

Sahayb bought a Persian Qama knife and a smaller blade after chatting to his older sibling on iMessage about their fervent belief in the death cult, it was said. Pictured, he also allegedly purchased a balaclava, left, and a combat hat, right

Sahayb in one of a series of homemade videos he sent to his brother Muhamed on June 30 last year, which has been shown at the Old Bailey

The undercover police officer told jurors the group was overseen by an Emir, and each new member was vetted by the group administrator before the rest of the members would agree they could join.

Between June and July 2020 Rashid, using the name Abu Hamza, communicated with members of the group, purporting to be able to smuggle people and weapons into the UK.

Sahayb, using the name Tariq Bin Ziyad joined the group and began to communicate and share images with members.

Everything he shared was recorded by mole Rashid.

The time for talking is over, one hundred percent, talking is over, the kuffar arent talking thats for sure, he allegedly wrote on 25 June.

Ive got travelling blood man, I love to just disappear and get out of here, north Africa would be amazing, the user wrote on 24 June following a discussion about terrorist group GIA in Algeria.

Sahayb Abu, from Dagenham, Essex, denies preparation of terrorist acts under Section 5 of the Terrorism Act 2006.

Muhamed Abu, from South Norwood, southeast London, denies failing to disclose information about acts of terrorism under the Terrorism Act 2000.

The trial continues.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Experts have devised a novel approach to selecting photos for police lineups that helps witnesses identify culprits more reliably.

In a paper published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchersfrom the University of California San Diego and Duke University in the United States and the University of Birmingham in the U.K.show for the first time that selecting fillers who match a basic description of the suspect but whose faces are less similar, rather than more, leads to better outcomes than traditional approaches in the field.

The counterintuitive technique improves eyewitness performance by about 10 percent.

"In practice, police tend to err on the side of picking facially similar fillers for their lineups," said John Wixted, the paper's senior author and a professor in the UC San Diego Department of Psychology. "What our study shows is that it is, contrary to intuition, actually better to pick fillers who are facially dissimilar. Doing it this way continues to protect the innocent to the same degree while helping witnesses to correctly identify the guilty more frequently."

In a study of 19,732 participants, the researchers played a mock-crime video depicting a white male stealing an office laptop and then provided photographs of one suspect (either the perpetrator or an innocent suspect) plus five police lineup fillers. The fillers always matched the most basic description of the perpetrator but they varied in how much they facially resembled him. Facial similarity among photos was scored by an additional set of participants on a scale of 1 to 7, with 7 being most similar.

The researchers found that picking fillers who were facially dissimilar enhanced the ability of eyewitnesses to accurately pick out the perpetrator when he was in the lineup, without increasing the likelihood of wrongly identifying an innocent suspect when the real perpetrator was not in the lineup.

In a typical police lineup, one photo of the suspect is displayed, plus photos of five or more "fillers" who are known to be innocent. To create a fair lineup in which the suspect does not stand out, fillers are selected if they are similar in basic appearance to the suspect (height, weight, race, hair color and length, etc.), or if they have facial features included in a witness's description of the culprit. Often, a combined approach is used, in which fillers with similar facial features are selected from a pool of description-matched photos.

For decades, experts have disagreed on and puzzled over the question of what is most effective, while also being fair to the suspect. There are concerns that using fillers that are too facially similar to the suspect will confuse eyewitnesses and protect guilty suspects by making the identification task too difficult. Conversely, if the fillers are too facially dissimilar to the suspect, there are concerns that this would put an innocent suspect at risk of being falsely identified.

The new approach relied on insights from signal detection theorywhich considers the memory strengths that are generated by each face in the lineup in the mind of the eyewitnessto deduce that selecting fillers who are not facially similar to the suspect from a pool of acceptable description-matched photos actually increases the ability of eyewitnesses to discriminate between innocent and guilty suspects.

Importantly, this approach did not have any effect on the number of "false alarms," in which an innocent suspect is incorrectly identified.

Study co-author Melissa Colloff, of the University of Birmingham's School of Psychology, said: "Eyewitness misidentifications have contributed to many wrongful convictions, which are later overturned by DNA evidence. Eyewitnesses failing to identify a perpetrator when he is in the lineup can also result in guilty perpetrators being free to commit additional crimes. Although many useful reforms have been introduced to protect the innocent, sometimes these will also protect the guilty. Our approach demonstrates it is possible to create police lineups that are more effective for everyone involvedincreasing the likelihood that a guilty perpetrator will be identified, without increasing the likelihood that an innocent suspect will be imperilled."

Explore further US police lineups are better at catching criminals than UK ones

An Indian Air Force's Chinook helicopter carries supplies from a forward airbase in Leh (Image: Reuters/Danish Siddiqui)

India may ease some restrictions for Chinese investment in the country without compromising national interest or hurting local enterprise, as the border tension that flared up in 2020 has started improving, sources said.

The matter has been discussed at the level of the cabinet secretary and ministries of finance, home, and commerce and industry, they said.

Restrictions on foreign direct investment (FDI) by Chinese companies may be reviewed, sources said. In April 2020, India tightened the rules for FDI from countries with which it shares a land border.

Also Read: India must no longer wait for China to change its behaviour

It made official approval mandatory for proposals from neighbouring countries even for sectors which normally get automatic clearance, although the immediate goal was to restrict opportunistic takeovers by entities across the border. Sources said this rule may be relaxed following the improvement in the border situation.

There are several options which the government may consider, including allowing FDI up to 25 percent or 26 percent in sectors under automatic route, sources said.

However, while considering such proposals, rules would not be relaxed for sectors related to national security, they said. Also, the government would not relax rules if such a move hurts its commitment to promote local industry.

Also Read: Indian Army soldiers push back Chinese troops in Sikkim sector

For several products, the government has extended the implementation date for quality-control orders because domestic industries are unable to immediately comply with them. Most of those goods such as toys are primarily imported from China.

The border tension between India and China flared up in June 2020 because of the violent clash in the Galwan Valley in eastern Ladakh.

After the deadly border scuffle, India retaliated by restricting import of several items by imposing quality-control order, import policy changes. It also banned many Chinese apps and restricted government procurement from the country. However, some of the steps were aimed to help domestic industry.

After the restrictions were imposed, there was some concern within the government about the impact of such steps on certain large projects and in certain sectors where domestic capabilities are inadequate.
Before you venture onto frozen ponds, lakes and rivers, it's critical to make sure they're safe, an expert cautions.

"A minimum of four inches of clear, newly formed ice is needed to support one person on foot," according to Curt Sinclair, a natural resources specialist at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

"New ice is usually stronger than old ice, and clear ice is usually stronger than ice that appears cloudy," Sinclair explained in a university news release.

Ice is seldom uniform, because water movement and snow cover can create significant differences in ice thickness and strength. Moving water under frozen streams interferes with the freezing process, Sinclair noted.

"A pond may have 12 inches of ice in one area and only 1 inch of ice only 10 feet away," he said.

If you plan to get out on the ice, here are safety tips from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources:



Test the thickness of the ice in several areas.

Wear a personal flotation device under winter gear.

Don't fish or play on the ice alone and keep a safe distance from others on the ice.

Carry a rope to pull someone out of the water if needed.

Carry a pair of ice picks to pull yourself out of slippery, water-covered ice.

Explore further Unfrozen water content affects thermal-hydro-mechanical characteristics of frozen soil

More information: Michigan State University has more on Michigan State University has more on ice safety

Copyright  2020 HealthDay. All rights reserved.
The National Coalition for Proper Human Sexual Rights and Family Values has expressed disapproval over an alleged opening of an office by the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Transgender and queer Intersex Rights (LGBTQI) movement in Ghana.



The Coalition said the alleged existence of the office was illegal and an affront to the laws, traditions and customs of the country and must be shut down.



Mr Moses Foh-Amoaning, Executive Secretary of the Coalition, at a press conference, said the act was disrespect to Ghanaians and undermined the sovereignty of the State.



He explained that Ghana as a country had not signed any international laws permitting the promotion of the LGBTQI in the country and, therefore, any attempt by anybody to promote the activities of the group amounted to illegality.



Mr Foh-Amoaning noted that on the contrary, international laws such as the Economic, Cultural, Social and Political Rights of the United Nations treaty, which the country had ratified, protected the sovereignty of Ghana to defend its cultural values.



He, therefore, accused the international community in Ghana of promoting an act which, he said, was alien to the customs and traditions of Ghanaians and infringed on the sovereignty of the state.



Mr Foh-Amoaning called on the Inspector General of Police and other security agencies to swiftly move in to close down the said office and arrest and prosecute persons found to have breached the laws of the state.



He appealed to Parliament to quickly move and pass comprehensive legislation to deal effectively with the issue.



We call on all state agencies including Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), the Ghana AIDS Commission, the police, politicians and the media to take all steps to protect our nation from the negative impact of this LGBTQI, Mr Foh-Amoaning, said.



Most Reverend Philip K. Naameh, President of the Catholic Bishops Conference described the LGBTQI agenda as a complete disorder of the fundamental law of God in creating man and woman.



The LGBTQI is a clear departure from Gods purpose of creation because the woman was not created to be an object of pleasure for man, he said adding that the Catholic as a Church would only continue to recongnise marriages between a man and a woman to ensure that Gods purpose of creation materialized.



The Reverend Godwin Amuzu, a representative from the Christian Council of Ghana, urged Ghanaians to remain resolute in maintaining the culture and sanctity of the State as believers in God.



The Reverend Johnny Apeakorang, who represented the Ghana Pentecostal and Charismatic Churches, said the Association would continue to render its support to the Coalition to ensure that its goal was achieved.



The Coalition for Proper Human Sexual Rights and Family Values is an amalgamation of Christian and Para-Christian bodies, Muslims, Non-Religious entities, Traditional rulers and opinion leaders in Ghana.



The Coalition aimed at ensuring the preservation of indigenous African traditional and cultural sexual rights and family values.

It has been a strong advocate against the LGBTQI movement in Ghana since its inauguration in December 2013.

Source: GNA









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Top companies covered are Reichold (U.S.), Royal DSM (Netherlands), Deltech (U.S.), Polynt (Italy), Dow (U.S.), BASF SE (Germany), INEOS (U.K.), U-PICA Company. Ltd. (Japan), UPC Technology Corporation (Taiwan), Scott Bader Company Ltd. (U.K.), and other key players profiled in unsaturated polyester resin market research report

Pune, India, Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The global unsaturated polyester resin market size is set to gain momentum from the increasing demand from numerous end-use industries, such as marine, electrical & electronics, aerospace, and automotive. This information is given by Fortune Business Insights in a new report, titled, Unsaturated Polyester Resin Market Size, Share & COVID-19 Impact Analysis, By Type (Orthophthalic, Isophthalic, and DCPD), By Application (Building & Construction, Marine, Pipes & Tanks, Electrical & Electronics, Land Transportation, Wind Energy, and Others), and Regional Forecast, 2020-2027 The report further states that the market size was USD 11,579.6 million in 2019 and is projected to reach USD 16,965.7 million by 2027, exhibiting a CAGR of 5.9% during the forecast period.





List of the Leading Companies Profiled in the Global Unsaturated Polyester Resin Market are:

Reichold (U.S.)

Royal DSM (Netherlands)

Deltech (U.S.)

Polynt (Italy)

Dow (U.S.)

BASF SE (Germany)

INEOS (U.K.)

U-PICA Company. Ltd. (Japan)

UPC Technology Corporation (Taiwan)

Scott Bader Company Ltd. (U.K.)

Other Key Players





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COVID-19 Pandemic: Shortage of Raw Materials May Decline Demand

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected a wide range of industries worldwide, thereby halting trade and manufacturing activities. The lockdown has also caused a shortage of raw materials. Hence, the costs of finished products have surged rapidly. These factors are set to decline the demand for unsaturated polyester resins in the near future.

Story continues





How Did We Create This Report For You?

We follow an innovative research methodology that includes data triangulation on the basis of bottom-up and top-down approaches. We conduct extensive primary research to validate the projected market numbers. The data used to estimate the forecast for various segments at the country, regional, and global levels is collected through interviews with various leading stakeholders. We also derive information from paid databases, industry journals, SEC filings, and other authentic resources. The report includes several details, such as drivers, opportunities, challenges, and dynamics of the market.





Key Drivers & Restraints-

Excellent Surface Finish and Water Repellency to Augment Growth

The building and construction industry is the major user of unsaturated polyester resins as the material is necessary for producing bathroom fixtures, floor tiles, roof tiles, and window panels. It also has certain beneficial properties, such as good electrical insulation, rigidity, resistance to wear, water repellency, and excellent surface finish. These factors are anticipated to propel the unsaturated polyester resin market growth in the upcoming years. However, the availability of numerous substitutes in the market would obstruct growth.





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Major Segment-

Marine Segment to Grow Steadily Fueled by Usage in Surfer Boards & Boat Decks

Based on the application, the marine segment generated 8.84% in terms of the unsaturated polyester resin market share in 2019. It is set to show substantial growth backed by the increasing usage of UPR in surfer boards, fiberglass panels, interior & exterior parts, and boat decks.





Top Regional Insights-

Asia Pacific to Lead Fueled by Demand from Construction and Marine Industries

Geographically, Asia Pacific procured USD 6,606.2 million in 2019 in terms of revenue. It is likely to retain its dominant position throughout the forthcoming years because of the rising demand for unsaturated polyester resins in numerous industries, such as aerospace, marine, building & construction, and automotive. Emerging nations, namely, Japan, India, and China, are expected to contribute to this growth because of constant economic development.

On the other hand, North America is set to exhibit a significant share stoked by the rising disposable income and technological advancements in the region. In Europe, Germany would showcase the highest growth on account of the sales and production of automobiles.





Key Competitive Landscape-

Key Players Focus on Various Organic & Inorganic Strategies to Compete in Market

The global market for unsaturated polyester resins houses several renowned manufacturers. Most of them are adopting the strategies of collaboration, acquisitions, new product launches, and expansion of distribution channels.





Below is one of the latest industry developments:

December 2020: AOC acquired a Spolchemie plant for unsaturated polyester resins in the Czech Republic. It would aid the company to enhance its logistics and services.





Browse Detailed Summary of Research Report with TOC:

https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/unsaturated-polyester-resin-upr-market-104760





Detailed Table of Content:

Introduction Research Scope Market Segmentation Research Methodology Definitions and Assumptions

Executive Summary

Market Dynamics Market Drivers Market Restraints Market Opportunities

Key Insights Key Emerging Trends  For Major Countries Key Developments: Mergers, Acquisition, Partnership, etc. Latest Technological Advancement Insights on Regulatory Scenario Porters Five Forces Analysis

Qualitative Insights  Impact of COVID-19 on Global Unsaturated Polyester Resin Market Supply Chain Challenges Steps taken by Government/Companies to overcome this impact Potential opportunities due to COVID-19 outbreak

Global Unsaturated Polyester Resin Market Analysis, Insights and Forecast, By Type, 2016-2027 Key Findings / Summary Market Size Estimates and Forecast By Type (Volume/Value) Orthophthalic Isophthalic DCPD

Global Unsaturated Polyester Resin Market Analysis, Insights and Forecast, By Application, 2016-2027 Key Findings / Summary Market Size Estimates and Forecast By Application (Volume/Value) Building & Construction Marine Pipes & Tanks Electrical & Electronics Land Transportation Wind Energy Others



TOC Continued!





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Pharmaceutical Glass Packaging Market Size , Share & COVID-19 Impact Analysis, By Product (Vials & Ampoules, Bottles, Cartridges, and Syringes), By Drug Type (Generic, Branded, and Biologic), and Regional Forecast, 2020-2027

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Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 05:32:03|Editor: huaxia

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BISSAU, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Guinea-Bissau's High Commission of fighting against COVID-19 announced on Monday that the country has detected two coronavirus variants first discovered in the United Kingdom and South Africa.

"We hereby to inform you that we have registered 26 cases of the British-identified coronavirus variant, and one case of the South African-identified variant, among 40 samples sent to a laboratory certified by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in The Gambia," announced Aldajie Balde, a member of the High Commission.

"The appearance of these two variants in the country preoccupies the health authorities, but we will take new measures to contain their spread," Balde said.

The High Commissioner of fighting against COVID-19, Magda Robalo, also expressed concerns over these variants in the country. But she said that she was expecting them, because there had been many citizens back from aboard in the past days.

"We will send other samples during the week to the Pasteur Institute in Dakar to check the profile of the virus detected," Robalo said.

President of Guinea-Bissau Umaro Sissoco Embalo declared in January a state of calamity throughout the territory for a period of 30 days, following the surge of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the country.

So far, Guinea-Bissau has reported 2,924 positive cases, including 2,464 recoveries and 46 deaths. Enditem
A 31-year-old man held a teenager at gunpoint before stealing her vehicle over the weekend just 20 minutes after he was released from jail, according to police in Washington state.

Officers from the Spokane Police Department responded to Browne's Addition neighborhood around 10.28pm Saturday night after receiving a report about a carjacking.

At the scene, authorities said a 16-year-old girl told them her vehicle had been stolen.

Marcus Goodman, 31, stole a teenager's vehicle over the weekend just 20 minutes after he was released from prison, according to police in Washington state. The incident occurred near Francis Avenue (file image)

She explained that a stranger had approached her, indicated he had a gun, and demanded her car. Officers immediately began searching the city for the car.

Just before 1am, a patrol sergeant located the stolen vehicle near Francis Avenue and N Nevada Street in northeast Spokane.

Authorities detained the driver who was later identified as 31-year-old Marcus Goodman.

'As officers investigated Goodmans activity they became aware Goodman had been released from jail on an unrelated felony charge at 10:08PM,' a statement from the police department reads.

Over the span of 20 minutes, Goodman had traveled the roughly 1.5 miles from jail to the incident location in Brownes Addition and robbed the teenager, police said.

Goodman, a convicted felon, was booked back into Spokane County Jail for the felony charge of second-degree robbery.

He is being held on $15,000 bond.

It's unclear what Goodman was previously convicted for and a DailyMail.com request for comment to the Spokane Police Department was not immediately returned Monday morning.


Orange DRC has signed a 10-year deal with Canadian vendor NuRAN that will help it to expand its rural coverage across the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The agreement focused on NuRANs Network as a Service (NaaS) offering, with the Canadian firm constructing and running 2000 new towers across the next 40 months. The towers will allow Orange to provide 2.75G services.

TeleGeography notes that the deployment will in particular seek to connect rural communities with populations of over 5000, with the goal of connecting up to 10 million people who previously had little or no access to internet connectivity.
WINNESHIEK COUNTY, Iowa - A northeast Iowa man is facing eight felony burglary charges after a search warrant was executed in Fort Atkinson.

The sheriff's office said Brandon S. Thibadeau, 27, of West Union, is facing eight counts of felony burglary and possession of methamphetamine.

Two others, Barry Martin, 34, and Lois Kamp, 29, are facing charges of possession of stolen property.

The search warrant was executed in the 300 block of 1st St. SE.

Thibadeau admitted to doing over 10 burglaries in the Fort Atkinson area, according to court documents. He also marked on a map 10 different locations and identified items taken from them.
Nurses wearing personal protective equipment attend to patients in a COVID-19 intensive care unit at Martin Luther King Jr. Community Hospital in Los Angeles, Calif., on Jan. 6, 2021. (Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images)

UK COVID-19 Variant Could Be More Deadly: Study

Scientific advisers to the British government believe the COVID-19 variant first detected in the United Kingdom could be deadlier than previous variants.

The variant, known as B.1.1.7, is associated with an increased risk of hospitalization and death compared to infection with the original strain of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as the novel coronavirus, scientists said in the study, released on Feb. 12 (pdf).

While noting that the absolute risk of death per infection remains low with the new variant, the study confirms earlier findings that were based on limited data.

The study also noted that in-patients did not identify evidence of increased disease severity or is linked to a higher risk of in-hospital case fatality.

The UK variant, which was earlier determined to be around 30 to 70 percent more transmissible than other strains, has been spreading rapidly across the United States.

Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), told CBS Face the Nation on Feb. 14 that the UK variant may be the dominant strain in the United States by the end of March.

We know now that, or we estimate now that about 4 percent of disease in this country is related to B.1.1.7, she said. And we have projections that it may be the dominant strain by the end of March.

Walensky said that infections of the UK variant have been confirmed in 39 states.

The CDC stated on Feb. 14 that there have been 1,173 confirmed cases of B.1.1.7 in the United States.

Two other variants, one first identified in South Africa (B.1.351) and the other in Brazil (P.1) have also led to infections in a handful of states, the CDC said.

A total of 17 cases of the South African strain have been confirmed in California, Illinois, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, and Virginia.

Just three cases of the Brazil variant have been confirmed in Minnesota and Oklahoma.

In light of the new variants spreading in the United States, the CDC said that rigorous and increased compliance with public health mitigation strategies, such as vaccination, physical distancing, use of masks, hand hygiene, and isolation and quarantine, is essential to limit the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19 and protect public health.

Some states, such as Iowa and Montana, have lifted some restrictions, including masking requirements, which Walensky said is a mistake.

I think were not out of the woods yet. We need to get our kids back to school. We need to get our communities back to some normal functioning before we can start thinking about letting up our mitigation strategies, she told CBS.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 16)  The National Economic Development Authority has urged President Rodrigo Duterte to place the entire country under the lowest form of community quarantine starting March 1, as it cited the country's need to recover from huge economic losses.

Acting NEDA chief Karl Chua made the proposal during a televised meeting with President Rodrigo Duterte and other government officials on Monday. He noted that strict COVID-19 restrictions implemented since March last year have led to significant decline or total income loss among Filipinos. Further extending the lockdown would only worsen hunger and poverty, Chua added.

"Kailangan po natin mag-shift sana sa lalong madaling panahon sa MGCQ (modified general community quarantine) for the entire Philippines sana starting March 1, 2021, para i-address po 'yung hunger," he said.

[Translation: We need to shift as soon as possible to MGCQ for the entire Philippines, hopefully starting March 1, 2021, in order to address hunger.]

"The main reason is gusto na po natin ma-mitigate or mabawasan 'yung [we want to mitigate or reduce] sickness, hunger, poverty, job and income loss that are arising," he added.

Chua said if needed, the government can instead implement localized lockdowns at the barangay or municipal level to address the local spread of COVID-19.

With proper safeguards in place, the acting NEDA chief also proposed to increase operational public transportation from 50% to 75%. He added that the public transportation system should be complemented with active transport support, such as bike lanes, especially as many have now shifted to riding bicycles to work or when buying basic commodities.

He said the age group allowed to go out should also be expanded even if only gradually from the current 15 to 65 years old, to five to 70 years old. "Pwede natin gawing dahan-dahan [We can do this gradually], in increments of five years, also with appropriate safeguards," Chua said.

Lastly, he asked that the government resume pilot face-to-face classes in low-risk areas.

Recommending the easing of restrictions does not mean putting Filipinos' safety at risk, Chua said. With continued adherence to health guidelines, he maintained the economy could further be reopened to help lift more people out of poverty, while at the same time ensure public health is not compromised.

According to NEDA, the COVID-19 pandemic and related restrictions have brought the country a total income loss of around 1.04 trillion in 2020, or a daily average of around 2.8 billion.

The Philippines' coronavirus cases have breached 550,000, with over 511,000 recoveries and more than 11,000 deaths. Metro Manila, the Cordillera Administrative Region, Batangas, Tacloban City, Davao City, Davao del Norte, Lanao del Sur, and Iligan City are currently under GCQ. The rest of the country is under the most relaxed MGCQ.
Indian IT industry body National Association of Software & Services Companies (Nasscom) is hopeful of a positive engagement with the new US administration which it believes is pro-immigration.

Speaking at Nasscom's strategic review report, its Chairman U B Pravin said that though it is early days with a new team under President Joe Biden settling in, some of the initial announcements coming from the US have been fairly positive.

"Our expectation and reading of this administration is that it will be much more consultative and they will discuss with all the stakeholders and Biden in the past also has been pro-immigration from that perspective," said Rao.

While Nasscom was actively engaged with the concerned people on the US side even during the Donald Trump administration, the current deferral on wage based H-1B lottery system by a year is a welcome move, he added.

"As an industry we have contributed significantly in making American companies competitive, we have contributed to the local economy, in job creation. In fact during the pandemic, we have also kept some of the critical infrastructure like health, financial service, all running," Rao said.

Also read: Biden grants huge relief for spouses of H-1B visa workers; Indians to benefit most

While the US administration will do what would be right for America, with the value addition that IT industry has been bringing to the nation, "we have always advocated free mobility of talent and hopefully we will have a positive engagement with the new administration", added Rao .

Earlier this month, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) had announced to delay a rule issued in the final days of the Trump Administration that sought to change the existing H-1B selection process to prioritization based on wage level, pushing the effective date of the rule to the end of calendar year 2021 .

During the said time, DHS would review the rule as a whole for potential changes or rescinding it. This was following an announcement by the U.S. Department of Labor to delay the effective date of the final rule affecting wages for H-1B workers to May 14, 2021.

Nasscom had earlier said that prioritizing purely on wage levels has the potential to significantly damage some of the most innovative companies in the world along with many hospitals and health care providers, research facilities, universities and other petitioners.

Terming the current situation as evolving, and being hopeful of the US administration to take a balanced view, Rao said, "America still wants the best talent and any law that comes up there will help in achieving that objective. I believe there will be opportunities for sending people from here and there will be opportunities for local students."

Also read: Nasscom expects Biden administration to reverse Trump's 'harmful policies'; bring relief to Indian IT industry

Also read: Biden administration welcomes India's emergence as leading global power
If Yang makes it to the Major League, he will be guaranteed a salary of US$1.3 million, with a separate incentive of up to US$550,000 based on his performance (US$1=W1,106).

Yang earned W2.3 billion last year as a starting pitcher of the Kia Tigers. Kia earlier promised to treat the ace to the same rewards this year.

But having achieved just about everything he could as a player in Korea, Yang refused to become complacent and instead chose to pursue his long-time dream of playing in the Major League.

And now he one step closer to the dream. But even if Yang has a successful debut season and gets his maximum pay of US$1.85 million, it will still be less than what he made last year in Korea. If he does not succeed in being called up to the Major League, he will earn less than W200 million.

But Yang's determination to play in the U.S. is so strong that he is ready to take a pay cut. When he realized he was not getting enough interest from Major League clubs, Yang gave up on conditions such as a guaranteed spot in the 40-man roster and right to refuse a minor league assignment.

Now he has to prove himself all over in spring training. The Rangers start their spring training in Surprise, Arizona this week, and Yang will leave for the U.S. as soon as he gets a work visa.

"I was able to become who I am now thanks to the Tigers fans who passionately supported me for the last 14 years. I will do my best not to make this challenge end in vain," he said.


CLEVELAND, Ohio --Cleveland Play House has appointed Collette Appolito Laisure and Anita H. Cook to lead the institution on an interim basis as it begins its search for a new managing director following the passing of Kevin Moore, who died suddenly in October.

Laisure will serve as interim managing director, working with board chair Anne Marie Warren and artistic director Laura Kepley in overall business operations. She previously served as vice president and executive director of the PNC Fairfax Connection and is a past president and executive director of The Presidents Council. Shes also been on the board of the Cleveland Public Theatre and Karamu House.

Cook steps into the newly created role of chief financial officer, focusing on the 2015 Regional Theatre Tony Award winners financial operations. The retired CPA served as executive director of the West Side Catholic Center until 2017.

I am grateful to CPH Board Chair Anne Marie Warren and the Executive Committee for creating this thoughtful interim plan to support the staff and the organization during this time of transition, said Kepley in a press release. The pandemic still has us navigating a good deal of uncertainty, but Collettes calm, open, collaborative nature and her years of leadership experience will help steer the ship through these choppy waters. I look forward to partnering with her on our exciting plans for CPHs return to in-person programming.

Added Warren, Both of these talented women are well-known and trusted in the community, have not-for-profit executive leadership experience, a love of theatre, and will bring open, steady, and collaborative approaches to the work ahead.

The CPH Board Executive Committee considered over 50 people before hiring Laisure and Cook. Both will be involved in the theatres commitment to diversity, inclusion and anti-racism.

The board of directors will begin a national search for a permanent managing director in the spring.
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Preparative And Process Chromatography Market Growth & Trends

The global preparative and process chromatography market size is expected to reach USD 17.26 billion by 2028, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc. It is expected to expand at a CAGR of 11.65% from 2021 to 2028. High demand for monoclonal antibodies, coupled with the growing adoption of preparative chromatographic techniques in the bioprocessing industry, is anticipated to boost the revenue growth in the market over the forecast period.

Moreover, an increase in the number of R&D activities in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries is driving the adoption of liquid chromatographic techniques in downstream assays, resulting in the anticipated market growth. In addition, technological developments to advance the final product recovery in terms of yield accelerate and augment the uptake of these techniques across various applications.

Furthermore, expanding application of these techniques has propelled the key players to make strategic investments to increase their revenue share in the space. Companies are actively engaged in the development of new products to meet the changing consumer demands. For instance, in November 2020, Shimadzu Corporation launched Advanced i-Series HPLC. This is an improved flagship liquid chromatography model to support remote work.

Chromatography columns are gaining increasing attention in the global space. Companies involved in prepacked chromatography columns consistently innovate new products to gain a reputed market share. Moreover, the integration of preparative chromatography in COVID-19 vaccine development has created lucrative opportunities for the key players to capture the untapped avenues of the market.

Preparative chromatographic techniques are anticipated to register the fastest CAGR throughout the forecast period due to the increasing application in medical research and the drug approval process. The food end-use segment is estimated to exhibit the fastest CAGR over the forecast period owing to the high use of analytical techniques for food safety and food authentication assessment.

Request a free sample copy or view report summary: Preparative And Process Chromatography Market Report

Preparative And Process Chromatography Market Report Highlights

By product, process chromatography accounted for the largest revenue share in 2020 owing to the growing research activities and adoption of automated systems in the field of biopharmaceuticals

On the basis of type, the liquid chromatographic segment dominated the market in 2020 owing to the high demand for preparative HPLC in the therapeutic development process

Based on end use, the pharmaceutical segment held the largest share in 2020 owing to increasing application in drug safety assessment as an analytical tool for qualitative and quantitative analysis

North America dominated the market in 2020 owing to increasing investments in the development of new resin for the isolation and purification of vaccines. Extensive COVID-19 vaccine development efforts in the region have spurred the market growth as the process significantly relies on the use of chromatography for the characterization

Asia Pacific is projected to witness the fastest growth over the forecast period. The growing biopharmaceutical sector in the region has increased the demand for antibodies and resins. Extensive R&D activities in the Asian pharmaceutical market result in the growing demand for chromatography products

Preparative And Process Chromatography Market Segmentation

Grand View Research has segmented the global preparative and process chromatography market on the basis of product, type, end use, and region:

Preparative And Process Chromatography Product Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Process Chromatography System Multi-use Batch Chromatography Systems Single-use Batch Chromatography Systems Continuous Chromatography Systems Consumables Reagents Resins Affinity Resins Ion-exchange Resins Size-exclusion Resins Hydrophobic Interaction Resins Reversed Phase Resins Mixed-mode/Multi-mode Resins Columns Prepacked Columns Automated Columns Manual Columns Services Preparative Chromatography System Semi-preparative Chromatography Systems Other Chromatography Systems Consumables Reagents Resins Affinity Resins Ion-exchange Resins Size-exclusion Resins Hydrophobic Interaction Resins Reversed Phase Resins Mixed-mode/Multi-mode Resins Columns Prepacked Columns Empty Columns Services



Preparative And Process Chromatography Type Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Liquid Chromatography HPLC Flash/Column Chromatography Ion-exchange chromatography Size-exclusion chromatography Affinity chromatography

Gas Chromatography

Thin Layer Chromatography

Paper Chromatography

Gel-permeation (Molecular Sieve) Chromatography

Hydrophobic Interaction Chromatography

Preparative And Process Chromatography End-use Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

Pharmaceutical

Biotechnology

Food

Nutraceutical

Others

Preparative And Process Chromatography Regional Outlook (Revenue, USD Million, 2017 - 2028)

North America US. Canada

Europe Germany UK. France Italy Spain

Asia Pacific Japan China India

Latin America Brazil Mexico

MEA South Africa Saudi Arabia



List of Key Players of Preparative And Process Chromatography Market

GE Healthcare

Agilent Technologies

Danaher Corporation

Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc.

Merck KGaA

Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc.

Shimadzu Corporation

Novasep Holding S.A.S

Waters Corporation

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.
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Olivia Wilde had high praise for boyfriend Harry Styles as she paid tribute to the stars of her movie Don't Worry Darling this week.

After production wrapped on her psychological horror movie, director Wilde, 36, shared some of her favorite movie-making memories to Instagram, including a post dedicated to her new boyfriend.

On Monday, the filmmaker wrote about how she admired Styles, 27, for accepting a supporting role alongside a female lead, when many male actors would avoid it, while gushing about the heartthrob's 'talent', 'warmth' and 'grace'.

'Humility and grace': Olivia Wilde paid tribute to her boyfriend Harry Styles on Monday after he starred in her upcoming movie, Don't Worry Darling, which has just wrapped

'Little known fact: most male actors don't want to play supporting roles in female-led films.' Wilde began her post.

'The industry has raised them to believe it lessens their power (i.e financial value) to accept these roles, which is one of the reasons it's so hard to get financing for movies focusing on female stories.' she continued.

'No joke, it is harrrrrd to find actors who recognize why it might be worth it to allow for a woman to hold the spotlight.'

The tribute was accompanied by a black and white snap of the former One Direction member suited up and sitting atop a vintage convertible in Palm Springs.

'Enter: @harrystyles, our "Jack". Not only did he relish the opportunity to allow for the brilliant @florencepugh to hold center stage as our "Alice", but he infused every scene with a nuanced sense of humanity.

On set: The tribute was accompanied by a black and white snap of the former One Direction member suited up and sitting atop a vintage convertible in Palm Springs

That's a wrap! The couple were seen in matching white hoodies as they posed for an on set snap shared by comedian Asif Ali

'He didnt have to join our circus, but he jumped on board with humility and grace, and blew us away every day with his talent, warmth, and ability to drive backwards. #dontworrydarling' the mother-of-two ended her note.

In a separate post Wilde praised her female lead, Florence Pugh, calling her 'talented and brave' and writing, 'Cant wait for the world to see the astonishing work youve put into this movie.'

Wilde directed and also stars in the 1950s-set psychological horror, which also stars Gemma Chan, KiKi Layne and Chris Pine.

Wilde and Styles were first romantically linked after they were seen holding hands at his agent's wedding in Montecito, California, last month.

Memories: In a separate post Wilde praised her female lead, Florence Pugh, calling her 'talented and brave' and writing, 'Cant wait for the world to see the astonishing work youve put into this movie.'

A source told DailyMail.com that the new couple stayed together at James Corden's house near Palm Springs during filming, where they were able to 'be alone and keep their relationship very secret.'

And it seems that things may be getting serious between the Drinking Buddies star and English pop icon, as sources told The Sun last month that they were preparing to move in together.

On Valentine's Day, Wilde was pictured moving some belongings out of the home she shared with Sudeikis, 45, in Silver Lake, Los Angeles.

Styles is known to have a home in the Hollywood Hills, where the new couple were spotted together in early January.

Official:Wilde, 36, and Styles, 27, confirmed their romance when they were pictured holding hands at his agent's wedding in Montecito last month

Their blossoming relationship first emerged just months after Wilde and her fiance of seven years Jason Sudeikis, 45, announced that they had called it quits in November.

Wilde and Sudeikis got together in 2011 and welcomed two children, Otis, six, and Daisy, four, before they broke their engagement last year.

Although their separation only went public in November a People source has alleged: 'The split happened at the beginning of the year.'

Last month, an Us Weekly source said Sudeikis hopes 'that this is just a phase and that Olivia will snap out of it or that Harry will get bored and move on before too long.'

The insider claimed that the former SNL star is 'desperate' to 'repair their family' by finding a way to rekindle his romance with Wilde.


Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 22:41:34|Editor: huaxia

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BAGHDAD, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi Minister of Health Hassan al-Tamimi said on Monday that the ministry detected cases of a new strain of coronavirus, while the ministry reported 2,798 new coronavirus cases in the country.

"Unfortunately, laboratory tests in the Central Laboratory of Public Health in Baghdad showed the emergence of the mutated coronavirus in Iraq," al-Tamimi said in a press conference.

The new strain of coronavirus is characterized by faster transmission, "which requires everyone to adhere to the health-protective measures and instructions of the Higher Committee for Health and National Safety to prevent the spread of the virus," al-Tamimi said.

Al-Tamimi said that the ministry has recorded several infections with the new strain of coronavirus among children.

Also in the day, the ministry reported 2,798 new COVID-19 cases, the highest daily record in 2021, bringing the tally to 646,650.

The ministry also reported six new deaths, raising the death toll from the infectious virus to 13,185.

It said that 1,119 cases recovered during the day, bringing the total recoveries to 608,178.

A total of 6,278,144 tests have been carried out across the country since the outbreak of the disease in February 2020, with 47,129 done during the day, according to the statement.

Iraq has taken a series of measures to curb the pandemic since the first coronavirus case appeared in the country.

China has been helping Iraq in its fight against the pandemic. On Feb. 4, the Chinese Embassy in Iraq said the Chinese government donated 50,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine to Iraq.

Earlier, the Iraqi Health Ministry said the Iraqi National Board for Selection of Drugs had approved the emergency use of China's Sinopharm and Britain's AstraZeneca vaccines to contain the spread of COVID-19 in the country.

From March 7 to April 26 in 2020, a Chinese team of seven medical experts spent 50 days in Iraq to help fight the disease, during which they helped build a PCR lab and install an advanced CT scanner in Baghdad.

China has also sent three batches of medical aid to Iraq. Enditem

The judges and lawyers huddled on their screens and talked about what worked and what didnt.

A surprising amount of it worked. Bexar County has held a handful of civil jury trials on Zoom, and some of the participants were so struck by the advantages of teleconferencing over actual courtrooms that they want them to continue after the coronavirus pandemic is over.

A judge at a recent virtual debriefing session posed a question: Would you do it again, and are you looking forward to it?

I genuinely hope that Bexar County maintains the virtual component of this process, replied Leslie Luttrell, a local lawyer. She was fresh from arguing a virtual trial, a bill of review case to determine if a lawsuit petitioner had been negligent.

Luttrell had noticed that the demeanor of the jurors was different  they seemed more relaxed and paid greater attention.

You could actually see it in their physical manifestations, she told the panel. They are far more comfortable than sitting on that hard church pew.

Another upside: Neither jurors nor attorneys had to drive around the courthouse to find a place to park.

A happy juror makes for a productive juror, so I hope you maintain that process going forward. Lets get something good out of COVID, Luttrell said.

On ExpressNews.com: In-person jury trials still a ways off - Texas Supreme Court extends coronavirus restrictions

Even a few jurors participated in the virtual debriefing and were asked about their experiences, from jury summons to the moment their panel was dismissed.

Two of them suggested tutorials be posted on how to use the technology.

Absolutely, some tips would help, said Juror No. 10, identified as such to preserve post-trial anonymity.

The conference was hosted by state District Judges Cynthia Marie Chapa, Mary Lou Alvarez, Rosie Alvarado and David Canales.

For San Antonio attorney Bill Oliver, using Zoom as a digital component to share documents has become a preferred method.

Its awesome, definitely an improvement over what we have in the courtroom, he said. And I guess its pretty neat to not drive to the courthouse.

On ExpressNews.com: 'It's truly a new age' - Bexar County administrative judge plans for virtual jury trials in October; in person in January

Not having to commute to a trial was an important aspect for Dallas-based attorney Randal Tilford.

I like the fact that Im sleeping at home at night, instead of a hotel in San Antonio, he said, quickly adding with a smile that he loves San Antonio.

Tilford, who practices law statewide, also touted the significant money savings from not having to travel to meet clients or appear before a judge. Others mentioned that the high costs of hiring out-of-town experts to testify are not as high if they appear online, negating the need to pay for their travel and lodging.

It has been nearly a year since in-person jury trials have been conducted in Bexar County, both criminal and civil. The Texas Supreme Court has repeatedly extended its emergency order restricting in-person court proceedings to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Alvarez, presiding judge of the 45th District Court, was given the task in May of implementing a plan for judges to begin hearing civil cases virtually. So far, five jury trials have been conducted in Bexar County online, officials said.

On ExpressNews.com: In a first, Bexar County will attempt to seat a jury via Zoom video conference

For potential jurors who dont have computers, the states Office of Court Administration has helped counties provide iPads to pick up and use during jury selection and, if potential jurors are chosen, at virtual trials. Soon, Bexar County will be purchasing its own devices for that purpose, Alvarez said.

The civil district judges have been successful, said Ron Rangel, administrative judge over the district courts. Because of that, we are doing two virtual civil jury trials a week.

Rangel, like the lawyers in the debriefing, believes that some aspects of the system could permanently change with Zoom. Good examples include hearings, attorney-client meetings and conferring on dockets between defense attorneys and prosecutors.

Because of the extra constitutional protections for defendants, the Texas Supreme Court allows virtual trials in criminal cases only if both defense and prosecution consent, Rangel said, adding, But I dont see both parties in any given case agreeing to one.

In-person jury trials could resume in Bexar County courtrooms under a plan devised by Rangel and approved by Fourth Administrative Judge Sid Harle. But first, the communitys coronavirus positivity rate must be at or below 5 percent, Rangel said.

Were not out of the danger zone, he said. Maybe April 1. Theres always the hope.

Alvarez and a team that includes Alvarado and fellow District Judges Antonia Toni Arteaga, Cathy Stryker and Angelica Jimenez have been strategizing and instructing others on virtual trials.

Alvarez held a Lunch and Learn virtual meeting Jan. 29 that attracted some 200 people  judges, lawyers, court clerks and sheriffs deputies.

The speakers were the five lawyers who had argued a complicated jury trial in Alvarezs court, a child custody case where both Texas Child Protective Services and a set of intervening foster parents were seeking termination of the parents rights. It lasted 11 days, including jury selection, testimony from 18 witnesses and 46 exhibits.

The lawyers covered all aspects of the Zoom proceedings and answered questions, everything from technology issues to jury feedback (it was positive), along with the benefits of being able to wear sweatpants in the comfort of home.

We want to make sure everyone has the expertise that these attorneys have developed for trying a case on videoconference, Alvarez told the group.

During the debriefing, Alvarez drove home what had been accomplished: the confidence that an 11-day trial can be done on Zoom.

Its possible. We had attorneys that did it, so theres a lot of potential here, she said. This is why it is so critical for us to get your feedback because every time we do this, we are learning and improving the process.

We are collectively developing our expertise.

ezavala@express-news.net | Twitter: @elizabeth2863

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 21:28:11|Editor: huaxia

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PARIS, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday said that Chinese and Russian vaccines are necessary for the world to win the "war" against COVID-19.

"We should work with the Chinese and Russians so that the vaccines developed by their scientists be integrated in this great multilateral effort -- immediately when they start the necessary certifications by the WHO (World Health Organisation)," he said in an interview with French weekly Le Journal du Dimanche.

"We are now engaged in a fight against variants, which is a real race against time," Macron said, urging "rapid, effective and united" global efforts in the fight against the pandemic.

The French president also called for international efforts to ensure equal access to vaccines against COVID-19, especially in Africa.

"African countries rightly challenge us on their access to vaccines," he said, noting that without further efforts to achieve that goal, "we will be at risk of not only health but also ethics."

Earlier this month, Macron expressed openness of his country to any vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency, which has so far only given green light to vaccines of Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca.

The shortage of approved vaccines in Europe has been drawing increasing public criticism and prompted demands for alternative solutions. Enditem
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Bharat Forge share price shed over 2 percent intraday on February 15 after the company posted a net loss of Rs 210.4 crore for the quarter ended December 2020.

The company's profit in the corresponding period stood at Rs 40.4 crore. The company had reported an exceptional loss of Rs 299.4 crore for the December quarter 2020, against a loss of Rs 27.6 crore in the year-ago period.

Also Read - Bharat Forge reports a loss of Rs 210.4 crore in December quarter

Here is what brokerages have to say about the stock and the company after Q3 earnings announcement:

UBS | Rating: Buy | Target: Rs 720

Results beat on consensus with strong FY22 outlook. UBS expects sharp revenue rebound in FY22-23, aided by strong truck cycle recovery. Factoring in Q3 margin miss they cut their FY21 EPS estimate by 50%.

The research house expects the full impact of cost reduction initiatives to be visible in FY22 and also expect the margin to improve to 28.6%/30.5% for FY22/FY23, reported CNBC-TV18.

Nomura | Rating: Neutral | Target: Rs 649

There was a strong cyclical rebound but that has been factored in. New segments needed to offset oil & gas slowdown, reported CNBC-TV18.

Kotak Institutional Equities | Rating: Sell | Target: Rs 375

The sequential recovery is on track, while valuations are still expensive. Q3 EBITDA was above estimates led by strong volume growth in domestic business.

The lower employee costs were partly offset by a decline in export non-auto revenue. Kotak expects a strong recovery in the CV segment led by higher demand for freight. The valuations are too expensive given cyclical nature of the industry, it said.

Prabhudas Lilladher

The brokerage has maintained hold rating with a revised target price of Rs 581 (earlier Rs 520) at 22x Mar-23 EPS (v/s Sep-22). It cut FY22/23 EPS by 2%/1% to factor in the weak mix.

ICICI direct

Continued improvement in the profitability of European subsidiaries is a key monitorable. The stock price, however, captures many positives in its view, limiting the upside potential. It has retained hold rating on the stock valuing BFL at Rs 670 i.e. 35x P/E on FY23E EPS of Rs 19.1 (earlier TP Rs Rs 510).

Motilal Oswal

A cyclical recovery is visible in CVs and PVs. Contribution from new businesses would drive a sharp recovery in BHFC over the next 2-3 years.

It expects consolidated revenue/EBITDA/PAT to grow at 7%/25%/42% CAGR (FY20-23E). The stock trades at 39.1x/24.1x FY22E/FY23E consolidated EPS. It maintained a buy rating with a target price of Rs 742/share.

At 09:42 hrs, Bharat Forge was quoting at Rs 625.45, down Rs 14.65, or 2.29 percent on the BSE.

The share touched its 52-week high Rs 676.10 and 52-week low Rs 207.85 on 13 January, 2021 and 07 April, 2020, respectively.

Currently, it is trading 7.49 percent below its 52-week high and 200.91 percent above its 52-week low.

Nay Pyi Taw, Feb 15 : Myanmar's military has warned anti-coup protesters across the country that they could face up to 20 years in prison if they obstruct the armed forces.

Long sentences and fines will also apply to those found to incite "hatred or contempt" towards the coup leaders, the military said. The legal changes were announced as armoured vehicles appeared on the streets of several cities, the BBC reported on Monday.

Hundreds of thousands of people have taken part in protests in recent days.

The demonstrators are demanding the release from detention of their elected leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi, and the restoration of democracy.

On Monday, Suu Kyi's lawyer said she would be detained for a further two days. She will then be tried via video link at a court in the capital Nay Pyi Taw on Wednesday, Khin Maung Zaw added.

Suu Kyi was rounded up with other members of the government on February 1, but her detention was due to end on February 15.

The charges against her include possession of unlawful communication devices - walkie-talkies used by her security staff.

Her party was elected in a resounding victory last November, but the military has alleged voter fraud without providing proof.

The military's heightened presence is the latest sign of a potential crackdown on opposition to the coup.

The ruling junta has also announced a series of legal changes, imposing long prison sentences and fines on anyone found to incite hatred towards the military, "by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation".

In a statement posted on a military website on Monday, it said that people preventing the security forces from carrying out their duties could face seven years in jail, while those found to stir up fear or unrest in the public could be imprisoned for three years.

The news came hours after the Internet was restored.

Across the country on Sunday, hundreds of thousands of protesters rallied against the military for the ninth day in a row.

In the city of Myitkyina, in Kachin state, shooting could be heard as security forces clashed with anti-coup demonstrators. It was not clear whether rubber bullets or live rounds were being fired.

Five journalists were among those arrested, but were later released.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
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Nepal: Persecuted Christians See Bodies of Dead Loved Ones Dug Up, Dumped on Streets

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A Christian group in Nepal lobbying the government to establish rights for believers says Christians face major hardships in the Hindu-majority nation, such as not being allowed to share the Gospel and even being barred from burying their dead.

C.B. Gahatraj, general secretary of the Federation of National Christians, Nepal, spoke with The Christian Post through an interpreter in a phone interview on Thursday, where he said that in some reported cases, the remains of deceased Christians have been dug up from the ground and dumped at the homes of their relatives, or left out on the streets.

FNCN represents a number of local and national Christian mission and church organizations in Nepal, and says that it is the only group of its kind set up properly under the law, which allows it to engage directly with the government and be heard when lobbying for Christian issues.

Gahatraj told CP that one of the main hardships Christians have faced in the past few years has been getting the right to their own burial grounds.

Without a proper graveyard, Christians are forced to take the bodies to nearby forests at night, but there are legal consequences if they are caught.

What is more, if Christians bury their loved ones in land where they are not allowed, the local Hindu majorities force them to dig up the remains and relocate them somewhere else.

"When Christians die in Nepal, they have two pains. One is they suffer, they grieve because of their loved ones who are no more; secondly, they have no place to bury their loved ones," Gahatraj said.

"If Hindus find Christians buried in their area, they force Christians to dig them out from the graveyard, and bury the bodies in another place."

The consequences for refusing to comply are gruesome.

"If Christians refuse to dig out the bodies of their relatives, in some cases Hindu radicals have themselves dug out the bodies, and taken the bodies to the Christian relatives' home, and in other cases have just left the dead bodies on the streets," he explained.

Gahatraj said that Christians have protested against such treatment by holding hunger strikes, include one to protest the burial ban in Kathmandu, the nation's capital.

"After 40 days of hunger and strike in Khatmandu, the government of Nepal came to us and we made a Three Point Document. Under that agreement, the government agreed to temporarily [allow] a cemetery for Christians," he said.

The agreement also allowed Christians to form an advisory board to petition for long term plans for burial grounds. But Gahatraj said the government has not yet implemented what was discussed, and believers have not received any benefits so far.

Recently there has been some good news for Christians on another issue, however, when the government of Nepal decided late last year to restore Christmas to the list of public holidays.

The government of former Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Oli had removed Christmas from the holidays list back in April, but after pressure from Christian leaders, decided to restore it.

Gahatraj said that the reversal was a surprise, and said that it "glorifies God." The FNCN leader said that his organization lobbied the government on the issue, which played a part in the victory.

Christians reportedly make up only around 1.4 percent of the population, but despite the persecution they have been facing, followers of Christ are "continuously growing," he said.

The country also has a growing number of churches. Gahatraj said there are over 10,000 houses of worship, but the struggle is to get them recognized as nonprofits and officially registered by the government.

This growth has been seen as threatening by government leaders, Gahatraj said, however, and although Nepal is officially a secular state, it establishes great obstacles for Christians looking to spread the faith.

The government is reportedly trying to bring back anti-conversion laws that would turn some Christians into criminals, as it would carry a three- to-six year prison penalty, along with a $500 fine, for anyone found preaching the Gospel.

Gahatraj explained that while people in Nepal are allowed to practice their own religion, they are prevented from trying to bring others to their faith.

"A Hindu can practice his Hinduism, and a Christian can practice his Christianity," he said, but people are not allowed to convert others to their faith.

He explained that Christians are harassed in a variety of different ways in Nepal. "Even if a cow has died from a natural death, the government accuses Christians of slaughtering the cow."

Some church pastors, on the other hand, are falsely accused of money laundering if they receive foreign aid.

What is more, police sometimes enter churches without permission and investigate pastors without just warrant, contributing to a widespread harassment of Christians in the public sphere.

FNCN has been lobbying and negotiating with the government to stop this kind of treatment, and has also brought its efforts to the U.S. to raise international attention for the plight of Christians.

"We have a six-point agreement with the government of Nepal. If the government implements and takes action on this agreement, our rights, our freedom of religion, will be very much benefited, and it will last for a longer period of time," Gahatraj said.

The Six Point Agreement calls on Christian churches across Nepal to be accepted by the government. The agreement also states that Christians should have the right to equal treatment when it comes to being allocated public holidays, and should also be allowed to manage their sacred religious places.
Judge Seamus Hughes has jailed a couple for a number of thefts following a brief hearing at last weeks sitting of Longford District Court.



Megan Gaffey, of no fixed address, was arrested on Monday night, February 1 and charged with seven counts of theft before appearing in court last Tuesday morning.



Gda Aidan Hynes of Athlone Garda Station explained that the majority of property had been recovered at a residential address, where Ms Gaffeys cousin lived.



Mark Costigan, The Frederick B&B, 48 Hardwick Street, Dublin 1, was also arrested on Monday night and charged with two counts of theft to which he replied Is that the only charges Im getting?, Gda Hynes told the court.



Ms Gaffey, the court heard, had 51 previous convictions, 44 of which are for theft, while Mr Costigan had 17 previous convictions.



None were for attempted robbery, Gda Hynes explained, but he had a number for attempted robbery, production of an article and threats to kill.



The conviction for threats to kill, Gda Hynes added, was in 2015 and Mr Costigan was on a suspended sentence when he committed the offence. He was given a six year prison sentence.



Ms Gaffey, the court heard, was not living in Athlone but has family in Athlone, while Mr Costigan was only in Athlone because he is Ms Gaffys boyfriend.



Gardai explained to the court that they thought the couple was robbing to stay in certain locations.



The slow cooker, for example, may have been handed over for rent, said Gda Hynes.



The court heard that Mr Costigans father died tragically in a gang-related incident in Dublin and that money was owed with the accused currently under threat in Dublin. The couples solicitor explained that every time he pays money to these people, they up the amount of money owed.



Ms Gaffey, he added, is pregnant and has had a tragic life with some children being taken into care. She has also been on the streets and spent some time in prison but both accused were hoping to return to Dublin.



They are in a steady relationship and Ms Gaffey wants to move on, have this child and hold onto and keep this child, the solicitor explained, adding that the pair will stay away from Athlone.



She came out of prison at the end of November and since then you immediately came to my attention, Judge Hughes said.



Today you have seven charges, so you went on a crime spree. There is nothing here to say you wont continue with this lifestyle. She was in Athlone for two weeks and has committed several offences - all within the hundreds of euros.



For the theft from Dunnes, Im sentencing you to eight months and taking into account your remission, so youll be out before your child is born. Youll be in a safe place and wont commit another crime, he said, noticing that Ms Gaffey had started to cry.



Im sorry to see you upset. It upsets me to see you upset but you brought this upon yourself and the prison authorities, Im sure, will be good to you. For all other charge sheets, a concurrent sentence.



Judge Hughes noted that Mr Costigan, with 51 previous convictions, didnt have as bad a record but has a very serious record and would also be going to prison.



For taking alcohol, Im sentencing him to six months and a concurrent sentence on all other charges, he concluded.
Anti-coup protesters gather outside US Embassy in Yangon, Myanmar on February 13. (PC-AP)

Myanmar cut internet service and deployed troops around the country on Monday in signs of a feared crackdown on anti-coup protests, hours after security forces fired in order to disperse a demonstration in the country's north.

The junta has recently escalated efforts to quell a burgeoning civil disobedience campaign which is demanding a return of the country's ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Monday's internet shutdown came soon after live-stream images shared on social media platforms showed military vehicles and soldiers moving through some parts of the country.

Monitoring group Netblocks said the "state-ordered information blackout" had taken Myanmar almost entirely offline.

Troops in Myitkyina fired tear gas then shot at a crowd who gathered in the northern city to stop a rumoured shutdown of the electricity grid.

A journalist at the scene said it was unclear whether police had used rubber bullets or live rounds.

Local media outlets said at least five journalists monitoring the protest had been detained and published pictures of some people wounded in the incident.

A joint statement from the US, British and European Union ambassadors urged security forces not to harm civilians.

"We call on security forces to refrain from violence against demonstrators, who are protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government," they said.

The US embassy advised American citizens to shelter in place and not risk defying an overnight curfew imposed by the regime.

UN special rapporteur Tom Andrews said the junta efforts to rein in the country's burgeoning protest movement was a sign of "desperation" and amounted to a declaration of war against its own people.

"Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable," he wrote on Twitter.

Much of the country has been in uproar since soldiers detained Aung San Suu Kyi and her top political allies, ending a decade-old fledgling democracy after generations of junta rule.

The Nobel laureate spent years under house arrest during an earlier dictatorship and has not been seen in public since she was detained on February 1, in the middle of an earlier internet shutdown.

An internet blackout last weekend failed to quell resistance that has seen huge crowds throng big urban centres and isolated frontier villages alike.

Striking workers who spearheaded the campaign are among at least 400 people to have been detained since the coup, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners monitoring group said.

But fear of arrest did not deter big crowds from returning to streets around the country for a ninth straight day of street protests on Sunday.

In the southern city of Dawei, seven police officers broke ranks to join anti-coup protesters, mirroring local media reports of isolated defections from the force in recent days.

Parts of the country had in recent days formed neighbourhood watch brigades to monitor their communities and prevent the arrests of residents joining the civil disobedience movement.

"We don't trust anyone at this time, especially those with uniforms," said Myo Ko Ko, a member of a street patrol in Yangon.

Near the city's central train station, residents rolled tree trunks onto a road to block police vehicles and escorted away officers who were attempting to return striking railway employees to work.

International condemnation

The country's new military leadership has so far been unmoved by a torrent of international condemnation.
President Joe Biden on Sunday called on Congress to institute "commonsense gun law reforms". Biden is pictured here at the Queen Theatre on November 24, 2020 in Wilmington, Delaware.


Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The liquidation of the 15 billion fund allegedly lost to corruption is expected to be completed within the first quarter, a top official of the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation said.

During a Laging Handa briefing on Monday, PhilHealth president Dante Gierran said 94 percent of the controversial fund that was already released to health care institutions under the interim reimbursement mechanism has been liquidated as of February 15.

This will be completed "before the end of March," he noted.

Late in January, Gierran also downplayed the claims that the said fund was missing in the first place.

He reiterated on Monday that he would not allow the Filipinos' money to be stolen, stressing PhilHealth has been closely working with the National Bureau of Investigation to look into corruption claims.

"We are in continuous cooperation and communication, especially with the cases of fraud that was committed against PhilHealth fund," he said.

"Hindi natin papalampasin ito. Hahabulin natin ito," Gierran, a former NBI director, added.

[Translation: We will not let this pass. We will pursue this.]

Gierran's remarks on liquidation issue, however, were questioned by two lawmakers. Sen. Panfilo Lacson said that "liquidated" funds do not necessarily mean that they were legally disbursed from the start.

"If public funds were spent not for Covid-19 as required under the IRM (interim reimbursement scheme), but for dialysis centers and infirmaries which are clearly not authorized, it can still be declared as liquidated, but it doesnt mean that funds were legally disbursed," he said.

Bayan Muna Party-list Rep. Carlos Zarate said that the so-called liquidation "will not just erase the fact that [the fund] was anomalous in the first place." He also called on the Commission on Audit to conduct a special audit on the matter.

The news about the massive fraudulent scheme broke in August last year after PhilHealth's former anti-fraud legal officer Thorrsson Montes Keith claimed that officials of the agency have stolen some 15 billion, covering unauthorized release of IRM, funds allocated to "fortuitous events" such as the pandemic, and "bloated" budget for IT equipment.

READ: Whistleblower claims 15 billion stolen by PhilHealth execs in fraud schemes

The government filed complaints against officials of PhilHealth, including its former chief Ricardo Morales, over the alleged anomalies.

READ: Duterte OKs filing of complaints vs. Morales, other officials over PhilHealth corruption
Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin writes to PM Modi, urges him to remove GST on COVID-19 vaccines

Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin writes to President Kovind, seeks release of all convicts from Rajiv case

DMK chief Stalin slams Centre for arrest of activist Disha Ravi

India

pti-Madhuri Adnal

Chennai, Feb 15: DMK president M K Stalin on Monday denounced the arrest of climate activist Disha Ravi by Delhi police on "flimsy charges", saying silencing critics through "authoritarian" means is not rule of law.

"Shocked by the police arrest of Disha Ravi on flimsy charges. Silencing critics of the government through authoritarian means is not the rule of law," the top DMK leader tweeted.

"I urge the BJP government to desist from taking such punitive action and instead listen to the voices of dissent from young persons," he said.

How a call from this neta left the Patna DM stumped

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal dubbed her arrest an 'unprecedented attack on democracy.' On February 13, Disha Ravi was arrested from Bengaluru by Delhi police, which comes under the Union Home Ministry's ambit for 'collaborating' with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to 'spread disaffection' against the government.

She edited 'toolkit Google doc' and was a key 'conspirator' in its formulation and dissemination as well vis-a-vis the farmers protest, according to police.
While Karnataka state government's comments on the Union Budget stated, "Tesla would be setting up a manufacturing plant in the state," a senior official who did not wish to be named told BusinessToday.In that the government has still not received any concrete proposal for the company. He added that there has been no further development in the allotment of land process for the company even though the government has indicated two places.

Earlier last month, Tesla Inc - Tesla India Motors and Energy Private Limited - classified as a Subsidiary of Foreign Company registered at Registrar of Companies, Bangalore with its corporate headquarters on Lavelle Road in the city. The company's authorised share capital is Rs 15,00,000 with a paid up capital of Rs 1,00,000. Two out the three directors listed in the Indian entity are high-ranking officials in the parent company. Vaibhav Taneja is the Chief Accounting Officer at Tesla, and David Feinstein is global senior director. The third director Venkatrangam Sreeram, is also on the board of two other firms - Xenon Automotive India, an automotive fleet and dealer management firm, and Clearquote Technologies India, an artificial intelligence firm that specialises in vehicle inspections.

Earlier on January 12, Karnataka CM BS Yediyurappa tweeted welcoming Tesla to India and said that it would open and R&D centre and commence operations soon. However the tweet was deleted quietly after a few hours. Several states are competing to welcome Tesla in their state. Tesla has reportedly not struck a deal in Karnataka. Industries minister of Maharashtra Subhas Desai said that the company is looking to open showrooms where it would showcase cars imported from US and Europe. Further depending on the response the company would select the model and set up a manufacturing unit, he said, as mentioned in a report in Times of India.

Also read: Elon Musk's Tesla to take tax-friendly jurisdiction route to enter India

Also read: Tesla to set up electric car manufacturing unit in Karnataka: CM Yediyurappa


Colombo: Sri Lanka's Election Commission Chairman Nimal Punchihewa on Monday shot down reports of India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) planning to set up a political unit in the island nation, saying the country's electoral law does not permit such an arrangement.

"Any Sri Lankan political party or group is permitted to have external links with any party or group overseas. But, our electoral laws do not permit overseas political parties to work here," Punchihewa told reporters.

Punchihewa's comments came after media reports quoted Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb as saying that the BJP was planning to extend its footprint in Sri Lanka and Nepal.

On Saturday, Deb said Amit Shah, when serving as BJP president, had told party leaders that the BJP would establish rule in other regional countries as part of 'Atmanirbhar South Asia' initiative. Deb said the BJP deeply valued the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) partnership.

Interestingly, last year, President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa's brother, Basil, had said he envisioned modelling the ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna either on the lines of the BJP or the Communist Party of China. PTI CORR IND AKJ IND IND

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.

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Minister-designate for Parliamentary Affairs, Osei-Kyei Mensah-Bonsu, has reiterated his opposition to the practice of organising primaries to elect parliamentary candidates every four years.



The practice, he said, is to be blamed for the high attrition rate of experienced Members of Parliament, which is adversely affecting the work of the legislature.



r. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, also a Member of Parliament for Suame, was responding to a question of how he would help to end the high attrition rate of MPs when he appeared before Parliaments Appointments Committee on Friday for vetting.



According to him, though Article 55 (5) of the 1992 Constitution enjoined political parties to comply with democratic principles it did not necessarily mean that parliamentary candidates should be chosen through elections.



He indicated that parliamentary candidates could be chosen through popular acclamation and appointments, which would help in maintaining experienced MPs in the legislative house.



The Majority Leader argued that in some developed democracies, political parties set up committees after the end of the tenure of MPs and assess their performances, and then propose that MPs who distinguished themselves continue without going through any elections.



The Suame legislator attributed the loss of experienced MPs to the monetisation of politics in Ghana, which he described as a reality, and advised political parties to confront the issue to stem the tide.



Not until the parties confront this reality and realised the need to make reforms with regard to the mode of choosing parliamentary candidates, the high attrition rate of MPs would go on unabated.



Mr. Chairman, there are other considerations other than the performance of an MP that comes into play in electing parliamentary candidates and this results in MPs losing their seats, he explained.



He alluded to some experienced MPs including Hon Ben Abdallah Bandah and Inusah Fuseini who were members of the Committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Mr. Joseph Yieleh Chireh, former MP for Wa West and Former Chairman of the Finance Committee and Dr Mike Asibey Yeboah, who lost their seats due to frustrations in the primaries.



Responding to a question of whether there should be a review of the 1992 Constitution, Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu said there should be a holistic review of the Constitution because after operating it for almost three decades, there are some provisions that lacked clarity and are confusing, hence the need to review it holistically.



With regard to the widely held perception that MPs are development agents and not just legislators, Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu said although MPs are supposed to be legislators, however, because of the huge electoral promises some parliamentary candidates make, the constituents tend to hold them accountable for those promises.



He advised MPs to be cautious with the kind of promises they make during elections since their Common Fund allocations allowed them to undertake only patch up projects and not major development projects.



He proposed a discussion on what could be done to retain such MPs to maintain the quality of legislators in the House.



He advised his colleagues not to portray themselves as agents of development at the grassroots, adding: Let us learn useful lessons from our conduct.



Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu noted that chief executives of the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies are not hounded for developmental projects, but when MPs go to solicit votes, the people asked them if they are aware of their challenges.



He argued further that the MPs Common Fund, on which they fell to support development projects in their communities, is not enough.

Source: GNA









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A month into the vaccination drive, which has covered more than 8.5 million so far, the has indicated that Covid-19 vaccines are not likely to be there in the open market anytime soon.

This is because the government is not willing to take chances with technical protocols and the responsibility of a national vaccine roll-out.

It is emergency use authorisation and during this time it is the responsibility of the government to keep things under control. That is why it cannot be brought in the open market yet ... If some wrong product comes to the market, then who would be responsible for it? Union Health Minister said on Monday.

The minister said 18-19 vaccines were in various stages of development with a few doing advance clinical trials.

With India likely to start vaccination in March for those above 50, the expert group on vaccines is in the process of finalising the details for this phase, including whether it would be gratis or come at a particular price.

There is no clear-cut decision in this matter yet. The strategy for the next 270 million is being deliberated by the expert group, the health minister told reporters.





ALSO READ: India may approve Russia's Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine within next few weeks

On whether emergency use authorisation will be converted into regular market authorisation for the two vaccines, Vardhan said: There will be an appropriate time for that as well ... All over the world vaccines are currently under emergency use.

He said the prime minister had met the chief ministers of some states and sought their feedback on the matter. The government is bearing the cost of vaccination for 10 million health functionaries and 20 million front line workers.

The finance ministry had allocated Rs 35,000 crore for vaccination with the assurance that more would come as required.



Expenditure on health as a percentage of GDP has gone up from 1.5 per cent in 2019-20 to 1.8 per cent in 2020-21, the said.

The committee of experts is yet to finalise the details of vaccinating those with co-morbidities, such as the diseases that would be covered and given priority for the jab.





ALSO READ: Coronavirus LIVE: Night curfew to be imposed in Gujarat's four cities

The health minister also said there had been no serious or severe adverse event or death because of the vaccine.

The smallest of adverse events are being recorded. No death has been found attributable to the vaccine. Even the routine side-effects are negligible. I want to assure the people that vaccines in the public domain are safe and immunogenic, the said.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO) data, in 2020, besides Covid, 60 outbreaks were tackled around the world.

The Indian Council of Medical Research has investigated 1,240 regional outbreaks in the past six years.

We have observed that many other infections dropped because of wearing the mask, Vardhan said.

In the past 28 days there have been no new Covid cases in 76 districts, no fresh cases for the past two weeks in 34 districts, and no new cases for the past 21 days in 21 districts, according to the health ministry data.
Moscow  Supporters of imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny came out to residential courtyards and shined their cellphone flashlights Sunday in a display of unity, despite efforts by Russian authorities to extinguish the illuminated protests.

Navalnys team sent photos of small groups with lit-up cellphones in cities from Siberia to the Moscow region. It was unclear how many people participated overall.

No arrests were immediately reported. However, police detained nine people at a daytime demonstration in the city of Kazan calling for the release of political prisoners, according to OVD-Info, a human rights group that monitors political arrests.

The group said security guards at Moscow State University recorded the names of people leaving a dormitory to take part in a flashlight rally there.

When Navalnys first team urged people to come out to the cellphone protests, many responded with jokes and skepticism. After two weekends of nationwide demonstrations, the new protest format looked to some like a retreat.

Yet Russian officials spent days trying to blacken the protests. Officials accused Navalnys allies of acting on NATOs instructions. Kremlin-backed TV channels warned that flashlight rallies were part of major uprisings around the world. State news agencies cited unnamed sources as saying a terrorist group was plotting attacks during unapproved mass protests.

The suppression attempts represent a change of tactics for Russian authorities, who used ignore Navalny.

Kremlin-controlled TV channels used to not report about protests called by Navalny. Russian President Vladimir Putin has never mentioned his most prominent critic by name. State news agencies referred to the anti-corruption investigator as a blogger in the rare stories when they did mentioning him.

Navalny went from a person whose name is not allowed to be mentioned to the main subject of discussion on state TV, said Maria Pevchikh, head of investigations at Navalnys Foundations for Fighting Corruption.

Pevchikh credited Navalnys latest expose for the sudden surge in attention. His foundations two-hour video alleging that a lavish palace on Black Sea was built for Putin through corruption has been watched over 111 million times on YouTube since Jan. 19.

The video went up two days after Navalny was arrested upon returning to Russia from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin. The Russian government denies involvement and claims it has no evidence that Navalny was poisoned.

While the high-profile arrest and the subsequent expose were a double blow to authorities, political analyst and former Kremlin speech writer Abbas Gallyamov says that keeping Navalny and his protests off the airwaves to deprive him of additional publicity no longer makes sense.

The fact that this strategy has changed suggests that the pro-government television audience is somehow receiving information about Navalnys activities through other channels, recognizes him, is interested in his work, and in this sense, keeping the silence doesnt make any sense, Gallyamov said.

The weekend protests in scores of Russian cities last month over Navalnys detention represented the largest outpouring of popular discontent in years and appeared to have rattled the Kremlin. Police reportedly arrested about 10,000 people, and many demonstrators were beaten, while state media sought to downplay the scale of the protests.

TV channels aired footage of empty squares in cities where protests were announced and claimed that few people showed up. Some reports portrayed police as polite and restrained, claiming officers had helped people with disabilities cross busy streets, handed out face masks and offered demonstrators hot tea.

Once the protests died down and Navalny ally Leonid Volkov announced a pause until the spring, Kremlin-backed media reported that grassroots flash mobs titled Putin is our president started sweeping the country. State news channel Rossiya 24 broadcast videos from different cities of people dancing to patriotic songs and waving Russian flags, describing them as a genuine expression of support for Putin.

Several independent online outlets reported that instructions to record videos in support of Putin came from the Kremlin and the governing United Russia party and that people in some of the recordings were invited under false pretenses.

The Russian presidents spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said the Kremlin had nothing to do with the pro-Putin videos.

After Navalnys team posted its video involving the palace allegedly built for Putin, state channel Rossiya aired its own expose of Navalny. Anchor Dmitry Kiselev claimed in Germany, Navalny lived in the luxury he so much despises.

The reporter filmed inside a house Navalny rented but failed to capture any high-end items in the two-story building, which featured several bedrooms and a small swimming pool.

She pointed to two sofas, a TV, fresh fruit on the table in the living room and a kitchen with a coffee machine, and described a bedroom as luxurious even though it looked a a business hotel room.

In recent days, official media coverage focused on the flashlights-in-courtyards protest, accusing Navalny ally Volkov of acting on instructions from his Western handlers.

The political talk show 60 Minutes devoted nearly a half-hour to the topic, calling the flashlight rally an idea from a handbook on revolutions. It aired footage of protesters shining flashlights during the 2014 Maidan protests in Ukraine, mass rallies in Belarus last summer and other uprisings.

On Thursday, state news agencies Tass and RIA Novosti, citing anonymous sources, claimed that a terrorist group from Syria was training insurgents for possible terrorist attacks in Russian cities at mass rallies.

The Kremlin is awfully scared of the flashlight action, because such a peaceful, light-hearted event would allow the opposition to build a rapport with new supporters who are not ready to be more visible, Volkov said in a YouTube video.

He suggested the heavy-handed response to the announcement actually helped dispel skepticism about the courtyard demonstrations.

I saw many posts on social media (saying) When Navalnys headquarters announced the flashlight rally, I thought what nonsense But when I saw the Kremlins reaction, I realized they were right to come up with it.
Gov. Greg Abbott has spent much of the past six months focused on police defunding and trying to make sure every other Texan is focused on it, too.

On Twitter and in televised news conferences, the Republican has railed against the city of Austins efforts to scale back and restructure police spending and called on legislators to craft a law so onerous that no city or town would dare cut its local law enforcement budget again.

Were not going to let cities in Texas follow the lead of cities like Portland and Seattle and Minneapolis by defunding the police, he said in his annual statewide address this month. Thats crazy.

But while Abbott has provided plenty of rhetorical kindling, lawmakers have yet to rally around any of his policy prescriptions, and the path forward could be a slog. The governors proposals are mostly untested, have been only vaguely defined and are sure to face stiff opposition from city leaders and residents who fear they may be unintentionally harmed by a law whose only ostensible target is Austin.

This punishment for defunding the police is a far better political issue than it is in implementation, said Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University. Once you end up having to do it, its kind of messy.

The saga began in August, when the Austin City Council cut 5 percent from its police budget in the wake of a local police killing and amid national unrest over the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police. They also pledged to shift tens of millions of dollars worth of traditional police functions to other city agencies.

Abbott has pressed lawmakers to consider a raft of retaliatory measures for cities such as Austin, including stripping annexation powers from offending cities, withholding sales tax revenue and having state troopers take over entire police departments.

All of the sanctions would appear to be unprecedented, though the Legislature holds broad legal authority over local officials and can in theory impose most any condition it wants. But state laws cannot target individual municipalities; legislation has to apply either everywhere or to a broad group that can change over time, as laid out by the states highest court.

The question is whether an artful draftsperson could draft a bill that was specifically applied to Austin and fit within this Supreme Court definition, said Randall Erben, a former legislative director for Abbott and an adjunct professor at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law.

Qualms about bills targeting cities

Few major cities outside of Austin and Dallas have even discussed shrinking their police budgets in the past year, and Houston slightly increased police funding. Many smaller cities and towns are led by Republicans who are politically aligned with the governor. They could still be affected by such measures, though, if their budgets declined for any number of reasons  say, a drop in population or the end of debt payments on a bond. Some towns could buy a new police cruiser one year and not the next.

Those scenarios will likely be more heightened in coming years, as towns and cities work to dig themselves out from the financial toll of the coronavirus pandemic. And it comes after Abbott led a successful push last session to cap local property tax revenue, putting a potential squeeze on municipal budgets that mostly revolve around public safety spending.

Members of the legislature are going to be getting pressure from their people at home saying, You know, this opens up a whole Pandoras box, said Sherri Greenberg, a former state representative who teaches public policy at UT Austin. But on the other hand, there still could be opportunities and various ways to, if not precisely withhold sales tax, to do other things legislatively.

Three Republicans have filed legislation so far in the House on defunding, but none of the measures would impose any sanctions on cities. One calls for a local election if the cut is more than 5 percent, and the others simply restrict how much police spending can drop year over year.

A spokesman for House Speaker Dade Phelan, R-Beaumont, said he anticipates more bills on the topic to be submitted before the March 12 filing deadline. Phelan, Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick are in lock-step against police defunding, the spokesman said.

Every community has different approaches to public safety, and the committee process will be a venue for review and discussion that will inform how our State moves forward, Phelans spokesman said.

A spokeswoman for Patrick did not respond to a request for comment. Abbotts spokeswoman did not answer emailed questions but said in a statement that the governor is working with the legislature on the right approach.

Winning issue for GOP

The focus on police defunding, meanwhile, could come to overshadow what Democrats had hoped would be a legislative session dedicated in part to substantive criminal justice reforms in the wake of Floyds death, which was captured on video and sparked nationwide protests. Phelan has made overtures toward reforms in the past and drew support in his bid for speaker from many of the same progressives now pushing those changes.

Its not just in Texas. While many political leaders called for more creative approaches to law enforcement following Floyds death, top Democrats have been wary of defunding efforts. In a call with civil rights leaders in December, President Joe Biden reportedly blamed the push for down-ballot losses in November.

In a sign of perhaps just how fraught the defunding legislation could be, the Texas Municipal League, which represents the city of Austin, has not taken a public position. The group also represents the Texas Police Chiefs Association.

An Austin city spokesman declined to say whether the city was considering litigation if Abbotts proposals move forward but said the city believes in supporting law enforcement and the type of social services that can help prevent crime from occurring.

Without the ability to manage our own local budgets, the city cannot effectively do those things, he said.

Even if none of Abbotts ideas becomes law, the payoff may have already come. His press conferences and Twitter storms denouncing Austin helped Republicans rebound in key House races last fall and distracted from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed the lives of more than 40,000 Texans. The public health crisis had hurt the governors approval ratings.

I think hes already won, Jillson said. Hes already made his point. If he can exact a cost from Austin, his base will love that.

jeremy.blackman@chron.com

twitter.com/jblackmanchron




Haiti - Politic : Signature of a tripartite agreement for the National Maritime Training Institute project





The past week was signed a tripartite agreement between Eric Prevost Junior, Director of the Maritime and Navigation Service of Haiti (SEMANAH), Renold Telfort of the Caribbean Development Bank (BCD) and the engineer-architect Elisabeth Coicou, President and CEO General of the Trame SA Group for the realization of the architectural studies of the building to house the training institute of the trades of the sea in the commune of Cabaret.



Elisabeth Coicou thanked the officials of SEMANAH and the BCD for having selected her firm from among 12 competitors who responded to the call for tenders for the realization of her studies, affirming that her group will get to work without delay to hand over as soon as possible the plans for this project.



For the moment, the topographic studies have already been carried out and the National Building and Public Works Laboratory is currently carrying out technical studies of the 38,700 m2 land on which this center on which will be built in Cabaret (North of Port-au-Prince) this training center for trades of the sea.



This Institute will welcome young people in nearly 15 disciplines including, among others : Naval engineering, Maritime transport, Mechanical engineering, explained Eric Prevost Junior, stressing that this institute will create thousands of qualified jobs in the years to come.



TB/ HaitiLibre


















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Journalists have been refused access to a hearing for the teenager accused of killing parents-to-be Kate Leadbetter and Matt Field in Alexandra Hills on Australia Day.

Several media organisations submitted applications asking to hear proceedings in the Brisbane Childrens Court on Monday, but magistrate Rosemary Gilbert rejected them.

Matthew Field and Kate Leadbetter, and their unborn son Miles, were laid to rest in Brisbane this month. Credit:Facebook

The accused 17-year-old was initially charged with serious offences including two counts of murder.

Last week, police laid eight extra charges including a fresh count of dangerous operation of a motor vehicle while adversely affected by an intoxicating substance, failing to fulfil duties at an accident, wilful damage, driving disqualified driving and possession of tainted property.
NEW CANAAN  The chief states attorney says hes willing to consider a deal in the Jennifer Dulos case if it leads to the missing mothers remains.

Believe it or not, Im a very open-minded person, Chief States Attorney Richard Colangelo Jr. said in an interview with CBS correspondent Erin Moriarty that aired Saturday night on 48 Hours.

Im not going to close the door on anything, he said.

I will take that as a yes, Moriarty said. Thats how much you would like to know where Jennifer is?

Absolutely, Colangelo replied.

The nearly two-year investigation into the death and disappearance was the focus of 48 Hours, which included comments from Michelle Troconis family for the first time.

The show also included video footage from inside Fotis Dulos Farmington home before his suicide last January. Fotis Dulos died while facing murder, kidnapping and other charges in his estranged wifes death and disappearance. His sister and nieces were interviewed on the show and maintained his innocence.

Troconis, who is free on $2 million bond after pleading not guilty to conspiracy to commit murder, tampering with evidence and hindering prosecution charges, was included in the show but was not interviewed.

An attorney for co-defendant Kent Mawhinney, who has pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and could testify against Troconis, declined to be interviewed.

Troconis family said she was not involved in any crime and does not know where to find Jennifer Dulos, who vanished on May 24, 2019.

This has shattered our life because my sister is not the person that theyre saying and she would never be capable of anything theyre saying that she has done, Troconis sister, Claudia, said.

She wouldnt harm anybody, her father Carlos Troconis said.

Michelle Troconis mother, Marisela Arreaza, who lives with her and has appeared by her side throughout the case, was not included in the show.

The family said Fotis Dulos claimed to be going through an amicable divorce with his estranged wife while he was dating Troconis.

But arrest warrants indicated Fotis Dulos acrimonious relationship with his estranged wife was a source of contention between him and Troconis.

In arrest warrants, police said Fotis Dulos told his girlfriend, sometimes I wish she (Jennifer Dulos) would disappear.

However, Rena Dulos Kyrimi told CBS that her brother was not capable of killing his estranged wife even though they were involved in the contentious divorce and custody dispute.

My brother was an easy target, she said in the interview. They accused him of murder from the beginning.

In video footage CBS captured about 10 days before he was charged with murder and kidnapping, Fotis Dulos can be seen cooking and spending time with family in his Farmington home as they tried to support him around the holidays in late 2019.

Fotis Dulos declined to answer questions while CBS was inside his home, citing a gag order in the case.

About a month later, Fotis Dulos attempted suicide in his garage the day he was summoned to an emergency hearing where a judge could have revoked his bond and sent him back to jail. He died two days later at a New York hospital on Jan. 30, 2020.

I could have never imagined this, Dulos Kyrimi said. He had such a tragic end.

Dulos Kyrimi has previously claimed that she believed the conditions inside the Garner Correctional Institution in Newtown, where her brother was held for two nights after being charged with murder, contributed to his suicide.

While Dulos Kyrimi has maintained that her brother was innocent, investigators said he was quickly identified as a suspect.

State police supervisor Sgt. Kenneth Ventresca and Detective John Kimball outlined their case and provided new insight into their investigation during the hour-long CBS segment.

One week after the disappearance, Fotis Dulos and Troconis were arrested for the first time on tampering with evidence and hindering prosecution charges. Ventresca said investigators at the time were not sure if Fotis Dulos had committed the homicide.

But we were convinced he was involved, he said.

Ventresca said the case began with a missing persons report and it quickly became a criminal investigation when police found blood evidence in Jennifer Dulos SUV and in her garage.

Ventresca described how Jennifer Dulos Chevy Suburban was found on the side of Lapham Road near Waveny Park in New Canaan about an hour after she was reported missing.

The SUV was locked and had been backed up to a tree and left in reverse  but it wasnt running and there was no sign of Jennifer Dulos, her cellphone or car keys, Ventresca said.

You see the cleanup of the blood-like substance all over the passenger side, Ventresca pointed out.

There were also swirl marks on the vehicles in the garage of her New Canaan home that indicated a cleanup had occurred, he said.

Ventresca said investigators believe Fotis Dulos and Troconis spent about two hours bagging bloody evidence at his 80 Mountain Spring Road property in Farmington the afternoon of the disappearance.

Ventresca said they then drove to Albany Avenue in Hartford, where video surveillance showed Fotis Dulos dumping bags and the trunk liner that police believe belonged to Jennifer Dulos SUV. The bags were later determined to contain Jennifer Dulos blood and clothing, arrest warrants stated.

Its not every day that someone throws out bloody clothing, cut up  who does that? Ventresca said in the interview with CBS.

Carrie Luft, a longtime friend of Jennifer Dulos, said in the interview that she recalled feeling terror, fear, helplessness, as the investigation progressed.

Luft said her friend had a keen mind and an infectious giggle. Jennifer Dulos was an accomplished writer and runner but her five children, who were between the ages of 8 and 13 when she vanished, were the real joy of her life.

The past 18 months have been unfathomable, Luft said. The children are now being raised by Jennifer Dulos 85-year-old mother, Gloria Farber.

Ventresca says investigators hope to bring closure for the family.

Every day I ask myself, wheres Jennifer? he said.
Amanda Burke can be reached at aburke@berkshireeagle.com, on Twitter @amandaburkec and 413-496-6296.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 04:47:52|Editor: huaxia

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CAIRO, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Turkey on Monday reopens schools in rural areas as the country continues to push forward the mass vaccination for the COVID-19. Meanwhile, the number of vaccinated people in Israel is nearing 4 million, taking up so far 42.5 percent of the country's total population.

"As of this week, we are happy to reunite our students in the villages with their schools. Following this first step, our second move will be to open the doors of our schools for students in eighth and 12th grades on March 1," Turkish Education Minister Ziya Selcuk said on Monday at a ceremony in Godekli village of the eastern Igdir province.

Last November, Turkey suspended face to face schooling after a surge in the number of COVID-19 cases across the country and continued online education. The government decided to gradually start in-person education after its mass vaccination process started on Jan. 14 with the COVID-19 vaccines developed by the Chinese company Sinovac.

So far, more than 3,953,000 Turks have been vaccinated and more than 634,000 of them received their second doses of the jab.

Schools already have a set of guidelines and measures in place, from enforced social distancing in classrooms, mandatory masks, and delivery of hand sanitizers.

Turkey on Monday reported 7,945 new COVID-19 cases, including 660 symptomatic patients, as the total number of positive cases in the country reached 2,594,128, according to its health ministry.

The death toll from the virus in Turkey rose by 91 to 27,562, while the total recoveries climbed to 2,482,435 after 7,106 more cases recovered in the last 24 hours.

Also on Monday, the Israeli health ministry said the country has ready vaccinated more than 3.95 million people, or 42.5 percent of the total population, since the vaccination campaign began on Dec. 20, 2020.

The health ministry reported 5,647 new COVID-19 cases on Monday, raising the tally of confirmed cases in the country to 729,373.

The death toll from the COVID-19 in Israel reached 5,406 after 28 new fatalities were added, while the number of patients in serious condition decreased from 1,008 to 979, out of 1,516 hospitalized patients.

The total recoveries rose to 670,010, with 7,382 newly recovered cases, while the active cases decreased to 53,957.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Ishtaye announced on Monday that his government will tighten the precautionary measures for two more weeks to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the West Bank.

"The indicators of the spread of the virus forced us to close many areas that have high rates of infections," Ishtaye said in a statement issued after the weekly cabinet meeting in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

He called for abiding by the preventive measures, mainly wearing masks and keeping social distancing, saying that many countries returned to lockdowns "to combat the new, deadliest and fastest-spreading strains."

Ishtaye said there was a delay in the arrival of the vaccines required for the vaccination process, which was scheduled to start on Monday for the elderly and those with chronic diseases.

The country's health ministry said earlier in its daily coronavirus report that Palestine reported five fatalities and 1,048 new COVID-19 cases in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.

Since the outbreak of coronavirus in Palestine in March last year, the virus has claimed the lives of 2,133 Palestinians, and 190,316 have been infected, including 177,474 recoveries.

In Morocco, the COVID-19 tally rose to 478,595 on Monday as 121 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours. The death toll hit 8,491 as 14 COVID-19 patients died in the last 24 hours.

The total number of recoveries from COVID-19 in Morocco increased to 459,549 after 697 new ones were added, while 467 people are in intensive care units.

Kuwait reported on Monday 823 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number of confirmed cases in the country to 178,524.

The Kuwaiti Health Ministry also announced six more deaths, taking the death toll to 1,009.

The tally of recoveries in Kuwait rose by 772 to 166,791, while 10,724 coronavirus patients were receiving treatment, it said.

Abdullah Al-Sanad, the ministry's spokesman, urged people in Kuwait to comply with the precautionary measures against the coronavirus and maintain social distancing.

On Sunday, the ministry said that Kuwait has received a new shipment of coronavirus vaccine.

With the arrival of more doses, Kuwait's vaccination campaign looks poised to reach its target of inoculating more people, the ministry said.

Lebanon recorded on Monday 1,793 new COVID-19 cases, raising the total number of infections to 340,861, the Health Ministry reported, adding that the number of deaths went up by 44 to 4,037.

The country continues to vaccinate its medical staff in various hospitals and medical centers after receiving 28,500 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

The country is expected to receive the second batch of the Pfizer vaccine by next week to vaccinate the elderly above 75 years old.

The Omani Health Ministry on Monday announced 286 new COVID-19 infections, raising the total number of confirmed cases in the sultanate to 137,592.

More than 11,000 people in Oman have received the AstraZeneca vaccine since Feb. 7, the health ministry announced on Monday.

Last week, Oman continued land border closure "until further notice" in a bid to curb the spread of the pandemic. Enditem
Several hundred protesters gathered in Thailands capital of Bangkok on Saturday to denounce the governments use of draconian lese majeste law against critics and participants in last years pro-democracy demonstrations that demanded the laws abolition and the reform of the monarchy. Similar protests also took place last Wednesday.

Activists climbed Bangkoks Democracy Monument and draped it in a red cloth, which they stated represented the blood of fighters for democracy. When hundreds of people attempted to march to the Grand Palace, the residence of Thailands King Maha Vajiralongkorn, police in full riot gear surrounded them, instigating small scuffles. Some protesters threw paint at the police while authorities claimed some also threw firecrackers at officers.

Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha and his military-backed government continue to refuse to yield to the demands of demonstrators and resorted to increasingly repressive methods since pro-democracy protests began last year.

Mass protest on Saturday at Sanam Luang, Bangkok (Credit: @arulprk)

Chutima Kaenpetch, one of the protesters on Saturday, stated the reason for the renewed protests. We want Article 112 to be revoked plus the release of four of our leaders and other political prisoners convicted by this law. Article 112 of Thailands criminal code contains the lese majeste law which provides for jail terms of between three and 15 years for anyone, including minors, deemed to have insulted the monarchy.

The immediate impetus for that latest protests was the Thai authorities denial of bail to four prominent activists while awaiting trial on sedition, violating the lese majeste law, and other charges. The four include Arnon Nampa and Parit Chiwarak, two of the most well-known leaders in the pro-democracy movement. At the same time, many activists in Thailand have been drawn inspiration from pro-democracy demonstrations involving hundreds of thousands in neighboring Myanmar against the February 1 military coup there.

Wednesdays rally of around 1,000 and the second protest on Saturday were the largest since gatherings declined last December as the number of COVID-19 cases in Thailand rose drastically. Smaller demonstrations also took place in January as the police charged protesters and activists for their involvement in the movement.

The protests began last year, led by students and young people demanding democratic reforms. This included the re-writing of the Thai constitution, Prayuths resignation, and an end to the persecution of government critics. Prayuth seized power in 2014 in a military coup, ousting the government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, the sister of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, also ousted in a coup in 2006.

Since last July, more than 50 people have been charged under the the lese majeste law, with most but not all released on bail. The high number of people charged and the severity of the sentences are clearly aimed at intimidating protesters.

Patsaravalee Tanakitvibulpon, a university student facing multiple charges including two lese-majeste counts, told the New York Times earlier this month: The government does not act according to a democratic system. The government is using the law to shut us up, not allowing us to talk.

In January, the Thai courts sentenced Anchan Preelert, a former civil servant, to 43 and a half years in prison for sharing audio clips on social media in 2014 and 2015 supposedly critical of the Thai monarchy. Originally sentenced to 87 years behind bars, this was halved after Anchan agreed to plead guilty.

Sunai Phasuk, a senior researcher on Thailand for Human Rights Watch, commented: [The] court verdict is shocking and sends a spine-chilling signal that not only criticisms of the monarchy wont be tolerated but that they will also be severely punished.

The political opposition led by the Pheu Thai party is trying to divert anger towards the Prayuth government behind a no-confidence vote slated for this week based on its mishandling of the COVID-19 outbreak. Last weeks protests were originally called to back the no-confidence vote, with the focus only altered after the authorities refused to grant bail to the prominent protest leaders.

The way forward for Thailands pro-democracy movement is not through bourgeois parties or the parliament. The opposition postures as opponents of the government in order to prevent young people from breaking with establishment politics. While they may differ on how best to carry out the interests of the capitalist class, they are united in their opposition to any mass movement particularly of the working class.

Young people and students wanting to fight for democratic rights should turn to the working class, in Thailand and internationally. Around the world amid the deepening social and economic crisis accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the ruling classes are turning to autocratic and fascistic methods of rule to crush a resurgence of the class struggle.

Democracy is incompatible with the present political and economic system of capitalism. As a result, the struggle for democratic rights is intimately bound up with the fight for social rights and a socialist future.
NBA superstar Michael Jordan announced he is making a $10 million donation to Novant Health, to open new health clinics in his hometown of Wilmington, North Carolina. The news comes after he donated $7 million in 2017 to open two clinics in Charlotte, which provide primary medical care and mental health services to uninsured and under-insured communities.

Video Transcript

GAYLE KING: Well, we've got a big announcement that you'll see first on CBS This Morning." I love when this happens. NBA superstar Michael Jordan, you know where he was this weekend at NASCAR, but he always finds time to give back. He's making a $10 million donation to Novant Health to open new health clinics in his hometown of Wilmington. That's North Carolina.

This comes after he already donated $7 million back in 2017 to open in two clinics in Charlotte. The Michael Jordan Family Clinics to provide primary medical care and mental health services to underinsured or uninsured communities.

Dr. Michael Hoben has worked very closely with Michael Jordan on his efforts. He told us how the clinics impact the community.

MICHAEL HOBEN: You have a place that's thinking more about just here's a prescription, go take this medication. But really pulling in the pieces that may be barriers for them to achieve their best health and live their best quality of life.

GAYLE KING: Michael Jordan does so many things behind the scenes to help. This is one of the rare occasions where they're letting us know publicly what he's done, so bravo to him. You have money--

ANTHONY MASON: Yeah, a big bravo, because this is such an important thing for those communities.

GAYLE KING: Will help a lot of people.

TONY DOKOUPIL: Big gift, and it's targeted in a great way.

ANTHONY MASON: Yeah, all right--
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 14) - The Cardinal Santos Medical Center in San Juan City is one of the first private hospitals to get a hand on COVID-19 vaccines under the World Health Organizations COVAX facility.

I was told by the LGU (local government unit) that they are getting the vaccine for us, said CSMC chief medical officer Dr. Zenaida Javier-Uy in an interview with CNN Philippines.

San Juan City mayor Francis Zamora also confirmed that the private hospital will get Pfizer vaccines.

Ang national government ay maglalaan sa San Juan pati sa Metro Manila LGUs (local government units) ng Pfizer, he said. Ang unang batch na darating na Pfizer na darating sa San Juan, ito po ay para sa kategoryang ito, for the healthcare workers, for medical frontliners wherein kasama po ang Cardinal Santos diyan.

[Translation: The national government will allocate Pfizer vaccines for San Juan and for other Metro Manila LGUs. The first batch of Pfizer vaccines that will arrive in San Juan are meant for healthcare workers, medical frontliners, wherein the Cardinal Santos is included.]

The country is expecting within this week the arrival of 117,000 doses of vaccines produced by Pfizer under the COVAX facility.

Javier-Uy said that the hospital had already acquired ultra-low temperature freezer for the Pfizer vaccines, which require 70-degree Celsius freezing temperature.

She added that 3,600 doses of vaccines will be allocated to the hospitals 1,800 healthcare workers and other employees in contact with patients.

The CSMC was also the first hospital that handled the first case of local transmission of COVID-19 in March last year.

The initial batch of vaccines is expected to cover healthcare workers in referral hospitals such as the Philippine General Hospital, East Avenue Medical Center, and Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center in Cebu.

Aside from the Pfizer vaccines, 5.5 million up to 9.2 million doses of vaccine from AstraZeneca are expected to arrive within the first quarter of the year.

But the Department of Interior and Local Government said there is no definite date yet when the Pfizer vaccines will arrive in the country.

Although you committed delivery, you cannot commit a specific date, said Usec. Epimaco Densing in an interview with CNN Philippines. The words came from them it will arrive next week. Although they did not mention any specific date. So you can only mention na expected na darating sa linggong ito (So you can only mention that they are expected to arrive this week).

Meanwhile, the Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines, Inc. said that it has not yet received any word from the government on how many vaccine doses will private hospitals get.

But the organization said that local government units are already coordinating with some private hospitals in preparation for the arrival of vaccines.

Last week, nag-umpisa na po ang coordination ng mga local government units po sa mga different private hospitals at different healthcare facilities, especially dito sa provinces, said PHAPI president Dr. Jose De Grano in an interview with CNN Philippines Newsroom Weekend.

[Translation: Last week, the local government units already started coordinating with different private hospitals and different healthcare facilities, especially in the provinces.]

CNN Philippines Senior Correspondent Lois Calderon and Multi-Platform News Writer Vince Ferreras contributed to this report
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- This May, three Cuyahoga County school districts and one city are asking voters to support tax increases on the May 2021 ballot.

Along with tax increases on the May 4 primary, Parma and Strongsville are holding primaries for city council candidates.

The board of elections always suggests people vote early, either in person or by mail. Early voting by mail, in-person, and drop-off begins April 6.

See a full list of Cuyahoga County issues from the Board of Elections.

Here are the increases on the Cuyahoga County ballots May 4:

North Olmsted schools: The district is asking for an 8.5-mill increase for current expenses, amounting to $297.50 a year in new taxes per $100,000 of home value. There is no expiration date.

Superintendent Michael Zalar says the district held off from asking voters for help as long as they could.

Were at a point right now where we need to make the request in order to continue to provide an excellent school system for this community, Zalar said.

Zalar said the purpose is to help maintain current programs and services. He noted there could be major repercussions for district operations if voters dont approve the tax.

If were not successful, the district will be forced to look at areas in our operations that we will need to reduce or eliminate services and programs for students, Zalar said. Thats certainly not something we want to do.

Parma schools: The district has two issues on the ballot. The first, a 5.9-mill, $271 million bond issue for 37 years, amounts to $206. 50 a year in new taxes per 100,000 of home value, for two new school buildings and facilities for grades 6-12, and improvements and renovations to other buildings.

The second, a 0.4-mill increase in taxes for construction, enlargement, renovation, and financing, amounts to $14 a year in new taxes per $100,000 of home value. There is no expiration date.

Our need is real, said district spokeswoman Audrey Holtzman. Quite simply, we should no longer be a three high school district. Passage of this bond issue will allow us to cut the number of high school and middle school buildings we operate from six to two.

Holtzman says the reduction will save the district over $1 million in operating costs per year.

More importantly, new schools will have updated technology, a STEM learning center, and Career Technical Education classrooms that will allow our students to compete for high paying jobs when they graduate from high school, said Holtzman. If we cannot pass a bond issue, we will soon be forced to consolidate our students into old schools, the youngest of which opened during the Lyndon Johnson administration.

Rocky River schools: A 4.9-mill increase in taxes is for current expenses, amounting to $171.50 a year in new taxes per $100,000 of home value. There is no expiration date.

But the school district has a 1-mill tax expiring, so if the new tax passes, the actual increase on tax bills will be $140.88 a year in new taxes per 100,000 of home value.

Rocky River superintendent Dr. Michael G. Shoaf said the district has been planning the request for more than three years and needs the money to cover operational costs and current building operations. The tax will also allow the district to buy new buses, technology, and textbooks and even redesign the high school kitchen to for the first time serve lunches for its two elementary schools.

Shoaf says the increase will help the school district maintain quality and support students in all academic areas.

The levy is critical to maintaining our educational system as we have it in place in right now, Shoaf said.

Strongsville: The city is asking voters to approve a 2-mill increase in taxes for fire and emergency medical service equipment and personnel, amounting to $70 a year in new taxes per $100,000 of home value. There is no expiration date.

Strongsville Fire Chief Jack Draves says the levy will help increase staffing if passed by voters in May.

The goal is to increase our staffing by up to 20 firefighters, Draves said.

Last fall, the city asked voters to pass a similar tax increase but it was ultimately not passed.

Since it failed in the fall, were going back to the voters with a revised amount of millage and the language and has been reworded to be more clear, which is some feedback we got from residents, Draves said.

Draves noted there had been a 45% increase in call volume since 2011. Fire and EMS workers deal with a variety of issues. He said the increase in calls could be due to traffic, the aging population of residents, etc.

Were trying to get ahead of this so that we can properly and effectively take care of the residents in the city, Draves said. The increased staffing will make sure we have more available units to respond to calls for service, and it will help us decrease our response times throughout the city.
CHICO, Calif. - A 28-year-old man was arrested in Chico on Saturday for resisting arrest. Police said he threatened Enloe Medical Center staff and created a disturbance.

Trevell Jones of Oroville was a patient during the incident. Police said he left the hospital against medical advice. They said he became threatening to security staff prior to walking out.

When Chico police officers responded to the location they said they could not locate Jones. Shortly after that, dispatch received a call from a driver reporting that a man that matched Jones' description jumped in front of her car and screamed at her, before trying to stop other vehicles at the intersection of Citrus and W. 3rd Avenues.

Police said when they located Jones he was lying in the middle of the roadway on Citrus, but later proceeded to run down a driveway toward the back door of a Citrus Avenue home.

Chico police said they believed Jones posed a "significant" risk to the safety of the public. They took him to the ground and handcuffed him, eventually placing him in a full-body restraint.

The man was taken back into the hospital to determine if he was under the influence and later was taken to the Butte County Jail. He faces a charge of resisting arrest by force, threat or violence.

Police said no one was injured during the incident.
Bishop of Limerick Brendan Leahy has today confirmed that people across the diocese will be able to get 'Blessed Ashes on Wednesday'  Ash Wednesday  from most local Churches.

Speaking ahead of the commencement of Lent and the distribution of the ashes, Bishop Leahy asked that as people avail of this opportunity, that they also observe the public health guidelines.

Theres has been huge interest in getting blessed ashes, more than perhaps we even expected and that shows a yearning on the part of the public to commit to Lent and all it means as we embark on a personal pilgrimage in preparation for Easter, he said.

We are delighted to be able to facilitate the collection of ashes but we are really asking that people, given the circumstances of where we are with COVID, be mindful of the public health guidelines. They should not, in the first instance, come themselves to the church to collect ashes if they are in a vulnerable category but might, instead, assign a person from their support-bubble to collect the ashes for them.

For those visiting a Church to pick up the ashes, they are encouraged to be mindful of social distancing and sanitisation guidelines, Bishop Leahy said.

Its a relief for so many that they can still get their ashes this Ash Wednesday but we want to make sure that happens in accordance with public health advance, he added.

People can also celebrate Mass on Ash Wednesday via the various online masses that are happening across the diocese and at St. Johns Cathedral at 10:00 or 17:45.

Meanwhile, in his Lenten statement, Bishop Leahy urged Catholics this Lent to dream about the post-COVID world they want live in and what they can do to influence it. He invited people of the Diocese not to let Lent drift past us, despite all the distractions and the despair that some of us feel because Lent is time for hope.

He said: Yes, we need to work a little more than usual at making Lent work for us this year but if we do, the return will be greater. It is really worth it because the world needs people to take time out to focus on what we have learned from COVID, appreciate the essentials of life, not least love, and find ways to give to others who really need it.
Queenslands Opposition Leader has backed calls for the federal government to stump up cash for tourism operators after data revealed more than a quarter of a million jobs would be on the chopping block next month when JobKeeper ended.

A total of 259,000 Queensland workers relied on JobKeeper in December, data compiled by the Australian Tax Office and released by the federal government on Monday revealed.

The tourism industry has been begging for extra support once JobKeeper ends in March. Credit:Attila Csaszar

Of those, there were 49,200 recipients on the Gold Coast, 21,300 on the Sunshine Coast and 16,600 in Cairns.

While there was a 64 per cent drop in employees paid through the scheme from phase one (April to September) and phase two (October to December), tourism-reliant cities remained disproportionately affected.
Three men have been arrested as anti-lockdown protesters clashed with police at a popular Melbourne shopping strip during day three of the states five-day coronavirus lockdown.

Video footage of the heated confrontation shows about a dozen police officers attempting to move on a small group of men and women, many of whom were not wearing mandatory face masks, at Eaton Mall in Oakleigh on Monday.

The police officers, who can be heard repeatedly asking the rally group to move on, can be seen attempting to separate them before one officer pulls out his capsicum spray.

Another officer can be heard telling a man wearing a grey T-shirt and black cap to leave the area or risk being arrested.

GRAND HAVEN, MI-- Scores of people ventured onto Grand Havens iconic pier this weekend to see what Mother Nature left behind after the winter storm last weekend.

They were there to catch a glimpse of the incredible ice that clung to the rails of the catwalk and lighthouses on the pier.

Related: Great Lakes ice cover growing rapidly after arctic outbreak; See with your own eyes

First responders in Grand Haven and elsewhere along the Lake Michigan shoreline caution residents and visitors against going out onto the piers during the winter months, warning of dangerous conditions and treacherous ice.

It was not an easy walk for many, as people slipped and slid across the ice-covered pier, headed for the outer lighthouse.

Large waves from the storm that hit Michigan over the weekend on Feb. 6 mixed with below-freezing temperatures, covering the pier and lighthouse in ice. The front face of the outer lighthouse, which stands approximately 36 feet tall, was covered in ice.

Click here to see photos of the Grand Haven pier covered in ice.

Lake Michigans famous ice shelves have also taken shape along the shoreline this year.

Many of the Grand Haven catwalks supports were covered in inches of ice as well as emergency call boxes and warning lights on the pier. The door to the inner lighthouse had at least a half-inch sheet of ice encasing the door.

Also on MLive:

Lake Michigan shoreline transformed into winter wonderland of ice

See stunning blue ice here to stay through cold snap

4 warning signs of frostbite - in this weather, it only takes 5 minutes
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A Jefferson Parish grand jury indicted two men accused of killing a 16-year-old boy and critically wounding another man in a deadly shooting outside Oakwood Shopping Center in Terrytown.

Darrell Douglas, 18, and Trevon Gibson, 20, were charged with second-degree murder and attempted second-degree murder, according to court records. Gibson was also charged with two counts of being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm.

Douglas and Gibson are charged in the Oct. 11 death of Ivan Wheeler, a freshman at Landry-Walker High School in Algiers.

Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office detectives investigating Wheeler's death also uncovered evidence linking Douglas to the killing of a third suspect in the Oakwood mall murder, as well as an earlier Marrero shooting that left two people wounded, according to Detective Donald Zanotelli.

On the day of the mall shooting, Wheeler received a telephone call from one of the suspects, Zanotelli testified last week during a probable cause hearing held for Douglas in Jefferson Parish Magistrate Court. During the call, Wheeler and the suspects arranged to meet in the parking lot behind Dillard's department store at Oakwood, located at 197 West Bank Expressway, Terrytown.

Wheeler went to the mall as a passenger in a car driven by a 29-year-old man who was a friend and former neighbor. When Wheeler arrived, Douglas and Gibson were already waiting inside a red Toyota Camry. Also in the Camry were David Fraser, 21, and a fourth, unidentified man, Zanotelli said.

All four men got out of the Camry and walked over to the Honda in which Wheeler and the 29-year-old were sitting. Gibson and Douglas approached the driver's side, handed an unloaded, .40-caliber Smith & Wesson to Wheeler's friend. The man then gave the gun to the teen, Zanotelli said.

Wheeler's friend, who survived the shooting, told investigators that Douglas and Gibson then suddenly demanded that he and Wheeler turn over everything they had. The phrase suggests a robbery, but it doesn't appear that the victims were given any time to surrender property.

"They (Gibson and Douglas) immediately opened fire into the vehicle," Zanotelli testified.

Fraser and the fourth man, who were standing near the Honda's passenger side, did not fire any weapons, according to Zanotelli.

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Though wounded, Wheeler's friend was able to drive off, making his way to the mall's food court entrance where witnesses noticed the bullet-pocked car and called 911, according to authorities. A Sheriff's Office deputy working a security detail at the mall responded and found Wheeler dead of gunshot wounds inside the car.

Crime lab testing determined the .40-caliber Smith & Wesson that was given to Wheeler was never fired. But investigators found Douglas' DNA on the gun, Zanotelli said.

+2 Shell casings, cellphone records link man to deadly Oakwood shooting, accused accomplice's killing: sources Bullet casings and cellphone records tie an 18-year-old man suspected of fatally shooting a teenager outside the Oakwood Center shopping mall 

Detectives recovered spent shell casings from a 9mm and a .45 caliber pistol at the shooting scene, however neither weapons has ever been found, Zanotelli said.

But ballistic testing revealed that the .45 caliber gun used in Wheeler's murder was also used to fatally shoot Fraser two days later in New Orleans, Zanotelli testified. Fraser was gunned down and his body set on fire near the corner of France Road and Florida Avenue.

The Sheriff's Office has confirmed that, had he not been killed, Fraser would have been arrested and booked with murder in the Oakwood mall investigation.

Douglas' cell phone records show that his device was pinging off cell towers that service the Oakwood mall and the area where Fraser was killed just before and after shootings, according to authorities. New Orleans police have obtained a warrant for Douglas in Fraser's death.

Ballistic testing also linked a gun used in the Oakwood homicide to an Oct. 2 shooting that occurred in Marrero and left two people wounded, Zanotelli testified. In that case, one of the victims identified Douglas as a gunman. But no information was available about whether he will be booked on charges related to that case.

The Sheriff's Office on Wednesday rearrested Gibson and booked him with conspiracy to commit second-degree murder. The department declined to comment on the new charge, including whether it is related to Oakwood homicide investigation.

Douglas and Gibson are scheduled to be arraigned on Feb. 18, according to court records. Both were being held Sunday at the Jefferson Parish Correctional Center in Gretna.

Bond for Douglas was set at just $1 million. Gibson was being held on a $1.9 million bond.
Medical workers collect swab samples for Covid-19 testing in Hai Duong Province. Photo courtesy of the Ministry of Health.

Vietnam confirmed 40 more coronavirus cases in Hanoi and northern Hai Duong Province Monday evening, putting the tally of the new wave at 677.

Two patients in Hanoi are a 24-year-old woman in Ba Dinh District and a 43-year-old Japanese man in the Somerset West Point hotel of Tay Ho District, both associated with a deceased Japanese man who stayed at the hotel and was found dead before being confirmed a Covid-19 patient Monday morning. His cause of death is yet to be determined.

The two have been in close contact with the deceased man at a meeting on Feb. 2, according to the Hanoi Center for Disease Control (CDC). They are now being treated at the National Hospital for Tropical Diseases, according to the Ministry of Health.

The deceased man had been quarantined for two weeks upon entering HCMC from Japan, during which time he tested negative for the coronavirus twice. Then he flew to Hanoi on February 1 before being found dead on February 13.

Health Minister Nguyen Thanh Long has said it's more likely that he was infected in Hanoi.

Chu Xuan Dung, Hanoi's vice chairman, on Monday ordered local authorities to close street restaurants, coffee shops and historical and religious sites from Tuesday to prevent further Covid-19 spread.

The 38 other patients are in Hai Duong, all being close contacts of previously confirmed coronavirus cases. They are being treated at local field hospitals.

Hai Duong, the epicenter of a new coronavirus outbreak that has swept through 13 cities and provinces since late last month, would undergo social distancing starting Tuesday for 15 days to stem the spread of the virus.

Minister Long said at a Monday meeting that extinguishing outbreaks in the province, home to more than two million people, has been difficult as contact tracing and testing are not being carried out fast enough.

Long said infection sources still lurk inside the community despite authorities having collected and tested around 90,000 people, as people are getting infected faster than they could be traced, tested and isolated.

Mismanagement inside quarantine zones is also an issue, as the sheer number of people inside such zones combined with improper quarantine procedures means there were cross-infections inside the zones themselves, he said.

As a result, Long has requested Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc to put all large centralized quarantine zones in Hai Duong under the management of the army instead of civilians.

Vietnam's total Covid-19 infection tally is now 2,269, including 690 active cases. Around 150,000 are in quarantine nationwide, either in hospitals, quarantine zones or at home.
DALLAS (AP)  Wintry weather is forecast for much of the U.S. on Sunday, with freezing temperatures expected to dip as snow falls as far south as Texas' Gulf Coast.

"Typically, we just dont have quite this much cold air in place that far south, said Marc Chenard, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service's Weather Prediction Center.

The storm has prompted officials in Houston, where temperatures were in the 70s Fahrenheit (20s Celsius) earlier this week, to advise residents to prepare for power outages and hazardous roads that could be similar to those experienced in the wake of a Category 5 hurricane. Temperatures were expected to drop to below freezing there by Sunday night.

He said significant ice and up to 12 inches (30 centimeters) of snow were expected across parts of the southern Plains on Sunday and into Monday, with the most snowfall expected near the Oklahoma-Texas border.

Winter weather conditions are affecting large portions of the U.S., but it is rare for them to extend so far south, Chenard said.

The Dallas area had a covering of snow by Sunday morning, with flakes still falling, and as much as 6 inches (15 centimeters) was forecast.

Chenard said sleet and freezing rain could hit further south.

Were looking at potentially over a quarter inch of freezing rain, and that will cause significant impact," Chenard said. We may even see some freezing rain get as far as New Orleans by early Monday.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who issued a disaster declaration for all of the states 254 counties, warned on Saturday: All of Texas is facing an extremely dangerous winter storm.

Abbott, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson have each activated National Guard units to assist state agencies, such as rescuing stranded drivers.

___

Associated Press journalist Julie Walker contributed to this report from New York City.
Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) walks through the Senate subway after calling former President Donald Trump guilty of inciting an insurrection, in Washington on Feb. 13, 2021. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

North Carolina GOP to Decide on Censuring Burr After Guilty Vote in Trump Impeachment Trial

Top Republicans in North Carolina are meeting Monday to vote on whether to censure Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) after he sided with Democrats and six other Republicans to convict former President Donald Trump.

An official with the North Carolina Republican Party confirmed to The Epoch Times that the censure vote is being held by the partys Central Committee.

Kyshia Lineberger, the Republican National Committee committeewoman for North Carolina, will be one of those voting. She plans to vote yes.

Senator Burr called the impeachment trial unconstitutional leading his constituents to believe that he would cast a not guilty vote, she told The Epoch Times via email.

He shocked all of us with his guilty vote on what he called an unconstitutional process. This is highly disappointing for North Carolina Republicans.

Rep. Dan Bishop (R-N.C.) said on Twitter that he supports censuring Burr.

The partys Central Committee features a chairperson for each of the states congressional districts, among other officials.

The vote on whether to censure Burr comes two days after he voted to find Trump guilty of inciting an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6.

People storm the Capitol Building in Washington on Jan. 6, 2020. (Ahmed Gaber/Reuters)

Burr said he agreed with arguments that the former presidents language about the election results contributed to the breach of the Capitol.

When this process started, I believed that it was unconstitutional to impeach a president who was no longer in office. I still believe that to be the case. However, the Senate is an institution based on precedent, and given that the majority in the Senate voted to proceed with this trial, the question of constitutionality is now established precedent. As an impartial juror, my role is now to determine whether House managers have sufficiently made the case for the article of impeachment against President Trump, he said in a statement, referring to how he voted twice to dub the trial unconstitutional.

I have listened to the arguments presented by both sides and considered the facts. The facts are clear, he added. The President promoted unfounded conspiracy theories to cast doubt on the integrity of a free and fair election because he did not like the results. As Congress met to certify the election results, the President directed his supporters to go to the Capitol to disrupt the lawful proceedings required by the Constitution. When the crowd became violent, the President used his office to first inflame the situation instead of immediately calling for an end to the assault.

Burr and the other Republicans who called Trump guilty have faced backlash from within the party. Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) was quickly censured by the state GOP, while North Carolina GOP Chairman Michael Whatley called Burrs vote shocking and disappointing. The North Carolina House Freedom Caucus also voted over the weekend to condemn Burr for the vote. Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.), who is running for Burrs seat, said North Carolina needs a true conservative champion as their next senator.

Burr, 65, is in his third term in the Senate. He is not running for re-election in 2022, so will leave office in January 2023.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), the states other senator, voted not guilty. Trump was acquitted because the guilty votes fell short of the 67-vote threshold.

There were complexities with this transaction that made it hard for other capital solutions firms to get it closed.

Pathway Capital Corp. has closed on a $3.5 million non-notification factoring facility for a startup specialty hauling company based outside of Houston, Texas. Pathway acted as sole arranger. The facilitywhich was vital to the companys launchprovided a 90% advance on receivables purchased as well as 120-day terms on numerous accounts.

There were complexities with this transaction that made it hard for other capital solutions firms to get it closed. We took the time to understand the clients concerns and find the right lender partner, said Glenn Thomas, president of Pathway Capital.

Pathway Capital is a boutique capital advisory firm that has a demonstrated track record and reputation for closing complex transactions expeditiously and with a level of certainty that its clients and their management teams rely on. Its deals range from under $5 million to premier transactions in the $70-100 million range. More information about Pathway Capital is at http://www.pathway-capital.com.

###

About Pathway Capital Corp.

Pathway Capital Corp is a Nyack, New York-based boutique capital advisory firm providing innovative solutions to complex financial transactions. The company provides advisory services for a wide range of transactions including traditional commercial loans, debt restructuring and consolidation, equipment financing, as well as interim and permanent financing on commercial real estate. The Pathway Capital team of professionals possess a unique and diverse background with vast experience in commercial banking and lending, restructuring and turnaround, and accounting and operations. Find out more at http://www.pathway-capital.com.
Director General of Ukraines State Concern Ukroboronprom Yuri Husev signed agreements and contracts with Tawazun Economic Council and EDGE Group to expand military and technical cooperation totaling more than USD 1 billion.

The agreements were signed during an official visit of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to the United Arab Emirates, Ukrinform reports with reference to the press service of the head of state.

"As part of the official visit of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to the United Arab Emirates, Ukroboronprom Director General Yuri Husev signed agreements and contracts with Tawazun Economic Council and EDGE Group to expand military and technical cooperation totaling more than USD 1 billion," the report reads.

The agreement with EDGE on military and technical cooperation will allow the exchange and development of advanced technologies.

"EDGE places a strong emphasis on joint development and cooperation. The signing of this trilateral agreement demonstrates our intention to cooperate with leading international companies within the defence industry. We are excited about the opportunities that open up for the UAE and Ukraine as a result of cooperation, exchange and mutual benefit from military and technical potential of the two countries," CEO and Managing Director of EDGE Group His Excellency Faisal Al Bannai said.

As Ukrinform reported, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife Olena Zelenska are on an official visit to the United Arab Emirates on February 14-15. A number of bilateral documents were signed during the visit.

ish
A man has filed suit against a school district in Bergen County, alleging he has been haunted for life by sexual abuse at the hands of his teachers more than 50 years ago.

The victim, identified in court papers as D.H., claims the abuse began in 1967 on a sixth-grade class trip to Montreal when the teacher tackled him, held him down and lingered on top of him.

After returning from the trip, the teacher  who is not named as a defendant in the lawsuit  allegedly encouraged the victim and other students to spend time in his apartment to drink alcohol and smoke cigarettes, states the suit, filed Wednesday in Superior Court of Bergen County.

The following year, the teacher allegedly began discussing sexual activity with D.H. and showed him pornographic magazines, the lawsuit claims.

The teacher also allegedly told D.H. that he could make money by selling nude photos of himself and that another teacher at the school had connections in the porn industry, the suit states.

The abuse included the teacher taking nude photos of the victim in exchange for a watch, and sexually assaulting him into the 1970s, the lawsuit states.

In August 1973, children broke into the teachers house while he was away and police officers who investigated the burglary found nude photos of D.H. in the home, the suit states.

One of the detectives recognized the victims face in one of the pornographic images and criminal charges were soon filed against the teacher, the lawsuit states.

(D.H.) gave a statement to the police and testified before a grand jury, the suit states. The teacher was indicted and D.H. testified against him in court.

However, the case was dismissed because police did not have a warrant to search the teachers home when they found the child pornography, the lawsuit claims.

In 1973, D.H. claims another teacher cornered and sexually abused him while he was enrolled at Dwight Morrow High School.

The lawsuit states that the high school teacher had been told by the grade-school teacher that D.H. was an easy target for sexual abuse.

Around the same time, D.H. overheard other students gossiping that police had found pictures of little boys in the first teachers apartment, the suit states.

(D.H.) was terrified that other students and members of the community would find out that he was the little boy in many of those photographs, the lawsuit claims.

D.H. claims he went to a guidance counselor to express his concern about the photos, but instead of providing comfort, the counselor asked D.H. about his sexual preferences, the suit states.

Ashamed and terrified, D.H. dropped out of school that same day, the lawsuit states, adding that the alleged abuse caused him to suffer severe emotional distress.

The emotional and psychological trauma associated with his sexual abuse has haunted (D.H.) for his entire life, the suit states. He has been and remains confused, traumatized and ashamed as a result of the acts.

The lawsuit, which seeks a jury trial and monetary damages, alleges the Englewood Public School District violated New Jersey laws against child sex abuse when it failed to protect D.H. from the alleged crimes.

The suit also alleges negligent hiring and supervision, failure to warn and implement adequate child sex abuse policies.

Officials with the Englewood Public School District and its board of education did not immediately respond Monday morning to requests for comment.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a subscription.

Anthony G. Attrino may be reached at tattrino@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyAttrino. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Yves here. Were giving the latest USPS horrorshow, that of Postmaster General DeJoy actively trying to push the Postal Service into a death spiral by raising prices and degrading service, extra attention in the hope that citizens will call or e-mail their Congresscritter to demand their old Postal Service back.

USPS has a fake problem, its supposedly unfixable economics, which in fact result completely from punitively bogus accounting. As the Los Angeles Times Mike Hiltzik wrote last year:

DeJoy didnt mention at all the single most important driver of the Postal Services annual deficit: the onerous requirement, enacted in 2006, that the service pre-fund its retiree healthcare costs, a mandate not imposed on any other government agency or private corporation. According to the Institute for Policy Studies, a Washington think tank, the mandate costs the USPS more than $4 billion a year. Without this burden, the institute says, the Post Office would have reported operating profits in each of the last six years. Instead, This extraordinary mandate created a financial crisis that has been used to justify harmful service cuts and even calls for postal privatization.

The USPS has also been afflicted by a drop in first class mail and significant growth in package deliveries, which literally place bigger loads on infrastructure. But rather than manage this demand, its instead another element in the trumped-up case for privatization.

Even though this article focuses on prominent calls for DeJoys ouster, a recent article in Slate contends theress no easy path to removing him:

If DeJoy served at the pleasure of the president, Biden surely wouldve fired him on Day One. But he doesnt. The problem, ironically, originates from Congress desire to insulate USPS from politics. For most of American history, the Postal Service played an integral rolein the spoils system, and postmaster general was a plum post for an ally of the president. In 1970, Congress overhauled the structureof the Postal Service to end this sordid tradition of patronage by giving the agency substantial independence. To oversee USPSs activities, Congress established a nine-member board of governors who are nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate. No more than five members of the board may belong to the same political party. Once confirmed to the board, governors can only be removed by the president for cause; that means their jobs are safe unless the president can show that they engaged in malfeasance or extreme neglect of duty. The board of governors, in turn, selects the postmaster general, who is not subject to Senate approval. And once appointed, the postmaster general can only be removed by the board, though it need not justify its decision. This structure, in short, is why Louis DeJoy remains postmaster general under Biden. The board of governors is dominated by Trump appointees; Senate Republicans refused to confirm President Barack Obamas nominees to the board, leaving vacancies that Trump promptly filled. Today, there are four Republicans and two Democrats on the board, plus three vacancies. One Democrat, Ron Bloom, is serving a holdover term, which means Biden can replace him at any time. Thus, Biden can fill four seats on the board of governorsa move that would flip the board, giving Democrats a 54 majority. The new president can then urge the Democratic members to remove DeJoy, which they can do by a majority vote. Filling these vacancies is the simplest way for Biden to get rid of DeJoy, though there is no guarantee that it will actually work. The new board would include five Democratsbut one of them, Donald Lee Moak, is a Trump-appointed moderate who, along with the rest of the board, backed DeJoywhen he came under fire for his alleged corruption.* It appears unlikely that Moak would choose to oust a postmaster general whom he supported through this summers controversy. And if Moak declined to join Bidens nominees in firing DeJoy, the postmaster general would retain his position indefinitely.

If the Democrats had a spine, an alternative would be to prosecute DeJoy for corruption if theres enough smoke to get a grand jury to indict. Rooting around in someones file cabinets with discovery powers can unearth all sorts of dirt. But as we can see from how quickly the Democrats folded in the latest impeachment, all they stand for is political theater.

By Jake Johnson, staff writer at Common Dreams. Originally published at Common Dreams

Undeterred by the backlash and widespread delays that followed his disruptive operational changes at the U.S. Postal Service last year, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy is reportedly planning to roll out another slate of policies that would significantly hike postage rates and further slow the delivery of certain kinds of mail.

While the plan has yet to be finalized, new details of the proposalfirst reportedby the Washington Postintensified pressure on President Joe Biden to take decisive action before DeJoy inflicts any more damage on the most popular government institution in the country.

Fire DeJoy before he burns down the USPS, Zephyr Teachout, associate professor of law at Fordham University, tweeted Saturday. Biden has the power to fill the board that decides his fate. That board should be full of people who believe in public postal services. And that board must be ready to fire him quickly.

According to the Post, DeJoywith the support of the USPS Board of Governors, which is composed entirely of Trump appointeesis preparing to put all first-class mail onto a single delivery track a move that would mean slower and more costly delivery for both consumers and commercial mailers.

The postmaster general has also discussed plans to eliminate a tier of first-class mailletters, bills, and other envelope-sized correspondence sent to a local addressdesignated for delivery in two days, the Post reported. Instead, all first-class mail would be lumped into the same three- to five-day window, the current benchmark for nonlocal mail.

The plan also prevents first-class mail from being shipped by airplane, the Postnoted, forcing all of it into trucks and a relay of distribution depots.

In addition to the new operational changeswhich would be piled on top of the DeJoy policies that dramatically hampered USPS performance last year amid the coronavirus pandemic and national electionsthe postmaster general intends to push for significantly higher postage rates in the name of raising revenue, according to the Post.

This is unacceptable. Trump may have left office, but his Postmaster General is still wreaking havoc even after the Congress just provided the Post Office with an additional $10 billion. He must be replaced.https://t.co/SxyiA1IKdX  Senator Chris Van Hollen (@ChrisVanHollen) February 13, 2021



The new details of DeJoys plan came as a growing number of Democratic lawmakers and outside progressives are urging Bidenwho by law cannot fire the postmaster general himselfto take the forceful step of terminating every sitting member of the postal board and filling it with officials committed to preserving and strengthening the USPS as a public service. Postal governors, who can remove the postmaster general with a majority vote, must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate, which Democrats narrowly control.

Late last week, Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) became the first senator to call on Biden to quickly fire and replace every current member of the postal board, arguing in a letter that such as move is necessary to restore accountability and credibility and send a message to future leaders that silence in the face of a campaign of sabotage will not be tolerated.

Supporters of the move argue that replacing the entire postal board would set the stage for DeJoys ouster and begin the process of undoing the damage he has inflicted during his eight months in power. Biden has the authority to fire postal governors for cause, and proponents of removing the sitting board members argue that their complicity in DeJoys assault on the USPS would qualify as sufficient cause.

They have proven to be a cabal of cowards, complicit in DeJoys attacks, derelict in their duties, and unwilling to hold the postmaster accountable, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) tweeted on Friday. America deserves a clean slate.

Biden should fire the governors of the USPS who appointed DeJoy, install new ones, and have them fire DeJoy. He should not be allowed to continue destroying the postal service. https://t.co/JLw3yUNHVe  Robert Reich (@RBReich) February 13, 2021

Alternatively, Biden could fill the three vacant governor spots on the postal board; combined with the two Democrats currently on the board, three Biden-appointed governors would give Democrats a majority. But as Slates Aaron Mak and Mark Joseph Stern wrote last week, that more cautious approach has potentially significant limitations.

Filling these vacancies is the simplest way for Biden to get rid of DeJoy, though there is no guarantee that it will actually work, Mak and Stern noted. The new board would include five Democratsbut one of them, Donald Lee Moak, is a Trump-appointed moderate who, along with the rest of the board, backed DeJoy when he came under fire for his alleged corruption.

It appears unlikely that Moak would choose to oust a postmaster general whom he supported through this summers controversy, they added. And if Moak declined to join Bidens nominees in firing DeJoy, the postmaster general would retain his position indefinitely.

But the Biden White House has signaled that it is nevertheless planning to pursue the strategy of simply filling existing vacancies, saying in a statement last week that the president is focused on appointing officials who reflect his commitment to the workers of the U.S. Postal Servicewho deliver on the post offices vital universal service obligation.

U.S. Mail Not for Sale, a worker-led campaign sponsored by the American Postal Workers Union and the National Association of Letter Carriers, is collecting signatures for a petition calling on Biden to nominate board members who are fully committed to vibrant, public, and universal postal services and opposed to DeJoys agenda of cutting service and slowing the mail.

Filling the vacancies on the postal board, the petition reads, is essential to build back better the Postal Service and to serve our communities and to help heal our economy.
THE mother of a boy with special educational needs has praised his teachers for helping him to continue learning from home during the coronavirus pandemic.

Roman Wiltshire has several conditions which affect his reading, writing, concentration and social skills after being born more than 10 weeks premature and weighing just 1lb.

The nine-year-old, of Greys Hill, Henley, was overlooked at his old primary school on the south coast but finally got the help he needed when he moved to Trinity Primary School in Vicarage Road a year ago.

Staff encouraged his mother Ashley Adams, who lives with Roman and her partner Martin Andrews, to pursue a diagnosis as he was struggling with his class work and suffered anxiety.

Shortly after he enrolled, the school gave him extra one-to-one help in the classroom and devised ways of structuring his day so that he felt less worried and could focus more easily.

When the first lockdown was imposed, the team adapted all of Romans homework and gave him constant feedback over the internet to make sure he remained interested. Miss Adams says this helped Roman to make progress in his writing and also helped her to feel less alone as her partner has to work full-time.

She said: The staff are always at the other end of the phone, no matter what the time, and they give frequent, regular feedback so Roman always feels reassured that hes doing the right thing.

We cant do a six-hour day but we try to manage three and its going well. It would have been disastrous without the extra help  we would really have crumbled.

Roman was born in Perth, Australia, and moved back to Britain with Miss Adams when he was five.

She says his first school spotted him struggling but took no action despite her pleas. It was a relief when Trinity acknowledged there was a problem and immediately looked at ways of helping as well as giving advice on private assessments.

The school will ask Oxfordshire County Council, the education authority, to put together an education, health and care plan which will outline Romans support needs until he turns 25.

Miss Adams said: I felt severely let down by Romans old school but Trinity was quick to call a meeting, which was wonderful as Id been fighting for so long to work out what was going on.

I had a mothers instinct that something wasnt quite right and the old school noted all my concerns but did nothing. I later found theyd written a report on all his problems but never shared it with me, which was very upsetting.

I was on the point of giving up because I felt so unheard  it was soul-destroying. Once wed identified the issues, they did things like giving him more time, warning him about changes to the daily routine and having someone to talk to.

Staff stayed in contact as soon as lockdown was imposed and adapted Romans assignments so that they related to either Lego or animals, two of his favourite topics. They also helped his mother create a daily task chart with pictures to help him stick to a routine.

Although children classed as vulnerable were allowed to go into school for three days a week, it was decided Roman would have more stability at home. He returned to class when the coronavirus restrictions were eased last summer.

The school team, including his year 4 teacher Clara Hart, special needs co-ordinator Holly Chaplin and special needs teaching assistant Jacky Broomhead, offered the same level of support when the primary closed again last month.

Miss Adams said: Roman was sad to hear we were going back into another lockdown as he misses his friends but theyve really gone the extra mile to keep him engaged, which makes it easier for me to help him.

They could have just sent out the same work that everyone else gets, or even made him do year 3 work, but theyve insisted on doing everything they can for him and were so thankful.

He finds it hard to hold a pen or pencil but his writing has improved, which hes so proud of and so am I. His teachers were thrilled and it helps him to realise that he can achieve things.

Roman now enjoys school and is looking forward to the end of lockdown. Miss Adams said: He never used to be happy because he was struggling without support but the staff and his lovely friends have helped him to feel good about himself, which is lovely to see.

Miss Chaplin said: The lockdowns have been a real challenge but over the past year weve learned more ways of ensuring that children with special needs remain engaged and well-looked after. Its lovely to hear that parents are pleased with the support weve given.
A doctor has been hailed a hero for rescuing COVID-19 vaccine doses from a burning vaccination centre in England's Surrey, as per local reports. Emberbrook Community Centre in Thames Ditton, Surrey, was evacuated on Saturday after volunteers spotted smoke blowing from its roof.

Credit: David Marsden

The locals who had turned up for their COVID jab had to be turned away as firefighters rushed to the scene to get the situation under control.



But before the fire was even out, one brave doctor headed back into the building and was seen pulling out a large refrigerated container holding precious doses of the vaccine.

Also read: What Happens To COVID-19 Vaccines When They're Not Used? All You Need To Know

Credit: Anne Smith

Surrey Heartlands CCG, the health service group, confirmed that all of the vaccines were saved from the fire. Anne Smith, 68, was volunteering in the health centre car park at the time when she began to see smoke rising from the building.



Anne told Surrey Live: "I could see the smoke but it was on the other side of the roof, I initially thought someone had a fire going at home. But it didn't subside and it was very apparent very quickly [it was not a planned fire] because it stank, I think it was the insulation on fire."

Also read: India Shuns WHO's 8-12 Weeks Gap Rider, Starts Giving 2nd COVID Vaccine Shot: Here's Why

Representational Image/Reuters

As per the report, Anne and other volunteers began stopping people from entering the building for their vaccination appointments. But inside, those administering and receiving the vaccines were unaware of the blaze.



But once everyone was rescued, Anne saw a doctor re-entering the building to save the coronavirus vaccines. She said the team were administering the Oxford/AstraZeneca jabs on Saturday.

Anne told the local news outlet: "One of the doctors who was concerned actually went back in for the vaccine, which I thought was amazing, in a great big refrigerated container he managed to drag it out. It was his priority to get that out."



Also read: 'Paramedic Of The Year' Arrested After Being Caught Stealing COVID-19 Vaccines
Scottsdale, Arizona--One of the most fascinating self-help books to come out recently, Solid Ground: A Foundation for Winning in Work and in Life by T.W. Lewis, has won the Literary Titan Gold Medal Book Award. Lewis has taken the many lessons learned from family, friends and business associates and created a unique and inspiring roadmap for life.

This is the second award for Solid Ground which was recently named "Winner" of the Pinnacle Book Achievement Award in the Self-Help category.

What sets Solid Ground apart are the clear and concise messages which accompany one's journey through the interesting and successful life of T.W. Lewis. The reader lives his story while absorbing the valuable lessons which propelled Lewis to become a highly respected businessman and philanthropist. By carefully looking back at various turning points in his homebuilding career, Lewis provides a road map for whatever part of the journey one might be traveling at any given time.

Another aspect which sets this book apart are continual reminders of where business practices and values came from and what they mean for a company and everyone affected by their existence. Truly a self-made man, Lewis used his grit, determination, and a little luck to overcome the odds and to build the "solid ground" on which his future success would rest.

"I wrote this book because young adults today are getting bad advice about how to succeed," Lewis says. "I want to show them a better way. When it comes to being successful in life, having good judgment and making good decisions are far more important than just being smart."

The T.W. Lewis Company has received numerous national awards, including America's Best Builder and the National Housing Quality Gold Award. Lewis received a Lifetime Achievement recognition from Professional Builder magazine and was named the first inductee into the National Housing Quality Hall of Fame.

"In today's media-driven, anything-goes culture," says Lewis, "we seem to be losing sight of solid groundthe time-tested attributes of personal character, hard work, goal setting, self-awareness, and helping othersthat have always been necessary for a successful life. Popular myths are now attempting to redefine everything, and the 'solid ground' is being replaced with the 'shifting sands' of instant gratification, self-absorption, and consumerism."

Lewis challenges these popular myths that make it harder to achieve success and happiness. These are a few of the myths Lewis takes head on.

"Tom Lewis has provided a roadmap for a richer, more meaningful, and happier life. Take that road!" Dennis Prager, Author and syndicated talk show host

"T.W. Lewis is an impressive mentora guide for securing success and happiness." Grady Harp, Amazon Top 50 Hall of Fame Reviewer, 5-stars

"Solid Ground guides readers to become masters of their fates and captains of their souls." Barbara Barrett, Nominee for Secretary of the Air Force

Myth Reality Successful people are just lucky. Successful people use their natural talent, start early, work late, set goals, and keep getting better. You can be anything you want. You can be anything you are naturally good at . . . if you earn it. You have to choose between success and happiness. You can have both, either, or neither because they are unrelated. Work smarter, not harder. Work smarter and harder. It takes both to succeed. Following your passion is the key to success and happiness. Success is the result of talent, hard work, and persistence. Happiness naturally occurs when you help others and grow as a person. Thirty is the new twenty. Thirty is still thirty, and your twenties are still your defining decade. Successful people don't waste time.

Solid Ground shatters the popular myths in today's culture about how to create a successful life. By reminding us of the time-tested principles of personal character, hard work, goal setting, self-awareness, and helping others that seem to have gotten lost, Solid Ground explains and celebrates the real building blocks of a successful career and life.

"Ten years from now you will thank yourself for reading this book," says Lewis. "It will change the trajectory of your life."

Solid Ground: A Foundation for Winning in Work and In Life (eBook) $9.95, ISBN 9780960095308 (Hardcover) $29.95, 2020, T.W. Lewis Company, 368 pages, available at Amazon, Barnes&Noble and Pathway Book Service.

Tom Lewis is a graduate of Kentucky University with an MBA from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and the founder of T.W. Lewis Company, a Scottsdale, Arizona-based real estate investment company known for its outstanding quality and customer service in the homebuilding industry. The company has received numerous national awards, including America's Best Builder and the National Housing Quality Gold Award. Tom received a Lifetime Achievement recognition from Professional Builder magazine and was named the first inductee into the National Housing Quality Hall of Fame.

In 2002, Tom and his wife, Jan, formed T.W. Lewis Foundation to support higher education, children and families in need, youth character education, and a variety of local and national nonprofits that build community and strengthen America's civil society.

You can find more information on Tom Lewis and Solid Ground at SolidGroundBook.com and TWLewis.com.

Media Contact: For a review copy of Solid Ground or to arrange an interview with T.W. Lewis, contact Scott Lorenz of Westwind Book Marketing at scottlorenz@westwindcos.com or by phone at 734-667-2090. Follow Lorenz on Twitter @abookpublicist
They intentionally made me feel as if I was going to lose my job so I wouldnt go to the police, Ms. Higgins wrote. They were trying to silence me, and I think thats so wrong, she added, describing a workplace where victims were often blamed when they spoke out. It was so gross, and it was so disparaging, she added.

Documents reviewed by The Times confirmed that Ms. Higgins had ceased pursuing the case with the police in April 2019, citing current workplace demands.

The case remains open, but it is not under active investigation given that there has been no formal complaint from Ms. Higgins, according to the police in the Australian Capital Territory.

The government called the allegations deeply distressing, saying in a statement to the news media on Monday that it regrets in any way if Ms. Higgins felt unsupported through this process. But it maintained that she had been encouraged by Ms. Reynolds to speak with the police in order to assess the options available to her. Ms. Reynolds did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

But speaking to Senate members in Canberra, the capital, on Tuesday, Ms. Reynolds said, I unreservedly apologize to Brittany Higgins, adding that Ms. Higgins trauma and distress over the handling of the rape allegation was very clear for all to see.

One in six women in Australia over the age of 15 have experienced sexual violence, according to the most recent figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. That figure has grown in the past decade, though it is unclear whether that is because assaults are rising or because a greater percentage of assaults are being reported.
(CNN) - The biotechnology company Novavax told CNN on Monday that its scientists are testing a new version of its COVID-19 vaccine in the lab that specifically targets the coronavirus variant first identified in South Africa.

As part of this research, the scientists are hoping to determine whether the new vaccine would serve as a booster shot to the original vaccine that has already been developed, or as a bivalent vaccine administered on its own, meaning it would target two strains of the coronavirus, both the original and the variant first identified in South Africa.

Once lab testing is complete, the new vaccine could move to clinical trials  but a timeline is still in the works and the research is still very early.

In a previous announcement in January, the company said, "Novavax initiated development of new constructs against the emerging strains in early January and expects to select ideal candidates for a booster and/or combination bivalent vaccine for the new strains in the coming days. The company plans to initiate clinical testing of these new vaccines in the second quarter of this year."

This story was first published on CNN.com, "Novavax testing new version of its COVID-19 vaccine to specifically target variant"

Mitch McConnell has said he is open to opposing any 'unelectable' candidates in 2022, even if they are strongly backed by Donald Trump, as he wrestles with how to handle a deeply-divided party following Trump's impeachment hearing.

McConnell voted on Saturday to acquit the former president, but then publicly attacked him, accusing him of a 'disgraceful dereliction of duty' in his most critical remarks ever uttered.

His tightrope walk between defending and demonizing the former president impressed few.

McConnell's home newspaper, The Lexington Herald-Leader, accused him on Sunday of having 'contorted himself into a strange pretzel-shaped politician hated by everyone'.

Mitch McConnell on Sunday told Politico he was focused on 'electable' candidates for 2022

His party has been engulfed in controversy sparked by Trump-backed Marjorie Taylor Greene

Lara Trump, wife of Eric Trump, is widely reported to be considering a 2022 Senate run

Back for another round: Donald Trump at his own Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach on Sunday, a day after he was acquitted by the Senate at the end of his historic second impeachment trial

On Sunday, McConnell told Politico that he was now focused on the future - with or without Trump's support.

'My goal is, in every way possible, to have nominees representing the Republican Party who can win in November,' he said.

'Some of them may be people the former president likes. Some of them may not be. The only thing I care about is electability.'

McConnell did not mention any names.

Candidates backed by Trump such as QAnon believer Marjorie Taylor Greene, who only entered Congress in January, have already caused him and his party significant headaches, with her previous incendiary comments.

The Kentucky senator has long had a troubled relationship with Donald Trump

Newly acquitted: Trump took to the golf course hours after the Democratic effort to convict him and potentially bar him from running for office again in 2024 fell ten votes short of the required supermajority

Other candidates likely to be backed by Trump, such as his daughter-in-law Lara, expected to make a run for the Senate in 2022, could not count on McConnell's support, he said.

'I'm not predicting the president would support people who couldn't win,' McConnell said.

'But I do think electability  not who supports who  is the critical point.'

McConnell declined to say whether he would support the former president if he seeks re-election in four years time.

'I'm focused on '22,' he said.

Shelley Moore Capito, a Republican senator for West Virginia, admitted that the party was at a crucial juncture with deep divisions between loyal Trumpites and those committed, like her, to McConnell.

'I don't know what happens to the party as a whole in terms of the folks deeply committed to President Trump,' she told the site.

'But I hope they stick with us.'

Andy Biggs, a representative for Arizona and head of the arch conservative House Freedom Caucus, said many people in his party were upset at McConnell.

'A lot of people are frustrated with his comments. I'm not going to sugarcoat it,' he said, adding that Trump's influence remained.

'The fact he is no longer in the White House does not mean he is not the leader of the movement he started four or five years ago.'

McConnell could find himself supporting candidates who are spurned by Trump in 2022

McConnell and Biggs could find themselves representing different, opposing, ends of the Republican party line in 2022.

McConnell has shown his support for figures like embattled Representative Liz Cheney, who voted to impeach Trump on January 13 and has been singled out by Trump-supporting Republicans ever since.

She is up for re-election in 2022, and it is already clear that she is going to face a strong challenge.

One of Trump's staunchest supporters, Florida representative Matt Gaetz, even went to Wyoming last month to campaign against her.

'The future of the party will be determined in places like Wyoming in '22,' McConnell said.

He spoke on the day Kentucky's influential newspaper excoriated him in a column.

'The good of the country has always come in second to the good of McConnell,' she wrote

'Everyone sees through him now,' wrote Linda Blackford.

'He may have helped create the modern Republican party, but when it most needed saving, he was nowhere to be found.

'He could have given political cover to his colleagues to stand up to Trump and the attack on Jan. 6, but as I wrote before, the monster he helped create was no longer in his control.'

Blackford said 'the history books will be clear about those who coddled and engendered Trump's madness in the name of political power.'

She accused the 78-year-old of having 'upended, diluted and blocked' policies on poverty reduction and improving the lives of ordinary Americans throughout 'his entire career in his quest for personal power.'

She added: 'The good of the country has always come in second to the good of Mitch McConnell.'
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Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  The director of the Philippine General Hospital on Monday said there may be a need to beef up the vaccinee substitution list in their hospital following the delay in delivery of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccines in the Philippines.

PGH is set to receive the first batch of vaccines arriving in the country to inoculate its medical frontliners and other hospital personnel. Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said the government hospital will receive a portion of the 117,000 Pfizer doses that will be sent through the COVAX facility.

Director Gerardo Legaspi said 74% of 2,007 staff surveyed said they are willing to be inoculated with any brand of vaccine. He added it went up to 94% during the pre-registration for the vaccination program in the government hospital.

However, the timeline for the Pfizer vaccines is uncertain now due to delays. Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles raised the possibility that the delivery of the COVID-19 vaccines from the American firm may coincide with the arrival of Chinas Sinovac vaccine shipment slated on Feb. 23.

Legaspi said he is unsure if the positive outcome in surveys and pre-registration will change if they will not receive Pfizer vaccines. But he stressed the need for the quick substitution list in case someone backs out of the vaccination on the day of inoculation.

"I don't want to second guess kung magiiba ang brand. Palagay ko kung mag-iiba ang brand ng bakuna dapat maghanda lalo ang ospital sa quick substitution list," he said in a media briefing.

The hospital director added, "Kung ayaw ng iba dapat meron nang kadikit na listahan. I think there will be a lot willing to take whatever vaccine comes based on our survey para sa magpapalit ng isip [for those who will change their minds]."

[Translation: If the brand will change, I think this is more reason for the hospital to prepare the quick substitution list. If someone doesn't want to get vaccinated, there should be other names on the list.]

Hospitals and local government units will be required to come up with a quick substitution list to prevent coronavirus vaccines from going to waste. The Health Department is eyeing at least 20% of people as back up COVID-19 vaccinees in case some back out or miss their appointment. For example, if 800 people are set to be vaccinated on that day, there will be 200 names on the quick substitution list who should be on standby and ready to go to the vaccination site.

Over 5,700 of PGHs 6,316 personnel have pre-registered for the vaccination. Legaspi hopes the remaining 671 personnel will also register. He said some are still hesitant because of the reported adverse effects to the vaccine in other countries, but he clarified that such cases are rare.


The people of Agyan, Domunli, and Akonu three adjoining communities expressed great satisfaction to Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) for building the First-Ever Community Junior High School for them.



Three communities namely, Agyan, Domunli, and Akonu in the Nzema East Municipality of the Western Region have had their first-ever community Junior High School.



The school was built by the government of Ghana funded by the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) Foundation.



The Executive Direc6tor of GNPC Foundation, Dr. Dominic Eduah speaking to the media said, the project forms part of the Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR) of the foundation therefore they are happy to the school block is in has been built for the communities.



"Education in actual sense is the key to development and this is not the first time we have put up such a block, we have done so many things to help the people across the length and breadth of the country and we are happy to embarking on our Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR).



The natives could not believe their eyes when the GNPC foundation was hardening over the 4-unit classroom block to them.



The pupils who used to sit under tree recounts and expressed their joy for the completion of the school block.



They said the new building will facilitate learning proceedings, adding that they will study assiduously in order to achieve their aspirations.



The people of Agyan, Domunli, and Akonu three adjoining communities expressed great satisfaction to GNPC Foundation for building the First-Ever Community Junior High School for them

Source: Peacefmonline.com









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Any attempt to comprehend elite politics in China requires an understanding of the factional dynamics within the party

As the global debate on the Chinese model, and especially its domestic political system intensifies, there is a tendency to regard the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as a monolith. This paper corrects such a view and argues that any attempt to comprehend elite politics in China requires an understanding of the factional dynamics within the party. The paper outlines the evolution of factional politics in China, and shows how two factions  the Shanghai Gang and the Chinese Communist Youth League (CCYL)  have dominated the countrys politics over the past three decades. The rise of President Xi Jinping in the last few years has run parallel to the emergence of his own new factionnow the dominant one in the party.

Introduction

The Peoples Republic of China (PRC) has become increasingly assertive in its foreign policy over the past couple of years. This has led many scholars and analysts to conclude that such shift is directly correlated with President Xi Jinpings consolidation of power in Beijing, and his side-lining of long-established principles of political conduct in the domestic arena.[1] However, if one takes a longer view of domestic Chinese politics, such a conclusion, though not incorrect, rests on an unstable premise.

Pundits who argue that Chinas newfound aggressive economic, military, and diplomatic external policy is a consequence of a politically stronger leader, make the assumption that for decades, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its leadership have been a monolith. In their understanding, Chinas foreign policy shift is merely a consequence of a change in preferences within the CCP. Such an understanding comes from taking the idea of a centralised one party state quite literally. Viewing the CCP as a monolith is misleading, and impedes the understanding of domestic Chinese politics, and the dynamics of factional politics within it, which have governed the partys behaviour over the past few decades.

This paper is an attempt to correct such a view. It provides an overview of factional politics in China, showing the different phases beginning in the Mao Zedong era to the present one of Xi Jinping. The paper argues that the dynamics of factional politics within China are an effective barometer of the nature of political power in Beijing at any given time.

To be sure, neither factions within the CCP nor their study are new phenomena. No party outside the party reflects an imperial ideology; no faction within the party is an incredibly bizarre notion, said Mao during the Eleventh Plenum of the 8th National Party Congress, held at the beginning of the Cultural Revolution in 1966.[2] Consequently, it was the Cultural Revolution and the purging of many high-ranking CCP officials during that period, which sparked scholarly interest in factional conflict as a lens to comprehend Chinese politics.[3] While the study of Chinese factional politics is not new, it has been mostly limited to media outlets in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and a few scholars in the West. The use of factional conflict and dynamics to ponder Chinese politics remains an underutilised tool among most China observers, including those in India.

The first section of this paper lays out the organisational structure in China. The second section looks at the development of collective leadership in the Deng era and the central role of factions within it. The third section provides an overview of the Shanghai Gang and the Chinese Communist Youth League (CCYL), and how the two eventually developed a power sharing arrangement, resulting in the institutionalisation of collective leadership.

The fourth section looks at the rise of a new faction in Chinese politics, headed by Xi Jinping  the Xi Gang. It looks at how Xi rose to power using his membership of the Shanghai Gang, but as he concentrated power during his first term, he used it to side-line both the other factions. The fifth section looks at the composition of the Xi faction and how Xi and his proteges now occupy almost all of the significant leadership posts in the party and the administration  both at the central and provincial level. Finally, the sixth section looks at the other political and governance measures used by Xi to further centralise power. The paper concludes by arguing that the rise of the Xi Gang has fundamentally altered the idea of collective leadership in elite Chinese politics.

Chinas organisational structure: An overview

The CCP was formed in 1921 with the assistance of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Over the next couple of decades, it quickly expanded, defeated the Kuomintangs (KMT) Nationalist Government in a civil war, and established the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) in 1949. The CCP has since ruled over China, making it one of the most stable single-party systems in the world. But it was during its very years of rise between 1921 and 1949, that the party developed certain institutional features which would define its character for decades to come. One of the first among these party institutions to be established was the Organisation department.[4]

This internal party institution was formed right after Maos historic Great long March. As his new Communist movement was gaining traction, there was an upsurge in the number of membership applications for the CCP. Mao established the Organisation Department to vet the new members and determine their loyalty. He feared that under the guise of inducting new members, the KMT might be placing its spies within the Communist party ranks. The department was modelled on a similar Soviet institution called Orgburo, which was established by Vladimir Lenin. Eventually, Joseph Stalin also built his political machine with Orgburo at its core. In China, since 1949, the Organisation Department has been at the heart of the CCPs organisational structure and some of the most powerful leaders in the country have headed it.

Since then, the role of the Organisation Department is to dispense patronage in the form of powerful government and party positions, making it the key forum for CCPs internal political battles. Essentially, these behind-the-scenes political battles to secure key positions for themselves or their factional members, is the central theme of Chinese politics. As the clearing house for these disputes, the organization department has become the institutional hub of the entire political system, wrote Richard McGregor in his book The Party: The Secret World of Chinas Communist Rulers.[5]

While the Organisation Department is at the heart of the CCPs affairs, the decision-making power rests on a series of hierarchical central party institutions. These include (in a hierarchical order): The President (and General Secretary of the CCP), the seven-member Politburo Standing Committee (PSC), the 25-member Politburo, the 376-member Central Committee, the 2000+ member Party Congress, Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), and the Central Military Commission. Other significant institutions include the Secretariat to the Politburo and the PSC, and increasingly the Leading Small Groups within the Central Committee.[6] In the judicial arena, the Supreme Peoples Court and the Supreme Peoples Procuratorate are the key central bodies. Meanwhile, CCPs apex institution the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection has gained a lot of prominence in the Xi era. While these institutions represent the CCP and the judiciary, the State Council, headed by the Premier is the chief administrative authority of the country, and all provincial governments also come under it.

The key indicator of which faction is dominant is how they can comprise the majority of positions in these institutions. For instance, during Jiangs rule, members of the Shanghai Gang mostly filled the positions; today members of the Xi gang do. Conversely, if no faction enjoys a majority, then it suggests a power-sharing arrangement between factions, such as during the Hu era.

Moving to the bureaucracy of the state, while there is technically a distinction between the party officials and public administration, it is largely a mirage.[7] To develop a better understanding of Chinese politics, one has to begin by looking at the bureaucracy. The Chinese bureaucracy involves two vertical hierarchies, the state and the party. These two vertical hierarchies are then replicated across the five levels of government: central, provincial, county, city, and township. According to scholar Kenneth Lieberthal, such a criss-crossing lines of authority leads to a matrix structure.[8]

It is important to look at political power in China through the lens of this matrix structure, primarily because it shows how the final power lies with the party, and not the government. The party exercises this power through the Organisation Department and its ability to control appointments from the central to the township level. For instance, at the provincial level, there are two parallel leadership posts of the governor and a provincial CCP secretary. But for all practical purposes, the governor is subordinate to the party secretary.

That said, China has grown more complex over the past few decades and so has governing the country. This has made way for a slightly more independent bureaucracy, from the township to the centre. One of the legacies of the Jiang and Hu eras was to facilitate some degree of institutional separation between the party and the government. Since Xi took charge, he has tried to bring that decision-making power back to the party.

Collective leadership and the role of factions

Following the single-man leadership in the Mao era that was characterised by excesses, Deng sought to make definitive changes in how the CCP conducted itself: to make a set of individuals responsible for decision-making, as opposed to just one man. Deng issued a series of political documents to articulate this championing of collective leadership. Foremost of these was the document, Several Principles on Political Life in the Party, which established the principles of collective leadership, inner-party democracy, the rights of all the CCP members, and prohibiting the development of a personality cult.[9]

While the intent behind Dengs idea of collective leadership was to allow different voices to function within the CCP leadership, it was also the bedrock on which factions and their idea of sharing power was built on. In the post-Deng era, as the Shanghai Gang and the CCYL became formidable political factions within the CCP, they were forced to share power with each other, guided by Dengs idea of collective leadership. In 2007, when Hu was president, a Party Congress Communique defined collective leadership as a system with a division of responsibilities among individual leaders in an effort to prevent arbitrary decision-making by a single top leader.[10]

In most authoritarian regimes, a lack of electoral backing raises fundamental questions about the nature of political legitimacy for the countrys leadership.[11] After forming a republic in 1949, PRCs first two leaders, Mao and Deng, enjoyed political legitimacy primarily from their participation in the revolutionary war, which led to the establishment of the republic.[12] However, by the time Jiang came to power 1989, there were hardly any leaders left who had participated in the Civil War of the 1940s. From then on, different ideas of political legitimacy had to be constructed.

CCP leaders chose a two-fold method to achieve political legitimacy. First, as has been argued by several scholars, the CCP leaders gained the trust of the Chinese people by consistent provision of economic growth.[13] Second, the CCP built a system of patronage, whereby a leader in a position of power would appoint his loyal proteges in various other positions below him. As the said leader was promoted up the ranks, he ensured that so were his proteges. This power-sharing patronage network is how Chinas formidable factions were built. From 1989 to 2014, the Chinese state was ruled by either the Shanghai Gang or the CCYL, or a combination of the two. The formation of these factions was based on sound political rationale.

Factions operate within a given party hierarchy, argue Patrick Francois et al. in their paper Factions in Nondemocracies: Theory and Evidence from the Chinese Communist Party.[14] Moreover, factions play a dual role. First, factions provide support to their members in obtaining promotions up the ladder in the Chinese system. Second, they allow the allocation of that support to be decided by senior affiliates. Therefore, junior members are often blocked by higher ranked cofactionals keen to avoid promoting colleagues who will compete with them for future openings. The authors further contend that factions in the CCP emerge through close personal connections with patrons (such as Jiang, Hu, and Xi) and do not necessarily represent specific territorial or economic interest groups.

Francois and others conducted an econometric analysis of factional arrangements and dynamics within the CCP to demonstrate how factions matter in Chinese politics. Their analysis considered CCYL and Shanghai Gang as the only two factions that function in an organised fashion, leading to dividends for their members. A few of their findings help highlight the significance of CCP factions and how they operate.

First, members of CCYL and Shanghai Gang exhibit promotion rates higher by 10 percentage points relative to neutral members. Moreover, if a member of one of these factions is the current president of the country, these numbers go up further. Having a cofactional leader adds 20.6 percentage points to CYLC and 19.3 to Shanghai Gang, inducing a substantial, highly significant, leadership premium in the speed at which leaders cofactionals are promoted, notes the paper. Second, a faction can support only one member for a position. Third, it is nearly impossible for a faction member, without the backing of his faction, to win against another one with a backing. Fourth, under Jiang and Hu, the opening in the Politburo and the Central Committee were filled with mostly the top leaders of their respective factions  highlighting how factions accumulate power once their chief becomes the paramount leader.

Fifth, factions observe a seniority veto, which allows them to avoid intra-factional fighting. However, it is important to note that such vetoes are mostly regional in nature, so a higher up factional member cannot block the advancement of anyone below him throughout China. Providing these limited vetoes is the factions way of balancing career incentives while lessening the costs of intra-faction rivalry, so that sufficient faction members in the hierarchy have a good chance of attaining the paramount leadership, the authors argue.

Sixth, and most importantly, their analysis shows strong evidence in favour of power sharing between the Shanghai Gang and the CCYL. The authors demonstrate that if a member from of the Shanghai Gang or CCYL is sitting in the top two leadership positions of national or provincial institution/organ, then the likelihood of the other position being held by a co-factional member is extremely low.

One Party, Two Factions

Throughout the 1990s, Chinese politics was dominated by Jiang and his Shanghai Gang.[15] The subsequent decade saw Hu and his CCYL faction at the helm of Chinese affairs, but their power was balanced by the Shanghai Gang. Jiang and his faction represented elite and coastal interests within China, resulting in more market-friendly policy preferences in the Jiang era.[16] Meanwhile, Hu and his faction mostly hailed from the Chinese hinterland, and demonstrated their preference for more populist policies, that aimed to restore the balance of power between the wealthy eastern coastal provinces and the poorer interior ones.[17]

After Hus tenure ended, the appointment of Xi  who belonged to the Shanghai Gang  was considered by most observers as the two factions alternating in the drivers seat, the top-position in the CCP. The near complete domination over Chinese politics between these two factions has been categorised as one party, two factions by Cheng Li. The following section looks at what these factions are, their origins, and how they eventually entered a de facto power-sharing arrangement.

Shanghai Gang

The Shanghai Gang comprises members who rose to prominence because of their association with Jiang Zemin while he was in Shanghai.[18] There is also a geographic component to this faction, as a large number of its members hail from the provinces of Shanghai, Zhejiang, and Jiangsu.

Before rising to the top position as CCP general secretary in 1989, Jiang served his time in the metropolis of Shanghai as mayor, and then party secretary. It is during his time in Shanghai that he developed an extensive political network, and after his appointment as general secretary, many of his close contacts took up prominent leadership positions at the central and provincial level.[19]

Most significantly, Zeng Qinghong, his chief-of-staff in Shanghai accompanied Jiang to Beijing. Throughout the 1990s  during Jiangs presidency  Qinghong headed the sensitive CCP General Office and the Organisation Department. In this period, Qinghong established his own network, and appointed proteges at the provincial and central level. Once Jiang retired in 2002, Qinghong became the de facto head of the Shanghai Gang. He entered the Standing Committee in 2002, headed the important Party School of the CCP, and served as the 7th vice president of China from 2003 to 2008.[20] This highlights how key loyalists of a factional patron form their own network  helping further the reach of their grouping.

Other that Qinghong, among Jiangs personal staff, You Xigui (bodyguard), and Jia Tingan (personal secretary) also moved to Beijing with him. Xigui was appointed director of the Bodyguards Bureau and then the deputy director of the CCP general office. Meanwhile, Tingan was appointed director of the presidents office and of the General Office of the Chief Military Commission. These three (Qinghong, Xigui, and Tingan) constituted the most crucial figures in the inner circle of Jiangs administration. A few years after Jiang moved to Beijing, two of Jiangs deputies in Shanghai, Wu Bangguo and Huang Ju, were promoted to Politburo members and later served as members of the PSC, writes Cheng Li in his book Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era.[21]

Appointing key confidants from Shanghai was not the only way Jiang established his faction and then expanded its control over China. To begin with, over the past three decades, a majority of leadership positions in Shanghai have been occupied by either Jiang or Qinghongs loyalists. For example, Xi Jinping who served as Shanghais party secretary was a loyalist of Qinghong. In addition, a significant number of municipal leaders in Shanghai have been promoted to the national leadership or transferred to other provinces and cities where they served as top leaders, writes Li.[22] For example, former deputy party secretary of Shanghai Meng Jianzhu served as Jiangxi party chief and entered the CCP Politburo.

Jiang ensured that while he served in Shanghai, all key leadership positions went to his confidants. Eventually, when he made it to Beijing, he ensured not only that all key leadership positions in Shanghai would continue to be filled by his loyalists, but also that many of these loyalists from Shanghai would take up significant leadership positions across China. By the end of Jiangs tenure, he and Qinghong had established a comprehensive patron-client network that would ensure that Shanghai Gang continues to be a formidable political alliance long after the two leaders had left active politics.[23]

However, it is not just through appointments that the Shanghai Gang dominated Chinese state during the Jiang years. For as long as Jiang was in power, eastern coastal provinces, and especially Shanghai, continued to receive highly preferential economic treatment from the central leadership. A study conducted in 2002 showed how over the 12 years prior (1990-2002), Shanghai received 19.8 billion yuan more in state grants and loans than its chief domestic competitor, the city of Tianjin.[24] This preferential treatment also resulted in more flows of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into Shanghai than any other Chinese city. Another figure helps provide a broad sense of how the Shanghai Gangs preferential treatment of Eastern coastal China aided its rapid economic growth: between 1978 and 2002, 86 percent of FDI inflows into China went to the East coast, even as the countrys West accounts for 71 percent of the total land area.[25] Most of Chinas export-led growth came from these provinces, and this process started under the leadership of Jiang and Zhu Rongji, former premier of China. Rongji had also advanced his career through the route of Shanghai, and is considered the political mentor, as well as patron of Jiang.[26]

If Rongji was the de facto founder of the Shanghai Gang, Jiang institutionalised the faction during his tenures, Qinghong continued to represent its interest when power moved to Hu and the CCYL, and finally, with the appointment of Jinping as the CCP general secretary in 2012, the power came back to the Shanghai Gang.

In scholarly studies of elite Chinese politics, there is a lot of debate regarding the nature of princelings as a factionthe political leaders who come from a veteran communist revolutionary family or has a high-ranking official family background.[27] Some consider them to be an independent faction, while others see them as part of the Shanghai Gang; still others do not consider them a faction at all. For instance, the econometric analysis by Francois et al showed that princelings are not organised enough to function as a unified faction.[28] However, other scholars such as Li contend that over the past three decades, princelings have formed the core of the Shanghai Gang, also known as the elite coalition in Chinese politics.

Chinese Communist Youth League

As Jiangs tenure ended, Hu Jintao was appointed general secretary of the CCP, and Chinas president. His appointment marked the rise of the Chinese Communist Youth League (CCYL) as the second major political faction in Chinese politics. CCYL is essentially the youth wing of the CCP, and had long been a source of recruitment for the party. The Chinese Socialist Youth League, precursor to the CCYL, was established in 1922  just a year after the party was founded  and was renamed CCYL in 1925. Its members ranged from ages 14 to 28, and the idea behind its formation was to introduce new blood into the party and government. [29]

Regardless of the CCYL being the partys youth wing, power remained elusive for its cadre for nearly eight decades. In the first few decades of PRC, elite politics was dominated by Mao and his fellow revolutionaries. After Mao, over the subsequent decades, elite politics came under the grip of Xiaoping, and then the Shanghai Gang. In these periods, there were hardly any leaders with a CCYL background who were appointed to top leadership positions. It was only in 2002 that the CCYL rose to power under the leadership of Hu. The only exception to this trend might be Hu Yaobang, who was a close associate of Deng and a member of the CCYL. Hu eventually made it as party general secretary and member of the PSC in the 1980s.

The CCYL, also known as tuanpai, was a faction comprising those officials who worked in the senior levels of CCYL leadership (municipal/prefecture, provincial, and ministerial levels or above) anytime from 1982 to 1998, during which they likely formed close working relationships or even mentor-protege ties with heavyweight tuanpai leaders Hu Jintao, Song Defu, and Li Keqiang, according to Li.[30]

While power at the national level was still a distant goal, the CCYL came of age during the 1980s, especially as a consequence of the ties between Hu and Li Keqiang. Hu had already worked on provincial and national levels of the CCYL, before he was appointed member of the CCYL Secretariat (1982-84) and then its first secretary (1884-85). Keqiang also started working at the CCYL Central Committee in 1892  the same time when Hu joined the CCYL Secretariat. By 1983, Keqiang was promoted to the position of an alternate member of the CCYL Secretariat, on Hus nomination. Hu and Keqiang established close ties in this period and began to form a large network of CCYL members through patron-client ties. [31] These handpicked proteges by Hu, Keqiang and other top-leaders of the CCYL during the 1980s would form the core of the CCYL faction. Most of the members from CCYL background who went on to take prominent leadership positions at the central and provincial level during the Hu era, were drawn from this core CCYL faction formed in the 1980s.

It terms of power, the CCYL really came of age after Hu rose to power in 2002. According to a study, by 2005 more than 150 tuanpai officials were serving as ministers, vice-ministers, provincial party secretaries, provincial deputy party secretaries, governors and vice-governors across China.[32] More specifically, in 2005, there were 13 provincial party secretaries and governors, seven ministers, and two heads of the CCP central department from the CCYL faction  constituting 21 percent, 25 percent, and 50 percent of total numbers in those three levels of leadership, respectively.[33]

Other than staffing positions with CCYL members, the rise of this faction had a substantial policy impact as well. The cornerstone of the Hu-Keqiang governance model was their policy of macroeconomic control, which essentially meant a reorientation of Chinese economy towards the interior provinces, and away from the coastal ones, that had received preferential treatment during the Jiang era.[34] Economists continue to debate as to which degree Hu succeeded in this fundamental economic reconfiguration; however, there were some obvious outcomes.[35] For instance, Shanghais construction boom, which primarily drove the citys economy during the late 1980s and 1990s, was substantially curtailed once Hu came to power.

Once Hu retired from active politics in 2012, Keqiang became the de facto head of the CCYL faction. After serving as party secretary in the provinces of Henan and Liaoning between 2002-2007, Keqiang was appointed Vice Premier in 2008.[36] Following the departure of Hu, Keqiang was appointed Premier of PRC, which is considered as the head of the government in the country. Since 2012, Keqiang, as the second-ranked member of the PSC and the premier of the country, has continued to represent the CCYL at the highest level in Chinese politics.[37]

In the ongoing Xi era, he has tried to play a role similar to the one played by Qinghong during the Hu regime. During the years of Hus rule, the Shanghai Gang led by Qinghong tried to balance CCYL in all major institutions across the country. Similarly, Keqiang as the leader of the CCYL faction has been trying to balance Xi. While CCYLs balancing efforts were somewhat successful during the initial part of Xis rule  when the latter was still the leader of the Shanghai Gang  they have had little success over the past few years, as Xi has facilitated the rise of his own new faction, what this paper refers to the Xi Gang. The weakening of the Shanghai Gang and the CCYL, and subsequent erosion of power sharing in Chinese politics shall be explored in the next section.

Inner-Party bipartisanship

The sharing of power between the Shanghai Gang and the CCYL factions has been one of the hallmarks of elite Chinese politics over the past few decades. This unofficial power sharing between the two largest factions within a single party, is what led many to categorise the CCP as one party, two factions. Since Hu came to power in 2002, this power sharing dynamic has emerged as the key symbol of Dengs idea of collective leadership. More substantively, Li categorised this factional dynamic in the CCP as inner-party bipartisanship.[38]

In 2007, Li argued, Factional politics is becoming less a zero-sum game in which the winner takes all, and more a power-sharing dynamic in which two factions or coalitions compete in certain arenas and cooperate in others. Within this emerging system of inner-Party bipartisanship, Chinese politicians are constantly engaged in coalition-building, political negotiation, compromise and deal-making to ensure that their faction maintains its relative position.[39]

In terms of power and politics, the idea of inner-party bipartisanship or one party, two factions has had three specific characteristics. First, the respective factions not only compete for power, but also represent specific socioeconomic and geographic constituencies, and consequently promote different policy agendas. Second, in procedural terms, the CCYL and the Shanghai Gang have alternated their time in power, which is signified by which faction gets to appoint the CCP general secretary (who is also the president of PRC). Therefore, the position of the general secretary moved from Shanghai Gang (Jiang) to CCYL (Hu) and then back to the Shanghai Gang (Xi).[40] Third, in substantive terms, the power sharing happens by the presence of leaders of the opposing faction in the highest decision-making bodies. For instance, during the Hu rule, a number of seats at the Politburo and the PSC were taken by members of the opposing Shanghai Gang. Similarly, during Xis first term, CCYL had a presence in these aforementioned bodies.[41]

However, over the past few years, Xi has attempted to overhaul these established norms of inner-Party bipartisanship. He has made an effort to subvert every single one of these characteristics that symbolised the idea of one party, two factions. While Xi has made progress, his project of subverting these norms is still not complete evident from the fact that some norms of factional power sharing still remain in place. As a consequence, the opposing factions are no longer able to balance against Xi in either the Politburo or the PSC  leading to a fundamental watering down of factional power sharing arrangements in the CCP.[42]

The Xi turn in Chinese politics

In the past few years, China observers have begun to see Xi Jinping as an autocratquite distinct from the previous generation of leaders who were referred to as enlightened authoritarians.[43] Such a perception regarding Xi primarily owes to an aggressive turn in Chinese foreign and security policy, the ruthless crackdown on domestic dissent, the constant attacks on the relative autonomous status of Hong Kong, and finally resetting the terms of engagement between the state and private firms in China. However, most of these analyses miss the most obvious sign of Xis growing authoritarian character: his attempts to water down the long-held norms of factional power sharing within the CCP. This, coupled with the rise of a new faction within the CCP, headed by Xi himself, has been one of the most fundamental shifts in Chinese elite politics in the past three decades.

Over the past three years, most major provincial and central positions in China have been filled by either Xis proteges or proteges of his most loyal men. This hierarchical patron-client network has resulted in the formation of a new faction in Chinese politicswhat this paper refers to as the Xi Gang. More importantly, the rise of the Xi Gang has come at the cost of the other two existing factions, the Shanghai Gang and CCYL. Not only has Xi purged several leaders of those factions during his anti-corruption drive, but he has also significantly reduced their presence in key decision-making bodies of the state such as the PSC, Politburo, and even the Central Committee.

If one needs to understand how Xi has managed to centralise power in his own new faction, then they have to begin by acknowledging the leaders political background. During his political career, Xi has succeeded in developing a dual image: princeling and peasant. Xi was born in a veteran revolutionary family: his father Xi Zhongxun was the first secretary general of the State Councilessentially the number two in the Mao government. However, during the Cultural Revolution, Xi was sent to work in the countryside, and he spent years working there before joining the CCP in 1974. His time spent in the countryside helped him establish a direct connection with people and empathise with them. Eventually, after Xi rose to power in 2012, he leveraged this experience to project himself as a leader who understood the countryside, and to prove his populist credentials, which would be essential to undercut the influence of the CCYL in the countryside.[44]

By 2007 Hu was beginning to serve his second term and the understanding within the CCP was that it was unsustainable to allow CCYL another ten years in power. Hence, Xi as a member of the Shanghai Gang was chosen as a compromise candidate, and was given a place in the nine-member PSC. For party elders, the idea that a candidate from the youth league would take the reins for another decade was unacceptable, as that would have entrenched the power of a single faction at the expense of the others, writes Richard McGregor in the Foreign Affairs.[45] Between 2007 and 2012, things rapidly changed in the Chinese political arena.

The Bo Xilai (former provincial party secretary of Chongqing) scandal in 2012 epitomised everything that was wrong with the party and the countrys overall political environment. The prevailing sense within the top echelons of the CCP was that the weak leadership during the Hu era had given way for free-for-all corruption, which had begun to fundamentally rot the political system and cost the party its much prized legitimacy. Xi shared these feelings.[46]

By the time Xi came to power, he had developed a deep fear that the key pillars of the CCP rule  the military (Peoples Liberation Army), the state-owned enterprises (SOEs), the internal security apparatus, as well as the propaganda machinewere deeply corrupt and would result in the decline of the partys rule. So he set out on a rescue mission. He would be the Reddest leader of his generation, writes McGregor.

The feeling that the house needed to be put back in order, was shared among the top CCP ranks. In that sense, the initial steps Xi would take  such as a massive anti-corruption drive, which saw the purging of millions of officials, and thousands of high-ranking ones, including a former PSC member  had the backing of the party leadership.[47] However, what the CCP leadership failed to anticipate was how far Xi would eventually go. In turn, not only side-lining a large part of the established political class, but also facilitating the rise of his own new faction.

In 2012, Xi along with the Shanghai Gang needed the support of princelings in order to curtail the influence of the CCYL. At the beginning of his term, at the 18th Party Congress, the princelings occupied four out of seven PSC seats, and nine out of 25 at the Politburo. At this time, the CCYL held the largest number of seats in these two bodies. But over the next few years, as Xi consolidated power, he attacked both the Shanghai Gang (and the princelings within it) and the CCYL, eventually succeeding in drastically scaling down their role.[48] He managed to do this by using a couple of tactics.

First, his anti-corruption drive resulted in the purging of members of both the Shanghai Gang, CCYL, as well as the military. Analysis by Xi Lu and Peter Lorentzen shows that there was a strong factional balance among the leaders purged during the anti-corruption drive.[49] For instance, the six most influential leaders to be purged in Xis anti-graft includes Sun Zhengcai, Bo Xilai, Zhou Yongkang, Ling Jihua, Guo Boxiong, and Xu Caihou.[50] Sun was a top official of Congqing and a member of the Politburo, Bo was the former party secretary of Chongqing and also a politburo member, Zhou was a former member of the PSC, Ling was a close aid of Hu Jintao, and Guo and Xu were top military officers at the Central Military Commission (CMC). It is evident that purged Sun and Bo were part of the elite coalition. Meanwhile, Ling came from CCYL, and Guo and Xu from the military.[51] In this fashion, Xi managed to conduct a broad-based attack on all probable factions in Chinese politics as well as the military.

Second, by using his own populist credentials, Xi has tried to actively reduce the role of CCYL as representatives of the hinterland Chinese provinces and their population. He accompanied this by launching a massive poverty alleviation program that aimed to lift 40 million Chinese out of poverty. Over $41 billion were allocated to this program between 2012-17  almost double of the amount allocated over the prior five years during the Hu era. This helped Xi erode the power base of the CCYL.[52]

Third, Xis attack on CCYLs mass politics has also been accompanied by an attack on its elite politics and institutions that underpin the very power of the faction. During Xis first term, the budget of CCYL was reduced to half.[53] Moreover, the CCYL was attacked in the state-run central media as being too elitist and inefficient. President Xis tough tactics for elbowing aside the CYL Faction were summed up by his widely-circulated internal assessment of the League, that it was paralyzed from the neck down, noted a report in Jamestown Foundation.[54] Many of the provincial positions occupied by CCYL members  such as the party secretaries of Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen  have been replaced by his own proteges .[55]

As a consequence, during the 19th Party Congress in 2017, the presence of both the Shanghai Gang and the CCYL at the PSC, Politburo and the Central Committee had been substantially reduced. For instance, the number of princelings in the Politburo were reduced from nine to four.[56] Similarly, the numbers of princelings in the 376-member Central Committee went down from 41 to 20  resulting in their lowest representation within this body over the past two decades.[57] Xi then staffed these positions with his own proteges . As Xi began his second term in 2017, there was ample evidence to suggest that a new faction under his leadership had emerged, and it had managed to significantly eclipse the powers of the previous two dominant factions.

The Rise of the Xi Gang

The rise of a new power-seeking faction under the patronage of President Xi is one of the biggest developments in elite Chinese politics over the past three decades. On one hand, the composition and the inner workings of this new faction are quite similar to the previous two dominant factions. The members of the Xi Gang are essentially party officials who have had a professional, educational, or personal connection with Xi at some point during the latters career  much like members of Shanghai Gang and CCYL had with Jiang and Hu. On the other hand, the rise of the Xi Gang has meant a shift in the factional dynamics of the CCP, specifically resulting in the weakening of the power-sharing arrangement between factions. This section outlines these overlapping phenomena.

In a paper titled The Kings Men and Others: Emerging Political Elites under Xi Jinping, Guoguang Wu of University of Victoria shows how a new class of political elite has experienced upward political mobility in the Xi era.[58] Wu focuses on elites who have emerged in recent years at or above the deputy provincial and vice-ministerial levels in the CCP, and then categorises these politicians into seven distinct groups based on their nature of connection with Xi: princelings, Shaanxi, Tsinghua University, Hebei, Fujian, Zhejiang, and Shanghai.[59] Through his research, Wu has shed light on the composition of the new Xi Gang. Each of these seven groups represent a particular stage in Xis political career. Therefore, all the members of the Xi Gang essentially formed a relationship with the leader as Xi rose up the ranks. Additionally, some close allies of Xi such as Wang Qishan have also formed their own patron-client networks, and these are also included in the Xi Gang.

Xis princeling connections mostly comprise of his childhood schoolmates and family. Some notable princelings to emerge include Zhang Youxia, a military leader and a politburo member and Liu He, who is believed to oversee the economy on Xis behalf. The second category is Shaanxi, where Xi spent six years working in the fields during the Cultural Revolution and the most prominent leader in this group is Li Xi, now the party secretary of Guangdong province. Other leaders to emerge from Shaanxi include Wang Dongfeng, now party secretary of Hebei province and Jing Junhai, governor of Jilin province. Wang Qishan, former PSC member, and the key architect of Xis anti-corruption drive, and now vice president of PRC is said to one of the closest allies of Xi. Qishan is a princeling and had forged a close relationship with Xi during their time in Shaanxi. During Xis time at Tsinghua University, he established close ties with Chen Xi, who now heads the eminent Organisation Department and is a member of the Politburo.

Substantively, Xis political career began working in the suburban county of Zhengding, in the province of Hebei. Here Xi developed a close friendship with Li Zhanshu, who now sits on the PSC and is Chinas third-ranked leader. Fujian province is where Xi spent the longest part of his career (1985-2002), rising up the ranks gradually. The most significant political elites to rise from Fujian include Cai Qi, now party secretary of Beijing and considered among the rising stars of the CCP, and Huang Kunming, who is now a Politburo member and heads the all-important propaganda department.

After his time in Fujian, Xi served as party secretary of Zhejiang from 2002-07, where he had complete control over all organisational and personnel affairs. Therefore, Zhejiang represents Xis major power base, with even more elites from Zhejiang joining the central government than elites from Fujian; the special term of Zhijiang xinjun, meaning new troops from Zhijiang, with Zhijiang as a nickname for Zhejiang, was accordingly created to refer to those rising political stars in Xis China with a Zhejiang background, writes Wu. Finally, the last group is Shanghai, where Xi served as party secretary for a short duration. Unlike Zhejiang, Xi was only nominally able to control Shanghai, due to the outsized influence of Jiang. Moreover, people to rise from a Shanghai background cannot be entirely attributed to their ties with Xi, predominantly because of Jiangs influence over Shanghai.

As aforementioned, the broad design and composition of the Xi Gang is similar to that of the Shanghai Gang and CCYL. Almost all its key members have close ties to the leader of the faction or one of his close proteges. However, the departure from older norms comes when one begins to look at how Xi has marginalised the other factions. The real strength of the Xi Gang becomes evident when one looks at the numerical strength of this faction  i.e. how many significant positions are currently being held by its members.

According to a study by Niel Thomas of the think-tank Marco Polo, While the composition of the 18th Politburo (2012-2017) reflected the clout of his predecessors, Xi capitalized on the outsized power he acquired during his first five-year term to install close comrades in the 19th Politburo. Approximately 60% (15 members) of the 19th Politburo (25-member) have direct ties to Xi, up from around 20% (five members) of the 18th Politburo.[60] The Central Committee is comprised of full and alternate members, and full-membership is considered a prerequisite for joining the Politburo. However, four members of the 19th Politburo were elevated from being alternate members of the 18th Central Committee and two were brought in from outside the Central Committee entirely.

In more substantive terms, the six Chinese cities Tianjin, Beijing, Shenzhen, Shanghai, Chongqing, and Guangzhou  that dominate the countrys economy, are now all run by Xis men. This was not the case during Xis first term, and most of these appointments were only made around 2016-17, when Xi had already consolidated power. Of the 62 provincial/municipal party secretaries and the provincial governors or mayors of Chinas 31 province-level administrations, 57 (92%) have been replaced since 2017, writes Cheng Li in his paper Xi Jinpings Proregress for the Brookings Institution.[61]

Xi has not only appointed his loyalists to almost all significant positions across China, but has done so with the intent of side-lining the members of previous two dominant factions, the Shanghai Gang and CCYL. The CCP leadership emphasizes administrative experience gained through serving as a major city party secretary during the reform era, these posts are pivotal stepping-stones for aspiring entrants onto the Politburo Standing Committee and into other top posts in the national leadership, argues Li[62]. Therefore, by appointing his proteges across key cities and provinces, Xi has ensured that the future leadership of bodies like the Politburo and the PSC would be dominated by members of his own faction  further limiting the role of the other two.

Xi establishes new rules

Xis attempts to establish complete control over Chinese elite politics through handpicked appointments has been accompanied by a series of other measures that have further destabilised the idea of collective leadership. These measures include altering the membership recruitment patterns of CCP, rewriting the official CCP rules regarding collective leadership, and enhancing the partys decision-making role by formalising leading small groups.

In terms of CCPs recruitment trends, the number of new members has significantly fallen during the Xi era.[63] In 2012, party membership was growing by 3.1 percent, but during Xis first term (2013-17) the recruitment fell by 1 percent. The acceptance rate to the CCP organisation fell from 14.5 percent in the Hu era to 8.8 percent in 2015. More substantively, under Xi the party composition has also changed, and it is now more elitist and diverse.

Xis goal to improve Chinese governance by tightening Party discipline has brought slower membership growth and lower application numbers, and he has reinforced the elitist nature of previous recruitment campaigns. These efforts form part of a broader reform agenda that has recentralized power away from the local level and toward the central Party, contends Neil Thomas.[64]

The most significant attack on the idea of collective leadership was brought about in 2017 by revising the contents of 1980 document Several Principles on Political Life in the Party, which is considered the most significant political document from the Deng era. As aforementioned, this document established the idea of collective leadership. In 2017, the second section of the document  Adherence to Collective Leadership and Opposition to Personal Arbitrary Rule  was removed altogether. The second section of the 1980 document began by stating, Collective leadership is one of the highest principles of the leadership of the party. However in the revised document, while the reference to collective leadership was intact, it has been moved to the body of a new section, titled, Adherence to the Principle of Democratic Centralism.[65]

(The 2017 document) instead of framing collective leadership as one of the core principles of the party, the section begins with the statement Democratic centralism is the fundamental organizational principle of the party and subordinates collective leadership to being part of democratic centralism, contends Minxin Pei.

In terms of governance, Xis thrust has been to bring decision-making powers back to the party, and away from the government. One of the most significant developments in the Xi era has been the formalisation of leading small groups of the CCP to the level of Central Committee Commissions. Four Central Committee leading small groups, including the Central Leading Small Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms, the Finance and Economy Leading Small Group, the Foreign Affairs Leading Small Group, and the Cybersecurity Leading Small Group, were elevated to Central Committee commissions in 2018. Effectively formalizing what previously had been informal policy coordination task forces, writes Alice Miller.[66] Xi heads all four of these leading small groups.

Conclusion

This paper highlights the factional dynamics of Chinese elite politics. In the post-Deng era, Chinese politics had been dominated by two rival factionsthe Shanghai Gang, headed by Jiang Zemin, and the Chinese Communist Youth League (CCYL), led by Hu Jintao. Over the years, the two factions developed an arrangement of power sharing. Seats at the countrys key decision-making bodies  the Politburo and the Politburo Standing Committee  were divided between these factions. The two factions alternated their time at the top, the partys general secretary, also the president of China. The Shanghai Gang and CCYL competed for influence but also cooperated on some issues. This factional interplay has been the most substantive symbol of Dengs idea of collective leadership by the CCP. Deng had established the idea of collective leadership in the aftermath of Maos rule, in an attempt to safeguard China from the excesses of a one-mans dictatorial rule.

The appointment of Xi Jinping as party secretary in 2012 could be seen as an outcome of this factional power sharing arrangement. Xi, a member of the Shanghai Gang had replaced Hu, the leader of the CCYL. However, as Xi consolidated power during his first term, he began to establish his own new faction, which this paper refers to as the Xi Gang. The rise of this third faction has been one of the most significant developments in elite Chinese politics over the past three decades. Xi has sought to appoint his loyalists at a majority of central and provincial positions across China. Most significantly, the rise of the Xi Gang has come at the cost of influence of the previous two factions. The idea of collective leadership has been severely watered down. As things stand, Xis faction enjoys majority at all significant decision-making levels, and the two rival factions are unable to balance its power.

Endnotes

[1] Kurt Campbell & Mira Rapp-Hopper, The End of Beijings Foreign Policy Restraint?, Foreign Affairs, July 15, 2020

[2] Cheng Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era: Reassessing Collective Leadership, Brookings Institution, July 2017

[3] Alice L. Miller, The Trouble with Factions, Hoover Institution, March 19, 2015

[4] Richard McGregor, The Party: The Secret World of Chinas Communist Rulers, Harper Collins, June 2, 2010

[5] McGregor, The Party: The Secret World of Chinas Communist Rulers

[6] Marc Blecher, China Against the Tides: Restructuring through Revolution, Radicalism and Reform: 3rd Ed, New York: Continuum, 2010

[7] Yuen Yuen Ang, Autocracy With Chinese Characteristics, Foreign Affairs, May/June 2018

[8] Lieberthal, Kenneth, A New China Strategy: The Challenge, Foreign Affairs, November/December 1995

[9] Minxin Pei, Rewriting the Rules of the Chinese Party-State: Xis Progress in Reinvigorating the CCP, Chinese Leadership Monitor, June 1, 2019

[10] Pei, Rewriting the Rules of the Chinese Party-State

[11] Barrington Moore, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World, Beacon Press, September 1, 1993

[12] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[13] Yun -han Chu, Sources of Regime Legitimacy and the Debate over the Chinese Model, China Review, Spring 2013

[14] Patrick Francois, Francesco Trebbi, & Kairong Xiao, Factions in Nondemocracies: Theory and Evidence from the Chinese Communist Party, National Bureau of Economic Research, October 2016

[15] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[16] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[17] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[18] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[19] Lowell Dittmer, Chinese Factional Politics Under Jiang Zemin, Journal of East Asian Studies, January-April, 2003

[20] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[21] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[22] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[23] Chinas Factional Politics, The Diplomat, December 8, 2012

[24] Look at www.chinesenewsnet.com, July 22, 2004.

[25] This figure is based on official data released from the conference, 21st Century Forum held in Beijing, December 2003

[26] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[27] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[28] Patrick Francois et al, Factions in Nondemocracies: Theory and Evidence from the Chinese Communist Party

[29] Klaus H. Pringsheim, The Functions of the Chinese Communist Youth Leagues (1920-1949), The China Quarterly, December 1962

[30] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[31] Li, Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[32] Look at Zhongguo shibao, China Times, July 13, 2005

[33] Cheng Li, Hus Policy Shift and the Tuanpais Coming-of-Age, China Leadership Monitor, Summer 2005

[34] See Straits Times, July 10, 2004

[35] See IMF Survey: Chinas Difficult Rebalancing Act, September 12, 2007

[36] Cheng Li, China: Riding on Two Horses, Brookings Institution, October 23, 2007

[37] Li Keqiang: Chinas marginalised premier, BBC, September 28, 2020

[38] Cheng Li, Was the Shanghai Gang Shanghaied? The Fall of Chen Liangyu and the Survival of Jiang Zemins Faction, Chinese Leadership Monitor, Hoover Institution, February 28, 2007

[39] Li, Was the Shanghai Gang Shanghaied?

[40] The Diplomat, December 8, 2012

[41] , Chinese Politics in the Xi Jinping Era

[42] Katsuji Nakazawa, Xi Jinping and the end of collective leadership, Nikkei Asian Review, October 23, 2017

[43] Chengyuan Ji & Junyan Jiang, Enlightened One-Party Rule? Ideological Differences between Chinese Communist Party Members and the Mass Public, May 22, 2019

[44] Cheng Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress: Domestic moves toward a global China, Brookings Institution, September 2019

[45] Richard McGregor, Party Man: Xi Jinpings Quest to Dominate China, Foreign Affairs September/October 2019

[46] McGregor, Party Man: Xi Jinpings Quest to Dominate China

[47] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[48] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[49] Peter L. Lorentzen & Xi Lu, Personal Ties, Meritocracy, and Chinas Anti-Corruption Campaign, September 7, 2016

[50] Katsuji Nakazawa, Xi Jinping and the end of collective leadership, Nikkei Asian Review, October 23, 2017

[51] Nakazawa, Xi Jinping and the end of collective leadership

[52] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[53] Benjamin Kang Lin & Ben Blanchard, Xi set to consolidate power in China by curbing Communist Youth League, Reuters, September 30, 2016

[54] Willy Wo-lap Lam, The Eclipse of the Communist Youth League and the Rise of the Zhejiang Clique, The Jamestown Foundation, March 11, 2016

[55] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[56] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[57] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[58] Guoguang Wu, The Kings Men and Others: Emerging Political Elites under Xi Jinping, China Leadership Monitor, June 1, 2019

[59] Wu, The Kings Men and Others

[60] Neil Thomas, The Ties that Bind: How Xi Jinping Got his Politburo, Marco Polo, June 17, 2020

[61] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[62] Li, Xi Jinpings Proregress

[63] Neil Thomas, Members Only: Recruitment Trends in the Chinese Communist Party, Marco Polo, July 15, 2020

[64] Thomas, Members Only

[65] Pei, Rewriting the Rules of the Chinese Party-State

[66] Alice Miller, Only Socialism Can Save China; Only Xi Jinping Can Save Socialism, Hoover Institution, May 16, 2018.

Views expressed are personal.

The article was originally published on ORF Online and has been reproduced here

The author obtained his Bachelors degree in Political Science and Economics at McGill University. He writes on global affairs for ThePrint.
At the beginning of this year, rumors started swirling around that Apple was in talks with several carmakers for manufacturing the Apple Car, with Hyundai-Kia in the lead. That partnership talks fell through as confirmed by Hyundai with Apple now looking at all available options.

The latest rumor says that Apple had approached Nissan a few months ago for a potential Apple Car partnership. There were brief negotiations between the two companies, though the talks did not reach a higher level as they both disagreed on a lot of key metrics of the vehicle. Nissan was worried that it would end up becoming a hardware supplier to Apple as the Apple Car is only expected to feature the Cupertino companys branding. Nissans COO Ashwani Gupta also said in an earnings presentation that while Nissan is open to partnerships, it wont change the way it makes cars for this. The company has its own customer base to cater to.

Previous Apple Car rumors did suggest that Apple could partner with Nissan. The company was reportedly in talks with all six major Japanese automakers, though big ones like Honda and Toyota are not interested in the partnership as they do not have the idle resources and are too busy with the development of their own electric vehicles. Nissan, on the other hand, has some idle capacity that it could utilize for the Apple Car production. Hyundai executives were also unsure of the Apple Car partnership for the same reason as they did not want to end up playing second fiddle to Apple and affect their brand in the premium segment in any way.

Apple is seemingly looking for an Apple Car manufacturer, with the company intending to design the vehicle in-house. While the company has the expertise to do the latter, it does not have the resources to manufacture vehicles on a scale, and setting up a production unit could end up costing it billions of dollars.

[Via Financial Times
GRAND RAPIDS, MI  A Michigan non-profit social services provider received nearly $8 million for an intervention program that aims to keep children out of foster care.

Samaritas was awarded the state funding through the Family First Prevention Services Act. The in-home programming allows children to stay with their families when there is concern of abuse or neglect flagged by Child Protective Services.

Although foster care is certainly a service that keeps children safe, children are best supported when they are able to remain at home, said Laura Mitchell, an executive director at Samaritas.

While the childs safety is key, Mitchell said the intervention program would happen if Childrens Protection Services has not determined its time to remove a child from the home environment, but additional support is needed for the family.

The faith-based organization already offers family preservation programs, but it anticipates being able to serve 600 additional families a year through the grant.

The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) received $15 million in federal funding to go toward programs that place greater focus on prevention in the states child welfare system, said Bob Wheaton, a public information officer with the state health department.

Michigan has been providing this type of family perseveration service since the late 1980s, but a portion of the funding will implement a new evidence-based model called HOMEBUILDERS. The program is intensive, quick work, said Mitchell, that improves parental skills, family interaction and childrens behavior over a month-long period.

HOMEBUILDERS will be brought to seven counties: Calhoun, Ingham, Jackson, Kalamazoo, Kent, Muskegon and Wayne.

Samaritas believes that all families when they have good support and information can make changes, said Mitchell. The organization won seven contracts to implement HOMEBUILDERS, bringing their total number of family preservation contracts to 17.

Wellspring Lutheran Services was awarded the eighth contract by the state, according to MDHHS.

The three-year contracts will support the program through 2023.

More on MLive:

150k Michigan families would be eligible for child care subsidies under Whitmers budget

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In Huntington's disease, a faulty protein aggregates in brain cells and eventually kills them. Such protein aggregates could, in principle, be prevented with a heat shock protein. However, it is not well known how these proteins interact with the Huntington's disease protein.

New research by Patrick van der Wel (University of Groningen, the Netherlands) and colleagues at the University of Texas has partially resolved the structure of heat shock proteins that bind to such aggregating proteins, helping us to understand how they work. The results were published on 11 February in the journal Nature Communications.

Heat shock proteins (Hsp) are produced by cells that are exposed to stressful conditions. The Hsp family is diverse, and quite a few of the proteins function as chaperone. This means that they help other proteins to fold (or re-fold after being damaged) in the correct way.

These proteins can assist in folding thousands of different proteins. To this end, they use co-chaperones with specific binding abilities." Patrick van der Wel, Associate Professor of Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy, University of Groningen

Ordered

One class of heat shock proteins, Hsp40, helps to suppress protein aggregates like those that appear in Huntington's disease. These Hsp40 proteins come in different kinds, and some of them will bind specifically to aggregating proteins with a lot of repeated glutamine amino acids, like the faulty protein found in Huntington's disease. One of these Hsp40 proteins is called DnaJB8, and this was the protein studied by Van der Wel and his colleagues.

"In order to understand the action of DnaJB8, we need to know what it looks like," says Van der Wel. However, it is difficult to resolve the structure of this type of protein. "It appears as a dimer or an oligomer, so a number of these protein units work together, but their structure is not really ordered," he continues. This makes it impossible to use standard techniques, which all require ordered structures.

Carbon atoms

Van der Wel was asked by colleagues at the University of Texas to help tackle this problem. Van der Wel is specialized in solid-state NMR spectroscopy, a technology that can measure how atoms are connected to each other. In simple terms, the NMR signals of two connected carbon atoms in DnaJB8 depend on how they interact with other atoms in the molecule. Therefore, the measured spectrum of the carbon atoms can show in which amino acid they are located. Such information can be used to get an idea of the protein's structure, even if it is not well ordered.

The DnaJB8 protein is made up of different domains, with different functions. Through a series of experiments, Van der Wel was able to determine which domains are stuck inside the DnaJB8 protein, and which are available on the outside. The experiments suggested that the so-called 'J domain' of DnaJB8 was able to switch between being stuck and being accessible. This is important because this part of the DnaJB8 protein is responsible for turning on the Hsp70 protein, which can prevent the protein aggregates from forming. In other words, there seems to be a 'switch' in DnaJB8 that controls this interaction with Hsp70. Interestingly, this switch was found to be located in a domain of DnaJB8 whose exact role was previously unclear.

Hypothesis

"Thus, our hypothesis based on the structure was that the DnaJB8 is inactive until it binds to the faulty proteins and that it then attracts Hsp70," says Van der Wel. A series of simulations and experiments at the University of Texas confirmed this idea and yielded a detailed model of how these proteins work together.

DnaJB8 is a protein that is mainly found in the testes. However, a very similar protein called DnaJB6 is present in the brain, where Huntington's disease strikes. It seems more than likely that this protein acts similarly, when it protects against glutamine-rich proteins that aggregate in the brain cells of patients. "It may take many more years, but now that we understand how this process works, it could help us to find a way to enhance the activity of DnaJB6, which could reduce the protein aggregates that cause the disease," concludes Van der Wel.
Finland's foreign minister says he will discuss the poisoning and imprisonment of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny during talks in Moscow.

Pekka Haavisto met Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in St Petersburg on Monday.

Haavisto said he would also raise Russia's crackdown on pro-Navalny protests.

Navalny was arrested upon returning to Russia from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin.

The Russian government denies involvement and has said it has no evidence that Navalny was poisoned.

Weekend protests in scores of cities last month over Navalnys detention represented the largest outpouring of popular discontent in years and appeared to have rattled the Kremlin.

Police reportedly arrested about 10,000 people, and many demonstrators were beaten, while state media sought to downplay the scale of the protests.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
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The six victims who were killed in a 133 car pile-up on a Texas freeway Thursday morning have been identified.

The tragedy occurred along Interstate 35 near Fort Worth shortly after 6am, with shocking video showing a FedEx truck plowing into a barrier after losing control on an icy downhill stretch of road, killing six people.

Dozens of vehicles travelling behind the truck subsequently smashed into one another, with the crash site stretching back for 1.5 miles.

The victims have been identified as 34-year-old Tiffany Gerred, Aaron Watson, 45, Michael Wells, 47, Christopher Vardy, 49, William Williams, 54, and 46-year-old Tamara Mendoza Querales.

Gerred was an employee with the Tarrant County District Clerk's office, according to CBS.

Tom Wilder, the head of the clerk's office, called Gerred 'a beacon of light with her energetic personality'.

Watson's family confirmed his death. He had two sons and was described as 'a giver' to his family and to his work.

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The six victims who were killed in a 133 car pile-up on a Texas freeway Thursday morning have been identified. The victims have been identified as 34-year-old Tiffany Gerred (pictured)

The six victims who were killed in a 133 car pile-up on a Texas freeway Thursday morning have been identified. The victims have been identified as 34-year-old Tiffany Gerred (left)

Aaron Watson (left), 45, and Michael Wells (right), 47, were both victims in the pile-up last week

Christopher Vardy (left and right), 49, was identified as one of the victims killed in pile-up on Thursday morning

In a statement to CBS, Wells' family shared: 'Mike was a great friend to many. He never met a stranger and would do anything for anyone. Our family will never be the same.'

The tragedy was caused by Winter Storm Shirley, which wreaked havoc on many southern states, brought freezing temperatures to the area overnight Thursday, making the roads unusually icy.

First responders described the scene as a 'mass casualty incident' with crushed cars stacked on top of one another and helpless drivers stuck inside.

The death toll was initially reported at five, before officials confirmed a sixth fatality on Thursday evening.

Investigators confirmed that 36 of the 65 people who were injured were taken to local hospitals via ambulance.

One Medstar official said no children were among the seriously injured.

An investigation into the cause of the crash is now underway, with local politicians now questioning whether the roads were properly prepared for the wet and slippery conditions that had been forecast.

The tragedy was caused by Winter Storm Shirley, which wreaked havoc on many southern states, brought freezing temperatures to the area overnight Thursday, making the roads unusually icy. Investigators confirmed that 36 of the 65 people who were injured were taken to local hospitals via ambulance

The FedEx truck that was filmed at the start of the crash after losing control and plowing into one of the barriers

Firefighters were seen making their way through vehicles on Thursday afternoon trying to find survivors

'I've got lots of good friends that are both on the police department and fire department and I asked them to tell me what they saw there... We can't see evidence of any protection of deicing techniques that were performed,' Fort Worth state Rep Ramon Romero told

Romero told the news network he plans to hold a hearing to question North Tarrant Express Mobility Partners - the company that maintains the stretch of privately operated freeway where the crash occurred.

In a statement the company told NBC 5: 'Our crews treat the entire corridor, managed lanes, general purpose lanes, frontage roads and ramps, and operate under the same procedure as the Texas Department of Transportation. Additionally, our message boards throughout the corridors have been alerting drivers of the adverse weather conditions and encouraging them to drive with caution.'

One first responder told NBC 5 that stretch of road 'was solid ice when police and firefighters first arrived.' Rescue workers were allegedly slipping on the ice as they attempted to reach victims inside their cars. Some had to lay salt and sand over the road in order to mitigate the slippery conditions.

Late on Thursday, Forth Worth Mayor Besty Price released a statement saying her 'heart is broken' over the tragedy.

'So many people have lost their loved ones or had them injured and that pain is just incredible, this whole community will feel that pain,' she stated.

A crumbled car seen as it was towed away from the crash site on Thursday afternoon

A crane is seen lifting out a damaged truck from the pile-up on Thursday afternoon

The scene appeared almost too much to bear for one rescue worker as he walked away from a destroyed vehicle

Texas is now getting another frigid blast of winter weather and has plunged the state into an unusually icy emergency Monday that knocked out power to more than 2 million people and shut down grocery stores and dangerously snowy roads.

The worsening conditions halted the delivery of COVID-19 vaccine shipments and left some Texas providers scrambling to find takers for doses expiring within hours.

Temperatures nosedived into the single-digits as far south as San Antonio, and homes that had already been without electricity for hours had no certainty about when the lights and heat would come back on, as the state's overwhelmed power grid throttled into rotating blackouts that are typically only seen in 100-degree Fahrenheit summers.

The storm was part of a massive system that brought snow, sleet and freezing rain to the southern Plains and was spreading across the Ohio Valley and to the Northeast.

The Southwest Power Pool, a group of utilities across 14 states, called for rolling outages because the supply of reserve energy had been exhausted. Some utilities said they were starting blackouts, while others urged customers to reduce power usage.

'We're living through a really historic event going on right now,' said Jason Furtado, a professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, pointing to all of Texas under a winter storm warning and the extent of the freezing temperatures.

In Houston, where county leaders had warned that the freeze could create problems on the scale of massive hurricanes that slam the Gulf Coast, one electric provider said power may not be restored to some homes until Tuesday.

Firefighters rescued several dogs from the wreckage on Thursday afternoon. It's unclear if any animals died

Vehicles were seen piled up after a fatal crash on Interstate 35 near Fort Worth, Texas on Thursday

'This weather event, it's really unprecedented. We all living here know that,' said Dan Woodfin, senior director of system operations at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas.

He defended preparations made by grid operators and described the demand on the system as record-setting.

'This event was well beyond the design parameters for a typical, or even an extreme, Texas winter that you would normally plan for. And so that is really the result that we're seeing,' Woodfin said.

The largest grocery store chain in Texas, H-E-B, closed locations around Austin and San Antonio, cities that are unaccustomed to snow and have little resources to clear roads.

The slow thaw and more frigid lows ahead was also taking a toll on Texas' distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.

State health officials said Texas, which was due to receive more than 400,000 additional vaccine doses this week, now does not expect deliveries to occur until at least Wednesday.

Air travel was also affected. By midmorning, 3,000 flights had been canceled across the country, about 1,600 of them at Dallas/Fort Worth International and Bush Intercontinental airports in Texas. At DFW, the temperature was 4 degrees Fahrenheit, which is 3 degrees colder than Moscow.

The storm arrived over a three-day holiday weekend that has seen the most US air travel since the period around New Year's.

More than 1 million people went through airport security checkpoints on Thursday and Friday. However, that was still less than half the traffic of a year ago, before the pandemic hit with full force.

The southern Plains had been gearing up for the winter weather for the better part of the weekend. Texas Gov Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for all of the state's 254 counties.

Abbott, Oklahoma Gov Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov Asa Hutchinson each activated National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks including rescuing stranded drivers.

President Joe Biden also declared an emergency in Texas in a statement Sunday night. The declaration is intended to add federal aid to state and local response efforts.
Kids want to fish? You don't know how yourself? Here's a little help
When, back in January 2016, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump said he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and not lose any of his voters, folks reasonably saw the statement as just another bit of campaign trail hyperbole.

If only.

As it turns out, he could incite a mob of his supporters to riot, to storm our nations Capitol in an effort to stop the constitutionally mandated recording of the Electoral Votes in the presidential election, and hed manage to maintain the support of most Republicans in the Congress.

On Saturday, fully 43 Senate Republicans wrote their names into the history of ignominy by voting that the former president was not guilty of inciting the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol. What most did, of course, was to let the former reality TV star escape on a technicality, voting to acquit because Trump is now a private citizen.

Theres a word for this sort of behavior: cowardice.

Though Trump was acquitted in the Senate, the court of public opinion will doubtless offer a very different verdict: Guilty as charged. History, too, will treat neither the inciter in chief nor his sycophantic GOP apologists in the Congress kindly.

We will learn, perhaps sooner rather than later, what will become of Trump the private citizen. He could well face serious legal trouble. He could even end up in jail.

But the reckoning that the Republican Party will face will evolve more slowly. Therell be plenty wholl look to pick up where The Donald left off, hoping to find some way to attract his devoted followers. But this will very likely be more easily wished for than accomplished.

Trumpism was only about Trump. It wasnt based in ideas and didnt have an overarching governing vision. Trying to imagine a kinder, gentler, smarter Trump is impossible, because his meanness and coarseness and general incoherence were an integral part of the package.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat from California, said it best after Trumps acquittal on Saturday: I think our country needs a strong Republican party -- its very important.

Shes got that right, of course. But therell not be a viable Republican Party, offering legitimate governing ideas, as long as the party remains under Trumps thumb.

And sadly, Saturdays vote in the Senate showed that the once-Grand Old Party today remains Donald Trumps party through and through.
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US President on Sunday (local time) called for tougher gun laws on the third anniversary of the Parkland shooting, wherein 17 people were killed at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

"Three years ago today, a lone gunman took the lives of 14 students and three educators at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. In seconds, the lives of dozens of families, and the life of an American community, were changed forever," said Biden according to an official statement by The White House.

Highlighting that this incident was not lone but one among many, he said that "as we mourn with the Parkland community, we mourn for all who have lost loved ones to gun violence".

"All across our nation, parents, spouses, children, siblings, and friends have known the pain of losing a loved one to gun violence. And in this season of so much loss, last year's historic increase in homicides across America, including the gun violence disproportionately devastating Black and Brown individuals in our cities, has added to the number of empty seats at our kitchen tables," he said.

The President also used the occasion to urge Congress to strengthen the gun laws, including requiring background checks on all gun sales, banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and eliminating immunity for gun manufacturers "who knowingly put weapons of war on the streets".

Emphasising the urgency for a strong gun law, the President said that his administration "will not wait for the next mass shooting to heed that call".

"We owe it to all those we have lost and to all those left behind to grieve to make a change. The time to act is now," he added.

(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.)
Balaguluchiadi, Punarnavadi and Gugguluthiktaam are the three kashayams that have been approved scientifically to treat rheumatoid arthritis.

I.S. Aswathy, who was part of the study team, said a major problem faced by classical ayurvedic medicines is lack of scientific evidence in spite of their efficacy."We were fortunate enough to get a project to the tune of Rs 26 lakhs from KSCSTE and the study took us around 42 months," said Aswathy.She said the study was conducted in four phases in rats after inducing rheumatoid arthritis and the treatment duration was based on standard protocol."Severity of pain and inflammation associated with rheumatoid arthritis were decided by the infiltration of so many pro-inflammatory cytokines, lymphocytes, oxidants etc. By this study we were able to find that kashayams exerted therapeutic efficacy in the management of rheumatoid arthritis by regulating pro anti-inflammatory cytokines balance, increasing antioxidant level and by immune modulation," said Aswathy.The study team that was guided by A. Helen, Professor and Mentor, has published their work in the international peer reviewed Journal of Ayurveda and integrative medicine and two papers are under review.The highlight of the study is that while all these three kashayams are available in the market there was no scientific validation, which the study team has been able to do.The team instead of relying on the readily available kashayams, decided to make their own under the guidance of Ayurveda physician Sukumara Varier of Kottakal Arya Vaidyasala.The team prepared the decoction from 28 different forms of herbs and the major difference was they did not add any substance, which is added to increase the shelf life.With regard to the outcome, Aswathy said "our attempt was to give better hope to patients suffering from rheumatoid arthritis besides a vehicle to enrich traditional knowledge with well documented scientific background for the sake of mankind."Source: IANS
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. Syrian air defense systems deflected an Israeli missile attack on the outskirts of Damascus, TASS reports citing SANA news agency.

Today, Israel carried out a series of missile strikes from the occupied Golan Heights and from Galilee, hitting some targets near Damascus, a military source said, according to the report, adding that the Syrian Armed Forces were able to destroy most missiles.

There were no reports on victims and damages.
Workforce

Could Schedule F ever come back?

Rep. Gerry Connolly still wants Congress to pass his bill explicitly prohibiting the Schedule F executive order

About three weeks before Election Day last year, former President Donald Trump signed an executive order that created a new category of federal employee, Schedule F, that would be exempt from traditional civil service protections in hiring and firing, as well as eligibility for union representation.

Agencies were asked to submit lists of policymaking, policy determining and certain supervisory posts to convert to the new category. The Office of Management and Budget's submission included almost 90% of its workforce.

Governance groups and federal employee unions panned the substance of the order, saying that it ultimately undermined a career civil service meant to be insulated from political pressures by creating a new category of quasi-political appointees.

Their concerns were shared by President Joe Biden, who reversed the executive order within days after moving into the White House. Reporting from the Washington Posthas found that the implementation of the order was largely scuttled as the lifespan of the Trump administration came to a close.

One question remains, though.

"What's to stop another president four years from now trying the same thing?" asked Steve Lenkart, the executive director of the National Federation of Federal Employees.

"At minimum, there's an open question," said Max Stier, the president and CEO of the Partnership for Public Service.

Trump made the executive order in the name of efficient government and accountability, saying that the order would better enable managers to rid themselves of poor performers. Some of his allies agree.

"It's disappointing President Biden and congressional Democrats seek to allow massive bureaucratic power to continue to go unchecked," said Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, in a statement to FCW. "President Trump sought to rein in the unelected, unaccountable federal bureaucracy in order to make the executive branch more accountable to the American people."

"It nothing changes, it could very much return in the future," Donald Moynihan, a public policy expert at Georgetown University, told FCW. "There's nothing to say that another president four years from now or eight years from now couldn't take the exact same language and write another executive order."

The courts are one way that the landscape could change. The National Treasury Employees Union sued to block the executive order, but legal action was dropped after Biden rescinded the policy.

Legislation is also an option. Some congressional Democrats have acted to try to block the order since it was created.

Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), chairman of the Subcommittee on Government Operations, wants to take action. He introduced a bipartisan bill with Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) before Biden's inauguration, and he still would like it to be passed.

He does not think that the president shouldn't have this authority to create new schedules without the consult of Congress, he said.

"This is about the responsible role of Congress in shaping the federal architecture," Connolly said.

The bill would block the reclassification of any competitive service positions to an excepted service schedule made after September 30, 2020. That would include Schedule F, along with any other new schedules that could be made.

"Congress going back to the 1880s passes the Pendleton Act, which creates the civil service and asserts the principle that we want a nonpolitical, nonpartisan profession cadre," said Connolly. "Until we saw Trump do it, no one had focused on the fact that there's a big loophole here, though, and the irony of that loophole is that it actually undermines the whole purpose of having a civil service."

Beyond Schedule F, fundamental questions about government operations remain, said Stier. The National Federation of Federal Employees would appreciate legislation to block any future Schedule F-type executive orders, as well as increased whistleblower protections, Lenkart said.

The last time Congress passed on overhaul on the civil service was in the late 1970s.

"There's a strong case for some sort of bipartisan consensus to come together and think about 'What would a new civil service look like?'" Moynihan said.
The Lord Chancellor has blasted lawyers who deliberately delay immigration cases by lodging last-minute human rights claims.

In an interview with the Daily Mail, Robert Buckland confirmed that the Government will introduce sweeping measures to streamline the asylum and immigration system.

He accused lawyers of taking the public for a ride with legal challenges at the last moment  as with the controversial deportation flight of Jamaican criminals in December.

Celebrities including actress Thandie Newton and model Naomi Campbell were among those who called for the deportations to be stopped, comparing the criminals with the victims of the Windrush scandal.

Jermaine Stewart from Liverpool was jailed for six years in 2014 for raping a woman who fell asleep on his sofa. He was removed from the Home Office charter plane for Jamaica

Thandie Newton (left) and model Naomi Campbell (right) were among those who called for the deportations to be stopped, comparing the criminals with the victims of the Windrush scandal

At the time, Home Secretary Priti Patel said the comparison was deeply offensive.

Mr Buckland, who is also Justice Secretary, said it breaks my heart to see laws that were designed to protect the vulnerable being abused in undeserving immigration cases.

What I think has gone wrong is that the process has become very, very lengthy and, frankly, sometimes deliberately elongated in order to buy people more time in the country, he said. That, to me, isnt a proper reflection of due process. He added: Thats why both the Home Secretary and I are very anxious to make sure that we can strip out unnecessary procedures while preserving the rights of the applicant and the interests of justice.

What I dont think people like is being taken for a ride by people who keep on inventing new grounds of appeal.

Miss Patel said last autumn that activist lawyers were frustrating the removal of Channel migrants. Mr Buckland, a barrister and former part-time judge, stepped in to ask her to tone down her rhetoric, it was reported at the time.

Last years Jamaica deportation case saw 23 Jamaican nationals, including murderers and rapists, pulled off a Home Office charter plane as lawyers made new claims including allegations the criminals had been victims of modern slavery.

Among those taken off was Jermaine Stewart from Liverpool who was jailed for six years in 2014 for raping a woman who fell asleep on his sofa.

Mr Buckland said: The modern slavery laws are such an important, ground-breaking piece of legislation. It breaks my heart to think it might be potentially open to abuse by people just because they want to launch another argument to buy them more time.

He added: This country has a great reputation of being a safe haven for people of all faiths and sexualities, from the Huguenots through to the Kindertransport. Im proud of that.

Mr Buckland also confirmed plans to restrict the use of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, banning torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, which is often cited by foreign national criminals seeking to avoid being deported.

In todays interview, the Lord Chancellor added that it would be April next year before the courts begin to get back to normal, as crown courts in England and Wales struggle with a backlog of 56,000 cases.

n The Parole Board could be renamed in a major shake-up to increase transparency, the Lord Chancellor said. Mr Buckland argued that the role of the board, which assesses the safety of a prisoners release, was often confused with probation. He indicated wider reforms than the previously announced plans to allow the public to attend parole hearings.

Wigs are hair to stay! Robert Buckland rules out barristers removing their hairpieces during court hearings

By Home Affairs Correspondent

Britains Justice Secretary Robert Buckland said the 17th century-style wig and black gown would never be changed on his watch

Courts may have embraced innovations such as online hearings during the pandemic  but the barristers wig is here to stay, the Lord Chancellor has insisted.

Asked if the 17th century-style wig and black gown were due an update, Robert Buckland, pictured, said: Never, never, never. I make no apology for it, and it will never happen on my watch. I think it adds to the solemnity of the proceedings, and Im a strong believer in it.

The costume is even more important in the age of video trials, he said, adding: Its a wonderful way of reminding people even though youre online and may be sitting in your front room... it is still a court.

He said he worried people may start to think that its all a bit more informal than it really should be.
Another 10,972 people in Britain have tested positive for Covid-19, bringing the total number of cases in the country to 4,038,078, according to official figures released.

The country also reported another 258 coronavirus-related deaths. The total number of coronavirus-related deaths in Britain now stands at 117,166. These figures only include the deaths of people who died within 28 days of their first positive test, Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday.

Meanwhile, more than 15 million people of the most vulnerable groups in Britain have received a first dose of a jab, according to the latest official figures.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson described the latest development of the country's vaccine rollout as an "extraordinary feat".

"In England, I can tell you we have now offered jabs to everyone in the first four priority groups, the people most likely to be severely ill from coronavirus, hitting the first target we set ourselves," said Johnson in a video posted on Twitter.

The vaccines had been "delivered by the most extraordinary army of vaccinators who have jabbed like there's no tomorrow", Johnson said.

Also on Sunday, Vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi tweeted that the government would "not rest" until the vaccine was offered to all over-50s by the end of April. Britain aims to offer all adults their first dose by autumn.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out vaccines.

--IANS

int/

(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.)




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Two people play in the snow in San Antonio, on 14 February 2021 ((Associated Press))

More than 2.5 million people in Texas are currently without power, as residents of the state have been told to stay off roads, amid a storm described by governor Greg Abbott as unprecedented.

Areas of all of the 254 Texas Counties are either under a winter storm watch or winter storm warning, as PowerOutage.us shows that 2.5 million of them are currently without power.

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which manages power for the state, told NBC News on Monday that it was experiencing record-breaking demand, due to the extreme cold temperatures.

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In order to meet the record power demand, utility companies have been forcing the states grid operator to enforce rolling blackouts across Texas, according to Reuters.

Traffic lights and other infrastructure may be temporarily without power, ERCOT said on Twitter on Monday morning, as it urged Texans to put safety first during this time.

ERCOT also confirmed that nearly half of the states wind power generation capacity was offline because of frozen wind turbines in West Texas.

Turbines in that area have frozen amid the cold temperatures, causing the states wind power capacity to fall from 25,100 megawatts of energy to just 12,000, according to the Austin American-Statesman.

However, the grid operator confirmed that strong winds in Texas were causing the remaining wind turbines to spin at a higher rate than normal, helping to offset the difference in capacity.

Speaking about the issues to the Statesman, Dan Woodfin, Senior Director of System Operations for ERCOT, said: This is a unique winter storm thats more widespread with lots of moisture in West Texas, where theres a lot of times not a lot of moisture.

He added: Its certainly more than what we would typically assume.

Mr Abbott declared a state of emergency in the state amid the conditions, and urged residents to stay off the roads.

People think they will know how to drive on ice and there have been some people whove driven on ice before and snow before, Mr Abbott said in a press conference on Saturday.

Story continues

The governor added: But these conditions are so unprecedented for so many reasons in the state of Texas, there will be so many other people who have never driven on ice before. And it could be one of the most hazardous things that you can do.

Texas has been badly affected by record low temperatures over the last week, as heavy snowfall and icy conditions have led to multiple traffic deaths.

Six people were killed and 36 others were injured in a deadly 100 vehicle pile-up on an icy road in Fort Worth, Texas, last week, as authorities were still picking up pieces of debris at the end of the day.

Icy weather also caused accidents across north and central Texas, as 25 cars were involved in another pile-up in Austin and one motorist was killed in Dallas.

Read More

Power cut across Texas as snow, ice blanket southern Plains

Fort Worth: Nurse crawled out of deadly 1.5-mile Texas pile-up and went to work
Kamala Harris niece is still using the Vice President to flog her range of feminist sweatshirts  despite being ordered not to by the White House.

DailyMail.com can reveal that Meena Harriss Phenomenal line is still listed on non-profit retail website Social Goods next to a quote from Harris.

A $59 Ambitious sweatshirt appears next to a line from the Vice-President that reads: There will be a resistance to your ambition, there will be people who say to you, 'you are out of your lane.'

They are burdened by only having the capacity to see what has always been instead of what can be. But don't you let that burden you.

Meena, 36, was ordered to stop promoting her products using Harris name after the November 3 election.

At that point, she had already launched a range of gear featuring the Im speaking! quote that was used by Harris to check former Vice President Mike Pence during their debate.

But the mom-of-two has continued to cash in since then  launching a collection of MVP [Madam Vice President] sweatshirts and collaborating with Beats by Dre on a set of limited-edition headphones featuring a quote from Harris acceptance speech.

White House lawyers have reportedly told Kamala Harris' niece, Meena, to stop using her aunt's status to build her brand

A $59 Ambitious sweatshirt appears next to a line from the Vice-President that reads: There will be a resistance to your ambition, there will be people who say to you, 'you are out of your lane.'

Meena, 36, was ordered to stop promoting her products using Harris name after the November 3 election. At that point, she had already launched a range of gear featuring the Im speaking! quote (left ) that was used by Harris to check former Vice President Mike Pence

Although Meena has now removed the MVP line from her Phenomenal Clothing website, she has continued to push her products on Social Goods using her aunts name.

She also continues to sell an Im Speaking sweatshirt for $59 on her own website, although references to Harris have been taken out.

Social Goods also sells a childrens picture book called Kamala and Mayas Big Idea for $18.99  the name was inspired by Harris and Meenas mother Maya.

The accompanying blurb also references the Vice-President, although it still refers to her as being a US Senator, and reads:

Kamala and Mayas Big Idea by Meena Harris is an empowering picture book about two sisters who work with their community to effect change, inspired by a true story from the childhood of her aunt, US Senator Kamala Harris, and mother, lawyer, and policy expert Maya Harris. It's an uplifting tale of how the authors aunt and mother first learned to persevere in the face of disappointment and turned a dream into reality.

On Sunday, a White House official scolded the 36-year-old in the Los Angeles Times, saying: 'Some things can't be undone. That being said: Behavior needs to change.'

Both Meena and Social Goods have been contacted for comment by DailyMail.com.

In a statement released through a PR firm to the LA Times last week, Meena said: ''Since the beginning of the campaign, I have insisted on upholding all legal and ethical standards and will continue to strictly adhere to the ethics rules of the Biden/Harris White House.

'With regards to Phenomenal, it was always our plan to remove the likeness of the Vice President from the website before the Inauguration, and refrain from using her likeness in any products or campaigns going forward,'

Meena's mother, Maya (right, 53), was a single mother at 17. Kamala is center, Meena is left; Kamala Harris helped raise her niece

Meena worked with Beats By Dre on headphones with the slogan 'The First But Not The Last'

Meena Harris' clothing brand Phenomenal also sold sweatshirts with MVP - Madam Vice President - and 'I'm speaking' on the front; she was told after election to stop hawking products with her aunt's picture on them

A book that Meena wrote about her mother and aunt, Kamala and Mayas Big Idea, is number four on the New York Times bestseller list

Meena is the daughter of Maya Harris, who was a single mother at 17. The Vice President helped raise her niece.

The 36-year-old lives in San Francisco, California, with husband Nikolas Ajagu, 37, and their two young daughters, and launched Phenomenal in 2017 on the back of the Womens March in DC.

She uses her Instagram page to promote the clothes, regularly posting selfies of herself wearing the sweatshirts.

Meena also uses her social media to push her political views, which include support for the Defund The Police movement.

She has also created a range of t-shirts for her Phenomenal line promoting Black Lives Matter, and is also campaigning for the rights of migrant farmworkers.

Since the election, the 36-year-old has become a media fixture and has used interviews to promote Phenomenal and her latest childrens book Ambitious Girl, while talking about her aunt.

Meena has also spoken about how she gave up a high-flying job at Uber to launch the company, while husband Ajagu has taken leave from his job at Facebook to care for their daughters and allow her to focus on the brand full time.

In an interview with The Times of London last month, Meena said her partner gave up his high-flying tech job in San Francisco to be a stay-at-home father to their two daughters, and free her to run her business.

She told how Ajagu, who she met while working in the tech industry, decided he wanted to be a full-time father to Amara, four, and two-year-old Leela.

We do not ascribe to the traditional gender role thing in our house,' she said.

Meena Harris with her husband Nikolas Ajagu, and daughters Amara (left) and Leela

Meena is not the only extended White House family member accused of cashing in in recent weeks.

President Bidens son Hunter recently signed a million-dollar deal to write a memoir and has also faced scrutiny over allegations he used his White House connections to score business deals during the Obama administration.

Biden's son-in-law Howard Krein has also come under the microscope due to his job at a healthcare investment firm that tells companies how to get a government contract.

The Presidents brother Frank was also censured recently after his law firm advertised its ties to the Oval Office.

The White House has emphasized its policy on possible conflicts of interest.

'The president is committed to ensuring we have the most ethically vigorous administration in history,' White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at the end of January. 'And that is something that he's conveyed publicly and privately as well.'

She also read the official White House policy: 'It's the White House's policy that the president's name should not be used in connection with any commercial activities to suggest or in any way that could reasonably be understood to imply his endorsement or support.'

Harris' office follows the same guidelines, which were put into place partly because of questions that arose about former President Donald Trump's family and how they may have profited off of his administration. His sons Don Jr and Eric kept the family real estate firm running during Trump's White House tenure.

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner held interests in a lifestyle brand and family real estate businesses while they served in (unpaid) positions in the White House.
Staff at Australian National University in Canberra have been asked by academics to stop using the word 'mother' and instead say 'gestational parent', alongside a list of other bizarre changes.

In a bid to introduce gender-inclusive teachings, ANU's Gender Institute Handbook also asked for fathers to be referred to as the 'non-birthing parent' and 'breastfeeding' to be replaced with 'chestfeeding'.

'Mother's milk' was also said to be replaced with 'human or parent milk'.

'While many students will identify as "mothers" or "fathers", using these terms alone to describe parenthood excludes those who do not identify with gender-binaries,' the handbook, obtained by The Daily Telegraph, reads.

Staff at Australian National University (pictured) have asked been asked by academics to stop using the word 'mother' and instead say 'gestational parent'

In a bid to introduce gender-inclusive teachings, ANU's Gender Institute Handbook also asked for 'breastfeeding' to be replaced with 'chestfeeding'

'This non-gendered language is particularly important in clinical or abstract academic discussions of childbirth and parenthood, both to recognise the identities of students in the class, and to model inclusive behaviour for students entering clinical practice.'

Staff have been asked to 'correct' themselves if they accidentally use the wrong terms.

'Language habits take practice to overcome, and students respect the efforts you make to be inclusive,' the guide read.

But a spokesman for ANU, Australia's top ranked university, said the document is not an official policy of the institution.

The spokesman said the handbook was produced by experts who are allowed to 'research in their field of expertise under our policies on academic freedom'.

The changes come a week after a hospital in the United Kingdom told staff to use terms like 'birthing parents' and 'human milk' rather than just referring to 'mothers' and 'breast milk' to avoid offending transgender people.

Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust unveiled a blizzard of 'gender inclusive' phrases in a drive to stamp out 'mainstream transphobia'.

The Trust is the first in the country to formally implement such a radical overhaul for its maternity services department - which will now be known as 'perinatal services'.

A spokesman for ANU, Australia's top ranked university, said the document is not an official policy of the institution

ANU's Gender Institute Handbook also asked for fathers to be referred to as the 'non-birthing parent'

Other changes include replacing the use of the word 'woman' with the phrase 'woman or person', and the term 'father' with 'parent', 'co-parent' or 'second biological parent', depending on the circumstances.

It said: 'Gender identity can be a source of oppression and health inequality. We are consciously using the words 'women' and 'people' together to make it clear that we are committed to working on addressing health inequalities for all those who use our services,' a policy document read.

The move was welcomed by inclusivity campaigners. Campaign group TransActual tweeted: 'This is fantastic, well done. Let's hope many more trusts follow suit. Everybody deserves to be treated with dignity and respect.'
Tamil Nadu: Rising diesel prices worry fishers

February 15,2021 | Source: The Hindu

Fishermen, reeling under the impact of spiralling prices of fuel, have urged the government to increase their monthly quota of subsidised diesel. Fishermen said mechanised boats use up to 8,000 litres of diesel per deep sea voyage and in many cases, boat owners are lamenting that they were incurring losses. My boat is back from a trip and I have to pay Rs.2 lakh but I have only Rs.1 lakh in hand. I am unable to repay my loan amount of Rs.50,000 a month taken towards buying nets, said M.E. Raghupati, a boat owner and a fishing community leader in Kasimedu. He said Karnataka had increased the subsidy cap on the number of litres according to the engine capacity. This could be easily emulated here. We need to check how much is allocated as subsidy each year and how much is left unspent and that amount could be given to fishermen who depend on diesel to run their boats, he added.



Long dry period



K. Bharathi, of the South Indian Fishermen Welfare Association, said the associations were in discussion as to what to ask of the government. Many of the fibre reinforced plastic boats have not gone for fishing since men dont have money for diesel at the present rate. The government should consider a cap on diesel prices for fishermen. That would help and be easy since we tank up at designated bunks inside fishing harbours, he added.

 2021, THG PUBLISHING PVT LTD.
Barghouti died in the Jordanian capital Amman on 14 February at the age of 76. He is survived by his son, poet Tamim Barghouti.

Mourid Barghoutis work has been a strong voice of Palestine and the Palestinian cause, weaved in an unmatchable prosaic language that established his reputation as a great writer. He dedicated his life and works for Palestine and immortalised its story in his books; a story of an occupied, appropriated, dispossessed, renamed country, and a story of the displaced Palestinians who were living in the diaspora.

Barghouti was born in Deir Ghassana near Ramallah on the West bank on 8 July 1944. He travelled to Egypt in 1963 to study English literature in Cairo University, from which he graduated in 1967. This is the same year Israel occupied the rest of Palestine, which prohibited him from going back to Ramallah for 30 years. He was only able to return in 1997.

After his visit to Ramallah, he wrote his autobiographical book, Rayt Ramallah (I Saw Ramallah) in which he gave an insight into 30 years of diaspora and ironies of coming home after long absence. He summarised the experience of coming back home by saying No absent thing comes back whole, and nothing can be retrieved as it was. The book was published in Cairo by Dar Al-Hilal before it was published in English by the AUC Press with the translation of Ahdaf Soueif and forward by Edward Said.

The book offers Barghouti's narrative about home and homelessness and the harrowing experience of a Palestinian who is denied the most elementary human rights in his occupied country and in exile alike. It provides a view of Palestine that has been dispossessed and changed beyond recognition by usurpers, yet from the heap of broken images and shattered homes.

The book won him the Naguib Mahfouz Prize in Literature in 2017.

In Cairo, Barghouti met the love of his life, Ashour, the author of the Trilogy of Granada. They got married in 1970 and stayed together until her death in 2014, although in 1977 he was deported from Egypt after his opposition to the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. The family then had to move to Hungary.

His other book that is considered a landmark in his career is Woledt Honak, Woldet Hona (I was born There, I was Born Here, published in 2009. The book can be regarded as a continuation of I Saw Ramallah, as he describes his journey back to his hometown in 2003 with his son who was born in Egypt. The book was also translated into English by renowned translator Soueif and published by the AUC Press in 2012.

The book traces Barghoutis life in recent years and in the past  his early life in Palestine, his expulsion from Cairo and exile to Budapest, marriage and birth of his son, and then the young mans own expulsion from Cairo. It tells the story of the Palestinian journey of the father and son.

In addition to these two important books, Barghouti published 12 poetry books between 1972 and 2005.
President Joe Biden spoke out on the Senate's acquittal of former president Donald Trump on Saturday, saying that the impeachment of Trump was an illustration of the danger posed to the country's democracy by misinformation and extremism.

Biden said that although Trump was acquitted, his actions in the lead-up to the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 were not "in dispute," according to an NPR report.

In a statement released on Saturday night, Biden noted that while the final vote did not convict Trump, the charge's substance was not in dispute.

"Even those opposed to the conviction, like Senate Minority Leader McConnell, believe Donald Trump was guilty of a 'disgraceful dereliction of duty' and 'practically and morally responsible for provoking' the violence unleashed on the Capitol," Biden said.

The President noted that this chapter in U.S. history had reminded the people that democracy is fragile and "it must always be defended," and "we must be ever vigilant." Biden added that violence and extremism have no place in America.

Related story: On a Vote of 57-43, Trump Finally Acquitted in 'Witch Hunt' Impeachment Trial

Biden's Reaction

Biden had remained mostly mum about the former president's impeachment until his comments on Saturday. He told reporters last week that he did not plan to watch the trial, according to a WBEZ report.

Biden added that he neither fully supported nor opposed Congress' vote last month to impeach Trump, saying that he wanted to leave the matter up to Congress.

Biden has previously honored Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, one of the five people who died during the violent Capitol riot.

Acquitting Trump

A majority of senators voted to hold Trump guilty on one charge of inciting an insurrection. However, the 57-43 tally was 10 votes short of the two-thirds majority required for conviction. Sixty-seven votes were needed to secure a conviction.

Seven Republicans voted for the conviction of the former president. It made Saturday's vote the most bipartisan in a presidential impeachment trial in the country's history.

Republican Governor Larry Hogan of Maryland predicted a "real battle for the soul of the Republican Party." Hogan was known to be on frequent Trump critic, according to an AFP News report.

One of the seven Republicans to vote to convict Trump was Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana. He predicted that Trump's still strong-hold on Republicans would soon fade.

"I think his force wanes... I think our leadership will be different going forward," Cassidy said in the report.

Several Republicans were dismayed over Trump's role on Jan. 6 and in the weeks before, saying that he stoked anger with false claims that the last presidential election was stolen from him.

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who voted against conviction, said that there's no question that Trump was "practically and morally responsible for provoking the events." But he noted that a former president could not be impeached.

One of the former president's loyal supporters, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, said that Trump retains a huge political role as the party looks ahead to the 2022 midterm elections.

"We need to work with President Trump -- we can't do it without him," Graham noted in the report.

Trump's Statement

In his statement released on Saturday, Trump welcomed his acquittal. He denounced the impeachment proceedings as "yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our country."

He then added that there was so much work ahead, "and soon we will emerge with a vision for a bright, radiant, and limitless American future."

Trump, for now, remains in his Palm Beach, Florida club. He celebrated his win at Mar-a-Lago, surrounded by friends and family. One of his lawyers even joked: "We're going to Disney World!," according to an Associated Press report.

With his acquittal, Trump is expected to reemerge as he eyes ways to reassert his power. The former president has flirted with the idea of running again in 2024.

Read also: Pelosi Calls for Trump Impeachment in Fear He'll Pardon Capitol Rioters

12th Street Crash Sends Murray Man to the E.R.

By West Kentucky Star Staff

MURRAY - A Murray man went to the hospital Saturday afternoon after a two-vehicle crash.The Murray Police Department says officers responded shortly after noon to a crash on South 12th Street near Sycamore Street.Upon arrival, officers spoke with 27-year-old Corwin Potrzebowski of Fishers, IN who told them he was turning left out of a parking lot and didn't see a southbound vehicle driven by 75-year-old Larry Black of Murray before it hit his vehicle.Black was taken to the emergency room for treatment of possible injuries.The Murray Police Department was assisted on scene by the Murray Fire Department and the Murray Calloway County Ambulance Service.
DUBLIN, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Research Report on the Automobile Radiator Industry in China, 2021-2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The report estimates that the production volume of automobile radiators in China exceeded 70 million units in 2020, among which more than 20 million were exported.



Increased production volume and penetration of automobiles across the world lead to the growing demand for whole-vehicle manufacturing and aftermarket for automobile radiators.

According to this analysis, with economic globalization and fierce competition in the industry, the global automobile industry experienced a significant change in the past decades. For automobile radiator manufacturers in China, many opportunities for growth were offered over the last 10 years. One opportunity came from stable growth in the automobile component market that stimulated the export of automobile radiators in China.



Another being the rapid growth in China's automobile industry, which naturally raises the demand for automobile radiators. China's production volume of automobiles was merely 13.79 million units in 2009 while that in 25.72 reached 29.02 million, with a CAGR of more than 6% over the decade. China has been established as the world's largest automobile producer and seller for 12 consecutive years from 2009 to 2020. Car ownership in China was only 62.81 million units in late 2009. By the end of 2019, it surged to more than 250 million.

According to the analysis, in 2019, China exported approximately 23.9 million automotive radiators, with an export value of 557 million U.S. dollars. The main export destinations include the United States, Russia, Mexico, Brazil, etc. With the outbreak of COVID-19 at the beginning of 2020, it has had a certain impact on China's auto radiator exports. The analyst predicts that China's auto radiator exports will decrease by about 10% from 2019 to the second half of 2021. Will gradually recover.

Competition in China's market is intense with a large number of manufacturers involved and the market is composed of numerous small-scale enterprises. High certification requirements on OEM put most manufacturers off this market. Therefore, the majority of automobile radiator manufacturers in China focus on supporting domestic and overseas aftermarkets.

Due to the outbreak of COVID-19 in early 2020, which has had a serious impact on the global economy, the analyst predicts that global and Chinese automobile production will decline in 2020-2021.



From 2022, global automobile production will gradually recover. However, global and Chinese car ownership will continue to grow from 2020 to 2025, and the aftersales market will contribute more and more to car radiators. Due to the low price of China-made car radiators, the analyst expects that China's auto radiator exports will still have room for growth in the next few years.

Topics Covered:

The impact of COVID-19 on the global automotive radiator market

Development environment of the automotive radiator in China

Sales volume and value of automotive radiator in China 2015-2025

2015-2025 Sales volume and value of automotive radiator in China by section 2015-2025

by section 2015-2025 Major automotive radiator Manufacturers and their market share in China

Export volumes and values of automotive radiator in China

Major export destinations of China's auto radiators

auto radiators Prices of automotive radiator in China

Prospects of Chinese automotive radiator Market 2021-2025

Key Topics Covered:

1 Relevant Concept of Automobile Radiator Industry

1.1 Definition

1.2 Classification

1.3 Development Status of Automobile Radiator Industry

1.4 Composition of Automobile Radiator Industry Chain

1.5 The impact of COVID-19 on the global automotive radiator market

2 Development Environment of Automobile Radiator Industry in China and the World

2.1 Economic Environment

2.1.1 Global Economy

2.1.2 China's Economy

2.2 Development Status of Automobile Market

2.2.1 Development Overview of Global Market

2.2.2 Production Volume and Sales Volume in China

2.2.3 Aftermarket in China

2.3 Policy Environment of Automobile Radiator Industry in China

2.3.1 Industrial Competent Departments and Regulation System

2.3.2 Relevant Policies and Major Laws and Regulations

2.4 Development Status of Automobile Component Market

2.4.1 Analysis of the Global Market, 2015-2020

2.4.2 Analysis of China's Market, 2015-2020

3 Analysis on Automobile Radiator Industry in China, 2015-2020

3.1 Analysis of Supply

3.2 Analysis of Demand

3.2.1 Overall Market Demand

3.2.2 OEM Market Demand

3.2.3 Aftermarket Demand

3.3 Export Analysis of Automobile Radiators in China, 2017-2020

3.3.1 Analysis on Export Scale

3.3.2 Analysis of Export Destinations

3.4 Analysis of Production Cost of Automobile Radiators in China

4 Competition in China's Radiator Market

4.1 Barriers to Entry

4.1.1 Technology

4.1.2 Brand

4.1.3 Capital

4.2 Industry Competition Structure

4.2.1 Bargaining Power of Upstream Raw Material Suppliers

4.2.2 Bargaining Power of Clients

4.2.3 Internal Competition

4.2.4 Potential Entrants

4.2.5 Substitutes

5 Analysis of Major Automobile Radiator Manufacturing Enterprises in China, 2019-2021

5.1 Zhejiang Yinlun Machinery Co., Ltd.

5.2 Shandong Houfeng Auto Radiator Co., Ltd.

5.3 Yangzhou Enterex Industrial Co., Ltd.

5.4 Yangzhou Tongshun Radiator Co., Ltd.

5.5 Shanghai Delang Auto Parts Manufacturing Co., Ltd

5.6 Jiangxi Xintian Auto Industry Co., Ltd.

5.7 Yangzhou Sanye Radiator Co., Ltd.

5.8 Qingdao Toyo Radiator Co., Ltd.

5.9 Toyo Heat Exchanger (Zhongshan) Co., Ltd.

5.10 Weifang Hengan Radiator Co., Ltd.

5.11 Nanning Baling Technology Co., Ltd.

5.12 Wuxi Hongsheng Heat Exchanger Manufacturing Co., Ltd.

5.13 Lei Te Auto Parts Manufacturing Co., Ltd.

5.14 Taian Lumei Auto Radiator Co., Ltd.

5.15 Faret Auto Radiator Co., Ltd.

5.16 Chongqing Changjiang Electrical Appliances Industries Group Co., Ltd.

6 Prospect on China's Automobile Radiator Industry, 2021-2025

6.1 Factors Influencing Development of Automobile Radiators in China

6.1.1 Driving Forces and Market Opportunities

6.1.2 Threats and Challenges

6.2 Forecast on Supply of Automobile Radiator Industry

6.3 Forecast on Demand of Automobile Radiator Industry

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/nklskk







Media Contact:

Research and Markets

Laura Wood, Senior Manager

[email protected]



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Bombay HC quashes FIR against Sushant's sister Mitu Singh; no relief for Priyanka

India

oi-Deepika S

Bombay, Feb 15: The Bombay High Court on Monday quashed a case registered against Sushant Singh Rajput's sisters Shweta Singh and Mita Singh for allegedly putting him on medication without consultation. The court, however, did not give any relief to Rajput's another sister Priyanka Singh.

The Bandra police lodged the FIR against the duo on September 7, based on a complaint filed by Rajputs girlfriend and actress Rhea Chakraborty, who is currently in jail in connection with a drugs case related to the actor's death.

In her complaint, Chakraborty accused Rajput's sisters and Dr Tarun Kumar of the Delhi-based Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital of forging a prescription of medicines supposedly for anxiety that were prohibited under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, 1985.

As per the complaint, the medicines were for Rajput.

The 34-year-old actor was found hanging at his residence in suburban Bandra on June 14 this year.

In the petition, Rajput's sisters claimed the FIR was filed based just on media reports and that the complaint was fraught with material irregularities and discrepancies.

They also said there was an inordinate delay of 90 days in lodging the complaint the medicines were prescribed on June 8, the day Rajput asked Chakraborty to leave his house, and the complaint was lodged on September 7.

The petition by way of interim relief has sought a direction to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), to whom the FIR against petitioners has been handed over by police, from taking any coercive steps against them.

The CBI is already probing a complaint lodged by Rajputs father K K Singh, who accused Rhea Chakraborty and her family of abetting his sons suicide.

"A bare perusal of the complaint and the FIR shows it does not make out any cognisable offence. The drugs that have sought to be allegedly given by Dr Tarun Kumar are not banned drugs, the petition said.

There is no evidence to show the medicine prescribed was administered to Rajput or anyone else, it said.

"There is nothing in the FIR to suggest that the petitioners had used the prescription to buy the alleged drugs from any third party or induced it to Rajput, the plea said.

"The present FIR has been lodged on a very vague complaint based on alleged conjectures and surmises with ulterior motive to frame the petitioners (Priyanka and Meetu)," it said.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

The plea alleged that Rhea Chakraborty was tarnishing Rajput's image by suggesting he was suffering from mental illnesses and was a drug addict.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 14:48 [IST]
While we continue to debate over the merits and demerits of the new farm laws and the protests against them, the sad reality is the average small farmers continue to suffer, due to low prices offered for their produce, which sometimes does not even cover the amount they had invested in the farms to cultivate the crops.

Representational Image

There have been several such cases where farmers were forced to abandon their crops as the prices they were offered would not even harvest and transportation charges.

Yet another such heartbreaking incident has now surfaced from Uttarakhand, where some farmers were left with no option, but to destroy their banana crop, due to low prices.

The farmers, three brothers from Sitarganj area in Uttam Singh Nagar District destroyed their 4.25 acres banana crops, Hindustan Times reported.

According to them, they had planted banana plants on the advice of horticulture officials in 2019, but when it was ready for harvest they failed to get buyers and proper rates for the crop.

Ramesh Yadav, one of the three brothers told the newspaper that their crop was ready in January, but failed to attract buyers. He said that he had even gone to Pilibhit and Bareilly of UP in search of buyers, but failed to get a good offer.

The brothers said they were left with no option, but to destroy the crop that they had put their hard work on for over a year.

BCCL/ Representational Image

In December, hundreds of farmers from Andhra Pradesh were forced to sell their tomatoes at 10 paisa per kg.

Farmers said, with such low prices, they won't make any profit from the harvest and can't even recover the investment they made.

According to farmers tomatoes are grown in around 4,000 hectares of land in Kurnool and on average they spent around Rs 8,400 per acre every season, including labour cost and transportation.

BCCL

Farmers who cultivate fruits and vegetables which are not covered under MSP and have a relatively low shelf-life have regularly faced this situation.

During the peak harvest season, when large quantities of vegetables and fruits hit the wholesale markets the prices of them fall to shocking lows.

Image For Representation/Reuters

But as they cannot hold the harvested crops for more than a day or two, the farmers are left with no option, but to sell them for whatever they are offered.

Many farmers also make their hard-produced vegetables and fruits cattle fodder as that is more economical.
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The UK should help Ireland out with vaccines as it has purchased 407 million doses, said Dr Gabriel Scally.

The President of Epidemiology and Public Health at the UKs Royal Society of Medicine said Ireland should be making relationships with the vaccine companies and asking the UK for help.

"My first stop would be to have a conversation with Boris Johnson, the UK has purchased 407 million doses, he said on RTE Radio 1s Today with Claire Byrne.

"Thats enough to vaccinate the total adult population of the UK about four times with two doses each time, so thats a lot of surplus vaccine.

Dr Scally said it would be in the UKs best interest to help Ireland with its vaccine roll-out.

Read More

"I think itd be very beneficial, the last thing the UK wants is Ireland lagging behind and having a lot more cases.

There is only one EU land border that the UK has and thats with the Republic of Ireland, its a common travel area and its absolutely in the UKs interest to help Ireland with vaccines.

The Public Health Doctor said Ireland is at a very worrying point when it comes to international travel as the UK has put 33 countries on the list for mandatory quarantine while Scotland as banned all international travel. He added: The Republic of Ireland hasnt moved on this.

When told that the government is working on having 18 countries on the mandatory hotel quarantine list, Dr Scally said thats no good.

He added: The variants are on their way and the variants move far faster than the Irish government.
It is not in the Congress' convention to announce a chief ministerial face in advance, and a decision on it will be taken after the Assam polls, the party's state unit chief Ripun Bora said on Monday and exuded confidence that the alliance forged to take on the ruling BJP will win over 101 of the 126 seats. Slamming the BJP for its criticism of his party's alliance with the AIUDF for the upcoming state polls, Bora said the AIUDF chief, Badruddin Ajmal, is not anti-Hindu and the BJP, which accuses him of being communal, had in fact joined hands with his party to run three district councils in the state.

The Badruddin Ajmal-led outfit is not communal and cannot be regarded as "untouchable", he said. Bora also said that "winds of change" were blowing in Assam and expressed confidence that the Congress, along with its allies All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), CPI, CPI(M), CPI(ML) and Anchalik Gana Morcha, will win over 101 out of the 126 Assembly seats in the polls likely in March-April.

In an interview with PTI, Bora said it was not the Congress' convention to announce a chief ministerial face in advance and the party will decide on who would be the chief minister only after the elections. "It is a party of internal democracy. So the party will decide who will be chief minister only after elections, that is the democratic way. It is not only the case with Assam but in other states also the party has followed this," he asserted. The Assam Pradesh Congress Committee chief lashed out at the BJP for attacking the Congress over its alliance with the AIUDF, saying while the BJP had in the past aligned with the "anti-national" PDP in Jammu and Kashmir, it was questioning the Congress' tie-up with the AIUDF. "Ajmal is not anti-Hindu, but talks only about the welfare of Muslims. Talking about the welfare of Muslims or the people of his own religion is not a crime unless he hates the people of other religions. Ajmal has never been anti-Hindu," he said. AIUDF is considered to have a large base among Assam's about 35-per cent Muslim population. Bora, a frontrunner for the chief minister's post if the Congress-led alliance is voted to power, said the BJP has been saying the Congress has joined hands with AIUDF, but the fact is that the saffron party had entered into a pact with Ajmal's party to capture power in district councils of Darrang, Karimganj and Nagaon. "The BJP has no moral right to lecture us on politics," he said. Bora claimed that the BJP is "more communal" than any other party as it had formed a government in Jammu and Kashmir along with "anti-India forces" like the PDP, which "does not accept the Indian constitution and Indian flag". The BJP is focused on communalisation, but for Assam's people, the main issue is to save the state because of the way the BJP and the RSS have attacked the identity, culture and heritage of Assam by the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), Bora said. The CAA is going to destroy Assam's social fabric, it will divide people and create communal disturbance as well as conflict between different castes, communities and religions, he alleged, adding that the CAA will serve no purpose for the people. "The CAA will bring threat to the language and to the existence of the culture of the people of Assam. Therefore, even though the BJP has declared that after elections they are going to implement the CAA, but we in the Congress have said that after election if our party comes to power, we will not allow implementation of the CAA in Assam," Bora said. On Sunday at a rally here, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had said his party will protect every principle of the Assam Accord and will not let the CAA be implemented if voted to power in the polls. Bora also hit out at the BJP over the issue of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) for Assam, saying it has been a long standing demand of Assam but the BJP has stopped the NRC after final publication. The Congress' stand is clear that the NRC, the final list which has come out with 3.11 crore people of Assam, should be accepted, Bora said. "Secondly, side by side we have said that 19 lakh names which are not there, all of them are not foreigners, most of them are Indians, we have demanded that those people as per the rule of NRC should be given an opportunity of appealing before court so that they can prove themselves as Indian citizens," he said. Asked about the number of assembly seats the Congress will contest, Bora said of the 126, the party would field candidates in around 90 and the remaining 36 would be given to allies. He, however, said seat-sharing talks are yet to be concluded as there are "surprising demands" from partners. Bora also said the alliance will "very soon" come out with an appeal to the people elaborating the issues for which the six parties have come on a common platform and added that the CPI(M) has some reservations about calling it a 'common minimum programme'. On Congress' chances in the polls, he said "winds of change are blowing" in the state and there is a "tremendous undercurrent" in favour of the party and its allies. "People are scared of coming out openly (against the BJP) as they are being threatened and blackmailed that if you go with the Congress you will not get benefits," he alleged. Bora said the people are feeling a "sense of betrayal", realising that the ruling party has only been making "false promises". "In Assam, the BJP made so many tall claims. The BJP said there are 25 lakh unemployed youth and they will all be absorbed within six months of it forming government, they said not a single Bangladeshi foreigner in Assam will be left, they said 1 lakh crore will be allotted for expressway on both sides of Brahmaputra, 1 'tola' of gold will be given to girls, but nothing has happened," he said.
Dromod Boxty, who are supported by Local Enterprise Office Leitrim, were winners at this years National Enterprise Awards. The awards, which took place virtually were broadcast online from the Mansion House in Dublin, are in their 22nd year and run annually by the Local Enterprise Offices.

Dromod Boxty, manufacture a range of homemade products including boxty, pancakes and potato bread from their base in Dromod took home the North West Regional award.

Joe Lowe, Head of Enterprise, said; We are delighted that Dromod Boxty won the North West Regional award. This was a well deserved win as Aine has brought, what was a strong business to the next level, with her level of dedication, enthusiasm and vision for growth  LEO Leitrim are looking forward in continuing to support Dromod Boxty in the future.

Dromod Boxty, follow in the steps of another local boxty producer, Mc Niffes Bakery who won the North West Regional award in 2016. There are 8 regional awards in total and the North West Regional Award is selected from counties Donegal, Sligo, Leitrim and Longford.

The overall winner at the National Enterprise Awards was Mullingar mobile craft canning company, Bevcraft. Established in 2016 by friends Ciaran Gorman and Darren Fenton the company has gone from strength to strength. They now work with over 250 brands to can their produce using their mobile canning technology. They are operating across 5 European countries and in 2021 aim to handle over 50million cans.

Along with the overall winner, five category winners were announced. The Innovation Award winner was VRAI, who are backed by LEO Dublin City. The tech company provide virtual reality training similuations to companies who may work in remote or dangerous areas.

The Best Export Award went to Kianda Technologies who were supported by LEO Fingal and have recently moved to Enterprise Ireland. The company have achieved significant penetration in global export markets with their business automation software that streamlines business processes in areas such as finance, HR and quality.

The Future Focus Award went to Lidan Designs, backed by LEO Roscommon. The business creates modular energy efficient buildings off-site in the areas of offices, schools and housing.

To recognise the particular challenges overcome by businesses in 2020, two new awards were presented, the Brexit Ready Award and the Pivot Award. The Brexit Ready Award went to Knockanore Farmhouse Cheese who are supported by LEO Waterford. The raw milk artisan cheddar cheese producers impressive response to Brexit has seen them actually grow their business on the back of the UK leaving the EU, accessing new markets.

The Pivot Award winner went to WowWee.ie who are backed by LEO Clare. A personalised gifting company who relied heavily on corporate gifting saw their business disappear once the pandemic hit but pivoted to sell direct to consumers. The response has seen them excel in an extremely competitive market.

Announcing the awards virtually from the Mansion House, Minister English said; The awards are an opportunity to celebrate the sheer talent, determination and success which exists in Irish businesses. The winners tonight are outstanding companies and, along with all the finalists, are trailblazers for every small business and budding entrepreneur across the country. I have no doubt that the companies here will continue to grow their businesses, create more jobs and make a significant contribution to their local economies. The foundations of the Irish economy is built on by small businesses and through these awards we can recognise their valuable role in society.

Established in 2014, the Local Enterprise Offices are the essential resource for any entrepreneur looking to start a business or any small business that is looking for support or advice to help them grow. The LEOs work with over 7,000 client companies across Ireland in a diverse range of sectors offering mentoring, training, expert advice and financial supports to small businesses. For more information see www.LocalEnterprise.ie


The judges and lawyers huddled on their screens and talked about what worked and what didnt.

A surprising amount of it worked. Bexar County has held a handful of civil jury trials on Zoom, and some of the participants were so struck by the advantages of teleconferencing over actual courtrooms that they want them to continue after the coronavirus pandemic is over.

A judge at a recent virtual debriefing session posed a question: Would you do it again, and are you looking forward to it?

I genuinely hope that Bexar County maintains the virtual component of this process, replied Leslie Luttrell, a local lawyer. She was fresh from arguing a virtual trial, a bill of review case to determine if a lawsuit petitioner had been negligent.

Luttrell had noticed that the demeanor of the jurors was different  they seemed more relaxed and paid greater attention.

You could actually see it in their physical manifestations, she told the panel. They are far more comfortable than sitting on that hard church pew.

Another upside: Neither jurors nor attorneys had to drive around the courthouse to find a place to park.

A happy juror makes for a productive juror, so I hope you maintain that process going forward. Lets get something good out of COVID, Luttrell said.

On ExpressNews.com: In-person jury trials still a ways off - Texas Supreme Court extends coronavirus restrictions

Even a few jurors participated in the virtual debriefing and were asked about their experiences, from jury summons to the moment their panel was dismissed.

Two of them suggested tutorials be posted on how to use the technology.

Absolutely, some tips would help, said Juror No. 10, identified as such to preserve post-trial anonymity.

The conference was hosted by state District Judges Cynthia Marie Chapa, Mary Lou Alvarez, Rosie Alvarado and David Canales.

For San Antonio attorney Bill Oliver, using Zoom as a digital component to share documents has become a preferred method.

Its awesome, definitely an improvement over what we have in the courtroom, he said. And I guess its pretty neat to not drive to the courthouse.

On ExpressNews.com: 'It's truly a new age' - Bexar County administrative judge plans for virtual jury trials in October; in person in January

Not having to commute to a trial was an important aspect for Dallas-based attorney Randal Tilford.

I like the fact that Im sleeping at home at night, instead of a hotel in San Antonio, he said, quickly adding with a smile that he loves San Antonio.

Tilford, who practices law statewide, also touted the significant money savings from not having to travel to meet clients or appear before a judge. Others mentioned that the high costs of hiring out-of-town experts to testify are not as high if they appear online, negating the need to pay for their travel and lodging.

It has been nearly a year since in-person jury trials have been conducted in Bexar County, both criminal and civil. The Texas Supreme Court has repeatedly extended its emergency order restricting in-person court proceedings to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Alvarez, presiding judge of the 45th District Court, was given the task in May of implementing a plan for judges to begin hearing civil cases virtually. So far, five jury trials have been conducted in Bexar County online, officials said.

On ExpressNews.com: In a first, Bexar County will attempt to seat a jury via Zoom video conference

For potential jurors who dont have computers, the states Office of Court Administration has helped counties provide iPads to pick up and use during jury selection and, if potential jurors are chosen, at virtual trials. Soon, Bexar County will be purchasing its own devices for that purpose, Alvarez said.

The civil district judges have been successful, said Ron Rangel, administrative judge over the district courts. Because of that, we are doing two virtual civil jury trials a week.

Rangel, like the lawyers in the debriefing, believes that some aspects of the system could permanently change with Zoom. Good examples include hearings, attorney-client meetings and conferring on dockets between defense attorneys and prosecutors.

Because of the extra constitutional protections for defendants, the Texas Supreme Court allows virtual trials in criminal cases only if both defense and prosecution consent, Rangel said, adding, But I dont see both parties in any given case agreeing to one.

In-person jury trials could resume in Bexar County courtrooms under a plan devised by Rangel and approved by Fourth Administrative Judge Sid Harle. But first, the communitys coronavirus positivity rate must be at or below 5 percent, Rangel said.

Were not out of the danger zone, he said. Maybe April 1. Theres always the hope.

Alvarez and a team that includes Alvarado and fellow District Judges Antonia Toni Arteaga, Cathy Stryker and Angelica Jimenez have been strategizing and instructing others on virtual trials.

Alvarez held a Lunch and Learn virtual meeting Jan. 29 that attracted some 200 people  judges, lawyers, court clerks and sheriffs deputies.

The speakers were the five lawyers who had argued a complicated jury trial in Alvarezs court, a child custody case where both Texas Child Protective Services and a set of intervening foster parents were seeking termination of the parents rights. It lasted 11 days, including jury selection, testimony from 18 witnesses and 46 exhibits.

The lawyers covered all aspects of the Zoom proceedings and answered questions, everything from technology issues to jury feedback (it was positive), along with the benefits of being able to wear sweatpants in the comfort of home.

We want to make sure everyone has the expertise that these attorneys have developed for trying a case on videoconference, Alvarez told the group.

During the debriefing, Alvarez drove home what had been accomplished: the confidence that an 11-day trial can be done on Zoom.

Its possible. We had attorneys that did it, so theres a lot of potential here, she said. This is why it is so critical for us to get your feedback because every time we do this, we are learning and improving the process.

We are collectively developing our expertise.

ezavala@express-news.net | Twitter: @elizabeth2863
Myanmars coup leaders have called on hundreds of thousands of government employees  doctors, garbage collectors, electricity workers  to set their emotion aside, abandon their protests against the military and return to work.

But on Monday, even after the army had put armored vehicles in the street in a nighttime show of power, the workers displayed little interest in returning to their jobs.

The work stoppages, which appear to be growing, are undermining the ruling generals as they try to assert their authority over the population after seizing power two weeks ago.

The walkouts have been especially notable among government employees, including at the ministry that provides power nationwide, tax offices and the General Administration Department, which oversees a wide range of public services and government functions.
Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. spent his first years as chairman of a powerful House committee largely playing defense against President Donald Trumps efforts to expand oil drilling.

Now hell get to lead an offense with President Joe Biden calling the plays.

Pallones House Energy and Commerce Committee is Ground Zero for Bidens efforts to deliver an economy with net-zero emissions by 2050, including moving to renewable energy from fossil fuels, and to reduce health care costs by strengthening the existing law.

And with Democrats controlling both the House and Senate in addition to the White House, some of those initiatives could make it into law.

Its a huge change or sea change, Pallone told NJ Advance Media. You have a president who believes in science, who says we have to take climate action and wants to take the lead on climate action globally. You have leaders in the Senate who want to get things done and want to make a difference in peoples lives.

Its a tremendous opportunity that we have. Thats why I first ran for Congress, because I wanted to make a difference. And now theres a real opportunity that hasnt been there before.

And the effort on climate change will be led by someone with a 96% lifetime rating from the League of Conservation Voters.

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Congressman Pallone is a strong leader on important environmental issues and making sure were moving aggressively to meet the challenge, said Ed Potosnak, executive director of the New Jersey League of Conservation Voters.

Its exciting for our state. Its going to be hard work. He faces probably the biggest test of his career to get a bold climate plan together. We will be working with him and pushing him to be as bold as possible because theres no time for half measures.

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2018 said the impacts of climate change were worse than originally thought, and some environmentalists said that put more pressure on Pallone to act aggressively.

He holds a singularly important position in Congress, said Matthew Smith, state director of Food & Water Action. He does bear increased responsibility in his position to really articulate policy prescriptions that are in line with what the science is requiring of us.

Bidens 2050 goal matches the one set by Pallones own Climate Leadership and Environmental Action for our Nations Future Act  or Clean Future Act  for a 100% clean economy.

Thats two decades behind the Green New Deals 2030 deadline.

In the 2020 Democratic primaries, both Biden and Pallone defeated opponents who criticized them for not embracing the Green New Deal, the policy guidelines proposed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, D-N.Y., and U.S. Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass., that would provide a more radical solution to climate change.

Pallone said its a question of whats possible, given the fact that Democrats have only 50 votes in the Senate and one of them is Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a state whose economy is dependent on fossil fuels.

To me, the Green New Deal is very similar to the Clean Future Act but as an accelerated case, Pallone said. It is really saying we want to do this quickly. If I can move it up to 2030 and get the votes to do it, obviously I would. Its an issue of what we can do.

Still, Ted Glick, president of the environmental group 350 New Jersey/Rockland, said he would like to ask Pallone: If you had been a congressperson back in the 30s, would you have opposed FDRs New Deal?

The big issue for anyone who calls himself a climate leader is a question of ambition and leadership, he said.

And the clean energy standards in Pallones bill still would allow fossil fuels such as natural gas, according to a report by Friends of the Earth.

Chairman Pallone needs to do better, said Lukas Ross, program manager for the environmental group. A clean energy standard that allows for natural gas isnt climate leadership. Its climate surrender.

Pallone said he would reintroduce his bill and hold hearings on his legislation and on climate change in general. And he said he could see elements incorporated into an infrastructure bill that Biden has talked about tackling after passing the $1.9 trillion coronavirus stimulus legislation.

Elements like improving energy efficiency, improving the energy grid or cleaning up brownfields could be added to such legislation, Pallone said.

And he has called for a permanent ban on oil drilling in the Atlantic Ocean, removing the threat to the Jersey Shore and the states tourism industry. Right now the area is off limits through 2022.

Because Pallone represents a coastal district, he is constantly reminded of the impact of climate change, Potosnak said.

Theres probably not as many congressional districts that are impacted as much as Frank Pallones, Potosnak said. Its a reminder of how aggressive and bold we need to be to combat climate change.

Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.

Yet another Liberal Party staffer has alleged she was sexually assaulted by a parliamentary colleague, this time in Parliament House.

The young woman, Brittany Higgins, reported the assault but felt forced to choose between justice or a career in politics. The response to the case, by Defence Minister Linda Reynolds, was dreadful. Higgins was interviewed about her experience in the very room where the assault took place. Just 18 months ago, another staffer, Chelsey Potter, reported she was pinned down and had her underpants torn off. Yet another said a fellow Liberal came to her house the same year and forced himself on her while masturbating.

Brittany Higgins (inset) claims she was sexually assaulted by a colleague in Defence Minister Linda Reynolds office at Parliament House in March 2019. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen/Twitter

Is the Liberal Party the worst workplace in the world? Is Labor any better? Can women only speak out after they leave?

At the beginning of 2020, the Liberal Party released its National Code of Conduct, which insists any victim of criminal conduct should report the complaint to the police and parliamentary staffers should refer the matter to Parliament or government departments. Labor is in the final stages of updating its code of conduct and harassment policies and procedures. In its draft form, it at least says it will support the victim through the complaints process.
An 8-month-old girl who was the victim of an alleged assault last week had severe bruising over much of her body, a bite mark on her arm and was gasping for air when Decatur police arrived, according to a police affidavit filed Friday.

The girl remained in critical condition Friday afternoon at Childrens of Alabama in Birmingham, according to police.

Cameron Almen Elliott, 22, 1839 Brownstone St., Decatur, was arrested Wednesday and charged with second-degree assault, first-degree possession of marijuana and possession of a controlled substance, police said. He remained in Morgan County Jail on Friday with bail set at $260,000, according to jail records.

According to an affidavit by Detective Timothy Pace, Morgan County 911 received a medical call reporting an unresponsive child shortly before midnight Tuesday and police responded to the 2200 block of Victoria Drive Southwest along with medical personnel.

Upon arrival, police found the girl gasping for air and unresponsive, with bruises, abrasions and welts on her neck, face, shoulder and legs, and a bite mark on her arm, according to Pace.

She was initially transported to the Parkway campus of Decatur Morgan Hospital.

Medical staff there advised all of her injuries appeared to be recent and her nonresponsive condition was due to the amount of trauma her body had received, Pace wrote, and she was transported to Birmingham.

Pace interviewed the childs mother, who said her daughter had been in good health with no injuries. The mother told Pace, " Cameron Almen Elliott took (the child) on a car ride and when he returned approximately 10 minutes later (she) was gasping for air and in her current state, according to the affidavit.

At that point Elliott was charged with second-degree assault. After being booked into the Morgan County Jail, according to Paces affidavit, Elliott made a jail phone call instructing someone to get his backpack from a residence. Police contacted the owner of the residence and obtained consent to search it, and then retrieved Elliotts backpack, according to the affidavit.

After obtaining a search warrant, police found the backpack contained marijuana packaged in baggies for resale, Adderall pills and three digital scales with marijuana residue, according to Pace.

Elliott had previously been charged three times with misdemeanor domestic violence for allegedly assaulting a former girlfriend  not the same woman whose child he allegedly assaulted  in Decatur.

On Sept. 28, 2019, according to an affidavit by Decatur police Officer Jonathan Espino, Elliott went to the former girlfriends apartment and, after a verbal altercation, she ran downstairs to call the police.

Elliott punched the woman in the mouth, according to the affidavit.

Once (the woman) was on the ground, Elliott started stomping her head and kicked her several times, once in the stomach, according to Espino.

The woman was five months pregnant with Elliotts child at the time, according to the affidavit, and the two also had another child.

Another incident, on May 12, 2019, involved the same woman. According to a police statement, Elliott struck her in the face and head and scratched her arms and back.

Elliott transferred both municipal court cases to the Circuit Court. They remain pending, although the victim in November 2019 submitted a letter to authorities asking that the charges be dropped. We have put it behind us and have moved forward, she wrote. Weve been co-parenting and getting along.

A third domestic violence charge was filed against Elliott for an incident with the same ex-girlfriend that took place March 26, 2020. That charge also is pending.

 eric@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2435. Twitter @DD_Fleischauer.

___

(c)2021 The Decatur Daily (Decatur, Ala.)

Visit The Decatur Daily (Decatur, Ala.) at www.decaturdaily.com

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THE National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) is calling on people across Northern Ireland to volunteer for its Young Witness Service.

The service, which is the only one of its kind throughout the UK, assists children and young people under 18 years old who have to attend court as prosecution witnesses in Northern Ireland.

It operates in every local crown, magistrate and youth court in Northern Ireland, including in Derry, Limavady and Magherafelt.

In 2019-20, the service offered support to 480 young witnesses across the country.

The service has continued to support children and young people throughout the COVID-19 pandemic by adapting and using technology.

Billy Eagleson, Volunteer Co-ordinator at NSPCCs Young Witness Service, said: Volunteers act as a support person for children and their families when they attend court to give evidence in criminal proceedings.

"All our volunteer Young Witness Supporters are supervised and supported in helping children and young people deal with the challenging and sometimes intimidating prospect of coming to court as a victim or witness.

To become a volunteer, you need to have at least one years experience in a caring or supportive role, have availability during normal court operating hours (9am to 5pm Monday to Friday) and must be able to commit to the role for at least one year after completion of training.

Volunteers will be fully supported throughout their journey and will have a dedicated key contact should they have any questions along the way.

For more information about becoming a Young Witness volunteer and full role description, visit join-us.nspcc.org.uk/ volunteers/
The case of a 17-year-old charged with murdering a Brisbane couple in a crash on Australia Day has been brought before a court again, but media have been shut out of the proceedings.

The teenager, who cannot be identified, was held in custody after his first appearance in Brisbane Children's Court last month.

His case was set for mention in the same court on Monday, but requests for media to attend proceedings were refused.

Brisbane couple Kate Leadbetter and Matt Field died after being struck by an allegedly stolen car at Alexandra Hills on Australia Day

They both died at the scene in Alexandra Hills and it's alleged the teen fled before stealing a set of keys from a nearby house

The Logan boy is accused of murdering Kate Leadbetter, 31, and Matthew Field, 37, while walking their dogs on Australia Day.

Police allege the 17-year-old boy ran a red light in a Landcruiser and collided with a truck at an intersection before the 4WD rolled and ploughed into the couple who were crossing the road.

They both died at the scene in Alexandra Hills and it's alleged the teen fled before stealing a set of keys from a nearby house.

He was then arrested by police after being disturbed by the resident.

Police believe the Landcruiser was stolen from a home in Cleveland earlier that afternoon.

The 17-year-old was charged with two counts of murder as well as offences relating to dangerous driving while under the influence of an intoxicant, failing to fulfil duties at the scene of a crash, wilful damage and burglary.

After an earlier appearance he was remanded to reappear by videolink in March. The boy was then required to appear on Monday after being charged with additional offences by police.

But magistrate Rosemary Gilbert said she would refuse requests by the media to attend Children's Court proceedings because reporting on the case could be prejudicial for the teenager.

Flowers placed by dozens of people remain at the crash site some weeks after the couple died.
Lawmakers on marijuana study committee plan out-of-state site visits

Lawmakers want a firsthand look at legal cannabis operations in response to South Dakotans voting to loosen their state's pot laws last fall.
Screenshot from Tessica Brown/Instagram

Tessica Brownyou might know her as the Gorilla Glue Womanrejoiced when she was able to finally run her fingers through her hair again. And now shes giving back.

The Louisiana woman who became famous on TikTok for using Gorilla Glue as a substitute for hairspray (locking her hair in place for more than a month) set up a GoFundMe to help free her follicles, which has raised more than $23,000 to date.
Coupang headquarters in Songpa District, Seoul / Yonhap



By Nam Hyun-woo



Coupang's proposed plan to offer its shares on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) is rekindling a debate over the necessity of dual-class shares in Korea, where a one-share-one-vote regime is mandated.



Those supporting the dual-class system say it helps startups and venture companies raise investments without concerns about protecting their managing rights, while others argue the system would only assist Korea's family-owned companies' long-time practice of controlling their corporate empire with a small stake.



Coupang filed for its initial public offering (IPO) with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to debut on the NYSE. In doing so, the company said it has no plans to file for an IPO in Korea. Though the company did not elaborate on its rationale for ignoring on the Korean bourse, industry officials say the company made the decision in order to issue dual-class shares.



On the NYSE, Coupang will issue two classes of common shares  Class A with one voting right and Class B with 29 voting rights. Class B shares will be given only to CEO Kim Bom-seok.



Though Coupang did not reveal how many Class B shares CEO Kim will have, he is expected to easily keep a firm grip on the e-commerce company because a mere 2 percent stake will give him a 58 percent voting right.



Unlike the U.S., Korea's Commerce Act stipulates "every shareholder shall have one vote for each share." Though several exemptions are allowed, such as issuing preferred shares, the basic principle for common shares is one share equals onevote.



Due to this, talks over allowing firms to issue dual-class shares surface as a tool for companies to protect their managing rights whenever activist funds attempt hostile M&As or other types of attack. The cases included earlier battles between SK and Sovereign Asset Management back in 2003, KT&G and Carl Icahn in 2006, Samsung C&T and Elliott in 2015 and Hyundai Motor Group and Elliott in 2018.



Businesses have been urging the country to allow dual-class shares. The Korea Enterprises Federation, the Federation of Korean Industries (FKI) and a number of other lobby groups representing businesses have been calling for the country to allow dual-class shares, citing most G7 countries are adopting the system as a measure for companies to defend their management rights.



"Dual-class shares are also especially beneficial for promising startups and venture companies because they can raise funds with less concern on protecting management rights," an industry official said, citing the recent IPOs of DoorDash and Airbnb, which had three and four classes of shares, respectively.



According to research released by the Korea Small Business Institute last month, a 1 percentage point increase in the voting right of a largest shareholder having a 30 percent to 50 percent stake in a venture company resulted in a maximum 5.4 million won increase in R&D expenditure, meaning if a company can increase the largest shareholder's stake by issuing dual-class shares, this will spur the company's owner to allocate more resources for R&D.



Following the requests, the government tabled a bill on allowing dual-class shares only for venture companies last December, and it is now pending at the National Assembly.



However, opposition voices are growing among liberal civic groups. Citizens' Coalition for Economic Justice (CCEJ) and a number of other economic civic groups held a press conference last month, denouncing the government's bill, saying if passed it will only help Korean conglomerate owners further tighten their corporate control with small stakes and pass on their fortunes to their heirs.



According to them, the owners of 55 Korean conglomerates were exercising an average 57 percent of voting rights with a 3.6 percent stake in companies by using cross-shareholding structures between affiliates.



When dual-class shares are allowed, they claim such a practice would be worsened, allowing family-controlled business groups to strengthen their control with smaller stakes, and this will provide grounds for them to use companies for their private interests.



"Dual-class shares will allow control of a company with a small stake, thus widening the gap between ownership and control," CCEJ said in a statement.



Students, staff and academics across the world are voicing their indignation after the University of St. Andrews in Scotland failed to renew the contract of the female director of its Institute for Gender Studies, part of its philosophy department.

The move has raised questions about the underrepresentation of women in academia, particularly in a field of study focused on representation and identity.

Alison Duncan Kerr, an American philosopher, has been working for the prestigious university since 2017 on a temporary contract. In 2018, she was contracted to establish the St. Andrews Institute for Gender Studies, and in 2020 created a masters degree program in gender studies at the university. She designed, developed and initially taught the curriculum for that program.

In an open letter, her supporters say that she had every reason to believe her work would result in a permanent position, but that instead, the university is dismissing her in June. Her tasks will be distributed to other staff members none of whom has gender as a central research interest, the letter says.

House Bill 133 aims to extend Medicaid coverage to eligible new mothers. The House version of the bill calls for a one-year extension, whereas the Senate version calls for a six-month extension. Advocates say the bill could reduce the states maternal mortality rate. Currently, the state offers Medicaid for two months after giving birth. Should Texas extend Medicaid for eligible new mothers for six months or one year?

You voted:
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will judge this week how fast England can exit COVID-19 lockdown after vaccinating 15 million of its most vulnerable people, but the health minister said death and hospital admission numbers were still too high.

With nearly a quarter of the United Kingdom's population now inoculated with a first dose of a COVID vaccine in a little over two months, Johnson is under pressure from some lawmakers and businesses to reopen the shuttered economy.

"We've got to watch the data," Health Secretary Matt Hancock told Sky News. "Everybody wants to get out of this as quickly as we safely can, and both as quickly, but also as safely, are important."

"The question is a judgement of how quickly and safely, how quickly we can do that safely. That's the judgment that we're making this week, looking at the data, ahead of the prime minister setting out the roadmap, on the 22nd," he said.

The biggest and swiftest global vaccine rollout in history is seen as the best chance of exiting the COVID-19 pandemic which has killed 2.4 million people, tipped the global economy into its worst peacetime slump since the Great Depression and upended normal life for billions.

Britain has vaccinated 15.062 million people with a first dose and 537,715 with a second dose, the fastest rollout per capita of any large country.

VACCINE CERTIFICATES

Hancock said the British government was speaking to other countries across the world about giving British people certificates showing they had been vaccinated so that they could travel abroad in the future to countries that require them.

"There is this international work going on because if other countries require (proof of vaccination) we want to allow Brits to be able to travel to those countries," Hancock said.

"We'd want to be able to facilitate that sort of vaccine certification, but it isn't anything we're planning to introduce here," he said, adding that a so-called vaccine passport was not something that would be required to access services in the UK.

The United Kingdom has the world's fifth-worst official death toll - currently 117,166 - after the United States, Brazil, Mexico and India.

A new COVID-19 hotel quarantine system for arrivals from 33 "red list" countries, intended to limit the spread of new variants of the virus, appears to be working smoothly a few hours after it was introduced, Hancock said.

"As of 6.30, when I got my latest update, this is working smoothly, we've been working with the airports and with the border force to make sure everybody knows the process," Hancock told Times Radio.

Short link:



The World Health Organization (WHO) has given emergency use approval to AstraZeneca's Covid-19 vaccine on Monday (February 15) and allowed distribution to the world's poorest countries.

WHO in its statement said that it had approved the usage of AstraZeneca-SKBio (Republic of Korea) and the Serum Institute of India vaccines.

WHO tweeted on Monday: Today WHO gave emergency use listing to two versions of the Oxford-AstraZeneca #COVID19 vaccine, giving the green light for these vaccines to be rolled out globally through COVAX"-@DrTedros #VaccinEquity #ACTogether

"Today WHO gave emergency use listing to two versions of the Oxford-AstraZeneca #COVID19 vaccine, giving the green light for these vaccines to be rolled out globally through COVAX"-@DrTedros #VaccinEquity #ACTogether https://t.co/mbmm1ZAOeM  World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) February 15, 2021

Countries with no access to vaccines to date will finally be able to start vaccinating their health workers and populations at risk, contributing to the COVAX Facilitys goal of equitable vaccine distribution," said Dr Mari'ngela Simao, WHO Assistant-Director General for Access to Medicines and Health Products.

But we must keep up the pressure to meet the needs of priority populations everywhere and facilitate global access. To do that, we need two things  a scale-up of manufacturing capacity, and developers early submission of their vaccines for WHO review," he added.

WHOs Emergency Use Listing (EUL) allows countries to expedite their own regulatory approval to import and administer COVID-19 vaccines for efficiency. The process is accelerated when full data is submitted by the vaccine developers to WHO in a timely manner.

After the data is submitted, the organisations team quickly evaluates and conducts inspections of manufacturing sites.

But in the case of the two AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccines the process took over a month. WHO assessed the quality, safety and efficacy data, risk management plans and programmatic suitability.

The vaccine was reviewed on 8 February by WHOs Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE), which recommended the vaccine for all age groups 18 and above.

Over 109 million people have been reported to be infected by the novel coronavirus globally and more than 2.5 million have died, according to a Reuters tally.

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Dairy farmer Peter Wehl is remembered by his family as a big-hearted man who always dreamed of taking his grandchildren camping.

But the discovery of a spot behind his ear dashed those dreams.

Mr Wehl had a level four melanoma removed after it was discovered during a routine skin check.

The late Peter Wehl (centre) and his wife Heather with (from left) son-in-law Ben Cottrell, granddaughter Madeline Cottrell, Alice Cottrell and grandson James Cottrell.

His daughter Alice Cottrell said the family waited nervously for five years, the time given by doctors for Mr Wehl to get the all-clear. He got it in 2013.
NEW HAVEN  For those who knew Kevin Jiang, he radiated light and joy into the world, Trinity Baptist Church Co-Pastor Greg Hendrickson said as many gathered Saturday for a funeral for the slain Yale graduate student.

But even amid this light, Jiang, 26, last Saturday night, was gunned down on the street and the peace of a neighborhood was shattered, Hendrickson said.

Kevins life was taken from us in a moment, and our city mourned its sixth homicide in as many weeks. What do we make of this? What do we make of a human being who radiated light and joy, but whose life was snatched away on a dark night in a violent attack? Hendrickson asked.

In his sermon, Hendrickson drew parallels between the Biblical story, including the salvation represented in Jesus Christ, and Jiangs life, which was driven, in part, by his faith. Hendrickson spoke as family, friends and well-wishers mourned the loss and celebrated the life of Jiang, killed Feb. 6 on Lawrence Street in the citys East Rock neighborhood.

Jiangs mother and father described their sons warmth, kindness, energy and faith in their remarks, offered as part of the service, which was streamed live by the church.

Jiang lived full-heartedly, enthusiastically, like a ray of sunlight, his mother, Linda Liu said. He led his friends and family to faith; he had grown as a person while serving in the military. He was a good communicator; he loved science and nature. He had taken care of her, showing his thoughtfulness, reassuring her about the future, she said.

Kevins life was short but colorful, and brought so much joy, happiness and positivity to those around him, said his mother. As a mother, I will always miss Kevin, and treasure the blessings he brought me. Although Kevin is gone from us now, Kevin is the most wonderful gift God has ever given me on Earth. I look forward to being reunited with Kevin in heaven in the future, she said.

His father, Mingchen Jiang, thanked people, both those they knew and those they did not, for offering their heartfelt condolences after his sons passing. He said his son had spoken to him a lot about faith as he walked his journey in life; they grew and matured together.

I realize, now, that Kevin himself is an angel. His mission to this world is to deliver love, said Mingchen Jiang. Love is the word Kevin used most often.

Kevin Jiangs father read a poem he wrote for his son.

To my beloved son: as a devout Christian, you are a faithful servant of Jesus. As a mature son, you took kind care of your family. Your heart is full of love. Your smile is always warming and charming. You are naturally unguarded and honest. My dear, you said that heaven is peaceful; you wish that that will be our future home, said his father. Where are you in heaven now? We will look for you for the rest of our life, and will stay with you.

Kevin Jiangs former youth pastor in Chicago, Mark Brunke, said Jiang had changed as a young man, channeling energy that led him to try to wrestle everyone in their youth group into a ball of joy in adulthood.

I think, in his teenage years, it was his encounter with the love of God that changed him, said Brunke. That truth  that is the truth that breathed new life into Kevin. And I know, for some hearing this, it may sound hokey, it may sound church-y, but you cant argue with the results... Im so grateful to have known Kevin, because I think his life was a chance for all of us to see God refresh, restore and renew someone... Im proud of you, young man.

Zion Perry, Jiangs fiancee, said he had offered glimpses of his faith in unconscious aspects of life  in the peace of his face when he slept, in his music  and his overt faith.

Kevin would want us to cherish the gift of life we still have on Earth, and share the good news of eternal life in Christ Jesus, said Perry. I cant wait to see my beloved sweetheart in his heavenly body. I will always love him, with the love of Christ.

The Bible celebrates creation, Hendrickson noted. Kevin Jiang wanted to do his part to preserve and share it in his environmental stewardship, making sure the world God had made would be cared for, along with his fellow human beings, he said.

After being bullied as a youth, Jiang had found solace in the Biblical understanding of humanity, and the inherent dignity in the universality of Gods love it includes, Hendrickson said.

There is blood and murder in the Bible, Hendrickson said. It begins with the killing of Abel by Cain, where unchecked jealousy spilled over into rage and destruction; the text includes understanding of the commonality of sin among human beings.

He suggested that those in attendance, in considering this balance between darkness and light, take solace in the example of Jesus, the Christian savior, who, like Jiang, had his life cut short by violence.

The Biblical story may seem fanciful to some, he said. But he noted the impact it had on Jiangs life, his works on this Earth, and the legacy he left among those that knew him.

The light and life and joy and hope that we saw in Kevin are available to each of us from Jesus today, said Hendrickson.

Jiang, 26, who studied at the Yale School of the Environment and lived in West Haven, was shot to death between Nicoll Street and Nash Street. He was an Army veteran and a National Guard reservist.

Police have said Jiang may have been targeted, rather than being killed in a random act.

Police are continuing to investigate Jiangs killing, including searching for Qinxuan Pan, considered a person of interest in the case. Police have not said whether Pan and Jiang knew each other.

Pan, 29, a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was last seen in Georgia. Connecticut District Deputy U.S. Marshal Supervisor Matthew Duffy said Saturday efforts were still focused there.

Perry attended MIT as an undergraduate student, graduating in 2020 with a degree in biological engineering. She then move on to graduate school at Yale. The couple became engaged a week before Jiangs death.

william.lambert@hearstmediact.com
Where is Raymond Koh? Pastor remains missing 4 years after abduction

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An international group serving persecuted Christians has drawn attention to the unsolved case of Malaysian Pastor Raymond Koh, who has been missing since he was abducted in a well-organized, military-style operation four years ago after being accused of preaching to Muslims.

For four years, hes been neither seen nor heard from. For four years, his family has suffered, worried and fought for answers, says The Voice of the Martyrs in a statement sent to The Christian Post, recalling Kohs abduction on Feb. 13, 2017, while driving near Kuala Lumpur, the capital of the Muslim country in Southeast Asia.

Koh, who is ethnically Chinese, founded Hope Community, a nonprofit to serve the poor and underprivileged along with his wife. In 2011, authorities accused Koh of seeking to convert Muslims  an act forbidden by law in Malaysia. Though the allegations against Koh were dropped, bullets were later sent to his home as a warning.

Kohs 40-second abduction was captured on surveillance cameras (watch here), but neither Koh nor his car has ever been found. Koh was driving in the Petaling Jaya area when his car was surrounded by three black SUVs, forced to a sudden stop and he was abducted.

A task force was formed after Malaysias Human Rights Commission found in 2019 that Malaysias Special Branch intelligence service was likely behind Koh and Muslim social activist Amri Che's disappearances.

Another year has gone by, VOMs spokesperson Todd Nettleton said. Yet no arrests have been made, no one has been held accountable, and there is still no explanation for what happened to him. His family deserves answers.

Last January, Malaysias Ministry of Home Affairs said that the task force needed more time to prepare its report.

VOM said the motive for the pastors forced disappearance centers around Kohs strong Christian faith and particularly allegations that he evangelized ethnic-Malay Muslims  a crime under the southeast Asian nations strict Islamic legal code.

Last March, Pastor Kohs wife, Susanna Liew, was honored with the U.S. State Departments International Women of Courage Award. Despite police harassment and death threats, she continues to advocate for her husband and others, not because of her faith or theirs, but because of their rights as Malaysians, a State Department press release said at the time.

In 2019, VOM launched a petition called Release Raymond, calling on Christians around the world to demand that the Malaysian government reveal the truth.

We, pastor Raymonds fellow Christians from around the world, call on your government to release any and all information related to the forced disappearance of Pastor Raymond Koh, including any involvement of policemen from the Special Branch, the petition read in part. We demand pastor Raymonds immediate release and safe return to his family. Finally, we call for justice. Those responsible for his disappearance must be held accountable for this inhumane crime.

VOM says it has launched a site for Koh, and more than 65,200 people have signed the petition, which will be hand-delivered to the Malaysian embassy in Washington, D.C.

Malaysia is 56% Muslim and less than 10% Christian.
New Braunfels, TX (78130)

Today

Isolated thunderstorms early, mainly cloudy overnight with a few showers. Low 71F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%..

Tonight

Isolated thunderstorms early, mainly cloudy overnight with a few showers. Low 71F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%.



The Benchmark indices rallied for the third consecutive day, hitting fresh record highs on the back of buying seen in the realty and financial names. At close, the Sensex was up 609.83 points, or 1.18%, at 52,154.13, and the Nifty was up 151.40 points or 1% at 15,314.70.

Motherson Sumi | CMP: Rs 211.25 | The stock jumped over 7 percent after the auto ancillary company reported a strong performance for the December quarter, with earnings beating estimates. On the operational front, consolidated Ebitda rose 60.7 percent to Rs 1,795.5 crore from Rs 1,117.1 crore, while EBITDA margin expanded by 310 bps to 10.5 percent from 7.4 percent, YoY. The Japanese research firm Nomura has maintained a 'buy' rating on the stock and has raised the target to Rs 252 per share.

Tata Motors | CMP: Rs 332 | The share price added 2 percent on February 15. The company said that JLR is on the path to double-digit EBIT margin with positive cash flow, while it will curate closer collaboration and knowledge-sharing with Tata group companies. All JLR nameplates to be available in pure electric form by the end of the decade, it added.

Bharti Airtel | CMP: Rs 594.50 | The stock ended in the green after the company said its board will meet on February 17 to discuss strategic plans and reorganisation of the shareholding framework of subsidiary companies. This may lead to consolidation or acquisition of shares of subsidiary companies, "the consideration of which may be discharged through the issuance of equity shares of the company on a preferential basis and/or cash", the company said in a regulatory filing.

Kalpataru Power | CMP: Rs 369 | The scrip gained over a percent on February 15. The company has posted more than two-fold jump in consolidated net profit to Rs 308 crore for the December quarter compared to the year-ago period, mainly on the back of higher revenues.

Edelweiss Financial Services | CMP: Rs 67.70 | The share price was down more than 4 percent after the company reported a consolidated net loss of Rs 63 crore for the third quarter ended in December 2020. It had registered a net profit of Rs 35.32 crore in the same quarter last year. Sequentially, the loss widened from Rs 56.12 crore in the September quarter.

Amara Raja Batteries | CMP: Rs 928.50 | The stock price shed 6 percent on rising cost pressure. The company's operating margin was at 15.6 percent, down 200 basis points sequentially. Gross margin deteriorated by 80 bps quarter-on-quarter in December amid increased raw material prices and higher staff costs.

Vodafone Idea | CMP: Rs 12.10 | The stock slipped 3 percent after the company reported a net loss of Rs 4,532 crore for the December quarter against Rs 6,439 crore in the year-ago period, driven by higher 4G wireless customer additions, improved service quality and cost optimisation.

Info Edge | CMP: Rs 5,517.90 | The stock gained over 2 percent after the company reported consolidated profit at Rs 679 crore in Q3FY21 (led by exceptional gain) against a loss of Rs 62.1 crore in Q3FY20, revenue declined to Rs 277.6 crore from Rs 335 crore YoY.

Delta Corp | CMP: Rs 153.15 | The scrip was down more than 3 percent after the company's revenue fell to Rs 120.82 crore from Rs 205.13 crore YoY. The company reported consolidated profit at Rs 1.28 crore in Q3FY21 against Rs 55.07 crore in Q3FY20.

THE Sovereign, His Majesty King Mswati III and Ingwenyama, will on Friday deliver the last State Of the Nation Address (SONA) during the State opening of Parliament before the Kingdom of Eswatini transits from Third to First World status in 2022, which is about 10 months away. This makes this occasion momentous in many dimensions not least that for the first time the State opening of Parliament will be virtual - courtesy of the COVID-19 pandemic - which should not be surprising even for a nation with a penchant for holding on to irreverent practices of the dark ages in this the 21st century age of algorithms and robotics.

Transition

It is for this singular reason that Vision 2022, which embodies the transition to First World status for the kingdom, is likely to get a mention in the SONA. And ah, yes, the self-same novel coronavirus responsible for COVID-19 conspired to slow, if not derail, the national progression and quantum leap into a new world could be valid reasoning in the event of shortcomings. But what is that common thread that knits us together as a collective and a cohesive force we, emaSwati, identify with and shall rally around in unison to affirm that this is our country and its inhabitants have arrived to the promised First World destination. What is it that we can all point out as significant achievements that qualify this country to join and be welcomed into the league of First World countries?

To put matters in perspective, we ought to reflect that Vision 2022 was birthed 25 years ago in 1997 when emaSwati from diverse backgrounds  from ultra-conservative traditional leaders (chiefs) to progressive trade unionists who were/are largely proponents of multiparty democracy, professionals, non-governmental organisations to government apparatchiks  put their heads together in a nation building exercise and by so doing disproving and nullifying the theory that political and social pluralism and diversity was divisive and counter to national cohesion by producing the National Development Strategy (NDS).

Dream

Embodied by the NDS was a 25-year dream, Vision 2022, in which emaSwati in their diversity set themselves the goal of making this the Kingdom of Eswatini  then formally known as the Kingdom of Swaziland  one of the top 10 developing nations in the world. The NDS was, and is, coherent how this was to be achieved in terms of comprehensive action plans and developmental projects to be undertaken as well as how this 25-year journey was to be benchmarked. But this group of wise men and women who are the authors of the NDS were not blind to the apparently hostile political environment they identified as a stumbling block and, therefore, not conducive to its practical implementation and success. The key to unlocking the countrys potential, the NDS authors reasoned and agreed, was in political reformation of the kingdoms body politic.

As I see it, the very suggestion that the NDS could only be unlocked by political reforms was its very undoing. Political reforms were not going to happen and have not happened to date. While at the time a constitutional review commission (CRC) was in place and could easily have assimilated the NDS yet, for obvious reasons, did not. Instead the CRC chose to entrench the same political system in which all power - Executive, Judiciary and Legislative - is vested with the Monarchy, an antithesis to the creation of a modern vibrant economic environment capable of attracting investors that was, and is, the lodestar to achieving Vision 2022. Consequently the NDS was consigned to the dustbin and its vision of making Eswatini one of the top ten developing countries by 2022 was tweaked and the goal of Vision 2022 became that of transforming eSwatini into a First World country, a quantum leap from the original objective yet seemingly and magically achievable within the same timeframe.

Adopted

Ironically in the intervening period between 1997 when the NDS was adopted and today, on the eve of the final push to the promised First World, not much has changed just in about every facet of the typical life of an ordinary liSwati. Poverty has deepened among the majority of emaSwati privately referred to as timfucuta (debris) by the high and mighty while government is looking the other way and pouring billions of the taxpayers Emalangeni into projects of no economic value as well as in financing the First World lifestyle of the political elites. EmaSwati still have to live with a dysfunctional, irrelevant and increasingly unaffordable education system. Land tenure remains a controversial issue in the absence of a coherent policy.

Unemployment, especially among the countrys youth including tertiary graduates, is on the ascendancy. Even in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic people are forced to inhabit overcrowded queues overnight to access government services some of which, such as healthcare with its perennial shortages of drugs and personnel, are non-existent. The countrys road infrastructure network has all but disintegrated. The list is long!

And when all is said and done, the questions remain in respect of the meaning and import of First World status to the ordinary liSwati and whether or not it is the country that is cynosure in all of this. Your guess is as good as mine!
Deceased Japanese man confirmed as new Covid-19 infection case in Vietnam

A Japanese man who died at a hotel in Hanoi has tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, raising the total number of infection cases Vietnam to 2,229, the Ministry of Health reported on Monday morning.









Authorities in Hanoi lock down a hotel where the Japanese man was found dead with positive SARS-CoV-2 virus. Photo by Dantri





According to the ministry's report, the 54-year-old man arrived at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City on January 17 to work at Mitsui Vietnam. He was sent to a local quarantine area upon his arrival.

During his stay at a quarantine facility in Tan Binh District, he tested negative for the virus twice on January 17 and 31.



After finishing his quarantine period, the man flew to Hanoi on February 1 and stayed at a hotel in Tay Ho District from February 1-13. During this time he travelled from the hotel to his company.



On February 13, he was found dead at the hotel and subsequent tests later proved he had carried the virus.



The hotel has been locked down and disinfected while local authorities are tracing those who had contact with the deceased Japanese man for monitoring.



With these new infection cases, the number of imported Covid-19 patients in Vietnam has increased to 2,229, including 1,330 locally-transmitted cases with 637 cases reported since the new outbreak started in Hai Duong on January 28.



As of 6 am on February 15, a total of 1,534 Covid-19 patients had recovered and been discharged from hospital. There have been 35 deaths, most of them being the elderly with serious underlying diseases.



At present, as many as 152,690 people who had close contact with Covid-19 patients or returned from virus-hit areas are being monitored at hospitals, quarantine facilities, and at home.

Lisa Curry is heavily grieving the death of her daughter Jaimi, who tragically died on September 14 last year at the age of 33.

Over the weekend, the three-time Olympian, 58, shared a special tribute to her eldest girl as the five-month anniversary of her death fell on Valentine's Day.

Lisa's heartbreaking raw social media post spoke about Jaimi's love of flowers, and the former Ironwoman encouraged others to use the holiday to 'love and be kind'.

'Never a moment goes by where Jaimi is not thought about': Lisa Curry (pictured) shared a heartbreaking Valentine's Day message on Sunday with fans to mark the five-month anniversary of her daughter Jaimi's death

'Never a moment goes by where Jaimi is not thought about. Our beautiful girl who loved flowers for any occasion, in fact... there really didnt need to be an occasion because flowers just brightened up her day.. any day,' she wrote in the post.

'5 months have passed but shes never forgotten.... ever,' she added.

She encouraged her followers to 'tell people you love that you love them, hold them tight, give them a hand written hand made card ... and if no one buys you flowers, go and buy some for yourself. Love yourself, be kind to yourself.'

'Shes never forgotten.... ever': As the five-month anniversary of Jaimi's (pictured) death fell on Valentine's Day on Sunday, the Olympian, 58, shared a special tribute to her beautiful girl

'Im still crying at anytime': The retired athlete said it feels like she's 'lost her sparkle' since Jaimi's death

A month after Jaimi died Lisa said she saw many 'signs' sent from her daughter in the form of her favourite things - flowers.

Lisa had previously spoken about her late daughter's love of flowers, and had even decorated Jaime's funeral with pink and white blooms.

The retired athlete admitted that losing her daughter had tested her strength, and a day after her Valentine's Day post confessed she still cries all the time and feels like she's 'lost my sparkle' without Jaimi around.

Touching: Lisa had previously spoken about her late daughter's love of flowers, and had even decorated Jaime's funeral with pink and white blooms

Gut-wrenching: Following Jaimi's death, Lisa said that she didn't know 'what to do' with herself while carrying so much grief

Lisa announced Jaimi's death in an emotional social media post on September 15 - one day after her passing.

'Our beautiful daughter Jaimi has lost her battle with a long-term illness and passed away peacefully in hospital yesterday morning with her loving family by her side,' she wrote at the time.

It was later reported that Jaimi had battled alcoholism and an eating disorder before her death at a Sunshine Coast hospital.

Lisa and ex-husband Grant Kenny, 57, are also parents to son Jett, 27, and daughter Morgan, 29.

For confidential support in Australia, call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or visit www.lifeline.org.au. Alternatively, call Kids Helpline on 1800 55 1800

A well-known Cuban-born journalist, Albor Ruiz was announced dead in Homestead, Florida. Ruiz was 80-years-old.

Ruiz was known to write columns for The Daily News, El Diario, and Al Dia News, advocating for Latino immigrants and demanded that the United States lift its longstanding trade block against his homeland, according to The Portland Post report.

Ruiz's sister, Enid Ruiz, said that the cause of his death was pneumonia. Ruiz was said to reach his largest readership at The Daily News in New York, where he worked for 23 years as an editorial writer; the editor of the bilingual version of the news portal, El Daily News; and a columnist who wrote ardently about immigration, politics, education, housing, art, literature, and racism.

Ruiz was also known to have written often about Latinos. However, he was said to have described other people of other backgrounds, such as the four Polish immigrants who died in a fire in an illegal apartment in the Maspeth area of the borough.

The story reminded him of living illegally with seven friends in a small apartment in Miami after his escape from Cuba in 1961.

"His was a rich life of many adventures and deep commitments. Please keep him in your thoughts and prayers. Rest in power querido," stated the Facebook announcement of his passing as reported by The New York Daily News.

Related story: 'Barrio Imbroglio' Author Daniel Cubias Brings Humor to Latino Literature and the Detective World





Career and Writings

One of his latest pieces ran in October with the headline "The President's Madness." Aside from, writing columns, he released a book of poems entitled "In Case I Die Tomorrow," which is filled with his reflections on life.

Meanwhile, his final Nov. 11 column focused on the impact of President Joe Biden's leadership on Latin America.

"It has been said that when the U.S. sneezes Latin America catches a cold," Ruiz's piece started.

Journalist and colleague Ralph Ortega said that Ruiz lived a great life and it was a blessing to have known him. The former colleague added that he is heartbroken but happy that they recently spoke and laughed the way they always had for 30 years.

Ortega added that Ruiz has always encouraged and supported him as a journalist and as a friend.

Ruiz was initially laid off by the Daily News in 2013 but was brought back to write his column on a freelance basis. In 2016, he was let go a second time and quickly landed a job at Al Dia, where he spent most of his career until his death.

Ruiz was born in Cardenas, Cuba and came to the United States by boat after leaving his home country under cover of darkness in 1961. He then attended the University of Florida before starting his career in journalism.

In his poem, "In Case I Die Tomorrow," Ruiz writes about returning to his homeland and his ashes will be scattered at the oceanfront Cuban town of Varadero.

"I am a foreigner and she is calling. Let it be known that Cuba has reclaimed me. In case I die tomorrow," Ruiz wrote in his poem.

Related story: Diversity in Publishing: Should Multicultural Authors Skip Traditional Publishing, Pursue Self-Publishing to Share Their Stories?
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Union Home Minister on Monday reviewed the preparations for the celebrations of 75th year of India's independence, 400th 'Prakash Purab' of Guru Teg Bahadur and 125th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose.

The central government has already decided to celebrate the three events in a befitting manner.

"HM @AmitShah held review meeting with officials of MHA, @MinOfCultureGoI & @MIB_India on preparations for celebration of India@75. Also reviewed progress of work for celebrations marking 400th Prakash Purab of Guru Tegh Bahadur ji and 125th Jayanti of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose," Shah tweeted.

On August 15, 2022, several mega projects are expected to be dedicated to the nation on the occasion of 75th anniversary of India's independence.

The government has already set up acommittee under the chairmanship of Prime Narendra Modi to commemorate the 400th 'Prakash Purab' celebrations of Guru Tegh Bahadur (April 1, 1621--November 11, 1675).

The government has also decided to celebrate the 125th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, who was born on January 23, 1897, in a befitting manner at the and international level.

(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.)

The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Multi-year Advertising Representation Agreement Cements Frankly Media's Programmatic Advertising Capabilities

Extends Newsweek's Ability to Connect Leading Brands with Consumers across Platforms

Engine Media and Newsweek to Pursue Content Creation for Gamers and Tech Savvy Consumers

TORONTO, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Engine Media Holdings, Inc.. (TSXV: GAME; OTCQB: MLLLF) ("Engine Media" or the "Company") announced today that its Frankly Media subsidiary, a programmatic advertising provider for the mobile and digital platforms of television and radio stations, has entered into an extension of its advertising representation agreement with the publisher of Newsweek.

For decades, Newsweek has been a provider of quality journalism with news and information that reach millions of Americans and people around the globe. Today, with its increased mobile and digital presence, Newsweek reaches more than 100 million unique viewers a month including more than one in five Americans.

"Newsweek is a powerful brand with real credibility with consumers of news and information," said Tom Rogers, Executive Chairman of Engine Media. "We are really pleased to have reached this agreement putting in place another important cornerstone of our programmatic advertising capability. And while being able to offer brands access to Newsweek's mobile and digital sites is important, we are equally excited to pursue further establishing Newsweek's presence as a provider of content for gamers and the tech savvy consumer, which furthers our Engine Media gaming business."

The agreement is fundamental to the overall Frankly Media strategy of establishing a powerful technology platform that provides access to programmatic advertising capabilities, enabling leading marketers and brands to access consumers on the mobile and digital platforms of more 1,200 national and local television and radio stations as well as digital news publishers including Newsweek.

"We are pleased to have had the opportunity to extend and expand our relationship with a premiere publisher like Newsweek," remarked Engine Media CEO, Lou Schwartz, "and look forward to working closely with them to pursue innovative content creation and distribution channels for gamers and tech savvy consumers, amongst other opportunities."

Among the terms of the agreement beyond the extension of the term, Franky Media will receive an increase in its commission, while agreeing to make a series of advance revenue share payments totaling US$6 million.

About Engine Media Holdings, Inc.

Engine Media is focused on accelerating new, live, immersive esports and interactive gaming experiences for consumers through its partnerships with traditional and emerging media companies. The company was formed through the combination of Torque Esports Corp., Frankly Inc., and WinView, Inc. and trades publicly under the ticker symbol (TSX-V: GAME) (OTCQB: MLLLF). Engine Media will generate revenue through a combination of: direct-to-consumer and subscription fees; streaming technology and data SaaS-based offerings; programmatic advertising and sponsorships; as well as intellectual property licensing fees. To date, the combined companies clients have included more than 1,200 television, print and radio brands including CNN, ESPN, Discovery / Eurosport, Fox, Vice, Newsweek and Cumulus; dozens of gaming and technology companies including EA, Activision, Blizzard, Take2Interactive, Microsoft, Google, Twitch and Ubisoft; and have connectivity into hundreds of millions of homes around the world through their content, distribution and technology.

Cautionary Statement on Forward-Looking Information

This news release contains forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of Engine Media to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Often, but not always, forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of words such as "plans", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "estimates", "intends", "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" or "will" be taken, occur or be achieved.

The forward-looking statements and information in this press release include, financial, operational and other projections and outlooks, expectations regarding the Company's agreement with Newsweek and the benefits to accrue thereunder. Such statements and information reflect the current view of Engine Media. By their nature, forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause Engine Media's actual results, performance or achievements or other future events, to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such factors include: expectations regarding existing products and plans to develop, implement or adopt new technology or products; expectations regarding the successful integration of recent acquisitions of WinView, Inc. and Frankly Inc.; the expectation of obtaining new customers for the Company's products and services; requirements for additional capital and future financing options; the completion of and our use of the proceeds of the Offering; and, those factors discussed in the Company's continuous disclosure documents filed with the Canadian Securities Administrators, which may be viewed at www.sedar.com .

Should one or more of these risks, uncertainties or other factors materialize, or should assumptions underlying the forward-looking information or statement prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as intended, planned, anticipated, believed, estimated or expected. Engine Media cautions that the foregoing list of material factors is not exhaustive. When relying on the Company's forward-looking statements and information to make decisions, investors and others should carefully consider the foregoing factors and other uncertainties and potential events.

Engine Media has assumed that the material factors referred to in the previous paragraph will not cause such forward-looking statements and information to differ materially from actual results or events. However, the list of these factors is not exhaustive and is subject to change and there can be no assurance that such assumptions will reflect the actual outcome of such items or factors. The forward-looking information contained in this press release represents the expectations of Engine Media as of the date of this press release and, accordingly, is subject to change after such date. Readers should not place undue importance on forward looking information and should not rely upon this information as of any other date. While Engine Media may elect to do so, Engine Media does not undertake to update this information at any particular time except as required in accordance with applicable laws.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

SOURCE Engine Media Holdings, Inc.

Related Links

https://www.engine.media


Animal disease specialist, WHO expert Peter Daszak said people most likely got infected with Covid-19 from bats.

"I think the virus emerging either in Southeast Asia or Southern China from bats, getting into a domesticated wildlife farm," he told The New York Times in the interview after his return from an investigative research mission to Wuhan, the site of the original Covid-19 outbreak, and surrounding areas.

According to the expert, the people that work there, as well as civets, ferret badgers, raccoon dogs could be able to get infected from bats.

A team of experts selected by the World Health Organization to investigate the origins of the virus that caused the Covid-19 pandemic returned last week from Wuhan, site of the worlds first outbreak. The team, having broken the ice with Chinese scientists, plans to produce a joint report on the possible origins of the virus.



The two groups of scientists, from China and the W.H.O., agreed to pursue some ideas that the Chinese government has been promoting, like the possibility that the virus was transported on frozen food. But the W.H.O. team also became frustrated by Chinas refusal to turn over raw data for analysis.
Police on Monday said Christine Mensah, 44, who passed on whilst visiting her boyfriend on the night of February 5, this year, allegedly died unnaturally.



Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), Mr Alexander Yeboah, Acting Ho Municipal Police Commander, who confirmed this to the Ghana News Agency, said, the deceased boyfriend, Joseph Debrah, 49, a resident of Fiave, a suburb of Ho, reported the incident to the Police at about 0230 hours.



He said the deceased in the course of the night suddenly fell ill and collapsed as all attempts to resuscitate her proved futile.



He said Police went to the scene to examine the body and to ascertain whether there was any foul play.



ASP Yeboah said the deceased was then moved to the morgue for preservation and autopsy.



He said deceased boyfriend was cautioned and released on bail pending the result of the autopsy from the Police hospital.

In a related case, the Command has embarked on an operation to seize unregistered motorbikes in the enclave to stem criminal activities.

Source: GNA









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MEPs Call For EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism

by Ulrika Lomas, Tax-News.com, Brussels

15 February 2021

Lawmakers sitting on an EU parliament climate committee have called for the introduction of a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM).

On February 5, 2020, the Committee on Environment, Public Health, and Food Safety adopted a resolution calling for the introduction of a CBAM, by 58 votes to eight, with 10 abstentions.

The MEPs supported the introduction of a WTO-compatible CBAM that would place a carbon price on imports of certain goods from outside the EU if the exporting countries are not deemed ambitious enough in their efforts to tackle climate change. They said that the CBAM should be part of a broader EU industrial strategy and cover all imports of products and commodities under the EU's current Emissions Trading System (ETS).

MEPS also recommended that, following an impact assessment, the CBAM should by 2023 cover the power sector and energy-intensive industrial sectors like cement, steel, aluminum, oil refining, paper, glass, chemicals, and fertilizers. To prevent "carbon leakage," carbon pricing under the CBAM should be linked to the price of EU allowances under the EU ETS, they said.

Parliament is set to vote on the resolution in a plenary session in early March. The European Commission is expected to present a proposal on a CBAM in the second quarter of 2021.

A CBAM was among the new "own resource" measures that were floated as part of the EU's Multiannual Financial Framework for 2021-27.
RIVERSIDE, Calif. -- Materials having excess electrons are typically conductors. However, moire patterns -- interference patterns that typically arise when one object with a repetitive pattern is placed over another with a similar pattern -- can suppress electrical conductivity, a study led by physicists at the University of California, Riverside, has found.

In the lab, the researchers overlaid a single monolayer of tungsten disulfide (WS 2 ) on a single monolayer of tungsten diselenide (WSe 2 ) and aligned the two layers against each other to generate large-scale moire patterns. The atoms in both the WS 2 and WSe 2 layers are arranged in a two-dimensional honeycomb lattice with a periodicity, or recurring intervals, of much less than 1 nanometer. But when the two lattices are aligned at 0 or 60 degrees, the composite material generates a moire pattern with a much larger periodicity of about 8 nanometers. The conductivity of this 2D system depends on how many electrons are placed in the moire pattern.

"We found that when the moire pattern is partially filled with electrons, the system exhibits several insulating states as opposed to conductive states expected from conventional understanding," said Yongtao Cui, an assistant professor of physics and astronomy at UC Riverside, who led the research team. "The filling percentages were found to be simple fractions like 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, 1/6, and so on. The mechanism for such insulating states is the strong interaction among electrons that restricts the mobile electrons into local moire cells. This understanding may help to develop new ways to control conductivity and to discovery new superconductor materials."

Study results appear today in Nature Physics.

The moire patterns generated on the composite material of WS 2 and WSe 2 can be imagined to be with wells and ridges arranged similarly in a honeycomb pattern.

"WS 2 and WSe 2 have a slight mismatch where lattice size is concerned, making them ideal for producing moire patterns," Cui said. "Further, coupling between electrons becomes strong, meaning the electrons 'talk to each other' while moving around across the ridges and the wells."

Typically, when a small number of electrons are placed in a 2D layer such as WS 2 or WSe 2 , they have enough energy to travel freely and randomly, making the system a conductor. Cui's lab found that when moire lattices are formed using both WS 2 and WSe 2 , resulting in a periodic pattern, the electrons begin to slow down and repel from each other.

"The electrons do not want to stay close to each other," said Xiong Huang, the first author of the paper and a doctoral graduate student in Cui's Microwave Nano-Electronics Lab. "When the number of electrons is such that one electron occupies every moire hexagon, the electrons stay locked in place and cannot move freely anymore. The system then behaves like an insulator."

Cui likened the behavior of such electrons to social distancing during a pandemic.

"If the hexagons can be imagined to be homes, all the electrons are indoors, one per home, and not moving about in the neighborhood," he said. "If we don't have one electron per hexagon, but instead have 95% occupancy of hexagons, meaning some nearby hexagons are empty, then the electrons can still move around a little through the empty cells. That's when the material is not an insulator. It behaves like a poor conductor."

His lab was able to fine-tune the number of electrons in the WS 2 - WSe 2 lattice composite in order to change the average occupancy of the hexagons. His team found insulating states occurred when average occupancy was less than one. For example, for an occupancy of one-third, the electrons occupied every other hexagon.

"Using the social distancing analogy, instead of a separation of 6 feet, you now have a separation of, say, 10 feet," Cui said. "Thus, when one electron occupies a hexagon, it forces all neighboring hexagons to be empty in order to comply with the stricter social distancing rule. When all electrons follow this rule, they form a new pattern and occupy one third of the total hexagons in which they again lose the freedom to move about, leading to an insulating state."

The study shows similar behaviors can also occur for other occupancy fractions such as 1/4, 1/2, and 1/6, with each corresponding to a different occupation pattern.

Cui explained that these insulating states are caused by strong interactions between the electrons. This, he added, is the Coulomb repulsion, the repulsive force between two positive or two negative charges, as described by the Coulomb's law.

He added that in 3D materials, strong electron interactions are known to give rise to various exotic electronic phases. For example, they likely contribute to the formation of unconventional high temperature superconductivity.

"The question we still have no answer for is whether 2D structures, the kind we used in our experiments, can produce high temperature superconductivity," Cui said.

Next, his group will work on characterizing the strength of the electron interactions.

"The interaction strength of the electrons largely determines the insulation state of the system," Cui said. "We are also interested in being able to manipulate the strength of the electron interaction."

Cui and Huang were funded by grants from the National Science Foundation, a Hellman Fellowship, and a seed grant from SHINES.

###

They were joined in the research by Tianmeng Wang, Shengnan Miao, Zhipeng Li, Zhen Lian and Su-Fei Shi at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York; Chong Wang and Di Xiao at Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania; Takashi Taniguchi and Kenji Watanabe at the National Institute for Materials Science in Japan; and Satoshi Okamoto at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. Huang, T. Wang, Miao, and C. Wang contribute equally to the study.

The research paper is titled "Correlated Insulating States at Fractional Fillings of the WS 2 / WSe 2 Moire? Lattice."
There have been reports of computer part retailers in Europe hiking prices of GeForce RTX 3060 AIB boards before the graphics card is even launched. Nvidias MSRPs for the GeForce RTX 3060 are US$329/329/299 but retailer prices have gone beyond double in some cases. Gamers have been blaming the hikes on cryptocurrency miners.

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The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 will be officially launched on February 25 and there are already reports (via VideoCardz, h/t The Determinator) appearing of the Ampere-based graphics card having its MSRP hiked to exorbitant levels. In one instance, a Portuguese retailer called PCDIGA is currently showing a price of 699.90 (US$849) for the Zotac Gaming GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB GDDR6 Twin Edge OC graphics card. According to a screenshot, this same board had been previously priced at 599.90 (US$728). However, the largest price hike difference shown at this retailer was for the non-OC variant of the Zotac GeForce RTX 3060 board, which went from 490 (US$595) to 689 (US$836) in the space of a week.

That particular GeForce RTX 3060 price hike of 199 (US$242) represents a rise of +40.6% over the previous price, and the current cost is a whopping +109.4% over Nvidias MSRP. Another European retailer, ProShop, has also been getting handy with the price tags, and it now has boards ranging from 499 (US$605) up to 659 (US$800). Retailers in the UK seem to be holding back a little at the moment, with CCL, which previously displayed high RTX 3060 prices, now removing the SKUs, and Scan mostly not listing prices for the upcoming graphics cards. However, Scan does have a price listed for one board, the Zotac Gaming Twin Edge variant, at 299. This is the same as Nvidias MSRP for the UK, so it will be interesting to see how much it changes before launch.

It seems reasonable to presume that a similar picture will be painted in the North American market too, with the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 desktop graphics card going well beyond MSRP for a basic variant. Obviously not all AIB boards are created the same, so there is always a higher price to pay for greater customizations. But the additional retailer price-gouging tactics have been blamed partly on the current crypto mining boom, with the astonishing prices for coins like Bitcoin and Ethereum once again encouraging miners to snap up mining-capable GPUs (desktop and laptop) in bulk. Unsurprisingly, retailers will want to take advantage of this huge demand, thus hiking prices and leaving the likely short supply of RTX 3060 cards in the hands of crypto miners who will gladly pay the exorbitant prices as they can quickly recoup the cost.

Buy the Zotac Gaming GeForce RTX 2070 Super Mini 8 GB card on Amazon



Deputy President William Ruto has dismissed claims of going against President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Speaking at Ngaremara in Isiolo county on Saturday, the DP said here is no contest between them and that Uhuru is the one who calls the shots.

Ruto also mentioned that he was stripped of some of his official duties but he is still loyal to Uhuru.

The President is my boss and I have never gone against him or said anything against him out of respect

Although some tasks that I am supposed to undertake as the Deputy President were taken away and given to someone else, I have respected that decision because I want unity in our country, said the DP.

Ruto further maintained that he has accomplished all the tasks assigned to him by his boss.

There is no contest between the President and me. I do what the President directs and I have not failed to perform any of the assignments given to me, he said.

Dr Ruto was speaking a day after President Uhuru dared him to resign instead of criticising the same government he works for.

The DP declared he will not resign, saying: I will continue working as the Deputy President of Kenya because that is my position under the Constitution.

Also Read  Ruto: Jubilees Second Term Plans Have Flopped
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The Nifty50 opened strong and remained in the positive terrain throughout the session to close above the 15,300-mark for the first time on February 15, backed by optimistic global sentiment and improving corporate earnings.

Banking and financials led the rally as the BSE Sensex, too, reached a milestone by crossing the 52,000-mark.

The Nifty50 witnessed a gap-up opening at 15,270.30 and extended the rally to hit an intraday record high of 15,340.15. The index settled at 15,314.70, up 151.40 points, or 1 percent.

The record high close saw the index form a bullish candle on the daily charts, as the closing was higher than the opening levels. Experts expect the rally to the index to march towards the 15,500-mark if the momentum sustains in the coming sessions.

Traders with a high-risk appetite should remain long on the index by placing a stop below 15,240 levels, Mazhar Mohammad, Chief Strategist  Technical Research & Trading Advisory at Chartviewindia.in told Moneycontrol.

The volatility cooled down further today, which could be supporting the market. India VIX was down by 2.57 percent to 21.47.

The Nifty50 appeared to have registered a breakout, with a brief consolidation of five trading sessions, signalling the resumption of the rally, Mohammad said.

The trading range remained narrow with 97 points, which was accompanied by a negative advance-decline ratio, suggesting caution in the broader markets which witnessed profit-booking, he said.

To make further gains, it is critical that the index sustains above 15,243 in the next session, he said. In such a scenario, a modest target of 15,500 is possible and beyond that higher target of 15,700 can't be ruled out, he said.

If the Nifty registers a close below 15,243, then the breakout shall be deemed to have failed and the Nifty may once again slip into a corrective or a consolidation phase. More weakness shall not be expected unless Nifty closes below 15,100 levels.

On the options front, maximum Put open interest was seen at 14,000 followed by 15,000 strike, while maximum Call open interest was at 16,000 followed by 15,500 strike. Put writing was seen at 15,000 and 15,300 strikes, while Call writing was seen at 15,300 then 15,800 strike. Option data indicates that the immediate range for the Nifty could be at 15,000-15,500.

The Bank Nifty opened gap up at 36,501.40 and rallied more than 1,300 points to hit a new high of 37,449.90. Banking stocks powered the rate- sensitive index which ended the day with gains of 1,197.40 points or 3.32 percent at 37,306.30, forming a strong bullish candle on the daily scale.

"The index has been forming higher highs-higher lows from the last two sessions. Now it has to hold above 37,000 to witness a move towards 38,000, while on the downside support is seen at 36,500 and 36,000 levels," Chandan Taparia, Vice President|Analyst-Derivatives at Motilal Oswal Financial Services said.

On the stock front, a bullish setup was seen in Cholamandalam Investment, Apollo Hospitals, LIC Housing Finance, Motherson Sumi, Adani Enterprises, M&M Financial, Piramal Enterprises, Axis Bank, Shriram Transport Finance, L&T Finance Holdings, ICICI Bank, PFC, REC, Bajaj Finance, SBI and Tata Motors. Weakness was seen in Indiabulls Housing Finance, Amara Raja Batteries, Glenmark Pharma, Indraprastha Gas, PVR, TCS and IOC, he added.
New Labour Laws: Latest update on wages for working overtime

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: The government is preparing to implement a new Labour Law and once it comes into effect, there would be improved rules for the country's labour market.

According to a Hindustan Times report, the government may change the existing time limit of overtime under the new law and working more than 15 minutes beyond the scheduled hours will be considered as overtime.

The companies will have to pay their employees for this. This would mean that an employee would be paid overtime if he or she works even 15 minutes more than the scheduled work hours.

Labour ministry likely to give shape to National Employment Policy by December

Currently the time limit to get paid overtime is half an hour or more beyond the scheduled working hours. The Ministry of Labour has consulted with all stakeholders regarding the new laws. The process is expected to be complete by the end of this month.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Under the new law, companies should ensure that their employees get PF and ESI and no company can deny the same stating that the employees have come through a contractor or third party. Apart from this, those working under contract or third party will get full salary.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 11:23 [IST]
A first photograph of the Mars surface was sent home by the United Arab Emirates probe, Hope, showing, among other features, Olympus Mons  the largest known volcano of our solar system. The image was sent to Earth by Hope on Wednesday, February 10, after it entered the Martian orbit a day before. The probe was at a height of almost 25,000 kilometres above the Martian surface, when it captured the volcano breaking out into a Martian sunrise. Hope is the first Arab probe in history, and among scientific observations, is stated to aim to excite the younger generation in UAE in space exploration projects.

Olympus Mons is the biggest surface blister of its kind in Earths vicinity. It is the largest volcano in our solar system, and the second-largest mountain across the entire set of planets and their satellites. The volcano is situation in a volcanic patch on the Martian surface that contains 12 volcanoes  Olympus Mons included. The volcanic mountain is approximately 25 kilometres tall, or almost three times the height of Mount Everest  Earths tallest peak. The volcanos crater spans 80km at its mouth, making it roughly 100x larger than Earths biggest volcano  Mauna Loa.

         ..         The first picture of Mars captured by the first-ever Arab probe in history, 25,000 km above the Red Planet's surface pic.twitter.com/Qgh2Cn3JPF HH Sheikh Mohammed (@HHShkMohd) February 14, 2021

Marking the feat, UAE prime minister and Dubai crown prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum tweeted the photo sent home by the UAE Hope probe. The latter happens to be the first of three Mars probes that entered the planets orbit in the recent months, alongside USA and China as well. The Hope probe carries onboard three key scientific instruments, which have been tuned to study the Martian weather and capture fine data points about the weather conditions and influences on Mars.

The photo sent home by Hope shows the volcanic patch featuring Olympus Mons, in the gradually sunlit upper hemisphere of Mars. Earths nearest neighbour has also been a strong candidate for having supported life at some point of time in its past, which has made it a strong area of focus for space missions across the world.

She added, It is way too much control for one branch to have over another branch, particularly where one of its charges is to rein in the excesses of the legislative branch.

If the Republican bill becomes law, Pennsylvania would become just the fifth state in the country, after Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi and Illinois, to wholly map its judicial system into electoral districts, according to the Brennan Center. And other states may soon join Pennsylvania in trying to remake the courts through redistricting.

Republicans in the Texas Legislature, which is also controlled by the G.O.P., recently introduced a bill that would shift districts for the state appellate courts by moving some counties into different districts, causing an uproar among state Democrats who saw the new districts as weakening the voting power of Black and Latino communities in judicial elections and potentially adding to the Republican tilt of the Texas courts.

Gilberto Hinojosa, the chair of the Texas Democratic Party, called the bill a pure power grab meant to keep Blacks and Latinos from having influence on courts as their numbers in the state grow.

These judicial redistricting battles are taking shape as Republican-controlled legislatures across the country explore new restrictions on voting after the 2020 elections. In Georgia, Republicans in the state legislature are seeking a host of new laws that would make voting more difficult, including banning drop boxes and placing sweeping limitations on mail-in voting. Similar bills in Arizona would restrict mail-in voting, including barring the state from sending out mail ballot applications. And in Texas, Republican lawmakers want to limit early voting periods.

The nationwide effort by Republicans follows a successful four-year drive by the partys lawmakers in Washington to reshape the federal judiciary with conservative judges. Led by Senator Mitch McConnell, until recently the majority leader, and Mr. Trump, the Senate confirmed 231 federal judges, as well as three new Supreme Court justices, over the former presidents four-year term, according to data maintained by Russell Wheeler, a research fellow at the Brookings Institution.

In a state like Pennsylvania, which has two densely populated Democratic cities and large rural areas, this could give outsize representation to sparsely populated places that lean more conservative, particularly if the legislature resorts to a gerrymandering tactic similar to one used in Pennsylvania in 2011.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is "deeply concerned" over the increased use of force and the reported deployment of armoured vehicles in Myanmar. In a statement issued on February 14, Guterres' spokesman, Stephane Dujarric said that the UN chief called on the military and police of Myanmar to ensure that the right of peaceful assembly is "fully respected" and demonstrators are "not subjected to reprisals". He said that the reports of continued violence, intimidation and harassment by security personnel are "unacceptable".

Secretary-General @antonioguterres is deeply concerned about the situation in #Myanmar.



He calls on Myanmars military and police to ensure the right of peaceful assembly is fully respected and demonstrators are not subjected to reprisals. https://t.co/GwkoaoU8AW  UN Spokesperson (@UN_Spokesperson) February 14, 2021

READ: Suu Kyi Detention Extended As Protests Continue In Myanmar

According to a press note, Guterres said that the ongoing arrests of political leaders, government officials, members of civil society and media representatives are "deeply concerning". He further added that the internet and communication in the country "must not be disrupted" in a bid to ensure the right to freedom of expression, which includes access to information. The UN chief also reiterated his call on Member States "collectively and bilaterally" to exercise the organisation's "unwavering support" to their pursuit of "democracy. Peace, human rights and the rule of law".

The Secretary-General calls on the military authorities urgently to allow the Special Envoy, Ms. Christine Schraner Burgener, to visit Myanmar under agreeable conditions and to assess the situation firsthand, concluded the statement.

The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, Thomas Andrews also tweeted and said that the situation in Myanmar looks as if the generals have declared war on the people. Andrews said that the late night raids, internet shutdown and the military convoys are signs of desperation. Further, he warned the generals that they will be held accountable.

It's as if the generals have declared war on the people of Myanmar: late night raids; mounting arrests; more rights stripped away; another Internet shutdown; military convoys entering communities. These are signs of desperation. Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable.  UN Special Rapporteur Tom Andrews (@RapporteurUn) February 14, 2021

READ: Myanmar Military Reinstates Law Requiring People To Report Overnight Visitors

Myanmar military coup

The Myanmar military overthrew the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi on February 1, a day before the newly-elected members of parliament were scheduled to take the oath. The military accused Suu Kyi's government of rigging November elections, in which her party National League for Democracy (NLD) had emerged the victor by a landslide. Suu Kyi's party managed to win 396 of the 476 parliamentary seats of the ones that are not reserved for the military. Experts suggest that the military feared Suu Kyi, with a larger majority than in 2015, would try and reduce the number of parliamentary seats reserved for the Army.

Prior to the 2020 election, Suu Kyi had promised to decrease the proportion of seats reserved for the military. The army currently controls 25 percent of the parliamentary seats, on which the civilian parties cannot fight elections. Myanmar is a young democracy, with the military ruling the country for the most part of its independent history. When the military finally decided to let go of the control following the revolution in 2011, it reserved seats for itself in the Parliament while drafting the Constitution. Suu Kyi decided to challenge the rule and change the status quo, which experts believe is the reason behind the coup.



READ: Myanmar Anti-coup Protesters Keep Pressure On Junta



READ: Myanmar Protests In 2nd Week, With Neither Side Backing Down


All 77 BJP MLAs in Bengal to have central security cover

West Bengal polls 2021: Amit Shah to visit Kolkata this week, PM Modi to address rally in Hooghly on Feb 22

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

New Delhi, Feb 15: Ahead of West Bengal assembly elections 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to visit the State to address a rally in Hooghly on February 22. Meanwhile, Union Home Minister Amit Shah will inaugurate BJP's "Parivartan Yatra" in Kolkata on February 18.

PM Modi might also take part in a few development programmes and events during his visit to the state. He is also expected to attend the convocation programme of Visva Bharti University as the Vice-Chancellor.

Amit Shah has plans to form BJP govts in Nepal, Sri Lanka: Tripura CM Biplab Deb

Meanwhile, Amit Shah will flag-off BJP's 'Parivartan Yatra' from Kakdwip of Kolkata zone.

The saffron party is organising 'Parivartan Yatra' in West Bengal in five phases. The yatra was flagged-off by BJP president JP Nadda on February 6 from Nabadwip in Nadia district. The yatra will cover all the 294 constituencies in the state.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Last week, the union minister had flagged-off the fourth phase of 'Parivartan Yatra' from Cooch Behar and take part in various party programmes. BJP president JP Nadda will also visit West Bengal on February 25.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 12:35 [IST]
Syrian intelligence members have forcibly conscripted young men from bakery queues in eastern Ghouta, according to Sowt Al-Asima.

On Saturday morning, the regime Intelligence continued its campaign of pursuing young men from eastern Ghouta, who are wanted for military service in the regimes army, with the aim of forcibly recruiting them.

The Sowt Al-Asima correspondent said that patrols belonging to Military Security, and others belonging to the Military Police, targeted in their campaign this morning queues of people waiting for bread outside bakeries in the towns of Saqba, Kafr Batna, and Hazza in eastern Ghouta.

The correspondent added that the patrols came to the vicinity of the bakeries and all the youths were subjected to a security operation in search of the wanted men.

It was confirmed that the patrols arrested many young men wanted for compulsory and reserve military service and handed them over to the Military Police.

Regime Intelligence began a campaign of compulsory recruitment in eastern Ghouta on January 27, during which it raided many mens barber shops and some gymnasiums in the region, coinciding with the establishment of temporary checkpoints in its neighborhoods, and arrested more than 50 young men and residents of the region for forcible recruitment.

The regimes Intelligence Services used several ambulances to carry out the raids, including an ambulance belonging to the Al-Ahly Specialty Hospital and another belonging to the rapid ambulance system in the region, in order to set a trap for the youths, who would disappear as soon as the patrols entered their towns.

In 2020, the Sowt Al-Asima team documented 39 security campaigns launched by the Regime Intelligence and Military Police in Damascus and its countryside, aimed at arresting young men who failed to perform military and compulsory service, during which at least 694 young men were forcibly recruited into the Syrian regime army.

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.
Three teachers from the Eastern Shore of Maryland recently spoke to the World Socialist Web Site Educators Newsletter about the reopening of schools and their reasons for joining the Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee. Their names have been changed to protect them from retaliation by both their school system and union.

The Eastern Shore, separated by the Chesapeake Bay from the more populous Baltimore-Washington D.C. metropolitan region, is mostly rural. The major economic activity of the region includes: farming, especially large-scale chicken farms for the areas many chicken processing plants; fishing, especially for shellfish along the Bay and its tributaries; and in the warmer months, tourism centered on the Atlantic coast beach resort town of Ocean City.

The region is significantly poorer than the rest of the state. In 2019, the median household income in Maryland was $84,805. In Somerset County, the poorest county on the Eastern Shore, the median household income was only $37,803.

Barbara, one of the teachers interviewed, explained that in her school there were already numerous positive COVID-19 cases even before schools reopened for students on February 8. The week prior, teachers had returned for three days to prepare for the reopening. In this time, four teachers, an assistant principal and an intern tested positive.

All three teachers report that safety measures and personal protective equipment have been meager. Custodial staff are very upset at our school, Barbara reported. One of them says she cries everyday about having to come to work. Multiple [custodians] have said that they received no training on how to deep clean. Just a link to a video.

The teachers are also expected to wipe down student desks with a cleaning chemical after every class change. My school is considering these cleaning chemicals as PPE, Teresa explained. I had to buy my own mask, I had to buy my own face shield. If I wanted to get a shield on my desk, Id have to purchase that for myself. Were not being given gloves, hospital gowns.

In addition to the chemicals, the only other safety supplies that Teresa has been provided by her school system is painters tape to make marks on the floor for students to follow social distancing. When she explained to her union that she was not being provided PPE, the union representative told her to ask the Board of Education for a mask. Thats not providing PPE, Teresa noted, Thats saying if you need it, request it and it will maybe be provided to you. Providing would be: heres your box of masks for the week. Thats not at all what theyre doing.

Teresa noted that with the added responsibilities of trying to make classrooms safe, including spending time cleaning, Were actually reducing the instruction that were giving in order to do what I call hygiene theater: pretend that were doing something about COVID by spraying chemicals on it.

Along the same lines, Mark explained that in teaching at home, virtual, our main focus is teaching and now going back to school, my main focus is my health and the health of my family. Thats number 1. Item number 2 is teaching and educating. Its still going to be the same basic lessons. Normally when you teach your main focus is on teaching. But now its more like well, where are these kids? Gotta be distant. Cant get too close to the other teachers. Theres just a whole other concern that is more important [than teaching].

Hybrid is virtual for us. Instead of kids sitting in their home, theyre going to sit in a classroom, Barbara added. The education will be worse, though, because instead of just speaking freely into the camera where they can see my face, I have a mask on, Im going to have a face shield on, I have to wear headphones. I literally look like an astronaut. Its weird, its scary looking. So that part is going to get worse for 95 kids because of these ten [returning to school buildings].

All three teachers reported that the vast majority of students are not returning for in-person learning. Those who are returning are generally from wealthier families. Despite claims by both Democratic and Republican politicians that they are opening up schools for those falling behind, especially minority and special education children, it is the working class that is the most resistant to sending their kids back in the midst of the pandemic.

Teresa said: I dont know where this Parents have spoken farce has come from. I did read that the Biden administrations big push is that this is what parents need, this is what black and brown students need. But then I also read that they dont have any documentation of any of this. They dont have any studies, any data that shows who needs school [or] whos failing.

The demographics of those returning to Marks school are similar. My school is a more rural school. Being rural, its in a more conservative area. Theres a slightly larger percentage of students coming in. Of all the kids that have either IEPs [for special education students] or 504s, most of them are staying home. All the kids that are minorities, most of them are staying home.

Everything that theyre talking about: the learning loss, impacting minorities and the special ed theyre going to fall behind, when I look at my situation, and it sounds like Teresas and Barbaras are very similarThats not really the case. Its sort of the middle class parents, the ones who are on social media all the time, probably, who are saying open the schools, open the schools, open the schools. Thats who were really opening it for.

The school buildings and classrooms to which the teachers are returning to are also not adhering to the most basic public health measures. We already have a history of issues with our old school thats never really clean, Teresa said. They say theyve deep cleaned the school for months and months. I went in. It was no different. It had not been cleaned. But what they did do was polish the floors. I dont think theres any science that shows that having shiny floors reduces the risk of COVID in a building.

Were not allowed to move our desks to be by a window, Mark added. My room doesnt have any windows. Theres a door you have to keep shut for protection. When I walked into my room this past week, my school had sort of spaced out the desks already, [supposedly] six feet apart. I went and measured, and they were only four feet apart. And then I walked around the school and looked, all the desks are four feet apart. Luckily, I was able to move my desks and actually space them six feet apart. But even something like that, the desks arent six feet apart, theyre only four feet apart, but theyre saying theyre six feet apart.

To force the reopening of schools, many school systems across the country claim they have made upgrades to HVAC systems. Ive also been told that they updated or cleaned the HVAC, but the teachers arent given any real documentation of this, Teresa explained. My school, right before COVID, right before the shutdown, we actually had to evacuate our school because there was a putrid smell coming through our HVAC.

When asked about the role of the Democratic Party in the current wave of nationwide school openings, Barbara noted, Bidens the one sending us back.

Theres one party. Its the business party, Teresa added. I dont really see the big difference between Trump and presidents before him. Yes, his rhetoric was horrific. He was more blatant about it in many ways. As far as education goes, its just the same. Theyve been threatening funding from educators no matter what administration.

After Biden was elected, the teachers thought the schools would remain closed as long as the science showed that this was necessary. Barbara said, Im actually pretty shocked. I was pretty shocked that [Maryland Governor] Hogan went on and said, open up the schools right now. I didnt see it coming. I thought we were all scientific and metrics-based here.

On January 21, the day after Biden was inaugurated, Governor Hogan held a press conference calling on all school systems statewide to open by March 1 and threatened action against teachers who didnt return. Hogan pointed to Chicago, where the city cut off the pay for teachers who did not return to schools, and South Carolina, where the state threatened to take away educators teaching licenses for the same reason. If school systems dont immediately begin a good faith effort [to reopen] we will explore every legal avenue at our disposal, Hogan said.

Mark explained that prior to Bidens inauguration, We were following scientific metrics. [In] our county, we were so proudWe had hard data that we were gonna use and the Governor had in the past had been kind of threatening, you know, sort of thinly veiled, but as soon as Biden gets elected, talks about opening schools.

Mark continued, Our governor [now] says the science is clear. No one has been getting an education for months. I demand the schools to be open by a certain date. Just like that, bam, all of the metrics go by the wayside. All of a sudden it was never about metrics anyway. Theres a whole new story being told about this. Its really shocking how quickly everything sort of fell. I wasnt expecting that. Im looking at the metrics, thinking okay they might be going down, maybe some time by the spring, not a couple of days after Bidens inauguration.

Mark pointed to the hypocrisy of Hogan pretending to care about the education of working class children, With Governor Hogan, this persons entire career as a politician has been to strip away public schools, fund them less. He vetoed this big bill in Maryland that was gonna provide hundreds of millions or billions of more dollars for schools. He just vetoed that last year. Hes big on school choice. He wants to take public taxpayer money and give it to private schools. And all of a sudden, hes the big school champion who cares about the minority students who supposedly arent getting a great education. Wow, what a hero he is. Literally his entire career hes been fighting to dismantle public schools.

When asked about the approach of the Educators Rank-and-File Safety Committee, which calls for teachers to unite with the broader working class and with teachers across the country and internationally to prepare for a general strike, Mark said, I think that its necessary because when this came down in Maryland, when the Governor gave his incendiary speech about opening schools and kind of blaming the teachers, I thought, Our unions will really hit them back hard. There will be some kind of resistance and it was just vanilla: a politely worded letterOur local union they seemed to talk a lot; seemed like they were trying to do something but basically all that were doing is hey, on Monday, the first day that kids come back, lets all wear red shirts.

Mark continued, I was thinking Are they going to call for a sickout or something, anything? And its come down to: we disagree and wear a red shirt. Ive always been a big supporter of unions. Obviously, Im a member of one. But this is really eye opening. I just feel like theyve all just sort of accepted this and theyre not trying to do anything.

I think this thing is going to be eye opening, Barbara said. Being abandoned by our union and being led to the slaughter by our school system. I think this is going to be eye opening for a lot of people. And its like, yeah, youre taking a risk if we take direct action but theres also the risk of going to school and catching COVID so its a risk either way and one way were being led to the slaughter and another were going down swingingI feel [a strike] could happen here.

These rank and file organizations are essential because they are the only place, Teresa added. This is the first conversation Ive had that is actually meaningful. We have an objective. We want to get somewhere.
Then-U.S. vice president Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping toast during a state luncheon for China hosted by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in Washington on Sept. 25, 2015. (Paul J. Richards/AFP via Getty Images)

Will Trumps China Strategy to Contain the CCP Be Ruined by Biden?

A commentary on the latest Atlantic Council report

Commentary

The Biden administration recently stated that theres no hurry to engage with China and dialogue with allies and partners comes first. This is quite strange, because the U.S.-China relationship is undoubtedly the most important bilateral relationship in the world, involving the security, peace and stability of the United States, China, and the world on all levelsmilitarily, politically, economically, and technologically.

In the couple of weeks since the new administration took office, President Biden has spoken to leaders of many countries. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has done similarly. But there has been no dialogue with the leaders of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which of course has aroused speculations.

Whether former President Trumps strategy to contain the CCP on a global level will be halted or even ruined, and whether the United States will itself embark on the path of Venezuela, are topics of concern to the American people and the people of the world. Why then is the Biden administration not eager to talk to the CCP? Is it because they dont know what to say?

The CCP has invested a lot of manpower and material resources to influence the outcome of last Novembers U.S. presidential elections. Isnt now the time for the CCP to want to claim the debt and seek returns? If the Democrat leaders cant clarify their entanglement with the CCP and dare not face up to the CCPs election interference, of course they will feel embarrassed. They wont know how to deal with the situation or what to say.

At a press conference in early February, U.S. Department of State spokesperson Ned Price was asked whether the United States was delaying its interaction with China on major global issues.

Price replied that it depended on how we are thinking about the sequencing of our foreign policy broadly. If the United States really ensures that it is in lockstep with those allies, in lockstep with those partners, to work against the CCP together, is of course not bad; its also consistent with the U.S. strategy.

However, the Biden administration is actually still upholding the banner of strategic patience as the CCP is pressing on and repeatedly provoking the United States and sanctioning former officials of the Trump administration. It inevitably makes people worry whether the United States will give the CCP a break and allow it another comeback.

Atlantic Council Longer Telegram Report

The Atlantic Council published a new research report in early February with a noteworthy title: The Longer Telegram: Toward a New American China strategy. And the author is anonymous.

The Atlantic Council is an American think tank with a history of 60 years. Its main objective is international affairs, providing a platform for leaders in international politics, business, and intellectual circles. It has ten regional and functional research centers that specialize in global economic and security issues.

The description Longer Telegram was used in the title because theres a famous report called Long Telegram.

The so-called Long Telegram was an 8,000-word telegram sent back to the United States by George F. Kennan, a diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow in February 1946. It was a report completed at the request of the U.S. State Department in order to understand why the Russians were opposed to the creation of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. However, the report eventually helped the U.S. government confirm its tough policy towards the former Soviet Union and laid the foundation for the U.S. strategy of containment during the Cold War.

Kennans merit lay in his affirmation that the Soviet communist regime did not believe that it would coexist peacefully with the capitalist world for a long time, so the United States had to adopt a policy of containment against the expansion of Soviet communism. Kennan later published a research report using the anonymous X as a pseudonym, clarifying his views in the Long Telegram.

So now, more than 70 years later, a Longer Telegram research report has been published, also anonymously, aiming at the last and largest communist regime, the CCP, which is very intriguing.

The Atlantic Council report clearly points out that the only and most important challenge facing the United States in the 21st century is from a rising, increasingly authoritarian CCP under the leadership of Xi Jinping. Because of the CCPs economic and military power, the speed of technological development, and a worldview that is completely different from that of the United States, it has now impacted every aspect of American national interests. Moreover, this is a structural challenge that has gradually formed over the past 20 years. Xi Jinpings rise to power has accelerated this challenge from the CCP.

The report notes Xis return to Mao Zedongs Marxist-Leninist line, his systematically eliminating political enemies, stopping Chinas market reforms, and strengthening the Communist Partys control over private enterprises. During the Xi era, according to the report, China has accelerated its transformation into a totalitarian police state and extended the CCPs totalitarian system, coercive foreign policy, and military deployment to all parts of the world outside of China. Therefore, the report posits that Xi now presents a serious problem for the whole of the democratic world, and the U.S. government needs to deal with this imminent challenge.

Chinese military soldiers march at Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China, on April 28, 2020. (Lintao Zhang/Getty Images)

It seems this report was researched and written during the Trump administration, based on the latest analysis of the CCP. It can be said to comprise Trumps policy of containment of the CCP presented in the form of a think tank report for the future U.S. government to adopt and implement. The report mentions the Trump administrations 2017 U.S. National Security Strategy and praises the Trump administration for sounding the alarm about the CCPs ambitions.

10 Strategies to Contain the CCP

The report points out that the CCP has been much more dexterous in survival than its Soviet counterpart, but also that to make the overthrow of the Communist Party the nations declared objective  is strategically self-defeating. Such an approach only strengthens Xis hand as it enables him to circle elite political and popular nationalist wagons in defense of both party and country.

The following are the 10 recommendations from the Atlantic Council report:

First, U.S. strategy must be based on the four fundamental pillars of American powermilitary power, dollar hegemony, emerging technologies, and a free legal system.

Second, U.S. strategy must begin by attending to domestic economic and institutional weaknesses.

Third, the United States China strategy must be anchored in both national values and national interests.

Fourth, U.S. strategy must be fully coordinated with major allies so that action is taken in unity in response to China.

Fifth, the United States China strategy also must address the wider political and economic needs of its principal allies and partners. This is related to the fourth strategy.

Sixth, the United States must rebalance its relationship with Russia whether it likes it or not. This is very interesting and could have been implemented by Trump had it not been for the Russiagate disinformation campaign against him.

Seventh, the central focus of an effective U.S. and allied China strategy must be directed at the internal fault lines of domestic Chinese politics in general and concerning Xis leadership in particular. A fundamental error of U.S. strategy has been to attack China as a whole, thereby enabling Xis leadership to circle the wagons within Chinese politics around the emotional pull of Chinese nationalism and civilizational pride. Just as significant an error has been to crudely attack the Chinese Communist Party itself. This is the most interesting strategy and will really agitate Beijing.

Eighth, U.S. strategy must never forget the innately realist nature of the Chinese strategy that it is seeking to defeat. This is an important reminder because the CCP only recognizes fists and strength, not morality.

Ninth, U.S. strategy must understand that China remains for the time being highly anxious about military conflict with the United States.

Tenth, for Xi, too, its the economy. In other words, the CCP is very much afraid of economic collapse. If the trade war and sanctions put in place under the Trump administration continue to move forward, in my opinion, the CCP will surely collapse within this year.

Trump successfully changed the China dialog and alerted people to the dangers from the CCP. The Atlantic Council report reiterates and confirms Trumps strategy of isolating and containing Xi Jinping and the CCP. But whether these excellent strategies will be implemented or whether they will be dismantled by the Biden administration is the biggest concern for all good people around the world.

Frank Tian Xie, Ph.D., is a John M. Olin Palmetto professor in business at the University of South Carolina Aiken, and a visiting scholar of the National Taiwan University.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Black January has traditionally also been used to highlight impunity for these crimes. But it is also important to look at continuing violations, writes Ruki Fernando.

For many years, Sri Lankan media freedom organisations have commemorated Black January, recalling the numerous violations of free expression and crimes against free expression committed during the month of January. With Covid-19s onset, this years Black January event took place online on January 29.

Earlier in the month, editor Lasantha Wickrematunge, who was killed in January 2009, was remembered by family and colleagues. After 12 years of waiting for justice, his daughter is reported to have lodged a complaint with the Switzerland-based United Nations Human Rights Committee (UNHRC). The Committee usually accepts complaints after the exhaustion of domestic remedies, but it is likely that it may consider this, as for 12 years domestic processes had not even led to a prosecution, let alone convictions.

Another remembrance was also organised in Colombo, marking 11 years after the enforced disappearance of journalist and cartoonist Prageeth Ekneligoda in 2010. His wife, friends, colleagues, and supporters gathered to launch a new initiative named the Ekneligoda Forum with a website about Ekneligoda and others subjected to enforced disappearances. The Batticaloa Press Club organised at least two events, one to remember Wickrematunge and the other to remember journalist S. Sugirtharajan who was killed in Trincomalee in January 2006.

Back in January 2012, the Alliance of Media Organisations' Black January services listed 37 incidents against the media that had happened during the period from 2006 to 2012. These incidents included assassinations, a plot to assassinate, an enforced disappearance, arrests, interrogations, assaults, incidents of torture, threats, discrediting through public statements, raids on journalists houses and media institutions, withdrawing the license to a broadcaster, the closure of newspapers, arson attacks, etc. To the best of the authors knowledge, 15 years later, under three different governments, no one has been convicted for any of these crimes.

As far as I know, there is only one prosecution. That is in the case of Ekneligoda. The prosecution started in late 2019 at the special three-bench trial at Bar in Colombo, but not much progress has been made, with multiple hearings being postponed due to Covid-19-related lockdowns last year. Dates for the next hearings are unknown, after the last scheduled hearings in November 2020 were not held.

Separately, on November 25, 2020, a court hearing at the Homagama High Court in relation to the trial of the abduction of Ekneligoda was postponed to March 2021, as details of some phone records were not presented. The progress of the case is in serious doubt, with the chief of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) that led the probe being jailed and a lead investigator having fled the country. A Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) appointed to look into incidents of political victimisation had ignored a court order and heard from a key eyewitness in Ekneligodas case, a day after the judges at the trial at Bar had ordered the witness not to appear before the Commission. The witness is recanting his previous testimony and this may seriously affect the prosecution.

Black January has traditionally also been used to highlight impunity for these crimes. But it is also important to look at continuing violations, and thus this article will also focus on challenges to free expression in the last two months (November and December 2020), following a bleak month for free expression in October 2020.

A major crackdown was launched in the Northern and Eastern Provinces against the annual commemoration of Tamil militants killed during the war. Last year, army and police were reported to have interrupted and interrogated Tamil civilians and politicians across the North and East as soon as preparations got underway and enforced roadblocks on private land where Thuyilum Illams (cemeteries and graves of dead Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam [LTTE] cadres) are placed, and even vandalised them. Court orders have also been issued across the North, banning public commemorations, at the request of the police.

In addition to the large number of incidents reported in relation to the above activities, around 24 other incidents related to free expression had been reported across the country in the last two months. These have included the killing of an outspoken government official, physical attacks on journalists, arrests, questioning, and other legal actions against journalists, social media commentators and Opposition politicians, restrictions, obstructions against journalists, and negative pronouncements from government politicians.

Killing outspoken govt. official, physical attacks on journalists

The most serious incident was the reported killing of a government official, S Vijayanthiran, after being attacked on November 6, 2020, in Athimottai in the Mannar District. The media described Vijayanthiran as an advocate against illegal sand mining and that police investigations are taking into account that he may have been targeted for speaking out on these issues.

Jaffna-based Journalist S Mukunthan was reported to have been attacked by an unidentified group which had broken into his home on November 11, 2020. Mukunthan is reported to have alleged that the organisation Tamil Kodi (translated as Tamil flag) hosted relief activities that did not follow social distancing measures, despite the growing threat of a second wave of coronavirus across the island. Members of Tamil Kodi had allegedly mounted pressure on Mukunthan to delete his Facebook post and he had been attacked by persons alleged to be affiliated with the said organisation.

In another incident, a provincial media organisation reported that journalist Saman Wijaya Bandara had been attacked and that his camera had been damaged when he had gone to report on illegal constructions in Devanagala.

Legal actions against free expression

Sinhala language social media commentator Chirantha Amerasinghe was arrested on November 17, 2020, by the CID. A Tamil journalist in the Batticaloa District, Kokulathasan was reported to have been arrested after making a Facebook post about remembering the dead, ahead of the LTTEs annual remembrance day of its dead cadres.

Also in November, another Batticaloa journalist Selvakumar Nilanthan was reported to have been questioned for several hours by policemen who visited him at his home. The questioning had come after Nilanthan reported on tensions between Sinhala and Tamil farmers over the reallocation of land in Mailaththamadu, Mathavanai. Again in November 2020, another Batticaloa-based journalist and Batticaloa Press Club President Balasingham Krishnakumar was reported to have received a phone call from the superintendent of the Batticaloa Police, asking him to come to the police to make a statement without making the reasons clear.

In December 2020, police reported filing a case against the Jaffna-based Uthayan newspaper after it published photos of LTTE Leader Velupillai Prabhakaran on his birthday on November 26.

A local politician in the Thunukkai Divisional Council, S Sujansan is reported to have said that police threatened him against commemorating the victims of a claymore attack on November 27, 2007, in Iyankulam in the Mullaitivu District. On November 16, Opposition parliamentarian Eran Wickramaratne was reported to have been questioned by the CID for nearly four hours over statements made at a media conference in which he questioned the safety of high-profile witnesses in remand custody.

On November 7, the PCoI probing incidents of political victimisation was reported to have decided to pursue legal action against five Opposition MPs for allegedly making derogatory comments and challenging the Commissions authority, after the MPs had filed a complaint with the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC), claiming the PCoI probing incidents of political victimisation had misused State funds to bypass the rule of law.

Also, some Hindu priests supported by inter-faith committees had made police complaints across the country and called for the arrest of female activist and lawyer Jeevanee Kariyawasam, after she had re-posted an image an artist had created of a goddess on her Facebook account with a thought-provoking caption.

Restrictions and obstructions

Journalists were banned from covering parliamentary sessions in November 2020, when two regulations in the Quarantine and Prevention of Diseases Ordinance submitted by the Minister of Health were approved. Later in the month, media was banned from covering a debate in Parliament on the budget. Both were reported to be unprecedented measures, especially as diplomats and other officials were reported to have been allowed to be in Parliament during the reading of the Budget. A State Minister is also reported to have advocated banning journalists from covering the Batticaloa District Development Council sessions.

Amerasinghe, who had been arrested over a Facebook post, had earlier complained to the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) that his Twitter handle (@chirantha7777) had been blocked from accessing the official Twitter account of the President of Sri Lanka. He claimed the Presidents Twitter account distributes valuable information for all citizens and by blocking access, the authorities had violated his right to free expression and freedom from discrimination, and that the blocking occurred after a response he made to a Tweet by the Presidents official Twitter handle. Despite having been granted official permission to shoot and produce teledramas, production crews around Sri Lanka are reported to have faced restrictions from health authorities.

On November 21, the Batticaloa-based journalist had visited the Mailaththamadu, Mathavanai area to cover tensions related to land rights and taken video footage of the situation. When he returned home, police and local government officials asked him to stay at home in self-quarantine for two weeks, claiming that a person in the area he had visited had been confirmed as a Covid-19 patient. He had later discovered that no one in the area had tested positive for Covid-19 and that no one else who had been there had been asked to self-quarantine.

On December 14, Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS) tweeted that the uncle of baby Shaikh, who was forcibly cremated by the authorities, was removed from Colombo for allegedly being Covid-19-positive. JDS wrote that activists suspect an attempt to silence him as he has been the most vocal person in the family. A peaceful white cloth campaign was started against the forcible cremation of the Covid-19 dead at the Borella Cemetery in Colombo, where the 20-day-old Muslim child was forcibly cremated. Police and intelligence units are reported to have removed the material from the gates and fence surrounding the Borella crematorium, and questioned and intimidated those who had gone to tie white cloths.

On the night of November 6, the laptop used for professional work by the Batticaloa-based journalist Gunalingam was stolen by unknown persons from a residence that he sometimes uses. No one had been there that night, and the locked door was broken. A complaint was made at a local police station.

Negative pronouncements from government politicians

On November 21, Mass Media Minister Keheliya Rambukwella announced that a proper mechanism for the regulation of local websites was needed and would be implemented within two weeks. In the same government announcement, Education Minister Professor GL Peiris was quoted as saying that the formulation of a new mechanism should be made after studying a new law that had been passed in Singapore.

However, a former editor of a government newspaper said that the proposed regulatory mechanism for websites, which emulates a draconian Singaporean law (the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act [POFMA]), would be extremely dangerous and that it was a flagrant attempt to silence dissenting voices in the online space through punitive action and surveillance. The founding editor of a civic website has raised concerns that this may serve censorious ends and warned that a POFMA-esque legislative framework in Sri Lanka, which is completely militarised, with no data protection or privacy laws, will lead to unsurprising consequences for independent, investigative, and critical media. Rambukwella subsequently said there were no plans to regulate social media.

A circular issued by the Presidential Secretariat has directed officials of state institutions to prioritise the state media when allocating government expenditure on advertising and marketing. This is likely to negatively affect private medias financial stability at a time when some private media are already facing financial difficulties due to Covid-19.

Trade Minister, Dr Bandula Gunawardana, is reported to have expressed displeasure over a cartoon published in a government newspaper. He had alleged that newspapers operating with public money are following orders of some almighty state officials who are acting in a manner challenging the powers of the President, the Prime Minister, and the Parliament, and requested the newspaper be summoned before Parliament to answer questions on its reporting.

The future of free expression

Impunity for past crimes and violations, along with continuing violations, such as those highlighted above, paints bleak prospects for free expression in Sri Lanka. Reading one of my recent articles in a daily newspaper, my elderly parents expressed fears for my safety, citing incidents reported in the media about those who had been killed, forcibly disappeared, assaulted, and/or detained, as reprisals for free expression. Well-meaning friends and colleagues have also advised me to be restrained.

Since then, I have subjected myself to a degree of self-censorship. I have come across many other persons and institutions who have subjected themselves to self-censorship in various forms since last year. At least one journalist had fled the country and another prolific social media commentator is considering fleeing.

Some of the incidents above had led to condemnation from local and international media freedom organisations and the UN. Several Opposition MPs have raised concerns related to the freedom of expression, at the end of last year and since then, concerns have been raised about even MPs facing reprisals for free expression, compelling one Opposition MP to write to the Chief of Police. On November 17, Freedom House (FH) issued an appraisal of Sri Lankas Freedom on the Net for 2020, giving Sri Lanka a rating of 52/100 for Internet Freedom, or partly free status. It also noted evidence that the Covid-19 pandemic had resulted in increased data sharing between service providers and military intelligence, as well as a greater number of arrests for online activity.

As we commemorate Black January this year, a young poet is in detention for more than eight months, an outspoken rights lawyer is in detention for more than nine months, a journalist raising critical questions online is in detention for two months, and some others have left their homes fearing reprisals. But it is such circumstances that have made Black January a rallying cry for the freedom of expression and it must continue to be so, demanding a stop to ongoing crimes and violations of free expression and ensuring accountability for past crimes. Black January should encourage and nurture peaceful and democratic dissent, resistance, and defiance that are still there in some traditional and new media, offline and online, amongst journalists and beyond.

This article was first published in The Sunday Morning news portal.
India's government has shortlisted four mid-sized state-run banks for privatisation, under a new push to sell state assets and shore up government revenues, three government sources said.

Privatisation of the banking sector, which is dominated by state-run behemoths with hundreds of thousands of employees, is politically risky because it could put jobs at risk but Prime Minister Narendra Modi's administration aims to make a start with second-tier banks.

The four banks on the shortlist are Bank of Maharashtra, Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank and the Central Bank of India, two officials told Reuters on condition of anonymity as the matter is not yet public.

Two of those banks will be selected for sale in the 2021/2022 financial year which begins in April, the officials said. The shortlist has not previously been reported.

The government is considering mid-sized to small banks for its first round of privatisation to test the waters. In the coming years it could also look at some of the country's bigger banks, the officials said.

The government, however, will continue to hold a majority stake in India's largest lender State Bank of India, which is seen as a 'strategic bank' for implementing initiatives such as expanding rural credit.

A finance ministry spokesman declined to comment on the matter.

India's deepest economic contraction on record caused by the pandemic is driving the push for bolder reforms, economists say.

Modi's office initially wanted four banks to be put up for sale in the coming fiscal year, but officials have advised caution fearing resistance from unions representing the employees.

Bank of India has a workforce of about 50,000 and Central Bank of India has 33,000 staff, while Indian Overseas Bank employs 26,000 and Bank of Maharashtra has about 13,000 employees, according to estimates from bank unions.

Bank of Maharashtra's smaller workforce could make it easier to privatise and therefore potentially one of the first to be sold, the sources said.

On Monday workers started a two-day strike opposing the government's move to privatise banks and sell stakes in insurance and other companies.

The actual privatisation process may take 5-6 months to start, one of the government sources said.

"Factors like number of employees, pressure of the trade unions and political repercussions would impact a final decision," the source said, noting that the privatisation of a particular bank could be subject to change at the last moment due to these factors.

The government hopes that the Reserve Bank of India, the country's banking regulator, will soon ease lending restrictions on Indian Overseas Bank after an improvement in the lender's finances that could help its sale.

Some economists said there could be a few takers for weak and small banks - saddled with bad assets - but that Modi should consider the sale of bigger banks like Punjab National Bank or Bank of Baroda. The sale of small banks was unlikely to help the government raise much in the way of resources for budget spending, they said.

"The government should consider what gives it a better pricing without compromising its long-term goal of financing the growing Indian economy," said Devendra Pant, chief economist at India Ratings, the Indian arm of Fitch ratings agency.

Also Read: Bank unions call for 2-day strike to protest PSB privatisation; check dates
You can listen to the latest episode of Today in Pa at this link, or on any of your favorite app including Alexa, Apple, Google, Spotify and Stitcher. Episodes are available every weekday on PennLive. Feel free to subscribe, follow or rate Today in Pa. as you see fit!

Today in Pa. Daily Podcast | Feb. 15, 2021

Police arrest a man in Pittsburgh who intentionally crashed his pick-up truck into a gas station in order to steal the ATM. Maurkice Pouncey retires from the Steelers after 11 seasons. A church in Harrisburg which sits on a historic Civil War site will be sold to a veterans ministry. And a mom in Texas tackles a Peeping Tom looking in her teenage daughters bedroom window.

Those are the stories we cover in the latest episode of Today in Pa, a daily weekday podcast from PennLive.com and hosted by Claudia Dimuro. Today in Pa is dedicated to sharing the most important and interesting stories pertaining to Pennsylvania that lets you know, indeed, whats happening today in Pa.

Todays episode refers to the following articles:

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Upstate New York was a hotbed in the 19th century for the abolitionist movement and the Underground Railroad. Names like Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass and Gerrit Smith are familiar. But there were also valiant figures from the region, white and Black, who fought for the end of slavery whose names have faded into history.

During this Black History Month, after searching through old newspapers and websites, we take a look back at some of Upstate New Yorks forgotten abolitionists.

***

If you were a runaway slave, escaping north from New York City along the Hudson River towards Albany, hoping to reach freedom and Canada, Stephen Myers was the man you needed to find.

We devote all our time to the care of the oppressed who come among us, Myers said in 1860. Our pay is small, but yet we are willing to continue to do what we can for them. We have arrivals every few days from southern oppression and forward them to the next depot.

Besides being one of the leaders of Albany-area Underground Railroad, Myers was also a prominent abolitionist publisher and lobbyist.

He was born in slavery in Hoosick, N.Y., a town north of Albany, in 1800. He was freed in 1818.

In 1827, he married Harriet Johnson, whose family owned a sloop which sailed between Albany and New York City. The couple moved to Albany and had four children.

Beginning in the 1830s, the couple began assisting slaves on the Underground Railroad, possibly using the family boat to ferry them northward.

The work kept Stephen and Harriet very busy in the years leading up to the Civil War.

This letter to John Jay II from December 1860 gives an idea of their work:

During the last eight weeks there has been more fugitives escaped from the south than there have been in any four months before. Two from South Carolina and one from Georgia last Sundaywe had eight in one party, men women and children. There is three here tonight who came on Saturday, one from Baltimore County MD, two from Charleston, PA.

Because of the Myers tireless work, the Albany station gained a reputation as being one of the most organized segments of New Yorks Underground Railroad.

In 1842, Myers began publishing the Elevator, a short-lived abolitionist newspaper. Then he founded the Northern Star and Freemans Advocate, which he published with the assistance of wife Harriet. The paper was a prominent voice for freedom and Black rights.

Myers became a leader to the Albany anti-slavery movement and traveled extensively to speak out for the cause of freedom.

He was a member of the Albany Vigilance Committee and served on the executive committee for the first African American labor union, the American League of Colored Laborers.

He advocated for Black voting rights and lobbied state legislators to amend the New York constitution which required Blacks to pay a $250 property tax when they bought a home.

In 1855, Myers attended the National Convention of Colored People, representing Upstate New York.

During the Civil War, he helped raise Black troops to serve in the Union Army.

When he died in 1870, the Troy Daily Times remembered Myers this way:

Mr. Myers was a man of considerable ability and was one of the most prominent leaders of his people. Previous to the war for many years he was agent of the Underground Railroad in Albany, and often a dozen runaway slaves were secreted in his house at one time. He aided hundreds to reach Canada, and secured situations for others in this city and elsewhere.

He will take his well-deserved spot in the National Abolition Hall of Fame when he is inducted in October 2021.

Our series

See all of our profiles of Upstates forgotten abolitionists here.

Black History Month

Black History Month in Upstate NY: Historical sites, monuments and more

Black History Month movies: 20 great films to stream right now on Disney+, Hulu, Prime Video, more

Peterboros Abolition Hall of Fame and Museum offers free daily videos during Black History Month

CNY Jazz brings L.A. to Syracuse for Black History Month cabaret

Send your ideas and curiosities to Johnathan Croyle at jcroyle@syracuse.com or call 315-427-3958.
Delhi Chief Minister Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal (File image)

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal called the arrest of climate activist Disha Ravi an unprecedented attack on Democracy.

A Cyber Cell team of the Delhi Police arrested Ravi from Bengaluru on February 13 for allegedly sharing with Greta Thunberg the "toolkit" related to the farmer's protest against the Centre's three agri reform laws. She was produced before a Delhi court on February 14 and remanded to police custody for five days



Arrest of 21 yr old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime.

 Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) February 15, 2021

Reacting to Ravis arrest, Kejriwal said supporting farmers is not a crime.

Ravi is a 22-year-old climate activist from Bengaluru, Karnataka. A Bachelor of Business Administration graduate from a private college in Bengaluru, Ravi is also one of the founding members of a group named 'Fridays For Future India', police said.

Also read | Who is Disha Ravi? All you need to know about the climate activist arrested in 'toolkit' case

The Delhi Police has claimed Ravi was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and a "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.

Police alleged that Ravi and others "collaborated with pro-khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State."

"She was the one who shared the toolkit doc with Greta Thunberg," the Delhi Police claimed in a tweet.

Follow our LIVE blog for the latest updates of the farmers' protest

Ravi was picked up from her house for questioning and later arrested, a senior police officer said, adding that this was the first arrest in connection with "toolkit case".

Thunberg, a teen climate activist, had shared the "toolkit" to lend her support to the ongoing farmers' agitation in India against the three farm reform laws. In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were listed which were needed to be taken to support the farmers' protest.

(With inputs from PTI)

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune  www.newsofbahrain.com

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that Bahrains economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic will be gradual, projecting growth of 3.3% this year after a contraction of 5.4% in 2020.

The improvement in economy will coincide with an expected recovery of 3.9% in the non-oil sector, supported by the widespread distribution of vaccines to cushion the negative impacts of the coronavirus pandemic.

This was part of the preliminary findings made by IMF staff teams who visited the Kingdom of Bahrain to evaluate the countrys progress and future after the pandemic.

In a statement, Ali Al Eyd  head of the IMF mission  said: The post-pandemic recovery will be gradual. Economic growth is projected at 3.3 per cent in 2021 and is expected to remain flat at around 3 per cent over the medium term.

The IMF teams held virtual discussions from January 25 to February 11, 2021 to conduct the 2021 Article IV consultation.

The mission will submit a report to IMF management and Executive Board, which is scheduled to discuss the Article IV Consultation on March 17.

Bahrain moved quickly to address the health and economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, protecting lives and livelihoods.

Swift and well-coordinated policy responses have helped limit the spread of the virus, deliver rapid and widespread access to vaccinations, and target income and liquidity support to those most in need, said Al Eyd.

The country is suffering from the double shock of the coronavirus crisis and lower oil prices, which raised its overall fiscal deficit to 18.2% of GDP last year from a deficit of 9% in 2019.

Bahrain has accumulated debt since the oil price shock of 2014-2015.

A $10 billion Gulf programme helped it avoid a credit crunch in 2018.

The IMF said public debt rose to 133% of GDP last year from 102% in 2019.

Once the recovery intensifies, there will be a need for an ambitious and growth-friendly fiscal adjustment set within a reliable medium-term timeframe to address the large imbalances in Bahrain, put the government debt on a steady downward path, and restore macroeconomic sustainability, Al Eyd noted.

The amendment will also help rebuild foreign reserves, strengthen the exchange rate peg, which still meets Bahrains needs as a pillar of monetary policy, and supports access to sustainable external financing.
WESTPORT  Police are investigating a reported attempted robbery that occurred Sunday evening near a Westport Walgreens, according to a news release from police.

A person who had been shopping at the Post Road East store was about to enter her vehicle when another vehicle went into a space beside hers, according to the news release. That vehicle, a Toyota Rav 4, was reportedly stolen Sunday, according to the release.
OTTAWA - Adults from racialized communities disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic should be prioritized for shots in the second stage of the vaccination campaign, says new guidance from Canada's national advisory committee on immunization.

A container of COVID-19 vaccine is seen on a table at a vaccination centre at Winnipeg's Convention Centre, Friday, Jan. 1, 2021. The National Advisory Committee on Immunization has updated its guidance on vaccination priorities to include adults from racialized communities disproportionately affected by COVID-19 pandemic and all essential workers in the second stage of the vaccination campaign. THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods

OTTAWA - Adults from racialized communities disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic should be prioritized for shots in the second stage of the vaccination campaign, says new guidance from Canada's national advisory committee on immunization.

The advice also would see all essential workers who can't do their jobs from home moved into the second stage, instead of focusing on health workers with lower-risk jobs.

The second stage is expected to start this spring after provinces get COVID-19 vaccines into the arms of all the staff and residents of long-term care homes, adults aged 70 or older, front-line health workers and adults in Indigenous communities.

The list of groups that should receive COVID-19 vaccines in the second stage includes people between 60 and 69 years old, racialized adults from groups disproportionately affected by COVID-19, essential workers, first responders, caregivers and residents and staff of congregate living sittings including homeless shelters, prisons and migrant workers' quarters.

The committee added a third stage to its immunization recommendations that includes people between 16 and 59 years old with underlying conditions, those who are between 50 and 59 years old with no underlying conditions, and health workers and essential workers who are didn't got shots in previous rounds.

The new recommendations prioritize racialized adults from groups disproportionately affected by the pandemic ahead of some older non-racialized people.

"Key populations are sequenced in three stages corresponding to increasing vaccine availability in each quarter of 2021," the committee said Monday.

"By the end of the third quarter of 2021, it is anticipated that sufficient vaccine supply will be available to offer vaccines to the general Canadian population."

Canada's chief public health officer Dr. Theresa Tam said Friday the new recommendations take into consideration objectives to reduce serious outcomes of COVID-19 throughout society, and to reduce the burden of illness.

Health authorities in the provinces and the territories make the actual decisions on who gets vaccinated first.

"Provinces have different demographics but they use the evidence, I think, to inform their vaccinations," Tam said.

"For example, if you were in Toronto, if you're in Ontario, they've already got data in relationship to where those higher risk populations are and that they be considered as part of the rollout for the prioritization of vaccines."

The new federal vaccination guidance comes as COVID-19 vaccination efforts are expected to get a big boost this week.

The Public Health Agency of Canada says it expects Pfizer and BioNTech to deliver more than 400,000 doses of their COVID-19 vaccine this week and about 450,000 doses each week until April.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 15, 2021.



This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

With over 108 million reported infections from severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) worldwide, and nearly 2.4 million deaths, the ongoing pandemic has jeopardized the physical, financial and emotional wellbeing of the global population over the past year. A new preprint research paper posted to the bioRxiv* server discusses the emergence of mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 virus, allowing it to escape the effects of the most commonly used antiviral drug, remdesivir.

In an effort to arrest the spread of SARS-CoV-2 infection, drug development and repurposing research has been proceeding at a rapid pace in multiple centers.

Remdesivir shows conflicting results

Among the few drugs that have been approved for the specific treatment of COVID-19 disease, remdesivir (RDV) has been extensively used. This drug is a broad-spectrum nucleoside analog, and its in vitro viral inhibitory activity has been impressive. In three randomized trials, its use was associated with accelerated recovery, with the time being reduced by a third. No significant benefits on mortality were observed

However, these findings contradicted a larger Solidarity Therapeutics Trial carried out by the World Health Organization (WHO), which demonstrated a lack of association between RDV and survival. The time of initiation of RDV is also, apparently, crucial to its action.

Nonetheless, many countries continue to use RDV as a first-line treatment for COVID-19 patients hospitalized with a need for oxygen supplementation within ten days of infection. Remdesivir is often used along with the anti-inflammatory glucocorticoid dexamethasone.

Mutations are a well-known viral mechanism to escape drug inhibition, especially during monotherapy. However, current literature does not contain any examples of RDV-resistant SARS-CoV-2 strains in circulation. The current study aims to understand whether such resistance can emerge and which mutations are responsible.

Study details

The researchers found that of 12 viral lineages passaged in media containing RDV at either 1 M or 2.5 M, seven showed cytopathic effects (CPE), indicating the virus's active replication the cell. The virus titer also increased by 0.5 to 1 log, indicating the virus was adapting to the Vero cells.

In two of the passaged virus lineages, the speed and magnitude of replication showed a change, as well as the concentration of RDV required to achieve 50% inhibition. These lineages actively replicated in the presence of 7.5 M RDV. The titers were lower than when it was grown without RDV, however.

In Vero cells, these actively replicating strains showed a twofold increase in IC50, and a nearly fourfold increase relative to the parental strain. When the same viruses were passaged in media not containing RDV, the IC50 remained comparable with the parental strain.

This partial resistance to RDV was not replicated with other nucleoside analogs such as EIDD2801, indicating the emergence of specific resistance mutations.

Common mutations in partial RDV resistance populations. A. Location of E802 within the structure of SARS-CoV-2 NSP12 in association with NSP7 and NSP8 (PDB ID 6YYT). Three focused panels are WT (upper) and two potential confirmations of E802D. H-bonds are indicated by l 5 ight blue line. B. NSP6 I168 amino acid is not conserved across CoVs. C. Conservation of E802 amino acid across CoVs. Accession numbers for the CoV sequences are in the materials and methods.

E802 mutation

The researchers found two fixed non-synonymous mutations in these lineages, both of which were absent when the same strains were passaged in the absence of RD. These mutations were also not present in the original input virus or the ancestral Wuhan strain.

The first mutation was a glutamine to aspartate mutation (Glu802Asp; E802D) in the viral RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) NSP12, similar to that observed in other betacoronaviruses that show reduced RDV sensitivity. It is noteworthy that glutamate at this position is found in all betacoronaviruses.

The E802 mutation occurs near amino acid residues that are predicted to form bonds with newly formed RNA. The researchers suggest that this results in small structural modifications that reduce steric hindrance in this region. The result is resistance to the inhibitory effects of RDV incorporation into the growing RNA molecule.

I168T mutation

The second mutation is a substitution of threonine for isoleucine (Ile168Thr; I168T) in NSP6. This highly conserved protein is found to limit the expansion of the autophagosome. The presence of this mutation could lead to a change in the structure of the transmembrane and extracellular domains of the protein.

These mutations are not found to affect viral fitness or peak viral titers. Either the E802D or E802A mutation was found to confer partial resistance to RDV, similar to that found in viral lineages serially passaged in RDV-supplemented media.

E802 substitutions raise IC50

With the E802D and E802A mutations in NSP12, the IC50 rose by twofold, and by 2.5-fold, respectively, irrespective of the type of cell used. Thus, the researchers rule out different cell-dependent metabolism pathways, or variations in virus entry or replication dependent on the viral lineage, as explanations for the emergence of these mutations.

Interestingly, viruses with both mutations had increased sensitivity to the drug relative to lineages with only the NSP12 mutation.

Secondly, either of the mutations was consistent with intact sensitivity to EIDD2801. Thirdly, when cultured in human airway-derived Calu-3 cells, the researchers found that the titer for all virus lineages was reduced, in correlation with the dose of RDV used.

However, the titers of viruses containing the NSP12-E802 mutation were higher at both 24 and 48 hours compared to the wildtype or NSP6-mutant viruses.

RDV-resistance mutations found in circulating strains

The study found eight viral genomic sequences with the E802 mutation, four with E802A and four with E802D. Seven of these were from RDV-treated patients, but one was not, suggesting selection for this mutation can occur without exposure to the drug. There were 33 sequences showing substitution of isoleucine at 1168 with other residues.

Globally, the E802 substitution is as common as other NSP12 mutations associated with partial resistance to RDV in other coronaviruses. Though rare, these mutations are demonstrated to be viable and can emerge as part of a resistant variant under selective pressure.

Compared with the input virus, the passaged viruses were more sensitive to RDV when grown in Vero cells in the absence of RDV than in its presence.

When compared to the input sequence, there were 41 non-synonymous and 10 synonymous mutations, but none in the proofreading NSP14 that would contribute to the altered sensitivity of the virus to RDV. The effect of RDV concentrations on the rate of viral mutation is thus unclear at present.

Most mutations affected the spike open reading frame, but not the furin-like cleavage site. Many of these mutations have been found in the emerging UK and South African variants. Only one, P681P, was present in the parental strain. The E484 mutation appeared in 20% to 40% of the virus lineages except one.

What are the implications?

Surprisingly, these mutations occurred in vitro, without any immune selection pressure.

"These observations underline the plasticity of the SARS-CoV-2 genome and also suggest that the independent emergence of different geographical variants sharing common mutations has not occurred due to selection pressure based on pre-existing immunity in the infected individuals."

Of 10 mutations in the passaged strains that were present in the input virus, five were found in over half of the population, and four became fixed by passage 13.

Overall, the study showed the emergence of a genome signature that confers partial resistance to RDV in the presence of the drug in vitro. This demonstrates the possibility of selection for RDV resistance. However, considering the extensive use of this drug, the rarity of the mutation rules out the global spread of such resistant variants.

The findings also show the occurrence of the key mutations that are characteristically found in the newer variants of concern in vitro, without exposure to human immune antibodies.

"Our study offers new perspectives for the surveillance of new SARS-CoV-2 variants and the clinical management of patients treated with RDV."

*Important Notice

bioRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
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Meanwhile, the head of Victorias hotel quarantine program, Emma Cassar, confirmed an incident review was being undertaken into how a returned traveller was able to use a nebuliser in his hotel room and whether any staff were at fault. The returned traveller previously told The Age and Sydney Morning Herald he felt he had been blamed for spreading coronavirus through the Holiday Inn quarantine hotel by using a nebuliser, despite saying he was twice given permission from Victorian health authorities to use the medical device while in quarantine. COVID-19 Quarantine Victoria commissioner Emma Cassar addresses the media on Tuesday. Credit:Penny Stephens It is suspected the use of the nebuliser, which turns liquid medications into a fine mist that can be inhaled, caused fine aerosolised particles carrying coronavirus to be suspended in the air and spread throughout the hotel. The Holiday Inn cluster, which has so far infected 19 people, has triggered a lockdown across Victoria for five days in response to fears the highly infectious British variant of the coronavirus had spread throughout the community.

Loading Ms Cassar said the investigation was being led by COVID-19 Quarantine Victoria and the Department of Health. It follows an earlier audit of the incident that led Ms Cassar to categorically say there was no record of the medical device ever being declared by the returned traveller at the Holiday Inn hotel at Melbourne Airport. When asked by a reporter if she had spoken to the returned traveller, Ms Cassar said she had spoken to the man directly on Tuesday and apologised for his treatment. But federal Health Minister Greg Hunt has demanded an independent investigation into the incident, saying the patient had put forward a compelling case.

The individual has put forward a clear, categorical case and a very compelling case, Mr Hunt told radio station 3AW. Clearly that needs to be assessed independently, so we know the facts. Professor Sutton said public officials still suspect the use of the nebuliser helped seed the Holiday Inn cluster that has plunged the state into lockdown, but it was difficult to determine with absolute certainty how the outbreak unfolded. The Covid-19 testing site in Broadmeadows on Tuesday. Credit:Justin McManus Epidemiological links pointed to those who were on that floor of the quarantine hotel being infected when the nebuliser was in use. Thats the linkage and thats why it supports that theory as opposed to other days when it wasnt in use, he said.

These things in the world of epidemiology always remain working hypotheses. Its not to say that coronavirus is not incredibly contagious under normal circumstances. There is no denialism about airborne transmission from my point of view. I know that nebulisers can increase that risk.  It has yet to be decided whether Victoria would return to the same restrictions that applied prior to the snap five-day lockdown or whether the new rules, such as mask-wearing at all times outside the home, would be gradually removed. Staff escort guests from the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane on Tuesday. Credit:Luis Ascui I wish I could give a definitive answer right now but that would not be honest, that would be guesswork at best. So the best thing to do is just wait to see what happens over the next 24 hours, said Mr Andrews. [The lockdown] is working. Has it worked, full stop? We wont know that until tomorrow. But weve got very promising early signs.

Two more cases were also detected in international arrivals on Tuesday, taking the total number of active COVID-19 cases in the state to 25. Mr Andrews was speaking to reporters as authorities evacuated one of the states hot hotels, housing high-risk patients who either have coronavirus or are close contacts of someone who does. The returned travellers who were completing their quarantine at the medi-hotel, the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane, are now being transferred to the Pullman Hotel at Albert Park, while repairs for water damage from a sprinkler system are completed. Mr Andrews also said the Victorian government was considering its options for a purpose-built accommodation hub outside the CBD, to replace the existing hotel quarantine scheme.

Its more than just scoping it, we are going to get on and build a facility, he said. On Monday evening, the Health Department announced two more exposure sites, in Broadmeadows. The Department of Health has said a positive case visited Saccas Fruit World between 12.30pm and 1.15pm last Tuesday. The shop is inside the Broadmeadows Central shopping centre.

They also visited the Woolworths in the same shopping centre between 12.15pm and 12.30pm on February 9. Hours after the first doses of the long-awaited Pfizer vaccine landed on Australian shores, the TGA granted provisional approval for the AstraZeneca vaccine on Tuesday, paving the way for all Australians to receive a coronavirus vaccine by the end of the year. Mr Hunt warned people will not be able to vaccine shop and the coronavirus jab they receive will likely be determined by the medical supply of where they decide to go. When asked whether Australians would be able to request Pfizer, which has a higher efficacy rate of 95 per cent, Mr Hunt responded no.

Loading It will be where you go and whats being distributed there, Mr Hunt told radio station 3AW on Tuesday morning. He said it was likely much of the population would be vaccinated with AstraZeneca, describing it as the backbone of the global vaccine program. These vaccines are showing outstanding outcomes around the world, he said All of the initial vaccines, in particular the Pfizer and AstraZeneca, are offering immense protection against serious illness and hospitalisation and loss of life.
Spoiler alert: This story contains some details (but no major revelations) presented in Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel.

Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel is an arresting new docuseries that fans of the true-crime genre are flocking to. The four-part series was released on Netflix in Australia last Thursday and has since settled in the streaming platforms top 10, sitting in the number one spot for two days. Whats the appeal?

Australian viewers have sent Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel straight to the top of Netflixs charts. Credit:Netflix

The series, directed by Joe Berlinger (Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes) and executive produced by Ron Howard, delves into the 2013 disappearance of 21-year-old Elisa Lam, a Vancouver native traveling solo through California. She was last seen at the ramshackle Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles destitute and perilous Skid Row, where she was staying.

The hotels low rates and transient appeal drew addicts and violent guests including serial killer Richard Ramirez (known as The Night Stalker) and the mystery surrounding Lams disappearance there unfurls at a pace likely to keep the audience guessing and engaged until the final reveal.
A British man has pleaded guilty to breaking Singapore's strict coronavirus rules by sneaking out of his hotel room to meet his fiancee during quarantine.

Nigel Skea, 52, faces six months in prison for leaving his room in the five-star Ritz Carlton Millenia three times on September 21.

One of the breaches was to meet his Singaporean partner Agatha Maghesh Eyamalai, who was not in quarantine but had booked a room in the same hotel.

Nigel Skea has pleaded guilty to breaking Singapore's strict coronavirus rules by sneaking out of his hotel room to meet his fiancee Agatha Maghesh Eyamalai (both pictured in court on Monday)

The Briton faces six months in prison for leaving his room in the five-star Ritz Carlton Millenia three times on September 21

Skea was serving his 14-day quarantine in a room which is mandatory for most incoming visitors in Singapore

Skea was also not wearing a mask, which is required in Singapore, during his ventures out of his hotel room.

Eyamalai, 39, who married Skea in November, pleaded guilty to abetting him.

The city-state requires most arrivals to undergo 14 days of quarantine at government-designated hotels.

Skea was twice 'loitering along the corridor' and went to Eyamalai's room 13 floors higher by using a stairwell through an emergency exit door, which she had opened for him, according to the charges.

'This is a classic tale of two lovers wanting to be together and trying to be as close as possible to each other, but breaching the law,' the couple's lawyer S.S. Dhillon told the court.

Skea was also not wearing a mask, which is required in Singapore, during his ventures out of his hotel room

On one of occasion, Skea (left) climbed 13 flights of stairs to visit Agatha Maghesh Eyamalai (right) who was staying on the 27th floor of the hotel

Sentencing is expected to take place on February 26.

A spokesperson for the Ritz-Carlton Millenia told Insider that the hotel 'observes all government-mandated regulations' when accommodating guests serving their stay-home notices.

'For privacy reasons, we are unable to provide any further comment on specific incidents,' the spokesperson added.

Quarantine violations carry a penalty of a fine of up to S$10,000 ($7,565) or up to six months in jail, or both.

Quarantine violations carry a penalty of a fine of up to S$10,000 ($7,565) or up to six months in jail, or both

The couple were staying at $360-a-night luxury Ritz-Carlton Millenia hotel in Singapore

Singapore has jailed and fined others for breaking COVID-19 rules, while some foreigners have also had their work permits revoked.

Forty-four foreigners who have breached the city-state's quarantine laws have already had their right to work rescinded.

It has largely brought the coronavirus under control, with less than a handful of new local cases a day, due to strict quarantining of arrivals, contact-tracing and social distancing.
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Joel Fitzgibbon has been creating political mayhem by selling a false impression of the Hunter region. His high-profile focus on coal would lead you to believe the Hunter is populated by black-faced, hard hat-wearing underground miners straight out of the 19th century. With this imagery, he seems to be holding the Labor Partys climate change policy hostage, while ignoring the real interests and concerns of his constituency. There have to be better ways forward.

I am an Awabakal woman, a descendant of Mahrahkah, one of few known Indigenous ancestors of the region.

Labors Joel Fitzgibbon is pushing an image of the Hunter that doesnt square with everyone. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Like many non-Indigenous members of the Hunter community, I also have ties from early contact in the region that were formed due to the coal mining enterprises on our Awabakal country. My Scottish great-grandfather migrated from Glasgow to work as a coal miner when Cessnock was only a settlement, not even a town, in 1900. Members of my family have been employed in the coal mining industry in the Hunter for generations.

Families who have traditionally been part of the coal-mining industry in the Hunter have been and remain a close-knit group. We helped each other out with food during strikes or wept beside each other in church services after another father, husband or son was tragically killed down a mine.
A brief history of conservative publications in Canada  updated to 2021 (Part One) By Mark Wegierski

A survey of conservative publications in Canada tells a sorry tale of short-lived efforts lacking the ideological coherence and material support necessary to make a significant impact. Any group of conservative writers and thinkers needs to be aware of the struggles of those who have gone before and to learn, if possible, from their mistakes. One of the most well-known quotations by Conrad Black concerns his promise (or threat) to establish a publication in Canada which would be a National Review North. Although Lord Black certainly created a revolution in the Canadian newspaper world, whose effects continue to be felt today, he did not manage to create a publication that could play as profound a role in Canadian politics as the early National Review played in the creation of an American conservative movement. Black never allocated the funding for a profound intellectual journal of conservative opinion in Canada (although The National Post and other Black papers partially undertook such writing). In earlier decades, The Toronto Sun (descendant of The Toronto Telegraph) had carried a number of conservative columnists (some of whom were remarkably acerbic), but lacked the consistent intellectual credentials to avoid classification by critics as a tabloid. In the 1980s, with a huge Progressive Conservative majority, there was some quickening of conservative intellectual life in Canada, but all struggled to achieve a lasting impact. The businessman William A. B. Campbell launched a magazine called International Conservative Insight, but the venture disappeared when it became apparent he wasnt going to turn a profit from this initiative. There was an attempt to produce a right-leaning newsmagazine in Ottawa called Seven Days, but it failed after a few issues. Dr. Branka Lapajne had somewhat more success with a monthly newspaper called The Phoenix, which continued for a few years before closing. There was also a brief attempt to launch a right-leaning student newspaper at the University of Toronto called The University of Toronto Magazine, but the paper faced troubles right from the start, for example over name duplication, and never managed to find its feet. Launched with great fanfare, Peter Worthingtons Influence magazine collapsed after about two years. It began with a misstep  billing itself as directed at men of influence-- and tried to sell itself as a magazine for wealthy businessmen, rather than for conservatives per se. The newsletters of the University of Toronto P.C.s, Rabble & Reaction, and of the young Ontario P.C.s, Blue Wave, were sometimes interesting but had nothing more than a local reach. The period was characterized by a variety of initiatives, none of which found a sustaining audience. Finally, there arose The Idler, a precocious journal of literary-artistic-cultural pretensions, with some sotto voce conservative philosophizing. It was in a non-glossy large-magazine format, with artistic covers in colour, the interior in black and white, and some interesting illustrations. It had a broad variety of contributors, many of whom were literary aspirants who avoided forthright political statements. The main problem with The Idler could be summed up by saying that it offered a tiny, frothy dessert confection  as opposed to the meat-and-potatoes that many conservatives were hungering for at the time. The very title seemed redolent of affectation and political inaction. Considering that it often made a point of putting down ordinary people, it never achieved much of a circulation (apparently  8,000 at the maximum). The major conservative publications of the time were the Alberta Report/B.C. Report/Western Report of the Byfield family. Alberta Report had a circulation of about 60,000; B.C. Report about 15,000 (in the province of British Columbia); and Western Report (in the provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba), about 5,000. Even the most successful conservative publications were limited in their readership and impact. Some of the most long-lasting publications had an economic focus. The National Citizens Coalition put out a newsletter-type publication, and the Fraser Institute produced Fraser Forum, which continually improved in physical quality. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation also publishes a magazine. The trend of short-lived and varyingly ambitious ventures continued into the early 1990s. At this time, The Idler finally folded when foundation funding was withdrawn. William D. Gairdner, the author of the bestselling The Trouble with Canada tried to launch a newsletter-type publication called Speaking Out that failed with the first issue. In Toronto, Judi McLeod, who had been a prominent Toronto Sun columnist, launched Our Toronto Free Press, a free-distribution monthly newspaper (which has subsequently become a webzine). Torontos free-distribution monthly newspaper Transforum was open to contributions from across the spectrum. There was also a free-distribution newspaper called Toronto Westend Express, in which some conservative articles appeared. Young writer Michael Taube attempted a zine called From The Right, which lasted only three issues. It was packed with interesting articles during its short lifespan. A major magazine (glossy, full-colour) open to contributions from across the spectrum was The Next City, which was supported by the Donner Canada Foundation. Gravitas (non-glossy, black-and-white, but with high-quality paper) also funded by Donner, was a brief, brave attempt at a conservative intellectual magazine of considerably greater social and political engagement than The Idler. It too failed to take off, perhaps because it was perceived to be too narrowly intellectual. The only real success among Canadian conservative publications were the Byfield newsmagazines. By the 1990s, the magazines looked in format somewhat like Time or Newsweek (glossy, full-colour covers, although mostly monochrome inside) and contained a variety of features. In summation, the 1980s was a dreadful time for conservatives in Canada  unlike in the U.S. and Britain. Living in megapolitan Toronto before the coming of the Internet, it often must have seemed to conservative thinkers that nothing belonged to them except the few cubic centimeters inside their skull (as Orwell had put it). The Idler was certainly not an answer to this dilemma. With the rise of the Reform Party in the 1990s, there was greater hope -- but attempts to create an enduring conservative intellectual magazine (Gravitas came closest to it) continued to fail. In Part Two, the author will look at how subsequent ventures fared. To be continued. Mark Wegierski is a Canadian writer and historical researcher.

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Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison's attempt to pursue better climate policies faces opposition from the nation's ruling Liberal-National coalition. This puts Morrison in a tough spot because the international community is also putting pressure on him to do something.

Australia's fight on net-zero emissions

Mr. Morrison, a longtime critic of taking hard actions against climate change, has recently shown a willingness to step towards a net-zero emissions goal, although gradually.

He implied earlier this month that he was open to pursuing a zero-emissions target, a path adopted by increasing numbers of major economies. However, it was resisted by Australia's ruling coalition.

The prime minister did not commit to a firm commitment, addressing the National Press Club, but stated: "Our goal is to reach net-zero emissions as soon as possible, and preferably by 2050."

For the prime minister, who reportedly once took a lump of coal into Parliament to taunt the opposing Labor Party's push to reduce emissions, this was a major change. Australia is one of the world's highest carbon emitters per capita and is not yet on schedule to reach its pollution mitigation goals for 2030. However, many experts agree these targets are insufficient.

Related Article: Australia Proposes the World's Most Ambitious Project on Renewable Energy

Resistance

He faces fierce resistance within his own party, considering Mr. Morrison's recent shift of tone. Several National Party MPs, the rural-based junior coalition member, responded by calling for new coal industry investments and protecting the mining and agriculture industries from any efforts towards new carbon reduction goals.

Mr. Barnaby Joyce, a popular national MP, vowed to vote against the government last week if it sought to enact legislation to reach the 2050 target. He expressed fear that farmers would have to pay for methane emissions from cattle and other animals, which account for around 10% of overall greenhouse gas emissions from Australia.

"I want to see what the plan is before I make any decisions about whether we are part of this or not," he told ABC Radio.

Mr. Morrison is under pressure to respond because Australia's key allies and trade partners have indicated support for greater international climate change action.

International Climate Action

President Joe Biden of the New United States has explicitly promised to encourage countries to implement better carbon reduction policies and is convening a meeting of world leaders to address climate change in April.

It is suspected that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is preparing to use foreign summits such as the G7 or the Group of Seven Advanced Economies to impose carbon tariffs on emission-intensive goods from climate-weak countries. Through equal tariffs, the European Union is moving forward.

However, Mr. Morrison's party has firmly criticized those moves and has suggested that it would resist both Mr. Johnson and the European Union's efforts.

Anonymous senior sources reported by the Sydney Morning Herald said that Australia's capital, Canberra, will claim that potential free trade agreements with both London and Brussels were threatened by carbon tariffs.

"The Morrison government will argue that carbon tariffs are not aimed at combating climate change, but rather at economic objectives including protecting local industries such as British and European meat, cheese and wine."

While Mr. Morrison has suggested that he follow a zero-emissions target, he has steered away from any attempt to place a price on carbon emissions. He proposed instead that modern technologies would make it easier for Australia to mitigate emissions. He also supposedly considered making any elimination goals optional rather than binding.

Related Article: "Actions Not Promises" Says NGOs After EU Allegedly "Failed to Protect the Seas"

Internal Conflict

These proposals were opposed by critics, arguing that specific goals and carbon pricing were the most effective ways to minimize emissions and provide the business sector with certainty.

Mr. Morrison, however, clearly appears unwilling to agree to a firm position. He is keenly aware that party infighting over climate change has contributed to the demise of a series of Australian politicians on both sides of the political system. As a matter of fact, his own promotion to the Liberal party leadership in 2018 was facilitated by the ousting of his predecessor, Mr. Malcolm Turnbull, after an internal party conflict over energy policies.

ALSO READ: Earth 'Net Zero': The Race to Stabilize Global Heat Spikes

For more Environmental news, don't forget to follow Nature World News!

By Benjamin Jumbe

Kyambogo University vice chancellor Prof Elly Katunguka is proposing a phased graduation for students who have completed their studies.

This comes as some students who completed their final exams are getting anxious over delays in releasing graduation dates.

Speaking to Kfm, Prof Katunguka says since students in various faculties complete requirements for graduation at different times, the university may consider having them graduating at different times virtually.

He further says the university is set for reopening on the 1st March however calling on students returning to university to ensure they observe the set SOPs to contain spread of COVID 19.

About 20,000 students are expected to report back for studies.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 21:13:41|Editor: huaxia

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HARARE, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Zimbabwe is set to sign with China a citrus export deal that will give local farmers direct access to a market worth 500 million U.S. dollars annually.

The country's agency for export development and promotion, ZimTrade, said on Monday that it is negotiating with Chinese authorities on behalf of the government, and called the deal "farming industry-transforming."

"This is expected to open up direct access to a huge market for local farmers," said ZimTrade CEO Allan Majuru, adding that such a deal will open up a new frontier for locals who have previously relied on the European market.

The citrus fruits to be exported to China include orange, mandarin, lemon, limes, tangelo and grapefruit, Majuru said.

The southern African country is currently working on scaling up production in its horticulture sector to meet a soaring demand for citrus fruits worldwide. Enditem
"...it's about the humans we serve and their opinion means more to our success than any bottom line" - Aaron VanTrojen

"The companies that are voted into the top ten are those companies whose customers and clients say are the best companies to do business with, in Arizona," said Mike Atkinson, President and CEO of AZ Big Media. "There is no better endorsement in business than one from your customers."

Over one million consumers cast their votes based on their opinions of the quality of products and services provided and, on with whom they would recommend doing business.

"We're not the biggest lender in Arizona, but it's not about us, it's about the humans we serve and their opinion means more to our success than any bottom line" Aaron VanTrojen, CEO of Geneva Financial said in a statement. "Arizona has been the home of our Corporate Office since inception in 2007, so this honor holds special meaning for us. This is also one of the most competitive housing markets in the nation, further solidifying for me that the human branding and BE A GOOD HUMAN initiative we launched in 2019 was the right direction for our customers and employees alike."

As of the date of this publication, Geneva Financial employs in excess of 700 humans in over 130 physical and smart branches nationwide. Geneva maintains a 4.9 out of 5 star Google rating with over 1,500 reviews and a 4.9 star rating on WalletHub. The company's commitment to employees and community service earned the lender multiple 'Best Companies to Work For" honors by industry publications and an Arizona Excellence in Banking award in 2020.

Geneva Financial offers Conventional, FHA, VA, USDA, Refinance, Reverse, Jumbo and Condo Financing as well as Down Payment Assistance Programs, First-Time Homebuyer Programs, Physician Loans and Hero Loans for First Responders, Police, Firefighters, Nurses, and Teachers.

To learn more about Arizona based mortgage lender Geneva Financial, visit www.GenevaFi.com

About Geneva Financial

Founded in 2007 by Aaron VanTrojen, Geneva Financial (NMLS 42056) is a direct mortgage lender headquartered in Chandler, Arizona with more than 130 branch locations nationwide. Our mission at Geneva Financial is to approach every aspect of our business from the "inside-out". With a culture-forward mindset, we focus on our loan originators and support staff first in order to ensure an unbeatable experience for our customers.

Our Core Values were created as a daily reminder to operate with the inside-out approach in mind. Core Value #1 is the backbone of all our Core Values, our mission and our brand vision: Home Loans Powered by Humans. Geneva Financial offers Conventional, FHA, VA, USDA, Refinance, Reverse, Jumbo and Condo Financing as well as Down Payment Assistance Programs, First-Time Homebuyer Programs, Physician Loans and Hero Loans for First Responders, Police, Firefighters, Nurses, and Teachers. Learn more about Geneva Financial Mortgage Home Loans at www.GenevaFi.com

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Spoilers ahead if you havent watched the films discussed.

If anyone ever asks me to define what love is, I would simply point them to Antoinette Jadaones films.

I know movies are hardly the best resource to learn about the facts of life, much less love, but there is something sweetly tragic and authentic about Jadaones filmography, which, despite being shoehorned in the romantic comedy category, has less to do with cinematic romance than actual relationships, and really isnt as funny as it is unnervingly real.

Take the groundbreaking release of her 2014 film That Thing Called Tadhana. Jadaone threw in existential anxiety, socioeconomic worry, and personal insecurities to an otherwise typical rom-com formula, and the result is a widely relatable, if a little painful, movie about human connection. Jadaone reintroduced relevant love stories to a new generation, not by fully exposing the nitty-gritty of it, nor by blowing it up to a saccharine standard, but by meeting audiences somewhere in the middle.

The unique triumph of Tadhana and her other films that followed it is that they are equal parts tragic (owing perhaps, to her desire to instill realism into rom-com tropes) and hopeful (an inherent trait of big studio productions), but instead of taking away from her stories, this compromise uplifts them. It sets up the writer-directors philosophy on modern-day relationships: love is a constant give-and-take that is always, somehow, worth it.

Think of JM De Guzman and Angelica Panganiban at the end of Tadhana. They spent most of the time getting to know each other in a deeply personal and enviable way, only for her ex to show up at the eleventh hour, hindering any possibility the leads might have of getting together. Or recall Liza Soberano and Enrique Gil in Alone/Together (2019) They never get the timing of their reconciliation right, so for most of the story, they have to watch each other end up with other people, with Enriques character even fathering a child. Frustrating incidents like these punctuate Jadaones films with a sad realism, but before viewers are pulled so far down that they decide to renounce love forever, hope springs. The last thing we see in Tadhana is JM driving happily to some unknown caller/lover, while Alone closes off with a scene placing Liza and Enrique side by side, together once more. Vague, but hopeful still.

JM De Guzman and Angelica Panganiban in "That Thing Called Tadhana." Screenshot from CINEMA ONE ORIGINALS/YOUTUBE

Perhaps this delicate balance between pessimism and optimism  an important quality in both storytelling and relationships  is best exemplified in the 2018 film Never Not Love You. At a convenience store patio, the characters of Nadine Lustre and James Reid discuss the future of their fragile relationship. Nadine wants to keep it long-distance, but James doesnt. He admits that Nadines growth is painful to watch because it seems to distance her further away from him.

Nadine is clearly hurt by the confession, but she chooses her next words very carefully. She could resurrect James many failings as a boyfriend, or she could reiterate the need to be pragmatic at this point in their lives. Instead, she inches closer to him, cupping her hand as she does around his, and offers a simple I love you. I love you, like its the answer to all their problems. I love you, like it means something more than just plain zeal.

In less deft hands, this scene may come across as trite and cheesy, but because Jadaone has put these two through so much, fleshing out their personas right before our eyes, it feels redemptive, earned even. As cliche as those three words sound, we all live to hear them a little more, especially if theyre as selfless and heartfelt as they are here.

This trademark vulnerability can be traced back to films such as Before Sunrise (1995), which is often compared to Jadaones work owing to the dialogue-heavy treatment of relationships.  At one point in the film, Celine (Julie Delpy) wonders, If there's any kind of magic in this world, it must be in the attempt of understanding someone sharing something. I know it's almost impossible to succeed, but who cares, really? The answer must be in the attempt. Why risk so much for love  why bother hurting or waiting or sacrificing for it? Its a question many have tried to answer, especially through art, but Jadaone already has hers and its for a taste of this very connection, this real-world magic.

Thats why conversation is always front and center in a Jadaone film. Viewers might come away from a screening of Never Not Love You unable to recall why exactly James Reid has to fly off to London, but theyll always keep with them the intimate exchanges he had with Nadine, whether its a conversation about dreams in a Zambales lake or a marriage proposal in bed.

James Reid and Nadine Lustre in "Never Not Love You." Screenshot from VIVA FILMS/YOUTUBE

One of my favorite moments of vulnerability in Jadaones films is slightly less dramatic, though. It takes place in a budget resort on the outskirts of the city, where lodgers are cramped in a shared pool, laughing and drinking in gay abandon. The night is cool and young, dotted lovingly with stars, and looking wistfully at this all is Joshua Garcia. Soon hes joined by Julia Barretto, who is made to look like an outcast in tacky clothes, choppy bangs, and a makeup-less face, but shes glowing nonetheless. She hands him a Sapporo beer, and they drink in silence before she asks, Anong iniisip mo?

This scene from Love You to the Stars Back (2017) might seem like your typical rom-com setup, where the pretty leads are bound to be swayed by the nights idyllic allure and charm their way into each others arms. But instead of drunken flirtations or gimmicks about who-sleeps-where, the two just share their honest musings on dreams, tattoos, and aliens. The dialogue that transpires is so endearingly plain and earnest, it feels almost intrusive to watch.

I cant recall how many times a conversation almost exactly like this (with perhaps more pretension involved) has kept me up all night wondering if I was, indeed, in love myself. We, too, shared unlikely aspirations over a can of beer. We, too, exchanged mundane details about our mundane lives with keen and genuine interest. We, too, tried to play down our burgeoning feelings by burying them in bad jokes and pseudo-philosophy  excuses, really, to keep each other company.

I used to doubt the validity of these experiences because they were leagues away from the intense passion I supposed love was. I thought that you had to chase your partner to the airport or declare your feelings in front of hundreds of strangers to be considered a bona fide lover. Likewise, I thought I had to be cheated on, rejected, or bereaved to truly feel heartbroken. As it turns out, these ardent depictions, enjoyable as they are onscreen, are just that: depictions. Heightened simulations of love for the masses.

Real love is somehow less climactic and more affecting than that. If Jadaones predilection for the subtler things in life has taught me anything, its that I could just be walking along Maginhawa with the boy that I like in deep silence and still feel the same electricity one feels in a kiss. Or I could simply look at the same boy in a crowded restaurant and somehow feel the crushing weight of our imminent end. Its in muted and dual moments like these where real passion reveals itself, and by choosing to dwell in them, Jadaone has proven to be a veritable voice of love.

Her stories carry in them nuggets of truth about the inner workings of the heart, how it clicks and clacks in our current landscape. The answers are all there, bare and scattered like the thoughts of her strikingly verbose characters. All we have to do is watch.
A paperboy saved the life of a pensioner who had been lying on the floor of her Kent home for three days after he spotted her newspaper hadn't been read.

Robert Purt, 18, spotted the paper poking out of the pensioner's letterbox in Birchington, near Margate, a day after he had delivered it.

Concerned, he called up McColl's newsagent, where he worked, and and they called Kent Police to carry out a welfare check.

Officers arrived and rushed the pensioner to hospital - where she is expected to make a full recovery.

Having been praised by the 88-year-old pensioner's family, the humble teenager said: 'It just felt like the right thing to do.'

His quick-thinking actions come in stark contrast to shocking footage taken last week of a Royal Mail worker refusing to pick up a fallen pensioner.

Eagle-eyed paperboy Robert Purt, 18, saved a pensioner's life after noticing she had left her newspaper and post in her letterbox. Police were called to her home in Birchington, Kent, where they discovered she had been lying on the floor for three days after a fall

Widow Patricia Stewart fell down her front steps in Bainsford, near Falkirk when she went to collect a parcel and shouted to the postman to help - but he told her he was 'knackered' and walked off.

The callous incident was recorded last Wednesday by a neighbour's Ring doorbell camera. Footage shows the postman saying: 'I can't help you pal. I'm knackered. Absolutely knackered.'

But the far more helpful Mr Purt, a paperboy of four years, said he acted quickly to help the Kent pensioner, as he 'had a feeling something was wrong.'

He added: 'I contacted my colleague on duty. I had a concern as I knew it was an older lady who lived there on her own. I felt a welfare check would be a good idea.

'My colleague called 101 to get the police to do this check, while I carried on with my round.

'I had a call for the shop to let me know the police had done a check and the lady was okay.

'The police had been in contact to give the shop an update and to say thank you for what I had done.'

Mr Purt, who is also a carer for his mother, Sam (pictured together) remains unphased after saving the 88-year-old woman's life, saying: 'It just felt like the right thing to do'

The family of the pensioner - who doesn't want to be named - put out a Facebook appeal to try and track down Mr Purt, known as Bob to his friends, and say thank you.

Bob's proud mother Sam, 46, also posted on social media praising her son and urging others to keep an eye out for elderly neighbours.

Bob, of Birchington, added: 'The lady had spent three days stuck on a wooden floor in the cold weather we had had.

'My mum was informed that she was doing well in hospital and would be getting help with physio to help her be mobile again.

'The lady's family were incredibly grateful that I had noticed there was something not right and made the call.

'This lady is alive and will get all the help she needs.'

Mr Purt, who is also a carer to his mother as she has fibromyalgia, added : 'I know lots of people are proud of what I have done but for me it just felt like the right thing to do.

'I understand more now how this could have been such a different story, with all that is going on in the world right now people need to just keep an eye out.

'There are lots of people who live alone in our area and if everyone just keeps an eye out even on the small things like the post has not been picked up, or a paper more people would be found and helped quicker.

'A two second call to the shop you work for or the police if you are worried could save so many lives at any one time.'

The pensioner is now set to leave the Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Hospital in Margate.

Mr Purt's mother added: 'I'm so proud of Bob. He is my carer and doesn't think he's done anything special, but he helped save her life.

'He is just happy the lady is alive and safe and is understanding that what he sees as a small thing has a bigger picture to the world around us.'

The pensioner's niece - who also asked not to be named - said: 'Robert's actions certainly got my aunt help earlier than I would have. We are very grateful.

'He's a smart fella. Being on a wooden floor for three days has affected her mobility.

'But she's alive, and for that, we are grateful.'

He demanded that the state government reject PRCs recommendation on reducing the HRA.  By arrangement

Hyderabad: Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) president and Nalgonda MP N. Uttam Kumar Reddy asked graduates and employees to vote for the Congress party if they wanted a rollback of the PRC recommendations on house rent allowance and fitment.

Uttam Kumar Reddy appealed to people to elect Congress candidates to restore morality in politics and democracy in Telangana.

He expressed confidence that the Congress would win elections for the Mahabubnagar-Rangareddy-Hyderabad and Khammam-Warangal-Nalgonda graduates constituencies of Telangana Legislative Council.

Mr Reddy said that both their party candidates, Chinna Reddy and Ramulu Naik, were highly capable of serving people, especially in addressing the needs of graduates, including state employees and jobless youth.

Telangana became a reality due to the struggle and sacrifices made by students. Thousands of government employees too risked their jobs and careers of their children by participating in the Sakala Janula Samme'for over 40 days to achieve statehood. However, neither students nor employees benefited after the formation of Telangana. Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao and his family took control of all resources and neglected everyone else, he alleged.

The TPCC chief said that educated youth must unitedly defeat the corrupt and unethical regimes of the TRS and BJP.

Criticising Chief Minister Rao, Mr Reddy said that the promise to fill one lakh vacant posts in government department before the 2014 elections still remains unfulfilled.

The Pay Revision Commission, in its recent report, has disclosed that over 1.91 lakh posts were lying vacant in various departments. He said the delay in the recruitment process has deprived thousands of students, who participated in the Telangana movement, from getting a government job.

Similarly, the Congress leader said that the TRS government lured jobless youth in 2018 Assembly elections by promising them a monthly unemployment allowance of `3,016. However, this promise too has not been fulfilled, even after nearly two-and-a-half years. He alleged that the Chief Minister has been openly cheating jobless youth ever since he came to power in June 2014.

Mr Reddy also alleged that gross injustice was being done to government employees. He said that the revision of pay scales was long overdue. He further said that the new PRC has disappointed employees by recommending a fitment of a mere 7.3 per cent. He reiterated the demand that employees be given a fitment of not less than 43 per cent.

Further, he demanded that the state government reject PRCs recommendation on reducing the HRA. He said that HRA should be increased as per existing rental values in Hyderabad and other locations.
BELLEVILLE, MI  A man who broke an ankle on a spongy tire while running through an obstacle course will get his day in court, The Associated Press reports.

Tarek Hamades lawsuit against DeBucks Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch was wrongly dismissed by a lower court, the Michigan Court of Appeals said Thursday, Feb. 11, The AP reports.

Hamade fractured an ankle while running across tires in the Tough Farmer obstacle course, an autumn attraction at the farm near Belleville, the report said. The injury happened when he stepped on a very soft, spongy tire.

DeBucks argued in court that the tire was an open and obvious risk, which is a key legal standard under Michigan liability law, the report said. The appeals court disagreed: the tires condition was not obvious.

If theyd called it the spongy tire challenge we might have a different case. But thats not what it was presented as, Judge Michael Gadola said.

The lawsuit will be returned to Wayne County Circuit Court.

READ MORE:

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Credit: Pixel2013 Source: Pixabay (CC BY 2.0)

Two fifths (42%) of adults aged 18-29 report being stressed about Brexit, more than the proportion who are worried about catching COVID-19 (32%) or becoming seriously ill from the disease (22%), find UCL researchers as part of the COVID-19 Social Study.

Across all adults, almost a third (30%) reported being stressed about Brexit between 23 December to 7 February, lower than the proportion worried about catching COVID-19 (38%) or becoming seriously ill from the virus (33%). Almost one in ten (8%) respondents in England and Wales say they are majorly stressed about Brexit, but this rises to 14% in Scotland, the same proportion who are majorly stressed about catching COVID-19.

While stress levels about Brexit have decreased from 34% the week of the end of the transition period to 27% the week ending 7th February, concerns clearly remain for a substantial proportion of people. People with higher incomes reported that Brexit was a major source of stress more often than those with lower incomes, but people with lower incomes were more worried about catching (15%) and falling seriously ill from COVID-19 (16%) than people with higher incomes (10% and 11%, respectively). Major stress about catching COVID-19 is highest in those over 60 (14%), but 15% of adults in both this age group and those aged 30-59 reported being worried about falling seriously ill from the disease.

Launched in the week before lockdown started, the ongoing UCL COVID-19 Social Study is funded by the Nuffield Foundation with additional support from Wellcome and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). It is the UK's largest study into how adults are feeling about the lockdown, government advice and overall wellbeing and mental health with over 70,000 participants who have been followed across the last 46 weeks.

Lead author, Dr. Daisy Fancourt (UCL Epidemiology & Health Care) said: "It is not surprising that younger people are most worried about the impact of Brexit. A greater proportion of younger people voted to Remain than to Leave in the 2016 Brexit referendum and the ongoing news about the ramifications of leaving the EU for jobs, finances and businesses is likely to have a greater impact on younger people. There is also the perception among younger people that they are at lower risk from COVID-19 and that even if they do catch the disease, they are unlikely to become seriously ill.

"On the flip side of this, older people are less likely to have been affected by the new arrangements since the Brexit transition period ended but are at a higher risk of becoming seriously ill from COVID-19, leading to greater stress around catching the disease and reduced worry about Brexit."

Alongside these worries, respondents have said that the current lockdown is causing more upheaval to their lives than the first lockdown in 2020. A quarter (24%) report that their lives are 'completely different' from usual, compared to 18% in 2020. In England, adults aged 18-29 continue to report the greatest differences in their lives compared to pre-pandemic, and the number reporting their lives as being 'completely different' has increased from 23% in 2020 to 31% in 2021.

Women are also being impacted more by the current lockdown than men, with over a quarter (27%) saying their lives are 'completely different' compared to before the pandemic versus a fifth (22%) of men.

Despite this upheaval, compliance is at its highest levels since May 2020, with 96% of people reporting 'majority' compliance with the rules and 60% reporting 'complete' compliance.

Cheryl Lloyd, Education Programme Head at the Nuffield Foundation said: "These survey results show that young adults (18-29 year olds) are experiencing greater differences in their lives compared to before the pandemic and higher levels of loneliness than other age groups. The ongoing crisis has also had an impact on young people's opportunities.

"As Nuffield-funded research from the Resolution Foundation has shown, young people are some of the most likely to be furloughed or to stop working during the pandemic. More needs to be done to provide young people with adequate support, including access to mental health services, and the skills they need to re-enter the job market."

The study team is also running the COVID-MINDS Network: an international network of over 140 longitudinal mental health from over 70 countries. Through the network, dozens of scientists and clinicians are coming together internationally to collate results from mental health studies running in countries around the world and compare findings. The initiative is supporting the launch of new mental health studies in other countries, to research whether actions taken in specific countries are helping to protect mental health.

More information: Understanding the psychological and social impact of the pandemic: Understanding the psychological and social impact of the pandemic: www.covidsocialstudy.org/
Conservative MP Sir Desmond Swayne has admitted he was wrong to say being gay was 'gross and unnatural,' in Parliament 20 years ago - pinning his outdated views on 'intellectual laziness'.

The former senior aide to David Cameron previously voted against reducing the age of consent in the gay community from 18 to 16, while also supporting the ban on promoting homosexuality in schools, known as Section 28.

Parliament archives show in 2000 he said homosexuality is 'gross and unnatural' and the same year he caused outrage when he appeared to agree with an American evangelist's description of Scotland as a 'dark land where public life is dominated by homosexuals'.

The New Forest MP also claimed that homosexuality differed from 'ordinary sexual behaviour'.

Two decades on, the 64-year-old has written a blog stating he has undergone a 'transformation,' and now finds his previous comments 'shocking'.

LGBT campaign group Stonewall said the MP's comments were 'refreshing'.

Sir Desmond is no stranger to controversy. In 2019 he defended wearing blackface to a fancy dress party, saying people have 'lost their sense of humour'.

Sir Desmond Swayne has condemned comments he made in 2000, describing being gay as 'gross and unnatural'. The Tory MP said he found the comments 'shocking,' adding he has undergone a 'transformation'

Last year he condemned the death of George Floyd, but warned Black Lives Matter protesters 'have it coming,' amid reports of rioting and looting in parts of the US.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the outspoken MP has been criticised for sharing 'dangerous misinformation' about the virus and has been a vocal critic of lockdown measures.

Concerning his new outlook on the LGBT community, the former Minister for International Development has shared a blog on his website titled 'How I Came to Recant'.

It reads: '[Speeches] I made years ago in debates about the repeal of Section 28 and reducing the age of sexual consent have surfaced, in which my antediluvian prejudices are quite shocking, even to me.

'How could I have ever believed such things, let alone said them?'

He added: 'I call it a transformation not an evolution, because it was sudden.

'I put my original prejudice down to intellectual laziness. I simply never challenged, or even thought about the views that I held.

'Furthermore, when I received a very large correspondence in support of my position and against the liberalising measures that we were debating, it was so much easier to simply reply by stating that I agreed with them, rather than investing any intellectual effort in the matter.'

Sir Desmond, an MP since 1997, said he had a 'flash of enlightenment' when Parliament debated the Sexual Orientation Regulations legislation and how it impacted homosexual customers using commercial services such as in the hospitality industry.

He added that his 'transformation' saw him 'become the champion of the Equal Marriage Act, the Lord Commissioner responsible for whipping it through all its stages in the Commons'.

In 2000, while debating the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Bill to lower the consent age for homosexuals from 18 to 16, which was ultimately passed, the MP said homosexuality is 'unequal'.

Sir Desmond Swayne has come under fire in recent years after defending wearing blackface at a fancy-dress party. He has also been criticised for sharing 'dangerous misinformation' about the Covid-19 pandemic and has been a vocal critic of lockdown measures

He said: 'It is a restriction that applies only for two years. If the love is that profound, can it not wait?

'I believe that homosexuality and ordinary sexual behaviour are clean different, and not equal in any way. It is proper that the law should establish that inequality.

'It is proper that young men of 16, who I believe are still very impressionable, should have the assistance of the law in reinforcing a powerful message that homosexual behaviour is not normal.

'Those parties disappointed at 16 by being unable to pursue their homosexual desires are only being asked to wait two years until they are marginally more mature and better able to make the decision.'

In 2004, he was in the minority when he voted 'no' on the Civil Partnership Bill.

Following last week's blog, Eloise Stonborough, associate director of policy & research at Stonewall, said: Its refreshing to hear Sir Desmond Swayne reflect on how his views on LGBT+ rights have changed since he spoke against the repeal of Section 28 and reducing the age of consent.

'Too often in todays polarised society, its assumed people cant change their minds or grow from past mistakes, but Sir Desmond Swayne shows that doesnt have to be the case.

'People in positions of political power have a responsibility to champion the individuals they represent, and to invest the time and effort to understand the issues at stake.

We have always relied on bold leadership to secure our freedom, our equity and our potential.

'Today, more than ever, we need leaders from across society to step up, be courageous, challenge misinformation and support LGBT+ communities.'
Scoffing at Tripura CM Biplab Deb's remarks that 'BJP will form govt in Sri Lanka and Nepal', Congress on Monday, claimed that such 'stupid remarks' were the reason why India's relation with its neighbours was souring. Shiv Sena spokesperson Priyanka Chaturvedi too wondered what MEA thought of Deb's 'ridiculous claims'. Deb had allegedly claimed that former BJP President Amit Shah has plans to establish a government in Nepal and Sri Lanka. Deb said that Amit Shah during his visit to Tripura, in a tea party with the state leadership, said that he plans to establish the party in neighbouring countries after winning in most of the states in India.

Tripura CM asks people to decide his leadership future on Dec 13; BJP reassures Biplab Deb

Congress: 'Due to such stupid remarks..'

Wonder what MEA thinks about such ridiculous comments coming from someone who is not merely a BJP member but also appointed CM of Tripura. https://t.co/3zSwyKyO1P  Priyanka Chaturvedi (@priyankac19) February 15, 2021

BJP plans to expand into Nepal & Sri Lanka, form govts there: Tripura CM quotes Amit Shah

Deb: 'Amit Shah plans to form govt in Nepal & Sri Lanka'

We were talking in the state guest house when Ajay Jamwal (North-East Zonal Secretary of BJP) said that BJP has formed its government in several states of India. In reply Shah said, Now Sri Lanka and Nepal is left. We have to expand the party in Sri Lanka, Nepal and win there to form a government, the Chief Minister said quoting the Union Home Minister on Saturday, during a party program in Rabindra Satabarshiki Bhavan.

Deb said it was only under the leadership of Amit Shah that the BJP became the worlds largest party. "The communist had claimed that their party was the largest in the world, which Amit Shah broke by making BJP the largest party in the world. The BJP will change the trend of change of government between the Left and the Congress every five years in Kerala and emerge as the winner in the southern state as well," he said. Even BJP Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy scoffed saying, "Was the CM joking? Or sarcastic? He could not be serious."

When HM was party chief, he had visited the state. We were sitting & talking. We said that we've so many states(BJP govt in several states). He said Sri Lanka & Nepal still remain. He said that we've to take party to Sri Lanka & Nepal too. We've to win there too: Tripura CM(13.2) pic.twitter.com/fWHiJpjlSH  ANI (@ANI) February 15, 2021

BJP ministers slam Congress neta's 'liquor help' to farmers protests: 'Can't revive Cong'

Deb's previous controversial claims

Last year, the Tripura CM was in hot water after making highly controversial remarks at an event where he drew a comparison between people of Punjab and Haryana with Bengalis, saying that Punjabis and Haryanvi are physically strong but have "dull brains" whereas nobody can beat the "wit and the brain of a Bengali". Even before that, he claimed that advanced technologies such as telecommunications satellites, TVs, and missiles were available to those fighting the Mahabharata war. Deb, currently faces rebellion in Tripura BJP itself with 4 BJP MLAs complaining to BJP chief J P Nadda about the alleged misgovernance and pointed out that it could lead to BJP's defeat in the 2023 Assembly polls. Deb was assured by Nadda that he will continue as CM.

Haryana Congress neta urges workers to help farmers protest: 'Can give them money, liquor'
Valerie Taylor is one of the first to capture great white sharks on film and dive with them without a cage. Along with her husband Ron, she was involved with the worlds first documentaries on great whites, and was called upon by Steven Spielberg to capture the shark footage seen in the 1975 blockbuster Jaws.

These days, Taylor is trying to secure protections for great whites and the rest of the marine world through her work as an activist and conservationist, work that has earned her the Order of Australia. She is the subject of the new documentary Playing With Sharks, which premiered at Sundance and was acquired by National Geographic Documentary Films.

Below, Taylor describes her first experience in the water with a great white shark, and what is was like to film those sequences for Jaws. Her story appears as told to Charles Thorp, and has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Valerie Taylor

I taught myself to SCUBA dive off the coast of Australia, along with my husband Ron, and our first was pursuit was spearfishing. Eventually became national champions in the sport, until we both decided to quit after winning the titles.

During my time as a spearfishing lady, there were always sharks around, because they were interested in the fish that I caught. I would usually just give them the catch  or swim away whenever they got too close.

The first time I saw a great white properly in the water, I was in a shark cage in Australia. It was like seeing an underwater freight train coming out from the mist. He swam straight towards the cage and crashed into it. I remember thinking, Wow, this is some beast. It is the epitome of a wild animal, and the epitome of an apex predator.

Ron and I started working on great white videos, some of the first, and the director Peter Gimbel saw one of them. This was in the early 70s, and he decided to cast us for his feature documentary Blue Water White Death. The movie followed us during some of our dives and spotlighted the work that we were doing at the time with sharks.

That was seen by two movie producers, Richard Zanuck and David Brown, who sent us the galley proofs for a new book coming out called Jaws. They asked us if we thought it would make a good movie. We both read it and thought, Yes! It was very interesting, not to mention we saw work for ourselves in it, so that helped to motivate us in giving the positive review.

Once the movie was going they hired us immediately. They smartly decided to get the live shark footage before filming the rest of the movie, because it would be much easier to adjust the acted scenes than to change what the real sharks were doing. We employed Rodney Fox, who was an abalone diver, to go on the shoot with us. He handled the baits, and helped with the other boat work.

We decided to stay on familiar ground in South Australia, off of Dangerous Reef, to get the footage. It was an area well known for great whites. They were attracted there by the great number of sea lions that lived there. Ron had his big film camera on hand, and that is what we used to get the footage that they needed.

The shark in the movie was supposed to be 25 feet long, and the sharks on the reef were closer to 15 or 16 feet long. So to keep the appearance right, we went out on a very small boat, built a smaller shark-proof cage, and hired a very short actor. We learned after the fact that he really didnt know how to dive, and was worried about being around the sharks. At that moment there were about three large great whites gliding around outside.

We didnt want to force anyone into the cage, and it was good that we didnt, because suddenly a huge 16-foot great white got caught in the wench that was connected to the cage. The shark started thrashing around, the wench broke off the side of the abalone boat, and fell down into a frothing mess in the sea. The cage was destroyed  clearly not as shark-proof as we had thought.

If that actor had been in the cage when this happened, he would have died. We were fortunate that he was so reluctant. We were even more fortunate that Ron was already in the water and filming. I had run across the boat to grab our other camera and started filming from above as well. It was some of the most incredible shark footage anyone had ever seen, so of course the studio was happy.

Taylor with the animatronic Bruce Valerie Taylor

They rewrote the script to reflect the shark breaking up the cage, because that was a pretty dramatic sequence, and would be silly not to use it. We captured a lot of great footage during those trips. There were a lot of large sharks, and was a lot of great, what we call action happening. Every time you see a full great white shark in the movie, it is an Australian great white playing the part of the American great white.

Our work didnt end with the shark footage. Ron went on trips to America to meet Steven Spielberg and help them build Bruce, which is what they nicknamed the mechanical shark that plays Jaws. Eventually the studio flew both of us over to Marthas Vineyard to check out the set and meet all of the actors. I got to know them all quite a bit, but Roy Scheider used to sit with us on the beach when we were playing extras. He was very interested in the marine world.

The film was very successful, which was good, but we were a bit horrified by the way that some people reacted to the film. They became afraid of the water. They became terribly afraid of sharks. One woman even told me that she was afraid to get into the bath after seeing it. That seemed ridiculous to me. You dont go to New York and worry about King Kong hanging off of the Empire State Building, because it is a fictitious story. In the same way, you dont go into the ocean and worry about Bruce.

The biggest shark that I ever saw in the ocean in Australia was probably around 20 feet long, and we called her Big Mama. But I have learned during all of my experiences that sharks arent looking to eat people. I myself have been bitten four times, but I have always been able to pull away after. They arent out there looking for us, but they are being hunted as trophies.

Great whites are an important part of the underwater ecosystem, and it is sad to see them killed for no reason. They are slow breeders, and their numbers are already low. I havent seen any sharks the size of what we had around when we were doing the movie. That is why I have dedicated my life to getting them protected. I hope people will open their minds, and help me save these great, wild animals.

This series is done in partnership with the Great Adventures podcast hosted by Charles Thorp. Check out new and past episodes on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts from. Past guests include Bear Grylls, Andrew Zimmern, Chris Burkard, NASA astronauts, Navy SEALs and many others.

The post What It Was Like to Film the Shark Sequences for Jaws appeared first on InsideHook.
Haryana Home Minister Anil Vij had earlier today tweeted condemning Disha Ravi, a 21-year-old climate activist arrested in connection with the "toolkit" on farmers' protests shared by Greta Thunberg. The tweet has since been removed, and restored again by Twitter.

Vij had tweeted in Hindi, "Those with seeds of anti-nationalism in their minds should be destroyed, whether it is Disha Ravi or someone else."

                  #_      ANIL VIJ MINISTER HARYANA (@anilvijminister) February 15, 2021

Twitter had deleted the tweet after a complaint was filed by a user from Germany under that country's Network Enforcement Act. Under the law, social media companies are required to delete unlawful content within a short period of time.

The minister later shared a screenshot of another notification sent to him Twitter which stated that the content of his tweet was investigated and "it is not subject to removal under Twitter Rules".

Disha Ravi was arrested for being allegedly involved in sharing the "toolkit" related to the farmer's protest on social media. The Delhi Police had claimed that 21-year-old activist, who was arrested by a Cyber Cell team of the force on Saturday, was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.
A police officer adjusts his helmet at a barricade outside the Seattle Police Departments East Precinct in Seattle, Wash., on June 2, 2020. (Jason Redmond/AFP/Getty Images)

Seattle Antifa Protesters Build Snow Barrier to Block Police Vehicles From Exiting East Precinct

Purported Antifa protesters on Saturday built a snow barrier outside the Seattle Police Departments East Precinct, a move that blocked police from responding to emergencies during a snow storm.

A video posted to Instagram shows a police vehicle attempting to drive over the snow barrier, before rolling backwards down a ramp.

A crowd of around a dozen demonstrators cheered as the police vehicle struggled to bypass the snow barrier, a separate video of the incident shared by journalist Andy Ngo on Twitter shows.

Antifa goons blocked the exit of the East Precinct with a pile of snow tonight, in an effort to stop vehicles from responding to emergency calls, another video posted by the same Instagram user, standwithseattlepd, claims.

Journalist Ngo added: Overnight, #antifa in Seattle gathered to pile snow on one of the driveways of the Seattle Police east precinct (where CHAZ used to be). They stopped police from being able to drive out to respond to calls during the snow storm.

Seattles East Precinct was at the center of violent riots that took place in the summer months of last year. Former President Donald Trump said in September 2020 that Seattles city government had allowed anarchists and rioters to take over six square blocks of the city that they named CHAZ (Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone) and later CHOP (Capitol Hill Occupied Protest). The protest zone was dismantled by July 1.

President Donald Trump speaks to the media as he makes his way to board Air Force One before departing from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on Jan. 12, 2021. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

The far-left, anarcho-communist Antifa network is vehemently against the police, frequently calling for the abolition of police departments and jails.

Instagram user seattleblmfairy uploaded a 15-minute long video in which one of the demonstrators can be heard saying that the crowd are just having a friendly snowball fight here at the East Precinct.

The cops are being aggressive and violating peoples rights, another can be heard saying.

One police officer with the precinct addresses the crowd, telling them that they cannot block police from exiting a police vehicle precinct.

Another officer attempts to push a member of the group away from the snow barrier, before two others say stop touching her and were literally not blocking your building.

After the snow barrier is cleared by officers, they head back inside the precinct while the group continue to hurl snowballs and shout at them.

The Seattle Police Department didnt immediately respond to a request for comment by The Epoch Times. It is unclear whether any arrests were made.

The Porsche driver accused of filming a dying police officer after a horrific crash that killed four officers is set to plead guilty to charges next month.

Millionaire businessman Richard Pusey, 41, appeared via videolink on Monday in a Melbourne court where he faced numerous charges - one of which hasn't been used since the 1600s in England.

'Amazing. Absolutely amazing. All I wanted to do was go home and eat my sushi and now you have f**ked my f**king car,' Pusey was allegedly heard to say as Leading Senior Constable Lynette Taylor lay dying.

Richard Pusey was arrested on April 23, one day after the fatal crash which killed four police officers

Pictured: Emergency services trying to remove a Porsche from the scene the day after a fatal crash on Eastern Highway in Kew

Pusey had avoided the crash that killed the officers after he jumped the fence to urinate.

A listing for Pusey's arraignment in the County Court of Victoria appeared online on Monday just hours after his suppressed court hearing took place.

Pusey is being represented by top Melbourne barrister Dermot Dann, QC, who has long argued his client would plead guilty to some charges if police cut his client a deal.

His client has been listed to appear at the County Court of Victoria on March 1.

Pusey remains in jail at the Metropolitan Remand Centre where he has languished since he was arrested again late last year after causing a scene on the roof of his Fitzroy home.

He has been contesting a charge of 'outraging public decency', which was added to his existing 12 charges in late June.

Pusey has long contested the offence on the basis it has never been used in Australian legal history.

The court listing suggests either Pusey has given up his fight over the charge or police have.

Prosecutor Robyn Harper had previously warned Pusey that the Crown would not back down on the ancient 'outrage' charge, arguing that elements of the charge had been used before in prosecuting sex offenders.

Ms Harper produced newspaper court reports dating back more than 100 years to back-up her claims.

Whatever the case, the development moves Pusey a step closer to finally being released from jail.

While in the lower magistrates' court, it was heard that Pusey had been co-operative with police after they pulled him over on April 22 on Melbourne's Eastern Freeway amid allegations he was speeding.

Mr Dann said Pusey's behaviour toward Leading Senior Constable Taylor had been conducted in a 'good natured way' before the truck hit.

'There was laughing between them. This can be seen. There is evidence of Mr Pusey describing Leading Senior Constable Taylor as being lovely and nice. And this is in the immediate aftermath of this filming,' Mr Dann said.

'It's no part of the defence case that there can be some kind of characterisation of this whole event as Mr Pusey being angry with the individual officers that he was dealing with at the scene. We say that's not part of our case and it's not the evidence.'

The mortgage broker (pictured in a court sketch) avoided being struck because he'd been urinating off to the side of the road

Pusey had faced a dozen charges and has indicated he will plead guilty to at least some of them

Senior Constable Kevin King (pictured, far left), Constable Glen Humphris (second from left), Leading Senior Constable Lynette Taylor (second from right) and and Constable Josh Prestney (far right) all died in the crash

Mr Dann said his client had not argued with police and said the prosecution agreed too that Pusey had not taunted the dying officer.

'He cannot be described as taunting any of the police officers,' he said.

Mr Dann argued no trace of the actual charge being prosecuted could be found in Australian legal history.

The court had heard previously the legal process could have dragged on for years if Pusey contested the charge.

The driver of the truck, Mohinder Singh, had already pleaded guilty to four counts of culpable driving and also remains behind bars.

Mr Dann had previously argued that even if the charge did exist, his client could not have been found guilty of it because hardly anyone had heard his comments.

Top Melbourne barrister Dermot Dann, QC, (left) claimed police had charged Richard Pusey with an offence that may not even exist in Australia. He is pictured with ex Tiger Jake King

Pusey has been behind bars practically since April when a truck crashed into four officers after they pulled him over for allegedly driving at 149km/h in his Porsche 911 with cannabis and ice in his system.

The three male officers were already dead when Pusey allegedly began filming.

Public funerals were held for all four officers after the tragedy, which marked the single greatest loss of police life in Victoria's history.

Pusey's previous 12 charges include driving at a dangerous speed, reckless conduct endangering life, destruction of evidence, perverting the course of justice, failing to remain at the scene after a drug test and failing to render assistance.

At a previous hearing, Magistrate Jo Metcalf labelled Pusey's alleged filming of the graphic crash scene as 'highly intrusive and morally repugnant' but noted it was not illegal.
The UK Supreme Court on Friday allowed a group of 42,500 Nigerian farmers and fishermen to sue Royal Dutch Shell (RDS) in English courts after years of oil spills in the Niger Delta contaminated land and groundwater.

Senior judges said UK-domiciled Shell, one of the worlds biggest energy companies, did have a common law duty of care, in the latest case to test whether multinationals can be held to account for the acts of overseas subsidiaries.

The ruling comes almost two years after a seminal ruling by the Supreme Court in a case involving mining company Vedanta. The judgment allowed nearly 2,000 Zambian villagers to sue Vedanta in England for alleged pollution in Africa.

That move was seen as a victory for rural communities seeking to hold parent companies accountable for environmental disasters. Vedanta ultimately settled out of court in January.

Nigerias Ogale and Bille communities allege their lives and health have suffered because repeated oil spills have contaminated the land, swamps, groundwater and waterways and that there has been no adequate cleaning or remediation.

Represented by law firm Leigh Day, they argued that Shell owed them a duty of care because it either had significant control of, and was responsible for, its subsidiary SPDC. Shell countered that the court had no jurisdiction to try the claims.

(The ruling) also represents a watershed moment in the accountability of multinational companies. Increasingly impoverished communities are seeking to hold powerful corporate actors to account and this judgment will significantly increase their ability to do so, Daniel Leader, partner at Leigh Day, said.

SPDC is the operator of oil pipelines in a joint venture between the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation which holds a 55% stake, Shell which holds 30%, Frances Total with 10%, Italys Eni with 5%.

A Shell spokesman said the decision was disappointing.

Regardless of the cause of a spill, SPDC cleans up and remediates. It also works hard to prevent these sabotage spills, by using technology, increasing surveillance and by promoting alternative livelihoods for those who might damage pipes and equipment, Shell said.

Shell has blamed sabotage for oil spills. It said in its annual report published last March that SPDC, which produces around 1 million barrels of oil per day, saw crude oil spills caused by theft or pipeline sabotage surge by 41% in 2019.

Shell CEO Ben van Beurden said last week that the firm would take another hard look at its onshore oil operations in the west African country.

The ruling is the second judgment against Shell this year regarding claims against its Nigerian operations. In a landmark Dutch ruling two weeks ago, an appeals court held Shell responsible for multiple oil pipeline leaks in the Niger Delta and ordered it to pay unspecified damages to farmers, in a victory for environmentalists.

Leigh Day said that the amount of compensation sought would be quantified as the case enters the trial stage.

In 2015, Shell agreed to pay out 55 million pounds ($83.4 million) to the Bodo community in Nigeria in compensation for two oil spills, which was the largest ever out-of-court settlement relating to Nigerian oil spills.

(Reporting by Julia Payne and Kirstin Ridley; editing by John Stonestreet, William Maclean)

Topics Lawsuits Agribusiness Energy Oil Gas
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As the social media giants continue to crack down on those who violate their trans-activist talking points (see here and here), another perspective has been raised from an unexpected source. Im talking about a powerful, deeply moving article posted in Newsweek and titled, We Need Balance When It Comes To Gender Dysphoric Kids. I Would Know.

The author of the op-ed is Scott Newgent, self-described as a 48-year-old transgender man. What Newgent has written is courageous, deeply revealing, poignant, and accurate.

Perhaps others will now heed these urgent warnings, since those of us on the conservative Christian side who have been presenting similar cases have been largely ignored to this day.

Six years ago, Newgent was told by the medical community that she could turn from a woman into a man. But, Newgent adds, all the negatives were glossed over.

As a result, I have suffered tremendously, including seven surgeries, a pulmonary embolism, an induced stress heart attack, sepsis, a 17-month recurring infection, 16 rounds of antibiotics, three weeks of daily IV antibiotics, arm reconstructive surgery, lung, heart and bladder damage, insomnia, hallucinations, PTSD, $1 million in medical expenses, and loss of home, car, career and marriage. All this, and yet I cannot sue the surgeon responsible  in part because there is no structured, tested or widely accepted baseline for transgender health care.

Most of us cannot imagine this kind of trauma, let alone imagine telling a story like this to the whole world.

Yet, because it comes from the mouth of a biological female who now identifies as a male, the author can hardly be called transphobic. Plus, this op-ed was published in Newsweek rather than in a Focus on the Family magazine.

Unfortunately, when Christian conservatives have stated these same facts, we have been branded hateful and bigoted and transphobic. Not only so, but when former transgenders like Walt Heyer or Laura Perry tell their own, agonizing (yet redemptive) stories, they too are branded hateful and bigoted. (To see their stories for yourself, watch this free documentary. You wont regret taking the time. You can also visit the SexChangeRegret website for more.)

But it is love and truth that caused Newgent to write, not hate. As Newgent states, It is not transphobic or discriminatory to discuss this  we as a society need to fully understand what we are encouraging our children to do to their bodies.

Thats why Abigail Shrier wrote her important book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters, named a book of the year by The Economist and one of the best books of 2021 by The Times and The Sunday Times.

The alarm must be sounded. The warning must be issued. Not only are adults destroying their bodies and their lives, but our children are doing so as well. Doesnt love compel us to speak?

Consequently, when Amazon refused to allow Shriers publisher to advertise the book on their site (sell it, yes, but advertise it, no), wasnt it Amazon, not the publisher, that displayed dangerous bias?

Newgent, who previously identified as a lesbian, experienced many doubts about the transitioning process. But rather than the professionals slowing down the transition process, they all encouraged her to keep going. This is just what you need!

To the contrary, the surgeries and drugs took a terrible toll on Newgent, who found no real help in the medical world that was so quick to recommend her transition.

During my post-operation 17 months of sheer survival, Newgent writes, I discovered that transgender health care is experimental and that large swaths of the medical industry encourage minors to transition due, at least in part, to fat profit margins.

Yet those of us who seek to raise a cautionary flag, those of us who say, Slow down! Lets see if you can be helped from the inside out, are branded the haters and the transphobes. How can this be?

I urge everyone reading this article to take the time to read every word of Newgents op-ed. A summary cannot begin to do justice to her journey, from the physical pain to the emotional agony to the devastating losses to the list of negative consequences.

In fact, everyone considering transitioning should memorize this list of 13 potential consequences. It begins with decreased life expectancy and includes no improved mental health outcomes. To call it sobering would be a gross understatement.

Remarkably, after citing examples from other countries which are rethinking their approach to sex-change surgery and treatments, Newgent writes, We now have the obligation to work together to slow trans medicalization of minors until they are adults and have the capacity to truly understand the lifelong consequences of transitioning. As a former lesbian and current trans man, I maintain this is not transphobic. It is actually sensitive and caring to recognize that not just one treatment or pathway is right for all kids.

But of course. It is love that has motivated many of us to call for this very slow down  in particular, love for the children. (You can see for yourself how my call for this on Tyra Banks was received over 10 years ago.)

Newgent closes with this: So, endocrinologists and pediatricians, moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans, radical feminists and evangelicals, lawyers and psychologists, parents and teachers: My hand is out. I will grab yours and turn down no one. Together, we can build a circle around our most precious resource: our children. Help me fulfill the promise I made on the night I almost gave up, to be here for my children  and now yours. Who's with me?

As a conservative evangelical, I say to Scott Newgent: for this cause, I am with you. Lets do something to stop the madness. Lets put the children first. And if I can be of help to you on any personal level as you work through your own journey, count me in.
The World Health Organization has approved the AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford COVID vaccine for emergency use, NBC News reports.

We now have all the pieces in place for the rapid distribution of vaccines, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Monday, the outlet reports. But we still need to scale up production.

The AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine has been lauded as less expensive to manufacture than the Pfizer and Moderna shots. Studies show that the two-dose vaccine is more effective when the second dose was delayed more than six weeks.

The University of Oxford found that a single dose of the vaccine was 76% effective against the respiratory infection for the first 90 days. The vaccines efficacy increased from 54.9% with an interval of less than six weeks to 82.4% when spaced 12 or more weeks apart, researchers said.

Research also showed that AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine shot may not only protect against symptoms, but reduces transmission by up to 67%. The vaccine has still not yet been approved for emergency use in the United States.

We continue to call for Covid-19 vaccine developers to submit their dossiers to WHO for review at the same time as they submit them to regulators in high-income countries, Ghebreyesus said, NBC News reports.

It is unclear, as is the case with the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, exactly how effective the AstraZeneca-Oxford shot will be in combating a number of COVID variants reported and closely monitored in the U.S. and other parts of the globe. One trial showed that it did not protect participants against mild or moderate illness caused by the highly infectious South African variant, according to the New York Times.

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A skilled but relatively inexpensive workforce, good infrastructure and a slew of free trade agreements position Vietnam as a key supply chain hub, experts say.

"Vietnam is rapidly emerging as one of the world's new manufacturing hubs as multinationals are diversifying their production to build greater resilience in their supply chains following severe production disruptions during the Covid-19 pandemic," said Rajiv Biswas, Asia-Pacific chief economist at IHS Markit, a world's leading company providing analytics for major industries and markets.

According to the General Statistics Office, phones and components fetched the biggest value among Vietnam's exports last year, at $50.9 billion, or 18.1 percent of the country's export turnover.

Biswas said exports of computers and related products rose by an estimated 20 percent in the third quarter as a global shift to remote working boosted demand.

Vietnam significantly increased its share of global exports of computers in the past five years, and is now competing with China in terms of total exports.

An Intel's facility in Saigon Hi-Tech Park, HCMC. Photo by Intel Corporation.

According to Biswas, a key factor driving supply chain diversification is the massive disruption to industrial production in China during the Covid lockdown in early 2020.

This created supply chain vulnerabilities for many multinationals due to excessive reliance on manufacturing in China.

Other factors to seek diversification include the U.S.-China trade war. With the U.S. imposing punitive tariffs on imports from China, multinationals are looking for alternative manufacturing locations for exports to the U.S.

Vishrut Rana, an economist at S&P Global Ratings focusing on the Asia-Pacific region, said in 2020 Vietnam became a key part of the electronic supply chain in this part of the world.

It means there is continued interest from companies across Asia in particular to move to Vietnam or expand existing operations in the country after it had a strong 2020 in terms of FDI, he said.

He explained that though last year was poor for the global economy, it was good for electronics, helped by work from home measures and people buying new accessories.

Competitive advantages

Biswas said Vietnam has been one of the biggest beneficiaries so far of the supply chain diversification thanks to its relatively low manufacturing wages compared to China, a skilled and well educated workforce and good infrastructure following massive investment over the past decade.

Another important competitive advantage for Vietnam is its plethora of bilateral and regional free trade agreements.

The new EU-Vietnam FTA has for instance provided a big fillip to Vietnam's competitive advantage as a global manufacturing hub.

Vietnam is also a member of ASEAN and a part of two major regional free trade agreements, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP).

Rana said, "Vietnam is in a good position as it has been open for FDI, and FDI regulations have been favorable."

Dr Seckin Ozkul, director of the supply chain innovation lab at the University of South Florida in the U.S., said Vietnam has around 10 deepwater ports and a well-trained labor force in the textile and many other industries.

Vietnam has proved that it could produce goods and ship and deliver them, he said.

Rana said the country plays an increasingly important role in global supply chains, particularly in technology, but could easily expand into other areas of manufacturing.

Many major global firms already have operations in Vietnam or are actively considering investing in the country, he said, citing the examples of Samsung 10 years ago and firms from Japan and Taiwan more recently.

This provides confidence to firms considering moving to the country and serves as reference points for them, he said.

As more and more firms move to or expand in Vietnam, the local supply chain grows and firms get access to shared labor markets and better procurement options and suppliers, he said.

In short, as more and more firms build up their capacity in Vietnam, people get this critical mass that attracts even more investment, he said.

"So it's like a virtuous cycle which is quite helpful."

Vietnam could compete with China as a key supplier of some niche technology products because the electronic supply chain is very fragmented with a lot of small products requiring specific expertise, he said.

For example, Singapore has very specific memory microchips, while Vietnam has a big advantage in phone components in which Samsung invested several years ago, he pointed out.

Vietnam and other emerging technology players can aspire for a larger slice of the overall technology manufacturing pie. For instance, South Korea and Japan began automobile production on a small scale but managed to grow into dominant players.

From 2020 experience, the U.S. and China have emerged as big buyers for technology and related products. Europe is another critical market for Vietnam. Rana said these markets will remain Vietnam's buyers this year.

Southeast Asia too offers good opportunities for Vietnam to widen market size since intra-ASEAN trade is becoming increasingly freer.

Electronics and infrastructure networks in ASEAN are very strong, with Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand key technology manufacturers in the supply chain, so Vietnam can leverage that to develop its market.

Ozkul said many companies are still thinking about how to diversify their supply chains after getting hit by Covid-19 and potential uncertainty in the U.S. and China relationship. There have been some tensions between the two powers and they may impact companies planning to go to Asia. They may consider going to Vietnam rather than to China because they don't know how things are going to play out between the new administration of Biden and China's.

In the U.S., things are improving with the Covid-19 vaccine being rolled out. Companies can escape lockdowns and actually plan ahead and look to make investments.

"I see that Vietnam's prospects in the next couple of years are pretty good."

Singapore is a major hub and many things flow through that country, but if Vietnam could cut Singapore out of the picture by directly shipping things to different locations, it could become the center of logistics, he said.

But he admitted there are some questions about deepwater ports in Vietnam like if they could berth new giant ships of 18,000-20,000 TEU and if goods from California in the U.S could be shipped to Vietnam without going through other places.

Ozkul said reliability is also crucial for Vietnam in attracting foreign investors as a new supply chain hub, and the countrys success in controlling the pandemic bodes well in this regard.

The speed at which companies move to Vietnam future depends on several things, he said.

Firstly they would check infrastructure such as the road network, ports and intermodal rail yards and talk to authorities in various places to see what incentives they offer, he said.

The government has a role to play in attracting them by offering incentives.

As for sectors in the supply chain, he noted that electronics companies prefer clusters. For instance, a phone company needs various parts from other suppliers such as microchips, motherboards and screens, and would come to Vietnam if these are available locally to minimize the cost of shipping them from elsewhere, he pointed out.

He recommended that Vietnam should have a deep discussion with foreign investors about the ready workforce in different sectors to attract them.

For instance, if Tesla, the U.S. electric car company, is looking to invest in Vietnam, it would consider if the workforce has basic knowledge it could develop or it has to begin from bottom up, he said.

Vietnam should invest in developing human resources for the logistics industry and supply chain management enabling locals to work such as operations and procurement managers, he said.

"On top of all this, Vietnam could highlight its success in controlling Covid-19 to show there is no disruption for investors."
SCRANTON  U.S. Rep. Matt Cartwrights greatest expectation of his new hire, state Sen. John Blake, is simple: produce jobs.

Blake, D-22, Archbald, will resign his Senate seat March 8, the day he starts working as Cartwrights new district director with an emphasis on economic development. They formally announced the moves at a joint news conference Monday at the former Oppenheim Building in downtown Scranton.

There are those who say the best social program is a job, Cartwright, D-8, Moosic, said. And Im one of them. And John Blake is another one. This is a remarkable opportunity for us in Northeastern Pennsylvania to put John Blake to work doing economic development. Economic development is a $50 phrase: it means more jobs.

The job description for Blake and his decades of government-based economic development experience includes finding worthy ways to spend all the federal money Cartwright promises to bring home in his new House post. Late last month, Cartwright, a House Appropriations Committee member, took over as chairman of the committees Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies Subcommittee, which oversees more than $70 billion in federal spending.

Blake, 60, first elected to the Senate in 2010, said Sunday he grew weary of sitting in a Senate where Democrats always sat in the minority, which thwarted their many legislative hopes. That and the ongoing health struggles of his wife Louise convinced him he wants to work closer to home. He already planned to retire from the Senate next year. He first talked to Cartwright shortly after the November election about working for President Joe Bidens administration, but then Cartwright brought up the district director post.

With Cartwrights growing influence in Washington, D.C., he can do more for the region than I can do in the minority in Harrisburg, Blake said during the news conference. Its really about that, because thats what my life has been about.

Blake spent a decade as executive director of the Lackawanna County Redevelopment Authority in the 1980s and 1990s, several years as a vice president and community development manager at PNC Bank, and more than seven years as Gov. Ed Rendells northeast regional director and in top jobs in Rendells state Department of Community and Economic Development.

Blake will get a raise from $90,335 as a senator to $110,000 a year working for Cartwright. He will replace Bob Morgan, district director since Cartwright first joined Congress in January 2013. Morgan will leave at the end of the month for another opportunity he declined to disclose, and said he has no hard feelings about his departure.

Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman will schedule a special election to replace Blake. The special election will likely coincide with the May 18 primary. Fetterman has already scheduled a special election for that day to fill a vacancy created by the Jan. 17 death of Sen. David Arnold, R-48, who represented all or parts of Lebanon, Dauphin and York counties.

Democratic and Republican parties in Lackawanna, Luzerne and Monroe counties will choose nominees for the special election. The exact nature of the process remains unclear with party chairmen saying they expect to determine that soon.

The special election winner will serve only until Blakes term expires Nov. 30, 2022, unless reelected earlier that month.

The potential Democratic candidates include:

State Rep. Marty Flynn, D-113, Scranton, who confirmed he will seek the nomination and said his seniority in the local House delegation should give him a leg up. Flynn first won his House seat in 2012, and is serving his fifth two-year term.

State Rep. Kyle Mullins, D-112, Blakely, Blakes one-time legislative director and long considered his apparent heir. He first won his seat in 2018, and is serving his second term.

State Rep. Bridget Kosierowski, D-114, Waverly, who won her first full House term in November after winning a special election for the state in March 2019. Kosierowski, a nurse recently named to a state COVID-19 vaccine task force, said thats taking up her time, but shes certainly weighing my options.

Attorney Francis McHale, of Scranton Democrat, a former state Workers Insurance Fund official, said he plans to seek the nomination. McHale unsuccessfully sought the 112th House District seat Democratic nomination when Mullins won.

The potential Republican candidates include:

Lackawanna County Commissioner Chris Chermak. In his second year as a commissioner, Chermak said hes considering seeking the partys nomination.

Scott Twp. Supervisor Mike Giannetta. Giannetta, Chermaks running mate for commissioner in 2019, lost that race amid some controversial Facebook posts. Though Giannetta has said he is eyeing a county judgeship race in 2023, he said he will seriously consider a Senate bid.

Cartwright represents the 8th Congressional District, which includes all of Lackawanna, Pike and Wayne counties, most of Luzerne County and part of Monroe County.

The 22nd Senate District includes all of Lackawanna County; Avoca, Dupont and Duryea boroughs and Pittston Twp. in Luzerne County; and Barrett, Coolbaugh and Price townships in Monroe County. The district is entirely within the 8th Congressional District.
Samsung Electronics' office in Seoul / Yonhap



By Baek Byung-yeul



Amid a wide range of industries struggling with semiconductor shortages, two Korean semiconductor giants  Samsung Electronics and SK hynix  are expanding recruitment to respond to increasing chip demand.



In its device solutions division, which oversees the semiconductor business, Samsung is recruiting experienced engineers for memory chips, large-scale system integration (LSI), foundries and other parts of the semiconductor business industry. SK hynix is also recruiting experienced professionals for its foundry engineering, memory chip and image sensor businesses.



Industry officials said they are expanding their workforces to better compete for a bigger slice of their respective markets and secure a dominant position at a time when more semiconductors will be increasingly used not only in the IT industry but also in other sectors.



For example, global carmakers are experiencing an unprecedented shortage of automotive chips affecting carmakers' vehicle production schedules. The chip shortage has occurred as semiconductor companies have prioritized chips for IT devices and home appliances, which have been in robust demand since the COVID-19 outbreak.



Analysts say a so-called semiconductor super-cycle is approaching thanks to rising chip demand stemming from a huge increase in the number of consumers spending time at home during the pandemic. However, an industry official in the local semiconductor industry pointed out that increasing the number of employees without any proper plans could hinder chip companies' financial flexibility as the semiconductor industry is highly cyclical.



"When the industry is in an upturn cycle, chip companies need a lot more workers to meet the strong chip demand. But when the industry is in a downturn, the increased number of staff could become a financial burden on chip companies," the official said.



Samsung Electronics is being courted by both Europe and the United States, which are asking the tech giant to build its new chip-production factory in their territories. Both Europe and the U.S. are trying to woo Samsung saying they are willing to provide various benefits such as tax cuts.



Although Samsung has not made an official announcement regarding the location of its new chip factory, the company reportedly has asked the city of Austin in Texas to provide tax abatements of around $800 million over a period of 20 years.



Given Samsung has been operating a giant chip-making plant in Austin with the regional government providing various tax and administrative incentives, it appears to be rational for the Korean company to add another factory next to its existing one. Other than Austin, Arizona and somewhere in the state of New York are also mentioned as possible candidate sites for the new factory.



Regarding questions over Samsung's reported plan to build a new semiconductor manufacturing factory in Austin, the city's Department of Economic Development told The Korea Times that it has no specific comments on the matter, saying "the City of Austin does not comment on economic development prospects."



Nevertheless, experts said semiconductor firms will expand recruitment as the chip-making process has become more segmented while demand for chips is on the rise.



"Both the chip-manufacturing departments and the chip-developing departments of semiconductor companies are seeking to increase the number of engineers because chip-developing and manufacturing processes have become subdivided and each process needs more workers," Lee Jong-hwan, a semiconductor engineering professor at Sangmyung University, said.



While Samsung and SK are striving to strengthen their capabilities in the non-memory semiconductor sector including the contract-based chip manufacturing foundry business, Lee said the companies should keep increasing the number of employees.



"Samsung and SK are seeking to improve their competitiveness in the system semiconductor sector and especially the foundry business. I expect the two companies will be able to do better as the foundry business has something in common with the memory chip business, in which they are the most competitive in the world," the professor said.



"To be better players, they will need more engineers as a chip company usually needs around 10,000 employees when launching a new chip-production line and most of the workers are comprised of engineers."


First Lady Melania Trump waits as President Donald Trump talks to reporters before departing with his family from the White House to his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida for the Thanksgiving holiday, in Washington on Nov. 21, 2017. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

Melania Trump Criticizes Medias Unhealthy Obsession With Her After Negative Report

Former First Lady Melania Trumps representatives have criticized CNN over an anonymously sourced report, asserting that the story shows the medias unhealthy obsession with her.

Mrs. Trump is no longer First Lady. She is a private citizen, mother, & wife. Sources in this article are not affiliated w her nor have insight into her thoughts or daily life. CNNs FLOTUS Correspondent choosing to publish false gossip illustrates the medias unhealthy obsession, the office of Melania Trump said in a statement on social media.

The CNN report cited several people in claiming Trumps daily life since leaving office has had nothing to do with politics. One of the unnamed sources allegedly said the former first lady was disengaged from the impeachment trial of her husband, former President Donald Trump, which ended with his acquittal on Feb. 13.

The report didnt cite a single named source.

Trumps office, in addition to its criticism, shared a post by Women for Trump co-founder Amy Kremer, who wrote, Why is it necessary to write a hit piece on Melania Trump after she has left the WH & is just trying to live her life in private, @KateBennett_DC ? Please, have some grace & leave her alone.

Kate Bennett was CNNs primary reporter covering Trump when she was in office.

Bennett and CNN didnt immediately respond to requests by The Epoch Times for comment.

Outgoing President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump address guests at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on January 20, 2021. (Alex Edelman/AFP via Getty Images)

Trump has primarily kept to herself since she and her husband ceded the White House to President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden on Jan. 20.

Trump established a formal personal office on Feb. 12. Supporters were told to follow an account on Twitter to keep current on updates about the former first lady.

Trump also released a video message on Jan. 18, telling supporters she was honored to have been the first lady of the United States.

Trump and the former president are living at Mar-a-Lago, their resort in Palm Beach, Florida.

The family is embroiled in a battle over their residency, with some residents alleging theyre not allowed to live there full-time.

But the president of the Palm Beach Council and the towns attorney have indicated the Trumps can live there, saying that under the towns code, they are likely employees of the resort.

John Marion, the presidents lawyer, told the town council last week that the former president is always present at Mar-a-Lago and has duties including the evaluation of workers.

The former president, meanwhile, issued his latest statement on Feb. 13, after the Senate acquitted Trump a second time.

Our historic, patriotic and beautiful movement to Make America Great Again has only just begun, he said. In the months ahead I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all of our people. There has never been anything like it!

In a rather shocking incident, a 66-year-old woman was arrested by the Secret Service after she was found carrying a fully loaded gun in her vehicle near the White House in Washington, United States. The woman claimed that she was carrying a letter for US President Joe Biden. As per police, a woman identified as Sylvia Hall was carrying the gun without a license. She has been held by the police on charges of carrying a pistol without a license, possession of an unregistered firearm and possession of unregistered ammunition.

A report published inNew York Postmentions that the incident took place around 5:40 PM at security checkpoint near the White House complex.

The report also mentions that the 66 years old woman was accompanied by an unidentified man who has also been arrested for possessing a BB gun. The security personnel found the weapon after they searched the car in which the two of them were traveling. The arrest was made after the officials refused to believe her claim of having a letter for the President.

In September last year, another woman who was suspected of sending a package that contained the poison ricin to the White House was arrested at the New York-Canada border. According to the officials, she was taken in custody by the US Customs and Border Protection officials. In her package, she had written a letter that was addressed to the White House and the then-president Donald Trump. The envelope was found by the government facility that checks all the mail addressed to the White House and US President. Moreover, an official had confirmed that the same package was also sent to law enforcement agencies in the Rio Grande Valley in South Texas.

In a different incident, a veteran Navy official was arrested by the authorities in 2018 after he accepted that he was sending Donald Trump and other people in his administration a substance from which ricin is derived. There was no injury caused to anyone as the mail was caught in time. Something similar also happened in 2014, when a man based out of Mississippi was sent to jail for 25 years for sending letters dusted with ricin to Barack Obama and other officials.

Meanwhile, the security situation in Washington has been quite tense ever since the MAGA riot at the United States Capitol on January 6. A total of five people lost their lives after supporters of former President Donald Trump attacked the congressional building.
on Monday told the that the (NAA) was not following due process of law and was even launching investigation against them when there was no cut in the goods and services tax (GST) rates or any increase in the

Arguments were also put forward challenging the constitutional validity of setting up the NAA without any methodology prescribed for profiteering. The court has posted the matter to March 4.

Earlier, the court had clubbed petitions of over 50 including HUL, Abbott, Johnson & Johnson, Philips, Acme Developers, Samsonite, Jubilant Foods, Nestle, Whirlpool, Samsung, Subway, Reckitt Benckiser and Patanjali, against NAA, Abhishek Rastogi, counsel for several petitioners said.

On behalf of the companies, Rastogi, partner at Khaitan & Co, argued, There have been various instances where the process has not been followed  there is no recording of the prima facie evidence or any conclusive report by the standing committee or the screening committee.



He also cited instances of parties being investigated even when they were not making supply.

The counsel also said that there were cases where real estate projects commencing after the GST cut-off date had been investigated for alleged profiteering.

The first test of anti-profiteering is that there should be a decrease in the tax rate or increase in The instances where there is an absence of these two factors, we have taken them to the court at the DGAP (Directorate General of Anti-profiteering) stage itself, he argued.

Clause 171 has been inserted in the GST Act which provides it mandatory for to pass on the benefit due to the reduction in the rate of tax or from to the consumer by way of commensurate reduction in prices.

The constitutional validity of anti-profiteering provisions was argued today. The validity of the provisions mentioned in Section 171 needs to be tested in the absence of any methodology prescribed to determine the quantum of profiteering, Rastogi said.

He said at this stage, the court wanted to determine whether provisions of anti-profiteering were constitutional. After the court decides the legality of the provisions, it would go into details of individual facts, he informed.

On February 20, the Belarus Digital Skills Coalition will host an online conference which will be held as part of Digital Skills Month. The focus is on digitalization, media literacy and education. The conference is organized by the Digital Skills Coalition Belarus of Belarusian National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum, Digital Communication Network in partnership with Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum, private educational establishment "Stembridge" , Hrodna Media Room, the Youth for Sustainable Development initiative, the EcoLife Leisure Center for Adults and Children, the Equal Opportunities NGO

Source: https://digitalskills.by/2021/02/10/onlajn-konferentsiya-tsifrovye-navyki-v-epohu-covid-20-fevralya-minsk/
Report on fish volumes up leaves Lake Victoria fishermen perplexed

February 15,2021 | Source: The Citizen

While the government reports an increase in the volumes of fish in Lake Victoria, wholesalers and operators of fish processing factories say they cannot see the impact of that - if any!. Official figures from the ministry of Fisheries and Livestock Development show that the volumes of Nile perch in Lake Victoria went up by 95.5 percent in the past five years. The figures show that Nile perch volumes rose from 417,936 tonnes in 2016 to 816,964 in 2020.



Similarly, the volumes of fish caught by fishermen in their natural environment (lakes, oceans, rivers and water dams) went up from 362,645 tonnes in the 2015/16 financial year to 497,567 tonnes in FY- 2019/20. These figures notwithstanding, fish wholesalers and operators of small scale fish processing factories say they have nothing to smile about!. Joseph Maganiko, 44, is one of them. He started a fish business in 2016 by buying Nile perch from wholesale and distributing them to major cities in the country. Mr Maganiko, a resident of Mwanza tells The Citizen that before 2018 the business was booming due to the large availability of Nile perch at the time and, he says, he did not regret his engagement with the trade. The businessman reveals he sold his farm at Sh10 million and used the capital to start a fishery business. For two years (2016 to around 2018) the business was very lucrative and the price was cheaper for us (wholesale), but as I speak to you today, I have abandoned the business because of the operating costs following an abrupt scarcity of fish, claims Mr Maganiko.



Not only Mr Maganikos business that is in shreds, but also the factories are said to be largely affected in terms of production due to the same situation described by the businessman who late last year opted for pastoralism. Beatrice* an employee of the Musoma Fish Processing Ltdsaid fish availability has declined substantially, adding that the factory was processing below its capacity. I can honestly say that from 2018 onwards, the supply of these fish was difficult and the factory greatly reduced production, she says without revealing actual production levels. Mr Maulid Ndamwe, a worker at the Tanzania Fish Processors Ltd (TFS), says a factory that has been processing and exporting Nile perch fillets since 1992 currently receives inadequate fish, which the affects the factorys market chain. Mr Ndamwe, who works in the TFSs waste department where all scraps that are obtained after taking all fillets are shortly stored before being sold, says there has been a decrease in the fish supply. Its noticeable whenever there is an increase in the number of fish but for at least a year or two now, there has been a massive decrease of fish supply in the industry, Mr Ndamwe tells The Citizen in an interview.



Why the situation?



The general secretary of the Tanzania Fishers Union (Tafu), Jephta Machandalo, says illegal fishing using prohibited nets was still a challenge in Lake Victoria. This (illegal) fishing system eliminates fish when they are still young from just three centimetres long and so legitimate fishermen who catch a perch of 50 centimetres end up catching nothing or find very little. This has created a huge shortage of fish to feed the factories in the Lake Zone, explains Mr Machandalo. He expounds that the situation has led to higher operating costs of fishing compared to revenues, leading to fish processing industries to operate below their capacity. Mr Machandalo argues that although the regulations allow fishermen to use of solar instead of Tilley lamps for fishing sardine, the traders and workers in processing factories are of the system [the use of solar] could be catastrophic to Nile perch. Sardine fishing using solar leads to the harvesting of young Nile perch from three centimetres who are then distributed in the local markets, he says. He says that the types of Japanese fishing nets (Zabrown) that have become popular with fishermen may be deeper and longer than normal and thus have a greater ability to harvest fish of all kinds.



Sardine fishermen have acquired the skills and ability to target young Nile perch which they harvest in large quantities using these nets which are legitimate to them, claims Mr Machandalo. As a result, he says, fish - especially perch - were declining so much so that it becomes difficult to safeguard the mid-sized industries. For instance a few years ago, there were eight fish processing factories in Mwanza and now only five are operational. In Musoma there were three such factories but today there is only one left and people have lost jobs, he notes. This, he said, was all due to big investors abandoning the business as a result of high cost of production.



Way forward



Despite these observations by fishermen and fish traders, the countrys Fisheries sector has insisted that it is still cracking down on illegal fishing and has increasingly arrested the perpetrators. Of course there exist illegal practices but we are continuously fighting unlawful fishing and there is a team whose job is to do specifically that, said the permanent secretary in the ministry of Livestock and Fisheries, Dr Rashid Tamatamah. Dr Tamatamah says the ministry will be in a position to speak when its team completes a research to authenticate the cause of the situation and promised to provide time for an interview with The Citizen that will provide answers based on the research outcomes.



But stakeholders suggest that in order to revitalize small businesses and industries in the fisheries sector in the lake region, there must be cooperation in eradicating illegal fishing. They say regulating illegal fishing should be the involvement of all stakeholders instead of using state agencies alone. A group of legitimate fishermen should be involved to help control illegal fishermen who usually do not have special camps like the legal fishermen, we are the victims of this prohibited practice and therefore we should participate in curbing the problem, says Mr Machandalo. He also says that since it is difficult to control the type of fishing that leads to catching young fish, the use of solar, deep and long nets should be revisited. The review should be prioritised while research is conducted against these concepts of solar and netting. The fact is that many fishermen used to use good nets, now they are moving to fishing using nets from Japan, explains Machandalo.

Theme(s): Post Harvest Technology and Trade, Fisheries Resources, Fishing Craft, Gear and Fishing Methods, Freshwater ecosystems and threats, Communities and Organisations, Fisheries Development and Aquaculture, Coastal Ecosystems and Threats, Landing Centres, Others.
A cliff in Jameson Land Basin in central East Greenland, the northernmost site where sauropodomorph fossils are found. The labels point out several series of layers that helped the researchers precisely date the oldest sauropodomorph fossils in North America. Credit: Lars Clemmensen

A new paper refines estimates of when herbivorous dinosaurs must have traversed North America on a northerly trek to reach Greenland, and points out an intriguing climatic phenomenon that may have helped them along the journey.

The study, published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is authored by Dennis Kent, adjunct research scientist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, and Lars Clemmensen from the University of Copenhagen.

Previous estimates suggested that sauropodomorphsa group of long-necked, herbivorous dinosaurs that eventually included Brontosaurus and Brachiosaurusarrived in Greenland sometime between 225 and 205 million years ago. But by painstakingly matching up ancient magnetism patterns in rock layers at fossil sites across South America, Arizona, New Jersey, Europe and Greenland, the new study offers a more precise estimate: It suggests that sauropodomorphs showed up in what is now Greenland around 214 million years ago. At the time, the continents were all joined together, forming the supercontinent Pangea.

With this new and more precise estimate, the authors faced another question. Fossil records show that sauropodomorph dinosaurs first appeared in Argentina and Brazil about 230 million years ago. So why did it take them so long to expand into the Northern Hemisphere?

Map shows how the major continents were arranged 220 million years ago in the Pangea supercontinent. "Isch" and "P" mark locations with sauropodomorph fossils up to 233 million years old. The herbivorous dinosaurs didn't reach Jameson Land in Greenland ("JL") until about 214 million years ago. Credit: Dennis Kent and Lars Clemmensen

"In principle, the dinosaurs could have walked from almost one pole to the other," explained Kent. "There was no ocean in between. There were no big mountains. And yet it took 15 million years. It's as if snails could have done it faster." He calculates that if a dinosaur herd walked only one mile per day, it would take less than 20 years to make the journey between South America and Greenland.

Intriguingly, Earth was in the midst of a tremendous dip in atmospheric CO 2 right around the time the sauropodomorphs would have been migrating 214 million years ago. Until about 215 million years ago, the Triassic period had experienced extremely high CO 2 levels, at around 4,000 parts per millionabout 10 times higher than today. But between 215 and 212 million years ago, the CO 2 concentration halved, dropping to about 2,000ppm.

Although the timing of these two eventsthe plummeting CO 2 and the sauropodomorph migrationcould be pure coincidence, Kent and Clemmensen think they may be related. In the paper, they suggest that the milder levels of CO 2 may have helped to remove climatic barriers that may have trapped the sauropodomorphs in South America.

On Earth, areas around the equator are hot and humid, while adjacent areas in low latitudes tend to be very dry. Kent and Clemmensen say that on a planet supercharged with CO 2 , the differences between those climatic belts may have been extremeperhaps too extreme for the sauropodomorph dinosaurs to cross.

A claw of a bipedal sauropodomorph (Plateosaurus) from the Jameson Land site in East Greenland. Parts of the animal were found in 1995 by Farish Jenkins (Harvard), Neil Shubin (U Penn), Lars Clemmensen (Copenhagen), and others. It is the oldest known specimen in the area. Credit: Dennis Kent

"We know that with higher CO 2 , the dry gets drier and the wet gets wetter," said Kent. 230 million years ago, the high CO 2 conditions could have made the arid belts too dry to support the movements of large herbivores that need to eat a lot of vegetation to survive. The tropics, too, may have been locked into rainy, monsoon-like conditions that may not have been ideal for sauropodomorphs. There is little evidence they ventured forth from the temperate, mid-latitude habitats they were adapted to in Argentina and Brazil.

But when the CO 2 levels dipped 215-212 million years ago, perhaps the tropical regions became more mild, and the arid regions became less dry. There may have been some passageways, such as along rivers and strings of lakes, that would have helped sustain the herbivores along the 6,500-mile journey to Greenland, where their fossils are now abundant. Back then, Greenland would have had a temperate climate similar to New York state's climate today, but with much milder winters, because there were no polar ice sheets at that time.

"Once they arrived in Greenland, it looked like they settled in,'" said Kent. "They hung around as a long fossil record after that."

The idea that a dip in CO 2 could have helped these dinosaurs to overcome a climatic barrier is speculative but plausible, and it seems to be supported by the fossil record, said Kent. Sauropodomorph body fossils have not been found in the tropical and arid regions of this time periodalthough their footprints do occasionally turn upsuggesting they did not linger in those areas.

Next, Kent hopes to continue working to better understand the big CO 2 dip, including what caused it and how quickly CO 2 levels dropped.

Explore further New dinosaur discovery in Switzerland fills a gap in evolutionary history of sauropods

More information: Dennis V. Kent el al., "Northward dispersal of dinosaurs from Gondwana to Greenland at the mid-Norian (215212 Ma, Late Triassic) dip in atmospheric pCO2," PNAS (2021). Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Dennis V. Kent el al., "Northward dispersal of dinosaurs from Gondwana to Greenland at the mid-Norian (215212 Ma, Late Triassic) dip in atmospheric pCO2,"(2021). www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2020778118
When working with clients, it is not unusual to hear, Hey, can we reduce the number of clicks?

And it is a fair request, considering the fact that the websites functionality has a huge impact on conversions, sales and bounce rates. If the visitors cant figure out where to find what they want, they are likely to leave or even worse, look elsewhere. Creating clear, hierarchical website navigation will help your visitors find what they want instantly. This is where information architecture (IA) and user experience (UX) becomes paramount.

Over the years, redesigning websites has been one of the popular requests that brands reach out to the digital agencies like us wherein the aim for the agencies lies in cleaning up the website navigation of the brand. Like a messy bedroom, websites have a tendency to accumulate a lot of junk over the years. Stakeholders cant figure out where new features and pages should go and marketing and sales cant figure out why they aren't getting conversions or leads. Without proper IA and UX, website structures can easily become cluttered and unusable.

The goal of a UX designer is to make tasks easier for users by streamlining the websites navigation and user interactions. A good rule of thumb to follow is to ensure that the website navigation allows the visitor to land on the site and find what they need within 2 to 3 clicks. Every click or interaction should take the user closer to their goal, eliminating as much of the non-essential as possible. The website visitors task will be easier if you provide them with simple navigation and understandable content.

Poor UX can also end up doing more damage to website navigation. Click to Action (CTA)-heavy features might seem irresistible to marketers but using too many of them can make a visitor leave the site instantly, almost like closing the door on an over-pushy salesman. Too much confusion on the site can lead to a higher bounce rate, which is the opposite of user engagement. When it comes to UX, it is important to remain lean. That means having a simple but aesthetic design and layout, a navigation menu that is easy and fast and content that is just enough to entice the visitors.

It is easy to forget that as online marketers, you are likely to know your website in and out. However, what seems intuitive to you, might not be the case for your website visitors. Have a UX designer review your site and flag out any areas that might seem complicated.

Speaking of complicated, for complex workflows and paths, rather than either being overwhelmed by the complexity or simplifying the design and usage, use the layers of complexity as a framework for breaking down tasks. Progressive disclosure is a technique being implemented in many recent websites, apps and products, that guides visitors through multiple screens to perform tasks such as filling long forms, signups or any other complex tasks.

Move complex and less frequently used options out of the main user interface and into secondary screens. Make more information available accessible but dont overwhelm the visitor with all the features.

It all comes down to providing the best user experience possible. Intuitive navigation starts with good, well-defined and mapped IA and UX. Start by analyzing how people are visiting the website and what they are doing on it. Do A/B testing: test different variations of the same page (change text, colors, organization etc.). This will help you figure out which variation works better and how you can further improve the user experience based on real insights.
Hard times reported for a local automaker as a key element in their line is now on hold.

Here's the report:

Ford Motor Co. is shutting down production of its highly profitable 2021 F-150 pickup trucks and Transit Vans for a full week in Missouri, the company confirmed Monday. "Due to unseasonably cold temperatures in the midsection of the United States, Ford was warned that the availability of natural gas could be restricted in the Kansas City area in the coming days," said Kelli Felker, global manufacturing and labor communications manager.
An Offaly Stud has won the prestigious Breeder of the Year Award.

Ringfort Stud in Rhode was one of the big winners at this weeks Irish Thoroughbred Breeders Association (ITBA) National Breeding & Racing Awards 2020, winning the Breeders of the Year award after an outstanding 2020. Their stud farm bred three Group 2-winning two-year-olds - Minzaal, Miss Amulet, and Ubettabelieveit.

The Irish National Stud was this years inductee into the ITBA Hall of Fame. The prestigious award is in recognition of the Irish National Studs invaluable contribution to the Irish thoroughbred industry over many decades and for the contribution it continues to make; from the stallions it stands, to its world-renowned thoroughbred breeding course and the impact the stud makes as a national tourist attraction. On behalf of the Irish State, Minister for Agriculture, Charlie McConalogue accepted this most deserving award.

An Taoiseach Micheal Martin paid tribute to the ITBA and highlighted the positive contribution that the industry provides not only to the economy but to Irish life: You and your colleagues have ensured the Irish breeding industry remains competitive at a global level, despite other nations having larger populations and economies. It is estimated that the thoroughbred industry has an economic impact of 1.9bn with direct and indirect employment of 29,000 people.

The Wild Geese Award 2020 went to the richly deserving Gordon Cunningham of Curragmore Stud in New Zealand while the years Special Recognition Award went to the much loved and respected Todd Watt, who has served Irish vendors at Tattersalls and Tattersalls Ireland so very well over many years and is seen as The Go To Man.

Thanking the ITBA for his invitation, President Michael D. Higgins, paid tribute to the Irish Thoroughbred Industry: The Irish racing and breeding sector is recognized internationally, and for some time, as one with a proud tradition of excellence. This is an indigenous and mostly rural industry that makes a valuable contribution to the social, economic and cultural fabric of this country.

Concluding the evening, ITBA chairman John McEnery said: Despite all the many challenges facing the industry in 2020, Irish breeders and Irish bred horses continued to excel on both the national and international stage. We are indebted to our loyal sponsors without whom we would be unable to stage these awards. We were delighted with the level of participation and engagement by the many viewers, who tuned in from all corners of the bloodstock world via social media to acknowledge the wonderful people and horses who made 2020 such a memorable year for the Irish thoroughbred breeding industry. Congratulations to all deserving winners!

A Perth man who was experiencing hallucinations and delusions when he fatally stabbed his mother, eight-year-old brother and 15-year-old sister has been acquitted of their murder on the basis that he was of unsound mind.

Teancum Vernon Petersen-Crofts, 21, killed his mother Michelle Petersen, 48, brother Rua and sister Bella at their Ellenbrook home on July 15, 2018.

He faced a judge-alone trial in the WA Supreme Court after pleading not guilty to their murders on insanity grounds.

Chief Justice Peter Quinlan on Monday said he was satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that Petersen-Crofts had killed his family members but that he was not criminally responsible for doing so because of his mental illness.

Teancum Vernon Petersen-Crofts, 21, faced a judge-alone trial in the WA Supreme Court over the deaths at their Ellenbrook home on July 15, 2018

Petersen-Crofts, who has been diagnosed with schizophrenia and is being supported by family members, will continue to be detained in a secure psychiatric facility.

Justice Quinlan said he was satisfied that Petersen-Crofts had been deprived of the capacity to control his actions at the time of the killings.

He accepted that Petersen-Crofts had experienced hallucinations and delusions including 'commands and instructions' from various deities.

'The voices were telling you that you must kill your family to save yourself and to save the world,' Justice Quinlan said.

'Those commands were delusions but I find they were real to you at the time, as real as I am speaking to you now.'

His mother Michelle Petersen, 48, was stabbed to death in 2018

The trial heard Ms Petersen had been attempting to get help for her son and had told friends she feared for herself and her younger children because of his increasingly bizarre behaviour in the weeks leading up to the killings.

Psychiatrists told the court he had displayed symptoms of a psychotic disorder since the age of 14 when first admitted to hospital in his native New Zealand.

But Justice Quinlan said Petersen-Crofts had never received adequate or sustained anti-psychotic treatment.

'A criminal trial is not the time or the place to consider how the community can better help people like you who suffer daily from serious mental illnesses,' the judge said.

'But it is still true to say, Mr Petersen-Crofts, that we, the whole community, have failed you. And we failed your mum and your sister and your brother, and we failed your grandmother and the rest of your family whose loss is indescribable.'

The trial heard Petersen-Crofts turned up at his local police station on July 13, shirtless and sweating profusely and claiming his neighbour was a serial killer.

He was detained and transferred to the emergency department at St John of God Hospital in Midland, where doctors said he was likely floridly psychotic.

But the following morning he appeared calm and doctors agreed to discharge him, despite his mother's concerns.

Forensic psychiatrist Daniel de Klerk told the court Petersen-Crofts had been admitted as an inpatient with psychotic symptoms on 12 occasions and presented at emergency departments many more times.

He said he was surprised Petersen-Crofts had not 'been taken more seriously' by doctors at St John of God Hospital.

The Perth man was acting upon 'command hallucinations' and not in control of his actions when he fatally stabbed his mum Michelle Petersen, 48, eight-year-old brother Rua (left) and 15-year-old sister Bella (right)

'The outcome could have been very different had he been admitted,' Dr de Klerk said.

In a recorded police interview the day after the slayings, Petersen-Crofts claimed his neighbour was a serial killer and blamed him for killing his family members.

Later in the interview, he said a deity named 'Big Papa' had committed the crimes.

He also claimed he had 'saved four billion people last night' and repeatedly stated 'put me on death row' before refusing to answer further questions.

The trial heard harrowing evidence about the killings, including that each of the victims received between 44 and 54 stab wounds from a large kitchen knife.

Bella was still alive in the backyard, softly pleading for help, when police arrived. She died on the way to hospital.

Petersen-Crofts was arrested outside a nearby service station after showing up in an agitated state with blood on his hands, telling a worker he had just killed his mother and siblings.

The Pennsylvania Department of Educations annual Safe Schools report for the 2019-20 school year showed a noticeable drop in reported arrests.

Districts are required to submit their misconduct reports, both criminal and academic infractions, to the state every year. Reporting sometimes changes from year-to-year, but no changes were made last school year.

Last year, the top three criminal reasons why students were in trouble statewide were:

Possession, use, or sale of tobacco or vaping  8.34 percent

Fighting  8.14 percent

Minor altercation  5.42 percent

Heres a list of the schools that had the largest number of arrests, and the crime that was most common at each school.

Statewide: Top 25

School buses on Progress Avenue in Susquehanna Township, March 11, 2020. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.com

25. Downingtown High School East Campus

School district: Downingtown Area School District

County: Chester

Enrollment: 1,720

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 13 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

25. Avon Grove High School

School district: Avon Grove School District

County: Chester

Enrollment: 1,713

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 7 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

25. Baldwin Senior High School

School district: Baldwin-Whitehall School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 1,504

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 41 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

25. Pleasant Valley High School

School district: Pleasant Valley School District

County: Monroe

Enrollment: 1,499

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 12 sale, possession, use, or under the influence of alcohol

25. Waynesboro Area Senior High School

School district: Waynesboro Area School District

County: Franklin

Enrollment: 1,279

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 44 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

25. Dubois Area Senior High School

School district: Dubois Area School District

County: Clearfield

Enrollment: 1,029

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 26 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

25. East Stroudsburg Senior High School North

School district: East Stroudsburg Area School District

County: Monroe

Enrollment: 996

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 7 fighting

25. Pittsburgh Obama 6-12

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 851

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 33 fighting

25. Westmont Hilltop Junior-Senior High School

School district: Westmont Hilltop School District

County: Cambria

Enrollment: 748

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 13 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

25. Furness Horace High School

School district: Philadelphia City School District

County: Philadelphia

Enrollment: 721

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 14 reckless endangering

25. Lehman Intermediate School

School district: East Stroudsburg Area School District

County: Monroe

Enrollment: 685

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 9 disorderly conduct; 9 fighting

25. Pittsburgh Morrow K-8

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 621

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 28 fighting

25. Ligonier Valley High School

School district: Ligonier Valley School District

County: Westmoreland

Enrollment: 488

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 13 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

25. Tyrone Area Middle School

School district: Tyrone Area School District

County: Blair

Enrollment: 545

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 16 minor altercation

25. Lackawanna Trail Junior-Senior High School

School district: Lackawanna Trail School District

County: Wyoming

Enrollment: 475

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 8 disorderly conduct

25. Pittsburgh South Hills 6-8

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 433

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 33 minor altercation

25. Farrell Area High School/UMS

School district: Farrell Area School District

County: Mercer

Enrollment: 281

No. of arrests: 7

Most reported offense: 6 fighting; 6 threatening a school official/student

Fighting was the No. 1 reported incident in the Pennsylvania Department of Education's 2019-20 Safe Schools report.

24. Emmaus High School

School district: East Penn School District

County: Lehigh

Enrollment: 2,868

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 19 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

24. Scranton High School

School district: Scranton School District

County: Lackawanna

Enrollment: 1,599

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 8 fighting

24. Exeter Township Senior High School

School district: Exeter Township School District

County: Berks

Enrollment: 1,303

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 16 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

24. Plum Senior High School

School district: Plum Borough School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 1,162

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 12 possession, use of a controlled substance

24. Waynesboro Area Middle School

School district: Waynesboro Area School District

County: Franklin

Enrollment: 1,148

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 9 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

24. Edison High School/Fareira Skills

School district: Philadelphia City School District

County: Philadelphia

Enrollment: 1,089

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 26 student simple

24. Dr. David W Kistler Elementary School

School district: Wilkes-Barre Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 987

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 14 fighting

24. East Norriton Middle School

School district: Norristown Area School District

County: Montgomery

Enrollment: 898

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 50 fighting

24. Shamokin Area High School

School district: Shamokin Area School District

County: Northumberland

Enrollment: 700

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 23 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

24. Pittsburgh Langley K-8

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 545

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 43 minor altercation

24. Shamokin Area Middle School

School district: Shamokin Area School District

County: Northumberland

Enrollment: 356

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 3 possession/use of a controlled substance; 3 possession of a weapon; 3 disorderly conduct

24. Kimmel Alternative School

School district: Altoona Area School District

County: Blair

Enrollment: 24

No. of arrests: 8

Most reported offense: 3 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

23. Hempfield Senior High School

School district: Hempfield School District

County: Lancaster

Enrollment: 2,187

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 36 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

Vehicles arrive at Central Dauphin East High School. During the coronavirus COVID-19 shutdown, drive-through distribution of breakfast and lunch will be available each weekday from 8:30 a.m. through 11:00 a.m. at Central Dauphin East High School and Swatara Middle School. This first-come, first-served program is for all resident children in the district ages 18 and under, March 17, 2020. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.com

23. Central Dauphin Senior High School

School district: Central Dauphin School District

County: Dauphin

Enrollment: 1,815

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 14 possession, use of a controlled substance

23. Fels Samuel High School

School district: Philadelphia City School District

County: Philadelphia

Enrollment: 962

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 23 fighting

23. Ringgold Middle School

School district: Washington

County: Ringgold School District

Enrollment: 895

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 19 fighting

23. Lehighton Area High School

School district: Lehighton Area School District

County: Fayette

Enrollment: 743

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 13 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

23. Albert Gallatin South Middle School

School district: Albert Gallatin Area School District

County: Fayette

Enrollment: 370

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 4 sale, possession, use, or under the influence of alcohol

23. Pittsburg Milliones 6-12

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 1,178

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 27 fighting

22. Northeast High School

School district: Philadelphia City School District

County: Philadelphia

Enrollment: 3,483

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 59 fighting

22. Garnet Valley High School

School district: Garnet Valley School District

County: Delaware

Enrollment: 1,569

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 9 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

22. Wilson Woodrow Middle School

School district: Philadelphia City School District

County: Philadelphia

Enrollment: 1,430

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 84 reckless endangering; 84 fighting

22. Moon Senior High School

School district: Moon Area School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 1,178

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 18 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

Zack Bordner, center, holds a sign to help direct vehicles. During the coronavirus COVID-19 shutdown, East Pennsboro School District is distributing food for meals from curbside for students who qualify for free and reduced lunch, March 16, 2020. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.com

22. East Pennsboro Area Middle School

School district: East Pennsboro Area School District

County: Cumberland

Enrollment: 816

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 11 minor altercation

22. Brownsville Area Middle School

School district: Brownsville Area School District

County: Fayette

Enrollment: 343

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 4 disorderly conduct

22. Pittsburgh School District

School district: Allegheny

County: Pittsburgh School District

Enrollment: 317

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 12 disorderly conduct

21. Northampton Area High School

School district: Northampton Area School District

County: Northampton

Enrollment: 1,851

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 23 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

21. Altoona Area Jr High School

School district: Altoona Area School District

County: Blair

Enrollment: 1,697

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 14 fighting

20. Lengel Middle School

School district: Pottsville Area School District

County: Schuylkill

Enrollment: 751

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 4 fighting

20. Heights/Murray Elementary School

School district: Wilkes-Barre Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 879

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 44 disorderly conduct

20. Pittsburgh Allderdice High School

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 1,468

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 43 threatening a school official/student

20. Pocono Mountain West High School

School district: Pocono Mountain School District

County: Monroe

Enrollment: 1,641

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 5 student simple

20. Pittsburgh Perry High School

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 361

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 41 disorderly conduct

20. Solomon/Plains Junior High School

School district: Wilkes-Barre Area School District

County:

Enrollment: 486

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 16 fighting

20. Lengel Middle School

School district: Pottsville Area School District

County:

Enrollment: 751

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 4 fighting

20. Pittsburgh Allderdice High School

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County:

Enrollment: 1,468

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 43 threatening a school official, student

20. Pocono Mountain West High School

School district: Pocono Mountain School District

County:

Enrollment: 1,641

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 5 student simple

21. Conneaut Area Senior High

School district: Conneaut School District

County: Crawford

Enrollment: 614

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 6 fighting

21. Northwestern Lehigh High School

School district: Northwestern Lehigh School District

County: Lehigh

Enrollment: 727

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 12 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

21. Saucon Valley Senior High School

School district: Saucon Valley School District

County: Northampton

Enrollment: 750

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 11 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

21. Hazleton Elementary, Middle School

School district: Hazleton Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 802

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 8 disorderly conduct

21. Chester High School

School district: Chester-Upland School District

County: Delaware

Enrollment: 900

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 43 fighting

21. Ephrata Senior High School

School district: Ephrata Area School District

County: Lancaster

Enrollment: 1,294

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 17 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

21. Fox Chapel Area High School

School district: Fox Chapel Area School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 1,333

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 7 disorderly conduct

21. Cedar Crest High School

School district: Cornwall-Lebanon School District

County: Lebanon

Enrollment: 1,539

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 5 disorderly conduct; 5 possession/use of a controlled substance

20. Pittsburgh Perry High School

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 361

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 41 disorderly conduct

20. Solomon/Plains Junior High School

School district: Wilkes-Barre Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 486

No. of arrests: 12

Most reported offense: 16 fighting

19. Academy Park High School

School district: Southeast Delco School District

County: Delaware

Enrollment: 1,303

No. of arrests: 13

Most reported offense: 25 fighting

19. Pottsville Area High School

School district: Pottsville Area School District

County: Schuylkill

Enrollment: 941

No. of arrests: 13

Most reported offense: 9 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

19. Pottstown Senior High School

School district: Pottstown School District

County: Carbon

Enrollment: 835

No. of arrests: 13

Most reported offense: 12 fighting

19. Lehighton Area Middle School

School district: Leighton Area School District

County: Carbon

Enrollment: 581

No. of arrests: 13

Most reported offense: 8 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

18. Elmer L Meyers Junior and Senior High School

School district: Wilkes-Barre Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 890

No. of arrests: 14

Most reported offense: 8 disorderly conduct

18. Northeast Intermediate School

School district: Scranton School District

County: Lackawanna

Enrollment: 861

No. of arrests: 14

Most reported offense: 9 fighting

17. Owen J. Roberts High School

School district: Owen J. Roberts School District

County: Chester

Enrollment: 1,656

No. of arrests: 15

Most reported offense: 26 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

17. Twin Valley High School

School district: Twin Valley School District

County: Berks

Enrollment: 1,036

No. of arrests: 15

Most reported offense: 31 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

17. Dover Area Intermediate School

School district: Dover Area School District

County: York

Enrollment: 567

No. of arrests: 15

Most reported offense: 17 other harrassment, intimidation

16. Central York High School

School district: Central York School District

County: York

Enrollment: 1,809

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 11 possession, use of a controlled substance

Mechanicsburg Area Senior High School

16. Mechanicsburg Area Senior High School

School district: Mechanicsburg Area School District

County: Cumberland

Enrollment: 1,220

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 16 failure of disorderly persons to disperse upon official order; 16 bullying

16. Pittsburgh Brashear High School

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 1,184

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 72 threatening a school official/student

16. Albert Gallatin Area Senior High School

School district: Albert Gallatin Area School District

County: Fayette

Enrollment: 1,041

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 21 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

16. Hollidaysburg Area Senior High School

School district: Hollidaysburg Area School District

County: Blair

Enrollment: 838

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 13 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

16. Kiski Area High School

School district: Kiski Area School District

County: Westmoreland

Enrollment: 838

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 35 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

15. Brownsville Area High School

School district: Brownsville Area School District

County: Fayette

Enrollment: 464

No. of arrests: 18

Most reported offense: 13 disorderly conduct

14. Norristown Area High School

School district: Norristown Area School District

County: Montgomery

Enrollment: 1,834

No. of arrests: 19

Most reported offense: 31 fighting

14. Dover Area High School

School district: Dover Area School District

County: York

Enrollment: 1,004

No. of arrests: 19

Most reported offense: 10 sale, possession, use, or under the influence of alcohol; 10 threatening a school official/student

14. Ringgold Senior High School

School district: Ringgold School District

County: Washington

Enrollment: 851

No. of arrests: 19

Most reported offense: 24 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

14. Bradford Area High School

School district: Bradford Area School District

County: McKean

Enrollment: 750

No. of arrests: 19

Most reported offense: 15 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

13. Upper Darby Senior High School

School district: Upper Darby School District

County: Delaware

Enrollment: 3,845

No. of arrests: 20

Most reported offense: 44 fighting

13. McDowell High School

School district: Millcreek Township School District

County: Erie

Enrollment: 2,163

No. of arrests: 20

Most reported offense: 62 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

13. East Stroudsburg Senior High School South

School district: East Stroudsburg Area School District

County: Monroe

Enrollment: 1,332

No. of arrests: 20

Most reported offense: 19 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

12. Pittsburgh Oliver

School district: Pittsburg School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 83

No. of arrests: 22

Most reported offense: 170 minor altercation

11. Penn Manor High School

School district: Penn Manor School District

County: Lancaster

Enrollment: 1,632

No. of arrests: 25

Most reported offense: 28 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

11. Hanover Area Junior and Senior High School

School district: Hanover Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 932

No. of arrests: 25

Most reported offense: 14 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

11. Albert Gallatin North Middle School

School district: Albert Gallatin Area School District

County: Fayette

Enrollment: 373

No. of arrests: 25

Most reported offense: 15 disorderly conduct

10. Freedom High School

School district: Bethlehem Area School District

County: Northampton

Enrollment: 1,875

No. of arrests: 26

Most reported offense: 12 student simple assault

10. GAR Memorial Junior and Senior High School

School district: Wilkes-Barre Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 934

No. of arrests: 26

Most reported offense: 34 disorderly conduct

10. Mount Carmel Area High School

School district: Mount Carmel Area School District

County: Northumberland

Enrollment: 422

No. of arrests: 26

Most reported offense: 36 disorderly conduct

A view of the Derry Township School District campus, including Hershey Early Childhood Center, Hershey Primary Elementary, Hershey Intermediate, Hershey Middle School and Hershey High School. Aerial photos, October 23, 2015. Dan Gleiter, PennLive.com PENNLIVE.COMPENNLIVE.COM

9. Hershey High School

School district: Derry Township School District

County: Dauphin

Enrollment: 1,225

No. of arrests: 27

Most reported offense: 17 theft

8. Academy at Westinghouse

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 696

No. of arrests: 28

Most reported offense: 65 fighting

7. Dubois Area Middle School

School district: Dubois Area School District

County: Clearfield

Enrollment: 1,122

No. of arrests: 31

Most reported offense: 14 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

7. Trinity Senior High School

School district: Trinity Area School District

County: Washington

Enrollment: 1,003

No. of arrests: 31

Most reported offense: 24 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

7. North Pocono High School

School district: North Pocono School District

County: Lackawanna

Enrollment: 934

No. of arrests: 31

Most reported offense: 28 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

7. Pittsburgh Carrick High School

School district: Pittsburgh School District

County: Allegheny

Enrollment: 700

No. of arrests: 31

Most reported offense: 87 threatening a school official/student

6. Central Dauphin East Senior High School

School district: Central Dauphin School District

County: Dauphin

Enrollment: 1,520

No. of arrests: 32

Most reported offense: 20 disorderly conduct

6. Spring Grove Area High School

School district: Spring Grove Area School District

County: York

Enrollment: 1,175

No. of arrests: 32

Most reported offense: 34 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

Carlisle Area School District offices in Carlisle, Pa., July 28, 2020. Mark Pynes | mpynes@pennlive.com

5. Carlisle Area High School

School district: Carlisle Area School District

County: Cumberland

Enrollment: 1,573

No. of arrests: 33

Most reported offense: 28 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

4. Red Lion Area Senior High School

School district: Red Lion Area School District

County: York

Enrollment: 1,483

No. of arrests: 36

Most reported offense: 42 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

3. Connellsville Area Middle School

School district: Connellsville Area School District

County: Fayette

Enrollment: 1,071

No. of arrests: 38

Most reported offense: 22 disorderly conduct

2. Wyoming Area Secondary Center

School district: Wyoming Area School District

County: Luzerne

Enrollment: 1,024

No. of arrests: 45

Most reported offense: 26 disorderly conduct

1. Liberty High School

School district: Bethlehem School District

County: Northampton

Enrollment: 2,665

No. of arrests: 51

Most reported offense: 25 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

Hand sanitizer sits holstered at a desk.AP photo by Jennifer Sinco Kelleher

Top Cumberland County Schools with the most arrests in 2020

7. Elmwood Academy

School district: Mechanicsburg Area School District

Enrollment: 680

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 12 bullying; 12 failure of disorderly persons to disperse upon official order

7. Wilson Middle School

School district: Carlisle Area School District

Enrollment: 624

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 7 possession, use, or sale of tobacco; 7 fighting

7. Lamberton Middle School

School district: Carlisle Area School District

Enrollment: 589

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 21 minor altercation

7. Camp Hill Senior High School

School district: Camp Hill School District

Enrollment: 417

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 3 possession, use, or sale of tobacco; 3 possession/use of a controlled substance; 3 theft

6. Cumberland Valley High School

School district: Cumberland Valley School District

Enrollment: 2,809

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 53 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

Custodian Luis Perez uses a cleaning solution applied to a cloth to wipe down all high-touch areas in a chemistry classroom. Custodial staff at East Pennsboro High School sanitize surfaces each day as a precautionary measure for the coronavirus, known as COVID-19, March 11, 2020. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.com

6. East Pennsboro Area Senior High School

School district: East Pennsboro Area School District

Enrollment: 780

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 11 minor altercation

6. Shippensburg Area Senior High School

School district: Shippensburg Area School District

Enrollment: 1,059

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 27 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

5. Big Spring Middle School

School district: Big Spring School District

Enrollment: 570

No. of arrests: 5

Most reported offense: 4 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

4. Mechanicsburg Middle School

School district: Mechanicsburg Area School District

Enrollment: 1,056

No. of arrests: 6

Most reported offense: 11 bullying; 11 failure of disorderly persons to disperse upon official order

3. East Pennsboro Area Middle School

School district: East Pennsboro Area School District

Enrollment: 816

No. of arrests: 10

Most reported offense: 11 minor altercation

2. Mechanicsburg Area Senior High School

School district: Mechanicsburg Area School District

Enrollment: 1,120

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 16 bullying; 16 failure of disorderly persons to disperse upon official order

Carlisle High School in Carlisle, Pa., July 28, 2020. Mark Pynes | mpynes@pennlive.com

1. Carlisle Area High School

School district: Carlisle Area School District

Enrollment: 1,573

No. of arrests: 33

Most reported offense: 28 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

Top Dauphin County Schools with the most arrests in 2020

9. Harrisburg High School

School district: Harrisburg School District

Enrollment: 992

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 55 disorderly conduct

9. Lower Dauphin Middle School

School district: Lower Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 912

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 5 fighting; 5 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

9. Rowland Academy

School district: Harrisburg School District

Enrollment: 819

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 9 disorderly conduct

9. Tri-Community Elementary School

School district: Central Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 444

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 1 criminal trespass, 1 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

9. Upper Dauphin Area High School

School district: Upper Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 364

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 25 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

9. Lenkerville Elementary School

School district: Millersburg Area School District

Enrollment: 352

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 1 burglary

School buses on Progress Avenue in Susquehanna Township, March 11, 2020. Dan Gleiter | dgleiter@pennlive.com

8. Lower Dauphin High School

School district: Lower Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 1,131

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 6 fighting

8. Susquehanna Township High School

School district: Susquehanna Township School District

Enrollment: 719

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 8 fighting

8. Hershey Middle School

School district: Derry Township School District

Enrollment: 841

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 6 fighting

7. Linglestown Middle School

School district: Central Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 812

No. of arrests: 3

Most reported offense: 4 threatening a school official/student

6. Steelton-Highspire High School

School district: Steelton-Highspire School District

Enrollment: 540

No. of arrests: 4

Most reported offense: 4 theft

5. Middletown Area High School

School district: Middletown Area School District

Enrollment: 676

No. of arrests: 5

Most reported offense: 5 fighting

4. Central Dauphin East Middle School

School district: Central Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 829

No. of arrests: 6

Most reported offense: 5 other harassment, intimidation

4. Middletown Area Middle School

School District: Middletown Area School District

Enrollment: 656

No. of arrests: 6

Most reported offense: 5 fighting

3. Central Dauphin Senior High School

Central Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 1,815

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 14 possession, use of a controlled substance

2. Hershey High School

School district: Derry Township School District

Enrollment: 1,225

No. of arrests: 27

Most reported offense: 17 theft

Pennsylvania students began learning remotely in March 2020.

1. Central Dauphin East Senior High School

School district: Central Dauphin School District

Enrollment: 1,520

No. of arrests: 32

Most reported offense: 20 disorderly conduct

Top Lancaster County Schools with the most arrests in 2020

7. Manheim Central Senior High School

School district: Manheim Central School District

Enrollment: 1,002

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 9 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

7. Landisville Middle School

School district: Hempfield School District

Enrollment: 1,002

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 19 bullying; 19 failure of disorderly persons to disperse upon official order

7. Pequea Elementary School

School district: Penn Manor School District

Enrollment: 399

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 1 minor altercation; 1 theft; 1 bullying; 1 failure of disorderly persons to disperse upon official order; 1 disorderly conduct

6. Marticville Middle School

School district: Penn Manor School District

Enrollment: 376

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 4 minor altercation

5. Manheim Township High School

School district: Manheim Township School District

Enrollment: 1,817

No. of arrests: 4

Most reported offense: 16 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

4. Manheim Township Middle School

School district: Manheim Township School District

Enrollment: 958

No. of arrests: 6

Most reported offense: 9 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

Classrooms sat empty for the latter half of the 2019-20 school year. EJA

3. Hempfield Senior High School

School district: Hempfield School District

Enrollment: 2,187

No. of arrests: 9

Most reported offense: 36 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

2. Ephrata Senior High School

School district: Ephrata Area School District

Enrollment: 1,294

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 17 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

1. Penn Manor High School

School district: Penn Manor School District

Enrollment: 1,632

No. of arrests: 25

Most reported offense: 28 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

Top Lebanon County Schools with the most arrests in 2020

3. Palmyra Area Senior High School

School district: Palmyra Area School District

Enrollment: 1,150

No. of arrests: 3

Most reported offense: 10 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

3. Cedar Crest Middle School

School district: Cornwall-Lebanon School District

Enrollment: 1,169

No. of arrests: 3

Most reported offense: 2 possession, use, or sale of tobacco; 2 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

3. Annville Cleona High School

School District: Annville-Cleona School District

Enrollment: 479

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 4 fighting

2. Lebanon Middle School

School district: Lebanon School District

Enrollment: 1,141

No. of arrests: 4

Most reported offense: 73 other harrassment, intimidation

Buses sitting idle. MLive File Photo

1. Cedar Crest High School

School district: Cornwall-Lebanon School District

Enrollment: 1,539

No. of arrests: 11

Most reported offense: 5 disorderly conduct; 5 possession, use of a controlled substance

Arrests at Perry County Schools in 2020

2. Greenwood High School

School district: Greenwood School District

Enrollment: 244

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 4 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

1. Susquenita High School

School district: Susquenita School District

Enrollment: 459

No. of arrests: 3

Most reported offense: 3 disorderly conduct

Top York County Schools with the most arrests in 2020

10. Dallastown Area Middle School

School district: Dallastown Area School District

Enrollment: 1,061

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 7 minor altercations

10. Goode School

School district: York City School District

Enrollment: 645

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 25 fighting

10. Spring Grove Intermediate School

School district: Spring Grove Area School District

Enrollment: 626

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 2 threatening a school official/student

10. Jackson School

School district: York City School District

Enrollment: 615

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 6 fighting

Preventing the spread of COVID-19 means hallways are continually sanitized. Patti Sapone, NJ Advance Media

10. Shallow Brook Intermediate School

School district: Northeastern York School District

Enrollment: 483

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 4 terroristic threats

10. South Eastern Middle School

School district: South Eastern School District

Enrollment: 399

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 4 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials; 4 sale, possession, use, or under the influence of alcohol; 4 disorderly conduct

10. Locust Grove Elementary School

School district: Red Lion Area School District

Enrollment: 383

No. of arrests: 1

Most reported offense: 1 sale, possession, use, or under the influence of alcohol

9. Hannah Penn

School district: York City School District

Enrollment: 675

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 10 fighting

9. North Hills Elementary School

School district: Central York School District

Enrollment: 661

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 1 simple assault; 1 possession/use of a controlled substance

9. Eastern York Middle School

School district: Eastern York School District

Enrollment: 608

No. of arrests: 2

Most reported offense: 5 possession/use of a controlled substance; 5 possession, use or sale of tobacco

8. Dallastown Area Senior High School

School district: Dallastown Area School District

Enrollment: 1,928

No. of arrests: 4

Most reported offense: 8 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

8. Spring Grove Area Middle School

School district: Spring Grove Area School District

Enrollment: 673

No. of arrests: 4

Most reported offense: 8 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

8. Hanover Senior High School

School district: Hanover Public School District

Enrollment: 519

No. of arrests: 4

Most reported offense: 6 possession, use, or sale of tobacco

7. Susquehannock High School

School district: Southern York County School District

Enrollment: 950

No. of arrests: 5

Most reported offense: 8 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

7. Red Lion Area Junior High School

School district: Red Lion Area School District

Enrollment: 880

No. of arrests: 5

Most reported offense: 4 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

6. William Penn Senior High School

School district: York City School District

Enrollment: 1,441

No. of arrests: 6

Most reported offense: 17 fighting

6. York Suburban Senior High School

School district: York Suburban School District

Enrollment: 1,005

No. of arrests: 6

Most reported offense: 11 fighting

5. Dover Area Intermediate School

School district: Dover Area School District

Enrollment: 567

No. of arrests: 15

Most reported offense: 17 other harassment/intimidation

Students spent the latter part of the 2019-20 school year learning from home. Fotosmile/Dreamstime

4. Central York High School

School district: Central York School District

Enrollment: 1,809

No. of arrests: 16

Most reported offense: 11 possession, use of a controlled substance

3. Dover Area High School

School district: Dover Area School District

Enrollment: 1,004

No. of arrests: 19

Most reported offense: 10 sale, possession, use, or under the influence of alcohol; 10 threatening a school official/student

2. Spring Grove Area High School

School district: Spring Grove Area School District

Enrollment: 1,175

No. of arrests: 32

Most reported offense: 34 possession, use, or sale of vaping materials

1. Red Lion Area Senior High School
The Minister for Justice and Attorney General-designate, Godfred Yeboah Dame, has stated that the Government, through the Ministry of Justice and Attorney put the interest of the state first and not the interests of any individual, organization, or group of persons when putting together the Agyapa Royalties transaction.



According to him, there are no vitiating factors about the transaction and argued that the Finance Minister, his Deputy and promoters of Agyapa were unfairly criticized in the controversial report of the Special Prosecutor.



He assured that the transaction, intended to monetize some of Ghanas gold royalties, was done in the national interest and in accordance with the laws of the land.



Speaking on the subject when he appeared before the Appointments Committee on Friday to be vetted, Mr. Yeboah Dame, who spent over six hours responding to questions indicated that the Special Prosecutor failed to give Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta, his deputy, Charles Adu Boahen and anybody else involved with the transaction the opportunity for a fair hearing before he concluded his damning report on the transaction in October last year.



The Special Prosecutor, on his own, called for documents covering the transaction and completed what he called an anti-corruption risk and risk of corruption assessment on the deal done under the mandate of the Minerals Income Investment Fund, which was set up by an Act of Parliament passed in 2018.



The former Deputy General under President Akuffo-Addos first term, invited parliamentarians to ignore the indicting aspects of the report because the whole exercise was undertaken not as a criminal investigation but an assessment and one that breached the basic natural justice rule of allowing the one under scrutiny to be heard.



He described Mr. Amidus report as a mere opinion of no direct legal effect.



Addressing one of the observations of the report which has to do with whether or not the countrys laws were breached because the Deputy Minister for Finance then, Charles Adu Boahen, was the one who signed for and on behalf of the government, instead of the substantive Minister, Mr Ofori-Atta.



Quoting from statutes, Mr. Yeboah Dame explained that the law gives authority to the Finance Minister to allow his deputy or any other person not below the rank of Director that the Minister may authorize.



The capacity to execute a financial agreement has been indicated in the Public Financial Management Act. In there, you find that Mr. Chairman, the capacity is given to the Minister for Finance or any person that the Minister for Finance may authorize, Godfred Dame stated.



In the light of this, it becomes quite clear that the Deputy Minister for Finance, if he was authorized by the Minister for Finance, has full capacity to enter into the agreement, the Attorney General-designate added.



Parliamentary Approval Not Required



A major subject of disagreement pertaining to the corruption risk assessment carried out by the then Special Prosecutor is his findings that the Mandate Agreement between the lead transaction advisor, Imara, and its local partner, Databank Group, was unconstitutional because it should be treated as an international transaction and, by that, required the approval of Parliament.



The AG nominee disagreed, arguing that the transaction advisory role was not the main transaction but an agreement to build the structure and building blocks towards the ultimate objective of listing the Agyapa Royalties Company on both the London and Accra stock markets.



I will submit finally that to the extent that Parliament had considered and approved the substantive agreement itself, the primary agreement being the Minerals Royalties Agreement, other agreements like the approval of a transaction advisor ought not to have come before this honourable house for approval, the learned Minister for Justice-designate told the 26 members of the Appointments Committee of Parliament.



The vetting spent time to exhaust that issue, with varying interpretations put on the Supreme Court decision that only major international transactions should come to the House for approval.



Mr. Yeboah Dame maintained that a contract to facilitate the main transaction cannot be viewed as a major transaction regardless of the fees.



Imara and its local partner, Databank, stood to earn a percentage of the amount raised for the listing as a success fee capped at $4m to be shared between the two.



Imara is on a $15,000 monthly retainer, which the contract states will be deducted from the success fee at the end of IPO.



Databanks partnership deal with Imara excluded the Ghanaian entity from the monthly retainer, and billed to be paid at the end of the floatation in success fee.



He reminded the House that on a regular annual basis, the transaction advisors involved in Eurobond issuance or facilitators of loan agreements ordinarily get paid a percentage of the total amount, which can easily be more than the $4m involved here and yet it is accepted as not at all necessary to present such incidental deals to Parliament.



Mr. Yeboah Dame, who was also a member of the board of the Public Procurement Authority took issue with the Special Prosecutor, who resigned last November, for raising issues with the rfp, which allowed any of the shortlisted companies approved by the PPA to have a local partner.



Mr. Yeboah Dame, who sat on the PPA board over the previous term, saw nothing irregular about it.



He also defended Databanks reputation over the last 30 years and their ability to work with virtually all governments based on merit.



This came up when the issue of potential conflict of interest was raised because Ken Ofori-Atta is a co-founder of the investment bank and Ghanas leading Securities Company.



Hon Godfred Yeboah Dame, faulted the Office of the Special Prosecutor and its former Chief Prosecutor, Martin Amidu, for breaking the rules of natural justice, when it refused to give all persons implicated in his corruption risk assessment a fair hearing before he reached his conclusions in his report.



In 2018, Parliament passed the Minerals Income Investment Fund, Act 2018, which establishes the Fund to manage the equity interests of Ghana in mining companies and receive royalties on behalf of the government.



The purpose of the fund is to manage and invest these royalties and revenue from equities for higher returns for the benefit of the country.



The government, then through the Minerals Income Investment Fund (MIIF), set up Agyapa Royalties Limited to monetize Ghanas gold royalties.



This was after Parliament on August 14, 2020, approved the Agyapa Mineral Royalty Limited agreement with the government of Ghana despite the walkout by the minority.



In exchange, the company plans to raise between $500 million and up to about $1 billion for the government on the Ghana and London Stock Exchanges to invest in developmental projects.



The deal, however, has become a topical issue following concerns first by the opposition National Democratic Congress leading up to the December 2020 general elections.



On August 14, 2020, a few days after approving an amendment to the MIIF Act, the Minority walked out during the approval process of the very transaction agreements, the facilitation of which the amendment to the Funds statute was amended.



Civil society groups quickly added their voices to the opposition, describing the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) being created then Agyapa Royalties of Jersey, as not being transparent, potentially corrupt, undervalued and that it must be suspended for greater stakeholder involvement, according to some of the dissenting voice.



The government has however insisted that the deal is in the best interest of the country.



The President, last year, directed the Finance Minister and Attorney General to review the transaction agreements and make the necessary adjustment to address some of the concerns raised by stakeholders, where appropriate.

Source: Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









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.

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Russias Special Purpose Police Units OMON Sunday arrested more than 5000 pro-Navalny protesters as the nationwide rallies strengthened in demand to free Kremlins jailed anti-corruption campaigner and Putins critic Alexey Navalny. A crowd in thousands congregated on January 31 in fresh demonstrations, according to a group that monitors political arrests, OVD-Info, confronting the law enforcement that "hauled off" the mob with lethal tactics. Sundays protests were organized for Lubyanka Square, where the Russian Federal Security Service that Kremlin critic alleged poisoned him, is headquartered. It was relocated to a public square a mile away due to heavy military police presence.

Fresh demonstrations: Call to release Navalny

In the wake of unauthorized detentions, and series of raids this past week at Navalnys anti-corruption organization (FBK) , apartments and offices of Navalnys family, friends, and associates, citizens planted one of the largest and widespread demonstrations against the Russian president Putin and the security forces. OMON held Navalnys brother Oleg and top aide Lyubov Sobol with coercion under two-month house arrest in connection with unauthorized protests and allegedly flouting the COVID-19 protocols.

[A policeman detains a man while protesters try to help him, during a protest against the jailing of opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Credit: AP/file]

This wave of detention is something that worries us a lot, as well as the detention of Mr Navalny, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said as he arrived to chair the ministerial meeting in Brussels.

Russian law enforcement agents launched a political crackdown, snapping communication lines and issuing warnings against the public assembly. Despite Russian polices threats of jail sentence, police cordons, and warnings to suppress the Sundays uprising, tens of thousands mobilized unlawfully risking arrests for jailing Kremlin critic on his return from a five-month recuperation in Germany following poisoning from Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok. To squash, the dissident movement against rampant corruption and Putins autocratic regime protesters clashed with security forces shouting Putin and his cronies must be jailed.

Read: Detentions Made At Moscow Pro-Navalny Demo

Read: Over 1000 Detained As Russian Protesters Rally In Support Of Opposition Leader Navalny

Under the Russian constitution, everyone in Russia has the right to express their opinion and to demonstrate. That must be possible. The principles of the rule of law must apply there, too  Russia has always committed itself to that," German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said in a televised address.

Kremlin chief spokesman lashes out on TV

Kremlin chief spokesman Dmitry Peskov meanwhile lashed out on Russian state television at the leaders of the free world for flaring the demonstrations and interfering in Russias domestic affairs. Sundays protests saw police manhandling citizens in as many as 100 cities, as demonstrators expressed anger after footage of police officers kicking one woman to the ground, beating others mercilessly in St. Petersburg emerged. Reacting to Sundays arrests, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told broadcasters: "I find this slide toward authoritarianism very worrying. The affront to the rule of law posed by these collective and preventive arrests is intolerable."German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas berated Kremlins detention on German public television calling Polices harsh tactics worrying.

All light must be shed on Navalny's poisoning. This was an assassination attempt," French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told France-Inter radio.

Read: US Condemns Russias 'harsh Tactics' As Protesters Demand Navalny's Release

Read: Russia Detains 4,000 Protesters For Storming Streets Of Moscow Over Navalny's Arrest

(Photographs Credit: The Associated Press)
A young Liberal party staffer has claimed she was raped in a minister's office by a colleague after a boozy night out.

Brittany Higgins was 24 when she was allegedly raped in March 2019 by a male staffer who she says was widely regarded as a 'rising star' in the Liberal Party.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison publicly responded to the sexual assault allegations during Parliament Question Time on Monday - saying Ms Higgins should be listened to and respected.

'Everyone should feel safe in their workplace, wherever that is. Reports today are deeply distressing. This matter is under consideration by police,' he said.

Brittany Higgins, then 24, has alleged she was raped by a colleague inside Parliament House in March 2019

Ms Higgins said her leg was 'crushed' during the alleged rape and took a photo of an alleged bruise in the bathroom (pictured)

The incident allegedly happened after Ms Higgins and her colleagues were on a night out.

She told news.com.au that she remembers the man buying several rounds of drinks.

When she announced she was leaving, he offered to get a cab with her because he was heading in the same direction, she said.

But instead of dropping her home, the man allegedly took her to Parliament House.

Ms Higgins said they went to their boss Defence Minister Linda Reynolds' office where she, intoxicated, fell asleep on the couch.

The former staffer said she woke up to the man raping her and begged him to stop but he carried on.

'I woke up mid-rape. I told him to stop. I was crying. He wasn't even looking at me. It felt like I was sort of a body that was there. It didn't feel like it was anything about me,' Ms Higgins told news.com.au.

She said the man left the building, leaving her to be discovered by security guards in her cocktail dress the next morning.

Ms Higgins said her leg was 'crushed' during the alleged rape and took a photo of an alleged bruise in the bathroom.

The following Monday after the incident, the man resigned for being in the office after hours.

Questions have now been raised about whether Senator Reynolds (left in right image) should apologise for her handling of Ms Higgins' allegations

Ms Higgins initially reported the incident to the Australian Federal Police but decided not to make a formal complaint, fearing that she would jeopardise her job.

She worked for Senator Michaelia Cash before resigning from government last month.

Ms Higgins said decided to speak out after being inspired by women's campaigner and Australian of the Year winner Grace Tame.

After the incident, Senator Reynolds summoned her to a formal employment meeting in the same room the alleged rape occurred.

Senator Reynolds says she did not know the alleged incident happened in her office at the time of the meeting.

'Of course I'm aware of today's reports, and I'm extremely concerned about the wellbeing of my former staff member. Women should be safe,' she told parliament on Monday.

'At the time of my initial meeting with the staff member I was not aware of the details or the circumstance of the alleged incident in my office. Had I known, I would have conducted the meeting elsewhere.'

Questions have now been raised about whether Senator Reynolds should apologise for her handling of the allegations.

Health Minister Greg Hunt declined to answer whether Senator Reynolds should apologise, saying the matter was sensitive and he did not have all of the details.

'And given the potentially criminal nature of this issue, it's not appropriate for me to be commenting,' he told reporters in Canberra.

Labor is calling on Senator Reynolds to publicly explain the circumstances around her handling of the rape allegations.

Labor frontbencher Kristina Keneally said the minister needed to explain whether the allegations had been properly investigated, and whether there were security issues about staff accessing her office out of hours.

'There are questions about whether or not this young woman was pressured to choose between her job and reporting the matter to police,' Senator Keneally said.

Ms Higgins pictured with Senator Micahela Cash (left) former Liberal Party deputy leader Julie Bishop (right)

'I don't care what side of politics you are on, there is no place for that kind of assault and attack in a workplace or in this parliament.'

Mr Morrison said at all times, guidance was sought from Ms Higgins about how she wishes to proceed with the allegations.

'This important best practice principle of empowering Ms Higgins is something the government always sought to follow in relation to this matter,' he said.

'The government has aimed to provide Ms Higgins with her agency, to provide support to make decisions in her interests and to respect her privacy.

'This offer of support and assistance continues. It is important that Ms Higgins' views are listened to and respected.'

Liberal MP Jason Falinksi praised Ms Higgins for speaking out.

'Assault of any sort, but sexual assault in particular, is just unbelievable. Ms Higgins is incredibly brave for speaking out and we should all respect that,' he said.

Labor MP Peta Murphy told parliament there needed to be an independent review of the treatment of female employees in Parliament House, and an independent office established to provide advice and counselling.
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Allergic reactions to the flu shot are rare, but they can happen. If youve had one, what does that mean for the coronavirus vaccine?

Our readers have questions about the coronavirus vaccine, and cleveland.com is getting answers from health care experts.

Q. Should you get the COVID-19 vaccine if youve had a bad reaction to a flu shot?

Experts say that depends on the type of reaction you had.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported that allergic reactions to the COVID-19 vaccine can occur, but they are rare. The Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines that have been approved for use in the U.S. do not contain eggs, preservatives or latex.

However, if youve had a toxic reaction to the flu shot, or if your reaction was unusual, its a good idea to be evaluated by a board-certified allergist who can provide an expert opinion on the COVID-19 vaccine, said Dr. David Lang, the chairman of the department of allergy and clinical immunology at the Cleveland Clinic.

There are other types of reactions that are either toxic or what Ill refer to as idiosyncratic or not well-understood mechanism for the reaction, Lang said. Those patients merit evaluation by a board-certified allergist to see whether administration of the COVID-19 vaccine is in their best health care interest.

The CDC also recommends consulting a doctor if youve had a prior allergic reaction to another type of vaccine.

For most people, though, having a bad reaction to a flu shot just means they should be monitored longer after they get the COVID-19 vaccine, said Jodie Turosky, the clinical director of the pharmacy at St. Vincent Charity Medical Center in Cleveland. Theyll be monitored for 30 minutes instead of the standard 15.

Typically, all it means is I would watch them longer, she said, because people who react to one thing  whether it be an injectable drug or a different vaccine  tend to have more reactions in general.

Its also a good idea for those people to get the vaccine at a hospital or doctors office, where they could get immediate medical care if needed, instead of someplace like a drug store.

Do you have questions about the COVID-19 vaccine that youd like an expert to answer? Send it in a brief email to cleveland.com reporter Evan MacDonald at emacdonald@cleveland.com.

Your coronavirus vaccine questions answered:

Are you contagious if you have side effects from the COVID-19 vaccine?

Can you mix and match two doses of coronavirus vaccine from different manufacturers?

Can I still get my second dose of coronavirus vaccine if I develop COVID-19 symptoms after the first?

Should you get the second vaccine if you contract COVID-19 after your first coronavirus vaccine dose?

Will your COVID-19 vaccine be less effective if you need to wait longer for the second dose?

If the coronavirus vaccine is 95% effective, how will you know if youre in the other 5%?

Why do I need to keep a mask on if Ive been vaccinated for coronavirus?
A young beauty therapist who sparked a police search after failing to comply with a self quarantine order will spend the remainder of her isolation in jail.

Ashlee Marie Jackson, 22, arrived in Western Australia from Victoria on February 7 and was required to self-quarantine for 14 days.

Ashlee Marie Jackson. Credit:Facebook

WA Police allege the 22-year-old was spotted in Victoria Park about 1.25pm on Sunday, February 14, a week into her self-quarantine.

A police search was launched for Ms Jackson, with CCTV footage allegedly showing her out and about in public.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finally issued guidelines last week on how to reopen schools safely. But some Bay Area health experts are not sure that what the federal agency is recommending makes sense  or that it has students mental health in mind.

The CDC on Friday outlined its much-anticipated guidance for returning for K-12 students to in-person instruction in the coming year. It recommends handwashing, disinfection of school facilities, diagnostic testing and contact tracing to identify infections and separate infected people from others in a school.

The CDC guidance is advisory  much as its public health guidance about gatherings, mask-wearing and the like are at the discretion of states and communities. Local school districts still will make their own decisions, and the CDC guidelines cannot be implemented in San Francisco until the school district and unions agree fully on conditions for a reopening.

To some Bay Area health experts, however, the CDC guidance seems arbitrary and riddled with exceptions.

Theyre saying everybody should wear masks, although of course not at lunch, said Dr. Myrto Ashe, a family medicine specialist in San Rafael. Theyre saying open the windows, but not if you cant. Theyre saying you should distance by 6 feet, but in some schools thats not gonna be possible and it shouldnt be an obstacle to reopening. Theyre saying vaccinating would be a great idea, but we wont be able to do it in time. Theyre saying testing is so nice, but its expensive so you dont have to.

Experts such as Ashe say the guidelines are based on flawed assumptions about how the coronavirus spreads, with excessive restrictions slowing down reopening at a time when schools are desperately trying to address the mental health consequences  and the academic losses  of distance learning.

They continued with the conservative approach, no longer supported by the best data, that adolescents represent a higher risk for in-school transmission, said Dr. Jeanne Noble, head of UCSFs emergency department COVID-19 response.

She noted that the CDC stresses that the safest way to open schools is by making sure there is as little disease in a community as possible. This links community transmission rates to school reopenings, despite data from North Carolina and Wisconsin that suggest community prevalence does not predict school transmission (while mask adherence does), Noble said in an email.

The CDC guidance includes a chart on assessing community spread, including rates of new cases per 100,000 people and the percentage of positive tests.

Dr. Mitul Kapadia, director of pediatric physical medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, praised the guidelines generally.

I think it is overall great that the CDC provided some centralized guidelines for school reopening, particularly in the areas of school mitigation strategies and teacher / staff / student testing as well as vaccination prioritization, he said in an email.

But Kapadia agreed with Noble that linking school reopenings to community transmission didnt make sense, arguing that the most recent data shows that safe school reopening can happen despite any level of community transmission.

In the Bay Area for example, outdoor dining and other activities that can have a much larger exponential impact on COVID rates of transmission have resumed while school reopening is considered unsafe, he said.

Annette Anderson, deputy director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Safe and Healthy Schools, praised the CDC for offering much-needed guidance amid division and confusion as school districts struggle to map out reopening plans largely on their own.

What were starting to see is the beginning of a coordinated federal effort to get schools reopened, Anderson said. That is a huge departure from where we were almost a year ago.

But according to Noble, that early effort doesnt go nearly far enough in getting schools to reopen.

There is no mandate for reopening schools, she said. Without a national mandate, most children are going to remain out of school for the rest of the year.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Tatiana Sanchez is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: tatiana.sanchez@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @TatianaYSanchez

Susie Neilson is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: susan.neilson@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @susieneilson

Prince Ned Nwoko has alleged that some people are plotting to assassinate him. The former member of the House of Representatives raised the alarm at a press briefing he organised alongside his wife Regina Daniels on Thursday, Feb 11, in Abuja.



He said that the plot is connected to a piece of land in his community in Delta state in which he was setting up a university. He added that a tussle about who becomes the next king of his community is also another factor.



He explained that the issue of who becomes the next king had been settled by the elders and that the allocation of the land to him followed due process.



The politician said that the assassination plot was exposed on social media by an inmate in Kuje Prison, Abuja, who overheard two fellow prisoners discussing the plot. He said the matter had been reported to the Nigerian Police Force.



Nwoko claimed that the inmate, who was later released from the prison, received series of threat messages and died mysteriously after three weeks and an autopsy was being carried out.



He said the inmate was able to get the information on social media and the attention of his wife, Regina was drawn to it.



"I then reported the matter to the police and Department of State Security (DSS) and they went and interviewed the inmates involved. The inmates mentioned the name of one businessman who deals in the oil and gas sector as the master minder."



Speaking further, he said the family of the late inmate would have been at this conference but due to fear for their lives, they refused to come.



He said though security around him and his family had been tightened, the press conference was necessary to let the world know of the threat.

Source: LIB









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.

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Story Highlights 62% say a third party is needed, up from 57% in September

Highest support for a third party by one percentage point

A record-high 63% of Republicans favor a third party

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Americans' desire for a third party has ticked up since last fall and now sits at a high in Gallup's trend. Sixty-two percent of U.S. adults say the "parties do such a poor job representing the American people that a third party is needed," an increase from 57% in September. Support for a third party has been elevated in recent years, including readings of 60% in 2013 and 2015 and 61% in 2017.

Meanwhile, 33% of Americans believe the two major political parties are doing an adequate job representing the public, the smallest percentage expressing this view apart from the 26% reading in October 2013.

Line graph. Sixty-two percent of Americans say a third political party is needed in the U.S., up from 57% in September and the highest, by one point, in Gallup's trend. Americans have typically been more likely to believe a third party is needed than to say it is not.

The latest results are from a Jan. 21-Feb. 2 poll. The survey was conducted before recent news reports that dozens of government officials in prior Republican administrations were in discussions to form an anti-Donald Trump third political party.

The survey found Americans' favorable opinion of the Republican Party has declined to 37%, while 48% view the Democratic Party positively. The poll also shows 50% of U.S. adults identifying as political independents, the highest percentage Gallup has ever measured in a single poll.

Gallup first asked about the need for a third party in 2003. At that time, most Americans did not think it was necessary, with 56% saying the parties were doing an adequate job representing the American people and 40% saying a third party was needed.

In several election years -- 2006, 2008 and 2012 -- Americans were divided as to whether a third party was needed, but since 2012, Americans have consistently favored the idea.

Majority of Republicans Now Favor Third Party

Independents are usually much more likely than Republicans or Democrats to favor a third political party, but in the current poll, Republicans are nearly as likely as independents to hold this view, 63% to 70%. That represents a dramatic shift for Republicans since last September when 40% favored a third party.

Republicans' current level of support for a third party is also the highest Gallup has measured for Republicans or Democrats in Gallup's trend. The previous high was 54% for Democrats in 2018. Currently, 46% of Democrats endorse a third party, down from 52% in September.

Line graph. Support for a third party by political party identification. Currently, 70% of independents, 63% of Republicans and 46% of Democrats say a third party is needed. Independents are always more likely than Republicans or independents to favor a third party. The current gap between Republicans and independents is the smallest measured to date.

Republicans' record desire for a third party comes at a time when they are deciding whether to remain loyal to Trump or to move on from him.

Currently, 68% of Republicans prefer that Trump remain the party leader, while 31% want the party to have a new leader. Republican-leaning independents, however, are divided, with 47% wanting Trump to continue leading and 51% preferring a new voice.

Republicans' preferences for a third party are similar among those who want Trump to continue to lead the party and among those who prefer a new leader.

An analysis that takes into account preference for a third party -- and preference of Trump leading the party -- finds that 41% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents both favor a third party and want Trump to be the leader of the GOP. Meanwhile, 28% favor a third party but want a new leader for the GOP. The remaining 31% of Republicans and Republican-leaners either don't want a third party or don't have a preference on Trump's future role in party politics.

More Republicans Want the Party to Move to the Right Than to the Center

The survey asked Republicans and Republican-leaning independents what direction they would like to see the party move in the future. A 40% plurality want the party to become more conservative, while 34% want it to stay the same and 24% to become more moderate. While Republican identifiers are about twice as likely to say the party should become more conservative than moderate (44% to 21%), Republican-leaning independents are split, with 36% wanting it to move further to the right of the ideological spectrum and 30% to move toward the center.

Republicans Most Inclined to Want Party to Become More Conservative [Asked of Republicans and Republican-leaning independnets] If you had to choose, would you rather see the Republican Party - [ROTATED: become more conservative, stay the same, (or) become more moderate]? All Republicans/Republican Leaners Republicans Republican-leaning indepdents % % % More conservative 40 44 36 Stay the same 34 35 33 More moderate 24 21 30 Jan. 21-Feb. 2, 2021 Gallup

Democrats Divided on the Direction of Their Party

Democrats' internal divisions between its moderate and liberal wings appear to be muted for now, following the party's victory in the presidential election and its regaining a Senate majority while maintaining a House majority. Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents are evenly divided on the direction their party should go -- 34% want it to become more liberal, 34% more moderate, and 31% to stay where it is.

Democratic identifiers tilt more toward wanting the party to go in a liberal direction (34%) than a moderate one (25%), while Democratic-leaning independents tilt toward wanting the party to become more moderate, 42% to 35%.

Democrats Have No Clear Preference on Direction of Party [Asked of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents] If you had to choose, would you rather see the Democratic Party -[ROTATED: become more liberal, stay the same, (or) become more moderate]? All Democrats/Democratic-leaners Democrats Democratic-leaning independents % % % More liberal 34 34 35 Stay the same 31 40 23 More moderate 34 25 42 Jan. 21-Feb. 2, 2021 Gallup

Bottom Line

Americans' appetite for a third party has never been greater in Gallup's nearly two decades of polling on the subject, and now a majority of Republicans are joining the usual majority of independents in wanting that option. The GOP is struggling to find its way in the post-Trump world, but party leaders hope it can unite in time to make gains in the 2022 elections. The possibility still exists that a pro-Trump or anti-Trump third party will splinter off from the Republican Party before then. However, that is something that party leaders like Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy are trying to prevent.

View complete question responses and trends (PDF download).

Learn more about how the Gallup Poll Social Series works.

The Australian share market finished session higher on Monday, 15 February 2021, amid positive corporate earnings and hopes of progress in U. S. stimulus talks.

Meanwhile, hopes of a global economic rebound in the wake of coronavirus vaccine rollouts also boosted sentiment.

At closing bell, the benchmark S&P/ASX200 advanced 62.18 points, or 0.91%, to 6,868.92. The broader All Ordinaries added 68.34 points, or 0.97%, to 7,149.65.

Bendigo and Adelaide Bank surged 11.3% as it reported a 67% rise in half-year profit. Retailer JB Hi-Fi jumped over 3% after posting an 86% rise in first-half profit.

Seven West Media soared 6.4% after it struck a licensing deal with Google to provide content for the tech company's News Showcase product.

Coca-Cola Amatil climbed 2.1% after the European arm of drinks giant Coca Cola raised its offer price in a takeover bid for the local operator.

CURRENCY NEWS: The Australian dollar was at $0.778 following its rise last week from levels below $0.772.

Powered by Capital Market - Live News

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
United Oil & Gas Plc (UOG) describes itself as a rapidly-growing full-cycle AIM-listed oil and gas company with the energy and capability to build on its track record of delivery.

The company is focused on low-risk production and development projects in Egypt, Italy, and the UK, and high-impact exploration in Jamaica.

In early 2020, the company acquired a 22% non-operating interest in the Abu Sennan asset. Located in the prolific hydrocarbon-producing Western Desert region of onshore Egypt, it comprises 7 development concessions.
Within a week of his release from Indore jail, standup comedian Munawar Faruqui triggered curiosity of his fans and opposers alike after he shared promo of his upcoming video "Munawar Faruqui leaving comedy". The video was his first after he walked free on February 6 after he was jailed for nearly a month over allegations of "insulting Hindu Gods and home minister Amit Shah".

ALSO READ: A Smiling Munawar Faruqui's First Instagram Post after Walking out of Jail is What Hope Looks Like

Faruqui's first video, titled "Munawar Faruqui Leaving Comedy", was released on Sunday, nearly a week after his release, on his YouTube channel. In the 10-minute-long video, he spoke about his passion for comedy, his intention of not hurting anyone's sentiments. However, he did not name anyone in the video nor did he speak about his time in jail. While everyone waited for the point where he would announce his retirement from comedy, there was a catch. Towards the end he said it was a "typo" in the subtitle that said "leaving" instead of "living".

In the beginning, Faruqui looks bit lost and one may think it is the month-long incarceration that has had impacted. The video is interspersed with his "Razzaq bhai's" comic relief. He spoke about how the world of Internet has changed over the years and how hare has overtaken everything.

"I can't leave comedy. It keeps me going. The sound of the laughter gives me energy and the ones who don't like me, I will try to win them over too with my comedy.

"I have a thousand reasons to leave comedy, but there is one reason that keeps me going," he says as the audio fades into the sound of audience clapping and cheering for him on the stage.

He hasn't given any direct statement after his release, but with this video the message has gone that he will continue with his work. On Tuesday he posted a picture of himself on Instagram. Wearing his brightest smile, Faruqui captioned the photograph with his poetry. "Mere ander ke andheron ko karne do shikayat, Hasa kar lakhon chehron ko Roshan kiya hai maine," he wrote as he thanked his fans for love and support.

A slight controversy followed this post too after people claimed that this post was aimed to instigate those who were offended with his jokes. He cryptically replied to such remarks on Twitter.

Ek hi tarkeeb aati hai muje ghum chupane kiFir bhi puch rahe hain woh wajah mere muskurane ki... #spreadlove #spreadsmile munawar faruqui (@munawar0018) February 11, 2021

Arrested for allegedly hurting religious sentiments, Faruqui was in Indore jail since January 1. n February 5, the Supreme Court granted him interim bail after the Madhya Pradesh High Court had rejected his bail plea on January 28. The apex court also stayed the production warrant issued against Faruqui by a court in Prayagraj in connection with an FIR lodged there.
Former US president, Donald Trump has been acquitted by the Senate in an impeachment trial over his role in the 6 January attack on the US Capitol, concluding the second impeachment trial of his term in office.



The U.S. Senate voted on Saturday to acquit Trump on a charge of incitement of insurrection after a majority of senators found Trump guilty, but the vote fell short of the two-thirds margin required to convict him after a five-day impeachment trial in the US Senate.



A total of 57 Senators voted to convict Trump of the impeachment article brought by the U.S. House of Representatives, with seven Republicans joining all 50 Democrats in the chamber.



This trial wasnt about choosing country over party, even not that this was about choosing country over Donald Trump and 43 Republican members chose Trump. They chose Trump, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said following the vote.



Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, was among those who voted to acquit the former president.



Explaining his decision in a floor speech after the vote, McConnell said Trump committed a disgraceful dereliction of duty by refusing to intervene as his supporters carried out a violent insurrection at the Capitol.





Theres no question, none, that President Trump is practically, and morally, responsible for provoking the events of the day, McConnell said, before concluding that the Senate was never meant to serve as a moral tribunal.



McConnell also dismissed the Trump attorneys claim that impeachment was an attempt to disenfranchise 74 million-plus American voters who voted for Trump in the 2020 election.



Thats an absurd deflection, McConnell said. 74 million americans did not invade the Capitol. Hundreds of rioters did. 74 million americans did not engineer the campaign of disinformation and rage ... One person did. Just one.



But in the end, after intense reflection, McConnell said he ended up concluding the Constitution did not allow the Senate to convict a former president.



Sen. Ben Sasse, R-NE, one of the seven Republicans who voted to convict, said in a statement. : "This trial is constitutional because the president abused his power while in office and the House of Representatives impeached him while he was still in office," Sasse said.



"If Congress cannot forcefully respond to an intimidation attack on Article I instigated by the head of Article II, our constitutional balance will be permanently tilted. A weak and timid Congress will increasingly submit to an emboldened and empowered presidency. Thats unacceptable."



After the decision, former President Trump released a statement saying: "This has been yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our Country. No president has ever gone through anything like it, and it continues because our opponents cannot forget the almost 75 million people, the highest number ever for a sitting president, who voted for us just a few short months ago."



"Our historic, patriotic and beautiful movement to Make America Great Again has only just begun. In the months ahead I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all of our people. There has never been anything like it!" the statement continued.



This was Trumps second impeachment trial. In December 2019, House Democrats impeached President Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, but the Republican-controlled Senate voted not to convict him.













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.

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New Delhi, Feb 15 : Penguin Random House India is to publish prizewinning writer Irwin Allan Sealys stunning new novel, titled "ASOCA: A Sutra", an imagined memoir of Ashoka The Great, the emperor who ruled most of the Indian Subcontinent and played a pivotal role in the spread of Buddhism from India to other parts of Asia in the 3rd century BC.

Earlier, Penguin had published the 30th anniversary edition of Sealy's critically acclaimed debut novel "The Trotter-Nama".

"Asoca", tells the story of the emperor who went from masterminding one of the biggest and deadliest wars to becoming one of the most profound advocates of non-violence. The beauty of Sealy's prose will transport readers to a time and place that is remarkable.

'With 'Asoca', I'm delighted to be back with old friends at Penguin", says the author.

Manasi Subramaniam, Executive Editor and Head of Literary Rights, Penguin Random House India, says: "It's an incendiary, powerful work that appears to combine the very best of Allan's preceding books. Slipping easily from mock gravitas to straightforward humour, his infinite variety is on full display here. It's a rich, dark-but-whimsical parable about nationhood and violence and religion and personal dilemmas. I found it irreverent, funny and poignant, rich with skepticism and heart. I absolutely loved it." Irwin Allan Sealy was born and raised in India. He has lived and worked in Canada, the USA, New Zealand and Australia. His first novel "The Trotter-Nama" was published in 1988 by Knopf and tells the story of seven generations of an Anglo-Indian family. The book garnered great praise and acclaim.

Allan has won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, Best First Book, Europe and South Asia, in 1989, the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1991, the Crossword Book Award in 1998, and received the Padma Shri in 2012. He lives in Dehradun.

Washington:

US officials have acknowledged that there have been inconsistencies in the American description of Jammu and Kashmir but insisted there was no change in its policy saying the pace, scope and character of any discussion on Kashmir is for India and Pakistan to determine.



Our policy on Kashmir has not changed, a State Department spokesperson told PTI.



The clarification came after questions were raised about the different ways the US has described Jammu and Kashmir.



Recently in one of its statements, the US described it as Indian administered Jammu and Kashmir and this week it said the Indian State of Jammu and Kashmir.



In June while designating Pakistan-based Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahuddin as a specially-designated global terrorist, the State Department had said the militant group has claimed responsibility for several attacks, including the April 2014 attack in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir.



India, however, had played down the nomenclature by the US, saying similar terms had been used previously too.

Suggested read | India protests against US terror report mentioning PoK as Azad Jammu and Kashmir



In the past, the US had also used India-held Kashmir.



In the latest Country Report on Terrorism 2016, released on Wednesday, the US used Azad Jammu and Kashmir to describe Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.



The use of the word Azad Jammu and Kashmir by the State Department was strongly opposed by the Indian Government.



US officials acknowledged that there has been inconsistency in the American way of describing Jammu and Kashmir, but insisted there has been no change in its policy.



Our policy on Kashmir has not changed. The pace, scope, and character of any discussions on Kashmir is for the two sides to determine, but we support any and all positive steps India and Pakistan can take to forge closer relations, the spokesperson said.

For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps.
tech2 News Staff

Amazon is currently hosting Apple Days sale that will end on 17 February. Amazon is offering discounts of up to Rs 6,000 on the Apple iPad Mini and an additional discount of Rs 3,000 on HDFC Bank credit and debit cards. The e-commerce platform has also announced that AirPods with a charging case will be available at a price of Rs 12,490, down by Rs 2,000. Here are a few best deals on iPhones available on Flipkart and Amazon during the sale.

Best deals on Apple iPhones

iPhone 12 mini

iPhone 12 Mini is currently selling at a starting price of Rs 64,490 on Amazon. It was launched in India at Rs 69,900 back in October last year. On the other hand, Flipkart is offering a discount of Rs 6,000 on HDFC Bank credit and debit cards at the launch price. Post the discount, it will be available at Rs 63,900.

iPhone 12

iPhone 12 was launched in India at Rs 79,990 (64 GB). This variant is priced at Rs 79,649 on Amazon and comes with a Rs 6,000 discount on HDFC Bank credit and debit cards. The same 64 GB variant is priced at Rs 79,650 on Flipkart and has an additional discount of Rs 6,000 on HDFC Bank credit and debit cards.

iPhone 11 Pro

iPhone 11 Pro is currently available at a price of Rs 82,900 (64 GB) on Amazon. The e-commerce platform is also offering up to Rs 1,500 instant discount on Yes Bank Credit Card EMI transactions. On Flipkart, the same variant is available at Rs 82,999.

iPhone 7

iPhone 7 32 GB variant is currently selling at Rs 23,990 on Amazon. On the other hand, it is available at Rs 24,999 on Flipkart.

iPhone 11 Pro Max

The 256 GB storage variant of the iPhone 11 Pro Max (Review) is priced at Rs 96,900 on Amazon. The website is also offering up to Rs 1,500 instant discount on Yes Bank Credit Card EMI transactions. Flipkart is selling the same variant at Rs 1, 31, 900.
Essar Group and Fulcrum BioEnergy Ltd on Monday announced a 600 million pounds waste-to-fuel plant in North West of England that will convert non-recyclable household waste into aviation fuel for use by airlines.

"This innovative bio-refinery will convert several hundred thousand tonnes of pre-processed waste, which would have otherwise been destined for incineration or landfill, into approximately 100 million litres of low carbon sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) annually, they said in a statement.

The project, which will see an investment of approximately 600 million pounds, will use Fulcrums proven waste-to-fuel process, which is already being deployed at its pioneering facility outside of Reno, Nevada in the US, where operations are due to begin later this year.

Essar owns and operates the Stanlow oil refinery which produces over 16 percent of the UKs road transport fuel annually.

"Essar Oil (UK) Ltd (Essar) is delighted to join forces with Fulcrum BioEnergy Ltd (Fulcrum) and Essars subsidiary company Stanlow Terminals Ltd to create a new facility that will convert non-recyclable household waste into SAF for use by airlines operating at the UK airports, the statement said.

The development will see Fulcrum, whose parent is based in California, US, construct, own and operate the plant within Essars Stanlow Manufacturing Complex in the North West of England.

This will be the first Fulcrum plant outside the US.

"Essar will assist with the blending and supply the new SAF to airlines, with Stanlow Terminals Limited providing product storage and logistics solutions for the project under a long-term agreement, it said.

The Fulcrum venture will complement Essars wider plans to build a green energy industrial cluster at the Stanlow site.

Earlier this year, it announced its participation in the production of blue hydrogen under the HyNet project.

The project, which will fully integrate Essar, Stanlow Terminals Ltd and Fulcrum assets and technology, is part of a number of innovative solutions at Stanlow designed to cut carbon emissions and contribute to the UK Governments Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution.

The ambitious plan sets firm foundations to accelerate the UKs path to net zero while transforming the economy, boosting employment and delivering growth.

"The Stanlow project, named Fulcrum NorthPoint, will create 800 direct and indirect jobs during the design, build and commissioning process and over 100 permanent jobs during its operation."

"Plans for Fulcrum NorthPoint are expected to be complete at the end of this year and subject to planning consent, will be operational in late 2025, the statement said.

This new development promises to lead the way to a cleaner and more sustainable future in the North West and change the way aviation fuel is made to help decarbonise the UK.

By using SAF derived from residual domestic household and commercial waste, greenhouse gas emissions are reduced significantly on a lifecycle basis when compared to fuels produced from conventional crude oil.

Such emission reductions are approximately 70 percent and have the future potential to be fully carbon neutral.

In addition, SAF produced at the site offers a 90 percent reduction in particulates, which may benefit local air quality in and around airports.

Stein Ivar Bye, Chief Executive Officer, Essar Oil UK, said: "Stanlow has produced high-quality energy products for over 60 years and we intend to remain a key national supplier of energy for the UK into the future.

"Our sights are firmly set on helping to drive the UKs decarbonisation strategy. This landmark development supports our long term sustainability ambition to deliver the energy solutions of the future and position Stanlow as the UKs leading sustainable aviation fuel hub.
live bse live

nse live Volume Todays L/H More 

There is a mild hint of long unwinding seen from FIIs derivatives statistics for index futures, and any further acceleration in unwinding along with India VIX moving near lower band can induce volatility going forward, Navneet Daga, Senior Derivatives Analyst  Institutional Equities, YES Securities, said in an interview with Moneycontrols Kshitij Anand.

edited excerpt:

A) Indian markets saw a consolidation of gains during the week as headline index digested the large gains made in the past 2 weeks. Traders bracing for a tight band trade for Nifty between 15,000 to 15,300 mark moving into fag end of Feb expiry.

India VIX settled 5 percent lower at 22 mark as options writing picked up pace in sideways markets. The large-cap stock started to see near-term price exhaustion on the upside leading to consolidation of gains.

A) Midcaps outperforming as largecap consolidate. Well, a similar trend is visible in the US markets as the Smallcap 2000 index was rallying and outperforming benchmark indices. We expect the rally in mid & smallcap to continue in the domestic markets as traders hunt for yield and chase momentum.

Midcaps continue to surge higher on cables and wire space. Polycab is trading near its upper band of resistance zone of Rs 1320-1340 zone, and any possible move above Rs 1350 is likely to trigger a fresh momentum with a possible upside target of over Rs 1500 in the coming days for the stock. The downside protection zone is seen at Rs 1260 levels.

Classic rounding bottom formation was seen on Nocil with the stock breaking out of the consolidation. We expect a large move above Rs 165 mark. Investors can buy the stock for a possible target of Rs 185, and a stop loss can be placed below Rs 149 levels.

A) The important level to watch would be 14980 on futures on the downside while on the upside 15260 is an important resistance to watch. If taken out decisively, it would force traders to cover short positions. We expect the Nifty50 to trade in the range of 15,000 to 15,300 for the next week.

BankNifty: Volatility is seen between the band of 35600 to 36680 range. We are currently in the middle of the trading band, and the index is likely to find buying interest at the lower range.

Options selling between the boundaries should be a profitable strategy for the coming week.

Data points for watch out:

A mild hint of long unwinding seen from FIIs derivatives statistics for index futures any further acceleration along with India VIX moving near the lower band can induce volatility going forward.

A) Here is a list of top trading ideas for the short term:

The stock saw heavy shorting pressure with an aggregate OI jump of 100% during the week. There is a momentum breakdown seen on the stock. It may face resistance near Rs 1720-1730 mark, and we expect downside extending towards the Rs 1500 mark. Traders can look to sell the rallies with a stop around Rs 1730 on the upside, and the target can be placed at Rs 1500.

The stock saw a fresh breakout above its impending resistance zone of Rs 200 mark with a sharp pick up in volumes and long buildup on futures. The stock can be bought near Rs 200 mark with a stop of Rs 189, and a target on the upside could be placed at Rs 225 levels.

: The views and investment tips expressed by experts on Moneycontrol.com are their own and not those of the website or its management. Moneycontrol.com advises users to check with certified experts before taking any investment decisions.

The national office-bearers meeting of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will take place in the national capital on Sunday, 21 February. It will be chaired by party president JP Nadda.

This is the first time that such a meeting will take place since the nationwide lockdown was imposed due to coronavirus. This is also the first meeting of office-bearers after the appointment Nadda's new team in September last year.

Besides Nadda and party general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh, top party leaders, including national general secretaries, vice presidents, general secretaries, state presidents, state general secretaries (organisation), morcha heads, state in-charges and national spokespersons will be present in this meeting.

The meeting which will begin at 10am at the NDMC convention centre in Delhi is likely to end at 5pm.

Sources told CNN-News18 Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to address the office bearers and give a mantra to the party as big elections are lined up in about a month. The PM is also likely to give a roadmap to the saffron party.

This meeting holds a lot of importance since elections are due in five states, namely West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry.

A source privy to the meeting told CNN News18 that state presidents will be presenting a report card of the developments in their respective states and how they are preparing for the upcoming elections.

Another source said discussion on the impact of farm laws and the awareness on the Union Budget is also likely to take place in this meeting. The need to strengthen the organisation, especially in states where the BJP does not have a government, is also likely to be discussed on priority.

The BJP national executive which is a regular feature happens at least four times a year. The last time such an event was held in January 2019.

Oil and natural gas are essential and irreplaceable to our lives, economy and environmental progress. Every Texan should be alarmed by efforts to undermine the oil and natural gas industry, as these misguided attempts will only threaten jobs, the economy and the environment.

As the Texas Legislature begins its work in earnest, we are encouraging lawmakers to consider a three-part Roadmap to Recovery policy to drive oil and natural gas investment to power Texas economic recovery, and provide critical state and local tax revenue Texans need.

Oil and natural gas taxes and state royalties anchor the Texas budget and provide funding that directly supports Texas schools, teachers, roads, infrastructure and essential services. These resources will be vital to meeting our states budget deficit due to the economic downturn caused by COVID-19. As challenging as last year was, the Texas oil and natural gas industry paid $13.9 billion in state and local taxes and state royalties.

Our states Economic Stabilization Fund  commonly known as the rainy day fund  the Permanent School Fund, or PSF, and the Permanent University Fund, or PUF, are funded almost exclusively with taxes and royalties paid by the oil and natural gas industry.

Last year, the PUF received $771 million and the PSF received $942 million. The rainy day fund received $1.66 billion from oil and natural gas taxes, bringing the balance to more than $10 billion.

In this legislative session, Texas lawmakers have several opportunities to advance economic and environmental progress. To meet the needs of our booming population, lawmakers must ensure continued, responsible development of essential infrastructure.

Every Texan relies on electric transmission lines, roads, high-speed internet, drainage and flood control, and pipelines for water, oil, natural gas and transportation fuels. The expansion of this infrastructure is essential to the states continued growth and success.

The Legislature should embrace smart tax policy, such as renewing the economic development program known as Chapter 313, that attracts investments and jobs to Texas and resists calls to increase taxes on an industry that pays 6.3 times more in taxes on a per-job basis than the average of the rest of the private sector.

We are also urging lawmakers to maintain their commitment to science-based policy and rational discussions related to environmental issues, with the leading oil and natural gas innovators at the table.

A healthy oil and natural gas industry isnt just good for the economy. The industry is advancing environmental progress as the nations leading investor in emission-reducing technologies.

As a result, Americans are breathing the cleanest air in decades and the U.S. leads the world in reducing energy-related carbon dioxide emissions. Methane emissions rates were down nearly 70 percent in five of the nations largest oil- and natural gas-producing regions between 2011 and 2019, according to data from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Energy Information Administration.

Alternative energy sources depend on Texas oil and natural gas, too  not just to provide reliable backup power, but also for their very composition as wind turbines and solar panels are made from oil and natural gas products.

These advancements are occurring while the United States enjoys more energy security than ever and American-made energy is powering economic prosperity and environmental improvements around the world.

This progress  and ways to build on it  must be part of more rational discussions about the future of our energy, environment and economy. Thanks to continued technological breakthroughs, driven largely by oil and natural gas companies, our energy choices do not have to be either/or. Oil, natural gas and alternative sources will all be part of our energy future.

Smart policies will only further encourage investment in and innovation by the oil and natural gas industry, and will power us toward the cleaner, stronger and better future every Texan deserves.

Todd Staples is president of the Texas Oil & Gas Association and former Texas agriculture commissioner.
The 2021 Programme of Kucheza Afrika Festival will take place online and at the South African State Theatre (SAST) from 1 to 11 April. This year's programme boasts the dance fraternity's renowned dancers such as Vincent Mantsoe, Lulu Mlangeni, Bailey Snyman, Nicola Haskins, Ignatius van Heerden, Fana Tshabalala, Thulani Chauke, Mdu Nhlapo and more.

We have intentionally and singularly curated an open programme  a platform to express the dynamism and uninhibited creative expression that Africa is known for, says Sekhabi. This dance festival also acknowledges our youth and their acute awareness of the challenges within society and their ability to narrate those stories, with their techniques and their interpretation of contemporary African dance.

Main programme

Nijinsky's War  Suzy Bernstein

Young artists programme

Memoryhouse - Louise Coetzer  Oscar O'Ryan

Ticket information:

Like many other art events across the globe last year, the launch of Kucheza Afrika Festival was postponed due to the life-threatening Covid-19 pandemic. To comply with the pandemics health and safety protocols, this years festival will be a hybrid of online and live theatre, with selected shows only streaming online while some showcase for both live and virtual audiences.The Kucheza Afrika Festival is a continuation of SASTs dance festival, which debuted under the name Dance Umbrella Africa in 2019. Inspired by the Swahili word for dance, Kucheza aims to be a platform that will help preserve dance in the country and the rest of Africa and ensure that dancers always have a home at the State Theatre. The festival is SASTs aspiration to continue serving domestic and continental dance communities, as well as a call to action for Africa to converge as one in its diversity.Spearheaded by the SASTs artistic director Aubrey Sekhabi, Kucheza is an exciting new leaf for dance at the theatre.The SAST will be home to dancers and choreographers hailing from all corners of the world to mark an optimistic era for dance in Africa. Kuchezas programme has been split into two categories. Namely, the main programme, which profiles experienced choreographers and headlining works, and the young artists programme, a bespoke platform for young dancers who are finding their feet in dance and taking up space in the dance community.In the main programme, world-renowned dancer and choreographer Vincent Mantsoe will take audiences through an abstract journey on loneliness in his new solo-piece called Soliidad, which he says it is a slavish imitation of a great monk who is on a journey he is not intended at reaching its destination. It will show for live audiences on 8 and 9 April. The acclaimed Nijinskys War, choreographed by Ignatius van Heerden, winner of 2017 Standard Bank Ovation Award for artistic excellence, will take centre stage on 3 and 4 April. The piece raises awareness of mental health through an adaptation of The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky (1953), who was the greatest ballet dancer of the 20th century to struggle with mental illness. It will also show both on stage and online.Lulu Mlangeni, who is 2019 Standard Bank Young Artist Award winner, dispels gender stereotypes with a piece titled The Encounter on 9 and 10 April, live in theatre and online. The work sees a duet, featuring Mlangeni and Bafikile Sedibe, in a dialogue exploring subtleties that undermine the potential for a smooth flow of relationships between genders. Another work highlighting societal ills is Slave by seasoned dancer Levern Botha and Port of Expression Dance Company, scheduled to virtually premiere on 9 April at the festival. Slave is a research-based work aimed at creating awareness of modern-day slavery.Concentrated on cementing a global position, Kucheza Africa Festival also invites dancers and choreographers from various countries in Africa and beyond its borderlines. Frances choreographer and theatre maker Phillippe Baldini will showcase a piece titled Vast. The piece, which is yet to stream from 2 April, follows a story about a young boy from Nepal who was kidnapped and abused. Roger Sarr who hails from Senegal, choreographs a self-introspective piece called Beyond An Appearance showing online from 3 April.Like Sarr, Benins dancer Serge Amoussou-Guenou is also featured under the young artists programme. The Beninese will do a virtual presentation of a tribute project called Originally. With it he pays homage to the most powerful king of West Africa during the late 19th century, the King of Dahomey called Behanzin, who resisted the colonial invasion in his country. Originally starts on 7 April. Featured South African artists in the fringe category include Marcia Modise showcasing Ten Minutes With A Refugee, Kristi-Leigh Gresse with Sullied and production called What Makes Us by companies Geronimo Theatre Collective & Performance on Pointe, all showing online on SAST YouTube channel.Dance companies Matchbox Theatre Collective and Performance on Pointe will present the 2019 Standard Bank Silver Ovation Award-winner Lost And Found in the theatre on 3 and 4 April. Choreographed by formidable dance scholars Bailey Snyman and Nicola Haskins, the work journeys through many trials of relationships- a sensitive, sensual and nostalgic reflection of time passing. It speaks to the notion of growing and the way we respond to different times in our lives.Another company bringing work is Unmute Dance Company, which will be presenting a double bill titled Trapped. Trapped challenges the trapped mentality that society uses to box someone living with a disability. In the piece, dancers use their disability as a catalyst for dialogue around questions of belonging and independence in a non-integrated and exclusive society for people living with disabilities. Trapped is bravely choreographed by Nadine Mckenzie and Siphenathi Mayekiso who both have been people living with disability from childhood. It shows only on the SAST YouTube page from 2 April.Online viewers can also enjoy work by Louise Coetzer in collaboration with Music Artists Brydon Bolton and Matthijs van Dijk titled Memory from 8 April. The piece immerses the viewer in a dreamscape where the tension between reality and remembering collides in an infinite loop.The festival will draw to an end with Standard Bank Young Artist Award recipient Fana Tshabalala joining forces with Thulani Chauke to reimagine the late Themba Mbulis renowned work Dark Cell. While celebrating and commemorating South African history, the piece is also embedded in the past as a mirror of contemporary society and a reflection of post-colonial interiorities. The duo performs for live audiences on 9 and 10 April. One the same dates, Naledi Award-winning choreographer Mdu Nhlapo will also stage his work titled Magnificent 7. The work is a mystical tale inspired by Antoine Fuqua depicting a turbulent journey of a group of individuals who are at the helm of an apocalypse. The works will also be streamed on SASTs YouTube channel online.Main programme: R120Young Artists Programme: R80Online shows (ALL): R30.Kucheza Afrika Festival tickets can be purchased from SASTs official ticketing service provider Webtickets, available online and over the counter at Pick n Pay stores natiowide.
Keep it up EU and.yes, Russia will!

Russia: Europe will be worked with on a country by country basis, if the EU does not straighten up and get its act together..No not Europe, but the EU!

Lavrov on Potential Russia-EU Break-up: Rift Has Been Growing for Years at Brussels Initiative

The foreign minister has previously stated that Moscow is prepared to end the relationship with the European Union if the bloc introduces sanctions that put the Russian economy at risk. The breakup between Russia and the European Union has been going on for a long time, with the bloc being the initiator, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Monday. In general, it is clear for any person that takes at least some interest in the situation in Europe that the breakup has been going on for many years, as the EU consistently keeps severing ties, Lavrov said at a press conference, held after talks with Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto. According to the Russian minister, the 2014 coup in Ukraine was a tipping point, as the EU in fact showed it could do nothing with the agreement, which the authorities and the opposition reached just ahead of the coup and which was signed by Germany, France and Poland.

Source: Lavrov on Potential Russia-EU Break-up: Rift Has Been Growing for Years at Brussels Initiative  Sputnik International

and

The Russian minister underlined that these meetings were meant to conduct full reviews of all areas of cooperation between Moscow and Brussels. All of this, I reiterate, was not destroyed by us, Lavrov stressed. The minister then added that Russia-EU contacts can now be described as sporadic. The contacts between the Russian foreign minister and high representatives, Josep Borrell and his predecessor Federica Mogherini, are mainly dedicated to situational talks about Syria, the Iranian nuclear program or some other international situation rather than reviews of the relations with the EU because there are almost no relations to speak of, Lavrov underlined. In other words, we meet from time to time depending on certain interests, primarily from Brussels. We are not imposing ourselves, we are ready to consider any issue which can be of mutual interest, but in any case the meetings that take place from time to time do not mean that there are relations, he added.

Source: Brussels deliberately destroyed framework of Russia-EU ties, says Lavrov  Russian Politics & Diplomacy  TASS

I have been talking about this and watching this lately. I suspect that Putin will soon step forward and have something to say very soon.for Lavrov was treated very badly and lied to in and by the last EU meeting with Josep Borrell. We have a saying, Straw that broke the camels back

Too many lies and too many straws

Remember: Russia does not bluff!

WtR




China's top procuratorate has pledged intensified crackdowns on crimes related to COVID-19 vaccines, following the emergence of cases including sales of counterfeit vaccines.

As of Wednesday, procuratorial organs across the country have approved the arrests of 70 suspects involved in 21 vaccine-related criminal cases, according to the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP).

In one case revealed by the SPP, several suspects manufactured nearly 58,000 counterfeit vaccine doses by using normal saline, pocketing close to 18 million yuan (US$2.8 million) from illegal sales.

The SPP has requested that procurators nationwide take resolute actions to combat vaccine-related crimes, providing legal guarantees to COVID-19 control and prevention work.
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Two days before Christmas, Ravi Zacharias International Ministries confirmed that its founder had engaged in sexual misconduct over the course of many years and promised further information when the investigation into the matter was complete. Late Thursday afternoon, RZIM released the full report as they had received it, along with an extended, contrite statement of apology.

Ravi was a significant personal influence and a great friend of the Colson Center. When Ravi died in May of last year, we honored him. At the time, both Ravi and RZIM leadership claimed that allegations of an inappropriate relationship had been dismissed and disproven after a thorough investigation. We trusted the information provided to us. We were wrong. I both believed and shared excuses that explained Ravis behavior. By doing that, I was wrong and misled others. To be clear, no one at the Colson Center had any sense just how much would be revealed in this final report. But I wish I had not been so quick to trust what I wanted to be true.

There is no sugar-coating, excusing, or explaining away Ravis behavior. It was sinful. It was wicked. And, as this report made crystal clear, it was duplicitous. Reading through it, I couldnt shake the words I heard time and time again from Chuck Colson: There is no limit to the human capacity for self-rationalization.

Thats why Proverbs uses the word folly to describe sin. As a mentor of mine used to say, sin makes us dumb. Buried in sin, we become fools, actually convincing ourselves that, for the first time in human history, we will be the ones to get away with it.

As sin takes us deeper than we ever imagined possible, others are dragged along into our self-deception. Sin always leaves other victims, human beings made in the image of God and for whom Christ died. The number of women Ravi abused, and the degree to which he deceived them, is breath-taking. RZIM has committed to make restitution and care for these women. I hope and pray they will. And there are other victims to remember: family members, friends, and the many disillusioned others around the world.

Recently, a BreakPoint listener emailed us asking how we should respond to cases like this, when a Christian leader or teacher is caught in sexual misconduct. Is it possible to separate the good that theyve done and the truth theyve taught, the person and their sin? And, what about in cases such as this, when the perpetrator is gone and has no further opportunity to acknowledge his sins, repent, and seek forgiveness?

We need not deny that Ravis teaching helped many Christians make sense of the Faith, deal with their doubts, and engage other people with the Gospel, in order to acknowledge the depth of his depraved behavior. As my colleague Shane Morris pointed out a few weeks ago, no one is made of finer clay than anyone else. As St. Paul wrote, There is none righteous, no not one.

Its also important to remember, to borrow a phrase popularized by Christian educator Arthur Holmes, all truth is Gods truth. In other words, if Ravi Zacharias ever said anything true in his life, and of course he did, he was not its source but only its medium. Any truth  all truth  comes ultimately from God, outside of time or place or context. Even if delivered by the most sinful voices, truth is as eternal and unchanging as God Himself.

A postmodern worldview, in contrast, relativizes truth to cultural settings or individuals. In other words, truth is not absolute. But, if truth is dependent on the shifting sands of attitudes, beliefs, perceptions of a culture or an individual, anything we build on it must collapse when any of those things do.

Of course, knowing that doesnt make whats happened any less painful, disorienting, or consequential, especially for all those women involved. Having talent, even amazing talent, to communicate does not give one a divine right or inherent privilege (and it is an incredible privilege) to have or to keep a public platform. Scripture is clear: teachers are stewards of the truth, and therefore held to a higher standard.

This is not the same thing as cancel culture, which is so popular in our time. Cancel culture cancels people because of their different beliefs. This is about behavior; this is about reprehensible behavior that deeply harmed other people.

Finally, let this be a reminder to not trust ourselves, but only God and His Spirit. Pray for your pastor, church leaders, spouse, and whomever else God has put in your life. We need His protection from the real and ever-present temptations, as well as from our own capacity to deceive ourselves and then rationalize our behavior.

Originally posted at breakpoint.org
New Delhi: At least 15 people were killed and two injured after a vehicle overturned near Kingaon village in Yawal taluka of Jalgaon district on late Sunday night (February 14). The truck with 15 labourers on board was going from Dhulia to Raver when the mishap took place.

According to reports, among the deceased include two children - a 6-year-old boy and a 7-year-old girl. The truck was loaded with papaya. The mishap took place as the vehicle's steering was locked.

All the deceased were labourers from Abhoda, Kerhala and Raver in the district, police told PTI, adding that they died after their papaya-laden truck overturned shortly after midnight near a temple at Kingaon village.

The number of death may increase. Further details are awaited.
Adrian Esterman, a professor of biostatistics, said all returning Australians should not be allowed in until quarantine workers and the vulnerable have been vaccinated

A former World Health Organisation epidemiologist has echoed Daniel Andrews' call for Australia to shut its borders even to returning citizens.

Adrian Esterman, a professor of biostatistics at the University of South Australia, said the government should be setting up specially-built quarantine centres for those returning home, suggesting the current hotel facilities should be scrapped.

He stressed that all international arrivals should be halted until quarantine workers and the most vulnerable are vaccinated against the virus.

His comments come after the Victorian premier controversially suggested Australians stranded overseas should not be allowed to travel home unless granted an exception on compassionate grounds.

'Our only source now of infection are others coming back from overseas, so if we stop overseas travel there will be no infections,' Professor Esterman told 3AW.

He said that traditionally quarantine stations would be set up in isolated areas, not in the middle of heavily populated cities.

'Hotels were never designed to be quarantine stations, they're not designed for it architecturally, their ventilation systems aren't designed for it, and they're in the middle of cities, which is silly,' the professor said.

Calls have been put forward to ban Australians stranded overseas returning home (pictured a woman hugs her loved one after returning from overseas)

Professor Esterman said the government should be setting up specially built quarantine centres for those returning home (pictured passengers at Sydney airport)

Professor Esterman said the hotels were suitable a year ago when the pandemic first started wreaking havoc across Australia.

'But we're now a year down the track and we should be thinking of other ways of handling this,' he said.

'This isn't the only epidemic that's ever going to hit Australia, we've got more coming in the future so we should actually have a system built ready for it.'

Mr Andrews on Friday said a 'cold hard discussion' needs to be had about tightening international borders even to Australian citizens.

The whole state of Victoria was plunged into a five-day lockdown on Friday after an outbreak of the mutant UK strain of Covid-19.

'This thing is not the 2020 virus. It is very different. It is much faster. It spreads much more easily,' Mr Andrews said.

'And, therefore, we, all of us, have to have a conversation about what's safe, what's proportionate, what's reasonable.'

'I think there needs to be a cold, hard discussion, and I'm happy to lead it.'

Mr Andrews said it is up to the federal government to make a decision on what happens to Australia's international borders but he suggested a 'smaller program' may be necessary.

A woman is seen arriving from New Zealand in October when travel restrictions were lifted

Australia already has one of the strictest flight caps in the world with only citizens, permanent residents and their spouses or dependents allowed to enter Australia.

Prime minister Scott Morrison rejected Mr Andrews' suggestion, but Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack broke ranks to suggest a middle ground.

Mr McCormack left the door open to drastically slashing international arrival caps in light of the latest coronavirus outbreak.

He said there was room for a discussion on reduced arrival caps but argued federal Labor was at odds with Mr Andrews.

'We'd obviously like to get every Australian back as soon as possible but there are quarantine restrictions, of course. There are limits on those numbers coming back in,' he told the ABC on Monday.

'There's only a certain number of places and Australia has helped that by facilitating paid-for flights to get back into the country.'

Opposition home affairs spokeswoman Kristina Keneally continues to attack the government over the growing list of stranded Australians registered to return home.

The Labor frontbencher believes the Victorian premier's suggestion to cut arrival caps is motivated by the Morrison government's refusal to take over quarantine from states.

Daniel Andrews earlier controversially suggested Australians stranded overseas should not be allowed to travel home unless they're granted an exception on compassionate grounds

'The problems that exist in hotel quarantine today are because of we have not had national leadership to take responsibility here,' Senator Keneally told Sky News.

Brisbane and Perth have also endured mini-lockdowns after hotel quarantine workers became infected.

The federal government is looking at ways to boost the capacity of the Northern Territory's Howard Springs quarantine hub after concerns about capital city hotels.

A proposal for a quarantine centre in the Queensland regional city of Toowoomba is also under consideration.

From this week, 6,300 international arrivals will be allowed into Australia each week.

Victoria will take just over 1,300 while New South Wales will take 3,010.

In Victoria there are 17 cases linked to the Melbourne Airport Holiday Inn cluster.
Business

Finance Minister to address post-Budget RBI board meeting

Nirmala Sitharaman

New Delhi, Feb 14 (Agencies) | Publish Date: 2/14/2021 12:43:53 PM IST

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is scheduled to address the post-Budget meeting of the RBIs central board on Tuesday and highlight key points of Union Budget 2021-22, including the fiscal consolidation roadmap. Fiscal deficit - the excess of government expenditure over its revenues - is estimated to hit a record high of 9.5 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the current fiscal ending March 31 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

For the next 2021-22 fiscal, the deficit has been pegged at 6.8 percent of GDP, which will be further lowered to 4.5 percent by the fiscal ending March 31, 2026. The meeting will be held virtually for the first time due to COVID-19 protocol, sources said. Earlier this month, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das said the central bank will able to manage the high quantum of government borrowings at Rs 12 lakh crore for the next fiscal in a non-disruptive manner. The governor had said the extraordinary event of the pandemic has resulted in deviation from the fiscal consolidation roadmap but declined to comment on what view the rating agencies will be taking on the high fiscal gap at 9.5 percent in FY21 and 6.8 percent in FY22.

Das had said the RBI, being the debt manager for the government, did discuss the borrowing with the Ministry of Finance even before the Budget. The government was earlier committed to getting the fiscal deficit down to 3 percent in the medium term as per the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (FRBM) Act mandate, and now plans to touch 4.5 percent by FY26. A wider deficit generally entails bigger borrowing by the government.

The finance minister would also apprise the board of various other announcements made in the Budget to revive growth by spending more on infrastructure and attending to the needs of the healthcare sector. The Indian economy is expected to contract by 7.7 percent in the current fiscal ending March, hit by the COVID-19 crisis.

The Budget has estimated nominal GDP growth rate of 14.4 percent and revenue growth at 16.7 percent for the next financial year. Real GDP growth is expected to be in the range of 10-10.5 percent. To boost growth, the finance minister in the Budget increased spending on capital expenditure to Rs 5.54 lakh crore from Rs 4.12 lakh crore, while the health sector allocation has been hiked to Rs 2.23 lakh crore from Rs 94,000 crore in the Budget estimate for 2020-21.

South Africa: 2020 matric exam not compromised, report finds

The 2020 combined matric examination was not compromised, while the leaks were only limited to a small group.

This is according to the Department of Basic Educations National Investigations Task Team (NITT) Chairperson, Hugh Amoore, who was leading the probe into the leaks of the 2020 matric Mathematics and Physical Science Papers 2, last year.

Speaking on Sunday, Amoore said while the full extent of the leak may never be known, the investigation found that widespread access to the question papers did not occur.

This was based on the investigative marking, interviews and statistical analysis, he said in his presentation.

There has been no compromise to the integrity of the 2020 combined examination as a whole and the integrity of the Mathematics Paper 2 and Physical Science Paper 2 has not compromised the overall results."

He said establishing the source of the leak was critical which involved the audit of the distribution chain, the investigation by the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks) and a forensic private investigator.

The purpose of the investigation was to establish the extent of the leaks, determine the source of a security breach, identify candidates who had prior access to the leaked question papers and make recommendations on the credibility of the examinations.

Amoore confirmed that an employee from a printing company contracted by one province has been arrested and appeared in court and will return in March.

However, the second source of the leaked paper showed that the paper was printed at the Governments Printing Works, of which the matter is in the hands of the Hawks.

It is of the utmost importance that the case against the person accused of stealing from one of the provinces processes be pursued to the conclusion and the investigation into the leak related to the Government Printing Works be finalised and the process be purposed to conclude.

Meanwhile, Amoore said it was comforting that there were no breaches during the storage and distribution of the papers in question by the department.

Candidates

According to the findings, 236 candidates, who are mostly top achievers, were allegedly involved in the Mathematics question paper sent via a WhatsApp group.

Of these, 135 learners belonged to a chat group where one of the candidates sent two sets of questions weighing five marks each asking for help in solving the problems.

This was after 10 pm, Sunday, 15 November for the exam that would be written the following morning on Monday.

Meanwhile, the other 101 learners were in other chat groups, where either the full paper was distributed or set questions were leaked.

However, according to Amoore, only 62 learners are believed to have had access to the Physical Science question paper.

Further investigations show that the leaks were limited to very small numbers.

Investigative and statistical marking

The investigative marking to identify unusual patterns to establish any collusion, revealed no evidence to suggest candidates benefited from prior access to the question paper or sub-questions, while some candidates need further investigation.

The department also embarked on statistical marking, done to indicate the pattern of usual performance in Mathematics or Physical Science Papers 1 compared to Paper 2.

The team compared the results dating back to 2016 to look at how years compared against each other.

He said there was no evidence of an unusual pattern, but only two candidates where upper "standardised residual" for Mathematics was identified.

Meanwhile, there was no distinction in Physical Science.

No evidence of collusion

The National Examinations Irregularities Committee (NEIC) that instituted the investigation, has concluded that the 2020-combined examination was not compromised based on the evidence collected through the investigation and recommendations.

NEIC Chairperson, Advocate Luvuyo Bono, said they have already studied the report and are satisfied.

It appears that the candidates have shown they had done the work individually and that there was no evidence of collusion and that the leak had really come out or spread through a WhatsApp message.

The Committee has since accepted the report and said it was happy with the findings.

Amoore had described the National Senior Certificate (NSC) as a flagship qualification.

Its critical at the exit from schooling in Grade 12 and its critical that its credibility and integrity is maintained.

Meanwhile, he said it was worth noting that one million candidates sat down for the combined matric examination in the context of COVID-19.

We had a very successful administration in the exams, but it needs to be accepted that the examination was marred by the leaks of Mathematics Paper 2 and Physical Sciences Paper 2 question papers.

The team has since divided the categories into sections and recommended that those in group C and D results will be locked, while results will be released in A and B, while E will be released pending the school investigation.

He said the report was presented to Umalusi on Friday and the Council will make its decision that will be announced on Monday.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-02-15. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
1 in 3 parents feel COVID-19 has made it harder to get preventive dental care for their child; families with Medicaid may face greater barriers.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. - A third of parents say the COVID-19 pandemic has made it difficult to get dental care for their children, a new national poll suggests.

But some families may face greater challenges than others. Inability to get a dentist appointment during the pandemic was three times as common for children with Medicaid versus those with private dental coverage, according to the C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's Health at Michigan Medicine.

"Regular preventive dental care helps keep children's teeth healthy and allows providers to address any tooth decay or dental problems before they become more serious," says Mott Poll co-director Sarah Clark, M.P.H.

"Our findings highlight how the pandemic may have disrupted families' dental care and exasperated potential disparities among those with insurance barriers."

Some parents attempted to continue their child's regular dental check-ups, only to find a lengthy wait time for an appointment, Clark says. Others found that the dental office had closed or reduced patient visits to urgent cases.

But the Mott Poll report revealed a silver lining too: One in four parents described improvements in how their children are taking care of their teeth and gums at home during the pandemic.

The nationally representative report is based on responses from 1,882 parents with at least one child ages 3-18.

Clark speaks more about the Mott Poll findings and dental care recommendations for families below:

1 in 3 Parents Cite Challenges Getting Preventive Dental Care

The American Association of Pediatric Dentists recommends that children receive regular teeth cleaning and exams every six months, starting when their first tooth comes in. Check-ups provide a consistent opportunity to identify and treat tooth decay, to apply protective treatments like sealants and fluoride varnish, and to educate parents and children about good dental hygiene.

But to protect patients and staff, some dental offices have changed or limited their operations to limit the spread of COVID-19.

Sixty percent of parents in the poll have tried to get preventive dental care for their child since the pandemic started. While most got an appointment in the usual time frame, 24% experienced a delay, and 7% could not get an appointment at all.

Overall, one in three parents (32%) feel COVID-19 has made it harder to get preventive dental care for their child.

Clark says a challenge for parents during the pandemic has been keeping up to date on the many changes in schedules and operations, from schools to stores to health care providers.

"Parents who were unable to get a dental appointment for their child should check back with their regular dentist, as lengthy wait times or patient restrictions may have changed," she says.

COVID-19 Safety Concerns May Delay Care

This Mott Poll suggests that some parents are worried about the risk of COVID-19 exposure during a dental visit and are delaying making a dental appointment for their child.

The majority of parents who didn't attempt to schedule preventive dental care for their child during the pandemic cited COVID-related reasons. Some 40% don't want to risk getting exposed, while 23% say the dentist office was closed or only seeing urgent patients.

Other parents say they did not call for an appointment because their child wasn't due for dental care or wasn't having any dental problems.

Most parents (67%) believe it's safe for their child to get dental care at this point in the pandemic, while 14% feel it's unsafe and 19% are unsure.

Clark recommends parents who are concerned about COVID exposure to contact their child's dentist to learn about what types of precautions have been put in place. These may include patient and staff screenings and temperature checks, and having patients wait in their cars rather than the waiting room.

"It may be helpful for dental providers to be proactive in reminding parents about the importance of regular dental check-ups for children," she says. "Reminder notices and website updates outlining changes to practice operations may also help more parents feel safe bringing children in for their visit."

Insurance Barriers Contribute to Dental Health Accessibility

Barriers to dental appointments occurred more frequently for children with Medicaid dental coverage compared to those with private dental insurance.

Among parents who tried to get their child in for preventive dental care, 15% of parents of children with Medicaid dental coverage reported not being able to get an appointment, compared to 4% of those with private dental insurance and 5% who had no coverage.

Clark notes that even outside the pandemic, these children often have difficulty finding a dentist, as many providers don't accept Medicaid payment. Some children receive preventive dental services through school or public dental clinics, but those services have decreased during the pandemic.

Among parents who didn't try to schedule a preventive dental appointment, cost was the reason for 23% of parents who lacked dental insurance, compared to very few of those with private or Medicaid coverage.

"Insurance barriers may lead to unequal opportunities for families to receive dental care critical to keeping their children's teeth healthy," Clark says.

1 in 4 Parents See Improvements in Child's Oral Health Habits

An unexpected finding from the Mott Poll report was that a fourth of parents reported improvements in their child's oral health habits during the pandemic.

This included more frequent brushing (16%), flossing (11%) and use of fluoride rinse (9%), and less drinking of sugary beverages (15%).

Overall, 28% of parents say their child has made at least one positive change, including more parents of children with Medicaid (37%) or no dental coverage (32%) compared to private dental insurance (24%).

"We were pleased to find parents describing positive changes in how their children are taking care of their teeth at home," Clark says. "Daily brushing and flossing and avoiding sugary drinks are important ways to prevent tooth decay.

"Parents whose child is not getting regular dental check-ups should take extra steps to improve daily oral health habits, particularly if regular dental care has been delayed or disrupted," she adds.

###
Addressing a press briefing on Monday, Delhi Police Cyber Cell Joint CP Prem Nath revealed details about the action taken against the creators of the 'toolkit' pertaining to farm protests. Elaborating on the contents of the toolkit, he mentioned that the "action plan" in the toolkit document was executed in a "copycat manner" on January 26 resulting in violence. Talking about the case against advocate Nikita Jacob, he said, "As soon as the investigation was enough to fetch enough information, a search warrant was obtained on February 9 against Nikita Jacob- one of the editors of the Toolkit Google document. A team headed by the IO of the case reached Mumbai and conducted searches at her house on February 11. After due intimation to the Mumbai Police, two laptops and one I-Phone was found".

Delhi Police Cyber Cell Joint CP Prem Nath remarked, "Initial investigation of this toolkit document revealed that it was created by a pro-Khalistani group named Poetic Justice Foundation and people associated with it. One portion of the toolkit mentioned action points named 'prior action'. As you are aware, there were digital strike two, hashtags on January 26 and earlier, Tweetstorm on January 23 onwards and physical action on January 26 and entering Delhi for Kisan rally and return back to the borders. The second part of the same document mentions tasks such as the disruption of India's cultural heritage such as Yoga, tea and targeting Indian embassies in different world capitals. The timebound action points and programmes given in the toolkit viewed with the actual developments in Delhi clearly shows that the action plan formulated in the toolkit was implemented on ground and executed in a copycat manner."

Read: Twitter Notifies Haryana Minister Anil Vij For Tweet On Disha Ravi; Complaint From Germany

Many screenshots of the toolkit were available on open source & were investigated. When probe was able to fetch enough information, a search warrant was obtained from Court on 9th Feb, against Nikita Jacob, one of the editors of the toolkit google doc: Prem Nath, Jt CP Cyber Cell pic.twitter.com/EO6eSMJu95  ANI (@ANI) February 15, 2021

Read: Rajnath Singh Backs Delhi Police To The Hilt; Slams 'neighboring Nations' Nefarious Acts'

'Due procedure was adopted'

Moreover, Joint CP Prem Nath alleged that Shantanu, Nikita Jacob and Disha Ravi are the creators of the toolkit. According to him, they were among 60-70 persons who attended a Zoom meeting on January 11 organised by pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to shape the modalities for January 26. Alleging that incriminating evidence was also found from Disha's device, he justified the action against the 21-year-old activist citing that Jacob did not cooperate with the police. Additionally, he allayed concerns about the manner of her arrest.

He made it clear that non-bailable warrants had been issued by the court against Jacob and Shantanu who are absconding at present. During the interaction with media, the senior police official also divulged that Disha sent the toolkit to Greta Thunberg via Telegram. After the toolkit was shared by Thunberg, an FIR was registered against the authors of this document under Sections 120, 124A, 153, and 153A of the Indian Penal Code.

The senior police official noted, "The initial examination of Nikita revealed that she and her associate Shantanu and Disha had created the toolkit Google document. The email account created by Shantanu is the owner of this document. All others are its editors. A woman named Puneet who is based in Canada connected these people to the pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation and through them, created the Google toolkit document titled 'Farmer Global Strike and Global Day of Action- 26th January'. On January 11, Nikita and Shantanu attended a Zoom meeting organised by Poetic Justice Foundation in which the modalities of the Global Day of Action was worked out."

"Based on these incriminating evidences collected against Disha from her device and in view of the fact that Nikita did not cooperate and she fled from her house, we acted against Disha because she has deleted a WhatsApp group which she created to coordinate among the various members for the toolkit. And the arrest was made in the presence of her mother and in presence of the SHO of the area concerned and due procedure was adopted for arresting her, conducting her medical test and producing her in the court," he added.

The Republic Day violence

On January 26, the farmers' rally took a violent turn after groups of farmers broke police barricades at the Delhi border to enter the national capital before the allocated time. Apart from this, some protesters did not follow the pre-decided routes and instead proceeded towards Central Delhi. As per visuals, some of the protesters vandalised a DTC bus and drove tractors to deliberately run over the police personnel at ITO in central Delhi.

In a clear violation of the conditions laid down by the police, farmers were seen carrying sticks and riding horses. Thereafter, the anti-farm laws protesters entered the premises of the Red Fort and unfurled their own flags from its ramparts. While the situation was brought under control by the end of the day, the untoward incidents provoked outrage from scores of people across the country. Subsequently, the Delhi Police registered 44 FIRs in connection with the violence and arrested more than 122 suspects including Deep Sidhu.

Read: Can We Not Say Anything For A While?: Disha Ravi-Greta Thunberg's 'toolkit' WhatsApp Chat
Hours after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi alleged that the government has "ceded" Indian territory to the Chinese and raised questions over the agreement, the Ministry of Defence issued a strongly-worded statement, saying the effective safeguarding of country's national interest and territory in the Eastern Ladakh sector has taken place because the government reposed full faith in the capabilities of the armed forces.

New Delhi : India on Friday said it has not conceded any territory as a result of the agreement finalised with China for disengagement of troops in Pangong lake areas in eastern Ladakh.

"Those who doubt the achievements made possible by the sacrifices of our military personnel are actually disrespecting them", the statement said.

The ministry also made certain clarifications in the statement, and said, "the assertion that Indian territory is up to Finger 4 is categorically false. The territory of India is as depicted by the map of India and includes more than 43,000 sq km currently under illegal occupation of China since 1962."

"Even the Line of Actual Control, as per the Indian perception, is at Finger 8, not at Finger 4. That is why India has persistently maintained the right to patrol upto Finger 8, including in the current understanding with China," the MoD said.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Thursday told Parliament that as per provision of the agreement, China will pull back its troops to east of Finger 8 areas in the northern bank of Pangong lake while the Indian personnel will be based at their permanent base at Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 in the region.

"India has not conceded any territory as a result of the agreement. On the contrary, it has enforced observance and respect for LAC and prevented any unilateral change in the status quo," it said.

The ministry also asserted that permanent posts of both sides at the north bank of Pangong Tso are longstanding and well-established.

"On the Indian side, it is Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 and on the Chinese side, east of Finger 8," the MoD said, adding the current agreement provides for cessation of forward deployment by both sides and continued deployment at these permanent posts.

The statement said the ministry has taken note of some misinformed and misleading comments being amplified in the media and on social media regarding the disengagement currently underway at Pangong Tso, asserting that it is necessary to set the record straight and counter certain instances of wrongly understood information.

Addressing a press conference, Gandhi questioned why the Prime Minister did not make a statement on the LAC situation, and claimed that Singh "sheepishly" made a statement on the issue in both Houses of Parliament.

"Why has he asked the Defence Minister to make the statement, the Prime Minister should say - I have given Indian land to China, this is the truth," he alleged.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : The role of two more activists is under scanner in the 'Toolkit' document case shared by global climate activist Greta Thunberg in support of the farmer protests. Non-bailable warrants are out against activists Nikita Jacob, who is a lawyer by profession, and Shantanu as a police team is looking for them.

The development comes at a time when outrage is spiralling over the arrest of Disha Ravi, a Bengaluru college graduate and climate activist, on conspiracy and sedition charges in relation to the 'Toolkit' document case. Disha Ravi was produced in a Delhi court on Sunday and was sent to five days in police custody.

Nikita's social media profile states that she is a practicing advocate enrolled with the Maharashtra & Goa State Bar Council and registered with the Bombay High Court (OS).

According to Delhi Police Special Cell sources, a team went to search Nikita Jacob's house on February 11. Since the team arrived at Nikita's home around evening, officials could not question her.

Nikita's role in the campaign came to the fore after Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg tweeted a 'toolkit' related to the farmers' protests against the Centre's three farm laws.

The Delhi Police had registered an FIR on February 4 on charges of sedition, criminal conspiracy and promoting hatred among groups under Sections 124-A, 120-A and 153-A of the Indian Penal Code against the "creators" of the 'toolkit' which was later shared by Thunberg.

The police later described Disha Ravi as a key conspirator in the document's formulation and dissemination and said that she had started a WhatsApp group and collaborated to draft the document.

"In this process, they all collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian state. She was the one who shared the 'Toolkit' doc with Greta Thunberg," said a senior police officer.

Meanwhile, several activists and politicians have expressed concern over the arrest of Disha Ravi.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has expressed his opposition to the arrest of 21-year-old eco-activist Disha Ravi saying the move by the Delhi Police was an "unprecedented attack on democracy".

"Arrest of 21-yr-old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime," he said in a tweet.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text

 Flash

As Hungary joined Serbia in spearheading mass inoculation with China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine in Europe, other European countries are struggling against a vaccine delivery crisis and exploring a way out of lockdown and into economic recovery.

In around a month, 14 percent of Serbia's 6.5-million population received their first doses of vaccine against COVID-19, thanks to the 1.5 million Chinese-made doses.

Following its neighbor, Hungary on Jan. 31 announced that it has reached a deal with Sinopharm, which will enable a mass immunization of 2.5 million people.

As the first shipment is supposed to arrive next week, Hungary is bound to become the first European Union (EU) member to sign up for Chinese vaccines.

"This deal will speed up vaccination, which could save the lives of thousands of people and contribute to lifting restrictions sooner," said Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.

Also on Jan. 31, German Health Minister Jens Spahn said he is "open" to the use of vaccines from Russia or China in Germany, while Markus Soeder, minister-president of the German state of Bavaria, called on the European supervision body to test Russian and Chinese vaccines "as soon as possible."

A shipment of Sinopharm vaccines will arrive in Bosnia and Herzegovina soon too, as one of its two entities, Republika Srpska (RS), ordered them on Feb. 8, Minister of Health and Social Welfare of RS Alen Seranic told Xinhua.

RS institutions have been following all the scientific effects and references of vaccines from all producers, including Chinese ones, and the efficiency, quality, and safety of vaccines are the three criteria that all vaccines entering RS must fulfill, said Seranic.

"Based on other countries' experiences, where Chinese vaccines have been already approved, we decided that we also need to acquire a certain number of vaccines from China," said Seranic.

"We already ordered vaccines for 20 percent of our population," he said, adding that ordering vaccines from China "will make us happy to be able to offer different kinds of vaccines to the citizens."

Earlier this month, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron expressed openness of their countries to any vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), which has so far only given green light to vaccines of Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca.

The shortage of approved vaccines in Europe has been drawing increasing public criticism and prompting demands for alternative solutions.

Addressing such concerns, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen admitted on Wednesday that the EU is lagging behind in combating the virus and it was "too optimistic" about the mass production of the vaccine.

It takes an additional three or four weeks to get the EMA's approval, which is "an investment in trust and safety," she said, while announcing a new regulatory framework as a future solution to speed up the process.

And yet, the public in the EU member countries seems not equally patient, as saving lives and ending lockdowns have become imperative.

"If there are no vaccines, we cannot vaccinate," Todor Kantardjiev, director of the Bulgarian National Center of Infectious and Parasitic Diseases, said last month, complaining about the poor progress of the inoculation program.

"The state will look for other options and we will not hesitate to buy any vaccine that is effective and harmless and that is recognized by Europe, including, of course, from Russia and China," Kantardjiev said.

In Serbia, the Sinopharm's vaccine is welcomed with full trust, and the early inoculation is seen as an opportunity, according to Ivona Ladjevac, head of the center for the Belt and Road Initiative at the Institute of International Politics and Economics in Serbia.

"We should use this opportunity," said Ladjevac. "Serbia can do something like Israel, the first country that will finish this mass vaccination and get back to normal. We can achieve something like that too."

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said in an interview with Xinhua that most people in the country are vaccinated with Sinopharm vaccine.

"There is not such a country in Europe in which you can find that level of trust (in Chinese vaccine) that you can see here in Serbia," he said.

"People here are very satisfied and we are very proud that we succeeded in delivering such good things for the better health of our people and for the future of this country," said the Serbian president.
Senator Lindsey Graham warned Sunday that if Republicans take control of the House of Representatives in next years midterm elections, Vice President Kamala Harris could face impeachment for her tweet supporting a bail fund for Black Lives Matter protesters over the summer.

Speaking in an interview on Fox News Sunday, a day after the U.S. Senate acquitted President Trump, the South Carolina Republican said the former presidents impeachment trial, brought forth because of the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riots, opened Pandoras box.

If you use this model, I dont know how Kamala Harris doesnt get impeached if the Republicans take over the House, because she actually bailed out rioters, Graham said of the former California senator from Oakland. So weve opened Pandoras box here, and Im sad for the country.

Like many pro-Trump Republicans, Graham appeared to be equating the deadly siege on the U.S. Capitol last month with last summers racial injustice protests, two very different events rooted in opposing movements.

On June 1, Harris tweeted a link to a fundraiser for the Minnesota Freedom Fund and asked her followers to chip in to help post bail for protesters in the city following outrage over the police killing of George Floyd. Video captured the incident in which Floyd, who was Black, gasped for breath, handcuffed on the ground, as an officer pressed a knee on his neck on May 25.

The Black Lives Matter movement demands an end to systemic racism that often disproportionately takes the lives of Black people. Small fragments of last years nationwide protests included violence but the movement was largely peaceful  though scenes of looting and fires drew media and public attention. A recent Princeton University study said that 93% of the 7,760 demonstrations linked to the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020 were peaceful.

The Capitol riots by Trump supporters aimed to overturn a free election by attacking an American institution, and took the lives of five people including one police officer. Trumps supporters turned up at his behest to fight like hell, after he stated more than once that hed fraudulently lost the election, birthing conspiracy theories.

Some Republicans have drawn a false equivalency between the two events. Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia focused on violence in last summers civil rights protests during the House impeachment proceedings.

Graham has spoken of the possibility of impeaching Harris before, bringing it up this month in an interview with Foxs Sean Hannity. The senators office did not return requests for comment.

Shwanika Narayan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: shwanika.narayan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @shwanika Instagram: @shwanika
An alleged paedophile captured on CCTV being chased down by a teenage boy in an arcade in western Sydney has been charged with sexual assault.

Police will allege in court the boy, 13, was sexually assaulted by the man, 70, in a toilet block at The Kingsway near Wentworthville train station on Monday afternoon.

Disturbing CCTV footage shows the young teen chasing down the man afterwards while trying to attract the attention of others.

The vision shows the boy dressed in a white T-shirt with a school backpack and dark shorts, throwing a glass frame at the adult man's back in a shopping arcade near the station.

The boy was captured on CCTV footage chasing the man down a shopping arcade on Monday afternoon, calling for help as he went

The man allegedly starts running as the teen gives chase through the passageway, calling for help from passersby as he went, Nine News reported.

Shocked business owners can be seen emerging from their stores in the arcade as the boy gave chase.

The man, carrying his slippers in his hand, runs towards a taxi parked next to the station to allegedly make his getaway, jumping into the passenger side.

The determined teen catches up with his alleged attacker and is seen repeatedly pulling the passenger door open to stop the taxi from leaving.

A Good Samaritan came to the aid of the boy by calling triple-zero.

The man allegedly tried to flee in this taxi pictured across the street but the brave young lad kept wrenching the passenger door open in a desperate attempt to stop him

The man was arrested later by police and taken to Granville Police Station, where he was charged with sexual assault of a child aged 10-14.

He was refused bail and will appear in Fairfield Local Court on Tuesday.

Police spent the rest of Monday afternoon at the scene forensically examining the cordoned off toilet block.

Anyone with more information about this alleged incident should call CrimeStoppers on 1800 333 000.


YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. The 9th point of the trilateral agreement signed between the leaders of Armenia, Russia and Azerbaijan on November 9, 2020 contains no provisions on creating any transport corridor. Any road or communication passing through the territory of Armenia has always been and will be exclusively under the jurisdiction and sovereignty of Armenia, Anna Naghdalyan, spokesperson of the MFA Armenia announced, answering the question of ARMENPRESS news agency.

Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev has announced that in the joint declaration signed on November 10 there is special provision about creating a corridor linking Nakhichevan with Azerbaijan. How would you comment on this?

The 9th point of the November 9 trilateral declaration is about the unblocking of all regional infrastructures and this is the approach of Armenia for the future regional stability and cooperation. The mentioned point does not contain any idea of creating a corridor. Any road or communication passing through the territory of Armenia has always been and will be exclusively under the jurisdiction and sovereignty of Armenia


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Press Release

15 February 2021

OYO enters 2021 with new hotels in Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Texas

Adds 10 new hotels as OYO continues to be the preferred choice of business travelers and families for affordable, clean, stylish hotels

Witness healthy recovery as RevPar reaches 130% (in Q4) of pre-COVID levels

OYO Hotels & Homes, the leading technology and revenue growth platform for owners and operators of hotels and homes, today announced that it opened doors to 10 new hotels in Colorado, Georgia, I owa, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Texas. Continuing its US recovery momentum, the company's RevPar reached over 130% of pre-COVID levels in Q4 2020 as it emerged as the preferred choice of accommodation for front-line travelers getting our economy moving again. Under the leadership of Kasra Moshkani, Head of OYO US, the company aims to continue delivering quality living spaces with 300+ hotel partners.

The newly launched hotels, as a part of the OYO family, will now run on OYO's proprietary technology, which includes CO-OYO, the OYO OS, and OYO app among other tech-based solutions. These tools are powered by benchmark industry data, analytics, revenue tools, and a dynamic pricing engine. This suite of products and technologies are designed to deliver higher occupancy and revenue for partners.

"We are delighted to expand OYO's footprint in the US by adding 10 hotels in key markets. I'm so proud to welcome new partners to the OYO family," sa id Kasra Moshkani, Head of OYO US. "The past few months have been unbelievably tough for the global hospitality industry, but we are now witnessing positive trends in the leisure and budget space. A recent traveler survey commissioned by AHLA suggested that 56% of Americans are likely to travel for leisure in 2021. OYO, along with our partners, stands ready to host new guests. OYO's technology will boost the performance of our partner's hotels through increased occupancy and revenue. We are deeply committed to continuing the momentum of OYO's recovery in the US while contributing to the hospitality industry at large."

All of the new OYO hotels will also benefit from its 'Scrubbed Clean' program, which ensures all of its hotels in the US comply with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines related to health and safety for everyone involved. Its updated operation protocols include physical distancing, a minimal-touch check-in and check-out experience, and the highest quality stringent housekeeping services.

The impact of the pandemic on the hospitality industry is undeniable. OYO recognized the slowdown as an opportunity for improvement and went back to basics, focusing on core strengths: its proprietary pricing engine and distribution channels, its unique hotel operating system (OYO OS), partner tools, data science, and operational excellence. As a direct result of these effortscoupled with travelers and essential frontline workers continuing to choose OYOthe company is witnessing a steady recovery in the US.
A Reddit user has found a new way to encourage smokers to give up the habit after posting a picture of a huge huntsman spider perched on top of a pack of cigarettes.

The image, uploaded on Sunday, sparked dozens of comments with many saying the method would be an effective anti-smoking campaign.

In the post the native Australian arachnid, which while scary looking is harmless to humans, can be seen on top of a lighter seemingly guarding the expensive item below.

The Reddit user posted the picture on Sunday with the caption: 'You can keep 'em'

'These new patches are next level,' one person said.

'And that kids is how I quit smoking,' another added.

'Who's scared of huntsman?' argued a third.

The type of spider is found is most temperate climates including Australia, Asia, Africa, and the Americas with the larger species generally found in woody places such a forests and timber piles.

They get their name from their method of hunting for food rather than spinning webs and are known to be very fast moving.
FORT WORTH, Texas, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Driving in the snow and ice can be challenging, even for experienced local drivers. As the tragic 133-car and 18-wheeler pileup in Fort Worth on Thursday morning demonstrated, local motorists may have been unprepared to navigate the icy conditions.

But what about professional truck drivers, who should have known what to expect that day and should have reacted accordingly?

Steve Laird Steve Laird

"Unlike other motorists, professional truck drivers are trained to manage hazardous road conditions. They also are equipped with additional resources beyond radio traffic and weather reports," says Steven C. Laird, a Fort Worth attorney. Laird is one of only 11 Texas lawyers board certified in Truck Accident Law by the National Board of Trial Advocacy.

"Truckers often have electronics that allow them to get detailed weather information from other truck drivers, as well as direct communications from their dispatchers about road conditions."

"They should use their extensive training and experience in handling and making decisions about driving an 80,000-pound truck into or during such weather-related events," Laird says.

Preparing for and knowing about dangerous driving conditions can help prevent accidents and injuries if drivers are willing to take the time to better understand what they are up against BEFORE they hit the roads. This is even more true for commercial motor carriers and professional truck drivers, who are specifically required to follow safety regulations for the industry.

"Federal Trucking Safety Regulations require 18-wheeler drivers to use 'extreme caution' in 'hazardous conditions,' including reduced speeds and even parking when conditions are too dangerous to continue," says Laird. "These safety rules are for the protection of the traveling public, including the truck drivers themselves."

Being careful is everyone's obligation, but professional drivers must play by a different set of safety rules. A 4,000-pound car is often no match for an 80,000 truck, especially in hazardous weather conditions, and the additional safety rules take that into account.

"All of us should use caution in icy conditions, but professional truck drivers need to step up and do the right thing. If the rules are broken, lives are often permanently affected," says Laird.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 17 percent of all vehicle crashes happen during winter conditions. And with more inclement weather forecast for our area in the coming days, drivers should do their best to prepare for the worst. (https://www.nhtsa.gov/winter-driving-safety)

Laird says that following some simple tips from the American Automobile Association can keep you safe:

Stay home! Do you really need to be out in bad weather? Slow down! You may not have the road traction you think you do. Keep your distance! You might need extra time to stop suddenly Check your brakes! Apply firm, steady pressure on the brake pedal Don't stop on a hill! Inertia works both ways  forward and backward  especially on ice

(https://exchange.aaa.com/safety/driving-advice/winter-driving-tips/)

MEDIA AVAILABILITY:

As a frequently sighted expert and media contributor, Steve Laird is available to discuss safety issues relating to automobiles, 18-wheelers, and commercial trucks.

Steve can be reached for interviews through media contact Kelly Hart 817-874-6486, [email protected].

ABOUT

Steve Laird has been an attorney for over 35 years and is one of only 11 lawyers in Texas to achieve NBTA board certification in Truck Accident Law (as of February 2021). Steve leads a firm of Fort Worth personal injury attorneys and truck accident lawyers. (www.texlawyers.com)

Steve is often recognized by his peers, by the media, and by outside organizations for excellence in the practice of law. He has been named to the top 100 "Texas Super Lawyers" list by Thomson Reuters and featured in Texas Monthly magazine (2003-2013, 2015-present). He has been selected an "Attorney of Influence" by his peers as published in the Fort Worth Business Press. Steve served as President of the Fort Worth Chapter and the State of Texas Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates and as President of the Tarrant County Trial Lawyers Association. He has also served as a Director of the Tarrant County Bar Association.

For more information about Steve or The Law Offices of Steven C. Laird, P.C., visit www.texlawyers.com, call 1-817-874-6486.

SOURCE Steve Laird
MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th February, 2021) French Defense Minister Florence Parly on Monday said she had held talks with her Estonian, UK, Swedish and Czech counterparts on the joint initiatives to tackle the terrorist threat in the Sahel region.

The discussions were held in the wake of a two-day summit in the Chadian capital of N'Djamena, bringing together the leaders of the G5 Sahel bloc, comprising Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, and Niger, and French President Emmanuel Macron, who joined the meeting online to talk about the fight against the armed terrorist group in the crisis-torn Western African region.

"Exchanges with my counterparts from Sweden [Peter Hultqvist], Estonia [Kalle Laanet] and Czech Republic [Lubomir Metnar], our partners in Task Force Takuba [European military mission in Mali], and my counterpart from the United Kingdom [Ben Wallace] about the N'Djamena summit: the opportunity to discuss our strategy and our common efforts in the Sahel against the local subsidiaries of Daesh and Al-Qaeda [IS terrorist organization, banned in Russia]," Parly tweeted.

France has a military presence in the Sahel through Barkhane, a 5,000-strong mission launched in 2014 to curb the Islamist insurgency in the region.

Another mission, the Takuba Task Force, also led by France and comprising several European states,is also designed to assist the G5 Sahel armies in battle against jihadists.

However, despite the efforts, the extremist groups are still active across the region, and regularly conduct deadly attacks on the military and civilians, with killings and kidnappings. In particular, several French soldiers were killed by terrorists in Mali over the last several months.

Additionally, the Western African country, a former colony of France, last month saw demonstrations against the French military presence in the region, a matter worsened by an airstrike conducted by the French army targeting jihadists in early January, which allegedly killed 19 civilians who gathered in a wedding ceremony. While the military denied allegations that civilians had been killed, claiming it eliminated 30 terrorists in an air attack, a local NGO confirmed that there were in fact civilian victims.
In 2020 mankind shrank once again to become a village, all sharing the same challenge but dealing with the virus in different ways. Some cohorts have taken Covid-19 very seriously and complied with restrictions and guidelines, others chose to ignore it, still others deny it even exists whilst offering often fantastical conspiracy theories.

It has been justifiably well established and broadcast who the frontline workers and heroes of the past 10 months have been. But as a career-long member of the private security industry, I am strongly of the view that we must ensure the contribution from this key business sector is not overlooked.

We must remember to give a shout-out to the many members of the industry throughout the country who unselfishly and continuously put their own lives and health on the line so others can enjoy safety and security; whether at work, whilst shopping, attending hospitals and healthcare facilities, bustling through bus and train stations and numerous other day-to-day situations.

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Men and women brave all weathers in this 24/7 industry to secure construction sites, food, technology and pharma medical production facilities, public buildings and numerous staff-vacated offices. They ensure there is a semblance of order maintained and an economic platform to relaunch from at a time when the pandemic is under control.

You will have witnessed the presence of security personnel mainly in shopping centres and supermarkets over the past 10 months.

I am informed of the relentless abuse that they have had to experience, along with shop workers and hospital staff.

They are, however, always at pains to state that it is only a minority of the public who behave like this.

The pandemic has naturally and unfortunately taken its toll on some areas of the security business such as those which provide door security in the hospitality sector and the hard-hit retail sector.

Our homes too and the safety of our families would be in peril without the existence of the alarm installation and monitoring workforce. While domestic alarm emergency call-outs were always exempted during the restrictions, the sector cannot not rely on this alone to sustain employment.

While the various Government subsidies are very welcome, they could never fully compensate for the loss of income incurred by these sole traders and small companies with few employees. Coupled with the loss of trade, operators also suffer the loss of self-esteem and pride in the work they perform.

The Cash in Transit sector kept the tills ringing all over Christmas and the ATMs were kept topped up as needed, but an emerging cashless society advanced by the pandemic will mean a more modest sector in the future.

The capacity and capability of the private security industry is boundless, with advancing technologies emerging at a pace never seen before or thought possible. There exists over-capacity in terms of the size of Ireland in almost all sectors and regrettably this is driving razor-sharp competition between companies.

This is damaging for the sustainability of businesses, it is not good for customers, it copperfastens low pay, and is driving high turnover of employees with some reports of attrition rates now as high as 30pc.

Notwithstanding this, there is a great deal of confidence in industry that pent-up demand is building while we are in the throes of Covid-19. Very substantial household savings are currently taking place and this is likely to be unleashed in mid-2021 as the pandemic abates.

Businesses will be looking to do things differently and smarter from hereon and the security industry will be well placed to give an immediate return on investment across a broad range of areas including household alarm, Smart Home and CCTV installations, etc.

As a security industry veteran of almost 50 years, I have always regarded this business to be one comprised of people first and foremost.

Security officers and managers, because of the nature and sensitivity of their job, need to be on their guard to the threat that exists day in, day out, and in some instances even after their days work has finished. They will always be heroes in my mind.

Padraic Cafferty is executive chairman of Northwood Technology Ltd, chairman of Datascan Document Services, past president of the Irish Security Industry Association, non-executive director of the Private Security Authority.
ELMA, Iowa  City officials are asking Elma residents to leave a pencil-thin cold stream of water running until further notice.

The city issued the appeal Monday to reduce the risk of pipes freezing or bursting during the extreme cold.

If residents contact the Elma City Clerks Office at 393-2543 and report theyre leaving their water running, their bill will be adjusted for the additional usage.
The people who live in the 16-story apartment building located at No. 4 Haro Square, in the Basque city of Bilbao, have been plagued by the coronavirus since mid-January. In the space of two weeks, an outbreak among residents and their close contacts has led to 33 positive cases, six of whom have since died.

The Basque health department and several experts believe that a super-spreader may have started the outbreak, with the virus further expanding through the use of the buildings two elevators, which can each accommodate five people.

The first alarm went off on January 21, when an 85-year-old woman living on the ninth floor died from Covid-19. But it was not until two days later that her neighbors began to realize that they had a serious problem on their hands. On January 23, the elderly womans 50-year-old son also died, a tragedy that was brought to the notice of the building manager the following day.

With help from the residents, the manager hired a cleaning company that proceeded to disinfect the communal areas on the night of January 26, at a cost of 700. On January 27, residents were living in a clean building for the first time since January 9, when the Basque department of health had been informed of the first positive case.

But that day there was further sad news: an 84-year-old woman living on the 11th floor had died overnight. Two brothers from the first floor, aged 73 and 75, passed away the following Saturday. And the Basque health chief, Gotzone Sagardui, recently confirmed the death of a sixth person on February 8.

Health authorities were informed of the first positive case in the building on January 9, but it wasnt until the 26th that the communal areas were disinfected and properly ventilated. During the 17 days in between, the virus was able to circulate freely with the help of the buildings two elevators. The first time authorities stepped in was on January 25, when they carried out tests on the residents and their close contacts.

The apartment building where the outbreak was detected. Fernando Domingo-Aldama

The case of the Bilbao building reminds Jose Jimenez, a researcher at the Department of Infectious Diseases at Kings College London, of what was known as ground zero during a 2003 outbreak of another coronavirus named SARS, which generated its own health crisis. The Chinese doctor Liu Jianlun was staying on the 9th floor of the Metropole Hotel in Hong Kong where he infected 16 people who then spread the virus to Canada, Vietnam, Singapore and Taiwan. It is suspected that the spread took place in communal areas, perhaps via the elevator button for the ninth floor, which was touched by all those who became infected.

As in the Metropole Hotel case, the positive cases at the Bilbao building continued to lead normal lives until they began to experience symptoms, which is when the regional health department began to monitor their condition. But the other residents were not notified about the growing number of cases. Some living on the ninth floor took their pets out for a walk two or three times a day while others went about their usual business, going to work and doing the shopping, with no restrictions other than the basic measures of wearing a face mask and washing their hands.

Among the close contacts of the residents to have caught the virus was another one of the first victims children, who is thought to have become infected while visiting his mother and brother to walk the dog when they were in quarantine and then subsequently hospitalized. Another infection probably occurred on January 24, when a neighbor entered a friends apartment on the 11th floor to check on her. He and his wife were hospitalized but have since been discharged. Although the Basque department of health has not specified how many of the 33 positive cases live in the building and how many are close contacts of those who do, at least half of them were residents, according to a count made by those living there, who said the positive cases were found on the first, fourth, ninth, 11th, 13th and 15th floors.

A building resident reads a notice informing about the death of a neighbor. FERNANDO DOMINGO-ALDAMA

There are people who have a very high viral load and who infect more than the average person because of their social activity, Jimenez explains, referring to super-spreaders. If one of them uses the elevator a lot, that could be the focus of contagion. But he also believes that there may be a different explanation, or at least an additional one: It could be that the buildings ventilation is connected and is very poor, as is often the case in bathrooms. Something similar happened in South Korea.

The affected property in Bilbao was built in 1973. Only one wing has a small courtyard and the neighbors report no construction problems, such as connected extraction fans. Neither was it the case that one of the elevators was reserved for the even-numbered floors and another for the odd-numbered floors, which would have explained the higher incidence of positives on the odd-numbered floors. The people on all the floors breathed the same air and touched the same surfaces in the communal areas between January 9 and the day that the building was cleaned on January 26, by which time three people had already died.

Pets

Experts believe it is unlikely that the dog of the infected family had a direct role in the transmission of the virus. Pedro Gullon, from the Spanish Society of Epidemiology, explains that there is no evidence that pets can infect humans. If it was the case, it would be because they were behaving like surfaces, he says, alluding to the probability of getting infected by touching inanimate objects, which is now believed to be much lower than previously thought. But there is no evidence that pets are playing an epidemiological role in the spread of human SARS-CoV-2 infections.

However, the World Organisation for Animal Health recommends that people with suspected or confirmed Covid-19 should avoid close contact with their pets and have another member of the household take care of them while exercising precaution through hygiene practices and the use of masks.

The regional department of health has ruled out the B.1.1.7 strain of the virus as being at the origin of the outbreak, as was initially suggested. It adds that it is investigating the case and that epidemiological monitoring of the outbreak is ongoing. It has not, however, specified the results of its most recent tests. There are still quarantined and hospitalized residents, said a spokesperson for the department.

Its unlikely were going to return to normality any time soon, says one resident. I feel sorry for the victims, for the residents who have been affected, and I feel upset by how scared we feel, but I also feel sorry for the businesses in the square that are losing customers because of the alarm surrounding the case.

Access to the buildings main entrance is in a corner of the square. The door is now permanently open, as are the windows on the landings between floors. Four young people sip coffee on one of the concrete benches in the square. We all have to learn from this, says the building manager.

English version by Heather Galloway.
Trump clears second impeachment trial, vows to fight on

Former US President Donald Trump was on Saturday acquitted on charges of inciting the 6 January assault on the US Capitol, after a majority of Republican senators refused to vote in favour of punishing Trump and instead voted not guilty, in the second impeachment trial in his four years of office.

While a two-thirds majority was needed in the 100-member US Senate to convict Trump on charges of inciting violence in the US Capitol Hill on 6 February, only 57 Senators voted in favour of holding Trump guilty, while 43 voted not guilty.

Seven Republican senators joined the Democrats in voting for his conviction in the five-day long trial, reportedly making it a bipartisan impeachment trial.

However, Trumps Republican colleagues despite opposition to his style of functioning, did not allow the Senate to punish him.

Trump described his second impeachment trial as "yet another phase of the greatest witch hunt in the history of our country.

The House had impeached Trump on 13 January and sent the charge of inciting an insurrection to Senate to hold the trial.

Our historic, patriotic and beautiful movement to `Make America Great Again has only just begun, Trump said in a statement, after the Senate vote failed to secure the necessary majority.

"In the months ahead, I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all of our people. We have so much work ahead of us, and soon we will emerge with a vision for a bright, radiant, and limitless American future," he added.

"There is no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day," senior Republican party leader Mitch McConnell said after he had voted to acquit Trump.

He said that his vote against conviction was based on a technicality that under the Constitution Trump could not be impeached by the House of Representatives and tried by the Senate because he was out of office, according to IANS.

Democrats and their Republican supporters, however, said that although he was no longer the president, he could still be impeached and face the penalty of being barred from running for office.
KIIS FM radio host Kyle Sandilands has said he is considering a 'no jab, no job' policy at his workplace once the Covid-19 vaccine is rolled out across Australia.

During a discussion about the coronavirus vaccine on Monday, he said all staffers at The Kyle and Jackie O Show must get the shot once it's available or face the sack - but he may have simply been joking.

He issued the office-wide edict after his co-host Jackie 'O' Henderson expressed concerns about the vaccine.

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Laying down the law: KIIS FM radio host Kyle Sandilands has said he is considering a 'no jab, no job' policy at his workplace once the Covid-19 vaccine is rolled out across Australia

Henderson, 46, said she thought the vaccine seemed 'a bit rushed', but stressed she 'is not an anti-vaxxer at all'.

Sandilands, 49, gently corrected Henderson, pointing out that the bureaucracy of vaccine development had been fast-tracked, not the science and safety testing.

'All the tests and clinical trials, they haven't been rushed. It's the bulls**t of waiting around through all the processes and paperwork. That's been rushed,' he said.

Hesitant: He issued the office-wide edict - which may have been a joke - after his co-host Jackie 'O' Henderson (pictured) expressed concerns about the vaccine

KIIS FM newsreader Brooklyn Ross also noted the Covid-19 vaccine was the result of scientists from many countries working together with enormous financial support.

'Jackie, what the difference is this time around is, like, the whole world just said, "We need a vaccine," and so much money has gone into it... and that gave them the ability to do more trials quickly,' Ross said.

'Without money, you can't do that, so that's what's helped it go through.'

Henderson, who still wasn't convinced, then asked her colleagues if any of them were 'a little bit unsure'.

Hmm! During a discussion about the coronavirus vaccine on Monday, Sandilands said all staffers at The Kyle and Jackie O Show must get the shot once it's available. Pictured with co-host Jackie 'O' Henderson (right) and KIIS FM newsreader Brooklyn Ross (centre)

She asked 'Will you all get it?' and several staff members said without hesitation they would get the jab once it's available.

Sandilands said: 'The second I can get it. I've even got an elastic band around my arm now. I'm bloody ready to go. Shoot me up, baby!'

The only employee who said they wouldn't be getting the vaccine straight away was senior producer Pedro Vitola, who by his own admission is 'into conspiracies'.

'If you don't get it, you're out,' Sandilands snapped in response. 'No jab, no job.'

Henderson laughed off her co-host's remark, but it's unclear if Sandilands was serious or just joking about a 'no jab, no job' policy at KIIS FM.

His view: The only employee who said they wouldn't be getting the vaccine straight away was senior producer Pedro Vitola (pictured), who by his own admission is 'into conspiracies'

Henderson said that many Australians have a 'wait and see' attitude to the vaccine - that is to say, they plan to wait until others have had it first to make sure it's safe.

However, Covid-19 vaccines have already been found to be safe and effective, and millions of people in countries like Britain and the U.S. have already received the jab.

When Ross reminded Henderson of the vaccine rollout in other countries, she seemed to be reassured.

Daily Mail Australia has contacted Henderson's manager for clarification regarding her views about vaccination.

WHY VACCINES ARE IMPORTANT Immunisation is a simple, safe and effective way of protecting people against harmful diseases before they come into contact with them. Immunisation not only protects individuals, but also others in the community, by reducing the spread of preventable diseases. Research and testing is an essential part of developing safe and effective vaccines. In Australia, vaccines must pass strict safety testing before the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) will register them for use. Approval of vaccines can take up to 10 years. Before vaccines become available to the public, large clinical trials test them on thousands of people. High-quality studies over many years have compared the health of large numbers of vaccinated and unvaccinated children. Medical information from nearly 1.5 million children around the world have confirmed that vaccination does not cause autism. People first became concerned about autism and immunisation after the medical journal The Lancet published a paper in 1998. This paper claimed there was a link between the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism. Since then, scientists have completely discredited this paper. The Lancet withdrew it in 2010 and printed an apology. The UK's General Medical Council struck the author off the medical register for misconduct and dishonesty. Source: Australian Department of Health Advertisement

Australia's first 80,000 does of the Covid Pfizer vaccine are about to arrive in the country, with hospitals on standby to start delivering jabs next week.

Leading epidemiologist Professor Tony Blakely told the Today show on Monday he had heard the vaccine was on its way to Australian shores.

A delicate operation will be undertaken to transport the vaccine, with the doses arriving under tight security from Belgium.

Government sources told The Australian the doses would arrive in Australia within 48 hours from Sunday night - so on Monday or Tuesday.

What is 'no jab, no job'? The term 'no jab, no job' refers to businesses that are calling for the right to ban workers if they refuse to get the Covid-19 vaccine. While unions have urged the government to vaccinate frontline workers before the wider community, small businesses are demanding the legal ability to stand down employees without pay if they do not get the jab. Advertisement

Hospitals were told to prepare to start vaccinations next week, after the Therapeutic Goods Administration conducts batch testing on some of the first vials.

The vaccines will undergo that final stage of testing to ensure they are safe before being rolled out to vulnerable residents later this month.

'Commencement of vaccinations  subject to arrival, quality and temperature controls  will take place in the last week of February,' Health Minister Greg Hunt said.

Australia has secured 20 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine, which is enough to vaccinate 10 million people.

The vaccines must be kept at minus-70C to preserve the mRNA responsible for inducing coronavirus immunity.

Distribution firms with specialist experience in cold logistics have been contracted to handle the doses, which will arrive in batches of 5,000 per shipping container.

The dry-ice filled boxes have been fitted with thermal sensors which will send messages to a central control tower if they drop below the required temperature.

First in line to receive the jab are the elderly, vulnerable, frontline health workers, hotel quarantine staff, as well as aged and disability workers and residents.

Mr Hunt said the Morrison Government will not decide on an official date for the first round of jabs until the doses are in the country but hospitals have been told to be on standby to started delivering vaccinations

Other Australians over the age of 16 will be then be ranked by health risk to determine when they get the vaccination, with those more vulnerable prioritised.

The government expects the AstraZeneca vaccine to get approval soon so it will be available in early March.

Rollout: Australia will reportedly received its first 80,000 doses of the Covid Pfizer vaccine within the next 48 hours. Pictured: Prime Minister Scott Morrison walks past vials of AstraZeneca vaccine during a visit to the CSL serum lab to inspect Covid-19 Immunoglobulin being produced in Parkville, Melbourne, on Friday

Health Department boss Brendan Murphy has said it is unlikely people will get to pick if they get the Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine, as it depends on their profile and category of risk.

The government wants the vaccine rollout to be complete by the end of October.

Hospitals will be able to store the vaccines in special low-temperature freezers, while aged care facilities will be able to keep them cool in their boxes for 15 days by regularly replacing the dry ice.

Mr Hunt said it is critical that communications around the vaccine program are also targeted for culturally, ethnically, and linguistically diverse communities.

'The government recognises that people from multicultural communities are a significant part of the health, aged care, child care and disability workforce and will be among the first people in Australia to receive vaccinations,' Mr Hunt said in a statement on Sunday.

But shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers is concerned that Australia is languishing in rolling out the program, which is creating uncertainty in communities and the economy more broadly.

He said some 90 countries have their vaccinations program under way.

'After the prime minister said we were at the front of the queue 160 million people have been vaccinated around the world, while zero Australians have been vaccinated,' Dr Chalmers told Sky News' Sunday Agenda program.
As part of a broader effort to expand access to chemical abortion, House Democrats are demanding that the Food and Drug Administration remove safety protocols for mifepristone, a drug most commonly prescribed for abortions during the first three months of pregnancy.

Under its current policy, the FDA requires women to obtain the first of two chemical-abortion pills in person from a health-care professional rather than via telemedicine. The in-person mandate is intended as a safety precaution to ensure that women are monitored and have access to follow-up care as needed.

Last week, several Democratic congresswomen on the House Oversight Committee wrote to acting FDA commissioner Janet Woodcock, demanding that the agency immediately eliminate the medically unnecessary in-person dispensing requirement for mifepristone.

The congresswomen claim that imposing this requirement in the midst of a deadly pandemic  one that has disproportionately impacted communities of color across the United States  needlessly places patients and providers in harms way, and further entrenches longstanding health inequities.

The letter is the latest move in a year-long effort from Democratic politicians and pro-abortion groups to eliminate safety requirements on chemical abortion during the COVID-19 pandemic, pushing to allow women to obtain the drug via telemedicine.

Last March, a coalition of Democratic attorneys general urged the FDA to undo the safety guidelines for the duration of the pandemic. In May, the American Civil Liberties Union sued the Trump administration on behalf of a coalition of abortion-advocacy groups, demanding an emergency order to lift the FDA safety policy, which the groups asserted was medically unnecessary.

Over the summer, a federal judge sided with the ACLU, calling the FDAs safety standards an unconstitutional substantial obstacle to the supposed right to abortion because of the conditions created by the pandemic and related lockdowns.

Story continues

By causing certain patients to decide between forgoing or substantially delaying abortion care, or risking exposure to COVID-19 for themselves, their children, and family members, the In-Person Requirements present a serious burden to many abortion patients, U.S. district judge Theodore Chuang wrote in his ruling.

That decision stood until just last month, when the Supreme Court overturned Chuangs decision and ruled 63 that the FDA could reinstate its safety standard. The Courts reversal has sent progressives back to the drawing board, now leading efforts  such as this letter from House Democrats  to lobby the newly installed FDA commissioner.

The debate is especially interesting because data suggest that an increase in the rate of chemical abortion is a central reason for the recent increase in the overall U.S. abortion rate. As Michael New recently pointed out on National Review Online, the number of chemical abortions women have obtained has risen consistently since the FDA first approved mifepristone for abortions in 2000.

Between 2015 and 2018, the percentage of total abortions that were chemical abortions increased from 25 percent to 40 percent, New notes. Among the 42 states that reported data on type of procedure in both 2017 and 2018, the number of chemical abortions increased by more than 10 percent.

That rise in the number of chemical abortions is likely a major reason why the Centers for Disease Control reported a rare increase in the overall abortion rate in 2018, even though the rate of abortions in the U.S. had been dropping fairly steadily since 1980.

Meanwhile, the Democratic campaign to undo safety requirements on mifepristone ignores the risks to women who take the drug, especially without adequate supervision or access to follow-up care. Many of the drugs possible side effects and complications require subsequent in-person care or emergency-room treatment, which can be especially difficult to access during the pandemic.

According to one study, between 5 percent and 7 percent of women who undergo a chemical abortion will require a follow-up surgical abortion. Another survey found that more than 3 percent of women who took mifepristone required emergency-room admission to manage complications. A recent paper in Issues in Law and Medicine, cataloguing FDA reports of adverse events after chemical abortion, found that significant morbidity and mortality have occurred following the use of mifepristone as an abortifacient over the last two decades.

As abortion-rights activists have pushed to loosen the FDA safety protocols, pro-life advocates have begun pushing in the opposite direction, rightly noting the potentially grave hazards to womens safety.

The American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists filed a citizen petition with the FDA in 2019, emphasizing the serious risks of mifepristone. The petition noted that abortion-related injuries are under-reported, because most treatments are provided in emergency rooms rather than in abortion clinics.

Last September, a group of Republican senators asked the FDA to classify the abortion pill as an imminent hazard to the public health that poses a significant threat of danger and remove this pill from the U.S. market.

We believe this deadly pill should never have been approved, yet the abortion industry was politically rewarded with an accelerated approval process normally reserved for high-risk drugs that address life-threatening illnesses like AIDS, the letter added. As you are surely aware, pregnancy is not a life-threatening illness, and the abortion pill does not cure or prevent any disease.

As Democrats intensify their efforts to remove all precautions from the chemical-abortion drug, the pro-life movement should direct its attention to this new challenge in the abortion fight, which takes the lives of unborn children and puts their mothers at risk.

More from National Review
Rajnath Singh hands over best marching contingent trophies to Jat Regimental Centre, Delhi Police

India

oi-Vicky Nanjappa

New Delhi, Feb 15: Defence Minister, Rajnath Singh presented the trophies of best marching contingents of the Republic Day Parade 2021, in New Delhi on February 15, 2021. Jat Regimental Centre bagged the trophy of best marching contingent among the Tri-Services, while Delhi Police was adjudged as the best marching contingent among the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) and other auxiliary services.

Brigadier Adarsh K Butail & Subedar Major (Honorary Captain) Virendra received the trophy on behalf of the Jat Regimental Centre and Special Commissioner of Police Shri Robin Hibu and Assistant Commissioner of Police Shri Vivek Bhagat, Commander received the trophy on behalf of Delhi Police.

The two contingents were adjudged on the basis of assessment by two panels of judges.

Speaking on the occasion, Singh congratulated Jat Regimental Centre and Delhi Police for winning the trophies, terming the honour as a symbol of respect for their hard work and dedication. He commended the panels of judges for performing the difficult task of choosing the top two contingents among all the equally brilliant contingents that marched with perfection during the Republic Day Parade at Rajpath. He lauded the courage and valour of the Jat Regimental Centre while praising the Delhi Police for effectively carrying out additional responsibilities.

Shri Rajnath Singh said, "Delhi is the nerve centre of Republic of India, thereby on the target of our adversaries. It is commendable that in addition to ensuring safety and wellbeing of the National Capital from internal and external threats, the Delhi Police win the best marching contingent trophy regularly."

Describing the oldest and largest democracy, India, as the land of varied cultures & religions, the Raksha Mantri stated that the marchpast by different contingents during the Republic Day Parade symbolises the country's unity in diversity and reflects the sense of national pride & preparedness of the security forces. Pointing out that the Defence Forces are well aware of the mantra 'the more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war', Shri Rajnath Singh said, "Our Forces ensure that peace & tranquility and unity & integrity are maintained throughout."

Raksha Mantri pointed out that despite the restrictions imposed due to the outbreak of COVID-19, the Forces marched at the Rajpath with passion and enthusiasm, terming it is as a matter of great pride for the nation.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat, Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Karambir Singh, Chief of Air Staff Air Chief Marshal R K S Bhadauria, Chief of Army Staff General M M Naravane, Defence Secretary Dr Ajay Kumar, Secretary Department of Defence R&D and Chairman Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) Dr G Satheesh Reddy and senior civil & military officials of Ministry of Defence and senior officers of Ministry of Home Affairs were present on the occasion.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 13:48 [IST]
President Joe Biden issued an executive order on Sunday reestablishing the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, undoing former President Donald Trumps efforts to reshape an agency that went largely unstaffed for most of his tenure.

In a statement accompanying the announcement of the executive order, Biden echoed his recent remarks to the National Prayer Breakfast, bemoaning widespread physical and economic suffering due to the coronavirus pandemic, racism, and climate change. He added that those struggling are fellow Americans and are deserving of aid.

This is not a nation that can, or will, simply stand by and watch the suffering around us. That is not who we are. That is not what faith calls us to be, he said. That is why Im reestablishing the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships to work with leaders of different faiths and backgrounds who are the frontlines of their communities in crisis and who can help us heal, unite, and rebuild.

He added: We still have many difficult nights to endure. But we will get through them together and with faith guiding us through the darkness and into the light.

Biden appointed Melissa Rogers, a First Amendment lawyer and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution to oversee the office, as Rogers did in former President Barack Obamas second term. Rogers, a lifelong Baptist, will also serve as senior director for faith and public policy in the White House Domestic Policy Council.

The offices deputy director will be Josh Dickson, the evangelical who ran faith outreach for the Biden-Harris campaign. Trey Baker, who worked as the National Director of African American Engagement on Bidens campaign, will serve as the White House offices liaison to black communities, a role that includes black religious groups.

Besides fighting the pandemic and racism and assisting with economic recovery, the office will focus its efforts on helping disadvantaged communities, advancing global humanitarian work, strengthening pluralism, and protecting cherished guarantees of church-state separation and freedom for people of all faiths and none.

The announcement noted that the office will work with Centers for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships that are embedded in agencies across the federal government.

The faith-based office has been called by different names since President George W. Bush established it, and different presidents have granted its clientsreligious and secular organizationsvarying degrees of access.

Biden will return the name the office had during the Obama administration, when Rogers led it from 20132017.

Under President Trump, the office went largely unstaffed until 2019, when he tapped Pentecostal preacher and longtime Trump adviser Paula White to oversee what he called the Faith and Opportunity Initiative. Until then, much of Trumps religious outreach involved informal meetings with mostly Christian faith leadersespecially a core group who became known as his unofficial evangelical advisers.

The two previous administrations made concerted efforts to connect with a wide array of faith groups, with bipartisan and interreligious access through the faith-based office, related cabinet-level offices, and task forces.

Rogers has been critical of what she saw as Trumps disproportionate engagement with evangelicals, saying in 2017 that the continuance of this Evangelical Executive Advisory Board, even unofficially, and the apparent failure to have any comparable entity that is open to non-evangelicals, sends a troubling message that the administration prefers evangelicals over other people of faith.

Rogers also opposed Trump administration plans to remove the requirement that faith-based social service providers offer a secular alternative to people seeking their assistance.

You cant benefit from protections you dont know you have, she tweeted in January 2020. The religious liberty of social service beneficiaries is as important as the religious liberty of faith-based providers.

Rogers came to Bidens defense in August when she said Trump made wild assertions about the former vice president during the 2020 campaign. She said the claims by Trump that Biden would have a no religion, no anything approach to faith if he became president could not be more wrong.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has arranged and prepared the release of three convicted sex offenders in an apparent misapplication of the enforcement directives of President Joe Biden.

Fox News reported that the three men were convicted of sex offenses against children in Texas.

According to an ABC 6 report, Texas officials said the trio were not released after weeks of talks and discussions between the state prison system and the immigration authorities. However, they noted that the process of keeping the three men in custody heightened alarms that the ICE was declining to detain convicts, contrary to immigration laws and policies.

Jason Clark, chief of staff at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, noted that the ICE had dismissed "detainer" requests against 26 people in Texas in the past weeks.

ABC 6 reported that immigration authorities issue detainers to law enforcement agencies holding an individual who is conceivably in the U.S. illegally. ICE could seek to take them into immigration custody when a person in the country illegally completes their criminal sentence.

In a U.S. News report, Clark said that dropping the detainer is threatening public safety, and they already expressed that to ICE officials.

"Our concern is that you have individuals that have offenses in which we believe they would pose a public safety threat," he noted.

According to state records obtained by The Associated Press, most of the 26 were convicted of drug charges or drunken-driving offenses. Bu two were convicted of sexually assaulting a teen, and the other man was convicted of indecency with a child.

Fox News reported that individuals convicted of sex offenses against minors still qualify for enforcement under the Biden policies. It further said that the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) memorandum defines public safety threats as a person "who have been convicted of an aggravated felony."

Read also: Biden Admin to Allow 25,000 Asylum-Seekers Waiting in Mexico to Enter U.S.

Biden's Directive on Immigration Enforcement

Biden's new directive on immigration enforcement issued on his first day in office prompted the DHS to issue a memo directing immigration agencies to align their enforcement efforts on threats to national security and public safety and immigrants who entered the country illegally on or after Nov. 1.

Meanwhile, ICE confirmed with Fox News that it was holding Jose Lara-Lopez following his release from the Texas State Penitentiary, where he was imprisoned for sexually assaulting a minor pending disposition of the 41-year-old suspect's immigration proceeding.

However, ICE did not confirm whether they will drop the detainer for Lara-Lopez and two other convicts. Lara-Lopez, who pleaded guilty two years ago to sexually assaulting a teenager in Houston, should have been transferred to ICE custody, but instead might have been scheduled to be released.

The implementation of Biden's new guidance seems to be uneven, with immigration lawyers in other states reporting that ICE declined to release immigrants the lawyers believe should be allowed to go free.

The agency explained that it makes arrests and custody determinations on a case-by-case basis. ICE further stated that it also based them on the circumstances' totality and compliance with federal law and agency policy, Fox News reported.

ICE has already canceled an operation that targets illegal immigrants with sex crime convictions. According to former head of the agency Thomas Homan, an email was sent out to the field on Feb. 3, shutting down the national Operation Talon, which targets to arrest at-large illegal aliens with sex crime convictions, including child molestation.

Related article: Biden Secures Deals for 600 Million COVID-19 Vaccine Doses, but California Man Tests Positive for Virus Weeks After 2nd Shot

WATCH: ICE nearly released sex abuse convicts despite Biden memo from Breaking News
A former community support worker sexually assaulted a vulnerable teenage boy weeks after using a state government database to search for information about him.

Alexander Jones, 32, was jailed on Monday for six years after violently assaulting the boy, then 13, in a Geelong hotel room in May 2018.

Jones met the boy in central Melbourne when Jones asked him for a cigarette and as a former mediation worker with Melbourne City Mission, later used the Department of Health and Human Services database in an attempt to find the boys file. Jones left Melbourne City Mission in 2017 but his log-in details for the database had not been cancelled.

Credit:Vince Caligiuri

The County Court heard Jones did not find any information about the boy on the database, but the pair made contact through Facebook, which enabled the man to begin grooming the boy in what judge Scott Johns described as predatory behaviour.
After having her life threatened online during the height of the interstate border closures last year, Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk wants to do more to curb online bullying.

She says tackling the issue will be one of her priorities during this term of government, after getting the coronavirus-ravaged economy back on its feet.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk laments that online communication means children can no longer leave their problems at the school gate. Credit:Getty

Ms Palaszczuk, who has vowed to stay on as Premier for as long as Queenslanders want me, will not face re-election until the end of 2024.

The next four years are years of action, she said.

Israeli authorities have stepped up efforts to counter online misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine, after seeing a sudden slowdown in the country's rapid rollout of the jab. Israel's inoculation rates are among the highest in the world, with over a quarter of the population - 2.5 million - having received both Pfizer doses and over four in ten having received the first.

But now there's been a drop in immunization rates, down from January's average of over 127,000 per day to just over 106,000 per day in February, according to health ministry statistics. The reluctance of some population segments to get vaccinated is a key reason why infection rates remain high. Israel, a country of 9.3 million people, has reported over 5,000 new cases each day over the past week, according to the ministry.

In all, the country has recorded over 723,000 cases of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic and nearly 5,400 deaths  over 20% of them in the past month. Last week Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has pinned his reelection hopes on the vaccination campaign, said the only obstacle to completing the task was "the fake news and the superstitious and sometimes malicious beliefs that are planted in the public and on the Internet."

The Health Ministry has reportedly invested millions of dollars in its efforts to educate the public. It has beefed up a digital task force to hit back at spurious claims about the vaccines. Einav Shimron, a senior official in the ministry, said that trackers in a fake news command center were monitoring social media for anti-vaccination posts, and sending alerts to the Ministry of Justice and police. There are other initiatives too, seeking to reach out to people through physicians and faith leaders.

In the ultra-Orthodox community, where internet use is low, the response is often more low tech. Anti-vaccination rabbis have posted false claims on posters known as pashkevils, commonly used to spread messages among the faithful. The ministry is countering with pashkevils of its own. At the same time, authorities are devising incentives for people to go get the jab.

The Health and Culture Ministries said Sunday that museums, libraries, concert venues and other cultural events will reopen later this month  but only to those who have been fully immunized. Avishai Matia, an anti-vaccine activist whose Facebook and Twitter accounts were suspended earlier this month, insisted the Pfizer vaccine was an "experimental drug" being tested on Israeli citizens, while other countries were holding back. But the Pfizer jab has been rigorously tested and rolled out in several countries worldwide, including the US and in Europe. In exchange for getting sufficient quantities for its population, Israel has agreed to share data with Pfizer, though it is not conducting any experiments.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
In 2018 we wrote about:

The 'Integrity Initiative' - A Military Intelligence Operation, Disguised As Charity, To Create The "Russian Threat".

The reporting was based on the British Integrity Initiative's internal files which some 'anonymous' organization had acquired and published.

Data acquired from Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office by the same group revealed large British propaganda programs in support of Jihadis in Syria as well as British influence operations designed to undermine the security institutions of Lebanon and to secretly influence its population.

Now another large set of files has been published by the same source. These describe an extensive British government program designed to undermine Russia by organizing and financing 'independent' Russian language media, by 'training' Russian journalists and by secretly paying Russian influencers. It is certainly not the only British anti-Russia program but it probably has, secretly, the most public influence.

The anonymous author has laid out the complete Undermining Russia program in four extensive parts: One, two, three, four.

The information discussed is from government files which outlay various projects and from companies and -interestingly- from charities who make bids to run the FCO projects. All underlying files are available for download as one archive file (~80 MB).

The most interesting files are the bids the companies make for projects. They reveal previous projects, methods and people and thereby create the larger picture.

The budget for the various anti-Russian projects runs at dozens of millions pounds per year. The first programs were launched in 2016 and some continue through this year.

A 'Supplier Event' for one of the projects laid out the general idea:

Programme Strands ENGAGE  working through the British Council to implement people-to-people activities between ethnic Russians and local communities to develop links along the lines of 21st century skills  includes English language skills and media literacy, social enterprises and cultural activities;

ENHANCE  supporting independent media in Russias near abroad to bring balance and plurality to Russian language media, in the Baltic States and Eastern Partnership countries;

EXPOSE  by debunking and exposing Russian disinformation in real time, which can be reported in mainstream media with the goal to expose malign state disinformation in countries that are targeted by it. If you expose disinformation, it is less likely to be impactful; therefore, the Russian State becomes less credible.

ENABLE  working with allied governments through the Government Communication Service to improve their strategic communications to their populations.

Note that 'Russian disinformation' is whatever Britain does not like about Russia. 'Exposing' such 'disinformation' is best done by spreading one's own. These are not defensive programs but attacks on Russia.

Projects to achieve the above were to be implemented in nearly every country that borders Russia and has a Russian speaking minority as well as in Russia itself.

The British government does not want you to know about such projects. The 'Supplier Event' sheet says:

Security No unauthorised disclosures of activity on this work. Contract will need to take a look at who we are working with. Basic IT security reasonable steps should cover our requirements but the FCO may request an explanation of wat steps have been taken to ensure security and Duty of Care. It should be noted that for security reasons, some grantees will not wish to be linked to the FCO. It should be noted that the Programme Team would prefer the programme documents do not end up in the Russian media. We know that they are following us, and we are expecting an expose soon.

What is the overall purpose of such secret programs? The author of the Undermining Russia series explains that with regards to the 'poisoning' of Alexei Navalny:

Many years of painstaking work of HMG through its embassies and intelligence cutouts precede a chemical attack. They create Media, CSOs and pseudo humanitarian organisations that happen to be just at the correct place and in the correct time with their cameras ready when 'suddenly' a dreadful accident 'shocks every one into action'. Do you believe HMG staged the 'Navalny accident' as part of some kind of a secret operation? Did HMG create Media outlets, nurture bloggers and stringers that it controlled? Did it engage Russia's youth and CSOs? Did it try to demonise Putin just like it had done with Assad by labeling them Evil Dictators who poisoned their people with forbidden chemical weapons? Do you know what all of this is needed for? They need it to delegitimise a leader of a country and convince people around the world that 'no holds should be barred to fight a mad dictator'. Can you grasp the gravity of what is going on? Well, you ought to. They are preparing us for war with the Russians and the Chinese. They are looking for casus belli, and only the truth can stop them, because 'if wars can be started by lies, they can be stopped by truth'. (Julian Assange)

That view is not even exaggerated. The 'west' has the knifes out against Russia. We previous mentioned a report from the Pentagon think tank RAND which evaluated how to best 'unbalance and overextend' Russia. In the end it was clearly aimed at regime change in Russia, or if not otherwise possible, war. On Friday Gabriel Felbermayr, the president of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, was asked by a German radio station about new sanctions the EU might impose on Russia. He is skeptic that those might work because (my translation):

The aims we have towards Russia are very big. We do not want anything less but regime change in Russia, which is difficult to achieve by economic pressure.

The new documents also reveal some interesting new points on Navalny who seems to be on the British government payroll:

These self-exposing documents show that the FCO has established a network of popular YouTubers in Russia who investigate corruption in the government, and the YouTubers get assistance from some journalists from the Baltic States. Also, the FCO has experience of instigating protests in Russia. By now you must have guessed the identity of one of the popular YouTubers investigating corruption. After obtaining EXPOSE Network files and examining the case studies two years ago, we didn't figure out which YouTuber the FCO supported through ZINC. We refrained from making any preliminary conclusions even when journalists discovered that Vladimir Ashurkov, a close ally of Alexei Navalny, was a part of the Integrity Initiative cluster. But when we saw Mr. Navalny and Bellingcat together, things started to make sense. By digging deeper, we discovered another Navalny's supporter who lives in London - some shadowy Maria Pevchikh who is promoting a system of smart voting in Russia. The Labour used a similar voting system to take the votes of the Conservatives. So, basically it is highly likely that the UK recommended the system to Mr. Navalny. It also turned out that Navalny began a smear campaign against the RT - one of the few media outlets in the West that allows those who disagree with the official position of western government to speak out. Note that Navalny's campaign was running in parallel with that of the Integrity Initiative. A reasonable question is - why Navalny who is mostly engaged in political battles inside Russia spends time fighting a TV network operating outside the country? Was RT really such a problem for him? No, it wasn't. It was a problem for the Western imperialists and apparently, they told Navalny to join in.

Anyway. Here are again links to the four parts of 'Undermining Russia': One, two, three, four.

They give extensive insight into the methods the 'west' is using to destroy foreign countries. Knowledge that one needs to really understand what is happening in this world.

Pennsylvanias Republican Party is planning a meeting to potentially discuss censuring U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey over his vote to convict Donald Trump during the former presidents second impeachment trial, county party officials said Monday.

County party chairs said the state GOP chairman, Lawrence Tabas, emailed them shortly after Saturdays impeachment vote to tell them that a meeting is being planned to discuss the Senates impeachment vote. Tabas did not return messages Monday.

Toomey is one of seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump of incitement of insurrection.

A resolution to censure Toomey came up for discussion at the state partys leadership committee meeting on Feb. 6, weeks after Toomey had said Trump committed impeachable offenses in the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. They decided against bringing it to a vote by the full state committee after speaking with Toomey about it, county party chairs said.

Several county parties already voted to censure Toomey even before Saturdays vote. In Washington County, GOP chairman Dave Ball said party members felt betrayed by Toomey.

The York County Republican Party voted to censure Toomey after he voted to convict Trump. One county party, in Cambria County, is planning to vote to censure Toomey during its regular Tuesday meeting, said Jackie Kulback, the county party chair.

The second-term Toomey, a resident of Upper Milford Township in Lehigh County, is not running for re-election in 2022.

Ultimately, Trump was acquitted of the charge because the 57-43 vote fell short of the two-thirds majority needed for conviction.
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February 15, 2021

Any guesses for when we might again have a fully functioning US Sentencing Commission?

It has been far too long since the US Sentencing Commission has been fully functional, and this post is my indirect way of saying that I hope getting the USSC back in action with a full slate of Commissioners is a top priority for the Biden Administration. But, given that we still do not yet have a new confirmed Attorney General nearly a month into the new administration, and especially with other business (and other judicial openings) sure to be a higher priority, I am wondering if it may still be months before we can start talking seriously about what the "new Commission" ought to be doing to advance criminal justice reform.

Former Prez Donald Trump's track record with respect to the US Sentencing Commission was quite spotty. As noted in this April 2017 post, the USSC had only two of seven commissioner slots filled at the start of 2017 (which led the Commission not to advance any formal amendments to the guidelines in that year). Senate confirmation of two nominees gave the USSC a functioning quorum to be able to move forward with 2018 guideline amendments. But a slate of new nominees to the Commission by former Prez Trump in March 2018 were controversial and got a cold shoulder from the Senate leaving the USSC again with only two Commissioners (and thus without a quorum) as it entered 2019. Prez Trump thereafter did not announce new nominees until August 2020 and, according to this recent Law360 piece, those names were never even formally sent to the Senate.

Long story short, the US Sentencing Commission was only somewhat functional for a small portion of the last four years, and the USSC has not had complete set of commissioners firmly in place for the better part of a decade. The USSC staff has completed lots of research and has churned out many reports in the interim, but the FIRST STEP Act's passage in December 2018 made it particularly problematic for the USSC to have been non-functional in terms of formal amendments or agendas in recent years.

As reveled on this official US Sentencing Commission page, right now the USSC currently has only a single Commissioner and so will need six new confirmed members to be back to full strength (and it needs at least three new commissioners to have a quorum to even be somewhat functional). All these vacancies present Prez Biden with an important opportunity to revive and reshape the work of the Commission at a time when the work of the Commission could and should be especially important. And, as I noted in this post in November, the criminal justice reform recommendations of the Biden-Sanders Unity Task Force (first discussed here; available here pp. 56-62) included this notable recommended agenda for the USSC:

Sentence Length and Early Release: Task the U.S. Sentencing Commission with conducting a comprehensive review of existing sentencing guidelines and statutory sentencing ranges, with the goal of generating legislative recommendations, promulgating new guidelines, and issuing formal guidance to reduce unreasonably long sentences and promote rehabilitation. The Commission should make recommendations regarding early release options, including expanding good time credits, reinstating federal parole, and creating a second look mechanism permitting federal judges to reevaluate sentences after a certain amount of time served. Any such options should use a systematic, evidence-based approach that reduces risks to public safety, prevents racially disparate implementation, reduces the total number of people under federal custody and supervision, and limits the duration and conditions of supervision.

I am hopeful that the Biden Administration is already working toward developing a list of nominees for the Commission (which, by statute, have to be bipartisan). I am especially hopeful that the Biden team might be already getting input on this list from key folks in the Senate so that any eventual slate of nominees will be well-received and quickly confirmed. But, as suggested at the outset, because of various competing priorities and the (usual and unusual) inside-the-Beltway distractions, I really do not have a good guess to the question in the title of this post.

February 15, 2021 at 03:05 PM | Permalink

Comments

I have what might be a rather controversial suggestion for two nominees: Bill Otis and Judge Jane Kelly of Iowa and the Eighth Circuit (one former AUSA and one former Federal Public Defender). While the other four picks can be used to influence the actual decisions made, these two picks would assure that both sides have a seat at the table to make their arguments.

Posted by: tmm | Feb 16, 2021 1:35:54 PM

The nomination of Bill Otis was one of the reasons Prez Trump's March 2018 slate was so controversial. Bill will surely be grateful to see him name raised again, but I am pretty confident he is unlikely to get picked again by the current administration. Judge Jane Kelly, on the other hand, certainly seems like she could be a real possibility.

Posted by: Doug B. | Feb 19, 2021 2:41:27 PM

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Infection rate among immigrants and racialized communities high, as they face higher risk of exposure.

Ottawa immigrants more impacted by COVID-19 Infection rate among immigrants and racialized communities high, as they face higher risk of exposure.

Ottawa immigrants more impacted by COVID-19 Infection rate among immigrants and racialized communities high, as they face higher risk of exposure.

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Immigrants and racialized communities in Ottawa are at a higher risk of exposure to COVID-19, according to a new report.

The summary report titled The impact of COVID-19 on immigrants and racialized communities in Ottawa was based on a virtual community dialogue event hosted by The Ottawa Local Immigration Partnership (OLIP) and funded in part by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC).

Sociodemographic data shows that racialized communities are over-represented among those who have tested positive to COVID-19. But why is this the case?

This is the question the community dialogue group discussions sought to answer. In addition, OLIP aimed to understand the best way to protect the community from the spread of the virus. The following are some of the findings.

Affected communities may face hardships when it comes to social aspects that largely impact peoples health and wellbeing. These include aspects such as employment, housing, transportation, racism, discrimination and access to healthcare.

Find out if you are eligible for Canadian immigration

Opportunities to gain good employment are not common among racialized communities due to systemic racism and discrimination. As a consequence, many immigrants end up gaining front-line jobs such as personal support workers, caregivers, childcare workers, cleaners and ride-share drivers.

Many cannot afford to buy a car or use personal transportation such as ride-share apps or taxis. As a consequence, they would depend on public transportation, where risk of exposure to the virus is greater.

Some members of affected communities live in over-crowded houses. If one household member tests positive for COVID-19, it would be difficult for others to physically distance themselves.

Many immigrants and members of racialized communities are temporary residents, such as international students, refugee claimants and temporary foreign workers. They may be uncertain about their immigration status. Some workers would like to complain about unsafe working conditions but fear that they will lose their job as a consequence.

In addition, many face difficulties accessing healthcare. Newcomers who are not covered through the Ontario Health Insurance Program (OHIP) due to complications in their immigration status, usually have access to the Interim Federal Health Program. However, many providers are currently not accepting this program.

Extending your stay in Canada

Temporary foreign workers, students and visitors may have the ability to extend their stay in Canada during the COVID-19 pandemic. Luckily, the Canadian immigration department has given temporary residents a chance to extend their stay.

In order to be eligible, applicants must have been in Canada legally between January 30, 2020, and May 31, 2021. They must have stayed in Canada since entry, and must have lost their status during this period. They must also pay the required application processing fees.

Ending the stigma and developing protection plans

Participants in the community dialogue suggested ways to end stigmatizing affected communities, and those who contract the virus. This includes educating the public on the inequities of the impact of COVID-19, through public education campaigns.

To ensure the effectiveness of the protection plans for the affected communities, participants suggested engaging the communities directly, by sharing crucial information on the COVID-19 response. Participants also suggested that testing should be more widespread, and in locations that are accessible to these communities.

COVID-19 vaccines to be available to immigrants

The Public Health Authority of Canada (PHAC) maintains that the COVID-19 vaccine will be available to everyone in Canada regardless of their immigration status.

Priority for vaccination is given to residents and staff of care homes, health care workers as well as adults in Indigenous communities.

Find out if you are eligible for Canadian immigration

 CIC News All Rights Reserved. Visit CanadaVisa.com to discover your Canadian immigration options.
Disturbing CCTV footage has emerged of a gutsy young schoolboy chasing down a much larger, older man at a train station in Sydney's west.

Witnesses say the brave young teenager had been approached by the man near the Wentworthville train station about 1.30pm on Monday.

CCTV footage reveals the small teenager dressed in a white T-shirt with a school backpack and dark shorts, throwing a glass frame at the adult man's back in a shopping arcade near the station.

The man then starts running as the young boy gives chase through the passageway, calling for help from passersby as he went, Nine News reported.

Startled merchants could be seen emerging from their shops in the arcade as the young teenager gave chase.

The man, carrying his slippers in his hand, ran towards a taxi parked next to the station to make his getaway, jumping into the passenger side.

The determined youngster ran after him, repeatedly pulling the passenger door open to stop the taxi from leaving.

A passerby then helped the boy by calling 000.

The young boy can be seen in CCTV footage chasing the much older man down a shopping arcade, calling for help as he went. It is not known what occurred to spark the chase

The man tried to flee in this taxi pictured across the street but the brave young lad kept wrenching the passenger door open in an attempt to stop him

NSW Police could be seen later on Monday cordoning off some grotty public toilets near Wentworthville Station and photographing the scene for evidence

It is as yet unknown what occurred to cause the young boy to chase the adult man.

However police cordoned off a grotty public toilet block near Wentworthville Station on Monday and were later seen inside photographing evidence.

The man being chased in the CCTV footage appeared to be of South Asian appearance, dressed in a neutral green long-sleeved shirt with 'Dakota' on the front and wearing dark blue jeans.

He was arrested an hour later and taken in for questioning.

NSW Police had no further details on Monday night and said the man had not been charged with any offense.

If you have any information about this incident, call police CrimeStoppers on 1800 333 000.


France's cybersecurity watchdog says it has discovered a hack of French organizations that bore similarities to other attacks by a group linked to Russian intelligence.

In a report released on February 15, the French National Agency for the Security of Information Systems (ANSSI) said the hackers had taken advantage of a vulnerability in monitoring software sold by the Paris-based company Centreon.

ANSSI said it discovered intrusions dating back to late 2017 and stretching into 2020.

The watchdog did not identify the names or number of victims involved but said they were mainly information technology providers, especially web hosting providers."

It also stopped short of identifying the hackers but said they had a similar modus operandi as the Russian cyberespionage group often nicknamed Sandworm and thought to have links with Russian military intelligence.

Centreon's website says the company has more than 600 enterprise clients across the world, including Frances Justice Ministry and blue-chip French companies such as power group EDF, defense group Thales, and oil and gas giant Total.

The announcement comes as U.S. cybersecurity officials are still investigating a massive espionage campaign that hijacked IT monitoring software made by U.S. firm SolarWinds.

U.S. intelligence services have said Russia was likely behind the intrusions discovered in December 2020 in which government and private company networks in the United States and other countries were breached.

Earlier this month, Reuters reported that suspected Chinese hackers also targeted SolarWinds customers.

With reporting by AFP and Reuters
Bennington, VT (05201)

Today

Occasional rain. Low around 45F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch..

Tonight

Occasional rain. Low around 45F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch.
ALBANY  Following days of turmoil surrounding an admission by the secretary to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo that their office had deliberately withheld data on nursing home deaths, the governor on Monday acknowledged his administration created a "void" by not providing the requested information.

The governor declined to explicitly apologize for his administration's decision to withhold data to the press and to state lawmakers on nursing home deaths, instead saying he erred by allowing others, including what he described as conspiracy theorists, to fill in the information gap with allegations of a cover up.

"Apologize? Look, I have said repeatedly, we made a mistake in creating the void," he said. "When we didnt provide information it allowed press, people, cynics, politicians to fill the void. When you dont correct this information you allow it to continue and we created the void."

Cuomo, in his first news conference addressing the issue, reassured New Yorkers that "everybody did everything they could" when it comes to the coronavirus infiltrating nursing homes, but recognized that requests for information from state lawmakers and the press should have been given "more priority."

"In retrospect, should we have given more priority in fulfilling information requests? In my opinion, yes," the governor said. "And that's what created the void, but I do understand the pressure that people were under."

Republicans and some Democrats escalated their calls over the weekend  and following the governor's remarks Monday  for outside investigations of Cuomo's administration. They have also pressed for the use of legislative subpoenas to compel answers from key officials  including state health Commissioner Howard Zucker  about a policy decision that many believe may have increased the number of infections and deaths tied to COVID-19 in New York's nursing homes.

The governor's office last week released a partial transcript of a closed-door meeting between state Democratic lawmakers and Melissa DeRosa, the governor's secretary, in which DeRosa acknowledged that their office had delayed providing nursing home data to the state Legislature out of concern about how that information might be used against the governor's administration in the face of a U.S. Department of Justice investigation.

'Worst in America': inside the very public feud between Cuomo and Stefanik

Opinion: Andrew Cuomo 'froze' nursing home truth

DeRosa in the meeting characterized a Justice Department official who sent a letter to the governor's administration last year seeking answers to questions about the state's nursing home policies and deaths as a "political hack" that she contends had pursued the probe at the urging of President Donald J. Trump.

"Basically, we froze because then we were in a position where we weren't sure if what we were going to give to the Department of Justice or what we give to you guys and what we start saying was going to be used against us and we weren't sure if there was going to be an investigation," DeRosa told the Democratic lawmakers.

The lawmakers who attended the briefing with DeRosa included Assemblyman John McDonald, D-Cohoes, chair of the Assembly's Oversight, Analysis and Investigations Committee, and Sen. James Skoufis, an Orange County Democrat who chairs the Senate's Investigations and Government Operations Committee. Skoufis and Aging Committee Chairwoman Rachel May, who were both in the meeting, have faced calls from Republicans for their chairmanships to be stripped by Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins because they did not alert their legislative colleagues to what had been said.

Skoufis had already come under fire by Republican lawmakers for not immediately issuing subpoenas for the information they had asked the health commissioner for last summer. Skoufis has said he would use the power if necessary, but would decide that issue after Zucker appears before the Legislature's joint budget hearing panel.

Cuomo at Monday's news conference initially said that state lawmakers were informed of the administration's decision to delay providing them with data in order to prioritize the response to the Justice Department. But that initial response was handled by his office quickly and some lawmakers, including Assembly Speaker Carl E. Heastie, said they only knew about the federal inquiry from press reports.

When pressed on that issue, Cuomo then clarified that his staff members alerted unnamed staff members in the Senate and Assembly about the decision, not lawmakers directly.

"Legislative staff was told by my staff ok?" he said. "So legislative staff was told; top legislative staff was told."

That message included informing those unnamed legislative staffers early on that the the governor's office would be prioritizing the Justice Department's request ahead of the Legislature requesting data on deaths of nursing home residents. He suggested that the breakdown in communication occurred within the houses.

Much of the information sought by lawmakers, press and special-interest groups stemmed from a March 25 state Department of Health directive requiring nursing homes accept residents who were COVID-positive. Cuomo said that decision, which was later rescinded, was according to federal guidelines at the time and he claims it did not exacerbate the spread of the virus in the facilities. Cuomo blamed the spread in nursing homes on asymptomatic staff members and others, including workers such as delivery drivers who may have entered the facilities and infected others.

"We should have done a better job of providing the information. We should have done a better job of knocking down the disinformation," Cuomo said. "We were too focused on doing the job and addressing the crisis of the moment, and we did not do a good enough job in providing enough information. I take total responsibility for that."

He said the lack of information allowed for "disinformation and misinformation," creating "conspiracy theories" around the deaths that the governor argued hurt the families who lost loved ones to COVID-19 in nursing homes.

"I'm worried about the effect on people-people," Cuomo said. "What bothers me is people calling up, saying, ... 'the March 25 directive was the reason my father died.' Those are the people who were hurt by the void."

Cuomo said "cruel torture" is perpetuating the theory that something more could have been done. He defended the actions taken throughout the pandemic, noting that advice was taken from the best medical professionals and everything that could be done, was done. The virus, however, targeted senior citizens who often have underlying health conditions, with the vulnerable population accounting for the majority of deaths from COVID-19, Cuomo said.

"That's why people died, not because anyone did anything wrong or because there was a conspiracy," he said.

Much of the information sought by the press and state legislators dating to last year has still not been released by Cuomo's office. The governor's office also has declined to release a copy of the full transcript of DeRosa's roughly two-hour meeting with the Democratic lawmakers last week.

Sen. Sue Serino, the ranking member of the state Senate's Aging Committee, seized on Cuomo's failure to apologize on Monday "to the vulnerable residents and loved ones who have been impacted by the states handling of the COVID crisis in our nursing homes."

"If the governor is so secure in the facts he presented today, then he should have no reason to oppose a thorough, independent investigation to verify them," Serino said in a statement.

Senate Minority Leader Robert Ortt also responded to the governor's briefing in a statement, accusing Cuomo of being incapable of taking the blame for "the hurt inflicted on our families by his administration's relentless disinformation campaign."

"The governor's major excuse for the failure of his administration to provide accurate, timely information to the public was, 'we were busy,'" Ortt said. "This is a pathetic response coming from a man who had the time to publish and promote a book about his pandemic response while New Yorkers clamored for the truth."

Assembly Minority Leader Will Barclay has called on lawmakers to hold a special session to discuss the alleged cover-up of nursing home data, a move that Ortt supports. They also want a revocation of the governor's emergency powers.

Those powers, set to expire April 1, were granted to the executive in last year's budget vote to more easily respond to the coronavirus pandemic, but legislators from both sides of the aisle have toyed with the idea of ending those powers earlier.

Heastie has remained largely silent on the matter. His spokesman issued a statement last week saying the governor's office had "communicated to staff that they needed more time to provide the information" on nursing home fatalities and policies. The statement added that Heastie was unaware of the Justice Department investigation, now stalled, "other than what was reported in the news."

Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins delivered a more forceful message on Friday, noting that "crucial information should never be withheld" from those empowered to do oversight."

"Politics should not be part of this tragic pandemic and our responses to it must be led by policy, not politics," Stewart-Cousins added. "As always, we will be discussing next steps as a conference."

Serino, a Hudson Valley Republican, has also demanded Cuomo's administration release the full transcript of the secret meeting with lawmakers. A partial transcript was released last week in response to the controversy, whereby DeRosa argued her remarks were taken out of context. The Times Union requested the full transcript last week, but the administration never responded to the request.

Stephen Hanse, president and CEO of the New York State Health Facilities Association, issued a statement following Cuomo's remarks called for politicians to stop pointing fingers and start treating long-term care as an investment rather than an expense.

"New York's 'hospital centric' approach focused the state's resources on hospital-based solutions such as the Javits Center and the USS Comfort that ultimately proved to be ill-advised while nursing homes throughout New York were left scrambling to safeguard their residents and staff."


A man sentenced for his involvement in two terrorist attacks in Moscow in 1999 has been found dead in a Siberian prison.

Media reports in Russia on February 15 identified the man as 65-year-old Khalid Khuguyev, who was serving his 22-year prison term in Correctional Colony No. 47 in the town of Volchanets in the Primorsky Krai region.

Meanwhile, the Investigative Committee's branch in Primorsky Krai issued a statement on February 15 saying that a 65-year-old inmate was killed by another 41-year-old inmate in a brawl with a knife, adding that a probe had been launched into the death.

The statement did not mention Khuguyevs name.

Khuguyev and another man, Magumadzair Gadzhikayev, were convicted of the organization and implementation of terrorist acts in 1999 in the Russian capital.

Eleven people were injured in a bomb attack carried out at the Intourist hotel in April 1999, and one person was killed and 39 injured in a second bombing in August the same year in the Okhotny Ryad shopping complex.

Khuguyev was initially sentenced to 25 years in prison and Gadzhikayev to 15 years. In 2020, the Supreme Court cut the prison terms to 22 and 13 years, respectively.

Khuguyev was expected to be released later this year.

With reporting by Interfax and RIA Novosti
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 02:15:16|Editor: huaxia

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NAIROBI, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said Monday it would soon disburse 262.69 billion shillings (about 2.4 billion U.S. dollars) to Kenya after reaching an agreement on a 38-month financial package.

The IMF said that its team and the Kenyan officials reached an agreement on a 38-month program to help the next phase of the country's COVID-19 response and a strong multi-year effort to stabilize and begin reducing debt levels relative to GDP.

"I am pleased to announce that the Kenyan authorities and the IMF mission team have reached agreement on economic and structural policies that would underpin a 38-month program under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) and Extended Credit Facility (ECF) arrangements for about US$2.4 billion," Mary Goodman who led the IMF mission to Kenya said in a statement issued in Nairobi. "The staff-level agreement is subject to IMF management approval and executive board consideration, which is expected in the coming week."

The IMF mission which was in Kenya from Dec. 9 to 17 last year and from Feb. 4 to 15, said the Kenyan economy is picking up from an unprecedented shock suffered as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

It said, however, despite the recovery, uncertainty remains in a durable return to the path of strong, sustainable, and inclusive growth. Enditem
The Government has again refused to publicly back proposals designed to make it easier for the parents of disabled children to access Child Trust Fund savings, as it was warned as much as 107million could be 'lost' over the next decade.

Responding to questions in the House of Lords on Thursday, justice minister Lord Wolfson said it was not for the Government to 'give its blessing to private sector schemes.'

It comes after parents of children with less than 5,000 in the bank were potentially spared the costly and time-consuming route of going through the Court of Protection thanks to proposals first reported by This is Money on Monday.

Those proposals would allow parents and guardians to access trust fund cash on their child's behalf by filling out a five-page application form and getting a medical practitioner to fill out another one-page document.

Justice minister Lord Wolfson pledged to do everything he could to help disabled children locked out of their Child Trust Funds but refused to publicly back new industry proposals

But while they have now been greenlit by a majority of trust fund providers, including asset managers, banks and mutuals, with four in five balances covered, the Government has consistently refused to confirm whether they comply with the Mental Capacity Act 2005.

The legislation is designed to protect disabled children from financial abuse and one of the architects of the proposals, Nigel Banfield, from the Investing and Savings Alliance, said the proposals took into account 'the principles' of the act.

But while the Government has said it is considering TISA's alternative route for parents, it has failed to confirm whether it is legal, despite having been handed details of it last September.

Mr Banfield had previously called the lack of formal Government approval 'disappointing' when the proposals were published in December 2020.

Asked twice by peers on Thursday why the Government had failed to give its blessing to TISA's proposals, Lord Wolfson said: 'It is not for the Ministry of Justice to give its blessing to private sector schemes and to say whether they do or do not comply with the relevant legislation.

'The relevant legislation is important, it's there to protect people. If the private sector wants to put in a scheme that is a matter for the private sector.

'So far as my department is concerned, we need to make sure so far as we can that the court rules and procedures are both appropriate, proportionate and accessible.'

Mr Banfield hit back at Lord Wolfson's remarks and said the industry had 'been left with the choice to either meet the consumer needs with a robust process or sit back and wait for the Government to arrive at their own solution.'

The Government was also warned that as much as 107million could be lost to disabled children over the next decade if one in four parents gave up on trying to access them because of the 'administrative burden' it entailed.

How do TISA's proposals work? According to the proposals published by the Investing and Savings Alliance last December, this is how the alternative process would work:  In advance of the maturity, typically from age 16, the firm would make parents aware of the different requirements if the child has no capacity, and point them towards the Ministry of Justice to understand their own personal circumstances  Around maturity time, check to see whether the parent has a Court of Protection order or a Lasting Power of attorney  Check whether there are other savings in the name of the account holder - if so then this process cannot be used, and the court route is required anyway  If the parent insists on not going through the court process the CTF provider will consider this alternative process  If the value is under a threshold, recommended around 5,000, then this alternative process can be considered  Full identity check on the parent claiming the proceeds on behalf of the account holder to be carried out  The parent provides evidence of the approval as DWP appointee to receive and manage the account holder's benefits, or similar evidence  The parent provides appropriate evidence from appropriate practitioners that their child does not have the capacity to make the financial decisions or provide the instructions necessary to complete the maturity process  Finally, the parent completes a declaration confirming they will act in the best interests, and that the money will be spent for the benefit of, the account holder  The process asks for relevant evidence to provide protection appropriate to the circumstances and is more commensurate with the value being applied for

Parents could access the keys to their disabled children's Child Trust Funds under proposals greenlit by the savings industry last week

Applying to become a deputy and access their disabled child's finances through the Court of Protection could entail 47 pages of forms, thousands of pounds and up to a year of waiting, although Government has pledged that no one applying to the court solely to access a CTF will pay fees.

Former pensions minister Baroness Altmann said the Government had a 'special responsibility' to up to 200,000 disabled young people locked out of their trust funds, after the Labour Government which set them up in 2005 handed extra money to those in receipt of disability living allowance.

While parents were handed extra money, those same disabilities mean those children lack the mental capacity to manage money and therefore cannot access their trust funds when they turn 18.

Lord Wolfson, who was appointed as a justice minister last December, insisted the Government was doing all it could, and said any solutions it came up with would apply to Junior Isas as well as Child Trust Funds.

Peers had previously rounded on the Government's proposals to waive court fees but not make the process more straightforward in December.

Then-justice minister Baroness Scott had rejected a call from Tory peer Lord Young to look at the system used by the Department for Work and Pensions to let parents manage the benefits of their disabled children.

She said the system was 'not appropriate'.

Nigel Banfield said: 'TISA and CTF providers have developed an interim solution pending anything from the Government. This was offered back in September.

'We sought feedback from them to arrive at something together. It was not designed to be a private sector solution but a way to offer immediate relief for affected consumers.

'Since September, in the absence of any alternative and with the continued refusal to provide any regulatory support, however limited that might have been, we've been left with the choice to either meet the consumer needs with a robust process or sit back and wait for the Government to arrive at their own solution.

'TISA and our members are committed to doing the right thing and not putting unnecessary barriers in the way of the consumer. This may not be the long-term solution but is appropriate for now and will allow parents to help their child gain access to their child trust fund and benefit from its proceeds.'
WASHINGTON (AP) - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Monday that Congress will establish an independent, Sept. 11-style commission to look into the deadly insurrection that took place at the U.S. Capitol.

Pelosi said the commission will "investigate and report on the facts and causes relating to the January 6, 2021, domestic terrorist attack upon the United States Capitol Complex ... and relating to the interference with the peaceful transfer of power."

In a letter to Democratic colleagues, Pelosi said the House will also put forth supplemental spending to boost security at the Capitol.

After former President Donald Trumps acquittal at his second Senate impeachment trial, bipartisan support appeared to be growing for an independent commission to examine the deadly insurrection.

Investigations into the riot were already planned, with Senate hearings scheduled later this month in the Senate Rules Committee. Pelosi, D-Calif., asked retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore to lead an immediate review of the Capitols security process.

In her letter Monday, Pelosi said, "It is clear from his findings and from the impeachment trial that we must get to the truth of how this happened."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif., with impeachment managers Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., and Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo., speaks to members of the media during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, after the U.S. Senate voted not guilty, to acquit former President Donald Trump of inciting riot at U.S. Capitol, ending impeachment trial, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

She added, "As we prepare for the Commission, it is also clear from General Honores interim reporting that we must put forth a supplemental appropriation to provide for the safety of Members and the security of the Capitol."

Lawmakers from both parties, speaking on Sunday's news shows, signaled that even more inquiries were likely. The Senate verdict Saturday, with its 57-43 majority falling 10 votes short of the two-thirds needed to convict Trump, hardly put to rest the debate about the Republican former presidents culpability for the Jan. 6 assault.

"There should be a complete investigation about what happened," said Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump. "What was known, who knew it and when they knew, all that, because that builds the basis so this never happens again."

Cassidy said he was "attempting to hold President Trump accountable," and added that as Americans hear all the facts, "more folks will move to where I was." He was censured by his states party after the vote.

An independent commission along the lines of the one that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks would probably require legislation to create. That would elevate the investigation a step higher, offering a definitive government-backed accounting of events. Still, such a panel would pose risks of sharpening partisan divisions or overshadowing President Joe Biden's legislative agenda.

"Theres still more evidence that the American people need and deserve to hear and a 9/11 commission is a way to make sure that we secure the Capitol going forward," said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a Biden ally. "And that we lay bare the record of just how responsible and how abjectly violating of his constitutional oath President Trump really was."

House prosecutors who argued for Trump's conviction of inciting the riot said Sunday they had proved their case. They also railed against the Senates Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, and others who they said were "trying to have it both ways" in finding the former president not guilty but criticizing him at the same time.

A close Trump ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., voted for acquittal but acknowledged that Trump had some culpability for the siege at the Capitol that killed five people, including a police officer, and disrupted lawmakers certification of Bidens White House victory. Graham said he looked forward to campaigning with Trump in the 2022 election, when Republicans hope to regain the congressional majority.

"His behavior after the election was over the top," Graham said. "We need a 9/11 commission to find out what happened and make sure it never happens again."

The Senate acquitted Trump of a charge of "incitement of insurrection" after House prosecutors laid out a case that he was an "inciter in chief" who unleashed a mob by stoking a monthslong campaign of spreading debunked conspiracy theories and false violent rhetoric that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Trumps lawyers countered that Trumps words were not intended to incite the violence and that impeachment was nothing but a "witch hunt" designed to prevent him from serving in office again.

The conviction tally was the most bipartisan in American history but left Trump to declare victory and signal a political revival while a bitterly divided GOP bickered over its direction and his place in the party.

The Republicans who joined Cassidy in voting to convict were Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

"Its frustrating, but the founders knew what they were doing and so we live with the system that we have," Democratic Del. Stacey Plaskett, a House prosecutor who represents the Virgin Islands, said of the verdict, describing it as "heartbreaking." She added: "But, listen, we didnt need more witnesses. We needed more senators with spines."

McConnell told Republican senators shortly before the vote that he would vote to acquit Trump. In a blistering speech after the vote, the Kentucky Republican said the president was "practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day" but that the Senate's hands were tied to do anything about it because Trump was out of office. The Senate, in an earlier vote, had deemed the trial constitutional.

"It was powerful to hear the 57 guilties and then it was puzzling to hear and see Mitch McConnell stand and say `not guilty and then, minutes later, stand again and say he was guilty of everything," said Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pa. "History will remember that statement of speaking out of two sides of his mouth," she said.

Dean also backed the idea of an impartial investigative commission "not guided by politics but filled with people who would stand up to the courage of their conviction."

Cassidy and Dean spoke on ABC's "This Week," Graham appeared on "Fox News Sunday," and Plaskett appeared on CNN's "State of the Union."

___

Associated Press writers Alexandra Jaffe, Lisa Mascaro, Eric Tucker, Mary Clare Jalonick and Alan Fram contributed to this report.

Lead House impeachment manager Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., with impeachment managers Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., and Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo., right, speaks to members of the media during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021, after the U.S. Senate voted to acquit former President Donald Trump, ending the impeachment trial. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., walks on Capitol Hill after the Senate acquitted former President Donald Trump in his second impeachment trial in the Senate at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. Trump was accused of inciting the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, and the acquittal gives him a historic second victory in the court of impeachment. (Greg Nash/Pool via AP)

In this image from video, House impeachment manager Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pa., speaks during closing arguments in the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump in the Senate at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021. (Senate Television via AP)

Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., rides an escalator on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 10, 2021, as he heads to the second day of the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., puts on a face mask on the fifth day of the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021 at the Capitol in Washington. (Stefani Reynolds/Pool via AP)
A white Andover student who was on the Peru trip with New York Times reporter Donald McNeil where he used the N-word claims he also told the group that racism was 'over', and that 'black Americans can get out of the ghetto if they want to'.

The trip was in 2019 and was part of the Times Journey program - a money making venture where seasoned Times reporters took people on guided educational tours in different parts of the world.

Sophie Shepherd was among the group who paid $5,000 per person for the educational trip with McNeil in Peru.

It was called 'Public Health and Development in the Andes' and involved day trips, activities and stays in hostels. At the time, she was a student of Phillips Academy at Andover, a prestigious boarding school in Massachusetts, and was 17 at the time, having just completed her senior year.

Now, she is a student at The University of Iowa. It's unclear if all of the kids on the trip were from the school, or if she'd arranged it privately.

She told the Times in an article published on Sunday that the N word was not the only racist thing McNeil said.

Sophie Shepherd was among the group who paid $5,000 per person for the educational trip with Donald McNeil in Peru

According to her, he also said: 'It's frustrating because black Americans keep blaming the system but racism is over, theres nothing against them anymore  they can get out of the ghetto if they want to.'

Shepherd said she tried to argue with him but that he shot back: 'This is the thing with these liberal institutions like Andover  they teach you the world should be like this but thats not how reality is.'

She said that he was 'grumpy' but that she fell sorry for him.

'There was this atmosphere where people didnt like him... He was kind of a grumpy old guy.'

According to Shepherd, McNeil had been talking to another student at lunch during the first day of the trip when he used the N word.

Earlier in the day, she'd run after him while the group was leaving their hostel to ask him about some of the criticism he'd faced over his book.

'He got very defensive very quickly about it,' she said.

She then felt 'terrible' and like she had come off 'like a crazy liberal'.

Another student who was there told the Times that when Shepherd used the N word, he was unapologetic about it.

'Im very used to people  my grandparents or peoples parents  saying things they dont mean that are insensitive.

The trip that McNeil was in charge if was a 14 day, 13 night trip to the Andes to teach the kids about public health. It was part of the Times Journeys program

'You correct them, you tell them, "Youre not supposed to talk like that," and usually people are pretty apologetic and responsive to being corrected. And he was not,' that student said.

The Times published her comments on Sunday along with more details about McNeil's resignation.

Times Executive Editor Dean Baquet wanted to fire McNeil when he learned of the teenagers' complaints in 2019 but McNeil's union stopped it

He will continue working at the Times until March 1 and is declining to comment on the scandal until then.

He resigned last week after 150 staffers wrote a letter demanding that he be fired.

The students complained to the Times at the time of the incident and Dean Baquet, the newspaper's Executive Editor, wanted to fire him but McNeil's union fought it.

One source said that the union was going to take the newspaper to arbitration to protect McNeil.

The issue resurfaced in a Daily Beast article earlier this month.

In his resignation and apology letter to colleagues, McNeil Jr. said he'd shown 'extraordinarily bad judgement'.

His ousting has split staff.

Some say he didn't deserve to have his career end over a 'single word'. Others have pointed to the fact that he was one of the Times' best COVID-19 reporters who featured regularly on the newspaper's podcast, The Daily.

In response to Shepherd's claims, McNeil told the Times: 'Im sure well have different memories of conversations that took place that long ago.'

Vietnam would receive around five million Covid-19 vaccine doses by the end of February, Deputy Health Minister Truong Quoc Cuong said at a meeting Monday.

They include about 4.9 million vaccine doses provided via Covax, a global mechanism for developing, manufacturing and procuring Covid-19 vaccine candidates and help member countries access vaccines as they become available. About 117,000 other doses would be imported, Cuong said, adding that they would come by the end of February provided that flights and procedures are completed as scheduled.

With the vaccine doses, five million people will receive the first shots, and three months later the second shots would be administered. Around two to five million people on the frontline of the coronavirus fight would be prioritized to get the vaccine.

Deputy Prime Minister Truong Hoa Binh said the vaccine doses imported aren't many, so authorities need to actively negotiate with other sources to buy more vaccines and promote domestic vaccine manufacturing.

"Some experts have requested that Vietnam considers vaccines produced by Russia due to their fairly good quality and affordable prices," he said.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said importing Covid-19 vaccines should be a foremost priority of the government, while calling for quick research progress on domestic Covid-19 vaccines as well.

"Within February, there have to vaccine doses provided by the United Nations and other buying sources, while domestic production needs to be boosted as well," he said.

The Ministry of Health would be tasked with choosing the vaccines and partners, determining those prioritized to be vaccinated and cooperating with the Ministry of Finance to propose the budget for buying vaccines. The final plan is expected to be considered and approved by the government on Wednesday, Phuc said.

Vietnam has reached a deal to receive 30 million doses of a vaccine developed by British-Swedish company AstraZeneca in collaboration with Oxford University within the first half of this year. The country is also stepping up negotiations with the U.S.s Pfizer and Moderna, along with other vaccine manufacturers in Russia and China.

Covax also announced last month that it would provide between 4.9 million and 8.2 million vaccine doses to Vietnam within the first half of this year.

Vietnam has four domestic Covid-19 vaccines developed by Nanogen Pharmaceutical Biotechnology JSC, the Institute of Vaccines and Medical Biologicals, the Vaccine and Biological Production Company No. 1 and the Center for Research and Production of Vaccines and Biologicals.

Nanocovax, produced by Nanogen Pharmaceutical Biotechnology JSC, has finished its first phase of human trials and is expected to begin the second one this month. Covivac of the Institute of Vaccines and Medical Biologicals is expected to commence human trials this month as well.

As of Monday, Vietnam has recorded 677 Covid-19 cases since the new community wave started late last month. The biggest coronavirus hotspot is northern Hai Duong Province, now with 499 cases.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.  The walls are starting to fall in on Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

And hes got nobody to blame but himself.

Cuomo cant hide from the deadly coronavirus calamity that he callously set in motion at New Yorks nursing homes. Its a tragedy that Cuomo still refuses to accept any responsibility for.

We now know that the Cuomo administration purposely undercounted the number of nursing home patients who died during the pandemic and then covered up that fact when the federal government and state lawmakers came looking for the data.

Cuomos response? Who cares where people died? What matters is that they died of the dreaded virus.

If it matters so little, then Cuomo should have been upfront about the numbers from the start.

But it actually matters a great deal to Cuomo, because it was his order last March 25 that forced nursing homes to accept COVID-positive patients from hospitals. So any resulting deaths are on Cuomo.

This isnt a political attack, as Cuomo has claimed all these months. This isnt the handiwork of former President Donald Trump and other Republicans looking to punch a hole in a blue state governor who received high praise for his handling of the pandemic.

This is simply Cuomos own chickens coming home to roost.

And Cuomos coronavirus miscues dont end there.

The governor kept a tight grip on the early rollout of the COVID vaccine, restricting access to the point where precious doses ended up in the trash because no qualified recipients could be found.

And Cuomo ignored local health agencies, which had vaccination contingency plans already in place, and handed the vaccination effort to his political allies at the states big hospital systems.

And it was Cuomo who shuttered indoor dining in New York City in December even though the governors own stats showed that home spread was the far greater threat.

It goes back even further than that.

Remember how the field hospital at the Javits Center and the military medical ship USNS Comfort both went under-utilized at the height of the pandemic last year?

And recall how a field hospital planned for the College of Staten Island was never built at all, and how both Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio vastly overstated the need for ventilators for COVID patients.

Remember how Cuomo joked around with his CNN host brother, Chris Cuomo, literally while people were falling ill and dying, making the pandemic into their own grisly star turn.

And who can forget the horribly self-aggrandizing coronavirus mountain poster that Cuomo issued, featuring his family members and staffers and patting himself on the back for a job that wasnt even half done?

After garnering near-universal praise for his early handling of the pandemic, everything is now tainted. You think Cuomo maybe wants to do a rewrite on that pandemic leadership book he wrote?

Even Cuomos fellow Dems are turning on him, something that would have been unthinkable just weeks ago.

Attorney General Letitia James issued a scathing report on the undercounted nursing home dead. And after reports of the coverup, state lawmakers are looking at stripping Cuomo of his emergency pandemic powers.

There are suggestions that Cuomo face a recall from New Yorkers voters, and the federal Justice Department has been called on to probe the nursing home calamity.

Its a huge mess. And one that Cuomo created himself with his dictatorial ways, his thunderous insistence that only he knew best how to handle the pandemic.

Its way past time that state lawmakers strip Cuomo of his emergency powers. Others need to step in and help manage the crisis. Cuomo has shown that hes no longer capable of going it alone.
Exploring a scientific Binh Dinh

Anyone who heads to Binh Dinh should make sure to visit Ghenh Rang to admire the wild beauty of Hoang Hau Beach, visit Thi Nhan Hill, and take a few photos at the tomb of Han Mac Tu. And at Ghenh Rang from Egg Stone beach, you can watch the sea and capture some stunning views of the city.

Most visitors are also very excited to see the ancient towers in the area  vestiges of the old Cham people. The region boasts several of the ancient Chams unique architectural relics, such as the Twin Towers in Quy Nhon city, Canh Tien and Phu Doc towers in An Nhon, and Banh It and Binh Lam towers in Tuy Phuoc. Although their kingdom has vanished, these towers still represent the pride of the Cham and are admired by most tourists.

Another unique place to visit is Quang Trung Museum, at which visitors can learn about Binh Dinhs hero who contributed to the golden history of the country. This place has kept many imprints and artifacts belonging to a time when the Tay Son brothers battled against the enemy.

Thanks to several restoration and renovation efforts, the century-old water well and tamarind tree at the house of the three Nguyen brothers have been preserved until today. Rumour has it that if people tell each other about their worries while sitting under the shade of tamarind tree, all sorrows will dissipate.

Coming to the area, visitors cannot help but recognise the serenity and gentleness of the ancient pagodas like Ong Nui, Thien Hung, Thap Thap, and Long Khanh. There is also Lang Song church, which houses the first printing house for the Vietnamese Quoc ngu, the national script used nowadays.

Science discovery tour

According to Binh Dinh Department of Tourism, early 2019 saw the beginning of an experimental tours pilot operation, which is expected to be fully completed this year. The tour is planned to take place at the 5,000-square-metre science discovery centre in Quy Nhons Ghenh Rang ward, called ExploraScience.

ExploraScience Quy Nhon boasts seven showcase rooms with different themes such as exploration, the universe and solar system, the earth, natural resources, and the laws of nature. There are 94 scientific models, most of which were created by the experts of the centre who replicated the exhibitions following exact ratios with real objects.

The model of the universe features devices using the latest projection and simulation technology, helping viewers discover stunning images of the universe and explain astronomy-related problems with visual illustration and vivid images. Meanwhile, the integrated science museum boasts many exhibitions of scientific experiments from physics, chemistry, engineering, life science, environmental science, and others.

At the astronomy section, visitors can observe experiments related to the earth as it is orbiting around the sun; models of the planets in our solar system; and images and models of planets in the universe taken by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Visitors can also learn about the Gregorian and lunar calendars as well as how to calculate the distance between the planets. There is also a large space with a cafe hall, a reading corner, a community science library, and a souvenir shop for visitors.One of the most attractive modules is a 1.5m-diameter globe simulating the planet, worth nearly VND3 billion ($130,000) which was imported from Germany. Many phenomena are simulated on the globes surface such as climate change, oceanography, plate tectonics, volcanoes, earthquakes, and day and night cycles as well as seasons. Visitors can interact directly with the globe through its touch screen.

In addition, the globe also projects images simulating the surfaces of other planets and satellites in the solar system, such as Mercury, Venus, Mars, and Jupiter, making these lessons about the planets become livelier and more attractive. Visitors can easily learn what makes up a planet and how to differentiate planets, stars, and natural and artificial satellites.

Stepping into the space exploration zone, visitors will be slowly familiarised with the dark to start a space travel trip. Here, they can learn about the history of space and astronomy while admiring the models of spacecraft, planets, and satellites.

At the workshop of ExploraScience, visitors will have the opportunity to see various machines and tools such as CNC and Laser cutting machines, 3D printers, and many more. At the same time, the workshop is also an ideal place for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) classes to be held.

The science complex is expected to become a science-exploring space for children and the public, conveying science and provoking interest in it along with creativity. This is the first place in Vietnam where the public has the chance to visit and explore science in such a vivid way. Currently, ExploraScience Quy Nhon offers a free scientific exploration tour with three sections, including a tour around the exhibitions, a scientific show, and in- and outdoor games.

Delicious food and beverage

One of the typical flavours of the Nau region is summed up in little cakes called Banh it la gai, which are always present at important anniversaries and festivals. The combination of sugar, aromatic sticky rice, beans, and oil combined in soft hemp leaves will make most visitors to the area remember their taste for a long time.

Another popular delicacy is called Banh hoi, a local speciality from Dieu Tri, which is a simple everyday dish that has become a beloved speciality among the local as well as visitors from far away. The cake is made from rice in the same way as rice vermicelli, but with thinner strings. Thus, it requires workers to be diligent, meticulous, and skilful. While other regions serve the cake with green onions, Binh Dinhs people use chives leaves, which give the cake a delicious and unique flavour.

Another famous dish is called nem chua cho Huyen which roughly translated to sour pork cake from Huyen market. Many people have been buying these cakes as souvenirs for their families and relatives at home.

The Nau region is also renowned for its coconut rice paper, which is different from most others due to its flavour to thickness. It requires a lot of work, from choosing the right ingredients to processing the coconut rice paper.

The rice paper is put under the sun until the end of the day to ensure a decent quality. The cake that is made from the paper is rather thick with a distinctive taste. Together with noodles, onions, and pepper, the coconut contributes to this dishs unique and strong aroma which cannot be mixed up with others.

Another speciality not to miss out is Bau Da wine  a famous beverage of Binh Dinh which is known for its descriptive name, good wine. Due to its popularity, Bau Da wine is an indispensable gift for your friends and partners.

There are also many other delicious dishes in the Nau region, and visitors who have the chance to enjoy these, will most likely remember dishes like Song than noodles from An Thai region, land shrimp rolls, Jumping shrimp pancake, Quy Nhon fish cakes, and small crab noodles in Phu My, and many more.
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.
Slovak town of Muses: Trnava

Often called the Slovak Rome, the city has a rich history.

The most beautiful view of the Acropolis is from this place.

Especially in the evenings, when it shines, visible from afar, covered in lights.

This 147 m high hill is the highest of the southern part of Athens. It was called Mouseion in Antiquity. Ancient Greeks believed it is the home of the Muses.

Today the mild wind plays with the pines here, and in the air you can feel a presence of these inspirational goddesses of literature, science, and the arts, the nine daughters of Zeus. You can sense the words, that only that person, beloved by the Muses, is happy.

It is one of the most beautiful and peaceful places of Athens. When you await the sunset, you will see the lights touch the columns of Athenas palace. And there in the arcade stoics used to walk. And Epicurus as well. And discussed. Including about love.

The first town to receive royal privileges

video //www.youtube.com/embed/dpLRCyts-xs

It was called Athens of the Kingdom of Hungary.

The seat of the Muses.

This town was founded at the end of the 9th century at the junction of important long-distance merchant roads as two small market villages, Saturday, named for the day its market was held, and Trnavka, named for the river, were married.

Trnava was the first town in the territory of Slovakia that was granted free royal privileges by King Bela IV in 1238.

And then everything started.

The Slovak Rome

Its importance grew, the town flourished.

Especially in 1543 when Esztergom fell under Ottoman control, its Archbishop moved to Trnava. And for almost 300 years, the town remained a cultural capital of the Kingdom of Hungary. This was a significant catalyst for development of education, arts, and architecture in the town.

In 1635 Cardinal Peter Pazmany established the university here. In its corridors walked doctors, theologists, philosophers. Here was discussed codification of the formal Slovak language for the first time.

And later, two Italians, Antonio and Pietro Spazzo fell in love with this town, and built the early Baroque Church of St John the Baptist. It was the first early Baroque cathedral in Slovakia.

Today the town is called the Slovak Rome. You can walk here long hours through the romantic streets, along the city walls, and admire the number of tiny church towers. And when you reach the main square, you will be enchanted by the monumental Renaissance Town Tower.

And still, there will always be this academic spirit of the Slovak Cambridge hanging in the air. And maybe you will be greeted by the mayor in his hat on his bicycle, who won his office with the only a single billboard.

An inspiration for artists

And what about the Muses?

The Muses of Athens, and also Trnava, entered the words in the mouths of poets and philosophers, and revealed amazing colours to painters and sculpturers.

As Gala did for Dali.

And as Rodins Camille did as well.

Because beautiful and brave women are not only the inspiration, but also the epic challenge for the world.

VaGa Agency is an incoming company concentrating on active, adventure, cycling, and sport tours in Slovakia, in the unique, authentic and safe country, far away from mass tourism; offer undiscovered and amazing places, tailored-made solutions and very professional individual guiding. For more information please visit: vaga.agency and www.vaga-camp.com.

15. Feb 2021 at 12:00 | Gabriela Psotkova, Valeria Polovkova
Turkish soldiers launched a military operation against Kurdish guerrillas in northern Iraq last week - Anadolu Agency

Turkey announced yesterday the arrests of hundreds of people it said were linked to an outlawed Kurdish militant group it earlier accused of executing 13 Turkish captives.

Ankara also summoned the American ambassador after President Recep Tayyip Erodgan expressed anger that the United States did not immediately accept Turkeys word on Sunday that the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) had killed the captured Turkish soldiers and police in a cave in northern Iraq.

The PKK said the prisoners died amid fighting and Turkish air strikes during a military operation by Ankara against the guerrilla group, which uses bases in northern Iraq to fight for Kurdish rights, part of a decades-old insurgency that has killed over 40,000 people.

Washington initially issued a conditional statement condemning the killings, saying that if confirmed then responsibility lay with the PKK, which is considered a terrorist organisation by Turkey, Britain and the US.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken then told his Turkish counterpart that "PKK terrorists" were responsible for the hostage deaths.

"The Secretary expressed condolences for the deaths of Turkish hostages in northern Iraq and affirmed our view that PKK terrorists bear responsibility," State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.

But this did not appease President Erdogan, who already enraged by Washingtons support for Kurdish fighters in neighbouring Syria accused his ally of siding with terrorists.

"If we are together with you in Nato, if we are to continue our unity, then you will act sincerely towards us. Then, you will stand with us, not with the terrorists," Mr Erdogan said in an address in the Black Sea city of Rize.

The comments are likely to strain relations already under pressure after Washington sanctioned Turkey in December over its purchase of a Russian missile system.

Mr Erdogan's ire also extended to the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), which accused the government of failing to seize earlier opportunities to negotiate the release of the prisoners, some of whom had been held since 2015 after being abducted in southeast Turkey and smuggled to PKK bases in northern Iraq.

Story continues

On Monday, Turkey's interior ministry said city and district heads of the HDP were among 718 people detained in 40 cities across Turkey for alleged links to the PKK.

HDP MP Garo Paylan said about 150 of his party's members were detained overnight.

He told The Telegraph that the arrests were partly about wounded pride after Turkey failed to rescue any hostages during its military incursion in northern Iraq but also an attack on Turkish democracy.

Erdogans goal is to end hopes for a peace process or a democratic solution to the Kurdish question and to end democracy in Turkey, Mr Paylan said in a phone call.

President Erdogan's government has targeted the HDP for the past five years, accusing the third largest party in Turkey's parliament of links to the PKK, which it denies.

Elected mayors from the HDP have been dismissed and more than 10,000 members jailed, including former chairman Selahattin Demirtas.

If they can jail thousands more, the HDP wont be able to function, said Mr Paylan, who believes the arrests and accusations of links to the PKK are part of a strategy to reduce the partys support to below the 10 percent threshold needed to hold seats in parliament.

President Erdogan wants to rule the country as a dictator for decades and for this he needs to demolish all of Turkeys institutions, he said.
Does your partner snore like a circular saw? Help may be at hand from a device that can reduce snorts by more than a fifth by applying electricity to the wearer's tongue.

The eXciteOSA unit does not actually zap the wearer while they sleep as punishment for snoring (as appealing as that might seem to some long-suffering bedmates!)

Instead, the device from London-based Signifier Medical Technologies is worn for sessions during the day, and stimulates the muscles in the mouth and tongue.

Snoring is caused by the vibration of the structures of throat, which relax when you sleep, constricting the passage and creating noisy air turbulence.

Strengthening tongue muscles, however, helps the breathing passage to stay open at night, allowing for a more restful night for the wearer and those within earshot.

The eXciteOSA device is already on sale in the UK for 648 and will go on sale in the US for $750.

Scroll down for video

Does your partner snore like a circular saw? Help may be at hand from a device, pictured in use, that can reduce snorts by a fifth by delivering electric currents to the wearer's tongue

The eXciteOSA unit does not actually zap the wearer while they sleep as punishment for snoring (as appealing as that might seem to some long-suffering bedmates!). Instead, the device from London-based Signifier Medical Technologies is worn for sessions during the day, and stimulates the muscles in the mouth and tongue

HOW EXCITEOSA HELPS TACKLE SNORING AND SLEEP APNOEA When you sleep, your throat and tongue muscles relax. In some people, this can lead to a narrowing of the airway and causing noisy air turbulence  that is, snoring (left). In severe cases, the airway can become completely blocked (right), interrupting normal breathing and causing the sleeper to wake. Poor sleep can lead to health issues Worn in the daytime, eXciteOSA uses safe electrical currents to stimulate the tongue muscles (left), giving them a 'work-out'. The strengthened muscle is less likely to obstruct the airway (right), reducing snoring and improving health in the long-term Advertisement

eXciteOSA may also help suffers of mild sleep apnoea  a condition in which one's airways can become completely blocked at night, interrupting normal breathing.

Sleep apnoea, if untreated, can increase the risk of cancer, glaucoma, heart attacks, high blood pressure, strokes, type 2 diabetes and cognitive and behavioural disorders.

'We are thrilled to launch the first ever daytime therapy for the treatment of obstructive sleep apnoea and primary snoring,' said Signifier Medical Technologies' CEO & Co-Founder, Akhil Tripathi.

'Our patented smart device, eXciteOSA, not only treats the root cause of the problem, it also requires no night-time wearable device for a peaceful night's sleep.'

The Bluetooth-enabled, app-controlled device resembles a sort-of mouthguard on a stick, and is worn to sit around the tongue, and contains four electrodes which stimulate the tongue's top and the underside surfaces.

Snorers are encouraged to use eXciteOSA in the daytime for 20 minutes each day for the first six weeks and then once a week after that.

During each session, the electrodes stimulate the tongue muscles using a series of electrical pulses, each lasting a few seconds, with similar rest periods in-between.

'The stimulation does not hurt and the patient has the option of setting and adjusting their desired therapy level,' a Signifier Medical Technologies spokesperson said.

The firm added that eXciteOSA has already served more than 2,000 users  the majority of whom are in the UK.

The eXciteOSA device (pictured) from London-based Signifier Medical Technologies is worn for sessions during the day, and stimulates the muscles in the mouth and tongue

The eXciteOSA is already on sale in the UK for 648 and will go on sale in the US for $750. Pictured: the device (left, in its case) fits around the tongue (as illustrated, right)

The eXciteOSA tool was approved for marketing to American adults as a prescription-only device earlier this month by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)'s Center for Devices and Radiological Health.

'Obstructive sleep apnoea not only impacts sleep quality, but can have other serious health impacts if untreated,' said the FDA's director of the Office of Ophthalmic, Anaesthesia, Respiratory, ENT and Dental Devices, Malvina Eydelman.

In tests, FDA experts found that a course of using the eXciteOSA device reduced snoring at levels louder than 40 decibels  as loud as bird calls  by more than 20 per cent in 87 of 115 patients.

In a subset of patients who experienced snoring and mild obstructive sleep apnoea, meanwhile, the team noted an average reduction of 48 per cent in the number of periods of shallow breathing per hour, from 10.2 to 5.3, in 41 out of 48 patients.

The Bluetooth-enabled, app-controlled device  which resembles a sort-of mouthguard on a stick, and is worn to sit around the tongue  contains four electrodes which stimulate the tongue's top and the underside surfaces. Pictured: the My eXciteOSA app interface

Snorers are encouraged to use eXciteOSA (left) in the daytime for 20 minutes each day for the first six weeks and then once a week after that. During each session, the electrodes stimulate the tongue muscles (right) using a series of electrical pulses, each lasting a few seconds, with similar rest periods in-between

'Today's authorization offers a new option for the thousands of individuals who experience snoring or mild sleep apnoea,' added Dr Eydelman.

eXciteOSA is not suitable, however, for patients with pacemakers or pacing leads, implants, dental braces, dental jewellery, metal oral prosthesis, mouth ulcerations or those who are pregnant.

Side effects observed in the FDA study included excessive salivation, tongue or tooth discomfort, tongue tingling, dental filling sensitivity, metallic taste, gagging and a tight jaw.
The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the process of digital transformation and the creation of new projects in Ukraine and around the world, Deputy Prime Minister - Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine Mykhailo Fedorov says.

He said this on the air of Radio NV, Ukrinform reports with reference to the website of the Digital Transformation Ministry.

According to the minister, we see a trend of accelerating the digital transformation process in all countries. We had a meeting with the Minister for Digitalization of Luxembourg, and they have very similar cases - for example, there is a similar application that helps stop the spread of coronavirus disease. In general, the medical direction in startups is now actively developing. "

Today, technical and medical companies are merging to maintain digital records of vaccination against COVID-19, in particular the status of the vaccinated person and the number of doses received. The initiative brings together many well-known healthcare and technology companies, such as Microsoft, Oracle, Salesforce and Epic, as well as Mayo Clinic, Safe Health, Change Healthcare, and the CARIN Alliance, Fedorov said.

He recalled that Ukrainians will soon be able to sign up for COVID-19 vaccination through the Diia app. The Ministry of Digital Transformation and the Ministry of Health are developing an effective digital tool to simplify the vaccination process for Ukrainians.

As Ukrinform reported, Fedorov said that Ukraine had the opportunity to implement new European legislation and carry out the reform of the digital sphere simultaneously with the countries of the European Union.

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The big issue specifically handicapping people in Indiana seeking treatment is medical necessity, which means there has to be some kind of crisis to get into a rehabilitation program, like going through withdrawal, Stepherson said. What he noticed is a lot of people sitting in jail with a substance abuse problem have Medicaid but by the time they are released they no longer have a medical necessity to go to rehab, he said.
The Union government will begin vaccination drive for around 27 crore Indians above the age of 50 three weeks from now, Union Health Minister said on Monday.

"Three weeks from now, the government will start giving doses of vaccines to 27 crore persons above the age of 50," he said at a press briefing here. An expert group on vaccination will discuss how to pay for the doses for those above 50, he added.

The vaccination for frontline workers began earlier this month.

Commenting on the private healthcare sector's role in the vaccination process, he said that such facilities and workers were already a part of the drive.

"During emergency use authorisations (EUA), it is the government's responsibility to keep things under control; open market sales are not part of the EUA," he added.

The Minister said that no new cases of COVID-19 have been reported in 188 districts of the country in the past seven days.

Vardhan emphasised the importance of social distance and appropriate healthcare behaviour amid the pandemic despite falling number of corona cases in the country.

"It is crucial that people continue to follow COVID-appropriate behaviour which I had called a social vaccine, along with the real vaccine," he quipped.

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry said that a new flagship programme -- Prime Minister Atmanirbhar Swastha Bharat Yojana -- has been announced in the Union Budget 2021-22. "The Budget refers to a holistic approach toward health and healthcare. Allocation to the health sector for 2020-21 is 1.8 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product," the Ministry added.

The Union government has prioritised vaccination of 30 crore Indians, dividing them into three categories -- one crore healthcare workers, 2 crore frontline workers, and 27 crore general populace above the age of 50.

--IANS

str/tsb

(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.)
BOZEMAN  According to Montana State University Extension, some Montanans can qualify for state and federal tax credits that may provide funds for working families with children who have faced dire financial consequences during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Marsha Goetting, MSU Extension family economics specialist, said Montanans should look into the earned income tax credit, the federal governments largest program for helping working Americans. Created in 1975, the EITC is a refundable federal income tax credit for low- to moderate-income workers. When the EITC exceeds the amount of taxes owed, Goetting explained, the result is a refund to eligible taxpayers who claim and qualify for the credit.

For 2020 the earned income tax credit at the federal level ranges from $548 to $6,660, Goetting said. The amount depends on income and number of children.

If individuals earned income was higher in 2019, they can use the 2019 amount to figure their federal EITC for 2020. This temporary relief is provided through the Taxpayer Certainty and Disaster Tax Relief Act of 2020, Goetting said.

For 2019, earned income and adjusted gross income at the federal level must each be less than $50,162  $55,952 married filing jointly  with three or more qualifying children; $46,703  $52,493 married filing jointly  with two qualifying children; or $41,094  $46,884 married filing jointly  with one qualifying child.

For the Montana EITC, Goetting said, the basic qualifying rules state that individuals must have investment income below $3,650 in the year they claim the credit, must have a valid Social Security number and be a U. S. citizen or a resident alien for the entire year. In order to claim the credits, individuals have to file both a federal 1040 form and Montana Individual Income Tax Return, also known as Form 2.

For most people in Montana, the state EITC is worth 3% of the federal EITC claimed, Goetting said. The credit is refundable, meaning that if it exceeds the total amount of taxes you owe, you will receive the difference.

For those who are unsure whether they can claim the EITC, use the EITC assistant from the IRS at irs.gov/credits-deductions/individuals/earned-income-tax-credit/use-the-eitc-assistant.

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The Pennsylvania House State Government Committee recently began a series of hearings on state election laws  ostensibly to learn more about the 2020 elections and with an eye toward improving the states future electoral process. It is difficult, however, to separate the causes and likely consequences of these hearings from past and ongoing efforts to sow doubt about election outcomes.

The 2020 elections were the most litigated in Pennsylvanias history. Sixty-four of our state legislative leaders were signatories to a letter urging Congress not to accept our states votes. At least 21 lawsuits were filed against the counting of state ballots. These objections to our states Electoral College results ultimately failed, but not before an insurrection in our nations Capitol and eight of our states federal representatives voted to disqualify Pennsylvanias electoral ballots.

 READ MORE: Pennsylvanias 2020 election was really hard to pull off. This year wont be much easier.

Like voters around the nation, Pennsylvanians cast ballots in November under extraordinary circumstances  not only did a highly competitive presidential election drive unprecedented surges in turnout and mail-in voting, but it did so amid a global health pandemic, an operational crisis in the U.S. Postal Service, and widespread social unrest fueled by racial injustice.

Many Pennsylvanians  despite being inundated with misinformation about mail-in ballots  voted by mail for the first time, an option made possible not by the pandemic, but by a bipartisan expansion of mail-in voting signed into law in 2019. Those who voted in person faced long lines and new COVID safety protocols.

How has all of this shaped the confidence of state voters? Do Pennsylvanians believe we had a fair, safe, and accurate election? A postelection survey conducted by Muhlenberg College in December offers important, and troubling, insight.

Roughly one in three voters say they are not at all confident that election results in our state were accurate. A closer look at voters concerns about the integrity of the electoral process reveals deep partisan divisions: 82% of Democratic voters are very confident that the election results were accurate, compared with 68% of Republicans. Most Republican voters (59%) identified voter fraud as the biggest threat to Pennsylvanias election, whereas a plurality of Democratic voters (46%) identified voter suppression as the biggest concern.

Some Republican state lawmakers have indicated interest in repealing no-excuse mail-in voting. Pennsylvania voters are divided on the wisdom of this: 51% object to limiting mail-in voting, while 47% agree that limits should be put in place.

 READ MORE: Election reform must remain a priority for Pennsylvania | Editorial

Voters experiences clearly shape their views. Mail-in voters express significantly greater confidence in the fairness and accuracy of the 2020 elections: 84% of mail-in voters indicated they are somewhat or very confident in the final results of the state elections, but only 40% of in-person voters held the same view.

Trust in political institutions and confidence in the electoral process are prerequisites for a healthy democracy and an active citizenry.

While the Muhlenberg College survey findings and recent events point to troubling divisions, we are encouraged by two data points that transcend party affiliations:

A majority of both Democratic and Republican voters strongly agree that fake news and misinformation are serious threats to democracy.

An estimated 71% of eligible Pennsylvanians participated in the 2020 elections  a record high turnout. Among them, the Muhlenberg survey found, first-time and young voters reported the highest levels of confidence in the accuracy of the election. This is a positive sign for our democracy and well worth celebrating.

Our state lawmakers can help restore confidence and rebuild trust by clearly, unequivocally disavowing misinformation, even when the truth is politically inconvenient. They need to acknowledge the dangers of distrust in political institutions, highlight what went right during the last election cycle, dismiss unsupported claims of fraud, and broaden, rather than restrict, access to voting for Pennsylvanians.

The second impeachment and acquittal of former President Donald Trump  a process that prominently featured Pennsylvania elected leaders  only highlights the need for restoring trust in our electoral process.

After all, these efforts would benefit both Republicans and Democrats. No party remains in the majority forever  and both parties need voters who believe in the integrity of the electoral process.

Lanethea Mathews-Schultz is a political science professor at Muhlenberg College. She wrote this op-ed with input from Pennsylvania Post-Election Poll Project students Louie Horning, Tyler Mercado, Cynthia Noehrenberg, and Max Wengroff.
DUBLIN, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Research Report on China's Shipbuilding Industry, 2021-2025" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

Shipbuilding is a modern and comprehensive industry of strategic importance that provides technical equipment to industries such as water traffic, ocean development and national defense.



China's shipbuilding industry has been developing rapidly with the government's policy support and cost advantages since the beginning of the 21st century. China-made mainstream ships including container ships, bulk carriers and oil tankers and high-end ships including liquefied gas carriers have certain competitive advantages on the international market. In the recent decade, the global shipbuilding industry presented a market structure of tripartite China-South Korea-Japan competition.

According to the analyst, in 2020, affected by the COVID-19 epidemic, the global new shipbuilding market remains sluggish. In 2020, pessimistic expectations in the global newbuilding market will increase, new ship transactions will decrease significantly, and the number of new ship orders received by major shipbuilding countries will decline year-on-year. From January to November 2020, China received orders for new ships of 22.52 million dwt, a year-on-year decrease of 8.7%.



Among them, orders for export ships were 19.77 million dwt, a year-on-year decrease of 13.5%, and export orders accounted for 87.8%. In the same period, Japan's orders for new ships dropped by 66.7% year-on-year, and South Korea's orders for new ships dropped by 8.4% year-on-year. The global market share has increased.



From January to November, China's shipbuilding completions, new orders, and hand-held orders accounted for 40.4%, 50.8% and 46.9% of the global market, respectively. The three major indicators are higher than in 2019. The completion of the shipbuilding industry was better than expected.

The COVID-19 epidemic that broke out in early 2020 has had a major impact on China's shipbuilding industry in the first quarter of 2020. In the first quarter of 2020, China's shipbuilding completion volume fell by 27.3% year-on-year.



It will gradually recover from April 2020. From January to November 2020, China's shipbuilding completed 33.24 million deadweight tons, down 2.6% year-on-year. Among them, the completed export ship volume was 30.03 million deadweight tons, a year-on-year decrease of 5.8%, and the completed export ship volume accounted for 90.3%.

On November 15, 2020, the ten ASEAN countries, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand formally signed the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (RCEP). RCEP is currently the world's largest free trade zone. In 2019, the 15 member states of RCEP have a total population of 2.27 billion, GDP of 26 trillion U.S. dollars, and total exports of 5.2 trillion U.S. dollars, each accounting for about 30% of the global total. The establishment of the RCEP free trade zone means that about one-third of the world's economy will form an integrated market.

After the agreement comes into effect, more than 90% of the goods trade in the region will eventually achieve zero tariffs, and the tax will be reduced to zero immediately and within 10 years, so that the RCEP free trade zone is expected to fulfill all the goods trade liberalization commitments in a relatively short time.



According to the analysis, After the RECP takes effect, it will greatly promote the import and export trade between the contracting states, thereby promoting the rapid development of intra-regional and external maritime trade. Shipping is still the most important mode of transportation in global trade. The signing of the RCEP agreement may bring new growth momentum to the shipping industry, and the development and growth of the shipping industry will create new market space for the shipbuilding industry.

According to this forecast, if the COVID-19 epidemic can be alleviated in 2021, the global and Chinese shipbuilding industry is expected to recover. If the epidemic continues, the global shipbuilding industry will still be in a downturn in 2021 and may not gradually recover until 2022.



Topics Covered:

The impact of COVID-19 on the global shipbuilding market

Development environment of shipbuilding in China

Sales volume and value of shipbuilding in China 2015-2025

2015-2025 Sales volume and value of shipbuilding in China by section 2015-2025

by section 2015-2025 Major shipbuilding Manufacturers and their market share in China

Export volumes and values of shipbuilding in China

Major export destinations of China's shipbuilding

shipbuilding Prices of shipbuilding in China

Prospects of Chinese shipbuilding Market 2021-2025

Key Topics Covered:

1 Basic Concept of Shipbuilding Industry

1.1 Definition of Shipbuilding Industry

1.2 Classification of Ship Products

1.3 Methodology

1.4 The impact of COVID-19 on the shipbuilding industry

2 Analysis on China's Shipbuilding Industry

2.1 Development Environment of China's Shipbuilding Industry

2.1.1 Economic Environment

2.1.2 Policy Environment

2.1.3 Technological Environment

2.2 Shipbuilding Supply in China

2.2.1 Analysis of China's Shipbuilding Capacity

2.2.2 Main Operational Indicators of China's Shipbuilding Industry

2.3 Analysis of China's Demand for Ships

2.3.1 Overall Demand

2.3.2 Demand in Segment Markets

2.4 Exports of Ships from China

2.4.1 Overview

2.4.2 Major Export Destinations

2.4.3 Export Structure

3 Analysis on Competition in China's Shipbuilding Industry

3.1 Barriers to Entry in China's Shipbuilding Industry

3.1.1 Policy Barriers

3.1.2 Capital Barriers

3.1.3 Technological Barriers

3.2 Competition Structure of China's Shipbuilding Industry

4 Analysis on Major Shipbuilders in China, 2015-2020

4.1 Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding Co., Ltd.

4.2 Yangzijiang Shipbuilding (Holdings) Ltd.

4.3 Dalian Shipbuilding Industry Co., Ltd.

4.4 Guangzhou Shipyard International Co., Ltd.

4.5 Nantong COSCO KHI Ship Engineering Co., Ltd.

4.6 CSSC Chengxi Shipyard Co., Ltd.

4.7 Qingdao Beihai Shipbuilding Industry Co., Ltd.

4.8 Hudong-Zhonghua Shipbuilding (Group) Co., Ltd.

4.9 Jiangsu New Times Shipbuilding Co., Ltd.

4.10 CSC Jinling Shipyard

5 Analysis on Shipbuilding Costs and Ship Prices in China, 2015-2020

5.1 Analysis of Shipbuilding Costs

5.2 Analysis of Ship Prices

5.3 Labor Cost

6 Forecast on Development of China's Shipbuilding Industry, 2021-2025

6.1 Factors Influencing Development of China's Shipbuilding Industry

6.1.1 Driving Forces and Market Opportunities

6.1.2 Threats and Challenges

6.2 Forecast on Shipbuilding Supply in China

6.2.1 Forecast on Production Capacity

6.2.2 Forecast on Completion of Ships

6.3 Forecast on Shipbuilding Demand in China 2021-2025

6.3.1 Domestic Demand

6.3.2 Forecast on Export of Ships from China, 2021-2025

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/za6x4e







Media Contact:

Research and Markets

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2019: Australian intelligence services conclude that China was responsible for a cyber-attack on Australia's parliament and three largest political parties in the run-up to a May election.

April 2020: Australian PM Scott Morrison begins canvassing his fellow world leaders for an inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic. Britain and France are initially reluctant but more than 100 countries eventually back an investigation.

April 15: Morrison is one of the few leaders to voice sympathy with Donald Trump's criticisms of the World Health Organization, which the US president accuses of bias towards China.

April 21: China's embassy accuses Australian foreign minister Peter Dutton of 'ignorance and bigotry' and 'parroting what those Americans have asserted' after he called for China to be more transparent about the outbreak.

April 23: Australia's agriculture minister David Littleproud calls for G20 nations to campaign against the 'wet markets' which are common in China and linked to the earliest coronavirus cases.

April 26: Chinese ambassador Cheng Jingye hints at a boycott of Australian wine and beef and says tourists and students might avoid Australia 'while it's not so friendly to China'. Canberra dismisses the threat and warns Beijing against 'economic coercion'.

May 11: China suspends beef imports from four of Australia's largest meat processors. These account for more than a third of Australia's $1.1billion beef exports to China.

May 18: The World Health Organization backs a partial investigation into the pandemic, but China says it is a 'joke' for Australia to claim credit. The same day, China imposes an 80 per cent tariff on Australian barley. Australia says it may challenge this at the WTO.

May 21: China announces new rules for iron ore imports which could allow Australian imports - usually worth $41billion per year - to be singled out for extra bureaucratic checks.

June 5: Beijing warns tourists against travelling to Australia, alleging racism and violence against the Chinese in connection with Covid-19.

June 9: China's Ministry of Education warns students to think carefully about studying in Australia, similarly citing alleged racist incidents.

June 19: Australia says it is under cyber-attack from a foreign state which government sources say is believed to be China. The attack has been targeting industry, schools, hospitals and government officials, Morrison says.

July 9: Australia suspends extradition treaty with Hong Kong and offers to extend the visas of 10,000 Hong Kongers who are already in Australia over China's national security law which effectively bans protest.

August 18: China launches 12-month anti-dumping investigation into wines imported from Australia in a major threat to the $6billion industry.

August 26: Prime Minster Scott Morrison announces he will legislate to stop states and territories signing deals with foreign powers that go against Australia's foreign policy. Analysts said it is aimed at China.

October 13: Trade Minister Simon Birmingham says he's investigating reports that Chinese customs officials have informally told state-owned steelmakers and power plants to stop Aussie coal, leaving it in ships off-shore.

November 2: Agriculture Minister David Littleproud reveals China is holding up Aussie lobster imports by checking them for minerals.

November 3: Barley, sugar, red wine, logs, coal, lobster and copper imports from Australia unofficially banned under a directive from the government, according to reports.

November 18: China releases bizarre dossier of 14 grievances with Australia.

November 27: Australian coal exports to China have dropped 96 per cent in the first three weeks of November as 82 ships laden with 8.8million tonnes of coal are left floating off Chinese ports where they have been denied entry.

November 28: Beijing imposed a 212 per cent tariff on Australia's $1.2 billion wine exports, claiming they were being 'dumped' or sold at below-cost. The claim is denied by both Australia and Chinese importers.

November 30: Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lijian Zhao posted a doctored image showing a grinning Australian soldier holding a knife to the throat of an Afghan child. The move outraged Australians.

December 12: Australian coal is added to a Chinese blacklist.

December 24: China suspends imports of Australian timber from NSW and WA after local customs officers say they found pests in the cargo.

January 11, 2021: Australia blocks $300million construction deal that would have seen state-owned China State Construction Engineering Corporation takeover Probuild. The bid was blacked over national security concerns.

February 5, 2021: China confirms Melbourne journalist and single mother Cheng Lei has been formally arrested after being detained in August, 2020.

February 23, 2021: China accuses Australia of being in an 'axis of white supremacy' with the UK, USA, Canada and NZ in an editorial.

March 11, 2021: Australia is accused of genocide by a Communist Party newspaper editor.

March 15, 2021: Trade Minister Dan Tehan announced he wants the World Trade Organisation to help mediate discussions between the two countries over the trade dispute.

April 21, 2021: Foreign Minister Marise Payne announces Australia has scrapped Victoria's controversial Belt and Road deal with China using new veto powers.

May 6, 2021: China indefinitely suspends all strategic economic talks with Australia, blaming the Morrison Government's attitude towards the relationship. The move cuts off all diplomatic contact with Beijing under the China-Australia Strategic Economic Dialogue, freezing discussions between key officials below a ministerial level.

New Delhi: External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar on Monday pitched for connectivity from "The Arabian Sea to the South China Sea" even as India and Japan work together in tandem. Speaking at an event in Guwahati, Assam the EAM said, the "approach to create connectivity to and within Assam, beyond to the North-East, then to neighbouring Myanmar and Bangladesh, but eventually push all the way by road, by sea, by air to Vietnam, to Japan."

India is working on a number of connectivity projects to connect northeast with East Asia--India-Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral Highway, with an aim to expand it to Vietnam via Laos. The Kaladan Multimodal transport link will provide North East access via Sittwe Project and the Paletwa Inland Water Terminal. Work is on BIMSTEC masterplan on transport connectivity via 264 projects.

Jaishankar lauded India Japan partnership, calling it "natural and close" and said, "India-Japan collaboration has always had a central place in our national modernization and development efforts." Japan has been involved in the funding of the Guwahati water supply project, road connectivity in the northeast, construction of a primary school in Manipur etc.

Recently New Delhi and Tokyo reached a pact for people from India to jo to Japan under "specified skilled workers" visa and will increase in people to people engagement.

Interestingly Jaishankar pointed out to Assam becoming a "major player" in producing refined petroleum products and "a pipeline to supply Bangladesh high-speed diesel is an important beginning". India and Nepal recently opened a cross country oil pipeline, the first such pipeline in South Asia.
Photograph: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

The seven Republican senators who broke rank by voting to convict former president Donald Trump at his impeachment trial faced immediate hostility and criticism from fellow conservatives revealing the potentially high cost of opposing Trumpism within the party.

These senators  North Carolinas Richard Burr, Louisianas Bill Cassidy, Maines Susan Collins, Alaskas Lisa Murkowski, Utahs Mitt Romney, Nebraskas Ben Sasse, and Pennsylvanias Pat Toomey  brought the total number of guilty votes to 57. That was not nearly enough to secure a conviction, but easily enough to ensure instant attack from fellow Republicans and others on the right.

Thereaction was a powerful illustration of the strength of Trumps grip on the Republican party even though he is out of office.

Lets impeach RINOs from the Republican Party!!! Trumps son and conservative favorite Donald Trump Jr said on Twitter, using the insulting acronym for Republicans In Name Only.

The instant backlash came from powerful rightwing media figures also.

Conservative Fox News host Laura Ingraham commented: Prediction: none of the Republicans who voted in the affirmative today will speak at the 2024 GOP convention.

For Cassidy, there was almost instant retribution in his own state. Jeff Landry, the Republican attorney general of Louisiana, tweeted: Senator Bill Cassidys vote is extremely disappointing.

The local party agreed and its executive committee unanimously voted to censure Cassidy for his vote. We condemn, in the strongest possible terms, the vote today by Sen. Cassidy to convict former President Trump. Fortunately, clearer heads prevailed and President Trump has been acquitted of the impeachment charge filed against him, the Republican Party of Louisiana similarly said in a statement.

Cassidy was not alone, as Burrs state party in North Carolina also went immediately on the attack.

Michael Whatley, North Carolina Republican Party chair, condemned his colleague in a statement, saying: North Carolina Republicans sent Senator Burr to the United States Senate to uphold the Constitution and his vote today to convict in a trial that he declared unconstitutional is shocking and disappointing.

Story continues

Even Republicans who voted to acquit Trump were not necessarily spared from conservative backlash, including Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell. The lawmaker said that he voted to acquit over a jurisdictional issue and because Trump was no longer in office, McConnell didnt think impeachment was in its purview.

However, McConnell also firmly criticized Trump following the acquittal, saying theres no question, none, that President Trump is practically, and morally, responsible for provoking the events of the day and that hes still liable for everything he did while hes in office. He didnt get away with anything yet.

Trumps circle was displeased at the lack of fealty, despite the vote to acquit.

If only McConnell was so righteous as the Democrats trampled Trump and the Republicans while pushing Russia collusion bullshit for 3 years or while Dems incited 10 months of violence, arson, and rioting. Yet then he just sat back and did jack shit, said Trump Jr.

Related: Senate Republicans stand by their man and Trump wins his second acquittal | David Smith's sketch

These attacks come as party-line Republicans have ratcheted up their efforts to unseat dissenting conservatives in upcoming primaries. The ten House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump are already seeing primary opponents trying to unseat them and replace them with Trump loyalists.

Matt Gaetz, a Florida Republican congressman and dogged Trump loyalist, even flew to Cheyenne, Wyoming in late January to hold a rally against senior Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney who backed impeachment.

Defeat Liz Cheney in this upcoming election, Gaetz commented, and Wyoming will bring Washington to its knees. How can you call yourself a representative when you dont represent the will of the people?

Gaetz also described Cheney  the daughter of former vice-president Dick Cheney  as a Beltway bureaucrat turned fake cow girl that supported an impeachment that is deeply unpopular in the state of Wyoming.
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Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton defied the guidelines for the $180 million Safer Communities program by granting cash to projects that had failed the criteria for funding, undercutting his public claims about the scheme.

Mr Duttons department told him the two projects in the marginal electorate of Braddon do not represent value for money because they had scored too poorly under the eligibility criteria, but he awarded the cash anyway.

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton approved funding for two projects in a marginal seat before the funding guidelines were available. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The advice, given in January 2019, counters the federal governments claims in Parliament on Monday that the funding decisions were consistent with the relevant rules and guidelines of the program.

Labor used question time to challenge the Home Affairs Minister on decisions including an $827,000 grant to the National Retail Association, an industry group that had supported him with donations.
Two Chinese rights lawyers struck off after speaking out about the cases of 12 Hong Kong activists jailed after trying to escape to democratic Taiwan by speedboat have said they have no regrets about their actions.



Lu Siwei and Ren Quanniu both had their licenses to practise law revoked earlier this year after they were hired by two of the defendants' families, and later spoke regularly to the media about being barred from meeting with their clients, and about the huge political pressure brought to bear on their colleagues by local ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials.



"I have no regrets," Ren told RFA on . "I think I did the right thing."



"We have a clear conscience about what we did, and now we have to start over: I do believe that there is a future for us," he said.



Lu said he couldn't have predicted he would end up in this situation.



"Sometimes it is difficult to imagine what your life will bring," he said. "You can make some plans, but there are still some certain events that will change your life."



"We were completely invested in doing law before this happened, and now we will have to give it all up," he said.



Lu and Ren both received notification around New Year that their licenses were being reviewed by their local judicial affairs bureaus because they had "posted inappropriate remarks" online.



No access to clients

Lu, who was never allowed to visit his client Quinn Moon in Yantian Detention Center in Shenzhen, despite having been hired by her family, was particularly vocal in the months following the initial detention of the 12 protesters aged 16 to 33 by the China Coast Guard on Aug. 23, repeatedly commenting about his attempts to gain access to his client, to no avail.



Judicial authorities in the central province of Henan sent a similar notice to Ren, who was hired by the family of Wong Wai-yin but similarly prevented from carrying out his instructions, and revoked his license a few weeks later.



Ren said he hadn't immediately realized the sort of high-profile attention that the case of the 12 Hong Kong detainees would generate.



"I didn't think too much about it; it seemed like a pretty straightforward case to me," he said. "Then the ministry of justice and the state security police approached me and warned me off."



"When I tried to visit [my client in the detention center], I was accompanied by two state security police," he said. "So then I realized that it wasn't straightforward at all."



Lu said neither lawyer was obliged to take the case, however.



"We could have turned it down," he said. "It had turned into a very sensitive case, so much so that Shenzen wanted to get done with it before the Lunar New Year."



Ren said the decision to strip him of his license had left him with no illusions about the current political system.



"Before I was suspended, I still clung to some illusions about the state judicial system, that they cared about facts, and about the law," he said. "But there is nowhere for me to hide in this country; things just seem to get worse."



"This isn't just my personal misfortune; it is also a tragedy for the whole country and its citizens," he said.



Watching Hong Kong's slide with sorrow

He said he had watched the erosion of Hong Kong's civil liberties, political opposition and judicial independence with sorrow over the past few years.



"It's a tragedy that these good things are being smashed," he said. "But if you don't want to leave, or you can't leave, then there isn't any way out of it."



"All we can do is persevere in our pursuit of democracy, justice and universal values," he said.



United Nations human rights Special Rapporteurs recently wrote to the Chinese ambassador expressing concern about the continued arbitrary detentions of fellow rights attorneys Qin Yongpei and Chang Weiping, who are being held under "residential surveillance at a designated location," a form of enforced disappearance.



"[Qin] has defended other human rights lawyers and acted on behalf of protestors detained in connection with demonstrations against pollution allegedly attributable to State-owned mining companies," the Dec. 4, 2020 letter said.



"He has been a vocal critic on social media of alleged government corruption, human rights violations and abuse of power in China."



It said Chang "has been a vocal advocate for the rights of lawyers in China and the rule of law."



"In his work as a lawyer, he has defended cases of human rights defenders, discrimination based on health status, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation [and] has also provided pro bono legal counsel for victims of defective vaccines, as well as women, LGBT persons, and persons living with HIV/AIDS and hepatitis B who face discrimination in the workplace," the letter said.



U.N. human rights experts have also expressed concerns over curbs on the liberty of rights lawyers Yu Wensheng, Jiang Tianyong, Chen Wuquan and the disbarment of Sui Muqing.



Reported by Lu Xi and Gigi Lee for RFA's Mandarin and Cantonese Services. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Germany's Volkswagen is not concerned by any Apple plans for a passenger vehicle that could include the iPhone maker's battery technology, its chief executive Herbert Diess said. Reuters reported in December that Apple may have progressed enough to build a vehicle for mass markets by 2024, helped by cost cuts in battery technology. "The car industry is not a typical tech-sector that you could take over at a single stroke," Diess was quoted as saying an interview with Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. "Apple will not manage that ...
Chennai: Prime Minister Narendra Modi handed over the indigenously built Arjun Main Battle Tank Mk-1A to the Indian Army here Sunday and launched a slew of projects and laid the foundation stone for many others. This was a prime ministerial visit on which he made no mention of the Opposition or any other political subjects.

Arriving by helicopter on the Navy helipad near Marina Beach, the PM drove to the Nehru Indoor Stadium where he first took the salute from an Arjun tank before proceeding to the meeting venue, where he spoke in English. Describing various projects he was waving the green flag to as symbols of innovation, he quoted freely from great Tamil poets Avvaiyar and Subramania Bharathi to touch a chord in the mostly Tamil audience.

Touching upon an issue sensitive in Tamil Nadu, the PM assured people that not a single fisherman was in Sri Lankan custody at the moment and that while 313 boats seized by the Sri Lankan Navy had been got back, efforts were on to get back several others. He dwelt at length on what India had done for Sri Lankan Tamils in the Jaffna Peninsula, where 15,000 houses had been built for displaced Tamils as well as a hospital and an ambulance service.

Espousing the Tamil Nadu fishermens cause further, he said: Special importance has been given in Budget to develop the coastal area. Extra credit mechanism has been given in the Budget for fishermen, stressing on seaweed farming to improve the conditions of the fishermens community, he said, and announced that a Seaweed Park will come up in Chennai soon.

The Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu may be only a couple of months away but Mr Modi refused to be drawn into any election-related issues. Before departing the venue for Kochi in Kerala, Mr Modi linked hands with both chief minister Edappadi Palaniswami and deputy CM O. Panneerselvam, and the trio raised their hands in a gesture loaded with a message. Just over a week ago, BJP president J.P. Nadda had cleared the decks for the alliance in Tamil Nadu between the AIADMK and the BJP and other allies.

While Mr Modi kept politics and elections totally out of the event where he flagged off various projects and schemes, he was closeted with Mr Palaniswami for at least five minutes after the function was over. It is believed he got the message from the CM that the AIADMK-BJP front along with other allies was intact, and that the DMDK and PMK were willing partners.

BJP sources say the remainder of the month will be quite busy in Tamil Nadu as the Mr Modi is expected to come to Chennai again to inaugurate more schemes ahead of the summer polls, and Mr Nadda and finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman are also expected to be in the state on frequent visits. If the alliance is sewed up by then, seat-sharing talks could figure in the meetings with Mr Nadda.

Both the PMK and DMDK, thought to be parties that are ready with alternatives or even prepared to go it alone in the polls if the AIADMK is not more forthcoming about continuing ties, were well represented in the PMs function, where Mr Modi was seen waving to them in particular from the dais at the Nehru Indoor Stadium on Sunday.

In view of past troubles with a cold reception for Mr Modi in the city, the police were extra cautious and refused to allow all those wearing black masks entry to the event.

Flagging off the 9.01-km northern stretch of Chennai Metro Rail Phase I to Wimco Nagar costing Rs 3,770 crores, the PM said that the project had been completed on schedule despite the Covid-19 pandemic and by Indian engineers, using only Indian rolling stock. In this years Budget, Rs 63,000 crores has been set aside for Phase II of the project. This is the largest amount earmarked for a project in any city in one go. This will help the people of Chennai, he added.

Among the other major projects that he flagged off were the Discovery Campus of IIT Madras in Thaiyur at a cost of around Rs 1,000 crores in the first phase, with a built-up area of 200,000 sq. m. and modernisation of the Grand Anicut Canal System that plays a major role in the irrigation of the rice bowl in the Delta districts of Tamil Nadu. Other projects included electrification of the Villupuram-Thanjavur-Thiruvarur railway line and the Chennai Beach-Athipattu fourth line to connect Chennai and Kamaraj ports and facilitate freight movement.

The PM also paid tribute to the martyrs who had laid down their lives on February 14, 2019 when a Jaish-e-Mohammad suicide bomber rammed a car filled with explosives into a CPRF convoy moving from Jammu to Srinagar, near Pulwama. No Indian can forget this day, Mr Modi said.
Samsung today launched its mid-range smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy F62 in India. The Samsung Galaxy F62 is the South Korean manufacturer's second smartphone in its new Galaxy F-series, after the company launched the first F-series smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy F41 in October last year. The Samsung Galaxy F62 has been launched with a 7nm Exynos 9825 processor and a quad rear camera setup. The smartphone will go on sale on Flipkart starting February 22.

The Samsung Galaxy F62 has been launched at a price of Rs 23,999 onwards for the 6GB RAM + 128GB storage variant, and costs Rs 25,999 for the 8GB RAM + 128GB storage variant. The smartphone will go on sale starting February 22 and will be sold on Flipkart and Samsung's official store. Samsung, as an introductory offer, has announced a Rs 2,500 discount for buyers using ICICI Bank Credit and Debit cards. The Samsung Galaxy F62 has been launched in three colour options - radiant green, radiant blue, and radiant grey colour options.

In terms of specifications, the Samsung Galaxy F62 is powered by Samsung's Exynos 9825 chipset, paired with up to 8GB of RAM and 128GB of internal storage. The smartphone comes with a 6.7-inch Super AMOLED Infinity-O display with a full-HD+ resolution. The Samsung Galaxy F62 further has a massive 7,000mAh battery with support for fast charging.

In terms of camera, the Samsung Galaxy F62 comes with a quad rear camera setup that includes a 64-megapixel primary shooter, a 12-megapixel ultra-wide-angle lens, a 5-megapixel depth sensor, and a 5-megapixel macro lens. Up fron, the Samsung Galaxy F62 comes with a 32-megapixel selfie shooter with 4K video recording capabilities.
By Simon Lewis and Tuvan Gumrukcu

WASHINGTON/ANKARA (Reuters) - Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday reassured Ankara that Washington blames the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) for the executions of 13 kidnapped Turks in northern Iraq, after Turkey called an earlier U.S. statement on the killings "a joke."

Turkey said on Sunday militants from the outlawed PKK executed the captives, including Turkish military and police personnel, amid a military operation against the group.

The United States had said on Sunday evening that it stood by fellow NATO member Turkey and that it condemned the killings if it was confirmed that responsibility lay with the PKK.

Turkey, already angered by Washington's partnership with Kurdish fighters in neighbouring Syria, was infuriated by the conditionality of the statement and summoned the U.S. ambassador to Ankara on Monday.

In a call with Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on Monday, Blinken "affirmed our view that PKK terrorists bear responsibility," State Department spokesman Ned Price said.

Price did not say if the call was made in response to Turkey summoning the U.S. ambassador. A call between the countries' two top diplomats had been anticipated for weeks.

The call was the first between Blinken and his Turkish counterpart, nearly four weeks after President Joe Biden took office. Biden has not yet spoken to Erdogan, a delay that has been interpreted by some as a snub of an important ally.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan earlier on Monday criticized Washington, which has designated the PKK a terrorist organisation but deployed U.S. forces alongside Kurdish YPG fighters in Syria. Ankara considers the YPG to be inextricably linked to the PKK.

"It's a joke. Were you not supposed to stand against the PKK, the YPG? You clearly support them and stand behind them," Erdogan said in the Black Sea city of Rize.

Cavusoglu also complained on Monday about silence from "countries that are supposedly claiming to battle terrorism," adding they were trying to "gloss over" the issue "with ifs and buts".

Story continues

Since Biden was elected last year, Turkey has repeatedly said it wants to improve strained ties with the United States, but Washington's support for the YPG remains a big point of disagreement.

Erdogan said that Ankara would continue its cross-border operations into Iraq against the PKK, which has waged a decades-old insurgency in mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey in which more than 40,000 people have been killed.

"If we are together with you in NATO, if we are to continue our unity, then you will act sincerely towards us. Then, you will stand with us, not with the terrorists," Erdogan said.

He said nobody could criticise Turkey's cross-border operations in Syria or Iraq after the killings, and countries must choose between Turkey and the militants.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu and Ece Toksabay in Ankara, Simon Lewis and Humeyra Pamuk in Washington; Editing by Dominic Evans, Angus MacSwan and Sonya Hepinstall)
The European Union, EU Commission, has reacted to the appointment of Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as the new Director-General of the WTO. President o...









The European Union, EU Commission, has reacted to the appointment of Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as the new Director-General of the WTO.





President of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen described Okonjo-Iwealas appointment as a historic moment for the world, especially as the first woman to be appointed as WTO DG from Africa.

The EU pledged its support to Okonjo-Iweala as the commission called for reforms of the body.

In a post on her verified Twitter, the EU President wrote: Congratulations @NOIweala!

This is a historic moment for the entire world. Im so glad to see a woman from Africa at the head of the WTO.

Europe is fully behind you. We support the reform of the WTO and will help you protect the rules-based multilateral trading system.

Iweala was confirmed as the WTO head at a special meeting of the general council after a selection process that included eight candidates from around the world.


On Saturday, the Delhi Police arrested 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi for allegedly sharing the toolkit related to the farmers protests against the Centre's three farm laws on social media.



Ravi was arrested by the cybercrime unit of Delhi Police from her home in North Bengaluru.

 TheNewsMinute_Twitter

According to the reports, a senior police officer said that this was the first arrest in connection with the toolkit case.



What is a 'Toolkit'

'Toolkit' is a term activists often use for a campaign information document.

What Did The Police Say

Ravi, as claimed by the police force, was an editor of the 'toolkit Google doc' and 'key conspirator' in the documents formulation and dissemination.

The police also said that Ravi and others collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State.

Disha Ravi, arrested by CyPAD Delhi Police, is an Editor of the Toolkit Google Doc & key conspirator in document's formulation & dissemination. She started WhatsApp Group & collaborated to make the Toolkit doc. She worked closely with them to draft the Doc. @PMOIndia @HMOIndia https://t.co/e8QGkyDIVv  #DilKiPolice Delhi Police (@DelhiPolice) February 14, 2021

In this process,they all collaborated with pro Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. She was the one who shared the Toolkit Doc with Greta Thunberg. @HMOIndia @LtGovDelhi @CPDelhi  #DilKiPolice Delhi Police (@DelhiPolice) February 14, 2021

The Delhi Police took to Twitter and stated that Ravi was the one who shared the toolkit document with Greta Thunberg, a teen climate activist, who had shared the toolkit to lend her support to the farmers agitation against the three farm reform laws.

Who is Disha Ravi

Disha Ravi is a graduate in Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) from Mount Carmel College in Bengaluru.

She aspired to pursue a career in finance and had been vocal about environmental issues long before she graduated from Mount Carmel College in Bengaluru in 2018.

On her social media handles, she has described herself as co-founder of a group named Fridays For Future India (FFF India).

 Facebook

In an interview last year with US author and professor Gayle Kimball, who is compiling a book on Gen Z girl climate activists, Disha mentioned that the Friday For Future India campaign materialised largely after she came in contact with two like-minded women from Bengaluru, who were interested in the climate change campaign on the Internet.



All our associations were formed through the internet  Instagram and other social media. We connected through mutual friends and that is how we found each other. Most of us are women. I had not seen any of them before. Bangalore was the first but simultaneously Mumbai and Delhi started. We did not want do it in one city alone, she said in the interview.

FFF India currently has around 150 activists with around 20-30 in Bengaluru. With its activity being largely volunteer-oriented, there are only a few activists who are part of all activities and others are volunteers who may be part of a few events.

 Twitter

Besides, she regularly writes columns and articles in leading news portals on climate action and is a familiar name in important climate forums frequented by youth activists across the globe.



In an interview with Auto Report Africa in 2020, Ravi spoke about how she found her passion for climate activism and said, My motivation to join climate activism came from seeing my grandparents, who are farmers, struggle with the effects of the climate crisis.

At the time, I wasnt aware that what they were experiencing was the climate crisis because climate education is non-existent where Im from. Only when I did my research, did I find out about it, she added.

How Did She Get Linked To Greta Thunberg

 Reuters

Dishas role came under suspicion by the Delhi Police after climate activist Greta Thunberg tweeted a toolkit document which the police alleged had led to the January 26 violence in New Delhi.



Without naming Thunberg in the FIR, the Delhi Police went ahead to register the case against the authors of the toolkit.
The defense chiefs of South Korea and the U.S. on Wednesday clashed over key issues like sharing the cost of maintaining 28,500 American troops in Korea. Their joint statement at the end of their talks did not include the phrase "maintain the current level of the U.S. military personnel" in Korea, and a scheduled joint press conference of Defense Minister Suh Wook and U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper was canceled at the last minute. Discord is also becoming more evident on issues like U.S. pressure on Korea to join the anti-Chinese Quadrilateral Security Dialogue or "Quad" which includes Australia, India and Japan. Esper said, "I hope we will all agree on the necessity of reaching [a cost-sharing deal] as soon as possible to ensure the stable stationing of U.S. forces on the Korean Peninsula."



Defense Minister Suh Wook (right) and U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper arrive at the Korean War Veterans Memorial in Washington on Wednesday.

U.S. President Donald Trump is demanding a massive hike in Seoul's share of the troops' upkeep, and Washington upped the pressure by demanding for the first time in 12 years the omission of the phrase "maintain the current level of the U.S. military personnel" in Korea. But Seoul now seems determined to sit out Trump, whose chances of re-election next month are fading, and unwilling to present him with a diplomatic victory that could help him stay president. This in turn has peeved Washington, which is now reluctant to help President Moon Jae-in meet one of his election promises before his five-year term is up. Regarding the handover of full operational control of Korean troops to Seoul before Moon's term ends in 2022, Esper said, "Fully meeting all the conditions for the transition of operational control to a [Korean] commander will take time, but the process of doing so will strengthen our alliance."

National Security Adviser Suh Hoon (right) and his U.S. counterpart Robert O'Brien pose for a photo at the White House in Washington on Wednesday, in this grab from the U.S. National Security Council's Twitter account.

Meanwhile, Cheong Wa Dae's national security adviser Suh Hoon met his U.S. counterpart Robert O'Brien in Washington and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. A Cheong Wa Dae official said Suh's visit comes at the invitation of the U.S. and the purpose is to "discuss key alliance issues." It is unclear why there would be any urgency since Trump is concentrating all his efforts of his re-election campaign. The real purpose of his sudden visit was apparently to try and hammer out the sticking points between the two defense chiefs. Cheong Wa Dae kept Suh Hoon's visit under wraps until Washington announced it. One former vice foreign minister here said, "The current administration tends to wrap itself in too much secrecy when it comes to visits by government officials because the bilateral alliance is not what it used to be, but this only gives the impression that it lacks diplomatic confidence."

A 'hardworking and caring' porter died from Covid just seven days after his colleague, 52, at the same hospital also passed away from the virus.

Tributes have been paid to Mark Elliott, from Stoke-on-Trent who had worked at Royal Stoke University Hospital for the last five years.

The father of three died on Valentine's Day aged 64. His death came just seven days after that of fellow porter John 'Adam' Jackson with the virus.

Both of the men were employed by outsourcing company Sodexo.

Mark Elliott, 64, from Stoke-on-Trent who had worked at Royal Stoke University Hospital for the last five years died from coronavirus on Valentine's Day

Mr Elliott's death comes just seven days after that of his colleague John Jackson (pictured), who worked at the hospital and was also employed by Sodexo

Tracy Bullock, chief executive of University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust, said colleagues had started the week with a 'heavy heart' after losing 'another of our portering staff to Covid'.

Mr Elliott's brother Shaun Elliott said he was a 'family man who had been with his wife Sandra since they were teenagers'.

He added that the couple had 'three beautiful children, Ian, Sarah and Simon, and the whole family are devastated'.

'Mark was a huge Stoke City fan who took great joy in watching his team and he recently received an award for his kindness which he found overwhelming,' he added.

Tracy Bullock, chief executive of University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust, announced 'with a heavy heart' that the team had lost another porter. Pictured: Royal Stoke University Hospital

'Mark had been a valued member of the team for some time. He was known for his infectious sense of humour and ability to make anyone smile,' added Louise Durose, logistics and waste manager at Sodexo.

'He was hardworking and caring in everything he did and a much loved member of the portering and Discharge Lounge families.'

Mr Elliott's fellow porter colleague John Jackson worked in theatres at the Royal Stoke Universtiy Hospital.

The 52 year old, who was described by his sister as loving and kind, died on February 7, the Evening Express reports.

Mr Jacksons sister, Louise Grice, of Clayton, Newcastle-under-Lyme, said he was a 'true gentleman' and had a passion for heavy metal music and vintage films.

Their deaths come as earlier this month Filipino nurse Estrella Catalan, 52, died from Covid-19 in the NHS hospital she had worked for 18 years.

Estrella Catalan (right), 52, died in early February after weeks in the critical care unit of Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, where she had worked since September 2002

After weeks in the critical care unit of Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, where she had worked since September 2002, Estrella died on February 5.

Ms Catalan was a staff nurse on the Gunthorpe and Heydon wards, as well as the emergency department and acute stroke team.

Sam Higginson, chief executive of Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (NNUH), said: 'Our deepest and heartfelt condolences are with Estrella's loved ones and friends at this very difficult time and with all those who worked alongside Estrella and knew her.

'She was a wonderful person and a caring and conscientious nurse, who loved to teach and mentor students; she will be terribly missed.

Ms Catalan was a staff nurse on the Gunthorpe and Heydon wards, as well as the emergency department and acute stroke team

'This is a heartbreaking reminder of the situation we are facing every day to help others and we want to thank our staff for their ongoing courage and commitment during the pandemic.'

According to a GoFundMe page created in her honour, Ms Catalan is survived by her husband Melvin and their sons John and Josh - adding that her eldest son Vince died two years ago.

Elsewhere, healthcare assistant Becky Regan, 29, died following the birth of her fourth child after catching coronavirus while she was pregnant.

She worked at North Tyneside Hospital from January 2020 and was 31 weeks pregnant when she tested positive for the virus.

James Mackey, Chief Executive of Northumbria Hospitals NHS Trust said: 'It's with deep sadness that we mourn the loss of one of our own team who has tragically died this week.

A fundraiser was launched while Ms Regan was in hospital to raise funds for her and her children

'This will be remembered as a very sad day for Northumbria and we are all devastated at the loss of our friend and colleague. Our deepest condolences are with the family at this tragic time.

'While every death during this pandemic has been a tragedy, the loss of Becky will feel especially painful having just given birth and her close family are now dealing with the worst possible news.

'Our thoughts are also with her close colleagues and those who treated her during her illness who will also be grieving her loss.'

A GoFundMe page was created by family and friends in January, while Ms Regan was in hospital, to help her children.

Ms Regan leaves behind three daughters; Sophie, 10, Stacey, eight, and Connie-Mae, three.
President Joe Biden has proposed $4 trillion in tax increases on American families and businesses. While Biden touts his tax hike plan as a way to ensure corporations pay their fair share, the proposal will harm the U.S. economy at a time that it is recovering from the Coronavirus pandemic.

These tax hikes will make American a more uncompetitive place to do business, send jobs overseas, trigger a return of corporate inversions, and make it easier for foreign businesses to acquire U.S. companies.

The Biden plan tax hike calls for raising the corporate rate from 21 percent to 28 percent, proposes a new global minimum tax on American businesses, and creates a 15 percent tax on book income. These tax hikes would be devastating to American businesses and would see U.S. businesses pay a 32 percent rate after state taxes, one of the highest rates in the developed world.

For instance, the U.S. rate would be higher than key competitors such as the United Kingdom (19 percent), China (25 percent), Canada (26.5 percent), Ireland (12.5 percent), Germany (29.9 percent) and Japan (29.74 percent), according to data compiled by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

It would also impose new taxes on American businesses at a time the U.S. is lagging behind foreign competitors when it comes to promoting innovation. In fact, according to a Manufacturing Leadership Council study, the U.S. ranks 26th in research and development tax incentives when ranking the 36 developed countries in the OECD.

Not only will these tax increases result in businesses creating jobs overseas instead of America, they will also cause a return of corporate inversions.

Inversions came to prominence during the Obama administration, when concern grew that the uncompetitive tax code was causing U.S. business to merge with, or acquire, a foreign business with the intent of incorporating the new, combined entity overseas. In 2014 alone, American businesses with combined assets of $319 billion announced plans to invert, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) signed into law in 2017 solved this problem and caused businesses to begin coming back to America. This is not the only problem solved by the TCJA that will return if Bidens tax hikes are signed into law  the U.S. will also see a surge of foreign businesses acquiring American businesses.

Between 2004 and 2017, the high U.S. rate and worldwide tax system meant non-U.S. companies could outbid U.S. companies. As a result, American companies suffered a net loss of almost $510 billion in assets, according to a study released by EY.

If the corporate rate was lower between 2004 and 2017, the study estimates that U.S. companies would have acquired a net of $1.2 trillion worth of businesses, meaning that more than $1.7 trillion in businesses were lost because of the uncompetitive U.S. rate.

A corporate tax increase will not just harm businesses  it will directly harm American workers in the form of fewer new job opportunities and lower wages.

Numerous studies have found that between 50 percent and 70 percent of the corporate tax is borne by workers. This correlation of lower corporate taxes and the well-being of American workers can also be seen in economic data following passage of the TCJA. For instance, in 2019 median household income increased by $4,440 or 6.8 percent  the largest one-year wage growth in history. During this time, wages grew faster for the bottom 25 percent of wage earners than the top 25 percent of earners, according to the Atlanta Fed.

Bidens tax increases will be borne by publicly traded companies, which will also harm millions of middle-class Americans that are invested in the stocks.

This is not about the rich. These tax hikes will harm the 53 percent of Americans that are invested in the stock market, and half of all Gen-Zers and Millennials that have begun trading in stocks as a way to increase their life savings.

In addition, it will reduce the life savings of the 80 to 100 million Americans that have a 401(k) and the46.4 million households that have an individual retirement account. It is important to note that a majority of the assets in these accounts are invested in stocks  of the $6.2 trillion in assets held in 401(k)s, almost 70 percent (or $4.3T) are in stocks.

The fact is, Bidens plan to raise taxes on businesses will harm American families and businesses as we look to rebuild our economy. It will impact workers, suppress wages, and reduce the life savings of families across the country. It will make the U.S. a less competitive place to do businesses, resulting in jobs being shipped overseas and a return of corporate inversions.

Alex Hendrie is Director of Tax Policy at Americans for Tax Reform.
Britain's Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle are expecting their second child, their spokesman said in a Valentine's Day announcement on February 14.

The couple released a black and white image of them under a tree, all smiles, with Markle, 39, showing signs of pregnancy.

"We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother," the spokesman said, referring to the couple's son. "The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child."

Meghan and Harry, 36, who is Queen Elizabeth II's grandson, quit frontline royal duties in March 2020 and now live in California.

The news follows Markle's disclosure in The New York Times in November that she had suffered a miscarriage in July.

A Buckingham Palace spokesman said: "Her Majesty, Duke of Edinburgh, Prince of Wales and the entire family are delighted and wish them well."

Misan Harriman, a friend of the couple who took the photograph they released, wrote on Twitter: "Meg, I was there at your wedding to witness this love story begin, and my friend, I am honoured to capture it grow."

The couple's departure last year -- dubbed "Megxit" by the British press -- was a far cry from 2018, when they married in a ceremony at Windsor Castle watched around the world.

The mood soured as reports circulated about a rift between Harry and his brother Prince William, second in line to the throne.

Since leaving, they have launched several legal cases against news outlets alleging invasion of privacy -- including one that ended on Thursday with a victory against Associated Newspapers in the UK.

The cases have attracted criticism from some, as the couple are also launching themselves into the public eye with high-profile commercial projects.

- Multi-million dollar contracts -

In 2020, they launched a non-profit organisation, Archewell, after giving up a "Sussex Royal" brand as part of the terms of their departure from frontline royal duties.

They have started other ventures, including signing a deal with Spotify to produce podcasts that tell "uplifting and entertaining stories".

The couple also signed a contract, reportedly worth tens of millions of dollars with streaming giant Netflix to produce "impactful" films and series.

As well complaining about invasion of her privacy, Meghan, a former television actor, has also described past trolling of her as "almost unsurvivable".

In 2016, Harry issued an unprecedented statement denouncing "the racial undertones of comment pieces" and "the sexism and racism of social media trolls".

Pressure from tabloids has dogged Harry throughout his life, and he blames them for the death of his mother Princess Diana.

Harry and Meghan's announcement came days after Princess Eugenie, a granddaughter of the queen, gave birth to a baby boy.
An exhibition featuring large-sized paintings on Vietnams landscapes, people and culture opened on February 12 in a pedestrian zone in Budapest, Hungary.

A photo on showcase at the exhibition (Photo: VNA)

The event was jointly organised by the Embassy of Vietnam in the European nation and an association for Hungarys culture.

It was originally planned to take place last year to celebrate the 70th founding anniversary of Vietnam-Hungary diplomatic ties, but put on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

After the event, the paintings will be displayed at other exhibition zones in Budapest and across Hungary to promote Vietnams images to Hungarian and international friends.

Vietnamese Ambassador Nguyen Tien Thuc took this occasion to grant an interview to a local TV station, which will be broadcast on Hungarys major channels./.

Vietnamese Ambassador Nguyen Tien Thuc (L) grants an interview to a local TV station (Photo: VNA)

VNA
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Scientists say they have discovered a potential new target for immunotherapy of malignant brain tumors, which so far have resisted the ground-breaking cancer treatment based on harnessing the body's immune system. The discovery, reported in the journal CELL, emerged from laboratory experiments and has no immediate implications for treating patients.

Scientists from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard said the target they identified is a molecule that suppresses the cancer-fighting activity of immune T cells, the white blood cells that seek out and destroy virus-infected cells and tumor cells.

The scientists said the molecule, called CD161, is an inhibitory receptor that they found on T cells isolated from fresh samples of brain tumors called diffuse gliomas. Gliomas include glioblastoma, the most aggressive and incurable type of brain tumor. The CD161 receptor is activated by a molecule called CLEC2D on tumor cells and immune-suppressing cells in the brain, according to the researchers. Activation of CD161 weakens the T cell response against tumor cells.

To determine if blocking the CD161 pathway could restore the T cells' ability to attack the glioma cells, the researchers disabled it in two ways: they knocked out the gene called KLRB1 that codes for CD161, and they used antibodies to block the CD161-CLEC2D pathway. In an animal model of gliomas, this strategy strongly enhanced the killing of tumor cells by T cells, and improved survival of the animals. The researchers were also encouraged because blocking the inhibitory pathway appeared to reduce T-cell exhaustion - a loss of cell-killing function in T cells that has been a been a major hurdle in immunotherapy.

In addition, "we showed that this pathway is also relevant in a number of other major human cancer types," including melanoma, lung, colon, and liver cancer, said Kai Wucherpfennig, MD, PhD, director of the Center for Cancer Immunotherapy Research at Dana-Farber. He is corresponding author of the report along with Mario Suva, MD, PhD, of Massachusetts General Hospital; Aviv Regev, PhD, of the Broad Institute, and David Reardon, MD, clinical director of the Center for Neuro-Oncology at Dana-Farber.

Many cancer patients are now being treated with immunotherapy drugs that disable "immune checkpoints" - molecular brakes exploited by cancer cells to suppress the body's defensive response by T cells against tumors. Disabling these checkpoints unleashes the immune system to attack cancer cells. One of the most frequently targeted checkpoints is PD-1. However, recent trials of drugs that target PD-1 in glioblastomas have failed to benefit patients. In the current study, the researchers found that fewer T cells from gliomas contained PD-1 than CD161. As a result, they said, "CD161 may represent an attractive target, as it is a cell surface molecule expressed by both CD8 and CD4 T cell subsets [the two types of T cells involved in response against tumor cells] and a larger fraction of T cells express CD161 than the PD-1 protein."

Prior to the current study, the researchers said little was known about the expression of genes and the molecular circuits of immune T cells that infiltrate glioma tumors, but fail to halt their growth. To open a window on these T cell circuits, the investigators took advantage of new technologies for reading out the genetic information in single cells - a method called single-cell RNA-seq. They applied RNA-seq to glioma-infiltrating T cells from fresh tumor samples from 31 patients and created an "atlas" of pathways that regulate T cell function. In analyzing the RNA-seq data, the researchers identified the CD161 protein, encoded by the KLRB1 gene, as a potential inhibitory receptor. They then used CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing technology to inactivate the KLRB1 gene in T cells and showed that CD161 inhibits the tumor cell-killing function of T cells.

"Our comprehensive atlas of T cell expression programs across the major classes of diffuse gliomas thus identifies the CD161-CLEC2D pathway as a potential target for immunotherapy of diffuse gliomas and other human cancers," the authors of the report said.

This strategy was tested in two different animal models created by implanting "gliomaspheres" - 3-dimensional clusters of tumor cells from human patients - into rodents, which developed aggressive tumors that invaded the brain. The scientists subsequently injected T cells with the KLRB1 gene edited out into the cerebrospinal fluid of some of the animals, and T cells that hadn't had the KLRB1 gene deleted. Transfer of the gene-edited T cells slowed the growth of the tumors and "conferred a significant survival benefit," in both of the animal models of gliomas, the scientists said.

###

The research was supported by a grant from the Ben and Catherine Ivy Foundation and the Bridge project, along with National Institutes of Health grants R01 CA238039, P01 CA236749, R37CA245523, and others. Wucherpfennig is a member of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy.

Wucherpfennig is a co-founder and advisory board member of Immunitas Therapeutics. He serves on the scientific advisory board of TCR2 Therapeutics, T-Scan Therapeutics, SQZ Biotech, and Nextechinvest and received sponsored research funding from Bristol-Myers Squibb and Novartis.
Polistes colonies offer windows into the evolution of cooperation. Credit: P Kennedy

Wasps provide crucial support to their extended families by babysitting at neighboring nests, according to new research by a team of biologists from the universities of Bristol, Exeter and UCL published today in Nature Ecology and Evolution.

The findings suggest that animals should often seek to help more distant relatives if their closest kin are less in need.

Dr. Patrick Kennedy, lead author and Marie Curie research fellow in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Bristol, said: "These wasps can act like rich family members lending a hand to their second cousins. If there's not much more you can do to help your immediate family, you can turn your attention to the extended family."

By closely observing twenty thousand baby wasps and their carers on colonies around the Panama Canal, the research team could determine the usefulness of workers on colonies of different sizes. They showed that workers become less useful as the number of colony members rises, due to a surplus of help.

Andy Radford, Professor of Behavioral Ecology, also from Bristol and co-author, explained: "By helping more distant relatives who are more in needthose living next door with fewer carersworkers can pass on more copies of their genes overall. We believe that similar principles of diminishing returns might explain seemingly paradoxical acts of altruism in many other social animals."

Dr. Kennedy added: "The fact that these paper wasps in Central and South America help at other colonies is really bizarre when you consider that most wasps, ants and bees are extremely hostile to outsiders. To solve this puzzling behavior, we combined mathematical modelling with our detailed field observations."

Dr. Kennedy continued: "We ended up being stung a lot. But it was worth it, because our results show that worker wasps can become redundant at home. A wasp on a colony with few larvae but lots of other workers becomes almost useless: the best thing to do is to babysit the larvae of other relatives."

Since Darwin, biologists have been trying to understand how 'altruism' evolves in animals. At first glance, acts of selflessness to help other individuals do not seem to allow individuals to pass on their genes.

Professor Radford said: "In 1964, the legendary biologist W. D. Hamilton figured out the cardinal rule of animal altruism. Lavish help on your family because they share many of your genes. Copies of your genes will triumph in the population."

But the tropical paper wasps studied by the team baffled Hamilton back in 1964. In Brazil, he was surprised to notice that Polistes wasps were leaving their close family on their home nests and flying off to help the neighbors, who are less closely related.

Previous work by co-author Seirian '@WaspWoman' Sumner, Professor of Behavioral Ecology at University College London, showed that over half the workers in a Panamanian population were helping on multiple nests. Wasps usually viciously attack outsiders, so this babysitting suggested something unusual was going on.

Professor Sumner explained: "Wasps offer amazing windows into the evolution of selflessness. There is so much going on in a wasp nest: power struggles, self-sacrifice, groups battling against the odds to survive... If we want to understand how societies evolve, we should look more deeply at wasps."

Explore further How to blackmail your family

More information: Diminishing returns drive altruists to help extended family, Nature Ecology and Evolution (2021). Journal information: Nature Ecology & Evolution Diminishing returns drive altruists to help extended family,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41559-020-01382-z , https//dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41559-020-01382-z
GST Menace: Traders' body CAIT to release white paper

The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) on Sunday said that it will soon release a white paper on the state of Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime in the country.

The traders' body has been raising concerns for some time now over the arbitrariness of the tax regime. It has also called for a traders' strike on February 26.

In a statement on Sunday, CAIT said that the call of "Bharat Vyapar Bandh" (nationwide traders strike) on against "draconian and arbitrary provisions" of GST has received tremendous response across the country not only from the trade associations but the bodies of tax practitioners, chartered accountants, MSME and other verticals of domestic trade have also come out in support of the call for a nationwide strike.

"It shows the high level of gross resentment in people of the country against current state of GST which is called as 'good and simple tax', much away from the ground reality," it said.

The statement said that traders across country are deeply agitated over recent amendments made in the GST rules which give arbitrary and unfettered powers to the GST officials.

"Even after four years of implementation, the GST portal is suffered with various glitches and is a unstable tax portal but instead of penalising the operators of GST portal, the traders are penalised even for a mistake which has not committed by them," CAIT said.

Further, since the introduction of GST, more than 900 changes have been introduced from time to time due to which the GST taxation system has become extremely complicated and has lost its sanctity, it added.

Disclaimer: Information, facts or opinions expressed in this news article are presented as sourced from IANS and do not reflect views of Moneylife and hence Moneylife is not responsible or liable for the same. As a source and news provider, IANS is responsible for accuracy, completeness, suitability and validity of any information in this article.
The European Commission urged better coordination between EU members on Monday, a day after Germany imposed border measures to stem the spread of new coronavirus variants

Brussels, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :The European Commission urged better coordination between EU members on Monday, a day after Germany imposed border measures to stem the spread of new coronavirus variants.

The EU executive said it was sending letters to all 27 members to highlight travel recommendations they had agreed to last October to prevent the chaos seen at the start of the pandemic, when unilateral closures snarled traffic and freight.

Germany has been filtering crossings from Austria and the Czech Republic since Sunday in a bid to slow the spread of coronavirus variants that emerged in the UK, South Africa and Brazil.

And Germany said on Monday it would not rule out doing the same on its border with France, where the South African variant is gaining ground in the eastern Moselle region.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert said Berlin was "continuing to monitor the situation", adding that pandemic measures were under constant review.

He said border closures were a "last resort" but insisted Germany had to do everything it could to stop the new variants spreading as quickly in Germany as they had elsewhere.

Earlier, France's Europe Minister Clement Beaune had urged Germany not to close the border.

"We will do everything to avoid an uncoordinated decision and a nasty surprise," said Beaune.

He added that any border closures should be introduced in coordination with France and include as "wide-reaching exceptions as possible" to protect cross-border workers.
Checkers & Rally's has always kept guests at the heart of both its marketing and operations, and the new campaign is designed to offer guests everyday wins  something we could all use more of these days. The first spot features "Diego," a young man heroically helping his friend move, carrying heavy boxes, climbing stairs, loading the truck and working up a big appetite. He's definitely earned a win, and he gets one at Checkers & Rally's with the new Super Loaded Buford limited time offer (LTO).

A core component of the brand's DNA is offering rewards to the hardworking and the often-underestimated everyday hero. These are the people who have continued to work, educate, support and provide essential services to us throughout the most challenging times; the moms and dads who have balanced home schooling and work; and so many others who deserve a win every day. As the campaign rolls out over the next several months, future spots will include a young woman who works long hours on her feet as a hostess and a dad who spends his entire day helping his son with a messy science project. Both of these people need a win, and they find it at Checkers & Rally's.

"This campaign represents so much more than just a marketing effort," said Dwayne Chambers, CMO of Checkers & Rally's. "This is about demonstrating to our guests that we see how hard they are working, we see the challenges they've had to overcome, and we are dedicated to giving guests a stress-free and delicious respite. 2020 was a difficult year, but we managed to thrive throughout it, and we are carrying exceptional momentum into 2021. Now, we are dedicated to providing wins for the people who really need them, each and every day."

As serious as Checkers & Rally's is about rewarding everyday heroes, the brand's new ad campaign is also playful. In keeping with the style guests have come to know and love  a style that introduced item names like the Big Buford and the Mother Cruncher Chicken Sandwich  the campaign is bold, offbeat, and confident as well as inspiring and genuine.

Checkers & Rally's new ad campaign will also introduce an enticing new limited-time offering, a more-is-more take on the classic Big Buford, "The Super Loaded Buford," which includes two large hand-seasoned, 100% beef hamburger patties topped with two slices of melted American cheese, caramelized onions, crispy onions, Checkers' famous seasoned fries, bacon, dill pickles, ketchup and mayo all served on a toasted, bakery-style bun.

Of course, the new campaign will also underline many of the features that have long helped the brand stand out from its competition, including high-quality food; exceptional value; streamlined, simple and speedy experiences; and craveable, fun food.

Checkers & Rally's new ad campaign was developed by the brand's in-house agency, led by Chambers, in creative production partnership with Fitzgerald and Company. Chambers joined the Checkers & Rally's team in 2019, bringing vast experience working with major brands like Sonic, Red Robin, P.F. Chang's China Bistro, Inc., Krispy Kreme, Fuddruckers & Koo Koo Roo and Noodles & Company. One of the first changes he made was bringing the creative team in-house. This campaign marks the second major marketing moment for the brand in the last two months, coming on the heels of the Mother Cruncher Monster Truck event in December 2020.

To watch the new Checkers ad, please go to: https://www.checkers.com/super-loaded-buford/

To watch the Rally's version of the ad, please go to: https://www.rallys.com/super-loaded-buford/

ABOUT CHECKERS & RALLY'S RESTAURANTS, INC.

Based in Tampa, Fla., Checkers & Rally's Restaurants, Inc., an iconic and innovative drive-thru restaurant chain known for its bold flavors, exceptional value, and people-first attitude, operates and franchises both Checkers and Rally's restaurants. With nearly 900 restaurants and room to grow, Checkers & Rally's is a proven brand with flexible building formats that is aggressively expanding across the country. Checkers & Rally's is dedicated to being a place where franchisees and employees who work hard can create opportunity for themselves, their families, and their communities. In recent years, the brand has been awarded several of the industry's most prestigious awards including: Ranking #140 on Entrepreneur's 2018 Franchise 500, Top Food and Beverage Franchise by Franchise Business Review, 2016, 2017 and 2018 Best Franchise Deals, "Best Drive-Thru in America" by QSR Magazine, the "Hot! Again" award from Nation's Restaurant News, and "#1 Most Craveable Fries" by Restaurant Business. For more information about franchise opportunities with Checkers & Rally's, please visit www.checkersfranchising.com.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Julie Green

No Limit Agency

[email protected]

312-526-3996

SOURCE Checkers & Rally's Restaurants, Inc.

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The Indian tech industry is expected to add over 1.38 lakh net new hires in FY2020-21, taking the total employee base to 4.47 million, according to the Nasscom CEO Survey 2021.

The industry continues to be a net hirer, with significant focus on digital upskilling, it showed. The digital talent pool is expected to cross the current 1.17 million, growing at 32 per cent over last year.

Companies upskill 2.5 lakh employees in the digital space every year, the survey said.

As part of its annual strategic report shared on Monday, Nasscom also said that the size of the technology industry is estimated to grow 2.3 percent to $194 billion for the year ending March 2021, compared to $190 billion last year.

Exports rose to an estimated $150 billion from $147 billion last year. The industry grew 7.7 percent in FY20.

Indian tech contributed about 8 percent relative share to the national GDP, with 52 percent relative share in services exports, and 50 percent share in total FDI (based on FDI inflows for April-September 2020).

Tech investments

The deal value for cloud grew 80 percent between April and September 2020, compared to October-March 2020 at the back of COVID-19. The industry also saw 146 merger and acquisition deals, with over 90 percent of them digital- focused.

Digital will clearly be the key growth driver, going forward. The survey indicates that over 70 percent companies expect investment in global technology to be higher than in the previous year. These are likely to be in the areas of cloud, cybersecurity and IoT (Internet of Things).

With faster cloud adoption, 60 percent industry CEOs expect larger digitisation deals in 2021, with investments likely to recover in core sectors including banking and financial services, retail and manufacturing, the survey pointed out.

Speaking to media persons, Debjani Ghosh, President, NASSCOM, said: "As we look at 2021, while there are positives on the vaccination front and accelerated digitisation across verticals, the technology industry in India is well geared to build on these trends and continue its transformation journey in this redefined techade.

UB Pravin Rao, Chairman, Nasscom, said: Digital transformation is the topmost priority for global corporations and in a highly connected world that will remain largely contactless for an extended period. There are shifts in business models, customer experience, operations, and employee experience.

More than 1.15 lakh tech patents were filed by companies in India in the last five years, the survey pointed out.

Nisia Trindade Lima is the first female president of Brazils Fiocruz health institute in its 120-year history. Credit: Peter Ilicciev/Fiocruz

As Brazil reels from the impact of COVID-19, a "profound cultural change" is needed to stop women bearing the brunt of the crisis, says the head of biomedical research institute Fiocruz.

Sociologist Nisia Trindade Lima joined the organization in 1987 as a researcher; in 2017 she became the first female president in its 120-year history.

In an interview with SciDev.Net for the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, Trindade Lima speaks about the challenges of integrating scientific and social research, closing the gender gap, and tackling disinformation on vaccines.

You are the first female president of Fiocruz in its history. Your background in sociology also differs from most previous presidents. How does this impact your leadership?

My perspective as a social scientist has not only influenced many of the processes I've been involved in, but also dealing with an agenda that requires a multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary effort has always been very important in my career at Fiocruz.

In respect of gender, it is an issue that has been widely debated at the institution. We have a gender and race equity committee, set up under my predecessor Paulo Gadelha. I've worked to advance the issues of this committee and institute a special program for the international day of women and girls in science.

At Fiocruz, gender inequality still manifests itself in institutional leadership positions: we still have few women in top rolesthere are about 30 percent in top management positionsso there is a lot to be done, especially in understanding the place of women, which in pandemic times becomes even more acute.

You hint at the idea that the pandemic has disproportionately disadvantaged women What needs to change?

I think a large part of the domestic work is still done either by the women of the family or by other women. In the pandemic, this has become harder, as contagion spreads and social inequality increases.

The virus started circulating in upper-middle classes and spread to the working class, starting with domestic workers. This shows an unequal and very complex reality. Women are responsible for a great deal of child care We need a profound cultural change, because there is no other way to deal with this situation.

The work of Fiocruz encompasses health research, public service, and the production of medicines and vaccines. What are the main challenges in pandemic times?

Fiocruz's main challenge now is to get the core activities that define usresearch, education, well-structured information systems, access to data and vaccine productionand merge them into a synergic and integrated vision. There's no use thinking about vaccines without thinking about vaccination policies, or access to the vaccination.

In more immediate terms, the big challenge is vaccination. We're focusing all our efforts in the production of the COVID-19 Fiocruz vaccine, originally developed by the University of Oxford in partnership with AstraZeneca laboratories, which now will be produced at Fiocruz. At the same time, we're working on raising public awareness for the importance of the vaccine. The key now is to vaccinate more and make vaccines available through our Unified Health System. This is the great challenge in which we are totally immersed at this moment.

For the future, I think the big challenge is for us to make these policies sustainable with regular investment in science and technology. There's got to be sustainability to these efforts and ensure public laboratories of national production can do their job.

The COVID-19 pandemic has propelled Fiocruz and science into the media spotlight. How can this attention be sustained after the pandemic?

We have to take advantage of the fact that many issues will remain [after the crisis]  awareness, preparation, valuing science, the Unified Health System. So we are thinking about how we can learn from this whole experience and how the relationship with the media, guided by science communication, can develop. I think this is Fiocruz's greatest contribution, the one that makes people come to us most.

Before the pandemic we had already advanced on many issues, with the institutional repository which allows citizens to have access to our scientific productionan observatory focused on COVID-19 during the pandemic. So, I think from here, other actions will unfold because Fiocruz has always valued this activity.

One of the challenges facing the COVID-19 vaccine is disinformation. How has Fiocruz tackled this issue?

By trying to communicate as transparently as possible. Our portal has an entire area dedicated to vaccines and vaccination. We have consolidated communication channels of our own, such as Canal Saude and Radis magazine and in addition to that we have sought communication experts as much as possible to communicate the importance of vaccines and vaccination and encourage our community to vaccinate. We also have public events to inform the population about vaccines, but much of their reach also depends on the media coverage they get.

We have figures at the institution who are historically linked to the fight for vaccination, such as Dr. Akira Homma [former president and emeritus researcher at Fiocruz, and one of the world's leading vaccine experts]. So it is, if you like, embedded in the organization, and there are a number of people fighting for public health, the cause to which they dedicate their lives.

Explore further Sinovac, AstraZeneca seek vaccine approval in Brazil

Provided by SciDev.Net
Musicians perform in the "Desliga da Justica" street band in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. AP-Yonhap



Supergirl came out of the dressing room ready for action as usual.



She took her place alongside Freddy Krueger, Poison Ivy and Captain America and they kicked off, into song.



That idiosyncratic lineup is a typical sort of lineup for the Carnival street band Desliga da Justica, but this year they were facing cameras in a studio and the fans were scattered across the internet instead of dancing in the streets during one of the world's most iconic celebrations.



''Everybody at home, move the furniture out of the way to dance and drink cold beer,'' called out the woman dressed as Poison Ivy, who began the show with a traditional Carnival song.





Musicians perform in the "Desliga da Justica" block party in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. AP



The COVID-19 pandemic forced Rio to shut down its famed festival and threaten legal action against those who defy the ban to party. So groups like Desliga  the name is a Portuguese language play on ''Justice League''  turned to online events for their backers, streaming music and dances via YouTube and other social media platforms.



This year, all members of the band took a PCR test for coronavirus on Sunday when they arrived at studio in the south of Rio.



Desliga has been holding the parties since 2009 and the gatherings have been growing ever since.



''When everyone is immunized, we are going to have the biggest Carnival that Brazil has ever seen. Wait for us until 2022,'' said Supergirl, aka Carla de Freitas, 38. ''We want everyone to be healthy and protected to have fun in peace''.





Members of the "Desliga da Justica" street band look at their production in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. AP



Brazil is still recording an average of more than 1,000 deaths a day from the pandemic and as in many countries, immunization campaigns have been lagging. The Sambadromes of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo that normally throb with partying this time of year after being used as vaccination stations.



Rio's mayor's office reported that as of Sunday morning, it had closed four nightclubs that broke restriction rules and imposed seven fines for social distancing violations.



Still, some Carnival fans met in small groups of ''bate-bolas''  revellers who dress up yearly in exuberant hand-made costumes each Carnival  for symbolic celebrations on Saturday.



''It's very difficult, I'm not very emotional, but this (the cancelled Carnival) stirs emotions,'' said Jonas dos Santos, who has been in charge of a group of bate-bolas for 31 years. ''On the day we parade, it's magical, fantastic. People come, the street is packed but this year we won't have this. We feel a void, people say something is missing.''





A healthcare worker takes a nasal sample from a member of the "Desliga da Justica" street band to test for COVID-19 before he participates in a recording and live broadcast of the group on social media in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. AP
Abuja, Nigeria (PANA)  Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has vowed that his government would protect all religious and ethnic groups in line with its responsibility under the constitution
All of Hai Duong will undergo social distancing starting Tuesday, around half a month since a new wave of Covid-19 outbreaks swept through the northern province.

Nguyen Viet Hai, chief of office of Hai Duong Party Committee, said the province would undergo social distancing for 15 days starting Tuesday as per a government directive on Covid-19 prevention.

The social distancing directive, the same applied nationwide in April last year to stem the spread of Covid-19, calls for people not to go outside except for getting food, medicine or other emergencies; requires a minimum social distance of two meters and bans gatherings of more than two outside of hospitals, offices, schools and public spaces.

Traffic through the province, home to more than two million people, would also be limited during the period, with only vehicles with essential purposes allowed to enter Hai Duong, which is more than an hour drive from Hanoi.

As of Monday, thousands of families in Hai Duong, epicenter of a new Covid-19 wave in Vietnam since late last month, remain quarantined. The province's Chi Linh Town and Cam Giang District are still under lockdown to extinguish local coronavirus outbreaks.

The province has recorded 461 local cases out of the nation's 637 since late last month, making it the biggest coronavirus hotspot in Vietnam at present. The first coronavirus cases of the new wave were recorded in Hai Duong and northern Quang Ninh Province late last month, breaking Vietnam's streak of no community transmissions for nearly two months.


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The South Carolina Department of Education is receiving more than $940 million from the federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund, state officials announced Friday.

Most of the grant funds will be distributed to local educational agencies, according to a SCDE document.

A total of $28,203,447 is going to the Aiken County Public School District. Based on school district data, the money works out to about $1,251 per student in Aiken County.

The relief fund is authorized by the CARES Act, which has provided aid during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the past, the Aiken County Public School District has used money from the CARES Act to purchase items like new laptops  improving accessibility for students as instruction moved to virtual and hybrid models.

District officials have not responded to a request for comment on how the $28 million might be used.

The statewide school districts that govern local public charter schools are receiving relief funds as well.

Horse Creek Academy's district, the Charter Institute at Erskine, is receiving $12,025,257. The district has 22 schools across South Carolina.

Another $12,376,102 is allocated for the South Carolina Public Charter School District, which governs 34 schools. In Aiken and Edgefield counties, this district includes Fox Creek High, Bettis Preparatory Leadership Academy and Tall Pines STEM Academy.
The MBTA promised its riders theyd see new CRRC-built Red Line cars by the end of 2020, and the transit system delivered.

With less than a day to spare.

Thats par for the course for Chinese-owned CRRC MA, where work to replace aging Red Line and Orange Line cars is still about a year behind schedule. Problems with equipment, supplies and the workforce began even before the coronavirus pandemic disrupted both operations at the Springfield factory and its supply chain, which stretches back to China.

Mechanical problems, included noise coming from the undercarriage and trouble with doors, cropped up on Orange Line cars already in service in Greater Boston in late 2019.

Vince Conti, CRRC MAs director of business administration, acknowledged the issues.

Lessons learned from overcommitting and under delivering based on an under-trained work force, Conti said. Unfortunately the MBTA paid the price for that.

Add to that a fraught trade relationship between the U.S. and China, one that deteriorated over the last four years. The Trump administration slapped 25% tariffs on rail cars and parts as some in Washington complained that the Chinese, by establishing CRRC here, were trying to destroy international competitors.

CRRC says it is looking forward to a brighter 2021 with new leadership in Washington, more and better-trained workers, and a smoother supply chain as it ramps up production not just for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority but also for Philadelphia and Los Angeles.

14 CRRC Rail factory in Springfield

Change will come under the Biden administration, said U.S. Rep. Richard Neal. Last year he Neal brokered a deal buying time for CRRC when lawmakers wanted to bar it from getting any federal transportation money.

I think that they are probably going to get a more careful introspection on the use of tariffs, Neal said. I think that the review needs to be comprehensive and it needs to be robust.

But Neal said China still faces criticism about unfair trade practices.

They use economic means and in some cases the threat of military might in Hong Kong to expand their economic interests, he said.

Thats why agreements like the new North American trade pact and a multilateral trade deal with the European Union are important. And so is the American relationship with China.

Its the most important bilateral consideration in the world, said Neal, who campaigned this summer in part on having saved CRRC jobs. He chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, which has jurisdiction over tariffs. There are examples, like CRRC, where the relationship works.

Its an extraordinary investment that was made on Page Boulevard, he said. So many people have fond memories of Westinghouse.

Westinghouse had a plant on the site from 1915-70. Conti said CRRC is improving things inside its mammoth plant, which began production in 2018.

The first MBTA Orange Line cars built by CRRC in Springfield went into service in 2019.

CRRC has adjusted its schedules to work with suppliers and bring in new materials  materials that will avoid quality control problems that have plagued production over the past few years.

The company has ramped up hiring. It has 376 employees in the state, 293 of them at the Springfield plant and the rest in Boston working with the T.

Of the Springfield employees, 212 are union production workers. They now are getting or have recently received training in everything from reading blueprints to wiring to drilling a hole.

Everything is different on a rail car, Conti said. Drilling a hole is not like drilling a hole at home. You have to use tapping fluid, it has to be precise.

The factory has a first-of-its-kind, state-sponsored apprenticeship program in railroad car manufacturing. It features 2,000 hours of technical training at CRRC in addition to 150 hours of related technical instruction provided by Sheet Metal Workers Local 63.

COVID-19 has made it tough for Conti and his managers to maintain their workforce.

On average, 23 people who normally would be on the CRRC factory floor are out with COVID-19 issues. Those can include illness or the inability to get child care.

Its been very significant for us to manage through that, he said.

Rail cars come to CRRC in Springfield as shells manufactured in China. Theyre shipped here by sea, usually to the Port of Philadelphia, and then carried north by rail. The shells spend about three months at the Springfield factory, getting everything from lights to motors installed. About 60% of the parts are U.S.-made. After assembly, the cars are tested on the factorys 2,000-foot track along Interstate 291.

Passengers ride on one of the new MBTA Red Line cars produced by CRRC in China. Additional Red Line cars will be assembled in Springfield.

Conti said the industry is taking root here.

Lets be open about that, Conti said. This Is the first time in about 100 years weve had rail car manufacturing in the state of Massachusetts.

Wason Manufacturing Co., which made railroad passenger cars, went out of business in the 1930s. It was one of the largest makers of railroad cars and locomotives in the country and operated here starting in 1845. The Shelburne Falls Trolley Museum has a Wason trolley car.

The state went without federal money on the new trains project so it could require final assembly in Massachusetts. The states idea, under former Gov. Deval Patrick, was to make Massachusetts a center for rail car manufacturing again.

CRRC received a $566 million contract from the MBTA in 2014 to build 152 Orange Line cars and 252 Red Line cars in Springfield. In 2016, the state upped the order with another 120 Red Line cars, with a production cost of $277 million.

The Orange Line project is expected to be completed in 2023, the Red Line in 2024.

The MBTA said in December that it recently accepted the 24th new Orange Line car. Orange Line trains have six cars each. To date, the Orange Line typically has three new six-car trains, or 18 cars total, in service daily.

The first new Red Line pilot train that entered service at the end of December had prototype cars made in China. Subsequent cars will be made in Springfield.

Southern California officials voted in 2016 to buy 64 new subway cars for the Los Angeles-area Metro Red Line and Purple Line from CRRC at a cost of $178.4 million.

In 2017, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority ordered 45 double-decker rail cars from CRRC at a cost of $137.5 million. Today, the cost is up slightly to $138 million.

In December, Conti said he expects to get pilot cars from China in the new Los Angeles design in February. The double-decker SEPTA cars will arrive for the first time in May.
For those counting at home, that is 27 days -- less than a month -- to figure this out.

In that time, Senate Democrats will need to settle a series of intra-party debates over the scope of this bill, whether they are all willing to spend $1.9 trillion, whether they are willing to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, whether they are satisfied with the House's guardrails on stimulus checks that give individuals making $75,000 and couples making $100,000 the full $1,400 while phasing out the check amount faster for higher earning Americans.

Democrats have largely tried to talk about these issues privately and most are likely to vote for whatever comes to the floor given the expectation that giving Americans additional financial benefits is going to be popular. One Democratic senator told CNN last week, "Look, I am voting for this no matter what." But the next three weeks could test Democratic unity in a way we haven't seen for a long time.

The minimum wage fight

When Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont, was up to become the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee, no one in leadership necessarily expected Democrats would be controlling a 50-50 Senate where what Democrats want and what they have to do to legislate are potentially in conflict.
Former Belgian prime minister and ardent EU cheerleader Guy Verhofstadt has branded the bloc's vaccination efforts a 'fiasco'.

Verhofstadt called on Brussels to renegotiate its 'ill-conceived' contracts with manufacturers in a video titled 'the inconvenient truth behind the vaccination fiasco of the EU'.

The MEP is an outspoken critic of Brexit who campaigned with the Liberal Democrats in the 2019 EU elections and even used their slogan 'B*****ks to Brexit'.

But in the nine-minute clip, Verhofstadt blamed the European Commission for the shortages and slow rollout and slammed the 'diplomatic disaster' brought about by triggering Article 16 of the Northern Ireland Protocol.

'If you believe in Europe, if you love Europe, it's your duty to be the most vocal critic, especially when Europe falls short of its potential and our expectations.

'That's exactly what's happening now with the vaccinations. It's a fiasco,' Verhofstadt said.

European Union member states are considerably lagging behind the United Kingdom in their vaccine rollouts

Verhofstadt pointed out that while the majority of coronavirus vaccines were produced in Europe, EU countries were falling behind on vaccine rollouts.

Only four per cent of EU citizens have received their first dose, compared to 20 per cent in the UK and more than half in Israel.

'It is not so much the capacity in Europe that is the problem, but the allocation of the produced doses,' Verhofstadt said.

'There is a crucial lack of supply in every European member state, a lack that we don't see in the same dramatic proportions in countries like, for example, in the United States, in Britain, in Canada or in Israel'.

In the video, posted to Facebook on Saturday, Verhofstadt blamed the slow roll out on the contracts between the EU and the drug manufacturers, seeming to dismiss European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen's explanation last week that Brussels had simply been 'too optimistic' regarding production and delivery.

The EU boasts of having secured access to more than 2.3billion doses, but its failure to get supplies has been blamed in part for the sluggish pace of the roll-out.

Brussels did not strike a deal with AstraZeneca until three months after Britain ordered the jabs, a delay which the firm says is responsible for the UK continuing to be fully supplied while shipments are held up on the continent.

Similarly, the EU did not make an agreement with Pfizer until soon after the first trial results were reported in November, whereas Britain and the US had deals last July.

London and Washington also spent more money from public coffers investing in the development of a vaccine than Brussels did.

Seeking to relieve its supply problems, the EU caused further chaos last month by imposing export controls which briefly threatened to undermine the hard-won Brexit agreement on Northern Ireland.

Verhofstadt is an outspoken EU cheerleader and Brexit critic who campaigned with then-Liberal Democrat Vince Cable, pictured, ahead of the 2019 European elections

Verhofstadt, who twice ran for the commission presidency, said the contracts were vague and gave too much wiggle room to pharmaceutical companies at the potential expense of the health of Europeans.

'I think the measures taken by the Commission are hugely symbolic, insufficient and counter-productive,' he said.

Verhofstadt urged the EU medicine's agency to follow faster approval procedures for new vaccines and called for a renegotiation of the 'ill-conceived' contracts to include binding deadlines.

It comes after the Amsterdam-based agency approved the Pfizer and AstraZeneca jabs long after they had already been put into widespread use in the UK.

The Belgian also called for more funding for the pharmaceutical sector and for the EU to organise the acquisition of medicines to avoid making similar mistakes in any future pandemic.

'The European Union is not a problem, but the solid basis for the solution,' he said.

Last week, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen (pictured) said Brussels had been 'too optimistic' regarding production volumes and deadlines for regulatory approval of vaccines [File photo]

With growing concern over more contagious variants, the EU has agreed to fast-track approval of vaccines updated to target them, health commissioner Stella Kyriakides said on Sunday.

'We looked at the process together with the European Medicines Agency (EMA),' Kyriakides told German daily Augsburger Allgemeine.

'We have now decided that a vaccine, which has been improved by a manufacturer based on its previous vaccine to combat new mutations, no longer has to go through the entire approvals process.'

The EU is also struggling to keep members in line on border closures, which it had hoped to avoid after chaotic traffic and freight hold-ups last spring.

Germany has unilaterally started checks on its Czech and Austrian borders to slow the spread of the UK, Brazil and South Africa variants of the disease.

Angela Merkel's government has not ruled out doing the same with France, which urged Germany not to inflict a 'nasty surprise' by closing the border.

Belgium's ban on non-essential travel, imposed last month, has also sparked unease from the Commission.
There have been no new deaths reported to the Health Protection Surveillance Centre today.

There has been a total of 3,948 Covid-19 related deaths in Ireland.

As of midnight, Sunday 14th February, the HPSC has been notified of 821 confirmed cases of Covid-19.

There is now a total of 210,402 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Ireland.

Of the cases notified today:

430 are male/ 389 are Female

70% are under 45 years of age

The median age is 31 years old

333 in Dublin, 91 in Galway, 53 in Limerick, 41 in Kildare, 38 in Meath and the remaining 265 cases are spread across all other counties.**



As of 8am today, 916 COVID-19 patients are hospitalised, of which 157 are in ICU. 40 additional hospitalisations in the past 24 hours.

As of Friday 12th February, 265,237 doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in Ireland:

175,238 people have received their first dose

89,999 people have received their second dose



Dr Ronan Glynn, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Department of Health, said: With the commencement of vaccination of people aged over 85 in the community, today marks a significant milestone as we seek to protect the most vulnerable from this pandemic.

"It is an extraordinary testament to science that less than one year since our first case in Ireland, we are now in the process of rolling out three effective vaccines. The challenge now is to continue to suppress this disease so that as many people as possible can benefit from these vaccines over the coming months.

Professor Philip Nolan, Chair of the NPHET Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group, said; The current patterns remind us of the care we need to take to stay safe. In our workplaces and our colleges especially, we need to take care to stay safe until we are all protected by a vaccine.

Dr Lorraine Doherty, National Clinical Director Health Protection HSE - Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC), said; From today, the over 85 age sub-cohort, which accounts for approximately 72,500 people, will receive their first vaccine over the coming weeks. This week, a total of 116 GP practices will participate in the rollout with an estimated 374 GPs taking part.

2,491 GPs spread across 1,373 practices will administer vaccines to approximately 490,000 people over 70 years old, in the weeks ahead.

Dr. Sumi Dunne, General Practitioner, said; As of this morning, the beginning of the over 85s cohort began to receive their vaccines at selected GP practices. The level of vaccine confidence and enthusiasm for vaccination in this group has been widely reported, along with a sense of relief as hope for a normal life returns.
Students at a secondary school in Hanoi keep their distance as they return to school after a long Tet break due to Covid-19, May 4, 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Ngoc Thanh.

Schools across Hanoi will be closed at least until the end of February as the capital recorded new coronavirus cases Monday.

Online classes could be an option for the capital's over two million students from kindergarten to high school levels, Chu Ngoc Anh, chairman of the city People's Committee, said at a Monday meeting.

He also requested the city's Department of Education and Training to let universities and colleges follow suit.

Following the decision, Hanoi has become one of 13 localities to let students stay home after the Tet break amid rising coronavirus cases, others being An Giang, Ben Tre, Binh Duong, Binh Phuoc, Binh Thuan, Can Tho, Dien Bien, Ha Nam, Hai Duong, Hai Phong, HCMC and Thanh Hoa.

Schools had been scheduled to resume on Feb. 17.

Last year, Covid-19 also forced schools across the country to close for three months after Tet.

On Monday, the capital recorded two new coronavirus-positive cases associated with a deceased Japanese man in the Somerset West Point hotel in Tay Ho District, who was found dead before being confirmed a Covid-19 patient Monday morning. The two people are a 24-year-old woman in Ba Dinh District and a 43-year-old Japanese man in the same Tay Ho hotel, both colleagues of the deceased man at trading firm Mitsui Vietnam.

The two have been in close contact with the deceased man at a meeting on Feb. 2, according to the Hanoi Center for Disease Control (CDC). They have not been tagged as Covid-19 patients by the Health Ministry.

Hanoi has recorded 33 Covid-19 patients since late last month out of the nation's 638 community cases.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : Delhi Metro has decided to upgrade its Automatic Fare Collection System.

IANS spoke to Anup Dayal, Executive Director, Corporate Communications, DMRC, on the subject. Dayal said, "In order to upgrade ticketing technology, DMRC envisages to upgrade the existing Automatic Fare Collection System to enable the QR Code, EMV (Account Based Ticketing) and Rupay based open loop ticketing following the NCMC standard model as specified by MoHUA (Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs) for interoperability with other operators by use of non-proprietary standards so that the interface is scalable to other networks (transit operator/retail outlets/parking etc.) in Delhi/NCR." Dayal further said, "Delhi Metro has invited Expressions of Interest (EOI) for implementation of QR Code, EMV enabled Account Bases Ticketing (Master/VISA), and RUPAY based Open Loop Ticketing in DMRC including Comprehensive Maintenance of AFC system of Phase I, II and III stations of supplied equipments/parts." This Expression of Interest (EOI) is to solicit and examine the response of the Financial Institutions, banks along with firms, companies and entities that are capable of upgrading the AFC System and provide Comprehensive Onsite Maintenance of supplied equipments and parts.

Dayal further said that the key dates for delivery and commissioning will be detailed out in the RFP Document.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip  The announced replacement of a mosque in the west of Gaza City at a cost of more than $1 million has sparked widespread controversy among Palestinians in the coastal enclave, where 85% of the population suffer from poverty.

The Al-Ahram al-Zahabia Construction Company announced on Facebook Feb. 5 that it had won a bid to replace the Khalil al-Wazir Mosque at a total cost of $1.093 million. The post was later edited and the amount removed.

The mosque, modestly constructed like most in the coastal enclave, was destroyed during the 2014 Israeli war on Gaza.

In 2018, Hamas Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs signed an agreement with the Malaysian Aman Palestin Foundation to fund the mosque replacement, on the condition that it be done in a Malaysian architectural style.

The Aman Palestin Foundation is a Malaysian charity founded in 2004 to collect donations to help Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Lebanon and Syria.

Palestinians expressed anger and criticism at the Ministry of Endowments and Hamas, which runs the Gaza Strip, for not directing the funds to development projects and feeding the poor instead of rebuilding mosques. According to the Ministry of Endowments' statistics, there are 1,078 mosques in the tiny enclave of 365 square kilometers (227 square miles).

Building luxurious mosques in the Gaza Strip has become a trend since Hamas took over in 2007. Al-Khalidi Mosque was built by a businessman with ties to Hamas, Abdel Aziz al-Khalidi, on the Gaza shore in 2013 at a cost of a half-million dollars.

Mohammed Abu Jiyab, editor of the Al-Eqtesadia newspaper in Gaza, told Al-Monitor, Building luxurious mosques in the Gaza Strip is inappropriate given the residents' economic situation. Abu Jiyab stressed the need to use available money to fight poverty and unemployment with projects like building factories.

He added that 46.5% of Palestinians are unemployed and 80% of the population depends on food aid.

Abu Jiyab added that in 2020, international funding for the Gaza Strip declined by 60% and aid from regional Arab countries fell more than 80%.

Building a mosque at such a high cost is shocking as there are some 2,700 Palestinian families in Gaza who are still displaced since their homes were destroyed in the 2014 war. These families live in rented houses that the UNRWA is paying for, Abu Jiyab said.

Meanwhile, Abdel Hadi al-Aghad, the undersecretary of the Ministry of Endowments in Gaza, defended the project.

He explained that the design includes a second floor that will house a medical dispensary operated by the Ministry of Health to serve the people of the area. He added that there will be an elevator to accommodate the sick and elderly.

Agha said that Israel destroyed 110 mosques in the Gaza Strip during the 2014 war. The ministry has rebuilt 94 mosques with funding from international charities and continues to look for funders to rebuild the remaining 16.

Agha pointed out that the Ministry of Endowments does more than rebuild mosques, saying, During the year 2020, the ministry, through donations from inside and outside the Gaza Strip, provided about $10.5 million in food and cash assistance to about 490,000 Palestinian families.
On Tuesday, consent forms will be distributed to aged care facilities and those residents and aged care workers included in the first week of the rollout are being contacted so they can prepare for their vaccination. The aged care doses will cover more than 250 facilities across the country, including regional and metropolitan homes. On Monday evening, Victorias Health Department confirmed it was expecting to receive between 11,000 and 12,000 doses of the vaccine a week initially  dependent on supply. That number is expected to increase as more Pfizer vaccine reaches our shores. AstraZenecas vaccine will be available in March, pending approval by the drug regulator. The Australian Medical Association estimates there are about 170,000 Victorians included in the first phase of the vaccine rollout.

Julian Rait, president of the Victorian branch of the Australian Medical Association said he had been told Victoria would receive 11,000 doses of Pfizers two-dose jab every week for seven or eight weeks  a total of 77,000 to 88,000 doses. And as a consequence, there is going to be some rationing, Professor Rait told ABC Radio Mornings on Monday. Professor Rait said there were 170,000 Victorians who were expected to receive a vaccine as part of the phase 1a rollout, which includes aged care workers, vulnerable residents of aged care facilities, hotel quarantine workers, border staff and essential health care workers. That is insufficient to immunise everybody, especially when you consider that you have to provide a second injection... Within 21 days, he said.

Victoria has already said it plans to immunise border and quarantine workers first, with high-priority healthcare workers next. The state is planning to set up nine COVID-19 vaccination hubs, with the ultra-cold freezers needed to store the fragile vaccine. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video The federal governments vaccine plan does not specify which medicos are considered frontline health care workers  leaving some medical groups concerned their members may miss out. Suzi Nou, president of the Australian Society of Anaesthetists, said several of her members had been told they would not be part of the first phase of the rollout, despite having jobs that exposed them to COVID-19. It just seems really unfair you have everyone else in the COVID team from the emergency department or the intensive care unit vaccinated, she said.

So far she had zero clarity on how many of her members would be vaccinated and when, despite writing multiple times to federal and state governments. Mark Suss, an anaesthetist working across several Melbourne hospitals, said he was regularly exposed to COVID-19 in his role. The issue is we work very closely with intensive care and emergency department doctors, who are clearly stated to be in group 1a. When were on call, we attend every intubation in the hospital. By definition, we do as many aerosol-generating procedures as everyone else, he said. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said the state would prioritise hotel quarantine workers with the initial vaccinations.

Mr Hunt said it was up to the states to states to decide which groups from phase 1a phase would take priority. They have indicated  and we generally support it  that the greatest immediate risk is the border quarantine process, he said. They will make sure that the balance is focused on the greatest risk, and I think thats appropriate. Public health expert Professor Robert Booy said it made sense to focus on hotel quarantine workers first. Quite honestly its practical and sensible, theyre the ones who are most exposed in Australia to COVID, he said. Mr Hunt expected the first phase of the rollout to take six weeks. Professor Booy said essential healthcare workers would not miss out by more than a week or so.

Now that weve got enough for 10 million people we can cover all of those risk groups very well, he said. The Australasian College of Emergency Medicine also supported putting hotel quarantine workers at the front of the queue. Loading We believe we need to vaccinate border and quarantine staff first, as that is where most of the cases are coming from, ACEM President Dr John Bonning said. A spokeswoman for the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation said it had been told all staff who worked in intensive care and emergency departments, as well as COVID or suspected COVID wards, would be part of the phase 1a rollout. Nurses involved in vaccination and testing would also be part of phase 1a.
Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) leaves the Senate chamber at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, on Jan. 30, 2020. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Toomey Censured by Pennsylvania County GOP Over Vote to Proceed With Impeachment

The York County Republican Party in Pennsylvania voted to censure Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) for his vote to proceed with the impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump.

For the past four years, Senator Toomey sat silently as a hyper-partisan Democrat Congress relentlessly attacked President Trump, impeaching him twice on fabricated charges, stated Republican state Rep. Dawn Keefer, who drew up a resolution to censureor condemn in an official capacitythe senator.

Given his recent support of the second unconstitutional impeachment effort against a president who is no longer in office the York County Republican Committee has reached the limits of its frustration, Keefer wrote.

Toomey announced he would retire at the end of his current term, which expires in 2022.

The committee passed the resolution during a meeting on Feb. 13. Toomeys office didnt immediately respond to a request by The Epoch Times for comment.

Toomey had said that he would vote to convict Trump for allegedly inciting violence on Jan. 6 during the Capitol breach because of all the evidence that was presented by Democratic House impeachment managers.

Its important as a party to be able to distinguish  the terrific successes of this administration, the fact that the president did stand up to and against some bad policies and some bad trends, Toomey said. Those things can be true, and it can also be true that his behavior after the election became completely unacceptable.

The Senate acquitted Trump in a 5743 vote; seven Republicans joined all 50 Democrats in voting to convict. The result fell short of the two-thirds majority needed to convict.

Aside from Toomey, Republican Sens. Richard Burr (N.C.), Mitt Romney (Utah), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Bill Cassidy (La.), Ben Sasse (Neb.), and Susan Collins (Maine) voted to convict Trump.

Over the weekend, Cassidy faced blowback from the Louisiana GOP, which unanimously voted to censure him after his vote to convict.

The Executive Committee of the Republican Party of Louisiana has unanimously voted to censure Senator Bill Cassidy for his vote cast earlier today to convict former President Donald J. Trump on the impeachment charge, the state GOP said in a statement on Feb. 13.

We condemn, in the strongest possible terms, the vote today by Sen. Cassidy to convict former President Trump, the GOP members wrote. Fortunately, clearer heads prevailed, and President Trump has been acquitted of the impeachment charge filed against him.

The Louisiana senator, who is up for reelection in 2026, wrote an opinion article on Feb. 15 for The Advocate, saying that he voted because Trumps speech and claims were clearly intended to prevent a peaceful transfer of power, adding that I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution, and I take that oath seriously. This was, is, and will remain my commitment to you.

Trump during a Jan. 6 speech called on demonstrators to peacefully and patriotically make their voices heard. He later condemned the violence at the Capitol.

The former commander-in-chiefs lawyers asserted that House managers doctored evidence during the impeachment trial, adding that the impeachment effort was unconstitutional.


For the past 25 years, Dino Robinson has given countless days and hours, pouring his blood, sweat and tears into not only a vision, but a cause. A cause that feeds knowledge of a proud history, and provide a foundation to a people, that will allow them to grow and create their own legacies, wrote Ald. Robin Rue Simmons, 5th Ward, in her application for an honorary street name sign.
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Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch..

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Periods of rain. Low near 45F. Winds N at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a half an inch.
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The UK government will on Monday introduce mandatory hotel quarantine rules for arrivals from dozens of countries deemed "high risk" for coronavirus variants, as it tries to stop new strains spreading.

The new policy requires all UK citizens and permanent residents entering England from 33 countries on a wider travel ban list to self-isolate in approved hotels for 10 days and take several COVID-19 tests.

Other visitors from the countries currently on the so-called "red list", which includes all South American nations, South Africa and Portugal, are currently barred from visiting under lockdown rules.

Arrivals found to have given false information about being in one of the countries 10 days before travel could receive up to 10 years in prison -- which has drawn criticism for being excessive.

The government says it has signed contracts with 16 hotels so far, securing nearly 5,000 rooms near English airports, with a further 58,000 rooms on standby.

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

"The rules coming into force today will bolster the quarantine system and provide another layer of security against new variants at the border," said Health Secretary Matt Hancock, adding that they would also protect the national vaccination programme as the country worked "towards restoring normal life".

The 11-night quarantine will cost people 1,750 ($2,420, 2,000 euros) and includes transport, food, accommodation and security costs, as well as other essential services and testing.

Passengers must have a negative COVID-19 test result from within three days of travel, and book and pay for the package before setting off for Britain.

They will then take further tests on day two and eight of their stays.

The hotel occupants will only be able to leave their rooms in "very limited circumstances", with exercise among them but requiring "special permission" from staff or security.

Anyone refusing to take tests risks a fine of between 1,000 and 2,000, while those who do not self-isolate could have to pay between 5,000 and 10,000.

A limited list of exemptions from the measures include hauliers travelling from Portugal, defence personnel, visiting forces, government contractors and diplomatic missions.

'Can't be easy'

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Sunday the new regime would provide "extra safeguarding" as Britain looks to ease strict lockdown measures next month after weeks of falling infection rates.

"We think we've got the right balance -- robust measures, but targeted measures," he told Sky News, branding calls for a blanket travel ban disproportionate.

The UK government unveiled the plans earlier this month following pressure to tighten Britain's borders amid fears foreign virus variants could derail the country's so far successful mass vaccination programme.

It has vaccinated 15 million of the most vulnerable people with a first jab, and is looking to inoculate all over-50s by May.

Ministers last month scrapped the previous "travel corridors" system that allowed unchecked travel from countries with lower caseloads.

The UK now requires all arrivals from non-"red list" countries to show negative COVID-19 tests and then self-isolate for 10 days at a place of their own choosing.

However, Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has urged the UK government to impose the new hotel quarantine system on arrivals from every country.

Her devolved government was still finalising plans over the weekend to impose a blanket policy on those landing directly in Scotland from Monday.

But it is unclear if they will include preventing arrivals travelling on to Scotland from England.

Wales, which receives fewer international arrivals than its larger UK neighbours, has said it will not adopt hotel quarantines while Northern Ireland is still to decide.

The British government said it had met with stakeholders from various sectors including aviation and hospitality ahead of finalising its plans.

Charlie Islam-Harry, manager of the St Giles Heathrow hotel, said staff would do regular welfare checks on guests during their enforced stays.

"It can't be easy for them to be in a bedroom for 10 days, not having to go anywhere," she told AFP.

"But obviously while they are quarantined we try to keep as much distance as possible because we obviously don't know their health situation."
There are more than 750,000 properties in Perth, but of those, its estimated around 1000, or just 0.1 per cent would attract a price tag of more than $5 million.

The most expensive of those sold in 2020 was a $14 million waterfront property in Dalkeith, with the COVID-19 pandemic doing little to deter Perths most wealthy from splurging on luxury homes.

The $14 million mansion fetched the highest price in Perth in 2020. Credit:CoreLogic

The 2281-square-metre home on Victoria Avenue was purchased by Alfonso and Gillian Pelliccione in March, 2020 after being on and off the market since 2018.

Mr Pelliccione is the managing director of Ampac Technologies, Australias largest independently owned fire detection and emergency warning systems company.

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The Ohio House of Representatives announced in a memo Monday that all committee meetings will be canceled Tuesday because of the upcoming inclement weather.

The memo noted that members are advised to check for text and email notifications regarding Wednesdays committee meetings and Thursdays session.

National Weather Service Wilmington has Franklin County under a winter storm warning until 1 p.m. Tuesday. According to the NWS Wilmington website, snow is forecast in Columbus during Monday afternoon and the evening, all the way up through 6 a.m. Tuesday, when theres a slight chance of precipitation.

From 7 p.m. Monday to the same time Wednesday, downtown Columbus is expected to receive two inches of snowfall, according to the NWS Wilmingtons snowfall forecasts.

The forecast for the Cleveland area is similar, but snowfall is expected to last longer, with a chance of precipitation through 6 p.m. Tuesday. Snowfall in the Cleveland area is expected to reach 8-12 inches.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court Monday granted 5-day bail to journalist Siddique Kappan, arrested on his way to Hathras where a young Dalit woman had died after being allegedly gang-raped, to visit his ailing mother for five days. A bench headed by Chief Justice S A Bobde, however, said that during his visit he shall not give any interview to the media, including social media.

The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, said that Siddique will not meet members of the public except his relatives and doctors concerned. It said Siddique will be escorted by a team of Uttar Pradesh police officers and police at Kerala will cooperate with them.

Kappan was arrested on October 5, 2020 while he was on his way to Hathras, home to the 19-year-old Dalit woman who died after being allegedly gang-raped by four upper-caste men on September 14. Her cremation at night by the authorities, allegedly without the parents' consent, had triggered widespread outrage.

The police had said it has arrested four people having alleged links with the PFI in Mathura and identified the arrested persons as Siddique from Malappuram, Atiq-ur Rehman from Muzaffarnagar, Masood Ahmed from Bahraich and Alam from Rampur.

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tech2 News Staff

The Renault Kiger compact SUVs India launch will take place today, 15 February. The Kiger, which marks Renaults entry into Indias hotly-contested sub-four-metre SUV segment, was revealed in production form only at the end of January, and Renault has now begun production of the Kiger at its Chennai plant, with bookings and test drives set to commence at its dealerships across the country, shortly.

2021 Renault Kiger dimensions and platform

Just like its cousin, the Nissan Magnite, the Renault Kiger, too, is based on the Alliances CMF-A+ platform. Its 3,991 mm long, 1,750mm wide and 1,600 mm tall, and has a 2,500 mm-long wheelbase. Despite not being larger than its rivals, Renault claims the Kiger offers segment-leading cabin space, and at 405 litres, also has the largest boot in its class. Ground clearance for the Renault Kiger is rated at 205mm, and top-spec variants will ride on 16-inch alloy wheels shod in 195/60-section tyres.

There will be a total of six colour options for the Kiger, and in what is an unusual (but welcome) move, Renault will offer dual-tone paint options on all variants.

2021 Renault Kiger interior and features

On the inside, the Renault Kiger follows a neat and simple design theme, and adopts a dark colour scheme. Taking centre stage on the neat and simple dashboard is an 8.0-inch touchscreen infotainment system, and theres also a 7.0-inch digital instruments display.

In terms of features, the top-spec Renault Kiger will be equipped with an eight-speaker Arkamys sound system, wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, ambient lighting, backlit steering controls, wireless phone charging, auto climate control, a PM 2.5 filter, reverse camera and more.

On the safety front, the fully-loaded Renault Kiger will get front and side airbags, as well as ABS and a seatbelt reminder system.

2021 Renault Kiger engine and gearbox options

The Kiger borrows its powertrains from the Magnite, so it will be available with two petrol engine options, and there will be no diesel engine on offer. Buyers will be able to choose between a 1.0-litre, 3-cylinder, naturally-aspirated unit that makes 72 hp and 96 Nm of torque, and a turbocharged version of the same engine, which churns out 100hp and 160Nm of torque.

As is the case with the Magnite, the Kiger will get a 5-speed manual as standard, and the turbo-petrol version will also be available with a CVT automatic. The difference, however, is that unlike the Magnite, the naturally-aspirated Kiger will also be available with a 5-speed automated manual transmission (AMT); something that isnt yet offered with the Nissan.

Expected Renault Kiger price and rivals

Nissan shocked one and all with the rock-bottom starting price of the Magnite at the time of its launch, and its likely that Renault will go down the same path and price the Kiger rather aggressively. Expect the Renault Kigers prices to be in the range of Rs 5  9.5 lakh (ex-showroom). When it arrives, the Kiger will have to do battle with the Magnite, as well as established players in the segment, such as the Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza, Tata Nexon, Hyundai Venue, Kia Sonet, Ford EcoSport, Toyota Urban Cruiser and the Mahindra XUV300.
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Carolina Village residents exult at vaccine clinic

Maxine Hall was one of the first in line to receive her first COVID-19 vaccination at Carolina Village Monday

A retired nurse, Ms. Hall  or Vaccine Maxine, as she has become known  has seen first-hand the huge impact and difference that a vaccine can make in fighting disease. She worked through the polio epidemic in the 1950s and watched patients, including loved ones, battle HIV in the 1980s and 90s.

Its nothing short of a miracle that we have a vaccine this quickly, she said. Im proud to be getting it!

Our team has been working to bring the vaccine to Carolina Villages Independent Living residents for weeks, said Kevin Parries, Carolina Villages executive director. Our Care Canter and Medical Center residents began receiving their doses in January, so we were anxious to serve all of our residents. Were grateful to have a partner in CVS that allowed our Independent Living residents to receive the vaccine without having to leave campus. Those who dont drive, for example, were extremely worried about being able to get the vaccine. My phones been ringing off the hook.

More than 500 independent living residents received the vaccine on Feb. 15.

This isnt like a normal flu shot clinic, said Parries. From check-in to post-vaccine observation, we have tried to coordinate every detail to keep residents as safe as possible.

Ive been so impressed with how smoothly this has flowed, said resident Nancy Randall. Not that Im surprised. Theyve taken such great care of all of us this past year or so, thinking of everything.

Since the vaccine clinic was the day after Valentines, the Village dubbed it the Breaking Up with COVID clinic. They set a festive atmosphere by decorating with balloons, a photo booth, and other festive details. One banner welcoming people to the check-in area said, Welcome to our vaccine party! We dont have beer, but we do have SHOTS!


remaining of

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New Delhi, Feb 15 : In a relief to NDTV promoters Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy, the Supreme Court on Monday directed Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) to hear their appeals against the orders of market regulator SEBI without the pre-condition of depositing half of the fine.

A bench, headed by Chief Justice S.A. Bobde and comprising Justices A.S. Bopanna and V. Ramasubramanian said: "Appeals are to be heard on March 4. No amount shall be recovered coercively in absence of any deposit for hearing the appeals." However, the top court emphasised that this order shall not be treated as a precedent.

On January 28, the NDTV promoters had informed the Supreme Court that the news channel is facing financial hardship due to limited resources. The submissions were made during the hearing of their appeal challenging the Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) order directing the Roys to deposit 50 per cent of the alleged unlawful gains, which market regulator SEBI said they made.

Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, representing the NDTV promoters, contended before the bench that he is not saying its a pre-deposit (condition). "They will attach my house", he said.

Counsel had submitted that the NDTV promoters were willing to provide a statement of shares and their current market value, and also an undertaking that these shares will not be transferred.

SAT had directed the NDTV promoters to deposit 50 per cent of the disgorged amount before the SEBI. The market regulator had imposed this penalty in the view of alleged violation of various securities norms, where information was concealed from shareholders in connection with certain loan agreements. The SAT had also noted that if NDTV were to deposit the amount, the balance would not be recovered during the pendency of the appeal before the tribunal.

The tribunal, in two separate order passed on January 4, agreed to examine the appeals filed by Roys and scheduled the hearing in the matter on February 21.

The couple had filed appeals against the SEBI November order, which barred them from the securities market for two years and also directed them to disgorge illegal gains of Rs 16.97 crore for indulging in insider trading more than 12 years ago. The news channel has denied these charges.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
The company is set to become the first cannabis company to IPO on the LSE when it lists on Tuesday

Ltd, a maker of vaporisation and inhalation technology for cannabis, is poised to become the first cannabis company to list on the London Stock Exchange when it performs an initial public offering (IPO) on Tuesday.

The Israeli company is set to list on the market through a reverse takeover of ( ) after the transaction was approved by shareholders last week. The listing also follows a move by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) last year to allow medical, but not recreational, cannabis companies to list on the London market after medicinal use of the drug was legalised in the UK in 2018.

In an IPO prospectus published on January 29, Kanabo said it has raised 6mln through the issue of around 92.3mln shares at a price of 6.5p each, while Spinnaker plans to change its name to once the reverse takeover is completed.

The company is also expected to list on the LSE will a market value of around 23.2mln, while the 6mln raised will be used to fund its growth strategy going forward.

"I believe the UK and Europe are ready to embrace the benefits of medicinal cannabis and the overwhelming support and interest from investors has proved this. The roadshow was oversubscribed and this will help the company grow and create value faster than previously expected", Kanabo chief executive Avihu Tamir said in the companys prospectus on January 29.

While it may be the first cannabis firm to IPO on the LSE, Kanabo will not be the only company in the space looking to draw the eye of Londons investors.

Other companies, such as dual-listed phytocannabinoid derived medicines group MGC Pharmaceuticals ( ) and Aquis-listed CBD products firm Sativa Wellness Group Inc ( ), are already looking to tap surging investor interest in the global legal cannabis market, which is expected to be worth around US$65bn by 2027 compared to around US$17.5bn at the end of 2020.
The South African technology press has been reporting that the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) is talking to aerospace manufacturer and space transportation services company SpaceX regarding its satellite-based Starlink internet service.

Starlink is described as a fast, low-latency satellite broadband service that will eventually be available across the world. It uses satellites said to be more than 60 times closer to Earth than traditional satellites, with all that implies for improved latency and better services.

Is this a big deal? Well, Starlink says that during its beta phase, users can expect to see data speeds vary from 50Mb/s to 150Mb/s and latency from 20ms to 40ms in most locations over the next several months (albeit there will be brief periods of no connectivity). It adds: As we launch more satellites, install more ground stations and improve our networking software, data speed, latency and uptime will improve dramatically.

And South Africans can sign up now in advance of a 2022 service launch in their country, by visiting the website, entering their personal details and paying a deposit of $99 via debit or credit card. Once signed up, users will receive a Starlink Kit which includes a Starlink Wi-Fi router, power supply, cables and mounting tripod.

The service is only available to a limited number of South African users per coverage area. Orders will be fulfilled on a first-come, first-served basis.

However, the company requires regulatory approval from ICASA before it can start operating in South Africa. Hence the ongoing discussions, not least, it seems, to resolve potential interference issues.
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Virginia has enabled app-less COVID-19 exposure notification services for iPhone users, joining California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Minnesota, Nevada, Washington, Wisconsin and the District of Columbia. This means iPhone users in those states won't need to install exposure notification apps and can instead turn on notifications in the phone's settings.

The services use the coronavirus exposure notification system built jointly by Apple and Google for their smartphone operating systems, iOS and Android, which the companies updated to work without apps. The system uses the ubiquitous Bluetooth short-range wireless communication technology.

As of January, 20 states and the District of Columbia are using the system for exposure notification apps and app-less services. All of the apps and services are voluntary; however, the island of Maui in Hawaii now requires visitors to use one.

Dozens of apps are being used around the world that alert people if they've been exposed to a person who has tested positive for COVID-19. Many of them also report the identities of the exposed people to public health authorities, which has raised privacy concerns. Several other exposure notification projects, including PACT, BlueTrace and the COVID Watch project, take a similar privacy-protecting approach to Apple's and Google's initiative.

Recently, a study found that contact tracing can be effective in containing diseases such as COVID-19 if large parts of the population participate. Exposure notification schemes like the Apple-Google system aren't true contact tracing systems because they don't allow public health authorities to identify people who have been exposed to infected individuals. But digital exposure notification systems have a big advantage: They can be used by millions of people and rapidly warn those who have been exposed to quarantine themselves.

So how does the Apple-Google exposure notification system work? As researchers who study security and privacy of wireless communication, we have examined the system's specifications and have assessed its effectiveness and privacy implications.

Bluetooth beacons

Because Bluetooth is supported on billions of devices, it seems like an obvious choice of technology for these systems. The protocol used for this is Bluetooth Low Energy, or Bluetooth LE for short. This variant is optimized for energy-efficient communication between small devices, which makes it a popular protocol for smartphones and wearables such as smartwatches.

Bluetooth LE communicates in two main ways. Two devices can communicate over the data channel with each other, such as a smartwatch synchronizing with a phone. Devices can also broadcast useful information to nearby devices over the advertising channel. For example, some devices regularly announce their presence to facilitate automatic connection.

To build an exposure notification app using Bluetooth LE, developers could assign everyone a permanent ID and make every phone broadcast it on an advertising channel. Then, they could build an app that receives the IDs so every phone would be able to keep a record of close encounters with other phones. But that would be a clear violation of privacy. Broadcasting any personally identifiable information via Bluetooth LE is a bad idea, because messages can be read by anyone in range.

Anonymous exchanges

To get around this problem, every phone broadcasts a long random number, which is changed frequently. Other devices receive these numbers and store them if they were sent from close proximity. By using long, unique, random numbers, no personal information is sent via Bluetooth LE.

Apple and Google follow this principle in their specification but add some cryptography. First, every phone generates a unique tracing key that is kept confidentially on the phone. Every day, the tracing key generates a new daily tracing key. Though the tracing key could be used to identify the phone, the daily tracing key can't be used to figure out the phone's permanent tracing key. Then, every 10 to 20 minutes, the daily tracing key generates a new rolling proximity identifier, which looks just like a long random number. This is what gets broadcast to other devices via the Bluetooth advertising channel.

Someone testing positive for COVID-19 can disclose a list of their daily tracing keys, usually from the previous 14 days. Everyone else's phones use the disclosed keys to recreate the infected person's rolling proximity identifiers. The phones then compare the COVID-19-positive identifiers with their own records of the identifiers they received from nearby phones. A match reveals a potential exposure to the virus, but it doesn't identify the patient.

Most of the competing proposals use a similar approach. The principal difference is that Apple's and Google's operating system updates reach far more phones automatically than a single app can. Additionally, by proposing a cross-platform standard, Apple and Google allow existing apps to piggyback and use a common, compatible communication approach that could work across many apps.

No plan is perfect

The Apple-Google exposure notification system is very secure, but it's no guarantee of either accuracy or privacy. The system can produce a large number of false positives because being within Bluetooth range of an infected person doesn't necessarily mean the virus has been transmitted. And even if an app records only very strong signals as a proxy for close contact, it cannot know whether there was a wall, a window or a floor between the phones.

However unlikely, there are ways governments or hackers could track or identify people using the system. Bluetooth LE devices use an advertising address when broadcasting on an advertising channel. Though these addresses can be randomized to protect the identity of the sender, we demonstrated last year that it is theoretically possible to track devices for extended periods of time if the advertising message and advertising address are not changed in sync. To Apple's and Google's credit, they call for these to be changed synchronously.

But even if the advertising address and a coronavirus app's rolling identifier are changed in sync, it may still be possible to track someone's phone. If there isn't a sufficiently large number of other devices nearby that also change their advertising addresses and rolling identifiers in synca process known as mixingsomeone could still track individual devices. For example, if there is a single phone in a room, someone could keep track of it because it's the only phone that could be broadcasting the random identifiers.

Another potential attack involves logging additional information along with the rolling identifiers. Even though the protocol does not send personal information or location data, receiving apps could record when and where they received keys from other phones. If this were done on a large scalesuch as an app that systematically collects this extra informationit could be used to identify and track individuals. For example, if a supermarket recorded the exact date and time of incoming rolling proximity identifiers at its checkout lanes and combined that data with credit card swipes, store staff would have a reasonable chance of identifying which customers were COVID-19 positive.

And because Bluetooth LE advertising beacons use plain-text messages, it's possible to send faked messages. This could be used to troll others by repeating known COVID-19-positive rolling proximity identifiers to many people, resulting in deliberate false positives.

Nevertheless, the Apple-Google system could be the key to alerting thousands of people who have been exposed to the coronavirus while protecting their identities, unlike contact tracing apps that report identifying information to central government or corporate databases.

Explore further How Apple and Google will let your phone warn you if you've been exposed to the coronavirus

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.


Schools in Northern Ireland are not a major source of the transmission of Covid-19, the Public Health Agency (PHA) has said.

During a meeting with the principals of special schools last month the PHA said that transmission of the virus in schools "does occur but tends to be small scale".

The BBC has reported meetings are ongoing between education officials, school principals and union representatives ahead of the planned reopening of all schools on March 8.

Read More

The Executive is set to meet on Thursday to discuss the reopening and other Covid-19 restrictions.

As part of the PHA presentation it emerged that 190 out of 194 secondary schools in Northern Ireland had at least one case of coronavirus in the 2020/21 school year.

Almost 70% of 792 primary schools also had at least one positive case of the virus.

The PHA said the virus in schools "reflect community prevalence" and was not a "major driver" of the second wave of Covid-19.

They said that as cases in the community fall there would also be a reduction in positive cases in schools.

The PHA said that schools transmission occurred on a limited basis and that children were less affected by the virus "in prevalence and severity".

Referring to new variants, the presentation warned that new variants of Covid-19 were more infectious across all age groups, but not worse in children.

The PHA said that preventative measures, including social distancing, good hand and respiratory hygiene and class bubbles had proved effective in stopping the spread of the virus.

Dr Joanne McClean, Consultant in Public Health Medicine with the PHA, said the presentation was given around a month ago to special school principals.

She told BBC Radio Ulster's Nolan Show it was centered on the risk to staff working in special schools.

Some special schools in Northern Ireland remain open despite the restrictions to care for pupils.

Dr McClean said staff were concerned they were being put at risk while others were allowed to stay at home.

"The purpose of the presentation was to present these special school principals the evidence that we have around transmission in schools, and special schools in particular," she explained.

Dr McClean said that while the risk to staff was not zero, "what the evidence has shown us so far is that staff in schools are not more likely to become infected or become really unwell with coronavirus than other members of the workforce".

She said an Office of National Statistics (ONS) study found that staff working in schools are not at greater risk than other workers.

The PHA consultant accepted that schools contribute to the transmission of the virus in the community, increasing the R number by 0.3-0.6.

"The contribution comes not just from what goes on in the classroom, but what goes on around schools," Dr McClean said.

It comes as Queen's University virologist Dr Connor Bamford has warned opening schools before April will result in Northern Ireland enduring another deadly surge of Covid-19.

"We need to get cases down as low as possible before we start to ease restrictions - we saw what happened when the schools went back last September and we never really got on top of community transmission from there," he said.

On Sunday Dr Tom Black, the chairman of the British Medical Association in Northern Ireland, said it would be a "big ask" to reopen secondary schools on March 8. Schools were closed until at least that date at the start of January.

But speaking on BBC NI's Sunday Politics programme, he said the reopening of primary schools was more likely because transmission infection in younger children is much lower.
The funeral of convicted criminal Philip Griffiths turned into a frightening spectacle and had to be abandoned by the priest on Saturday after dozens of mourners turned up at the Crumlin church, in breach of Covid regulations.

The priest refused to begin the mass because of the numbers who had gathered, and angry mourners said their own prayers and gave a eulogy before removing the coffin from St Agnes Church and taking it away for burial.

A church source said the burial took place without a priest.

Speaking about the stand-off in the church, the source said the gardai handled it very well and professionally.

It was over as quick as it started, but it was quite frightening. The gardai did a very good job under difficult circumstances, they explained.

Gardai later called to a house in nearby Sundrive Park where a large number of people had gathered to mark the death of father-of-three Griffiths (40).

Under Level 5 Covid restrictions, only 10 mourners are allowed to attend a funeral and house parties are banned.

Griffiths was found dead in an apartment in the Orwell Road area of Rathgar in south Dublin on February 8. His death was being treated as a personal tragedy and there was no foul play involved.

Two years ago he was named in High Court papers as a member of the drugs and crime gang led by Liam Byrne  the man now regarded as the right-hand man of Daniel Kinahan.

The Criminal Assets Bureau told the High Court that Griffiths was part of the Byrne gang.

He was previously jailed in 2001 for seven years, after he was caught with 1.5m of ecstasy and cocaine in a Dublin hotel in March 2000.

That seizure, in a hotel room on Pearse Street, Dublin, was the catalyst that led to the Crumlin/Drimnagh feud after internal gang allegations of an informant within the camp.

Gang member Declan Gavin (21) was in a different room when gardai raided the hotel, and as a result he was not prosecuted, which led to accusations of him being a rat.

Gavin was later stabbed to death in Crumlin and the feud spiralled out of control, leaving 15 men dead over the following years.

Gardai believe that Griffiths became active with the Byrne gang following his release from jail in 2005.

In a statement, gardai confirmed it was aware of the funeral that took place in Crumlin on Saturday.

Gardai attended the scene and engaged with those present. Gardai also attended a property in Sundrive Park on the night of February 13, following reports of a party in the property. Gardai discovered a number of people present in breach of current Covid-19 regulations, engaged with those present, and they eventually dispersed, the statement said.

It added that the Health Act provides certain restrictions on funerals but they are not penal regulations, meaning there would be no penalty for the breach.

Where Gardai identify potential breaches of the public health regulations, a file is prepared for the DPP in each case or a Fixed Payment Notice is issued where appropriate, the garda statement said.

The Covid-19 Pandemic remains a public health crisis and An Garda Siochana continues to appeal to all citizens to demonstrate personal and social responsibility to comply with public health guidelines and regulations, in particular essential journeys, in order to continue to save lives, it added.
The problem with this moral logic is that besieging an oppressive regime usually harms not the oppressor but the oppressed. In a 2019 study, the economists Antonis Adam and Sofia Tsarsitalidou found that when the United States sanctions an autocratic government, civil liberties get worse. A 2020 article in the Journal of Development Studies found that both American and United Nations sanctions lead to lower life expectancy. As the political scientists Dursun Peksen and Cooper Drury have explained, dictators respond to embargoes by hoarding scarce resources, and using them to reward their cronies and starve their opponents, thus further entrenching their power. They think they are hurting President Maduro, a Venezuelan woman whose child couldnt get epilepsy medicine told the German media outlet Deutsche Welle in 2019, and theyre really hurting the people.

Americas sieges might be more defensible  or at least briefer  if they stood a reasonable chance of success. The sanctions on Iran that the United States and the U.N. imposed during Barack Obamas presidency harmed ordinary Iranians. But their intent was to convince Irans government to compromise on its nuclear program, not utterly capitulate, or give up power. And, arguably, they helped achieve that relatively modest goal.

By contrast, none of Americas current sieges are married to remotely realistic objectives. Despite Americas efforts to oust them, Mr. Maduro and President Bashar al-Assad of Syria are more firmly in control today than when the United States imposed its harshest sanctions. After more than a decade of escalating punishments aimed at pressuring North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, that nation possesses as many as 60 of them. Iran is closer to the bomb than it was when the Trump administrations maximum pressure campaign began, and just as influential across the Middle East.

Despite this, Americas other forever war retains substantial bipartisan support. Thats especially true in Congress, where politicians who have lost their appetite for deploying troops see an apparently cost-free way to signal their opposition to repressive and adversarial governments  and dont care if the real costs are borne by the suffering people they claim to support.

To its credit, the Biden administration is reviewing whether sanctions are unduly hindering responses to the Covid-19 pandemic. But the agony caused by Americas sieges didnt begin when the virus hit, and wont end when it passes.

Mr. Biden wants to re-enter the Iran nuclear deal, which would entail lifting nuclear sanctions on Tehran. However, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has promised that Americas numerous non-nuclear sanctions will remain. He has called the 2019 law that threatens foreign companies doing business in Syria with secondary sanctions a very important tool. Hes proposed that the United States more effectively target sanctions on Venezuela, yet suggested that Americas siege of North Korea  which has forced multiple international charities to leave the country  isnt tough enough.

Why are policies that have proved so ineffective and immoral so hard to undo? Because abandoning them would require admitting hard truths: North Korea will not abandon its nuclear weapons. Iran will remain a regional power. Mr. Assad, Mr. Maduro and the Communist government in Havana arent going anywhere. Americas leaders would rather punish already brutalized populations than concede the limits of American power.
The lead from The Atlantics Ronald Brownstein last Thursday was dire: Democrats face a daunting future of severe Republican gerrymandering that could flip control of the House in 2022 and suppress diverse younger generations political influence for years to come.

Brownsteins assessment is drawn from a new Brennan Center for Justice report, which found that Republican state legislatures will fully control the U.S. House redistricting process in 18 states, while Democrats will control only seven. The redistricting process will begin soon, following the completion of the census, which will determine whether states gain or lose House seats. Meanwhile, the Democrats For the People Act includes a provision requiring states to use independent commissions, not state legislatures, to draw congressional district lines. As Republicans could create enough favorable districts to overcome the Democrats narrow House majority in the 2022 midterm elections, Brownstein counsels Democrats to urgently abolish the filibuster, pass their sweeping voting rights legislation, and stop gerrymandering for good.

Its hard to defend the practice of a single political party drawing congressional district lines to tilt elections in their favor. But does gerrymandering pose such an existential threat to Democrats that they must abolish filibuster in order to defuse it? The premise is based on a series of commonly held but flawed assumptions.

The first is that, in the years following the aggressive gerrymandering of 2011 and 2012, Republicans won an outsized number of House seats disproportionate to their share of the vote.

That was initially true. In the 2012 House elections, the first after last decades redistricting, Democrats won a 48.8% plurality of votes nationwide, yet Republicans took 53.8% of the seats. In 2014 and 2016, Republican won the most votes but their share of House seats remained disproportionately higher.

However, the tide turned in 2018. Democrats not only took the House majority, but their share of seats was roughly equal to their share of the vote. The same held true in 2020. Thanks to court rulings throwing out Republican gerrymanders, Democrats netted one Virginia seat in 2016, three Pennsylvania seats in 2018, and two North Carolina seats in 2020. But otherwise, Democratic gains  a net of 47 seats in the 2016 and 2018 elections  were earned on the same maps of the prior three elections.

The second wrongly held assumption is the gerrymandering was the primary reason Republicans did so well in the first half of the last decade. In 2013, political scientists John Sides and Eric McGhee simulated the 2012 House election using 2008 maps, and found that the intervening redistricting appeared to give Republicans seven more House seats. (Republicans won a 17-seat majority that year.) But then they factored in the advantage of incumbency, as incumbents ran five points better than non-incumbents that year. They concluded in a Washington Post column that, once we took incumbency into account, the apparent effect of gerrymandering vanished. That is, the ability of Republicans to retain the House majority may have been due to incumbency advantage, not new and more favorable districts.

Remember, Republicans had a lot of incumbents in 2012 because they flipped 63 House seats in 2010 to take control the House  before that decades round of redistricting.

A third assumption is that to the extent that gerrymanders work as intended, the impact is long-lasting. But our experience of the past decade calls that into question.

The 2012 election was christened The Great Gerrymander by Sam Wang of the Princeton Election Consortium in a New York Times op-ed. He identified 10 states where a political party won more House seats than if the state had district lines that were not contorted to protect a political party or an incumbent. Seven of those states had district lines drawn by Republicans  Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin. An eighth, Texas, had lines drawn by Republicans and the federal courts.

How did those lines hold up? As noted above, courts recently forced Pennsylvania and North Carolina to redraw those lines. Today, Pennsylvania has an evenly divided House delegation that is reflective of the House popular vote. North Carolina still has a Republican skew; eight of the 13 seats are Republican while the popular vote was roughly even.

Ohio as well retains a big Republican skew, grabbing 75% of the states 16 seats with 56.5% of the vote.

Smaller Republican skews can be found in Florida (59.3% of the seats, 52.3% of the vote) Texas (63.9% of the seats, 53.4% of the vote), and Wisconsin (62.5% of the seats, 51.4% of the vote.) But in 2010, before redistricting, the Republican seat share/vote share disparity in Florida was more than double the size of today. The skews in Texas and Wisconsin were slightly wider yet roughly similar to today; also, the partisan composition of the Texas delegation is slightly more Democratic than 10 years ago, with no change in the Wisconsin delegation.

And Republican-drawn lines did not protect their House delegation majorities in Michigan and Virginia. In Michigan after 2010, Republicans flipped control of the delegation and held nine of 15 seats. Michigan lost a seat in redistricting, and Republicans held nine of 14 seats after 2012. But Democrats picked off two seats in 2018 and held them in 2020, evening out the delegation.

In Virginia after 2010, Republicans also flipped control of the delegation, claiming eight of 11 seats. That held until 2016, when Democrats picked up a seat after a court ruling forced a redraw of one racially gerrymandered district. Then in 2018, Democrats flipped three seats and took control of the delegation, retaining it in 2020. Most notably, in 2020, Virginia Democrats won 63.6% of the seats with only 52% of the vote.

Of course specific gerrymanders can work for one political party and undoing them can help the other; the examples of court-ordered redraws cited above prove that. But lines drawn in one year cant anticipate demographic shifts and reversed political winds in future years. They may end up as just the proverbial finger in the dyke.

Having said that, Republicans may well be poised for a significant short-term gain in 2022. RealClearPolitics Sean Trende estimated that with only modest gerrymandering, combined with expected changes in the size of state congressional delegations following the census, Republicans could net a gain of six House seats. This sends Democrats in a panic, since Republicans only need five to win back the chamber.

Meanwhile, some Republican strategists are trying to lower expectations. The Washington Examiners David Drucker recently reported that the continued bluing of formerly ruby-red suburbs and the uncertain outcome of expected Democratic legal challenges to new congressional maps could blunt Republican gains from new lines.

So, would a nationwide requirement for independent commissions, as proposed in the For the People Act, help Democrats? Maybe, so long as such commissions undid past aggressive Republican gerrymanders. But what if such commissions also sought to redraw lines that have produced partisan skews without aggressive gerrymanders?

For example, Democrats hold all the congressional seats in Massachusetts and Connecticut, all but one in Maryland, Nevada, and Oregon, and all but two in New Jersey. With the exception of Maryland, these are not considered gerrymandered states. And while they are mostly deep blue states, Democrats there are still enjoying a seat share/vote share discrepancy. Independent commissions could try to help Republicans overcome their inefficient blue-state distribution and gain more representation.

None of this is to say that independent commissions are a bad idea. But do Democrats have to move heaven, earth and the filibuster to impose them nationwide, or face obliteration in the House elections?

Its probably a moot question; if Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema continue to rule out eliminating the filibuster, Democrats wont be passing their voting rights bill as is on a party-line vote.

Democrats need not fret. Gerrymandering never was the reason they lost the House in 2010, since that was before redistricting. A midterm election is inherently treacherous for the party in power, wherever the lines are drawn.

But if Democrats can retain their popularity in the suburbs with a good performance in office, and can successfully battle any particularly egregious gerrymandering in the state courthouses, theyll do just fine.

Most importantly, if Democrats do lose in the House in 2022, they can still win it back in a subsequent election, as they did in 2018. Gerrymandering doesnt last forever.
China took the lead in spreading foreign disinformation about COVID-19's origins, a new investigation has found.

Among powerful forces around the world, Beijing's propaganda machines played a key role in churning out conspiracies about the coronavirus originating from other countries, according to a nine-month investigation by Associated Press.

Leading media and officials in Russia, Iran and the US  including Donald Trump  also ramped up politically motivated false claims in a global race to control the narrative about where the virus came from, the report said.

China took the lead in spreading foreign disinformation about COVID-19's origins, a new investigation has found. In this file photo taken on February 6, 2020, medical workers transfer a coronavirus patient in the isolation ward at a hospital in Wuhan, Hubei province

It took just three months for the rumour that COVID-19 was engineered as a bioweapon to spread from the fringes of the Chinese internet and take root in millions of peoples minds.

By March 2020, belief that the virus had been human-made and possibly weaponised was widespread, multiple surveys indicated.

The Pew Research Center found, for example, that one in three Americans believed the new coronavirus had been created in a lab; one in four thought it had been engineered intentionally.

This chaos was, at least in part, manufactured, according to a nine-month Associated Press investigation of state-sponsored disinformation conducted in collaboration with the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab.

Powerful forces, from Beijing and Washington to Moscow and Tehran, have battled to control the narrative about where the virus came from.

As the pandemic swept the world, it was China that took the lead in spreading foreign disinformation about COVID-19's origins.

FILE - Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian speaks during a daily briefing at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs office in Beijing on February 24, 2020. Zhao has repeatedly suggested on Twitter that the coronavirus might have come from the US Army

Most of the first cases recorded in Wuhan at the beginning of the pandemic were associated with the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, seen in a picture taken on March 20, 2020

Coronavirus DID start in China and 'exploded' at a Wuhan wet market after spreading from bats - despite Beijing's claim it could have arrived on frozen Australian beef, WHO scientist says The coronavirus pandemic started in China and 'exploded' at the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan, an Australian scientist investigating the origins of the pandemic claims. Professor Dominic Dwyer was one of 14 scientists who travelled to China over the past month in a World Health Organisation investigation into the virus that has killed 2.3 million people around the world. On Tuesday many were shocked to hear the leader of the WHO team, Peter Embarek, echo Communist Party's assertions that frozen food imports, such as Australian beef, could have led to the initial outbreak. However, Prof Dwyer, a microbiologist and infectious diseases expert, broke ranks with those claims, saying the source of the virus was most likely bats as previously suspected. 'The evidence for it starting elsewhere in the world is actually very limited. There is some evidence but it's not really very good,' he told Nine News. 'We know that other viruses that are closely related to [Covid-19] are present in bats. We know that other viruses like MERS and SARS back in 2003 also came from bats. 'Now these bats don't respect borders of course so they are present not just in China but in other parts on South East Asia and indeed elsewhere around the world.' From bats the contagion probably transferred to an intermediate animal such as a pangolin or a cat - which are sold at the traditional Chinese exotic animal 'wet markets' as food. Advertisement

Leading officials and allied media in all four countries functioned as super-spreaders of disinformation, using their stature to sow doubt and amplify politically expedient conspiracies already in circulation.

The analysis was based on a review of millions of social media postings and articles on Twitter, Facebook, VK, Weibo, WeChat, YouTube, Telegram, and other platforms.

Beijing was reacting to weeks of fiery rhetoric from leading U.S. Republicans, including then-President Donald Trump, who sought to rebrand COVID-19 as 'the China virus.'

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs says Beijing has worked to promote friendship and serve facts, while defending itself against hostile forces seeking to politicise the pandemic.

'All parties should firmly say 'no' to the dissemination of disinformation,' the ministry said in a statement to AP, but added, 'In the face of trumped-up charges, it is justified and proper to bust lies and clarify rumours by setting out the facts.'

The day after the World Health Organization designated the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic, Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), shot off a series of late-night tweets that launched what may be the party's first truly global digital experiment with overt disinformation.

Chinese diplomats have only recently mobilised on Western social media platforms, more than tripling their Twitter accounts and more than doubling their Facebook accounts since late 2019. Both platforms are banned in China.

'When did patient zero begin in US?' Zhao tweeted on March 12. 'How many people are infected? What are the names of the hospitals? It might be US army who brought the epidemic to Wuhan. Be transparent! Make public your data! US owe (sic) us an explanation!'

What happened next showcases the power of China's global messaging machine.

On Twitter alone, Zhao's aggressive spray of 11 tweets on March 12 and 13 was cited over 99,000 times over the next six weeks, in at least 54 languages, according to analysis conducted by DFRLab.

The accounts that referenced him had nearly 275 million followers on Twitter - a number that almost certainly includes duplicate followers and does not distinguish fake accounts.

Multiple countries have uncovered evidence that the virus was circulating months earlier than originally thought. While Beijing has tried to insist this proves the virus originated elsewhere, most scientists still think China was the origin - raising the prospect that communist officials simply hid evidence of the early spread

Influential conservatives on Twitter, including Donald Trump Jr., hammered Zhao, propelling his tweets to their largest audiences.

China's Global Times and at least 30 Chinese diplomatic accounts, from France to Panama, rushed in to support Zhao.

Venezuela's foreign minister and RT's correspondent in Caracas, as well as Saudi accounts close to the kingdom's royal family also significantly extended Zhao's reach, helping launch his ideas into Spanish and Arabic.

His accusations got uncritical treatment in Russian and Iranian state media and shot back through QAnon discussion boards. But his biggest audience, by far, lay within China itself - despite the fact that Twitter is banned there.

Popular hashtags about his tweet-storm were viewed 314 million times on the Chinese social media platform Weibo, which does not distinguish unique views.

Late on the night of March 13, Zhao posted a message of gratitude on his personal Weibo: 'Thank you for your support to me, let us work hard for the motherland !'

Chinese scientists and officials have been keen to point the finger of blame outside their own borders - variously suggesting that the virus could have originated in Bangladesh, the US, Greece, Australia, India, Italy, Czech Republic, Russia or Serbia

China leaned on Russian disinformation strategy and infrastructure, turning to an established network of Kremlin proxies to seed and spread messaging.

In January, Russian state media were the first to legitimise the theory that the US engineered the virus as a weapon. Russian politicians soon joined the chorus.

'One was amplifying the other... How much it was command controlled, how much it was opportunistic, it was hard to tell,' said Janis Sarts, director of the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, based in Riga, Latvia.

Iran also jumped in. The same day Zhao tweeted that the virus might have come from the US Army, Irans Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei announced COVID-19 could be the result of a biological attack. He would later cite that conspiracy to justify refusing COVID-19 aid from the US

Ten days after Zhao's first conspiratorial tweets, China's global state media apparatus kicked in.

'Did the U.S. government intentionally conceal the reality of COVID-19 with the flu?' asked a suggestive op-ed in Mandarin published by China Radio International on March 22.

'Why was the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Ft. Detrick in Maryland, the largest biochemical testing base, shut down in July 2019?'

Within days, versions of the piece appeared more than 350 times in Chinese state outlets, mostly in Mandarin, but also around the world in English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and Arabic, AP found.

China's Embassy in France promoted the story on Twitter and Facebook. It appeared on YouTube, Weibo, WeChat and a host of Chinese video platforms, including Haokan, Xigua, Baijiahao, Bilibili, iQIYI, Kuaishou and Youku.

A seven-second version set to driving music appeared on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok.

'Clearly pushing these kinds of conspiracy theories, disinformation, does not usually result in any negative consequences for them,' said Mareike Ohlberg, a senior fellow in the Asia Program of the German Marshall Fund.

In April, Russia and Iran largely dropped the bioweapon conspiracy in their overt messaging.

China, however, has carried on.

In January, as a team from the World Health Organization poured through records in China to try to pinpoint the origins of the virus, MOFA spokeswoman Hua Chunying urged the US to 'open the biological lab at Fort Detrick, give more transparency to issues like its 200-plus overseas bio-labs, invite WHO experts to conduct origin-tracing in the United States.'

Her remarks went viral in China.

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs told AP it resolutely opposes spreading conspiracy theories. 'We have not done it before and will not do it in the future,' the ministry said in a statement.

'False information is the common enemy of mankind, and China has always opposed the creation and spread of false information.'
OFFUTT AIR FORCE BASE, Neb. (AP)  The remains of more than 300 sailors and Marines who died when the USS Oklahoma sank during the attack on Pearl Harbor 79 years ago have been identified thanks to the work of experts at Offutt Air Force Base.
Members of the Aam Aadmi Party demand the release of Indian climate activist Disha Ravi during a protest in Mumbai (Rafiq Maqbool/AP)

Scores of people have demonstrated in the Indian cities of Bengaluru and Mumbai after a climate activist was arrested for circulating a document on social media supporting months of massive protests by farmers.

Disha Ravi, 22, was arrested in Bengaluru on Saturday.

Police said at a news conference on Monday that the document spread misinformation about the farmer protests on the outskirts of New Delhi and tarnished the image of India.

They say Ms Ravi shared the document with Swedish teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg, who tweeted it earlier this month.

Expand Close Activists hold placards demanding the release of Indian climate activist Disha Ravi during a protest in Mumbai (Rafiq Maqbool/AP) / Facebook

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Whatsapp Activists hold placards demanding the release of Indian climate activist Disha Ravi during a protest in Mumbai (Rafiq Maqbool/AP)

Police say the sharing of the document on social media indicated there was a conspiracy behind violence on January 26, Indias Republic Day, when the largely peaceful farmer protests erupted into clashes with police.

One protester died and hundreds of police and demonstrators were injured.

The call was to wage economic, social, cultural and regional war against India, police tweeted on Sunday.

Demonstrators on Monday in the southern city of Bengaluru, including prominent historian Ramachandra Guha, held placards calling for Ms Ravis immediate release.

In the western city of Mumbai, around 50 people also demanded that Ms Ravi be freed.

Her arrest has been condemned in India and beyond.

Opposition parties called her arrest harassment, intimidation and an attack on democracy.

Overseas, the niece of US vice president Kamala Harris, Meena Harris, criticised the government on Twitter for silencing activists.

Expand Close A man demands the release of Disha Ravi during a protest in Bengaluru (Aijaz Rahi/AP) / Facebook

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Whatsapp A man demands the release of Disha Ravi during a protest in Bengaluru (Aijaz Rahi/AP)

Police also issued arrest warrants for two other activists, Nikita Jacob and Shantanu Muluk, saying the three created the document and shared it with others.

Police said the document contained links to websites that were pro-Khalistani, a movement for an independent Sikh homeland called Khalistan in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

The government initially tried to discredit the protesting farmers, many of whom are Sikhs, as motivated by religious nationalism.

Since November, tens of thousands of farmers have camped outside the capital and blocked roads to protest over new agricultural reform laws they say will devastate their incomes.

The protests have posed a major challenge to Prime Minister Narendra Modis Hindu nationalist-led government, which says the laws are needed to modernise Indian farming.

Critics have accused the government of using the massive demonstrations to escalate a crackdown on free speech.

The protests attracted international attention earlier this month when pop star Rihanna, Ms Thunberg and Meena Harris tweeted their support.

Indias Ministry of External Affairs condemned vested interest groups trying to enforce their agenda.
The Minister-designate for Education says the Nana Addo-led government will improve on Science Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) programs to prepare students for the job market right after school.



Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum said the initiative will be a priority in Ghanas education in the second term of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to help all students as the world goes high-tech.



He has earlier informed the vetting committee governments plans to build more centres in some communities for students to have unique skills.



Currently, a centre is under construction at Jachie in the Bosomtwe Constituency to commence the STEM program in Ghana  entry will be free after a special exam by the education service.



The edifice classrooms will also be designed into a laboratory to boost tech teachings.



The school will specifically train students in Science Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.



Students from class 6 to SHS 3 will be trained on robotics, lab tech, artefact creation, mammal surgery among other related subjects to prepare them for the future.



About STEM



STEM is an approach to learning and development that integrates the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics.



Through STEM, students develop key skills including:



Problem-solving



Creativity



Critical analysis



Teamwork



Independent thinking



Initiative



Communication



Digital literacy.



Why is STEM important?



The global economy is changing. Current jobs are disappearing due to automation and new jobs are emerging every day as a result of technological advances.



The continual advances in technology are changing the way students learn, connect and interact every day. Skills developed by students through STEM provide them with the foundation to succeed at school and beyond.



Employer demand for STEM qualifications and skills is high and will continue to increase in the future. Currently, 75 per cent of jobs in the fastest growing industries require workers with STEM skills. To be competitive, the contemporary Ghanaian workforce needs people who can adapt to a changing workplace.



STEM empowers individuals with the skills to succeed and

Source: Peacefmonline.com









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Bombay High Court will deliver verdict in a case against Sushant Singh Rajput's sisters filed by actress Rhea Chakraborty on Tuesday. Ahead of the court's verdict, Sushant's sister Shweta Singh Kirti took to Instagram to share a heartbreaking post remembering her brother.

"Kahan chala gaya baby?? Just come back... it has been 8 months...havent seen you or heard from you.... Please, come back," she wrote alongside a picture of the late actor.

Rhea Chakraborty, who is accused of abetting the suicide of actor Sushant Singh Rajput, had filed a complaint with Mumbai Police, accusing Rajput's sister Priyanka Singh and a Delhi-based doctor of forgery and preparing a "fake" prescription of medicines for anxiety. In her complaint sent to the Bandra police here on Sunday, Chakraborty sought that Priyanka Singh and Dr Tarun Kumar, working with Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital in Delhi, be booked under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code for forgery, the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act and the Telemedicine Practice Guidelines.

The 28-year-old actress in her complaint said Rajput was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and was undergoing treatment for various other mental health issues. However, Rajput was not disciplined in following the treatment and would often abruptly stop his medications, she further said in the complaint.

"On June 8, 2020, Rajput showed me the messages he and his sister Priyanka had exchanged in which Priyanka sent him a list of medicines to take. I explained to Rajput that he has already been prescribed medicines by doctors who are treating him," Chakraborty said in her complaint. "He (Rajput), however, disagreed with me and insisted that he would only take the medicine his sister was prescribing," she said.

On the same day, Rajput asked Chakraborty to leave the house as his sister Meetu Singh was coming to stay with him for a few days, according to the complaint. "It has now come to light that Rajput on June 8 told his sister Priyanka that he would not be able to obtain the said medicines without a prescription. His sister Priyanka subsequently on the same day sent him a prescription signed by one Dr Tarun Kumar, working with the Dr Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital in Delhi," the complaint said.

"Prima facie, the prescription appeared to be fabricated. The medicines prescribed by the doctor are prohibited from being prescribed electronically without consultation with the patient," Chakraborty said in the complaint. "Rajput died just a few days after he obtained the prescription, wherein he was unlawfully prescribed psychotropic substances at the behest of his sister Priyanka and the doctor Tarun Kumar," she said.

Rajput, 34, was found hanging in his apartment in suburban Bandra on June 14 following which the Mumbai Police had lodged an Accidental Death Report (ADR). On July 25, Rajput's father K K Singh lodged a complaint with Patna police against Rhea Chakraborty, her parents Indrajit and Sandhya Chakraborty, her brother Showik Chakraborty, the late actor's former manager Shruti Modi and his house manager Samuel Miranda.

He accused them of cheating and abetting his son's suicide. He also claimed that the accused persons had siphoned off Rs 15 crore from his son's bank accounts. Based on this allegation, the Enforcement Directorate is probing money laundering charges.

The FIR lodged by Patna police was later transferred to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) is probing drugs angle in the case.

(with inputs from PTI)
Nearly a year after the COVID-19 pandemic began tossing people out of work, a circuit judge is again poised to consider a potential class-action lawsuit stemming from major problems in Floridas unemployment compensation system.

Leon County Circuit Judge John Cooper is scheduled Tuesday to hear arguments about whether he should dismiss the lawsuit filed against the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity and Deloitte Consulting, LLP, a contractor that helped put the states CONNECT online unemployment system in place in 2013.

Cooper in September dismissed an earlier version of the lawsuit but gave the plaintiffs an opportunity to file a revised complaint. The case seeks damages and raises several arguments, including that the department and Deloitte were negligent and breached a fiduciary duty.

DEO (the department) breached its fiduciary duty to the hundreds of thousands of Floridians who now await their life-sustaining funds and encounter roadblock after roadblock to payment, said the revised lawsuit, filed Nov. 16 by plaintiffs attorneys Gautier Kitchen and Marie Mattox. The damages flowing from defendants breach multiply daily as people lose homes, cars, savings and dignity.

But in motions to dismiss the case, attorneys for the department and Deloitte said the plaintiffs are repeating arguments that were in the version of the case rejected by Cooper in September.

They contend Cooper should also dismiss the latest version for a series of reasons, including the constitutional separation of powers between courts and the executive branch of government; sovereign immunity, which helps shield government agencies from lawsuits; and a lack of a legal basis for showing a fiduciary duty.

Simply put, the (version of the case filed in November) is substantively indistinguishable from the one the court has already found to be deficient and provides no basis for the court to revisit its prior conclusions, Deloitte attorneys wrote in a Dec. 7 motion to dismiss the case.

Story continues

The CONNECT system was overwhelmed after the pandemic slammed into the state in March and forced businesses to shut down or dramatically scale back operations. The state scrambled to shore up the system, but many people who lost jobs remained frustrated as they tried to get benefits  with Gov. Ron DeSantis even describing the system as a jalopy.

The plaintiffs filed the potential class-action lawsuit in April. Cooper in May rejected a preliminary injunction that plaintiffs sought to force the Department of Economic Opportunity to fix the system.

Coopers Sept. 30 order dismissing the case did not give detailed reasons, saying only that he grants the motion to dismiss on the grounds argued by the defendants, while allowing plaintiffs to subsequently file the revised version.

During a June hearing, Department of Economic Opportunity attorney Daniel Nordby argued, in part, that the lawsuit should be dismissed because of the constitutional separation of powers. He said decisions by the department involve a great deal of discretion that cannot be second-guessed by judges under the separation of powers.

As of a Thursday count, the unemployment system had processed more than 5.16 million claims since March 15, with 2.36 million found to be eligible, according to the Department of Economic Opportunitys website. The system had paid about $22.2 billion in benefits, with the most of that money flowing through the state from the federal government.

The World Health Organization(WHO) gave emergency use approval to AstraZeneca's Covid-19 vaccines on Monday, allowing distribution to some of the world's poorest countries to begin.

A WHO statement said it had approved the vaccine as produced by AstraZeneca-SKBio (Republic of Korea) and the Serum Institute of India.

Countries with no access to vaccines to date will finally be able to start vaccinating their health workers and populations at risk, contributing to the COVAX Facilitys goal of equitable vaccine distribution," said Dr Mariangela Simao, WHO Assistant-Director General for Access to Medicines and Health Products.

But we must keep up the pressure to meet the needs of priority populations everywhere and facilitate global access. To do that, we need two things  a scale-up of manufacturing capacity, and developers early submission of their vaccines for WHO review."

WHOs Emergency Use Listing (EUL) assesses the quality, safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines and is a prerequisite for COVAX Facility vaccine supply. It also allows countries to expedite their own regulatory approval to import and administer COVID-19 vaccines.

The WHO EUL process can be carried out quickly when vaccine developers submit the full data required by WHO in a timely manner. Once those data are submitted, WHO can rapidly assemble its evaluation team and regulators from around the world to assess the information and, when necessary, carry out inspections of manufacturing sites.

In the case of the two AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccines, WHO assessed the quality, safety and efficacy data, risk management plans and programmatic suitability, such as cold chain requirements. The process took under four weeks.

The vaccine was reviewed on 8 February by WHOs Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE), which makes recommendations for vaccines use in populations (i.e. recommended age groups, intervals between shots, advice for specific groups such as pregnant and lactating women). The SAGE recommended the vaccine for all age groups 18 and above.

The AstraZeneca/Oxford product is a viral vectored vaccine called ChAdOx1-S [recombinant]. It is being produced at several manufacturing sites, as well as in the Republic of Korea and India. ChAdOx1-S has been found to have 63.09% efficacy and is suitable for low- and middle-income countries due to easy storage requirements.

Nearly 109 million people have been reported to be infected by the novel coronavirus globally and more than 2.5 million have died, according to a Reuters tally.

Infections have been reported in more than 210 countries and territories since the first cases were identified in China in December 2019.

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The new findings point to the dangers of countries easing restrictions as the variant takes hold in the

British government scientists are increasingly finding the coronavirus variant first detected in Britain to be linked to a higher risk of death than other versions of the virus, a devastating trend that highlights the serious risks and considerable uncertainties of this new phase of the pandemic. The scientists said last month that there was a "realistic possibility" that the variant was not only more contagious than others, but also more lethal. Now, they say in a new document that it is likely that the variant is linked to an increased risk of hospitalization and death.

The British government did not publicly announce the updated findings, which are based on roughly twice as many studies as its earlier assessment and include more deaths from COVID-19 cases caused by the new variant, known as B.1.1.7. It posted the document on a government website Friday.

The reasons for an elevated death rate are not entirely clear. Some evidence suggests that people infected with the variant may have higher viral loads, a feature that could not only make the virus more contagious but also potentially undermine the effectiveness of certain treatments.

But scientists are also trying to understand how much of the increased risk of death may stem from the propensity of the variant to spread very easily through settings like nursing homes, where people are already vulnerable.

No matter the explanation, scientific advisers to the British government said Saturday, the new findings laid bare the dangers of countries easing restrictions as the variant takes hold.

The variant has spread to at least 82 countries, and is being transmitted 35% to 45% more easily than other variants in the United States, scientists recently estimated. U.S. officials have suggested that the variant could be the dominant source of infection there by March.

The overall picture is one of something like a 40% to 60% increase in hospitalization risk and risk of death, Neil Ferguson, a public health researcher and scientific adviser to the British government, said in an interview Saturday. Referring to the tight restrictions on socializing that are in effect across Britain, he said, It reinforces the policy measures in place.

Most COVID-19 cases, even those caused by the new variant, are not fatal. And the government scientists were relying on studies that examined a small proportion of overall deaths.

The scientists also struggled to account for the presence of underlying illnesses in people infected with the new variant, and for whether the cases originated in nursing homes.

They were largely limited to studying people who had tested positive for the virus at community testing sites, rather than in hospitals. A quirk of hospital tests means that many cannot detect an altered gene that is often used as a proxy for the variant.

One of the studies that fed the new government findings also offered alarming, though very preliminary, signs that the elevated risk from the new variant held especially among Black and Asian Britons. That raised the notion that because the variant was more contagious, it could be hitting vulnerable populations harder.

Overall, the government scientists assessment that the variant was likely to be linked to a higher risk of death still only signaled 55% to 75% confidence in the finding.

I think these results are possibly genuine, although there are still several limitations, and we need to understand what causes it, said Muge Cevik, an infectious disease expert at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland and a scientific adviser to the British government.

She added that there are other explanations of this increased severity, among them that the variant may transmit disproportionately in settings with frailer people, like nursing homes, because it is more transmissible.

The biggest danger of the new variant remains its propensity to spread: It is thought to be 30% to 50% more transmissible, although some scientists put the figure higher than that.

Since the first sample of the variant was collected in southeastern England in September, it has become the dominant source of infection in Britain. It accounts for more than 90% of cases in many parts of the country.

A stringent lockdown has recently driven down the number of new cases, but only after British hospitals became overwhelmed. An easing of the lockdown could trigger a sharp rise in cases caused by the variant.

Roughly 117,000 people have died from the coronavirus in Britain, half of them since the end of November as the variant spread.

This has been quite catastrophic in terms of mortality, said Ferguson, the public health researcher. And thats a result of both the increased transmissibility and the increased lethality.

A recent study by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, one of those the government scientists relied on, offered rough estimates of the effect of the variant. It examined 3,382 deaths, 1,722 of them in people infected with the variant, and estimated that the risk of death was 58% higher among cases caused by the variant.

For men from 55 to 69 years old, for example, that raised the overall risk of death from to 0.9% from 0.6%. For women in that age group, it raised the overall risk of death to 0.3% from 0.2%.

"Calculating when we can lift restrictions has to be influenced by this," Simon Clarke, an associate professor in cellular microbiology at the University of Reading, said of the new report. "It provides extra evidence that this variant is more lethal than the one we dealt with last time."

He added that the findings vindicated the British governments decision to raise an alarm about the variant in December and then publish evidence last month that it was potentially more lethal. Some outside scientists initially dismissed the warnings.

They didnt hold the data back, Clarke said. They were very upfront about how uncertain things were.

Benjamin Mueller and Carl Zimmer. c.2021 The New York Times Company
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Like many Donald Trump supporters, conservative donor Fred Eshelman awoke the day after the presidential election with the suspicion that something wasn't right. His candidate's apparent lead in key battleground states had evaporated overnight.

The next day, the North Carolina financier and his advisers reached out to a small conservative nonprofit group in Texas that was seeking to expose voter fraud. After a 20-minute talk with the group's president, their first-ever conversation, Eshelman was sold.

"I'm in for 2," he told the president of True the Vote, according to court documents and interviews with Eshelman and others.

"$200,000?" one of his advisers on the call asked.

"$2 million," Eshelman responded.

Over the next 12 days, Eshelman came to regret his donation and to doubt conspiracy theories of rampant illegal voting, according to court records and interviews.

Now, he wants his money back.

The story behind the Eshelman donation - detailed in previously unreported court filings and exclusive interviews with those involved - provides new insights into the frenetic days after the election, when baseless claims led donors to give hundreds of millions of dollars to reverse President Joe Biden's victory.

Trump's campaign and the Republican Party collected $255 million in two months, saying the money would support legal challenges to an election marred by fraud. Trump's staunchest allies in Congress also raised money off those false allegations, as did pro-Trump lawyers seeking to overturn the election results - and even some of their witnesses.

True the Vote was one of several conservative "election integrity" groups that sought to press the case in court. Though its lawsuits drew less attention than those brought by the Trump campaign, True the Vote nonetheless sought to raise more than $7 million for its investigation of the 2020 election.

Documents that have surfaced in Eshelman's litigation, along with interviews, show how True the Vote's private assurances that it was on the cusp of revealing illegal election schemes repeatedly fizzled as the group's focus shifted from one allegation to the next. The nonprofit sought to coordinate its efforts with a coalition of Trump's allies, including Trump attorney Jay Sekulow and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the documents show.

Eshelman has alleged in two lawsuits - one in federal court has been withdrawn and the other is ongoing in a Texas state court - that True the Vote did not spend his $2 million gift and a subsequent $500,000 donation as it said it would. Eshelman also alleges that True the Vote directed much of his money to people or businesses connected to the group's president, Catherine Engelbrecht.

Asked about the shifting focus from allegation to allegation, Engelbrecht said, "A good thorough investigation takes the course it takes, and we were not going to expose whistleblowers to make a quick headline." She said that the group's investigation "is ongoing even now." In court documents, True the Vote says Eshelman's money was spent properly.

True the Vote's lawyer, James Bopp, said that no conditions were attached to Eshelman's donations and he is not entitled to the return of his money just because he didn't like the outcome.

The court documents and interviews show how quickly Eshelman and his allies became disillusioned with True the Vote.

"We were just not getting any data or proof," said Tom Crawford, who had worked for Eshelman as a lobbyist and served as his representative on the True the Vote effort. "We were looking at this and saying to ourselves, 'This just is not adding up.' "

- - -

True the Vote was formed in 2010 by Engelbrecht, a Texas-based tea party activist. Engelbrecht, 51, came to prominence during the Obama administration partly for accusing the Internal Revenue Service of improperly targeting True the Vote and other conservative nonprofit groups.

True the Vote has spent the past decade aggressively promoting claims of voter fraud and pushing for voter-identification laws. The group has established itself as a hub for training volunteer poll watchers to monitor voters for their eligibility. Democrats have accused it of trying to intimidate minorities and other low-participation voters.

As a nonprofit, True The Vote is required to be nonpartisan, and Engelbrecht has said that its mission has nothing to do with party politics. But it has worked with Republicans on other campaigns - for instance, partnering with the Georgia GOP on a "voter integrity" effort for last month's Senate runoffs in that state.

Eshelman, 72, was not familiar with True the Vote before Election Day. A drug company founder turned financier whose Wilmington, N.C.-based firm invests in health-care companies, he had previously donated largely to initiatives and groups that championed free-market principles and attacked Democratic candidates.

But after Biden jumped ahead - a shift election experts had expected as mail-in ballots were tallied - Eshelman asked Crawford for advice on funding an operation to determine if widespread fraud existed. Crawford agreed to help as an unpaid, informal adviser.

"I thought about the range of possibilities around vote fraud," Eshelman said in an interview with The Washington Post. "There was already noise around cities like Detroit, Milwaukee, Atlanta and Philadelphia."

He added: "I wanted to determine if this was legit. Can we find a real smoking gun?"

Eshelman's Nov. 5 donation was easily the biggest gift True the Vote had ever received, according to a person familiar with its operations, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss matters in litigation. True the Vote had never raised more than $1.8 million in a single year, its tax returns show.

The windfall propelled the nonprofit into action.

That evening, Engelbrecht sent Crawford a one-page summary of the group's ambitious new "Validate the Vote 2020" campaign. It included a budget of $7.3 million and envisioned plans to set up cash rewards for whistleblowers, analyze voter data to identify "patterns of election subversion" and file lawsuits to "nullify the results" in seven battleground states.

In a news release announcing the whistleblower program the next morning, Engelbrecht said: "Unfortunately, there is significant tangible evidence that numerous illegal ballots have been cast and counted in the 2020 general election, potentially enough to sway the legitimate results of the election in some of the currently contested states."

But over the following days, in federal lawsuits True the Vote filed in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the group said the evidence for its claims was still being developed.

The suits, filed by Bopp, said True the Vote would use "sophisticated and groundbreaking programs" to show that enough illegal votes had been cast - by noncitizens, felons, fake voters and others - to swing the election to Biden. "This evidence will be shortly forthcoming," each complaint said.

Bopp, whose firm received a retainer of $500,000 for its work on the lawsuits, told The Post that there was "tons of evidence" of voter fraud but that it was "anecdotal, circumstantial."

- - -

True the Vote and Eshelman believed that finding people in swing states with vivid tales of voter fraud would be a crucial part of the project's success, according to emails. Crawford gave Eshelman regular updates about True the Vote's progress on that front.

"We need [True the Vote] to get whistleblowers vetted and ready and to get their data teams beefed up," Crawford told Eshelman in a Nov. 10 email.

Later that day, Crawford reported to the financier that a man in Yuma, Ariz., had come to True the Vote with allegations of large-scale "ballot harvesting" by Democrats in the region. "Please God let his story pan out," Crawford wrote.

"Sensational," Eshelman replied, adding that he was "still committed to putting in big money" if progress was made.

While it scrutinized the accounts of purported whistleblowers, True the Vote also sought to prove fraud through data analysis. Bopp's lawsuits promised "expert reports" comparing vote tallies with registration databases and other records. True the Vote, he wrote, had "persons with such expertise and data-analysis software already in place."

Engelbrecht's Validate the Vote plan, an exhibit in the lawsuit, budgeted $1.75 million for "data and research" work. It was to be led by a company whose name evoked the shadowy world of intelligence operations: OPSEC Group.

Records show that OPSEC had been formed less than two months earlier in Alabama by Gregg Phillips, a former True the Vote board member whose 2016 tweet was the source of the false claim that Trump would have won the popular vote that year but for millions of fraudulent votes by illegal immigrants.

Phillips, 60, and Engelbrecht are business partners in a health-care company. Eshelman alleges in a legal filing - without providing evidence - that the two are also lovers.

In an interview, Phillips denied any such romantic relationship. Engelbrecht declined to comment on the allegation.

On Nov. 12, Eshelman and Crawford joined a conference call with Engelbrecht and Bopp to hear an update on the data analysis and other aspects of the legal plan. "I was encouraged," Eshelman wrote in an email to Crawford a couple of hours later, but noted: "You did not really give details on whistleblowers. Where are we on that?"

Crawford replied that three whistleblower complaints, including the Yuma allegation, had survived initial screening.

The following day, Eshelman wired another $500,000 to True the Vote.

- - -

On that day, Nov. 13, Engelbrecht received a bill for a $1 million publicity campaign from Old Town Digital Agency, an online advertising firm whose founder, Dikran Yacoubian, has worked in Republican politics on and off since the 1990s. Yacoubian had worked with Eshelman and helped introduce him to True the Vote. Eshelman and Crawford then brought Yacoubian on to help plan a publicity campaign.

Most of the money was to cover the upfront costs of online ads to trumpet True the Vote's fraud findings, according to Yacoubian. The rest, he said, was to be spent on retainers for Republican consultants who would push the project's findings through political and media channels.

Yacoubian said he had already begun securing the services of these consultants, including Robert Heckman, a longtime strategist for Graham. Yacoubian hoped Heckman would pass the group's findings on to the Senate Judiciary Committee, which Graham then chaired.

But Engelbrecht didn't pay the $1 million bill, saying later in an email to Eshelman's handpicked firm that it had no contractual agreement with True the Vote and had not provided "any services."

Her refusal to pay contributed to an emerging rift between Engelbrecht and Crawford, who at the same time was growing frustrated by what he described as the group's vague and ever-shifting leads.

"There was a guy in Georgia who claimed to be the bagman for Stacey Abrams," Crawford told The Post. "It was, 'We're getting an affidavit,' and then it was, 'He ran away and we can't find him.' "

The "ballot harvesting" whistleblower in Yuma turned out to have already contacted law enforcement, according to the person familiar with the group's operations. Two people were later indicted on a charge of submitting votes for other people - but during August's primary, not the general election.

Yacoubian, too, was frustrated that True the Vote's whistleblowers were not materializing. "I really didn't get to do, on the promotion side, anything - because there wasn't anything to promote," he said in an interview.

At one point, a publicist working for Engelbrecht instead sent Yacoubian an eight-minute video titled "Who Is Catherine Engelbrecht?" that she wanted posted online.

Engelbrecht continued to make promises about whistleblowers, claiming in a Nov. 14 email to Eshelman: "We are writing up the briefs on these individuals now to give Senator Graham and Cruz."

Heckman, the veteran Graham consultant, said he listened to a pair of conference-call presentations from Engelbrecht and Phillips but came away so unimpressed that he never even mentioned the effort to Graham. "I was asked to determine whether there was any legitimate evidence there," he told The Post. "My conclusion was there wasn't."

In an email, Engelbrecht said the group shared promising early leads with Heckman while it continued to gather information. She acknowledged that her publicist sought help in posting the video.

She denied that True the Vote gave Yacoubian and Crawford nothing to work with, saying that the group's own publicists were "working non-stop" at the time to issue news releases on its activities. "The fact is that [neither] Dikran nor Tom seemed interested in actually doing anything," she wrote.

In any case, Crawford's exasperation was growing.

"We cannot get ANY information from her or her team," he wrote in a Nov. 15 email to Eshelman. "It goes on and on like this."

- - -

As True the Vote struggled to produce solid whistleblower accounts, its lawsuits also failed to gain traction. Bopp, who serves as the group's general counsel, told The Post that he reached out to Trump and his legal team with a proposal: that they join forces.

In phone conversations with Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani, Trump's personal attorneys, Bopp said he urged the Trump legal team to adopt True the Vote's legal strategy, which hinged on persuading a federal judge to open up access to voter rolls.

"It was becoming clear to me that the lawsuits we filed were not getting the attention they needed" from judges, Bopp said in an interview. "And the Trump legal effort was a disaster, both their strategy and the tactics."

Bopp said Sekulow and Giuliani supported the proposal and told him they would recommend it to Trump.

Bopp said that, at Sekulow's request, he briefed a group of Trump allies in a phone call that included Sekulow, Graham and Fox News host Sean Hannity.

Giuliani did not respond to requests for comment. Representatives for Graham and Hannity declined to comment. Sekulow wrote in a text message: "I do not disclose discussions that I may have had on legal matters on behalf of a client."

Bopp said that on the morning of Nov. 15 he spoke to Mark Meadows, Trump's chief of staff, and sent him a written proposal about True the Vote's legal approach. A spokesman for Meadows declined to comment.

According to Bopp, Meadows said he would speak to Trump and get back to Bopp by 3 p.m. that day. But the call never came.

The following day, Bopp decided to abandon all four of True the Vote's lawsuits, concluding that without the campaign's involvement the suits had little chance of advancing before the election was to be certified in December. The lawsuits were just one component of the operation Eshelman was funding, but True the Vote had pitched them as critical to overturning the election results.

Bopp told Eshelman about the decision that day, during a tense phone call.

Eshelman was furious, according to court documents and interviews.

On Nov. 17, he sent Engelbrecht an email demanding the return of his money. True the Vote offered on Nov. 23 to return $1 million to settle the matter. Eshelman filed his first lawsuit two days later, saying the group had failed to provide an accounting of how the remainder of his money had been spent.

He withdrew the federal lawsuit on Feb. 1 and filed the suit in Texas state court.

None of Eshelman's money has been returned, court documents show.

Bopp told The Post his firm ultimately billed True the Vote roughly $300,000 - more than half its retainer - for its work on the four lawsuits. He said he withdrew them because he "could see they were not going to accomplish anything."

Overall, the experience left several people who were involved in the effort unconvinced that there ever was evidence of voter fraud to be discovered.

Even Phillips, the former True the Vote board member, said he has doubts about the impact of any irregularities. "I don't know if there was enough to make a difference in the presidential election," he said.

Crawford said: "I believe very much that Biden won and that anything we saw in terms of irregularities was not widespread enough to have changed the outcome."

Eshelman said he still believes there was "some misbehavior" in the election. "But do I believe it might have risen to a degree that would change the electoral outcome?" he said. "I don't know."
A novice powerlifting competition is set to get underway in Tauranga, with the aim of giving those new to the sport a chance to compete at a relaxed level.

Ruthless Barbell Club in Judea will host the Birth of Champions Novice Powerlifting Meet.

This will be the fifth time the gym has hosted such an event and it offers the less experienced powerlifter a chance to get more involved in the sport.

The purpose of novice competition is to give people who have thought about powerlifting a nice easy way into the sport where our dress code isn't so formal and the reffing is a little bit more helpful and less strict," says Ruthless Barbell Club owner Mike Jones.

You dont have the high level of competition you might do at a sanctioned comp.

They seem to be getting better and better. The idea was we have six lifters from our gym lifting and the rest are from all over the show.

Once you have a novice competition under your belt you should know whether you like the sport or not and whether to start pursuing better competition.

Entrance for the competition is now closed, with a full complement of 24 competitors split between two groups of 12.

They will compete in the disciplines of squat, benchpress and deadlift.

The competition will get underway at 11am on February 20, with the event open to spectators, dependent on COVID-19 regulations.

What we do, is we set up for the competition and the platform is facing outside so spectators are outside, which is actually great for COVID issues," says Mike.

At the guts of it, we do the novice competition for the lifters, so it is good to keep people out of the gym. But hopefully it's a good day for it.

It's really easy for people to just swing by and check out what powerlifting actually is. It is going to be fun. It is always a good day.

The Birth of Champions Novice Powerlifting Meet will take place at Ruthless Barbell Club in Judea from 11am on February 20 and entrance to spectators is fee.

For more information go to www.facebook.com/ruthlessbarbellclub
Nicole Snooki Polizzi is the latest New Jersey celebrity to test positive for the coronavirus.

She shared her COVID-19 diagnosis in a Valentines Day Instagram post Sunday.

Happy Valentines Day! she said. This ones a bit different....I have Covid. Ive been isolated in my room since I found out. My family & I have been super cautious & careful, so this is super scary.

Polizzi, 33, who rose to fame in 2009 as one of the breakout cast members on MTVs Jersey Shore, lives in Florham Park with her husband, Jionni LaValle, and their three young children: Lorenzo, 8; Giovanna, 6; and Angelo, 1.

My symptoms started out as just a bad sinus cold, she said. Headache, Stuffy nose & mild cough. Then I felt super tired and ended up napping all day which made me go get tested. Today i just feel groggy. I ended up losing my taste and smell last night.

Its fricken weird, she continued. I had a greasy cheese pizza & couldnt taste a damn thing. WHAT A SIN. The rest of my family tested negative, so i am here hiding out in my bedroom until this is over.

But that didnt stop Polizzi from celebrating Valentines Day. She shared a picture of her heart-day spoils.

I woke up to roses and chocolates thrown on my floor from my family, she sad. Still showing my quarantine ass Love on Valentines Day!Appreciate all of your concerns, but I am ok! Please stay safe everyone!

Polizzi, who owns The Snooki Shop, a boutique in Madison, left the Jersey Shore revival series Jersey Shore Family Vacation in 2019 to spend more time with her family.

Snooki isnt the only local reality TV star to share her COVID-19 diagnosis during the pandemic.

In April, Jennifer Aydin, a cast member on Bravos Real Housewives of New Jersey from Paramus, tested positive for the coronavirus. Aydin asked her husband, Bill Aydin, a plastic surgeon, to bring home a coronavirus test after experiencing symptoms.

I thought I took all the necessary precautions, she said. But a headache and muscle aches persisted.

It wasnt my usual headache, it felt like a very dense headache where my head felt like it weighed 1,000 pounds, Aydin said.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a subscription.

Amy Kuperinsky may be reached at akuperinsky@njadvancemedia.com and followed at @AmyKup on Twitter.
The funeral for one of Britain's oldest identical twins stopped off at her favourite supermarket Asda where she was a loyal customer for 20 years.

As part of the send off for Doris Hobday, who died in January after a two-week battle with coronavirus aged 96, shopped at the store in Great Bridge, Tipton, West Midlands, for decades.

She and her sister were such big fans of the store, last August supermarket bosses opened early and laid on a special Covid-friendly shopping trip for Doris and twin Lilian Cox as a 96th birthday present.

The funeral for 96-year-old Doris Hobday took a longer route to stop off at her favourite Asda supermarket in Great Bridge, Tipton, West Midlands

So people could pay their respects to the much loved twin, her family decided to take a longer route and stop off at the store she had shopped in for 20 years

The funeral also stopped outside the Kings Arms pub, where the twins used to visit, on the way to the church. Pictured: Lillian and Doris during their Asda birthday visit

In August supermarket bosses opened early and laid on a special Covid-friendly shopping trip for Doris and Lilian Cox as a 96th birthday present. Pictured: Lillian at Doris's funeral today

Doris and her identical twin sister Lilian Cox became celebrities in their own right after stealing the hearts of the nation as Britain's oldest identical twins.

They became popular figures online with their positive outlook on life and sense of humour.

Doris shot to fame beside her twin sister after saying the secret to their old age was 'plenty of sex' during an episode of Good Morning Britain.

Due to the current coronavirus restrictions, only limited numbers could attend Doris's funeral, which saw her laid to rest with her husband Ray who she lost 11 years ago after 65 years of marriage.

To make it even more special, the family chose a longer route so people could pay their respects and stopped off at the supermarket.

The route also included passing by the Kings Arms pub, where the twins used to visit, on the way to the church.

People gathered outside the stored socially distanced to pay their respects to the much-loved Doris, one of the oldest twins in Britain

Doris and her identical twin sister Lilian Cox (pictured) became celebrities in their own right after stealing the hearts of the nation as Britain's oldest identical twins

At the funeral, Doris was laid to rest with her husband Ray who she lost 11 years ago after 65 years of marriage. Pictured: Lillian at the funeral today

Lillian's granddaughter Kerry Clarke, from Hagley, Worcestershire said: 'A lot of people have been asking what they can do in memory of Doris, whether it be light a candle or play a song at the same time.

'What we are doing is to have a longer route to the church and people can stand on the street to see her off, as we can't have hundreds attend her funeral.'

Lilian and Doris lived in the same street after getting married, worked together at an ale-making factory in Birmingham and more recently lived next to one another at sheltered accommodation in Tipton.

Doris (right) shot to fame beside her twin sister Lillian (left) after saying the secret to their old age was 'plenty of sex' during an episode of Good Morning Britain

The family hoped by extending route to the church for the funeral, everyone in the local area that was unable to attend due to Covid restrictions, could stand in the street and pay their respects. Pictured: Lillian at the funeral today

Lilian and Doris lived in the same street after getting married, worked together at an ale-making factory in Birmingham

Mrs Cox also tested positive for coronavirus last month. The twins were both admitted to hospital but Doris sadly died on January 5.

It was the first time she had ever been admitted to hospital. Tragically just two days after her death, Doris's vaccine appointment letter arrived in the post.

Lillian has since been discharged from hospital.

She spoke to her sister over the phone, begging her to 'fight for her life', but was utterly heartbroken after learning of Doris's death.

More recently the pair lived next to one another at sheltered accommodation in Tipton before being admitted to hospital in January

The twins were both admitted to hospital but Doris sadly died on January 5. It was the first time she had ever been admitted to hospital. Pictured: Lillian at the funeral today

Late last month she appeared on ITV's Good Morning Britain again with her great-grandson Brayden Clarke, and paid tribute to her sister, saying she was 'the only one I ever had'.

Lilian had five children but raised them mainly as a single mum. She has 13 grandchildren and 19 great grandchildren.

A fundraising page for the Beacon Centre for the Blind, a charity close to Doris's heart as it supported Ray for 20 years, has raised nearly 6,000 in her memory.

To donate, visit justgiving.com/fundraising/dorishobday.
The Krewe of Bacchus didn't roll through the streets of New Orleans Sunday night, but Mardi Gras certainly still happened for all Y'all. It was just different.

In the third and final episode of "Mardi Gras for All Y'all," the broadcast visited the history of krewes like Rex, Zulu, Cleopatra, Orpheus and more. It covered the peaceful tradition of the Northside Skull and Bones.

Saints player Cam Jordan weighed in on his favorite king cake (hint: it's a tie.) Chef Toya Boudy shared her tips on how to make sure that rice can't "snatch the life out of" your gumbo. A mixologist shared how to make an Ojen cocktail.

How New Orleans is Delfeayo Marsalis and the Uptown Jazz Orchestra?



"The pandemic made us cancel Mardi Gras this year but we goin' virtual so you can stand in front of your TV dressed in your Mardi Gras gear."



Watch the #MardiGrasforAllYall performance: https://t.co/iCW15NTG5v  NOLA.com (@NOLAnews) February 15, 2021

Musical performances included Delfeayo Marsalis and the Uptown Jazz Orchestra, St. Augustine High School Drumline, Sam Price and the True Believers, Tulane University Marching Band, Leo Nocentelli and George Porter Jr.

While this Carnival season hasn't had parades, the streets of New Orleans have become the parades with house floats. They're popping up on every street "the way plastic babies pop up in every king cake." Learn more about the movement and more in the videos below.

Check out the playlist below for a rundown of some of the top segments from the third and final night. Can't see the videos? Click here.

Want to rewatch the entire broadcast? Check out the video below. Can't see the video? Click here.

Looking to catch up on Saturday's episode? Check out the playlist below. Can't see the videos? Click here.

Looking to catch up on Friday's episode? Check out the playlist below. Can't see the videos? Click here.

SOCIAL MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS/WHAT Y'ALL ARE SAYING

Big chief

Iko iko

Casanova

Do what you wanna

Mardi Gras mambo

Carnival time

I feel like funkin it up https://t.co/Sf79ms1SXO  Rod Fulton (@SaintRoderick) February 15, 2021

My sister @danaobrentz & I are loving #MardiGrasForAllYall via YouTube in Manhattan! This photo is from #MardiGras 2019 & we cannot wait for 2022 Carnival! Thank you @NOLAnews ! Sending all the best to all of the incredible New Orleanians! Stay safe (& warm)!  #nola pic.twitter.com/bwVRLo7J89  Candi Obrentz (@candiobrentz) February 15, 2021

Chef Toya Boudy just shared her tips to a perfect gumbo. 



Her rule of thumb? "Get your gumbo to a place where it's more salty by itself because you have to add rice to it. When you add rice, it's going to snatch the life out of your meal." #MardiGrasforAllYall pic.twitter.com/VhX9uVJd9W  NOLA.com (@NOLAnews) February 15, 2021

Have you ever had the anise liqueur Ojen? 



Here's how to make a traditional Ojen cocktail to sip on during Mardi Gras. #MardiGrasforAllYall https://t.co/POBk3j7TGY  NOLA.com (@NOLAnews) February 15, 2021
What happened to '60s movie star Kim Novak at the Oscars in 2014 was a reminder of why she'd greatly reduced her roles since then. Donald Trump, not yet the official Republican nominee for president, tweeted, "Kim should sue her plastic surgeon!"

The star of Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo is quick to acknowledge that she could've looked better.

Kim Novak promotes Vertigo at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 20, 2015. (Photo: Sonia Recchia/WireImage)

"You know when you get insecure and you think somebody can help you? I didn't want a facelift or anything like that, so I went to a doctor and he put some fat injections in my face," Novak said in a new interview with The Guardian. "That was the stupidest thing I could have done. First of all, I didn't need it, because I think my face is too round anyway. But it filled out my cheeks so I looked different."

She also "took a Valium on an empty stomach" because she was trying to lose a little weight.

But the harsh criticism was part of the reason the 88-year-old's last acting credit was in 1991.

"I thought: 'I'm much too vulnerable for this town. I take things to heart too much,'" she said.

"It's exciting to dress up in gorgeous clothes and to feel sexy and to look sexy. It's wonderful, but it's a trap," Novak warned. "You become satisfied with that being enough, then later in life it isn't enough. So many people, once they got older and were no longer looked at for their beauty, just fell apart."

Kim Novak and Matthew McConaughey speak at the Oscars on March 2, 2014. (Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty Images)

The actress, who now lives in Oregon, is open about this, as she is with her mental health issues through her advocacy work. She was diagnosed with bipolar disorder herself in the early '00s, which she attributes to multiple factors.

"I inherited my mental illness from my father, but the rape must have added to it," Novak says of an assault that she endured early in life. "It was in my early teens by multiple boys in the back seat of a stranger's car."

Story continues

The Chicago native began modeling at home and eventually moved to Los Angeles, where she signed with Columbia Pictures. She recalled the studio's president, Harry Cohn, calling her fat. She wasn't. And she saw people change because of Hollywood. It wasn't exactly incentive to stay.

Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak film Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 movie Vertigo. (Photo: Richard C. Miller/Donaldson Collection/Getty Images)

Take, for example, Frank Sinatra.

"I had a relationship with Frank, yeah. He was a very sexy guy," Novak said. (She adds that she did not have a romantic relationship with Sinatra's Rat Pack pal and her good friend Sammy Davis Jr., despite his feelings for her.)

Novak also worked with Sinatra on two movies, which left her with two very different impressions of him.

"If I'd only worked with him on the first movie, [1955's] The Man With the Golden Arm, Id be bragging about how wonderful he was," she said. "He could be kind and gentle  and he could be cocky, not wanting to listen to anybody but himself."

The two teamed up again in 1957, for Pal Joey.

Kim Novak and Frank Sinatra attend a movie premiere with Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart on Oct. 10, 1955, in Los Angeles. (Photo: Earl leaf/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)

"The real Sinatra was a very sensitive person. But he was affected by people putting him on a pedestal, so he let that simple, beautiful side of him go," Novak said. "You can get lured into loving yourself too much. That's why I left Hollywood. I didn't want to get into all of that. I didn't want to lose myself. I needed to leave to save myself. I like who I am, even with the suffering you go through, even with the fact that when you're vulnerable you feel everything so intensely."

One person who did handle fame well was Jimmy Stewart, Novak's co-star in Vertigo, which consistently ranks among the best films of all time.

"He lived in the midst of all that vanity and was never tainted by it, Novak said of Stewart, who also co-starred with her in 1958's Bell Book and Candle. "Most leading men enjoyed the glamour of it all. So many times we would sit after the scene was over and we'd take off our shoes and put our feet up on the table and not even talk. We'd just hang out, because we were both real. It was hard for me to believe that somebody could live in Hollywood for so long, right in the middle of Beverly Hills, and stay real. He deserves a big trophy just for that; one that says: 'I was real.' I'd like that same trophy."

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Property Damage

On Wednesday, the City of San Antonio launched an Emergency Resource Call Center and website to assist residents impacted by the storm. To access it, residents can call 311 and select option 5, call 210-207-6000 or visit the website. The call center will be open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

The Texas Division of Emergency Management is asking Texans  residents and businesses  to report damage from the recent winter event, which will help the state receive financial support from the federal government.

Homeowners with insurance should make a claim with their insurance carrier. For those without insurance or if additional assistance is needed, a claim can be filed with the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Individual Households Program. To file a claim, call 800-621-3362 or visit disasterassistance.gov. Applicants must have a social security number to apply.

Businesses and rental properties that suffered damages can also apply for the Small Business Administration's Disaster Loan Assistance Program, which provides low interest loans. For more information, visit the government agency's website or call 800-659-2295.

The SAWS Community Pipe Repair Fund is another avenue for individuals who don't qualify for FEMA's program. SAWS will prioritize emergency pipe repair that risks causing harm to life, health or safety of the occupants. To be eligible, applicants cannot qualify for FEMA assistance and their home value can't exceed $140,000, or have an annual income at or below 140 percent of the Federal Poverty Level, which is equal to $18,032 for an individual or $37,100 for a family.

To apply, visit the SAWS website or call 210-233-3499.

Here are more details about insurance and storm damage.

Power

CPS Energy has suspended its auto-pay feature for all customers. Anyone seeing a payment process through their account should call 210-353-2222.

Here is an explainer on what went wrong with the Texas power grid.

Water

The boil-water advisory has been lifted for 100 percent of SAWS customers.

The city, Bexar County and San Antonio Food Bank are operating 13 bottled water distribution sites through March 6. The sites will be open 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., daily. Limit: One case of bottled water per household, per day.

Wheatley Heights Sports Complex, 200 Noblewood Drive

Brooks, Challenger Drive at Research Place

Texas A&M University at San Antonio, One University Way

Port San Antonio, 205 Billy Mitchell Blvd.

SeaWorld San Antonio/Aquatica, 10500 Sea World Drive

Six Flags Fiesta Texas, 17000 Interstate 10 West

San Antonio Food Bank, 5200 Enrique M. Barrera Parkway

Our Lady of the Lake University, 411 S.W. 24th St.

Community Bible Church, 2477 N. Loop 1604 East

Heroes Stadium, 4799 Thousand Oaks Drive

Rolling Oaks Mall, 6909 N. Loop 1604 East

Bullis County Park, 27583 Old Blanco Road

Julius Matthey Middle School, 20350 Red Forest Lane

The city is also providing bottled water delivery to homebound seniors, SAHA properties without water, nursing homes, boarding homes, some dialysis facilities and residents with medical needs. Delivery can be requested by calling 311.

SAWS also announced a one-time bill relief program in which customers will only be charged the lower of two amounts on their next bill: either the total current charges for February, or January's current charges. The utility said the program will especially aid customers with unusually high bills due to a freeze-related leak. More details here.

Roads

All previously closed interchanges and roadways in San Antonio are now open.

Vaccines

City vaccine sites: Some second dose COVID-19 vaccine appointments scheduled at the Alamodome last week have been moved to the same time at new dates below.

Feb. 15 rescheduled for Feb. 19

Feb. 16 rescheduled for Feb. 20

Feb. 17 rescheduled for Feb. 21

Feb. 18 rescheduled for Feb. 22

Click here for a full list vaccine site updates.

WellMed vaccine sites: WellMed-run community vaccination clinics have resumed. Cancelled second-dose appointments from last week have been rescheduled to the same time and location but at the new dates below.

Feb. 15 reschedule to Monday, Feb. 22

Feb. 16 reschedule to Tuesday, Feb. 23

Feb. 17 reschedule to Wednesday, Feb. 24

Feb. 18 reschedule to Thursday, Feb. 25

Feb. 19 reschedule to Friday, Feb. 26

Feb. 20 reschedule to Saturday, Feb. 27

Airport

The San Antonio International Airport is open and has resumed standard operations. Visit the airport website or your airline website for details on individual flights.

How to help

Blood donation: The San Antonio Metropolitan Health District has declared a blood shortage emergency as citywide power and water outages worsened what was already a dire shortage of blood amid the coronavirus pandemic. The center is extending hours through at least Monday at its seven donor rooms in hopes that people will volunteer to roll up their sleeves. Call 210-731-5590 or visit SouthTexasBlood.org to make an appointment.

San Antonio Food Bank: A Facebook fundraiser is collecting money to replenish food bank supplies. The food bank also is looking for 500 volunteers for mass distributions Friday through Sunday. Register here.

San Antonios Battered Womens and Childrens Shelter: The shelter sustained major damage after a pipe burst, causing a ceiling to collapse. Donations are being accepted here.

South Alamo Regional Alliance for the Homeless: SARAH is looking for volunteers to help in the shelters. Follow their Facebook page for ways to donate to other San Antonio organizations that help with housing assistance.

Jefferson United Methodist Church: The church is seeking donations at its GoFundMe after experiencing flooding due to the severe winter storm.
New Zealands largest city is being placed in a three-day lockdown following the discovery of three unexplained coronavirus cases in the community.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced the move for Auckland after an urgent meeting with other top politicians in the cabinet.

She said they decided to take a cautious approach until they found out more about the outbreak, including whether the infections were of the more contagious variants.

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The rest of New Zealand will also be placed under heightened restrictions although will not go into lockdown, Ms Ardern said.

The lockdown is the first in New Zealand in six months and represents a significant setback in the nations largely successful efforts to control the virus.

New Zealand had successfully stamped out community spread, and many people elsewhere in the world looked on in envy as New Zealanders went back to work and began attending concerts and sporting events without the need to wear masks or take other precautions.

Indeed, Ms Ardern had planned to attend the Big Gay Out on Sunday, an Auckland festival that celebrates the rainbow community and attracts tens of thousands of people. She ended up cancelling those plans and returning to Wellington to manage the outbreak.

Im asking New Zealanders to continue to be strong and to be kind, Ms Ardern said at a hastily arranged press conference on Sunday evening. I know we all feel the same way when this happens. We all get that sense of not again. But remember, we have been here before and that means we know how to get out of this again, and that is together.

New Zealands greatest vulnerability has been at the border.

Expand Close Thousands of people attended a concert on Saturday by the band Six60 in Wellington, New Zealand Photo by: Nick Perry/AP / Facebook

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Whatsapp Thousands of people attended a concert on Saturday by the band Six60 in Wellington, New Zealand Photo by: Nick Perry/AP

New cases are regularly caught among returning travellers, all of whom are required to spend two weeks in quarantine. Despite precautions, there have been several times when the virus has leaked out from the border before being controlled again, and officials are trying to determine whether that has happened again.

In the latest case, an Auckland mother, father and daughter caught the disease. Officials said the mother works at a catering company that does laundry for airlines, and officials are investigating whether there is a link to infected passengers. Officials said the woman had not been going aboard the planes herself.

We are gathering all of the facts as quickly as we can, and the system that served us so well in the past is really gearing up to do so again, said Covid-19 response minister Chris Hipkins.

He described the cases as new and active. He said scientists are carrying out genome sequencing to see whether they are variants, and also to see whether they match with any infected passengers.

New Zealand has kept Covid-19 contained better than almost any other country, Mr Hipkins said. But as we have kept saying, there is no such thing as no risk.

New Zealand, with a population of five million, has reported a total of just more than 2,300 cases and 25 deaths since the pandemic started.


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Israeli missile strikes against several targets near Syria's capital Damascus killed at least nine pro-regime militia fighters early Monday, a Britain-based war monitor said

Beirut, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :Israeli missile strikes against several targets near Syria's capital Damascus killed at least nine pro-regime militia fighters early Monday, a Britain-based war monitor said.

"Nine Iran-backed militia fighters were killed" in Israeli strikes targeting arms depots, including missile stores, around Damascus, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Observatory said all the fighters killed were non-Arab "pro-government" forces but it said it could not determine if they were Afghan, Pakistani or Iranian.

"Syrian air defences intercepted a sizable number of the missiles but many hit their targets and caused material damage," added the monitor, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria for its reports.

The attack began shortly after midnight and lasted for nearly half an hour, it said.

Syrian state media also reported the strikes but said that air defences had intercepted "most" of the missiles.

Contacted by AFP, an Israeli army spokeswoman said "we cannot comment on these reports.

" Since the outbreak of Syria's civil war in 2011, Israel has routinely carried out raids in the country, mostly targeting Iranian forces and Lebanese Hezbollah fighters as well as government troops.

Iran and Hezbollah have backed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime in the near-decade-long war.

Israel rarely confirms strikes in Syria, but the Jewish state's army said it hit about 50 targets in the war-torn country in 2020, without providing details.

It has consistently vowed to prevent its arch-enemy Iran from gaining a foothold in Syria.

On Sunday, the Israeli army started a four-day drill along its northern border with Lebanon, a country with which it is still technically at war.

The "surprise exercise" was "designed to improve Air Force readiness for combat" in the border region, the army said in a statement.

During the exercise, which will end on Wednesday, Israeli "aircrafts, jets and helicopter traffic will be felt across the country, and a number of explosions may be heard in northern Israel", it added.

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The Ukrainian pavilion will start working in test mode in early August 2021.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and First Lady Olena Zelenska during an official visit to the United Arab Emirates have visited Ukraine's pavilion and displays at Expo 2020 in Dubai.

"It is very important for Ukraine to be highly represented at an exposition of this level. We are among the largest exporters of agricultural products in the world and make a significant contribution to food security in many countries," he said, as reported by the president's press service.

The Ukrainian pavilion will start working in test mode in early August 2021. The opening of Expo 2020 is rescheduled for October 2021 over the COVID-19 pandemic.

The building whose total area is 2,600 square meters (four floors and 15 meters high) will be decorated using Ukrainian style and ornament, and the architectural image of the pavilion embodies the idea of an ear of wheat.

"The idea is that a wheat grain planted in the ground is the beginning of a new life, and an ear filled with these grains means new ideas, thoughts, people who get united. It is an allegory of new thinking. We want to unite people around global issues and how to live, hear and feel smart today. After all, the theme of our pavilion is called 'Smart Ukraine: Uniting the World,'" Secretary of the Coordinating Committee for the preparation and ensuring Ukraine's participation in Expo-2020 Alina Shyshkina said.

She stressed the main goal is to rebrand Ukraine as a reliable partner for work, trade, and travel.

Zelensky's visit to UAE

The Ukrainian president is paying a two-day official visit to the UAE.

Upon arrival in the UAE, he said in an interview to the Emirates News Agency WAM the relations between Ukraine and the UAE were quite dynamic and with a stable tendency toward rapid development.

On February 14, Zelensky met with Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces Mohammed bin Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan to discuss prospects for boosting bilateral trade by several times.

Also, the two countries' delegations signed a number of bilateral documents, in particular, a memorandum on mutual recognition and exchange of national driver's licenses.

CEO of Ukraine's state-run Ukroboronprom Concern Yuriy Husyev and representatives of the UAE-based Tawazun Economic Council and EDGE Group signed agreements and contracts totaling more than US$1 billion to expand military-technical cooperation.

Reporting by UNIAN
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Five people have died of Ebola virus in Guinea, the health agency said on Monday, as the government and aid groups began to roll out their response to the outbreak.

Guinea announced the outbreak on Saturdaythe first in West Africa since a 2013-2016 epidemic that left more than 11,300 dead in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

According to an epidemiological report by the country's health agency dated February 15, five people have now succumbed to the virus, rising from a death toll of four reported earlier on Monday.

Only one of the victims was confirmed positive for Ebola, with the remaining four listed as "probable cases".

Two other people have tested positive, the health agency said, while another 10 are showing symptoms.

The first confirmed victim was a 51-year-old nurse, who died in late January.

She was from Nzerekore near the town of Gouecke in the forested south of the country.

Two of the nurse's brothers who attended her funeral on February 1 have also died, a health official who requested anonymity said.

It remains unclear who the other victims are, or whether they attended the nurse's funeral.

The UN's Guinea office tweeted that the first flight carrying experts and sanitary equipment arrived in Nzerekore on Monday.

Prime Minister Ibrahima Kassory Fofana said Guinea had "set up structures to deal with this type of epidemic".

"No panic, let's respect the sanitary instructions. Ebola will be defeated again," he tweeted.

Vaccines on the way

Ebola causes severe fever and, in the worst cases, unstoppable bleeding. It is transmitted through close contact with bodily fluids, and people who live with or care for patients are most at risk.

An NGO official who spoke to AFP on condition of anonymity said he was concerned because health workers had not yet identified who infected the nurse.

But Alfred George Ki-Zerbo, the World Health Organization's representative in Guinea, said on Monday that Ebola vaccines could arrive in the poor nation of 13 million "within 72 hours".

"Our priority is to complete the risk assessment on the ground and to analyse the cross-border dimension," he said, referring to the area near the Liberian border where the virus re-emerged.

Guinea's health agency is also increasing its capacity in the area.

Anja Wolz, the Ebola coordinator for Doctors Without Borders, said the NGO was sending an experienced medical team to meet local people and explain the need to follow health rules.

"We know that when such a frightening disease is misunderstood in the community, and individuals suddenly arrive giving instructions, in costumes resembling spacesuits, it can easily generate a hostile reaction," she said.

Explore further Growing concern over first W.Africa Ebola outbreak for five years

 2021 AFP
LIMA, Peru (AP)  Peru's foreign minister resigned Sunday amid an uproar over government officials being secretly vaccinated against the coronavirus before the country recently received 1 million doses for health workers facing a resurgence in the pandemic.

President Francisco Sagasti confirmed that Elizabeth Astete stepped down and told the local television channel America that Peruvians should feel outraged and angry about this situation that jeopardizes the enormous effort of many Peruvians working on the front line against COVID.

The scandal erupted Thursday when former President Martin Vizcarra, who was dismissed by Congress on Nov. 9 over a corruption allegation, confirmed a newspaper report that he and his wife had secretly received shots of a vaccine from the Chinese state pharmaceutical company Sinopharm in October. Health Minister Pilar Mazzetti resigned Friday after legislators accused her of concealing information

Sagasti said on Twitter that during Vizcarra's administration, an extra 2,000 doses of the vaccine had been received from Sinopharm and that some senior public officials were vaccinated.

New Health Minister Oscar Ugarte said Sunday night that Sagasti ordered the resignation of all officials who secretly received the Chinese vaccine. Ugarte said an investigation is underway to identify officials who were secretly vaccinated in September.

Astete, who led the Peruvian negotiations to buy the 1 million doses of Sinopharm's vaccine, said Sunday in a letter that she was vaccinated with the first dose Jan. 22. I am aware of the serious mistake I made, which is why I decided not to receive the second dose.

Peru bought the vaccines in early January at a price that is secret under the contract.

Doctors and nurses have protested because they were not included in the first lists to be vaccinated with doses received from Sinopharm. The pandemic has caused the deaths of 306 doctors and 125 nurses, with more than 20,000 doctors and nurses being infected.

Peru has had more than 1.2 million cases of coronavirus infections, with 43,491 deaths related to COVID.19 according to Johns Hopkins University's tally of cases around the globe.
Reforms in India started with the financial crisis of 1991. The country is in the midst of another. Shrinking government revenues means that there is only a little to go around to recapitalise state-run banks.

A clear estimate of how much is needed will be evident only after the central banks forbearance measures in the wake of the pandemic are withdrawn. This holds true for private banks as well, though they are relatively better off, having raised close to Rs 60,000 crore in recent times. Various macro indicators suggest an economic recovery. So the question is: Are banks in a ...
Nearly 15,000 beneficiaries in received COVID-19 vaccine shots on Monday and of them 2,191 got their second dose, officials said.

The immunisation drive, which started on January 16, picked up pace in the last one week. On Saturday 1,856 healthcare workers got their second dose after receiving the first shot on the inaugural day of the vaccination drive.

The turnout for the second dose on Saturday was about 43 per cent.

On Monday,14,965 beneficiaries were vaccinated.

Among the healthcare workers,4,571 got their first dose and2,191 the second shot. Also,8,203 frontline workers got their first jabs on Monday, a senior official in the health department said.

"Seven cases of AEFI (adverse events following immunisation) was reported," he said.

Under the nationwide mega vaccination drive, a total of 4,319 (53 per cent) healthcare workers, against a target of 8,117, were administered the shots at 81 centres across the city on day one.

According to doctors, the second dose is to be given to a beneficiary after a gap of 28 days.

On Saturday, a total of 13,768 beneficiaries received vaccine shots and the second dose began to given to healthcare workers who had received the first jab 28 days ago.

On the second scheduled day after the roll-out of the exercise on January 16, the figures had stood at 3,598 (44 per cent of the target). The sharp fall had come after one severe and 50 minor adverse effect cases were reported, on the opening day of the vaccination drive.

The count on the third scheduled day was much higher, at 4,936 (48 per cent).

"On February 12, as many as 14,843 people were administered the anti- and AEFI (adverse events following immunisation) was reported in seven persons," a senior official of the Health Department had said.

recorded 141 fresh COVID-19 cases and two deaths on Monday, even as the positivity rate stood at 0.36 per cent.

(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.)
Agence France-Presse

China's space agency released video footage from its spacecraft circling Mars on Friday, two days after it successfully entered the planet's orbit in Beijing's latest ambitious space mission. In the video, published by state broadcaster CCTV, the surface of the planet is seen coming into view out of a pitch-black sky against the outside of the Tianwen-1, which entered the orbit of the Red Planet on Wednesday. White craters are visible on the planet's surface, which fades from white to black through the video as the probe flies over the course of one Martian day, said official news agency Xinhua.

The five-tonne Tianwen-1  which translates as "Questions to Heaven"  includes a Mars orbiter, a lander and a solar-powered rover and launched from southern China last July.

It is the latest step in Beijing's space programme, which aims to establish a crewed space station by 2022 and eventually put an astronaut on the moon, and has opened up a new, extraterrestrial arena for US-China competition.

Tianwen-1 launched around the same time as a rival US mission, and is expected to touch down on the surface of the planet in May.

Its success comes the same week as the United Arab Emirates' "Hope" probe also successfully entered Mars' orbit  making history as the Arab world's first interplanetary mission.

Chinese scientists hope to land a 240-kilogram rover in May in Utopia, a massive impact basin on Mars. Its orbiter will last for a Martian year.

For the three-month study of the planet's soil and atmosphere, the mission will take photos, chart maps and look for signs of past life.

The probe has already sent back its first image of Mars  a black-and-white photo that showed geological features including the Schiaparelli crater and the Valles Marineris, a vast stretch of canyons on the Martian surface.

Mars has proved to be a challenging target, with most missions since 1960, sent by Russia, Europe, Japan and India, ending in failure.

NASA's Perseverance, which is set to touch down on the Red Planet on February 18, will become the fifth rover to complete the voyage since 1997  and all so far have been American.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, now the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, removes her mask to speak during a news conference in Wilmington, Del., on Dec. 8, 2020. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

CDCs Walensky Explains Changing School Distancing Recommendation

The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) defended telling educators last year that social distancing in schools of three feet was quite safe, while new reopening guidance from her agency says six feet of distancing is recommended.

Over the summer, we were at much less disease, and our guidance is a bit more flexible in terms of the distancing if you are at low rates of transmission, those rates that we were seeing over the summer, Dr. Rochelle Walensky said on Feb. 14.

The other thing I want to just highlight is that a lots changed since July. We know, we have a lot more science. We have over 60 references accompanying our school guidance. Many, if not most of those references have been experiences that have happened in the fall, both here in the United States and in Europe, as well as new data on variants, which we werent talking about over the summer. So, I think one of the lessons learned here is, we have to be humble as to what were learning and be willing to be flexible as we learn more, she added.

Walensky was speaking on CNNs State of the Union.

Before she was selected to lead the agency, Walensky in the summer of 2020 told the mayor of her hometown in Massachusetts that if people are masked, it is quite safe and much more practical to be at three feet, emails obtained by a group of parents showed.

Parents in Newton pointed to the recommendation when questioning why officials in the town were against fully reopening schools. The officials said it wasnt possible, citing guidance from its health department that recommended six feet of distancing.

Newtown Public Schoolss (NPS) decision to ignore the three-foot expert recommendation prevented Newton from fully opening schools, Dr. Stefanos Kales, a professor at Harvard Medical School, wrote in a blog post. Newton owes taxpayers, parents, and children some explanations.

Some groups have said a minimum distance of three feet is appropriate, including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (pdf).

Some countries have been able to successfully reopen schools after first controlling community-wide spread of SARS-CoV-2 while using three feet of distance between students without increases in community spread. Physical distance between desks should follow current public health guidance, and desks should be placed at least three feet apart and ideally six feet apart, the academy said in reopening guidance.

SARS-CoV-2 is the strain of coronavirus, also known as the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, that causes the disease COVID-19.

A student works on a computer at Freedom Preparatory Academy in Provo, Utah, on Feb. 10, 2021. (George Frey/Getty Images)

The CDCs new guidance, published last week, repeatedly states that six feet of distancing should be targeted when reopening schools. Walensky told reporters in a call about the guidance that, along with masking, physical distance of at least six feet should be required across the school environment.

Joseph Allen, associate professor and director of the Healthy Buildings program at Harvard Universitys T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and Helen Jenkins, an associate professor of biostatistics at Boston University School of Public Health, criticized the guidance.

The CDC emphasizes maintaining six feet of distancing, even between kids. But that ignores the science on children, transmission and the power of layered risk-reduction measures, they wrote in an op-ed. Ultimately, this six-foot distancing rule is what will keep most kids out of school simply because of space limitations.

The CDC didnt immediately respond to a request for comment about the origin of the six-foot guidance.

A spokesperson for the City of Newton told The Epoch Times via email: The Newton Public Schools and City of Newton have consistently used recommendations from the CDC and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.

Walensky said on NBCs Meet the Press that the distancing guidance can be flexible, depending on the amount of community transmission of the virus in the schools locale.

Our guidance is really dependent on how much disease is in the community. We know that most of the disease that comes into the school comes into the community. And with universal mask-wearing, we know that theres very limited transmission within the schools, and that that transmission is largely from staff to staff and largely when those masks are, mask-wearing is breached, she said.

So, we are more flexible with the six feet if theres limited amount of community spread in those low to moderate ranges. When you get to substantial and high ranges of community spread, we really feel like you need six feet. The data suggests, the science suggests, you need six feet with universal mask-wearing to keep our children and our staff safe.
Alabama is focusing attention on its rural areas in a bid to spur economic development.

The states Department of Commerce today unveiled the RurAL website along with a marketing campaign trumpeting opportunities away from the cities. Its the latest move over the last few years to direct investment and opportunity to Alabamas small towns and underdeveloped counties with fewer than 50,000 people.

The website, and the campaign itself, is described as an extension of the Commerce Departments Made in Alabama site and branding, which launched back in 2013. The site will spotlight existing projects and companies, and give information for developers.

Alabamas rural counties are home to many of the worlds best-known companies and thousands of skilled workers and talented artisans creating first-class products, Governor Kay Ivey said in a statement. The states rural communities are primed for business growth and economic development.

Alabama in recent years has made a priority of rural economic development through several initiatives. In 2015 the state began offering incentives to qualified projects in targeted counties as a bid to spur rural job creation. Then, in 2019, the state expanded the area where targeted incentives were available, and hired a the states first rural development manager.

Alabama Commerce Secretary Greg Canfield said the campaign should bring more attention to business opportunities in the targeted communities.

While economic developers working in rural areas often face a specific set of challenges, we know that these communities offer advantages that are sometimes overlooked, Canfield said.

According to the Commerce Department, foreign direct investment in Alabamas rural counties approached $1.5 billion between 2015 to 2019. Since 2015, incentivized projects have brought over $4 billion in new capital investment to the states targeted counties.

One thing that is often overlooked is that rural Alabama is a place of great innovation and industry, Brenda Tuck, Commerces rural development manager, said. Through this new campaign, we can tell the story of what rural Alabama has to offer and shine a light on the industries that are there and the quality of life that exists in these communities.
Donald Trump's acquittal on Saturday has relaunched prospects that his daughter-in-law Lara Trump could launch a Senate bid in North Carolina to take retiring Republican Senator Richard Burr's seat.

Burr has come under intense criticism from the GOP for voting Saturday that Trump did 'incite an insurrection' on January 6  and he is now facing a censure vote from his state's Republican Party.

Trump ally and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham told Fox News that Burr's vote basically assured that if Lara were to launch a bid, she would earn the Republican nomination in the state.

'My friend Richard Burr just made Lara Trump almost the certain nominee for the Senate seat in North Carolina to replace him if she runs,' Graham told Fox on Sunday.

One senior Republican official with knowledge of her plans told The New York Times that while the Capitol riot did soured Lara's desire to seek office, she is still considering it.

The official said she would decide over the next few months whether to run as part of a coordinated effort to bring back the Trump family to politics.

With impeachment over, speculation is reemerging that Lara Trump (left) is considering a Senate run in North Carolina

North Carolina Republican Senator Richard Burr, who voted for Trump's conviction in the impeachment trial on Saturday, announced in 2016 he would not run for reelection in 2022

The North Carolina GOP voted Monday to formally censure Burr. The state's GOP Chairman Michael Whatley in a statement Saturday called Burr's decision 'shocking and disappointing'

Trump ally and South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said Sunday: 'My friend Richard Burr just made Lara Trump almost the certain nominee for the Senate seat in North Carolina to replace him if she runs'

Last year, rumors emerged that Eric Trump's wife, who he shares two children with, was considering a Senate run in her home state

Burr announced in 2016 when reelected that he would not seek another term in 2022.

There are several questions over the logistics of a Lara Senate run, however, including her residence.

Lara, Eric and their kids Caroline, 1, and Eric Jr., 3, live in the northern suburbs of New York City and if she was successful they would need to move to North Carolina.

Several Trumpian Republicans have announced they are launching primary bids in local elections in the midst of the fallout from the Capitol insurrection, which Democrats and seven Republican senators pegged on the former president.

The Senate ultimately failed to earn the two-thirds votes needed to convict Trump for 'incitement of insurrection on Saturday in a 57-43 vote.

Richard Burr will face Monday a censure vote from North Carolina's Republican Party after he joined six other Republicans on Saturday in voting in favor of convicting Donald Trump for 'inciting an insurrection.'

The move by Burr's home state GOP is the latest in fallout for the seven Republican senators dubbed 'Republicans in name only' or 'RINOs'.

The vote to formally express disapproval of Burr is expected to pass swiftly with overwhelming support for censoring him.

'I am voting yes because he failed his state and his constituents by voting to convict FORMER President Trump in what was an unconstitutional trial. A trial that even he said was unconstitutional,' North Carolina's RNC committeewoman Kyshia Lineberger told CNN.

'At the end of the day, America is a Republic where we the people elect representatives. Senator Burr did not represent the will of the people and that is a shame.'

North Carolina's GOP Chairman Michael Whatley called Burr's decision 'shocking and disappointing' in a statement Saturday.

Fellow dissenter Republican senator Bill Cassidy was also censured by the GOP in his home state of Louisiana.

Republicans are turning en masse on the seven GOP senators who chose to convict Donald Trump during his second impeachment trial on Saturday.

Those who voted to convict with the 50 Democrats include Republican Senators Burr, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

There are some obstacles the family would face if Lara were successful, including moving her, husband Eric Trump and their two children Caroline, 1, and Eric Jr., 3, from New York City suburbs to North Carolina

Of the seven, Burr was the biggest surprise as he was the only one of them all who voted last Tuesday that it was unconstitutional for the Senate to move forward with it's impeachment trial against an ex-president.

'I have listened to the arguments presented by both sides and considered the facts. The facts are clear,' Burr said in a statement Saturday after casting his 'guilty' vote.

'The President promoted unfounded conspiracy theories to cast doubt on the integrity of a free and fair election because he did not like the results,' he continued. 'As Congress met to certify the election results, the President directed his supporters to go to the Capitol to disrupt the lawful proceedings required by the Constitution. When the crowd became violent, the President used his office to first inflame the situation instead of immediately calling for an end to the assault.'

Trump was ultimately acquitted 57- 43, with Democrats falling 10 votes short of the 67 needed to convict the former President of inciting insurrection before the January 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol.

A two-thirds vote was required to successfully convict.

While 43 Republican senators chose to support the former President, seven ultimately agreed that Trump violated his oath of office by stirring MAGA fans into a frenzy before they took part in the siege of the Capitol.
The six-foot vessel was launched from Cuba with ten people aboard

The US Coast Guard is searching for ten people reported missing off the coast of Florida after they launched from Cuba on board a makeshift vessel.

Rescuers found the remains of the rickety 6ft boat off Key West on Friday after the makeshift vessel set sail from Havana for the Florida coast.

In a separate operation, crews have called off a search for six people following another sinking. A Jamaican national who had been on board the vessel from Bimini, Bahamas, that capsized on Wednesday, was rescued by a good Samaritan off the Atlantic coast on Saturday.

The rescued Jamaican said six others were with him when their 18ft vessel overturned 23 miles offshore from Fort Pierce.

It comes days after the Coast Guard rescued three Cuban nationals from a deserted Bahamas island after their vessel capsized in rough waters.

Two men and a woman were rescued last Tuesday after they were stranded for 33 days and survived on conchs and rats. The castaways, who have not been named publicly, are now in ICE custody, USCG said.

They told rescuers that they ended up on the island about five weeks ago after their boat capsized in rough waters and they swam to shore.

Capsized boat carrying ten people who left from Havana, Cuba is pictured in waters off the coast of Key West

A separate rescue mission was launched late last week for ten people who have gone missing off the coast of Key West after they left Havana, Cuba, in a '6-foot makeshift vessel' last Sunday. Vessel is pictured above

In one of the more recent rescue operations, Coast Guards were contacted by a boat operator who said he had rescued a Jamaican man from waters east of Fort Pierce.

Those on board were en route from Bimini, according to the Coast Guard, but the agency did not mention where their boat was headed.

The rescued man was transported ashore and taken to hospital for medical treatment.

An image tweeted by the Coast Guard shows the capsized boat that held the seven people coming from Bimini, Bahamas.

The Coast Guard dispatched three cutters and an airplane to search the area but the operation was suspended on Sunday evening at 10.30pm.

it comes days after two men and a woman were rescued from a deserted island in the Bahamas after they were stranded for 33 days and survived on conchs and rats. The trio are seen on the shore before a helicopter crew picked them up in a photo released by the US Coast Guard

One of the castaways, who officials said were Cuban nationals, is seen next to a pile of supplies air-dropped by the Coast Guard before the rescue

The USCG wrote on Twitter: '@USCG suspended the search Sunday at 10:30 p.m., for six people who were reported as missing approximately 23 miles east of Fort Pierce.'

The Coast Guard searched an area of 10,694 miles for a total of 140 hours, according to a statement.

'The decision to suspend a search-and-rescue case is never one we come to lightly,' said Capt. JoAnn Burdian, commander of Coast Guard Sector Miami.

The boat carrying seven people from Bimini, Bahamas is pictured overturned in waters off Fort Pierce. The U.S. Coast Guard suspended the search on Sunday evening

'We offer our deepest sympathies to the friends and families of those involved during this difficult time.'

A separate rescue mission was launched late last week for ten people who have gone missing off the coast of Key West after they left Havana, Cuba, in a '6-foot makeshift vessel' last Sunday.

It remains unclear why the homemade vessel vanished.

The US Coast Guard tweeted on February 12: '10 people missing after reportedly leaving Havana, Cuba Sunday for Florida in a 6-foot makeshift vessel.

'@USCG crews are searching.'

Today, the Coast Guard tweeted that the search for the ten missing people is ongoing.

'@USCG continues the search for the 10 missing people south of Key West.'

Last Tuesday, two men and a woman were rescued from a deserted island in the Bahamas after they were stranded for 33 days and survived on conchs and rats.

A helicopter crew with the US Coast Guard (USCG) conducted the Hollywood-worthy rescue on Tuesday.

The agency said officers spotted people waving flags on Monday during a routine air patrol of the waters around Anguilla Cay, an uninhabited Bahama Banks' island between Cuba and the Florida Keys.

The castaways, who have not been named publicly, were all Cuban nationals and are now in ICE custody, USCG said.

The trio told rescuers that they ended up on the island about five weeks ago after their boat capsized in rough waters and they swam to shore.

Coast Guard aircraft commander Mike Allert told WPLG-TV the trio survived on rats and conchs - a tropical marine mollusk.

He added they appeared in 'dire straits due to a lack of fresh water on the island'.

The Coast Guard posted a video on Twitter of a helicopter crew dropping a package with food, water and a radio down to the castaways last Monday. The crew then returned on Tuesday to airlift the trio and transport them to the Lower Keys Medical Center

The Coast Guard said officers spotted people waving flags on Monday during a routine air patrol of the waters around Anguilla Cay, an uninhabited Bahama Banks' island between Cuba and the Florida Keys

USCG Petty Officer 2nd Class Brandon Murray said it wasn't immediately clear why the people were in the boat in the first place, the Sun Sentinel reported.

Murray speculated that they may have been migrants trying to make it to the US or fishermen who got lost at sea.

He expressed disbelief that the group managed to survive for so long on the island alone.

'I cannot recall a time that we saved people who were stranded for over a month on an island,' Murray said. 'That is a new one for me.'

The helicopter crew that first noticed the group dropped water, food and a radio down to them on Monday, as seen in a video released by the USCG, but bad weather called the main rescue off for a day.

A crew then returned on Tuesday to airlift them and bring them to the Lower Keys Medical Center.

None of the castaways appeared seriously hurt, USCG said.

They were initially taken to Lower Keys Medical Center but were later taken into ICE custody and transferred to Pompano Beach.
Congress activist in Odisha dresses like PM Modi, asks people whether fuel prices have come down

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

Bhubaneswar, Feb 15: A Congress activist in Odisha on Monday resorted to a unique way of protesting against fuel price rise by dressing like Prime Minister Narendra Modi and going around on a bullock cart asking people whether petrol prices have come down or not.

The protest was witnessed in Umerkote town in Nabarangpur district during the Congress's six-hour state-wide bandh against fuel price rise.

Ache din lauta do: Opposition attacks Narendra Modi's govt over rising fuel prices

Loudspeakers in the Congress rally blared the recorded question from an old speech of Modi and the man with white hair and beard enacted it by lip-syncing along with hand gestures.

This unique way of protest amused residents of places through which the rally traversed. The district witnessed a complete bandh as a large number of Congress workers led by former parliamentarian Pradip Majhi blocked roads.

All shops, schools and colleges were shut and vehicles remained off the roads in the district.

Priyanka Gandhi, Arvind Kejriwal slam central govt over Disha Ravi's arrest

Earlier, the Opposition political parties launched a series of attacks on the Narendra Modi government over the increasing prices of petrol and diesel. The fuel prices were raised for the seventh successive day across the country on Monday.

Taking to Twitter Congress leader Rahul Gandhi took aim at the Modi government over the continuous petrol and diesel price and claimed that common people are being looted for the benefit of 'two people'.

West Bengal polls 2021: Amit Shah to visit Kolkata this week, PM Modi to address rally in Hooghly on Feb 22

Samajwadi Party leader IP Singh also took a dig at the central government over the rising petrol and diesel prices, saying that the public is demanding from the Centre that please give back 'Ache din'.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Sitaram Yechury lambasted the Modi government over the rising prices of petrol, diesel and LPG. He accused the Centre of implementing policies which only benefits the 'cronies'.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 13:58 [IST]
She married AFL great Chris Judd in a lavish ceremony on New Year's Eve in 2010.

And on Sunday, Rebecca Judd shared a sweet tribute to her husband as they celebrated Valentine's Day, just a few weeks after their 10-year anniversary.

The 38-year-old WAG posted a photo to Instagram of herself and Chris, and wrote in the caption: 'V Day every day for more than 17 years. ILY [I love you].'

Tribute: Footy WAG Rebecca Judd has shared a sweet tribute to her husband, Chris, as they celebrated Valentine's Day on Sunday

In the picture, the couple wore black face masks while on a stroll in Melbourne.

The Judds met at a pub in Perth 17 years ago when they were both teenagers, and wed on December 31, 2010, at Melbourne's Albert Park.

They have since welcomed four children, son Oscar, nine, daughter Billie, six, and four-year-old twin boys Tom and Darcy.

How romantic: The 38-year-old posted this photo to Instagram of herself and Chris, and wrote in the caption: 'V Day every day for more than 17 years. ILY [I love you]'

Last year, Rebecca shared her secret to a long and happy relationship on KIIS FM's 3pm Pick-Up radio show.

She explained how a bad sleeping arrangement can lead to tension in a marriage, so she makes sure Chris never interrupts her.

'If he comes anywhere near me or if he has a toe touching me at night time, I'll like wake him up [and] push him over,' she said.

'I cannot sleep if you're touching me. You actually need to be at least half a metre away from me, so if I want to roll and turn in the night, I can turn and still not have to touch you.'

Romance: The Judds met at a pub in Perth 17 years ago when they were both teenagers, and wed on December 31, 2010, at Melbourne's Albert Park

However, Rebecca added she and Chris make sure to have a 'quick kiss and cuddle' before turning out the lights and enforcing the no-touching policy.

'When we were first together, it was better to sleep knowing he was there,' she explained.

'We would be like completely entwined in each other and have the best night's sleep.

'Now, we'll have a quick kiss and a cuddle and then it's like, "See you in the morning!" Maybe that's why our marriage is almost at 10 years.'
In a separate report filed with the Australian Charities & Not-for-profits Commission a fortnight ago, St Basils directors predicted the Fawkner home would have to cut jobs. It is anticipated that staff will need to be made redundant given the low numbers of returning residents, St Basils directors wrote. All steps will be taken to ensure that St Basils remains financially viable. The home reported it made a loss of $615,000 in 2020 and said careful consideration needed to be given to whether it should continue operation. A St Basils spokeswoman said there have been no redundancies and no plans for future redundancies, but did not explain why they had told the charities regulator there would be.

The Victorian Coroner is investigating the 45 deaths at the home from coronavirus, while a separate federal probe in December found St Basils was inadequately prepared for emergencies. The chairman of St Basils during the deaths, Kon Kontis, stood down in September and is no longer a director, while the homes manager, Vicky Kos, has also departed. St Basil's Homes for the Aged in Fawkner, where 45 residents died. Credit:Joe Armao St Basils sits on three hectares of land overlooking the Merri Creek and is owned by the Greek Orthodox church, which also operates the facility. An investigation by The Age last year found the annual rent of $2.5 million paid by St Basils to the church was nearly twice the amount both a council rates valuation and one of the states most senior commercial agents said it should pay.

In its most recent report, St Basils confirmed the church had cut the rent to $1.85 million in the latest financial year. The accounts were signed off in October and submitted to the charities regulator at the end of January. Christine Golding, whose 84-year-old mother Efraxia died after contracting coronavirus at the home, said St Basils had paid less to the archdiocese because so many residents were either deceased or families had taken them to another home. Former state government minister Theo Theophanous, a prominent member of the Greek community, has previously described the aged care homes handling of the pandemic as a debacle, and described the rent paid to the archdiocese as exorbitant. Last week Mr Theophanous said he was unsurprised the federal government had cut off payments to St Basils for new residents. Proper accountability and responsibility needs to be taken by St Basils if they are going to be allowed to continue operation, he said.

A St Basils spokeswoman said it was continuing to upgrade the facility and that its priority was the health and wellbeing of residents. St Basils had been working well and adhering to government regulations until residents were removed in July 2020, the spokeswoman said. The board is committed to executing the recommendations of the [Aged Care Quality and Safety] Commission and is engaging clinical and professional experts to ensure the safety and highest quality care of residents. The spokeswoman also said the archdiocese received rent based on market value for St Basils and the cut in rent it received was due to falling income at the home. Funds contributed to the archdiocese have been reduced to accommodate lost income and to ensure the organisations financial future. About 95 per cent of St Basils $13 million annual income comes from federal government grants, its financial reports show. St Basils was bought by the Greek Orthodox archdiocese of Australia for $525,000 in 1993. Senior church figures sit on its board. A council valuation puts the value of land and buildings on the site at about $24 million.

Fotini Atzarakis who died in the Austin Hospital at the end of July, after contracting coronavirus at St Basils. Aged care operators in the Greek community have attracted a steady flow of new residents to their homes, as the wave of migrants that came to Australia from the 1950s onwards enter their 70s and 80s and 90s and need more intensive care. Kathy Bourinaris mother, Fotini Atzarakis, was 77 when she died in the Austin Hospital at the end of July, after contracting coronavirus at St Basils. Ms Atzarakis went into the home for a brief round of respite care on June 29. A month later she was dead, following a 10-day battle with coronavirus in the Austin Hospital. She had Parkinsons and we just needed a bit of a break. We thought if she is going to be safe anywhere, its going to be a nursing home, Ms Bourinaris said

Ms Bourinaris said her father, who was married to her mother for 62 years, felt lost. The couple, who had three children and eight grandchildren, came to Australia in the late 1960s. St Basils didnt know what they were doing, said Ms Bourinaris, who has been interviewed by the coroner about her mothers death. Kathy Bourinaris mother Fotini Atzarakis died in the Austin Hospital in July 2020 after contracting Coronavirus at St Basils Credit:Chris Hopkins She was not contacted by St Basils about her mothers death  but she did receive a call from the home in November. Ms Bourinaris thought the home was calling to ask how she was coping after her mothers death. Instead, they were ringing to see if her mother was interested in coming in for a tour, to see if she wanted to come and live at the home.

I was shocked. I told them, My mum passed away there you morons. St Basils was contacted for comment but did not respond. Loading Replay Replay video Play video Play video Lawyer Tony Carbone is leading a class action of relatives who died at the home. He said there had been a large number of complaints made to the aged care quality commission about St Basils, but until now no meaningful action had been taken against the operator. So for the commission to come up with this sort of conclusion appears to show a massive shift  up until now, no one has expressed any joy dealing with the commission.

Mr Carbone said that, if breaches continued, he would consider taking action against the commission as well as part of the legal case. Loading If there were any other breaches, we will pursue them too  they are supposed to be overseeing all of these homes and if theyre not making homes comply, surely theyve got to be in the gun. Aged Care Services Minister Richard Colbeck said the health of older Australians and the workers who care for them was of the utmost importance. St Basils Homes for the Aged remained subject to a notice to agree issued by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission, he said.
Muzaffarnagar : , Feb 15 (IANS) The Muzaffarnagar police celebrated the third birthday of its sniffer dog Dicky with a special cake.

Dicky, whose birthday was celebrated on Saturday, was helped by his handler, Sunil Kumar, in cutting the cake.

Wearing a colourful paper cap and a solemn expression, Dicky 'cut' the birthday in the presence of her handler, and other police personnel at the police line kennel here.

The Labrador Retriever received a new coat and a leash as gifts. As a treat, she had boiled chicken along with her daily meal, comprising boiled eggs, mutton, vegetables, flatbread and milk.

The function was in keeping with Muzaffarnagar SSP Abhishek Yadav's directive that the birthday of all police personnel be celebrated at his duty premises -- the police station or outpost concerned or police line.

Abdul Raees Khan, police line in-charge, said, "Dicky has been trained by Indo-Tibetan Border Police at Panchkula in Haryana. She was posted to Muzaffarnagar in August 2019. Since then Dicky has been a part of operations to sniff out explosives at bus stands, railway stations, markets and other important places." She was a part of the then US president Donald Trump's security drill when he visited India in 2020, he added.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Wild Capuchin monkey (Cebus capucinus), on a tree near a river bank in the jungles of Guanacaste, Costa Rica. Image: David M. Jensen/Wikipedia.

An international team of scientists has sequenced the genome of a capuchin monkey for the first time, uncovering new genetic clues about the evolution of their long lifespan and large brains.

Published in PNAS, the work was led by the University of Calgary in Canada and involved researchers at the University of Liverpool.

"Capuchins have the largest relative brain size of any monkey and can live past the age of 50, despite their small size, but their genetic underpinnings had remained unexplored until now," explains Professor Joao Pedro De Magalhaes, who researches ageing at the University of Liverpool.

The researchers developed and annotated a reference assembly for white-faced capuchin monkeys (Cebus imitator) to explore the evolution of these traits.

Through a comparative genomics approach spanning a wide diversity of mammals, they identified genes under evolutionary selection associated with longevity and brain development.

"We found signatures of positive selection on genes underlying both traits, which helps us to better understand how such traits evolve. In addition, we found evidence of genetic adaptation to drought and seasonal environments by looking at populations of capuchins from a rainforest and a seasonal dry forest," said senior author and Canada Research Chair Amanda Melin who has studied capuchin monkey behaviour and genetics for almost 20 years.

The researchers identified genes associated with DNA damage response, metabolism, cell cycle, and insulin signalling. Damage to the DNA is thought to be a major contributor to ageing and previous studies by Professor de Magalhaes and others have shown that genes involved in DNA damage responses exhibit longevity-specific selection patterns in mammals.

"Of course, because aging-related genes often play multiple roles it is impossible to be sure whether selection in these genes is related to ageing or to other life-history traits, like growth rates and developmental times, that in turn correlate with longevity," said Professor De Magalhaes.

"Although we should be cautious about the biological significance of our findings, it is tempting to speculate that, like in other species, changes to specific aging-related genes or pathways, could contribute to the longevity of capuchins," he added.

The team's insights were made possible thanks to the development of a new technique to isolate DNA more efficiently from primate faeces.

FecalFACS utilises an existing technique that has been developed to separate cells types in body fluidsfor example to separate different cell types in blood for cancer researchand applies it to primate faecal samples.

"This is a major breakthrough because the typical way to extract DNA from faeces results in about 95-99% of the DNA coming from gut microbes and food items. A lot of money has been spent sequencing genomes from different organisms than the mammals we're actually trying to study. Because of this, when wildlife biologists have required entire genomes, they have had to rely on more pure sources of DNA, like blood, saliva, or tissuebut as you can imagine, those are very hard to come by when studying endangered animals," explained the study's lead author, Dr. Joseph Orkin, who completed work on this project as a postdoctoral scholar at the University of Calgary, and in his present location at Universitat Pompeu Fabra-CSIC in Barcelona.

"FecalFACS finally provides a way to sequence whole genomes from free-ranging mammals using readily available, non-invasive samples, which could really help future conservation efforts," he added.

Explore further Scientists sequence genome of bowhead whalelongest-lived mammal

More information: Joseph D. Orkin et al, The genomics of ecological flexibility, large brains, and long lives in capuchin monkeys revealed with fecalFACS, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2021). Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Joseph D. Orkin et al, The genomics of ecological flexibility, large brains, and long lives in capuchin monkeys revealed with fecalFACS,(2021). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2010632118

Love Leitrim have joined the Irish Centre For Human Rights, Friends Of The Earth Ireland, Safety before LNG, Belcoo Frack Free and FutureProof Clare in asking that a fracked gas import ban be included in the Climate Bill.

In a joint letter to the three government party leaders the groups are asking the government to implement the recommendation of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action that the Minister address in the Bill and/or revert to the Committee with a comprehensive plan to ban the importation of fracked gas and specifically to ban LNG terminals in Ireland within the year 2021".

The letter also includes legal advice from the team at the Irish Centre For Human Rights, led by Dr Maeve O'Rourke, that such a ban in the Climate Bill would be compatible with EU and WTO trade laws.

Following the quashing of development consent for Shannon LNG to build a fracked gas import terminal in November 2020 the groups behind the letter to Micheal Martin, Leo Varadkar and Eamon Ryan have stated that it is an ideal opportunity to deliver a ban.

The letter also appeals directly to Eamon Ryan, who is in charge of drafting the Climate Bill, to follow through on the commitment in the Programme For Government, the recommendation of the Oireachtas Climate Action committee and seize the opportunity to this take this meaningful action.

The groups said the inclusion of a fracked gas ban in the Bill "will leave a legacy that will last beyond the lifetime of this government, namely and a world-first ban on fracked gas imports".

Jamie Murphy, chairperson of the Love Leitrim group, one of the letters signatories said "A fracked gas import ban in the Climate Bill would demonstrate a willingness to tackle the worlds largest single super emitter of methane and one of the worst contributors to climate change. It would also demonstrate solidarity and empathy with communities in Pennsylvania, Texas, Northern Ireland and elsewhere affected by, or threatened with, the scourge of fracking.

"Such a ban would set Ireland on course to become a Global Climate Leader. Ireland would be the first country in the world to ban the importation of fracked gas having already implemented a legislative ban on fracking in 2017. We are asking the public to contact their TD's and ask them to ensure this happens."

You can email your TDs on the Friends Of The Earth Ireland website here
CLEVELAND, Ohio A Cuyahoga County Jail officer was found in a car with a suspected member of the Heartless Felons street gang who police accused of possessing a loaded rifle and marijuana, according to Parma police.

While the jail officer is not accused of any wrongdoing, Cuyahoga County and jail officials have long struggled with the Heartless Felons -- the areas most widespread and violent gang -- and the gangs role in distributing drugs in the jail.

Parma police Lt. Dan Ciryak said suspected gang member -- Jahlil Johnson Hardwick is the jail officers boyfriend. The jail officer was not charged with a crime in the incident, but police issued her a traffic citation.

Cuyahoga County spokeswoman Mary Louise Madigan said the officer is still working at the jail. After the incident, she was moved from her role in jail sanitation to the laundry room, where she has less contact with inmates and more supervision.

Madigan said county officials are reviewing all aspects of the situation, but declined to provide specifics. The officer was hired in 2016.

Cuyahoga County Jail Administrator Ronda Gibson said the jail officer filled out a form after the incident notifying officials of her relationship with someone who has previously been an inmate at the jail. Gibson said jail officials are looking into if the officer should have disclosed the relationship before the Jan. 25 incident.

Adam Chaloupka, an attorney for the Ohio Patrolmens Benevolent Association, the union that represents jail officers said its unclear whether the jail has any policies against association with known inmates.

Johnson Hardwick has since been found guilty of violating terms of his parole and was sent to the Lorain Correctional Institution to serve prison time, according to state prison records.

The incident happened about 2:45 p.m. Jan. 25 on State Road and Grantwood Drive. A Parma police officer stopped the jail officers car for running a red light, according to police reports.

Police searched the car and founded the loaded HiPoint semi-automatic carbine rifle. Officers also found about a gram of marijuana, according to police. Ciryak said Johnson Hardwick told officers that the drugs and gun were his and not the jail officers.

Johnson Hardwick is charged with fourth-degree felony improper handling a gun in a car. His criminal history includes five felony convictions since 2009, including an incident in which he and two others beat and stomped a man in an apartment building stairwell.

He was charged in 2018 in connection with the deadly shooting in Clevelands Broadway-Slavic Village neighborhood. Court records say prosecutors dropped all charges after a key witness refused to testify.

In recent years, investigators acknowledged strong ties between the Heartless Felons gang, corrections officers and the drug trade inside the downtown jail.

Prosecutors with the Ohio Attorney Generals Office said in interviews recorded in 2019 during a probe of jail misconduct that Heartless Felons heavily influenced the flow of drugs into the jail. Some inmates told investigators that it was easier to get drugs in the jail than on the street.

Drug incidents at the jail skyrocketed from 22 in 2017 to 83 in 2019. Five of the 12 inmate who died since June 2018 died from drug overdoses, including a woman in August who prosecutors say overdosed on fentanyl given to her by her cellmate.

Former warden Eric Ivey told attorney general investigators in 2019 that he believed jail officers were responsible for bringing the drugs into the jail, but that he did little to stop the flow of drugs into the jail. He also said the sheriffs department, which is responsible for investigating incidents in the jail, often ignored jail officials pleas to investigate specific officers.

Attorney generals office investigators in 2019 uncovered a drug ring inside the jail where officers and Heartless Felons worked in tandem to sell drugs, including to an inmate who survived an overdose.

The group included eight inmates working with seven officers to smuggled heroin, fentanyl, cellphones and vape pens into the jail. Two officers -- Stephen Thomas and Marvella Sullivan -- and two inmates -- Heartless Felons members Lamar Speights and Alexander Foster -- were convicted of bribery, theft in office and drug trafficking.

The gang members bribed and sweet-talked officers into bringing drugs into the jail and sold them with ease under the officers protection, according to court records.

Read more from cleveland.com:

Cuyahoga County Jail mistakenly releases inmate accused of drug dealing, marking 10th mistaken release in 2 years

Cuyahoga County Jail officer pleads guilty to stomping docile inmates arm

Fired Cuyahoga County jail guard pleads guilty in inmates overdose death
The Mumbai Police lodged the FIR against Priyanka Singh on 7 Sep last year, based on a complaint filed by Rhea Chakraborty

Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Monday refused to quash an FIR lodged against late actor Sushant Singh Rajput's sister Priyanka Singh for allegedly forging and fabricating a medical prescription for her brother.

A division bench of Justices SS Shinde and MS Karnik, however, quashed the FIR against Meetu Singh, Rajput's other sister. The court said while there was prima facie evidence against Priyanka, the case against Meetu does not stand.

The sisters had approached the HC, seeking to quash the First Information Report (FIR) lodged for alleged "forgery and fabrication" of a medical prescription for their brother for his anxiety issues.

The FIR was lodged against Priyanka, Meetu and doctor Tarun Kumar of Delhi's Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital by the Mumbai Police on 7 September last year, based on a complaint filed by Rhea Chakraborty.

As per the complaint, Rajput's sisters and the doctor had prepared a forged and fabricated prescription for anti-depressants for the actor.

Rajput, 34, was found dead at his residence in suburban Bandra on 14 June last year. His father KK Singh later lodged a case of abetment

of suicide and cheating against Chakraborty and her family members.

The CBI is conducting a probe into the case. After registration of FIR against Rajput's sisters, the Bandra police forwarded the case papers to the Central Bureau of Investigation, as per directions of the Supreme Court which had said all cases pertaining to the death of Rajput shall be probed by the CBI.
They confirmed their relationship last month, and recently announced plans to live together in London after just one month of dating.

And Demi Sims and Francesca Farago looked incredibly loved up as they posed together for a series of Valentine's Day bikini snaps which were shared to Instagram on Sunday.

TOWIE star Demi, 24, looked sensational as she donned a cut-out swimsuit, which she paired with a set of funky sunglasses.

Romantic: Demi Sims and Francesca Farago looked incredibly loved up as they posed together for a series of Valentine's Day bikini snaps which were shared to Instagram on Sunday

Too Hot To Handle Star Francesca, 27, caught the eye in a skimpy black bikini, taken from her own brand Farago The Label.

She opted for a triangle top, complete with a criss-cross pattern, with a matching thong.

One shot saw the couple stand alongside each other, while another saw them straddle in a sweet embrace beside a swimming pool.

Turning up the heat: TOWIE star Demi, 24, looked sensational as she donned a cut-out swimsuit, which she paired with a set of funky sunglasses

Turning heads: Too Hot To Handle Star Francesca, 27, caught the eye in a skimpy black bikini, taken from her own brand Farago The Label

Demi captioned the post with a heartfelt tribute to her girlfriend as they marked their first Valentine's Day together, writing: 'Close your eyes and picture the sun, that's what it feels like to love her - warmth.'

'Happy first valentines my little baby, you have brought so much happiness into my life I will love you always and forever.'

Francesca later shared another sweet snap to her own page, which saw her hugging Demi as the two wrapped their arms around each other.

Perfect Valentine's Day: Demi later took to Instagram Stories to share a series of photos and clips of her romantic Valentine's Day with her partner

Delicious: She was treated to breakfast in bed by Francesca, which included slices of avocado toast, smoothies and glasses of champagne

Demi later took to Instagram Stories to share a series of photos and clips of her romantic Valentine's Day with her partner.

She was treated to breakfast in bed by Francesca, which included slices of avocado toast, smoothies and glasses of champagne.

Demi later revealed that she and Francesca had both brought each other surprise gifts from Prada without the other knowing.

Surprise: Demi later revealed that she and Francesca had both brought each other surprise gifts from Prada without the other knowing

Luxury gifts: Francesca had gifted her a pink bucket hat, while Demi opted to surprise her beau with a handbag

Francesca had gifted her a pink bucket hat, while Demi opted to surprise her beau with a handbag.

It turns out that Francesca had also designed to treat herself to the same pink bucket hat she had gifted her partner.

Demi explained: 'So she got me that one, and I got her this, how funny,' as she panned the camera over the luxurious gifts.

Matching: It turns out that Francesca had also designed to treat herself to the same pink bucket hat she had gifted her partner

She later turns the camera towards Francesca, who presents her matching bucket hat.

'What, you got one for yourself?' she then asks her.

Later sharing a snap of the gifts, she captioned the post: 'How have we managed this, I'm actually laughing.'

Loved-up: Francesca later took to her own Stories to share a sweet clip of her and Demi in their matching bucket hats

Francesca later took to her own Stories to share a sweet clip of her and Demi in their matching bucket hats.

'You're so cute,' she gushed.

'My baby brought us matching bucket hats,' Demi then said in response.

Demi and Francesca officially confirmed their romance last month, after sharing a loved-up snap of them locking lips.

New couple: Demi and Francesca officially confirmed their romance last month, after sharing a loved-up snap of them locking lips

They later shocked fans as they got their names tattooed on each other's bottom and wrist, just days after going public with their relationship.

Francesca also shared shots of herself in blue floral bikini bottoms and a white crop top from PrettyLittleThing as she revealed her future plans with Demi.

She wrote: 'Moving to London next, brb,' which was quickly met with approval from Demi's sister Frankie, who wrote: 'Yay.'

Shortly after, Demi confirmed the news as she wrote: 'Can't wait for you to live with me!' amongst a trio of adoring comments on Francesca's post.
Is Trade Money A New Ponzi or Double-Your-Money Scheme?

One more Ponzi or money circulation scheme is promising huge returns on investment to gullible investors. This scheme operating under the name of Trade Money, has its office at Dadar in Mumbai. It claims to borrow money from the investors and use it for trading in stocks in bulk while offering the investors a return of 20% per month on their invested amount.

Trade Money claims to be a sub broker for various brokers like CM Goenka Securities, FTC, AARAHM, UPSTOCK. However, they have deliberately used similar sounding or look alike names of the large brokerages in order to mislead investors. This is a major red flag for potential investors.

Trade Money is said to be a company operated by Raj Kumar Singh. He claims to deal in stock market trading.

According to our sources, Trade Money has already lured several small investors to invest in his schemes by claiming to offer good returns on investing money with him.

There is also reference to referral marketing of this scheme like a Ponzi and multi-level marketing (MLM) scheme. In the application form for Trade Money scheme, details of the referrer who referred the investor to invest in this scheme are mentioned. This effectively means, someone who invested in the scheme can earn referral commission by bringing in/ influencing other people to invest in Trade Money.

Trade Moneys double-your-money scheme is simple.

You invest Rs50,000 and for the next 10 months, they will pay you Rs10,000 very month or Rs1 lakh in total. It claims to give 20% return on investment per month. The return paid to investors is divided into two parts, one is profit return per month and second is the instalment from principal amount.

So, in this example, the investor would receive 10% or Rs5,000 as profit return per month and Rs5000 as 10% refund on his investment.

To provide an assurance, Trade Money also offers 10 post-dated cheques to investors.

This sounds too good to be true. Especially, when nobody in the financial market gives an annual return of 120% or 20% per month.

Trade Money says it has a website, trademoneys.com. This domain is registered by Brandup Consultancy Pvt Ltd from Maharashtra with GoDaddy. However, this domain name, trademoneys.com is currently up for sale by GoDaddy.

Under these circumstances, usage of trademoneys.com on its brochures and other communication appears suspicious and shady. Trade Money also uses a generic Gmail ID instead of its own domain.

The company gives an appreciation certificate to the investor for associating with the company as an investor over the companys investment plan along with taking online/ offline training on investment awareness with the company. The website (which is not existent) and a generic Gmail email address are shared on the certificate.

The last page of the loan agreement between the investor and Trade Money is signed by Mr Singh who claims to be the proprietor of the company. Moneylife has reached out to them but they have not responded to us. As and when we receive a response from them, we will update this story.

Retail investors, who are scared of equity market volatility but are not satisfied with returns from bank fixed deposits, often fall prey to dubious schemes that promise them the moon. The greed to make 'easy' money is so intense it sometimes overpowers their common sense and financial wisdom. They get attracted to such flashy schemes, promising impossible returns and weird business models of little-known companies.

But stay far away from Trade Money - like schemes which promise to give huge return on your investment.
The security agencies in Punjab are keeping a close watch on over 200 YouTube channels that have sprung up in the last few months in the name of supporting the ongoing agitation of farmers.

They are under watch not only for their content but also for their funding sources. Intelligence agencies suspect that some of these channels could be fuelling anti-India sentiments under the grab of farmers' stir.

Sources in the intelligence wing of the State police revealed that since November 26, there has been a number of YouTube channels mushrooming and routinely covering live from Tikri, Ghazipur and Singhu borders of Delhi. These channels also run Facebook lives from these locations.

Sources said that though many of them have clean operations which focus on the agitation, a significant number of these channels has raised concern among the security agencies.

There is a need to keep a constant monitoring of these channels. The kind of content which is disguised as genuine stir reporting is actually nothing but fanning extremist viewpoints, said a source in the intelligence department.

The Centre has already banned the YouTube channel and Facebook page run by controversial head of the US-based secessionist group Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), Gurpatwant Pannu. But sources said to circumvent the ban, Pannu was funding other YouTube channels which are reporting under the guise of farmers agitation.

Our monitoring teams are constantly monitoring the content. Since it is a very technical and complicated task we are trying to identify and get such channels blocked, said an officer.

Interestingly, even some farmers organisations have approached the security agencies fearing that some mischievous elements could try to malign the stir through what they claimed as vicious content on air.

We have been provided information about some Facebook pages and YouTube channels by farmer leaders expressing fears that they could have been used for maligning the agitation, said an officer.

Noticeably, even Punjabi actor turned activist who had been arrested recently for the January 26 violence had been posting his speeches on Facebook and YouTube till he was nabbed. The Delhi Police are also investigating the content that Deep Sidhu had uploaded before the January 26 violence.
 Flash

Fijian Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama attended Sunday the celebrations by the Chinese community in Fiji for the Lunar New Year which fell on Feb. 12 this year.

During the celebrations held at the Yat Sen School in Suva, capital of Fiji, Bainimarama congratulated local Chinese on the Lunar New Year, saying that "Chinese New Year is a time to reflect on the events of the past year and it is an opportunity to look forward to a better future. I wish health, happiness and prosperity for 2021 to you, your family and your friends."

The prime minister also hoped that the spirit of ox will help Fiji work together to rebuild its economy which contracted by 19 percent last year due to COVID-19.

"This is a year that will be marked by those qualities we associate with the ox--steadfastness, strength, hard work and perseverance. Most importantly, oxen work best in teams, and we will all need to pull together and work together as we rebuild our economy."

For his part, Chinese Ambassador to Fiji Qian Bo said that the animal "Ox" in Chinese culture symbolizes diligence, bravery and perseverance. It also represents for pioneering, enterprising and success. Therefore, the Year of Ox will be a year of both cultivation and harvest.

"As we celebrate the lunar new year, I wish China-Fiji relations a harmonious, prosperous, and bright future, and wish both Chinese and Fijian people good luck and happiness in the Year of Ox," he said.

The year 2020 is special in the history of China-Fiji relations as the two countries celebrated the 45th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations together, the ambassador said, adding that China looks forward to deepening exchanges and cooperation with Fiji in various fields in 2021 to push forward the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries.

The ambassador also praised local Chinese for the role of bridges they have played in helping maintain and improve the China-Fiji relations over the past years, especially during the extraordinary time of COVID-19.

The Chinese community in Fiji also entertained people by holding art performances and a Chinese food fair.
The Good Law Project has begun a High Court fight with the Cabinet Office after complaining that a focus group contract was awarded to a company with links to then government aide Dominic Cummings.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson's former aide Cummings today told a judge that he would 'never do such a thing'.

He denied asking for a company to be given a focus group and communications support services contract because the bosses were his 'friends'.

Cummings was forced to defend the award of the contract to Public First - at the start of the coronavirus crisis nearly a year ago - after a campaign group complained of 'apparent bias' and took legal action.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson's former aide Dominic Cummings (pictured) denied asking for a company to be given a focus group contract because the bosses were his 'friends'

Ministers are fighting the claim and Mr Cummings outlined the reasoning behind the contract award in a written witness statement, seen by Mrs Justice O'Farrell.

A barrister representing the Good Law Project today told Mrs Justice O'Farrell that Public First was awarded the contract because Mr Cummings, then chief adviser to Mr Johnson, 'wanted' Public First to have the contract.

Jason Coppel QC told the judge at a virtual High Court hearing that 'no other provider was considered'.

He said more than 500,000 had been spent and told that the judge that it was 'not strictly necessary' to award the contract to Public First without competition.

Mr Cummings said Britain had been facing an emergency because of the coronavirus crisis, and 'the award of the contract without delay' was 'entirely justified'.

The Good Law Project has begun a High Court fight with the Cabinet Office. Pictured: Royal Courts of Justice, London

'Obviously I did not request Public First be brought in because they were my friends,' said Mr Cummings.

'I would never do such a thing.'

Mr Cummings said he was Mr Johnson's main political adviser from July 2019 until November 2020.

'Because of Covid in 2020, this role involved issues of management and procurement far more than it did political advice,' he said.

'A big part of my job was solving Whitehall problems - in particular trying to eliminate obstacles and to get the right people into the right roles and the right meetings.'

Mr Cummings said he was friends with people involved with Public First, including director James Frayne.

Then PM special advisor Dominic Cummings speaks at a press conference in the Rose Garden at 10 Downing Street in central London on May 25, 2020

But he said he had not met Mr Frayne since 2016.

'James Frayne and I worked on the euro campaign 20 years ago, other political issues, and set up the campaign to fight the proposed formation of a regional assembly in north-east England in 2004,' he said.

'I have talked to them extensively about focus groups and public opinion over many years.

'I knew from my experience that Public First were very good at running focus groups and that its key staff had thought extensively about how people who usually ignore most news and political communication think and might be influenced.

'I knew that I could rely on them to make an extra effort, beyond what they were paid to do.

'I knew they would give us honest information unlike many companies in this sector.

'Very few companies in this field are competent - almost none are very competent, honest and reliable.'

He said he had 'no involvement' in contractual arrangements with Public First 'or their remuneration'.

Mr Cummings told the judge that the work done by Public First was 'worth more than every penny spent'.

He added: 'I was under the impression that, provided we were acting genuinely in light of an emergency, that the courts later on would understand that we could not spend weeks on procurement in the normal way when we had hours to act and save lives.'

The hearing continues.
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HARD work by Tidy Towns' volunteers and the outdoor staff of Offaly County Council was responsible for Tullamore's fourth place position in the latest nationwide anti-litter league competition.

That's according to the members of Tullamore Municipal District who praised the work of the local Tidy Towns committee and council staff at their February meeting last Thursday.

Proposing the vote of congratulations, Cathaoirleach Cllr Danny Owens said it was only a few years ago that Tullamore was well down the table in the Irish Business Against Litter (IBAL) league.

A lot of hard work has been done, said Cllr Owens singling out Tidy Towns volunteers and former councillor Tommy McKeigue for special mention.

He has put a lifetime of work into it and I'm sure he's as busy as ever, added the Cathaoirleach.

Cllr Sean O'Brien described the achievement as fantastic and noted the Tidy Towns and the council had worked on a programme over the past number of years.

He also praised the work of residents associations around the town particularly those located on approach roads.

Cllr Declan Harvey said he had spoken to the Chairman of the local Tidy Towns committee, Ray Carroll who stressed that the ranking could not have been achieved without the work of the council's outdoor staff.

We would have got nowhere, said Cllr Harvey adding they (the outdoor staff) are after putting their shoulder to the wheel.

He said the outdoor staff were always on call and ready to respond to emergencies.

Cllr Harvey also praised Tidy Towns volunteers and members of residents associations as well as people going on walks who picked up litter.

But, he said that some people who walked dogs were going to have to learn to clean up after them.

Cllr Tony McCormack recalled during his period as President of the local Chamber of Commerce when Tullamore had been ranked at bottom of the IBAL he had been contacted by a journalist from the Irish Times who asked him if this was a black day for the town.

I said it wasn't and that this was the start of a process, said Cllr McCormack adding that a programme of works had been put in place at that point which had now borne fruit.
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YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. No incidents were recorded on February 14 and 15 at the Armenian-Azerbaijani Line of Contact of the Armenian state border, according to the Armenian Ministry of Defense.

Nevertheless, the ministry said that it has recorded irregular gunfire. In some parts of the borderline irregular shots mostly fired into the air  which did not change the operational tactical situation - were recorded.

The units of the Armed Forces and the National Security Service border troops of Armenia are controlling the border situation at the entire length of the borderline, the ministry added.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan
Business owners donate winnings

Sponsors of Brookfields first Ultimate Holiday Showcase presented cash rewards to the five best holiday decorated store fronts at a gathering at Town Hall on Feb. 3.

In a show of community support during the pandemic, several of the winners donated their winnings. Robert OConnor, OConnors Pub Owner, is giving his first place prize of $500 to his employees.

Libero and Simona Pugliese, Johns Best Pizza owners, gave their second place prize of $400 to their church, St. Marguerites.

Rick Tedesco, Guitar Hangar owner, is giving his third place award of $300 to the Huckleberry and Whisconier Schools music department.

Danbury

Acts of kindness raise $25K

Students at St. Joseph School raised $25,000 within a week by performing acts of kindness.

The students have asked their community members, family and friends for donations to support their Catholic school. As a way to show their gratitude, they are paying it forward by performing acts of kindness.

The campaign kicked off on Thursday, Feb. 4, when Principal Louis Howe performed a virtual Rockathon concert for families. In just over an hour, the concert raised $8,000. Within 24 hours, the school surpassed $12,000 in donations.

The school pledged close to 500 acts of service over two weeks. These include: standing up for others, making cards for a hospital, creating a basket for the Danbury police station and shoveling a neighbors driveway.

The fundraiser will continue through this Friday.

Anyone who wishes to support the students can donate by clicking on the "Fundraising" tab at: sjsdanbury.org. The principal will dye his hair purple and let the students dunk tank him if they reach their goals.

Danbury

Painter to lead virtual lecture

Painter Colleen McGuire will host an online lecture at 6 p.m. on Tuesday.

Western Connecticut State University is hosting the event as part of the spring semester Virtual Art Faculty Talks series sponsored by the WCSU Department of Art.

McGuire, an adjunct professor of studio art and art history at WCSU, will discuss her artistic works and creative techniques and philosophy in a Zoom presentation.

The public is invited to register in advance at no charge by accessing the Eventbrite web page for the event at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/art-faculty-lecture-series-colleen-mcguire-tickets-140014199239. Registrants will be sent the Zoom invitation link to attend the event online.

A graduate of the WCSU Master of Fine Arts program, McGuire has participated in 17 solo and group exhibitions in Connecticut and New York since 2004. Her works focus on domestic interiors and scenes from ordinary life, featuring careful observation and attention to composition and light in a style reminiscent of early modernist painters such as Edward Hopper and Edouard Vuillard.

McGuire primarily paints on wood and Masonite, materials that allow for reworking, scraping and layering while exploring the formal and physical possibilities of oil paint.

As a WCSU faculty member, McGuire teaches courses in studio art. She has also taught at the Hotchkiss School and at Southern Connecticut State University. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts. degree from SUNY Purchase.

For more information, contact Lori Robeau of the Department of Art at robeaul@wcsu.edu or Sherri Hill of the Office of University Relations at hills@wcsu.edu.

Danbury

Association donates to hospital

Officers of the Greater Danbury Bar Association presented the Danbury Hospital with a check for $21,550. Given the pandemic, the Bar Association decided to conduct a fundraising campaign throughout an outreach with its membership and other generous members of the community.

Danbury

Immaculate students compete in mock trial

Immaculate High Schools Mock Trial Team had its first competition on Jan. 29.

It was hosted virtually, but was a way for students to face off against students from other schools in the state. The team lost to Fairfield Ludlowe in a very close round, but the Immaculate team won against the defense team from Mercy, bringing Immaculate to 1-1 on the day.

Individual honors were awarded to Grace Garvey 21, who was awarded second best attorney for the morning round, and so was Allie Belone 22 for the afternoon round. Ernst Koch 22 was awarded best witness in the afternoon round. Their next competition is to take place on February 26.

Danbury

Landscape architect earns award

A landscape architect in Danbury was recently recognized for her work and volunteer service.

Jane Didona, principal at Didona Associates Landscape Architects, was presented with the first Elizabeth Bullard Award. She was honored for her sustained record of volunteer service and distinguished design practice by the Connecticut Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects Awards Committee.

Gwen Heerschap, the chair of the Connecticut chapter, presented Didona with the award.

Bullard was a pioneer in the profession, becoming the second female member of the American Society of Landscape Architects, and was elected as a fellow of the ASLA in 1899.

Wilton & Ridgefield

Virtual exhibit reflects on COVID

Weir Farm Art Alliance will present the virtual exhibition, Reflecting on the Pandemic.

The exhibition, featuring 73 Weir Farm artist-in-residence alumni, allows the farm to highlight the wide variety of work produced by the talented artists who have participated in the program since it began in 1998, focusing on works created in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Each artist in this exhibition presents up to three images along with a statement where they reflect on their experiences over the past year, how they have been impacted by the coronavirus and how they have used their art as a means of persevering during this difficult time.

This exhibit is a companion piece to the recently launched video interview series, Weir Farm Artist-In-Residence Reflections; Creating During the Pandemic, where AIR Alumni reflect on their experience while in residence, how the residency affected their future work, and the impact of the coronavirus, including how creating art helped get them through the past year.

Through this exhibit and video series, attendees may reconnect with alumni artists-in-residence from 1998-2020 and be inspired by their work and experiences in response to the pandemic.

Ridgefield

Housatonic Habitat begins Ridgefield house hunt

Housatonic Habitat for Humanity is on the hunt for donated or near-donated land, gifts, including homes to be renovated.

The initiative is called Habitat Ridgefield Site Search 21.

The ideal site is served by town sewer and water, or by an existing well and septic system. The organization aims to build on land in Ridgefield or renovate a single-family home that fits into its neighborhood. Habitat would then sell it to a family who qualifies.

Thirty years and 34 homes after its founding in 1991, Housatonic Habitat for Humanity is returning home to Ridgefield to change the life of a first-time homeowner, the organization says. The initiative is the partnership between Ridgefields Affordable Housing Committee and Housatonic Habitat for Humanity.

Ridgefield

Eagle Scout of the Year named

Ridgefield Spencer Carlson has been named Eagle Scout of the Year.

The CT Society of Sons of the American Revolution recognized Carlson, who is an Eagle Scout with Troop 76.

The National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution annually select a Norman M. and Berdena King Eagle Scout of the year.

On Feb. 2, by a review committee of five compatriots, the CT Society of Sons of the American Revolution chose the CT state representative, who has a chance to earn a $10,000 scholarship if the national winner.

Sherman

Conservation biologist to discuss vernal pools

Deer Pond Farm will offer two webinars on vernal pool ecology next month.

The small, temporary wetlands known as vernal pools provide breeding habitat for forest-dwelling amphibians like wood frogs and spotted salamanders.

This webinar with Jim Arrigoni, a conservation biologist, will explore the variety of life forms and sagas taking place beneath the surface of the water.

The program will be held at 7 p.m. March 4. Visit https://www.ctaudubon.org/2021/02/vernal-pool-ecology-webinar/ for more details and registration.

Washington

Hands-on program teach about maple sugar

The Institute for American Indian Studies is launching new workshops on maple sugar.

The two-part, in-person outdoor workshops will be held this Saturday, as well as Saturday, Feb. 27.

These hands-on programs are intended for people that want to learn about the history of this sweet tradition, as well as the ins and outs of making maple syrup. They are part of the institute's Winter Survival Program, taught by Susan Scherf, an educator at the institute.

Both workshops offer one-hour time slots running from 11 a.m. until 4 p.m. for 20 people per session.

At the first workshop, The Sweet Taste of Success, participants will learn the basics of modern maple syrup production.

The second program, The History of a Sweet Tradition focuses on the history of maple syrup as it was produced and enjoyed through the centuries.

To sign up, visit the museum website in order to reserve a space through Eventbrite or email the museum at events@iaismuseum.org.
London, Feb 15 : British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Monday said that his government will be "very prudent" in easing coronavirus restrictions to ensure a "cautious but irreversible" progress.

"We've got to be very prudent and what we want to see is progress that is cautious but irreversible," Johnson said on his plan for easing the current lockdown, which is expected to be announced on February 22, Xinhua reported.

"I think that's what the public and people up and down the country will want to see," he told the media.

Johnson said that "too many people are dying" due to the pandemic and while rates of infections are "coming down" they remain "comparatively high".

The road-map exiting the lockdown is expected to include the earliest possible dates for reopening schools and different sectors of the economy, he added.

"If we possibly can, we'll be setting out dates," Johnson said.

"The dates that we will be setting out will be the dates by which we hope we can do something at the earliest, if you see what I mean -- so it's the target date by which we hope to do something at the earliest." "If, because of the rate of infection, we have to push something off a little bit to the right -- delay it for a little bit -- we won't hesitate to do that," he added.

Meanwhile, the first travellers required to stay at quarantine hotels in England have begun arriving at London's Heathrow Airport.

From Monday, all British and Irish citizens and British residents who arrive in England after being in the "red list" of more than 30 high-risk countries now have to self-isolate in hotels. The "red list" countries include South Africa, Portugal and South American nations.

The new measures, designed to prevent coronavirus variants from entering the country, apply to arrivals who have been in one of those countries in the past 10 days.

Another 10,972 people in Britain have tested positive for Covid-19, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 4,038,078, according to official figures released Sunday.

Meanwhile, more than 15 million people of the most vulnerable groups in Britain have received a first dose of a coronavirus jab, according to the latest official figures.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out coronavirus vaccines.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
A glance at some of the day's highlights from the Proactive Investors newswire

( ) said dosing has commenced with its inhaled interferon beta product as part of a US Government-funded phase II/III coronavirus clinical trial.

( ) shares soared 55% to 21.25p, prompting the company to put out a statement about the share price movement. The developer of novel immunotherapies for the treatment of cancer and infectious disease noted the recent press coverage and the share price increase and referred shareholders to its interim results statement of January 29, where it gave a full update on the COVIDITY program and the goal of starting a Phase 1 clinical trial, to determine the safety and immune responses to the vaccine, as soon as possible during 2021.

Learning Technologies Group PLC ( ) announced it has agreed to acquire learning and talent development software provider Bridge for US$50mln (36mln) using existing cash resources.

Sativa Wellness Group Inc ( ) said it has submitted its novel food application for validation to the UKs Food Standards Agency (FSA) ahead of the March 31 deadline as part of what it said is a commitment to continually deliver the highest level of regulatory compliance and product quality.

( ) told investors that it is confident its careful approach to distribution would ultimately lead to better sell-through rates as it provided an update on the progress of its rollout of CBD products on both sides of the Atlantic.

( ) said it will launch its novel payments and loyalty solution powered by Open Banking in the second quarter of 2021, which it said will provide merchants with an alternative to rising card interchange fees" and boost loyalty amongst consumers.

( ) has signed non-binding heads of terms with mass spectrometer maker Microsaic Systems to enter a multi-year framework services agreement through which DeepVerge which be appointed as a non-exclusive agent to promote the latters technologies.

Limited ( ) said its tidal turbine and generation equipment has been successfully installed in the Goto Island chain in Japan.

( ) has agreed a new offtake agreement for tin concentrate from the Uis mine in Namibia with its existing trading partner, Thailand Smelting and Refining Corporation (Thaisarco), as well as signing an inaugural offtake agreement with AfriMet Resources AG for its future tantalum production.

s ( )(USOTC: SMCDY) 100%-owned subsidiary Cornwall Resources Limited has been notified that the 'Deep Digital Cornwall' project led by the University of Exeter's Camborne School of Mines, in which Cornwall Resources and are delivery partners, has been awarded funding by the European Regional Development Fund. Strategic Minerals Redmoor exploration licence area will be used as a field laboratory for collection of geochemical and geophysical data, which will also provide information relevant to a number of new prospects.

( ) has completed an initial soil sampling programme on its Jundee East gold project in the Eastern Goldfields region of Western Australia, and has now commenced ground-based gravity surveying over key target areas.

( ) told investors that the ASH-3 production well at the Abu Sennan project, in Egypt, will begin initial testing in the coming days.

Holdings PLC ( ) achieved a sixfold increase in revenue in the six months to the end of November as it continued to establish partnerships with leading pharmaceutical and biotech companies in the key areas of oncology, autoimmune diseases and infectious diseases.

APQ Global Limited ( ) noted that, as at the close of business on January 31, 2021, its unaudited book value was 36.69 US cents (26.72p) per share.

( ) announced that it has received notification to exercise warrants over a total of 10,000,000 new ordinary shares at a price of 0.15 pence per share. The exercise of the warrants of will add A$27,000 of funds to Mosman's existing cash reserves.

( ) has said its deputy chair Trudy Norris-Grey and non-executive director (NED) Mark Freebairn will step down from the board with immediate effect and the company will initiate a search for a new independent NED in due course. I would like to thank Trudy and Mark for their time and contribution to the board of LVCG, Live Company chairman David Ciclitira said in a statement.

( ) (OTCQB:WRHLF) said it is planning to change it name to Love Hemp Group PLC as part of a strategy to build upon the success of its subsidiary Love Hemp Limited and propel the Love Hemp brand to global recognition. The company said the change will take effect over the coming weeks and that it has convened a general meeting for 12 noon on March 11.

CentralNic Group PLC ( ) notified that its preliminary unaudited results for the 2020 calendar year will be on March 1, with the audited annual report and accounts published towards the end of April.

( ) has posted a circular to shareholders in respect of its firm placing, directors' subscription and open offer to raise up to 13mln.
Actor Siddharth has called out Delhi police after the arrest of 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi, in the Greta Thunberg 'toolkit' case. In a series of tweets, he also opened up about the organised tweets shared by Bollywood actors including Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgn and others.

Siddharth took to Twitter explaining what a toolkit means. He wrote, "If you want to go watch a movie with friends, you message all of them which movie, what time and where to assemble before heading there.... This is what may be called a #Toolkit. The ugly version of this is what IT cells do. Stop the bullshit. #ShameOnDelhiPolice."

He went on to remind netizens that Bollywood celebrities are known to use toolkits for film promotions. "Standing unconditionally in solidarity and support with #DishaRavi. I'm so sorry this happened to you sister. We are all with you. Stay strong. This injustice too shall pass," read another tweet by the actor.

"If protestors assemble in a church they are Christian mercenaries, if they eat biryani they are jihadis, if they wear turbans they are Khalistanis, if they organise themselves it's a toolkit... But we cannot say anything about this FASCIST government. Godi media is not investigated. Planned, voluntary compromise of journalistic ethics isn't investigated... A toolkit is. This is Animal Farm in real life," (sic) he added.

"You should see how star's fans organise and execute tweet storms, common DPs and hashtags... Then you will understand why it's so moronic to even discuss this #TOOLKIT. We are living in a bizarre dystopia," the Rang De Basanti actor concluded.

According to the latest reports, Disha Ravi was arrested by a Cyber Cell team of the force on Saturday. The Delhi Police has claimed that she was one of the editors of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.

Police have alleged that Ravi and others (Nikita Jacob and Shantanu Muluk) collaborated with pro-khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State. The Delhi Police in a tweet referring to Disha Ravi said, "She was the one who shared the toolkit doc with Greta Thunberg."

Earlier this month, the said toolkit was shared by a Swedish climate activist, Greta Thunberg on Twitter. The toolkit has been cited as means of spreading disaffection and ill-will against the Government of India to create disharmony among various social, religious and cultural groups, by Delhi Plolice. Reports revealed that Disha is to remain in police custody for five days.

ALSO READ: Mah Govt To Probe Ajay Devgn, Akshay Kumar And Lata Mangeshkar's 'India Together' Tweet

ALSO READ: After Delhi Police Files An FIR Greta Thunberg Tweets 'I Still #StandWithFarmers'
February 15, 2021 / 10:32 PM IST

Price (MSP) system being retained. Multiple rounds of talks between the Centre and the farmers union leaders have ended in a stalemate. Protesting farmers fear that the new laws will dismantle the MSP system and corporatise farming. The Supreme Court had earlier ordered a stay on the implementation of these contentious laws, hoping it will end the protest. The farm union leaders have also rejected Centre's proposal to suspend implementation of the laws for the 18 months. On January 26, the protest turned violent when some farmers deviated from a pre-decided route for their Republic Day tractor rally and clashed with police. Some protesters scaled the ramparts of the Red Fort. Several protestors and police personnel were injured in the ensuing clashes. The farmers' unions also held a 'chakka jam' on February 6 where they blocked national and state highways to protest the internet ban in areas near their agitation sites and harassment allegedly meted out to them by authorities, among other issues.

The 'Delhi Chalo' farmers' protest at border points of New Delhi has entered the 82nd day today. Thousands of farmers, especially from Punjab and Haryana, are staging a sit-in protest along Delhi borders. The protest started on November 26, 2020. The farmers are demanding a complete rollback of the new farm reform laws and a guarantee on the Minimum Support
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Sunday termed former US President Donald Trumps impeachment and acquittal by the Senate of charge of inciting insurrection at the Capitol last month as "toings and froings and all the kerfuffle". Johnsons remarks jarred with those of current US President Joe Biden who called Trumps acquittal as "sad chapter in our history has reminded us that democracy is fragile" as the US Capitol attack, that Trump was being blamed for inciting, left at least five people dead including a police officer. The US President at the time told his supporters to "fight like hell" to overturn his defeat in the November Presidential elections on January 6 when Congress convened to certify Biden's victory.

The British Prime Minister had condemned the Capitol attack. However, on Sunday, during his appearance on CBS Face the Nation, when Johnson was asked about what signal the acquittal of a former US president, who was being blamed to stoke such violence while casting doubt on the democratic process, would reflect the world. Johnson said, "The clear message that we get from the proceedings in America is that after all the toings and froings and all the kerfuffle, American democracy is strong and the American constitution is strong and robust."

"Biden is not so sure. Democracy must always be defended, he said, adding: We must be ever vigilant  each of us has a duty and responsibility as Americans, and especially as leaders, to defend the truth and to defeat the lies.

Read - US: Impeachment Isn't The Final Word On Capitol Riot For Trump

Read - Impeachment Isn't The Final Word On Capitol Riot For Trump

Donald Trump acquitted in Senate

In the Senate Chamber on Saturday, 57 senators voted to convict the former US President Donald Trump but a two-thirds majority in the 100-member body was required to formally punish and bar him from running for office again. At least seven Republican defections, among them Trumps public critic Mitt Romney of Utah made it the most bipartisan impeachment verdict of four in the American history. Trump was acquitted similar to all impeachments of US presidents in the US history including Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1999 and himself in his first trial last year.

Read - Support Grows For Capitol Riot Inquiry After Trump Acquittal

Read - Trump Looks To Reassert Himself After Impeachment Acquittal


Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 22:14:24|Editor: huaxia

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File photo taken on Dec. 30, 2020 shows British Prime Minister Boris Johnson leaves 10 Downing Street for the House of Commons in London, Britain. (Photo by Ray Tang/Xinhua)

"We've got to be very prudent and what we want to see is progress that is cautious but irreversible," Johnson said about his plan for easing the current lockdown, which is expected to be announced on Feb. 22.

"I think that's what the public and people up and down the country will want to see," he told reporters.

LONDON, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Monday that his government will be "very prudent" in easing coronavirus restrictions to ensure a "cautious but irreversible" progress.

"We've got to be very prudent and what we want to see is progress that is cautious but irreversible," Johnson said about his plan for easing the current lockdown, which is expected to be announced on Feb. 22.

"I think that's what the public and people up and down the country will want to see," he told reporters.

Johnson said that "too many people are dying" due to the pandemic and while rates of infections are "coming down" they remain "comparatively high".

The road-map exiting the lockdown is expected to include the earliest possible dates for reopening schools and different sectors of the economy, according to Johnson.

"If we possibly can, we'll be setting out dates," Johnson said. "The dates that we will be setting out will be the dates by which we hope we can do something at the earliest, if you see what I mean -- so it's the target date by which we hope to do something at the earliest."

"If, because of the rate of infection, we have to push something off a little bit to the right -- delay it for a little bit -- we won't hesitate to do that," he added.

A man wearing a face mask walks past an advertising board reading "Stay Home Save Lives" in London, Britain, Jan. 10, 2021. The coronavirus-related deaths in Britain surpassed 80,000 on Saturday with another 1,035 reported in the country. (Xinhua/Han Yan)

Meanwhile, the first travelers required to stay at quarantine hotels in England have begun arriving at London's Heathrow Airport.

From Monday, all British and Irish citizens and British residents who arrive in England after being on the "red list" of more than 30 high-risk countries now have to self-isolate in hotels. The "red list" countries include South Africa, Portugal and South American nations.

The new measures, designed to prevent coronavirus variants from entering the country, apply to arrivals who have been in one of those countries in the past 10 days.

Another 10,972 people in Britain have tested positive for COVID-19, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 4,038,078, according to official figures released Sunday.

Meanwhile, more than 15 million people of the most vulnerable groups in Britain have received a first dose of a coronavirus jab, according to the latest official figures.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since the outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out coronavirus vaccines.

A woman collects a swab for a coronavirus test at a temporary COVID-19 testing facility set up in Ealing, a district in western London, Britain, on Feb. 2, 2021. (Photo by Ray Tang/Xinhua)
New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Indian Navy got its third Scorpene submarine, which will be commissioned as INS Karanj, of Project P-75 on Monday in Mumbai.

The acceptance document was signed by Vice Admiral (Retd) Narayan Prasad, Chairman and Managing Director of Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited, and Rear Admiral B Sivakumar, Chief of Staff Officer (Tech) of Western Naval Command.

With the delivery of Karanj, India further cemented its position as a submarine building nation. MDL, one of the India's leading shipyards with the capacity and the capability to meet the requirements and aspirations of the Indian Navy, has delivered three Scorpene submarines named Khanderi, Kalvari and now Karanj.

The fourth submarine, Vela, launched on May 6 2019, has commenced sea trials, the fifth submarine Vagir, was launched on November 12, 2020 and has commenced harbour sea trials whilst the sixth submarine is presently in an advanced stage of outfitting.

All the six submarines are being constructed under Project 75. The number 75 in Project 75 refers to a unique identifier which was assigned to a programme for series production of submarines.

Two SSK submarines built by MDL in 1992 and 1994 are still in service today, after more than 25 years.

MDL also achieved expertise in submarine refits by successfully executing the medium refit-cum-upgradation of all the four SSK class submarines of the Indian Navy.

It is presently carrying out the Medium Refit and Life Certification of INS Shishumar, the first SSK submarine.

With the construction of the Leander and Godavari class frigates, Khukri class Corvettes, Missile Boats, Delhi and Kolkata class Destroyers, Shivalik class Stealth Frigates, the SSK submarines and the Scorpene submarines under its belt, MDL has almost mapped the history of indigenous warship building in India.
LLEIDA, Spain: A Spanish rapper sentenced to jail time on charges including insulting the monarchy and praising terrorist groups barricaded himself inside a university in northeastern Spain on Monday with a group of supporters.

Pablo Hasel had until last Friday to surrender and serve his nine-month sentence, which has caused an uproar across Spain and led the government to announce it would ease restrictions on free speech, even if not in his particular case.

We are trying to raise awareness of what is happening  This is a very serious attack on our freedoms, not just on me," Hasel, who is known for his radical leftist views, told Reuters.

Hasels lyrics and tweets, which included references to banned guerrilla groups, compared a court to Nazis and called former king Juan Carlos a mafia boss, were found by a court to have encouraged violence and insulted the monarchy.

He and around 20 supporters used a chain with a padlock to shut the main entrance to one of the buildings of Lleida university in the region of Catalonia where they took refuge. Police have yet to show up.

We dont know if they are coming in half an hour or a few days," he said, adding that he faced two years behind bars because he was not planning to pay the fine that was part of his sentence.

In a sign of support, local artist Cinta Vidal has painted graffiti in a town near Barcelona depicting a singing Hasel being painted over by former king Juan Carlos with a roll brush.

It is not acceptable that an artist should go to prison for expressing his ideas," said Vidal, 38.

James McClean has highlighted a threat sent to him on social media just days after he posted calling for an end to 'anti Irish abuse'.

On Sunday, the Republic of Ireland international shared on his Instagram story a direct message sent to his account which read: 'Don't make me set your house on fire and burn everyone inside it.'

It was the fourth in a string of messages sent from the same account, part of which read 'f**k the IRA and f**k Ireland' and also called McClean a 'stupid ginger pr**k'.

While McClean said the earlier messages in the chain were 'like water off a duck's back', he said the final message was 'crossing the line'.

It followed just two days after McClean had taken to social media to call for an increase in condemnation of 'anti Irish abuse' as, having flagged the issue on previous occasions, he said the 'silence is deafening'.

"Banging my head against a brick wall here but I have been doing that for a long time so one more wont make a difference," he wrote.

"So much coverage this past couple weeks about discrimination and the condemnation of it across media outlets, players, ex players etc which is great to see because it's wrong and idiots should be held responsible for their actions and words as nobody should be subjected to that.

"Make no mistake about it or to take anything away from that but just to pose the question... does being abused for being Irish and anti Irish abuse acceptable? Is it not popular enough to be seen to be... spoke out about too?"

Last summer, McClean said he had considered retirement in light of the abuse he has received.

There are 108.5 million global COVID-19 infections, Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported early Sunday. The U.S. has the most cases at 27.5 million, followed by India with 10.9 million and Brazil with 9.8 million.

The Telegraph newspaper reports British scientists are developing a universal vaccine that would combat all the variants of the coronavirus and could be available within a year.

The British newspaper says scientists at the University of Nottingham are working on a vaccine that would target the core of virus instead of the spike protein that current vaccines focus on.

Targeting the core alleviates the need to frequently adjust existing vaccines as the virus mutates.

The Telegraph said proteins found in the core of the virus are far less likely to mutate, meaning the vaccine would protect against all current variants and would theoretically have greater longevity.

A 58-year-old man in France is reported to be the first person infected for a second time with the highly contagious South African variant of the coronavirus.

The mans reinfection is rare albeit probably underestimated, according to the authors of an article in the Clinical Infectious Diseases journal.

New Zealands largest city in going into a three-day lockdown, the countrys first in six months. The shuttering of Auckland comes after the discovery of three family members  a father, mother and daughter  with COVID.

The rest of the country will be on heightened restrictions.

New Zealand is known for having have stamped out the local transmission of the coronavirus, but it regularly detects the virus in travelers to New Zealand who are then placed in quarantine.

The mother in the New Zealand family with COVID works at a catering company that does laundry for airlines. Authorities are investigating whether there is a link to an infected passenger.

Not all U.S. states are happy about President Joe Bidens plan to establish 100 COVID vaccine inoculation sites around the country by the end of the month, according to an Associated Press report.

The wire service reports that some states have learned that the sites do not come with additional vaccines but would pull vaccines from the states existing allocation.

A spokesperson for Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee said, Up until now, weve been under the impression that these sites do not come with their own supply of vaccine  which is the principal thing we need more of, rather than more ways to distribute what we already have.

Adding to the confusion, AP reported that some states have been told by federal officials that the new sites would come with their own supply of vaccines.
Morello, who graduated from LHS in 1982, has been part of several bands and musical groups, including Rage Against the Machine, Audioslave, Prophets of Rage and the Nightwatchman. Morello ranks No. 26 on the Rolling Stones greatest guitarists of all time, and has sold more than 30 million albums worldwide, district officials said.
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. President Armen Sarkissian has returned to Armenia at the end of last week, his office said.

Upon the advice of doctors the president continues treatment in Yerevan, his office said.

Sarkissian was hospitalized with COVID-19 induced double-pneumonia on January 13 in London, where he was on a medical visit for an unrelated condition.

He was discharged from hospital in late January and was recovering at home in London.

Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan
Hes been poisoned, almost blinded, arrested and jailed but Russias anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny isnt cowed.

This week on Foreign Correspondent, Eric Campbell speaks to Navalnys key advisors in his fight to take down President Vladimir Putin.

Its a story Hollywood couldnt make up. An epic tale of power and brinkmanship, corruption and courage.

In this battle of the titans, two men fight about the future of the worlds largest country, Russia.

One is Alexei Navalny, an anti-corruption campaigner and avowed democrat.

The other is the ruthless strongman  President Vladimir Putin.

In this battle of the titans, Navalny has been poisoned, almost blinded, arrested and jailed. But this isnt stopping him.

Six months ago, Putins fiercest opponent lay on his death bed in a German hospital, poisoned by a nerve agent, a substance made by the Soviet military.

Down but not out, Navalny recovered and on a crazy-brave mission, returned to Russia to keep fighting.

As Navalny was arrested and hauled off to prison, his team upped the stakes, releasing a film documenting the existence of a one and a half billion dollar palace which they say belongs to Putin.

As people across Russia rise up to protest against Putin and his excesses, Navalnys inner circle are directing operations outside the country.

The ultimate victory from us would be Russia without Vladimir Putinbecause we understand that absolutely the majority of our problemsthey come from him personally, says Maria Pevchikh, who heads up Navalnys investigations unit.

In this exclusive report, former Russia correspondent Eric Campbell speaks to Navalnys key advisors to find out what motivates their leader and what their next steps will be.

And we hear from the ordinary people of Moscow who are braving freezing temperatures and police to voice their opposition.

Tuesday 16 February at 8pm on ABC.

Next week on #ForeignCorrespondent  The inside story of Alexei Navalnys plan to take down Vladimir Putin. pic.twitter.com/cssb2vgcmy  ForeignCorrespondent (@ForeignOfficial) February 9, 2021

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Justice PB Sawant, former Judge of SC, Passes Away at 90

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Legal luminary and former judge of the Bombay High Court and Supreme Court, Justice P.B. Sawant, who was one of the co-conveners of the Elgar Parishad in 2017, passed away here following a cardiac arrest on Monday, his family said.

A former Chairman of Press Council of India, Justice Sawant was 90 and breathed his last at his family home here around 9.30 a.m.

Justice Sawant is survived by his wife Jayashree, a lawyer son Vishwajeet and two daughters Sujata and Rajashri, his grandson Aditya told IANS.

His last rites will be performed in Pune on Tuesday after his son reaches here, said another family member.

After a thriving legal practice in Mumbai, Justice Sawant was appointed judge of Bombay High Court in 1973 and later elevated to the Supreme Court in 1989.

Among his notable early achievements was probing the crash of the Air India aircraft 'Gauri Shankar' on a Kuala Lumpur-Mumbai flight, which crashed during hard-landing at Mumbai's Sahar International Airport on June 21, 1982, during a thunderstorm, killing at least 17 passengers.

Associated with many human rights, civil liberties, public and social causes, Justice Sawant was one of the three judges - along with late Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer and late Justice H. Suresh - of an independent panel, Indian Peoples Tribunal that probed the post-Godhra violence in Gujarat in 2002.

In 2003, he headed the Justice P.B. Sawant Commission of Enquiry to probe social crusader Kisan Baburao alias Anna Hazare's corruption allegations against four ministers of the then Congress-NCP government in Maharashtra.

Later, the Commission's observations created a massive political furore and led to the resignation of two Cabinet ministers.

On December 31, 2017, Justice Sawant along with his colleague Justice B.G. Kolse-Patil co-convened the Elgar Parishad followed by a series of repercussions like caste riots in Bhima-Koregaon on January 1, 2018, the police swoop on alleged urban Maoists from different parts of India and culminated in a major socio-political churning.

"Justice Sawant was a very ideal, public-minded and dignified person. He excelled in every field as a judge, as an activist, as a social worker... The manner in which he conducted himself in public life serves as an example to all of us," said retired Justice Kolse-Patil, crusader and a personal friend of Justice Sawant.

Maharashtra Trade Unions Joint Action Committee (TUJAC) convener Vishwa Utagi described Justice Sawant as a "pillar of strength to the cause of the working class, a fierce upholder of civil and human rights for citizens" whose loss will be felt deeply.

Well-known activist lawyer Asim Sarode said Justice Sawant was a reformer in the socio-legal fields who regularly used to guide and mentor young lawyers, exhorting them to work for social justice through the legal profession.

Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh said he was pained to learn of Justice Sawant's passing and condoled the bereaved family.

Former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan described Justice Sawant's demise as a "great loss for Maharashtra's progressive movement" as he strove for secularism and equality after retiring as a judge.

Several prominent personalities from the legal, social and political arenas have condoled the demise of Justice Sawant.

Disclaimer: Information, facts or opinions expressed in this news article are presented as sourced from IANS and do not reflect views of Moneylife and hence Moneylife is not responsible or liable for the same. As a source and news provider, IANS is responsible for accuracy, completeness, suitability and validity of any information in this article.

The onset of the pandemic, however, meant delaying their wedding  theyre now hoping to have it in November  and fast-tracking their move. Their cozy apartment quickly became claustrophobic as Mr. Abbatiello worked from the living room and Ms. OReilly from the bedroom, both taking calls throughout the day.

After exploring the local offerings, it became clear that they couldnt afford something newer with more space in West New York. The newer luxury high-rises were astronomically priced, Mr. Abbatiello said. Apartments would be like 900 square feet for $3,500 or $4,000.

Added Ms. OReilly: And that was just the base rent. There were all these additional add-ons: an amenity fee, really expensive parking fees, pet fees. The couple has a cat, Billie, rescued from the construction site of a luxury high-rise across the street from their walk-up.

In any case, there was no longer a need to stay in West New York, since the couple had been freed from their daily commutes for probably at least another year. Ms. OReilly makes the trip into her office about once every two weeks. Not having to be five minutes from the Lincoln Tunnel anymore, it was a no-brainer, she said.

And their friends and family were scattered throughout the greater New York area, which made it easier to leave. Mr. Abbatiello, who is from Staten Island, has a number of friends who still live in the borough, but his parents have moved to South Jersey. Ms. OReillys brother lives in Hoboken, and her parents are in Bergen County. Several friends live in Westchester.
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), an agency within the US Department of Labor (DOL), reported last month that 5,333 US workers died due to workplace injuries in 2019, an increase of 2 percent from the previous year. This is the highest number of workplace deaths in the United States since 2007.

This grisly figure has been steadily rising since a temporary decline during the 2008-2009 recession, when millions of people left the labor force altogether. In the years since, the jobs wiped out by the financial crisis have been replaced by new jobs overwhelmingly concentrated in low-wage, highly exploitative sectors of the economy.

As horrific as they are, the BLS figures are in fact a vast undercount, in part because it does not count deaths due to workplace related diseases. Given the omission of disease-related deaths, as well as the undermining of reporting of workplace COVID-19 infections and deaths by the federal government, it is likely that the figures for 2020, once they are released in next year's report, will represent a far larger undercount of the real number of workplace fatalities than in 2019.

Tesla Motors Assembly Line (Image Credit: Steve Jurvetson/Flickr)

According to an AFL-CIO report, Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect, which analyzed data from 2018, on average 14 workers died on the job each day in the US, and an estimated 95,000 workers died from chronic occupational illness.

Due to limitations in the current injury reporting system and widespread underreporting of workplace injuries, this number understates the problem. The true toll is estimated to be two to three times greateror 7.0 million to 10.5 million injuries and illnesses a year, the AFL-CIO report stated. According to the report, only 3.5 million injuries were reported in 2019.

While the figures from 2019 do not include deaths which occurred during the coronavirus pandemic in the US, they shed light on why COVID-19 has had such a devastating impact in the United States. Even before the pandemic, workers in America were subjected to horrific conditions, with more Americans dying at work each year than died during the entire eight years of the Iraq War.

Meanwhile, rising levels of inequality have led to worsening health outcomes, including a decline in the average expectancy. The deadly social consequences of the engorgement by the corporate oligarchy on societys resources was demonstrated in a recent study by the Lancet medical journal which found that 200,000 Americans would still be alive if mortality rates in the country had kept pace during the pandemic with the average for advanced countries.

Meanwhile, both capitalist parties have systematically hollowed out workplace safety regulations and enforcement. Though the Trump Administration starved Occupational Safety and Health Agency (OSHA) of funds, under the Democratic administration of Barack Obama OSHA also faced a funding crisis. OSHA oversees the enforcement and implementation of safety rules at 8 million workplaces with a combined 130 million workers, but has little more than 2,000 employees and an annual budget of half a billion dollars.

Many of the deaths accounted for in the BLS figures had been previously reported on in the World Socialist Web Site in 2019. This includes:

 Two young UPS part-time package handlers, Austin Stache, 20, of Rancho Cucamonga, and Noe Tinoco Jr., 22, of San Bernardino, California

 Duntate Young, 23, a young Federal Express worker with two young children was killed in November 2019 at the Memphis, Tennessee based companys World Hub

 Jill Greninger, 35, a young mother who died at the Economy Locker Storage Company in Muncy, Pennsylvania

According to the BLS report, 642 workers died in 2019 due to exposures to harmful substances or environments, the highest level since records began in 2011. Workplace suicides increased in 2019 to a total of 307, a 34 percent increase from 2015. Unintentional overdoses also increased for the seventh consecutive year to 313. This means that over 11 percent of all workplace deaths in 2019 were deaths of despair.

According to the report, 2,122 died due to transportation accidents in 2019, a 2 percent increase from the 2018 total of 2,080. A substantial portion of this figures are commercial drivers. Nearly 1 out of every 5 fatally injured workers was employed as a driver/sales worker or truck driver, the BLS report states.

Workplace deaths were disproportionately concentrated among older workers, reflecting the impact among this segment of increased speedup and longer work shifts. Fatalities among workers age 55 and over increased 8 percent from 1,863 in 2018 to 2,005 in 2019, which is the largest number ever recorded for this age group. The death toll for all workers over 45 years of age was 3,087, or 58 percent of the total. By comparison, only 44 percent of the workforce as a whole is over the age of 45. This figure remains significantly higher than it was before the Great Recession.

Some of the factors which have led to increased deaths among older workers can be seen among truck drivers, and the average age of the workforce is 55. Because of a lack of hiring, drivers face greater risks because they are forced to work longer hours, frequently at night, and have added physical responsibilities like helping unload their truck or trailer, factors which lead directly to driver fatigue.

It is plausible that the pandemic will cause a spike even in non-COVID-19 fatalities in the trucking industry. During the pandemic, even more goods have been transported by truck, which accounts for 70 percent of the total amount of goods shipped according to an estimate from the American Trucking Association (ATA).

The BLS study is a portrait of the social devastation of a society in deep crisis and driven by irrational profit motives. It demonstrates the need for the independent mobilization of the working class against the capitalist system.

Who was the Capitol riot ringleader?

By Mark Alexander



As the Democrat actors guild launched their theatrical impeachment farce against former president Donald Trump last week, the nation's capital looked like an occupied war zone  a city on lockdown under imminent threat of a terrorist attack. There are more than 6,000 National Guard personnel still on "defense" around the Capitol at a cost of almost $500 million, and an absurd array of hardened barriers topped with razor wire.

To emphasize and extend the drama, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is treating Republican members like criminals, and Democrat Party protagonists want to make the terrorist barriers permanent.

Moreover, to nationalize the drama, the Biden/Harris regime ordered the Department of Homeland Security to issue a national terrorism alert warning (the first in years) about anti-government extremists, though admitting "DHS does not have any information to indicate a specific, credible plot."

So, what specific and credible threats can DHS verify?

Start with the Demo-constituent riots nationwide over the last six months, which historian Victor Davis Hanson notes resulted in "torching federal court houses and police precincts, 700 policeman injured, 40 people dead, $4-$5 billion in damages..." Democrats justify that violence, including the murder of police officers, under their wholly unfounded "systemic racism" lie, insisting that "police are the problem."

Since that DHS warning was issued, there was a violent insurrectionist battle with police in Bellingham, Washington  which you did not hear about, because some insurrections are acceptable. As political analyst Daniel Greenfield notes, "The [Southern Poverty Law Center] announced that it is shutting down its black nationalist hate groups category [and] will no longer list black racist hate groups because 'the hate is not equal.'"

Of course, you know the "anti-government extremists" Biden's DHS is warning about  grassroots American Patriots, who Demos are calling terrorists.

Consider the language House Intelligence Committee chairman and unhinged leftist Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) used to describe the Capitol mayhem: "It was the most dangerous moment for our democracy in a century. ... America has been through a Civil War, World Wars, a Great Depression, pandemics, McCarthyism, and now a Trumpist and white nationalist insurrection."

Thus, according to the irreparably delusional Schiff, the Capitol riot was "the most dangerous moment for our democracy in a century." He is out of his mind, but the rhetoric he is using is callously calculated to invite more violence.

As I wrote last week, "Demos are baiting and begging for more violence"  you know, as part of Biden's "unity theme."

Fact is, American Liberty is under assault, but not by conservatives across the nation or military personnel who have been stationed in DC as theatrical props. They are merely a smoke screen to obscure the real threat posed by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, their Leftmedia propagandists, and their Big Tech First Amendment suppressors.

Regarding the "Capitol riot jackasses," in my assessment of that disgraceful incident, I wrote that it was no mystery why police were unprepared for the riot: "The real reason Capitol Police were not prepared for that fringe mob is that all law enforcement agencies expected Trump rally supporters to act like they always have  with civility and respect."

I noted further: "Given the upbeat and lawful tenor of ALL previous Trump rallies across our nation over the last four years, there was no reason to believe that a tiny element of last week's rally attendees, some fraction of 1% of those in attendance, would resort to the riotous thuggery associated with 'peaceful' leftist protests. Heretofore that has been the standard modus operandi of so-called 'Black Lives Matter' racists and so-called 'antifa' fascists. What happened on the Capitol grounds was unprecedented for a Trump rally."

In fact, those who battled with police outside and inside the Capitol building, by both appearance and action, certainly do not represent any marginally affiliated contingent of conservatives. They looked and acted more like the Demo-constituents clashing with DC Police last weekend, threatening to burn the city down, as they have done in other urban centers for the last six months.

So, the question remains, who were these thugs? Given that they were completely atypical of "Trump supporters" (as they have ubiquitously been tagged by Democrats and their Leftmedia), who were they?

Though a handful of them were leftist agitators, the majority were NOT. While many of those who followed the rioters into the Capitol were not combative, the atypical break-off group of violent radicals, clearly distinguishable from "Trump supporters," were much less likely inspired to violence by anything Donald Trump said than they were by the rhetoric spewed by a primary benefactor and promoter of that rally.

We now know that benefactor and promoter was InfoWars agitator and conspiracy theory charlatan Alex Jones. The 46-year-old Dallas native once claimed he stopped using marijuana because "it made me paranoid," then dropped out of Austin Community College to launch his paranoid conspiracy theory empire.

He has a long and sordid history of promoting wholly discredited conspiracy theories. This includes being a 9/11 truther, one who promotes the theory that the 9/11 Islamist attack was an "inside job." (Let's not get into the "fake" 1969 Moon landing, weather weapons, and "white genocide.")

In 2015, we took on Jones for promoting the conspiracy that a military exercise was actually "way worse than you realize," telling his adherents it was really about "the U.S. Army's plan to wage war on the American people." According to Jones, "Now this is just a cover for deploying the military on the streets... This is an invasion ... in preparation for the financial collapse and maybe even [Barack] Obama not leaving office."

Jones is currently being sued by parents of students murdered by a sociopath assailant at Sandy Hook elementary school. Those suits stem from claims by Jones that the deadly assault was "a giant hoax" and "as phony as a three-dollar bill."

He has amassed a substantial "alternate reality" cult following, and he has led heated "Stop the Steal" rallies since the election. We now know, based on FBI affidavits supporting charges against some of the rioters, there was advance planning of this incursion, some of which goes back to November, just after the election.

The Jones path to the Trump rally on 06 January, and the riot that followed, was paved by one of his InfoWars show hosts, former Trump adviser Roger Stone. According to Jones, "The White House told me three days before, we're going to have you lead the march." In other words, Jones anointed himself the leader of the malcontents.

The night prior to the rally eruption at the Capitol, Jones rallied his ilk by declaring: "We have only begun to resist the globalists. We have only begun our fight against their tyranny. They have tried to steal this election in front of everyone. I don't know how this is all going to end, but if they want to fight, they better believe they've got one." The next day, Jones fired up his bunch once again: "We declare 1776 against the new world order. We need to understand we're under attack, and we need to understand this is 21st-century warfare and get on a war-footing."

Jones, also a major promoter of the QAnon conspiracy, added, "We will never back down to the Satanic pedophile, globalist new world order and their walking-dead reanimated corpse Joe Biden, and we will never recognize him."

After Trump spoke and Jones arrived at the Capitol building with his crew, seeing the emerging confrontation with police, he tucked tail: "As much as I love seeing the Trump flags flying over this, we need to not have the confrontation with the police. They're gonna make that the story." Almost like his followers were rational law-abiding folks.

Jones broadcast live near the Capitol, where he reported, "Our own cameraman followed the crowds into the Senate, and I watched them execute an unarmed woman." That was a reference to Ashli Babbitt from San Diego, who was shot by a Capitol Police officer as she attempted to climb through a broken window within the Speaker's Lobby.

By the end of the day, there were many police officers injured, including one who later collapsed and died the following day  Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, though the exact cause and circumstances of his death are still unclear.

Since then, more than 200 of those identified in the Capitol building, some violent offenders but mostly those who were nonviolent, have been arrested.

Among them is William Arthur Leary from New York, who, according to the Associated Press, "doesn't trust information reported by the mainstream media" and declared InfoWars to be "one of his main sources of information."

According to an FBI report, Jones is directly connected to Proud Boys activist Ethan Nordean, who was among others arrested last week on conspiracy charges related to the riot.

Another Jones conscript from Alabama, William Wright Watson, who was photographed with "QAnon shaman" Jake Angeli during the riot, told the FBI he was "following the schedule Alex Jones" promoted, telling his followers to meet at the Capitol after the rally. Asked if he had received any specific direction, he said, "No, it was kind of just what the mob was doing."

Again, Jones was one of the original promoters of the QAnon conspiracy (a.k.a. "#TheStorm"), but as quickly as he has attempted to distance himself from the violence at the Capitol, he has disavowed QAnon.

Jones now claims: "Q tells this stuff and all of it's lies ... full of st. Because every G d thing out of you people's mouths doesn't come true. And it's always, 'Oh, there's energy.' 'Oh, now we're done with Trump.' You said he was the messiah! You said he was invincible! You said that it was all over. That they were going to Gitmo and now that he's part of a larger thing of Q. I will not suffer your Q people after this. I knew what you were day one, I know what you are now, and I'm sick of it. I'm sick of all these witches and warlocks and pumpkin popsomes."

Well okay, InfoWars guy! But once again, at the DC rallies Jones boldly referenced the "Satanic pedophile, globalist new world order," a direct reference to the centerpiece of the QAnon conspiracy. But I suppose Jones can recreate his own delusional alternate reality as quickly as he can that of his followers.

According to Jones's attorney, "Like many Americans, Mr. Jones peacefully assembled to register his concerns about the 2020 election. He deplores the violence that took place."

I accept that Jones had no idea what was about to unfold when he marched over to the Capitol with his followers. But he should have. That being said, I suspect that a common denominator among some if not most of the violent rioters is  drumroll please  Alex Jones.

I also believe that good people who feel deeply threatened by the world around them and perceive it is out of control often desperately seek some context for understanding that threat. And they can get sucked into these conspiracy rat holes.

In the final analysis, Donald Trump has been the lightning rod for the Capitol riot, and, by extension, so have ALL genuine conservative Patriots. However, the riotous jackasses in the Capitol building, and those like Jones who inflamed them, are directly to blame for the damage inflicted on all conservatives.

These self-aggrandizing thugs managed to defile the standing and reputation of every Liberty-loving and law-abiding conservative across our nation. Their obscene actions have demeaned all Americans who have supported Trump administration policies over the last four years. Their narcissistic lack of self-awareness has done more to undermine the long list of Trump administration policy successes and advance the leftist agenda than anything Democrats could have hoped to achieve.

Their actions provided the opening for Democrats and their Leftmedia parrots to paint ALL Trump administration supporters with the disgraceful actions of a fringe few, thus branding almost half the nation as riotous thug sympathizers.

To that end, Alex Jones and his InfoWars lineup  and those unwitting souls whose rational thought processing ability their poison short circuits  are not part of the solution. Far from it.

Mark Alexander is the executive editor of the Patriot Post.
A few hours after the Senate voted in Donald Trumps impeachment trial on Saturday, I spoke to the lead impeachment manager, Jamie Raskin. He was crushingly disappointed. Despite Republicans indulgence of Trump over the last five years, despite the fact that three Republican senators met with Trumps lawyers before they presented their defense, Raskin had so much faith in the overwhelming case he and his colleagues brought that, until the end, he held out hope of conviction.

Ive always been seen as a rose-colored-glasses guy, he said. Raskins openhearted belief that Senate Republicans maintained a remnant of patriotic solidarity with their fellow citizens is part of what made his presentation so effective; he threw himself into it without fatalism or cynicism.

The House managers forced the Senate to reckon with the scale of the terror Trump unleashed on Congress. I did see a bunch of the Republicans who voted against us, including Mitch McConnell, crying at different points, said Raskin. The case was strong enough to win over even two Republican senators, Richard Burr and Bill Cassidy, whod initially voted against holding the trial at all.

But when it comes to McConnell and his caucus, cynicism always prevails.

Because Im less optimistic than Raskin, I was less disappointed. The 57-to-43 verdict against Trump was the biggest bipartisan majority for conviction in a presidential impeachment trial. And it seems to me that if McConnell couldnt behave honorably, he did the next best thing with the speech he gave after voting to acquit.


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At least 30 travellers were abducted Sunday evening by gunmen who ambushed commuters along the Tegina-Zungeru highway in Rafi Local Government Area of Niger State.

Officials of the drivers union in the area said the victims were travelling in a bus of the Niger State Transport Authority (NSTA) when they ran into an ambush by the bandits.

The gunmen also killed three members of the local vigilante group which attempted to foil their operation.

Bello Muhammed, a senior official of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) in Tegina, told PREMIUM TIMES that the vigilante members were shot dead by the assailants while the group was attempting to foil the abduction.

Mr Muhammed said the victims were returning as a party from a wedding in Rijau Local Government Area.

He said the driver of the bus, Isa Dangana, was among those abducted.

The police spokesperson in Niger, Wasiu Abiodun, did not respond to PREMIUM TIMES calls requesting police comments for this story.

The residents said abductions were unusual on that stretch of the highway, though some communities adjoining it had suffered attacks and abductions before. They said commuters ply the highway because they consider it relatively safe.

Below are the unedited names of the abducted persons as provided by the NURTW officials in the area.

Talatu,

jummai,

larai Halima

Aisha ya Fati,

Sala,

Saadatu,

Hauwa Asmamau,

Hassana,

Maryam,

Nafisa,

Abdulkadir,

Hassan,

Sadiq,

Babakarami,

Mama Iye,

Mama jummai,

Mama larai

Hauwa abdlsm

Asmau abdlsm

Mama Halima

Anty ladidi

Hassan Ashiru

Baba kararami

Sadiq abdlsm

Hassana abdlsm

Abba abdlsm

Nafisa Adamu

Saadatu Danjuma

Salamatu Danjuma
Like many high schoolers across Illinois, Cal Vine, 16, had to take a health class their sophomore year. Vine, who uses the pronoun they, was looking forward to the sexual education session at Carbondale Community High School.

But the class focused mainly on basic anatomy and drug use and did not address Vines questions about sexual identity and health.

Theres some stuff I had to learn on my own, and I still dont know everything, but health should be about everything you need to know about relationships in the real world and how they affect you, Vine said. In the classroom we learn nothing about people like me. Our teachers never talked about queer people. It was like we did not exist.

In an effort to create inclusive and factual health education standards, a coalition of public officials and activists is pushing to reintroduce the Responsible Education for Adolescent and Childrens Health Act, which would require personal health and safety education for K-12 public schools in Illinois.

The act defines grade-appropriate education ranging from personal safety to anatomy, abuse, bullying and gender identity for elementary-age students.

Grades six through 12 build on previous instruction and deal with issues like consent, sexual harassment, abuse and interpersonal violence, plus offer information about sexual orientation, gender identity and sexual health.

Currently, 30 states mandate personal health and safety education. Illinois does not have any mandates in place.

We have to look at this through all grade levels, it is not too early to teach children about healthy relationships, said state Rep. Kathleen Willis, an Addison Democrat who is the House sponsor of the act. We hear about students being bullied young, by doing this starting at a young age, we are making sure we take those steps forward so we can have young adults that can later understand behaviors and healthy relationships.

The requirements would be phased in over a two-year period, said state Sen. Ram Villivalam, a Chicago Democrat.

Story continues

We cant afford for schools not to provide comprehensive health and safety education, he said. We need to make sure its uniform and that there is a standard. We dont want a situation where a teacher is saying something that isnt medically accurate. This legislation is comprehensive, is age appropriate and will assure medically accurate information is dispersed.

Willis said the guidelines would be placed on basic curriculum but how schools decide to teach them would be up to individual school districts.

The legislation was initially introduced in February 2020 but had been delayed because of the COVID-19 emergency declaration.

Illinois has remained largely stagnant on health education policy, relying on legislation from the 1980s, according to Brigid Leahy, senior director of public policy for Planned Parenthood Illinois Action.

The decision was made to have it be optional; thats been the status quo for 30 years, she said. Over the years, weve gone back and tinkered with it, but we decided to start working on this in the fall of 2019. The base conclusion is that every student deserves to get quality personal health and safety education.

Supporters are hopeful it will pass and have received interest from legislators, she added.

Deonn Strathman, director of Community Engagement and Adolescent Health Initiatives at Planned Parenthood of Illinois, has overseen outreach and education programming for over 10 years in Ohio and Illinois. Strathman, who goes by the pronoun they, said they have seen little changes when it comes to health education over their career, especially when it comes to sexual education.

Im still hearing people using scare tactics in the classroom or homophobic language, they said. Its so heartbreaking to talk to college students about how they never got sex education and they just feel like theyre unprepared to take care of their bodies.

Most common in sexual education is the need to piecemeal information heard from peers or through social media, Strathman added. A lack of comprehensive education creates gaps in students education that are later filled, sometimes with incorrect information.

Were dealing with a new generation thats saturated with social media so its also being able to talk to them about misinformation, Strathman said. Students crave this knowledge; they want to have frank conversations.

While sex education remains a subject of contention among schools both private and public, Strathman emphasized that education programs are about seeking personal agency over ones body and making healthy choices.

Ignoring it doesnt help the situation, it makes young people ignorant of their own bodies and it makes them unable to make safe choices for themselves, Strathman said. Planning is empowerment, jealousy isnt a sign of love, condoms arent reusable. More than ever, our young people are overwhelmed and need this information.
Prime Minister will lay the foundation stone of a statue of warrior King Suheldev in Bahraich on Tuesday to commemorate his birth anniversary.

The prime minister, who will be addressing the people via video conference, will also unveil programmes for the beautification of Shravasti, Chittora Lake and Bahraich on the occasion, a government spokesman said here.

He will also announce the development of various tourist amenities like a cafeteria, guest house, and a children's park, the spokesman said.

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Governor Anandiben Patel will be attending the event which will be held on the occasion of Vasant Panchami on February 16 in Bahraich to mark the birth anniversary of King Suheldev, the icon of Rajbhar community.

Since coming to power, the Modi government has taken a number of steps to honour Suheldev. In February 2016, BJP leader Amit Shah had unveiled a statue of Suheldev and also launched a book on him in Bahraich district near the Indo-Nepal border, where the medieval king enjoys a legendary status, the spokesman said.

The central government had also released a postal stamp, and run a superfast train -- 'The Suhaildev Express'. The tri-weekly train covers the breadth of India's most populous state i.e. from Ghazipur in Purvanchal to Anand Vihar in Delhi.

(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.)
Notwithstanding the recent strain in New Delhi's relations with Colombo over a port project, India is unlikely to support a resolution proposed to be moved by some western nations at the United Nations Human Rights Council next week seeking punitive actions against Sri Lanka for atrocities on its minority Tamils.

The Sri Lankan government recently scrapped a tripartite deal it had inked with New Delhi to let India and Japan develop and run the East Container Terminal of the Colombo Port. Though New Delhi suspects that Beijing nudged Colombo to scrap the deal, it may not support any move against Sri Lanka at the UNHRC.

The Lankan government, led by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, in fact, already got in touch with New Delhi seeking support at the UNHRC, which would start its 46th session on February 22.

With the Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu around the corner, the BJP government in Delhi over the past few weeks has raised its pitch over the rights of Tamils in Sri Lanka. It nudged Colombo to fully implement the 13th amendment to its Constitution to ensure devolution of power to the local governments in its Tamil-majority Northern and Eastern Provinces. Prime Minister Narendra Modi too reaffirmed India's support to Tamils in Sri Lanka during a visit to Chennai on Sunday.

The alleged excesses, human rights violations and atrocities on the minority Tamils during the offensives against rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009 were under the scrutiny of the UNHRC for more than a decade now. The government, led by Rajapaksa Clan, in February 2020 withdrew from a 2015 UNHRC resolution, which the erstwhile regime had agreed upon for probe into allegations of atrocities.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, will next week submit at the council a report on Sri Lankas progress on implementation of the earlier recommendations made by her office to address allegations of excesses by its armed forces as well as for reconciliation. Canada, United Kingdom and some other western nations are planning to move a resolution at the UNHRC, seeking targeted sanctions, assets freeze and travel bans on certain Sri Lankan officials for alleged involvement in human rights violations during the offensive against the LTTE.

DMK leader M K Stalin urged the government of India to support the move against Sri Lanka at the UNHRC. He wrote to the Prime Minister, arguing that India must join the move against Sri Lanka as the island nation was reluctant to "take forward constructive and internationally acceptable measures for accountability in the matters of war crimes and all human rights violations''.

The source in New Delhi however said that Indias action on the proposed resolution against Sri Lanka at the UNHRC would be guided by its position that any intrusive approach by the council or any other UN organs undermining national sovereignty and institutions of any nation was counterproductive.
To showcase the variety and highlight the importance of bamboo resources in Assam, a foot-over-bridge has been uniquely built with primarily just bamboo as its base in the state.

On February 14, this Sunday, state minister Himanta Biswa Sarma inaugurated three bridges in the city of Guwahati and out of the three, the one built at Khanapara has been designed with bamboo. The newly built bridge will help the people to conveniently traverse across the two sides of road. Along with it, the bridge will also serve to highlight the importance of bamboo and its diversity prevalent in Assam.

CORRECTION Assam: A foot overbridge, primarily decorated with* bamboo, was inaugurated by state minister Himanta Biswa Sarma at Khanapara in Guwahati yesterday. pic.twitter.com/aajsvtPYXV ANI (@ANI) February 15, 2021

The beautiful bridge is truly a very beautifully made structure and is a treat to the eyes.

Netizens loved the concept of a bmaboo built bridge and were all praises for the unique idea.

Beautiful and lovely bamboo bridge yaar. Avtar Singh (@avtarart) February 15, 2021

pure art. famagusta (@msjasrotia11) February 15, 2021

The bridge will also serve as an entry landmark to the city and has a sign saying 'Welcome to Guwahati' over it. The bamboo foot over bridge has been constructed at Khanapara. During the night, the lights on the bride shines adding to its beauty.

On Sunday, a couple of other bridges were also inaugurated in Dispur and Kamakhya.

Assam is the largest producer of bamboo in India and the state boast of nearly 50 kinds of the plant. In total, the Northeastern region of the country supplies more than 60 % of the total production value of the country.

The use of bamboo is an integral part of the lives of the people in Assam as the plant is very closely tied to the state's culture and livelihood. The abundant presence of the bamboo has helped the locals develop their skill and expertise with the plant and it has resulted in a new boom for the bamboo industry again.

A knowledge of craft involving bamboo is a common factor for artisans in Assam. The products of bamboo are seen to be used in almost every house in Assam in some form or the other.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in many of his speeches recently has reiterated the importance of developing the bamboo industry. The central government has planned to set up a Bamboo Industrial Park in the Northeast in Dima Hasao district to help increase the potential and usage of the bamboo sector in Assam.
Expo 2020 Dubai continues its pre-event programme with Expo Talks: Travel and Connectivity, a series of panel discussions and talks exploring digital connectivity as a universal human right, on Tuesday (Feb 16).

The talks will also probe connectivity across key sectors such as mobility, transport and logistics, governance, education and travel.

This digital event will spotlight topics such as smart mobility, artificial intelligence (AI) for good, virtual learning, remote work, data privacy and digital connectivity, and e-governance.

Providing a glimpse of how the Expo will bring to life the theme of travel and connectivity across the six months that it will be open to the world, the talks will convene experts from around the world, alongside Expo 2020s international participants and official partners.

It will address the following question: How will we balance the impact of the expansion of the digital world with our physical reality?

Speakers will include Reem Ebrahim Al Hashimy, UAE Minister of State for International Cooperation and Director General, Expo 2020 Dubai; Sir Tim Clark, President of Emirates Airline; and Hatem Dowidar, CEO of Etisalat Group.

A number of international participants, including Bhutan and Portugal, will dive into the future of sustainable tourism, while a panel on digital services and solutions in the new reality of Covid-19 will feature Kersti Kaljulaid, President of Estonia. In parallel, many international participants will also host talks on their own channels.

In addition, an Emirates panel on Travel and Tourism in the post-COVID World will explore how the airline is helping to re-envisage travel during and after the pandemic; the impact of Covid-19 on the travel industry; and the role of technology in mitigating challenges and expanding travel opportunities. - TradeArabia News Service


Affirming the role of digital technology

On June 3, 2020, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc signed Decision No. 749 approving the "National Digital Transformation Programme by 2025, with a vision to 2030", its target being to turn Vietnam into a digital country by 2030, with stable and prosperous development and pioneering the testing of new technologies and models. Of which, the scheme plans to fundamentally and comprehensively renovate the management and administration of the Government, as well as the production and business activities of enterprises and the living and working of the people, while developing a large-scale, safe and humane digital environment. The national digital conversion programme also aims to both develop digital the government, the digital economy and digital society, and help Vietnamese digital enterprises be more capable of integrating further into the international arena with a number of basic specific indicators set by 2025 and 2030. According to experts, digital and tech enterprises are the core, responsible for building the foundation as well as leading the national digital transformation process. Currently, domestic tech giants and ICT corporations like VNPT, Viettel, FPT, CMC and VNG are actively participating in the process of building platforms and digital conversion ecosystems in Vietnam. Amid the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic since the beginning of 2020, the role of Vietnamese tech enterprises has been further promoted, especially in the programme on tech enterprises and Make-in-Vietnam products launched by the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC).

MIC Minister Nguyen Manh Hung said Vietnam has witnessed significant progress in the development of tech businesses since the Make-in-Vietnam strategy was implemented. After a year, more than 13,000 digital tech enterprises have been established, up 28%. Vietnam's digital tech business community currently has over 58,000 companies  a record number, as at first, the project was expected to see only 6,000 enterprises a year at its peak. With the current implementation speed, the set target of 100,000 digital businesses by 2030 can be achieved by 2025. According to Minister Hung, Make-in-Vietnam is an action slogan, as instead of outsourcing or assembling, let us make the products ourselves: From Ncovi, Bluezone and CoMeet, to online learning platforms, remote medical consulting, remote accounting and management platforms for small and medium-sized enterprises as well as micro-businesses, Vietnam has been perhaps the world leader in creating digital platforms during the COVID-19 era. If we did not master the technologies and didnt have Make-in-Vietnam, we wouldn't be so. Rapid response is a vital factor in this very unpredictable era. The minister especially emphasised the importance of technology in the fight against COVID-19, saying the countrys strategy in the future is to build a digital Vietnam. Therefore, Make-in-Vietnam needs a long-term vision and appropriate strategies for each stage. 2021 is expected to be a year of strong development of Vietnamese technologies. Make-in-Vietnam will solve Vietnam's technological issues, thus helping our country to successfully implement the digital transformation process as well as continuing to develop strongly and sustainably.

Bluezone launch

The interface of the Bluezone app.

On April 18, 2020, the Bluezone mobile app, designed to protect the community against COVID-19 and developed by Bkav Corporation, was officially launched by the MIC and the Ministry of Health in the presence of Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc. Bluezone was considered a breakthrough in the use of technology to prevent and fight the epidemic at that time. The app is a solution that applies Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) positioning technology. Smartphones with Bluezone installed can communicate with each other up to a distance of two metres, recording close contact with other users. This is the ultimate technology for controlling contact tracing. When detecting a positive case (F0) for COVID-19, instead of quarantining thousands of people, we only need to isolate a few dozen people. This idea in Vietnam was formed early, almost at the same time as many other countries around the world. The result was the introduction of Bluezone. Although Vietnam was not the first country to introduce this solution, the Vietnamese software basically solved omissions or issues related to optimal operation which some similar software previously encountered.

The Bluezone app gathers intelligence from many groups of developers from various Vietnamese digital tech enterprises, including Memozone, VNPT, MobiFone and Bkav, of which Bkav was the unit in charge of operating the system. According to Nguyen Tu Quang, Bkav CEO, Bluezone is a non-profit project of Bkav. It's our pleasure to be part of this project. With Bluezone, from the beginning we set up a team in our research institute of about 10 people. We continue to gather statistics and create new research methods in the hope of participating in useful projects to prevent and fight the epidemic. One day I received a call from the Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung about organising tech groups to work on the issue of using Bluetooth. I was very happy and immediately gathered a team of nearly 100 people to take part in the fight against COVID-19.

According to Quang, once Bluezone is installed, during daily activity, when users interact with each other, the app on their phones "talk" with one another. If a close contact is detected (within a distance of two metres), the device will record in its log. If a COVID-19 infection case (F0) is detected, the infected person's data will be imported onto the system and then transferred to all devices in use. The Bluezone mobile app will then compare the F0 data with the previously recorded exposure history. If it detects that the device has been exposed to an F0 for a sufficient time, the system will notify the user (F1) of a possible risk of infection. Bluezone can even provide specifics on when and for how long you were exposed to the F0. The application will also provide the contact of the competent health authority and recommend the user make contact for guidance and assistance. When the authorities receive F1 data, they will continue to enter such data on the system to warn the next F in a rapid and accurate manner. By mid-December 2020, over 23 million Vietnamese users had installed and used Bluezone, and during the process of review and inspection, more than 100 cases of F1 and F2 out of the known list were detected using the app. According to an assessment from leaders from the MIC and Ministry of Health, Bluezone is considered a breakthrough in the use of technology to prevent and control epidemics.

Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb has stirred up a fresh controversy after disclosing that former BJP President Amit Shah has plans to establish a government in Nepal and Sri Lanka, or at the very least, expand the party into India's neighbours.

According to a report in news portal East Mojo, during a party program in Rabindra Satabarshiki Bhavan on Saturday, Deb said that Amit Shah during his visit to Tripura, in a tea party with the state leadership, said that he plans to establish the party in neighbouring countries after winning in most of the states in India.

'Now Sri Lanka and Nepal is left'

We were talking in the state guest house when Ajay Jamwal (North-East Zonal Secretary of BJP) said that BJP has formed its government in several states of India, in reply Shah said, Now Sri Lanka and Nepal is left. We have to expand the party in Sri Lanka, Nepal and win there to form a government, the Chief Minister said quoting the Union Home Minister.

According to the report, Deb said it was only under the leadership of Amit Shah that the BJP became the worlds largest party. "The communist had claimed that their party was the largest in the world, which Amit Shah broke by making BJP the largest party in the world. Deendayal Upadhyayas party, Shyama Prasads party, Prishtha Pramukhs party," Deb added.

"The BJP will change the trend of change of government between the Left and the Congress every five years in Kerala and emerge as the winner in the southern state as well," he said.

Reacting to this, BJP leader and Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy tweeted saying, "Was the CM joking? Or sarcastic? He could not be serious."

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Tripura CM Biplab Deb's claim feasible?

It is not immediately clear how serious Deb was about Shah's purported remarks. While expanding an Indian political party into other countries is a new idea, this concept has been witnessed elsewhere in the world as well, though along ideological underpinnings. For instance, Nepal is currently ruled by a communist party which is said to have close links with the Chinese CCP, currently the most significant Communist force in the world.

Biplab Deb is also hardly new to overstatements or controversies. Last year, the Tripura CM was in hot water after making highly controversial remarks at an event where he drew a comparison between people of Punjab and Haryana with Bengalis. Addressing a conference of the Tripura Electronic Media Society at Agartala, he appallingly said the Punjabis and Haryanvis are physically strong but have "dull brains" whereas nobody can beat the "wit and the brain of a Bengali."

Even before that, he has made the headlines for claiming that advanced technologies such as telecommunications satellites, TVs and missiles were available to those fighting the Mahabharata war, in all seriousness.

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FAST-GROWING Revolut is to increase its fees, in a move that is set to disappoint its more than one million users here.

It is raising the fees for withdrawing cash from ATMs and for international money transfers.

Last summer the money app increased fees charged on foreign exchange transactions.

Some 1.2 million customers in this country have signed up to Revolut as the app-based financial services company is seen as a low-cost way of availing of day-to-day banking.

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The latest fee rise is likely to make customers wonder if more fee hikes are on the way.

It is making it more expensive to use cash.

From April 9, people using the Standard Revolut account will see the limits on free monthly ATM withdrawals changing.

Currently there is a 200 limit on free monthly ATM withdrawals on the Standard plan.

After this, users are charged 2pc of the value of the withdrawal.

Revolut is adding a limit on the total number of ATM withdrawals and by setting a minimum fee once the free allowance runs out.

The 200 monthly limit will remain but there will be a limit of five ATM withdrawals as well. Once you hit this, you will also begin paying a fee.

Both of these limits apply independently. This means customers will start paying a fee as soon as they hit one limit even do not hit the other limit.

The fee remains 2pc but there will now be a minimum fee of 1. This means customers will pay the greater of 1, or 2pc, of the withdrawal.

The changes are similar to ones introduced by Revoluts rival, N26.

Revolut said it was not limiting the number of withdrawals you can make fee-free on Plus, Premium and Metal plans but it is introducing a minimum fee of 1 per withdrawal.

International money transfers will continue to be free for countries within the Sepa (Single Euro Payments Area) area and the UK and Switzerland.

Cross-border and Swift international transfer fees will range between 30c and 5, depending on how much being transferred and where.

Revolut spokesman Michael Russell said: We are laser focused on keeping our day-to-day transactions free where possible. In order to keep our day-to-day fees low - and free in most instances - we have changed some of the fees for certain transactions that are either infrequent or that impact a tiny fraction of our users.

Daragh Cassidy of price comparison site Bonkers.ie said Revolut still offers exceptional value, but he questioned how long this will continue.

Both AIB and Bank of Ireland increased current account fees lately.
The company is well-funded to carry out exploration activities aimed at upgrading resources and reserves at the Finniss Lithium Project in the Northern Territory.

( ) (OTCMKTS:CXOXF) is making solid progress in its aim to become Australias next lithium producer through the development of its flagship Finniss Lithium Project in the Northern Territory.

The companys plans are supported by already established binding and non-binding offtake agreements, one of which may see it become part of s ( ) supply chain.

Core has released a new investor presentation outlining its near-future growth potential along with the progress made in 2020.

Aggressive plans

Finniss is Australias most advanced lithium project with all necessary government approvals in place and construction plans being formulated.

The company has chalked out an aggressive plan for the year ahead that includes completing a definitive feasibility study in the second quarter and a final investment decision in the third quarter with the intention to start construction in the second half of 2021.

With a capex budget of A$85 million, the company is eyeing annual revenue of A$160 million from minimum production of 175,000 tonnes.

Finniss Lithium Project

The flagship Finniss project is adjacent to world-class infrastructure, being only 25 kilometres from Australia closest port to Asia and nearby Darwin capital city infrastructure.

This project will employ simple dense material separation (DMS), which avoids problems of other new flotation projects burdened by high capex, large debt and high finance costs along with high operating costs.

Deployment of DMS will help the company produce 6% lithium oxide concentrate at 70% recovery with low iron and other contaminants.

Potential to be part of Tesla chain

Earlier this year, the companys largest shareholder and offtake partner, Chinas Sichuan Yahua Industrial Group, signed a deal to supply battery-grade lithium hydroxide to US electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla over the next five years.

It is expected that Cores near-construction-ready project will be a key source of spodumene concentrate for Yahua to fulfil its mandate with Tesla and other customers.

Yahua currently holds a three-year, 75,000 tonnes per annum offtake agreement with Core.

The news was cheered by investors sending the companys share price to a record high last month.

Last year, the company secured its first European offtake with the signing of a non-binding Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Geneva-based Transamine for around 50,000 tonnes of spodumene concentrate for over five years.

Resource extensions

The company has been granted a mineral lease (ML) for the BP33 deposit within the Finniss Project  the second lithium mineral lease in the Northern Territory awarded to the company after the Grants deposit in 2019.

Drilling has achieved excellent core recovery throughout with a majority of the planned targets intersected as planned.

Geotechnical diamond drilling at Grants and BP33 that will contribute to the DFS has been completed and logging will be completed later this month.

Recent mine planning and resource assessment studies have highlighted opportunities to further extend resources and reserves at Grants and BP33, particularly in light of efficient underground mining methods verified in the pre-feasibility study (PFS).

Besides this, the company is undertaking brownfields exploration of Far West, Shirleys, BP31, Ahoy, Talmina, Talmina W, Saffums and other prospects.

Well-funded for drilling

The company has around A$40 million available to carry out activities to extend and expand the mineral resource estimate with infill and resource drilling, which is expected to restart in the second quarter of 2021.

The company recently undertook a placement exercise, which was well supported by global institutional investors, to raise A$40 million.

With the availability of funds to boost growth, the company is also open to the idea of acquiring additional assets adjacent to its base in an effort to increase resources and earnings.
Leaders across several political parties denounced the arrest of 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi by the Delhi Police on Sunday

Leaders across several political parties denounced the arrest of 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi by the Delhi Police on Sunday.

The police have alleged that Disha shared and contributed written material to a 'toolkit' about the ongoing farmers' protest, which was later mentioned by Greta Thunberg in a tweet. She has been remanded to five days' police custody.

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi quoted a poem by Faiz Ahmed Faiz and said on Twitter, "India won't be silenced."

     

      !   ,  ! India wont be silenced. pic.twitter.com/jOXWdXLUzY  Rahul Gandhi (@RahulGandhi) February 15, 2021

Several other Congress leaders also hit out at the Delhi Police and the Centre over Disha Ravi's arrest. Former environment minister Jairam Ramesh said, "The arrest and the manner of arrest of green activist Disha Ravi shows clearly the intensifying murder of democracy in India. But the young in India cannot be silenced. More power to them!"

In a series of tweets, P Chidambaram said 

A took kit to support the farmers protest is more dangerous than the intrusion by Chinese troops into Indian territory! India is becoming the theatre of the absurd and it is sad that the Delhi Police has become a tool of the oppressors  P. Chidambaram (@PChidambaram_IN) February 14, 2021

Terming the arrest an onslaught on freedom of expression, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) MP Kanimozhi said, "Arresting a young woman for retweeting a tweet supporting the farmers is undemocratic. I stand with Disha Ravi against this onslaught on freedom of expression."

A statement by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) read, "A rattled govt is going after anyone reporting on, showing solidarity with the farmers protest or amplifying their message. Shameful that they won't even spare a 21-year-old environmental activist. But they will not succeed. We will resist."

Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal remarked 

Arrest of 21 yr old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime.  Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) February 15, 2021

In response to Kejriwal's tweet, BJP MP Manoj Tiwari said, "You have set a new precedent by brazenly supporting all who instigate violence. Indian government is working for betterment of farmers. Yoga and Tea are our essentials but inciting violence in the name of farmers is a crime and it has nothing to do with age."

Tiwari was making a reference to a point in the original toolkit, which Thunberg later deleted, which called for disrupting the 'yoga and chai' image of India.

Haryana home minister Anil Vij also sought to justify Disha's arrest, saying, "People who have the seed of treason in their minds must be destroyed, be it Disha Ravi or anyone else."

Disha Ravi was arrested from Bengaluru for being allegedly involved in sharing the "toolkit" related to the farmer's protest on social media.

The toolkit has been cited by some critics as 'proof' of her conspiracy to fuel protests in India.

Ravi, a graduate in Bachelor of Business Administration from a private college in Bengaluru, is also one of the founding members of a group named 'Fridays For Future India'.

With inputs from PTI
NAPLES, FEB 15 - A 50-year-old Tunisian-born farm hand died in a fire in a shanty-town near Caserta north of Naples at the weekend. "Hamed knew seven languages and had been in Italy for around 30 years, a country he thought was hospitable but which he discovered was totally indifferent to his destiny and that of so many others," said the migrant farm labourer aid group Don Diana. "Hamed died of hardship and cold, worn out by exploitation. "Alone, without another hand to hold. "We are all guilty of his death", said the association's coordinator Salvatore Cuoci, after visiting the scene of the fire with Ivorian farm trade union leader Aboubakar Soumahoro, who has been fighting for years against gangmasterism. Hamed died at Lusciano, in the middle of the Land of Fires area of toxic waste dumps burned by the local Camorra mafia, which also has extensive farming land. Gangmasters drive the immigrant labour force all day for starvation wages. (ANSA).
A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind.
We are seeing the biggest pent-up demand for travel in history and extremely strong bookings for the end of 2021 and into 2022, and after more than a year of minimal travel and sales, we want to help ensure our franchisees can sustain their business for when this travel boom arrives.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, home-based travel agency franchise Dream Vacations/CruiseOne has been an industry leader with its support of its franchise owners. With the financial backing of its parent company World Travel Holdings, the nations largest cruise agency and award-winning leisure travel company, the franchisor has raised the bar even higher by offering up to $1 Million in commercial loans to its franchise owners as part of its Were There to Help Stimulus Plan.

For our franchise owners, travel is more than a passion, it is their livelihood and the pandemic has had serious implications on their businesses, said Drew Daly, senior vice president and general manager of Dream Vacations/CruiseOne. As a franchisor, we take pride in providing our franchise owners the resources they need to succeed. However, in times like these, it is crucial to go beyond providing a business-in-a-box. The success of our franchisees is our only business and this Stimulus Plan supports the foundation of our business model  to support small business owners.

The Were There to Help Stimulus Plan, which represents World Travel Holdings initials, has a three-pronged approach to providing franchisees with additional resources and financial assistance to navigate through 2021 and the COVID-19 pandemic.



World Travel Holdings-Funded Commercial Loan  World Travel Holdings will make up to $1 Million available in commercial loans to qualified Dream Vacations/CruiseOne franchisees. Applicants will have to explain how they plan to use their funds and submit a business plan to be considered.

PPP Assistance with Bank  Through a partnership with World Travel Holdings banking institution, they negotiated an agreement where Dream Vacations/CruiseOne franchisees can receive assistance from the bank in securing a PPP loan.

Cares Page  Dream Vacations/CruiseOne created a special section on its Business Center intranet that consolidates financial assistance information from World Travel Holdings, government, franchising, trade and business organizations in one easy-to-find location.

We are seeing the biggest pent-up demand for travel in history and extremely strong bookings for the end of 2021 and into 2022, and after more than a year of minimal travel and sales, we want to help ensure our franchisees can sustain their business for when this travel boom arrives, said Brad Tolkin, co-CEO/chairman of World Travel Holdings. In spite of World Travel Holdings not qualifying for PPP funds due to our size, it was very important to us to find a way to provide additional assistance for the small business owners within our franchise system. We know the future of leisure travel is bright and we want to do our part and assist our travel agency franchise owners to be ready to meet this demand.

The Were There to Help Stimulus Plan is just one of many initiatives that Dream Vacations/CruiseOne has implemented to provide assistance to its franchisees during COVID-19. They have provided enhanced support to its existing franchisees by offering the option to defer monthly fees for up to six months; hosting Town Halls and webinars with industry executives; presenting robust virtual training and conferences; creating increased and unique engagement opportunities such as a Walking Club and more. Dream Vacations/CruiseOne has steadily been recruiting the entire year and new travel agency franchises are opening each month. The franchisor has adapted its onboarding process for new franchisees to better meet the unique challenges they are facing while opening during a pandemic. The saying We Care More has always been a mantra for Dream Vacations/CruiseOne, and it has never been as meaningful as it has these last 14 months.

To learn more about joining the travel agency franchise that cares more about its franchise owners, please visit http://www.dreamvacationsfranchise.com or call 888-249-8235.

About World Travel Holdings

World Travel Holdings is the nations largest cruise agency and award-winning leisure travel company with a portfolio of more than 40 diverse brands. In addition to owning some of the largest brands distributing cruises, villas, resort vacations, car rentals, resort day passes and luxury travel services, World Travel Holdings has a vast portfolio of private-label partnerships comprised of top leisure travel providers, including almost every U.S. airline, leading hotel brands and prominent corporations. The company also operates a top-rated travel agency franchise and the country's original host agency, and is consistently recognized as an industry leader in work-at-home employment. Its global presence includes operating multiple cruise brands in the United Kingdom. World Travel Holdings has offices in Wilmington, Mass.; Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; New York, NY; and Chorley, England. For more information, visit WorldTravelHoldings.com.

About CruiseOne / Dream Vacations

A member of the International Franchise Association, the top-ranked home-based travel agency franchise CruiseOne has been in operation since 1992, and its sister brand Dream Vacations launched in April 2016, giving franchisees a choice in how they want to brand their travel business. CruiseOne / Dream Vacations franchisees have the resources to plan and create seamless vacation experiences for their customers while offering the best value. CruiseOne / Dream Vacations is part of World Travel Holdings and has received franchise partner of the year, a top-ranking status, by all the major cruise lines as well as national recognition for its support of military veterans. For more information, visit http://www.DreamVacationsFranchise.com. Like CruiseOne / Dream Vacations on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/DreamVacationsFranchise, follow on Twitter at @Dream_Franchise and watch its videos at http://www.youtube.com/DreamVacationsBusiness.
ISLAMABAD -- Hundreds of employees of Pakistan's Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) have taken to the streets of Islamabad against the planned privatization of the countrys state-owned power distribution companies.

The protesters on February 15 came to the Pakistani capital from all over the country, chanting slogans against Prime Minister Imran Khan such as Go Imran, go!

They also demanded that the government increase their salaries and make the positions of contractors permanent.

WAPDA employees have held similar protests in several Pakistani cities since early October 2020 against the governments plans to privatize at least 10 power distribution units.

In 2019, the government had already postponed such plans following mass protests.
This Valentines Day, join Netflix on a journey of exploring the adorable and unexpected bond of streaming and binge-watching with your loved one. Through a social media campaign called The Things We Stream For Love, Netflix explores the romance & intimacy of bonding over content with that special someone. It doesnt stop there! It also features the silly things we all do to impress our significant other, like watching a show they like, only to strike a conversation with them.

The campaign features two cutesy videos capturing all these moments and to give you all the feels. The first will help you relive the cutest non-date date from the Netflix Original Series Mismatched, starring the national crush of India - Rohit Saraf (Ludo, Mismatched), and our favorite Mostly In'Sane' content creator Prajakta Koli (Mismatched). The second perfectly captures a crazy chance-meeting on a dating app with the much loved Yashaswini Dayama (Delhi Crime, International Emmy Award Winner for Best Drama Series).

One thing is for sure, this Valentines Day is bound to leave you feeling warm and fuzzy: only on and by Netflix.
VN-US relations:

"Thank heaven we are here today/To see the sun through parting fog and clouds" are two sentences from Truyen Kieu (The Tale of Kieu) quoted by then US Vice President Joe Biden,

during the reception hosted at the US Department of State to welcome General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong six years ago.

In 2000, during the reception at the Presidential Palace in Hanoi, hosted by then President Tran Duc Luong, then US President Bill Clinton delivered his remarks to thank the Vietnamese government for their warm welcome. He also quoted two sentences from The Tale of Kieu:

Sen tan cuc lai no hoa

Sau dai ngay ngan, ong a sang Xuan

(Just as the lotus wilts, the daisy blooms forth.

Time softens grief, and the winter turns to spring).

The lotus is traditionally understood as a symbol of summer. Similarly, the daisy represents fall. By referring to a verse describing cyclical change and renewal, implying that time softens grief, Clinton offered a message of hope for such renewal to occur between the US and Vietnam, from former foes to close friends.

Without a lengthy speech, he only used a few sentences in The Tales of Kieu by Nguyen Du to talk about the relations between the two countries. Thats great!

The Vietnam-US relationship was actually established by President Ho Chi Minh 70 years ago. Ideological difference hindered the two countries from holding opportunities to shake hands with each other, even causing pain and suffering for the two peoples. But the Vietnam war gave birth to a student who was strongly opposed to the war. That was Bill Clinton.

Time softens grief, and the winter turns to spring

Therefore, it is no coincidence that when becoming the US President, one of the important tasks that he did was to lift the embargo and normalize relations with Vietnam.

US President Bill Clinton shakes hands with Hanoians in 2000.

Thats why the 42nd President of the United States quoted two sentences of The Tales of Kieu to describe in a gentle, easy to understand, but deep cultural way about the Vietnam - US relationship.

Just as the lotus wilts, the daisy blooms forth.

Time softens grief, and the winter turns to spring

The Vietnamese were very surprised and excited to hear the US President quoting The Tales of Kieu. The US President chose culture to convey an important message about the relationship between the two countries at that time.

He stated: We are honored to join you in writing a new chapter in the relationship between the United States and Vietnam, and grateful that this chapter has a happy beginning. Yes, the history we leave behind is painful and hard. We must not forget it, but we must not be controlled by it. The past is only what precedes the future, not what determines it.

After 26 years of normalization, from two enemies in the past, Vietnam and the US have established a comprehensive partnership. It is an unexpected success, consistent with the trend of peace and cooperation of the era.

In fact, the development of the Vietnam-US relationship is getting better and better, because it has been built and challenged over a long process, by conscientious leaders.

To see the sun through parting fog and clouds

Once again, culture was used to express the results of diplomatic relations as well as the prospect of comprehensive cooperation and partnership between the two countries, exactly like the two sentences of The Tales of Kieu quoted by then US Vice President Joe Biden in 2015:

Troi con e en hom nay

Tan suong au ngo ven may giua troi

(Thank heaven we are here today

To see the sun through parting fog and clouds)

Now, Mr. Joe Biden - a veteran politician - has fulfilled his aspiration to sit in the most powerful chair in America as the new US president.

General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong and then Vice President Joe Biden at a reception hosted at the US Department of State to welcome Mr. Trong six years ago.

His victory over Donald Trump was dramatic, unique in American history. The handover of power between him and Mr. Trump was also a very special one. But in the end, Joe Biden was elected the 46th President of the United States of America.

General Secretary, State President Nguyen Phu Trong and Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc sent a congratulatory message to Mr. Biden, expressing "the trust that the President and the new US government will achieve with many new successes for the prosperous and happy development of the country and the American people, contributing positively to peace, stability, cooperation and development in the world".

The fog has disappeared. It is expected that US President Joe Biden will always be a friend of the country and people of Vietnam.

Lets "clear clouds" to brighten the sky, so that with the foundation of the Vietnam-US relations that has been built and nurtured over the past 26 years, bilateral ties will continue to be developed and deepened, and be effective and sustainable, striving towards human happiness, so that culture is always the foundation to override differences, creating a world of peace, cooperation and development in the future!

Luu Huong
The Maharashtra government needs to order an inquiry into the planting of false evidence on Bhima-Koregaon accused Rona Jacob Wilson. It owes this to the Indian public to protect freedom of speech and the right to dissent in our democracy.

The sensational but hare-brained conspiracy to assassinate Prime Minister Narendra Modi is entirely built on evidence, which a US cyber forensics company has shown to be fake and planted on the accused, describing it as one of the most serious cases involving evidence tampering that it has come across. If the ...
Oil and gas producer Beach Energy has discovered more than double the amount of gas it expected from a new gas field off the coast of Victoria, which it says will help buyers in south-eastern states avert winter shortfalls feared within five years.

Beach Energy, whose top shareholder is billionaire Kerry Stokes Seven Group, said the Enterprise gas field identified in the Otway Basin in December would add 97 petajoules of new gas reserves to the states gas supply.

ASX-listed Beach Energy posted a 54 per cent dive in first-half profit. Credit:James Davies

Chief executive Matt Kay described the new gas field as a cracker.

We are spending a billion dollars on offshore projects, we can see a decline facing east-coast gas supplies and we are here to fill the gap, Mr Kay said.








[ gravity ] 02.14.21 Cronus Ate a Rock Baby and Thats What Killed Them

T his isnt how my mom would have told me how. She always saidtake care of your outside if you want to be healthy whats inside. I was a little Michigan boy when she told me that standing out in the cornfields and now Im a big Michigan man loitering downtown in this city on the bluff. I tried all sorts of outside things to keep the thrall at baysee I tried wrapping my head in a scarf the way the old actresses do in black and white. I looked myself up and down in the mirror in a womans dress. I found an old pair of moms dressup shoes in the closet leftover from when she moved out. Sometimes I even worked up my courage and wore these articles out onto the bluff for something like a promenade down Lake Streetbut looking out over the water I still felt the pull toward that darkest quiet at the bottom of the Lake. I dont think all that works for me. Im still a chickadee in the body of a gull no matter how I dress my feathers. Now I wear my real manly clothes and pin just one loud female item somewhere to my person. So Ive been trying to eat better. Figure Ive got something wrong inside then I should mind what I put away in there. That means leafgreen salads for breakfast chalky hardboiled eggs in the lunchtime and for dinner some lean white bird with steamed vegetables. A handful of nuts (unsalted!) if I go hungry during the day. No more coffee. No more beers and wine. Nothing prohibited by the surgeon general. Definitely no more smokes which are a bad habit taken back up. No more loud sounds from music I like to listen tojust stop it all. Remember how doctors used to tell the old ladies to spend weeks or months in bed because their insides werent going the right way. Try it like that. Spend a week in bed the phone shutoff in a drawer somewhere and justrest. Bedrest doesnt have to be prescribed by a doctor. It can be an overthecounter drug. The only fixing ever worked for me is stories before bedtime. One in particular that didnt put me to sleep but woke me up hopeful. Mom read it from a blackcloth book that smelled like our basement after a flood. Cronus married a woman Rhea and started having babies. Because he was scared of kings succeeding kings (and because he jealoused his woman queen) he thought the best way was to be eating each of his babies when they were born. He ate up one baby then another then three four five so that he ate all five babies from his queen Rhea. But the mother being very sad at the way her husband was eating all her babies traded her sixth baby for a rock baby which she handed over to the king. So Cronus ate a rock baby instead of little Zeus and thats how the real actual god grew up strong and manly. He killed his father succeeding him as king of the world then he cut open the stomach. Therefore all five of his own siblings were birthed from a man his father and not a woman. The possibilities of being alive. Having bedrested a week or more I decide to go outside where the Lake chucks a cold wind up the bluff (almost December already? how long I been sleeping?) wrapping my neck in a scarf to find a bar where I can sit. One has blacklights and smoke machines and bands. Another has coffee and chocolate in the day and at night if you ask the barista theyll pour a glass of liqueur. Another has cheap beer and nachos and all the older locals. Nachoswhats on the menu that takes as much time to consume as beer but doesnt scare the surgeon general. Thats the bar I pick a woodsy darklighted place where I drag the stone weight of my legs. In the back of the bar a youngish man sobs the kind of drunk you can only get when youve got something wrong on the inside. My head turns so I can see him in my periphery. Hes got a parka and faceful of pimples. Crying to a friend across the booth. You know theyve been there a while because the waitress keeps a wide berth from themwhenever they need something to drink the friends got to sidle up to the bar himself. I sit down in the booth behind. Shoveling beef and cheese and sourcream on brittle chips I listen all about this mans story. They didnt let him in the place they took the thing out of his wife. It was some specialized clinic. She had to tell him later how all the other women wanted to hand the thing right over and that made it the most traumatic eight hours of her life. That was what he heard about it at least. The thing having been removed his wife cried for a single week and that was it. The week passed and she went back to work happyhours and he wasnt really sure where she was at. Then she left on a work trip to Las Vegas and the man found out a couple weeks later she had met somebody on LinkedIn who rented her an apartment out west and she wasnt coming back to the bluff. Meanwhile he was still thinking about the thing. Ill call this man Mister. Mister downloaded an app on his phone that told him what size a fruit it was supposed to be. Poppyseed peppercorn pomegranate seed blueberry raspberry cherry kumquat fig plum lemon peach apple avocado onion. The thing was a sweet potato now. The thing was a mango. Then everything started to get confusing. Banana. Carrot. Eggplant. Was this really how the thing was supposed to look? An ear of corn. An acorn squash. A zucchini? He couldnt even picture it anymore. So his wife was still paying the rent on his duplex down by the beach (one of those nicepainted numbers below the bluff that Chicagoers rent out for summer) but it was only him that was living there. But he wasnt really alone. He was having these dreams. In these dreams the cauliflowerheaded thing toddled up to him down the carpeted hallway in their duplex and the thing loved him and he loved the thing. He picked the thing up in his arms and he swaddled it like a pineapple. The spines pricked his inner arms when he hugged it. Then he went to bed with the little watermelon and he was so tired he was so afraid of rolling over onto the thing and suffocating it. The thing became a pink mush against his nightshirt. Mister didnt even wear nightshirts! The dreams were so stupid to him. Dreams can be like seeds planted in the dirt of your brainI should stop talking about the fruit or I might inherit this dream myself. Mister took to bed his arms and legs so heavy he could barely lift them up. For as many months as the springtime he was bedresting on the axblade between hungry and nauseous. No food he could keep down. The best luck he had was with a box of oyster crackers his wife used to munch on if she was hungry before bed. It was like the thing had taken up residence inside his stomach and wasnt letting any kind of bedmates come to sleep with it. Then the sun rose again in the morning and the neighbors houses filled with Chicagoers and the sickness finally passed. That summertime the smells outside came strong into Misters windows but they no longer bothered him to nausea. He ventured out from the duplex a little ways into the orangeish sunlight and right away a fat man without a shirt raised his drink into the air. He could see this very place where were currently sharing our nachos and drink on top of the bluff. A train of hundreds of bathingsuits climbed the open stairway that went from down there on the beach to up here in the city. Lately they put a new fountain in at the bottom where a bunch of little kids with potbellies were playing in the wetness. The bleachy smell of the water the unshaken dog smell of wet towels and the slight ruddishness of their own dusty sand. His feet swole up so red and puffy he walked out barefoot to the Lake which could be seen in the space between two houses from his front door. A fence blocked the way. Thin pine posts connected by two runs of wire. But only fifteen feet from where he stood the fence had been buffeted down by wind or by Chicagoers so he could tramp over top and sift through the prickly dunegrass out to the Lake. I want to describe the water of the beach its irresistible thrall but Mister didnt come to love up the water. Actually hes a man of two swole feet stuck firm to the groundsomething besides his body Ive come to jealous. That particular ruddy sand thats been wet then dried again carried his feet out this far. He never had the sense to smell the sand before and now he couldnt help but sink down on his knees. A little boy played with a bucket and shovel nearby. He was maybe four years old with a big fat belly. It wasnt obvious right away where his parents were at. Mister blinked at the little boy. Youre digging up sand Mister asked? The little boy was too shy to sound anything out. He shoveled the sand then turned it back over. The bucket was empty. Are you building something with it? The little boy shook his head. He was digging a ditch. Mister asked whats the point in digging something up if youre not going to build something? The little boy scraped the sand guiltily. The color the shovel left behind was a dappling of dark wet spots. Mister wanted to reach out and take a scoop. Actually he didhis knees made a slithering pattern in the sand and he took a pinch of that shoveled sand in his fingertips. I like digging! Finally the little boy had spoken. Mister looked at the tawny sand pinched between his fingers. Then he brought it to his mouth to taste that particular alien ruddiness. The texture was unpleasant but the taste of earthhe only wished the stuff had come from deeper down. The little boy watched him eat sand and giggled. Then a call came from past the fence and the little boy had to go home. If he could hardly keep down oyster crackers that springhe gobbled everything up now. The ash from the cracks in the coffee table dried his tongue the same way as sand but tasted faintly sour like the fizz in a pop. He sucked whatever salty moisture was left out of the hairballs. The fingernails (his wifesshe had the habit of springing her nails off wherever she was clipping) had no flavor but how they squeaked against his teeth. Peanuthusks stuck in his gums tasting grassier than the nut itself. But spent matches were his favoritethat yellowish savor of their tips. He flared their flames to smell up the dark and crunched off the tips when he woke up. Wasnt till the start of fall when every cloud crawling across the sky looked like a babyhand that he heard again from his wife. By then itd been seven months since she moved to Las Vegas. She sent him a text saying miss the duplexcan we open a dialogue? Mister thought he was getting kicked out so his wife and her LinkedIn boyfriend could move to Michigan and live the rest of their happy days sinking into the beach running their claws through each others manes etc. But when he finally got on the phone giving his salutation with a fast embarrassing hi there! he was surprised to hear that that wasnt the case at all. Something a lot more real was happening. He didnt know what that meant but those were her words. More real. Can I see you she said? I dont live in Las Vegas. Is that so? Where do you live? Stop. I didnt even want to reach out. Call it necessity. So. They need me back at HQ next month for annual review. Neither of us like each other very much right now but we owe it to ourselves to discuss this face to face. Do you really want me to stay in a hotel? I dont think Mister had much of a choice. He watched the appointed day toddle closer on the calendar while he dreamed fruitmonster dreams at night. A long time ago he uninstalled the fruit app from his phone (the things loss nowadays being the furthest thing from his mind) but in specific once he went to bed he was fruit shopping at the supermarket. He filled his plastic shopping bag without paying (so you know its a dream) all the different fruits he once cycled through on the app. Then finally he picked the spiny pineapple from the shelf just as the produce sprinklers started up misting his hand and shirtsleeve. He dropped the pineapple into his bag and amazing to say it started thrashing against his thigh. It was so heavy he couldnt bring it up with two hands onto the checkout belt. The cashier smiled at him. She got her face real close so that all he could see was her big lips and freakhouse smile. She lifted the bag no problembut the pineapple was so feisty it punched a hole in the fabric as it rode the belt in to scanning. When he woke up the next morning he looked down on his bare torso. His stomach had got bigger and bigger as he ate all the trash around the house but never had it been this bigswole even bigger than his own feet he could no longer see. His bellybutton popped inside out. With an ache of nausea he went to the shower and washed his whole body in cold. Now the Lake has turned the color of stone. The sky has zoomed way up high. The Chicagoers have moved away so the sand on the beach looks like a dirty pillowcase. Winds have picked up and fall storms crawl across the water. White lightningscary thunder. Storms sweep over top of our beach town but never gestate into rainbearing clouds. Smells and tastes have drained from the beach and Mister looks at the sand as barren dirt. This is how it was this morningthe day his wife would come to meet him. He bagged up his body in a giant parka and wore his biggest pair of sweatpants. He shaved his face which had broken out worse than highschool. He waited. He waited for the sound of keys in the front door. He waited for a car in the driveway. He waited for a call or a text or anything. Night came early. The sun barely sizzled dropping into the Lake. What an idiot to believe she was coming back! The fact clicked for him sometime after eight. He was in the middle of writing a pissy text when he felt something hed never felt before. First it was a fluttering not so different from the nervousness he felt all day waiting for his wife. But it grew crazierthe flutters turned to swishes turned to rolls and kicks and bucks. Lightning struck his crotch and it felt like his entire lower half was pulsing about to break. His legs went red. The room white. Slick with sweat Mister pitched into bed. But before he could fall asleep he heard something out front. A car in the drive. Keys in the door. Finally his wifes voice sounding exhausted honeysweet. It hurt him to stand but he met her in the hallway. They stood on opposite ends the lights all off. Mister could make out the outline of her hair against the living room window. It was messed up standing in tangles. He started to say I was waiting But she hushed him. Im sorry she said. For what? I had it all figured out what I was going to say. You dont have to. I think it was important that I left. It makes logical sense to me. Something toxic between us and I think thats why itI had to go away to do it right. And Mister heard the way she said it and it was the truth. He hadnt heard her speak so genuine since they had first discovered about the thing. When she told him how scared she was and how she wasnt sure she was right. He told her of course you can do it women have been doing it for as long as there have been women. But I dont know if I can she said. She just wanted him to touch her hand so he did. He walked toward her in the dark hallway and reached out and touched her hand. But in her hand was something else. A warm bundle of blankets that stirred and let out a cry. A pink little baby soft and sweet. The tiny whimpers in her arms blocked out everything his wife said. It wasnt joy he felt at that moment or dread or anything else you might expect. What he felt was the border between his own body his wifes disappearing. They were just copies of one single entity. A greater body containing all the ingredients from man and woman needed to further life. He looked down at his own swollen belly. Rushed by panic he realized he himself contained only sand and ash and matches and fingernails and stone. I push the last soggy chips across my plate. Mister in the booth behind me has pretty much cried himself out. My own scarf unravels from my neck. I wipe my tears on the fabric and drape the thing over top my head. It feels kind of like a hug. Like it doesnt matter where Im looking so long as I keep looking and looking and never close my eyes. Mister gets up across from his friend and now his tears are dry hes got a flush across his face. When he walks by my table his parka falls unbuttonedunder his shirt I see the long protrusion of his bellybutton like a finger pointing straight ahead. I look and look and dont close my eyes. I look so long I guess Mister finally notices me looking. He glowers down at me with my scarf over my head like the actresses in black and white and he hollers down on me what are you looking at? You some kind of f? For a long minute we string thread between our eyes. Then his friend bumps into his back and pushes him out of the bar. Stories like this take the heaviness in my body and form it into lumps. I go out on the bluff after paying for my nachos. All the restaurants closed now their lights off and the road only lit by moonlight. I walk a few blocks to the bluff. The moon swells over the Lake. Whatever that water once had for me (attraction or magnetism even gravity) the moon hovering there holds my eye tonight. Its full and yellow and bloated. I stroke my own belly. After this first phase passes I will feel the tide inside my own.
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Greenspoon Marder is pleased to announce the promotion of six attorneys to partner from various offices firm wide. The individuals recognized for their professional accomplishments and outstanding client service include Jamie D. Alman, Marcel J. Gesmundo, Harlan Greenman, Brent D. Kimball, Justin McNaughton, and Eliot New.

"These accomplished new partners demonstrate exceptional legal and business skills, a dedication to client service, and high levels of productivity that have propelled them to earn this promotion," said co-managing director, Michael Marder. "We are proud to call them partners, and are confident that they will uphold the high professional standards at Greenspoon Marder. Congratulations to this impressive group on this major milestone in their careers," said co-managing director, Gerald Greenspoon.

Ms. Alman is a member of the firm's Marital & Family Law practice group in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. She regularly handles legal issues relating to family, divorce, paternity, enforcement/contempt proceedings, modification proceedings, alimony, child support, child custody/timesharing and parental responsibility, and pre and post nuptial agreements. Ms. Alman presently serves on the Board of Directors of the Young Lawyers Section of the Broward County Bar Association. She received her law degree from the University of Miami School of Law in 2012.

Mr. Gesmundo is a member of the firm's Litigation practice group in Portland, Ore. During his career, his practice has shifted from environmental litigation to real property, commercial and residential leasing and landlord tenant law. Mr. Gesmundo's practice includes advising clients on legal developments, teaching courses on legal compliance for housing providers and trade associations, and advocating for clients at trial and on appeal. He is an active member and frequent presenter for Multifamily NW on landlord tenant issues. Mr. Gesmundo received his law degree from the Lewis and Clark Law School in 2011.

Mr. Greenman is a member of the firm's Real Estate practice group in New York, N.Y. He has extensive experience in all aspects of complex commercial real estate, including office and retail leasing, financing, development, construction, sales and acquisitions, restructurings, workouts and joint ventures. He is an active member of the New York City Bar serving as chair of the Finance and Development Subcommittee of the Real Property Law Committee. Mr. Greenman is a member of the City Bar's Working Group evaluating proposed legislation concerning a new benchmark to replace LIBOR. He received his bachelor's and law degrees from Columbia University.

Mr. Kimball is a member of the firm's Litigation and Marital & Family Law practice groups in Orlando, Fla. His practice focuses on litigation including contract disputes, corporate dissolution, landlord/tenant matters, homeowner's association disputes, and family law matters. He received his law degree from the University of Florida in 2009.

Mr. McNaughton is a member of the firm's Intellectual Property practice group in Nashville, Tenn. Mr. McNaughton works primarily with technology companies in securing, acquiring, and licensing intellectual property. As a trademark attorney, he also assists clients in protecting the hard-earned goodwill their brands represent. He particularly enjoys difficult trademark areas, such as protecting cannabis brands and securing non-traditional trademarks, such as sounds. Mr. McNaughton serves as co-host for the Greenspoon Marder "You, Me & IP" webinar series. He received his law degree from Washington University in St. Louis in 2004.

Mr. New is a member of the firm's Litigation practice group in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He advises and represents primarily businesses and employers in a broad range of disputes, class and collective actions, and labor and employment matters. This includes advising and representing clients through all stages of a dispute, prior to litigation, through administrative and governmental investigations, and to final resolution by settlement, binding arbitration, or trial in state and federal courts. He is licensed in Florida and Texas and Board Certified in Labor & Employment Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization.

About Greenspoon Marder

Celebrating the 40th anniversary of its founding in 1981, Greenspoon Marder is a national full-service business law firm with over 200 attorneys and offices across the United States. We are ranked among American Lawyer's Am Law 200, as one of the top law firms in the U.S. since 2015. Our firm was founded with the goal of providing the highest quality legal services at the highest value for our clients. Each of our clients is unique and so are their legal needs. We believe no one size fits all for professional services. Our lawyers offer flexible and creative solutions to meet our clients' respective needs. Our mission is to understand the challenges our clients face, build collaborative relationships and craft solutions with a focus on strategic goals. For more information, visit www.gmlaw.com.

MEDIA CONTACT

Cynthia Howard, Chief Marketing Officer

720.370.1182 | [email protected]

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Activists in jail, terrorists on bail: Shashi Tharoor on Disha Ravi's arrest

India

oi-Briti Roy Barman

New Delhi, Feb 15: Congress leader Shashi Tharoor criticised the arrest and subsequent police custody of 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi for her alleged role in spreading 'toolkit' related to farmers' protest shared by Greta Thunberg.

"Activists in jail while accused terrorists are on bail. Wondering how our authorities would commemorate this case on anniversary of Pulwama Attacks?" he tweeted on Sunday.

Disha Ravi is one of the founders of the 'Friday for Future' campaign and allegedly edited the 'toolkit' and forwarded it on social media. She was picked up from her house in Soladevanahalli area of Bengaluru on Saturday.

The Delhi Police had registered an FIR on February 4 on charges of sedition, criminal conspiracy and promoting hatred among groups under Sections 124-A, 120-A and 153-A of the Indian Penal Code against the "creators" of the 'toolkit', which was later shared by global climate activist Greta Thunberg.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

According to the police, the unfolding of events during the farmers' protest on January 26, including the violence at the Red Fort, allegedly revealed copycat execution of the 'action plan' detailed in the 'toolkit'.

For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications

Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 16:12 [IST]
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Updated traffic map

See traffic cams here

Tuesday

Icy roads are being reported from north Alabama down to the west-central part of the state. You can go here to see the latest road reports for the entire state.

12 Alabama snow: Feb. 16, 2021

A winter storm warning remains in effect for north Alabama and portions of west central Alabama and travel could be impacted through late morning Wednesday, Feb. 17.

12:25 p.m.

Be careful on area roads. Some roads are fairly clear and others have patches of black ice or snow and ice where trees... Posted by Huntsville-Madison County Emergency Management Agency on Tuesday, February 16, 2021

9:31 a.m.

 ROAD CONDITIONS UPDATE  (9 AM) pic.twitter.com/ayoAmsn3Dn  Alabama Law Enforcement Agency (@ALEAprotects) February 16, 2021

8:30 a.m.

From Muscle Shoals Police: Road conditions havent improved, still covered with ice. Please stay home unless you have to get out. If you are on the roadways please drive slowly and with extreme care.

8:25 a.m.

Limestone County EMA will contiinue to closely monitor the situation.ads and bridges in the county remain impassable. Only emergency vehicles may travel on Limestone County roads and bridges, until further notice.

7 a.m.

In Huntsville, Memorial Parkway and Research Parkway, closed late last night due to icing, have reopened. Both roads still have icy patches, Huntsville Police said.

Earlier:

Morgan County

Live cam of the Tennessee River bridge.

HWY 231 Tennessee River Bridge from ALDOT camera [ROAD CONDITIONS] Every road in the county is potentially slick, with... Posted by Morgan County Sheriff's Office on Tuesday, February 16, 2021

Icy conditions are hampering driving throughout the state.

Good morning from your Tuscaloosa County EMA! We are receiving reports of ice on Lurleen Wallace (North & South), Hugh Thomas Bridge, and I-359. This has been reported to Alabama Dept. of Transportation and Tuscaloosa Dept. of Transportation. If you must drive, use caution. pic.twitter.com/ZrxI5LklSr  TuscaloosaCountyEMA (@TuscaloosaCoEMA) February 16, 2021

 ROAD CONDITIONS UPDATE:



Pickens Co:

The entire county - declared impassable



Sumter Co:

All county roads & bridges - declared impassable



Tuscaloosa Co:

U.S. 43

AL 69 N

Lake Tuscaloosa to the county line - there are reports of snow/ice building up on the roadway#alwx  Alabama Law Enforcement Agency (@ALEAprotects) February 16, 2021

It's snowing!! For commuters, we have identified a few spots with ice patches that may be hazardous. Please use extreme caution.

Old Town Bridge

Hwy 261 @ 1st, 2nd, and 3rd St

Hwy 261 @ Railroad Ave

Hwy 93 @ Hwy 277

Hwy 93 @ Woodlands

South Shades Crest Rd @ Timber Lakes Dr pic.twitter.com/AvfIMwuH0a  Helena, AL Police (@HelenaPolice) February 16, 2021

Utilities

Widespread power outages have been reported in Athens.

Athens Utilities Electric Department Manager Blair Davis said as of Tuesday at 6 a.m., there are 2,300 customers without service. For some customers, power could remain out through tomorrow as workers must remove fallen trees before crews can make repairs.

Pockets of isolated outages are scattered throughout Limestone County.

Monday

Update 8:40 p.m.:

Traffic Alert: Officers are closing Memorial Parkway in both directions due to icy conditions. Officers are also closing Research Park Blvd northbound and southbound. Please avoid the areas and stay safe. pic.twitter.com/ZEc71phj1H  Huntsville Police (@HsvPolice) February 16, 2021

Update:

7:49 p.m.

NEWS RELEASE - HUNTSVILLE UTILITIES POWER OUTAGE UPDATE Monday - February 15, 2021 - 6:20pm Huntsville Utilities... Posted by Huntsville Utilities on Monday, February 15, 2021

7:48 p.m.

Franklin Electric Customers Franklin Electric Co-op will postpone utility restoration activities from 6:00 PM this... Posted by Franklin County Sheriff's Office on Monday, February 15, 2021

7:45 p.m.

From the City of Athens:

Power outages are scattered throughout Limestone County and limbs and trees continue to fall. Linemen are further hampered by the dark and freezing roads. Depending on the issue, some outages could continue throughout tonight and into tomorrow. Crews are working as quickly as they can while making safety a priority. Leaving comments on the Citys Twitter and Facebook or sending tips to Nixle do not get your address into the dispatch system. Call 256-232-1440 to report an outage, down lines, or other utility emergencies. You may have to call more than once as circuits are busy.

2:18 p.m.

Right now, our power generating fleet is meeting the power demand across our seven-state service region during this winter storm! (1-2) pic.twitter.com/XEUPwmBSqE  Tennessee Valley Authority (@TVAnews) February 15, 2021

2:13 p.m.

Ice accumulating on power lines & tree limbs. Athens Utilities crews working to restore scattered outages in Athens & Limestone Co. Outages may continue to be an issue during this weather event. Please know crews will work as quickly as they can while making safety a priority. pic.twitter.com/43u0RZNACB  City of Athens, AL (@AthensAL) February 15, 2021

1:55 p.m.

All county roads and bridges in Lamar County should be considered impassable, according to the county engineers office.

1:47 p.m.

All roads in Pickens County are impassable, per the county engineers office. Only emergency vehicles should travel on county roads and bridges, officials said.

1:45 p.m.

Waterloo, in Lauderdale County. Video from Allison Bates pic.twitter.com/REMQ7AU3cJ  James Spann (@spann) February 15, 2021

1:43 p.m.

1:37 p.m.

Update: Highway 86 from the state line to Gordo is now impassable.  ALDOT West Central (@ALDOT_WCRegion) February 15, 2021

1:34 p.m.

From Hamilton Police Department: Due to inclement weather, all Hamilton city streets are closed until further notice, except to emergency services. Please refrain from driving unless it is a life threatening emergency.

12:50

The latest from Alabama Law Enforcement Agency:

All county roads in Colbert County have been deemed impassable. State and federal roads have icy conditions.

All county roads in Franklin County are impassable, according to the Franklin County Emergency Management Agency.

All roads in Lauderdale and Lawrence counties have icy conditions.

In Hamilton, there are several wrecks with icy conditions on I-22. State troopers are reporting deteriorating conditions on the west side of I-22.

12:49 p.m.

The Bankhead Tunnel (U.S. 90) will be closed this evening from 5 to 5:30 p.m. while a de-icing agent is sprayed on the roadway. The Alabama Law Enforcement Agencys Highway Patrol Division asks motorists to seek an alternate route and expect possible delays during this time.

12:15 p.m.

Impassible Roads The roads are worsening by the minute. Trees are falling across the roadways and we have received... Posted by Franklin County Sheriff's Office on Monday, February 15, 2021

12:10 p.m.

11:30 a.m.

We strongly encourage you to stay home if you're able to today. If you do have to go out, we ask that you use extreme caution. https://t.co/MBkmQaJj21 pic.twitter.com/TZcayVJhW0  Madison Sheriff AL (@mcsosheriffAL) February 15, 2021

11:30 a.m.

The scene on HWY 231 is now clear. Only minor injuries reported. HWY 231 to remain closed at this time. Excellent... Posted by Morgan County Sheriff's Office on Monday, February 15, 2021

10:30 a.m.

IMPASSABLE TRAVEL ADVISORY issued for all Colbert County Roads - COUNTY ROADS ONLY https://t.co/iM2AqugYoo pic.twitter.com/pOgvH1UDxT  Colbert EMA (@colbertema) February 15, 2021

9:46 a.m.

Daylight is starting to creep in on the scene on HWY 231. Brindlee Mountain Volunteer Fire Department, Lacey's Spring Volunteer Fire, ALDOT, EMS and Troopers are on scene. Posted by Morgan County Sheriff's Office on Monday, February 15, 2021

9:40 a.m. - From northwest Alabama, ice has been reported on the bridge on U.S. 43/AL Highway 17 in both directions in Hackleburg. Icy conditions have also been reported on Highway 17 in all directions. @ before River Rd/County Road 35 in Sulligent.

9:30 a.m. - According to the Alabama Law Enforcement Agnecy, Alabama Highway 133 from the Singing River Bridge to Veterans Drive in Colbert County, U.S. Highway 43 and Alabama Highway 24 in Franklin County, Alabama Highway 157 and Alabama Highway 20 in Lauderdale County, Alabama Highway 101 and Alabama Highway 20 at Town Creek, Alabama Highway 33 in the Mill Pond area in Lawrence County are icy or have icy spots.

Other ice bridges include Alabama Highway 17 in the Sulligent area in Lamar County, Interstate 22, and U.S. Highway 43 in the Hackleburg area in Marion County.

Earlier:

At least 20 vehicles are involved in a wreck in north Alabama, according to the Morgan County Sheriffs Office.

The sheriffs office reported the accident around 6:28 a.m. on Highway 231 North at Husky Private Drive near the bridge at Laceys Spring. The office said there were no major injuries but the southland lanes are blocked by responders. Northbound lanes are blocked and covered with ice.

The Alabama Department of Transportation has been notified.

[Update] Major vehicle pile up. No major injuries. 231 blocked in both directions. Northbound is sheet of ice pic.twitter.com/LMUlS6l0hL  Morgan County Sheriff's Office (@morgan_sheriff) February 15, 2021

Major Crash on US231 both dir. @ MP 303.3 near A L36 in Morgan County. Road closed. Seek alternate route. More details: https://t.co/mCjfnSicNd  ALGO Huntsville (@algo_hvl) February 15, 2021

Icy road conditions have been reported throughout northwest and north central Alabama with the situation expected to worsen as the day goes on and another round of winter weather hits.

How to track road conditions

The Alabama Department of Transportation provides tracking on road conditions. You can see more here.

You can also follow realtime at @AlgoTraffic.

You can follow ALDOTs traffic cams here.
The Japanese government has approved its first vaccine against the Covid-19, kick-starting a massive rollout programme for the country of 126 million people.

Inc.'s Covid-19 mRNA vaccine got the final approval for emergency use on Sunday from health minister Norihisa Tamura, two days after a government committee gave the shot its seal of approval, paving the way for inoculations to start as early as Wednesday, The Japan Times reported.

The vaccine approvals usually take a year or two, but the government shortened the review period to less than two months, scrapping the requirement for large, third phase clinical trials in Japan amid the mounting toll of the pandemic.

Japan, however, was still the last country among the Group of Seven nations to give it the OK as it required an additional clinical trial to be conducted on Japanese people to ensure safety.

The UK and the US approved the shot, jointly developed by the US pharmaceutical giant and Germany's BioNTech SE, in December.

Late-stage trials of Pfizer's vaccine conducted on more than 43,000 participants, of which 5 per cent were Asian, in the US and five other countries have shown that it was 95 per cent effective in preventing Covid-19.

Japan's approval came despite a lack of a large clinical trial in the country, as the number of Covid-19 cases in the country remains significantly lower compared to other countries.

Tamura said Pfizer's clinical trial in Japan on 160 people age 20 to 85 has confirmed the vaccine's effectiveness in producing antibodies in line with the results from the large-scale trial conducted overseas.

The first shipments of Pfizer's vaccines arrived at Narita International Airport from Brussels on Friday, carrying vials for around 400,000 shots, according to Kyodo News. Japan has signed a contract to receive 144 million of Pfizer's vaccines, enough to inoculate 72 million people, by the end of 2021.

--IANS

int/

(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 Montgomery police officer is facing misdemeanor charges and disciplinary action amid domestic violence allegations.

Montgomery police said 27-year-old Zavarius Jones is charged with third-degree domestic violence  menacing and third-degree domestic violence  harassing communications, said Capt. Saba Coleman. Both crimes are Class A misdemeanors.

The department launched an investigation Sunday after receiving notification of the charges from the Municipal Court Magistrates office. The officer was immediately placed on administrative leave. No other details were released but Coleman said the officer was off-duty at the time of the alleged incident.

Jones joined the department in 2020 and was a patrol officer before he was placed on leave.

Photo: (Photo : Photo by cottonbro from Pexels)

New research led by Oxford-AstraZeneca to assess how well their vaccine against coronavirus performs to children ages 6 to 17 is set later this February.

First to Test Children

On Saturday, the United Kingdoms' University of Oxford said in a statement that they are set to test the effect of the Covid-19 vaccine on children that they developed with pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca. This move makes them the first developer to test the coronavirus shot success in children and young adults between the ages of 6 and 17.

With more than 116,000 deaths, Britain has Europe's deadliest coronavirus epidemic so far worldwide. They are now in third national lockdown as officials seek to control new, more transmissible strains of viruses. Also, most schools are closed and the economy is down. These may address their national concern.

READ: A Kid's Mental Health Left Unchecked Could Possibly Lead to Suicide, Experts Warn



Previous studies did not involve children younger than 12 before the Oxford-AstraZeneca trial. Three other firms and the only approved vaccines in the United States to date  Pfizer, Moderna, and Janssen  have announced plans to launch trials this spring for younger kids.

U.S. regulators, on the other hand, are awaiting further trial results. Children are not expected to receive the vaccine on a widespread basis for months, and maybe not until 2022, even with clinical trials for younger patients are underway.

ALSO READ: Almost All U.S. Children Live in "Red Zones" According to CDC's School Reopening Guidance



AstraZeneca Vaccine Trial Details

The trial will determine the 'vaccine's safety and immune responses' and include 300 volunteers or participants. It will take place in three English towns: London, Southampton, and Bristol, with the injections to start later in February, they added.

Those who wish to take part must complete a short questionnaire. Those living near one of the four sites of study  the University of Oxford, St George's University Hospital, London, Southampton University Hospital, and Bristol Royal Children's Hospital  are encouraged to participate and are asked to sign up.

The trial's goal is to determine whether children between the ages of six and 17 can develop a robust immune response once jab induces. The vaccine is one of two that, along with the Pfizer-BioNTech thrust, are used to protect against serious illness and death from Covid in the U.K.

When the experiment is underway, as many as 240 children will receive the vaccine. The rest will receive a control meningitis jab.

The Oxford-AstraZeneca two-dose vaccine is also expected to be cheaper and simpler than other competitors to deliver. This year alone, AstraZeneca plans to manufacture 3 billion doses and has said it has many orders from countries such as the United States, Canada, Japan, Brazil, and the United Kingdom.

Other than the plans for children's' vaccination, United Kingdom revealed earlier this month that they would be trialing combining vaccine shots. Patients will receive separate vaccines for their first and second doses: either an Oxford-AstraZeneca shot followed by a Pfizer and BioNTech injection, or vice versa.

As more than 14 million individuals from its population of around 66 million have received their first vaccine dose so far.

READ MORE: Canceled Spring Break Plans? Here Are Staycation Ideas for You and Your Family


Business hit by pandemic, owners of Indian restaurant in the US get support from President Biden

Neal and Samir Idnani own Indian restaurant NaanStop in Atlanta, Georgia. Screengrab courtesy: Twitter/@WhiteHouse

Companies across the world have been struggling for the last year with the COVID-19 pandemic having hit small businesses in particular. One such pair of struggling business owners - Neal and Samir Idnani - found a sympathetic ear in US President Joe Biden.

The owners of Indian restaurant NaanStop got the opportunity to sit down for a virtual chat with the American President, in a video release by the White House.

Their restaurant serves Indian food in three locations in Atlanta, Georgia and has seen a drop in business by almost 75 per cent Neal told Biden.

Countless small businesses across the country are struggling because of COVID-19  businesses like NaanStop in Atlanta, Georgia. President Biden called owners Samir and Neal to discuss how his American Rescue Plan will help them get through the pandemic. pic.twitter.com/xXyPBQMGak  The White House (@WhiteHouse) February 13, 2021

"As small business owners during the pandemic, every day is an open question," said Samir in the video. "When President Biden found out about our situation, he reached out."

Neal also told Biden that because of the decline in business, their staff had gone down to 10-15 people from having 20-25 employees.

When President Biden asked the duo what they need for their restaurant to survive, Neal responded that their biggest need is for everyone to get vaccinated so that people could start going out again.

President Biden also told them about his rescue plan that provides tens of billions of dollars in grants to small businesses".

"We have to invest more, not less. We've got to give you a chance to rebuild that's separate and apart from dealing with the virus," he added.

The video ends with Neal and Samir accepting Bidens request to visit NaanStop whenever he visits Atlanta next.
(@ChaudhryMAli88)

Paris, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :Investors flocked into the French media conglomerate Vivendi on Monday after it unveiled plans to spin off the lucrative Universal Music Group, a move long sought by analysts as well as its own top shareholders.

Vivendi owns 80 percent of UMG, whose artists and catalogue range from the Beatles to Lady Gaga, after recently selling 20 percent to China's Tencent group.

In December, Universal shocked many in the industry by announcing a deal to secure the rights to Bob Dylan's entire back catalogue of songs, reportedly for more than $300 million.

On Saturday, the company said it would study the distribution of 60 percent of UMG to Vivendi shareholders in order to reduce what it called a "conglomerate discount." "Vivendi's leading institutional shareholders have been pressing for a number of years for a split or the distribution of Universal Music Group," it said.

Vivendi said UMG, which would be listed on the Amsterdam stock market, could be worth at least 30 billion Euros ($36.4 billion).

The deal, set to be voted on at a shareholder meeting in March, sent Vivendi's stock rocketing 18 percent higher to 30.82 euros in Paris.

The company's other assets range from movies and tv production to publishing and advertising.

"In 2022, Vivendi should be refocused on all its other main units (mainly Groupe Canal+, Editis and Havas) alongside its minority holdings" including UMG as well as Lagardere, Prisa and Spotify," the Paris brokerage OddoBHF commented in a note.

jra-jub/js/sjw/bmm
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Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

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Suspended Member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Allotey Jacobs says Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is a political leader who thinks Ghana first.



To him, the President of Ghana believes in working together even with his arch opponents for the betterment of Ghana.



He was speaking on the victory of E.T Mensah in the just ended Council of State Election in the Greater Accra Region.



I wont be surprised that President Akufo-Addo worked in clandestine to ensure E.T. Mensah wins because we are having a political leader who thinks Ghana first, he said.



I support Mr E.T. Mensah and I support his victory which I know he will exhibit his rich experience to help Nana Akufo-Addo, Allotey Jacobs said.



To him, this opens the gate for politicians who are open minded like him to serve in the government of an opposing political party.



there are some radical people in the NDC who would verbally attack an open minded people like us, but, if I am given an opportunity in the NPPs government and it is the will of God, why not I will serve, he said.









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.

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Burr, 65, will not seek reelection next year and will retire. In a written statement, he said Trump made unfounded claims about a fraud-riddled election because he did not like the results. He said Trump used the presidency to inflame the rioters rather than urging them to stand down. The evidence is compelling that President Trump is guilty of inciting an insurrection against a coequal branch of government, Burr said.

Also striking was the guilty vote by Cassidy, who was reelected in November from a deep-red state where GOP support is widespread.

Cassidy, 63 and a physician, had initially sided with the vast majority of Senate Republicans who voted last month to block the trial from moving forward. But he blasted a shambolic performance by Trumps legal team at the start of the trial while praising Democrats for presenting a compelling case.

Our Constitution and our country is more important than any one person. I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty, Cassidy said in a one-sentence statement issued after his vote to convict.

Toomey, a traditional conservative, decried Trump's efforts to overturn election results  Trump's targets include Toomey's Pennsylvania  and to encourage his supporters' march on the Capitol.


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The Egyptian parliament on Feb. 7 called for cooperation with Sudan on revising and ridding its school curricula of extremism.

Parliament member Farida al-Shobashi said in parliament, The Egyptian parliament encourages the Egyptian ministries of education and endowments to support Sudan in its unique experience in revising its school curricula to cleanse them of extremist content.

Shobashi added, Egypt has experience in combating extremism and confronting takfirist ideas. Therefore, Egyptian experiences must be transferred to Sudan to help it rid its school curricula of any content tainted by extremism.

The People's Initiative for Strengthening the Sudanese-Egyptian Relations also announced its readiness to participate in revising the curricula.

Hatem Bashat, a member of the said initiative, said at the Feb. 7 parliament session, The initiative called for reviewing the Sudanese curricula and removing any offensive material to Egypt in order to build generations in the two brotherly countries devoid of any destructive ideas.

A number of public figures from Sudan and Egypt had announced on Jan. 28 the launch of the People's Initiative for Strengthening Sudanese-Egyptian Relations.

Egyptian Minister of Education Tarek Shawki revealed on Feb. 6 that a number of Arab countries, including Sudan, called for implementing the Egyptian curriculum in their schools. He said an educational cooperation protocol was signed between Egypt and Sudan.

On Jan. 25, Sudans Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok announced the formation of a committee to review and rid the Sudanese curricula  which was developed under ousted President Omar al-Bashir  of extremism.

Under Bashir, Sudans school curricula contained content the Sudanese transitional government deemed to be tainted with extremism.

Sudanese Minister of Religious Affairs and Endowments Nasruddin Mufreh said in a press statement on Jan. 27 that Sudan decided to rid the school curricula, especially the Islamic education curricula, of the extremist and terrorist ideology to make it consistent with the general framework and goals of moderation.

The US-based Al-Hurra website revealed excerpts that contained extremist ideas in the Sudanese curricula under Bashir. Chief among these paragraphs came in an Islamic culture book taught to students of the Sudanese Al Neelain University. The book included the phrase, Belonging to atheistic schools such as communism, secularism and capitalism is tantamount to apostasy as far as Islam is concerned. If those who follow such ideologies claim to be Muslims, then they are hypocrites.  They are called to repent. Otherwise, they are treated as apostates while alive and even after they die.

Sudan has resorted in the past months to Egypt to develop its curricula in Sudanese universities. In October 2020, Egyptian Minister of Education Khaled Abdel Ghaffar and his Sudanese counterpart, Gabriel Changson, signed a cooperation protocol in the field of higher education to cooperate in preparing study plans, curricula and textbooks in universities.

Also, in August 2020, Cairo University announced the reopening of its branch in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, to receive Sudanese students after a 27-year closure.

In a related context, Sudanese journalist Mohamed Osman told Al-Monitor, The Egyptian-Sudanese cooperation in developing school curricula is ongoing, but it was scaled up in the wake of the dismissal of Brotherhood-affiliated President Omar al-Bashir.

Osman added, Egypt is keen to support Sudan in getting rid of the remnants of the Brotherhoods rule, especially as far as education is concerned. This is especially true after the Brotherhood published its reactionary ideas in school curricula that included takfirist and extremist paragraphs.

He continued, Egypt was affected by the extremism of the Muslim Brotherhood in Sudan, which would encourage unrest in Egyptian-Sudanese relations. Therefore, Cairo is trying to help Sudan cleanse its curricula of any Brotherhood ideas.

Osman said, After the Sudanese revolution and the overthrow of Bashir, Egypt sought to send educational missions to Sudan and Egyptian teachers to Khartoum to ensure rapprochement between the two countries. Also, education officials in Sudan held meetings with officials in Egypt to benefit from the Egyptian experience in dealing with extremist Brotherhood ideas.

In this vein, Sudanese Minister of Higher Education Intisar Soughayroun discussed on Jan. 25 with Egyptian Ambassador to Khartoum Hossam Issa cooperation in the field of education between the two countries.

In October 2020, Sudans Minister of Higher Education discussed with the Egyptian Minister of Endowments Mohamed Mokhtar Gomaa ways to deal with extremist ideas.

For his part, Sudanese journalist Fikri Abu al-Qassem told Al-Monitor he rejects any Egyptian-Sudanese cooperation in developing the Sudanese curricula.

Sudan is aware of its problems and crises in school curricula, and it insists on removing any residues of extremism from the Bashir era without any Egyptian interference, he said.

Egypt wishes to participate in reviewing the Sudanese curriculum, not assist Khartoum in confronting extremism. It wants to control the Sudanese intellectually and boost Egyptian influence in Sudan, Qassem added.

Egyptian participation in reviewing school curricula in Sudan or any educational cooperation between the two countries affects the Sudanese identity. The Sudanese must take charge of education affairs without cooperation with Egypt or any country that spreads its ideas among future Sudanese generations, he concluded.
A more recent publication of this set of statistics is available. Latest publication: Index of turnover in industry 2021, March

Published: 15 February 2021

Turnover in industry decreased by 7.7 per cent in December

According to Statistics Finland, working day adjusted turnover in industry (TOL BCD) decreased in December by 7.7 per cent year-on-year. Among main industries, turnover in the chemical industry decreased most, being 11.6 per cent lower than one year earlier. Adjusted for working days, turnover decreased by 6.5 per cent in January to December from the previous year. Seasonally adjusted turnover in industry (TOL BCD) fell in December by 2.1 per cent compared with November.

Annual change in working day adjusted turnover in manufacturing (BCD), % (TOL 2008)

After the chemical industry, turnover declined most in December in the forest industry, by 8.9 per cent from one year earlier. In the metal industry, turnover decreased by 7.1 per cent and in the food industry by 7.0 per cent. Output increased most in mining and quarrying, by 12.0 per cent from the previous year. The turnover of the textile, clothing and leather industry increased by 2.4 per cent and that of electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply by 1.8 per cent compared to one year ago. Turnover in the electrical and electronics industry grew by 1.1 per cent.

Annual change in working day adjusted turnover in manufacturing by industry, December 2020, % (TOL 2008)

Export turnover and domestic turnover decreased most in the chemical industry in November

Export turnover decreased most in the chemical industry in November and was 16.8 per cent lower than one year earlier. In the forest industry, export turnover decreased by 7.3 per cent and in the textile, clothing and leather industry by 4.3 per from the previous year. Export turnover grew most strongly in mining and quarrying, by 25.8 per cent from one year ago. There was also growth in the electronic and electrical industry, by 19.9 per cent, and in the metal industry, by 13.3 per cent. In addition, export turnover in the food industry grew slightly.

Annual change in working day adjusted export turnover and domestic turnover in manufacturing by industry, November 2020, % (TOL 2008)

Domestic turnover declined in November most in the chemical industry, by 16.9 per cent from one year earlier. Domestic turnover also decreased in the food industry, by 5.8 per cent, and in the forest industry, by 3.5 per cent from one year ago. Domestic turnover grew in the textile, clothing and leather industry, by 9.0 per cent, and in the electronic and electrical industry, by 8.6 per cent. Domestic turnover in the metal industry grew by 0.4 per cent.

Trend series of turnover, export turnover and domestic turnover in manufacturing (BC), January 2007 to November-December 2020, % (TOL 2008)

The index of turnover in industry describes enterprises whose main industry is manufacturing. The calculation of the indices is based on the Tax Administrations self-assessed tax data which are supplemented with data obtained with Statistics Finlands sales inquiry. The monthly turnovers of manufacturing enterprises can vary considerably, especially in the metal industries. The variation is mainly due to invoicing practices. The final invoice for major machinery deliveries and projects may be recorded in the sales of one month, even if the delivery had required the work of several months or years.

The factors caused by the variation in the number of weekdays are taken into account in adjustment for working days. This means taking into consideration the lengths of months, different weekdays and holidays. In addition, seasonal variation is eliminated from seasonally adjusted series, on account of which it makes sense to compare observations of two successive months as well.

In terms of turnover, data for the latest month are preliminary and are released at a delay of around six weeks. The data may become significantly revised particularly on more detailed industry levels in coming months. Export turnover and domestic turnover are, for the time being, still released at a delay of two and a half months.

Industries of enterprises have been revised in the data released in February

Starting from statistical release published in February 2021 the latest industries defined by the Business Register have been taken into use in the turnover and wage and salary indices. The industry corrections are visible as revised data in some of the published industries for the years 2019-2020. The effects of the changes are taken into consideration in statistics production so that no breaks occur in the time series of the published index series. The interpretation of the statistics also remains unchanged in the renewal. Revisions to annual changes in industries are presented under Revisions in these statistics .

Source: Index of turnover in industry 2020, December, Statistics Finland

Inquiries: Maija Sappinen 029 551 3348, Heli Suonio 029 551 2481, myynti.teollisuus@stat.fi

Head of Department in charge: Katri Kaaja

Publication in pdf-format (343.4 kB)

Updated 15.2.2021

Referencing instructions: Official Statistics of Finland (OSF): Index of turnover in industry [e-publication].

ISSN=1798-596X. December 2020. Helsinki: Statistics Finland [referred: 31.5.2021].

Access method: http://www.stat.fi/til/tlv/2020/12/tlv_2020_12_2021-02-15_tie_001_en.html
The Congress on Monday demanded immediate rollback of hike in prices of petrol, diesel and LPG cylinders as it accused the BJP-led government at the Centre of being insensitive towards the problems of the common people.

Party leader Rahul Gandhi attacked the government for the LPG price hike alleging that it was "looting" people for the "development of only two".

"Loot from the public, development of only 'two'," he alleged.

Gandhi's barb follows his 'Hum do, Hamare do' jibe in Parliament on Thursday. Attacking the government over the three farm laws, he had alleged that the nation is being run by only four people with a 'Hum do, Hamare do' approach.

Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala referred to a June 2011 tweet by Union Minister Smriti Irani to attack her over the issue and asked whether she would speak up against the LPG price hike.

"Illusionist Smriti Irani ji, the price of gas cylinder has increased by Rs 175. Will you say something or will you remain silent and keep enjoying power," he said in a tweet in Hindi.

Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinate said in the last two months alone, LPG gas prices have gone up by Rs 175 per cylinder and that is hitting the common people who are already reeling under economic recession.

"We are amid an economic recession. Today, India is facing acute unemployment. People's wages have been cut and now they are being burdened with skyrocketing prices, thanks to LPG cylinders or petrol and diesel prices, where records are being set by this government. Petrol prices in Madhya Pradesh have crossed Rs 100 per litre," she said.

"I think it tells you a lot about how this government functions and thinks. They are not just insensitive, I also believe they want to look the other way. The government has raised excise duty more than 12 times in its tenure so far and has amassed a whopping Rs 24 lakh crore which actually belongs to the people of this country and taxation is so very high," she alleged.

Shrinate asked who is going to be answerable for this and demanded that the government withdraws this hike to help provide relief for the common man.

Accusing the BJP of politicising the issue, she alleged they will lower taxes wherever elections are held.

"Why can the (Narendra) Modi government not be sensitive towards the needs of people? I also believe if the common men and common women start asking tough questions to this government as far as economic mismanagement and skyrocketing prices are concerned, they will be labelled anti-nationals and sedition cases will be filed," she alleged.

The Congress spokesperson asked if it not the moral duty of the government to give relief to the people or is it alright to make money at the cost of people's problems.

"We believe the 'Achche Din' that the Modi government spoke about, and shies away from, is nowhere in sight.

"We demand these prices and excise duty increase be rolled back. The excise duty structure and the excise collections be paused for a while and the government give relief to the common man because of the unprecedented situation and the government's prime duty is to bring more relief to the people," Shrinate said.

Launching a broadside against the BJP government at the Centre, another Congress spokesperson Jaiveer Shergill demanded subsidy on bicycles as prices of petrol and diesel are touching "record levels".

"By continuously rising fuel prices, the BJP government is fulfilling its mission 'Aab Ki Baar Petrol/Diesel Rs 100 Paar'. It is now an open secret that the BJP government does not believe in welfare but is launching economic warfare against its own citizens," he alleged.

He demanded that BJP immediately lower or provide subsidy on purchase of bicycles, as its real goal is 'expensive India' and that is its version of 'achche din' (good days).

Petrol and diesel prices on Monday were hiked for the seventh day in a row as a rally in international oil prices took retail rates in India to new highs.

Petrol price was increased by 26 paise per litre and diesel by 29 paise, according to a price notification of state-owned fuel retailers.

This pushed retail rates, which differ from state to state depending on the incidence of local sales tax or VAT and freight charges, to their highest level.

(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.)
The Moscow-based Novaya gazeta newspaper on February 15 published official documents it says prove that many of the people allegedly killed in extrajudicial executions in Chechnya in 2017 had been detained by local police.

Novaya gazeta reported in 2017 that 27 detained individuals had been summarily executed in late January that year.

Chechen authorities have denied the individuals in question had ever been arrested, while the Investigative Committee rejected Novaya gazeta's request to launch an investigation into the allegations.

The North Caucasus region of Chechnya is controlled by Kremlin-installed strongman Ramzan Kadyrov. Its security forces have been accused of gross human rights abuses for many years, including abductions, torture, and killings.

Citing documents Novaya gazeta said were obtained from the Chechen Interior Ministry, the newspaper reported on February 15 that the 27 were detained during a special operation following an attack against police officers in Grozny in December 2016.

In April 2017, Novaya gazeta officially handed to the Investigative Committee the list of the 27 people and an additional three men who, according to the newspaper, were also killed by the Chechen police during a campaign against gays in February 2017 in the region.

Investigators only confirmed that four men from the list had died, and two other men were announced as being alive.

However, Novaya gazeta said in its latest investigative report that the two in fact were brothers of two executed men identified as Mokhma Muskiyev and Shamkhan Yusupov.

The report also alleged that several men detained in Chechnya in January 2017 were pressured by local law enforcement to "take an oath of loyalty to the Islamic State [extremist group]" in front of cameras and then forced to denounce the extremist group.

The newspaper suggested that the videos were later used to declare the men as terrorists.
In Venice, LA, Residents Point Out Failures of Homeless Policy

LOS ANGELESWhen Brian Ulf says its a problem that the weight of homelessness throughout Los Angeles County has landed squarely on the shoulders of a few cities, he should know.

A recovering alcoholic who sits on the board of the Los Angeles Homeless Committee, hes well aware of the problem. Now hes trying to be part of the solutionbut when he looks around Venice Beach in Los Angeles on a bleak winters dayat the scattered garbage, littered encampments, and damaged peopleits hard to be optimistic.

This is a spot where the public doesnt get protected, Ulf, 63, told The Epoch Times. Theres not enough housing  but in the interim of when theres not housing, what are we doing for this population, while theyre still out here on the street?

Many local residents, who no longer feel safe, are asking the same question. As the homeless population grows amid a lingering COVID-19 pandemic, official efforts to deal with the problems of the homeless, and the problems they have brought to the city along with them, are failing, they say.

And they point to a local bridge housing project as a prime example.

A homeless man sleeps on a bench in the Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

The Housing-First Solution

The Pacific Sunset bridge housing facility sits just a couple of blocks away from the Venice Boardwalk, between Main Street and Sunset Avenue. Its one of 26 supportive housing projects either already built or under construction in Los Angeles.

The 154-bed housing unit was launched in February 2020, before the COVID-19 stay-at-home orders took effect, and championed by LA Mayor Eric Garcetti and 11th District Councilmember Mike Bonin to provide individuals in homeless encampments on nearby sidewalks with temporary, safe, secure housing and services acting as a bridge to permanent housing.

But a year later, its unclear how many residents are currently living in the facility, or how many have been transitioned to permanent housingwhile right outside its doors, tent encampments dot the sidewalks.

According to a September 2020 report in the citys local paper, the Venice Current, the program had thus far only placed seven people into more permanent housing units. Seventy people were still waiting to be transitioned six months after the projects opening, while another 50 original occupants either left or were kicked out for behavioral issues.

Since its inception, the project has met with resistance from local residents, who say the failing efforts to help are bringing more crime and depravity into their neighborhoods. They point to the encampments that line the streets adjacent to the supportive housing as proofalong with discarded needles, trash, and a proliferation of stolen bicycle parts that pepper the Venice neighborhoods.

This was the mayors initiative, and the way that they sold it to the community was that it was a way to break up the homeless encampments, Venice Beach resident Soledad Ursua told The Epoch Times.

Ursua said officials sold some residents on a housing-first model because we needed to provide shelter for people to go, and people would be taken there.

The facility would get people to come out of their tents and to go into housing, she said. And it was very flexible to get people to comply. For example, you could not do drugs inside, but you were able to be on drugs, because the facility does not require residents to be sober.

Garcettis A Bridge Home initiative was billed to residents as a temporary, safe, secure, humane alternative to neighborhood encampments, and was launched in Venice with a promise to clean up the area. But Ursua says the city doesnt live up to its commitment unless specific inquiries are made to the non-emergency local 311 phone number, and just last month, a homeless person defecated in her carport space for the third time in 12 months.

As part of its operations, the project promised extra sanitation for the area, security, and other emergency services. But a quick glance around reveals an area littered with homemade barbecue pits, makeshift propane setups, multiple-room encampments, an unusually high number of bicycles and parts, burnt trees, semi-naked people shuffling on the sidewalk, including a woman with Sharpie scribbles all over her leg.

Klaus Moeller, the co-owner of Venices Ben & Jerrys, told The Epoch Times he decided to close his ice cream shop after only three years due to the increased crime and homeless encampments. He said his stores sales were down 75 percent.

Its important to me that people understand this is not a local homeless problem, he said via email. This is a problem about out-of-state transients and drug dealers/users moving in because they can act without repercussions.

I mean, you have people dealing drugs in plain sight of tourists and chopping up bicycles right on the boardwalk. Where else in America does that happen?

A homeless person walks across 3rd Street in the Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Tents line Venice Beach in Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Trash litters the ground in the Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Both Ursua and Ulf said cleanups have stopped due to COVID regulations.

Its sort of this way for officials to put their hand up and just say, Theres nothing we can do. What the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] has said is to let people shelter in place and to not move homeless encampments, but that assumes that people are sheltering in place.  They are not, theyre moving around, Ursua said.

Gang members and drug deals are plentiful, according to Ulf, who said that many of the homeless are afraid.

Residents are also concerned with personal safety. According to Ursua, county efforts to defund the police have resulted in a $157 million budget reduction for the departmentand one of the items that was gone was the patrol car for the neighborhood.

Ursua said one of the leaders of the local defund-the-police movement was Councilmember Boninthe same 11th District representative who championed the local bridge housing unit.

Bonin didnt respond to The Epoch Times prior to deadline after repeated attempts to reach him and his office.

A homeless man looks in a trash can near the boardwalk at Venice Beach in Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Housing by the Numbers

The Venice shelter was built for $8 million as part of Los Angeless 2016 Proposition HHH ballot measure, which was approved by more than 77 percent of the voters and allocated $1.2 billion in general obligation bonds to subsidize 10,000 supportive housing units for the homeless.

To expedite the construction process, Garcetti and the City Council took advantage of a new state law and announced an emergency shelter crisis in 2018. The mayor also advocated for city, county, and state partners to increase funding for bridge housing projects.

But in a September 2020 audit report, City Controller Ron Galperin said that supportive housing slated to be built through Proposition HHH was more expensive and further behind schedule than the previous year. The average cost per unit of supportive housing built under HHH had increased to $531,000, up $10,000 per unit from 2019, with more than 28 percent costing over $600,000 eachand the report noted these figures are increasing as more units are developed.

Four years after the measure passed, only three buildings with 179 supportive housing units have been built. Meanwhile, the number of homeless in Los Angeles increased by 16 percent from 2019 to 2020, to an estimated 41,000 people, according to the latest Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count.

The audit report stated that 5,522 supportive units and 1,557 non-supportive units are still in the development pipelinebut noted that nearly 73 percent of these have not yet begun construction. More than half will not be available until 2023.

Lizotte, a homeless man who lives in a tent, is seen near Venice Beach, Los Angeles, on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Boots on the Ground

For some of the areas homeless, the situation is equally frustrating. Some people living in tents just a block away from the Pacific Sunset housing facility told The Epoch Times they have been trying to get into the program for months.

Lizotte, 49, lives in an encampment on nearby Rose Avenue. He said he was riding his motorcycle from Washington to Mexico on New Years Eve in 2019 when it started to get dark, so he decided to stop for the night and check out the Sunset Strip. Bad idea, Ive been here ever since, he said.

Lizotte and his girlfriend, Alexis, who lives in the same encampment, say they have been trying to get into supportive housing for a year through various programs. Lizotte said the two have been stopped by bureaucracy, but its unclear why he hasnt been helped by outreach workers or local officials.

They havent really done anything, and I dont expect them to, either. You gotta pull your own weight, Lizotte said.

A homeless man named Pat stands on Venice Beach in Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Another unsheltered Venice resident, Pat, is on the local Homeless Committee. He told The Epoch Times that a one-size-fits-all housing solution doesnt tackle the root problems, including substance abuse. When people want to get clean, he said, they need better resourcesnot housing shoved in their faces.

Theres got to be a way, a path forward from sleeping on the pavement to eventually having a place. But I think all of the energy to give that path forward should come from the person in that situation, he said, suggesting that some people would benefit from special rehab programs, akin to assisted living, that aim for a sense of accountability.

Pat agreed that the Venice situation has gotten worse during the pandemic.

There is a condition with COVID right now where there is less of a fight. There is less of an enforcement posture. So some of the things that were done, as far as you cant have your tent past a certain time, those arent really being enforced in a way that I think makes it more visible, he said.

As part of the Homeless Committee, Pat wants to have a conversation about how the government is spending the money earmarked for the homeless. I want to think about what has happened to the measure Triple-H money, right, because I understand like 40 percent of it has already been spent, he said.

Homeless advocate Brian Ulf in the Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

Alternative Housing

Venice-resident Ulf is a member of the Community-Police Advisory Board for the Los Angeles Police Department and chairman of SHARE! Housing, a public-private supportive housing project. He blames liberal spending policies for bringing the problem to his backyard.

Theres nothing in Hermosa, theres nothing in Manhattan, theres nothing in Palos Verdes, he said. How do all those municipalities get to not participate in the problem or become part of the solution?

Though empathetic, he blamed a lack of fiscal responsibility and the deep pockets of Los Angeles for magnifying the problem in Venice.

Ulf, whos worked in real estate for 40 years, said affordable housing is a big problembut not the only one. Big issues of addiction, big issues of mental health, big issues of just multiple things that happened to people, and the consequences of behavior are also to blame, he said.

When he became involved in some real estate projects on Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles, he started to realize the cost of the homeless problem. Ulf said the city is spending tens of millions to pay outreach workers to contact homeless people and get their information so they can be placed in housingbut even after multiple meetings and contracts, housing is not being built and the homeless arent being helped.

He cited a big drop-off in the trust factor between outreach workers and the homeless population as the result. As you talk to people and say youre going to house them and then they dont, you lose trust, and its become a big issue, he said.

If you buy in that this is a housing issue, theres not enough housingbut in the interim of when theres not housing, what are we doing for this population while theyre still out here on the street?

Then he narrowed the focus to the problem on Venice Beach. When you go to these encampments, you see filth and rot and festering and trashand all that, is that humane? he asked.

We have CDC rules that say they have to be there because we cant move them out of the tents because they have to quarantine. Most of these people throughout the day are not in their tent. But the CDC rules said theyre supposed to be. And thus, we cant come in and clean these off, he said.

COVID-19 has exacerbated the strain on those at risk for experiencing homelessness.

Theres a mixed population down here, he said. There are truly homeless people that have fallen in despair, from consequences or the economy. But COVID is gonna double this population  and no one wants to hear that the cost of this virus is going to increase homelessness.

Ulf is pushing to get his SHARES! Housing program on the radar as a more cost-effective alternative to other bridge housing facilities. His program offers counseling for mentally ill residents and more comprehensive wraparound services.

The SHARES! program pairs the homeless and fosters a sense of community, creating tasks for participants and providing health care services and specialized counseling for veterans with PTSD.

A woman hands items to a homeless person in the Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles on Jan. 27, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

A Concerned Citizen

Often when she goes for a drive, Los Angeles resident Kiki Pagador said she stops by the encampments on Rose Avenue to hand out water bottles, snacks, blankets, jackets, and hand warmers to the needy. On Jan. 27, she handed some bottles of water to Lizotte.

People think Im crazy just for going and passing stuff out, but these are peoplethat could be me, that could be you, and just imagine that youre having your hardest day and then you have nowhere to go home to, Pagador told The Epoch Times. When we look at homelessness, we talk about it as homelessness, but not as people experiencing hardship.

Most of them are mentally ill or dealing with drug addiction, she said. When Pagador visits Michelle, a homeless woman who hangs out by Casablanca restaurant on Lincoln Boulevard, sometimes shes mentally there, and sometimes shes totally not, she said.

Over the past two years, Pagador has made charity an individual habit, meeting new friends along the way. Its given her some insight into the challenges of life without a home.

I do have a friend who lives on the street who lived in her car for like six years, and only the last two years she finally got housingand shes 89. She used to be a mail delivery person in Venice, Pagador said.

If we can just see each other as people, all the politics and other  [stuff] starts to fall away.

WASHINGTON (AP)  Donald Trump took in the win at Mar-a-Lago, surrounded by friends and family. His lawyers celebrated with hugs and smiles. One joked, "Were going to Disney World!

Now acquitted in his second Senate impeachment trial, Trump is preparing for the next phase of his post-presidency life. Feeling emboldened by the trial's outcome, he is expected to reemerge from a self-imposed hibernation at his club in Palm Beach, Florida, and is eyeing ways to reassert his power.

But after being barred from Twitter, the former president lacks the social media bullhorn that fueled his political rise. And he's confronting a Republican Party deeply divided over the legacy of his jarring final days in office, culminating in the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol. Searing video images of the day played on loop during his impeachment trial, which ended Saturday.

Trump remains popular among the GOP base, but many Republicans in Washington have cooled to him. Never before have so many members of a president's party  seven GOP senators, in his case  voted for his removal in a Senate trial.

Some may work to counter efforts by Trump to support extreme candidates in next year's congressional primaries.

Undeterred, friends and allies expect Trump to resume friendly media interviews after weeks of silence. He has met with political aides to discuss efforts to help Republicans try to take control of the House and Senate in the 2022 midterms elections. He remains fixated on exacting revenge on Republicans who supported his impeachment or resisted his efforts to overturn the results of the November election won by Democrat Joe Biden.

I imagine youll probably be hearing a lot more from him in the coming days, senior adviser Jason Miller said.

In a statement after the vote, Trump offered few clues, but was defiant as he told supporters their movement has only just begun.

In the months ahead I have much to share with you, and I look forward to continuing our incredible journey together to achieve American greatness for all of our people, he said.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, who spoke with Trump on Saturday night, acknowledged that Trump is mad at some folks, but also ready to move on and rebuild the Republican Party and excited about 2022."

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., speaks to reporters on the fifth day of the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump, Saturday, Feb. 13, 2021 at the Capitol in Washington. (Stefani Reynolds/Pool via AP)

In their conversations, Graham has stressed to Trump, who has threatened to start his own party to punish disloyal Republicans, that the GOP needs him to win.

I said, Mr. President, this MAGA movement needs to continue. We need to unite the party. Trump-plus is the way back in 2022, Graham, R-S.C., told Fox News Sunday.

"My goal is to win in 2022 to stop the most radical agenda Ive seen coming out of the Democratic presidency of Joe Biden. We cant do that without Donald Trump, so hes ready to hit the trail and Im ready to work with him, Graham said.

Graham said Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who voted to acquit but then delivered a scalding denunciation of Trump, got a load off a chest, obviously. Graham said later in the interview: If you want to get something off your chest, fine, but I'm into winning."

At his Palm Beach club on Saturday night, Trump was in a joyous mood as he enjoyed dinner on a patio packed with people. After a mellow last several weeks, one member described a party atmosphere not felt since before the election.

Still, Trump isn't in the clear yet. No longer protected by a Justice Department opinion against the prosecution of sitting presidents, he now faces multiple, ongoing criminal investigations.

In Georgia, the Fulton County district attorney has opened a criminal investigation into attempts to influence the election, including Trump's call to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger demanding that the official find enough votes to overturn Bidens victory.

In New York, Attorney General Letitia James is investigating whether Trump and his company improperly inflated the value of his assets on annual financial statements in order to secure loans and obtain tax benefits. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. continues his own investigation, which has included grand jury testimony.

He didnt get away with anything  yet," McConnell, R-Ky., after the vote. We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation. And former presidents are not immune from being accountable by either one."

McConnell voted to acquit Trump on the grounds the trial was unconstitutional because he is no longer in office, but insisted, Theres no question  none  that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day."

Former President Donald Trump was acquitted Saturday in his Senate impeachment trial for inciting a mob to assault the U.S. Capitol in January. Seven Republicans voted with Democrats to convict him. (AP Graphic)

That sharp rebuke from his once-loyal defender underscores how dramatically Trump's stock has fallen in Washington since his first impeachment trial just over a year ago. But the desire to be rid of Trump is not shared across the country, where Republicans who have dared to admonish him have faced swift rebuke.

Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., was forced to defend her third-in-line leadership position after she voted in favor of impeachment. On Saturday, Louisianas Republican Party quickly censured Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of the seven Republicans senators who voted for Trump's conviction.

In an interview Sunday with ABCs This Week, Cassidy seemed at peace with his decision.

I think his force wanes, he said of Trump. The Republican Party is more than just one person. The Republican Party is about ideas.

But how long Trump retains his grip remains an open question, especially with a slew of likely 2024 candidates now trying to take the mantle.

Some, like Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, are advocating a clean break from Trump, who ended his presidency with a record low 34% approval rating according to Gallup polling. Others have stressed the need to keep his voters engaged, perhaps with candidates who trumpet the policies Trump championed, but with a less caustic style that might win back suburban voters.

In a sign of his enduring power, the Republican National Committee and other groups spent the trial sending fundraising appeals urging their followers to Stand with Trump and SAVE President Trumps Legacy, in the words of the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Oh, time is going to take care of that some way or another," said Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, told reporters Saturday. "But remember, in order to be a leader you got to have followers. So were gonna find out, whoever leads. But everybodys going to be involved. Were a big tent.

While the Senate failed to bar Trump from running again for office, many believe he has done too much damage to be a credible candidate himself in 2024.

Republican Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, who is retiring, said Trump's refusal to accept the results of the election had very badly damaged his reputation," eclipsing his accomplishments in office.

Instead, Toomey said, "hell be remembered throughout history as the president who resorted to nonlegal steps to try to hold on to power.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 01:22:20|Editor: huaxia

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RAMALLAH, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Palestine calls for international pressure on Israel to ensure holding the general elections in East Jerusalem, according to a senior official of the ruling Fatah party on Monday.

Jibril Rajoub, secretary-general of the Fatah Central Committee, said in a statement that the international pressure on Israel "is important to hold the general elections in the holy city as well as in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip."

Rajoub, who met in Ramallah with French Consul General in Jerusalem Rene Troccaz, said the role of France is important in monitoring the legislative elections scheduled to take place in Palestine on May 22.

Troccaz, according to the statement, welcomed the Palestinian efforts to hold the general elections, saying that France is ready to provide all the needed support for the democratic process in the Palestinian territories.

So far, Israel has not yet accepted or rejected holding the Palestinian general elections in East Jerusalem, although the Palestinians of the city participated in the legislative elections held in 2006.

In a decree issued in mid-January, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas announced that the 2021 general elections will include legislative elections on May 22, presidential elections on July 31, and the Palestinian National Council elections on Aug. 31.

The last Palestinian presidential elections were held in March 2005, and the legislative elections in January 2006.

The internal Palestinian division between Hamas and Fatah began in 2007 when Hamas forcibly took over the Gaza Strip from Fatah. Enditem
At a time when small businesses go wanting, why is COVID relief easily attained by Democrats' favorite radical activist groups?

Apparently, it's rolling out for them, based on political and even racial and political considerations. With Joe Biden attempting to ram a monster new COVID relief stimulus through in these days, it may be that Democrats are looking to make their radical activist allies into millionaires.

Jason Rantz of 770KTTH of Seattle wrote about what's going on, citing examples from his state and examples from others:

The Washington State Department of Commerce gave federal COVID relief tax dollars to nonprofits pursuing radical political agendas. Tax dollars even went to indirectly bail criminals out of jail. The selection process for funding was based on race. And some of the vetting seems influenced more by ideology than by need. The Department of Commerce, led by Lisa Brown, aimed to "distribute COVID relief funds equitably to the communities hardest hit by the pandemic." But to qualify to the Washington Equity Relief Fund, a group of "reviewers" made sure the nonprofits were "led by and serving Black, Indigenous and people of color."

Among others, the noxious Jew-hating NGO known as CAIR pocketed a free $50,000 from the taxpayers as its COVID relief measure. It had been reportedly rejected for budget reasons earlier, according to Rantz, but somehow, someone pulled some strings to ensure they got it, and too bad about the rules.

Another group, the Climate Justice Initiative, claimed that COVID led to canceled contracts and canceled fundraisers. You know, those big glittering charity balls full of ladies who lunch? Somehow, they got theirs ahead of restaurants and gyms and beauty parlors.

There were also these charmers:

Collective Justice, part of the Public Defenders Association, is a partisan, social justice group. It actively lobbies light-on-crime policies and is now being propped up by federal tax dollars. The nonprofit is currently asking supporters to back a Democrat-sponsored bill forcing courts to ignore the juvenile crimes of adult defendants in sentencing. It received $25,000 in federal tax dollars through the state.

And these, whose mission, according to Rantz, seems to be to "bail criminals who recommit." And these people seem to be fond of dishonesty, as Rantz reports:

The Bail Project was described as a "small startup program" by internal paperwork to justify the grant. But it is not a small startup. The Bail Project national organization had an operation budget of nearly $25 million in 2018 and $15 million in 2019, according to Charity Navigator.

This is outrageous. The groups claim that COVID has dried up their donations, but the problem may well be that the public doesn't want to donate to them anymore, given their bad causes. Instead of change their missions to something more in the public interest, they're getting federal bailouts, so they can keep pursuing bad causes that the public at large doesn't want to pay for.

It might actually be an artificial life support system for every radical cause under the sun.

For radicals, it's a pinata, because Joe Biden is trying to ram through another $1.9-trillion COVID relief spending bill. You might get $1,400 from it. But social justice warriors will get $50,000. It calls to mind President Obama's rewarding of this ACORN allies with 2009 stimulus funds. It's nothing but political back-scratching by Joe and his cronies, and like Venezuela's wealth, it will be lost to corruption. Why are these people getting money at all while legitimate businesses are being shut down and forced to wait for any such relief?

Image: Pixabay, Pixabay License.
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A terrorist who claimed asylum in Britain after he was sentenced to death in Egypt for a failed assassination plot is set to win the right to stay in this country.

Yasser Al-Sirri, 58, first claimed asylum in 1994 but was turned down and has taken the issue to court more than eight times at great cost to British taxpayers.

Al-Sirri, who was also charged in the US with assisting someone involved in the 1993 World Trade Centre bombing, has appeared in several tribunals since.

And last week a tribunal decided he was entitled to remain in the UK as a refugee.

Yasser Al-Sirri first claimed asylum in 1993 but was turned down and now is set to win the right to stay

Home Secretary Priti Patel was among those at the Appeal Court to contest the finding, but it ruled in the convicted terrorists favour.

The Sun reported Lord Justice Phillips said any failure to follow through must be capable of enforcement by the High Court.

He added: It is unclear to me why that should not be at the point when the Home Secretary first ignores such a determination.

The Home Office is carefully considering its next course of action.

Al-Sirri was a member of Egypt's Islamic Jihad in 1993. The group attempted to assassinate the then Egyptian prime minister using a car bomb outside a girls' school.

A 12-year-old girl was killed in the blast and he was sentenced to death in his absence despite his arguments he played no part.

Following the death of 9/11 mastermind Osama bin laden, Al-Sirri was quoted as saying: The al Qaeda leader met his God willingly but in an unplanned manner and he died an honourable death.

In 2003 he defended Taliban propaganda videos of an American vehicle exploding.

Former Tory MP Patrick Mercer described him as: 'Yasser Al-Sirri is a dangerous individual.
Rewat takes office as PPAO President

PHUKET: Rewat Areerob was inaugurated into his new position of President of the Phuket Provincial Administration Organisation (PPAO, or OrBorJor) today (Feb 15) with a special event at Phuket Provincial Hall marking his first day in office.

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By Eakkapop Thongtub

Monday 15 February 2021, 04:34PM

Rewat Areerob was welcomed to his new position as President of the Phuket Provincial Administration Organisation (PPAO, or OrBorJor) at a special event at Phuket Provincial Hall today (Feb 15). Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub

Rewat Areerob and his wife were congratulated by Phuket Governor Narong Woonciew (left) and his wife, Ms Wandee (2nd left), at a special event at Phuket Provincial Hall today (Feb 15). Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub

Phuket Governor Narong Woonciew welcomed Rewat Areerob to his new position as President of the Phuket Provincial Administration Organisation (PPAO, or OrBorJor) at a special event at Phuket Provincial Hall today (Feb 15). Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub

Mr Rewat gave his inaugural speech as PPAO President at a special evnet at Provincial Hall today (Feb 15). Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub

Rewat Areerob was welcomed to his new position as President of the Phuket Provincial Administration Organisation (PPAO, or OrBorJor) at a special event at Phuket Provincial Hall today (Feb 15). Photo: PR Phuket

Joining the event to welcome Mr Rewat back to the provincial halls of power were Phuket Governor Narong Woonciew, PPAO councilors, and a host of other officials.

Mr Rewat gave a speech outlining his promises and policies.

Mr Rewat explained that his announcement this morning was to inform all PPAO councilors about the policies and framework for administering the island.

All our policies came from the problems [that need fixing] and the needs of the local people, he said.

Mr Rewat also promised to do his best as PPAO President and to make the PPAO an organization with good service as priority.

We will work and brainstorm with other officials to improve peoples lives, he said.

I will work with the high moral principles and goals needed to develop the islands infrastructure, people, and the whole province. I will also adopt the Sufficiency Economy Philosophy to develop Phuket under the slogan Phuket is safe, and modern, with a creative economy, he said.

The PPAO will focus on nine main issues to develop the island, he said: local administration, tourism and economic development, public health, education, quality of life, infrastructure, information technology, natural resources and protection from corruption.

The nine issues are based on the policy framework under the Provincial Administrative Organization Act B.E. 2540 and other relevant laws, Mr Rewat explained.

All the works will be conducted with honesty and will be transparent in order to be easily examined, in order to provide the highest benefit to Phuket people, he said.

Governor Narong said, The Phuket Porvincial Government congratulates Mr Rewat and all councilors for being elected. We are ready to work with and support each other to develop the 18 subdistricts [on the island.

All officials will all work together and move forward to make this island great again, he said.

The Election Commission of Thailand (ECT) earlier this month dismissed a complaint filed against Mr Rewat and confirmed him to be the new president of the Phuket Provincial Administration Organisation (PPAO, or OrBorJor) after he secured victory in the PPAO election held on Dec 21.

The Phuket office of the Election Commission of Thailand (PEC) initially declared Mr Rewat the winner of the election, confirming that he had secured 83,144 votes.

Mr Rewat had bested second-placed contender Jirayut Songyot, who secured 50,914 votes, the PEC reported at the time.

Representing the Phuket Yatdai Party (Phuket Trustworthy Party), Mr Rewat is already nearly a household name across Phuket. He has already served the island as a Member of Parliament for the Democrat Party and throughout the COVID-19 crisis has served as assistant secretary to Deputy Public Health Minister Sathit Pitutecha.
Former Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) arrives for the inauguration of President Joe Biden at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 20, 2021. (Andrew Harnik/AP Photo)

Former GOP Sen. Flake in Touch With Biden Administration About Foreign Policy

A former Republican senator said hes been in touch with the Biden administration regarding bipartisanship in foreign policy positions, but indicates theres been no specific talks about ambassadorships.

All Ive said is I have an interest in making sure President Bidens foreign policy is bipartisan. We used to say that partisanship stops at the waters edge, former Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), a CNN political commentator, said during an appearance on the network on Feb. 14.

Pressed on what he meant by no specific talks, Flake said: I think theyre a ways from decisions like theyre talking about now, I mean they still have half the Cabinet to get through the Senate. But I certainly have an interest in, like I said, making sure that our foreign policy is bipartisan. But well leave that to the Biden administration to make those decisions.

Flake then confirmed that hes been in touch with the Biden administration.

Flake, 58, left office in January 2019, after deciding not to seek reelection in the 2018 midterms. He was succeeded by Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), who defeated Republican candidate Martha McSally.

Flake has been heavily critical of former President Donald Trump and endorsed Biden over Trump in the 2020 election.

Biden trumpeted his own experience reaching across the aisle during his decades in Congress and as vice president while campaigning; hes said hed consider appointing Republicans to key positions.

Former Sen. Doug Jones (D-Ala.), who lost his bid for reelection last year, said Biden will be looking at some of his Republican colleagues and others for different places in the administration.

President Joe Biden speaks during a meeting with a bipartisan group of governors and mayors on his COVID-19 relief plan, at the White House on Feb. 12, 2021. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

We dont see that in the Cabinet right now, but I think hes open to that, Jones said, while appearing on the same program.

Biden has seen some of his nominations stall because the Senate was consumed with the impeachment trial of Trump. The Senate acquitted Trump on Feb. 13, enabling Congress to turn to other matters.

Biden has so far picked no Republicans for key posts.

One report last week claimed that Biden was considering nominating Flake and Cindy McCain, the widow of the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and a fellow Republican from Arizona, for ambassadorships. McCain also endorsed Biden in 2020, and has criticized Trump.

Flake, McCain, and Arizona GOP Gov. Doug Ducey were censured last month by the Arizona Republican Party for their opposition to Trump.

Flake penned an op-ed for CNN on Feb. 15 that called for the Republican Party to move on from the former president.

There is no redeeming his behavior. And lets not continue this tragic charade by further humiliating and debasing ourselves, he wrote, referring to allegations against Trump relating to the Jan. 6 breach of the U.S. Capitol.

History always knows the truth. Lets learn the lessons of this experience, admit our failings, and move on. This is what our country deserves.
When Russians took to the streets three times in recent weeks to protest the jailing of Kremlin opponent Aleksei Navalny, police violently dispersed the crowds and detained more than 11,000 people. But the latest nationwide demonstration, on February 14, provoked hardly any clashes or arrests.

That was one of the goals of the Valentine's Day gatherings, which saw residents of numerous cities brave subzero temperatures to hold flashlights in the courtyards of their apartment buildings, silently expressing opposition to President Vladimir Putin's government while showing solidarity with Navalny and other activists swept up in the crackdown.

Absent were the chants -- "Putin is a thief!" and "Down with the tsar!" -- that echoed through town squares at rallies across Russia on January 23 and 31 and in Moscow and St. Petersburg on February 2. Police mostly stayed away despite advance warnings that formed part of a concerted state effort to keep people from taking part.

Thousands posted selfies online, boosting the hashtag # (#LoveIsStrongerThanFear) to the top of the Russian-language segments of Twitter and Instagram.

But the diffuse nature of the flashlight protest, and the difficulty of gauging how many joined them, provoked mixed responses as to what impact they could have in a country where many of the key opposition activists are under house arrest or in jail, with many wondering whether such demonstrations can maintain momentum in the months before parliamentary elections in which Navalny's allies hope to challenge the ruling United Russia party.

Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, seized on the lack of reliable turnout figures to suggest the low-key demonstrations had little impact. "Yes, some people walked around with flashlights," he told reporters on February 15. "Wonderful."

"It wasn't a failure, but you can't exactly call it a success either," Abbas Gallyamov, a former Kremlin speechwriter and now political analyst, told RFE/RL. "It seems not that many people came out."

Ivan Zhdanov, the director of Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation, suggested on February 15 that based on the thousands of social-media posts, tens of thousands of people had come out.

Vladislav Inozemtsev, an economist and political analyst who is a critic of Putin, said that if just a few residents from thousands of apartment buildings came out, the total numbers may have been similar to the 100,000 estimated at protests on January 23 and 31.

'No OMON, No Fear'

The opposition has had a tough time in recent weeks. Following a particularly violent crackdown on the recent protests, and Navalny's sentencing to more than 2 1/2 years in prison on February 2, activists issued a controversial statement calling for a halt to street rallies until the spring and urging supporters to dig in for a protracted political campaign that would culminate with the September elections to the State Duma, the lower house of parliament.

So it came as a surprise to some when Leonid Volkov, who runs Navalny's network of campaign offices across Russia, announced the flashlight demonstrations as an alternative show of anger against the state.

"Let's have social-media feeds filled with thousands of shining hearts from dozens of Russian cities," Volkov wrote on Facebook on February 9. "No OMON [riot police], no fear."

The unorthodox protest was initiated by Navalny's team as a way of circumventing the authorities' readiness to deploy violence and overcoming the fear it instilled. It was also a way of keeping up momentum in the face of the authorities' campaign to break it through force, through TV propaganda, and by organizing counter-rallies featuring participants professing their ostensible respect and admiration for Putin.

Inozemtsev said that the Valentine's Day initiative had greater symbolic appeal than large street protests and that it reached more people because it took place in neighborhoods across cities, including on their outskirts, not just in the center.

"The number of people who saw what was taking place was immeasurably greater than the number that directly observed the protests on recent weekends," he wrote on Facebook. "In other words, as a symbolic act the initiative turned out to be very successful."

Many participants voiced the same sentiment, revealing hopes that despite its more understated nature, the series of flashlight demonstrations would send a message that would resonate across the country and recruit even more activists to the protest cause.

"I went out alone. It was predictable, I expected nothing else," Yekaterina Khramtsova, an activist in the Urals city of Chelyabinsk, wrote on Twitter. "And if just one person walked past or looked out of their window and paused to think, then all this wasnt in vain."
New mother Princess Eugenie no doubt has her hands full with her baby son, but royal fans have rushed to her defence on social media claiming that the news of Meghan Markle's pregnancy has stolen her thunder for the second time.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who currently reside in California, announced yesterday that they were expecting their second child, five days after Princess Eugenie, 30 and Jack Brooksbank, 34, welcomed a baby boy on Tuesday, and only two days after Eugenie was discharged from hospital.

Fans on Twitter said that Harry and Meghan should have waited longer to break the news of their pregnancy, in order to let Eugenie have her moment and release the first images of her newborn and his name first.

They likened the awkward timing to how Harry and Meghan announced their first pregnancy with their son Archie to the rest of the royal family during Eugenie's wedding in October 2018 - days before the official Buckingham Palace announcement.

'It did not go down particularly well with Eugenie, who, a source said, told friends she felt the couple should have waited to share the news,' Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand reported in the biography Finding Freedom.

Royal fans have accused Prince Harry and Meghan Markle to have once again stolen Princess Eugenie's thunder by announcing their second pregnancies days after she's given birth to her son, after announcing their first pregnancy to family at her wedding on October 12 2018 (pictured: Eugenie and her wedding day with Jack Brooksbank)

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, 36 and 39, who currently reside in California with their son Archie, 20 months, have announced yesterday they are expecting a second child and shared a beautiful black and white picture showing Meghan's baby bump in the announcement

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex told close family members the news at the nuptials because it was the last time they saw senior royals before jetting off to Australia for the start of their royal tour.

Just four days later, on the eve of their arrival in Sydney, Meghan and Harry announced that they were expecting. At the time Meghan was just 12 weeks pregnant, but the couple chose to announce early rather than to have the entire tour overshadowed by pregnancy rumours, which were already swirling.

The incident was also branded a 'huge social gaffe; by Dylan Howard and Andy Tillett, in their explosive book Royals At War, which was published in June 2020.

Eugenie, who tied the knot with Jack on October 12 2018 was reportedly furious with her cousin after he and Meghan announced to family and friends present at the wedding they were expecting their first child.

'Meghan put her foot in it when she decided that it would be the ideal moment to announce that she and Harry were expecting their first child,' the pair wrote.

'This was a huge social gaffe, even if you were not a royal  stealing the limelight from Eugenie, who was furious, as was her mother, Sarah.' The authors claim the announcement left Prince Harry, who is currently living in LA with his wife and son, feeling 'embarrassed'.

The pregnancy was announced to the public on 15 October 2018, which coincided with the 59th birthday of Eugenie's mother Sarah Ferguson on the eve of Prince Harry and Meghan's tour of Australia and New Zealand.

In 2018, Harry and Meghan reportedly infuriated Eugenie and her mother Sarah Ferguson by announcing their first pregnancy at her wedding in a 'huge social gaffe' (pictured attending Eugenie's ceremony)

Now fans say the timing of the couple's latest announcement was poor form, even if unintentional.

'They had to announce it when Eugenie just gave birth. It looks like something against her. They did the same at their wedding,' one fan wrote.

'So happy for the couple. But again, she couldn't give Eugenie a week before stealing her thunder. First their wedding and now this,' another said.

The date of Harry and Meghan's latest announcement seemed to be an intentional nod to Princess Diana, whose second pregnancy with Prince Harry was announced by Buckingham Palace on February 13 1984, and made front page news around the country the next day on Valentine's Day.

A spokesperson for Meghan, 39, and Harry, 36, said: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother.

'The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child,' they went on.

The couple accompanied the announcement with an intimate black and white picture taken remotely by their friend and photographer Missan Harriman.

While some fans said the awkward timing of Harry and Meghan's announcement was unintentional, others said the couple at least had waited a few days after Eugenie gave birth to make their announcement

In the candid snap, Harry is resting his hand on Meghan's head as she lay in his lap underneath a tree.

While congratulating the couple for their good news, royal fans could not help notice that their announcement was extremely close to the birth of Princess's Eugenie's son, which happened Tuesday.

The Queen's granddaughter had husband Jack Brooksbank at her side at The Portland Hospital in central London where their son - the Queen's ninth great grandchild - was delivered at 8.55am.

The couple broke with tradition by immediately sharing a black and white photo to Eugenie's Instagram of their baby boy on the day, showing them holding his tiny hand.

Following the announcement, Eugenie and Jack were spotted leaving the hospital on Saturday to take their little bundle of joy home.

Fans noted the fact Harry and Meghan did not wait a full week to come out with their own news was reminiscent of the time they announced their first pregnancy at Eugenie's wedding in 2018.

Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank announced she had delivered a son in the morning of Tuesday 9 February and shared a picture of their hands holding the baby's fingers on Instagram

New mum Eugenie was discharged from hospital on Friday to take her son home to Frogmore Cottage

'Megs, I know it probably wasn't intentional, but strong women don't overshadow each other,' they added.

'It's because Meg & Harry make a point of dropping news when Harry's family does. The moment we heard Eugenie had a baby we knew it would be hours before Meg announced a pregnancy,' another claimed,

'At least this time she didn't do it on the exact day like she did on Eugenie's wedding day,' they added.

'However happy for them, I can't help noticing that they did it again: announcing the first baby at Eugenie's wedding and now, the second one after she just gave birth,' one wrote.
EV

According to a report from the Financial Times , Nissan was one of the companies Apple reached out to, but the talks ended abruptly due to divisions over branding.Interestingly, earlier this month, Nissans bosses expressed the companys willingness to manufacture electric vehicles for companies in the tech sector, suggesting the Japanese automaker could end up working with Apple. But now it seems Nissan wants to do the whole thing on its own terms that would prevent its brand from becoming just a hardware supplier for other industry giants.Ashwani Gupta, Nissans chief operating officer, told the cited source the company isnt currently holding any talks with Apple over the production of an Apple Car. He explained that in the long term, the Japanese brand is all about doing business as an automaker.We have our own customer satisfaction, which comes by car. No way we are going to change the way we make cars, Gupta was quoted as saying. The way we design, the way we develop, and the way we manufacture is going to be as an automotive manufacturer, as Nissan.We have to check who has got the best competency to catch what the customer is thinking. For this, we can do the partnership, but that is to adapt their services to our product, not vice versa.Apple is also believed to be considering other companies for a potentialmanufacturing partnership, including BMW and Magna. Some analysts see Renault as the best way to go given its production capacity, though at this point, its not known if the Cupertino-based giant is discussing with the French firm or not.
Chamoli: Over 18 bodies have been recovered by the State Disaster Response Force in the last 24 hours in Uttarakhands Chamoli.

SDRF discovered eighteen new bodies taking the total death toll to 56 on Monday (February 15), while the rescue teams are still trying to reach more than 30 people who are trapped inside a tunnel near Tapovan after a flash flood.

Six out of the eighteen new bodies were discovered from the tunnel at the disaster-hit Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel project site in Chamoli district and one each was found in Maithana and Srinagar tunnel. Additionally officials fear for the live of 150 missing. Over 30 bodies have been identified.

District magistrate said, they (rescue teams) continue to dredge out the sludge from the tunnel, making slow progress. We must always try to be hopeful when the circumstances are adverse."

Families of some of the missing people continue their vigil near the tunnel, plucking up the courage to take a look every time a body is brought out. But many are beginning now to return to their homes, reported PTI.

The operation was temporarily halted following a rise in the level of water in the Rishiganga River.

Meanwhile, the Uttarakhand government had on Friday (February 12) sounded an alert after satellite images indicated the formation of a lake in the catchment area of the turbulent river.

Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat added that the authorities are closely observing the developments and that there is no need to panic.

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Rather than making a consolidated market entrance as an outlier, our incremental phased approach is designed to ensure that our products are the market favourite across every geography in which we operate," said co-chief executive, Antonio Russo

( ) said it is confident its careful approach to distribution would ultimately lead to better sell-through rates as it provided an update on the progress of its rollout of CBD products on both sides of the Atlantic.

Its prepare for lift-off plan will see its Chill brand of tobacco alternatives start taking prime positions on dedicated shelf space in 10,000 stores that are part of the Asian American Trading Associations Councils (AATAC) network.

Initial product shipments are anticipated in the coming weeks, with the programme's early requirements set to be satisfied with existing inventory and available funds, investors were told.

With initial test markets set to span from New York to California, these key strategic geographies will inform our wider strategy, enhance brand recognition, and allow us to execute a mass market rollout that is repeatable and scalable.

Zoetic co-chief executive, Antonio Russo, described it as an exciting time for the group.

We are confident that our careful approach to distribution will ultimately yield better sell-through rates and higher revenues, all whilst significantly boosting brand awareness, he went on.

Rather than making a consolidated market entrance as an outlier, our incremental phased approach is designed to ensure that our products are the market favourite across every geography in which we operate.

We are enthusiastic about the growing popularity of our lines and look forward to seeing this trajectory continue in the coming months.

Zoetic said its beta-store programme with Ox Distributing is now complete.

Products were sold in convenience stores that were owned by the Schrader Family. The results were described as extremely encouraging as Chill became the chain's number-one selling CBD line.

The Schrader Family has now divested its interest in the convenience store chain and has also fully executed their previous financial commitment.

The group is very thankful for their continued support and guidance, and now looks to a promising future as the Chill brand continues to penetrate the wider American market with the benefit of valuable guidance from the Ox Distributing team, Zoetic added.

In the same announcement, investors were told legal and regulatory work is underway for entry into the European market.

In this regard a novel foods dossier has been submitted to the UKs Food Standards Agency, while EU compliance work is also taking place.

The CBD space is one of the most dynamic current business sectors, both in terms of activities and regulations, Zoetic said.

As evidenced by our FSA Novel Foods application, Zoetic seeks to be at the forefront of current best-practice. This requires frequent input from our legal advisers and regular changes to our website and marketing material.

In a wide-ranging update, the company said Paul Ferguson, formerly vice president for corporate finance, has been appointed chief financial officer.

Investors were also told: An executive search programme has also commenced, as the group targets talented independent board directors.

Interviews for Zoetic board positions have begun, and the group looks forward to providing an update on this front in the coming months.
New York Democrats are calling for Governor Cuomo to be subpoenaed and investigated over his administrations coverup of its dismal handling of nursing home coronavirus deaths.

Last week, reports broke that a top aide to Governor Cuomo admitted that the administration covered up the true data on nursing home deaths from the coronavirus in New York state in order to hide the magnitude of the issue from federal authorities.

Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa apologized to state Democratic lawmakers during a recent video conference call, saying we froze out of fear that the real nursing home death numbers would be used against us by federal prosecutors, the New York Post reported.

Representative Antonio Delgado, a Democrat representing parts of the Hudson Valley in the House, called Sunday for a probe into Cuomos handling of the states data on coronavirus nursing home deaths.

Politics should never come before peoples lives. The Secretary to the Governors remarks are beyond troubling and warrant a full investigation, Delgado wrote in a tweet. Thousands of New Yorkers lost family in nursing homes to COVID-19, a pain made worse by the inability to comfort their loved ones in their final hours. They deserve answers and accountability.

On Friday, New York State Senator Jessica Ramos, a Democrat representing east Queens, called for Cuomo and his administration to be subpoenaed for all of the pertinent information relating to nursing home coronavirus deaths along with a full investigation.

At a time when we need New Yorkers to trust their elected officials the most, the Governor and his administration knowingly chose to lie and play politics with New Yorkers lives, Ramos said in a statement. This news is another slap in the face to the many New Yorkers still grieving the loss of their loved ones across our state.

Ramos also joined a growing chorus of lawmakers calling for Governor Cuomo to be stripped of the emergency powers granted to him last year at the beginning of the pandemic.

Story continues

His emergency powers must be rescinded, he and his administration must be subpoenaed for all of the pertinent information, and a full investigation must result in justice for our grieving families, Ramos said in her statement.

It has become increasingly clear that the Governor has allowed his ego and his donor base to dictate the response to this pandemic, leaving the most vulnerable in our communities at risk and dismissing their cries for relief at every turn, she said.

The state had been tabulating the deaths of nursing home residents who died after being transported to the hospital as hospital deaths, making it difficult to ascertain the actual number of residents who died.

Meanwhile, one of Cuomos policies signed into law on March 25 and rescinded in May required nursing homes to accept coronavirus-positive patients after they were discharged from hospitals, causing the virus to spread like wildfire among elderly nursing home residents. The policy received fierce backlash and has dogged his administration since the early days of the pandemic.

The astonishing admission from the governors top aide of a coverup surrounding the nursing home death toll immediately sparked bipartisan calls for an investigation and for Cuomos prosecution.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who often spars with Cuomo on local issues, said he agrees 100 percent with stripping Cuomo of emergency powers.

More from National Review
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15) Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles on Monday allayed concerns over the absence of signed supply agreements with COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers, saying the term sheets the Philippines has previously entered into mean that the doses are already reserved for the country.

The term sheets according to Secretary (Carlito) Galvez is already a commitment, Nograles, also the co-chair of the Inter-Agency Task Force, told CNN Philippines The Source. So its not really something to worry about because the term sheet already commits the number of doses na magkakaroon tayo dito sa Pilipinas (that well have here in the Philippines).

Its like already reserved to the Philippines based on those term sheets and then the supply agreement would come forthwith, he stressed.

Galvez in previous interviews emphasized that finalizing a supply agreement is a complicated process, as such contract would include specific details including payment schemes and delivery dates.

He clarified that due to the limited vaccine supply globally, manufacturers have not been able to provide specific dates of arrival thus preventing them from entering into supply agreements with the Philippine government.

Nograles, for his part, also stressed that the vaccines would have to earn nod of the countrys Food and Drug Administration.

Theres a term sheet agreement [on] how many vaccine doses do you need And it passes through conditions like the FDA approval ng kanilang (of their) EUA, and thats where the ball gets running in terms of signing the supply agreement, he said.
At least three former San Antonio federal prosecutors are looking to fill the post of the top federal law enforcer for a huge swath of Central and West Texas.

Jackson Walker partner Erica Benites Giese, Davis & Santos partner Jay Hulings and solo practitioner Michael McCrum each want the job of U.S. attorney for the San Antonio-based Western District of Texas.

Others vying for the post include Justin Nelson, an Austin lawyer who lost to Ken Paxton in the 2018 race for Texas attorney general, and former long-time El Paso District Attorney Jaime Esparza.

Immigration Judge Walter Bud Paulissen also has surfaced as a possible candidate. He is a former San Antonio federal prosecutor, as well.

McCrum, 63, confirmed his interest but declined to say much.

All I can say is Ive spoken with numerous congressmen about my interest, McCrum said.

Both Giese, 46, and Hulings, 45, declined to comment, and Paulissen, 64, didnt respond to a request for comment.

It will be up to President Joe Biden to nominate a candidate  with input from Texas Republican Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, both of whom serve on the Senate Judiciary Committee. A nominee must be confirmed by the full Senate.

Its been about a quarter century since a lawyer hailing from San Antonio was sworn in as U.S. attorney in the Western District of Texas. Bill Blagg assumed the post in 1996 following his nomination by President Bill Clinton, a Democrat. Blagg resigned in 2001 after Republican George W. Bush was elected president.

Barack Obama was the last Democratic president to nominate a U.S. attorney for the Western District. He chose Robert Pitman, who was a U.S. magistrate judge in Austin, in 2014.

John Bash was the most recent U.S. attorney for the region nominated by a president. Bash, who worked in Washington, D.C., was nominated in Sept. 2017 by President Donald Trump, following recommendations from Cornyn and Cruz. Bash stepped down in October to pursue work in the private sector.

Then-U.S. Attorney General William Barr appointed Gregg Sofer to replace Bash. Sofers appointment was for 120 days, a term that expired this month. The U.S. District Court then appointed Ashley Chapman Hoff as the top law enforcement officer for the region. Hoff, who is based in Austin, had been the first assistant U.S. attorney since 2018.

Any interest by USA Hoff in retaining the position on a permanent basis would be sheer speculation at this point, Daryl Fields, spokesman for the U.S. attorneys office, said in an email.

The U.S. attorneys office employs more than 300 people, including more than 150 lawyers. It has seven offices, including San Antonio, and covers 68 counties.

The offices priorities are national security, violent crime and transnational organized crime, Fields said. Hoff also plans to focus on civil rights, which includes human trafficking offenses and hate crimes.

Democratic U.S. Reps. Joaquin Castro of San Antonio, Lloyd Doggett of Austin and Veronica Escobar of El Paso collectively recommended Hulings, Nelson and Esparza for the post.

Each bring unique qualifications to the important job of United States Attorney, who may contribute significantly regarding voting rights, environmental law enforcement, and the prosecution of official corruption, and organized crime, among other important responsibilities, Doggett said. I fully support each of them.

Candidates also can get their names in front of the White House other ways, including through the backing of groups and activists.

The White House will seek Cornyn and Cruzs input on the candidates its presented. The senators will then forward the names to the Federal Judicial Evaluation Committee to review the applications, vet the candidates and interview them. It will then rank them, said San Antonio attorney and committee Chairman David Prichard.

The committee, comprised of about 25 to 30 members in the legal field, also screen federal judicial candidates and contenders from Texas to serve on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The committees ranking of the candidates for U.S. attorney will be presented to Cornyn and Cruz. They then may interview some of the candidates, confer and make a recommendation to the White House. The president then makes a nomination.

The process can take about five months to complete, Prichard said.

The San Antonio candidates have each been assistant U.S. attorneys.

Giese, an Eagle Pass native, served as a federal prosecutor for 13 years. She was chief of the Western Districts financial litigation unit, as well as chief of the San Antonio and Del Rio divisions. She is now with Jackson Walkers white-collar and government investigations section.

Hulings served as a federal prosecutor for about seven years in Del Rio and San Antonio, where he led national security, public corruption, complex fraud and organized crime investigations and prosecutions, according to an online bio. He previously serves as counsel to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

Hulings, a law school classmate of Joaquin and Julian Castro, finished in fourth place in the 23rd Congressional District Democratic primary in 2018. His practice now includes general litigation and white-collar defense.

McCrum was an assistant U.S. attorney for 11 years. Eight of those were in supervisory roles, including as head of the major crimes unit from 1996 to 2000. He was the leading candidate to become U.S. attorney more than decade ago but withdrew his name from consideration because of delays in the nomination process.

McCrum has represented some high-profile defendants, including former state Sen. Carlos Uresti and oil and gas businessman Brian Alfaro. McCrum is defending attorney for Martin Phipps, who was arrested Monday on suspicion of telephone harassment, a Class B misdemeanor.

pdanner@express-news.net
A string of recent attacks on elderly Asian Americans has led to an uproar in the Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) community.

Why it matters: Violence and discrimination against Asian Americans appears to have risen dramatically since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, leaving families nervous and afraid even in many of Americas most diverse cities.

Driving the news: Just within the past two weeks, a 61-year-old Filipino man was slashed across the face in New York City; an 84-year-old Thai immigrant died after he was slammed into the ground in San Francisco; and a 91-year-old man was shoved to the ground in Oakland, California's Chinatown.

The coronavirus appears to have triggered a spike in anti-AAPI violence, and experts say former President Trumps rhetoric  referring to COVID-19 as the China virus  only made matters worse.

Violence against Asian Americans increased "following the identification of the coronavirus in China," LAPD Deputy Chief Kris Pitcher told LAist.

By the numbers: Anti-AAPI hate incidents numbered around 200 in 2019, per FBI data. National data arent available yet for 2020, but there are clear signs that those numbers rose.

New York City, home to Americas largest AAPI population, reported just one incident of anti-AAPI violence in all of 2019, which jumped to 20 incidents in just the first half of 2020, Queens Chronicle reports.

Los Angeles reported 14 such incidents in the first half of last year, up from seven in the entire year before.

Stop AAPI Hate, a group formed shortly after the start of the pandemic, collected over 2,800 self-reported incidents of racism targeting Asian Americans across the U.S. between March and December of 2020.

7.3% of the incidents involved people older than 60.

Data: Stop AAPI Hate; Chart: Axios Visuals

Between the lines: Assaults and homicides against people 60 and older have surged in recent years, and elderly Asian Americans are particularly vulnerable.

60% of Asian and Pacific Islanders over 65 have limited English proficiency, according to the Asian Pacific Institute on Gender-Based Violence  which makes them less able to defend themselves and less likely to report a hate crime.

What were watching: Within days of taking office, President Biden signed an executive order directing an examination of anti-Asian discrimination.

When asked about the recent assaults at a White House briefing, Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Biden would "support additional action on the local level or the federal level," but neither the White House nor the Justice Department offered specifics.

The bottom line: These "acts of cowardice ... show where we stand as a society," said Joon Bang, president and CEO of the National Asian Pacific Center on Aging.

Go deeper: Taking coronavirus fears too far
Opinion Article

15 February 2021

Each bottle of Champagne always represents a special occasion and should be treated as such: these are wines with unique characteristics which require a few simple measures to be enjoyed in their entirety. Hence, to taste bubbles at their best, the Laurent-Perrier EHL Alliance Ambassadors (Thierry and Alice) explain how to conduct perfect champagne tasting in three easy steps.

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The Maison Laurent-Perrier was founded in 1812 and is now one of the 23 founding members of the EHL Alliance. Please read this article with a glass of Champagne in your hand to practice your tasting skills!

Sparkling wines have the particularity of appealing to all our senses: hearing, sight, smell, taste and even touch on the palate and tongue. It is not surprising that, under these conditions, Champagne wines have naturally become ideal for celebrations. All the senses can be solicited to understand the world of these wines and appreciate their characteristics: nuances of colour, subtlety of aromas and degrees of effervescence. The champagnes express themselves and invite you to taste them, although more than "a tasting", we prefer referring to the process as an authentic "sensory experience".

Step 1. Look at what is in the glass

After popping the bottle and pouring the Champagne, we should wait a moment before tasting it and indulge in admiring the wine robe (the wine's "appearance").

The primary consideration relates to the intensity of the colour which can vary from pale, or light to deep. Hue is a notation of colour. A distinction is made between the hue of the wine's body and that of its reflection, which can be seen on the fringe at the rim of the glass. Wines can take several shades: passing through green-yellow, lemon, straw, gold, buttercup, honey for a white Champagne. For Rose, the range is extensive too, going from peony to orange through to raspberry, strawberry and salmon (Laurent-Perrier Cuvee Rose & Alexandra Rose Millesime), for example. The colour of a Blanc de Blancs Champagne generally has a pale straw colour. Other characteristics that can be described are the brilliance and transparency of the wine, which gives an idea of the age and the making process.

Laurent-Perrier Cuvee Rose & Alexandra Rose Millesime  Photo: EHL

Brilliance is the wine's ability to reflect light and can be described as clean, or luminous. Transparency, on the other hand, appreciates the transmission of light by the wine. It will then be qualified as transparent, limpid or crystalline.

In addition to non-sparkling wines, we can consider the perlage (foam and bubbles). The gas release depends on several factors. First of all, the pressure of the gas in the wine, which depends on its elaboration but also on the temperature of service. The colder a wine is, the more carbon dioxide it can dissolve. Secondly, its constitution: the richness in foaming agents will favour the abundance and stability of the foam. The observation of foam can also be impacted by the glass shape (tulip, flute or coupe), the surface condition of the glass (smooth or scratched) and its cleanliness.

Depending on the time endurance, different words can be used to describe the moss, such as fine, sustained, regular or persistent. When the primary foam from pouring has disappeared, we can still observe a thin "string" of bubbles, reminiscent of a pearl necklace in contact with the glass. At the same time, the bubbles of the wine can be described according to their size and persistency. These two elements allow drawing a preliminary conclusion about the quality of the Champagne: typically, the finer and the more persistent the bubbles, the more qualitative the wine.

Step 2. Appreciate the aromas

First of all, our advice on how to appreciate Champagne aromas is not to swirl the wine. Indeed, the agitation of the glass only exacerbates the release of CO present in sparkling wines. The aromas present in Champagnes can be classified as primary and secondary aromas in an even clearer way than for other wines. The grape varieties used in the production process impose the varietal aromas. For example, Laurent-Perrier uses a majority of Chardonnay grapes to create its wines. This grape brings some fresh aromas of lime blossom, white fruit and flowers, citrus fruits, mint, verbena and fresh grass. When it gets older, it takes on notes of dried fruit, such as hazelnut, ripe apple and honey. On the contrary, Pinot Noir, which constitutes 100% of Laurent-Perrier Cuvee Rose carries aromas such as cherry, red fruits, peony, violet, spices and notes of apricot.

To know more about a wine, we can then think about the secondary and tertiary aromas, which indicate the wine production methods. Notably, Champagnes are sparkling wines produced applying a traditional method, marked by the autolysis of the yeasts during the second fermentation. This adds some additional aromas such as toasted bread, brioche, caramel or fresh butter. Depending on the blends, ages and origins, the range of fragrances is infinite, making each Champagne unique. Hence, during the second stage of the tasting, let yourself be invested by the aromas in order to fully appreciate the exclusivity of each Champagne and the distinctive style of each Maison.

Step 3. Taste it!

Finally, it is the moment to taste the wine, the most sought-after part after all the preliminary analysis. Firstly, we should linger on the abundance and finesse of the bubbles in the mouth. They can be invasive or discreet, aggressive or creamy.

Afterwards, similarly to the olfactory examination, we reconsider all the aromas present in the wine and highlight the ones that strengthen thanks to the actual tasting. A wine made from Blanc de Blancs will have a light, airy, delicate structure. If Pinot Noir is used in its composition, the wine will take on body, structure and richness. Rose champagne will have even more body and apparent tannins. As the wine ages, it gains additional structure and complexity. In general, this tasting part assesses the balance of the Champagne between its acidity, softness, and tannins (present in black grapes). These perceptions together help to create an idea of the body of the wine.

Laurent Perrier Blanc de Blancs  Photo: EHL

The acidity should be refreshing and sustain the wine, but not too sharp. It can be balanced from the sweet sensation given by the sugar present in the Champagne. The sweetness of a Champagne is impacted by the intervention of the winemaker, who adds the liqueur de dosage or liqueur d'expedition. Depending on the quantity added, we are able to recognize and categorize the Champagne in Brut Nature (no liqueur), Extra Brut, Brut, Extra Dry, Sec, Demi-sec or Doux. For how long you were able to feel the aromas on the palate? The sensation of the wine's evanescence can be defined as "persistency", which is a hallmark of long-lasting Champagnes.

We are at the end of this article, and probably of your glass of Champagne. We hope that with this brief guide you will be able to fully appreciate sparkling wines and their characteristics from now on.

Want to learn more about Champagne?

Discover Laurent-Perriers food pairings.
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Ahead of the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Suvendu Adhikari while hitting out at the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) said that it wants to turn the state into Bangladesh by importing "Jai Bangla" slogan. While speaking to media in Siliguri subdivision of Darjeeling district, the BJP leader asserted that the saffron party will come to power in West Bengal with a huge majority.

READ | Toolkit Case: BJP MP Likens 21-yr Old Disha Ravi To Ajmal Kasab, Says 'No One Above Law'

Suvendu Adhikari said, "No matter what they (TMC) do, people of West Bengal have decided to vote for double engine government. BJP will come to power with a huge majority. Modi Ji and Amit Shah Ji had given a slogan -- '2019 me half, 2021 me saaf' and that is going to happen."

BJP's Suvendu Adhikar hit out at TMC

Stating that "Khela hobe" slogan was coined by Narayanganj (in Bangladesh) MP Shamim Osman 4 years ago, Adhikari said that TMC wants to turn Bengal into Bangladesh and this is the reason why it has imported "Jai Bangla" slogan. He said, "Our slogan is -- ' Bharat Mata Ki Jai' and 'Jai Shri Ram." Meanwhile, Trinamool Congress workers took out 'Shanhati Rally' from Palta to Shyamnagar in the North 24 Parganas district on Sunday.

READ | Suvendu Adhikari Condemns Deadly Attack On BJP Leader; Says It 'reveals TMC's Desperation'

Earlier on February 11, Union Home Minister Amit Shah targeted Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and said that till the elections will end, "Didi will chant Jai Shri Ram". This came after Mamata Banerjee on January 23 had not delivered his speech in protest" at an event at Victoria Memorial to mark the 125th anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose after "Jai Shri Ram" slogans were raised when she was invited to speak. She had said "government programme should have some dignity" and it "is not fair to insult somebody whom you have invited."

READ | BJP Issues Whip, Seeks Support On A 'very Important Legislative Business' In Lok Sabha

West Bengal assembly elections

Meanwhile, the BJP has claimed it will win 200 seats in the elections, while the TMC, via poll strategist Prashant Kishor, has contended that the saffron party won't cross 99. West Bengal assembly with 294 seats will go to polls in April-May 2021, Trinamool holds 222 seats. BJP has made major inroads in the state in the Lok Sabha elections winning 18 seats and establishing itself as the major opposition force in the state. Mamata Banerjee has announced that she will contest polls from Nandigram, the place that paved way for her rule in the state, and her ex-aide Suvendu Adhikari - who is now in BJP - has vowed to defeat her.

READ | West Bengal: BJP MP Jagannath Sarkar's Car Attacked; Leader Suspects TMC Conspiracy
Rolls-Royce has picked a former partner at Deloitte to be its finance boss as it tries to rebound from the Covid crisis.

Panos Kakoullis, 53, will take over from Stephen Daintith at the engineer in early May. Kakoullis is a surprising pick for the job as he has never held a role at a publicly-listed company.

But he spent 20 years at Big Four accountant Deloitte, rising to the head of the firms global audit operations and advising FTSE 100 groups such as Vodafone and Tesco.

Rolls-Royce is in the process of an overhaul that includes cutting 9,000 jobs from its 52,000-strong pre-pandemic workforce, many of which are from the same arm that makes jet engines

He will now be tasked with steering a sweeping turnaround at Rolls during what chief executive Warren East has described as the firms darkest hour since it went bust in the 1970s.

Kakoulliss appointment comes amid speculation that, despite a mammoth restructuring, Rolls could still require state intervention or could even merge with Airbus. Ministers have considered the possibility of a tie-up with the European plane maker, according to the Sunday Times.

Airbus had weighed up the possibility of merging with its supplier long before the pandemic, according to reports, but the complexity of such a deal was among the reasons the idea was ditched.

Rolls in the process of a huge overhaul that includes cutting 9,000 jobs from its 52,000-strong pre-pandemic workforce, many of which are from the same arm that makes jet engines, and selling off 2billion of businesses.

Turnover and profits have been battered by the slump in air travel because it gets paid for the number of hours its engines fly.

Rolls dire financial position, huge debts and the cuts it has made to its commercial aviation division have led analysts to question will be able to last as a stand-alone company.

Nick Cunningham, analyst at equity research firm Agency Partners, said: The issue is, has Rolls-Royce really got the resources to remain an independent and successful entity given all the challenges it faces?

By cutting the size of the jet engine unit by a third, analysts have also questioned how quickly it will be able to ramp up engine production once orders for planes start rising.

Although Rolls also works in industries such as nuclear power and defence, around half its revenue usually comes from the commercial aviation arm.
Teagasc yield assessments found all fertilisers  CAN, urea and protected urea  "performed the same". Photo: Roger Jones

Results from Teagascs latest trials on protected urea application to grasslands have found no evidence of milk residue issues, it has been confirmed.

In a research update last week, Dr Patrick Forristal  research officer in soil science agronomy at Teagasc Johnston Castle  also confirmed that protected urea is reliable for grazing yields, has lower greenhouse gas emissions than CAN and lower ammonia emissions than conventional urea.

As such, protected urea  which is conventional urea coated with urease inhibitor to reduce ammonia and nitrous oxide emissions  was said to tick a lot of boxes as a technology that offers significant scope to reduce emissions from agriculture particularly as uptake comprised just 5pc of total nitrogen use in Ireland last year.

On new research that tested milk samples for potential to contain residues of protected urea Dr Forristal explained that a highly sensitive method to detect the urease inhibitor was developed, alongside a method to preserve samples. Almost 180 bulk tank samples and 240 individual cow samples were collected at Johnstown Castle dairy and analysed at Ashtown Food Research Centre.

The bulk milk from the overall dairy herd was sampled between February and September 2020. The average nitrogen rate for the whole herd was 181kg/N/ha/year.

We applied all of the nitrogen on the farm as protected urea to maximise its delivery to the platform and to exaggerate the risk potential.

P and K were applied separately using compounds and samples were preserved and sent for analysis.

The individual cow sampling was carried out on a 20-cow herd established grazing paddocks fertilised at 234kg N/ha/year. Again all nitrogen was applied as protected urea to maximise delivery.

P and K were applied separately. Samples were collected in June, July and August, preserved and sent for analysis.

Almost 180 samples were analysed from the bulk tank and in terms of residue all the samples were below the limit of quantification which was two parts per billion.

Also in the case of the individual cow samples all 240 of them were below the limit of quantification  again two parts per billion.

So were not finding a milk residue issue, Dr Forristal told the Signpost Webinar Series adding that a manuscript is being prepared for peer review and publication.

Fertiliser effect

On yield assessment  including cutting trials, grazing trials and long-term cutting trials at Johnstown Castle where fertiliser has been repeatedly applied to the same plot  Dr Forristal stated that all fertiliser (CAN, urea and protected urea) performed the same.

"There was no significant fertiliser effect. Essentially, all the fertiliser performed at a similar level so this is good because we know that they perform differently for their emissions so it gives us options.

On the ongoing grazing trials we can see that yield performance between the three different fertilisers is very similar.

There was no significant effect of fertiliser type on herbage production and they didnt run into any practical issues with using protected urea at farm level in combination with grazing. But the study will continue for another year.

This gives us another layer of confidence around the ability of protected urea to deliver yield for a farmer.

Low hanging fruit

Finally, referencing comments from Aidan Lawless, the farm manager at Johnstown Castle dairy farm who has been using protected urea since 2016, Dr Forristal said:

Aidan says it spreads in the same way as normal urea - thats his practical experience over the last five seasons of using it.

Because its more concentrated than CAN he says the benefit is less refiling time  two bags of CAN is 1,000kg which covers about 10ha versus about 13ha for two bags of protected urea coming in at 750kg.

Its a slightly cheaper product to grow the same amount of grass versus CAN and protected urea has lower greenhouse gas emissions.

"So in Aidans words in terms of meeting emission reductions, he says protected urea is about the lowest hanging fruit he can think of  and I would agree with that statement.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : Luxury automobile manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover announced its new global strategy titled 'Reimagine' to become a more environmentally sustainable brand.

Accordingly, the plan envisages the electrification of both Land Rover and Jaguar brands on separate architectures with "two clear, unique personalities".

"In the next five years, Land Rover will welcome six pure electric variants as it continues to be the world leader of luxury SUVs through its three families of Range Rover, Discovery and Defender. The first all-electric variant will arrive in 2024," the company said in a statement.

"By the middle of the decade, Jaguar will have undergone a renaissance to emerge as a pure electric luxury brand with a dramatically beautiful new portfolio of emotionally engaging designs and pioneering next-generation technologies." According to the company, both Jaguar and Land Rover will offer pure electric power, nameplate by nameplate, by 2030.

"By this time, in addition to 100 per cent of Jaguar sales, it is anticipated that around 60 per cent of Land Rovers sold will be equipped with zero tailpipe powertrains." Besides, Jaguar Land Rover's aim is to achieve net zero carbon emissions across its supply chain, products and operations by 2039.

"As part of this ambition, the company is also preparing for the expected adoption of clean fuel-cell power in line with a maturing of the hydrogen economy." "Development is already underway with prototypes arriving on UK roads within the next 12 months as part of the long-term investment programme." Furthermore, the company has made an annual commitment of 2.5 billion pounds.

This will include investments in electrification technologies and the development of connected services to enhance the journey and experiences of customers, alongside data-centric technologies that will further improve their ownership ecosystem.

In addition, to realise this vision the company will curate closer collaboration and knowledge-sharing with Tata Group companies to enhance sustainability and reduce emissions as well as sharing best practices in next-generation technology, data and software development leadership.

Jaguar Land Rover has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Tata Motors, in which Tata Sons is the largest shareholder, since 2008.

-- Syndicated from IANS
Colorado Springs, CO (80903)

Today

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%..

Tonight

Showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm this evening, then some lingering showers still possible overnight. Low 47F. Winds N at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 90%.
WASHINGTON (AP)  After former President Donald Trump's acquittal at his second Senate impeachment trial, bipartisan support appears to be growing for an independent Sept. 11-style commission into the deadly insurrection that took place at the U.S. Capitol.

Investigations into the riot were already planned, with Senate hearings scheduled later this month in the Senate Rules Committee. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has asked retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore to lead an immediate review of the Capitols security process.

Lawmakers from both parties, speaking on Sunday's news shows, signaled that even more inquiries were likely. The Senate verdict Saturday, with its 57-43 majority falling 10 votes short of the two-thirds needed to convict Trump, hardly put to rest the debate about the Republican former presidents culpability for the Jan. 6 assault.

There should be a complete investigation about what happened, said Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump. What was known, who knew it and when they knew, all that, because that builds the basis so this never happens again.

Cassidy said he was attempting to hold President Trump accountable, and added that as Americans hear all the facts, more folks will move to where I was. He was censured by his states party after the vote.

An independent commission along the lines of the one that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks would probably require legislation to create. That would elevate the investigation a step higher, offering a definitive government-backed accounting of events. Pelosi has expressed support for such a commission while stressing that the members who sit on it would be key. Still, such a panel would pose risks of sharpening partisan divisions or overshadowing President Joe Biden's legislative agenda.

Theres still more evidence that the American people need and deserve to hear and a 9/11 commission is a way to make sure that we secure the Capitol going forward, said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a Biden ally. And that we lay bare the record of just how responsible and how abjectly violating of his constitutional oath President Trump really was.

House prosecutors who argued for Trump's conviction of inciting the riot said Sunday they had proved their case. They also railed against the Senates Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, and others who they said were trying to have it both ways in finding the former president not guilty but criticizing him at the same time.

A close Trump ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., voted for acquittal but acknowledged that Trump had some culpability for the siege at the Capitol that killed five people, including a police officer, and disrupted lawmakers certification of Bidens White House victory. Graham said he looked forward to campaigning with Trump in the 2022 election, when Republicans hope to regain the congressional majority.

His behavior after the election was over the top, Graham said. We need a 9/11 commission to find out what happened and make sure it never happens again.

The Senate acquitted Trump of a charge of incitement of insurrection after House prosecutors laid out a case that he was an inciter in chief who unleashed a mob by stoking a monthslong campaign of spreading debunked conspiracy theories and false violent rhetoric that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Trumps lawyers countered that Trumps words were not intended to incite the violence and that impeachment was nothing but a witch hunt designed to prevent him from serving in office again.

The conviction tally was the most bipartisan in American history but left Trump to declare victory and signal a political revival while a bitterly divided GOP bickered over its direction and his place in the party.

The Republicans who joined Cassidy in voting to convict were Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Its frustrating, but the founders knew what they were doing and so we live with the system that we have, Democratic Del. Stacey Plaskett, a House prosecutor who represents the Virgin Islands, said of the verdict, describing it as heartbreaking. She added: But, listen, we didnt need more witnesses. We needed more senators with spines.

McConnell told Republican senators shortly before the vote that he would vote to acquit Trump. In a blistering speech after the vote, the Kentucky Republican said the president was practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day" but that the Senate's hands were tied to do anything about it because Trump was out of office. The Senate, in an earlier vote, had deemed the trial constitutional.

It was powerful to hear the 57 guilties and then it was puzzling to hear and see Mitch McConnell stand and say not guilty and then, minutes later, stand again and say he was guilty of everything, said Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pa. History will remember that statement of speaking out of two sides of his mouth, she said.

Dean also backed the idea of an impartial investigative commission "not guided by politics but filled with people who would stand up to the courage of their conviction.

The lead House impeachment manager, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., called the trial a dramatic success in historical terms by winning unprecedented support from GOP senators. He said the verdict didn't match the reality of the strength of evidence.

We successfully prosecuted him and convicted him in the court of public opinion and the court of history, he said. Pointing to McConnell and other Republican senators critical of Trump but voting to acquit, Raskin said, Theyre trying to have it both ways.

Raskin and Plaskett defended the House teams last-minute reversal not to call a witness, Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash. They acknowledged they were aware they might lose some GOP votes for conviction if they extended the trial much longer.

Beutler's statement late Friday that Trump rebuffed a plea from House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy to call off the rioters was ultimately entered into the trial record.

I think what we did was, we got what we wanted, which was her statement, which was what she said, and had it put into the record, Plaskett said.

Cassidy and Dean spoke on ABC's This Week, Graham appeared on Fox News Sunday, Raskin was on NBC's Meet the Press, and Plaskett appeared on CNN's State of the Union.

___

Associated Press writers Alexandra Jaffe, Lisa Mascaro, Eric Tucker, Mary Clare Jalonick and Alan Fram contributed to this report.

Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  A head nurse assigned to administer the first COVID-19 vaccine at the Philippine General Hospital said the arrival of vaccines this month will help pave the way for recovery from the health crisis.

In an interview on CNN Philippines' News.PH on Monday, Chareluck Santos of the University of the Philippines Health Service said there is excitement among the hospital staff, and even called the vaccines a glimmer of hope.

Santos said that in their vaccination training, the hospital staff focused on studying the Pfizer brand. The American-made vaccines are expected to be the first to arrive this month, with an initial 117,000 doses for medical frontliners nationwide.

Santos said hospital workers want to make sure no dose goes to waste, as she noted the sensitive requirements in handling COVID-19 vaccines. Among these is the storage temperature requirement, which has to be minus-70 degrees Celsius for Pfizer.

May mga pagsasanay pa nga po kami na bawal po syang i-shake, kasi pag na-shake mo po sya, kailangan na itapon yun, so sayang naman po [In our training, we were even told that if we accidentally shake the vaccine, it will already have to be discarded, so that would be such a waste], she added.

Over 5,700 of PGHs 6,316 personnel pre-registered for the vaccination. PGH Director Gerardo Legaspi said some are hesitant because of the reported adverse effects to the vaccine in other countries, but he added such cases are rare.

RELATED: PGH sees need for more vaccinee substitutes if Pfizer not the first brand to reach PH
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is under mounting pressure to lift all COVID-19 lockdowns in two and a half months as lockdown-sceptic Tories called on him to commit to a timetable for easing the restrictions with a complete end to controls by the end of April.

In a letter to the prime minister, leaders of the Covid Recovery Group (CRG) said the "tremendous pace" of the vaccination rollout means restrictions in England should begin easing from early March, the a local newspaper reported on Sunday.

They said ministers must produce a cost-benefit analysis to justify any controls that remain in place after that date, with a "road-map" stating when they would be removed, Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday.

The letter was organised by the CRG chair and deputy chair, Mark Harper and Steve Baker, and was said to have the backing of 63 Conservative Party lawmakers in all.

The letter was sent to the prime minister at a time when a government scientific advisor warned that Britain could face another wave as big as the current one if lockdown restrictions were all lifted.

Professor Steven Riley, a member of the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Modelling, has said the rollout of the vaccination program did not mean controls could be dropped.

"No vaccine is perfect," he told a BBC radio program. "We are certainly going to be in the situation where we can allow more infection in the community but there is a limit."

"If for some reason we were to choose to just pretend it (coronavirus) wasn't here any more then there is the potential to go back to a wave that is a similar size to the one that we are in now," he added.

The prime minister confirmed Saturday that the reopening of schools "is still his priority", followed by opening shops and then hospitality.

This was further reiterated by British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, who said on Sunday that the British government remained focused on reopening of schools on March 8.

The British ministers said they are confident they will meet their target of getting an offer of a vaccine to all 15 million people in Britain in their four priority groups, including all over 70s, by February 15's deadline.

During a visit to a vaccine manufacturing facility in Teesside on Saturday, Johnson said he was "optimistic" he could announce plans for a "cautious" easing of the rules when he sets out his "road-map" out of lockdown on February 22.

However, he said ministers would have to look at the data "very, very hard" before taking any decisions as they did not want to be forced into a "reverse ferret" if the disease started to spread again.

In contrast, the CRG, in their letter, said that the government's "national priority" of re-opening schools in England by March 8 "must" be achieved.

By Easter, they said pubs, restaurants and other hospitality venues should be able to open in a way that is Covid-secure but still allows them to operate "in a commercially viable manner".

And by the end of April, when all the government's top nine priority groups, including all over 50s, should have been offered a vaccine, they said there will be "no justification" for any legislative restrictions to remain.

"Covid is a serious disease and we must control it. However, just like Covid, lockdowns and restrictions cause immense social and health damage and have a huge impact on people's livelihoods," the letter said.

"The vaccine gives us immunity from Covid but it must also give us permanent immunity from COVID-related lockdowns and restrictions," it said.

By March 8, the government's top four priority groups, which account for 88 per cent of deaths and 55 per cent of hospitalizations, will have had their first dose of the vaccine at least three weeks earlier allowing time for protection to kick in, it said.

"All restrictions remaining after March 8 should be proportionate to the ever-increasing number of people we have protected," it added.

"The burden is on ministers to demonstrate the evidence of effectiveness and proportionality with a cost-benefit analysis for each restriction, and a roadmap for when they will be removed," it noted.

Downing Street refused to be drawn on reports suggesting that restrictions on meeting friends in a park could be among the first to be lifted once schools are back.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out vaccines.

--IANS

int/

(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.)
ROME, FEB 15 - Walter Ricciardi, a top Italian physician and advisor to Health Minister Roberto Speranza, has suggested Italy have another full-blown nationwide lockdown amid concern about the spread of new variants of COVID-19 in Italy. Ricciardi suggested a short but tough lockdown, in which non-essential activities would be stopped and schools closed. The proposal stirred angry reactions from many quarters, with League leader Matteo Salvini blasting "experts who sow fear". (ANSA).
Shiv Sena spokesman and MP Sanjay Raut on Sunday accused Maharashtra governor BS Koshyari of blocking several decisions taken by the state government due to political pressure.

Raut claimed that an open war is going on between Raj Bhavan and the Maharashtra government due to pressure from the BJP and accused the Centre of using governor BS Koshyari to pressurise and destabilise the state government, The Times of India reported.

Its not a cold war. Cold war is carried out clandestinely. This is an open war. Raj Bhavan is being used for political purposes by BJP. This war is not only between the governor and the state government. BJP is using Raj Bhavan, the TOI report quoted him as saying.

Rauts statement comes a day after the Shiv Sena, which is in power in Maharashtra, Koshyari of toeing the BJP's line, and said that if the Centre wants the Constitution to be upheld, it should recall him.

The party also asserted that the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) dispensation is stable and strong, and added that the Centre cannot use the governor's shoulders to take aim at the state government "Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari is back in news again.He has been in politics for the last many years. He was a Union minister and also the chief minister of Uttarakhand. However, ever since he became the Maharashtra governor, he has always remained in news or landed in controversy," the Sena said in an editorial in mouthpiece 'Saamana'.

"Why he is always landing in controversy is a question. Recently, he is in news over the use of a state government's plane. The governor wanted to go to Dehradun using the state aircraft. But the government denied permission to it. He sat in the aircraft on Thursday morning, but as the plane did not have approval to fly, he had to disembark and take a commercial flight to Dehradun," it said.

The opposition BJP is creating an issue out of it. But why did the governor sit in the plane even as the government had not given its approval for it to fly, the party asked. It was a private tour of the governor and as per the law, not only the governor, but even the chief minister cannot use a state plane for such purposes. The Chief Minister's Office (CMO) has acted in accordance with law, it said.

"But Leader of Opposition Devendra Fadnavis accused the state government of being egoistic. The country knows who is indulging in politics of ego. Despite the death of over 200 farmers during the ongoing protest on Delhi borders over the three farm laws, the government is not ready to withdraw them.Isn't that ego?" the Uddhav Thackeray-led party asked.

A governor should pursue the agenda of the government of the day and not that of the opposition, it added. The Sena also criticised the delay in governor's approval of 12 names recommended by the state cabinet for their nomination to the Legislative Council from his quota. The governor is acting like a puppet," it alleged.




Guangzhou, China, Feb 14, 2021 - (ACN Newswire) - AI-assisted computing has greatly improved the efficiency of new drug research and development. Suntrap Life Technologies Co., Ltd has taken the lead to establish the Suntrap IDDNU(R) platform to serve as an international drug discovery network alliance.In 2019, Suntrap Life Technologies established a drug research team, carried out comprehensive drug research and development projects, and built the Suntrap IDDNU (Suntrap International Drug Discovery Network Alliance) technology platform. Suntrap IDDNU is based upon the EK-DRD database, published by one of the researchers, Mr. Jason Zhao. (J Chem Inf Model. 2019 Sep 23;59(9):3619-3624. EK-DRD: A Comprehensive Database for Drug Repositioning Inspired by Experimental Knowledge). This database includes detailed information on the US FDA approved 1963 drugs (including those withdrawn from the market), and the activity information in the target, cell, animal, and clinical experiments. In addition, the Suntrap research team also included the structure and activity data of 400,838 natural compounds.Through the collection of these data and the construction of a database, the Suntrap research team has developed a series of natural compounds for drug redirection. Based on AI drug discovery algorithms and mathematical models, it can quickly calculate the affinity between these compounds and the target, and predict the compound-protein interaction, the ability to discover multi-pharmacological (multi-target) compounds, and the discovery of the correspondence among the drug-target-disease interactions, provide a very efficient platform for systematic pre-screening of drugs. For a variety of diseases, the Suntrap research team has initiated a variety of biological drug research and development pipelines (ie. tumors, viral infections, tissue fibrosis, respiratory infectious diseases, aging-related chronic diseases, and others).Given that the new coronavirus is still pandemic throughout the world, the Suntrap research team responded and launched the 'Research on Anti-Coronavirus Products' project in early 2020. Drugs claimed to be targeting the coronavirus have been clinically proven to be ineffective and have side-effects. In terms of target selection for the new drug development, the Suntrap research team aims to the development of small molecules with multi-targets, broad-spectrum, and collaborative therapeutic effectiveness, which acts not only to the original coronaviruses but also on the mutants or related strains. The Suntrap IDDNU quickly screened the antiviral activity of natural small molecular compounds from a database of drugs, herbals as well as food components, and discovered the multi-target synergistic anti-coronavirus compound "LeSoleil(R)". The Suntrap research team, together with the Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Guangdong Provincial Institute of Public Health, completed the sensitivity study and safety evaluation of 'LeSoleil'. The experimental conclusions show that 'LeSoleil' has significant effectiveness in the in vitro inhibition of the coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2). Further studies confirmed the effectiveness, which laid the foundation for 'LeSoleil' to be further developed into a candidate for the anti-coronavirus drug. The Suntrap's team studies have indicated that 'LeSoleil' has the advantages of low toxicity, good tolerability, and high accessibility, The Suntrap IDDNU guarantees the rapid development of broadspectrum COVID-19 prevention and therapeutic drugs.'LeSoleil' series of specific drugs for the treatment of new coronavirus pneumonia have completed preclinical trialsIn the face of the increasing spread of the new mutant coronavirus strains that are more infectious and elusive, existing drugs and vaccines are not enough to combat and completely eliminate the mutant virus. The world has an urgent need for new coronavirus therapeutic drugs. Based on this understanding, Suntrap's research team took 'LeSoleil' as the main drug component and carried out further development of the 'LeSoleil' series. According to the characteristics of infection, different formulas were tested in drug development.First of all, an emergency anti-coronavirus protective spray was released, which can effectively block the infection and the spread, while reducing the probability and risk of the mutation of the coronavirus. The protective spray can directly act on the nasal cavity and oral cavity, which are the initial sites where the virus infection manifested in the human body. The studies showed that the 'LeSoleil' spray effectively and stably prevent virus infection, inhibit virus replication, inactivate the virus, and prevent the virus from further infecting the human body. These observations also applied to the asymptomatic infected person who carries the virus, the spray could effectively eliminate the virus from being discharged droplets through breathing, sneezing, coughing, etc. After applying the 'LeSoleil', the exhaled air still retains the active ingredients that can effectively inhibit the virus, making the virus lose its infectivity. At present, the development of the 'LeSoleil' series of nasal and mouth spray formulations has been completed, including formulation design, formulation screening, mechanisms research, process optimization, and the quality evaluations of the QA and QC. The design, the quality control are strictly in accordance with domestic and international FDA regulations, which are complying with the general requirements of the current edition of the 'People's Republic of China Pharmacopoeia'. In addition, these nasal and mouth sprays could also effectively inhibit the inflammatory responses in the lungs, as experimented with the rat animal model of pneumonia. The experimental results show that 'LeSoleil' can prevent the inflammatory storm caused by the coronavirus infection, reduce the damage of the inflammation to the body, and have a good anti-inflammatory effect. At present, Suntrap's research team has also completed the development of 'LeSoleil' series injections, which can treat patients with severe and critical pneumonia caused by coronavirus infection.Furthermore, pulmonary fibrosis can also be prevented. Pulmonary fibrosis is a common sequela of patients discharged from the hospital with COVID-19, which seriously affects the quality of life and prognosis of patients. Pulmonary fibrosis is also commonly happening in other lung diseases, and currently, there are no effective therapeutics to cure pulmonary fibrosis patients.Studies have shown that the new coronavirus can directly invade the brain's nervous system, causing loss of sensory such as smell and taste, and affecting the functionality of human neurotransmitters, leading to the onset of anxiety, depression, and other mental illnesses. Suntrap's research team has fully studied the targets related to pulmonary fibrosis and constructed in vivo and in vitro testing models. In the in vitro studies, the TGF-Beta1 induced HFL-1 cells fibrosis can be effectively inhibited, and in the in vivo bleomycin-induced rat pulmonary fibrosis, 'LeSoleil' showed reliable effectiveness in stopping the pulmonary fibrosis processes. The experiment shows that 'LeSoleil' can reduce oxidative stress, inflammation, and fibrosis, which reduce the tendency of post-infection pulmonary fibrosis. In the 'LeSoleil' neuron protection experiment, it was found that it can effectively inhibit the apoptosis of nerve cells, protect neurons and repair the damaged nervous system.Pulmonary diseases have become more common in recent years. Although the formula and the inhaler are more complex than other forms of administrations, the 'LeSoleil' can directly reach the lungs and be absorbed more effectively. Such routes of absorption also bypass the liver metabolism, which usually happens with oral administration. The advantages are also prominent when compared with muscle injection, as the inhaler delivery reaches the loci more quickly and directly. The Suntrap research team has developed the 'LeSoleil' series administered with inhalation devices, which can treat and prevent pulmonary fibrosis, repair the damaged sensory perception of taste and smell, and are expected to completely improve the prognosis of the new coronavirus pneumonia.In ConclusionThe weakening trend of the COVID-19 pandemics does not mean that the virus disappears completely or that the next wave of pandemics will not come. The threats of future pandemics are still looming large. The WHO warned that a virus more deadly than the current coronavirus may also be inflicting humans in the future. The Suntrap research team through modeling global pandemics data, in combination with the environmental factors and the effects of social distancing and other quarantine measures, also predicted that some influenza epidemics may also occur from March to May 2021. These epidemics are also expected to be accompanied by an explosive number of cases of pulmonary infection. The symptoms of such pulmonary infections are easily confused with that of coronavirus pneumonia, and there is also a risk of superimposed infection, which makes the coronavirus pandemics even more difficult to be prevented, treated, or managed.The coronavirus is so small that it is invisible to the naked eye, but it is enough to distress the world. Today, with globalization prevail, no single country or nation can be standing alone unaffected. Under various situations of cultural, commercial, or political situations, the pandemic's impact has become far more complicated than ever. Faced with the COVID-19 pandemics, human beings cannot rely on a sheer stroke of luck. Large-scale testing, mandatory isolation, and restrictions on the movement of people are not the optimal long-term measure. The prevention and control of infectious diseases require a high degree of professionalism. It is essential to adapt and follow the scientific principles in solving such a problem.Therefore, it is the best strategy that we fight the disease actively, with efficiency as well as rationality so as to keep as much the normal operation of the society, minimize the economic impact, and develop safe and effective medicines for the pandemics.Experimental researches have proved that the 'LeSoleil' series of drugs can not only block the broad-spectrum coronavirus infection, resist further development of respiratory infection, but also kill the viruses. 'LeSoleil' can also contain and eliminate the inflammatory storm caused by the infection, and prevent pulmonary fibrosis. It is expected that 'LeSoleil' will become an effective drug against this and the coming pandemics. At present, the Suntrap research team has completed the pharmacodynamic, pharmacokinetic, and safety evaluation studies of the 'LeSoleil' series of products. Patents have been filed and authorized in China. Clinical trials are also under planning and are expected to be completed in a short time. The Suntrap team is striving to make 'LeSoleil' available as soon as possible.Contact:Suntrap Life Technologies Ltd.Zoe ZhouE: 2113@suntrap.comT: +86 18825197167Source: Suntrap Life Technologies LtdCopyright 2021 ACN Newswire . All rights reserved.

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The variant of the coronavirus (COVID-19) first discovered in the United Kingdom is likely associated with a higher risk for hospitalization and death, British government scientists said Friday, a concerning development in the latest stage of a pandemic that has caused well-over two million deaths.

The latest findings by the British government were bolstered by additional studies compared to its earlier assessment of the variant and include more deaths caused by the mutated form of the virus, according to a document posted on a government website.

The overall picture is one of something like a 40 to 60 % increase in hospitalization risk, and risk of death, Neil Ferguson, an epidemiologist and scientific adviser to the British government, told the New York Times.

Despite that increased risk, the British scientists said, the absolute risk of death per infection remains low.

The mutation  known as B.1.1.7  is rapidly spreading throughout the United States, a recent study found separately, and has gained a strong foothold across the world, the researchers in that analysis wrote.

Scientists believe the U.K. strain is about 35% to 45% more transmissible than the initial form of the virus that launched the pandemic. Last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said the mutated virus could become predominant in the U.S. by March.

The cause of the elevated death rate observed by British scientists in the collection of studies utilized was not immediately clear.

There were limitations to the studies, the scientists said, including not being able to adequately account for the presence of underlying illnesses in infected people and whether or not the cases began in nursing homes.

Because the virus is considered to be more transmissible, a higher death rate could be caused by the virus spreading among at-risk populations, like those in assisted-living facilities.

Data indicates the U.K. variant has already spread to at least 82 countries and the CDC has tallied nearly 1,000 cases in the U.S. as of late last week, though that total is likely higher due to limitations in virus surveillance.
Bangladesh: Fish markets in Barishal sit idle

by Sushanta Ghosh

February 15,2021 | Source: The Daily Star

Anglers and fisheries officials have reported a decrease in the number of fish caught from Barishal's rivers, though for different reasons according to each party. As a result, supply of local fish to major fish markets has come down noticeably. On one hand, local anglers said the situation arose as fishing in the river has been banned for the last 15 days, while fisheries officials said fish supply has decreased naturally, as is normal for this season. In addition, officials said anglers are catching less fish than before, as they are using illegal nets, which depletes fish supply and brings fewer catches. Following their claims, this correspondent, while visiting Port Road Wholesale Fish Market -- one of the biggest wholesale fish markets of the south region -- and other markets and saw very little activity. Traders and labourers were mostly sitting idle, as there is not much work. Some shops were found closed while some store fronts were being used to repair fishing pots. Soleiman Fakir, a worker at the market, told this correspondent that since a lot less fish is coming in every day, their income has decreased by at least six to eight times.



Nirab Hossain Tutul, president of Barishal Port Road Motsho Arotdar Samity, said compared to an inflow of 800-2,000 maunds of fish per day, the number has now come down to 100-150 maunds. Hilsa rarely comes, with less than 50 maunds arriving on Thursday. "Some anglers are afraid of going out to the rivers after thousands of nets were burned in a massive operation to protect jatka, which ran from January 10-16 and January 25 to Feb 1. This is another reason why netting has decreased," Nirab said. According to the Fisheries Department, the special operation ran on six districts of Barishal division. In total, 761 operation were conducted by 294 mobile courts. Bimal Das, district fisheries officer (hilsa), said as a result of the operation, anglers are not able to use illegal nets, which may give off the impression that less fish is being caught, but he assured that this is normal. "It is normal for fish supply to be low at this point of the year. It will increase from April. There is nothing to worry about," said Anisur Rahman Talukder, deputy director of Divisional Fisheries Office of Barishal. "The operations seized 1,243 'Behundi nets', 68.09 lakh metres of current nets, 22.707 metric tonnes of jatka, and one tonne of other fishes. In the meantime, 131 cases were filed and 92 anglers were jailed for illegal netting,'' he added.

 2021 / thedailystar.net
KYODO NEWS - Feb 15, 2021 - 23:35 | All, Japan, Coronavirus

Japan plans to start inoculating elderly people only after the coronavirus vaccinations for frontline health workers have been administered, possibly delaying the initially anticipated start date for seniors in April, a senior government official said Monday.

The move aims to ensure a stable supply of Pfizer Inc.'s vaccine, which was formally approved by the health ministry on Sunday, the official said. Around 3.7 million health workers are to begin receiving the vaccine in March, followed by 36 million people aged 65 and older from April 1 at the earliest.

But, according to another government official, it is uncertain when Japan can receive subsequent shipments and how much, following the European Union's tightening of export controls on vaccines. Pfizer is also likely to delay its plan to increase production capacity from March.

But once a sufficient supply of vaccines has been secured, inoculations could still take place simultaneously for front-liners and the elderly.

After a total of 3 million doses are administered to the general public, Japan will survey the potential side effects caused by various coronavirus vaccines, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare said Monday.

The ministry will invite participants to respond to its survey after the inoculation for the elderly people and plans to track common side effects such as fever and fatigue among three different vaccines, including Pfizer's.

Around 10,000 to 20,000 health care workers are set to begin receiving their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine on Feb. 17. The government will collect and periodically release details about all side effects experienced, regardless of whether the vaccine is the cause.

It will also provide information on the safety of the vaccines garnered from the survey after inoculations begin for the general public.

The survey is expected to cover around 500,000 people per single dose of each version of the vaccine. A total of 3 million doses will be necessary if the government includes doses by pharmaceuticals AstraZeneca Plc and Moderna Inc., alongside Pfizer.
PITTSBURGH, Feb. 15, 2021 - By capitalizing on a convergence of chemical, biological and artificial intelligence advances, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine scientists have developed an unusually fast and efficient method for discovering tiny antibody fragments with big potential for development into therapeutics against deadly diseases.

The technique, published today in the journal Cell Systems, is the same process the Pitt team used to extract tiny SARS-CoV-2 antibody fragments from llamas, which could become an inhalable COVID-19 treatment for humans. This approach has the potential to quickly identify multiple potent nanobodies that target different parts of a pathogen--thwarting variants.

"Most of the vaccines and treatments against SARS-CoV-2 target the spike protein, but if that part of the virus mutates, which we know it is, those vaccines and treatments may be less effective," said senior author Yi Shi, Ph.D., assistant professor of cell biology at Pitt. "Our approach is an efficient way to develop therapeutic cocktails consisting of multiple nanobodies that can launch a multipronged attack to neutralize the pathogen."

Shi and his team specialize in finding nanobodies--which are small, highly specific fragments of antibodies produced by llamas and other camelids. Nanobodies are particularly attractive for development into therapeutics because they are easy to produce and bioengineer. In addition, they feature high stability and solubility, and can be aerosolized and inhaled, rather than administered through intravenous infusion, like traditional antibodies.

By immunizing a llama with a piece of a pathogen, the animal's immune system produces a plethora of mature nanobodies in about two months. Then it's a matter of teasing out which nanobodies are best at neutralizing the pathogen--and most promising for development into therapies for humans.

That's where Shi's "high-throughput proteomics strategy" comes into play.

"Using this new technique, in a matter of days we're typically able to identify tens of thousands of distinct, highly potent nanobodies from the immunized llama serum and survey them for certain characteristics, such as where they bind to the pathogen," Shi said. "Prior to this approach, it has been extremely challenging to identify high-affinity nanobodies."

After drawing a llama blood sample rich in mature nanobodies, the researchers isolate those nanobodies that bind specifically to the target of interest on the pathogen. The nanobodies are then broken down to release small "fingerprint" peptides that are unique to each nanobody. These fingerprint peptides are placed into a mass spectrometer, which is a machine that measures their mass. By knowing their mass, the scientists can figure out their amino acid sequence--the protein building blocks that determine the nanobody's structure. Then, from the amino acids, the researchers can work backward to DNA--the directions for building more nanobodies.

Simultaneously, the amino acid sequence is uploaded to a computer outfitted with artificial intelligence software. By rapidly sifting through mountains of data, the program "learns" which nanobodies bind the tightest to the pathogen and where on the pathogen they bind. In the case of most of the currently available COVID-19 therapeutics, this is the spike protein, but recently it has become clear that some sites on the spike are prone to mutations that change its shape and allow for antibody "escape." Shi's approach can select for binding sites on the spike that are evolutionarily stable, and therefore less likely to allow new variants to slip past.

Finally, the directions for building the most potent and diverse nanobodies can then be fed into vats of bacterial cells, which act as mini factories, churning out orders of magnitude more nanobodies compared to the human cells required to produce traditional antibodies. Bacterial cells double in 10 minutes, effectively doubling the nanobodies with them, whereas human cells take 24 hours to do the same.

"This drastically reduces the cost of producing these therapeutics," said Shi.

Shi and his team believe their technology could be beneficial for more than just developing therapeutics against COVID-19--or even the next pandemic.

"The possible uses of highly potent and specific nanobodies that can be identified quickly and inexpensively are tremendous," said Shi. "We're exploring their use in treating cancer and neurodegenerative diseases. Our technique could even be used in personalized medicine, developing specific treatments for mutated superbugs for which every other antibiotic has failed."

###

Additional researchers on this publication are Yufei Xiang and Jianquan Xu, Ph.D., both of Pitt; Zhe Sang of Pitt and Carnegie Mellon University; and Lirane Bitton and Dina Schneidman-Duhovny, Ph.D., both of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

This research was supported by the UPMC Aging Institute, National Institutes of Health grant 1R35GM137905-01, Israel Science Foundation grant 1466/18, the Ministry of Science and Technology of Israel and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Center for Interdisciplinary Data Science Research.

To read this release online or share it, visit https:/ / www. upmc. com/ media/ news/ 021521-shi-massspecproteomics [when embargo lifts].

About the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine

As one of the nation's leading academic centers for biomedical research, the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine integrates advanced technology with basic science across a broad range of disciplines in a continuous quest to harness the power of new knowledge and improve the human condition. Driven mainly by the School of Medicine and its affiliates, Pitt has ranked among the top 10 recipients of funding from the National Institutes of Health since 1998. In rankings recently released by the National Science Foundation, Pitt ranked fifth among all American universities in total federal science and engineering research and development support.

Likewise, the School of Medicine is equally committed to advancing the quality and strength of its medical and graduate education programs, for which it is recognized as an innovative leader, and to training highly skilled, compassionate clinicians and creative scientists well-equipped to engage in world-class research. The School of Medicine is the academic partner of UPMC, which has collaborated with the University to raise the standard of medical excellence in Pittsburgh and to position health care as a driving force behind the region's economy. For more information about the School of Medicine, see http://www. medschool. pitt. edu .

http://www. upmc. com/ media

Contact: Erin Hare

Mobile: 412-738-1097

E-mail: HareE@upmc.edu

Contact: Allison Hydzik

Office: 412-647-9975

Mobile: 412-559-2431

E-mail: HydzikAM@upmc.edu
A rapper who bragged on Instragram live video about how he would carry out a revenge petrol bomb attack on a rival has been jailed for 12 years.

George Carpenter, also known as Carpo, carried out the revenge attack at a home in Grove Street, Edge Hill, Liverpool, on July 11 last year.

A court heard he had 'bad blood' with another rapper in the city, Tremaine Wiltshire, known as Tremz.

A video of Carpenter's grandmother's home being attacked by a group of men was shared on Tremz's Instagram account, where shouts of 'Carpo you grass' could be heard.

Carpenter then shared an Instagram live video in which he made threats to 'light up' the home of a woman whose son is friends with Tremz.

George Carpenter, also known as Carpo, was jailed for 12 years after he shared on social media his plans to carry out revenge petrol bomb attack on rival rapper Tremz

In the video Carpenter comments 'silence is deadly' and says 'I guarantee that genie gets put in the bottle'.

It is understood the males who committed the attack on the home of Carpenter's grandparents have not been identified.

Carpenter, 33, appeared at Liverpool Crown Court alongside Adam Achramowicz, also 33, who drove Carpenter and an unknown male from Milton Keynes to Liverpool.

The court heard on the way Achramowicz stopped at a service station and filled a container with petrol, initially claiming it was for fuel.

But a judge said this week: 'You must have had some knowledge of what your co-defendant was going to do with the petrol, though I accept by your plea you were unaware of the exact plan.'

When they arrived Carpenter and the unknown male were dropped close to Grove Street where they had a short discussion before Carpenter left.

In July last year Carpenter (pictured during an Instagram live) carried out the attack on a property in Edge Hill, Liverpool, following 'bad blood' with another Liverpool rapper, Tremaine Wiltshire, known as Tremz

Cheryl Mottram, prosecuting, said: 'The crown say it is clear the unknown male threw the petrol bomb through the window at the instruction of Mr Carpenter.'

The court heard the woman was awake when she heard a bang before realising the curtains in her living room and her couch was alight.

Fortunately she and other occupants in the house were able to extinguish the blaze with a hose.

The court heard the victim suffered injuries to her foot due to the broken glass as well as burns to her hands and fingers and 'some psychological harm'.

A fire investigation officer described a 'strong smell of petrol' and a wine bottle was discovered near the sofa.

Shortly after the attack Carpenter uploaded a second video to Instagram where he 'gloated' about the arson attack.

Carpenter, of no fixed address, but previously of Walton, Liverpool, admitted committing arson with intent to endanger life.

Carpenter, 33, appeared at Liverpool Crown Court (pictured) alongside Adam Achramowicz, also 33, who drove Carpenter and another male from Milton Keynes to Liverpool

He has nine convictions for 14 offences including violent disorder and robbery, sexual offending, possession of drugs, handling of stolen goods, possession with intent to supply cannabis and in February 2019 was convicted of affray and failing to surrender, which resulted in a custodial sentence.

Achramowicz, of Towpath Avenue, Northampton, admitted arson being reckless as to whether life was endangered.

The court heard Achramowicz is 'effectively' of good character with one conviction for failing to surrender in 2010.

Mike O'Brien, defending Carpenter, said: 'The defendant maintains once he became aware a fire started he arranged a male and female to attend the address to warn the occupants.'

The court heard that their attendance was confirmed in the woman's witness statement.

Mr O'Brien explained Carpenter pleaded guilty and 'expresses remorse' in a probation report where he 'shows insight into his behaviour'.

Laban Leake, defending Achramowicz, explained the defendant was effectively offered free drugs to carry out the journey but is now drug free.

The court heard Achramowicz has maintained a strong work ethic and has been employed for around the past 11 years.

Judge Garrett Byrne, sentencing, said: 'This was a serious and wicked offence which arose from what started as a trivial feud between you Carpenter and a Mr Tremaine Wiltshire.'

The court heard the woman was awake when she heard a bang before realising the curtains in her living room and her couch was alight at her home in Grave Street, Liverpool. Pictured: A general view of Grove Street

The judge said in the footage Carpenter was 'very angry' and 'clearly out of control and intent on committing acts of violence'.

Judge Byrne said: 'You were effectively threatening a revenge attack.'

He added: 'Had all the occupants been asleep there was no guarantee they could have roused them before the fire took hold of the house.

'The risk was still very high and the risk was of very serious injury.

'It was fortuitous to say the least that the victim was awake at the time and that she and her family were able to put out the fire.'

The judge said if the woman had been asleep the situation could easily have been more serious, adding that after it took place Carpenter uploaded another video 'effectively gloating'.

The judge said: 'This is aggravated by your previous convictions and the fact this was a revenge attack, that there was a significant degree of planning and the use of a petrol bomb.'

Carpenter was branded a 'dangerous' offender by a judge and was jailed for 12 years, with an extended two years on licence.

The team defending Achramowicz (pictured) explained the he was effectively offered free drugs to carry out the journey but is now drug free

This type of sentence means he will spend at least two thirds of the custodial term - eight years - behind bars.

Carpenter will then only be released before the end of his sentence if a parole board considers he is no longer a risk.

Sentencing Achramowicz for arson being reckless as to whether life was endangered the judge said he accepted there was 'an element of exploitation' of Achramowicz by Carpenter.

Achramowicz was jailed for four years.

  29  30 3324  53010.5     2022  v.s.    5.24 593 23000  20508  9.02 102.56 108.6527 71.76 99.53 2021Q147.67 11 2021Q147.67 80 622 38.92 2.16 7%400 4.99   4%  2.34%  5% 2760
It's been just over a year since a general election that was run on the twin issues of housing and homelessness. In that year, an unprecedented global pandemic has utterly changed Irish life. With people confined to their houses, those without homes are dying in unprecedented numbers. More people known to homeless services are dying  and everyone wants to know why, and how to stop it, writes Noel Baker.

"It's growing, growing all the time," Catriona Twomey says of the deaths of people known to homeless services.

Given her work with Cork Penny Dinners, she is in the know. She refers to a woman who passed away not that long ago, whom she believes was only in her 30s.

She speaks of people who were found collapsed in the street, people who died in B&Bs and later turned out to have been moving between different types of emergency accommodation. She thinks more than 10 people died in these circumstances in Cork last year.

"If you put it all together the number would probably be way more than that," she says.

Also in today's special feature:

Reaching out on Limericks streets by Ryan ORourke

Coming up in part two of our special feature tomorrow:

Profile : Gary Dineen, lost in music, by Noel Baker

: Gary Dineen, lost in music, by Noel Baker Profile : Michail Moisejenkov, a proud dad, by Aoife Moore

: Michail Moisejenkov, a proud dad, by Aoife Moore Profile : Iggy Rybka, shy and polite, by Ryan ORourke

: Iggy Rybka, shy and polite, by Ryan ORourke Interview with Housing Minister Darragh OBrien by Aoife Moore

Dr Dermot Kavanagh, director of Irish Examiner, also believes the number of deaths has risen in the past year. Asked for figures by the Cork Simon Community, Cork City Council did not provide data but said "any death is a source of upset and concern to the staff working with the homeless services".

Limerick Council confirmed that it had engaged with nine rough sleepers in the course of the year, with one, a Polish man aged 69 known to locals as Iggy, found dead in the city centre in January.

One person availing of emergency accommodation is known to have died in Galway during 2020.

In Dublin, we know the number of deaths has increased. Figures provided to Dublin City Council by the Dublin Region Homeless Executive (DRHE) ahead of last week's local authority meeting showed 79 deaths in the capital last year.

Of those, eight people died while rough sleeping, 44 people died in emergency homeless accommodation  supported temporary accommodation and private emergency accommodation  and 27 people died in long-term supported tenancies where there are on-site medical services, including three from Covid-19.

DRHE said further five deaths involving rough sleeping involved people who had not been connected into homeless services in Dublin. The total of 79 was 30 higher than the figure for 2019.

And yet even with these numbers, there is uncertainty.

The Mendicity Institution, based in Dublin, has been operating for more than two centuries. Its CEO, Louisa Santoro, believes the figure of 79 is an underestimate.

First, the five deaths not known to homeless services: "I would just say that nobody ever asked us, so we can't say that.

"What measure of checks and balances did you use to determine they were not known to some services? They may not have been known to Dublin Simon Outreach, who do amazing work, but they can't be everywhere."

She says the description of people not known to services is troubling:

It implies blame, that they were outside and unwilling to engage.

"I would be keen to dispel this idea that homeless people are a bunch who don't want to talk to you."

As for the figure of 44 people who died in emergency accommodation, Louisa says more details are required, including average age and crucially, whether they were in accommodation that was supported, or not.

She makes the distinction between supported services, such as those run by Focus Ireland, the Peter McVerry Trust and others, and the "more than half" provided by "for profit providers with no support on-site".

"It's not about throwing rocks," she continues, but it seems the answers provided about deaths among those without a home just raise more questions.

Pandemic response

The DRHE told Dublin City councillors that it "is concerned at the significant increase of deaths in the latter months of 2020 (from July) and a comprehensive review of such deaths for the full year is under way in conjunction with the HSE".

That review, due in the coming weeks, is being carried out by Dr Austin O'Carroll, a founder of Safetynet Primary Care and currently the clinical lead for Covid-19 and homelessness in Dublin.

The management of the pandemic among people who are homeless has been a success, at least in terms of its primary aim.

At the end of December, there were just 88 confirmed cases in homeless services, although this number has since increased significantly.

In the context of more than 10,000 people being homeless at the start of 2020, the spread of infection was limited, and other measures to mitigate against Covid has meant an increase in bed capacity, certainly in Dublin, even as the total number of people who are homeless dropped to 8,200 last December.

Catriona Twomey of Cork Penny Dinners.

DRHE said it anticipates that the additional beds which it sourced in response to Covid-19 will be retained for at least a further six months.

Yet while family homelessness has thankfully decreased, the number of single homeless in the Dublin region rose from 2,865 in January 2020 to 3,027 by last December.

Dr Dermot Kavanagh believes while the effort to limit the impact of Covid-19 on those in emergency accommodation has been successful, it has come at a cost, primarily a lack of social and one-to-one contact, especially through day services which have been curtailed or suspended by different providers around the country on public health grounds.

"I do think the response from [Cork] City Council when Covid arose was very, very swift and extremely helpful," he says.

"It's difficult because it involved reducing capacity in the shelter and they did that in other places as well, but the city council did come up with alternatives for people."

Cork did not have the same scale as Dublin in terms of numbers or in terms of response, so people had to be moved around.

Read More Michael Clifford: To die on the streets is an unthinkable way for a life to end

According to Cork City Council: "The accommodation placement service provided by the council has remained opened to the public throughout the restrictions and continues to provide emergency accommodation and advice to anyone facing homelessness.

"The service providers have had to adjust their services to allow for social distancing requirements and this has had an impact on bed capacity, but alternative emergency accommodation has been provided through the accommodation placement service, so there clearly is accommodation available to anyone who needs it."

Limerick Council put into place 10 extra beds for rough sleepers, while Galway City Council established 13 new rough sleeper beds in 2020.

Ultimately, however, the low level of deaths of homeless people from Covid nationally has not meant a fall in overall deaths.

"It was 79 people in Dublin and no doubt many more right across the country besides the very, very low number who passed away from Covid," he says.

It shows homelessness was and is a huge crisis for people.

"The frustrating thing is we know what works, anecdotally, but I can tell you the people who have passed away in Cork in homelessness are by and large on the streets or in emergency accommodation.

"The people who have been housed, those people are having far, far better outcomes, even though they themselves were homeless long-term with all the challenges that come with that."

What works, he says, is minimising the time spent by people in homelessness and reducing harm.

Cork Simon has housed 156 people over the past seven years, many of whom were at some stage long-term homeless. Just 5% of them are homeless again now and more than 80% never re-entered the system.

"One of the factors very strongly at play here is we don't have anything like enough one-bed units, small units in the city or probably in most parts of the country and that is one of the huge challenges," Dermot says.

He said Cork Simon will have another eight units coming on stream later this year.

"If you are single and can't find an affordable place to live and you get stuck there [in homelessness], that leads to all kinds of bad outcomes over time.

"The big challenge for us and everyone else is to ensure more housing and the right kind of housing."

Duration of the crisis

There is something else to be considered: the sheer duration of the homelessness crisis.

While many people have entered homelessness over the past seven years and then subsequently exited it, it was by no means a quick process. Even the most recent quarterly report issued by the department showed that 25% of families had been in emergency accommodation for more than two years.

The proportion for single people is considerable, and within that group there is the long-term homeless.

The deleterious impact of living without stable housing for a long period can't be overstated.

Last year Merchants Quay Ireland (MQI) published a study called Old Before Their Time, based around research by Dr Cliona Ni Cheallaigh, profiling the health of homeless people in the 45-50 age bracket.

The findings were stark: on average, the grip strength was equivalent to that of a 65-year-old. They had only half the functional mobility of someone 65 and older.

Nearly one-in-three were described as frail. More than a third reported falling in the previous six months and there were high rates of diabetes, depression, hypertension, stroke, and seizures.

"Worldwide, study after study shows people who are homeless have higher rates of mortality, disease, and hospitalisation.

"Sometimes  but not always  compounded by addiction to drugs or alcohol, the struggle for survival is fertile ground for the speeded-up ageing process called weathering'," the report found.

Some of the most vulnerable people on Ireland's streets in the country's hostels and B&Bs have been assailed by multiple 'weather' fronts.

MQI chief executive Paula Byrne believes it may be having an impact regarding fatalities: "The average age of death for homeless women is 38, for men, it's 44.

"Now that's staggering, when you think about it. It's very young, put it that way. It's the impact."

You see homeless people and think they must be in their 50s and 60s and they're only in their 30s. It's only a half-life.

The DRHE said that it was making increased efforts to limit the risk of death for those rough sleeping and in emergency accommodation.

"In collaboration with the HSE, the DRHE has strengthened supports being provided to homeless households in emergency accommodation," it said.

"For single households, living in NGO facilities, social and housing supports are provided on-site by the operators. For single households, living in private emergency accommodation, supports are provided by a number of services providers.

"This team covers all of the private emergency accommodation sites in Dublin City by providing a clinic onsite once weekly.

"The team is led and managed by HSE Homeless Clinical Lead, Dr O'Carroll, and managed by nurses and MHSC staff. This work in PEAs is supported by 14 staff from Ana Liffey Drug Project who provide supports in relation to addiction and harm reduction.

"Intensive housing supports to singles are also provided by the DRHE Housing Support Workers and, up to the end of December 2020, 777 single people had been assessed for housing and given advice/assistance regarding a move to more permanent social housing supports."

Catitriona Twomey and chef Philippe in the Kitchen at Penny Dinners on Little Hanover Street, Cork. Picture: Dan Linehan

In Cork, the city council said there had been "significant progress made in 2020 in reducing the numbers of families and individuals in emergency accommodation", stressing the importance of Housing First and wraparound services in assisting those who need help, and acknowledging "the lack of suitable, affordable private rented accommodation for single people" in Cork and elsewhere.

In Limerick, Limerick Council says that between 1 January and the end of November 2020, 98 individuals and 96 families moved on from homeless services.

Galway City Councils homeless services unit dealt with an average of 217 people each month during 2020. Figures for how many people exited homelessness in Galway during 2020 were not available.

For its part, the Department of Housing said it takes the deaths of people known to homeless services "very seriously".

The Department of Health has recently requested the Health Research Board (HRB) undertake a study to collect data on deaths among people who were homeless at time of death, to be completed by the end of 2021.

Read More Agencies urged to adopt 'trauma' approach to dealing with homeless children

The HRB is undertaking a one-year feasibility study to collect relevant data from coroners records and the report will build on a previous study published in 2019 in the British Medical Journal.

A departmental spokesperson also referred to additional funding of 11m under Covid-19 specific initiatives that would assist people who are homeless.

Last year's exchequer funding allocated to housing authorities was 271m, up 36m on the sum for the previous year. The budget allocation for homeless accommodation and related services for 2021 is 218m.

The department also referred to the last rough sleeper count in the capital, which found an average of 40 empty beds throughout the city.

"There is a bed for everyone," it said. "The challenge is to get people into these beds, and the outreach teams which are funded by Government and the local authorities are on the street doing this."

Complex problems

The problems that chase after some of those without a home are not new  addiction, mental health, ailing physical health. For migrants, throw in lack of access to social welfare and associated supports.

Dr Fiona O'Reilly of Safetynet Primary Care speaks of involuntary admissions on mental health grounds at a rate of one a month.

She says the risk of violence has not really diminished, despite the lack of footfall on the streets.

In its report to Dublin City Council this month DRHE said that since the outbreak of the pandemic, it moved away from night shelters, and converted all facilities to 24-hour accommodation, with the unintended consequence that migrants or people presenting to Dublin from other counties no longer had a place they could access directly without an assessment of their eligibility, housing need and requirement for emergency accommodation.

This was highlighted in the recent RTE programme where the 'local connection' was cited as a reason for some people not getting a bed.

It's not a situation limited to Dublin, with Dr Dermot Kavanagh saying it is also an issue in Cork. Another problem.

And then you have Covid  the primal fear, but more likely its role in limiting access to services which, ordinarily, keep people connected, keep them alive.

"Covid is barely in the top 10 things in your mind in terms of someone who is homeless," said Louisa Santoro who thinks the pandemic may have widened the tiers that exist within homelessness.

"We would have rough sleepers occasionally who are [Covid] contacts or suspected Covid, they're plucked from a sleeping bag, taken to a posh hotel, and at the end of their 14 days they're released back onto the footpath.

I have had a few guys saying 'I wish I did have Covid', and when you hear somebody say that, you realise their circumstances are pretty poor.

She believes everyone  including private providers  need to be at the table, to avoid duplication and fragmentation, to provide a guide for people in homelessness, to know where they can eat, shower, charge their phone, access training, find a way out.

In Cork, Catriona Twomey sums it up: "A lot of people misunderstand what homelessness is and what its causes are. It can be a word for people who are homeless, and obviously it is, but it's more than that. We are all human beings and we are all supposed to be equal."

This year has already seen homeless deaths in Dublin and Limerick. Just a few more times when even the half-life slipped away.

(Additional reporting by Aoife Moore and Ryan ORourke)





Reaching out on Limerick's streets

By Ryan O'Rourke

It's nearly 7pm, but the cold, dark, February night, combined with the wind and the rain, makes it feel much later.

People impacted by homelessness, food poverty, or just those who have fallen on hard times come in ones and twos to grab some much-sought food from the Novas outreach van, parked up on Limericks Lower Gerald Griffin Street.

The warm aromas of hot meals, soups and sandwiches fill the air. The food gets donated by the Greenhills Hotel and the Hook and Ladder cafe and is distributed by Novas volunteers, whose kind faces are hidden by masks, necessary protection in the current pandemic.

Aisling Kelleher, Novas Limerick. Picture Brendan Gleeson

Two of these volunteers dish out meals. In the space of an hour, they feed 20 to 30 people. For many, this meal will have to see them through the night, wherever they may find themselves sleeping.

Familiar faces are greeted with unique bits and pieces. A fresh scone to make someones day. A chocolate bar for the sweet tooth. Shoes in the right size for the person who has been looking.

All these little things seem to add to the sense of community which gathers around the Novas van.

A man asks for a hat, unfortunately, they have none to give him. The current restrictions which have seen department stores, such as Pennys, close because of their non-essential status means that items such as this need to be ordered in.

Una Burns, head of policy and communications with Novas, explains that if not for the rain, or the pandemic, people would often sit and have their meals together. The communal aspect and the socialising are all part of the service that the van offers.

The number of people who come out varies from night-to-night. It could be 10 people, it could be 30 or 40. We would have people who are just over 18 years of age, to people who are in their 50s and 60s, so its right across the age range, Ms Burns explains.

The volunteers would know most people by name. They would know the things they like, maybe its a fresh scone or something they are looking for  the volunteers would know.

Ms Burns mentions the death of an elderly homeless man, Ignacy Rybka, and the impact that has left on the community after his passing in January.

She brings attention to the wet weather she stands in and explains the risks that those who will sleep on the streets that night will face.

Its horrendous. On a night like tonight, its cold, and its wet.

They are exposed to the elements, without cover, without a roof. They are exposed to potential violence.

In Limerick, we have about 10 people sleeping rough on any given night. But obviously, 10 people is 10 too many.

Ms Burns explains that although, in large, most people want to access emergency accommodation provided. However, this is not the case for everyone.

Some times people have significant mental health issues, or addiction issues. They may be nervous, they may never have experienced homelessness before, a hostel might overwhelm them, she said.

The tents where some homeless people are residing on the Condell Road, Limerick. Picture: Brian Arthur

The evidence of this comes in the form of a newly established campsite, in a wooded area near the Condell Road, which sits just outside the city centre.

Here a small group of around four individuals affected by homelessness have gathered, pitching tents among the undergrowth and trees.

This isnt the first time we have seen those affected by homelessness move out of the city centre like this. It might be, that because they have room to camp up together, they are feeling safer in numbers, Ms Burns said.

Homelessness: The facts

10: How many homeless people have died in Cork since last February (estimate)

79: The number of homeless people who died in Dublin last year

72%: The drop in the number of people using hotels as emergency accommodation in Dublin in 2020

8,200: The number of individuals in emergency accommodation in Ireland in December 2020

970: The number of families in emergency accommodation in December 2020

2,327: The number of children in emergency homeless accommodation with their families in December 2020
Soldiers and armoured vehicles are stationed in front of the Central Bank in Yangon, Myanmar, 15 February 2021. EPA-Yonhap



Security forces in Myanmar deployed with armoured vehicles in major cities and cut internet access on Monday after protests over this month's coup and the detention of elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi drew hundreds of thousands onto the streets.



Suu Kyi's detention on charges of illegally importing six walkie-talkie radios is due to expire on Monday. Her lawyer, Khin Maung Zaw, could not be reached for comment on what was set to happen.



Police opened fire to disperse protesters at a power plant in northern Myanmar on Sunday during a ninth day of anti-coup demonstrations against the Feb. 1 coup, which derailed the Southeast Asian country's tentative transition to democracy.



As well as mass protests around the country, the military rulers are facing a strike by government workers, part of a civil disobedience movement that is crippling many of the functions of government.



Soldiers were deployed to power plants in the northern state of Kachin, leading to a confrontation with demonstrators, some of whom said they believed the army intended to cut off the electricity.





Soldiers in armoured vehicles drive along the street outside Sule Pagoda in Yangon, Myanmar, 14 February 2021. EPA-Yonhap



The security forces fired to disperse protesters outside one plant in the state capital, Myitkyina, footage broadcast live on Facebook showed, although it was not clear if they were using rubber bullets or live fire.



On Sunday evening, armoured vehicles appeared in the commercial capital of Yangon, Myitkyina and Sittwe, the capital of Rakhine state, the first large-scale rollout of such vehicles across the country since the coup.



On Monday, more than a dozen police trucks with four water cannon vehicles were deployed near the Sule Pagoda in central Yangon, which has been one of the main sites for protests in the commercial capital.



The government and army could not be reached for comment.



Shortly after midnight, residents reported an internet outage. All four telecommunications networks were inaccessible from about 1 a.m. on Monday (1830GMT), they said. In the early days after the coup, the internet was cut across the country.



The army has been carrying out nightly arrests and on Saturday gave itself sweeping powers to detain people and search private property.





Soldiers are stationed in front of the Central Bank in Yangon, Myanmar, 15 February 2021. EPA-Yonhap



"It's as if the generals have declared war on the people," U.N. Special Rapporteur Tom Andrews said on Twitter.



"Late night raids; mounting arrests; more rights stripped away; another Internet shutdown; military convoys entering communities. These are signs of desperation. Attention generals: You WILL be held accountable."



Western embassies - from the European Union, Britain, Canada and 11 other nations - issued a statement late on Sunday calling on security forces to "refrain from violence against demonstrators and civilians, who are protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government".



The U.S embassy in Myanmar earlier urged American citizens to "shelter in place", citing reports of the military movements in Yangon. It also warned there was a possibility of a telecoms interruptions overnight between 1:00 a.m. and 9:00 a.m.



"Internet shutdown in #Myanmar now in effect again across all major operators, reportedly until 09:00," Alex Warofka, product policy manager for human rights and freedom of expression at Facebook, said in a post on Twitter after the internet went down.





Protestors hold placards during a protest against the military coup outside the Russian Embassy in Yangon, Myanmar, 14 February 2021. EPA-Yonhap



Civil Disobedience



In the latest sign of disruption by workers, the Department of Civil Aviation said in a statement many staff had stopped coming to work since Feb. 8, causing delays to international flights.



A pilot, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution, said hundreds of staff from the department were striking.



Soldiers were surrounding the international airport in Yangon late on Sunday night, he said.



Trains in parts of the country also stopped running after staff refused to go to work, domestic media reported.





A protester holding a placard poses next to a military vehicle filled with troops parked along a street in downtown Yangon on February 15, 2021, the morning after Myanmar's military cut the nation's internet and deployed extra troops around the country. AFP-Yonhap
Even though their prosecution failed to deliver a conviction, both lawmakers said they hope to turn their newfound prominence into gains for their constituents as President Biden barrels forward with an ambitious agenda for economic stimulus and other overhauls. And in interviews after the trials conclusion, both said they were conscious of their roles as among the few Black lawmakers who took part in an impeachment of a former president whose race-baiting and anti-immigration stances helped create deep divisions in the country.

It certainly was not lost on me that in moments during the trial, as I stood there, or as Stacey, my friend, stood there in the well of the Senate, there are only four or less  depending on whether the senators were in the room  Black elected officials in the room, Mr. Neguse said in an interview. That is certainly unique. I think Stacey and I both worked really hard to do justice in terms of honoring the experiences of so many people of color that day.

Both of their careers were already marked with notations for the history books: Mr. Neguse, 36, is the youngest impeachment manager in the countrys history, while Ms. Plaskett, 54, is the first delegate from an American territory to hold the role. They are just the second pair of Black lawmakers to hold the role.

Theres always a different level of pressure on Black members of Congress to make sure that were carrying ourselves in a way that represents the district, the community and the struggles of those who have come before us, said Representative Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat of New York and one of the first two Black impeachment managers, along with Representative Val B. Demings, Democrat of Florida, during Mr. Trumps first impeachment trial. Joe Neguse and Stacey Plaskett shouldered that burden in an extraordinary way.
A winter storm warning has been issued for much of Central New York as 8 to 12 inches of snow is expected to fall on Monday and Tuesday, according to the National Weather Service.

The warning was issued for portions of Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga, Madison and Cortland counties. It is expected to last from 10 a.m. Monday through 4 p.m. Tuesday.

About an inch of snow is expected to fall during the day on Monday with heavier snow moving in on Monday night and into Tuesday morning, according to the National Weather Service. The snow should stop falling by late Tuesday morning or early Tuesday afternoon, the National Weather Service said.

Forecasters for the National Weather Service have said Central New York could see two winter storms this week, with the second being a bigger storm than the first.

Got a tip, comment or story idea? Contact Chris Libonati via the Signal app for encrypted messaging at 585-290-0718, by phone at the same number, by email or on Twitter.
GOOSE CREEK  The days of Goose Creek being a bedroom community are long gone.

Since its incorporation 60 years ago, this Berkeley County city has evolved from a small town with strong military ties into the eighth-largest municipality in the state.

That means since 2010, Goose Creek has become one of the fastest-growing cities in South Carolina, adding more than 10,000 new residents in a 10-year span.

The population is expected to spurt past the 50,000 mark by 2024.

How Goose Creek officials handle the citys rapid growth over the next decade will determine its future. Its why this years 10-year comprehensive plan might be the most critical in the citys history.

Its as important as anything weve done because it will be a blueprint for what we want the city to become, Mayor Greg Habib said.

South Carolina requires each city to produce a comprehensive plan every 10 years. Each plan is then updated after five years. The goal of the 10-year plan is to provide a framework for the citys future.

In the past, Goose Creek had treated its comprehensive plan as little more than a formality  a requirement by law that was quickly forgotten.

That apathetic attitude is not an option this time.

We are going to have to figure out a way to balance all that growth and maintain the quality of life that has made Goose Creek so popular, City Councilwoman Gayla McSwain said.

The city has invested more than $150,000 and used the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments and TSW, an Atlanta-based community consulting firm, to help shape its vision of what the city will look like. Traffic, affordable housing and recreational opportunities are all priorities.

But first and foremost, Goose Creek is searching for an identity. Summerville, North Charleston and Hanahan, which border Goose Creek, have been able to carve out their own personalities. Habib admits Goose Creek is playing catch-up. The city must move beyond being a bedroom community.

Creating a walkable city

One of the most effective ways for Goose Creek to establish its own, unique identity is to create a distinct downtown.

Goose Creeks neighbors in Summerville and North Charleston have thriving downtown communities. A survey conducted by the city found that 93 percent of Goose Creek residents work outside the city limits. Nearly as many dine or shop outside of the city at least twice a week.

Habib and the City Council want those dollars to stay inside its boundaries. One of the citys top priorities will be to establish a distinctive downtown area where residents can shop and eat.

This is not a new idea; its been talked about for years, but Habib and members of the council are committed to building a downtown brand for the city.

We dont have a walkable downtown area, Habib said. I think people and municipalities are realizing how important a downtown area can be, and we think its a realistic project.

Since only 3 percent of the land within the current city limits is vacant, a downtown area will almost certainly have to come from a revitalization effort. There are several aging shopping centers within the city that can be transformed into such a space, similar to what happened in North Charleston with Park Circle.

Were not going to tear things down, said Mark Brodeur, the citys planning and zoning director. This wont be a development project, but a redevelopment and revitalization project. Having a walkable downtown has been a common theme among many of our residents.

Habibs vision for a downtown area would only take up a few blocks, with a hotel anchoring one end of the development and shops, restaurants and a theater or stage on the other.

Were not talking about 100 acres, Habib said. Its not something thats going to be huge.

It also wont happen overnight. The key to creating a downtown will be having a mayor and council members in the future committed to such a venture. Brodeur, who has worked as a city planner for municipalities in Arizona, California and Oregon, said plans he developed in the 1980s are only now finally coming to realization.

You have to have a group of people in government and in the private sector that want this to happen, Brodeur said. It wont happen tomorrow or next year, but you have to continue to move it forward.

The city has already started to attract businesses with the concept of a town center. The Creek City Grill & Brewery  Goose Creeks first brewery  is set to open in the second quarter of 2021.

The Cityvolve group, which helped convert the old fire station on Button Hall Road to a brewery, has plenty of experience developing areas into financial dynamos. Cityvolve was heavily involved in developing Park Circle.

The hope is that the new brewery will be a catalyst for other commercial development in the area. Theres already a commercial real estate project in the works down the road from the old fire station.

Renovating the old fire station and turning the Button Hall Road area into another Park Circle isnt out of the question.

Hopefully, the brewery and restaurants will be one of those early building blocks that can lead to a longer-term vision for the city, said Jeff Baxter, a partner in Cityvolve, a North Charleston real estate development group.

Its an idea that appeals to many of the new, younger residents who have found affordable housing in Goose Creek.

If you want to go out and get something to eat or shop, you almost always have to leave the city, said Joshua Martin, 25, who works at the nearby Naval Weapons Station. I would love to be able walk to a local restaurant or shop at a local store.

The idea of revitalizing and updating aging shopping centers makes sense for the environment, too. A walkable downtown would take cars off the road, thus reducing traffic, which is a top concern for most residents.

If you dont have to get in your car and go to Summerville or North Charleston you reduce traffic, said Jason Crowley of the Coastal Conservation League. Goose Creek seems to be focusing inwardly and thats the smart approach. They are trying to create a downtown area organically and not force the issue. I think in 10 years people are going to say I cant believe what this place has become.

Annexation and doughnut holes

A map of Goose Creek looks like a partisan, gerrymandered political district. The 41 square miles zigzag south to the Cooper River and north and west to Summerville and unincorporated Ladson.

There are pockets of unincorporated areas  known as doughnut holes  sprinkled throughout the city limits. Providing basic services to the residents of these doughnut holes can be a confusing endeavor due to complex jurisdictional issues.

Doughnut holes are not only an issue for Goose Creek but also for many cities across the state as municipalities continue expanding their borders to accommodate growth.

One of the goals of the comprehensive plan is try to consolidate the citys boundaries.

Some of the citys boundaries just dont make sense, said Councilwoman Hannah Cox. Goose Creek High School is not in the city limits. Theres an apartment complex in Crowfield Plantation thats not in the city, while the rest of the neighborhood is in the city. There doesnt seem to be any rhyme or reason to it.

The best and easiest solution to doughnut holes is annexation.

Annexation can happen in three ways:

The 100 percent rule: All of the property owners must agree to be annexed. This usually happens when theres only one property owner for one parcel of land up for annexation.

The 75 percent rule: In a community where there are many owners, three-fourths of them must be in favor of annexation.

The 25 percent rule: A quarter of the owners can petition for a special election where the annexation is placed on a ballot.

Also, a property must be connected to a municipalitys border for it to be annexed.

Some of the prime doughnut hole candidates for annexation are older neighborhoods such as Devin Forest, Beverly Hills, communities adjacent to Red Bank Road and north of the Century Aluminum complex.

A lot of those communities are being impacted by what we do but dont have a say in what we do, Habib said. Wed love to see them come into the city, but were going to do our due diligence and be deliberate about it.

Some of the residents in those areas want no part of Goose Creek. Jackie Adams, who lives on Thurgood Road near JW Aluminum, said the additional services offered by the city wouldnt make up for the increase in taxes.

Wed have to pay city and county taxes and right now were just paying county taxes, Adams said. There would also be too many restrictions. The city would get to tell me what I could and couldnt do with my property, and we like our community the way it is.

Annexing mega subdivisions that border the town, like Cane Bay, would not make financial sense, Habib said.

It would be a financial disaster because Cane Bay is an established community, Habib said. Wed have to provide basic services for 5,000 additional residents immediately, and we don't have the resources to do that.

Annexing nearby Nexton would be a better option but unlikely.

You want to annex a neighborhood or development that you can grow with, Cox said. Nexton would make sense because its not built out yet, but they have to want to come into the city, and Im not sure thats realistic.

The strategy of filling in doughnut holes within the city limits instead of taking on the mega developments makes sense on several levels, Crowley said.

A few years ago, there was this rush by cities to go after big developments, but I think cities are realizing that there are some serious financial repercussions, Crowley said. Goose Creek is being deliberate in their annexation, which makes sense.

Final recommendations will be made to City Council in March, and the comprehensive plan approved this summer.


After arresting 21-year-old Bengaluru activist, Delhi police on Monday issued a warrant against Bombay High Court lawyer Nikita Jacob who, they said, was involved in creating the toolkit that was ultimately shared by environmental activist Greta Thunburg on Twitter. Besides Jacob, police is also looking out for another activist Shantanu.

Jacob has moved the Bombay high court for interim protection against police action. Her lawyer sought an urgent circulation and the HC has posted the matter for hearing on Tuesday.

The toolkit tweeted by Thunberg sought to lay down different ways people could participate in the ongoing farmers' protest. The first one included references to "tweet storms" on or before Republic Day, and protests around Indian missions. She deleted this version before uploading another one, saying the earlier document was "outdated".

Sources told News18 that MO Dhaliwal, founder of Poetic Justice Foundation, contacted Jacob through his colleague Puneet with a motive to "create a Twitter storm ahead of Republic Day".

"There was a Zoom meeting too before January 26, which was attended by Dhaliwal, Jacob and Ravi among others. They also spoke about the death of a farmer. Since Ravi knew Thunberg, she was taken onboard," sources said.

They further said that four days ago a special cell tea, went to Jacob's house and her electronic gadgets were examined. Delhi police told that they would visit again to question her but the next day she was found absconding, the sources said.

Ravi was arrested from Bengaluru by a Cyber Cell team of the Delhi Police on Saturday for allegedly sharing with Swedish teen campaigner the "toolkit" related to the farmers' protest against the Centre's three agri laws. The police claimed Ravi was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and a "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination. She and others "collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State", police alleged. At a mahapanchayat held at Indri in Karnal district of Haryana, SKM leaders warned that the BJP's days are "numbered as more and more farmers are getting awakened".
Somewhere out there, there's an amazingly sinister story to be told about what happened in the series of events on Jan. 6 leading up to impeachment.

Because fresh after the slapdash, failed second impeachment of President Trump, the New York Times has withdrawn the rawest element of its story: the anonymously sourced claim that Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick was killed by one of President Trump's supporters who hurled a fire extinguisher at him. Trump, recall, was declared "a murderer" for it, with "Trump's legal exposure questioned" for it, as USAToday reported.

Here's how bad that New York Times retraction was, as reported by Red State:

If you search for the original NYT story today, you find the following "Note" now at the top: UPDATE: New information has emerged regarding the death of the Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick that questions the initial cause of his death provided by officials close to the Capitol Police. Julie Strong at American Greatness has been aggressively pursuing this story for weeks, and two days ago she published a column that noted efforts by media outlets  including the NYT  to slowly back away from narrative created by the early reporting done by the NYT and acknowledging that the cause of Sicknick's death was still undetermined. (We've also reported on CNN's about-face here.)

That's the rawest element thus spewed in the impeachment fiasco  that Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick was murdered by President Trump's supporters with a fire extinguisher.

Revolver has an account that Sicknick was alive and well as the riot went on and, creepily enough, reported dead before his death happened. His family was taking calls from the press about it, and at the time, they had every reason to think he was alive. If that's true, something really sinister may be going on.

Recall also that Sicknick's death, which wasn't from a fire extinguisher, but now "due to injuries sustained while on duty," drew a huge, massive funeral, with the man lying in state in the Capitol. The unprecedented show was held that way as a means to advance the narrative that Trump was a killer. Joe Biden attended (and advanced a mendacious narrative, as Andrea Widburg notes). You can bet he won't put on such a show next time another police officer is killed by either a leftist or a criminal. According to PBS, citing the Associated Press:

The 42-year-old officer was only the fifth person to lie in honor in the Capitol Rotunda, a designation for those who are not elected officials, judges or military leaders. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, along with their spouses, paid their respects during two days of visitation Tuesday and Wednesday, as did members of Congress and his fellow law enforcement officers.

This sounds pretty Potemkin. Meanwhile, according to USAToday:

The death of U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick is being investigated as a homicide by federal and local authorities  a development that raises the stakes of an already sprawling investigation into possible crimes committed during the violent security breach at the Capitol. The federal officer's death widens the net on who could face severe charges after a mob of pro-Trump rioters stormed the Capitol Wednesday. It also has raised questions about President Donald Trump's possible legal exposure after he leaves office for any role he may have played in inciting the surge. Acting Attorney General Jeff Rosen said the Justice Department "will spare no resources in investigating and holding accountable those responsible" for Sicknick's death. An official with knowledge of the matter said any criminal charges related to the officer's death will be federal because the events leading up to it happened on federal property.

As Revolver reports, there's been no Justice Department report. No autopsy. Sicknick's remains were swiftly cremated, meaning no additional autopsies, no additional questions, and maybe someone wanted it that way.

The press seems to have been complicit. As I noted here, a CNN reporter reportedly danced with glee with a known leftist rioter who's since been arrested for acts at the Capitol, shouting, "We did it!" with him, which if true suggests some kind of complicity. Someone needs to start answering questions about that.

Now the Times gets rid of its bad reporting, post-impeachment, when it no longer matters, claiming that its two official sources somehow had bad information. Who the hell were these bounders? A good reporter would get rid of bad sources like a bad penny based on how they damaged his credibility, but not these guys  they continue to protect them. The Times doesn't really care about what this stuff does to their credibility based on this behavior. Yet if they were real journalists, they'd get to the bottom of this and really report how they had been used by creeps spreading false information for political gain. What were their bad sources' motives? Were they worthy as sources or political operatives with an agenda? But this is being hidden in that hope-to-not-be-noticed "oopsie note" at the top of their lower-than-tabloid mendacious story.

Besides the strange role of those two, another third weird one was the Wall Street Journal editorial page swiftly calling for impeachment of Trump in the aftermath of the Capitol riot because of its "transparency." What was with that speed? Were they really that naive?

The press malfeasance is striking here. So is the narrative they all promoted. Now that the claims about how Sicknick died have been junked, why, really, did Brian Sicknick die? Anybody asking? It sure as hell wasn't the fire extinguisher.

Where was he when he died  on the floor of the Capitol or in his office? There are two sets of reports. Why were his remains reportedly cremated so quickly? Revolver reports that he must have instead died of a stroke, but I think this looks so bad that it shouldn't be ruled out that someone connected to these Trump-hating forces could have killed him in order to pin the crime on Trump. They hate cops, after all. Could that have happened? It ought to be investigated. The only thing we are getting from this failed impeachment is evidence and suggestions that there's some kind of cover-up going on  a lot of information Trump-haters are desperate to never see the light of day.

The cover-up extends to another problem that points to some kind of conspiracy and demands an investigation. Shortly after the fire extinguisher story went out, an innocent citizen was nearly framed for it.

There was this incident where an innocent retired Chicago firefighter was falsely accused of hurling the extinguisher, based on a strange doctored photo where the insignia in the man's cap was altered.

As I noted earlier:

According to The Patch of Chicago: The retired Chicago firefighter from Mount Greenwood  whom social media trolls called a "terrorist" and accused of fatally wielding a fire extinguisher that killed a cop as a mob of Trump-supporting insurrectionists stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6  was grocery shopping and celebrating his wife's birthday in Chicago, Patch has learned. Twitter exploded with unsubstantiated claims Tuesday that Quintavalle  who retired from the fire department in 2016 after 32 years  was the bearded "#extinguisherman" in a surveillance video wearing a "CFD" stocking cap wanted for questioning and "soon to be arrested" by the FBI regarding the fatal beating of U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick. Quintavalle had all his receipts and proofs. But this is how the left's rush to judgment went for him: By Tuesday night, Quintavalle began getting angry calls from people saying he's a "f------ murderer" who belongs in jail. TV news reporters had staked out his house. Chicago police dispatched a patrol car to keep watch overnight, as well, his lawyer said. Some folks got ridiculed for tweeting that Quintavalle wasn't "the guy" and his facial features don't match those of the man wanted for questioning by the FBI. One post claimed that tweets disputing Quintavalle's involvement in the U.S. Capitol insurrection were pushed by trolling Twitter "bots with practically no followers coming out of the woodwork."

How does something that strange start, reportedly with bots? And what a coincidence that it happened in Chicago, home of the Jussie Smollett hoax and the Chicago way. Any chance there someone might try to pin something on Trump and frame an innocent Chicago man from a sector unpopular with the left to advance the narrative? Someone needs to ask.

The Journal's hasty Jan. 7 editorial demanding President Trump's resignation or, if not that, then impeachment was ironic, given its claims as to why:

Impeachment has the virtue of being transparent and politically accountable. If there were enough votes to convict in the Senate, it would also seem less partisan. The best case for impeachment is not to punish Mr. Trump. It is to send a message to future Presidents that Congress will protect itself from populists of all ideological stripes willing to stir up a mob and threaten the Capitol or its Members.

Transparency is precisely the opposite of what we have gotten from this slapdash rush-to-judgment impeachment. We now have a whole slew of questions post-impeachment that demand answers. Why did the Times (and apparently CNN) run the phony story? How did Sicknick die? And biggest of all, is this sinister series of events the evidence in pinpoints pointing to a conspiracy to frame Trump? We've seen some spectacular conspiracies come out of the woodwork from Trump's enemies desperate to take him down in the past. It's time that this one got investigated, too.

Image: Screen shot from PBS video via shareable YouTube.

Chris and Sarah Fryer, founders of plant-powered vegan pie company, Magpye

Looking back on the events of the past year, its incredible to think how many businesses have managed to survive during this seemingly unending period of uncertainty.

Yet survive they have. In fact, some have even thrived - particularly those who have adapted their businesses for online trade.

Chris Fryer and his wife Sarah have been some of the lucky few to see their business succeed despite rolling lockdowns and its all thanks to one well known website (and the delicious pies they sell, of course).

Here, Chris reveals all about his booming food company, Magpye, and how hes been able to take it from a small local business to roaring national success.

A recipe for success

From chick'n & chorizno to chick'n, leek & bacun, there's a whole world of greener, meat-free and mouthwateringly good alternatives to our favourite pies at Magpye

Back in 2018, 38-year-old Chris and his wife, who are based in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, were getting tired of their careers; Chris was a full-time teacher, while Sarah was a medical secretary.

Inspired by their longing for change, their minds were primed for any opportunity. Thats when they realised there was a big gap in the market that might be the chance theyd been waiting for.

Ive been vegan (or at least vegetarian!) for about 25 years, while my wife Sarah was brought up as a vegetarian, so she has never known anything different, says Chris. But we both felt that there was a bit of a gap in the market when it came to great vegan food. We could never find the comfort food that reminded us of our childhood that we really wanted.

We both felt this was our opportunity to try something new.

After a year of experimenting with different flavours and recipes in their kitchen, the Fryers launched Magpye - a vegan pie company specialising in comfort food.

From steak and ale pies which taste as good as their real meat equivalent, to Chriss personal favourite, roasted butternut squash and brussel sprout pie, there are plenty of indulgent, plant-powered pies to choose from - and theyre all handmade.

In its earliest days back in spring 2019, Magpye sold its first pies out of a converted horsebox trailer, which Chris and Sarah took to events around the local area.

We started selling our piping hot pies with mash out of the trailer and I still worked part-time to make ends meet. We didnt have a website at all, just relied on passing trade.

But when the pandemic hit, it was decision time - would the Fryers hit pause on the business or take a gamble to keep it going?

Having their pie - and eating it!

From horsebox trailer to online business, Magpye has gone from strength to strength since it began its online presence

Taking a small business online may seem daunting to fledgling entrepreneurs. But Chris and Sarah have reaped the rewards by doing so and can now rely on Magpye for their sole income - and its all thanks to GoDaddy.

Chris says: Once it became clear in mid to late March 2020 what was about to happen with coronavirus, that was when we decided it was time to set up a website.

As Magpye grew, Chris purchased a domain name for it from GoDaddy with the view of eventually creating an online arm to the company. But with global events taking a turn for the worst, this move had to come a little quicker than planned.

Fortunately, it was a low-risk gamble - and setting up a GoDaddy website was surprisingly quick and easy to do.

When we came to setting up a website, I went to check on the domain and learnt that GoDaddy had a website builder advertised with a months free trial, he reveals. Before I knew it, Id signed up and I was really happy with how it worked. And as it was a months free trial, I had nothing to lose giving it a go.

It took us all of a morning to build Magpyes website back in March and weve changed very little since building it, he continues. We were so pleased with it that after the free trial we signed up for their Websites + Marketing ecommerce product and havent looked back.

GoDaddys Websites + Marketing ecommerce product allows you to build a professional looking website quickly and easily - regardless of your technical experience.

You also have access to a range of tools to help you manage your social media posts as well as templates to create professional-looking posts for different platforms, making managing your social presence a little more straightforward.

But it has a whole host of other nifty features too, such as its online store management facility.

For Chris, this particular tool has been a godsend.

When we first launched the Magpye website, it was just for local delivery in and around Newcastle; people would order pies and wed deliver them every weekend. So using the GoDaddy online store, we found it was really easy to add products, monitor your stock levels, process your orders  it just makes it all really simple.

What we also really liked is that theres an option to download a spreadsheet that goes into granular details of your stocks and orders, Chris continues. Its a great way of keeping track without spending the time doing it yourself. Its ideal for online business newbies.

Easy as pie

After the success of their pies in their hometown, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Chris and Sarah decided to take Magpye national

Starting your own enterprise has many challenges, so having a platform such as GoDaddy to do a lot of the hard work for you is so valuable. It also helps boost your visibility, helping business go from local entities to national success stories.

This is exactly what happened with Magpye.

With GoDaddy, Chris and Sarah could see how their orders and profits were soaring month by month. This, combined with the amazing feedback they were getting from their Newcastle customers, gave them the confidence they needed to start delivering Magpyes vegan pies throughout the UK.

Since then, trade has skyrocketed and Magpye has made and delivered 14,000 handmade pies across the country - and the orders keep coming.

For those looking to set up a business of their own, in the current climate or in the future, Chris can't recommend GoDaddy enough.

'To sum up what we love about GoDaddy, it has to be the speed and the simplicity of it all  not just the website building but how it enables us to manage orders so efficiently. It helps us concentrate doing what we do best  making pies!

'I absolutely recommend it for anyone looking to start an online business. We pay about 29.99 a month which includes all the ecommerce and marketing stuff, website management, social media management etc. So for less than a tenner a week its quite good value.'

With GoDaddy, the future for Magpye is looking bright too.

Chris says: 'Were excited about the future for Magpye. We currently have a TV advert with GoDaddy which were hoping will help us on our way to becoming the UKs no.1 vegan pie producer  thats now our main aim!'
Two new locally-acquired cases of coronavirus have been found in Melbourne, as Victoria continues its strict Stage Four lockdown.

The two cases are close household contacts of a previously confirmed case linked to the Holiday Inn at Melbourne Airport, with the hotel's cluster now at 18.

The entire state of Victoria was plunged into lockdown on Friday, with the tough restrictions originally set to be lifted on Wednesday at 11.59pm - but premier Daniel Andrews has refused to say if this will go ahead.

The Melbourne Airport Holiday Inn (pictured) Covid-19 cluster has grown to 18 after new cases of coronavirus were reported on Tuesday

Meanwhile, a 'hot hotel' in central Melbourne where COVID-19 infected guests are housed is being evacuated as water damage from a sprinkler system is repaired.

On the fourth day of Victoria's snap lockdown, 31 residents of the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane will be moved on Tuesday after an incident three days ago.

A sprinkler system was activated on the hotel's fourth floor on Saturday, resulting in water damage to half of the eight levels.

The residents and staff will be transferred to the Pullman Albert Park Hotel, which COVID-19 Quarantine Victoria planned to bring online as an additional site after recently housing Australian Open participants.

'(It) was assessed by ventilation experts and determined as the most suitable hotel within CQV's current hotel stock to accommodate symptomatic and positive residents,' a spokeswoman said.

'Strict infection prevention and control measures will be followed during the transfer to ensure the health and safety of residents, staff and the community.'

Returned travellers quarantining at the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane in central Melbourne will be evacuated on Tuesday while a water damaged sprinkler system is repaired. Pictured, police outside the hotel

Victoria Police are pictured outside the Holiday Inn on Flinders Lane. Half of the hotel's eight levels suffered water damage after the sprinkler system was activated

Authorities are yet to rule out an extension to the five-day shutdown due to end on Wednesday after Melbourne's Holiday Inn hotel outbreak continued to grow.

Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton is waiting to see more data and concedes further cases stemming from the Melbourne Airport quarantine hotel cluster are reasonably likely to arise in the coming days.

But he indicated they won't necessarily sink Victoria's chances if they are linked to the more than 3000 Victorians who are contacts of confirmed cases and are now isolating.

'We're hoping that all of those would occur in people that have already been identified, already been quarantined and would not generate any more exposure sites,' Prof Sutton told ABC radio on Monday.

Residents and staff of the Holiday Inn in Flinders Lane will be transferred to the Pullman Albert Park Hotel. Pictured, police outside the hotel on Tuesday

'That's the critical thing. We don't want new cases to emerge where we hear that they've been to multiple public areas or gatherings.

'That's, in essence, the reason for this five-day short, sharp lockdown.'

Premier Daniel Andrews says while he's not yet in a position to confirm the lockdown will end as planned on Wednesday the state is 'well placed'.

'However, I've never been one to try and make bold predictions. We just have to take this one hour at a time, one day at a time,' he said on Monday.

Overnight, a Melbourne fruit market was added to Victoria's growing list of coronavirus exposure sites.

A Covid-infected customer attended Sacca's Fruit World at Broadmeadows Central in Melbourne's north between 12.30pm and 1pm on Tuesday February 9.

The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has identified the venue as a Tier 1 exposure site - meaning all shoppers who were there over the same time frame must quarantine at home.

'Anyone who visited here during these times must isolate, test and remain isolated for 14 days,' DHHS said overnight.
Posted Monday, February 15, 2021 8:37 am

The coronavirus pandemic has stolen a precious year from Abby Rosenblum and her mother.

After the adult family home in Seattle's Blue Ridge neighborhood where her 87-year-old mother, Anne Adams, lives barred visitors last spring because of COVID-19, Rosenblum relied on the bed of a pickup truck to get to a high enough point from where she could her mother through a window.

Rosenblum, like so many others, is pinning her hopes of seeing her mother again  to hug her mother again  on a COVID-19 vaccine.

"For the past year, I've climbed up on this old pickup truck that's parked under her window one and a half stories up," Rosenblum said.

The coronavirus pandemic has kept loved ones apart far longer than many expected, and in doing so, changed the ways people interact with not only casual relationships but also our most intimate connections.

The collective pent-up frustration and pain of this lost year is heightened now that vaccines are not only inoculating people against the virus but also delivering a boost of optimism. People are now able to envision hugging their families, playing with grandchildren and doing things that seemed so commonplace before the coronavirus tore across the globe.

That optimism is tempered by guidance from public health professionals and scientists about what people can expect post-inoculation.

"The vaccine is not a, you know, VIP path to stop wearing masks or, you know, social distancing in the community," said Dr. Seth Cohen, medical director for infection prevention at the University of Washington Medical Center. "I do think it's a huge step forward as part of our exit strategy, but the challenge is that our community rates are just too high to let down our guard right now."

A major limiting factor for vaccinated people wanting to jump back into the world is if they can still be infected and asymptomatic, giving them the ability to transmit the virus.

"Just because you're vaccinated doesn't mean that you're safe for your loved ones," said Dr. Angela Shen, a visiting research scientist at the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. "The vaccine protects you, but we're not sure whether or not it prevents infection. And so you should wait until your loved ones are vaccinated before seeing them."

Until the pace of vaccinations increases, public health officials are urging people, vaccinated and not vaccinated, to continue to wear masks, social distance from others, practice good hand hygiene and avoid gathering with people outside your pandemic bubble.

Washington is still not meeting the state Department of Health's goal of vaccinating 45,000 people a day. The seven-day average was at 26,479 doses given per day as of Feb. 8.

The state is in the Phase 1B category for vaccinations, which is for people 65 and older and those 50 and older living in multigenerational households. This group accounts for about 1.7 million people, equating to 3.4 million doses that have to be done before moving to the next phases.

There is hope that the pace of vaccinations will increase. On Wednesday, DOH officials said they can now plan vaccinations more than one week in advance because the federal government is forecasting allocations of vaccine three weeks in advance.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease doctor, was asked during a CNN town hall late last month if a person has had one dose of the two-dose Moderna vaccine could they travel to visit their grandchildren.

The first of two doses of the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines does provide some protection but that the maximum efficacy only happens 10 to 14 days after receiving the second dose, Fauci said.

"We don't want people to think because they got vaccinated that other public health recommendations just don't apply," Fauci said.

Rosenblum is inching closer to being with her mother without a window between them. Her mother received her first dose of vaccine Feb. 1 and is scheduled for her second dose Feb. 22.

Despite her mother being vaccinated, Rosenblum knows the wait might drag on because she is a healthy 63-year-old who might not be vaccinated for some time. But, once the adult family home allows visitors, she will double mask, stay six feet from her mother and hope others do the same while visiting loved ones.

"My hope is that I'll be able to visit her in her room after she's got her second vaccination," she said. "My fear is that that's not a good idea because I'm not vaccinated."
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Texas lawmakers will almost certainly be back for a rare special legislative session in the fall now that the U.S. Census Bureau has set a September deadline for releasing the 2020 census results.

Facing significant holdups in finalizing the decennial count, the bureau announced Friday that the detailed population numbers needed to redraw legislative and congressional districts to reflect the states growth in the last decade will be delivered by Sept. 30, a months-long delay that could upend the next set of elections for seats from Congress down to local offices.

The bureaus original plan was to get the data in lawmakers hands as soon as this month, giving them time to rejigger district boundaries and decipher Texans representation during the regular 2021 legislative session. But the census typical timeline was repeatedly upended by the coronavirus pandemic and interference from the Trump administration.

If this were a typical decade, we would be on the verge of delivering the first round of redistricting data from the 2020 Census, James Whitehorne, chief of the bureaus redistricting and voting rights data office, said in a statement. Our original plan was to deliver the data in state groupings starting Feb. 18, 2021 and finishing by March 31, 2021. However, COVID-19 delayed census operations significantly.

Instead, the bureau is still working to release the population numbers that determine how many congressional seats are apportioned to each state by April 30  blowing past the legal deadline for those numbers by many months. Census officials previously indicated the second set of more detailed numbers needed for redistricting wouldnt be available until after July.

The current timetable puts the data delivery far past the end of the 2021 legislative session on May 31, meaning Gov. Greg Abbott would need to call lawmakers back for legislative overtime in the fall.

Congressional and state House and Senate districts need to be reconfigured before the 2022 elections to account for the states explosive growth in the last 10 years.

Estimates show Texas has grown by more than 4.2 million residents since 2010, which could garner it up to three additional congressional seats that will need to be added to the states map. Because the states growth has been concentrated in the urban centers and suburban communities, the populations of existing districts are significantly uneven.

The census delays have taken the steam out of the ongoing legislative session during which the politically fraught redistricting process was expected to dominate lawmakers agendas, along with the state budget and the states response to the pandemic.

Still, the state is expected to end up back in court over its eventual mapmaking  potentially beginning with fights over whether the Legislature is constitutionally allowed to redraw state legislative political maps after a regular session and extending into lawmakers treatment of voters of color.

Decade after decade, the state has faced allegations  and subsequent federal court rulings  that lawmakers discriminated against those voters, intentionally working to dilute the power of their votes, in drawing up political maps.

That sort of legal wrangling pushed the 2012 primary elections back by more than two months even without any census-related delays at the time. Under the states current schedule, the filing deadline for candidates hoping to be on the 2021 primary ballot is Dec. 13.

The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.


EIR LEAD EDITORIAL FOR MONDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2021

Lyndon LaRouche: Livestream Memorial on Second Anniversary of His Death Bespeaks a Talent Well Spent

By Diane Sare

Feb. 14 , 2021 (EIRNS)February 12, 2021 marked the second anniversary of the death of Americas greatest statesman and philosopher Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr, who passed away on Abraham Lincolns birthday in 2019 at the age of 96. The LaRouche Organization and the Schiller Institute, founded by his wife Helga Zepp-LaRouche, commemorated that day with a 19-hour livestream of Lyndon LaRouches speeches and lectures, which opened and concluded with the powerful memorial concert which was held in New York City on June 8 in the year of his death.

The livestream featured some of LaRouches most critical, history-changing interventionsbut to those who knew him and his legacy, far more than 19 hours would be required to revisit even a fraction of the speeches and classes he gave that changed history. In that regard, Lyn was a true scientist, always challenging the prevailing assumptions of the day, including his own, and developing a higher hypothesis.

To those who began watching, at whatever point in the day-long event, it was nearly impossible to tear myself away, said several of LaRouches associates, this author included. Allowing oneself to spend hours in the presence of such a mind through this video tour was a welcome and joyful contrast to the treasonous and deceitful spectacle taking place in the United States Senate of the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump, which finally ended in the expected acquittal, but continues in the press.

Equally disturbing are the recent comments of the Strategic Command Commander Adm. Charles Richard, about the necessity to prepare for the possibility of nuclear war, and the continued demonization of Russia and China. LaRouche would see the new COVID relief bill as a sick joke, and just a further vindication of his 1996 Triple Curve/Typical Collapse Function, which was illustrated in the penultimate video of the day.

Even after watching only a few minutes of Lyndon LaRouche and/or hearing from others of the profound effect he had on their lives, it is clear that the United States suffers greatly from the lack of such inspired leadership as LaRouche embodied for decades, including emphatically throughout his eight presidential election campaigns. And it continues to suffer because of his unjust, five-year imprisonment as a political prisoner, and the fact that he has not been exonerated to this day.

As Helga Zepp-LaRouche described her late husband in her introduction to her video statement for the LaRouche Legacy Foundation, dedicated to publishing all his writings, Lyndon LaRouche from the beginning, developed an analysis of what went wrong with the system, on the one side, and the necessary solution on the other:
Under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act, the Small Business Administration (SBA) let businesses apply for loans under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). Through forgiveness of PPP loans, these businesses could have portions of the loan proceeds used toward eligible costs forgiven in full.

While the applications for PPP loans closed in August 2020, some recent revisions in its provisions allow businesses to apply for a new PPP loan. But applicants wanting to apply for the new loan must do so by March 31.

For existing loans, the program also allows borrowers to apply for loan forgiveness. More than five million loans were issued under the PPP. However, businesses were able to request forgiveness since August.

Related: New Legislation Would Grant Automatic Forgiveness of PPP Loans Under $150,000

Loan forgiveness under PPP

Borrowers can apply for loan forgiveness once they use all loan proceeds for which they are requesting forgiveness. The SBA allows them to apply for forgiveness any time up to the loan's maturity date. However, if borrowers do not avail of it within 10 months after the last date of the covered period, then the loan payments will not be deferred. They will need to start making loan payments to their PPP lender.

Depending on the businesss circumstances, it can apply for loan forgiveness using one of the three loan forgiveness applications. These circumstances include the type of the business, the loan amount, and the reduction in staffing, salary or wages.

Firstly, there is the 3508EZ Form, which is available for self-employed individuals with no employees or those who kept their employees count, and salaries and wages at a specified level.

The second form is Form 3508S for loans of $50,000 or less. Form 3508S makes the process less complicated for eligible applicants and is designed for any businesses that don't qualify in the above categories.

Businesses can get their first draw and second draw PPP loans forgiven. However, during the eight-to-24-week covered period following the loan disbursement, they need to have:

Maintained employee and compensation levels.

Spent the loan proceeds on payroll costs and other eligible expenses.

Spent at least 60% of the proceeds on payroll costs.

For second draw PPP loan forgiveness, they must also ensure that they have maintained employee and compensation levels similar to the requirement for the first draw PPP loan.

Related: How to Obtain an SBA Coronavirus PPP Loan and Have It Forgiven

Applying for loan forgiveness

Businesses must contact their PPP lender and complete the correct form to get their PPP loan forgiven. As mentioned, they can use one of the three forms to do so. They must also compile their documentation that goes with the forgiveness application. These documents can either relate to payroll or non-payroll expenses.

For payroll expenses, the documentation required includes the following:

Bank account statements or other third-party payroll service provider reports. These statements or reports should document the amount of cash compensation paid to employees.

These statements or reports should document the amount of cash compensation paid to employees. Tax forms overlapping with the covered period. These include payroll tax filings reported to the IRS and state quarterly business and individual employee wage reporting and unemployment-insurance tax filings.

These include payroll tax filings reported to the IRS and state quarterly business and individual employee wage reporting and unemployment-insurance tax filings. Payment receipts, canceled checks or account statements. These will document the amount of any employer contributions to employee health insurance and retirement plans included in the forgiveness amount.

For non-payroll expenses, businesses must provide the following documentation:

Copy of lender amortization schedule and receipts or lender account statements for business mortgage payments.

Copy of current lease agreement and receipts or canceled checks for business rent or lease payments.

Copies of invoices and receipts, canceled checks or account statements for business utility payments.

After compiling the required documents, businesses must submit their forgiveness form and documentation to their PPP lender. The lender may request additional documentation, which they must also provide.

The SBA may take some time to approve the forgiveness application. During this time, businesses need to stay in contact with their PPP lender, who notifies the borrower when the SBA takes a review of their loan and the decision it reaches. Businesses also have an option to appeal certain SBA loan review decisions.

Best of luck to everyone trying to keep their company afloat in this extraordinary time.

Related:

What to Know When Applying for a New PPP Loan By March 31

Do You Have to Pay Taxes on Your PPP Loan?

How Does the New Stimulus Package Affect You?



Copyright 2021 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved
The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, has called for the cancellation of the ongoing membership registration and validation exercise of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kwara State.

Mr Mohammed, at a press conference in his hometown, Oro, on Monday, said the officials sent to the state to conduct the exercise have violated the procedure set by the party.

Specifically, he said the committee flouted the guidelines regarding distribution of materials for the exercise.

The guidelines are also clear on how registration materials are to be handed over and distributed. It says officials for the assignment are prohibited from handing over registration forms, other materials inclusive of registration data in a manner not prescribed by the exercise to unauthorized persons, and that the materials (forms, registers and others) are to be distributed directly to the Registration Officers, and records of the distribution are to be captured and reported accordingly, he said.

He demanded the cancellation of the APC Membership Registration Exercise in Kwara State and the putting in place of a process to ensure the conduct of a credible and fair exercise that will enjoy the support and confidence of all.

He also accused the committee of taking sides on the crisis rocking the state chapter of the party by sidelining major stakeholders who worked for the election of Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq.

PREMIUM TIMES had reported how the lingering crisis in the party centred on a rift between Mr AbdulRazaq and a group of party leaders led by Mr Mohammed.

It recently escalated when Bashir Bolarinwa, who is loyal to Mr Mohammed, was removed as the party chairman and replaced with Abdullahi Samari.

Although the national body and executives of the North Central zone of the party have intervened in the matter, they are yet to achieve reconciliation of the warring members.

Observers had warned that the lingering crisis threatened the successful conduct of the membership registration and revalidation exercise which began last Tuesday.

They said if not resolved, the crisis might thwart Mr AbdulRazaqs chances of reelection.

Read the full text of Mr Mohammeds address at the press conference below.

TEXT OF THE PRESS CONFERENCE ADDRESSED BY THE HON. MINISTER OF INFORMATION AND CULTURE, ALHAJI LAI MOHAMMED,ON THE ONGOING APC MEMBERSHIP REGISTRATION EXERCISE IN ORO, KWARA STATE, ON MONDAY, FEB. 15TH 2021

Good morning gentlemen of the press.

2. As you are aware, the All Progressives Congress (APC) membership registration started in Kwara State on Feb. 9th 2021. Ahead of my registration this morning at my polling unit, PU 006, Oro Ward 2, we had sent out our people to monitor the process to ensure compliance with the guidelines stipulated by the party. The reports from our monitoring teams are out, and I wish to inform you, gentlemen, that sadly, the whole exercise did not comply with the stipulated guidelines.

3. The guidelines stipulate consultation with all stakeholders by the Registration Officials from Abuja. After the botched attempt to have a meeting of stakeholders, due to orchestrated violence, the Registration Officials failed to consult with all stakeholders before the commencement of the membership registration exercise, opting instead to work with only one of the four tendencies here in Kwara, the Fagbemi Group to which the Governor belongs, thus excluding the three other tendencies  The Akogun Group, the Gbemi Saraki Group and the Lai Mohammed Group, without which the O To Ge Movement would not have succeeded. Ironically, the Fagbemi Group is the weakest of the four tendencies. Out of the 193 wards in the state, the group has only nine ward chairmen and does not have even one local government chairman. Even at the state EXCO, the Fagbemi group has only four members. Also, the recruitment of officials for the registration has been a one-sided affair and indications are that the hand-picked officials are under strict orders from above as to how to carry out the exercise. We have evidence to corroborate this.

4. The guidelines are also clear on how registration materials are to be handed over and distributed. It says officials for the assignment are prohibited from handing over registration forms, other materials inclusive of registration data in a manner not prescribed by the exercise to unauthorised persons, and that the materials (forms, registers and others) are to be distributed directly to the Registration Officers, and records of the distribution are to be captured and reported accordingly. Well, I regret to say that these particular provision of the guidelines were not complied with. When the Registration Officials from Abuja landed in Ilorin, they simply handed over the registration materials to an individual, not recognised by the provisions of the guidelines, who has decided to hoard them instead of distributing them to the wards (we also have evidence to back this up).

5. The implication is that the registration is being carried out without Party Membership Register, while temporary membership slips, to be signed and detached from the forms after registration, are not being given to those who have purportedly registered. According to our findings, since the commencement of the registration, over 80% of the registration units do not have either membership register or membership registration slip. In the few places where they are available, they are kept in private apartments of some political office holders. In Baruten, the registration materials were handed over to the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, who is from there. In Oyun, the materials were given to one Olayiwola Ojo, a member of the State House of Assembly. In Shao, in Northern Kwara, the registration materials were taken to the police station, where the DPO of that station presided over membership registration, in contravention of the party guidelines. It was only when the people mobilized against the use of the police station for registration that the illegality was stopped. What happened in Shao is the clearest indication yet that the police and other security agencies may be complicit in the mess being made of the membership registration in Kwara State.

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6. Gentlemen, instead of membership registers, conniving registration officials are using exercise books or foolscap sheets to register members. Even senior Kwara government officials and State House of Assembly members were made to write their details in the exercise books or foolscap sheets, in clear violation of the guidelines. We have pictorial and video evidence of this. More worrisome is that members who have purportedly registered are being asked to come back for their registration slips. Till date, no such member has been given the registration slip. Even senior officials of the State Government, including Special Advisers, as well as House of Assembly members, have had to register using exercise books/foolscap sheets (we have video and pictures to corroborate this). Also, due to the shoddy and non-compliant mode of registration, using exercise books and foolscap sheets instead of the membership register, many members are unwilling to submit their personal details via such unsecured and illegal process. The question to ask, gentlemen, is: Where are the Registration Materials that were brought to the state?

7. Now, the membership registration guidelines prohibit any form of discrimination or exclusion of all interested, eligible members of the public during the exercise. However, there seems to be a deliberate policy of exclusion by the Registration Team from Abuja and their collaborators. It seems there is a plan to de-register even high-ranking members and stakeholders who have not only paid their dues in the parry, but without whose contribution this government would not have been in power. For example, at the Registration Unit of Senator Gbemi Saraki, the Hon Minister of State for Transport, which is PU 005 at Ode-Opobiyi in Ajikobi Ward of Ilorin West LGA, not a single registration official has been sighted at the designated point since the commencement of the exercise, not to talk of registration materials. This is the situation in all other places considered to be the stronghold of high-ranking party members. Also in Irepodun, my local government, registration officials only showed up once and disappeared, making it impossible for many members to register. Also, even though the registration exercise was supposed to last two weeks, registration officials only showed up in many registration units for only one day. There is no stronger evidence of deliberate exclusion than this. Also, if the purpose of this registration exercise is to revalidate old members and register new ones, why then are people being prevented from registering? Meanwhile, members across the state who have complained about the non-compliance with the guidelines have been arrested and threatened with prosecution, while many have been beaten up. At the last count, over 100 of our members have had to been bailed from police stations.

8. Gentlemen, since their arrival in Kwara State, the seven-member APC Membership Registration Committee for Kwara, led by Senator John Danboyi, seems to have gone underground. They have not had any useful interaction with lawful members of the State EXCO as well as party leaders and other stakeholders, including Local Government Chairmen and their executives and Ward Chairmen and their executives. These are lawfully-constituted party executives that the registration guidelines stipulate should not only be consulted but carried along during the exercise.

9. It is clear, from what I have enumerated above, that there seems to be a policy to massively disenfranchise/de-register APC members in Kwara State. This has left many members disillusioned.

10. Based on the communication that I have received from APC stakeholders across the state on the report of the monitoring teams, and the glaring non-compliance with the stipulated guidelines for the membership, we, the critical stakeholders of the APC in Kwara State, hereby demand the following:

A)  Immediate cancellation of the APC Membership Registration Exercise in Kwara State and the putting in place of a process to ensure the conduct of a credible and fair exercise that will enjoy the support and confidence of all.

B)  The Immediate disbandment of the Senator John Danboyi-led Membership Registration Committee for Kwara State. A vast majority of the APC stakeholders in the state have lost confidence in the committee.

C)  The constitution of a fresh Membership Registration Committee that is truly independent, non-compromised and sensitive to the delicate diverse interests in the party

D)  A thorough investigation into the botched membership registration exercise by the Senator John Danboyi-led committee.

E)  That these demands are the irreducible minimum requirements for peace and progress in the Kwara APC.

10. Gentlemen, I thank you for your kind attention.


Nicky Berger wants better understanding between food producers and consumers.

Mahurangi farms will open their gates this weekend in a bid to bolster public understanding of the role farmers play and how the food people eat is produced.

Among those participating in the Open Farms NZ event will be Ahuroa sheep and beef farmer Nicky Berger, who founded GrassFed in the City  an organisation dedicated to countering misconceptions about farming and farmers. Ms Berger says many families are increasingly separated from the food they eat and the people who have grown it for them.

As food producers we, too, often feel separated from our consumers, with whom we would love to share the passion we have for growing great food, she says.

Ms Berger says farmers are especially sensitive to the noise on social and mainstream media where anti-farming activists regularly cast doubt on the trusworthiness of farmers and their capacity to take care of the land and animals.

She says entering into arguments on Facebook and Twitter is seldom productive, with people trading angry insults at each other and where those who understand the nuances of the argument tend to tune out. The frustration led to the inaugural Open Farms NZ field day last March. She believes Open Farms is the best way for urban Kiwis to connect with the people who grow their food  giving them a chance to ask all their questions related to land, crops, animals and orchards, plus a chance to show children where their food originates.

Visitors to Dan and Nickys Braeside Farm will have a chance to watch sheep being shorn, talk to the shearer, watch dogs draft lambs through the yards and possibly see a demonstration of drenching.

There will be a woolpit for younger children and a sausage sizzle and cold drink for everyone.

Also participating is Atiu Creek Regional Park, which includes a sheep and cattle farm run by a specialised farming team working alongside park rangers. Atiu Park aims to become a leader in environmentally-sustainable farming. Visitors can sit in a tractor, or see sheep shearing, cattle handling demonstrations, dogs working stock and participate in a self-guided farm walk.

For a rather different experience, visitors can check out Cue Haven in Kaipara. Here a former dairy farm has been restored to native bush for education and enjoyment. Volunteers have planted more than 170,000 native trees and built more than 3kms of walking tracks. Visitors can walk the tracks, spot native birds and take advantage of a newly opened viewing platform offering magnificent views of the Kaipara Harbour. There will be free tea, coffee and biscuits.

Open Farms will be held on Sunday, February 21, and is free. Register at www.openfarms.co.nz.


Super happy Luna Rossa command Americas Cup challenger final

SAILING: Super happy Luna Rossa moved into a strong position to challenge Team New Zealand for the coveted Americas Cup by taking a 4-0 lead in the challenger series final in Auckland yesterday (Feb 14).

Sailing

By AFP

Monday 15 February 2021, 12:12PM

Luna Rossa (left) has moved into a strong position to challenge Team New Zealand for the Americas Cup. Photo: AFP.

But it was unclear when the next races in the best-of-13 series would be held, after Auckland was placed in lockdown late yesterday following a fresh coronavirus outbreak.

As a result of the government announcement of a level three lockdown in Auckland, initially for 72 hours, the next scheduled race day on Wednesday has been postponed, organisers said in a statement.

They added that there would be a meeting with authorities in the next few days to work out the ramifications.

After winning the first two races against Ineos Team UK on Saturday in light winds which favoured the Italian boat, Luna Rossa dominated races three and four in stronger winds when gifted the start by critical errors from Ineos skipper, the acclaimed British yachtsman Ben Ainslie.

Once in front, the outcome was never in doubt as Luna Rossa helmsman Jimmy Spithill covered every move by Ineos to hold the lead through to the end.

Todays racing was all about getting off the line in front which we did a great job of and then just a foot-on-the-throat approach, Spithill said.

The boys on the handles did an outstanding job, tack for tack and we were gaining every time.

It leaves Luna Rossa, owned by Prada fashion house boss Patrizio Bertelli, needing only three more wins to take the series with Ineos yet to get on the board.

At stake for the winner in the best-of-13 challenger final is the right to race holders Team New Zealand for the Americas Cup, professional sports oldest trophy and yachtings Holy Grail.

We are super happy. Were very happy for the team, were very happy for Italy, Luna Rossas co-helmsman Francesco Bruni said, unable to contain his delight at their domination in stark contrast to the mood on Ineos.

It was a tough day, were not happy with it. We can sail a hell of a lot better than that, and we need to, Ainslie said.

We just gave two races to those guys off the start line. At this level, you cant afford to make mistakes and we made too many.

Ainslie fluffed the start of race three when he drew the favoured port entry into the starting box and was outmanoeuvred by Spithill, who crossed the finish line 13 seconds ahead.

In a pre-start manoeuvre 30 seconds before race four began, the British lost control of Ineos which reared up before falling back into the water.

Although they were back on their foils by the time they crossed the start line, Luna Rossa had the advantage and sailed away to win by 41 seconds.
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton defied the guidelines for the $180 million Safer Communities program by granting cash to projects that had failed the criteria for funding, undercutting his public claims about the scheme.

Mr Duttons department told him the two projects in the marginal electorate of Braddon do not represent value for money because they had scored too poorly under the eligibility criteria, but he awarded the cash anyway.

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton approved funding for two projects in a marginal seat before the funding guidelines were available. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

The advice, given in January 2019, counters the federal governments claims in Parliament on Monday that the funding decisions were consistent with the relevant rules and guidelines of the program.

Labor used question time to challenge the Home Affairs Minister on decisions including an $827,000 grant to the National Retail Association, an industry group that had supported him with donations.
Uttarakhand tragedy: Three more bodies recovered, toll climbs to 53

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

Dehradun, Feb 15: Three more bodies were recovered on Monday from the flood-ravaged Tapovan tunnel, taking the toll in the glacial disaster in Uttarakhand to 53. The bodies were recovered this morning from the Adit tunnel at the NTPC's Tapovan-Vishnugad project site, Chamoli District Magistrate, Swati S Bhadauria, told reporters.

Rescue efforts are now underway at the Silt Flushing Tunnel (SFT) only with the help of excavators as a camera or a pipe cannot be inserted due to mounds of sludge and water choking it, the district magistrate said.

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The SFT at Tapovan where drilling was completed on Saturday night in the hope of inserting a camera to locate those believed to be trapped inside is also badly choked with slush and water, she said.

Rescue or recovery is possible only with the help of excavators now, she said.

Officials said over 150 people still remain missing after the February 7 devastation, possibly triggered by an avalanche in the upper reaches of the Alaknanda river system. A surge of water in Dhauliganga and Rishiganga rivers had ripped through two hydel projects.

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Asked about the chances of survival of those missing or trapped, the district magistrate said, "We must always try to be hopeful when the circumstances are adverse."

Around 30 people, who were at work inside the tunnel when the flashflood occurred, are believed to be trapped inside the SFT at Tapovan. The last rites of those pulled out dead after DNA sampling and other formalities have also been going on and compensation cheques are also being distributed among the next of kin of the deceased.

Families of those from outside Chamoli district killed in the tragedy are being paid compensation of Rs 4 lakh each through bankers cheques by the concerned district administration. Over 500 ration kits carrying foodgrains and essentials have already been distributed among residents of over a dozen villages that were cut off from the district headquarters following the disaster that struck a week ago.

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Electricity supply has been restored in all affected villages except Pang where solar lanterns have been provided to residents for the time being, she said.

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The agencies involved in the Tapovan rescue work include the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, the National Disaster Response Force and the State Disaster Response Force.
Historians use newspapers and media clips to study the past and how we lived in it.

But if any of us analysed Irish media today what might we find?

Whose opinions, experiences, and interests are reflected in the pages of national newspapers, during the radio segments that shape public opinion and on influential TV programmes?

Does this snapshot truly represent Irish society? Whose voices are missing or underrepresented? Why?

These questions, and concerns about increasingly sexist and racist media commentary in the US, UK, and Europe, led to the recent founding of the Equality Expert Group in Ireland.

We are former journalists, politicians, campaigners, policy wonks, and entrepreneurs who think the Irish media can and must do better in terms of representation.

Irish media has a woman problem and they cant claim they dont know about it.

Over the last 10 years, voluntary campaigning groups such as Women on Air,

Women for Election,Sounding the Feminists and now Covid Womens Voices and WhyNotHer? have been raising the red flag with data and evidence: women are largely missing from medias senior management, newsrooms, opinion pages and coverage.

Their response? Deafening silence.

Holding a mirror to the media

Sure, some organisations and individuals have made changes, notably RTE which developed a gender diversity policy and appointed a diversity and inclusion lead and TV3s Vincent Browne who insisted on a 50/50 gender balance on his programmes when he was still on air.

A few individual public service presenters have quietly followed his lead. But tinkering around the edges is just not good enough for representative democracy and its also not good for business.

The Future of Media Commission is currently exploring the challenges and opportunities for public service media and providers.

We think media diversity and representation are a key part of the solution and our submission this week reflected these views.

Women make up 51% of the population but represent only about 25% of those heard, seen or read in the news.

During times of crisis, such as Covid and the financial crash this figure can plummet to as little as 8%, according to research done by Prof Kevin Rafter of DCU.

When times are hard, womens opinions and experiences dont seem to matter.

Yet women tend to be the ones most catastrophically affected  financially, physically, and emotionally.

We have witnessed that with the domestic violence pandemic and seen the stark reality faced by those working for low wages on the frontlines of healthcare, childcare, retail, and hospitality.

Behind the scenes, things arent much better.

The Global Media Monitoring Project, last published in 2015, revealed that women struggle to comprise even a third of media professionals here.

Six years on, worrying numbers of women have left their senior media management and staff positions in national newspaper newsrooms, commercial radio, and TV stations. This is a matter of profound concern.

Its the duty of journalists and the media to ask tough questions and to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

Perhaps now is the time to take a hard look within the media and ask why its such an unwelcoming place for women. Who benefits from their silencing?

Media commentary and debate often shape the first draft of public policy. When half the population (and more when we include minority groups) is excluded from this vital space, then our needs, concerns and voices are ignored.

In turn, this affects our lives, our community and wider society as policy decisions are designed to meet the needs of the few, instead of the many.

Nobody should be beyond scrutiny, particularly those in the media who can exert a dramatic influence on our lives. Yet, we dont have the full picture on diversity in the media; we only have data snapshots and anecdotal experience.

Mapping inequality

So, what can we do to ensure Irish media better reflects modern society?

At a minimum, the State should hold media providers to account by funding and overseeing a triple-lock system of regular tracking, measuring, and reporting on diversity. What gets measured, gets done.

All media should be obliged to regularly and publicly furnish  in their reporting to regulators and their annual accounts  details of its monitoring of, and compliance with, gender equality and inclusion measures.

This public scorecard approach is transforming corporate boardrooms thanks to Balance for Better Business and ensuring our European officials are more accountable thanks to European Movement Ireland.

Senator Ivana Bacik conducted a report into the barriers women face getting involved in politics.

Several years ago, Senator Ivana Bacik conducted a seminal report into the barriers to women who want to get involved in politics.

She found the 5Cs  confidence, cash, culture, childcare, and candidate selection  and the group Women for Election has been working on breaking them down ever since.

We call for a similar study to reveal the barriers that women and minorities face in entering the media and the issues that may disproportionately force them out of the profession in their 30s and 40s.

The good news is that we do not need to reinvent the wheel to improve gender equity in, and across, the media. The technology to track and trace already exists.

So, too, does the expertise of the Central Statistics Office which can be used to level the playing field by adding its monitoring heft to gender equality, across media.

Internationally, there are many models we can follow. The BBCs 50:50 Equality Project is creating content that fairly represents our world and simple editorial tools from the Financial Times automatically warn if an article quotes too many men.

Some of these ideas dont require new budgets, just targets, leadership, and greater willpower.

We know what is at stake. We know that when one group dominates, we all suffer.

We know how a divisive, non-diverse media that has lost sight of its public service remit, can lead to crises of institutional governance and trust, as recent controversies in the US, UK, and other democracies have shown.

We know of the importance of the links between representative media, trust, and the wellbeing of our populations.

As well as the risks, we also know the rewards of a public service media that reflects the interests of all of the public it serves.

When we give everyone a voice, we give everyone a chance to fulfill their true human potential.

Based on a submission to the Future of Media Commission by the Equality Expert Group (EEG), a collective of experts drawn from a variety of fields, public and private, seeking to support equality and diversity in Irish social, economic and cultural life. Current founding members of the EEG include Carol Hunt, Aine Kerr, Dearbhail McDonald, Jillian van Turnhout, Noelle OConnell and Margaret E. Ward. EqualityExpert@gmail.com #EqualityExpertMedia
Bollywood actress Kangana Ranaut recently took to Twitter and wrote that she defeated "underworld mafia" to own a home in Bandra.

She tweeted, "Left home at the age of 15 my father refused to help me in my struggle, was on my own, was captured by underworld mafia at 16, At 21 I had squashed all villains in my life, was a successful actress a national award winner owner of my first house in Mumbai city posh location Bandra."

Left home at the age of 15 my father refused to help me in my struggle,was on my own,was captured by underworld mafia at 16, At 21 I had squashed all villains in my life,was a successful actress a national award winner owner of my first house in Mumbai city posh location Bandra. Kangana Ranaut (@KanganaTeam) February 15, 2021

Earlier, the actress had compared herself with Hollywood stars. She said that Meryl Streep could never pull off a film like Queen.

She wrote, "Massive transformation alert, The kind of range I display as a performer no other actress on this globe has that right now, I have raw talent like Meryl Streep for layered character depictions but I can also do skilled action and glamour like Gal Gadot #Thalaivi #Dhaakad."

Massive transformation alert, The kind of range I display as a performer no other actress on this globe has that right now, I have raw talent like Meryl Streep for layered character depictions but I can also do skilled action and glamour like Gal Gadot #Thalaivi #Dhaakad pic.twitter.com/fnW3D20o6K Kangana Ranaut (@KanganaTeam) February 9, 2021

Further wrote, "I honestly want to know why do we worship white people? Forget their budgets and our age gap, tell me about just acting can she do Thalaivi and Dhaakad? Queen and Tanu? Fashion and Panga? Kaya and Datto? Answer is she cant, then why not emerge from the deep rooted complex."

I honestly want to know why do we worship white people? Forget their budgets and our age gap, tell me about just acting can she do Thalaivi and Dhaakad? Queen and Tanu? Fashion and Panga? Kaya and Datto? Answer is she cant, then why not emerge from the deep rooted complex? https://t.co/59ir97DCw5 Kangana Ranaut (@KanganaTeam) February 9, 2021

The actress had made her assertion sharing several images from her upcoming films, Thalaivi and Dhaakad. The photographs showed Kangana's physical transformation, when she gained weight for her role in Thalaivi and shed the extra kilos for the action film Dhaakad.
Abu Dhabi National Exhibitions Company (Adnec) and Expo Tel Aviv, Israels leading exhibition centre, have signed a strategic MoU aimed at fostering further collaboration and cooperation in the regional business tourism sector.

The MoU will forge a relationship between the leading exhibition centres, enhancing their respective new business pipelines and increasing opportunities for collaboration at both venues.

It demonstrates the wider spirit of cooperation between the UAE and Israel, said Humaid Matar Al Dhaheri, the Managing Director and Group CEO of Adnec, after signing the deal with Tamir Dayan, CEO of Expo Tel Aviv.

"Our relationship with Expo Tel Aviv will enable the wider growth of the business tourism sector in the UAE and wider region, which Adnec consistently seeks to promote. This strategic partnership showcases our efforts in fostering intraregional cooperation and will offer new developments for the transfer of knowledge to local audiences," he noted.

Al Dhaheri pointed out that additionally, this partnership would continue to boost Adencs leading status as a key destination for business tourism.

"Our efforts to identify opportunities for collaboration with a range of regional and global partners are ongoing, strengthening the Middle Easts and the worlds business tourism sector," he stated.

Dayan said: "Adnec and Expo Tel Aviv provide models for regional leadership in the business tourism sector. Our mutual expertise in the design, delivery, and execution of world-class events makes us natural partners."

"Israel and UAE will probably be the first countries in the world to be vaccinated against the corona virus and lead the exhibitions industry forward and now through this MoU, we are aiming to foster our cooperation, providing further opportunities for the transfer of knowledge and expertise between our two entities," remarked the top official.

"My colleagues and I look forward to working with our Emirati partners in identifying and capitalising on new opportunities for the Middle Easts business tourism sector, and welcoming new visitors from the UAE and beyond in Tel Aviv," he added.
Kids want to fish? You don't know how yourself? Here's a little help
On 11 February 2021, President Cyril Ramaphosa delivered the annual State of the Nation address, done digitally this year due to Covid-19 restrictions limiting the usual red carpet style of the event that most South Africans have enjoyed seeing over the years. But without the usual pizzaz of it all, the president gave an address that focused on the Covid-19 pandemic, the current economic situation and providing much needed hope.

Social Media Exposure on SONA mentions in February 2020 (orange) vs February 2021 (blue) click to enlarge

Sentiment analysis on SONA mentions on Social Media between 6 February and 12 February 2021 click to enlarge

ANC incompetence and corruption, which refers to this tweet from @SimonPGrindrod that gained much engagement

Unnecessarily expensive displays, which refers to this tweet from @MelBala regarding the cost of this years SONA as opposed to the previous year

Trending themes on SONA social media mentions between 6 February and 12 February 2021 click to enlarge

Top posters, by reach, on SONA social media mentions between 6 February and 12 February 2021 click to enlarge

Meltwater, the world's leading editorial and social media analytics company, tracked social media mentions surrounding this years State of the Nation address to see some of the online reactions to the key focus areas that the president addressed.On 11 February 2021, when looking at the amount of times SONA or State of the Nation Address was mentioned on social media in South Africa, it was just over 4,000 times. Compared to last years address, which took place on 13 February 2020, the amount of mentions was just over 10,000. The reason for the high number of mentions last year included the presence of Miss Universe, South African-born Zozibini Tunzi, reactions to the usual glitz and glam of the red carpet fashion, as well as reactions to topics that the president touched on (such as youth unemployment).Even though this years SONA garnered few social media mentions, the social reach of these mentioned was 235 million people on 11 February 2021. At least 94% of these social media mentions came from Twitter, 5% were from blogs and 1% were from online forums.When it comes to how South Africans were feeling about this years SONA address, the data indicates that 79% of social media mentions on SONA or State of the Nation Address were negative on 11 February 2021. Social media comments that were of a negative nature include users who felt underwhelmed by what the president had to say this year. One Twitter user felt misled by the narrow definition of unemployment, while others felt that watching SONA is a waste of time.However, the 21% of online users who felt positive about this years SONA praised the president for his efforts in acquiring Covid-19 vaccines, as well as how he touched on corruption in the country being one of the greatest impediments to the countrys growth and development, as The Citizen News tweeted Looking at some of the trending themes to have emerged from this years SONA, it echoes how President Ramaphosa chose to focus his speech mainly on the Covid-19 pandemic, the economy and unemployment rate. These are noted to be some of the key themes that online users picked up on, alongside the following trending themes:While South African news outlets, such as News24, eNCA and SABC News, covered most of the address on social media, some other influential and top posters that engaged with SONA or State of the Nation Address conversations online include Mmusi Maimane, Helen Zille, Jessica Nkosi and Anele Mdoda.Without the usual pomp and circumstance of this years State of the Nation Address, social media users in South Africa did not seem all too invested in tuning into what the president had to say. But for those who did listen in, very little positivity was felt towards what President Ramaphosa addressed in his speech. Perhaps there will be more to look forward in next years SONA; only time will tell.If you want to get insights like these to monitor trending topics in news and social media about your brand, business, industry or competitors, you can contact the Meltwater Team here Meltwater is a leading global provider of social and media intelligence. By examining millions of posts each day from social media platforms, blogs and news sites, Meltwater helps companies make better, more informed decisions based on insight from the outside. Meltwater was founded in Oslo, Norway, in 2001 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with 50 offices across six continents. The company has 1,700 employees and 28,000 corporate customers, including industry leaders in several sectors.For more information visit meltwater.com
 Any guesses for when we might again have a fully functioning US Sentencing Commission? | Main | Bureau of Justice Statistics releases "Federal Prisoner Statistics Collected under the First Step Act, 2020" 

The title of this post is the title of this notable new Slate commentary authored by Hannah Riley. I recommend the full piece, and here is how it starts:

In 2017, a man named Willie Nash was booked into a Mississippi county jail on a misdemeanor charge. For reasons that arent clear, his cellphone wasnt confiscated as the law dictated. When he asked a jailer for a charger, the phone  which he had been using to text his wife  was seized. Nash was then sentenced to 12 years for possessing the cellphone. The case went all the way up to the Mississippi Supreme Court, where the 12-year sentence was affirmed. While obviously harsh, Justice James D. Maxwell II wrote for the court, Nashs twelve-year sentence for possessing a cell phone in a correctional facility is not grossly disproportionate. Mr. Nash, a father of three, will be released back to his family in January of 2029, for the crime of texting his wife from jail.

In all federal and state prisons and jails, personal cellphones are classified as contraband  illegal for incarcerated people to possess. Incarcerated people are allowed to communicate with loved ones via letters, expensive phone calls in a centralized location (done through a prepaid account or collect calls, for a limited amount of time), or sometimes through expensive email and video messages on a prison-issued tablet. Due to COVID-19, in-person visitation has been halted in most prisons and jails since last March.

These rigid policies isolate incarcerated people and weaken their ties to friends and family. And this isolation radiates harm well beyond each individual. The vast majority of the millions of people currently incarcerated in this country will, at some point, be released. Every year, roughly 600,000 people leave prisons across the U.S., and a much higher number cycle in and out of jails. Roughly 2.7 million children in the U.S. have an incarcerated parent.... There is a wealth of research that confirms that the stronger the relationships and connections to loved ones and community, the better a person will fare once they are released from prison or jail. Weve known this for a long time. A study from 1972 noted that, The central finding of this research is the strong and consistent positive relationship that exists between parole success and maintaining strong family ties while in prison. Decades later, the findings remain the same. Incarcerated men and women who maintain contact with supportive family members are more likely to succeed after their release, a 2012 Vera Institute report found.

There is one obvious way to facilitate these community ties: allow incarcerated people to have cellphones. For more than a decade, jailers and elected officials have attempted to incite a moral panic in the general public around the danger of cellphones, warning that incarcerated people would only use them to organize hits and buy drugs and run gangs on the outside.

Its true that some incarcerated people have used contraband phones to extort people on the outside. But targeting the tools rather than the roots of the corruption and violence within prisons is misguided. A full decade ago, the New York Times conceded that the harsh penalties and increased vigilance werent working to keep phones out of prisons: The logical solution would be to keep all cellphones out of prison. But that is a war that is being lost, corrections officials say. That hasnt changed. If you want to find a cellphone in prison or jail now, you can. One former sheriff in South Carolina even allowed detainees in his jail to purchase cheap cellphones from commissary, arguing access to cellphones actually improves safety....

The reality is that prisons and jails are already saturated with cellphones (mostly smuggled in by correctional officers), and the vast majority of people use them in the exact same ways the vast majority use them on the outside: to stay connected. To stave off boredom. To learn. To laugh.

Northern Irish farmers are backing plans to abolish the Agricultural Wages Board as it will reduce the 'regulatory and administrative burden' on farming businesses.

It was recently revealed by the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) that their officials are working to bring forward legislation to progress with the plans.

The AWB was introduced in Northern Ireland when trade boards were common and it was established to set a minimum wage for agricultural workers.

However, in recent times it has been overtaken by the duplication of legislation between the National Minimum Wage (NMW) and the National Living Wage (NLW).

The NLW has rapidly increased since its introduction in 2016, rising to 9.21 per hour in 2021.

The Ulster Farmers' Union (UFU) said the NLW had decimated the grading structure that underpinned the AWB.

"As a result, the pay of agri workers is no longer calculated by experience and levels of responsibility," said UFU deputy president David Brown.

These bands are essential to allow employers to pay workers based upon their qualifications and experience, both of which are crucial to agricultural work especially in the area of animal husbandry."

He said this brought into question the existence and relevance of the AWB in Northern Ireland.

"Farm businesses rely upon skilled and competent workers and our membership have always paid their farm workers a rate that guarantees this," he added.

"Following abolition of the AWB, agricultural workers would receive the protections afforded by wider employment law and UK minimum and national living wage rates.

Northern Ireland councils will now be able to tailor district rates to the needs of their local areas.

It follows legislation put in place by the Finance Minister, Conor Murphy.

For the first time councils will have the option to strike different levels of household and business rates.

The Finance Minister made the announcement following a meeting with councillor Matt Garrett, who chairs the Northern Ireland Local Government Association (Nilga), to discuss the continuing partnership approach between the Executive and local government in the year ahead.

Mr Murphy said: "Local councils have played a key role in the pandemic response and are delivering vital services.

"Recognising the challenges facing councils, the Executive has provided an additional 100m of funding this year.

"The Executive has also made 290m worth of business rates relief available to over 25,000 businesses across all council areas, which has protected councils' rate revenues.

"I am committed to continuing to work closely with councils and have introduced legislation that provides them with a new option of striking independent household and business district rates. I believe this is a positive step which will give councils the freedom to set different local rates to achieve their local priorities. I have also amended the legislation to give councils additional time to strike District Rates by deferring the deadline from February 15 until March 1."

Ahead of councils striking the District Rates, Mr Murphy said: "I appreciate that setting rates in the midst of a pandemic is extremely difficult. Now more than ever we must be conscious of the challenging circumstances facing individuals and businesses as a result of Covid-19.

"That is why the Executive has chosen to freeze the regional rate for businesses at last year's substantially reduced level, and freeze the domestic rate for the second year in a row."

He added: "I urge councils to use these additional rate setting powers to set District Rates which in the short-term will help individuals and businesses through the tough months ahead and will help stimulate economic growth as we look ahead to our recovery from the pandemic."

Mr Garrett welcomed the continued engagement with the Finance Minister and central government: "In this intense period of Covid containment and recovery, councils and NILGA are working collaboratively with Stormont at all levels."
Gordon Ramsay has taken a thinly-veiled swipe at his neighbours in Cornwall following his highly-publicised spat with them.

Various residents complained about his family spending lockdown 1 at their home on the coast last spring; and the TV chef, 54, has mocked them in a recent interview.

Asked what he's most looking forward to when lockdown 3 eventually ends, Gordon quipped: 'Getting back to see my f*****g neighbours in Cornwall.'

Love thy neighbour? Gordon Ramsay has taken a thinly-veiled swipe at his neighbours in Cornwall

He also joked: 'And guess what? I've invited Joe Biden for breakfast. Wait till you see who I've got coming for f*****g breakfast. Big Joe! You know he's coming down for the G7!'

The new president is due to attend the G7 meeting at the Carbis Bay beach resort near St Ives this year, with Gordon adding that his neighbours were 'going to go crazy'.

Gordon angered locals after relocating to his second home in Cornwall during the coronavirus crisis despite the Government urging Britons not to travel.

The star - who has since returned to London - was spotted a number of times taking long excursions when outings were still limited to an hour a day including a beachside stroll with his entire family.

Beach views: Various residents complained about his family spending lockdown 1 at their home on the coast last spring; and the TV chef, 54, has mocked them in a recent interview

Asked what he's most looking forward to when lockdown 3 eventually ends, Gordon quipped: 'Getting back to see my f*****g neighbours in Cornwall'

At the time, the fiery chef was accompanied by wife Tana, 46, and three of their five children - Jack, 21, Matilda, 18, and Oscar, one - during a brisk walk across the sand.

The Hell's Kitchen star also landed in hot water with the local coastguard, who are said to have issued an official warning to him over his apparent flouting of lockdown guidelines.

Sources indicated that Gordon was seen in Rock, Fowey, Port Isaac and Newquay  some distance from his 4 million home in Trebetherick.

While people with second homes are not allowed to travel back and forth during lockdowns, choosing one home and spending the duration there was not against official advice.

A friend of the family told MailOnline: 'The family see Cornwall as their family home when the kids are back from uni and Gordon back from filming around the world it's where they spend all their family time together.

He also joked: 'And guess what? I've invited Joe Biden for breakfast. Wait till you see who I've got coming for f*****g breakfast. Big Joe! You know he's coming down for the G7!' [Biden is pictured]

Ramsay boys: 'How fitting is it that that my first best mate is now a Royal Marine commando and I have a new best mate in Oscar,' he said of his sons

'They've been spending time there for 10 years and Jack actually lives in the house there full time too. Most of their neighbours are so welcoming and they love being part of the community.

'The campaign against them is hurtful and unnecessary at a time when we should all be coming together and supporting each other.'

Gordon also said in his recent interview that he can change a nappy with his eyes closed after spending so much time at home.

He said his youngest son Oscar had become his 'best mate' during lockdown, and he had changed some 150 nappies in total.

'Having the chance to spend that time with your family is unprecedented,' he said. 'So, we were very fortunate having all seven of us together.

Last year: The fiery chef was accompanied by wife Tana, 46, [pictured] and their kids when they opted to stay at their Cornwall home during lockdown 1

'The only one we're missing now is Jack, he's off as a Royal Marine, active, and so again, you depend on those Zoom calls. But it's much harder for the 18 to 25-year-olds because they can't see a way out as you can as an adult and a parent and so the reconnect is extraordinary.

'And on top of that is the quality time. I must have gone through about 150 diapers with Oscar. I can literally change a nappy now with my eyes closed and he's become my best mate.

'And how fitting is it that that my first best mate is now a Royal Marine commando and I have a new best mate in Oscar.

'I think he should have a buzzcut, I suggest we should go number two on top and shave it at the sides to number two.'

The chef is hosting a new game show on BBC One called Gordon Ramsay's Bank Balance.

He said of this: 'There's something pretty dynamic about being given a show at 9PM, stripped across nine nights on the BBC. You wake up in the morning and you s**t yourself.

Seeing the sights? Sources indicated that Gordon was seen in Rock, Fowey, Port Isaac and Newquay  some distance from his 4 million home in Trebetherick

New series: The chef is hosting a new game show on BBC One called Gordon Ramsay's Bank Balance

'It's very rare you get a chance to not just present your own show, but be part of that creative team. And that was the bit that got me out of bed every morning at 5AM.

'You look at the success of The Chase, The Wall, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? coming back, there's definitely a need for that kind of connect. And Bank Balance offers that.'

Hoping that the show will be 'an amazing hit', Gordon added: 'We were on it 12 hours a day, five days a week [in lockdown]. I'd never go in thinking it was a home run. There's going to be a lot of eyeballs on this thing.'

The format sees contestants win up to 100k by answering questions against the clock to earn the chance to balance bars across a pyramid that risks collapsing.

'I wanted something sort of cutting edge that intimidates every goddamn guest that walks up those stairs,' he said of the gold bank vault-like set.



Gordon Ramsay's Bank Balance debuts on BBC One on February 24 at 9PM.
CHARLOTTE, N.C., Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, Novant Health and Michael Jordan announced a $10 million gift to open two medical clinics in New Hanover County on the southeastern coast of North Carolina. The regional health care system and Jordan previously partnered to open two Michael Jordan Family Clinics in Charlotte, N.C., bringing comprehensive primary care, including behavioral health and social support services, to the area's most vulnerable communities. Jordan's gift will help Novant Health bring this same integrated care model to more rural and rural-adjacent communities in his hometown, offering much-needed services to those who are uninsured or underinsured. The two new clinics are slated to open in early 2022.

"I am very proud to once again partner with Novant Health to expand the Family Clinic model to bring better access to critical medical services in my hometown," said Michael Jordan. "Everyone should have access to quality health care, no matter where they live, or whether or not they have insurance. Wilmington holds a special place in my heart and it's truly gratifying to be able to give back to the community that supported me throughout my life."

To date, the two Novant Health Michael Jordan Family Clinics in Charlotte have seen more than 4,500 patients, in addition to providing critical COVID-19 response. Nearly 1,000 COVID-19 vaccines have been administered from both the Freedom Drive and North End locations with plans to scale up vaccination efforts even further as supply increases.

"This pandemic has exacerbated health equity gaps across our state, making our efforts to close them even more emergent. We look forward to standing these clinics up as quickly as possible to ensure all members of the community have access to necessary medical care" said Carl Armato, president and CEO of Novant Health. "We are so appreciative of Michael's unwavering commitment to help us bring affordable care to our communities that need it most. It's not only an investment in us as a partner, but it's an investment in each and every person that our clinics can reach."

Today's announcement comes on the heels of Novant Health finalizing its purchase of New Hanover Regional Medical Center (NHRMC), which includes a partnership with UNC Health and UNC School of Medicine. The health care system, which beat out five systems to move forward with the sale, stressed its commitment to bringing clinics and services to underserved communities as a tenant of its proposal.

"When we set out to partner with New Hanover Regional Medical Center, we made it absolutely clear that one of our top priories was to improve health outcomes in southeastern North Carolina, with access to affordable care for all," Armato added. "With Michael's gift, we'll be able to more quickly, and directly, have an impact. The establishment of these two new clinics reinforces our true commitment to improving the health of the southeast region."

The $10 million gift from Michael Jordan was made to the Novant Health Foundation, which has now received a total of $17 million in funds from Jordan dedicated to developing clinics, which are owned and operated by Novant Health.

Assets

CLICK HERE for video and photos from Michael Jordan's virtual Zoom meeting with patients of the Novant Health Michael Jordan Family Medical Clinics.

About Novant Health

Novant Health is an integrated network of physician clinics, outpatient facilities and hospitals that delivers a seamless and convenient healthcare experience to communities in Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia. The Novant Health network consists of more than 2,300 physicians and over 36,000 employees that provide care at more than 700 locations, including 16 hospitals and hundreds of outpatient facilities and physician clinics. In 2020, Novant Health was the only healthcare system in North Carolina to be included on Forbes' Best Employers for Diversity list. Diversity MBA Magazine has also ranked Novant Health third on its 2019 list of "Best Places for Women & Diverse Managers to Work." Novant Health provided more than $993.2 million in community benefit, including financial assistance and services, in 2019. For more information, please visit our website at NovantHealth.org. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

SOURCE Novant Health

Related Links

https://www.novanthealth.org


Kenya Moore came under fire for being 'fake' and 'selfish' on Sunday's episode of The Real Housewives Of Atlanta.

As the 50-year-old former beauty queen spent time with pals in Isle of Palms, South Carolina, she offended many of them.

Kandi Burruss, 44, called Kenya 'annoying' as she refused to get along with others in the group.

Under fire: Kenya Moore came under fire for being 'fake' and 'selfish' on Sunday's episode of The Real Housewives Of Atlanta

She detailed the ways in which Kenya had failed them, pointing out that she was the trip's host.

Kenya had not only taken her own private jet, she had also eaten lunch without arranging it for others, and given Marlo Hampton, 44, the worst room, Kandi told her.

In a confessional, Kandi noted that she always stood up for Kenya and took heat for it.

Kenya grew emotional and said, 'I don't have a village right now, you know what I mean? So for me, it's just been really stressful, and I told you that I said, ''Kandi, I feel like I'm not keeping it together. There's so many things coming at me at one time;.' And Marc is making my life really hard right now when it comes to Brooklyn, and I don't feel like I'm keeping it together.'

Candid conversation: Kandi Burruss, 44, called Kenya 'annoying' as she refused to get along with others in the group while hosting the trip to Isle Of Palms, South Carolina

She reminded Kandi that she'd separated from her ex-husband Marc Daly a year before and was parenting Brooklyn, two, alone.

Kandi decided to give Kenya a pass 'for now.'

She regretted that when Kenya apologized to the group for her transgressions then cackled in a disingenuous way.

Loud laugh: Kenya apologized to the group for her transgressions then cackled in a disingenuous way

'Kenya kind of reminds me of a Disney villain,' Porsha Williams, 39, told the cameras. 'You know, one of those evil Disney princesses? Maleficent! That b**** is Maleficent!'

Things had been more positive as the episode began, when Cynthia Bailey 53, asked Kenya and Marlo to stop sniping at each other.

Marlo agreed that it was time to squash their beef, joking, 'At this point, I'm like, ''Do I like her? Damn, should we make love? We've just been going at it forever!'''

Disney villain: 'Kenya kind of reminds me of a Disney villain,' Porsha Williams, 39, told the cameras. 'You know, one of those evil Disney princesses? Maleficent! That b**** is Maleficent!'

Porsha remembered that they all bonded over laughter and proposed they play 'Never Have I Ever,' which she said she'd played in jail.

Kenya joked that she had a great game in mind, too: they'd all run to their rooms and go to sleep.

She retired to her room to be with Brooklyn, which annoyed Kandi.

Bed time: The women were ready to have fun, but Kenya called it a night early and went to bed

'I'm not fixin' to do this,' she said, when Kenya insisted she wasn't coming downstairs.

Kenya pretended she had no one else to watch Brooklyn, but everyone knew she had nannies, and Porsha was irritated that as host she hadn't let everyone bring their kids.

'Y'all know I've been even-keeled with this b**** the whole trip,' Porsha said. 'But her baby is up there, her baby is asleep. I have a baby. Guess where my baby sleep at? Not with me.'

Not cool: Kandi told Kenya that her behavior was 'not cool'

'Someone cared for Brooklyn all day, right?' she continued. 'They can care for her while we doing what we doing right now.'

Kandi pointed out that her own infant daughter Blaze was the youngest of the group's kids, and cried every time she called home.

'Here's my thing: When it comes to feeling like your mothering is above our mothering, it's just not gonna work for me,' Porsha said of Kenya.

Not working: 'Here's my thing: When it comes to feeling like your mothering is above our mothering, it's just not gonna work for me,' Porsha said of Kenya

All the ladies agreed they were no longer in the mood to play games, as Kandi grew upset.

'This is all a double-standard thing that's happening right now, and I'm not with it,' she said.

The next day, Kandi informed her friends that she would be hosting a sexy bachelorette party for Cynthia, who was due to get married in October 2020.

Bachelorette party: The next day, Kandi informed her friends that she would be hosting a sexy bachelorette party for Cynthia, who was due to get married in October 2020

She'd bought them all costumes, hired stripper Michael 'Bolo' Bolwaire, and taken out $4,000 in one-dollar bills.

To make sure everything went smoothly, she asked Kenya to have her nanny work that night, but Kenya protested that she couldn't have someone work 24 hours.

Kandi pointed out that she'd had to get round-the-clock care for Blaze in order to come.

Party plans: Kandi bought them all costumes, hired stripper Michael 'Bolo' Bolwaire, and taken out $4,000 in one-dollar bills for the bachelorette party

'This is my thing,' she told Kenya. 'You have been annoying this trip.'

Kenya subtly questioned whether Kandi always had her back, which incensed Kandi.

During the day, LaToya Wilson, 34, led a fitness routine for the girls, who took shots while exercising.

Fitness routine: During the day, LaToya Wilson, 34, led a fitness routine for the girls

Shots also: The women took shots of alcohol while exercising

Porsha sat with Drew Sidora, 35, and they spoke about how weirdly 'upbeat' Kenya acted.

'I have tried over the years, and I realize that for whatever reason, Kenya is not my friend,' Porsha revealed. 'There is a complete block between us.'

That afternoon, the women gathered to watch an update on the shooting of Breonna Taylor, the Louisville, Kentucky, medical worker killed by police on March 13, 2020.

Catching up: Porsha sat with Drew Sidora, 35, and they spoke about how weirdly 'upbeat' Kenya acted

The cast was appalled but not surprised to learn that just one police officer was charged with 'wanton endangerment,' and there were no charges beyond that.

'I am discouraged by the legal system in this country,' Porsha said, tears running down her face. 'It just doesn't feel as a Black woman like I even belong in America. It just feels like I'm here on borrowed time, if something can happen to me and nothing can be done.'

Over dinner that night, Drew tried to lighten the mood with her new game, which she dubbed 'The Real-est or the Fakest.'

Officer charged: 'I am discouraged by the legal system in this country,' Porsha said, tears running down her face. 'It just doesn't feel as a Black woman like I even belong in America. It just feels like I'm here on borrowed time, if something can happen to me and nothing can be done'

She said she was confused by the jovial way the women were treating Kenya, since they'd been angry with her the night before.

Kenya said she felt attacked, and explained that she hadn't meant to upset anyone the previous night by staying with Brooklyn; she'd just made the best choices she could for her family.

'What we wanted to hear as a group of girls that are on this trip with you is that you actually, sincerely wanted to hang out with us,' returned Tanya Sam, 42.

Game time: Over dinner that night, Drew Sidora tried to lighten the mood with her new game, which she dubbed 'The Real-est or the Fakest'

In a confessional, Kandi agreed. 'I try to be understanding of Kenya; I just feel like she totally doesn't care what anybody else is going through.'

Kenya saw that Marlo and Porsha weren't fully listening to her, and sniped that they needed to pay attention.

Marlo reminded Kenya that she often buried herself in her phone when she didn't want to deal with things.

Pay attention: Kenya saw that Marlo Hampton and Porsha weren't fully listening to her, and sniped that they needed to pay attention

'Y'all want to have a sisterhood and have support, then be my motherf***ing village then,' Kenya blurted.

Cynthia suggested that it would have been nice for Kenya to at least give the moms in their group the option to bring their kids.

'I don't need to give them an option,' Kenya rejoined, setting everyone off.

Group dinner: 'Y'all want to have a sisterhood and have support, then be my motherf***ing village then,' Kenya blurted

She later apologized to Kandi for upsetting her, and the group's good mood was restored.

Everyone headed back to the house, where the stripper Bolo awaited.

The Real Housewives Of Atlanta will return next week on Bravo.
MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine government's approval of the reopening of many movie theatres, video game arcades and other leisure businesses shut since last year was postponed at least another two weeks after mayors feared it will bring new coronavirus infections.

A woman wearing a face mask to prevent the spread of the coronavirus walks as traffic snarls in Quezon City, Philippines on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. The Philippine government's approval for reopening many movie theaters, video game arcades and other leisure businesses closed since last year was postponed at least another two weeks after mayors feared it will bring new coronavirus infections. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila)

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine government's approval of the reopening of many movie theatres, video game arcades and other leisure businesses shut since last year was postponed at least another two weeks after mayors feared it will bring new coronavirus infections.

The easing of restrictions in the capital and other regions under moderate restrictions was planned after Manila was hit by one of the worst pandemic-wrought recessions in the region.

The government also will allow larger crowds inside places of worship in Asias largest Roman Catholic nation, allowing 50% of their capacity, up from 30%.

Mayors under the Metro Manila Development Authority expressed apprehension over the reopening of cinemas and video game arcades. Philippine officials said mayors and health officials should draw rules to ensure safety amid the easing of quarantine restrictions in more public areas, including museums, libraries, parks and historical sites.

This is a very problematic proposition. This might bring a surge in our COVID cases, Marikina city Mayor Marcelino Teodoro told ABS-CBN News, adding that mayors in the capital region were not consulted by the national government on the reopening of cinemas.

Teodoro said he would order movie houses to remain shut in his city.

Manila Mayor Isko Moreno told The Associated Press that he and other mayors will meet government officials to discuss the reopening of cinemas, which he welcomed as long as health safeguards are put in place.

The former TV and movie actor said movie house staff should be tested for the virus, and he added that reopening theatres would help encourage movie companies produce films again.

We want the economy reopened to the maximum possible and in the most responsible way possible, he said by telephone.

Presidential spokesman Harry Roque said in a televised news briefing that the reopening of movie houses would be postponed from Monday to March 1 in the capital region to allow consultations and more time to craft safety guidelines. Movie houses in regions which have drafted health guidelines could reopen right away, Roque said.

Roque said a government body dealing with the pandemic and mayors are not engaging in a cockfight. We agree that the economy should gradually be reopened because more people now are going hungry than those who get sick or die due to COVID.

The Philippines has reported nearly 550,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with more than 11,500 deaths, the second highest in Southeast Asia. The government has faced criticisms for failing to immediately secure COVID-19 vaccines despite being a pandemic hotspot.

President Rodrigo Duterte has said wealthier Western countries, where the vaccines originate, have purchased massive vaccine doses for their citizens, depriving poorer countries like the Philippines of early supplies. Roque said initial batches of COVID-19 vaccine, including about 600,000 doses donated by China, would arrive in the Philippines later this month.
A Fianna Fail TD sent a research paper to the Taoiseach calling for Level 2 restrictions on a day when the Department of Health announced more than 1,000 Covid-19 infections.

Marc MacSharry said in his report that the virus was not indiscriminate and was mostly affecting older people and those with pre-existing conditions.

He said this rendered a forced closure for younger, otherwise healthy individuals questionable and suggested there was little evidence to support the idea restaurants and pubs were responsible for the spread of the disease.

The Department of the Taoiseach initially refused to release the report, saying it was sent on a strictly confidential basis.

It said release of the research would make it less likely that other TDs and senators would send information to Taoiseach Micheal Martin in future. The case was appealed to the Information Commissioner and the department allowed release of the paper.

Mr MacSharry said at the weekend the report was sent at a point in time before there was awareness of Covid-19 variants and that his views had changed over Christmas.

It was sent to Mr Martin on October 14 with a short note saying: It sets out an evidence-based suggestion for return to Level 2. I am only circulating it to you and Stephen Donnelly.

On the day it was sent, the daily statement from Nphet had notified 1,095 cases of Covid-19, The day after there were 1,205 and the second lockdown was introduced within a week. In his research, whose origin is not clear, Mr MacSharry suggested a return to Level 2 restrictions with increased enforcement and compliance with what were described as golden rules.

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These rules  which were taken from World Health Organisation (WHO) recommendations  included mask wearing, avoiding crowded indoor settings, and maintaining basic hygiene.

He wrote: At no point do they [WHO] refer to hospitality closures such as hotels, restaurants, or bars. This is contrary to the Irish level based system.

Mr MacSharry asked whether we were decimating an already reeling hospitality industry when the WHO did not regard such closures as essential. He said fear was being compounded by the prospect of a circuit-breaker lockdown which he said was being touted by Tanaiste Leo Varadkar.

The Fianna Fail TD said Covid-19 preys upon the old, vulnerable, and otherwise sick and that nearly 95pc of deaths involved people with underlying clinical health conditions.

He also said the spread of the disease was concentrated in households based on official cluster data.

This highlights the superficiality of having restrictions on hotels, restaurants, and bars when the virus still has so many other vectors to facilitate spread, he wrote.
JACKSON COUNTY, MI  Jackson Countys three major police departments didnt have any substantiated complaints from citizens in 2020.

There is a procedure for citizens to file complaints about interactions with any police department employee at all three departments, which investigate the claims themselves.

At Blackman-Leoni Department of Public Safety, the body camera footage is reviewed and the officer and complainant are interviewed, Director Mike Jester said.

The body and dashboard cameras are an unbiased third party during interactions between police and the public, which helps provide transparency, he said.

The public might think that police officers dont like cameras, but its actually the opposite, Jester said. They look at it as thats protection for them from someone making an unfounded claim against them. On the flip side of that, if the officer does wrong, its going to be recorded.

Out of the 13 complaints made in 2020 between the Jackson Police Department, Jackson County Sheriffs Office and Blackman-Leoni, 12 of them were not valid, according to documents obtained by MLive/Jackson Citizen Patriot through the Freedom of Information Act. There was not enough evidence in the 13th complaint to determine what happened.

The Jackson Police Department had four complaints, the Jackson County Sheriffs Office had five unfounded complaints and the Blackman-Leoni Department of Public Safety had four complaints, records show.

For every one citizen complaint in 2020, Blackman-Leoni Public Safety had 6,433 contacts with the public, Jester pointed out.

The sheriffs office and BLPS included narratives about the complaints and how the investigation was handled in the FOIA documents. Jackson police included a brief description of the complaint and the date the investigation was completed.

Names of the police officers and citizen who filed the complaints were withheld in all documents granted via FOIA.

Jackson police complaints

Jackson had one complaint that was not sustained, which means the investigation showed there was not enough evidence to sustain a complaint or exonerate the officer, records show. The other three complaints were unfounded, which means the alleged actions did not happen or did not involve department members, per records.

 An investigation found an allegation of harassment and stalking on Jan. 15 was unfounded, records show.

 Allegations filed Jan. 21 about an unjustified traffic stop and illegal search were also unfounded, the police reported.

 Police found a complaint filed Jan. 29 about discrimination and an illegal traffic stop was also unfounded.

 A citizen filed a complaint June 1 alleging they were assaulted by a member of Jackson police. An investigation found that complaint to be not sustained, records show.

Blackman-Leoni Department of Public Safety complaints

The four complaints were not validated, per records.

 An officer was accused of stealing someones dog on April 23. The complainant wanted the officer fired and criminally charged. Police reviewed video from the interaction, which showed the officer was taking custody of the dog as mandated by a court order.

The officer explained the reasoning as they took the dog, and behaved according to policy, per records.

 A Black man alleged the two officers pulled him over because of his race on May 20. Officers said they pulled him over because his windshield was cracked. The man acknowledged the cracked windshield but maintained he was pulled over because he was Black, records say.

Officers gave the man a verbal warning and ended the traffic stop. They acted according to policy and in professional manner, records show.

 A woman alleged she was held on a traffic stop for 47 minutes before being allowed to leave on June 28. She also said she was asked to leave her vehicle, which is legal, police said.

Review of video of the traffic stop shows the stop was 7 minutes and 13 seconds long, records show. She was driving 60 mph in a 50-mph zone and was given a verbal warning by the officers.

 An officer responding to a medical emergency Dec. 29, was accused of telling a woman she needed to go to a care home and that he was lazy, nasty mouthed and cocky, records show.

Video of the officers response was reviewed by police. It showed that the woman said she was failing down often and didnt know what to do, to which the officer said she should figure out the cause and that she might not want to stay alone until then, records show.

The woman then asked the officer where she could go, and he asked if she had looked at assisted living. She said she would not go to a care home and the officer did not bring it up again, records show. As the woman was being loaded into an ambulance, the officer can be heard wishing her luck, records show.

Jackson County Sheriffs Office complaints

The complaints to the sheriffs office were not validated, records show.

 A complaint on June 24 said a deputy was driving on the complainants private road and taking pictures. The deputy also wanted to arrest the complainant for violating a personal protection order, the complaint says.

The deputy did take pictures because he works as an ordinance officer and was investigating violations, a letter from the sheriffs office to the complainant said. The deputy said that he was mistaken about the personal protection order. Someone had said there was an active protection order, which the deputy could not confirm because the computer system was down at the time, the letter said.

A man was pulled over by a deputy for not having insurance Aug. 6. The man told the deputy he had a gun in the vehicle, and the deputy took the gun to his patrol car.

The man said the deputy did not let the mans wife and 1-year-old child out of the hot truck. The deputy said it was for his safety. The family was in the vehicle for more than 10 minutes, according to the complaint. The man alleged the deputy did not activate his body camera or wear a mask.

An investigation showed the deputy did activate the body camera and the traffic stop was captured, records show. A mask is not required to be worn outside unless the deputy is interacting with a large group of people, a letter to the complainant said.

The length of the traffic stop was not unreasonable, the letter said.

 On Oct. 2, a woman reported that she was intimidated by her son because he had an illegal firearm, a complaint said. The deputy then arrested the woman without any investigation, the complaint alleges.

A sergeant talked to the woman who said she was upset because the deputy didnt hear the whole story, a memorandum within the sheriffs office said. However, the body camera footage shows that was not true.

The footage of the incident shows the deputy interviewed the woman and her son, the said. The deputy found the woman had cut the sons face twice with a knife, and the woman was arrested.

 A deputy was accused of rude and unprofessional behavior in a Dec. 15 complaint. The deputys body camera was on and the footage showed he was professional and followed department policies, a letter to the complainant said.

 A complaint received Dec. 19 alleges a case mishandled by an officer. However, the body camera footage shows that was not the case, a letter to the complainant said.

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Sales of marijuana concentrates increased 40.5% last year in the adult-use states of California, Colorado, Nevada and Washington as well as the recreational and medical markets in Oregon.

( ) stock has remained flat at 12 cents per share over the course of January 2021 compared to a 0.3% rise for the broader market as represented by the ASX 200.

However, the benchmark Alternative Harvest ETF has dramatically risen in January by about 33% from US$14.35 to US$18.97.

Thus far in February the ETF has moved up another 82% and closed at US$34.6 on February 11.

MMJ is witnessing significant follow through on the buying action that now appears to have come down cap into many of its investee companies as well.

Harvest One and WeedMD have seen significant gains over the last several weeks.

New federal legalisation bill

Furthering the progress in the US, key US Senate leaders from the Democratic party held a meeting with marijuana stakeholders on Friday, seeking input in creating a new federal legalisation bill.

The senators released a joint statement announcing the plan earlier this week that decried the failures of marijuana criminalisation and called for a federal policy change that prioritises repairing the harms of prohibition.

The senators did not go in-depth into the details of the forthcoming reform proposal, but one commitment from the start, according to attendees, is that the Senate bill will at a minimum de-schedule cannabis and seek to regulate it with a justice- and equity-focused approach.

Marijuana concentrates sales jump

According to MJBizdaily and Seattle-based data analytics firm Headset, sales of marijuana concentrates surged 40.5% last year in the adult-use states of California, Colorado, Nevada and Washington as well as the recreational and medical markets in Oregon as consumers become more comfortable with dabbing and associated technologies.

This bodes well for MMJs portfolio names such as Embark Health which recently shipped their first batch of concentrates to the provincial buyer of cannabis in British Columbia with the companys Hank brand available across the province.
Lima: Perus foreign minister has resigned amid an uproar over government officials being secretly vaccinated against the coronavirus before the country recently received 1 million doses for health workers facing a resurgence in the pandemic.

President Francisco Sagasti confirmed that Elizabeth Astete stepped down and told the local television channel America that Peruvians should feel outraged and angry about this situation that jeopardises the enormous effort of many Peruvians working on the front line against COVID.

Medical workers in Lima who say they work directly with COVID-19 patients protest they are not in line to get shots of Chinas Sinopharm vaccine. Credit:AP

The scandal erupted on Thursday when former President Martin Vizcarra, who was dismissed by Congress on November 9 over a corruption allegation, confirmed a newspaper report that he and his wife had secretly received shots of a vaccine from the Chinese state pharmaceutical company Sinopharm in October. Health Minister Pilar Mazzetti resigned on Friday after legislators accused her of concealing information.

Sagasti said on Twitter that during Vizcarras administration, an extra 2000 doses of the vaccine had been received from Sinopharm and that some senior public officials were vaccinated.
The warrants were issued two days after climate activist Disha Ravi was arrested for collaborating with a pro-Khalistani outfit to 'spread disaffection against India

New Delhi: Non-bailable warrants have been issued against two people for allegedly sharing the "toolkit" related to the farmers' protest on social media, the Delhi Police said on Monday, two days after it arrested climate activist Disha Ravi in connection with the case.

The 21-year-old activist was arrested on Saturday from Bengaluru and sent to five days police remand on Sunday by a Delhi court.

The two suspects against whom the non-bailable warrants have been issued include Nikita Jacob and Shantanu, police said, adding that the duo was allegedly involved in preparing the document and was in direct touch with pro-Khalistani elements.

"Non-bailable warrants have been issued against Nikita Jacob and Shantanu. The two are wanted in connection with the toolkit case. They are suspected to be involved in preparing the documents and were also in direct interaction with pro-Khalistani elements," a senior police officer said.

The police are conducting raids in Mumbai and other places to nab the duo. The Delhi Police had on Sunday claimed that Ravi was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document's formulation and dissemination.

Police also alleged that Ravi and others "collaborated with pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation to spread disaffection against the Indian State". "She was the one who shared the toolkit doc with Greta Thunberg," the Delhi Police claimed in a tweet.

Thunberg, a teen climate activist, had shared the "toolkit" to lend her support to the farmers' agitation against the three agri laws.

In the document, various urgent actions, including creating a Twitter storm and protesting outside Indian embassies, were listed which were needed to be taken to support the farmers' protest.

The toolkit has been cited by some critics as a "proof" of her conspiracy to fuel protests in India.

The police on Sunday told the court that her custody was required to probe an alleged larger conspiracy against the government of India and to ascertain her alleged role relating to the Khalistan movement.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has called Ravis arrest unprecedented attack on democracy while the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), which is leading the farmers' protest at Delhi's borders, too condemned the activist's arrest and demanded her immediate release.

Thousands of farmers protesting the Centre's new agri laws had clashed with the police during their tractor parade on 26 January.

Over 500 police security personnel were injured while one protestors died during the Republic Day violence.

Earlier, the Delhi Police had asked Google and some social media giants to provide information about e-mail id, URLs and certain social media accounts related to the creators of the "toolkit" shared by Thunberg and others on Twitter in connection with the farmers' protest.
DALLAS (AP)  A winter storm dropping snow and ice also sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S.

Rotating power outages were initiated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, early Monday morning, meaning hundreds of thousands went without electricity for short periods as temperatures fell into the teens near Dallas and 20s (about minus 5 degrees Celsius) around Houston.

We urge Texans to put safety first, ERCOT tweeted as it urged residents to reduce electricity use. The council manages the flow of electric power in the state.

Traffic lights and other infrastructure may be temporarily without power, the council said.

The council described the rotating outages as a last resort to preserve the reliability of the electric system as a whole, adding that utility transmission companies are tasked with determining how to reduce demand on the system.

Every grid operator and every electric company is fighting to restore power right now, ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness said in a statement.

The rotating outages were expected to last throughout Monday morning.

Nearly 2.6 million customers in Texas were in the dark as of 8:20 a.m. CST, according to poweroutage.us, a utility tracking site.

Matt Varble in the Dallas suburb of Las Colinas told The Dallas Morning News his power had gone out a couple of times Monday morning. The second time, it went out about 3:30 a.m. and hadnt returned as of 7 a.m.

Its starting to get very cold inside my house, Varble told the newspaper. I lived in the north for a very long time and nothing like this has ever happened when I lived in New York, Ohio and Illinois.

Around 5,000 Oklahoma Gas & Electric customers were without power overnight, and Entergy Arkansas logged about 3,000 outages. Both states have much smaller populations compared with Texas.

Officials in Houston had warned people to prepare for outages and hazardous roads  conditions similar to what residents might see in the wake of a Category 5 hurricane.

There (have) been numerous reports of accidents from icing recently, National Weather Service lead forecaster Bob Oravec said Monday. I think there's going to be a big threat today as the system pushes northeastward.

By midmorning, 3,000 flights had been canceled across the country, about 1,600 of them at Dallas/Fort Worth International and Bush Intercontinental airports in Texas. At DFW, the temperature was 4 degrees Fahrenheit (-15 degrees Celsius)  3 degrees (-16 degrees) colder than Moscow

Accumulating ice between a tenth and a quarter of an inch (0.25 and 0.6 centimeters) was possible across eastern Louisiana, Mississippi, central Tennessee, Kentucky and over into the West Virginia and Ohio border region, Oravec said.

Up to 12 inches (30 centimeters) of snow was expected across parts of the southern Plains into Monday, said Marc Chenard, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service's Weather Prediction Center.

The region had been gearing up for the winter weather for the better part of the weekend. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for all of the states 254 counties. Abbott, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson each activated National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks including rescuing stranded drivers.

President Joe Biden also declared an emergency in Texas in a statement Sunday night. The declaration is intended to add federal aid to state and local response efforts.

The National Weather Service said Sunday that the forecast through early Tuesday calls for 8 to 12 inches (20 to 30 centimeters) of snow in central Oklahoma, and 4 to 8 inches (10 to 20 centimeters) in an area extending from eastern Texas to the Ohio Valley in the Northeast.

In Louisiana, police closed multiple bridges and parts of some interstates because of icy conditions around Baton Rouge. Notably, Interstate 10 between Baton Rouge and Lafayette was closed in both directions Monday morning because of ice accumulation that caused multiple crashes

In Memphis, Tennessee, snow started falling Sunday afternoon, and in Mississippi, sleet in Jackson and other central parts of the state left roads and bridges slick.

Parts of Kentucky and West Virginia still recovering from an ice storm last week were expected to get up to a quarter-inch (0.6 centimeters) of ice or up to 8 inches (20 centimeters) of snow by Tuesday.

___

Associated Press journalist Kate Brumback in Atlanta contributed to this report.

Northern Tories are today demanding Boris Johnson trigger an economic 'Big Bang' as part of his plan to 'level up the country'.

Conservatives, many of them in so-called 'red wall' seats taken from Labour at the last election, want the Prime Minister to unleash a new investment boom in the region.

The Northern Research Group (NRG) of MPs said the region needs its a shot in the arm comparable to the deregulation of the City of London in the 1980s to deliver opportunity and prosperity.

In a report written with the Centre for Policy Studies think tank, the NRG said the Government now needed to match the 'radicalism' of voters who backed the Conservatives for the first time with a radical agenda of its own.

They said locals were tired of being 'neglected' by Westminster politicians in favour of the prosperous capital and South East.

NRG chairman Jake Berry said: 'At the last election millions of northern voters broke with tradition by voting for the Conservative Party, in many cases for the first time.

'The Prime Minister needs to recognise that they did so not only to deliver Brexit, but to voice the systemic disadvantages felt in many communities that were tired of being neglected in favour of London and the South East.

'The measures we have put forward will help the Prime Minister and this Government to 'level up' the economy and help make the North build back better as one of the most investable places in modern times.'

NRG chairman Jake Berry said millions voted for the Tories 'not only to deliver Brexit, but to voice the systemic disadvantages felt in many communities that were tired of being neglected'

The Northern Research Group (NRG) of MPs said the region needs its a shot in the arm comparable to the deregulation of the City of London in the 1980s to deliver opportunity and prosperity

In a report written with the Centre for Policy Studies think tank, Mr Berry's (centre) NRG said Boris Johnson's (left) Government now needed to match the 'radicalism' of voters who backed the Conservatives for the first time with a radical agenda of its own

The report's recommendations include cash incentives for investors to spur a 'green industrial revolution', fast-tracking major planning applications with decisions in 'weeks not years' and updating pension scheme rules to encourage more investment in northern infrastructure.

It called also for the creations of a new northern infrastructure bond aimed at global investors with a northern recovery bond to allow local investors to support growth and a new growth board for the North to help steer investment.

'The aim of a Northern Big Bang should be to unleash a torrent of investment into the Northern economy, to deliver the productivity gains, economic growth and higher wages that are so desperately needed,' it said.

'These proposals, and that investment, can help create a Northern Big Bang, comparable to the 1980s Big Bang in the City of London, which did so much to bring new opportunities and economic growth in London and the South East.'

The report said the various proposals put together had the potential to unlock billions of pounds of private sector investment in the region.

'There is a particular opportunity to make the North the home of the green industrial revolution which the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, has called for,' it said.

'The innovation and technology which will allow us to achieve our net-zero ambitions need to be inculcated somewhere, and the North of England is the most obvious place, given its manufacturing strengths and industrial pedigree.'
The colleagues of a junior firefighter who took his own life did not think he was being bullied, an inquest has heard.

Jaden Francois-Esprit, 21, was found hanged at his home in Wapping, east London, in August 2020 despite no previous history of mental health issues.

The inquest heard the firefighter felt he was being bullied and treated unfairly at Wembley Fire Station in north London where he was singled out in group tasks and teased for eating Caribbean food.

But colleagues today claimed Mr Francois-Esprit had been frustrated in his job and had never confided in them about being bullied.

Lewis Gunn, a lead firefighter at Wembley, said: 'I knew he didn't feel like we were busy enough, I think that's a realisation that every firefighter comes to after going through training.'

Jaden Francois-Esprit, 21, who was stationed at Wembley Fire Station in north London, died at his home Wapping, east London, in August 2020

He said he was unaware that Mr Francois-Esprit had reported finding him hard to approach, adding: 'I felt that the interactions we had were genuinely quite pleasant.'

Mr Gunn said he was also unaware that Mr Francois-Esprit struggled with dyslexia, but said he had noticed he had become more withdrawn in the months before he died.

He said he had had a word with him when Mr Francois-Esprit had snapped 'What now?' after he asked him to help clean the station mess.

'I asked him if he was happy in the job and if he was happy at the station - he didn't seem that happy,' Mr Gunn said.

Sean Nunkoosing, a colleague of Mr Francois-Esprit, also knew he was frustrated in the job but said he had never confided in him about being bullied.

'He was quite a shy character, but when he got to know someone he would warm up to them,' Mr Nunkoosing said.

'I got to know him and it was obvious he had a really good sense of humour. He was a polite young man, personable - just a really nice person.'

He added: 'He never said he was unhappy at work - he used the word ''bored''. I could infer from our conversation that he wasn't as happy as he might have been in another job.'

Mr Nunkoosing went on: 'I wouldn't say he was being bullied - I would say that's too strong a word to describe his time at Wembley, but that's only my opinion.

An inquest previously heard that Wembley Green Watch had about 22 members at the time and Mr Francois-Esprit was the youngest

'Probably everyone who has ever been in a workplace probably feels like they've been singled out in some way or another and feels like they could have been dealt with a bit more positively.'

Mr Nunkoosing said Mr Francois-Esprit had continued applying to the London Ambulance Service because it was a busier job, but feared he would not pass the exams.

A friend who trained with the young firefighter but was posted to a different station said Mr Francois-Esprit had asked him about his training and the procedures where he worked.

Mr Ivarsson said his friend was concerned that his monthly development meetings were not taking place, and he was not being given the support he needed to complete his development book.

He said Mr Francois-Esprit also felt he was being given too much to do without support, such as undertaking the inventory check for five fire engines alone on every shift.

In his statement, Mr Ivarsson said: 'Jaden expressed to me that he felt he was being treated unfairly and that he felt he was being bullied.

'He told me he was left alone to undertake tasks at the station without being told what to do.

Mr Francois-Esprit (pictured left with his brother Kairo) had made 16 transfer requests to four different stations in London between February and August 2020, an inquest heard

'Jaden told me that he felt he was being teased about his food. To my understanding, the teasing related to his cultural background.

'He also told me that he had made 19 transfer requests and that he loved his job but hated his Watch.

'Officers at the station should have realised he was desperate to move station. Jaden told me he was being called things like ''lazy boy'' which he did not like.

'As an organisation, I believe that the LFB have failed in giving Jaden the right support.

'There were indications that he was not happy with his station. As an organisation, I believe they should have a closer watch on their recruits.'

Commissioner of London Fire Brigade, Andy Roe, said: 'The thoughts of all at the Brigade remain with the family of Firefighter Jaden Francois-Esprit throughout this difficult time.

'This is a tragic incident and it saddens me to hear that instead of enjoying a new career as a firefighter, Jaden faced challenges and felt unhappy.

'Soon after Jaden's death I met with his family, to not only offer my condolences, but to assure them that the Brigade would investigate what happened. An internal investigation was carried out and has been shared with the coroner.

'I would like to personally reassure the public that the Brigade does not tolerate any form of bullying. We take any incidences of alleged bullying seriously and have strict policies in place, which all staff are expected to adhere to.

'We hope once the inquest has concluded, it will provide Firefighter Jaden Francois-Esprit's family and friends with some closure.'

The inquest previously heard that Wembley Green Watch had about 22 members at the time and Mr Francois-Esprit was the youngest by about seven years.

He had made 16 transfer requests to four different stations in London between February and August 2020, but knew his request was unlikely to be granted until he had completed his workbook.

The process would probably have taken him about eight months.

A post-mortem recorded Mr Francois-Esprit's cause of death as suspension.

The inquest continues.

For confidential support, call the Samaritans on 116123 or visit a local Samaritans branch. See www.samaritans.org for details
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A new national set of best practices might help small towns in New Mexico help build local outdoor recreation economies that can help them keep pace with the Moabs and Durangos of the world.

Late last month, the Outdoor Recreation Roundtable, a coalition of outdoor industry trade associations and other organizations, released a document aimed at giving rural communities the tools they need to develop an ecosystem of outdoor recreation businesses.

Axie Navas, director of New Mexicos Outdoor Recreation Division, said the Rural Economic Development Toolkit provides concrete, step-by-step instructions for communities looking to embrace outdoor recreation but unsure where to begin.

It is so refreshing to be able to now say: This is the blueprint, heres a place to start, Navas told the Journal.

Chris Perkins, a fellow at ORR and the studys author, said rural communities in New Mexico and elsewhere have struggled to keep pace with the economic growth in urban centers. The report says the Great Recession contributed to the loss of 17,500 businesses in counties with fewer than 100,000 people.

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................................................................

In New Mexico, all but four counties outside the states metropolitan areas lost population from 2009 to 2019, according to a recent report from the New Mexico Chamber of Commerce.

Perkins said building an economic strategy around outdoor activities, from hiking to mountain biking to hunting, can help struggling New Mexico communities start replacing lost jobs as power plants shut down and mining complexes close.

What we see in the development of outdoor (recreation) economies, is an opportunity to supplement existing industries and  help build more balanced and resilient economies, Perkins said.

Still, making the transition is easier said than done. Navas said one barrier, at least in New Mexicos smaller communities, is that many cities and counties lack the dedicated staff to oversee this kind of transition.

When it comes to actually creating that brand, putting together the marketing strategy, potentially investing in infrastructure  thats a lot of work, Navas said. And some of our communities struggle to bring those resources together.

The toolkit, assembled by ORR in conjunction with local leaders across the country, is designed to help circumvent that.

The document lays out 15 best practices for rural communities to follow as they begin working to build an outdoor recreation economy, ranging from identifying funding partners to generating public support. Just as importantly, the document lays out how to identify funding sources.

Perkins said one of the most important parts of the toolkit is creating collaboration between community stakeholders.

Theres so much strength in building collaboratives.

Gabe Vasquez, a Las Cruces city councilor, said he has already seen the impact of focusing on outdoor recreation in southern New Mexico. He said the designation of the Organ Mountains Desert Peaks National Monument and other similar changes have already established his community as a jumping-off point for outdoor recreation enthusiasts. With some work and community collaboration using strategies from the toolkit, he said he expects that effect to trickle into other southern New Mexico communities as well.

I think its imperative on our community to really meaningfully start to shape what our next generation of jobs are going to look like, Vasquez said. I think outdoor recreation plays a big part in that.

Stephen Hamway covers economic development, health care and tourism for the Journal. He can be reached at shamway@abqjournal.com.
ABHI_1512 BHPian



Join Date: Feb 2020 Location: Calcutta Posts: 410 Thanked: 4,215 Times

re: Drive from Calcutta to the land of Crocodiles, Bhitarkanika Calcutta-Kolaghat-Balasore-Bhadrak-Chandabali-Pattamundai-Rajnagar-Khola-Dangmal(Bhitarkanika). There is another route through Jayanagar but that was used earlier and one has to take a boat to reach Dangamal.



The estimated time to reach Bhitarkanika is around 8-9 hours and so we started leisurely at around 11 after a nice dinner at home, just before midnight. We got through empty city roads and crossed the second hoogly bridge in a jiffy. First slowdown happened near the Dhulagarh toll which was chock-a-block with the commercial truck traffic. Stuck still for around 15 minutes before taking a round about just before the toll and crossed without any hiccup.



This is the newly built Majherhat Bridge in Calcutta and which has recently been rebuilt to give respite to us people from Southwest Calcutta.





Second slowdown happened just after the Debra toll and we encountered some dense fog. Navigating slowly and carefully, we took the road towards Belda and Balasore. Dense fog accompanied us on and off before we reached Jaleshwar and took our first chai break. Road conditions were very good to good till then. Once you cross Balasore, the diversions start appearing every now and then. One needs to be little cautious while going through the diversions since some of them have some nasty broken patches.



We reached Bhadrak during early morning and this is where we left NH16 and took SH9 towards Chandabali and Dangamal. Stopped for a small chai break here as well even tested some piping hot puris and subzi. Little chitchat and off we were on the road again. The road was fantastic and the surface was equally good if not excellent. The two lane state highways are the real life lines of the country and it was heartening to see the excellent quality. Odisha state highways are brilliantly maintained and I say this from my experience of using them over the years.



Road signages are ample and are located strategically.





Stopped for breakfast at an obscure looking eatery in Pattamundai and the default morning breakfast in these parts is Upma along with some form of chickpea curry. Some of us opted for the usual puri-subzi while some of them gorged on the upma. Some sweets and chai after, we finally started for our final leg of the onward journey. The roads passed through small towns like Chandabali, Pattamundai and Rajnagar. The last leg after Rajnagar is a meandering drive through many little bridges over the rivers which ultimately merge into Bhitarkanika sanctuary.



Brilliant state highway through Chandabali- Butter smooth roads.





Tree lined interior roads are the hallmark of Odisha.





Baahon posing on an empty road towards Dangamal.





Signages mentioning the Eco retreat en route Dangamal.





Dangamal is around 10kms from Khola-the point where the boats start from the sanctuary to take the river route to reach Bhitarkanika Dangamal jetty. This boat ride is the most interesting part of Bhitarkanika sojourn. Finally we reached Dangamal and Aranya Niwas was omnipresent as soon as you reach. It was quite bizzare to look at the sprawling property when one has to pass through thatched roof houses as you approach the OTDC property.



Prominent signage of Aranya Nivas.





Baahon parked after the overnight drive soaking in the sun.





Baahon along with its counterpart from Calcutta.





The property, as I mentioned before was inaugurated just a month back and work was still going on. The rooms were spick and span along with a small balcony at every floor. The property being new has got some teething problems for now since staff were still getting a hang of the things. The staff though were very accommodating and eager to help, despite limitations.



We spent the afternoon roaming around the property after a nice lunch. The property is just around 500 metres from the entry point of Bhitarkanika National Park. We went inside the park after strolling through the village roads and spent some time inside. One needs to take the entry tickets along with camera charges. The park has got the Forest Rest House inside and one can book them for staying as well. The park also has a museum where the different carcasses of crocodiles are also kept. It has also got a breeding center for crocodiles.



Entry point of the park.





We took a stroll around the park and it was a nice walk through. In fact, there is a stretch which passes through mangroves and it was quite eerie to go through since light was fading. The guide with us though was confident of taking us through and was quite energetic in terms of finding us some wildlife. Spending some time there and it ended with us having chai and some snacks at the in house restaurant inside the park.



The pathway inside Bhitarkanika National Park.





Dungston checks in !!





Forest Rest House inside the park.





Cottage inside the park.





Dangamal jetty.





Our walkaway inside the park and in the dark.







The evening went off well and we retired for the night after having our adda session which went on late in the night. The next morning was to be the highlight and accordingly we got in touch with our guide and pre-booked our boat ride from Khola. So, the plan was to leave Calcutta by the evening and subsequently we made all the necessary arrangements. Being a saturday, it was easier since it was a holiday as well. Now the route to Bhitarkanika is simple and straight forward-. There is another route through Jayanagar but that was used earlier and one has to take a boat to reach Dangamal.The estimated time to reach Bhitarkanika is around 8-9 hours and so we started leisurely at around 11 after a nice dinner at home, just before midnight. We got through empty city roads and crossed the second hoogly bridge in a jiffy. First slowdown happened near the Dhulagarh toll which was chock-a-block with the commercial truck traffic. Stuck still for around 15 minutes before taking a round about just before the toll and crossed without any hiccup.Second slowdown happened just after the Debra toll and we encountered some dense fog. Navigating slowly and carefully, we took the road towards Belda and Balasore. Dense fog accompanied us on and off before we reached Jaleshwar and took our first chai break. Road conditions were very good to good till then. Once you cross Balasore, the diversions start appearing every now and then. One needs to be little cautious while going through the diversions since some of them have some nasty broken patches.We reached Bhadrak during early morning and this is where we left NH16 and took SH9 towards Chandabali and Dangamal. Stopped for a small chai break here as well even tested some piping hot puris and subzi. Little chitchat and off we were on the road again. The road was fantastic and the surface was equally good if not excellent. The two lane state highways are the real life lines of the country and it was heartening to see the excellent quality. Odisha state highways are brilliantly maintained and I say this from my experience of using them over the years.Stopped for breakfast at an obscure looking eatery in Pattamundai and the default morning breakfast in these parts is Upma along with some form of chickpea curry. Some of us opted for the usual puri-subzi while some of them gorged on the upma. Some sweets and chai after, we finally started for our final leg of the onward journey. The roads passed through small towns like Chandabali, Pattamundai and Rajnagar. The last leg after Rajnagar is a meandering drive through many little bridges over the rivers which ultimately merge into Bhitarkanika sanctuary.Dangamal is around 10kms from Khola-the point where the boats start from the sanctuary to take the river route to reach Bhitarkanika Dangamal jetty. This boat ride is the most interesting part of Bhitarkanika sojourn. Finally we reached Dangamal and Aranya Niwas was omnipresent as soon as you reach. It was quite bizzare to look at the sprawling property when one has to pass through thatched roof houses as you approach the OTDC property.The property, as I mentioned before was inaugurated just a month back and work was still going on. The rooms were spick and span along with a small balcony at every floor. The property being new has got some teething problems for now since staff were still getting a hang of the things. The staff though were very accommodating and eager to help, despite limitations.We spent the afternoon roaming around the property after a nice lunch. The property is just around 500 metres from the entry point of Bhitarkanika National Park. We went inside the park after strolling through the village roads and spent some time inside. One needs to take the entry tickets along with camera charges. The park has got the Forest Rest House inside and one can book them for staying as well. The park also has a museum where the different carcasses of crocodiles are also kept. It has also got a breeding center for crocodiles.We took a stroll around the park and it was a nice walk through. In fact, there is a stretch which passes through mangroves and it was quite eerie to go through since light was fading. The guide with us though was confident of taking us through and was quite energetic in terms of finding us some wildlife. Spending some time there and it ended with us having chai and some snacks at the in house restaurant inside the park.The evening went off well and we retired for the night after having our adda session which went on late in the night. The next morning was to be the highlight and accordingly we got in touch with our guide and pre-booked our boat ride from Khola. Last edited by ABHI_1512 : 13th February 2021 at 18:41 .

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An estimated 500 oil and gas tankers have been destroyed in a catastrophic explosion and fire at Afghanistan's biggest trade crossing with Iran, causing tens of millions of pounds of losses.

The huge blaze, which broke out Saturday afternoon at Islam Qala port 75 miles from the western city of Herat, has been contained and an investigation launched into its cause.

At least 60 people were injured after hundreds of fuel vehicles exploded in the blaze and a series of blasts hurled lorries hundreds of yards into the air, disrupting power supplies and causing tens of millions of pounds of damage.

The fire was so intense that NASA satellites could reportedly see the blast from space and Afghan officials were forced to appeal to neighbouring Iran for help.

An estimated 500 oil and gas tankers have been destroyed in a catastrophic explosion and fire at Afghanistan's biggest trade crossing with Iran, causing tens of millions of pounds of losses. Pictured on February 14, a firefighter walks amidst wreckage of gas tankers after a huge fire accident at Islam Qala occurred on the outskirts of Herat, Afghanistan on Saturday

The huge blaze, which broke out Saturday afternoon at Islam Qala port 120 kilometres (75 miles) from the western city of Herat, has been contained and an investigation launched into its cause. The picture shows the aftermath of the blaze

At least 60 people were injured after hundreds of fuel vehicles exploded in the blaze and a series of blasts hurled lorries hundreds of yards into the air, disrupting power supplies and causing tens of millions of pounds of damage

Younus Qazi Zada, the head of the Herat Chamber of Commerce, said on Sunday that 500 tankers had been engulfed by flames.

'Around $50 million of damage has been caused by the fire, but a more accurate figure will be available in the coming days,' he added.

'The catastrophe was much bigger than imagined,' he said.

Videos posted on social media on Saturday night showed the towering fire and huge clouds of thick black smoke billowing into the sky.

The huge blaze broke out Saturday afternoon at Islam Qala port 75 miles from the western city of Herat

The fire was so intense that NASA satellites could reportedly see the blast from space and Afghan officials were forced to appeal to neighbouring Iran for help. A man surveys the scene of a fire at Islam Qala Border near Iran, in Herat, Afghanistan

The blaze, broke out on Saturday afternoon at the Afghanistan-Iranian border on February 13, has been contained and an investigation launched into its cause. Pictured, Afghan firefighters work at the scene of the massive fire on Saturday

Afghan firefighters are pictured working at the scene of a fire at Islam Qala Border near Iran, in Herat, Afghanistan on February 14. The fire has been contained on Monday and an investigation has been launched into its cause by local authorities

The finance ministry said early findings suggested the blaze started in a tanker before quickly spreading and causing 'heavy financial losses' - including fuel, tankers and customs facilities. Men walk amidst wreckage of gas tankers after the fire

During the blaze looters descended on the site, stealing goods that were being imported and exported across the border.

Security forces on Sunday opened fire on a vehicle, killing one man, after the driver failed to stop at a checkpost that had been hastily set up to prevent suspected looters from entering what was left of the customs office compound.

The finance ministry said early findings suggested the blaze started in a tanker before quickly spreading and causing 'heavy financial losses' - including fuel, tankers and customs facilities.

Damage to power lines from the incident left large parts of Herat province without power on Sunday.

At least 60 people were injured after hundreds of fuel vehicles exploded in the blaze and a series of blasts hurled lorries hundreds of yards into the air, disrupting power supplies and causing tens of millions of pounds of damage. Pictured, residents walk amidst wreckage of gas tankers on Sunday after a fire broke out in Islam Qala, Herat province, Afghanistan

Pictured, smoke rises from burnt tankers after a fire in Islam Qala, Herat province, on Saturday. The fire has been contained

During the blaze looters descended on the site, stealing goods that were being imported and exported across the border. Afghan men walks past the wreckage of gas tankers on Saturday after a fire accident at Islam Qala on the outskirts of Herat

Islam Qala is one of the major ports in Afghanistan, through which most official trade with Iran is conducted.

Kabul has waivers from Washington allowing it to import oil and gas from Iran despite US sanctions.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said the border 'was held open for trucks, cars and people running from the fire'.

Afghanistan's vice president Amrullah Saleh said hundreds of trucks were allowed to enter Iran to escape.

Traders have been asked to use alternative border crossings.

A man walks past burnt tankers in Islam Qala, Herat province, Afghanistan on February 14. Younus Qazi Zada, the head of the Herat Chamber of Commerce, said on Sunday that 500 tankers had been engulfed by flames

An estimated 500 oil and gas tankers have been destroyed in a catastrophic explosion and fire at Afghanistan's biggest trade crossing with Iran, causing tens of millions of pounds of losses. A security officer walks amidst wreckage of gas tankers

Pictured on Saturday, an Afghan firefighter works at the scene of a fire at Islam Qala Border near Iran, in Herat, Afghanistan

The Taliban has regularly attacked fuel tankers they suspect of supplying foreign troops in the country.

In 2014, the hardline group destroyed more than 200 fuel trucks on Kabul's outskirts in an attack.

There was no indication that militants were behind Saturday's blaze.

However, insurgents assaulted a nearby security post shortly after the blaze broke out, taking advantage of the situation, the spokesman for the governor of Herat province said Saturday.

People survey the scene of a fire at Islam Qala Border in Herat, Afghanistan, on February 13. The fire has been contained

An estimated 500 oil and gas tankers have been destroyed in a catastrophic explosion and fire at Afghanistan's biggest trade crossing with Iran. An Afghan security officer walks past burnt tankers in Islam Qala, Herat province, on February 14

In this video screenshot, smoke rises from fuel tankers at the Islam Qala border with Iran, in Herat Province on February 13

Security forces have been deployed around the port area.

Afghanistan has been hit by a surge in violence despite ongoing peace talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government, which have so far failed to achieve a breakthrough.

The rise in violence has led US President Joe Biden's administration to launch a review of a deal signed between Washington and the terror group last year that paved the way for the withdrawal of all American troops in the coming months.
The Minister of Economy, Entrepreneurship and Tourism, Claudiu Nasui, gave his approval for the allocation of 2.5 billion RON for supporting the operators from the tourism industry, the president of the Romanian Hotels and Restaurants' Employers Association (HORA) Daniel Mischie declared, on Monday, at the end of a meeting the HoReCa industry union leaders had with the minister.

"The most important topic that was discussed was the allocation of budgetary resources for Measure 224, the allocation of 20 percent from the turnover difference for the tourism industry operators, the hospitality industry. We secured the Minister of Economy's approval for 2.5 billion RON, and the next stop of tourism operators is at the Finance Ministry, at Minister Nazare, who has to allocate another 1.5 billion in order for this sum to be complete. The Minister of Economy gave his approval for 2.5 billion RON and there is also an appeal made in this sense," Daniel Mischie said.

The HORA leader specified that at the meeting they also discussed the scheme through which the state could cover 40 percent of the minimum wage.

"We discussed the program proposed for the hospitality industry, a 40 percent reduction from the gross national minimum wage for the 2021-2027 exercise, with these taxes supported from PNRR [the National Recovery and Resilience Plan] and a proposal was made by the industry for remaking Measure 3, so that the money from this measure could reach those entitled to it," Daniel Mischie mentioned.

The coordinator of the Coalition for Romania's Development, Dragos Anastasiu, present at the talks, later welcomed the Government's intention of covering 40% of the gross national minimum wage from the hospitality industry.

"We talked a little about the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, here I joyfully found out that that there is an active aid scheme in the works, a percentage of 40% of the gross national minimum wage for the employees in the HoReCa industry," he said.

On the other hand, Mischie announced that hospitality industry operators are holding protest actions in relation to this economic sector's economic situation.

"Tomorrow, starting with 12:00 hrs, there will be a protest held by hospitality industry operators. It is a protest through which we are trying to warn that this industry can no longer support the expenses to which they are wrongfully subjected to in order to give the state time and space in order to solve this crisis. The protest is taking place in front of the units, each operator will come out in front of the unit, along with all employees, with significant messages for the government members," HORA chairman said.
The deputy says the issue is yet to be discussed with the Rada leadership.

Yuriy Vitrenko, a former Naftogaz official, could once again be nominated to the post of Energy Minister, says Danylo Getmantsev, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Finance, Tax and Customs Policy, People's Deputy with ruling Servant of the People faction.

"Vitrenko's nomination and the issue of submitting it to the Verkhovna Rada has not been discussed," the MP told a briefing during a meeting of the majority faction on February 15, an UNIAN correspondent reports.

"However, I don't rule out the possibility that it will be tabled," the deputy noted.

To clarify when this might happen, Getmantsev said he had no such information.

"This is an issue that must be agreed with the Verkhovna Rada leadership. But, you know that the resolution on the appointment can be put up on the agenda at any moment, without a preliminary vote. Therefore, it's possible any day," he suggested.

Read alsoEarly to hope for Ukraine's EU membership prospects: EP approves new reportIn addition, when asked if there are enough votes in Parliament secured to support Vitrenko, Getmantsev said that the previous two failed votes showed that it was impossible to say until the last moment, adding that he would back Vitrenko's candidacy.

Vitrenko's nomination for energy minister: Background

On December 17, the Verkhovna Rada did not support the appointment of the former top manager of Naftogaz of Ukraine, Yuriy Vitrenko, as first vice prime minister, minister of energy. A total of 186 lawmakers backed his nomination, with the required minimum of 226 votes.

On December 21, the government appointed Vitrenko acting energy minister.

December 22, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Dmytro Razumkov said in an interview with a Ukrainian TV channel that the appointment of Vitrenko as acting energy minister, bypassing parliament vote, would not facilitate cooperation with the government.

On January 28, parliament once again snubbed Vitrenko's candidacy.

On February 4, the Verkhovna Rada rejected a bill that would prohibit renominating the same candidate for a certain position in government during one Parliament session.

Through an amendment to the draft law, introduced by First Deputy Chairman of the ruling faction, Oleksandr Kornienko, it was proposed to allow an acting minister to remain at the helm for 90 days instead of the current 30 days. The draft, however, was sent for revision after failing to pass Parliament.

Reporting by UNIAN
Mohammad Ayaz lost two family members last summer in a clash with a rival family over an irrigation channel in southeastern Afghanistan.

Ayaz lives near Gardez, the capital of Afghanistans southeastern Paktia Province. He says he lost his son and nephew in the July clash while two of his brothers and a nephew were severely injured. One of them lost his kidney while the other was crippled when his leg was amputated, he said.

He says local authorities failed to act a month earlier, when he requested protection from a powerful rival family in his village. His real troubles began, however, after his case made it to a local court in Gardez.

The judges asked me for a Toyota Corolla car and a $20,000 bribe to favor me in the case, but I am too poor to pay such money, he said while explaining how several members of his family are still detained despite suffering injuries. How can I expect justice now?

Judges in Gardez refused to talk to Radio Free Afghanistan to discuss specific cases or even comment generally. Local attorneys and administrative officials, however, reject the widespread view that Afghan courts are either inefficient or corrupt. Many Afghans, especially those in Paktia and other southeastern provinces, still prefer settling disputes by tribal laws despite the international community spending hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to resurrect the Afghan judiciary.

In Loya Paktia or Greater Paktia, which includes the provinces of Paktia, Paktika, and Khost, most of the regions predominant Pashtun residents maintain that they trust the local tribal leaders administering traditional laws in informal tribal councils over government courts.

Unlike many litigants in state courts, many of those who turn to tribal law say they are happy with their choice. Mukhlis Ahmadzai, another Paktia resident, says the tribal justice system saved him when he accidentally killed a child with his car.

Ahmadzai says that while attending to the injured child, he informed his family and friends instead of reporting the incident to the police. By the time he took the childs body to his house, his family had mobilized a tribal jirga and organized a nanawati or ritualized form of seeking forgiveness. It involves the sacrifice of goats and sheep at someones doorstep to seek forgiveness for a crime, mistake, or transgression.

They accepted our apology and absolved us of murder, he said. God bless them, they were very nice people.

Pashtun customary laws are unwritten codes and practices. Their essence is informed by Pashtunwali, a collection of ideal behaviors, codes, and aspirations, but their local practice is determined by precedents, ecology, history, and collective decisions within a tribal, clan, or region. Communities, particularly those in the Pashtun heartland straddling Pakistan and Afghanistan, follow narkh or local versions of Pashtun customary laws.

Kausar Zadran, a tribal leader in Paktia, often takes part in tribal councils arbitrating disputes in light of narkh. He says people prefer the Pashtun courts because resolutions are swifter.

We decide more than 90 percent of our cases in the light of tribal traditions and laws, he told Radio Free Afghanistan. We take the rest to state courts because they somehow involve the government and the state [and cannot be solved within the local communities].

Gulnawar Khan Zadran, another tribal leader in Paktia, says they resolved a land dispute in the village of Said Khel by invoking customary laws.

Four of us intervened in the dispute after they had exhausted each other by engaging in a violent blood feud for years, he told Radio Free Afghanistan. We secured their agreement for arbitration and were able to resolve the dispute within a week.

We even got the local government administrator to back our arbitration, he added. We were able to solve a complex problem through customary laws.

Javed Himat, a lawyer in Gardez, says invoking customary laws in criminal cases is illegal under the current Afghan legislation. He says the government courts are not corrupt, despite claims to the contrary.

Obviously every court case will favor one party over the other or hold someone guilty while exonerating others, he told Radio Free Afghanistan. We have not seen any evidence of corruption in the courts.

Himat acknowledges that most family issues and financial and land disputes across Paktia are still being resolved by informal tribal courts.

The tribal councils have an important role in swiftly resolving disputes, he noted. They are more prevalent in remote regions outside the government control, but in regions controlled by the government people are increasingly turning to the judiciary and other state organs.

Land Of The Jirgas

Grappling with mounting Taliban violence while fighting for its survival in the wake of a possible departure of U.S. and international troops this year, Kabul isnt prioritizing justice at the state court level and has barely debated the issue.

Senior Afghan officials in Kabul and across greater Paktia have been known to romanticize the regions tribal heritage by calling it the land of the jirgas. But activists and legal experts question whether the government is willing or able to establish the rule of law by overpowering tribal laws, some of which contradict the human rights protections guaranteed by the Afghan constitution.

Paktia Governor Mohammad Haleem Fidai, however, says gradual progress is being made and the government courts are slowly replacing the tribal councils in legal disputes.

During the past one year we courts have resolved more than 1,100 cases, he said. Court cases take more time because all cases have to go through various tiers to ensure that justice is dispensed properly.

For those in Paktia, however, it may be years if not decades before the Afghan courts gain the trust of residents and truly take over the role of dispensing justice.
Kappan was arrested on 5 October while on the way to Hathras, home to the young Dalit woman who died after being gang-raped, allegedly by four upper-caste men

New Delhi: The Supreme Court Monday granted 5-day bail to journalist Siddique Kappan, arrested on his way to Hathras where a young Dalit woman had died after being allegedly gang-raped, to visit his ailing mother for five days.

A bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde, however, said that during his visit he shall not give any interview to the media, including social media.

The bench, also comprising Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, said that Siddique will not meet members of the public except his relatives and doctors concerned.

It said Siddique will be escorted by a team of Uttar Pradesh police officers and police at Kerala will cooperate with them.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ), stated that Kappan's mother could not talk on video conference and the doctors have said she might live only for two or three more days.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Uttar Pradesh government, said however that the condition of Kappan's mother was not as serious as was being projected and no medical certificates are provided.

"There are posters in Kerala and the wife of Kappan is collecting money in his name as if he is a martyr... When he goes to Kerala to visit his mother political opinions would be formed," Mehta said.

The bench said it was taking Sibal's statements on face value and "we will not allow him (Kappan) to be paraded and he will go to his house under the protection of armed guards".

On 16 November last year, the top court had sought a response from the Uttar Pradesh government on the plea challenging the arrest of the journalist on his way to Hathras.

Sibal had sought bail for the journalist saying that there was nothing against him in the FIR lodged at Mathura by the UP Police.

The FIR has been filed under various provisions of the IPC and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) against four people having alleged links with the Popular Front of India, or PFI.

PFI had been accused in the past of funding protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act across the country earlier this year.

Kappan was arrested on 5 October while he was on his way to Hathras, home to the young Dalit woman who died after being gang-raped, allegedly by four upper-caste men.

The KUWJ had filed a habeas corpus petition in the top court against the arrest of the journalist and it also sought his immediate production and release from illegal detention.

The police, however, had said it has arrested four people having links with the Popular Front of India in Mathura and identified the arrested persons as Siddique from Malappuram, Atiq-ur Rehman from Muzaffarnagar, Masood Ahmed from Bahraich and Alam from Rampur.

Hours after the arrest, the prominent journalist body of Kerala identified Malappuram native Siddique by his full name as Siddique Kappan, saying he is a senior Delhi-based journalist.

The plea stated that the arrest was made in violation of the mandatory guidelines laid down by the apex court and with the sole intention of obstructing the discharge of duty by a journalist.

The petition alleged that family members or colleagues have not been informed of his arrest.

Hathras has been in the news following the death of a 19-year-old Dalit woman who was allegedly gang-raped on September 14, 2020, in a village in the district.

Her cremation at night by the authorities, allegedly without the parents' consent, has triggered widespread outrage.
Hyderabad, Feb 15 : The daily Covid count in Telangana dropped to below 100 on Monday as health authorities conducted fewer tests over the week-end.

The state reported 99 new cases during the last 24 hours, taking the tally to 2,96,673.

Two more persons succumbed to the virus during the period, pushing the death toll to 1,618.

The fatality rate remained 0.54 per cent against the national average of 1.4 per cent.

According to the director of public health and family welfare, while 44.96 per cent of the deaths occurred due to Covid, 55.04 per cent had comorbidities.

Of the total 33 districts, no cases were registered in 13 districts during the last 24 hours.

Greater Hyderabad saw maximum number of cases at 24, followed by Rangareddy (10). Remaining districts reported new cases in single digit.

A total of 169 people recovered from the virus during the period, taking the cumulative numbers to 2,93,379.

The state's Covid recovery rate moved up to 98.88 per cent against the national average of 1.4 per cent.

The number of active cases dropped to 1,676 including 705 who are in home/institutional isolation.

During the last 24 hours 15,766 samples were tested -- 12,374 in government labs and 3,392 in private labs. This was about 50 per cent of the tests conducted on week days.

With this the cumulative number of tests conducted in the state rose to 83,11,404. Tests per million population climbed to 2,23,304.

Over 92 per cent of the beds in hospitals treating Covid cases remained vacant. As many as 8,204 beds out of 8,577 beds in 62 government hospitals were vacant. Similarly, in 217 private hospitals 7,066 out of 7,664 beds were vacant.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
Chennai, Feb 15 : The death toll in the fire at Tamil Nadu firecracker unit rose to 20 as one more person succumbed overnight to his injuries, officials said on Monday.

J Vanaraja, 51, who had sustained 90 per cent burns, succumbed at the Government Rajaji Hospital in Madurai on Sunday night. Two more injured were said to be in 'critical' condition.

A massive fire at Sree Mariyammal Fireworks near Sattur in Virudhunagar district on February 12, killing 11 persons and injuring more than 20 others.

Meanwhile, officials have identified three more victim women -- M Poomari, 50, S Sankareswari, 55, and P Malliga, 58.

Preliminary police investigations revealed that excess workforce along with illegal sub-leasing of the premises contributed to the disaster. Police has arrested one of the leaseholders, Ponnupandi, and are on the lookout for five others, including the factory owner.

In a related development, Tamil Nadu Revenue Secretary K Phanindra Reddy has urged Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organisation to request the Centre to bring an amendment to the Explosives Act to prevent such disasters in the future.

Reddy, who is also Commissioner of Revenue Administration, met with officials from various departments, including Virudhunagar Collector R Kannan, at the collectorate on Sunday and discussed ways and means to prevent recurrence of such fires.

He also suggested that minimum qualification or training be made compulsory for workers employed at fireworks units. He asked officials to form teams of officials from various departments to carry out inspections at such units to ensure that these don't employ more workers than permitted.
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White House chief medical adviser on COVID-19 Dr. Anthony Fauci stands at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Md., on Feb. 11, 2021. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)

Fauci: Stimulus Bill Must Be Passed For Schools to Safely Reopen

Infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci said Sunday that in order for schools to safely reopen nationwide amid the CCP virus pandemic, a stimulus bill must first be passed to provide further resources.

I think that the schools really do need more resources and thats the reason why the National Relief Act that were talking about getting passedwe need that. The schools need more resources, Fauci said during an appearance on ABCs This Week.

Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, made the remarks in response to the Feb. 12 guidelines released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on the reopening of schools in the United States.

He said he did not believe that schools currently have sufficient resources to follow the updated CDC guidance.

Democrats are attempting to push President Joe Bidens $1.9 trillion relief proposal though Congress, which includes a federal minimum-wage hike, a round of $1,400 stimulus checks, and extended unemployment benefits.

The proposal in its current form has little or no GOP backing. According to Reuters, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) last week said he predicts that not a single Republican will support the $1.9 trillion plan.

Fauci added that he believes schools will eventually reopen in a way that is safe for children and teachers.

I think it can be done. I mean, obviously its not a perfect situation, but its really important to get the children back to school in a safest way as possible. Safe for the children but also safe for the teachers and the other educators, he said.

Biden aims to reopen over half of schools nationwide for some teaching in person at least one day a week by day 100 of his presidency, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said last week.

His goal that he set is to have the majority of schoolsso, more than 50 percentopen by day 100 of his presidency, Psaki said. And that means some teaching in classrooms. So, at least one day a week. Hopefully, its more.

CDC director Rochelle Walensky echoed Faucis remarks on Sunday by saying that many more resources are needed from the federal government in order to reopen schools safely.

I think we need a lot more resources in order to get the schools safe. One of the things thats really been emphasized in the school reopening is how unsafe some of our school ventilation systems are, Walensky told Fox News. Thats a problem not just for SARS-CoV-2 but for other respiratory viruses, for children with asthma, for exposure to mold.

So I think that theres a lot of work that we need to do in order to get our schools a safer environment, she added.

Some measures needed in schools in order to mitigate the spread of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus include more space for children, fewer children in classrooms, more nurses and staff, and screening, Walensky said.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 01:35:24|Editor: huaxia

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MOGADISHU, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Somalia and the United Nations on Monday launched the 2021 Somalia Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP), seeking 1.09 billion U.S. dollars to provide life-saving assistance to 4 million people who will be in critical need of humanitarian assistance across the country in 2021.

Adam Abdelmoula, humanitarian coordinator for Somalia, said the HRP estimates that 5.9 million people will need humanitarian assistance in 2021, an increase from 5.2 million in 2020.

"As a result, we expect humanitarian needs to grow during 2021. Our support in ensuring availability and access to basic services such as food, shelter and health services is therefore vital," Abdelmoula said in a joint statement issued in Mogadishu.

He said multiple crises including erratic climate shocks, protracted conflict, disease outbreaks and a massive desert locust infestation have driven millions of children, women and men in Somalia to the brink of survival.

According to the UN, the humanitarian situation in Somalia worsened in 2020, compounded by the triple threat of floods, COVID-19 and desert locusts.

In 2021, the UN said, Somalia is projected to face more significant humanitarian challenges. Enditem
New Delhi: The condition of Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, who fainted on stage while addressing an election rally in Vadodara on Sonday, is better fine and he has been kept under observation for 24 hours.

Dr RK Patel, Director, UN Mehta hospital in Ahmedabad told reporters late on Sunday night, "His (Gujarat CM Vijay Rupani's) condition is stable. All his medical check-up reports including EGC and CT Scan are normal. There is nothing to worry about. He will be kept at the hospital for 24 hours just for observation,"

Gujarat Deputy CM Nitin Patel, however, told reporters on Sunday night that "CM Vijay Rupani fainted on stage while addressing an election rally in Vadodara. He was brought to Ahmedabad and admitted to UN Mehta hospital for a medical check-up."

"His health completely fine and he will be kept in observation for 24 hours," Deputy CM Nitin Patel added.

Earlier on Sunday, Vijay Rupani collapsed while addressing a public meeting planned for the upcoming local body elections in Vadodara. Rupani was given first aid on the stage, and then he was seen descending the stairs of the stage on his own. Reports say that it was Rupani's third public gathering of the day and he fainted, giving a speech in the Nizampura area.

Live TV

In a video, a bodyguard, who was behind him, is seen trying to hold the Gujarat Chief Minister, and other BJP leaders present on the dais also rushed to his help.

The Chief Minister was then flown in a helicopter from Vadodara to Ahmedabad and admitted to UN Mehta hospital in Ahmedabad.
Credit: Petr Novak, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.5)

People with Charles Bonnet Syndrome, which involves visual hallucinations for people who have lost their sight, have had worsening symptoms during the pandemic, finds a study led by UCL researchers.

The study of 45 patients from Moorfields Eye Hospital between June and July 2020, published in BMJ Open Ophthalmology, reports of harrowing increases in symptoms in over half of participants.

The findings highlight that social isolation, loneliness, lack of exercise and exposure to distressing media over the COVID-19 lockdown have exacerbated and intensified visual hallucinations in 56% of the patients studied.

Lead researcher Professor Mariya Moosajee (UCL Institute of Ophthalmology and Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust) said: "I had been trying to raise awareness of this condition pre-COVID; it can affect any one with sight loss ranging from young children to the elderly. COVID has impacted every single one of us, but now we have evidence that social isolation is precipitating a scary complication of visual impairment, which may have a major long-term effect on mental health."

Charles Bonnet Syndrome (CBS) is not curable but there are techniques to manage the condition as well as support. The study's researchers say that, where possible, increasing social interactions and engaging in physical exercise could help to reduce hallucinations. They say that an increase in healthcare professionals being aware of CBS risk factors is vital to diagnose more effectively. This leads to better strategies to promote patients being able to manage their condition.

The study publication coincides with increased public discussion of CBS, as an established character on Coronation Street, Johnny, began to hallucinate due to his sight loss from optic neuritis. In this week's episode, the character is scared, isolated and afraid that people think that he is 'going mad."

Esme's Umbrella, the UK's CBS campaign has been working tirelessly since it was founded by Judith Potts in 2015 to raise awareness of the condition. Potts, who is a co-author on the researcher paper, said: "Sadly it is often overlooked as a mental health condition or otherwise and is therefore not managed effectively. I am so pleased that our voice is now being heard and the horror of the condition is being recognized not only on national TV but also in this latest study.

"My dream is that anyone experiencing CBS will not be afraid to go to their doctor and when they do, they will be diagnosed quickly. COVID-19 has added to the situation in negative way as highlighted in the study."

The study was supported by the NIHR Moorfields Biomedical Research Centre, Thomas Pocklington Trust and Wellcome.

Another study by a UCL researcher, published last month, found that the visual hallucinations experienced by people with CBS can stem from spontaneous activity in the brain's visual centers.

Explore further A brain mechanism underlying 'vision' in the blind is revealed

More information: Lee Jones et al. Exacerbation of visual hallucinations in Charles Bonnet syndrome due to the social implications of COVID-19, BMJ Open Ophthalmology (2021). Lee Jones et al. Exacerbation of visual hallucinations in Charles Bonnet syndrome due to the social implications of COVID-19,(2021). DOI: 10.1136/bmjophth-2020-000670
The Income Tax Department has detected unaccounted transactions of Rs 1,500 crore by a Mumbai-based Gutka and Pan Masala manufacturer after week-long raids on the premises of the company located across many parts of the country.

The raids were carried out from 8 February to 13 February.

The raids have led to detection of foreign assets lying with a company registered in tax-haven British Virgin Islands (BVI) with an office in Dubai, and controlled and managed by the Chairman of the group. The net worth of the BVI company is Rs 830 crore created by siphoning of funds from India. This fund has been round-tripped to India in the form of a share premium amounting to Rs 638 crore in flagship companies of the group.

During the raids, various digital evidence and forensic analysis have yielded email communication, establishing control and management of the company with the promoter of the group searched. One of the employees, who was also a shareholder in the BVI company, was identified and cross-examined with the promoter. It has been accepted by parties involved that the employee was not aware of being a shareholder in the company and he had signed papers on the instruction of the main promoter.

Further, it has been found that the group has fraudulently availed deduction under section 80IC of the Income-tax Act, 1961 to an extent of Rs 398 crore. The group has set up two entities in Himachal Pradesh and was found to indulge in sham transactions in order to claim the deductions.

It was also found in the raids that the company had unaccounted production of pan masala of an amount of Rs 247 crore at two factory premises of the group.

The group's Gandhidham unit has falsely claimed Rs 63 crore deduction under section 10AA of the Income-tax Act, 1961.

The income tax department seized Rs 13 lakh cash and jewellery worth Rs 7 crore. Prohibitory orders have also been placed on 16 lockers and in 11 premises of the company.

Also read: I-T Dept launches faceless penalty scheme; here's how it works
London: Australia has joined a Canadian-led global coalition, comprised of dozens of signatory nations, aimed at pressuring countries like China, Russia and Iran who arrest innocent citizens in acts of hostage diplomacy.

Canadas Foreign Minister Marc Garneau said the declaration was urgently needed.

Today countries from every continent stand together to tell people who are being arbitrarily detained abroad that they are not alone, he said at a launch attended by human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, of London-based Doughty Street Chambers.

Canadas foreign minister Marc Garneau. Credit:AP

Using foreign nationals as bargaining chips to exercise leverage over another state is illegal, it is immoral and it needs to stop.
Jaipur (Rajasthan) [India], February 15 (ANI/SRV Media): Shaadidukaan.com, a digital platform, helps customers reach the right vendors for all your wedding needs. Planning a wedding, although greatly enjoyed by families, comes with its own set of hurdles.

Jaipur based startup Shaadidukaan.com helps reduce the hassle by helping their clients get in touch with verified vendors that fit the budget while providing quality service. Having vendors across 46 categories the digital platform is equipped to handle every wedding need, right from makeup, venue, catering, photographers and wedding planners to honeymoon packages.

Shaadidukaan.com helps their customers with budget forecasting and price negotiation so that the customers get value for their money and can easily plan their dream wedding on a reasonable budget. They also provide packages to the customers to streamline the process.

Founded in 2015, the idea of the company's digital platform came to it's founder Rohit Sharma, when he was attending a family wedding. He was inspired by the Indian wedding culture and traditions which is the reason he founded the startup.

This inspiration, coupled with his roots, was the reason to choose Jaipur as its starting location. Another reason to pick Jaipur was also that customers enjoy traditions with a touch of luxury which made the Pink City the perfect choice. Their presence today is spread across 173 cities in India where they continuously help couples realise their wedding dreams.

The event-planning background created a strong base for the company to understand the customers' requirements and ways to provide quality service. Through all their testimonials, their attention to detail, amiability, and service quality are repeatedly highlighted. Their testimonials also underline that they stay up-to-date with trends and help create memorable events.

"As a company, we enjoy a large customer base and vendor network which we wish to continually expand. We have helped plan over 15,000 weddings till date and all our work has garnered high praise for us throughout. Owing to this we expect to make presence in additional cities in the near future along with adding new vendors to our nexus. Our motto is to build India's biggest online wedding market and we look forward to seeing Shaadidukaan.com reach the top," said Prachi Kaushik, Head of Marketing, Shaadidukaan.com.

Shaadidukaan.com connects customers with maximum verified vendors to reduce their worries and to do away with the hassle. These vendors come with a guarantee of performance and quality and can be trusted entirely. The verified vendors have also helped ensure safety and hygiene during all the weddings that have taken place in the pandemic.

During the COVID times, the intimate wedding packages created by the digital platform and the services being provided online, have helped the customers to have a safe and tension-free wedding.

Shaadidukaan.com has launched its franchise division which has assisted in opening opportunities across the 173 cities across India. It is also the only company in India in the WedTech segment to have seen operating profit for two consecutive fiscal years within four years of its service.

Shaadidukaan.com is still a bootstrap company and has done exceptionally well in the previous year despite the pandemic. The company is also working in various domains and is looking forward to to align itself with the "Make In India" initiative. While growth is always something that the platform looks forward to, the service quality and customer satisfaction remain at the top of its priority.

Check them out on their Facebook: (https://www.facebook.com/shaadidukaan)and Instagram handle: (https://www.instagram.com/shaadidukaanofficial)

This story is provided by SRV Media. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/SRV Media)

DISCLAIMER

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Richard Burr will face Monday a censure vote from North Carolina's Republican Party after he joined six other Republicans on Saturday in voting in favor of convicting Donald Trump for 'inciting an insurrection.'

The move by Burr's home state GOP is the latest in fallout for the seven Republican senators dubbed 'Republicans in name only' or 'RINOs'.

The vote to formally express disapproval of Burr is expected to pass swiftly with overwhelming support for censoring him.

'I am voting yes because he failed his state and his constituents by voting to convict FORMER President Trump in what was an unconstitutional trial. A trial that even he said was unconstitutional,' North Carolina's RNC committeewoman Kyshia Lineberger told CNN.

'At the end of the day, America is a Republic where we the people elect representatives. Senator Burr did not represent the will of the people and that is a shame.'

North Carolina's GOP Chairman Michael Whatley called Burr's decision 'shocking and disappointing' in a statement Saturday.

Burr, however, had nothing to lose in his vote against Trump as he already announced in 2016 that he will not seek reelection in 2022. Rumors have swirled that the former president's daughter-in-law Lara Trump is considering a run for his seat in her home state.

North Carolina Senator Richard Burr is facing a formal censure vote from the GOP in North Carolina  the state he represents  after voting with six other Republican senators in favor of convicting Donald Trump for 'incitement of insurrection'

Burr announced in 2016 that he is not seeking reelection in 2022

North Carolina's GOP Chairman Michael Whatley in a statement Saturday called Burr's decision 'shocking and disappointing'

Fellow dissenter Republican senator Bill Cassidy was also censured by the GOP in his home state of Louisiana.

Republicans are turning en masse on the seven GOP senators who chose to convict Donald Trump during his second impeachment trial on Saturday.

Those who voted to convict with the 50 Democrats include Republican Senators Burr, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Of the seven, Burr was the biggest surprise as he was the only one of them all who voted last Tuesday that it was unconstitutional for the Senate to move forward with it's impeachment trial against an ex-president.

'I have listened to the arguments presented by both sides and considered the facts. The facts are clear,' Burr said in a statement Saturday after casting his 'guilty' vote.

'The President promoted unfounded conspiracy theories to cast doubt on the integrity of a free and fair election because he did not like the results,' he continued. 'As Congress met to certify the election results, the President directed his supporters to go to the Capitol to disrupt the lawful proceedings required by the Constitution. When the crowd became violent, the President used his office to first inflame the situation instead of immediately calling for an end to the assault.'

Trump was ultimately acquitted 57- 43, with Democrats falling 10 votes short of the 67 needed to convict the former President of inciting insurrection before the January 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol.

A two-thirds vote was required to successfully convict.

While 43 Republican senators chose to support the former President, seven ultimately agreed that Trump violated his oath of office by stirring MAGA fans into a frenzy before they took part in the siege of the Capitol.

'RINO Traitors': Fallout has ensued in the midst of the seven senators turning on Trump, including calls for Utah Sen. Mitt Romney (left), Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski (center) and Maine Sen. Susan Collins (right) facing calls for resignation

Cassidy was one of the GOP senators who broke ranks with his party, declaring: 'Our Constitution and our country is more important than any one person. I voted to convict President Trump because he is guilty.'

However, he has been quickly rebuked by GOP officials in Louisiana for his scathing assessment of Trump.

The executive committee of the Republican Party of Louisiana unanimously voted on Saturday evening to censure Cassidy.

The group released a statement on Twitter which read: 'We condemn, in the strongest possible terms, the vote today by Sen. Cassidy to convict former President Trump. Fortunately, clearer heads prevailed and President Trump has been acquitted of the impeachment charge filed against him.'

The other six GOP senators who voted to convict Trump have now been labelled 'RINO traitors' and are also being savagely attacked by supporters of the former POTUS. The term RINO is often used by the far-right sects of the GOP to describe those they perceive as not real conservatives.

The executive committee of the Republican Party of Louisiana unanimously voted on Saturday evening to censure Cassidy

Hundreds of President Trump's supporters stormed into the Capitol attacking police, smashing windows and sending lawmakers into hiding on January 6

Conservative commentator and staunch Trump supporter Brigitte Gabriel trolled Romney and Murkowski on Twitter.

'RT if you want @SarahPalin to primary Lisa Murkowski!!' she wrote, referring to the former Vice Presidential nominee, who also hails from Alaska.

She then wrote: 'Mitt Romney should be required to #LeaveTheGOP'.

Gabriel also tweeted directly at the Utah Senator stating: 'We are counting down the days until you lose your next primary.'

The other six GOP senators who voted to convict Trump have now been labelled 'RINO traitors' and are also being savagely attacked by supporters of the former POTUS

The senators have been branded 'traitors' by furious Republicans, who are now pushing for them to resign or be primaried by other conservatives

Others also lashed out at Romney, with one writing: 'You should really think of becoming a democrat. You're disloyal, have no integrity, have no honor or sense of loyalty, just like a democrat. You're a traitor. RINO!!'

Other described him as a 'piece of garbage' and wished him a 'swift trip to hell'.

Maine senator Susan Collins was also not immune from criticism.

She was described as a 'Satanist traitor' who needed to be pushed out of office.

Collins, Murkowski and Romney are all moderates who were frequently seen as the three Republican senators most likely to clash with President Trump. However, of the three, only Romney voted to convict Trump during his first impeachment trial last year.
NORTH GREENBUSH  Two young cows are still loose two weeks after 174 animals including other livestock, cats and dogs, were removed from the town's last farm on Hidley Road, police said.

We can see them out in the woods. Theyre spooked by people, Chief David Keevern said.

Many of the animals seized from the farm on Jan. 26 were traumatized, authorities said. Theyve been treated and are recovering at the Mohawk Hudson Humane Society and the Woodstock Farm Sanctuary in High Falls. Six of the 174 animals were dead on arrival. Some livestock was sent to three area farms.

Given the size of this case, we are extremely grateful to all who played a role in moving all of the animals to safety. While MHHS was able to take custody of 53 animals, mostly cats, we relied on caring local partners for all the other placements. We also thank all who have contributed donations to the care and rehabilitation of those with us, said Ashley Jeffrey Bouck, CEO of MHHS.

Three members of the family that owns the 75-acre farm have been charged with five misdemeanor counts each of failure to provide sustenance to the animals, Keevern said. They were arraigned in North Greenbush Town Court and await future court action. Keevern said the case remains under investigation.

The police department is keeping an eye on the two cows, but cannot safely remove them, Keevern said. Police are attempting to get the animals out without tranquilizing them due to the obstacles in carrying them out over the rough grounds at the farm. The cows have been grazing.

Among the animals that the animal welfare organizations, along with police, took from the farm are 54 cats, 44 chickens, 34 ducks, 20 cows, 13 pigs, seven turkeys and two dogs.

All the birds are in pretty good shape, said Rachel McCrystal, executive director of Woodstock Farm Sanctuary.

Four of the turkeys are headed to a farm sanctuary in Georgia and the ducks are going to a sanctuary in Iowa, McCrystal said. Woodstock Farm Sanctuary has two younger cows that are recovering.

Mohawk Hudson has started placing many of the cats in adoptive homes, while others are up for adoption. Some are very sweet and friendly, said Marguerite Pearson, a Mohawk Hudson spokeswoman. Others are still recovering. A pig, Mabel, has been adopted.

Donations to help the animals and to learn more can be done at the Mohawk Hudson Humane Society at its website mohawkhumane.org and at the Woodstock Farm Sanctuary website at woodstocksanctuary.org.
Mia Amin is the undergraduate student body president at the University of New Mexico. She is a senior studying business with a concentration in organizational leadership and accounting. This My View is also signed by Mathew Madrid, student body president at the New Mexico State University and Quincy Bradfield, student body president at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.


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TIJUANA, Mexico  After a weeklong bus ride from Honduras, Isabel Osorio Medina arrived in northern Mexico with the hope President Joe Biden would make it easier for people like him to get into the United States.

It seems the new president wants to help migrants, Osorio said as he got ready to check in to a cheap hotel in downtown Tijuana before heading to the U.S. Theyre saying he is going to help, but I dont know for sure how much is true or not.

The 63-year-old is among thousands of people who have come to the U.S.-Mexico border with the hope they will be able to ask for asylum and make their way into the U.S. now that former President Donald Trump is no longer in office.

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While Biden has taken some major steps in his first weeks in office to reverse Trumps hardline immigration policies, his administration hasnt lifted some of the most significant barriers to asylum-seekers.

In fact, its discouraging people from coming to the country, hoping to avoid what happened under both Trump and former President Barack Obama  border agents getting overwhelmed by migrants, including many Central Americans with children.

Now is not the time to come, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at a recent briefing, and the vast majority of people will be turned away.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken struck a similar tone on Feb. 6 as he announced official steps to end Trump-era agreements with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala that required many asylum-seekers to seek refuge in one of those countries instead of the U.S.

To be clear, these actions do not mean that the U.S. border is open, Blinken said. While we are committed to expanding legal pathways for protection and opportunity here and in the region, the United States is a country with borders and laws that must be enforced.

That message hasnt reached everyone.

More people have been arriving at a encampment in Matamoros, Mexico, a dangerous city just south of the Texas border where hundreds of asylum-seekers have been waiting under Trumps Remain in Mexico program.

Its possible even more may come after the Biden administration announced Friday that it would slowly allow an estimated 25,000 people to enter the U.S. as their cases are reviewed. The first wave is expected Feb. 19.

Walter Valenzuela, a 37-year-old Honduran, said he had been waiting in Tijuana, across the border from San Diego, for months for a chance to either seek asylum or risk an illegal crossing.

For years, asylum-seekers who met the initial threshold of demonstrating a credible fear of persecution in their homeland could generally stay in the U.S. until an immigration judge decided whether they qualified for permanent residency, which can take years.

Trump administration officials believed many asylum claims were fraudulent or lacked merit, submitted by people simply looking to remain in the U.S. But the issue is murky as tens of thousands flee violent gangs, natural disasters and political upheaval.

The Biden administration has signed several executive orders on immigration, including allowing in more refugees and establishing a task force to find the parents of about 600 children who were separated under Trump and still havent been reunited.

But it hasnt ended a public health order Trump issued at the start of the coronavirus pandemic that allows U.S. Customs and Border Protection to immediately expel nearly everyone, including asylum-seekers.

Psaki said the government is still working to develop a humane, comprehensive process to evaluate people coming to the U.S.

Asylum processes at the border will not occur immediately, she said. It will take time to implement.

Alan Bersin, who held top positions dealing with border security during the Clinton and Obama administrations, warned that Biden is headed for a crisis if he releases all asylum-seekers into the United States in the short term.

Meanwhile, pressure is mounting.

The number of people apprehended at the border has increased since January, though its below some previous periods. Authorities say many are getting caught and returned multiple times.

Complicating matters, a law has taken effect in Mexico that prohibits holding children in migrant detention centers, and the U.S. has stopped sending back some families along parts of the border. CBP, which doesnt have capacity to hold families because of COVID-19, in recent weeks has released dozens of people into the U.S. with instructions to appear in court later.

Authorities fear that as word spreads of those releases, more people will come. And asylum is not the only immigration issue creating headwinds for Bidens administration.

Texas and Arizona have both sued to stop Bidens 100-day deportation moratorium, which a judge temporarily put on hold. Immigration and Customs and Enforcement officers are complaining about proposed rules to focus on detaining and removing people in the country illegally who pose national security threats or have been convicted of more serious crimes.

Jon Feere, a senior adviser to ICE under Trump, said such moves are part of a larger pattern that the Biden administration will come to regret.

When you send the message that you are not serious about immigration enforcement, you cant act surprised when you see a massive influx of people that you have to manage, he said.

Raul Ortiz, deputy chief of the Border Patrol, said last week that as a liaison to the Biden transition team, he found the staff to be very attentive to the issues. Some had experience with surges of asylum-seekers under Obama.

This wasnt uncharted waters, Ortiz said in an interview produced by the Border Patrol. It wasnt like we were starting from scratch.

The larger debate is lost on Osorio, who came to Tijuana because he heard Biden wants to help people like him. He says he intended to seek asylum based on the dangers he faced as an environmental activist protesting illegal logging in Honduras.

But because he cant seek asylum at the official border crossing in San Diego, other migrants told him about a place he could try to cross illegally. He said if he encountered the Border Patrol, he would ask for asylum and see what happens.

They already told us more or less how to do it, Osorio said. Were going to take a look.

___

Fox reported from Washington.
Director Sooraj Barjatya, is gearing up for his upcoming projects in collaboration with some notable names in Bollywood. Sooraj Barjatya is responsible for some of the most iconic romantic movies in Bollywood, right from Maine Pyar Kiya to Prem Ratan Dhan Payo. Sooraj Barjatya has directed and produced some of the highest-grossing Bollywood films, his films include top films like Hum Aapke Hain Koun..!, Hum Saath-Saath Hain, Main Prem Ki Diwani Hoon, Vivah etc.

According to an exclusive by Pinkvilla, Sooraj Barjatya is set to collaborate with legendary actors Amitabh Bachchan and Boman Irani for his next directional venture. The upcoming film will be 'a tale of friendship'. The report added that the Maine Pyar Kiya director likes to take his time when it comes to pre-production and music seating which is why, in spite of the script and screenplay being locked, the team will only begin filming in September.

Also read: Valentine's Day 2021: Check Out The List Of Shows/movies To Watch On Netflix On V-date

Actor Amitabh Bachchan will also be done with other acting commitments by the time filming begins. The film will be one that, "celebrates bonds and human relationships like a festival". The film in question will be the story of a friendship between two senior citizens. The film is slated to release sometime in 2022.

Also read: Valentine's Day 2021: A List Of Movies & Shows On Prime Video For Your Perfect Date Night

Sooraj Barjatya's films and more

Sooraj Barjatya will be moving on to his directional venture with actor Salman Khan for another love story next. According to Pinkvilla, the film will be "a mature love story of a married couple against the backdrop of nuclear families". Sooraj Barjatya has yet to figure out the second part of the story of this film which he will do once done with his other venture with Amitabh Bachchan and Boman Irani. The source also revealed to Pinkvilla that Salman Khan will complete filming for 3 other movies before joining Barjatya for the film.

Sooraj Barjatya's son, Avnish Barjatya, is also set to make his debut soon. Avnish Barjatya is set to follow in his father's footsteps by taking up a romantic genre for his directional debut. The film will be a destination wedding fim which will tread along the lines of Yeh Jaawaani Hai Deewani. The report stated that the casting of the film is still underway as the film calls for young actors. Filming was supposed to begin by this time, however, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a delay. The director still, however, plans to begin filming this year.

Also read: Valentine's Day 2021: Ten Romantic Movies To Watch On Disney+ Hotstar This Weekend

Also read: If You Loved 'To All The Boys: Always And Forever', Here Are Other Teen Dramas To Watch

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.
Mumbai, Feb 15 : Mumbai-based lawyer-activist Nikita Jacob on Monday moved the Bombay High Court for anticipatory bail after a Delhi court issued a non-bailable arrest warrant against her.

The Delhi court's warrant came in the case involving the 'toolkit' shared by teenage global climate campaigner Greta Thunberg in support of the farmers protests in the national capital region.

Jacob's plea for an urgent hearing was mentioned by her lawyer Abhishek Yende before Justice P.D. Naik on Monday who has posted the matter for Tuesday.

A practicing lawyer since the past six years, Jacob is a resident of Goregaon and has been active in public causes.

Terming the Delhi Police FIR as "false and baseless", she sought transit anticipatory bail for a period of four weeks to enable approach the court in Delhi concerned and apply for a pre-arrest bail.

She also directions to prevent the Vanrai Police Station or any other police in the jurisdiction of Mumbai to arrest or take any coercive steps, as directed by the Delhi Cyber Police.

"However, the applicant fears that she may be arrested due to political vendetta and media trial," her application said.

The development came in the wake of the arrest of Bengaluru college graduate and environment activist, Disha Ravi on charges of sedition and conspiracy and her being sent to 5 days police custody by a Delhi court, sparking a political furore and condemnation from the Opposition parties.
This is the seventh in a "Letter to President Biden" series aimed at conveying policy recommendations through open letters from politicians, scholars and experts to the new U.S. president following his Jan. 20 inauguration.  ED.



By Daul Jang





Dear President Joe Biden,

I would like to express my congratulations on your inauguration as the 46th president of the United States of America together with Vice President Kamala Harris.



As you have repeatedly stressed, the climate crisis is an imminent, existential threat in our time. It significantly risks not just our environment, but our health, global security, economic well-being and therefore sustainable future.



Even in the COVID-19 pandemic, the world witnessed the increase of the intensity and impact of extreme weather events  from the bushfire in Australia, to the flood in China, the longest monsoon in Korea and the wildfires in California, devastating lives and livelihoods.



At this time of global climate emergency, we need a unified global response. Not only as the largest economy in the world, but also as the biggest CO2 emitter since the Industrial Revolution, the roles and responsibilities of the U.S. cannot be emphasized more.



Therefore, I sincerely welcome your executive order to rejoin the Paris Agreement. It was a necessary correction of a big mistake. There are high expectations from the world on your newly formed climate team: John Kerry, Gina McCarthy, Deb Haaland, Jennifer Granholm, Michael Regan, Brenda Mallory and Ali Zaidi.



A crisis provides an important opening as well. On the one hand, we are suffering from an unprecedented pandemic and we need to be ready to work on relief and recovery. On the other hand, with this great disruption to our old way of life, people become more interested in a new vision of building a more just, green and peaceful future.



Going back to normal should not be a solution because the "normal" was already a multiple crisis. We need to imagine how to build up a new world that supports life in all its diversity in a sustainable manner.



In this journey toward "building back better," South Korea and the U.S. have huge potential to work together. The two countries have been solid security allies for decades. Now, it is time for the two major economies to form another alliance for human security.



In fact, the Green New Deal Resolution and the following discussion in the U.S. was one of the major drivers for the ruling Democratic Party of Korea and the Moon Jae-in administration to come up with its Green New Deal Policy.



Different from the traditional security concept, the new alliance does not have enemies. It should be inclusive enough to bring in as many countries as possible, especially major economies, namely the EU, China, India, Russia and Japan. The EU has shown great leadership in global climate governance and the European Green Deal.



Recently, the three major economies in Northeast Asia committed to 100 percent carbon neutrality by 2050 (Japan and Korea) and 2060 (China). The next step for the three countries as well as the U.S. is to strengthen the current 2030 national reduction targets in accordance with their new long-term net-zero visions and come up with concrete action plans to achieve the targets.



The new alliance also should open the door to local governments. Cities are key contributors of climate change responsible for 75 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions according to UNEP. It is crucial, therefore, to make cities an integral part of the solution in mitigating climate change.



Many local governments in the U.S. have shown good climate leadership in renewable energy development, energy efficiency, and climate regulations. In Korea, almost all of the local governments jointly declared a climate emergency last year.



The role of corporations in addressing the climate emergency is also a key to success. Around the world, over 280 major firms have joined the global RE100 initiative, committing to go "100 percent renewable" for their energy use. The 2020 RE100 annual report says the average target year of its members is 2028.



The largest number of headquarters of the RE100 members are located in the U.S. In December 2020, six SK Group affiliates including semiconductor, chemical, and telecommunications firms became the first Korean members of the RE100.



However, despite this irreversible global trend, some companies are still resistant to change. You must accelerate the trend by increasing support to those who are for, and strengthening regulations such as a carbon adjustment fee for those who are against.



Many people and communities on the frontlines of the global climate civil movement look forward to your first 100 days. As you promised, the people and communities expect to see an action-oriented climate world summit to directly engage the leaders of the major carbon-emitting nations in making more ambitious national pledges, beyond their current commitments. After all, actions speak louder than words.



Again, congratulations on your opportunity to serve your country and the global community.



Sincerely,

Daul Jang





Daul Jang (daul.jang@greenpeace.org) is a government relations and advocacy specialist at Greenpeace East Asia Seoul Office.


NEW DELHI: Television actors Karanvir Bohra and Teejay Sidhu welcomed their third child to the family in December 2020. On Valentines Day, Karanvir shared an adorable picture of his newborn daughter calling her his new Valentine and revealed her name as well. In the black and white picture, Karanvir is seen cradling his youngest daughter in his arms while she rests her head on his shoulder. Out of all celebrity Valentines Day posts, this was surely the most 'touching and heartwarming'.

The couple has named their daughter Gia Vanessa Snow and Bohra explained the significance of her name in his Valentines Day post on Instagram. Gia means mother earth, Vanessa refers to Venus who is the god of love and Snow is what her sisters call her lovingly.

On his Instagram, Karanvir has often posted about the happiness and joy he gets from spending time with his daughters. He seems to be grateful for all the daddy duties coming his way. When Gia was born, Karanvir had shared a heartwarming video of him welcoming her home and introducing her to her sisters Vienna and Raya-Bella. In the caption, he wrote, "You cant even imagine the bolt of happiness going thru my veinsI cant believe that Im a father of 3 girls.yahooooo! Life cant get better than this, imagine ruling the world with these 3 queens in my life Thank you God for all these angels you have sent! Ill take the best care of them, because they are my #teendeviyaan.. My #laxmi #saraswati #parvati. P.s. You can also call me #charlie! #charliesangels My #alpha #chi & #omega (sic)"

The adorable couple Karanvir and Teejay got married in November 2006 at the Art Of Living ashram in Bangalore. It was almost love at first sight when they met for the first time in a church, Karanvir said in an interview. They have been married for 14 years and are going strong. They became parents to twin daughters in 2016 and were blessed with a third child in December 2020.
London: Australia has joined a Canadian-led global coalition, comprised of dozens of signatory nations, aimed at pressuring countries like China, Russia and Iran who arrest innocent citizens in acts of hostage diplomacy.

Canadas Foreign Minister Marc Garneau said the declaration was urgently needed.

Today countries from every continent stand together to tell people who are being arbitrarily detained abroad that they are not alone, he said at a launch attended by human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, of London-based Doughty Street Chambers.

Canadas foreign minister Marc Garneau. Credit:AP

Using foreign nationals as bargaining chips to exercise leverage over another state is illegal, it is immoral and it needs to stop.
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Due to implementation of social isolation, people across the globe are experiencing loneliness and are feeling isolated. Japan has also experienced an increase in suicide cases owing to the same reason. To overcome this situation, the Govt. of Japan has appointed a Cabinet Minister as MINISTER OF LONELINESS  to address this concern.

Tetsushi Sakamoto, who is currently working on issues responsible for declining birthrate in Japan, is appointed as MINISTER OF LONELINESS by Japans Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga.

According to Yoshihide Suga, as compared to men, women are suffering more due to the isolation and he is hopeful that Tetsushi Sakamoto will be able to identify the issues and lay down effective measures to improve the societal condition.

Sakamoto is also well aware about the objective and the adverse effects of social isolation caused by pandemic. He will work to improve the social ties.

Sakamoto will focus on major issues such as suicide prevention, child poverty and elderly care.

In order to work comprehensively on these issues he will coordinate with various agencies. He has also scheduled a discussion meeting with experts to formulate the most effective strategy to help people who are suffering from loneliness and isolation.

The suicide rate was declining till the beginning of 2020. However, it again started increasing during 2020. Approximately 20,919 people committed suicide last year in Japan. This resulted in rise in suicide cases by 3.7 percent as compared to year 2019.

The practice of appointing a minister to deal with social issues like isolation and loneliness was also followed by the British Government in 2018.

The British Government extended the responsibilities of the Minister for Sport and Civil Society to tackle issues like loneliness among a large number of Britons. They modified the designation as Minister for Sport, Civil Society and Loneliness.
By Guy Faulconbridge and Hannah McKay

LONDON (Reuters) - Zari Tadayon, who flew into Britain on Monday from Dubai, will have to spend her 69th birthday alone in a Radisson Blu hotel room in COVID-19 quarantine.

Tadayon, who hails from Greece but has pre-settled status and her family in Britain, flew to Dubai on Jan. 22 to deal with some legal matters before Britain brought in its hotel quarantine policy for certain countries including the United Arab Emirates.

Those wishing to return to Britain from a list of high-risk countries have to pay 1,750 pounds ($2,400) for a 10-day quarantine in a hotel.

"It's disappointing - it's quite disappointing," Tadayon told Reuters from the Radisson Blu at Heathrow. "I'm not sure if I am allowed out - nobody explained anything to me."

She will celebrate her birthday on Tuesday alone in her room.

"I can't even see my children on my birthday," Tadayon said.

"The cost is quite high - I wasn't prepared for this forced expense. I could have given it to my children or celebrated my birthday nicely with my family for half of that amount or even a quarter of that amount."

Tadayon said she had to wait for several hours on entry into the country because of teething problems with the quarantine policy.

"The officers at the immigration were not very sort of up-to-date about what they should be doing - we just waited and waited for a hotel," she said.

She spoke to Reuters while eating a spinach salad and some roast chicken with potatoes. She said that for medical reasons she would have preferred to isolate at home.

"I was in Dubai for three weeks - I needed to attend to some legal matters which were very important. I was not there for a beach holiday."

Asked what she would do for 10 days, she said: "I don't know. I don't have any books with me as I was not prepared. Maybe watch TV and chat with friends and family online. What else can you do?"

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Giles Elgood)
As part of its ongoing commitment to support Iraq and its people through the acceleration of socio-economic progress, GE has partnered with Kapita, a grassroots entrepreneurship organisation to launch the Iraqi Microbusinesses initiative  Taqat in Arabic.

Through the new partnership, GE will support up to 50 microbusinesses owned by young Iraqis across the country, by providing funding, marketing, and business training. The programme aims to help promising young Iraqi entrepreneurs to scale up their business. The initiative will target E-commerce, food manufacturing, agriculture, tech solutions and innovative projects in energy and healthcare.

Rasheed Al Janabi, President of GE in Iraq said: Microbusinesses play a significant role in driving the progress of the nation by contributing to youth employment, building economic self-reliance and supporting the growth of a local value chain. As a long-term partner in the development of Iraq, GE believes it is important to support the next generation of entrepreneurs and positively influence their lives through this programme. We are committed to supporting the country and the people in building a vibrant microbusiness environment that generates positivity and confidence amongst Iraqi youth by unlocking their creative, innovative, and entrepreneurial potential.

Mujahed Waisi, CEO of Kapita, added: As a private sector development company committed to enhancing the microbusiness ecosystem of Iraq, our goal is to build grassroots-level entrepreneurial talent and enable them to achieve their highest potential. GEs support of young Iraqi entrepreneurs enables them to understand the essentials in marketing, sales, and domestic manufacturing from one of the worlds top industry leaders. This sets a new model in knowledge-sharing and skillset development, which is crucial for the success of microbusinesses.

Usually starting at zero-budget projects that are dependent on revenues to purchase raw materials, the microbusinesses stand to benefit from GEs in-depth training and services to support production, marketing, and sales. To be part of the programme, owners of microbusinesses across Iraq must submit applications online with details of the businesses and the services they plan to develop. GEs support will further empower small and medium-sized enterprises through investment and market development programmes.

An expert committee will evaluate each application to choose 50 microbusinesses with the highest potential and GE will provide support and services based on the requirements of the entrepreneur and the recommendations of the committee. One mentoring session will be provided per month to each microbusiness with follow-up tasks and monitoring. The duration of the mentoring programme is three months.

With more than 300 employees in Iraq, including services provider FieldCore, GEs teams are deployed in the toughest locations, bringing power and healthcare infrastructure where it is needed most. The GE team comprises 95% Iraqi professionals who are working to make a positive impact on their communities. -- Tradearabia News Service
Accenture (NYSE: ACN) has acquired Edenhouse, a UK-based independent SAP partner. The acquisition will further enhance Accenture's capabilities to support clients in their digital transformation journey. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005240/en/

Accenture has acquired UK-based SAP partner, Edenhouse (Photo: Business Wire)

Founded in 2008 and an SAP platinum partner, Edenhousespecializes in the sale, implementation, support, and hosting of SAP products and services to mid-sized businesses. Edenhouse's SAP specialists have a broad breadth of technical knowledge, coupled with deep industry and line of business experience spanning on-premise and cloud-based solutions to help clients unleash the full power of SAP solutions and get increased value from their investments. Edenhouse has won a number of awards since its inception, the most recent being the SAP EMEA North Award for Partner Excellence 2021 for Top SME Cloud Performer.

"Now that Edenhouse is part of Accenture, we're in an even stronger position in the UK to help our clients harness change and accelerate their transformational journeys," said John Erik Ellingsen, Intelligent Platform Services Lead for the UK and Ireland at Accenture. "The global pandemic has increased demand for SAP's cloud-based solutions and the additional skills we now have access to will enable us to rapidly meet the needs of our clients, helping them to progress more quickly on their path to value and become more sustainable businesses for the future."

The acquisition will scale Accenture's capabilities in the UK to address accelerated demand for SAP's cloud-based solutions. Edenhouse's team of 220 professionals will join Accenture's SAP Business Group in the UK to support the local business while benefiting from access to global resources and skills.

Paul Solomon, CEO at Edenhouse said, "Together, Accenture and Edenhouse are a great fit. Being part of Accenture will provide amazing opportunities for our staff and our clients. We have similar shared values, including putting business outcomes at the heart of everything we do to deliver 360 value for clients and leveraging our deep relationships with SAP. We're excited to be able to bring the combination of our people, technology and industry excellence to take digital transformation to the next level for our clients."

Mukul Dixit, SAP Business Group Lead for the UK and Ireland at Accenture added: "By teaming with Edenhouse we will broaden the depth of our SAP capabilities to serve our large and mid-sized clients on their next phase of growth and transformation, and cement our leadership position in the UK market. I'm excited by the possibilities that this acquisition opens up for our clients through our combined SAP expertise coupled with Accenture's deep industry knowledge, end-to-end transformational capabilities and global reach."

In October 2020, Accenture also acquired New Zealand-based SAP and cloud solutions technology firm Zag. The acquisition bolsters Accenture's New Zealand and Australian digital transformation capabilities to meet increased demand from organizations migrating to the cloud and SAP's next-generation products.

About Accenture

Accenture is a global professional services company with leading capabilities in digital, cloud and security. Combining unmatched experience and specialized skills across more than 40 industries, we offer Strategy and Consulting, Interactive, Technology and Operations services all powered by the world's largest network of Advanced Technology and Intelligent Operations centers. Our 514,000 people deliver on the promise of technology and human ingenuity every day, serving clients in more than 120 countries. We embrace the power of change to create value and shared success for our clients, people, shareholders, partners and communities. Visit us at www.accenture.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

Except for the historical information and discussions contained herein, statements in this news release may constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words such as "may," "will," "should," "likely," "anticipates," "expects," "intends," "plans," "projects," "believes," "estimates," "positioned," "outlook" and similar expressions are used to identify these forward-looking statements. These statements involve a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied. Many of the following risks, uncertainties and other factors identified below are, and will be, amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic. These risks include, without limitation, risks that: the transaction might not achieve the anticipated benefits for Accenture; Accenture's results of operations have been significantly adversely affected and could in the future be materially adversely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic; Accenture's results of operations have been, and may in the future be, adversely affected by volatile, negative or uncertain economic and political conditions and the effects of these conditions on the company's clients' businesses and levels of business activity; Accenture's business depends on generating and maintaining ongoing, profitable client demand for the company's services and solutions including through the adaptation and expansion of its services and solutions in response to ongoing changes in technology and offerings, and a significant reduction in such demand or an inability to respond to the evolving technological environment could materially affect the company's results of operations; if Accenture is unable to keep its supply of skills and resources in balance with client demand around the world and attract and retain professionals with strong leadership skills, the company's business, the utilization rate of the company's professionals and the company's results of operations may be materially adversely affected; Accenture could face legal, reputational and financial risks if the company fails to protect client and/or company data from security incidents or cyberattacks; the markets in which Accenture operates are highly competitive, and Accenture might not be able to compete effectively; Accenture's profitability could materially suffer if the company is unable to obtain favorable pricing for its services and solutions, if the company is unable to remain competitive, if its cost-management strategies are unsuccessful or if it experiences delivery inefficiencies or fail to satisfy certain agreed-upon targets or specific service levels; changes in Accenture's level of taxes, as well as audits, investigations and tax proceedings, or changes in tax laws or in their interpretation or enforcement, could have a material adverse effect on the company's effective tax rate, results of operations, cash flows and financial condition; Accenture's ability to attract and retain business and employees may depend on its reputation in the marketplace; as a result of Accenture's geographically diverse operations and its growth strategy to continue to expand in its key markets around the world, the company is more susceptible to certain risks; Accenture's business could be materially adversely affected if the company incurs legal liability; Accenture's work with government clients exposes the company to additional risks inherent in the government contracting environment; Accenture's results of operations could be materially adversely affected by fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates; if Accenture is unable to manage the organizational challenges associated with its size, the company might be unable to achieve its business objectives; if Accenture does not successfully manage and develop its relationships with key alliance partners or fails to anticipate and establish new alliances in new technologies, the company's results of operations could be adversely affected; Accenture might not be successful at acquiring, investing in or integrating businesses, entering into joint ventures or divesting businesses; if Accenture is unable to protect or enforce its intellectual property rights or if Accenture's services or solutions infringe upon the intellectual property rights of others or the company loses its ability to utilize the intellectual property of others, its business could be adversely affected; Accenture's results of operations and share price could be adversely affected if it is unable to maintain effective internal controls; changes to accounting standards or in the estimates and assumptions Accenture makes in connection with the preparation of its consolidated financial statements could adversely affect its financial results; Accenture might be unable to access additional capital on favorable terms or at all and if the company raises equity capital, it may dilute its shareholders' ownership interest in the company; Accenture may be subject to criticism and negative publicity related to its incorporation in Ireland; as well as the risks, uncertainties and other factors discussed under the "Risk Factors" heading in Accenture plc's most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and other documents filed with or furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission. Statements in this news release speak only as of the date they were made, and Accenture undertakes no duty to update any forward-looking statements made in this news release or to conform such statements to actual results or changes in Accenture's expectations.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005240/en/

Contacts:

Molly McDonagh

+44 7825 023 622

molly.mcdonagh@accenture.com

Julie Bennink

+1 312 693 7301

julie.l.bennink@accenture.com
Despite the back and forth among passionate birders, none of the celebrity birds appear to have been harmed by the spotlight.

The snowy owl landed in a fenced-off part of Central Park on Jan. 27, and park rangers kept overzealous onlookers back. Mr. Barrett sent a warning to his followers to give space to the snowy owl  the first spotted in Central Park in 130 years  and, in the end, crows and a hawk harried the owl more than birders. It left after a day. (More recently, a snowy owl, likely the same one, has been spotted near the Central Park Reservoir, the sightings dutifully reported by Mr. Barrett.)

Still, some birding groups said that letting others know the location of sensitive birds sometimes required more consideration than simply firing off a tweet.

Jeffrey Gordon, the president of the American Birding Association, said birding is built on sharing, but we think its very important to temper that impulse to share information freely with understanding the real world impacts of doing so.

Kathryn Heintz, the executive director of New York City Audubon, wrote in an email that because owls are easily disturbed, we do not condone the public posting of owl locations.

Of course, an owls arrival at one of the most visited urban parks on the planet would be hard to keep secret no matter what.

A celebrity snowy owl certainly draws a crowd  and it should, Ms. Heintz said.

Crowds of birders have sometimes led to unfortunate outcomes. In rural Washington five years ago, a local man killed a northern hawk owl, a protected species, because he was angered that birders were photographing the bird in the area. He was fined $5,000.
The Sino-Indian disengagement deal in Eastern Ladakh is a bad deal. Make no mistake it is an agreement on terms of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA). Unfortunately, it was perhaps the only one on the table and thus a fait accompli. Indias ability to negotiate is severely constricted owing to its diminished Net National Power over the past 80 months of the NDA/BJP rule. A ravaged economy, coupled with cut to the bone defence spending, has left us very vulnerable.

The decision to disengage on the Southern bank of Pangong Tso, thereby giving up our tactical advantage on the Kailash range in return for China moving back to their base in Srijap east of Finger eight and India moving to its position on Finger three  the Dhan Singh Thapa Post, can hardly be termed as a negotiating triumph.

The judgment not to have a broader disengagement all along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) encompassing Depsan, Gogra, Hot Springs, Naku-la and the Upper Subansiri district of Arunachal Pradesh, given that the Chinese have transgressed across our perception line of the LAC at all these places, has, in fact, de-facto legitimised the Chinese 1959 claim line.

Anyone in government with even a nodding acquaintance with the November 1960 Report of Officials of the Government of India and the Peoples Republic of China on the Boundary Question knows that the Chinese perception line of the LAC, even according to them, lies further to the east of Finger eight. The PLA, therefore, has withdrawn only to their perceived claim line without making any substantive concession.

It would be noteworthy to recall that on the intervening night of August 29 and 30, 2020, Indian troops had occupied commanding positions on the heights overlooking the south bank of Pangong Tso. These heights included Rezang La, Reqin La, Black Top, Hanan, Helmet, Gurung Hill, Gorkha Hill and Magar Hill.

The operative part of defence minister Rajnath Singh statement to both Houses of Parliament underscores this concession unambiguously. He said, The agreement that we have been able to reach with the Chinese side for disengagement in the Pangong lake area envisages that both sides will cease their forward deployments in a phased, coordinated and verified manner.

The Chinese side will keep its troop presence in the North Bank area to east of Finger 8. Reciprocally, the Indian troops will be based at their permanent base at Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3.

A similar action would be taken in the South Bank area by both sides. These are mutual and reciprocal steps and any structures that had been built by both sides since April 2020 in both North and South Bank area will be removed and the landforms will be restored. It has also been agreed to have a temporary moratorium on military activities by both sides in the North Bank, including patrolling to the traditional areas. Patrolling will be resumed only when both sides reach an agreement in diplomatic and military talks that would be held subsequently. The implementation of this agreement has started yesterday in the North and South Bank of the Pangong Lake. It will substantially restore the situation to that existing prior to commencement of the standoff last year The House should also know that there are still some outstanding issues with regard to deployment and patrolling at some other points along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh. These will be the focus of further discussions with the Chinese side.

What this statement clearly means is that India has exchanged its tactical advantage on the South Bank of Pangong Tso for concessions on the North Bank. India will leave the tactically important heights it had occupied in late August.

Why did the Chinese agree to go back and now? To answer that question one needs decode a further riddle. Why did the Chinese come in the first place? This is a question no one in the Indian strategic community has ever asked with any degree of seriousness and the government, of course, runs a mile refusing both to discuss and even answer questions on the Chinese transgression both inside and outside Parliament.

Let us rewind to the February-March of 2020. Details started emerging that the China in conjunction with the World Health Organisation (WHO) had covered up the severity of a mystery illness that broke out in Wuhan on November 19 and soon became the worst global pandemic since 1918. Given a generic nom de guerre Covid-19 it should have rightly been called the China Virus. This rapidly proliferating virus caused horror around the world calling into serious question Chinese pretensions of global leadership.

The Communist Party of China (CPC), thereafter, was confronted with a twin challenge of gargantuan proportions. Staving off an international scientific investigation into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic because it would have triggered of enormous demands for reparations and concurrently repair the global damage to its standing.

It, therefore, decided to act with extreme bellicosity. It created three flashpoints. First and foremost it stoked tensions in the South China Sea by unilaterally announcing on April 18, 2020, the establishment of two new administrative structures, prompting the US Navy to launch repeated freedom of navigation operations through out 2020. Second, in April itself, it encroached deep into Indian territory at multiple points along the LAC in contravention of multiple agreements. It did not even hesitate to engage in the most medieval orgy of violence on June 15 and 16 in the Galwan valley that left 20 Indian soldiers dead. A stand-off that is continuing even today.

On June 30, it moved on the sovereignty of Hong Kong by enacting a new security law that fundamentally transformed the one nation two systems paradigm, thereby sparking of another international outrage.

The intent was to send a message to the world. China would react with ruthlessness and irresponsibility if the world demanded accountability for its malfeasance qua Covid-19.

Then, very mysteriously, on February 9, 2021, a WHO investigative team, after a purported four-week investigation, gave China a virtual clean chit by publicly declaring that the coronavirus came from an animal and had not leaked from the laboratory in Wuhan. China had got its vindication. Its threat to disrupt global peace had paid off.

On February 11, Rajnath Singh announced the disengagement deal. Are these two developments coincidental? Absolutely not. China is a bad actor. The world will pay a price for succumbing to its blackmail in the years ahead.
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Ankara, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :The United States on Monday sought to defuse a furious diplomatic row with NATO ally Turkey by saying it now accepts Ankara's claim that Kurdish "terrorists" had executed 13 Turks in Iraq.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had lashed out at the State Department's initial hesitance to blame the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) for the deaths.

Both sides view the PKK as a terrorist organisation but the US also backs a Kurdish militia in neighbouring Syria in the conflict against President Bashar al-Assad.

Ankara on Sunday accused the PKK of executing the hostages -- most of them soldiers and police abducted in Turkey and kept in a cave -- as Turkish forces advanced in a rescue operation launched last week.

The PKK blamed Turkish air strikes for the deaths.

The US State Department then fuelled Turkish ire by saying on Sunday that Washington "deplores the death of Turkish citizens" but was waiting for further confirmation of Ankara's version of events.

Erdogan then branded Washington's response "a farce".

"You said you did not support terrorists, when in fact you are on their side and behind them," he said in televised remarks.

The Turkish foreign ministry later summoned US ambassador David Satterfield to convey Ankara's displeasure "in the strongest possible terms".

Washington issued a new statement after Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu held his first official phone call on Monday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

"The Secretary expressed condolences for the deaths of Turkish hostages in northern Iraq and affirmed our view that PKK terrorists bear responsibility," State Department spokesman Ned price said in a statement.
PRIMROSE  Eleven parishioners of St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church donated their time and talents Sunday to serve chicken parmesan dinners that featured spaghetti sauce made by the church pastor.

The dinners were served drive-thru style from St. Nicholas Hall along Route 901.

Sherri Quandel, fundraising coordinator for the parish, said Sundays drive-thru meals were not the first served by the parish but the first on Valentines Day.

People still dont want to go out, and some just enjoy being at home so this way they can pick up their food and enjoy it wherever they want, she said.

Quandel said Sundays meal featured spaghetti, chicken parmesan, a salad, Italian bread and a homemade chocolate pretzel treat prepared by one of the parishioners.

The sauce for the chicken and spaghetti was made Saturday night by the Rev. Mark Fesniak.

You cant get better than homemade, Quandel said, adding that 200 platters were preordered and a few extras available for those who ask.

Quandel said the parish, like many other churches and nonprofit organizations, are trying to find ways to bring in much-needed funds and still comply with the mandates and restrictions set in place with the COVID-19 pandemic.

The parish lost several major fundraisers in 2020 and Quandel said she hopes 2021 will be better.

We had to cancel our Chinese auction, bingos and unfortunately our two-day block party, the biggest fundraiser we have, she said. All of our large, personal events could not take place.

Although Sundays chicken parmesan meal was the first of its kind offered by the parish, previous drive-thru meals included chicken and halupki, ham and halupki and roast beef, all with the traditional side dishes.

Were trying to think outside of the box and be creative while doing it safely, Quandel said.

She said 11 volunteers began working around 8 a.m. Sunday in order to have the meals ready when people started driving through.

In addition to the drive-thru, Quandel said meals are also delivered to shut-in members of the public who are unable to travel to the church hall in person.

Although it is a lot of work, Quandel said it is also nice to get together with friends for a common cause.

Its work but its fun, too, she said.

Parishioners pleased

Parishioners Lori McCarthy and Lynn Schies, both of Forestville, drove by to pick up two meals they ordered.

McCarthy said she is more than happy to support her church by buying a meal.

It helps the church and the food is really good, she said. We always support our local businesses.

John and Joann Hertz, also parishioners, took their meals through the drivers-side window of their car. Like McCarthy, Joann Hertz said she and her husband are always happy to support the churchs fundraisers.

The food is always good, she said.

Parishioner Connie Brophy, of Minersville, said parish fundraisers are successful because of hard work by loyal church members.

We have such good help and such a good group, she said.

Thinking outside of the box, Quandel said another drive-thru fundraiser is set for 10 a.m. to noon March 6 at the hall in Primrose. A rolling macaroni truck will be on hand serving macaroni and cheese made the traditional way or as crabby mac, buffalo chicken mac, pulled pork mac and Skook Sundae mac.

We have to keep moving forward and finding ways to bring in money without the major events were used to, Quandel said.

Ambassador Yamanouchi Kanji of the Consulate General of Japan in New York became an internet sensation in 2020 for his electric guitar performance of The Star-Spangled Banner, a special project in celebration of the US Independence Day. A reporter sits down with the veteran diplomat to discuss his approach to supporting bilateral relations during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ambassador and consul general of Japan in New York. Joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1984, where his main focus has been US-Japan relations. Previous positions include executive secretary to the deputy chief cabinet secretary and executive secretary to the prime minister, director of the Ministrys First North American Division, and deputy director-general of the Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, minister at the Embassy of Japan in Washington DC, director-general of the Economic Affairs Bureau of the Ministry, and one of the architects of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. His current post began in October 2018.

Yamanouchi Kanji, Japans top ambassador in New York, seems an unlikely rock-and-roller. In a video that made the rounds on social media in July 2020, the grey-haired ambassador, dressed in a dark suit and sporting a red bow tie, stands between a Japanese and American flag as he cordially greets viewers. After a brief speech, he swaps his jacket for a Stratocaster and proceeds to hammer out a Jimi Hendrixinspired rendition of the US national anthem, complete with whammy bar and heavy distortion.

The response was overwhelmingly positive. Within six days of its upload, it had amassed some 260,000 views on Facebook alone. Comments such as So awesome!!! We love you Japan!!!! and Sir, you are a superb musician! You give me hope in this dark world. flowed in, and soon the video was trending across the globe.

It all began with a suggestion from the consulates public relations team. Why not celebrate US-Japan ties with a performance for the July 4 holiday? It would be a way to express respect and gratitude to Japans most important ally on its key national holiday, as well as to mark the 160th anniversary of the first Japanese official delegation to the United States in 1860.

The consulate also wanted to include a message of appreciation for the nations medical personnel and essential workers, and hoped to provide a moment of reprieve to citizens during the pandemic.

With these goals in mind, the ambassador explains, a run-of-the-mill performance was out of the question. I wanted to add a spin to it, in a way that would resonate in the hearts of our American friends. Inspiration eventually came to him in the image of Jimi Hendrix.

Musical Ambassador

I have always loved all genres of music, says Yamanouchi. He recalls a childhood surrounded with instruments like guitars and an organ, and his mother, who was also fond of music. He discovered Western rock and roll in his adolescence through late-night radio, prompting him to take up the guitar, form a band with friends, and eventually begin playing at events like school festivals.

These youthful memories brought Yamanouchi back to Jimi Hendrixs legendary performance of The Star-Spangled Banner at Woodstock in 1969. The heavily distorted rendition of the US national anthem enthralled the younger generation with its raw energy, yet also received rebukes from conservatives at the time. A half century later, though, it is remembered as a defining moment in both music and US history. To Yamanouchi, Hendrixs performance and its reverberations are pure American, embodying the nations values of freedom and diversity.

Keenly aware of his diplomatic role, however, the ambassador and consulate staff carefully planned the video to ensure a respectful tone. Everything from his wardrobe to the performances opening remarks was meticulously designed to bring out the projects core message of gratitude for the host nation.

The results stunned even Yamanouchi himself. Prominent Americans in Japan and elsewhere, including the charge daffaires ad interim at the US embassy, Joseph M. Young, and leading scholar of Japanese literature and professor emeritus at the University of Tokyo, Robert Campbell, offered high praise for the performance. The New York Post and other outlets also picked up the story.

It certainly was beyond my expectations, laughs Yamanouchi. It was a particular honor when Dennis Shea, the US ambassador to the World Trade Organization in Geneva, brought up the performance during a trade policy review session.

This was not Yamanouchis first foray into musical diplomacy. He recounts his time at the Japanese embassy in Seoul in the early 2000s, when he and other staff would informally play gigs on their days off. Relations were very strained at the time, but a rock band of Japanese diplomats was novel enough that the locals would come to hear us play, he says. For me, I was happy to help ease tensions a little by doing something that I loved.

He has continued this approach in the United States, forming bands while at the Japanese embassy in Washington DC and at the Consulate General in New York to deliver performances at annual events such as the Sakura Matsuri in Washington and Japan Day in New York.

Supporting Artists in COVID-19 Times

The consulate is also finding ways to support local musicians during the pandemic era. The most recent initiative is a livestreamed Friday Night Live concert hosted at the ambassadors official residence on the third Friday of each month, featuring resident Japanese artists who have found themselves without a stage.

The economic fallout has hit entertainers especially hard, says Yamanouchi. There are so many talented people in this city who now have no place to share their art, and we wanted to do something about that.

Onsite attendance is limited to under 10 people due to COVID-19 safety measures, but the small number has not dampened the excitement of musicians who longed to play again before a live audience. Guest performers so far have included a jazz trio, Jazz Triangle 6577 in October 2020; a koto, shamisen, and cello team, Duo Yumeno in November; renowned classical pianist Kigawa Takayuki in December; and an amazing Jazz quartet led by Elena Terakubo in January 2021. An archive of the concerts is also available on the consulates official YouTube channel for those who missed the Facebook livestreams.

Even if we could fill our physical venue to capacity, we would end up with a hundred people at best, notes the ambassador. Online, though, we can quickly reach thousands. Its a tangibly effective way to support our artists while expanding Japans soft power outreach.

Outside of music, the consulate also supported visual arts by teaming up with the Nippon Club for the November online art exhibition Forward Together! Seven works were selected for a special Ambassadors Award and temporarily display at the Ambassadors Residence. Says Yamanouchi, It is a real joy to be able to help artists and also give my guests a chance to enjoy some contemporary Japanese artworks.



Yamanouchi introduces the winning pieces of the Ambassadors Award. (November 2020 at the Ambassadors Residence)

Changing Times

The pandemic has forced people to curb in-person interactions, making it all the more important to find alternative ways to stay in touch. Since the first statewide lockdown in New York in March 2020, the consulate has been keeping Japanese residents informed of the latest developments by delivering summaries of the governors and mayors press conferences via email newsletters and social media and updating its website. Having access to information in their native language has helped the residents feel more at ease.

Compared to his days working at government offices in Tokyo, Yamanouchi says it is in his current post that he feels a closer proximity to the citizens he serves. There are some 100,000 Japanese living within the consular jurisdiction, he explains. The consulate exists as their last pillar of support. We have to always be on our toes.

The need for diligence extends to the diplomatic front as well. 2020 saw a number of transitions including in national leadership for both Japan and the United States. On the topic of transitions, Yamanouchi describes the shift in Japans status on the world stage in the past 30 years: In 1990, the Japanese economy accounted for 15 percent of global GDP. Today, its down to 5 percent. He adds that Japan has gone from boasting 34 of the 50 most valuable firmsseven of which were among the top 10to just one, Toyota Motor. Aggregate market value isnt the only indication of economic strength, but it is clear that our nation has headed into an era of challenge on the economic front.

He further notes the decline of the G7 powers from a combined economic clout of 70% to less than 50% of the global total, signaling a shift in the world order itself. Even so, he stresses, Japan is the worlds third largest economy and continues to play a leading role in areas like development assistance, public health, and free trade, including pushing forward the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Still, drawing attention to Japans various contributions and accomplishments is not as easy as it once was. Yamanouchi notes that media coverage of Japan in the United States has now taken a back seat to news about China and North Korea. The stories that do make headlines often have a negative tone, such as former Nissan head Carlos Ghosns escape from Japan to Lebanon and the plight of passengers aboard the coronavirus-stricken cruise ship Diamond Princess.

Japan got plenty of coverage in the United States back when there was trade friction between the two countries, he comments. Tensions were very high then. Its like an airport, in a sensefor the most part, planes take off and land just minutes apart without incident, and its a marvelous example of human ingenuity, but this isnt news. If an accident happens, though, its front-page news. It may just be the nature of journalism to spotlight bad things. What this means though, is that appearing on the front pages isnt quite the same as being respected.

Among his various diplomatic duties, he sees bolstering the favorable opinion of Japan in the United States as one of the most crucial. US national security experts have emphasized the strategic importance of US-Japan ties in countering the increasingly unstable international political environment, he explains. Japan is being seen as the most trusted ally.

Soft Power

Yamanouchi feels that pro-Japanese sentiment in the United States benefits not only from bilateral cooperation in the arenas of politics, security, and business, but also through soft-power influences such as Japanese pop culture, literature, and traditional cuisine. The New York Times, for example, recently included works by Japanese authors Kawakami Mieko, Murata Sayaka, Onda Riku, and Yu Miri in its featured list 100 Notable Books of 2020. Accomplishments in the fields of science and technology like the Hayabusa2 probes success in bringing back samples from a distant asteroid, as well as the steady stream of Japanese Nobel laureates, also help to shine a positive light on Japan. The way Japanese culture has been embraced in the United States and elsewhere, proves to me the importance of the work that we do.

The ambassador asserts that strengthening its ties with the United States is the key to Japans foreign policy, as the United States is Japans most important diplomatic partner and ally. A major challenge right now is working together to realize the Free and Open Indo-Pacific. Maintaining strong US-Japan relations at every level including politics and security, economy, culture, and grass-roots exchanges is essential to Japans continued peace and prosperity, Yamanouchi declares. There is still a lot to do. We will continue to work hard in New York to promote this vital relationship.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JapanConsNY

(Originally published in Japanese. Interview, text, and photos by Kasumi Abe. Banner photo: Ambassador and Consul General of Japan in New York Yamanouchi Kanji at his official residence in November 2020.)
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By the end of Saturday, 15,062,189 people in Britain had received a first dose, with 537,715 also getting their second shot

Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Sunday called Britain hitting a target of inoculating 15 million of the most vulnerable people with a first coronavirus jab "a significant milestone", as the country prepared for the next phase of its vaccination programme.

Johnson, who has faced severe criticism over his year-long handling of the pandemic, had set the ambitious aim of offering a jab to everybody in the top four priority groups of around 15 million people by the middle of this month.

That comprises all over-70s, care home residents and staff, NHS workers and the extremely clinically vulnerable to the virus.

By the end of Saturday, 15,062,189 people had received a first dose, with 537,715 also getting their second shot, according to the latest health ministry statistics.

"This country has achieved an extraordinary feat," Johnson said in a video message posted on Twitter, noting it had been just over two months since Britain embarked on its biggest ever vaccination programme.

"We've still got a long way to go to. And there will undoubtedly be bumps in the road. But after all weve achieved, I know we can go forward with great confidence."

The country will now start administering vaccines from Monday to those aged between 65 and 69 and the clinically vulnerable to Covid-19, with almost 1.2 million already invited to book their jabs, the state-run National Health Service (NHS) said.

Ministers have also vowed to vaccinate all over-50s by May and all adults by September.

"There is so much more to do and I urge anyone eligible to step forward and take up their appointment," Health Secretary Matt Hancock added Sunday.

"The vaccine is our route to freedom -- we will beat this virus jab by jab.

- 'Cautious' easing -

Britain, which has been among the hardest hit in Europe by the pandemic, registering more than 117,000 deaths within 28 days of a positive Covid-19 test, has led the world in promptly approving the use of several vaccines.

Story continues

It now has one of the highest proportions of people vaccinated against the virus of any nation -- a rare success for Johnson during a pandemic in which the UK has fared badly by most other measures.

Infection rates have dropped markedly across the country over recent weeks, as strict lockdown measures have curbed previously spiralling case numbers, hospitalisations and deaths.

The improving situation has prompted calls for stringent lockdown restrictions to be lifted in early March, despite concern about the spread of virus variants that may be more resistant to vaccines.

A new 10-day hotel quarantine regime for British residents returning from 33 virus variant hotspots begins on Monday.

Johnson has said he is "optimistic" that plans for a "cautious" easing of the stay-at-home rules in England from next month will go ahead.

He has vowed to review all relevant data next week, ahead of setting out the government's "roadmap" for lifting restrictions on February 22.

But he is facing pressure from some of the government's own lawmakers.

Conservatives worried about the impact of lockdown on the economy and children's education have called on Johnson to commit to a timetable for completely ending the controls by May.

In a letter to the British premier, the leaders of the Covid Recovery Group of Tory MPs said the "tremendous pace" of the vaccination rollout allowed for the move.

"The vaccine gives us immunity from Covid, but it must also give us permanent immunity from Covid-related lockdowns and restrictions," they wrote.

"All restrictions remaining after March 8 should be proportionate to the ever-increasing number of people we have protected."

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Every week since the COVID-19 pandemic changed the world back in March, Robin Bialecki has seen more new faces in need of food to get through until their next paycheck.

The center provides weekly groceries for any family in need. If there are children in the home they get enough food for breakfast, lunch and a snack all week.

Additionally the family gets bags of food including meat, milk, yogurt, eggs, bread, vegetables along with canned vegetables and other food items, explains Bialecki, executive director of the Easthampton Community Center.

The community center received two grants totaling $28,000 from the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts COVID-19 Response Fund to help cover the costs of the increased needs of families served by the agency.

We were seeing hundreds of more families, and we didnt know how we were going to provide for them, Bialecki says. When the community foundation offered us this funding it was phenomenal because we certainly have never had to turn anyone away and we were able to help everyone that came and continues to come for food.

The grants were among many emergency awards targeting organizations in Hampden, Hampshire and Franklin counties serving people in need affected by the pandemic. The foundation distributed more than $6.8 million between March and August. These were proactive grants that did not require an application but were awarded based on the foundations knowledge of those organizations, their credibility and their work in the community.

Grants were distributed immediately, another departure from the typically much more involved grant application process which could require several months.

We have experimented and piloted different approaches over the years, but up until March of 2020 the community foundation operated in pretty much the standard way that foundations do, says Katie Allan Zobel, president and CEO of the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts. We had grant cycles that we announced a year in advance. People knew what they were going to apply for, and it was a one-time, once-a-year application.

The pandemic required the foundation to think of alternative ways to get money to organizations in need in an expedited way, she says.

COVID required us to behave and to operate in a new way. It was an emergency response so we had to do things differently, but what we learned from that was that we can operate differently, that we can find new partners, we can streamline our process and that we can develop more trust-based philanthropy, Zobel says. That means developing relationships with organizations and not requiring the funding to be for a specific project or a program, but to say, We will provide unrestricted support for the work you do, you decide where you need to put that money and we trust that you are going to put it to the things you need the most to be as effective as possible.

1/20/2021 -Easthampton- Robin Bialecki runs the Easthampton Community Center's food pantry at their Clark Street headquarters. (Don Treeger / The Republican)

In the case of the Easthampton Community Center, it meant purchasing a lot more food.

Traditionally we have had about 1,200 families a week, increasing to about 1,400 during the holidays, Bialecki says. Right now we are at almost 2,200 families. We have gone from 4,500 to 4,700 families served each month to about 9,500. Its been a drastic increase, and a lot of that is because so many people lost their jobs so unexpectedly. It has been an astronomical change.

Currently, the pantry in Easthampton serves families from 23 surrounding communities due to the School Choice program which sees students from other districts attend school in Easthampton. The center runs a summer meals program for children, but, because of the increased need during the pandemic, Bialecki decided to expand the program to include the school year.

When COVID hit we started immediately giving out bags. We knew there were children that relied on school for breakfast, lunch and snacks, and we didnt want them to go hungry. That program hasnt stopped, she says. We are continuing to make sure kids are fed.

1/20/2021 -Easthampton- The Easthampton Community Center operates a food pantry at their Clark Street headquarters. (Don Treeger / The Republican)

The community center receives food from the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, and Bialecki also tries to partner with local farmers when possible.

We found that some of the local farms who had contracts with the schools were having to dump their milk because it was spoiling. With some of the funding from the community foundation we were able to approach the dairy farms and buy their milk, Bialecki explains. We did the same thing with a lot of the produce farmers in the area, so we were able to have huge amounts of fresh vegetables over the summer to give families.

Since March, all of the distribution has taken place outside with only volunteers entering the building. There is also a delivery service providing food for senior citizens and those who are immuno-compromised.

We used to do about 60 deliveries for people who were shut-ins, and now we are doing about 225 deliveries every week, Bialecki says.

In October, the community foundation awarded $2 million to nonprofit organizations that were struggling to survive in the midst of the pandemic, yet would be able to get their footing with some additional support. The organization has also been awarded $900,000 from the state to be distributed to nonprofits providing emergency assistance to undocumented immigrants in the three counties, according to Zobel.

1/28/2021 - New North Citizens Council, Inc. on 2455 Main Street in Springfield. (Hoang 'Leon' Nguyen / The Republican)

The New North Citizens Council is a longstanding nonprofit in Springfields North End which helps families with everything from food insecurity to housing, employment, child care, education and more. The neighborhood is largely populated by Latino families, many of which have recently migrated from Puerto Rico or immigrated from Central and South America and Mexico as well as the Caribbean. It received five grants totaling $135,000 from the foundation.

The bulk of the money was used to purchase food gift cards from 90 Meat Outlet between $50 to $100 increments. We also gave gift certificates to Medinas Supermarket. These were all distributed to families in need in the North End, says Maria Ligus, executive director of the citizens council. The majority were female-headed households with lots of children, but we also saw couples and individuals.

Some of the funding was used to help families with funeral arrangements for loved ones who died from the coronavirus. Each family received $500 towards the funeral or cremation services. We helped at least 15 families with funerals for their loved ones, Ligus says.

1/28/2021 - Maria Ligus, executive director of New North Citizens Council, Inc. (Hoang 'Leon' Nguyen / The Republican)

Some of the money was also used for masks, gloves and hand sanitizers distributed to all employees and any clients who visited the organization. Ligus also made a request to the foundation to give employees a one-time bonus. The foundations $30,000 grant was used to provide bonuses for 66 full-time and part-time staffers.

It was a way to express our appreciation to the entire staff for putting themselves at risk for exposure because they were still having in-person contact with people all throughout the pandemic, Ligus says. They were doing deliveries and at-home visits, and we didnt really stop except for our (state) Department of Children and Families services which transitioned to mostly remote.

In her report to the community foundation about how the grant money was spent Ligus cited several cases in which the funds made a huge difference in the lives of clients: a mother fleeing a domestic violence situation in Puerto Rico was in need of housing and food; and immigrant families with multiple children and no transportation were able to walk to Medinas Supermarket in their neighborhood and purchase groceries. Ligus says the emergency grants came at just the right time and were desperately needed.

We are so thankful for the funding because while some of our services have seen a reduction in numbers like our referrals walk-in services, those went down dramatically, Ligus says. But, there has been an increase in the need for food and housing. We had people calling and lining up outside of our building in need of food, and I can say that anyone who needed it received the help.

In January, the community foundation once again awarded about $1 million in grants to non-profit organizations providing critical support related to the pandemic, specifically food, eviction prevention services and mental health services.

The foundation also launched the ValleyCreates artist working capital grant program to support working artists in the region who lost most, if not all, of their wages due to the pandemic. The foundation partnered with the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Arts Assets for Artists to pilot a the program for artists who live or have studio space in Franklin, Hampshire, and Hampden counties. Over 115 application were received, and 20 artists were selected based on criteria including financial need, readiness to benefit from the program, and connection to a larger community or eagerness to build those connections.

Zobel says the foundations COVID relief efforts flourished with the help from many new donors. About 400 of the more than 650 who contributed were individuals who have never before given through the community foundation. The gifts have ranged from $5 to $150,000. Every week the foundation continues to receive additional gifts to the fund enabling it to award additional grants quickly.

So many people have seen a need and donated to the fund, trusting us to award those funds to non profits that are doing real work in the community and serving people whos lives have been completely changed because of COVID, Zobel says.

Moving forward, there are more grants to be awarded and more opportunities to create partnerships with organizations that have stepped up to meet the needs of the community during this pandemic.

There are a lot of elements of trust-based philanthropy that we used in this emergency response that we are now going to be employing in 2021, Zobel says. Normally I would have a calendar with grant application dates, but we are not doing that because we are in the middle of a global pandemic. We will be providing grants around food, eviction prevention services, and mental health as well as grants to serve the immigrant population, but it will be a streamlined process for unrestricted support. Its a different, but very effective way to help people who are in need right now.

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Texas is colder than it's been in decades, one of at least 25 states under a winter weather advisory during this week's historic cold outbreak.

But as Texans scramble to stay warm, rolling power outages have begun across the state following high demand.

Millions of customers across the US have lost power, with much of those outages occurring in Texas. Power outages can be dangerous for those unprepared for such intense winter chill.

If you're among the Texans whose power has gone out or will go out at some point this week, here's what you need to know to stay warm and safe this week.

Stay home

Staying indoors is your best bet at staying safe during a winter power outage, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says.

Stay off the roads if you can -- icy conditions could lead to car accidents. Just last week, at least nine people were killed in car crashes triggered by winter storms in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, including six who died in the 133-car pileup in Fort Worth.

Take stock of the essentials

In case the power outage lasts a few days, you should have the following on hand:

Extra food and water: A three- to seven-day supply is a good standard

Flashlight and extra batteries

Battery-powered radio

Extra medicine

First-aid supplies

If you need to make a trip outside, keep it as brief as you can, and layer up, the CDC says. Check with your local emergency authorities to make sure it's safe to drive or travel in the cold.

Stay warm

Layer up -- it's going to get cold. In extreme cold, the Houston Office of Emergency Management recommends wearing at least three layers of tops, plus an outer layer to block out wind, and two layers of bottoms. A hat, gloves and a warm face mask are musts, too.

The CDC recommends warming up with extra blankets, sleeping bags and winter coats.

It's not safe, though, to keep blankets and other flammable materials near alternate sources of warmth like a portable space heater. Keep the heaters in an area clear of flammable fabrics.

If you're using a fireplace, first make sure it's properly vented to the outside and won't leak gas into your home. You should keep it stocked with dry firewood -- not paper, the CDC says -- throughout the power outage.

To keep in heat, close blinds and curtains and shut doors to rooms to avoid "wasting heat," the National Weather Service recommends. Stuffing towels in the cracks under doors can keep some of the chill out of your home, and eating and drinking throughout the power outage will help keep your body warm.

Keep your food & water supply safe

Avoid opening your fridge or freezer during the power outage to keep your food cold. According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), a fridge can keep food cold during an outage for about four hours, and a freezer will keep its temperature for about 48 hours.

Fill coolers with ice, if necessary, to keep food from spoiling.

Some water purification systems may not function fully when the power goes out, the CDC warns. You can check with local officials to make sure your water is safe -- they should give you specific recommendations for treating water in your area.

Be careful of carbon monoxide

Generators can release poisonous carbon monoxide if you use them inside your home. If you're using one this week, keep it outside, about 20 feet away from your home, the CDC advises.

You should never use a gas stove or oven to heat your home, according to Ready.gov, the US government's online disaster planning resource.

If it's safe, go somewhere warm

If it's safe for you to travel to a shelter, be sure to wear a mask or layer two masks and bring extras in case your stay is extended. These locations should be well-ventilated, though social distancing is still advised, according to Ready.gov.

Know the signs of hypothermia

Babies, older adults and unhoused people are the most vulnerable to hypothermia. If you're worried about people in these groups, look for the signs: Confusion, shivering, difficult speaking, sleepiness and stiff muscles in adults, and bright red skin and low energy in babies, according to the CDC.

If you fear someone in your household has hypothermia, call for medical help. If they can't immediately arrive, try to warm them up yourself with blankets, food and water and an alternate heat source.

Conserve power if you still have it

Start by turning off and unplugging nonessential lights and appliances, and don't use large appliances like ovens or washing machines if you can avoid it, the Houston Office of Emergency Management suggests.

Turn down your thermostat to 68 degrees or lower -- if too many people crank up the heat, the demand could trigger another blackout.

During the day, if it's sunny, open your blinds so the sun can heat your home, but close them at night to prevent losing heat.

Check on your loved ones

When safe to do so, check in with the people around you to make sure they're OK.

Those who have medical equipment that require power, like respirators, should be taken to locations with generators or a friend's or neighbor's home that hasn't been impacted.

Keep your pets warm

Don't leave pets outside when it gets cold. Move them into a shelter inside where they'll stay warm, the Humane Society of the United States advises.

If you're walking your dog (though outdoor activity should be brief), consider wrapping them up in a sweater or coat -- pets can get hypothermia, too.

Look on your pet's paws for rock salt or other chemicals used to melt ice. Those chemicals can irritate your pet's feet, so wipe them down with a warm, damp towel upon returning home.

If you have a reptile or another pet that relies on outside sources of warmth, you can heat them up with hand warmers, a generator (again, used only outside your home) or snuggling, says PetCoach, an online veterinary database from Petco.
The CEO of Hallmark Channel's parent company claimed fans will be seeing more LGBT characters in their future storylines as they will remain committed in their pro-LGBT stance, a report says.

Wonya Lucas, the president and CEO of Hallmark Channel's parent company Crown Media Family Networks, gave his remarks during the Winter Television Critics Association meeting and said that Hallmark Channel is "proud" of its progress on the issue, Christian Headlines reported.

Hallmark has long been pushing to include the LGBT community in their storylines. Back in 2019, Hallmark was involved in a controversy over a commercial that shows a kissing scene between a same-sex couple.

"All I can speak to is where we are today. And really just coming in six months ago and seeing the work that the team had already done and begun, it really did make me proud," Wonya Lucas said when asked about any fallout from the 2019 same-sex ad controversy.

"What I see, moving forward - and I can speak for myself - is that we're gonna continue to lean into that and you're gonna see more of that. And we welcome all the advertisers who have been supportive of us, and our team's been supportive, and our parent company is incredibly supportive. So this is who we are," Lucas continued.

Wonya Lucas's remarks on the controversy were first reported by Deadline.

The controversy received a lot of negative comments, including from One Million Moms, an organization of Christian moms and social conservatives.

"The once conservative network has recently caved to LGBTQ pressure and has done a one-eighty from the wholesome content the channel once aired, and the network is now catering to the Left," One Million Moms said in a statement last year. "So many people feel betrayed by Hallmark over these past seven months."

According to Christian Headlines, the Hallmark Channel will be debuting "Mix Up in the Mediterranean" this month, which was billed at the Television Critics Association meeting as the first-ever Hallmark movie with a gay lead actor.

The film revolves around the story of a single man whose twin brother, a famous city chef, is married to another man.

Last year alone, Hallmark released two new movies, The Christmas House and Wedding Every Weekend, which featured characters from the LGBT community.

Michelle Vicary, Crown's executive vice president for programming, mentioned how "excited" she is about their upcoming "Mix Up in the Mediterranean" which includes their "first gay lead."

Wonya Lucas and Michelle Vicary said that their channel, is committed to showing racial, religious, and LGBT diversity in their storylines.

"Before I arrived, we had begun to expand our brand inclusiveness in front of and behind the camera," Lucas said. "I'm proud of the progress this team is making to expand diversity in our programming and it is nothing short of seismic."

"The significant achievements made in the D&I (diversity and inclusion) space in 2020 laid the groundwork for us to branch out in our storytelling to approach the complexity of what it means to love and be a family in a more authentic, varied, and inclusive way."

Lucas also added that their team will continue to "strive to defy common stereotypes and give our characters more depth and dimension; in short, to more broadly represent the human condition," and that he believes there is so much more "good work yet to be done."
Egypts Higher Education Minister Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar said on Sunday that first semester university exams will not be replaced by research papers as was the case last year during the first wave of the coronavirus.

However, first semester exams in schools and universities, scheduled for December 2020, were put off due to coronavirus concerns.

Meanwhile, the government decided to extend the mid-year holiday for an additional week. First semester exams will be held starting 27 February, the minister said.

Abdel-Ghaffar told the media that students will take written exams in their faculties, except for the universities that earlier announced they have the required infrastructure to give exams online.

The majority of Egypt's private universities are qualified to conduct online exams due to their advanced facilities and the small number of students registered in their courses, Mohamed Helmy, head of the Supreme Council of Private Universities, told Al-Watan newspaper in December.

Cairo University President Mohamed Othman El-Khest said the faculties were free to conduct the exams in the way they see fit, Al-Watan quoted Cairo University Spokesman Mahmoud Alam El-Din as saying earlier this month.

Alam El-Din added that some faculties, including the Faculty of Mass Communication, have decided to conduct exams online.

Abdel-Ghaffar said on Sunday university students are entitled to request postponing their courses and exams for a year.

Minister of Education Tarek Shawki on Sunday also announced a bundle of measures to explain how the exams and the second semester will take place.

Among the most important decisions is giving students between grades four and eight a collective test that covers all the main subjects instead of first semester exams.

The decision excludes students of grades nine and 12, who will take the exams at the end of the academic year. In addition, according to the new educational system, pupils in grades less than four don't take exams.
(ANSAmed) - BEIRUT, FEBRUARY 15 - The vaccination campaign against Covid is kicking off officially on Monday in Lebanon after the first 28,000 doses of the vaccine developed by Pfizer-BioNTech arrived at the airport of Beirut during the weekend. But there are many concerns and controversies over the management of the campaign by institutions which is not transparent, Lebanese media reported on Monday morning. Media reports said the first to receive the vaccine over the past few hours were medical staff from the hospital Rafiq Hariri in Beirut, which has been for a year the main Lebanese hospital on the frontline of the fight against coronavirus.



Lebanon, a country dealing with its worst economic crisis in the last 30 years and rocked by deep social tension, has registered some 4,000 deaths formally attributed to Covid over the past year.



During the last few days, local and international humanitarian organizations have sounded the alarm on the risks that the small number of vaccines so far, compared to the residing population of over six million people, could induce the Lebanese political class to manage the vaccination campaign according to clientelist practices with little transparency.



(ANSAmed)

The Joint Forces Command of the Ukrainian Armed Forces has presented awards to participants in hostilities in other states, the Command's press center has reported on Facebook.

"Ukrainian servicemen took part in local wars and armed conflicts in 16 states. These are military specialists with experience in conducting operations in Vietnam, Syria, Angola, Mozambique, etc. Today we are proud that the combat reserve of the Ukrainian army consists of Afghan war veterans  the war that lasted for ten years," Commander of the Joint Forces of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Lieutenant General Serhiy Nayev said during the event.

According to him, since 1992, tens of thousands of Ukrainian troops have taken part in international peacekeeping operations as part of many peacekeeping missions.

Today, during the fighting against the insidious Russian aggression in eastern Ukraine, these military specialists effectively use their combat experience, show heroism and courage, Nayev said.

Addressing the officers who took part in hostilities in other states and performed tasks as part of peacekeeping missions, Nayev wished them good health, family comfort and well-being, unshakable will in their difficult struggle for victory over the enemy, the implementation of all plans and successes for the sake of ensuring the defense capabilities of Ukraine.

"We are honored to serve with you as part of the Joint Forces Command of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, where your combat experience is an undeniable significant contribution to the acquisition of capabilities by our Command," he said.

At the end of the ceremony, servicemen were given honors, diplomas and valuable gifts.

Ukraine marks the Day of Remembrance for Participants in Hostilities in Other States on February 15.

It was on February 15, 1989 that the Soviet Union pulled its last troops out of Afghanistan.

Photo: facebook.com/JointForcesCommandAFU
Dan Leavy has had surgery on his knee and will be unavailable for at least thre months. Photo by Gareth Everitt/Sportsfile

Leinster flanker Dan Leavy will be out for the next three to four months of action after undergoing surgery on a knee cartilage injury.

The Ireland international has made nine appearances for the province this season since returning from the horror knee injury he suffered in March 2019.

While news of a fresh knee injury will alarm fans, Independent.ie understands that the elective procedure, which was taken as a precaution, was successful and Leinster are confident that Leavy will make a full recovery to be available in May or June.

Leinster this afternoon issued an update on Caelan Doris who they say "flagged some concussive symptoms while in camp with Ireland and returned to Leinster Rugby to investigate those symptoms".

Doris is listed as unavailable for selection for this Friday's game against Dragons and Leinster say no further update will be provided until the investigation is complete.

Read More

Leo Cullen will have Rory O'Loughlin and Tommy O'Brien fit for the trip to Wales, while Michael Bent (neck), Adam Byrne (hamstring) and Scott Penny (neck) are being monitored at training before a decision is made on their availability.

Jimmy O'Brien (hamstring), Conor O'Brien, Max Deegan (both knee) and Vakh Abdaladze (back) remain sidelined.
Preview: Ecstatic Ahly take on Merrikh in Champions League quest



Mahmoud Sheleib, , Monday 15 Feb 2021



The Reds will be fighting for their first three points against Sudans Merrikh, to share the lead of Group A with Tanzanias Simba, which defeated DR Congos Vita Club 1-0 in the first round



Just a few days after claiming the bronze medal in the Club World Cup, defending champions Ahly will kick off their African Champions League group stage campaign against Sudanese giants Merrikh on Tuesday.



The Reds, who have nine Champions League titles under their belt, beat Brazilian Champions Palmeiras for the third place, becoming the only African side to claim a medal twice in the elite FIFA club competition, following their maiden bronze medal in 2006.



Ahly skipper Mohamed El-Shennawi stressed that celebrations were over and theyve turned over the World Cup page, and are now fully concentrated on their upcoming goals.



We seek to keep the Champions League title and win it for the 10th time in order to return to participate in the Club World Cup, the 32-year-old keeper told Ahlys official website.



While high on confidence, the Cairo giants have been hit by injuries that may put some restrictions on the choices of coach Pitso Mosimane.



Ahly will have to do without Ali Maaloul, Ayman Ashraf and Salah Mohsen, who sustained injuries during the Club World Cup. Veteran forward Walid Soliman remains unavailable with a hamstring injury, and most recently rising forward Taher Mohamed Taher, who made a big impact during the Club World Cup,suffered a muscle strain in training.



Hussein El-Shahat is another notable absentee from this game, ashe is still serving a four-matchsuspension from CAF over the incidents that followed the latest Champions League final.



Ahly football director Sayed Abdel-Hafiz stressed that the game against the Sudanese side will not be easy.



Merrikh came early to Cairo in order to prepare themselves well for Ahly, and the match is expected to be tough, as all the teams seek positive results in the group stages.



Winning the bronze medal at the World Cup is good, but the tournament is over and now we are only focused on the game, he said.



On the other side, Merrikhs Tunisian coach Nasreddine Nabi has revealed his optimism to achieve something positive in Cairo.



Ahly is a big team that is highly respected at Merrikh, but we wont drop back in the field, Nabi told local Sudanese media.



We will play to achieve what weve planned for, as we know everything about Ahly and weve observed pretty well their participation at the World Cup, he added.



Tanzania's Simba have gone to the top of Group A after beating DR Congos Vita Club 1-0 on Friday.



(For more sports news and updates, follow Ahram Online Sports on Twitter [email protected]_Sportsand on Facebook atAhramOnlineSports.)



https://english.ahram.org.eg/News/404099.aspx
Pope Francis recalls the faithful witness of 21 Christians - 20 Egyptian Orthodox Copts and 1 Ghanaian - who were killed by Islamist extremists in 2015 in Libya.

By Fr. Benedict Mayaki, SJ

Pope Francis sent a video message on Monday on the sixth anniversary of the death of 21 Coptic Orthodox Christians killed in Libya by the so-called Islamic State.

Today is the day I have in my heart, that February of 2015, the Pope said. I hold in my heart that baptism of blood, those twenty-one men baptised as Christians with water and the Spirit, and that day also baptised with blood.

They are our Saints, Saints of all Christians, Saints of all Christian denominations and traditions, the Pope affirmed. They are those who have blanched their lives in the blood of the Lamb, they are those... of the people of God, the faithful people of God."

The occasion was commemorated virtually on Friday in an online event, which saw the attendance of Coptic Orthodox Patriarch Tawadros II. The Primate of the Anglican Communion, Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury, was also present, along with several other dignitaries.

Ordinary men, witnesses to Jesus

Speaking further on the testimony of their lives, Pope Francis explained that those 21 Christians who bore witness to Jesus Christ were ordinary men who went abroad to support their families.

Ordinary men, fathers of families, men with the desire to have children; men with the dignity of workers, who not only seek to bring home bread, but to bring it home with the dignity of work.

Their throats slit by the brutality of ISIS, they died saying, 'Lord Jesus!', confessing the name of Jesus, the Pope said.

Pope Francis pointed out that, even though their deaths on the beach in Sirte was a tragedy, that beach was blessed by their blood. He added that it is even more true that "from their simplicity, from their simple but consistent faith, they received the greatest gift a Christian can receive: bearing witness to Jesus Christ to the point of giving their life.

Gratitude to God, church and family

Expressing gratitude to God for the gift of these courageous brothers, the Pope thanked the Holy Spirit for giving them the strength and the consistency to confess Jesus even to the point of shedding their blood.

The Pope also acknowledged the bishops and priests of the Coptic Church who raised them and taught them to grow in the faith.

Turning his attention to their mothers, the Pope expressed thanks for their role in nursing them in the faith: They are the mothers of God's holy people who transmit the faith 'in dialect', Pope Francis said. A dialect that goes beyond languages, the dialect of belonging.

Salutations

Pope Francis went on to express his closeness to the participants at the online occasion, greeting in particular, Coptic Orthodox Patriarch Tawadros II, the Primate of the Anglican Communion, Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury, and all other bishops and priests.

I join the holy faithful people of God who in their simplicity, with their consistency and inconsistencies, with their graces and sins, carry forth the confession of Jesus Christ: Jesus Christ is Lord.

Lastly, Pope Francis reiterated his gratitude to the 21 Christians for their witness, and thanked the Lord for His closeness to his people.

Concluding, the Holy Father encouraged all to pray, on this anniversary of the deaths of the Coptic Orthodox Christians, that they might intercede for us all before God.

Restaurants will no longer be allowed to sell pre-packaged meals through arrangements with supermarkets and other outlets, as Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley definitively closed this loophole yesterday.

Rowley said this would not be allowed to continue, as it defeats the purpose of the public health regulations. Restaurants and street food vendors were among those businesses ordered to close to limit the movement of people and curb the spread of Covid-19.

Four people died and seven others became ill in the southeastern region of Nzerekore due to Ebola virus. Guinea on Sunday has declared an Ebola epidemic.

According to the health ministry, The infected patients have been kept in isolation in treatment centres. In a statement, the ministry said, "Faced with this situation and in accordance with international health regulations, the Guinean government declares an Ebola epidemic."The infected patients have been kept in isolation in treatment centres. According to the media report, seven people fell ill with diarrhoea, vomiting and bleeding after attending a burial in Goueke, near the Liberian border.

The world Health Organization (WHO) has already started supporting Liberia, Sierra Leone and the Democratic Republic of Congo authorities that have been on high alert amid reports of emerging new Ebola cases. In a tweet, media wrote, "Very concerned by reports of 4 suspected Ebola deaths in Guinea. WHO is ramping up readiness and response efforts to this potential resurgence of #Ebola in West Africa, a region which suffered so much from Ebola in 2014."

Also Read:

Open to all hypotheses and require further analysis and studies: WHO

Guterres appreciates critically vital partnership between US, UN

Corona fatalities in Africa surged amid new variants: WHO
[Follow our live coverage of Oprahs Interview with Meghan and Harry]

LONDON  Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, are expecting their second child, their spokesperson said Sunday, a joyful bit of news after a turbulent year in which they broke away from the British royal family, started new lives in California and suffered a miscarriage that Meghan said brought almost unbearable grief.

We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother, the spokesperson said in a statement, referring to the couples nearly 2-year-old son, Archie Mountbatten-Windsor. Harry and Meghan, who are also known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, are overjoyed to be expecting their second child, it said.

The statement did not say when the duchess was due to give birth or whether the couple knew the babys gender. They released an artful, black-and-white photo of them relaxing affectionately under a tree, a baby bump clearly visible on Meghan.

For the 39-year-old American actress-turned-duchess, the news is particularly welcome, given the anguish of her miscarriage last July, which she recalled in starkly personal terms in a column in The New York Times last November that drew an extraordinary worldwide reaction.
[February 15, 2021] Crypto Finance Group: Why Every Bank Will Need a Crypto Asset Strategy

ZURICH, Feb. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- We live in an age of digital disruption that has accelerated over the last year. Central banks are unleashing record levels of monetary stimulus, while technology continues to rapidly reshape our global economy. It has shown us that conventional thinking will not bring the answers for what lies ahead. In the midst of this change, crypto assets are emerging as a 'safe-haven' asset for institutional investors looking for alternative stores of value for their investment portfolios. This comes as the Crypto Finance brokerage has received the securities house licence from Swiss regulator FINMA. The timing couldn't be better. CEO Rupertus Rothenhauser explains why. A new asset class is emerging  crypto assets. It is an asset class designed for the new digital age we are now entering. Bitcoin and other crypto assets have attracted retail investors and now the attention of institutional investors, who are drawn to the independence these assets enjoy from the policies of central banks and governments, and the blockchain technology shaping the future of finance. Every bank will need a crypto asset strategy Banks will need to both create the infrastructure for crypto assets and respond as trusted advisors to clients who are interested in investing in this asset class. This creates a challenging dualit: the current financial system remains, and this new digital asset finance sector emerges. Securing the expertise of a specialised partner for trading and investing in crypto assets, and developing a digital asset strategy, is an efficient way to meet this need for innovation, in incremental steps.



Increasing regulatory clarity on crypto assets With a new DLT law addressing crypto assets effective in February 2021, Switzerland is one of the few countries with this regulatory clarity. The securities house licence granted by FINMA to Crypto Broker AG  the brokerage firm of Crypto Finance Group  is one more step in making secure, reliable access to crypto assets possible for the finance sector.

Rupertus Rothenhauser, CEO of the brokerage comments, "It's now possible for banks to shape a crypto asset strategy within the regulated finance sector," based on the full suite of crypto asset financial services the Crypto Finance Group provides professional investors. Read more: https://www.cryptofinance.ch/en/why-every-bank-will-need-a-digital-asset-strategy/ www.cryptofinance.ch Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1436704/Crypto_Finance_CEO.jpg

Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1429543/Crypto_Finance_Logo.jpg Press requests: Yara Ainsworth, T +41 41 552 45 31, press@cryptofinance.ch

[ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 02:42:53|Editor: huaxia

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SKOPJE, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- The first batch of COVID-19 vaccines from manufacturer Pfizer arrived in North Macedonia from Serbia on Sunday, Media Information Agency (MIA) reported.

According to MIA, the first batch of 4,680 out of 8,000 Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine doses was handed out to Prime Minister Zoran Zaev by Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic at the Tabanovce border crossing, northern North Macedonia.

Speaking at a press conference held at the border crossing, Zaev said that the delivery of the vaccines from Serbia is "an act of solidarity and friendship from the brotherly Serbian people."

Zaev thanked Vucic and Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic for their work and for providing North Macedonia with the vaccines. He added that the second vaccine batch will arrive in the coming days.

In his remarks, Vucic said: "I am happy that the citizens of North Macedonia will be able to start the immunization process now."

North Macedonia's Health Minister Venko Filipce, present at the press conference, told reporters that the vaccination program in the country will kick off on Feb. 17 and the first to receive the vaccine will be health professionals.

On Sunday, the Health Ministry reported 180 new COVID-19 cases, taking the total in North Macedonia to 97,052, with 87,652 recoveries and 2,989 fatalities.

As the world is struggling to contain the pandemic, vaccination is underway in some countries with the already-authorized coronavirus vaccines.

Meanwhile, 242 candidate vaccines are still being developed worldwide -- 63 of them in clinical trials -- in countries including Germany, China, Russia, Britain and the United States, according to the latest information released by the World Health Organization. Enditem
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A third judge is now presiding over the case of a Baton Rouge man accused in the 2019 killing of civil rights activist Sadie Roberts-Joseph, who founded the city's African American history museum two decades ago.

State District Judge Christopher Dassau, who inherited Ronn Jermaine Bell's cases after he defeated incumbent Judge Richard Anderson in November, voluntarily recused himself on Feb. 5.

"In my previous private practice of law, I was employed by the family to complete the succession of the decedent, and alleged victim in this case, Sadie Roberts Joseph," Dassau wrote in his recusal order.

The case has been randomly allotted to state District Judge Kelly Balfour, according to an order entered into the court record Friday.

Bell, 39, faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison if convicted of second-degree murder in the July 12, 2019, slaying of Roberts-Joseph, 75.

+2 Sadie Roberts-Joseph's accused killer pleads not guilty in civil rights activist's slaying The man accused of killing civil rights icon Sadie Roberts-Joseph pleaded not guilty Thursday in the July slaying of the woman who had founded

She was found in the trunk of her car behind an abandoned house in the 2300 block of North 20th Street. Police said she had been suffocated. Bell's DNA was found on Roberts-Joseph's body, an arrest report says.

Bell was a tenant in one of Roberts-Joseph's properties and had fallen about $1,200 behind on his rent, police said. He acknowledged that during an interview with detectives, but said Roberts-Joseph agreed he could remain in the house as long as he paid her something, police said.

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Video evidence shows Bell near where Roberts-Joseph's car was found  about three miles from her Scotlandville home, police stated. That home is down the street from the house Bell was renting.

Bell later admitted to detectives that he had been in the location where the car was dumped, but said he was not inside the vehicle and had not seen Roberts-Joseph for several days before her death, police said.

Sadie Roberts-Joseph's body was doused in bleach; empty bleach bottles found in suspect's house A search warrant filed Monday in the murder case of Baton Rouge civil rights activist Sadie Roberts-Joseph reveals new details about the polic

A search warrant indicated bleach was poured over her body in an apparent attempt to destroy evidence. Detectives later found two empty bleach bottles inside Bell's home.

Bell, who has pleaded not guilty, also is charged in the case with failing to register as a sex offender.

Roberts-Joseph was best known for founding the Odell S. Williams African-American Museum in downtown Baton Rouge in 2001 and organizing an annual Juneteenth festival celebrating the end of slavery in the United States.

The museum on South Boulevard was vandalized one month after her death but later reopened. It is now set to relocate into the Municipal Annex Building on St. Louis Street and expand under a cooperative endeavor agreement between the city-parish and museum.


Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has visited the United Arab Emirates in a bid to improve business ties between the two nations.

During the visit, Zelenskiy met with the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and business representatives to discuss future trade.

The two leaders said they hoped to increase bilateral trade over the next five years.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
The Kalashnikov Group will hold the presentation of the latest 5.56mm AK-19 assault rifle abroad for the first time, The Kalashnikov press office said.

"The AK-19s world presentation will take place at the Middle Easts largest IDEX-2021 arms show that will run on February 21-25 in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates," the press office said in a statement.

The AK-19 assault rifle has already evoked the interest of some customers from the Middle East that use 5.56-45mm rounds as the standard ammunition, the Kalashnikov Group stressed.

"in a hot, humid and dusty climate, the AK-19 will provide the efficiency of its round-the-clock use, reliable operation and easy maintenance," the statement says.

"The AK-19 is chambered for the 5.56x45mm cartridge adopted in NATO and widely spread in the world. Therefore, our latest assault rifle is fully geared to the external market. While presenting the AK-19 at the IDEX worlds largest arms show, we are confident that it will evoke big interest from foreign customers whose requests we are already receiving," the press office quoted Kalashnikov Group CEO Dmitry Tarasov as saying.

The AK-19 assault rifle was unveiled at the Army-2020 international arms show.
Josh Duggar and Anna Duggar are among the most controversial Duggar couples. While the early years of their marriage werent noteworthy, by 2015, there was trouble. Back-to-back scandals sent the young family back to Arkansas and led to much speculation about how they ended up married. Some digging suggests that the couple never even went on a date before they got engaged in 2008.

Josh and Anna met at a homeschooling conference in 2006

The Duggar family and the Keller family first met at a homeschooling conference in 2006. The Kellers, however, were aware of the Duggars from magazine articles and chatter in social circles. Because they are the same age, Anna and Josh ran in similar social circles at the conference, but they didnt appear to have much contact.

RELATED: Counting On: A Church Insider Alleges Some Marriages are Highly Encouraged

Later, the Keller family and the Duggar family began visiting each other for fellowship. The Duggars hosted the Kellers in their Arkansas home first. Later, the Duggar family took a trip to Florida, where they visited with the Kellers. A second meetup at the ATI conference with limited exposure to Anna and Josh had decided he was ready to get married.

Anna agreed to marry Josh after meeting him just a few times

Josh proposed to Anna on her 20th birthday during a surprise visit to Florida. Family critics note that Anna looked incredibly uncomfortable during the proposal and the meal after accepting the ring. There is probably a good reason for that. A Reddit user did the legwork and figured out that, based on what the Duggars have said in two of their books, the couple only saw each other four to five times before getting engaged. Two of those visits occurred at homeschool conferences, and none of the visits included one-on-one time.

Josh and Anna Duggar | Kris Connor/Getty Images

There is more evidence to suggest that Anna had no idea Josh was courting her when the engagement happened. During a 19 Kids and Counting episode, Michelle Duggar mentioned that Annas father had said that Anna was not allowed to court until her 20th birthday. But wait, the couple got engaged on Annas 20th birthday. The statement suggests that Josh skipped the entire courtship process and went straight to engagement.

Josh was the first Duggar to begin dating and the first to get married. Jessa Duggar started dating Ben Seewald next. Jill and her husband, Derick Dillard, got together shortly after that. Jessa and Bens courtship was markedly different from Josh and Annas early relationship. Jessa and Ben actually courted before getting engaged. If you look at Josh and Annas story closely, it becomes glaringly obvious that the pair never even went on a chaperoned date until after they were officially engaged.

RELATED: Counting On: Josh Duggars OkCupid Q&A Answers Paint a Pretty Disturbing Picture

Since their meetings were limited to family fellowship before their engagement, they didnt experience what Joshs siblings experienced in their early relationships. They skipped the entire courtship and chaperoned dates and jumped straight to wedding planning. Some family critics believe that Annas father and Joshs fathered brokered the marriage, instead of letting it happen organically.
A Mexican beauty queen has been warned she could face jail after being arrested on suspicion of being part of a kidnapping gang.

Laura Mojica Romero, 25, faces up to 50 years in prison if convicted of the charges against her.

She is currently being detained in Huatusco, a city in the Mexican state of Veracruz.

Romero, who comes from the city of San Juan Bautista Tuxtepec in Oaxaca, won the Miss Oaxaca 2018 regional beauty contest and took part in the Miss Mexico competition the following year.

Laura Mojica Romero, 25, faces up to 50 years in prison if convicted of being part of a kidnapping gang

Romero won the Miss Oaxaca 2018 regional beauty contest in Mexico and ended up having a shot at Miss Mexico the following year

Romero, one of three women and five men arrested, wass identified only by her first name in a statement released by investigators in the eastern Mexican state of Veracruz. Her mugshot is pictured above

The English-speaking model went on to triumph as her nation's representative at the 2020 International Queen of Coffee beauty pageant in Colombia.

Romero, one of three women and five men arrested, was identified only by her first name in a statement released by investigators in the eastern Mexican state of Veracruz.

She was described as one of 'eight alleged members of a criminal organisation specialising in kidnap' in the statement. Prosecutors said an elite anti-kidnap unit had acted to ensure there was 'no truce for people who cause serious harm to Veracruz.'

She was described as one of 'eight alleged members of a criminal organisation specialising in kidnap' in the statement.

Laura is understood to have been held in Huatusco, one fo the 212 municipalities that make up the state of Veracruz

The model defined herself as 'more than just a pretty face' in an interview in January 2019 after her Miss Oaxaca triumph

They added: 'The capture of Luis Antonio 'N'; Raul 'N'; Maria del Rosario 'N'; Ana Martha 'N'; Laura 'N'; Cesar Enrique 'N'; Diego 'N' and Jossiel 'N' took place in Veracruz when personnel specialized in tackling kidnapping carried out an operation to capture those now linked to this judicial investigation.

'The eight alleged kidnappers have been remanded in custody for two months while the investigation continues.'

Laura is understood to have been held in Huatusco, a city in the Mexican state of Veracruz.

The business studies graduate said her priorities included tackling the problem of violence against woman

'We can't stand idly by, we have to eradicate violence against women, through campaigns and educational talks that make men aware of this issue,' she said

She was described at the time as a fluent English speaker and a spokeswoman in the fight against breast cancer and leukemia

The model defined herself as 'more than just a pretty face' in an interview in January 2019 after her Miss Oaxaca triumph.

The business studies graduate said her priorities included tackling the problem of violence against woman, saying: 'We can't stand idly by, we have to eradicate violence against women, through campaigns and educational talks that make men aware of this issue.'

She was described at the time as a fluent English speaker and a spokeswoman in the fight against breast cancer and leukemia.

The Nomura India Business Resumption Index (NIBRI) rose to 98.1 (provisionally) for the week ending 14 February from 95.9 the preceding week, according to a report by the global bank. The latest data suggests that economic activity is now only about two percentage points below pre-pandemic levels.

Mobility indicators continue to pick up and, while power demand fell by 0.1% week-on-week, this likely reflects a payback from the stellar 9.6% rise during the preceding week," Nomura said. The labour participation rate inched down to 40.5% from 40.9% the preceding week."

Also Read | Inside the five-year battle food companies have fought to resist stricter labelling norms

The NIBRI tracks high-frequency indicators such as mobility, labour participation, and power consumption to assess post-pandemic recovery.

Since its trough in April last year, when the lockdown first began, NIBRI remained on an uptrend through 2020 that has continued into 2021, rising from 86.5 in October-December 2020 to 94.7 in January-March 2021.

View Full Image Graphic Mint





The continued recovery in NIBRI is strongly predicated on containment of the pandemic," the report said. Beyond this, we remain upbeat on growth prospects due to the confluence of fiscal activism, the lagged effects of easy financial conditions, base effects and faster global growth. We expect real GDP growth of 13.5% year-on-year in FY22 (RBI estimates of 10.5%), up from -6.7% in FY21.

Nomuras predictions are in line with Indias recent data on industrial production, which registered a modest growth of 1% on an annualized basis in December 2020 compared to a contraction of 2.1% in November. The IIP index now stands at par with the pre-Covid level seen in February 2020.

Recovery was led by index heavy-weight manufacturing, consumer goods along with infrastructure and construction goods.

With the lockdown restrictions being progressively brought down to minimal levels, mobility indicators are now only 10-15% below pre-Covid levels," ratings and research agency Acuite said. The policy environment, characterised by a countercyclical fiscal outturn reinforced in the Union Budget FY22 amidst an accommodative monetary and liquidity backdrop that RBI remains committed to, continue to remain supportive of economic recovery."

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Supreme Court says Alabama prison cannot execute inmate unless pastor is present

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An Alabama inmate sentenced to death cannot be executed unless he has, per his request, a pastor present in the execution room, according to an opinion by the United States Supreme Court.

In the case of Jefferson S. Dunn v. Willie B. Smith, III, the high court decided last Thursday to deny a request by Alabama to vacate a lower court injunction in favor of the inmates request to have a clergyman present for his execution.

At issue in the case was the request of Smith to have a pastor in the chamber when he is executed for murder, despite Alabama law only allowing clergy to be present in the viewing room.

Justice Elena Kagan authored a concurring opinion to the decision, being joined by Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Amy Coney Barrett.

Alabama has not carried its burden of showing that the exclusion of all clergy members from the execution chamber is necessary to ensure prison security, wrote Kagan.

Prison security is, of course, a compelling state interest. But past practice, in Alabama and elsewhere, shows that a prison may ensure security without barring all clergy members from the execution chamber.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh authored a dissenting opinion, being joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, arguing that the States policy is non-discriminatory and serves the States compelling interests in ensuring the safety, security, and solemnity of the execution room.

Diana Verm, senior counsel at Becket, a law firm that filed an amicus brief in the case in support of Smith, celebrated the ruling from the Supreme Court in a statement Friday.

If Willie Smith has to leave this world, he shouldnt have to leave it all alone, stated Verm. Alabama used to know that, which is why it always required a chaplain to be with the condemned man until the end. Prisoners should be allowed to make peace with their Maker in their final moments.

For years, the Alabama Department of Corrections allowed for Christian clergy to be present inside of an execution chamber while an inmate was given lethal injection.

In 2019, the state garnered much criticism for refusing to allow an imam to accompany Domineque Ray into the chamber when he was executed.

Ray had filed litigation over the matter, but the Supreme Court had ruled 5-4 at the time to deny a stay of execution to resolve the imam issue, with the majority arguing that Ray had taken too long to file the appropriate petition.

On November 6, 2018, the State scheduled Domineque Rays execution date for February 7, 2019. Because Ray waited until January 28, 2019 to seek relief, we grant the States application to vacate the stay entered by the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, concluded the majority.

Eventually, in response to a separate 2019 Supreme Court decision, Alabama decided to bar all clergy from the execution chamber, regardless of religious affiliation.
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Describing as "alarming" the rise in fresh COVID-19 cases in some districts of Maharashtra, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Monday warned of taking some "harsh decisions" and asked people to be prepared. Some districts in Vidarbha region in east Maharashtra, especially Amravati and Nagpur, and Nashik in north Maharashtra have seen the number of new cases rising over the last few days.

Speaking to reporters, Pawar expressed displeasure over people not following the pandemic-appropriate behaviour and violating guidelines. Pawar, who also holds Finance ministry, was in Aurangabad to chair a review meeting of eight districts under the Marathwada region.

"I have come across (reports that) people are not following the COVID-19 guidelines which are aimed at checking the spread of the infection. If the situation worsens, we may need to pay heavy cost for this carelessness. The number (of new cases in the state) is alarming. We have seen that lockdown was imposed in many parts of the world again in view of the second wave of the pandemic," he said. Pawar said the matter will be discussed with Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray in Mumbai tonight.

"Harsh decisions can be taken and the people should remain prepared. If certain decisions are not taken in time then we will have to pay a heavy cost later," he added. Maharashtra on Sunday recorded 4,092 new coronavirus cases, taking the infection tally to 20,64,278, while 40 deaths pushed the toll to 51,529, as per the state government.

The "3T formula" of tracing, testing and treatment will have to be implemented strictly to tackle a rise in COVID-19 cases in some parts of Maharashtra, state health minister Rajesh Tope said. Talking to reporters, Tope said the state government had managed to flatten the curve in the last one month as far as daily addition of cases was concerned, but a recent rise in numbers in Mumbai, Wardha and some other pockets was "alarming".

"We have given instructions that the 3T formula of tracing, testing and treatment be implemented strictly, effectively. Testing needs to be increased. Meanwhile, people also need to follow COVID-19 guidelines," he added. The minister said the situation needs to be controlled as "we don't want to go in for a lockdown now".

Speaking on the COVID-19 vaccination drive, Tope said the state was waiting for the Centre to start the second round of administering doses, adding that the vaccine should be given free to the "poor and lower middle class".

While 19,75,603 people have recovered so far in the state, there are 35,965 active cases as on Sunday.
MBABANE  The country might continue rolling out the Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine.

This is according to the Minister of Health, Lizzie Nkosi, who said the realisation that the said vaccine prevented COVID-19 severe illness and death suggested that they would continue rolling it out.

This follows reports of scepticism by government on whether this vaccine would work among the populace given that there were huge chances that the kingdom had the same COVID-19 variant that was present in South Africa.

The Oxford AstraZeneca was said not to be quite effective with the SA variant, resulting in the republic temporarily pulling the plug on it.

Nkosi said this was discussed in an extensive meeting with the World Health Organisation (WHO), scientists from the University of Witwatersrand and Oxford University last Saturday.

She said during the meeting, it was suggested that the Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine could still be administered to people because they would be safe from severe illness, regardless of the new South African COVID-19 strain which was spreading across the southern African region.

A person who has been given the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine could catch the virus and have sniffles which subside quickly and not get severely sick.

This new information that has been given to us has motivated the ministry to continue enrolling the said vaccine, despite it being dismissed in other countries because of new evidence that it could not prevent mild COVID-19 symptoms of the South African strain, said Nkosi in an interview yesterday.

She said the country had not completely ruled out using Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine as an option against the COVID-19 vaccine.

When asked if the COVID-19 vaccine enrolment would still begin at the end of February as planned, the minister said they were still on schedule, further stating that the first vaccine that would be rolled out might be the Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine.

We never cancelled our order with COVAX as we continued making consultations. The evidence that is being presented strongly suggests that we continue using the AstraZeneca vaccine, said Nkosi.

The minister said the Oxford AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Sputnik COVID-19 vaccines worked in a similar manner. Worth noting is that the country will use different vaccine candidates, including the Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer BioNTech.

Over a week ago, studies in South Africa revealed that the Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine could not prevent mild COVID-19 sickness with the new strain in that country.

This caused the neighbouring country to halt their enrolment plan after procuring the vaccines on February 1.

Since then, the countrys Ministry of Health has been in a dilemma with regard to choosing a COVID-19 vaccine candidate, though the government confirmed that it had turned to Johnson & Johnson as well as the Russian Sputnik vaccine.

In the meantime, Eswatini has taken some samples to South Africa to determine how much of that countrys variant is available in the kingdom.

Samples

According to the minister, the kingdom will know the type of COVID-19 variant it has by the end of this week when the samples return.

Nkosi said government was determined to know the percentages of people in the country who had the strain found in SA.

We sent samples to South Africa in Pretoria to assess the strain which is in the country. We are patiently waiting for the results and they should be out by the end of this week. The laboratories in SA are swamped with samples from other African countries who wish to find out the type of COVID-19 strain in their countries, said Nkosi.

She said the country would be informed once the results were out.

In the meantime, COVID-19 patients and survivors are not eligible to the coronavirus vaccines for at least six months.

This is according to the revised World Health Organisation (WHO) interim guidelines with regard to the enrolment of COVID-19 vaccines, which was released last Wednesday evening.

WHO Health Promotion Officer Dr Kevin Makadzange had explained in an earlier interview that people who were positive for COVID-19 and those who had just recovered from the virus, should not be vaccinated for at least six months after infection.

This means that if a person is COVID-19 positive in February, they can get their first jab in August. This is because the evidence collected suggested that people who have recovered from the disease have antibodies with a life span of about three to six months, said Makadzange.

When asked if this recommendation also applied to the elderly and people with comorbidities, because they were at risk of severe disease, and sometimes death, the health promotion officer said it did.






Michael Wyke / Contributor

Houstons historic cold snap had already canceled hundreds of flights Sunday evening, as the region braces for the coldest stretch in decades.

The weather led to 707 cancellations at Bush Intercontinental Airport and 144 at Hobby Airport, according to Augusto Bernal, public information officer for Houston Airport System. The cancellations amounted to 53 percent of all flights at IAH and 40 percent of Hobbys flights through 3 p.m. Monday.
Legendary poet Mirza Ghalib breathed his last on this day in 1869. He was born on 27 December 1797 in Agra. He studied Arabic and Persian according to the system of the time. At the age of thirteen he married Umrao Begum and at the age of seventeen he settled in Delhi.



It is said that he had seven children but unfortunately none of them survived. The pain of losing his children found its way into his poetry.



Mirza Ghalib was one of the important poets in the court of Bahadur Shah Zafar II. He suffixed his name with Mirza because of the title that the emperor added to his honour - Mirza Nosha. He was then addressed as Mirza Ghalib.



His words on love, loss and life continue to enlighten humans and calm their souls. Many of his ghazals and letters carried a history of events of the downfall of the Mughal dynasty and arrival of the British. In remembrance of the renowned poet, here are some of his most famous couplets:
One firm that could particularly have a huge advantage is MapMyIndia, founded 25 years ago.

The Indian tech and startup ecosystem hailed the government's move on February 15 to liberalise mapping, a move that is likely to spur innovation, lead to the next generation of mapping, and unlock capital.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi described it as a decision that would provide a huge impetus to Digital India and a massive step in its vision for Atmanirbhar Bharat.

While Infosys founder and Aadhaar architect Nandan Nilekani tweeted that "the new map policy is another strategic step in India's journey of data empowerment", Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu thanked the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) for liberalising policies around geospatial data.

The guidelines released by the government direct the Survey of India and other government agencies producing or owning maps and geospatial data to simplify procedures, revise/abolish various forms/licences and use modern techniques such as cloud, open APIs, to make its data accessible in an online format.

While Indian entities will be free to use this data and build on it, foreign entities and foreign-owned or -controlled Indian companies can licence from Indian entities.

"The new regulations will lead to new innovations by Indian startups with much higher resolution of mapping. One earlier required approvals and licence to map, which goes away now. The US and Europe didn't have these restrictions, which helped companies there come up with innovations such as Street View and aerial photography," said Lalitesh Katragadda, who built Google Maps for India and also worked on the Aarogya Setu app.

When asked about the privacy concerns, he said there wouldn't be loss of privacy as the mapping is only allowed in public places.

He said Google had the edge when it came to permissions and approvals for mapping in India because of the resources at its disposal, something that smaller Indian startups could not compete with. The current changes give Indian internet companies a level-playing field.

He also said freeing up mapping could lead to better mapping of assets, thus unlocking capital to those looking for loans with land as collateral.

One firm that could particularly have a huge advantage is MapMyIndia, founded 25 years ago. It competes with Google Maps and counts Flipkart as an investor. It recently tied up with the Indian Space Research Organisation to offer an indigenous satellite-based mapping service.

MapMyIndia CEO Rohan Varma welcomed the move, saying that while it has 5,000 enterprise customers in India, it will focus on increasing awareness among standalone consumers. Some of its customers include Apple, PhonePe, Flipkart, Paytm, Amazon, Facebook and Uber.

At the same time, iSPIRT co-founder Sharad Sharma said, "Clearly we need the next level of maps to come up. They have to be more precise. The question is who should produce those maps. Google or Indian companies? Of course, Indian companies."

"The old rules were only hurting Indian companies. Simplifying these rules substantially brings the Indian companies into the fold. In any case maps cannot be built only by satellite. We require local stuff to happen and the drone policy is out. So the combination sets up the stage. Indian companies have been itching to do this, just needed the right policy framework. It is like the old payment system was controlled by Visa, Mastercard, the new system, UPI, is controlled by us as NPCI. Same thing is happening here that your next generation map will be created by the Indian companies," he added.
An Irish woman has told how she is still recovering after being bitten by a false widow spider two months ago.

RTEs Liveline heard from a caller called Sinead who shared her experience with the spider.

Sinead told Joe Duffy how she woke up shortly before Christmas with a mark on her arm that resembled a cigarette mark or a blister, but her local pharmacist revealed it was actually a spider bite.

Despite regularly using steroid cream and antibiotics, the woman said that the sore had not healed eight weeks on and is still inflamed.

Sinead revealed her dermatologist wants to perform a skin biopsy on the bite, which will cost around 900.

Read More

A number of Irish people have been hospitalised with bites from the spider in recent years, sparking fears that the number of false widows are increasing.

In Ireland, false widow spiders live close to buildings and houses inhabited by people.

They typically only survive in cities and not in rural areas.

The creatures, which can resemble their cousins, the often lethal black widow spiders, are known as "false widows", but they pose no great danger.

False widows have dark, shiny bodies with pale markings and a cream band on their abdomens.

Dublin, Cork and Wexford have the highest number of False Widows to date.

The spider originally comes from the Canary Islands and arrived in the UK about 100 years ago and has steadily invaded Ireland over the past 20 years through human transport of goods, a by-product of globalisation.

It lives for five to seven years whereas most other spider and bug species in Ireland only live for a maximum of one year.

The spiders are mainly found outdoors in the bark of trees, however they do venture indoors sometimes.

A bite by the spider may cause swelling and redness, but doesn't usually result in any long-lasting side effects and rarely requires medical attention.

Read More




Part of the U.S. Forces Korea needs to remain north of Seoul near the frontline after headquarters relocates south of the capital, USFK commander Curtis Scaparrotti said Monday.

"In terms of the residual in what we call Area I, there may be a need operationally to leave some residual in those areas just for proper defense and response," Scaparrotti told the Defense Ministry press corps. It was his first meeting with the reporters after he was inaugurated as the new USFK commander last month.

The plan so far has been for the entire USFK to retreat to a new base in Pyeongtaek in southwestern Gyeonggi Province by 2016.

But since last year, the USFK has been talking with the South Korean military about leaving the 210th Fires Brigade of the 2nd Infantry Division in Dongducheon to promptly respond to threats from North Korean long-range artillery.

This suggests the U.S troops would continue to play a "tripwire" role, a term used to mean that the U.S. will automatically intervene in a war here if American soldiers in the frontline area are attacked by North Korean troops.

There has been concern that if all U.S. forces retreat south, there would be no tripwire and therefore a greater threat of provocations from the North.

Scaparrotti also came out in favor of reorganizing the 2nd U.S. Infantry Division to include some South Korean troops. "There has been no decision, but we discussed it and I think it is a strong possibility and will be a strong additive to our alliance," he said. "It is something that I will look into and talk to the [South Korean] leadership about."

The idea has been under discussion as a way to tighten the Korea-U.S. alliance in preparation for the transfer of full operational control of South Korean troops to Seoul in December 2015 and the subsequent dismantlement of the Combined Forces Command.

The debate has been put on hold as the two countries are talking about a further delay of the handover.

Scaparrotti said a prerequisite for the handover is to secure adequate capabilities to deter North Korea. "The important part of the OPCON transition was the conditions that had to be met," he said, using the military acronym for the handover.

Meanwhile, in a lecture sponsored by the Association of the Republic of Korea Army at the Koreana Hotel, Scaparrotti said Seoul and Washington have kept improving capabilities to respond to missile threats from the North.

He claimed there is no need to worry even though the U.S. military faces budget cuts, and Korea remains "the second-highest priority" after Afghanistan.



Mr. Kinzinger is unapologetic about his priorities.

Central and northern Illinois deserve an explanation and deserve my full attention, and theyll get it, he said. But to the extent I can, I will also focus on the national message because I can turn every heart in central and northern Illinois and it wouldnt make a dent on the whole party. And thats what I think the huge battle is.

Mr. Kinzinger has drawn praise from Democrats, but he is not anyones idea of a progressive. His campaign website trumpets his longstanding opposition to the Affordable Care Act, and he is an opponent of abortion rights and increased taxes. He first won his seat in Congress with Sarah Palins endorsement.

Raised in a large central Illinois family  his father, who has 32 first cousins, ran food banks and shelters for the homeless in Peoria and Bloomington  Mr. Kinzinger was interested in politics from an early age. Before hed turned 10 he predicted he would one day be governor or president, Ms. Otto said, and he won election to the McLean County Board when he was a 20-year-old sophomore at Illinois State University.

He joined the Air Force after the Sept. 11 attacks and served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Upon his discharge he joined the Air National Guard, where he remains a lieutenant colonel. In the 2010 Republican wave Mr. Kinzinger, then 32, beat a Democratic incumbent by nearly 15 percentage points and, two years later, with support from Eric Cantor, then the House majority leader, ousted another incumbent, 10-term Republican Don Manzullo, in a primary following redistricting.

But Mr. Kinzinger soon became dispirited by a Republican Party he believed was centered around opposition to whatever President Barack Obama proposed without offering new ideas of its own.

His frustration level has been rising ever since he got to Congress and I think the Trump era has been difficult for him to make sense of and participate in, said former Representative Kevin Yoder of Kansas, who was one of Mr. Kinzingers closest friends in Congress before losing a 2018 re-election bid. When loyalty to Mr. Trump became a litmus test for Republican conservatism, Mr. Yoder said, that became a bridge too far for him.
Nepal: Miracles drive one of the world's fastest-growing churches

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In 1999, doctors diagnosed Nepali Christian Gita Shakya with a painful, paralyzing spinal growth. Doctors told Gita and her Christian son, Suroj, that her best option for healing was a risky, potentially lethal surgery, Suroj said in a written testimony shared with The Christian Post.

Surgery was also expensive, and Gitas husband, Babukaji, a Buddhist priest, refused to pay his Christian wifes expenses. Doctors in Singapore gave 19-year-old Suroj two days to decide whether to let his mother live in terrible pain or risk her death.

He prayed, then decided it was best to do the surgery. But he didnt know what he would tell his family if Gita died, he said.

At that time, I felt so alone in Singapore because it was my first visit, and I had nobody to share my problems with besides talking with the Lord in prayer, he added.

Suroj heard a knock at the door. It was a group of local church members who wanted to pray for Gita. After 20 minutes of prayer, a miracle happened, he said.

Gita stood up. She kicked out with her left foot, which hadnt moved for years. She punched out with her left arm. Suddenly, she could move. Gita started to weep and praise God, Suroj recalled.

There was no pain and sadness, which she had before. Her face was changed into joy and happiness, he said.

Afterward, Suroj said doctors didnt believe Gita was the same woman. Babukaji didnt believe his wife had been healed without surgery until he saw she had no scars. Then along with his son, Suman, he became a Christian.

Such stories happen often in Nepal, said Suroj, who's now a 41-year-old church elder.

Despite persecution and poverty, the Nepalese church has grown incredibly quickly. The South Asian country has one of the fastest-growing Christian populations in the world.

To secular Westerners, it might seem impossible. But the mountains of Nepal have witnessed incredibly fast church growth in part because of miraculous healings.

Suroj told CP that he became a Christian at 8 years old after God healed him from food poisoning.

Firstly, church growth is because of miracles, Suroj asserted. [If] people dont [get healed] from the hospital, they go to the church and ask for prayer from the church leaders. When the church family and church leaders pray for the sick people, they are getting healed.

To those who see the world from a materialistic viewpoint, reports of miracles might sound impossible or far-fetched.

The miraculous break natures laws and cant be replicated. But that alone doesnt disprove their existence, Wheaton College Intercultural Studies Professor Scott Moreau told CP. Not all of reality can be understood by using scientific methods.

Its not that science clashes with religion [when it comes to miracles], he said. They have completely different toolkits to get at the understructure of reality. One has testable formulae, but miracles dont work that way.

While miracles cant be explained by natural laws, Moreau said they can be observed or verified.

You can examine whether the reports of a miracle are consistent with each other, he said.

People around the world agree that miracles exist, Moreau added. The fastest-growing Christian denominations around the world emphasize the miraculous.

Church growth in Nepal

In 1951, Nepal reported no Christians in its government census. And by 1961, that number increased to just 458.

Today, the World Christian Database ranks the country as the 12th fastest-growing Christian population in the world with 1,285,200 believers, said database co-director Gina Zurlo.

The real number might be higher.

In some countries, fast growth rates of Christians are due to migration. In other countries, high birth rates may contribute more. But in Nepal, the main factor for growth is conversion from other religions, she explained. We estimate that Nepal is 4.25% Christian.

Most Nepalese people today practice Hinduism, the worlds third-largest religion.

The polytheistic Hindu religion values behavior and community belonging over belief.

Until 2008, Nepal was a Hindu kingdom. For Hindu radicals, being Nepali means being culturally Hindu, Pastor Tanka Subedi told CP.

Subedi leads Nepals Family of God Church and serves as director of the International Nepal Fellowship.

Although most Hindus live in peace with Christians, he said some fiercely oppose the Gospel.

The prime minister himself says he doesnt believe in God but is Hindu, said Subedi. State media and government officials [say] Christianity is coming to Nepal to destroy our culture. Its challenging to evangelize people who have that mindset.

The pressure and violence Christians experience from Hindus places the country at No. 34 on Open Doors USA's global persecution watch list.

Nepal is known for criminalizing actions that lead people to change their religion, International Christian Concern South Asia Regional Manager Will Stark told CP.

Hindus fear Christianity because it threatens the Hindu caste system, Stark said. They believe that people get reincarnated based on what they did in their past lives. Bad people are reborn to do degrading or unclean jobs. They are low caste or untouchable because it's believed that they spiritually pollute other Hindus. Hindus in higher caste positions often treat them with cruelty or contempt.

When Christians preach equality before God, Hinduism crumbles, Stark asserted.

The Gospel tells you that all people are equal and Jesus cares about you and being your personal Savior, he detailed. The caste system is based on dividing out or stratifying the community. Without the bottom of the pyramid, the rest of it doesnt really exist.

Nepals anti-conversion law says that any act that causes a religious conversion will be punished. This broad wording gives police the right to punish Christians for even mentioning the name of Jesus in public, Stark noted. Hindu radicals who attack Christians also justify their actions by saying they were enforcing the law.

Bishwa Raj Pokharel, spokesman for the Nepalese National Police, claimed, One can choose the religion they want to follow, in a statement to the Global Press Journal in response to a January article about Christians who accused police of targeting them for their faith.

But one cannot take advantage of a persons situation and induce them to change their religion. The law says that you can change your religion, but you cannot change someone elses religion.

Persecution increasing

Government persecution has increased recently, said Subedi.

In 2019, Nepalese authorities threw 73-year-old Christian Cho Yusang in jail for distributing Bibles. Two weeks in prison damaged his health so severely that he had to be admitted to a hospital.

After an orphanage closed this year, Nepalese Pastor Hari Tamang opened his home to shelter children for 10 days. In response to his generosity, police arrested him on false charges of trafficking and attempted religious conversion.

According to Open Doors USA, Christian persecution in Nepal rose during the watchdog organization's 2020 reporting period as pressure is high for Christians "in every sphere of life." The group reports that governing authorities in Nepal "make life difficult for followers of Christ."

China and India both support Nepals government in its persecution of Christians, but for different reasons, Subedi said.

India wants Nepal to remain Hindu, while China fears that Christians will support political movements to free Tibet, he explained.

Despite rising persecution, Christians continue to share their faith, Subedi said, because the government cant arrest them all.

We come from a persecuted background. We were never free. We are used to it, he said. Theres not necessarily a state apparatus to use [the anti-conversion] law for mass arrests.

People also feel eager to become Christians because of the reality of the Christian faith, Subedi added.

God works visible miracles in churches and traditional healers cant compete. Christians point to a historical Jesus in contrast to mythical Hindu gods.

If you go deeper [into Hinduism], you find nothing. Theyre just stories from different places with different gods, the pastor contended. When you hear about Jesus, it is solid. It is a fact. It happened in history and people can accept it. People are looking for a real God. All the Christians pray for healing and healings happen.

Suroj stressed that Christianity also changes the lives of believers.

When a man comes to the church and accepts Jesus, his life will be changed, he said. Before coming to the church, he used to take alcohol and smoke. But after coming to the church, he leaves all these things. The people who are not Christian want to come to the church and leave all the negative things in their life. People from other faiths feel excited and amazed that these things happened.

Subedi noted that so many people become Christians in Nepal that its difficult for current believers to teach them all. He estimated that the church grows between 5% and 10% per year.

The Hindu people are so scared of the Christians, said Suroj. They know that the Christian community is growing in very large ways. They are scared that if it happens for a few more years, in Nepal there will be no more Hindu people.

In an increasingly connected world, many religions have spread far from their original homelands.

Buddhism has gained popularity in America over the decades, and ideas from Hinduism influence popular American movies like "Star Wars" and "The Matrix." In Asia, Christianity has grown more rapidly than ever before. But theres a difference between the way Western people have sampled Eastern religions and the way Eastern people have believed in Christianity, according to Wheaton College Anthropology Professor Brian Howell.

They are two really different phenomena. In the West, people are picking up Eastern religious influences in a very piecemeal fashion. They are doing it as self-expression, he told CP. With people finding Christianity, they are finding a community and a tradition they can connect to globally.

Americans want some Eastern religious ideas; Nepalese people want to become Christians, Howell said.

Nepalese believers tend to gather in churches smaller than 100 people, although some churches are far larger, said Suroj. Believers in rural villages want practical teachings on how to live out their faith, while believers in cities want to know more about Christian theology.

Giving, repentance, all these practical things, we teach in the church. We also teach the theological part of the Bible because the church believers we have in Nepal are about 60% uneducated people, he said. They love to learn and hear practical things.

Church members in Nepal also help and care for each other, he said. They become family.

The Christian people face many problems from his or her [Hindu] family and community, Suroj added. The church helps these Christian brothers and sisters in whatever way the church can. We are staying as one family. We help each other, we care for each other, we teach and we support each other.

As it grows, the Nepalese church faces many difficulties, said Subedi. Poverty and persecution cause problems, but the biggest need is pastors who can help people fully understand their faith.

This is one of the biggest challenges, to disciple people, he said. A lot of pastors in the villages havent gone to school. My organization tries to teach them at home. There is a huge need for training pastors and leaders in the villages.

New Testament communities

In countries with heavy persecution, small churches grow faster, Moreau explained.

House churches split as they grow larger and believers commit to share their faith. Small churches also resemble the New Testament Church.

If its a house gathering, it tends to be more organic. If its in buildings, it tends to be more programmatic. The biblical evidence seems to point to the more organic method as the norm, he said. In the Muslim world, the organic churches have grown bigger faster simply because when a church becomes visible in the public arena it can get shut down very quickly.

As Nepals church has grown in size and reputation, a small number of people have tried to join for the wrong reasons, Suroj said. Christians in Nepal have a reputation for politeness, hard work and honesty, so people become Christians in an attempt to get a job or visa.

They think, If I become a Christian, I can easily get a job, he said. One family came to my church office and was asking for a Christian certificate even though they are not Christian, churchgoers or baptized. They offered money to the church and said if the church wants money, we need the baptism certificate.

In many ways, the church in Nepal resembles the church of the New Testament.

At once hated and admired, its a new community that people join even at the cost of their families. It heals the sick, helps the poor and transforms sinners. People want the life the church gives, sometimes even for the wrong reasons. Despite persecution, it multiplies.

Its like the time of Jesus for Nepal. Believing in Jesus means you are a second-class citizen. You may be disconnected from your family, Subedi said. Its a big sacrifice to follow Jesus. It was bigger in the past, but it has not changed a lot. Were still considered second-class citizens, outcasts from many things. It costs you a lot.
Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Deb has said that BJP has plans to not only expand across the country but in neighboring nations as well.

Recollecting a discussion he had with Home Minister Amit Shah while preparing for the Tripura assembly election in 2018, the CM said that Amit Shah, who was then BJP chief, during a meeting spoke about "overseas" expansion after winning in all the states in India.

"We were talking in the state guesthouse when Ajay Jamwal (northeast zonal secretary of BJP) said that BJP formed its government in several states. In reply, Amit Shah said that now Sri Lanka and Nepal are left. 'We have to expand the party in Sri Lanka, Nepal and win there to form a government'," Biplab Deb was quoted telling NDTV.

The chief minister further went ahead to praise Shah's leadership for making the BJP the 'world's largest party'. He said the BJP will change the trend of change of government between the Left and the Congress every five years in Kerala and emerge as the winner in the southern state as well.

Also read: Tripura CM Biplab Deb Apologises for Statement Comparing Bengalis with Jats and Punjabis

He also stated with confidence that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress will be ousted from Bengal by BJP in the upcoming polls.

Biplab Deb who has often been caught on the wrong foot had earlier stirred a controversy by saying Punjabis and Jats are physically strong but less brainy while Bengalis are known to be very intelligent.

Addressing a program at the Agartala Press Club on Sunday, Deb had said every community in India is known for its certain type and character. "For Bengal or Bengalis, it is said that one should not challenge them when it is regarding intelligence. Bengalis are known as very intelligent and it is their identity,"

"When we talk about the people of Punjab, we say he's a Punjabi, a Sardar. They may have less intelligence but are very strong. One can't win them over by strength but with love and affection. A large number of Jats live in Haryana. So what do people say about Jats? Jats are less intelligent but are very healthy. If one challenges a Jat, he will bring a gun from his house," Deb was heard saying in the clip that had taken the social media by storm.

His statements were widely criticized by all political parties alike with many leaders cautioning the CM to be more careful with his remarks made in public.
Married At First Sight star Billy Vincent is becoming a major star in the UK as his season of the show airs over there.

And the Byron Bay barista whipped his British fans into an absolute frenzy when he shared his application photo for the reality show to Instagram this week.

Several commented on his astounding likeness to iconic late Hollywood comedian, Robin Williams.

Two of a kind: MAFS Billy Vincent has whipped his fans into an absolute frenzy when he shared his application photo for the reality show to Instagram this week. Several commented on his astounding likeness to iconic late Hollywood comedian, Robin Williams

'Has anyone ever told you, you look like Robin Williams,' one fan wrote, adding a smiley emoji with love heart eyes.

Another added 'Billy literally looks like young Robin Williams' [or] just me?'

Twinning: 'Has anyone ever told you, you look like Robin Williams,' one fan wrote, adding a smiley emoji with love heart eyes. Another added 'Billy literally looks like young Robin Williams' [or] just me?'. Pictured: Robin Williams in sitcom Mork and Mindy in 1979

Yet another added: 'I've said this from the start too! A younger, sexier, less hairy Robin Williams.'

Billy was inundated by the Robin Williams comparisons, and another fan even joked with a haircut she could still see the similarities.

'See I told you Billy Vincent, just because you got a haircut this week, it doesn't mean you look like a young Leo, it's still a young Robin Williams.'

Looks like Robin! UK fans were whipped into a frenzy by the photo

Billy revealed earlier this month he was dating model and professional snowboarder Rani Siregar. The pair have been together for about 12 months.

His 'marriage' to cosmetic nurse Susie on season six of MAFS didn't work out.

Susie was accused of bullying her 'husband' because of his gentle personality.

New flame: Billy revealed earlier this month he was dating model and professional snowboarder Rani Siregar (pictured). The pair have been together for about 12 months

After the experiment, she started dating Todd Carney, a retired rugby league player.

In a recent Instagram video, Billy said of his relationship with Susie: 'I have well and truly moved on since the experiment.

'But moving on, it doesn't mean I forget how I was treated. I don't forget because I don't want it to happen again.'
New Delhi:

Over 27,000 cyber security incidents were reported in the first six months of this year to Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), Parliament was informed on . These incidents include phishing, website intrusions and defacements as well as ransomware attacks.



The rate of cybercrime increased in 2017, as one case of cybercrime was reported in every 10 minutes. This is higher than 2016 when a cybercrime was reported in every 12 minutes.



"As per the information reported to and tracked by Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), a total number of 44,679, 49,455, 50,362 and 27,482 cyber security incidents were observed during the year 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017 (till June), respectively," Minister of State for Electronics and IT PP Chaudhary sais in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha.



He also stated that the types of cyber security incidents included phishing, scanning/probing, website intrusion and defacements, virus/malicious code, ransomware, denial of service attacks etc.



The minister said CERT-In issues alerts and advisories regarding latest cyber threats/vulnerabilities and counter measures to protect IT systems and mobile devices.



"In addition, tailored alerts are being sent to key organisations in public and private sector regarding latest cyber threats and counter measures," he added.



The government has also formulated Crisis Management Plan for countering cyberattacks and cyber-terrorism for implementation by all ministries/departments of Central government, state government and their organisations and critical sectors, the report said.



Besides, cyber security mock drills are being conducted regularly to enable assessment of cyber security posture and preparedness of organisations in the government and critical sectors, including corporate sector, it said.



The minister said 15 such drills have so far been conducted by CERT-In, where 148 organisations from different states and sectors such as finance, defence, power, telecom, transport, energy, space, IT/ITeS etc participated.



Also, the government has empanelled 54 security audit organisations to support an audit implementation of information security best practices, he informed the House.
It was the course I never knew I needed.

This is how Henry Abbott Technical High School senior Noelia Nunez describes the yearlong course on African American, black, Latino and Puerto Rican studies shes taking from social studies teacher Adrian Solis.

Mr. Solis class brought us back to the surface from other history courses and textbooks, where it felt like we were written out of history, Nunez said.

Solis is one of a handful of high school teachers in the state offering a pilot version of the yearlong course, which will be offered more widely in the fall. Based on the interest hes seeing from students in his other courses, Solis expects to be able to fill two or three sections of the course next year.

These kids are thirsty for this, he said. Kids need to learn about themselves, not just the single narrative theyve learned since kindergarten. This course means theyll be able to have conversations and have empathy for one another.

All public high schools in Connecticut will be required to offer the class as an elective by fall 2022. Some conservative publications have painted Connecticuts Commissioner of Education and President Bidens nominee for Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona as the architect of the course and a pioneer and trailblazer in the movement to require students to take courses that will indoctrinate them with a view of history through the lens of identity politics, one which they say characterizes all white people as oppressors.

Where to begin?

First, Connecticut is hardly a trailblazer in this arena. Eight other states already require that ethnic studies courses be offered as electives or even required courses for graduation in K-12 curriculum.

Second, Cardona has had very little to do with advocating or implementing the law that established the course, which was adopted before he had been named as commissioner by Gov. Ned Lamont. It was passionate, engaged students like Nunez, thirsty for a historical narrative that does not erase them, along with dedicated educators like Solis, who lobbied state legislators and testified in Hartford on behalf of the legislation.

Gladys Labas, the Department of Educations director of equity and language, said the involvement of students in lobbying state lawmakers and testifying in Hartford in support of the new course was unprecedented.

Telling the full story of American history is essential for all students. In Nunezs words, the course would be an eye-opener for nonminorities.

The need to integrate historic narratives of oppressed communities into all American history courses, to go beyond the bold step the new state course represents, will become even more important as demographics continue to shift and nonwhite students make up an ever-greater percentage of the public school population.

To continue to teach a course titled American history that focuses solely on the narratives of white American is to perpetuate a narrative that has been revealed in recent months, perhaps more starkly than ever, to be a lie. In Solis estimation, current U.S. history texts and curriculum erase at least one-third of the countrys path from its origins to the present day.

For this reason, Labas said the committees charged with designing the curriculum have been working simultaneously to build out smaller units from the course that can be integrated into curriculum resources for teachers of the current required U.S. history courses.

We wanted to connect the stories of POC to the story of the history of the U.S., she said, filling in the gaps that conventional texts and lesson plans have tended to gloss over.

Her colleague, state social studies consultant Stephen Armstrong, would like to see content on African American, Native American and Latino studies to be integrated throughout the curriculum, and to begin earlier than high school.

The tragedy would be for teachers to think this can be separate, instead of realizing that this is a critical part of the American story, Armstrong said.

Last Thursday, during a committee hearing that took place prior to former President Trumps second impeachment trial, Cardonas nomination for U.S. secretary of education was forwarded to the full Senate by a vote of 17-5. Despite some objections to his nomination based on his advocacy for students of color and transgender athletes, Cardonas nomination is expected to easily pass the full Senate, where his push to reopen schools despite the COVID pandemic has been met with bipartisan approval.

Lamont has not yet named Cardonas replacement. Whoever he names, it will be up to them to oversee full implementation of the course as a required elective, and to determine where ethnic studies in Connecticuts public schools goes from here.

The elective is a start, Solis said. The end game has to be that this is part of the K-12 curriculum. This material has to be integrated within American history.

Labas agrees: This is not the end. This is the beginning.

Lisa Pierce Flores is a writer who lives in Newtown. Her column appears monthly in Hearst Connecticut daily newspapers.

Pittsfield Sells $28M Bond, Rates High For Bond Credit

PITTSFIELD, Mass.  The city of Pittsfield sold a large bond for financial health and scored the highest possible rating by a municipal bond credit rating agency.

Last week, the city sold a $28,420,000 bond. The transaction includes refinancing of $10 million of older bonds that will provide gross budget savings of $1,049,382 for the city over 10 years and support various municipal projects.



Projects in the borrowing include the Tyler Street Streetscape Design for $200,000, Clapp Park improvements for $355,000, Springside House exterior renovation for $400,000, and the Tyler Street and Woodlawn Avenue intersection design at $185,000.



In a press release, Finance Director and Treasurer Matthew Kerwood said taking advantage of these refinancing opportunities are key components in controlling the city's debt. Bond proceeds will refinance city bonds originally issued March 1, 2008, Oct. 1, 2010, and Jan. 15, 2011.



This type of refinancing is a common occurrence and supports the city's debt management strategy. The bids for the bonds and notes were accepted in Boston at the offices of the citys Financial Advisor.



Kerwood explained that the city also issued $7 million in bond anticipation notes along the way in separate transactions that are a part of the larger bond. These are short term, interest-bearing security issues in advance of a larger, future bond issue.


A woman has sparked a heated debate after sharing her outrage over what she claimed to be a 'sexist' skin check form.

Venting her frustration in an Australian Facebook group, the woman complained that the diagram where patients can mark existing lesions depicted a 'man' - despite no genitalia being shown.

The woman argued the 'male' only imagery promoted the idea that society revolves around men, but dozens hit back insisting it was gender neutral and branding her a 'Karen' for being offended by something so innocent.

'So I had an overwhelming puffer fish moment today when I went for my skin cancer check,' she wrote. 'WHY is the diagram on the form automatically male?'

Scroll down for video

A woman sparked a heated debate after sharing her outrage over this 'sexist' skin check form, which she claims shows a diagram of a man (right) - despite no genitalia being shown

The woman argued the 'male' only imagery promoted the idea that society revolves around men

After taking a few minutes to 'calm down', the woman told her doctor the form should be reviewed to avoid 'gender discrimination'.

'How are our daughters supposed to believe they have equal rights when male is always the default?' she asked.

The woman said 'wonderful' doctor, who has daughters himself, agreed with her 'wholeheartedly' - but few others did.

'It has no genitalia though?' one woman replied, while another added: 'How is it male? There's no penis on the diagram.'

Other women said it was ridiculous that anyone would complain about something so trivial, labelling it political correctness gone mad.

'I looked at this and saw no gender. What an overreaction,' said one.

'Here we go again. It's a neutral drawing,' added a second, while a third wrote: 'Not everything needs to be political.'

A fourth said she thought the sketch looked 'asexual', with many agreeing it showed no sex features, making it gender neutral.

'It's very much not male, or female,' one woman said.

'And if it was female, someone else would be offended about the depiction of the female body  too skinny, too fat, not tall enough, five toes, not inclusive.'

'I think it just shows the outline of a body, it's not male or female,' a second agreed.

'It's neither. No penis as far as I can see, unless he is a drag queen and is tucked,' added a third.
John Oliver didnt mince words when reacting to Michigan Senate Leader Mike Shirkeys recent comments that the Jan. 6 attack at the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C. was a hoax and prearranged.

In a segment on the latest episode of HBOs Last Week Tonight, Oliver played a clip of a video made public last week by members of the Hillsdale County Republican Party and asked Shirkey, What the f*** are you talking about?

To the extent Jan. 6 was prearranged by anyone, it was clearly by Trump, Oliver said on the show, later adding, I know that man looks like he answers the question, What if Steve Martin was awful? but the fact is hes the Majority Leader of the Michigan Senate. He has real power.

Related: U.S. Capitol insurrection was a hoax, Michigan Senate leader says in video

In a video taken at Spanglers Family Restaurant in Jonesville last week, Shirkey, R-Clarklake, said the storming of the U.S. Capitol building has been a hoax from day one, later adding that what occurred was all staged and implied Sen. Mitch McConnell and other leaders wanted to have a mess.

Elsewhere in the recording, which ran for over an hour, Shirkey remarked that he contemplated inviting Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to a fistfight on the Capitol lawn and said hed spanked her politically.

Weve spanked her hard on the budget, spanked her hard on appointments, he said.

Shirkey has faced heavy criticism for the comments in Michigan and on a national level, primarily from Democrats and progressives. The Michigan Progressive Womens Caucus on Thursday said he should step down as Senate Majority Leader.

House Speaker Jason Wentworth, R-Clare, issued a statement Wednesday afternoon calling Shirkeys remarks disappointing.

Majority Leader Shirkeys comments are his own and dont reflect my feelings or beliefs, he said. Its disappointing that this situation is detracting from the important work we are doing every day.

Related coverage:

Conservative Christian, prominent businessman, polarizing politician. Who is Mike Shirkey?

U.S. Capitol insurrection was a hoax, Michigan Senate leader says in video

Progressive women lawmakers call on Mike Shirkey to step down from Senate leadership role

Michigan Democratic Party calls on Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey to resign
A Fine Gael TD has written to the ambassador of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to ask if the Emirati government is aware of crime boss Daniel Kinahan.

Mr Kinahan is currently based in Dubai but a High Court affidavit in Ireland in 2019 from the Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) asserted that from there he managed and controlled the day-to-day operations of the Kinahan organised crime gang.

This evidence was accepted by the court though Mr Kinahan has said that is not the case and that he is a legitimate businessman, involved in boxing promotion who has no convictions.

Mr Richmond, however, has said that Mr Kinahan "should not be allowed live a charmed life in exile as the families of his gangs victims continue to mourn here in Ireland".

The Dublin Rathdown TD has not yet received a response to his letter to Sultan Mohamed Al Ali which says that Mr Kinahan had spent "years coordinating chaos, even death in Dublin" and asked the sultan if he was "happy to allow him to continue his efforts" in the UAE.

Mr Richmond has also submitted a private members motion to the Oireachtas that would see the Government legislate to ring-fence funds seized by state agencies like the CAB and channel them back into targeting the causes of crime at source.

Mr Richmond said that records amounts of cash are being seized and rather than go into the exchequer, should be used for grassroots crime prevention measures like sports and community clubs.

Cash seized by the gardai is on the rise, from 7.44m in 2019 to over 16m in 2020. In 2021 over 2m was seized in the first month alone.

It would be brilliant to see this crime cash used for addiction counsellors, social workers, youth diversion programmes, training courses, education schemes, awareness programmes, and more.

By ring-fencing seized cash we are not only reaffirming our commitment to supporting communities and families who have been devastated by crime, but also protecting generations to come from turning to crime in the first instance."

LBC Tank Terminals Holding Netherlands B.V. announces Q2 FY21 financial results conference call

LBC Tank Terminals announced today that a conference call will be held to discuss the company's financial results for Q2 FY21 which ended on 31 December 2020.

The results will be published today, Monday 15 February 2021, followed by a conference call for all investors on Tuesday, 23 February 2021 at 16:00 (Central European Time) / 10:00 (Eastern Standard Time).

Call details and copies of the financial statements will be made available on the Intralinks website.

Investors of LBC Tank Terminals Holding Netherlands B.V. Senior Notes, due 2023, can request access to Intralinks by contacting investors@lbctt.com.







LBC Tank Terminals

LBC Tank Terminals, with its headquarter in Belgium, is an independent operator of midstream and downstream bulk liquid storage facilities for chemicals, oils and refined petroleum products currently owning and operating seven terminals located in Houston, Freeport, Baton Rouge, Antwerp and Rotterdam with combined storage capacity of 2.6 million m, serving over 100 customers including all major players. Our goal is simple: we aim to provide our customers with the safest, most reliable and efficient tank storage and logistical solutions. More information is available at www.lbctt.com

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210215005284/en/


A Celltrion plant in Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province / Courtesy of Celltrion



By Nam Hyun-woo



Celltrion said Monday it has won an (EMA) approval for CT-P17, a biosimilar to AbbVie's Humira, which is the top-selling drug in the world.



Celltrion obtained marketing authorization from the European Commission for CT-P17 on Feb. 11. CT-P17 will be marketed in the region under the name Yuflyma.



The green light came two months after the European Medicines Agency's Committee for Medical Products for Human Use recommended the authorization of CT-P17. The authorization covers all of Humira's target diseases including rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease.



CT-P17 is the first high-concentration biosimilar of Humira and provides pain-reducing features as it comes with a citrate-free formulation, meaning it causes less pain upon injection.



"Celltrion has been focusing on high-concentration type in developing CT-P17, and the authorization has recognized the distinguished competitiveness of this drug," a Celltrion official said. "We will accelerate our distribution process to provide this high-quality biologic at a competitive price to patients and health workers in Europe."



The company said its affiliate, Celltrion Healthcare, will be in charge of pricing of the drug for each country and finish other processes as soon as possible in order to take advantage of being the first high-concentration Humira biosimilar in the region.



"We aim to provide a wide range of anti-tumor necrosis factor treatment alternatives, together with Remsima for patients suffering from chronic inflammatory diseases," the company said.



According to market tracker Evaluate, Humira was the top-selling drug in the world last year, achieving $19.83 billion in sales, but its growth has been slowing due to incoming biosimilars. Celltrion said it assumes more than 90 percent of Humira sold in Europe since 2015 is the high-concentration type.


Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) has announced the introduction of Quick Response (QR) codes and other payment-based systems with the aim of making entire ticketing process contactless. The initiative has been brought on as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

DMRC has invited Expression of Interest (EOI) from private companies for up-gradation of the network's existing Automatic Fare Collection (AFC) system. DMRC wants to enable QR code, RuPay and bank account-based ticketing system on the Delhi Metro network.

As of now, Delhi Metro's airport express line is the only section of the network where the QR code-based ticketing system is being used. The airport express line also allows the use of National Common Mobility Card (NCMC). The NCMC initiative was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in December 2020.

DMRC now plans to implement the QR code-based ticketing system on its nine corridors, which are spread across 314 kilometres, and 245 stations by 2022. DMRC stated that this initiative is being carried out following the NCMC standard model which was specified by the Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry, according to the Hindustan Times.

DMRC Corporate Communication Executive Director Auj Dayal told the daily, "DMRC has invited expression of interest for implementation of QR code, EMV (enabled Account Based Ticketing (Master/VISA), and RuPay based ticketing."

The EOI also includes maintenance and upgrading the APC technology currently being by DMRC. As per the current system, Metro users have to swipe the token or the travel card to gain access to the platform area. DMRC officials stated that entry AFC systems on Metro corridors constructed during Phase I, II and III have to be upgraded. "There is a need for comprehensive maintenance of the AFC system of our Phase I, II and III stations. The existing AFC technology and infrastructure (hardware and software) needs to be updated. The key dates for delivery and commissioning will be detailed out in the Request for Proposal document," Dayal added.

According to the EOI document, firms will be awarded work for a time period of almost 11 and a half years. This would include five years of maintenance and operation from the date of commencement.

Also Read: DMRC shares a glimpse of '2020 in 4 photos'; check it out
TORONTO - The mayor of a community that was hit hard by a COVID-19 variant outbreak is urging people to continue following public health measures when a stay-at-home order lifts for most of the province on Tuesday.

Barrie Mayor Jeff Lehman, centre, looks on at the unveiling of a statue at the town hall in Arras, France, Monday, April 10, 2017. Barrie, a community that was hit hard by a COVID-19 variant outbreak, is urging people to continue following public health measures when a stay-at-home order lifts for most of the province tomorrow. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld

TORONTO - The mayor of a community that was hit hard by a COVID-19 variant outbreak is urging people to continue following public health measures when a stay-at-home order lifts for most of the province on Tuesday.

Barrie, Ont., Mayor Jeff Lehman said Monday that his city has seen how quickly more contagious variants can spread and he's concerned the government's economic reopening is coming too soon.

"We're gonna have to be fast to respond if there are issues," Lehman said in an interview.

"Honestly, when I talked to people, they would rather be locked down for a week or two more now in winter than ... in April."

An outbreak involving the COVID-19 variant first identified in the U.K. has led to the deaths of 70 residents at the Roberta Place long-term care home in Barrie.

The city is among communities in 27 Ontario public health units that will see pandemic measures loosen on Tuesday as those regions move back to the province's tiered restrictions system. Where a region is placed in the system depends on local case counts.

Three hot spots in the Greater Toronto Area and North Bay, Ont., will remain under the stay-at-home order for another week.

The province's reopening plan has been criticized in light of recent projections showing a likely third wave of COVID-19 lies ahead if strict measures aren't in place.

Niagara Region will be the only one in the strictest grey-lockdown category, which will now allow businesses to open at 25 per cent capacity.

Barrie will reenter the system in the red category - the second-most strict level, along with several other communities.

Lehman said he worries people who have grown weary of strict measures will stop obeying all public health rules once restrictions ease.

"The message I'm trying to get out is, please do not change your behaviour," he said. "Reopening on Tuesday does not mean now it's OK to have a party. It is not."

The mayor of Sarnia, Ont., said he was worried residents are finding the province's messaging on public health measures contradictory.

Mayor Mike Bradley, whose city will be placed in the less-restrictive orange category, noted that the provincial government is letting some non-essential businesses reopen, while also telling people to stay home as much as possible.

"My read of the community is that there is an overwhelming desire for businesses to reopen and for people to have more social interaction and that will overrule the 'don't go out message,'" he said.

Bradley said he worried the province was easing up on the rules too early and that could lead to another lockdown. Cases in the region have been declining since the Jan. 14 stay-at-home order was imposed.

Premier Doug Ford cautioned people Friday that moving back to the colour-coded restrictions system doesn't mean all public health advice no longer applies.

"We're doing a little bit of a balance and letting small businesses open up very, very cautiously," he said.

The president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business said members of his group are approaching the reopening with mixed emotions.

Dan Kelly said many businesses in the province are still subject to some form of restrictions and that will continue to hurt their ability to stay afloat.

"For much of the province, this is basically replacing a provincewide lockdown with a regional lockdown," he said. "This is not going to move businesses on a pathway to profitability."

The president of the Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario said she thinks even a gradual reopening of the province at the same time that more contagious variants of COVID-19 are emerging presents great risk.

"If we had done it one step at a time, and reopened three weeks after schools, we could have seen the impact that had," Doris Grinspun said, referring to the resumption of in-person learning after a stretch of online classes.

She also worried that dealing with any potential resurgence in cases could distract the province from its vaccine rollout.

"I am very concerned that come March, when we will have 1.2 million doses of the vaccine, that we will not be ready to give them to people 24/7," she said.

The province has said it will use an "emergency brake" measure to move regions back into lockdown quickly if necessary.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 15, 2021.
Prime Minister on Monday expressed grief at the loss of lives in a in Maharashtra's Jalgaon district and approved an ex gratia of Rs 2 lakh each for the next of kin of the deceased.

The Prime Minister's Office also said Rs 50,000 would be given to those seriously injured in the accident.

Fifteen people were killed and five others injured after a truck carrying labourers overturned and fell into a roadside pit in Maharashtra's Jalgaon district in the early hours of Monday, police said.

"Heart-wrenching truck accident in Jalgaon, Maharashtra. Condolences to the bereaved families. May the injured recover at the earliest," Modi said in a tweet posted by his office.

In another tweet, the PMO said the prime minister has approved an ex gratia of Rs 2 lakh each from Prime Minister's Relief Fund for the next of kin of those who have lost their lives due to the tragic truck accident in Jalgaon.

"Rs 50,000 would be given to those seriously injured," the PMO said.

The accident took place near a temple in Kingaon village around 1 am when the papaya-laden truck was on its way to Yawal tehsil in Jalgaon from Dhule.

The PMO also announced that an ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakh each from Prime Minister's Relief Fund would be given to the next of kin of those who have lost their lives in the in Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh.

It said Rs 50,000 would be given to those seriously injured.

Tragedy struck a group of pilgrims on their way to Ajmer Dargah as 14 of them, including eight women and a child, were killed and four injured in a road mishap in Kurnool district in Andhra Pradesh early on Sunday.

(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.)
Royal experts today questioned whether the Queen and Prince Philip would ever get to meet Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's second child.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who now live in California, announced their pregnancy last night on Valentine's Day, saying they were 'overjoyed.'

The baby will automatically become a US citizen if born across the pond and will also be entitled to a British passport through Harry.

Harry, Meghan and Archie left Britain for Canada in November 2019, meaning their firstborn, who now speaks with a North American twang, has not seen any of his British relatives since he was six months old.

They are now living in an 11 million mansion in Montecito where they have signed multi-million pound deals with Netflix and Spotify.

The Duke is expected to return to the UK this summer to see his family for the first time since the couple quit Britain and the Royal family last March - dubbed 'Megxit'.

Meghan was unlikely to join him for 'personal and practical' reasons, sources previously revealed, so it remains unclear when the new baby will meet his grandfather Charles or his great-grandmother the Queen.

One Royal expert told MailOnline that the couple's new arrival may never meet the Queen or Prince Philip, while another said the baby won't travel to Britain before Christmas.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle released a photograph yesterday which showed them beaming with delight following the announcement they are expecting a second baby

Veteran Royal correspondent Phil Dampier told MailOnline: 'It does beg the question, when will the Queen - who is 95 in April - and Prince Philip - who is 100 in June - actually meet the new child.

'It may be that they never actually see the baby.

'But also Archie  they haven't seen him for many months and it's very sad. They've had Zoom calls but it's not the same as seeing them in person.

Does a child born in America get automatic US citizenship? Any child born in the US gets automatic US citizenship under the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. This states: 'All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.' The only exception applies to the 'jurisdiction' element, which means children born to diplomats and other recognized government officials from foreign countries don't get US citizenship if born on American soil. Anyone born in the US gets citizenship for their life unless they make an action to give it up such as filing an oath. Advertisement

'You know, the Queen is very family orientated and loves seeing her great-grandchildren. I think it will be very, very sad if they (the Queen and Prince Philip) never see the baby in person.

'Not only them but Prince Charles, I think he sees a lot more of Will and Kate's kids than he did before because they're at Anmer Hall.

'He sees a lot more of George, Charlotte and Louis than he did a year or two before. So he also will be very sad to see Archie and the new baby grow up more without seeing them.

'Obviously there are difficulties with Covid, but it underlines the difficulties of Megxit.'

The new Sussex baby will become eighth in line to the throne, after Prince Charles, Prince William, William's three children George, Charlotte and Louis, Prince Harry and his eldest child 21-month-old Archie Mountbatten-Windsor.

Harry retained his place in the line of succession despite his decision to quit royal life.

The couple announced last night on Valentine's Day that they were expecting - the same day Princess Diana revealed she was expecting Harry in 1984.

They are yet to reveal when they are expecting the baby, who will be a younger brother or sister to Archie who turns two in May.

Royal biographer Angela Levin said news of Meghan's pregnancy was tinged with sadness for the Royal family because they are unsure when they will get to meet the new baby, not having seen Archie for months.

She told ITV: 'The worrying thing, of course, is will this new baby ever see their father's family?

'I think there's a doubt over that. They'll be a little American, they can also be English too. But will the royals ever see them?'

Ms Levin added: 'I think the Queen made a very nice comment that everybody's delighted, and of course they are.

'But there is a sadness underneath that she hasn't seen Archie as a person for a very long time.

'So there's a sorrow even though they will be her eleventh great-grandchild, which will be quite amazing.

'But I do think it's quite sad as well as being happy.'

Prince Harry is due to return to Britain in the summer for the Duke of Edinburgh's 100th birthday in June or for the unveiling of Princess Diana's statue outside Kensington Palace on July 1 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of her death.

It is also possible that Harry may attend for the Trooping of the Colour - the official celebration of Her Majesty's birthday on June 12.

Royal author Robert Jobson told MailOnline: 'It's difficult to know when the rest of the Royal family will meet the new baby. Firstly, it is unclear when the baby is due in the late summer or autumn.

'Travel restrictions may also be in place. Given that it appears that Meghan is not planing to return to the UK this summer for the Duke of Edinburgh's 100th birthday or the unveiling of the Diana statue.

'I would think, apart from zoom calls, it will be some time before the baby will be introduced, possibly at Christmas time 2021 could be the earliest.'

As any child born in the States, the baby will be entitled to US citizenship under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.

He or she will also be automatically entitled to UK citizenship because father Harry is British.

To celebrate the news yesterday, the couple released a black and white photograph which showed them beaming with delight.

Meghan lay with her head in her husband's lap, her hand resting on her visible baby bump.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are seen with Archie in Cape Town on September 25, 2019

The Queen and Prince Philip leave St Paul's Cathedral in June 2016. Her Majesty turns 95 in April, her husband is 100 in June

Barefoot Harry cradled her head in his hand as the couple relaxed together under a tree on a sprawling sunlit lawn.

The picture was shot by photographer Misan Harriman, a friend of the duke and duchess. It was believed to have been taken in Montecito.

A spokesman for the couple said: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child.'

The announcement comes after Meghan, 39, suffered a heart-breaking miscarriage last year.

Mr Harriman said being asked to take the photograph felt especially poignant after the duchess's miscarriage.

He said: 'To be asked to help share this absolute joy after such an unimaginable loss and heartache is a marker of true friendship.

'Meg reminded me that had I not introduced her to a mutual friend then she wouldn't have met Harry. I'm grateful for whatever small part I played.'

The couple have been hunkering down at a sprawling nine-bedroom mansion in Montecito that they purchased for $14.65million last June (pictured)

It comes almost exactly 37 years after Princess Diana was confirmed to be pregnant with her second child  Prince Harry.

Buckingham Palace made that announcement on February 13, 1984.

Harry and Meghan chose to put out a statement themselves yesterday, in keeping with their decision to move away from their traditional roles within the Royal Family.

Buckingham Palace said that Her Majesty, the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales and 'the entire family' were 'delighted'.

Bookmakers immediately began offering odds for royal names last night, with Alfie and Alexandra emerging as early favourites.

The names Alfie and Alexandra are the favourites with one bookmaker to be picked by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex for their second child.

Ladbrokes has Alfie and Alexandra as frontrunners, both with odds of 4-1, and the betting on the baby's sex has seen both a boy and girl priced at 10-11.
The gang behind the killing of activists and journalists in the city of Basra, epicenter of 2019 anti-government protests, has been arrested, Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi has announced today Monday.

The death gang that terrorized our people in Basrafell into the hands of our security forces, al-Kadhimi said on Twitter.

The Prime Minister did not elaborate on the arrest but security forces, Anadolu news agency reports, said four members of the 16-strong gang had been rounded up.

The security sources also pointed out that the gang was allegedly involved in the killing of activists who were active in the anti-government protests that broke out in October 2019.

Over 500 Iraqi including security forces were killed in the protests against poor state services, corruption and employment.

A policeman aims a catapult towards an unknown target during a crackdown on anti-coup protesters holding a rally in front of the Myanmar Economic Bank in Mandalay (AP)

Security forces in Myanmar have intensified their crackdown against anti-coup protesters.

They are seeking to quell the large-scale demonstrations calling for the military junta that seized power earlier this month to reinstate the elected government.

More than 1,000 protesters were rallying in front of the Myanmar Economic Bank in Mandalay, the countrys second-largest city, when at least 10 trucks full of soldiers and police arrived.

They started firing catapults towards the protesters before they even got out of the trucks, according to a photographer who witnessed the events.

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The soldiers and police then attacked the protesters with sticks and catapults, and police could be seen aiming long guns into the air amid sounds that resembled gunfire.

Local media reported that rubber bullets were also fired into the crowd, and that a few people were injured.

Police were also seen pointing guns towards the protesters.

In the capital, Naypyitaw, protesters gathered outside a police station demanding the release of a group of high school students who were detained while joining in anti-coup activities.

One student who managed to escape told reporters that the pupils  thought to range in age from 13 to 16  were demonstrating peacefully when a line of riot police suddenly arrived and began arresting them.

It was not clear exactly how many students were rounded up, but estimates put the figure at between 20 and 40.

Earlier on Monday, Myanmars military leaders extended their detention of deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose remand was set to expire and whose freedom is a key demand of the crowds of people continuing to protest against the February 1 coup.

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Ms Suu Kyi will now be remanded until February 17, when she is likely to appear in court by video conference, according to Khin Maung Zaw, a lawyer asked by Ms Suu Kyis party to represent her.

The Nobel laureate remains under house arrest on a minor charge of possessing unregistered imported walkie-talkies.

Ms Suu Kyis extended detention is likely to further inflame tensions between the military and the protesters who have taken to the streets of cities across the South East Asian nation seeking the return of the government they elected.

Protesters continued to gather across Myanmar on Monday, following a night in which authorities cut the countrys internet access and increased the security presence in major cities seeking to curtail demonstrations.

Thousands of engineers marched on the streets of Mandalay chanting and holding signs that read: Free our leader, Who stands with justice? and Stop arresting people illegally at midnight.

In Yangon, the countrys most populous city, fewer protesters gathered on Monday due to the loss of the internet and reports of military vehicles on the streets.

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Nevertheless, more than 1,000 anti-coup demonstrators were outside the Central Bank of Myanmar building, where there were also military trucks full of soldiers, riot police, water cannon trucks and armoured personnel carriers.

Demonstrators carried placards that read #SupportCDM #SaveMyanmar.

CDM refers to the civil disobedience movement that has seen doctors, engineers and others in Myanmar refuse to work until the military releases elected political leaders and returns the country to civilian rule.

Some protesters posed for photographs in front of military vehicles while holding red signs that read Join in CDM.

When the military seized power, it detained Ms Suu Kyi and members of her government and prevented recently elected legislators from opening a new session of parliament.

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The junta, led by Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, said it stepped in because the government failed to properly investigate allegations of fraud in last years election, which Ms Suu Kyis National League for Democracy party won in a landslide.

The state election commission rejected that contention, saying there is no evidence to support it.

The military justified its move by citing a clause in the 2008 constitution, implemented during military rule, that says in cases of national emergency, the governments executive, legislative and judicial powers can be handed to the military commander-in-chief.

It is just one of many parts of the charter that ensured the military could maintain ultimate control over the country it ruled for 50 years following a 1962 coup.

The military is allowed to appoint its members to 25% of seats in parliament and it controls several key ministries involved in security and defence.

An order on Sunday that appeared to be from the Ministry of Transport and Communications told mobile phone service providers to shut down internet connections from 1am to 9am on Monday.

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It circulated widely on social media, as did a notice said to be from service provider Oredoo Myanmar containing the same details.

On Sunday, ambassadors from the United States and Canada and 12 European nations called on Myanmars security forces to refrain from violence against those protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government.

They condemned the arrests of political leaders and activists as well as the militarys interference with communications.

We support the people of Myanmar in their quest for democracy, freedom, peace, and prosperity, they said in a joint statement issued late on Sunday night.

The world is watching.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg called on the Taliban on February 15 to reduce violence in Afghanistan and said any withdrawal of allied troops would be based on the situation on the ground.

"Our common goal is clear: Afghanistan should never again serve as a haven for terrorists to attack our homelands," Stoltenberg told a news conference. "While no ally wants to stay in Afghanistan longer than necessary, we will not leave before the time is right."

Stoltenberg also said that the Taliban militants must do more to meet the terms of last year's peace agreement with the United States to allow for any possible foreign troop withdrawal by May.

"We see that there is still a need for the Taliban to do more when it comes to delivering on their commitments...to make sure that they break old ties with international terrorists," he said.

U.S. President Joe Bidens new administration said it is reviewing a U.S.-Taliban agreement signed in February last year to determine if the militant group is meeting its commitments, including reaching a cease-fire and engaging in meaningful negotiations with the Afghan government.

Under the agreement, all foreign forces are to leave Afghanistan by May 2021 in exchange for security guarantees from the militant group, including severing ties with Al-Qaeda terrorist group.

Despite the launch of peace talks between Afghan and Taliban negotiators in Qatar in September, violence in Afghanistan has soared.

Based on reporting by Reuters and A


Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State, on Sunday, explained himself over a comment he made about herdsmen carrying Ak-47 rifles for self defence, a statement issued by Mukhtar Gidado, his Senior Special Assistant (SSA) on media, said.

PREMUM TIMES reported how Mr Mohammed and his Benue counterpart, Samuel Ortom, disagreed over the issue of herders carrying guns in order to protect themselves and cattle from rustlers.

The Bauchi governor said that the primary objective of his comment was to avert the dangerous prospect of a nation-wide backlash and generalisation of the Fulani clan as criminals.

According to the statement, Mr Mohammed said it would be inappropriate to label an entire tribe as criminals, based on the crimes of a few members of the ethnic group.

The attention of the Bauchi State government has been drawn to reactions from various members of the public to gov. Mohammeds speech, at the closing ceremony of the Press Week of the Correspondents Chapel of the NUJ in Bauchi State, last Thursday.

The Governor used the occasion to weigh in on the contentious issue of clashes between herdsmen and farmers, particularly against the backdrop of the eviction and other forms of restriction orders, issued by some state governments and non-governmental entities.

The primary objective of the Governor was to avert the dangerous prospect of a nation-wide backlash as tempers flared and given that the phenomenon of inter-ethnic migration, is a national pastime involving all ethnic groups in Nigeria.

By extension, the Governor made it abundantly clear that it will be inappropriate to label any one tribe based on the crimes of a few members of the ethnic group, said the SSA.

Mr Gidado said that the governors reference to AK47 was simply to put in perspective, the predicament and desperation of those law-abiding Fulani herdsmen who, while carrying out their legitimate cow-rearing business, have become serial victims of cattle rustling, banditry, kidnapping and assassination.

He said these were the people who, in the absence of any protection from the security agencies, are forced to resort to self-help, to defend both their means of livelihood and their lives.

As a Constitutionalist which, he has proved over time, all through his political career, Gov Mohammed will be the last person to advocate a subversion of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. He did not do so in the past; he will not do so today, Mr Gidador said.

He explained further that Mr Mohammeds description of forests, as no mans land is a carry-over from his own geo-political environment where a pastoralist could set up camp, in any forest, for a few weeks without causing any uproar or opposition.

To interpret such a temporary stay as a form of land grab by the Fulani herdsmen is completely incorrect.

In actual fact, neither does such temporary habitation of the forest inconvenience anyone nor does the itinerant Fulani sojourner, bother anyone about his plight in the forest characterised by life without access to electricity, pipe borne water, good roads or hospitals.

On the contrary, Mohammed is very familiar with the Land Use Act, including the criteria for land acquisition and cannot, therefore, seek to undermine the statute which, as governor, he has sworn to uphold, he said.

Mr Gidado said the governors statement was intended to caution all stakeholders to guard against escalating the tension, just as many patriotic stakeholders, particularly from the North, have been working round the clock to avert reprisal actions that could throw the entire country into a cauldron of unimaginable proportions.

Rather than vilify Governor Mohammed, it is incumbent on all those criticising him to admonish those governors whose lack of restraint is responsible for the escalation of this crisis.

Mohammeds antecedents, as a bridge-builder, humanist and nationalist, are so well known that he will never, under any circumstances, deliberately fuel any national crisis or subvert the Constitution, he said. (NAN)

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Not subject to removal: Twitter restores Haryana minister Anil Vij's tweet on Disha Ravi

India

oi-Madhuri Adnal

Chandigarh, Feb 15: Haryana Home Minister Anil Vij on Monday posted a tweet on activist Disha Ravi's arrest that appeared to urge "exterminating" those who harbour the "seed of anti-nationalism", prompting an investigation by Twitter.

The remark in Hindi could also be read as exterminating that "seed of anti-nationalism".

Twitter notified the minister about a complaint it received under the German law over the tweet but said after investigation it found that no guidelines were broken.

Congress leader Shashi Tharoor reacted sharply to Vij's tweet. "Surely tweets like this are far more harmful to our democracy than anything in the ''toolkit'' Disha Ravi retweeted?" he said.

"Desh virodh ka beej jiske bhi deemag mein ho uska samool nash kar dena chahiye fir chahe veh # Disha Ravi ho yaan koi aur," it said.

DMK chief Stalin slams Centre for arrest of activist Disha Ravi

Roughly translated it reads, "Whoever harbours the seed of anti-nationalism in their mind, that has to be destroyed from the roots, be it #Disha_Ravi or anyone else." It could also be read advocating the destruction of that person.

The minister's remarks follow's Ravi's arrest by the Delhi Police for allegedly sharing with German climate activist Greta Thunberg the toolkit related to the farmers' protest against the Centre's new laws.

The Delhi Police had claimed that the 21-year-old activist was an editor of the "toolkit Google doc" and "key conspirator" in the document''s formulation and dissemination.

The minister posted a response from the Twitter, saying it had received a complaint over the tweet.

"We have investigated the reported content and have found that it is not subject to removal under the Twitter Rules or German law. Accordingly, we have not taken any action as a result of this specific report," it said.

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Story first published: Tuesday, February 16, 2021, 0:00 [IST]
Britney Spears has recently gone through another harrowing chapter in her ongoing conservatorship battle.

But the Grammy winner has an overwhelming amount of friends, family and fans in her corner, including a hunky supportive beau.

Her boyfriend Sam Asghari took his 'lioness' for a beautiful hike Sunday in Los Angeles, as he penned her a sweet Valentine's Day tribute on Instagram, following the explosive documentary about her conservatorship.

Lion and lioness: Britney Spears' boyfriend Sam Asghari took his 'lioness' for a beautiful hike Sunday in Los Angeles, as he penned her a sweet Valentine's Day tribute on Instagram

Sam, 26, posted a photo of himself and Britney, 39, standing in front of a beautiful backdrop of rolling hills, writing: 'After chocolate Im her favorite. happy chocolate Day lioness #myvalentine'

He also treated her to a pancake breakfast, posting a video to his Instagram Story of a stack of homemade pancakes, smothered in syrup.

The fitness influencer later showed off his guns during a let gym session, writing: 'Late one but had to burn those [pancakes emoji]. Round 2?'

He and Britney began dating in 2016, after he appeared in the music video for her single Slumber Party, from her ninth studio album Glory.

Sweet as chocolate: Sam, 26, posted a photo of himself and Britney, 39, standing in front of a beautiful backdrop of rolling hills, writing: 'After chocolate I'm her favorite. happy chocolate Day lioness #myvalentine' (pictured in July, 2019)

Valentine's treat: He also treated her to a pancake breakfast, posting a video to his Instagram Story of a stack of homemade pancakes, smothered in syrup

No cheat days: The fitness influencer later showed off his guns during a let gym session, writing: 'Late one but had to burn those [pancakes emoji]. Round 2?'

Sam recently broke his silence on Britney's conservatorship battle, telling People: 'I have always wanted nothing but the best for my better half, and will continue to support her following her dreams and creating the future she wants and deserves.

'I am thankful for all of the love and support she is receiving from her fans all over the world, and I am looking forward to a normal, amazing future together.'

He also spoke up against her father Jamie Spears, 68, who's since been reinstated as her co-conservator with wealth management firm Bessemer Trust Company.

The Family Business actor wrote: 'Now it's important for people to understand that I have zero respect for someone trying to control our relationship and constantly throwing obstacles in our way.

'In my opinion Jamie is a total d***. I won't be going into detail because I've always respected our privacy but at the same time I didn't come to this country to not be able to express my opinion and freedom.'

Supportive boyfriend: Sam recently broke his silence on Britney's conservatorship battle, telling People: 'I have always wanted nothing but the best for my better half, and will continue to support her following her dreams and creating the future she wants and deserves' (pictured in September, 2019)

Speaking up: He also spoke up against her father Jamie Spears, 68, who's since been reinstated as her co-conservator with wealth management firm Bessemer Trust Company (pictured in November, 2017)

Deadbeat dad: The Family Business actor wrote: 'In my opinion Jamie is a total d***. I won't be going into detail because I've always respected our privacy but at the same time I didn't come to this country to not be able to express my opinion and freedom'

Onscreen romance: Sam and Britney began dating in 2016, after he appeared in the music video for her single Slumber Party, from her ninth studio album Glory

Britney appeared to address her conservatorship case and a recent documentary earlier this week, posting a throwback video to Instagram of herself performing Toxic during her Las Vegas residency.

She wrote: 'Can't believe this performance of Toxic is from 3 years ago !!! I'll always love being on stage .... but I am taking the time to learn and be a normal person ..... I love simply enjoying the basics of every day life !!!!

'Each person has their story and their take on other people's stories !!!! We all have so many different bright beautiful lives !!! Remember, no matter what we think we know about a person's life it is nothing compared to the actual person living behind the lens !!!!'

The Crossroads actress was the subject of last week's sixth episode of The New York Times Presents, entitled Framing Britney Spears.

The episode took a deep dive into her career, revealing the many ways her narrative has been manipulated by the media and those in her life, leading to her mental health struggles and her ongoing conservatorship woes.

A bomb was planted into his car and detonated while he was driving to bring his daughter to school.

A car owned by "commander of the people's guard" of the so-called "Donetsk People's Republic" ("DPR") Sergey Popov aka "Dlinnyi" ("Long") or "Duremar" ("Fool") has been blown up in the Russia-occupied town of Horlivka in Donetsk region.

Read alsoThree Ukrainian soldiers killed in booby-trap blast in DonbasThe relevant footage has been shared on the terrorists' Telegram channel.

According to the latest information from local media, the doctors assess his condition as moderate. His preliminary diagnosis is multiple shrapnel wounds of the lower extremities, shrapnel fracture of the hip.

A bomb was reportedly planted into his car and detonated while he was driving to bring his daughter to school. The girl has survived.

Terrorist Popov: What is known about him

According to the Myrotvorets ("Peacemaker") database of persons who pose a threat to Ukraine's national security, Popov was a member of the "Crimean self-defense" illegal armed formation during the occupation of the peninsula. Later, he returned to Horlivka, was an ally of terrorists' ex-leader Igor Bezler, nom de guerre "Bes" ("Devil").

Before the war in Donbas, Popov owned a car repair shop in Horlivka.

Reporting by UNIAN
In one searing apocalyptic moment 66 million years ago, Earth was transformed from a lush haven into a nightmare world with a fiery wound that bled soot into the skies. The extraterrestrial object that slammed into our planet spelled doom for dinosaurs and countless other species, even as its fallout opened new niches to our mammal ancestors.

For decades, scientists have debated the identity of the impactor that struck our planet that fateful day, leaving a 90-mile scar called the Chicxulub crater under what is now the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico.

Although an asteroid remains the leading candidate, a team based at the Center for Astrophysics, in Cambridge, Mass., has proposed that the culprit may have been an icy comet that flew too close to the sun.

When long-period comets from the outer reaches of the solar system approach the sun, they can be torn asunder by the stars immense tidal forces. The resulting shards may have been catapulted across Earths orbit, providing a satisfactory explanation for the origin of the impactor that killed the dinosaurs, according to a study published on Monday in Scientific Reports.
Some 5,000 people were turned away from Tyrol's border with Germany - Lennart Preiss/Getty Images Europe

A diplomatic row has broken out after Germany closed its borders with the Czech Republic and the Austrian region of Tyrol in a bid to prevent the spread of coronavirus mutations.

France warned Germany not to take any similar measures at its border without consulting Paris first as Austria accused Angela Merkels government of a provocation.

The Austrian government summoned the German ambassador at the weekend to protest what it described as unnecessary measures that do more harm than good, and German carmakers have warned the closures could lead to delays in the supply of parts and force a slowdown at their factories.

There were reports of three-hour queues at the border between Germany and the Czech Republic on Monday after the closures went into effect , and almost 5,000 people had been turned away by early afternoon.

Only German citizens, foreign residents and essential workers are currently allowed to cross the border  and they must have a negative PCR test no more than 48 hours old. There are no exceptions for regular cross-border commuters.

Germany ordered the closures last week amid concern at the high incidence in the Czech Republic and Tyrol of newer coronavirus variants that are feared to be more infectious.

Drivers seeking to enter Germany from the Austrian province of Tyrol - Lennart Preiss/Getty Images Europe

While the worst delays have been at the German-Czech border, it is the restrictions with Austria that have caused the bigger row. Vienna, which has already imposed internal travel restrictions on Tyrol, argues the move is excessive.

The corona pandemic and its effects must be dealt with at an objective level. Pointing the finger at the state of Tyrol is more of a provocation than a suitable measure to contain the pandemic, Karl Nehammer, the Austrian interior minister said.

The region is at the crossroads of Europe, and even Slovakia, which has no border with Germany, has protested at the knock-on effect for its supply chains.

There is speculation Germany could order a similar move at its border with France after the region of Moselle recorded a high incidence of the South African variant.

Story continues

Clement Beaune, the French Europe minister, called on Monday for discussions with German regional leaders to avoid any nasty surprises, adding: There must be no decision that is not coordinated.

Controls in the heart of Europe are always the last resort, an absolute exception, Horst Seehofer, the German interior minister, said. We will get back to normal as soon as possible, but at the moment the controls are necessary to protect our health.

The fear of coronavirus mutations is understandable, but the truth is that the virus cannot be stopped by closed borders, Stella Kyriakides, the European Union's health commissioner said.

But her comments were dismissed by Stephan Mayer, Mr Seehofers deputy at the German interior ministry, who said: Germany doesnt need any instructions from Brussels.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  Teens aged 15 to 17 in Metro Manila will soon be allowed to go out for leisure travel, according to Benhur Abalos, chairman of the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA).

The official on Tuesday said Metro Manila mayors have agreed to ease age restrictions that prohibited those under 18 from leaving their homes for non-essential travel.

The local chief executives in the National Capital Region previously set their own age restrictions when the COVID-19 task force IATF allowed those aged 15-65 to step out.

"The age in Metro Manila under GCQ is 18 to 65... Lahat ng mayors ay nagsabi na ang edad sa Metro Manila, kung pwede from 18 ay maging 16-65. I think halos lahat ay nag-agree dito," Abalos said.

The MMDA chief said the change of heart comes after seeing the need to balance health with economy. He added the age limitations could possibly be brought down further if cases do not increase after the easing of restrictions.

"This is all about calibration" Abalos told a media briefing. "Titingnan mo: Binawasan natin ng 15. Nag-spike ba? Give it a few more weeks. Kung medyo maganda naman, hindi tumaas, babaan natin ulit."

[Translation: We will look if cases will spike if we lower it to 15. If it turns out good and it did not go up, then we can bring it down further.]

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Corporate logos of LG and SK



By Kim Yoo-chul



In the world of business, a negotiation is a process between interested parties aiming to find common ground and eventually reach a consensus to possibly settle a matter of "mutual concern," resolve a conflict and exchange value.



In addition, an effective negotiation is a way by which affected parties narrow their core differences. It is fair to say that when it comes to any disagreement, these affected parties naturally tend to seek the best possible outcome based on their "unique position."



This general principle is being put into practice right now in a blockbuster intellectual property dispute between two Korean business conglomerates.



The United States International Trade Commission (USITC) ruled in favor of LG Energy Solution (LGES) in an intellectual property dispute with SK Innovation (SKI). And SKI may now be ready with a fresh set of "negotiation strategies" since it has made clear its intention not to make any mistakes when negotiating with the LG subsidiary.



After the USITC's ruling, SKI voiced regret over the dispute. That response was not surprising given its continued and sizeable investments in battery plants in the U.S. state of Georgia, some of which are still under construction. "Before and after a 60-day presidential review of the commission's ruling, yes, SKI is open to begin actual talks over settlements," according to its statement.



LGES also wants to avoid a "worst-case scenario" for SKI despite the commission's ruling. The means SKI needs focus on "detailed goals" toward finding an amicable solution to the conflict. The U.S. agency also left room open for the importation of necessary parts for four more years for the domestic production for Ford's F-150 and for Volkswagen's American MEB line for two years.



Informed sources told The Korea Times Monday that LGES will be flexible in terms of narrowing differences over an estimated compensation SKI should pay to the LG Group affiliate. But LGES apparently wants to verify the authenticity of SKI's potential offers.



"LGES is known to have asked SKI to pay a few billion dollars, while SKI was reportedly hoping to pay a few million dollars as its battery business revenue last year was not enough to meet LG's request. First and foremost, SKI needs to identify the best alternative of each side for a negotiated agreement (BATNA) or just research LGES's key interests. LGES could be seeking an apology. And if that actually happens, LGES may be willing to let SKI save face as this would be just business," said a senior fund manager from a European bank in Seoul, which invested millions of dollars both in LGES and SKI.



As of January this year, LGES practically ranks at No. 2 in terms of global battery market share, closely chasing CATL of China, while SKI ranks sixth, according to market research firms.



The fund manager added that SKI is experiencing "growing pains" like Samsung Electronics did a couple of years ago. "While the cases are different, the dispute between Apple and Samsung helped Samsung hugely expand its smartphone market share." The fund manager added that SKI needs to think hard about how to make the best decision.



Also, while it's true that the LGES-SKI intellectual property dispute involves two private companies, a protracted conflict is detrimental to the best interests of South Korea and its economy, according to analysts.



Like semiconductors, batteries have huge growth potential and are considered as the next growth driver for manufacturers. Both LGES and SKI have an obligation to strictly abide by their supply agreements with global automakers. But given the basics of the dispute, SKI needs to be a bit more sincere in approaching the settlement talks, while LGES is advised not to pursue a "punishment-oriented" rapprochement which was achieved though the USITC ruling.



"From a third-party perspective, better opportunities come after a crisis. The USITC clarified again that it will protect the beauty of intellectual property and that means LGES's battery technology has been credited. That's it; however, given SKI's earlier contribution in various aspects, having frank discussions could help them enjoy potential benefits by avoiding the worst," said a patent expert, asking not to be identified.


STORY LINK Pound to Japanese Yen Rises as Japans Economy Shrinks by 4.8% in 2020

GBP/JPY Exchange Rate Heads Higher as Japanese Economy Struggles with Covid-19

The Pound to Japanese Yen rose by 0.6% today after the UK hit its target of 15-million vaccinations over the weekend. The pairing is currently fluctuating around 146.32.



The Japanese Yen suffered today following news that the Japanese economy had shrunk by -4.8% in 2020 because of Covid-19.



Takumi Tsunoda, senior economist at Shinkin Central Bank Research, told Reuters:



The conditions are such that Japan will not be able to avoid negative growth in the first quarter.



There is a high possibility that there will be a repeating cycle of coronavirus infections spreading and being contained this year, which means that consumption is not likely to recover at the expected pace.



As a result, JPY investors are becoming concerned about the worlds second-largest economy. This is despite the Japanese Government announcing further stimulus in December.



Japan's Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced a 73.6-trillion Japanese Yen package to help pull Japans economy out of its slump.



Pound Heads Higher as UK Hits 15-Million Covid-19 Vaccination Target

The Pound rose today after the UK Government hit its 15-milllion target for first-time Covid-19 vaccinations. As a result, demand for GBP has risen on renewed hopes in the nations economic recovery in the months ahead.



Now Downing Street is preparing the next phase of the coronavirus vaccine rollout. Ministers are now planning to vaccinate the remaining priority groups, estimated at around 17-million people.



However, Sterling investors are remaining cautious after Professor Neil Ferguson, a scientist advising the Governments coronavirus response, warned:



Our current virus, which is the dominant one in the country, only requires one or two more mutations to partially escape immunity  and that means immunity naturally gained or immunity gained by being vaccinated  and so it is imperative that we monitor the situation as closely as we can.



Health Minister Matt Hancock was however hopeful that the current lockdown will be the last, adding:



Having a sustainable exit  so lifting the measures in such a way that can be sustainable and we dont have to have another lockdown  that is obviously an important part of our considerations.



With the UK speeding ahead of many countries with its vaccination programme, however, GBP investors are more optimistic about the outlook for Britains economy going forward.



Outlook: Japanese Trade Data in Focus

Japanese Yen investors will be awaiting tomorrows publication of the Japanese trade date. Any improvement in Januarys exports, which are forecast to rise by 6.6%, would be JPY-positive.



Tomorrow will also see the release of the latest Japanese Machinery Orders for December. If these sink by the consensus of -6.2, however, then this could further drag down the Japanese Yen.



Pound traders will continue to monitor the UKs Covid-19 situation this week. If Covid-19 vaccinations continue to speed up, then Sterling would rise as the outlook or the nations economy improves.



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TAGS: Japanese Yen Forecasts Pound Yen Forecasts
SUV

ICE

EV

Hopefully, every month of 2021 will bring us news about another global carmaker taking up the electric revolution within the same mathematical progression boundaries  March for zero-emissions business by 2038, April for 2037, and so forth.But lets not get ahead of ourselves and check out JLRs strategy first. Its called Reimagine and comes at the behest of newly installed Chief Executive Officer, Thierry Bollore ( kicked out of office by Renault in 2019, quickly snatched by JLR in the summer of 2020). Naturally, it also includes some grandiose words, such as sustainability-rich reimagination of modern luxury or positive societal impact.Never minding the marketing talk , we need to extract the bare essentials. First and foremost, Jaguar will be reimagined as an all-electric luxury marque from 2025  so goodbye roaring supercharged V8s! Even more, the brand mentions explicitly the planned XJ replacement has been scrapped, even though the nameplate may be retained for the future.Unlike Jaguar models that will only use a pure electric architecture in the future,maker Land Rover is going to make use of the upcoming Modular Longitudinal Architecture (MLA) flexible platform that allows bothmodels and full EVs, as well as the Electric Modular Architecture (EMA).More precisely, during the next half-decade, Land Rover is scheduled to welcome six pure electric variants of its models in the family, with the firstalready announced to arrive in 2024. By the end of the decade, every Jaguar and Land Rover nameplate still in use will also be available with zero tailpipe emissions.The company is preparing for this electric future with annual investments of around 2.5 billion (almost $3.5 billion at the current exchange rates) towards electrification technology and connected services, while also gearing up for the adoption of fuel cells. As such, in the next year or so, were going to be seeing the first hydrogen-powered prototypes on UK roads.

Joint Commissioner of Delhi Police (Cyber) Prem Nath

Advocate Nikita Jacob and activist Shantanu were among "editors" of the toolkit which Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg had shared, the Delhi Police said on February 15.

Non-bailable warrants were issued against Jacob and Shantanu, two days after the Delhi Police arrested 21-year-old climate activist Disha Ravi from Bengaluru.

Joint Commissioner of Delhi Police (Cyber) Prem Nath, while addressing the press conference, defended the action taken against the trio. The preliminary probe has suggested their role in the "toolkit" conspiracy, he said.

"A team reached Mumbai and conducted searches at her (Nikita Jacob) residence on 11th February. She and her associates Shantanu and Disha had created the doc. The email account created by Shantanu is the owner of this doc and all others are its editors," news agency ANI quoted him as saying.

"Disha, Shantanu and Nikita created and edited the toolkit. Disha sent the toolkit to Greta Thunberg through the Telegram app. Disha deleted the WhatsApp group which she created to spread the toolkit," Nath said.

Shantanu and Nikita also attended a virtual meeting called over video-conferencing platform Zoom by pro-Khalistani group Poetic Justice Foundation (PJF) on January 11, days before the Republic Day violence, the police claimed.

"A woman named Puneet who is based in Canada connected these people to the pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation. On 11th January, Nikita and Shantanu attended a Zoom meeting organised by Poetic Justice Foundation in which modalities were chalked out," Nath said.

The toolkit, which is at the centre of the controversy, was shared by teenage Swedish activist Greta Thunberg on February 4 as she called for support for the protesting Indian farmers. The tweet entailing the document was shortly deleted by her and another edited toolkit was subsequently shared.

The aim of the toolkit, as stated in the Google document, was to "to enable anyone unfamiliar with the ongoing farmers protests in India to better understand the situation and make decisions on how to support the farmers".

However, the police claimed that content in the toolkit first shared by Greta suggested a ploy to stoke "economic, cultural, social and regional tensions in India".

The Delhi Police had, after taking cognisance of the toolkit, registered a case of sedition and criminal conspiracy against unknown persons. Disha was the first to be arrested, followed by the warrants issued against Jacob and Shantanu.

Jacob has approached the Bombay High Court with an anticipatory bail plea. The matter would be taken up for hearing by the court on February 16.

The police, under criticism following the arrest of Disha, said the "due procedure" was followed by while taking her into custody. She was arrested in the presence of her mother and the State House Officer (SHO), Nath claimed.

The student-activist was produced before the Patiala House court in Delhi on February 14, which sent her to five-day remand. Before the bench, Disha had reportedly broke down, claiming that she "edited only two lines" of the toolkit with the intent to support farmers' stir.
Press Release

February 15, 2021 Hontiveros responds to Lorenzana: Now is the time for firmness; China's tactics in disputed areas are the real danger to peace in the Indo-Pacific Senator Risa Hontiveros on Monday called on Department of Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana to stand up for the country's interests in the West Philippine Sea and renewed her call for a clear, consistent, and firm national policy for meeting the challenge of Chinese aggression in the disputed waters. This statement came after Lorenzana downplayed the risks posed by China's Coast Guard Law  which authorizes the use of force against foreign vessels within disputed areas claimed by Beijing  by encouraging FIlipino fishermen to continue fishing in their traditional fishing grounds. However, in another statement, he said that the Philippines will not be joining naval drills in the South China Sea with other countries in the region for fear of antagonizing China. Lorenzana said that "China is watching," and that "a lot of things could be done to us by the Chinese government if they are antagonized." "With all due respect, Sec. Lorenzana, now is the time for firmness. China's aggressiveness in the West Philippine Sea, and not our joining joint exercises with our allies and other friendly nations, is the real threat to peace and stability in the region. It is also a clear and present danger to vital national interests in the contested areas. Why are we so considerate about antagonizing China when China seems intent on antagonizing us every day?" Hontiveros said. "I have always respected Sec. Lorenzana as an officer and a gentleman, but his flip-flopping and indecisiveness will only lead China to think that we are a weak nation. We also cannot stand up to China alone. But how are we going to work together with our allies when we don't even want to be seen with them when China is looking? This is the sort of policy that is very unlikely to inspire confidence in the Philippines as a partner nation. Hindi tayo pagkakatiwalaan," she added. Hontiveros also said that we must emulate neighboring nations that have been firm and consistent with their policies by clearly rejecting Beijing's sweeping territorial claims in the South China Sea. Vietnam, for instance, has repeatedly condemned China's military drills in the Paracel Islands, and has joined naval exercises in the South China Sea. Indonesia has also made it known to the UN that while it is not party to disputes in the South China Sea, it maintains that China's claim "clearly lacks international legal basis." The senator then emphasized that Lorenzana's vacillating position was not the first time top officials gave out mixed signals in connection with the issue: Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque also downplayed the impact of the law by saying that our fisher folk were already protected by the provisions of the UNCLOS, an international agreement that China has already stated does not apply to conflicting claims within the South China Sea. "Consistency is a virtue. Tama na ang atras abante. Our top officials, especially those directly in charge of national defense, need to provide clear and consistent directives to not only guide our navy, air force, and coast guard, but also to reassure our people as well that their interests are being protected. We have bent over backwards for China long enough," she said. "Dapat makipagtulungan na tayo sa mga karatig bansa. We must show other countries in the region, particularly our allies, that we are willing to work with them, and that we will not withdraw in the face of aggression," Hontiveros concluded.
Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party national president and former cabinet minister Om Prakash Rajbhar launched an attack on the ministers and legislators of the Uttar Pradesh government for presenting the paperless budget of the Yogi Adityanath-led state government. Om Prakash Rajbhar further said that all the 'high school fail' ministers and legislators in the Uttar Pradesh government are "unsuccessful".

Om Prakash Rajbhar said, "These high school failed ministers, legislators will be able to run laptops and iPads? This is not a paperless budget but a loot business. All are planning and robbing."

READ | Yogi Adityanath Hails Centre For Introducing Paperless Union Budget, SP Raises Questions

UP govt opts for paperless budget

This statement comes after CM Yogi Adityanath-led Uttar Pradesh government decided that this time the budget of the state will be paperless. Earlier on February 6, the UP state government had asked members of the state's legislative assembly and council to purchase tablets for a paperless budget session. According to Deputy Chief Minister Dinesh Sharma, each legislator will be reimbursed Rs 50,000 to buy Apple iPads. There are 403 MLAs and 100 MLCs in the state.

READ | Yogi Adityanath To Flag Off BJPs Vijay Yatra In Poll-bound Kerala On Feb 21

"All MLAs and MLCs in the state will get iPads. Each iPad is expected to cost around Rs 50,000 and the cost will be reimbursed," Sharma, who also holds the portfolio of electronics, information technology had told PTI.

He had said the states ministers have attended a training programme in this regard. On February 2, Yogi Adityanath had directed that the state cabinet should hold a virtual meeting in future for which ministers must be given training. He had said, "Modern technology is extremely helpful in performing various works quickly and in a transparent manner. Ministers should be imparted training for e-cabinet meetings at their official residence and office. Information regarding the security features for the e-cabinet meeting should be given to them." He said the initiative will help the state cabinet go paperless.

READ | UP: Six Killed, 11 Injured In Highway Crash; CM Yogi Adityanath Expresses Condolences

Efforts should also be made to make the state budget paperless on the lines of the Union Budget," he said.

On February 1, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had read out the Union Budget speech in the Lok Sabha from a tablet instead of a conventional paper document.

READ | Noida Film City Yogi Adityanath's 'dream Project', To Come Up In Next 3 Years: Srivastava
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Dutchman from Phuket arrested for Shopping Mall app scam

PHUKET: Police are calling for all people who fell prey to the scam rolled out through the Shopping Mall app to file reports of how much money they lost to the scheme. Police believe that more than 1,000 people in Phuket and on Koh Samui were duped out of money through the scam.

crimetechnologypolice

By The Phuket News

Monday 15 February 2021, 06:30PM

The arrest of the Dutchman, who had been staying in Kathu, was announced in Bangkok today (Feb 15). Photo:CCBI

The arrest of the Dutchman, who had been staying in Kathu, was announced in Bangkok today (Feb 15). Photo:CCBI

The call for victims to file reports of how much money they lost came today as police announced the arrest of a Dutch national for operating the scam.

The Dutchman, named today by police only as Mr Wesley, was taken into custody at Suvarnabhumi International Airport in Bangkok last Thursday night (Feb 11), said Lt Gen Kanchai Khlaikhleung of the Cyber Crime Investigation Bureau (CCIB).

Mr Wesley was with his Finnish wife and daughter when he was arrested, Lt Gen Kanchai explained to a press conference held at the Royal Thai Police headquarters in Bangkok today (Feb 15).

The Shopping Mall scheme had 30 groups called All Star with about 500 members in each group. Each member had to invest at least B1,000. Some people had invested about B200,000, Lt Gen Kanchai said.

At this stage, about 1,000 people have identified themselves as victims. Many of them came with tears on their faces, as they had spent all of their savings on this investment, he added.

Most of the victims are living in Phuket and on Koh Samui. Some of them understood well how the scheme worked, some just wanted to try it, some had no idea that it was a ponzi scheme, he said.

Every day, there was some trading through the app, and everyone got some interest and thought that this was an investment, Lt Gen Kanchai explained.

Mr Wesley monitored the app every day at about 11am and invited people to join the scheme. Applications to join the scheme opened in October last year, he said.

All of the money invested in the scheme had been transferred into 44 accounts in four banks in a neighbouring country, he added.

Lt Gen Kanchai did not explain that the investigation into the Shopping Mall scam began after victims filed complaints with the police.

Instead, today he explained, This investigation into the Shopping Mall scam began after a Facebook Live post on the Hod Jang Jangwat Phuket Facebook page.

Then there was a cooperation between Phuket Provincial Police and Region 8 Police, Lt Gen Kanchai said.

The Phuket Provincial Court issued a warrant of arrest for Mr Wesly on Feb 11, he added.

The man, his wife and child were about to flee the country. If they could get out of the country, about B100 million would have gone with them, as they had already transferred it to the banks in a neighbouring country, Lt Gen Kanchai noted.

We cooperated with Immigration officers to keep an eye on them after they took a flight from Phuket to Bangkok, Lt Gen Kanchai explained.

They were waiting to get on a flight by KLM. The man knew well that he was being observed, so he let his wife and child check-in for the flight first, he added.

As the wife and child were on the Immigration watchlist, when they checked-in, officers immediately knew that they were fleeing the country, then immigration officers eventually moved in and arrested him, Lt Gen Kanchai said.

Another officer at the press conference today explained the Dutchman was living in Kathu, in Phuket, before attempting to flee the country.

Then he and his Finnish wife and daughter flew to Bangkok on Feb 9, the officer said.

They came to Suvarnabhumi airport on Feb 11 in order to take a KLM flight that was scheduled to fly to the Netherlands at 30 minutes pass midnight, he added.

We checked the flight info and then moved in to arrest him. Then we took him back to Phuket to be prosecuted by Phuket City Police, the officer explained.

The Dutchman arrested is just the tip of the iceberg, the officer noted.

The Dutchman was the main admin [for the Shopping Mall app], while there were about 40 other admins in total, he said.

Police were now tracking down the remaining administrators, he added.

Lt Gen Kanchai urged all victims of the scheme to file reports of how much money they lost to the scam via a Google Form. (Click here.)

All victims of this ponzi scheme do not come to Bangkok to inform us by yourselves. Please enter your information in the Google form, Lt Gen Kanchai said.

After we receive your information, CCIB officers will call you later to make an appointment for you to present yourself at your local police station in your area, he added.

Last but not least, I want to remind people to do two things: 1) Think; and 2) Check, Lt Gen Kanchai said.

Everything can be checked by a search on the internet. Dont believe everything too quickly, please check first, he urged.

Along with the poaching of Hangul, leopards, bears, musk deer and other mammals, poaching of birds is also worrying wildlife lovers and experts in Kashmir.

By Athar Parvaiz

On 17 January, a group of young men out on a winter trek in the Dachigam Wildlife Sanctuary near Srinagar were stunned to see the carcass of a Hangul with bullet wounds in the Pehlipora area of the forest.

We were shocked when we saw the dead Hangul. There were clear signs of a bullet injury on its body, said one of the trekkers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. There was no footprint of a wild animal such as a leopard on the snow around that spot. It appeared that the Hangul fled from where it was shot and succumbed after covering some distance.

It was a stag. Its antlers had been sawed off and taken away. Deer antlers are used in some preparations of Chinese traditional medicine and are therefore sought after by poachers and traffickers.

Altaf Hussain, Wildlife Warden of Central Kashmir, confirmed that the Hangul had died, but added, It is too early to conclude that the Hangul has been hunted down. It is unfair to jump to a conclusion when we are still ascertaining the causes of the Hanguls death.

The Jammu and Kashmir Wildlife Department has filed a formal complaint with the police and has sent a sample from the carcass to a forensic laboratory in Chandigarh. Once we get the result, we will be in a position to give more details on this, Hussain told The Third Pole.

The state animal of Jammu and Kashmir, the iconic Hangul (Cervus hanglu hanglu), also known as Kashmir red deer and Kashmir stag, is under Schedule I of the Indian Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 and the Jammu and Kashmir Wildlife Protection Act, 1978.

That is supposed to provide maximum legal protection to the deer that is part of the elk family. The International Union for Conservation of Natures (IUCN) Red Data Book  which lists species at risk of extinction  has declared the Hangul as one of three species in Jammu and Kashmir that are critically endangered. The other two are the Markhor  the worlds largest species of wild goat found in Kashmir and several regions of Central Asia  and the Tibetan antelope or Chiru, found mostly in the mountainous regions of Mongolia and the Himalayas.

Experts say that until the early 1900s, Hangul were widely distributed in the mountains of Kashmir and parts of Chamba district in adjacent Himachal Pradesh, north and east of Jhelum and Chenab rivers. The population was estimated at around 5,000.

But, according to the latest survey in 2019, there are only 237 Hangul left, all in and around the Dachigam Wildlife Sanctuary near Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir.

Many signs of wildlife trafficking

A fortnight after the finding of the Hangul carcass, on 31 January the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau (WCCB) of Indias federal Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) stated that it had seized a cache of wildlife contraband in Jammu and Kashmir.

Acting on the basis of intelligence a joint and well-coordinated operation was conducted by WCCB, Wildlife Division of Jammu and Kashmir Forest Department & Jammu and Kashmir Police which resulted in huge seizure of wildlife contrabands (sic) and arrest of two kingpins in Manwal and Anantnag, Jammu and Kashmir on 30 January, 2021, the statement said.

According to WCCB, 13 leopard skins, seven leopard nails, eight canines, two molars, two leopard skulls, leopard bones (four jaw bones and 140 bone pieces), 38 bear bile sacs, four musk deer pods and one set of musk deer teeth were seized in this operation from Manwal in Udhampur district and from Anantnag.

In cases of international smuggling  be it of wildlife, humans, drugs or arms  Interpol has a rule of thumb: for every consignment caught, ten get away.

Reacting to the WCCB announcement, Mridula Paul, senior policy analyst at the Bangalore-based Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE) said there was very little information about the whole scandal.

Are locals involved, or is this a job by outsiders? In case locals are involved, then what is the context in which this is occurring? Fighting just the final outcome without understanding the circumstances may not be helpful in preventing these crimes in the long term, Paul told The Third Pole.

While it is important to investigate cases of poaching, it is also important to ask government and NGOs about all forms of crimes against wildlife, Paul added. For instance, these crimes committed by individuals are nowhere on the scale of sanctioning a railway track through the Western Ghats, that was done by MoEFCC. It is perhaps easier to go after the small guy rather than create systemic change or question big corporations that mine and cause environmental destruction.

Unsafe landing

Along with the poaching of Hangul, leopards, bears, musk deer and other mammals, poaching of birds is also worrying wildlife lovers and experts in Kashmir. In November last year, two of the four white Bewicks Swans that had migrated to Kashmir for the first time were poached in northern Kashmir within days of their arrival.

We had reports about arrival of four Bewicks Swans in Kashmir  this excited us all, said an official of the Wildlife Department. But, unfortunately, two of them were hunted down within a week. While we are sure about the poaching, we might never know about the poachers. Bewicks Swans (Cygnus columbianus) migrate southwards from Siberia in winter.

At the start of 2017, Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology (SKUAST) started a research project to study the migration pattern of birds that visit the wetlands of Kashmir every winter. According to the principal investigator of the project, Khursheed Ahmad, it is a pioneering study aimed mainly at assessment of movement patterns of 12 migratory waterfowl species  especially ducks, geese and swans.

Ahmad and his team began the study by ringing 200 birds and followed it up in February 2018 with tagging five birds with satellite transmitters (also called Platform Transmitter Terminal, PTT). The birds, which were ringed and tagged included mallard, shoveler, grey legged geese and gadwall.

However, within months, Ahmad and his team stopped receiving signals from the birds fitted with PTT. He suspects the birds were poached. They survived for a few weeks only, Ahmad said.

 Featured image: The carcass of the Hangul found in Pehlipora area within the Dachigam Wildlife Sanctuary on 17 January
El Marakby Steel's chief business development officer Ramy Saleh told Fastmarkets on Monday February 15 that, in January, rebar use was at its lowest level for more than 10 years - even lower than the 312,000 tonnes consumed in May 2020 when Egypt was in lockdown because of the Covid-19 pandemic.He said at the countrys rebar consumption in December was 816,000 tonnes, making the month on month decline even steeper at 62.25%.Saleh said the fall in consumption in January was expected, after the strong demand in late November and for the whole of December 2020 - supported by international and local price increases.However, he added that such a sharp a decrease in January 2021 had made for a tough start to the year.Despite the increase in demand toward the end of 2020, total rebar sales in Egypt only reached 6.85 million tonnes for the whole of 2020, down by 7.68% from the 7.42 million tonnes sold in 2019.Egyptian demand for long steel products has been weak since the country imposed a ban on most construction activity in May 2020, despite the rules of the ban being relaxed in September. Market participants in Egypt now expect rebar prices to fall because of the weak demand, but prices have remained unchanged at E13,350-13,654 ($853-873) per tonne ex-works including 14% VAT since December 27
The Ministry of Health is reporting no new COVID cases in the community today.

There are five being reported in managed isolation.

"There are no new cases in the community outside of the three cases announced yesterday," says an MOH spokesperson.

"For formal reporting figures, the third community case is included in our numbers today.

"There are five cases of COVID-19 in managed isolation, one of which is historical."

Auckland February cases

The results of genomic sequencing for the first 2 Auckland February cases have confirmed the COVID-19 variant B1.1.7, first detected in the UK.

ESR is now conducting a scan of the international genome database to see if there is a match.

"This result reinforces the decision to take swift and robust action around the latest cases to detect and stamp out the possibility of any further transmission.

"An intensive source investigation around the latest cases continues, along with public health actions and alert level changes outlined yesterday, are designed to break any potential chains of transmission."

Serology testing for the three positive cases and a close household contact is also now underway.

The three cases remain in quarantine and one household contact, who has tested negative, is in isolation.

Close contacts

Contact tracing has identified 10 close contacts outside the household. Six of these close contacts have returned a negative test and 4 results are pending.

"Investigations will continue today into the three community cases, including further interviews. As a result the number of locations of interest, close and casual plus contacts may change," says the MOH.

"The priority is for close contacts and casual plus contacts to be tested so we can understand any risk in the community.

"There are a number of locations of interest for people who may be 'Casual Plus Contacts' or 'Casual Contacts' of COVID-19 cases in the community.

"While risk from these locations is most often low, contacts who attended one of the locations during the relevant timeframes are asked to follow the directions of health officials."

For the latest information on locations of interest, and to understand if you are a casual or close contact, please see here: https://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/diseases-and-conditions/covid-19-novel-coronavirus/covid-19-health-advice-public/contact-tracing-covid-19/covid-19-contact-tracing-locations-interest

Testing centres

More than 1000 tests were carried out in Auckland yesterday at community testing centres.

Today, community testing centres have extended their hours at Health New Lynn, The Whanau Ora Community Clinic in Wiri, Otara Community Testing Centre and Botany Testing Centre.

For further information on community testing station hours is available on the Auckland Regional Public Health Service website https://www.arphs.health.nz/

A testing site is also available at Papatoetoe High School, the school Case B attended. Please note this testing site is only for students, teachers and their families.

Sky Chef, where Case A worked, have testing onsite for staff and their families today.

Waikato

There are two pop-up testing centres in Waikato, along with one permanent community testing centre.

The two pop-up centres are at Claudelands Event Centre and Otorohanga Sport Club. Opening hours can be found on the DHBs website. https://www.waikatodhb.health.nz/your-health/covid-19-in-waikato/cbac/

Taranaki

A number of testing centres are open in Taranaki. These locations are: Taranaki Base Hospital; MediCross Urgent Care & GP Clinic; Hawera Hospital; Waitara Health Centre; Opunake Health Centre/Coastal Care.

Please check the DHBs website for instructions on how to arrange a test.

"Its important the right people can get access to testing  so please dont rush to a centre if you are well, or if you werent at one of the locations of interest," says the MOH.

"We are anticipating high demand at our COVID-19 testing sites and delays are possible, so our request is to please be patient.

"A reminder that if you were not at a location of interest at the stated times and you have no symptoms you do not need to be tested.

"If you were at the locations of interest at the times stated, you need to get a test, and remain isolated until you receive the result.

"If you have symptoms but have not been to a location of interest stay home and call Healthline for advice.

"As always, if you are unwell with symptoms, take advice about getting tested before you head out  firstly by calling Healthline."

Travel/exemptions

Auckland is now at Alert Level 3 until midnight Wednesday, February 17, and the rest of New Zealand is at Alert Level 2.

The Auckland region under Level 3 includes the southern motorway and the north boundary south of Mangawhai Heads.

Anyone wanting to travel between Alert Level 3 and Alert Level 2 regions needs to check whether they are eligible to travel. An exemption process is in place for:

 Businesses or work-related travel  please contact MBIE

 Personal travel that is urgent, or you need to return to your home - please contact Ministry of Health https://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/diseases-and-conditions/covid-19-novel-coronavirus/covid-19-health-advice-public/covid-19-travel-within-new-zealand



New border case details

Arrival date From Via Positive test day/reason Managed isolation/quarantine location 13 Feb United Arab Emirates Malaysia Around day 0 / routine testing Auckland 13 Feb India UAE and Malaysia Around day 0 / routine testing Auckland 13 Feb India UAE and Malaysia Around day 0 / routine testing Auckland 13 Feb India UAE and Malaysia Around day 0 / routine testing Auckland





A fifth case that arrived from the United States on 28 January has been deemed historical and remains in managed isolation.

Six previously reported cases have now recovered. The total number of active cases in New Zealand is 47. Our total number of confirmed cases is 1980.

The total number of tests processed by laboratories to date is 1,589,949.

On Sunday, 3132 tests were processed. The seven-day rolling average up to yesterday is 3864 tests processed.

Historical cases

Since January 1, there have now been 29 historical cases, out of a total of 171 cases.

NZ COVID Tracer

NZ COVID Tracer now has 2,591,784 registered users. More than 1.1 million people have now enabled bluetooth.

Poster scans have reached 179,756,337 and users have created 7,373,334 manual diary entries.

Its critical to keep track of where youve been and the COVID Tracer app is an easy way to do this. Please continue to scan QR codes wherever you go and turn on Bluetooth tracing in the app dashboard if you havent already done so.





Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 22:27:54|Editor: huaxia

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SANAA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Yemeni Houthi militia said that they had launched on Monday new cross-border attacks on two Saudi airports in southwestern the kingdom, using three bomb-laden drones.

"Our drone air force carried out attacks on Jeddah International Airport and Abha International Airport, forcing them to suspend air traffic for two hours," Yahya Sarea, spokesman of the Houthi militia, said in a statement aired by the militia-run al-Masirah television.

"The attacks were in response to the escalation by the Saudi-led coalition," he added.

The Saudi-led Arab coalition has made no comment yet on the militia's claim.

Last week, the Houthis attacked the Abha airport, causing a civilian plane on the tarmac to catch fire, no injuries were reported, said the Saudi-led coalition.

Yemen has been mired in a civil war since late 2014 when the Iran-backed Houthi militia seized control of several northern provinces and forced the internationally-recognized government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa.

The Saudi-led Arab coalition intervened in the Yemeni conflict in 2015 to support Hadi's government. Enditem
COLONIE  U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer, in his first visit to upstate New York as the Senate majority leader, lauded a restaurant relief fund policy he's folding into the broader COVID-19 stimulus package that in the works in Congress.

In a press briefing at the TORO Cantina on Wolf Road in Colonie on Monday afternoon, Schumer was joined by owner of the restaurant Jaime Ortiz, who said he'd planned the Mexican eatery for two years before doors opened last spring  just in time for them to almost immediately close again due to the pandemic. Because it was a new business, it was ineligible for Paycheck Protection Program funds, Ortiz said.

Under the proposed program, Schumer said $25 billion would be set aside for restaurants  restricted to small businesses  to help them out through the end of the year.

Schumer touted his new swagger in the Senate, saying that as majority leader he has the power to decide what amendments get votes on different bills. That allows him to ensure that measures like the restaurant fund, which he said has bipartisan support, end up in the final version of bills that land on the president's desk.

"I am going to use that clout to help New York and help the Capital Region," Schumer said.

The press conference was held in the midst of a political maelstrom over the policies of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in dealing with COVID-19 in New York's nursing homes.

Republicans had long alleged a coverup of the full number of deaths in the facilities, allegations that were given weight by a state attorney general's report last month. Then last week, Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa acknowledged in a closed-door meeting with Democratic state legislators that "we froze" and the administration had withheld information from their chambers  and from the public  out of fear it would be politicized or used against them in an unrelated U.S. Justice Department inquiry.

Typically, when Schumer or his junior colleague Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand hold press conferences to tout specific policies, they ask for questions on those policies first, then open the floor to broader questions. More than a dozen journalists attended Schumer's Monday afternoon event, and many had planned to ask the senator about the controversy involving Cuomo.

But Schumer abruptly ended the news conference and cut through the kitchen to exit through a back door to a waiting car, dodging questions about Cuomo and nursing homes.

The sub-study will evaluate drug SNG001s potential in people with mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms not yet requiring hospitalisation

( ) said dosing has commenced with its inhaled interferon beta product as part of a US government-funded phase II/III coronavirus clinical trial.

The sub-study will evaluate drug SNG001s potential in people with mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms not yet requiring hospitalisation.

The ACTIV-2 clinical assessment is being used to accelerate the development of the most promising treatment candidates.

It is sponsored by Americas National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health, and is adaptive in nature.

This means the phase II will seamlessly expand into a phase III trial if the results are positive.

Synairgen chief executive Richard Marsden said: With mutations of COVID-19 now emerging, and the concern that mutations may render the vaccines less effective, the need for broad spectrum treatment options remains very high.

Our product is a potentially effective treatment as it is a virus agnostic and, we believe, strain agnostic antiviral, which is easy to use in the hospital or home setting.

We look forward to tracking the progress of the ACTIV-2 trial alongside our other COVID-19 trials.

As well as looking for safety and efficacy signals, the sub-studies in ACTIV-2 will assess whether a drug can reduce the amount of SARS-CoV-2 virus detectable in the nasopharynx (the upper part of the throat, behind the nose).

Synairgen itself is running a separate 610-patient, international phase III trial, which it said is progressing well.

This is assessing the efficacy of inhaled interferon beta in hospitalised people with COVID-19.

The company also recently completed recruitment of a group of 120 at-risk patients to evaluate SNG001 as a treatment for home use. The results are expected in the second quarter.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 22:58:12|Editor: huaxia

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TIANJIN, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Wearing a mask and disposable gloves, Michal Krauze sped around the restaurant of the Four Seasons Hotel in China's Tianjin, ensuring every dining table was properly disinfected, knowing that a wave of guests was on its way.

It was a day before Lunar New Year's Eve, and the Polish national had good reason to be excited about his work: As China marked this year's Spring Festival with the COVID-19 epidemic largely contained, the hotel's dining business is bouncing back alongside many other restaurants in China.

"Even though we set strict limitations on the guest flow and kept a certain distance between the tables, our Chinese restaurant has been fully booked for the Spring Festival, and the buffet restaurant is 90 percent booked," said Krauze, director of food and beverage at the hotel.

It is a special Chinese New Year for Krauze, who decided to stay in Tianjin with more than 200 staff members of the hotel's six restaurants who followed the government's stay-put advice. Instead of returning to Guangzhou to see his wife and daughters during the holiday, he wrote a card reading "Wish you a prosperous and joyful 'Niu' Year!" and sent it home with a gift basket.

"Epidemic prevention and control need cooperation and team efforts. In this regard, China sets an example," Krauze said.

As China has basically tamed the COVID-19 outbreak, catering businesses are welcoming the return of foodies with stringent anti-COVID-19 measures.

"We've been back to full operations since April 2020. Business was even better in the second quarter," Krauze said, noting that the Chinese government's fee and tax cut policy had greatly helped the hotel. He said the hotel's food and beverage sales in December were up 20 percent from the same period in 2019.

Eyeing great opportunities in this year's booming Spring Festival market, the hotel's Jin House Chinese restaurant recruited new chefs and designed new dishes revolving around the ox, the zodiac sign for this Lunar New Year.

Krauze said the dining sector's return to thriving business was not easy. "The pandemic is still severe around the world. People in China can enjoy meals in restaurants. Thus, we have to cherish what we have now."

His hotel has also adopted a series of measures to ensure the safety of diners, including limiting the number of guests, regularly sterilizing tableware, disinfecting all imported ingredients, and ensuring all chefs who handle food have been vaccinated.

Having lived in China for more than 10 years, Krauze has witnessed tremendous changes in the country's catering sector. "The consumption level has been rising thanks to the growing middle class in China. I see increasing demand for wines and cocktails."

According to official statistics, China was likely the only major economy to post growth in 2020, with its GDP expanding 2.3 percent year on year and exceeding the 100-trillion-yuan (about 15.5 trillion U.S. dollars) threshold for the first time.

"I'm very confident in China's economic growth. Everything has changed in a positive way. I see a lot of investments in Tianjin. We are very confident about our business this year," Krauze said. Enditem

New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Ministry of AYUSH and the World Health Organization's South East Asian Regional Office (WHO-SEARO) signed a Letter of Exchange on Monday for the deputation of an AYUSH expert to WHO's regional traditional medicine programme in New Delhi.

Vaidya Rajesh Kotecha, Secretary, Ministry of AYUSH and Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director of WHO South-East Asia Region, signed the agreement.

The initiative has been taken to support the WHO-SEARO implementing the regional traditional medicine action plan, with particular emphasis on the safe and effective use of traditional medicine service including Ayurveda and other Indian traditional systems of medicine and its appropriate integration into national health care systems.

Efforts will also be made to strengthen capacities of SEAR countries in the area of traditional medicine, said ministry officials in a statement.

This partnership will be part of joint efforts of Ministry of AYUSH and WHO in helping countries in the South-East Asia Region to develop policies and to implement action plans to strengthen the role of traditional medicine.

At the ceremony to mark the start of this partnership, WHO South East Asia Regional Director, Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh said, "The close collaboration of WHO and the Government of India goes back many decades, to the Basic Agreement both parties concluded on July 16, 1952, to fulfil mutual responsibilities in a spirit of friendly cooperation. Today's agreement will formally extend this cooperation into the area of traditional medicine, which is a valuable tool in our shared quest to achieve universal health coverage." Secretary Kotecha said that AYUSH has already had various interactions with WHO in the field of Ayurveda, Yoga and other Indian traditional systems of medicine and these Indian systems are getting more popular and being accepted as medicinal systems in South-East Asian countries, Africa, Europe, Latin America and others.

As a major outcome of this partnership, Ministry of AYUSH and WHO would be working to identify various challenges faced by the member states of SEAR (region) in regulating, integrating and further promoting traditional systems of medicine in the respective countries.

Ministry of AYUSH and WHO will assist member states to develop appropriate policy, regulation framework, exchange of information, activities performed for integration of traditional medicine in public health and dissemination of information to the community, said the AYUSH secretary.

The Ministry of AYUSH and the WHO SEAR office also agreed to launch a public health research project on COVID-19. The project is jointly supported by WHO-SEARO and the Ministry of AYUSH.
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VALLETTA: Maltas nurses union has warned that its hospitals, hard-pressed by the COVID-19 pandemic, face a staffing crisis as Britain has enticed away a growing number of the island nations foreign nurses with offers of better pay and conditions.

Some 600 third-country national nurses work in Malta, but roughly 150 have moved abroad or else handed in their resignation since December, union sources said.

It is a crisis," the MUMN union said in a statement.

Other southern European countries have complained about nurse shortages during the coronavirus pandemic with wealthier northern nations able to offer better packages.

Foreign staffers, including include Indians, Pakistanis and Filipinos, make up around 15% of the total nursing staff in Malta, and the fact they speak English makes them especially attractive to Britain and Ireland.

Recruitment agencies in Britain and India have run Facebook adverts urging nurses in Malta to apply for jobs in Britain.

Sources in the nursing sector said nurses are being offered a basic starting salary of 32,000 pounds or 36,000 euros($44,500) compared to the current Malta salary of 18,722 euros for trainee nurses and 21,000 euros for qualified nurses.

But the nursing union said that better conditions rather than higher pay was proving especially attractive - particularly the offer of quicker routes to citizenship for them and their families.

Moreover, Britain is offering foreign nurses free accommodation for the first 12 months, MUMN said.

The present nursing workforce is already working under a heavy workload with none of the wardshaving the agreed nursing complement," nurses union leader Paul Pace said in a statement. Losing 15% of the nursing workforce will literally bring the health service to a standstill."

The union said it would meet the government and the state agency responsible for handing out residence permits with a view to trying to keep foreign nurses in Malta.

($1 = 0.7193 pounds)

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National Australia Bank chief executive Ross McEwan says ongoing measures to contain COVID-19 and the removal of government support programs will continue to challenge the bank despite falling deferral balances.

NAB is outperforming the major banks in reducing its deferred loan book, reporting outstanding paused loans had fallen to around $2 billion for businesses and $1 billion for mortgage holders, compared to peaks of $19 billion and $38 billion respectively.

Deferred loans constitute just 1 per cent of NABs total loan book, compared to 3 per cent at ANZ and Westpac, and 2 per cent at CBA, according to January figures from the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority.

NAB CEO Ross McEwan says the banks quarterly performance is sound. Credit:Jesse Marlow

The deferral figures came as NAB published its quarterly update on Tuesday, reporting flat profits of $1.7 billion and cash earnings of $1.65 billion, identical figures to the corresponding period last year.
As the series of snowslides claimed 17 lives across seven U.S. states this year, another two individuals died on Valentine's Day avalanches in two different locations in the state of Colorado.

According to CNN, the Colorado Avalanche Information Center or the CAIC shared that the latest victims of the series of deadly avalanches mark the fifth and sixth avalanche deaths in the state in less than two months.

Based on the CAIC website, a snowboarder was caught in an avalanche on Sunday morning close to Loveland Pass' ski area.

At around 9:30 a.m. local time (11 a.m. E.T.), a snowboarder traveling in a backcountry area about 50 miles west of Denver was struck by an avalanche.

On the preliminary report released by the CAIC, the avalanche ran on an east-facing slope east of Mount Trelease at an elevation of more than 12,000 feet.

The Clear Creek Sheriff's office also has mentioned that the victim of the first incident was a 57-year-old man from the nearby area St. Mary's, Colorado, CBS Denver reported.

On the other hand, the CAIC also reported that at around 50 miles north, a snowmobiler was caught and killed in a second avalanche, which was recorded west of Rollins Pass on Mount Epworth on Sunday.

Moreover, the avalanche happened on an east-facing, above tree line slope, which buried the snowmobiler underneath his sled on Pumphouse Lake.

According to the count of the CAIC, Colorado has seen six avalanches fatalities in less than two months and a total of ten this season, which is more than any other state if compared.

In addition, in December 2020, three backcountry skiers were also killed in two different avalanches a day apart.

The three men were all local officials from Eagle County, Colorado, and were killed in an avalanche near Ophir on the first of the month.

A few days later, based on the CAIC, two skiers were also caught in an avalanche close to Vail, with one digging out while the other was dying.

Aside from the state of Colorado, fatal avalanches have also been reported in six different states in the U.S., including the state of Washington, where a Washington State Trooper was killed while snowmobiling in Kittitas County last week. Earlier this month, four backcountry skiers were also caught and killed in an avalanche in the state of Utah, AZCentral reported.

A forecaster at the Utah Avalanche Center, Nikki Champion, mentioned earlier this month that the deadly season could result from two possible reasons: people are enjoying more time outdoors, especially during the global health crisis, and second, due to the dangerous snowpack.

The Forecaster at the Utah Avalanche Center also added that this year's avalanche season has likely been more active because of the persistent weak layer of snow.

RELATED ARTICLE: Remains of Three Skiers Killed in a Colorado Avalanche Found Buried Under 20 Feet of Debris

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CALS condemns remarks by Minister Motshekga that "an educated man won't rape"

Though education is an important tool in addressing gender-based violence, asserting "educated" people don't rape is misleading and harmful

Today, a video clip of Basic Education Minister, Angie Motshekga, has surfaced where she asserts that an educated man wont rape. The remark was reportedly made during an address to learners of a secondary school in the context of making an important statement about using education as a tool to address social ills. While education has a critical role to play in addressing gender-based violence, the statement that educated men dont rape is not only factually incorrect, but extremely harmful to victims and survivors of gender-based violence.

There is no evidence to suggest that the propensity to commit rape or other forms of gender-based violence is linked to formal education in any way. Suggesting that only uneducated people commit these kinds of offences is misleading and harmful. Many well-documented cases exist of so-called well-educated people abusing their positions as academics, doctors, lawyers, activists and teachers to abuse the people under their command or care. Many more likely exist that have not been reported by the victims and survivors of these crimes. The idea that educated people do not commit these crimes denies the experiences and trauma of these victims and survivors. The idea that only uneducated people commit these crimes is insulting and discriminatory.

The idea of perpetrators as everyday men has also been discussed by our courts, including the Constitutional Court. In a 2019 case before the Constitutional Court in which CALS appeared as a friend of the court, Tshabalala v S, Justice Khampepe notes in her concurring judgment:

The notion that rape is committed by sexually deviant monsters with no self control is misplaced. Law databases are replete with cases that contradict this notion. Often, those who rape are fathers, brothers, uncles, husbands, lovers, mentors, bosses and colleagues. We commune with them. We share stories and coffee with them. We jog with them. We work with them. They are ordinary people, who lead normal lives. Terming rapists as monsters and degenerates tends to normalise the incidents of rape committed by men we know because they are not monsters  they are rational and well-respected men in the community. Yes, the abominable behaviour of these men is abhorrent and grotesque and the recognition that they are human does not seek to evoke sympathy  it serves to signify a switch from characterising rapists as out-of-control monsters, and centres the notion that rapists are humans who choose to abuse their power. The idea that rape is committed by monsters and animals may have adverse effects in that it may lead to the reinforcement of rape myths and stereotypes.

With this in mind, it is important to acknowledge that those who commit rape are part of our communities. Perpetrators are a product of our society and education is an important tool to try to effect change. But we are not even close to the stage where we could say that those who go through our formal schooling system, who are educated, do not commit rape. Promoting this idea is harmful to victims and survivors who are unlikely to come forward for fear they will not be believed or met with hostility.

In light of this, we call on the Minister to issue an apology for the misleading statement and clarify her position around the myths and stereotypes related to rape and other forms of gender-based violence. We furthermore reach out to the Minister to engage with organisations like CALS and others working in the area of gender-based violence to learn more about our experiences with victims and survivors, especially regarding sexual violence in schools.

For inquiries, please contact:
A fascinating 1999 interview, taken when Elon Musk had newly become a multi-millionaire, provides a fascinating insight into what led to the creation of SpaceX, Tesla Motors, The Boring Company.

YouTube





The video which has recently gone viral has people pointing to the fact that Musk looks younger in his 40s than in his 30s.



It could have been the fashion choice and the hairstyle but there's little that we can deny.

A YouTube comment read, "Elon Musks hairline made the biggest comeback in the history of everything." In 1999 Musk with his noticeably less hair, very frankly reveals that his success didn't come overnight. It was just 3 years ago that he was sleeping on the floor and showering at the YMCA.





"I can buy one of the islands in the Bahamas and turn it into my personal fiefdom. I'm much more interested in trying to build and create a new company," says Musk.

In the video Musk and his then-fiance celebrate the arrival of the McClaren, "the perfect car for Silicon Valley," he is then seen explaining his vision of transforming the banking industry.

Also Read: Elon Musk Shared A New Close-Up Photo Of His Baby 'X  A-12' And People Can't Stop Gushing

Reuters

As Musk receives his million-dollar supercar, he says: "back in '95, there weren't very many people on the internet, and certainly nobody was making any money at all.

"Most people thought the internet was going to be a fad. This is definitely very cool." Tesla billionaire Elon Musk is now the richest person in the world, he is now worth $182.9 billion, which again makes him the wealthiest person on the planet.

Also Read: Elon Musk Announced Hes Leaving Twitter For A While, And No One Knows Why

Musks net worth has grown at an astonishing rate over the last year, raising more than $150 billion since March 2020, when he was worth $24.6 billion.

Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 21:46:52|Editor: huaxia

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YINCHUAN, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Interior designer Jiang Lele, 33, has recently abandoned her favorite oily, salty and spicy dishes to turn to light meals mainly comprised of vegetables.

"I feel like I'm a rabbit, eating grass. The food is really bland," Jiang said. "But it's nutritious and healthy."

After eating healthy meals with ingredients like lettuce, steamed pumpkin, fish and dragon fruit for more than 20 days, Jiang's weight and body fat have both fallen.

"For office workers who spend a long time sitting and have no time for sports, light meals are a good choice to stay healthy and fit," said Jiang.

Jiang lives in Yinchuan, capital of northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. People in the northwestern region are known for having heavy tastes, favoring oily and salty foods. But recently, light meals have become popular there.

Ma Rui, who runs a restaurant in Yinchuan, goes to the local market to buy the freshest produce every morning to prepare over 20 set light meals that she sells in her restaurant.

The restaurant also offers online takeaway services. On the busiest days, it handles over 170 orders, and receives over 3,000 orders each month.

"The ingredients often run short before the restaurant closes," Ma said.

A report released by major Chinese food delivery platform Meituan Waimai shows that in the first nine months of 2019, light food orders on the platform increased by 98 percent year on year.

The new trend stands in contrast to the established eating habits of Chinese people -- large quantities of meat and carbohydrates are generally favored at tables.

In 1961, China's daily per capita caloric intake was less than 1,500 kilocalories. An adult male needs about 2,000 kilocalories a day as suggested by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

Yinchuan resident Liu Dong, 43, remembers that during his childhood, even eating a cookie was a luxury. Vegetables and meat were scarce, and the family ate pickles and steamed buns almost every day in the winter.

"My father's generation experienced famine, and often talked about the severe food shortage in their childhoods. They dug up grass and picked bark for food. Who would be fat in those days?" Liu said.

However, with the quality of life improving over the decades, many Chinese are now able to satisfy their previously unmet cravings for meat and carbohydrates, and obesity has become an increasingly challenging issue.

According to an official report on Chinese residents' nutrition and chronic diseases published in December last year, the overweight and obesity rates of Chinese residents aged 18 and above are 34.3 percent and 16.4 percent, respectively.

"Nowadays, there's a fancy meal at every get-together," Liu said. "And people's weight and blood fat are surging."

Being aware of the problem, Liu signed up as a member of Ma's light meal restaurant. Whenever he feels uncomfortable after eating too much oily food or whenever he finds that his blood fats are too high, Liu turns to light meals for a while.

Ma noted that the COVID-19 pandemic has further increased people's awareness of their health, as more are starting to adopt self-disciplined lifestyles.

In the six months following the containment of the virus in China, Ma's sales reached the whole-year level of 2019. She expects the demand for light meals to grow further after the Spring Festival.

"I plan to build my restaurant into a chain one day," she said. Enditem
Over 10 may mop up at least $10 billion in rush

Over 10 with total valuations of $84 billion (some are planning fresh fund-raising) are bracing to launch initial public offerings (IPOs) in the next 36 months. While the size of their IPOs is under discussion, estimates are that they would together raise a minimum of over $8-10 billion during the initial listing. Read more

IBC set to resume; relief for key worst-affected sectors on the cards

The central government is contemplating lifting the blanket suspension of the (IBC) to accelerate resolving stressed assets. It may also consider giving relief to some of the worst-affected sectors. Fresh proceedings under the IBC are suspended till March 24. Read more





Factory reset: Bumps galore, but auto hubs breathe easy on sales spike



The traffic tells a story. During the lockdown, it took 45 minutes to zip through the deserted 35-km stretch from Chennai to reach the automobile heart of Sriperumbudur-Oragadam. Today, it takes two hours, sometimes more. The automobile nucleus is humming again. The industrys order books are full. But the fortunes of large manufacturers and their small and medium component suppliers vary. This first of a four-part series looks at signs of comeback after months of lockdown-linked pain in the automobile cluster. Read more

India Inc's profit contribution to GDP likely to jump three times

India Incs contribution to gross domestic product (GDP) is predicted to nearly treble by FY23. The ratio in FY20 was the lowest in two decades, at just 1.8 per cent. The Centre's move in 2019 to cut base corporate tax from 30 per cent to 22 per cent, too, will lead to an improvement in the profit-to-GDP ratio. Read more





FinMin to infuse Rs 3,000 cr in state-owned general insurers this quarter

The Finance Ministry will infuse Rs 3,000 crore capital into state-owned general insurance companies during the current quarter in a bid to improve their financial health. Read more

moves up the gears, plans to become an aspirational brand

To that end, it has worked hard on design tweaks and technological upgrades in its models, besides overhauling its retail network in a big way. Read more

nears $50,000-mark as it hits a record in weekend action

reached a new record on Sunday, rising above $49,000 for the first time. The worlds largest cryptocurrency reached about $49,344 earlier in the day, and was around $49,202 as of 10:20 a.m. in London. Its now up about 70 per cent so far this year. Rival cryptocurrency Ether hit a record on Saturday and is up about 150 per ent year-to-date. Read more

InMobi's Glance eyes TikTok acquisition to become a global powerhouse

With 125 million active users straddling on its digital platform in India and South-East Asia daily, Glance  part of the inMobi group  has set an ambitious growth plan in a bid to become a global powerhouse. According to sources, it has started negotiations with Chinese tech giant Bytedance to acquire TikTok, which was banned in India, in order to achieve the objective. Read more
Dusit International, one of Thailands leading hotel and property development companies, has signed a hotel management agreement with Al Fajer International Holding Company, a Kuwait-based private real estate company, to operate the Dusit Princess Mahboula Kuwait  the first Dusit-branded hotel in the country.

The new hotel will comprise 180 hotel rooms and 70 serviced apartments under Dusit Internationals upper midscale Dusit Princess brand. The property is located in the Mahboula district, an industrial and commercial coastal area just 25 minutes by car from boththe city centre and Kuwait International Airport.

Slated to open in Q4 2023, the new property will be equipped to meet the needs of both transient and long-stay guests, including associates of local oil and gas companies seeking comfortable and convenient lodgings near their places of work. The propertys serviced apartments have been specifically designed for families.

Alongside an all-day dining venue, a specialty restaurant, and a lobby lounge, the property will offer a swimming pool, a 900 sq m gym equipped with the latest fitness equipment, and Dusits signature Namm Spa providing a wide range of wellness therapies and treatments.

Four meeting rooms with capacity for 120 people, and a ballroom accommodating up to 350 guests, will cater to the local corporate and events market.

Situated overlooking the Arabian Gulf just south of the Fintas district, the property will also put guests within easy reach of popular local attractions such as Al Kout Mall, Kuwaits largest waterfront retail and leisure destination; and Kuwait Magic, a large beachfront mall with an indoor amusement park.

In line with our strategy for sustainable growth, which includes expanding our presence in key destinations in the Middle East, we are delighted and honoured to bring our unique brand of Thai-inspired gracious hospitality to Kuwait for the first time, and enlarge our footprint in the region through this signing, said Lim Boon Kwee, Chief Operating Officer, Dusit International.

Prior to the pandemic, the Kuwaiti government stated its intention to dramatically increase the role tourism plays in the nations economy, and we are confident that the country will continue to grow as a destination for both business and leisure when the world is travelling again. With Dusit Princess Mahboula Kuwait set to open in Q4 2023, the property will be well-positioned to tap into both markets, and we look forward to making it a resounding success.

Taleb Hussein Ali Jarraq, Chairman of the Board, Al Fajer International Holding Company, said: Our mission as a company is to contribute to the sustainable development of Kuwait through distinctive projects that champion quality, affordability, and diversity. By combining Dusits signature Thai-inspired gracious hospitality with local hospitality customs and traditions, Dusit Princess Mahboula Kuwait will certainly offer unique guest experiences in line with these values. And we are confident that, under Dusits management, the property will deliver enduring value to the Mahboula community at large.

Dusits portfolio now includes 340 properties operating under six brands across 15 countries. In the Middle East, the company currently operates seven hotels and is on course to open two more this year. -TradeArabia News Service
Presidents Day is an annual American holiday that began in honour of the first president of the United States, George Washington.

Every year, on the third Monday in February, US citizens enjoy a three-day weekend to mark the federal holiday.

How did it start?

The tradition began in honour of President Washington, the countrys first leader whose birthday falls on 22 February.

It became a national holiday in 1968, when the US Congress passed a measure known as the Uniform Monday Holiday Act.

The day is also understood to celebrate Abraham Lincoln, America's 16th President, who was born on 16 February.

Although it is commonly referred to as Presidents Day, the federal government still recognises it as Washingtons Birthday.

Read more: 2021 Federal Holidays: Full List

How is it marked?

Carnivals and parades usually take place across the country, although this years will be affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

It is also traditionally a big shopping day, as Americans hit the sales that take place over the bank holiday weekend  although schools, banks and government agencies tend to be closed.

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

Despite its direct link to Washington and association with Lincoln, the day is popularly viewed as an opportunity to celebrate all US presidents past and present.
TESLA HERE WAIT!

A document from the Karnataka chief minister's office released over the weekend sent journalists in a tizzy. A line in the document listing highlights of the Union Budget mentioned Tesla will set up a manufacturing unit in Karnataka. Turns out it was a false alarm, yet again! Officials close to the CM clarified later to a few journalists that it was more of a political statement and nothing has been signed yet. What's more puzzling is how a mention of Tesla made it to a highlights of Budget document when the Budget itself didn't say anything about Tesla making in India. This is the second time the CM's office has back pedalled on Tesla's plans in the state. A tweet claiming Tesla would set up an R&D centre in last month was posted and deleted within an hour, leaving top bureaucrats to field angry calls from Tesla. Officials were on the phone yet again last night, telling journalists it was all a misunderstanding. While the car maker has registered its office in Bengaluru, talks are still on between the two parties, even as states such as Tamil and Maharashtra are very much in the race to woo Tesla. As one veteran journalist quipped to MC Insider, "All that Karnataka government and Tesla have done is have a coffee. At this rate, the company will set up elsewhere." Or is this a hint from the CM that an announcement is imminent? Well, it's not over till it's over!


ISTANBUL  Turks reacted with shock and anger Monday to the news that Kurdish guerrillas had executed 13 Turkish soldiers and police officers held captive in a cave in the mountains of northern Iraq.

The men were being held hostage by members of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or P.K.K., a Maoist guerrilla movement that has been fighting the Turkish state for more than three decades. Turkish soldiers discovered their bodies in a cave during a military operation in Iraqs Gara region, the government said Sunday. All of the hostages had been executed, all but one with gunshots to the head, it said.

The death toll, and the manner in which the men were killed, landed like a bombshell in Turkeys tense and divided politics. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his political allies condemned the attack, as opposition parties questioned why the government had failed to negotiate the mens release and had risked a military operation to rescue them.

The P.K.K. said the deaths were caused by airstrikes during the Turkish military operation that began on Feb. 10. The Turkish minister of defense, Hulusi Akar, said the P.K.K. commander in charge had executed the men as soon as the operation began.
A man is dead following an explosion at a property north-west of Melbourne.

Emergency services were called to Troups Road South in Fieldstone, near Truganina, after reports of a chemical drum explosion shortly after 12.40pm on Monday.

Emergency services are responding to a chemical drum explosion. Credit:Joe Armao

A police spokeswoman said the man has been working at the Troups Road farm when the explosion occurred.

CPR was commenced, however the man died at the scene, she said.

Erdogan angrily denounced the US administration for not immediately accepting Ankara's account of the killings

The United States on Monday sought to defuse a furious diplomatic row with NATO ally Turkey by saying it now accepts Ankara's claim that Kurdish "terrorists" had executed 13 Turks in Iraq.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had lashed out at the State Department's initial hesitance to blame the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) for the deaths.

Both sides view the PKK as a terrorist organisation but the US also backs a Kurdish militia in neighbouring Syria in the conflict against President Bashar al-Assad.

Ankara on Sunday accused the PKK of executing the hostages -- most of them soldiers and police abducted in Turkey and kept in a cave -- as Turkish forces advanced in a rescue operation launched last week.

The PKK blamed Turkish air strikes for the deaths.

The US State Department then fuelled Turkish ire by saying on Sunday that Washington "deplores the death of Turkish citizens" but was waiting for further confirmation of Ankara's version of events.

Erdogan then branded Washington's response "a farce".

"You said you did not support terrorists, when in fact you are on their side and behind them," he said in televised remarks.

The Turkish foreign ministry later summoned US ambassador David Satterfield to convey Ankara's displeasure "in the strongest possible terms".

Washington issued a new statement after Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu held his first official phone call on Monday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

"The Secretary expressed condolences for the deaths of Turkish hostages in northern Iraq and affirmed our view that PKK terrorists bear responsibility," State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.

- Mass arrests -

The PKK militants have been waging an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984 that is thought to have left tens of thousands dead.

A breakdown in peace talks between the PKK and Ankara in 2015 was followed by Turkish military campaigns against the militants across the region and mass arrests of pro-Kurdish politicians and officials in Turkey.

Story continues

The Turkish interior ministry said on Monday that it had detained 718 people -- including the heads of pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) -- across the country in a series of coordinated raids.

The HDP is Turkey's second-largest opposition party. It denies all formal links to the PKK but also questions Turkey's account of the 13 deaths.

We "express our deepest regret and condolences to the families and loved ones of those 13 people who by no means were capable of protecting themselves against an armed attack," the HDP said in a statement on Sunday.

- 'Killing innocents' -

The incident threatens to escalate tensions across Iraq and Syria while delivering an early test to Erdogan's relations with Biden.

Turkey has long accused the Iraqi government of being too tolerant of the PKK.

Ankara also wants Washington to renounce the Kurdish militia in Syria because of its alleged links to the PKK.

It instead wants Washington to reaffirm its support for Turkey's anti-terror campaign.

Erdogan said Turkey's NATO allies had to pick sides.

"If we are going to be in NATO together, you should be sincere. You should not be on the terrorists' side," Erdogan said.

"After this, there are two options. Either act with Turkey with no ifs or buts, without questioning, or they will be a partner to every murder and bloodshed," he said.

"The terrorist organisation on our doorstep, on our borders, is killing innocents."

Erdogan is still waiting for a phone call from Biden that could help set the tone for future US-Turkish ties.

fo-raz/zak/ach
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Gov. Ralph Northam announced plans to remove the statue last June

The Supreme Court of Virginia said Friday it will take up appeals in two lawsuits that seek to prevent Gov. Ralph Northam from removing an enormous statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee in Richmond.

Last June, Democratic Gov. Northam declared that Richmond is no longer the capital of the Confederacy and announced plans to remove Lees statue along with that of other Confederate leaders. Northam, whose term as governor ends next January, announced his decision to take down the statue after George Floyds death last year in police custody in Minneapolis.

But the governors removal plans have been tied up in court since then.

(Credit: Getty Images)

Read More: Black contractor braves threats in removing Confederate statues in Richmond

Attorney General Mark Herring, who is representing Northam in court, has previously tried to speed up the proceedings in the matter.

Attorney General Herring remains more committed than ever to removing this symbol of Virginias racist past from its place of prominence in our community, allowing Virginians to begin to heal and move forward to a more equitable future, his spokeswoman, Charlotte Gomer, said in a statement.

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Michael Fisher Sr., lifts his son, Michael Fisher Jr., to dunk a basketball at the Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee statue on Monument Avenue on January 15, 2021 in Richmond, Virginia. (Photo by Patrick Smith/Getty Images)

Unfortunately, plans to remove the statue fell apart when the court granted a petition of appeal from a group of Richmond residents and from a descendant of signatories to an 1890 deed that transferred the statue, pedestal, and ground they sit on to the state. It was not immediately clear how soon the court might take the matters up, the Washington Post reports.

The city of Richmond, which was the capital of the Confederacy for most of the Civil War, has removed more than a dozen Confederate statues on city land since Floyds death, which sparked a renewed wave of Confederate monuments removals across the U.S.

Read More: Virginias Robert E. Lee statue removed from the US Capitol

Critics of the statues say keeping them in prominent places glorifies efforts to preserve slavery. Others say their removal amounts to erasing history.

Story continues

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The post Virginia Supreme Court to hear appeals over removing Robert E. Lee statue appeared first on TheGrio.
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New Delhi:

Union Minister Smriti Irani while addressing traders and businessmen at 'GST - a Tool for Inclusive Growth' event in Ahmedabad on Saturday encouraged them to accept the new tax policy. No one will be harassed under the Goods and Services Tax (GST), she said.



There will be no punishment for being honest If government agencies or officers ask about past transactions or harasses anyone, direct action will be taken against them, Irani said.

ALSO READ: Smriti Irani hits back at Rahul Gandhi for Hitler dig on PM Modi



Taking a step further, Irani termed the GST as Great Step towards Transparency. The beauty of GST is that it is a destination tax and it gives money back through tax credit, she further added.



Talking about the previous transactions and if there will be punishment for the faulty ones, Irani said, "Past transactions won't be checked under this system. There will be no punishment for being honest. If government agencies or officers ask anyone about past transactions or harasses anyone, direct action will be taken against them."

ALSO READ: Smriti Irani gets I&B, Narendra Tomar Urban Ministry after Venkaiah Naidu resigns

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Felon Arrested After Alleged Assault of Officer

By West Kentucky Star Staff

PADUCAH - A Paducah man whom police say has a lengthy criminal history was arrested early Sunday morning after he reportedly assaulted an officer.Paducah Police say officers pulled over a vehicle about 3 am near the intersection of 9th Street and Park Avenue for a traffic violation. When an officer saw a handgun in the driver's door, he attempted to arrest 38-year-old Mauricus Haynes, who is a convicted felon. He struggled with officers, kicking one of them and also striking him in the face before fleeing the scene.Officers found and arrested Haynes at his home about 10 am. Police say the gun in his vehicle had the serial number removed, and a 31-round magazine was also found.Haynes was charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, receiving a stolen firearm, defacing a firearm, fleeing or evading police on foot, 3rd-degree assault of an officer, resisting arrest, and improper lane usage.Police say Haynes is currently on federal supervision after being convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Police say he has two separate cases pending in McCracken County courts stemming from arrests in 2017 and 2018. They involve drug trafficking and being a persistent felony offender.
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To be selected, candidates need to clear the preliminary examination followed by the mains. The examination shall comprise papers set both in Hindi and Englis

The Jharkhand Public Service Commission (JPSC) has invited applications for 252 civil service posts from today. The applications will conclude on 15 March.

According to a report in The Indian Express, candidates can pay fees till 16 March. Candidates who are interested and eligible can apply at jpsc.gov.in. The preliminary exam is scheduled to be held on 2 May.

As per the report, to be selected for the post, candidates need to clear the preliminary examination followed by the mains. The examination shall comprise papers set both in Hindi and English. The main examination will have a written test and an interview. The interview will be of 100 marks with no qualifying marks.

Candidates who score 40 percent aggregate marks will be selected for mains. There will be relaxation for reserved category candidates.

Here's how to register for JPSC Civil Services Exam 2021:

Step 1: Candidates need to visit the official web link of Jharkhand Public Service Commission jpsc.gov.in.

Step 2: Once there, they need to click on the JPSC Civil Services Exam 2021 Registration link and complete the process and log in using credentials.

Step 3: Candidates need to enter the information asked and upload the documents required.

Step 4: Once done, they need to make the examination fee payment through online mode and submit the application form and take a print out for future reference.

According to a report by Times Now, candidates who are selected will be hired as Deputy Collector, Assistant Municipal Commissioner, District Coordinator, Jail Superintendent, and others. Candidates who apply for the posts should have attained the age of 21 years and must not be older than 35 years of age.
The Hills: New Beginnings star Heidi Montag Pratt addressed speculation about whether or not she was pregnant with her second child over the weekend.

'No I am not pregnant yet,' the 34-year-old reality star - who boasts 2.8M social media followers - tweeted last Saturday.

'Just a little overweight.'

Setting the record straight! The Hills: New Beginnings star Heidi Montag Pratt addressed speculation about whether or not she was pregnant with her second child over the weekend (pictured Sunday)

The 34-year-old reality star - who boasts 2.8M social media followers - tweeted last Saturday: 'No I am not pregnant yet. Just a little overweight'

Heidi's clarification came a month after she showcased her slightly 5ft2in curvier frame while splashing in the Carpinteria surf in a neon green bikini.

On Valentine's Day, Montag's husband of 12 years Spencer Pratt scolded her for eating their three-year-old son Gunner's grilled cheese sandwich rather than the Caesar salad she ordered.

'Honey, that's Gunner's grilled cheese,' the 37-year-old Pratt Daddy Crystals owner said via Instastory.

Fun in the sun: Heidi's clarification came a month after she showcased her slightly 5ft2in curvier frame while splashing in the Carpinteria surf in a neon green bikini

'Honey, that's Gunner's grilled cheese': On Valentine's Day, Montag's husband of 12 years Spencer Pratt scolded her for eating their three-year-old son Gunner's grilled cheese sandwich rather than the Caesar salad she ordered

The 37-year-old Pratt Daddy Crystals owner said via Instastory: 'Honey, that grilled cheese is not for you, honey. Chef Manny made that for Gunner'

'Honey, that grilled cheese is not for you, honey. Chef Manny made that for Gunner.'

Spencer then treated the Colorado-born blonde to Italian lingerie boutique La Perla on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills for a shopping spree.

Heidi - who famously underwent 10 plastic surgery procedures in one day back in 2010 - looked fantastic in a red silk robe and matching lingerie set.

Babe! Spencer then treated the Colorado-born blonde to Italian lingerie boutique La Perla on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills for a shopping spree

Werrrk! Heidi - who famously underwent 10 plastic surgery procedures in one day back in 2010 - looked fantastic in a red silk robe and matching lingerie set

The family-of-three just returned from a ski trip to Lake Tahoe where they filmed scenes for the second season alongside castmates Brody Jenner and Brandon Thomas Lee.

Montag protected herself and others from the coronavirus by wearing a surgical mask as well as an olive-green cut-out turtleneck tucked into black skinny jeans and matching snow boots.

The Assassin 33 A.D. actress - who was born in mountain town Crested Butte - appeared to have injured her left wrist as she was wearing a brace.

'This was the best trip!' The family-of-three just returned from a ski trip to Lake Tahoe where they filmed scenes for the second season alongside castmates Brody Jenner and Brandon Thomas Lee (pictured Thursday)

Mandatory: Montag protected herself and others from the coronavirus by wearing a surgical mask as well as an olive-green cut-out turtleneck tucked into black skinny jeans

Ouch! The Assassin 33 A.D. actress - who was born in mountain town Crested Butte - appeared to have injured her left wrist as she was wearing a brace

Season two will also include appearances from Kristin Cavallari, Caroline D'Amore, Audrina Patridge, Justin Brescia, Frankie Delgado, and Whitney Port.

Heidi tweeted Saturday: 'There would be no show without me, so you're welcome!'

Back in 2006-2010, the Laguna Beach spin-off was frequently criticized for fabricating storylines.

Ready for more? Season two will also include appearances from Kristin Cavallari (R, pictured February 7), Caroline D'Amore, Audrina Patridge, Justin Brescia, Frankie Delgado, and Whitney Port
Vijay Rupani

Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani tested. He has been admitted to a hospital, ANI reported.

Vijay Rupani fainted on stage while addressing a rally for upcoming civic polls in Nizampura area of Vadodara, following which he was flown to Ahmedabad and admitted in a hospital, BJP leaders said.

Rupani, 64, was given first aid on the stage after he collapsed. He was later seen descending the stairs of the stage on his own.

He was then flown in a helicopter from Vadodara to Ahmedabad and admitted in U N Mehta Hospital.

No medical bulletin was issued by the hospital till late night.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi enquired about Rupani's health over phone, said a statement issued by the Chief Minister's Office.

Modi told Rupani to get himself thoroughly checked and to take proper rest, it said.

This was Rupani's third political rally during the day in Vadodara.

"Rupani fainted on stage and I gave him a primary medical treatment. He was fine and walked back to his car from the stage," said Vadodara city BJP president Dr Vijay Shah who was present on the dais at the time of the incident.

BJP leader Bharat Danger told reporters that the CM collapsed while addressing the public meeting in Nizampura area.

"Rupani's security guards caught hold of him when he fell. He was given first aid and was taken to the airport (from where he flew to Ahmedabad)," he said.

"Rupani was unwell for the last two days, but instead of cancelling his public meetings held in Jamnagar on Saturday and in Vadodara on Sunday, he preferred to continue," Danger said.

Elections to six municipal corporations including Vadodara will be held on February 21 while those for municipalities, districts and taluka panchayats will be held on February 28.

Tourism operators are reeling after the snap lockdown wiped out one of their busiest weekends of the year, prompting pleas for regional Victoria to be separated from tough restrictions imposed because of a coronavirus outbreak in Melbourne.

Many coastal and rural businesses are reliant on income over busy weekends after the end of the school holiday season, but they have been forced to temporarily stand down staff and dump masses of food they prepared for the Valentines Day weekend.

Torquay last October. Tourism operators in the region had hoped for a busy Valentines Day weekend. Credit:Paul Jeffers

The Victoria Tourism Industry Council estimates losses across the state could reach hundreds of millions of dollars.

Its chief executive, Felicia Mariani, said 454 business operators who responded to a snap survey on Saturday reported they had lost $8 million in cancellations and $2.2 million on stock and supplies.
Meek Mill and Tekashi 6ix9ine had a run-in outside of an Atlanta nightclub early Sunday, with security squads for both rappers getting in between them amid an exchange of fiery words.

Meek Mill, 33, was departing the venue in the parking lot when the 24-year-old Fefe artist, whose real name is Daniel Hernandez, began shouting him down, claiming he's was incorporating police officers into his private security detail.

Both took to social media in the wake of the incident, with Tekashi writing in a since-deleted Instagram post, 'STOP LETTING THESE RAPPERS LIE TO YOU! THEY TO TOUGH FOR SECURITY @meekmill RUNNING AROUND WITH POLICE.'

The latest: Meek Mill, 33, and Tekashi 6ix9ine, 24, had a run-in outside of an Atlanta nightclub early Sunday, with security squads for both rappers getting in between them amid an exchange of fiery words

Footage of the incident was posted on multiple social media accounts.

Meek Mill, a Philadelphia native, gave his side of the story in a series of tweets, writing, '69 waited out side the club for me they tryna get usssssss wtf.'

He continued: 'We did not run into eachother I was getting in my car he just popped out ....we almost was smoking on that 69 pack for the love of a viral moment ..... he tryna get something locked up no cap lol.'

According to TMZ, he also tweeted, 'The feds sent him to take me out wtf. [I] had to spit on him so he retreated lol he really waited outside the club for me. I thought I was dreaming wtf we almost smoked him lol he posed a lil threat popping up in the parking lot waiting for me.'

Meek Mill, a Philadelphia native, gave his side of the story in a series of tweets, writing, '69 waited out side the club for me they tryna get usssssss wtf'

Upset: The New York native donned a black hoodie in his clash with Meek Mill

Pull apart: Security for both artists parted them amid the potential for violence

Meek Mill, whose real name is Robert Rihmeek Williams, ripped the Bushwick, New York native last May for giving testimony to authorities that resulted in the convictions of members of the Nine Trey Bloods street gang.

'I hope that rat going live to apologize to the people he told on or the victim.....,' he wrote. 'Y'all forgot that fast a "rat" killed nipsey he wasn't suppose to be on the streets!

'That's the only thing ima day because he's dead... left his baby mom and child like a coward as targets!'

Point of contention: Meek Mill ripped the Bushwick, New York native last May for giving testimony that resulted in the convictions of members of the Nine Trey Bloods street gang

Tekashi writing in a since-deleted Instagram post, 'STOP LETTING THESE RAPPERS LIE TO YOU! THEY TO TOUGH FOR SECURITY @meekmill RUNNING AROUND WITH POLICE.'

6ix9ine in 2019 was convicted in connection with racketeering, drug trafficking and weapons charges, and got a lesser sentence.

He had faced as many as 47 years in custody for his testimony against one-time associates.

He was sentenced to two years in prison, and released from prison into home arrest last April after citing concerns about coronavirus, with his home arrest drawing to a close July 31.

Muzaffarnagar: Muzaffarnagar police on Saturday celebrated the birthday of its sniffer dog Dicky, who was a part of the then US President Donald Trump's security drill when he visited India in 2020.

Dicky, who turned three, was helped by his handler, Sunil Kumar, in cutting the cake. With a paper cap and a solemn expression on her face, the canine cut the cake at the police line kennel.

The Labrador Retriever received a coat and a leash as gifts. Along with her routine meal which includes eggs, mutton, vegetables, flatbread, and milk, Dicky was fed boiled chicken as a special treat.

"Dicky has been trained by Indo-Tibetan Border Police at Panchkula in Haryana. She was posted to Muzaffarnagar in August 2019. Since then, Dicky has been a part of operations to sniff out explosives at bus stands, railway stations, markets, and other important places, Abdul Raees Khan, police line in-charge, was quoted as saying by IANS.

The function was held in accordance with Muzaffarnagar SSP Abhishek Yadav's direction that the birthday of all police personnel be celebrated at duty premises including the police station or outpost concerned or police line.

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Arnold Gold / Hearst Connecticut Media

NEW HAVEN  Police said two men are dead after being found unresponsive in a supply closet at a College Street apartment building, police said.

Sgt. Shayna Kendall confirmed that one of the two men is dead, while the status of the second remains uncertain, however New Haven police told WTNH-8 two restaurant employees were found dead after overdosing on drugs and a third was found alive.
Quick prediction . . . In about a decade frats & sororities closely associated with school campuses won't be a thing anymore . . . Quite a few schools have already cancelled them and now the movement seems to be coming to the Midwest.

Read more . . .
The Tezpur University, a Central University, has invited online applications from qualified and interested individuals for filling Ninety (91) vacancies to the post of Assistant Professors, Associate Professors and Professors at Tezpur University in Assam, India on a fulltime basis. Online registration-cum-application process towards the same started on February 13, 2021 and closes on March 16, 2021.

CRITERIA DETAILS Name Of The Posts Assistant Professors, Associate Professors and Professors at Tezpur University Organisation Tezpur University Educational Qualification Masters Degree in Arts, Humanities, Sciences and Commerce with M.Ed in concerned discipline; B.E/B.Tech/M.E/M.Tech/M.Sc in relevant engineering discipline; Ph.D in relevant discipline Experience Relevant years of experience in teaching/research Job Responsibilities null Skills Required Teaching/Research Job Location Assam Salary Scale In the pay ranging from Rs. 57,700 to Rs. 1,44,200 per month as per the post Industry Central University Application Start Date February 13, 2021 Application End Date March 16, 2021

Tezpur University Recruitment 2021: Age Criteria And Fees

Candidates interested in applying for Tezpur University Faculty Jobs 2021 through Tezpur University Recruitment 2021 must meet the age criteria as per the Tezpur University norms, with relaxation (upper age limit) for reserved categories as specified in the Tezpur University Notification 2021.

Candidates must pay a prescribed amount of Rs. 1,000 as application fee for Tezpur University Faculty Jobs 2021 under Tezpur University Recruitment 2021 through online mode only. However, SC/ST/PWD candidates are exempted from paying the application fee as mentioned in the official Tezpur University Notification 2021 given at the end of the article.

Also Read: BEL Recruitment 2021 For 22 Havildar, Security Officer And Supervisor Posts. Apply Online Before February 17

Tezpur University Recruitment 2021: Tezpur University Vacancy 2021

Post Name No. Of Vacancies Assistant Professor 55 Associate Professor 18 Professor 18 Total 91

Tezpur University Recruitment 2021: Education And Eligibility

Desirous candidates applying for Tezpur University Jobs 2021 through Tezpur University Recruitment 2021 must possess a Master's Degree in Arts, Humanities, Sciences and Commerce with M.Ed in concerned discipline; B.E/B.Tech, M.E/M.Tech, M.Sc in relevant engineering discipline; Ph.D in relevant discipline from a recognised University/Institution with relevant years of experience in teaching/research as detailed in the Tezpur University Notification 2021.

Tezpur University Recruitment 2021: Selection And Pay Scale

The selection of candidates to Tezpur University Jobs 2021 through Tezpur University Recruitment 2021 will be done through Shortlisting, Interview and Document Verification as notified in the Tezpur University Notification 2021.

Candidates selected to Tezpur University Jobs 2021 through Tezpur University Recruitment 2021 will be paid emolument in the pay ranging from Rs. 57,700 to Rs. 1,44,200 per month as per the post.

Also Read: UREDA Recruitment 2021 Notification For Project Officer Posts, Apply Online Before March 13

Tezpur University Recruitment 2021: How To Apply

Candidates applying for Tezpur University Faculty Jobs 2021 through Tezpur University Recruitment 2021 must register online on the official Tezpur University website and submit their applications on or before March 16, 2021.

Post-online submission, a hard copy of the same must be submitted to "The Registrar, Tezpur University, Napaam, Tezpur -784 028, Assam" on or before March 26, 2021.

Download Tezpur University Recruitment 2021 Notification PDF for Assistant Professors, Associate Professors and Professors posts
Most counties flanking the international boundary suffer from poverty levels double that of the U.S. average. In unincorporated settlements known as colonias, from Texas to California, border residents live without such basic services as clean water and waste removal. The Trump administration exacerbated longstanding problems by vilifying the border and those living along it and ignoring the regions vital role in U.S. cultural, ecological, and trade relations with Latin America.

Lands and communities along the international line need help. They need jobs with livable wages and strategies to make desert ranches, farms and towns more resilient to climate change. Damage inflicted by the wall must also be repaired, including the restoration of wildlife corridors between the U.S. and Mexico. Fostering community engagement, cross-cultural exchanges and trade are among the most promising strategies.

Desert communities in the borderlands are already laboratories for the future because their residents have been adapting for decades to the new normal of increased aridity.With hotter, drier conditions expected to affect some 162 million people in nearly half of North America over the next two decades, border communities have much to teach about climate resilience.

Border inhabitants are also experts in racial and multicultural solidarity, bilingualism and endurance. They have mastered the art of frugality and self-reliance, because so few effective forms of governmental assistance have ever reached them.

Bijnor, Feb 15 : Congress National General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, while addressing a 'Kisan Panchayat' in Uttar Pradesh's Bijnor district on Monday, said Prime Minister Narendra Modi can visit America, China and Pakistan but cannot meet the farmers sitting in New Delhi.

Priyanka launched a scathing attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and asked whether farmers' income had doubled under the Modi government.

The Congress leader said Modi made fun of the farmers and called them 'Andolanjeevi' (protesters) and parasites. Modi ji did not recognize the difference between patriots and traitors. Modi can visit America, China and Pakistan but cannot meet the farmers sitting in Delhi.

Priyanka lambasted Modi over the new Union farm laws in her speech that lasted for nearly half-an-hour.

Talking to farmers, she said why did the general public elect Modi twice as the Prime Minister. Priyanka said people must have believed that Modi would work for you (people). The first time when Modi came to power, many big things were promised.

Priyanka Gandhi charged "Sugarcane price has not increased in Uttar Pradesh since 2017. Modi has not paid the dues of farmers, but has bought an airplane for himself worth Rs 16,000 crore. The Modi government has implemented new laws which would lead to hoarding by big industrialists." Addressing the farmers in Chandpur at Bijnor, the Congress General Secretary said, "All the three Union farm laws have been implemented for billionaires and not for the farmers. The farmers have been sitting at the Delhi borders in the chilling cold for the last 80 days and are also facing the scorching heat but Prime mInister Modi is not ready to repeal the farm laws. In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the people reposed their faith in Modi but he broke their trust. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Modi had promised employment but the people have not yet been provided jobs." Priyanka said when the farmers are against the three farm laws, then why is the Centre not withdrawing these laws. India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had enacted a law against hoarding but now such a practice has started again. There is no restriction placed on hoarding.

She said, "The first (farm) law will increase hoarding. The second law will fill the coffers of big industrialists. The government mandis will be closed. Private mandis will get encouraged. This will end the Minimum Support Price (MSP). With the third law, under the contract the industrialists will buy the produce of the farmers. Later the contractors will not buy your (farmers) sugarcane. After which the farmers will become helpless. All the three farm laws are made for the industrialists."



A police precinct in Seattle was blocked by a three foot ramp made out of snow on Saturday night, blocking the officers' vehicles from getting in and out of the building.

Around a dozen demonstrators gathered outside the East Precinct, cheering as the police vehicles struggled to get over the ramp.

The East Precinct was the epicenter of anti-police protest this summer. From June 8 until July 1 the building was abandoned, and the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest (CHOP) sprung up around it. CHOP was forced out on July 1.

On August 24 a man from Alaska tried to set fire to the East Precinct, and was charged with arson.

A month later molotov cocktails were thrown at the building by rioters.

'Antifa goons blocked the exit of the East Precinct with a pile of snow tonight, in an effort to stop vehicles from responding to emergency calls,' said one person, posting a picture on Instagram.

Demonstrators in Seattle on Saturday night blocked the exit of the East Precinct with snow

Seattle saw a foot of snow fall overnight on Friday and by Saturday it was thick on the ground

As the patrol car tried to leave the precinct, and was blocked by the ramp, protesters could be seen jumping up and down and celebrating, hurling snowballs at the vehicle.

Police officers came outside the precinct and began shoveling the snow away from the exit.

One officer can be heard on video threatening to detain the protesters for making the ramp, saying: 'Do this again and we'll arrest everyone'.

Protesters told police they were having a snowball fight.

On one Instagram video an officer can be heard saying: 'You cannot block police from exiting a police vehicle precinct'.

Police confronted protesters outside the precinct as they came out to shovel the snow

Officers brought shovels to clear the snow from their precinct

As the officers began shoveling the snow, those gathered outside chanted: 'Peaceful protest'

As the police began moving people away, to start shoveling the snow, one demonstrator said: 'cops are being aggressive and violating people's rights.'

Small scuffles ensued, as the police shoveled the snow and protesters chanted: 'Peaceful protest'.

Seattle police department has not commented on the incident.
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MONROE COUNTY, MI  Two men are facing a multitude charges after being accused of opening fire on a car stopped at a Monroe County intersection, shooting a woman multiple times.

Kelvin Lamont Harris and Austin A-Kouri Watkins were arraigned on various felony charges Friday, Feb. 12, in connection with the shooting that occurred at about 10:15 p.m., Feb. 1, in the area of Telegraph and Stewart roads in Frenchtown Township, according to the Monroe County Sheriffs Office.

Harris, 28, is charged with six counts of assault with intent to murder and one count each of felony firearms, felon in possession of a weapon and felon in possession of ammunition. Watkins, 26, is charged with one count of conspiracy to commit assault with intent to murder, records show.

Monroe woman shot multiple times in car stopped at intersection

Both men were identified as persons of interest early in the case and were wanted for questioning. Harris and Watkins turned themselves in, police said.

Police responding to the scene discovered two shooting victims in the vehicle, with witnesses stating a car had pulled up next to the victims car and a man getting out of that car opened fire on the victims vehicle before fleeing, police said.

The driver, an 18-year-old woman, was shot multiple times and was taken to an area hospital in critical condition.

The second victim, a 17-year-old woman, was also taken to the hospital to be treated for a gunshot wound that was not considered to be life-threatening and has since been released, police said.

There were six people in the victims vehicle when the shooting started, though only the driver suffered multiple injuries, police said, adding that investigators do not believe the shooting was random.

Police believe the shooting may be connected to another shooting incident in Detroit where a home was fired upon. There were no injuries reported in that incident, police said.

Bond for Harris was set at $1 million. Bond for Watkins was set at $250,000. Both are scheduled for probable cause conference hearings Feb. 24 in Monroe County District Court.

Harris was out on bond for several pending drug charges at the time of the shooting, while Watkins was on probation on a drug charge at the time of the shooting, police said.

Investigators are still following up on leads in this case and are asking for anyone who might have information to contact the Monroe County Sheriffs Office Detective Bureau at 734-240-7530.

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YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 15, ARMENPRESS. Chief of the Special Investigation Service Sasun Khachatryan received on February 12 Ambassador of the Czech Republic to Armenia Bedrich Kopecky and Consul Ani Saginjanova, the SIS told Armenpress.

Touching upon the further development opportunities of the Armenian-Czech legal ties, SIS head Sasun Khachatryan expressed hope that this meeting will serve as an important base for the cooperation between the respective structures of the two countries.

New cooperation directions over issues relating to the return of assets which were illegally withdrawn from the country, as well as the investigative actions for corruption crimes were discussed during the meeting. The necessity to study the Czech experience in this field was also emphasized.

The Czech side thanked the SIS chief for the warm welcome and expressed confidence that this meeting will give an impetus of organizing mutual visits.

Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan



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We need a governor who understands those day-to-day challenges that we all face, a governor who will live by the same rules that the rest of us follow, a governor who will stand up to the entrenched special interest groups that have done so much damage. Most importantly, we need a governor we can trust to do the right thing and make tough decisions, he said.
A meeting of the BJP's office-bearers will be held here on February 21, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi also likely to participate in what will be the first such physical get-together of these leaders since the COVID-19 outbreak.

president J P Nadda, other office-bearers of the party at the level, besides its state unit chiefs will attend the meeting, sources said.

The meeting comes as the party gears up for the Assembly polls in five states, including the high-profile West Bengal election, where it is in a direct contest with the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC).

(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.)
Thick woods overtook the old St. Rosalie Plantation house more than 70 years ago.

But to the people of Ironton, a community of modest homes just south of those woods, St. Rosalie remains a powerful symbol of Black heritage in the heart of what used to be a bastion of White supremacy  Plaquemines Parish.

And now, plans to build a new oil export facility on St. Rosalie are raising concerns about whether a key part of that heritage could be erased.

Nearly 200 years ago, a free Black man named Andrew Durnford owned and operated a sugar plantation at St. Rosalie, along the west bank of the Mississippi River. Durnford died a few years before the Civil War and left the plantation to his widow and children. Records show the Durnfords enslaved Black workers, but also paid them wages during the Civil War.

Once emancipated, those workers founded the town of Ironton just south of the plantation.

Durnford and his family were laid to rest in aboveground tombs in one spot on the St. Rosalie property, close to where La. 23 now passes. About a quarter-mile closer to the river, enslaved people were buried in an area of unmarked graves.

The existence of the historic graves was no secret. Documents stored in the Tulane University Archives include lists of workers names and references to the enslaved people who died at St. Rosalie. Official maps in the 1920s and 1940s clearly marked two cemetery locations, and Ironton residents who hunted in the woods there knew exactly where the burial grounds were.

We would see the graves, said Wilkie DeClouet, a retired Jefferson Parish sheriffs deputy who lives in Ironton. We knew the graves was there, but we know to go around and you respect that kind of stuff.

But DeClouet and his neighbors have witnessed plenty of disrespect for those cemeteries over the years. And recently, they feared the parishs thirst for industrial development would lead to a final desecration.

In 1977, Louisiana Power & Light was preparing to build a nuclear power plant at St. Rosalie when the utilitys bulldozers crushed the Durnford family tombs. Plaquemines Parish historian Rod Lincoln said LP&L blamed treasure seekers for using the bulldozers when they were left near the tombs over a weekend.

To DeClouet, it sounded like an excuse for one of many failed attempts over the years to build on top of a sacred place.

They're going to blame it on vandalism. It wasn't vandalism, DeClouet said.

Again and again, major projects have been planned at St. Rosalie, but none have come to fruition. A Colorado company wanted to build a coal export terminal there, but walked away in 2018.

At that point, the Plaquemines Port and Harbor District, a public agency, purchased the old St. Rosalie property for $30.5 million. Plaquemines Liquid Terminal, a joint venture of Tallgrass Energy and Drexel Hamilton Infrastructure Partners, put up the money.

PLT now leases the site and plans to build a $20 million oil export terminal there, complete with railroad service, massive oil tanks and underground pipelines to receive oil and transfer it onto seabound tankers that can dock on the river.

By law, PLT had to research the site and determine if any historic cemeteries still exist there. That process began two years ago, according to records filed with the State Historic Preservation Office.

Archaeologists and other investigators found almost 13,000 artifacts from the plantation, including pieces of inscribed tombstones, wood and screws from coffins and three pieces of human bone.

In July 2020, archaeologists hired by PLT filed another report with the state pinpointing the two historic cemetery locations and recommended avoiding construction on those areas. But in the same report, PLT indicated it still planned to build two oil storage tanks on top of the location identified as the main cemetery for enslaved people, and another tank less than 25 feet from the location identified as the Durnford family plot.

Audrey Trufant Salvant, a former Plaquemines Parish councilwoman who traces her Trufant ancestors back to the founding of Ironton and likely to the enslaved people at St. Rosalie, has been warning parish officials about the cemeteries for decades. She and other residents started sounding the alarm again as soon as PLT introduced its development plans in 2018.

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There were community meetings that were held here at the local church and all members attended and we informed them of our knowledge of cemeteries on that property, Salvant said.

She said the ports executive director, Sandy Sanders, attended those meetings. But Sanders told WWL-TV in an interview that he only recently learned about the cemeteries existence.

They didn't say cemeteries, Sanders insisted after a Jan. 28 Port Commission meeting. I mean, they said it's been over there for over 200 years. So, you figure you're going to find something.

Sanders said he didnt learn about the cemeteries until October, when Tallgrass and its contracted archaeological team from ELOS Environmental notified the port staff about three human bones. The ports deputy director, Paul Matthews, sent an email to port commissioners listing the 13,000 artifacts. It noted there were three human bones but said nothing about a cemetery.

The Port Commission comprises nine elected parish council members. The commissions chairman, Richie Blink, said he first learned about the cemeteries in December, when a member of the public sent him the archaeological reports.

In an email to Blink after the Jan. 28 meeting, Sanders asked Blink to share his copies of the archaeological reports.

We would appreciate everyone having the same information regarding this matter, Sanders wrote.

When Blink said a member of the public had provided him with the records, Sanders questioned how because he believed it was privileged information.

Blink said hes baffled by the air of secrecy surrounding the project. Sanders sent an email to PLT officials in December suggesting they hold two separate meetings with port commissioners to update them on the PLT project "so as not to bump into more than 4 commissioners together at one time."

Such a setup is called a walking quorum and is a violation of the Louisiana public meetings law, according to the Attorney Generals Office.

At the Port Commissions Jan. 28 meeting, Tallgrass Vice President Craig Meis offered a public explanation of the archaeological investigation for the first time. He also apologized to commissioners for not keeping them apprised of the cemetery findings.

But Meis and representatives from ELOS told the commissioners they were not trying to keep those findings secret. The reports Blink and WWL-TV obtained from public records requests will still be considered drafts until they are approved by the State Historic Preservation Office. ELOS Vice President Jay Prather said the reports will be provided to the commissioners when the final draft is approved.

Sanders told WWL-TV the port will not allow the PLT development to move forward with building any oil tanks on the cemetery sites. It was never going to allow it, he said.

We would never put a tank down on top of that; never, Sanders said. And we would certainly enshrine it, and (be) proud of it. It's their heritage. It's our heritage.

But Salvant remains dubious.

There's always an issue, always an industry to come in, she said. And you would think that the government would have your back. But that's never the case.

This time, however, Blink says theres a new attitude about racial justice on the council. He openly acknowledged the systemic racism that made Ironton one of the last communities in the U.S. without running water or sewer service.

This community didn't get in running water until 1980, and they had to fight tooth and nail to get it, Blink said. I mean, they were systematically held back.

Its not clear how PLT will alter its plans for the site, but Blink says he wants to make sure the burial sites are protected and accessible to descendants.

I mean, you wouldn't go bulldoze St. Louis No. 2 to build a casino or something, he said, referring to one of the many revered historic cemeteries in New Orleans. These folks here, they don't want a tank built on top of their grandfather's grave.
Cyclone Yaas to make landfall near Odishas Balasore around Wednesday noon; Flight services may be hit

Fuel price hike: Odisha bandh affects normal life, educational institutes closed

India

oi-Deepika S

Bhubaneswar, Feb 15: Normal life in Odisha was partially affected on Monday due to the 6-hour bandh called by Congress over the rising prices of petrol and diesel in the country. The bandh will remain in place for six hours - from 7 am to 1 pm.

Petrol and diesel at Rs 89.69 per litre and Rs 86.47 per litre respectively, today in Bhubaneswar.

The state government has closed all the schools, colleges and universities across Odisha for the safety of students.

After a gap of about nine months, schools across Odisha had on January 8 reopened their classrooms to students who would shortly be appearing for their board examination, amid strict adherence to COVID-19 guidelines.

The institutes also resumed physical classes for students of 9 and 11 standards from February 8.

Blaming both the Centre and the Odisha government for the rising prices of petrol and diesel, state Congress president Niranjan Patnaik had said that the shutdown would begin from 7 am and continue till 1 pm.

All the essential services, movements of patients and marriage parties will be kept out of the purview of the shutdown, he said.

Four elephants die within 11 days in Karlapat Wildlife Sanctuary, Odisha

Meanwhile, the BJD government has taken a slew of measures to tighten the security arrangement in and around the state capital to avoid any untoward incident.

The government also advised its employees to reach their workplaces before 9.30 am on Monday, an official said.

All Odisha Bus Owners Association also announced that the passenger vehicles of their members will stay off the roads till 1 PM on February 15.

Patnaik alleged that both the Centre and the state government are imposing unreasonable taxes on petrol and diesel, leading to a steep rise in fuel prices.

He said prices of essential commodities have shot up due to the spiralling fuel costs.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

Stating that the shutdown will be peaceful, the Congress leader appealed to the people to support their call.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 15:38:44|Editor: huaxia

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BANGKOK, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Thailand on Monday confirmed 143 cases of coronavirus infection and two fatalities, according to Center for the COVID-19 Situation Administration (CCSA).

Of the new cases, 132 were domestic ones and 11 others referred to imported infections, the CCSA spokeswoman Apisamai Srirangsan said.

Sixty-nine of the local cases reported in Samut Sakhon province and another 50 were in Pathum Thani province, Apisamai added.

The two new fatalities were a 78-year-old Thai male in Samut Sakhon and a 62-year-old Thai male in Ubon Ratchathani, raising the death toll to 82, she said.

Thailand has so far confirmed 24,714 cases of infection, 22,067 of which were reported as domestic while 2,647 others referred to those who had returned from abroad.

So far, 22,883 patients have fully recovered and been released from hospitals while 1,749 others are currently hospitalized. Enditem
When you are ready to leave hospital hopefully your parents house will have been modified so you can live at home.

These were the words I repeatedly heard as a 16-year-old who spent six months in an archaic hospital with a spinal cord injury. I had never thought much about disability or housing design and, in any event, I felt I would only need to think about it when I became old.

I was wrong. Accidents or illness can affect anyone at any time.

Wheelchair ramps are just the start to make housing accessible.

Much has changed since 1995, but Australias approach to accessible housing has not. There has been a lot of rhetoric but little action. This has created a human rights and economic issue for Australia that compromises our aged care, health and disability support systems.
Jasmine Stefanovic celebrated her first Valentine's Day as a mother on Sunday.

To mark the special day, the 37-year-old shared an adorably sweet photo of husband Karl and their lookalike daughter Harper, nine months.

Jasmine professed 'my loves' in the Instagram caption.

'My loves': Jasmine Stefanovic, 37, shared a cute photo of Today show host husband Karl Stefanovic (right) and their lookalike daughter Harper (left) on Valentine's Day

Proving the apple didn't fall far from the tree, little Harper appeared already show strikingly similar looks to her doting parents.

The adorable father-daughter photograph set off a slew of reactions from her celebrity pals.

Former E! host Ksenija Lukich wrote: 'So gorgeous.'

Milestone moment: This Valentine's Day marked the first one as a new mother for Jasmine

Nine star Belinda Russell commented on how 'grown up' little Harper was looking in the photo.

The post comes after Karl's own sweet post about his wife, while celebrating her 37th birthday last month.

Karl shared a number of glam photos of Jasmine, before writing a special message dedicated to the Mara & Mine shoe designer.

'You are light and love': Karl gushed over his 'beautiful' wife Jasmine (nee Yarbrough) when he shared a sweet tribute to her on her 37th birthday last month

'Happy birthday my beauty... You are light and love and everything in between. You've even taught Ava [his daughter from a previous marriage] never to get angry when I get home late from the pub.'

Karl and Jasmine welcomed their daughter Harper on May 1, 2020. She was born at North Shore Private Hospital in Sydney.

In a statement to Nine's Today show at the time, Karl said: 'Harper and Jasmine are doing well and dad had a great night's sleep.'

He added: 'I am in awe. Harper is absolutely perfect.'

Sweet: Karl posted a picture of Jasmine pulling a funny face as she stood alongside his eldest daughter Ava, 14 (left)

Karl met Jasmine in late 2016, five months after he separated from his first wife, former TV producer Cassandra Thorburn.

The couple wed in a lavish ceremony at the One&Only Palmilla resort in San Jose del Cabo, Mexico, in December 2018.

In addition to baby Harper, Karl has three children from his marriage to Cassandra: sons Jackson and River, and daughter Ava Willow.
"One of the easiest ways to let older adults know they are valued is by simply engaging with them, which can leave a lasting, positive impact. Research has shown that acts of kindness can improve the physical and mental health of a senior and strengthen the bond between the giver and the recipient."

Everyone could use a little more kindness in their life. Yet showing kindness is often done while being present and engaged with those around us. With the ongoing pandemic, older adults are more physically distant from loved ones and friends than ever before. In fact, according to the U.S. Administration on Aging, 14.7 million older adults live alone  often going days or even weeks without any social interaction.

With such isolation, it has never been more important to find new ways to demonstrate empathy and compassion for older adults in your community. By prioritizing acts of goodwill and displays of selflessness, we can help build a kinder and more compassionate world.

A year into the pandemic, its often hard to see the positive in the world, said Erin Albers, vice president of Social Purpose at Home Instead. But there is hope, and social distancing doesnt have to mean disconnecting. There are plenty of ways to impact the lives of our aging community from a safe distance.

One of the easiest ways to let older adults know they are valued is by simply engaging with them, which can leave a lasting, positive impact. Research has shown that acts of kindness can improve the physical and mental health of a senior and strengthen the bond between the giver and the recipient.

Random Acts of Kindness Week (Feb. 14-20) is a great opportunity to make an older adult in your life feel seen, heard and loved. It all starts with adding a little bit of kindness to your everyday routine. Albers suggests a random act of kindness for each day of the week to connect with the older adults near you:



Monday: Lend a hand. During the pandemic, older adults may be isolated without the normal help they receive from family or friends. Give a senior neighbor a hand by offering to finish an outdoor project for them. Tackle the activities that may prove to be more difficult for them first: bring their newspaper or mail to their doorstep, shovel snow or scrape ice off their car. If you need help getting started, download and print a card to say Im Ready to Help.

Tuesday: Write a letter (or two). When we rely on our phones and text messages to convey love and appreciation, feelings can get lost in translation. A letter to an older adult is a simple gesture that bears great meaning. For isolated seniors, it may even be the one interaction theyve had in a long time. Take it one step further by becoming a pen pal. Skip the stamps by submitting your letter online at readytocare.com/penpals.

Wednesday: Deliver dinner. Social distancing can lead to feelings of loneliness, especially around mealtime. Surprise a senior friend by treating them to a home-cooked meal or an entree from their favorite local restaurant. Consider making several meals in bulk and freezing them. Having healthy frozen meals on hand may be particularly helpful for seniors who live alone.

Thursday: Pick up the tab. It can be a scary time for older adults to leave their homes. Next time you see a senior at the grocery store, drive-thru or car wash, consider picking up the bill. Or, pay it forward in other ways. For example, create a video with Celebrate. Use the promo code KINDNESS to create a heartwarming gift for a loved one while simultaneously supporting the important work of charities that support older adults. 75% of every video purchased with this code will go directly to Home Instead Foundation to support seniors in need.

Friday: Create a kindness jar. To fuel your kindness well beyond Random Acts of Kindness Week, fill a jar with ideas and inspiration for thoughtful acts. Once a week, select one idea from the jar and make it your mission to complete it for a senior friend or stranger. At the end of the year, think back on the difference you were able to make in the lives of others. For more ideas, sign up to receive free weekly text messages from Ready to Care by Home Instead.

While these ideas are simple, theyll leave a lasting impression. Even the smallest interactions can increase someones quality of life and positively impact their health. Helping those in need through random acts of kindness and care will matter more than ever in the days ahead.

For more ideas and inspiration to support older adults, visit ReadyToCare.com.

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(Vi) on Monday said its fundraising talks were progressing well even as it ramps up focus on 4G services.

The telcos board had, in September 2020, approved of a Rs 25,000-crore fundraising plan and the management had set a 3-month timeline to complete it (by early 2021).

I do not believe it (fundraising) is taking an inordinate amount of time. There is interest from various participants in helping us in fundraising, said CEO and MD Ravinder Takkar in a post-results conference call.

He added that the company would raise tariffs at the right time. Takkar said Vis network was 5G-ready and it would roll out 5G as and when the ecosystem becomes ready for launch.

The operator posted Rs 4,532 crore net loss in Q3FY21 on the back of flat revenue growth and gains from stake sale in Indus Towers. It lags peers in parameters such as average revenue per user (ARPU).

Analysts at Goldman Sachs estimate that its ARPU needs to increase 1.9x its current level (Rs 121 in Q3FY21) to meet upcoming payment obligations related to debt, spectrum and adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues.

Takkar said the company will not wait for competition to increase prices. The company had undertaken a limited tariff hike in family pack plans in select circles, such as Uttar Pradesh.

We have started to gain momentum and traction in the market. Our 4G subscribers are growing and our customer engagement is improving, he added.

The company is stepping up focus to add more 4G customers and intends to close down 3G services by FY22. However, it will continue with 2G services. Around 55 per cent of its 269.8 million customers use 2G services.

3G is not required anymore and is continued only because some people are using devices that only run on 3G, chief financial officer (CFO) Akshaya Moondra said. Our intention is to close 3G as soon as possible while keeping consumer requirement in mind, he added.

Moondra said discontinuation of interconnect usage charges will impact companys revenue and expenses by around 10 per cent. Impact on earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation (Ebitda) will be around Rs 80 crore each quarter as a consequence, he added.

Takkar reiterated that the firm would roll out 5G services when the ecosystem gets ripe.

Last month, Airtel carried out successful demonstration of 5G service in Hyderabad. Airtel said the full impact of 5G experience would be available to customers upon availability of adequate spectrum and receipt of government approvals.


Conditions at some of the citys shelters for Philadelphias homeless population are lousy and unsafe, a group of demonstrators said Sunday, and federal funding could be used to again make hotel rooms available instead  if the city goes after it.

City officials, who relied on hotels as housing for Philadelphias homeless population for much of 2020 until it expended the funding source, said uncertainty and concerns about the reliability of another federal funding stream have made them reluctant to use that money to restart the hotel program. Instead, they have relocated some people from hotels to other facilities, including unused buildings that had to be quickly refurbished to accommodate them.

Some of the shelters are cold, dank, and remind me of prison, said Leon Tyer, a member of the activist group ACT-UP Philly and one of six people who held a demonstration Sunday outside the home of Tumar Alexander, the citys managing director.

Hot water, heat, and access to outlets are spotty, Tyer said he has learned from people who have stayed in the shelters. City officials have pushed back against those claims, saying the shelters do have heat and hot water. There are also concerns, though, that the shelters, some of which have communal dining and bathrooms, could facilitate the spread of COVID-19. There have been a small number of cases at one of the shelters this month, members of ACT-UP said.

Where is the compassion today? Tyer said. Where do we go from this point?

Offering people without homes hotel rooms in 2020 reduced the risk of COVID-19 infecting some of the citys most vulnerable people, and federal funds from the CARES [Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security] Act covered the costs. As many as 200 people had taken advantage of the hotel rooms in 2020, but the city spent the CARES money by December and has not sought reimbursement available from the Federal Emergency Management Agency that could allow continued reliance on hotels.

Before Trumps presidency ended, FEMA offered a 75% reimbursement for hotel rooms reserved for the homeless, but the city never pursued that resource. In January, though, the Biden administration announced that FEMA would fully reimburse cities that seek to house people in hotel rooms. The city has yet to submit an application to be reimbursed for 2020 expenses associated with the hotel program, officials have said. They dont plan to seek to use FEMA funds for hotel rooms, officials said last week.

 READ MORE: As Biden offers more emergency funds, activists say Philly should reopen COVID hotels for the homeless

Despite the more generous reimbursement rate, city officials are concerned that caveats and delays could still leave cash-strapped Philadelphia with a financial burden. Other cities that have used the FEMA funds for hotel accommodations have reported some costs that arent covered, like behavioral health treatment. The reimbursement can take a long time to arrive, some cities have reported.

In Philadelphia, the recently reopened buildings are housing about 70 of the people who had been staying at hotels. Most of the people who had been put up in hotels either found other housing arrangements or returned to the street, said Max Ray-Riek, another ACT-UP member.

A lot of folks are living in the PATCO stations, he said.

The decision to move people out of hotels and into other housing also came amid uncertainty over whether the hotels would even be available after 2020, said Mike Dunn, a city spokesperson. And officials didnt learn FEMA would reimburse municipalities housing the homeless in hotels in 2021 until a few days before the end of the year, he said, though demonstrators said they had urged the city to pursue FEMA reimbursement as early as April 2020.

We certainly could not have waited until then to make a decision, Dunn said Sunday. We needed to plan for this many weeks in advance.

Since December, a Center City Holiday Inn has only been used by the city to shelter people without homes who have tested positive for COVID-19. Since the start of the pandemic, the rate of coronavirus infections in shelters is about 3%, city officials have said.

The city is pursuing federal funding, but it would be disruptive to move residents who are not infected out of shelters and back to hotels, officials said last week.

Outside Alexanders Allegheny Avenue home on Valentines Day, Ray-Riek, Tyer, and four others chanted, Zoomed with other advocates, and spoke. Three held up hearts that, when read together, said, Tumar, open COVID hotels.

 READ MORE: As Phillys COVID-19 hotels empty, some residents say theyre dismayed by conditions in their new accommodations

On a tree they hung a banner emblazoned with the Martin Luther King Jr. quote, Justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.

Ray-Riek said there were hundreds of people in the city without permanent housing who are in some of the high-risk groups for COVID-19 who would benefit from staying in hotels.

I want them to reopen the COVID hotels, Ray-Riek said, and expand the program to meet all the demonstrated need.

This story has been updated to clarify when Philadelphia learned of FEMAs reimbursement policy in 2021.
streamer star wars

A streamer who made a hilarious takedown on the Star Wars sequels had Twitch in stitches.

William WillNeff Neff is a variety streamer best known for his collaborations with Hasan and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. During a stream, Will explained the plotline of the deeply divisive Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker in an impassioned rant.

The planes were sleeping on an island, or a planet, Will said on his stream, describing Emperor Palpatines Final Order fleet. What planet? The Sith one. Okay, wheres that? I dont know they had to have some kind of beacon  thats the journey! No one knows where this planet is, even though its the largest army in history. No one knows where this thing is ha ha ha ha!

Will then speculated how J. J. Abrams and Disney executives discussed the end of the Skywalker Saga.

But the emperor is invincible, Will continued. He cant die. How does he die? How do they kill him? How does Rey beat him? How does Rey (gasp) Friendship. And Disney went what the F*** did you just say? And he [J. J. Abrams] went, They kill him with friendship.

Holy s***! Will exclaimed after slowly backpedaling on his chair with his mouth agape.

The clip, which was posted on /r/LivestreamFail, was met with an outpouring of agreement.

Based af take, f*** the sequels, one commenter said.

Lets pretend the new trilogy doesnt exist and just enjoy The Mandalorian, another commenter suggested.

This is gold, yet another Reddit commenter wrote. It really summarizes that f****** joke of a trilogy

The latest Star Wars trilogy was divisive to say the least. While Star Wars: The Force Awakens was universally loved after its release, fans and critics were deeply split on both Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.

One of the largest overall complaints was the suspension of disbelief that Will referenced on his stream. Of course, Star Wars is more akin to a fantasy series in space than a sci-fi series. Any viewer who goes into Star Wars expecting logic to prevail is in for a bad time. But even then, the new trilogys incoherent story and characterizations were too much for some fans.

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And that included the actual actors. Mark Hamill expressed disappointment over how Luke, Leia and Han never got a reunion scene which felt like a giant middle finger to long-time fans. John Boyega has openly criticized Disney and accused it of conceding to the racist parts of the Star Wars fandom who wanted to see Black characters pushed to the side.

Fortunately, theres at least one thing that all Star Wars fans can agree on: Grogu (AKA Baby Yoda) is super cute.

In The Know is now available on Apple News  follow us here!

If you liked this piece, check out how The Mandalorian is using lore from Star Wars video games to broaden its storytelling.

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The post Streamers Star Wars explainer leaves Twitch in awe appeared first on In The Know.
By Parisa Hafezi

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran said on Monday it will block snap inspections by the U.N. nuclear watchdog from next week if other parties to the 2015 nuclear deal do not uphold their obligations, a challenge to U.S. President Joe Biden's hope of reviving the accord.

"If others do not fulfil their obligations by Feb. 21, the government is obliged to suspend the voluntary implementation of the Additional Protocol," Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said.

"It does not mean ending all inspections by the U.N. nuclear watchdog...All these steps are reversible if the other party changes its path and honours its obligations," he said, alluding to the United States.

Iran's envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency wrote on Twitter on Monday that Tehran has informed U.N. watchdog about its plan next week to end sweeping inspection powers given to the agency under the nuclear pact.

Under legislation enacted by hardline Iranian lawmakers last year, the government is obliged on Feb. 21 to limit IAEA inspections to declared nuclear sites only, revoking its short-notice access to any location seen as relevant for information-gathering, if other parties did not fully comply with the deal.

The Biden administration aims to return the United States to the deal, which his predecessor Donald Trump abandoned in 2018. Under the deal, Iran agreed to curbs on its uranium enrichment programme in return for the lifting of sanctions.

After Trump quit and reimposed sanctions, Iran began violating some of the deal's limits on sensitive uranium enrichment. Washington and Tehran now disagree over how best to restore the accord, with both sides demanding the other side act first to return to compliance.

Despite Iran's public hard line that Washington must take the first step, however, several Iranian officials told Reuters last week that the mounting economic pain of U.S. sanctions may push Tehran to show flexibility on terms for restoring the nuclear deal.

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Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani said last week Doha was in consultations to help salvage the deal, and Iranian state media said he would meet Iran's president and foreign minister in Tehran on Monday.

"We welcome efforts by friendly countries like Qatar ... There have been consultations between Tehran and Doha at various levels," Khatibzadeh said.

Iran has long denied striving to develop nuclear weapons through uranium enrichment, though its intelligence minister said last week persistent Western pressure could push Tehran to fight back like a cornered cat and seek nuclear weapons.

But Khatibzadeh rejected this, citing a religious decree issued in the early 2000s by the Islamic Republics top authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, banning the pursuit of nuclear arms.

(Writing by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
The Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) plans to establish a major airline company to compete with the state-owned Saudi Arabian Airlines and other major aviation companies in the region, reported Saudi Gazette.

The Saudi sovereign wealth fund, in collaboration with investment entities, has made major headway in the formation of the company that targets to tap the vast opportunities in the aviation sector along with the kingdoms plan to attract as many as 100 million visitors and tourists annually by the year of 2030, according to a report, carried by Maaal online business newspaper.

The new airline will operate both international and domestic flights; the newspaper reported quoting sources, who requested anonymity.

The project has come a long way in its studies, but it is not yet in the final shape, they said.

With this move, the Saudi wealth fund seeks to tap the huge potential of the travel industry with the vast opportunities expected to be laid open with the worlds success of stemming the spread of coronavirus pandemic along with a huge increase in the number of those who receive vaccine shots in the near future.

The idea of the new airline company is based on exploring the prospect of increasing the aviation sectors contribution to the gross domestic product (GDP) by increasing competition, making available of more flight seat capacity, by launching companies with huge competitive capabilities, the sources said.
BMW says the CS's engine is the most powerful it has ever developed, but that's not true. The most potent BMW engine dates back to the 1990s. But there's a catch: it was never offered in a BMW road car. If you're a BMW nut, you probably already know I'm talking about the S70/2, the 6.1-liter V12 engine that the Munich-based company developed for the McLaren F1 This engine was commissioned by Gordon Murray after he was turned down by Honda, his first choice for firepower. Technically, the S70/2 in the F1 was based on the S70B56, the 5.6-liter V12 that BMW had introduced in the first-generation 8 Series in 1992. However, the S70/S only shared the V12 layout and bore spacing with the 850CSi.Featuring heads based on the S50 inline-six engine, four valves per cylinder, variable valve timing, individual throttle bodies, and a dry-sump oiling system, the S70/2 was essentially a new design.Tipping the scales at only 266 kg (586 pounds), the S70/2 was good for 618 horsepower and 479 pound-feet (649 Nm) of torque, both impressive figures for the era. But 618 horsepower is a bit below the BMW M5 CS' output of 627 horses, right? Well, the S70/2 was capable of more than that, and McLaren made full use of its immense power in a limited-edition version of the F1, the LM.Built to celebrate McLaren's success at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, where the F1 won outright in 1995, the LM was fitted with the race-spec engine that had its race-mandated restrictors removed. This resulted in a higher output of 671 horsepower and 520 pound-feet (704 Nm) of torque. That's exactly 44 horses more than the BMW M5 CS.Until BMW develops an even more powerful version of its current V8, assuming it will happen at some point, the S70/2 remains the most powerful engine ever to come out of the M division shop. Sure, it wasn't offered in a BMW, and the F1 LM was limited to only five units, which were sold for more than $1.5 million a pop, but it was a road-legal car without significant alterations under the hood.BMW actually used the S70/2 in one of its cars, but only on the race track. A race-spec version of the F1 engine, called the S70/2, powered the V12 LM and V12 LMR racing prototypes that BMW fielded in various series from 1998 to 2000.The V12 LMR brought BMW's first and only victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1999 as well as second-place finishes in the American Le Mans Series in 1999 and 2000.
MIT researchers in collaboration with surgeons at Harvard Medical School have devised a new type of amputation surgery that can help amputees better control their residual muscles and receive sensory feedback. Credit: MIT

MIT researchers have invented a new type of amputation surgery that can help amputees to better control their residual muscles and sense where their "phantom limb" is in space. This restored sense of proprioception should translate to better control of prosthetic limbs, as well as a reduction of limb pain, the researchers say.

In most amputations, muscle pairs that control the affected joints, such as elbows or ankles, are severed. However, the MIT team has found that reconnecting these muscle pairs, allowing them to retain their normal push-pull relationship, offers people much better sensory feedback.

"Both our study and previous studies show that the better patients can dynamically move their muscles, the more control they're going to have. The better a person can actuate muscles that move their phantom ankle, for example, the better they're actually able to use their prostheses," says Shriya Srinivasan, an MIT postdoc and lead author of the study.

In a study that will appear this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 15 patients who received this new type of surgery, known as agonist-antagonist myoneural interface (AMI), could control their muscles more precisely than patients with traditional amputations. The AMI patients also reported feeling more freedom of movement and less pain in their affected limb.

"Through surgical and regenerative techniques that restore natural agonist-antagonist muscle movements, our study shows that persons with an AMI amputation experience a greater phantom joint range of motion, a reduced level of pain, and an increased fidelity of prosthetic limb controllability," says Hugh Herr, a professor of media arts and sciences, head of the Biomechatronics group in the Media Lab, and the senior author of the paper.

Other authors of the paper include Samantha Gutierrez-Arango and Erica Israel, senior research support associates at the Media Lab; Ashley Chia-En Teng, an MIT undergraduate; Hyungeun Song, a graduate student in the Harvard-MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology; Zachary Bailey, a former visiting researcher at the Media Lab; Matthew Carty, a visiting scientist at the Media Lab; and Lisa Freed, a Media Lab research scientist.

Restoring sensation

Most muscles that control limb movement occur in pairs that alternately stretch and contract. One example of these agonist-antagonist pairs is the biceps and triceps. When you bend your elbow, the biceps muscle contracts, causing the triceps to stretch, and that stretch sends sensory information back to the brain.

During a conventional limb amputation, these muscle movements are restricted, cutting off this sensory feedback and making it much harder for amputees to feel where their prosthetic limbs are in space or to sense forces applied to those limbs.

"When one muscle contracts, the other one doesn't have its antagonist activity, so the brain gets confusing signals," says Srinivasan, a former member of the Biomechatronics group now working at MIT's Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. "Even with state-of-the-art prostheses, people are constantly visually following the prosthesis to try to calibrate their brains to where the device is moving."

MIT researchers in collaboration with surgeons at Harvard Medical School have devised a new type of amputation surgery that can help amputees better control their residual muscles and receive sensory feedback. Credit: MIT

A few years ago, the MIT Biomechatronics group invented and scientifically developed in preclinical studies a new amputation technique that maintains the relationships between those muscle pairs. Instead of severing each muscle, they connect the two ends of the muscles so that they still dynamically communicate with each other within the residual limb. In a 2017 study of rats, they showed that when the animals contracted one muscle of the pair, the other muscle would stretch and send sensory information back to the brain.

Since these preclinical studies, about 25 people have undergone the AMI surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital, performed by Carty, who is also a plastic surgeon at the Brigham and Women's hospital. In the new PNAS study, the researchers measured the precision of muscle movements in the ankle and subtalar joints of 15 patients who had AMI amputations performed below the knee. These patients had two sets of muscles reconnected during their amputation: the muscles that control the ankle, and those that control the subtalar joint, which allows the sole of the foot to tilt inward or outward. The study compared these patients to seven people who had traditional amputations below the knee.

Each patient was evaluated while lying down with their legs propped on a foam pillow, allowing their feet to extend into the air. Patients did not wear prosthetic limbs during the study. The researchers asked them to flex their ankle jointsboth the intact one and the "phantom" oneby 25, 50, 75, or 100 percent of their full range of motion. Electrodes attached to each leg allowed the researchers to measure the activity of specific muscles as each movement was performed repeatedly.

The researchers compared the electrical signals coming from the muscles in the amputated limb with those from the intact limb and found that for AMI patients, they were very similar. They also found that patients with the AMI amputation were able to control the muscles of their amputated limb much more precisely than the patients with traditional amputations. Patients with traditional amputations were more likely to perform the same movement over and over in their amputated limb, regardless of how far they were asked to flex their ankle.

"The AMI patients' ability to control these muscles was a lot more intuitive than those with typical amputations, which largely had to do with the way their brain was processing how the phantom limb was moving," Srinivasan says.

In a paper that recently appeared in Science Translational Medicine, the researchers reported that brain scans of the AMI amputees showed that they were getting more sensory feedback from their residual muscles than patients with traditional amputations. In work that is now ongoing, the researchers are measuring whether this ability translates to better control of a prosthetic leg while walking.

Freedom of movement

The researchers also discovered an effect they did not anticipate: AMI patients reported much less pain and a greater sensation of freedom of movement in their amputated limbs.

"Our study wasn't specifically designed to achieve this, but it was a sentiment our subjects expressed over and over again. They had a much greater sensation of what their foot actually felt like and how it was moving in space," Srinivasan says. "It became increasingly apparent that restoring the muscles to their normal physiology had benefits not only for prosthetic control, but also for their day-to-day mental well-being."

The research team has also developed a modified version of the surgery that can be performed on people who have already had a traditional amputation. This process, which they call "regenerative AMI," involves grafting small muscle segments to serve as the agonist and antagonist muscles for an amputated joint. They are also working on developing the AMI procedure for other types of amputations, including above the knee and above and below the elbow.

"We're learning that this technique of rewiring the limb, and using spare parts to reconstruct that limb, is working, and it's applicable to various parts of the body," Herr says.

Explore further Making prosthetic limbs feel more natural
Welsh Ambulance Service ICT worker from Anglesey dies after battling Covid for weeks

This article is old - Published: Monday, Feb 15th, 2021

A father of three has become the fourth member of the Welsh Ambulance Service to lose their life to Covid-19.

Kevin Hughes, 41, from Valley, Anglesey worked on the ICT Service Desk based at St Asaph.

He passed away at Ysbyty Gwynedd, Bangor, yesterday morning, Sunday 14 February.

He had been battling the virus for several weeks.





A keen Liverpool FC fan Kevin had been with WAST as a member of our team since May 2017 as an ICT Service Desk Analyst, having previously worked as a civilian for RAF Valley Search and Rescue operations and also Anglesey County Council.

A dedicated family man, Kevin leaves behind his wife Emma and three children Liam, Sioned and Jamie.

Chief Executive, Jason Killens said: Kevins loss will be felt deeply by everyone here at Team WAST and we extend our deepest sympathies to Emma, Kevins children and his wider family.

Our focus will now be on supporting his family and bereaved colleagues at this most difficult time.

Kara Walsh, ICT Service Desk Manager and Kevins line manager paid tribute to him by saying: Kevin was a well-respected member of the ICT service desk.

The messages that myself and the team have received from across the Welsh Ambulance Service since his death, speaks volumes of how well liked he was.

He will be truly missed by us all.

The government is trampling our rights, and just about everyone knows it. The conservatives want it stopped, and to have changes made according to constitutional rules. The Democrats don't think the Constitution is as relevant and say it should be reinterpreted as necessary. I'd like to see someone do that with simple traffic law and get away with it.

"Gee, officer. There was no other traffic for, like, two blocks, so I viewed that stop sign as more of a flashing yellow light."

Right.

Laws are (or should be) carefully worded to ensure no ambiguity. Contrary to misinformed opinions, the Constitution is not ambiguous.

The Founders carefully debated the principles of the future Constitution in great detail over a period of years, before settling upon the version we have (see The Federalist Papers). They paid serious attention to how it was ultimately written to ensure that it was clear. Furthermore, they made no bones about the fact that if they did not specifically assign governmental responsibilities to federal or state governments, those matters were left for the people to decide. In other words, the Constitution is a government-limiting, not a citizen-limiting, document.

For the most part, there are two reasons why people find this confusing today. The first reason is that we don't teach our citizens about how our government is supposed to operate. Civics and American government instruction have left our public schools to make room for victimology, sex education, identity agendas, distorted history, and many other topics.

The second reason, which the left aggressively abuses, is that the Founders wrote in the language of their day. They stated things in ways that were obvious to Americans at the time but have since evolved out of our everyday lexicon or common understanding. The truth is, we know exactly what they meant at the time they drafted the Constitution because the Founders also provided us with thousands of documents giving the details and reasoning behind each principle or rule in the Constitution.

Recall that we have 50 state constitutions, too, but even fewer people have spent time understanding them than our federal documents. It is worth noting that many of the earlier state founders not only amplified the principles of the federal documents, but regularly expanded on them to make those principles and rules even clearer!

Many people are confused about the Second Amendment because of the "militia" statement. They assume that the word "militia" means army or national guard. It does not. The Founders clearly meant that males over 16 years old should be ready to form a militia and protect the nation in accordance with the Constitution. This is clear by the written records they left behind.

Pennsylvania's constitution declares: "The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned."

Indiana's 1851 Constitution states it more plainly. "The people shall have a right to bear arms, for the defense of themselves and the State."

Unfortunately, governments violate state constitutions at least as often as (and likely more often than) the federal government violates the U.S. Constitution. Indiana and Pennsylvania both currently require an application for and granting of a permit to carry a pistol, and they abide by federal background check requirements for sales.

People do not need a permit in either state to take advantage of their right to free speech (yet). There are hundreds of examples of regular violations of state constitutions ranging from bearing arms to how laws are made. Yet most citizens remain blissfully unaware as more restrictions, fees, and taxes are laid upon them to fund larger and more powerful federal and state governments  all of which the Founders did not want and the Constitutions were written to prevent.

All of the constitutions have mechanisms for amending them, and these were made purposely difficult to prevent temporary passions or powerful sub-groups from changing them without careful debate and the support of the people  not to mention the fact that politicians take advantage of complexly worded and documented laws to make it much more difficult and time-consuming for the average citizen to stay informed.

Until we teach Americans what these binding legal documents say, they can never know whether the government is obeying them. The supreme law of the land clearly states that the government is of and for the people and that the documents exist to control  that is, to limit the power of  the government.

Power implies the ability to do violence, like forcing citizens to pay taxes upon threat of arrest and even to cause death from resisting a government that may be violating its own laws. Shouldn't it be obvious, then, that it is in our best interest to know whether our governments are acting in accordance with our laws? To change how our government behaves, we must first know the law and then take action to ensure that our governments follow that law.

Image: Washington at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 by Junius Brutus Stearns. Public Domain.

Family members, an employee, a pastor, and others related to a Nigerian business mogul undergoing trial, Obiwanne Okeke, have flooded a U.S. court with appeals for leniency ahead of his sentencing for wire fraud.

In a series of letters of attestation to character sent to Rebecca Smith, the judge handling the case at a Virginia court, they expressed shock about the involvement of Mr Okeke in the unlawful activities and pleaded he be given a second chance.

They also pledged he would not take part in any unlawful act again.

Invictus Obi

Also known as Invictus Obi, Mr Okeke will be sentenced on Tuesday.

The 33-year-old and Chairman of Abuja-based Invictus Group, before his arrest in 2019, was listed as one of the influential young entrepreneurs recognised by Forbes.

Mr Okeke was nabbed by the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) which alleged he connived with certain individuals, some of whom remain at large, to defraud American companies and individuals over a period of at least four years.

One of his victims, Unatrac, a subsidiary of American heavy equipment manufacturer Caterpillar, lost $11 million in spurious wire transfers, court documents showed.

Agents of the international security agency obtained an arrest warrant and intercepted the fraudster in the airport while returning to Nigeria after a brief visit to the U.S. in 2019.

However, after months of denying his involvement in the crime before a federal judge in the U.S. and argument over jurisdiction, he pleaded guilty to the allegation of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and agreed to cooperate with American authorities last year June.

The guilty plea helped Mr Okeke, who was initially indicted on two counts of computer and wire fraud, to secure the withdrawal of the second charge that carries lesser sentence and fines.

As part of his deal with the U.S. government, he would now enjoy immunity from prosecution on the same matter in the U.S. Eastern District of Virginia.

The district would also confirm the validity of the plea agreement in case Mr Okeke is charged over the same offence in another jurisdiction. Although his sentencing was initially scheduled for October 22, 2020, it was postponed to Tuesday for reasons unknown to PREMIUM TIMES.

The conviction could see him spend 20 years behind bars with up to $250,000 in fines amongst other punishments, this newspaper gathered.

Temper justice with mercy

Meanwhile, Mr Okekes lawyer, John Iweanoge, begged the court to sentence him to a substantially lower jail term than required by the law.

In the court documents, detailing the defendants position on the sentencing, which was exclusively obtained by PREMIUM TIMES, Mr Iweanoge argued that the guideline range of imprisonment of 97 to 121 months or 151-188 months will be too much for someone of his age and status.

A sentence within either guidelines range would be nothing short of overly punitive for a 33-year-old, non-violent, first-time offender who checks nearly all the correct boxes with regard to his low risk of recidivism.

Moreover, a sentence within the guideline range would be disparate with many sentences imposed for individuals whose crimes had a much more severe and far-reaching victim impact.

The court is charged with fashioning a sentence that promotes respect for the law, affords adequate deterrence, reflects the seriousness of the offense, and provides just punishment while also avoiding unwarranted sentencing disparities among defendants.

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Attached to his plea were letters of character attestation from Mr Okekes family, former pastor, mentee and close relations.

In the copy of the letters obtained, the writers also pleaded that the judge be merciful to him.

Show mercy for my mentor

Also, Nwosu Favour Chikadibia, a pharmaceutical technology student studying at Federal Polytechnic Nekede Owerri, Imo State, who claimed the defendant is her mentor and friend, wrote to Ms Smith (judge) on February 4, 2021.

I have known Mr. Obinwanne Okeke for more than 10 years and he is indeed a good person and a very kind man, and also very generous. He took me in and showed me the fatherly love I never experienced: even when I had lost hope of furthering my education, God Almighty through him blessed me.

He offered me a scholarship right from my secondary school level till now that I am in a higher institution and he also really helped me and my family in so many ways. It was believed that everyone in this life has a destiny helper, truly Mr Oberwanne Okeke is my own destiny helper, that was why I was really saddened when I heard of his arrest, because this is not the great mentor, father, that I have come to respect and count on. I am really helpless right now without him.

Please judge, with anguish and a sorrowful heart. I plead with you in the name of our lord Jesus Christ to please show mercy, Ms Nwosu begged the judge.

Former pastor pleads

Also, Ikechukwuka Nwanze, Mr Okekes former pastor at Kingsway International Christian Center South Africa (KICC SA), wrote the judge on February 9, pleading for mercy

I know Mr Okeke, as he was a member of my congregation at KICC SA for a period of 5 years and at the time he was a student at Monash University in South Africa.

According to him, Mr Okeke is a quiet young man with keen interest in business, especially Real Estate opportunities.

I was quite intrigued at the time that a young man his age wanted to make something of his life. He was involved in youth activities in the church and I had asked him at a time to be a keynote speaker at one of the business seminars for young people.

The clergyman said he was in complete shock when he found out the wrongdoings Mr Okeke committed, insisting that it was not consistent with the character he witnessed during his tertiary education and the period he was in the church.

I want to use this opportunity, your honor, to plead for leniency on your judgement and also on behalf of Mr Okeke, deeply apologise to victims of these nefarious activities and to the government of the United States, he wrote.

Also, employee begs

Francisca Asuquo, an employee of Invictus Group, in her letter, stated that she worked with the accused for three years.

We met at a meeting and we had an intellectual discussion about renewable energy, which got my interest and made me decide to get into the renewable energy sector which is emerging in Africa.

As a female in this industry, it has made people and society have more respect for me seeing that I am sound in the field all thanks to Okeke for roping me in, she wrote.

Ms Asuquo also pleaded with the judge to give Mr Okeke a second chance.

I know that he has to attend the court on a theft charge. He is really upset and sorry about what he has done and wishes to spend more time with his new born child & family hoping to be a good father-figure that will excel at raising his family uprightly, she wrote.

Brother, sister appeal for leniency

In addition, the defendants brother and sister, Alexander Okeke and Florence Ozobugha respectively, in two separate letters, appealed to Ms Smith to be considerate in her sentencing.

I sincerely apologise on his behalf to the victims and I also ask that you consider is predicaments and show mercy to him because he is a young man that have future, young daughter and an aged mother who suffers from diabetics and they will suffer emotionally and otherwise, If you sentence him to a long period of jail, Mrs Ozobugha stated.

Mr Okeke, who is a traditional chief in Nnewi South Local Government Area of Anambra State, is also a civil/highway engineer for over 30 years working for the Maryland State Highway Administration in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.

He wrote, I will humbly plead that the Court tempers justice with mercy at sentencing because he (Obinwanne Okeke) has a long way to go before he can actually be tagged free. In sentencing, I urge that this Honorable Court consider all the mitigating factors before it with a view to striking a lenient or tempered balance in sentencing, taking into account the U.S. sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors.

New Delhi:

In Delhi to attend a dinner hosted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for outgoing President Pranab Mukherjee, Janta Dal United chief Nitish Kumar on Saturday met Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi.



According to reports, the Bihar Chief Minister also met Congress supremo Sonia Gandhi at her residence.



The meeting comes at a time when tension between JDU and RJD is boiling over in Bihar. The corruption charges on RJD chief Lalu Yadav's son Tejashwi Yadav have brought the Grand Alliance in the state to the breaking point.



Nitish's special meet with Congress top brass could also be a sign of appeasement after the presidential nominee support fiasco.



The JDU chief had refused to go with the choice of anti-BJP alliance and had supported NDA candidate Ram Nath Kovind on the grounds that he was a good social worker and from Bihar.



This led to friction between JDU and other parties, so much so that senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad alleged that Nitish Kumar has flexible principles.



Azad's remarks did draw flake from Rahul gandhi as he warned party leaders of action if anyone targets Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.





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Boston police over the weekend busted a 40-year-old man with a loaded handgun equipped with a laser sight, numerous prescription drugs and narcotics and thousands of dollars in cash, according to authorities.

Officers in the Drug Control Unit of the Boston Police Department arrested Jay Candelario on firearm- and drug-related charges around 2:45 p.m. Saturday during an investigation on Southampton Street in Roxbury, according to a statement from the department.

Authorities said the suspect was taken into custody without incident after police discovered a loaded .40 caliber Taurus handgun equipped with a laser sight and several plastic bags containing large amounts of fentanyl, cocaine and marijuana.

According to the department, officers also found $3,509 in cash, more than 500 pills or pieces of Alprazolam, commonly known by the brand name Xanax, and 48 Suboxone strips.

Candelario is set to appear in Roxbury District Court on multiple charges, including unlawful possession of a firearm and ammunition, trafficking Class A and B drugs and possession with intent to distribute Class C and D drugs, the department said.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 20:56:44|Editor: huaxia

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LUSAKA, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Zambia's efforts to promote the consumption of local products is now getting the maximum campaign and recognition across the country.

Various stakeholders are now appreciating the fact the promotion and consumption of local products are good for the growth of the economy.

Granted, Zambia has been an import-dependent country for years but slowly this is diminishing as more people are beginning to understand the importance of appreciating local products.

Recently, President Edgar Lungu expressed happiness that more local products are being sold in shops and that more people are consuming the products.

"This is patriotism. It is also a clear indication that our 'Proudly Zambian Campaign' has taken root," he said when he addressed the National Assembly on the progress made on the application of the national values and principles.

According to him, 33 companies have so far been certified to use the official "Proudly Zambia" logo, covering 500 product lines, adding that this is a step in the right direction and a mark of quality as well as increasing competitiveness of local products.

The benefits accruing to this national consciousness are evident in the increased consumption of what we produce, he added.

"This is not only creating a ready market for our local producers but also creating employment opportunities for more of our people, particularly the youth," he said.

Indeed the need to promote the consumption of local products cannot be over-emphasized.

Last week, the government banned the importation of onions and potatoes from outside the country.

Ministry of Agriculture Permanent Secretary Songowayo Zyambo said there is no need to import the two products because the country had enough of them to meet national demand.

He said in a release that the decision was arrived at following consultations with various stakeholders.

Stakeholders have since supported the move as well as encouraged authorities to extend the ban to other products that can easily be produced locally.

Buy Zed, which promotes the buying of local products, has expressed delight at the move to restrict the importation of onions and potatoes.

Evans Ngoma, the founder of Buy Zed says the move will have a positive effect on many players, especially farmers who are now assured of a ready market.

He however said there is need for farmers to build their capacity in order to meet the demand.

The Zambia National Farmers Union (ZNFU), a grouping of farmers, has also welcomed the move as this will promote local production of agricultural products.

"ZNFU is confident that producers are capable of expanding production because there are examples where this has happened such as wheat industry where import substitution has happened," he said in a release.

He has since urged the ministry responsible for agriculture to be resolute on the policy and not to be swayed, adding that regulation of imported agricultural products should go beyond onions and potatoes.

According to him, the continued importation of certain agricultural products has a negative effect on the country's economy.

The need to produce local products is not new in Zambia and has been a focus of discussion for many years although realization of the move has been slow.

In 2004, the Ministry of Commerce, Trade and Industry launched the "Proudly Zambian Campaign" which seeks to spur job creation and economic development through the promotion of production and consumption of high-quality Zambian products.

The campaign entails that products under it have an official logo as a mark of quality assurance and national pride.

The campaign recognises that consumers want to buy goods of high standard and quality hence all products under the campaign are subjected to a vetting process to ensure highest standard.

Indeed the appreciation of local products is now becoming a buzzword all over the country. Countries are now realizing the importance of promoting local products in spite of the globalization agenda and Zambia is no exception. Enditem
Despite facing difficulties due to the COVID-19 pandemic, seafood exports last year were estimated at US$8.58 billion, the same as in 2019.

The Vietnam Association of Seafood Producers and Exporters expects them to increase by 10 per cent to $9.4 billion this year aided by many positive factors.

Truong Dinh Hoe, its general secretary, talks about this and efforts made by the industry to enhance its competitiveness and grow.

What do you think about the seafood industrys export prospects this year?

The seafood industry has set a growth target of 10 per cent in exports this year or US$9.4 billion. And there are factors that give us confidence.

Demand for seafood products globally is tending to increase though only at a moderate 1-3 per cent.

We have an advantage of having a reliable raw material source since aquaculture supplies 70 per cent of what is needed to produce commercial seafood products.

Vietnam has controlled the COVID-19 pandemic well, and so seafood processing plants have been operating normally. While other major seafood exporters in other countries are struggling with lockdowns to control the spread of COVID-19 and mobilising workers, leading to a reduction in supply.

With a reduction in supply from other countries, importers will seek alternative sources from Vietnam.

Free trade agreements such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, the EU-Vietnam FTA and the UK-Vietnam FTA promise bright prospects for seafood exports to those markets.

The export of shrimp products, one of the sectors key export items, increased by 15 per cent last year to $3.85 billion. Looking ahead, how do you see their export potential?

We set a target of increasing exports of seafood products in general by 10 per cent this year, but in the case of shrimp, we aim for higher growth of 15 per cent based on the export situation last year.

Thanks to better control of the pandemic, Vietnam has advantages over other large shrimp exporting countries such as Thailand and India, with the two countries seeing a drop in shrimp output.

COVID-19 has changed consumption habits globally, with people eating at home more frequently and tending to eat more seafood products, especially shrimp, at home. The trend is expected to continue for the next few years.

To further increase exports, the sector must find ways to reduce production costs to make its products more competitive so that consumers will use them regularly.

In 2021 the sector will focus on three basic programmes.

The first is how to make shrimp farming more stable by diversifying farming methods and enhancing value chain management.

Shrimp breeding must be further improved to ensure environmental protection and traceability to meet a market trend where every market requires certification of origin.

Meanwhile, shrimp processors and producers need to enhance connection to ensure stable supplies.

Secondly, exporters must identify consumption trends in each market and requirements in terms of quality, certificates and social responsibility norms to come up with appropriate plans to boost exports.

Thirdly, businesses must identify that the fight against COVID-19 will continue to be an important task in 2021, because if just one employee is infected, the whole company will be locked down.

With the series of free trade agreements the country has signed, do you think exporters have capitalised on opportunities emerging from them? The UK-Vietnam FTA took effect at the end of last year. Do you think it will have a big impact on the seafood sector?

Businesses have capitalised well on FTAs to boost exports.

Exports to the EU have increased significantly since the EU-Vietnam FTA came into effect last August, thanks to the reduction in tariffs.

They also understand which FTAs carry lowest tariff duties on their products in case that market and Vietnam are in more than one FTA [Vietnam and Japan are in ASEAN-Japan, Japan-VN and RECEP].

The important thing now is that competent authorities need to improve procedures for issuing certification of origin for export items and conduct regular checks of their origins to prevent fraud and ensure fair competition for all.

The UK-Vietnam FTA is an important continuation of trade facilitation between the two countries after the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement expires for the UK.

The UK is among the large seafood importing countries in the EU. Vietnams seafood exports to the UK used to account for one third of its total seafood exports to the bloc of 28 countries.

So if there is no bilateral free trade agreement with the UK, exports to the market will face difficulties.

The UK has high demand for seafood products, offering businesses the opportunity to boost exports.

How does the association plan to ensure the seafood industry develops in a sustainable manner?

We are focusing on many programmes for creating a solid foundation for the industrys sustainable development in the long run.

Firstly, we are building an export strategy for the Chinese market, a lucrative market for seafood products.

It is time for us to change our mindset about this market. It is not an easy market but a large one and has high requirements in terms of quality. So we need to conduct careful research to come up with a strategy to consistently export to the market.

Secondly, we will continue to promote Vietnamese seafood in the global market. This year perhaps we will stop at focusing on developing programmes to promote Vietnamese seafood but on a large scale and in terms of each specific product and market.

Thirdly, we will work with relevant State agencies to get rid of the European Commissions yellow card warning for illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing in Vietnam this year to support the enforcement of the EVFTA better.

The association is urging the Directorate of Fisheries and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to promote consumption of seafood in the domestic market.

The domestic market of nearly 100 million people is seen as having huge potential to come to the rescue of businesses in case export markets are volatile and help stabilise production, thereby lowering production costs.

In general, the seafood industry still has bright prospects and we are working to ensure it continues to thrive in a sustainable manner.

VNS

Gov. Greg Abbott has spent much of the past six months focused on police defunding and trying to make sure every other Texan is focused on it, too.

On Twitter and in televised news conferences, the Republican has railed against the city of Austins efforts to scale back and restructure police spending and called on legislators to craft a law so onerous that no city or town would dare cut its local law enforcement budget again.

Were not going to let cities in Texas follow the lead of cities like Portland and Seattle and Minneapolis by defunding the police, he said in his annual statewide address this month. Thats crazy.

But while Abbott has provided plenty of rhetorical kindling, lawmakers have yet to rally around any of his policy prescriptions, and the path forward could be a slog. The governors proposals are mostly untested, have been only vaguely defined and are sure to face stiff opposition from city leaders and residents who fear they may be unintentionally harmed by a law whose only ostensible target is Austin.

This punishment for defunding the police is a far better political issue than it is in implementation, said Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University. Once you end up having to do it, its kind of messy.

The saga began in August, when the Austin City Council cut 5 percent from its police budget in the wake of a local police killing and amid national unrest over the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police. They also pledged to shift tens of millions of dollars worth of traditional police functions to other city agencies.

Abbott has pressed lawmakers to consider a raft of retaliatory measures for cities such as Austin, including stripping annexation powers from offending cities, withholding sales tax revenue and having state troopers take over entire police departments.

All of the sanctions would appear to be unprecedented, though the Legislature holds broad legal authority over local officials and can in theory impose most any condition it wants. But state laws cannot target individual municipalities; legislation has to apply either everywhere or to a broad group that can change over time, as laid out by the states highest court.

The question is whether an artful draftsperson could draft a bill that was specifically applied to Austin and fit within this Supreme Court definition, said Randall Erben, a former legislative director for Abbott and an adjunct professor at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law.

Qualms about bills targeting cities

Few major cities outside of Austin and Dallas have even discussed shrinking their police budgets in the past year, and Houston slightly increased police funding. Many smaller cities and towns are led by Republicans who are politically aligned with the governor. They could still be affected by such measures, though, if their budgets declined for any number of reasons  say, a drop in population or the end of debt payments on a bond. Some towns could buy a new police cruiser one year and not the next.

Those scenarios will likely be more heightened in coming years, as towns and cities work to dig themselves out from the financial toll of the coronavirus pandemic. And it comes after Abbott led a successful push last session to cap local property tax revenue, putting a potential squeeze on municipal budgets that mostly revolve around public safety spending.

Members of the legislature are going to be getting pressure from their people at home saying, You know, this opens up a whole Pandoras box, said Sherri Greenberg, a former state representative who teaches public policy at UT Austin. But on the other hand, there still could be opportunities and various ways to, if not precisely withhold sales tax, to do other things legislatively.

Three Republicans have filed legislation so far in the House on defunding, but none of the measures would impose any sanctions on cities. One calls for a local election if the cut is more than 5 percent, and the others simply restrict how much police spending can drop year over year.

A spokesman for House Speaker Dade Phelan, R-Beaumont, said he anticipates more bills on the topic to be submitted before the March 12 filing deadline. Phelan, Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick are in lock-step against police defunding, the spokesman said.

Every community has different approaches to public safety, and the committee process will be a venue for review and discussion that will inform how our State moves forward, Phelans spokesman said.

A spokeswoman for Patrick did not respond to a request for comment. Abbotts spokeswoman did not answer emailed questions but said in a statement that the governor is working with the legislature on the right approach.

Winning issue for GOP

The focus on police defunding, meanwhile, could come to overshadow what Democrats had hoped would be a legislative session dedicated in part to substantive criminal justice reforms in the wake of Floyds death, which was captured on video and sparked nationwide protests. Phelan has made overtures toward reforms in the past and drew support in his bid for speaker from many of the same progressives now pushing those changes.

Its not just in Texas. While many political leaders called for more creative approaches to law enforcement following Floyds death, top Democrats have been wary of defunding efforts. In a call with civil rights leaders in December, President Joe Biden reportedly blamed the push for down-ballot losses in November.

In a sign of perhaps just how fraught the defunding legislation could be, the Texas Municipal League, which represents the city of Austin, has not taken a public position. The group also represents the Texas Police Chiefs Association.

An Austin city spokesman declined to say whether the city was considering litigation if Abbotts proposals move forward but said the city believes in supporting law enforcement and the type of social services that can help prevent crime from occurring.

Without the ability to manage our own local budgets, the city cannot effectively do those things, he said.

Even if none of Abbotts ideas becomes law, the payoff may have already come. His press conferences and Twitter storms denouncing Austin helped Republicans rebound in key House races last fall and distracted from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed the lives of more than 40,000 Texans. The public health crisis had hurt the governors approval ratings.

I think hes already won, Jillson said. Hes already made his point. If he can exact a cost from Austin, his base will love that.

jeremy.blackman@chron.com

twitter.com/jblackmanchron
Canberra, Feb 15 : Australia's Covid-19 vaccination rollout will begin next Monday as the first 142,000 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine landed in the country, Health Minister Greg Hunt said.

Hunt said the vaccines landed in Sydney just after midday on Monday and would go through security and quality-assurance processes, including batch testing, before the rollout began on February 22, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.

"Today marks another important milestone; next week with the first vaccines marks an even more important milestone," he said, adding: "With those milestones we give Australians hope and protection." The federal government will keep 62,000 doses of the initial shipment aside for second vaccinations. Thirty thousand will be used for aged care workers and residents, and the remaining 50,000 will be divided between the states and territories on a population basis.

Hunt expects the first phase of the rollout to take six weeks.

States have been told how many doses to expect but the Health Minister did not publicly release that breakdown.

"We'll provide that later on in the week; the states have been notified," he said.

Phase 1a includes aged care workers, vulnerable residents of aged care facilities, hotel quarantine workers, border staff and essential health care workers.

The federal government will control the vaccination plan for aged care residents and staff. Hunt, however, said it was up to states to decide which groups from that phase would take priority.

"It's a matter for the states, but they have indicated - and we generally support it - that the greatest immediate risk is the border quarantine process," he said. "They will make sure that the balance is focused on the greatest risk, and I think that's appropriate." Prime Minister Scott Morrison said it was a historic day for Australia.

"One of the largest logistics exercises ever undertaken in this country has been planned for, Mr Speaker, and is now under way," he said during question time.

Latest updates on Coronavirus (COVID-19)

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
New Delhi:

During a shameful incident, a 32-year-old man has been arrested for allegedly masturbating in front of a German woman, who is pursuing PhD from JNU, in southeast Delhis Greater Kailash, said police.

The incident took place on Thursday around 2.45 pm when the 33-year-old scholar had taken her dog out for a stroll in Greater Kailash-II, they said.

She stopped for a while when she saw the man looking at her in a weird manner.

However, when he looked away, she moved ahead. But as soon as she reached closer to where he was standing, he pulled his trousers down and started masturbating while looking at her, the police said.

She shouted at him but before she could try and catch him, he drove off in his car. The woman managed to capture a picture of the car and its numberplate.

The woman informed the police following which the accused Tarun was arrested on Friday. Tarun was on Friday produced before a court that sent him to judicial custody.
In the shadows of the rumbling El, Kimberly Dardaris, a sex worker in Kensington, sought refuge inside a center that provides food, clothing, and counseling to women in need.

She walked into a brightly lit room at the Salvation Armys New Day Womens Drop-In Center on Kensington Avenue, where she was immediately greeted by friendly faces. The social-services workers there offered her a simple, warm meal. Tissues. A donated pair of pants. And they offered a welcoming ear.

Dardaris, 34, who grew up in Montgomery County, has been going to the center for the last 10 years and says she would like to get out of the sex trade, but she says such work is easy, fast money and it feeds her drug habit. And right now, shes not ready to get off drugs.

Theyre really good people, she says of the workers at the center.

The Salvation Army has been helping women and girls in the sex trade since its founding in England in the late 1800s. Its Greater Philadelphia New Day to Stop Trafficking Program started in 2010 with a womens drop-in center, opened partly in response to the Kensington Strangler, a man who terrorized the neighborhood by raping and killing three women that year. Women who worked in the sex trade could go in to feel safe, and seek warmth and food.

Many of the women who stop in the drop-in center, now on Kensington Avenue near Hart Lane, are victims of human trafficking or commercial sexual exploitation, said Heather LaRocca, director of the New Day program. And they are primarily the people the program hopes to help. But the center is also open to any woman and helps many who face poverty or substance-abuse issues.

The program has expanded over the years to include case managers who help connect people to social services, a transitional housing program in Montgomery County that shelters up to eight women who were victims of human trafficking, partnerships with law enforcement, assistance in Philadelphia Family Court for youth victims of trafficking, and a 24-hour hotline.

LaRocca says she measures the programs success in the number of people it serves and in the relationships it has built. She realizes change can take years.

The realities of the folks we work with is it might take 20 years for them to get out of the commercial sexual exploitation theyre in, she says. Its a constant walking along beside them. Its our hope they will want to take the next step and leave the situation theyre in. We want to create opportunities so people know they have the choice if thats what they want.

Last year, the New Day program served 1,471 people, up from 1,036 in 2019, said LaRocca.

Before the pandemic descended on the city, the drop-in center was a communal space with a comfy couch and a television, and offered group classes like art therapy. Women could also use the centers bathroom and shower.

But because of the coronavirus, the centers hours have been curtailed and women generally are allowed only in the front room, where they can get snacks or a lunch to go, along with clothing, and feminine-hygiene products, unless they have an appointment with a case manager. On Fridays, women can stop in to see a mental health therapist or talk to a doctor in person or by phone through Courage Medicine.

Case managers help people find shelter, get into drug rehabilitation, or obtain mental health services, and sometimes accompany the women to court to support them. And workers at the center can also help them find jobs outside of sex work.

Catrina Payne, 40, who stopped into the center on a frigid day to get warm and to get food, said she wasnt aware of the case-management services but would absolutely like to be helped to get out of sex work. She said she has been a sex worker in Kensington for the last year, after her husband died of a drug overdose and she lost her job as a dental assistant because of a drug addiction.

As staffer Chante Tapley heated a frozen chicken pot pie in the microwave and gathered up a pair of pants, fuzzy socks, and a shirt for Payne, another staffer, Sarah Colton, handed Payne a bad date sheet, an updated list with a description of men who have been violent or abusive to sex workers in Kensington.

They try to help us, keep us safe, said Payne.

Its a scene repeated regularly at the center, which strives to be supportive and welcoming.

So many of them have lost hope in the world around them, Major Tawny Cowen-Zanders, head of the Greater Philadelphia Salvation Army, said of those it serves. Theyve lost hope in the people theyve trusted. And theyve lost hope in themselves. So first and foremost, we have to help them remember and to capture how precious they are.

A godsend

Erika Bassett was looking to make $20 from a john so she could buy more crack last September when an undercover cop solicited her and two vice cops put her in handcuffs.

But instead of arresting her, the officers, from the citys Police-Assisted Diversion program, said, Im here to help you, she recalled. I never had that. They really did and I was shocked. After checking to make sure there were no warrants out for her arrest, they took her to the Salvation Armys office on Allegheny Avenue near F Street, where she met Susan Jones, then working as a case manager.

The Salvation Army was a godsend, said Bassett, 50. They changed my life. Got me to treatment. Even though I made the decision to stay clean, they were the catalyst.

Hers was a long journey. At age 12, Bassett ran away from an abusive home. On a Center City street, she said, she met a 26-year-old man who told her hed take care of her but instead forced her to have sex with other men for money.

I prostituted for him. I made money for him. I slept for him, Bassett said. All I wanted was someone who loved me.

She said she became addicted to crack cocaine during her five years with him and was a sex worker in different parts of the city for more than 30 years  until that September day when police handed her over to the Salvation Army.

Jones, who confirmed Bassetts story, got her into drug-addiction treatment that same night, Bassett recalled. She stayed with me until I got to Episcopal Hospital. All I had was the clothes on my back. She gave me a pink-and-white teddy bear, which I still have. Gave me socks and underwear. They gave me snacks and juice.

Bassett, who is now living in a group rehab house in South Philadelphia, said shes been drug-free for more than four months.

The Salvation Army has given her resources to help her get her life back on track. Theyre teaching me independence, she said. They helped me save my life.

Building relationships

Because of the pandemic, the Salvation Army has shifted to doing street outreach, including joining city efforts to divert people away from the criminal justice system and refer them to social services.

On a recent rainy morning, Jones, now assistant director of the New Day program, and Hannah Long, the groups victim advocate, drove to Harold Street and Kensington Avenue, where there have been a rash of community complaints about commercial sex workers.

They encountered two women, both addicted to drugs, one a 31-year-old from Chester, who said she works in the sex trade to support her drug habit. They gave the women prepacked bags that included juice, crackers, socks, hats, gloves, wipes, masks, and underwear.

Jones told them about the availability of shelter beds, but the women said they werent interested because of the early curfew. She then connected them to the Esperanza Health Center to help them get same-day Suboxone treatment for their opioid addictions.

Providing services is a better approach than anything else, Jones explained. We can provide connections to housing and recovery care. We build relationships with community members.

Jones knows her work is about building trust over time. We follow people and we meet them where theyre at, so when theyre ready to leave their trafficker or get out of commercial sex, theyre doing it in their own spirit.

Anyone who is a victim of human trafficking can call the Salvation Armys hotline at 267-838-5866 or its drop-in center at 267-886-8395, or email newdaydropin@gmail.com. Donations can also be dropped off at the center, preferably before drop-in hours.
A cheese-making firm is slashing prices after struggling to sell its stock during lockdown, while farmers are warning that their pigs are getting 'too fat' to be sold to supermarkets.

The Cornish Cheese Company faces throwing away up to two tonnes of blue cheese which it has been unable to sell during the Covid shutdown.

The company sells 80 per cent of its product to the hospitality sector, which has been crippled by government curbs on movement and has been closed since early January.

But with a three-week window before the cheese goes off, the company is now slashing prices in a bid to entice online customers into buying its products direct. Cheese lovers can buy 1kg of blue cheese for 16 down from 24, 700g for 12 down from 18, and 2kg of whole blue cheese for 27 down from 35.

It comes as farmers warn their pigs are getting so porky during lockdown that British supermarkets no longer want to buy them.

Farmers say Covid is causing knock-on delays within abattoirs, meaning pigs are being continuing to grow past their usual selling weight.

They warn supermarkets are now turning their noses up at the larger pigs, and say that Brexit red tape is making it even harder for them to export the porky pigs to the Continent.

The Cornish Cheese Company faces throwing away up to two tonnes of blue cheese which it has been unable to sell during the Covid shutdown

Meanwhile, farmers warn their pigs (pictured: library image) are getting so porky during lockdown that British supermarkets no longer want to buy them

The company sells 80 per cent of its product to the hospitality sector, which has been crippled by government curbs on movement and has been closed since early January

Cornish Cheese Company discounts The Cornish Cheese Company, based on Bodmin Moor, has slashed its prices to get rid of stock it can't sell. Its blue cheese takes about 10 weeks to mature and then has to be sold within six weeks. But with three weeks to go, the company is appealing to its customers direct to entice them to stock up. 1kg of Cornish Blue Cheese is now available for 16, down from 24; 2kg of whole Cornish Blue Cheese is available for 27, down from 35; 700g of Cornish Blue Cheese is available for 12, down from 18. Advertisement

But bosses at the Cornish Cheese company are determined to avert the double food disaster by selling direct to customers.

Ben Stansfield told the BBC: 'We were making this cheese back in October and September, and we didn't expect a lockdown in January, February, March and maybe even longer.

'And because of hospitality having to close we lost our wholesale business overnight. We have got a big fridge full - about two tonnes.

'Normally we could sell this easily with all the wholesalers open but it is all going to go off within two to three weeks.

'We are trying our best to not have to throw any away but we won't be able to sell it after that and you can't freeze two tonnes of cheese.'

The company, based on Bodmin Moor, Cornwall has developed its online platform in recent months and appealed on social media for people to buy the remaining stock.

Founder Philip Stansfield said: 'What catches us out is when lockdown finishes and you haven't got enough cheese.

'We could have sold twice as much last July and August which are our busiest months if we had had the stock. At the moment we are not sure when to start pushing again. It's a nightmare.

'If we don't open until May we have got to have cheese to sell as May, June, July and August is when it starts to get really busy for us.'

The company is currently only making cheese one day a week 'to keep us ticking over, and the milk being used', they explained.

Other cheese makers have cut back on production and have lost sales through pubs and restaurants being closed.

Martin Gaylard, from Curds and Croust, near Liskeard, said his soft cheese matures after about 20 days. 'I have had to put the brakes on,' he said.

'It affects me in terms of sales but doesn't affect me in terms of having lots of cheese with nowhere for it to go, because I'm not producing it.'

Meanwhile, farmers say a combination of Covid-19 chaos and Brexit hiccups mean their pigs are surviving too long and gaining weight as a result.

Anna Longthorp, an award-winning pig farmer in Howden, East Yorks, said: 'Pigs are getting bigger and bigger and bigger. We can't stop them growing.

Cramped abattoirs and pork packing plants have seen increasing numbers of workers sick with coronavirus. It means they have had to reduce their workload.

In turn, pigs are staying on the farm for longer and gorging themselves into obesity.

Anna Longthorp, an award-winning pig farmer in Howden, East Yorks, said: 'Pigs are getting bigger and bigger and bigger. We can't stop them growing.

'I have been trailering them all over the country to just get paid basically.

'A lot less than our cost of production.'

Two farmers, speaking to BBC Radio 4 last week, said that in some cases, the bigger a pig gets, the harder it is to sell.

One farmer said: 'Like any other manufacturing business, we have to produce to a spec and if we don't hit the spec, we don't get paid for the product.'

Another added: 'Once a pig hits a certain weight, it no longer fits in that packet, and so supermarkets penalise us massively.'

The National Pig Association estimated 100,000 pigs are stuck in lockdown on UK farms right now.

Brexit hiccups have also caused some delays, with some farmers having had issues exporting animals due to mountains of red tape and a lack of border control ports for livestock on the Continent.

John Royle, the National Farming Union's chief livestock adviser, said last week: 'There have been no live exports of any cattle, sheep or goats since January 1.

'That's because there are no border control posts for them at EU mainland ports.'

Slamming the difficulties, Zoe Davies of The National Pig Association said: 'We flagged it with Defra last year in June or July. But they basically said it was our problem.'

Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 15)  Malacanang denied on Monday that the administration is "extorting" from the United States, even after President Rodrigo Duterte threatened to end the Visiting Forces Agreement without sufficient compensation.

"Sa mga nagsasabing extortion, hindi po iyan extortion. 'Yan po ay pagtaguyod ng national na interes ng mga Pilipino, at dahil marami po tayong gastusin lalong lalo na sa COVID-19, bakit di tayo sumingil?" Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said in a briefing.

[Translation: To those who have been claiming that it's extortion, it is not extortion. It is a way of upholding the national interest of Filipinos because we have a lot of COVID-19 expenses, so why can't we ask for compensation?]

Roque reasoned that the Philippines should even be getting an amount close to the $16 billion compensation of Pakistan, which is equivalent to over 766 billion. Citing a study by US-based think tank Stimson Center on counterterrorism assistance, he noted that the country has only been getting over $3.9 billion, or over 186 billion, as of 2017.

"Ang nakukuha lang natin $3.9 billion. Malaki po ba iyan? Naku, barya po iyan kung ikukumpara sa mga nakukuha ng ibang bansa. For instance, ang Pakistan, kailan nga lang ba 'yan naging kaalyado ng Amerika?" Roque said.

[Translation: We are only getting $3.9 billion. Is that big enough? That's only loose change compared to what other countries are getting. For instance, Pakistan, when did it only become allies with America?]

"We think we should be getting something similar or close to that amount," Roque added, referring to Pakistan's compensation.

However, he clarified that while the amount could benefit the Philippines' COVID-19 response, it is the national government that will pay for the Western vaccines that will be delivered to the country. Roque denied any "inconsistency" with the previous stance of Duterte.

The President warned last December that he will proceed with the abrogation of the VFA if the US fails to produce at least 20 million vaccines for the Philippines.

READ: Duterte to US on VFA: No vaccine, better get out

"There is no inconsistency (in President Duterte's previous statement). I think the President is saying, 'show your commitment to the Philippines by allocating to us vaccines,' but we're not begging for the vaccine because we're going to pay for it," Roque said.

On Sunday, Vice President Leni Robredo slammed Duterte's pronouncement in his speech last week that the U.S. responsibility in the agreement "does not come free."

"Parang extortion lang. Parang kriminal eh, kung gusto mo nito magbayad ka muna," Robredo said in her radio show on Sunday.

READ: 'Parang extortion': Robredo slams Duterte's VFA threat

Former Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert Del Rosario also said in a statement on Monday that Duterte's stance is a "sentiment that is not shared by our patriotic soldiers and our countrymen who want to defend our West Philippine Sea against China."

Roque, however, claimed that America was "neutral" on the disputed South China Sea, including the Philippines' sovereign rights over the West Philippine Sea.

The VFA is a 1998 agreement between the Philippines and the United States on the protocol for American military personnel in the country. It is seen to support the Mutual Defense Treaty, another agreement which guarantees that the two countries will provide military aid to each other in case their metropolitan areas or territories in the Pacific are attacked by a foreign force.

Beijing continues to reject the Philippines' 2016 arbitration win over the West Philippine Sea. The U.S. government previously imposed sanctions on Chinese companies militarizing resources and helping the country advance its territorial claims in the disputed territory.
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White NHS staff are almost twice as likely as black medics to get the Covid vaccine, according to data.

The figures have prompted experts to warn that jab hesitancy among health workers could undermine the national roll-out.

Only 64 per cent of staff at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust had taken up the offer to get their first dose by February 3, a study showed.

While uptake was 71 per cent in white medics, the highest of any group, it plunged to half this level in black staff. This was despite research showing BAME groups are at higher risk of serious illness and death if they catch the virus.

It was also lower among South Asians, where only 60 per cent had received their first dose.

Doctors at the trust  the only occupation with a majority of BAME employees  were also least likely to get the jab, after only 57 per cent turned up to appointments.

And under-30s were less likely to get the jab than their older colleagues, which experts feared could be down to perceptions they are not at high risk from the virus.

As the drive peaked in early January before dropping considerably, the study's scientists said this implied all those who would get a vaccine 'had already done so'.

Professor Kamlesh Khunti, a SAGE member who led the study, today urged ministers to identify the reasons for the 'huge disparities' between groups.

'As well as all the other public health interventions, such as social distancing, hand hygiene, face coverings, and test and trace, vaccination is crucial if were going to get out of this pandemic,' he said.

'And this risk is not only to themselves and their families but to patients as well. Its crucial we get uptake in healthcare workers as high as possible.'

The results also showed no group had achieved the 85 per cent uptake experts say is needed for 'herd immunity', where the coronavirus stops spreading because enough people are protected.

Asked about the results, the Health Secretary Matt Hancock today called on doctors and nurses to get their jabs saying: 'It's important for your patients and of course it is important for the whole of society that we get this to as many people as possible.'

Vaccination rates among white employees were almost double those among black medics at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust, data up to February 3 showed

Data also showed that doctors were the least likely to have received their first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine at the trust. The scientists noted this was the only occupational group made up by a majority of BAME employees, which could explain the difference

Under-30s were also less likely to get the vaccine than older employees at Leicester hospitals. This may be because of perceptions they are less at risk from the virus, study scientists said

The above graph shows vaccine uptake by ethnic group over time, and the total number of vaccinations. It reveals a higher uptake among those from White backgrounds, and that the rollout peaked at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust in early January

Boris Johnson has been calling on all Britons to get the Covid vaccine. He is pictured visiting a jabs centre at the Indian Muslim Welfar Society's Al-Hikmah Centre in Batley, West Yorkshire

WHAT WAS THE UPTAKE IN LEICESTER HOSPITALS? Doctors checked the records of 19,044 healthcare workers at University Hospitals Leicester NHS Trust who had been offered the coronavirus vaccine. They found that uptake was higher among White staff than those from BAME backgrounds. Group Leicester NHS White employees South Asian staff Black staff By profession: Executives Nurses Facilities staff Doctors By age: Over-30s Under-30s % Uptake 64.5% 70.9% 58.5% 36.8%

73.2% 62.5% 60.7% 57.4% 68.4% 51.7% Advertisement

The study surveyed the medical records of almost 20,000 NHS staff at the trust, one of the largest in England, to identify gaps in vaccine uptake.

The records included information on age, sex, self-reported ethnicity, occupation and residential area for permanent, part-time and bank staff members.

Data on the hospital's vaccine programme was also collected, which showed it kicked off on December 12 and peaked between January 8 and 15 before dropping sharply.

This suggests no group will reach the 85 per cent coverage needed for 'herd immunity' by the end of today, the date by which the Government aims to have got the first dose to all NHS staff.

There were 11,500 white employees at the trust, of which 8,100 got the jab.

This compared to 4,900 South Asian employees, of which 2,800 got the jab, and 1,357 black employees, of which 500 got the jab.

As well as revealing higher vaccine hesitancy among those from BAME backgrounds, the results also showed that those in executive and administrative roles were most likely to get their first dose after 73.2 per cent were covered (2,500 staff out of 3,500).

They were followed by nurses, where 62.5 per cent (4,900 out of 7,800) turned up for shots, and those working in facilities and estates roles, where 60.7 per cent (1,400 out of 2,300) turned up.

The study authors said it was 'surprising' doctors were least likely to get the jab (1,700 out of 3,000) especially when noting influenza shot uptake was higher among doctors than other occupational groups in England last year.

But they added they were the only occupational group with majority BAME employees, which could explain the difference.

On lower uptake among those in facilities roles, they said this could be down to 'limited access to the email communications regarding vaccination, as well as factors interrelated to occupational role such as educational level, deprivation and ethnicity'.

When broken down by age the results also indicated under-30s were less likely to get the vaccine than the over-30s (10,000 out of 14,600), at 51.7 per cent compared to 68.4 per cent (2,290 out of 4,400).

Scientists behind the study said this was most likely due to a lower perceived risk from the virus in younger age groups.

They added this could also be explained by vaccination initially targeting 'those with risk factors for severe Covid-19 (including those advanced in age) and thus older staff may have had more time and opportunity to be vaccinated compared to their younger colleagues'.

When considered by deprivation, the results showed those from the most deprived areas were least likely to get the jab.

Employees living the most disadvantaged areas were only 57.4 per cent likely to have got the vaccine (1,700 out of 2,900). But those in the least deprived areas were 71.2 per cent likely to have received their first dose (3,300 out of 4,600).

Data on those who had previously been tested for the virus showed that 70 per cent of those with either a positive or negative test for antibodies turned up for vaccinations (8,500 out of 11,600). This compared with only 51 per cent among those who had never been tested (3,800 out of 7,500).

There was a similar uptake of the vaccine when results were compared by sex.

The data at the trust was also checked by those who have been tested for antibodies against the virus. It found those who had never got a test were least likely to also get the vaccine

When the results were broken down by deprivation, they revealed those who lived in the most deprived residential areas were less likely to get the jab than the least deprived

Above is Mufti Zubair Butt, a muslim imam and chaplain, receiving his first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine at Whetley Medical Centre in Bradford

Professor Khunti told The Guardian: 'We were expecting differences, but not these huge disparities, especially as seen in the black healthcare workers.

'We know that black populations are less likely to take up any vaccine, but to see this in healthcare workers was a surprise and a worry as well.'

He added: 'Its understandable for people to have concerns and we urgently need to identify reasons for vaccine hesitancy among healthcare workers and address their barriers.'

The scientists behind the study added that their results were only for one trust. The paper was published as a pre-print, meaning its results are yet to be scrutinised by other scientists.

Dr Julian Tang, a consultant virologist at Leicester Royal Infirmary who was not involved in the study, told MailOnline it was likely the results were 'representative to some extent' of the situation across the whole NHS.

'There are many cultural barriers to universal vaccination, particularly in different BAME populations,' he said.

'We are aware of this and can see this partly reflected in the annual primary influenza vaccination programme - where overall uptake is 50 to 70 per cent in most areas.'

Asked about the results on BBC Radio 4's Today Programme, Mr Hancock said: '(The Covid vaccine) it is safe it is effective and we need everybody to come forward and have the jab.

He added: 'I hadn't seen the data (behind this study), but I do know the take-up in the NHS is clearly rising  it's around four-fifths overall.

'But I also know take-up among black staff and staff from other ethnic minority groups is lower.'

Experts have warned take-up among ethnic groups may be lower because of historical mistreatment in vaccination programmes, increasing hesitancy.

The Government yesterday hit its target of vaccinating 15million by mid-February, as it now expands the rollout to those between 65 and 69 in England.

It had been aiming to get jabs to all members of the NHS, over-70s, care home residents and staff and the vulnerable by February 15.
Australia and New Zealand also joined the statement issued on February 14 by the Amabsaddors to Myanmar calling on security forces in Southeast Asian nation to refrain from violence against the anti-coup demonstrators and the civilians who are organising nationwide protests demanding the release of government leaders after the military seized power. Ambassadors to Myanmar from Australia, Canada; the Delegation of the EU and European Union Member States with presence in Myanmar: Denmark, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, and Sweden; New Zealand; Norway; Switzerland; the United Kingdom; and the United States signed the statement issued on Sunday.

The 17 Amabassdors wrote, We call on security forces to refrain from violence against demonstrators and civilians, who are protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government. We unequivocally condemn the detention and ongoing arrests of political leaders, civil society activists, and civil servants, as well as the harassment of journalists.

We also denounce the militarys interruption of communications, as well as the restriction of the Myanmar peoples fundamental rights and basic legal protections. We support the people of Myanmar in their quest for democracy, freedom, peace, and prosperity. The world is watching, they added.

Read - Japanese Couple Become Olympic Ambassadors After

Read - Medical Students Should Lead Vaccine Drive As Ambassadors: Karnataka's Health Minister

UN HRC adopts resolution on Myanmar military coup

The United Nations' top rights body on February 12 voted for a stringent resolution criticising Myanmars military coup and demanded the restoration of the civilian government along with the immediate release of Southeast Asian nations State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi. The resolution, deploring the military taking over power in Myanmar, the UN adopted a resolution by consensus among the Human Rights Councils 47 members. It called for the the immediate and unconditional release of all persons arbitrarily detained," and "the restoration of the elected government."

The council took an important step today by passing a resolution against the coup and urging respect for democratic and human rights. The resolution rightly called on the Myanmar military to release those arbitrarily detained, including Aung San Suu Kyi. But, it failed to address the most necessary condition for change: accountability, Grant Shubin, legal director of the Global Justice Center said in a statement.

Read - NCC Cadets Brand Ambassadors Of Unity, Discipline, Culture: J And K LG

Read - Barnier Arrives Ahead Of EU Ambassadors Meeting
NEW DELHI : Coal India Ltd (CIL) on Monday said its overall expenditure declined by 3.3% to 54,241 crore in the first nine months of the ongoing fiscal.

In a statement, the company also said its composite open cast production increased by 16.1% in the April-December period.

"CIL's overall expenditure dropped to 54,241 crore, during the referred period, from that of 56,079 crore for the same period year ago," it said.

According to the statement, the company clocked 6.3% output growth, 9.1% surge in coal off-take and 17.3% increase in Over Burden Removal (OBR) during the third quarter ended December 2020.

In terms of expenditure, employee benefit expenses dropped by 735 crore.

These include salaries, performance-related pay of the executives, performance- linked reward of the non-executives and coal mines provident fund contributions.

In recent years, CIL has seen superannuation of around 13,000 employees annually.

The company's manpower stood at 2.72 lakh at the beginning of the current fiscal compared to 3.22 lakh employees four years ago.

During the nine-month period of the current fiscal, manpower reduced by 13,800. This reduction is expected to continue for few more years which would further shrink the employee benefit expenditure, which currently stands close to 50 per cent of CIL's overall revenue expenditure.

As per the statement, there was less provisioning for stripping activity of 2,894 crore during the April-December 2020 period.

Stripping activity is the quantity of OB removed for the required coal produced. OBR is one of the significant components of the expenditure.

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The fossilised tooth of a Neanderthal child found in a cave near Jerusalem could be proof our cousins made it into Africa as Cairo is just 400km away, study claims.

Archaeologists from the Max Planck Institute re-examined the fossil record from Shuqba Cave - 28km northwest of Jerusalem - including a child's tooth.

The tooth was discovered in the cave in the 1920s and sat in a private collection for most of the 20th century until it was donated to the Natural History Museum in 2001.

Experts were able to determine the tooth belonged to a Neanderthal aged between seven and 12, raising questions about the history of hominin occupation of the area.

Before this study there was no evidence that Neanderthals - an extinct hominin species that lived in Eurasia until 40,000 years ago - had ever lived in Africa.

The tooth was discovered in the cave in the 1920s and sat in a private collection for most of the 20th century until it was donated to the Natural History Museum in 2001

Before this study there was no evidence that Neanderthals - an extinct hominin species that lived in Eurasia until 40,000 years ago - had ever lived in Africa. Stock image

Scientists discover a single gene alteration that may have separated modern humans from predecessors One single gene alteration in the brains of modern humans may be all that separates us from our extinct Neanderthal cousins, study shows. Researchers catalogued differences between the genomes of modern humans and those of Neanderthals. They found 61 genes that were different, with one - NOVA1 - the key to what makes us 'modern humans' because it influences other genes during early brain development. The researchers used the discovery to create a 'mini brain' that mimics a Neanderthal mind with stem cells. This enabled them to create a direct comparison with modern humans. They found that the 'Neanderthal-ized' brain organoid 'looked very different' to that of a modern human, with a distinctly different shape and different protein functions. This single genetic alteration could explain modern capabilities in social behaviour, language, adaptation, creativity and use of technology, the team from the University of California San Diego explained. Advertisement

Chris Stringer, a human evolution expert at the Natural History Museum, involved in the new discovery, said there were 'two fascinating aspects' to the find.

'Firstly, we have speculated for a long time whether Neanderthals ever got to Africa. Shuqba is just a few hundred miles from Africa, so this finding really adds to the possibility that they did make it there.

'Secondly, the stone tools found there were thought to be the product of modern humans,' Stringer said, adding it looks like Neanderthals also used those tools.

'This tooth reflects long term occupation rather than sporadic visits, it's likely that these kinds of tools were made by Neanderthals as well,' he said.

As well as being the most southerly example of Neanderthal occupation, it is also the first site discovered where there are both Neanderthal and modern humans.

This is the first time fossils of both Homo sapiens and Neanderthals have been discovered within the same region - marking it as a potential mixing ground.

'Up to now we have no direct evidence of a Neanderthal presence in Africa,' said Professor Stringer.

'But the southerly location of Shuqba, only about 400 km from Cairo, should remind us that they may have even dispersed into Africa at times.'

Homo sapiens and Neanderthals shared the use of a wide range of stone tool technologies - but the Nubian Levallosi technology had been thought to be exclusively used by modern humans until now.

This information was used to help identify sites exclusively populated by Homo sapiens - but Neanderthals now appear to have used the same technique.

Dr Jimbob Blinkhorn of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History and lead author of the paper, said sites like this are still a rarity,

The tooth was discovered in the cave in the 1920s and sat in a private collection for most of the 20th century until it was donated to the Natural History Museum in 2001

Experts were able to determine the tooth belonged to a Neanderthal aged between seven and 12, raising questions about the history of hominin occupation of the area

'Sites with both hominin fossils directly associated with stone tool assemblages remain a rarity - the study of both is critical to evaluate hominin occupations of Shuqba Cave and its place in the landscape.'

Shuqba Cave was first excavated in the spring of 1928 by Dorothy Garrod, who reported a rich assemblage of animal bones and Mousterian-style stone tools cemented in breccia deposits, often concentrated in well-marked hearths.

She also identified a large, unique human molar. However, the specimen was kept in a private collection for most of the 20th century, prohibiting comparative studies using modern methods.

A tooth dug up 17 miles from Jerusalem has been identified as belonging to a nine year-old Neanderthal child. The molar marks the southernmost known range of our primitive cousin

Photos of Nubian Levallois cores associated with Neanderthal fossils. This is the first time they've been found in direct association with Neanderthal fossils, which suggests we can't make a simple link between this technology and Homo sapiens

Shuqba Cave: A site of ancient archaeological significance Shuqba Cave was first excavated in the spring of 1928 by Dorothy Garrod, a pioneering female archaeologist. It is located on the norther bank of Wadi en-Natuf, about a 28km northwest of Jarusalem. Garrod reported a rich assemblage of animal bones and Mousterian-style stone tools cemented in breccia deposits, often concentrated in well-marked hearths. She also identified a large, unique human molar. However, the specimen was kept in a private collection for most of the 20th century, prohibiting comparative studies using modern methods. The area has been added to the UNESCO 'tentative list' for possible world heritage sites. Advertisement

The recent re-identification of the tooth at the Natural History Museum in London has led to new detailed work on the Shuqba collections.

'We've examined the size, shape and both the external and internal 3D structure of the tooth, and compared that to Holocene and Pleistocene Homo sapiens and Neanderthal specimens,' said Clement Zanolli, from Universite de Bordeaux.

'This has enabled us to clearly characterise the tooth as belonging to an approximately 9 year old Neanderthal child,' says Zanolli, adding 'Shuqba marks the southernmost extent of the Neanderthal range known to date.'

Illustrations of the stone tool collections from Shuqba hinted at the presence of Nubian Levallois technology so the team reinvestigated the museum collection.

'In the end, we identified many more artefacts produced using the Nubian Levallois methods than we had anticipated,' says Blinkhorn.

'This is the first time they've been found in direct association with Neanderthal fossils, which suggests we can't make a simple link between this technology and Homo sapiens.'

'Southwest Asia is a dynamic region in terms of hominin demography, behaviour and environmental change,' adds Simon Blockley, of Royal Holloway.

The region 'may be particularly important to examine interactions between Neanderthals and Homo sapiens,' the study co-author added.

'This study highlights the geographic range of Neanderthal populations and their behavioural flexibility, but also issues a timely note of caution that there are no straightforward links between particular hominins and specific stone tools.'

The findings have been published in the journal Scientific Reports.

A popular 21-year-old barmaid and mother-of-two took her own life after 'the fight got too hard', her devastated family have revealed.

Hundreds of tributes have been paid to Sophie Watts from Guisborough, North Yorkshire, after her sudden death on February 4. The mother leaves behind two children aged two and four and a partner.

Sophie's sister Bethany Watts, 24, told TeesideLive of how her 'party girl' sister 'lit up any room she walked into' and had been well known in the area - working at the Aruba nightclub, Redcar.

Sophie Watts, 21, from Guisborough, North Yorkshire, died on February 4

Bethany told the publication: 'She was the life and soul of every party and lit up any room she walked into. She was constantly pranking people.'

She told how her sister had called her friends as normal on the morning of her death.

On saturday around 150 people released orange balloons near the river at South Gare, Redcar, to remember Sophie, who often wore bright orange eyeshadow.

Bethany, who was very close to her sister, wrote in a tribute to Sophie: '21 years old and such a hard life she lived, nothing was ever easy for her and in the end the fight got too hard and she got too tired to fight anymore.

On Saturday around 150 people released orange balloons near the river at South Gare, Redcar, to remember Sophie (pictured), who often wore bright orange eyeshadow

'Our family is so broken at the minute. One minute we had her the next she was gone just like that.'

The sister told TeesideLive how Sophie had loved her job behind the bar at Aruba nightclub before the Covid pandemic.

Sophie is survived by her large family, mother and father Debbie and Peter, and her four sisters and three brothers.

The family have set up a GoFundMe to raise funds for Sophie's funeral and headstone.

The mother leaves behind two children aged two and four and a devoted partner

Sophie is survived by her large family, mother and father Debbie and Peter, and her four sisters and three brothers

A message on the page reads: 'We want to raise funds to give her the best send of she deserved because after all the best deserves the best.

'She was loved by many and going to be missed so very much words can't describe how we are feeling.

'She's left behind 2 gorgeous little boys and a partner who was her ride or die. Please help us give her the send of she deserves !!'

For confidential support call the Samaritans on 116123 or visit a local Samaritans branch, see www.samaritans.org for details.
Des soldats camerounais dans une rue de Bamenda, capitale de la region camerounaise anglophone du Nord-Ouest le 17 nove AFP/Archives/STRINGER

Two gendarmes, two soldiers, and four police officers are currently under detention at the Territorial Gendarmerie Brigade in Ndu for beating a civilian to near-death.

In a press release Monday, 15 February 2021, Navy Captain Atonfack Guemo Cyrille Serge, Head of Communication Division at Cameroons Ministry of Defence says the decision to detain the defense and security forces in question was taken by the Minister Delegate at the Presidency of the Republic in charge of Defence.

On Saturday, 13 February 2021, an amateur video appeared on the web, presenting a man being interrogated, then assaulted and severely beaten by some elements of the Defense and Security Forces. The scene took place in the afternoon of Thursday, 11 February 2021, in the locality of Ndu, Donga-Mantung Division, North West Region, the press release read in part.

Navy Captain Atonfack Guemo says the victim, identified as Jean Fai Fungong was suspected to be a criminal relay and local terrorist.

The press release ends with a condemnation of the acts carried out by the men in uniform.

Hear the military spokesman: The disciplinary, administrative and judicial investigations prescribed by the High Command and opened by the local administrative authorities and the Defence and Security Forces, will help in determining the magnitude of these intolerable acts, which are in contradiction with the respect of the rules of engagement on the one hand, and on the other hand, the protection of human rights, which constitute cardinal principles to which the elements of the Defence and Security Forces are firmly bound.

Eight security forces detained for violating human rights (c) Official document

Cameroon-info.net recalls that Adamu Shuaibu, Divisional Officer of Ndu Subdivision in Donga-Mantung Division had ordered disciplinary and legal measures against the state forces who tortured a man mercilessly with machetes.

A mixed squad comprising Cameroon's police officers, gendarmes, and soldiers beat Fai Jean Claude Yengong to near death on grounds that he refused to disclose the hideout of separatist fighters in Ndu and because his brother is a separatist fighter.

A video lasting 9 minutes and 35 seconds went viral on social media over the weekend. It showed the state forces pouring water on a man and taking turns to whip him with a machete.

In the video, a mixed force, comprising Police, Army, and Gendarmes, with unkempt hairs, are seen brutalizing a young man whose brother is allegedly an Ambazonia fighter.

One of the uniform officers is overheard saying 'Elanga Zime Bi', a statement understood to mean "We will deal with him, look at his eyes" in the Ewondo dialect.

As the video proceeds, they poured water on him, then used a machete to beat his stomach, his buttocks, and his legs.

"Where is your brother? For how long have you known that your brother is a separatist fighter? You will speak today," the state forces said as they gave the civilian snake beatings.

"My brother is in the bush. I know that my brother is a separatist fighter. I do not know his whereabouts. He is my younger brother," the man said.

Quizzed further where his brother lives, the man said he does not know. I do not know where my brother is.

But they said he was pretending. The man who initially was filming took the machete and asked the young man to lie down looking up, he then beat his legs until he passed out. One of the soldiers even suggested that the mans head be chopped off.

It is after he passed out that one of them said, "Leave him, leave him, to rest before you continue, we cannot tell if he is Amba for now."

After severe torture, The Post reports that Fai Jean Calude Yengong was released to his family and has been confined where he is receiving medical treatment.

The act is said to have been committed within the premises of the Ndu Council. Security forces are said to use the location for their operations, The Post reported.

The D.O. of Ndu said state forces carried out the horrendous inhumane torture of a certain Jean Fai on February 11, 2021, after a successful Youth Day celebration in Ndu. He says the security officers had the audacity to film and publish the act on social media.

You are hereby requested to immediately launch disciplinary and legal measures against the perpetrators, Adamu Shuaibu, Divisional Officer of Ndu said Sunday, February 14, 2021, in a fax to security chiefs in the area.
The Industrial Development Bank of India (IDBI) has recently released an advertisement inviting applications for the Bank Medical Officer (BMO) Posts purely on a contract basis. The willing and interested candidates can apply for the IDBI Bank Recruitment notification 2021 through the prescribed application format before 24 February 2021.

IDBI Recruitment 2021: Vacancy Details

The IDBI Recruitment 2021 contains a total of 23 vacancies for Bank Medical Officer (BMO) posts. The interested candidates can apply by going through the official website idbibank.in.

Category Vacancy SC 03 ST 01 OBC 06 EWS 02 UR 11 Total 23

IDBI Recruitment 2021: Eligibility Criteria

Educational Qualification: The candidate must have an MD/MBBS Degree from any recognised institute approved by the Medical Council of India in the Allopathic System of medicine.

Age Limit: The candidate's maximum age limit should not be above 65 years of age.

CRITERIA DETAILS Name Of The Posts Bank Medical Officer (BMO) Posts Organisation Industrial Development Bank of India (IDBI) Educational Qualification MD/MBBS Degree Graduate Experience 3-5 years of experience Job Responsibilities null Skills Required null Job Location Across India Salary Scale Rs.1000 per hour Industry Banking Application Start Date February 12, 2021 Application End Date February 24, 2021

IDBI Recruitment 2021: Selection Criteria

The candidates will be selected on the basis of their applications and Merit. At first, the applications will be scrutinised after which the eligible candidates will be called to appear for personal interviews for the final round of selection for the Bank Medical Officer Post.

Also Read: GAIL Recruitment 2021 For 25 Executive Trainee Posts Through GATE-2021 Score, Apply Online Before March 16

IDBI Recruitment 2021: How To Apply

The interested and willing candidates can apply for IDBI Recruitment 2021 for Bank Medical Officer Posts through the website idbibank.in before 24 February 2021 in a prescribed application format. The applicants can send their documents along with the application form to the General Manager, IDBI Bank at the official Mumbai address.

Download the IDBI Recruitment 2021 notification PDF for Bank Medical Officer (BMO) posts here
Several hundred fuel tanker trucks exploded at the Iranian-Afghan border this Saturday, injuring dozens of people and killing seven, The National reports, adding that the cause of the fire was as of yet unknown.

The fire that started the explosions broke out at the town of Islam Qala, some 120 km from the city of Herat in Afghanistan, where the tankers were parked after crossing the border from Iran.

According to our estimate, around 500 vehicles were in the parking lot of the border and were damaged, Yunus Qazizada, head of the Chamber of Commerce and Investment in Herat said, as quoted by The National. Our initial figures show that around $40-50 million worth of equipment and goods are affected.

The fire prompted Afghanistan to suspend its electricity imports from Iran, which left the city of Herat without power.

According to a report by Irans ISNA news agency, tanker drivers had said that more than 500 trucks carrying fuel and natural gas had burned, which also added that two of the explosions were so massive they could be seen from space.

Firefighters were still trying to put out the fire on Sunday, with local Afghan authorities concerned that forecasts of windy weather would fan the flames and make firefighters jobs harder, threatening other oil tankers parked in the vicinity.

A report by France 24 noted that many vehicles had fled the site of the explosion to Iran, which kept the border open, according to the countrys foreign ministry.

The AP notes that the road between the border town of Islam Qala and Herat is a dangerous area fraught with criminal gangs, including Talibans. It is also a key transport artery between Iran and its eastern neighbor, which is allowed to import oil, gas, and fuel from Iran despite U.S. sanctions.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:
Congress MPs Benny Behanan and Hibi Eden on Sunday alleged that they were denied seats at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's official programme here, though the projects he inaugurated fell in their constituencies. However BJP sources said the matter was brought to the notice of Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who had requested Eden not to keep away from the function.

Alleging breach of protocol at the function, the MPs alleged that no seats were reserved for them on the dias. They did not attend the function.

The prime minister inaugurated a Rs 6,000 crore Propylene Derivative Petrochemical Project of oil major Bharat Petroleum at Ambalamugal which falls in Behanan's constituency. The PM also launched three other programmes in Ernakulam constituency represented by Eden.

Attacking the centre and the state governments over the issue, the MPs said they would petition the Lok Sabha speaker for violating the protocol that MPs from the areas should be given seats on the dias of the Prime Minister's programme while launching the projects in their constituencies. They also questioned the organisers for allocating a seat for Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan, a Rajya Sabha MP from Maharashtra, on the dias.

They alleged they were denied seats at the programme, fearing they would protest against the soaring prices of fuel and the Modi government's decision to privatise the BPCL. Meanwhile, workers of the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) staged a protest against the fuel price hike and the centre's decision to privatise the BPCL.

The DYFI workers also launched 500 black balloons in the air and burnt an effigy of the prime minister in protest against the centre's privatisation move.

.

New Zealand's biggest city began a snap three-day lockdown Monday, forcing two million people to stay at home, as authorities scrambled to contain the nation's first outbreak of the highly contagious UK variant

Auckland, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2021 ) :New Zealand's biggest city began a snap three-day lockdown Monday, forcing two million people to stay at home, as authorities scrambled to contain the nation's first outbreak of the highly contagious UK variant.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern ordered the 72-hour lockdown for Auckland after three family members were found to be infected in the North Island city.

Schools and non-essential businesses have been forced to close and residents barred from leaving the city except for a few essential reasons.

The health ministry said genomic sequencing has since showed two of the cases were caused by the strain that was first detected in Britain. Tests from the third person were still pending.

"This result reinforces the decision to take swift and robust action around the latest cases to detect and stamp out the possibility of any further transmission," the ministry said.

Authorities said testing of the family's close contacts had so far found no further cases, raising hopes the lockdown will end quickly.

But health officials are still unsure how the strain entered the largely coronavirus-free country.

New Zealand's director-general of health, Ashley Bloomfield, said the initial focus was on the mother's workplace -- at a company providing laundry services to international flights -- "because of its obvious connections to the border".

He cautioned it was "too soon to rule in or out" any source of transmission and the woman had not been at work for eight days before testing positive.
As Americans anxiously watch variants first identified in the United Kingdom and South Africa spread in the United States, scientists are finding a number of new variants that originated here. More concerning, many of these variants seem to be evolving in the same direction  potentially becoming contagious threats of their own. In a study posted Sunday, a team of researchers reported seven growing lineages of the novel coronavirus, spotted in states across the country. All of them have evolved a mutation in the same genetic letter.

"Theres clearly something going on with this mutation," said Jeremy Kamil, a virologist at Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center Shreveport and a co-author of the new study. Its unclear whether it makes the variants more contagious. But because the mutation appears in a gene that influences how the virus enters human cells, the scientists are highly suspicious. "I think theres a clear signature of an evolutionary benefit," Kamil said.

The history of life is full of examples of so-called convergent evolution, in which different lineages follow the same path. Birds gained wings as they evolved from feathered dinosaurs, for example, just as bats did when they evolved from furry, shrew-like mammals. In both cases, natural selection gave rise to a pair of flat surfaces that could be flapped to generate lift  enabling bats and birds alike to take to the sky and fill an ecological niche that other animals could not.

Charles Darwin first recognized convergent evolution by studying living animals. In recent years, virologists have found that viruses can evolve convergently, too. HIV, for example, arose when several species of viruses shifted from monkeys and apes to humans. Many of those lineages of HIV gained the same mutations as they adapted to our species.

As the coronavirus now branches into new variants, researchers are observing Darwins theory of evolution in action, day in and day out.

Kamil stumbled across some of the new variants while he was sequencing samples from coronavirus tests in Louisiana. At the end of January, he observed an unfamiliar mutation in a number of samples.

The mutation altered the proteins that stud the surface of the coronavirus. Known as spike proteins, they are folded chains of more than 1,200 molecular building blocks called amino acids. Kamils viruses all shared a mutation that changed the 677th amino acid.

Investigating these mutant viruses, Kamil realized they all belonged to the same lineage. The earliest virus in the lineage dated to 1 Dec. In later weeks, it grew more common.

On the evening of his discovery, Kamil uploaded the genomes of the viruses to an online database used by scientists across the world. The next morning, he got an email from Daryl Domman of the University of New Mexico. He and his colleagues had just found the same variant in their state, with the same 677 mutation. Their samples dated to October.

The scientists wondered whether the lineage they had discovered was the only one to have a 677 mutation. Probing the database, Kamil and his colleagues found six other lineages that independently gained the same mutation on their own.

It is difficult to answer even basic questions about the prevalence of these seven lineages because the United States sequences genomes from less than 1% of coronavirus test samples. The researchers found samples from the lineages scattered across much of the country. But they cannot tell where the mutations first arose.

Id be quite hesitant to give an origin location for any of these lineages at the moment, said Emma Hodcroft, an epidemiologist at the University of Bern and a co-author of the new study.

It is also hard to say whether the increase in variants is actually the result of their being more contagious. They might have become more common simply because of all of the travel over the holiday season. Or they might have exploded during superspreader events at bars or factories.

Still, scientists are worried because the mutation could plausibly affect how easily the virus gets into human cells.

An infection begins when a coronavirus uses the tip of the spike protein to latch onto the surface of a human cell. It then unleashes harpoon-like arms from the spikes base, pulling itself to the cell and delivering its genes.

Before the virus can carry out this invasion, however, the spike protein has to bump into a human protein on the surface of the cell. After that contact, the spike becomes free to twist, exposing its harpoon tips.

The 677 mutation alters the spike protein next to the spot where our proteins nick the virus, conceivably making it easier for the spike to be activated.

Jason McLellan, a structural biologist at the University of Texas at Austin who was not involved in the study, called it an important advance. But he cautioned that the way that the coronavirus unleashed its harpoons was still fairly mysterious.

Its tough to know what these substitutions are doing, he said. It really needs to be followed up with some additional experimental data.

Kamil and his colleagues are starting those experiments, hoping to see whether the mutation does indeed make a difference to infections. If the experiments bear out their suspicions, the 677 mutation will join a small, dangerous club.

Convergent evolution has transformed a few other spots on the spike protein as well. The 501st amino acid has mutated in a number of lineages, for example, including the contagious variants first observed in the United Kingdom and South Africa. Experiments have revealed that the 501 mutation alters the very tip of the spike. That change allows the virus to latch onto cells more tightly and infect them more effectively.

Scientists anticipate that coronaviruses will converge on more mutations that give them an advantage  against not only other viruses but also our own immune system. But Vaughn Cooper, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Pittsburgh and a co-author of the new study, said lab experiments alone would not be able to reveal the extent of the threat.

To really understand what the mutations are doing, he said, scientists will need to analyze a much bigger sampling of coronaviruses gathered from across the country. But right now, they can look at only a relatively meager number of genomes collected by a patchwork of state and university labs.

Its ridiculous that our country is not coming up with a national strategy for doing surveillance, Cooper said.

Carl Zimmer. c.2021 The New York Times Company
Scuba divers at a coral reef while on a dive in the Red Sea waters off the coast of Israel's southern port city of Eilat

Israeli environmentalists are warning that a UAE-Israeli oil pipeline deal threatens unique Red Sea coral reefs and could lead to "the next ecological disaster".

The agreement to bring Emirati crude oil by tanker to a pipeline in the Red Sea port of Eilat was signed after Israel normalised ties with the Gulf Arab nation late last year and should come into force within months.

With experts warning of possible leaks and spills at the ageing Eilat port, and the Israeli environmental protection ministry demanding "urgent" talks on the deal, activists mobilised last week.

They held a protest in a parking lot overlooking Eilat's oil jetty against what they see as a disaster waiting to happen, chanting that profits will be made "at the expense of corals".

"The coral reefs are 200 metres (yards) from where the oil will be unloaded," said Shmulik Taggar, an Eilat resident and founding member of the Society for Conservation of the Red Sea Environment.

"They say the tankers are modern and there won't be any problem," he said, warning however that "there's no way there won't be a malfunction".

He predicted that with the projected arrival of two to three tankers a week, traffic will be "back-to-back".

Environmental activists gather for a protest at a parking lot overlooking an oil jetty in the port city of Eilat

This, he said, would also impact the aesthetic of a city promoting ecological tourism.

"You can't sell green tourism when you have oil tankers by the dock," he said.

Unique reefs

The Jewish state and the UAE established ties last year as part of the US-brokered "Abraham Accords".

One of the deals that followed was a Memorandum of Understanding between Israel's state-owned Europe-Asia Pipeline Company (EAPC) and a new entity called MED-RED Land Bridge Ltda joint venture between Abu Dhabi's National Holding company and several Israeli firms.

In October, EAPC announced a "binding MoU" with MED-RED to bring crude from UAE to Eilat and then transport it by pipeline to Israel's Mediterranean city of Ashkelon for onward export to Europe.

Taggar argued that deals benefitting the fossil fuel industry at the expense of the environment are "not in the spirit of our times".

Men row on standup paddle boards in the Red Sea waters near the Eilat-Ashkelon Pipeline Company's (EAPC) oil terminal

"It might have been appropriate in the 1960s and 1970s, before we were a developed state," he said.

Activists argue the deal evaded tough regulatory scrutiny because of EAPC's status as a state-owned firm working in the sensitive energy sector.

While coral populations around the world are under threat from bleaching caused by climate change, the reefs in Eilat have remained stable due to their unique heat resistance.

Eilat's coral beach reserve extends some 1.2 kilometres (almost a mile) off the city's coast, protecting reefs that are home to a rich variety of marine life.

But their proximity to the EAPC port puts them at grave risk, Nadav Shashar, professor of marine biology at Beersheba's Ben Gurion University, told AFP.

The infrastructure is not set up to prevent accidents and only designed "to treat pollution once it's already in the water," said Shashar, who is also head of marine biology and biotechnology at Eilat's Interuniversity Institute for Marine Science.

Shashar, one of 230 experts who petitioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu against the deal, argued that with the increase of shipments, "the result will be a constant leak of oil pollution".

Shmulik Taggar, a resident historian of Israel's Red Sea port city of Eilat and founding member of the Society for Conservation of the Red Sea Environment

'Get in the way'

After the agreement was struck in October, EAPC said it could increase oil flow through Eilat by "tens of millions of tonnes per year".

Contacted by AFP, the company declined to discuss the deal's specifics but stressed that its equipment was "state of the art" and up to international standards.

The environmental protection ministry said it had fulfilled its oversight role but also called for an "urgent discussion of all relevant governmental bodies" to review the deal.

The talks, a statement said, "would examine all anglesincluding the environmental onesof increasing the volume of crude oil being transported".

Shashar said the goal was not to close down EAPC but to "limit the extent of its use to something that can be handled".

Some activists have voiced more militant views, including Michael Raphael of the international Extinction Rebellion movement.

While coral populations around the world are under threat from bleaching caused by climate change, the reefs in Eilat have remained stable due to their unique heat resistance

Youths jump into the Red Sea water off an abandoned oil jetty in Israel's southern port city of Eilat

Raphael, who came to the recent rally armed with a bullhorn, said he was aiming to set up an Extinction Rebellion chapter in Eilat to resist the UAE deal.

"If the problem isn't solved, we'll have to get in the way of things," he said. "We don't just demonstrate ... we disrupt the work of those who pollute."

 2021 AFP
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New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Supreme Court on Monday allowed jailed scribe Siddique Kappan to meet his terminally ill mother in Kerala, and directed him to return within five days. The Uttar Pradesh government claimed that Kappan's wife is collecting money in Kerala under his name and he has been projected as a "martyr" who has made a very big sacrifice.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing Kerala Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ), submitted before a bench headed by Chief Justice S.A. Bobde that according to doctors Kappan's mother is terminally ill and she maybe alive for only a few days. "Please allow him to visit his mother for 5 days and he will come back", said Sibal.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the UP government, contended before the bench also comprising Justices A.S. Bopanna and V. Ramasubramanian that it is learnt that his mother is not in a serious condition as she has been projected and cited Kappan's PFI links. The Chief Justice replied, "We are willing to commit the error, what if she dies, what will you do?" Mehta said he understands the emotional aspect of the matter but insisted tough conditions should be imposed on Kappan when he visits his mother in Kerala. "Money is being collected under his name, as if he is some kind of a martyr," said Mehta.

The Chief Justice said: "We will ensure that this is not done." Mehta replied: "Big posters of his are being put up across the city, his wife is collecting money as if he has done service for the state and projected him as a martyr. He is not a journalist. Money is being collected and emotions are being stoked," said Mehta.

The top court replied that it will ensure that nothing of this sort is done when he visits his mother, and granted 5 days' conditional bail to Kappan.

Kappan, Secretary of KUWJ, was arrested by Uttar Pradesh Police last October while on his way to Hathras where a young Dalit woman had died after allegedly being gang-raped. The police have alleged he was visiting the village to stoke communal and casteist differences.
Of all the many cluster bombs left behind when Andrew Bailey left the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for the Bank of England a year ago, the most dangerous was the closure of Neil Woodfords investment empire.

The decision left up to 500,000 savers exposed to an estimated half-a-billion pounds of losses.

It is aggravating and disturbing that 20 months have passed since trading was halted in Woodfords Equity Income Fund, and still no official report into the imbroglio has seen the light of day. Woodford, so far as we know, is still an authorised person and feels able to start all over again.

Of all the many cluster bombs left behind when Andrew Bailey left the FCA for the Bank of England a year ago, the most dangerous was the closure of Neil Woodford's investment empire

Allowing the FCA to investigate itself was a huge mistake. The Government should have used the powers it has under Section 82 of the 2012 Financial Service Act to launch a judicial inquiry.

Dame Elizabeth Glosters rigorous report into the failure of London Capital & Finance was done and dusted in 18 months.

In the corporate world, Alison Levitt QCs devastating report into working practice and governance at Boohoo was completed in a remarkable three months.

Going back into history, the Singapore and UK reports into the collapse of Barings, one of the UKs most venerated banks, were completed in a year.

The slug-like progress is bad enough, but so is the failure of the FCA to explain. New chief executive Nikhil Rathi offered no comment at his first public appearance in December 2020.

At the very least, there should be an update on progress or an interim report. Trust in the UKs savings culture depends on it.

Lengthy delay is unacceptable and particularly unhelpful as a mountain of litigation against authorised corporate director Link and investment platform Hargreaves Lansdown piles up.

The prevarication inevitably will lead to suspicion among Woodford savers of some kind of whitewash.

Or even worse, the report is being buried by endless Maxwellisation of the kind which has held up the one into management failings at collapsed bank HBOS for nearly a decade.

Shelving publication is damaging, not just for the FCA, but also for Bailey, who was on the burning deck when the fire ignited.

Pump priming

A release to the stock exchange on the refinancing of pubs group Mitchells & Butlers requires more than a little decoding.

The rescue vehicle, Odyzean, brings together three investors: Piedmont, Elpida and Smoothfield, all hiding their light under a bushel.

A decade ago, these investors were at war. Veteran trader Joe Lewis  owner of Spurs  sought to keep horse-racing moguls JP McManus and John Magnier at arms length, along with other super-loaded members of the Sandy Lane, Barbados set, Michael Tabor and Derrick Smith.

Still, in the hour of need the three groups have come together to support a 350million fund-raising, which will leave them owning 55 per cent of the stock. Where this leaves the minority shareholders is anybodys guess.

Lewis and his co-investors are seeking to tighten their grip by dumping a team sheet of independent directors built up to keep previously warring factions apart. Pubs and the beerage, along with most hospitality, are listing badly as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

So it may be just as well that traditional owners have allowed in outside investors. Suffolk-based Greene King was sold in 2019 to CK Asset, a vehicle controlled by Hong Kongs richest entrepreneur, Li Ka-shing, who also owns the UKs biggest container port Felixstowe as well as water companies.

London brewer Fuller, Smith and Turner sold the famous Griffin Brewery to Japanese booze firm Asahi but hung onto the pubs.

The call from Tim Martin of Wetherspoons for early reopening to save an industry on its knees indicates the degree of hurt. Ownership of much of the industry by rich outsiders may not be so bad after all.

Towering error

All the critical decisions have been made now. But if ever there was a moment when Vodafone, as a leading FTSE 100 company, wanted to demonstrate its fealty to the City and the institutions which backed its growth over the last couple of decades, it was now.

Instead, it is opting to float its Vantage Towers enterprise  including its recently added UK network  in Frankfurt.

Can you imagine Siemens, RWE or any other major German business opting to do the splits in London?

Thank you for reading!

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Fancy cooking up some tasty treats for astronauts on interstellar missions? Great, but remember, their food must be able to be cooked and eaten in space, feeding these far-flung travelers as they head to Mars. US$500,000 is up for grabs for the winners of this Deep Space Food Challenge.

Have you got what it takes to be a space chef? Then this is the challenge for you. But Michelin-starred gastronomes can step aside, because the Deep Space Food Challenge from NASA, in collaboration with the Canadian Space Agency, is calling for participants to invent new systems and technologies to feed astronauts on their space missions.

And that's no mean feat. Space food research has already developed special ultra-high-calorie chocolate bars to provide astronauts with energy but keep food weights on board low. And for years, NASA has been studying the potential to grow fresh fruit and vegetables in space to offer healthier options to humans on missions.

The aim of this new challenge is to find innovative ways of sustaining astronauts traveling to Mars. They may not be able to enjoy hearty stews or grandma's beef casserole, but space travelers will nevertheless need some comfort during the three years -- minimum -- this interstellar voyage requires.

As well as feeding astronauts, the challenge also envisages putting new systems and technologies to use to cultivate healthy and fresh products in the most extreme locations of the globe.

Would-be participants have until May 28 to sign up, and until July 30 to present their innovative projects. The winners (the top 20 teams) will share half a million dollars, or $25,000 each. But the prize is only available to participants in the US. Teams in Canada can take part in a similar initiative to win between CA$30,000 and $380,000. International teams can also enter, although no prize money is available.

Stay up to date with news from the challenge on their Instagram page.
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-16 01:53:12|Editor: huaxia

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BAGHDAD, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Iraqi Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) said that it would use more than 70,000 verification devices in the elections slated for Oct. 10, official al-Sabah newspaper reported Monday.

Jumana al-Ghalai, spokeswoman of the IHEC, told al-Sabah that "the electoral commission would use 70,704 voters' verification devices, in addition to 63,000 sorting devices in the upcoming elections."

The accuracy of the verification devices is 100 percent because it depends on matching the voter's fingerprints, al-Ghalai said.

She also said that these devices would work even if the power is cut off because they are provided with chargers that would give them a sufficient work period, the newspaper added.

This procedure by IHEC came to ensure the integrity of the elections in accordance with international standards to restore the citizens' confidence in the electoral process, as many Iraqis believe the 2018 parliamentary elections were marred by fraud and irregularities.

On Jan. 19, the Iraqi government approved Oct. 10 as the new date for the country's early elections to allow the IHEC more time to complete preparations.

The last parliamentary elections in Iraq were held on May 12, 2018. Enditem
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Getting less than five hours sleep a night can harm brain health and increase dementia risk, a new study has found.

New research published in the journal Aging found that not getting enough sleep doubled both Alzheimers risk and the risk of a premature death.

The study was based on 2,610 over-65s who completed sleep questionnaires as part of the National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS) in 2013 and 2014.

Researchers at Brigham and Womens Hospital, Boston, looked at respondents answers to questions relating to sleep disturbance and deficiency. They examined how participants rated their alertness, frequency of naps, how long it took to fall asleep, snoring and sleep duration and quality.

Data was also collected for up to five years on patient outcomes like dementia and death from any cause. Where necessary, this information was sourced from carers.

Overall, experts found a strong link between sleep problems and dementia over time, Independent reported.

How long someone took to fall asleep was also linked to their dementia risk, with those who frequently took longer than 30 minutes facing a 45% higher risk of incident dementia.

Napping often, struggling to stay alert and poor sleep quality were also linked to a greater risk of death.

Previously, it was believed sleep problems in people diagnosed with Alzheimers were simply a symptom of the disease. But evidence is growing that sleep problems may have a role to play in the conditions development.
The Nagol is Back! VTOs guide to this years Nagol, plus where to stay and play in south, central and north Pentecost.
It was just a touch  a light one  and it lasted for only a moment. I was a 13-year-old boy at the Rock Hill Boy Scout Camp. His name was Ray, and he was the camp medic.

The older scouts called him 'Gay Ray,' and taunted and teased us about our inevitable encounter with him when the itch of the mosquito bites became too much to bear. It happened almost precisely like the older kids said it would.

Covered in bites, I went to the Medical Cabin. He told me to take my clothes off. I complied. He looked at my body and examined the bites, just like they said he would. He began applying an ointment just like they said he would.

I remember being paralyzed as his hands moved up my body and brushed over my penis. I remember all of this with perfect clarity up to the moment I was touched. The next part is fuzzier. I just know that I left.

Then, I came back to camp, and I must have had a look on my face because I remember the laughing. The look on my face must have looked familiar to the other boys because it was the same one they must have had when they returned from Ray's exam.

Camp continued, and I made sure never to return the Medical Cabin.

When I got home, I told my parents. The adults huddled, and the collective decision they made was to deal with it internally. He wasn't turned into the police because the consensus of the adults was that dealing with law enforcement would be traumatic for all of the boys involved.

In the end, we were told that Ray wouldn't return. I don't know what happened to him, and even when the day came that I had the power, money and ability to find out and do something to him, or about him, I chose not to.

Something else happened in that cabin that day. The extroverted little boy who walked in died; an introverted boy with deep trust issues walked out.

Before that day, I have no memory of ever feeling anger. After that day  and despite the passage of so many years  the anger has never left. It's always there; below the surface. It has risen up many times over the years.

Later in life that anger would immolate my faith in the Catholic Church. My faith had been diminished to a flicker of flame by the time I served in the White House.

I remember feeling like something that had anchored me was stolen. I felt lost in a strange way, though at the time, I would never have described myself as particularly religious.

I reached out to see if I could get an audience with the man who had presided over my Confirmation at St. Luke's Church in North Plainfield, New Jersey.

By this point, he was a Monsignor and the acting Auxiliary Bishop of the Metuchen Diocese. When I met with him in Washington, he was his Eminence Theodore Cardinal McCarrick.

Learning that the man I trusted to share my soul and the deepest memories of my violation was amongst the most prolific of the Catholic Church's sex criminals permanently shattered my faith and left me estranged from God.

It has taken nearly 16 years since that betrayal to find faith again, which I have during the process of my conversion to Judaism.

A touch on a table at age 13 that lasted seconds has been a defining event in my life. It never went away. That moment bequeathed me the three companions of my life that are always close and often present: anger, shame and depression.

Depression has always been the companion I feared the most, and it something I was too ashamed to admit I was struggling with. I found help in a most unlikely place: Curtis Houck is a writer for NewsBusters.

He attacks me and the Lincoln Project with fervor and glee, and yet one day he wrote bravely about his struggles with depression. When I read it, I felt like it was meant for me and I reached out to him to thank him. He saved my life and liberated me from a fear of seeking help.

I will always be grateful for his courage and I am talking about my struggle in an open way for the first time because maybe it will be the case that I can help just one person understand what I couldnt until I was almost 50 years old. It wasnt my fault.

I met a man for the first time in my life in late 2006. His name was John Weaver.

I met him at a fundraiser for Arnold Schwarzenegger where John McCain was the headliner at the end of the 2006 campaign. I arrived at that event with Arnold and I left with McCain.

Within months, under Weavers leadership the campaign had collapsed and was bankrupt. During all the time I worked for John McCain I never heard a single person ever whisper that John Weaver was a predator.

I did not have a professional relationship with John Weaver again until December 2019.

I have said on the record that I learned about John Weavers misconduct this past January. I know this is true, and I have certainty that the Lincoln Project independent investigation into John Weavers conduct will validate this.

My purpose in writing this isn't to express what and when I knew about John Weaver, but how I feel about him, what he did and how many people he hurt.

This is my truth. John Weaver has put me back into that faraway cabin with Ray, my Boy Scout leader. I am incandescently angry about it. I am angry because I know the damage that he caused to me, and I know the journey that lies ahead for every young man that trusted, feared and was abused by John Weaver.

I know the shame, the guilt, the doubt, the depression and anger that lies ahead. I know John Weaver will be a life-long companion for them in the way that Ray has been for me.

I detest John Weaver in a way I can't articulate. My heart breaks that young men felt unseen and unheard in an organization that I started. I am ashamed of it.

I promise that we will release the full findings of what we discover through an independent investigation.

There is another truth about John Weaver of which I must speak. Like all predators, he is a skilled liar, and like all predators, he left clues.

I had the surreal experience in the last month of being grilled by a national newspaper about my knowledge of John Weavers misconduct.

When I got off that call, I talked to another reporter from the same newspaper who said the newspaper has known for years.

Since John Weavers misconduct was made public, I learned about another national reporter that was going to write about Weaver, but then was ultimately dissuaded to do so by Weaver because he had told the reporter that his cancer had returned, and he had just six months to live.

I was asked by a reporter if I thought the heart attack he told us about was real. The truth is: I don't know. I responded by saying I don't know if he lives in Texas. I just know that he is a liar and a predator, and I wish our paths never crossed. Unfortunately, they did.

I wish John Weaver was not a co-founder of the Lincoln Project, but as hard as I wish for that to be, I cant change that he was. I am enormously proud of the Lincoln Project and what we have accomplished to-date.

I believe we built the most successful and politically lethal SuperPAC in history. We built a movement with millions of people, and we played a decisive role in Donald Trumps defeat.

During these last weeks, I have been consumed by anger and rage as I have seen the attacks from the rancid collection of liars, thugs and fascists, including Donald Trump Jr. and Laura Ingraham, attack the Lincoln Project, my character and the character of my friends over John Weavers amoral predations.

I am in a tough business, and I know what I signed up for. I am long past the moments of fear that gripped me when FBI agents showed up at my house to tell me I was on the hit list of the Trump bomber.

The truth is that these attacks awakened all of my old companions at once  shame, anger and depression. For those around me, it is the anger that has been most visible. For those who love me, it has been the depression.

Either way, it has not brought out my best self. I am not the daily manager of the Lincoln Project, but I am the senior leader. As the senior leader, it is my responsibility to set an example and to assume accountability.

I would like to apologize to Jennifer Horn. I let my anger turn a business dispute into a public war that has distracted from the fight against American fascism. Jennifer was an important and valuable member of our team.

Truth be told, I didnt interact with Jennifer very often, but I always enjoyed the occasions when we did. She deserved better from me. She deserved a leader who could restrain his anger. I am sorry for my failure.

Yesterday, I was shown correspondence between Jennifer Horn and Amanda Becker, a reporter at The 19th News. I was told it came from an anonymous source.

That direct message should never have been made public. It is my job as the senior leader to accept responsibility for the tremendous misjudgment to release it.

I apologize on behalf of the organization to both Jennifer Horn and Amanda Becker. I woke up this morning, and realized Ive been fighting for a long time. Its taken a toll. Im tired.

Presently, the Lincoln Project board is made up of four middle-aged white men. That composition doesnt reflect our nation, nor our movement.

I am resigning my seat on the Lincoln Project board to make room for the appointment of a female board member as the first step to reform and professionalize the Lincoln Project.

The Lincoln Project was built to fight. It is my deepest hope that, despite the recent internal events that have distracted from our cause, you will entrust in us to continue to fight for what the entire Lincoln Project movement believes in: combatting the rising tide of fascism and authoritarianism in this country.

We are one election away from seeing the end of American democracy. This fight will go on for the rest of my life.

For me, its time to step back from the front  to get healthy mentally, physically and spiritually. I look forward to being on Real Time with Bill Maher tonight on HBO, and then to taking some much-needed time off.

Stay strong. There is much work to be done.

Steve
A young Liberal staffer has broken down in tears as she told of how she felt pressured to stay silent after being allegedly raped on Defence Minister Linda Reynolds' couch - and felt 'alone' and 'suicidal' after it happened.

Brittany Higgins, 26, opened up to The Project's Lisa Wilkinson about what she says happened to her in Parliament House two years ago ahead of the 2019 national election.

Ms Higgins was 24 years old and in her dream job as a ministerial media adviser to Defence Minister Linda Reynolds when she was allegedly raped by a powerful senior staffer widely regarded as a 'rising star' in the Liberal Party.

Weeks before the 2019 Federal election, internal Parliament House police referred the alleged rape to the Australian Federal Police for investigation.

Ms Higgins said the AFP investigators couldn't get the CCTV footage from Parliament House of the night when she and the senior staffer entered the building.

The investigation was proceeding until a few weeks before the 2019 Federal election, when Ms Higgins said she felt like she was given a choice between justice and her job.

Fiona Brown, a senior adviser to Prime Minister Scott Morrison who had been seconded to Minister Reynolds' office as chief of staff when the male staffer left, gave her a choice, she said.

She could either go to Western Australia to be part of Minister Reynolds' team on the other side of the country - or go home and wait out the six weeks remaining on the staffer contract to process what had happened - but she would not be coming back.

Ms Higgins broke down in tears as she spoke of the pressure she felt to choose between justice through the police or her career. She wanted to keep her dream job but was sent to WA

Ms Higgins said at that moment she realised her alleged rape was now a political issue, and her job was on the line.

She felt forced to choose between justice and her dream job - and felt pressured not to proceed with her case through the AFP, she said.

The former Parliamentary staffer broke down in tears as she told Lisa Wilkinson of her devastating choice.

'I had worked my entire life to get here. I wanted this future. I wanted to be a part of it for my entire working life. So yeah, I went to WA,' she said.

Brittany Higgins, then 24, has alleged she was raped by a colleague inside Parliament House in March 2019

In Western Australia Ms Higgins had no support network of friends and family.

She was suicidal and alone, working seven days a week and living out of a hotel room, she said.

'I was pretty suicidal to be honest at the time, cause youre just alone, its really hard,' she said, brushing away tears.

Ms Higgins said she felt as though the decision to send her to the other side of the country had been intentional and that Minister Reynolds was avoiding her, despite having initially encouraged her to go to the police and report her alleged rape.

She said the culture of being a team player meant she was discouraged from going to the police for fear of letting the side down.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison spoke words of support for Ms Higgins in Parliament, saying that at all times, guidance was sought from her about how she wanted to proceed with the allegations.

Ms Higgins said her leg was 'crushed' during the alleged rape and took a photo of the alleged bruise in the bathroom (pictured)

'This important best practice principle of empowering Ms Higgins is something the government always sought to follow in relation to this matter,' he said.

'The government has aimed to provide Ms Higgins with her agency, to provide support to make decisions in her interests and to respect her privacy.

'This offer of support and assistance continues. It is important that Ms Higgins' views are listened to and respected,' he said.

But Ms Higgins told The Project that even though she went down the 'right path' to report the problem, the Liberal party was not there with real support.

Questions have now been raised about whether Senator Reynolds (left in right image) should apologise for her handling of Ms Higgins' allegations

When she started feeling panicked walking through the entrance of Parliament House, she alleged that Workplace Minister Michaelia Cash made it clear that she would have to suck it up and deal with it, or leave.

Ms Higgins had to resign in the end while her alleged rapist went on to get a great job in Sydney, she said.

She said no consequences had come to the senior staffer who she says raped her on Ms Reynolds' ministerial couch as she lay, drunk and passed out after a night out with colleagues in the early hours of March 23, 2019.

It was less than three weeks after starting a new job in Minister Reynold's office, and Ms Higgins had organised a Friday night drinks event with her contacts and colleagues.

The well-connected senior male staffer had been invited in a professional context.

Ms Higgins revealed that she noticed he was buying her drinks, but she had thought he was rewarding her for having done a good job organising her first after-work function in her new role.

Soon, she was inebriated.

She was so drunk that she fell over in a 'face plant' and decided to leave.

The male staffer offered to get a cab with her as he was heading in the same direction - but he said he needed to stop at Parliament House to pick something up, she said.

Ms Higgins described going through the back entrance to Parliament House, passing through security and riding the lift up to Defence Minister Reynolds' suite.

Ms Higgins pictured with Senator Micahela Cash (left) former Liberal Party deputy leader Julie Bishop (right)

As the staffer was taking a long time, Ms Reynolds said she fell asleep on the couch.

The next thing she knew, she woke up being raped, she said, in pain with a sweaty senior staffer on top of her, her leg being crushed beneath his weight.

'I don't know why I knew he was almost finished but I felt like it had been going on for a while or that he was almost done, he was sweaty, I couldn't get him off of me. At this point I started crying,' she told The Project.

Ms Higgins said she told the staffer to stop at least six times but he didn't.

Government statement on incident A spokesman said: 'The Government takes all matters of workplace safety very seriously. No one should feel unsafe in a workplace. 'On Tuesday, March 26, senior staff in Minister Reynolds' office became aware of an incident that occurred in the Minister's office outside of work hours. This incident involved two staff. It was initially treated as a breach of the Statement of Standards for Ministerial Staff. 'After further consultation with one of the staff members over the following days, it became clear to senior staff that there were elements of the incident that may be of a more serious nature. 'The staff member was notified that should they choose to, they were able to pursue a complaint, including a complaint made to the police, and that to do so was within their rights. They were informed that they would be assisted and supported through that process. 'During this process, the Minister and a senior staff member met with the staff member in the Minister's office. Given the seriousness of the incident, the meeting should have been conducted elsewhere.' 'The Minister encouraged the staff member to speak with the police in order to assess the options available to them. At this meeting, the staff member indicated they would like to speak to the Australian Federal Police, which the Minister supported and the office facilitated.' Advertisement

Once he finished raping her, he left. Ms Higgins couldn't get off the couch. She said she sustained a large bruise from where her rapist was pinning her down with his weight.

A security guard then came into the room but he did not call for medical help.

On Monday, Ms Higgins returned to work as did the senior staffer who allegedly raped her, and nothing happened, she said.

On Tuesday, a senior advisor to Prime Minister Scott Morrison, director of operations Fiona Brown, was seconded to the office as chief of staff, she said.

Ms Brown called in the senior staffer, Ms Higgins said, and after 45 minutes, he emerged from the meeting and began packing his things.

Ms Higgins was called in next for what started out as a disciplinary meeting for being inside Parliament House after hours.

She was told to sign the Ministerial Code of Conduct again, she said.

After Ms Higgins revealed her rape in the meeting, however, she said the tone changed from disciplinary to 'management' of a political threat.

Ms Higgins said Ms Brown gave her the rest of the day off and a brochure with a number for a psychologist in the employee assistance program - for which there was a two month wait.

She was interviewed by the special internal Parliament House branch of the AFP.

Ms Higgins pictured in front of Parliament House, excited that her career was blossoming

After the incident, Senator Reynolds summoned her to a formal employment meeting in the same room where the alleged rape occurred.

Ms Higgins said she couldn't remember much that was said at that meeting as her mind blanked out and all she could focus on was the couch where the alleged rape took place, like a loop playing over and over in her mind, reliving the horror.

She said she asked for the CCTV footage showing the night she entered Parliament House with the staffer, but says they wouldn't give it to her.

Ms Higgins said while Senator Reynolds encouraged her to go to the police, and said she would be supported, it felt insincere, like she was box-ticking for human resources.

She said Ms Brown became her only point of contact in the office that she could discuss the alleged assault with, but that the issue was down-played as if it was her issue to deal with alone - and that if she couldn't deal with it then she should leave.

Eventually she resigned, losing her cherished career that she had worked all her life for.
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South Carolina recorded more than 1,100 new confirmed cases of the coronavirus on Feb. 15 and 31 additional deaths.

A total of 24,556 molecular tests have been reported statewide since the beginning of the pandemic, not including antibody tests, according to the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control.

Efforts to increase testing and vaccinations for COVID-19 are ongoing.

Last week, Clemson University announced that five teams of researchers at the school have received funding to develop tests and strategies that can be used to continue fighting the pandemic on campus and in the surrounding community. Each team was awarded $25,000 from the university to complete the work.

Specifically, the project aims to develop new long-lasting sanitizing solutions, faster diagnostic tests and tools to more accurately predict the spread and severity of the virus, according to a news release.

Windsor Westbrook Sherrill, Clemson's associate vice president for health research, said Clemson researchers have risen to the challenge of finding new ways to fight COVID-19.

The research will build upon current COVID-19 research and data sets gathered by the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments lab recently established at Clemson, the release said.

Statewide numbers

New cases reported: 1,109 confirmed, 97 probable.

Total cases in S.C.: 427,763 confirmed, 61,255 probable.

Percent positive: 6.5 percent.

New deaths reported: 31 confirmed, 5 probable.

Total deaths in S.C.: 7,180 confirmed, 854 probable.

Percent of ICU beds filled: 73.6 percent.

How does S.C. rank in vaccines administered per 100,000 people? 45th as of Feb. 14, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Sign up for our new health newsletter The best of health, hospital and science coverage in South Carolina, delivered to your inbox weekly. Email

Sign Up!

Hardest-hit areas

In the number of newly confirmed cases, Charleston, Greenville, Lexington and Spartanburg counties saw the highest totals.

What about the tri-county?

Charleston County had 86 new cases on Feb. 15, while Berkeley counted 38 and Dorchester saw 34.

Deaths

Six of the new confirmed deaths reported were among people age 35 to 64, with the remainder of the patients age 65 and older.

Hospitalizations

Of the 1,222 COVID-19 patients hospitalized as of Feb. 15, 301 were in the ICU and 173 were using ventilators.

What do experts say?

The CDC encourages folks to continue to wear a mask, avoid crowds, stay 6 feet from others and avoid poorly ventilated spaces.

Dr. Linda Bell, DHEC's chief epidemiologist, said now is not the time to relax these prevention measures.

The CDC released guidance last week stating that wearing two well-fitting masks on top of each other enhances their effectiveness.

People who are out and about in the community are urged to be tested for COVID-19 once a month or sooner if they develop symptoms or have been around someone who has tested positive for the virus.
A Scottish dessert parlour owner has been branded 'savage' for his hilariously scathing responses to negative reviews on Just Eat.

Masam Ali, owner of Shuga Daddy in Paisley, Renfrewshire, hit out at an unhappy customer who complained on Saturday about portion size by saying he would take their advice and 'flush it down the toilet'.

The Just Eat reviews were first posted by Twitter user @KelseyRobin99 who shared screenshots of some of the reviews and wrote: 'I'm in actual tears at the just eat reviews on a dessert place in my town.'

One customer called Joel said: 'Do not order from here! I tried calling the shop 11 times with no answer and the number on their website is invalid.

'Food that was supposed to be warm wasn't and the ice cream tub wasn't full either and took over half an hour to deliver even though we live 11 minutes away.

A Scottish dessert parlour owner has been branded 'savage' for his hilariously scathing responses to negative reviews on Just Eat

Mr Ali hit out at an unhappy customer who complained on Saturday about portion size by saying he would take their advice and 'flush it down the toilet'

One customer said: 'Do not order from here! I tried calling the shop 11 times with no answer and the number on their website is invalid'. Mr Ali responded: 'Oh Joel please dry your tears'

'Will not be going here again, really disappointed.'

In response, Mr Ali said: 'Oh Joel please dry your tears. Your delivery to Renfrew took a whole half an hour, that's including food prep.

'If you want it within 11 minutes then please order from one of The Avengers and not Shuga Daddy.'

Just Eat customer Sarah said: 'Milkshake was spilled and cookie doe was cold.'

Mr Ali responded by correcting the woman's spelling, writing: 'Dough'.

Another customer, Lewis, said: 'Absolutely shocking price for the portion size. It was also late by 25 mins. Won't be buying from here ever again. Hope you take some advice. Thank You.'

The sweet shop owner responded: 'Thanks for the advice Lewis. I have taken your advice, wrapped it up in some toilet paper and flushed it down the toilet.

The Just Eat reviews were first posted by Twitter user @KelseyRobin99, who posted: 'I'm in actual tears at the just eat reviews on a dessert place in my town

Mr Ali's wife Romana Ali responded to the viral post yesterday, writing: 'My husband is savage'

Since the reviews were shared onto Twitter on Saturday, the post has attracted over 2,700 likes and comments from social media users

'Thanks for trying though. Hope you enjoy cheaper, bigger portions of absolute garbage elsewhere.'

Mr Ali's wife Romana Ali responded to the viral post yesterday, writing: 'My husband is savage.'

She posted a photo of her hubby replying to another review which slams the store for being too expensive.

He wrote: 'Hello Shay, It's 5.99 for a waffle and a scoop of ice cream. So thank you for paying the instalment for my Lambo this month.'

Since the reviews were shared onto Twitter on Saturday, the post has attracted over 2,700 likes and comments from social media users.

@K_aaatherine said: 'Was reading these the other week. Absolute gold.'

@robbiegoudie posted: 'Dough*' followed by laughing face emojis.

@StevenDavies_1 commented: 'Amazing man.'
Govt should deploy all resources in saving lives than in building PM Modi's new house: Priyanka Gandhi

Priyanka Gandhi, Arvind Kejriwal slam central govt over Disha Ravi's arrest

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

New Delhi, Feb 15: Joining the growing attack demanding the release of climate activist Disha Ravi, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi on Monday slammed the BJP-led government and said that "people who carry guns are afraid of an unarmed girl"

Taking to Twitter, Priyanka Gandhi said, "Those who carry guns are afraid of an unarmed girl. An unarmed girl has spread of ray of courage," the Congress leader tweeted in Hindi, using hashtags #ReleaseDishaRavi, #DishaRavi and #IndiaBeingSilenced.

Meanwhile, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal also criticised the arrest of the activist and called it an "unprecedented attack on the democracy".

Ache din lauta do: Opposition attacks Narendra Modi's govt over rising fuel prices

"Arrest of 21 yr old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime," CM Kejriwal said on Twitter.

Senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal hit out at the Centre asking if the country is so "intolerant" that it cannot tolerate youth standing with farmers. "Disha Ravi Climate Activist Is the state so weak that a tweet threatens its security? Is the state so paranoid that a 22 year is a national security threat? Is the state so intolerant that it cannot tolerate youth standing with farmers? Is this the "badlav" Modiji wanted?," he asked.

Toolkit case: Disha Ravi first to be arrested, more to come say Delhi Police

A political slugfest has erupted after the 21-year-old climate activist was arrested from Bengaluru on Saturday in connection with the "toolkit" shared by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg and others on Twitter to extend support to the farmers' protest underway at several border points of the national capital against the Centre's farm laws.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

On Sunday, Disha Ravi was arrested by a Cyber Cell team of the Delhi Police. She has been sent to the custody of Delhi Police Special Cell for five days by a court.

The case against unnamed persons was registered on charges of criminal conspiracy, sedition and various other sections of the Indian Penal Code.
Tel Aviv: Dr Anthony Fauci has won the $US1 million ($1.28 million) Dan David Prize for defending science and advocating for vaccines now being administered worldwide to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

The Israel-based Dan David Foundation on Monday named President Joe Bidens chief medical adviser as the winner of one of three prizes. It said he had earned the recognition over a lifetime of leadership on HIV research and AIDS relief, as well as his advocacy for the vaccines against COVID-19.

Dr Anthony Fauci at a White House briefing with then-president Donald Trump in 2020. Credit:AP

In its statement, the private foundation did not mention former president Donald Trump, who undermined Faucis follow-the-science approach to the pandemic. But it credited Fauci with courageously defending science in the face of uninformed opposition during the challenging COVID crisis.

Fauci, 80, has served seven presidents and has been the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984.


Caution has given way to the overly optimistic sentiment of late 2020, with most energy agencies cutting their estimates of 2021 crude demand. According to an industry consensus, global crude demand will increase by 5.5-6mbpd, implying that a full return to pre-COVID demand levels will require several years to take place. The underlying question whether crude output levels can actually follow this demand growth this year has been growing in importance, steep backwardation on the Brent curve might suggest has serious qualms about it. With divergent trends abounding, Middle Eastern national oil companies have opted for nuance after the January-February price increases. As usual, Saudi Arabia has led the way, rolling over all of its February 2021 OSPs into March completely unchanged.

Graph 1. Spreads for Brent-M1, Brent-M2 and Brent-M3 in 2020-2021 (USD per barrel).

Source: S&P Global Platts.

The robustness of Asian demand remains a key gauge for Middle Eastern NOCs. China and India have been leading the continent with fuel consumption almost returning to pre-COVID levels in both. On the other hand, insular economies such as the Philippines, Indonesia or Taiwan have been running their refineries below maximum capacity or temporarily halting several units amidst poor margins. At the same time, turnaround season is just around the corner and Japans month-on-month import drop in February is the first of many to come. Albeit smaller in terms of overall output, refinery maintenance in Thailand, Taiwan and Sri Lanka will also tighten the markets a bit. February turnaround will blaze the path for next months large-scale works, China alone will have at least 0.9mbpd of refinery capacity going offline in March 2021.

If one is to aggregate all the push and pull factors impacting Middle Eastern pricing, not changing anything seemed like the ideal way forward, after all even the cash Dubai futures spread has barely moved from December 2020. Moreover, Aramcos pledge to cut its total production by 1mbpd implies a two-month period of duration (February/March) and considering the palpable price surge, with quotes close to Riyadhs fiscal breakeven of $68 per barrel, there was no reason to jeopardize it. Thus, Saudi Aramco and the Kuwaiti KPC have rolled over their entire grade portfolio destined for Asia, whilst the Iraqi SOMO and the Emirati ADNOC have made marginal alterations to February 2021 OSPs  the former has hiked Basrah Light and Basrah Medium by 5 and 10 cents per barrel, respectively, the latter has decreased the value of Upper Zakum by 5 cents, to a 0.75 premium over the Oman/Dubai average. Related: Biden Sets The Stage For An Offshore Wind Energy Boom



Graph 2. Saudi Aramco Oficial Selling Prices for Northwest Europe in 2018-2021 (vs ICE BWave).

Source: Saudi Aramco.

The precipitous fall of Urals, triggered by the enhancement of the February loading programme and a tangible decline in the grades Asian demand, has somewhat counterintuitively nudged Saudi Aramco to commit to a much more aggressive pricing policy on the European front. The extent of Aramcos audacity has surpassed the actual depreciation of Urals which at the time of the OSP issuance stood at $-0.6/barrel to Dated in the Baltics and $-0.2/barrel to Dated Brent in the Mediterranean. The Saudi NOC has hiked its March 2021 prices for Northwest Europe for all its marketed grades by $1.40 per barrel (FOB Ras Tanura basis), the Mediterranean-bound cargoes saw a $1.30 per barrel month-on-month increase.

Graph 3. Saudi Aramco OSPs for US-Bound Cargoes in 2018-2021 (vs Argus Sour Crude Index).

Source: Saudi Aramco.

Interestingly enough, crude exports from Saudi Arabia to the United States witnessed a sudden upswing in January 2021, with 7 cargoes (5 VLCCs and 2 Suezmaxes) departing from the Middle Eastern kingdom. The monthly total of US-bound crude hit an 8-month high (12 MMbbls) after a gradual decline has almost completely dried up an export stream that at its peak around 2014-2015 went as strong as 1.3-1.4mbpd. Moreover, there might be a natural inclination to assume that most of the barrels went to US refiners on the Pacific coast, however exactly half of it went to USGC, Texas and Louisiana to be specific. Against this background, Aramco has committed to a 10 cent-per-barrel across-the-board increase for all grades with its March 2021 official selling prices.

Graph 4. SOMO official selling prices in 2017-2021 (vs Oman/Dubai average).

Source: SOMO.

As mentioned above, the Iraqi SOMO has made only marginal changes to its Asian OSPs. Its European prices, however, show significantly more nuance as Basrah Light and Kirkuk were hiked by 90 cents per barrel from February, whilst Basrah Heavy and Basrah Medium witnessed steeper increases of $1 and $1.1 per barrel, respectively. All of this is lower than Aramcos aggressive European pricing  such circumspection might be explained by SOMOs willingness to reconquer some bits of its European market share as it continues to drift towards increasing dependence on South and Northeast Asia. Its concurrent halving of the European freight escalator (a pricing tool it employs to incentivize certain destinations) by 15 cents per barrel would certainly corroborate this claim.

Graph 5. Iraqi Official Selling Prices for Europe-Bound Cargoes in 2018-2021 (against Dated Brent).

Source: SOMO.

Basrah Light, once a favorite among Mediterranean refiners hitting around 0.5mbpd in average monthly imports into Europe, has all but disappeared from the European market after SOMOs quality recalibration (0.07mbpd for January loaders). Moreover, although one of the declared objectives of splitting the Basrah streams into 3 was to calibrate their quality to the respective needs of customers, the buyers pool of Basrah Medium remains quite narrow up to now. Represented across the heretofore loaded 15 cargoes, Basrah Medium was shipped to four countries  China, India, Greece and the United States. One Basrah Medium cargo arriving to the Texas Gulf Coast is all the more interesting as Californian refiners continue to import their usual routine of 3 Basrah Light cargoes per month. Related: Is The Caribbean Ready For An Oil Boom?

Graph 6. NIOC official selling prices in 2017-2021 (agains the Oman/Dubai average).

Source: NIOC.

In stark contrast to all other Middle Eastern oil producers, Iran still waits for a political breakthrough vis-a-vis its dealings with the United States. Although Teheran claims it can ramp up production from its current level of 2mbpd to 3.8mbpd within several months from the sanctions lifting, the imminence of a thaw with Washington is by no means confirmed. Therefore, NIOC continues to refrain from sharp moves and largely follows the line championed by Saudi Aramco, albeit with a certain sense of moderation. Thus, the official March selling prices for Asia-bound cargoes were all rolled over from February with the exception of Iranian Light that was hiked by 5 cents to a +0.85 per barrel premium against the Oman/Dubai premium. This marks the 3rd consecutive month that IRL is at a discount to Arab Light, despite being better qualitatively.

Graph 7. ADNOC official selling prices in 2017-2021 (against the Oman/Dubai average).

Source: ADNOC.

The Emirati ADNOC was the only Middle Eastern NOC that decreased its March 2021 OSPs, by eliminating Upper Zakums quality to the benchmark grade Murban (Das, Umm Lulu and Murban itself were rolled over from February 2021). On the one hand, weaker demand in the upcoming 1-2 months may push spot prices below the stipulated threshold, on the other hand ADNOCs curtailment of its term commitments (Murban and Upper Zakum by 15%, Das by 20%) will counteract the downward pressure. It should be noted that whilst the significance of China as an importer of UAE crudes seems to be somewhat faltering after a temporary high point in December 2020, India-bound cargoes loaded in January 2021 have attained the second-highest aggregate ever (21.5 MMbbls, equivalent to 0.695mbpd).

By Viktor Katona for Oilprice.com

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The Telegraph

One of Britains top universities has apologised for the harm caused to staff after they complained about being sent a photograph of Prince Philip who had a history of racist and sexist comments. The photograph of the late Duke opening the university library was included in a recent email bulletin to staff at Kings College London. However, a Kings College London spokesman later said that bosses at the institution remained very proud of its long association with Prince Philip. Joleen Clarke, associate director at the Kings College libraries, sent the email apology to staff after some workers complained about being offended by a photograph of the Duke featuring in a staff bulletin previously sent via email. Members of the universitys Anti-Racism Community of Practice reportedly reacted angrily to the photo, which showed the Duke alongside the Queen opening a library at Kings College in 2002, due to his history of racist and sexist comments. Vanessa Farrier, the colleges head of partnership and liaison, was reportedly among the staff angered by the Duke featuring in the email. In June, she was asked to decolonise the Kings College library. The Duke was notorious for his controversial comments, most famously for referring to slitty eyes during a 1986 trip to China. Ms Clarke was subject to what a source said was a kangaroo court among Kings College workers, who judged the use of the photo to be offensive. The offending photograph in the staff bulletin, sent shortly after the Duke died on April 9, was accompanied by a caption reading: As the nation marks the death of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, we thought you might like to see this photo of the Duke at the official opening of the Maughan Library in 2002, which some colleagues will remember. Ms Clarke has reportedly been active in Kings Colleges anti-racism programme. In the subsequent apology email, sent in the week beginning May 10, she wrote: The picture was included as a historical reference point following his [the Dukes] death. The inclusion of the picture was not intended to commemorate him. Through feedback and subsequent conversations, we have come to realise the harm that this caused members of our community, because of his history of racist and sexist comments. We are sorry to have caused this harm. On Saturday a Kings College spokesman said: As we previously highlighted in an official university tribute on April 9 2021, Prince Philip had a long association with Kings which continued right up until his retirement from public life. We valued immensely, and remain very proud, of his friendship and support for Kings. The Dukes association with the College began in 1955, when he became a Life Governor of the institution. He and the Queen visited Kings College many times, most recently in 2012, for the opening of its Somerset House East Wing (pictured below).
Google has stepped back from a threat to shut down its search engine locally and is on the brink of striking commercial deals with some of Australias largest news organisations after months of hard fought negotiations over planned media bargaining laws.

The ABC, Nine Entertainment Co (owner of this masthead) and Guardian Australia are in eleventh-hour negotiations with the $1.8 trillion tech giant for use of their content on various Google services. Industry sources briefed on the talks indicated the deals could be reached within 48 hours. However, while the talks are in advanced stages, there is no guarantee the agreements will be completed.

Googles threats to pull search from the market are unlikely to go ahead if it signs a series of major deals. Credit:Getty

Google threatened to turn off its search engine in Australia in January in response to the laws. The search giant's progress on agreements with publishers will shift focus to Facebook, which is yet to strike any deals for its own news product and has threatened to pull journalism from its platform if the laws aren't revised.

Kerry Stokes Seven West Media became the first of the major media companies to ink an agreement with Google on Monday.
Washington  Donald Trumps acquittal at his second impeachment trial may not be the final word on whether hes to blame for the deadly Capitol riot. The next step for the former president could be the courts.

Now a private citizen, Trump is stripped of his protection from legal liability that the presidency gave him. That change in status is something that even Republicans who voted on Saturday to acquit of inciting the Jan. 6 attack are stressing as they urge Americans to move on from impeachment.

President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office, as an ordinary citizen, unless the statute of limitations has run, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said after that vote. He insisted that the court were a more appropriate venue to hold Trump accountable than a Senate trial.

He didnt get away with anything yet, McConnell said. Yet.

The insurrection at the Capitol, in which five people died, is just one of the legal cases shadowing Trump in the months after he was voted out of office. He also faces legal exposure in Georgia over an alleged pressure campaign on state election officials, and in Manhattan over hush-money payments and business deals.

But Trumps culpability under the law for inciting the riot is by no means clear-cut. The standard is high under court decisions reaching back 50 years. Trump could also be sued by victims, though he has some constitutional protections, including if he acted while carrying out the duties of president. Those cases would come down to his intent.

Legal scholars say a proper criminal investigation takes time, and there are at least five years on the statute of limitations to bring a federal case. New evidence is emerging every day.

Theyre way too early in their investigation to know, said Laurie Levenson, a law professor at Loyola Law School and former federal prosecutor. The have arrested 200 people, theyre pursuing hundreds more, all of those people could be potential witnesses because some have said Trump made me do it.

Whats not known, she said, is what Trump was doing during the time of the riot, and that could be the key. Impeachment didnt produce many answers. But federal investigators in a criminal inquiry have much more power to compel evidence through grand jury subpoenas.

Its not an easy case, but thats only because what we know now, and that can change, Levenson said.

The legal issue is whether Trump or any of the speakers at the rally near the White House that preceded the assault on the Capitol incited violence and whether they knew their words would have that effect. Thats the standard the Supreme Court laid out in its 1969 decision in Brandenburg v. Ohio, which overturned the conviction of a Ku Klux Klan leader.

Trump urged the crowd on Jan. 6 to march on the Capitol, where Congress was meeting to affirm Joe Bidens presidential election, Trump even promised to go with his supporters, though he didnt in the end. Youll never take our country back with weakness, Trump said.

He also had spent weeks spinning up supporters over his increasingly combative language and false election claims urging them to stop the steal.

Trumps impeachment lawyers said he didnt do anything illegal. Trump, in a statement after the acquittal, did not admit to any wrongdoing.

Federal prosecutors have said they are looking at all angles of the assault on the Capitol and whether the violence had been incited. The attorney general for the District of Columbia, Karl Racine, has said that district prosecutors are considering whether to charge Trump under local law that criminalizes statements that motivate people to violence.

Let it be known that the office of attorney general has a potential charge that it may utilize, Racine told MSNBC last month. The charge would be a misdemeanor with a maximum sentence of six months in jail.

Trumps top White House lawyer repeatedly warned Trump on Jan. 6 that he could be held liable. That message was delivered in part to prompt Trump to condemn the violence that was carried out in his name and acknowledge that he would leave office Jan. 20, when Biden was inaugurated. He did depart the White House that day.

Since then, many of those charged in the riots say they were acting directly on Trumps orders. Some offered to testify. A phone call between Trump and House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy emerged during the impeachment trial in which McCarthy, as rioters stormed the Capitol, begged Trump to call off the mob. Trump replied: Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are.

The McCarthy call is significant because it could point to Trumps intent, state of mind and knowledge of the rioters actions.

Court cases that try to prove incitement often bump up against the First Amendment. In recent years, federal judges have taken a hard line against the anti-riot law. The federal appeals court in Virginia narrowed the Anti-Riot Act, with a maximum prison term of five years, because it swept up constitutionally protected speech. The court found invalid parts of the law that encompassed speech tending to encourage or promote a riot, as well as speech urging others to riot or involving mere advocacy of violence.

The same court upheld the convictions of two members of a white supremacist group who admitted they punched and kicked counter-demonstrators during the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Its possible federal prosecutors will decide not to bring charges, and if Trump were indicted in one of the many other separate investigations, federal prosecutors could decide justice would be done elsewhere.

Atlanta prosecutors have recently opened a criminal investigation into Trumps attempts to overturn his election loss in Georgia, including a Jan. 2 phone call in which he urged that states secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to find enough votes to reverse Bidens narrow victory.

And Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., is in the midst of an 18-month criminal grand jury investigation focusing in part on hush-money payments paid to women on Trumps behalf, and whether Trump or his businesses manipulated the value of assets  inflating them in some cases and minimizing them in others  to gain favorable loan terms and tax benefits.

GOP Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who voted to acquit along with McConnell and 41 other Republicans, argued that because Trump is no longer in office, impeachment is not the right way to hold him to account.

The ultimate accountability is through our criminal justice system where political passions are checked and due process is constitutionally mandated. No president is above the law or immune from criminal prosecution, and that includes former President Trump.
Romania's motor vehicle registrations were 46.6 percent less this January compared to the same month of 2020, with car registrations suffering a 52.2 percent setback, shows statistical data of the Association of Automobile Manufacturers and Importers (APIA) released on Monday.

The top brands (cars + commercial vehicles) on the domestic market in January 2021 are Dacia - with 1,160 units, followed by Ford (987 units), Toyota (764), Hyundai (661), Volkswagen (542), Skoda (468) and Mercedes (465).

Of the total of 7,660 motor vehicles registered this January, cars account for about 77 percent (5,913 units), down 52.2 percent YoY.

The top 10 ranking of the first month this year is somewhat different from the one so far, having Dacia in the lead with 914 units (down 74.4 percent from 2020, market share 15.5 percent), followed by Ford with 734 units (+31.3 percent and a 12.4 percent market share), Toyota - 705 units (+8.1 percent and a market share of 11.9 percent), Hyundai with 661 units (-25.2 percent, market share 11.2 percent), Skoda with 468 units (-54.5 percent and a market share of 7.9 percent), and Volkswagen with 452 units (-65.8 percent, market share 7.6 percent).

By models, Dacia Logan is on top with 365 units registered in the first month of the year, but 75.8 percent down from January 2020, followed by Ford Puma with 237 units (13-fold increase compared to January 2020), Ford Focus with 225 units (down 16 percent YoY), Hyundai I20 with 202 units (down 28.4 percent) and Dacia Sandero with 189 units (down 79.7 percent).

By the type of fuel, the share of gas-powered cars decreased to 59.2 percent, 8.6 percent less YoY, whereas diesel cars saw their market share dip just 1.2 percentage points compared to December 2020, and only 0.3 percentage points compared to January last year.

January's green car registrations increased 26 percent from the same month last year. The market share of green cars expanded to 14.3 percent, as to only 5.4 percent in January 2020.

By sub-categories, 100 percent electric cars saw a considerable advance of 0.6 percent, while plug-in hybrids registered a 66.1 percent leap. Full-hybrid cars are also on an upward trend (+30.1 percent YoY).

The brands with the highest sales volumes for all-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles were Volkswagen (59 units), BMW (38), Mercedes Benz (19), Volvo (18) and Renault (17). Electric car purchases increased 17.9 percent YoY, accounting for a significantly higher market share (4.4 percent) than in the similar month of 2020.

Legal entities account for the bulk of car purchases nationwide, with 63 percent of the total this January, while purchases by individuals represent the other 37 percent.
The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency's Director Jeong Eun-kyeong speaks during a press conference at the agency's headquarters in Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, Feb. 15, about the country's inoculation plan for February and March against COVID-19. Yonhap



South Korea will begin its first inoculations against the new coronavirus on Feb. 26 with AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine, but the inoculation of seniors will be put on hold amid efficacy concerns, health authorities said Monday.



The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said people and patients, excluding those aged 65 and older, at nursing homes and other high-risk facilities will receive the first batch of the vaccine developed by the British-Swedish pharmaceutical giant and Oxford University.



The decision to put the vaccination of seniors on hold could possibly hamper the country's inoculation plan, which had initially called for a total of 760,000 health care workers and the elderly to be among the first to receive vaccinations between February and March.



A total of 272,000 patients and people working at facilities, including sanatoriums, nursing facilities and rehabilitation facilities, will receive the first shot of AstraZeneca's two full-dose regime, the KDCA said.



South Korea aims to get 70 percent of its population inoculated by September, with so-called "herd immunity" here predicted to be created by November.



The government has already secured COVID-19 vaccines to inoculate 56 million people under the World Health Organization's global vaccine COVAX Facility project and separate contracts with four foreign drug firms.





A vial and syringe are seen in front of a displayed AstraZeneca logo in this illustration taken January 11, 2021. Reuters



Last week, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety approved AstraZeneca's vaccines on the condition that the pharmaceutical firm submit further data on the current phase three clinical trials on adults aged over 18.









Still, the ministry cautioned against inoculating people aged 65 and older with the vaccine, after a separate review panel said earlier there is not enough data on its efficacy for the age group.



Following the warning, the government said it will postpone AstraZenca vaccine shots for people aged 65 or older until further data is obtained. The decision will be made in late March.



KDCA Director Jeong Eun-kyeong said in a briefing that people aged 65 and older are expected to receive the shots in the second quarter, possibly with vaccines by AstraZenca or U.S. drugmaker Novavax.



Controversies arose globally on the use of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine for seniors as there is not enough data to back its efficacy in older people. Last week, the European Medicines Agency's expert committee unanimously recommended the vaccine to be used for people 18 and over.



However, several European countries, including Germany and France, have announced they will restrict the vaccine to younger people and cautioned against its use for the elderly, citing insufficient data on its efficacy.





A health official at an early COVID-19 testing center near Seoul Station in Jung District takes a nasal swab from a visitor on Feb. 15. Yonhap
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

A plan to ensure COVID-19 vaccines reach the world's poorest can finally swing into delivery mode after the World Health Organization approved the AstraZeneca jab on Monday.

Covax is the globally-pooled coronavirus vaccine procurement and equitable distribution effort, which was set up to secure enough COVID-19 vaccines this year for at least the most vulnerable 20 percent in every country, rich or poor.

Its first wave of distribution, which is almost entirely reliant on the AstraZeneca (AZ) vaccine, can now go ahead following the WHO green light.

Since December, dozens of the world's wealthiest countries have begun vaccination campaigns in a bid to curb the coronavirus pandemic.

Via Covax, poorer nations should now start receiving their very first doses from the end of this month.

How Covax works

Aimed at pooling the risk and rewards, Covax is inspired by previous mechanisms that facilitated universal and equitable access to pneumococcal and Ebola vaccines.

It guarantees the purchase of a fixed volume of COVID-19 vaccines even before they have been approved for use.

Covax thereby aims to give pharmaceutical companies the confidence to invest in production, and ensures vaccines are ready to roll once regulators give the go-ahead.

The intention is to ensure poorer nations can vaccinate too, on the basis that the pandemic will remain a global threat if not tackled worldwide.

Some 198 countries and territories are participating.

For the 92 lower- and lower-middle income economies involved, funding is covered through donations from governments and organisations.

For richer countries, buying into Covax's bulk purchases operates like a back-up insurance policy for their own direct deals with vaccine producers.

Which vaccines are in?

Covax has struck agreements with manufacturers for two billion vaccine doses in 2021, and has secured options on a further billion.

The deals so far are for:

 1.1 billion doses from the Serum Institute of India (SII), which is making AZ and Novavax vaccines;

 500 million from Johnson and Johnson Janssen;

 200 million from Sanofi-GSK;

 170 million from AZ, produced in South Korea;

 40 million from Pfizer-BioNTech.

Covax is open to signing deals for other vaccines that would broaden the portfolio.

First wave roll-out

The distribution list issued on February 3 broke down the programme's initial 337.2 million doses. First deliveries are expected in late February.

Some 145 participating economies are set to receive enough doses to immunise 3.3 percent of their collective population by mid-2021.

Only AZ and Pfizer are in the first wave of distribution as they are the only two vaccines with WHO emergency use validation.

The distribution list includes 240 million AZ doses from the SII; 96 million AZ doses being produced in South Korea; and 1.2 million Pfizer doses.

Both vaccines require two injected doses.

UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund, has the most experience in UN vaccine logistics and is preparing to transport up to 850 tonnes of doses per month.

Destination countries

Countries will receive doses in proportion to population size, with the most in the first wave going to India (97.2 million), Pakistan (17.2 million), Nigeria (16 million), Indonesia (13.7 million), Bangladesh (12.8 million) and Brazil (10.6 million).

Wealthy self-financing countries are on the list, including South Korea (2.6 million doses), Canada (1.9 million) and New Zealand (250,000).

Tuvalu is set to receive the smallest number of doses at 4,800, followed by Nauru and Monaco with 7,200 each.

The Pfizer-BioNTech dosesrequiring special ultra-cold storageare destined for 18 economies by the end of March, with Colombia, Peru, the Philippines, South Africa, South Korea and Ukraine getting the most at 117,000 doses each.

Covax financing

The Covax facility was launched in June 2020 at the Global Vaccine Summit.

It is co-led by the WHO as well as the Gavi vaccine alliance and CEPI, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations.

It needed an initial $2 billion last year to kick-start the programme and has thus far secured more than $6 billion in pledges.

But at least $2 billion more will be needed in 2021 for vaccine procurement and delivery, plus a further $800 million early this year for research and development.

Explore further Follow the latest news on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak

 2021 AFP

A group of seven asylum seekers, including children, who had been forced to wait in Mexico while their immigration applications were being processed in the US under a controversial Trump policy, have been granted a preliminary injunction allowing them to reunite with loved ones already living in America and safely pursue their asylum cases there.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represented the group in court, has welcomed the injunction as a victory against a Trump-era policy that immigration and human rights groups have long warned has put already vulnerable asylum seekers at risk.

Under the Trump administrations Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), tens of thousands of asylum seekers, including thousands of children, have been forced to wait in Mexico, while their applications are weighed in America.

The Biden administration has sought to reverse the programme, but has warned that doing so will take time as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) begins allowing access for thousands of asylum seekers with active claims.

In the case of the seven asylum seekers represented by the ACLU, US District Court Judge Indira Talwani issued a preliminary injunction in favour of families living in Massachusetts who said their loved ones were wrongly being forced to remain in Mexico.

Read more: Plan to use force in fingerprinting Channel asylum seekers will spark violence and self-harm, Priti Patel warned

Among the plaintiffs are a family of five that the ACLU says has been struggling to feed their children while living in a dilapidated home in the Mexican border town of Matamoros.

The plaintiffs also include two mothers whose children were processed out of the MPP in recent months, one living at the migrant camp in Matamoros and one living in Nuevo Laredo, where she has survived numerous close encounters with cartels, they said. Both mothers will now be able to reunite with their children in Massachusetts.

Recommended Asylum seekers forced to remain in Mexico under Trump policy say Biden is their last hope

Families belong together, and we are delighted that these families will be brought to safety after well over a year in peril, Carol Rose, the executive director of the ACLU of Massachusetts, said in a statement published online.

Thousands of families, including young children, have been subjected to violence and suffering as a result of [the MPP policy], she said, however.

Unwinding Trumps harmful and unlawful policies is just the start to making our asylum system more efficient, fair, and humane.
IDLIB  The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) wrote on Facebook Jan. 29 that the Islamic State organization (IS) escalated activities in January within the Aleppo-Hama-Raqqa triangle, in addition to the desert area of Homs and Deir ez-Zor. Military operations are conducted on a daily basis in this area as part of the Syrian regime's and Russia's attempts to stop IS activities.

According to SOHR statistics, IS killed 153 members of the regime forces and pro-regime militias in January in the Syrian Desert, out of which 70 members were killed in five IS ambushes. The rest were targeted in clashes, roadside bombs or landmines. In contrast, 81 IS militants were killed in Russian airstrikes and clashes with the regime forces and pro-regime militias.

The escalation continued in February, with IS killing 19 members of the regime forces and pro-regime militias Feb. 3 in an offensive in the Ithriyah-Sukhna axis in the Syrian Desert. That is the harbinger of a new escalation in the area.

A few days ago, Assad's forces announced a "sweeping campaign" in the Deir ez-Zor, Homs and Hama governorates. The operation aims to secure the highway that links Damascus to Deir ez-Zor. This comes after IS resumed activities, carrying out a series of attacks against the Assad regime and pro-regime militia positions. Seventeen members of Liwa al-Quds and the 17th Reserve Division were killed in the latest IS offensive, which followed another attack killing 12 members of Liwa al-Baqir in the same area.

In this vein, Capt. Abdulslam Abdulrzaq, a military analyst based in Idlib, told Al-Monitor, IS has reorganized its ranks in the desert area, taking advantage of the vast and empty space to resume activity. It banks on communications amongst its groups, which consist of small and fast-moving units that excel in maneuvering and master setting up ambushes and carrying out swift and precise swoopings on their targets. The regime forces and Iranian militias are not well trained, given the regimes constant need for fighters. In this case, organizing training is deemed unsuitable, because the regime does not have the time for it. After each strike and after targeting the regime, ISs strength grows bigger, particularly since it seizes weapons and ammunition.

Speaking to Al-Monitor, Abu Hafs al-Shami, a pseudonym of a jihadist commander based in Idlib, said, The reason why IS spreads out continuously is that it opts for the right geographical environment to operate and moves in small groups that carry light and easy to use weapons. It carries on with the same strategy it adopted before 2010 when it was in Iraq. The strategy relies on swift actions involving speed, maneuvering, and flexible concealment and withdrawal tactics. In general, the way IS operates is similar to a guerilla war that consists of a war of attrition in the long run  without, however, seeking to make quick gains. Thats its main strategy. This strategy was changed when IS proclaimed the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (in 2013), as it was no longer possible to shift to phase two of the guerrilla war. Yet IS obviously moved immediately to phase three (seizing cities in 2014). That was the reason behind the flaw in its tactic, which was reflected in its apparent presence.

He added, There are two reasons behind the heavy losses IS inflicts on the regime forces. Firstly is that IS fighters are well-experienced. Secondly is that the regime had initially dispatched unprepared units for this type of war, namely guerilla [warfare]. Ostensibly, the regime soldiers underwent quick and classic training courses that their units usually take. This is why there is a Russian interest in improving the training for these units. I do not see that IS is growing again, and it is too soon to speak of genuine and effective outcomes that would have a dangerous impact on the Syrian regime. Yet [if] IS continues at the same pace and the Syrian regime continues to overlook the importance of IS acts, one would anticipate that IS would increasingly grow.

Suhaib al-Jaber, a journalist for the Euphrates Post network and who is based in Turkey, told Al-Monitor, IS has not changed its strategy much. It has only intensified attacks lately after a period of stagnation (in the summer of 2019 and winter of 2020). This period has boosted its capabilities with the training, support and ammunition received. This period also allowed IS to regroup its ranks. Yet IS still relies on the surprise attacks and then on concealing in the desert, which is hard to put under control even through airstrikes. The movements of the Iranian militias and regime forces in their fight against IS in the desert area have unveiled the regimes positions and turned its members into easy prey for IS units that are called the lone wolves (in reference to the swiftness in conducting operations in small groups). IS focused its attacks on parts of eastern Syria and western Iraq, stretching along the cities surrounded by (the Abu Kamal, Sukhna, Kobajjeb and Palmyra) desert areas.

Speaking to Al-Monitor, Hammam Issa, a journalist based in Idlib, said, The city of al-Sukhna, which is considered the second city in the Syrian Desert after Palmyra and which is administratively part of Homs governorate, has turned over the past months into a place where IS focused activities and operations in the desert area. In the past months as well, IS protected itself in a pocket stretching between the Homs and Deir ez-Zor governorates, from the outskirts of al-Sukhna to the borders of al-Bukamal and al-Mayadin in Deir ez-Zor. It uses these parts as small and scattered pockets. IS operations consist of swift attacks against the regime forces. This area serves now as a cornerstone for any IS expansion to northeastern Syria in the future, as IS strived to speed up the pace of its strategy, which consists of imposing shadow control in the nearly 80,000-square-kilometer desert.
William & Mary to celebrate 100 years of Asians, Asian-Americans

A century ago this fall, Pu-Kao Chen 23 left Shanghai, China, to enroll at William & Mary, becoming the universitys first Asian student and opening the door for hundreds of Asian and Asian-American students, faculty and staff to follow  and create their own firsts  over the next 100 years.

William & Mary is now preparing to mark that anniversary with a multi-year commemoration, beginning this semester and culminating with the 2022 Commencement ceremony. The Asian Centennial will celebrate all those at W&M, past and present, who identify as Asian or of Asian ancestry, including those from Southwest Asia  often referred to as the Middle East.

We want to celebrate the centennial of Pu-Kao Chen to give visibility to the Asian, Pacific Islander and Middle Eastern experience and their contributions to William & Mary, the larger Williamsburg-James City County community and hopefully Virginia, especially at a time when inclusivity, diversity and just pluralism, in general, have been threatened, said Francis Tanglao Aguas, professor of Asian & Pacific Islander American studies and theatre and coordinator of global studies.

We believe the Asian Centennial is an opportunity for William & Mary to truly function as the Alma Mater of the Nation.

Tanglao Aguas is co-chair of a committee of faculty, staff, students and alumni from across the university that is organizing the centennial. They have been charged by W&M President Katherine A. Rowe to develop and execute the commemoration with three goals in mind: to honor trailblazing leaders at W&M; understand and elevate the impact of Asian and Asian-American students, faculty and staff; and advance W&Ms aspirations as a global, cosmopolitan and multicultural institution.

William & Mary has not always had the greatest history with respect to racial diversity and inclusion, said Deenesh Sohoni, co-chair of the committee, professor of sociology and director of the Asian & Pacific Islander American Studies. Acknowledging our past is a necessary part of ensuring that we do better in the present and future.

Upcoming events, projects

The multi-year commemoration will focus on scholarship, events programming and fundraising to make its efforts sustainable.

While it will officially launch in fall 2021, it will begin with a soft rollout this semester starting with a virtual Asian & Middle Eastern Film Festival. That series will begin Feb. 15-19 with streamed showings of the film Far East Deep South. After the Feb. 19 showing at 11 a.m., a Zoom Q&A with the director and producers will be available. The event is free to W&M faculty and staff and $7.50 for the general public. Registration is required.

Also this semester, the commemoration will feature Asian, Pacific Islander, Middle Eastern/Muslim (APM) alumni events, the virtual Banh Mi Lecture Series and collaboration with the Lemon Project, which explores the history of African-Americans at W&M.

Headlining the centennials plans is the commissioning of Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Marissa Aroy to create a documentary film about the history and contributions of Asians and Asian-Americans at W&M. Aroy will be appointed the Asian Centennial Distinguished Film Fellow in residence.



Additionally, the centennial will also include a fine arts project with local artist Roberto Jamora, the universitys inaugural Asian Centennial Art Fellow.

Research and scholarship

With still so much unknown about that history, research is also a central goal of the centennial with the establishment of the APM Research Project.

William & Mary prides itself as a leader in faculty/student research collaboration, said Sohoni. We seek to enhance this reputation by creating a model for faculty/student collaboration across the disciplines.

While the APM Research Project will not be as expansive as the Lemon Project, it seeks to emulate that effort by integrating faculty and staff in research outside of the classroom and the publication of that research, said Tanglao Aguas.

It was necessary for us to utilize the currency of academia, which is research, to take full advantage to contribute to the conversation at William & Mary, and the community around our history with race, racism, inclusion and exclusion, he said.

Three Asian Centennial faculty research fellows have been named: Sohoni; Chinua Thelwell, associate professor of Africana studies and history; and R. Benedito Ferrao, assistant professor of English and Asian & Pacific Islander American studies.

Work by them and their student research assistants is already underway. For example, under the direction of Professors Deenesh Sohoni and Chinua Thelwell, two undergraduate researchers, Sumie Yotsukura and Brian Zhao, will conduct archival research to create a list of early APM students and gather information on their experiences at W&M.

Additionally, Yusuf Jafri, a fellow with W&Ms Center for Racial and Social Justice  under the directorship of Law Professor Vivian Hamilton, a member of the centennial committee  is researching how national and state level legislation related to immigration and housing segregation impacted international and minority students at W&M, said Sohoni.

Our long-term goal is to create a sustainable project where students and faculty can research the varied histories of Asian and Asian Americans at W&M, and more broadly race-relations at W&M and in Virginia, said Sohoni.

Exclusion/inclusion

While the centennial will celebrate the achievements of Asian and Asian-American people at W&M, it will also serve to begin a broader dialogue.

We are also hoping to commemorate and reflect on our institutions participation in exclusion, specifically about the exclusion if not, oppression of the African-American community, said Tanglao Aguas, adding that his students requested it.

They told me, Professor, this would be a good move as long as we make sure that we are not only celebrating Asian and Asian-American excellence, but we are also interested in discussing the ramifications of the various ways in which different minorities were treated. So, immediately they were pointing to the gradations of discrimination perpetrated by historic whiteness.  And so, as a result of that, we hope to form and execute a plan of celebration, commemoration, reflection and discernment, as a community, using the anniversary of the admission of Pu-Kao Chen from Shanghai, China, as a way to discuss how was this made possible.

While the commemoration will recognize the pioneering efforts of Asians and Asian Americans in diversifying W&M, it will also acknowledge that it took place within the context of African-American exclusion, said Sohoni.

The Asian Centennial thus creates the opportunity and space for a fuller history of William & Mary, and one that complicates and moves us beyond dichotomous white/black racial discussions.

Gathering the family

William & Mary recently celebrated two other significant milestones the universitys history: the 50th anniversary of African-American students in residence and the 100th anniversary of coeducation. The organizers of the Asian Centennial have taken lessons from those commemorations and hope to build on those histories  and that of other marginalized peoples, which are all intertwined.

Exploring the Asian experience means exploring the African Black, Latinx, Native story, said Tanglao Aguas. In the United States, no one lives in a vacuum. Lives intersect. And that's what we're counting on in this centennial. As we tackle the Asian story of William & Mary, we will also be having a parallel discussion about all the communities.

The William & Mary community is often referred to as a family, said Tanglao Aguas, a Filipino-American. And anniversaries are major events in Filipino culture. He hopes this anniversary creates a reason for the W&M community to come together.

This is an opportunity to build on the William & Mary community as a family, and as families do, we explore not only the joyful parts of our relationship, but even when pain has been inflicted. Doing so  exploring the history of that pain, and even joy  we can move forward."
TEL AVIV/GAZA: The Palestinian Authority (PA) accused Israel on Monday of holding up the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines into Gaza, where Palestinians have yet to receive any doses.

A Palestinian official told Reuters that the PA tried to send 2,000 doses of Russias Sputnik V vaccine from the occupied West Bank to Gaza on Monday, but that Israel stopped the shipment at a West Bank checkpoint and informed the Palestinians there was no approval to continue to Gaza."

An Israeli security official said the PAs request to send the 2,000 doses was still being examined" and that an approval hasnt yet been given".

The body charged with approving the transfer is Israels national security council, part of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus government, the Israeli security official said.

Netanyahus office did not immediately provide comment.

PA officials say they submitted the transfer request to Israeli defence authorities soon after receiving an initial shipment of 10,000 Russian doses in the West Bank on Feb. 4.

Today, 2,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine were transferred to enter the Gaza Strip, but the occupation authorities prevented their entry," a statement from PA Health Minister Mai Alkaila said.

These doses were intended for medical staff working in intensive care rooms designated for COVID-19 patients, and for staff working in emergency departments," the statement added.

The vaccine shipment was returned to Ramallah because it needs to be kept under cold temperatures, the Palestinian official said.

The delay highlights the challenges that Palestinians may face inoculating citizens across the West Bank and Gaza - two geographically-divided areas that Israel captured in a 1967 war and which are home to 5.2 million Palestinians.

Israel controls all entry and exit points to the West Bank and most of the coastal and land boundaries of the Gaza Strip, apart from a narrow border adjoining Egypt in the south.

Both Israel and Egypt maintain a blockade on the coastal strip, citing security fears about the Islamist militant group Hamas, which has controlled Gaza since 2007.

Palestinians and rights groups have accused Israel, a world leader in the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, of ignoring its duties as an occupying power by not including the Palestinian populations of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in their inoculation programme.

Israeli officials have said that under the Oslo peace accords, the Palestinian Health Ministry is responsible for vaccinating people in Gaza and parts of the West Bank where the PA has limited self-rule.

The PA began administering vaccines to health workers in the West Bank on Feb. 2, after receiving a small shipment of Moderna Inc vaccines from Israel.

(Additional reporting by Ali Sawafta in Ramallah; Editing by Stephen Farrell and Sonya Hepinstall)

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
THE headteacher of Goring primary is hoping to run 100km in two months to raise money for the school.

Angela Wheatcroft also hopes to publicise the Goring 10K Your Way virtual challenge on March 28, which the parent-teacher association is organising to replace the usual 10km race that it holds.

The annual event, which attracts up to 1,200 runners, had to be scrapped this year because of the coronavirus pandemic so the Wallingford Road school was set to miss out.

Proceeds from previous races have paid for new IT facilities, playground markings and a new 30,000 minibus.

Other fundraising events due to be held over the past year, including discos, quiz nights and craft fairs, have also had to be called off.

People entering next months virtual race can walk, run or cycle a 10km route of their choice as long as they obey rules on social distancing and bubbling to prevent the spread of covid-19.

Alternatively, they can sponsor Mrs Wheatcroft.

So far, the event has raised almost 3,800 and dozens of families, including those with children at the school, have signed up, along with most of the staff.

Mrs Wheatcroft chose to run 100km as she is a keen swimmer who switched to running because pools have been closed under government restrictions for much of the past year.

In the weeks before the 10km she will go on a series of training runs over shorter distances.

Mrs Wheatcroft, 55, who lives near Reading, said: I recognise that a single 10km run is a big achievement for a lot of people but Im fortunate that Im fit enough to run one at any time.

I felt that if I was going to be asking friends and family for sponsorship, I should really be pushing myself out of my comfort zone and this felt tough but manageable.

Ive got the first few runs out of the way and Im feeling energised about the rest of the challenge, which hopefully will last.

Theres now pressure, in a good way, to keep going with it. People have already started sponsoring me so theres no backing out.

Having a goal and a good reason behind it will keep me going and I find that running in the morning energises me for the rest of the day. I even love it when its dark or raining.

Im not fast by any means  I take it slow and steady and run little and often but its great for wellbeing.

Mrs Wheatcroft hopes the virtual run will make up for the schools lack of fundraising opportunities.

She said: The decision to cancel was taken some time ago because the PTA needs to apply for road closures well in advance and the national picture wasnt looking promising.

Its not a school event but its run by our parents and the proceeds benefit our children by improving and enhancing what we offer.

It pays for so many extra things that make a big difference.

Im always amazed at the effort which the committee puts into it, from planning to marshaling on the day, and I know their contribution has always been valued.

The school is considering a gradual refurbishment of its Sixties buildings, which an independent inspection confirmed were in poor condition.

A proposal to relocate the school has fallen through.

 The Woodcote 10km race, which takes place in early January every year in aid of Pangbourne Rotary Club, was also called off this year.

Bengaluru, Feb 15 : Several activists, including noted writer Ramachandra Guha, took part in a protest in front of Mysuru Bank circle in Bengaluru on Monday condemning the Delhi police arresting 22-year-old city based Climate change activist, Disha Ravi.

While participating in the protest against, Guha said: "Now I can say that the country is in the grip of dictatorship. I condemn this arrest." He added that those young boys and girls who have taken activism seriously are afraid of coming out. "Such a scenario existed when I was in my college days, during Emergency time," he said.

He wondered if the young girl who is standing with farmers rights and environmental rights is arrested simply because she is opposed to the state.

"With her arrest, this government is sending a loud and a clear signal to youngsters of this country that you cannot have a mind of your own, unless that is in sync with the government's policies," he charged.

Quoting former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Guha said the Union government could have first spoken with the activist instead of simply arresting her. "Vajpayee once said, those who speak with their pen, must be first spoken to. But this government is not following him at all. By this standard, I can safely say, if (Balagangadhar) Tilak and (Subhas Chandra) Bose, (Chandrashekhar) Azad were to be alive today, they too would be behind bars and facing sedition charges. This is worse than the colonial regime," he said.

He added that by arresting her the union government has shown how vindictive it can be. "Only paranoid rulers have behaved in such a manner in the past," he said and warned youngsters those who are silent should come out in the open to oppose such repressive actions of government.

"You (youngsters) might be thinking that keeping quiet is an option, let me tell you it is not. They must oppose such repression. As today it might be a case Disha or other activists, but there is no guarantee that it can not happen to others," he said He added that the country seems to be heading for personification of a cult person, one of conformism and obedience. "This won't do good for the country. We need vibrant democracy youths, who should learn to question the government and leaders," he said.
Ion Mihai Pacepa: 19282021

Highest-ranking Soviet-bloc officer ever to defect to the West has died

Commentary

In 2017, Christopher Monckton, Third Viscount Monckton of Brenchley and a former adviser to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, called Lt. Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa the most influential man of the 20th century and, arguably, the beginning of the 21st.

He was the man who pulled back the curtain to reveal the disinformation that was being churned out from the Soviet bloc. Unfortunately, most people remained unfamiliar with Pacepa and his work.

In the early morning hours of Feb. 14, COVID-19 accomplished what a $2 million bounty and two separate teams of Romanian-sponsored assassins could not. Ion Mihai Pacepa, Mike to those who knew him, was called home to his eternal reward.

Pacepa was born in Bucharest in 1928. He studied industrial chemistry at the Politehnica University of Bucharest, but prior to graduation, he was recruited into the secret police agency of the Socialist Republic of Romania, the Securitate. He was initially assigned to the Securitates counter-sabotage department. In 1955, he was transferred to Foreign Intelligence.

Pacepa was named head of the Romanian intelligence station in Frankfurt, West Germany, in 1957. Two years later, he was made head of Romanias new industrial espionage department, and he held that position until he defected to the West. Starting in 1972, he also served as deputy chief of Romanian foreign intelligence, adviser for industrial and technological development, and right-hand man to communist Romanias leader Nicolae Ceausescu.

In his new role, Pacepa lived at the top of the communist world order. He traveled the globe. He knew and socialized with Nikita Khrushchev, Mao Zedong, Fidel Castro, and of course, Ceausescu. He met Western leaders, including President Jimmy Carter.

Yet, in 1978, he risked his life to leave behind his position at the top of the Soviet/communist world and come to the United States. It became his mission to warn the West about the oppression that necessarily follows socialism and communism. He was and remains the highest-ranking Soviet-bloc officer ever to defect to the West.

Carter didnt believe Pacepa at first, and he wanted to return the defector to Romaniaa certain death sentence. Pacepas own disinformation had tricked the U.S. president into believing that Ceausescu was a trustworthy ally, and now Pacepa presented a very different picture.

Eventually the CIA convinced Carter of Pacepas bona fides, and Western intelligence agencies tapped the invaluable information he provided. Most important was his explanation of the way Soviet agents planted disinformation to deceive and undermine faith in Western governments, leaders, history, and institutionsespecially the churches. When Pacepa later attained U.S. citizenship, the CIA gave him a letter thanking him for his important and unique contribution to the United States.

In Romania, Ceausescu created a special Securitate unit charged with the sole task of assassinating Pacepa. The dictator also put two separate $1 million bounties on his head and dispatched the infamous assassin Carlos the Jackal to carry out the job, as well as a second team of assassins. They came close. Twice Pacepas secret identity was compromised and he had to undergo plastic surgery and rebuild his life with his American wife, a CIA agent whom he met while being debriefed.

Pacepa eventually published his information in the book Red Horizons, which exposed the corruption and brutality of the Ceausescu government and the Soviet/communist world. (President Ronald Reagan called that book his bible for dealing with dictators.) It was translated, condensed, and smuggled into Romania, where it became a catalyst motivating the people to overthrow their government. Ceausescu and his wife, Elena, were arrested, given a hearing, sentenced, and executed on evidence, much of which came directly from that book.

After coming to the United States, Pacepa and his wife lived under assumed identities, but he continued to write books and articles under his real name, including the 2013 book Disinformation: Former Spy Chief Reveals Secret Strategies for Undermining Freedom, Attacking Religion, and Promoting Terrorism, of which I was co-author. He wanted to correct false stories that he had helped create when he was influential in the Soviet-bloc intelligence world.

Among the most important pieces of disinformation that he wanted to correct were that the CIA was behind President John F. Kennedys assassination, that Pope Pius XII was pro-German in World War II, and that Middle Eastern terrorism was organic (rather than fomented from inside the Kremlin). The Soviet bloc intelligence machinery had cultivated all of these false narratives while Pacepa worked in that world. His final book, Operation Dragon: Inside the Kremlins Secret War on America (co-authored by R. James Woolsey), was just released by Encounter Books.

Americas recent flirtation with socialism had concerned Pacepa greatly. As head of foreign intelligence in communist Romania, he worked with agents, assets, and dupes to plant seeds of distrust in the American mind regarding its governments involvement in the Vietnam War. He noted that this type of disinformation was going on again today, with fake news and all kinds of stories (sometimes later retracted) that painted the United States in the worst possible light.

Pacepa spoke often of the mediamore specifically, the money behind the news media, which drives the stories. Pacepa specialized in developing stories in this manner when he was at the top of the Soviet-bloc intelligence community. He helped turn American attitudes on issues in the 1960s and 1970s. He recognized the same techniques being used today so that many people now have a very negative view of their government but a positive view of socialism.

Pacepa leaves behind his wife of more than 40 years and a grown daughter.

Ronald J. Rychlak is the Jamie L. Whitten chair in law and government at the University of Mississippi. He is the author of several books, including Hitler, the War, and the Pope, Disinformation (co-authored with Ion Mihai Pacepa), and The Persecution and Genocide of Christians in the Middle East (co-edited with Jane Adolphe).

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
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After abandoning hopes of a home birth to bring baby Archie into the world at a London hospital two years ago, Meghan Markle will have a choice of madcap, megabucks maternity services used by Hollywood A-listers if she welcomes her second child in California later this year.

Professional photographers, waiters in tuxedos bringing five-star meals and deluxe suites with flat-screen TVs are just some of the premium services offered by LA birthing facilities used by the likes of Kim Kardashian and Victoria Beckham.

As well as $4,000-a-night rooms for the birth itself, there are $450-per-couple classes in 'hypnobirthing', so-called 'crystal readers' who claim they can predict a child's future and companies which offer to turn the placenta into edible capsules for around $300.

One self-described Natural Birth Center in Los Angeles promises 'minimal or no interference' from medical staff, or alternatively to dispatch midwives for a home birth - which Meghan is believed to have wanted in 2019.

As well as these potential luxuries in the precious first few hours of its life, Meghan and Harry's new baby will, if it is born in the United States, also be guaranteed American citizenship under the Fourteenth Amendment.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle with their son Archie after his birth at a London hospital in 2019 - with the couple now preparing to welcome a second child after moving to California last year

A view inside the Cedars-Sinai maternity ward in Los Angeles where celebrities including Kim Kardashian, Victoria Beckham and Gwyneth Paltrow have previously brought children into the world

Maternity ward of the stars: LA's Cedars-Sinai Medical Center Meghan and Harry's first child, Archie, was born at London's private Portland Hospital, favoured by those wanting a money-no-object birthing experience. And the Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles can offer a similar level of comfort, expertise and exclusivity. The Californian hospital is where celebrities like Kim Kardashian, Victoria Beckham, Jessica Simpson and Kate Hudson have given birth. New mothers are given welcome packs which include nappies and a miniature bottle of wine, gourmet cuisine is also on offer, and, for those who do not want to be spotted arriving or leaving, secret entrances are available. A suite at the Cedars-Sinai hospital in Los Angeles The hospital's deluxe maternity suite package costs thousands of pounds a night and includes a three-room suite which is said to provide a doula - someone who is not medically trained but helps a women through pregnancy, labour and birth. Facilities provided by hospitals at this level are like five-star hotels and patients can ask for in-suite manicures, pedicures and a hairdresser so can they leave looking their best. Advertisement

Meghan gave birth at London's Portland Hospital in 2019, after reports that she was planning a home birth were followed by mystery when Buckingham Palace did not initially reveal where Archie had been born.

There was also confusion when it emerged that Meghan had in fact already given birth when the palace announced she had gone into labour.

Now free from palace supervision and ensconced in California, Meghan will enter a world where maternity units are used to handling A-list celebrities.

One of LA's most prominent childbirth facilities is at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center where Kim and Kanye's first child North West was born in 2013 and the Beckhams welcomed their daughter Harper in 2011.

Other A-listers said to have given birth at Cedars-Sinai include Salma Hayek, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kourtney Kardashian, Jessica Simpson and Anna Faris.

Britney Spears also had a child, Jayden James Federline, at the Cedars-Sinai maternity unit in 2006 - before later being admitted to a different wing of the hospital during her much-publicised breakdown in 2008.

Journalist Celia Walden described being able to 'gaze at the Hollywood sign' while giving birth to a daughter there in 2011, writing in the Telegraph about how staff at Cedars-Sinai quizzed her about her 'birthing plans'.

When she expressed interest in a natural birth, an anesthesiologist laughed and told her: 'Honey, in LA a natural birth means giving birth without your make-up on.'

Rooms at Cedars-Sinai are thought to cost around $4,000 a night and come with a lounge, en-suite bathroom and 24/7 access to a personal assistant called a 'doula' who is trained to offer 'physical, emotional and educational support'.

New mothers are given welcome packs which include nappies and a miniature bottle of wine, gourmet cuisine is also on offer, and, for those who do not want to be spotted arriving or leaving, secret entrances are available.

But Cedars-Sinai is by no means the only facility to offer luxury services, with the University of California in Los Angeles advertising deluxe suites and even a professional photographer contracted to take adorable baby portraits.

UCLA's self-styled BirthPlace in Santa Monica, where suites cost $330 per night, also comes with the promise of four hours of 'nesting time' per day when medical staff will not intrude into the baby's first hours with its parents.

A second UCLA facility, at the Ronald Reagan Medical Center in Westwood, boasts of its 'fine-dining room services similar to what is offered at a five-star hotel', delivered by tuxedo-wearing waiters known as 'food ambassadors'.

Rooms at the Ronald Reagan clinic also have fridges, flat-screen TVs and a sofa-bed for overnight visitors.

Meanwhile another facility, the Natural Birth Center, promises 'freedom from interventions' in suites which are 'similar to an up-scale hotel' - and also offers to dispatch midwives for a home birth.

The Los Angeles facility aims not to replicate the feel of a hospital - saying that 'emergency equipment is not what you see when you first walk in'.

It also offers hot tubs for a so-called 'water birth' which it describes as 'one of the most gentle and peaceful forms of births', while adding that mothers could do this at home by buying a pool.

Victoria Beckham had her daughter Harper (left) at the Cedars-Sinai facility in 2011, while Kim Kardashian and Kanye West (right) had their first child North at the same clinic in 2013

The Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles can offer a similar level of comfort, expertise and exclusivity to the Portland Hospital where Meghan gave birth to the royal couple's first child in 2019

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle released a photograph yesterday which showed them beaming with delight following the announcement they are expecting a second baby

Does a child born in America get automatic US citizenship? Any child born in the US gets automatic US citizenship under the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. This states: 'All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.' The only exception applies to the 'jurisdiction' element, which means children born to diplomats and other recognized government officials from foreign countries don't get US citizenship if born on American soil. Anyone born in the US gets citizenship for their life unless they make an action to give it up such as filing an oath. Advertisement

For California mothers, there are also classes available in 'hypnobirthing', a method that teaches relaxation, meditation and 'self-hypnosis' to manage the pain of childbirth.

Meghan's royal counterpart Kate Middleton revealed she used the method to cope with severe morning sickness which she suffered during her three pregnancies.

One California provider called The Soulful Birth offers classes for $450 per couple - or $385 in the current world of Zoom teaching - as well as a book on hypnobirthing.

After the birth, there are providers which will turn the placenta into capsules which can be eaten or turned into a 'smoothie', a practice viewed sceptically by scientists.

Supporters of the practice say it brings physical and psychological benefits, but the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that 'scientific evidence to support this is lacking'.

Nonetheless, there are companies in California which offer the service for around $300 - promising to pick up a placenta from the delivery room once it is placed in a sealed bag.

Walden also described LA mothers looking beyond hospitals and medics to recruit 'crystal readers' who supposedly predict a child's nature.

One of the baby's characteristics can be predicted on a firmer basis - if it is born in the United States, it will automatically be eligible for US citizenship.

The baby's older brother Archie is also likely to be eligible for dual nationality, but the family's immigration status in America has never been made public.

Harry, Meghan and Archie left Britain for Canada in November 2019, meaning their first child Archie has not seen any of his British relatives since he was six months old.

They then moved to California, where they have bought an 11million mansion in Montecito and signed multi-million pound deals with Netflix and Spotify.

The Duke is expected to return to the UK this summer to see his family for the first time since the couple decided to leave Britain and step down from their roles in the Royal Family in what was dubbed 'Megxit'.

Meghan was already said to be unlikely to join him for 'personal and practical' reasons, sources have said.

The new Sussex baby will become eighth in line to the throne, after Prince Charles, Prince William, William's three children George, Charlotte and Louis, Prince Harry and his eldest child 21-month-old Archie Mountbatten-Windsor.

At the beginnning: Alexi Lubomirski took this photo of Meghan and Harry in the grounds of Frogmore Cottage, their former Windsor home, one of two official engagement photos released in December, 2017. Right: An official wedding photograph released by Kensington Palace following their nuptials in May 2018, showed the couple on the East Terrace of Windsor Castle

The couple have been hunkering down at a sprawling nine-bedroom mansion in Montecito that they purchased for $14.65million last June (pictured)

Harry retained his place in the line of succession despite his decision to quit royal life. The couple are yet to reveal when the baby is expected.

They announced last night on Valentine's Day that they are expecting their second child - and said they were 'overjoyed' at their pregnancy.

To celebrate the news yesterday, the couple released a black and white photograph which showed them beaming with delight.

Meghan lay with her head in her husband's lap, her hand resting on her visible baby bump, while barefoot Harry cradled her head in his hand as the couple relaxed together under a tree on a sprawling sunlit lawn.

The picture was shot by photographer Misan Harriman, a friend of the duke and duchess. It was believed to have been taken in Montecito.

A spokesman for the couple said: 'We can confirm that Archie is going to be a big brother. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are overjoyed to be expecting their second child.'

The announcement comes after Meghan, 39, suffered a heartbreaking miscarriage last year.

Mr Harriman said being asked to take the photograph felt especially poignant after the duchess's miscarriage. He said: 'To be asked to help share this absolute joy after such an unimaginable loss and heartache is a marker of true friendship.'

Bookmakers immediately began offering odds for royal baby names last night, with Alfie and Alexandra emerging as early favourites.

It comes almost exactly 37 years after Princess Diana was confirmed to be pregnant with her second child  Prince Harry. Buckingham Palace made that announcement on February 13, 1984.

It's been 15 years since Adam Saunders rose to fame playing teen heartthrob Heath Carroll in ABC drama Blue Water High.

And the 34-year-old looks very different these days to how fans may remember him.

A far cry from his days as a young child actor, Adam now rocks edgy pink hair, a nose ring and an array of tattoos.

You'll NEVER guess what Heath from Blue Water High looks like now! Early 2000s heartthrob Adam Saunders looks very different to his days as a young actor

He is now a male model and fashion photographer based in Sydney, and often shows off his chiseled abs on his Instagram.

Adam rose to fame after playing heartthrob Heath Carroll in ABC drama Blue Water High from 2005 to 2008.

He went on to host the ABC show Creature Features before making appearances in theatre.

Transformation: A far cry from his days as a young child actor, Adam now rocks edgy pink hair, a nose ring and an array of tattoos

Career: Adam played heartthrob Heath Carroll in ABC drama Blue Water High from 2005 to 2008

After leaving his TV role, Adam pursued a career in music with his now-defunct band Prince of Thieves.

Unfortunately, the band failed to find success and Adam eventually decided to give up his dreams of being a musician.

Instead, he stepped behind the camera to film other groups performing.

He has since launched a production company called Killa Kreative, which specialises in creating photography and video content for brands.

He's not shy! He is now a male model and fashion photographer based in Sydney, and often shows off his chiseled abs on his Instagram

In 2016, Adam spoke to Vice about starring in Blue Water High at the start of his career.

'Every now and then there will be an article on Facebook about shows from the early 2000s, which always feels strange because it's not like it affects me day to day.'

He added: 'I started with Blue Water High when I'd just turned 18. I'd finished school and that was my first big acting role. I was still getting to know myself.'

New Delhi:

As the deadly terrorist group Islamic State had seized Iraq's second largest city, Mosul in 2014, it laid claim to various garrisons and military bases filled with huge stock of weapons such as rockets, bombs, guns and tanks. However, if that was not enough, they also found two caches of cobalt-60, a metallic substance with high levels of radiation, in a storage room of Mosul college campus. Cobalt-60 is used to kill cancer cells when it is contained within the heavy shielding of a radiotherapy machine.

However, in terrorists hands, it is the core ingredient of a dirty bomb, a weapon which could be used to spread radiation. Although Western Intelligence agencies knew about the cobalt and watched anxiously for three years for signs that the militants might try to use it. Problems intensified in late 2014 when Islamic State officials said that they had obtained radioactive material and again in early 2016 when the terrorists took over laboratories at the same Mosul college campus with the aim of building new kinds of weapons.

The Iraqi military was also apprised of the potential threat as they battled Islamic State fighters in the sprawling complex where the cobalt was last seen.

Finally, in early 2017, the Iraqi army entered the bullet-pocked campus building and peered into the storage room where the cobalt machines were kept.

The cobalt had not been left untouched by the terrorist group.However, it remains unclear why the Islamic State failed to take advantage of the cobalt at its disposal. U.S. officials and nuclear experts think that the terrorists may have been stopped by a practical concern: how to dismantle the machines thick cladding without exposing themselves to a burst of deadly radiation.

Read more: Trump accuses New York Times of foiling US attempt to kill ISIS chief

The danger has still not passed as despite Iraq's victory in Mosul, many IS operatives are still loose in the city.A lethal doseInternational experts around the globe were highly concerned since IS's entry into Mosul in 2014.

U.S. officials knew that the Islamic State had gained control of small quantities of natural or low-enriched uranium  the remnants of Iraqs nuclear projects from the time of Saddam Husseins presidency  as well as some relatively harmless radioactive iridium used in industrial equipment.

However, global intelligence agencies were concerned du to the existence in Mosul of at least one powerful radiotherapy machine used for cancer treatment, one that could potentially provide the Islamic State with a potent terrorist weapon.

However, US officials and private researchers were unable to answer where was the cobalt located exactly.In the end it was Iraqi officials who offered an explanation, claiming that both machines had been in Mosul throughout the Islamic States occupation, but not in the places where the terrorists might have thought to look for them.

Read more: US lists Pakistan among nations offering 'safe havens' to terrorists

They had been placed out of commission for several years because of lack of parts and had been put in storage in a building owned by the University of Mosul, somewhere in the citys eastern side.

Morris reported from Beirut. Mustafa Salim in Irbil, Iraq, contributed to this report.

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Several people have been injured in Oklahoma following a horrific pile-up involving multiple vehicles on a snow-covered highway during a 'dangerous' winter storm.

The Oklahoma Highway Patrol said the incident occurred westbound on the Turner Turnpike, in Oklahoma City, near mile marker 141 at around 3pm Sunday when two semi-trucks collided.

Two of the semis involved in the wreck burst into flames shortly after, and multiple people have since been rushed to the hospital, according to KOKH-TV.

The number of vehicles involved in the crash was not immediately clear. Officials have also not yet given word on the extend of the injuries of those hospitalized, or the specific number of those hurt.

The crash came as snow and ice blanketed large swaths of the US on Sunday, from the Midwest to as far south as Texas, where Gov. Gregg Abbott has declared a state of emergency, citing 'extremely dangerous' conditions. Snow also began falling thick and fast in Del Rio, near the US-Mexico border, on Sunday evening.

In total, more than 200 million Americans are expected to be impacted by the storm.

Several people have been injured in Oklahoma following a horrific pile-up involving multiple vehicles on a snow-covered highway during a 'dangerous' winter storm

Two of the semi's involved in the wreck burst into flames shortly after, and multiple people have since been rushed to the hospital

Video and photos of from the fiery crash in Oklahoma City have been shared widely across social media.

Firefighters were seen working to extinguish the smoke and flames from the blazing vehicles. The front cabs of two semis were also seen completely smashed in.

'We are currently working this injury crash on the Turner Turnpike westbound near Post Road,' Oklahoma Highway Patrol said in a statement. 'This is involving multiple semis and passenger vehicles.'

The turnpike has been closed in both directions while authorities work to clear the scene.

A hazardous materials team is on scene to monitor runoff with diesel and other vehicle fluids leaking, officials said, adding that the interstate could be closed for up to eight hours.

The Oklahoma National Guard confirmed in a tweet that guardsmen were also on scene transporting injured motorists and providing first aid as needed.

The Oklahoma National Guard confirmed in a tweet that guardsmen were also on scene transporting injured motorists and providing first aid as needed (seen above)

Officials have also not yet given word on the extend of the injuries of those hospitalized, or the number of those hurt

Officials said the interstate could be closed for up to eight hours, and warned locals not to travel during the storm unless absolutely necessary

The turnpike has been closed in both directions while authorities work to clear the scene

Elsewhere in the state, a male motorist was killed around 1:30pm local time near Braham after losing control of their vehicle and crashing into a semi truck.

According to OHP, the driver, later identified as 24-year-old Chevin Webb of Kansas, left the road, hit a bridge railing and continued to spin before coming to a rest on the road.

The driver of the semi was reportedly unable to stop in time and struck Webb's vehicle.

Webb was pronounced dead at the scene, while the driver of the semi was unharmed.

Earlier Sunday, Gov. Kevin Stitt declared a state of emergency in all 77 counties across Oklahoma due to the inclement weather conditions.

'Conditions range from light snow flurries to heavy snow with drifting across Oklahoma highways this afternoon, causing further travel delays,' the state's Department of Transportation said in a 4pm update.

'Oklahoma Department of Transportation crews continue around-the-clock plowing and clearing operations and are asking the public to delay travel heading into the evening as this is likely to be the worst point for conditions since the start of the storm.'

Elsewhere in the state, a male motorist was killed around 1:30pm local time near Braham (above) after losing control of their vehicle and crashing into a semi truck

Snow and ice also blanketed several other states across the US Sunday, prompting flight cancellations, making driving perilous and reaching into areas as far south as Texas Gulf Coast, where snow and sleet were expected overnight.

'Typically, we just don't have quite this much cold air in place that far south,' said Marc Chenard, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service's Weather Prediction Center.

The storm has resulted in state of Texas experiencing some of its coldest temperatures in more than 30 years, with some areas breaking records that are more than a century old.

In Houston, where temperatures were in the 70s earlier this week, officials have advised residents to prepare for power outages and hazardous roads that could be similar to those experienced in the wake of a Category 5 hurricane.

As rain fell Sunday in the Houston area, the temperature hovered near freezing. 'This rain will be transitioning over to just freezing rain, sleet and snow during the overnight through early morning hours tomorrow,' said National Weather Service meteorologist Josh Lichter.

Chenard said significant ice and up to 12 inches of snow were expected across parts of the southern Plains into Monday.

Winter weather conditions are affecting large portions of the U.S., but it is rare for them to extend so far south, Chenard said.

The weather has already proven deadly. On Thursday, icy roads led to a massive crash involving more than 100 vehicles in Fort Worth, killing six people and leaving dozens more needing hospital treatment.

Snow covered city streets including at 61st and Sheridan in Tulsa as a winter storm moves in to northeast Oklahoma on Sunday

Dallas: The Texas Department of Transit Sunday night shared images of Dallas' snow-covered highways

The Dallas area had a covering of snow by Sunday morning, with flakes still falling, and as much as 6 inches was forecast.

With the wintry conditions falling on Valentines Day, florists stayed busy even as the snow fell.

In Fort Worth, where it was already icy and snowy, Gordon Boswell Flowers general manager said delivery drivers were trying to wrap up before conditions got worse later Sunday afternoon.

'It is icy and snowing and theyre calling for more snow,' Cheri Kirkman said.

Despite the weather, she said they still had some people coming in to pick up gifts. 'We've got plenty all made up, ready to go,' Kirkman said.

Forth Worth: Winter weather conditions are affecting large portions of the U.S., but it is rare for them to extend so far south

Cars drive by Michael Given as he stands at an intersection asking for money during a winter storm Sunday, in Oklahoma City

Snow also began falling thick and fast in Del Rio, near the US-Mexico border on Sunday night

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who issued a disaster declaration for all of the states 254 counties, warned on Saturday: 'All of Texas is facing an extremely dangerous winter storm.'

'Every part of the state will face freezing conditions over the coming days, and I urge all Texans to remain vigilant against the extremely harsh weather that is coming,' Abbott said.

'Stay off the roads, take conscious steps to conserve energy, and avoid dangerous practices like bringing generators indoors or heating homes with ovens or stovetops.'

Abbott, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson have each activated National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks including rescuing stranded drivers.

There are over 3,000 troopers deployed. The National Guard will be assisting local law enforcement and performing welfare checks in rural areas, search and rescue teams are monitoring and the Texas forest service will be in place to deal with any downed trees and to clear roads.

In his statement, Abbott thanked 'President Biden for quickly issuing a Federal Emergency Declaration for Texas as we continue to respond to severe winter weather conditions throughout the state.

'This disaster declaration provides Texas with additional resources and assistance that will help our communities respond to this winter weather,' he said.

The weather was affecting operations at airports across the area, with more than 760 flights canceled at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, and at Dallas Love Field most of the nearly 200 flights for Southwest Airlines, the airports main carrier, were canceled.

American Airlines said about 345 of their flights were canceled at DFW Airport, its hub, by early Sunday afternoon. The airline said the storm was also affecting their flights across the region, with operations reduced and canceled at airports across Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas.

Officials were discouraging travel in the wintry conditions. By early Sunday afternoon, the Texas Highway Patrol had reported several multi-car pileups in West Texas, including one that involved 25 vehicles and shut down a portion of Interstate 20 westbound.

The National Weather Service said Sunday that the forecast through early Tuesday calls for 8 to 12 inches of snow in central Oklahoma, and 4 to 8 inches in an area extending from eastern Texas to the Ohio Valley in the Northeast.

Texas: Major cities  including San Antonio, Dallas and Houston  can see several inches of additional snow by the time the precipitation moves out on Monday, according to forecasters

Chicago: The Illinois is also currently locked in a deep freeze, with the city told the brace for at least a foot of snow - possibly more - by Monday

The Cloud Gate sculpture stands at Millennium Park in downtown Chicago, Sunday, where temperatures could drop as low as -7

Snow is shown along Main Street near the Tarrant County Courthouse in Fort Worth, Texas

Bradley Scott, an employee of American Parking cleans snow off of sidewalks outside a lot at 4th and Boulder in Tulsa on Sunday

Tulsa: The National Weather Service said Sunday that the forecast through early Tuesday calls for 8 to 12 inches of snow in central Oklahoma, and 4 to 8 inches in an area extending from eastern Texas to the Ohio Valley in the Northeast

In Memphis, Tennessee, snow had started falling, and while main roads were still passable, lines were forming at grocery stores as people rushed to stock up.

In Mississippi, sleet in Jackson and other central parts of the state left roads and bridges slick. Bill Parker, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Jackson, said up to three-quarters of an inch of ice could accumulate in central Mississippi, bringing the possibility of power outages or falling tree limbs.

Parts of Kentucky and West Virginia still recovering from an ice storm last week are expected to get up to a quarter-inch of ice or up to 8 inches of snow by Tuesday.

About 19,000 customers remained without electricity in southern West Virginia and about 9,000 in eastern Kentucky on Sunday from the storm that moved through on Wednesday and Thursday.

Utilities warned of the likelihood for additional power outages due to falling tree limbs. Hundreds of utility crews and contractors were traveling Sunday to be in place if additional outages occurred.

The National Weather Service said Sunday that the forecast through early Tuesday calls for 8 to 12 inches of snow in central Oklahoma (above)

The mass vaccination clinic put on by Medical Center Hospital and the City of Odessa at Ratliff Stadium is seen covered in snow and ice on Saturday

Seattle experienced its snowiest weekend in decades, following 11.1 inches of snowfall in the region between Friday and Saturday - the highest two-day total its seen in nearly 50 years

In Texas, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages the flow of electric power in the state, was asking customers to reduce electricity use as much as possible through Tuesday, including closing shades to reduce the amount of heat lost through windows and avoiding the use of large appliances.

'We are experiencing record-breaking electric demand due to the extreme cold temperatures that have gripped Texas,' said ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness. 'At the same time, we are dealing with higher-than-normal generation outages due to frozen wind turbines and limited natural gas supplies available to generating units.

Dan Woodfin, senior director of system operations at ERCOT, further warned of 'rotating' power outages over the next 72 hours, saying as temperatures drop further, the grid will not be able to support all the demands placed on it.

'Theres certainly a possibility we could have to do rotating outages,' he said. 'We believe we may have to tomorrow [Monday] and Tuesday. That is a little more likely.'

Texas is already seeing record-breaking electricity demands, ERCOT officials said.

If electric reserves drop below certain thresholds, ERCOT would ask regional providers to turn off electricity to some neighborhoods for 'maybe 15-30 minutes,' Woodfin explained.

Meanwhile, in the Pacific Northwest, tens of thousands of people were without power after a winter storm blanketed the region with ice and snow and made travel treacherous.

Seattle experienced its snowiest weekend in decades, following 11.1 inches of snowfall in the region between Friday and Saturday - the highest two-day total its seen in nearly 50 years.

A winter weather advisory is currently in place until 10pm, with two more inches forecasted to have fallen by Sunday's end. The advisory extends to 10am on Monday for the east Puget Sound lowlands and western Whatcom County.

Lake Michigan is covered with snow and ice, with the skyline in the background on a cold winter's day in Chicago

Seattle: In the Pacific Northwest, tens of thousands of people were without power after a winter storm blanketed the region with ice and snow and made travel treacherous

People are bundled up while walking in downtown Chicago on Sunday, amid a bitterly cold deep freeze

Chicago is also currently locked in a deep freeze, with the city told the brace for at least a foot of snow - possibly more - by Monday.

Monday will bring about 7 to 15 inches at Midway Airport, the weather service said. More snow likely will follow Tuesday, with a foot expected at OHare Airport.

Meanwhile, Sundays high temperature was expected to reach just 6 degrees, which would break the record for lowest high temperatures on Valentines Day  8 degrees, recorded in 1943.

Nighttime temperatures could dip as low as minus-7, with wind chills potentially dropping to minus-28, the weather service reported. In those temperatures, frostbite is possible in fewer than 10 minutes.

Temperatures arent expected to climb above freezing until next Sunday.
Three injured in clash during rally for Ram Mandir donation in Kutch

Picture of Kerala MLA donating money for Ram Mandir goes viral; Congress terms it as 'trap'

Ram temple in Ayodhya will give new dimension to India's culture: Sadananda Gowda

India

oi-Ajay Joseph Raj P

Bengaluru, Feb 15: The construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya will give a new dimension to the country's culture and tradition, Union Minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers DV Sadananda Gowda on Monday said.

"In a way it is a work related to the nation. It is not just the construction of Ram temple but it is going to give a new dimension to the country's culture and tradition," he said.

India maps the 21st Century

Gowda was interacting with journalists here after attending a fund-raising event for the Ram temple organised by the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Officers and Employees Welfare Association.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

He said the funds for temples were being mobilised from individuals instead of depending on governments because the Ram Janmabhoomi Teertha Kshetra believed that the temple construction should be done by ordinary devotees of Lord Ram. He hailed the BBMP association for organising the fundraising event.

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Story first published: Monday, February 15, 2021, 14:30 [IST]

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MBABANE  From being ranked among the top tertiary institutions in the country, the Eswatini College of Technology (ECOT) has surely downgraded to junk status.

This comes after allegations that the Eswatini Electricity Company (EEC) has switched off power at the college over a debt of about E100 000. The move by the service provider has left the college in darkness for the past two weeks.

This is despite that the college is home to equipment that costs millions of Emalangeni and the current situation is likely to attract thieves whose chances of walking away with the equipment bought using taxpayers hard-earned cash are very high.

According to a lecturer at the institution, electricity was switched off last week Monday and it has been dark to the present day.

Indignity

He shared that it was indignity for a highly ranked institution to face challenges of this fashion, especially at a time when the world was migrating into the digital era and electricity was the basic commodity for such an exercise.

The gospel nowadays is online learning and tertiary institutions are encouraged to explore the platform for the sake of progress in studies as face-to-face learning has been suspended due to the persistent COVID-19 pandemic. However, we have no confidence as lecturers that the school is well-capacitated to execute the online learning if the very basic need for the exercise is not available, shared the lecturer.

Another issue that was brought up by the lecturer, which also speaks to the junk status that the institution has downgraded to, is that of the sorry sight of the overgrown lawn and vegetation within the institutions premises.

He said the school last cleared its surroundings late last year and since then, it was nothing short of an abandoned farm.

The school has surely lost its dignity and to make matters worse, it is situated right next to a busy road where everybody can see. What is so unfortunate is that other tertiary institutions and general schools around the city have trimmed their vegetation and cleared the surroundings despite that there is no activity as schools are closed. It is so embarrassing, shared the lecturer.

A manager at EEC confirmed that the institution was among those that have had power switched off because they owed the service provider, but requested not to disclose the exact figure that the institution owed as that was confidential.

When contacted on the matter, EECs Corporate Communications and Marketing Manager Khaya Mavuso confirmed that there were multiple companies in their schedule which owed and the service provider had switched off power, without making a specific reference to ECOT.

We encourage that if people have a challenge with settling their debts with the service provider, they should come forward and engage us so that we reach an amicable solution, he said.

Efforts to get both the institutions Principal Nomcebo Nhlengetfwa and Vice Principal Tsiwani Masina proved futile as the formers mobile phone was not available while the latters phone rang unanswered when contacted over the weekend.

Junk

This is not the first renowned tertiary institution in the country to make headlines on having downgraded to junk status.

The Nation Magazine reported last year that the University of Eswatini (UNESWA), once the pride of the countrys education system, had collapsed. The magazine reported that underfunding and abuse of the few financial resources it had have been the cause of the mess.

Government has refused to fund the university adequately in the last 10 years and the results are now showing. Once revered as the Mecca of premier education institutions in the region, it has collapsed to the point where it is starting to look like a farce, read the article from the magazine.
Chahid El Hafed, Feb 15, 2021 (SPS) - The President of the Republic, Mr. Brahim Gali has received a message of gratitude from his Cuban counterpart, Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez, President of the Republic of Cuba, for the cordial congratulations on the occasion of the 62nd anniversary of the Triumph of the Cuban Revolution.

The Cuban president confirmed the will of his Government of to strengthen relations of friendship and cooperation between Cuba and the SADR.

Since the Caribbean nation recognized our country in 1980, Cuba and the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) agreed to establish high-level diplomatic relations with embassies in their respective countries. SPS

125/090/TRA
The University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA) has directed that students who wear indecent dresses on campus must not be allowed to attend lectures.



The Vice-Chancellor of the university, Professor Abednego F. O. Amartey, who issued the directive, mentioned the dresses which would not be tolerated on campus to include short skirts, torn jeans and other such apparel that exposed vital parts of the body.



At the universitys 2021 matriculation in Accra last Friday, Prof. Amartey said the directive followed an observation that some of the students admitted in the 2020/2021 academic year wore "very inappropriate dresses" on campus, against the professional ethics of the university.



"I have noticed that some of you have started wearing short skirts all over the place. The UPSA is a professional institution and we dress very well. We have directed lecturers that if you dress in an inappropriate manner, they should remove you from the lecture halls.



"You are not allowed to dress the way we have seen you dress these days. We allowed it in the past week because we assumed you did not know. Now you know, so there should not be excuses," he added.



Matriculation



The matriculation oath was administered to the 8,247 students who have been admitted to pursue professional, diploma, undergraduate and postgraduate courses.



They are made up of 70 professionals, 1,623 diploma, 5,671 undergraduate and 883 postgraduate students.



Prof. Amartey said the university received 13,148 applications, out of which 11,148 applicants were offered admission, the highest in the history of the university.



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"Matriculating with our fresh students today are six international students from four West African countries  Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Cote dIvoire and Togo," he added.



COVID-19



The UPSA Vice-Chancellor said the management of the university had adopted a blended teaching and learning approach (virtual and in-person) as part of measures to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 on campus.



He explained that for the first six weeks, there would be in-person or face-to-face teaching, with double contact hours per week, followed by another six weeks of online or virtual teaching.



"End-of-semester examinations will largely be held in-person, with examinations for a few courses taken online or as take-home assignments," he added.



Prof. Amartey urged the students to take their studies seriously and also desist from inappropriate practices that could bring the name of the university into disrepute.



For his part, the Chairman of the Governing Council of the UPSA, Dr Kofi Ohene-Konadu, assured the students that the management would not relent in its efforts to ensure their safety and success throughout the duration of their respective programmes.





Source: graphiconline.com









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Research Council (BARC) CEO Partho Dasgupta rigged the "entire" TRP system for news channels and also discussed issues of security with "a certain owner cum news anchor" on Whatsapp, the Mumbai Police told the Bombay High Court on Monday.

Special public prosecutor Shishir Hiray told a single-judge bench presided over by Justice PD Naik that Dasgupta was directly involved in manipulating Television Rating Points (TRPs) with the help of other accused persons.

Hiray, who was opposing Dasgupta's bail plea in the HC, said the crime branch of the Mumbai police had accessed, among other things, Dasgupta's WhatsApp chats with a "certain owner and anchor of a TV channel" where in he discussed manipulating the TRPs.

Hiray said the two also discussed issues concerning security.

"They tried to manipulate the entire system of TRPs. There are chats regarding the security of the nation," Hiray said.

The purported chats between Dasgupta and Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, who is also an accused in the TRP scam case, on the 2019 Pulwama attack are a part of the chargesheet filed by the police in the case.

Justice Naik asked if any offence had been registered with regard to the Wahtsapp chat regarding the Pulwama attack, to which Hiray replied in negative.

Dasgupta's counsel, senior lawyer Abad Ponda, told the HC that the WhatsApp chats were merely "loose talks".

"Regarding Whatsapp chats, I will only say it is loose talks. Those are not admissible and need corroborative evidence," Ponda said.

He said Dasgupta's co-accused in the case were out on bail and that the Maharashtra government had made a statement before the HC earlier this month saying it will not take any coercive action against Arnab Goswami or any other employees of ARG Outlier media, which runs Republic TV channels.

"I am not saying to arrest them. But then the whole group under Republic TV is protected and I am behind bars," Ponda told the HC on behalf of Dasgupta.

He also said that the chargesheet had already been filed in the case and Dasgupta's custodial interrogation was not required any more, and therefore, he be granted bail.

Objecting to the bail plea, Hiray said the statement made by Maharashtra government counsel Kapil Sibal, protecting the ARG employees, had been made with "reluctance".

Hiray said the TRP scam happened at three levels.

"The barometers for measurement were installed by and Hansa. The viewers were paid monthly for watching their channels. The inevitable conclusion is that the information was leaked from BARC," he said.

Justice Naik then asked if Dasgupta was the one who had leaked the information, to which Hiray said that seemed to be "the inevitable conclusion".

"There is a full involvement (of Dasgupta). For a few crores he (Dasgupta) allowed the TRPs to be manipulated," he said.

Hiray further said the other accused who were granted bail in the case were not as "powerful' as Dasgupta is.

The HC will continue hearing the arguments on Tuesday.

(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.)
Kids want to fish? You don't know how yourself? Here's a little help
Neither the coronavirus pandemic nor the resulting economic downturn served to help predict what the Catalan political scene would look like after Sundays regional election. The polls, which saw low voter turnout due to the ongoing health crisis, saw the Catalan Socialist Party (PSC) victorious, with its candidate, former Health Minister Salvador Illa, taking the highest number of votes and 33 seats in the regional assembly. But it was not enough to defeat the pro-Catalan independence parties, who emerged from the vote in a stronger position.

The Catalan Repulican Left (ERC) party drew with the PSC and took home 33 votes, while Junts per Catalunya (Together for Catalunya) secured 32. With the support of the far-left, pro-independence party CUP, which managed nine seats in the regional parliament, the three parties will be able to repeat their previous pact and exceed the 68 votes needed for an absolute majority and thus form a government. Should such a deal be reached, however, the novelty will be that ERC will lead the coalition, rather than Junts.

PSC candidate Salvador Illa was chosen to run thanks to his high profile and voter approval after a year in charge of the central governments response to the coronavirus pandemic. He managed to attract not just a good part of the anti-independence voters who opted for center-right Ciudadanos (Citizens) at the last regional polls in 2017, but also those who want to move on after 10 years of the pro-independence drive, which peaked in 2017 with an illegal referendum on secession from Spain and the passing of a unilateral declaration of independence in the regional parliament.

ERC candidate Pere Aragones (r) and party president Oriol Junqueras celebrate their party's strong showing at the election. Alberto Estevez / EFE

With 33 seats and 23% of the vote, the PSC secured its best result since 2006. ERC was close behind with the same number of seats and 21.3% of the vote. Its eternal rivals in the center-right, pro-independence area of the political spectrum, now together under the Junts per Catalunya brand, came in third with 32 seats and 20% of the votes.

Of particular note in last nights results was the success of the far-right Vox, which is now the fourth-biggest group in the Catalan parliament  the party has seen similar success both on a regional and national level, and is currently the third-largest power in Spains lower house of parliament, the Congress of Deputies. Its result in Catalonia on Sunday makes it the principal reference point on the political right in terms of combating the independence drive.

After winning the most seats at the 2017 election, Ciudadanos saw its voter support crumble last night, taking just six seats  one of the biggest election disasters ever seen in Catalonia. The conservative Popular Party (PP), meanwhile, also lost seats and was left with just three  one fewer than its showing in 2017.

The Catalan branch of left-wing Podemos, En Comu Podem, held steady at Sundays vote and took eight seats once more. The anti-capitalist CUP party, meanwhile, secured its best result ever, with nine seats in parliament.

On the basis of these results, the pro-independence parties could form a government once more. But the PSC could also try to do a deal with En Comu Podem and ERC, thus forming a left-wing block  the central government in Madrid is a coalition of the Socialist Party (PSOE) and Podemos, and governs in a minority thanks to the support of a range of other groups, including ERC.

Vox leader Santiago Abascal (front row, third from right) with regional candidate Ignacio Garriga after learning that the far-right group has entered the regional parliament with 11 seats. David Oller / Europa Press

Should the pro-independence bloc do a deal, ERC would be in charge, taking over from Junts per Catalunya, which gained the most seats in 2017. That would let ERC set the agenda for the upcoming political term, moving it away from the unilateral approach to independence set out by Junts leader and former regional premier Carles Puigdemont. The latter politician continues to live in self-imposed exile in Brussels after fleeing Spain to avoid arrest in the wake of the 2017 secession attempt. The other leaders of the failed secessionist bid were tried in the Supreme Court for charges including sedition, and were eventually convicted and imprisoned. The ERC are in favor of reaching a cross-party pact in order to hold a legal vote on the regions future within Spain.

A repeat edition of the outgoing administration will depend on whether Esquerra and Junts manage to agree on a common message in terms of independence. Junts has accused ERC of having abandoned the fight for independence after embracing more pragmatic political routes, while ERC has accused Junts of wanting to go after its goals without counting on sufficient support among the electorate.

For the first time on Sunday, the Catalan parties in favor of independence managed to secure more than 50% of the vote, but turnout was very low at just 54%. One of the secessionist parties, the Catalan European Democratic Party (PdeCAT), led by former regional premier Artur Mas, won no seats at all in Sundays elections, and the parties that did take seats have very different policies aside from the desire for an independent Catalonia.

Whats more, many of these parties have recognized that 50% of the vote is insufficient to declare independence, nor is it enough to reform the regions Estatut, the laws that set out the governance of the northeastern territory. The reality is that the pro-independence parties managed to exceed 50% of the vote with 630,000 fewer votes than they secured at the 2017 elections, and with just the support of 26% of eligible voters.

CUP cadidate Dolors Sabater (second from right) and other party officials address the media after the vote. Enric Fontcuberta / EFE

The ERC candidate, Pere Aragones, sent out a message to the central government after the results were in on Sunday. Its time to resolve the conflict, its time to sit down and see how we can resolve all of this with a referendum, he said. The intention of ERC is to form a government not just with Junts and the CUP, but also with the support of En Comu Podem. There is a clear majority of pro-independence and leftist deputies, he said, after calling for a meeting of the forces that support an amnesty for the jailed leaders of the 2017 breakaway attempt, including his own colleague and former deputy premier Oriol Junqueras.

A majority of leftist parties seems to be a more complicated option. While the PSC, En Comu Podem and ERC have a clear majority, during the election campaign the latter party categorically stated it would not do any kind of deal with the Socialists.

The PSCs candidate Salvador Illa insisted on Sunday night that he would stand at an investiture vote, despite not currently counting on the votes he would need to be confirmed as regional premier. The PSC is seeking to put a spotlight on its first win in many years at a Catalan election. Illa stated last night that change is coming in Catalonia and there is no going back.

Days and weeks of intense negotiations now lie ahead. If a deal cant be reached with the pro-secessionist groups ERC will have to explore other options, but this will not be easy

Days and weeks of intense negotiations now lie ahead. The small, left-wing CUP will be a necessary force to form a pro-independence government, but they have not made things easy in the past  in 2015 they even managed to ensure that Artur Mas gave up on seeking a new term as regional premier, to be replaced by Carles Puigdemont.

If a deal cant be reached with the pro-secessionist groups ERC will have to explore other options, but this will not be easy. The priority for each party will first be to ensure there is internal cohesion and then to consider deals with groups that they did not veto during the campaign  as the pro-independence parties did with the Socialists, for example.

The law sets out a 20-day period from now to constitute a new parliament. After that deadline has expired, the speaker will have 10 days to talk with the political forces and propose a candidate for the premiership. After that, an investiture debate will be held. A candidate will need an absolute majority to prosper in the first round of voting, and if this bid fails, a second round will take place 48 hours later where a simple majority is enough (more yes votes than no).

If no candidate is successful, more votes can take place during a two-month period, after which new elections would be called should no candidate be successful. This scenario nearly played out in 2015, until the CUP agreed to lend its support in exchange for the withdrawal of Artur Mas at the last minute.

The vote was defined by a very low turnout of less than 54%, even lower than the previous record set in 1992, back when longtime leader Jordi Pujol was winning back-to-back absolute majorities. Applications for mail-in ballots tripled from the previous election in 2017, according to the postal service. And a quarter of the 82,251 citizens who were randomly selected to man the voting stations requested to be excused from their duty, reflecting widespread fear about contracting the coronavirus.

Sundays election was the fourth held in the region since Mas began the pro-independence process in 2010. The polls were called eight months before the political term was due to expire after the previous regional premier, Quim Torra of Junts, was barred from office by the Supreme Court after being found guilty of disobedience. Torra had refused to remove political banners from public buildings during an election campaign, thus falling foul of electoral law.

As the main architect of the secessionist drive, Mas suffered a massive setback on Sunday. No longer having links to Junts and now supporting PDeCAT, he has gone from leading parties that won up to 62 seats in parliament to being wiped from the map in the Catalan parliament.

English version by Simon Hunter.
YANGON, Myanmar - Security forces in Myanmar pointed guns toward anti-coup protesters and attacked them with sticks Monday, seeking to quell the large-scale demonstrations calling for the military junta that seized power this month to reinstate the elected government.

In this image made from video by the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), two armored personnel carriers were seen traversing on a road in Yangon, Myanmar, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. Sightings of armored personnel carriers in Myanmars biggest city and an internet shutdown raised political tensions late Sunday, after vast numbers of people around the country flouted orders against demonstrations to protest the militarys seizure of power. (DVB via AP)

YANGON, Myanmar - Security forces in Myanmar pointed guns toward anti-coup protesters and attacked them with sticks Monday, seeking to quell the large-scale demonstrations calling for the military junta that seized power this month to reinstate the elected government.

More than 1,000 protesters rallied in front of the Myanmar Economic Bank in Mandalay, the country's second-largest city, when at least 10 trucks full of soldiers and police arrived and immediately started firing slingshots toward the protesters, according to a photographer who witnessed the events.

The soldiers and police then attacked the protesters with sticks, and police could be seen aiming long guns into the air amid sounds that resembled gunfire. Local media reported that rubber bullets were fired into the crowd and that a few people were injured. Police also were seen pointing guns toward protesters.

In the capital, Naypyitaw, protesters gathered outside a police station, demanding the release of a group of high school students who were detained while joining anti-coup activities.

One who managed to escape told reporters that the students  thought to range in age from 13 to 16  were demonstrating peacefully when a line of riot police suddenly arrived and began arresting them. It wasnt clear exactly how many students were rounded up, but estimates put the figure at between 20 and 40.

Engineers hold posters with an image of deposed Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi as they hold an anti-coup protest march in Mandalay, Myanmar Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. Myanmar's military leaders extended their detention of Suu Kyi, whose remand was set to expire on Monday, as protests continued to roil the Southeast Asian country following a military coup earlier this month. (AP Photo)

Earlier Monday, Myanmar's military leaders extended their detention of deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose remand was set to expire and whose freedom is a key demand of the crowds of people protesting the Feb. 1 coup.

Suu Kyi will now be remanded until Feb. 17, when she will likely appear in court by videoconference, according to Khin Maung Zaw, a lawyer asked by Suu Kyis party to represent her. The Nobel laureate remains under house arrest on a minor charge of possessing unregistered imported walkie-talkies.

Suu Kyi's extended detention is likely to further inflame tensions between the military and the protesters who have taken to the streets of cities across the Southeast Asian nation seeking the return of the government they elected.

Anti-coup protesters take a selfie while posing in front of an armored personnel carrier deployed outside the Central Bank of Myanmar building in Yangon, Myanmar on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. Myanmar's military leaders have extended their detention of deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose remand was set to expire Monday and whose freedom is a key demand of the crowds of people continuing to protest this month's military coup. (AP Photo)

Protesters gathered across Myanmar on Monday, following a night in which authorities cut the countrys internet access and increased the security presence in major cities in a bid to curtail demonstrations.

Thousands of engineers marched in the streets of Mandalay, chanting and holding signs that read, Free our leader, Who stands with justice? and Stop arresting people illegally at midnight.

In Yangon, the countrys most populous city, fewer protesters gathered amid the internet loss and reports of military vehicles on the streets. Nevertheless, more than 1,000 anti-coup demonstrators were outside the Central Bank of Myanmar building, where there were also military trucks full of soldiers, riot police, water cannon trucks and armoured personnel carriers.

A man gestures while talking to police during a crackdown on anti-coup protesters holding a rally in front of the Myanmar Economic Bank in Mandalay, Myanmar on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. Security forces in Myanmar intensified their crackdown against anti-coup protesters on Monday, seeking to quell the large-scale demonstrations calling for the military junta that seized power earlier this month to reinstate the elected government. (AP Photo)

Demonstrators carried placards that read #SupportCDM #SaveMyanmar. CDM refers to the civil disobedience movement that has seen doctors, engineers and others in Myanmar refuse to work until the military releases elected political leaders and returns the country to civilian rule.

Some protesters posed for photographs in front of military vehicles while holding red signs that read Join in CDM.

When the military seized power, it detained Suu Kyi and members of her government and prevented recently elected lawmakers from opening a new session of Parliament. The junta, led by Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, said it stepped in because the government failed to properly investigate allegations of fraud in last years election, which Suu Kyis National League for Democracy party won in a landslide. The state election commission refuted that contention, saying there is no evidence to support it.

A man is held by police during a crackdown on anti-coup protesters holding a rally in front of the Myanmar Economic Bank in Mandalay, Myanmar on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. Security forces in Myanmar intensified their crackdown against anti-coup protesters on Monday, seeking to quell the large-scale demonstrations calling for the military junta that seized power earlier this month to reinstate the elected government. (AP Photo)

The military justified its move by citing a clause in the 2008 constitution, implemented during military rule, that says in cases of national emergency, the governments executive, legislative and judicial powers can be handed to the military commander-in-chief.

It is just one of many parts of the charter that ensured the military could maintain ultimate control over the country it ruled for 50 years following a 1962 coup. The military is allowed to appoint its members to 25% of seats in Parliament and it controls several key ministries involved in security and defence.

An order on Sunday that appeared to be from the Ministry of Transport and Communications told mobile phone service providers to shut down internet connections from 1 a.m. to 9 a.m. Monday. It circulated widely on social media, as did a notice said to be from service provider Oredoo Myanmar containing the same details.

Soldiers stand next to a military truck parked near the headquarters of the National League for Democracy party in Yangon, Myanmar Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. Security forces in Myanmar intensified their crackdown against anti-coup protesters on Monday, seeking to quell the large-scale demonstrations calling for the military junta that seized power earlier this month to reinstate the elected government. (AP Photo)

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres reaffirmed the unwavering support of the United Nations to the people of Myanmar in their pursuit of democracy, peace, human rights and the rule of law and called on the military to allow U.N. special envoy Christine Schraner Burgener to visit Myanmar to assess the situation firsthand, U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said.

Schraner Burgener spoke to Myanmars Deputy Commander-in-Chief, Soe Win, on Monday and conveyed Guterres growing concern at the militarys increasing use of force and arrests of political leaders, government officials and others, Haq said.

The U.N. envoy also reiterated Guterres' call to ensure the right to peaceful assembly and that demonstrators are not subjected to reprisals, Haq said.

She has conveyed to the Myanmar military that the world is watching closely, and any form of heavy-handed response is likely to have severe consequences, Haq said.

On Sunday, ambassadors from the United States and Canada and 12 European nations called on Myanmars security forces to refrain from violence against those protesting the overthrow of their legitimate government.

We support the people of Myanmar in their quest for democracy, freedom, peace, and prosperity, they said in a joint statement.
The death has occurred of Maurice (Mossie) Murnane, Glenfield Rd, Kilmallock.

Peacefully at University Hospital Limerick. Deeply regretted by his loving Wife Joan (nee Murphy), son John & daughter Dolores, sister-in-law, nephews, nieces & extended family.

Rest in peace

Funeral Mass on Wednesday at 12 noon at SS Peter & Pauls Church, Kilmallock. Funeral cortege to pass by his residence after Funeral Mass to cemetery in Effin.

Due to Covid guidelines family only. Mass will be live streamed & letters of sympathy can be sent to McCarthys Undertaker, Kilmallock.

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The death has occurred of Trish Merrick (nee Colfer), Carrigareely, Caherconlish / Golden, Tipperary and formerly of Castlemungret, Mungret.

Trish, died (peacefully) in the loving hands of the staff of ward 4C, University Hopsital Limerick, following a brief illness.

Daughter of the late Patsy and May Colfer. Beloved wife of P.J. and loving mother of Kevin, Robyn and Jack. Sadly missed by her sisters her twin Annette Dundon (Pallaskenry) and Jackie Sinnott (Crecora), brothers Seamus (Raheen) and Bernard (Bournemouth, U.K.), nephews, nieces, aunts, uncle-in-law, mother-in-law, brothers-in-law, sisters-in-law, cousins, great neighbours and many great friends.

May She Rest in Peace

For those would like to pay their respects by means of standing in a guard of honour, Trish's funeral cortege will depart Cross' Funeral Home, Ballyneety, on Wednesday (February 17th) at 11.00am, on route to Our Lady, Mother of the Church, Caherconlish, to arrive for a private Requiem Mass, for family only at 11.30am, Mass will be live streamed (to view click here) funeral afterwards to the adjoining Cemetery.

In compliance with the current HSE guidelines, the funeral will be limited to 10 people. Please ensure social distancing and public health advice is adhered.

Messages of sympathy may be expressed through the condolence section below or cards and letters of sympathy can be sent to Cross' Funeral Directors, Ballyneety, Co. Limerick.

No flowers please. Donations, if desired, to Limerick Animal Welfare, (To donate click here)

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The death has occurred of Barbara Leonard, Blackrock, Dublin and formerly of Newcastle West.

Peacefully in the wonderful care of the staff of Brymore House Nursing Home, Howth, Co. Dublin. Deeply regretted by her sister Pamela Leonard (Gallagher) and her brother Michael, nieces Alison, Katherine and Hilary, nephew Michael, grandnieces, grandnephews, extended family, relatives, and friends.

May She Rest in Peace

In keeping with current government guidelines on public gatherings Barbaras Requiem Mass will remain private for immediate family only. Those who would like to attend but due to the current circumstances cannot, or are unable to, may view her Funeral Mass remotely on Wednesday, February 17th, at 12.30 pm using the parish webcam https://www.churchservices.tv/booterstown A private message of condolence can be left for her family using the following link https://www.masseybrosfuneralhomes.com/funeral-notices/ All enquiries to Massey Bros., Blackrock Tel: (01) 280 4454.

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The death has occurred of Kathleen Hannon (nee Murphy), Cois Baile, Dromin, Listowel, Co. Kerry and late of old Kildimo and Tullylease, Co. Cork.

Peacefully, on February 15th, 2021, at her home, in the wonderful care of her husband Batt and son Stephen. Predeceased by her infant daughter Catriona. Sadly missed and lovingly remembered by her husband Batt, sons Batt, Sean and Stephen, grandchildren Kate and Jack, brother Bertie, daughters-in-law Amy and Karen, brothers-in-law, sister-in-law, nephews, nieces, extended family, her special friend Breda, neighbours and many friends.

MAY HER GENTLE SOUL REST IN PEACE

In accordance with HSE guidelines and in the interest of public health, a private family Funeral will take place for Kathleen, with the Requiem Mass being celebrated in St. Mary's Church, Listowel, on Wednesday morning at 11.30 a.m, which will be live-streamed on www.listowelparish.com with burial afterwards in St. John Paul II Cemetery, Ballybunion Road, Listowel. Family flowers only, please. Donations, if desired, to www.kerryhospice.com
Camillus, N.Y.  In his first public comments since Saturdays impeachment vote, Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer again asserted former President Donald Trump was responsible for inciting the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

Make no mistake about it. The person who incited this was Donald J. Trump, Schumer said Monday.

And I believe he deserved to be impeached and he should have been convicted, Schumer added. If you dont believe me, you can ask Mitch McConnell.

Schumer did not take questions about the failed impeachment effort or McConnell today, his first visit to Upstate New York since becoming the leader of the U.S. Senate.

On Saturday, McConnell and 42 other Republican senators voted against convicting Trump, ending the former presidents second impeachment trial in a second acquittal.

After the vote, McConnell once again said Trump was responsible for the Jan. 6 riot.

There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day, McConnell said, adding the presidents false statements about a stolen election created an atmosphere that led to the violence and destruction on Jan. 6.

But McConnell said he voted against conviction because he believes its unconstitutional to impeach a former president.

Today, Schumer said he was disappointed in the votes by those 43 Republicans. I salute the seven Republican senators who convicted, Schumer said. This was the most despicable act that any president has ever done.

The final vote was 57 to 43. It takes 67 votes to convict.

Schumer said he believed the majority of Americans believe Trump was guilty of inciting the riot and failing to stem the escalating violence. Schumer said the impeachment trial brought new details from the attack to light, and that will help diminish the fervor for additional protests and insurrections.

What the president did was awful, Schumer said. I believe that Americans will see this kind of support fade over the next several months.

Got a story idea or news tip youd like to share with a Syracuse-area reporter? Please contact me through email, Twitter, Facebook or at 315-470-2274.
Western Australian Premier Mark McGowan has been accused of basing his Covid-19 restrictions on polls rather than science to help him win the upcoming election.

Mr McGowan has repeatedly insisted his decision to maintain an eight-month hard border closure with the rest of Australia last year was informed by guidance from the state's chief health officer.

He made the same claims when locking down Perth, the South West, and Peel regions for five days over a single case of the virus on January 31.

But the state's Liberal party has accused him of basing his coronavirus response on his own political agenda rather than science after it emerged he spent $100,000 on community sentiment polls during the pandemic.

Masked theatre patrons at a Fringe Festival event on February 5 as Western Australia came out of lockdown. WA Premier Mark McGowan has been accused of basing his Covid-19 on community sentiment rather than health advice to help him win the next election

Mr McGowan locked down Perth and the South West and Peel regions for five days over a single case of the virus on January 31

HOW WESTERN AUSTRALIANS REACTED TO THE STATE'S COVID-19 RESTRICTIONS May - 64 per cent supported WA's decision to open schools in term two for those who needed them 80 per cent supported WA's hard border closure Three-quarters wanted playgrounds to be reopened in a month; two-thirds wanted hospitality venues to open in the same time period One-third wanted intrastate travel ban relaxed in two weeks June - 83 per cent believed WA government had the best coronavirus response in Australia July - 42 per cent wanted AFL Grand Final played at Optus Stadium Source: Metrix Consulting research commissioned by the WA Department of Premier and Cabinet Advertisement

The surveys - commissioned over three months in 2020 - found in May that 90 per cent of the state's population backed the state's hard border closures.

The state's residents were also polled in July on its stance on WA hosting an AFL hub - 29 per cent of whom opposed it - and whether Perth should host the the league's Grand Final.

Pollsters reported only 42 per cent of respondents wanted the final played at the city's Optus Stadium.

In June, the state government relaxed rules on regional travel in WA just weeks after a third of those polled said the restrictions should be eased in the next fortnight.

'Im disappointed Western Australians have been played for mugs,' WA opposition leader Zak Kirkup told The West Australian.

'We thought we were all in this together but Labor was using polling companies that exploited our anxieties and fears about Covid-19.

'During the height of the pandemic we expected leadership backed by the worlds best health advice but what we got were decisions based on polling and data analytics.'

Two masked women exercising in Perth on February 5. The state's Liberal party has accused Mr McGowan of basing his coronavirus response on his own political agenda rather than science

WA residents are due to go to the polls to choose their next premier on March 13.

The weekly surveys in June found more than 80 per cent believed WA dealt with the virus the best out of all the Australian states and territories.

The premier's office said advice from government medical experts and the state's police commissioner guided his coronavirus response.

Pictured: WA Liberal leader Zak Kirkup. He said the state's residents had 'been played for mugs' by their premier

His office further claimed he had never even been given the results of the polling.

'The premier was not briefed on the public sentiment reports,' a spokesman said.

'All decisions related to the state of emergency restrictions and the Covid-19 pandemic were based on the advice of the Chief Health Officer and State Emergency Coordinator.'

Mr Kirkup said in October the constant polling showed 'the government's decision making is being driven by a political agenda, not health advice'.

'The premier is gauging the opinions of people in the public for political gain because there is an election on the horizon,' he said.
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ARMED gardai shot dead a pet dog was as they arrested the owner on suspicion of drug dealing and making phone threats to kill his ex partner.

A court heard Mark Byrne's mobile was being seized and his home searched when more than 9,000 worth of cannabis was found and the two-year-old dog was fatally shot.

His defence maintained the garda response to a complaint about a threatening phone message was "particularly heavy handed."

Judge Treasa Kelly refused to grant bail and remanded the accused in custody to appear in court again later this week.

Mr Byrne (48) is charged with possession of cannabis with intent to sell or supply at his home at Coburg Place, Dublin 1. He is also charged with threatening to kill or cause serious harm to his ex-partner.

Detective Garda Brendan Meares told Dublin District Court the accused made no reply to the charges after caution at Coolock Garda Station yesterday.

Objecting to bail, he said it was alleged that over the course of Friday evening and into Saturday morning, February 13, Mr Byrne contacted his former partner by phone, leaving threatening voicemail and WhatsApp voice messages.

His phone was seized for analysis and in the course of the search of his home yesterday, February 14, some 462 grammes of suspected cannabis herb was found. The current valuation was 20 per gramme, Det Gda Meares said.

Mr Byrnes ex partner told the court she did not think she would be able to walk down the street without looking over her shoulder, and would be afraid to go home if he was released on bail.

She said she did not think she would be able to relax knowing he is out and that she would be at risk.

Mr Byrne was her ex-partner from a long time ago and they had been in a relationship for about a year and a half, she said.

Applying for bail, defence solicitor Yvonne Bambury said the Emergency Response Unit was brought to the accuseds home and armed gardai shot this mans dog dead.

In the course of his arrest, Mr Byrne's two-year-old puppy, his pet, was shot twice and died, Ms Bambury said. It was a very heavy handed response, she said.

Det Gda Meares said the incident was the subject of a Garda Siochana Ombudsman Commission investigation.

Ms Bambury said the accused was presumed innocent and would be happy to comply with bail conditions. If denied bail he could be in custody awaiting trial until 2022 at the earliest.

She said the animal was shot after armed gardai were sent following a complaint about a phone message. Judge Kelly said she was taking account of the concerns expressed by the alleged victim, his ex-partner.

She refused bail and remanded Mr Byrne in custody to Cloverhill District Court on Thursday, February 18, for the directions of the DPP



Bihar on late Monday experienced a 3.5 magnitude earthquake in several districts including capital city Patna, according to the National Center for Seismology.

The agency stated that the tremors occurred 20 km northwest of Nalanda at 9:23 pm. No injuries or damage was reported, according to reports.

The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav requested people to take precautions and go to safe open places if needed.

Tremors felt in Patna. I wish everyone safety and plead all to be attentive, take safety precautions & move to safe open spaces if needed," Yadav wrote on Twitter.

Earlier, a high-intensity earthquake hit Tajikistan on Friday night, tremors of which were felt in Delhi-NCR and several other parts of north India.

The seismology department at first erroneously gave the epicentre as Amritsar and put the quake's depth at 19 km. It later sent a revised statement to confirm the quake was in Tajikistan. It ascribed the error to a software mistake.

According to the National Centre for Seismology (NCS), the magnitude of the quake was 6.3.

The tremors created panic among people who rushed out of their homes. However, there were no immediate reports of any loss of life or damage to property.

With agency inputs





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Eliana was four months pregnant when she heard about the first novel coronavirus case in Kakuma refugee camps in northwestern Kenya.

I was scared that, with most services closing down, the hospitals would close, too, said the Burundian refugee. Later, I saw that the hospitals remained opened and I was relieved.

When we spoke to her, she stopped occasionally to take deep breaths as she struggled to sweep her small shop. She is proud to be an entrepreneur.

I started this business to make money so I can buy things for my family, said Eliana, who runs the shop with her husband.

However, the COVID-19 pandemic has heavily affected her livelihood.

The price of supplies has really gone up, and only a few customers visit my shop now, she said.

For mothers like Eliana, an increase in prices and restrictions of movement have also meant limited access to basic items such as secondhand clothing for babies and fresh food for their health and well-being.

During my first pregnancy, I easily got fresh fruits. Currently, it has been difficult to find any in the market, she said.

Luckily, despite the pandemic, Eliana was still able to access her routine medical visits, thanks to the maternity wing at Natukobenyo Health Clinic, managed by the Kenya Red Cross Society (KRCS), a health partner of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

KRCS hires community health promoters, including refugees who regularly followed up with Eliana and other pregnant women and girls in the camp to ensure that they have access to prenatal care at nearby health facilities.

I feel very safe when the health promoters come to check on me,

With support from the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund and the United Nations Foundation, UNHCR and partners have ensured continuity of essential medical services, including routine vaccinations, reproductive health services for pregnancy and delivery, emergency care, and other services across all health facilities in the Kakuma refugee camps and the Kalobeyei settlement. This is in addition to COVID-19 support, including testing and treatment.

Dr. Jesse Muriithi, UNHCRs public health officer in Kakuma, is appreciative of the support from the World Health Organization (WHO), which has ensured a sustained response to COVID-19 in the camp that hosts over 198,000 refugees, and where 307 cases have been detected since the first one was reported in May.

Because the camp is densely populated, the risk of a rapid spread of COVID-19 remains high, Muriithi said. This support has given health care workers and the community the tools to cut off the transmission of the virus and avert avoidable deaths.

Between January and November 2020, 4,753 refugee and Kenyan babies were delivered in health facilities across Kakuma camp and Kalobeyei settlement, with over 3,140 of the deliveries performed since May, when the first COVID-19 case was reported in the area.

Eliana gave birth to a healthy girl in October and named her Christena, after her husband, Christophe.

Normally, a convoy of motorbike riders would come to welcome the newborn. They would hoot all the way home and the community would come together to welcome the baby, said Eliana.

While the pandemic made this celebratory parade impossible, Eliana is grateful for the safe delivery of her healthy baby.

In Kenya, where the COVID-19 outbreak represents yet another challenge that risks overshadowing the preexisting humanitarian needs of the most vulnerable people, the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund contribution is crucial. Thanks to this funding, UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) activities in response to the current situation are strengthened, including health assistance in clinics and hospitals in different refugee-hosting areas of the country, which the host community can also access.

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Cristina Lucero gathers snow while trying to build a snowman Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

A frigid blast of winter weather across the U.S. plunged Texas into an unusually icy emergency Monday that knocked out power to more than 2 million people and shut down grocery stores and dangerously snowy roads.

The worsening conditions halted the delivery of COVID-19 vaccine shipments and left some Texas providers scrambling to find takers for doses expiring within hours.

Temperatures nosedived into the single-digits as far south as San Antonio, and homes that had already been without electricity for hours had no certainty about when the lights and heat would come back on, as the state's overwhelmed power grid throttled into rotating blackouts that are typically only seen in 100-degree Fahrenheit (38-degree Celsius) summers.

The storm was part of a massive system that brought snow, sleet and freezing rain to the southern Plains and was spreading across the Ohio Valley and to the Northeast. The Southwest Power Pool, a group of utilities across 14 states, called for rolling outages because the supply of reserve energy had been exhausted. Some utilities said they were starting blackouts, while others urged customers to reduce power usage.

"We're living through a really historic event going on right now," said Jason Furtado, a professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, pointing to all of Texas under a winter storm warning and the extent of the freezing temperatures.

Cristina Lucero's hands are covered in snow while building a snowman Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

In Houston, where county leaders had warned that the freeze could create problems on the scale of massive hurricanes that slam the Gulf Coast, one electric provider said power may not be restored to some homes until Tuesday.

"This weather event, it's really unprecedented. We all living here know that," said Dan Woodfin, senior director of system operations at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. He defended preparations made by grid operators and described the demand on the system as record-setting.

"This event was well beyond the design parameters for a typical, or even an extreme, Texas winter that you would normally plan for. And so that is really the result that we're seeing," Woodfin said.

The largest grocery store chain in Texas, H-E-B, closed locations around Austin and San Antonio, cities that are unaccustomed to snow and have little resources to clear roads. The slow thaw and more frigid lows ahead was also taking a toll on Texas' distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.

Alyssa Remi, 12, tries to keep warm while playing in the snow Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

State health officials said Texas, which was due to receive more than 400,000 additional vaccine doses this week, now does not expect deliveries to occur until at least Wednesday.

But with doses already in-hand expiring, Rice University on Monday abruptly began offering vaccines on its closed Houston campus. Harris Health System told the school it had about 1,000 vaccines that "were going to go to waste" and asked if the school could find takers, said Doug Miller, a university spokesman.

"The window was just a couple hours. They have to take care of it quickly," Miller said.

Caught without enough groceries on hand, Lauren Schneider, a 24-year-old lab technician, walked to a Dallas grocery store near her home Monday morning dressed in a coat, hat and face mask. Schneider said she didn't feel comfortable driving with the roads covered in snow and ice. She said she hadn't seen a serious snowfall in Dallas since her childhood.

Alyssa Remi, 12, slides down a snow covered hill Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston.A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

"I really didn't think it's would be this serious," said Schneider.

Teresa and Luke Fassetta, trundling through the snow carrying grocery bags, said the store lost power while they were shopping. The couple said they lost power overnight, then got it back around 9 a.m., and they were hoping it would still be on when they arrived home. If not, Teresa said, "we just have a bunch of blankets and candles and two cats to keep us warm."

Several cities in the U.S. saw record lows as Arctic air remained over the central part of the country. In Minnesota, the Hibbing/Chisholm weather station registered minus 38 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 39 degrees Celsius), while Sioux Falls, South Dakota, dropped to minus 26 Fahrenheit (minus 26 degrees Celsius).

In Kansas, where wind chills dropped to as low as minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 34 degrees Celsius) in some areas, Gov. Laura Kelly declared a state of disaster.

Robert Savannah and his daughter Sophia, 4, slide down a snow covered hill Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Most government offices and schools were closed for Presidents Day, and authorities pleaded with residents to stay home. Louisiana State Police reported that it had investigated nearly 75 weather-related crashes caused by a mixture of snow, sleet and freezing rain in the past 24 hours.

"We already have some accidents on our roadways," Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said during a morning news conference. "It is slick and it is dangerous."

Air travel was also affected. By midmorning, 3,000 flights had been canceled across the country, about 1,600 of them at Dallas/Fort Worth International and Bush Intercontinental airports in Texas. At DFW, the temperature was 4 degrees Fahrenheit (-15 degrees Celsius)3 degrees (-16 degrees) colder than Moscow.

The storm arrived over a three-day holiday weekend that has seen the most U.S. air travel since the period around New Year's. More than 1 million people went through airport security checkpoints on Thursday and Friday. However, that was still less than half the traffic of a year ago, before the pandemic hit with full force.

Diane Phelps, 54, walks along Main Street in Girard, Pa., during a morning snowfall on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. A storm expected in northwest Pennsylvania and western New York region is predicted to drop up several inches of snow by Tuesday afternoon. (Christopher Millette/Erie Times-News via AP)

A man peers out from under a blanket while trying to stay warm in below freezing temperatures Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Igee Cummings walks through the snow Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Igee Cummings walks through the snow Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Erasmo Vazquez walks through blowing snow Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Vehicles drive on snow and sleet covered roads Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Spring, Texas. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

A wrecker crew works to remove a car from the median of Interstate55 in McComb, Miss., on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. A winter storm dropping snow and ice also sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains. (Matt Williamson/The Enterprise-Journal via AP)

Erasmo Vazquez, right, walks along a snow covered sidewalk with his wife, Maria, center, and daughter Day, left, Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

A woman walks through falling snow in San Antonio, Sunday, Feb. 14, 2021. Snow and ice blanketed large swaths of the U.S. on Sunday, prompting canceled flights, making driving perilous and reaching into areas as far south as Texas' Gulf Coast, where snow and sleet were expected overnight. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

Vehicles drive on snow and sleet covered roads Monday, Feb. 15, 2021, in Spring, Texas. A winter storm dropping snow and ice sent temperatures plunging across the southern Plains, prompting a power emergency in Texas a day after conditions canceled flights and impacted traffic across large swaths of the U.S. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

Ice hangs from a buildings fire escape in Downtown Cincinnati on Monday, Feb. 15, 2021. The National Weather Service issued a winter storm warning starting Monday and going through Tuesday with heavy snow expected. (Albert Cesare /The Cincinnati Enquirer via AP)

The southern Plains had been gearing up for the winter weather for the better part of the weekend. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for all of the state's 254 counties. Abbott, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson each activated National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks including rescuing stranded drivers.

President Joe Biden also declared an emergency in Texas in a statement Sunday night. The declaration is intended to add federal aid to state and local response efforts.

Explore further Frigid Arctic air, winter storms grip much of US

 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
NEW HAVEN  Police are making some headway in its manhunt for a person of interest in the killing of a Yale graduate student, said a U.S. Marshal on Monday.

U.S. Marshal Matthew Duffy said the department is making progress in their search for Qinxuan Pan, a 29-year-old graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who is a person of interest in the slaying of Kevin Jiang on Feb. 6.

Though Duffy said he couldnt go into too much detail, he said he remains confident that Pan is located somewhere in Georgia, where he was last seen on Thursday.

Were still running down some leads and checking out some information before we make any moves, Duffy said Monday afternoon.

Though Duffy described Pan as a very intelligent kid, he did not doubt that he would be apprehended.

As the U.S. Marshals Service searches for Pan, detectives have continued their homicide investigation in New Haven.

New Haven Police Chief Otoniel Reyes said last week that Pan was believed to have been in the area when Jiang was shot on Lawrence Street in the East Rock neighborhood.

On Thursday, police could be seen combing the area behind the Arbys on Washington Avenue in North Haven, next to where Pan reportedly was last seen in the area.

Pan is described by police as 6-feet tall, weighing 170 pounds and having short, black hair.

Police said he was behind the wheel of a vehicle reported stolen by a Massachusetts police department. The car was towed in North Haven, police said.

Unfortunately, some of these investigations are lengthy at times, Duffy said of these types of manhunts.

Duffy said information obtained from interviews conducted with Pans family members have helped investigators. When asked about other possible persons of interest, Duffy was adamant in his assertion: My focus is on catching Mr. Pan.

The marshals service has asked anyone with information to call 877-926-8332. There is a $5,000 reward offered for information that leads to Pans arrest, but officials have warned that he should be considered armed.
[February 15, 2021] Evoque Data Center Solutions CEO to Speak on Data Center Infrastructure Evolution at KeyBanc Capital Markets' Virtual "Emerging Technology Summit"

Andy Stewart to discuss infrastructure investing; more than 100 top executives from leading public, private firms slated to speak at online conference DALLAS, Feb. 15, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Evoque Data Center Solutions (www.evoquedcs.com), one of the worlds 20 largest data center firms with presence across four continents, today announced that its Chief Executive Officer, Andy Stewart, will be a featured speaker at KeyBanc Capital Markets (KBCM) 16th annual Emerging Technology Summit. Stewart will join top executives from many of todays leading public and privately-held firms like Peloton, GitLab, Cogent Communications, Quicken, TechTarget, Databricks and many more. Stewart is scheduled to present on Wednesday, February 24th, and will take part in a panel discussion on Infrastructure Investors. He will be joined on the panel by top executives from Colony Capital, GTT Infrastructure and Stonepeak Infrastructure Partners. The discussion, like the rest of the conference, will be conducted virtually. Investors continue to be bullish on the data center sector, with analysts predicting strong double-digit growth this year. As such, it validates both the industrys long-term potential and our corporate strategy moving forward, said Andy Stewart, Evoques Chief Executive Officer. This growth, coupled with our focus on combining connectivity, colocation and cloud services in a hybrid IT environment to the benefit of our clients, positions Evoque for significant growth in 2021. Its a story were proud to shae with KeyBancs conference attendees.



By combining the perspectives of executives, like Andy Stewart, our equity research analysts and Mosaic industry leaders, KeyBancs Emerging Technology Summit is constructed to investigate the trends and companies that will deliver outsized alpha in the technology sector over the coming years, said Terry Schallich, MD, KeyBancs Head of Technology Investment Banking. The resulting observations are what have made KBCMs technology conferences and events foundational for company executives, board members and investors alike. KBCMs Emerging Technology Summit will center over a four-day period on timely and unique content across the technology landscape. The Summit, taking place wholly online for the second consecutive year, gathers leaders from todays most relevant technology names, taking a thematic approach toward exploring the market shifts, particularly considering the increase in digital acceleration, remote work, deglobalization, and changing consumer consumption habits.

Invited attendees will be able to meet with and hear from C-level executive management teams representing leading companies across a wide range of technologies, including Application Software and Tech-Enabled Services, Internet & New Consumer, Financial Software, and Infrastructure Software, Communications and Security. Dynamic panels and fireside chats will be paired with curated 1x1 schedules to offer a unique perspective in market shifts. About Evoque Data Center Solutions Evoque Data Center Solutions, headquartered in Dallas, Texas, is one of the worlds 20 largest data center firms. Evoque Data Center Solutions offers enterprises a full range of services, ranging from local, regional and global connectivity to secure space in highly available and redundant environments across four continents. The company supports a diversified base of Fortune 1000 customers across multiple segments, including utilities, transport, energy, communications, healthcare, and technologies. For more information, visit https://www.evoquedcs.com/. Evoque Data Center Solutions is a portfolio company of Brookfield Infrastructure Partners, a leading global infrastructure asset manager that owns and operates high-quality, long-life assets in the utilities, transport, energy and data infrastructure sectors across North and South America, Asia Pacific and Europe. For more information: Steve Friedberg

Evoque Data Center Solutions

484.550.2900

sfriedberg@evoquedcs.com



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Daniel Andrews (pictured) has been nominated for a political leadership award

Daniel Andrews has been nominated for a political leadership award despite presiding over three lockdowns and a coronavirus disaster which killed 801 Victorians.

The Victoria premier is shortlisted for the 2020 McKinnon Political Leader of the Year prize alongside five other politicians including Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Treasurer Josh Frydenberg.

The judging panel that selected him praised his 'firm, decisive and courageous leadership through Victoria's Covid-19 crisis'.

But political opponents have been left fuming as the state endures a third lockdown after coronavirus escaped from hotel quarantine last week.

The latest restrictions follow a major outbreak over winter which killed 801 Victorians and led to a four-month lockdown of Melbourne that destroyed businesses and jobs.

Liberal MP James Newbury said Mr Andrews' nomination for the award was a 'disgrace'.

'It is an insult to the families of the 800 Victorians who died during his government's second wave,' he told Daily Mail Australia.

'And it's a slap in the face to the thousands of mum and dad small businesses that he sent broke.'

Referring to Victoria's current five-day lockdown, Mr Newbury added: 'Without warning, and because of his incompetence, he has shut down our state. We have been locked into our homes and the economy has been sledgehammered again.

'He only deserves one award: the most dangerous political leader in our lifetime.'

During the four-month lockdown, residents were only allowed out of their homes to exercise for an hour. Pictured: A woman walks along St Kilda Beach

Melbourne endured a four-month lockdown over winter after coronavirus leaked from two quarantine hotels in May and June.

The virus rapidly spread, causing 801 deaths and 20,000 cases, peaking at 725 new infections on August 5.

The lockdown was one of the harshest in the world, forcing residents to stay in their homes except for one hour of exercise per day within five kilometres of their address.

Thousands of businesses were pushed to the brink of collapse and thousands of families lost loved ones.

Mr Andrews was roundly criticised for being unable to explain who made the decision to use private security to guard the hotels instead of the police.

An inquiry into the disaster by former judge Jennifer Coate heard the outbreak and subsequent four-month lockdown caused 'devastation and despair'.

'It was a program which failed to meet its primary objective to keep us safe from the virus,' said counsel assisting Ben Ihle.

The McKinnon prize judging panel noted that Mr Andrews was 'criticised for the devastating failings of Victoria's hotel quarantine system'.

But it also said 'he was acknowledged for swiftly calling an inquiry into the system, and for committing to act on its recommendations.'

Liberal frontbencher Tim Smith described the Coate Inquiry as a 'sham' and said if Mr Andrews wins then the award 'isn't worth the paper it's written on'.

'It's obvious that Andrews didn't learn anything from the Coate Inquiry as infection control failures have ensured further Covid-19 transmission from Victorian quarantine hotels,' he told Daily Mail Australia.

'This Premier has failed. A total of 801 people died last year in Victoria because of his government's failings. The only award Andrews should get is for outrageous spin,' he added.

A couple wearing masks in St Kilda during Melbourne's lockdown in October

Victoria's latest outbreak began on Monday when a hotel quarantine worker at the Holiday Inn at Melbourne Airport caught the virus from a returned traveller before more guests and workers caught the disease.

Mr Andrews plunged the whole state into a five-day lockdown on Friday but has refused to confirm the restrictions will be lifted on time.

The McKinnon prize panel - made up of former politicians and prominent journalists - will pick a winner later this month.

The other nominees are Scott Morrison, Josh Frydenberg, Health Minister Greg Hunt, Indigenous Australians Minister Ken Wyatt and NSW Energy Minister Matt Kean.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian won the award last year.
What started out as a food and wine speciality shop, YORK has transformed over the years into an Ann Arbor institution. Over the last year, it has become one of the hottest spots in Ann Arbor to embrace the cold, and enjoy the outside, with a patio that has multiple features and options.

We are really a neighborhood joint, said owner Tommy York. Hes been a managing partner here for over two decades. YORK was originally named Morgan + York, but in 2019, York took over ownership completely. With the addition of new partners Sarah Okin, a private investor and brothers Ethan and Noah Kaplan, YORK is now a true acronym of all the owners.

The location of YORK has hosted a variety of markets through the years, starting in 1940 when it opened as the Big Ten Market. In 1953, it acquired a liquor license and transformed into the Big Ten Party Store. York himself also has a long history in the food and drink business in Ann Arbor, having gotten his start at Espresso Royale, and at one time, was a managing partner at Zingermans.

YORK continues to change and grow, transforming this last year into a true outdoor community gathering place, and supporting local food trucks and pop-up restaurants as a welcoming host site.

Its all worked out really well, said York. Weve had new food, and new customers.

York Ann Arbor has been serving the area since 2001, but there has been a market at this location since 1940.MLive.com

Depending on when you stop by, you'll find everything from open fire pits roaring away, groups of seating, the Gnar Bar serving hot apple cider, food trucks, and sometimes even a DJ spinning tunes.York Courtesy Photo, used with permission.

Step into YORK, and youll be welcomed by the friendly staff into a rather large space. Obviously, right now, tables and chairs are stacked up, making the space feel even bigger. There is a bar, where you can get a glass of wine or beer, or a an artisan cocktail. There is a quick service counter where you can order coffee, a bit of breakfast, a sandwich or a salad to grab and go, or take out to the patio. The cheese case is stocked with handmade artisanal cheeses. Ricewood BBQ calls YORK home, operating a take-out window featuring their Asian inspired fusion barbecue.

In the back, there is a full-service wine and beer shop, featuring quite the selection of interesting, hard-to-find beverages, with an incredibly knowledgeable and passionate staff ready to guide you. The wines are almost exclusively grower-produced varietals. You can pick out any bottle, and for a $10 corkage fee, take it and enjoy it outside on the patio.

The outside of YORK has turned out to be immensely popular, and most of this can be attributed to York working tirelessly to continually transform the space over the last year. Nestled between two buildings, there is plenty of space to spread out, with multiple areas to enjoy. Up top, you can gather around a fire pit or meet friends around one the many small tables. Down below, more fire pits await you, as well as two open-sided tents. You can grab a drink from the Gnar Bar, which is usually pouring spiked hot cider in addition to beers and wine. On the weekends, you can often find a DJ spinning tunes, enjoy, but please remain seated York warned.

YORK has the option of blocking off the back parking lot, and often does on the weekends, when they welcome a rotating list of locally-owned food trucks. They are the permanent home to the Bao Boys food truck. It was important to York to help support other businesses during this difficult time, and he only sees positives to bringing others into his space.

Local businesses are not the only ones that have benefitted from Yorks generosity. Hes made a point of welcoming anyone from the Ann Arbor community to use the outdoor space here over the last year. Meetings have been held, neighborhood potlucks have been enjoyed, birthdays celebrated. No charge, and York is just happy to be breaking even right now. He understands how important connection is right now, and said Lets just be safe.

Recently, new customers have been arriving in the form of students from U of M. We are really trying to make this a true neighborhood hangout, York said.

York is ready to continue to change up what is offered at his business, whether its inside or out. I have what might be called malignant optimism, he said. Even if its not going to work, Im going to make it work.

The staff at York Ann Arbor are ready to safely serve you.MLive.com

The search for Michigans Best Outdoor Dining is sponsored in part by Warm Fitness.

York

1928 Packard St., Ann Arbor, MI 48104

More info: https://www.yorka2.com/ or https://www.facebook.com/yorkannarbor

Ricewood BBQ

More info: https://www.ricewoodbbq.com/ or https://www.facebook.com/ricewoodbbq

Bao Boys

More info: https://www.facebook.com/baoboysaa

A picture from this summer on the patio at York in Ann Arbor.York Courtesy Photo, used with permission.

The cheese case at York Ann Arbor. They offer pastries, toasts, bagels and coffee in the morning, sandwiches and salads throughout the day, and have cocktails, beer and wine to enjoy.MLive.com

More Michigans Best Outdoor Dining:

Ann Arbor outdoor dining poll winner has enticing dishes, great ambience

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10 great outdoor dining spots along the White Pine Trail

See all the photos from RORA-Rockford Outdoor Refreshment Area

Operation Shantyville is adventurous twist on outdoor dining supporting Bay area restaurants

Play river rocks, get farm to table dining at this SW Michigan spot

See all of the nominations for Michigans Best Outdoor Dining

Traditional Irish food, tacos and great service at this Michigans Best Outdoor Dining spot

6 things Michigan restaurant staff want you to know before you eat out

This Northern Michigan town has transformed into an outdoor dining village

Enjoy the cozy hygge lifestyle at this Grand Rapids restaurant
The National Communications Officer of the National Democratic Congress Sammy Gyamfi, has advanced reasons for the abrogation of the contract between the Government of Ghana and Frontier Healthcare Services for the administration of coronavirus testing at the Kotoka International Airport.



Sammy Gyamfi holds that the deal which is shrouded in secrecy is a rip-off and that a local laboratory could have been engaged to offer the same services at a lower rate.



He urged Ghanaians not to tolerate the deal and demanded an immediate abrogation of the contract.



The cutthroat charge of $150 per antigen test at Kotoka smacked of profiteering which should not be countenanced by Ghanaians. We are talking about something that has become an essential tool for risk minimisation in the fight against Covid. An essential tool for slowing down the spread of the virus, here were talking about testing.



And so the affordability of that tool is very important because now its become an essential service. And that is why in some countries, these tests are done for people for free. People dont even pay anything for it because of how important and critical it is to the fight against the spread of the pandemic.



Sammy Gyamfi explained that due to the opaque nature of the deal, the NDC, through its MPs, is using this vetting process to hold to account persons who are entrusted with the responsibility of ensuring that these things are done for the welfare of the people.



Speaking on Joy News Newsfile Saturday, Mr Gyamfi, also stated that investigations carried out by the NDC on the Frontier Healthcare Services Limited, the company in charge of administering the antigen test at the airport, had revealed that the deal and circumstances surrounding the procurement of their service had been illegal.



That the deal and the circumstances under which that company was engaged is shady, opaque, illegal and that the terms of the transaction, the amount being charged for the antigen test is a rip-off. We think that what is happening is a clear case of profiteering which should not be countenanced by the people of this country.



Governments contract with Frontier has become an issue following revelations by some appointees that they are not privy to the details of the contract.



Health Minister-designate, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, told Parliament that he is not in the known about the deal.

Kwaku Agyeman-Manu justified that in the pandemic, there were certain things that we had to do and try to rectify as we go forward because of the urgency of what we should do immediately

Source: Peacefmonline.com/Ghana









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
Jaguar Land Rover bosses have outlined the car maker's future plans, including the intention for Jaguar to be an 'all-electric luxury brand' to rival Tesla from 2025.

The move will see Jaguar completely axe the petrol engines that made its name within the next four years.

Land Rover will also launch six new pure electric models in the next five years and every car in its range will have an electric option by 2030.

New JLR CEO Thierry Bollore made the announcement on Monday, with the new 'Reimagine' strategy also committing to retaining its production facilities in the UK.

Jaguar to be a direct Tesla rival from 2025: The British marque will be an all-electric car maker in 2025 as part of the UK's biggest car maker's wider plans to shift to battery-powered vehicles announced this morning by new French boss, Thierry Bollore (right)

At the same time, he said that Land Rover will phase out diesel engines from 2026 and invest more heavily in hydrogen fuel cell technology.

Jaguar Land Rover is one of the car makers hit hardest by the downturn in demand for diesel vehicles in recent years.

Its range of models across both brands relied heavily on diesel engines, which have seen sales tumble in the years since the VW emissions cheating scandal rattled the industry in 2015.

Ballore, the brand's new French boss, was drafted into JLR last July having been ousted from Renault after less than a year in the top job. He took over from Carlos Ghosn  who last year famously fled from Japan to the Lebanon in a spectacular escape to evade criminal corruption charges there.

Bollore said the aim of the Reimagine strategy will not only revive the fortunes of JLR - owned by the Indian Tata Motors group - but will steer it on course to becoming a net zero carbon businesses by 2039.

The headline announcement is the dramatic shift for Jaguar, which is to be reimagined as an all-electric luxury brand by 2025.

The statement said: 'By the middle of the decade, Jaguar will have undergone a renaissance to emerge as a pure-electric luxury brand with a dramatically beautiful new portfolio of emotionally engaging designs and pioneering next-generation technologies.

'Jaguar will exist to make life extraordinary by creating dramatically beautiful automotive experiences that leave its customers feeling unique and rewarded.'

This will pit the iconic British maker directly against Tesla, which currently has a stronghold on the premium EV market.

Jaguar Land Rover will phase out diesel engines from 2026 and invest more heavily in hydrogen fuel cell technology, bosses said on Monday

Jaguar will be a 'pure-electric luxury brand' from 2025 while Land Rover's switch to EVs will take place later

Ironically, Jaguar's reliance on diesel over the past decade only came after the firm had lost out initially to rivals such as BMW and Mercedes the early 2000s shift away from petrol engines.

For many years Jaguar was famous for its smooth and powerful inline six cylinder and V8 petrol engines, but its XF and XE saloons can now only be ordered with either a four cylinder petrol engine or mild hybrid diesel engine.

Currently, Jaguar sells just one fully-electric model - the i-Pace SUV launched in 2018. Prices start from 65,195.

One model that definitely won't be pitched against Tesla's Model S is an all-electric XJ limousine.

JLR's statement has confirmed that the well-developed plans to launch the XJ EV later this year has been ditched entirely.

'Following a thorough technology review against the exponential change in the automotive industry, we concluded that the planned XJ replacement does not fit with our vision for a reimaged Jaguar brand,' the statement read.

'We have made the tough decision that it will not form part of the line-up, as the brand looks to realise its unique potential. However, the nameplate may be retained.'

The I-Pace SUV (pictured) is currently the only electric vehicle in Jaguar's range. Launched in 2018, prices start from 65,195

All JLR models will be offered with a pure electric version by the end of the decade, it says, while Land Rover will launch six pure electric vehicles, with EV variants of five with the first all-electric Land Rover due in 2024.

By the end of the decade the firm is aiming for 100 per cent of Jaguar sales to be fully electric, along with three in five Land Rover registrations.

Who is Thierry Bollore? Jaguar Land Rover CEO, Thierry Bollore New JLR boss Thierry Bollore hails from Brittany in France and studied for an MBA at Paris Dauphine University. Among the most pressing items in his in-tray when taking over at the helm of JLR are the challenge to return Britain's biggest car maker to profit after a big hit from the Covid-19 pandemic and a concern about sales in one of its biggest markets  China  at a time of international tension. But Bollore's experience of electric powered cars, charging networks, and changing patterns of mobility  where future generations may use vehicles but may not own them  gleaned at Renault and through family links is likely to have been a strong suit in his appointment against a strong line up of rival external and internal candidates. He has a strong track record of working in the automotive industry in China where, in the current political climate, JLR may feel exposed. He also has a proven track record for quality control of outputs, with the British brand infamous for making less-than-reliable motors, which tend to prop-up the dependability standings in owners surveys. Bollore is a cousin of French billionaire Vincent Bollore, whose family owned investment firm Bollore, has big interests in electric car and charging networks, including providing those for the UK capital, though its Bluecity car-share scheme in London ended in January after poor take-up. His wide ranging international experience on many continents  but particularly China - should stand him in good stead.

Part of the switch to battery cars will see the brand use just three architectures: two dedicated to Land Rover and a new pure-BEV platform that will be exclusive to Jaguar.

'It's time to re-imagine the next chapter for both brands... British brands steeped in a rich tapestry of timeless designs,' Bollore added.

JLR said it will spend around 2.5billion annually on electrification technologies and development of connected vehicle services.

Shares in Tata Motors rose as much as three per cent after the announcement.

And in a boost to post-Brexit Britain, bosses said there are no plans to close any of its 'core manufacturing facilities', which includes the Solihull and Castle Bromwich plants in the West Midlands and its Halewood factory near Liverpool.

However, Bollore, hinted that the Castle Bromwich plant in would focus on 'non-production' activities in the long term - though added no further details.

'From a core manufacturing perspective that means Jaguar Land Rover will retain its plant and assembly facilities in the home UK market and around the world,' it said.

Solihull will also be the home to the 'future advanced Jaguar pure electric platform'.

Jaguar Land Rover has said that it will not discontinue any current products and does 'not plan to stop production' of any existing models.

Jim Holder, editorial director at Autocar, said the wider impact on the JLR workforce remains to be seen as the strategy clearly signals there will be reductions in manufacturing capacity and a shrinking of its UK footprint outside of its manufacturing facilities.

'While details were scarce in today's announcement, it is clear that Jaguar Land Rover, in common with most car makers, has come to the realisation that its business model needed to be completely ripped up in order for it to have any chance of thriving into the future,' he said.

Mr Bollore also confirmed that JLR has committed to phasing out diesel powertrains by 2026 and will also invest heavily into the development of hydrogen fuel cell technology, with the firm's first hydrogen tech mules due to be running on public roads by the end of 2021.

Jaguar Land Rover is the UK's biggest car manufacturer.

In 2020, it produced 243,908 vehicles across its three manufacturing sites.

While this was more than any other UK maker, it was 37 per cent lower than production in 2019.

Commenting on JLR's announcement, trade body boss Mike Hawes said the news that the country's largest automotive business has confirmed its long-term commitment to the UK is 'very welcome' and 'an injection of confidence into the wider sector'.

The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders chief executive added: 'Its roadmap to a future that is built around sustainability, with electrified and hydrogen models as well as investment in connected and digital technologies, aligns with Government ambition and increasing consumer expectations.

'Delivering this ambition, however, will require the UK to improve its competitiveness.

'The UK automotive industry is essentially strong, innovative and agile, but the global competition is fierce. Government must ensure advanced manufacturing has its full support, with a policy framework and plan for growth that reduces costs, accelerates domestic battery production and electrified supply chains, and incentivises R&D and skills development.

'Every effort must be made to create the conditions that will enable the entire sector to flourish.'

Pope Francis released a video message for the 'Day of Contemporary Martyrs', organised by the Coptic Orthodox Diocese of London to commemorate the 21 Coptic Orthodox martyrs killed on 15 February 2015.

Vatican City (AsiaNews)  Pope Francis released a video-message today for the Day of Contemporary Martyrs, organised by the Coptic Diocese of London on the anniversary of the murder of 11 Orthodox Copts on 15 February 2015. In it the pontiff described them as Saints of all Christians, Saints of all Christian denominations and traditions.

The initiative brought together via weblink Pope Tawadros II, Patriarch of the Coptic Orthodox Church; Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury; Cardinal Kurt Koch, president of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity, and representatives of other Churches.

The Day of Contemporary Martyrs is a commemorative event of thanksgiving for the life of those who have practised their Christian faith to the point of spilling their blood and to raise awareness about the tragedy of those who are still persecuted for their faith today.

Here is the text of the video message from Pope Francis, who, when he celebrated Mass for the Martyrs on 16 February 2015, stated that they were killed simply for the fact that they were Christians.

Today is the day I have in my heart, that February of 2015. I hold in my heart that baptism of blood, those twenty-one men baptised as Christians with water and the Spirit, and that day also baptised with blood. They are our Saints, Saints of all Christians, Saints of all Christian denominations and traditions. They are those who have blanched their lives in the blood of the Lamb, they are those... of the people of God, the faithful people of God.

They had gone to work abroad to support their families: ordinary men, fathers of families, men with the illusion [desire] to have children; men with the dignity of workers, who not only seek to bring home bread, but to bring it home with the dignity of work. And these men bore witness to Jesus Christ. Their throats slit by the brutality of Isis, they died saying: Lord Jesus!, confessing the name of Jesus.

It is true that this was a tragedy, that these people lost their lives on that beach; but it is also true that the beach was blessed by their blood. And it is even more true that from their simplicity, from their simple but consistent faith, they received the greatest gift a Christian can receive: bearing witness to Jesus Christ to the point of giving their life.

I thank God our Father because He gave us these courageous brothers. I thank the Holy Spirit because He gave them the strength and consistency to confess Jesus Christ to the point of shedding blood. I thank the bishops, the priests of the Coptic sister church which raised them and taught them to grow in the faith. And I thank the mothers of these people, of these twenty-one men, who "nursed" them in the faith: they are the mothers of God's holy people who transmit the faith "in dialect", a dialect that goes beyond languages, the dialect of belonging.

I join all of you, brother bishops, in this commemoration. To you, great, beloved Tawadros, brother bishop and friend. To you, Justin Welby, who also wanted to come to this meeting. And to all the other bishops and priests, but above all I join the holy faithful people of God who in their simplicity, with their consistency and inconsistencies, with their graces and sins, carry forth the confession of Jesus Christ: Jesus Christ is Lord.

I thank you, twenty-one saints, Christian saints of all confessions, for your witness. And I thank you, Lord Jesus Christ, for being so close to your people, for not forgetting them.

Let us pray together today in memory of these twenty-one Coptic Martyrs: may they intercede for us all before the Father. Amen.
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A major effort is getting underway at several universities, tribal museums and libraries around the U.S. to digitize the oral histories of thousands of Native Americans that were collected a half century ago as part of a project initiated by the late philanthropist Doris Duke.

The New York-based Doris Duke Charitable Foundation announced Tuesday that it has awarded more than $1.6 million in grants to help with the translation, transcription and indexing of the recordings so they can be accessible to Native communities, students and the wider public.

The goal is to create a website that will act as a central hub where visitors can access the materials, some of which include reel-to-reel magnetic tapes that have been collecting dust in library archives and university repositories for decades. Plans also call for expanding the collections with contemporary voices.

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Most of the recordings come from a pivotal time in U.S. history when the civil rights movement spurred greater visibility of minority populations, including Native Americans. It was in the late 1960s and early 1970s that Indigenous activism took off  first with a nearly two-year occupation of Alcatraz Island in California by activists who were fighting for recognition of tribal sovereignty and treaty rights, and later through protests in Washington, D.C., and elsewhere.

For the foundation, the work that began in 1966 is coming full circle because of a resurgence in Indigenous issues.

We were really keen to bring new life to this collection because there has been a growing active movement within Indigenous communities to bring more visibility to their experience, said Lola Adedokun, the foundations program director for child-wellbeing. I think the movement in the last couple of years specifically has created a space where the experience of Native people is actually valued and where theres a movement around particularly young people who are really driving that conversation.

The coronavirus pandemic also helped to accelerate the push for breathing new life into the collections, she said.

Many Native American communities in the U.S. have been hit particularly hard by COVID-19 infections, resulting in higher deaths rates among elderly tribal members as well as young people who have fallen victim to mental health pressures made worse by the pandemic.

We thought now more than ever is it not only important to update and upgrade this collection but also to give it the national visibility that it deserves and then encourage more young people to contribute their stories to keep it moving over the several decades, Adedokun said.

The Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries and Museums will serve as the national coordinator for the project. The participating schools include the Arizona State Museum at the University of Arizona, University of Florida, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, University of New Mexico, University of Oklahoma, University of South Dakota and University of Utah.

The collection at the Arizona State Museum contains hundreds of cassettes and typed transcripts that resulted from nearly 700 interviews that involved Tohono Oodham, Apache, Navajo, Pima and Yaqui tribal members. The collection also includes materials from tribes in California and northern Mexico.

Molly Stothert-Maurer, head of the museums library and archives, said the original researchers did not get permission forms signed at the time the interviews took place so use of the material has been limited to those who participated in the interviews, their relatives and tribal communities.

For 50 years now, the permissions have never been resolved, Stothert-Maurer said. So we have so much work to do  digitizing the recordings, translating them, transcribing them and getting buy-in from all the communities.

With the grant, the Arizona museum will be able to hire an archivist for two years to focus solely on the digitization project. Part of that work will ensure that no restricted material is released without taking the proper steps and consulting with the tribes, officials said.

Ron Geronimo, co-director of the Tohono Oodham Language Center, first learned about the recordings during a trip to the museum as an undergraduate student. The tapes were inaccessible then and remained inaccessible when he asked again a decade later.

Geronimo was successful in getting funding in 2013 to start the process of accessing and organizing the 239 Oodham-related tapes in the museums Doris Duke collection. That work continues today as the Tohono Oodham Nation looks to grow the language program it started last year.

Even though the Tohono Oodham have speakers who are fluent in their native language, Geronimo said there are fewer young people who are bilingual. Aside from providing a glimpse into what life was like for past generations, he said the recordings can serve as a tool for learning more about the language and boosting cultural awareness.

Were trying to keep it from ever getting to the point where it would be critical, where it would be endangered. he said. We have to bring about that awareness.
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Were entering this new phase in the lunar calendar, which has come along with a palpable period of mental and physical fatigue among a lot of people I know. The year of the rat has left many with feelings of cynicism, exhaustion and grief, and rightfully so, considering everything that weve endured until now. But Im finding comfort in knowing that were entering the year of the ox  or in the Vietnamese version of the zodiac, the water buffalo. The buffalos steadiness and determination are grounding forces: antipodes to the chaos and instability of the previous year.

I see promises of this in the many ways our local Bay Area community has worked through the tumult of this year. The pandemic hit Hang Ah Tea Room, the oldest dim sum restaurant in this country, particularly hard, emptying out the 100-year-old Chinatown institutions dining room. On some days, owner Frank Chui told The Chronicle, the restaurant makes only $200 in sales. Incoming aid from the city will help it survive, and Chui plans to celebrate by distributing 2,020 meals to food-insecure families in the neighborhood.

Xenophobic violence in our Chinatowns, mirroring the uptick in hate crimes against Arabs and South Asians in the wake of 9/11, has also compounded economic stress. The moment has prompted difficult conversations about the role of policing in Asian enclaves, a historically fraught topic for these communities, which have been subjected to multiple incidents of nativist and white supremacist violence since their establishment in the 1800s.

In response, people are searching for more ways to take care of each other.

In a truly slow-and-steady buffalo-like gesture, local Asian American folk medicine experts Adrian Chang and Erin Wilkins will be hosting a dumpling making class and fundraiser on Feb. 20, which will benefit Oakland Chinatown organization GoodGoodEatz. The organization works to bridge the various ethnic communities in Oakland: to further mutual understanding and respect organically by hosting Chinatown cleanup events and improving food security throughout Oakland. The event promises to be filled with good conversation about food, too.

Im also reminded of how the Bay Area leapt into action after the abduction of San Franciscan Jeffrey Fangs children while he was delivering food for DoorDash, both in an effort to locate the children and to raise funds to help his family recover from the incident. The fundraiser has generated $150,000 in donations, and the case put a new spotlight on the conditions of food workers like Fang, who kept his children in his delivery vehicle because his family couldnt afford child care.

The arrival of the ox year should remind us to be patient, but to keep our gazes forward. And to let the slow, deliberate work of making positive change unite us as we plough through the muck of these challenging times together. Lets make the most of it.

On the podcast

Jessica Christian / The Chronicle

Keeping to theme, this weeks Extra Spicy episode is all about Chinatown, past and present. Our producer, Tea Francesca Price, brings on a collection of San Francisco Chinatown community leaders to talk about the history of the neighborhood. They reflect on the past year, as well as what itll take for it to survive for another 170 years.

What Im eating

Joe Weaver

For an upcoming story on high-end takeout, I was able to treat myself to some of the most elegant packaged food out there. One highlight was the pescatarian Crenn Kit Luxe ($155/person) from Atelier Crenn in San Francisco, a grand meal kit that came with some hors doeuvres that might be familiar if youve ever dined at the restaurant. It begins with a caviar and koji rice tart, a single-bite tartlet that you build from the crust-up. A jellied disc of fish fumet and a dollop of white sturgeon caviar contribute a one-two punch of briny flavor, off-set by a luxurious koji-flavored cream.

Food Guide Top 25 Restaurants Where to eat in the Bay Area. Find spots near you, create a dining wishlist, and more.

Prompted by Momo Changs great Berkeleyside story on One Plus cafe, I ventured over the bridge to try its organic Beijing-style jian bing ($14). The basic crepe, made with a mixture of rice, wheat and other flours, has a distinct, whole wheat-like chew. Wrapped inside are crisp wheat crackers, a layer of fried egg and lettuce, making each bite texturally rich. Its a popular street food and breakfast in China, and Im glad there are more places to get it here.

Recommended reading

 Speaking of oxen (ha!), I put together a list of the best places to find really great steak dishes in the Bay Area, including one restaurant that sources beef from its own sustainable cattle ranch.

 This thoughtful essay by Jaya Saxena at Eater sparked some welcome soul-searching in the food media at large. Its on the role of the ubiquitous lunchbox story in immigrant narratives, and its sometimes-awkward imposition on disparate people as a one-size-fits-all story.

 For Taste, local young chef Rahanna Bisseret Martinez wrote a sweet tribute to hibiscus, the Old World plant also known as flor de jamaica. Drunk in tea and other infusions throughout the world, the plants presence in the Americas also etches out the long, global legacy of the transatlantic slave trade; Martinez reflects on the teas place in her own family memories as well.

Bite Curious is a weekly newsletter from The Chronicles restaurant critic, Soleil Ho, delivered to inboxes on Monday mornings. Follow along on Twitter: @Hooleil
Chad will send 1,200 troops to combat jihadists in a flashpoint Sahel border zone, its president said Monday, as France looks to reduce its longstanding military presence in the vast, volatile region.

Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and France are holding talks on the future of their campaign against insurgencies raging in the Sahel, which according to the UN have killed thousands and displaced more than 2 million.

The troops will be deployed to the flashpoint "three border" zone between Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, Chad's President Idriss Deby Itno said on Twitter on the fringes of the regional summit.

Chad, which reputedly has the best armed forces among the "G5" Sahel nations, had promised a year ago to send a battalion to the area.

Opening the summit, Deby said it was time for the international community to "urgently" step up funds for development and poverty alleviation to help cut off sources of recruitment for jihadists.

The meeting, which French President Emmanuel Macron joined by videolink, comes a year after France boosted its Sahel deployment, seeking to wrench back control in the brutal, long-running battle.

But despite touted military successes, jihadists remain in control of vast swathes of territory and attacks are unrelenting.

Just hours before the summit opened, Malian sources said two troops had been killed by a highway bomb in central Mali.

The deaths bring the number of Malian, UN and French troop losses to 29 since the start of the year, according to an AFP tally.

Islamist fighters in the Sahel first emerged in northern Mali in 2012, during a rebellion by ethnic Touareg separatists that was later overtaken by the jihadists.

France intervened to rout the insurgents, but the jihadists scattered, taking their campaign into the ethnic powder keg of central Mali and then into Burkina Faso and Niger.

The crushing toll has fuelled perceptions that the jihadists cannot be defeated by military means alone.

Story continues

Jean-Herve Jezequel, Sahel director for the International Crisis Group think tank, told AFP that conventional military engagement had failed to deliver a knockout blow.

The jihadists "are capable of turning their backs, bypassing the system, and continuing", he said.

Last year, France upped its Barkhane mission in the Sahel from 4,500 troops to 5,100 -- a move that precipitated a string of apparent military successes.

French forces killed the leader of the notorious Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), Abdelmalek Droukdel, as well as a military chief of the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Group to Support Islam and Muslims (GSIM).

- Troop drawdown? -

But attacks in December and January have brought the number of French combat deaths in Mali to 50, prompting soul-searching at home about Barkhane's cost and usefulness.

Macron last month opened the door to a drawdown, suggesting France may "adjust" its military commitment.

To lighten the load, France is hoping for more military support from its European partners through the Takuba Task Force that assists Mali in its fight against jihadists.

The Sahel armies, for their part, have been unable to pick up the slack.

In 2017, the five countries initiated a planned 5,000-strong pooled force, but it remains hobbled by lack of funds, poor equipment and inadequate training.

While acknowledging the alliance's weak points, Chad's Deby on Monday "urged all member states to get on with making the joint G5 Sahel force self-sufficient, by giving it its own financial and logistical resources".

Paris also hopes last year's successes can strengthen political reform in the Sahel states, where weak governance has fuelled frustration and instability.

"The socio-economic situation in our countries isn't gleaming... we're appealing urgently to all our partners to give us the additional resources they promised," Deby said, underlining "debt cancellation" as a priority for regional governments.

bur-ah/ri/dl/jxb/rma/jah
Azerbaijani army will never allow Armenian fascism to raise its head again, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev said in his speech during a visit to the village of Gulabird, Lachin district. Yesterday, Ilham Aliyev, First Vice-President Mehriban Aliyeva and Vice President of the Heydar Aliyev Foundation Leyla Aliyeva have visited Fuzuli, Zangilan, Lachin and Jabrayil districts, liberated from occupation. Ilham Aliyev laid the foundation of the Horadiz-Aghband railway in Fuzuli district.

"The city of Zangilan, as indeed other cities, has been destroyed by the enemy almost completely. Only several houses remain. These housed their military unit and police station. Armenians from abroad also lived here illegally," he said in Zangilan, noting that master plans of all cities are being prepared and the first smart village project will be implemented in Zangilan district. - the destroyed village of Aghali will be the first village to be restored.

"Transport projects play a special role in the long-term development of the region, ensuring stability and reducing military risks to zero. All the countries participating in them will only benefit from that. Azerbaijan connects with Nakhchivan and Turkey. At the same time, a railway line from Russia to Armenia may be opened. This line can only pass through the territory of Azerbaijan. In addition, a railway communication will appear between Russia and Iran through the territory of Nakhchivan. There will be a railway connection between Iran and Armenia. A railway link will be created between Turkey and Russia. In other words, all countries of the region will only benefit from this," the president of Azerbaijan said.

"This is Khandak village of Gubadli district. There were fierce battles here as well. Our army liberated these territories by destroying and driving out the enemy. The enemy also settled here illegally. They lived in very difficult conditions. Notice that their houses are no better than kennels. This is exactly meant when I said that Armenians lived in abject poverty in the occupied territories. Hunger, misery and lawlessness were pervasive. They used such dilapidated roads," he said.

"Muradkhanli village of Gubadli district. The Armenians lived here and destroyed it. Restoration work is already underway. This is Hakari village. Look at its condition. The Armenians lived in this kennel. These destroyed houses are a product of Armenian fascism. Let the whole world see this. This is Bala Soltanli village. Most of the houses here are destroyed, but some houses were illegally occupied by the enemy. This is also a war crime. The enemy has already received its due for all these crimes and will also respond at the international level. Yusifbayli village of Gubadli district. This village was also completely destroyed by the enemy," the Azerbaijani president said.

"We are in the southern part of Lachin district today, on the territory of Gulabird village. A hydroelectric power plant is opening in the village of Gulabird today. Less than two months after the liberation of Lachin district from occupation, a month and a half later, a hydroelectric power station is being commissioned here. The generating capacity of this hydroelectric power plant is 8 megawatts. Among small hydroelectric power plants, an 8-megawatt plant can be considered a medium-sized plant. The key thing is that the launch of this station will create generating capacities here and thus we will effectively use our nature, the Hakari River," he said.



"In the Kalbajar-Lachin zone, the natural conditions for hydroelectric power plants are very favorable. There used to be many stations here before. The contemptible enemy also used these stations during the occupation. But within 20 days after their capitulation, by 1 December, Armenia destroyed all these hydroelectric power plants, removed the equipment from here and demolished the buildings of the stations. The enemy has also destroyed the Gulabird hydroelectric power station. Otherwise, this station would have been serving us already from 1 December. But the instructions I gave were fulfilled in a short time and we are celebrating the opening of the Gulabird hydroelectric power station with a capacity of 8 megawatts today. This is the first power plant being commissioned on the liberated lands. It has great significance and great symbolic meaning. We are returning to these lands. We will restore all the hydroelectric power stations in Kalbajar and Lachin districts the Armenians illegally exploited for many years and destroyed them. On the territory of Lachin district alone, the enemy destroyed five hydroelectric power plants. All of them will be restored. A further 12 hydroelectric power plants will be reconstructed on the territory of Kalbajar district. Thus, the generating capacity of the stations that have been destroyed and will be rebuilt in Kalbajar and Lachin districts alone will amount to 120 megawatts. This is a very large generating capacity. Thanks to that, we will restore these territories and provide them with uninterrupted energy," AzerTAc cited him as saying.



"The overall significance of the Patriotic war lies in the fact that we have liberated our lands from occupation, expelled the enemy from our lands and also restored the territorial integrity of the country. We have demonstrated to the whole world the power of our people and state, have shown the unwavering spirit of the people. At the same time, having taken practical steps to achieve strategic goals related to the future of our country, we signed important documents. The joint statement signed on 10 November ensured the return of Lachin, Kalbajar and Aghdam districts, of course. We returned these lands without a single shot being fired. At the same time, it is this statement that secures a connection of Azerbaijan with its integral part of Nakhchivan. Also, this railway infrastructure will extend to Turkey, thus creating a second railway network connecting Azerbaijan and Turkey. Three and a half years ago, we put into operation the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway," the head of state stressed.

"Revanchist forces are trying to raise their heads in Armenia even today. They are trying to threaten Azerbaijan with more provocations and another war. They must understand that we are paying attention to everything, that we keep everything under control and will never allow Armenian fascism to raise its head again. We have destroyed Armenian fascism. We drove out the enemy out of our native lands, threw it out of here. It is safe to say that we have destroyed the Armenian army. There is no Armenian army. It has been defeated. There is neither equipment nor manpower left. They have acknowledged that they had 10,000 deserters during the war. There was not a single deserter in the Azerbaijani army. This testifies to the high morale of our people and our army. This is a manifestation of the current policy," he said.



"We won Victory on the battlefield. We liberated these lands from the invaders in battles. Having inflicted a defeat on Armenia, we forced it to sign an act of surrender on 10 November and return Lachin, Kalbajar and Aghdam districts to us because it never wanted to return Lachin and Kalbajar districts to us during the negotiations. This was the main reason for the lack of progress in the negotiations. Unfortunately, the position of Armenia and some of its foreign patrons consisted in returning five districts to Azerbaijan, so that Azerbaijan would be content with this and Nagorno-Karabakh would someday be given independence, while Kalbajar and Lachin districts would remain under the eternal control of Armenia. I rejected that offer," President Aliyev emphasized.

"Life has shown that by demonstrating a strong will and courage, we were able to achieve what we wanted. They didn't even think about returning Lachin district to us. Moving along the path I came here along today, liberating all the districts, villages and cities along the way, we came to these places. We liberated the southern part of Lachin district, the village of Gulabird from the occupiers. The villages of Safiyan and Turklar are located here. We also liberated them, creating a military foothold to control the Lachin corridor, which was already under our control. In essence, we conducted our strategic operations advancing from this direction. At the same time, advancing from the opposite side, from Khojavand district to Shusha, and passing through the mountains and gorges, we were able to conduct a successful operation. This southern part of Lachin district was liberated as a result of a military operation," the head of state noted.

"Our Victory is historic. We have restored historical justice. We have restored our rights, avenged our martyrs, took revenge and returned. Restoration work is under way now and will be continued. I have said that we will turn this region, Karabakh into a paradise. All instructions have already been issued. All work is being done and will be systematically done. From now on, we will live on these lands forever. Nobody can prevent us from living on these lands. Karabakh is ours! Karabakh is Azerbaijan!" Ilham Aliyev concluded.
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The age-old tradition of pottery has gained the attention of the Jammu and Kashmir government after an engineer-turned-potter pitched for the revival of the dying art in the Valley.

Saima Shafi, 32, popularly known as 'Kral Koor' (potter girl in Kashmiri), was recently invited by the state's handicrafts department to share her experiences with the artisans of Beerwah in central Kashmir.

During her interaction with the artisans, the overwhelming response for the revival of pottery in Kashmir made the handicrafts department official decide that data on such artisans will be collected in order to work out schemes for them.

Shafi, who works as a junior engineer with the Public Works Department here, asked the people present at the function to ensure that they teach the art of pottery to their future generations.

"Curd still sets down best in an earthen container and clay pots have their effect on making the water sweeter and colder during the summers. One ought not to forget that while the wickerwork makes the Kashmiri Kangri a bright and cheerful sight, at its core is an earthen pot made by a potter," she said.

Urging artisans not to look only at the government for help, she asked them to get associated with non-governmental organisations in order to understand the changing techniques in this trade globally.

Addressing the gathering, Shafi said the time has come where we need to bring the centuries-old tradition of pottery back into modern Kashmiri kitchens. She informed them that stoneware clay from Haryana can make utensils from the potter's wheel and it can even be used in microwave ovens.

Later talking to a group of potters separately, Shafi told them about the Burzahom archaeological site in the Kashmir valley, that has remnants of the stone age and is awaiting the UNESCO World Heritage Site status.

"During excavation, there were earthen pots discovered that had been made during the stone age. The place is very close to Srinagar city and tells the tale of ancient links to pottery. Please pass this art to your next generation so that we remain connected to our roots," Shafi said.

The civil engineer said she learnt about the present irreverent state of pottery the day she started looking for an institute that can teach this art in the region. "If we know the trade, where are the institutes that teach this? Why are government schemes not popular among the potter community... These are questions that need to be answered," she said.

After her working hours and on weekends, Shafi frequents places within the Valley that were known for pottery a few decades ago. She visits the local potters, sparsely distributed in the region, to preserve their traditional techniques for posterity. Her dual identity of an engineer and a potter draws surprised responses from these artisans.
Nearly 12 crore doses of Covid vaccine to be available in June: Health Ministry

Will send Covishield to Canada in less than a month: Adar Poonawalla

India

pti-Madhuri Adnal

New Delhi, Feb 15: Vaccine maker Serum Institute of India (SII) on Monday said it will send COVID-19 vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University to Canada in less than a month.

SII CEO Adar Poonawalla in a tweet said, "Dear Hon'ble PM @JustinTrudeau, I thank you for your warm words towards India and its vaccine industry. As we await regulatory approvals from Canada, I assure you,@SerumInstIndia will fly out #COVISHIELD to Canada in less than a month; I'm on it!".

Adar Poonawalla thanks govt for Rs 35,000 crore Covid immnisation fund

Covishield is the brand name for the AstraZeneca-Oxford University COVID-19 vaccine. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on February 10 had assured his Canadian counterpart Justin Trudeau that India would do its best to facilitate supplies of COVID vaccines sought by Canada.

"Was happy to receive a call from my friend Justin Trudeau. Assured him that India would do its best to facilitate supplies of COVID vaccines sought by Canada," Modi had said in a tweet.

Arvind Kejriwal expresses opposition to the arrest of activist Disha Ravi| Oneindia News

India has already provided over 229 lakh doses of coronavirus vaccines to various countries out of which 64 lakh doses have been supplied as grant assistance and 165 lakh on commercial basis, the Ministry of External Affairs had said on February 12. India is a major manufacturer of vaccines in the world.
Kim Suk-kyoon, the former chief of the Korea Coast Guard, arrives at Seoul Central District Court, Monday, to attend a sentencing hearing on his alleged mismanagement of the sinking of the Sewol ferry in 2014, which resulted in over 300 casualties. Yonhap



A Seoul court on Monday acquitted a former maritime police chief of mishandling the rescue operation during the sinking of the Sewol ferry in 2014 that killed more than 300 people.



The Seoul Central District Court found Kim Suk-kyoon, then-chief of the Korea Coast Guard, not guilty of professional negligence in one of the country's worst peacetime disasters.



Eight others, who were in key posts of the organization at that time, were also acquitted of the same charge.



Two other former officials, however, were given suspended sentences for fabricating documents related to the case.



Delivering the not-guilty ruling, judge Yang Chul-han said the prosecution failed to substantiate the allegations against the nine defendants.



He said given the little information the defendants had about the state of the ferry at that time, it was difficult for them to come up with an evacuation or rescue order.



The judge also rejected any causality between the defendants' alleged negligence of duty and the occurrence of casualties from the ferry's sinking.



"With no more information than what the Jindo vessel traffic monitoring center that directly communicated with the Sewol ferry had gathered about the situation of the disaster, it was not easy for the defendants to make any decision," Yang said.



"They could be blamed for the disorganized system in dealing with a massive deadly (maritime) disaster but cannot be held criminally liable," he added.





Families of Sewol victims hold a press conference in front of the Seoul Central District Court, Monday. Yonhap
The blueprint was drawn 11 years ago: a sweeping plan encompassing the diverse, historic Journal Square, that would revitalize it as a business hub and prioritize sustainability.

Now, proposals for new Journal Square buildings flood planning board meetings, as developers ask to build five stories here and 26 stories there with hundreds of new units for middle income singles or couples.

Though the grandest changes are yet to materialize  including a new courthouse, 3-acre park and two 64-story towers next to a reimagined PATH plaza  the neighborhoods transformation has already begun.

And the new Journal Square appeals to a new set of renters: young, carless professionals who can afford a $1,900 studio apartment. One developer calls it sustainable growth while some community leaders cry displacement, asking for changes or the elimination of the decade-old redevelopment plan that spurred the growth.

Journal Square is one of the most diverse vibrant communities in the city, and I think we deserve a built environment that reflects that and makes space for all the people that want to live here, said Kevin Bing, president of the Journal Square Community Association.

Diego Hodaras Titanium Realty Group has exclusively built in McGinley Square and Journal Square. In recent months, the city Planning Board has considered two projects he has envisioned for Summit Avenue, one 19 stories and the other 26.

Its on the top of the hill in Jersey City together with the Heights, Hodara said. You have incredible views  you have the mass transportation, you have all of the government infrastructure and offices from a Hudson County level, you have universities, you have a very rich diversification in terms of ethnicity right there. You have plenty.

The 26-story project hes planning is in collaboration with Eliot Spitzers Spitzer Enterprises. It will have 386 units, 328 of which will be studios and one-bedrooms.

A rendering of a 26-story planned for 425 Summit Avenue in Journal Square.

Building mostly studios and one-bedrooms is common for Journal Square developers.

A project at 308 Academy St. is proposing to raze a long-vacant single-family home in favor of a four-story building with four studio apartments and five one-bedroom units.

The Journal Square 2060 Redevelopment Plan, that blueprint approved in 2010, offers developers freedom to build taller than many existing buildings. It doesnt require them to offer affordable housing, so nearly all projects in the works dont have any planned.

When the City Council passed it unanimously in August 2010, it got a standing ovation from union construction workers.

Rich Boggiano, then just the president of the Hilltop Neighborhood Association, spoke against the plan that day. The council was helping developers, not residents, and 60-story buildings in Journal Square were not what residents wanted, he said.

As far as Im concerned, they havent listened to the input from the neighborhood, he said at the time.

Now Boggiano is Journal Squares councilman and he says he doesnt like what the plan has done to his ward.

Id like to see the 2060 plan thrown out, he said Thursday. Id like to see it gone and if you want to come in and you want to build, you get the communitys approval.

The areas transformation is in its infancy despite developments like the towering Journal Squared. Yet the new development is already inflicting harm on existing communities, said Helen Bongon, overall chair of Philippine American Friendship Community, Inc.

The neighborhood lost a FilStop grocery story and local Filipino restaurants, she said. What came in? Jollibee, beloved by Filipinos, Bongon said, but a fast-food chain.

It only shows how expensive it is to do business in Jersey City, Bongon said. I also know many families who have moved out of the area because they cant afford to live in Jersey City anymore. They either cant afford the rent or sold their home because they feel like they will inevitably have to sell.

Its like our people and culture are being erased overnight.

Raju Patel of the Jersey City Asian Merchant Association, meanwhile, said his main concern is that the city is not requiring Journal Square developers to build much parking to complement the new units.

People spending that kind of money in the rent, they are the good income, he said. They are going to keep their cars, so that is the only reservation I have. Otherwise, development is development.

The Journal Square Community Association reviews every new building planned and meets with developers regularly. Its done so with nearly 40 since Chris Lamm entered as chair of its construction and planning committee three years ago.

Not all change is bad, Lamm said. New restaurants, transit opportunities and residents are welcome. But concerns about affordability are among the top issues raised by members, and some have already begun being displaced, he said.

Hodara, the developer, said he prefers the term sustainable growth to gentrification.

As an immigrant, I was never able to do the typical buying income-producing buildings trying to buy out and push out all the tenants and try to reposition the building, he said. I cannot do that. I do not feel comfortable doing that and thats why I elect to (build) ground up from an empty lot, a burned house, a rundown house, a gas station, a parking lot  or from homeowners who sell it to me.

But the target demographic for his new buildings are millennials, and so far, none of his buildings have set aside affordable housing, he said.

The renters will be pushed out because of their rental prices, but if you are a homeowner, whats the worst that you can get? Hodara postured. The worst that you can get is that the coffee that you were buying next door before was 50 cents and now its a dollar.

Journal Square projects that have appeared on Planning Board agendas since October for review or amendments:
Source: Xinhua| 2021-02-15 17:45:16|Editor: huaxia

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VIENTIANE, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Laos has conducted COVID-19 test on 108,010 cases since January 2020, with 45 of them positive, according to Lao Ministry of Health.

Deputy Director General of the Department of Communicable Diseases Control under the Lao Ministry of Health, Sisavath Soutthaniraxay, told a press conference here on Monday that Laos has been carrying out test on a daily basis to detect coronavirus infections since January 2020, completing 108,010 in total so far.

Among the people tested, 45 have been confirmed to be infected with the virus and 41 of the patients have been discharged from hospitals.

On Sunday, a total of 699 people entered Laos through international border checkpoints. Body temperature checks showed no one had signs of fever.

According to the National Taskforce Committee for COVID-19 Prevention and Control, it has been monitoring 2,701 people at 35 accommodation centers across the country.

The Lao government has urged people nationwide to remain vigilant and continue to implement preventive measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Laos detected its first two COVID-19 cases on March 24. Enditem
FAIRFIELD  Sacred Heart University held a COIVD-19 Memorial Service on Monday to honor and remember the Connecticut residents and members of the Sacred Heart community who died due to the coronavirus.

It included a welcome message, music and reading the names of the deceased.
In a jolt to the four and



half year-old V Narayanasamy-led government here, senior party legislator Malladi Krishna Rao on Monday resigned from the post of MLA.

A communication purportedly sent by Rao to the media said that he conveyed his resignation in his letter head to Speaker V P Sivakolundhu from his home town of Yanam.

He stated that he tendered "his resignation of my seat in the House with effect from February 15."



However, when contacted a spokesman of the Assembly said the office of Speaker had not received any letter from Rao today.

Rao had quit the post of Health Minister some weeks ago. But the Chief Minister denied such reports at press conferences that Rao had quit the post of Minister.

Rao was not available for confirmation over phone when PTI attempted to contact him.

An official source in the Assembly said that the Speaker was "out of station."



Malladi Krishna Rao is the third legislator to quit the post of MLA after the former PWD Minister A Namassivayam and E.Theeppainjan on January 25.

N Dhanavelu a member was disqualified in July last year for alleged anti-party activities.

If the Speaker accepts his resignation, the strength of the Congress in the 30-member House will come down to 11.

The Congress had won 15 assembly seats in the 2016 Assembly polls including the Speaker.

The Congress hinges on the support of the three member DMK and an Independent from Mahe N.Ramachandran.

On the opposition side, the AINRC has seven members while AIADMK has four and there are three nominated members belonging to the Bharatiya Janata party.

Rao's resignation has come as a bolt from the blue to the Congress when the party is going ahead with arrangements for the visit of party leader Rahul Gandhi on February 17.

Rao has been holding the lone Yanam constituency without break since 1996 although at one stage in 2000 he quit the MLA post to facilitate the then Congress leader the late P Shanmugham who became Chief Minister without being an MLA to contest to regularise himself as head of the then government.

Shanmugham won the poll in the byelection held in 2000 within six months of becoming the head of the government without being a member of the House.

Rao was felicitated by the government at a function on January 16 in Yanam for being "a legislator for a long period" and among those who felicitated him included the Chief Minister and his cabinet colleagues.

Rao also accompanied the Chief Minister last week to New Delhi to meet President Ram Nath Kovind to urge him to replace Lt governor Kiran Bedi for her alleged interference in administration in the union territory.

(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.)
I note one of the major sponsors of the Australian Open is a car company, says George Manojlovic of Mangerton. If it provided the vehicles, it would be of little use to Australias No.1 player, because when youre in the Kia of De Minaur, it always has a flat.

David Isaacs of Eastwood points out: The ABC expert on money-laundering is Dr Coyne.

I have a broken tooth and had heard horror stories about the cost of implants, writes Chris Greenwood of Nethercote. So, fearing the worst, I asked the dentist. I was right to fear so. Between five and six thousand, he replied. Was this a mistake? It was a tooth I wanted replacing, not a heart. No, that was the going rate. And the justification for the inflated price? You are paying for the research and technology, he said. Which was exactly the reason I was given for the sky-high price of my new hearing aids. If this catches on, I might be paying in the millions for my ticket when Boeing comes up with their next new airliner.

Ian Usman Lewis of Kentucky (the NSW one) says: The item on the sign reading Resilience and Safety Work Ahead (C8) reminded me of one near Cat Lo, Vietnam, which always aroused interest. It read: Attention, Populous Agglomeration Ahead! Americans love excessive verbiage, even though most cannot speak anything approaching English.

North-south orientation (C8) for a house is the best by far, claims Tony OConnor of Glenwood in response to Kerry Kyriacou. It captures the winter sun if you have plenty of glass on the north side. It could add thousands to the value of a property. Thelma Frost of Mudgee sees a different aspect: From a gardening point of view, Kerry, a property with a house facing north-east is the ideal. The western side will allow a great area for sun-loving plants, while its eastern side will be ideal for the shade-preferring plants.
Actress Julie Andrews recently went out of her way to encourage a group of Alabama theatre students to go on with the show after the loss of their play director.

Prattville Christian Academy Director Joey Fine died on Jan. 20 from COVID-19, reports WSFA. Fine, who was 48 years old, was working with students in grades 6-12 on a production of Mary Poppins, Jr. at the time.

After seeing the young cast struggle with Fines passing, a parent decided to try and reach out to Andrews, who won an Academy Award for her portrayal of Mary Poppins in the 1964 Disney film, to see if she could offer any words of encouragement.

In return, she received a personal letter from the beloved actress addressed to the students.

A little bird told me that you have been working on a special benefit production of Mary Poppins, Andrews wrote in the letter. Great! I am sending you warmest wishes for success. Do it in honor of Mr. Fine. He must have been a really nice guy.

Fines wife, Tammy, told WSFA she thought her late husband would be very proud of his students for pressing on with the show.

For more information, you can read the full WSFA article here.
New Delhi, Feb 15 : People have grave apprehensions on loss of privacy, the Supreme Court said on Monday, making it clear that it is the court's duty to protect this right as it heard an application against WhatsApp's new privacy policy.

The observation came as senior advocate Shyam Divan, representing petitioner Karmanya Singh Sareen, sought direction to restrain WhatsApp from implementing its new privacy policy in India.

"They have come up with new differentiating privacy policy for the Europeans and different set of rules applicable to Indians," Divan argued. He added that till the time new data protection law comes into force in India, WhatsApp should not bring its new privacy policy.

At this, Chief Justice S.A. Bobde replied: "We will issue notice in the matter." A bench, headed by the Chief Justice and comprising Justices A.S. Bopanna and V. Ramasubramanian, told counsel for WhatsApp: "People have grave apprehensions about loss of privacy. You may be 2 or 3 trillion dollar company, but people value their privacy more than your money... we have to protect people's privacy." The top court issued notice to WhatsApp and Facebook on this plea against its new privacy policy.

Senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Arvind Datar, appearing for WhatsApp, strongly contested Divan's argument, saying that the Delhi High Court is already seized of the matter.

Sibal said that Europe has a different set of data privacy laws, and WhatsApp's new privacy policy for India is similar to policy applicable in the US, Australia and other countries. "The fact is that this policy is applicable to the rest of the world except Europe.. In Europe, it is different because they have a special law," he argued.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the Centre, said the right to privacy is a fundamental right and they cannot compromise with the privacy of people.

Divan cited that WhatsApp has already delayed the implementation of its new privacy policy till May 15 this year and sought a notice which is returnable before this date. The bench said it is impressed with Divan's submission that while the Data Protection Bill is about to be brought into force, WhatsApp is framing a policy to share data. Datar also said that the messages are encrypted end to end.

The top court directed WhatsApp and Facebook to file their statement contesting the contentions in the present application.

The Chief Justice told WhatsApp counsel that people think if a message is sent from a person to another and then to a third person, the whole thing is disclosed to Facebook.

As counsel contended that this is not happening, Chief Justice Bobde disagreed, saying that they are telling information heard and read through news reports, and if WhatsApp disagrees, it should clarify this on oath.

The top court noted that it will have to consider if a similar petition, pending before the Delhi High Court, is maintainable when the apex court's constitution bench is already seized with the matter wherein WhatsApp's 2016 privacy policy has been challenged.

After a detailed hearing in the matter, the top court issued notices to WhatsApp, Facebook and the Centre in the matter and fixed for further hearing after four weeks.

-- The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text
The makers of the upcoming show, 1962: The War In The Hills, just unveiled the full-length trailer and introduced the 60-year-old story of Indian soldiers. The show directed by Mahesh Manjrekar stars Abhay Deol as leader Major Suraj Singh. Singh along with 125 Indian soldiers fought against 3000 Chinese in a battle that changed the course of the war.

The trailer features Abhay Deol leading the small battalion called 'C Company', against the Chinese army in a battle that India could not afford to lose. We also see other cast members like Akash Thosar, Sumeet Vyas, Rohan Gandotra, Annup Soni, and Mahie Gill struggling to choose between their personal loss and the love for their country. Meanwhile, Meiyang Chang will be seen as a member of the Chinese army scheming against Indian forces.

Talking about the show, during the Trailer launch, Abhay Deol said, "There is something to be said about stories of such historic importance. To me, it feels like a personal responsibility to deliver the strength of Major Suraj Singh, to showcase his brave exterior as he leads his troop in a battle to the last stand, while also dealing with life as a father and husband. It's an extraordinary story about courage that is relatable to everyone, no matter which community or culture they belong to."

Take a look at the trailer:

The makers have described the story inspired by true events as, "1962: The War In The Hills is a fictional take about one of the fiercest battles ever fought." The show follows the soldiers who despite being outnumbered and armed with basic equipment stopped the infiltrating army in its tracks on Ladhak border. Calling it a "greatest last stands in military history", the synopsis adds, "this is also a story about their personal battles, their life beyond their uniforms and their times of love, heartbreak, longing and celebration."

1962: The War in the Hills, the 10-episode war-drama written by Charudutt Acharya will release exclusively on Disney+ Hotstar VIP and Disney+ Hotstar Premium on February 26, 2021.

ALSO READ: Disney+ Hotstar VIP Releases First Look Of War-Epic Titled 1962: The War In The Hills Starring Abhay Deol

ALSO READ: Abhay Deol Praises Taapsee, Swara For Backing Farmers' Protest; 'You All Should Be In The Next Rihanna Video'



South Africa: Safety of learners paramount as academic year kicks off

The Basic Education Department says it ready to welcome learners to school under safety protocols although over 20 000 are still not placed.

The academic year 2021 officially commences today for millions of learners as public schools stalled to return to classes due to the second wave of COVID-19.

Speaking during the state of readiness on Sunday, Minister Angie Motshekga emphasised the health and safety of teachers, staff and learners, which she said remains at the top of the priority list.

We emphasise the critical importance of vigilance and strict adherence to the health and safety protocols, in order to save lives, she explained.

The Minister said the impact of the Coronavirus continues to affect the department, with at least 1 169 educators having passed away as a direct result of COVID-19.

This year alone, up until 12 February, the department lost 159 teachers and 63 non-teaching staff.

This is really heartbreaking and we convey our sincere condolences to the affected families, she said, before observing a moment of silence for the deceased.

The Minister said her department would continue to maintain the delicate balance between health and safety while paying great attention to curriculum gaps identified last year.

Senior managers in the sector, under the leadership of the Director-General, have been working very hard to strengthen the already existing plans for 2021.

School admission

Meanwhile, the Minister said the demand for space in schools, especially in Grades 1 and 8 remains a challenge.

All provinces are experiencing a high demand in particular areas, she told the media.

While progress has been made, the department stated that 8 982 Grade 1s are still not placed as their peers start school today, while 16 117 are those meant to start Grade 8.

The Council of Education Ministers (CEM) met yesterday [Saturday] and agreed the matter of school admission was identified as critical because the system cannot afford to see any learners being left behind.

The Council is said to be looking into the matter and working around the clock ensure that all learners are placed in the next coming week.

CEM appeals to parents and guardians to cooperate with officials at the district level, to accelerate the placement process.

Several schools closed

Meanwhile, several schools in the Eastern Cape, Limpopo and Mpumalanga were affected by the Eloise Tropical Cyclone and could not open on 25 January when principals went back to work.

Also, 1 724 schools have been vandalised since lockdown, the department added.

The Minister has since thanked the social partners, business and the community for supporting the sector as it continues to operate under difficult conditions.

These COVID-19 circumstances require the entire nation to support its children and indeed cooperate and support schools on a sustainable basis.

He called on people to continue to adhere to the health and safety protocols by wearing masks, sanitising, washing hands with water and soap, social distancing and avoiding large gatherings.

I urge every one of us, to play our part in keeping our communities safe and healthy.  SAnews.gov.za

This story has been published on: 2021-02-15. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article.
Scott Morrison looks almost unrecognisable after sharing a photo of him and his wife Jenny taken in 1985 as part of a heartfelt Valentine's Day tribute.

The prime minister shared the sweet photo to his Facebook page on Sunday, taken when they were teenagers and first started dating.

'Happy Valentine's Day Jen. From when we first started dating back in 1985 to now being married for more than 31 years. Blessed together and always,' he wrote.

Scott Morrison shared a photo of he and his wife Jenny taken in 1985 in a heartfelt Valentine's Day post on Sunday

The future leader looked worlds apart from what many know him as now, sporting a full head of brown hair and missing his usual set of glasses.

His trademark grin and dimples were the only features that would give most Australians a clue that he is the same man they see on TV every day.

The couple met when they were just 12 years old when their families both had a day at Luna Park, despite both growing up in Sydney's Sutherland Shire.

They officially started dating at 16 and got married at the tender age of 21.

But their marriage was not without its struggles, with the couple opening up about their years long battle to have a child.

The couple met when they were just 12-years-old at Sydney's Luna Park and got married at 21

In 2007, Mrs Morrison gave birth to their first child Abigail at the age of 39. Later, their second daughter Lily was born.

'She is our miracle child, the answer to a lifetime of prayer and 14 years of painful, invasive, heartbreaking treatment,' Mr Morrison said about Abigail in 2009.

While her husband was thrown into the spotlight after being elected in 2018, Mrs Morrison has lived a relatively quiet life.

The former registered nurse still drops her two daughters off to school each day and tries her best to keep life as normal as possible.
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 16)  President Rodrigo Duterte again took aim at Vice President Leni Robredo, this time over her statement that asking the US to pay to retain the Visiting Forces Agreement was "extortion."

In his weekly address, Duterte said Robredo should stop commenting because the US owed the country.

"Itong kay Robredo, sabi ko nga ma'am, kung ikaw ang presidente, hindi mo alam ang trabaho mo, dapat alam mo 'yan kasi abogado ka. You should not open your mouth when we are negotiating because maraming kasalanan ang Amerika sa atin," Duterte said.

[Translation: With Robredo, I say ma'am, if you become president you should know your job because you are a lawyer. You should not open your mouth when we are negotiating because America has a lot of sins against us.]

Duterte also reiterated that Robredo is unfit to be president.

"I'm sorry to say, you are not really qualified to run for president. You do not know your role in this government... Foreign relations with other countries is vested on the president alone," he said.

On her radio show on Sunday, Robredo criticized Duterte's pronouncement in his speech last week that US responsibility in the VFA "does not come free."

"Parang extortion lang. Parang kriminal eh, kung gusto mo nito magbayad ka muna," Robredo said.

[Translation: It sounded like extortion. It seemed like an act of a criminal asking someone to pay him to get what the other wants.]

"Every time she opens her mouth...she forgets that she's a lawyer. And being a lawyer, she should know that the Constitution says that...that is my function. That is not her function. At kung anong gusto kong sabihin para sa aking bayan, may purpose 'yan. Hindi kasi nila alam (And what I want to say for my country has a purpose. They don't know that)," Duterte said.

The President also said Subic was slowly being turned into an American base. But he did not give details on this, only saying he has reports given by the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

In a separate press briefing on Monday, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said the government was not extorting money from the US.

"Sa mga nagsasabing extortion, hindi po iyan extortion. 'Yan po ay pagtaguyod ng national na interes ng mga Pilipino, at dahil marami po tayong gastusin lalong lalo na sa COVID-19, bakit di tayo sumingil?" Roque said.

[Translation: To those who have been claiming it's extortion, it is not extortion. We are upholding the national interest of Filipinos because we have a lot of COVID-19 expenses, so why can't we ask for compensation?]

Roque said the country should even be getting an amount close to the $16 billion compensation of Pakistan, which is equivalent to over P766 billion. Citing a study by US-based think tank Stimson Center on counterterrorism assistance, he noted that the country has only been getting over $3.9 billion, or more than P186 billion, as of 2017.

Duterte also called out Senator Panfilo "Ping" Lacson, who had also criticized his statement the US will "have to pay" to keep the VFA. But the President said he could "forgive" Lacson, because he is not a lawyer.
2020 was a year marked by hardships and challenges, but the Fauquier community has proven resilient. The Fauquier Times is honored to serve as your community companion. To say thank you for your continued support, wed like to offer all our subscribers -- new or returning --

4 WEEKS FREE DIGITAL AND PRINT ACCESS.

We understand the importance of working to keep our community strong and connected. As we move forward together into 2021, it will take commitment, communication, creativity, and a strong connection with those who are most affected by the stories we cover.

We are dedicated to providing the reliable, local journalism you have come to expect. We are committed to serving you with renewed energy and growing resources. Let the Fauquier Times be your community companion throughout 2021, and for many years to come.
Impeachment is over and Donald Trump was acquitted. Now what?

Trump said in response to the result that the Make America Great Again movement "has only just begun." The impeachment ends neither Trump's political career nor his influence within US politics.

Even though Trump's words and actions undoubtedly pushed the mob to the US Capitol, which threatened the lives of the lawmakers and even his own vice president, 43 Republican senators voted against a conviction. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who accused Trump of "disgraceful dereliction of duty" and claimed that Trump was "practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day," voted against conviction. He made the comments just moments after he voted to acquit Trump on what many described as a Senate technicality rather than constitutionality.

The power of Trump is not lost on Republican officials. A Monmouth University January 25 poll shows that, despite 56 percent of Americans approving of the House impeachment of Trump, the support against impeachment in the Republican Party is in the high 80s. Only 13 percent of Republicans reportedly approve of the House's action. According to Hill-HarrisX polls from a January 28-29 survey, 64 percent of registered Republican voters said they'd leave the Republican Party and join Trump's if the former president ever sets up another political party.

Such is the strength of Trump's hold over Republicans.

Over the past four years, US politics has been split into two impulses  rage and hope. Rage about the corporate interests that seem to have captured the government, about the demographic changes that could end the traditional way of life, about the challenge to values that many today consider to be of white supremacy, homophobia and religious intolerance.

And hope, what Trump's predecessor and successor ran on, is about the belief that the government could benefit the common people again after decades of weakening protections for workers and a growing division between the wealth, the powerful and everybody else.

The rage was rejected in the 2020 election, but not by a large margin. Joe Biden and the Democrats have little time to prove that their version of the US government fits the "hope" that the public expect from them before 2022 midterm election takes place. This will be the first election affecting redistricting following the 2020 census. Whoever wins will be able to hold the pen to redraw the US political landscape. And Democrats don't have a lot of room for error when it comes to maintaining grip on Congress.

With Trump's opposition within the Republican Party largely contained to several rank-and-file members, it's more than clear that nationalism, populism and protectionism still rule over the Republican Party  despite many officials' attempts to shake the shackle. That rage still exist, perhaps no weaker than before. "Donald Trump is the most vibrant member of the Republican Party. The Trump movement is alive and well," said Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, "we need Trump."

The Democrats are by no means letting Trump off the hook. There are talks about flooding him with lawsuits or taking action under the 14th Amendment to block him from ever holding office again. Georgia prosecutors already announced probes into Trump's alleged attempts to overturn the state's 2020 election result.

Trump isn't going quietly into the good night, perhaps nobody ever expected him to. And with him eyeing a return to politics, the war between rage and hope rages on.

From CGTN
New Delhi: Israel's coronavirus cabinet has allowed up to 2000 foreign air travelers to enter the country every day, the prime minister's office and the health ministry said on Sunday (February 14).

"The ministerial cabinet has endorsed the transport minister's plan for inbound and outgoing flights. Up to 2000 people will be able to fly into Israel every day," a statement read, according to news agency ANI.

The defense ministry of the country has been tasked with contracting hotels where arrivals will be quarantined.

Israel largely closed Ben Gurion Airport, the Jewish state's main gateway on January 25 in an effort to prevent mutant coronavirus strains from entering.

The total number of coronavirus cases in the country has reached over 7.2 lakhs which includes over 5300 deaths. More than 6.6 lakh patients have recovered from the infections.

In the last 24 hours, 2534 new cases have been registered, 37 new deaths due to the virus were recorded.

(With inputs from ANI)

Live TV
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The Rev. Dr. Brian Coulter will be saying goodbye to First Presbyterian Church in Aiken this March as he prepares for his next role in Fort Worth, Texas.

March 14 will be Coulter's last day preaching at the local church, where he has been a pastor since 2014.

Coulter said he will miss many things about First Presbyterian Church in Aiken: the people, the community, the interconnectedness of the downtown churches, the staff, the missions programs, the church elders and the deacons.

Still, Coulter looks forward to getting to know a new community and "stepping into ministry in new ways."

He said one of the tag lines of First Presbyterian is "Busy writing a new chapter in an old story."

"I think we've been doing that for seven years now, and one of the things I've realized in the midst of this, and in the midst of discerning God's call, is that it's time for me to write my next chapter with a different group, and it's time for them to have someone help them write their next chapter," Coulter said. "While it's bittersweet and sad to step out of here, I'm excited to know that God is calling me to write a new chapter somewhere else."

The church has been doing "amazing" over the last seven years, Coulter said. Among other accomplishments, he said the congregation gained 41 new members in the past two years, the church started a new in-home and in-depth Bible study and the church's budget rose higher than ever in 2019 and 2020, allowing more money to go toward missions and serving the community.

To the First Presbyterian Church community in Aiken, Coulter said, "I miss you. I love you. You're in my prayers."

Al Hasani, who collaborated regularly with several and renowned international media, was arrested on 17 September 2020 at a checkpoint between the province of Abyan and the neighbouring city of Aden, in southwest Yemen. The area is controlled by the separatist organization, the Southern Transitional Council (STC).

Al-Hasani was taken to Al-Mansoura prison, a facility run by the STC in Aden. According to media reports, he has been regularly tortured and his health condition is at serious risk.

Due to his long-time imprisonment, Al-Hasani hasnt been able to meet his youngest daughter, who was born less than a month ago.

The IFJ and NJ sent a joint letter on 10th February calling on Yemeni Prime Minister, Mouin Abdel-Malik, to make "all possible efforts to release our colleague Adel Al-Hasani. He is known to all as very committed to his profession, trusted and caring for the safety of the journalists who work with him. Without his assistance, many journalists would not have the chance to report safely from Yemen".

Norwegian channel TV 2 Norway also highlighted his work. In 2018, the producer worked with a TV 2 crew to cover the Yemeni war and famine.

Since the beginning of the civil war in 2015, Yemen has become one of the most dangerous countries for journalists in the world. Last year, the Yemeni Journalists Syndicate (YJS) documented 112 cases of violations of media and journalists rights, including two killings, torture, kidnappings, arrests and bans.

IFJ General Secretary, Anthony Bellanger, said: We are deeply concerned over Adel Al-Hassani's detention and health conditions. Together with the Norwegian Union of Journalists, we call on the Yemeni Prime Minister to secure the release of our colleague and provide him with urgent health care".
The scientists said that the sampling site (Thailand only) and the sampling size was small and limited but they are confident that coronavirusesPrevious studies have suggested that SARS-CoV-2 emerged in an animal, most likely a bat, before spreading to humans. However, the precise origin of the virus is not known and a team commissioned by the World Health Organization (WHO) have investigated the same.In the latest research, the scientists detected a close relative of SARS-CoV-2 in horseshoe bats kept in an artificial cave at a wildlife sanctuary in Thailand. The isolated virus, named RacCS203 showed 91.5% similarity in their genomes which is a close match to the genetic code of SARS-CoV-2.Another coronavirus called RmYN02 found in bats in Yunnan, China showed 93.6% similarity to the genome of SARS-CoV-2.Scientists from Singapore, China, US, Australia and Thailand also looked at the antibodies in the bats and in a trafficked pangolin in southern Thailand. Pangolins are scaly anteaters. They found that the antibodies were able to neutralize the pandemic virus, which further provided evidence that SARS-CoV-2-related coronaviruses are circulating in Southeast Asia.Further, the scientists compared the structures of the spike proteins found on SARS-CoV-2 and a coronavirus isolated from Malayan pangolins which were seized by authorities after being smuggled to China. It was found that the pangolin virus was able to bind to receptors from both pangolins and humans. This is a different characteristic when compared to the bat coronavirus, which could not effectively bind with human or pangolin receptors.Co-lead author of the study, Antoni Wrobel, postdoctoral training fellow in the Structural Biology of Disease Processes Laboratory at the Crick said,The scientists are continuing their examination of the spikes of SARS-CoV-2 and related coronaviruses, including other bat viruses, to better understand the mechanisms of infection and evolution.Source: Medindia
Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long has ordered the northern province of Hai Duong considering implementing the Prime Ministers Decree 16/CT-TTg on a wider scale to avoid getting behind developments of the pandemic.

Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long speaks at the conference (Photo: VNA)





Long made the request at an online conference co-organised by the ministry and local authorities to direct COVID-19 prevention and control work across the province.

Decree 16/CT-TTg focuses on deploying urgent and drastic COVID-19 prevention and control measures.

Also at the conference, the minister praised local efforts to mobilize its entire political system and people in fighting the pandemic in a short time and to promptly lockdown Chi Linh city and Cam Giang district under the decree.

He envisaged the local COVID-19 situation to be further complicated and prolonged and urged the province to make all-out efforts to curb the spread of the virus.

He recommended letting the army monitor concentrated quarantine sites for tightened discipline in a bid to deter cross infections.

Long asked the local police to tightly manage peoples self-quarantine at residential areas in line with the ministrys regulations.

He stated the ministry will continue offering more assistance to Hai Duong.

Secretary of the provincial Party Committee Pham Xuan Thang said Hai Duong is now capable of collecting 30,000 samples for COVID-19 testing daily.

He added that the locality's major tasks are to control cross infections at quarantine sites, further speed up sample collection process, and direct prevention and control work at industrial parks.

Thang said the provincial Party Committees standing board will hold a meeting to issue specific directions focusing on wider-scale implementation of Decree 16, prioritising testing at quarantine sites and increasing personnel for pandemic prevention in Cam Giang district.

He proposed the ministry increase capacity of the COVID-19 treatment hospital at the Hai Duong Medical Technical University Hospital to 600 beds and quickly aid the province in establishing testing facilities in Chi Linh, Cam Giang, and at the university hospital.

Deputy head of the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology Tran Nhu Duong said the key work for Hai Duong is to prevent and control the pandemic at industrial parks, particularly in Cam Giang which is home to 60,000 workers.

According to the provincial centre for disease prevention and control, as of February 14, Hai Duong recorded a total of 461 COVID-19 cases, with 31 cases posted on the day.

To date, the province has collected more than 90,400 samples and saw 55 patients fully recovered.

VNA

A new species of nostoceratid ammonite that lived during the Coniacian stage of the Cretaceous period has been identified from fossils found in Japan.

Named Yezoceras elegans, the new ammonite species swam in the Cretaceous seas between 89 and 86 million years ago.

This is the first species of the genus Yezoceras to be discovered in 44 years, said lead author Dr. Daisuke Aiba and his colleagues from the Mikasa City Museum and Yokohama National University.

Yezoceras elegans belongs to the family Nostoceratidae, a diverse group of heteromorph ammonites known for the bizarre coiling of their shells.

The species had loosely coiled whorls, a wide umbilicus, and two prominent tubercle rows concentrated in the lower part of the whorls.

Nostoceratidae includes more than 15 genera, Dr. Aiba said.

Many genera belonging to this family have basically helically coiled whorls, others have three-dimensionally meandered whorls.

Dr. Aiba and co-authors found eight specimens of Yezoceras elegans in the Haboro area in Hokkaido, northern Japan.

They think that this and two other species in the genus, Yezoceras nodosum and Yezoceras miotuberculatum, were endemic to the northwestern Pacific region.

Yezoceras elegans might have originated from Yezoceras nodosum, judging from the stratigraphic correlation, they said.

The restricted occurrences of three Yezoceras species in Hokkaido suggest that the speciation of Yezoceras occurred in the northwestern Pacific realm during the Coniacian age.

The discovery of Yezoceras elegans is reported in a paper in the journal Paleontological Research.

_____

Daisuke Aiba et al. 2021. A New Species of Yezoceras (Ammonoidea, Nostoceratidae) from the Coniacian in the Northwestern Pacific Realm. Paleontological Research 25 (1): 1-10; doi: 10.2517/2020PR008

The Year of the Ox was ushered in on Friday, but as to be expected, the Lunar New Year celebration in Chinatown was scaled back this year due to Covid. The huge parade that normally winds through the streets of Chinatown has been tentatively rescheduled until the spring. A small program did take place Friday at Confucius Plaza and lion dance troupes made their way up and down Mott Street on Friday and Saturday.

Businesses, of course, can use your support more than ever. This is an important time of the year for restaurants and other small businesses in Chinatown. Foot traffic was down sharply last year, even before the first cases of Covid surfaced in New York City. After almost a solid year of the pandemic, many mom-and-pop shops have closed are are barely hanging on. Restaurant owners were hoping for a boost Fromm the return of indoor dining with 25% capacity.

Several local groups and institutions are hosting in-person and virtual Lunar New Year events:

Send Chinatown Love has a Lunar New Year Crawl throughout the month of February.

For the kids, the Museum of Chinese in America is hosting noodle puller Peter Looi in a virtual event on Tuesday; hell be demonstrating the art of pulling long life noodles.

Think! Chinatown! is offering several virtual storytelling events, including artist Spica Wobbe in an inventive pop-up art workshop; youll learn how to make your own Tuan Yuan greeting card to send to loved ones this Lunar New Year.

Still need some ideas? Check out Welcome to Chinatowns Lunar New Year shopping and eating guide.
A technique frequently portrayed in dramatic resuscitation scenes in television and film is among several alternative methods to CPR that have shown no benefit in saving lives in a review by University of Warwick researchers.

The systematic review reinforces cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) as the 'gold standard' technique when health professionals or members of the public are attempting to resuscitate someone in cardiac arrest.

The article, published in the journal Resuscitation, is the first comprehensive systematic review of evidence on the effectiveness of three less-used resuscitation techniques: cough CPR, percussion pacing and precordial thump. The precordial thump, in which a patient is struck on the chest in the hope of restarting the heart, has often been used in dramatic scenes in TV and film, such as in Grey's Anatomy and Lost.

The researchers from the Warwick Clinical Trials Unit analyzed data from 23 previously published studies that examined the effectiveness of the three techniques. The research examined precordial thump, in which a rescuer will make a firm strike to a patient in cardiac arrest in the lower half of the sternum; percussion pacing where a less forceful, repetitive and rhythmical impact is made to the left sternal edge; and cough CPR - a misnomer as it does not involve CPR - in which an individual coughs forcefully if they feel they are about to collapse.

Although popular media and social media frequently portray these techniques positively, researchers conclude that there is no benefit to using any of the three techniques either in hospital nor outside of it. In particular:

Use of the precordial thump may actually increase risk to the patient

Social media reports on 'cough CPR' erroneously confuse cardiac arrest (when someone has collapsed, is unconscious and unresponsive and is not breathing) and heart attack (which typically presents with chest pain when blood supply to the heart is insufficient) and - potentially dangerously - advocates for the person driving to hospital whilst continuing to cough. Anyone who thinks they may be having a heart attack or has concerning chest pain should seek immediate medical attention.

The research team concludes that this reaffirms CPR as the 'gold standard' in the situation of a cardiac arrest, as recommended by Resuscitation Council UK and resuscitation experts worldwide. Both health professionals and members of the public should prioritise it when faced with an individual experiencing a cardiac arrest, rather than be delayed with the use of other techniques.

It is vital that the person in cardiac arrest receives CPR, which is a skill everyone should be encouraged to learn. Every minute without CPR and early defibrillation can decrease someone's chances of survival by up to 10%. Resuscitation Council UK Guidelines stress the importance of prompt action with CPR and early defibrillation as being vitally important to giving someone the best chance of survival.

Lead author Dr Christopher Smith, a Clinical Lecturer at Warwick Medical School and an Emergency Medicine doctor said:

People need to continue doing the basics: if someone collapses you should call 999, start CPR, and if someone else is present they should find a defibrillator. Those who have chest pains and are unwell need to seek medical advice without delay. Early intervention by members of the public has the biggest impact on survival. The effectiveness of these techniques have been considered in international resuscitation guidelines, but this is the first time they have been comprehensively studied in a systematic review. They are not established practices but were at one time advocated and have since fallen out of favour. Some of these techniques are still being used around the world and with this research can confidently say they are of no benefit to patients."

Sue Hampshire, Director of clinical and service development at Resuscitation Council UK said: "Prompt action when someone has collapsed and is not breathing normally is crucial to the person's chances of survival. There isn't time for confusion. So, we believe it's vitally important that as many people as possible know how to spot if someone has collapsed and stopped breathing normally, so they act quickly by calling 999, starting CPR and accessing a nearby defibrillator.

"We want everyone to learn the simple steps to perform CPR that will give somebody having a cardiac arrest their best chance of survival, whilst reducing the risk of COVID-19 transmission from performing CPR.

"During this time when COVID-19 is widespread within the community we advise some modifications to standard CPR techniques. Loosely lay a face covering, (such as a mask, cloth, towel or item of clothing), over the mouth and nose of the person who has collapsed, do not put your face next to theirs when checking for breathing and do chest compression only CPR (no mouth-to-mouth rescue breaths).

"You can find out more about how to keep yourself safe while doing CPR by visiting www.resus.org.uk/watch. Your quick actions could be the difference between someone living or dying."

Co-author Professor Gavin Perkins, head of the Warwick Clinical Trials Unit, said: "Stepping forward to help someone in an emergency can literally make the difference between life and death. If you find someone who is unconscious, with absent or abnormal breathing - call 999 and start chest compressions if instructed to do so."
This is the 'arrogant' postman who claimed he was 'too knackered' to help a frail pensioner who fell in the snow.

Thomas McCafferty has been suspended by the Royal Mail for refusing to assist Patricia Stewart, 72, when she lost her footing and fell down her icy front steps as she tried to collect a parcel he left for her.

Mr McCafferty, 51, responded to her appeals for help by telling her 'I can't help, I'm too knackered' and then walked away.

Calling over his shoulder, McCafferty told Mrs Stewart to put on her slippers as he walked off, which had come loose during her fall.

The incident in the village of Bainford, Falkirk, took place during the coldest February since 1955.

It came to light after footage from a neighbour's doorbell camera was posted on social media and gained traction worldwide.

Pictured: Thomas McCafferty is identified as the Royal Mail postal worker who left Patricia Stewart, 72, in the snow after she fell while collecting a parcel because he was 'too knackered'

Mrs Stewart's family said the postal worker should be sacked and claimed Mrs Stewart, who suffers from the bone disease osteoporosis and uses a Zimmer frame to move about, could have died.

McCafferty, who is not the pensioner's regular postman, also failed to alert neighbours as he carried on going about his rounds and didn't bother to alert them to Mrs Stewart's plight.

He could now face the sack if Royal Mail bosses find him guilty of gross misconduct.

He was not at his home yesterday as MailOnline approached him for comment, but has yet to apologise to Mrs Stewart for his behaviour.

A neighbour told MailOnline: 'He hasn't been seen for the last few days, but people are talking about him.

'I haven't seen the video but it is not something people expect of members of the local community and especially a postman. We're close knit around here.

Patricia Stewart (pictured), who suffers from osteoporosis, slipped and banged her head as she bent over to pick up two parcels left on the doorstep of her home in Bainsford, near Falkirk

Patricia was thankfully rescued by 22-year-old Hermes driver Karolina Domska 20 minutes later, who helped her up, got her inside her home and called her neighbours for more help

'We like to think we would help each other in need.'

Mrs Stewart was only rescued when a Hermes driver Karolina Domska, 22, came along 20 minutes later.

She found her soaked through and sobbing in the snow in her bare feet with her slippers nearby and immediately rallied neighbours to help.

Mrs Stewart's niece Sheryl Harkins said: 'Our usual postman is lovely.

'But what this gentleman did is disgusting. He deserves everything he is going to get.

'He seems to be quite well known in the postal industry and has worked there for over 20 years.

The incident was captured on a neighbour's Ring doorbell and showed the worker walk off

'The postal workers I have spoken to are refusing to work with him again and I've been told he'll be moved to another office, but I'm hoping they won't work with him either.

'He shouldn't be working with the public.

'Postal workers and retired postal workers have sent me so many messages about this guy and he appears to be known for being arrogant.'

Mrs Stewart is a grandmother of two. She has lived on her own after the death of her husband a decade ago.

She said: 'I felt a bit dizzy. I fell from the top step to the bottom and I banged my head. I just couldn't get up.

'I shouted for the postman to help me and he came back.

The postman can be heard telling Patricia to put her slippers on as they fell off during fall

'But he said, 'I've been working from early this morning and I'm knackered', and then went away.

'If it hadn't been for the people who helped I would have been lying there for hours.'

Sheryl added: 'I've had people from Russia trying to get in touch with me, American families have got in touch.

'People are just disgusted. If there was no footage I don't think anyone would believe it.

'Even if he didn't lift her up he could have called on a neighbour or someone. It's inhumane to do what he's done.

'You wouldn't treat a dog like that.

Patricia's niece Sheryl Harkins, 36, accused postman of leaving her aunt 'to die' in the snow

'He could have contacted me to apologise but he hasn't and a postman told me he doesn't think he has done anything wrong.

'If that is the case we're not going to get an apology off this guy, if that's his mentality.

'We want him exposed which is why we put the video out on Facebook, because it's not acceptable.

'I am still expecting an official response from Royal Mail about what is happening to the guy.

'We should be entitled to know the outcome of their investigation.'

Treatment for Mrs Stewart's health condition, including scans and operations, has been delayed due to the coronavirus lockdowns.

It is understood that the former social care manager fell a day after she received a coronavirus vaccine.

Mrs Stewart said: 'I've done nothing wrong. I'm a nice person. I couldn't believe that he walked away and left me and didn't seek anybody's help.

'I'm still in shock.'

Last night, a Royal Mail spokesman said: 'Royal Mail expect the highest standards of behaviour from our people while out on deliveries and collections at all times.

'We regularly remind our postmen and postwomen of the important role they play in their local communities.

'We were very sorry to learn about this incident, and for the distress this incident has caused.

'We have been in touch with the customer concerned to apologise and to inform them we are investigating this incident.'
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) returns after a dinner break on the second day of former President Donald Trump's second impeachment trial in Washington on Feb. 10, 2021. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Cassidy Outlines His Vote to Convict Trump in Column

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) penned a column published on Sunday defending his decision to vote against former President Donald Trump in the Senate impeachment trial.

Cassidy, who was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump, wrote in an op-ed published in the Louisiana newspaper The Advocate that he was convinced the former president was actively subverting the peaceful transfer of power.

I voted to convict former President Trump because he is guilty. Thats what the facts demand, Cassidy said.

The Louisiana senator took issue with Trumps effort to question the integrity of the 2020 election over a slew of voting and counting irregularities and allegations of fraud. The former president and his team disputed the results of several key swing states in the courts in an attempt to prevent election officials from counting ballots that they say were illegal.

A majority of those cases were dismissed by judges on procedural grounds such as lack of jurisdiction or standing. In some cases, the judges were not convinced by the allegations presented by the Trump team.

Cassidy argued that he believes Trumps interactions with state officials, the Jan. 6 rally organized by members of the pro-Trump nonprofit group called Women for America First, and his speech that day were all part of a calculated campaign to lie about the election.

He also apportioned blame to Trump for the lack of National Guard response on Jan. 6. However, the senator did not address the claim by former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows that the former president had offered to deploy 10,000 National Guard troops in Washington D.C. prior to Jan. 6 multiple times but was rebuked.

We also know that in January, but also throughout the summer, that the president was very vocal in making sure that we had plenty of National Guard, plenty of additional support because he supports our rule of law and supports our law enforcement and offered additional help, Meadows told Fox News host Maria Bartiromo earlier this month.

Even in January, that was a given, as many as 10,000 National Guard troops were told to be on the ready by the Secretary of Defense, Meadows said. That was a direct order from President Trump and yet here is what we see  all kinds of blame going around but yet not a whole lot of accountability.

The Pentagon and the office of Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser did not respond to The Epoch Timess previous requests for comment.

On Jan. 6, former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said Trump had directed the National Guard to send forces, along with other federal protective services, to respond to the rioters and protesters.

The Louisiana senator, who also joined Democrats in voting to allow the trial to proceed, has since faced backlash for his decisions. The Republican Party of Lousiana voted unanimously to censure Cassidy on Feb. 13. Cassidy was previously censured by the Republican Party in East Baton Rouge for his vote affirming the constitutionality of the Senate impeachment trial.

Other Republican lawmakers who voted to impeach or convict Trump have faced similar backlash in their home states through censures by their state Republican parties or threats of primary challenges.

I have no illusions that this is a popular decision. I made this decision because Americans should not be fed lies about massive election fraud. Police should not be left to the mercy of a mob. Mobs should not be inflamed to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power, Cassidy said.

He also called on Louisianans to move on from this ugly chapter in our history.

It is time to come together to focus on COVID-19 recovery, create jobs, and make a better life for everyone in Louisiana, he wrote.

Cassidy has also expressed his approval for a complete investigation about what happened on Jan. 6 amid a push for a 9/11-style commission to probe the tragedy.

Trump was ultimately acquitted by a Senate vote of 57-43 on the impeachment charge that he incited the Jan. 6 breach of the U.S. Capitol. Sixty-seven votes were needed to convict the president.
SHENZHEN, CHINA, Feb 13, 2021 - (ACN Newswire) - On the morning of February 4, a press conference themed 'Foreseeing the Future in Longhua, Shenzhen' was held in Shenzhen Citizen Center. Longhua District will launch an all-round future city scenes experiment, make every effort to build a future city development experimental field and ideal society showcase window, and take the lead in exploring the system and path to adapt to the future development of high-density urban areas.This year is the opening year of the 14th Five-Year Plan. With the new starting point, Longhua District is launching the all-round future city scene experiment, another important innovation building Shenzhen into a socialism pilot demonstration area and global benchmark city.Longhua District will promote the application and integration of future city scenes in a comprehensive and systematic manner based on the following five strategic positionings: Firstly, it will focus on the positioning of a leading area with high-quality development and build a new scene of digital economic empowerment; Secondly, it will focus on the positioning of a law-based demonstration city and building a scene of advanced grassroots rule of law; Thirdly, it will focus on the positioning of an urban civilization model and build a new scene of digital culture and innovation; Fourthly, it will focus on the positioning of a benchmark for people's livelihood and happiness and build a new scene of intelligent public service; Fifthly, it will focus on the positioning of a pioneer for sustainable development and build a new scene of integration of "ecology, production and living". Li Junqi, chairman of Foxconn Industrial Internet Co., Ltd, a listed company located in Longhua District, said, "Longhua is our birthplace, and we will continue to lead innovation in Longhua."Longhua District has announced the global launch of its eight themed clusters of application scenes for the experimental scenes of the future city: the overall "smart" governance scene of the North Station International Business District, the public life scene of the Heron Lake Central City, the future industrial innovation scene of the Jiulongshan Digital City, the future ecological scene of the Guanlan River Basin, the future traffic scene of Longhua Avenue, the digital fashion scene in the Dalang Fashion Town, the talent service scene in the Talent District, and the digital culture scene in the Guanlan Culture Town.Lei Weihua, Chief Executive of Longhua District, indicated that Longhua will carry out the all-round future city scene experiment with stronger confidence and greater determination, and also sincerely invite all entrepreneurs and friends to actively participate in and make contributions to the building of the "twin districts" and the implementation of comprehensive reform pilot in Shenzhen.Media contact:Longhua District People's GovernmentEmail: fzhggj@szlhq.gov.cnFrom: www.szlhq.gov.cn/ydmh/xxgk/xwzx_138039/gzdt_138040/content/post_8538875.htmlSOURCE: Longhua District People's GovernmentSource: Longhua District, Shenznen, ChinaCopyright 2021 ACN Newswire . All rights reserved.
Gwyneth Paltrow announced her lifestyle brand Goop has launched its first sex toy with a cheeky Instagram post on Valentine's Day.

To promote her company's $95 Double-Sided Wand Vibrator, the 48-year-old Oscar winner shared a throwback photo from the 71st Academy Awards ceremony in 1999.

'Beat you to it...I know how to meme too, guys,' she captioned an edited photo, which showed her holding the new product, in place of her golden statuette.

Proud: Gwyneth Paltrow announced her lifestyle brand Goop launched its first sexy toy with a cheeky Instagram post on Valentine's Day

After Cleo Wade, a poet and activist, called her an 'icon' for spending the COVID-19 pandemic 'creating her own vibrator,' Paltrow had the perfect response.

'Had to pass the time, you know?' the mother-of-two, who has been married to Brad Falchuk since 2018, joked on her Instagram Story.

Her post was an instant hit among fans and many of her celebrity pals, like Drew Barrymore, who commented: 'Oh my God, I love you.'

Cheeky: After Cleo Wade, a poet and activist, called her an 'icon' for spending the COVID-19 pandemic 'creating her own vibrator,' Paltrow had the perfect response

'Had to pass the time, you know?' the mother-of-two, who has been married to Brad Falchuk since 2018, joked on her Instagram Story of her latest product (seen in 2019)

Others joked 'who needs an Oscar when when' you have the 'best vibrator.'

As for the vibrator's features, according to the Goop website, it is equipped with a 'wonder-ball wand with deep, rumbly vibrations' and external stimulation on one end, and 'powerful and precise vibration' for clitoral or internal stimulation.

Additionally, 'each side features eight different pulsating patterns with varying intensities' and was designed to look like 'something youd leave on your nightstand as a functional objet dart.'

Happy couple: Paltrow and Falchuk seen together on September 26, 2019 in New York City

The vibrator is also waterproof, so it can be used in the bath or shower, and be 'submerged for up to thirty minutes in water up to one meter (approximately three feet) deep.'

Last January, she made headlines for releasing a vagina-scented candle in her Goop store, named 'This Smells Like My Vagina.'

Just a few months later, she introduced another risque candle, called This Smells Like My Orgasm, during a virtual visit on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.

Making headlines: Last January, she released a vagina-scented candle in her Goop store, named 'This Smells Like My Vagina' (seen in 2019)
The Assam Congress on Monday said the chief of its ally AIUDF, Badruddin Ajmal, is not anti-Hindu and the BJP, which accuses him of being communal, had in fact joined hands with his party to run three district councils in the state. Assam Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) president Ripun Bora also exuded confidence that the Congress-led alliance will oust the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from power and form the next government in the northeastern state.

The Congress has formed an alliance with the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), the Left and a regional party to fight the Assam Assembly polls that are likely to be held in April. Bora, who was instrumental in stitching the opposition alliance, said Ajmal is a three-time Lok Sabha MP and people have seen his work and politics over the years.

"Ajmal is not anti-Hindu, but talks only about the welfare of Muslims. Talking about the welfare of Muslims or the people of his own religion is not a crime unless he hates the people of other religions. Ajmal has never been anti-Hindu," he told PTI.

The AIUDF is considered to have a large base among Assam's about-35-per cent Muslim population. Bora, a frontrunner for the chief minister's post if the Congress-led alliance is voted to power, said the BJP has been saying the Congress has joined hands with the AIUDF, but the fact is that the saffron party itself had entered into a pact with Ajmal's party to capture powers in three district councils - Darrang, Karimganj and Nagaon.

"The BJP has no moral right to lecture us on politics," he said.

The APCC president claimed that the BJP is "more communal" than any other party as it had formed a government in Jammu and Kashmir along with "anti-India forces" like the PDP, which "does not accept the Indian constitution and Indian flag". "The PDP had declared Afzal Guru, who was hanged for the Parliament attack, a martyr," he claimed.

Asked about the number of seats the Congress is going to contest, Bora said of the 126 Assembly seats in the state, the party would field candidates in around 90 and the remaining 36 would be given to the allies. He, however, said the seat-sharing talks are yet to be concluded as there are "surprising demands" from the partners.

Asked whether the Congress would find it difficult to regain popularity among people in Upper Assam after its tie-up with the Muslim-dominated AIUDF, the APCC president said his party was not in an alliance with the AIUDF in the 2016 Assembly polls but still got less seats there.

"The issue is not who has joined hands with whom. The issue is to oust the BJP and defeat its communal politics. The issue is price rise, the issue is the deprivation of Assam, the issue is the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) and safeguarding the indigenous people of the state," he said.

Bora said Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Assam twice in the last one month but did not utter a single word about the CAA, which is a major issue in the state Assembly polls. "The CAA is a major issue for Assam. But why is the prime minister silent on it?" he asked. The CAA, enacted by Parliament in December 2019, proposes to grant citizenship to non-Muslim persecuted minorities from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

According to the law, Indian citizenship will be given to the Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians from the three countries, who had come to India till December 31, 2014. However, it contravenes the provisions of the 1985 Assam Accord, which says irrespective of religion, anyone coming from Bangladesh after March 25, 1971 would be deported from the state. Because of this, Assam witnessed large-scale protests after the CAA was enacted.

Asked about the two newly-formed regional parties -- Asom Jatiya Parishad and Raijor Dal -- which refused to join the opposition alliance, Bora said the two parties will harm the ruling BJP and not the Congress. "They are products of the CAA and going to fight the BJP," he said. The Congress leader asserted that the party-led alliance will get at least 101 seats in the Assembly polls and definitely form the next government in Assam.

Asked about who would be the chief ministerial face of the alliance, he said it would be decided after the polls. "No one will be projected as the chief ministerial candidate and it will be decided by the MLAs after the polls, with the approval of the (party) high-command," Bora said. He also blasted the BJP-led government in the northeastern state for its "all-round failure" to fulfil the hopes and aspirations of people. "Not a single section of the society is happy with the BJP government in Assam. "We will form the next government in Assam. The BJP may try to polarise the electioneering, but it will not be successful," the state Congress chief said.

(Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from a syndicated feed; only the image & headline may have been reworked by www.republicworld.com)
Tanaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Leo Varadkar TD

Central Pharma expects to begin production at its contract packaging and supply centre in Kerry later this year.

The UK-headquartered company first announced plans for the facility at the IDAs Advanced Technology Building in Tralee in December 2018.

The project is supported by the Government through IDA Ireland.

Responding to questions from TD Brendan Griffin, the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Leo Varadkar said the company had experienced hold-ups in progressing their plans in part due to Covid-19 restrictions, which have delayed work on the site.

The IDA has informed me that the company expects to begin production in 2021 and has given assurances that it remains committed to its plans for the site, Mr Varadkar said.

Around 100 jobs are expected to be created at the Kerry

centre.

The minister said that recruitment for roles at the facility was currently under way for lead staff.

Once these positions were filled there would be further hires, he added.

Central Pharma is involved in the packing and filling of pharmaceutical products.

The company also provides specialist warehousing facilities.
State educators are launching a program aimed at trimming Louisiana's rate of out-of-school suspensions, including the fact that more than twice as many Black students are suspended than their White peers.

The idea is better trained school administrators, principals and counselors will help bridge the gap with students who often arrive at school saddled with poverty, trauma or other learning barriers.

"If we can better understand what our kids are going through, where they are coming from, what their beliefs are, then we have a better chance of meeting them where they are and helping them to be successful," state Superintendent of Education Cade Brumley said.

The effort is touted as a way to meet the social and emotional needs of students from kindergarten through 12th grade.

It is supposed to show adults and students how to set goals, show empathy for others, establish positive relationships and make responsible decisions.

"The new program will help lead to stronger school climates and academic and emotional success," according to the state Department of Education.

Officials of the agency said suspensions often stem from stress, self-doubt and "classrooms that are not inclusive and fail to provide a sense of cultural belonging."

Public school leaders will undergo 30 hours of training, including how changes can translate into better performance in the classroom in a state long plagued by low academic achievement.

The recommendations will eventually filter down to classroom teachers, starting with 48 public schools with high rates of suspensions, including 14 in the Orleans and Jefferson parishes school districts.

The issue has sparked controversy before, including arguments on the merits of the suspensions.

Pre-K students suspended? State panel shocked over toss rate A new state panel Friday was surprised to learn the depth of Louisiana's student discipline problems, including the revelation that nearly 8,0

During the 2018-19 school year, out-of-school suspensions totaled 54,020 students, according to state figures. Of that total, 37,893 suspensions involved Black students and 16,127 were White students.

That translates into more than 30,000 days and 180,000 hours of missed instruction, according to the state. In 2017-18, suspensions totaled 56,302 students, including 40,383 Black students and 15,919 White students.

Black students make up 42% of the public school population and White students 44%.

Senate Education Committee Chairman Cleo Fields, D-Baton Rouge, said some of the problem stems from uneven starts in how and what young children learn.

"Kids get depressed and upset in class because they feel they cannot meet certain standards," Fields said.

Five years ago, a state panel did a study of student behavior and discipline. State officials said at the time that students targeted the most tended to be low-income, minority and disabled.

Numbers, racial disparity 'striking': Is education served by suspending troubled students? Why nearly 8,000 of Louisiana's youngest students were tossed out of school last year is triggering arguments on why it is happening and how t

One side said educators were well within their rights to toss out students, especially if classroom disrupters were making it hard for the rest of the classroom to learn. Others said the racial disparities were striking and that it showed teachers needed help reaching children who lack basic social and emotional skills.

Top stories in Baton Rouge in your inbox Twice daily we'll send you the day's biggest headlines. Sign up today. e-mail address * Sign Up

The state effort is being assisted by LSU.

Here's how new teacher training might curb racial disparities in school suspensions, panel suggests Revised teacher training may help address Louisiana's racial disparities in public schools suspensions and its rate of young students being to

Judith Rhodes, director of the school's Social Research and Evaluation Center, said the training will include a unit in social and emotional learning "through a racial equity lens."

"We are going to go to the literature and look at case studies in other school systems and how disparate impact has been deal with successfully," said Rhodes, who is an associate professor of research.

"As kids can learn to regulate their emotions, improve their social behavior, they will be able to learn," she said.

While the numbers remain high, school suspensions have actually dropped through the years.

In 2007, they totaled 86,120 students.

"The schools are working on this," Rhodes said. "It is not something that has been ignored."

Said Brumley, "I believe that while we have seen some level of progress in those total numbers, we have a long way to go."

Lack of Black male teachers  5% of the total  is another challenge, he added. White women make up 60% of the teaching ranks in Louisiana.

"If Black boys have access to a Black male teacher between the third and eighth grade, it leads to so many positive outcomes in their life," Brumley said.

The coronavirus pandemic, which has disrupted classrooms since March, adds another layer to the challenge.

"The issue there is when all of the children come back to school and you have students who have been in an unstructured environment, how are they going to react," said Mike Faulk, executive director of the Louisiana Association of School Superintendents.

Faulk, former superintendent of the Central School District, said teachers and students faced similar issues after the 2016 flood, including what students had been through. "You want structure, you want order in a classroom," he added. "But some people go overboard. Some people go overboard because they don't understand where the kids are coming from."

The same concern surfaced during 40 focus groups sponsored by the state on how education was faring during the pandemic.

"One of the top three concerns we received across the board from children and adults is the mental health and well being of individuals during the pandemic," Brumley said.

Rhodes made a similar point.

"Right now, on this pandemic, all the issues anybody has have risen to new levels."

HSBC's digital business to business platform, Serai, has launched a solution for the apparel industry to trace the origin of cotton and other raw materials in the industry's supply chains as cotton exports from Xinjiang come under greater scrutiny by the US government.

Using the new traceability solution, suppliers can input data on the provenance of their goods at each step along the value chain - from raw material to processed or in-process goods and final shippable product.

"The platform adds greater visibility and transparency to the entire supply chain and helps consolidate data at each stage," said Vivek Ramachandran, CEO of Serai, a wholly owned subsidiary of HSBC.

Get the latest insights and analysis from our Global Impact newsletter on the big stories originating in China.

It can help buyers and suppliers to prove the origin of cotton and other materials as the US has enacted several legislations aimed at countering alleged human rights violations of Uygurs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, an autonomous region in China's northwest.

Vivek Ramachandran, CEO of Serai. Photo: Jonathan Wong alt=Vivek Ramachandran, CEO of Serai. Photo: Jonathan Wong

China is the world's second largest cotton producer, with 85 per cent of the output originating from the autonomous region alone in 2019, according to the US Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs. The US imported US$50 billion worth of textiles from China in 2019.

"The US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has asked for up to almost 44 documents. Those documents can be shared by suppliers and supply chains over the platform," said Ramachandran, who was previously the global head of growth and innovation at HSBC in Hong Kong.

He said suppliers can get third party surveyors to validate the data and share them over the platform. Buyers - brands and retailers - can explore and send them to the US law enforcement agency. "We do not do any accreditation, we just provide a platform for buyers and suppliers to share data," he said.

Story continues

Under the Tariff Act of 1930, last September the CBP issued five Withhold Release Orders (WRO) on goods produced using forced labour in Xinjiang. The CBP can block all merchandise within the WRO scope from entering the US market, according to international law firm Mayer Brown.

If the importer contests the WRO, it can submit to the CBP, within three months, a certificate of origin and a detailed statement countering forced labour allegations.

"It will help the industry if the solution works well," said Stanley Szeto Chi-yan, chairman of Hong Kong-listed apparel supply chain manager Lever Style, a Serai customer. "Currently buyers only rely on the suppliers to tell us the origin of the materials."

On top of the traceability solution, Ramachandran said Serai wants to help companies in the apparel industry connect with each other.

L aunched in 2019, Serai bills itself as the "LinkedIn" for apparel companies. It currently has 3,500 companies on the platform, employing a staff of 40 in Hong Kong and 20 in China.

"What we want to do is to build a platform that makes it easy for businesses to share information with each other, and get information from each other and build relationships with each other," Ramachandran said.

Explainer | Xinjiang cotton, WROs, Entity List and how blacklisted companies may skirt US sanctions

Lever Style's Szeto said that while Serai was the first of its kind in the industry to connect buyers and suppliers, the platform was not big enough in terms of network of companies.

It has the potential to become an influential force once the scale has been built up, he said.

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  2021 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Copyright (c) 2021. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
Ukraine may extend quarantine until end of April  media

Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal earlier said quarantine curbs in the country could be extended until April 30.

Ukraine's government plans to extend the coronavirus-related quarantine until April 30. That's according to the RBC Ukraine news agency, which cites a Health Ministry source. Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal earlier said quarantine curbs in the country could be extended until April 30. Yet, he said, the date was unlikely to be final. Read also Government not to gather this week to decide on future quarantine in Ukraine Quarantine in Ukraine In early February, Shmyhal said the Cabinet of Ministers, Ukraine's government, would decide on the return to adaptive quarantine in the coming days.

The prime minister stressed red quarantine zones would be established by separate decisions.

On February 9, Ukrainian Deputy Health Minister, Chief Medical Officer Viktor Liashko said the ministry would offer the government a new model of adaptive quarantine to be in effect from the middle or end of February. Reporting by UNIAN

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Officials from Daejeon Metropolitan Police Agency search inside the International Mission headquarters in Daeheung area in Daejeon's Jung District, Feb. 15. Yonhap



Police on Monday raided the headquarters of a local Christian missionary group over suspected violations of antivirus protocols that led to a large outbreak of the coronavirus.



Investigators have been seizing computer hard drives and documents from the International Mission headquarters in Daejeon, 164 kilometers south of Seoul, according to the police.



IM has been blamed for more than 400 cases of the coronavirus at its facilities, including at the IEM School in Daejeon.



The city government earlier filed a complaint with the police, accusing the leaders of IM and IEM School of violating the law on infectious disease prevention and control.



The school held in-person worship services when only virtual services were allowed, and ignored a 20-percent seating cap during a period of eased social distancing, according to city officials.





Officials from Daejeon Metropolitan Police Agency get ready to enter the International Mission headquarters with boxes for articles of evidence on Feb. 15. Yonhap
The Delhi Police on Monday claimed that climate activist Disha Ravi, another activist and lawyer Nikita Jacob, and Shantanu had created the toolkit and shared it to 'defame India across the globe on the issue of three farm laws'.

Addressing a press conference this afternoon regarding the toolkit case, the Delhi Police said that the 21-year-old Ravi had deleted the WhatsApp group, which she created to spread the 'toolkit'.

Ravi, arrested in the Toolkit case, and two others, held a Zoom meeting organised by "pro-khalistani group PFJ" before 26 January to plan a social media buzz on the tractor parade, the Delhi Police said today.

The cops also said that a woman, identified as Puneet based in Canada, connected these people to the "Pro-Khalistani Poetic Justice Foundation". On 11 January, Nikita and Shantanu attended a Zoom meeting organised by the PJF, in which modalities were chalked out, they added.

Two others -- Nikita Jacob and Shantanu Muluk -- are wanted by the Delhi cops in the case.

Ravi's arrest and non-bailable warrants against two other activists in the Greta Thunberg toolkit case have created a furor across India and abroad. The three activists have been accused of collaborating with a pro-Khalistani group to create a toolkit and share it on social media.

The toolkit, first shared by Swedish teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg more than 10 days back, has been claimed as the proof of the Khalistani conspiracy against India by many critics.

After registering an FIR against the creators of the toolkit the same day, Delhi Police had requested Google for email ids of those involved in publishing and editing the document. "We have got a reply from Google on some of the questions regarding the Toolkit Doc," the Delhi Police said today.

Opposition attacks govt over Disha Ravis arrest

Attacking the Centre following the arrest of Ravi, the opposition has said the voice of India cannot be silenced. The BJP, meanwhile, defended the action, saying a crime is a crime no matter at what age.

Leading the opposition offensive following the arrest of 21-year-old Disha Ravi in the case, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said the country will not be silenced.

"Your lips are free to speak. Say that the truth is still alive. They are scared, not the country," Rahul Gandhi said in a tweet. "India will not be silenced," Rahul Gandhi added.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said, Arrest of 21-year-old Disha Ravi is an unprecedented attack on Democracy. Supporting our farmers is not a crime."

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CSS Corp, a new-age IT services and technology support company, today announced that it has been presented with Gold Stevie Award in the Best Use of Technology in Customer Service - Computer Industries category at the 15th Annual Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service, for their customer experience transformation platform.



CSS Corps customer experience transformation platform transforms contact center ecosystems holistically across the business application layer, the CRM platform and the CTI system. Clients can pick and choose across a basket of flexible modules with pre-built integrations. Based on the customers imperatives, telephony migration to the cloud or CRM re-alignment can also be done to structure an optimized and agile ecosystem.



The platform streamlines end-to-end customer service delivery, across customer acquisition, support, and retention, with an outcome-based approach. It unites the three essential pillars of customer service, namely, customer experience, operational efficiency, and agent productivity, seamlessly with shared intelligence and insights. It leverages cutting-edge technology, including AI, cognitive RPA, analytics, and augmented reality, to deliver customized solutions for clients, and ensure tangible business benefits for them.



Speaking on the occasion, Manish Tandon, Chief Executive Officer, CSS Corp said, When contact centers faced unprecedented disruptions due to rising customer expectations and the shift to virtual operations during the pandemic, CSS Corp stood strong using its proprietary technology platforms. Our customer experience transformation platform is designed by strategically infusing technology interventions at all stages of the customer journey to drive unprecedented service level consistencies. Winning the Gold Stevie Award is another indicator of our capabilities and positioning to drive unique value creation for our clients as we take a pragmatic approach towards the digital transformation journey.



In the toughest working environment in memory for most organizations, 2021 Stevie Award winners still found ways to innovate, grow sales, please their customers, and secure new business, said Stevie Awards president Maggie Gallagher. The judges have recognized and rewarded this, and we join them in applauding this year's winners for their continued success. We look forward to recognizing them on April 14.



More than 2,300 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry, in 51 nations, were considered in this years competition. Winners were determined by the average scores of more than 160 professionals worldwide on nine specialized judging committees.
The British government is facing calls from MPs to ban Russia and China from any involvement in supplying equipment to Britains armed forces.

The Commons Defence sub-committee said the widespread use of overseas firms in the UK defence supply chain left it open to potentially hostile foreign involvement.

It said that investments from countries such as Russia, which regularly engage in espionage against the UK, should be classed as hostile.

And it said China in particular had a record of large-scale intellectual property theft, raising concerns that any UK firm working alongside Chinese suppliers could have its technology stolen.

The committee urged ministers to draw up a list of friendly countries they were happy to see continuing to invest in the defence supply chain, while the rest should be barred.

"Countries that consistently involve themselves in intellectual property theft, and regularly behave contrary to the UKs values, such as China under the Chinese Communist Party, should be categorised as hostile. Investments from countries, such as Russia, that regularly engage in espionage against the UK, or its allies, should also be classified as hostile," The Sunday Post cited the statement as saying.

Sub-committee chairman Richard Drax said: Investment in the defence supply chain from all countries that fall outside of an approved list, including Russia and China, must be barred.
by Francis Khoo Thwe

Tanks and armoured vehicles are patrolling the main streets. Today, engineering and technology students rallied north of Yangon. Soldiers drag to work people involved in civil disobedience. The human rights provisions of Myanmars constitution have been suspended. Soldiers can arrest and search without a warrant, and keep people in prison for more than 48 hours. Aung San Suu Kyi's trial postponed for two days.

Yangon (AsiaNews)  The military junta that took over on 1 February is moving towards greater repression; however, despite tighter measures, resistance to the coup d'etat has not stopped.

Today, tanks and armoured vehicles patrolled the main streets in Yangon. After several policemen went over to protesters, soldiers replaced police to enforce law and order.

Today, Aung San Suu Kyi's defence lawyer said that her trial was adjourned for three days until Wednesday.

The leader of the pro-democracy movement has been under house arrest since the first day of the coup and is accused of illegally importing some walkie-talkies.

Despite the crackdown, engineering and technology students rallied north of Yangon today to protest. TV stations filmed soldiers dragging protesting railway staff and bank employees to work.

Yesterday, for the ninth consecutive day, tens of thousands of people took to the streets in various cities across the country, including the capital Naypyidaw, Yangon, Sittwe and Myitkyina. Myitkyina is the capital of Kachin State, near the Chinese border.

Last night, security forces fired on protesters. It is not clear whether rubber bullets or deadly bullets were used. Some journalists  who filmed the incident  were arrested, but released today.

Two days ago, the military junta suspended Articles 5, 7 and 8 of the 2008 constitution, which protect basic human rights of the population.

Because of this, the military can now arrest without warrant, enter houses and search without a court order, get internet providers to provide information, and place people under arrest for more than 48 hours. Meanwhile, the internet has been shut down almost everywhere.

The junta has also issued arrest warrants for seven pro-democracy figures, including Min Ko Naing, a hero of the 1988 generation (student movement), and Myo Yan Naung Thein, a former political prisoner.

The warrants require people to help the police find the fugitives. Anyone who helps the latter will be arrested.

So far, at least 400 people have been arrested: political leaders, pro-democracy activists, doctors, public sector employees, students, etc.

According to various reports, three days ago the junta released criminals from prison in order to create unrest in the cities.

In Yangon, groups of these prisoners set fires in several streets around Tharkayta and allegedly poisoned the water in the Nga Moe Yeik district.

Now in each neighbourhood, barricades have been set up and groups of volunteers have been established to stop the criminals on the loose.

UN special rapporteur Tom Andrews said that the military leaders will be held accountable for the violence against the population.
KARACHI, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 14th Feb, 2021 ) :"Ghalib was the greatest prose writer of his time who was great at humor also, his tricks were amazing and it is said that every poet rebels, but Ghalib rebelled against rebellion.

Ghalib is not so easy to understand, just as Shakespeare is difficult to understand, so is Ghalib, these views were expressed by renowned scholar Dr. Noman-ul-Haq in a special lecture "Ghalib Fahmi" organized by the Karachi Arts Council on the occasion of the death anniversary of Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib here on Sunday.

Talking about Ghalib's personality and style of writing, Dr. Noman-ul-Haq said that Ghalib's poetry covers his beloved, but unfortunately he could not see his beloved. There is something that must be grasped by the intellect, he added.

Talking about poetry, Dr. Noman-ul-Haq said that the use of ancient Persian language in Ghalib's poetry is evident.

Ghalib had an amazing sense of humor he even spoke about his death in an interesting way and did not create darkness? Dr. Noman-ul-Haq added that the irony is that I teach about Ghalib in Pakistan but for the reference, I use Columbia's website.

On this occasion, the participants asked interesting questions about Ghalib's poetry and prose, to which Dr. Noman-ul-Haq answered in an amazing way.

The special lecture was attended by eminent academic and literary personalities.

President Arts Council Muhammad Ahmad Shah thanked the audience and said that on the occasion of Ghalib's death anniversary, he thought of doing something to commemorate Ghalib and to freshen up his memories , so he invited Dr. Noman-ul-Haq for a special lecture.

He added that he is grateful to the governing body of Karachi Arts Council for celebrating Ghalib's death anniversary.